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Katy ISD · Work Study Meeting
Katy ISD Work Study Meeting, January 13, 2025
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In this meeting
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- 0:09 to 0:45 1. Call to Order
- 0:45 to 1:51 2. Pledges of Allegiance
- 1:51 to 2:30 4. Closed Meeting
- 2:30 to 3:56 5. Reconvene from Closed Meeting
- 3:56 to 1:56:08 6. Reports
- 1:56:08 to 2:03:21 7.1 Discuss and consider Board Approval of the November 2024 Financial Reports.
- 2:03:21 to 2:05:03 7.2 Discuss and consider Board approval of the January 2025 budget amendments.
- 2:05:03 to 2:32:22 7.3 Discuss and consider Board approval of the annual financial audit report.
- 2:32:22 to 2:33:17 7.4 Discuss and consider Board approval of a contract renewal for the land and real estate consulting services.
- 2:33:17 to 2:33:23 7.5 Discuss and consider Board approval to award a contract for design services necessary for the auto program expansion at Miller Career and Technology Center.
- 2:33:23 to 2:38:13 7.6 Discuss and consider Board approval to award a contract for design services necessary for the construction of Junior High School #19.
- 2:38:13 to 2:41:13 7.7 Discuss and consider Board approval of a contract to the expansion of the Shaw Center.
- 2:41:13 to 2:43:24 7.8 Discuss and consider Board approval of a contract for the safety and security improvements at various campuses.
- 2:43:24 to 2:44:16 7.9 Discuss and consider Board approval of Amendment One to the Stewart Builders, LLC contract related to the renovations at Cimarron Elementary School and Nottingham Country Elementary School.
- 2:44:16 to 2:44:52 7.10 Discuss and consider Board approval of Amendment One to the Anslow Bryant Construction, LTD. contract related to the renovation at Katy Junior High School.
- 2:44:52 to 2:45:21 7.11 Discuss and consider Board approval of a blanket electrical easement to CenterPoint Energy Houston Electric, LLC associated with the construction of the Northwest Transportation Center.
- 2:45:21 to 2:45:49 7.12 Discuss and consider Board approval of Amendment Two to the Stewart Builders, LLC. contract related to the comprehensive renovations at Katy High School.
- 2:45:49 to 2:46:41 7.13 Discuss and consider Board approval of the delivery method updates for various infrastructure projects in the 2023 Bond.
- 2:46:41 to 2:49:24 7.14 Discuss and consider Board adoption of the Order calling for a regular election of the School Board Trustees to be held on May 3, 2025 and authorization of the Administration to provide official notice of the election as required by the Texas Election Code.
- 2:49:24 to 3:02:51 7.15 Discuss and consider future Board approval of the 2026-2027 Instructional Calendar.
- 3:02:51 to 3:03:20 7.16 Discuss and consider future Board approval of a Professional Development Waiver for the 2026-2027 instructional calendar.
- 3:03:20 to 3:05:30 7.17 Discuss and consider future Board amendment of the 2025-2026 Instructional Calendar.
- 3:05:30 to 3:24:35 7.18 Discuss and consider Board approval for a TEA waiver request to the Texas Virtual School Network (TxVSN) course review process.
- 3:24:35 to 3:25:42 8. Information Items
- 3:25:42 to 3:26:17 9. Future Meetings
Full transcript
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1. Call to Order
Good afternoon, everybody.
This is our first meeting of the year, 2025, so happy New Year to everybody.
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, January 13, 2025, and the time is 5 p.m.
Dr. Gorski, will you verify that we're in compliance with the provisions of the Texas Open Meetings Act with regard to the notice for this meeting?
Mr. President, I do confirm we're in compliance with the provisions of the Texas Open Meetings Act for our meeting tonight.
Thank you.
2. Pledges of Allegiance
KDSD Chief of Police Henry Galt will lead us in the Pledge of Allegiance.
I pledge allegiance.
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.
I want to ask because I don't think we have any scouts in the audience.
And normally at this time we have the open forum portion.
But since we didn't have anyone sign up to speak today, we will – the open forum concludes.
And that concludes, and the Board will now convene and close meeting as authorized under
4. Closed Meeting
Section 551.001 of the Texas Government Code for the following purposes.
Texas Government Code 551.071 and 551.129.
5. Reconvene from Closed Meeting
The Board will now reconvene in open meeting.
Today is Monday, January 13, 2025, and the time is 5.35 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, January 10, 2025.
The Board will receive information and recommendations from staff, administration, and 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 thus reconvened from closed meeting.
In accordance with Chapter 551 of the Texas Government Code, any action that arises from
discussions in a closed meeting must be taken in an open meeting.
The first item is 6.1, it's a report on the 2025-2026 budget update, and our presenter
is Chris Smith, Chief Financial Officer.
Okay, well I have a slightly different agenda.
The agenda that you have, 6.1, is the Fine Arts Theater Producing High Quality Productions
6. Reports
that Captivate and Transport the Audience.
Our presenter is Damon Archer, Executive Director of Fine Arts, and Susan Chierborowski, Assistant
Director of Fine Arts.
Welcome.
Good evening, President Perez, Dr. Gagorski,
and board members thank you for the opportunity to provide academic updates
for fine arts and focus on theater arts in Katy ISD the vision statement for the
fine arts department is inspire lifelong engagement in the arts the vision
provides direction for our teachers in programs as they design curriculum and
provide the highest quality of instruction and experiences for students
Why teach fine arts? Per Texas Education Code, fine arts education is required in Texas at the elementary, middle school, and high school levels, and is required in every Texas high school graduation plan.
What does the College Board say regarding fine arts?
Fine arts is a basic academic subject along with English, math, science, social
studies, and foreign language and is beneficial to every student. The arts
help teachers reach students across a broad spectrum of learning styles and
raise achievement at at-risk students, young children, underserved populations,
in students with disabilities.
Further studies show Texas students who are highly engaged in the arts
more than one middle school or high school course were twice as likely to graduate,
more likely to earn exceptional scores on standardized tests up to 112%,
20% more likely to attend college,
and 42% more likely to attend a four-year college or university.
Arts education prepares the 21st century workforce by developing core competency and interpersonal skills.
Creativity, innovation, critical thinking, problem solving, communication, and collaboration.
Across Texas, nearly 845,000 people are employed in creative careers,
which represents 1 in 15 jobs. In addition, the arts has a large impact on
the economy. The Texas art culture industry has grown more than 30% over
the past decade, generating six billion dollars for the Texas economy and nearly
380 million dollars in state sales tax revenue. The first core competency of
creativity mentioned on the previous slide is also echoed by employers. 72% of employers say
creativity is the primary concern when hiring, yet 85% of these employers cannot find the creative
applicants they seek. The arts provide vital skills and experiences that translate directly
in preparing students for job readiness. Currently, in grades K through 12, we have over 70,000
students enrolled in the fine arts and 450 teachers supporting these students.
Fine arts education in KDISD offers a variety of areas of study including
music, visual arts, dance, and theater. At the secondary level we provide more
specific courses such as band, choir, orchestra, technical theater, painting,
painting, ceramics, show choir, jazz band, mariachi, and support cheer.
For 22 years, KDISD has earned the distinction as a Best Community in Music Education
by the National Association of Music Merchants.
We have also earned a distinction award by the Texas Art Educators Association for four years.
These distinctions include rigorous rubrics that include financial support, course offerings, fine arts staff development, fine arts enrollment, facilities, student opportunities, and achievement.
I would like to add, for the past two years, KDIC has had the most all-state musicians of any school district in Texas.
In 2024, KDIC had 71 all-state musicians.
And now Susan Chobrosky, Assistant Director of Fine Arts, will share about Theatre Arts.
Thank you, Damon. So theatre students in KDISD have an abundance of opportunities to perform and connect with their campus and community.
Each junior high and high school schedules a full season of shows each school year, as
well as other performance opportunities such as theater improv, comedy sports, and other
community events.
Katy ISD theater programs are known for their high quality musical productions, which are
performed every other year as a full fine arts department collaboration, and some campuses
choose to perform musicals every year depending on their event calendars.
Our high school theater departments also produce children's shows that are performed specifically for KDISD elementary students.
For instance, last year, Morton Ranch High School performed the Bully Show with over 3,500 KDISD students in attendance who made a commitment to end bullying.
We currently host three adjudicated junior high one-act play festivals annually to accommodate all of our participating campuses.
These festivals serve to generate a love for the theater in our junior high students, as well as prepare them for the high school UIL one-act play process that they can participate in when they move on to high school.
And finally, the high school UIL one-act play contest is a highly competitive UIL academic event that all of our high school campuses participate in each year.
The contest includes five levels of competition, including zones, district, by district, area, regional, and state.
And some of you may remember that our very own Katy High School show, Ghetto, last year made it to the state level of OAP competition.
Katy ISD students have the opportunity to attend and compete at the Texas Thespian Festival each year.
This year's festival was held in Corpus Christi and in Grapevine with 11,519 attendees, 2,713 national qualifiers, and around $45,000 in scholarships that were awarded.
KDISD had 270 students attend, with 158 of those students qualifying to compete at the International Thespian Festival coming up in June of 2025.
25. We also had a student from Jordan and a student from Katy who were chosen to be state ambassadors
and Texas Thespian officers. We had many Katy ISD students who won or placed in many of the event
categories at the state festival and Taylor High School show Harry Potter was chosen to perform at
the main stage which is a top honor for festival participants. The Tommy Tune Awards program
Graham celebrates the educational value, artistry, and community of high school musical theater in
the greater Houston area. Houston area high schools produce a full-length musical to compete
in over 15 TTA categories. Awards are given at the Tommy Tunes ceremony, which also includes a
variety of live performances from participating schools and students. In 2024, Pato and Tompkins
won awards at the Tommy Tune Awards ceremony.
And in 2025, we have Jordan, Morton Ranch, and Tompkins
vying for Tommy Tunes awards.
And then also, theater is under the UIL academic umbrella.
And so we have students who compete
in the UIL State Theatrical Design every year.
And this year, Taylor High School won fifth place
in the 6A group design category.
And now why we're here tonight, why we're so excited.
We have Katy High School Theater students here tonight to perform a scene from their upcoming musical.
The Katy High School Theater department is led by Head Director Katie Taglia-Bue and Assistant and Technical Director Charles Woods.
Please welcome to the floor Katy High School Theater presenting a scene from Little Women, the musical.
And I might add, board members, you are invited to come sit in the audience since they are going to be facing this way.
You may want to come so you can see them.
Thank you.
What happened?
I should tell her the ice skate.
She was skating by the bridge and suddenly the ice skate went in.
I walked through it just in time.
She's scared.
She's mad.
She just wanted to be with you.
I love skating so much.
Don't think you know you're not supposed to skate by the bridge.
Everyone knows the ice skate by the bridge and it's history.
You didn't want me skating near you.
I love your story, Joe.
I tried to write one to make up for what I'd done, but I couldn't do my thing.
So I drew that picture of you with your beautiful hair.
And my big mouth.
You looked so gorgeous.
You looked so pretty.
I'm so glad you took this picture.
You look so beautiful.
Thank you.
Never talk like that.
I thought that was me.
All I could think of was that I could have lost it.
Then go on, don't forget it.
I didn't know how much this was going to cost me.
I didn't know how much this was going to cost me.
I thought I'd stop it!
I thought I'd stop it!
I thought I'd stop it!
I thought I'd stop it!
I thought I'd stop it!
I thought I'd stop it!
I thought I'd stop it!
I thought I'd stop it!
I thought I'd stop it!
I thought I'd stop it!
I thought I'd stop it!
I thought I'd stop it!
I promise you, you'll never see me again.
My sister.
I want to go.
The March sisters. Forever.
Forever!
Lori.
Lori is my favorite.
She's my favorite mom.
I want to swear before the world that on this day I will be able to enjoy a beautiful
She adored him.
And now he lost all context to say.
And now he's a father.
A father to her.
And now he's a father to her.
And now he's a father to her.
Spirituality is so full of royalty.
And now he's got a new workshop.
I swear I'll follow you like royalty.
Come, let our royal clothes depart.
From now on we are one, and we shall not be aparted. From this day on it's over, for one and all for mine.
We'll live like Boston deers, together we'll prevail. We'll each plan it for all forever from now on.
Now each of us must swear for all eternity, our bond shall never be undone.
Nothing shall sever this fraternity We'll always live and die as one
From now on we are joint And we shall not be parted
From this day on it's all One and one for all for life
Together we will fight Your battles will be mine
We'll be five for all forever from now on
Me too!
On this wonderful day
What I'll never forget
I am honored to say
I am yours!
From this day on we swear that we shall not be parted. From this day on no matter what, for five for all for life, we'll conquer every foe.
We'll warm and light our sky. We'll conquer for here. We'll keep our friends. We'll make them all bitter and heathen. We'll be loyal till we end.
We'll be fine for all forever
Run now on and on and on
Run now on!
Thank you.
We'd like to say thank you to our Katy High School students and directors.
And if you are a parent of one of these amazingly talented students, would you please stand?
Thank you so much again.
All right.
We have a robust calendar full of junior high and high school theater productions coming up this semester.
These are the flyers for upcoming high school shows and musicals,
and you can find more information about these and our junior high productions as well on our fine arts pages on the KDISD website.
website and I already told someone I would send you all the digital flyers for these
so you have direct access as well.
Thank you so much.
Thank you Susan and for the theater updates and students and directors Katie and Charlie
for providing us a snapshot of the upcoming show.
As Susan mentioned, you may visit the KDISD website where a specific calendar for each
discipline is located to provide the most updated information about upcoming
fine arts performances and events. KDISD students are leading productive lives in
the arts. They are performing, managing, or teaching in the area of the arts. The
high level of teachers and instructions in KDISD provides a strong foundation to
build a successful career. Art education purpose is not only to support these
careers but to create more complete human beings who have critical thinkers
who have curious minds who can lead productive lives and this enables the
students to fulfill our KD ISD mission to create the future we appreciate your
time and the opportunity to share about the theater arts and the KD ISD fine
arts department if you have any questions we'd be happy to address them
at this time thank you so much that was outstanding thank you there's a real
a treat for us any questions comments trustees mr president ms fox wow i i am so thrilled you
are here and that you are give us a little glimpse into the incredible talent and the depth of the
types of programs that you put on katie high school at katie high school it happens at all
all 10 of our high schools.
Musicals are my favorite thing to go to ever.
Everyone knows that.
And I come to all your shows,
and I want to tell you that Ghetto changed me.
I mean, like still lives with me.
The program you did about the Holocaust,
I was there the night the Holocaust survivors
and their families were there, and it was so moving.
I could not leave my seat for a long time
when it was finished.
and you won a lot of awards for it because it was spectacular.
No one thought of you as high school children,
but of the characters you represent, just like you did here tonight.
Your voices are amazing, how you just command a room,
and you're here with an odd kind of crowd,
and yet you're just right there in your characters.
Ms. Katie, thank you for all you do for our students
and how much you love them and pour into them and bring out the best in them.
and I love it so much.
I want those performing arts centers to be packed to overflowing every night.
So thank you to our fine arts director and assistant director
for giving us the flyers that we can spread on social media.
I encourage everyone to do that.
They'll be on my social media.
Take them, spread them around.
Our community needs you.
They need these programs.
They need to come to a show for $10 or $15.
and bring their children and see, like, this is, we don't need to drive to the hobby center.
Right here in our communities at our incredible performing arts centers are just exceptional programs.
And I already have my tickets to see your show, and I'm bringing a friend, and so I can't wait to see it.
And Mr. President, and especially Dr. Grogorski, thank you for allowing us to have this as a little snippet of what happens at this exact time.
When is your performance?
January 23 to 25, right?
And there are three night shows and a matinee.
Okay.
Okay, and you can look on the website,
and you'll be able to find out how to get tickets.
Thank you so much.
Thank you so much.
Thank you.
Other comments?
Mr. President?
Ms. Champagne?
I really enjoyed it, and I, too, try to go to a lot of the shows.
And I just want to say also that even when my children were young,
that was the way we entertained ourselves,
is just going to the theater shows that were here in Katy.
And I'm the mom of three fine arts kids,
And so I'm always, and I was in the band myself.
And so I was, they're not nerds anymore, but back then.
I'm proud.
I'm proud of you being a nerd.
I'm good with it.
So, but I just want to say that to, I hope everyone was watching this.
There are so many benefits.
And I know Mr. Archer had gone through some of the statistics, but there's also things like, well, actually I have a list.
And I'd like to just read some of the lists.
and we all know this but do you know that people with a fine arts background have tend to score
seven points higher IQ they're three times more likely to participate in community service they
have you'll have enhanced memory because obviously you that's part of what you have to do is memorize
things and any any kind of fine arts has a lot of memorization to it increased problem-solving time
management and also it you're 50% better able to reduce your anxiety I guess by
just listening to music and thinking like that and you're both your verbal
and nonverbal skills are better so I really think I'm really grateful to KDISD
for allowing us to have such a robust fine arts program because if you
you look online I was just doing that there are so many places that they cut
fine arts and it's always kind of a fear I think you know with all the budget
cuts that we have and the state not giving us money but that's never that as
far as I've known been an option or even a consideration of this district to do
that so I really applaud you guys and keep up the good work I can't wait to
see you thank you mr. president miss Tami I just wanted to say thank you to
all of you for sharing your gifting and your talents with us and with our
community to your each one of you are very gifted and I'm excited for what the
future has for each of you thank you you know I guess it was right before
Christmas there was a big art exhibition at Merrill my granddaughter from
from elementary school was part of that.
And we went there and I was just blown away
by all the talent.
I mean, I couldn't believe the fine arts talent,
the art exhibition was amazing.
Some of those works were going to NRG.
Actually, my granddaughter's was.
And you couldn't take pictures of the works
because just in case they went to auction, right?
You weren't allowed to take pictures.
I thought that was pretty amazing.
But anyway, I was blown away at the talent there.
It was pretty amazing.
Last year I went to the mariachi concert at Morton Ranch,
and that was so good.
It's not what I expected.
And I think that's spreading, right, to other schools.
So anyway, I encourage that, and it was really good.
Mr. Perez, that Merrill Center floor is, like, covered in art projects,
table after table.
I mean, like, the whole thing, right?
It's like hundreds and feels like all of that.
It's an incredible thing to attend.
Yeah, it is.
We used to have it in the 1,200 rooms, and now it's expanded to the Merrill Center.
And I can't draw a stick figure very well.
I see that kind of thing, and I'm like, yeah, all of it.
Thank you.
Okay.
Well, thanks so much for the presentation and for the performance.
It was fantastic.
Fantastic.
Now we will move on to Mr. Smith from theater.
From theater, now we go to finance.
So for the 2025-2026 budget update,
and our presenter is Chris Smith, Chief Financial Officer.
Tough act to follow.
Good evening, President Perez.
And you mentioned that as a treat and they have no idea what kind of treat they're getting to get to leave before this
But this is budget update this is really the first official talk of the 2526 budget we kind of started this when you heard from
Pasa back in November and we're that's kind of the official kickoff if you will are you will
let's say we're warming up and doing our stretches and then the gun fires with
this presentation for the development of the 25-26 budget. Of course the budget
objectives for this next school year are to have a balanced budget and without
draconian changes that's pretty much going to be impossible without the help
of the state of Texas. Competitive compensation, I'm going to mention that a
couple of times tonight. We're very competitive in our compensation but
But unfortunately, unless the landscape in Austin changes, as your chief financial officer, I am sad to say that we will not be able to afford a salary increase.
Nobody's fault in this room.
It's just a fact of state funding and that we are spending to the limit since we've been on such a fixed income for so long.
But that will not be able to happen.
without something happening at the state level.
The health plan, about the same thing as a competitive salary
is a competitive health plan.
And we were able to do some things with underspending
last year to keep our health fund healthy, pun intended.
But if something doesn't change at the state landscape,
again, that may be tough to do.
High priority on student and staff safety.
It's always gonna be the case, and that's always gonna be
be one of those things that is absolutely not talked about when it comes to cutting corners
when we're developing a budget. Plan for opening new schools. We have two schools to open,
elementaries 47 and 48. Those will need to be staffed, and that'll be a challenge. It always
is a challenge. It's going to be a little bit more of a challenge in this budget. And then again,
the legislative session kicks off tomorrow. I think it's afternoon sometime when that session
kicks off. Our assumptions in the budget, we're going to be using average value
growth. It really doesn't affect the general fund if the state does pass more
more tax relief, tax rate relief. That will, the faster you grow, the little bit,
the faster your relief kicks in, but mostly that will affect our interest in
sinking budget. That's where prep in the state funding formulas now, we're really
value growth helps us. It's neutral and when it comes to the maintenance and
operations fund. Enrollment projecting, we're projecting below average
enrollment. Folks, I think you've heard us say this before, our enrollment has
slowed. We are the fastest growing school district in the state of Texas, but it's
slowed. In fact, we're about 400 students shy of what we budgeted last year for
this school year. We haven't hit that budget projection. We continue to grow
every month. We probably will hit it, but it won't be until May when normally
we're hitting that sometime before Christmas. And if you think about our
enrollment projection, we don't have an official number yet, but based on what
PASA told us and where we are right now, or where we were with our budget
projection, you're only looking at about a 500 student growth when it comes to
growth from year over year. That's substantially different than what we've
seen over the last many years. Now that could change, but as it stands right now,
I've talked to other districts that are also in the top two and three for
Growing districts in the state. They're seeing the same thing. It's slowed
We're still growing but it's slowed down and they're not making meeting their projections and they're
Projecting a little bit less of a number if you listen to the comptroller today when he did his the biennial revenue projection
He's saying also statewide
We're looking at 1.6 percent enrollment growth at the Roman growth has slowed significantly
significantly when it comes to new people moving to the state of Texas. So it's not just Katy,
it's not just those other districts that I speak to that are high up in growth,
it's the state of Texas as a whole, the growth is slowing down. Campus staffing and units growth,
if we grow 500 students from budget to budget, that's not going to be a lot of staff that we're
going to need. Now we're going to have retirements and we're going to have, you know, just regular
turnover that we would have, but as far as new people to the district, it's going to be slowed.
That's where the challenge comes in. We are opening two new schools
so that there will be some challenges for the administration to to try to
Stay within as much as we can within budget knowing that we're not going to have all that growth that that usually goes hand-in-hand
With opening new schools. We still have the need for those schools by all means and those schools will open full
based on those projections, but
It's going to be a different landscape
compensation and benefits have already spoken to that again.
Nobody's fault in his room that we won't be able to afford a salary increase
unless the state does something. That's just fact. It's science. And, uh,
um, and we, we had a very good day last week on Capitol Hill or not on Capitol
Hill, but at the state, uh, capital, uh, discussing that.
And I think the message is loud and clear that in Austin that something needs to
be done. And I think something will get done, uh, in tax rates. Uh,
There are several bills right now to lower the maintenance and operations tax rate.
There's a $24 billion surplus, I believe I remember hearing, for this biannual projection,
and I think they'll use a good chunk of that to buy the tax rate down again.
So that's good news as taxpayers, et cetera.
But, again, they can lower it all you want, but that doesn't mean that it helps or puts money
or takes away money from the classroom.
room. Something needs to happen with the funding formulas in order for new monies that keep up with
inflation to start flowing. General fund, we're now at 89% in salary and benefits. That's probably
because this board gave a very generous 3% salary increase, and we were able to, we did reduce other
areas of the budget that weren't payroll related, squeezed those pretty tightly. Again, the largest
section behind that would be our utilities and you really can't do much
on those. Mr. Fuchs and Mr. Vierling and his their crews do a great job in
keeping our utilities low and trying to save some money and they have done some
substantial job on that but there's only so much you can gain when you run a 10
flat 100 meters it's hard to get to a 9.9 because you're up but 10 point is
great and we've gotten from an 11 to a 10 with their skills but it's good it
makes it more and more tough as the years go on to save that number there's
that 32 cents hour tax rate decrease you can see it started in 2019 with the
House Bill 3 where they started buying down that tax rate and they bought it
down 32 cents over those last years and that's been tremendous for taxpayers
taxpayers, and the state's picking up a larger share by doing that, but they're not picking up,
they're not allowing through the formulas an amount that enables school districts across
the state to have access to more money to keep up with inflation. I labeled this the good.
Our financial position, you're going to hear from our auditor here in a few minutes,
we're in a good financial position as a district. We should be blessed, feel blessed with that.
We are blessed that we're in a good financial position to go through these unknowns.
Because of that, we've not had to make tough draconian changes that hurt those children that we just saw
and did not take away from that, and that's because we've been in a good financial position.
We did have a property value audit that just before the Christmas break, we did get sent to TEA.
we're gonna hopefully in February hoping we're shooting for February but for sure
March will be bringing several budget amendments that affect revenue to the to
this board but that will be a positive and a good one attendance rate is up mr.
Hines sent me data last week that the attendance incentive that we've done
last year was effective throughout the first semester this year it's even
effective again in other words we improved on our improvements from last
year which was hard to do going back to that sprinter analogy but it is up again
there's legislation that's that's being passed or being discussed about moving
to in average enrollment I think I've expressed my feelings on average
enrollment but you know attendance is what we need forget the money part we
We need kids in school to learn, period.
And they're safest in school, and it's the best place for them to be.
So funding aside, I'm hoping that it stays with average daily attendance for students across the state to get in that classroom where they can learn best.
But our attendance rate is up, and as the formulas are right now, that's a good thing.
Declining maintenance and operations tax rate.
I just talked about that, $0.32.
I expect that to be continued decline after this legislative session, and that's a good.
Another good, found out Friday that our property insurance, you know, we took a huge hit on that these last few years.
We're actually going to actually get a better rate than we had last year.
We didn't get the 10% increase that we expected.
We're actually getting a little bit better rate and saving a little over a million dollars, Lance, we think,
and he'll be bringing that to you next month.
But that's going to be a million dollars of underspending that is a good.
And it's great.
We're not having to spend it on stuff like that.
The bad, sluggish enrollment.
We're not going to meet.
It's going to be a few more months until we meet our enrollment projection.
We haven't met it.
It's sluggish.
We're not seeing the kind of growth.
We're not projecting the kind of growth next year.
As I mentioned earlier, neither is the state or some of these other districts.
districts. Allotment caps. The biggest one is the fast growth allotment. They put $100
million aside for the fast growth allotment. We're the fastest growing school district
in Texas. When you take all those that are eligible for fast growth, they spent more
than $100 million, so we got prorated back. That's a $9 million hit to this district.
They funded it to the full amount, we would be $9 million better off. Are they going to
to move forward in this session with enrollment, I mean with monetary caps just to put a backstop
on spending or are they just going to let it go? That would be a great thing if they just said if
it costs $111 million, it costs $111 million. We're Texas, we're big. But to cap it, it hurts
us by $9 million. And there's other caps that are affecting us, but that's the big one and the one
that it's worth talking about publicly the shars and uh comp ed that's an ugly it's getting uglier
by the day we got news this time last year that our shars which was our third largest revenue
you've heard me say that from up here before was going to get cut five million dollars we embedded
that in the budget that was one of the things that made the budget even tougher we got word just
before christmas that it was going to cost us another five million dollars a road on that and
and that stacks and so moving forward as a district we're looking at an 11 million dollars
less in chars as far as for the next several years until they change it again that hurts also some of
the things that have happened uh with chars and and not not chars but uh decisions made out of hhsc
are affecting our comp ed enrollment amounts we had been growing in our comp ed amounts which
is a driving factor for our bottom line, for our revenue,
is free and reduced lunch numbers.
Been growing at a clip of 6% a year.
And now we budgeted 3%.
We budget conservatively.
That sounds conservatively growing at 6%.
We're not growing at all next year.
We're not going to grow at all in our comp ed numbers.
And the reason is because of some decisions that are made coming out of COVID
with students and those that are eligible for free and reduced lunch.
The ugly, probably not fair on my part.
I didn't realize this.
The legislative session isn't ugly yet.
It hasn't even started.
So it's not fair for me to put that.
And I apologize.
But the last legislative session we had was really ugly, in my opinion,
when it comes to school funding and our budgets.
And the next one hasn't started yet.
And so let's hope we can put an asterisk by that in our minds and say,
say it starts tomorrow, it's going to be better, it's not going to be ugly this time.
And then stagnant revenue.
Again, it's been well known we're on a 6160 basic allotment and it's been that way since
2019.
That's the primary fuel that drives the car, runs the car, and it's been stagnant and we
really need them to do something.
That message is loud and clear out there and I think there's some relief.
How that relief will be delivered to school districts through the funding formula is yet
to be known uh is that going to just put it in the basic allotment are they going to put it in things
that i think it was house bill one uh or house bill three or 100 house bill 100 did last year
where they put it in special ed allotment and kind of changed the way that special ed's funded
they had a fine arts allotment those kind of things that fell uh out when house bill
bill 100 went away, but that would have delivered some different ways to fund schools, but it
would have helped with our bottom line.
It just didn't happen in that session.
District levels considerations, we are continuing to monitor all our expenditures as we always
do.
That's why we're well aware of the million plus savings that we're going to have.
looks it's looking like we're gonna have with our property values I'm not our
property insurance just our property insurance like we're having on our
houses we see those increases luckily we're not seeing that this year thank
goodness we're preparing for growth we got a staff up only 500 student
increase but we're opening two new schools we're continuing looking at our
operations to make sure that we're saving everything we can where it
doesn't hurt affect student learning such as utilities efficiencies with
computer software and everything to help us keep keep staff down that's not in
the classrooms and in programs new campuses I'm not going to say that again
but we're opening them enrollment growth I've hit on that not as robust as we've
had but we have the student attendance incentive that again was successful
throughout all of last year and the first semester is looking good for this
year if they if they shift to average enrollment funding that could affect
this again I'm going to stand here and say we should still encourage kids to
come to school and to continue with that education because they need to be in
school to learn regardless of money property value growth mentioned it
earlier we're meeting with Jeff Robert our municipal advisor and he's going to
to meet with this board. He's going to stand here and do what I'm doing next month to talk about our
interest in sinking budget. We're going to do everything we need to do from a budget perspective
on our interest in sinking, but we're going to be looking at average growth and maybe actually a
little bit, dial it back a little bit to try to be conservative as we usually are. Economic
uncertainty, state funding's uncertain as can be right now. Inflation continues to be an issue in
And the state economy right now is very robust.
They're not looking at as large a surplus as they did, what, two years ago.
But they're still looking at a very robust surplus.
And a lot of that surplus from two years ago had ester-related issues that created some of that.
So still things are good when it comes to the state's coffers.
This is our calendar, high-level calendar.
and I'll just talk about next month where we look at our long-term debt plan and our projections in the debt service fund and
Then we'll move forward and hopefully by April. We'll be able to look at
What's happening and what bills may be may be happening as far as that could pass the finish line
Hopefully that'll start taking shape again. I'll warn the
Administration and the board that it's it would be great to let everybody know what kind of salary increase that we can do
but I would caution us to say that until funding happens in Austin that we hold
our keep our powder dry so that that we don't have to stack it we can't afford a
three percent salary increase this year without changes in state funding it
happened to this district Oh 20 plus years ago I wasn't here then but as I
understand it they approved a salary increase then the state did their thing
and they had to add that on to the salary increase that was already done
It's great for employees, not good for the bottom line.
And unfortunately, we're not in a position to have that risk.
And I think that's all I have.
Investing in excellence, empowering tomorrow is kind of the motto that Esperanza has come up with and that I like.
And we're going to be doing the best we can for our leaders for tomorrow.
And I'll be glad to answer any questions.
thank you great great motto esperanza um any questions mr president
ms gosella thank you thank you chris appreciate the overview um last year the pie chart you know
that you always do at this time you know last january what was payroll what was the percent
88 88 we've been at 88 for a good long while okay so it's 89 now okay and then the um
The other operating, kind of bugs me, but 1.9%, right?
That's $26 million roughly of our budget.
Can you shed some light on that?
What is that?
That would be.
Why do we have other?
Sorry?
Why is there an other category?
Okay, that other is defined by TEA.
The Texas Education Agency puts out a FASRAG, we call it the FASRAG.
It's an acronym that stands for Financial Accountability Resource Guide.
and we have a chart of accounts that we adopt after that 6400 are others so when
we do any student travel when we're taking buses to and from our stadiums
that gets charged to 6400 travel any staff development 6400 I'm not doing
these in any order what we pay the appraisal districts to appraise our
properties 6400 legal fees 6400 any travel reimbursements that would be from
somebody traveling to Austin or back what am I missing that's big insurance
Prada our property insurance etc it would be 6400 something else big yeah
turds payment this will be the last year for our turds payment that in fact it's
the year we're in is our last year and that would be coded at 6400 so you could probably
the tourist payment is going to probably be significant enough to see that uh that clip
downwards just in the tourist payment okay i really appreciate that so tea is the one who
calls it other yes yes okay thank you i had a couple questions on the um when you mentioned
the property value audit that you expect to see the results of i guess in february march i think
you said that yes sir what do you think your guess is on the outcome of that well right now we're
looking at netting it with other other revenue things that we know of like the tar the shars
so will we improve upon the deficit i think so will we will will the whole thing uh be recognized
probably not unfortunately there's a couple other things that are going against that but i'd say i
I don't know, Mr. Perez.
I haven't put it all together at this point in time.
But the property value audit itself yielded a very large eight-figure number.
Okay, great.
And what do you and your peers attribute to the slow growth,
both in KDISD as well as other districts, the slower growth?
This is not scientific because I am not an expert in that field,
but we the districts that I've spoken with we think it's in sure interest
rates interest rates people are moving people aren't moving people that would
like to leave to let a new family come in can't afford the interest rate and
just they're better off sitting in and where they are right now and then also
when they do younger families coming in interest rates are hurting that's what
what we think it is, but I'm not an economist and I don't know that for certain.
You mentioned about the, let's see, my notes here on, well, anybody have any questions?
Mr. Perez?
Help.
Anybody have any questions?
Yes, Ms. Champagne?
I have a couple.
So, I know that we get some extra money or something added to our formula for being a
fast-growing district so are we still even though our numbers are slowing down
we still in that that's done over a six-year look back so it's how much
you've grown over a six-year period of time and so right now we've grown 12,000
students over that six-year period of time so it'd be this time next year when
they look at it it will have let's just say all things else considered would be
11,500. There's only a handful of districts that are over 10,000. In fact, there's only a handful
of districts that have grown over 8,000 in that time period. So it would be several years, in my
thoughts, before that kind of worked its way through the snake. So I think we're a few years
away from that really hurting us. But again, it's happening at a couple of other top five
districts that are slowing as well so and I would say that's an that's a
concern what happens if the fast growth allotment doesn't get funded again it's
a 31 million dollars it would be a hit to this district a 31 million dollar hit
to this district whereas right now it's a nine million dollar hit because it
should be 40 but it's it's it's about 31 million at this point but that could be
something that is unique to only 50 or 60 districts.
All right.
And then I just wanted to do a little kudos to Jamie Hines for his
incentive, the attendance incentive.
And I know he's been recognized throughout other districts in the state.
Could you share with us the sort of the recognition he's gotten for that and also
And also how he's inspired other districts.
There's a big one.
I'll just start with that.
There's a big one I can't share with you,
but you're going to have to trust me on it a couple of months.
We will.
But I'll say that going back to the TASBO conference in March of last year,
it was in Houston, well attended because there's a lot of school districts in
Houston and they are able to get there.
A session that Mr. Crider and Mr. Hines put on was a stand.
I went in and kind of eavesdropped and watched our guys at work.
But it was a standing room only session because there was enough interest in it.
And I would say 30 to 40 minutes after it was over, they were still up there yielding questions.
That very day at a Center for School Finance meeting, I was asked to impromptu give us a shorter information on that.
that yielded five or six emails from from colleagues of mine up throughout
the state we were asked to do a presentation at the summer much smaller
but summers as Hasbro conference and then I know mr. Hines has spent a many
hour on the phone with other districts on kind of clarifying stuff and pretty
much giving them this is our format and and kind of helping them implement it
and i know several that have implemented with success this year and some are going to start
next year and and just the last thing i'd like to say about that is i said this in the committee
meeting the other day but i i think that that's so inspiring that that we were able to put together a
plan like that and share it with the other districts because as i said before this is
not just about ktisd it's about all isds in texas and i think helping to bring kids back to school
benefits our entire state because we never know where these kids are going to end up
working one day.
They could all end up moving to Houston.
And we need educated children.
So I really appreciate the efforts in that.
Yeah, I appreciate Mr. Hines bringing that up and the amount of work that he and the
technology, Mr. Crider, et cetera, have done over the last year and a half on that.
And sharing with other districts, yeah, that district may have my heart surgeon in it.
and they are coming to school and they're going to be better at their job because of when they get to me, I want them to be.
Thank you very much.
Mr. President.
Anything else?
Sorry, Mr. Smith.
I heard anecdotally from someone in Austin who said if we had been given an increase to student allotment since, when did they stop doing it?
2019?
2019.
2019, that that for KDISD would mean $130 million.
Does that figure sound incredible to you or unbelievable?
I mean, if they had been doing allotments for the last six or more years, that would be the impact.
It's something like over $1,000 per student is what it should be to keep us.
$1,300 is what I heard.
It would be a very large number and a number that would have us
not in doing
Woes, you know
We would still be trying to be prudent and put as much as we could in the classroom and to spend on the students
But yes, that would be it would have been very helpful and our people would have been able to weather this inflation a little bit
better a
lot better
Hey, thank you. Thank you. Mr. Smith
I appreciate the presentation.
The next item is 6.2 and this is the third through twelfth grade Chromebook survey presentation.
Dr. Ingrid Ruhms, Chief Communications Officer.
Thank you and good evening President Perez, Trustees, and Superintendent Gorgorski.
As you indicated, tonight's presentation is on the outcomes of the Class 1-1 Chromebook
Chromebook survey, which was administered this fall.
As you're familiar, the Chromebook program, also known as Class 1-to-1, was launched this
past fall.
It's been in operation for about four months now.
That program emerged out of the Bond 2023 initiative, in which the community approved
Chromebooks designed to provide a standardized and secure device to every third through 12th
grade student.
The survey that we administered took place between November 18th and December 20th.
We targeted four stakeholder groups, including, let me back that up, three stakeholder groups,
including our students, teachers, and parents.
And those students were broken up into two pairs.
So we had the elementary students and the secondary students, being the junior high
and high school students together.
The board has already received about three full reports on the outcomes for each of those
stakeholder groups.
There's over 100 different data points in those reports.
I'm not going over every data point this evening.
What you're going to see is those high-level data points captured in tonight's presentation.
So here you'll see the participation rate by those stakeholder groups that I mentioned.
About 14% of our elementary parents chose to participate in the survey and 10% of our
secondary parents.
The survey was sent to parents in all stakeholder groups, or I should say the secondary students
and the parents at least once a week as we got closer to the end of the survey
we start sending it every other day for our elementary teachers we had 28%
participate and for elementary students 73% participated 53% of our junior high
students participated and 21% of our high school students participated now
this survey was conducted by a research firm k-12 insight they tell us that any
participation rate between 20 and 30 percent is considered statistically
significant. So again I'm just going to go through some high-level data points
here starting with overall sentiment. All the survey questions were questions that
had Likert scales attached to them usually ranging from strongly disagree
to strongly agree. In other cases we are measuring time, time spent on the device
So looking at rarely to never all the way up to daily, which would be five days a week at the school
So in this overall sentiment you see 81% of our elementary students
Strongly agreeing or green in terms of whether or not they like their Chromebook. They're saying yes
like it. It helps with the learning. At the junior high and high school level, you'll
see that the students report that the resources available on the Chromebook helps in their
understanding of course material. 71% of those junior high students said that, 59% of the
high school students. Go down to the next one, Chromebook makes it easier for them to
complete assignments, 71 and 56. And then at that last question, you see whether or
or not it's made a positive impact. What they perceive as the program having made a positive
impact on their learning thus far. We see 49 and 42 percent. So just under half.
We ask the same questions of the parents as well as the teachers.
And you can see those percentages here. Those parent overall sentiment is around 50 percent.
I'm just taking the average of the elementary, junior high, and high school. I'll say it's 55
percent and then looking down at those elementary and junior high and high
school parents in terms of whether or not they think the Chromebook program
supports student learning you see them hovering around 64 percent believe that
it supports learning overall sentiment for teachers again we asked the same
types of questions on that Likert scale we're looking at strongly agreed or
agreed together so for those elementary teachers you have them 80% believe that
resources available on the Chromebook help with their students learning and
understanding of course materials 74% of those junior high teachers in 71% of the
high school teachers next question we posed very similar to the last two
stakeholder groups as a Chromebook make it easier for their students to complete
complete class assignments, elementary teachers, 75% yes,
and again, those junior high and high school teachers
all hovering around that 75 to 77%.
And then lastly, in terms of overall sentiment
among our teachers, 75% of elementary and junior high
teachers believe that the Chromebook program has made
a positive impact on student learning,
while you have about 69% of high school teachers
saying the same thing.
So we took a look at different aspects of the program ranging from ease of use, can
they navigate it, can they turn it on, to the frequency of use, and again, how it impacts
their learning.
So looking at the frequency of use here, you can see that elementary students, and these
are the students self-reporting, say they use their Chromebook daily, and those numbers
remain high for both the junior high students and the high school students all above 80 percent
the parents also said that their elementary kids use the chromebook daily 77 of them said
that junior high parents 90 and high school parents 85 percent the teachers for elementary
pretty much aligned with what the students reported 84 of elementary teachers say that
that they use Chromebooks daily within their instruction.
But we see something a little bit different here
with the junior high and high school parents
coming in much lower than the perception among the students.
Junior high teachers report 48% use, daily use,
and high school teachers report 40% daily use.
And at that secondary level, we also ask them
what subjects do they use the Chromebook most for,
and these are the subjects they reported on,
math, language, arts, science, and social studies. You'll recall back in October the
teaching and learning team led by Dr. Caskey provided the board report on the
class one-to-one program and what blended learning looks like in the
classroom. So we did want to ask do students perceive that they use both
Chromebook and paper in the classroom and you'll see in the longer form
reports that you received we dig a little deeper into this and there's some
data that goes along with that so elementary students 66% say they use
both paper and Chromebook at school and at the junior high and high school level
we did ask this more as a frequency type question how often do you use both
of Chromebook and paper.
And 68% junior high, 62% high school
said we use both of these tools three or more days a week.
Parents' responses are very similar to that of the students.
Their perception of Chromebook and paper use
is a little bit higher at both the elementary parent level
and the junior high parent level.
And then when you pop down there to the teachers,
you'll see that 81% of elementary teachers say that they incorporate paper and Chromebook activities into their classroom
lessons at least three times a week or more
62% of junior high teachers and 53% of high school teachers
We also took a look at printing and
Perceptions around
Printing we asked the students
parents, do your teachers require you to print schoolwork at home?
86% said no at the elementary level, 90% at the junior high level, and 88% at the high
school level.
Parents reported similar at the elementary and junior high level.
High school parents, about 57% say that their parent does not print at home.
And then elementary teachers along with junior high and high school teachers, their perception
was a little different with more than 90% across the board saying that they rarely or
never require students to print schoolwork at home.
And here's that ease of use question.
I mentioned we measured how students feel they navigate it.
Can they turn it on?
Can they find the programs that they're looking for?
and 86% elementary, 84% junior high, and 74% say that the Chromebook is logistically just easy to use.
Elementary parents, more than 70% across the board, say the same thing.
And you see that rate even higher for teachers, where mid-80s to 90% agree that the Chromebook is just easy to use.
We also took a look at the frequencies of problems that they encounter at school.
77% of elementary students indicated they rarely or never encounter problems with their
Chromebook at school.
And we do drill deeper into this.
You'll see that data in the full report.
67% of junior high, and then that drops down to 51% of high school.
elementary parents all hovered around the 50% range where they say that their
child has reported that they rarely or never have problems at school and then
teachers come in around 31% for elementary 39% for junior high and 42%
in terms of reporting that their students say they rarely or never have
problems with their Chromebooks at school so when we drilled into that a
little bit to see what type of problems might exist. Common concerns raised had
to do with battery life of the device as well as Wi-Fi connectivity. And in that
survey, if an individual indicated that Wi-Fi was a problem at the secondary
level, we did ask them is there a certain part of the building, the school facility,
in which you see that problem. And that gives our technology team some data to
work to work from to start testing some access points we also asked about their
ability to effectively utilize their Chromebook tool at home as well as
whether or not they take their Chromebook home or schoolwork and this
question addresses that latter issue do they bring their Chromebook home for
for schoolwork at least once a week.
75% yes at the elementary level.
And junior high, 83%.
High school, 66%.
Parents are reporting that at the elementary level,
78% report their child bringing their Chromebook home
for schoolwork at least once a week.
88% junior high and 77% high school.
And then teachers, we asked them a very similar question.
Do they assign homework that requires a Chromebook to be taken home at least once a week?
Elementary teachers, 46% say that they require the Chromebook to go home for the purpose of homework at least once a week.
54% junior high teachers and 63% high school teachers.
When we ask students if they see any difficulties utilizing their Chromebook at home,
They cited similar issues as what they see at home. The Wi-Fi might be a little
tricky at home, maybe slow. We also asked the students and the parents about
transporting Chromebook or carrying the Chromebook. 45% of elementary students
indicated that their Chromebook is comfortable to carry. It's worth noting
noting that about 33% of those same students said it's sometimes comfortable.
Junior high students, we had 38% of those students indicating that the Chromebook is
very comfortable or comfortable to carry, and 30% of high school students.
Again, it's worth noting that 23% of junior high and 23% of those high school students
registered no opinions in response to that particular survey item.
And finally you have the parents perception of the Chromebooks. Very
similar perception of elementary parents with elementary students. Actually I
I skipped this, I'm going to address that in a moment.
So this question asked first, there's two parent questions
pertaining to Chromebook transportation.
The first question simply asked the parents,
has your student ever mentioned to you
that the Chromebook is uncomfortable?
45% of parents said, no, my student
has never mentioned this to me.
47% of junior high parents said the same thing,
and 58% of high school parents said,
my student has never mentioned to me
that the Chromebook is uncomfortable. However, flip that, taking a look at
those parents who did say they have mentioned it to me, we followed up with a
question and you'll see here that out of those individuals who said my child
has mentioned something to me, 83% of the parents report that their child reports
that their Chromebook is uncomfortable to carry. So that represents 46% of the
the total parent population who responded to the survey.
Similar number for junior high and then 76% reported of high school parents reported that
their child reports to them that their Chromebook is uncomfortable to carry.
And that represents 32% of the total high school parent population that responded to
the survey.
And some of the problems that they reported was weight and size.
So I think some of the concerns that were raised are things we probably heard before.
Certainly issues that I know our class one-to-one committee, which meets weekly, has been exploring
and identifying solutions to.
The program has been in effect for four months.
Part of the purpose of this survey was to identify what's working and to also take a
look at how we can continue to improve it are there any questions thank you
very much I know that was really tedious appreciate you going through all that
questions trustees okay um I just have two questions for you um there was at
the beginning there was a discrepancy between the junior high and high school
teachers and then the students and the parents I forget which topic it was on
it was like 40% for the teachers and then it was students and parents were
like in the 80s it was closer to the beginning was the frequency of use is
that the one I think I think that's yes yes frequency abuse yes do you have any
Does anyone have any idea on what may be causing that discrepancy there?
Can you tell from the feedback?
Yeah, it's a great question.
We actually just distributed the data that you see tonight
and also the data reports that we provided the board on board docs.
We distributed that to our internal teams today,
so they're going to spend the next week or so just calling through all of that data,
and we look forward to being able to provide an answer to that.
Okay, great.
great and then my other question thank you for doing that my other question is
on the printing slide I think it's there go we're getting at home we didn't go
over the elementary and the last grouping the elementary teachers and
then the junior high the teacher section okay so what they're saying is they
rarely are never require their students to print in class and they're saying 96
Wait, print, to print class assignments.
Okay, so teachers are saying they're not requiring, by a large part, they're not requiring their students to print.
Okay.
That's correct.
So I'm wondering, why are we getting feedback from the community that they are?
I'm not saying teachers are not.
I'm just saying, is there a breakdown within the student to the parent?
You know what I mean?
I do know what you mean, yeah.
This is just purely speculative.
while the teachers may not be assigning work that requires printing that doesn't
really tell us whether or not the student is choosing to print right okay
could we could we maybe get see if your group would maybe look at that too and
maybe my if they have any other areas because I would like to make that be
more you see in sync with on another okay yeah there's a few areas really
really worth diving into a little further here.
Thank you very much.
Mr. President?
Yeah, Ms. Costello?
I echo Trustee Teemee's comment on that.
That jumped out to me, too.
The teachers are thinking one thing,
but the parents are thinking another on the printing of paper for assignments.
So that's been either a communication problem or something's not right,
and that echoes what we heard when this all started.
In addition to, you know, at the beginning there was overall sentiments about the Chromebook rollout.
I think we really do need to consider overall there is a sentiment that it's heavy and hard to carry.
That is, I mean, this survey does say that overall.
So that is something I hope that we'll consider, particularly for the elementary kids.
So that's nothing new.
That's been said at the very beginning so it's consistent, and I think that needs to be considered as an overall
Sentiment may not be positive, but it is a sentiment and a fact that the survey is also reflecting
So hopefully we can we can address that
There was I'm I apologize I don't know
this
Presentation on the board dogs know okay what you got with the full report yes, okay?
Okay, so this is just high level.
Yes, I like this.
My notes, I read ahead of time and prepped,
and I have something saying slide 16, but that's not going to apply here.
But it had to do with, like, the fully charged battery isn't lasting all day long.
Yes.
And the startup of the Chromebook is too slow.
Those are cited as frequent concerns regarding use, the battery, the connectivity.
activity.
So I'm sure we take that seriously because that's something that could be fixed, should
be able to be fixed.
There's an internal group of department heads and other staff who've been involved in the
rollout of this program for the past year and a half who meet weekly.
Again, they received this data for the first time today and they're going to be looking
at every single one of those data points, over 100 different data points, and they're
going to have to and they will make some decisions about areas they can tweak
and prove upon and move this forward in a positive way okay so sorry they're
just getting it today you're saying okay and the comments I just popped in a few
of the surveys just is to read some of the comments that people make it's hard
to quantify those but I think they're important I hope hopefully those will be
considered to give color to some of this because this this doesn't show a
subject area like maybe math really needs to be addressed versus science I'm
just throwing that out there math is difficult so I hope that they will
consider that and use use those comments that people took time to give so what is
the timeline for responding and acting upon this data my next juncture our
our committee head, Mrs. Hack.
Let me go ahead and jump in on a few things I've heard,
and maybe I can help add some clarification to what we're accomplishing here.
I heard some comments about maybe some of the disconnect on what parents may have said
versus what kids have said, especially when it comes to printing.
Some of that may be explained in the percentages of the number of takers of the survey.
If you recall what Andrea was presenting there,
some of the least number of surveys were completed by our secondary parents
because we there were more elementary parents who completed it so there may be
disconnect there that one low survey participation so we just don't know and
to just a disconnect of not knowing what the kid is doing or required to do in
there and so yeah it'll take a little more digging in there to look at that
but that was one of the big things that jumped out me is there's huge
huge discrepancy in the number of participants in the survey on an item like that.
Yeah, are we going to look at everything in there, the weights and the stuff?
Yeah, we need to examine that.
This is high-level data, a lot of it, and some of it will take time to dig in
and then maybe survey differently to look at teachers differently in a pocket or an issue in there.
So when it comes in to think about uncomfortable, okay, a Chromebook's uncomfortable.
Well, if you're a kid who's never carried a Chromebook in your life, it could be uncomfortable.
Yeah, that's a new thing.
Whether it weighs this much or this much, it's uncomfortable now that I have to take a Chromebook anywhere I go.
You saw some data in there that we really need to look at with elementary.
If the kid is truly not using the Chromebook most frequently, you know what I mean, a week, do they need to take it home every day?
Okay.
And we need to dig into that.
That's going to be that connection between what the teacher expects the kid to do on the Chromebook and what the kid is actually doing.
I think there was a question in there at one time about some disconnect on whether the kid's using the Chromebook or not.
The teacher may not have signed anything, but the kid gets on the Chromebook anyway because they choose to get on it because they want to work on something.
There's modules in there, might be a program they're working with that they like to work with.
They might get on there to read a book through the online library system.
They might get on there to use DreamBox, but not as an assignment, but as practice or self-choice
to get on the Chromebook and use it.
So there'll be some things in there, but we really need to look at the comfort level of
that or not.
But we'll see what we need to do.
They'll dive in and see if we need to look at a different product, a different type of
case that could go on.
There's a million things we can look at over the next six months, but after four months
of data, this is kind of where we're at.
we'll collect more data and then we'll make decisions based upon that data
thank you thank you I think for me when you get this government go ahead I will
I wanted to drill in a little bit on those numbers so I'm glad you stepped in
dr. Gorski and so when I was looking through this we had 15,000 participants
that took place am I getting that number right with elementary a little over
fifteen thousand that's correct and then for junior high am i reading this
correctly it was 11,000 students for junior high and then for high school
what was it six thousand four hundred ninety eight okay so I think that the
discrepancy and the amount of participants is very telling when you
have the you know a district that's got 96,000 students now not all of those
students have those Chromebooks my understanding right that K through 2
does not have Chromebooks that they are taking home now I know that what we've
seen is that some elementary schools are providing Chromebooks but it's typically
the PTO PTA that's providing those Chromebooks I've seen that in our so
okay through to you yeah so the district has a standard dr. Lana may know off top
his head what that standard is so if your grades three and up you get one
issue to you that's the one-to-one initiative you are younger students that
that may need to use a device in K1 and 2,
there's a standard number per classroom per student
based on that.
Some campuses do want to supplement that,
and they've been doing that for years
through whatever fundraising they can accomplish
or PTA to get almost a one-to-one in those classrooms.
But the kids wouldn't take them home,
they're not assigned to them,
but they would have enough at that point
to do one-to-one in all their first grade classrooms.
And our most economically disadvantaged schools are they've been on Chromebooks for a while because they were already provided
Prior to this correct like one-to-one
There have been a number of our
Title one schools that have used title one dollars to supplement that standard for years. Yeah, right. Okay, so
This is kind of my thought when I'm looking at these numbers again
And we're looking at three grades three through twelve who are they're the ones that are taking them home every day
So K-2 you're not taking the survey. So out of 96,000 we're taking the K-2 students out of it.
We're just looking at 3-12, but even in that these numbers, junior high obviously takes the cake.
So what did we do differently here? Do we know where teachers asking students to take the survey in the class?
Which is not a bad thing. I would I wish that the high school teachers would have done that
honestly to push that a little bit more to get a better representation of what
our upperclassmen are dealing with as well. Yeah our elementary principals
targeted the kids and asked them to take the survey at school, help them log in, do
the survey, so that's going to be a much greater percentage of students who took
that survey. Secondary we gave it out to them and we asked them to just take it.
Junior high, sometimes they can encourage kids a little bit more, and that's why you see at high school the lowest percent of the number of students who took the survey, because it was just an open survey to kids is what we usually do at secondary.
So my only concern with that, and of course, you know, you can't force anybody to do anything, especially at a high school level.
These kids have a bazillion things going on.
The last thing they want to do is sit down and take a survey.
But I would think that the issuance of the Chromebooks, because they would be using them, and if I'm looking at a couple things, it's going to impact them more because their GPAs are that they're only using their Chromebook.
They can't use their MacBook.
They can't bring their Lenovo from home.
They're using the Chromebook in classroom, correct?
They are not bringing their own devices to school.
so you're having to use that which means that you are now subject to any issues
that you may or may not have such as you know I don't know the Wi-Fi going down
during SAT or whatever and then you're stuck with it which not necessarily
anything you can do about that but you're stuck with that issue and that
could impact GPAs that could impact a lot of different things so I really want
want to know what's going on at the high school level for those students because of that GPA.
I mean, there's a lot of GPA games that are going on right now, and kids are trying to get into
colleges, among other things. So that's really, really going to be a big deal for them. Yeah.
Look, a couple of thoughts on that. I would say this, with everything I've learned in instructional
technology from our departments over there, Dr. Launay and Dr. Kasky, and every question I've
I've asked, there is nothing that a kid can't do with our Chromebook that's not instructionally related.
So, in other words, I wouldn't argue that a kid would be at a better advantage if I bought a laptop or a MacBook or a Lenovo or a PC or whatever.
That's not going to help them one bit over the other because we're not asking them to do anything differently that the Chromebook won't do.
The Chromebook does an incredible amount of work for what it's designed to do.
The other part in there, any issue that would come up with a connectivity, it would be regardless.
A connectivity, whether you have the Chromebook or you brought your own device in there.
Part of it we've got to understand a little bit better for those areas that are connectivity problem is we've got a system where tickets can be put in and help us better understand what's happening in the school.
I've had numerous conversations with Dr. Laune on this of how we can track that, what we can do, what we need to go in and put in wireless access points, what's happening.
And he's got a good handle on that for the future.
But you also got to remember the subjectivity of questions like that.
And it's really hard because what you think might be slow,
I might think is adequate or fast and what a kid thinks.
I tell you, in today's standard,
if a kid doesn't get something instantaneously in three seconds,
my stuff's moving slow, which may or may not be an issue.
But we've encouraged the kids, if you have a device that moves slow,
if you have stuff you should go down, get that device checked out.
We check the thing.
If it's truly an issue with the Chromebook, we do an immediate hot swap right there, which means the kid gets issued a new device.
We take the other one back.
That moves pretty quickly.
The other thing I would say about this is, yeah, in the front end of stuff, things may have moved slower than when kids got used to using the device and have it in the right spot.
And they know that I might not get a connectivity point here in my school.
But it's probably not important I get one here.
Where do I get it and how does it work for me?
And that'll take time to figure out too.
Maybe a little slower connectivity in the front end.
Maybe things have improved.
But over time, we should see kids responding to those kind of questions,
maybe a little differently after we've made the improvement
and the kids have had the device for a while and they're better navigating it.
I think familiarity with the device that you're using at home would really push you to,
because when I was looking at the data, looking through this,
out of the percentages of kids that answered this you had 78% that said out
of the percentage that answered it that they use their own device at home so
even though they were taking the Chromebook home 78% of them were saying
yeah I'm taking it home and no I'm not using the Chromebook for my work but I'm
actually using a different device so I'm using my own device so familiarity does
make a difference in terms of what you feel comfortable using but I understand
understand security concerns that we've addressed here of what can we protect when you're bringing
your MacBook that you have jailbroken and you can access whatever you want to through your own
private VPN and so I see that there's a reasoning for us locking down a lot of this that is good
and I'm not disagreeing with that but I just feel like that I wish that we had had more participation
to get a larger overview. And I know it's going to take some time, not that the questions or that the people, the participants who did are not valid, but it just to get a broader scope of what we're really looking at.
But I know it's going to take some time to kind of tease this out to see exactly what all of this is saying.
So I'm interested and I'm looking forward to really drilling down into this to get a better, clearer picture about what this looks like for our community.
Because we spent, I mean, 80, upwards of $80 million to do this.
So I think it's pretty important.
Yeah.
I think the positive takeaway on some of the data that you'll read in there, and I've read every survey, every data point, everything that came in.
I've gone through it all.
this this past week in there but you'll see a common message
in there that most people believe it's been beneficial.
You'll see that upwards to 75%, 80% of the students believe it.
They think it adds value.
They think it's helping them learn.
Teachers are saying that.
Parents are saying that.
For the smaller percentage that it does not
seem to be working for them, what is the reasoning for that?
Or why do they not like it?
Yeah, we could try to figure that one out in there.
But I think overall, I've been really pleased with the rollout,
how we have these Chromebooks out there.
We've got 96,000 kids.
We've got 74,000 plus Chromebooks out there.
Some of the things we've put in place.
I tell you, where else do you get the kind of customer service where if your device doesn't
work, you can put in a help desk ticket, you can call somebody, they're going to fix your
problem right away, and if they can't fix it, you can walk down to the library, hand
it to somebody, and they're going to give you a new device that is maybe working better
than expected.
So I think overall, I think we could be real pleased with some of the results we've seen
that we're moving in a positive direction with the initiative,
and it's going to be good stuff happening in there.
Last point on positivity with the IT department,
I can attest to how amazing those people are.
I have worked with them, like personally gone back there,
talked to them when we had the big outage this last fall,
and like nothing was working,
and everybody had to bring in their Chromebooks
or whatever laptop you had,
and they are absolutely phenomenal back there.
They are so incredibly smart,
and they are so incredible at what the job that they're doing. They are an excellent team.
So give credit where credit's due. The IT team back there is pretty insane.
Mr. President. Ms. Fox. I have a question for Mrs. Calhoun if I may.
Where is the information about students not using a Chromebook and using their own
personal device, something other than a Chromebook? Where did you find that? That was on the
one that we got that is not accessed to the public right now. I'm looking through it.
And I can see that miss box. It's part of the high school full report
That's in board Docs. Okay?
Thank you
Thank you. Mr. President. I'm sorry. I mean I say I'm so sorry. Um, I
Personally believe that this is a good response
percentage
21% of high school students 53 percent of junior high and 73 percent of elementary and
And I'd like to remind part of this board that we developed a whole program based on 2 or 3 percent of teachers responding to a survey.
So I think that this 21 percent is 10 times the amount of that.
And I think that this is a good representation.
And I also believe that people that are really concerned about something will be more apt to respond.
So I think that this is a good representation.
And I think that just like with everything else, when there's a new, something new, it's hard to change and adapt to that.
And the one example I always think of is when my kids were in elementary school and we got rid of the Friday folders.
The moms were all mad about no more Friday folders, but after a couple years, we got used to no Friday folders.
So I think it's just part of the learning, the learning, the growth of into this new program that will, that will, you know, kind of grow into.
Also about the printing, it's just my perspective, but it's just something me as a mom, you know, when they ask the parents how much printing they're doing.
Well, when I'm sitting downstairs and I hear my daughters upstairs printing things, and
then I ask them what are they doing, and they say they're doing their homework, I'm just
going to put two and two together that it must have been required, and not really understanding.
When I get the question, I'm like, well, they're printing things, so it must be that that's
what they're doing is a required thing.
And one other question I have is, do you know the weight of the Chromebook?
I think our technology team has the answer to that.
Sorry.
Is it two pounds?
Oh, the weight?
If I remember correctly, it's between 2.7 to 3.2.
Okay.
So I know I said this before and it sounds silly,
but it's almost kind of like the Friday folder thing.
So when my kids, and my kids aren't that old.
I mean it was eight, seven years ago or so when my youngest one was in junior high and
they would have to carry full textbooks in their backpacks and walk half a mile home
and they didn't like it but nobody else, nobody also asked them, are you comfortable, you
know maybe I asked them but the teacher didn't say are you comfortable carrying your textbooks
home because I'm sure my kid would have said no they're not comfortable doing that but
But it's just part of what she had to do.
So that's all I'd like to say about that.
I was just going to ask a question.
I was just doing a little math, and I was thinking,
if we have approximately 4,000 students in every high school,
so that's about nine high schools, and then you have 2,000 at Freeman, right,
because you don't have two grades.
So that's 38,000 high school students.
So they're about 39% of our student population.
So we only had 17% of our students respond.
21%.
So can I finish?
It is on here.
Can I just finish please?
You provided the data.
Without being interrupted please?
Okay.
So if it's about 17% of our students that responded, would you see any value or Dr.
Dr. Grooms, do you all see any value in offering the high school students another round to answer this survey?
And, you know, maybe if we present it in a way, hey, we really do want your feedback
because we want to make sure, you know, we're addressing your concerns about GPA
and we want to give you a voice.
I just wonder, do you see any value in that?
Because I do think 6,481 students, which is about 17% of the students, is pretty low.
Point of clarification, though, she's provided the information as 31,288 students and 6,498 responses, and so that's 21%.
It's on slide.
21% is not that difference from 17.
It's a lot higher than 2%.
I'm just trying to ask a question.
You're asking a question?
Yes.
So K-12 would tell you, and I think Andrea mentioned at the front end, if we can get 20 to 30 percent participation on a survey, it's pretty good at times.
I know it's not perfect or anything, but it would be statistically significant to go ahead and look at some of those data points that are in there.
But to your larger question, I don't know if it would be better to do a targeted approach with that.
If you just roll it out again, we'll probably get the same.
If we looked at some things and I'm gonna give that to the committee to examine and not hold them to this
But possibly to look at this way
Is there something within the survey for high school folks that could be asked differently or better or drill down a little bit deeper?
somehow and then maybe we pick a couple of schools north of the freeway a couple of South and do a
Targeted approach and try to get a sampling that way of what people are saying and maybe we could target for high schools who would
participate in fully give up time but of course every time we ask schools to do
that is can you stop instruction and you make kids do this for us the value is in
here maybe we can get a few principals that would volunteer for that I don't
know but I'm gonna give it to mrs. hack and the team to look at that data and
see can we get another sampling of that to get a little bit more information we
can take a look at that thank you very much did you say it mr. I had something
Dr. Lallanguiera, comment?
Yeah, a comment on the Wi-Fi and the connectivity with the Chromebooks versus the home devices.
Just keep in mind that these Chromebooks are optimized to connect to our network.
We've actually, when we used to have bring your own device, we've had issues with the
the device is being configured for home connectivity or just really not configured correctly.
And then during the test, you know, they couldn't connect.
Now, the Chromebooks, they are configured to basically connect reliably every time and
they're locked.
You can't change that configuration.
So that minimizes disruptions during exams.
And, you know, I know this data includes a lot of the early stage of the rollout where
we had to rebalance our Wi-Fi environment.
So I think a lot of this reflects that rebalancing that we did because we all of a sudden we
had about 80,000 devices connecting to our network.
So I think you'll be, this is a good baseline for us.
moving forward now everything is going to compare compare to this baseline and
how much improvement we're making yeah also when I add one last comment here
really just the cost of the one-to-one was 16 million thank you that was part
of the whole package of technology package was 83 million but that
That included a lot of other investments.
My mistake.
Thank you, and I think it's really great that we can provide
a device like this to every kid in the district from third grade up.
That some kids, some families may not have access to this technology.
And we know that technology is critical for the future, and that we're able to
supply that district-wide, one-to-one for the third through 12th grade.
So, you know, my biggest concern would be, you know, if there's no balance, you know
what I mean?
Like, we have the Chromebooks that are here to stay, but if there's no balance in terms
of even though, you know, like say somebody says that their Chromebook is being used three
three or more in a week, they may be just fine.
Just as long as parents have concerns about their students being in front of screens
all day long or too much.
So to me, my biggest thing is balance in the classroom
between paper and also using the Chromebook.
Use both of them, all of the above.
So that's my big thing.
But anyway.
Mr. President, may I please add one more thing?
because Mrs. Calhoun said that it costs $80,000 to do the survey.
I never said anything about the cost.
Oh, I thought you said that.
No, I didn't.
You said about the cost of all the one-to-one.
Oh, okay.
So anyway, I don't know what the cost of doing the survey is,
but I'm hoping that whatever it does cost, you know,
with having Andrea Grooms' team do a new survey
and taking time from the principals and all that,
you know it's hard to probably calculate the exact cost of it but to do another
survey again to high school students I just want to make sure I don't really
know what mrs. Timmy is looking for to find in the end and the results because
like like you said mr. Perez the the Chromebooks are here to stay so I don't
know what kind of information wouldn't make that make that different so let me
go ahead and talk a little bit about cost you see you know with our contact
K-12 Insight has been a great partner of KDIC for a number of years and so the package we have, we can do more surveys and it's a one-time cost for the contract per year.
So whether we do one survey or I do five more, it doesn't cost me any more regardless of that.
Now there is time involved.
We have to put good questions together.
So that involves people like Dr. Grooms and Dr. Olone, Dr. Kasky over there.
So we can put their time investment into that and it may be a wise investment to collect more data
We planned on collecting more data
We just hadn't decided yet when and how and what still early to figure that out
And that's why Andre had mentioned the team that gets together to talked about class one to one will figure that piece out
Thank you. Thank you
One more clarification I'd like to make
I'm sorry, I was, I'll wait.
On the reasons for discomfort, I know there was some discrepancy on how much the Chromebooks
weighed, and I know that that can be a little, when you're talking to like a third grader
who weighs all of, I don't know, 30 pounds, then everything seems heavy to them.
But when you look at the high school students, when you had 6,400 students answer, 2,000, 2,900 of those 6,400 said that it was uncomfortable to carry.
So out of those 2,900, 95% of our high school students said that it was too heavy.
And then 36% of that said that it was too large.
So our high school students which weigh quite a bit more than a third grader are saying that it's too large and it's too heavy
So I think that clarification matters
When we're moving forward a clarity matters
So yes for a third grader anything's going to seem heavy
But for a fully developed high schooler, they're also complaining of the same thing
Mr. Breda this box I
I would like to maybe, just because of what she said, clarify with Dr. Alani who said
the next generation is going to be lighter weight.
Is that correct?
So this year they're more, I don't know, we can't undo the weight of what we currently
have but the newer model will be, I mean Chromebook's working on making them lighter for the next
ones.
My question is for maybe Mrs. Teamey. What information are you looking for
from high school students? So I'm not looking for anything in particular. I
don't have an agenda. I just know working with high school students and being a
former high school teacher, they tend to not want to do surveys very much and you
you know if it's presented in a way and I'm not saying no one and no one did this
I'm just saying if it were me I would be presenting a hey we want your feedback
we want to serve you as best as we can we only can do that with facts and data
just like we analyze in our math classes so the more data you get the better
picture you get so I thought miss Calhoun brought up a good point that our
high school representation is quite low and so I just wanted you know we're here
serving the public and so our job is to see to it that we know what the public
wants so more data helps me feel more comfortable with what the what the
community wants that's it I don't have any agenda I just want a better picture
so that we are serving our community and our students with excellence I was given
when I was in school thank you so I also wanted to comment on the overall survey
I think it shows that people like the Chromebooks.
They're very satisfied or satisfied with how it's working,
what's happening across all levels.
I think it didn't surprise me at all the difference between, like,
students, teachers, and parents, how that does,
especially when you get to high school.
As we know, when our children were in high school,
How was your day? Fine. What'd you do today? Just stop that. I have to go do homework. My teacher is so demanding of me. Right. It's all of the things that students tell parents to be like, you know, I don't know.
So I, the only comments I have heard that have me concerned were on very specific courses,
and I can't remember what they were.
Parents were telling me that the Chromebook doesn't do whatever the device was,
that it was limited in things like, I'm going to pick something out of the air that isn't it,
macroeconomics, BC physics, something like that, that the Chromebook didn't really serve as well
in a specific. Those are some of the concerns I heard from parents that I didn't know how to
answer. We didn't cover that here, but so when we hear about that, can they bring their own, and
maybe that's why they're going to their own device when they get home from school. I think whoever
ever said familiarity is is right on target what you're comfortable with at
home and speed whatever but I thought the survey yielded really good results I
thought they were positive and it's such an early rollout I think that as when
they become more familiar and they use it more I've you know when you look at
the one of the slides I looked at was how many times a week do you have a
problem and when you looked at elementary it was a lot and that's
probably because and those were teacher responses it's the teacher had to go and
probably help them with it and when you got to high school it was rare that they
had problems they couldn't figure out on their own so I think that just kind of
shows the difference between third exactly what mrs. Calhoun was saying the
difference between third graders and 12th graders is significant and so I I
I thought that the responses gave us a good overview of what's happening,
and I think the high schoolers are kind of like, Chromebook?
I can do this and this and this and this.
I can invent a Chromebook.
They're just so brilliant.
I think it would be so familiar with technology that they didn't answer
because they're like, I don't need to do that.
because I could I'm curious how much some big old history and literature
books way that we used to carry you know history social studies literature all
those in a backpack how much it does away compared to the Chromebook I'm just
curious every good experiment to run and I wonder if high school students even
think really good okay anything else mr. Perez go ahead Mary Ellen it was
mentioned that there's a new generation of the Chromebooks mr. Arnie that would
come out that are lighter but that is that within what's already been expensed
or is that a new bond packaged for that new next gen so these Chromebooks are on
replacement lifecycle right every five years so basically we're on the lookout
for the lightest device to replace the next I'm sorry with what money oh yeah
they do it will be part of the bond that's part of the bond so you know
every five years we replace those devices part of using the next bond it's
So it's required for more bond money, correct?
We don't have a replacement.
How many replacements or life cycles are within the bond money we've already received in 2023?
There is, yeah, zero.
Is that hard to quantify?
Zero, right?
Yes.
Okay.
Just to be clear on that, you might recall from an earlier presentation,
we did roll out and deploy some devices that were up to three years old,
and the life cycle is five years.
So think about it like that.
We're not replacing anything unless it's damaged, broken, unusable, something like that.
But we're not going to take any of these devices in the near future
and just replace them with new devices until the end of that life cycle.
So the first group to be replaced on a life cycle would be this year plus one more,
get it to the five years.
That make sense?
On those devices.
Yes.
So we're not jumping out there and buying a whole bunch more and taking a heavier one and replacing it with what they call a Chromebook ultralight.
There's a product out there, but we'll examine that for future purchases when we get there.
Okay.
I'd like to move on unless somebody else has anything else.
I just want to add one thing about the technology and the bond.
as far as I'm concerned, I know as long as I've been here, not just on the board,
but just as a parent, technology is always on the bond and it's used to
replace all kinds of technology. It's computers, it's smart boards, it's those
yeah all kinds of things. So it's just a normal part of a bond so it's not
something this was extra because we were buying a whole bunch of new ones but
normally that's always on there as far as I am aware thank you one last
question I just have one last question I swear I'm done I swear I'm everybody
spoken I think so when I'm looking at this one of the big issues that we heard
from parents especially during our listening circles was the the
the integration from math to with the Chromebooks.
And when I'm looking at the data and they're asking the high school students,
what subjects do you use your Chromebook for during the school day, 71% of the participants said math.
So I would like to really be able to drill down on that and understand what does that look like.
because a lot of parents were complaining that the Chromebook was
taking place of just the how are you supposed to do certain math problems or
certain math styles with a Chromebook you need to have tangible paper and pen
and not that they weren't being offered paper and pencil I'm not saying that but
I'm saying that if 71% of them are saying that we are utilizing the
the Chromebook and math, what does that look like?
And then the whole reason, one of the big reasons that we were even buying the Chromebooks,
we were really doing this push to one-to-one, is because Texas was requiring our third graders
to take the STAR on Chromebooks.
And so we were trying to help with that.
We were trying to prepare our students to meet those assessment needs.
So do we have that STAR data as far, I mean, is that even out yet as far as the STAR data
on what that looked like when we did with our what the third graders did or
where are we still in flux with that legally not us personally but just the
state we have the data from last year students who took star yes we have that
on every student and everything this is the first year of the Chromebook so I
really couldn't tell you whether or not a kid using a Chromebook regularly or
would make them more proficient and more ready for STAR.
We hope they will be.
We'll look at that at the end of the year.
Because they're now taking other assessments on there,
and they're used to using it kind of in their daily life.
Right.
But as far as trying to match that up,
but that's really going to be a real hard match to try and say,
because the kid had the Chromebook, they're more familiar.
You'd have to ask the kid that.
Do you feel more comfortable using it?
and you know me ask them for some sort of qualitative data but I don't think
we're gonna be able to make a quantitative look at scores and say they
went up because of the Chromebook okay I don't know if we can make that leap mr.
president we did but we did in our legislative advocacy put in there that
we want the start testing on the computer to move from third grade to
fifth to give some time for them to get up speed and so on mr. president yes mr.
Redmond one last thing to add miss Colquhoun mentioned about math class in
high school to high schoolers different levels they are taking notes and
accessing their notes every day so saying you're using your Chromebook in
class every day could easily be you're going through the notes then that's
certainly mean they're always doing their work on it and so I think though
those are different things like right when we're looking at these surveys over
over the years I've learned is that little question,
do you use your Chromebook every day?
Yeah, I get on there and I check Canvas,
and I see what's going on.
But are they doing their work at home with that,
or are they just checking it because they forgot
when they need to turn in a worksheet or a permission slip?
And so simply the math in high school,
I've watched geometry, pre-cal.
They're doing their notes, absolutely.
They can access their notes, all those kinds of stuff.
They're not always filling out all their work
and you know being able to use paper they're able to use paper they're not
always turning everything in on that thank you thank you I think we'll move
on thank you so much great discussion at 729 we finished one minute ahead of 730
so I'm happy about that and now we have discussed and considered board approval
7.1 Discuss and consider Board Approval of the November 2024 Financial Reports.
of the November 2024 financial reports finally we get to discussion items even
even though we had a big discussion on this.
The presenter, Jamie Hines, award-winning Jamie Hines,
Assistant Superintendent of Finance.
Good evening, President Perez, Board of Trustees, and Superintendent Gagorski.
You have before you our financial reports for January,
which include our financial statements, our construction report,
and our tax report through the month of November,
as well as our check register summary for the month of November. I'm just gonna
point out a few things. Sorry am I too close to it? I'm gonna point out a few
things. This is the third month of the fiscal year so we're through 25% of the
fiscal year. Really this is the first set of financial statements that we can
really start to kind of glean some insight from based on these percentages. We finally have enough
expense to really start looking at them. So I'm going to go into them a little bit more than
the last couple of months, but not too long. First off, you'll notice up in the top right of
the very first page of the financial statements that you've got the general fund budgeted fund
fund balance as of September 1, 2024. Later on tonight, you'll be hearing about the annual
financial report. So you'll hear about the new updated fund balance, actual fund balance as of
that the end of last fiscal year or the beginning of this one. So starting next month, we will go
back and that number will be updated to that new fund balance. Also, again, we're through 25%
of the fiscal year. So as we kind of start to analyze the expenditures over on the right,
we're really looking at 25% and wanting to make sure that those numbers are below that for the
most part. And when we're looking at it by object code, which is this first page, you'll see payroll
costs. Our biggest one is at 24%, so it looks very good. Also, you'll see purchased and contracted
services that at 18% that that's fine for this this time of year because we
still have the summer when we use a lot of that and then you notice that the
supplies and materials that's higher and I've mentioned this you know in in the
past couple of months that's our software licensing that we do at the
beginning of the year and again that's going to continue to work itself out and
and that will come down to where it's just in line with the monthly percentage.
The other operating expenses, Ms. Cuzela, I believe you kind of brought that up a little bit earlier tonight.
You'll see we're at 12% there.
That will, over the next couple of months when we start bringing forward property insurance,
our vehicle insurance, those type things, once we have those contracts approved
and we start making those expenses,
that will come up to the budgeted percentages as well.
So you'll see those come in line.
And then, of course, debt payments we'll make in August as well as February.
So February and then August.
So that's going to stay at 0% until we start making those payments.
Capital outlay, we have a lot of projects going on, primarily with nutrition.
As we said on that food service fund balance,
We're working on spinning that down through those capital projects.
And so that will, as those start coming to fruition throughout the fiscal year, you'll start seeing that spin down.
Beyond that, I'll be glad to take any other questions.
I do want to just go back real quick.
quick to what y'all were talking about earlier the attendance incentive and and make sure we recognize
um uh mr ronnie edwards because he was also a part of all of that information sharing that we
do with other districts and his department has been done the lion's share of all the the rollout
of that project so but i'll be glad to take any other for saying that questions
Any questions, trustees?
Mr. President?
Ms. Cuzela?
So under the construction report, there's always each bond,
and then there is a miscellaneous capital project report or page?
Yes, ma'am.
Okay.
Okay, is this where we would see under expenditures the extra approximately $6 million approved for the build-out of Merchant Way?
Or is that where the scout that goes?
Yes, ma'am.
That's where those interest earnings would be put into that miscellaneous capital projects fund,
and then that's where we would use those funds to pay that down.
Okay, and so it's going to show up on this page here?
Yes, ma'am.
Just for my own...
That's correct.
Great, thank you.
Mr. President.
Ms. Champagne.
I would like to apologize to Mr. Ronnie Edwards for not acknowledging him earlier.
Thank you very much.
He's over there nodding now.
Thank you.
It looks like our estimates on our bond now, the 23 bond,
that we're showing a little better situation in terms of under.
Right now, we.
About 21, at least right now, about 22 million.
Yes, sir.
It is there, but it is early on in a lot of those construction projects.
And a lot of them, you know, we're still going out in pricing.
And I wouldn't even comment.
I would rather have Ms. Gassman or Mr. Bierling probably comment on where that's at.
but yeah I wouldn't I wouldn't you know it always kind of starts out with that
and then as we spend down in those projects get sometimes overspent as
we're actually doing them so okay so don't book it okay when we obviously
we're not looking at spending that that has got to make sure that we get that
through and spend all of that on those are all of the projects that were
approved by the bond referendum need to be paid for before we could ever utilize
any of that understanding.
It's still good.
I mean, it's still good so far.
Yeah, it's great news.
We won't overspend anything,
but that is project savings
in which this board can use
if something comes over budget.
We'll be glad that we have that project savings
because we have to fulfill the promises
that we've made to the voters.
And assuming it's all said and done
or all the projects are let,
that will enable the board
to make one of two decisions,
not sell the bonds,
not sell the bonds because we don't need it,
reduce the next bond need or the next bond election or to do another project
like we've done before we use project savings to build an elementary school
okay thank you any other questions Thank You mr. Hines and we have now the author
7.2 Discuss and consider Board approval of the January 2025 budget amendments.
of the the motto for the budget Esperanza real director of budget and
treasury on the january 2025 budget amendments
welcome good evening board president perez
board of trustees and dr kakorsky tonight we bring forth budget
amendments which are all direct functional offsets
the functional offsets include staff development academic competitions and rf
id tags for cameras the approval of these amendments
will result in no impact to the general operating fund
We'll also bring forth a capital operating budget amendment, which will repurpose current
funding for the build out of the Merchants Way building as presented at the November
board meeting and approved at the December board meeting.
And this will result in no change to the capital projects fund balance.
Thank you.
Any questions?
Questions?
So since now we've finished the audit, I assume next month I guess we're going to have a budget
amendment related to that general fund being higher than anticipated?
The fund balance will change on years I was talking about?
Yes, the general fund balance.
Yes, it'll change once it gets approved, and then we'll make that in February.
You'll see that new fund balance change.
It looks like it's about $20 million higher.
Yes.
Huh?
Yes?
Yes.
Okay.
That's great.
So we start the year.
In a better position.
In a better position, yeah.
Great.
Thank you so much.
Thank you.
7.3 Discuss and consider Board approval of the annual financial audit report.
We're going to now discuss and consider Board approval of the Annual Financial Audit Report.
The presenter, Chris Smith, again, Chief Financial Officer.
And then we have Lupe Garcia with Whitley Penn, LLP.
Jamie Hines, again, Assistant Superintendent of Finance.
Kayla Smith, Executive Director of Accounting.
It looks like we have the 18 of them here.
All but me.
And I'm going to go ahead and start.
And first of all, yes, Mr. Edwards, I apologize.
I apologize. He was instrumental in it and I was just seeing what I saw. It's not smart enough to remember. I had to see. Education Code 44.008 requires us to get an annual audit and it be approved by the Board of Trustees.
We have an audit, one considerate could say it's ongoing because we work with our audit partners throughout the year.
They really dig in in June with our interim audit and they're here for a couple of weeks going over our internal controls and speaking with our staff and interviewing our staff members.
And then, of course, they come in the fall, November mainly, where they go through all our financial statements in which they're going to present to you tonight.
tonight. Representatives for our audit firm are Lupe Garcia, he's the partner, and Laura Lynch is our senior manager. And I didn't see Ms. Lynch here tonight, but I know Lupe Garcia is here, and I'm going to turn it over to Mr. Garcia.
Good evening, President Perez, members of the Board of Trustees, and Dr. Grigorski.
I'm here tonight to go through the financial statement audit results.
The financial statement highlights themselves, go through some financial required communications,
and the audit process, as was mentioned earlier, did begin several months ago.
The audit process began in the May-June timeframe where we focused on the district's internal
internal controls and compliance over the major federal programs.
It's at this time of the audit that we're interviewing several individuals in all the
various areas of the district that impact the district's financial statements.
We identify the major programs in the federal single audit and we perform the majority of
the compliance testing at that time.
Once the district's fiscal year ends in August, we return in November for year-end field work
where our financial procedures and auditing procedures are more financial in nature.
We're auditing the district's balances those reported in the annual comprehensive financial report and the transaction classes reported in the report
As well as confirming those balances with financial institutions
Directly, we're performing a variety of analytical procedures and other substantive procedures
to obtain enough audit evidence to support the opinion on the financial statements as
External auditors we can issue one of three opinions
A disclaimer would be an opinion presented in a situation either where the records didn't exist or were in such poor condition, no assurance could be given whatsoever.
A qualification is a type of modified opinion where everything in the district's financial statements are fairly stable except for the areas that we note in the report.
And then the best outcome in a financial statement audit is referred to as that unmodified opinion, and that's also referred to as a clean opinion.
So I'm happy to report that our opinion on the district's financial statements for the 2024 fiscal period is an unmodified opinion.
So that's at the beginning of the financial section of the annual comprehensive financial report.
What that indicates to the users of the financial statements is that the district's financial statements are following generally accepted accounting principles and that the financial statements and the note disclosures are fairly presented in all material respects.
We also issue a report on the district's internal controls over financial reporting and compliance to the financial statements. The majority of the audit procedures that we performed during interim is where we would identify matters that would sometimes rise to be in a material weakness or significant deficiency.
But our audit procedures not identify anything like that. So a clean report here as well. Nor did our audit procedures identify any material noncompliance to the financial statements.
And the third report we issue is related to the district's administration of its federal awards.
Every year, the district prepares a schedule of expenditures of federal awards, or what we call the SIFA.
That schedule is the basis for our major program determination.
There's federal guidelines related to how major programs are determined each and every fiscal year.
For fiscal year 2024, those major programs included the special education cluster, special education grants for infants and families with disabilities,
and then Title III Part A, which is your English language acquisition immigrant federal grants.
Each of these grants has its unique compliance requirements.
We tested the district's transactions in accordance with those compliance requirements.
No question costs, no noncompliance, no weaknesses or deficiencies that we identified as a result of the procedures that we performed in the federal single audit.
So good news here as well.
Within 30 days of issuing this report, the district has to submit and certify the results, as do we.
to the federal audit clearinghouse, and that's the first way that the Department of Education,
the Department of Agriculture, Health and Human Services become aware of how the district
performed both in the federal single audit and the financial statement audit.
Looking at the district's government-wide statement of net position, this is your balance
sheet. This is a snapshot on August 31st, 2024 of all the district's balances, your assets,
and your liabilities. The district's total assets and total deferred outflows of resources total
total $3.9 billion of that balance.
That's primarily comprised of your cash investments,
$881.8 million on that date.
And then all the district's capital assets,
your buildings, your construction in progress,
vehicles, furniture, and equipment,
netted depreciation used to provide services
to the district's students,
that totaled $2.6 billion.
On the other side of your balance sheet,
you have your liabilities
and your deferred inflows of resources.
That was $3.6 billion of that balance.
That's primarily your outstanding bonds payable that the district owes over 20 to 30 years,
$2.6 billion there, including your unamortized premiums.
And then you have two liabilities related to your participation in the teacher retirement
system of Texas, the pension liability and the other post-employment benefit liability,
which is related to retiree healthcare.
care. The net pension liability was $373.7 million and the net OPEB liability was $151.9 million.
Those liabilities represent KDISD's proportionate share of the statewide liability. Those are
measured each and every year by TRS and their auditors and actuaries. It's your responsibility
to take that information and report it in your financial statements. The difference between the
district's assets and liabilities and outflows and inflows totals $322 million at the end of
the fiscal year. Looking at the general fund revenues for fiscal year 2024, that comes up in
a few slides. So here, just to give you an idea of what the net pension liability has been over the
last five fiscal years, $373.7 million is the current net pension liability. That represents
73% of the overall funded ratio, which is in the pension world a healthy pension plan. You can see
that that funded ratio has been in the 70 mid 70s as high as 89 a couple of fiscal years but trs is
a well managed and administered pension plan keep these percentages in mind as we look now at the
retiree opeb liability the percentages are much less compared to the pension plan because the
retiree health care plan is a pay-as-you-go plan it's not designed to accumulate cash investments
investments over time to fund that benefit into the future. So that net OPEB liability and that
funded ratio is much less than the net pension liability. And here's the net OPEB liability with
the funded ratio. You can see it's at 15%, but still nowhere near the funded ratio of the net
pension liability. And that's just how the plan is designed. The general fund is the district's
main operating account for fiscal year 2024 the general fund reported 1 billion 33.1 million
dollars in revenues 52 percent of those revenues came from state funding followed by 38 percent in
property taxes so that's 90 percent of the general fund revenues six percent is other state funding
that's trs on behalf three percent and other local funding primarily investment income and one percent
represents federal funding that's reported in the general fund um and that rounds out your general
fund revenue sources so keeping these percentages in mind in particular property taxes and state
funding 52 and 38 i included in the presentation what these amounts were last year for fiscal year
2023 you can see there was a very significant change in the makeup of property tax revenue
and state funding and that was related to one the decrease in the tax rate due to tax compression
to there was the increase in the homestead exemption from $40,000 to $100,000. So yes,
the district experienced increase in tax values. You had an increase in enrollment and average
daily attendance did improve, but the homestead exemption and the decrease in the tax rate really
changed your revenue allocation in the general fund pretty drastically. So it went from, it was
a 12% swing for both property taxes and your state funding. Property taxes decreased by 12%,
state fund and increased by 12% in the general fund. Your expenditures for fiscal year 2024 were
$1,026,700,000. 68% of your general fund expenditures are related to instruction and
instruction related services. So that's functions 11, 12, and 13 in your budget. Student support
services, so those functions 31 through 36, that includes guidance counseling, student transportation,
that was 11% of your general fund budget,
followed by maintenance and operations at 8% of the budget.
Instructional school leadership,
or your campus-based leadership,
was 7% of the general fund budget.
Security, monitoring, and data processing,
that's functions 52 and 53, 3% of your budget.
General administration, 2% of the general fund budget,
1% for intergovernmental expenditures,
and all your other functional categories
represented 4.3 million,
which is less than 1% of your general fund budget.
So while your revenues change pretty drastically,
I included 2023, so you can compare those percentages
to 2024, and you can see they're virtually the same.
There was maybe one percentage change
between some of those categories, but for the most part,
it was very similar to how the district expended resources
in the previous fiscal year.
So what I included here, so you can benchmark yourself
against other large school districts in region four,
We have Aldine, Cypress, Fairbanks, Fort Bend, and Houston ISD.
All those school districts have June 30th year end, so their fiscal 2024 audited financial statements have already been made public.
So I wanted to compare school districts in the same region, same size, facing some of the same challenges to give you an idea of how KDISD compares to some of its peers here in the greater Houston area.
and I'll start with instruction and instruction related services by far the largest category of expenditures and a school districts financial statements
You can see that Katie compares pretty favorably compared to the other four school districts
Cyphair is that 69% Katie's at 68%
You can see all the import Bend and Houston are pretty behind both Katie and Cyphair
If you look at your administration and your operation
generation functional expenditures, instruction and school leadership, that's your campus-based
leadership, functions 21 and 23. KDISD, 7% compares very similarly to CyFair and the other districts
have a greater amount of campus-based leadership expenditures in the general fund budget. General
administration, that's everyone here centrally. Administration expenditures, 2% for KDISD. Again,
Again, that's very similar.
That's exactly what CyFair and Houston report, and Aldine and Fort Bend also report 3%.
Student support services, 11% for KDISD compared to its peers, 13% and 12% for Aldine and Fort Bend, and CyFair at 10% and 8%.
And you can see maintenance and operations is the last kind of large operational expenditure category, 8%, a low percentage compared to its peers.
CyFair is at 6%.
They're a much larger school district.
they can achieve some economies of scales there.
But you can see that Cypress Fairbanks, Fort Bend, Houston,
Katy there, and Aldine in maintenance and operations,
Katy fares favorably well.
So I think overall, looking at expenditures that impact students
in the classroom directly, Katy ISD fares looks favorable.
And if you look at both your campus and overall district-wide administration,
Katy fares favorably compared to its peers here and operations.
Now these functional categories, as mentioned earlier, all school districts have to report and use the same chart of accounts.
So the expenditures are comparable.
So you can, what's function 11 here is function 11 at Cyphair, is function 11 at Houston ISD, and so on, on down the chart of accounts.
So that is mandated by the state.
And so that makes this comparison valid.
You can do that.
So we're looking at school districts for the same fiscal year, same part of the state, same challenges.
I think this was a great slide to see how Katie compares to other large districts in the area.
The general fund budget to actual results revenues were greater than budgeted revenues by $5.2 million.
Your expenditures were less than budgeted expenditures by $15.5 million, so very close there for both revenues and expenditures.
The district does a great job of monitoring the budget each and every month throughout the fiscal year to ensure that they are on target.
revenues and other sources exceeded expenditures and other uses by 11.5 million. So fund balance
increased during the fiscal year by that amount for an ending fund balance of $364.3 million.
That balance gets broken up into a few different categories. You have non-spendable fund balance
amounts and prepaids and inventory, 3.4 million. You have amounts that are earmarked for particular
purposes by the district and management that's committed and assigned fund balance of 15.5
million and 71.7 million and then everything else gets reported as
unassigned fund balance of two hundred and seventy three point seven million
dollars that two hundred and seventy three point seven million dollars of
unassigned fund balance represents twenty six point seven percent of your
general fund expenditures and you can see that's the range that the district
has been in in each of the last five fiscal years the district has a goal of
maintaining at least 15 percent so you can see you're you're meeting that goal
and being consistent year to year in that general fund unassigned fund balance.
That is something that the district will get questioned about
when the credit rating agencies make their annual phone call.
They want to ask and inquire about the district's management of its fund balance
and ensuring that it has enough resources to carry forward into future fiscal periods.
There's two additional budget to actual schedules in the report.
The Nutrition and Food Service Fund revenues were greater than budgeted revenues by $1 million.
expenditures were less than your budgeted expenditures by $3.6 million.
Overall you had a plan decrease to fund balance and in this fund of $4.1 million
for an ending fund balance of $26.2 million. The debt service fund is a
district's fund for accounting for the interest in sinking portion of your
property tax rate for the repayment of principal and interest on the district's
bonds. Your revenues were greater than budgeted revenues by $400,000.
dollars expenditures were less than budgeted expenditures by a million dollars overall a
slight decrease in fund balance there of one hundred thousand dollars for an ending fund balance
of 64.5 million this is the fund balance on august 31st 2024 the district's next debt service payment
is made in february so this fund balance along with property tax collections being made in
december and january is what it uses to make the february 2025 debt service payment
As part of the audit, we do review the district's accounting policies and we found that the district is using all current pronouncements for fiscal year 2024.
There weren't any new pronouncements that the district had to implement for the preparation of this annual comprehensive financial report.
The financial statements do include estimates. Some of the more significant estimates include anything related to state funding, your allowances for your uncollectible receivables based on historical collections.
and then the amounts related to pension and retiree health care of course are
the largest estimates by far in the financial statements so we've deemed
that management has recorded those appropriately and in accordance with
generally accepted accounting principles now every financial statement audit of
any entity includes the risks that management can override internal
controls so as external auditors of your financial statements we do have to
perform procedures to address that risk to ensure that while you have
established policies and procedures and business practices. We do look to see if
there's evidence that management has decided to do something else, especially
when it comes to the recording of transactions in the general ledger and
the preparation of this report. While the district is not, well while the district
doesn't have a profit motive per se, there is always the risk that revenue
could be recorded in the incorrect fiscal period. We perform procedures over
your significant revenue sources, property taxes, state aid, your grant
revenues to ensure they're being recognized in the correct fiscal year. As far, we didn't encounter
any difficulties in performing and completing the audits. I'd like to thank everyone sitting
to my left and the district and all the departments involved because there is a tremendous amount of
information we request throughout the audit since last May in order to get to this point of issuing
this report. So I appreciate the district and their cooperation and their patience throughout
throughout the entire audit process.
No misstatements that we identified
as a result of our audit procedures.
No disagreements with management
when it comes to the reporting of any estimates
or the application of any accounting pronouncements.
We do obtain a letter from management.
We call it a management representation letter.
That letter ensures that nothing's been withheld,
information we've requested has been provided,
nothing's occurred since field work
that might need to be recorded or disclosed
in these financial statements.
statements, no consultations with any other auditors or accountants that we're aware of
to report to you.
And the last bullet, during the year, we may answer questions, provide guidance and resources
to the district related to financial reporting and accounting and auditing matters, but at
no time do we feel the way we answer or the position we take is a condition to our retention
as the district's auditors.
So that concludes my remarks on the audit, the audit results, the financial statement
highlights and I went through the required communications.
If you all have any questions about the financial statements or the audit or the federal single
audit, I'd be happy to take those questions at this time.
Thank you.
Thank you so much.
Congratulations for getting this behind you and congratulations for the results and getting
getting this mammoth undertaking every year to, you know, behind you.
So any questions, trustees?
Mr. President?
Ms. Grisella?
Yeah, excellent report.
Very small, tiny question, but important.
There's a federal funding amount.
It may be more for Mr. Smith, but why is it 11.5 only?
I thought it was more.
Am I missing something?
It says what, 11.5?
Federal funding was 11.5 on slide 10 for me.
So that's the federal funding that's actually recorded in your general fund,
but the majority of your federal funding is recorded in your special revenue fund.
So Title I, special education, child nutrition.
It's outside of this.
It's outside of the general fund.
It's more double that, I think.
Okay.
Yes, it's much more than that.
That would probably explain it.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Anything else from anyone?
I'm just very impressed with Ms. Smith.
Thank you for creating the annual comprehensive financial report for our district. I appreciate it. I
Would just like to say miss gazelle you could on page 111 of the actual
183 page document
Liz describes a definition of about 24 funds that has the federal funds and then following that schedule
Exhibit j1 would have the monetary amounts of those funds
that
that are the federal funds that are not part of the general fund.
Thank you.
What page was that again?
It was page 111.
Thank you.
And then I would just like to thank the board and the superintendent.
Well, let me back up and say I'd like to thank Mr. Garcia, Ms. Lynch,
and Whitley Penn for their partnership and their thoroughness through this audit,
but also the superintendent and the board for their setting our high expectations
for management here.
here. Budget managers, grant managers, program managers such as food service,
Nikia Koi, they have a big part in this. They're not sitting at this table but
they do a fantastic job all year. And then we're not done with this report by
any means tonight. We will be signing the report to submit to GFOA and ASBO
for the award but we will also be putting this data in a digital format
through PEMS and submitting that to TEA by the end of the month. This report gets
uploaded to PEMS as well as electronically and that's what creates
the comparisons in which we can all use that data to try to get an apples and
apples look of what might be happening in the panhandle at a district and
compared to us or in the valley compared to us. Since we all use the same
account structure prescribed through TEA you get apples and apples of that so
So that's PEMS.
And then that data is also used in the Schools First report, which you'll hear us present in the latter part of October, early November, where we discuss Schools First.
That data that we're going to be sending to them is how TEA gets it.
They also put it on their website for transparency reasons.
We put this stuff on our website for transparency reasons.
And we'll be submitting this to the Federal Clearinghouse, the Municipal Advisory Council of Texas.
and a few other agencies in which we're required to upload this data,
and we will be doing that in the next couple of weeks.
And, again, Ms. Smith, Noken Smith, and her staff have done a fantastic job on this,
and I appreciate their efforts.
Thank you.
You know, it's gratifying.
I see that the unassigned general fund balance, even though over the years our expenses have gone up,
the general fund expenditures have gone up.
Our unassigned general fund balance has gone down
maybe like by three-quarters of 1%, something like that.
So it's really pretty flat.
And so that's really gratifying to see that staying so solid.
But thank you so much.
Mr. Kessler, may I please say something?
I saw something in your report, the big, huge thing,
that last year we got the Certificate of Achievement
for Excellence in Financial Reporting.
and so I'm assuming we'll get that again this year and how many years in a row
have had Katie I see received that award I'm not sure the exact number off the
top my head it says in that report I should know it but it's longer than
mrs. no Ken Smith has been alive really no pressure on her but since before she
she was born I think it's 40 years but that that's a long time and I really I'm
really so grateful to this district for the education that my children received
in the way that your team and the teams before I guess have maintained this
reputation Katie ISD mr. president so much mr. president Fox thank you for the
presentation how many pages is that report mr smith 133 183 183 it changes every year it's 182.
182 pages what a mammoth task but no stone left unturned every detail in explicit detail
to make sure that kdsd maintains its stellar reputation on how
we, he, them manage our finances that the taxpayers have so willingly given to us and
entrusted to us.
to us. KDSD's incredible reputation has a great deal to do with the financial security and trust
they place in an award-winning department year after year after year, decades. And
I especially love the bar graph. I love a bar graph. It gives that thing of how we compare
with other districts right I just love to see that visual of money to the
classroom money to instruction compared to administrative money when the general
people perspective is for every school district oh you know top-heavy you know
so many administrators and when you see it in a in a picture this to this is
just I think of just a reinforcement again of
What's happening in our classrooms every day and the success of KDSD is because we manage our finances
So well that when times get tough we give raises we went from 88 to 89 percent in salary and
payroll payroll
Because that's what matters our teachers and our students is what matter and then we skim and trim and cut and squeeze
squeeze every other dollar in order to deliver, you know, what's world-class teachers, world-class
instruction for our students. And you just, 183 pages just keeps reinforcing all of that. And I'm
just very, very grateful. Like Mrs. Champagne said, our children benefited, many do. And
I'm just feeling super grateful. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. And thank you
For the audit, thank you for the team really appreciate it
Great job, and we're about to start the Lisa Kastman show coming up
We have like
Like a hundred items that's all 11 11 11 items
These are Kastman executive director facilities planning construction
7.4 Discuss and consider Board approval of a contract renewal for the land and real estate consulting services.
Do you want to walk us through the first one, 7.4, discuss and consider board approval of
a contract renewal for the land and real estate consulting services?
Yeah, once again, it's a renewal of the contract for consolidated properties.
Same contract as last year.
And as you all have witnessed, their services are very extensive, not just only procuring
land, but helping us with the infrastructure as well.
Any questions?
Okay.
Do you want to move on to 7.5?
and this is the contract for design services necessary for the auto program
expansion the Miller Career and Technology Center yes so recommending
a Stantec architecture they've worked on the Miller campus before and then per
the bond it's an additional classroom to support the automotive technology
program at the Miller Career Center and once again they're very familiar with
with our program any questions on 7.5
7.5 Discuss and consider Board approval to award a contract for design services necessary for the auto program expansion at Miller Career and Technology Center.
we're gonna go ahead and move on to 7.6 which is this is considered board
7.6 Discuss and consider Board approval to award a contract for design services necessary for the construction of Junior High School #19.
approval to award a contract for design services necessary for the construction
of junior high number 19 okay this is we're recommending PBK this is a more
more than a modified repeat of the last two junior highs.
We're looking to increase the capacity from 1,400 to 1,600
on the property in Grange that we recently brought.
I'm bringing them as the architect this month
because when I brought the other architects in January,
we had not purchased the land yet.
This is gonna be approximately a 10-classroom addition
to that facility.
and this for design correct uh by pbk and i have representatives from pb care in the audience
tonight as well mr president uh miss fox i don't have a question i just get asked this question
all the time where in the world are y'all building new schools so this is morton road and schliff
road it's just unbelievable that we're that far north and east north and west in our district and
i've even heard mrs calhoun talk about you know growing up here and and being around that area
morton and schliff is junior high 19. people are going to ask
So this junior high 19 is a bigger footprint? Correct. From what we've been building in the past?
That is correct. We're doing that with the elementaries too right? Yes that is correct.
From a thousand to for for elementaries? 1236 that thousand thirty to twelve thirty six.
And then on the junior highs? From 1400 to 1600. Okay. Mr. Perez if I may a couple of things.
Mr. Verling.
One thing that always comes up is that what are we going to do about portables?
We got that question in the bond committee.
We get that question at Leadership Katy.
We get that question at Teacher Leadership Forum.
I get that question from random people.
So that really, that's kind of the crux of why you're seeing us do this.
What we found is, especially in the newer part of the district, there is some slow growth
growth as Mr. Smith spoke about in some of our existing homes and some of our older communities,
but the northwest part of the district is still growing like crazy. And what we found is we can't
even get schools on the ground fast enough. So when we build these schools a little bit bigger,
it buys us a little more time. It allows us a little more time before we need to go back to
the taxpayers for bonds and things like that. And hopefully it gets kids in the building and
keeps them out of portables. And so that's kind of what you're seeing. All these renovations at
these junior highs that we're doing we're adding 10 classroom additions the
Katie junior high Beck junior high and and then McDonald junior high in the
previous bond so it's sort of in line kind of with what we're doing I will say
when when miss Cassman comes back to the board with a contract for this school it
is probably going to be a little more expensive PBK did some work on because
you had more kids you've got to expand the cafeteria and places like that so in
in terms of why we don't spend a bunch of bond savings right away,
that kind of is the thinking there.
So you'll see that coming up.
I wasn't saying spend it.
Sir?
I wasn't saying spend it.
Only when it's absolutely necessary.
So the $69 million, you're thinking it may be higher than that?
Around that number.
Around that number, okay.
And when I saw, I know it says 2023 bond,
when I saw the open the fall of 2028 this is still with 23 free money correct
sign anticipating a new bond yeah this is part of the 2023 bond we have funds
for that okay it's the last project okay school any other questions mr. president
steamy okay so we're going up about 200 in the elementary and then about 200 in
the junior highs if we do it another high school would y'all I mean Freeman
is the same footprint right so what about the high school what would you so
the high school high schools as a former high school principal high schools give
you a little more flexibility in terms of what you can do with classrooms and
floating and things like that we're not what teachers want to know that's not
what teachers want to hear although from the guy who floated for four years so
coach turn bow could come and teach health in his classroom I can tell you I
I lived it.
For the high school, we're a ways away.
So we'll do some talking before that ever comes up.
High school 11s.
Coaches are great teachers, by the way.
What's that?
Coaches are great teachers.
Yes, sir.
Coach Turnbow's a good dude.
Absolutely.
So we're a ways off on that.
So we move on to 7.7, which is the expansion of the Shaw Center.
7.7 Discuss and consider Board approval of a contract to the expansion of the Shaw Center.
So we're recommending Rava Construction for the renovations
and the additions at the Shaw Center.
on the Rava construction they're actually the former pepper loss and
people and they've done a lot of work for us in the district in the past they
ranked out number one through our CSP process any questions on the Shaw Center
mr. president this Fox I was gonna ask about Rava because I haven't heard from
them is that a buyout kind of thing pepper Lawson or just a spin-off or it's
kind of historical thing pepper Lawson was pepper companies out of Chicago then
they were bought by weber and then they broke apart because uh from what i understand whoever
wasn't in the k-12 business and this group had been doing k-12 for a long time so they're still
around and they have a long history of k-12 and the shaw center is very specific so you feel
comfortable with them doing this work yes they've done actually work at miller for us in the last
two bonds ago so they're familiar with the site okay because the people who built shaw is not
that's not who this is that was the Jamala tick the same architect but
Jamala was the contract I see got it thanks mr. president I have a question
about the Shaw Center go ahead I wanted to confirm we're not building extra
parking out of this is not included and this correct like the parking that's
there we're not going to be able to expand that or anything and I know the
parking is an issue there as well as at Miller just because of the proximity to
one another but that is not including a parking space that's correct but under another contract
with kimley horn a traffic engineer i hired them they came out in the fall and they've done
observations with stadium traffic and they've also observed miller oac and shaw so we're going to be
reconvening again here in the spring and getting some recommendations from them okay all right
thank you okay mr president uh miss gizella thank you um thank you very much could you speak to the
the Builders United cost number being lower but ranking low?
So their cost figure is roughly $500,000 less.
Can you speak to why they ranked low?
That's part of our rubric when you go through experience in the area.
And if you look at the other numbers, we kind of look at that.
Everybody else is closely grouped together in their bids,
and they're kind of out there.
That builder is new to the Houston area.
area. They used to different delivery methods where they came from in Nevada, but I would
be happy to share the rubric to go through how they scored with everybody.
Okay. I ask for myself, but also for the public who may be paying attention and listening
as well. So, thank you.
And I've reached out to that company and to talk with them about the process so they
understand.
That's great. Were they receptive to meeting with you and getting to know each other better?
Yes, they were very much so. Yeah, no, they were very receptive.
Okay.
7.8 Discuss and consider Board approval of a contract for the safety and security improvements at various campuses.
Thank you. We'll go ahead and move on to 7.8, which is for the safety and security improvements at various campuses.
Yes, so we're recommending Acme Architectural.
They were the only company that bid on all three facilities, and they actually had the better number for all three when you look at the other two.
They've done a lot of work for the school district, and this is going to be an updated intrusion alarm at the Ag Center, Fielder, and then May Creek High School.
May Creek High School is probably the biggest part of the whole project.
Okay.
And that project did come in under budget as well.
ACME.
You think they're going to come up with a better name?
Can it have a road run?
That reminds me, yes.
The dynamite in the Roadrunner always came from ACME.
You're showing your age.
Okay.
Mr. President.
7.9.
Can I ask a couple of questions on this?
Okay.
Please.
I'm sorry.
Why only one bidder?
That always bugs me to no end.
Why do we only have one bidder on this?
Just scope of the work. It's just kind of the scope of the work. I mean is that
Expected or sometimes it is we've had it in the past some previous kitchen projects
We've only had one bidder on we'll go out again and just kind of depends on the market
This is kind of very specific with intrusion and access control. So it's not like a big general contractor market
More like really hardware, right? A lot of it is hard to relate especially make three
five to three hardware.
Okay.
The more bidders, the more competition, the better price usually.
So that's why I asked.
We did come in under budget, almost $200,000.
Sure, which is good, which is good.
And I was reading there's about $300,000 to cover something, some costs.
Contingencies, yeah.
Where is that coming from again?
Well, that's part of the whole project.
So that includes the architect fees.
And then also just contingency.
When you go into a building, especially like May Creek High School,
you start getting into the door hardware, into the walls.
You don't know what you're gonna find so this gives us the that extra money whatever we don't use will obviously be turned back
But this way we don't have to come back to the board in the middle of the project. Okay, I'm sorry
That's part of the expenditure overall correct. You're just saying that portion of it is for this correct. Okay. Thank you
7.9 Discuss and consider Board approval of Amendment One to the Stewart Builders, LLC contract related to the renovations at Cimarron Elementary School and Nottingham Country Elementary School.
Thank you. Well, I move on to 7.9, which is
Amendment number one the Stuart builders contract related to the renovations of Cimarron
School and Nottingham Country Elementary School
Yes, so at Cimarron we're going to have just the front office and library at Nottingham
as well as the front office.
And also at Nottingham we're incorporating some maintenance projects, the roof, the fire
alarm, intercom and a boiler just to kind of, we're not disrupting the campus more than
one time.
I thought the Cimarron, like the reception area was already in process.
No?
We're just doing it now?
now it was done about five years ago but the new safety and security measures
were fine-tuning it okay any questions on 7.9 710 is going to go ahead it's
7.10 Discuss and consider Board approval of Amendment One to the Anslow Bryant Construction, LTD. contract related to the renovation at Katy Junior High School.
related to the amendment number one to the Ansel O'Brien construction contract
related to the renovation of Katie junior high school so this will be
amendment number one so we can procure materials earlier mechanical and electrical and we'll be
coming back in february with the total project class which will include amendment one and that
second amendment but this will give us an opportunity to order materials like front end
loaded stuff yeah like hvac equipment switch gear things are long lead items okay that we get in the
queue any questions on this uh 7-eleven electrical easement through centerpoint energy houston
7.11 Discuss and consider Board approval of a blanket electrical easement to CenterPoint Energy Houston Electric, LLC associated with the construction of the Northwest Transportation Center.
and electric associated with the construction of the northwest transportation channel so this is
the standard blanket electrical easement um it's not attached to your board item this evening
because we just received it this afternoon from center point but it'll be in your packet for
monday to sign but uh they um this gives permission for them to go out and we stake
the transformer and the lines and everything okay um anything on that uh we'll move on to 712 which
7.12 Discuss and consider Board approval of Amendment Two to the Stewart Builders, LLC. contract related to the comprehensive renovations at Katy High School.
which is comprehensive renovations.
So this is amendment number two,
comprehensive renovations at Katy High School.
Yes, this is the amendment number two
and the final total cost to GMP for the band hall
and the original V-hall that was built in 1972.
And we already approved amendment number one,
like for about 500,000.
Correct.
Anything, any questions?
7.13 Discuss and consider Board approval of the delivery method updates for various infrastructure projects in the 2023 Bond.
713 is discussed and considered board approval
approval of the delivery method updates for various infrastructure projects in the 2023 bond
so in December when I brought the list of projects and delivery methods the scope of work was not
defined for Cimarron West Memorial or Maid Creek but since then we've defined that scope Cimarron
and May Creek were identified in the 2023 project sheets West Memorial that parking was added when
the bilingual program stayed at that campus we need to provide more parking and all that work
will take place this summer so this is pretty easy work as far as paving and
paving your parking lot well it's gonna have drainage involved as well too so
that's probably the hardest part is the drainage drainage yeah okay we move on
to 714 discuss it consider board option of the order calling for a which is not
7.14 Discuss and consider Board adoption of the Order calling for a regular election of the School Board Trustees to be held on May 3, 2025 and authorization of the Administration to provide official notice of the election as required by the Texas Election Code.
not let's hear something I'd like to recognize my three project managers here
this evening art Campbell in the back Megan Irving and Casey double D they're
gonna make all this work happen thank you so much all right thank you and now
And now we have presenter is Alaina Smith,
Deputy General Counsel, to discuss and consider
board adoption of the order calling for a regular election
of the school board of trustees to be held on May 3rd, 2025
and authorization of the administration
to provide official notice of the election
as required by the Texas Election Committee.
Welcome.
President Perez, Board of Trustees, Dr. Gorgorski,
this is the time of year that we call for an election.
As you know, position one and position two
are up for election in our regular election come may everything in the order is the same as what
was approved for last year's election and i see uh ellen abe is with you also welcome thank you
any questions on 714. i just would like to make a statement please um
miss elena smith is also not related to chris smith or kayla smith
That is correct.
Lots of Smiths here tonight.
It's good to see you here.
Thank you.
Mr. President.
Ms. Costello.
I have a question.
Is there a reasoning?
So to be clear, for county elections outside of our school district,
a voter can choose to vote in any precinct on election day.
That's Fort Bend County and Harris County are two huge counties, right?
Right. So for KDISD, our district election here that you're presenting on Election Day, is there a reason why we make the voter vote in their precinct?
So I'm filling in for Mr. Graham. I apologize.
And so he'll be back in later this week and he will make sure we get you an answer on that.
I would request of him to find a way to let the voter.
I realize we've got to open up more polls on Election Day, and I think that might be driven by the state
I'm not exactly sure but I want the voter to be able to vote at any of our polls
Versus having to vote in the precinct, which is not the way they vote for County elections
I'm sure when mr. Graham gets back in the office this week. We will get you an answer prior to
Monday's meeting that'd be great. Thank you. Oh Tuesday. Oh Tuesday. That's correct Tuesday's meeting
Well, thank you. Thank you so much
7.15 Discuss and consider future Board approval of the 2026-2027 Instructional Calendar.
Discuss and consider Board approval of the 2026-2027 Instructional Calendar and we have Sherry Ashorn, Director of Student Affairs and Dr. Andrea Gruen, Chief Communications Officer.
Normally we see Ms. Ashorn for the Discipline Management Plan and other policies.
Good evening. Yes, I'm off discipline duty today, just calendars. And although we are in 2025, it's hard to believe we're going to be planning ahead to 2027.
So before Dr. Grooms presents the instructional calendar feedback survey, just a little bit of a reminder.
Two options are generally presented. One we call our District of Innovation calendar that allows us to start before the third Monday in August.
And our second option is a more traditional fourth Monday start date.
And so we try to make those as similar as possible in terms of professional development
provided and holidays because we don't want our staff, families, or students to have to
choose between days off or breaks.
So what you'll notice in those two calendar options is you'll have one with the start
date of August 12th, one with the start date of August 24th, and the same number of instructional
days so that students are having the same amount of seat time no matter which
calendar is selected so I'll go ahead and let dr. grooms present those survey
results and then if you have any questions I'm happy to answer okay and
the outcomes of the instructional calendar survey were pretty
straightforward we had 16 and 16,000 individuals participate where we had
about 56 percent of those 16,000 being parents get to that slide and 24%
representing staff and together they overwhelmingly supported option a which
you just heard as the recommendation option a option a that's correct so
that option a is that district of innovation calendar it allows us to
start a little bit earlier in August but gives us that finish before the Memorial
Day weekend which does accommodate all of our growing list of graduations for
all of our amazing high schools so if you have any questions about the calendar i'm happy to try to
answer at this time is this is option a in keeping with how we have this year yes it's consistent
with this year it is consistent with this year the only difference you're going to notice is the
number of flex days allowed for staff members has been reduced you're going to see two agenda items
from now that we'll be asking you to modify the 25 26 school year tea provided in their
their student attendance and attendance accounting handbook
that flex days where staff are not there,
present for professional development,
cannot be used for those waiver minutes.
So we definitely wanna align to their vision of that.
So we are reducing the amount of flex days to one flex day.
So this year they had more.
However, we still wanna provide that opportunity to them
so they'll have that chance
before the first day of school starts.
We do see the benefit in rewarding teachers who are, you know, participating in that professional development during the summer.
We wanted to keep that up.
But those flex days that occur from the first day of school to the last day of school will just be true professional development days,
which does provide principals with more seat time with their staff to educate, work on any development needs that they have.
So did I hear you say that, for example, if they take professional development in the summer,
they can no longer use it in the school year, during the school year, if it has, if it's before
the beginning of school? So the problem is with the waiver minutes. So we can only achieve
waiver minutes between the first day of school and the last day of school, during that professional
development waiver so because those days are kind of blocked off you know not to
use flex days for that the only flex day that's going to be available for the 26
27 school year and a recommended modification for next year as well will
be that first contract date that teachers come back so I'm for example on
option aim it would be July 31st so if you are a returning teacher and you've
done professional development you don't have to come in to work that Friday I'm
July 31st and then you will start on August Monday August 3rd with the rest
of the staff so the only change is no middle of the year flex days okay mr.
president mr. price walks teachers will hate that the July 31st is when they
want to be there and be prepared for their school to their classrooms and get
it ready so but that's a state decision yes the tea attendance i want to tell you the correct
wording exactly the student attendance accounting handbook was released in september of 2024 so
after our school year started and it says that exchange or trade days for professional development
that staff receive on their own time may not be counted towards the waiver minutes allotted for
staff development and we certainly want to maximize those staff development minutes because
it gives us that bank of time that we use whenever there's bad weather how is
that how is that different for teachers what do they have now that they're not
going to have next year they have flex days I think they have two flex days now
and now they're gonna go down to one on July 31st which is like the first year
that we introduced the flex day option it was that very first day upon
returning it extended their summer break just a little bit so that everyone could
start together and then if you were a new employee or a new teacher and didn't
have that opportunity it gave you a good chance to get acclimated with your
campus before staff returned I'm very sad that the state has decided to do
that because our teachers work incredibly hard even when they're not
getting paid during the summer getting all of that done that flex day on July
31st they're gonna be very busy preparing for students and being excited
about them coming and being prepared for them and so to take a flex day when they
need one mental health day maybe something during the year I mean for
heaven's sakes we don't we don't pay them well why don't we gift them an
opportunity to use a transfer day oh it makes me so unhappy and I know they will
be unhappy but it is not a school board decision it's not a KD ISD decision one
one more question if I may when we have let me remember instructional coaches
something about instructional coaches that have five extra days and they can
take those days during the year something like that does that five flex
days during the year if they tell about it soon enough does that apply to them
I'm not going to be able to comment on that I can go ahead and answer it it
wouldn't apply to them because that's not taking away the instructional
minutes the school day is still operating and so we're still having
those instructional minutes and professional days with teachers my
understanding is is taken primarily by principals talking at them is that as
you understand it I think there's a variety of methods used for professional
development our school leadership and support team could probably speak a
little more specifically to that mm-hmm it's yeah the professional development
is is is it more of a campus-led thing dr. Berg or ski where it's I don't know
they just they what they say to me is we get talked at by the principal all day
when there are so many things we could be doing to prepare lessons and things
like that well I couldn't comment on what's happening on every 77 campuses
every professional learning day. There are days designed as district days with
district-led initiatives for certain professional learning, but we give a lot
of autonomy to our principals that on those campus days those should be
designed for campus-led initiatives. Those should be initiatives related to
either district initiatives or campus-based initiative based on their
strategic plan and we ask the instructional leader of that campus, the
principal to design that as miss ash horn said there's a variety of methods
to design professional learning but if if teachers have concerns about their
professional learning guess who they should talk to their principal thank you
anything else I have a question I do too after her oh I'm sorry okay right miss
champagne so on that on that flex say that they're gonna be losing is that
just for professional a professional day or is that to maintain the minutes that
the children are required to have teaching so we're required to have 75,600
minutes so I have a beautiful spreadsheet that adds all of these
numbers together for each regular instructional day early release days and
any days or waivers we have for professional development so the reason
for the flex day being removed as an option is because we are requesting
waiver minutes for that professional development we're saying we're providing
providing PD on that day for our staff.
And in exchange, TA is gonna give us the same minutes
as if the students were in the seat, up to 2100 minutes.
So in order to still receive those minutes
for that flexibility down the road,
we wanna make sure that we're in alignment.
So it might not be as bleak as it sounds,
but I guess we'll just have to wait
and see how that turns out.
I appreciate your, I don't know who had the creative
about them to figure out the trading and all that so that we can make that work
anything else yeah mr. president I am proud to say I was one of the 16,000 who
took the survey because I do have to get enrolled so thank you very much and I
noticed I was paying a little more attention to you know we have option a
which is basically what we do today and then we had option B which is much
later in August why don't we have a third option apologize for that that
other week in August so so not the week of August 10th but the week of August
17th
Why don't we ever tease that out?
I think one of the goals that we established when we meet with KIC and just some feedback that we've heard from previous surveys is that students and parents really like the option to end before that Memorial Day weekend.
So, excuse me, so I was looking, though, we end in May 20th, right, with option A, which is what we do today.
Yes, next year is going to be.
Or 21st.
Right.
Okay.
Okay, but we could, I'm just very quick looking at the calendar.
Let's say we started on August 19th, and I would just move that end day to then May 28th,
which is right before Memorial Day weekend.
Right, it would be an anomaly, I think, for this 26-27 year because of the way that May is structured.
Memorial Day is very late on that May 31st.
So we almost never have, I don't think, that largest break of a time, if I'm remembering correctly.
So I think because of the way that the Mondays fall in the year, it pulls a little bit later.
So that wasn't an option we suggested for this year, just because that's not something
that I think we're normally able to do based on the timeline.
But that's certainly some feedback we can take for the future to add an option if we
feel like there's some creativity there.
MS.
It seems like the goals are still met.
We're still starting school in mid-August and we're finishing before June.
with another option, is all I'm saying.
I was just curious why it wasn't offered.
We can certainly put that in our notes
and look at that for next year.
Okay, thanks.
Would it impact the end of the semester in December
if we started a week later?
Well, so we've heard feedback consistently
that we do not want to end the semester in January.
We want it to remain ending in December.
And so the closest that we can balance
both the fall and the spring semesters
is obviously always a priority.
And so we do look at that one, especially when we talk to KIC as well.
We talk about one of our goals is always to balance semesters as good as possible, especially
with our high school courses.
We want them to have an equal opportunity to learn all of that heavy curriculum.
Maybe that's a reason why?
It could be.
I mean, it's one of many pieces in this very crazy puzzle that has to do with days, but
also minutes and professional development.
Mr. President, I would just like to add something.
So I appreciate that because I do, I remember seeing something like that when you add a
week it would make the finals be after Christmas and when I was a kid my finals were after
Christmas in my high school and it was terrible because then you have to study on your Christmas
break.
High school kids don't want to have to do that so.
Definitely not.
Thank you. Let's move on to... So the next item after that is just your
7.16 Discuss and consider future Board approval of a Professional Development Waiver for the 2026-2027 instructional calendar.
approval will be requested next week for the professional development waiver in
order for us to get those 2100 minutes that our campus teams are providing
professional development for. That will be a board item that will ask you to
approve. Standard process 21 minutes is the amount of time for five school days.
So any questions on that?
Questions on that?
Okay.
And then the last piece is just looking forward to not two years ahead, but one year ahead.
7.17 Discuss and consider future Board amendment of the 2025-2026 Instructional Calendar.
In order to align with that attendance accounting handbook, we are looking to modify next year's calendar.
And so we've provided you with a removal of those internal flex days that were between the first day of school and the last day of school
and just modified those just to true original professional development
with their campus principals and their teams
and retained a campus flex day on that first Friday back,
so that Friday, August 1st.
So if you're returning, you'll get one more Friday off,
and otherwise campuses will have their complete staff on Monday, August 4th.
Questions?
Okay, we move on then to...
718.
Mr. President, I do have a question for Ms. Ashhorn.
I'm sorry. When you talk about the professional
development days, I'm not looking at the calendar, I apologize. Are most of those
front end loaded where you really get a lot of benefit from them while
students are there or are they near the end of the school year or do you know?
Yeah, they're sprinkled out throughout the school year. I want to remind you that traditionally
if we've had enough minutes and no bad weather,
the professional development that's after that Easter weekend
is usually one that's provided as a staff holiday.
So we kind of don't count the late one
because if everything goes well,
the board has been generous
in giving that holiday in the past.
But it does allow campuses to not only front load
during those contract days before the first day of school,
but then they can layer on
additional professional development,
touch up on some things that maybe there's confusion on.
You know if there's an update from a department that goes out, you know
They might they might need to share with their staff
It gives those little pockets of opportunities to recalibrate throughout the school year. I would think up until spring break
They'd be very well used between spring break and into school
I don't know yet the only one between spring break and the end of school. Is that after Easter Easter Monday? Okay, good
Thank you. Thank you
Thank you.
Dr. Sinebell, assistant superintendent teaching and learning to discuss and consider board
7.18 Discuss and consider Board approval for a TEA waiver request to the Texas Virtual School Network (TxVSN) course review process.
approval for a TEA waiver request to the Texas Virtual School Network course review process.
Good evening President Perez, board members and Dr. Gagorski.
I'm here this evening to request board approval for a TEA waiver to be submitted to the Texas
Texas Virtual School Network, also referred to as TXVSN, which will allow the district
to certify that KDISD virtual courses meet Texas VSN core standards.
TEA administers the Texas VSN.
They also set the standards for and approve Texas VSN courses.
The courses we are submitting for review to Texas VSN are CTE computer science courses.
By offering these courses to students through Texas VSN, the district can collect CTE weighted
funding for all CTE courses offered through Texas VSN, which is currently not available
for online CTE courses offered through our Katy Virtual School.
So right now any CTE course that we have that we offer through KVS, we are not able to receive
weighted funding for.
Texas VSN allows two options for course certification.
One option is for a district to submit the courses for review to Quality Matters,
which is an organization committed to promoting and ensuring quality online and blended courses.
This organization can certify the district's virtual courses,
certify that the district's virtual courses meet Texas VSN course standards.
There is a fee associated with submitting courses for review when submitting to Quality
Matters.
This option is usually selected by vendors.
The second option, which is the option we are requesting the Board to approve, is to
submit a TEA waiver that allows the district to certify that the courses being submitted
for review meet TXVSN course standards.
Our courses would be identified as provider certified, so we would self-certify.
We have several members of our instructional technology team, Ms. Richards here has joined me,
who are certified Quality Matters course reviewers.
So we feel that we have the knowledge and the skills to certify our own courses.
The Texas VSN course standards are the Quality Matters course standards,
providers and most school districts, they use this waiver method to get their courses
approved. Just to note, there are 11 Texas VSM providers. Nine of those are school districts.
One is a regional service center and one is a university. I'm happy to answer any questions.
Also, if Ms. Richards here from Instructional Technology that can answer any questions at
this time.
So this is we will provide we'll be providing this to non-KDICD kids to take
to take the courses virtual. So for right now we can make a little bit of
money on it. Correct but for right now we are focusing on getting the courses
through for our students so we can we can receive the weighted funding but we
also then have the option to be a provider to students outside of the
district okay okay thank you any questions i have a question i'm i'm not well versed on this so i
apologize uh if this is out there so these courses um are developed by us or these are courses we're
we're purchasing to be online for our students?
These courses are developed by us in KDISD by our teachers, taught by our teachers.
And so this will give us the opportunity to,
now they'll be available to multiple people outside of the district.
But the biggest thing is we'll be able to get that weighted funding,
which is really important.
And we have a lot of students who take our computer science courses.
They take them now.
And so this just gives us the opportunity to collect that weighted funding for those courses
That gives me great confidence knowing that our instructors will be providing it virtually and I really like how this aligns with goal 5
That KDSD will provide best-in-class
Technology to educate and inform all stakeholders. I really appreciate how that ties into our goal 5 and and
Sounds like a great idea. So we're looking for a waiver from the state
Yes, we, this is what we're asking your approval to approve the waiver that we are going to apply to self-certify our courses.
We feel very confident in our team.
And so once that waiver is approved, then we'll be able to offer those courses.
You feel pretty confident it'll be approved?
A hundred percent.
That's pretty confident.
Yeah, pretty much.
You said computer science.
Can you give me some other examples of some of the courses?
The four that we're going to offer next year would be Computer Science 2 CAP, Computer Science 1, AP Computer Science Principles, and AP Computer Science A.
And we're currently offering all those courses right now through Katy Virtual School.
So Computer Science 1, what grade would that be?
What grade could that be?
All the computer science courses are open to students, grades 9 through 12.
It's depending on the prerequisites.
So the prereqs, if you meet the prereqs, you're able to take those courses.
Just one more question.
This may not be on this topic, but do we offer coding classes?
Well, in the computer science course, it includes coding.
So computer science one is intro to coding is part of that course.
So they're learning the languages of coding in all these courses.
And what I was going to say also, we have lots of different opportunities for students to engage in coding.
And you may be able to speak to some of these, some of the programs that aren't necessarily courses,
but definitely there is an emphasis on exposing students to coding in different ways.
I think there's some different technology initiatives that you guys have through instructional technology to give students the opportunity,
starting before they get to high school to choose computer science just the
interest in our elementary and junior high schools there's different programs
and different pushes to ensure that our students have experience with coding so
that we can have robust numbers in our computer science courses we have an
extremely large computer science program compared to the state in December we
have what's called the hour of code and instructional technology created courses
courses for students and enrolled them in the courses so they can experience coding
even though they're not in a course.
And that's elementary, junior high, and high school.
Oh, that's awesome.
Thank you.
And then do you see, do you have any interest in growing this, the program, the courses
that we offer through this waiver?
Or are we just going to stick with this?
I think this is phase one.
Obviously this is pretty innovative and we have pretty robust virtual course offerings
right now and so this is really to kind of get our foot in the door there but
once we start with phase one we have a great team that meets and we're led by
very innovative leader that is given us permission to really explore as many
things as that we that we can to continue to offer those unparalleled
learning experiences to our students but also to tap into other students out
there as well i appreciate your forward thinking thank you thank you mr president sorry go ahead
that's okay i don't care uh i'll ask real quick then um right what was the i'm just curious my
son was went through taylor high school um our second child computer science courses ate it up
and he's a very successful computer science major at texas a m so thank you katie isd and that's a
a hard program to get into and stay successful in it at A&M so he was well
prepared so I'm really interested in this what was the motivation to have
this virtual versus are we trying to grow that way for what reason
well one out of a need so a lot of our computer science courses now are on
offered through KVS not all of our campuses have computer science teachers
in the classroom and so this gives students the opportunity and multiple
courses or multiple campuses to engage in those courses and then also for this
particular waiver and while we're applying the students that take the
computer science courses virtually right now in Katy we do not receive weighted
funding for those students and so that's really important too and so if we can
certify that our courses are quality as outlined in the rubrics by Texas VSN
in then that gives us we are we're teaching them we created them then that
gives us the weighted funding okay okay so it's it's a money for sure that's
great let's get some more and then leveraging what we already are courses
without having the teachers in the classroom that we can't find or is that
correct so it's gonna be delivered online we're leveraging it that way
right correct be able to offer it to more students right but we don't have a
physical teacher we do have some at some of our campuses is that correct is that
a correct statement or are we just going with a different model no it's the same
model that we have and so not all like at most at all schools you don't have
teachers in all array of subjects so sometimes that means that hey we may not
be able to offer that this gives us the opportunity to offer to students who may
maybe at a campus that a physical teacher is not present, and it's computer science.
So a good mode of delivery for computer science is via a computer.
Sure.
If you'll let me jump in, there's a couple other scenarios that have come up as well that I'll mention that happened.
So let's say you get enough kids for, you have one computer science teacher,
and you have enough kids to build six sections for that teacher,
and I built a million high school master schedules.
You can't ask that teacher to do seven out of seven.
Okay, that would be illegal.
You have to give them a conference period and a lunch.
So what you would do is say you don't want to tell the kids, well, I don't have a class for you.
So that teacher is going to teach six in person and then one virtual maybe outside of the school day.
And that's the way you can make sure every kid gets that.
Same thing would happen in some classes or schools where we're going to combine kids.
You might not have enough sections to hire a full-time teacher.
So I don't go find a computer science teacher because I only need two sections of it
So I could do it this way and save the teaching unit or I might have in some of these very specialized classes like
was talked about today that
The ones that get very advanced I might be in high school and only have seven kids who want it
That's it seven kids in the whole day
So I'm going to combine those seven kids with seven kids over here and seven kids over here
I'm going to make a virtual section of it to make sure those kids can get it
So a lot of the discussion we've had on this is making sure every high school has every opportunity for every kid
Even when those opportunities may not exist for an in-person
We're cobbling together four or five other options and then we found out this thing of okay. We already got the courses
We're already teaching virtually you're telling me I can get an additional funding if we do it through TX
Bring it on. Yeah, right. Okay, because we're already doing this. We've been doing this for years
Right, so you are leveraging your we are the leverage of
technology and reaching more kids being more efficient with how we deliver and
then more money and then the only third question I had was you said it's offered
to kids outside of the district and can you explain what does that mean could be
offered to kids outside the district if we choose to do that so that's ideas I
brought forward to talk to our groups about Leslie hack and I have had
numerous discussions guys we're looking for any revenue source we can that does
doesn't equal revenue. Yes, it would equal their revenue. So let's say I've got a summer program
and I can offer certain classes outside of the district. I'm not saying we've done this yet,
nor are we committed or have we designed it? Is it there? But I'll tell you this, if I can pick
up kids who want to take courses through TXVSN, there are KDISD courses, and I can offer those
to kids all over Texas in the summer, and I can generate revenue from that, that helps fund my
summer school program that I'm expending millions of dollars to teach our kids
why not leverage that point with our teachers who want to teach it nobody
has to teach a summer class but if they wanted to teach it and they chose to
teach kids outside the district and I can bring in some revenue so from a
revenue generating standpoint that was one of the many ideas we came up with
where can we get more money and it's also a it's an incentive for our
teachers we have I don't know Susan how many teachers do we have that are now
highly qualified KVS.
We've got 175, 80 teachers
that are qualified to teach for KVS.
They can teach those sections and it's financially rewarding
for them. Right. Yeah.
It's a good thing.
They get paid very well.
Okay, thank you very much.
Yes, I am sorry for my
ignorance of this, Dr. Bell
and Mrs. Richardson, but
if a student is going to take one of
these classes and let's act like they go to
Taylor High School
And this is going to be one of their classes, and the kid is going to take seven classes that day.
How are they doing an early release?
Are they trying to take the class in school, but it's online virtually?
Are they sitting in the library lab?
How is their day modeled?
How is their schedule modeled to fit in this virtual class when everything else for them is going to be in person?
There's two different models.
For some of the students, they are in a study hall during the day, and they're assigned their computer science course or their KD virtual school course, and they work on it during their study hall, but they can also work on it 24-7, which we know they do, right?
And then you have those students who are taking seven face-to-face courses, and then they're taking that eighth course after school because they choose to do that.
They'll be able to take it on their Chromebook?
Mr. President?
Thank you.
Ms. Fox?
A follow-up here.
So it's not 25 kids at one time, third period doing it.
This is virtual.
Take it whenever you want.
It's flexibility for students, right?
Yes.
So the courses are asynchronous, so it's not live like right now we're all on the screen.
And so the teacher engages with the students.
If the student needs assistance, they have their teacher at their disposal.
They work at their pace.
They submit their assignments.
And so it's asynchronous, not live.
Everybody get on right now, 9 to 10.
And they have the teacher at their disposal in e-mail kind of thing.
Correct.
Not a live.
They can message their teacher through the Canvas inbox.
box. The teachers do provide office hours. This is when I'm going to be online, so if you want
to jump online, jump online. And then the teachers also schedule like webinars, like I'm going to
explain this concept that, you know, we're moving forward to, and they'll record that so if the
students can't make it, they can watch it after hours. But the student can always request online
assistance from the teacher. How is the number of students limited by teacher? Because, of course,
they wouldn't want to take on 100 extra students on top of their course load during the day.
So is there a limit to how many number of students any teacher could have?
We try to follow what happens on a campus, basically.
So it's around 30, 35.
For the first year a teacher's teaching for us, we're going to keep it 30 and below.
And if they're experienced, we might give them 35 students.
So, yes, because they're also teaching during the day.
They're not full time.
They're all teaching during the day.
So this is an additional assignment that they choose to do
Mr. Thank you
Just clarification. So this is more of like a university style model is what I'm picking up on
So where you can log on you can take the class you can watch the webinars if you want to you can join in whenever
You're looking for it and then this would be offered district-wide
So this wouldn't just be focused at any school or just like one school or whatever
whatever, you're having all of our high schools potentially being able to access this.
So all of our students would have equal access to these computer science classes.
That is correct.
Just like now with our Katy Virtual School courses, we have an array of courses.
All students have access to that.
So this is just nothing is changing other than we want to self-certify our courses.
It's just a self-certification.
We're just looking to get more revenue out of this.
Correct.
Correct.
Expended revenue put back into what we're already doing.
We're not mandating that any teacher that's already teaching commuter science do this.
This is a choice that you can do this if you want to.
If you want to add this on, then you can do this.
And then this, again, broadens out what we can offer and then the money that we can take in from that.
Yes.
Am I understanding that correctly?
That is correct.
Just making sure I'm crystal clear and I'm understanding it.
Yes.
Okay.
All right.
Thank you.
It's kind of like what we're doing now, but we're taking the show on the road a little bit.
you got it okay anything else from anybody well thank you so much thank you
it's great so that was the last item for discussion we have the information items
anybody have anything on the information items mr. president on the investment
report I just noticed miss sherry Butterfield's name I'm sure that will be
taken off at some point she retired from the district sherry Butterfield's on the
investment report mr. Smith just just heads up I don't know if you already knew
that but I happen to I see Esperanza on there but looks like this Butterfield's
name wasn't
Okay, thanks
Thank you
Madam Secretary do we have any board requests for information? It was my request and it's already been answered believe it or not
8. Information Items
We don't have any then
Excuse me. What so we don't have any well. I just wanted to provide his answer real quick about the election day
He explained he just emailed us so you'll you'll have it in in your email. I guess but that on election day for Graham did yes, sir
Okay, he was very fast
Why should probably read it versus we just that
We that we would like to do that, but there's separate state code for elections for what are we called?
Political subdivisions which we are a school district is so for some
inefficient reason the code is written that way even though the counties don't do that anymore
so unfortunately the law says we have to do that even though the counties don't which is
unfortunate but we can talk to our lawmakers and hopefully get that changed in the future
Okay. Thank you. Okay. Our regular board meeting is January 21st, which is a Tuesday.
9. Future Meetings
The regular board meeting will be held on Tuesday, January 21, 2025. And before the meeting,
my wife asked me, how long is it going to be this meeting? And I said, somewhere between 9 and 10.
So I'm at 8.59, so I did pretty good.
There being no further business before the board, this meeting is adjourned.
The time is 8.59.
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.