Noting that a quorum is present, I hereby call this regular board meeting of the Board of Trustees of Katy Independent School District to order.
Katy ISD · Regular Board Meeting Agenda
Katy ISD Regular Board Meeting, March 31, 2025
Find something in this meeting
Search every word of the automated transcript. A result moves the recording to the moment the words were spoken.
In this meeting
The headings and the descriptions beneath them are the district’s own words, taken from its index of this recording.
- 0:03 to 10:32 1. Call to Order
- 10:32 to 25:05 3. Recognitions
- 25:05 to 1:39:01 4. Public Comment/Citizen Participation
- 1:39:01 to 1:39:13 5. Closed Meeting
- 1:39:13 to 1:41:40 6. Reconvene from Closed Meeting - The Board will reconvene from Closed Meeting.
- 1:41:40 to 2:23:23 7.2 Report on Board Counsel value and frequency of use.
- 2:23:23 to 3:01:09 7.3 Bluebonnet Update
- 3:01:09 to 3:13:51 8. Consent Agenda
- 3:13:51 to 3:27:47 9.1 Board Committee Updates
- 3:27:47 to 3:29:46 9.2 Recap of Board member requests for information.
- 3:29:46 to 3:30:02 10. Future Meetings
Full transcript
Automated transcript, not human verified. It is a way to find a passage, not a quotation.
1. Call to Order
Today is Monday, March 31, 2025, and the time is 5.01 p.m.
Dr. Gorgorski, 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 our Texas Open Meeting Act for our meeting tonight.
And we're going to go ahead and jump right in and start off with our pledge leader, who I'm going to bring up in just one moment.
But we've got Logan Lange.
Here's a fifth grader over at Fielder.
Principal, I see her out there, Christina Borgstadt.
Parents, Brittany and Cole Lange.
Got a sister, Emma, in the eighth grade.
special interests cooking reading the crave mega self-defense an amazing shake
club maybe we'll hear some of that today favorite subjects social studies and
challenge and from principal mrs. Borg stat Logan is a remarkable young man who
brings so much to Fielder Elementary he recently was named the winner of
Fielder's amazing shake competition and truly exemplified the spirit of servant
leadership by consistently prioritizing the needs of both his teammates and
customers fostering an environment of trust and respect Logan will do great
things in life and it is an honor to be his principal and from miss delaying
fifth grade teacher Logan is outstanding young man he daily demonstrates
excellence in his academic endeavors and empathy towards his classmates he was
recently selected as the winner of Fielder second annual second annual
amazing shake competition which he successfully ran a restaurant that he
named Falco Fantasio is also a vivacious individual stay tuned he is currently
compiling a recipe book as well so before we bring up our pledge leader
would also introduce our con brio from Beck junior high who will be performing
the national anthem after the pledges so from Beck junior high principal dr. Leah
Radloff is our con brio group music director Shannon Skillman and Haiti
Valdez students with us tonight Tyler our Maddie Bob Rowski
Abbey Carol Sophia then Kova scup Jose Fernandez Emily Freeman Kathy
Gaurapu Riley Lewis Noel McClure Julian Ortega Abby ransom Zoe singer Taylor
sluice and Lila Wilkins and from our directors Beck junior highs performing
ensemble con brio is comprised of advanced musicians dedicated to
exploring new techniques in high musicianship in a mixed choir students
in this group rehearse twice per week before school these singers are leaders
Leaders on campus are involved in many activities, most of them are involved in sports on and
off campus.
Many hold officer positions in organizations like NJHS, Student Council, Quiz Bowl, Destination
Imagination, Cheer, and Theater.
So let's go ahead and invite up our pledge leader and we'll start there and then we'll
do the national anthem.
I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.
Honor the Texas flag.
I pledge allegiance to the University of Texas, one state and under God, one and
indivisible.
Oh, say can you see by the dawn's early light,
What so proudly we hailed at the twilight's last gleaming,
Whose broad stripes and bright stars through the perilous fight,
O'er the ramparts we watched were so gallantly streaming?
And the rocket's red glare, the bombs bursting in air,
Gave proof through the night that our flag was still there.
O say does that star-spangled banner yet wave
O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave?
Logan, you have some remarks you're going to give us tonight?
Okay, you can come on back up.
Go ahead.
Thank you.
Good evening.
President Perez, board members, and Superintendent Grigorski. My name is
Logan Lange from Fielder Elementary. It's such an honor to be here today and lead
the pledges for you this evening. One of my favorite things at Fielder was the
amazing shake competition. It was a fun experience to show my people skills
and manners and I learned from the feedback sessions that I sometimes need
to show more of myself when giving speeches. Another really interesting
thing that I've done at Fielder was dissecting a cow eyeball in challenge. At
At the beginning, I thought it would be disgusting, but when I actually got to the dissection, it was interesting, but definitely odd.
I love to read, and I'm not sure what I want to do as a career, but I'm thinking about maybe being a teacher.
Thank you for inviting me here tonight and taking the time to listen to my speech and learn a little about me.
Thank you.
Mr. President.
Congratulations.
Mr. President, point of privilege.
Logan, would you put me on the list for one of your cookbooks when it's ready?
Okay.
I love to cook too, so I want one of your cookbooks.
Okay.
Okay.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Okay.
Thank you.
Thank you.
3. Recognitions
Thank you all.
Next up on our agenda are some recognitions that we're going to take care of at this time.
I'd like to introduce Rachel Ross, General Manager for Media Relations for the recognitions portion of our meeting.
Good evening, President Perez, Trustees, and Superintendent Grigorski.
Our first recognition this evening is a testimony to the dedication, teamwork, and hard work our students demonstrate each and every day.
At this year's State Leadership Development Event, the Katie and Tompkins High School FFA Chapter walked away as state champions.
The Katy High School Senior FFA Quiz Team earned the top prize in the Texas FFA Chapter
Agricultural Quiz, while the FFA Green Hand Quiz Team from Tompkins High School won first
place in the FFA Green Hand Quiz.
At this time, would the members of the Katy High School Senior FFA Quiz Team please come
forward?
Samuel Burns and Sam Weathers.
Emma Beeson and Jackson Peltier are not in attendance but are also part of the team.
Along with them are their sponsors, Megan Cohn, and joining them will be Katie High School Principal Dr. Rick Hall and Jeannie Konearam, Director of Career and Technical Education.
Thank you.
Congratulations to you all.
Now we invite the members of the Tompkins High School Green Hand Quiz Team to please
come forward.
MELANIA KU, ISABELLA MONTIEZ-GARCIA, SOFIA MORAN,
AND LAUREN PATRINELLA,
ALONG WITH THEIR SPONSOR, MADISON POSINSKI.
AND JOINING THEM WILL BE
TOMPKINS HIGH SCHOOL PRINCIPAL ELIZABETH BRAUT
AND JEANNIE CONIERUM,
DIRECTOR OF CAREER AND TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
Thank you.
Congratulations.
To introduce our next recognition, please welcome Damon Archer, Executive Director of
Fine Arts.
Thank you and thank you President Perez, School Board, and Dr. Gorski. Earlier this year, KDISD
earned the top three spots in the UIL 6A Division I Spirit State Championship held in Fort Worth.
UIL Spirit recognizes the vital role cheerleaders play in their school's culture.
At the state meet, schools compete in three categories, crowd leading, fight song, and band chant.
Tonight, we'd like to honor and recognize the talent, determination, and drive that led the May Creek High School cheerleaders to bring home first place gold medal.
Will the May Creek High School cheerleading team please come forward as well as their coaches Megan Montgomery, Kamiya Wright, Taylor Encalarde, Principal Lizzie Herring, and Lakeisha McGowan, Assistant Director of Fine Arts.
Parents, there are some chairs on the front two rows that are empty if you want to come
up and get some better pictures.
Parents of these wonderful girls, there are some empty chairs right here if you'd like
to.
And also, school board, they had medals for y'all if y'all got them for you.
Thank you.
All right.
Thank you.
Wow, that's a lot to ask.
How many phones is it?
Hello again.
How are you doing?
I'm doing good.
I saw you.
3 guitar beat louder 3 3 turn it up turn it up
3 guitar beat louder 3 3 turn it up turn it up
3 guitar
Thank you.
this evening I'd like to introduce Lance Carter, Executive Director of Athletics.
Thank you for the opportunity to be here today. As a proud Maid Creek resident,
I want to say that was incredible and that was awesome and we are so proud of them.
And I'll also state this, that I think it's only fitting that one of y'all, if you'd like to come
down and take her on real quick after this, you know, we'll knock that out real quick also.
2025 the UIL tournament was held at the Berry Center and included the 6A wrestlers and contenders from all over the state of Texas.
All nine of our high schools qualified wrestlers for the state tournament.
KDISD was blessed to have 16 total medalists at the state tournament.
Tonight I am very proud to present Emily Beltran from Katy High School.
She bested her opponent in the second period with a pin and earned her place as a state title holder for Katy High School.
Emily's win also secured a third place finish for the team for a Katy High
School team. At this time I would like for her coaches Vinnie Lowe, Julie
Staten and Joel Kruger as well as Dr. Hall and Assistant Athletic Director
Justin Landers to please come forward. We present to you Emily Beltran.
And I just found out she was regular season 48 and zero for the year.
Congratulations to all of our students this evening and this concludes the recognition
portion of our meeting.
Any scouts in the audience?
Any scouts?
Darn, I ask every time, and there's never any scouts.
We need to get some scouts to show up.
We have scouts?
Okay, come on up.
Come on up.
All right, here we go.
I think he's a scout, too.
Any scouts?
just come on up all right thank you for bringing them thank you for being here
so tell us something about yourself and where do you go to school and also what
rank are you and what merit badges you might be working on right so let's go
I am currently life rank. I'm working on citizenship in the community and
I'm in band
Your band and and you said you were you going to Taylor and you're working on life
Eagle Eagle, okay fantastic. How many mayor badges you have in total right now?
I'm not sure.
Okay, okay, okay.
But somewhere around 21, right?
Somewhere close to it.
You've got to get 21.
I think he probably has about 16 right now.
Okay, okay.
What's your favorite?
Swimming.
Swimming?
Okay, that sounds good.
You bet.
All right.
Thank you so much for coming.
What rank are you?
My name is Napoleon. I'm a life rank currently.
Life, okay. And where do you go to school?
I go to school at Pato High School and Miller Career Technology Center.
Fantastic. And where do you all have your meetings?
We have our meetings at St. Edith Stein Catholic Community.
Okay, okay. And what merit badges are you working on right now?
Currently working on finishing up environmental science and citizenship in the nation.
Okay.
And art.
I know when I was an Eagle Scout, I don't think we had environmental science as a badge,
but I'm glad to have it.
So how far away are you from being an Eagle?
Just need a few more mayor badges and an Eagle project.
I think about seven last I checked.
Okay.
Well, congratulations.
Thank you so much for, I mean, scouting is great.
Thank you so much for coming.
At this time, the Board of Trustees will give members of the public an opportunity to speak
4. Public Comment/Citizen Participation
in accordance with KDISD Board Policy BED Local as defined by Board Policy.
speakers who signed up by 2 p.m. on Monday March 31 2025 provided their
first and last name and signed in 15 minutes prior to 5 p.m. we allowed to
address the board speakers who signed up to speak on posted agenda items will be
allowed three minutes to speak and speakers that signed up to speak on
non-agenda items will be allowed approximately two minutes and 30 seconds
If a speaker is not finished speaking at the end of their allotted time, the audio will turn off.
If speakers wish to share written material with the Board, please provide 10 copies to the Secretary for Board Services before the meeting begins
for Board members, the Superintendent, the Chief Communications Officer, and permanent record.
If a speaker has not attempted to solve a matter administratively through proper channels as stated in Board policy,
the presiding officer's designee shall advise the speaker to seek resolution
through the appropriate policy finally pursuant to Texas government code
section 551 point zero seven four and five five one point zero eight two one
the board will not permit the presentation of personal personally
identifiable information regarding a student and will not discuss the
appointment employment evaluation reassignment duties discipline or
dismissal of a public officer or employee or to hear a complaint or
charge against an officer or employee should a speaker wish to address one of
these issues they must do so through the appropriate local grievance policies F
and G local D GBA local CKE local or GF local our speakers will be called
forward and the order they were signed up to speak and first we have a speaker
that are speaking on the agenda items and our first speaker is Katie Nixick
Katie Nixick welcome good evening president Perez esteemed board members
and superintendent Gregor ski my name is Katie Nixick and I'm here to speak about
the profound impact that the FIRST Robotics program has had on my son and
its potential to shape the future of students in our district. My son, a senior
now, serves as a lead programmer on Kryptonite, Cinco Ranch's FIRST Robotics
team, Cinco Ranch High School's FIRST Robotics team. Through this experience
I've witnessed firsthand the remarkable growth and development that this program
fosters. It's far more than building rope, just building robots, it's far more than
a club or an extracurricular activity. Kryptonite has provided Eli, my son, with invaluable hands-on
experience in STEM fields. He's learned to apply complex engineering and programming concepts to
a real-world challenge. He has also developed crucial leadership and communication skills,
effectively collaborating with his teammates to achieve a common goal. Because of the advanced
programming and engineering schools he's honed through Kryptonite, my son will enter his college
computer science and engineering program with a significant advantage,
possessing practical experience that he would otherwise lack. Beyond the STEM
skills, FIRST Robotics has instilled in him a powerful sense of perseverance and
resilience. The challenges inherent in building and programming a robot have
taught him to embrace failure as an opportunity to learn, and he can tell you
that there are plenty of opportunities to learn when building a robot. And also
instilled in him the ability to persevere when under pressure and faced
with problems or setbacks, a skill that will serve him well in college and more
importantly in life. What truly sets FIRST Robotics apart for me though is
its emphasis on gracious professionalism. FIRST Robotics focuses on a culture of
respect and sportsmanship, encouraging students to support and learn from each
other even in the midst of fierce competition. In our rapidly evolving
evolving world, the skills and experiences gained through FIRST Robotics are more important
than ever.
A recent 2022 National Science Foundation science and engineering report indicated that
the U.S. is falling behind in science, technology, engineering, and math, the STEM fields, and
that the problem needed to be addressed not just in higher education, but in K-12 to close
that gap.
FIRST Robotics directly addresses this by providing hands-on STEM experiences, fostering
the next generation of problem solvers.
I'm incredibly proud of the growth that I've seen in my son and the opportunities that
are coming his way, including an amazing opportunity for a summer internship in software engineering.
And I am deeply grateful.
to our district for their continued support of these FIRST robotics teams.
It's not only an investment in our students but also an investment in our
collective future. Thank you. Thank you very much.
Our next speaker is Virginia Eban followed by Jared Burton. Good afternoon
President Perez, Superintendent Grogorski, and esteemed board members. My name is
Ginny Eben. I have two KDISD alumni and one daughter who's a sophomore in high
school here in KDISD. Thank you for this opportunity to speak with you today
about the importance of the KDISD robotics program. Last year at the first
robotics world tournament I had the opportunity as a parent to walk around
and speak with sponsors of the tournament. Sponsors like NASA, Boeing,
Disney, BAE Systems, and more. I asked them about internship opportunities for my
kids and other students and they told me that if an applicant has FIRST Robotics
on their resume, that applicant automatically shoots to the top of the
pool. That's a great way to break through the vast number of internship
applications, giving KDISD students a leg up. Two years ago, a KDISD robotics
student interned at NASA during the summer before college. Now as a sophomore
at A&M, he's taking a year to work for SpaceX to improve the avionics systems
on the Starship and booster rocket in California. That's pretty cool. Another
former robotics member, a young woman now a junior at University of Alabama, was
was offered a year-long engineering internship in Germany
working for Mercedes Daimler-Benz
before she graduated from high school.
And finally, another young woman
who graduated from high school last year
went from not knowing how to use a drill
in her first year in robotics
to being the lead of the electrical team
and club president by her senior year.
These kids learned so much from other team members
and gracious mentors during their time on the robotics team.
Finally, my daughter has shown an interest in engineering as a career for many years.
Neither I nor her father are engineers.
There's no way she could have the opportunities to learn and experience and work
with these skilled engineers, former engineers, current engineers, as I see it,
or with the students who also share her passion without the KDISD robotics team.
This year, she's the team's safety lead.
She teaches and watches to make sure the team members know how to properly use the tools and equipment
at our amazing Robert Shaw STEAM Center and carries that safety mindset to the robotics tournaments.
These opportunities wouldn't be available to her without the high school robotics team,
And I want to thank you all for providing not just my student, but all of KDISD with these opportunities
Thank you. Thank you
Thank you
Jared Burton followed by Laura Bannerman
Hello Board, my name is Jared Burton. I'm a senior at Tompkins and president of the
School of Sexuality and Gender Alliance Club. On the agenda today is the
controversial Blue Bonnet Learning Program recently approved by the State
Board of Education. While I realize that this is only a report and therefore will
not see any action by the Board, I would still like to voice my opposition to the
the adoption of certain aspects of this curriculum by the district.
Certain lessons in the Blue Bonnet curriculum unfairly and
disproportionately cover Christianity over other religions.
There's no problem with learning about different religions and
their traditions in school.
I loved learning about the world religions when I was in sixth grade.
However, you must cover these religions equally, fairly, and honestly.
It is one thing to dumb down certain events for
the sake of simplicity to young students, but
there are many misrepresentations within this curriculum.
Lessons about the civil rights movement and
in the Civil War claimed that Christianity motivated
the abolitionist movement figures like MLK Jr.,
which is certainly true to an extent,
but it fails to mention that proponents of slavery
and segregation also drew from their faith to defend them.
It's disingenuous to act like religion was always on
and used by the right side in history.
Religion is responsible for some of the most interesting
aspects of humanity, but we can't ignore that
it has also been responsible for much violence
throughout history.
Our students deserve an honest, high quality education
on these subjects.
KDISD is made up of Fort Bend and Harris County, which are some of the most diverse counties in the nation.
Our curriculum should reflect the many identities and culture that make up our wonderful district.
If we're going to teach young children about religion at all, there is a very fine line to walk.
It is for that reason that I urge the board not to adopt the religious lessons from the Blue Bonnet Learning Program,
at least in their current form, when and if ever it officially comes to the board to be voted on.
Now, with the time I have left, I'd like to speak a bit on the upcoming board election, and I'll stay brief.
Mr. Perez, this is a nonpartisan race.
You should not be running on a political platform, yet you've sent out campaign text
painting yourself as aligning with a certain political ideology
while also disparaging your opponent by claiming they're for the other one.
Additionally, your financial disclosure is a joke.
Your campaign text kept the text which disclosed which political action committee
paid for your text so small and so out of the way
that I don't think there's anybody on the dais here that wouldn't need their reading glasses to see it.
I'd also like to point out that you had to go out of district to find students who would actually endorse you.
You claim to be running on KD values, but you always disregard the voices of KD students and community members who disagree with you.
The most KD thing about your campaign so far is the seat that you're running for.
Lastly, while it isn't the reason I'm here tonight, I ask that you all please really listen to the students who took the time out of their Monday night to come here and speak with you.
Youth civic engagement is so important and you should be immensely proud of them and their cause.
To the film students here tonight, I'm rooting for you and good luck. Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you. Laura Bannerman followed by David Long.
Good evening President Perez, Dr. Gagorski, and our distinguished and hardworking board.
My name is Laura Bannerman and I have been a longtime resident of Katy ISD for 46 years.
I went to Hetzel Elementary, Katy Junior High, and Katy High School.
I've been an educator in the district for 17 years with the last 19 years being an elementary school counselor.
I'm currently an elementary school counselor at Griffin Elementary.
I have three children currently enrolled in Katy ISD.
Today, I want to address Agenda Item 8.3, Consider Classroom Security Enhancements for
Students and Staff Safety.
The purchase of a protective safety locks for the district.
At first, I was intrigued with the thought of an extra layer of protection this device
would give.
Not just a lock, but another lock too.
Then I thought, is there a need for this extra layer of protection?
section.
Has there been a breach, an intruder that got through a locked door with children that
I am not aware of?
I began to wonder who would know this information.
It would be our KDISD police officers.
I just happened to see a KDISD police officer and did a little informal survey.
I asked, do you know of any instances where an intruder got inside our schools from our
are top of the line two-door vestibules or other entrances
and got inside a locked classroom.
The puzzling look said it all.
He repeated my question.
I would love to repeat it, but I am on a limited time here.
And he said no.
Of course, if there was an incident such as that,
every KDISD police officer would know for sure.
So that they could mitigate the potential safety
issue in the future and I think you would have been informed also I happen
to meet a KDISD sergeant at my daughter's UIL band contest at a local
high school just this past weekend the same puzzling look and thoughtful
reflection happened whenever I asked him the same question the pause came and he
said no he was unaware of this proposed purchase of these added safety locks and
and couldn't give me a reason why we would spend millions of dollars on something we do not have an issue with.
He did say that officers and security guards have mandatory door checks for the outside doors to make sure that they are locked.
So please ponder and consider this information before making your vote tonight.
Do we really need this extra added layer of security, or is it just to help us feel safe?
What I can tell you from my observation as a school counselor going from room to room responding to student needs and teacher needs is that sometimes interior door classroom doors are accidentally left open.
Thank you. Thank you very much.
David Long, followed by Tam McFarland.
Hello, thank you for your time, staff and members of the board.
I want to speak on the Blue Bonnet curriculum that was recently approved by the Texas Department
of Education.
From the beginning, our country has been built around religious freedom and religious accommodation
via the separation of church and state.
The Blue Bonnet curriculum is not just blurring that line, it is blatantly running over the
Establishment Clause of the Constitution.
If parents want this material for their children, they can attend a private school.
Public schools for everyone and all religions.
This is profoundly offensive and unfair to people of other religions.
It will exclude students and harm learning.
One thing that's been claimed is that students need to be exposed to a classical education.
Elementary school is too young for that.
Save the classical education for a high school elective.
Teach them all kinds of crazy world religions, including the unusual ones.
Elementary schools should contain proven ways to teach kids to read, like phonics.
This is not going to do that.
This is not going to help kids learn to read.
Finally, we know that the Bluebonnet curriculum is purely bad because the people pushing it
would be horribly offended if something similar was done based on another religion.
Don't let yourself be tricked.
This is about forcing religion down kids' throats, not about education.
Thank you.
Thank you.
you. Pam McFarland. Hello everyone. I'm actually here to speak about Blue Bonnet as well. I had
the opportunity to review the State Board of Education IMRA materials K through 5 ELA. It was
superior when I compare it to my daughter's ELA here with Savas by far
leaps and bounds classical foundations that build that kind of foundation that
kids need to build upon I had the opportunity to submit State Board of
Education testimony this really is enriched learning it's above and beyond
As far as the concerns, I got to listen to 10 hours of testimony.
The Attorney General's constitutional attorney came and discussed that concern that people are bringing up.
And he gave the opinion that it is not proselytizing at all.
It is a historical representation of the Bible.
It mentions other religions as well.
but it is not violating the Constitution and the separation of church and state
is indeed a bit of a myth as long as you're not proselytizing and everybody's
free to practice their religion and there's no establishment of religion so
I'm gonna trust the Attorney General and the experts but I'm gonna ask this board
to really consider this material it is high level it is in rich learning and
And I'm glad I got a chance to read it all.
It's fantastic.
So thank you.
Thank you.
Our next speaker on non-agenda items is Gabriel Gonzalez.
After that, we have Stephanie Saron.
Good evening, Superintendent Gragorski,
Board President Perez, and the rest of the board.
I actually just came here as an eighth grader
from Ties Junior High. A few weeks ago I toured the campus of Miller Career Center and to me one
of the most interesting courses was film. Really nothing else at the center compared to it. So when
I caught wind of the news a couple weeks ago through Facebook that the film course would be
removed I felt completely shocked. You claim that you removed the course due to low interest but
but after discussing it with many of my friends and students from my school,
there was quite a lot of interest.
So I want to be very honest here.
Removing film is going to discourage many potential students from going to Miller.
Students that could credit Miller, that could have success with this career.
Film is growing larger and larger, especially in Texas at the moment.
These students could potentially work at Miller in the future and train the next generation of filmmakers.
KDISD's job is to provide students opportunities that help them in the future.
So why are we removing one of the biggest opportunities this district offers?
As a student who participated in theater since sixth grade and who makes films on his own time, I would personally benefit from this course.
I hope that you as the board will reconsider eliminating the film program.
I would love to look back at my high school years and know that my KDISD
education contributed to my success as a future director and filmmaker. I would
like to use the rest of the time to also wish everyone else who is here for many
different issues the best of luck. Thank you very much. Thank you.
Stephanie Ceron followed by Shatiana Smith.
Good evening, Board.
I'm Dr. Stephanie Ceron.
I'm here to advocate for the reinstatement of the unilateral termination of the Miller Film Program by Principal Kelly Carrillo.
Principal Carrillo cited a five-year enrollment decline, but this decision lacks proper context.
During COVID enrollment declined across Miller, but more recently a prerequisite for film was enforced without adequate marketing.
Most students remain unaware of the requirement resulting in the decreased enrollment.
Projections for 2025-26 were deliberately misrepresented.
With a 24 student cap, film 1 had 24 commitments and film 2 had 12, representing all eligible juniors.
However, Principal Carrillo removed the courses from the course planner four days before the deadline,
artificially lowering the numbers to justify cutting the program.
Her claims of increased marketing are also false.
A comparison of the Miller Facebook posts since 2021 show 41 posts for culinary arts,
29 for manufacturing, and only 11 for film, only four of which were for promotional purposes.
Additionally, the Miller website does not list the film program on its course offerings
page.
Another justification was to expand manufacturing by reallocating the film classroom to architectural
design and using the staff position to hire another instructor.
However, she admitted that no alternatives like portable classrooms or requesting additional
staffing were considered.
This was a calculated effort to reduce interest in the film program and justify its termination.
The decision harms the district's interest. 88% of the Miller Film crew are Miller Film students who provide AV services for the Rhodes and Legacy Stadium events.
Hiring professionals for the football and graduation ceremonies will cost $271,000 compared to $67,000 with the Miller Film crew.
That's a 303% increase. The savings alone cover the cost of an additional teacher and a portable.
The alternative courses being provided for current students to complete their CTE pathways
are not comparable to the Miller Film Program.
Miller Film students are Texas Thespian National Short Film finalists,
achieved state UIL recognition, and were named 2023 Texan Live Student Multimedia Program of the Year.
Our community stands with me. 750 people have signed.
Thank you. Thank you very much.
Shatina Smith, followed by Jeff Wozniak.
Good evening.
I am Shatana Smith, a self-contained fifth grade teacher in Katy ISD.
I am also a parent and a member of AFT.
Last month someone made a comment that the five teachers who spoke are in unique situations
at five unique campuses.
But I'm here to say that that is not true and I am speaking for many educators.
I was overwhelmed with responses after speaking last month.
so many Katy ISD teachers reached out to thank me for speaking for telling their
story your teachers are brilliant and hard-working but they're also tired and
fed up a lot of good things are happening in Katy as you can see tonight
but many of our teachers are planning their exits it used to be the district
everyone wants to work for but now it's the district everyone wants to leave
what happened the expectations for teachers have doubled admin are acting
acting as middlemen. SPED is so overwhelmed that they are struggling to support their
campuses. At the elementary level, the district has decided to do away with three-way splits
for fourth and fifth grade, leaving one teacher to master the content of at least two teachers.
Even our legally protected planning periods are taken up with ARDS and staffings, which
only pertain to one student. Under these conditions, the A-plus in our logo will be a myth, a thing
of the past. Please hear what we're saying. We want to work, but we want to be respected
and compensated as the experts we are. Thank you.
Thank you. Thank you.
Jeff Wozniak, followed by Jay Van Dyke.
Good evening to y'all. I'm here tonight as a citizen and a parent that come here and participate.
I believe in solutions, not complaining, looking for answers.
It's not easy managing a $1.4 billion school district with 80,000 plus students.
I'm here tonight willing for the film program.
program. You know, the mission statement says, at the end of the day, you guys know, to create the future.
And the vision statement says, be the legacy. Well, again, the film program that Dr. Cerrone talked about, my daughter has participated in.
She was looking forward to her senior year to be in film. She wants to be in film for her life. She wants to be rich and famous.
You know, hopefully one day her Oscar speech might be part of this, but the reality is
this is what she wanted to do for her future.
And that future was taken away.
There was no communication.
You know, change management, I get it, you've got to make tough decisions.
But when you're trying to communicate, reach out to the parents, let people know, hey,
there may be an issue with enough interest and we can justify it.
There was no communication of the process.
There's no opportunity to fight and have a discussion.
Bring out the facts and have a rational discussion saying, hey, is there enough for this?
And fine, if there is not enough support, what about the juniors and seniors who signed
up for this program and had one year left to finish it and now they're told, sorry,
film's not important.
You know, it's interesting because you look at, again, the webpage, film's not on there.
There's 19 programs and all those 19 programs, only three are really kind of liberal arts
based.
And I get it, Miller Technology Center is about technology, but film is technology.
It's not just films.
It's journalism, it's mass media.
Corporate America spends money on journalism, marketing and everything.
Again, this is KDIC, I get it, we're trying to make everybody happy, but this really is
about the future.
And so what I'm trying to say here is we need to be better at these processes.
I would love you guys to bring back the film program, but if not, at least look at the
process.
gave us a chance to fight.
Katy is the home of champions.
This is not created by quitting.
This is done by hard work to create the future.
And as our vision statement says, be the legacy.
Our kids have put in the energy and efforts in this program
to make it great.
There's no quitting them.
The only legacy that Miller has done for our kids in film
is to cancel them.
Thank you.
Jay Van Dyke followed by Anna Waint. Welcome. Good evening. My name is Jay Van Dyke, a Film II
practicum student at Miller. Just two weeks ago I stood on the dirt at the Houston Livestock Show
and Radio, living my dream working behind the scenes with Grammy-nominated musician Post Malone.
For three weeks I shadowed video industry professionals from around the world,
concert after concert, gaining hands-on experience that will shape my future.
This wasn't luck. This was the direct result of one teacher, Mrs. Thompson, the film program she has built, and the valuable career skills she has taught me.
When Mrs. Thompson ran the Miller video crew, formerly Lambs, we were a team. You've seen us at football games, graduations, events.
Some of you have even told Mrs. Thompson how impressed you were. Thank you for that.
Later, last year, we won the state championship for best student live production.
We accepted our award in Dallas' AT&T Stadium at the 50-yard line.
Mrs. Thompson was there to support us, but no one from Miller leadership was there.
It feels like our principal, Mrs. Curley, never wanted film or Miller
video crew to succeed. On February 24th, I stayed until 8 p.m. after school to help
Mrs. Thompson present the film pathway to interested junior high students and
their parents. The next day, Mrs. Thompson was informed that film was being pulled.
On the morning of February 26th, Miller removed film from the course enrollment
portal, days before the official enrollment deadline of February 28th.
Mrs. Carrillo claims our film course was canceled due to low enrollment numbers,
but how can a class meet its numbers when students weren't even given the
full opportunity to sign up? The application window was cut short without
notice and Ms. Carrillo has no reason for that. When the next student who could
have been filming a major concert, producing live events, or winning another
state championship is instead stuck in an elective that they never wanted, I
hope you ask yourself, was it really just about the numbers? I was a member of the
the superintendent leadership circle, vice president of the SkillsUSA and film, a student
ambassador for film and digital audio, but I had to make the difficult decision and step
down from all these positions. I also want to thank the Saga Alliance and the SEAT organization
as well as the Miller Film alum that came from Austin, UT, just to be here. Thank you.
Thank you. Thank you.
Thank you.
Anna White, followed by Eduardo Revuelta.
Good evening, everyone.
In 2012, I was set to move from Brazil to the United States.
I found struggle in the simple task of asking for water,
so my family and I resorted to films, embracing and absorbing the language,
and eventually I fell in love with the art and the magic of it all.
From then on, after obtaining a citizenship,
I've known my passion was to shine under a spotlight,
and that passion grew to working behind and in front of a camera. Then the week
before spring break by the same person that guided me through this passion I
was told that the film program that began shaping me as a person and my
future career was being shut down. If we were going to discuss numbers let's look
at an important one. Zero. That's the number of times I have seen our Miller
principal Miss Carilla. Many of us at Miller wouldn't even recognize her in
the hallway and that's not a statistic it's a reflection of how disconnected we
feel from the decisions being made about our future. We weren't given a chance to
fight for our program. It was taken from us before we even knew it was at risk.
The application window was closed days early without warning ensuring numbers
stayed low. Yet in just 48 hours over 500 people signed a petition to save this
program. Some of those who signed were students who wanted to take the course
next year but never got the chance. If we had known this was coming, we
wouldn't have been standing here begging to undo it. We would have prevented it
from happening in the first place. Miller is an establishment to create realities
and mold young mites to form a decision and begin creating said path.
So I ask you, why take that opportunity away from so many?
Ms. Thompson this year, for me, has served well beyond a simple teacher.
Yes, she has taught me curriculum, but she has taught me how to become a better person,
to grow within myself, to find confidence, to collaborate, to engage, and to believe.
She has become a mentor and a safe space to me and to countless other individuals.
She is a yes and a C of no's for a career so difficult yet so necessary in today's world.
With kids of your own, I'm sure your greatest desire is to see them to succeed.
To see them happy and with a secure future with proper guidance.
I ask you to please think about your kids, their passions and aspirations,
and how much you want that for them.
And in turn, allow that same goal for hundreds of students to follow theirs.
I ask you to please, say film.
Let us follow the path we started and leave that door open for many to follow.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Eduardo, Eduardo Revuelta, followed by Patty Lacy.
Good afternoon board members.
My name is Eduardo Revuelta,
and I'm here to speak in support
of the Key to ASD film program,
a program that profoundly shaped the course of my life.
When I joined, I met Miss Carrie Thompson.
She became more than a teacher.
She became a mentor, someone who believed in me
when I didn't even believe in myself.
Her classroom was where I learned how to collaborate,
communicate, lead, and grow. Because of that experience, I became a substitute
teacher for KDISD to give back to the same district that helped shape me. I
earned my Adobe Premiere certification, developed professional film skills, and
secured a job at the Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo, a job I still proudly
hold. But my story isn't unique. This program has empowered countless former
students to pursue careers in education, marketing, content creation, and the film
industry. Some are working for major media networks and others have even
even started production companies.
You can even find names of former students
in the credits of Christopher Nolan films.
Not every student fits into the traditional fine arts
like choir, theater, orchestra, or band.
This program gave students like me a creative outlet,
a voice, and a place to belong.
This program isn't just about cameras and editing.
It's about unlocking futures.
Taking it away doesn't just erase a course.
It severs a connection that has empowered
generations of storytellers.
I hope that you remember that while you have the power
to take this program away, you also have the power to save it. Thank you for your
time and your consideration.
Followed by Tana Weiss. Hello, my name is Patty Lacy and I'm not talking about
film but they do a great job and I do love going to football games. I'm one of
those weird people that even love going to graduation so do whatever you have to
to do but y'all are awesome. I want to thank you for Dr. Gorgorski, W.E. Superintendent, Ms. Hack,
I want to thank Mr. Morgan, Dr. Kasky, Dr. Grooms, she's not there, and then I want to talk about the
planning period. So on February 24th you called for a special meeting to be held on March the 20th
for planning periods and I understand it's a huge undertaking. I want to, what I think happened is
that when that was called the admin started scrambling. I know you guys were
working really hard preparing for those 24 days from the time it was called
until the presentation on March 20th. So I want to thank the presenters which is
Miss Harper, Miss Hubbell, Mr. Smith, Dr. Coffey and then the
principals Miss Shipley and Miss Langley.
It just it seems like they worked really really hard in making that presentation. I don't know what the goal was
I don't know if you all just wanted to get the information and then work on figuring out what to do later
But it seems like they worked really hard the principals and the teachers that showed up
We're really expecting an answer, and I don't know if that was just not able to happen
It just seemed like they did more homework than y'all did but again
I don't know what the result was that you were looking for maybe you just wanted information from them, but
But that was 24 days of them scrambling, and it seems like it was sort of disrespectful for y'all to not have something to say to them.
I don't know what the answer is.
I'm sure y'all don't either.
But I do know that when you decided to come up with another committee, I ask that you respect the people that have worked so hard and the knowledge that they have.
And, you know, I've talked to y'all several times about being wise, and a wise person is going to go to those people that did all the homework, that know the work, that know what's happening and how it works and stuff like that,
and get teachers and get principals and get some of the people that did the
presenting have them help you they can help you figure out what to do if
there's an answer please ask the people that know the answers to the questions
thanks so much thank you
and a wife followed by Tam McFarland good evening dr. Gorg or ski and board
members my name is Tana Weiss and I'd like to read some words from our current
school board president and his supporters i am running to stop a liberal takeover of our board
and district my opponent has been endorsed by a radical left-wing group i am pro parental
authority i implemented policies that keep liberal gender ideology from our schools i'm honored to
receive the endorsement of moms for liberty and texas latino conservatives who champion parental
parental rights. I enjoyed being on the Michael Berry show. On Michael Berry's Facebook page,
KDISD parents and taxpayers, beware. The group that is populated by local activists is trying
to take back your school board. Board President Victor Perez was our guest this morning to discuss
what is happening. Perez, it's harder to get things done. It's a lot more political. Berry,
Gary, I'm not sure that the lefties trying to control the Katy Independent School District aren't worse than the HISD lefties.
But I have noticed these lefties, this group, are white liberals.
And it's a whole different level of nastiness.
Perez, yes, it's surprising to see them get involved and endorse in a school board.
Political endorsements.
Where did all this start?
With you, Mr. Perez.
You've used your school board title over the last three years to promote yourself and your ideologies, accepted endorsements, appeared on controversial podcasts and talk shows, all while proudly displaying your school board name tag and representing yourself as the Katy ISD school board champion.
While you also claim to not be an official spokesperson for the district.
Every time you appear in public, Mr. Perez, you are a representative.
You don't get to pick and choose.
Let's get back to the community we were before you.
Diverse ideas, people, and beliefs coming together again for the kids.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Tam McFarland followed by Rebecca Trahan.
Hello again.
I am here to talk about a concern the community has about two school board members, Rebecca Fox, Don Champagne, associated with the group Indivisible, like the last speaker.
Indivisible is the group that is coordinating the anti-Trump Tesla paid protests and the upcoming nationwide protests against Trump April 5th.
According to NBC News, the group took in more than $8 million from the Soros Open Societies Foundation.
Indivisible is also partnered with the Democrat Socialists of America.
Speaker Mike Johnson stated that Indivisible is engaging in domestic terrorism to attack Tesla owners and their vehicles.
There is also the Indivisible Guide that is published online for its members that I encourage everybody to read and be aware of the concerning material in it.
The guide labels all Trump voters as bigoted Christian nationalists, mega minions, and fascists. All of them.
It discusses infiltrating local offices and school boards to pose as concerned constituents to disrupt and sabotage from within in order to rid them of conservative Christians.
This is why I'm speaking here today.
This is a real concern that we have two active board members, Rebecca Fox and Don Champagne, associated with a Soros-funded group.
Look it up.
It's the truth. You can't hide the truth.
With the Soros-funded group-
Excuse me just one second, Ms. Fox.
People spoke about me. I didn't interrupt them.
If you could just listen to them without interrupting them.
Thank you.
She has no basis of-
Well, you know, we listen to the public.
It's their First Amendment right. We listen to them.
The truth is coming out.
We just listen to them.
No, okay. Ms. Fox, you're out of order, please.
their policy votes aligned with indivisible guides they voted no to the pro parent gender policy they
which also keeps boys of girls sports and bathrooms and they continue to lie to the public about that
vote spots in the box this box stop interrupting that is the truth of interrupting and it cannot
be hidden they also abstained from removing the gender explicit indoctrination content from Katie
ISD in the indivisible Katie endorsement photo for Fox and champagne found on their X page they
proudly displayed the sexually explicit books lawn boy and jack of hearts that was available to Katie
KDISD parent.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Rebecca Trahan followed by our last speaker which is Damian Reyes.
Good evening board.
My name is Rebecca Trahan and I'm a KDISD parent and tonight I stand in solidarity with
my film and TV student friends.
I would want to vote.
And I'm going to tell you right now, we need to fight for these kids.
I would love to see KDISD stand strong with these children.
They need the hands-on experience.
You can't get a job in Hollywood.
You can't get a job in broadcasting.
You can't go to college for film and TV without having the hands-on experience.
I know that personally.
Let's empower them. Let's empower the future.
In fact, let's go one step further.
Let's have a KDISD film competition.
Let's draw people from other districts,
and let's get some film students up here with some film awards.
How about that?
Wouldn't that be good?
Wouldn't that be really good?
It's all right.
So we need to help these kids.
Please don't take away the vital program.
I also want to quickly say teacher planning time.
Teachers are not getting enough time.
They need more planning time.
time. Finally, last board meeting that I attended, I heard a lot of talk about the schools being
left for principals to run. I love the principals here, but it made a lot of parents and a lot
of teachers angry. I love the principals here, but I will say it is one of the reasons why
I am very proud to be working with state legislators passing bills right now to take away, not in
a bad way, but to give more power to the parents and to the teachers.
So it's the parents and the teachers that get to make the decisions.
Again, nothing against principals or administrators, but sometimes that can be part of the problem
because sometimes when you're so top heavy, the parents and the teachers don't get listened
to and thankfully by this time next year parents and teachers will have a lot
more power there's also going to be stronger consequences for schools and
school boards who violate the parental rights and the teacher rights I will
also say that frankly I wish that these laws were on the books right now because
if they had been on the books there wouldn't have been the incident last
last week where there was an innocent child that was injured at a school and
suffered from neglect from a teacher not following district policy and now has
further damage thank you thank you very much thank you
this concludes this concludes the open forum portion of our meeting the board
will now convene in closed meeting as authorized under section 551.
I'm sorry, I apologize. Go ahead.
Good evening board members. I'm sure tonight's events all seem like some
television spectacle but this is real life. When I first entered high school I
was told I should take my school's audio-video principals class. For two
For two years, my home campus teacher wasted our time by watching movies at his desk, playing the guitar, playing the harmonica, and other nonsense like that.
My time was wasted in a class that felt more like babysitting than education.
Home campus programs are inconsistent and unreliable, making Miller's film program the only real opportunity for students serious about building a career in the film industry.
industry. The advanced film curriculum is designed to prepare students for college or
joining the workforce directly. Film program alumni have gone on to study in top universities
and have successful careers in the film industry throughout the nation. Since joining the film
program this year, I have learned the most I ever have and my experience has gotten me
accepted to one of the top film programs in the nation at DePaul University.
With the loss of this program, students will struggle to get their foot in the door and
and get a start in this competitive field.
The film program is being cut under the guise of low
enrollment numbers, but the numbers presented
are not accurate.
As we all know, high school students often finalize
decisions at the last minute and with good reason.
For example, the SAT is a major source of stress upon students
and requires a lot of focus, which
could have prevented students from enrolling
until the last minute.
Those students should have had a fair chance
to submit their applications until the final strike
of midnight.
A school's purpose is to educate and to prepare students for their careers.
Students were promised a chance only to have it taken away because of numbers. If
numbers were all that mattered then entertainment will be nothing more than
equations and calculations but that's not what life is about. From the
heart-wrenching tragedy of Titanic to the whimsical wonder of E.T. soaring
across the moon, film is an art form that transcends borders, cultures, and
generations. It teaches us to see life through different perspectives and to
to build empathy in ways no textbook ever could.
That is what life is about, connection, emotion,
and storytelling.
KDISD's motto is be the legacy.
But what kind of legacy does that leave?
You have the chance to sit in a theater one day,
watch the credits roll, and know that you
helped shape the next generation of great storytellers.
Thank you.
Thank you very much.
Thank you.
Thank you very much.
Now this concludes the open forum portion of our meeting.
The Board will now convene.
A closed meeting is authorized under Section 551.001 of the Texas Government Code.
For the following purposes, Texas Government Code 551.071, 551.074, and 551.129.
Mr. President.
Mr. President.
Do we have any flexibility in our agenda so that these hardworking students could present their robotics so that they can go home and work on homework and we could do closed session, maybe just flip it and let the robotic students and their hardworking educators go home?
Because we're normally back there way over an hour, sometimes more.
I think we can do the robotics but not the rest of it.
Right.
Just the robotics.
Just the students and their hard-working educators.
Great.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Okay.
So we have a report from Steve Adams, coordinator of the Robert R. Shaw Center for STEAM, and
And it is titled Shaw Center Robotics, Blending Cutting Edge Technology with Adaptability.
Welcome.
Good to have you.
Thank you.
Thank you very much.
Good evening, President Perez, members of the board, and Dr. Gagorski.
My name is Steve Adams, and I serve as the facility coordinator for the Robert R. Shaw Center for STEAM.
Thank you for giving us the opportunity to highlight the Shaw Center this evening.
This February we proudly celebrated our 10 year anniversary.
Our mission is to inspire students to pursue STEAM subjects and careers.
We accomplished this primarily in two ways.
The first is by providing field trip experiences for every third grade and seventh grade student in KDISD.
The second way is by offering a dedicated space for high school robotics teams to build and to practice.
I'd like to take a moment to express my gratitude to two individuals who have been instrumental in the success of our field trip programs.
First, Liz Detloff, our instructional specialist.
Her hard work and expertise have played a vital role in making our field trip program a success.
her dedication and commitment are truly appreciated. Additionally, I would like to
extend a thank you to Cindy Shaw, who has donated countless hours of her time to
assist us with field trips. Her generous support has made a significant impact
and we are grateful for the help.
So tonight I'm excited to present a short video that will showcase our field
field trips, robotics programs, summer camps, and family STEAM nights.
The footage you'll see highlights the hands-on experiences that are happening daily, daily
at the Shaw Center.
Even as we speak, they're back there building robots.
Afterward, we'll have the pleasure of hearing from some of our talented robotics students.
So first with the video.
video.
and figure out what's the highest number you get.
I see 65, pretty consistent.
See, I don't like taking it.
No, guys, look, look.
We don't like too much cake anymore.
So you might get it from here to there
without this touching the nine beans.
Oh my God.
Yes!
Three, two, one!
I'm still taking it!
Oh, that's like dry ash.
Oh, I'm about to have to run into this guy.
She has a patella fracture in her kneecap.
So to help with that we put splines to restrain it with...
You look at a ghost, kind of bumping out right there, and the common injury that what caused this.
You should sit here.
Okay, go ahead and put it at the lowest setting, okay? Go ahead.
!
!
!
!
!
!
!
!
!
Thank you.
Thank you.
Now I'm going to try to get back to the PowerPoint here.
All right, let's see.
There we go.
So it's time now to hear from our some of our robotic students and if the
students are speaking are you ready the ones who are going to introduce yourself
you're going to come right after I say just a couple of words. Currently many of
these teams are getting ready to go to state competition at the end of this
week so thank you Miss Fox because they need to get back and not not to homework
They need to get back to do the robot.
So thank you very much.
They're getting ready to go to the George R. Brown Convention Center for the state competition.
It's amazing.
Last year we had four teams go on from state to the world, where over 600 teams from around
the world come, and they did very well.
They're amazing.
We don't have time to highlight all their many awards, but I want to take time to recognize
a very special individual, Lana Henderson.
Lana represents all of our great robotics mentors.
She truly represents all of our great robotics mentors.
At a robotics tournament in Tomball,
Lana was recognized as Mentor of the Year
out of over 100 mentors at the event.
She has not only helped her team daily for over 20 years,
She's also been the key component of helping start and support other robotics teams in
KDIC.
Thank you so much, Lena.
So, without further ado, who you really came to see, I'd like the robotics students, they're
just going to briefly introduce themselves and they're going to go stand by their robot.
My name is Aryan and I'm from Cinco Ranch High School and I'm here today representing team 624 Kryptonite.
And just for a special note, this is our 25th year building great robots such as these and thank you so much for your continued support.
Hello, my name is Christopher Morales and I'm from Maid Creek High School representing team 6488.
I am the president of the club and have been a member for four years and
This year we made it to States
Hello, my name is Ewan Carringer. I'm also from May Creek High School
I'm the vice president of the Robo Rams team 648 as well, and I've been on it for three years
Hello, my name is Mauricio Diaz and I'm of team 6488 and I am representing the Bell team.
Good evening, I'm Chris. I'm from Seven Lakes High School. I'm a junior and I'm vice president.
Good evening everyone. I'm Aditya. I'm from Seven Lakes High School representing Team 4639 Robo Spartans.
Hello, I'm Jonathan, also from Team 4639 Seven Lakes, and thank you all for providing us with the STEAM Center so we can do our robots.
Hello, I'm Rishabh Sudeikar. I'm from Tompkins High School. I'm a senior and this is our 10th year competing.
Hello, I'm Eric Seong and I am from Team 5427 of Tompkins and I am the head of the programming team.
Hello, I am Dylan. I am the student president of Team 8370 Glow with the Flow.
And I just wanted to say I'm very proud of all the students this year for having a successful year as a completely student-led and built and operated team.
Hi, my name is May. I'm from Jordan High School and representing Golden Warriors Robotics.
Hello, I'm Abidur Rahman, and I'm from Martin Orange High School representing Team 282 Nuts and Bolts, and this is our 16th year competing.
competing.
My name is Dakota Mock and I'm also from Morton Ranch High School and I'm the team's lieutenant.
Hello, my name is Sam and I'm from team 624 and I just want to say thank you for giving
us this opportunity to spread first throughout our community.
Hi, my name is Sophie and I'm from Cinco Ranch's team 624 kryptonite.
Hello, my name is Liam Longfield.
I'm a senior at Cinco Ranch High School and I'm the president of Team 64 Kryptonite.
And on behalf of all of the robotics teams here, I want to thank you guys so much for
how you've impacted us by your continued support.
So thank you so much.
Good evening Dr. Grogorski, President Perez, and members of the board. My name is Mei Chen. I'm a
senior at Jordan High School and I'm currently the strategy officer of Golden Warriors Robotics.
Robotics has been a huge part of my high school experience and as the newest team in KDISD,
we are especially able to appreciate how access to the Shaw Center has enabled our team to
rapidly grow into an organization with over 100 students that are graduating and going
into careers in engineering and other STEM fields, as well as gaining experience in business,
organizational leadership, and fundraising, all that kind of thing.
THINGS.
THANKS TO THE SHAW CENTER WE'RE ABLE TO HAVE A SPACE WHERE WE CAN PRACTICE, WHERE WE CAN
WORK ON OUR ROBOTS AND ALSO LEARN FROM THE OTHER TEAMS THAT ARE MORE EXPERIENCED THAN
US IN THE KDISD ROBOTICS COMMUNITY.
IN THE PROCESS OF GROWING OUR ORGANIZATION FROM A ROOKIE TEAM IN 2022 UP TO A TEAM THAT
IS NOW ABLE TO HOLD THEIR OWN IN OUR DISTRICT, I'VE LEARNED SO MANY NEW SKILLS NOT ONLY IN
in the technical fields of building and manufacturing,
designing robots, but also in my ability
to speak in front of a crowd,
to lead my teammates to competitions, and so much more.
I love robotics so much.
I'm sure as many of my peers here can relate,
we're at the RSC five, six days a week
during competition season,
spending like well over 20 hours every week at robotics.
And this opportunity is so, so important to us
and to our future development,
development into engineers and other fields.
This year, many of my teammates have been admitted
into top engineering programs in the country.
My teammate Kevin and I are both considering
the UT Austin's new robotics honors program
as one of our top choices.
And many of my teammates have been admitted
to other competitive majors such as electrical
and computer engineering, as well as mechanical
and engineering in CS.
So thank you very much for your continued support
of the robotics program in KDISD,
and good luck to all the teams competing at State this weekend.
Thank you.
So we're going to quickly conclude by each team is going to say something about their robot,
and then you all can ask questions if you want to.
But we're just going to quickly go around.
They're going to tell you one thing about their robot.
We'll start with Cinco Ranch.
Well, you can just...
Alright, so our robot has been a series of redesigns, failures, but we've found a great success.
And our cherry on top for all of that is our end-effector right here.
You see this? This is the last thing that we redesigned on our bot, and it's really what brought us together into going from prototyping and development phases,
to being really ready for the state of the company.
And now we really get to give our time to programming, optimization, and tuning.
We're really proud of what we built here and what we hope to accomplish will be great in the future.
Hi, I'm Dylan.
I want to say that this robot, I am more proud of it than any other robot that this team has ever made because it is entirely student designed.
student built and student tested. A lot of other teams have, we have mentors as
well, but other teams have mentors a little more involved than we do. We have
it very hands-off from the mentors really just making sure that we don't
kill ourselves. So I'm very proud of this robot. It has performed extremely well
this year and when we have special recognition to Blake back there, he's
our build lead so he has helped a lot in the build of this robot.
Hello I'm Abidur and this is our robot for the 2025 competition
season. This year we really focused on structural integrity which is something
that we had to build up to over a few years. This is our first year
year in, well, during my time on the team that we used custom parts, CNC'd on the robot.
It challenged us a lot and we got to learn a lot of things, but this was our probably
first robot in six years that was not damaged at all from any of our competitions.
So that's one of our achievements.
Hi, I'm Chris from Seven Lakes High School. Our robot may seem a bit different than the others
because this is our 2022 robot that we took to the World Championships. One thing I really liked
is our climbers that we could test out with the extensive facilities at the Shaw Center. What
this climber does, it basically can do monkey bars. So it would reach up, grab a pole, and then
and continue on traversing through a series of poles.
And that's what I really love about our 2022 robot.
Pretty amazing.
Hi guys, our robot is not here today
because it's over across the street at the Shaw Center.
Our programmers are working hard to work on our autonomous,
which is a mode of the robot where it drives entirely with.
driver control as opposed to teleop where two drivers and drive coach work
together to pilot the robot so they're over at the Shaw Center right now
working on our robot.
Hello my name is Christopher and this is our robot
Dumpy. So one cool thing about this robot that I'm pretty proud of is this robot
was built by our team our students in collaboration also with help from other
teams in the STEM Center so you know whenever we have an issue we run into
where we're confused on something you know we have the opportunity to go speak
with other teams like Cinco Ranch Jordan 7th morning and just all the teams there
they're willing to help and that's just one thing that I really love about the
STEM Center and the first robotics is the team effort so yeah hi I'm Rashaad
from Tompkins High School and this is our 2025 robot we named it Argo one of
the most important or my favorite part about this robot is that on this side we
actually have an oculus quest VR headset that we use in order to figure out where
our robot is located on the field which is really important for again auto and
then also lining up with the specific scoring areas in tele op mode
So thank you very much for giving us this time.
I'd be remiss if I didn't mention that construction has started.
We appreciated your support of the bond.
We've got four more new bays.
There's going to be more kids, more activity.
It's just fantastic.
So thank you to the board for giving us this time.
Thank you for adjusting your schedule.
And thank you.
Mr. Adams, thank you.
Thank you. Thank you very much. So just so impressive. And I can see how it would have a life changing experience, you know, being involved in this program. I can definitely see that. So impressive. Thank you so much. Board members, do we have any questions? Mr. President, I do. Ms. Gatlin? Mr. Adams, I just wanted to just tell you how impressed I am again with the way that the Shaw Center is run and the way that you devote your time and your energies. I know the parent volunteers that are up there.
with the kids give their heart and soul. A lot of these parent volunteers don't even have kids
that are in these programs anymore, and yet they dedicate long nights helping these kids, and it is
wildly impressive what you guys do. I am a huge, huge cheerleader of the robotics teams. I love
you guys. You're amazing. I didn't get to go to Worlds last year, and I'm really, really hoping
that my schedule lines up so that I can go and watch you. I got to see you guys at the Merrill
Center last year and it was I was just fangirling the whole time I was just I
got some merch when I was up there before you guys went to your competition
last time and I was just dying it's up in my office at home and it's right
there I got my little green duck and I just I just want to congratulate you
guys for all the hard work that you do you guys did an amazing job here
presenting tonight thank you for taking time away from your robotics teams to
come out here and to showcase what you're doing you are impressive you are
amazing you are smart you are our future and we are so so so proud of you so
thank you guys
mr. mr. president questions kryptonite I don't know if you will know or if Lana
will know how long were you a robotics team before the Shaw Center like how
How long were you like in a strip mall, in someone's garage?
We built robots until 09, when my husband became the inventor.
He built a micro-box.
And that was the first year that we built two robots.
And we won our very first Blue Banner.
We were very proud to step up.
And Mr. Franklin stood nose in our annual banquet,
watched the video, and said he had no idea what all of this is.
And he promised us that he would give us a play.
And he certainly made that dream come true.
Which is awesome.
Thank you.
Thank you.
So I'm probably the only, well I am, the only school board member left at this dais who
watched all of that.
You all would come every year and show us your robots and all of the things that would
happen and then the Shaw Center became a dream and we built it not sure what it was going
going to be, like would it only be used at nights and weekends
for robotics?
And now it's turned into this incredible thing
where it sees 16,000 students a year, and it's too small.
It was almost too small immediately.
But the amount of science, technology, engineering, arts,
and math that are being spread to children daily
and consistently, and then how you all
have grown the programs school to school.
And here's the thing I remember when we were designing the Shaw Center and the glass windows, the glass walls.
I was like, you can't do that.
They'll see each other.
And it'll be like cheating.
And they're like, no, it's collaborative.
And that's how we make each other better is by being able to see what the other team is doing.
And then the center part where you all come together and help each other be better.
and then you encourage other teams.
And seeing that, I feel like Mrs. Calhoun, like fangirl,
like so excited that you all are collaborative and you cheer each other on
and you go to competitions and you help build other programs
and you helped with sponsors.
So Mr. Shaw was one of my dearest friends.
This was his seat.
He loved sitting on the end.
and this was his place and he'd sit here and he was an engineer and so he loved you all the reason
his name is on the center is because he believed in what you did and was like like a mentor and
loved coming to the competitions and every time you all took it was just you'd get the you'd get
the lecture you know of how that's why that's so good for all the students so I just tell that
story because his legacy is living on in that center and through all of you and I
know he's smiling down and just so proud of you and so am I so thank you so much
and thank you to kryptonite for kind of getting us started and thank you for
continuing to grow and share and represent us and being the legacy
I have one quick thing to say, and I do love the Robotics Club and all that, but I just
wanted to say something on behalf of the Shaw Center, that I've been going out there every
once in a while seeing some field trips, and I get so excited seeing the third graders
and the seventh graders, but I wanted the public to know that they have these family
nights every so often.
I know you've talked about it a little bit, but my kids, we used to have a membership
to the Children's Museum and it costs a lot of money and we had to drive kind of far but you
get almost the same experience at the Shaw Center that you would at the Children's Museum Center
there there's several even the fish the fishing people are there and Fishing America I mean
there's several different activities out there and it's free and so if you're hearing me right now
and you're a parent with children I would say probably elementary through at least junior high
and early high school, that it's a really fun, fun thing to do.
And you should take your kids out there every opportunity you get.
You just go to your website, right?
I mean, I guess, Mr. Adams, you can talk about that more.
But anyway, I really encourage everybody to attend those.
Thank you.
Thank you.
It is on our website.
Thank you.
Thank you very much.
Thank you, Mr. Adams.
Thank you, everybody, for coming.
5. Closed Meeting
We will now move into our closed meeting.
Thank you so much.
6. Reconvene from Closed Meeting - The Board will reconvene from Closed Meeting.
The Board will now reconvene in opening meeting today is Monday, March 31, 2025, and the time is 7.33 p.m.
On behalf of my colleagues, I welcome everyone to this meeting's regular board meeting.
Each board member received the agenda and documentation for this meeting on Friday, March 28, 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 just reconvened from closed meeting.
In accordance with Chapter 551 of the Texas Government Code, any action arising from discussions
in the closed meeting must be taken in an open meeting.
I will now consider a motion on item 6.1.
Mr. President?
Ms. Champaign?
I move that the Board of Trustees approve for employees who are being recommended to
receive one-year employee probationary contracts, one-year employee dual assignment probationary
contracts, one-year employee term contracts, one-year employee dual assignment term contracts,
and two-year employee dual assignment term contracts for the 2025-2026 school year with
the exception of those employees who have resigned or a decision has not been made at
this time concerning being recommended for a contract for termination or for proposed
non-renewal, which will occur at a future meeting.
I have a second.
Mr. Redmond. It is moved and seconded that the Board of Trustees approves for employees who are being recommended to receive one-year employee probationary contracts, one-year employee dual assignment probationary contracts, one-year employee term contracts, one-year employee dual assignment term contracts, and two-year employee dual assignment term contracts for 2025-2026.
School year, with the exception of those employees who have resigned or a decision has not been made at this time concerning being recommended for a contract.
for termination or for proposed non-renewal, which will occur at a future meeting.
Trustees, we'll go ahead and vote by pressing your keypad.
The motion passes 7-0.
7.2 Report on Board Counsel value and frequency of use.
We will now have a report now, 7.2, which is a report on board counsel and frequency of use,
and the presenter is a Rebecca Fox board member miss Fox well it really isn't a
presentation I asked to have a discussion item added to the agenda
where we might make a motion but it's put on there as a report and so I'll
I'll state my concerns and we'll just, I guess, call it a report.
So these notes I'm going to refer to are about our external lawyer.
First of all, this item was requested to be on last week's agenda in open session.
All guidelines were followed according to Board operating procedures, which is any three people may place something on an agenda as an item to be discussed.
With three members in agreement, I reached out to two members, and they joined me in agreeing to put it for discussion.
Yet it was not added to the agenda.
That's fine if there was a reason not to add it to the agenda.
The surprise was that the agenda posted, the deadline was fast passed, and I found out about it when I went to the agenda.
And I'm just wondering, Mr. Perez, why wasn't, why did you put it on closed session and not open session without a discussion with the original requester?
Well, I think we know that because, as you know, Mr. Graham advises that it would be
best to have it enclosed because of concerns about attorney-client privilege.
Right.
And so we had that enclosed last time, and so now we're having it in open in spite of
the fact that he advised that we try to deal with this in a closed session.
Well, his warning was not to discuss attorney-client privilege, not to violate the attorney-client
privilege in open session.
And I have no intention of doing that.
So I knew that.
It's why I asked it for an open session.
I'm just very disappointed that you didn't tell me that it wasn't going to be on there
or ask me if I would agree to having it in closed session
because I would have told you.
That's not the discussion I'm going to have.
It's not about the attorney-client privilege.
Okay.
I took the advice of Mr. Graham in terms of putting it in closed,
and then if we needed to put it in open, then we did, which we have.
Your responsibility is to communicate with your board members.
Like you are the liaison, not the boss, right?
You're the liaison for these board members, and I followed all the rules.
We all followed the rules, except you didn't.
And so even if you don't like me, you still need to communicate with me and have a professional relationship.
It had nothing to do with whether I like you or not.
It had nothing to do with whether I like you or not.
Why didn't you call me?
It was the suggestion that I had a meeting with Dr. Rogorski and Mr. Graham about this topic,
and we agreed that it would be best that it go enclosed initially.
Without knowing what it was about.
And then if needed, we could put it in open, which it's now in open.
Okay, it's in open. Here we are.
So here's the topic that has to be discussed.
Our ongoing relationship with the external lawyer
and the value for the taxpayer money expended thus far.
No topics will be discussed by me.
or anyone, I hope, because that is where we could possibly maybe sort of violate attorney-client privilege.
While we have done it from this dais before, when we talk about consulting with the external lawyer on policy recommendations by the policy committee,
we have done that in public by item.
I do not wish to discuss any item tonight.
What I want to know, what I want to talk about is the necessity of having an external lawyer for the board when only the board president has access to him.
Or the policy committee, there are three of you who get advice from him, but that advice doesn't translate down to the board.
It appears to me the Board President is using Mr. Brush, our external attorney, to pursue personal agendas based on the invoices that come, and we know the topics discussed, which we will not bring up here.
I will not list the things we're being billed for, but we have spent thousands of dollars, the equivalent of a teacher's salary, on advice given to the president and sometimes the policy committee as you all pursue changes to KDISD without the knowledge or inclusion of all seven members.
Then you hide it or deny it happened.
happened. Recently, the policy committee was talking about a recommended change to a policy.
And sitting at this dais, I looked at you, Mr. Perez, and said, I quote, did you all
confer with outside counsel? Mr. Perez, quote, no. Rebecca Fox, about this policy? Mr. Perez,
No. And then the invoice reveals there are six charges about the item I asked, spending almost $4,000 on the item when I asked you if you conferred and you said no. So what are you trying to hide? Why would you misrepresent that?
Are you finished?
I'm asking you. I'm not finished. I'm asking you a question.
Well, why don't you go ahead and finish, because I'm not going to be sort of cross-examined here.
If you would, just what are your points?
Besides only president does not have access, personal agendas, and then that I consulted on a policy.
I'm asking you a direct question.
When I said, did you confer with outside counsel about the policy we were discussing that night, you said no.
And that's true because Mr. Graham was the one that was involved in marking up that policy.
And only Mr. Graham was involved in marking up that policy, no one else.
As far as reviewing the policy itself, no one else was involved in that.
We're charged for it $3,932 worth for that policy by name.
I can't get into that we're not getting into the topic we said we can talk about
the invoices we could talk about we can talk about may I respond to what you've
said so far okay so months ago months ago first of all initially when we
retain outside counsel and actually everyone agreed here and before before I
became president we all agreed it would be a good idea to have outside counsel for the board i
thought it would too right because just simple reason that the outs our in-house counsel reports
to the superintendent and we have oversight over the superintendent so in certain situations it
it may warrant that the board should have its own outside council.
Very simple.
Very simple concept that happens in the corporate world.
It happens in other districts.
I know that other districts also have outside council.
And by the way, they use this firm, Rogers Morris Grover, a lot, all around us.
So it's not something that we came up with, that I came up with.
It is not uncommon at all for school districts to have outside council
and to have also in-house counsel and outside.
And they might have used another firm for their in-house
and then used another firm for outside.
That's not uncommon at all.
Initially, I said, hey, yeah, why don't we,
and we all agreed and we all interviewed Mr. Brush.
Everybody had the opportunity.
We interviewed him both by Zoom
and also here in the conference room.
So initially I said yes, you know, it might be good to keep legal expenses down instead of everybody calling up the outside counsel to kind of run through me, let's go through me.
But then after a while and months ago, I sent an email to everybody saying, you know, if you have questions of outside counsel, go ahead and deal directly with outside counsel.
And I know that you've done that.
There's nothing at all.
I'm very comfortable that I haven't dealt with outside counsel on any personal agendas
I'm very comfortable with that saying absolutely not
Okay, well do me a favor just respond to being instead of saying mmm whatever
If you disagree with that, but anyway
There's no personal agendas. Mr. Brush would never deal with me or anyone else on a personal agenda
Go ahead.
I can't respond to that because I would need to bring up a topic and I'm not going to do that here.
So I'm questioning the value of having an external counsel and spending taxpayer monies when the internal counsel could answer so many of the same questions and most assuredly give the same advice.
and he has given the same advice.
Mr. Graham gives us law.
He gives us cases to provide basis in the advice he gives,
and I have yet to hear him offer different counsel
than that of the external counsel,
and he's already our employee on salary.
And I agree with what you're saying.
I agree with what you're saying about Mr. Graham.
So I use outside counsel for too many things because I will agree with you.
When we were talking about having an external counsel, we had an issue a few years ago where it would have been beneficial to have someone report directly to the board on a board issue between board members and some things that also involve the school district.
But it feels like the items you take to Mr. Brush could very easily be handled by Mr. Graham.
And I just don't know that the trust is there for Mr. Graham.
I'm not sure why you don't just take them to him.
We see the invoices when they come, but I don't know what you're talking.
We don't get a legal brief, so I'm not sure what the discussions are.
but I wish I always wonder like so you I was that necessary let me let me just
kind of interject that as as it's typical with a lot of school districts
as well as in the corporate world we use the district uses a lot of other outside
councils for different reasons like whether it be HR reasons litigation
real estate etc we use a lot of other outside councils and that's common it's
normal and so you're not worried about those you know you're not asking about
those you're just asking about this specific one only it's the only one you
care about no no I think but we don't those are not the things we're being
built for we're not being built for litigation we're not being built for
those kinds of things things that you said that's not what mr. brush is
helping you know I'm mr. brush but other law firms sure outside law firms yes and
And I think those are necessary.
And I think if we were...
How do you know they're necessary?
You haven't asked about them.
You've only asked about this one.
Talking about the things that were invoiced by this council
that are things that we would have asked Mr. Graham about
before we had Mr. Brush.
It's hard to do this without talking about the items on the invoices,
but I just feel like in an effort of transparency
that this needed to be had here.
That's fine. I don't have any problem talking about. I'm happy to see that you're conscious of expenses. Honestly, I've never heard you ask about any expense item. I think in the almost three years that I've been on this board about questioning an expense, except for now.
So I'm glad to see that you're questioning an expense. I'm glad to see that.
I know you tune me out a lot.
Go ahead.
Mr. President, may I say?
Go ahead, Ms. Champagne.
Thank you.
So I added it all up, and I may be missing some,
but right now what it comes out to, the total is about 52,
it's $52,683 from August of 2023 through March of 2025.
That's 17 months.
months, and that ends up being about $3,100 a month, which is $100 a day.
So you are approving $100 a day, and I have never spoken to the attorney, because one
time I tried to, because Mr. Brush said that at the beginning, he said, if you want to
talk, or I think you said it, and we were all, you know, this was the agreement, that
that if you want to talk to him, the way you'll know that I've answered your question,
that Mr. Brush has seen my question, is that you'll get an answer.
So I sent you a question, and then I have the email to show it that you said,
no, I'm not going to send that to him,
which told me that I'm not supposed to be asking a question of the attorney.
So I didn't do it anymore.
I don't remember the email that you're alluding to.
I'm not saying that you didn't send it.
I just don't remember you sending the email that said that we could all ask him questions
But it does seem like when I look at all the expenses and I won't tell the issues either
But I count up all the interactions, you know, like who said it who said it who said it?
75 percent of them are from you and so
Zero percents from me. I'm president of the board. So it's only natural that I would I mean you're deciding to spend
dollars a day. I want to I want to make sure we correct the amounts that you're
talking about because what we're talking about is about 18 months 18 19 months
and those two the numbers I work out is that for the 52,000 is approximately an
average of I think 33 to 34 thousand dollars on an annual rate annual run
rate so you're talking about a year and a half and then I just want to make sure
We're not quoting the $52,000.
We're quoting a number in the range of $33,000, $34,000.
And that is about what, when we discuss.
$52,000.
I'm sorry.
$52,000.
No, but listen.
$52,000 divided by 17 months is $3,000.
It's going back to August.
So whether it's 17 or 18.
No, I got all the expenses back from August of 2023 to now.
Yeah.
And that's 17 months.
and the total was 52,000 and I can do a calculator first bill came in October so
we have 17 bills but it was back to August right so I started it for when
you started talking to them was in August so when I calculate it per month
average it comes out to $3,000 a month if there's 30 days in a month about then
then that's $100 a day.
I think that 30 times 100 is 3,000, I think.
But I could be wrong.
But anyway, so 52,000.
So let's see.
Over another year and a half, it'll be 100,000 at this rate.
Just to make sure we're clear, it's not 52,000 a year.
I didn't say a year.
It is 52,000 for a year and a half.
For 17 months, which equals 3,000.
Okay.
Something dollars a month.
I didn't say for a year.
We spent $52,000 since inception.
August of 2023.
August of 2023.
Through March of 2025.
So I don't know what you did in April yet.
Well, April just started, I guess.
Well, it hasn't started.
So through March is $52,000.
So I counted up the amounts.
I can do it again August, September, October.
It ended up 17 months.
so so anybody can do it 52 everybody get your phone 52,000 divided by 17 is close
to thirty one hundred dollars a month which if there's 31 days in a month then
that's a hundred dollars a day I'm just saying that that hundred dollars a day
and and here's here's my problem really my big problem with it is for all of
that money
in all of these times that you've talked to him, I do not know one thing about what you discussed.
And in our operating procedures, it says that every school board is supposed to know everything
that all the others do. This is the pile of invoices I have. I know nothing of here. I only
know what the expense is, which you said, you know, we're not going to say what it is, but I
I don't know anything.
So for that $52,000, I should know something about something that's said in here.
Well, I think you do, actually, because you're looking at the bills.
And by the way, I don't receive the bills and I don't approve the bills.
The bills don't come into me.
Just FYI.
But after one or two months, when you realize, okay, I have $8,000 of bills,
maybe I should stop, maybe I should tone it down or something.
Maybe I shouldn't spend $100 a day.
You know, let me ask you, let me say this. When we discussed this at the outset, I remember having discussions with Dr. Grzyworski, with Justin Graham, I don't know who else, that probably on average, we would spend no more than about $35,000 on outside counsel.
A year?
Exactly. And that's exactly where we are. It's about where we are. It's about 35,000 on a yearly basis. Not a year and a half, but a yearly basis. And so it's very much in line with the original expectations.
Well, I didn't know those expectations.
And also when I agreed to, and I was someone, I was kind of happy to have an outside counsel
and I told you that.
But I didn't know that I would never know any of the information.
I mean, I know the information when you all come out here and talk about the policies
that you've developed.
And I know about the information that you'll share during that discussion.
But I don't know majority of what you've talked about.
And I think that we all should know.
I mean if we're going to spend $35,000 a year on something then I think that we all should know what
What the discussions are we should we should have you know we have closed session we have confidential files
I mean
Mr. Graham sends us things all the time with attorney client privilege a lot of those things if you feel like it should be under
Attorney client privilege could be sent to us the same way and then that way we would all be on the same page and we would
All know the same information for that amount of money that the board
has agreed to pay.
And some of those discussions have involved collaboration with Mr. Graham, by the way.
It's not just like a lone cowboy.
It's a collaboration with Mr. Graham on policies.
So I think if you have additional questions, I think just feel free to bring Mr. Brush in.
I don't have any problem with that whatsoever.
I don't want to spend more money on Mr. Bruch.
Well, okay.
Because you're here and we have Mr. Gray on here.
No, I just want the information that you have.
I just want the information you have.
That's all.
I don't have any information.
So all of these things, what are you doing?
You're just spending all these hours and you don't have any information from it?
As I mentioned, it's $35,000, and I appreciate that you're being centered to the cost.
I am too.
$35,000 on an annual basis, maybe not every year, but we've had some things that we've worked on over the last year and a half.
So maybe it won't be that for the next 12 months, but that's what it averaged, if you will, around a run rate for a year and a half.
Okay, so my last question to you, and then I'll be done.
I just want to know that if we're going to continue with this could we please have the information that you have because I
Hate to think that you've been we've been spending all this money, and you have no information
So I just want to know if you get the information
You know if you want to send it through you know mr.
Graham or whatever and put it under attorney client privilege that the rest of us can all have the same information
Yeah, just be aware that for example. I think a couple months ago. We had mr. Brush come in
I made two or three months ago we had Mr. Brush come in and he gave us, we met with him about, you know, just the engagement with him and so on.
We talked about it with him.
Of course, that cost us to bring him in.
So just be aware.
Well, I'm not asking to have him in.
I'm asking you if you spend hours and hours on something.
I don't spend hours and hours.
Well, it says hours and hours.
Well, I mean, over a course of a year, we've got different things in those invoices that we're not discussing,
that you know about, that we all know about, but we're not discussing them here in open session.
I know.
Just send it to us under attorney client privilege is what I'm asking.
Thank you.
Anything else?
Mr. President.
Ms. Cuzela.
I wanted just to make a clarifying point that the attorney is not paid a yearly amount.
They're paid hourly, correct?
Right.
There's no retainer.
Just to be clear to the public, it's maybe misleading, this discussion.
It could be quite less next year.
We don't really know.
It depends on the work of the board.
And it also can be quite up and down.
Correct.
Sometimes nothing, sometimes something greater, depending upon the topic.
Mr. President, I just have a point of clarification.
I think the majority of the public understands that attorneys charge by the hour.
rather than you know I know mr. Graham is is an employee but most attorneys
charged by the hour so I don't I think most people have that understanding that
we have he's been charging by the hour or his company and that's how we have
paid him okay mine my question to the both of you and although I'm not sure if
it was just trustee Fox who said it that I know she at least said it I'm not sure
if you also shared the same sentiment trustee champagne but that you do not
feel that you were he is available or outside board counsel to both of you is
that correct and could you elaborate on that and why well I would like to
elaborate right again but I've already stated it I've stated it a number of
times to to y'all that the one time I did try to use it use him I asked I have
an email I just I remember okay so that that's my elaboration and you trustee
Fox I'm sorry mrs. champagne I don't remember would you finish what you were
saying you you asked well at the very beginning there was a question about um
oh social media and so i sent him the question and i said could you please ask mr brush about this
he said no that's okay or something like that no we don't need to you see well you could have
asked mr graham that question but but i wanted i was excited to have this i had it i was excited
started out recall that's how we started out to keep expenses down run through stuff through me
So we don't have seven people calling the attorney then a couple months later or several months later
I we changed that and I sent an email to everybody saying go ahead and contact them directly if you have questions
I don't want to stay in the way
And yes, your answer is yes. I know he's available to me. I called about one issue one time
And a follow-up to see what the ruling was as he was waiting on a ruling so I've spoken to him on the phone twice
Okay, but just remember you saying that you said outside counsel isn't available to all
board members.
We don't have the information.
All board members don't have the information from outside counsel.
He is available to all board members.
He can be, but I'm not going to run up a bill to ask him something.
I trust Mr. Graham to ask legal questions.
He is available.
I'm not running up a bill to call him about things.
And I believe that the board president based on the items I see on the invoices is asking things that
He's interested in that I'm not interested in and that I
Don't know how many of you all know what he talks to the council about and if he's sharing that with you
But he's never shared anything with me. I don't know I see what the charges are, but I don't know what the conversations are
just like Mrs. Champagne said.
I think that if you're spending all of our money,
the seven of us should know what the legal counsel is
about the topics that you're asking.
Okay.
So, and I'm still just unclear on why you denied talking to him
when I asked you specifically about that.
And it just has me wondering.
You mean like last week?
No, it was it was not last week. It was
In February
That was a different topic
That was a different topic and that that topic
talking about the policy committee, talking about changes to a policy, and I asked you if you'd
conferred with outside counsel. We were discussing the draft policy and the draft policy was worked
on by Mr. Graham. So I would challenge you to look at the invoices. I feel like I'm 100% truthful in
that. Look at the invoices. Yeah. Right. So six times. The policy is referenced several times in
invoices and we've been charged for thousand it was a different topic so I
I just wonder like I know that you're having secret meetings with teachers I
know that you're talking with them about planning times it's just all about the
secret yes I've had I have had meetings with
teachers and then you ask them to come and speak in public you ask them to come
and speak in public and talk about things to all of us i know that you undermine the superintendent
to them they tell me about that no is this is this about the uh the legal council now or this is
about you have your leadership as our board president okay well is that is that do you have
a laundry list of things you want to air out or are we just talking about the council now
otherwise we're going to move on
By the way, I didn't hear any complaints because the previous board, not this board, and I wasn't on the board,
I didn't hear any complaints when the district spent over $100,000, $130,000 to investigate Ms. Champagne.
You know, this pales compared to that.
These are asking just basic questions of outside counsel,
And we have not spent anything like the kind of money it was spent before I
reference you back to the
To the board meeting where I spoke about wasting a hundred and thirty thousand dollars and getting nothing finding nothing wrong with mrs.
Champagne I completely complained about that. I thought it was a waste of time
resources and money district money to
Investigate someone who had done nothing wrong and there was never any proof
And then I believe I believe you're also were involved in spending
Two and a half million of the district's money in terms of to extricate the district from the prior
superintendent including a five hundred thousand dollar penalty
Know that you're you're all wrong. Okay. Well, that's big money. This is this is we're talking here about things that are furthering policy
for the board
one of clarification
So I'm just trying to make sense of this.
So you had $52,000 is what we're talking about over the amount of time that we've been going back and forth about.
But as you just pointed out, if I'm understanding this correctly, it was $130,000 just focused on one issue with one trustee sitting next to me on that one issue prior to us taking the board.
Prior to me being on the board.
Right.
So $52,000 spread out over how long for 18 months versus $130,000.
And then subsequently, trustees at that and during that board publicly asking another trustee to step down to relinquish her seat.
To be censored.
And she was censured.
and my understanding when we were running
was that from that trustee that she was very on board
with supporting us as candidates
because we had floated around the idea
of potentially looking at when and if we took place,
maybe, maybe talking to that trustee,
we would look at getting outside counsel.
And then we did with her support
and with the entire support of this board.
And so when you look at $52,000 over 18 months versus $130,000 targeted towards one trustee with zero outside counsel helping to support her, I think we often forget, and I think that's easy to do, that we as board members do not get paid anything to sit up here and do this.
We continue to take the responsibility, continue to take the arrows, continue to take the fire sitting up here as a trustee went through.
and was publicly really ran through the ringer and had no one to support her from her outside
council and so we're looking at this again 52 000 over 18 000 or 18 months versus 130 000
for one event in the face of a 1.6 billion dollar budget to give your trustees a measure of security
And that's too much.
But $130,000 wasn't.
That was not my choice.
I just wanted a clarification.
I was on the board, but I didn't make those decisions.
So when you wag your finger at me, it's not I wasn't making the decisions or the expenses.
I disagreed with it.
I just wanted a clarification, and I got it.
So thank you.
President Perez provided all the clarification that I needed.
I thank you so much.
Can we move on?
Are we I had one comment mr. Redmond our our policy continues to say that all legal inquiries
Will go through the superintendent board president or board designee as appropriate
Maybe there's a move to add I
think we're hearing is if
You were in the situation where you got a report
That things have been people reach out to lawyers and had conversations when the board had not
to take action on items and then you found out those things that happened weeks months
prior to the board taking action i don't think you would feel um informed i think like if we're
getting down to the the heart of this is that as individuals we we cannot take action we have no
power as individual trustees we do as a board correct and so if we are engaging outside council
As a board president, there's absolutely the right because there are issues that pop up where you have to have an answer now.
Having outside counsel absolutely is a positive thing.
We could list a bunch of issues where that would be needed.
It would protect our district.
It would protect our general counsel.
It would protect us.
Not arguing the value in having a relationship with outside counsel.
But as I look at our BDD policy, it could probably be built up a little more here where we have some guidelines as far as what's shared with the rest of trustees so you don't get in a situation where you get a legal bill and you're like, that was talked about before we ever talked about it on the board or before we ever decided to move forward.
So my frustration when I said I would like to talk about this is we can go talk to legal counsel, whether it's in-house or third party or whatnot, but as a board, we don't take action as individuals.
We don't take action as committees.
Correct.
We take action as a board.
Correct.
and so if we're going to engage legal counsel that is and maybe we set a limit
maybe it's an hour-long conversation maybe it's a dollar amount where until
we hit that moment or until the board has said we're gonna move forward with
this that doesn't happen and so that that might be a way to I mean again BDD
local it lays that out about who can request what that looks like we probably
put some more let some more uh guidelines around that so that we we all are playing on the same
field because i do feel like i pull up and open up a legal document and i see that there are things
that were discussed multiple phone calls made to a lawyer and then it shows up on an agenda coming
up and go all right are we responding were people planning on happiness was this a committee was
this an individual we could probably find a way that we would all feel comfortable seeing
those things pop up and know how we're heading.
Okay.
Mr. President, don't the policy, excuse me, the committee reports answer your questions?
That's your opportunity to know the work being done, if there's any question.
I mean, what I'm hearing a lot about is policy committee.
Committees, not necessarily a specific committee, sorry.
So is that really the issue?
you don't like board committees getting work done and you're confused about how the council
outside council's conferring with a committee on policy development that eventually ends up on your
desk all board members get that what is the mystery yeah so if our if we had voted on to say
hey go do this right if you came to the academic committee and said y'all need to go work on this
and it was something we had to get with legal about and the board had given direction to go
do that or in an instance where miss fox and mr pres and i are in there we we come up with it
and we go spend i don't know how many hours with with legal counsel right you're not gonna be super
happy with that because you're not knowing what's going on right well i will know at work study
meeting actually prior to work saving i have at least seven days to read the document but
but there has not been a single time any committee in here has shared the legal counsel that was
given them or that they were even um engaged in that right i mean if if our goal is to be
transparent and serve this district those should be things that again we're not right i think it
goes on throughout our our board operating procedures that we're not going to do anything
that's going to legally commit the district to things i don't i do believe there's some gray
or you hear that a board president is able to do things in their own...
I hear what you're saying.
I think without getting into the deets of bills and things like that,
there's been instances where Mr. Rush has been relied on
to support something that or give opinion or whatever
on something that is being collaborated on with Mr. Graham,
just like there's other attorneys that work with Mr. Graham in the same way.
So where it kind of is a collaborative arrangement between outside and in-house.
I mean, there's six sentences that describe working with an attorney for the board.
And so one thing that did change, this is adopted in 2020.
We did bring this on in 2023.
And so I think there are some more, again, foundation that we can put on this policy so that we're all on the same page.
Okay.
I think we did add some verbiage to the board operating procedures.
Mr. Perez?
The last couple of years.
Mr. Perez?
Yes.
So here's an example without telling you details.
In February, there were three charges about a policy that had already been voted on in January.
So I think this is what, so for example, I don't know what, so we, so, you know, going back to what Ms. Cosella said, her example, yes, when we come to a meeting and we talk about the policy, then we can kind of derive what was talked about.
but this is an example and I didn't review all of them this my newly but I'm
just looking at the light you know this one there's there's charges on a policy
that has already been voted on so there's no way I can know what was that
because we never voted on it again this is just one of I don't know there may be
other examples all right so it doesn't always work out like that okay anything
Anything else on this topic?
Mr. Perez, are you saying that everything you talked to Mr. Brush about,
you also confer with Mr. Graham?
No, I didn't say that.
Okay.
You said something like that, that when you talk with Mr. Brush,
you also talk with Mr. Graham knows about what you're chatting about.
No, I didn't say that.
I didn't say that.
Earlier, you said something like that.
How often does Mr. Graham know about your conversations with Mr. Brush?
I don't know.
I can tell you.
Most of the time, some of the time, no.
I think on the bigger things.
Okay.
Anything else?
Can you quantify big?
No, I couldn't.
Okay.
So Mr. Graham sometimes knows what you're talking.
You just mentioned something earlier.
I don't remember.
Mr. Graham, did that catch your eye, your ear the way it did me,
that it was like that he said that you are in in conversations with I said mr.
mr. Graham refers to outside attorneys for other topics you talked about
And similarly, on at least one pretty significant project, Mr. Graham conferred and worked collaboratively with Mr. Brush.
Are we done or is there anything else?
Okay, we're going to move on then.
We're going to move on now to 7.3, which is, and thank you for bringing this up and being
so conscious of the cost.
It's great.
7.3 Bluebonnet Update
7.3 is a move on and update and we're pleased to have here by invitation, thank you, she's
been very patient, Audrey Young, who is State Board of Education member, board member, District
8.
and what happened do we have a microphone for her? Thank you very much and we're going to have
an update and some commentary from Miss Young about the Blue Bonnet
curriculum, move on and update.
State Board of Education member, District 8, welcome.
Thank you for coming and thanks for your patience.
Can we get her a microphone?
Do you have a microphone?
Okay, great.
Thank you.
So thank you all for having me here today.
And I will get behind the microphone so you can hear me.
Thank you all for having me here today. I brought some sample Blue Bonnet materials, some for you all to keep in the district, pass among each other, amongst each other.
I also brought my materials that, like any good educator, I spent my summer working on this last summer.
I am the chair of the Committee on Instruction for the State Board of Education, and I was invited here tonight to speak specifically about this one curriculum.
However, this is not the first time that I've been invited to a board to speak about curriculum.
Usually the board lets me know what curriculum they would like me to talk about.
And I want to open this up by saying that if you want to hear about any other curriculum,
I am more than happy to come talk to you about that as well.
Or answer any individual questions that you may have.
just shoot me an email or send me a text message my cell phone number is on the
right hand side of that card so you are welcome to hit me up and I will do my
best to get an answer for you whatever that is if you have any questions about
any of the curriculums so just know that tonight I was asked to speak about this
and this is what I'm speaking on. Do I click it? Do you click it? Who clicks it?
Okay. So if you haven't yet, I want to encourage you to take a look at the TEA update 2024.
It is on the TEA website. It tells you all about all things that are happening
in the state of Texas from the last PEMS reporting in that you will see a huge
rise in special education I just I just wanted to bring that to your attention
that's all has nothing to do with bluebonnet that is my field of expertise
so I do want to thank you also for your work as a board member I served on my
local school board for six years prior to running for state board i'm in um i'm in my second term on
the state board five years now so a total of 11 years thus far being in the same seat that you
are in it is unrelentless sometimes unforgiving it is unpaid i appreciate your work for that
the best part of the times on the state board to me was making the best choices for the students
and the student recognition, that is always so exciting.
And your robotics program is amazing.
So I was so glad to be here tonight to see all of that.
I would have to say the worst part about being on the school board
is when people stand up and say things that aren't true about you.
That really is the worst.
Misinformation is the worst.
So on that we want to, am I hearing words in the back? With that I just want to make sure that we
have the opportunity to to talk about all the curriculums that are available when you want to,
but also to ensure that y'all have information, that you have the information that you need in
in order to provide information to your constituents
and your staff and students throughout the district.
So that there's not misinformation.
And I'd have to say that my own mother called me up,
she's a retired superintendent,
and she was asking me a bunch of questions
about this particular curriculum.
And she had a conversation with a professor,
and she said, but Audrey,
and then she spouted off a whole bunch of stuff
that she had heard click bait and i said mom have you read it and she said well no and i said would
you like me to bring it by your house so you can because until you do you don't know what you're
talking about so and so that is my intention to make sure that you have a copy of this
we've ordered them through esc4 they will be brought to you so that you can take a look
yourself of the paper copy as well as there's online copy so that you know
that you know what it is that you're talking about and what it is that you're
reading because accurate information is the best information to have so how this
all started was House Bill 1605 oh my there will be a quiz on these acronyms
when we're done at the end of this presentation and so we're going to start
with HQ IM anybody know what that is high quality instructional materials
Good job because the last time I presented this I kept saying HQMI and I think that's like a cable cord that goes on
the back of some TV or something and so and finally finally superintendent was like
Audrey that's HQIM
Sorry about that and then sure enough when I sent the PowerPoint over I had it as HQ
MI or whatever and so I had it backwards and so I had to fix it real quick. OER
are we are anybody open resources that the open resource yeah education
resources good job okay all right okay s Boe
State Board of Education. TEA. Texas Education Agency. IMRA.
Good, good job everybody. CER.
We'll learn about that in a second. SB. It's not school board, let me tell you that.
Senate bill. Senate bill, good job HB. House bill. TTTR. Yeah, too tired to remember. So there you go. Okay, so I will send this power point to you when I'm finished or I'll send it to the lady who runs the show and she will send it out to you as well.
but I want to tell you a little bit about open education resources they are
effectively state-owned instructional materials that can be modified over time
and House Bill 1605 placed the State Board of Education in this function of
OERs so the previous version of TEA's available instructional materials are
considered COVID emergency release CER that's that CER acronym COVID emergency
release bluebonnet learning materials are the products that incorporate
feedback from Texas stakeholders are being reviewed by the SBOE that would be
yes and pending approval will be available for implementation in school
year 25-26 and then it tells a little bit about the English bluebonnet
materials and our our K through 5 RLA K through 5 mathematics and 6 through 8
mathematics are currently undergoing IMRA review and the Spanish bluebonnet
learning materials will undergo IMRA review next year 2025 but will still be
available for pilot implementation with English materials in school year 25-26.
What are open education resource materials? Well they are the instructional
materials are textbooks and they reside in the public domain or have been
released under an intellectual property license that allows for free use, reuse,
use modification and sharing with others in this process the SBOE the
instructional materials review and approval process is conducted by the
SBOE that's us by the way there are 15 members of the State Board of Education
we each represent just shy of 2 million people 2 million guess how much we get
same thing I'll do and we don't even get a UIL card to get into football games or
a t-shirt that would be nice anyway um so the instructional materials review and
approval process is conducted by the SBOE to evaluate the quality of
instructional materials has anybody had a chance to watch how that show went
went down in Austin several months ago.
Any viewers at all?
That was a long process.
I know you all had a handful of speakers tonight, some testifiers tonight.
We had 225 testifiers on this process.
We started at 8 o'clock in the morning,
and we walked out of the building at 11 o'clock at night with no lunch break,
no dinner break.
I was hangry.
So anyway, that's where we are in the EMRA process. You can go online to TEA and look up IMRA and look at all the rubrics that are being used that is accessible to you.
It's important that you use it as local school board members. These rubrics are available. You could apply them to other curriculums that you are also considering adopting.
It's free. It's open and available.
In the 88th regular legislation House Bill 1605 required that TEA develop
state-owned textbooks in certain grades and subjects which are subject to
approval by the State Board of Education. One of the things that I hear most
frequently is that well we we adopted it because it was on the list. I'm gonna get
back to that in just a second. High quality instructional materials, HQIM, are
Texas open education resources provide one HQ IM option to Texas schools and it
provides district schools and teachers in Texas with optional 100% teak's
aligned high quality customizable Oh hold that word customizable open
open curricular materials in core content areas.
The selection of instructional materials
continues to be a local decision.
That's all, folks.
That would be you.
Customizable.
I was recently interviewed.
Somebody said, oh, did you hear what some school district did?
They whacked out a whole chapter in a science book.
and I said yeah that happens that happens because these folks are the
voice and the value of the community we all are representing your community and
so I often say who knows where Apple Springs ISD is I know some of you do
listen little baby Trinity County which is where I live I served on the board
there 185 students pre-k through 12 right so what's what is the value and
voice in Austin ISD may be completely different than what is the value of
little baby Apple Springs ISD and so that's why it's very important for y'all
to choose the curriculum that your constituents feel and that your parents
want for their students under state law school systems in Texas have flexibility
and final authority to choose the instructional materials the lessons the
the books, the videos, the tutoring content, and the textbooks used with students,
as long as those instructional materials in total cover the State Board of Education
adopted Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills and do not,
and then there's a whole list of other things, which includes 3Qing.
Literacy is an issue and has been for quite some time.
and the one thing that this curriculum does is cover literacy in multiple areas
for this school year 25-26 implementation it has the K through 3
skills English at one RLA at one math at one six through eighth grade math at one
and then do for the school year 25-26 pilot are the Spanish versions of that
the blue bonnet materials provide foundational skills and knowledge strands it has a skill
strand knowledge strand it integrates knowledge and skills and when when I was a classroom teacher
I taught eighth grade English language arts and reading so literacy has always been important to
me we did cross-curricular planning so whatever the math and science teachers were teaching the
social studies teacher was teaching I utilized that vocabulary or that theme
that they were teaching on to teach what I taught in my eighth grade English
language arts and reading bluebonnet provides that type of curriculum in
addition to an excellent in addition to an excellent scope and sequence it also
provides a hundred percent of the teaks as well as all the areas in which
students need to learn their skills here is a list of the topic progression can
you all see that do I need to read out you can see it in front of you it's
fancy okay so there it is for you like I said you're gonna get a copy of this
PowerPoint so I'm not gonna read it all out loud to you here are the science
connections just a front page of it so you can have a look at what it looks
like chemical matter land of opportunity and then we're gonna get to the hot
topic it's always it is the hot topic right what is the role of religious
source material in knowledge coherence and we heard today some testimony that
directly related to that and again my challenge is if you haven't read it
yourself you don't have a place to speak about it but that's just my personal opinion
in this box
I'm more than happy to share that information with you, of what those cases are and what
they look like.
What I want to tell you about that is it is, and this isn't all the personal, y'all, this
is you, it's all the personal.
It is less than 10% of the curriculum.
10%.
And I can tell you, I only wish some of the boards were as conscientious about this information as they were
when they adopted some science materials that called pregnant women, pregnant person,
and some other materials that have been adopted that people didn't pay quite as
much attention to when they adopted them and yet this one is receiving a lot a
lot of pushback because of 10% of the materials I will tell you that the Bible
is the most referenced literature in the world and it is important to note that
including content from or about religious source material and these
instructional materials is not for the purpose of advancing any particular
religious belief rather is included for the literary and historical value of the
content and its connection to creating a strong background of knowledge for
students and I will continue to say that over and over again the role of
religious source material and knowledge coherence and here is an example of it
for you again I will be more than happy to provide all of those pages that I
have tabbed in my own materials for you as well as provide you with any
particular connection to any material that you would like to know reiterating
that you are the local choice.
So if you as a school board decide to adopt curriculum
and determine that chapter seven out of a book
does not speak to the values or the vision of your community,
then you have the right as a board
to remove that from being taught.
thought. Keep that in mind when you are looking at adopting materials that have 100% of the
TEKS. And so I was asked previously, well, what do we do if we take out Chapter 7? That's
just an example. Chapter 7. And I said, well, you figure out what TEKS you're fixing to
remove. You figure out what skill is not going to be taught. And then you replace it with
but the same for someone else, for the teachers.
It is a whole lot better than adopting multiple.
The HQIM process is a guarantee of 100% TEKS,
and the whole purpose of that is to ensure
that school districts can just adopt one piece of material
instead of having to adopt multiple sets of materials
the teachers have to work out of
in order to get all 100% of the TEKS together.
The other thing I want to share with you is that the way that these are designed,
and so I brought you some teacher guides, it provides very deep teacher guides. It provides,
it tells the teachers what to teach step by step. And one of the things that I heard tonight,
and I just kind of sat back there and smiled because it's true. Teachers don't have the time.
they are asked to do a lot of stuff but to know that you can hand your teachers a curriculum with
a teacher guidebook that does all the work for them so that then they can actually just teach
which it's magic in itself is huge and it allows them it gives them back the gift of time for this
And so I have some of those for you. I'll pick those up and pass them out to you in just a few minutes
Like I said, you're welcome to take a look at what I have here. This is my set. You can't have it
But I do have something that I'm gonna leave with you
questions
I'll go ahead and start and thank you for coming and I also want to
Recognize
Trustee Calhoun who initiated the invitation to you to come tonight.
So one of the things that I guess about two years ago we implemented a new reading,
science of reading curriculum if you will, phonics based.
And I think from my standpoint what I'm focused on or looking at and
interested in coming up is math followed by i think social studies so where what's what's next
on math and have the have the teaks been modified to to adjust to that uh math uh bluebonnet math
math. I don't know who of you like numbers in here but I don't. Math is next on our
TEEX adoption list so we are updating the math that's being used and so Bluebonnet
materials that are being piloted in math will be updated based on our
the update to the teaks that answer your question we need to one needs to wait of
course for the for the update based on making sure it's consistent with teaks
that is correct but it'll be automatically updated so in this next
school board state board meeting coming up we we have will have some in the
committee of instruction all updates to any and all published materials
anything that the state has adopted comes through the Committee on
Instruction. So if a publisher wants to update an image on page 132 of their
book, it has to come to us first and approve it before they can print it out.
Make sense? Okay. So one would adopt but still it would be updated once
the TEKS is updated? Yes sir. Or once you adjust it? Yes sir.
You're not adjusting the teaks, you're adjusting the curriculum to be consistent with the teaks.
She's flashing.
You want me to smile?
There you go.
Okay.
So these are some copies for you all to keep, pass around between each other, take one home with you, take a good look at it.
I have asked ESC4 to print y'all sort of a set like mine that includes the phonics and the reading materials as well and has the additional.
And then I can provide you what my little sticky notes have on that.
Any other questions?
Thank you for the question.
Thank you, Morgan, for inviting me here.
Questions, trustees?
Yes, Mr. President.
Go ahead, Ms. Gisela.
You had one slide, just one slide, on the religious content as an example.
And I was able to put my reading glasses on and read it just a little bit,
but it talked about the golden rule and that it also mentioned the Hindu, Islam,
and Christianity share that in common.
I was impressed with that.
Is that a fair representation of how religion is presented?
That is a very fair representation.
You can't have this now.
Oh, yeah.
I got it.
You can't have that one.
That one's fine.
But yes, that is a fair representation of how religion is presented.
So it is not exclusively one religion over the other?
No.
No, it's not.
Thank you.
I don't want you to state that.
Thank you.
Yes.
Okay.
Okay.
For example, when I hear this in conversation,
and it was all about the ELA literacy,
which we've already adopted a hefty curriculum on that
recently, and spent money on that.
So I'm curious, could we adopt,
how does this work mechanically?
I'd be interested in seeing math inside.
I have a slide. Okay, so my slide presentation was 110 slides long.
And if you want me to, I can go back to the beginning if you'd like, or I'll just forward you that.
If you'll just send me an email and remind me.
You want the slide on how the adoption process looks?
And the pieces, I guess.
And the pieces of it. I have that in slides.
Okay, thank you.
More than happy to share that with you.
So another question I was after math or maybe it's overlaps their social studies is coming up as well. Is that correct?
Yes, sir. So she's happening right now as well
I'm on that. I'm on the ad hoc committee so forth for the the SPOE is looking at social studies now for
adoption or
We are working on the teaks for who knows what the teaks are. Oh
Okay, good
the we are updating the teaks and then materials will follow yes sir that's in within this next
year we had at the start of 2025 and so we have until probably December this year so we'll have
a meeting we have our meeting in April where we will have a meeting with the committee on social
studies teaks. We will finalize some of that over the summer and then we'll have
public hearings on it in September, November. It should have a final product
December or January. And then they will develop the Bluebonnet for
high quality instructional materials. Open education resources will all be
developed based on those updated teaks. Thank you. Going back to math, when do you
have a final product there? The math teaks are also due this year. So
So it's the same thing.
So you're talking, what's, is this 25, this will be 25-26?
So should be the 26-27 school year, along with the Spanish materials as well.
Okay.
So we're in 24-25 now, so you're talking about 25-26?
25-26.
One more school year.
26-27.
In the 26-27 school year.
For math?
Yes, sir.
There's a pilot for math right now, which you can adopt, which you can use.
For the with the teak so you're talking about another year with the teaks
We will have the teaks updated and then it takes another year for the the product which okay
I can tell some funny stories about that
Mr.. President
Miss Fox go ahead
Thank you for your presentation I
So my understanding is the SBO e is now doing both
TEKS and materials and it didn't used to be that way so having you all is that
true that you're doing TEA is doing the materials okay we're not developing
anything so TEA is essentially its own publisher of open education resources
SBOE has always filtered the information but I think what you might be alluding
to is House Bill 1605 required us to not only have a quality rubric which we had
but we needed to beef it up but now a suitability rubric and that is what
ours with all the high quality instructional materials are now going
through is the the suitability rubric which you can also locate on the TEU
website which ensures that all the materials meet state law and 100% of
the teaks so and and they won't get on the list so it what month is this is are
we still March okay so November yeah I know can you believe the school year is
almost over so in November we adopted a hundred and forty high quality
instructional materials this one happened to be one of them that's why I
said if there's any other materials you want to learn about I'm more than happy
to share that information with you and so that I just want you to know and we
just put another 250 on the on the list that's going to go through the whole
suitability high quality process that so we'll probably have that in November
again this year of more materials to add to that list and that for school boards
provides you with the information that it's following the law whatever those
laws are because they change every couple years right and then the it's it's a hundred percent
teak's aligned and that's i think the biggest benefit of all so i agree with uh so mr
redmond mr perez and i are on the academic committee and and so we talked through these
things and we did just adopt a new ELAR curriculum high quality curriculum and
this is the second year our teachers have learned a brand new curriculum so
if we tried to change that on them now I don't know that we would keep any of them.
You know how hard that is. I hear what you're saying. So math is our next adoption. And you're not
you're not the only you know you're not the only board that I have that I have
spoken with that is that have one today that wants me to come next Wednesday and
bring bring all my tab to books with me in the same situation I think the most
important thing that you want to ensure for your district is that it is a
hundred percent teak's aligned and and the most valuable thing about this is
that it does save teachers time on planning because it it is it provides
everything they need in those teachers guides so we went through a very very
extensive process of adopting and all the choices they made and I had this one
picked out I was like oh I know this is it because I hear about it at our at our
TASB meetings this is the one everybody's using and I had it all in my
mind and then they didn't even didn't even make the short list and I was like
what happened to this one and they're like it wasn't high quality enough for
for Katie.
And wow, and so the one they adopted is, you know, and we're at the second year and now
we'll begin to, you know, really see the measurements and things that will come from that and our
teachers doing that.
But it was, we involved stakeholders, community, our best teacher.
It's a lot.
It's a lot.
And y'all just adopted one.
Imagine 140.
Right.
right so i'm with uh mr prez on this that the math one will be our next adoption and so we really are
kind of ready to do that next year but we might wait i don't know mr pres we kind of talked about
what that would look like and and as you're developing the teaks because that has to come
first before you get the so we um so again it's this is an open conversation you have you have my
information and so please reach out and let me know you know whatever the
questions that you have when as it pertains to any of the blue bonnet
materials but in particular this is the one I know the best and there's a
financial incentive for the district as far as printing these materials out am I
aware of that are we reimbursed on printing materials that if we use a
printed material instead of a digital material for these or no that's a that's
an excellent question and first I want to tell you that when I get angry
constituents that are like oh they innocent advise this they gave everybody
$60 for the for the materials I'm like first of all that wasn't state board so
you know take your ugly talk away but anyway what however high quality
instructional material 1605 embedded $40 per student for the high quality
instructional materials so that that 140 list that I just mentioned plus it's
actually 140 plus any of those materials which includes these materials you asked
me to speak about tonight okay the additional $20 that was embedded in 16
f5 against a board had nothing to do with that is for printing the materials
now that's a use it or lose it fund your superintendent can tell you way more
about it or your your CFO y'all are a big school district so um y'all probably
have a chief finance law oh there you are hey he's hiding behind his screen
he's like don't do that he can tell you more about how that really works but
what I know is that the $20 is a use it or lose it for the printing but the $40
rolls over every year right
I wonder what I needed to know to answer the question.
Can I ask a quick question?
Ms. Teamee, go ahead.
Okay, can I just ask you, so help me understand the process.
So SBOE, you all helped develop the TEGs?
We do.
Okay, and then you handed off to TEA and they came up with this?
We handed off to any publisher.
Okay.
any publisher who wants to update their materials or sell a book to the school
districts of Texas and and the publishers have a choice publishers
don't have to come to TEA to the SBOE to get approved they don't have to be on
the list that's why I pinned that way at the beginning of this this it used to be
until 2011 and then legislature changed and made it the local authority who
decided who was going to be for example and nobody shoot me for this fontes and
panell was not on our list 25% of the school districts adopted that curriculum
fontes and panell okay yeah right literacy tanked in Texas welcome blue
loop on it so you you know but that that wasn't approved it didn't go through our
high car our quality rubric and now it has to go through our both sets of
rubrics in order to make a list so the best way to ensure that your school
districts are aligned with what's happening in Texas and the teaks is to
to ensure that you have high quality instructional materials.
I hope that answered your question.
Yes, thank you.
You're welcome.
Thank you very much.
Any other questions, trustees?
Thank you so much.
Thank you for coming.
You're welcome.
Thank you so much for the information.
Yes.
Those are y'alls to keep and pass around
to share with each other.
Oh, you have the one, yes.
Yeah, so the ones that I handed out,
with the exception of this one or for the district to to keep and then I will
have more copies sent over to your district any other questions or concerns
that I can answer at this time if y'all want some real excitement log in online
on April 7th through 11th y'all have school board meetings or one night a
week sometimes they last really long our school board state board meetings last
for five days so and the student recognition is until Friday so you gotta
wait all week long to get to the good part anyway thank you so much so much
thanks for coming all right take care thank you waiting yes sir
mr. Pritz I would kind of like to give
Dr. Young, a shout out because she is former school board member,
former teacher principal, all the things.
And she is a frequent presenter at TASB
and has given a lot of help to school board members
and helped us in ways that because of her connection to SBOE
really has given me quality information, instruction,
and we've been friends a very long time.
I appreciate you being here.
Thank you.
Thanks.
I remember we met in about 2022 when you were giving a talk about the dyslexia handbook.
Yes.
Appreciate your work.
Thank you for all you've done.
Absolutely.
Absolutely.
I appreciate that a lot.
Right now, you're one too bad.
I'm a rock star.
Again, thanks for coming.
Thank you.
We will now move on to the full consent.
8. Consent Agenda
A consent agenda shall include items that were discussed and considered at the previous
work study board meeting as well as items of a recurring nature.
The board shall be furnished with background material for each item.
Consent agenda items shall be grouped together under one action item. All items
shall be acted upon by one vote without separate discussion unless a board
member requested an item be withdrawn for individual consideration. This is per
BE legal and BE local. So are there any items or any that the any board members
would like to remove from the consent agenda? Mr. President. Ms. Fox. I missed last
Last week, I didn't think I would.
I had surgery on the day that you had the planning meeting, the teacher planning meeting,
and I thought I might be recovered in time for last week, and I just wasn't.
So I did watch from home, and I have a couple of questions about things that happened last week
that I'd like to pull and get answers.
Do you want to pull something?
I do.
I want to pull the one about the staffing model.
Is that 11?
I wrote it down somewhere now.
Let's see where it is.
8.11.
8.11.
And yes.
So may I ask?
Can we approve the others?
Yes.
Okay.
Do I hear a motion?
I move that the Board of Trustees approves the consent agenda for items 8.1 through 8.12 except for 8.11, which has been removed from the consent agenda.
Second.
I have a motion and a second.
It is moved and seconded that the Board of Trustees approves the consent agenda for items
8.1 through 8.12 except for 8.11, which has been removed from the consent agenda.
We'll now vote by pressing the key on the keyboard.
The motion passes 7-0.
Go ahead, Ms. Fox regarding 811.
Mr. Shush, I think this question is for you.
So as we talk about the threshold of positions given to schools,
and I'm primarily talking about elementary schools at this point,
is the threshold 800, is that where, I'm just trying to make sure I'm right,
where there's like an added fine arts?
Dr. Gorgorski, please stop me if I should be asking you this.
Would you interrupt me if I need to direct anything to you?
It's around 800 is my understanding where they get an extra like fine arts or PE and an extra AP
is that
650 and then 1250 for the a piece
But 800 for the fine arts are correct 800 for the fine arts and 1250 is for the AP
650 and 1250
Okay.
Anecdotally, in conversations, and I don't have a reference school here, but I understand there are more than one schools that the projection that we have for them is around 785.
I'm rounding here.
I do not have exact numbers, so I'm not talking about a specific school, please.
Let's say it's 785.
That's the projection, passive projection, possibly.
but they consistently run 810 or 805 and so all year they're under just well
they're they're maxed out on their staffing positions because clearly at
800 if we think that that needs one more fine arts person and you can imagine how
hard it would be to do art with 810 children and music and PE all those so
So how do you measure that?
I know that one year probably wouldn't be it,
but do you look at trends over time?
And if they've done it more than two years,
when do you give them the extra?
Yeah, so this, I mean,
that's part of our process every single year.
And when the HR team gets the numbers from,
gets the enrollment projections,
our staffing data analysts,
they'll create the campus sheets
very strictly based on the standards, right?
And then following that
is when we meet with our assistants
superintendent team they discuss the principles and i'm also answering this in kind of a general
way but um and so it's at that time when we meet with the assistant suit team they might
bring up a concern to hey they're only five below that threshold is there any way we could keep that
art music teacher or that counselor or that assistant principal and we have all of those
conversations through that staffing process and each year we do make several exceptions
We can't make them all.
And it's always not as easy as, well, there are only 15 students below, so let's make
that exception because then if I did that across the board, well, then I would just
create another standard, right?
And so that's why those discussions are so important, again, with school leadership,
with the principals, and how it's impacting campus dynamics.
And that a lot of times is how we'll make those decisions, whether we leave one and
and don't take one, or whether we give an extra,
it's all a part of that, and we do listen to all those concerns.
But again, we can't make all of them, but we do make several.
So I understand, like if it's really close
and they're about to lose one as they're going down,
but when it's been more than one year, I don't know how many,
where the projection is low,
but the actual enrollment is high for the entire year.
And yes, and I think that that conversation comes up every single year as well in one school, right?
Where I know this is what my projection says. This is where I was last year. This was my projection last year
I you know, I was higher than that all year. So we we look at all of that information as well. Okay
so would it be I
Hear you but I want a little more from that in that would it be
fair to say
say for a year it might be okay you're at 805 8 10 8 15 whatever it is and we can't do it this year
there just isn't enough money I mean we clearly don't have enough money and don't have enough
people I get that but do you do it a second year in a third year or is that when you say okay you
were over all year I trust that even though the rejection says less that you're going to be over
when do you give them that extra person would you ask them to do that like two
or three years I mean if they're over the threshold they're gonna get that
person automatically get the person yes yeah if they're over the threshold
that's gonna be a part of their staffing it's where after the school year starts
oh I see what you're saying I'm sorry so we do look at that kind of on case by
case here's the thing we do get requests for great that's one of the reasons we
have growth units you know and we do get requests for those different situations
throughout the year sometimes the principals don't ask because their
master schedules are set or classes are set and so they don't want to you know
break a class apart or whatever it might mean to add that additional person but
no we don't say well you didn't have 800 at the beginning of the year so you're
not getting it no if if we do have those conversations throughout the year okay
Okay, so if it goes over and they get their month or two in,
you would be able to get a person provided you have one?
Because it's going to be a fine arts person probably
because you can't do without PE.
It's either going to be a music group or an art probably in an elementary.
And then what are the thresholds at junior high?
Do you know?
I have the numbers here.
but in the friday update i believe well mrs champaign with your expert well you're so good
at what do you what do you want to know just the the star assistant principal up to 14.99 they get
three fifteen hundred they get four you didn't you want me to go through the whole i mean no you got
it no and then anyway but the may i ask a question about this though of course since i'm looking at
this so what would I so I wasn't going to ask but since you you're at our I
noticed it on the senior high in the junior high there is exceptions made it
says an appeal can be made for the second assistant director of enrollment
is between 275 and 299 and if the and then if the enrollment falls below 300
the second assistant director can be retained for two years after which a
process must be entered. So why can't we do that for elementary? Well, so that, so, I mean, that is
a very specific process, and when it comes to junior high and senior high, we work with Damon
Archer on those. I mean, with elementary, really, it's... Why can't there be a little window and then say,
oh, but if they fall below, then we can keep them for two years? We certainly could do that. I think
in essence, when we do make these exceptions, that is kind of what we're doing. I mean,
the you know like i said school leadership will bring it to our attention the principal bring it
to our attention and a lot of times we will say okay we'll we'll let you keep that uh that fine
arts person whether it's art or music and uh we'll let you keep it for the year and then we'll see
where your enrollment is next year so even though we don't have it specifically listed in there like
that um that that's how a lot of these exceptions i i personally so i know i'm just one board member
i'm not trying to make all the decisions but i would feel better if something like this was
written for elementary where there was some kind of an appeal can be made for
second direct assistant director and then they give it range and then if
enrollment falls below that the second assistant director can be retained for
two years because that that would be a fair because I've seen it we're like
they had to let go a music teacher in an elementary just like that and this
person had to you know there was two music teachers forever and ever and so
So they based their whole program on the fact that they had two,
and then they went down 20 people and they lost one.
And so, no, she didn't have 800 anymore, but she had 780.
And now she has 780 by herself rather than 400 each, which is a big difference.
But if you gave her something like, okay, well, you get two years,
you know, we're going to, like there was a statement.
So if you get two years, and then if you're still like that,
and then that way they can kind of prepare,
and she can kind of like plan her stuff,
knowing that she'll probably lose that other person.
Yeah, we can certainly look at doing something like that,
and we can look and see how that would have impacted staffing this year.
One thing I will say, and it's been the past couple of years,
there have been, based on the staffing standards,
a lot of reductions in fine arts at the elementary level
that were dictated by enrollment and staffing standards.
For instance, this year, and Dr. Hill, correct me if I'm wrong,
but I believe when we got our initial staffing summaries,
there was a reduction of 17 fine arts at the elementaries
just based on enrollment alone.
And I think in the summary that we have now, I think it's three.
So, I mean, we did have those conversations
and make quite a few exceptions when it came to fine arts at the elementaries.
I don't know if the board needs to do anything or, you know,
just to take my word for it, I mean, y'all can all look at this,
but there is a little statement that says what I'm saying under senior high
and junior high but no thing says anything about elementary that's just
what I'm alluding to so we can look anyway any other questions thank you
thank you may we have a food have any other questions and I'll entertain a
motion to approve or 8.1 one approve the campus staffing plan for 2025 2026
school year mr. president I move that the board approve future board approval
of campus staffing plan for the 2025 2026 school year I have a motion do I
hear a second okay I have a motion and a second if we go ahead and vote press the
your keypad. Okay, 811 passes by 7-0. As far as the next item, we have some Board Committee
9.1 Board Committee Updates
updates and I wanted to just mention, even though it's not per se a committee, just mention
kind of the follow-up if you will for the teacher planning effort if you will
so we had a meeting actually a miss teaming myself had a meeting dr. Gorski
and miss act this past Friday to kind of chart forward you know a next step in
terms of like you know following up on on this issue and try to resolve
something try to make some progress and it's you know we anticipate that it
it will be not a long-term drawn out you know committee won't be a committee actually just
a meeting or two with uh we discussed with a meeting or two with a couple with some principals
with some teachers with some staff members to kind of try to look for solutions and try to
hammer something out if you will that's uh that would be beneficial so i think there's a meeting
meeting planned for next week. I think Ms. Teeming and Ms. Cuzela are attending that
meeting. And so that's that on teacher planning.
Mr. President?
Yes.
I have a question on that. I didn't feel like that we got a full answer the last time
that we discussed this. And so I'm just trying to, I guess it's clarification more
than anything i wanted to ensure um did we ever get an answer on where we are sitting legally
definitively yeah i think that that is part of what will be discussed at this couple upcoming
meeting there's some definitive reading on um on where that stands where are we what's what's uh
you know uh in terms of like mr graham's opinion of that and you know for protection for the
the district to make sure, you know, to just where are we on that, on the legality of it?
Because I understood that it was campus by campus, but we've heard this again and again
from multiple campuses about the lack of teacher planning time. I myself have talked to
numerous teachers that are from across the district who all continue to say that they do
not have their teacher planning time. So if we're going, I just want to understand where this task
FORCE OR COMMITTEE OR WHATEVER YOU WANT TO CALL IT IS GOING FROM FROM A
STARTING OUT POINT IF WE'RE GOING FROM OUR CAN WE JUST MAKE SURE ON A BASE
LEVEL THAT WE ARE COMPLYING WITH THE LAW LIKE JUST COMPLYING WITH THE LAW TOWARDS
TEACHER PLANNING TIME AND MAKING SURE THAT WE'RE UNDER THAT COMPLIANCE IS JUST
THE STARTING POINT AND THEN EVERYTHING AFTER THAT IS YOU KNOW WE CAN WORK IT
OUT AND I'M SUPPOSED THAT'S WHAT YOU'RE GONNA DO BUT JUST FOR OUR UNDERSTANDING
as the board to understand where we're starting out from.
If it's because of SPED, if it's because of ARD meetings, if it's because of whatever that we're not
in a compliance, okay, but can we at least have the understanding of
we're not meeting this mark and this is what we're trying to achieve.
That's what I want to understand. I think that's what the teachers would like to
understand from what I'm hearing, from what we've seen here, from what we've seen outside of here.
Are we in compliance or not? And what is the fastest,
most efficient way for us to get under compliance at a bare minimum, hopefully doing that sooner
rather than later, not having to wait till next school year, but trying to do something
in the immediate.
Yeah, thank you.
So that's what I'm looking for.
Yeah, thank you.
So that, as I mentioned earlier, this is not going to be a long, drawn-out process.
This needs to be something that we can have a meeting or two, maybe two meetings, but
but at least have a meeting, a basic meeting next week to kind of lay all that out in terms of, like, the legality
as well as what opportunities do we have to protect teacher planning time.
Mr. Perez?
Yes.
So last week when we talked about this, I think that was last week, I asked if I could be on the committee.
Can I know why I wasn't chosen?
Well, actually, it's not a committee, but it's actually going to be Ms. Cozella and Ms. Teamee.
and if you want to join in the meeting, it's a meeting.
If you want to join in the meeting, yeah, absolutely.
I'm not joining in the meeting because we want to make sure we keep it to three people or less.
So we just scheduled a meeting with Ms. Cuzela and Ms. Teamey
and principals and teachers and staff to get together.
So if you want to join in the meeting, it's a meeting.
Okay, and I think we have an academic performance committee, Mr. Redman, this week, don't we?
We're meeting on Wednesday afternoon.
Okay, and did you have anything to say on the, any one of you on the legislative advocacy,
I think?
I have a, oh, sorry.
We have something coming up, Mr. Redman, on April 15 as well.
Yes. I'm not able to make that meeting so I don't have the information.
Okay. We did, I believe, send out invitations, are in the process of
sending those out to, I think what we shared last week, as far as the board was
able to recommend people that wanted to go as well as some invites sent out and
so I'm not aware yet of who has responded and accepted those. There are some
community members as well as trustees and staff, etc. Okay. Ms. Fox, did you have something?
Mr. Press, I have a question about committees.
And so here's my question.
The academic committee is you, Mr. Redman, and myself.
Mr. Redman is the chair.
So I have a question for the chair.
Did you know that Blue Bonnet curriculum was going to be on tonight's agenda?
No.
So I'm just, once again, I see the agenda
and I'm shocked that there's something about academics
and the academic committee had zero input and zero knowledge
of it coming to a board meeting agenda.
Who placed it there?
It's a report.
Is this a report?
Like tell us about the Blue Bonnet?
Just like every other academic report, the three of us
decide what it's going to be.
That's what the committee is for, right?
Right?
I'm just trying to see, is this a president-run board,
or is this a collective board of trustees with a liaison as president?
I feel left out.
You know what?
I can tell no matter what I do, Ms. Fox is not going to make you happy at all.
Mr. President, am I wrong?
I'm expecting that.
I'm asking an SPOE member to come and just share with us an update
an update or you know her some comments from her about the blue bonnet curriculum
and in a time when we aren't choosing an issue with that well so we're choosing to have her come
and and she's a she's a friend of mine i i love dr young and i i'm a christian conservative mom
i like the blue bonnet curriculum i'd be confident with my children hearing uh having
having Bible verses shared and that kind of thing from my perspective, as long as it matches my faith.
But I don't want to, but as a board member, in my board member role, I might have a different view of that.
But in spite of lies that are told about me during open forum that...
Point of order.
Are you going to stick to the committees or Blue Bonnet?
I am talking about Blue Bonnet.
Point of order.
You said committees, and now you're talking about Blue Bonnet.
Which one is it?
Blue Bonnet?
is a curriculum.
Committees or blue bonnet?
It's academic committee.
Which one?
Blue bonnet or committees?
Because blue bonnet...
Can you rule on her point of order, please?
What I want you to finish what you were saying...
Is that lies being told that I am a liberal...
Why are we talking about lies?
I'm going to stop you there.
I'm a Christian conservative who likes the blue bonnet curriculum.
I'm going to stop you there.
I'm gonna stop you there. You know what people speak about me badly all the time
from open forum. I listen to them. She used your words. No. She used your words. No no no no no no.
Look are we talking about academic performance? Are we talking about blue bonnet?
We're talking about academic. What you're saying has nothing to do with the open forum. This is we're
talking here about board committee updates. Do you have anything you want to
say about board committee update about academic performance about the blue bonnet anything on
that academic committee why are we having a presentation without the academic committee
knowing it's happening and why now when we've already chosen an elar curriculum and spent 10
million dollars on it specifically she specifically may i finish yeah okay so we're not looking to do
an ELAR. You said it, I said it, we said that in our committee meeting. That's not because we've
discussed this Blue Bonnet curriculum that this is not the time for ELAR. We just spent 10 million
dollars and have a new program going that was thoroughly vetted, high quality instructions.
The science curriculum is already decided so we're waiting for math and their math teaks are not
ready. So we're two years out from even looking at a new curriculum. So why now? Why during this
season when this curriculum is going across the state causing such confusion
in school boards that people are being thrown out in school boards around you
know we're not we're not addressing ela we fact she didn't really address ela
and it was it wasn't about the whole Bible thing it was an update on Lubana
curriculum and I started out by saying my focus is on math and social studies
Let's talk about math and social studies.
So I'm sorry for bringing in an SPOE board member that could give us her insight,
whatever insight she has, on Lubana curriculum.
And her strength is ELAR because that's what she does.
Well, that's basically what we're doing is bringing in an SPOE board member to give us her insight.
It's not every day we have a board member here talking about a curriculum.
Let's hear what she has to say.
Mr. Perrin, we're two years out.
I would just want to say I think that what Mrs. Fox is saying, and I'm not going to get into anything other than just the committee, but she's on the academic committee with you and Mr. Redman.
And so definitely Blue Bonnet curriculum, and I appreciate her coming and all that, but it is part of academic.
Sure is.
Everything is academic.
Right.
But I'm just saying like if we're thinking about the possibility of a new program under academics
Maybe it should have been mentioned to the academic committee and it's good for Redmond and mrs
Fox didn't know about it tonight. Can I say something?
Great miss Timmy
So I think I think the problem is is we're also bound by open rec or open meetings act
and I think it was miss Calhoun that wanted to bring them in bring her in and so if
if miss if mr. Perez would have
informed the academic committee we would have had a walking quorum which is
against the law not with mr. the president can can speak to the
committee's though so it wouldn't be like he would just say we have an idea
of bringing in the bluebonnet just to let them know you know we know the
academic performance committee meets quarterly with our our teaching and
learning people and we they bring us updates as to reports that are coming up
that we're going to be interested in so we can drill down and look at reports to
see how we're doing should I have asked the academic
performance committee could I bring the an SPOE member to come and speak to us I
don't think it was necessary I mean I could have thought of it but I don't
think it was necessary to be honest with you I think the academic performance
committee is going to meet this coming Wednesday and we're going to review
whatever dr. Caskey dr. Bell so on wants to review in terms of like upcoming
information related to the performance of the district on academics but we
talked about it in academic committee and we all agreed the entire committee
agreed that that wasn't ready for us until their math yeah because it needs
TEEX needed to be updated.
TEEX needed to be updated, right?
Right?
Right.
And we agreed, yeah.
So then it comes here during the potential time.
Well, okay.
Okay, Ms. Fox.
It's a little suspect.
Okay.
A little suspect in what way?
No, just a while.
Anyway, okay.
See, we had a work-study meeting, a meeting with the finance group before the work-study meeting, just FYI, to review the budget update.
That meeting was right before the work study meeting that we had on the 24th.
So we did have a work study meeting with Mr. Smith and his staff.
Thank you very much for that.
And we've got an update on the budget that we all received as well as the monthly financial reports.
And we have any recap board member requests?
9.2 Recap of Board member requests for information.
No, Mr. President.
Okay.
I have a request.
I was going to pull it from consent agenda, but it wasn't on consent agenda to talk about.
So I would like information from Mr. Veerling.
Last week, you all talked about an ABM, just random ABM that came.
And I think you're doing a survey or something about a group of children who go to one elementary, a different junior high and a different high school.
Like I completely agree with that.
I've been, Mr. Beierling will tell you, I've been the one going, pure feeder, pure feeder patterns.
I love them, and I'm glad that you're doing that one.
I wonder if there are other pockets like that throughout our district who maybe don't have a friend on the school board who can get something to an agenda.
Do you have other pockets that we could look at at the same time?
Ms. Fox, Ms. Fox, just may I say something?
This is, you know, I've had people approach me before about, hey, how about this is an issue here with our area, blah, blah, blah, et cetera.
I've gone to Dr. Gorski and Mr. Verling in the past and found that it didn't make sense whatsoever.
It didn't fit whatsoever.
This one is very compelling.
I'm asking if there are others.
I brought it before Dr. Gorski and Mr. Verling to look at it and to do a survey if it made sense.
And it seems like it's very compelling.
It makes sense to me. I agree nothing to do with me having a friend of the you know being having a friend or anything
Like that it's it's a group of community people of parents that approach the district actually emailed dr. Gorg, or ski emailed me, etc
That's what it is. Don't don't make don't insinuate something else
Don't insinuate something else that it is who added it to the agenda. I
Added it to the engine. Oh
Oh, boy, you really are a role tonight.
Mr. Bierling would tell us if there are other pockets.
Okay.
Anyway, we have a meeting coming up April 14.
10. Future Meetings
That's a work-study meeting.
And then we have regular morning on Tuesday, April 22.
And there being no further business for the board, this meeting is adjourned.
Time is 924.
Official documents
Agenda
The district's own agenda file, as published on its video page. 18 pages.
Board packet · 32 documents
The district's own backup material for this agenda, retrieved from BoardDocs. Each file was checked against the size BoardDocs states for it.
- State Crisis Intervention Grant Program 87 KB
- Project Safe Neighborhoods Grant Program 87 KB
- Criminal Justic Grant Program_Radios 87 KB
- Criminal Justic Grant Program_Body Worn Cameras 88 KB
- State and Local Cybersecurity Grant Program_Assessment and Evaluation_Penetration Testing 97 KB
- State and Local Cybersecurity Grant Program_Workforce Development 88 KB
- State and Local Cybersecurity Grant Program_Assessment and Evaluation 96 KB
- MFC - FLIPLOKS LLC - Classroom Door Security Devices_03.21.2025 6684 KB
- A101-2017_Hutsell ES Paving_Exhibits_SG_SB 6116 KB
- Hutsell ES_RankingSheet_03.03.2025 56 KB
- Hutsell ES_RecLtr_03.03.2025 115 KB
- 1 Financial Statements - January 2025 183 KB
- 3 Construction Report - January 2025 430 KB
- 5 Check Register - January 2025 181 KB
- 2 Function Object Analysis - January 2025 213 KB
- 4 Tax Report January 2025 56 KB
- March 2025 Budget Amendments - with FlipLok 238 KB
- AgBarns_HCMUD495_Easement 1263 KB
- Exhibit A_HCMUD495 Proposed Force Main Route 3027 KB
- Exhibit B_Cross Section 815 KB
- Exhibit C_Fill Agreement_EXECUTED 1854 KB
- Shaw Center March 31 - Board PPT Presentation Youtube Link 969 KB
- 2024-25 Instructional Calendar - DRAFT - Approved _____ 148 KB
- 2025-26 Instructional Calendar - DRAFT - Approved ___ 148 KB
- 2026-27 Instructional Calendar - DRAFT - Approved ___ 147 KB
- 1 - U124 - Instruction Sheet 45 KB
- 2 - U124 - Explanatory Notes 132 KB
- 3A - U124 - Local for Adoption - TASB 999 KB
- 3B - U124 - Local for Adoption - KISD 93 KB
- 4 - U124 - TASB Local Policy Overview 86 KB
- MIN_2_17_2025_Board_Work_Study_MeetingSIGNED 1031 KB
- MIN_2_24_2025_Regular_Board_MeetingSIGNED 1761 KB
Motions and votes
Recorded actions
MOTION 001 · AGENDA 6.1
PassedIt is recommended that the Board of Trustees approves for employees who are being recommended to receive one-year employee probationary contracts, one-year employee dual assignment probationary contracts, one-year employee term contracts, one-year employee dual assignment term contracts, and two-year employee dual assignment term contracts for the 2025 - 2026 school year with the exception of those employees who have resigned or a decision has not been made at this time concerning being recommended for a contract, for termination or for proposed non-renewal, which will occur at a future meeting.
7 Yes · 0 No
| Trustee | Vote |
|---|---|
| amy-thieme | Yes |
| dawn-champagne | Yes |
| lance-redmon | Yes |
| mary-ellen-cuzela | Yes |
| morgan-calhoun | Yes |
| rebecca-fox | Yes |
| victor-perez | Yes |
MOTION 002 · AGENDA 8.1
PassedIt is recommended that the Board of Trustees approve the District's January 2025 Financial statements
7 Yes · 0 No
| Trustee | Vote |
|---|---|
| amy-thieme | Yes |
| dawn-champagne | Yes |
| lance-redmon | Yes |
| mary-ellen-cuzela | Yes |
| morgan-calhoun | Yes |
| rebecca-fox | Yes |
| victor-perez | Yes |
MOTION 003 · AGENDA 8.2
PassedIt is recommended that the Board of Trustees approves the District's March 2025 budget amendments.
7 Yes · 0 No
| Trustee | Vote |
|---|---|
| amy-thieme | Yes |
| dawn-champagne | Yes |
| lance-redmon | Yes |
| mary-ellen-cuzela | Yes |
| morgan-calhoun | Yes |
| rebecca-fox | Yes |
| victor-perez | Yes |
MOTION 004 · AGENDA 8.3
PassedIt is recommended that the Board of Trustees approves the contract with FlipLok, LLC. for classroom door security devices.
7 Yes · 0 No
| Trustee | Vote |
|---|---|
| amy-thieme | Yes |
| dawn-champagne | Yes |
| lance-redmon | Yes |
| mary-ellen-cuzela | Yes |
| morgan-calhoun | Yes |
| rebecca-fox | Yes |
| victor-perez | Yes |
MOTION 005 · AGENDA 8.4
PassedIt is recommended that the Board of Trustees awards a contract to Stewart Builders, LLC. for the paving of the Hutsell Elementary School parking lot in the amount of $2,000,000 and approves the total project cost not to exceed $2,800,000.
7 Yes · 0 No
| Trustee | Vote |
|---|---|
| amy-thieme | Yes |
| dawn-champagne | Yes |
| lance-redmon | Yes |
| mary-ellen-cuzela | Yes |
| morgan-calhoun | Yes |
| rebecca-fox | Yes |
| victor-perez | Yes |
MOTION 006 · AGENDA 8.5
UnknownIt is recommended that the Board of Trustees awards Harris County Municipal Utility District (MUD) No. 495 a sanitary sewer easement associated with the Agricultural Sciences Center as depicted in the attached easement document.
MOTION 007 · AGENDA 8.6
PassedKaty ISD’s administration and Technology Operations department are recommending that the Board adopt these resolutions which allows the District to participate in the State and Local Cybersecurity Grant Program in the following areas: Assessment and Evaluation Projects (two grant applications) and Workforce Development Projects.
7 Yes · 0 No
| Trustee | Vote |
|---|---|
| amy-thieme | Yes |
| dawn-champagne | Yes |
| lance-redmon | Yes |
| mary-ellen-cuzela | Yes |
| morgan-calhoun | Yes |
| rebecca-fox | Yes |
| victor-perez | Yes |
MOTION 008 · AGENDA 8.7
PassedKaty ISD’s administration and Technology Operations department are recommending that the Board adopt these resolutions which allows the District to participate in the Criminal Justice Grant Program (2 grant applications), State Crisis Intervention Grant Program, and Project Safe Neighborhoods Grant Program.
7 Yes · 0 No
| Trustee | Vote |
|---|---|
| amy-thieme | Yes |
| dawn-champagne | Yes |
| lance-redmon | Yes |
| mary-ellen-cuzela | Yes |
| morgan-calhoun | Yes |
| rebecca-fox | Yes |
| victor-perez | Yes |
MOTION 009 · AGENDA 8.8
PassedIt is recommended that the Board of Trustees approves a low attendance waiver as recommended by administration.
7 Yes · 0 No
| Trustee | Vote |
|---|---|
| amy-thieme | Yes |
| dawn-champagne | Yes |
| lance-redmon | Yes |
| mary-ellen-cuzela | Yes |
| morgan-calhoun | Yes |
| rebecca-fox | Yes |
| victor-perez | Yes |
MOTION 010 · AGENDA 8.9
UnknownIt is recommended the Board of Trustees approves an amendment to the 2024-2025, 2025-2026 and 2026-2027 Instructional Calendars to address a staff holiday based on the use of bad weather days.
MOTION 011 · AGENDA 8.10
PassedIt is recommended the Board of Trustees approves the adoption of Policy Update 124 as presented by administration.
7 Yes · 0 No
| Trustee | Vote |
|---|---|
| amy-thieme | Yes |
| dawn-champagne | Yes |
| lance-redmon | Yes |
| mary-ellen-cuzela | Yes |
| morgan-calhoun | Yes |
| rebecca-fox | Yes |
| victor-perez | Yes |
MOTION 012 · AGENDA 8.11
PassedIt is recommended that the Board of Trustees approves the campus staffing plan for the 2025 - 2026 school year as recommended by the superintendent.
7 Yes · 0 No
| Trustee | Vote |
|---|---|
| amy-thieme | Yes |
| dawn-champagne | Yes |
| lance-redmon | Yes |
| mary-ellen-cuzela | Yes |
| morgan-calhoun | Yes |
| rebecca-fox | Yes |
| victor-perez | Yes |
MOTION 013 · AGENDA 8.12
PassedIt is recommended that the Board of Trustees approves the minutes for the February 2025 Board meetings.
7 Yes · 0 No
| Trustee | Vote |
|---|---|
| amy-thieme | Yes |
| dawn-champagne | Yes |
| lance-redmon | Yes |
| mary-ellen-cuzela | Yes |
| morgan-calhoun | Yes |
| rebecca-fox | Yes |
| victor-perez | Yes |