Dr. Luis Soria walked the Board through his presentation on "MAP District Overview: BOY".  See attached presentation.  He explained how the use of MAP testing allows the teachers to be more adaptive.  The school has created their own analysis of the data to look for gaps and comparison to the national average.  The district has work to be done in math and they are making changes to the curriculum to address it.  

It should be noted that Bill Baga prepared the data analysis for this presentation as well as others tonight and the Board was grateful for the methods and clarity it provided.

At the request of the Board, Dana Benton-Johnson presented the Districts discipline data with the support of Nancy Sepe and Cheryl Sclar. See attached presentation.  Incident rate in Kindergarten, Grade 6 and 7 are significantly higher than other grades.  This is following the return of all students from remote learning and no one was surprised to see an increase in incidents in these grades.  

The Board and administration had a frank discussion on the higher rates of black students being reported for office referrals than their caucasian counterparts.  We discussed that this data is not normalized for any "repeat customers" for referrals and a challenge in reviewing the data.  This is also a national trend that is observed and unfortunately FRCS is not immune to this trend.

The Equity and Inclusion Committee and Sub-Committees are being rescoped with this in mind as we move forward in a large task of changing culture.

The Board welcomed Julia Garcia as the new Director of Human Resources to the school.

See the Finance Committee section for addition discussion on personnel updates.

The Board welcomed Amanda Goddard and Jen Johnson to present the English Language Education Program.  See attached presentation.  The presentation included the statistics on the number of students/families that are in the program and the methods the staff uses to support the students.  It highlighted the twenty different languages the school needs to manage across the district with various levels of support based on needs of the students / families.    

No updates this month. Luis suggested the Special Education Department could provide updates from SEPAC & ELPAC, as they are managed through this department. He will work with Lori Obenchain to establish an update system.  

• Investment Policy
  • The Board asked about who has already reviewed the policy: Our audit firm, legal council, and investment advisors.
  • The Board did not request any changes to the Investment Policy.
• Debt Management Policy
  • Tabled this month

• The Enrollment Committee did not have any appeals to hear this month
• The Board review the enrollment numbers including the applications for next year that were provided.
  • Current enrollment 1658.  See attached report for the breakdown by grade
  • 602 applications for next school year have been received
  • 94 applications of the 602 are from siblings 

Badawi Dweik met with Matt Harrington to kick off the Facilities Committee.  During the Board meeting Annie Azarloza volunteered to join the facilities committee along with Luis Soria and Kevin Heayden.

The Board reviewed the Facilities Report provided to the meeting. See attached file.

• There was a great deal of concern expressed that the Middle School roof will not be ready for installation over the summer break.
• Staff laptop will be handed out tomorrow 12JAN2022.
• Elementary School roof is currently with legal to contact the installer.

NOTE: Matt recognized all of the work that Kevin Heayden and Linda Lavallee completed over the winter break to keep projects on track including the HVAC filters being replaced, UVB lighting Maintenance.  The High School boiler also broke over the break requiring emergency replacement.

Teacher Salary Implementation: 

Matt Yezukevich discussed a proposed change to the salary structure at the school. For existing staff, informal feedback for many years has been that our teachers are underpaid when compared to similar schools. This has led to turnover and lower morale. Working closely with the Finance Committee, Dr. Luis Soria made understanding this issue a priority and undertook a systematic review of the School’s salary structure which included: 

• Comparisons with similar schools, Dr. Soria identified what average teachers should be making based on experience, teaching qualifications and education (which teachers were required to validate via  survey).   
  • Based on the review, approximately, one quarter (85) of our teachers are underpaid (anywhere from 1% to 29%) when compared to similar schools. The total annualized increase is approximately $511k.   
• The Board requested a four year budget projection to understand what the School could afford for any proposed increases.  The exercise demonstrated we can afford this both in current and in future years. However, with the commitment to to teachers salaries this is the direction the board wants to move forward with, It should be noted that this means there will be less budget flexibility in other areas for the next three years due to the size of the annual increase.  
  
  Based on the review, the Finance Committee recommends the following: 
• FY2022, we are proposing increasing the salaries budget by approximately $235,000 which is the prorated amount based on school days through the end of the year (note: this is not a budget increase as the increase will be paid for by adjusting other budget line items). This increase would then be included as part of base teacher salaries.   
• To mitigate the impact on FY23, teachers who receive an increase of $5k or more will not be eligible for an annual increase; several members of the senior leadership team will forgo their annual increase for FY23.  

• There was no meeting in December for this Foundation Committee given the short month. The goals are unchanged for this year.  We plan to give every graduating senior a financial gift.  We currently do not know the amount of the gift for this year.
• The Foundation balance is currently $10,320

• MAP Testing Update
• Policy Review
  • 1st reading:
    • Debt Management Policy
    • Code of Conduct
    • Student Handbook
  • 2nd Reading
    • Investment Policy