October 10, 2016 at 5:30 PM - Board of Education Regular Meeting

Enrollment Projections

District NeSA/MAP Data

Total amount of claims to be approved in the consent agenda for the month of October, 2016 by specific fund are as follows:
General Fund = $426,707.53

Nutrition Services Fund = $222,982.64

Cooperative Fund = $3,995.72

Depreciation Fund= $118,621.18

Special Building Fund = $32,453.21

QCPUF = $208,000.00

Student Fee Fund= $15,730.41

The total amount of claims for the month of September, 2016 in the Activities fund are as follows:
Activity Fund =$136,049.75 

Our annual audit has gone well and our auditing firm is in the process of finalizing documents for the 2015-2016 fiscal year.  Final audit documents will be brought to the board at the October 27th meeting.  We are already 2 months into our new fiscal year and everything seems to be going well at this point.

Curriculum & Assessment

• MAP Fall Testing window is closed. Fall data gives valuable pieces of information for teachers to refer for assisting and helping students individually to achieve their education growth goals.
• I’ve been making connections weekly with the Senior High Career Academy teachers to work on curriculum. We are making some really good progress.
• We are pursuing continued work with the newly adopted Wonders program in K-2 grades. There was training in mid-September. The teachers were really pleased with the training and are working hard to incorporate all of the new components of the program. I owe credit to Jill Blaylock for making sure training was well organized. Along with this, because Nebraska is unique in the area of writing, Claudia Olsen, another Teaching and Learning team member is working with teacher groups to implement appropriate writing instruction to support the Wonders components.

Title

• It’s that time of year again.  I will be working on the Title grant and meeting the deadlines. The grant program on the web is a little hard to work with. I compliment my assistant, Maria Austin, on her patience to work through all of the details of the program.
• The implementation of the Title program at the Middle School is new this year. I’m very impressed with Mr. Hughes’ and Mrs. Robinson’s placement of the teachers in those positions, Mariah Bloomquist and Jenna Lordemann. They are doing a great job building that program at the Middle School.
• Mr. Hughes, Middle School Principal, just took a team of teachers to Minneapolis last week to an RTI Conference. Typically I would attend, however I chose to go to a Curriculum Director’s Conference since I missed the prior year attending that conference with the Junior High and Jefferson last year. The RTI conference does such a nice job of working with teams to go back to their buildings to work and assist student’s individual needs. Excellent education and strategic work occurs there. I would really like to get all of our principals and teacher teams to the RTI conference at some point.

Technology

• Life in the world of technology has been interesting to say the least since the update of Windows 10. One of the most problematic pieces to the update--Windows 10 updates whenever it decides to and interrupts users. We will be striving for updated devices this year for teachers.  

1. “CPR/AOA” training has been provided for selected staff from all of our NPS attendance centers. All schools now have trained staff to help address CPR and asthma attacks.
2. Elkhorn Logan Valley Public Health Department will provide staff to offer on-site flu shots for staff and family, at several school buildings in the district.
3. Friday, October 21st marks the end of our First Quarter of the 2016-2017 school term.
   
   
4. The attached chart reports the attendance at Fall Parent Conferences in our district schools.

AdvancED:

• This year will be an accreditation year for our school district and we are scheduled to have an External Team Review March 26-28, 2017.
• Building principals are updating and finalizing information for their building data books.  This information will be very valuable in the accreditation process.
• More details on accreditation and the External Team visit will be discussed at future meetings.  

APL Training:

• On Tuesday, September 27th and Wednesday, September 28th we sent twelve teachers to the first of five days of intensive training on APL. APL is our district instructional model and the training provides “in depth” information and practice on consistent instructional strategies implemented across the district.   
• The next three days of training are Tuesday, November 1st, Wednesday, November 2nd and Thursday, November 3rd.
• Twelve additional staff will participate in APL training in the spring.   

Safety Training / Information:

• All “frontline” office support staff will participate in crisis response training on Wednesday, October 19th from 3-5 p.m.
• Personnel from the Norfolk Police Division will conduct the training.
• Principals have completed the task of updating their individual building safety plans.

Professional Development:

• On Monday, October 24th, Dr. Tina Boogren from the Marzano Institute will be here in Norfolk to lead our certified teaching staff in the process of creating and sustaining highly engaged classrooms. This workshop, based around the book The Highly Engaged Classroom by Robert Marzano and Debra Pickering is a great opportunity for our teachers to continue to add strategies to their instructional toolboxes. Continually increasing our proficiency with teaching and learning adds additional positive impact to student achievement.
• The Highly Engaged Classroom is centered around four questions teachers should remember as they guide their own practice and work to keep students attentive and engaged. These four “student-centered” questions include the following:

1. How do I feel?

2. Am I interested?

3. Is this important?

4. Can I do this?

Board Retreat

NPS will hold a Board Retreat at Central Office on November 1, 2016 from 8:15-4:30.  Building Principals will present their Data Books and Building Goals in the morning.  The original Strategic Action Planning Committee will join us at 11:30 for a Strategic Planning Update, as well as a Comprehensive Facilities Update and a brainstorming session regarding Next Steps.  

The entire meeting will be open to the public.

GNSA Update

The Greater Nebraska Schools Association held their first meeting on Wednesday, September 28, 2016.  Mark Adler (Sup't. from Ralston Public Schools) is our new President and Rob Winter (retired Sup't. from Grand Island Public Schools) is our new Executive Director. 

Our updated GNSA brochure and schedule have been attached for your reference.  

Superintendents were assigned Senators to contact between November 18 and January 4th, which marks the beginning of the legislative session. I was assigned Senator Jim Scheer, as well as Senator Tyson Larson and the TBD Senator for District 17.

I will continue to serve on GNSA's Legislative Committee. We will meet at least once per week during the legislative session, via Google Hangout.

National Public Schools Foundation Regional Workshop

Sarah Dittmer and I will be attending the National Public Schools Foundation Association Regional Workshop  in Grand Island, on October 13th.  Sarah is a founding board member of the new Nebraska Public Schools Foundation Association and I will be serving on the Superintendent's Panel that is discussing what a successful school foundation looks like and how  a school district can  leverage and partner with a school foundation for maximum impact.

The Finance and Facility Committee met on Friday October 7th at 12:00 noon.  The agenda included the following:

• Review of October claims
• Review of September activity claims
• Review of Budget and percent comparison's
• Facility update
• Initial Audit review with representatives from Kruse and Schumacher
• Initial discussion on some possible staffing in activities

Our next meeting will be at noon on November 14th

The Policy and Government Relations Committee reviewed our new policy section 6283-6591 electronically. Only minor changes were recommended.

No new changes were made to the policies that are up for 2nd reading.

The Activities Committee held their first meeting of the year on Monday, September 26, 2016.

Mr. Ries and Mr. Schiers shared fall participation numbers.  It was noted that our One Act Play will have over 100 participants, which is outstanding.

Coach Larsen provided an update on Unified Bowling. This will be a great opportunity for more NHS students to become involved in activities. Our practices and events will be held at King's Lanes for NO charge.

The committee discussed Board Policy 5304 regarding Co-op Activities. We are currently above our "cap" in some sports, and need to determine whether to raise our caps or revise our policy.  Mr. Ries will get more information and opinions from the coaches of these sports prior to our next meeting.

Mr. Ries indicated that "hot topics" for the NSAA this year will include: Home School Eligibility (10 vs. 20 credit hours) and  Football Classification (may be based on a boys only count).

Our next meeting will be held at 1:00 on Thursday, October 27, 2016.

We have received an official request from NCEA President, Kimberly Erickson to be recognized as the exclusive bargaining agent for non-supervisory certificated employees for the 2018-2019 school year.  The NCEA has already been approved as the exclusive bargaining agent for 2017-2018. The Nebraska Education Association encourages their members to obtain this recognition one year in advance, and it is customary for us to grant this recognition.  

By law, we must hold our first negotiations meeting with NCEA prior to November 1st. Salary increases have already been set for 2017-1018, as part of the two-year agreement reached last year.  However, we will be meeting on October 25th to verify salaries, discuss the results of our ad-hoc Extra Duty Committee that was formed as a result of last year's agreement, and change language related to cash-in-lieu insurance to meet new legal requirements.

A slight, non-substantive wording change was made to Policy 6391 (Controversial Issues in the Classroom).

A #7 was added to the B)  Critieria for Instructional Materials in Policy 6300 (Selection and Review of Instructional and Media Materials).

No changes were recommended to policies:

6283 (Concussions), 6284 (Initiations, Hazing, Secret Clubs and Outside Organizations), 6286 (Return to Learn From Cancer), 6290 (Dedications and Commencement), 6310 (Textbook Loans), 6320 (Parent Request for Exclusion), 6360 (Recognition of Religious Beliefs and Customs), 6361 (Acknowledgment of Religious Holidays), 6362 (Religion in the Curriculum), 6363 (Purpose of Religion in the Curriculum), 6370 (Multicultural Education), 6380 (Equal Opportunity: Instruction Program), and 6390 (Controversial Issues).

State statute and the ESSA require that schools teach students and staff about the harms of copyright piracy. The Policy and Government Relations Committee felt that this information should be separated from the information in Policy 6020.  

The Policy and Government Relations Committee reviewed these policies and is recommending them for second/final reading tonight: 6200 (Objectives of the Instructional Program), 6210 (Curriculum-Development and Adoption), 6211 (Curriculum - Assessments), 6212 (Assessments - Academic Content Standards), 6220 (Experimental/Innovative Program), 6230 (Curriculum Guides), 6240 (Homework), 6260 (Guidance), 6270 (Field Trips), 6271 (School Activity Trip Drivers), 6280 (Activities), 6281 (Activity Fund Management), and 6282 (School Colors).  No changes have been recommended following their First Reading last month.

* Policy  8153 was reviewed and revised to reflect the changes made to policy 6210, regarding curriculum review by the Curriculum and Americanism Committee.

* Policy 2320 (Evaluation of Superintendent) has been updated based upon the work of the ad-hoc Superintendent Evaluation Committee.  The evaluation process now includes a self-reflection by the superintendent, where he/she provides supporting evidence related to each standard for the Board to review as they evaluate him/her.  A goal-setting component was also added to the evaluation process.

No changes have been made to this policy since the First Reading.

The second meeting of the month will be held at noon on Thursday, October 27th in the Central Office Board Room.

We will also hold a Board Retreat on November 1st, starting at 8:15 AM. Our approximate end time is 4:30 PM.  We will meet in the Central Office Board Room.