BOARD OF EDUCATION

SCHOOL DISTRICT 9-R

REGULAR BOARD MEETING

MINUTES

Tuesday, August 16, 2005

ITEM #1 – CALL TO ORDER, ESTABLISH QUORUM

President Brevik called the meeting to order at 6:10 p.m. Mrs. Brevik, Mr. Horvath, Dr. Jones, Mr. Patterson, Ms. Paulson, Mr. Seiter, and Mr. Short were all present.

ITEM #2 – APPROVE AGENDA

President Brevik indicated to the board that they had additional material for the agenda item on Referenda C & D, plus new pages for the actual resolution. There was also a new Human Resources agenda, and the addition of a report from Student Council members.

A motion was made by Dr. Jones to approve the agenda as amended. The motion was seconded by Mr. Seiter and unanimously approved.

ITEM #3 – CLOSING THE LOOP

President Brevik indicated that videos of the board meetings are still being delivered to the libraries, and the issue of director districts will be up for discussion later in the agenda.

ITEM #4 – PUBLIC PARTICIPATION

Walt Heikes, 1401 E. 3^rd Avenue, talked about the need to recruit special education teachers from the top graduate schools in the country, but the drawback is the cost of housing. District should consider what a hospital in Santa Fe is doing by contributing $500.00 towards a down payment on a house. Dr. Jones thanked Mr. Heikes for the information on dyslexia.

Vicki Gallegos questioned how the board could continue to support spending more than it collects in revenue. She talked about the cuts that have been made at the elementary schools, and how the district has been running in a deficit for three years. She asked how the transportation override would help, and the expense of $1200.00 per month for electronic board packets.

Ms. Brevik stated that Mrs. Doney is going to give the board a two, three, and five year budget scenario. She explained that we are working on a draft of the budget at this time, and actual numbers will come later. Diane is extremely conservative.

Sue Herbst from the League of Women Voters urged the board to adopt the resolution in support of Referendum C & D as the budget crisis is real. Referendum C would provide funding for health care, education, and transportation and Referendum D would allow for capital improvements.

Bliss Bruen talked about the monitoring of EL-3 asked the board to take it off the consent agenda to discuss it. This is about how the district treats the community, parents, and students, and she felt there was a lack of trust. She asked for the board to write tighter EL’s, and asked that they incorporate community input sooner than the summit in January.

There was no correspondence.

ITEM #5 - REPORTS

ITEM #5A - SUPERINTENDENT

Dr. Barter reminded the board about the school convocation at Miller in the morning, with administrators serving breakfast at 7:00 a.m., followed by a short program to welcome new administrators and share good news.

The administrator’s retreat was held with work being conducted on policy governance, board policies, and accountability of new administrators. We had consultants training the new administrators, and we reviewed the recommendations from the Minority Student Achievement Task Force.

ITEM #5A-1 – STUDENT COUNCIL

Bailey Kunkel talked about the Student council retreat which was held at the Hesperus Bible Camp, where they do their planning for the coming year. Homecoming will be the third week of school with an ancient Greek theme.

Casey Baker said they hired Ernie Baca, a consultant from Loveland, Colorado to train the freshman orientation leaders who will be a part of the mentoring link program. The freshman were divided into groups with a leader who shared their similar interests, and then they rotated activities throughout the day, going through the registration process, lunch, playing games, library and computer labs. There were separate parent seminars, which allowed the kids time to get to know other kids. The overall feeling was that they enjoyed it and established more of a connection.

ITEM #5B – BOARDDOCS

Mr. Seiter and Mr. Horvath reported on the availability of laptops, whether or not to provide printers and Internet connection, and the idea of providing a set amount to each board member in lieu of equipment. BoardDocs is a web based, cost effective way for the board and district to manage their money and time. It has research and archiving possibilities, and the cost is $1000.00 per month. Mrs. Rodri indicated that the board is spending roughly $17,000 per year now for paper packets, and eventually we’ll see a cost savings. The board discussed dial-up versus DSL, the cost of printers, and the rationale behind a stipend. The board agreed that they would do what it takes to get it done, being fair to all board members.

ITEM #5C – LINKAGE: SUBSTANCE ABUSE PREVENTION AND INTERVENTION

Ms. Paulson updated the board on the linkage for substance abuse prevention and intervention, which will be held on September 27 from 6 – 8:30 p.m. in the boardroom. She said Peter Tregillus will be the facilitator and those involved with the panel discussion will be members of the La Plata Meth board, John Lopez – regional prevention specialist, John Marcino, Michael Dougherty, and members of SuCap. Ms. Paulson will speak about the White Bison model. She explained that this would be a sharing on what we do and don’t know about drug abuse in our community, and what experiences kids should have to become healthy adults so they don’t turn toward drugs. Invitations will be sent to the key communicator groups along with all our parents and members from the facilitators’ groups.

ITEM #5D – BRESNAN COMMUNICATIONS

The City and County are looking at a joint venture in April 2006. They have hired a consultant and are holding focus groups about what possibilities should be considered when they negotiate the new franchise. Federal law requires cable television to provide educational channels. We share programming with City Span 10, but we could ask that a separate channel be put on for our use. If we were to do something like that, we would need more equipment to run our own television show. Without a significant contribution of funding – live broadcasting would be a couple years away. We will continue to explore web casting, but we need to develop a long-range plan. We may want to develop a class at DHS and the City is looking at building a joint studio so other organizations can use it.

Board members discussed the legality of the franchise, how the franchise fees are distributed, and public and education access over city access, the availability of equipment at the high school, and the need to be proactive and plan for this. The board suggested that we have a conversation with the college about a mutual interest in pursuing a channel for education purposes.

ITEM #6 – DISCUSSION

There were no discussion items.

ITEM #7 – DISCUSSION/ACTION

ITEM #7A – POSSIBLE REVISION OF DIRECTOR DISTRICTS

Dr. Barter discussed the options of staying with seven director districts, or reducing the number to five, with equal amounts in each area, and two representatives at large. The consultant, who is looking at changing our boundaries this year for our current director districts, needs your direction if you are interested in changing the number of districts. The board members wanted to continue with representation in the rural districts, and were in agreement that the number of districts remain the same. There was no action on this item.

ITEM #7B RESOLUTION TO SUPPORT BALLOT REFERENDA C & D

Mr. Horvath asked the board to support the referenda for C & D, as it will increase funding for the district. If this does not pass, mental health and other programs for at risk youth will be cut, and that will stretch our resources because we will have to pick up those costs. It is critical to education. Dr. Jones made a motion to support referendum C & D, which was seconded by Mr. Short and unanimously approved. There will be speakers’ training on the evening of the 23^rd at the Arts Center, and Andy Romanoff will be speaking on this issue on the 21^st at Rotary Park.

ITEM #7 C – MONITORING OF GP-2 GOVERNING STYLE

There was discussion about how the board deals with policy, and some members felt the community thinks our policies are open to different interpretations. The board will be an initiator of policy, not a reactor to staff initiatives. This policy has two exhibits, and the board should decide if it wants to continue to use the monthly or get rid of it. We are assessing our compliance on how we performed this past year. The exhibit is something we can take up at the retreat. Mr. Seiter made a motion that the board has performed in compliance with GP-2 Governing Style. Mr. Short seconded the motion, and it passed unanimously.

ITEM #8 - ACTION

There were no action items.

ITEM #9 – CONSENT AGENDA

ITEM #9A – MONITORING REPORT: EL-3 TREATMENT OF STUDENTS, PARENTS, AND COMMUNITY

ITEM #9B – MONITORING REPORT: EL-20 REAL PROPERTY PLANNING

ITEM #9C – APPROVAL OF INTERGOVERNMENTAL AGREEMENT FOR A COORDINATED ELECTION

ITEM #9D – HUMAN RESOURCES

ITEM #9E – REGULAR SCHOOL BOARD MEETING MINUTES, JULY 12, 2005

Ms. Paulson asked that items A and B be removed from the Consent Agenda. Dr. Jones made a motion to approve items C, D, E of the Consent Agenda. Mr. Horvath seconded the motion, which was unanimously approved.

Ms. Paulson felt that committee recommendations weren’t followed under EL-3. She felt we needed to be respectful of recommendations that come from committees if we are going to have any credibility with the community. Mrs. Brevik agreed and suggested putting those who are influenced by the policy in charge of monitoring it, such as DAAC. A sub-committee was suggested, but Ms. Brevik wanted to wait until after the report from the consultant was heard. Dr. Jones asked if there was any substance in that report that would contradict us if we approved this as in compliance tonight? Mrs. Brevik said that there was.

Dr. Jones made a motion to delay approving the monitoring report for EL-3 until after the discussion with the consultant on Thursday. Mr. Short seconded the motion, which was unanimously approved.

Ms. Paulson referred to the monitoring report for EL-20, and asked about the issue of transportation as we begin to move out into the Grandview area. The transportation issue of getting kids from one end of the city to the other is huge. Mrs. Doney said that the report should be ready this fall, as we needed to finalize the infrastructure review in order to complete it. Ms. Paulson made a motion to approve the monitoring report for EL-20 as presented, and it was seconded by Mr. Seiter and unanimously approved.

ITEM #10 – EXECUTIVE SESSION

ITEM #10A – LEGAL MATTER

Mr. Short made a motion to go into Executive Session at 8:17 p.m. for a conference with the district’s attorney to receive legal advice regarding a legal matter C.R.S. 24-6-402(4)(c). Those present in Executive Session shall be members of the board of education, the superintendent, the board clerk, the director of human resources, and the school district’s legal counsel. Dr. Jones seconded the motion, which passed unanimously.

The board returned from Executive Session at 9:09 p.m. Mr. Horvath made a motion to return from Executive Session at 9:09 p.m., which was seconded by Mr. Patterson and unanimously approved. No decisions were made and no votes were taken.

ITEM #11 – COMING EVENTS

The board talked about the special board meeting on August 18, and the coming work session/special meeting on August 30 where the superintendent’s evaluation would be conducted. The next regular board meeting is September 13.

ITEM #12 - ADJOURN

Mr. Patterson made a motion to adjourn at 9:15 p.m., which was seconded by Dr. Jones and

unanimously approved.

Respectfully submitted,

Kristy Rodri

Board Clerk

Approval: