Transcript

0:07:07I would like to call to order this regular meeting of the Boulder Valley School District Board of Education for Tuesday, February 10th, 2025. Board members may attend and participate in board meetings by electronic means in accordance with board policy BMEA and state law. Chris, will you please call the role? Booker here. Chavez here. Medler here. Quinna here. Rajpaw here. Tuing here. Here. Thank you. like everyone to turn their attention to the screens for our land acknowledgement this evening. The Boulder Valley School District resides and operates on land that is the ancestral homeland and unjustly and illegally taken territory of the Ute, Pueblin, Arapjo, Cheyenne, Apache, Navajo, and 48 other tribal nations historically tied to this land who have called this land home since time and memorial. We acknowledge the atrocities committed here, including the painful history of genocide, forced assimilation, and efforts to alienate the indigenous inhabitants from their homeland, supported by the policies of the United States government.

0:08:49BBSD is aware of the many indigenous peoples, past and present, and their dignified nations and cultures, who care for this land with strength and resilience. BBSD recognizes the histories of the land in Colorado and the survival of many nations that carried their oral traditions into the present. It is BBSD's responsibility to educate ourselves, our community, and our students so that we can embrace the wisdom and knowledge of indigenous peoples and actively stand together to address injustices. In offering this land acknowledgement, we affirm and honor the history, wisdom, oral traditions, and resilience of indigenous people, and recognize the responsibility to care for and appreciate this land together. I'd like to remind everybody that the mission of the Boulder Valley School District is to create challenging, meaningful, and engaging learning opportunities so that all children thrive and are prepared for successful, civically engaged lives. Thank you for joining us here this evening. We're glad to have you observe and participate in our meetings. At this time, is there a motion to approve tonight? A motion to approve tonight's agenda.

0:10:04Moved by Anna, seconded by Lenia. Chris, can you please call the role? Booker, yes. Chavez, yes. Medler, yes. Quinna, yes. Rajpal, yes. Tuading, yes. Anger, yes. Motion passes. First item up on our agenda this evening is a superintendent report. Dr. Anderson, good evening. Good evening, board president Raj Paul. Board members, good to see everyone. Have a few uh remarks this evening. Starting off with the National History Day event kickoff at Manhattan Middle School. Board members, as you know, this time of the year, several of our BBSD schools hold National History Day events where students present on historical topics of their choice and then have the opportunity to be selected to compete at the regional level. and even eventually nationals. This year, Manhattan Middle School of Arts and Academics went above and beyond. They had all of their sixth and seventh graders. More than 300 students present their projects during a special event last week. As you can see from the pictures uh displayed here, uh students chose all kinds of topics from p from the punk rock movement to the iPhone revolution. They presented in a number of ways including video documentaries to costume performances.

0:11:21Manhattan's educators along with several dozen community members were recruited to judge the project. Uh very very impressive Phoenix is great job in BBSC. We know that our school food is not only dish delicious but a bit revolutionary. So it should be no surprise that it's worthy of being highlighted in museums. For the past two weeks, the Museum of Boulder featured the school food project in a rotating family table display as part of its ongoing Boulder Eats food traditions along the Front Range. exhibit. Visitors got a glimpse of our school meals and learned about our local sourcing and scratch cooking along with a mannequin uniformed like our lunch ladies and guy. There's also a permanent case in the exhibit with several school food project artifacts from Chef Ann's time and Cooper here in BBSD. So, last week we got some exciting news.

0:12:13We're excited to share that uh some new electric buses will be hitting the roads. Um, last week at our Lafayette terminal, we received four new electric buses. These are all type A 14 passenger buses and will be used for special education routes. BBST mechanics are checking them over. Should be out on the roads in March. So, keep an eye out for those electric buses. And then finally, board members, I want to um encourage uh our community to check out uh what we we sent out uh earlier today, the first edition of the BBSD enrollment impacts newsletter. This is going to be a foundational way we are able to share updates regarding the impacts BBSD is facing when it comes to declining enrollment, also ways that our community can engage moving forward and eventually the decisions that we make. And all of that will be able to be um shared at this through this uh newsletter. So I encourage all of our community to open that, read that, watch the video at the top. It's a twominute video that'll give you a very good sense of what we're dealing with if you are just getting up to speed. And so um thanks to our communications team for putting that together and pushing that out today. And that's all I have for my remarks this

0:13:26evening. Thank you, Dr. Anderson. And board members, do you have any questions or comments? Seeing as there are none, we'll move right along to public participation. The board respects the right of the public to speak on matters concerning the operation of our schools. The board does not endorse any individual comments and reminds all those who speak that you're responsible for ensuring your remarks are suitable for an audience that includes kindergarten through 12th graders. Furthermore, it's an opportunity for the board to hear from the our constituents. It's not a time to for the board to engage with or react to speakers remarks. Speakers will each have two minutes to speak. You'll see a yellow card when you have 30 seconds remaining and an orange card when you have 10 seconds remaining. If you run out of time or would like to share additional information, you may always email the board.

0:14:11Our first speaker this evening actually sent an email saying they were likely not going to attend. Luci Lucia Herup, are they online or are they not? Okay, so we'll move next to Crystal Chin. Just push the round button and a little green light will come on to know indicate the mic is working. Yep. Okay. Does this thing move? Oh, it does move. Okay. Is my time already on? Mhm. Oh, can we like restart that? Do I have to hold it? Oh, no. Do I have to do anything? Oh, okay. That one's much easier. Well, good evening. My name is Crystal Chin and I'm a BBSD parent. I'm here tonight to place my concerns on the public record in good faith. Over the past several years, my family experienced serious harm related to student safety and how concerns were handled by the district. Medical documentation was provided, including two ER visits related to stress and the onset of anxiety induced seizures. And yet, the situation continued.

0:15:29I was told to send fewer emails and that I was expecting too much. And despite clear signs of distress, my child was not removed from mental health support until the final week of the school year, 69 days after she repeatedly asked adults at school for help. The district conducted an internal investigation. I was told staff followed procedures and that no corrective action was taken. I appealed and the district upheld its findings. Later, through a fer request, I obtained records the district already had. They showed concerns were minimized and underdocumented. At the time, I documented 34 bullying incidences in real time. The district only showed three. In those same records, I discovered a separate and deeply troubling issue. The principal forwarded a private email about my child to a teacher with no educational reason to receive it and made a racist comment in that same chain. I shared this with the district leadership and with this board.

0:16:25In both situations, there was no independent review and limited transparency. And this is not about one school, one employee or punishment. It is about whether this district has systems that respond objectively and safely when harm is reported or whether families are left to navigate that process alone. I'm here to ask for something specific. Independent oversight, including independent investigation and independent data collection and analysis, so the district is not policing itself in matters where conflicts of interest are inherent. Thank you. On enrollment, the next speaker. Thank you. Our next speaker this evening is Techla Heirs. It's still on. Yes. Yes. Good evening. My name is Tela Ays. I am a former BBSD parent. My child used to attend community monastery and we had similar concerns under the same principle. Ultimately, our family chose to homeschool because we no longer felt our child was safe or supported in this district.

0:17:35I'm speaking briefly because this board has been focused on declining enrollment, which I guess there's a new video on the website about that which I'll watch. Families do not take leaving lightly. We leave when harm keeps happening to our children and when we lose confidence that concerns will be taken seriously, documented accurately, and addressed in a way that actually protects students. From my perspective as a parent who left BBSD, independent oversight, including independent investigation and independent data collection and and analysis is necessary to rebuild trust with families. For the sake of student safety and the future of this district, I urge you to take this request seriously. Thank you. Thank you. Our next speaker this evening is Stefan Shrier. Appears they are not here. So our final speaker is Natasha Boddorf who is attending virtually. She is not here either. I guess then that concludes public comment for this evening.

0:18:49On behalf of the board, I want to thank everyone who took the time to speak tonight um to share your thoughts and experiences with us this evening. Our next item on the board agenda is board communication. Board members, who would like to begin? Uh, since we last met, I've had the opportunity to go to a couple of our different elementary schools, which um to discuss declining enrollment and school closures. Um, and I'm struck again by what amazing teachers we have and how much they love their schools and how much they put into those schools. Um, and I did a lot of learning about things that are very important to them, the things we need to preserve as we go through this process. Um, which is a a big ask when people are feeling very emotional about uh potential closings. That's hard. But I was really impressed people can come forward with what their most important priorities are. And for all of us, it always ends up being students. Um, and that we need to preserve student experience.

0:20:12So um and secondly, I had a nice title n meeting uh just to share with my fellow board members u moving forward with some ways to get more student voice as in uh our kids experience in our especially our comprehensive high schools. Uh, we had all of our comprehensive high schools offer Healthy Kids Colorado survey, which typically you'd only see maybe two schools be chosen to do that. And so I think that's good work that we're doing. Thanks, Jake. Yeah, I just want to echo Lenia's comments. I was able to go join uh Dr. Anderson, Dr. Da Cruz, and Nicole at Mesa and um and also at Creekide and same thing. just incredible things happen in the schools, you know, really engaged staff. Uh, and I think one of the big takeaways for me was that people realized that the status quo is not sustainable. Um, and you know, had all sorts of, uh, kind of emotions as part of the discussion, sadness, uh, you know, some anger, but also I think at the end of the day, um, you know, hopeful about what this process could lead to and what may potentially other resources might be coming to schools that as a result. Uh, and so I to be honest, I was a little nervous going into these things. How would they how

0:21:37would they go? Would people be angry? And I think at least from my own experience, it was a really positive uh conversation. Dr. Anderson, I don't know how you're able to sustain that kind of I only went to two and I didn't say anything. Um, and you're going to a number and so really appreciate the time you've spent on you're putting on your calendar to do this and staff as well. Um, and I'm just uh looking forward to going to more. hope we'll continue to see, you know, a whole range of teachers and actually staff from across the school join uh to provide their thoughts and uh feedback and recommendations for how we move forward here. So, um just wanted to report on those two visits. Alex in. Yeah. Um I'll start with the declining enrollment discussions as well. I've only had a chance to be at the Bear Creek discussion this morning. Um, but I echo what people have said. The staff have been uh were very thoughtful. Um, were very articulate about the things they value and appreciate about the culture of their own school and appreciating the community nature of the challenges we were facing. Um, so I thought it was it was constructive and the things you're talking about about people's anxiety coming into the process

0:22:53and at the same time like the palpable like pride they have in what they're doing as well as like they're involved in big intense challenges now with things like class size or the different uh part-time specials and things and they're making do and feel like they want to make sure this thing is not making this worse, right? And I think uh we need to make sure they feel like this is a constructive process and that we can honor the amount of choice we have in this community and the different cultures we have in the schools but focus on the values we're trying to get to be available to all our kids. So um any I just was very uh impressed with the thoughtfulness and the engagement. I had the same thing actually with a long sit down with some Mesa parents this weekend as well. And again, like there's an instinct to say, "Okay, save my school." And then there's the start you start engaging about what it is you like about your school, what why it made a difference to you, why you chose it in this environment. And people then get into the things that really matter to their kids. And I like this is a engaged community and they are pretty deep thinking about how to make that all

0:24:03work. And I think they get the trade-offs. That's why I think the engagement process and the simulations are going to um be really uh stimulating and provocative for people because they are trying to think about this on so many levels and I just hats off to the parents, hats off to the staff for doing this. Um I will make one plea. I got a couple emails that indicated that some adults are talking to their kids about this and sort of a, you know, maybe venting, maybe trying to just update their kids and doing so in a way that is, I think, potentially adding to the stress for our students. And so I I think we all can advocate for it. We want to communicate what we need, be clear about what we're going on, but I just put out a plea for everybody to be supportive and positive about schooling with our kids and that if uh it's not going to be developmentally appropriate for the little elementary school kids, probably not constructive, and it will add to the stress that our students have. And I think I would as a parent, I'd be thinking about reassuring them about the things that we value and the people that are taking care and working for them and that that's going to stay the same. So,

0:25:12I'm hoping we can all do that collectively. Uh, switching subjects a little bit. Um, it was great to be at the DAC meeting this month. Um, uh, they seemed appreciative of having a single designated liaison, so there'd be continuity, but I remind all the other board members that we can have two people go there. Um, and so I do encourage you to come through every once in a while. Let me know in advance so we don't end up with three and you know having an issue. But I really do think you should go again super impressed by the intentionality and the leadership of the DAC designing the process for them. They heard from Rob Price about the declining enrollment and the engagement process was most of the discussion last uh last week and again um we have a great group of people there in that discussion and we should um learn from them and hear what they have to say. Um I will say that uh um one of the feedback I got and uh this perhaps for Kathleen and for us to think about it um the policy subcommittee was thinking oh what is it you're actually going to do with something like IGA and as a single board member I don't know for sure what it is we're going to do

0:26:19but any policy we proceed but I do think our initial conversations at the first step are really helpful clue to them about where their feedback is most useful. So when we think about the first interactions we have whether it's prioritization or something else if we can add a little more specificity to our discussion about policy issues or maybe uh with council when we're dealing if we can get a little more heads up about the substance of the discussion we'll have about a particular policy then I think the DAC can prioritize a little bit more and figure out you know what to do because they have so much stuff they're dealing with they deal with community engagement the UIPs they deal with the budget they deal with policy so if we can make their time more efficient I think uh that would get better feedback.

0:26:59Now the schedule seems better aligned, but they're still saying, "Well, what are you guys going to do about it?" And I'm like, "I'm not sure what we're going to do about it." So, let's see a similar report. I'll start with I was only able to attend one of the um roundts with teachers. And um for my teacher buddies out there, I have to tell you that I am the one that brought up the fact that they've asked you to meet during your duty-free lunch. And I appreciate all of you volunteering to be there and talk to the superintendent because it is your time and for you to give it to the district is an extra duty. So I really appreciate you all coming through. I saw the teachers moving in and out as um they needed to and that seems to be really appropriate.

0:27:52So, make sure that you're taking care of yourself on your on your lunch. Um, and I learned a lot about schools that are suffering because they don't have enough um, maybe specials added or they don't have enough resources to have a full-time librarian or they don't have um, any number of programs. and those schools especially really see that um consolidation would add to their experience, their own experience and their students experience. So it was great to see people trying to work together to achieve more for kids. Uh on the second item I went to Cabbach which is the committee that is dedicated to um taking care of the bond um items. Uh, it was incredibly full agenda, a couple of hours. I particularly loved my tour of the APEC center and all of the different programs that they now have up and running with the equipment and the mini hospital rooms and the and the ambulance out back. I I really loved it and went I went running to some of the students I know and said, "You should go there."

0:29:09So hopefully that'll bring some enrollment. It was uh really fun to see how excited the principal is in showing that off and um I loved that part of our meeting. We also got to have a review of some of our budget qualms um and the potential for having to combine schools um so that everyone was aware. And the committee was incredibly well-run, organized, and uh ready to act. I was especially impressed with um the decision to put the elementary schools into phase four of the bond work so that we can make really good decisions about how that bond money is being spent simultaneously with the decisions about schools. So that was really impressive work that's being done that clearly took many years of planning. So I enjoyed my time um joining the committee. I also went to um tech committee meeting and I have to say I was uh I had been warned about the tech committee and did not find it that way at all. the tech committee um who are focused on AI um broke out into working groups and have a direction about creating policy and a roadmap and they were able to find examples from other districts that they could use in order to form that road map and it was a highly productive and very

0:30:46positive meeting. So when we get together and have our chance to wrestle with the AI policy for BBSD, we're going to have a lot of really good information and feedback. So that was really wonderful to see. Thank you for diving right in to those committees. Board members, anybody else? Um, like my fellow colleagues, I've been able to attend several different roundts at schools, schools that are at three rounds today and might stay that way, schools that are, you know, have multi-age classrooms, schools, all kinds of schools, choice schools. And I think uh one thing I want to elevate from the conversations I've been able to sit in is some gratitude and appreciation around this process and how it was very different from the process in the early as um listening first talking to our educators trying to understand the complexities of the problem not just making last minute decisions at the dis which I guess is what her happened in the past and I just honoring that our community some members of our community still remember what that looked like and that that feeling is still very real.

0:31:59And so I am appreciative of the time that staff, board members are willing to take to go listen first and then to our to our teachers and our principles and our community and the prolonged seems prolonged compared to the previous process to really make sure as the community is coming along with us that they're not surprised by any one outcome that we make late in the evening. So that has come up at several different sites. I think as as school listening to teachers, my takeaway is all of our school, it continues to be all of our schools are really special places and our staff love their schools and they love their students and they love what they do and and that actually makes me feel really like happy inside. sad that we'll have to probably close some schools, but knowing how much people care for the work that they're doing in the places that they are speaks volumes. And I think I've been thinking a lot about about those feelings and how much culture matters and feeling valued matters and and thinking about after we get through this phase of listening like that community building to really en ensure that those values and those things that people care most about remain intact even if the buildings have to change or it's something that is just

0:33:25I've been reflecting a lot on how can we make sure that that community building um in times transition is really strong so that those feelings remain uh even if conditions have to change. So appreciative for folks listening for or for folks sharing being very transparent providing the written feedback so we can really make the best of what is going to be difficult choices. I also had the opportunity to attend our quarterly meeting yesterday with the city and the county of Boulder CU and somebody asked a question about what would it take to to turn this declining enrollment around and I was pretty frank like well the city of Boulder does really need to reconsider the types of housing that they're building and the way in which they are want to be family friendly or not family friendly and without changes at the level of the city we will be the city of Boulder in particular will a place for retirees and college students with not a lot of folks in between. So, I tried to elevate that to our folks at the city um in that in that moment because that is increasingly feeling like the reality that we are that we are in.

0:34:34But that's all I've been up to since we last convened. Next item on tonight's agenda is information. We have two information items this evening. The first of which is the long r long long range advisory committee update and the annual enrollment trend report. Rob Price will do the introductions. All right. Good evening, President Rashba, members of the board and Dr. Anderson. A reminder that tonight's presentation really serves two uh purposes. The first purpose is to provide an update from our long range advisory committee. Handling that will be I bet Solless and Jeff Anderson our chairs for our loan range advisory committee. Sorry about that. And then Glenn Screw our district senior planner will be presenting on our annual enrollment trend report which was put together to establish enrollment trends at our elementary schools. That was uh first presented to the board I believe about three years ago was the first time. So with that I will turn it over to Solless.

0:35:43Okay. Good evening. My name is Dvette Sales and I am Sue Staint Marie Chipoa and I'm a parent, grandparent and employee. Um on this slide, it reinforces that the work um before the board is a result of a multi-year effort which has been supported by the work of the long-range advisory committee, also known as LRAK. Since 2022, the district has consistently examined enrollment trends, developed metrics, engaged with communities, and updated board policies to responding to respond to declining enrollment. In in addition to drafting the original metrics, LRAK has provided feedback and insights from the perspective of parents, staff, and community members. The lower part of this uh slide um highlights that the district has taken comprehensive and deliberate approach using every available strategy to influence the enrollment trajectories. These efforts have been thoughtful and proactive and they provide important context for YBVSD as is at this point in the process today.

0:36:55The committee has met twice since our last update to you in October. At our meeting in November, we heard an update from the staff about the attendance boundary adjustments. We reviewed the Octo October 21st work session and had initial discussion of the community engagement process. At the January meeting, the group heard the enrollment update that was given to the board in December and discussed and provided feedback on the upcoming community engagement process. At this time, I'm going to turn this over to Jeff Anderson, our co-chair. Just make it a go backwards one. Um, thanks Evette. I'm Jeff Anderson, a co-chair of Elrach here over the last four years. And I don't have any slides. I'm just going to make a few remarks u to the board and to the district leadership. So the first thing I want to briefly remind you is things that we've learned from this process that we'll be going through again tonight, which is reviewing the enrollment data. So when we first did this, we built this as an early warning system and I think the board bought into that and it was very effective. It was an early warning system. It provided us a lot of ideas about what was going on with our elementarymentaries.

0:38:06The depiction of that data that we used for that early warning system, which you'll see again tonight, I think is still very useful now that we have been warned and we're moving into a phase where we're making um action faster than we might have initially planned when we looked at this. So, we're really into an engagement phase where we're moving forward. The board's all on that, the district's all on that, but this data is still useful and Glenn will present it in a minute. So the initial action that we planned and this was three years ago that we started was to deal with this on a school-by-school basis and we started with that in a very convenient way. There was one school that became the pilot program, Heatherwood Elementary School. So we got a chance to try some things out and we learned some things from that. I think the first thing we learned is that our schools are all great and if we put more resources into them, we can make them even greater. And so I've still been engaging with with Heatherwood. I know some of us have kind of moved on to the next part of the process, but this has been great. And as an environmental scientist myself, it's just so exciting there, but we can't do that for every

0:39:07school. That's become absolutely clear. So, we can't pour resource into every school. And that leads us to the term holistic, which we first brought to you two years ago at this. And I'd like to thank board members again, especially board member Chavez, who used that holistic term very effectively in a discussion in the January meeting about this. we've moved on to understanding that this regional approach, which is really the holistic thing, is where we have to go. And again, the board's fully bought into that. The district staff has fully bought into that. But there were a few other things I think that we learned from the pilot project at Heatherwood that we can bring to bear here. The first thing is that district leadership, especially um Dr. Anderson and board leadership, especially President Rajald, got some experience dealing with um controversial issues in a school community. And I think we've we've learned from that. I think that's helping this process now and I think it's important to remember how that went and how it could have gone maybe bad and it didn't it went very very well. So that's really useful experience. Um the second thing is that we learned that single school solutions are not viable because we can look back at the data tonight and we'll see that while great

0:40:11things are happening at Heatherwood we're not seeing a huge enrollment in increase there. So this are just things that you can't control. Um and so that led to this holistic approach. Now a key thing about the holistic approach to remind everyone is it's vastly more complex to think about a whole bunch of schools together than it is to think about one fix for Heatherwood. Okay. And so in my day job I am a scientist who studies prediction and complexity and uncertainty. And so I just want to quickly bring a little of that experience what we've talked about a lot in Elrach to bear here looking forward Neil. So a few key points for you to look for in the presentation that Glenn's going to make for in a moment. The first thing in there is that traditionally there's been very little information in those reports about the uncertainty of the data. But there is in fact a piece there and that is the first slide he shows you with data on it is going to show the projected enrollment trends and the actual enrollment trends.

0:41:05Glenn did not predict the global pandemic. Okay. He did not predict um I think highly unexpected actions by the current administration which both led to uncertainty. But despite the quality of the rest of the things, there's still some uncertainty there. And the uncertainty amplifies when you go to individual school levels. Um decision making uncertainty is very very difficult. Okay. And so we need to keep in mind when we're making the decisions um how we react. All of us make decisions under uncertainty all the time. And again, I'm an environmental scientist. I don't trust the weather forecast I hear every day. And so if I really believed it was going to be 34 degrees like the forecast said, I might not worry about ice. But I'm going to worry anyway. Okay. And so these are the ways decisions are changed under complexity and uncertainty.

0:41:53The second thing you're going to see in the slides tonight, I think it's on the fifth slide, is there's going to be a list of bullets about the procedure Glenn used. You've you've seen this before, but a key quote there is that these are primarily based on past trends. Okay? And so Glenn does work hard to take new information into account, but past trends become far less useful than they have been in the past when we start doing new things because we're intentionally trying to break those trends. So a reminder again here that there is lots and lots of uncertainty in the data and moving forward. Okay. Um and we've discussed this in IRA. These issues are there. We don't know exactly what's going to happen. Um so you make you will be making decisions both the district staff and the board in the presence of a highly complex system with lots of uncertainty. Um and the final thing that makes this hard is that it's going to be in the presence of choice. So both by law and by philosophy I believe the district is absolutely committed to maximizing choice. And we learned again at Heatherwood that you can't enforce choice. You can't predict choice very well. And so there's that much more uncertainty and that more much

0:43:08more to deal with. Now BVSD already deals with a whole bunch of decision-m and uncertainty. And my suspicion is that certain staff here will tell you that when you're trying to decide what to do about a delayed opening, okay, there's a whole bunch of uncertainty. There's a whole bunch of thinking there. So we have expertise in house. Um but again things we've discussed about on LRAC is just it's going to be an enormous amount of complexity an enormous amount of work to deal with this. Again in your January most recent January meeting several of the board members again including board chair Rajpal board member Chavez specifically called out the need how much work that staff is doing. This is going to be really really hard and I think everyone needs to be sympathetic to the fact that this is going to be hard and eventually it's going to be hard for the board. Um so complexity, uncertainty and choice making everything hard. I have one last point I want to make again emphasizing something that was mentioned in the January meeting and that is that breaking into regions. We had a lot of conversations in Elrech about how to do that what the region should be and other things. Again this came up Lafayette and Erie certainly as Dr. Anderson pointed

0:44:19out certainly as board member Chavez pointed out are dealing with different problems but there is a significant possibility that there will be a big impact on them in different ways by the decisions that are made elsewhere. I just think it's important to remember to keep um them in the mix along with everything else. Um thanks very much for everyone working on this super hard problem and sorry for talking too long tonight but we have been talking about this a lot. Oh, and I'm sorry. Glenn's coming on with the data now, so the real show starts. Thank you, Jeff. All right, moving on with uh the enrollment trend report. Uh we'll start with uh the slide showing uh the last year um 10ear pro or 10year enrollment trend that we've seen. Uh we've seen this one before. Um generally going uh starting a decline around 2017 2018 and continuing to this year uh in 2025 with about a 1.9% loss a little bit over 500 students down about twice what was expected. Um, we also had uh an average year-over-year or an average trend of the last um uh five years is now at about uh minus 1.3%. So, it's averaged all of those years together. Um, and also the current immigration climate is also likely uh affected impacted 2025 enrollment as

0:45:49well as uh last year as well. Looking forward, uh overall district enrollment is projected to decline to continue to decline uh by about 1,700 students over the next five years. Uh although we did see some year overyear uh leveling at the elementary uh level. Um uh we still expect overall declines to continue um to we excuse me, we expect overall declines over current levels. Uh for this reason, we expect elementary to continue to to drive the most uh most of our facility and staffing needs going forward. And as a reminder, preschool is not included in these slides uh given the unique nature of that program and uh the difficulty in in assessing demand for it and project methodology. Um how we come up with these projections and looking forward to it. Uh we use the cohort survival method which is principally the technique most school districts use. Uh it looks at the rate each cohort or class or class level like kindergarten or first grade uh progresses from one year to the next. So you can see in the diagram you have 2017 students kindergarteners and we compare that to the next year when that same class becomes first graders and and derive a rate from that and and we average those rates and project it forward. Uh now

0:47:23BBSD does modify this to as best we can uh to account for uh resident students and resident populations in neighborhood schools uh and the kinds of impacts that will have. We also look at the in uh the inputs for open enrollment flows coming in and out of schools and out of the district uh and new housing development and uh how births will affect kindergarten classes going forward. Of course, when doing projection, there's always assumptions. Um, we look at open enrollment flows and net migration when they're stable. Uh, projections are going to be more consistent. Uh, new housing, whether it's consistent at similar rates as we estimate in the projection. So, when coming up with new housing, we use the best available information to see what we think new housing will look like. Um but that's not always possible dead on with that. So that's an assumption. Uh the ratio of birth to subsequent kindergarteners uh is also an important one and uh when those are stable projections are much more solid and really primarily as Jeff said uh these are based on past trends. Um but we're able to use births, new housing, open enrollment updates to fight to at least provide some of a glimpse moving forward and not just relying on those past trends. Um, and of course, as Jeff said

0:48:49eloquently, uh, future events aren't always predictable, and big events like COVID or even some of the immigration, um, uh, climate that we're seeing now in the country also can can, uh, produce a lot of volatility in projections and here is are the projections at a school level. uh we have um uh arranged them to color code them uh as an early warning projection or an early warning system uh and indicators using those LRAT criteria that we've discussed in the last few years. Uh we colorcoded uh uh schools and years that are uh one and a half rounds. That's 1.5 CLA uh classes per grade level at a school and 50% those are noted in if one of those uh indicators is hit are hit then those are ind are shown in red here. Uh and in yellow we use that as as a kind of um uh schools that are getting close to that red mark and those are schools that are at two rounds per school or 60%.

0:50:03Uh when looking at this and comparing it to last year, we see about the same number of schools that are in the yellow or red category, but we are seeing more red moving forward in the later years. That's the one thing that stands out. We're also seeing in uh over the next five years by 2030 that we'll probably have around five schools that will have uh both of those indicators met being one and a half rounds and uh 50% at least. And we're also seeing uh an increase in the number of empty seats from around 4,800 to 5100. This slide is a graphic representation of that that uh highly numeric chart that we just looked at. It shows the locations of the schools uh and whether they've met that one and a half rounds uh and 50% shown in red here. And we also have the other schools shown in yellow. This is a current year as we see it. And progressing forward, we see some additional schools hitting either the red or yellow criteria out until we get to 2030.

0:51:24And we see five of those schools uh in red noted here and where they're located. So in summary, projections indicate that overall district enrollment will continue to decline over the next five years with elementary um with the elementary level driving most of the facility and staffing impacts. Uh by 2030, BBSD is projected to have 14 schools at two classes per grade level. So that's two rounds. This is looking only at rounds, not capacity as well. So we expect 14 of those um by 2030 with two rounds being very close to that level um as well. And of those 14, seven are expected to be at one and a half uh classes per grade level or below. Uh which in in those situations we would uh which could necessitate mixed grade uh classrooms going forward. This is the same timeline that you saw on January 27th. So currently in phase one as communicated uh by multiple board members and Dr. Anderson. So we're engaging with our principles and our teachers. That work will continue through February and then we will start engaging with our community uh in March time frame and I would expect more details on that process to be coming out here in the next few weeks. Then the timeline will continue as we discussed at that January 27th meeting.

0:53:06And with that we'll open it up for questions. Thank you for that presentation. Board members, any questions or comments? Alex. Uh, just first off, I just want to say a big thanks to Jeffet and everybody else in the long range advisory committee. It's really remains helpful and I especially like the um the lesson taking uh from what we've been doing so far and pausing to reflect on what we've learned and done. So, thank you. Um, in terms of questions going forward, one question I have is can we do we have numbers on the actual number of multil- language learner like drop from year-over-year like what is the impact of the current chaos on our enrollment in terms of actually being on enrollment? Uh, we thought it was maybe around 100 students um very generally looking at because we only have can use uh multil- language learners but uh using that and comparing it to last year and previous years probably about a hundred Okay, thank you. Um, uh, and, um, Glenn, this is also a question for you. Um, I I've asked this before, but I think it's relevant to, uh, Nicole's comments about dealing with the city. I live in Table Mesa, you know, behind, uh, King Supers and a ton of large neighborhood, single family homes with yards. And um the big thing

0:54:31there that changes the amount of kids on my block is the turnover from the you know the retirees and now like me the empty nesters to the next family. And my particular block has turned over. When my wife and I moved there we were two families of 11 out of the 11. And now we're the empty nesters and there are eight of the houses have families in them with multiple kids. So like the big thing for me that's again 15 billionth variable to take into consideration is the interest rate and the ability of retired people to downsize and have any financial reason to do so. It's like that's again outside our control. But can we get a sense of eventually if our single family homes with yards had families in them? Like how many people might we get back uh 10 or 15 years from now if you know we had the kind of ratios of kid per house that say we had 20 years ago in those same neighborhoods. Is there a new way to take that in consideration?

0:55:28Very difficult. I mean we go from the information we have you know we'd be saying what you'd be seeing though is demographically a lot of reversals because technically per household we've still been seeing declines even for single family detached relatively. Um so you know there's that part of it. Um and um you know, yeah, it's really the the empty nesters and and the aging population is really the biggest roadblock that I'm seeing over the next 15 20 years um of of of creating a lot of new students in in in this in that time period. After that, I mean, you would argue that yes, some houses might start opening up, but it's very difficult to tell what those rates are going to look like. And so far, most of them have been declining. Yeah. And following up on that, I mean, I think about the city's emphasis on trying to address affordability. And they tend to go for the numbers and the subsidy and not the number of bedrooms, right? And so like and I think our argument will continue to be with the city. Hey, can we if if we are adding housing stock, can we do it with more bedrooms so there's a greater likelihood that families will live here.

0:56:37Um but the other one for me is trying to figure out what those ratios are. Uh I live in southwest Boulder. We've got a lot of single family homes. I would anticipate that they would continue to turn over and that we'd want to maintain the capacity eventually that there might be kids there. And that what my observation is even though the housing's really expensive, people with the ability to buy a single family house are more likely to want to have kids in it too. So just because it's expensive doesn't mean that families aren't moving in there and having kids. It just means only wealthy families are, which is not a great thing. And those wealthy families that move in have the capacity to exercise choice and attend a private school. So we have to be all the more competitive, all the more meeting people's needs to keep the enrollment in that neighborhood. But I'd love to know if there's any uh if there's any other lessons from other cities where housing stock gets expensive but you still see single family homes lead to students over time.

0:57:34And I don't know where like is that a California story we could learn from or something? We can look at that. I mean I think past Boulder has been an example. We have seen uh occup families with children occupy houses uh that were not inexpensive houses and it's you know right now the constraint is availability. I think Dr. Anderson and then Jorge I would say also that there's more competition for affordability, right? Like, so if you're a young, you know, if you're a young family and you're looking to uh buy your first or your second home and you want a yard and you want a a newer home with maybe not some of the challenges that an older home may may present, uh you're looking in Frederick and Firestone. And as we've been doing our roundts, I've been making that point. And every single time someone goes, "Yeah, that's where I live because that's where young families are." And um I did appreciate Nicole's comments at our our quarterly meeting and uh we are in a challenge and we are very much in danger of Boulder not being a familyfriendly place to live because to be family friendly you have to have kids.

0:59:05Like I know that sounds silly to be that direct, right? So there's lots of efforts underway to to make our I think that the city's taking on a child-friendly city initiative and I was brought into a meeting there and I said the same thing. Well, childfriendly for what kids? But it's not just Boulder, right? We're talking Lewisville. We're talking SP. talking all of our municipalities and intentionality to ensure that families have the ability to live and raise their kids there, right, is is something that if as a community we don't lock arms and make that a priority, it will not happen. We've done our part in every corner of this school district. our schools are achieving and providing the supports uh and incredible uh amazing educators, teachers and you know we're in the kid business.

1:00:02So without kids right we're going to have to make some significant shifts. Uh so uh back to this point you know this idea of if you're aging in place with people living longer with folks retiring maybe earlier like you know you could be two three decades out before things change you know I think maybe our best bet is a stabilization so but it's you know and I appreciate that Jeff stood up because as a scientist who studies unpredictability I always value his opinion Uh we we are we are um I would say this community members, if you're not paying attention, you need to pay attention. This is a serious issue that we're all going to have to wrestle with. We know and understand as a governance team, we have tough decisions to make. We stand ready to do that, right? I think that folks knowing and understanding what our challenge is and that our challenge stretches beyond the number of schools we have and it really comes down to the number of families that can live here is is really at the root cause of of the challenges that we're that we're really facing.

1:01:13I just want to jump in on two issues. So the first one is I have made um quite a bit of study recently on other districts and demographics and the question of attracting families with children is one thing. Right now we're dealing with a national demographic where the number of children per childbearing couple is vastly reduced from what it was 20 years ago and even more reduced from what it was 40 or 50 years ago when we were building elementary schools on the west side of the district. And so you cannot predict these types of trends very well either. I think it is unlikely that we're going to go back to four kids per house on your street of 11 and the density that we had earlier. And of course we've already closed some of those schools. So it is not just enough. We're not going to solve everything by solving these problems of getting families in. That would be helpful and I'm glad you're engaging on it, but that's going to not going to be enough. Um the second thing again comes back to um uncertainty which we're hearing all over the place here.

1:02:12So emergency managers including people dealing with emergency situations in the district. There's a huge body of literature on how to make decisions in this type of thing. And normally the thing to do is to be conservative. And so your issue of what if we get 10 down years 10 years down the road and there are eight families on your street with three kids each coming up. um one has to think very carefully about closing and selling district properties and the impacts of that versus other things. So there's a lot of a lot of challenges here to think about. Thanks Jorge. Thank you. Uh thank you for your work on this. You know it's always kind of not jarring but always kind of so sobering to see this. Um it's less a question more probably the two points. Um, one, the map you showed on there, it's not just a problem in West District. It's the across the whole district, right?

1:03:05The schools are spread out everywhere. So, it's not just about one community, it's all communities. Um, the the part about the demographic cliff, right? We we've seen that for a long time and we'll probably see smaller. We've got a group of cohorts coming through at the high school and middle school level that are getting smaller and smaller and will be for the for the future. Um, so it does make it kind of tricky. Um and and we've got lots of housing being built, but it's not bringing in kids now. The stuff that's already happening now. And and I think in one of the charts you said by 2030 we'll have 14 schools that are below two rounds. That chart is actually really stable. We have 14 schools now that are below two rounds. It's the same schools that are still below two rounds. We just have more that are getting close to it. So the problem is here. Um and those 14 schools are spread out across our entire district. So, I think um you know I I get the uncertainty moving forward, but we're there now and so I appreciate that. Thank you, Jason.

1:04:05Yeah, just kind of on that point, um you know, if we're talking about I mean there's so many complex and interesting issues here, but you know, if you're looking as Jorge said, this is not just a Boulder problem. This is there these we have these challenges in the eastern part of the district as well. How how would you explain Broomfield because I look at Broomfield it seems like there's a lot of construction um a lot of single family housing I mean obviously condos and apartments too and yet the problem is there as well so you know it's affordability fewer and fewer kids per family I just don't it you know I think there's some things you can explain I don't I can't explain when you see the you know kind of more robust development on the eastern part of the district how that's not translating to more kids in those schools I mean some of the schools Do you see like I think it was meark that it's exceeds capacity but the majority of them in the eastern part of the district still see a decline and do you have any sense of what's happening? Is it still not the right kind of housing? I mean so Broomfield on in the BVSD part of Broomfield does not have much new

1:05:07housing at all. There's one development just north of Aspen Creek uh that's broke ground. It's a small developer and they're not building a lot of units every year. Um, so that's so Broomfield's actually been pretty landlocked in that regard for a while and they've been on a slow decline for for some time as far as the the lower yields in the other new housing that we're seeing in Lafayette and Erie. Um, you know, that's a trend other school districts are saying they're seeing in new development. Um, one part of that it does appear looking at it that we have quite a number of moveups in those. So, a lot of people who are already in the district uh want a bigger house or want something different and are moving to those and they already have their kids in high school or or something like that. That can be part of the explanation. Um other than that, it's it's a trend that I could I've seen regionally and it's about pretty much all we know.

1:06:10Okay. Guess I just want to four years or it's been a while since we started LRAK and I just want to take a moment to honor all of the work that all the folks that have served on LRAK over the years have done and our staff to support them. I think it really has their efforts and their recommendations have really got helped us get to the place we are today to have these kinds of conversations. And I've been thinking a lot about how do you bridge that image we have shown for a long time on slide 10 with the schools and the different colors to where we are today. And I think that that image is still relevant because it shows how we cannot take this as a one by one school sight by sight um problem.

1:06:44We have to take it by a regional regionally and think districtwide because there are multiple schools across this district that are changing from gray to yellow to red. And so I think that is still very much relevant. And so I just wanted to highlight that and thanks to the committee for doing all the work. Just because we're in this new phase doesn't mean that their work is done or that there was not a value and purpose to that. It just helped us get to where we are today in the addressing the realities that we face. I also want to like the complexity is is very real. That's the other thing I hear at roundts staff will acknowledge like I don't I this is hard. There are thousands of there's a thousand levers you could pull. I don't know what might be best.

1:07:28Good luck in making that decision. And so I think the complexity is is real and I think it it because we're not in the conditions that our neighboring school districts have been in recently where we have to close a bunch of schools in a very short time because we're fiscally constrained in some ways it actually makes the problem slightly more complex for us makes our comm how we're communicating it slightly more complex. So I just want to acknowledge that as well. So I thank you for elevating that complexity. There isn't there isn't one solution that is going to be exactly right. And so just that leaning into the listening and that this is going to look different than our neighboring districts because our challenges are slightly different and our reality is is slightly different. So um we'll continue to see these presentations. We're going to continue to see the this data and the trends and do our best to message to the community why we are tackling the work of today.

1:08:23And I just um thank you for all your efforts to help us help us um communicate why we have to make some hard decisions moving forward. Alex, yeah, I I just want to add on um on the complexity thing. I play poker with my friends and some are very nerdy atmospheric scientists as well and they always like to point out that in the history of all card games on Earth, the same 52 card deck has never existed. So once you have 52 variables, you it'll never you can never have the same thing happen. And so we're dealing with our school approaches and we have, you know, all these elementary schools and we have five or six options for them. There's no like, well, you should do this scenario. We're gonna we're gonna have a lot of input about the considerations we should take and our our leadership and staff are going to come back with um a set of ideas that are trying to match our principles and our values while still managing all this complexity. So like I know the instinct is to start gaming out like you should close this one and open this one and combine these two. And I feel like it's it's almost premature because we have to figure out what it is we're trying to achieve and then be

1:09:33intentional about the design of how those things work. because we we won't we could have a million solutions to how to structure our 56 schools and still not achieve our values. And so if we stay focused on what the principles are we're trying to achieve as we make that change, then we're more resilient to continue making the decisions. And the other thing I I just want to add is that um we're now at a more urgent situation and I think you just have to look at some of the other districts in Colorado to see what not taking action does to budgets that then that what that does to staff, what that does to politics and blows up a community. So we have careful financial stewardship. We have strong finance team. We have responsible planning and this is stuff that maintains our ability to be coherent and focused on kids 5 and 10 years from now rather than dissolving into the chaos you see in some of the other Colorado districts. And one last part of that is that we have to make decisions over the next couple of years that are designed to be the structure we'll have for the next eight or 10 years. And so not taking action would be undermining our finances which undermines our initiative, our ability to solve

1:10:42problems and is um affecting the 26 or the 14,000 elementary kids for another decade every year. So that's why I think we have to have the right conversation about principles be open to the options and then hold them up against those principles and criteria rather than saying well this is the way I envisioned them working. It's like this is what I envision them achieving is what we have to be talking about. Um, I just want to add that, um, I appreciate everything that you said. Um, but when you're making your decisions and your making your private discussions to be mindful that it was really important for the LRO community and um, a lot of the research that we did outside of that, looking at what happened in other districts and how their communities were really upset about everything that we are transparent. The main thing that we always wanted to have you guys take away was that we were being transparent with what's happening and what we're doing.

1:11:41And if you can accomplish that, I think this will make everything a lot easier for our families to handle. Thank you. I couldn't agree more. Board members, any other comments or questions on this information item? Thank you. Our next information item, final information item this evening is a legislative update. Dr. Anderson, is there anything you wanted to share on that? Yes, session has has started. Thank you, board president Raj Paul. Uh we're tracking 20 bills right now in our bill tracker. Uh no real movement. think, you know, our continued uh top priority is ensuring that the specialized um that the SOT taxes that um are being framed up as having to be included into the local share that that doesn't happen. Uh it it would take 6.5 million from our district, 200 million from school districts across the c uh the not the country, the state. Uh we feel like that we're making some progress. There is a united effort between school districts across the front range to push back against this along with case CASBY um and CA. So there is unified opposition to this idea.

1:13:01That's not to say that if we're successful that that the budget stabilization factor won't come back. I think that there is a real risk of that happening unfortunately and I think that would be an unfortunate regression uh in how we fund schools. Uh but I will say that and you know when we talked to legislators and we saw this at our legislative uh breakfast that there is a lot of stress at the capital on how do you balance this budget and who how do you how do you share the the pain so to speak. So, uh, more to come. We're we're watching really closely. Uh, and, uh, we've got about 20 bills in our bill tracker, but really too early to to, I think, really do much on any of those yet. I will say we're actively opposing a bill, Senate Bill 57, that would change how schoolboard elections occur. You would only be voted on by folks living in your region. So, some significant concerns around what would happen if only people in district B could vote for district B and how we would be able to adequately represent our entire community if we were beholden to the individuals that voted for us.

1:14:15So, we're opposing that bill. Um, and then we did take a support bill, support stance on that bill that would allow concurrent enrollment at higher education campuses. We talked about that one board members already. Everything else we're kind of monitoring at this point. I will say there are some bills like we had anticipated that while they have a $0 fiscal note on the bill itself would put work and costs to school districts, well-intended bills like concussion safety or things of that nature. So, there are some bills creeping up like that and we continue to make it clear that um we are aware that that we this is not a good time for us to take on more work or more finance, more um costs at this point. and so continue to push back on some of those, not necessarily actively opposing or actively supporting those, but it it is what we anticipated happening there is really happening there and that's um frustrating and we'll just continue to monitor those bills. Dr. Anderson, so there there may not be a bill I dislike more than this idea of single member districts.

1:15:22You know, the idea that each and every one of the governance team members up here would have a an individual set of constituents and then we would come together as the United Nations and not represent all kids in our district. I've watched this actually happen in other places. It's massively divisive and unproductive. And so I can't speak out loudly enough against that bill. And then just this idea of anybody who's pushing a bill that will take resources um to implement is actually voting for something to take resources away from classrooms and and unfortunately it's not framed that way. So whether it's concussion bill or other well-intentioned good ideas that somebody cooks up and they want to you know you know push push a bill forward because they feel like you know that's the the thing they're passionate about. We are in a position where we are in no shape financially to any districts. I mean 135 districts across the state are in declining enrollment to add administration.

1:16:25And I think that we're very wary of our administrative costs. Uh you know we we are are low in administrative costs will probably end up having to be lower as we make hard decisions and try not to impact our classrooms. Uh but when we have to have dedicated bandwidth for compliance reports or mandatory follow-up quality control on trainings because of a bill that takes resources out of classrooms and I don't know that it's been framed that clearly. Uh so um I just wanted to put that on the record. Thanks for that board members. Any questions on our legislative agenda on the legislative update? We will then move on to action items. Consent grouping 7.1 Personnel item 7.2 approval of a minutes January 27, 2026. 7.3 acceptance of donation Aspen Creek PK8. 7.4 acceptance of donation community monatory. 7.5 acceptance of donation Monarch PK8. 7.6 intergovernmental agreement with the city of Boulder. 7.7 grant federal programs titles two and three from the CDE. Are there any items board members would like to pull from consent grouping?

1:17:36Seeing none, is there a motion to approve the items on the consent? Moved by Alec, second by Lenia. Board members, any discussion on these items? Feels like a short list, which is kind of nice. Um, seeing as there's nothing to discuss, Chris, can you call the role on consent grouping? Booker, yes. Chavez, yes. Medler, yes. Quinna, yes. Rajpal, yes. Tuading, yes. Yes. Motion passes. Moving on to policy action items. Consent grouping 9.1 board policy DB annual operating budget. 9.2 policy DBJ budget transfers. 9.3 board policy DFA cash management investment policy. 9.4 policy DG depository funds and authorized signatures. Are there any items board members would like to pull from consent grouping? Seeing as there are none, is there a motion to approve consent? Moved by Lania, seconded by Jason. Board members, any discussion on these items?

1:18:42Seeing as there are none, Chris, can you call the role? Uh, yes. Chavez, yes. Medler, yes. Quinna, yes. Rajpal, yes. Tuading, yes. Anger, yes. Motion passes. Next item this evening, board members, we have several policy items to study. Once again, rounding out our D chapter this evening. Um, board policy DLB, board policy DLBR, DL DA, and DFB. I will turn it over to Kathleen to walk us through these policies. Thank you. Thank you, board president Raj Paul. Um, so as you as the president already indicated, we are coming up on concluding the board's maintenance of the D chapter. There is only one policy that you have not yet seen. I blame that on my kids dance show last weekend. But um, so looking at the first one, if I can find it, is salary deductions. This policy we are proposing to collapse both the policy and the regulation into a new umbrella policy.

1:19:58So that's 11.1 and 11.2 are proposed to be retired. The language that's contained in those items is now shown in red line in proposed policy DLA. That would be payroll procedures and salary deductions. So it carries over that uh the language from those first two that are recommended for elimination. There's one remaining policy on this topic that you will see at your very next meeting. But the final D policy has to do with revenues from licensing of school facilities. This had not been updated since 1996. At the time it was adopted. It was specifically adopted to make sure that we could put cell phone technology on buildings and make revenues from that. Um, it had an awful lot of detail in the policy that was unnecessary and was only focused on the telecommunication uses. So the red line proposal is just to back off some of those things that that you can count on your staff taking care of in the contracting and also broadening the scope of this policy to permit similar related uses. Um and those are the red lines proposed for the board study tonight.

1:21:24Thank you, Kathleen. Board members, any questions or comments about these policies? Are any of these extra required policies to have? No. That answers a lot of the questions we might have had already. Um, so I think collapsing into that one policy and my question is because even the policy that we're retaining on DLA is not required. Can you or staff speak to why we think it's important to have that procedure? It's more of a procedure codified in policy. There are a few things in this policy that we actually use as a practical matter having to do with errors that sometimes will happen or a employee might be have too many deductions or too few taken. And there is language in this policy to help us be clear with employees that as an employee I have to make sure my records are accurate and keep track of my salary. It does allow us to have some specificity and how we would correct those errors.

1:22:49Alex, and if we had the same question about the final one on the licensing, um, are these things we need or and are they things that help us make sure that as we enter into new agreements that we have leverage with potential entities that they know we got to work with this policy, don't even so don't even start negotiating away from these things or why do we keep this one and how does this help us? It's a really good question. I don't honestly know that this particular policy necessarily helps us. I'm looking at my friend Rob Price just to see if there's anything in it. I can tell you one of the first things I did when I got to this district, we had a little dispute and we just said we're done with you.

1:23:34You don't get to decide. We had a dispute with the telecommunications company. Do you remember that? Yeah. We felt really big time since we were taking on a major network. But honestly, I think this board's been pretty clear. I think the leadership is clear that we do look for opportunities to enhance revenue. The board adopted that in the K policy that you've already looked at. To the extent that the board um uses policy to direct staff, I think that it's pretty clear that you expect us to make prudent and responsible use of facilities. So candidly, uh, I don't think not having this policy would change anything about what Dr. Anderson or your or his staff do. there's a reason this policy exists. And uh to the extent that it's relevant or not relevant, I think at some point um and and Kathleen, correct me if I'm wrong, sometimes boards set policies when uh when things happen that uh are out of bounds but that were never clarified.

1:24:56So to the extent that um I think we're in a great place right now, we know and understand, right? If dynamics and thing dynamics and things were to change, uh, having something like this, it might be like a more of an insurance policy for the board to know and understand the bounds in which to operate and an insurance policy for staff who may think they're doing something innovative and the right thing and there's no policy that prevents it. Uh, so I do think that you could do without it if you'd like, but then you take on those risks um in the future for future boards, future superintendents, because I think we'll be fine. Alex. Yeah, I was that's kind of where I was going. Um, and the thing I think about is the board's responsibility is in the approval of the resulting agreement or contract if it's at the threshold where we're approving it. And then in a future of a different board, different superintendent, different administration that might do something not so great, there's still both the responsibility of the board to be reviewing and authorizing the actual procurement and then but this policy would help probably some future group thinking about what they're going to pitch or how we would negotiate them, right? So that's the reason we

1:26:09would still keep it. And to be clear that it's a use that's approved by the board. There may be some school districts where they felt like it would be inappropriate to have whatever that technology is for aesthetic or whatever reason. So, this does clearly authorize the staff then to go and pursue appropriate opportunities. And a policy that is rather benign, will be whittleled down to one page could be useful when we need to lean on it. Probably good to keep. And I appreciate all the elimination of unnecessary detail in there. Board members, any other Alex, sorry, I should have said this before just for efficiency sake. I would and I would tell my friends on the DAC, this is probably not one that needs your time as a DAC. Agreed. um you removed both most references to telecommunication except for the first paragraph um where you refer to use of telecommunication and other similar equipment. Could given the more general use of the policy, can that just be removed? And I'm not sure if there's a way to limit that without just being specifically about tele communication, but other questions or comments, board members?

1:27:38It feels great to be able to move through so many policies that are not very spicy. Thank you for your work on this. Board members, final study item, final shifting to study items. You have one item to study this evening, which is digital scoreboards. Dr. experience in Rob Price. Somebody will do the introductions. Thank you, board president Raj Paul. Uh board members, we're bringing together, you know, per our conversation this past fall in beginning to think about what are some ways in which our district can capitalize on potential advertising, potential partnership, uh to increase, um new revenue streams. Um, we had our team uh investigate some options and tonight we'll be presenting on one option that we think is an enhancement for our our student and community experience but also could provide additional revenue down the line with some one-time investment. So, with that, I'll turn it over to our assistant superintendent of operations, Rob Price.

1:28:36Thank you, Dr. Anderson. Good evening, President Rashall, members of the board. Uh, as Dr. Anderson just mentioned, I'm here to present a proposal for outdoor scoreboards at our high schools. So, this initiative is aligned with uh board policy KHB utilizing advertising as a ongoing revenue stream. And one idea to generate additional revenue would be to replace the five scoreboards at our five high school stadiums with modern digital units. Uh the modernization would elevate the overall aesthetic and technical capabilities of our stadiums which in turn enhances the game day experiences for the thousands of families and visitors who visit our campuses annually. Beyond the physical upgrade, this project delivers tangible educational value. It provides our students with real world operational media outlet which can be integrated directly within our CTE curriculum. Students would have the ability to manage content creation, gain hands-on video and a audio skills, uh produce weekly game game day releases, hype videos, interviews, preparing them for future careers in digital media and production.

1:29:56So, the one-time capital investment for this project is estimated at 2.38 million. The majority of this 1.99 million is for the five digital units themselves. an additional 175,000 for the fiber optic and then carrying a contingency of about 216,000 uh for just unforeseen associated with construction etc. Um small ongoing cost of about 21,000 for maintenance software easily offset with the ongoing uh annual revenue that we'll talk about on this slide. So as part of the financial strategy, the digital scoreboard serve as a premium advertising asset. Uh community schools would launch a new dedicated sponsorship program with a target of uh generating about 400,000 in annual revenue. The income would then be used to offset the one-time costs associated with the project and then the ongoing um uh annual costs of about $21,000 all supporting board policy KHP.

1:31:03So summarize this is a threepronged investment. We're enhancing our facilities for our community, our athletes. Um we're providing a valuable career and technical education for our students. and we're creating a sustainable revenue source in alignment with board policy. So, as a reminder, this is a study item tonight. If the board is supportive, we bring back the contract for the scoreboards in a future meeting. Um, and with that, I'll open it up for the board. Thanks for that overview, Rob. We'll go Lenia and then Jason. So, do we have any experience that we've talked with other districts about the impact on neighborhoods of these new scoreboards? Uh, yes. And the primarily it's been around the uh noise, the sound, etc. because ultimately they're distributing noise directly straight out of the scoreboard. So there's some planning associated with that. I have not heard any any feedback. Um maybe outside of the Naiwat community. I think there was some feedback I got out of Naiwat. Um other than that I have not received any about the appearance of the scoreboards.

1:32:21I would think that we might want to be mindful of light pollution as we exist in Boulder County. and I know their rules around it there. Okay. Uh yeah, thanks Rob. I want to ask about the just the numbers behind it. It looks like um almost 2.4 million for the cost, right, for five scoreboards and other related costs. And then it's 400,000 not per scoreboard, but total revenue for all five. Uh so what are so just looking at a long term that looks like it's about six years to cover the costs and then are we are these do these have like a 20-y year lifespan or what are we like anticipating revenue because if I mean we're looking at six years before we break even and then we'd be able to make you know potentially 400,000 I would imagine there's some more than just at the after six years we'll have more than just maintenance costs but potentially replace talking about even replacement I don't know the lifespan but I think just questions about the kind of long-term financing around this.

1:33:31So, let's assume that we're not going to be right out of the gate making $400,000. So, I'm going to assume the payback is going to be 7 to 8 years. The warranty on these boards is a little over 11 years. Um, we are assuming that we'll get at least 12 years. Manufacturer saying that you'll get 12 years if you operated them 247. You're more than likely going to get 15 years the way we typically would operate those. So, you're net positive approximately 7 to eight years on that back end. If our payoff at life cycle cost is 7 to eight years, if that makes sense. Um, I do not expect the maintenance costs to go up. Uh, I still expect those maintenance costs to be around $9,000 a year for all five boards. Then the rest of that is software. So, I wouldn't expect that to go up. But then we're at a pinch point in 15 years. You know, do we continue to renew that, etc. with as with any new technology first. Um I live approximately a mile from Centaurus and every Friday night I hear the I hear the game all the way through and when it's band day, woo, when we have the band festival. So, I would really like to encourage a sound pollution kind of check on those because

1:34:53really being a mile away from Centurus and still being able to hear every football game is uh a lot. Um, and that would also put me a mile away from Monarch or so. So, I could hear both of them from where my neighborhood is. So, that worries me. Um, I do have a concern that um I like the fact that you're going to use this as an educational opportunity for kids who are trying to learn how to do um media kind of management, but I have the concern that once again a great boon of money is going to a very small amount of children because not everybody plays football and soccer and baseball and those things. So, it feels a little bit inequitable. Just a question. I also would really like to make sure that those scoreboards I like the picture that you've provided there in that it looks like there's more than one uh provider of advertising money and it's not some exclusive of a um a corporation that's trying to get our children's attention. So I would like to see that it's not exclusive.

1:36:16My comments Alex. Yeah. And then uh could you um I think that makes sense and I appreciate the estimates of the range. I'd be curious what other communities have had in terms of a range per you know board for how we get to the 400,000 calculation. Um and one other thing to think about is having the students help with that as well. You know as an entrepreneurial experience. Um, I'm also uh uh it matters to me that we think about that $400,000 income as not just belonging to the place that gets the most seats in the in the stadium each time. So, I I'd like to make sure that we're thinking equitably in terms of gender and sports and activities for how we use the revenue that comes from it. Um, and uh and can you tell us which fund does the two and a half million come out of and which fund does the 400,000 go into?

1:37:13fund would come out of fund six go into bills. Yeah, the TBD fun 10 would it bill or schools? Yeah. And to address your other question, we did reach out to other districts. other districts uh have these um all around us and we do believe those ranges are in alignment with what they're seeing for advertising. Rob and and just to speak to Deian's point because as a um as a band dad uh who worked uh multiple music uh band festivals and spent every weekend for the past four not this this year but past four years. I I do think that Centaurus does a significant music festival. Monarch does a significant music festival and you can put kids uh videos from, you know, from band like this is actually inclusive and think about it a football game where it's actually a place to highlight the kids that might not be getting highlighted.

1:38:33Like it's not just uh you know football highlights. It could be students of the week or, you know, certain clubs who want to do a promo. I do think that if we do this well, it can be very inclusive because I'm incredibly sensitive, Dean, to that point of of this is purely for athletics. I do think that our football games um are our biggest community gatherings that we have uh in the fall for sure. Um but soccer games, band competitions, I think there's other opportunities as well. And I think that we would want to make sure that we were being very sensitive to in to to have equitable airtime to allow all kids to be highlighted uh to be able to to share information with our community. Um and I will say that the it is we we are becoming one of the few school districts that doesn't have this type of uh this type of um advertising. Yes. But but just opportunity for kids uh in our schools, whether they're in the band, whether they're playing a sport, whether they're at a schoolwide assembly, to have these types of um these types of scoreboards. Now, that's not to say that there won't be bumps in the road, board members. I think that that is that is part of what comes with enhancing a

1:39:57something like this. But when I think about um our big schools like Recfield and um Spanglebergfield uh at Centurus um I mean we've we've dealt with noise and light kind of concerns with neighbors. Uh I think we would follow those same processes. Yeah. I want to just to piggyback on that. I mean we used to do graduations at these stadiums and that would be a value ad. you taught our athletic facilities and things of that like this nature are lagging everybody around us and we did a good job in our policy to say that any revenue generated from these types of things would be distributed across the school district. It doesn't mean a scoreboard shows up at Rectfield and Boulder High gets the proceeds and that would that's that's our board policy KHB would really guide that revenue sharing.

1:40:50And so I think for me I think this shows our community that we care about youth sports and activities which a lot of people care about even if we are increasingly not maybe if always familyfriendly cities based on housing policy but we do care and all kinds of kids um use these facilities and I think it is a great opportunity to to elevate that. It's a better spectator experience. I think it's cool that kids can learn to how to how to film and um do some of those things. I have a question that the cost to each school is different. Are the sizes of the boards different? I I know the three with the highest amount of costs are our biggest stadiums and the other two are smaller. Can you tell me a little bit about those one-time funds and why they're different and and the size of these boards potentially? So, as a reminder, Recfield and Spangenberg Field are both shared stadiums, so they have bigger boards.

1:41:45Broomfield is also uh football plus multiple sports. We do not play football and some of our bigger sports at Monarch and Fairview. Therefore, those two boards are smaller. So, the reason for the reduction in cost is because they're smaller boards and rough size. Um, any idea? I will get that for you. board members, any other thoughts or questions? And and because Deian and Anna didn't have a chance to be engaged with KHB, I'd encourage you to look at that policy just to see like how any whether it's scoreboards or other types of revenue, how the how we are looking at that and and also how we're looking at folks that may potentially be able to advertise because that's going to guide any of those decisions more than any one contract would. Um, just throwing that out there.

1:42:45I appreciate it's not that long of a time since we looked at that policy and talked about being creative re finding creative revenue generators that benefit our students and our staff and our facilities. So, thank you for bringing this forward and not too much time. So, is the direction to bring back contract? Okay. I'd like to Yeah. Okay. Bring back the contract. Thank you. Well, board members, our final agenda item this evening is future agenda item requests. I know we have a lot on our plate this semester, but we are always looking ahead to the future semesters. Are there any items board members would like to add to our running list of prioritized items? Seeing as there are none, this agenda is this meeting is adjourned.