School Board Update
September 19, 2019
Meeting Overview
Newly Approved Policies
- Policy 704 - Development and Maintenance of an Inventory of Fixed Assets and a Fixed Asset Accounting System
- Policy 706 - Acceptance of Gifts
- Policy 711 - Video Recording on School Buses
- Policy 904 - Distribution of Materials on School District Property by Nonschool Persons
Additional Items Approved by the Board
- 2020 CIHS Band & Choir Trip
- 2020 Model UN Trip to Chicago
- HRA Addendum
- eLearning Plan
- 2019-21 Instructional Assistant Contract
- 2020 Combined Polling Places
- 2019 Payable 2020 Preliminary Property Tax Levy
- 2019 Joint Truth in Taxation Meeting
- Revised 2021 Long Term Facility Maintenance Ten Year Expenditure Plan
- Well Drilling Bid (New Facility)
School Board Showcase - Isanti Intermediate School / School for All Seasons
Great things are happening at Cambridge-Isanti Schools!
Superintendent's Report - Dr. Rudolph
Back to School
What a great time of year to be in education! I am seeing The Bluejacket Way in action in every building I visit, and I am truly proud to be part of this group of people. From back to school workshops, professional development days, and opening our doors to our students, there is a great deal of hard work, camaraderie, school spirit, and compassion going into everything I see. We are off to a great start for the year!
At the Education Service Center, our staff has been working extremely hard to ensure schools and programs are supported accordingly and that students, staff, administrators, and families have what they need to develop well rounded individuals who excel in leadership, achieve at the highest levels, and are responsible citizens. It is noted that this work has been done this fall with fewer resources than in past years, and that the finance team, teaching and learning team, community education team, student support services team, human resources team, technology team, and building and grounds team have all contributed a great deal of collaborative effort to provide the district supports necessary to continue to be successful in our mission.
Communications
As I spend time better understanding our organization, I have been working closely with various members of our administrative and support teams to clarify and articulate our communications plan. This work will help to ensure that we, as a district, are prepared for any situation from weather closings to emergencies. In the absence of a District Communications Coordinator position, the teams have been incredibly helpful with not only identifying our needs, but stepping up and taking on additional tasks and roles as needed.
Area Leaders
During my first few weeks with the district, I have been fortunate enough to meet with some area leaders and nearby district superintendents. Each meeting provides additional insight about our community and the importance of Cambridge-Isanti Schools’ role within the communities.
District Principal/Director Meetings
Throughout the month of September, I am meeting with each of the building principals and directors as an opportunity to get to know them as individual leaders and better understand our organization. For each meeting, I have had them identify three things that are going well, two current challenges that they are facing, and identify how I can best support them (3-2-1) through my role as Superintendent. These meetings have been outstanding and have further reinforced the fact that we have amazing leaders in our district!
Administration Report Highlights
REPORT FROM: Administrative Services and Human Resources
by: Julia Lines
Back-to School Training
The rollout of the mandatory training through Schoology was very well received and worked great. In addition to bloodborne pathogens and employee right to know quizzes we added a policy quiz and a quiz on cyber security. These topics are important for all employees to be mindful and cognizant of. We are happy with the new Schoology platform and have a goal of increasing the new employee training experience using modules in Schoology. For example, it would be ideal for new Special Education Instructional Assistants to be able to complete a Schoology module related to the specific disability area they will be working with, in addition to just a general SPED 101 course. We continue to work toward the goal of a better and much more comprehensive onboarding process and we are happy to have this new platform to work within.
Communications and Emergency Preparedness
With budget cuts comes the addition of new responsibilities for so many employees. I have been impressed and pleased with the positive attitudes I have encountered in the face of adding more to already full plates. One of the new jobs for the HR team is to assist with communications. HR Administrative Assistant, Jessica Faust, has taken on assisting with the district social media pages. Ann Venneman, assistant to the Superintendent is also assisting with the district website duties. We have been working together on communicating updates to families via these vehicles. So far the reception has been very positive and we continue to look for ways to improve communication strategies.
Emergency response has also been a very important topic of discussion, and roles have been discussed and assigned as we have a fair amount of new faces at the Educational Services Center. The goal is to all be on the same page and ready to go in the event of an emergency. The Emergency Management Committee will be resuming meeting in the near future as well.
REPORT FROM: Finance and Operations
by: Christopher Kampa, CFA
Finance
We completed the major onsite visit of the audit process resulting in a successful evaluation. There were no major findings and audit is ahead of last-year’s pace. We have since turned our attention to the levy certification process and will present the preliminary levy to the Board for approval at the September 19th meeting. We are required to provide the County Auditor with a certified preliminary property tax levy by September 30th. We will present the levy to the public at a truth-in-taxation meeting in December and ask the School Board to certify the final payable 2020 property tax levy during the December 19, 2019 School Board meeting.
Transportation
There is always a little bit of chaos to start each year as new students and kindergartners learn the hub systems we implement at CMS and IIS. However, we have received reports that this year has been smoother than other years thanks to our bus drivers and the older students, who do a great job helping the younger kids learn the system.
Building & Grounds
The custodial staff is transitioning well to the start of school. Staff at all of our sites are doing a nice job of working with our teachers, instructional assistants, and food staff to ensure that all the needs are being met. We are also beginning our every other day cleaning routines at all buildings. As we move forward we will see where we can improve this plan and make any necessary changes as we go along. Feel free to reach out to me with any questions or concerns.
Food Service
We are off to a great start to the new year. We had a few vendor challenges, but we were able to successfully navigate those issues without any deviations to the published school menus. Our main focus in the coming weeks will be conducting our on-site reviews at each location and making preparations for our MDE Food Service Administration Review coming up later this fiscal year.
New Facility
We are working diligently with the construction and design teams to identify areas of potential cost savings, which has already resulted in over $200,000 of valued engineering savings. We have a tight construction time frame and projecting the building exterior to be completed by early December. We completed the project to raise the site elevation and will begin pouring footings the week of September 16.
REPORT FROM: Community Education
by: Dave Maurer
Early Childhood
The 2019-20 school year has started well. We have 399 students registered in our Preschool classes. This year we are offering two new classes with ECFE. One is a grandparent/child class called Me & My Grandparents. Another is ECFE 2.0, which is for parents who have “graduated” from ECFE with students who are up to and including third grade. This is a wonderful new addition!
Driver Education
Driver Education has a Parent Aware class that parents attend with their child who is working on obtaining their driver’s license. This year, we have 44 people registered for our class next week compared to 33 all of last year. This class is valuable in that parents learn updated information about driving and what their children are learning and need to learn as they go through the process.
REPORT FROM: Teaching and Learning
by: Dr. Brenda Damiani
Teaching and Learning District Committees
The Teaching and Learning District Committee cycle began on September 17 with the District Curriculum Committee. The committee reviewed the MDE standards implementation timeline, elementary report card revision communication, and the continuous improvement process. Elementary report cards have been standardized across grade-levels and schools and will be using a 4-point scale rather than a 5-point scale. This scale mirrors what teachers use in the classroom with students and will provide more detailed information for families about a student’s progress toward grade-level standards. We will share the family communication with the board in October.
Curriculum
Curriculum pilots are underway in middle school ELA and math as well as elementary ELA. Teachers who are piloting curriculum will receive additional professional development on September 30. High school math is implementing their newly adopted curriculum in geometry and algebra II. We are grateful to the teachers who are part of this process.
Data & Assessment
Fall testing is underway with the new early literature and math measures through DIBELS. We are looking at this data in correlation with previous TIES and NWEA data to determine target scores for intervention. The individual student assessment histories are in the process of being created and uploaded into Skyward. The goal for this completion is October 1.
Professional Development
Coordinators, principals, and academic coaches have been busy planning for the September 30 professional development day. The focus of the morning with be the Marzano Focused Evaluation Model, specifically teacher growth plans and student day. Staff will also learn about expectations for eLearning Days (pending board approval). The afternoon will be devoted to curriculum and Schoology training.
The Department of Teaching and Learning is preparing to launch the Flexible Professional Learning options on September 30 as well. These options will allow licensed staff to personalize their learning and support their individual growth plan and student learning.
Federal Programs
Title II, Title IV and ADSIS Grants have all been approved by the Department of Education and the Interventionist Teams are in the process of identifying students in need of additional academic and/or behavioral support. We are still waiting to hear approval of our Title I application, but we do not anticipate any issues. ADSIS End of the Year documentation was submitted to MDE last week with the data indicating that 440 students in our district received support through this funding during the 2018-2019 school year. A new Indian Education Liaison has been hired by the district, and programming is being put into place for our Native American students. The district PBIS team met in August and will be meeting again in September to create action plans for supporting our building level PBIS teams and community outreach efforts.
REPORT FROM: Student Support Services
by: Julie Williams
Summer Training
I wrapped up summer training with several Crisis Prevention Intervention (CPI) refresher and full course classes in the month of August. This brought the total of CPI certified staff to 207 going into the school year. This is great news as staff are able to collaborate as teams, work on common language, and access additional resources as they work with students day to day. If staff were hired at the end of the summer, they may have missed the training, but I have plans to offer a few sessions throughout the school year.
Back to School Professional Development for SpEd and IA’s
On August 27th, the Special Ed staff, all IA’s and substitute teachers/IA’s participated in training together. We kicked off the morning with a speaker from Proof Alliance (formerly the Minnesota Organization on Fetal Alcohol Syndrome) to share information and discuss strategies related to Fetal Alcohol Disorders (FASD). Then staff were able to access 3 different breakout sessions with a variety of topics. We had many guest speakers from a range of organizations (Isanti County Family Services, Minnesota Department of Education, Canvas Health, Isanti County Public Health).
MDE Review
As we move into the 2019-2020 school year we will be following through with the corrective action plans as outlined in our MDE Review. I have been working closely with the lead monitor from MDE to document our progress on each of the 12 Corrective Action Plans (CAPs). Although the process can be time consuming, it is also a great way to look at district procedures and past practices to see if we are meeting the needs of students and staff. Also, looking to see how our practices align to requirements so we can ensure we are meeting the needs of the district, staying within requirements and using time/resources efficiently.
Contact Us
Email: dist-communications@c-ischools.org
Website: c-ischools.org
Location: 625 Main Street North, Cambridge, MN, USA
Phone: 763-689-6188