July 10, 2023 at 6:30 PM - Regular Meeting

Description:  If time allows, the Board will discuss operational matters or schedule future meetings.

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Description:  A motion will be necessary to approve the agenda as presented (or) with changes as recommended.

Description:  Individuals may use this time to comment on any topic. A copy of Board Policy 187 —Public Participation at Board Meetings is enclosed for your reference. Each speaker will be allowed 3 minutes to speak for a total of  30 minutes.  .  Emailed comments will be shared and reviewed by all the board members but will not be read out loud.

Description:  The purpose of this agenda item is to provide the public with an opportunity to share any comments or ask any questions regarding the 2023-2024 budget process. The third draft of the budget is attached in the budget committee section of the agenda. Allie Dye will provide a high level overview of the 2023-2024 budget process and then we will seek input from any members of the public who would like to participate in the budget hearing.

Description:  This section is reserved for any comments from members of the board on meetings they attended or other informational items.

Description:  Brian Grabarski, Director of Human Resources, will update the Board and community on the next steps in the Superintendent Search Process.

Description:  Tiffany Loken, Director of Special Education, will present the Disproportionality Plan to the Board, that will then be sent on to DPI.  This plan is required per DPI as a result of a disproportionate number of our black students being identified within our special education programs.  Tiffany will provide background on the disproportionate criteria and the approach to putting together this plan.  

Description:  This action item is to approve the attached proposal that was tentatively agreed upon at the negotiations session on June 21, 2023 for a base wage increase for teachers.  The WTA membership also has to take action to finalize the agreement.

Description:  This action item is to approve wage increases for Administration and Administrative Support staff and to operate the district teacher compensation plan, as a supplemental pay structure to base wage negotiations. Attached please find a spreadsheet that provides the July 1, 2023 WERC calculated CPI increase for administration/administrative support staff. The board's long term goal has been to provide compensation at least at the average level of comparable districts. There are a couple of positions below this average level and catch-up pay has been included in the attached spreadsheet. The third draft of the budget will be revised to reflect the 2023-25 state budget school funding, which allows for a balanced budget with CPI increases.   The HR Committee advanced this proposal by a 3 -0 vote.
 

Description:  This action item is an additional increase to the wage schedule that was approved at the June regular meeting.  This increase is to both bring these employee groups in line with the base increase for other internal groups (8%) and to take additional steps to address market competitiveness for Administrative Assistants and Classified Staff.

Within this proposal, the first two steps of the pay schedule for Administrative Assistants and one step for Classified Staff would be removed and all employees would advance the additional steps on July 16, 2023. The third draft of the budget has been revised to include this additional compensation.

The HR Committee advanced this proposal by a 3-0 vote.

Description:  The High School Mathematics Department is proposing a new Foundations of Algebra course designed for students who are underprepared for Algebra and would be better served with a Pre-Algebra course instead of Algebra with Algebra workshop.  The initial group of students to be served will be newcomer multilingual students who have had interruptions in their mathematics education.  Additional students will be served as we develop placement criteria to appropriately identify candidates.

The Curriculum committee recommended this on a voice vote 3-0.  

Description:  The Heritage Bilingual Biology course is part of our bilingual program implementation at the High School.  Content coverage is aligned with our existing Biology course and students will use the Spanish language version of our Biology textbook with supplemental materials.

The Committee recommends this on a voice vote 3-0.  

Description:  Attached is the annual testing and assessment schedule for 2023-2024.  This is very similar to previous schedules.  STAR Early Literacy replaces PALS as our early literacy readiness screener for 4K.  The Middle School has been selected as a site for the National Assessment of Educational Progress.

The Committee Recommends this on a voice vote - 3-0.

Description:  The purpose of this agenda item it to request school board approval of the annual Fund 73 contribution. Fund 73 is the Employee Benefit Trust Fund. We have held off on making the payment for 2021-2022 until the end of the fiscal year. The main reason for holding off the payment was to determine whether or not these funds would be needed for 2022-2023 budget planning. We would need to make the 2022-23 payment by July 31, 2023.

Administration will be seeking feedback from the budget committee on making this payment in July. There are two separate accounts within fund 73. The first account is with American United Life and this account is in the district's name. The second account is with MidAmerica and this account is allocated to employees in a health reimbursement account. The American United Life account has a balance of $861,000 while the MidAmerica account has a balance of $7.2 million. Any district contribution would be added to the American United Life account. 

The district's actuarial firm calculated an annual contribution amount of $705,410. This calculation is higher than the past because the district no longer has a long term rate cap on our health insurance benefit. The district's calculation for 22-23 could range from $0 to $705,410. Administration estimates that a payment of $215,000 would result in a balanced end of the year budget. The budget committee recommendation will be shared with the school board at the meeting. 

Description:  The purpose of this agenda item is to review the third draft of the budget for the 23-24 school year. I have attached the third draft of the budget for your review. Please note that the third draft of the budget is based on the following:
1. The $0/student increase in the per pupil categorical aid, with a $325/student increase in the revenue limit formula
2. An increase in the percentage of State Special Education Categorical Aid to 33.3% (from 30%)
3. The personnel cost line includes an inflationary salary increase of 8%, implementation of the teacher and classified staff compensation systems, a 0% increase in dental insurance rates, and a 3% increase for health insurance rates.
4. The capital maintenance projects are funded from Fund 49
5. The second draft includes an increase of 10 FTE, as outlined on page 13 of the document.
6. The debt service fund includes the new debt issued for the $175 million referendum.
7. All of the remaining budget requests have been placed on hold at this time.

The changes for the third draft of the budget include:
1. New information on the 2023-25 state budget
2. Grant allocations for fund 27
3. Updates to the Community Services budget (Fund 80)
4. Updates to the New Teacher program budget (Fund 99)
5. Update to property tax levy in fund 39 and fund 10. The tax levy in fund 10 was increased to reflect the state budget and the tax levy in fund 39 was then decreased to keep a consistent property tax amount. 
6. Increased open enrollment revenues to reflect additional students and an increase in the per student transfer
7. Increased fund 10 interest revenues to reflect the continued increase in interest earnings
8. Increased wellness clinic budget to reflect a staffing change to an RN position instead of a medical assistant and increased costs for the contract renewal

Description:  The purpose of this agenda item is to request school board approval of the next round of bids for Heritage Elementary. Attached please find a list of the recommended bidders, the bid amount, and a comparison to the budgeted amount. The attachment is presented in a different format this month due to the large number of bids. Please reach out to Steve Summers at stevesummers@waunakee.k12.wi.us if you would like any additional information on these bids. Rich Stoffels from Vogel will be at the facility committee meeting to review the bids. The facility committee is meeting Monday morning to review the bids. The August board meeting should be the final round of bids for Heritage as well as the development of the guaranteed maximum price. We can also start the conversation at that time on the topic of reallocating funds from Heritage Elementary to districtwide maintenance. 

Description:  The purpose of this agenda item is to request approval of additional districtwide maintenance projects. Attached please find the project tracking document with the additional maintenance projects identified on page 2 of the document. John Cramer will be present to review these projects.  Tiffany Loken will also be present to review the middle school restroom project. If approved, these projects will be funded through the districtwide maintenance projects portion of the referendum funds. The facility committee will be meeting Monday morning to discuss this topic. 

Description:  Attached please find the Booster Club Handbook that the administration has been working on with the athletic booster clubs since January. The administration will present this handbook to the Board on Monday and will highlight some of the key areas that we addressed through this work.

There were three meetings held between January and May, and at each meeting feedback, input, ideas, etc. were gathered from the booster club representatives.  The administrative team that was part of this work included Randy Guttenberg, Steve Summers, Brian Grabarski, Tiffany Loken, Brian Borowski, and Anne Blackburn.  Aaron May, previous athletic director, was also part of these meetings, too.  The purpose for creating a handbook was to bring consistency to our booster organizations, create a better financial reporting process, tighten communication, articulate where to go with questions, and ensure that items like the management of camps, communication methods, district/booster responsibilities, etc. were articulated and supported.

Please note, as we work through the utilization of this handbook for the first time, we anticipate the need to add and/or modify items that are missing or that need to be reworked. 

The meetings to develop this handbook were attended by representatives of all of our athletic booster clubs, and we greatly appreciate their collaboration, assistance, and input.  

Description:   Attached in the "extras" section of BoardBook, please find a list of the accounts payable payments issued during the month of June 2023.

Description:  Attached you will find the 2022-23 Budget Status report as of June 30, 2023 and the Cash Reconciliation report for May 2023.

Description:  Attached please find a memo outlining the changes to the K-6 handbook.    The handbook is attached to the extras section, for your reference.

Description:  As is required for approval on an annual basis, please see the attached memo from Tim Schell and Amy Johnson that outlines the academic standards that are part of our instructional programs.

Description:  The purpose of this agenda item is to provide the School Board with an annual report of fundraisers utilizing the Classmunity program. Attached please find a list of all fundraisers for the 2022-23 school year and the information that has been reported in Classmunity.

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