Board Briefs—December 12, 2006 In This Issue... Special Reports and Recognition Board Member Reports Highlights from Superintendent's Report School Based Health Center Expansion Grant 2005-2006 Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP) Report   DAAC Accreditation Report Audit Report Enrollment Projections for 2007-2008 Mill Levy Certification Security Camera Proposal Consensus Items

PLEASE NOTE: The January 2 Board meeting has been canceled.
There will only be one meeting in January—Tuesday, January 16.

Special Reports and Recognition
2006 Outstanding Educator of the Year—The Board recognized Dr. Patty Meek, Special Education Instructor at Sinclair Middle School, for being named a 2006 Outstanding Educator of the Year by the Council for Learning Disabilities.

Board Member Reports  
CASB Annual Conference—Board members reported on sessions they attended at the recent CASB Annual Conference. Some of the covered topics included school finance, security, and teaching for the 21st century.
Englewood Education Foundation—Ms. Thompson said the Englewood Education Foundation would be hiring a new Executive Director after the first of the year.
Educating for 21st Century Democracy Seminar—Ms. Thompson received information about this seminar, happening on January 12, 2007. She thinks it is important for Englewood to have a presence, but she cannot attend. Mr. Gorsky and Ms. Hunt expressed interest in attending.
School Finance Video—Ms. Thompson attended a fundraiser for a video put together by Great Education Colorado to publicize issues around school finance in Colorado. Ms. Thompson appears in the video.
School Finance Project—Ms. Thompson attended a recent steering committee meeting for the School Finance Project. Ms. LaPlante was also at this meeting and talked about finance problems unique to Englewood; for example, declining enrollment and the averaging formula, which negatively impacts districts once they start to grow again.

Highlights from Superintendent's Report
CDE Audit—The District received a reply from CDE on December 1 denying all adjustments the District had suggested on the previous audit report. The District has sent a letter to CDE Commissioner William Moloney requesting an appeals hearing.
Flood/Sinclair Update—Dr. McCabe had the following updates:
- They are working on proposed models for instruction and have narrowed it down to 4 programs. All schools will hear about the models in January and final selections will be made in February. Final selections will go to the Board for approval.
- Mr. Randy Johnson is setting up a committee to name the new middle school. Suggested membership of this committee will go to the Board for approval.
- A student transition team is looking at mascots and colors for the new middle school.
- A draft transportation plan is being looked at.
Strategic Planning—The Strategic Planning Team met last week to review action team plans. Over the next month, the administration will be combining the action plans into an overriding plan for the District. They will bring a rough draft of this plan to the Board on January 16.

School Based Health Center Expansion Grant Handout
The Board approved a school based health clinic grant in the amount of $20,000 to add a mental health component to the EHS Health Clinic.

The Board approved moving the EHS Health Clinic from the Lowell Annex into the main EHS building to allow for the expansion.

Ms. Diedrich explained that the grant money came from House Bill 1396, which allocated funds for establishment or expansion of school-based health clinics. Ms. Tena Rose, a District parent and Regis student, coordinated the grant project as part of her studies at Regis. She provided an overview of the current EHS Health Clinic and explained the need to add the mental health clinic.

2005-2006 Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP) Report
Ms. Vedra reported on AYP status for the District. Currently, the District does not meet AYP and is working on a District Improvement Plan. Board members and the administrative team discussed the challenges of AYP. Many surrounding districts also did not make AYP.

DAAC Accreditation Report
Ms. Vedra explained that districts accredit their own schools, based on district requirements. Englewood's accreditation requirements require that a school meet one of the following: AYP, MAP Growth, ACT performance, or School Accountability Reports (SAR) criteria at Average or above. The District Accountability Advisory Committee (DAAC) reviewed this criteria for each school and determined that all schools met one or more criteria. All schools met the SAR criteria. DAAC representative, Ms. Alisa Osemwengie, reported that DAAC recommends to the Board that every school be designated as fully accredited for the 2006-2007 school year.

Audit Report
Mr. Ken LeCrone from Swanhorst and Company provided the Board with an overview of the 2005-06 audit. In summary, Mr. LeCrone said the District was in good financial shape, which is a testament to the District's budget process. Mr. LeCrone reported that the audit was a clean opinion with no qualifications.

Enrollment Projections for 2007-2008
Ms. LaPlante provided preliminary enrollment projections for 2007-2008 to the Board. This is the first step in the 2007-2008 budget process. The projections are based on five-year weighted average cohort advancement ratios and historical percentage of birth rates in Englewood. The projections show October 2007 FTE to be estimated at 3,182.5, down from 3,299 in October, 2006. Ms. LaPlante stressed that these are preliminary numbers and that these numbers could still change if there was data to back it up.

Mill Levy Certification
The Board approved 2007 mill levies for the Property Tax Year 2006. The total mill levy is 40.354 to raise $14,466,274 in property tax revenues.

Security Camera Proposal
Since the beginning of the summer, 2006, Ms. Peg LaPlante, Mr. Dale Stout, and Ms. Ilene Brandon, have been soliciting bids for security cameras for Sinclair, CFAHS, and EHS. They have also performed walkthroughs at each school with prospective vendors and have performed site visits at other locations where equipment has already been installed. Based on information from their research, Ms. LaPlante recommended the District use ProTek as the vendor for security camera equipment and installation at Sinclair, CFAHS, and EHS. Funds for this project have already been allocated in the budget.

The Board agreed by consensus to move forward with ProTek as the vendor for security cameras at Sinclair, CFAHS, and EHS.

Consensus Items
The Board approved the following consensus items:
a. Personnel Recommendations & Addendum

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