District Advisory Board Agenda

Monday, Januray 11, 2010

7:00-9:00 p.m.
Johannsen Support Services Center (JSSC) 2407 LaPorte Avenue

Time Topic Presenter Pre-Meeting Material

Approve Nov 2009 Minutes Terri Sunset, DAB Chair http://dab.posterous.com/

Safety and PSD

Emotional/Social Safety Beth Shefcyk, PSD Counselor
Resources Coordinator
7:00-
7:30
Norm Bastian, PSD
Crisis Security http://tinyurl.com/yhwykkp
Management/Emergency

2010/11 Budget Jim Sarchet, Assistant

Superintendent Business
Services/CFO and http://tinyurl.com/yh8ahvm

Dave Montoya, Budget Mgr

Feedback on Community Ellen Lauben, http://tinyurl.com/yfn9dol

7:30- Values Related to Funding PSD Communications Svcs
8:30 Small Schools See email below for further instruct
attached file:

Small School Forum Option DAB Re

http://tinyurl.com/yk7wlaf
Feasibility Committee Update Kevin Hahn, Assistant
Superintendent of
Elementary Schools

Chuck DeWayne, Director

8:30- New State Standards http://tinyurl.com/q4nylp
of Curriculum, Instruction
8:50 See email below for further info
and Assessment

http://tinyurl.com/ya8kehk

Attached files:
8:50- DE 1.0 and DAB Proposal Kim Redd, Best Graduate
9:00 for further clarification Sub-Committee Member Proposal for Clarification of District
Policies.rev.1.7.10.doc

Civic Participation Means and Measu

Safety and PSD

Emotional and Social Safety Resources – Beth Sheycyk, PSD Counselor Coordinator

There are several programs in PSD to support the social and emotional safety of
our students. A school wide support system is the best. These programs are effective
when a school wide climate is set up. Thirty of our fifty schools are in process of
implementing positive behavior support programs.
 High schools have the SART Peers program. SART stands for Sexual Assault
Resource Team and it’s purpose is to reduce the incidence of sexual assault and sexual
harassment among today’s youth through peer education and community support.

Middle schools have the WEB program. WEB stands for Where Everyone
Belongs. Leaders are 8th grade students who welcome and mentor incoming 6th grade
and, this year, 7th grade to the school.

Elementary schools have several programs:

• Talking about Touching – Educates kids about appropriate touching in age
appropriate ways.
• Second Step – Works with students on anger management and empathy skills.
• Get Real About Violence – A mixed-media prevention program that helps
schools build a culture of nonviolence. The program targets a wide range of
violent behavior including bullying, teasing, and spreading rumors.

Crisis Management/Emergency – Norm Bastian, PSD Security

The National Incident Management System came from 9/11 and is mandated for
first responders. It provides a uniformity of language and terminology as well as a
framework for dealing with emergencies. The general framework for types of
emergencies is laid out, but the specifics need to be flexible enough to be developed on
the fly as an individual situation warrants.

At schools the principal is in charge and is known as the Incident Commander.

The principal appoints staff members to act as liaison, safety officer, and aide in support
of the emergency preparedness. All school administrators have taken ICS 100:
Introduction to Incident Command System. PSD has rewritten our booklet outlining
plans for every situation at every school and a copy is at every school. There is also a red
pamphlet for crisis response in every classroom along with classroom rosters. These
plans are flexible so they can be modified on the fly to handle every situation.

Our job is to stop what we can and minimize damages for what we cannot. For
instance, we can stop a school gunman, but we can’t stop a tornado.

Minimize damages for what we cannot:

• Bully proofing
• Information sharing
• Positive relationships
• Threat assessment
• Vulnerability studies
• Building security assessments

Preparedness
• Building crisis response team
• Drills
 o Lockdown drills
o Fire drills
o Tabletop excecises
• Communications
• Students with Special Needs
• “Go Bags” filled with emergency equipment

Response
• Incident commander in charge until 1st responders arrive
• Follow procedures in manual and quick guide
• Do we stay in the building or evacuate?

Stay or go?
• Bomb Threat: For bomb threats we actually stay. The goal of a bomb threat is
to disrupt the school day, and is most likely a student prank. Bombers don’t
announce their plans. Small bombs, such as dry ice bombs, or other bombs
with minimal damage are the most likely to actually be in schools. A large
bomb is more likely to be in a truck in the parking lot, so we want the students
in the building not in the parking lot
• We also need to be able to communicate to parent community. Our telephone
and e-mail system sends messages to the first numbers and e-mails on the
student emergency contact information. We do not release students from
school during a lockdown. Parents coming to the school actually cause traffic
and get in the way of the emergency responders and cause the emergency to
last longer.

Recovery from an Emergency

• Physical Plant
• Emotional

Our Recovery goals are to:

• Return to normal as soon as possible
• Debrief – learn from what happened
• After action reviews
• Identify high risk groups

Questions?
• Is this presentation used throughout the schools? No, this presentation was
designed specifically for the DAB. Schools have different informational and
training materials.
• How are school team chosen? The principal is in charge and he or she selects
team members for their school site.
• What kind of training do school staffs receive? Department meets annually
with each team at each site.
 • Do school personnel go through active shooter training? School personnel
receive training on how to lock down doors, self evacuation, etc. A training
DVD for staff and students is being developed for lock down situations.
• Is there an anonymous hotline available for students to report concerning
behavior? Safe to Tell is a telephone hotline operated through the Colorado
State Patrol. The Colorado State Patrol passes information to the school
principal. The hotline telephone number is: 1-877-542-SAFE
• How are at risk students identified outside of the tip line? Our staff has done
great job of identifying at risk students.
• Who gets contacted in an emergency? There are e-mail list for most sites.
Emergency calls go to first two phone numbers listed for a student.
• Is the principal as Incident Commander in charge of all aspects of a school
emergency? The principal in charge of the school end and the professionals
are in charge of their end (police, fire, etc).

Budget Update – Dave Montoya & Jim Sarchet

The budget situation for schools in Colorado is pretty bad right now. The
majority of PSD funding comes from state. In the last quarterly economic report from the
state in December, a $560 million shortfall was forecast. K-12 is 43% of the state
budget, and other areas of the state budget have already been cut significantly with
minimal impact to K-12 education. Given a lack of other places to cut, K-12 education is
experiencing and expecting some significant cuts. These cuts are expected to continue
for multiple years and will impact everyone in PSD.
Last year, Colorado schools were told to set aside $110 million ($3.3 million for
PSD) as the state was likely to have to ask for the money back. While this occurred, it
looks likely that the state will want another $600,000 back from the PSD budget this
school year.
When the September forecast numbers came out, a $560 million shortfall in the
state budget was forecast. Since there have been significant reductions in many areas
before this, reductions couldn’t be kept from K-12 education, so a $260 million reduction
to K-12 education in Colorado looks likely for 2009-2010.
For the 2010-2011 school year, it appears we will still have this cut of $260
million cut plus an additional $40 million. The state of Colorado is potentially looking at
being $2.2 billion short over next three fiscal years. This problem is not going away
soon. We are looking at significant budget impacts over the next several years or longer.
Starting in October, PSD started to work with the BOE (Board of Education) to
develop priorities and review the budget. We are planning for a $12 million reduction for
the next school year. We are taking a district wide approach and looking at reductions
everywhere. We need to have everyone look at where cuts can take place. We also need
to look at the impacts of these reductions.
PSD is forming a Budget Advisory Committee which will include community members
(a sign up sheet was sent around the room asking those interested in serving on the
committee to put down their names and contact information). The Budget Advisory
Committee is likely to start with a survey of parents and staff.
PSD has a web page (going live on Wednesday, January 13, 2010) with all budget
information including BOE priorities (11 priorities on website), the governor’s
information on budget cuts, and additional information. We encourage everyone in the
PSD community to spend time looking at this site and we encourage your suggestions.

Questions?
• What is the total PSD budget? The PSD budget is approximately $200 million, so
we are looking at about a 6% cut. There are some budget items which are
mandated and can’t be reduced. This year more than $3.3 million of will be
rescinded and likely another $600,000 before the end of the school year.
Additionally, property taxes are estimated to be down 5.4% reducing our other
major source of income.
• What about money from the stimulus package? The stimulus money already used
and we’re still short.
• What about Amendment 23? When you take into account that amendment 23
says inflation plus 1%, increase for education, for this year we are looking at the
“plus 1%” and then considering 0.9 % deflation for a grand total of 0.1%.

Feasibility Committee – Kevin Hahn

The Facility Design Feasibility Committee was developed while looking for
efficiencies. The charge of the committee is:

1. Finding a location for the Lab School for Creative Learning within an existing
school site. Locations to be studied are Moore and Riffenburgh elementary
schools and Cache La Poudre elementary and middle schools given the Lab
School’s interest in moving to a K-8 configuration.

2. Moving early childhood and other programs out of Fullana and Barton to
Moore, Riffenburgh, Bauder, and/or other elementary schools. Temporarily close
Fullana and Barton for different programming considerations.

3. Moving Red Feather Elementary students to Livermore Elementary. The

committee will study the feasibility of moving students based on many factors,
including cost efficiency, transportation costs, facility maintenance, and
enrollment trends.

The committee is putting together scenarios for the placement of the Lab School
and of Early Childhood programs. Since Moore and Riffenburgh are being considered
for multiple purposes, the recommendations will be in tandem. The goal to finish prior to
school of choice deadline in February. A formal report from the committee will be
presented to the Board of Education at the end of February. The small high school
portion of the charge was taken off the committee’s charge in December.

Questions?
• Is there a target savings number for this committee? No
• It doesn’t sound like a decision will be made in time for people to decide whether
or not to attend Lab School. School of choice deadline around Lab school may
need to be looked at.
 • Has the decision making responsibility changed? Tom Balchak told us the BOE
has directed administration to come up with language putting school closings in
the hands of the BOE as per policy governance. Questions surrounding this are:
If BOE takes this over, then where do they stop? Boundary changes? Other
decisions?
• Are finances part of the committee’s deliberation process? Yes, finances are part
of the discussion, as well as the ability of programs to meet high quality
educational standards.
• Are early childhood program participants from one area or several areas? The
eventual early childhood goal is Pk-5 and having programs in all the schools.

Values Related to Funding Small Schools – Ellen Laughban

Four community input forums will be held looking at community values when it
comes to funding small schools. Many schools receive a small school subsidy in the PSD
funding formula. Community input forums looking at funding solutions for the
2010/2011 school year and beyond. but there are no plans at this time to make any
changes which would impact the next school year. These forums are separate and
distinct from the Facility Design Feasibility Committee work. The options being looked
at these forums are the following:

A. Continue PSD’s current model of providing small schools with additional

funds, using the small school funding factor. Find other areas to make budget
cuts.
B. Close some small schools and combine students into larger schools.
C. Include small school funding as a provision in a November 2010 mill levy
election.
D. Fund a portion of small school costs through voluntary, private contributions
that could include homeowner associations, property owners, and/or
parent/teacher organizations. Pool funds and distribute equitably between small
schools.

Two of these forums are BOE work sessions. This group will present it’s findings
to the BOE on March 9. The group facilitating these forums will include parents from
each feeder system and two at large parents. The time commitment is all four forums
plus one or two additional meetings.

The CSU Center for Public Deliberation is helping to develop the process which
will be used to capture public input. These meetings will start in a large group format
with a presentation, split into small groups with facilitators to collect information from
attendees, then we’ll come back to a large group to get additional feedback.

The community forums will be held:

• 7-9pm, Tuesday, January 26, at Poudre High School’s auditorium
• 7-9pm, Monday, February 1, at Rocky Mountain High School’s theater
• 7-9pm, Wednesday, February 17, at Fossil Ridge High School’s auditorium
• 7-9pm, Tuesday, February 23, at Fort Collins High School’s auditorium
We want feedback from everyone – large and small schools – to help determine the
priorities and values in our community. Please feel free to send input to Ellen Laubhan at
elaubhan@psdschools,org.

Questions?
• Why not affect next years’ budget since PSD is faced with such a large deficit?
This is really up to the BOE, but not planned at this time.
• What can we do to make some of these budget cuts happen for the next school
year - $12 million is huge? Tom Balchak: Want to make sure the work of the
Feasibility committee is honored – could happen though depending on report and
community input. Need to proactively prepare for worst. People intellectually
ready, but maybe not emotionally ready.
• Raise money or cut school – Dr. Wilson quoted as saying.
• Emotional preparedness. Option A. “Find other option” not specific enough.
Class size ramifications, etc. What does it mean to my kid?
• Problem with passing mill levy just to keep schools small. Don’t want to support
inefficiencies.
• Would Lab School take aver a school or a share a school site? Lab School would
coexist with another school in the same building.

Literacy Adoption – Chuck DeWayne

This Thursday, January 14th from 4-7pm is the community forum for the
elementary school literacy adoption. It will be held in the East auditorium at Timberline
Church.

It has been 12 years since the last adoption. Money has been saved to make this
happen. The last time this adoption occurred, the cost was about $500,000. This time it
will be approximately three times this cost. Keep in mind though that nearly one third of
this amount is used – in either the old program or a new program – is in the yearly budget
for consumables such as workbooks.

Questions?
• Is everything still paper based? Is anything available electronically? When
teaching literacy, it is important to get materials into the hands of the kids, so
much of it is still paper based. However, there is some level of integration with
current technology.
• Harris is concerned about the lack of materials in Spanish in the current program
ansswants to know if more Spanish materials would be available in any of the
programs being considered. Yes. We’re also looking at the needs of other
diverse learners: ELL, ELA, IEP, G/T.
• When will this new program be in our schools? It hasn’t been determined what
the roll out will look like for the new literacy program. Teacher training and
budgetary will play into this. Part or all of this new program will be this coming
fall.
 • Why not delay the new adoption given the budget situation? It has already been
pushed to 12 years from the normal 10 years. Some of the materials in the current
program are just not compelling for our students.

New Colorado Academic Standards – Chuck DeWayne

Check out the new, detailed Colorado academic standards for P-12 at the CDE
(Colorado Department of Education) website http://www.cde.state.co.us/ . Chuck will
discuss the plan for rolling out the new standards at the February DAB meeting. The new
standards are much more specific than the old standards. Each item in the standards will
have a corresponding assessment.

The Colorado Growth Model can be tweaked to accommodate thesenew standards

and assessments.

DAB Proposal for Clarification of District Ends Policies – Kim Redd & Rob
Petterson
The original Ends developed by the BOE seemed very vague to the DAB, so have
been working on a document to clarify these ends.

The Ends statement needs to reflect our values since this is how the BOE, who are
our elected officials, direct the superintendent in the running the school district.

We also need to figure out how do we assess progress/achievement in non-

traditional areas.

Please send comments to Kim at redds4@earthlink.net .

Tom Balchak expressed his appreciation of the DAB work into this process.

Academic Subcommittee– Rob Petterson

The Academic Subcommittee will be meeting this coming Thursday, January 14,
2010 at 11:15am at Timberline Church in room 204. Everyone is welcome! The agenda
is:

1) Presentation from Lisa, the district's science specialist, on the science program
in the district, recent changes, improvements PSD is working on, and
measurements PSD tracks. This will provide the foundation for any next steps we
might choose to take in considering the science program in light of our charge.

2) Discussion of feedback on the monitoring report. I have received several

pieces of input. If you have not given me yours, please do so by Tuesday at noon.
I will collate the results Tuesday night and send them to the group.

3) Discussion of what we might do in support of the district's initiatives to close

the achievement gap.
 The academic subcommittee is still interested in hearing your input on the PSD
monitoring report and on the science programs in your schools. Please send the
monitoring report feedback to Rob at rcpett2@gmail.com by Tuesday at noon and the
science input by Wednesday, January 13th at 10 PM.

The monitoring report can be found at

http://www.psdschools.org/documentlibrary/downloads/Board_of_Education/Policy_Go
vernance/Monitoring_Reports/District_Ends/DE_1.0_General_ENDS_Policy_September
_2009.pdf

Remaining 2009/2010 DAB Meetings

Monday, February 1, 2010

Monday, March 8, 2010

Monday, April 12, 2010

Monday, May 10, 2010