3 Board Meeting Minutes 04242015€¦ · the highlights of the drama. With each production you...

Texas School for the Deaf

Governing Board

TSD Governing Board Meeting 1 of 16 December 12, 2014

Minutes of Meeting April 24, 2015

1. Call to Order

Walt Camenisch: I'm calling the meeting to order at 10:30 on April 24th, 2015. under Texas Government Code 551.001.

2. Call roll of Board members

Present: Beatrice Burke, Walt Camenisch, Sha Cowan, Eric Hogue, Tyran Lee, Shawn Saladin, Angie Wolf Absent: Jean Andrews, Susan Ridley

3. Provide opportunity for public comment and introduction of visitors

No visitors present.

4. Board Meeting Minutes of February 20, 2015

Angie Wolf moved to approve the minute of the meeting on February 20, 2015, with edits. Tyran Lee seconds. Motion passed.

5. Student Presentations

John Serrano shared that we've had so many exciting things happening on campus and have four different student groups making presentations: MathCounts competition, International Studies group that went to Peru earlier this year, a very successful play, Frankenstein, and, the High School Academic Bowl and is going to the national competition. So we have a lot of exciting things happen. First up is the MathCounts team, Jahren Ramborger. 8th grade. Ethan Nunez, 8th grade. Tyler Glennon, 8th grade. Nevan Graves, 8th grade. The MathCounts team went to Rochester, New York, Rochester Institute of Technology where they competed with 95 students from 25 schools across the U.S. and Canada. Individual competition results three of the teams to place in the top 10 for individual scores. Nevan came in first place for count down results. The entire team came in second place to Indiana who won by a single point. A great weekend making new friends and competing. Sponsors were Dana Stoddard and Dawn Kidd. Special thanks to the Austin Sertoma Club and Sorenson who sponsored the team. The International Studies went to Peru and the student group included: Jasi, CJ, Tatum, Shane, Damon, Dylan and Dalton. The students visited the Sacred Valley, Pisac (former military resting place), Ollantaytambo, and Sacsayhuaman and experienced a zip line adventure.


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TSD Governing Board Meeting 2 of 16 December 12, 2014

They hiked to the top of Machu Picchu. The people worship really three things there, the condor, which is the world's largest bird, even larger than the eagle, the puma and then a snake. Those three represent heaven, earth and the underground. It's the same concept of sky, humans and death. The trip included a visit to Amazon rain forest staying on the river for three days, visited with an Indian tribe in the Yagua, learned about llamas and alpacas in Lima, and, visited the floating islands on Lake Titicaca. They tried many different cuisines including guinea pig, piranha, and ceviche. While they were able to visit two different deaf schools, one was located in Lima and it has a strong oral influence. The reaction to signing was shock. The other deaf school we visited was in Cusco which is a private school and the teachers are nuns from Spain. The group brought writing supplies, books, other supplies and it was all very well received. The teachers there have to buy all of their own supplies and had to pay for everything to decorate their room, for all of their instruction, instructional materials, so you could see the culture there and you could see the similarities and what real deaf culture looks like there. It was a really great experience. In Lima, when we first got to Peru, the first meal we had was at a deaf restaurant. Their food was excellent. John Serrano recognized the important people who made this trip a success: Jennifer Campero and her hard work and dedication and her team, and that is Wilmonda, she works out the financial responsibilities and the trip arrangements. Karl Hummel as well as Russell West for their support. The High School drama Frankenstein cast, directed by Gabi Nocciolino (fifth production at TSD), shared the highlights of the drama. With each production you learn more and more. This production had a cast of 25 as well as a crew and worked for three months in the evenings with rehearsals, learning the lines, painting, set design and building everything themselves. Frankenstein is a different choice as we usually choose something like Cinderella, Peter Pan, something nice and pretty, very family oriented, family friendly. Jasi was Dr. Victor Frankenstein, Shane was Henry, the friend of Dr. Frankenstein. Damon, was captain of the crew working on the art and set design team. Nick, appeared in the meeting dressed as Frankenstein! Beatrice Burke asked if other deaf schools have their own productions? Gabi Nocciolino stated that Deaf schools across the country do not compete with each other, but we have an opportunity for TSD to compete with local Austin high schools is possible because there are several public high schools. Several schools and public groups went to see the production. Karl Hummel shared the Academic Bowl team competed at the New Mexico School for the Deaf won all of our matches except for one against Riverside. The team showed their sportsmanship very well, but you could see in their eyes that they knew they would go up against them for national championships and this time we're expecting to beat them because we've now put the fear in them. They beat all other teams by 40, thinking it was not a big deal, so they realize that we're a force to be reckoned with at the national championship.

7. Instructional Materials Adoption Johnett Scoggins reported on the Instructional Materials Adoption and the Curriculum Update. Jack Johnson is the newest curriculum team member. Johnett Scogin reported on the Instructional Materials selected reviewed and selected by the committee.


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TSD Governing Board Meeting 3 of 16 April 24, 2015 April 24, 2015

Social studies, teachers committees, parent representatives and administrative staff had input ending with a selection of four publishers with mixed digital or print packages. SND High School, social studies school service is an online program, Elementary is Nystrom, which is a hands‑on materials program and then everyone from Elementary through High School except for one course will be going with Pearson, which is a picture mixed format. Pearson no longer offers a Texas world geography based on their interpretation of House Bill 5, which seemed to push more for world history and TSD is now teaching primarily world geography. The price for that is currently in the ballpark of about 60,000, which we do have IMAP funds to cover. Joey Vaughan reported on High School math. Last year for kinder through 8th, TSD purchased materials for Elementary math and this year focused on High School. All of the High School math teachers go to Region 13 and attend different options and then we narrowed it down to our top two options. After this experience Pearson was selected for all of the High School math courses. It's 100% aligned with our Texas state standards, the TEKS. The price of $21,370 makes the most sense to go that direction and it's nice to have a variety of materials that come with the STAAR practice so the teacher has resources. For the fine arts selection there was only one vendor at Region 13 that was represented. Teachers took a look at that and it was a thumbs down and was turned down because it was not in like with the current TEKS and was not user friendly for the teacher or the students, and very limited resources. High School fine arts is more of an online resource selection. In Middle School they offer technical drawing, which is nine weeks, and that's part of their elective courses. And again, emphasizing that that's not offered every year, so didn't want to buy a set of books of that and then the courses have changed. So the teachers felt like they use the Internet more and would like to rely on those resources. Now, fine arts would not focus on getting textbooks. K through 5th we have an art class and an art teacher and who really is into the digital resources. Deep Space Sparkle is designed for Kindergarten through Fifth grade and it is a spiral teaching. So they teach elements in Kindergarten, go to First grade and go more in‑depth in it and so on and so on and everything is digital. The cost is $700.00. Sha Cowan moved to approve the adoption of the Instructional Materials recommended by the committees for Social Security studies K through 12, math, High School, and fine arts K through 12. Eric Hogue seconded and the motion passed.

6. Curriculum Department Presentation

Johnett Scogin shared that in connection with the last item; we can't afford to just think of here's a textbook, that's our curriculum. Everything that the teacher uses as part of that curriculum and that what the curriculum department is here for. The standards and programs are not a curriculum, but a marriage of how all of these things work together is part of that. We previously were using CSCOPE and not it has changed to the Texas Resource System creating some struggles and bumps in the road for our teachers. Sharee Darce shared that science is an example of a subject where we got the shiny new materials but the biggest challenge is how to marry the two to the curriculum purchased. It is rigorous and will help our kids improve and do well with STAAR, and yet here are these shiny new materials that that looks interesting. Very visual as well because there's a lot online, a lot of PowerPoint’s and interactive simulations online and a lot of things to help kids understand what's going on with science. Kudos to the teachers, they've had to work with this while they're figuring out while they're teaching and preparing. It hasn't been easy for them, but they've done a great job. I've tried to provide support and documents whenever possible to help them align the two as much as possible. There is an impact of iPads on


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science, especially in Middle School and SND. We certainly hope more iPads for middle school because we want to see what's happening in math and science happening in all the classes across the board. And also over here this is Elementary has a science club every Monday where kids come after school and do science stuff. Last year we purchased new materials to use this year with Kindergarten through Eighth grade. We do have new TEKS for those students. In Elementary we purchased a program called Origo, a different kind of program than we're used to. So not the traditional type of math approach. But we can see so many benefits with the students. Some are struggling along the way. With the new TEKS there are a lot of changes. There are a lot of skills that are scaled back and taught at earlier grade levels. So naturally there are some gaps that we are trying to fill to help with their progress. But at the same time they will progress as normal, but it will help fill in most of those gaps. And because Origo is so new and different for us we were trying to discuss different ways that we can maximize the use of this resource. So we got in touch with our representative and they offered one school that's using their material for the past two years and we got in contact and they said they really loved it and had become a model school for that program. And it happens to be in Texas, three hours from here. So we had the opportunity to have three staff plus Lee the interpreter go and look at that school to see three different grade levels, teaching a full lesson, plus observing the teachers, planning conferences, and it was just really powerful experience for us. We took notes and asked a lot of good questions. Then the next step was sharing that information with the Elementary team and seeing what they're using and doing there. We really like it, but we would like to go ahead and maybe steal some of that information to use here at TSD. Also the Elementary program has set time in their daily schedule for AI, which is Accelerated Instruction, to help them focus on certain individuals and what they need for their ELR, English language arts, reading and math. We see improvements with that in their small group instruction as well. Every year I'm sure you see on the 100th day of school it a huge celebration, especially for the younger students, and this year Kindergarten and First grade as a team really rallied a big celebration with all the students. It was so exciting to see that. We really applaud the parents' involvement. It was amazing. That day there were so many parents that showed up and just learning that some of the parents who came, they themselves experienced the 100 day celebration with Carolyn gay many years ago. It's really great to see that tradition. And so one still is has their 100-day of school shirt they made with 100 things on it. Really neat. You can see this picture right here. This was a student in Kindergarten with a boy in Fifth grade that came to help during that special celebration. It was really nice to see the kids learning from each other and really interacting and having some hands on activities. It was a lot of fun. And Elementary, they also have professional development every month focusing on math. So we try to respond to students' needs and teachers' needs as well. Next is Middle School. As mentioned before, Middle School purchased some new math materials from a company, Houghton‑Mifflin‑Harcourt. We are benefiting from the materials this year and using it with the High School team in making their final decision. It was nice to see that collaboration between the two departments. Middle School they set up a new RtI program which means Response to Intervention. So if a student is struggling and the data shows that that student focuses on a certain area we're able to pull that student in to help support what their needs are in math. So we use the STAR, not the state test assessment STAR, but it's called STAR math. We looked at the results and correlations there. As Sharee recently mentioned in middle school they've made good use of their iPads. They don't have enough for everybody so they do a time-share with them. But they see the kids, especially with the new materials they have, there's a strong digital component, so having that access is very impactful.

And, of course, you have to break down those standards and teaching it at regular grade level is difficult. So this is just really a guiding document for teachers who spent a lot of time this year in developing that chart. Also, this is the first time in quite a while to be hosting an annual math event. It's math in the real world as you can see some of these pictures here. The kids have the opportunity to use geometry or algebra in real‑life situations, such as construction of a bridge, assembling a car, that sort of a thing. It's really fun for the students; they had a week focusing on this. Project Based Learning. PBL. Thriving in all disciplines. We have really tried to bolster that in math, looking forward to the new materials, there's an strong writing components that we hope is really going to support that goal. Also this is a year of


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transition, new TEKS, this is a challenge, we are continuing to progress as a team and making sure we have all of the trainings necessary to make next year successful with the new adoption. Of course, also, we have the Special Needs Department. The Special Needs Department has a math program; by the name of Equals that program focuses on skills that are life applicable skills that would be appropriate for that population of students. But it also aligns with the state standards. Now we're trying to figure out but what the best kind of informal assessment may be to use with our students in that department. We want to make sure that we're meeting their needs, as well as able to be cognizant of the time. There's also math professional development for the Special Needs teachers to help ingrate different math concepts and looking forward to that in the future. The iPads I just learned something to do about how our students in the Special Needs Department are using the iPads. We have one student who is unable to use a regular calculator, so instead the iPad, of course, has an app for the calculator. But still it can be a struggle for that student. What that student does, they are able to write on the iPad and it converts their writing to a typed number. So it's a unique solution, technology can be used in such a variety of ways. It's amazing and I'm happy to see that happening in the classroom. Claire Bugen reminded everyone that last year, at the Foundation's gala, somebody purchased 35 iPads for the Special Needs Department. So they are really taking them to maximizing the use of those iPads. Christina Sicoli shared that in CTE we're going to have two new courses in addition to what we currently offer. One is Engineering and 3‑D printing. Which is a really cool class. They are making 3 D, so the kids come up with a blueprint and a plan and then they are to have the actual 3 D printed. So technology today is changing greatly. The second one is Video Game and App Design, which truly applies to today's world. More and more children are digital learners. I'm sure that you can agree with me on that. Those are two new courses that we'll be offering. There are some TEKS changes since last November, back in the fall. November 2014 as you can see this right here, there were some courses that are going to be changed. Those have been approved. And there are a lot of changes coming and we've read through them and it's quite a bit of impact. So we've been looking through those and trying to prepare. August 27th is when they will ‑‑ sorry; August of 2017 is when those changes will be implemented. Johnett Scogin mentioned that the House Bill that's have been passed lately have really upped the bar on what CTE courses can and should be offering and even the language in the ‑‑ in the changes to the TEKS, instead of just mentioning that maybe licensing would be a good idea, it actually is really pushing licensing and many more of the courses than are currently offered. So that is something that we really are looking toward in more of the courses. We essential do offer licensure in a few courses but we need to be pushing the bar. Frankly, I think CTE is one of the areas that we really need to be looking harder at as far as maximizing what our students can do, we have kids who aren't college‑bound so let's look at CTE. So let's go ahead and get them prepared for entering the workforce and go on to college if you would like to. Go on and get whatever training you need. These are not silly courses. These are very rigorous courses that we're talking about here. So we have to prepare our students and our teachers for a culture change really when we're talking about this kind of shift here. So it's going to take a while, but I think you are going to see a big shift in the way CTE is treated around the state. I don't think it's just a TSD thing. Okay? All right. Last, this is a fun one. We have established a Gifted and Talented program, following the Texas state plan, so we want to make sure that we're in alignment with that that we are in compliance. So this started in 2013, not too long ago. We focused on Elementary first, we did a screening of students and we did different rounds of testing during that time, I'll explain more about that in a moment. That was K through 5th where the screenings were conducted, looking at those pool, those students who qualified for that service. This year, 2014‑2015, we have expanded to Middle School, looking at 7th and 8th grade. I'm sure you are wondering why there are no sixth grade. They were already screened last year in Fifth grade, they moved up to Sixth grade, we don't have to do a rescreening with them. Only the new students we screen 7th and 8th graders. And we also set up provision of services for students K through Fifth. What that looks like I will talk about a little bit later. Then next year you will see us go ahead and add high school, 10th, 11th grade, same thing again, 9th grade, because this year's 8th graders have been screened,


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moving into 9th grade, only those new students will be going to screening. That way we have covered the entire gamut of K through 9 services. For the screening tests, we did a lot of investigation to figure out what kind of assessment tool that will not be biased against deaf students. So we did a lot of research and we found tests that are used commonly in many schools across the U.S. is called the NNAT 2. It's the non‑verbal test. It looks like this. There are pictures with one part that may be missing and then they have to figure out what the missing part is. And so it's kind of like a puzzle. Overall, there's I think 48 questions and the kids are timed. They have 30 minutes to proceed through it. It becomes more and more challenging as the test goes on. From there, you get the results right away and then we are able to look at the results and see which children got above the average results. So 7th, 8th and 9th, so the kids that did really well on that test, we were then contacting parents to inform them that we have begun the screening tests, the results show they may be in that range and so the parents would be given more information and we may possibly move those kids in the second round of testing with parent permission. The NNAT 2 test as she just explained, it's each grade. So they have a test designed specifically for Kindergarten, one designed specifically for First graders, so on, so forth. It's not the same. Fifth grade is more complex, more puzzle‑like compared to the other grades, but again it's all 48 questions in all 30 minutes. There are a lot of students who tend to answer in less than 30 minutes because it's computerized so they are able to make their selections of their four options and choose the best fit. So after we did this screening and they qualified with that seven, eight, nine above average, then we went on to Round 2, which means there was more assessment, more surveys being conducted. We had a parent questionnaire. We also had a teacher questionnaire that they had to fill out. It was a survey they did. And so the first year that we set up in elementary it tended to be Elementary teachers in the same grade. And we realized that we needed to change it this year, so the teachers, say there's three teachers for one specific grade. They would have all of them do the survey together. So that way it was less time on their plate because you know teachers are already overloaded as is. Plus we had a third, which is the Cognitive Abilities Test, CogAT, which is a used test. The CogAT, it is a paper test and there are three areas or three subjects to test on. Each one 30 minutes, 30 minutes, 30 minutes. There's a verbal portion, a quantitative and then a non‑verbal. Now, we didn't give all three on the same day, I want to tell you that. So we did 30 minutes of testing one day. The next day we do a second section and the third day do the next section. We don't want students to feel overwhelmed. And there was a third test that was given that measures their IQ ‑ it does not measure their IQ. It measures their creativity and their innovative thinking. It's art focus, critical thinking focus, thinking outside the box. Also divergent thinking, that sort of thing. So those three tests together. And then we would have the results from those. I'll turn it over to Joey. Once we got all the results the committee met, including the G/T staff, and our educational diagnosticians, principals, we had a discussion to look globally at everything to see if we felt that the students met the criteria for gifted/talented. It just so happened there was one test they didn't do well. We didn't have that pulling down their overall, but we wanted a global look at the student. So right now we have seven students who are receiving services. One requirement for providing services is they must have staff who have gone through 30 hours of training. And so far we've been very fortunate. We have about 15 staff who have been through that training. They've gone through all 30 hours. And of course, our goal is to try to integrate and diversify the teaching within the classroom, but we also have pullout services available for our elementary students this year as well. So you will see a picture coming up next. So right now the kids are working on a special project called Animal Nation. We're very fortunate that the State of Texas has developed something called the Texas Performance Standards Project, and that is specifically designed for students who have already been identified as gifted/talented. So the program encompasses all areas. It has in‑depth critical thinking and just so happens that our kids who qualify now were all in kindergarten through 2nd grade. So we've been working on different animals, kids are making a PowerPoint with a report, and they'll also be creating some type of visual aid. And our hope is to match them up with high school and have the high school students teaching the littler kids how to use


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iMovie. So if that works out we may be showing that at our next board meeting. The kids get that information through different types of resources, including regular books, online articles and also feels very critical to expose our kids to professionals in the field. We let them know we'll have an opportunity next week to go to world. We have it worked out ‑‑ to go to see world. We have it worked out to see the various animal train stories ask them about their animals and the kids will be responsible for developing the questions themselves and then that information will be videoed and photographed and then taken back and they'll have to include that in that PowerPoint in their iMovie. So we've really enjoyed having the opportunity to work with a variety of staff. Heidi and I have been working on that. We've also recruited others members from the curriculum team to work with us, include Sharee, Debbie and Jack. The students have been very motivated. You can see that they're looking forward to more and more of that. Angie Wolf asked now that you've finished screening Elementary, do you screen now with the admissions process? Not right now. We haven't worked it out with the admissions because every year we offer the screening assessment. And also we tell the parents if the child seems to not do well on a test the first time if the parents request it we can always do a rescreening because we realize that there are some students who really grow and change over time and so we don't want to close that door on any of our students. But admissions are not giving the test at that time. Beatrice Burke asked if there's a group of students in the same class, same age, with the various abilities, of course. After the screening you may notice that one group qualifies for this special service and the other doesn't. How do you split that group up or how does that work? Do they stay together? Really the state doesn't make that determination for us. As a school district we have that flexibility to develop service plan that's going to best match the student's needs as well as the staff resources available to us. So right now, for example, in Elementary will kids stay with their regular grade level in that group, but we do have pullout services that's designed once a week sometimes, maybe once a week is not enough and we make modifications as needed. It's flexible to ensure the kids are not getting behind with their projects. Beatrice Burke commented, I understand that, but why wouldn't they all stay in the same class while you're offering that special service to that special group? And the others are not? For example, this year we happen to have one Kindergarten student. In First grade we have three students and then in Second grade we have three students. We don't want them to be in the same class all day. We don't feel it's age appropriate because the Kindergarten with the Second grade there's different state standards there. For now we feel the pullout method is the easiest, plus we can change it throughout the day and best meet their needs. Claire Bugen commented that this is just the beginning. We're experimenting with different delivery methods there's just so many different ways to be able to deliver the gifted/talented program and I suspect that you will see a difference as we move towards Middle School and High School. Heidi and I have had the opportunity to have meetings at Region 13 with all of the G/T directors across the region, have discussions with them about what they're trying to do. So we have experience from a variety of experiences, we see their ideas that we can possibly implement here. So it's really nice to have feedback from others in the field. And we've also sent out the survey to different school districts and typically elementary is more pullout and there's also after school programs. Middle School and High School is typically course offerings like AP courses. So that's what the commonality seems to be. So we want to do what's best for our students. Angie Wolf asked if TSD would screen every year all the kids?


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No, the parents have to request and to let you know as well that for most schools do not screen everyone. The teacher and parent recommendations usually guide those this is such a new area for us we don't want to disclude anyone. Regardless of what they're in we will still do a screening for that applicable grade level. So like you said, if maybe the screening happens and they don't make it, a couple of years down the road if the teachers or the parents say we feel the student should be reviewed again then we bring them in at any time. Johnett Scogin stated as Joey and Heidi said, and Claire mentioned, with gifted/talented services, TSD is really at the beginning and already have such a small population. The curriculum staff have to really look carefully at what is the best service delivery model and that is likely to change at different points in different years as some students may qualify for math and some for ELA and some may qualify for difference things, we may have no students in middle school one year and the next year have five. It’s unknown so we have to look at what the state asks us to do, which is to make sure that we're screening everyone, that we're ready to provide services in whatever way that we deem appropriate. That we provide in some way some services that have like‑minded peers. So that's why when we have our K‑2 students together right now, because we want them to have some experiences where they have other gifted and talents students together because they spark off of each other. That's a different experience than being in your regular classroom. But AP classes we know haven't worked here so far. Walt Camenisch welcomed TSD’s LBB analyst, Pattie Featherston.

8. Superintendent’s Report

Claire Bugen, big event next Friday evening, the Foundation's gala and that's our biggest fund‑raiser event of the year. It should be a lot of fun so I'm hoping that you all will be able to come and spend a lot of money! John, Bobbie, myself and Karl just recently came back from CEASD conference in Washington state. It was really a wonderful conference. I mean, it's always nice to really network with other schools for the deaf, but the content of the conference in relation to relationship, it really motivated John and I. We're thinking pretty often, they must be reading our minds, because they were really feeding us so much of what we're currently talking about as we approach reorganization at TSD. Now I've reached the really challenging part of the reorganization and how to address all of the many functions and activities that are in academic affairs so that wick have better impacts on the student. We're really thinking about that and having deep dialogue going on with John, Russ and myself. Russ was planning to stay. I had to negotiate with him just a little bit. We will be posting three positions Chief Financial Officer, Human Resources Director and Director of Student Life because Russell's role has changed and we'll be picking up all of the operations side, with his current department responsibilities, such as health center, interpreting services, athletics. And then we'll add operations such as cafeteria, transportation, security, risk management. John Serrano added that House Bill 5 passed and that affected requirements. It required partnerships with other higher learning institutions so we needed college prep courses. We have a committee to take a look at the different options and the possible M.O.U. and have a partnership with ACC. And we wanted to discuss, you know, what the courses would look like for our students because our students are unique, you know, we do have a few number of challenges. Say that year we have just a few students. For example, this is designed for students who are not able to meet college entrance levels so they cannot go ahead and go into college level classes just yet, but they still have enough skill to have higher education rather than English 4. So that number is very small and that number varies every year. We're thinking about it, talking about it. We wanted to develop an M.O.U. with ACC and have that ready by August and by then we could implement that in the next two years because our students are on new graduation programs and that's the foundations, which are currently freshmen. As they move up in their high school career they have some time.


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Claire Bugen stated that right now we're having some preliminary dialogue about redesigning instruction delivery systems in the elementary department. John and I have been talking about it for awhile now and we're starting to meet with elementary principal and we're talking about developing a specific plan to address this. We have the privilege of having the state auditors on our campus. They will probably be on campus through the month of late June or early July, and then they project that they will have a report out sometime in September. This audit is very clear with us. It's at the recommendation of Senator Nelson and it relates to our spending on facilities and construction, for the past 10 years. Sound familiar? So we're working on gathering all of that evidence for the audit. Beatrice Burke asked if we have all 10 years worth? Claire Bugen responded that we haven't had a problem with that so far but it is very intense. They have started interviewing some of our staff as well. So I anticipate there would be more interviews with staff as they move forward. It will be a very comprehensive report. I know since then Texas Facilities Commission has also taken them on a tour of the campus, but one of the areas that they kind of focused on was, well, tell us about some of the issues, you know, that y'all are having in the area of facilities. Because, as you're aware, you know, we did move the maintenance function from TSD last biennium over to TFC. At the start of that it was kind of rocky, it's gotten a whole lot better. With the new legislation they will be taking all of our custodial staff and all of our grounds staff. So in the current biennium, if we had things that maintenance would have done previously, and TFC says it's not their responsibility, we're going to have to make sure that the memorandum of understanding that we have with TFC, as we move forward, includes everything. Because we're not going to have any staff left to do those functions. So TFC is going to have to take everything. Because we won't have anyone to do it if they come up with a decision for whatever reason to say "That's not our job." The MOU will have to be comprehensive. Walt Camenisch asked if our internal auditor reviewed work on the maintenance and what was done in the past? Gary Bego, they have not. Claire Bugen, if you recall at a previous board meeting, we had a gentleman that was representing this project. He had brought some pictures and did a little bit of an explanation about this project. It is now moving forward. The project has three goals. And we are involved, just a little bit. Walt was able to do a walk‑through on the project with Mr. Alan Holt. Walt Camenisch shared it was very interesting. I used to be a science teacher, and when I was a science teacher we took our class down there to that creek, so it was good memories for me. It was the north part. We started walking from South First Street through the creek to South Congress, and Alan Holt had three other people with him. One of them was a specialization in forestry, and another one water, and Alan is a city planner. He was explaining a lot of things about the creek and we did find some campouts there for the homeless, but there were no people there at the time. So we took a walk through the creek and it was really beautiful. I asked them what they were going to do with the rocks there and they said they would not touch that rock structure. They would have a path to go another route through there. There were some trees that developed a canopy; they said they would not touch the trees and so on. So that was really nice. Alan also said that there were going to be three people from Washington D.C. coming out, I guess in the next few months, to study the environment there,


Governing Board

TSD Governing Board Meeting 10 of 16 April 24, 2015

the water and so on. He explained quite a bit and it sounded really good and it's still a work in progress. They are hoping to have it ready by January 2016. Alan told me that he's been working with the Bouldin Creek Neighborhood Association, so they are aware of what he's trying to do. And, secondly, talking about the concerns of the fence. When we were walking just on south first, we noticed that there was a new gate there at South First that was built when Time Warner built on campus. Jim Johnston told Alan that he wanted to have the same type of gate design as that one and have it 8‑feet tall along the fence line. Claire Bugen emphasized that the improvements will not be happening on our property. Really, we will just benefit from the beauty of the end result project and so I think that they are going to have a new fence line. I mean, it's going to be really beautiful in style.

9. Risk Management Update

Gary Bego, I just wanted to introduce our new risk manager, Suzanne Kilpatrick has been with TSD for about six months and she came to us from the University of Texas. She was there for about a year. Prior to that she was born and raised in Oklahoma, worked there for a period of years and got to Texas as quick as she could. Suzanne Kilpatrick, I put together a little presentation on our worker's comp history over the last five years. I did this when I first started working at TSD just to see what the trends were in the worker's comp history and how we could improve going forward, what we should look at, areas that we should be focused on for training and those types of things. I look for any peaks and what causes the peaks. The peaks shows me that probably school is getting ready to let out, we have a lot of other activities going on campus that are not normally going on through the whole school year so there are just lots of possibilities that you can find from this graph on how to improve our worker's comp plans. And things to look at in future when May rolls around, we may want to check out, coming up soon, what kinds of activities are going on? Is there anything that we need to talk about before we go ahead and schedule all this stuff? So this next one goes claims by occupation. Not really that surprising that we see teachers and the residential staff as the highest risk areas. The reason this isn't surprising for me, as Gary said, I worked in Oklahoma before I came here, and I actually worked for a worker's comp agency. And it was the state worker's comp agency. So we covered all of the schools in Oklahoma and I visited a lot of schools. And any school that has students with disabilities we see a lot of injuries due working with those students. And that's just the nature of that type of work. So again, I wasn't surprised to see the teachers and residential staff as the highest in injuries. Plus they're also the ones who are out on campus all the time, walking around, going to different areas where admin, which I guess custodial, they're out a lot too, but a lot of these other groups are working in a specific area, they're not doing as much walking around on campus and interaction with the students. This next one is claims by action. So what actually caused the incident to happen? Again, since we do work with a lot of students that have multiple disabilities, it not surprising to see that interaction with those students causes injuries sometimes. I think that we do a really good job of training with Mandt and things like that. I think we do a really good job of that, but this gives us some things to look for in the future. Slips and falls was the second highest action for injuries. And again, with teachers and residential staff walking around, custodial staff walking around, mopping floors, leaving things out in the hallways, these are just typical things that you see in a school. These, I tell you, the slips and falls, lifting, strains, the struck, push/pull, those are all common injuries to see in a school system. I'll go ahead and mention there's a miscellaneous column here that's anything that we saw only one injury of that type. We stick it under that column because we don't really notice a trend in what's happening there.


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Contusions and sprains as number one injuries. Again, not that surprising if you have a lot of interactions with students and that's the cause of the injury, you will have some bruises. Also, slips and falls, we see a lot of strains from slips and falls and like lifting injuries and those kind of things. And claims by body part. Arm is by far the highest, and I always think about when you slip and fall what's your first reaction? Putting your arms down to try to catch yourself. So that's where we see a lot of arm injuries is from falling and trying to catch yourself and brace yourself. We have legs as the second and back as the third, which again if you're dealing with students there's going to be some strucks and things like that whenever you're dealing with them and they're going to be hitting arms, legs, those body parts. Back probably comes from lifting and also some slips and falls we see a lot of back injuries. We have a really good picture of our history with the worker's comp claims and how we have been improving over the last five years. I presented this the Executive Leadership Team a few months ago and I re-ran these numbers before this presentation just to see how it's changed, and they have decreased a lot. I thought that was an awesome thing to see. We also have the medical costs here, which as you can see are slowly going down. Makes a pretty big jump here in 2013 to 2014. And I will say that these medical costs that are reflected are the total amount that's set aside for that claim. So once a claim is settled, it will only reflect the amount that was actually paid out on the claim. And I think that's why we've seep the numbers get lower and more over the past few months is because as they settle more claims it shows a more realistic picture of where our claims are. And then the total cost of claims, that part was just so surprising and awesome to see as a risk manager. Gary Bego, I would like to add just one more thing to what she's saying. Basically that y'all may recall that as part of our budget we have to send money to the State Office of Risk Management each year for worker's compensation. And when I arrived at TSD 11 years ago we were paying over $200,000 per year. Each year that I have been here that number has gone down. We currently in current operating budget have budgeted $175,000 each though we didn't pay quite that much last year. But our bill for this year is only going to be $135,000. And I expect that it's going to be even below that next year because as our claims go down.

10. TSD Governing Board Scholarships

Walt Camenisch, the Board annually gives two scholarships in the amount of $500 one male graduate and one female graduate. The current balance of the fund is $1,208. The Board agreed to continue with the same scholarships for 2014- 2015 graduation.

11. 84th Legislature Update

Claire Bugen shared that the Board is aware of all the happenings at the Legislature. When the session began, we were pretty optimistic because, as you know, we thought that our problems from the fall were resolved. Walt and Eric, as Board members, put a lot of time and energy into going to the Governor's office, talking, participating in negotiations, then Gary and I and Leonard participated in mediation that you know did not go well with TFC leadership. But, still, we were optimistic going into the legislative session. I really did not think that we would have the problems that we ended up having. It wasn't expected. Our requests above base for this year included additional staff, vans and buses, and expansion of CTE career pathways in culinary and building trades, construction. A lot of things went right this legislative session and a lot of things went wrong this legislative session. We learned about, we're going to call it a white paper, that's a nice way to describe it. A white paper that was written by TFC that we got from the Texas Tribune and we learned that that white paper had been


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disseminated to selected senators the day before our Senate Finance Hearing. The paper painted a very unfriendly picture of TSD and our stewardship of our facilities and our budget related to facilities improvement. And you know what happened, many of you were there at the Senate Finance Hearing just sort of collapsed even to the point that the sale of the property became the topic of the day. Well, you know that in today's world, you say something like that in a public hearing, and it's on social media within seconds. And sure enough, that's exactly what happened and by the time I got back to school, I had parent phone calls and student questions and deaf community questions, alumni, it was complete chaos. It took weeks to get it under control. Not with the legislature. I'm just talking about with the community itself. Because our community really, really, was fired up. With the very, very best of intentions but you have to be so careful when and you are working with the legislature, you just can't go in and start screaming at them, calling them unpleasant things, calling their offices, challenging them. There's a way to challenge. I wrote you about this and I'm not going to repeat it and tell my long, sad story again and again. But I spent 18 hour days, you know, working here and Gary and I making visits, dealing with damage control at the legislature and then the nights working in the community, but not really working in the community because I'm not supposed to be working in the community, trying to get everybody calm and on the same page. It was very successful. I want to applaud our Texas deaf community, our alumni, everyone. I give a lot of the credit to Donna Hummel, she was able to organize people, establish a group separate from TSD completely. Because as a state agency, we can't do, we can't lobby, we can't participate in any kinds of activities. But parents can, alumni can, and they did their thing and I think made a pretty good impact on some key legislators. How do I know that? Because the sale of the property died and now it's right here, I'm saving it, because you never know. I learned from this legislative session that you never know what comes up. So who is to say that it may not pop up again sometime in the future and we should have that front of mind. Even though I don't think it's dead on arrival for this legislative session. But what I want you to understand is, to me, the damage was already done. So whatever picture was painted of us and now I understand it better reading this document, was very, very effective on the part of whoever was responsible. And I don't know names, so I don't know. I have no idea. I couldn't tell you who authored the paper. Nor do I want to know. So there's been a shadow of doubt casted on the Senate Finance Committee. I should be fair, on the Senate Finance Committee, about our reputation as an agency and about our ability to manage our funds for building and improvement and this audit is just more evidence of that. So it's very real. I know you all tell me, you want me to feel better. You told me everything is fine now and will be fine and we are in pretty good shape with the budget. As Pattie said, as our LBB analyst, we are really okay going into conference committee. We have a lot. You might not have expected us to get anything from the Senate. There was a time when we thought that was possible. We really believed it was possible that we would get nothing from the Senate and that did not happen. We worked very hard to switch the focus to our budget and away from the facilities because we were making no progress talking about facilities. I would call our House Subcommittee Appropriations Hearing, a textbook hearing. You couldn't ask for anything better. You couldn't ask for more support, more positive, appreciation of parent testimony, of student testimony, they were very, very positive and they recommended all our exceptional items. Senate, remember, I was expecting nothing. So with that in mind, they approved 6.5 of the 10.4 FTEs. And none of us have any idea, with the exception of the custodians, which they removed. They approved all of the buses and vans and none of the third exceptional item related to CTE. I agonized over these two bills and did not sleep for a week. Trying to make a decision, should we oppose them or should we go silently into the night and accept this new legislation that would transfer custodial and grounds. It's really hard for us because we've worked so hard on our grounds and our campus is so beautiful. People comment about what a beautiful campus it is and how well maintained it


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is. I don't think they take care of a lot of state buildings that the kind of landscape, foliage, maybe with the exception of the Capitol. But even then, so I don't know what's going to happen. I'm thinking positive. Angie Wolf asked what If we get all of the parents to contact TFC and ask what are you doing to our grounds? That's what I plan to do. Claire Bugen, yes. So I really struggled because ethically, morally, as a leader, I know these bills are wrong and I know they should have been opposed. But politically, I was afraid that the damage to the school would not be worth taking a position on it. I talked to all of you about it. You know, I almost did not want this to be my decision. You know? I wanted it to be your decision. So we're allowing these bills and they're just adding to that image issue because, you know, Senator Watson stands up in full Senate chambers and says, "Yep, one of the reasons for this is all of those bed bugs at TSD and they didn't know how to take care of it. So that's why we're proposing this legislation." Anyway, you know, with these two bills comes all of that additional negative because they are taking this over because we can't and because they can do it so much better. Selected members in key roles in key places are convinced that TSD has neglected its facilities, to not have spent the money that we received on the right things. I think they think we spent it on programs and services for students, and that TFC is right on. I know you keep sending me the newspaper articles about TFC and their problems, but it doesn't seem to impact their role with us. The differences between the House and the Senate will be resolved in conference committee. We've just learned of the appointees to the committees. Interesting group on both sides. We'll try to make some visits quickly because it will happen fast and there won't be an opportunity in the actual conference committee to testify or anything. You witness the final decision. But if we can make some visits to speak on behalf of some of our items, we will that are not included. So that's my summary. Good, bad, the ugly. Claire Bugen, let me tell you a positive. I met with the new executive director of TFC. We had a very, very frank, one on one, which Sha attended. Sha Cowan, I met with the director the day before he met with Claire, so I met one on one with him and he was very positive and welcoming, but he did say we need to go forward, not backwards, which I agree. And I showed him the paper, the white paper, just the itemized list some of things that were wrong on there like saying we needed 13 million for our guard station, trying to figure out what that meant. So anyway, he said I meet with Claire tomorrow so will you come also? Because the executive director is from the Kerrville area, had worked with my dad years ago. So we met with Claire the next day and I think it was very frank and I feel much more positive towards TFC under Harvey's leadership now because I think he knows that there have been problems in the past and we need to move forward. He can call in a group together and we couldn't nitpick the report, but he did agree that there are some things wrong in here and some people had to respond didn't get it cleaned up at all, but that wasn't the point. I think he's very aware and he did ask a new governmental relations person to be a liaison and she was responsive right away. So I think they got a different message now at TFC about working with TSD. I think the new leadership he's communicated it to them. So I'm hopeful and positive. Claire Bugen, let me just say they've been true to their word on that government relations person. She calls me, emails me all the time. And yesterday we had a face‑to‑face meeting and I'm very optimistic that he wants her involved in all of the meetings and any problem the minute it pops up he wants to be made aware of it. Maybe we'll be going forward with a better situation. I mean it can't get any worse. It couldn't get worse than this legislative session because this was really, really difficult. Angie Wolf, when it's time to develop the MOU I think it's going to be very, very critical to inform TFC of the kinds of maintenance issues we have and need for grounds keeping and whatever else our needs are. Claire Bugen, I think that's an excellent point.


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Beatrice Burke, do you need my involvement in the development of the MOU? Who all do you have mind for that? Claire Bugen, it was Gary and myself the last time. It's a good question and I've not arrived at that point yet. Eric Hogue, I guess the old saying is true, careful what you ask for, you might just get it. They're going to get the grounds, going to get the custodial, and I would just say try to work with them. Tyran Lee, my concern is when we give them all those duties, do we have any kind of a commitment that we're going to have with them? Claire Bugen, it’s an MOU written in good faith and you hope that they will follow through, but I think it's up to us to keep good documentation and not to hold it, but to share it when it happens immediately. Now we have a contact liaison in Maya Ingram, so we have a friendly person to bring it to their attention. So I hope that will help. Sha Cowan, I just want to comment that I think that the team has done a remarkable job during a difficult session, and also to acknowledge the role that Pattie Featherston, the LBB, has played. She has really understood the issues so it's been tough.

12. Gifts and Donations

Gary Bego reported that TSD has received gifts and donations totaling $49,921. Angie Wolf moved to accept the gifts and donations in the amount in the amount of $49,921. Eric Hogue seconded and the motion passed.

13. FY15 Budget Update

Gary Bego reported that the Board has been provided an update through the month of February 2015. This is basically half the fiscal year and the percent spent should be roughly around 50%. A couple of items were noted in the budget beginning with rental and leasing of buildings and the fact that no money has been spent. This is primarily due to summer activities through the ERCOD program like Family Weekend Retreat, which St. Edward’s University is rented, or Discovery Retreat, which Peaceable Kingdom is rented. Next, student travel under student travel and student services, the budget is almost expended. However, student services shows only a small portion expended. Both of these items are student travel and when combined the remaining budget is approximately $480,000. Lastly, lease payments to TPFA for technology equipment will be made in May.

15. Board Policies

Sha Cowan stated that the policy committee met this morning and reviewed 13 policies. Thank you to John Serrano and Julie Dodd for their work on the policies and Leonard for advising us on the legalities. Sha Cowan moved, on behalf of the policy committee, to amend the following policies with minor revisions: DBAA, DH, DH‑EXH, FD, FFAB, FFAD, FFG, FL, FNG. Sha Cowan moved, on behalf of the policy committee, to delete the following policies: DBF, DHA, DHG and to defer policy DBD. And on behalf of the policy committee I move to defer policy DBD. Motion passed.


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16. Reports or Comments by Board Members

Walt Camenisch: I don't know if you are all aware, but Shawn was confirmed by the Senate as a TSD Board member yesterday. Congratulations! Again, I was really impressed this morning by the four student group presentations. The curriculum presentation and, also, as I mentioned earlier, I truly enjoyed the play this last Friday. It was wonderful job and big kudos to all the staff at TSD. Eric Hogue: It was great to see the kids today and seeing Frankenstein walk in, that was pretty cool. Just the makeup work that they did, it's professionally done, it looks like. If you're not, you need to figure out a way to do the three camera video and send them out, that would be great. Angie Wolf: I really enjoyed all of the presentations today and it's really nice to see, finally, a Gifted and Talented program implemented here. I hope that we continue with it and I really would like to see it grow because we have a lot of bright students here. I think it would be helpful to challenge them more. I enjoyed seeing the clips of Frankenstein. I wish I could have attended, but I'm kind of glad I didn't because my 8‑year‑old would have been really scared! I really appreciate everyone's involvement in the legislative session because I know it's been difficult and challenging and it's a lot of work and you still have your day job. So thank you. Beatrice Burke: First of all, I really enjoyed the presentation by the curriculum team. It's very inspirational and exciting to know that the school is trying to continue to maintain providing the best possible services for our students. So thank you to everyone from the curriculum team. Wonderful presentation. I would like, if possible, for the Special Needs Department to give us an update on their programs at a meeting next school year. We haven't heard thinking from them in a while. I really appreciate the support of the deaf community, which has been longstanding, as we're facing legislative challenges and so I think it's really nice to see leadership in young, deaf people. I really appreciate the young deaf woman, Donna Hummel, helping us here at TSD. I want to see more and more younger people become involved with supporting the school. Thank you, Claire, for your continued hard work, your leadership, and I'm very optimistic and I just feel in my gut, I know that we're okay. I think that's it. Sha Cowan: I want to mention two people who are retiring and we're not going to see them at the next Board meeting. Good friends of mine and wonderful colleagues here at TSD, Diana Poeppelmeyer and Gary Bego. We're really going to miss the two of you. You can't be replaced. You've done such wonderful work for years and I hope that you enjoy retirement. I know Diana is going to be busy with her parents and family responsibilities, but we just applaud you for your work and dedication to TSD so thank you and good luck.

Tyran Lee: I really enjoyed the International Studies students. I think it's a great experience. I'm really happy they have that available to students here and that's a dream come true for me. I do want to congratulate Wess, Karl and Donna for their involvement with TAD. I worked well with them and I hope they continue to push on education being a priority, to see young leadership and involvement with education and continuing to garner that exposure to the younger and to the betterment of education. It’s so wonderful to see you all as a team and working together in response to the Legislature. You all have handled your responses very professionally. The community involvement is outstanding. Shawn Saladin: I am very pleased to see the international perspective for the students. I grew up in the military and moved around a lot. It's helped me a lot in my life to be able to understand different cultures and different people, what makes it work, not work. It's a wonderful thing. And I'm very happy to see the effort put into the curriculum at TSD. It may sound like a whole lot of money, but the math by itself is probably $16 per student, if you put a pencil to it. And best of all, the variety of activities that the students can do here. It enriches their lives, makes better citizens. And makes me wish that I had grown up here


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and makes me want to move back to Austin. I'm started talking with some people and talking to you about outreach to the Valley so the Hispanic community can benefit from being here, learning here. Thank you.

17. Grievance Appeal by Darla Coons

14. Professional Contracts 2015-2016

Walt Camenisch called the board into closed session under the authority of section 551.074 of the Texas Open Meetings Act for the purpose of discussing the grievance appeal by Darla Coons and Probationary Contracts at 2:14pm on April 24, 2015. Walt Camenisch called the Board back into open session at 3:45pm on April 24, 2015. Sha Cowan moved to approve the Probationary Contracts for 2015‑2016 as listed. Shawn Saladin seconded and motion passed. Eric Hogue made the motion on the grievance of Darla Coons, that the Board affirms the decision of the Superintendent and that we stand behind our superintendent in denying the grievance of Darla Coons. Sha Cowan seconded and the motion passed.

15. Adjourn

Meeting adjourned at 3:48.

Angie Wolf, TSD Governing Board Secretary Date Twyla Heslop, Recording Assistant Date

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