May 21 2025
AZ Committee Meeting

▼Full Transcript Below

1. Review of Committee's progress
   ⏯ 0:05:15 

   • Mark Pruitt reviewed the four core recommendation pillars (straight-line feeders, balanced student enrollment, program equity, and virtual high school options), confirmed previously eliminated proposals (such as 6–12 attendance zones, relocating CSW, and choice busing due to cost and logistical constraints), and transitioned into examining current CTE career cluster enrollment data across district high schools.

2. Slide presentation on what an Innovation Center would look like.  

     ⏯ 0:08:22 

• • The committee reviewed data to show potential CTE pathways, student progression, bell schedule and shuttle schedule.

3.  Discussion and vote on two remaining options, McKean Innovation Center or all choice IB magnet at Dickinson.
      ⏯ 0:47:25 

• • • Committee members voted to move forward with the McKean Innovation Center with 10 yes and 2 abstentions.

4.   Discussion and vote on relocating MYP to Skyline, plus discussion on Warner K-8.

      ⏯ 1:05:57

• The committee voted to move forward to move MYP to Skyline to allow for increased high school enrollment at Dickinson. In addition, the recommendation will include that the district should continue to look at middle school attendance zones, particularly as they relate to the Warner community.

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⏯0:36 Mark Pruitt: All right, I have 6:01. We have a packed agenda tonight and a timeline to meet, or at least approach, so we will get started. Thank you very much. Believe this is our fifth meeting, if I'm not mistaken. Been very productive. I appreciate everyone's participation to date so far. Life goes on. Couple of building-level administrators at events at their school tonight, you know that kind of thing. And so, but we've got a good, good number of folks here to continue the movement forward. If I could have a motion to bring the meeting to order.

⏯1:12 Vic Leonard: So moved. 

⏯1:12 Mark Pruitt: Mr. Leonard.

⏯1:22 Beth Jefferson: Who seconded?

⏯1:22 Mark Pruitt: Mr. Leonard and Amir.  All right, all in favor? Unanimous? 

And we are off. Can you advance the slide? The agenda was sent out a week ago and also posted on our website. 

Next slide. We are now to public comment. Would anyone in person like to provide public comment? Give proper wait time like a good teacher would. All right, it does not seem like we have any in-person public comment. Beth, do we have any virtual public comment? Okay, all right. No public comment, and of course we'll loop back at the end for possible public comment. 

All right, everyone has a hard copy of the minutes in front of them. They were also sent out a couple days after the meeting. Give just a moment to review those minutes and then someone can make a motion to approve the minutes. 

Beth has got her head both directions here, so she's not looking at it. So just motion and your name so that she can capture. Do we have a motion to either approve or amend the minutes?

⏯3:05 Reggie Worlds: The first one. 

⏯3:08 Mark Pruitt: Reggie. Do we have a second? Mr. Leonard. 

Any discussion? All right, we'll take a vote. All in favor, aye? Any opposed? Minutes are passed unanimously.

All right, we've seen the goals of the committee several times now. We may loop back to those later in the meeting. We've seen the norms several times. It's important I think to, particularly, there may be some disagreement, just like we discussed last meeting, did a great job in that regard. Assume positive intent, be solution-oriented, respect other points of view. And now we are to the timeline. 

We will discuss the timeline at the end again, but I just wanted to kind of look where we, frame where we are. We are at May 21st, which we are finished refining and developing a potential recommendation, or at least a framework for a recommendation. The goal is to have June 7th, on at the June meeting, is to have focus group and survey data analysis and hopefully complete the recommendation. 

Now, I will say that we have engaged with both the Rodel Foundation for focus group work and Hanover Research for a survey. You're going to see some of that later in the meeting. They have accepted the work, given us a scope of work, but it is a very tight timeline. So, I think we have to be understanding that we could send this out, push it out, not be happy with the number of respondents, that they sort of hedged a little bit with the tight timeline we provided them. And in fact, you'll see tonight that they're not going to launch, they're not going to give us their final draft for the survey until they see where we are at the end of this meeting. So then these timelines you'll see later are like two-day turnarounds, and then they've been great so far. 

All right, and now we're into current recommendations, right? Currently, we have come up with, I use the term core pillars for our recommendation, what I think front and center when we present to the school board: align high school attendance zone boundaries with middle school boundaries, i.e. straight-line feeders. We thought that was very important, and we sort of decided that, yep, we're going to move forward with that regardless of our programming considerations, okay? 

We were going to distribute students equally across attendance zones at the secondary school level, and we would have a commitment to our graduates, equity of programs across all schools. So, we wanted to have an enrollment that allowed us to offer comprehensive programs to our students that attend our comprehensive schools, be that middle or high school. 

We also decided to move forward in the recommendation that the district should continue to pursue the possibility of virtual programming for high school students. Okay, so that's where we are at this point. Any questions about that? Make sure I'm accurate, right? Next slide. 

We shared this information. This is the straw poll results that we used to drive last meeting. Next slide. From that, we sort of started removing ideas, okay? At the May 1st meeting, the committee looked at those that had the least support, and then if it had, there was one that did not have one straw poll vote, so we very quickly removed McKean, Conrad, and Cab Callowell smaller enrollments, okay? And then the others, anyone that did use one of their straw poll votes for that had the opportunity to talk the committee into keeping it in discussion. 

Ultimately, we also removed AI Middle and AI High to create one attendance, you know, one 6-12 attendance zone school has been removed from further discussion. Reduce the two attendance zone high schools and relocate The Charter School of Wilmington to the open site, that's been removed as an item. And provide equitable choice busing, after some robust conversation, to all students at all of our schools, that's been removed from discussion. Next slide.

⏯7:38 Kecia Nesmith: I'm sorry, I wasn't here. When you say provide equitable choice busing, so in other words, was the, I looked at the minutes, but the majority was around funding, is that what it was?

⏯7:49 Mark Pruitt: I would say funding and practicality were the two overriding reasons. I think there was discussion where someone said, no one is anti, if there was no price tag or logistics to it, picking someone up at their door and taking them wherever they wanted to go to learn is obviously something that no one would not support. But when we talked about the logistics of it and the price tag of it, the committee ultimately removed it as an item.

 All right, so now we are to data requests. There were two requests that the committee had at the last meeting. One was from Ms. Merto, who is not here. She talked about being a CTE teacher, which I didn't realize, in Pennsylvania, and wanted to take a look. Also, the next several slides for the committee members, hard copies are in front of you, okay? So this is where the hard copies begin. 

All right, so this is our current, please disregard level one, that column should have been deleted. This is total level one, two, and three, the number of students who are in these career clusters. This may not be the name of the course, all right? So I'll give you an example: Arts, A/V Technology, and Communications is a national cluster that's certified for federal funding and then state funding. However, at McKean, it's Radio and TV Broadcasting, okay? At AI High School, it's Digital Media or Website Design, that type of work, okay? So it gives you the numbers at each school.

⏯9:44 Vic Leonard: Mark, automotive would be transportation I guess?

⏯9:48 Mark Pruitt: Yeah, automotive’s under transportation. I think between Reggie and I and Ken- Ms.Todd-Dixon will be here momentarily, she just texted that she was running a few minutes late from Conrad. Yeah, we could probably tell you something like that.

⏯10:02 Eric Sanford: Can you define the JDG?

⏯10:07 Mark Pruitt: So Jobs for Delaware Graduates. Interestingly enough, Jobs for Delaware Graduates is a long-time state program on the state budget line where JDG is an organization that you can hire to come in and work with students on job-ready skills 9 through 12. It is approved as a pathway, it's also approved as a federal career and technical education pathway. However, they are not going to give us funding, they're not going to give the state funding for it after next year. I don't know how big of an issue that is for us, but yeah, it's Jobs for Delaware Graduates. Any other questions regarding, I know that was a specific ask of Ms. Merto, and of course I'll send the slides tomorrow.

 Okay, well we'll move on. The second ask was, you know, some samples. I think a couple people were asking like, well, what would an Innovation Center look like, right? And so I said, well, look, let me put some things together to sort of give us some sense as to what it might look like. Say, let me put my hand on it. I actually went over and met with Ms. Reitemeyer, who is an expert not only in school counseling, but in the master scheduling, school operations, logistics, how things work. And so she and I spent a couple of hours. I did some work from the Cecil County, Cherry Creek Colorado, some other ideas, took some ideas and we kind of talked through this and grappled with it to come up with what might be some samples. 

All right, first of all, this is what an Innovation Center programming may look like, right? So students at the two home schools would be able to head to the Innovation Center, which at McKean High School as it currently lists for plant science, animal science, audio radio and TV, engineering. There are two, if you remember, the CTE programming was much stronger from a facility standpoint at McKean. But the business, JA Entrepreneurship, could be picked up from Dickinson, moved over to McKean, as well as the NAF Academy of Finance at AI High School. But you see the list there. 

We have also engaged not only with Rodel for a focus group, but the vice president of Rodel is Luke Rhine, who is an expert in career and technical education. He was the assistant secretary of education under career programming in Delaware, left the state for a number of years, and is now back in Delaware with Rodel. We reached out to him about where do we have gaps, okay, as far as where's there an industry need? And he always points to where is there a livable wage for a graduate to get a job and have a livable wage? And he said where he saw gaps were in health science, we should expand anywhere we can expand in health science, whether that be nursing, phlebotomy, a billing certification, anywhere we can expand underneath allied health, we should do so. He also thought that information technology, there is a huge need, whether that be networking, there is a Cisco networking pathway. This would be someone—go ahead.

⏯13:52 Val Gould: I was also thinking clean energy jobs. I know that Sun Tech does that stuff. There's a huge need, I mean current presidential [inaudible] aside, [inaudible].

⏯14:15 Mark Pruitt: You got a partner on this side here.

⏯14:16 Vic Leonard: I'd love to see that.

⏯14:17 Mark Pruitt: Yeah, you got to get with Mr. Leonard. I know that. We’re not—I—CTE programming is never static, so the career clusters, the national career clusters actually they’re listed, are going to be reduced down to changed, reduced down to 14 by July 1. They're constantly moving based on 10-year market analysis and wages, so they're constantly changing. I believe we don't have anything in government, public administration, human services, law, and public. We asked him about that, he's like, "I think they're probably going to be either condensed or removed." He's like, there's just no, this would be, you're really looking for an opportunity for kids to get out and get a livable wage where there's a need, okay? And then, "I'm a CNA, I continue to go to nursing school part-time while I get this livable wage." Simplest example that everybody understands. So there's sort of a list of a starting point at what we might have. Next slide. 

From a student standpoint, a student will come in to 9th grade, take a CTE exploration course. Again, this is not firm, this is about a couple hours of work on my end, a couple hours of work with Maddie. A CTE exploration course, which we already do at a couple of our schools, Ms. Todd-Dixon does that at Conrad and Dickinson does that. So as ninth graders, they get exposure to all of their career programming and then select that program for 10th grade. All right.

⏯16:02 Vic Leonard: Is there anything we're doing in middle school, or is that later on to get them at least to know—

⏯16:08 Mark Pruitt: We are absolutely. We have a grant through Rodel that's aligning now. It's a constantly moving target if we're doing this, but absolutely. They're working to align their career readiness standards with what we have in our high schools, particularly our comprehensive high schools, with the idea being that we know a student that makes a choice to a life science high school, well, that's a choice they made. 

Okay, so you need three credits. We traditionally offer these credits, one in either 9, 10, 11, or 10 in the case of McKean: one in 9, one in 10, one in 11, or at Conrad, one in 10, one in 11, and one in 12, okay? This model, when we were spitballing, I got to say Dr. Heacock was in my office when we were looking at some models around the country. This model would have, because we're shuttling students to another site, they would be in class for about 2 hours and 10 minutes and get a credit and a half. So you would get your entire three-year sequence in a 2-year period, right? Which would allow, as seniors, to get dual enrollment or dual credit coursework and industry-standard credentialing coursework during that senior year, okay? As well as yet to be determined. I don't think the committee is going to put every leaf on this tree, right? We're giving a recommendation as a template to move forward. Questions about that slide?

⏯17:44 Jodi Muffley: So I do have questions about the 9th grade exploration courses at their home school. So what would that entail, like having—I just don't, 

⏯17:57 Maddie Reitemeyer: Like what would teachers, what’s it look like, stuff like that?

⏯18:00 Jodi Muffley: Yeah.

⏯18:01 Mark Pruitt: I mean, I think you have to keep in mind, that that course may or may not be CTE certified. That could be a transition to high school, high school skills we offer, you know. It could be high school skills, it could, but certainly there'll be career exploration. We would like to think that our pathway teachers would be able to get over to these courses at some point, sell it. We bring those kids over on the shuttle buses or additional buses at some point to make sure they made an informed decision, as well as we've built out an AVID program that we'd like to take maybe AVID Light and a boot camp course at McKean and AI, take some of the components from that and use that for all students so that they are prepared to be both college and career ready.

⏯18:46 Jodi Muffley: Perfect.

⏯18:48 Mark Pruitt: Okay, next slide. Okay, on the right is basically what our three schools do right now. I mean, Reggie may say, "Well, that's five minutes off." You know, if Dr. Royster was here, he might say, "We do a 20-minute this and you get that time back." But actually, this pretty closely follows AI, and I know AI followed McKean. I might have made a couple of adjustments to make it work, and I do think we'd have to work collaboratively on something like this. But that is basically what we do right now. That is four blocks in an A/B block. In an A/B block, meaning you take on a rotating schedule period 1, 2, 3, 4, the next day is period 5, 6, 7, 8. So there's eight periods over two days. Same thing would apply at the Innovation Center, only there would only be two courses on an A day, two courses on a B day in this model, all right?

And it sort of outlines really, you know, okay, this is a model here. This I could see, right? So students, certainly if a student drove to school or got a ride from a parent, they could deliver them straight to the Innovation Center a half an hour later, right, if that's where they started their day. If not, they're getting on their regular school bus, they're arriving at school 7:15, 7:20. They are immediately getting on a shuttle bus. That shuttle bus departs for the Innovation Center at 7:35. That block for one and a half credits runs from 7:55 to 10:05. Class is dismissed, they return to the shuttle, they return to campus, and they are back on campus for a traditional PM schedule for two periods. 

And again, this would happen four times. So if you're an Innovation Center teacher, you have four classes, credit and a half each, two on an A day, two on a B day, all right? The, if you have a class in the afternoon, you would go to two traditional classes in the morning. 

If you are going to the Innovation Center for the afternoon, you're eating lunch, your lunch is block one at your home school. At the end of that, you're getting on a shuttle bus at 11:15, class starts at 11:35, 2 hours and 10 minutes. Shuttle bus departs at 1:55, that bus drops off and gets right in line. We've talked to the transportation office, that will be one of the buses at that school that gets online and then takes a regular run home of students. 

Right, you see Google Maps has a 9-minute, during regular, during those off times, 9-minute from John Dickinson to McKean and 13 minutes from AI High School to McKean. Questions about that?

⏯21:54 Emily Carroll: So would the students get to pick if they, or like have a preference if they went to the Innovation AM versus PM?  

⏯22:02 Mark Pruitt: I think that would be—go ahead.

⏯22:04 Emily Carroll: I think of any athletes that have an away games—

⏯22:07 Reggie Worlds: I was just about to say, with this model, if it works, though, regardless if you're a AM or PM, that does not impact. But the only time that would be impacted is based on early dismissal sports. So other than that, the model looks the way it's supposed to look.

⏯22:22 Kecia Nesmith: So, but how do they get back to their home school? After the B block.

⏯22:27 Mark Pruitt: At 1:55 the shuttle bus departs for home campus.

⏯22:30 Kecia Nesmith: So they're going to the Innovation Center—from the Innovation Center —to the feeder pattern, like to home. They're going back to the home school. 

⏯22:39 Mark Pruitt: They're going back to the home school unless they were a student driver, 

⏯22:43 Maddie Reitemeyer: And then they get on their bus that they normally take home.

⏯22:46 Mark Pruitt: Mmhmm. But it's very important that all of this is done within the confines of a home school instructional day because these students are frankly more likely to be involved in extracurricular activities.

⏯23:01 Kecia Nesmith: So I had a couple of questions, and I know we're doing a slide-by-slide but I have a questions about the former slide. I heard you say something about the bell schedule, so you said they're similar. Are those bell schedules aligned to CAB and Conrad as well?

⏯23:17 Mark Pruitt: Uh, no. Uh, they are, from a general perspective, Cab Calloway rotates their schedule. 

⏯23:23 Kecia Nesmith: And so if you go to CAB or Conrad, what is the school or a—or IB program or whatever? 

⏯23:32 Mark Pruitt: Well, the IB program would certainly be—have access to this. 

⏯23:36 Kecia Nesmith: So if you go to Conrad or CAB, you won't have access to this?

⏯23:39 Mark Pruitt: That is—not this model, as I spent a few hours on it. Just to give some people an idea what it might look like. 

⏯23:46 Kecia Nesmith: No, I’m just trying to—and again, I'm not looking to—

⏯23:47 Mark Pruitt: I think we're trying to, I think the purpose is to have robust programming for students who are interested in a comprehensive high school. I think we've got—

⏯23:57 Kecia Nesmith: I get that.

⏯23:47 Mark Pruitt: —programming for students who choose to attend a life science magnet school or a performing arts magnet school.

⏯24:06 Kecia Nesmith: So I get that, but I guess this is just something to consider. This is an inclusive model, in general. Inclusive model for schools, magnet schools— and my son benefits from a great principal, love her, but it doesn't provide the same access, so it's like this or that. Of course if you have choices, you're going to make a choice. But what if this option is more robust in terms of opportunity than the other two programs that are in place that are magnet, right? 

So we have Charter School of Wilmington who claims to be STEM, there's the life science there, and then there's the arts, okay? So those are very specific things, but they also have access to some of the things that were on this CTE sheet, right? So they have access to dual enrollment like everybody else. They might have access to some of the classes or core content that's in some of these CTE classes. 

So I just want to understand the curriculum around and the concept of the continuity. If I go from one school to the next, you know, and I had some life science and I was in the animal science pathway or whatever, and now next year I go to a different school. Like I just want to make sure that we're thinking about transitions, movements, all of those things. And if there is some way to have some parity to some extent with some of these options, because when we talk about engineering, we're going beyond the former concepts of CTE which were mostly trade things, right? So when you're talking about having those access to engineering classes or more people, it just changes the vision of how we're configured, and are we making sure that all the programs have as robust option going forward—not right now, but going forward, I guess. Just want some, just to think about.

⏯26:13 Mark Pruitt: Sure, I'll give you my thoughts and then maybe I'll turn to Ms. Todd-Dixon to speak for CAB and Conrad. Students make a choice to attend Conrad or Cab Calloway. They should be making the choice based almost solely on the unique CTE programming at those schools. Now, whether they are or not, we're hoping to solve, we're hoping to level that to some degree with this, okay? So I don't know that a student should go—and I'm going to use performing arts, but, you know, if they did not want to be a performing artist, they could have fed into one of these programs to begin with, where they have a far more comprehensive programming. Now, I would say this: are we going to have to deal with transfers? Yes, but we do that now. There's no change in that now.

⏯27:06 Kecia Nesmith: And I don't disagree with you, but I guess I don't think we can compare today to tomorrow if we're going to put this in. I think that we need to just think about it, not defend it or whatever, but just think about it—okay, right now the choices are those magnet or outside of comprehensive choices, or Charter, or CAB, or Conrad. When you open this up to more students, does that impact negatively those other programs now? Because we want to have the viability of these other programs going forward, too. Now right now, if you go to McKean, you have access to that, but there's also some other reasons for which people choose to go to certain schools because of their preference of environment, preference of all, whether it's right or wrong. So now that we're taking McKean away, I'm hearing—or no, McKean would be split between the two schools—

⏯28:02 Mark Pruitt: I think if we were going to go with an Innovation Center, logistically it has to be McKean—

⏯28:05 Kecia Nesmith: It has to be that. So if you take McKean out of, you make that the C—the Innovation Center, then you have these kids. You're going to get to these slides, but you have—so now the whole district sort of is different. It's not like we're just choosing a pathway, we're not just choosing a school. Now you have a whole different formulation of how this district works. And I'm speaking with regard to magnet versus comprehensive versus charter. We have these problems because there's so many choices. I just want to make sure that when we're thinking forward 10, 20 years, that we're looking at whether we need the magnets to the same extent. Do we need to revamp some of the magnets? Do we need to expand some of the magnets for programming? I'm not saying to answer the question now, I'm just saying it's something to think about because like Conrad is a life science, but how much farther could we go for competitiveness in terms of where jobs are going to be in the future, right? So a lot of this CTE focuses on trade and maybe a pathway to explore something, but what about those more advanced degrees and careers that aren't even here right now? How are we thinking about those and having access? Cybersecurity is a big deal right now. So like the jobs that our kids are going to have 20 years, 10, 20 years from now, how are we preparing for that within these models? I just want us to think about it, not necessarily debate it, but that's just something I'm just thinking forward around how do magnets work in 2050? Is that something we even need anymore? I know Cecil County, I worked there, they have their center. They don't have magnet schools, so that's more, you know, all the schools have access to that program. I just want to make sure that we're just thinking forward. 

⏯29:57 Vic Leonard: I'm thinking, well, the hundreds that move to Delcastle Hodgson or Howard will stay in? And we’ll have more kids staying in the district.

⏯30:07 Val Gould: That feeds to the point that I mad, not at the last meeting the meeting before. You know, if the group and the board decides that this innovation center is the way to go, that it's best for the kids, that's the decision. But why did Cecil County create their Innovation Center? Their school district is not run very well, it's not funded very well— 

⏯30:38 Kecia Nesmith: It’s run well.

[laughing]

⏯30:40 Val Gould: I had a friend who worked in Cecil County Schools and had a really difficult time. I know there have been—well, I'm not going to get into—

⏯30:50 Kecia Nesmith: If you’re talking about teachers versus running the district. I would venture to differ. 

⏯30:55 Committee Member: Don’t go there.

⏯30:56 Kecia Nesmith: Anyways.

⏯30:57 Val Gould: So the the point I'm making is that, and you know, I'm going on one friend's experience, so maybe that was their experience. But I'm wondering why we're not focusing on making all of our schools really strong and introduce more parity to the equation? Because when you're splitting everything up into "this is special, this is special"—those of you who've seen the movie Incredibles, like, when everyone's special, no one is. And I'm not saying that the kids aren't special, but when we make everything special, it becomes overwhelming, and it can dilute the overall goals of the district. Just, you know, from my personal perspective, which I know this doesn’t mean anything. So I agree with what you're saying. Like, it can—it will change the entire way that the district functions. And are we still going to be within the scope of all of this providing the basic, intermediate, and advanced, whatever it is that kids want to go do? Are we going, or are we just trying to pigeonhole ability into these different career pathways? And, you know, my thoughts haven't fully formed around it, like you said, in particular. But it is—I grew up in New Jersey, and we can bash New Jersey, I’m here for it. I'm very happy to be here now and I’m never going back. But New Jersey has really strong public schools. They're also some of the most segregated in the country we're living in too. The public schools give you that shot. You look at Maryland public schools, they don't have as many magnets and charters in a lot of these districts as we do. And that means that, you know, these kids are going—they're going to one high school, only one, and so that school has to be good. And so I think that's where my perspective comes from, is like—again, I grew up in South Jersey. If you look at what Cherry Hill did, they split Cherry Hill into East and West. And when they did that, some of their programs were diluted, whether it was athletics or music or academics, whatever. You know, people got pulled into different parts of the district. And Red Clay has already done that with Charter, with Cab, with Conrad. We pulled kids out, and kids are being additionally pulled out in Odyssey, in DMA, in private school. It's like, it just seems like—it seems like so much. I know it is. I know it—our—I'm looking at like, as a middle schooler, like, you have all—like, my head explodes, and I'm 44 years old. Like, I can't imagine a 13, 14-year-old trying to make these decisions, and it feels like you're making a decision for the rest of your life.

⏯34:12 Mark Pruitt: Yeah, I will step in here as the chair of committee and say that we've got these two options here. I was asked by a couple people on the committee to bring some specifics about what a model might look like. And I think philosophical discussions—or, you know, we're in a choice state in this area, a highly choice environment. I don't know that the 19 of us can impact that. 

⏯34:41 Val Gould: I know, I know.

⏯34:42 Mark Pruitt: So, you know, but we do have some work to do here today. And I would also guard us against getting too granular here, right? Like also, like, one of the questions last week was like, "Well, what if a bus is late?" Well, if a bus is late, we're going to do the same thing we do every day, all day, every educator in America. We're gonna to fix it and adapt it. You know, Reggie is the ultimate expert about things getting triaged and things coming at him, you know, a million miles an hour all day long. So it's important that we stay here with our recommendation, in my opinion.

⏯35:21 Kecia Nesmith: So I don't have a problem at all with the schedule and the concepts in general— 

⏯35:27 Mark Pruitt: Next slide.

⏯35:27 Kecia Nesmith:  But as we go forward…because we're going to vote on this or not, right? So you need to make sure that we have done our due diligence and thought about every different scenario, problems, or possibly, before we want to make this recommendation, whatever that is. So that was my purpose.

⏯35:49 Mark Pruitt: Okay. The next slide looks at what a teacher schedule at the Innovation Center would look like, okay? They would teach two 2-hour-and-10-minute classes on an A day, two 2-hour-and-10-minute classes on a B day. Their planning looks a little bit different, but it is about the same number of minutes as every high school teacher in our district. It's just done—they're teaching six credits in four classes instead of six credits in six classes. Questions? 

⏯36:30 Jodi Muffley: So they're going to have 2-hour-and-10-minute classes there?

⏯36:33 Mark Pruitt: Mmhmm.

⏯36:36 Jodi Muffley: Or, well, really one. One 2-hour-and-10-minute class—

⏯36:40 Mark Pruitt: No, no, no. Two. In a day. 

⏯36:43 Jodi Muffley: No, I mean the kiddos. 

⏯36:44 Mark Pruitt: Well, the kids would probably just have one of those and go back to their home school. I do imagine that a senior or a unique junior would stay all day. We would—you know, we brought that up. I think Maddie and I talked about a light cart for lunch, you know, for unique situations, not a full cafeteria. But again, this is the work that a school district needs to do over the course of the next year. That's why we need a two-year lead to do something like this.

⏯37:11 Jodi Muffley: Okay. 

⏯37:13 Mark Pruitt: Okay? All right, next slide. Going a little further, you know, we talk a lot about straight-line feeders and balance. Be mindful that you have this slide in front of you in the packet. You know, we talk about straight-line feeders and balance, okay? This is an idea of maybe what it could look like. Now, we still need to engage in the attendance zone work, okay? Now, this can get a little wonky here, right? Like, if you don't live in a world where Dr. Heacock and I live. This is the numbers of our current high school kids that attend our attendance zone schools, okay? So these numbers are all of the kids that attend McKean, Dickinson, and AI High School. But they're disaggregated out by their middle school attendance zone, which the University of Delaware said would be a good starting point if you wanted to spitball what straight-line feeders might look like. 

So I will give you—so if you took all the kids that went to Stanton that live—that currently go to the three attendance zone high schools, and you sent them to John Dickinson High School, and you sent the Skyline feeder, the suburb portion of the Skyline feeder, and they continue to have approximately 70 out-of-district kids, and you would have to split up McKean's 88 out-of-district kids—and again, these are round numbers just to sort of give you an idea. A lot of work to be done over the next year on the specificity of this, okay? 

That would result in 1,107 students at the John Dickinson School, okay? 993 would be in-district, 114 out—say out-of-district, that's okay, choice total. Yeah, I get it, choice total, okay. If you sent all of the students that went to AI Middle School—all of the students that go there, all of the students that live in the AI Middle attendance zone, all of the students that live in the HB attendance zone, and all of the students that live in the Skyline feeder city portion, as well as the out-of-district choice kids to AI, and half, approximately, the McKean kids, that would result in a 1,235-student enrollment right now, okay? 

Of which approximately, at any given moment, three or four hundred, a couple hundred from each school, would be at the Innovation Center. So from a standpoint of operations and hallways, you're looking at about 200 less at each school at any given moment.

All right, but both schools can handle that enrollment. My suggestion when we got to that point would be, let's be very conservative with choice so we don't get ourselves in a bad spot early on. And then we'll turn the hose on to out-of-district choice once we have a better sense, because these types of changes, as Dr. Nesmith said, potentially impact the choices people make, right? You start doing—people may make a different choice based on this. So a few more in-district kids may choose to stay at their attendance zone. Conrad then gets to their out-of-district waitlist for high school students. Cab Calloway gets to their out-of-district waitlist for high school students, potentially. But those are unknowns. But I think you need to be conservative when inviting students to choice to these schools at this time, right?

I'm going to move ahead one slide, and then we'll back up and take questions on this. Again, this is just an idea to potentially address straight-line feeders, balance in enrollment, and the idea that a student in elementary would travel very similarly with the same group of students so there was continuity in education as they move forward. This is the next slide. So that is what the boundary would look like geographically with what I showed on the previous slide. Questions, comments? 

⏯41:56 Kecia Nesmith: [inaudible]

⏯41:59 Mark Pruitt: Yup.

⏯42:05 Kecia Nesmith: Okay, comments, question. First question—and you don't have to, these are questions I have that may or may not be answered right now. What happened to the IB program at Dickinson? Because AI is going to have another, another flagship program to—

⏯42:23 Mark Pruitt: You're talking about the high school IB?

⏯42:25 Kecia Nesmith: I'm talking about the IB altogether, middle and high.

⏯42:29 Mark Pruitt: The high school IB program will continue as it currently does at Dickinson, and the Early College Academy would continue with allowing for some more students because it would be their flagship college program at AI High School. That would be my thought.

⏯42:48 Kecia Nesmith: Next question is the change in—so you're suggesting, I'm trying to understand, you're suggesting that the 15-16 zones—

⏯42:58 Mark Pruitt: that, you know what—what was that? Who told—who said that today, Beth? That's Dr. Heacock? Somebody said that that's misleading.

Let me say something to you. That 15-16 is a slide that's currently on our website without any color. So that means that those are the middle school boundaries that were approved in 15-16. All we did was put a sample of what it might look like if you align the high school boundaries. I'll go forward one slide for a reminder. This is currently our high school attendance zones overlaid on our middle school boundaries, okay? The colors—blue, purple, light green, light blue—are the four middle schools, and the green lines, which are 24 years old, cut through in several different ways all of those zones, creating a very challenging continuity of education. 

⏯44:00 Kecia Nesmith: So can we go back to the other slide? 

⏯44:01 Mark Pruitt: Yep, back one slide.

⏯44:03 Kecia Nesmith: These are things that we won't solve here, but think that we must address in this plan at some point. So the whole issue with Redding Consortium, the whole split up of the city, the impact on students and neighborhoods with the fighting, and the "one street I go to this school, one street I go to that school." So when we still—you know, and I'm not saying this is what you're proposing because you have it as a sample, so that's why I was saying it this way. So that puts all the city schools at AI, and all of the suburban schools at Dickinson?

⏯44:42 Mark Pruitt: No. No.

⏯44:43 Kecia Nesmith: That’s the way this looks—so you have HB DuPont, that's a city—that's a city cluster right there on the right side, not the left.

⏯44:54 Mark Pruitt: That's right outside the city, that's outside the city. 

⏯44:56 Kecia Nesmith: So some of the issues that we have with the de-seg law, with why Redding is even existing, we cannot ignore that when we—whenever whatever this map looks like, we cannot ignore those issues in this plan. Because, and outside of us acquiring Christina schools, this already is problematic. And that's why at the beginning of this, I said that we need people at this table that are not here. These are city parents, these are Latino, these are the Black parents that are affected by these decisions. We have people who sign up in that lottery, but we have to have more than a survey and a focus group on this. Because those are real issues that we don't particularly deal with, but our kids are dealing with. And then lastly, I would suggest that whenever we go forward—and I don't know the next steps—that the middle school attendance zones be looked at again. Because geographically it might make sense, but culturally it would be very different that way and what the makeup of those schools are.

⏯46:11 Mark Pruitt: Any other comments? I would say this: that this is a committee giving a recommendation to the board, and then the board works with, you know, whether they either accept the recommendation, at which time Dr. Green's team starts to put leaves on the tree of the recommendation we give. And the board obviously can weigh in on that at any time. Any other thoughts on that? I feel…

⏯46:49 Jodi Muffley: I just have a question. Where does the Dickinson middle school IB program—is that not being touched? That's going to stay at Dickinson?

⏯46:57 Mark Pruitt: No, no, no. I think we'd have to move that. 

⏯47:00 Jodi Muffley: Okay.

⏯47:00 Mark Pruitt: One of our goals is also to reduce down by a middle school program. Now, I'm not suggesting we get rid of IB at Dickinson—

⏯47:07 Jodi Muffley: No, no, no. 

⏯47:10 Mark Pruitt: Once we get the high school decision—

⏯47:10 Jodi Muffley: The way I understand is we're going to move it—

⏯47:12 Mark Pruitt: Right. And we're going to get there.

⏯47:13 Jodi Muffley: Okay, perfect.

⏯47:25 Mark Pruitt: Okay, next slide. Next slide. All right, that brings us to a high school decision at this point. There are two high school decisions, and again, that was asked by the committee to bring us like a "what's this, what might this look like?" Okay, at this point, I think that the committee needs to make a decision whether to reduce down by one attendance zone high school and create the Thomas McKean Innovation Campus, or reduce down by one attendance zone high school—this is the other existing high school program—and expand the John Dickinson School as a 6-12 IB magnet school, all choice. Those are the two left on the table. 

And of course, we could do nothing. We could not make a recommendation for high schools, and I do think that this involves some discussion.

⏯48:21 Jodi Muffley: I feel very strongly about not making John Dickinson a magnet school. I think that we have enough. I think that we're just going to create another problem. My concern is, I like the innovation campus. I do think, in contrary, I think that gives more of our kids opportunities. Being at AI, my kids have no idea what they want to do because they're not exposed to anything. And they're not—I think that this, giving them an exposure, and it's not locking someone in. You can go to the innovative center as a 10th grader and decide, "I took that pathway, I don't like it." You don't lose anything, you just move on to something else. But I just think making another all-choice is just—I mean, it's playing Whac-A-Mole. It's just, here we go again. And then John Dickinson's going to explode because everyone's going to be like, "Oh, that's an all-choice school," and then we're going to run into that. I think that our comprehensive high schools are failing, and I think that given those two options, that an innovation campus would be great. My only concern is we're not changing what's happening at AI High School. So load 10 or load a thousand kids in there, I just feel like we're just adding more bodies in the building, but we're not changing what's going on there.

⏯50:00 Vic Leonard: So the second choice would be one eliminate one high school. AI or McKean. Is that correct? 

⏯50:05 Jodi Muffley: Well, it would be closing McKean—

⏯50:06 Mark Pruitt: No, no. You would lean into choice, as I believe the idea was put up. Lean into John Dickinson, create a fifth all-choice school, and then split the feeder pattern up between McKean and AI. But you are not reducing down by a high school at that point. 

I do not think that idea solves our under-enrollment problem that we've had persist in this district for 20 plus years. 

⏯50:36 Maddie Reitemeyer: I don't think it expands equity either.

⏯50:42 Jodi Muffley: No, that's—yeah, that's my point, Maddie. It's just going to make another—it's just going to make more people leave.

⏯50:42 Maddie Reitemeyer: Potentially more out-of-district people might catch on. Keep in mind that John Dickinson is right next to Christina, so actually I think you might, numbers-wise, get kids in. But that's not—I mean, it's not equity.

⏯51:02 Kendra Todd-Dixon: I don't know that the desire is there for a full 6 to 12 magnet IB program, because if it was—it would exist. And I don't know that they have choice numbers that states that that exists. I don't know that that is a reliable option to go to a 6 to 12 IB magnet program.

Now, I do have a wonder for the Innovations Center. Have we looked at the impact that it will have with dual enrollment, AP course offerings? Like, I know that that could potentially cause scheduling—

⏯51:37 Mark Pruitt: I think you—

⏯51:37 Kecia Nesmith: That's kind of what I was trying to get. 

⏯51:40 Kendra Todd-Dixon: And I'm assuming that we also probably look at the impact it would have when, if those lines are drawn, like how many kids from the new lines, potential new lines, are actually accessing—it might be minimally, because they're at schools that don't really have a ton of AP or dual enrollment offerings—would be accessing the dual enrollment or AP courses if we went with the innovation center? Like, I'm just thinking of like a higher level access to those upper level courses. Now, with the larger populations, you'd be able to run those courses potentially. Right?

⏯52:22 Mark Pruitt: I absolutely believe that enrollment drives programming. 

⏯52:27 Kendra Todd-Dixon: Yeah, absolutely.

⏯52:28 Mark Pruitt: Right. So I think when you look at AI and their reduction in—certainly the readiness, the academic readiness of students entering 9th grade impacts, you know, some program, whether how much programming can be filled. But we also know that if you have 550 students in a building or, as Dickinson did 12 years ago, 500 students in a building, that you are going to have six or seven advanced college-level courses. And if you had 1,000 or 1,100, you would have 15. I mean, it's pretty simple math, in my opinion. But I do hope that, you know, there's questions and robust conversation here.

⏯53:13 Val Gould: So I have a question. So you said you could see at any one time 200 kids being out of either AI or Dickinson, correct? And being at McKean—I know this is hypothetical—400. So the rest of the time, like everyone else is in school. So are there still—meaning at their home school—

⏯53:39 Mark Pruitt: Yes.

⏯53:40 Val Gould: So does that mean that they are—I'm assuming we're still putting them through like the other traditional, if there's a—

⏯53:53 Mark Pruitt: Go ahead, Maddie. Jump in there. Maddie could talk through that.

⏯53:56 Val Gould: I’m sorry, I wasn't here last meeting.

⏯53:56 Maddie Reitemeyer: No, we didn't talk about that. I think it was a super similar question to what I had which is why he—I asked him and he answered it—and I can answer it because I built the master at AI. So what—if you think about it, you can think about it a lot of different ways. But one way to do it is you have all your level ones in the morning, and so the majority of your 10th graders will need to go over to the Innovation Center, and your 9th, 11th, and 12th are doing English, math, science, social studies, world language, however you rotate it. And then they come back, and then your 11th grade—it doesn't actually have to work that way, but it's a clean way to think about it as a group.

⏯54:41 Val Gould: So what will kids—if they go to AI or Dickinson, will they still have the option of traditional academic program? Do they have to do—

⏯54:50 Maddie Reitemeyer: Everyone has to do a CTE.

⏯54:53 Kecia Nesmith: Oh, really? 

⏯54:54 Maddie Reitemeyer: That's like a state requirement. 

⏯54:55 Mark Pruitt: Everyone has to take a three-year sequential pathway.

⏯54:59 Maddie Reitemeyer: And they do now, too. So if a kid showed up at AI in 9th grade, they have to pick. And this is at Dickinson, McKean, AI, I actually think Cab and Conrad have it—

⏯55:11 Mark Pruitt: Oh yeah.

⏯55:11 Maddie Reitemeyer: They pick their pathway pick their pathway, and they have to get through three years. So in really robust programs, they get through four years often. I got—my guess is about being there Conrad has a lot of kids that finish fourth year, which is where you're doing that career, like really getting into the career piece of it. Where I will echo, it is hard to run a fourth year program with 500 kids in the school, because you're only getting two or three at the end, and then like, okay, I have an entire teaching unit for three kids. That's just really tough—I think this would open up a lot more kids to back in that fourth year. But they have to pick it now.

⏯55:55 Kecia Nesmith: So I have a question about the—so correct me if I'm wrong, in most programs like this, there is an application process, there’s a cutoff of how many kids. So how does that impact our vision of ensuring equity when some kids who are going to be at John Dickinson or AI, that's the top one, how do we ensure that they have the opportunity? Because there's no way you're going to be able to send half of the students back.

⏯56:32 Mark Pruitt: Cecil County has enough space for about 650 to something to 60% of their kids to access their Cecil County Innovation Center, whatever they call it, Career Center, okay? This model would allow all students to the Innovation Center.

⏯56:53 Kecia Nesmith: So we're busing that many kids in the middle of the morning to school back and forth?

⏯56:56 Mark Pruitt: We also, by the way—we also, by the way, bring them to school at McKean every day.

⏯57:07 Kecia Nesmith: Yeah, but we're adding in two-way because we're taking a bunch of kids at one time on the road to one place, and then we are taking them back.

⏯57:22 Mark Pruitt: Do I think every 10th grader, every family would want to do that? No. Do I think we need to have a couple of pathways at the home site? Certainly JDG is a good option, certainly, something that where the facility is not as involved, maybe a business administration pathway, something like that. You know, I definitely think we have to meet that need.

⏯57:45 Kecia Nesmith: So you're saying that all kids—if 100% of the kids in each home school, call it 90%, they would be accommodated by the McKean—

⏯57:52 Mark Pruitt: Yes. Well, I can tell you this, Mark—Mark Pruitt would not support any sort of application. I might get overridden by, you know, but I do not support any sort of application for a rising 10th grader to have access to this program.

⏯58:12 Kecia Nesmith: And so how much—this is just any program like this—how much instruction is lost because of travel?

⏯58:17 Mark Pruitt: Half a credit. 

⏯58:19 Kendra Todd-Dixon: So think of it like 30, 40 minutes. 

⏯58:23 Mark Pruitt: So, you know, you think about taking—think about taking eight credits over two days. You're now going to get seven and a half credits over two days.

⏯58:34 Maddie Reitemeyer: Which you only need 24, and right now kids have the opportunity for 32.

⏯58:40 Kecia Nesmith: And does—and would the—this is just out of curiosity—would this Innovation Campus be a pathway for someone who wants to take an academic path? 

⏯58:50 Mark Pruitt: There would still be an academic pathway.

⏯58:52 Kecia Nesmith: No, no, I'm not talking about like your core class. Would this also include someone who wants to go to MIT—

⏯59:01 Mark Pruitt: Absolutely.

⏯59:02 Kecia Nesmith: or just mainly around—I think that that message is important. Like a lot of people think CTE is like the VoTech. 

⏯59:13 Mark Pruitt: I don't think it impacts that in any way.

⏯59:17 Kecia Nesmith: I'm just saying, just for clarity of purpose.

⏯59:21 Jodi Muffley: I mean, I can speak to my program. Mine, as the Allied Health science program, is designed for my kids to continue on at DelTech to get a—like you can't leave my program and go get a job right now. Like I can give you a—you know, we can get little certifications, but that is kind of where I'm encompassing nursing, PT, OT, all of those things. But they're setting them up to—you're going to carry on. Like I'm linking with DelTech and having them come in and talk about their programs, but they got to go to DelTech to get those certificates.

⏯1:00:02 Kenra Todd-Dixon: I was gonna tell you, we have kids that go to Ivy League schools, all every single year. 

⏯1:00:08 Kecia Nesmith: No, no. [inaudible] at Conrad and here. 

⏯1:00:12 Jodi Muffley: Well, they will—well, they will both. 

[inaudible group discussions]

⏯1:00:22 Mark Pruitt: That’s what Conrad does.

⏯1:00:23 Jodi Muffley: Yes. It's like yours. They don't have to choose anything. 

⏯1:00:26 Kendra Todd-Dixon: What do you mean? I didn't hear.

⏯1:00:27 Jodi Muffley: Like, they’re in, they will be able to sit for a phlebotomy test or a CNA test.

⏯1:00:32 Kendra Todd-Dixon: Right, those are just certifications.

⏯1:00:35 Jodi Muffley: Right. But a bulk of my students that take my class right now, I will tell you, I'm graduating six seniors. They are all going on to DelTech, Bowie State, Del State. They're all going into—

⏯1:00:46 Jose Matthews: Yeah, at McKean and Dickinson we’ve had kids go to Ivy League,  Brown, UPenn.

⏯1:00:53 Kecia Nesmith: My question is around the perception and how do we message that so that people don't think it's just kind of like a VoTech? The second piece of that, if you're doing it, the—I don't know if I understand the same pathway that Conrad has or similar. That was what I was talking about at the beginning thing to think about, because we wanted—if you wanted to not overlap too much.

⏯1:01:20 Mark Pruitt: The only, the only duplicate pathway would be the allied health nursing pathway, which the state of Delaware cannot have enough pathways in that area.

⏯1:01:35 Kecia Nesmith: Do we have a pathway to dental?

⏯1:01:36 Jodi Muffley: It's in, it’s covered in allied health. Yeah, so we cover dental...I am saying that's exactly what—

⏯1:01:46 Mark Pruitt: Yeah, I'm going to ask: does anyone have an interest in moving forward with one or the other of those two existing programs to make a motion? Go ahead, Kendra.

⏯1:01:58 Kendra Todd-Dixon: I make a motion to move forward with the reduction of one comprehensive high school, create Innovation Center.

⏯1:02:07 Vic Leonard: I’ll second it.

⏯1:02:07 Jodi Muffley: I’ll second it.

⏯1:02:08 Mark Pruitt: Yeah. All right, so we got Ms. Todd-Dixon, and Ms. Muffley seconds. Okay, I will allow for any final discussion.

⏯1:02:20 Emily Carroll: Oh, and this is because I know we kind of always go back and forth on like—it's the aspect of with the Innovation Center kids, if you put them in a pathway and then they feel like that's what they have to do the rest of their life. But like, I had the opportunity in PA to go to a tech school, and I think it teaches more real-life skills rather than—and I'm not in the program that I went to the tech school for, and neither is my brother. We just had that opportunity, and it gave us more real-life skills, and I would say more like social skills, if anything, than like forcing us into that pathway. Neither me nor my brother are doing what we went to that tech school for, but we learned some real-life skills and more of interest than anything else, which I think could be more valuable a lot of times. So I think that's also something to keep in mind. It's not necessarily like, "You're now in this animal science pathway, well, now you have to be a vet." Like no, you can change afterwards, go into a completely different—

⏯1:03:18 Mark Pruitt: I've told this story—Kendra's heard this story more times than you know. The first valedictorian at Conrad Schools of Science in 2011 graduated as a biotech major, biotech pathway senior, and is now an attorney in DC. Right? These kids learn what they want to do. Certainly, a school with that pathway is going to have more students in those careers. It is not a one-to-one by any chance. You learn basic skills, executive skills. You learn being at work, being on time. No building does that better than McKean right now. You know, all of the job-ready skills that go with it. And you may learn that you want to continue that as a career, and you may learn that, "You know what, I liked animals when I was in ninth grade, but I don't want to be a vet tech." 

⏯1:04:14 Emily Carroll: It's sometimes more valuable to learn what you don't want to do.

⏯1:04:18 Mark Pruitt: I would say we have a motion and a second, and I would say that we cannot do both of these. So by voting in favor of what Ms. Todd-Dixon is saying, we are removing John Dickinson as a 6-12 magnet school from further consideration. Those in favor of moving forward with the Thomas McKean Innovation Center, hand raised. 

⏯1:04:41 Kecia Nesmith: I think we need to take a—

⏯1:04:44 Mark Pruitt: All right, want to do a roll-call vote? Sure. We're going to capture this individually, so we might need to go slower. 

⏯1:04:54 Beth Jefferson: All right. Mr. Brucker?

⏯1:04:55 Tom Brucker: Aye.

⏯1:04:59 Beth Jefferson: Ms. Carroll?

⏯1:05:01 Emily Carroll: Aye.

⏯1:05:03 Beth Jefferson: Mr. Farooqui? 

⏯1:05:04 Amin Farooqui: Aye.  

⏯1:05:07 Beth Jefferson: Ms. Gould?

⏯1:05:09 Val Gould: I don’t use Miss. 

⏯1:05:12 Beth Jefferson: I’m sorry.

⏯1:05:13 Val Gould: That’s okay. You didn’t know. Abstain.

⏯1:05:17 Beth Jefferson: Mr. Leonard?

⏯1:05:18 Vic Leonard: Aye. Yes.

⏯1:05:21 Beth Jefferson: Mr. Matthews?

⏯1:05:22 Jose Matthews: Yes.

⏯1:05:24 Beth Jefferson: Ms. Muffley?

⏯1:05:25 Jodi Muffley: Yes.

⏯1:05:28 Beth Jefferson: Dr. Nesmith?

⏯1:05:34 Kecia Nesmith: Abstain.

⏯1:05:31 Beth Jefferson: Mr. Pruitt?

⏯1:05:32 Mark Pruitt:Yes.

⏯1:05:34 Beth Jefferson: Ms. Reitemeyer?

⏯1:05:35 Maddie Reitemeyer: Yes.

⏯1:05:36 Beth Jefferson: Mr. Sanford?

⏯1:05:37 Eric Sanford: Yes.

⏯1:05:39 Beth Jefferson: Ms. Todd-Dixon?

⏯1:05:40 Kendra Todd-Dixon: Yes.

⏯1:05:42 Beth Jefferson: Mr. Worlds?

⏯1:05:42 Reggie Worlds: Yes.

⏯1:05:44 Beth Jefferson: All right, out of 12 members present, that is 10 yes, two abstain. Motion carries.

⏯1:05:57 Mark Pruitt: Motion carries even with a 19-person committee. Okay.

All right, next slide. This allows us to look at the—somebody brought the issue up of the middle school. So like if we're going to move forward and we're going to have 1,000 or 1,100 students at Dickinson High School, we have a very valuable IB middle school program called the Middle Years Programme, okay? There are three existing ideas in regard to, you know, fitting into this puzzle, right? Like, how might this fit together?

One is an overriding goal of reducing down our middle school program from 8 to 7, right? Something that fits into that is another one of our ideas: move the John Dickinson Middle School MYP program to Skyline to allow for increased high school enrollment in the two attendance zone schools, okay?

The third one—and I must say I had four tally votes, and I was really intrigued with the idea, so it got one of my tally votes—was a Warner-Shortlidge Community School K-8, including a support center with services, okay?

So my next comment, I think it's important that I preface it by saying a couple months ago it got my tally vote. It does in many ways contradict our work, right? So we're adding another school instead of reducing a school to bolster enrollment to improve programming. So I think—so at this point, I think that, you know, we can have some discussion generally without a motion on the table about where we currently stand with middle school programming.

⏯1:07:41 Maddie Reitemeyer: So I voted for the Warner-Shortlidge K through 8 with support center. When I saw the votes and then I started to think, and some of them surprised me, I started to think about it a little bit. And one of my concerns after voting for it was that it pulls all the city kids out of the other middle schools. So it sort of goes back to segregating again. I don't know what [inaudible]

⏯1:08:15 Jodi Muffley: No,it's true.

⏯1:08:16 Maddie Reitemeyer: So I actually—I did initially vote for it. I don't really love the idea anymore when I turned it around from that perspective. But I would—and I know it's outside the confines of the committee, but maybe just saying we have three board members here—I would be interested in maybe looking at or just recommending what a support center—there still could be like that, really, the strength of it to me. And in saying that, it's a center that serves all Red Clay kids, not just the K through 5. So what if they were a Warner-Shortlidge kid, but then they move out to HB for middle school? They can still access that, you know, from 3:00 to 5:00 or whatever, if necessary. And I know that's outside the bounds. I thought it could be something that answers one of the needs that I see in our community.

⏯1:09:15 Mark Pruitt: I feel like I've got a good note on that. I'd like to get any other thoughts regarding either one of those. Particularly, again, I think Dr. Bond initially brought that up in a very passioned way—right? So I'm like, boy, that's intriguing. But then I'm also doing a lot of the work to move an agenda forward for a much too spread-out school district, in my opinion, you know like as far as open facilities for students, which impacts low enrollment, which impacts reduced programming. So I was torn. But I was so intrigued that I was trying to figure out where to put my fourth tally mark and thought that, you know, at the heart, the intent was in the right place. So other thoughts on either one of them? Yep, Mr. Matthews? Welcome. Thanks for getting here. I know you’re busy. Busy evening.

⏯1:10:19 Jose Matthews: So I just wanted to speak on Dr. Bond's—the point that really resonated and left a lasting impression with me was her point of keeping communities together. And when you live in the city, a lot of families who go to some of our inner-city schools, transportation can be a barrier. Getting access to schools that are way too far and being a part of your child's education is a huge barrier, and that really destroys a child's ability to have their parents involved, who are their biggest advocate, and advocating for their education.

I hear from parents all the time. In fact, I just got a call from a parent who spoke recently at a board meeting. At Warner, if you guys remember, there was a Warner parent. She's going to be choicing out of Red Clay because of where they live. It's—they're limited. And, you know, they live in the city, they love living in the city, but having their child go to HB and being an active, involved—and as we heard from public comment, incredibly active, incredibly involved—would make it nearly impossible for her to continue that. And so you're now breaking up the family to be involved in their education, as opposed to fostering, you know, a way to make sure the families can stay connected. So they're going to PS DuPont, which is within walking distance of where they live in their community. And a lot of parents actually do that. I get that call more times than I could count over the last eight years of how many parents from Warner go to PS, because it makes no sense for them to go to school so far away versus going to a school where they could be at the table and advocate for their children and not, you know, have the barrier of being a contributor the way they want to be and need to be.

⏯1:12:07 Kecia Nesmith: And Jose, before you got here, that's what I brought up about our current attendance zones and how it's just not working, right? And we do need to consider what the potential Redding Consortium is going to come up with and think ahead so that if that does pass or whatever, that we're not far away from making it work, right? So, you know, I might be wrong, but it seems like Stanton is closer than HB, right? So why are we sending kids all the way out to HB? 

⏯1:12:39 Jose Matthews: AI Middle would be closer.

⏯1:12:41 Kecia Nesmith: Yeah. And so I agree, and that's kind of what I was saying about that. We really need to think about it. We cannot do this in isolation. No, you can't. 

⏯1:12:52 Jose Matthews: But even the issue with AI, and I think it would help a lot of families, but then if you don't have a car and you don't have public transportation, you know, the question then becomes, how do you get there? Because a lot of people in the city, they walk, you know.

⏯1:13:04 Kecia Nesmith: The concern I have with K-8 is the behaviors. Having been a principal, having been a parent, the behaviors specifically in that community with an eighth grader and a kindergartner—you’ll have parents that'll be upset about that. I don't think parents would agree with the K-8 inner-city split. I mean, I hear you on the transportation, but I think if they had to choose, they would probably say no to that. 

⏯1:13:28 Jose Matthews: With it being two: Shortlidge and Warner. 

⏯1:13:31 Kecia Nesmith: No, I'm saying a K-8 school. So Shortlidge right— 

⏯1:13:34 Jose Matthews: Shortlidge and Warner? So two? It’s still split.

⏯1:13:37 Kecia Nesmith: But they would have more kids at Warner. And the older kids would be with the younger kids. Either way, the middle school model, the 6 to 12, works a little bit better than a K to 8 does.

⏯1:13:50 Val Gould: I’ve been at Brandywine Springs; I agree.

[inaudible group discussions]

⏯1:14:02 Mark Pruitt: Other thoughts?

⏯1:14:03 Jodi Muffley: I'm going to say I agree with Maddie. I think I originally might have put my vote on this, but looking back, thought the same thing. And the other thing is, those, like, when I go to like Brandywine Springs, that's a K to 8. You know, it's elementary. It's not middle school. And I just, having been in an elementary school and been in a middle school, I do like the—you go K to 5 here, you go 6, 7, 8 here. It's a different feel, it's a different vibe. You're, you know, headed into, and then I think more preparedness. Where you walk the halls of Brandywine Springs, and it's—it's adorable, but in 8th grade, like, I don't know. So I don't like the idea, and I do think it negates what we're trying to do in reducing a program, we're adding one.

⏯1:14:54 Kecia Nesmith: I think Brandywine works differently. You have different communities involved. We're talking about inner city, we know what the issues are, right? And so K-8 at Brandywine might work—

⏯1:15:06 Jodi Muffley: Right, I agree. It's not going to work at Warner. 

⏯1:15:08 Val Gould: Most kids who are in middle school at Brandywine Springs did not get their choice, their top choice choice, and at least that was my experience. Obviously, it may have changed in the last five years or so, yeah. So it's—most kids who are at Brandywine Springs for elementary—

⏯1:15:30 Kendra Todd-Dixon: I think moving the Dickinson Middle Years Programme to Skyline increases access to that program.

⏯1:15:38 Group members: Yes, yes. 

⏯1:15:40 Kendra Todd-Dixon: Build the bandwidth and capacity for the high school, that is a great move. I think it helps to build out the high school program. 

⏯1:15:49 Mark Pruitt: I will add this caveat: that the MYP program, the middle school MYP, IB's middle school version—their international—does not allow a program—there's an answer to this—it does not allow you to have an exclusionary program where these 300 kids get this, but the other 300 kids do not get this. So if we were to make a choice to move the IB Middle Years Programme curriculum to Skyline, you can still accept choice program students—those kids' choice into that school—but you have to give access to the IB Middle Years Programme curriculum to all students, okay?

⏯1:16:34 Kecia Nesmith: Why is it different than if it's a housed in a high school building?

⏯1:16:38 Mark Pruitt: Well, there's—so here's how we do it, here's how we currently do it at Dickinson. At Dickinson, in the Middle Years Programme, they are all getting that program. They do allow a program within a school for the 11-12 IB, which is what we do at the high school program. 

⏯1:17:00 Kecia Nesmith: It's 9 and 10 and 12—

⏯1:17:02 Mark Pruitt: It is. We're phasing in 9 and 10. But why—we were able to do it just 11 and 12, of course you applied in eighth grade for it, but they allow it at the high school level, they do not allow it—Maddie, am I speaking correctly? I'm speaking correctly, right?

⏯1:17:17 Maddie Reitemeyer: So my concern—I mean, I know we need to move MYP, I’m not against it and I like it at Skyline because it's right—it's very close to Dickinson. I could see a lot of collaboration. My concern, having been even there when we implemented MYP, is IB won't sign on to it unless every teacher is trained, which is very, very expensive, very expensive. 

And every kid has to participate. And just to be clear, kind of what that means in the eighth-grade year, this Capstone project, and it's a personal project, and I won't go into the detail. I think it will be really hard to implement with students that did not opt in to be a part of that. And it's time-intensive from staff, and it's demoralizing and frustrating when a kid is absolutely refusing that. You don't have an option.

So to be fair to the other student who didn't opt into that, like, "I didn't ask to come and do a personal project." 

⏯1:18:22 Kendra Todd-Dixon: Do they add a roll-in sort of program, like a feed-in? Like if that is the move to a new building, sixth grade, seventh grade, like a build-in? And then is there space for differentiation as it relates to—I'm not familiar with the IB curriculum.

⏯1:18:37 Mark Pruitt: I mean, so here's—we have a—we're simply a blind lottery at Dickinson, and so they have opted into it. But then we have students that get there and are not as interested as maybe their parents thought they were in the curriculum. 

⏯1:18:55 Maddie Reitemeyer: Same with the IBDP. 

⏯1:18:56 Mark Pruitt: I do also think, having dealt with the College Board and now being trained administratively in IB, I've had the opportunity that it's—it's an access issue. So you have to give access and opportunity, right? Like to it. If a student chooses not to do the eighth-grade project, IB does not shut down the school, right? Yeah, it's—what they don't want to do is be exclusionary, or reduce, or limit access at such a young age.

I do think, you know, you have to make it work with the students you have, understanding that some students that choice into it or feed in, know they're already there, "I'm just going to feed in and do this to take advantage of it." That's great. Now, are there going to be some students who feed in that, you know, they have to adjust to? Yes. 

⏯1:19:47 Maddie Reitemeyer: Yeah, it's not impossible, it's just intensive. That was just my—

⏯1:19:50 Kecia Nesmith: Can you just do that, though? Don't you—if it becomes a whole school, don't you have to apply for that separately? 

⏯1:19:56 Maddie Reitemeyer: You know, that's a great question. 

⏯1:19:59 Kecia Nesmith: I don’t think you just move the IB program to a school without making it—like going through the whole process, because it's a different school?

⏯1:20:07 Mark Pruitt: I think that's part of the work that would be done over the next year, right? Like, I don't think that level of detail is—we're not going to have that answer now, you know? Like, the idea that we have—you know, we would have an endless list of subcommittees at the district office that would have to do this work.

⏯1:20:30 Maddie Reitemeyer: Really good point, I didn't think about it. But there—it's a five-year renewal every year, and I think they just did it two years ago at MYP. So you could probably build the renewal in, in the next—it might actually almost align.

⏯1:20:41 Kecia Nesmith: But I think—it’s connected with the school. The only reason why I know—I hear what you're saying, Mark, but this may not be an option just because of that. This may just not work. 

⏯1:20:52 Mark Pruitt: It might. 

⏯1:20:53 Kendra Todd-Dixon: Do we believe it without [inaudible]—

⏯1:20:55 Kecia Nesmith: No, it's the rules of IB.

⏯1:20:53 Committee Member: Just apply.

⏯1:20:59 Kecia Nesmith: It's not that easy. It's very—I’m a principal in Downingtown, we have—I understand how this works. 

⏯1:21:08 Jose Matthews: So you can’t just—

⏯1:21:09 Kecia Nesmith: You can't just—it’s not just the application. 

⏯1:21:11 Jose Matthews: So the first time we did it, we didn't get it approved? So we don't have an IB program, we didn't accomplish it before? 

⏯1:21:09 Kecia Nesmith: A program is different than a school. A program in a school is different than a school—

⏯1:21:21 Mark Pruitt: No, no, no. Dickinson is not a program in a school. Dickinson MYP, they treat it as a school because everyone in sixth, seventh, and eighth grade—

⏯1:21:30 Kecia Nesmith: No, but I'm talking about across—so if—

⏯1:21:33 Mark Pruitt: No, that's not how they look at it.

⏯1:21:35 Kecia Nesmith: If you move that to Skyline—

⏯1:21:37 Mark Pruitt: I think they would—it's my belief that they would allow us to transfer that over and reconnect it in the next renewal. I don't know that for sure, but I think that's the work that we do all the time to make it work. 

⏯1:21:50 Jose Matthews: Sure. It’s not impossible to ask. [inaudible]

⏯1:21:57 Kecia Nesmith: I think the details matter—

⏯1:22:01 Mark Pruitt: The details absolutely matter, but I just don't think that there—I don't think that they're this committee's details. Like, and it—but it could be involved in whether you make a decision like this or not, to, you know, as a member, to put forward. But I think we could all agree that we're not going to make that determination in this committee.

⏯1:22:21 Kecia Nesmith: This last thing I'm going to say about this. I get that, but as a board member, when we—when these things come up, and I'm not saying you're not thinking about these things or that Dorrell's not, but when you come to these barriers and then there's constituents that come to us with complaints, like, I'm trying to dot the i's and cross the t's before we start to go down this road. What's going to happen is we're going to be at the board level, and we're going to go back and forth, back and forth, back and forth, because we're going to have these questions that there's no answers to. And so I just wanted to put out there that it's not that simple to make a school or a program or move it, and not just because of what IB will let you do. But you have an HR issue, you've got training issues, you've got some more money. Like, all of these things matter. So, you know, we can't—we have this pie in the sky, but we also have to be realistic. And so that's why I'm bringing this thing up, because it's going to come back up, and it's going to not come back up in a good way. It's going to come up with board members who are not on this committee, who don't have this information when they're asked these questions. So that's why I'm being a little stickler about details, because then we're going to sit up there on top, and then people are going to go, "That sounds like a great idea." They don't have a clue about how to make it work.

⏯1:23:44 Jose Matthews: Well, I'll also say that, I mean, Devon Hynson's on virtually, and I know that Beth's been coming to all the meetings, too. So the board members are very well aware. They have access to all the information. All the reports have been put on the site. They have access to district staff personnel; they've all made themselves available.

⏯1:23:58 Kecia Nesmith: That’s fine, but I'm still bringing it up because I want to.

⏯1:24:00 Jose Matthews: Yeah, yeah, I know, I just want to make sure that, you know, the concern of the new board members coming on board, not being able to have input weigh in—

⏯1:24:07 Kecia Nesmith: No, that's not what I'm saying—

. 

⏯1:24:08 Jose Matthews:—Ok—

⏯1:24:09 Kecia Nesmith:—I'm saying that—

⏯1:24:10 Jose Matthews:—I just want to clarify—

⏯1:24:11 Kecia Nesmith: I'm saying that when we go to vote—

⏯1:24:11 Jose Matthews:—they’re very involved.

⏯1:24:12 Kecia Nesmith: “This sounds like a great idea.” Aye, Aye, Aye, Yes, Yes. And then, the stuff hits the fan after the fact. This is how it’s always been since I’ve been here. So, that’s what I’m saying.  

⏯1:24:23 Jose Matthews: I trust the district. 

⏯1:24:26 Mark Pruitt: I absolutely think—

⏯1:24:27 Kecia Nesmith: It’s not about trust. 

⏯1:24:27 Mark Pruitt: —that a recommendation that we put forward, there are going to be subgroups within the community that are impacted, and they don't—I don't think we're going to have a 100% consensus moving forward. Having lived and worked in this district for many years, I do think that we would need to be cognizant that it's not going to be a 100% consensus support for something like this. But I do think if we keep our focus on who's going to use these programs—the kindergartners, first, second, third, fourth, fifth graders now that are going to use our schools—I think we can come to, you know, I think we can come to an idea to move forward with that can be really beneficial. Yep? Question?

⏯1:25:20 Eric Sanford: Question. Yeah. Is there a scenario where we've already done Option 1 with the Innovation Center and increasing the enrollment? Is there a scenario where that happens, and this doesn't? Middle schoolers stay there?

⏯1:25:34 Mark Pruitt: They cannot. 

⏯1:25:35 Eric Sanford: So they're kind of married together. 

⏯1:25:37 Mark Pruitt: They are married. If you're going to reduce down to two home schools, you have to remove that middle school from that program.

⏯1:25:46 Kendra Todd-Dixon: Can I ask a question? Are we like completely committed to the Middle Years Programme? Just not knowing that information, that everyone in the school has to be a part of that program? That is—that's a wonder for me, like Okay.

⏯1:26:01 Mark Pruitt: I would say that we have invested—it's a great program, we've invested. It gives us another—again, these are just my thoughts, you know, I'm not—you know, but I think it's absolutely a program worthy of keeping as a feather in our cap in the school district, and an option in what is a district that really buys into school choice. So—

⏯1:26:26 Maddie Reitemeyer: I'll just piggyback. I really love the MYP program. I think it's a really great question, and maybe ultimately has to be let go for logistical reasons. I think it is. And the more kids that have access to do it, I think is great, too. I know, to say that generally.

What are the—I didn't see it, do you know what the numbers would look like for Skyline if we move MYP there?

⏯1:26:53 Mark Pruitt: So currently, there are 410-ish students at Skyline Middle School. It has an instructional capacity of 800. However, it does have some autism classrooms there, so I think a more reasonable number would be 700—a little over 700.

⏯1:27:16 Maddie Reitemeyer: So you're taking it just not quite to enrollment?

⏯1:27:22 Mark Pruitt: Well, you are, but you could—I do think you have to be flexible enough that if the building started to get crowded, you would have to cap school choice for that program—for the kids choicing into the program.

⏯1:27:37 Jodi Muffley: But also, do some of those kids overlap? Like, some of those kids that are in the Dickinson MYP program, are they Skyline feeder kids?

⏯1:27:46 Mark Pruitt: I absolutely think that—

⏯1:27:47 Jodi Muffley: You know what I mean?

⏯1:27:47 Mark Pruitt: I don't know that to be a certain

⏯1:27:48 Jodi Muffley:So it’s not really just adding—

⏯1:27:50 Mark Pruitt: but they are, because they're at Dickinson, and now they're going to be at Skyline. So in fact, it is a kid that was not at Skyline.

⏯1:27:59 Jodi Muffley: Oh,oh, oh. I see. You didn't go off feeder pattern, okay. I mean feeder numbers. Actually in that building. 

⏯1:28:05 Mark Pruitt: Here's maybe a different way of putting it: If the MYP curriculum at Skyline became very popular with the Skyline attendance zone families, from in and around Skyline, yes, and from Warner, then there would be no choice, because they could in fact take up every seat at that school, 

⏯1:28:34 Jodi Muffley: Which may draw those families back into Skyline.

⏯1:28:37 Jose Matthews: But I also remind the committee, you know, the whole eight-to-seven programs, that comes from the information, data, and reports that we've already received—information we already know, just as a reminder. We have schools who are completely under, and we have way more seats than we do students. And this helps kind of, you know, consolidate and shift and adjust, you know, and make hard decisions that will ultimately benefit us in the long run. But not—not doing anything about the under-enrollment, continuing operations, continues to put children without any real solution. So.

⏯1:29:22 Mark Pruitt: So I will say this, that we, this does not sit like the last issue sat, where, like, if you do this, you're removing the other ones. So it's possible that a committee like this could move forward with the top, but like we did with online programming, the district should consider to solve the fact that we have kids sitting on the north side of Wilmington that we're taking across the district at the middle school level, right? 

Like, there could be some things to consider that the school board and the district should consider moving forward like, like so this one is not, "If choose this, delete this." I do think the second one, if we're going to consider adding a middle school attendance zone at Warner, and we got to like kind of close this issue and set up another six-month plan, because now you're cutting up a lot of different attendance zones at the middle school level.

⏯1:30:31 Jodi Muffley: But I also feel like—

⏯1:29:31 Mark Pruitt: It's a—in many ways, it's a separate—it's another issue.

⏯1:30:35 Jodi Muffley: And I feel like that Warner K-to-8 needs to be more community than this decision. That comes from—I don't have—I don't know the impact of that. I don't believe to know the impact of it. I don't live the impact of it. I couldn't make my opinion or my vote because I don't live in it. Um, if that—you know what I mean? I'd really like to hear from the community on that aspect because, you know, you might have it split. Some say, "I love that my child gets to go to HB and experience, you know, the middle school play at that other middle school." Like you could go either way. But, you know, a few squeaky wheels, but we don't know really what the majority feel, and I think that would be wrong of us to make a decision.

⏯1:31:34 Jose Matthews:  [inaudible] one of the only elementary schools—everyone else had this cohort model, and here we just broke up the communities.

⏯1:31:49 Mark Pruitt: We have four attendance zones, they're going to the two that are the furthest away from them. 

⏯1:31:53 Jodi Muffley: Right.

⏯1:31:53 Mark Pruitt: At the middle school level. 

⏯1:31:57 Jodi Muffley: Right.

⏯1:31:58 Mark Pruitt: Well, it's also at the high school level, right? You know, unless we move forward with that high school, you know, but if we move forward with the recommendation the board accepts it, we can move forward. I think we can absolutely add, you know, the district needs to—this needs to continue to give consideration to the impact of the Warner attendance zone and the fact that we're—I'm beyond wordsmithing that at this moment, but, you know, and the fact that they're traveling across two other attendance zones to go to middle school. Or we can continue to do this work, but obviously, you know, it would extend out for a bit. Does anyone have a motion to put forward, and do we think it's time?

⏯1:32:45 Jose Matthews: Before we do so, Dr. Nesmith, I had a question for you because you had a really good idea at a previous meeting, and I don't want to reiterate your proposal or idea without doing it accurately, about the city representatives weighing in on this very subject. Can you reshare that for us? I thought it was a good idea, I just want to make sure that I—

⏯1:33:07 Kecia Nesmith: I was saying, yeah, so the democratic process that you used to select this committee has been done already, right? Those who wish to participate submitted their names and you picked it out of the hat, right? But we are still missing what's critical for this. So I wanted to have some type of way for them to weigh in at this level, for people who it affects more, who may not even be aware of this. And I didn't give a way for how to do that, but that's what I think should happen. I honestly, as a board member having to vote on whatever you come up with, I will [inaudible] the board.

⏯1:33:48 Jose Matthews: Didn't say the town hall there though?

⏯1:33:51 Kecia Nesmith: I did say a town hall at one point. Yeah, but I think that we, the board, charged the district with the timeline of preventing that from happening. 

⏯1:34:04 Jose Matthews: Definitely. [inaudible.]

⏯1:34:08 Kecia Nesmith: I think it's the time of year. I'm just telling you about how schools are and families are and kids, and they're getting ready to—they can't—it's really—you can't just do what like just happened in like two weeks and feel like it's—people are going on vacation now, or if they're not going on vacation, you know, I just think we need to be intentional about how we do that. It's really hard at this point in the year, yeah, to get engagement. 

⏯1:34:37 Val Gould:  I mean, not saying we shouldn't do it. Yeah, so my question is then: Can we do a town hall at Warner and/or Shortlidge in September? The beginning of school year, everyone's doing all their school stuff anyway. Can we—because this is an issue that I agree we need to—everyone sitting at the table—the people who are at those schools deserve to have—and they're not in these rooms. So in September, because we're making decisions about, you know, whatever now, but like this is a decision like we need to know. Do they hate being split up in all those different directions? We have a gut feeling, but like we can't speak for those people.

⏯1:35:26 Kecia Nesmith: Do they like to be in the suburbs because it provides a different environment, 

⏯1:35:31 Val Gould: Or would they want a K-8? Like we don't know, and so like these are questions that I don't feel anyone in this room—

⏯1:35:38 Jose Matthews: I also want to note—Yeah, I also want to note, I mean, I've been working with, you know, Warner and the city community, helped start their PTA, you know, helped give them access to resources, grants, you know, you name it, for the last, you know, seven ongoing eight years. And I also want us to think maybe a little bit broader than just the town hall, because I can tell you the Redding redistricting town hall that just happened was announced well in advance. I mean, Tizzy and them had a year-long timeline set off the block. We had a year-long—I'm her friend, you know—but a year-long timeline. We had food, we had daycare, we had the gym open. I mean, we tried to eliminate every boundary, every barrier, and I can tell you I can count the number of people that were there on these two hands, and the majority of them were all reps—several. So I do think you should do the town hall, but, you know, maybe thinking even a little bit more creatively on how to engage—I can’t hear you, Val. 

⏯1:36:47 Val Gould:  We might need to be door knocking [inaudible.] Like—if the district wants, there's no better way to show you care about someone than to go to them and ask them. And I know that's incredibly time-consuming. I ran for office, I know how much it sucks, and that's why I’ll never run for office again. But if you—I'm friends with Tizzy too—you go through all that and you get nine people to show up, that's tough. And that shows that you don't have—

⏯1:37:19 Jose Matthews: But none of them were from the school.

⏯1:37:21 Val Gould: And that also shows you don't have a connection with that community to begin with. And that's probably—

⏯1:37:27 Jose Matthews: and I'm not putting down the Redding Consortium or anything like that. I just wanted to make note there was a conversation at the town hall to, you know, give encouragement to folks in the community, maybe think outside of, you know—because I know you had mentioned, you know—because I think it's a good idea, too. I mean, I agree with you, but in terms of, you know, think creatively, I just think historically things—

⏯1:37:54 Val Gould: That’s the procedure. You go to where the kids are all the time, you got to go to where the kids are—

⏯1:37:58 Kecia Nesmith: So there's community people, like you have your city council people, at the PAL center, they have a lot of stuff for a lot of events, even though that's the Brandywine side. And I think the principals have an influence on parents. They’re communicating with them. 

⏯1:38:15 Kendra Todd-Dixon: Yeah, but wasn't this advertised? Didn't this go out? Like—I'm just trying to remember, like that this didn't go out well. Okay, I'm just trying to make sure I understand. 

⏯1:38:28 Reggie Worlds: Can I talk one second? I guess, just to move this forward. Just one second. I think this has to be a comprehensive plan. So if we agree to what you’re saying, this all has to come together. We can’t move forward on the thing we just voted on at all. At all. So now that we’re talking about the timeline that Mr. Pruitt talked about in the first part of this meeting. So we can't do one without the other. I mean, I'll support whatever, but it's not fair to go through all that work and now we're saying we have to have input, so we have to pause everything. We have to pause everything, and then we have to get input. So that's going to push back the timeline, so we have to be kind of equitable about that process, right? We can't say, "Oh, we're going to push forward, but we want this input." So we have to stop and say, "Let's get input, push the timeline back." You can't play both sides of that equation. That's all I'm saying. I agree with you—

⏯1:39:22 Kecia Nesmith: I said it day one. I said it day one. First day I sat here.  

⏯1:39:25 Val Gould: We were supposed to. 

⏯1:39:29 Reggie Worlds: We have to—it's unfair. I admit it. 

⏯1:39:33 Committee Member: I agree.

⏯1:39:33 Reggie Worlds: It is unfair for the people that have put in this work, if we're going to move forward, then we have to address it one way or the other. So we need to talk about real timelines. 

⏯1:39:43 Kecia Nesmith: Yes. 

⏯1:39:43 Vic Leonard: What is the drop-dead date for keeping us on schedule?

⏯1:39:47 Mark Pruitt: Well, I mean, I think if you were going to make changes like this effective for the August of '27, we would have to know what we're doing by—we would have to have an affirmative, a yes board vote September, maybe October?

I mean, I think there's a lot of work to be done. I mean, because the work has to be done by September of '26, because that is what we have to—that we have to allow families a chance to make choice decisions based on the new programming, so we don't have two years to do all this. We've got one year? Nine months.?

And again, and what I'll say about town halls and knocking on doors in September and October, because I do not think it's going to be fruitful late May, June, July, August, that I work for the superintendent who has charged me with meeting with the board expectation, which was to have a recommendation in July. And I think it's perfectly fine to say, "Guys, you know what? We need one more month because we didn't get all the data back from a survey." But my goal is to have a recommendation to the board, you know, unless this committee—our committee was like, the recommendation was we need more time, there is no recommendation. Because I heard very clearly by the president that, "You know what? We've got a unanimous vote here, and we are going to, you know, we're going to get this done." And so that—that's where we are at this point.

I do think that a recommendation can include, just like we did with virtual programming, just like we did with—there's something else on here that is escaping me right now that I have, you know, "This is our recommendation, but this does not—you—but we want the school district to continue to look at middle school feeder patterns, attendance zones, particularly as they relate to the Warner community." I mean, I think you could do something like that, and then the school district could continue that work. I don't know how the committee feels about that.

⏯1:42:06 Vic Leonard: I think it makes a lot of sense, personally, along with this plan, but also that's a separate issue. Then you're talking about K-through 8—that we talked about getting more community input. 

⏯1:42:21 Reggie Worlds: Maybe I missed something, but we said the first part we actually—we have to move this from this, so you can't move forward if you don't have—I guess not—

⏯1:42:31 Mark Pruitt: But moving moving the MYP—this committee’s saying, "Hey, we think—we think the district should move the MYP to Skyline." Does it impact attendance zones? You can come back and look at attendance zones as they relate to the Warner geographic community.

⏯1:42:48 Kecia Nesmith: This part of when we talked about, and correct me if I'm wrong—there have been lots of conversations—I thought that part of this conversation was about attendance zones.

⏯1:42:57 Val Gould: Yep.

⏯1:42:58 Kecia Nesmith: And so if we don't change attendance zones, then I'm confused about— 

⏯1:43:02 Jodi Muffley: That was high school.

⏯1:43:04 Committee Members: No, we spent, we aligned—I thought—

⏯1:43:10 Mark Pruitt: We have to know what we're doing. We have to know what we're doing programmatically before we can start determining attendance zones.

⏯1:43:18 Committee Member: I get it now.

⏯1:43:19 Kecia Nesmith: Yes. But I think—I thought the charge was more than that—was more than programming. I don't remember the exact—I thought it was, when I understood it when I voted, I was—I had lots of questions, I remember. And I wasn't sure, and I feel like I don't, I still don’t understand. I get the program. I think we're—I think the committee is going to make that recommendation. That was already put up there. We have these issues with understanding if this is going to happen or not. To your point, we can't—we can't belabor it. I don't think we should have ever done that, voted yes or whatever. But attendance zones was the issue, I thought, not just access to equitable programs.

⏯1:44:02 Mark Pruitt: I think attendance zones was one of the—one of—

⏯1:44:05 Kecia Nesmith: Yeah, so if we don't—if we don't have something in the recommendation about that, or—

⏯1:44:10 Mark Pruitt: We are changing attendance zones. Right? I mean, that's—We already voted to change attendance zones based on the movement from three to two high schools.

⏯1:44:20 Kecia Nesmith:  But that doesn't change the issues that I was talking about with the city. That just changes—

⏯1:44:25 Mark Pruitt:  That is correct.

⏯1:44:26 Kecia Nesmith: That just changes movement.

⏯1:44:27 Mark Pruitt: I agree with that. 

⏯1:44:29 Kecia Nesmith: And that was part of it. 

⏯1:44:30 Mark Pruitt: There you go.

⏯1:44:28 Jose Matthews: Would it address it if we—

⏯1:44:35 Mark Pruitt: There’s the charge. 

⏯1:44:38 Committee Member: That's what I meant. The align boundaries included to K-8—

⏯1:44:41 Jose Matthews: Yeah, and the align boundaries piece of it, we included part of that motion that consolidation of the middle school feeder pattern for the Warner-Shortlidge community be implemented as a part of our charge. Would that address—

⏯1:45:01 Kecia Nesmith: Just to your point, like when you was talking about HB, that's what I'm saying. That part's not here.

⏯1:45:08 Jose Matthews: Well, the alignment boundaries.

⏯1:45:10 Kecia Nesmith: Alignment, and what does alignment—I mean, if we could go back and forth. What does that mean? 

⏯1:45:14 Jose Matthews: So go back to—if we go back to the very first meeting packet that we received, we went through alignment of boundaries and we saw the feeder pattern, like where each elementary school went to, then the middle school and then the high school. And there were all of these clear pathways for that, and then Warner was all over the place. So that was an example of, you know, where our alignment is and where our misalignment is. And actually, even North Star was kind of similarly that way, too.

⏯1:45:43 Kecia Nesmith: And before you got here, I was saying with the map is that it puts all the city schools, just about—except for a small part of Skyline, to AI high school. And then she said that doesn't address the problem that we're having. You're just adding more people to the school and not addressing the equity issue. 

⏯1:46:05 Jose Matthews: I think that's where the board has to continue to make sure—

⏯1:46:07 Kecia Nesmith: That's—this is the whole goal of this committee. 

⏯1:46:09 Mark Pruitt: I think, I think what—as I read the charge here, you know, the goal is to re-evaluate enrollment, program, attendance zones of secondary schools and make recommendations to the school board at the July board meeting. In doing so, the committee should consider strong and balanced enrollment across schools, the impact of attendance zone changes, specifically the alignment of boundaries to K-8 attendance zones—so like align high school boundaries to K-8 when possible—and consider geography and neighborhood schools when possible. But I think it's talking about high schools there, but certainly nothing prohibits us from making a recommendation to look at middle schools.

⏯1:46:52 Reggie Worlds: Mark, I guess the question: Should there be a third option for the middle school process, meaning that they redistribute the middle school kids? Is that the third option? Because I thought—

⏯1:47:00 Kenra Todd-Dixon: [inaudible] gather alternatives. 

⏯1:47:05 Kenra Todd-Dixon: Yeah, here—here's the issue with—if you have a recommendation to put MYP into Skyline and then you redistribute students, you have to take into consideration that that program is there. It's just a lot to consider. I mean, certainly we can get—we can get anything done. I think—I

⏯1:47:27 Reggie Worlds: I'm not against—

⏯1:47:28 Mark Pruitt: You have to go back to the drawing board with group to do that.

⏯1:47:31 Reggie Worlds: I guess my question has been—that puts the first piece that we voted on pause—what I'm asking as a question—

⏯1:47:39 Mark Pruitt: That is correct. I don't think we can move forward unless—if we go back to the middle school slide. Is there any—

⏯1:47:48 Maddie Reitemeyer: There’s only two middle school options, right, or the only two middle school things to talk about—we don't have like another set. 

⏯1:47:54 Mark Pruitt: No.

⏯1:47:55 Maddie Reitemeyer: Okay, okay.

⏯1:47:56 Mark Pruitt: Um, so I mean, is there any—is there any interest in a motion to move forward and consider, you know, move forward with putting—putting the MYP at Skyline, and then within the motion, within the recommendation, that the—that the district should continue to look at middle school attendance zones?

⏯1:48:18 Committee Member: Yes. 

⏯1:48:20 Mark Pruitt: Particularly as they relate to the—the fact that Warner—and I'll word it and I'll get a draft recommendation to you guys to—we can come to some consensus here on what—what that should sound like.

⏯1:48:33 Committee Member: That sounds fair [inaudible.]

⏯1:48:40 Jose Matthews: Can you state the recommendation for me?

⏯1:48:43 Mark Pruitt: Sure. I would make a motion that we move forward with a consolidation of middle school programs from 8 to 7, which will include moving the John Dickinson Middle Years Programme (6 through 8) to Skyline to—that will also allow for what we—the decision we made earlier in the meeting with the increasing the high school enrollment in Dickinson. In addition, the recommendation should include that our recommendation is that the district should continue to look at middle school attendance zones, particularly as they relate to the Warner community and the—and travel across the district.

That's a lot, but I gave it a shot. But we do have it, we do have it. We're a consensus body, not a voting body—you know, so. Are people comfortable with what I said? 

⏯1:49:45 Jodi Muffley: Yes. 

⏯1:49:46 Mark Pruitt: Okay. 

⏯1:49:47 Jose Matthews: Anyone want to call the motion?

⏯1:49:50 Mark Pruitt: Anyone want to second the motion?

⏯1:49:51 Vic Leonard: I'll second.

⏯1:49:53 Mark Pruitt: Mr. Leonard seconds the motion. All in favor? One, two—let's get—let's get some names on this here, too.

⏯1:50:06 Beth Jefferson: Thomas Brooker?

⏯1:50:07 Tom Brucker: Yes.

⏯1:50:11 Beth Jefferson: Amin Farooqui?

⏯1:50:12 Amin Farooqui: Yes.

⏯1:50:13 Beth Jefferson: Val Gould?

⏯1:50:14 Val Gould: Aye.

⏯1:50:17 Beth Jefferson: Vic Leonard?

⏯1:50:19 Vic Leonard: Yes.

⏯1:50:20 Beth Jefferson: Jose Matthews?

⏯1:50:21 Jose Matthews: Yes.

⏯1:50:23 Beth Jefferson: Jodi Muffley?

⏯1:50:23 Jodi Muffley: Yes.

⏯1:50:25 Beth Jefferson: Kecia Nesmith?

⏯1:50:27 Kecia Nesmith: Yes.

⏯1:50:28 Beth Jefferson: Mark Pruitt?

⏯1:50:29 Mark Pruitt: Yes.

⏯1:50:31 Beth Jefferson: Maddie Reitemeyer?

⏯1:50:32 Maddie Reitemeyer: Yes.

⏯1:50:33 Beth Jefferson: Eric Sanford?

⏯1:50:35 Eric Sanford: Yes.

⏯1:50:37 Beth Jefferson: Kendra Todd-Dixon?

⏯1:50:38 Kendra Todd-Dixon: Yes.

⏯1:50:37 Beth Jefferson: Reggie Worlds?

⏯1:50:38 Reggie Worlds: Yes.

⏯1:50:40 Val Gould: [inaudible.] 

⏯1:50:47 Mark Pruitt: What was that?

⏯1:50:50 Val Gould: [inaudible.]

⏯1:50:52 Mark Pruitt: Well, at this point, let's—let's move forward. 

[inaudible group discussion]

⏯1:50:59 Val Gould: No, no, no. I know we already voted, and I voted. I'm just saying I was really looking forward to like making it—

⏯1:51:05 Mark Pruitt: Well, we're going to need folks in January to look at attendance zones. Like, we're going to need public members to look at attendance zones for, you know, just because I put up that attendance zone for the high schools doesn't mean that's what we're doing. That's just a simple sample of what a straight line could look like. Okay, well, I'm going to—I'm going to try to push forward here, because I think we might be able to really get through this agenda, which was packed, I get that.

All right, so community survey. Survey—we reached out to Hanover, asked them if they could produce a survey for us, understanding that, "Hey, we don't even know what we want to ask. What's—what we want to survey?" But we had about a 45-minute meeting with them, went well. They accepted this timeline, okay? So we sent them our ask, they sent us a draft of the survey, all right? And they—and they believe they can have a—not a detailed, but they believe they can have an analysis, an executive summary back to us for the January 17th meeting—January—June 17th meeting.

So, all right, next slide. Hanover has developed a survey tool draft. You'll—you'll see the contents of it momentarily, and will facilitate the survey administration, data collection. They're a global market research firm that does this work, right? Survey design includes industry standard best—industry standard best practices. Dr. Heacock mentioned that they use skip logic, so meaning if you—if you choose—if you say you're a staff member, that's going to give you a different series of questions than if you say you're a parent. All right, next question—uh, the next slide.

The attendance zone questions—there's backgrounds and screeners that will use skip logic: student, parent, staff, etc. And then depending on that, your grade level, what school do you attend, what is your—do you attend your attendance zone school? All right, and then demographic information, things like years of employment if you're a staff member, race, gender identity, those kinds of things. Questions so far?

Next slide. All right, the respondents will be able to rate the statements below as "very important," "moderately important," "not important at all," or "unsure/not applicable" based on the following statements. So each of those statements, they'll be able to weigh in on. Based on their answer, a follow-up question will ask respondents to identify the most important if they say more than one is very important. But we'll get some data on that. 

Questions, comments, edits at this point? Because we're going to get a draft back to them. Like, we have a meeting tomorrow to come up with a draft, so any feedback would need to—we need to get and get back to them for tomorrow.

All right, next slide. Respondents will be asked to review remaining options, which we're going to give them tomorrow, that exist. So we're going to give them—we are going to give Hanover the Innovation Center information, we're going to give them the movement of MYP to Skyline, we're going to give them consider—continue to consider to look at middle school feeder patterns, these kinds of things. And they're going to be able to, for each of those, they're going to be able to answer "completely support," "somewhat support," "neither support nor oppose," "somewhat opposed," or "completely opposed." Questions, comments, ideas, edits that you'd like us to give them?

Next slide. Respondents will have the opportunity to provide additional thoughts, comments to the Attendance Zone Committee in an open-text format. Respondents are informed that responses will be shared verbatim and are reminded not to include any identifiable information.

We're going to work with Alva Mobley, our communications department, work through principals to get this out in community blasts. You know, we will leave no stone unturned to get this survey link in the hands of our community.

⏯1:55:26 Maddie Reitemeyer: I wonder if you could do a prior QR code to put in kids'—in the elementary school kids' folders?

⏯1:55:33 Mark Pruitt: Great idea, done.

All right, Dr. Green and I met with Luke Rhine of the Rodel Foundation last Thursday. Not only is Luke the vice president of the Rodel Foundation, he actually is the Career and Technical Education expert in the state of Delaware. He used to hold the role as vice—secretary of education at DOE regarding Career and Technical Education programming, left the state for a number of years, he's now come back to Delaware working for Rodel. So, initially, he—he's about as expert as you're going to get on like an Innovation Center. Not only do we have the two ideas to use Cherry Creek and Cecil County, he gave us a couple others, particularly one in Washington, D.C., that we can look at as we move forward with this work over the next year. But he said, you know, his feedback was very positive. He said that, you know, this tends to be—this is tending to become more and more frequent. He loved the idea. He thought there was—again, I don't want to take credit for what we—what we said is where we needed, but we knew that from—we knew that there was a need for expansion of the health science pathways, and also the addition of information tech—of an information technology, which does not exist in our comprehensive schools at this time. Could be some combination of computer networking, artificial intelligence, and cybersecurity work. Cybersecurity was just launched as a major at one of our closest post-secondary partners, Goldey-Beacom College, so we're looking to do that work.

Next slide. Gave them—he asked Dr. Green and I for three big questions, because a focus group is going to be a conversation with a group of people, right? It's not a survey. He does this work, you'll see, you know, he was looking to do a focus group with students. We talked about middle school students, high school students, parents and caregivers, educators—both teachers in our district, particularly CTE teachers, and administrators in our district—and community and industry partners, which is where, you know, he does a lot of his work, okay? The three questions that we came to with Luke you see there. I'm not going to read those to you. He wanted—he thought that it was important that we had a question and a goal as to why, you know, we chose that question.

There is the tentative timeline that we used. This is a real squeeze for Rodel talking about getting people together, setting up meetings, talking to them for an hour, collecting the data, coming up with an executive summary and a report. But Hanover is 100% on board. Rodel—I trust Luke. Luke's like, "Let's see what we can do. Let's see if we can get this back to the committee by the 17th."

All right, questions, comments, ideas, edits?

⏯1:58:57 Vic Leonard: Yes. Wasn't U of D going to do something with this, too?

⏯1:59:00 Mark Pruitt: Absolutely, we're going to engage with the University of Delaware's Department of Demography and all that when we start to look at census data, demography, why people make the choices they do, the impact of our programming choices on attendance zones, the fact that we are putting—we're prioritizing straight-line feeders. We absolutely have to use them. And I think that that's going to be a separate committee. Certainly would invite you folks if anybody that would want to continue, but I think we're going to continue to do that attendance zone work parallel to the programming work that we're going to do here, if the recommendation gets approved by the board.

All right, so here's—here's a suggestion I have. I never thought we'd be here at 8 o'clock, and we, you know—but here's a suggestion I have to meet the board's timeline that they put on us, as well as get some feedback from the survey and the focus groups, okay? 

So next meeting is scheduled for June 17th, okay? We can have that—let's hold that meeting on June 17th, but I would like to reserve the right or the need—reserve the need to move that meeting back as far as—I say July 2nd, but that's a terrible week, so—but that that would be—that's one week prior to the school board meeting, so that would be the last day we could have it. But I would say whatever that—that Thursday is before that, in case Rodel needs additional time to get us feedback from their focus group surveys, okay?

The next meeting would include an analysis and discussion of the survey feedback, the focus group feedback, and Dr. Green's team with my taking the lead would bring—and I would give you in advance of the meeting—a draft of the recommendation to the school board that we would give to the board. You then will be allowed to provide discussion, feedback, edits on that at the meeting. So the meeting will be twofold: Are we considering any changes to our recommendation, and do we have any—did I put something in the recommendation that we don't think was what we said or what we agreed to? I think it's really important.

I would then say if we get through that and we were going to make a recommendation at the July meeting, I would love to have a member of each group—like a parent, a teacher, an administrator—to assist me in the presentation, because I can't thank you enough for the work. This is hard work. It's not over yet, but so we'll get there. And then of course, you're welcome to come to the school board meeting, but there will be an ask for someone to, you know, potentially pick up a slide or two. I'm willing to take on the bulk of it, but I think it would be great if we could have some folks there to support us in the presentation from this committee.

Thoughts about that? Everybody okay moving forward? That's a lot, I totally understand.

Okay, thank you. Public comment—do we have any public comment at this point in person? Do we have any public comment online?

Next slide. I have a motion to adjourn the meeting. Lovely, seconded by Mr. Matthews. All in favor?

You want to stay a little longer?

Thanks, see ya.

🌐Secondary Attendance Zone & Programming Committee webpage 

May 21, 2025 Meeting Materials 

📁Secondary Attendance Zone & Programming Committee Meeting Rolling Slides May 21, 2025 

📹Secondary Attendance Zone & Programming Committee May 21 Meeting Recording

📄Secondary Attendance Zone & Programming Committee May 21 Meeting Minutes For convenience, the full meeting minutes are typed below.

May 21, 2025 / 6:00 PM / RCCSD
Board Rm, 1502 Spruce Ave, Wilmington, DE 19805
Zoom Meeting (For public only. Committee members are in person.)

Attendance/Welcome
Thomas Brucker, Emily Carroll, Amin Farooqui, Val Gould, Vic Leonard, Jose Matthews, Jodi Muffley, Kecia Nesmith, Mark Pruitt Jr , Madeleine Reitemeyer, Eric Sanford, Kendra Todd-Dixon, Reggie Worlds Mr. Leonard made a motion to begin the meeting, seconded by Mr. Farooqui. Motion passed.

Agenda Items 

● Public Comment - None 

● Approve Minutes from May 1st. ○ Motion made to accept the minutes as submitted by Mr. Worlds, seconded by Mr. Leonard. Motion passed. 

● The Committee’s Charge/Goal - Mr. Pruitt 

● Meeting Norms - Mr. Pruitt 

● Tentative Timeline - Mr. Pruitt 

● A Review of May 1st - All 

● Additional Data Requests - Mr. Pruitt shared data on current CTE enrollment and provided logistical examples- bell schedule, shuttle bus, class schedule, attendance zones- of what an innovation center could look like. 

● Refining Ideas and Developing a Recommendation - All 

• Ms. Todd-Dixon made a motion to recommend reducing down by one A-Z high school and create the Thomas McKean Innovation Campus. The motion was seconded by Dr. Muffly. Motion passed with 11 yeas, 2 abstain.

• Mr. Pruitt made a motion to recommend consolidation of middle school programs from 8 to 7. Moving the John Dickinson Middle School(MYP) program to Skyline to allow for increased high school enrollment in the two attendance Red Clay Consolidated School District 1 zone schools. This would also include a recommendation to review the middle school attendance zones moving towards straight line feeder patterns with Warner elementary in mind. This motion was seconded by Mr. Leonard. The 12 members in attendance voted unanimously(one member left the meeting early reducing the number of votes by one). 

● Preparing for Community Feedback - All. 

• Mr. Pruitt reviewed the draft survey and focus group timeline with the committee. It was suggested that we use a QR code for the survey and send it home with students in their communication folders(elementary) and distribute it widely. 

● Adjusting our Timeline - It was discussed possibly moving the June 17th meeting back to be held between June 17th - July 2nd if more time was needed to get the results of survey information to gather community feedback. 

● Public Comment - None 

● Adjourn - Dr. Muffly made a motion to end the meeting, seconded by Mr. Matthews. Motion passed. 

Action Items

Send out surveys to solicit community feedback. Review results at the next meeting. 

Next Meeting June 17 @6pm at RCCSD Board Rm, 1502 Spruce Ave, Wilmington, DE 19805