you
Joining us on the WRC A Morning Show for a Wednesday, we're going to put the focus on the Richland School District Superintendent Steve Board is here.
Mr. Felipe Armijo, the intermediate principal in Richland District is going to join us as well this morning.
Steve, good to see you again.
Great to see you.
Yeah, boy, it's hard to believe it's November already.
It seems like every time we meet, you know, it's like we can't believe how recent it has been since we were just here.
But yeah, school years flying by and it's great to be here.
It's a beautiful, beautiful day here today.
I think we say that every month though, you know, where's the time fly,
right?
Isn't that the truth?
Yeah.
And I'll tell you, you know, the next couple of months, they really do fly by, you know, we're kind of in the middle of that.
what I would call the first grind.
That time between homecoming and Thanksgiving is a period of time.
There's about six, seven weeks there generally this week, or this year homecoming was a little later.
But it's a time when all of that excitement and the newness of a new school year has kind of wore off.
All the teachers have their expectations and routines down.
And then this is a time when exponential learning happens.
Because learning isn't linear.
You invest a lot of time early in the year to have
successful school year.
And then now is the time when teachers that have done that, and most of them have, we see a lot of learning because there's not a lot of days off outside of last week when we had parent-teacher conferences from the Friday of homecoming through Thanksgiving break.
I think that's the only day that schools will have or that we would have off for students.
And we don't typically get a lot of weather delays and things like that this time of year.
And so that's an opportunity for consistency and consistency in learning.
And so there's a huge academic increase that happens this time of the year.
But boy, when we hit Thanksgiving, and that's what I would call like the holiday season, you've got Thanksgiving and three weeks later, you've got the Christmas break, and then you've got New Year's break, and then you've got the end of the quarter break and Martin Luther King Day.
And before you know it, you know you're on January 20th, and you're like, where did the time go?
And so it just flies by.
But this is a real, real crucial time for student learning.
Yeah.
And in terms of the calendar, you'll be starting winter sports in, well, actually, I think practice is underway, isn't it?
Uh, yeah, boy, I think the girls basketball starts next Monday and I think wrestling starts Monday.
And then I think boys basketball is the following week.
I know girls basketball is next week.
I'm not sure when wrestling is, but yeah, you know, a lot of fall sports are just wrapping up.
We've got local teams that are doing real well.
It's just exciting time when it comes to sports, you know, you can feel a little coolness in the air, you know, so you can start to feel things changing.
It's been a relatively
warm fall that we've had here.
Weather's been great, but before long, you know, the leaves are all off and we'll be into the deer hunting season and Thanksgiving.
And again, before long, you'll be seeing Christmas decorations and things like that up and we'll be flying by.
Mr. Armillo is here as well.
I'm guessing we talked about the referendum and the air conditioning.
You probably appreciate that air conditioning this warm fall, didn't you?
Yes, we did.
Thanks for having us here.
It's exciting to be here.
Yes, the staff, students, the community was excited coming in for open house to feel that air conditioning as they rolled into the building and seeing the new paint, the new floor, the new furnishings, all of that.
The teachers were excited about that.
And then we started school and it's been exciting to see our staff.
My second year here seeing the RCIS staff just continue to grow with their professional development and being able to
go through the school year and then as Mr. Boer is talking about getting into the season where you have consistency and being able to deliver instruction and the students are enjoying the building but also enjoying the instruction and how the teachers are being able to deliver that.
So we have a great staff at RCIS and our front office is wonderful and custodians have done a great job.
and keeping this building in good shape after all the money that went into it to create such a wonderful learning environment.
There were some of the other improvements that you could see.
So
along with what I mentioned, the new flooring, also new furnishings.
So you see all this wonderful orange and black in each classroom and it's uniformed and the kids mentioned that as well.
They like
you know, to see uniformity.
They like consistency and it's exciting to see that out of the students when they come in and they feel comfortable and that leads to great academic success.
So those are some of the things that have been happening with the referendum and the RCIS.
Your second year at the helm there and what about message to the students at the start of the school year?
Was it similar to what you did last year?
Well, it's increasing and one of the things that, you know, adding that little bit of pressure that
We're here to educate and be able to do what we do, teach reading, writing, math, science, social studies, the arts, music.
Our band program is taking off.
This is the first year that we've kind of put everybody into the band program.
So every student in sixth grade is participating in band inquiry and exciting to see that.
that whole group of 74 students being able to, to get together and be able to perform.
So you see all of that well rounded educational part happening in the building.
For me, every morning I greet the students as they come in, I shake their hands and it's exciting to, you know, see them come off the bus.
I say, good morning.
And, you know, youngsters are learning how to say good morning, look at you, look you in the eye and say, shake your hand and say, how are you doing, Mr. Armijo?
And it's good to see that, that evolution of them growing up to be able to do those things that are
important as we go through in society.
Yes they are.
I've always said that.
That's one of the good lessons of life is just knowing how to interact and look someone in the eye, right?
Yes it is and they come in and they do that every morning with me, shake every hand that I can and it's exciting to hear some of the comments they may come in off the bus.
You know today we had a student mention he got a text on his phone which phones are not allowed in school but he was at home and and he said I got a text on
I needed to vote, but I'm not old enough to vote.
So, you know, we're done with the political season, but I thought that was kind of a funny story when you're talking, you know, to kids in the morning as they come off the bus and they share things that are important to them.
And I get to hear that every morning.
Yeah.
And I think it's important to know them by names.
And maybe does that help with accountability in terms of, you know, if there is some need for discipline?
Yes.
I mean, I always say this, that I need to put.
money in the bank.
I need to be able to have those positive encounters because, as you said, sometimes children make mistakes like we all do, and you have to have that consequence or whatever it may be.
And so when I have to draw out a little bit of that positive for those type of things, it's always good to know their name, being able to understand where they come from, some of their struggles, and being able to know what they do well academically both on the reading, writing, and math side.
So
That's such an important age, you know, in life, in terms of preparing them because they're just going through a lot at that age, aren't they?
Yes, and our staff, teachers, you know, down to the special ed assistants, TAs, all of those folks.
understanding that as we as I go through this with with being at the in Richland Center at the Intermediate School understanding that it's an important developmental side of their life and we set them up for the middle school to high school to be able to be as successful as they can it can be by taking care of some of those things the foundation is leads to the success at the middle school and high school level.
middle school underway with their fall or their winter sports season
now or well you'd have to talk to mr board about that because i'm three through six and three through six and we have a few students that are participating in the cross country
at 6th grade and then we'll come up with a few folks in basketball and then we'll have a few in track as we go along.
So we have six graders that participate in the sports, but I leave that up to those folks up at the middle school to do those type of things, but we're excited about the ones that do participate.
I've seen some middle school games on the schedule, Steve, I think.
Yeah, they're just getting started as well.
And like Mr. Armijo said, we do have a limited number of opportunities for our sixth grade students between cross country and some of them can participate in wrestling and then the track season.
But our seventh and eighth graders are getting underway as well.
They'll be well underway, just like our high school is.
And we were just talking yesterday in our administrative cabinet how important it is.
In fact, one of our goals will likely
be to get every student involved in something school-related but non-academic, whether it's the sports or clubs or those kinds of things.
And because the studies show that when kids are involved in those things, they're more
apt to be engaged and connected with their school, which means that they're more apt to be in attendance, which means they're more apt to have better learning, right?
And so it all kind of rolls into one.
And so getting kids involved in these different opportunities are great.
I think that over the course of the next year or so, we're going to see some increase in offerings at our younger levels for kids to be able to
be involved in things at an earlier age, not necessarily outside of school hours, maybe, but not necessarily outside of school hours, but just to have that
little extra connection to being part of something that is more than just academics and being part of a team and being part of having to cooperate and, you know, put yourself towards a bigger goal.
Again, whether that's a club or something that's a volunteer, sixth grade has student council at the intermediate school.
So starting to develop some leadership skills there, just so important for our students to have that opportunity.
Extra Curriculars and Mr. Armillo mentioned band students, but what a proud moment at homecoming, you know, the marching band, and I saw them perform their halftime show twice this year, and both times the opposing crowd was
That's one school's band.
And the same thing for the middle school band.
They were in the homecoming parade.
They would rival a lot of high school bands.
It's just incredible.
Absolutely.
The tradition of music in our community is just so rich and we're so proud of it.
We've got so many students.
I don't know the exact number, but I think that there's like 120 students in our band.
And so when you're talking about in our different bands, right?
They're not all necessarily in the marching band, but in our different bands.
You're talking about a third of our students in band and probably well over half in one of our fine arts programs.
That's just a phenomenal number.
Of course, we've got longtime teachers, which helps.
They recruit with Mr. Barons and Ms.
P. K. and Ms.
Niemeyer now and Ms.
Meyer at the intermediate school.
But to have that,
sense of, again, playing and being part of that larger group.
Everybody has their own instrument and playing their own notes, but putting it all together to, you know, sound as wonderful as they do.
I would rival our high school band and our intermediates with any college band, and I would rival our middle school band with any high school band.
And our sixth grade band is going to be, you know, better than most middle school bands.
And as Mr. Armijo said, one of the changes that was made at the intermediate school this year is it used to be an elective.
whether or not you were in band or or music and require vocal and this year we've decided every student needs to be involved in that to at least give it give it an opportunity to give it a try and I would be shocked if there aren't some kids that stick it out and become really really great at band further on in life that maybe would have never even given it a try if just just given an option and so wonderful I'm excited to see what our sixth graders look like and and I certainly see
but our seniors look like when they're at the end, so proud of our students.
Making a mention of music, we would remiss if we didn't mention Mamma Mia coming up this weekend.
Yes, the culmination of a lot of hard work that has been going on all summer with Ms.
Boyarsky and Ms.
Niemeyer putting that together, a lot of work from our foundation, our foundation, school district foundation funds, the Mamma Mia program.
And so without their support, we would not be able to have, not the Mamma Mia program, but the musical itself, of course, being Mamma Mia.
their support we wouldn't be able to to do that but we are really excited about what that's going to look like again large number of students involved and very popular musical certainly some some altercations that are that are made at our local level and at our high school level to to fit it into what we need to do but shows on Friday night Saturday Sunday we're expecting good turnouts and if community is is interested I don't have the exact times in front of me I believe it's seven
seven o'clock on Friday and Saturday and then an afternoon show on Sunday.
Contact the district office or the high school office.
You can buy tickets at the door, but we really want to see our students supported by our community, and I'm sure our community will not be let down by a wonderful performance by some very talented people.
They put it on for the school, don't they, on Thursday?
I believe on Thursday is going to be a dress rehearsal for our students as well.
You know, there's always that fine line, do we put it on for our
student body and get a good dress rehearsal, but then most of our students that aren't in the musical won't attend in the weekend, or do we not do that and then have them attend the weekend?
But we've traditionally wanted to have that dress rehearsal for our students.
And it gives our student body an opportunity to see their peers performing in a way that they maybe didn't realize that they could, and maybe that draws interest in having them participate the next year.
So yeah, Thursday dress rehearsal, Friday and Saturday and Sunday.
will be the real performances.
And again, I'm just excited to see what that looks like and proud of all of our students for their participation in
it.
Do you have concerts at the intermediate school for
looping?
Our concerts are held at the high school.
We do have concerts coming up and it's exciting because we go to the high school to do a dress rehearsal and then
that evening we'll be able to do the concerts and those the band concert and choir concerts are coming up at the end of November beginning in December so those are exciting but one thing that we do have going on is the veterans program going on next week that's exciting we're going to be on the 10th while the other two schools are
on the 11th.
So we'll be doing that and Miss Meyer is getting that ready and it's exciting to have our veterans in the building and they'll be able to see the new building and you know the money that went into that and being able to carry that tradition on in this community that you know schools are important and our veterans are important so those two things will be together at the veterans program one.
the 10th.
What time does that start?
It starts at nine.
Okay.
So it's exciting.
And it'll be the first time in a long time that three through six will be performing together.
Usually three, grade three was with the, with the music teacher in the, in from the primary.
So they had a different setup, but this is the first year that three through six will be performing all together in the gymnasium.
So that's exciting.
Did you have some new staff this year?
We added a new staff of Mr. Oates in, in,
writing in sixth grade.
We also added a, once a staff member moved over, Mr. Mackamick moved over from being our alternative ed teacher to being a math teacher in sixth grade.
And then we hired Mr. Dre to be our alternative ed teacher.
So a few members there.
And then we've added a few special ed assistants that have done really well as well.
So one other thing that I want to mention about the community events is our PATT
parent organization has really increased this past year.
So we went from about 10 members to about 40 members and they've been planning and they're planning a number of activities to happen as well throughout the year.
So we had two weeks ago we had bingo night for our community and our kids and everything and that was well attended about 70, 70 to 80.
kids, parents, everybody showed up to play bingo.
So that's exciting.
And we have some other events that they'll be advertising as well as we go through the year.
That's an important organization for your school.
It is.
It just adds another layer to being part of a school and being able to, you know, like Mr. Board was saying, offer those activities that are after school as well, that just brings everybody together to be able to participate and have, have a good time, you know, bingo, there could be, you know, a dance at some point, you know, those kinds of things that, you know, have traditionally happened and they're exciting to.
bring back and do as well.
How has attendance been so far?
Our attendance is is doing all right.
I mean, that's something that we continue to want to work on and encourage our families that school is important.
We have, I always say this to staff and parents is that, you know, we work 364 days a year, 300, you know, we have the weekends off, we have holidays, but school where that tight window and you miss a few days, you miss some content.
So if you can be at school every day, that would be exciting.
And we continue to push to do that.
One of the things that we did start at the intermediate
at school this year is we're sending out positive note cards.
So every staff member has a number of positive note cards that they address to the kid and the goods get sent through the mail.
And so we enjoy hearing back from families when they get those, those positive note cards of, and it's addressed to the child and it gets sent through the mail and you get to open it up as a kid and read what your teacher or staff member and all staff members are participating in that this year.
So it's exciting.
That's a good idea.
Is that something new that started this
year?
It's something that I've used in other places, but it's exciting when you hear back, just like the student I mentioned, but you hear back and when staff members hear back from parents, my kid really loved going to the mailbox and getting the postcard and opening it up.
It's trying to keep that process going that not everything's electronic.
We still have snail mail and you can run out to that mailbox and get a...
Get something positive out of it.
Well, and that's important too because sometimes it's like you know constructive things and things you can improve on but if you've got something that's positive We need that sometimes
as they do and it's exciting.
It's like I said It's just exciting to hear the stories when they come back and hit the teachers when they hear it You know they they light up that it's it's hit home
at home.
Yeah, I don't know about you, see my my card probably would have been blank in the mail.
Nothing real positive to say about this kid.
But a wonderful idea, isn't it?
It really is.
And that's something Mr. Armijo brought over and really has caught on there.
They've been doing it here at the intermediate school.
We're trying to implement it in some of our other buildings as well.
But something that makes such, you know, makes so much sense, but yet something, why weren't we doing more of this?
And so we appreciate Mr. Armijo's experience to be able to bring that over and something that really can translate into a positive connection with our students and our families and our teachers.
because we live in a world where it's just so easy to be critical of things.
And we hear whether it's on social media, things that are wrong, things that people are complaining, people have issues with things.
And students oftentimes, the only times they get called into the principal's office when you and I were there was when we did something that we shouldn't have been doing.
So to be able to flip the script and for parents and students to be able to hear the positive things, because there are so many positive things.
talked about this before, that we've always been doing great things.
We just don't always take the time to recognize them and to showcase them.
And so now we're doing it in the intermediate school at the individual level and teachers and staff, not just teachers, but staff, taking the time to write a sincere message to an individual student and getting that at home.
What a positive impact that is and something that I hope that not only we can carry on at the intermediate school, but that we can expand throughout our district.
At the start of the year, we were talking about enrollment and that third Friday, a pupil count in September.
And what will the enrollment numbers look like this
year?
Yeah, we'll be giving the official report to our board on the 18th, but happy to share that our third Friday counts.
So I've said this before, you know, every school in Wisconsin has two official pupil count dates.
There's snapshots in time on who you have enrolled in your school on the third Friday in September is the first official count.
and the second Friday in January is the second official count.
Now, we're a very transient community, so we get a lot of students that are coming and going throughout the year, but on those third Friday counts, that's the number that has determined how much funding you get.
You've heard me talk about the revenue limit and the amount of money that a school district can levy.
That's the number that it's based off of and so for us to increase enrollment in a time when 70 plus percent of the schools in Wisconsin are declining enrollment That's a big deal.
But yeah, we were able to do that this year We were able to increase our enrollment not only the number of students that were educating in our in our school district But also the number of students that are attending a public school.
That's what we get funded off of but more importantly Phil is the the
the flipping of the script that we've been able to do from an open enrollment standpoint.
And I've made no secret, this is my fifth year and since year one, the elephant in the room is we have to address the open enrollment problem that we have.
We were negative net 180 students.
We had 180 students more leaving our district than coming in.
I think we were about 260 students going out.
about 80 students coming in for a net negative 180.
And just to put that in perspective, you know, there's 31 schools in CISA 3 and negative 180 and the amount of dollars that are associated with that is like, you know, $2 million.
Not only did that put us at number 31 out of 31, but we were twice as bad as number 30.
right?
And so it was not just that our numbers were bad, right?
They were abnormally bad.
And so over the last five years, we have made this a very conscientious, it's a priority of ours, and we've been investing a lot of
time and resources and to making sure that we've got the right staff and doing all of those little things that Mr. Armillo is talking about now with with the positive postcards but all of the adult connections and the alternative programming and all the things that we've been doing has been in an effort to try to get some of those students back in our district and try to you know recruit and retain students to attend the Richland School District, okay?
So at the third Friday count We were at we had reduced that from negative 180
down to negative 70.
Now that's still not a great number, okay?
But that does move us from, you know, 31st to about number 28, okay?
So we're moving in the right direction, and that'll be our official count.
But the real great thing about that is we are continuing to enroll new students.
And so even as of today, we are now at negative 47, okay?
So even since the third Friday in September, we've gained another
23 students that are coming into our school district.
And that is money for the school district, which means that when school districts have to, you know, go back to referendum in a few years or whatever it is, hopefully it's not as much.
We're retaining kids in our school district.
So for us to be at negative 47, this is going to put us somewhere in the, in the low 20s, I expect for, for our CESA three.
But that's just, that's a huge swing.
That's 140 kids swing for us to have either
retained that are that are our students that are staying in our school or bringing in from neighboring districts.
And a large part of that has to do with our alternative programming that we have, you know, between the hive and pathways and partner and I thrive and the RC program, but also all of the wonderful things that our traditional programming is doing as well with our wonderful staff and the connections that they're making and their sincere connections, right?
Their real connections that they're making.
in the classrooms, in the hallways with students, sending postcards home, talking to kids in the hallway.
I've mentioned in the past, 100% of our students reported that they had a positive connection with an adult.
And so all of that is playing into our enrollment and helping our community and our school districts educate the students that live in our community.
We've still got some work to do.
I don't, you know, proclaim that that's good enough.
Negative 47 is still a negative number.
And we would love to be in the positive, but we have made huge gains in that.
And that is real dollars in our pockets that are able to be used for educating our students.
When you talk about students opting out or open and rolling or whatever, does that include homeschool or
how does that?
It does not include homeschool.
It does not include homeschool and it does not include number of students that are going to a private school.
school.
Okay, so those are not counted in the revenue limit.
They're not open enrolled in or out.
Now the private school voucher program is something that that should be mentioned here because at our last board meeting at the end of October, our board voted to send each of our taxing municipalities, right?
So each, I think we have 14 or 15 municipalities, you know, from the city of Richland to the village of Boaz to the township of Dayton or Richland or Eagle or whatever it
We have all these townships and municipalities.
Our school board voted to send them each a resolution, which we hope that they will pass, which will allow us to put on the property tax bills the amount of money from the school levy that is being allocated for the private school voucher program.
And this is kind of a statewide movement that...
excuse me, that is happening in just an effort to be transparent, right?
This is not necessarily for or against private schools.
It's just to let taxpayers know how much of their property tax is being used for this particular program because about a million dollars of the Richland School District levy is being used for the private school voucher program.
So to answer your question, the numbers that we're talking about in terms of open enrollment and what we get for revenue limit does not include homeschool, does not include private schools, but those private schools
voucher programs that are throughout the state are being funneled through the public school tax levy.
And it's not just the Richland School District, it's every school district around.
And so I think you're gonna see statewide a lot of townships and municipalities and cities putting on their property tax bill the amount of money that is going towards that so that taxpayers know.
Without getting into politics too much of course the election yesterday But looking at looking ahead both parties had said that with the state surplus we might see something change maybe something Coming through with this next school year Any idea of what might happen?
Yeah, you know your guess is as good as mine But you know with with next year next summer being a new biennial budget, right?
Of course my guess is is that we probably won't know right away although
with it looking like there'll be a democratic trifecta in Wisconsin, my hope would be that they can become united and figure out a good, fiscally responsible way to increase funding for public schools, right?
And I'm optimistic that that's going to happen.
That's something that I think that that party has ran on and with them taking control, they should be able to be able to increase that.
Now, what does that look like?
I'm not sure.
What is it increasing the amount
of money per pupil?
Is it increasing the amount of spec ed reimbursement that schools get?
Is it a combination of both?
Is it any changes to Medicaid and the funding that's happening there?
And, you know, it's a balancing act between because you can't just, well, I mean, you could, but it's probably un-reresponsible to just say that, okay, we're going to increase student funding by
$1000 per pupil, right?
Well, schools would love to have that extra money.
If they don't do something to offset property taxes, that's just going to make everybody's property tax bill skyrocket.
And so there's got to be this balancing act between
investing money into our public schools, which I think, you know, we've fallen so far behind in the state of Wisconsin in the amount of investment that we've made into public schools.
And we've got to catch that up.
We are doing a disservice to our youth by not investing into our public schools.
And we've dropped well below the halfway mark in our, you know, in the nation on the investment into schools.
So something's got to happen there.
But they've got to do that in a way that doesn't just put all of the burden on
to taxpayers.
And so that means that they're going to have to increase the amount of money into equalization aid, which means that that comes from the state level, which comes from all of the sales tax and lottery taxes and things like that.
They've got to find out a way to put that in there.
they'll use the surplus likely to do something.
But when you're talking about putting money into schools, you have to find a way to do that from a sustainable standpoint.
The surplus is one-time money.
And so you can't just put $3 billion into public schools and say, okay, well, that's what you get this year.
Now, what are you gonna do the following year?
You don't have that surplus anymore.
So there's gotta be a way to do this in a fiscally responsible way.
But to answer your question, I do anticipate with the elections
that school districts are gonna get a boost in funding of some sort, what that looks like and how they can do that without putting the entire burden on the taxpayers is yet to be seen, but I'm optimistic that they'll be able to come up with something.
And I hope that they get out there and they really ask schools and local places, what do we need to do and how do we need to do this to make this work?
And during the pandemic, all districts got some one-time money and it was helpful, but it was also sometimes hurtful too because if you use it for
like a building or something like that or bought another staff member or whatever the case might be, then you're kind of tough sledding the next
year.
Exactly.
Right.
And that's, you know, that, that COVID money, they, they called it the pandemic money.
There were a couple of rounds of Essar dollars, I guess is what ultimately became known as, but you're right.
If you invested in into one time purchases, like we need to upgrade our HVAC to have a better filtering system.
Okay.
Great.
You took one time money.
You applied it towards something that's going to last for a while, but.
if you invested it into staff.
what do you do when that money runs out?
And so then you end up with this financial cliff.
And I think that's exactly what you've seen from 2023 to now.
You have just seen such a huge increase in referendums for operating purposes.
There were a bunch of them on the ballot last night.
And many of them around the area seem to have passed.
But again, when you are increasing revenue purely from operational standpoint through a referendum, you are putting the
burden back on the taxpayers.
And so there's got to be this balance because everybody's pocketbooks are tight, right?
And even if you are a huge supporter of public schools, we have a lot of people that are on fixed incomes.
We have a lot of people that putting it directly on their property tax bill for them to increase their property taxes by
$500 is a significant impact when we've got the price of gas well over $4 and groceries are expensive.
We are not a high economic area.
Richland County is not a fluent county when you look at the state.
So there's got to be a way to find this balance and to be able to make that all work.
But yeah, I'm excited to see what's going to happen in the future here.
We're talking about the Richland School District's Steve Bord and Felipe Armijo are in the studio with us and we'll be right back with more after the break.
Today we're profiling the Richland School District for our November visit.
Steve Bord is in Felipe Armijo as well.
Felipe, when you go to, what makes you fired up to go to work at Richland Intermediate School every day?
The students of course, I mean just it's an for me I've been doing this a long time 20 25 years as an administrator three different states So this is my going to be my 10th year in the state of Wisconsin So it's been the same thing, you know I had a stand in central office back in back in New Mexico But I went back to be a principal because I just enjoy working with students but also
helping teachers get better in their craft.
And I always call it, there's a science of teaching and there's an art of teaching.
There's two things when you're a teacher and to be able to bring those two items together to be
you know, a scientist understanding the research, but also the craft of being able to deliver a lesson, being able to do those things.
For me, I'm able to hire teachers and be able to help with that process of them developing and using our veteran teachers that have been in the intermediate school for a long time and they've been committed to that school.
And there's a whole group of folks there that are committed to the Richland Center Intermediate School and the process of moving those three through six graders.
So every morning I get
two wonderful things, working with students and working with staff that are there to make sure we continue to increase the academic needs of our students.
Your staff, you hire, you kind of let them...
do their job, I'm sure.
Yeah, you know, they're professionals.
You hire a teacher, they're a professional teacher.
And, and just like in any profession, you have to continue to grow and develop.
And, and I use, use, you know, LeBron James, he didn't get great because he sat there and just did the same thing over and over again.
He watched himself on video.
So one of the things I encourage, and we're doing in the rich and centers, teachers video their lessons, and then they critique themselves.
And then we continue to get better at how, how, how we deliver.
And so that's one of the things that you want
to do as a principle, provide that support so that they can get better in their profession, develop that art of being able to deliver the lesson.
That's an interesting concept as well.
I mean, I think we're all typically critical of ourselves, probably watch the video, did I really say that or did I really do that?
So, I mean, it's hard, but if you put it in perspective, you know, LeBron James, professional, they do
that they review and then they go forth and they correct and they get better and better and better.
And for me as a young teacher, I remember reviewing my own lessons and looking at them and I'm like, oh yes, that I need to correct.
I'm shading to the right.
with all my questions and everything else like that in the classroom and I gotta be fully and I gotta look at the whole classroom and I gotta make sure that Steve over there is being engaged.
He's not falling off the map here and putting his earbuds in or not paying attention to the lesson.
I gotta maybe cold call him and do those type of techniques that we talk about in the profession of teaching.
So it's exciting and that's what brings me to Richland Center and it's exciting to be part of that process.
I mean, I took the position because
I hadn't been in the grades three through six for a while.
I'd been K through five K through six, but this three through six actually started as a teacher in an intermediate setting, but it was only five six.
But to be able to be in this three through six grade setting has been exciting.
What subject could you primarily teach initially?
I was a sixth grade teacher, self-contained.
So I taught all the class.
I had 24 kids in my room and 24 sixth graders every year.
And we go through that for, I did that for about nine years.
And it was exciting because, you know, you learn, when you're a classroom teacher, you learn a lot about your students and how to be able to help them with their challenges.
But the end goal is what we always say, academic success.
You know, you want, you want to be able to read, write and do math at the grade level so that you can go into the middle school.
And those middle school teachers can say, you prepared them.
They're ready for that next phase of life.
And we know what happens in the seventh grade world in middle school, because I've done that as well.
Those things happen, things change, and kids kind of go through that stage of life and have to be able to be sound on their academics.
And that helps them get through that little area of life that's a struggle sometimes.
Indeed.
I think we start seeing that earlier and earlier.
Yeah, we do.
And it is.
It happens earlier.
we also know that the majority of it happens in the middle school you know you start having those peer contacts that are a little bit different and parents kind of back off and you know I always when I was in the middle schools I would encourage parents to say you know you treat them like they're still in elementary you want to be engaged with them you want to be able to do those things ask those questions of your middle schoolers.
that you would be asking when they were in third and fourth grade.
They may blow you off a little bit, but they still love that and they still want you engaged in their life.
And then they move on to high school and things start getting a little bit different there.
Have students
changed
over the years you were in
education?
No, I mean, I say this all the time that, you know, students are still the same.
They still love to learn.
They still love to, they're curious.
They still love to do all those things.
Society has changed.
And, you know, kids,
Generally are the same.
On the outside, on the edges, you know, social media has caused some things that, that cause us to have to be able to change this as teachers as well.
But generally kids are curious.
Generally kids want to learn.
They want to come into a building that's safe, secure and be able to be able.
be able to sit down and and and learn and and that hasn't changed in the 28 years I've been doing this this business so from New Mexico to Utah to Wisconsin kids are kids and they love to learn.
You may not have as many worries with with AI at that level though right in terms
of
writing papers and things like
that.
Not not too much I mean kids kids
It's out there.
Kids are curious.
They'll use it in some form or fashion.
But it's not to the extent that they do at the middle school or high school level.
So we're still in that phase where we can kind of still get the content and be able to assess it and do those type of things and not have that AI kind of feather it in there as much in the intermediate school.
The other district news, we've been talking a little bit about it this year, but the campus property, is that still, is that in limbo?
Is that now an officially your possession?
Yeah, it's no longer officially the campus property.
It's the original school property.
So yes, long process, but again, great working with our county and Trisha Clemens in particular.
She just has been phenomenal to work with, but a long process that we had to work through with the DNR grant and all of those different things.
But earlier,
in October, we were able to officially close on that property.
And so the green, the fields to the west, along with the gymnasium and the building known as Melville Hall has officially become a district property.
We have
moved our pathways program, which was a program that we were doing at our public library for the last couple of years.
That is being held at Melville right now.
Our Hive program, our virtual program, which was kind of housed in our Richland Center High School Library, our IMC.
One of the things that has made that so successful is that we have real teachers, real live teachers that students can go to for help, either from a cross categorical, special education,
standpoint, or RIGAD, as well as just additional teacher support.
That's now available at at Malville as well.
We'd like to, we're exploring, I guess, moving the I Thrive program that is currently out at Rockbridge.
That lease out there expires on June 30th, and so we're hoping to be able to move that over to that building as well.
And so we'll have everything kind of real nearby.
you know, East Hall, where we put the partner school, that has worked out really, really well.
But the difference between that property and this property is that this is literally adjacent to the existing property that we already own.
So it really just becomes a continuation of Richland School District property at the high school.
And so that's really nice.
It's easy and convenient for our maintenance staff, obviously more grounds for them to take care of and building space for them to clean.
But the ability for us to be able to house our alternative programs
programming there and have access to that gymnasium, something that, you know, in the future, we want to be able to turn into truly more of a community gymnasium as well is just really good.
And I think you and I talked about it the last time, just, you know, there's a little bit of sentimental value there too, in terms of, you know, I was able to attend the campus in the early 90s when it was an educational facility.
And I know that that meant a lot to our community as well when UW-Platteville finally
pulled out and the future of that property was in danger.
for us to be able to take a small portion of it and just keep it in the hands of an educational facility, I think is is meaningful, certainly beneficial for our school district, but I think meaningful from our community as well.
What about upgrades to the buildings that you now have
purchased?
Yeah, just earlier this week on Monday morning, I met with the folks from Nexus and they had done a facility study.
And so we're going to be looking at what that's going to cost.
We're hoping to
have, you know, a few hundred thousand dollars of referendum dollars left over when all of the upgrades are done.
That whole project is starting to come to an end.
There's a few things that we're still doing yet, but we're hoping that we've got a little bit of money left.
But what we don't know at this point is how far that's going to take us, you know, the dollar just doesn't seem to go as far now as it did, you know, 10 years ago.
And so when you're looking at renovating building space that all
it takes more money than what you think it does.
And so that's probably the next step is what is it gonna cost to get that building to be able to do the things that we need it to do?
We're using it right now and it works, but it is an older building and it was left unoccupied for several years.
And so there is some upgrades that need to happen.
And so it'll be a kind of a balancing act between using the little bit that's left in referendum dollars.
And I say a couple hundred thousand, that's a significant amount of money.
But when you look at it over the course of 27 points,
It's still a relatively small percentage and to try to do some upgrades over there, we're going to do the best we can, but we'll have to see what it takes.
The hope is that those programs continue to grow.
And as we talked earlier about enrollments, that we continue to bring in more students into those programming that maybe over the next couple of years, that revenue that we gain is something that we're able to invest back into the building.
And, you know, the HVAC and things like that, you know, it's not gonna last forever, you know, and it could go out tomorrow.
We're hoping that we get a few years out of it and that over the next couple years we can use some of those additional revenues that we're anticipating through the increase in enrollment and invest it back into the building and try to stay ahead of the maintenance curve.
strategic planning.
Do we talk about that
yet?
Yeah.
So, you know, I think we talked about the last time that our board had identified, you know, of course, their steering committee recommended five pillars and our board identified pillar number one, academic excellence as kind of the priority pillar.
And so next steps will be here in November, our administrative team has been working hard and we have been trying to identify some key performance indicators, some KPIs, some, some very specific
things that we can measure and that we can show our community where we're at in terms of progress through a very transparent scorecard on moving the needle as it comes to academic excellence.
And our community was very clear that they wanted our school district to increase the rigor and relevance of academics, but also to be able to prepare students when they graduate from high school for
Whatever pathway their life takes them and so whether that's you know taking over the family farm or going into the trades or Going into the military or a vocational school or a four-year school or anything in between That we are preparing kids and students for that and so well we talk about transitioning our seniors into real life
That process doesn't just start when they're seniors.
That starts when they're in 4k and 5k and developing those skills.
Some of the things Mr. Armijo talked about earlier, those soft skills, those ability to
shake hands, look people in the eye, how to address people, how to respond to people, how to communicate with people that's not in a text message, how to be able to orally and be able to write effectively.
Those are all skills that everyone needs in life.
And so we have to do a better job as a school district.
And this is what our community is asked for in moving the needle in that aspect.
And so we're going to be presenting seven key performance
indicators to our board that revolve around academic excellence.
And for the first time, and what I would be pretty confident in saying for the first time in the history of our school district, we will have very specific goals that move the needle in academic excellence.
And anyone in our community can get on our website or join a school board meeting.
And as we get this thing going and see where are we at, right?
And these are not going to be goals that are just
easy to attain check the box out we did it and forget about it right now we want this to be meaningful real change and so they're going to be stretch goals they're going to be five year goals are going to be things that are going to be difficult to attain.
We may not get there, right?
We may fall just short.
That's okay.
We may get there a little early in which case we'll move the needle and stretch it out again.
But we want to expand.
We want to get better.
And just like every teacher is trying to get better by reflecting and looking at how they taught a specific lesson, we as a school district need to continue to get better.
We've made great strides and I'm happy and proud of where we're at as a school district.
But we have some ways to go and we do need to
continue to improve on our academics and move the needle and fulfill what our...
what our public wants from its public school.
And I'm excited about that.
I would encourage people to join our next couple of board meetings virtually or hop on YouTube and see a recording of it because as we present these key performance indicators, our community will know exactly what we are trying to move the needle on.
And then over the course of the next months and years, that's what our focus is going to be.
And we're going to be very transparent in where we're at with this.
And I think it's important for our community
And I've shared this with our board that.
we may try things that just don't work, right?
And that's okay because there's an opportunity to learn from that.
And we may implement a program to try to improve reading skills, and it might not be as effective as we thought it would be, but you're still learning from that.
And so you then reflect on that, like, okay, this part didn't work, this part didn't work, but this small part did.
Now let's take this strategy and let's try this and try to implement it.
Or how do we get students to attend school more regularly, strategies that we implement.
So
It'll be a very fluid process, but it'll be a very transparent process and something that we'll keep our community informed on through newsletters and things like that.
And then this next spring, we'll really be tackling the next, the other four pillars and trying to get that process started.
But our board wanted to and our administrative recommended this.
Let's pick one pillar.
Let's go through this process on one pillar first.
And that's the academic excellence pillar.
And then once we understand what that looks like and how it all works, then we'll be able to do the other four much more efficiently.
So that'll probably take place late next spring, early summer with the goal of next July 1st or by the start of next school year, having all of our pillars in place and having our goals and what we're focusing on very clearly outlined and again, very transparent for our community.
Wonderful to hear Steve.
Thanks for joining us.
We'll see you in December.
Yeah, I appreciate it Phil.
Thank you so much.
This is your good administrator Steve Board and Felipe Armijo.
Good luck to you.
It was exciting to hear what's going on at Intermediate School too.
Thank you for having me.
You bet.
We'll have more coming up tomorrow on The Morning Show.