College Station Independent School District

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October 2020 Board Meeting Recap

October 2020 Board Meeting Recap
Posted on 10/20/2020
CSISD Pledge Kids with Board

Note:  This is an overview of some of the items on the October workshop and meeting agendas.  This recap does not include every item on the agenda. Official meeting minutes will be made available on www.csisd.org following approval at the November board meeting.  A video and audio recording of the meeting will be made available within seven business days of the meeting at csisd.org.

COLLEGE STATION, Texas – The College Station ISD Board of Trustees met Tuesday, October 20.  The following discussions and actions are of note.

WORKSHOP

Discussion regarding Pre-AP Courses for 2020-2021 school year and beyond:  Dr. Penny Tramel led a second discussion regarding the future of Pre-AP classes with the board.

Because of new criteria by the College Board, CSISD has been exploring its options regarding the designation of classes as “Pre-AP” classes.  The new criteria will take effect in the 2021-2022 school year.

The new criteria include use of the College Board’s curriculum framework that is designed to be grade-level appropriate and not what CSISD would consider rigorous enough to be considered for the 5.0 grading scale.  In addition, the new Pre-AP curriculum is aligned to the Common Core curriculum, and a fee of $3,000 per course offered at each high school would be charged to the district.

Currently, CSISD has on-level courses (4.0 grade points), Honors courses (5.0 grade points), Pre-AP courses (5.0 grade points) and AP courses (5.0 grade points).

Three options were presented to the board at the September workshop and were considered since by a committee of high school students, teachers, counselors and administrators.

The three options explored were:

  • Option 1:  Change Pre-AP courses to “Advanced” courses, to allow the continued use of a more rigorous CSISD curriculum.  Honors courses would remain intact.  Advanced courses and Honors courses would be graded on a 5.0 scale.
  • Option 2:  Combine all Pre-AP and Honors courses into “Advanced” courses, to allow the use of rigorous CSISD curriculum.  All advanced courses would be graded on a 5.0 scale.
  • Option 3:  Pay the Pre-AP fee and continue to offer Pre-AP courses using the new Pre-AP curriculum.  A determination regarding the grade point scale for Pre-AP courses would be made at a later date.  Honors courses would continue to be graded on a 5.0 grading scale.

After meeting three times to consider options and discuss, the committee overwhelmingly supports option 2.  To make these changes, the board will consider adjusting language related to “Pre-AP” and “Honors” in policy EIC(Local) at the November meeting.

PUBLIC HEARING

Targeted Improvement Plans:  Chief Administrative Officer Molley Perry gave a brief presentation regarding Targeted Improvement Plans for five CSISD campuses. Although all campuses and districts in Texas received a label of Not Rated: Declared State of Disaster for 2020, schools are required to continue to implement previously ordered interventions from 2019.  Following the presentation, there was no public comment.  The plans were approved as part of the consent agenda during the regular meeting.

MEETING

Superintendent Update:  Superintendent Mike Martindale gave an update regarding several topics at the beginning of the meeting.

  • CSISD’s enrollment is currently at 13,738, which is down from 13,939 last year.
  • Beginning Monday, October 19, 80.2 percent of CSISD students were learning on-site, while 19.8 percent were learning virtually.  When school started on August 18, 67.9% of students were on-site learners.
  • From the start of school on August 18 through October 16, 47 CSISD students have tested positive for COVID-19.  36 of those have recovered and are back at school.
  • From the start of school on August 18 through October 16, 35 CSISD employees have tested positive for COVID-19.  27 of those have recovered and are back at work. 

Purchases/Bid Approvals:

  • Approved the purchase of the Renewal of Microsoft Education Desktop Package with Enterprise Client Access from SoftwareOne in the amount of $69,262.20 using Instructional Materials Allotment Funds.

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