By Lynn Janes

The Silver City Consolidated Schools held a work session and regular meeting January 20, 2025. Members in attendance included Ashley Montenegro, Michelle Diaz, Patrick Cohn, Mike McMillan and Kimberly Klement. Superintendent William Hawkins also attended.

Work session

Mark Valenzuela, managing principal Bosque Advisors, LLC., joined the meeting online to provide the final terms of the certificates for the general obligation (GO) bonds. Silver Consolidated schools had qualified for the 37 percent to the 63 percent match but by increasing the local property tax to a 10 mill levy they could qualify for more than a 37 percent match. By increasing the property tax to a 10 mill levy it raised the local property taxes 4.5 mills from what it had been. Property owners will see that increase this year.

They will be selling the bonds in four installments in the first year. They had just completed the first year's $7 million and in the following years it will be $6 million each. This year's will be paid over twenty years which will be what the state allows. They had put out an RFP (request for proposal) for an investment bank to handle the sale. Hilltop Securities had won the award and had also been the bond advisor. Valenzuela said they did a great job with a very difficult market. The true interest cost in the end had been 4.3 percent over the 20 years. The bonds rating came in as a B AA1 which is what it had been before they started, and he hoped over time it would be increased. He had provided the board with a presentation that explained the bonds.

Because of the market they had a problem attracting investors. Valenzuela said they had a strong participation with a local bank that Hawkins later announced had been First American Bank. The Federal Reserve had come out the day before and reduced interest rates by a quarter percent so that had helped because the interest rates rose a half percent after. He continued to explain the bond market currently and its uncertainty. The sale of the bonds had generated some fees. Hilltop had a fee of $44,500, Bosque Advisors fee had been $42,000, rating fee $20,00 and some others with a total fee of $108,360 for the sale.

Work session adjourned

Regular meeting started.

Every year the board conducts a board reorganization. The board members nominate people for the position of president, vice president and secretary. Montenegro had been nominated and approved and will continue as the president. Diaz had been nominated and approved and will continue as the vice president. Cohn had been nominated and approved and will continue as the secretary. They went over the committees and who would be serving on them. Montenegro and Klement will continue with the finance committee and Cohn will be a substitute. Montenegro and Cohn will continue on the audit committee. McMillan will continue with the threat assessment committee. Klement will take over on SHAC (school health advisory committee) for Diaz and Diaz will serve as the substitute.

The board approved the previous meeting's minutes and this agenda.

Information and presentations.

Bob Carson with Kiwanis attended to present the student of the month awards. The students have been chosen by the teachers at the high school and middle school. Carson provided a little history of Kiwanis. They are a service organization and are located all over the world. The implementation of the organization is done differently everywhere.

Brennan Shock, Cliff High School, shows exceptional leadership and dedication. He has a strong work ethic both in and out of the classroom and always shows a willingness to help others.

Lilly Verdugo, La Plata Middle School, has shown growth in character and academics. She demonstrates a positive attitude and has become a leader in her class.

Aubree Murillo, Silver High School, has a 4.38 GPA and writes at a college level. She works hard at breaking other students out of their shell. She will be presenting on her own for National History Day.

Angel Chacon, Silver High School, has worked hard on both the football field and in class to excel. He is positive and has become a leader.

Vincent Perry, Silver High School, respects himself and others, which automatically puts him in a leadership role. He goes out of his way to help when the need arises and works hard at school and at his after-school job.

Cassandra Hartley, coordinator Health Kids Community Grant County, attended to provide a report to the board and speak to the new wellness policy. She has throughout the year helped to support SHAC.

Heartly explained to the board what SHAC does. The public education department requires districts to have the program and that it meet a minimum of twice a year to establish and support health initiatives. Locally the committee meets monthly and has been well attended by school representatives of nutrition, nursing, health education, mental health and various health-related community partners. Each agenda always includes discussing upcoming health-related audits or evaluations.

Hartley read through the new policies that will be up for approval. She thanked the committee members for the hard work they had done and their dedication to SHAC.

Montenegro thanked Hartley for their help and keeping them compliant. She said this would serve as the first reading and a second reading would be done at the next board meeting.

Dianne Carrico, president of SCEA (Silver City Education Association), didn't have anything to report.

Information to the board

The La Plata Middle School student council had a presentation for the board. The presentation had been compiled and presented by Lisa Bernstein, Kendall Laney, Layla Thai, Alivida "Speedy" Beck and Pia Weosdorfer. Previously they had spoken to the new house system. It had been a great addition and had students more involved and making new friends. It had also made them more supportive of each other.

The students went over what had been going on this year, such as fewer fights in one grade and more drama in another. Attendance has been 90 percent, and 20 kids had perfect attendance. The students had some new electives added that they enjoyed. Incidents that took place in fall of 2023 and fall of 2024 had been compared and they had dropped considerably. The types of incidents compared had been disruptive behaviors, physical behaviors, bullying and object-based behaviors (cell phones). The students went over all the sports and how the students felt about them. The biggest struggle the students have been going through has been missing work. The kids in the classes don't understand what has been going on or they have just not been paying attention. Another problem they brought up many of the kids have been maturing and it has caused many to grow apart.

The students listed what they would like to see happen. They wanted to improve their grades and turn their work in. Some of the kids had expressed wanting to be more involved in the house system.

Montenegro asked them what they thought had reduced the number of incidents. One of the students said the previous year they had a lot more drama and some of the students had moved or were now being homeschooled. One said the teachers had become stricter. Montenegro asked if the house system had helped at all and did students feel like they belonged more? The students agreed it had helped.

Louis Alvarez, associate superintendent, provided the board with a personnel report. Currently the district is staffed at 98.8 percent. They had six position open at the time of the report but have filled three of those and still have three open

Cindy Barris, associate superintendent, had an enrollment update for the board. She told the board the enrollment went down by eight students and she had not been able to find any definitive pattern. She did say that part had to do with a migratory population at a few of the schools. Harrison Schmidt Elementary School has had the most fluctuation, but all the elementary schools have it.

Barris moved to the testing data. She had a number of slides for the board to look at with the broken-down data and milestones. They had an increase in proficiency but said it would be a process. She went over how they look at them and how they respond. Barris also went over the differences between local and state assessments. The data will not be just numbers but has faces behind it and they have to remember that. If something goes wrong in that little ecosphere it can have an effect. When they have conversations with the teachers many times, they know that a particular student would have not done well because of what had been going on with them. It has been especially prevalent in middle school. McMillan had told Barris a year in a half ago the district needed to be in the top ten. "The teachers know that is where we want to be." She continued to explain the data in depth and how they have been working to improve it.

Cohn asked some question about the data and performance expectations and where it started moving downward with the United States. He pointed out that New Mexico rates 49 or 50 in education. Barris said that number has been calculated on a lot of different things. "This is where we're not comparing apples to oranges." She went into an explanation of what that meant and how assessments have been different.

Montenegro asked when they started doing their own assessment. Barris explained the different scopes and sequences and said 2-4 years depending on the assessment. Hawkins explained the process of the assessments and increasing the outcomes. He said if you compared Silver High School and Cliff to other schools in New Mexico they have been in the top ten. He added they still needed to work hard to improve the level of instruction. "All teachers are stressed around milestone time."

Barris continued with the teachers being into improving the test scores and beating their own.

Joyce Barela, mental health grant coordinator had a report for the board. Since the school year started in August they have had 2,440 visits to the wellness rooms. She went over the interventions they had with Care Solace and had the data for the board. They have two groups of students that they see. Some come out of the wellness rooms for just a 15-minute reset or refocus and they have not been logged into the computer.

They have another group that they receive consent forms for and have been seen on a regular basis. Those students appear in the data she provided. With those students they have logged 642 different interventions with 112 different students. The data showed 87 percent of those intervention list as tier one. However, they had discussions that because they had consent forms, they should be tier two or three. She continued with the explanation of the interventions and the type of interventions. Those could be individual or some kind of group session.

The top five challenges the students come in with have to do with family concerns, behavioral concerns, self esteem, academic and emotional. They have been looking at providing training for all parts of the family that may be raising them. They will be moving ahead with that training. Barela said they would be moving ahead with the father support group also.

She brought up the McKinney Vento funding and the students they have been looking at that would qualify. These students would be in transition from maybe not having a stable, fixed or regular place to sleep. They have 48 students that qualify.

Next, they will begin working on ideas for staff wellness. Barela has brought photos of the renovations to the common areas to make them more inviting. She had some really positive feedback on the new common areas. It makes the schools feel far less institutionalized. Barris said she had done an excellent job. Some furniture has still not come in yet and they will be working on the libraries.

Board of education

Montenegro said the finance subcommittee had met and they went over the financial reports and the board budget. She said they have been thrilled to see what they have done with the mental health grant. "There are so many facets to mental health." She went over all the things the grant had helped with. Currently they have maintained an 80 percent salary to budget rate. "We are in a really good place."

Audit sub committee

Montenegro said they would not be meeting as the audit had been finished.

Threat assessment committee

McMillan said they had met, and he had not attended and deferred to Alvarez to summarize. Alvarez said they had talked about the recent shootings in the nation and what they could learn. The process of checking doors and verifying areas of concern had been discussed. Through POMS insurance they had run a vulnerability assessment, but he didn't get into the outcomes. They had found some weak areas and will be working with the insurance company to shut those down. They had also received positive feedback on the speed of identification when someone had tried to come in. Alvarez said the report had been extensive, but they would address all of it.

Hawkins added they will not rest with just the resources they had and cited armed guards, Zero Eyes software and anonymous reporting. It will be a continual evaluation of how they can do better. He thanked Alvarez for working with POMS and having that done.

Board president

Montenegro read the resolution to establish reasonable notice of all public meetings of the board.

Board comments

Montenegro thanked the students for all the recognition. They had decorated the board room for national school board month. "It is an honor and privilege that we get to sit here and just kind of join you in your endeavor of educating our kids and making Silver City and Grant County the best it can be." She thanked them back for all they do and said 2025 feels great. Everything just felt different. Everyone seems really excited.

Diaz said the biggest thing for her would be her heartfelt thanks to the kids. She had been referring to the artwork and goodies the students had provided for them because of national school board month. She went on about the good rapport the board has and thanked everyone for attending. "We don't want to settle for mediocrity. It starts with our superintendent, and we are grateful for his leadership."

Cohn said he didn't know where to start except he had the two best jobs in the world. Referring to school board member and county treasurer. "Without the community I would not be here. So, I want to thank the community for entrusting me to lead you. It is an honor to lead the administration, faculty and staff." He brought up sometimes he has a bad day, and he keeps the cards the students have given them on national school board month at his desk. The cards lift him up and warm his heart. He continued that he didn't think anyone would thank him for being county treasurer, because he charged them taxes. "It would be phenomenal, but I have yet to get a thank you for charging them property taxes." It made him feel good that the students thanked him for what the board has been doing. He hoped to be a role model in some shape or form to the students. He will be adding these cards to the ones for the past two years.

McMillan said before they knew it graduation would be happening. He spoke about the legislative session starting the next day and how much would be going on. He thanked the board members and students for all the gifts. He had one gift he wanted to open up in front of everyone. It came from Mr. Shock's class in Cliff. He opened it to find a handmade fishing pole with an inscription.

Klement thanked the kids for all the gifts and notes. She said it made her first year all worth it and also hearing and seeing all the data and statistics. She commended the administration on the professional development they have provided the teachers and how it keeps the energy going for the kids and thanked everyone.

Action items

Michele McCain, director of finance, had not been able to attend but Barris went over her requests. The board approved all requests made by McCain. She had checks totaling $4,185,103.96, as well as budget adjustments for grants and donations.

Budget adjustments:

Carl Perkins redistribution $1,818
General Bond Obligations bonds $7 million
Debit service fund $61,635.95
Public School capital outlay special award $2,003,002
Capital outlay Harrison Schmidt Elementary $1,127,871
Capital outlay La Plata Middle School $414,981

The donations included:

Silver City Moose Lodge – Silver High School Sunshine Fund - $750
Silver City Moose Lodge – Cliff High School Boys Basketball - $1,500
Bille Wellman- Cliff FFA - $500
Theater Group – District Wide Theater - $4,000

It also included a 31-page disposal list of technology items.

Montenegro wanted to highlight the capital outlay amounts spoken to earlier had been because of the 10 mill levy. Those funds would build Cliff a new school, new HVAC at Harrison Schmidt Elementary, etc. She thanked the community

Antonio Andazola, transportation and maintenance director, did not have a report.

The board approved the resolution to establish reasonable notice to the public for all public meetings of the board of education.

The board approved the disposal list, which had also been presented earlier.

The next meeting for the finance committee will be February 11, 2025
The next work session and regular meeting will be February 17, 2025

Hawkins said the principals had nominated four students to join them for Grant County Days. The students will have a tour of the roundhouse. They will also have the opportunity to speak with legislators and possibly meet with the governor.

The board went into executive session to discuss the evaluation of the superintendent.

The board came back into open session and said they had done the evaluation.

Adjourned