The 2014-2015 Classified Employees of the Year are: 

• Barbara Burkhead, Instructional Assistant, IBI, Manhattan Beach Preschool
• Hilda Camberos, Food Service Assistant, MCHS, Food & Nutrition Services
• Alice Carter, Administrative Secretary, District Office
• Rebecca Carter, Health Assistant, Robinson Elementary School
• Samuel Franco, Warehouse Delivery Driver, Maintenance & Operations
• Lawaii King, School Operations Team Leader, Pacific Elementary School
• Raymond Lee, Campus Security Lead, Mira Costa High School
• Kurt Markham, Instructional Assistant, Manhattan Beach Middle School
• Elmer Monge, Systems Technician, Grand View Elementary School
• Jack Moore, School Operations Team Leader, Meadows Elementary School
• Brayan Ramirez, Operations Worker, Pennekamp Elementary School

Beginning with the Mira Costa High school class of 2016, the new designations will follow the university model and will be listed in the commencement program:

Summa Cum Laude –             4.0 and above (weighted)

Magna Cum Laude –              3.80 to 3.99 (weighted)

Cum Laude –                          3.50 to 3.79 (weighted)

IV.       Class rankings will be released to universities/colleges based on quartiles only.

If passed by the Board, this policy would become effective beginning in the 2015-16 school year.  Students would receive weighted credit for applicable courses already taken.

The Food and Nutrition Department has made many improvements over the past several years. The program recognizes the District's secondary schools as opportunities to serve students the types of meals they would receive in the newer style fast casual restaurants as opposed to the types of meals found in the traditional school cafeteria.  Since the meal times are short and students need time to socialize, the program has recognized a need to go to the students rather than expecting the students to come to the program.

Purchasing a food truck provides an excellent opportunity to serve several purposes district wide and fill a niche. This truck will be used as a satellite serving area to serve students at our Middle School. Currently, the Middle School has a snack bar style serving area as well as some aging Cambro carts that are brought out for remote sales. A better solution is needed. With the addition of this truck, the program will be able to increase student meal participation and customer satisfaction by offering a larger variety of meals and higher quality meals due to the heated carts and refrigeration units that are board. The program will also be able to make better use of department labor since less time will be wasted on the tasks of loading and unloading carts and pushing them back and forth onto the campus several times a day.  With the purchase of this truck the program could provide service at alternate locations at an early lunch time and then head to the Middle School and set up the truck as a satellite serving area. This truck will also be used for many of catering functions that occur throughout the District.

The cost of this unit is $150,000.00. This is a used food truck with less than 5000 miles (the majority of the miles from the delivery of the truck from Ohio to California), and it is only 3 years old. The selling school district purchased 5 trucks 2012 while they remodeled their school kitchens. Due to the nature of the purchase, under Education Code Section 17542 MBUSD may purchase the truck without going through a formal bidding process. The purchase price of a comparable new unit would be $250,000.00 plus sales tax.

As required by Federal law, since this Food Truck which will be purchased with cafeteria funds it will be used exclusively (100%) by the nonprofit MBUSD Food & Nutrition Services Department.

The MBUSD Food & Nutrition Department has the funds to make this purchase without any encroachment on the general fund.

Each year in June and in compliance with California Education Code Section 42127(a)(2), the Board of Trustees must adopt the preliminary operating budget for the succeeding school year.  Since the approval of the 2014-15 Second Interim Budget Report, a number of significant budget developments have taken place, including the Governor's recent release of his May Revision to the budget that he proposed in January.  While the state's budgeting process will be ongoing until the legislature approves a budget and all trailer bills have been enacted, the District will utilize budget assumptions and parameters as provided by the Los Angeles County Office of Education, which will likely be released in late May or early June.  At this time, preliminary information and considerations for the 2015-16 district budget will be presented in order to allow the Board to provide direction to staff related to the preparation for 2015-16 Budget Adoption. Per Education Code (EC) Sections 42127 and 52062, two separate Governing Board public meetings, held at least one day apart, will be conducted in June for the school district LCAP and budget public hearings and adoption. 

Assembly Bill (AB) 86 (Chapter 48, Statutes of 2013), Section 85, appropriates $1.25 billion (approximately $200 per pupil for the prior year's enrollment) in the 2013-2014 school year to support the integration of academic content standards in instruction adopted pursuant to various Education Code sections. CCSS implementation funds can be expended for any of the following purposes: 

• Professional development for teachers, administrators, and paraprofessional educators or other classified employees involved in the direct instruction of pupils that is aligned to the academic content standards adopted
• Instructional materials aligned to the academic content standards including, but not limited to, supplemental instructional materials
• Integration of these academic content standards through technology-based instruction for purposes of improving the academic performance of pupils, including, but not necessarily limited to, expenditures necessary to support the administration of computer-based assessments and provide high-speed, high-bandwidth Internet connectivity for the purpose of administration of computer-based assessments. 

As a condition of receiving CCSS implementation funds, the District is required to:

• Develop and adopt a plan delineating how the CCSS implementation funds will be spent. The plan must be explained in a public meeting of the governing board of the school district and then be adopted in a subsequent public meeting
• Report detailed expenditure information to the California Department of Education (CDE) on or before July 1, 2015, including, but not limited to, specific purchases made and the number of teachers, administrators, or paraprofessional educators that received professional development. The funds may be spent in 2013-2014 and 2014-2015. Staff's proposed spending plan is attached to this Board item. 

The plan has been shared previously at Board meetings on September 3, 2013, and December 11, 2013.  The plan was approved on January 22, 2014 (attached).

Attached is the revised plan for your approval, which is based on expenditures and expected expenditures between July 1, 2013 and June 30, 2015.

With the change in instructional programming to Writing Workshop, Reading Workshop and CGI math, the need for extended time with students with fewer interruptions has arisen. In addition, the second grade team has explored more heterogeneous grouping in their classrooms so that students can benefit from the input of others as they learn. 

At Pacific there are currently multiple arrival and dismissal times due to early bird and late bird schedules.  This requires staff to leave the campus open as half of first and second grade students do not arrive until 8:55 a.m. Supervision of students for this time has created safety issues as well. If only first grade has early bird / late bird time, staff can leave only one gate open for first grade arrival and keep students outside of the gate until their designated arrival time. 

The Pacific second grade and leadership team met multiple times to discuss a shift away from the early bird/ late bird schedule for Pacific second grade. The staff voted and approved a schedule that keeps instructional minutes the same, but moves second grade to the same schedule as third grade. Second grade will therefore start the day at 8:15 a.m. and end at 2:15 p.m.   

The schedule was reviewed and submitted to MBUTA. Per the MBUTA-MBUSD CBA, a ballot was prepared by MBUTA and presented to staff on Tuesday, May 5. MBUTA counted and verified that a majority of the Pacific teachers approved the proposed new second grade schedule. 

The main purpose of the proposed schedule is to ensure less interruption in the second grade instructional day. The secondary reason is to streamline arrival times so that most children are on campus and in class by 8:15. Article 7.3.F of the MBUSD-MBUTA CBA states, "Any approved scheduled variation shall be valid for only one year, unless otherwise determined by the Governing Board, but shall be renewable in succeeding years on the same grounds outlined above." 

The PowerSchool User Group (PSUG) National Conference will be held from July 28-31, in Las Vegas, Nevada. This conference is highly valued by staff and administrators who use PowerSchool. 

PowerSchool users from around the country attend this one-of-a-kind user group event. Four days of training sessions are provided for beginning, intermediate & advanced users. This conference is put on by PowerSchool Users for PowerSchool Users. While Pearson will be in attendance, this is not a Pearson-sponsored event.