[{"_1":2,"_111":-5,"_112":-5},"loaderData",{"_3":4,"_26":27},"root",{"_5":6,"_17":10,"_18":19,"_20":21,"_22":10,"_23":-5,"_24":-5,"_25":10},"user",{"_7":8,"_9":10,"_11":10,"_12":-5,"_13":-5,"_14":15,"_16":-5},"roles",[],"isAuthenticated",false,"isPremium","planName","subscriptionStatus","featureFlags",{},"insightsBudget","isDevelopmentHost","userPreferences",{},"recaptchaSiteKey","6LcvOJcUAAAAAHsB-gPGfGktcRlKpH7OTIU_dMTD","isImpersonating","impersonation","affiliateStatus","isFreedomPortal","routes/v2/article/layout",{"_28":29,"_30":31},"notFound",true,"relatedArticles",[32,75,87,99],{"_33":34,"_35":36,"_37":38,"_39":40,"_41":42,"_43":44,"_45":44,"_46":47,"_48":49,"_50":51,"_52":53,"_54":55,"_56":57,"_58":59,"_60":61,"_62":63,"_64":65,"_66":67,"_68":69,"_70":71,"_72":73,"_74":73},"mediaId",6103049,"mediaKeyId","2802195-7bda9cbf54d30ebf702f9fb5cb7e14fd","parentId",2802195,"title","Votes at a glance: Kyrene board approves agenda items, contracts and calendar change; several motions pass unanimously","audioSeconds",0,"startMs",195000,"endMs","viewUrl","/Search/View?dp=1&key=2802195-7bda9cbf54d30ebf702f9fb5cb7e14fd&start=195&end=195","thumbnailUrl","https://assets.pipeline.soar.com/2802195-7bda9cbf54d30ebf702f9fb5cb7e14fd/thumbnail_195000.jpg","articleUrl","/articles/6103049/Arizona/Votes-at-a-glance-Kyrene-board-approves-agenda-items-contracts-and-calendar-change-several-motions-pass-unanimously","mediaUrl","https://secure.pipeline.soar.com/6103049-79e3e409095ee86d07f3cd24bc353542/orig.mp4?Expires=1771138097&Signature=L-nH4L-79bHmplVc2njMRG9uv-WcdYzN-wrabb6yN27CLzL9pV1R5ngVFAeaTPS82b05cv~hSRq7ibNxM-N6KXXDrYlR3eypQMEerarInvEv2qaMgi5AQY5ytmRLBdoUh7deT3GS8Uwu2sdaSu3VlUxMd2Exs3G9bKw7pSKNczwxuN~e2rUdJ4DqYlwPLHyAXVY5Cmbthh7uLxIi4Spzt72oLQXDG9eGPU1K6rli0oBNUOrzFisq5379Om~ypPyCbt61h5SzJdd9M1yg3C0kdNozJtgRhPuliZLgxlWfTCCnx0sMFG5o7ZyzZvMBlnjl8D1PbBUbrKXnzTVxwR0TGw__&Key-Pair-Id=KUT5TJCACFTXG","author","Kyrene Elementary District","date","2025-03-28T00:26:15.767Z","article","At its March 25 meeting the Kyrene Governing Board took several formal actions. Each motion and its result, as recorded in the meeting transcript, are summarized below.

Votes (selected items recorded in the meeting transcript):

- Motion to convene to executive session (Item 1.2): \"I'll make a motion to convene to executive session.\" The motion carried 3 to 0 (movers/second not fully specified in the transcript; the second was recorded as \"Second by Vice President Nelson\").

- Motion to conclude executive session and reconvene (Item 1.4): Motion to conclude the board's executive session carried 5 to 0 (mover/second recorded; second by Member Davis).

- Motion to approve the published agenda (Item 3.1): Motion by Member Collins; second by Member Satri. Motion passed 5 to 0.

- Consent agenda approval (Item 7.1): Motion by Vice President Nelson; second by Member Satri. Motion passed 5 to 0.

- Purchasing authorization: skylight and roof replacement at Kyrene de la Sierra (cooperative contracts 2106PO2 awarded to Progressive Roofing and 32306PO2 awarded to Norcon Industries) (Item 8.1): Motion by Member Davis; second by Vice President Nelson. Motion passed 5 to 0.

- Purchasing authorization: award for RFP K250330 for middle‑school grades 6–8 ELA curriculum (Item 8.2): Motion by Vice President Nelson; second by Member Collins. Motion passed 5 to 0. Funding source was cited as DAA (District Additional Assistance); this is a multiyear contract with an initial one‑year term and up to four one‑year extensions available.

- Motion to reopen the legislative update to invite Representative Patty Contreras to speak: Motion passed 5 to 0 (mover/second: motion by board member; second by Member Davis recorded).

- Calendar modification (Item 8.4): Motion to move the October 14 staff development day for the 2025–26 school year to August 18 and make the fall break consistent with winter and spring breaks. Motion by Vice President Nelson; second by Member Davis. Motion passed 5 to 0.

- Adjournment: Motion to adjourn carried 5 to 0.

Notes and clarifications: several motions in the early portion of the meeting were made before all board members were present (the initial executive‑session motion recorded a 3–0 vote). Where the transcript did not explicitly name the mover, the record above preserves the vote tally and notes when the second was identified. The transcript shows unanimous (5–0) approval for agenda, consent, purchasing authorizations, the ELA adoption, calendar modification and adjournment.

Full action list (structured): see actions array below for the motions, outcomes and vote tallies as recorded in the meeting transcript.","mediaType","Video","parentTitle","03-25-2025 Kyrene Governing Board Meeting","oneSentenceSummary","The Kyrene Governing Board recorded multiple formal actions on March 25, including votes to convene and conclude executive session, adopt the agenda, approve consent items, authorize roof work and adopt a middle‑school ELA contract, and move a staff‑development day from October to August.","taxTitle","Kyrene Elementary District (4267), School Districts, Arizona","taxId",13625,"location","Arizona","headline","","shortSummary",{"_33":76,"_35":36,"_37":38,"_39":77,"_41":78,"_43":79,"_45":80,"_46":81,"_48":82,"_50":83,"_52":84,"_54":55,"_56":57,"_58":85,"_60":61,"_62":63,"_64":86,"_66":67,"_68":69,"_70":71,"_72":73,"_74":73},6103053,"Public commenters urge partnership on early literacy and seek clarity on KTA art position",176,7225000,7401000,"/Search/View?dp=1&key=2802195-7bda9cbf54d30ebf702f9fb5cb7e14fd&start=7225&end=7401","https://assets.pipeline.soar.com/2802195-7bda9cbf54d30ebf702f9fb5cb7e14fd/thumbnail_7225000.jpg","/articles/6103053/Arizona/Public-commenters-urge-partnership-on-early-literacy-and-seek-clarity-on-KTA-art-position","https://secure.pipeline.soar.com/6103053-b23ff0c1d3ed0a586618f879ad92bbe2/orig.mp4?Expires=1771138097&Signature=NkAupMMkfXszTfrEtopi3c0HE9zvzfJKhzvzmhV7Wfj0GWk6Zzbn~xNNIfuXRr6Ei-PENWgo0tB0yx0fcnuUkZq7tIi7rl7uYikiKE26RtD24DFqD8PTgo2nUyJG7PWgb5dat6GEnQhaS9vjEggNhPFR-CdnasfDfX7EdJcLCzXswPLz2mpz4uksK5dF9eIoRTw4SqbCVxqLlozE5-Am4ZYya1gCYvVA0KPyZxHZqVwjYOTMlQ1T2V~joa1kGy-bIs2z0FLC49A5OAsXFHdxxvtCkd9RZIEZ8VMgDt025Fhs2kOhHfGVmPBuPtJRlrWTuGKMRKatQgCg4HwapMKsmw__&Key-Pair-Id=KUT5TJCACFTXG","Two members of the public addressed the board during the March 25 call‑to‑the‑public portion.

Gabriel Campos introduced himself as a representative of the Reading Alliance, an organization that places rigorously trained young men as tutors for ages 3 through third grade. Campos said tutors are 18–26 years old, receive sustained training, and are currently embedded in several Maricopa County districts. He told the board his organization’s internal data showed a substantial improvement in literacy among students who worked with tutors from the beginning to the middle of the school year; Campos described that change as a 450% increase in literacy rate for that cohort and said the group is available to discuss partnerships.

Kendra Stenberg, who identified herself as a current Kyrene employee and the art teacher at Kyrene Traditional Academy, said she recently learned her position was open for hire. Stenberg said she is working toward full certification and has roughly 15 years of art‑education experience. She told the board that students at KTA had experienced a series of short‑term art teachers and that her students were concerned about continuity. Stenberg said she created an Artist of the Month program aligned with the district’s \"Portrait of a Kyrene Kid\" attributes and asked for follow‑up from district staff.

Superintendent Laura Tenas and district staff told both speakers the district would follow up. Dr. Lane and other staff members were cited as points of contact for the Reading Alliance conversation; the superintendent’s office said it would contact Stenberg about staffing and next steps.

Why it matters: The Reading Alliance pitch would, if pursued, represent an outside tutoring partnership focused on early literacy. The KTA teacher’s comment raised a personnel and continuity concern at a specific campus; district staff committed to follow up with the teacher.","A representative of a tutoring group described an early‑literacy tutoring model and cited strong internal gains; a Kyrene Traditional Academy art teacher asked the board for clarity after learning her position was posted externally.",{"_33":88,"_35":36,"_37":38,"_39":89,"_41":90,"_43":91,"_45":92,"_46":93,"_48":94,"_50":95,"_52":96,"_54":55,"_56":57,"_58":97,"_60":61,"_62":63,"_64":98,"_66":67,"_68":69,"_70":71,"_72":73,"_74":73},6103058,"State legislators brief Kyrene board on budget, ESAs, charter oversight and state lands trust",2356,5682000,8038000,"/Search/View?dp=1&key=2802195-7bda9cbf54d30ebf702f9fb5cb7e14fd&start=5682&end=8038","https://assets.pipeline.soar.com/2802195-7bda9cbf54d30ebf702f9fb5cb7e14fd/thumbnail_5682000.jpg","/articles/6103058/Arizona/State-legislators-brief-Kyrene-board-on-budget-ESAs-charter-oversight-and-state-lands-trust","https://secure.pipeline.soar.com/6103058-37fa42f645d9a0f72aad946b4241d4ae/orig.mp4?Expires=1771138097&Signature=KjM6PusjCuQ9R5aRtj8W7laf~Qs2TJqKrmEp7MET~RSDD1BIJRqC6lIreUIs7s8iEdUT1LhhGOTih5QCDrX3dR7BQKdNQMCwMmIYVZQFJpEp17CPHETnev2zULaeYrrWKzuyEfA8-whlQGTNCNq37MUM0qTfrpTR0Dpldfx4DcDO4DIvItk4bwsIALnrTiPVcaKEE-pONFGkfsFbaX6KkggQ0zrUmfDPcz-~DKchqMEBGm9xocVhGhMRsD8EIc5IdtA9FEfvQIoKA~3wXaaeElERKBzC~GTXceCHcNst72ujN-mgy5u~y7geAY~iLspIBhKmmfmUKVn0DDidOcN1vQ__&Key-Pair-Id=KUT5TJCACFTXG","Kyrene board members heard a legislative update from state lawmakers at the March 25 meeting, with elected officials outlining education funding priorities and current bills that could affect district operations.

Representative Travers opened the briefing and said her team is watching several items, including Proposition 1/2/3 proposals, education savings accounts (ESAs) and the state budget. She described a bill she sponsored, House Bill 1383, that would require schools to disclose staff CPR training and health‑office credentials when parents ask; Travers said the bill advanced in the House education committee and received bipartisan attention in committee testimony.

Senator Mitzi Epstein said the Democratic caucus has ranked K–12 funding as a top priority for the budget. Epstein discussed bills addressing charter‑school procurement and financial transparency and said the legislature is working on amendments requiring charter schools to follow the Uniform System of Financial Records (USFRs) and procurement laws when appropriate. She named a bill she and others are pushing to ensure parity between districts and charter schools on reporting and procurement rules.

Epstein and Travers both flagged ongoing discussion of proposals that would tap the state trust lands corpus to fund schools (commonly described as Prop 1/2/3). Epstein explained that the state lands trust is constitutionally limited to using interest income and that proposals differ on whether and how much to draw from the corpus; she characterized some proposals as effectively borrowing against future trust value and said some legislators favor keeping withdrawals at a moderate, sustainable level.

Representative Patty Contreras, who arrived later and addressed the board, described committee workload and reiterated the caucus emphasis on funding personnel across school districts, not only teacher pay. Contreras also said she is working on water‑supply and sustainability measures and noted she will continue to press for school funding priorities in budget negotiations.

Board members asked for updates on the aggregate expenditure limit (AEL) and potential proposals to make school‑board elections partisan. Representatives said AEL proposals were in the pipeline and that the situation felt quieter than last year but urged continued advocacy. On school‑board elections, one legislator said making them partisan would likely be subject to a veto and that the idea remains politically charged.

Several board members thanked the legislators and asked for continued communication during the budget and bill negotiations. The board moved the legislators’ updates earlier in the agenda to accommodate their schedules; no board action was taken on legislative matters during the meeting.","Sen. Mitzi Epstein and Representatives Travers and Patty Contreras updated the Kyrene board about session priorities including K–12 funding, ESAs, charter school accountability and proposals involving the state lands trust and aggregate expenditure limits.",{"_33":100,"_35":36,"_37":38,"_39":101,"_41":102,"_43":103,"_45":104,"_46":105,"_48":106,"_50":107,"_52":108,"_54":55,"_56":57,"_58":109,"_60":61,"_62":63,"_64":110,"_66":67,"_68":69,"_70":71,"_72":73,"_74":73},6103063,"Kyrene outlines early‑literacy push aiming for 85% of students at grade level by 2027–28",2491,8275000,10766000,"/Search/View?dp=1&key=2802195-7bda9cbf54d30ebf702f9fb5cb7e14fd&start=8275&end=10766","https://assets.pipeline.soar.com/2802195-7bda9cbf54d30ebf702f9fb5cb7e14fd/thumbnail_8275000.jpg","/articles/6103063/Arizona/Kyrene-outlines-earlyliteracy-push-aiming-for-85-of-students-at-grade-level-by-202728","https://secure.pipeline.soar.com/6103063-7ad0b7c9a10bd3e40c89209715cfaeb8/orig.mp4?Expires=1771138097&Signature=Max1l2DuCjz9SBbvUv9E3RoU3XstsdPKLOnkvqePAYr7zUvV-0tnC9A9qeZvuc67qiTLha9YoTdJEo4G1O5-B-ot6fqn80j-pCtj29k6dgG0fwjwDRANXVJsJ70yjOK~cu~zbU2gIG6Nl13ZZKvis9b9Vyy7y1CrHkePsBtWyPOv35EtFj8V3Yk2YK~ezeBp58rXz2cYTMlbWozRhi1lfEjF7FvW0YTzT4jCp0PmUyOxlMCthL-Xn5coPG~gqhwK0JaZzAZ-SllIomWEpyJCFU~m5rSYneIsFl7c2YY4Qwdign0JN5lEtMERjOooBYj21LzWB51FIM6jl3WYn2G1IQ__&Key-Pair-Id=KUT5TJCACFTXG","Kyrene School District presented an expanded early‑literacy strategy at its March 25 governing‑board meeting, with district leaders saying the goal is to have at least 85% of students in kindergarten through third grade meeting end‑of‑year reading benchmarks by the 2027–28 school year.

District staff said the plan combines high‑quality instructional materials, targeted professional development and changes to scheduling and class size to strengthen foundational decoding and comprehension skills.

The district framed the effort as part of its strategic plan. Dr. Lane, who led the presentation on the early‑literacy initiative, said the work centers on prioritizing pre‑K to third‑grade instruction and increasing access to “high‑quality early literacy experiences” so students are reading at or above grade level by third grade.

Dr. Collins, the preschool‑through‑third‑grade director, walked the board through benchmark goals and recent results. He said kindergarten baseline performance for 2022–23 was 74% at end of year and rose to 78% last year. He reported end‑of‑year results last year of 81% for first grade, 76% for second grade and 74% for third grade.

Raquel Ellis, K‑3 literacy facilitator, described three core strategies: use of a vetted core curriculum (Core Knowledge Language Arts, CKLA), aligned professional development including LETRS (Language Essentials for Teachers of Reading and Spelling), and a robust, curriculum‑embedded assessment system that identifies the specific skills students are missing. Ellis said the district provides implementation guides and monthly Tier‑1 teams (principal plus grade leads) to review data and set 90‑day goals.

Spencer Folgatter, principal at Kyrene de la Mariposa, told the board the district materials and monthly protocols improved the consistency and focus of professional‑learning‑community meetings, and that the approach helped teams identify precise remediation steps. \"Because of the work that's been done beforehand, those conversations have been more rich,\" Folgatter said.

Anna Varela, a kindergarten teacher at Kyrene del Millennio, described classroom changes driven by LETRS and CKLA: clearer pronunciation instruction, updated sound walls and routine practice in decoding and mapping sounds to spelling. She said her class’s DIBELS benchmark rate rose roughly 20 percentage points from the beginning to the middle of the year.

District staff highlighted middle‑of‑year DIBELS analysis showing improvement for students who began the year in the highest‑risk category. Kyrene staff reported the district moved a larger share of its highest‑risk kindergarten students out of that category than comparable DIBELS users nationally (8% better at moving students to at/above benchmark and 7% better at moving students to the next lower risk category), and they said overall growth for that cohort outpaced national comparators by 15%.

Superintendent Laura Tenas said the district will continue smaller K‑2 class sizes and expand planning days and targeted professional development. Leaders also said they will examine how to connect the early grades’ decoding and foundational work to reading comprehension efforts in grades 3–5.

Board members praised teacher buy‑in and the cross‑departmental effort that produced new implementation guides, assessments and monthly data protocols. Several trustees asked about extending LETRS and other supports into upper elementary grades.

The presentation concluded with district leaders saying they will continue tiered monitoring, classroom supports and an external partnership (District Management Group) to sustain the work and measure progress.

The board did not vote on policy changes as part of the presentation; staff said follow‑up materials and implementation documents will be shared with the board and that principals and teachers will continue monthly data cycles.

Why it matters: Early reading proficiency predicts later academic outcomes. The district’s stated target—85% at or above benchmark by 2027–28—frames staffing, curriculum and professional‑development priorities and informs budget and scheduling decisions for coming years.","District leaders presented a multi‑pronged early‑literacy strategy—new curriculum supports, LETRS professional development, smaller K‑2 classes and monthly data teams—and reported midyear gains on kindergarten DIBELS that district staff say outpace national comparators.","actionData","errors"]

Article not found

Votes at a glance: Kyrene board approves agenda items, contracts and calendar change; several motions pass unanimously

Public commenters urge partnership on early literacy and seek clarity on KTA art position

State legislators brief Kyrene board on budget, ESAs, charter oversight and state lands trust

Kyrene outlines early‑literacy push aiming for 85% of students at grade level by 2027–28