Aurora East USD 131 committee reviews Title IX‑era policy updates, special‑education staffing and middle‑school dean request

Dr. David Ballard presented a package of personnel and policy items at the Aurora East USD 131 Finance and Personnel Committee meeting on June 2, saying the packet included multiple first‑read items and staffing requests related to Title IX compliance, student supports and school leadership.

Ballard told the committee that many of the policy updates reflect a return to the 2020 Title IX regulations as they existed prior to changes made during the Biden administration; the proposed updates refresh legal references and compliance language across multiple district policies. Ballard identified three items to note in the packet: “Policy 7 207 2 10,” which adds language about student suspension and expulsion to allow students to have a representative or support person at hearings (the support person may be anyone the student chooses); “Policy 7 2 50,” which adds language naming a person at each school responsible for providing support to students who are parents, expectant parents, or victims of domestic or ****** abuse; and “Policy 7 2 5 5,” which Ballard said will require the district to develop and implement a program to support students who are parents, expectant parents, or victims of domestic violence or ****** abuse. Ballard said the district will need to work with building leaders to develop those programs once the policy is in effect and that suspension/expulsion letters will need updated language after July 1.

Ballard described a staffing and compliance item for the Gonzales Child Center: an emergency request for a 1‑to‑1 teacher assistant for an upcoming school year. Ballard said the student meets criteria in an individualized education program and that the district is required by law to provide a 1‑to‑1 assistant under the district’s obligation to provide free and appropriate public education; he said that request will go to action at the next full board meeting rather than being decided by the committee.

On staffing and pay, Ballard said the packet contains a request for 3.16 overloads to pay staff working Project Lead The Way at Fred Rogers Magnet Academy for the fourth quarter, and a request to create 1.0 full‑time‑equivalent dean position at Simmons Middle School. Ballard said Simmons is currently the largest middle school without a dean; two years ago the district added deans at Waldo and Cowherd middle schools and the new dean would bring Simmons' staffing in line with the other large middle schools. Ballard said the Project Lead The Way overloads and the Simmons dean request would be coming to action at the board meeting that evening in some form.

Committee members asked clarifying questions about Simmons' prior leadership structure; Ballard responded that Simmons once had two co‑principals and an assistant principal and that the school will now have an assistant principal, two principals and the requested dean, aligning it with the district's other middle schools.

Ballard presented these policy and personnel items as first reviews or referrals to the board with required follow up; committee members did not record formal votes on these items in the committee meeting.