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OCN > 2411 > Monument Academy School Board, Oct. 17 and 24 – Board hears financial audit, improvement plan, internal review

Monument Academy School Board, Oct. 17 and 24 – Board hears financial audit, improvement plan, internal review

By Jackie Burhans

The Monument Academy (MA) board held two meetings in October. In its first meeting on the 17th, the board heard its financial audit, unified improvement plan, and October enrollment count report. It passed several policies.

At its second meeting on the 24th, the board heard an internal school review audit from a consulting firm and entered an executive session to discuss possible actions.

Financial audit

Tom Sistare of Hoelting & Co. Inc., MA’s audit firm, dialed in to remotely present a summary of the financial audit presentation, giving MA an unmodified or clean opinion. Sistare said his team had been on-site in July testing internal controls and believes MA’s financial statements are presented fairly.

He said the audit covers both fund statements, which are how the school keeps its books on a day-to-day basis, as well as government-wide statements that roll all funds together and add capital assets, debt, and other liabilities.

In the government-wide statement, the statement of net position is the balance sheet for the entire school, Sistare said, indicating that cash and investments were up, capital assets decreased due to depreciation, and grants receivables were down due to fewer grants being available. The long-term liability is $55.5 million with a $39.1 million loan balance. MA paid $922,000 in debt service through the building corporation fund which manages the bonds for the West Campus and has $16.2 million in liability due to the Public Employees’ Retirement Association (PERA) unfunded liabilities. MA’s net position decreased by $798,000 primarily due to PERA.

For the fund statements, Sistare said the ratio of ending general fund balance to total expenditures for the year was similar to last year, maintaining a balance equal to 80 days of expenditures. For the current year’s activities, he said local revenues increased due to increases in donations and state per pupil revenue. Federal revenue fell as COVID grants wound down. Revenue was up about 4% with expenditures up 5% with a resulting $243,000 increase in fund balance. This compares favorably with a budgeted $790,000 decrease in fund balance. Sistare concluded by saying there were no findings of deficiencies on internal controls or other areas.

Interim Chief Financial Officer Glenn Gustafson added a three-year high-level comparison. He noted that for government agencies MA uses full accrual, while for day-to-day purposes it uses a modified accrual. Over three years, Gustafson said, the general fund revenues increased from $10.8 to $13.8 million due to School Finance Act revenue or per pupil revenue (PPR) while enrollment has been flat. Expenditures have grown due to hiring and raises, but the difference has gone from a $131,000 loss to a $243,000 profit. MA is trying to come into full compliance with its bond covenants, he said, and ending fund balance, which is the reserve, has increased by $653,000, which is a good position for a bond refinance.

The preschool fund had a small loss, but MA has made changes to bring it back to financial stability. It drew down the balance from $99,000 to $66,000. The building corporation and the foundation funds handle the bonds for the West and East Campus respectively and function with a fairly straight flow through from the state’s intercept program. Bank balances are invested aggressively and have seen good interest returns. Finally, the Student Activity Fund totals $125,000, has had a lot of cleanup, and is used only for Student Council expenses. He said he was very pleased with Hoelting, a local firm that has done a lot of work with charter schools.

Non-financial audit summarized

At a special meeting on Oct. 24, Lis Richard of Helping Schools Thrive LLC (HST) delivered a summary of her internal review audit which she emphasized was focused on academic, operational, and governance review rather than a financial audit. A more detailed presentation will be presented at the Nov. 21 meeting.

Richard, who served as MA’s principal until 2017, said her objective was to compare current practices and policies with the original intent of the school charter and philosophy documents and offer the board and leadership some tangible reflection and resources. For her summary, she focused on academics, philosophy, and student achievement.

For philosophy, she said PK-12 staff has only a basic understanding of the philosophy of MA and that no one could give an elevator speech explaining it. The foundational principles, practices, and virtues are not trained annually nor understood by leadership, which she found concerning. Understanding philosophy could aid in ensuring that it is a pillar of practice, she said.

Her greatest area of concern was that PK-5 did not have a solid curriculum direction and had too many supplemental materials that do not follow Core Knowledge (CK) practices. There is a strong implementation of core subjects in secondary school, which was a stellar start, she said while noting that the arts curriculum could better follow the CK sequence and work to support interdisciplinary practices. CK is spiraling and vertically aligned, Richard said. Training on curriculum is lacking for staff and leaders, she said.

Regarding student achievement, she said there are no current methods for new student assessment, which would be a good practice to provide to teachers. The assessment data has fallen to lead teachers or administration and is not used as a method of accountability for instruction and utilization with students and parents. The purpose of assessment is not clear in PK, Richard said, and MA’s elementary schools are no longer competitive with other district schools. There is a spirit of “That may be OK,” she added. Middle school achievement is in the upper quadrant but has room to improve, she said, and it was encouraging that the high school has performed well in its few years of existence.

In respect to operations, Richard said there is adequate room for PK-5, but that obviously the secondary school needs more room. Documentation of standard operating procedures are in progress, she said, and handbooks need to become cohesive across the campuses. Graduation requirements meet statutes. Enrollment has remained stable but does not reflect growth, Richard noted, displaying a screen show depicting that the Tri-Lakes area from 2010 to 2021 had grown 50%. MA’s enrollment trends show the highest growth when the school expanded to K-8 and had a large class size in 2018, after which class sizes started to go down.

This year is the lowest class size since 2013, she said. Population in the Tri-Lakes area has increased by 67% while class size at MA has dipped 7%, she said, with enrollment increases being due to adding grades. D38 saw a growth of 9% over that same time frame, she said. With an increase in full-time equivalent (FTE) students, there has been an increase in staff and debt. The greatest need for sustainability in the future is to increase student enrollment, Richard stated.

On governance, she noted that MA board members are parents dedicated to the current and future success of the school. Board roles and responsibilities should be reviewed annually, and new member training should be consistent, she said. The board needs a better understanding of governing by policy and setting direction. She noted that the board had begun reviewing policies and said that an academic policy is needed that includes penmanship. Teacher representatives should be inducted as was done in the past, Richard advised.

Overall, Richard gave academics a mixed score of green, yellow, and red while operations was mostly green with some yellow and governance was 1/3 green with the rest mostly yellow and just a little red. She recommended that leadership identify an action plan, involve staff, and establish a timeline, saying that HST has a system for developing an excellent school and could return for quarterly benchmarks or annual reviews.

The board went into executive session for one hour for advice on specific legal matters regarding the external audit report and for discussion of personnel matters arising from the report. Upon returning, it took no action.

Unified Improvement Plan

East Campus Principal Angela Duca presented a draft of MA’s secondary school Unified Improvement Plan (UIP) for the board’s approval at its Oct. 10 meeting. The intent, she said, is to create goals based on student data as required by the Colorado Department of Education (CDE). The process began by attending a workshop with D38 and analyzing the data from the school performance framework to inform academic goals. By evaluating the SPF, NWEA, and Pre-Scholastic Aptitude Test (PSAT) data, MA identified the need to improve math growth in middle and high schools. The principals met to determine priorities and challenges.

For middle school, there has been a high turnover of math teachers and therefore inconsistent implementation of curriculum Duca said. She said the major strategies to improve include teacher retention and data-informed instruction. MA plans to use mentor teachers throughout the school year and provide support through frequent check-ins and monthly instruction and revised teacher training. MA will partner with colleges to recruit highly effective teachers, and math teachers will work together to create vertically aligned curriculum.

For high school, schedule constraints and lack of access to student data before the school year mean that instruction was not tailored to student needs, Duca said. The root focus is limited math programs and placing students in the right class. MA will implement data-informed instruction and work to vertically align curriculum and content. Duca said MA will use PSAT and NSMQT scores to help and will re-evaluate its math placement tests. Executive Director Collin Vinchattle had a 13% teacher loss rate, which sounds high but is about average, she said.

Elementary Principal Kurt Walker said West Campus improved by 18 points, moving from an “improvement” to a “performance” category, which is the highest category. The school rose in all areas except for math growth where scores went down, as did all D38 elementary schools, he said. Last year’s UIP goals were two-year goals, he said, so they would continue with those. They focused so much on English and Language Arts that they neglected math. The West campus started trainings on data analysis of the math scores and had a professional development session with both campuses, which opened his eyes to what was missing, he said.

The board unanimously approved the UIP plans for MA elementary and secondary schools. The plans go to D38 to be approved and sent to the state.

October count presentation

Registrar Lena Gross presented on the final enrollment after the October count. She explained that the October count encompasses Tuesday, Sept. 24 to Tuesday, Oct 8. If a student is absent on Oct.1, the official count day, MA could review the attendance record to prove a student was in attendance for five consecutive days before or after. If that wasn’t possible, MA gathered letters on extenuating circumstances from parents or letters from teachers affirm their attendance. The following week, MA was scheduled to present its numbers to D38 for submission to the CDE.

Gross explained that the homeschool partnership had 30 students, who are counted as half of a student for a total of 15 full-time equivalent (FTE) students. West Campus was just under the budget projection of 546 at 544.5 FTE including half-day students. East Campus was seven below the projection of 547. Middle school was budgeted for 407 and had 408 while high school was budgeted for 140 students and had 132. Overall FTE is 1099.6, which is 3.9 under the budgeted target of 1103.5.

Gross said it was possible that MA would be entering arbitration and was under discussion with two other districts about two students. This would bring the final FTE to 1097.6, but MA won’t know the final CDE determination until December.

There were a lot of additions and withdrawals during the October count, Gross said, with West Campus growing by two but then losing seven, and East Campus growing by one and losing seven. She said MA had been in touch with families who left and sent them exit interviews to capture as much data as possible to understand their reasons for leaving. Gross noted that last year about 26% of K-12 students resided outside of the district, and that had increased to 27% this year with more districts being represented in MA’s population. Gross said MA would use that data to inform its marketing strategy going forward.

Gross said that MA had held its first Community Connections night at its West Campus and were encouraged that several families attended. The team was hard at work planning events for the upcoming enrollment season including moving students to middle and high school, she said.

Policy updates

The MA board unanimously adopted and updated several policies at its Oct. regular meeting:

  • KECL-MA Library Policy – As discussed in previous meetings.
  • GBGG-MA Staff Leave – Explains types of leave and how it can be used.
  • GBGH-MA Sick Leave Bank – Placeholder as MA does not have a sick leave bank.
  • GBGH-R-MA Sick Leave Bank Regulation – Placeholder as above.
  • GBGI-MA Staff Military Leave – Updated to reference executive director.
  • GBGJ-MA Staff Bereavement Leave – Through paid or sick leave, not separate.
  • GBGK-MA Staff Legal Leave – Standard modified to suit MA.

Board President Ryan Graham said he was grateful to have a library policy in place and that, if revisions are identified during implementation, it can be brought back to the board. Board policies can be found on the MA website at http://bit.ly/ma-boe by selecting Board Policies.

Highlights

Board meeting highlights include:

  • Graham spotlighted outgoing West Campus school resource officer (SRO) Dustin Williams. He expressed gratitude for Williams ensuring safety while building impactful and heartfelt relationships.
  • Vinchattle reported that the field fundraising campaign had raised over $70,000 so far.
  • Gustafson said there was a $68,000 loss in August due to upfront expenses, but that year-to-date MA is $285,000 ahead with $3.5 million in the bank and investment accounts. Finances are looking good, and he feels MA has turned the corner.
  • Graham reported that, with MA’s completion of its recirculation construction, parents should sign up for project updates by emailing hwy105aconstruction@gmail.com.
  • Board member Matt Ross and Vice President Lindsay Clinton reported for their respective campus curriculum committees that both are looking to focus on vertical alignment after they get the results of the school audit due in November.
  • Ross and board member Jilinda Dygert reported for their respective campus School Accountability and Advisory Committees (SAAC) that they were working on an annual parent survey. Dygert said the East Campus SAAC is focused on providing support on the UIP and asked that input on direction, board priorities, goals, and survey topics be emailed to saacsecondary@monumentacademy.net or communicated to Vinchattle. She asked that parents consider volunteering for lunch duty and car line to free up teachers’ time.
  • The board unanimously agreed to modify its Integrity Bank signature cards due to the departure of MA’s business manager Diane Smith. They removed Smith and added Finance Assistant Dawn Bartlett, who has agreed to pitch in, picking up the financial slack in addition to her human resources duties.
  • The board unanimously approved changing its November meeting from the 14th to the 21st so consultant Lis Richard can present the full non-financial audit.
  • The next district Parent and Community Advisory Committee (PCAC) will be held at MA’s East Campus on Nov. 12 from 6 to 8 p.m., with an optional tour starting at 5:30 p.m.
Above: At the Oct. 17 Monument Academy school board meeting, board President Ryan Graham spotlighted outgoing West Campus School Resource Officer (SRO) Dustin Williams. Graham is on the left, with Williams on the right. Photo by Jackie Burhans.

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The MA School Board meets at 6:30 p.m. on the second Thursday of each month. The November meeting has been moved to accommodate a detailed school audit presentation. The next regular board meeting will be on Thursday, Nov. 21, at 6:30 p.m. at the East Campus. For more information, visit https://bit.ly/ma-boe.

Jackie Burhans can be reached at jackieburhans@ocn.me.

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