Board Highlights feature a brief description of the action items and discussion items on the meeting agenda. Board Highlights do not replace minutes. The minutes are approved by the Board and posted after the next regularly scheduled Board meeting. Present: Jay Bastian, Margaret DeLaRosa, Kermit Eby, Hetal Lee, Martha Mueller, Pete Nolan and Jim Shannon.
Belonging & Connectedness
IHSA Achievements:
Fine Arts Achievements and Happenings:
Glenbard South
Orchestra: Sophia Assaf, Emily Goodin, Leo OBrill, Logan Sassi
Band: Joude Bounama, Zach Jones, Soren Loest, Josh Push
Jazz Band: Zach Jones, J.J. Wallace
Chorus: Liv Abbott, Kate Costello, Erin Egan, Maureen White, Riven Wisniewski
Glenbard West
Orchestra: Chloe Kim, Madax Knudsen, Adam Manzke, Joanna Piczak
Band: Simon Ellis
Jazz Band: Nolan Beery
Chorus: Paige Brondyke, Cole Lisook
Learning & Success
School quality and student success indicators include:
Passion & Purpose
District Business
Community Events
Districtwide, we are excited to launch the Glenbard Cares Food Donation Drive. This initiative will run throughout the duration of the Thanksgiving basketball invitationals, beginning November 22 for girls and November 24 for boys. Attendees are encouraged to bring a non-perishable food item to help support community members facing uncertain times.
All donations collected through these efforts will benefit our local food pantries that serve our community year-round.
– the October 27, 2025 regular meeting minutes and closed session minutes.
– invoices for payment.
November 10, 2025
Education Fund $ 613,502.08
Operations & Maintenance Fund $ 409,122.43
Debt Service $ 0.00
Transportation $ 476,424.77
Capital Projects $ 2,683,341.44
IL Munic. Retire/Soc Security $ 0.00
Interim – Checks $ 1,217,069.88
Interim – Wire Transfers $ 4,952,545.19
TOTAL $ 10,352,005.79
– October 5, 2025 and October 20, 2025 Gross Payrolls.
October 5, 2025 Gross Payroll Net Payroll
Education Fund $5,551,822.07 $3,145,228.38
Operations & Maintenance Fund $48,099.13 $28,106.19
Transportation Fund $1,633.38 $1,129.29
October 20, 2025 Gross Payroll Net Payroll
Education Fund $5,209,078.25 $3,163,917.31
Operations & Maintenance Fund $46,909.45 $27,547.17
Transportation Fund $1,633.38 $1,123.65
Total Payrolls $10,859,175.66 $6,367,051.99
– the following personnel items:
SUPPORT STAFF – EMPLOYMENT:
Name School/Position FTE Effective Date
Doran, Thomas South/EL Bilingual Interpreter 100% 11/03/2025
– two excursions.
– School Board Members Day. The nearly 6,000 men and women who serve voluntarily as members of their local boards of education in Illinois serve tirelessly and willingly. Every day, our students benefit from school board members’ dedication and commitment to public education. All school board members make personal sacrifices and spend countless hours tending to board business.
November 15, 2025 is School Board Members Day in Illinois. This is a time to show our appreciation and to better understand how school board members work together to provide leadership for our schools.
– American Education Week. From November 17 through 21, we will join the country in celebrating public schools during American Education Week.
Each year, American Education Week celebrates public education and honors individuals who are making a difference in ensuring that every child receives a quality education. This weeklong celebration spotlights the myriad of people – support staff, educators, families and community members – who are key to building excellent public schools.
– new textbook adoption 2025-26. The proposal is for the adoption of a test preparation workbook for the AP Italian course. This course is offered exclusively at Glenbard North, and there is currently no AP exam prep book for it, unlike AP Spanish and AP French which utilize similar resources. This fifth edition is the most current resource to adequately prepare AP Italian students for success on the AP exam.
This proposal has been reviewed and approved by all four world languages department chairs, the Glenbard North Assistant Principal for Instruction, and the Glenbard North Principal. The Student Performance and Achievement Committee has also vetted the proposal.
– new course proposals 2026-27. We are committed to the continuous improvement of our curricular offerings in order to better meet the demands of student interest, postsecondary preparation, and career pathways. Each year we follow a review process for new course proposals submitted by teachers. This year our new course proposal includes one new Advanced Placement course, two new dual credit courses with the College of DuPage, and a new English course for seniors.
These proposals were approved by the four department chairs for the department, all four assistant principals for instruction, and all four principals. Additionally, they were reviewed and discussed at each of the four schools’ instructional councils. They were reviewed by the Student Performance and Achievement Committee on October 1, 2025 and recommended to go to the full Board for approval. We are recommending that the following courses be approved for the 2026-27 school year:
AP Cybersecurity
This is a new Advanced Placement course that is being offered by the College Board for the first time. AP Cybersecurity is a capstone course for students interested in computer science, and offers a broad introduction to the field and aligns closely with a college-level, introductory cybersecurity course. Students learn about common threats and vulnerabilities and how they combine to create risk. This is a year-long elective course from the Business/FACS Department and counts toward the Applied Arts requirements for graduation. This course aligns with our goals of increasing early college course exposure, career pathways and earning college credit before graduation from Glenbard.
Dual Credit Introduction to World Music 1115
This college-level course provides an introduction to the great variety of musical styles from around the world. This course examines representative music of the non-Western world, with an emphasis on its function within the culture of which it is a part. No previous musical experience is required. The course emphasizes an understanding of basic musical terminology and the development of improved listening skills. This is a dual credit course through the College of DuPage and is designed to fulfill general education requirements at the college level. This course is offered at no cost, is a part of the Illinois Articulation Initiative, and is widely transferable to many colleges and universities through a COD transcript. This is a semester-long course from the Fine Arts Department and counts toward cultural arts requirements for graduation.
Dual Credit American Politics/AP US Government and Politics
This course analyzes the dynamics and processes of the evolving American constitutional democracy: its origins, structure, and problems. Areas of study include an in-depth discussion of the U.S. constitution, federalism, civil liberties, interest groups, political parties, campaigns, elections, mass media, Congress, the courts, and the presidency. This is a dual credit course through the College of DuPage and is designed to fulfill general education requirements at the college level. This course is offered at no additional cost, is a part of the Illinois Articulation Initiative, and is widely transferable to many colleges and universities through a COD transcript. Additionally, this course prepares students for the Advanced Placement Examination in US Government & Politics and replaces that course. This is a semester-long course from the Social Studies Department and counts toward the civics requirement for graduation.
English 4: Advanced Composition
This year-long English course is for seniors who do not yet meet literacy benchmarks and is designed to prepare them for success in college. English 4: Advanced Composition is a college preparatory course that develops student skills in reading, critical thinking and analysis, and writing to support student success across majors and career pathways. Upon completion, students should be able to adapt their approaches and strategies as they engage in reading and writing tasks; analyze, evaluate, and synthesize while reading and writing; and demonstrate information literacy skills as an engaged reader and as a contributing writer. This course is offered by the English department and counts toward the English requirement for graduation.
– authorization to enter into a contract for emergency general education transportation service. District 87 has received multiple proposals to provide general education transportation services on an emergency basis, effective January 1, 2026. The administration has analyzed these proposals and narrowed them down to a few options. Administration met with representatives from several transportation companies to follow up on their proposals. A formal recommendation was presented to the Board at this meeting.
A contract will not be available at this meeting; therefore, we sought Board approval to proceed, which will enable us to finalize a contract with the approved vendor(s). The Board’s approval is necessary to allow as much time as possible for staff to transition and prepare to deliver service in early January. This contract shall not exceed 18 months in duration. The Board will need to approve the final emergency contract, which requires six affirmative votes, at an upcoming Board meeting.
Administration recommends conducting a formal bid process in the fall of 2026 to solicit competitive bids for the 2027-28 school year.
– authorization to lease property for emergency transportation service. District 87 has received notification from Safeway that, effective at the beginning of the new calendar year, the vendor will no longer be able to provide general education services. District administration initiated the process of contracting for replacement services under emergency status; however, a key component of this effort involves securing a suitable depot location, inclusive of adequate parking.
We are currently working with our legal team and the property owners of the depot on finalizing a draft version of the contract. The documents are still under review as we work through specific details and ongoing negotiations. Due to our tight timeline, the final version is not yet available; however, approval at this stage is necessary to maintain project momentum.
As for special education service transportation, we plan to continue services with Safeway until the end of the school year.
– revised Board member committee assignments. Glenbard has four Board committees: Communication, Legislation & Partnerships Committee, Finance & Facility Committee, Policy Committee and Student Performance & Achievement Committee. Each committee is comprised of three Board members, two community members and an administrative liaison. In addition, a member of the Board of Education serves as a representative of the Illinois Association of School Boards (IASB), Partnership for Educational Progress (PEP), and Legislative Education Network of DuPage (LEND), Glendale Heights Governmental Agency Partnership (GAP) and Glenbard Insurance Committee Representatives. All Board committee assignments are two-year terms.
The following Board committee assignments have been determined:
Communication, Legislation & Partnerships Committee:
Kermit Eby, Board Member Chair
Jay Bastian, Board Member
Margaret DeLaRosa, Board Member
Finance & Facility Committee:
Jay Bastian, Board Member Chair
Pete Nolan, Board Member
Martha Mueller, Board Member
Policy Committee:
James Shannon, Board Member Chair
Kermit Eby, Board Member
Pete Nolan, Board Member
Student Performance & Achievement Committee:
Kermit Eby, Board Member Chair
Pete Nolan, Board Member
Martha Mueller, Board Member
IASB Representative:
Pete Nolan
PEP Representative:
Jay Bastian
LEND Representative:
Pete Nolan / James Shannon
GAP Representative:
Jay Bastian / Margaret DeLaRosa / Hetal Lee
– IASB Resolutions Committee report. The 2025 Resolutions Committee Report to the Membership will be acted upon at the annual meeting of the Illinois Association of School Board’s (IASB) Delegate Assembly on November 22, 2025. Participating in the resolutions process by submitting new resolutions and discussing the resolutions gives member districts ownership in the association and the opportunity to establish the direction of the association and its major policies. This year, delegates will vote on:
IASB Resolution – The Resolutions Committee recommends DO ADOPT.
IASB Constitutional Amendments – The Resolutions Committee recommends DO ADOPT.
– tax levy hearing 2025. Annually, District 87 sets a tax levy, which provides the district with more than 75 percent of its total revenue. The setting of the annual tax levy is governed by The Truth in Taxation Law (the “Act”), school code, property tax code, and Property Tax Extension Limitation Law (PTELL). Each of these laws has specific requirements that must be followed, or a district’s tax levy could be subject to legal challenge.
Truth in Taxation Law (the “Act”): requires that at least 20 days prior to the adoption of the levy, the school board must estimate the aggregate levy for the year through a Board motion or resolution. The resolution provided to the Board complies with this requirement.
The 2024 year-end Consumer Price Index (CPI) came in at 2.9 percent. This will be the maximum amount the district can raise the tax levy (excluding new property growth and bond and interest payments).
School Code and Property Tax Code: require that the final levy be adopted and filed with the county clerks on or before the last Tuesday in December, which is December 30, 2025 this year.
The following timetable will satisfy the requirements of the above laws:
October 27 Levy presentation (Finance Committee & Board meeting)
November 10 Tax levy hearing (Board meeting)
December 8 Adopt 2025 tax levy (Board meeting)
December 9 File the levy with County Clerk (must be filed by 12/30/2025)
Property Tax Extension Limitation Law: PTELL limits the amount the tax levy (aggregate extension) can increase over the prior year’s tax levy. Debt service levies are not included in this limitation. Three factors determine the allowable tax growth under the PTELL laws: 1) amount of the prior year’s tax extension; 2) the increase in the Consumer Price Index for Urban (CPI-U) as of December 2024 (was 2.9 percent); and 3) new property growth. The first two items are already known, but the new property growth will not be known until April 2026, so the district must estimate the amount of new property growth and the county clerk will adjust the tax extension once the final number is known. We have prepared two calculations to account for this projection.
Most Likely:
We have calculated our most likely extension based on a 2024 calendar year CPI of 2.9 percent and an estimated new construction amount of $40,000,000. This calculation represents the total tax extension that we believe the district will most likely receive. Based on this calculation, we believe that our total property tax extension revenue will increase by $8,805,154 or 5.44 percent – year-over-year (2.9 percent increase due to CPI; 0.51 percent increase due to new construction and 2.03 percent in bond and interest). We have estimated an increase in property equalized assessed value (EAV) of 8.0 percent.
Manual Override/Submitted Levy:
School districts generally levy a dollar amount higher than the expected or most likely amount for three primary reasons: 1) Actual EAVs and new construction amounts are unknown at this time and will not be finalized until the spring of 2026. 2) If the district’s levy request is lower than what the county calculates, the district is only entitled up to the amount requested (it is prudent to request a higher amount to ensure that we do not under-levy). 3) At this point in time of the year, we have not finalized our required levy allocation by fund. Therefore, we intend on requesting higher amounts in each fund to make sure that when we finalize our levy allocation by fund (March/April 2026) that we have the opportunity to levy the requisite amount.
Fund Most Likely ‘Override’
For education purposes $125,870,000 $126,790,000
For operations, building & maintenance purposes $25,940,000 $26,130,000
For transportation purposes $9,070,000 $9,140,000
For IMRF purposes $770,000 $770,000
For Social Security & Medicare purposes $1,620,000 $1,630,000
Total $163,270,000 $164,460,000
Year-over-year increase: 3.41% 4.17%
Our proposed property tax levy submission, excluding the Bond and Interest Levy, is $164,460,000 which represents a 4.17 percent increase over the prior year’s aggregate tax extension (Override Amount). For reasons mentioned above, it is prudent to levy a higher dollar amount than expected.
In the spring of 2026, DuPage County will calculate our actual property tax extension pursuant to the tax cap, taking into account the CPI and new construction and all approved abatements.
– fiscal year 2025 audit review and acceptance. Baker Tilly US, LLP recently completed their annual audit of Glenbard Township High School District 87’s financials. A representative from Baker Tilly reviewed audit results at the meeting.
Highlights of the audit are as follows:
We highlighted the following legislative impacts/risks in the management, discussion and analysis section of the report, which would impact our ability to fund staffing and programs.
Many thanks to Glenbard staff Dana Pryor, and recent retirees Barry Brave and Maureen Cappozzo for their coordination with the Baker Tilly team.
– summer school 2025 report. Summer school principals from Glenbard North and Glenbard South presented highlights of the 2025 summer program and areas of focus for 2026. The presentation included a review of credit, bridge and enrichment courses. For the summer of 2025, Glenbard had 934 bridge and enrichment enrollments, 568 students enrolled in credit recovery coursework, and 343 students enrolled in get ahead credit coursework, with an overall passing rate of 96 percent.
Our focus areas for next year are to recruit more of our talented Glenbard teachers, offer credit recovery course options for ninth graders and offer a variety of get ahead credit courses so students can have flexibility in their schedules.
– dual credit update. In alignment with our Board Goals and the District Work Plan, the teaching and learning team has worked to create a vision for increasing student access to dual credit coursework. In 2020, Glenbard was the first district in DuPage County to enter into a formal agreement with the College of DuPage to offer general education dual credit courses that are a part of the Illinois Articulation Initiative. Since that time, we have expanded dual credit opportunities for students in both general education and Capstone experiences. In the 2024-25 school year, there were 2,525 dual credit courses passed by Glenbard students.
Key takeaways:
– Glenbard East construction bid review – bid package #5. Design and bidding have been completed for the Glenbard East commons addition and interior renovations. Wold performed the architectural design and PSI designed and bid all of the mechanical systems. Bids were received in multiple packages between October 20-24, 2025.
Gilbane recommends the approval of 21 contractors for the commons addition and interior renovations in the amount of $18,640,244, plus an additional $1,000,000 budget for site services, $400,137 for the accepted alternates, and $2,129,972 for Gilbane staffing, insurance, bonds and fee. This comes to a total of $22,170,353.
PSI recommends approval of 9 contractors to perform the mechanical, electrical and plumbing (MEP) work for the commons addition and interior renovations in the amount of $13,111,404, plus $200,380 for the accepted alternates. This comes to a total of $13,311,784.
Total costs for Gilbane and PSI are $11,400,726 lower than the 95 percent complete drawings estimate of $46,883,863. We will seek Board approval at the November 24, 2025 Board meeting to approve total costs for Gilbane and PSI for bid package #5 in the amount of $35,483,137. This includes $600,517 for recommended alternate bids, $1,000,000 (budget) for site services, and $2,129,972 for staffing, insurance, bonds and fees. Not included in the total recommendation for approval is a project contingency of $750,000.
– general education transportation bus purchase or lease. Currently, District 87 contracts with Safeway which in turn provides all buses necessary to provide general education transportation services. Based on the challenges and lead times associated with acquiring buses, administration recommends that the district lease or purchase buses directly. We currently have a proposal from Midwest Transit Equipment to lease up to 90 buses. We are also exploring the purchase of buses from the Safeway fleet. The number of buses that we will lease or buy will be determined by the final decision of which of the emergency proposals we move forward with in the coming week. We will need to finalize the decision no later than the November 24, 2025, Board of Education meeting to ensure delivery by the start of the second semester.
– policies & procedures for first reading & discussion. 2:30 School District Elections; 2:40 Board Member Qualifications; 2:40-E1 Disqualify Events for Board Membership (NEW); 2:50 Board Member Term of Office; 2:60 Board Member Removal from Office; 2:70 Vacancies on the School Board – Filling Vacancies; and Policy 2:110 Qualifications, Term, and Duties of Board Officers.
– Freedom of Information Act requests. By School Code, a Board of Education is to be informed at its regular meeting of any requests made under the provisions of the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) and the status of the District’s response. Here are the recent FOIA requests to which the District has responded:
DATE RECEIVED: 10/17/2025
REQUESTOR & COMPANY: Michael Ayele, aka W
REQUEST SUMMARY: Multiple items related to Cybersecurity Awareness Month, including local/state government agreements with the Department of Justice and Federal Bureau of Investigation regarding cybersecurity issues.
DATE RECEIVED: 10/20/2025
REQUESTOR & COMPANY: Steve Johnson
REQUEST SUMMARY: The superintendent’s latest contract.
Emergency Board Meeting-District Office
7p
GPS webinar with Dr. Ethan Kross in conversation with Dr. Jamil Zaki
12p
GPS webinar with Dr. Ethan Kross in conversation with Dr. Jamil Zaki
7p
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