The Minneapolis Public Schools board of education met Tuesday evening for its monthly committee of the whole meeting to discuss a timeline for the district’s school transformation plan. The board then moved to a special business meeting to develop its process to replace Faheema Feerayarre, who recently resigned.

The board is down to just eight members after District 3 Director Feerayarre resigned earlier this month. Directors Sharon El-Amin and Joyner Emerick were absent from the meeting, and Director Ira Jourdain left the meeting early to go to work.

District leaders shared a short overview of their timeline and work they expect to produce related to school transformation in the coming months.

The presentation didn’t include what a final plan for school transformation might include, such as closing school buildings, changing school boundaries and pathways, or changing magnet programs, which all happened with the comprehensive district design in 2020.

The district’s new senior operations officer, Tom Parent, will lead up visits to all of the district’s facilities from Oct. 9 to Oct.29. During those visits information will be collected about how schools are using the nearly 8.5 million square feet of district buildings, paying particular attention to things like space for special education services. The site visits will include principals, union leaders, school board directors and parents.

When the site visits are complete, Parent and his staff will produce a report about building uses and utilization that will be matched with existing district data on floor plans, enrollment and facilities conditions.

The district’s communications department has developed a plan for community engagement, including a website. Staff is currently reviewing feedback the district has already collected from parents and students over the past five years. The plan also includes working with principals to engage with families at school-based events during the school year to gather feedback on school transformation.

Families will have an opportunity to provide feedback to the district by ranking and prioritizing programs and services the district provides in February 2025.

The board’s transformation resolution also asks the superintendent to look for central office efficiencies. The district did some of that work last spring. According to Senior Officer of Finance Ibrahima Diop, once the audit is completed in December, the district will know what its budget deficit is going into next school year. Then, the priority-based budget process the district has used the past two years will begin, trying to close the deficit for the 2025-26 school year. This process will include finding additional central office efficiencies.

The board’s December 2023 school transformation resolution requires the district to develop a Spanish dual immersion task force to review the purposes and goals of the program. The immersion schools are currently part of the district’s magnet schools and are funded with achievement and integration funding. Students are currently placed in the program through the annual placement lotteries, which weigh students’ socioeconomic background and home language as factors in determining placement to balance the backgrounds of students placed at the immersion schools. The task force’s work will continue into 2025.

The discussion meeting was reduced to an hour to make time for a special business meeting regarding the process for filling the vacant District 3 director seat. The directors settled on a process where eligible candidates may submit an application to the district through Oct. 18. The board members will then each select up to one applicant to interview in person at a special board meeting on Nov. 7. The applicants will be asked three questions, two written by Chair Collin Beachy and Vice Chair Kim Ellision, and a third written by the two student representatives.

The board will utilize a process of ranked choice voting on Nov. 12 to narrow down the candidates, and ultimately select a new representative for district three. The application and process details are posted on the district’s website.

The board will hold its next regular business meeting on Oct. 8 at 5 p.m. at Davis Center. This meeting will include time for public comments.