- [Narrator] Funding for this program is provided in part by the Minnesota Arts and Cultural Heritage Fund and the citizens of Minnesota.

(bright music) - "R-Town," the show about Rochester learns about the Rochester Public Schools referendum.

We also rock out for spooky season with a local production of "Dracula: the Rock Musical."

And we catch up with what's new at Rochester Technical and Community College in a new segment led by college students.

All that and so much more coming up next on "R-Town," the show about Rochester.

(upbeat music) (upbeat music continues) Coming to you from 125 Live in Rochester, Minnesota, "R-Town."

(upbeat music continues) As we prepare to cast our ballots on November 5th, there is one critical local vote on the minds of many community members.

The ballot question will appear as school district question one, approval of new school district referendum revenue authorization.

This is the second year the referendum will be on our local ballots after failing to pass last year.

And here to tell us more about the referendum and what it means for the future of our local public schools and youth are superintendent, Dr. Kent Pekel and Kanika Couchene, a parent and campaign advocate for the Vote Yes for Student Success campaign.

Welcome to "R-Town," both of you.

- Thank you.

Thanks for having us.

- Thank you.

- So there's a lot to talk about with this referendum.

And Dr. Pekel, I wanna start with you just having, having you share a little bit about the objectives of the referendum and how these align with the larger RPS strategic plan.

- You know, this referendum has an academic purpose and it has a financial purpose.

The academic purpose is that taken together, the various positions and programs that the referendum would support are really all about igniting student learning.

They're about providing both critical supports, like reading specialists to kids who are struggling with reading.

And our advanced learning teachers for kids who are doing well and they're really ready to run.

It's about things like our school counselors and our career and technical education program.

So that's the educational piece.

Financially, it would give Rochester Public Schools financial stability for the foreseeable future, which is really essential.

My first two years here, we cut $21 million, 156 positions.

The senior administrators in the school district called the superintendent's cabinet, cut 'em by a third.

The work didn't go down by a third.

So we've made some hard choices and we wanna give our district and our community some predictability and stability.

So that's the economic rationale for the referendum.

- Okay.

So if the referendum is approved by voters this year, how would the funds be allocated?

- The funds would be allocated, $19.4 million, which would increase at the rate of inflation for 10 years.

And it breaks down roughly evenly across four key investment areas, supports for kids who are struggling academically, supports for kids who are advanced academically and academic enrichment for all kids, mental health and wellbeing supports, and then our career and technical education.

And we will be very transparent in allocating and reporting how those dollars are used within each of those categories over the tenure life of the referendum if it passes.

There may be some shifts in programs and positions within those categories, 'cause of course, kids choose different classes, parents have different priorities, state and federal laws change.

But our commitment is to make sure that the investment that the community would be making in our kids is held constant over those 10 years in those four key areas.

- Okay.

I love that you used the word investment.

One of the questions that I'm sure you often get from community members is what the financial impact will be on taxpayers with this referendum.

- There is, if you go to the school district website, there's a referendum page and you will find a tax calculator there that you can put in the value of your home.

The average priced home, now, according to most analysis in Rochester, is $350,000.

And that would be a $29 per month increase.

If the home is worth more, it would be more.

If it's less, it would be less.

Renters don't, of course, pay that directly.

And so it is important to find out what the impact might be for each individual homeowner or business owner.

And you can go to our website to find the specific information there.

But that gives you a general sense of what the impact would be.

- Okay, thank you.

As I mentioned at the start of the show, this is the second time that the referendum will be up for a vote in the community.

What was the immediate outcome of it not passing last year, and what are the considerations for this year?

- I know this is super confusing because, wait, it was, last year was 10.1 million.

This is 19.4 million.

They're both referendums, but they're totally different types of referendums.

And the state of Minnesota creates three different categories.

You can do buildings and facilities, that's not what we're talking about.

You can do capital projects, which is equipment and material.

That's what we did last year.

And you can do operating, which is for the core purposes of teaching and learning.

So last year we wanted to deal with about half of our total deficit, which is just under $20 million.

We asked for 10 million for technology.

We only asked for 10 million 'cause that's all we needed for technology.

We couldn't ask for 20 million for technology and have another 10 million to spend on computers that we didn't need.

That narrowly failed by 318 votes out of 22,000.

And we did a lot of deep discussion with the community over the course of the months after the referendum failed.

In my mind, when we asked for funding for technology, we were talking about cybersecurity.

We had just had a ransomware attack that shut down technology in our district.

I'm proud to say we beat back the international criminals that took over our computers, didn't pay 'em the million dollar ransom they asked for, but a lot of people were thinking about kids scrolling on TikTok.

It just didn't.

So this year we're asking for funding for teaching and learning, our core mission academically, and we're asking for the full amount of our structural deficit, what we need to be financially stable.

- Thank you.

And Kanika, as a parent and as someone who's been involved with advocating for this referendum, how do you see it affecting your role?

I guess, why is this so important in terms of your role as a parent, as a community member?

- Yeah, I think as a parent, I wanna see my child succeed.

And I believe that a easy way to ensure a thriving life is having a quality of education.

And I know I'm not the only parent that feels that way.

We all want the best for our children, and I truly believe that a strong community benefits as long as the schools are strong.

And so talking about the community aspect of it, when we don't have strong schools, then I feel like it's a domino effect.

Well then our businesses might not have the capability to attract local talent and maybe innovators are gonna think twice about coming to Rochester.

And when that starts to happen, you start to see that vibrancy of what Rochester is diminish.

And I don't wanna see that.

I'm really proud of the community that I live in and I want it to thrive.

- Thank you.

And I'd love for you to share a little bit more specifically about the Vote Yes for Student Success initiative and the efforts that advocates like yourself have been making over the last year.

- Yeah, so I started in the Vote Yes committee this summer.

And then six weeks ago, a handful of parents also created a second committee called Seeking Stability for RPS.

And we're working together with Vote Yes to just amplify the importance of the referendum within our community.

And we're doing that by community forums, social media outreach, buying marketing ads, really to make sure that people have the accurate information they need to make a informed vote.

Sometimes I feel like there can be a lot of misinformation and I wanna make sure that everyone that is voting has that right information to make an informed vote.

And I hope that it is a vote yes for our community.

- Wonderful.

Thank you so much.

- If I could even just super briefly add, what Kanika just said, it's really important to stress is separate from what I can say.

And so the Vote Yes is something that's independent of the school district.

I'm, you know, as an educator, I'm always glad when any community member or parent is engaged with our kids and my job is to be providing the information.

So it's really exciting to be here hearing about that.

Important for your viewers to know that these are two separate efforts.

Great to have this single conversation, but we are adhering to the state laws that mean there has to be kind of a wall here, even though we're all on the side of our kids.

- For sure, and thank you for explaining that for our viewers and I, we were excited to have both of these different perspectives.

- Yeah, it's great.

This is actually the first time I've done it.

So thank you for bringing us together.

- For sure.

Well, back to you Dr. Pekel.

We spoke about this actually last year when you spoke about the first referendum last fall.

How does RPS's per student funding compare to other districts of similar size in the state or even the national level?

And where do you see rooms for improvement here in Rochester?

- Most funding for K-12 education in Minnesota comes from Minnesota, which was a big change that was made in 2003 when Jesse Ventura was governor.

There were some other changes in the seventies.

So basically schools across Minnesota are funded by the same formulas for the vast majority of their money.

And the federal government is actually quite small, 6% for Rochester.

And that's mostly focused on kids with disabilities and kids who live in poverty.

So we're pretty similar in terms of the funding we receive from the state of Minnesota and the federal government for all other school districts in the state.

Now it varies based upon the demographics of your kids and like family incomes and stuff.

Where we're really different is there is a local contribution to education in Minnesota.

Some of that comes from a limited authority that school boards have to essentially levy taxes on local taxpayers, but it's very limited.

And unlike the city and the county, we have to put any funding we want beyond that on the ballot for the public to vote on.

And when you look at operating referendums, which is the kind we're talking about here today for school operations, Rochester ranks last out of the largest school districts in the state.

There's 15 school districts that serve more than 10,000 kids, which is very different than being in a school district of 1500 kids or 2000 kids.

They have their challenges too.

But to compare apples to apples, you kind of need to look at districts like ours.

We serve 17,300 kids.

We're the seventh biggest.

And so when you rank those school districts with our current voter approved funding, we're last at about $916 per student.

If the referendum passes on November 5th, we'll go to just below the average of those 15 school districts.

We will be number 10 out of the 15.

So this is not a moonshot, it's not saying Rochester Public Schools should vault up to being the top districts in the state funded by our local communities.

But there is a disparity.

And I do think a lot of Rochester parents want their kids to have a caliber of education that is certainly equal to what they're getting in Rosemount, Apple Valley, Eagan, or South Washington County, which are two school districts that are very close to us in size, but they're up there at that average and we're down there at the bottom.

- I'm curious, why the disparity?

Do you know?

- You know, I think it, these things just happen over years where, you know, voters need to have confidence in their school system.

They need to have confidence in the academic agenda, they need to have confidence in the financial stewardship.

I mentioned that we cut $21 million in my first two years here.

We also have had three completely clean external audits in a row, not a single finding.

So we manage our money scrupulously, we're focused on kids' academic success.

And I think that's where communities are willing to invest in kids if they believe the dollars are gonna be well used.

And that's a very, very important part of that equation.

We know from a lot of research that school funding does affect student achievement, but the money has to be effectively used.

And that's certainly our commitment in Rochester.

- As we're wrapping up here, Kanika, what would you say to community members who may not have children in the public school system, are kind of still thinking about what this referendum means?

What would you say to them?

- Yeah, I mean, again, I think schools are like the economy backbone of any community.

And so even if you don't have a child within the Rochester Public School system, you know, failing schools can hinder businesses, like I said, they can stop the ability to attract talent and which may result in fewer entrepreneurs and inventors coming, choosing Rochester as their home.

And ultimately, I think if the referendum doesn't pass, our city growth could stall and that would diminish the vibrancy of our community.

And I don't think anyone would like to see that.

So it's really important to consider.

- Well thank you both for joining us today and sharing your different perspectives on this important issue.

- Thanks.

(upbeat music) (upbeat music continues) - Be sure to stick around.

We have much more coming your way on "R-Town."

We get our thrills and some rock tunes in a local production of "Dracula: the Rock Musical" with our very own Danielle Teal.

Then we catch up with what's new on the RCTC campus in our new R-Future segment.

(dramatic music) - This is Danielle Teal with "R-Town Spotlight."

We're at Once & Future Classics checking out the play "Dracula: a Rock Musical" located at Peace United Church.

All right, we're here with Jaymi Wilson at Once & Future Classics.

It's a local community theater.

Can you tell us a little bit about your role and the current play?

- I'm the music director for this show.

We are doing "Dracula: the Rock Musical."

This is a show that follows the traditional story of Dracula.

It has integrated rock music from across the generations.

It's completely family friendly.

You can bring anyone from your 3-year-old to your 83-year-old and everyone will have a great time.

There's a lot of humor in it, even though it does follow the gothic tale.

- Right, so the plot, the vibe is similar to the, you know, story from past.

But how is it a little bit different?

- In our story, I think that you'll find that we make the best use of humor.

So while you think of this as being a dark story about Dracula and him going to suck the bloods of his victims and murder and mayhem, we also have taken the turn of looking at specific characters and using them to integrate some humor.

- Are there any characters that people should, you know, keep an eye out for in the play?

- I think you have to watch out for Lucy.

- Ooh, dun dun dun.

(both laugh) - I am Sonora Purrier and I am play Lucy Westenra.

- Okay.

And what is that role?

What's the story about her?

- Well, Lucy's your very typical girl.

She's got a best friend named Mina and a fiance who just happens to have the title of Lord Arthur.

And it kind of just seems like everything's just coming down.

Everything's roses for her.

You know, she got engaged, she's got a best friend, she's got a great family, and then all of a sudden Dracula comes into their lives.

Unfortunately, she does pass on.

- Oh... What is your favorite part about the play?

It's not that, right?

- No.

I think my favorite part is when I get to come back from the dead.

- Okay.

Okay, let me guess.

You're Dracula.

- Yes ma'am.

- Okay.

And do you actually bite people in the play?

- Not technically, but we make it look like I bite people.

- Now have you always been an incredible singer or did you take voice lessons?

- Well, I- - Or did you sing in the shower and you're like, "Oh, I'm pretty good."

- Have I always been an incredible singer?

No.

♪ Aside for us ♪ ♪ Who wants to live forever ♪ So I guess as far as my role goes, we get this idea that Dracula is just this really super dark character and kind of like sinister.

But because of his love for Serena as Prince Vlad, it's interesting to see how in depth I can get or Dracula gets, as far as how much he really like believes Mina is Serena and how much he actually loved Serena so much.

That's why he chose to stay alive.

- I'm Katie Eberhard and I'll be playing Mina Murray.

- Perfect, can you share a little bit more about the part, the character, you know, what do you do in the play?

- Yeah, so Mina is kind of like the main love interest of Dracula.

He thinks that I'm his dead wife reincarnated.

So I start off, I'm engaged, have a boyfriend, but he kind of disappears for a while.

Nobody really knows where he's gone.

And then Dracula comes along and kind of sweeps me off my feet.

- Your singing background, what, how long you been singing?

- I've always loved to sing.

I actually was really, really shy for a long time.

It was, I was, yeah.

- You were?

- I used to never sing in front of people.

Yeah, I was very shy, very self-conscious about it and finally just decided, "You know what, I'm just gonna fake it till I make it," so... - Well, and you made it 'cause you can sing.

♪ To live forever ♪ ♪ Forever is our today ♪ - Anything else you wanna share?

- Come see it.

I think it's great.

I think people will be surprised by what they see and people who may think they know what Dracula is, will learn more about it.

'Cause there's a lot more to the story than just a vampire.

- You've learned nothing, or you wouldn't be here.

You would be at home quaking in your bed.

- I've learned vampires burn, - But first you must have fire.

- My fire's out.

I may now use water!

- Agh!

(dramatic music) - Holy water hurts, too, doesn't it?

- Stand aside, she is mine!

- I shall not cede her to you!

- There will be one less fool in the world!

(Dracula grunting) - The show will take place on October 25th, 26th, November 1st and 2nd, November 8th and 9th at 7:30 PM.

And then we have a matinee on November 2nd at 2:00 PM.

All of the shows are at Peace United Church of Christ, which is near Silver Lake Shopping Plaza.

And you can buy tickets online or at the door.

- This is Danielle Teal with "R-Town Spotlight."

I'm gonna change in my costume and go join in the fun.

(dramatic music) - [Narrator] For more information about this story and other R-Town features, connect with us on Facebook, Twitter @KSMQ, #RTown, or ksmq.org/rtown.

(cheerful music) (cheerful music continues) (cheerful music continues) (cheerful music continues) (cheerful music continues) (upbeat music) - Hello and welcome to "R-Future," featuring college life and happenings at Rochester Community and Technical College and surrounding areas.

I'm Jessica Cormican.

The RCTC theater department has been rigorously rehearsing for the fall children's production of "Still Life with Iris."

There will be two public matinee performances as well as two daily performances for Rochester Area schoolchildren.

- It's a beautiful sort of modern fairy tale.

It's written by a man named Steven Dietz and it follows this young woman, Iris, as she sort of travels through some adventures and misadventures.

The conceit is that we carry our memories in our coats, and Iris unfortunately loses her coat.

And so she's left with just one button on her coat and she's trying her hardest to find this memory that she can see when she holds the button, but she, so she's traveling to get back to that memory.

The leads in this play, we've got Zoey Hollstein is playing Iris and Xander Carter is playing Mr. Matternot, and they're kind of the two leads.

Iris is the one that we follow throughout.

We see her traveling from her home in Noturno to the island on the Great Goods.

- She wants to know what her life was before the goods, before she ended up on the island, before everything, because she's in this place where she's bored.

She doesn't have anything she wants to do and she's lost.

- My character's name is Mr. Matternot, basically the lead, like the secondary character in the show behind Iris.

And he's kind of like a driving, like, he's like a very big plot point of the whole show.

She gets taken away by these two people who just kind of wanna keep her as like a pet.

And he basically, like, he is really intrigued by her, like her curiosity and her persona.

But you'll remember nothing that happened before this moment.

Now, please give me the button.

- As a stage manager, I'm responsible for making sure the actors are here and on time and keeping track of where they are if they are late.

I'm in charge of making sure they know their lines.

I'm on book is what we call it, every rehearsal up until tech week to make sure they have their lines if they need it, especially if they're not holding their script, I'm able to give them their lines.

I'm also in charge during show week of setting up the theater, turning on all the lights, getting all the actors into places.

And then at this theater and in most theaters in Rochester as the stage manager, I will run the light board during the shows.

This show has eight cast members, and then there's myself as the stage manager.

There will be a sound operator who will also probably be a student.

So that's 10 students involved in this show.

- So the public performances are the 2nd and 9th of November at 2:00 PM.

This has been a long standing tradition at RCTC is that we bring in students from our Rochester and surrounding areas.

And yeah, this place gets pretty full with students from as young as first grade all the way up to, I think fifth, sixth, seventh grade.

And they come and they see the show.

It's usually pretty energetic and pretty packed.

Personally, I love shows for young audiences because they haven't learned not to react like adults have.

And so you usually get a lot of laughter and you usually get kids like talking and pointing and very excited about the show.

So it's usually a really good experience both for them in the audience, but also for us as performers on stage.

- Tickets are $5 for adults, children.

Non RCT students and seniors are $3.

RCTC students get free admission with their student ID.

The RCTC choir has an upcoming concert November 6th.

The concert will feature several solo performances, and choir director Nicholas Johnson says this concert has a very unique feel to it.

- November 6th, we have a performance up in the the Hive, I believe it's called.

And it's kind of a mix of the choir singing.

And then we have, we're featuring a lot of our soloists.

And so I think we have about eight performances of people who are singing their own song.

Some people are singing an original song, songs that they wrote, playing guitar and singing.

We have someone singing their own arrangement of a song from the "Newsies."

We've got people singing Taylor Swift, we've got people singing old school Broadway songs.

And then, like I said, the choir will be singing three songs included in that night.

And then while all of that's happening, we're serving snacks and drinks.

And so it should be a nice, a fun event, I think.

Very informal concert.

So typically at a choir concert, you're sitting there and have to try to be quiet and silence the cell phone and everything.

This one, the singers are singing and people are eating and yeah.

So it's much more informal.

- Thank you for joining us today.

I hope you learned as much as I did about all that's going on in our city and the wonderful people making it happen.

For more content produced right here in Rochester, please be sure to check us out on Facebook and Twitter at #RTown.

I'm Nicole Nfonoyim-Hara, host of "R-Town", the show about Rochester.

We'll see you next time.

(cheerful music) (cheerful music continues) (cheerful music continues) (cheerful music continues) (bright music) - [Narrator] Funding for this program is provided in part by the Minnesota Arts and Cultural Heritage Fund and the citizens of Minnesota.