hey welcome to uh this edition of the issue Township Board of Education um pursuant to the public meetings act out of the public notice of this meeting has been given by the Secretary of Eastern Township Board of Education in the following manner posting written notice on the official bulletin board at the Board of Education Office emailing written notice at the Burlington County Times and Courier Post and filing written notice with the municipal clerk of Evesham Township may I have a roll call please this is Barbara Giovanni here Mrs Everhart here Mr physicaro here Miss Fleming Mr kampfan here Mrs null here Mr lancelotta Mr Meegan here Mrs Ryan yeah we have a quorum okay if we could all rise for the Pledge of Allegiance I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to this Republic for which it stands one nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for all of them a couple notes here real quick for anybody who is in the audience I am going to put us um all on uh mute obviously in a moment Dr blachford and uh um Mr rashindi is going to present the budget uh you're also going to see um a screen share by uh by myself of the budget which we're going to go over so I will do my absolute best to keep in Pace uh with with Dr blachford and uh and Mr rashindi so uh you have patience with me as I as I try to make sure you're recording all right what's that make sure you're recording I am recording I'm recording as well Frank I've I got I got that one down already that one that part I figured out and the right laptop too right okay at this point I'm going to uh share my screen and show the budget presentation and then at that point give the floor to Dr blatchford Who I believe is first on here so let me do that and here we are ready to go I'm ready when you are thank you Mr physicaro I started a neat sham on February 3rd 2020.
okay we are good to go super didn't record yes I just wanted to make sure we all could see the interpreter we can now so go for it thank you it is four o'clock now is the time set for the board meeting of the Arizona state schools for the Deaf and the blind again thank you everyone for joining us in this alternative format thank you for your resiliency during this difficult period which we'll hear more about later in the meeting so the first order of business is to do the roll call and for that I will cede the floor to sue cake and I for that this is sue que Linda Bove here Lin Davis here Mike Gordon I'm here Shelly her bald hello I'm here Dean Howard yeah sookay can Eiffel present Mike manly yeah David Nigro I am present and Marc Sims this is Dean he'll be joining us in just a sec you just texted me okay Thank You Sookie the next item on our agenda I am 1.02 information item executive team reports and the executive team reports are located in the board docs area so we were all able to see those reports are there any questions and again I'll pause and pause my video and mute to give you an opportunity to comment but if anyone any of the board members would like to comment on either the human resources information technology or operations report please do so now and again I'm going to pause my video and mute to allow people time to comment this is mark sims Oman Sally her bald this is Shelley I do have a question in regards to the stay-at-home order with staff and students how are they progressing with the Xoom meetings online also I'd like to know if there are any concerns or barriers in regards to accessibility with technology I know in some areas they may not have access and in the report it said that they had not been able to contact I believe those 53 families has anybody gone out to check on those students and my third question is there any mental health counseling being available and provided to those students so those are my questions in regards to that report this is Annette speaking our assistant superintendent Kristin Rex will have answers to those questions in her report so if you can just hang on for a few more minutes we'll turn it over to Kristen and she would be happy to respond to those questions so there any questions related to you the negative team report which not I can back to you I'm chairman Nigro president Nigro Thank You Annette sure those are all great questions and I am really waiting the answers in our next our next agenda item but again just one final call for any of these reports I'm going to stop my video and mute it just for one more moment if there any questions on these particular reports please raise your hand or otherwise let us know and you'll have the floor okay so I don't see any so we're going to move on to item 1.03 information item assistant superintendent report for assistant superintendent dr.
good morning I'd like to call this meeting to order dr. Thomason roll call please president Kaler members of the board please let the record show that we have four board members here live and we have mr.
hello kayoppe nation I'm superintendent Brad's her touch each morning I remind myself we are fortunate to be healthy as a family but I would be dishonest if I didn't share that each day gets a little more difficult during this stay at home order as a person I look forward to going to large family events attending my child's activities and sitting down in a restaurant and enjoying the noise of a crowd in the future as an educator I look forward to seeing teachers and students in their classrooms attending school activities and interacting with community members next school year I think it's fair to say we all have something we look forward to in the future while we all long for normalcy our hearts ache is nothing we do will provide a normal closure to a great four years of high school for the class of 2020 and the culmination of their k-12 education the class of 2020 s accomplishments competitive fire and commitment to service have brought great pride to their families our K Hogg family and our communities the outreach by our community's local leaders district employees and so many others has been remarkable and embodies the love and passion that burns for our students my hope years from now our students are able to look back smile and despite a lack of traditional ceremonies realize how much their chaotic family cares last this weekend we celebrate the mothers grandmothers and mother figures in our lives their roles have evolved in recent weeks our remote learning and this quote is very fitting to the world you are a mother but to your family you are the world happy Mother's Day and simply put thank you
good afternoon this is Mike Morris superintendent of schools here in Amherst and I want to thank everyone for coming in and tuning in to this second episode of councillors corner in today's is today's focus is parenting during times of uncertainty and certainly that promotes a lot of anxiety for families and for students for all of us actually in educators as well and today we're joined by Karen Peters and Sharon and sherry bells on oh excuse me from the high school and somewhere to the format we had last time both Karen and sherry you're gonna share some thoughts some experiences they have and an offer some tips and the second half will open it up for questions and comments so if you are a view turning in you can see on the right side you should be able to put comments and questions in and especially that second half we'll be able to show those on the screen and you'll be able to get some feedback from our experts here from the counseling world so thank you all for tuning in thank you very much for Karen and sherry for taking time of your busy day on a Friday afternoon we appreciate it and I'm gonna transition and start with sherry who's going to share some of our experiences and we'll get Karen on in a minute sure hi everyone I'm sherry belzoni I'm a school counselor at the high school and I'm gonna be really honest when Karen and I talked about doing this and we talked about parenting here in anxious times I was like oh I'm not so sure I'm the right person I have it soon to be twelve-year-old in two weeks and a 17 year old so a junior in high school so I am living this literally the same as you are I want to start by saying that everyone is doing a great job no matter how it is going whatever you are doing I am sure you are doing a great job Karen and I are here to support you we're here to brainstorm with you and we're just gonna offer you a little bit of background maybe some fine tuning and what things are going and how we'll move on from there so our focus of today is we're gonna talk about well-being connection redefining our expectations we want you to want to make sure that everyone is doing okay we want to really sort of reflect on how things are going and what we could change or what things are going well and share those with each they're Karen's gonna present to you the four s's and then I'm gonna talk a little bit about a fifth s that we've added in and then after that we'll give you some time for questions and answers and hopefully we can all share some of what's working really well and some of what maybe can help each other work a little bit better as we face this challenge of this really uncertain time I'm gonna turn it over to Karen now to introduce herself and talk about the four SS sorry thanks Jerry um I am really happy to be with everyone today as sherry said I'm Karen Peters I am one of the social workers at the high school and I run the bright transition program as we thought about what we wanted to share with all of you today we put together some of the common questions that we've been getting from parents that we've been working with and feelings that we've had ourselves as parents and some of those questions are things like if I'm feeling anxious as a parent is this contagious how am I going to am i transmitting this anxiety into my house what do I do a lot of parents are talking about feeling guilty or worried that they're not doing enough they're not present enough because they're balancing their own job or other children or other demands that they have how do I get unstuck from that some families are saying I think my kids are doing okay and should I be worried what what what should I be feeling if I think my my students are doing okay and then of course I think everyone is talking about how do we continue to manage these long days even with structure even with schedules how do we how do we keep keep this up so those are the questions that sort of our guiding what we thought we wanted to share with you all today and when I'm stuck when I feel overwhelmed and when I'm not sure what to do I look for and I go to the people that have grounded me and anchored me professionally or personally and professionally that one of those people has been dr.
I'm on aunt Donna yeah no no I was on her way in so Maria will step in for this part it's gonna be a week on order we'll call the meeting to order thank you a roll call Dennis bender here I don't eyes on her way more an aura Rick Rowley Wilson so here and now can we have the Pledge of Allegiance yes I purchase legions to the flag of the United States America and which stands one nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for we don't have any closed session report at this time who controls the screen I'm off the screen again you have any public comments we do are they related to closed session I see they're not related closed session um one one item is related to closed session and will need to be read at this time okay the comment is from Christie Croft and it states I wasn't going to comment tonight but my teachers asked me to because of the upcoming resolution that is going to be passed tonight to show appreciation to us a Buddha was disappointed in the decision that was made by this board last meeting to wait until the may revise to offer us anything regarding negotiations to us the district has already and is aware of how much money they get for this year and that is what we are currently negotiating we are not negotiating for next year ad USD is now the only district that is not in the process of settling negotiations for this year the teachers are feeling very unappreciated regardless of any resolution you pass tonight during our last negotiation meeting we came down significantly and what we were asking for in total compensation because we realize what this pandemic will likely bring the district in the future and will always bargain in good faith we ask that instead of passing a resolution of appreciation tonight you give direction to the district to settle the contract and show the certificated members your appreciation thank you and good night okay so any other conference for closed session Kylie that's the only public comment and that is the only public comment for a closed session item okay so do you want to make a motion to go into closed session okay we will go into closed session and this will the group will stay Kylie will leave and Jason will leave and the live stream will stop yeah we're gonna see if the if we can go into an on stream hey Mike commander thank you this is Jason Buchanan are you getting up there you go do you guys see anything on your screen mr.
before that on January 23rd Mr scavali and Mr ranchetti presented the preliminary Budget on March 10th Mr Ashanti presented the tentative budget and today Mr rashanti will present the budget for 2020 2021. thanks to his diligence and attention to detail the tax rate has not changed since the January 23rd meeting this maintains our small class sizes we are able to protect our programs and class size despite a 1.4 million dollar decrease in state aid budgeting is curriculum no curriculum initiatives happen without money budgets are also based on what's happening right now in normal years this is difficult and this year there are even more things that could change very quickly assembly bill a3902 would allow the delay of property tax to the school districts property tax revenues make up about 78 percent of the Evesham School District revenues which is approximately 5 million dollars per month if property taxes are not paid it would affect our ability to pay our employees there is also assembly bill a3904 which requires a school district to pay all employees Monies to them whether or not they are working the state has also moved the fiscal year from June 30th to September 30th which means that state aid payments which we would receive in July will not be received until October we do not get our budget for federal funding until June these are the title programs if we could have a reduction and then that would have to be made up with local funds the analysis of our budget does provide some good news and that is not just my opinion could I have the next slide please absolutely the New Jersey Department of Ed has a taxpayer's guide to educational spending for 2019.
Rex dr. X I know we have prepared remarks I know there's already been a question asked or several questions asked from a board member her bald which I think are all on our minds among others so if you will if you can give us your report thank you thank you this is dr. Rex and yes I do have an updated list of information that I'd like to share with you at the end of that sharing if there's additional questions I will be happy to answer them good afternoon president Nigro and ASDB board members on March 17th ASD bees world changed as we know it we were thrust into a situation that did not just affect our students staff and stakeholders but rather it affected our state our nation and our world our 16th President of the United States Abraham Lincoln once said I'm a firm believer in the people if given the truth they can be depended on to meet any crisis the great point is to bring them the real facts over the past weeks the ASDB administration has been providing facts and directives in real-time adjusting to new information as it came in with sometimes changes occurring daily we know we can always improve on communication but ASDB leadership has taken the challenge to inform our staff to help better serve our students and it is proving to be successful for many of our leaders here at ASDB when the kovat 19 pandemic arrived they were determined to give information to support staff so we met daily facts were disseminated as soon as possible our teachers and staff that provide educational opportunities have been challenged to provide instruction to our students in a remote format in spite of the new delivery reality they have risen to the challenge and we supported them with means to deliver service and opportunities to work with each other to share ideas and strategies there has been no easy route through the past eight weeks besides the obvious problem of selecting the correct correct path to take our instructional leadership faced monumental tasks of consistency reassuring staff persuading them to follow through on decisions and operating on limited information in a very short period of time one wrong move and we could have eroded the trust that has been built but the ASDB staff has been strong flexible innovative and truly seeking any and all ways to support our students as they are home for the remainder of the school year we have found unique ways to connect with each other our students and we keep pushing out the message that we are here to help educate and we are continuing school in a time when our teachers are usually wrapping up their instructional learning activities in their classrooms beginning there into the year activities wondering what students will be in their classes next year where they'll be teaching classroom wise their current reality is dramatically different than last year and now they are focused on will everyones internet work today during my lesson how are we collecting all the equipment that our students use for access for their learning at the end of the year will remote learning be how we begin next year all the typical year-end activities challenges and stressors they've changed you had my report that was submitted for your review but in the time that I gave it to Leticia to prepare for this meeting new information is now available and as we have done for our staff throughout the past few weeks I would like to update you with the most current information this information is on instructional opportunities we are serving information that we are getting and receiving an actual data from the birth to five ELP program our schools and our cooperatives the ELP program has experienced many successes as well as challenges along the way and to demonstrate some examples of this our parent toddler classes that were once held on-site are now being held online for families one parent had this to say about this opportunity quote I found the group very informative it was helpful to get input on ways to use our skills we're learning and a sounding board to help stimulate my son I knew the basic concepts but I didn't know actly how to implement this as part of his therapy and I appreciate the help one of our preschool teachers had this to say about the last two months for instructional delivery quote this is an uphill battle but I would do it again for my students knowing that maybe those 10 minutes I saw one of my kids is making a tiny tiny difference I can't wait until I can hug them for real again the day I'm allowed to do that I will be on their doorstep this is an important note for our board the number of families that we serve on the Navajo Nation has been affected a few of our teachers in northern Arizona have lost almost their entire caseloads but we will continue to reach out and be available for them as they are available to receive our services at this time we are respecting their request to allow them to heal and stay healthy some quick facts about ELP since the school closures in birth to three deaf or hard of hearing statewide blind and visually impaired in northern and southern Arizona the ELP is contacted 90% 96 excuse me 96 percent of their families they are providing services to 37 percent of the families at least one time a week they are providing services to 43 percent of the families at least every other week eighty-five percent of our families are receiving services are doing so through video conferencing like zoom the rest of them are using the phone emails and text messages we are periodically checking in with 17% of families at their request three percent of the families prefer no contact at this time 17 percent of our families have children turning 3 during our school closures 79 percent of these families have opted to continue with the birth to three service plan until our regular schools are open for them at the preschools on the Tucson campus and Phoenix Day School for the Deaf for preschool we are providing service to 82 percent of the families at least one time a week we are providing services to 4 percent of the families at least every other week 86% of our families receiving services are doing so through video conferencing while the rest are using phones emails and text messages in the preschool we are periodically checking in on 6% of our families and 8% of our families in the preschool want no contact at this point in time an update on the Tucson campus all 125 students on the Tucson campus have been contacted and are being provided educational opportunities the engagement level of these opportunities varies between grade levels and families some of our students are fully engaged others getting contact and actual time to work with kids has been a bit hit and miss but our teachers and our related service providers and counselors are checking in at a minimum of once a week the educational opportunities are being delivered through zoom Google meet Google classroom email phone and through paper instructional packets these are being mailed home the school currently mails 25 packets out to students each week in these twenty five packets cover 20% of the student population that has chosen this option the pdsd campus has been led by Nancy Alexander amber AB kinetise Flint fears and Jill Voigt as Courtney Fritz is was on maternity leave and as you know Courtney is very organized and she had planned out the time very well and all the roles and responsibilities were very clear and then the pandemic came and the plans changed but at this time I'd like to give a shout out to the team they adjusted they stepped up during this difficult time in our assistant principals with the support of Nancy Alexander made things happen great ideas planning execution of what needed to be done for our staff and our students it was truly impressive in our k2 grades we have 37 out of 40 students that have been reached and are actively learning in our third through fifth grade we have 44 out of 46 students that have been reached and our active students participating in educational opportunities in a variety of ways some are doing packets some are doing story time through zoom some have some one-on-one interaction through zoom other resources such as Khan Academy Moby max and all sorts of other instructional things that we have when school is regular in session have been made accessible to our students in our six to eighth grade 50 out of 58 students have been reached and are actively learning these students are participating through zoom classroom and some are using email our teachers continue to have their Google classroom sites updated and work is posted and submitted electronically zoom sessions are used to teach and clarify content and our middle school teachers have been checking in with their homeroom students daily in our high school 101 out of 101 students have currently been reached and are active students are participating in educational opportunities through the same resources and at this time we anticipate that 40% of the high school students will be improving their letter grade from the third quarter which shows that things are happening 25% of our high school students have earned at least half a credit or more through our IDI option courses during the closure alone students in the high school are continuing to work online in various subjects we have zoom meetings that are occurring with adoption staff students and we still have our online facilitator from pdsd to help with those courses all of our teachers have attempted to reach out multiple times to students that we have been unsuccessful and unfortunately for those few when we continue to have no luck and they have dropped off completely but we have not given up and we continue to reach out both skits to that excuse me both schools have continued to develop activities that will continue student engagement school spirit and pride and ways to continue to grow and learn some examples we have teachers dressing up to keep students engaged and excited I've seen some costumes I've seen unicorns and minions and one of our teacher has driven to a student's house several times in order to provide sticker charts because of some behavior management and social distancing is definitely practiced but the student is very excited when they see their teacher some students get so excited for their teachers to be welcomed into their home through zoom and they get to see their rooms or their toys or their pets as they continue to connect during these lessons we have a teacher that is currently learning Arabic so she can communicate better with the family that she is serving a couple of our students we even have a group of high school students that reached out to a teacher and have requested to do a play and they have selected a play and they meet by Zoom two times a week and they go through the play we have students that have finished their coursework and have asked to take on more classes and want to try to earn another half credit so our schools even though we're not in one place we are reaching out to many places and now to our cooperatives our cooperatives have been busy gathering data developing systems to collect information consistently and ensuring our statewide itinerant services are developing their quality assurances and our information will be easy to retrieve all cooperatives have reached out to their districts and I have the following data to share with regard to our cooperative students we are currently serving 274 district and charter schools with instruction our cooperative serve 1298 students statewide of those 1298 students we have reached out and made contact with 1146 of the students we are serving right now 77% are continuing to receive direct instruction 15% are receiving consultative is consultative instruction service and we are still seeking to connect and support those 77 students statewide that we are missing we do have six percent of our total families that are refusing service at this time as of today's date and to let you know our directors in each cooperative are working with their districts and the families to address concerns and needs as they come up there are weekly update meetings held to gather information make follow-up calls reach back out to families special education directors and to develop plans to support our students that we are serving my final update is a board action item that you will have the opportunity as board members to vote on in a moment I have submitted a recommendation for the contract for the Phoenix Day School for the Deaf principalship for 2020 2020 one school year - Courtney Fritz Courtney Fritz had resigned this position and did not sign a contract in hopes to be able to stay home with her daughters and support her husband's new career opportunity to let the board know that I did post the pdsd principal position the pdsd staff developed ideas and concepts of what they needed for school leadership for a principal through a survey from that we developed questions along with research-based behavioral questions that are used to hire a principal the plan was to have a screening committee submit names for interviews and a rubric was used there was an interview panel that was selected with agency representation as well as pdsd staff we conducted interviews unfortunately no one candidate internally or externally had enough support to move this plan forward the position of a k-12 principal is challenging due to the great span and no one candidate was able to demonstrate through this interview process the necessary skills experience confidence and attributes during this selection process along with the kovat 19 challenges and changes to how will be doing school in the future it became apparent to Annette Reichman and myself that we needed to develop another plan to support the students the staff and the parents of pdsd we have many steps in preparing for the 2020 2021 school year in August and I cannot think of a better team by offering Courtney Fritz this position and keeping the current assistant principals to help move this forward I'm a firm believer in our ASDB staff and I've seen it firsthand during this crisis with the information they've been given great opportunities to learn for students has been delivered by our staff I am in awe of some of the creative innovative stories that I've heard over these last couple months or we excuse me seems like months and I hope this information helps you as a board see the dedication and determination of ASDB thank you thank you dr.
Petrovic on the line so we're all here for our live meeting thank you thank you right now we're gonna have a moment of silence followed by the pledge so good morning we're having a special meeting this morning and I move that we approve this agenda second all those in favor aye aye motion carries 5-0 so now we're going to move on consent agenda items and I move that we approve approve the intergovernmental agreement between higley Unified School District and Mesa distance learning program services second any questions or comments president Kaler yes mrs. Ruiz I just want to thank dr. Foley for putting this together and my fellow board members coming together so quickly so we can try and get this moving I think it's a win-win situation or a win-win-win I think it's a great thing for the Mesa school district for their distance learning I think it's a great thing for Higley but above all I think it's a good opportunity for our higly students so keeping them in mind and moving quickly and putting this together very fast I just wanted to say thank you yes dr.
dan Siegel who is a clinical psychiatrist out of UCLA and has written tons of parenting books and books on interpersonal neurobiology I strongly recommend his work and I wanted to share some of the I think foundation some of a chemise done that has guided me as a parent and that I've shared with parents over the years in my practice and so these are four s's and what dr. Siegel talks about is these four s's are great in parenting they're great in relationships and they're great to work on with our relationship with ourselves and I imagine as sherry said that most of you are doing these things already and I find that in these anxious uncertain times it's really helpful to take some time take a few minutes and reflect on those things and maybe organize them a little bit better for myself as I continue to do my work of parenting and supporting families so I'm going to run through these four s's I'm going to highlight some of the things that I feel like are essential and important and then I'm going to turn it back over to sherry to share some other things so the first s when I share what the flores's are first to say you know it's coming so safety feeling soothed secured and seen so the first one is safety and we know that this is important always and particularly in times of distress kids need our help feeling safe psychologically this helps turn their reactive brains back to a receptive brain that can be flexible that can take in information and that can do some good reasoning so one of the ways to help promote safety in our children when they're in distress is coming to them with gentle loving responses when there are behaviors present I don't know about you but this is hard for me and this is hard for lots of reasons for parents it can be hard because the behaviors activate something in us perhaps that's connected to you the way we were parented or things just in our makeup that that push our buttons so doing that gentle loving responses is difficult and it's something that can help promote safety sitting with them actually getting down on their levels sitting next to them being close to them empathizing validating and if you tuned in last week and know that the counselors talked a lot about these concepts which are so critical to supporting safety and our children and this is not agreeing right this is not saying oh yeah that makes perfect sense you don't have to do any of those things this means that your feelings are valid they're true for you and I hear you when I'm struggling to do those gentle loving responses or empathize and validate one of the things and I'm sort of moved towards maybe being rigid or barking a bunch of orders one of the things that I like to do is just this idea of sportscasting or just narrating what I'm seeing so this might look like oh you really don't want to put your toys away and brush your teeth and get ready for bed you're really having a good time in what that does is that's connecting us that's helping to integrate their experiences with my experiences and it's giving me a little bit of time to slow myself down the last piece about safety is leave the teaching for later right we know that when we're activated and when our brains are reactive we're not open to hearing directions or hearing why what we did is not okay or why we should do something different right so to leave the teaching for later and really focus on the feelings we all yell and make mistakes right we all say and do things we wish we didn't and so the act actually the last piece of this is own and apologize if you react in a way that doesn't feel right doesn't feel good to you this really helps maintain connection which is what it's all about when we're able to do this with our children when we're able to say oh I killed I wish I didn't yell I was really upset by what happened and what we're maintaining that connection and we're helping to build resiliency okay all right so that was 50 so the next s is soothed right and we know that being soothed is one of the things we need to help slow our heart rate down and regulate our nervous system again so that we can get back on line with our thinking brain so that our emotional or sort of our fight flight freeze brain is not in control one of the things I learned from dr.
Rowley mr. bender can you hear me okay good now I see myself alright just waiting for you to let me see if I can move you gonna have a pop up or anything to you is there a pop up on your screen anywhere or something showing up because you should be in the closed session I can see myself I only see two participants yeah that would be you and I yeah so what do I need to click I haven't click anything I just leave it alone I'm gonna try moving you around and see if that helps so I hate should I join the breakout oh yes yes during the breakout room you thank you Jason Maria you're always the first one in you you've got this wired minimum yeah okay there's Kylie perfect let's let her get her screen up and there we go okay so if we can call the meeting to order and we're going to do the Pledge of Allegiance ready I pledge allegiance to the flag Kylie do you have any reports from the California School Employees Association CSEA I do okay mike coffman CSEA chapter president for chapter eight to eight I just want to wish everyone good health I like many of our classified hope to be back to work soon normally we have been working hard on finding a solution to the high cost of our health and welfare insurance we have a tentative agreement ready for the ratification from our chapter soon if passes this will be sent for your approval to you the board this was one of the hardest decisions we as negotiation team had to make because no one really wins I am so very proud of our classified unit who have been there for our students I wish for you to share those sediments I wish you all the best stay safe and I hope to see you all in person soon thank you and then from Apple Valley Unified Teachers Association Aveda I do this is from Buddha president Christy Croft good evening board members distance learning is in full swing and is going as well as expected we have noticed the disparities among students but we've also seen parents step up and really help out their children lastly a whole new appreciation has been formed for the school and the people that work there whether it's classified teachers counselors coaches or admin they realize what we all do to make each day occur for every student what they don't realize is how much we miss seeing and teaching them every day and this has made us know that we are all in it for the right reason we don't know what will happen in the fall but what we do know is that we can teach anywhere and in any situation we need to just tell us what you need from us thank you and good night thank you under closed session and I'm gonna do read read the action taken in closed session in closed session the Board of Trustees took action in support of the following recommendation from the superintendent be for conference with label on litigation on a motion government code section 54957 Wilson so and seconded it by Maria Parra the board voted unanimously to approve the claim of Maria Silencio in closed session the Board of Trustees took action in support of the following recommendation from the superintendent be-what for conference on litigation Government Code section by four nine five four point five D B Pruitt vs.
Evesham is in a group of 74 districts that a k to eight with 751 students or more the budgeted cost for 2018-19 that's the most recent year available we are number 30 of 74 that's budgetary costs per pupil we're right in the middle of our group that means we're not spending too much money or too little money on our students indicator number eight is very impressive total Administration per pupil ranking within the group we are the number one lowest spending District of 74 districts indicator 9 administrative salaries and benefits we're number eight of 74. again very near the bottom of the um 74 group indicator 13 extracurricular clubs are pure per pupil ranking is number 36 of 74. this is good because it indicates we're spending not too much money or too little money on clubs and activities indicator 19 is the ratio of Faculty to administrative personnel and we are number four of the group 74.
Rex that was quite a bit of information I will pause now to have any other board members give their or ask any questions of dr. Rex so please again as we mentioned at the start of the call please raise your hand or otherwise indicate that you'd like to be called upon I I will look to see if I could acknowledge someone on the video okay I see Linda I'm still swiping through I see Linda both Linda I will give you the floor right now thank you thank you dr. Rex thank you so much for that detailed report I really appreciate that I was reviewing it online as well as a lot of information but I did want to take this opportunity to make a comment and then also I have a question so as being a part of the board we do need to give lots of praise to this team and all that they have done the staff and the teachers and the students learning remotely I mean making this possible has been pretty amazing I've heard some wonderful stories from the community and from your staff and it has really been challenging for them but such a good experience as well as they've moved forward and implemented in such a quick timeframe and I am just very proud of the staff and the board is very proud we need to congratulate everyone on this test that you have completed thank you very much and also Annette thank you for your vision and moving forward with that secondly I do have a question related I am curious actually how will everything work out as far as Courtney continuing to be principal this coming year at PTSD and what is the vision and what that might look like for this new year I'm just curious what the vision is and I'm curious to learn as well do you mind sharing your plans I can this is Kristin excuse me I can share a little bit of plans this plan came together last week literally we have plans to bring Courtney back we have plans to do some internal leadership learning experiences for our current assistant principals and there are other people in the agency that want to learn and grow we are really starting to understand the critical need to grow our own leadership Courtney will be a part of that planning we will be meeting with the three assistant principals this summer and working through all that we probably need to and I don't want to steal Annette's thunder we probably need to work on what the business of school will be in August and she probably will give you more information on that but I have every faith that with Courtney moving forward they are not going to skip a skip a step they are adjusting these three assistant principals have had some on-the-job training that no one could be prepared for and I think all four of them stepping back into their roles will bring about consistency and commitment and our students are going to be better better for our decision so I think Courtney can probably elaborate upon that in the future and if this board would like me to send my most updated information through Leticia to you so you can see all the statistics I would be happy to do that because I was gathering it all today and putting it together and synthesizing it so I will be happy to forward my information if that will help any of you with the actual data because I know I gave you a lot but honestly I couldn't cut it because it was all so important okay thank you and thank you Linda are there any other board members that have questions or comments for dr.
Foley you've done so much in such a short amount of time we're very grateful do you want to just kind of explain a little bit just so that everybody can understand what this intergovernmental agreement will be please yes so this intergovernmental agreement will give us an opportunity this summer to have access to one of the best online curriculums that are available so that we can offer some credit earning a potential or our students this summer quickly there is some unique legislation with House bill 29:10 that allows for summer school this summer for June and July opportunities and so hence districts are looking for ways to provide options and this is a curricular option that is very high quality and will allow us our students to have access to this as part of our summer offerings so the quick movement here was to allow us to begin advertising but right away to our families and them to get an enrolled in this agreement will allow us access to that curriculum and president and just to clarify also for anybody it's it's two semesters that kids can take so in case anybody hears and things they're gonna take no for or five courses it's to one semester course one one course credit for the year or two semesters the government an econ or an American history yep thank you for clarifying mister what ovitch do you have anything that you'd like to add or say no questions thank you thank you yes I think this is a great opportunity for our students to have credit earning ability as well as our recovery that we normally offer so again thank you for the hard work to get this going and thank you to Mesa as well for allowing us to tap into this great curriculum that we can offer this for our students I just have one president Kaler so I often think a lot about our our students and this would be a good opportunity for them to take a class so that they didn't have to get up before the crack of dawn if they wanted to get ahead it's a unique opportunity and if if action item number four passes it would be at no cost to them so it's a good opportunity and anyway and and I'll just add to that too that not only are our but then it opens up their schedules if they like to explore more of our CTE options which we're always kind of pushing as well in our districts so they can explore other opportunities so again great opportunity and I hope even my own children will consider this this summer although they're nocturnal now so I don't know I guess they can do their class online at night but okay if there's not any other further questions or concerns all those in favor aye I heard you mister what ovitch motion carries 5-0 and now on to the really good stuff here I make a motion that the governing board approves ways waiving the second summer school fees for the months of June and July of 2020 second again any questions or concerns no comments nothing all right well I think this is just gonna be a fabulous summer for our higley students and I'm extinction to get that communication out ASAP and again thank you for all you do I don't know if the rest of the board knows this but on top of all the other things that dr.
Siegel is this idea he uses this hand model to teach children and parents and anybody about what the what's going on in the brain actually it's like this so with really young kids I might put a little puppet inside and talk about their little brain and then this is their big brain but the idea here you know this is our brain stem this part up here our cortex our thinking brain where we can engage in good reasoning and we're being thoughtful we're flexible and there are times when we are so reactive that we flip our lid and we're not doing those things and then this part of our brain the limbic system and the brainstem that control our those survival instincts that site flight freeze and our emotions are in charge this is when we're reacting big and we're not engaged with with that part of our brain and we can become more aware of our triggers and our inner our buttons and not flip our lid as much and ask for help when those things come up so I find this tool to be really useful I have some students that will sometimes just come down and be like I'm here I'm here and with really little kids we like I said we talked about the the little brain and the big brain and may use some some puppets but dr.
Abel USD on a motion by Wilson so seconded by Maria Okara the board voted unanimously to deny the claim of Barbara Pruitt and then under adoption of the agenda the board may approve the agenda as is or add or pull items from the consent agenda for discussion and or action we need to adopt the agenda as is need a motion Rick Rowley made a motion Rick I think you're muted that's okay I gotcha I need a second I'll second it thank you and then under a vote mr. bender I just need a yes or no thank you mr. Dave mrs. Davis yeah mr. Parra yes mr. Raleigh and mr. Sol yes thank you and next is D information discussion information d1 is presentation local control accountability plan and mr. Slusser yes I just wanted to share very quickly some of the changes that have been made regarding the El Cap and some of those timelines I'll share just a couple of words that you can see just how that's gonna play out this year so if you see on the screen there the timelines have been changed so that what is usually an El Cap is coming to you shortly in conjunction with the budget what they have asked for instead this year is an operational written report that will be submitted to the board in June this written report will detail the district's response to the governor's executive order items including remote learning provision of food for the community and our ability to provide childcare support to first responders and so we have received that template and written our response and we'll be bringing that to you in June as we as prescribed the El Cap summary put together with the hard work of our community will actually come along with the budget in June however will not be in the El Cap template because it is not released yet from the state they've changed the template because of this append and so what they are they are not requiring an L cap at this time however we feel responsibility to our district Advisory Committee and we will be bringing that summary forward at least so that they can see that those items that they prioritized and the responses that we're going to give them so that will come to you as an information item and then the new the new order from the governor requires that the yel cap for this one year period or the 2022 2021 school year can't be approved by the board by December 15th of course that's late we will perk on that as soon as the template for that one year L cap is released and then bring that to you as soon as we can but certainly before December 15th probably no later than the November board meeting and then finally the intention is that during the next school year we will be back into a three year L cap development cycle so that by July 1 or again in June of 21 for both of those meetings hearing and adoption will be bringing a three year L cap to you that will be from 21 to 24 so essentially what this has done is push the L cap proper process forward by one year with this provision of a one-year temporary L cap in the meantime and of course our operational written report so that's the information I have at this time I'll pause there did you have a question regarding that one is it the right time so if we approve this one in December of this year is it to help us run through to the end of 2020 2021 school year or is it to finish out the what would what we will be bringing to you prior to December 15th will be for only that school year next next school year yeah 21 thank you yes there's a one-year and by the time you get it it won't even be a one-year l capital essentially be a six-month out cap which is my that's which is why we are pushing up ourselves in our department to do that faster than December but of course we what we need to wait for the template okay under public comment Kylie do we have any public comments we have two comments okay the first comment is from Amber Tremblay and it states with several San Bertino County High School's Etiwanda Barstow and Silverado announcing graduation and senior activity alternatives including a drive-through graduation ceremony at individual appointed times with one to two cars of family members and photo and video opportunities to be streamed later what is Apple Valley Unified School District's plan for our seniors and graduate the second public comment is from Trina Mayer it reads I am putting in some ideas and requesting information for our 2020 seniors I'm thinking summer if not a couple bonfires or social events should be planned and include all classes in lieu of a yearbook signing party and social event some form of formal social dinner or event in lieu of a prom grad night should be postponed to an evening near or after our foreseen graduation I know we are trying hard to have an in-person graduation in June and I am completely grateful for all your efforts I am hoping and desiring social events because these kids did not get the goodbyes and closures they emotionally need their mental and emotional health has been damaged if we can make an effort to recover some that on a small level it would be appreciated this will never replace the 10 plus weeks they did not get to have with friends nor the 13 year long dreams of closing their senior years if we can try to make up for it I also think we can reach out to these senior parents and create groups or committees to help with planning and execution of these or other events I'm sure there are many great parents that are ready willing and able to help their senior recoup all they have lost and hopefully not lost forever or for good if we can help give them at least part of their dream of their senior year back thank you thanks Kylie okay next is superintendent comments and part of my superintendent comments are specifically regarding our seniors and so I'd like to just take a minute and let you you know what we're working on from a district perspective we have continued to meet with principals at the high school and their Co administrators each Wednesday and as we get updates from the Department of Public Health we try to move forward with opportunities we have been very limited in the information and as all of you know as board members last week we believed that we had been given permission to move forward with a face to face graduation and just an hour two hours later we were told they were incorrect and could not we could not do it so after I notified all of you and the principals and we're ready to thank goodness hadn't released it to parents at that point we were told we couldn't so we back stepped and thought what are the other things we could do in tomorrow's newsletter we will cover some of the things we we plan moving forward there's things that we still can't identify as when it will be safe to do so but we are moving forward with some virtual celebration of graduation that goes along with our senior cards this will be something that will televise if we have not opened back up for face to face graduation on their actual graduation day we have several dates in the June in July that we can utilize for a face-to-face graduation we believe that even if we get permission to move forward in that arena meaning a larger gathering and we will be limited in the number of people that could actually enter our stadium with all kinds of provisions in between so just know that there there are two pieces to that we do want to honor any student that is in enlisting or moving out of our area and will do a personalized graduation for those students one-on-one as we find out and we are going to survey our families to find out who is interested in having a face-to-face graduation we believe it's a very large number and so we know we have to plan for that in the future but we do want to know what other things they have an interest in us providing for the students as far as virtual versus the face-to-face so just now those are three things we are working towards the survey we believe will be pushed out sometime early next week through a Google classroom model for all seniors for them to respond as a family and then I want to just make sure that everybody has on their calendars May 22nd if you're available from 9 to 10 a.m.
number four from Nevada those are very impressive figures one of uh very impressive another figure is that our miscellaneous local revenue is almost 3 million dollars it's two million 913 447 it's one of the highest in the whole state even though we are in turbulent times Eve sham is in excellent shape one of the best predictors of success is past performance and we have many highly trained employees our curriculum is academically rigorous and dedicated to the students social and emotional needs all of our departments are exceptionally efficient and effective Personnel special education Transportation custodial maintenance and business Mr Ashanti and I congratulate the board for your steadfast dedication to the Evesham students Mr Shanti watches every penny and is a student-first business administrator with that I'll turn the program over to him hello can you hear me yep okay for some reason I was muted uh thank you Dr LeBron for uh good evening everybody and I'm going to start the budget presentation uh if you're going to advance to the next slide please okay so the presentation will be similar to the um public hearing presentations that we've done in the past so the format is basically the same as previous years so this slide here shows you the changes to our budget since the tentative budget that was approved back on March 11th by the board um as far as revenues go we've had to increase our budgeted fund balance by a little over a little over eight thousand dollars seven seven thousand nine hundred ninety four dollars and the reason for that is when you look at the Appropriations we were able to um create some additional savings through um decreases in staff uh and salaries for retirement and other brokerage of 84 however we had an additional uh special ed placement that we had to put into the budget um at a cost of 92 812 dollars um so we needed to increase our budget to balance the um increased rub uh the increase of preparation so that's why we had to adjust our fund balance by uh a small amount these changes had no impact to the uh tax levy that was presented at the tentative budget next slide please because okay someone um again like we've looked at in the past when you look at the 2020-21 operating budget the revenue side um the first two columns are the uh 2019 uh 2020 budget that um we're currently working with right now and then the next two columns are the 2021 proposed uh budget and then the last two columns gives you to you the uh difference in amounts and the percentage of differences so as you go across the um we look at our budget of fund balance uh in the current budget is um eight point I'm sorry 1.894 million um next year we're budgeting 2.6 million which is an increase of 742 000 um which is up by uh 39 um the local tax levy um last year was a little over 60 million this year it'll be a little over 62 million um up a little over uh two million dollars um and the reason for those two numbers being up when we get to um the fourth line down the state aid our state aid this year's uh 12 12.4 million and next year it'll just be a tad over 11 million down uh one point almost 1.4 million dollars um so um we're having those uh decreases uh in state aid um obviously we have to find other ways to make up uh for what the state's not giving us to uh balance our uh budget for next year further down when you get to the uh federal grants and state grants um this year we're 1.7 uh the proposed budget for next year is 1.5 down but the reason that it's down is we're only allowed the budget 80 of the current year so that way if um the federal grants um get reduced we don't end up with having a deficit in our budget so there's a possibility that it would be higher when we actually get the funding in June however we don't know those numbers until after we have an approved budget and we're required to budget at 80 percent uh Debt Service is about basically the same and this will be the last year for Debt Service after this year our debt service completely falls off and we will no longer have any Debt Service so when you get to the bottom line the total revenues um the current budget is uh 81 million and change uh next year's will be uh 83 million and change so it's up the total budget is up 1.88 million dollars which um is a 2.32 increase in our budget uh next slide please so now uh we're gonna look at the other side the actual uh Appropriations uh you know where we're budgeting the monies that where it's going to be spent at on again same format First Column is the current budget the 1920 the next column is the proposed 2021 budget next column is the difference between the two and then the last column is the percentage of difference so when we start at the top the salaries uh for the current years a little over 48 million uh next year it'll be about 49 uh almost 49.5 million up 1.3 million or at 2.75 percent increase in salaries um the next line is all the employee benefits that go along with the salaries the the FICO workman's comp medical prescription and dental the current budget is at 15.7 million next year it's 15.69 it's basically flat so we were able to um be able to control the costs in that area as far as our our medical and prescription to not have a increase to that budget line and that was done through some of the negotiations that we did with the unions uh over the past um collective bargaining agreements the PRS contribution is for the um non-certified uh staff members all the support staff were required to make a contribution to their pension and that is basically down a little bit um but you know for most part pretty much even but down a little bit other insurances which are General reliability and auto and all those items we've been able to maintain that uh pretty much down a little bit so we've been able to contain those costs as well other District costs again up a tad not not a whole lot but um you know again um for the most part we've been pretty good uh in in that area as well then we get into the different areas of the curriculum technology Personnel basically you know flat um special education that's obviously always an area of concern and that's where the big the biggest part of our budget increase one of the biggest Parts um it's up nine percent uh 313 000.
Rick's raise your and or wave I'm swiping through my dominant iPad right now so okay I see Kellie and Shelley you will have the floor right now okay excellent I'd like to ditto exactly what Linda Bove had just mentioned congratulations to all I know it has been a challenge providing that education the things that those students need especially mental emotional and all of that combined if you don't mind I may have missed it but if you could answer my question related to technology I'm sure there are some area is out there that don't have access to technology I do assume that that's part of the reason why you're sending out packets so I just wanted to clarify that oh yes okay yes okay and then also how do you maintain mailing those packets do they send the packets back how is the handled you have you have a couple of amazing administrators I know that every Tuesday Kelly Chrissy was going in downloading all of the information that the teacher sent for the students packaging it going to the post office mailing it and so it's kind of a back and forth and it's snail mail still works and we're going to do whatever it takes to get information and get information back for kids okay okay and then also what about the counselors being available are they checking in with students and checking in on that some mental and emotional you know abilities and the things that are going on in life especially right now there's seniors as well you know they can't March together they can't celebrate together with their graduating class I mean not only seniors of course we want to check in on all of them but you know they've lost contact with friends they've lost contact with teachers and and related stats has anyone followed up absolutely absolutely all the counselors are connecting with our kids be looking forward to information on how we're going to be celebrating graduation definitely different than in the past we are still honoring our kids the the social-emotional is huge and that's why we've got to open our schools again this is this has done its job but this is not what kids need for the whole package it we've helped with academics we're helping with the social-emotional but we need to be back in school without a doubt it's hard to replicate what a school is but we are we're making small strides but we have room to grow and learn absolutely great question all right great thank you for that okay Thank You Shelley there's anyone else I'll take another scroll through and I don't see anyone else I have just a couple of questions dr.
Foley's been working on for us she also took five courses at NAU this past year for her superintendent certificate and these are courses she could have taught so I mean again thank you for all that you're doing you you've really been a blessing to Higley so thank you for for this dr. Foley do you sleep at all okay all those in favor aye [Music] motion carries 5-0 and with that our special meeting I move that we adjourn second all those in favor aye aye aye stay well my friends meeting adjourned
Siegel has some great videos online if you're interested in learning more about that so soothing being aware of that that reactivity so that we can get back to a receptive state some things for children that can be helpful gentle touch hugging doesn't work for everybody but for some that's enough to sort of start that slowing down of their nervous system being aware of our energy is really important as we're trying to soothe another so a simple typical example might be your kid falls down right ah you fell oh my gosh right so what happens they escalate more they may cry more when we can come at it with a curious sort of more more balanced approach oh my goodness look you fell ah right let me see what's going on our kids are feeling that energy and we're right there with them when we need help sort of getting our energy reregulate it and sort of in a place where we can share and we can help soothe again we're helping kids get into that receptive state this is not easy to do in addition to being aware of our of when we're flipping our lid when we notice those things there's some some practical things we can do in those moments like I talked about sports casting to help slow the time down breathing I can't I can't skate enough the power of breathing before we react and for a lot of people the important thing here is the shift of ratio so that maybe in four four breaths hold for seven out for four so I'm just gonna practice that right now so in four four and I'm gonna hold for seven and out for four and again that's slowing down my heart rate that's increasing oxygen flow to my brain that's getting me back on line here so that I can make better decisions and how long did that take us another thing this is very simple and my daughter actually does this sometimes because I do it so often is just hand on heart hand on abdomen and there's something about this that research has shown that 98% of people find comfort in doing this I'm not really sure why so I might switch and then figure out which one is more comfortable for you but this is something you can do as you notice your buttons are getting pushed or that you're feeling a worried or anxious before you speak before you engage for you interact trying that for a minute this also helps us and I'd say the last part of soothing is tending to the heart before we focus on those consequences right whatever happened is valid for them tending to the heart helps keep that connection and keep us regulated before we're asking them to see our perspectives okay so we've done safety and soothing halfway through okay so the next one is seen this is the idea of feeling felt right in school we talked a lot about Pb Pb is a positive behavior support catching kids doing something good when I think about feeling felt and when I think about seeing I think about acknowledging kids for doing something positive or good for no reason telling them something specific that you like about them being curious about their interests acknowledging their effort or their struggle appreciating their progress in something and showing them some gratitude so this might be as simple as I love having you as a daughter I love being your mom I really and notice these interesting things you're building with your Legos can you tell me about it why did you choose this I'm curious over the past two months I can't tell you how many mud suits I have tasted over time because that's what my daughter is into right now and so taking a few minutes to really share that and see that and ask about it increases our connection reflecting on something that you enjoyed even if it is very small there's a Verret there's a lot of power and that for four kids yesterday I really enjoyed sitting with you all we both read a book together it was really fun for me or I loved playing cards with you or thank you so much for helping me set the table yesterday so those are some ways that we can help our our kids feel seen okay and the last one is secure and dr.