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welcome to join a conference now please enter a meeting number followed by pound if you are the meeting host please enter your pen otherwise press pound to continue right do you have her already gavin do you want me to wait sheila can you hear me sheila i got it i had to do it twice no problem okay you're good all right i'm not sure if i'm good or not but that's okay you're good you're on already okay good evening sorry for the delay this is june 30th for a special board meeting we also have a need for an executive session and the information is as follows item 1 1.01 call for executive session pursuant to ars 383 0.03 a and 1 to discuss the potential appointment of dr joyce meyers as executive director of talent management human relations there is a need for that executive session is there a motion dr santa cruz i'll move that we move to executive session thank you mr carr is there a second second thank you ms eugetti moved and seconded any discussion seeing none we will take a vote those in favor of moving to executive session please signify by saying aye aye those opposed motion carries 5-0 we will move to executive session of first floor conference room and reconvene or convene the board meeting upon our return our return thank you [Music] hey test test thursday friday beautiful [Music] is okay uh oh okay [Music] miss you jenny are you on the phone miss you jetty mr jetty miss you jetty can you hear us just having a couple of technical difficulties but we'll go ahead and get started miss eugetti is out of state and we will connect with her shortly she will be calling in i'm sure there'll be a bit of an interruption as that happens we apologize for the delay we were just in executive session and so i would like to call this meeting of the gilbert school governing board to order it's tuesday june 30th this is a special board meeting miss eugenie can you hear us can you hear me now yes i can hear you yes thank you okay thank you so we've called the meeting to order we will start with a moment of silence and then i will lead us in the pledge please remember cindy wood teacher from desert ridge junior high school as you engage in your moment of silence please stand as we engage in that please join me in the pledge i pledge allegiance to the flag of the united states of america the united states of america for which it stands with liberty and justice for all very good thank you for that we are now at item 2.04 the roll call miss wilson would you please help us with that miss laurie wood here mr reed clark here michela eugetti here miss jill humphries here dr charles santa cruz here mr president all boar members are present you have a quorum thank you ms wilson please add item 2.05 to your agenda we need to approve tonight's agenda that is not listed for us i will entertain a motion for approving tonight's agenda dr santa cruz i motioned that we approve tonight's agenda but in doing so move item 6.01 uh ahead of item 3.01 thank you mr car is there a second second thank you mrs humphries any discussion seeing none we will then take a vote all those in favor of approving tonight's agenda moving 6.01 to just before item 3.01 please signify by saying i i those oppose the same hi motion carries five zero four members we will move to item 6.01 prior to the presentation dr mccord do you have some introductory remarks i do thank you dr santa cruz governing board members tonight i bring to you as a recommendation for the executive director of talent management for human relations dr joyce meyer dr meyer has been principal at mesquite high school for this past year before that she was in chandler and before that she was here in gilbert public schools where she started her career as well as was a parent of two graduates from gilbert schools so she's our recommendation thank you dr mccord item 6.01 is before you board members we'll entertain a motion i move to approve the appointment of dr joyce meyer as the executive director of talent talent management human relations for the 20 20 21 school year thank you mrs humphries ms eugetti i would like to second that thank you it's been moved and seconded is there any discussion seeing none dr santa cruz i would comment i don't know if anyone in the public comment has requested to address this particular item but if they have i think it'd be worth acknowledging the public before we make the vote thank you and i don't see any requests to speak to that item dr santa cruz would could i so go right ahead miss i i would like to just say that i i am so glad we are having this position and we could not have anybody better than dr joyce meyer you we appreciate that additional remarks or commentary seeing none we will vote all those in favor of approval of item 6.01 that is the appointment of dr joyce meyers as executive director of talent management human relations for the 2020-2021 school year will please signify by saying i i i those are those opposed the same motion carries five zero we'll move to item three points dr santa cruz can we have miss dr meyer oh yes i wanted just to roll right back i know i appreciate that i know she was okay with it too congratulations dr meyer my apologies i was just in a hurry there who do want to hear from you congratulations thank you i just want to take this moment to thank you dr santa cruz and the governing board this is an amazing opportunity and i look forward to serving gilbert public schools i do want to thank dr mccord for his trust in me and his leadership i've had an amazing year at mesquite high school so i can't leave without saying thank you wildcats and i'm forever a wildcat so great place to make my last school stop so thank you thank you mr myers [Applause] and thank you for the interruption there dr mccord we'll now move to item 3.01 a plan to reopen schools a presentation for the 2021 school year dr mccord would you want to introduce that thank you dr santa cruz governing board members first of all to everybody welcome this evening thank you for attending our special board meeting those that could be here in person i know there's several people online this is a very highly anticipated uh presentation before we get going i'd like to just read some remarks that i was thinking about um over the last couple days and i wanted to put them on paper just so um everyone could hear uh this evening we'd like to present to you our reopening plan for the 2020-2021 school year but first i'd like to take you back to monday march 9th that was the day when reality set in for me as superintendent regarding the coronavirus it was spring break and i just finished putting up some shiplap on my island in my kitchen uh everything was right in the world i was pretty proud of what i accomplished and is feeling pretty good about my woodworking abilities i remember sitting on the couch that evening and the news was on the newscaster was talking about the potential widespread of the virus in arizona this of course piqued my interest because just before spring break we called our crisis team together to discuss preliminary plans if the virus hit arizona likely to hit the state of washington or the country of italy at that time i'm not sure anyone in the room really thought it would be something to worry about when i went to work in the morning on march 10th i knew things were going in a different direction as we made our way through the week i knew the clock was ticking and we had to make a decision regarding starting school up again after spring break on friday march 13th we decided to close down the district it definitely wasn't a popular decision nor an easy one but i believe it was the right one a couple days later governor ducey closed down all the schools for the remainder of the school year our teachers support staff principals technology department teaching and learning department all stepped up to create the best remote learning experience for our students as we possibly could given the amount of time we had to put that in place the experience wasn't perfect by any means for our students or our staff but it was close to perfect as we could get our operations department and nutrition services department sanitized our schools and fed our students while we were closed as a superintendent i don't know if i can remember a time when i've been more proud and honored to work with such amazing people we made it through the rest of the quarter and even had a virtual graduation which wasn't perfect either we knew that we had to focus on reopening our school system come august 5th so we assembled a task force comprised of 130 administrators educators support staff and parents the goal of the task force was to offer options for opportunities to learn when we returned to school many hours many lengthy discussions a few tears and even a few laughs went into the making of the reopening plan our assistant superintendent of teaching and learning dr barbara newman headed up the task force and has been the glue that has held all of this together we've reviewed this presentation modified it reviewed it again and modified it again and reviewed it and modified it again and at noon yesterday it was ready to go then at 3 pm yesterday governor ducey held a press conference regarding an update on the pandemic in arizona cases have been steadily on the rise and that has been concerning for many including our students staff and families during governor ducey's press conference he announced an executive order pertaining to schools here's a portion of that executive order states all schools shall delay the start of in-person classes for the year that begins july 1st 2020 until august 17 but schools may begin the year on their regularly planned start date prior to august 17 2020 through distance learning now obviously this executive order made eyebrows go up and jaws drop this executive order threw a wrinkle into what you may hear tonight but it doesn't change our approach to what we can offer students when we return before dr newman starts a presentation i'd like to say this to our students you've been through so much in the last four months and as a father as an educator and as a superintendent i wish i could change all of that for you i'm truly sorry for what you've had to endure but i'm very very proud of your resiliency and your grit and to our staff thank you thank you for caring about our students thank you for going several extra miles to get the job done and thank you for your unselfish hearts we know that in times of crisis everyone reacts differently it's human nature what i want you to know is that i've heard your thoughts concerns or your lack of concern your fears or your lack of fear please know none of your words have fallen on deaf ears our plan that we will present to you tonight will not be perfect but i promise you we will do all we can to make our students educational experience and our employees work experience as safe and as gratifying as we possibly can we won't have all the answers tonight but we will do all we can to get those answers to make everyone feel more at ease i love this school district i love our students and families and i love working with some of the most amazing people in the world gilbert public schools has been around for over a hundred years it's been successful for one reason and one reason only and that's the people it works with and serves now here's dr newman thank you good evening dr santa cruz governing board members and dr mccord thank you could you speak into the mic a little bit more please sir thank you good evening dr santa cruz governing board members and dr mccord what we have for you here is as dr mccord mentioned the plan that we have created and the reason why we created it is because we want to provide the best educational experience for our students and also choices for our families dr mccord mentioned 130 more than 130 committee members we had our advisory committee we had subcommittees in addition to that we had just under 26 000 survey responses we had additional feedback whether that be emails or that be meetings or phone calls conversations a lot of conversations with teachers and administrators techs and support staff tonight's presentation um different than before is going to be more of the sharing of the plan instead of subcommittee reports which we had considered previously our guiding principles through all of this work was to be sure that we were and everyone understood that we were obligated to find ways to serve all of our students even during times of disruption when remote learning requires them to connect from home we're responsible for the needs and meeting those needs of all of our students whether that be from low-income backgrounds students with disabilities and our english language learners we know that decisions are best made by consulting those closest to the problem including school leaders health officials community leaders and of course our community and our parents we added a fourth guiding principle as we began and we worked through our work and that was resource limitations to include product availability and funding levels must be considered to ensure that we operate in a fiscally responsible manner so through those guiding principles we determined what our commitments were to our community and to each other we wanted to be sure that we're ensuring the health and safety of our students staff and families provide a high quality education for all of our students ensure the social emotional well-being of our students staff and families we wanted to offer choices based on what's best for our students academically and for their health and wellness which includes both in-person and online learning options provide support to students who experience a disruption in their learning due to sickness or future closures and also we've added our last commitment which was create a plan that is flexible that could be modified as circumstances change and as you already know plans have already changed and so our plans are fluid so due to that disruption whether that be a disruption for an individual student whether that be disruption for a classroom for a campus or an entire state we want to be sure that we're able to safely run our services and also abide by local or state orders miss newman can i ask a question on that slide i appreciate the intent but i want to clarify that when we say we're going to ensure the health and safety of our students staff and families that's not something we truly can do we can do everything we can to mitigate the risks but we're living in a global pandemic and we simply can't promise that everybody will remain healthy so i understand the intent behind the word but i don't want anyone to misunderstand the intent on that thank you for that as we've mentioned previously we want to provide choices for our families and we have three delivery models for those choices the first option would be full time in person our our students would go to school five days a week and they would receive their education in their campus classroom another option option b would which is what we call our flex option that's a combination of in person and online and i will go into more detail a little bit later but our students would receive some of their instruction online and some of their instruction in person and then option c for families that feel as if it's safest for their children to attend just online instruction we have our gps global academy and that provides the option for our students to receive full-time instruction from our gps global academy teachers we want to be sure that whichever option the family chooses we were providing a quality education for our students and also that we had support for individual student disruption if that were to occur dr newman can i just say i think there's been a little concern that maybe we're just going to focus on we're only going to offer one of these like if there's going to be we have to settle on one of these not that we're going to be able to offer all three of these concurrently that's the plan that we would offer all three of these and that families would choose what works best and i know you're going to go through that but i just wanted to kind of if you want to address that a little bit make sure we do that absolutely the plan is all-inclusive and we are um we have plans in place we are ready we're willing and we're able to provide all of those three options for whichever option the family chooses for his or her children and um we will be able to do that due to the fact that we will if we need to and as the presentation continues we'll be able to do that because we will make sure that we have teachers and staff in the places that are most appropriate to be sure that all of our kids are receiving the educational opportunity in whichever option that they choose so they will be working at the same time concurrently yes thank you for that i guess except when we have when we have an executive order that says we can't be in person so we'll have to work through that yes so our plan is to be sure that we have everything in place that we are able to do that and then of course when something outside of our own um ability to make those decisions then that would happen but we would within that provide disruption time so for example our full-time in-person campus classroom our students for example if there is a disruption or a closure our students would continue to receive their instruction with their classroom teacher so every single option would remain it would just look a little differently during that disruption so we thought it might be helpful to go through each of the three options and explain a little bit about what it might look like for a student and then as well talk about what are some ways that it will also how it will look for some of our staff and also some of the precautions that we're putting in place depending on what those options are so our option a school campus with safety precautions our students would attend school five full days per week there will be social emotional supports in place for our students there will be accommodations and support services provided whether that be for our ell students our students with disabilities will our title students will continue to have support for them at our title campuses our students because they're going to campus five days a week all day long they will receive their elective classes they'll attend their special area classes as well desks and tables would be facing in one direction in rows whenever possible during that time there might be marked tables and areas so students know where the safety areas are for them to be to make sure that they're not in too close of proximity whenever possible classroom visitors would be need to be scheduled we would not have visitors just showing up on a campus and going into a classroom they would schedule that to make sure that they're adhering to guidelines there'd be hand washing sanitizing multiple times each day classroom when our students arrive on the campus they would report directly to their classroom there would be controlled student movement throughout the campus as i mentioned there would be support during disruption periods so if a student was sick the student would continue to be supported by his or her classroom teacher the individual student supplies would be what we would utilize whenever possible and any other items that would not be able to happen that way we would make sure that they are sanitized we would have class size considerations so a very careful review of their master schedule and making sure that we're leveling classrooms so that we're able to keep our class sizes in a at a number that is most appropriate and best for our students and our teachers with that too there's some cleaning and disinfecting that will happen there will be increased daily cleaning and disinfecting of high traffic areas doors counters sinks and other horizontal surfaces the restroom and health office touch point areas will be disinfected twice daily guidelines and supplies for cleaning the desk and tables provided to each classroom teacher there will be use of hydroxyl ozone machines to disinfect larger areas there will be signage for safe hygiene and hand washing posted throughout the classroom sinks and rough restrooms and our water fountains would be closed as a result of making sure that we're adhering to safety guidelines in addition for cafeteria our salad bars would be at this moment initially eliminated at the start of the school year choice is going to be provided to our students for meals but those will be prepared in the morning and packaged to facilitate placing on student trays to minimize clean up and spillage cafeteria tables will be marked decreasing table capacity sometimes by 30 or 50 percent as we are able to do that to minimize proximity to other students additional garbage cans will be provided for disposal of completed meal packaging and leftovers and after each lunch period tables and seats will be wiped down for the next group of students there's some health considerations and plans in place that we want to be sure that you are aware of we will have a parent at a station form that parents will review the list of symptoms daily that expectation is that our parents will screen their students before school each morning to make sure for example has their child experienced any of the following a fever 100 degrees point 100.4 degrees or greater cough muscle aches shortness of breath diarrhea questions about if the child recently has been in close contact with anyone who's tested positive for cova 19 or if anyone in the household's been diagnosed with coca-19 and then they would if as they go through their their testing that if that none of those are the case then they would send their students it would be safe for their students to be at school in addition there will be district health protocols for students and staff stringent health office requirements for students returning from illnesses so students when they return after being sick they would be checking in with a nurse and the nurse will be going through a protocol to be sure that the student is well age-appropriate education on good hygiene including what constitutes close contact making sure that staff is educated on signs and symptoms to help identify students notification to our staff and parents of positive contacts there's a student letter and a parent letter face coverings we will be utilizing base coverings per state and local agency guidelines right now that is for all students first through 12th grade they are required to wear space coverings as of today we will continue to follow our state and local agency orders and there may be an exception that will be documented health concerns to be handled the same as we do with our vaccination requirements that will all be handled through our health office in addition there will be a suspension of chronic absenteeism notification and reporting due to coven 19.

we will we wanted to be sure that we were avoiding multiple days in between our students so that's why we did not have for example the meeting on a monday tuesday because then there would be five days before they were back with their teacher with their students and when their and their their friends their peers um or so then wednesday would be a the day that the teacher would be able to do some small group and online work um do some prep and planning as well and when also then when the students are coming they'll be coming 7 30 to 12 30 which means the teacher would have opportunity in the afternoon for example to follow up and catch up with students that were working online that same day we want to be sure that we're making every effort for our siblings to be able to be using the flex days that are similar to their sibling there's others right so we want families to be able to come on the same days making that easier for our parents parents would be providing their own transportation because we have a modified school day they're going to be arriving earlier and leaving later the special area classes will be available through our gps global academy that will be optional if our parents want our students to take some of those classes they would we would provide a district advice for anyone that needed it at our elementary level since that is right now not normally the practice students having lunch that would be an option if they wanted to stay at lunch on those two days with their peers our teachers would be assigned two cohorts of students so this is not like what we did with remote learning our students would be in person and teaching them they would be assigning the students the work when they are not with them and then they would come back and they would be attendance reporting and the expectation is that students would be attending to school work five days a week our secondary flex option is similar in that it's in person and online experiences five days a week our students would be engaged in the work this will be for our grades 7 through 12.

here I'm in need I'm the director of Family School community partnerships and so this is a important part of the work that we're doing is wanting to talk more with Julie students and families about their feelings their thoughts fears anything you want to tell us about coming back to school in September so I'm gonna let dr. Walzer through also in June a little bit of welcome to and then we'll jump into how do you raise your hand tell us a little bit about what school you're in and what grade and your thoughts so mr.

Walston if he'd like to just respond in a sentence or two just some of these or sure hi Zach so Zach we we are number one we don't have all the answers let me just say to you and everyone on this call and the answers that I might provide might change by the time we open up school but right now our initial plan particularly at elementary school on the thought particularly at elementary school and middle school that thought is is that we would have students eating into classrooms and part of what we need to figure out is if we are eating in classrooms how are we gonna get food safely to your classroom who is going to be available for supervision so that staff can also have an opportunity to eat lunch themselves Oh will we be asking teachers to eat lunch with you so those are some of the things we're trying to figure out but right now the thought is if we're not gonna all congregate in the cafeteria together we would bring food to you that's a great question is out great Thank You Zach Amanda Pascarella so so and I just wrote me Amanda is it possible you can include your question in the chat box because I I couldn't understand you at all it was kind of going in and out on my side I don't know if anyone else heard you so they can I can hear you but it's it's it's very blurry it's not a good connection okay you put in the chat okay Amanda thank you so much so how about while you write that one and we'll go to the next question and then I'll come back and answer your question is that okay of course thank you okay thank oh now we can hear you should he try again yeah my friend [Music] Oh middle school/high germs there okay you know really weirdo me it's your writing skills please put it in please put you a question in the chat absolutely and I will circle right back to you great well go on to gabrielli and we'll come back to Amanda yes can you hear me yes is there any possibilities now we're gonna have like open school this year and have a full day year round hi Gabrielle er what would you mind me asking what level you're at elementary middle or high school finished middle school I'm going to high school Oh congratulations so I yeah you must you must be anxiously awaiting a response to that question so so we're really at the moment the plan is the governor has requested that we all go back to school in the fall but but but the expectation is we're supposed to go back to school in the fall and it's supposed to be done safely part of you know in and those expectations are that we're going to be appropriately socially distance that we can keep everyone safe and we're trying to make sure that we can do that for you for all of your friends for all of our teachers and for all of our administrators in the district and so the answer to your question that the quick simple answer to your question is yes the expectation is we will open up schools in the fall and you know short of a resurgence we will continue to remain in school throughout the school year but it is a strong possibility that we may have some modifications to what school will look like again in the fall whether that's full distance learning but are we going to school the whole week or is it gonna be some days we go to school some days we stay home yeah I know I understand and so we're still trying to figure that out and and part of this feedback this feedback opportunity is to get to get it full understanding from our community meaning you what you feel like is the best the safest way to re-enter our schools so do do you have a feeling so so dance to your questions Gabrielle we haven't made that decision yet but the governor right now expects us to all be back in school in September there may be some modifications to that but as of right now and you know we can we can certainly advocate for something different but right now the expectation is also all kids are back in school with masks in September and socially distance to the best extent possible okay thank you okay and then and I'm sorry I couldn't give you something more you know like definitive right right but it's it's really a moving target right now thank you I appreciate you I appreciate you right so we have a lot of hands up so I think what I'm going to do at this point is I know you all want to hear from mr.

in session to hear from all of you about your thoughts about reopening and dr. Tsao will talk more about that happy July first beautiful day beautiful so if everyone would please mute themselves that would be wonderful and that will stop any of the background noise so our protocol this morning will be after dr. Sal's introduction to what we were doing and what we'd like to get out of this session we will then break you into groups you will be into in groups for about 20 minutes answering one key question we will be asking you to assign a person to be the recorder for your group on the blue lips sheet that I've shared with everyone and that you can manipulate and use and then also to assign a reporter to your group so when we come back to a larger group you can give us your top three ideas for reopening schools so again welcome and I'm going to turn it over to dr.

governor LeMond at length I read as his document and really we're talking about this not being a children's disease and that the one thing we're not talking about is that it still is an adult disease and what's happening to the teachers that are high risk what is their options again teachers that are you know going home to families that are high risk they themselves are high risk so you have to have a comfortable teacher in a comfortable classroom to facilitate good mental health and emotional well-being for the students another would be if in talking to the governor there is sort of some sort of dispensation of okay Danbury is sort of an outlier it isn't a 100 person district the idea that the high priority students are coming back and first that could be our ELLs it could be our special ed it could be our elementary students on the students that really need more hands-on so if we could stagger that would seem to be our area to really focus on and we talked a lot about masks with the plastic cutouts or Plexiglas to be able to put around the youngers aspect and and our ell students if they really need to be able to see us while we're talking and so you know in a classroom that might be a solution I don't know if it overrides the mask-wearing but maybe it could be used you know we could take it off so that when the teachers instructing they can see the teachers mouth and then one other thing we just talked about was the sick time I know I'm going on four I apologize but this idea that if we are going out as teachers and we have to be out is that coming out of our sick time or are we getting kovat sick days the way businesses because it's more often than not we're gonna have to be out on multiple times and therefore now where we're worried about subs and sub plans okay thank you for those thoughts and we'll move on to room 7 so our room 7 I'm similarly that Jen just shared did talk about like the procedure even around exposure for Co vid so if somebody in your classroom has been exposed you're expected to quarantine what would that look like I'm explicitly at the elementary middle and high school level especially with students moving across the school at the high school in addition what was a resounding kind of team coming out is there needs to be a different plan at each level k5 6 8 & 9 12 because there are so many different anomalies for each level but a great suggestion was having a staggered start so Elementary might start first k5 you can work out all the bugs with that then 6 8 then maybe 9 12 and then the spacing in classrooms is a the biggest concern especially in some of the elementary schools people are using closets currently as classrooms and and spaces with kids so are we looking into other spaces in the city to accommodate students that are outside our current buildings and then other things that people brought up around the in-person instruction and how your expect to balance any remote learning possibly videoing having students video in during lessons in order to remediate that finally is the parent if we do have to move to distance learning model or any even kind of hybrid is we need better training for parents because most students who are not engaged it was due to a lack of the ability for teachers to communicate with parents or parents having the knowledge around how to help students remote in and things like that so using the August time to really train parents up and if anyone else in my group has more great Thank You Cara and we'll move on to room eight please okay hello this is Tracy and I'm we put all our concerns in the document so you folks can see it there if you need to and our some of our top concerns a couple people I noticed mentioned the staggered start we mentioned that it as well and I know I think I saw something on the CDC page about that if anyone's interested in looking into it but yeah we talked about space into in individual rooms and schools in general and class sizes and how we're going to maintain a safe environment with small spaces some rooms with no windows and and you know normal class sizes or sometimes larger class sizes we talked about access to PPE for staff and for students especially if it's disposable and how you're gonna get it on a regular basis we talked about monitoring student and family health the governor's plan doesn't mention anything about you know taking temperatures or anything like that but there was a concern about you know if somebody is sick and and they're in school so that's a group eight if the only thing I missed please feel free to add in there thank you very much for this opportunity thank you and room nine we'd like to hear from you now room nine I'll speak for room nine great so our three top ones the main thing that we talked about at the beginning was the sharing of resources and materials at all levels elementary middle school and high school you know whether it be crayons and pencils or science lab materials or computers you know how would we go about making sure that each student has their own set of materials and resources throughout each day another large thing that we talked about was the social-emotional learning piece and also making sure that there are resources available to students and families you know who have gone through drama or maybe students who are coming back to the classroom very anxious you know any of those things you know just making sure that there's a focus on the social-emotional piece and then the class size piece and cohorts we spoke about you know possibly the state of I'm sorry the city of Danbury has I think Kelly mentioned it you know talk to the state possibly starting at phase two because of the size of our district and possibly having a blended model or different start tying something along those lines so focusing again on the class size and cohorts and making sure that there's a set plan for that to make sure that the health and safety of students and teachers and staff are coming first I think that is the gist of our top three but if I missed any Gina thank you so much for doing that I'm and I'm also from room night as well I was more I was mostly telling the group I was like you know when it comes to social emotional learning like our us as school counselors or school social workers and psychologists are we going to be having like PD on ending the staff on that are we having people come in like you know are we going to be like you know teaching this essay l whether it's from ruler or castle like curriculums when it's going back to school so that was just a concern from student services as a school counselor from from our my perspective on that just wanted to add thank you noted that wonderful thank you and room 10 you room 10 are you there someone there sorry Ann I I have notes for group 10 give me a second so we the group and I we actually didn't nail down just the three but just kind of given what I heard I will share some of the thoughts that are a little different from what I've heard thus far right so so one support for families onboarding new families we talked about the group talked about those concerns particularly families from AOL you know AOL family is also providing distance learning support for those families and social-emotional support for those families another thing that was mentioned was the need for protocols and mentioned quite a bit in Boonton need for protocols for student staff and families to drive the chui implementation of the plan and so you know some of the examples of expectations you know what are the expectations aren't wearing the mask all day what are the expectations about walking in the hallway with the expectations around sharing books and materials will there be an expectation of kids are gonna bring in their Chromebooks every day that they were given last year you know what how we go how it teachers are suppose it's assess student safely and so you know the group talked about the need to you know having a big plan is one thing but having those who's those explicit details that's actually going to drive their day-to-day activities is going to be really important and then another and then the last one that I captured was how we addressing the needs of our staff and students with compromised immune systems how will we backfill staff who are sick you know given our challenges with what shortages and subs already will we be administering temperature checks oh and and you know another bigger world we have an isolation room for identified students in staff who are indeed sick so kind of three big buckets for us great thank you for sharing those Kevin and so we're on to room 11 and then 12 pretty much everything that's been said already is something that came up in our discussion as well we did sort of break it down to our top three which was super difficult but the safety the safety around everything that everybody has said the mask wearing you know keeping kids together what about kids who try what about kids who come in sick all of that the sanitizing concerns and the number of our bathroom spaces and hand-washing spaces available to us including then also the sanitizing and safety of materials especially the elementary level shared materials shared spaces and then the idea of cohorting you know how are you going to logistically and safely best do this you know different concerns obviously at elementary middle and high school levels but for elementary kids if you're talking about keeping you know small kids in one spot for an entire day that could be problematic some of the things that other people mention that I'm just gonna ream ention the idea of staggered starts we had a long conversation about that as well the training piece that several other groups mentioned we talked about that too and the need to train both kids and parents somebody else also mentioned the laptops that was a discussion in our group as well if we're not sharing materials and we're expecting kids to be on their devices are they are we now asking for year olds to be traveling back and forth with a laptop everyday and how long do we actually think those are gonna last that's my two cents worth yeah and I think that pretty much covers anything else that nobody else said but maybe I just wanted to mention one thing that that came up that I never thought about we're talking about cohorting students in school but on the buses they're not cohorted right so that I mean that's gonna be a huge issue yes great bra as well about if you cohort students all day but then they all get on a bus that is not cohorted so it was mentioned - yeah thank you for bringing that up Thank You Tracy and Melinda and lastly I wrote 12 good morning in I wasn't able to type in the document so I just told Cara I would just send it to her privately from our group but I'll be happy to share it for some reason I'm not allowed to get on the document okay um it's per group twelve we somewhat that down to around three entry so our first one was you know returning to school in August at a hundred percent work sir that it's not phased in like everything else should be and we're you know overly concerned education should not be the test pilot for going back 100 percent we're concerned with space issues as everyone else is as well as understanding the reality of what teacher instruction will look like under social distancing guidelines you know group work small group instruction which is really what we need to best support our students academic needs from what they've missed and also to kind of catch them up and you know apply the rigor to move them toward also the need and cost of individual supplies for each students that have the same materials they need each day to perform at their best our second was PPE equipment you know monitoring when when and when not to wear it you know brakes using masks the use of them the option for different types of masks who will they be provided by and how will they be monitored you know the reusable ones not reusable ones by staff and students we also talked about the cleanliness what is exactly going to be clean and sanitized also the frequency and who's actually going to monitor that that's happening on a daily basis and last but not least we had staff issues overall you know what about the comfort level of those returning to work what are the sick protocols look like compromised staff substitutes etc and we also talked about school programs what will they look like special areas sped speech and life skills programs as well as PD days being virtually or in person and last but not least we talked about temperature checks for staff and students okay wonderful so I'm going to ask does Kevin so that concludes all of our groups and all of those suggestions will be taken back and considered by the reopening committee Kevin or sal would you like to do a wrap-up yes thank you and thank you to everybody we still have 229 folks understand on this call you know for me as I as I listened all of us as familiar with Maslow's hierarchy of needs and you can put him in those category the physiological and then the safety needs that a toupee that needs that we need to provide I listen to all of all of us here I think we all realized that this is not normal that's abnormal and we need to learn from if when we do return that's why the phasing in makes a lot of sense it's that's provided I will tell in this group we will do the best we can to create those safety situations but understand that the communication to us has been clear that the chemical disease of the pandemic impacts youngsters at a different level than the adults but for me I'm concerned about the entire school system the adults and the students and the families so how do we come around that in a sensible reasonable fashion that will also provide an educational atmosphere so the youngsters are learning I don't have the answers but certainly today you're going to inform my decisions I could be mindful of Beninese things I will ask for some variant variations but just know that when we do return we will return with the safest plan that we have put together that's best again the best weekend so listening to you today has been really beneficial and much appreciated so thank you and and someone did talk about follow-up well we haven't been given a lot of time for this we've been given to the 24th some states actually are going into August so you know we'll be sending out some survey but certainly as someone do you reach out to us you have some thoughts and some ideas from other places don't be shy bring them to us you know maybe it's something we can utilize so thank you very much for this opportunity Thank You Anne thank you thank you dr.

we know that if our students are due to cobia 19 having to be out for an extended period of time we don't need to add ex additional stress to our families by telling them that they've missed they already know that they mess so we will be sure that we are suspending some of that we're keeping track of the absences as we need to but we're we're going to um adhere to not to adhere to some of that and there are miss newman on that one and perhaps on others as that's written in policy i assume that we will need to suspend that policy in a formal sense yes we will we'll be bringing that to the policy meeting thank you and then just also we have many many forms um actual flowcharts and forms we have an internal plan our internal plan is multi-pages our internal plan will be provided to our administrators to our staff to our families as appropriate within that form not only is it procedures protocols guidelines that we'll be following there are supporting documents so for example as i mentioned the student letter if on a campus something happens and they need to notify students our staff will be able to go whether to that electronic file or that binder and just pull that letter and get it prepared for our distribution to those that need to have it so that has really been the work of the task force is making sure that everything that is within the plan will is and will be readily available it will be continuously updated um as we need to and we'll continue to um add to that as as like i mentioned we need we might need to at the end of each option i'm also going to ask if you have any questions we'll stop okay so so each option we will be able to ask questions after each of them there we do have some elementary and secondary specific guidelines or information that we wanted to share um as i mentioned students will see eat in cafeteria with reduced cap capacity there will be a limited number of students in the playground our vfk provided 27 locations we will have structured door side drop off and pick up and our manaser preschool building blocks and k-prep will be provided with curbside drop-off and pickup for our secondary there will be a staggered release schedule for passing periods and directed hallway flow patterns reduce we're going to reduce the usage of our large common areas the gym auditorium lecture hall and the library there will be virtual assemblies reduced cafeteria seating with other locations open for lunch we mentioned that before it might be kind of great for the kids to be able to go and eat in different places around the campus for example on grass or outside with with others so that they're able to practice the additional distancing phased approach to athletics and performing arts which we've already begun modified performing arts practices and field trips will be determined on a month by month basis with the fine arts we're going to be sure that we're following national recommendations practicing in larger areas across the campus perhaps in sectionals or smaller groups the collection and storage of instruments there will be a protocol for that and and safety measures put in place um so that um our students are not in a very short small complex enclosed area for any length of period we will have procedures in place for that and at this point i'd like to ask if there are any specific questions you might have for us for this option okay i do have a question um particularly regarding choir because we have some choirs that are quite large and some that are smaller are we going to adjust the size of those choirs so that we don't have a concert choir that's probably 80 kids so that for the um practice mr ryan may want to speak a little bit more to this as well for the practices it would be more practicing in sectionals and others so we were able to still anyone who wanted to participate in choir could but they would be then practicing in smaller groups instead of always in the larger group okay and and spread out i assumed him to more than just the choir room because that's not big enough right their time they made mention about perhaps in an auditorium and spreading them out there i thought the auditorium are going outside and getting a little air conditioner for the teacher because she's going to be out there all day but the kids can last for their 50 minutes you know so yeah that's i mean because that is the hardest one because of the singing band is different and obviously orchestra is way different because they're just bowing so i'm i just want to make sure we get those opportunities especially in choir and also in general music in elementary so that's those are tough ones thank you all right our second option for our video before we move on as we hit some of these points do we have in our manual trigger points measures that uh as as things improve when we're all hopeful that they do that we that we're able to start removing these and return more to a normal whatever that new normal is but more towards a new normal approach yes we do and are those some place where we can understand what those are yes once when we have the um the form the document or the the binder or the electronic version of that yes all of those will be in and those will be some of our supporting documents that we have in place as well so our second option or choice for our families would be our flex and as i mentioned we talked a little bit about um our elementary and secondary before flex is also we're going to discuss it in in two ways we're going to discuss it just in general as we mentioned students are both online and in person but it looks differently between elementary and secondary our flex at the elementary level as i mentioned are our students will be in person and online learning with the same classroom teacher so with that our teachers will be working five days our students will just be coming to school um two days a week the classes will be at each school based on our kasich's enrollment needs our hope is that at every campus we're able to offer this and be creative and how we might do that but it will depend on the numbers the numbers of students and the interests of families for that but we do have some creative solutions as to how we can continue to keep our students on their campus with their community that they know there will be a decreased number of students in the classroom which will allow for physical distancing our students will receive two days of in-person teacher support each week that will look like a monday thursday hour a tuesday friday 7 30 to 12 30.

students would request a partial day with their currently enrolled school and then they would take any portion of their schedule in person and their remainder online for from their home or school campus ap and dual credit courses would be the ones that they would currently take on their school campus if that's what they were desiring to have in their schedule our on-campus courses that the students would be taking would be scheduled consecutively based on the availability um already been talking about master schedules and making sure that we are having opportunities for um students to take those classes and so that they wouldn't have to take a class in the morning and then take the last class at the end of the day that would not be an option for our flex students there would be campus assistance with scheduling our gps global academy classes that they'd be taking online all of these structures are already in place we already have students that are already utilizing this this option we just have never called it a flex or a partial day option for our students but we've always done that to meet the needs there will be a district device provided because there's already one for all of our 712 students students would provide their own transportation if they're arriving or they are departing at times other than our transportation would occur as i mentioned systems are already in place for this so for example registration on campus support we have our center for success so we've talked about adding additional center for success opportunities so maybe a student might first period take a class go to a center for success and work on an online class because the other class the student wanted was third period and so that would be the opportunity for them to do that and we would do our best to do scheduling to provide that for our students dr newman we would be adhering to what's in policy related to the five consecutive courses or the five credits for high school students we we have that in policy there are sometimes exceptions when students want to take a community college course for which we do not have for example dual credit so we do have exceptions at times when students do not do that and we would continue with that if our students had their grad credits and they really wanted to take for example a course that we did not have we've always it's gone through a process where they work with their counselor the administration also has a conversation with parents they make sure that that's what's best for the student make sure the student does have all grad credits and then that student sometimes does take that at the community college okay the question also relates to what if a senior only needs two credits to graduate how would we treat that so we would um encourage them to take more but i don't think that we would we have not um specifically said we would have to change policy we would have to suspend policy if we wanted something different it's important that we are providing choice for our students but at the same time we also need to be sure that we are receiving funding that we need to but the flex is for the purpose of being flexible and so that might be the option where we are not on campus we would want our students to be there all five periods flex we may not same thing with global academy i think that's an important feature uh for us to emphasize uh funding components become a real issue as it relates to district and uh whatever we have written in policy we should stay as close to as we can well i would add that the funding that is provided for those academics helps us to have the funding for the extracurricular activities so you know it if you want to be on a baseball team you really need to be there for five classes so we have the funding to provide for that baseball team dr santa cruz i would suggest that we have that discussion in a policy meeting and further discuss and explore that particular issue as ms newman communicated there is an exception place already in process and either on a temporary or otherwise basis given the situation given the current direction of the state that they're going to give us 98 percent funding regardless of count it may not be the same point in this situation and i would like to at least explore how we can be as flexible as possible to meet parental needs uh i wouldn't disagree with you mr carr just simply is worthy of uh having an open discussion so that at least that is out there in the public and i'm sure that dr mccord will add that to our policy mean [Music] thank you are there any questions about our flex model so on the [Music] for the high school for the secondary junior high in high school basically they would come to school for a couple hours a day and then they would go home and take the rest of their classes through the online learning through the global academy so it's just combining kind of those both both of those things it's not like they'll have one single teacher or anything like that it's just pretty normal to what we have right now but just giving them maybe a half day option or shorter options and then taking the rest of it online correct i do have one question about global academy they would have options for honors classes ap classes with global academy would there also be options for special ed students with global academy in all three of the options through the our task force work we have ensured that yes we can provide services for our special needs students it looks different perhaps than it used to and so we need to be sure for example for global academy there will be options for our students with learning disabilities and there will be florida virtual is our curriculum there will be shells specifically that will provide additional supports in those shells and we will have our teachers providing those the delivery of services for our special needs students as well okay thank you so option c our new newly branded gps global academy we are super excited thank you again for your approval to make that a k-12 entity our gps global academy for the 2021 school year will have highly qualified gilbert public schools teachers that will work five days a week full time providing online instruction to our students they'll be utilizing an accredited standards-based gilbert public schools adopted online curriculum it is also ncaa approved we have already processes in place to ensure that our athletes are getting what they need and they're getting the guidance and support in that way as well they will have our students will have access to full-time teachers that's different than now because our teachers are part-time so often our teachers are teaching during the day and they're not able maybe to answer questions when a student might have those questions so they'll have access to those full-time teachers five days a week those teachers will have office hours in addition to some synchronous lessons that they'll provide there will be open lab hours we'll have some virtual lessons for opportunities for students to discuss and converse and collaborate and work together our social emotional supports will be in place for all of these options including our online again the support services for english language learners and our students with special needs as we develop the plan we really looked at all three options and delivery models and we said how were we going to address the needs of and we looked at all of these various pieces of it to be sure we'll have in-person support at our new gps global academy campus we're moving to a bigger campus there will be opportunity for example maybe students are working um full-time online maybe students are doing a flex even schedule that they have and we'll have our teachers that will be able to um if it's works for the families and the families need that in-person support they can go visit um with a teacher they might have some virtual science classes and spiritual science labs as appropriate as well our students will be assigned a mentor for goal setting and additional support those mentors will be usually that there will be teachers it may not be all of the teachers that they were assigned to our teachers will have a much bigger load for example at the secondary level than they will have individual students that they're mentoring but it will be um someone that the student has as a teacher the gps counselor will have his counselor assigned to the secondary students for academic counseling support and again we will have district devices available our 712 students already receive those and we'll be sure that any of our k-6 students who need them will have them i have a question too um last year we piloted a blended learning structure uh are we still doing that or where where they would meet like once a week with the teacher or is that kind of moving away because of the current crisis well the current situation did not let us do the full pilot okay but we do want to con add some of those similar components so we want to be sure that if that works for our families that our teacher is available for students for for example like i said the science labs or other things that might be good for them to have okay thank you um all this is yes just a question and i'm not totally certain of all of the dynamics related to this question but i'm informed that uh the state government in florida has done some augmenting of its internal budget as it relates to uh online education or virtual instruction will that have an impact on us at all no it will not um we actually consulted with the florida virtual hour rep already this this evening that is the university of florida program that they had provided some resources during covet 19 to our k-12 it's an opportunity for students to earn college degrees or geds and provides also some additional support as far as scholarships go to our higher education florida virtual is its own entity it is a k-12 entity and we were told that actually their funding increased through the governor's bill in florida and so we're hoping that that gives us even additional supports for additional courses or things like that very good thank you dr santa cruz for me yes ms newman and i just want to clarify again because i've gotten a lot of questions about global academy and the online option this is not what we did fourth quarter last year uh fourth quarter we transitioned a number of students within their existing classes if you will with their existing teachers and they you know we give the teachers credit they were doing something completely new that they had not done in the past but this is a fully developed curriculum that's taught online that's designed for online we have offered it in the past but it's not the same as for those parents who transition from in person to online during fourth quarter right thank you this is um very different than fourth quarter remote learning um all the work is required students are expected to meet virtually with their teacher at least twice a week for a class as well as work through online lessons and complete those assignments daily those lessons have videos in them those lessons have assessments those lessons have progress checks and that is all built within the online shell that the students will be working on i'll talk a little bit more about the show later but the importance of that is everything is all in one place and so for example our full-time global students would log right into their portal and it would have all of their courses right there so that's an easy access for students and for families as well also we will as i mentioned we'll have the the support for our special needs students with this online option what we want to be sure is if parents choose the option of a full-time global academy or even the flex option staff will work with parents and contact parents and review the iep to make sure that the course selections and the support is in place that's appropriate for our students so that they're successful in this environment so here are our courses at the elementary level or at all of the levels we have our core classes we have electives k through 12.

Walston so good afternoon everyone great to see so many students on the line in their proud parents by their side and what we can't see students we can see parents so happy to see so so much involvement this afternoon so one you guys might be aware students you might be aware right number one I hope the last three four months away from the school buildings finds you and your family well we are trying to prepare our schools so all of you can come back to school building that is safe safe for your teachers safe for our staff safe safe and most importantly safe for you the the governor if you hear some noise in the background that's my dog who decided to start drinking water right now as I'm talking to you I so I apologize so the governor released on guidelines for back to support further safe back to school guidelines on Monday the district meeting Danbury Public Schools we are wrestling with on those recommendations and trying to figure out how we can safely get you back into school how many things safe to get back get your teachers back into school and even our parents who drop you off and pick you up make sure we have appropriate protocols in place for safe dismissal and safe arrival on a daily basis some of the questions that have come up from your teachers and are in our early morning session is you guys are probably aware of the social distancing rules and wearing a mask and so a lot of questions have been raised and now how are we going to handle kids walking down the hall all what are we gonna do about sharing materials in the classroom is this going to be safe for my kids so that the teachers have expressed a lot of concerns about your safety and we want to make sure we come up with protocols safety protocols to make sure you're safe and everyone in the building is safe so today is very important for us as we've got feedback from our parents as we've gotten feedback from our staff I'm going to make sure we give feedback from you two to kind of thing to learn about what you feel like your priorities are to make sure we have a safe school reentry in the fall so dr. Ann Mead has put together a really good process I'm gonna ask mr.

Walston some feedback to your questions we will make sure that we first of all we are recording this and we will publish something down the road more definitively to answer your questions but I think at this point we just want to hear from everyone so if we can start off with Jennifer grant please hi I'm a student at Danbury high school and I last year the halls were really really crowded and it was really hard to get to class in general but I'm really like worried as of now with going back to school how it's gonna be handled because I could barely get anywhere and I know that now with the whole Cova 19 thing it'll be even worse having everybody so condensed into one given area so I was just wondering about that yeah Jennifer that's a great wondering because we we share the same wondering we had a great meeting with administrators this morning and as you and they echoed the same sentiments we had it we had teachers in middle school and the high school who also expressed concern about about of students in the hallway and how we going to safely be able to move students around the building given how given how crowded we are and and this is why we have this is why we raise concerns about you know the re-entry and so we're hoping that there's an opportunity for some modifications to the plan but we don't know we don't know fully yet but right now we're certainly you know planning on a full reentry and coming up with protocols that within reason Jennifer to keep everyone safe and so one of the things that we talked about is having staircases that are one-way hallways that you know follow typical you know streets traffic patterns so everyone's on the right-hand side of the hallway if you can envision what that would look like to try to try to mitigate the risk of exchange of you know germs while kids are passing in the hallway and then of course the expectation is students will be wearing their masks but but we do we fully understand your concern and we're trying to come up with options so that we don't have so many students in a school that once particularly the high school great thank you and we'll move to shame or please hi I'm a student at Rogers Park and for transportation there are many students that don't have an option for going for having a parent I've them to school what are we gonna be able to do for on a bus when they're already overflowing and I don't believe anyone will be paying for more buses how would you sort out yeah hi Shay thank you for that question and so you guys are not making the questions any easier for this I'll tell you that right now honestly Shay we don't have an answer to that question certain part of part of what we plan to do is to survey our our families to get a feel of what what families will be taking advantage of of our school busing and what will not and then and then with that information we can kind of determine how much reasonably how much social distance and we can do on our buses we had a survey pushed out to our community earlier and we got this sense from our parents that many of them would be driving their their children to school but to your point not everyone and so we will you know our thoughts where we would come back and have another survey that's a little more definitive this is exactly what school will look like in the fall once we have those details in place and then and then you know and then pull our our families and ask you know the plane is in your child to school do you plan to send your child to school on the bus will you be picking your child up from the bus every day and then begin to use that information to determine how we're going to socially distance if we can safely do it and then what additional resources we might need thank you I love the talk that's going on in the chat box so if parents have a comment or want to add more um please feel free to because it's great to hear from lots of different folks and so Griffin please hi so I'm a rising senior at Danbury High School and I'm going to preface this by saying that I understand that you may not have answers to as many things as we would all like but I think we all appreciate that the efforts that you are taking to make the return to school as safe as possible um one caveat to that is I think that having read the budget for this upcoming year and understanding how high school children work there is no way that enforcing social distancing or mask-wearing is going to be effective in any capacity on buses and I think that in order to alleviate that something needs to be done to reduce capacity on buses because as it is we can only in order to keep people 6 feet apart you can only have like 10 people on a bus and we do not have money for enough buses so I think something along the lines of staggering who goes to school on what days as much as that might not be fun for us it would help keep down people in the hallways people on buses in classrooms and I think that if we don't do that that the amount of people that aren't able to be driven to school or drive to school is going to be completely overwhelming and also yeah that's a good point Jennifer the amount of people that will just outright refuse to wear a mask is going to be a problem whether we want it to be or not thank you for sharing that Mateus please we're not able to understand you can you put your thoughts [Music] the taste we're not understanding Mateus we're not understanding you can you put your message in the chat box for us please thank you and we're gonna move on to lowering our cherry please hi I know this is a probably low on the list of things but both of my kids do marching band in the fall are we looking at what we are going to do as far as after-school activities are we shelving that and just really concentrating on what we're gonna do in the classrooms hi Lauren so we we did receive guidance from this day around extracurricular activities and I'll just speak to two you know one of them deep being actually regular activities you know meeting CIA SI release some information about sports and after school sporting so that's one and then the other one is and so for example band instruments Orchestra they have released some guidance on on those content areas and also performances and spoke to you know the fact that those things can be done but with increased increased social distancing so for example if it's Orchestra strong you know string instruments etc Orchestra singing instead of being six feet apart it will need to be extended to twelve feet apart they encouraged us to you know take advantage of football fields and really large spaces that can accommodate you know large size groups of you know thirty five to fifty students because oftentimes we know how big those groups can be and they also encouraged us to have you know smaller smaller group sizes for training and you know practicing and then bring the bigger groups together only when necessary so there is some initial guidance on making that happen the expectation is if we're going to open up school fully in the fall that all the extracurricular activities will also be part of the school experience okay great thank you so much you're welcome and of course that doesn't make it easy to make implement but the expectation is is that we would have pro opening up for it thank you for asking that question because I know a family a lot of families and students are probably wondering I'm just gonna turn my camera to the one sitting next to me so she can give you her thoughts like in classrooms there should be like only like three people like for the blocks I think they should only be three people at a time doing it and on the buses only twenty people thank you and and what's that was what's that young lady's name Riley okay so Riley but we're gonna get you on this share a Google Doc so you can help me with this plan please good correct she was also concerned about children's masks snapped by other children so that was awesome so let's so and so and can I can I speak to the mask because for those students who are on the the the district is expecting to have an extra available mask for students and in those cases anticipating that those things can happen and so you know the the state expectation is anytime we enter a building everyone would have a mask on anyway but we also understand that you know mass will break you know students might lose their masks and you know whatever might happen it so we wanted we will we will definitely have additional masks available for kids throughout the school day and staff as well great okay and we'll go to Zac please what about switching masks and kids with asthma yeah yeah so so so Zac I'm sorry is your question students with asthma making sure they have a mass that is well make sure that they're wearing a mask that protects them I'm asking is since wearing a mask for a prolonged period Kenan bothers kids eyes my and inhibit their breathing so much that they will have an asthma attack sometimes what are we gonna do about that and also three about after every three hours we use will have masks and other masks will need to be switched so what what we have talked about extensively in whether this be for students or for staff but students specifically is making sure we've identified all of our students that have compromised immune systems in any way and so students that crew-cut who have you know asthma who have you know other conditions that could be compromised in this you know going back to school to make sure we have some type of consultation with our school nurse and the students and their family to walk them through you know the expectation is when we go back to school so is that that that was a great question I appreciate you asking you muted in yeah thank you is Trish to Robinson place Trish I was wondering how are you going to manage the cafeteria because lunch break and there's a lot of a lot of people in the cafeteria no how exactly and you have to take your mask off to eat so how exactly are we gonna space out everybody in the cafeteria we're gonna eat in our classes right and I'm sorry can you repeat your name again I even in and out can i am i coming through now having technical problems yeah sure am i coming through yes great great thanks go ahead no answer I it is from we're all thinking about about eating the cafeteria and trying that have been spaced out so we're trying to UM work that through obviously you can't use a mask while you're doing it so we'd have to work through some way of getting the lunches to folk get into you so that you can't eat them while you're spaced out that's something that's concerning to us so thank you for the question great glad to see you're with us dr.

sound good morning everyone we have 233 participants we also have board members on board and they thank you for being here board members we know no one more important than you to get information from regarding the opening I'm sure you've read the guidelines although it's two months away the guidelines are specific about creating a plan which engages all students on a returning to school model it also calls for call a hybrid in case they need to go to another phase of the return which would be hybrid of less students than normal all returning to to school and then the third model they call enhanced DL so in order for us needed to think about approach this we need to know your your thinking you know whether we agree or not with this safety your safety student safety is the highest priority for all of us so as we develop these plans we that will be our central focus I do intend on writing a commissioner in the governor allowing us a little more flexibility and we'll see what develops from that however the plan will have to take place does have to be submitted by the 24th of July and hearing when you have the say relative to how the day would go there are things of how do we do lunch and how do we do specials you know if you read the governor's comments or even the guidance they call for six feet apart but only if possible we have to define that and still create a safety safety net I've engaged an architect work with us who was laying out safety plans throughout the district for for spacing utilization of cafeteras have been recommended and other such venues but in fact we believe if we have to move furniture out and about the only places we have the move furniture on the belt and where it's not a fire hazard so I just always would be into some of these largest venues so a lot of think iDEN spread out to us but without clear ways they explode ways of doing but hearing from you is a priority for us today and we will start with that I'm not sure I know we have cabinet members on board as well so an with that makes the next phase great so Kara if you can go to our question there's that well let's go to the breakout protocol first the Google document is open to anyone please put your ideas in it and that document is I'm going to leave open after the meeting so people can fill in other writers over the next couple of days that might come to you or that if you're listening to other school districts and what they're doing and have some good thoughts that would be great to add it to us in your group you're going to choose one person to be that recorder and you'll be in your groups for 20 minutes about at the 17 minute mark if you can decide in your group that's top three Pro to discuss when we come back into the larger group that would be wonderful hey and I'm sorry to interrupt you I just think there's a little bit of confusion of where the Google Doc is okay so the Google Doc right now is in the beginning part of the chat so if you go to the top of the chat box in my opening remarks you can access it there Thank You carat great question and can you repost the link because for those of us who came in late we cannot see your thank you yeah as Anne's doing that you know aside from this there are some surveys that we've taken and we've also had time with with parents that will go into our thinking we have to conduct another survey gardening um it's a choice on on the office and parents in terms of choosing certain venues but as you think about this and I should have mentioned it the social emotional well-being of our youngsters is a very high priority so that needs a play into also our thinking it's well pleased okay you know we're ready to start we are you can move to the next slide so our question today is very similar to last night so please partake in that venue too but we want you to think about what are the top priorities I'm sorry there's a spelling mistake enough that the district should consider when planning a safe and effective school reopening and so at this point Kara is gonna break everyone into groups you'll go into your group for 20 minutes at that 17 minute mark if you would please assign a reporter and come up with your three top priorities you will be returned to the larger group and you'll be able to report out okay you ready then we'll separate out okay my head you please that would be wonderful so I reported from Kara first off how many groups soon we will end up with you're muted I think we had 12 12 groups both groups okay so if we could have group number one this group d'amour know that group number one number one okay let's go to group number two room number two ok that's us so our three top concerns were the sanitation and minimizing contamination throughout the building how are we gonna do that what does that look like within individual classrooms the kindergarten classrooms at elementary level looking at all the specials and how they share everything moving up the middle in high school how are we going to consistently keep that clean even though we're sharing all of these products and ideas the next one is teacher feedback is really really valuable at this point and what does that look like are we going to have more surveys how are we gonna get that feedback and also even breaking it down this is wonderful because it's a whole group entire district but even breaking it down into elementary school level middle school level high school level Sevilla schools and then even by buildings so making sure we have all of those taken care of for feedback ideas and then the third thing that was really important well there's two one was the masks which goes back to contamination how are the kids going to be wearing the masks especially when it's hot and there's no air conditioning in many buildings are we going to be able to handle that so that was another one of them lunches was also a big deal but that's for sorry no that's fine Thank You Christy for reporting out on that number three room one is also here whenever you're ready okay let's go back to green room one in room wasn't like our major ones were planning for online learning and for traditional classroom learning and that would be particularly challenging at all the levels because we gave parents the option to either come back or to stay on the distance learning model and one of our thoughts there was that maybe we could have teachers separated as some teachers will do the online distance learning if they are uncomfortable coming back or unable to come back and then teachers who were comfortable in the classroom could do only the traditional classroom planning teaching all of that stuff another one of our concerns was cleaning the classrooms in between classes at the middle school and high school levels a suggestion that we had was that kids can carry a small pouch of disinfectant wipes and kids can wipe down the chairs and the desks when they leave each classroom since they will be moving more than the students would at the elementary level and another one of our big concerns was the way staff is split between buildings particularly like OT PT speech that sort of thing and the way that students would either be able to go to specials or our students who receive resource services how they would be able to still get those services and be able to participate in specials while while we're trying to keep the cohorts together because then it immediately opens up to another set of people exposed to that classroom or exposed to those students great wonderful thank you for those that feedback will go to group number three now Group three or room three I'm not sure we picked a person the person okay so we um the first thing that we talked about was as has been said cleaning sanitizing bathrooms filters like for AC units who is doing what and are we going to be told exactly what's clean with the bathrooms how do we know how many kids are in there at one time like to be have to be careful about that social distancing our number two was professional development for all models of instructions and also with the professional development like training on new procedures somebody in our group brought up the fact that servers at restaurants how to get trained for how to deal with the virus and just serve people correctly are we going to have something like that and I think the biggest concern that we all have is a social distancing at all levels how in the classrooms do you keep kids 6 feet apart we talked a lot about the fact that not everybody has desks people have tables how do you work with that miss that other things so those are our top three and if I miss anything from group three please chime in okay wonderful thank you for sharing that room for please you're muted room for do we have someone from that group all right we'll move on to room five that's us an r8 go ahead you wanted to get do us I think Donna was going to Donna over there and you wrote it all down though okay let me pull her up so we came up with many different concerns and ideas and thoughts but it came down to for real specific ones one is the physical health of both the students and the staff and how that will be protected we also talked about the social-emotional learning we have many people that have gone through trauma have not been able to bring closure to things and so how will those things be accounted for and embedded in the learning so that students can learn and then lastly is that whole logistic the space the funding the rollout what training will be done how are the buildings going to be cleaned documented so that staff feel confident in coming back we did talk a little bit about working with legislators and getting them on board and how our plan danbury's plan as well as some of the larger districts needs to be customized to our particular needs and not necessarily what might work well in the district that only has a few fewer fewer students great all right and room six high in room six again as I look through everyone's comments listening we felt very had a lot of the same concerns one of the things that came up right away always was the health and safety of teachers there's you know I've listened to mr.

Tsao so that concludes this morning's participation as dr. Sal said please continue to send us your thoughts and your ideas because they are important as the decisions are made and thank you for coming go out and enjoy the Sun for a little bit get some of that good vitamin D and breathe and relax and we will get through this so thank you everyone thank Sam

we will we wanted to be sure that we were avoiding multiple days in between our students so that's why we did not have for example the meeting on a monday tuesday because then there would be five days before they were back with their teacher with their students and when their and their their friends their peers um or so then wednesday would be a the day that the teacher would be able to do some small group and online work um do some prep and planning as well and when also then when the students are coming they'll be coming 7 30 to 12 30 which means the teacher would have opportunity in the afternoon for example to follow up and catch up with students that were working online that same day we want to be sure that we're making every effort for our siblings to be able to be using the flex days that are similar to their sibling there's others right so we want families to be able to come on the same days making that easier for our parents parents would be providing their own transportation because we have a modified school day they're going to be arriving earlier and leaving later the special area classes will be available through our gps global academy that will be optional if our parents want our students to take some of those classes they would we would provide a district advice for anyone that needed it at our elementary level since that is right now not normally the practice students having lunch that would be an option if they wanted to stay at lunch on those two days with their peers our teachers would be assigned two cohorts of students so this is not like what we did with remote learning our students would be in person and teaching them they would be assigning the students the work when they are not with them and then they would come back and they would be attendance reporting and the expectation is that students would be attending to school work five days a week our secondary flex option is similar in that it's in person and online experiences five days a week our students would be engaged in the work this will be for our grades 7 through 12.

um at the elementary level unlike perhaps maybe as they circle through and they have all different kinds of specials our students would choose what elected they would want at that k5 classroom whether that be pe technology spanish or art we would also be sure that our sixth graders while they are at the elementary level for us here in gilbert public schools our sixth graders would actually have electives that are offered at the junior high that's a more of a middle school model which is the six seven eight so our sixth graders would have electives pe reading study skills spanish coding and art we would have opportunities for gifted or honors students at all three levels our gifted students would receive an acceleration of math for fourth through sixth grade and also the enrichment of our sixth grade curriculum at our elementary similar to what our model is currently right now our middle school would continue to have honors courses right now we don't have honors courses that we have offered and that's why we are running those through our teaching and learning departments to ensure that it is what we would consider honors and what we've said is our guidelines and our parameters for what an honors course would be and then at the high school we have honors classes there's the ability to take and offer ap courses whether or not we have those will be dependent just like on a campus of our teachers our staffing and what assignments our teachers would have of whether or not that would be an option what questions do you have for us miss newman with online there always has introduced new challenges there's not necessarily a teacher to call as a parent if my child is taking online how do i monitor their success how do i monitor progress and make sure they're completing assignments so the uh the portal that we mentioned which is our our our buzz agilics is the virtual platform that we have literally a parent could go right to that portal and that portal would show the parent not only would it show the parent all the courses that the student is taking but the progress that the student has on each of the assignments there is an a piece within the portal of communication between parent and teacher we are going to have teachers that are more available we're putting that into their schedule so they are available for phone calls and they are available for emails and that is in their daily schedule to be able to do that and um and help that way the um trying to think what other options for our parents we have besides the portal we also are going to have the opportunity for our the communication will be such that our teachers will be communicating with parents more and the parents will have only one place to go to figure it out that's what's going to be different about gps global academy and as we work through this through all of our options instead of parents thinking well our teachers are working on google classroom over here i think i think i got a text over here or there might be an email here that's really our our main purpose of looking at and ensuring that we have a virtual platform k12 so that our parents will have access in that way i have a question will that will the parent have to help some of the younger students like kindergarteners and first graders if they make this choice it seems like they would need more help with a global online curriculum than maybe some of the older students the yes the assignment so will be not always on the screen so there may be assignments that they might get and tell them for example an activity to do and that might involve them doing something hands-on and so that would be something that they'd be able to do gps global academy also with flex we know that our kindergartners will not be on the screen for five day five hours a day we're expecting our kindergartners to have two hours a day for that kind of work and then our teachers would teach on the days so our students would get both for example english language arts and math lessons two to three times a week and so the other time would them do some independent practice with that or independent reading or some other component similar to that okay all right thank you okay so the whole child supports um we can't say it enough we miss our students we want them back we want to be able to support them in any way that they can we also are so appreciative of the opportunity to add additional supports social workers and mental health counselors this year this upcoming year who would have known that in such a situation how how wonderful that would be for us we knew that we really wanted it and needed it but especially now there will be a opportunity and really a focus to re-establish the connections re-engage the disconnected we had we had students who were not engaged during fourth quarter we've had students that haven't been able to um engage in a lot of conversations or activities with our friends and so it'll be really important to do that outreach and the family engagement pieces the collaboration with campus staff so that their our teachers have support in helping them to also support their um their students the utilization of our behavioral health team members we have behavioral health bht members can i interrupt you and go back to the options just to make sure globally regardless of which option the student chooses as long as they meet the aia requirements for enrollment i'm assuming that we will count them as eligible to participate in athletics or or whatever other events is that is that correct assumption that is correct so our students in flex or global academy will continue to have the same opportunities that they have previously had in regard to participating yes thank you sorry for interrupting no that's okay it's also important for the process to include classroom and school-wide preventative interventions coordination with families and also that collaboration with community resources to be sure that our families and our students have what they need from a social emotional perspective i did want to add something in here i think it's really important to understand that students will learn best when they have those relationships and they feel comfortable with their teacher and that is part of the importance not only because we care about them but because we know that they will function better and do better if they feel comfortable and feel a part of their class or connected to their teacher that's really important absolutely in any of the settings yeah it's super important yes we were just talking about that this morning the importance of just connecting with the student and reconnecting and and building those relationships right from the very beginning and that will make such a difference we think too we know it will so for academics we've talked a little bit about this and previously about some of the things we're considering we knew that it was so important to make sure that there was that continuity of learning so that is why with the addition of the gps global academy going k-12 we now have the opportunity for our students in any of those options and all of our teachers to have access to a virtual platform have access to some online curriculum as well and so we are planned and we're ready if there are is any potential disruption whether that be individual classroom or a reason to close we're able to continue with the learning and we already have it in place and ready to go um we want to be sure to with that that there is a one-stop easy access for our students and for our families so students we have a rapid identity tile when they go into and log in initially they will just click on that it will take them right to the buzz platform and from there they will access their curriculum the curriculum will vary um depending on these options that our families choose um but we will always have a component of the virtual platform within any of the options so that everybody is familiar with it that is something that our teachers did such a great job of adding websites and creating google classrooms and doing some of that and they did such hard work but it was still difficult sometimes for our families to navigate all that especially if they had a student at the elementary level or a student at the high school they weren't always utilizing those same programs so that was really important to make sure that we had that the next piece is from an academic standpoint is we need to be sure that we're addressing the learning gaps we had a disruption for an entire quarter some students engaged and some students did not so what do we have in place for that we have several things we have our priority standards that we have curriculum guides scopes and sequences that we've already created for our teachers we knew this was coming this is something that we did during the closure um where we've already shared them out with some of our teachers at the various grade levels or for the various content areas the scope and sequence will will also include an identification of those priority standards that were missed in fourth quarter so for example if if a student is now doing fourth grade math that student would not take all of what the student learned in third grade fourth quarter or should have and they're not learning it right at the beginning they're looking at through the where those priority standards are and well where they will learn that progression of that standard in fourth grade and that's where the scaffolding and additional instruction will take place right then and that is actually in place right now for example in our math and in our english language arts we know that for foundational reading we have you know our students that missed perhaps a quarter of learning how to read and our foundations is a very very strong foundational reading program as is our spalding and so adding additional time for example during our 90-minute reading block to make sure that our students are able to meet the needs of what they've missed make sure that they've at least demonstrated proficiency we also know that gaps are going to continue to occur we're going to use diagnostic screeners teachers are going to identify those students specifically in reading who have gaps in those skills they're going to use whole group small group or intervention settings so that they can support those students with specific identify needs whether that be in person or in the virtual platform so as we're talking about all of these we make sure we made sure that regardless of the choice of delivery model our students would be taken care of in all of these areas and so we we literally had a matrix that said you know option a in person what about our flex and then what about our online learning and so that is there the learning support in services we will be reassigning staff because some staff will not be able to come back for example to the brick and mortar so that works nicely and that will need staff at our gps global academy as well that will ensure that we're going to have highly qualified and appropriately certified teachers and individuals that are providing our support whether that be ell specialists our special educators and also our title interventionists and then also for assessing student growth to inform our instruction we don't have spring 2020 data we don't have any of that because we did not take our state assessments and so it will be important that our teachers continue to work through our data teams process and through their psc plcs they will be able to have their classroom formative assessments they'll be able to determine what that student progress is towards proficiency of those academic standards the new platform we have a new platform for assessment so not necessarily the best time but that's okay because we already have things in place and is in regard to training and other wise our governor issued an order that said that we must have benchmarks within the first six weeks of our school year and we have already indicated that that is possible whether that be in person or virtually we're able to do those benchmarks in both of those modes so we're good we can make it happen and um that's a huge relief to know that we have that in place as well is there any questions about academics dr newman not necessarily a question but a statement for sure and that is and i'm certain you and the task force have factored this in we have a huge concern for our students and our families as we should they are our customers we have a group of professionals and staff who are also uneasy and i would hope that all of this structural stuff becomes part of their pd and that they have an opportunity to become as conversant with it as they can prior to meeting their their students in in whatever format is is chosen so that we're not placing additional burden on those teachers at any level k through 12.

Walston if he'd like to just respond in a sentence or two just some of these or sure hi Zach so Zach we we are number one we don't have all the answers let me just say to you and everyone on this call and the answers that I might provide might change by the time we open up school but right now our initial plan particularly at elementary school on the thought particularly at elementary school and middle school that thought is is that we would have students eating into classrooms and part of what we need to figure out is if we are eating in classrooms how are we gonna get food safely to your classroom who is going to be available for supervision so that staff can also have an opportunity to eat lunch themselves Oh will we be asking teachers to eat lunch with you so those are some of the things we're trying to figure out but right now the thought is if we're not gonna all congregate in the cafeteria together we would bring food to you that's a great question is out great Thank You Zach Amanda Pascarella so so and I just wrote me Amanda is it possible you can include your question in the chat box because I I couldn't understand you at all it was kind of going in and out on my side I don't know if anyone else heard you so they can I can hear you but it's it's it's very blurry it's not a good connection okay you put in the chat okay Amanda thank you so much so how about while you write that one and we'll go to the next question and then I'll come back and answer your question is that okay of course thank you okay thank oh now we can hear you should he try again yeah my friend [Music] Oh middle school/high germs there okay you know really weirdo me it's your writing skills please put it in please put you a question in the chat absolutely and I will circle right back to you great well go on to gabrielli and we'll come back to Amanda yes can you hear me yes is there any possibilities now we're gonna have like open school this year and have a full day year round hi Gabrielle er what would you mind me asking what level you're at elementary middle or high school finished middle school I'm going to high school Oh congratulations so I yeah you must you must be anxiously awaiting a response to that question so so we're really at the moment the plan is the governor has requested that we all go back to school in the fall but but but the expectation is we're supposed to go back to school in the fall and it's supposed to be done safely part of you know in and those expectations are that we're going to be appropriately socially distance that we can keep everyone safe and we're trying to make sure that we can do that for you for all of your friends for all of our teachers and for all of our administrators in the district and so the answer to your question that the quick simple answer to your question is yes the expectation is we will open up schools in the fall and you know short of a resurgence we will continue to remain in school throughout the school year but it is a strong possibility that we may have some modifications to what school will look like again in the fall whether that's full distance learning but are we going to school the whole week or is it gonna be some days we go to school some days we stay home yeah I know I understand and so we're still trying to figure that out and and part of this feedback this feedback opportunity is to get to get it full understanding from our community meaning you what you feel like is the best the safest way to re-enter our schools so do do you have a feeling so so dance to your questions Gabrielle we haven't made that decision yet but the governor right now expects us to all be back in school in September there may be some modifications to that but as of right now and you know we can we can certainly advocate for something different but right now the expectation is also all kids are back in school with masks in September and socially distance to the best extent possible okay thank you okay and then and I'm sorry I couldn't give you something more you know like definitive right right but it's it's really a moving target right now thank you I appreciate you I appreciate you right so we have a lot of hands up so I think what I'm going to do at this point is I know you all want to hear from mr.

Sal wonderful all of these in and out in a night okay all right great we'll go to have you here please hello I go to Westside and my sister goes to DHS and in the bathrooms we need soap hot water and it's individual paper towels at our schools we've run out pretty quickly because either it's because of the amount of people that go to the bathrooms or people doing pretending to be funny and just wasting them so how will these [Music] how will these be provided let me take that so Xavier sent some of the things that we've talked about is increased cleaning and disinfecting protocols throughout the day so that is definitely something that we're looking at we understand it's an absolute priority for our buildings because we're going to be encouraging students and staff to be disinfected on a daily but you know on an ongoing basis throughout the school day and so we will have disinfectant materials in our classrooms and in common spaces throughout the school but we also recognize that there's going to be a need to make sure that our our our baths our restrooms are adequately stocked and so that that will definitely be a priority for us some of the questions that were raised earlier throughout the day as well was what we have you know increased or additional custodial staff throughout the school day recognizing that they can't you know be everywhere at the same time whether that's you know making sure bathrooms are cleaned you know have ongoing cleaning making sure were wiping commonly-used spaces you know like doorknobs and when folks first into the building and so we we have an Iona and beginning to think that through of what that's gonna look like an impact that's gonna help on a budget but we are mindful that that's gonna meet that needs to be a priority for us because we're certainly gonna be encouraging everyone to keep their hands hands clean throughout the day I have a few more questions should I wait again or should I say them now go ahead okay thank you how frequently are the bathrooms going to be cleaned mr.

governor LeMond at length I read as his document and really we're talking about this not being a children's disease and that the one thing we're not talking about is that it still is an adult disease and what's happening to the teachers that are high risk what is their options again teachers that are you know going home to families that are high risk they themselves are high risk so you have to have a comfortable teacher in a comfortable classroom to facilitate good mental health and emotional well-being for the students another would be if in talking to the governor there is sort of some sort of dispensation of okay Danbury is sort of an outlier it isn't a 100 person district the idea that the high priority students are coming back and first that could be our ELLs it could be our special ed it could be our elementary students on the students that really need more hands-on so if we could stagger that would seem to be our area to really focus on and we talked a lot about masks with the plastic cutouts or Plexiglas to be able to put around the youngers aspect and and our ell students if they really need to be able to see us while we're talking and so you know in a classroom that might be a solution I don't know if it overrides the mask-wearing but maybe it could be used you know we could take it off so that when the teachers instructing they can see the teachers mouth and then one other thing we just talked about was the sick time I know I'm going on four I apologize but this idea that if we are going out as teachers and we have to be out is that coming out of our sick time or are we getting kovat sick days the way businesses because it's more often than not we're gonna have to be out on multiple times and therefore now where we're worried about subs and sub plans okay thank you for those thoughts and we'll move on to room 7 so our room 7 I'm similarly that Jen just shared did talk about like the procedure even around exposure for Co vid so if somebody in your classroom has been exposed you're expected to quarantine what would that look like I'm explicitly at the elementary middle and high school level especially with students moving across the school at the high school in addition what was a resounding kind of team coming out is there needs to be a different plan at each level k5 6 8 & 9 12 because there are so many different anomalies for each level but a great suggestion was having a staggered start so Elementary might start first k5 you can work out all the bugs with that then 6 8 then maybe 9 12 and then the spacing in classrooms is a the biggest concern especially in some of the elementary schools people are using closets currently as classrooms and and spaces with kids so are we looking into other spaces in the city to accommodate students that are outside our current buildings and then other things that people brought up around the in-person instruction and how your expect to balance any remote learning possibly videoing having students video in during lessons in order to remediate that finally is the parent if we do have to move to distance learning model or any even kind of hybrid is we need better training for parents because most students who are not engaged it was due to a lack of the ability for teachers to communicate with parents or parents having the knowledge around how to help students remote in and things like that so using the August time to really train parents up and if anyone else in my group has more great Thank You Cara and we'll move on to room eight please okay hello this is Tracy and I'm we put all our concerns in the document so you folks can see it there if you need to and our some of our top concerns a couple people I noticed mentioned the staggered start we mentioned that it as well and I know I think I saw something on the CDC page about that if anyone's interested in looking into it but yeah we talked about space into in individual rooms and schools in general and class sizes and how we're going to maintain a safe environment with small spaces some rooms with no windows and and you know normal class sizes or sometimes larger class sizes we talked about access to PPE for staff and for students especially if it's disposable and how you're gonna get it on a regular basis we talked about monitoring student and family health the governor's plan doesn't mention anything about you know taking temperatures or anything like that but there was a concern about you know if somebody is sick and and they're in school so that's a group eight if the only thing I missed please feel free to add in there thank you very much for this opportunity thank you and room nine we'd like to hear from you now room nine I'll speak for room nine great so our three top ones the main thing that we talked about at the beginning was the sharing of resources and materials at all levels elementary middle school and high school you know whether it be crayons and pencils or science lab materials or computers you know how would we go about making sure that each student has their own set of materials and resources throughout each day another large thing that we talked about was the social-emotional learning piece and also making sure that there are resources available to students and families you know who have gone through drama or maybe students who are coming back to the classroom very anxious you know any of those things you know just making sure that there's a focus on the social-emotional piece and then the class size piece and cohorts we spoke about you know possibly the state of I'm sorry the city of Danbury has I think Kelly mentioned it you know talk to the state possibly starting at phase two because of the size of our district and possibly having a blended model or different start tying something along those lines so focusing again on the class size and cohorts and making sure that there's a set plan for that to make sure that the health and safety of students and teachers and staff are coming first I think that is the gist of our top three but if I missed any Gina thank you so much for doing that I'm and I'm also from room night as well I was more I was mostly telling the group I was like you know when it comes to social emotional learning like our us as school counselors or school social workers and psychologists are we going to be having like PD on ending the staff on that are we having people come in like you know are we going to be like you know teaching this essay l whether it's from ruler or castle like curriculums when it's going back to school so that was just a concern from student services as a school counselor from from our my perspective on that just wanted to add thank you noted that wonderful thank you and room 10 you room 10 are you there someone there sorry Ann I I have notes for group 10 give me a second so we the group and I we actually didn't nail down just the three but just kind of given what I heard I will share some of the thoughts that are a little different from what I've heard thus far right so so one support for families onboarding new families we talked about the group talked about those concerns particularly families from AOL you know AOL family is also providing distance learning support for those families and social-emotional support for those families another thing that was mentioned was the need for protocols and mentioned quite a bit in Boonton need for protocols for student staff and families to drive the chui implementation of the plan and so you know some of the examples of expectations you know what are the expectations aren't wearing the mask all day what are the expectations about walking in the hallway with the expectations around sharing books and materials will there be an expectation of kids are gonna bring in their Chromebooks every day that they were given last year you know what how we go how it teachers are suppose it's assess student safely and so you know the group talked about the need to you know having a big plan is one thing but having those who's those explicit details that's actually going to drive their day-to-day activities is going to be really important and then another and then the last one that I captured was how we addressing the needs of our staff and students with compromised immune systems how will we backfill staff who are sick you know given our challenges with what shortages and subs already will we be administering temperature checks oh and and you know another bigger world we have an isolation room for identified students in staff who are indeed sick so kind of three big buckets for us great thank you for sharing those Kevin and so we're on to room 11 and then 12 pretty much everything that's been said already is something that came up in our discussion as well we did sort of break it down to our top three which was super difficult but the safety the safety around everything that everybody has said the mask wearing you know keeping kids together what about kids who try what about kids who come in sick all of that the sanitizing concerns and the number of our bathroom spaces and hand-washing spaces available to us including then also the sanitizing and safety of materials especially the elementary level shared materials shared spaces and then the idea of cohorting you know how are you going to logistically and safely best do this you know different concerns obviously at elementary middle and high school levels but for elementary kids if you're talking about keeping you know small kids in one spot for an entire day that could be problematic some of the things that other people mention that I'm just gonna ream ention the idea of staggered starts we had a long conversation about that as well the training piece that several other groups mentioned we talked about that too and the need to train both kids and parents somebody else also mentioned the laptops that was a discussion in our group as well if we're not sharing materials and we're expecting kids to be on their devices are they are we now asking for year olds to be traveling back and forth with a laptop everyday and how long do we actually think those are gonna last that's my two cents worth yeah and I think that pretty much covers anything else that nobody else said but maybe I just wanted to mention one thing that that came up that I never thought about we're talking about cohorting students in school but on the buses they're not cohorted right so that I mean that's gonna be a huge issue yes great bra as well about if you cohort students all day but then they all get on a bus that is not cohorted so it was mentioned - yeah thank you for bringing that up Thank You Tracy and Melinda and lastly I wrote 12 good morning in I wasn't able to type in the document so I just told Cara I would just send it to her privately from our group but I'll be happy to share it for some reason I'm not allowed to get on the document okay um it's per group twelve we somewhat that down to around three entry so our first one was you know returning to school in August at a hundred percent work sir that it's not phased in like everything else should be and we're you know overly concerned education should not be the test pilot for going back 100 percent we're concerned with space issues as everyone else is as well as understanding the reality of what teacher instruction will look like under social distancing guidelines you know group work small group instruction which is really what we need to best support our students academic needs from what they've missed and also to kind of catch them up and you know apply the rigor to move them toward also the need and cost of individual supplies for each students that have the same materials they need each day to perform at their best our second was PPE equipment you know monitoring when when and when not to wear it you know brakes using masks the use of them the option for different types of masks who will they be provided by and how will they be monitored you know the reusable ones not reusable ones by staff and students we also talked about the cleanliness what is exactly going to be clean and sanitized also the frequency and who's actually going to monitor that that's happening on a daily basis and last but not least we had staff issues overall you know what about the comfort level of those returning to work what are the sick protocols look like compromised staff substitutes etc and we also talked about school programs what will they look like special areas sped speech and life skills programs as well as PD days being virtually or in person and last but not least we talked about temperature checks for staff and students okay wonderful so I'm going to ask does Kevin so that concludes all of our groups and all of those suggestions will be taken back and considered by the reopening committee Kevin or sal would you like to do a wrap-up yes thank you and thank you to everybody we still have 229 folks understand on this call you know for me as I as I listened all of us as familiar with Maslow's hierarchy of needs and you can put him in those category the physiological and then the safety needs that a toupee that needs that we need to provide I listen to all of all of us here I think we all realized that this is not normal that's abnormal and we need to learn from if when we do return that's why the phasing in makes a lot of sense it's that's provided I will tell in this group we will do the best we can to create those safety situations but understand that the communication to us has been clear that the chemical disease of the pandemic impacts youngsters at a different level than the adults but for me I'm concerned about the entire school system the adults and the students and the families so how do we come around that in a sensible reasonable fashion that will also provide an educational atmosphere so the youngsters are learning I don't have the answers but certainly today you're going to inform my decisions I could be mindful of Beninese things I will ask for some variant variations but just know that when we do return we will return with the safest plan that we have put together that's best again the best weekend so listening to you today has been really beneficial and much appreciated so thank you and and someone did talk about follow-up well we haven't been given a lot of time for this we've been given to the 24th some states actually are going into August so you know we'll be sending out some survey but certainly as someone do you reach out to us you have some thoughts and some ideas from other places don't be shy bring them to us you know maybe it's something we can utilize so thank you very much for this opportunity Thank You Anne thank you thank you dr.

students would request a partial day with their currently enrolled school and then they would take any portion of their schedule in person and their remainder online for from their home or school campus ap and dual credit courses would be the ones that they would currently take on their school campus if that's what they were desiring to have in their schedule our on-campus courses that the students would be taking would be scheduled consecutively based on the availability um already been talking about master schedules and making sure that we are having opportunities for um students to take those classes and so that they wouldn't have to take a class in the morning and then take the last class at the end of the day that would not be an option for our flex students there would be campus assistance with scheduling our gps global academy classes that they'd be taking online all of these structures are already in place we already have students that are already utilizing this this option we just have never called it a flex or a partial day option for our students but we've always done that to meet the needs there will be a district device provided because there's already one for all of our 712 students students would provide their own transportation if they're arriving or they are departing at times other than our transportation would occur as i mentioned systems are already in place for this so for example registration on campus support we have our center for success so we've talked about adding additional center for success opportunities so maybe a student might first period take a class go to a center for success and work on an online class because the other class the student wanted was third period and so that would be the opportunity for them to do that and we would do our best to do scheduling to provide that for our students dr newman we would be adhering to what's in policy related to the five consecutive courses or the five credits for high school students we we have that in policy there are sometimes exceptions when students want to take a community college course for which we do not have for example dual credit so we do have exceptions at times when students do not do that and we would continue with that if our students had their grad credits and they really wanted to take for example a course that we did not have we've always it's gone through a process where they work with their counselor the administration also has a conversation with parents they make sure that that's what's best for the student make sure the student does have all grad credits and then that student sometimes does take that at the community college okay the question also relates to what if a senior only needs two credits to graduate how would we treat that so we would um encourage them to take more but i don't think that we would we have not um specifically said we would have to change policy we would have to suspend policy if we wanted something different it's important that we are providing choice for our students but at the same time we also need to be sure that we are receiving funding that we need to but the flex is for the purpose of being flexible and so that might be the option where we are not on campus we would want our students to be there all five periods flex we may not same thing with global academy i think that's an important feature uh for us to emphasize uh funding components become a real issue as it relates to district and uh whatever we have written in policy we should stay as close to as we can well i would add that the funding that is provided for those academics helps us to have the funding for the extracurricular activities so you know it if you want to be on a baseball team you really need to be there for five classes so we have the funding to provide for that baseball team dr santa cruz i would suggest that we have that discussion in a policy meeting and further discuss and explore that particular issue as ms newman communicated there is an exception place already in process and either on a temporary or otherwise basis given the situation given the current direction of the state that they're going to give us 98 percent funding regardless of count it may not be the same point in this situation and i would like to at least explore how we can be as flexible as possible to meet parental needs uh i wouldn't disagree with you mr carr just simply is worthy of uh having an open discussion so that at least that is out there in the public and i'm sure that dr mccord will add that to our policy mean [Music] thank you are there any questions about our flex model so on the [Music] for the high school for the secondary junior high in high school basically they would come to school for a couple hours a day and then they would go home and take the rest of their classes through the online learning through the global academy so it's just combining kind of those both both of those things it's not like they'll have one single teacher or anything like that it's just pretty normal to what we have right now but just giving them maybe a half day option or shorter options and then taking the rest of it online correct i do have one question about global academy they would have options for honors classes ap classes with global academy would there also be options for special ed students with global academy in all three of the options through the our task force work we have ensured that yes we can provide services for our special needs students it looks different perhaps than it used to and so we need to be sure for example for global academy there will be options for our students with learning disabilities and there will be florida virtual is our curriculum there will be shells specifically that will provide additional supports in those shells and we will have our teachers providing those the delivery of services for our special needs students as well okay thank you so option c our new newly branded gps global academy we are super excited thank you again for your approval to make that a k-12 entity our gps global academy for the 2021 school year will have highly qualified gilbert public schools teachers that will work five days a week full time providing online instruction to our students they'll be utilizing an accredited standards-based gilbert public schools adopted online curriculum it is also ncaa approved we have already processes in place to ensure that our athletes are getting what they need and they're getting the guidance and support in that way as well they will have our students will have access to full-time teachers that's different than now because our teachers are part-time so often our teachers are teaching during the day and they're not able maybe to answer questions when a student might have those questions so they'll have access to those full-time teachers five days a week those teachers will have office hours in addition to some synchronous lessons that they'll provide there will be open lab hours we'll have some virtual lessons for opportunities for students to discuss and converse and collaborate and work together our social emotional supports will be in place for all of these options including our online again the support services for english language learners and our students with special needs as we develop the plan we really looked at all three options and delivery models and we said how were we going to address the needs of and we looked at all of these various pieces of it to be sure we'll have in-person support at our new gps global academy campus we're moving to a bigger campus there will be opportunity for example maybe students are working um full-time online maybe students are doing a flex even schedule that they have and we'll have our teachers that will be able to um if it's works for the families and the families need that in-person support they can go visit um with a teacher they might have some virtual science classes and spiritual science labs as appropriate as well our students will be assigned a mentor for goal setting and additional support those mentors will be usually that there will be teachers it may not be all of the teachers that they were assigned to our teachers will have a much bigger load for example at the secondary level than they will have individual students that they're mentoring but it will be um someone that the student has as a teacher the gps counselor will have his counselor assigned to the secondary students for academic counseling support and again we will have district devices available our 712 students already receive those and we'll be sure that any of our k-6 students who need them will have them i have a question too um last year we piloted a blended learning structure uh are we still doing that or where where they would meet like once a week with the teacher or is that kind of moving away because of the current crisis well the current situation did not let us do the full pilot okay but we do want to con add some of those similar components so we want to be sure that if that works for our families that our teacher is available for students for for example like i said the science labs or other things that might be good for them to have okay thank you um all this is yes just a question and i'm not totally certain of all of the dynamics related to this question but i'm informed that uh the state government in florida has done some augmenting of its internal budget as it relates to uh online education or virtual instruction will that have an impact on us at all no it will not um we actually consulted with the florida virtual hour rep already this this evening that is the university of florida program that they had provided some resources during covet 19 to our k-12 it's an opportunity for students to earn college degrees or geds and provides also some additional support as far as scholarships go to our higher education florida virtual is its own entity it is a k-12 entity and we were told that actually their funding increased through the governor's bill in florida and so we're hoping that that gives us even additional supports for additional courses or things like that very good thank you dr santa cruz for me yes ms newman and i just want to clarify again because i've gotten a lot of questions about global academy and the online option this is not what we did fourth quarter last year uh fourth quarter we transitioned a number of students within their existing classes if you will with their existing teachers and they you know we give the teachers credit they were doing something completely new that they had not done in the past but this is a fully developed curriculum that's taught online that's designed for online we have offered it in the past but it's not the same as for those parents who transition from in person to online during fourth quarter right thank you this is um very different than fourth quarter remote learning um all the work is required students are expected to meet virtually with their teacher at least twice a week for a class as well as work through online lessons and complete those assignments daily those lessons have videos in them those lessons have assessments those lessons have progress checks and that is all built within the online shell that the students will be working on i'll talk a little bit more about the show later but the importance of that is everything is all in one place and so for example our full-time global students would log right into their portal and it would have all of their courses right there so that's an easy access for students and for families as well also we will as i mentioned we'll have the the support for our special needs students with this online option what we want to be sure is if parents choose the option of a full-time global academy or even the flex option staff will work with parents and contact parents and review the iep to make sure that the course selections and the support is in place that's appropriate for our students so that they're successful in this environment so here are our courses at the elementary level or at all of the levels we have our core classes we have electives k through 12.

uh and and i think that just needs to be said absolutely and i will go into more detail in regards to some of the supports that we have for our staff it actually is great timing dr santa cruz because that's next we know that we will have us regardless of the delivery model our teachers will be full-time teachers if they have a full-time contract and they will be teaching their regular work hours they'll be assigned to a delivery model that is best for them whenever possible and we know that we have some personnel that's susceptible to illnesses and otherwise and we want to be sure that they are also working in a safe environment we know that some of our staff can't wait to get back to our our students in person and we want to make sure that that environment is safe as well there will there has been a staff survey that's already gone out um from our otm office and they have surveyed our at-risk members to gauge their intentions in returning to work while maintaining also the confidentiality that they have in place they've offered and they will continue to offer special accommodations whether that be alternative teaching assignments whether that mean that they there's a need for example of additional staffing do we need additional custodians do we need additional nurses do we need additional health aids there will be we've reassigned a dean already to our flex model we know that super excited about the flex model i mean we wanted to do splendid learning for a long time but it does require a additional training and additional skill sets so we want to be sure that not only did we not um we wanted to be sure we provided the adequate and additional continuous training and professional development for our teachers not just in the beginning of the year but throughout the school year our professional learning communities they'll be able to meet on wednesdays with with the staff and we also knew that this would be extremely difficult for an administrator while the administrator has all of the in-person classes going on as well um we we're able to um have the expertise of a dean that has experience in online learning and um and so we're super excited we've assigned a tie to that team as well um and she is dynamic and she's very very knowledgeable and i think that the teachers will feel very comfortable going and asking for assistance and help from her as well that also as far as our employees we want to be sure that we are reporting identified coveted cases following guidelines established as i mentioned there is um there are forms already created and in place and we've had to use some of those um you know in different instances and there um we continue to make them as accessible and as updated as things change as we can the notification of those cases also adhere to ferpa and hipaa requirements and its state and federal employment law and extended leave allowances i want to go to the next slide just to show also some precautions that have been put in place for staff um procedures as well that are put in place we'll have personal protective equipment including our distribution of n95 mass as appropriate to our staff hand sanitizer is going to be in every classroom there will be cleaning solutions provided for that daily spot cleaning of hive traffic services there will be deep sanitizing every two days at a minimum throughout our campuses and our offices district health protocols for reporting and returning to work will be in place there will be that daily health screening and reporting to supervisors as appropriate if our staff does not if our staff is not healthy and that notification of contacts when our staff has been perhaps in the close proximity of somebody who perhaps does get the virus we also have cleaning and disinfecting for protecting our employees there's going to be some other additional slides that give you some more than what i'm going to explain right now but restroom and health office touch point areas will be disinfected twice daily there will be guidelines and supplies for cleaning desks and tables that are provided to classroom teachers there will be signage for safe hygiene and hand washing posted by all classroom sinks and restrooms and the utilization of our electrostatic sprayers for wide area disinfecting that is both our we have the backpack style and also the sprayer style the handheld sprayer style that can be used we also have return to work support in place for our employees it's important that um as employees are experiencing some things and they are also responsible for students as well um that they have and are very knowledgeable that there is an employee assistant program in place for all of our staff members there's regular communication and check-ins with our vulnerable staff the training for use of the online platform and the supplemental resources and i'm going to talk a little bit more about that later but that is the support that we put in place and we wanted to be sure that our staff knew that we're not going to leave them without the tools that they need and that instructional technology support dedicated as i mentioned just to virtual learning dr newman i do have a question especially considering the unknowns with this virus you know someone a staff member could have a family member that gets sick or they could have a contact with someone and not know whether or not they should quarantine it seems like are they going to have to use their own sick leave to deal with this or are we going to provide additional sick days i know there's something under the cares act but can you explain that a little bit better i'm going to ask mr mcintosh to explain that a little bit better good evening dr santa cruz governing board members and dr mccord so in order to answer your question the first 14 days of any symptomatic or confirmed case of the covet then they would have that from the federal government under the ffcra act and then if they needed additional time to care for a family member etc then they could utilize their own sick time at that time okay thank you yeah thank you so related to that mr mcintosh [Laughter] one of our challenges obviously is a large number of our substitute teachers are in by age what we may classify as a high risk category um we might have something to help the teachers but do we have resources for substitutes and and caring for them well currently we are getting ready to deploy a survey to all of our substitutes to see how many of them would be available to come back to work and also surveying them kind of like just like we did with the teachers if they have a reason or they're uncomfortable in coming back the two-week allowance is for is for employees so i'm assuming that that two weeks the 80 hours of the ffcra we would have to then go back and look at what substitutes how many hours they've taught or covered last semester and then we would proportion it out like that so um we haven't got all the way through that piece yet but we're working on that right now so we would i would have to seek some legal counsel on on substitutes because and also look at what the surrounding districts are doing with their substitutes but we are sending out a survey to see how many of them are willing to come back because we do know we're going to have a high utilization rate with substitutes because of coven 19.

Walston some feedback to your questions we will make sure that we first of all we are recording this and we will publish something down the road more definitively to answer your questions but I think at this point we just want to hear from everyone so if we can start off with Jennifer grant please hi I'm a student at Danbury high school and I last year the halls were really really crowded and it was really hard to get to class in general but I'm really like worried as of now with going back to school how it's gonna be handled because I could barely get anywhere and I know that now with the whole Cova 19 thing it'll be even worse having everybody so condensed into one given area so I was just wondering about that yeah Jennifer that's a great wondering because we we share the same wondering we had a great meeting with administrators this morning and as you and they echoed the same sentiments we had it we had teachers in middle school and the high school who also expressed concern about about of students in the hallway and how we going to safely be able to move students around the building given how given how crowded we are and and this is why we have this is why we raise concerns about you know the re-entry and so we're hoping that there's an opportunity for some modifications to the plan but we don't know we don't know fully yet but right now we're certainly you know planning on a full reentry and coming up with protocols that within reason Jennifer to keep everyone safe and so one of the things that we talked about is having staircases that are one-way hallways that you know follow typical you know streets traffic patterns so everyone's on the right-hand side of the hallway if you can envision what that would look like to try to try to mitigate the risk of exchange of you know germs while kids are passing in the hallway and then of course the expectation is students will be wearing their masks but but we do we fully understand your concern and we're trying to come up with options so that we don't have so many students in a school that once particularly the high school great thank you and we'll move to shame or please hi I'm a student at Rogers Park and for transportation there are many students that don't have an option for going for having a parent I've them to school what are we gonna be able to do for on a bus when they're already overflowing and I don't believe anyone will be paying for more buses how would you sort out yeah hi Shay thank you for that question and so you guys are not making the questions any easier for this I'll tell you that right now honestly Shay we don't have an answer to that question certain part of part of what we plan to do is to survey our our families to get a feel of what what families will be taking advantage of of our school busing and what will not and then and then with that information we can kind of determine how much reasonably how much social distance and we can do on our buses we had a survey pushed out to our community earlier and we got this sense from our parents that many of them would be driving their their children to school but to your point not everyone and so we will you know our thoughts where we would come back and have another survey that's a little more definitive this is exactly what school will look like in the fall once we have those details in place and then and then you know and then pull our our families and ask you know the plane is in your child to school do you plan to send your child to school on the bus will you be picking your child up from the bus every day and then begin to use that information to determine how we're going to socially distance if we can safely do it and then what additional resources we might need thank you I love the talk that's going on in the chat box so if parents have a comment or want to add more um please feel free to because it's great to hear from lots of different folks and so Griffin please hi so I'm a rising senior at Danbury High School and I'm going to preface this by saying that I understand that you may not have answers to as many things as we would all like but I think we all appreciate that the efforts that you are taking to make the return to school as safe as possible um one caveat to that is I think that having read the budget for this upcoming year and understanding how high school children work there is no way that enforcing social distancing or mask-wearing is going to be effective in any capacity on buses and I think that in order to alleviate that something needs to be done to reduce capacity on buses because as it is we can only in order to keep people 6 feet apart you can only have like 10 people on a bus and we do not have money for enough buses so I think something along the lines of staggering who goes to school on what days as much as that might not be fun for us it would help keep down people in the hallways people on buses in classrooms and I think that if we don't do that that the amount of people that aren't able to be driven to school or drive to school is going to be completely overwhelming and also yeah that's a good point Jennifer the amount of people that will just outright refuse to wear a mask is going to be a problem whether we want it to be or not thank you for sharing that Mateus please we're not able to understand you can you put your thoughts [Music] the taste we're not understanding Mateus we're not understanding you can you put your message in the chat box for us please thank you and we're gonna move on to lowering our cherry please hi I know this is a probably low on the list of things but both of my kids do marching band in the fall are we looking at what we are going to do as far as after-school activities are we shelving that and just really concentrating on what we're gonna do in the classrooms hi Lauren so we we did receive guidance from this day around extracurricular activities and I'll just speak to two you know one of them deep being actually regular activities you know meeting CIA SI release some information about sports and after school sporting so that's one and then the other one is and so for example band instruments Orchestra they have released some guidance on on those content areas and also performances and spoke to you know the fact that those things can be done but with increased increased social distancing so for example if it's Orchestra strong you know string instruments etc Orchestra singing instead of being six feet apart it will need to be extended to twelve feet apart they encouraged us to you know take advantage of football fields and really large spaces that can accommodate you know large size groups of you know thirty five to fifty students because oftentimes we know how big those groups can be and they also encouraged us to have you know smaller smaller group sizes for training and you know practicing and then bring the bigger groups together only when necessary so there is some initial guidance on making that happen the expectation is if we're going to open up school fully in the fall that all the extracurricular activities will also be part of the school experience okay great thank you so much you're welcome and of course that doesn't make it easy to make implement but the expectation is is that we would have pro opening up for it thank you for asking that question because I know a family a lot of families and students are probably wondering I'm just gonna turn my camera to the one sitting next to me so she can give you her thoughts like in classrooms there should be like only like three people like for the blocks I think they should only be three people at a time doing it and on the buses only twenty people thank you and and what's that was what's that young lady's name Riley okay so Riley but we're gonna get you on this share a Google Doc so you can help me with this plan please good correct she was also concerned about children's masks snapped by other children so that was awesome so let's so and so and can I can I speak to the mask because for those students who are on the the the district is expecting to have an extra available mask for students and in those cases anticipating that those things can happen and so you know the the state expectation is anytime we enter a building everyone would have a mask on anyway but we also understand that you know mass will break you know students might lose their masks and you know whatever might happen it so we wanted we will we will definitely have additional masks available for kids throughout the school day and staff as well great okay and we'll go to Zac please what about switching masks and kids with asthma yeah yeah so so so Zac I'm sorry is your question students with asthma making sure they have a mass that is well make sure that they're wearing a mask that protects them I'm asking is since wearing a mask for a prolonged period Kenan bothers kids eyes my and inhibit their breathing so much that they will have an asthma attack sometimes what are we gonna do about that and also three about after every three hours we use will have masks and other masks will need to be switched so what what we have talked about extensively in whether this be for students or for staff but students specifically is making sure we've identified all of our students that have compromised immune systems in any way and so students that crew-cut who have you know asthma who have you know other conditions that could be compromised in this you know going back to school to make sure we have some type of consultation with our school nurse and the students and their family to walk them through you know the expectation is when we go back to school so is that that that was a great question I appreciate you asking you muted in yeah thank you is Trish to Robinson place Trish I was wondering how are you going to manage the cafeteria because lunch break and there's a lot of a lot of people in the cafeteria no how exactly and you have to take your mask off to eat so how exactly are we gonna space out everybody in the cafeteria we're gonna eat in our classes right and I'm sorry can you repeat your name again I even in and out can i am i coming through now having technical problems yeah sure am i coming through yes great great thanks go ahead no answer I it is from we're all thinking about about eating the cafeteria and trying that have been spaced out so we're trying to UM work that through obviously you can't use a mask while you're doing it so we'd have to work through some way of getting the lunches to folk get into you so that you can't eat them while you're spaced out that's something that's concerning to us so thank you for the question great glad to see you're with us dr.

Walston just we're going to have to have a more rigorous routine to doing that in answer that right now probably more often than then then we could anticipate depending on the usage but we'd have to keep a close eye on them have had it deaf and keep them as clean as possible that's all you have to do and then monitor it daily some days are probably more than others you know it depends but it's a high priority for us to make sure that they stay clean and who will enforce that the masks stay on well how old are you 12 will help me out you know I I could see where it's gonna be difficult and we're gonna have to cooperate the adults are gonna have to crawl this is very unusual so you know we don't have a police state this is for medical reasons and health reasons I think most students will just follow someone's having some real challenges with it so we'd have some timeout areas so that they could take the mask off yeah we have to be reasonable and I want we don't want to catch the start being put out of school and all that stuff because they won't wear a mask we're looking for cooperation so part of it is that we're going to have to ask parents to help us work with their youngsters tell them how important it is and then when when something happens at school and it will happen that we work with that person so it gets back on reasonably so we work together as a team thanks for saving your heart questions for my boss I appreciate that chat box choose we're getting some good conversation in there as well I just couldn't I couldn't get the audio to work and I kept knocking it but I did hear something good questions Alberta please hi hello yeah summer student indeed yes I'm gonna be a senior this upcoming year so I just wanted to ask if like if we will be able to like as you said like we have to wear masks in school so will you guys provide them for us or we will be providing them for our so because at this time is very difficult for everybody to get masks and as if you've seen them like in in Amazon or like some other places they're really really like really expensive so will you guys be able to provide them for us or we have to provide them for ourselves well right now we're still talking about it we'll probably have obviously we'll have the some masks of for those that during the data that did that don't have them and then we'll work with families if that we need to purchase some so right now we're working through that okay great thank you very much and we'd like to Kiera McCarthy next hi um I was just wondering again how old the hallways are going to work like do you think it's a possibility that the bell like send one section of the school and the hallways at a time like all 3,000 kids at the hallway at the same time because like very like pushing in the hallways yeah that's a great question the height did you say you're at the high school now yeah I'm gonna be a junior well it would have been easier if you were a k5 I couldn't answer that question but I'll try to answer that question 4 K 5 6 8 and 19 but specifically for 912 add in very high school your principal you know school administrators and us we're all trying to think through that the safest way the best way to keep all of you guys safe and and and and that could mean a number of different things from different ways on how you guys are gonna different times on how you're gonna into different days on how you're gonna enter school different times on how you're gonna be released from classrooms and so we're still exploring all of those things and so we don't we don't have anything definitive for you right now at k5 in 6/8 particularly k5 wanted you know some of the things we talked about in terms of hallway movement is following the normal traffic patterns that we typically would have and and you know keep in keeping us students socially distanced you should know that your teachers are asking the same important questions the administrators are asking the same questions and in the superintendent dr.

um at the elementary level unlike perhaps maybe as they circle through and they have all different kinds of specials our students would choose what elected they would want at that k5 classroom whether that be pe technology spanish or art we would also be sure that our sixth graders while they are at the elementary level for us here in gilbert public schools our sixth graders would actually have electives that are offered at the junior high that's a more of a middle school model which is the six seven eight so our sixth graders would have electives pe reading study skills spanish coding and art we would have opportunities for gifted or honors students at all three levels our gifted students would receive an acceleration of math for fourth through sixth grade and also the enrichment of our sixth grade curriculum at our elementary similar to what our model is currently right now our middle school would continue to have honors courses right now we don't have honors courses that we have offered and that's why we are running those through our teaching and learning departments to ensure that it is what we would consider honors and what we've said is our guidelines and our parameters for what an honors course would be and then at the high school we have honors classes there's the ability to take and offer ap courses whether or not we have those will be dependent just like on a campus of our teachers our staffing and what assignments our teachers would have of whether or not that would be an option what questions do you have for us miss newman with online there always has introduced new challenges there's not necessarily a teacher to call as a parent if my child is taking online how do i monitor their success how do i monitor progress and make sure they're completing assignments so the uh the portal that we mentioned which is our our our buzz agilics is the virtual platform that we have literally a parent could go right to that portal and that portal would show the parent not only would it show the parent all the courses that the student is taking but the progress that the student has on each of the assignments there is an a piece within the portal of communication between parent and teacher we are going to have teachers that are more available we're putting that into their schedule so they are available for phone calls and they are available for emails and that is in their daily schedule to be able to do that and um and help that way the um trying to think what other options for our parents we have besides the portal we also are going to have the opportunity for our the communication will be such that our teachers will be communicating with parents more and the parents will have only one place to go to figure it out that's what's going to be different about gps global academy and as we work through this through all of our options instead of parents thinking well our teachers are working on google classroom over here i think i think i got a text over here or there might be an email here that's really our our main purpose of looking at and ensuring that we have a virtual platform k12 so that our parents will have access in that way i have a question will that will the parent have to help some of the younger students like kindergarteners and first graders if they make this choice it seems like they would need more help with a global online curriculum than maybe some of the older students the yes the assignment so will be not always on the screen so there may be assignments that they might get and tell them for example an activity to do and that might involve them doing something hands-on and so that would be something that they'd be able to do gps global academy also with flex we know that our kindergartners will not be on the screen for five day five hours a day we're expecting our kindergartners to have two hours a day for that kind of work and then our teachers would teach on the days so our students would get both for example english language arts and math lessons two to three times a week and so the other time would them do some independent practice with that or independent reading or some other component similar to that okay all right thank you okay so the whole child supports um we can't say it enough we miss our students we want them back we want to be able to support them in any way that they can we also are so appreciative of the opportunity to add additional supports social workers and mental health counselors this year this upcoming year who would have known that in such a situation how how wonderful that would be for us we knew that we really wanted it and needed it but especially now there will be a opportunity and really a focus to re-establish the connections re-engage the disconnected we had we had students who were not engaged during fourth quarter we've had students that haven't been able to um engage in a lot of conversations or activities with our friends and so it'll be really important to do that outreach and the family engagement pieces the collaboration with campus staff so that their our teachers have support in helping them to also support their um their students the utilization of our behavioral health team members we have behavioral health bht members can i interrupt you and go back to the options just to make sure globally regardless of which option the student chooses as long as they meet the aia requirements for enrollment i'm assuming that we will count them as eligible to participate in athletics or or whatever other events is that is that correct assumption that is correct so our students in flex or global academy will continue to have the same opportunities that they have previously had in regard to participating yes thank you sorry for interrupting no that's okay it's also important for the process to include classroom and school-wide preventative interventions coordination with families and also that collaboration with community resources to be sure that our families and our students have what they need from a social emotional perspective i did want to add something in here i think it's really important to understand that students will learn best when they have those relationships and they feel comfortable with their teacher and that is part of the importance not only because we care about them but because we know that they will function better and do better if they feel comfortable and feel a part of their class or connected to their teacher that's really important absolutely in any of the settings yeah it's super important yes we were just talking about that this morning the importance of just connecting with the student and reconnecting and and building those relationships right from the very beginning and that will make such a difference we think too we know it will so for academics we've talked a little bit about this and previously about some of the things we're considering we knew that it was so important to make sure that there was that continuity of learning so that is why with the addition of the gps global academy going k-12 we now have the opportunity for our students in any of those options and all of our teachers to have access to a virtual platform have access to some online curriculum as well and so we are planned and we're ready if there are is any potential disruption whether that be individual classroom or a reason to close we're able to continue with the learning and we already have it in place and ready to go um we want to be sure to with that that there is a one-stop easy access for our students and for our families so students we have a rapid identity tile when they go into and log in initially they will just click on that it will take them right to the buzz platform and from there they will access their curriculum the curriculum will vary um depending on these options that our families choose um but we will always have a component of the virtual platform within any of the options so that everybody is familiar with it that is something that our teachers did such a great job of adding websites and creating google classrooms and doing some of that and they did such hard work but it was still difficult sometimes for our families to navigate all that especially if they had a student at the elementary level or a student at the high school they weren't always utilizing those same programs so that was really important to make sure that we had that the next piece is from an academic standpoint is we need to be sure that we're addressing the learning gaps we had a disruption for an entire quarter some students engaged and some students did not so what do we have in place for that we have several things we have our priority standards that we have curriculum guides scopes and sequences that we've already created for our teachers we knew this was coming this is something that we did during the closure um where we've already shared them out with some of our teachers at the various grade levels or for the various content areas the scope and sequence will will also include an identification of those priority standards that were missed in fourth quarter so for example if if a student is now doing fourth grade math that student would not take all of what the student learned in third grade fourth quarter or should have and they're not learning it right at the beginning they're looking at through the where those priority standards are and well where they will learn that progression of that standard in fourth grade and that's where the scaffolding and additional instruction will take place right then and that is actually in place right now for example in our math and in our english language arts we know that for foundational reading we have you know our students that missed perhaps a quarter of learning how to read and our foundations is a very very strong foundational reading program as is our spalding and so adding additional time for example during our 90-minute reading block to make sure that our students are able to meet the needs of what they've missed make sure that they've at least demonstrated proficiency we also know that gaps are going to continue to occur we're going to use diagnostic screeners teachers are going to identify those students specifically in reading who have gaps in those skills they're going to use whole group small group or intervention settings so that they can support those students with specific identify needs whether that be in person or in the virtual platform so as we're talking about all of these we make sure we made sure that regardless of the choice of delivery model our students would be taken care of in all of these areas and so we we literally had a matrix that said you know option a in person what about our flex and then what about our online learning and so that is there the learning support in services we will be reassigning staff because some staff will not be able to come back for example to the brick and mortar so that works nicely and that will need staff at our gps global academy as well that will ensure that we're going to have highly qualified and appropriately certified teachers and individuals that are providing our support whether that be ell specialists our special educators and also our title interventionists and then also for assessing student growth to inform our instruction we don't have spring 2020 data we don't have any of that because we did not take our state assessments and so it will be important that our teachers continue to work through our data teams process and through their psc plcs they will be able to have their classroom formative assessments they'll be able to determine what that student progress is towards proficiency of those academic standards the new platform we have a new platform for assessment so not necessarily the best time but that's okay because we already have things in place and is in regard to training and other wise our governor issued an order that said that we must have benchmarks within the first six weeks of our school year and we have already indicated that that is possible whether that be in person or virtually we're able to do those benchmarks in both of those modes so we're good we can make it happen and um that's a huge relief to know that we have that in place as well is there any questions about academics dr newman not necessarily a question but a statement for sure and that is and i'm certain you and the task force have factored this in we have a huge concern for our students and our families as we should they are our customers we have a group of professionals and staff who are also uneasy and i would hope that all of this structural stuff becomes part of their pd and that they have an opportunity to become as conversant with it as they can prior to meeting their their students in in whatever format is is chosen so that we're not placing additional burden on those teachers at any level k through 12.

so are there concerns that we might have a shortage of substitutes under the circumstances are are we concerned about having a shortage of substitutes under the circumstances until i get the survey back it would be hard for me to guess um we are working on developing plans so that we could have site coverage with substitutes those those who are willing to come back we could assign to a campus so that way when a teacher or another staff member is out there's already a pool of substitutes on that campus to help cover um during that time so we're still in the developing plans with the with that but i think that we'll get there we've had the highest number of substitutes in our pool last year than what we've ever historically had but in our current situation until i get the survey back it's unknown just exactly how many are willing to to come in and help gps okay thank you i'm learning to enunciate better so you can hear me through the mask this is not related to that so um i'm not sure where this question comes in but since you've been talking about health protocols under employees this isn't necessarily related to employees but traditionally when there's an outbreak of some kind of illness at a particular school we report that to the county health department and they intervene what role does the county health department play at this point with with ongoing covid and if we have an outbreak miss jen frost is here specifically to answer those questions and if we're going to address this in the future we can i'll wait for an answer to that this is perfect okay this is great thank you good evening dr santa cruz members of the board um dr mccord so i've been working with department of health probably every other day we meet and they currently don't have a percentage typically with things like measles chickenpox those types of things there is a number directly tied to the virus that they want to use in order to know that they're going to shut down a classroom or excuse me a campus at this time we are reporting each case that we know of as positive and confirmed but they have not decided because this is a community born virus they have not decided what number that would take for a campus in order to shut anything down does that answer your question well we don't know is the answer so yes dr santa cruz go ahead go ahead ms eugenie i am i have a question for uh mr mcintosh okay let him come to the microphone go ahead and ask your question he and i talked about this this afternoon uh it has to do with the fact that the first coronavirus response act only covers 80 hours of paid leave for a staff member but what happens if that staff member gets exposed again and i know chandler has said that they are going to cover the teachers or any employees that that happens with so what are we going to do hi josh go ahead missy jenny it's shane um mr mcintosh and i talked about that i did speak to chandler as well it's something that they're going to propose to their board which is something that i would propose to you as well and that is if somebody has confirmed case of covid that is their second go around with cobid would we be willing to cover another 10 days for them to be able to recover quarantine for that time so i think i would be willing to propose that to you as a governing board but we would need to look at what policy that specifically speaks to and suspend that portion of it or reword it for the time being one of the concerns is that sometimes people are sick for quite an extended time with this virus and and they don't necessarily necessarily recover in just two weeks or even three or four i have heard of cases where it's gone on much longer so i think we're going to have to be a little flexible on a case-by-case basis depending on what the employees need mr jetty did you get the response you were looking for i did but but my question it has to do with even just being exposed not necessarily having it well i would think if they're if they're reporting it and they need to quarantine and whether they're exposed or whether they have it again we would be able to work with them based on direction from the governing board related to that again it's it's something that within our policy because the cares act takes care of the first 80 hours the assumption would be then the employees sickly would cover that moving forward but if we want to do some things different as a school district we i'm more than willing to do that but if they don't have enough sick leave and they keep getting exposed we've got to figure that one out right and and and again even if they had enough sick leave we could suspend them using that sick leave if they've been exposed again and need to quarantine that's that's something that we could decide as a as a school district and governing board your observation's a good one thank you dr you bet i i think that is another item for policy committee we'll have to as dr mccord has suggested take a look at the policy that applies and adjust the language accordingly for this moment in time so your your point is well taken thank you thank you dr santa cruz and dr mccoy dr santa cruz it sounds like our policy meeting is going to become a retreat it it does thank you mr carr go ahead dr newman all right um so there will be additional obviously training and support our teachers will be trained um and receive professional development as i mentioned initial and then ongoing professional development on the platform and also on best instructional strategies with whether that be for a blended model or whether that be for an all online model and how can they continue to engage the students in academic rigor like they would be used to in the classroom we want to be sure initially in july we once we have um approval to move forward we will train all of our teachers and at least one hour of training that we will pay them it's optional for them to do it in july but we know that some teachers want they want to get trained now because they have summer and they're used to summer time and working and preparing and so there will be an optional pd just on the overall common knowledge of what the virtual platform is we initially also knew that we need to have additional training for our flex teachers and for our gps global academy teachers now with recent news just as of yesterday there might be a need for us to train all of our teachers in much more detail on the florida virtual shell and how teachers can access that and how they can pull their own resources in there and do some more things that way sooner rather than later and so with that we know that with the return to school before our students would begin their calendar our teachers have their contracted calendar and so those days would be while the teachers on contract that we would be sure that teachers not only received the additional the initial training if they did not get it in july but then all of the additional training as well and support we've talked about having additional um almost an expert on each campus a go-to in addition to our ties who are such a great resource they will be doing the majority of the training along with dr barton at gps global academy and we have four teachers that our on our at our brick and mortar campuses right now that also are gps global academy teachers part-time and so that will be our team in addition to our professional development educators as well ms human just for a quick break is he jetty are you still there i i think i am i i think i get disconnected you're there here we got you i just i i heard a couple beeps and i didn't i just wanted to make sure you were still there thank you sorry to interrupt i wasn't leaving [Music] i'm afraid miss eugenie might have said something and that's why we heard the beep but um miss newman sorry poor attempted humor very funny miss newman you made a comment about when teacher contracts start with contracts starting as as uh as documented but now with us starting school later are we suggesting that the teachers still report on the report date and begin their contract if that's the case not knowing whether they're going to change the number of school days our teachers then gonna have to report and teach more days um and again if if i'm if i'm being a segway i'm not intending to so please if that's already addressed i can wait but well it's it's not necessarily addressed because it's it's kind of what happened yesterday in terms of the discussion of of when do we actually start school you know the governor said uh august 17th is when we can go back in person but also left the door open for us to start at our regular date online and so if that was the case the teachers would report not new teachers they'd report a couple days before that but all other teachers would report july 31st and we would continue teaching or start teaching online and then as you got to august 17th or up two if things haven't changed then we would segue in and into those three models of those that chose in person those that chose flex and those that choose to continue online and so that's how we'd move forward if for some reason we didn't do anything and pushed everything back and in person can start or those three options could start on the 17th then their contract would start three work days before that and so um everything would be pushed back but at that time and we don't know the answer to this today but the assumption is is that the pays would be delayed until uh that started so and that was one of my questions i mean from past experience or past discussion if we don't start the teacher pay we can't begin to pay them or if we don't start the contract we can't begin to pay them by state statute correct and i haven't seen any executive order to change that nothing in writing that would say pay him and start whenever you want because otherwise it would be considered a constitutional issue of gifting public gifting yeah um so i just want that clear to teachers i've been asked by a few teachers the simple answer at this point then is we don't know that is correct and and and i think that's something that we should probably discuss at further length this evening in terms of what our intentions are for august 5th uh as we move through this again not necessarily part of the presentation but definitely part of the discussion and also you know we talk a lot about teachers we need to recognize our support staff and again the same type of concept of gift of public funds if we go online or even if we wait and do nothing until august 17th there's still uh a lack of them being able to be paid and even if we start online the question is how do we or do we pay them because they won't be performing there'll be a handful of course that will continue to work but there'll be several paraprofessionals out there that we will not be able to utilize we might be able to do some trainings for a lot of different groups but that won't be a full-time job 40 hour a week it might be a few hours here and there so that's that concerns me greatly because our support staff and it seems like when things like this happen it seems like support staff is always left out of the loop and and they're extremely important to the operation and the functioning and the education of our students and so i don't know what there's a fix for that but i unless again like in the spring the reason why that was able to happen because there was an executive order well this executive order does not address that and i don't know if a future one will or not so again gray and related to that dr mccord the a executive order last week uh i believe it was last week indicated that they would guarantee school funding at at least to 98 percent of last year which the purpose of that is to allow us to to move forward planning because we simply don't know with only weeks to to come how we're going to support parents in their choices of online in person or or flex or you know whatever model they choose but the executive order that came out yesterday seems to indicate that if we start online that those even with the plan of transitioning the full time that those students who start online will be treated as an aoi online arizona online student for funding purposes so we seem to have con conflicts in those two executive orders the older one only a week old indicating we will receive funding the newer one indicating that our funding may be diminished um i understand it's just a two percent maximum decline right well i don't know i mean the newer one supersedes it doesn't reference that so that's my question if we could seek clarification because if that's the case and then again if funding is based on 100-day then maybe it doesn't matter because we're back in person by 100 day anyway right um so i i think there's some some questions where those two executive orders are in conflict with each other the newer one of the two seeming to give us a lower amount i think that impacts our our decisions and our ability to make decisions and we need to seek clarification on that very possible i i see it as irregardless of what we're funded at for aoi we're going to be held harmless up to 98 and but and i want to yeah i want to uh interpret it as i will leave with that but but anytime you have a newer document that says something that typically supersedes the previous document so in my mind it left it unclear i don't know that was the governor's intention to leave it unclear but i would like to if we can seek some clarification on that so that we're making smart informed decisions and we'll have uh mrs betts come up and a few talk about some dollars she might have a little more info to be able to share and i agree with you mr carr i also to add additional confusion as i listened to the governor speak yesterday i latched on to the word maximum flexibility in the financing i can interpret that any way i would like but i'm not sure that my interpretation would be equal to his interpretation or to the legislature's interpretation but we we need to capitalize on that maximum flexibility terminology and i did speak with mrs betts yesterday and she and i had a very good conversation and she's doing some research on our behalf i feel like i've been doing yoga i'm so flexible for the last four months this is awesome we also want to be sure that we're providing parent training and support as well training on the platform and how to access the platform how to best help students who are learning online or in blended situations that resource navigation and where to find things for students or where to look how to access progress of students and then again that strategy for student support what does that look like in all of our settings and so that will be also a focus when we look at training and support with that too we want to provide technical support tech services did an amazing job it was always fun to watch you know the cars driving through and whether that be because they had questions about a device or there was a device that perhaps needed some a little bit extra help there but they are prepared to support they are prepared to support at even a larger scale than they did before their students will have access at k-6 to not only a device but also some insurance options that they obviously did not have during fourth quarter and obviously they did not have it previously because our students did not have devices but they have expanded that opportunity for parents to purchase insurance for those devices also that internet accessibility and the importance of making sure that our families who may not have internet access do and so continuing to work with that cox connect to compete program making sure the collaboration between tech services our title offices and our parents and then for our parents that might live in locations where cox does not service those subdivisions making sure that there are alternative hot spots that are provided from the other vendors other than cox as well i have a question on just devices and i probably dr mccord can answer this we had a robust one-to-one um seven through twelve program and we've been able to roll down a lot of our chromebooks to the elementary will we need to purchase more chromebooks in order to give access to students or have we had sufficient chromebooks we've had sufficient chromebooks we've also ordered more because some have aged out and we're in the process of replacing some and also the city of mesa has graciously donated the funds to the tune of 420 chromebooks for our district from the money that they received from the federal government related to or the state actually i think related to um covet 19 so that's actually on the consent agenda for this evening okay i just wanted to make sure that we we're covering those elementary students as well thank you dr newman that we're not talking about all elementary students we're talking about elementary students who are either in the flex or the online the global yes any of them that would need that in either those options though knowing too we're going to we need to be flexible and there will be times of disruption so if an individual student for example all of a sudden is needs to be home for a length of time we'll be able to provide that for them as well okay thanks so as you can imagine um just i'm sorry questions keep coming up and this isn't related to this this is going back to our three options but uh as this is new information questions arise as they come to mind within all three student options uh how does evit work at the high school level if they choose the hybrid they choose online does eve it just work the same way are there special accommodations in all of those not only eve it but also our cte programs we've take have plans in place of how our students can continue for example our even our cte part of cte is that you have to have a certain percentage of hands-on experiences so when our students are there we want to be sure that they continue to have as many hands-on experiences just in case there is another disruption for whether that be student or otherwise and they also are utilizing some online programs that have some virtual experiences as well but we definitely would be able to um with just like the flex is a partial day gps global academy we could do the same thing with our students and then of course our brick and mortar and we'll follow what ebit says as well in regard to what their plans are we do not have those yet either so as you can imagine our district operations have um been working overtime did you have a question i do and and this may have been observed and i might have missed it but if in a classroom a student exposes a a whole class with a teacher and the entire class would have to be quarantined for two weeks what are is going to be the solution for that so if i think i heard her i'll try it okay if a classroom for example that would be a disruption of an entire classroom we would then continue to support the students the teacher would be able to if the students were having to be at home for a certain length of time during that quarantine time then the teacher would continue to support them through online learning they would already be used to the virtual platform they would already be used to some of the access in regard to the curriculum and our parents would also have knowledge of that so students would be doing some element of that throughout the um throughout the week and so we would continue with working with their classroom teacher whether that be an individual student is experiencing disruption or a classroom the same way thank you dr newman so for transportation times on buses will be minimized with new routes created buses will be cleaned twice a day once after our morning runs and once again at the end of the day base coverings will be provided to students who do not have them as they um as they arrive and and get on the bus in the morning or after school question about bus is will we it's been said that if if we can have the windows open will we have the windows open to help there be more airflow in the bus or or not i believe that we would we would have one or two windows open so there would be airflow okay thank you and of course we would take temperature into into i mean we're going to be careful that we don't um heat the students up you know in a manner so we'll we'll we'll do the best we can when it comes to that but yes that's the original okay thought is to have a window open okay thank you um as you know there have been cleaning protocols and materials that have we've changed some of our practices and we've added additional ones the we've standardized our practices acro throughout the district there are high use areas that are cleaned more frequently for example as we mentioned before bathrooms auditoriums multi-purposes the high-touch areas that we've purchased pro texas cordless electrostatic handheld and also backpack straight sprayers that are purchased for schools and for bus fleets um every school will have one depending on the size um they may have more than one and then also that sanitizing liquid that is used in those machines will also is already available and will be there at our warehouse as is needed the hand sanitizers will be mounted and available throughout our buildings in classroom surface cleaning materials will be available throughout the day we have approved a deployment of additional five-member custodial work team so as they're needed whether that be due to absences or an outbreak or a situation where they might need some heavy cleaning they are ready and able to work in that way there will be enhanced training for all our custodians and our non-custodial staff on the use of the disinfectant application um the the use of laundered and sanitized color-coded microfiber cloths for specific surface areas so that we're avoiding some of that cross-contamination do you have any questions about any of that or what i haven't mentioned maybe related to this so the disinfectant wipes would be available to teachers in the classroom we would be providing those there will be one of them whether it be a disinfectant wipe or whether it be the sanitizer that they're able to spray and utilize those cloths in that way to clean yes in every classroom okay thank you right so the financial and advocacy piece we've touched on that a little bit already tonight continually monitors state and federal funding as well as student reporting guidance that we receive sometimes always almost on a daily notice we will apply for and manage the cares act grant monitor warehouse supplies of our personal protective equipment and cleaning materials with that working closely to make sure that those are not only available in the warehouse but budget lines are already set up for our campuses and departments so it allows for quick acquisition for those needed supplies without any kind of delay for that facilitate that budget also again so that is quick for them but also make sure that that's readily available and it's there as they are requesting those materials it's important as i know you know to report the status of budget regularly to all of you and to the leadership team to make sure that we're making wise decisions and decisions that are fiscally responsible and then continue with that legislative advocacy for funding and accountability as well how is the legislative advocacy advocacy going to take place what are what do we have in mind there that's discussions with superintendents who actually have uh active lobbyists who are working for school districts as well as our local legislators i've been in a lot of contact with jennifer pollock i know she's probably watching us right now and uh very good with information and passing along information they they've done a really good job of keeping us in the loop and listening to our concerns okay thank you i'm going to ask mrs betts to come and explain the next slide because i think i probably could do it but certainly not give it the adequate justice that it deserves if you don't mind doing that i could try but you know that you'd still have to come up for a question or two anyway so dr santa cruz governing board members dr mccord um yes i just wanted to share that based upon the governor's first executive order which happened last week we did run a calculation based upon a presumption that we would be funded on ninety percent of the fiscal 2020 adm in addition um that was that nine zero or 98 would be funded at 98 percent 90 sorry maybe i may have um 98 of the 2020 adm actually the greater of the two but the worst case scenario would be 98 of the prior year so based upon that that would be a total loss of 664 students in addition to be extremely careful we also made the assumption that the 664 students were at our high school level which has the highest weight so in doing that calculation we determined that the maximum loss would be 1.5 million dollars note that we already assumed a 400 student loss so it's a 264 additional student loss and if i could address mr reed's question regarding guidance so we just received it i don't know maybe two hours ago there was a a school finance lawyer consortium group that came up with their interpretation of the two executive orders and simply the first the second executive order which does supersede the first one potentially expires august 17th or when we go back to in-person school so at that point it expires and therefore the first executive order then comes into play so based upon that guidance they are um their their interpretation is that the of the prior year adm would still be the enrollment stabilization still available to give us some clarity going into the fiscal 2021 school year so so assuming that the start of school does not get pushed out again and again and again past day 100 then the 98 would apply so the the presumption though is that the as part of the second executive order the governor did make a request that the department of education look at the impact of the a decrease from 180 days down to 177 down to 170.

Sal wonderful all of these in and out in a night okay all right great we'll go to have you here please hello I go to Westside and my sister goes to DHS and in the bathrooms we need soap hot water and it's individual paper towels at our schools we've run out pretty quickly because either it's because of the amount of people that go to the bathrooms or people doing pretending to be funny and just wasting them so how will these [Music] how will these be provided let me take that so Xavier sent some of the things that we've talked about is increased cleaning and disinfecting protocols throughout the day so that is definitely something that we're looking at we understand it's an absolute priority for our buildings because we're going to be encouraging students and staff to be disinfected on a daily but you know on an ongoing basis throughout the school day and so we will have disinfectant materials in our classrooms and in common spaces throughout the school but we also recognize that there's going to be a need to make sure that our our our baths our restrooms are adequately stocked and so that that will definitely be a priority for us some of the questions that were raised earlier throughout the day as well was what we have you know increased or additional custodial staff throughout the school day recognizing that they can't you know be everywhere at the same time whether that's you know making sure bathrooms are cleaned you know have ongoing cleaning making sure were wiping commonly-used spaces you know like doorknobs and when folks first into the building and so we we have an Iona and beginning to think that through of what that's gonna look like an impact that's gonna help on a budget but we are mindful that that's gonna meet that needs to be a priority for us because we're certainly gonna be encouraging everyone to keep their hands hands clean throughout the day I have a few more questions should I wait again or should I say them now go ahead okay thank you how frequently are the bathrooms going to be cleaned mr.

Pascal has been pushing us to think through a plan to answer that very question you know how are we going to meet or mitigate the risk in our hallways how are we going to mitigate the risk in a hawk and you know going to the cafeteria how we gonna mitigate the risk you know when when classes release and where kids are getting off the buses and coming in the building all congregated and we're still trying to figure those things out and again and trying to see if there's any flexibility on how we into school in the fall so we're still thinking through those things and we're still reaching back out to the state to see if there's any flexibility on how we answer okay I just have one more quick question so do you think it's like it's probably gonna be like this um so we're probably gonna just like leave the classroom doors like open at all times and unlocked so we avoid like touching doorknobs and everything and for all that we wanna fresh air is good leaving windows open we don't expect a lot of movement in the hallway so I would hope things like that to work out I think what's going to happen if it when we get back we're just gonna have to try some of these things they work best for us we don't have air conditioning as you guys know in all the areas but so we have the windows open it's gonna be healthy doors dancing true so we're gonna have to play that through all of those things as I said before we're all gonna be it's gonna be very unusual very different for all of us it's gonna take some time to figure this out we'll try to do what's right and that's why we enter school today keep these things in mind we do some of this we planned that way as best we can so ensure we'll keep them open again a lot of reasons one is the ventilation okay thank you good question Kara thank you and let's hear from Scott G next so i'm also student EHS and like i mean after listening to like a lot of things we were saying like there's clearly many concerns like you know with going back to school and everything so I think distance learnings okay apart whether it's like fully distance learning or some sort of hybrid um so as far as distance learning is going like this year well I guess last year we went into the school we went into distance learning already having like relationships and stuff with our teachers there he knew how to teach us for the most part very late like things were pretty much down pat from the most part it was the end of the year um you know if we go like right into distance learning this year or we don't you know see teachers a lot like how is that gonna work is the distance learning gonna be like it was this year were they justice honest work or is it gonna be like some sort of I don't I mean I don't know if has to be zoom but like some sort of something like that like zoom meetings where it's essentially like your normal school day just at home if that makes sense right now the state is putting the platform together to to make it a better system across the state everybody shut the way you did and it has to be enhanced remotely more synchronous work where you're actually doing some things those are all improvements and mapping as best we can yeah now the assignment achieved is an interesting question depending how you start doing you know it's just like we have credit recovery it's warm there's no relation sort of the pendulum that is not what we want so we have to work that for it should be a better system in the state I was talking to us about having a different system we need to see what mute their mic while other people are talking and we'd like to hear from many next many are you there with us or your son Minnie you're on mute okay thank you sorry about that okay good afternoon so um this question is from Cyrus who is who's a broad view student next year and the question he just text me the question the question was we're trying to are you trying to limit student interaction beyond the classroom it was one of my questions also so along the lines that do you have a plan for teachers to move between classrooms rather than children so that you know to mitigate what's good the way that's been obviously k5 easier that keeps youngsters in a cohort in the school middle high school becomes challenging if students talking about before about all the way but the idea is to minimize the number of folks that come into a class that there's going to have him cut contact with each other the best we can we'd have to work that was into it you know folks on the outside field trips things that nature I'm just gonna have to curtail all yeah try to minimize the movement and those that come in contact with them with the students during the day well okay five easier said than six seven eight wasn't even harder at the high school based on the specialized content it's going to be a challenge and one other question was are they going to have the temperature checks done at this point we have to rely on the medical folks to do it guides us on that certainly anything with symptoms and that we would do but as they come through the doors and stuff got something conversation with the medical folks with their advice yeah when you have thousands and thousands and causes but everybody that couldn't send my aunt in to us but if we have suspect the reason to believe that has to happen obviously something and advise parents not dispensed to disclose their do that temperatures so we're gonna work in the Schism we're with our health the point menu which is the best way around them thank you okay thank you so I'm going to move on to Solange please Kevin thickens the things going in and out on me okay I'm doing problems again I don't know why people are in the classroom or separatist if you could hear me but we're going to try to do is yeah we're working with some specialists to go through classrooms and try to set him up the state saying as long as we're wearing masks that you know that that'll that'll help us with distancing but we'd like to give away as much distance as possible so we probably will have to move furniture out of rooms where we can to get everybody more room so that there is some space in between so that's something that's a goal shorts to work on yes we have to work on take the mask or still wear them we're not sure about the gym classes in specials we're working on that that's that's a good question don't have a good answer right now we're gonna ask education teachers the rest to help us with that and they've got all the specials with art music lessons that may have to be I'd be much different than what we used to and I understand amanda had a question and she had include it in a group chat but honestly there's so many now I couldn't follow it long can we just ask Amanda do you want to ask that question for everyone can you yeah I think so um so my question was should we like be able to go to recess because I know I go to the PMBOK and lead you to rage from behind and that's a lot of people and it's dazzling more than 50 show and we're all just finished and look what about Rita yeah Amanda that that that's a great question I'm sorry Sally still there we want folks to go outside so we're gonna figure out how to do recess in area so that it's safe but it won't be the same but we want to go outside when we can so yes we're gonna have some kind of reset it'll be a little bit different but you can Amanda you should also know there was some some points raised earlier that we actually may need to build in mask-like recess for our students and just kind of go outside and just take the mask off and just breathe and get a break and so the recess is an absolute yes but we may also have to build in some recess for you guys just to get some air go outside where everyone socially disadvantaged question I think I saw fabulous success fir that we live in the Northeast and it rains a lot in the fall and it's snow then early winter so is there a plan in place for these things to happen within the building as well environment I know spaces issue yeah yeah so I I could be honest with you I have not heard any alternative plans to for recess I'm outside of the building you know certainly there's opportunity to take advantage of bigger spaces like a cafeteria or you know depending on a school that you're in or a gym but no we have not talked through you know alternatives to outside recess today but your point is a good one we'll make sure we we think through what that looks like thank you so shuri-chan please hi I'm maybe a sophomore in DHS questions sure go ahead so my first one will be about masks I do understand that we're gonna have to wear them when we're in class and I would think that considering that the school days like Oh like more than five hours I don't know how students will be able to like have it on the whole time like it would be pretty uncomfortable so how are you going to handle that and also sharing materials in classes like gym and science we're gonna have to share materials and sit in desks probably other students have sat on so how does the Sanitation well those are some great questions and so let let me tackle try to tackle the the first part first can you tell me what you said at the beginning is like a three-part question can you tell me what you X at the beginning all day and so and so we recognize it's it's going to be a challenge for our students and for our staff and so which is which is one of the reasons why earlier on the phone call because we had a similar meeting with teachers this morning and they encouraged us to think through you know mask breaks if you will for our students and staff and finding opportunities for you guys to have built-in breaks throughout the day you know literally what you guys can go outside where it's safe everyone's socially distance and we can take off our masks and just kind of and just kind of get a break from the mask itself I think we're gonna have to be intentional about making sure these things have built in as part of our schedule because we understand it's going to be a significant adjustment you know all of us go out now and wear a mask and you know go to the supermarket or maybe even go to the mall now but it's very different to your point to have to wear one all day and so I you know our thoughts particularly coming off of our meeting this morning is that we need to think through and have someone set with intentionality make sure our kids have an opportunity to get a break from the mask so we're not exactly sure what that's gonna look like but we're gonna have to come up with a plan because it's probably unreasonable to think everyone's going to be having on for five consecutive hours so it's a great question and your other question can you repeat that again I'm sharing materials in art and science and gym and sitting on desks that probably other students have sat on because we're gonna have to switch between classes and so just so you know I have a very nervous and anxious colleague on the line she's a director of Finance and facilities and operations and everything else and and and and we have talked through a plan where so for example I'll just start with you know subjects like art but to your point it also applies to subjects like science will you guys work in groups we work in teams you share materials in CTE classes you know we share materials in there and the expectation is to look to to the to the extent possible we will have individual will need to order and make sure we have individual materials for students and so you know in our k5 classes elementary school classes where you know it's sharing of art materials sharing of you know science materials group work it's going to have to be separate in students contribute a little differently and and and so you know going up to the middle schools if we have our classes where they share materials or group work in our classrooms it's also going to have to be we're gonna have to provide students with their own materials I mean we've gone as far as to talk through you know individual packets of materials for our students so that so that we limit or reduce you know they reduce sharing of materials in class we we have not and that's a very good point you know in every case where classes are changing there might be a need you know there's a need to possibly you know wipe down the spaces and and honestly I don't know if we've thought we've taught that part through we you know certainly we had talked about internally you know at the end of the school day every classroom will be disinfected and and that's certainly something that will be able to happen but I think if in absence of being able to wipe down chairs you know in between periods we may not be able to get to every single seat but we can encourage every single students and make sure their hands are clean in between classes going in and out of classes so if we have disinfectant materials for you guys to disinfect your hands when leaving or enter in a classroom I think that will certainly help us mitigate the risk I know it's not a great a great response or great answer and that's why this form form is so important to help us think through these things by I appreciate the question thank you so much yeah welcome thank you so our next person is Michael snow hi I'm a student high school and I had a I know we touched on the subject before and I just wanted to touch back on it just get a more solid answer sure so will my ets1 right okay well will we be able to participate in extracurricular activities such as like clubs sports tutoring hours and more upcoming school year I'm asking this because especially for high school students this can be a very important part in making them well-rounded students and adding to their college application and in and if the pandemic can become a problem and making this happen we can very well meet in different locations to make it easier or even have the students disinfect just in fact disart disinfect the locations that they meet in if if the problem is that janitors don't have time to clean up those spaces after they meet yeah Michael great question great point about how important it is to be a portfolio I think and because we received some initial guidance about extracurricular activities not necessarily for clubs in in particular I think Michael as long as we can demonstrate that we can congregate safely and certainly if we can demonstrate we can congregate safely in a classroom I would like to think we can congregate safely in a club right where typically we may not have as many as many students in the club as it is outside of a classroom so my answer would be yes without without seeing that explicitly in the plan but again if we're back to school fully you know we're gonna be back to school fully if we're back to school with conditions then we'll certainly need to spell those conditions out you know beyond wearing a mask but I anticipate if we're back to school 100% capacity in the fall these actually curricular activities that you're talking about will be employed I do have one more question should I wait no please go ahead - so if we were to implement a hybrid education system I would I'd like to share my opinion on not having the school days be cut short and it's a hybrid system were to be in play set I as a student would prefer that some students would go in for a full day and other students would go in on separate days for also a full day rather than some students going in for the morning some going in for the afternoon because I could see how this can waste time with all the buses and a disinfection that are disinfecting those locations the students have been this can also make getting to extracurriculars more difficult and for the students that aren't at the school at the time and can even cut the education Shore we're having to leave from the learning and look having to leave the school to go to a different location - there can be proven as difficult yeah so so these are these are great questions and points that you're raising honestly and I'm learning something new on every town hall forum that we're in I'm learning something new every time and and and not to see I mean as a as an educator former principal's not as if I haven't experienced these things but it's it's reminding me of how important these things are Michael so I appreciate you raising these these issues we will because you know with so many things in play and worrying about and thinking through how we're going to make sure the buildings are safe we also need to make sure we have school right and that your school that your school experiences is is honored and innocent as consistent with what how we know schooling and we have to we have to make sure that happens and so you have brought up the point about hey if they're going to if there are options out there these options that I would like and these are the reasons why when there will be a need for us to push out another survey to everyone and when we do push out a survey we will likely have a survey that's going to articulate the different options that are available if because the the governor has access to one at this low low level of instances in a community to go back to school at a hundred percent however if we ever if there's ever a place where we are designated as a community at moderate instances of koba 19 in a community on then we would enter school at a reduced at a reduced um at a reduced at reduced levels and it's important for the community to have some feedback to help inform this decision and so although right now we have a thought exchange out there that is eliciting feedback on what you feel like our top priorities should be but we will explicitly have some type of survey once we know exactly what our plan is folks will know exactly what's what's available what's in front of us and then they can make some choices and one of those choices definitely needs to be if we're gonna have a reduce model what are the models and what are the options and it will make sure that that's that's in there in some way so you guys can give your feedback so Mike I appreciate you asking the questions the way you have so we'll go to Christopher Borges next [Music] yeah over 19 you're gonna have to learn more can you put your message in the chat box we're not able to totally understand you but I think your question is very concerning to everyone so please put it in the chat box okay so and again there was also a question about orientation it looks yes Eric EDX and and maybe Serena is well incoming actually I'm not sure if Eric access question but Sarina executes asked about freshman orientation okay and and you know we we have freshmen orientation in place for a reason because we recognize how important that transition is so we will we will make sure we work with the principal to figure out what the alternative is going to be you know some of the some of some of the things that I've heard so far is not necessarily dimmer you high school but I know Ace was talking about perhaps some type of virtual orientation whether you know the prince will be walking around the school on and provide an orientation for students that way if we can't get students in person for the orientation so I will make sure you know when we connect with Dan that we're helping Dan in the high school through this because we again we understand how important that transition is and not you know for our private school students coming into public school and then just for our eighth grade students moving up into the ninth grade it's it's important make sure that they feel comfortable they feel safe going into this new environment so and we have a we have students there like two students on one video maybe we can get like extra credit if we ask them see if they have any questions for us absolutely so we still we still have three people in the chat box and yeah so if we can go to Jennifer grant I was wondering also about the lockdown drills and the fire drills because I know that those are common that we have them like just to make sure everything's working and that everybody knows what to doing what's going on but with lockdown drills we all have to sit in the same area so I was wondering how that was gonna work and how it would work to get students outside for fire drills yeah Jennifer that's a great question so that that question was actually talked about with our director of security recently in and we are reaching out to the powers that be to see if those are going if those expectations are going to be relaxed at all in the fall you know so as of right now the plan would be that we would still need to administer those drills but we will be asking a question while those drills be real will the expectations be relaxed in the fall kind of given you know given the pet return from the pandemic that that is a great question that is a great question I'll move on to Lauren our cherry but I'd like mr.

uh and and i think that just needs to be said absolutely and i will go into more detail in regards to some of the supports that we have for our staff it actually is great timing dr santa cruz because that's next we know that we will have us regardless of the delivery model our teachers will be full-time teachers if they have a full-time contract and they will be teaching their regular work hours they'll be assigned to a delivery model that is best for them whenever possible and we know that we have some personnel that's susceptible to illnesses and otherwise and we want to be sure that they are also working in a safe environment we know that some of our staff can't wait to get back to our our students in person and we want to make sure that that environment is safe as well there will there has been a staff survey that's already gone out um from our otm office and they have surveyed our at-risk members to gauge their intentions in returning to work while maintaining also the confidentiality that they have in place they've offered and they will continue to offer special accommodations whether that be alternative teaching assignments whether that mean that they there's a need for example of additional staffing do we need additional custodians do we need additional nurses do we need additional health aids there will be we've reassigned a dean already to our flex model we know that super excited about the flex model i mean we wanted to do splendid learning for a long time but it does require a additional training and additional skill sets so we want to be sure that not only did we not um we wanted to be sure we provided the adequate and additional continuous training and professional development for our teachers not just in the beginning of the year but throughout the school year our professional learning communities they'll be able to meet on wednesdays with with the staff and we also knew that this would be extremely difficult for an administrator while the administrator has all of the in-person classes going on as well um we we're able to um have the expertise of a dean that has experience in online learning and um and so we're super excited we've assigned a tie to that team as well um and she is dynamic and she's very very knowledgeable and i think that the teachers will feel very comfortable going and asking for assistance and help from her as well that also as far as our employees we want to be sure that we are reporting identified coveted cases following guidelines established as i mentioned there is um there are forms already created and in place and we've had to use some of those um you know in different instances and there um we continue to make them as accessible and as updated as things change as we can the notification of those cases also adhere to ferpa and hipaa requirements and its state and federal employment law and extended leave allowances i want to go to the next slide just to show also some precautions that have been put in place for staff um procedures as well that are put in place we'll have personal protective equipment including our distribution of n95 mass as appropriate to our staff hand sanitizer is going to be in every classroom there will be cleaning solutions provided for that daily spot cleaning of hive traffic services there will be deep sanitizing every two days at a minimum throughout our campuses and our offices district health protocols for reporting and returning to work will be in place there will be that daily health screening and reporting to supervisors as appropriate if our staff does not if our staff is not healthy and that notification of contacts when our staff has been perhaps in the close proximity of somebody who perhaps does get the virus we also have cleaning and disinfecting for protecting our employees there's going to be some other additional slides that give you some more than what i'm going to explain right now but restroom and health office touch point areas will be disinfected twice daily there will be guidelines and supplies for cleaning desks and tables that are provided to classroom teachers there will be signage for safe hygiene and hand washing posted by all classroom sinks and restrooms and the utilization of our electrostatic sprayers for wide area disinfecting that is both our we have the backpack style and also the sprayer style the handheld sprayer style that can be used we also have return to work support in place for our employees it's important that um as employees are experiencing some things and they are also responsible for students as well um that they have and are very knowledgeable that there is an employee assistant program in place for all of our staff members there's regular communication and check-ins with our vulnerable staff the training for use of the online platform and the supplemental resources and i'm going to talk a little bit more about that later but that is the support that we put in place and we wanted to be sure that our staff knew that we're not going to leave them without the tools that they need and that instructional technology support dedicated as i mentioned just to virtual learning dr newman i do have a question especially considering the unknowns with this virus you know someone a staff member could have a family member that gets sick or they could have a contact with someone and not know whether or not they should quarantine it seems like are they going to have to use their own sick leave to deal with this or are we going to provide additional sick days i know there's something under the cares act but can you explain that a little bit better i'm going to ask mr mcintosh to explain that a little bit better good evening dr santa cruz governing board members and dr mccord so in order to answer your question the first 14 days of any symptomatic or confirmed case of the covet then they would have that from the federal government under the ffcra act and then if they needed additional time to care for a family member etc then they could utilize their own sick time at that time okay thank you yeah thank you so related to that mr mcintosh [Laughter] one of our challenges obviously is a large number of our substitute teachers are in by age what we may classify as a high risk category um we might have something to help the teachers but do we have resources for substitutes and and caring for them well currently we are getting ready to deploy a survey to all of our substitutes to see how many of them would be available to come back to work and also surveying them kind of like just like we did with the teachers if they have a reason or they're uncomfortable in coming back the two-week allowance is for is for employees so i'm assuming that that two weeks the 80 hours of the ffcra we would have to then go back and look at what substitutes how many hours they've taught or covered last semester and then we would proportion it out like that so um we haven't got all the way through that piece yet but we're working on that right now so we would i would have to seek some legal counsel on on substitutes because and also look at what the surrounding districts are doing with their substitutes but we are sending out a survey to see how many of them are willing to come back because we do know we're going to have a high utilization rate with substitutes because of coven 19.

in addition as dr mccord shared if we began distance learning on our normal calendar expected to start august 5th that those two weeks of distance learning very potentially could be considered part of the 180 days that that is still an area that needs to be clarified and they're all waiting for further guidance from department of education regarding that so the idea would be that if we started distance learning 180 days would start on august 5th allowing us to finish school on our normal calendar school end date and and again as long as as long as we've transitioned back the funding would be based on in-person enrollment yeah presuming that but regardless we'd still be protected even if we were a hundred percent all 33 000 students went to arizona online were still protected to 98 percent of the prior your adm which still protects us anything further thank you so communication we are so fortunate to have dawn and team to help they are always she is always reminding us and her her team provides so many different ways for us to communicate we need we know we need to have plans and platforms in place to achieve frequent ongoing communication we have to make sure that those messages are developed at the district level so that we have that one source of truth which is what don always tells us that we need and oh and also a place the goal is that there's always a place to find that one source of truth making sure that they our stakeholders have that helpful important and detailed information and they know exactly where to go for that information will be accessible and provided in a wide range of media we'll have a video library that will have short videos for our families highlighting key safety information that needs to be reinforced reinforced whether it be for our students or for our families they will be accessible to on the external website they'll be accessible at our internal hub for our employees as well there will be signage and signs that are posted throughout our campuses and offices to reinforce best safety practices we have our parent newsletter and emails and we will continue with those on a regular basis and make those at a time that our families know that it's coming so it's always on a regular at the same day so that they're able to anticipate and be ready for that and know that's there our internal employees will have as i mentioned our employee hub we'll make sure that we have posters in english and spanish we're making also sure that we're achieving as i mentioned that consistent district voice whether that be the communication templates that we use the daily updates the training whether that be on our front for our front line staff so our office office members at our campuses they have that information they know right where to go to get that information they're provided the information they can reference that and direct our families to the right place to receive that information and as i mentioned communication channels whether those be existing and new the district website our blackboard emails our school websites and our school newsletters as well we started all of this with the charge of creating a task force for reopening schools and i guess i could say an incidental benefit of all of this is that we know how important it is for us to have a continuity of operations plan it's important that if there's any kind of disruption whether it be because of kova 19 or anything else there are plans in place so that we can continue with the continuity of our um education and of our services as well so with mr newman can i interrupt you just go back to the communication plan you don't need to switch slides okay i just want to make a comment you know a couple of years ago it seemed like everybody i talked to in the community was frustrated with our district communication and over the last few months everybody has said to me i can't believe how good the communication is so i just want to thank don but the entire staff that feeds her the information for the improvement that's been made i'm sure that there are areas where we can improve because and parents will let us know what those are but thinking where we've come from to where we are today uh thank you to everybody involved it's it's really set us apart and we've heard that from the community thank you for that and there's a lot of work that she does to remind us all all of the time at all different times of the day and we do appreciate it from our perspective too because we have our areas that we're working with but all of that still has to get communicated out and that's not necessarily our area of expertise but it's um she's able to create that in a way that it's it makes sense and it is a cohesive message for everybody so with this continuity of operations we know and we want to make sure that once we are done when we start school when we are moving towards the end of july we have this internal document and this plan that has more detailed descriptions for all of the areas that i described today we have protocols in place we have those protocols are readily accessible we have a detailed description instructional videos and what our service delivery will look like for our our academic standpoint we have flow charts we have our notification letters and we have the signage and that's all going to be in one place and and so regardless of what the disruption is um we were thrilled to know that now this will all be in one place we we experienced in fourth quarter very quickly we had to all of a sudden put some things in action now we can reference and all of the work that the task force has done um amazing work that the task force has done and those that are not directly involved with the task force but have provided so much input and done so much work to make this something that we can be proud of here in gilbert public schools so next steps um ongoing as you mentioned mr carr communication our website notifications we will continue with that just you know we submitted and posted our presentation online and then we got news yesterday so we're being very flexible and will continue to be flexible um so in july parent parents will identify and i'll show that slide to you in a second but what their choice will be in regard to the delivery model of instruction for their students which of those three choices they want for their student and they can choose any of those three for their student whether that be gps global academy or the flex choice that will be listed on the website that's listed here we anticipate that it will be soon but we do need some time to go through the most recent order and make sure that we review and plan whether that be for a new start date or if our start looks a little differently than we thought that perhaps it would prior to yesterday afternoon we want to make sure that our families are making informed choices and we want to be sure that all of that information is provided and it is as easy as possible for our families so if ours right now our students are all enrolled in their on their campus at their school campus and so if families choose um instead to have their student work through another delivery model they would be able to access that right on the website and that would be an all-in-automated system for them and with that too it would automatically send a message to a campus our campus would then reach out to our families whether that be for flex or gps global academy and assist in the registration process so our families are not having to do an over abundance of extra work because they've already been enrolled and so we want to assist with that we're going to continue in july with the start of school preparations our teacher and staff training our staff reassignments our office of talent management will be working very very hard making sure that um our staff are placed in in the spot that is right for each of them and then august we had a date and initially there took off the dates just for tonight but our first day of school we're anticipating will be in august one of the dates whether it be the previous or the 17th we want to make sure that our families get this information as soon as possible we'll continue to update the website so um initially um this was going to happen tomorrow as soon as you approve the plan if you approve the plan then we were going to be ready and we have everything in place we as i mentioned we want to take a little bit more time after the executive order yesterday but our families will have three choices they can choose any of those three choices for their children they can have three of their children do all three of the options if they want so they might have an older sibling choose one option and a younger sibling choose another any any of those that they wish that flexibility we want to continue to practice that that has become a word that we have continued to use our kids are have been and have had to be extremely resilient and we'll continue with that we know that once a family chooses something we would really recommend that once they choose an option they continue with that option for example through a quarter so that that is an easier transition for the child as they move from one to the other um sometimes that might not be best for what a student is so the recommendation is when is if the option is not working for a family or for a student the family is communicating with its campus and the campus administrators and they develop a plan that's best for re-entry or exit out or into one of those options so in in the scenario that somebody starts a class on global academy and they we ask them to try and switch at quarter now they've got a grade they're partially through a semester-long class does that grade transition or are they treated like a transfer student where if they were coming from california wherever it may be we would start with a fresh grade we wouldn't bring their california grades we would the the grade should be able to transfer for that quarter so then that can be applied for their semester grade so if they're getting an a they'll carry that a in if they're getting a c they'll carry that c into their new class right one question i have on finance we haven't had finance for the flex option before but i understand that was in the the executive order that was last week is that correct so we would get full funding for that the classification included that the hybrid or flex option would be right now reported as aoi uh depends again on future guidance where as as an example let's just talk about secondary for for instance so high school students can presently enroll in two classes a day in global and they would be that proportionate fte in online and then the other three classes would be the fifths of an f or yeah the three fifths of an fte on bricks and mortar and that's how it would be reported as it relates to elementary it appears that we would be reporting them as arizona online right now that's the interpretation however everyone's still waiting for further clarity on that okay thank you any other questions i i did want to say something i i do want people to understand that under normal circumstances we would take a whole year to learn about these different options and discuss it and then make the decision and then we would take another year to put it into place instead we have a month and we have to make the decision now and then another month maybe a little bit more to put everything into place so usually we would go through a very very careful process and i think this is part of the governor's problem too is that he doesn't have time for the careful process that he would usually do nor do we we have to make a decision and move forward and plan and do the best we can so that when we go back to school we are prepared and and usually it does take a lot longer we move much more slowly so you have to be patient with this miss eugetti board members any additional questions at this time uh doctor doctor stevens i don't i don't have a question i just want to say thank you to dr newman and all the members of the committee because this is an amazing presentation thank you mr jeddy dr santa cruz if i may so i guess i know that i was hoping that we would have that frequently asked question page up by tomorrow because we're going to have a lot of questions even just about the basics that you presented tonight like if families want to start thinking about we possibly would want an online i think i'd want a global academy but what might that look like and i know you had started putting together you know a lot of details about that so that people could start exploring it and i think we're going to have those questions so how do we i know some of the things have changed but how do we help answer that we talked about this before yes okay don and i and so this is this is like it was scripted oh well perfect don was ready go right ahead speak up yeah as dr mccord yes we are aware that people have been waiting quite a long time for this information and we do have certainly details about the three different learning models and we have that available so absolutely if it's determined that that would be helpful for the community we would be able to go live with the information just not with the registration piece so that when our families do make the choice they have the full set of information um in light of the governor's announcement yesterday but we could certainly go live with the the core content we have pretty in-depth faqs ready to go live i think that'd be helpful yes and based on you know the results of this evening we are talking about putting an email out at eight or nine o'clock tomorrow morning hopefully sometime in the morning and to be able to first of all give our families information our staff and second of all being able to direct them to an area where they can go find more detailed information about several questions great i think that would be really important our biggest fear is that we don't want to confuse them yeah you know but as we had discussions this afternoon they're going to have questions and i'd rather than be able to go read it first and then ask more questions if need be and so um that's the that's the approach we would take okay great well and we had even said like the global academy we were going to have some access for parents to go online and look at like especially the elementary and even the junior and high school are going to be different than what it's been even this summer school you know experience and what's been in the past because we know that we need to put different things in place to make that you know just a more robust experience especially and offer that to our families who need that but i know we talked about having some access for parents to maybe the k through six or you know curriculum so they could go and just start looking at it and say you know this is an option for me or not that's already been created okay and so they will be able to have access to see what that looks like because gps global academy will will exist k-12 regardless right of a choice and so um dr barton has already created that and that's avail that will be available on the website as well as soon as possible okay thank you thank you ms wood other questions comments just comment i would like to echo the previous comments and thank uh dr newman and the hundreds of people the parents the teachers the staff the uh you know there were literally 100 something people on this committee then this has been a lot of work um i i will say right out that uh my i don't usually get get anxiety but my anxiety level coming into this meeting was probably as high as i ever remember it nervous and it's well thought out not every question is going to be answered and not every solution is going to be provided we can't anticipate that in this fluid environment but thank you and since your last question or your last slide asked for questions i'll apologize for all my questions all along and not for holding them and dr newman and dr mccord i would echo the sentiments that have been expressed thus far i would also like to add and and would ask that dr mccord ad if he chooses to and that is that as much of the planning as has occurred and as well designed and well-intentioned as all of the models are and with all of the pieces that are in place including the extended documentation data and research things still remain fluid we don't know what tomorrow brings we don't know what will happen to change or disrupt our thinking again we think we are on solid ground at this point and yet i can still feel the ground moving beneath me so i appreciate all the work that is done i don't want any of us to think that we have completely and finalized every detail we are going to learn as we go we're going to do the best we can we're probably going to make some mistakes but not intentionally and all of this is with the best intention and with our families and students in mind along with our faculty and staff in mind as we move through this process so we have lots of responses some answers some definitive some yet to be defined and i hope i haven't misspoken dr mccourt not at all and and uh to dr newman and the task force um being being there uh during the process and seeing uh the things that they they went through to be here tonight it was it is extraordinary especially as you highlighted miss humphries in terms of the amount of time i'm i'm always impressed by the things that they do knowing that we probably missed something somewhere and when we figure that out we'll we'll correct it and we'll move forward i think and and we can have this discussion now or we can have it on the um 6.02 but i think it's worth having the discussion and and having some clarity in terms of what do we do on august 5th are we going to um start off the school year online and then transition um into the three modules that are offered um i i think we we need some guidance on that as well as i think the community would be uh appreciative of understanding where we're going on that um just because we have everybody assembled tonight and um and we're in the midst of the discussion we can like i said do this now or we can do it at an agenda item it's up to you however i'm open to the discussion now but i would recommend that we move it to the 6.2 time frame so that we have about five requests to speak so that we give our folks who have been diligently and intently listening to what's been presented to give them the opportunity to say what they came to say so if the board is willing and ready to indulge me in in that recommendation that would be what i propose that's good for me i i wanted to as well i thought if we could accommodate those who have been so patient and we're glad that they're here tonight i'm thankful that they're here to participate with us i would be fine with that very good then we will address the question proposed by dr mccord when we reach item 6.2 on the agenda we will now close the discussion on the reopening of school plan presentation and move to item four which is the community request to speak and i would ms wood would you want the recorded message or would you like to read it dr santa cruz before we go there could i request a five-minute comfort break most certainly we will recess for five minutes thank you thank you [Music] i could do it cheers i guess yes okay for the masks we are the nurse did she just leave she do you see jen she um i talked to her about that yesterday and she said that there would be a similar just like how the governor made this and now we'll reconvene in about 30 seconds uh okay i would like to call us back to order please we are now at item 4 a request to speak to the governing board item 4.01 michael please play the recorded message goes to address the public body the board may make an open call to the public during a public meeting subject to reasonable time place and manner restrictions to allow individuals to address the public body on an issue within the jurisdiction of the public body at the conclusion of the open call to the public individual board members may respond to criticism made by those who have addressed the board may ask the staff to review a matter or may ask a matter be to be put on a future agenda however members of the board shall not discuss or take legal action on matters raised during the open call to the public unless the matters are properly noticed for discussion and legal action during the open call the board requests that speakers refrain from voicing complaints against school personnel or any person connected with the district as it may impact due process rights policy k-e-k-e-b and k-e-d are provided by the board for disposition of legitimate complaints including those involving individuals forms required for use of these policies can be obtained from the gilbert public schools website have five requests to speak this evening the first one is not a request to speak but simply a question that she would like for me to read for her i believe that's correct is that rosie padillas is that correct okay and the question is to the task force dr mccord and probably to miss miss chen and that is will there be a testing set up for covid19 or an antibody test jennifer did you want to address that go ahead and go to the microphone so that the public can hear the response and dr sanchez just to clarify we're able to respond to this question because it's already an item that's on our topic okay thank you um to answer your question no we will not be testing or providing any antibody testing i do have a list of resources and a packet to give to parents that are interested should their child exhibit any kind of symptoms or if they're just curious for those resources how testing works where they can go get testing and what kind of testing is available in our area absolutely correct um we don't have that here at the district but if you want to um call me tomorrow i will get you all those resources thank you jennifer we have the following people who have requested to speak to the board on item 6.02 miss katie mrs katie layton mr brian layton and mr corey childs is that correct so mrs leighton please come forward hi what i was gonna i wrote down what i was gonna say because i seem to be scatterbrained sometimes my mind goes blank when i'm speaking in front of people um i it's kind of changed a little bit since you have i don't know what her name was doctor something but she went over the different things and um wow like that takes a lot of work and time and effort and um thank you for putting all that effort in i do feel that of the community around me by highland high school would i think they're very frustrated we want a normal year for our children we want to send our kids to school and for them to have traditions and to be able to be around each other they all hang out every single day so um i mean pep assemblies dances football games all of those things that's part of high school and it's my oldest daughter's senior year so with that said i don't really have a question i just wanted to say my opinion so me i don't know if it will make a difference but i got a rare virus ten years ago that um made me deathly ill and uh it changed my life forever and i couldn't do anything i didn't get to raise my children um throughout their elementary school years and i couldn't drive for years and years i um because of it i have damage to my brain stem and it took eight years for my neurologist to be able to help me to be able to cope with life and to have a better life so it might be surprising that i feel i was very scared to get any cold anything so i might surprise the board that i feel that each individual should be able to make their own choice if they want to go to school if they want school to be normal then they should have that choice and um and if those that are scared are fearful then they can stay home and do school a different way and i do feel like that the options do address a lot of that but it's i feel like it's so rigid and almost like not to youth school not in philosophy but in rigidness and kids are not going to adhere to those roles um but i did want to say that the facts about kovid do not equal the fear that is being put in the public it's not the black plague that took 60 percent of europe's population it kills three percent of the people who test for covid not the population just the people that test for it and most of those people are 80 plus years old 65 plus but most of them are 80 plus years old with a few flukes um and so i feel that the fear is just ridiculous 99.7 percent of people survive and so um eight of the ten coveted cases are people um that are si is it 60 yeah 65 years and older and so why should 17 year olds be living like an 80 year old a 75 year old and my dad has lung problems and i would he i love him i want him to live forever but he feels the same way he it's not fair to make other people wear a mask and i would have loved if people wear masks or stayed home so i didn't have to get a cold or worse but to insist on that in my opinion is very selfish and we have to let people live their lives and choose for themselves i know this would probably be better to governor ducey than this board but i just felt like saying what i feel this whole time there's been moms texting me and they're very angry and uh so um it might just be the high schools that feel that way i'm not sure but i think there are a lot a lot of times the people who are living in fear are the ones that are heard and that are the loudest and so they're the ones being heard and that's why i wanted to come here today it's so not like me but i wanted to be a voice for in my opinion the majority of parents in gilbert public schools so thank you thank you mrs leighton mr leighton i too uh good evening thank you board for uh providing this opportunity i uh come advocating not only as my wife mentioned two daughters in highland high school but also a you know born and raised here in gilbert and i love this community and so as i come voicing what i feel it is it is because i've i've lived in this community i know the values of this community and that is why i live in this community and so as as i listen and and the task force i also want to say thank you to the task force i have no idea what time and you know effort that entails in putting something like that together i'm i'm grateful for the options that are provided the students in this community i my my advocation is for those that choose the on campus scenario for them to be able to have a normal on-campus scenario those those things that our our youth are starving for so you know a social life and the traditions of what is high school and i feel that as as they go back to school and they are restricted of those things that that has a negative impact on not only their their their uh learning atmosphere but also the memories and the the social skills that they are going to need moving forward in life the other concern i have is as i listen to the the guidelines put upon what i see as our educators the teachers uh those that are working with our kids on a regular basis on a daily basis the extra things that i feel are being put on the educators i don't know how that's possible for them to to be expected to maintain a clean classroom but yet attend to each student online or in person or other scenarios that come up and so that that concerns me not only for for the education that my daughters are going to receive but also the the the community in the whole at the high school and i would hope that uh my my hope is that as those that decide to to be on campus that we we provide that opportunity or the opportunities provided for them to to be a normal high school kid given the circumstances i know but we are assuming those risks as parents and as children and we have been assessing those risks on a on a daily basis from the time we've been parents and i would ask that we continue to be given that opportunity thank you thank you mr leighton mr childs thank you i'm i'm corey chiles um thanks for letting me be here i've never been to anything like this before and uh the thoroughness of all this is pretty awesome i'll be honest um i've lived in gilbert about 17 years got four kids all go to gilbert schools got two high schoolers on the palm team and two elementary age kids i work full time mom stays at home and she normally volunteers three to four days a week at the elementary school she loves it the reason why i'm here is uh i want to kind of be a voice for some people my family i have two kids who have slight special needs and um some family members who suffer from anxiety and depression and uh since everything's been shut down um it's been really hard and for my wife in particular when you have an illness like depression and you put a pandemic on top of it it becomes my best comparison is like being in the grave and i know we have an option a which is awesome and i'm really excited for and i'm just trying to advocate for my children especially my children with special needs that the ability we have to have the great people who are part of the gilbert schools i saw mr martin here he was our principal for a long time at highland park elementary he was awesome um you know we just we need you guys man my kids like they need you and um really to be honest you know i haven't i go to work i come home we watch a lot of netflix we do a lot of nothing and you you know you look at the news and everything and i swear over these last couple months the world's become like a crazy mean place man and just like looking at all you guys around here and seeing like an actual like real concern and not this like violent like uh you know war of words between everyone actually has kind of renewed my hope for the day you know i'm like hey you know you know yeah you know gilbert is a great place to live there are a lot of like really good caring people and i and and i'm grateful for you guys i want you to know that um and i got 30 seconds left but my request is just to remember those people who don't have a voice um my family we've counted on you in the past you've come through in awesome ways i do like the new email stuff that i get and i love to read them please please keep them in consideration you know i'd love for the school just to be open again because it would really bless my kids also a lot of my neighbors i've talked to i feel like they really feel the same way um we live in morrison ranch thank you thank you mr childs our last speaker is mr joe gusik who just listed general for me board president fellow board members uh superintendent mccord all gps staff parents taxpayers and last but not least students my name is joe goosaki and i'm the lovable slightly annoying i'm the education lorex i want to say thank you to the committee i want to say thank you to the board for allowing the committee to do all this hard work you are flying a plane at 600 miles an hour and you are trying to rebuild the plane simultaneously that is commendable your efforts are not unnoticed mr mccord you brought up about how old this school district is when this school district first came into existence shortly after they went into world war one when it had its first graduating class it was still in world war one and it graduated four students and in that next fall the spanish flu appeared 000 americans perished over the next three years i hear the voices as i spoke last time and i hear them clearly we're a country that honors free will it is one of our greatest assets but it's one of our greatest achilles as well the surgeon general today asked the children if you want a football season wear a mask if you want prom wear a mask if you want graduation wear a mask one of the federal elected officials from tennessee echoed the words from the a.d a former football coach and said students if you want a football season wear a mask do i like to wear masks no if i could die today and wipe all of this out instantly i do it but i can't i feel the pain behind me and i feel it in front of me and i understand everything that's going on but we need to go forward i appreciate all the options that you've put forward i do believe that we do need to make sure that we respect everybody's opinion but we need to work together because we're communal gilbert is a golden rule town by proclamation it is also an education first town keep communicating keep educating keep getting better at it and let's keep having the discussion as we go through this very trying time on many people's nerves and on their wallets and on their psyche you know the thing that i do ask is that we make sure that we make sure that these teachers and staff have the proper ppe if it doesn't mean you can't pay for it i'll pay for it what i can if it means that you can't they have to pay for it get it for them be the conduit to find the face shields and all the other things that they need to make them feel comfortable in front of our students so that they can get the best possible experience they can i'm going to go just a little bit over we need to come together this is our moment we've sent a man we sent people in space long ago and one of those space missions actually had a problem those group those gentlemen went to the almost were to the moon and their their their ship had an issue very smart men and women on on this earth as americans got together and took a list of items and thankfully somebody invented duct tape because those three gentlemen would have come back dead i will end with this and and mr carr is correct you're not here to provide a guarantee of anybody's life in the next year let's make let's give everybody the best opportunity that that does happen once again i ask everybody to take a step back be respectful to each and everybody's opinion and let's work through it this plan is the best plan you got i don't know how to satisfy everybody's particular situation in this given scenario so i get it we're americans we like to self-govern and we don't like anybody to trample on anything the reality is though within those rights that you all have you also have responsibilities and i'm going to finish on this as an organization you need to keep the pulse on the front line of our hospitals those people got ppe coming out their derrieres and you overwork them you under run them you drive them into the ground what they are going to have to do is do triage and just like they did in my home state of new jersey in the tri-state area where they literally had to do a triage environment where they put a number on somebody's bed and it would be one two three or four and if there was not enough equipment i'm sorry number four you were going to die so let's be present of that as an as an organization and as a fellow community member to our first our frontliners in our hospitals because if we run them into the ground if this does get out of control then where are we going to turn then my apologies for going over this is tough and i i want you to know i'm proud of all of you thank you thank you mr gusik we'll now move to item 5 the consent agenda items item 5.01 is approval of the consent agenda items board members ready for a motion dr santa cruz i motion that we approve the consent agenda items thank you mr carr is there a second a second thank you second thank you mrs humphries is there any discussion seeing and hearing none we will take a vote all those in favor of the consent agenda item the consent agenda as printed please signify by saying aye aye those opposed please signify by same motion carries five zero we now move to action items item six six point zero one has already been addressed 6.02 is the approval of the plan to reopen schools for 2020 2021 school year dr mccourt any introductory remarks nothing specific other than the fact that we presented this reopening plan again we have uh three options available to our families and uh again wanting to additionally have the discussion about august 5th thank you dr mccord so item 6.02 is before you uh is there a motion i moved to approve the plan to reopen schools for the 20-20-21 school year thank you mrs humphries is there a second a second thank you miss wood there has been a motion and a second to approve the plans to reopen school for 2020 2021 uh any discussion dr santa cruz i did i did want to make a couple comments i i think that there's been a lot of thought and effort put into this plan and i i think we're really again building the airplane just like joe said we're really putting effort into trying to provide the kind of experience for each child that they will feel comfortable with under the current circumstances and when we make these decisions there's kind of four c's we have to think about what's best for kids what does the community want and how can we find common ground as a board and come to consensus the fifth c is sometimes there are constraints and there are a lot of constraints we're not free to make any decision we want we have constraints by statute by finance and also from the department of health so well i know we all wish that our kids could just go back to school and have a regular year that's just not in the cards right now we've been thrown back 150 years to deal with illnesses in the way that our ancestors did before they had the we had the medical um and scientific progress that we've had today so um i just want to complement the district and all those who worked on the task force and the cabinet and dr mccord for all the hard work because i there's a lot in here and it's a lot to think about and we're going to have changes we're going to have disruptions as demonstrated yesterday but i think it's um we all want to give our kids a great education and we'll do the best we can to make sure they have memorable experiences whatever the circumstances thank you mrs humphries the question also is before us what do we do with august 5th so so discussion yeah our options dr santa cruz if i may so our options are right now we can start basically we can have our parents choose those three one of those three options how they want for the rest of the school year but if we come back on august 5th basically each of those would be delivered online well it would be all online on august 5th moving to the next time in a presumably august 17th then those three options would kick in but it would be so if you registered at your campus school and you said i want to do on campus then and we started august 5th at this point in time because of what the governor said those campus teachers would be giving um the online instruction to those students until august 17th when we come that is correct and i guess my concern i have a lot of concerns one is the funding paying our teachers and staff because they're they're depending on that at that point i'm concerned that we'll have a repeat of the fourth quarter that will start school that way if we go back online so i just would want to address how could we make sure that it was i guess i don't know if i want to say i guess i just want to be a successful beginning of the school year i don't want it to be like a waste of time for two weeks i would agree we've had that discussion okay dr newman you want to come talk about the training that would be in place uh moving into august 5th and miss wood we you almost mirrored our words that we've had over the last couple days so i'm glad you asked hello again um yes we would be sure that um while our classroom teachers would be the teachers we would be utilizing um already the platform that's in place and we provide the adequate training for our teachers to where they could implement this in a way but with the expectation is that the assignments are required there will be lessons that the teachers and the students will be expected to log in and participate in those some of those live times there will be additional support whether that be small group one-on-one or other there will be particular hours in the day that the teacher will work with students on that there will be time provided and that's already going to be delineated out for as far as the expectations of what it looks like so that teachers have time during their 40 hours during the week that they're teaching or that they're working they have time that they should be that they are communicating that mentor piece will kick in right away the connection with the kids will kick in um to be sure that the students understand the platform so the first time that they're engaging in it the teachers are actually teaching the kids how to access that what is an online lesson look like why is it that we're doing it why what they'll be doing when they're not working live with the teacher and the teacher isn't doing like a webex lesson with them and so all of those will be in place and that's why we'll spend not only july providing some optional training for the teachers that will pay if they want to do it then that will give them more time to plan and prepare and get ready instead of that quick jump that we had to make for fourth quarter but we will also those days that they come back prior to the august 5th that will be intensive training planning collaborating with others to make sure that the quality of instruction and the connection is there for our students can you talk about students with special needs too sure thank you sure what the task force has created as part of our academic sub committee is making sure and understanding that we need to provide services for our students so for example if it is an online option that our parents are choosing for their students we will have teachers that will look at what for example that online curriculum looks like and they will be making modifications at the district level first and providing some of those shells to our for example our special education teachers that are going to be providing the instructional support for them with that too we want to be sure that teachers have the option and they do have the ability to access curriculum from all the grade levels regardless of the grade level that they teach so they're able to provide scaffolds and extra pieces there additionally they will be providing virtually if that need be or if students can come in maybe they are choosing the online option but in a small setting a student can work one-on-one with a service provider we'll have the opportunity for them to receive their services in that way but every single area of eligibility every single type of service that needs to be provided we have within our plan of what that would look like we have students that were not able to for example have their reevaluations for special education eligibility we already have begun some of um some of our students for example that are moving from sixth to seventh grade or in eighth grade to ninth grade we we've already initiated um reinstating some safely but reinstating some of the reevaluation so that students can start the beginning of the year with the appropriate and new iep based on the eligibility and the evaluation results that they have and we'll continue to do that that will continue throughout we won't have to stop because we're doing online learning we won't need to stop and not provide the reevaluation and some of the meetings that the staff members need to have or some of the academic testing that they need to provide for the students in order for them to provide data on the goals and see what the instructional needs are for the students after so the question still remains what are we doing with august 5th dr mccord you have some additional thoughts i do i just you know there's there's a lot of speculation related to to what will happen in the next you know six to eight weeks um first i i i have a fear that if we don't start educating our kids on the date that we've said we've started we're going to my fear is that they're going to look for someplace else to be educated whether that's online or that would be their only choice and so that's one and i want to keep all of our kids the second fear is that if we don't start on august 5th and we approach august 17th and all of a sudden that gets pushed back again what does that do to us educationally what does that do to our students what does that do to our staff and so those are the types of things that keep me up at night related to this i feel like we're a little bit boxed in in terms of making a decision you as a board me as a superintendent the clock's ticking i think when it comes to making a decision on this and granted the clock was started yesterday on us to a degree because there are things that we still have to continue to plan for training for our staff we do need to figure out what will we do for our support staff and so although not ideal my recommendation would be to start august 5th and be able to continue to keep our kids and then knowing that we will be able to move into those three options presumably on august 17th you know and even families that choose the online option to begin with or that they chose the online option for when we're able to reconvene on a campus they may get there and say oh this might not be the option for me you know i really need to be in front of somebody or you know the situation you know in our state has stabilized to a degree and their comfort level is different not that just doesn't go for our students but it goes for our staff as well and so you know not not ideal by any means the most logical choice i in my opinion yes but i'm one of just many so but a superintendent that's what i would think is our best choice educationally at this time thank you dr mccord i i would concur with your recommendation of august the 5th with this trepidation in mind and you and i have spoken i've not spoken with dr newman but i think through our task force experiences i've echoed the same kind of sentiment and my concern is with our faculty particularly with the online platforms i i have a suspicion that many of them are presuming that what we have in store for them relative to the online platform through global academy is very much like the experience they had at the fourth quarter of last school year you have reassured us as a board and reassured many this evening that no they're distinctly different but that training component and that opportunity for teachers particularly to get acquainted with their new students for this academic year loans large in i think i don't want to speak for teachers but i i have a suspicion that it looms large in their minds because the business is about the relationship that's built between and among students and teachers and teachers being conversant and comfortable with the tools they're utilizing to implement the instruction they've been added so that would be the caveat a long one albeit but i would concur with your recommendation of august 5th with the expectation that we do everything we can to address those things i've just mentioned uh dr senators i i haven't thought about it um go ahead mr jetty sorry mrs that's okay thank you dr santa cruz um thank you and i really appreciate dr mccord's words and your words and i'm really glad that tonight i'm not limited to three minutes for a public comment but i have written something that is from my heart and i wanted to say it right now i will be entering my 50th year of education in august and in may i made a statement that i a decision to vote about graduation was the hardest decision i ever had to make i never realized then that i might have to make a decision that could possibly be a matter of life or death i spent 38 years of my life in a school study 17 years as a teacher and 21 years as an elementary principal i love working with children educators and parents i love getting hugs and interacting with people to this day i am still in contact with many former students parents and educators and i value that connection so very very much it means more to me than words can ever express nothing can replace the community that is built in an individual classroom or in a school i will always believe that is the best education the child can ever get they need to learn much more than just our curriculum they need to be able to find out how to solve problems with others how to play how to face failure and how much our educators care about them they and i both need hugs and i know that not being at school can hurt our child's mental mental health i totally understand that but i would rather deal with those issues down the road than deal with them with death when i ran for the board i knew that there would be times that i would have to make a decision that would not be totally something that i believed in but i knew that it would be the most important to this community that i love i have chosen to live and work in gilbert and sometimes a decision is made because that is what is what people want but this is very different because this could be a life or death decision i am so saddened that it's become political there is absolutely nothing political in what i'm saying right now it is about the value of the lives of our children our families our parents and the community that i care so deeply about i have many memories of growing up in douglas arizona most of them are extremely positive but there are two that have always stood out to me now more than ever i remember when polio was rampant and we couldn't go to the public pool in the summer i remember a very prominent doctor whose daughter had polio and was in an iron lung they would bring her to sunday mass and i could hear her iron lung breathing for her she later died i remember when a vaccine came out and how happy everyone was for that i also remember when i was in third grade my grandmother died in november shortly thereafter my teacher sister beatrice ann died suddenly she had been my first grade teacher and i was my third grade teacher it was devastating as a child to lose my teacher and i don't want to ever put a child through this with that being said i know i can't and i won't make a decision to ever cause even one person to die i truly understand that going back to our schools is what is needed but that was before this horrible virus exploded in our world throughout my career and my life i have felt the loss of students parents and co-workers i have done more than my share of luigi's for people who i cared deeply about it was devastating to say the least but a decision i made did not cause any one's death i have been told that children can die in a bus accident or on a field trip that we have approved i understand that but that's an accident to me this is completely different we are in unchartered waters dealing with a health risk that we have never seen in our lifetime i know tonight's vote is only to approve the possibility of three ways in which we can go back in august as we all know there are many variables that can happen between now and august 5th or august 17th with the governor's executive order i also feel strongly that things have changed drastically since we did the first surveys i absolutely believe that we need to follow science and metrics i can only hope and pray that the trend we are seeing now doesn't continue and i respect the varying opinions of the different scientists and professional organizations and that is just it there are so many varying opinions on what is safe and what is not please know that these words come from my heart and my heart has always been with our children our families and our educators is my life and this is why i continue to do what i do and i can just be retired i love gps and i love being a gps board member i have been so blessed in my life to be able to serve this wonderful community at so many different levels and i have so much respect for all of you and all that we've done thank you thank you mr jetty well said mrs humphries well i i just wanted to point out that we're on a motion for the the plan and that we're going to have to make a separate motion about the um changes to the school calendar so i just want to make sure that we are aware of that but my thoughts are this has been very unpredictable so far and i don't think it's going to get any easier i would concur with dr mccord that we start online on august 5th and then if we can transition to having some of our students in school those that choose to do that or some on the flex schedule those that choose that that that we do that when that's possible um the best way i can um the thing that i've connected it to was i used to live in pennsylvania and so there was one school year where we had 10 snow days you'd get off and then you'd realize oh it's snowing we're not going to school today and at the end of the year we had to make up those days it was very unpredictable but you know we have this opportunity that um we can do good things online i think kids will be ready and wanting to be involved in education and having some different activities they've been home i mean we've had a whole march april may now we've got june july and we get to august i i think they will be ready and excited to do something even if it's only online until we can get to a place where we can be in person and i would suggest to all of us really think about what we're doing on the fourth of july we're here now because of the last two weeks of may and memorial day we're in this position if we want kids to go back to school let's put on that mask let's do the things we need to to stay home keep ourselves safe and keep people around us safe because this is a communicable communicable disease it's all of us together no one of us can solve this problem by ourselves we all have to give the concerted effort to bring this down to a level where we can deal with it where we can trace people and quarantine people there are other countries that have dealt with it and are now being more able to open unfortunately because of leadership issues and i won't say where they are but the fact that we as a school board have to make these decisions just shows that the leadership hasn't been there in other places but um again if we want our kids to be back in school it's incumbent upon us to do the things that we can to get them there and i i really think we should go ahead with the august 5th and then if on the 17th we're able to bring kids back to school who want to be there let's do that but starting and getting people going i think that's the most important thing we can do thank you mrs humphries board members anyone else dr santa cruz i do have some mr mccord if we don't start august 5th uh there's the possibility that we would have to alter the schedule and add days is that correct yes sir that's correct and we and we based on the the governor's uh executive direction executive order he's directed i'm just making sure i understand this all correctly he's the most recent one right yes he's directed the arizona department of education to look at the possibility of changing the number of days but at this point we don't know correct according to the order they will do an analysis and that shall be submitted to the governor the speaker of the house representative the president of the senate and the state board of education by august 31st so there's and again i'm going to go back to when we talked about high school graduation and we talked about the possibility of adding in person graduation we all wanted to do that but we but i at that time brought up the idea of certainty versus uncertainty and we had to make a decision we made a decision to have our virtual graduation so that we were certain that the seniors would have something we expressed that in the level of uncertainty we would add if we could and based on the experience that we had as well as witnessing what other school door districts did they tried to move forward with that and from what i saw one one of the school districts canceled it all together the other one had about a 20 attendance so they didn't really achieve what they'd hoped anyway so if i look at this my i'll be honest my desire is not to start um let let option two and three start my desire is to if we're giving parents the option of starting in person that's that's what they want i mean and so we're in essence removing a portion of that option but we do so with an uncertain if we proceed with that with again that's my desire we do so with a level of uncertainty we don't know that we will start on the 17th governor ducey made that very very clear that he's moving it to august 17th but that he may move it again so we also put an uncertainty in the lives of not only the students and the families but now we look and say we may have to make up days so all these families that have plans scheduled over uh fall break or spring break if if we move the date we may have to cancel those breaks and we create additional uncertainty in the plans when families are already moving vacations we put uncertainty in the lives of our teachers because now we can't tell them when their contracts start and how they're going to pay their bills i don't like this decision i don't like the fact that the states move the target without telling us what the new where the new goal line is i don't like the uncertainty that's that we have an ever moving goal line and we're trying to develop a strategy to get across it um given where we were if we could delay this decision two weeks i would do it but that just simply creates more uncertainty in the lives of our families and our students uh even during this meeting i've gotten and in the last half hour i've gotten texts from several several elementary teachers please don't make us start online it's so it's so difficult i've gotten texts from parents the online experience isn't what we want um you know the the simple reality is i i don't know how to give everybody what they want uh my preference is not to return august august 17th it's to return august 5th in person that's not an option that's given to us we recognize that the authority that this school board has is a delegated authority it's delegated by our legislature and our governor and an authority that we normally have has been taken away from us we have checks and balances those checks include things from the health department right now we're operating under a governor's order to change the date it's an authority that's been taken away from us we don't want to get in a situation where we have an outbreak and the authority is taken away from us from a health from the county health department or state health department we've we're we're operating in new uncharted waters and we and please parents i beg your patients because it's a situation where we don't have the answers in some cases we don't have the authority to do what we want my preference is to take a little bit of risk and move us and plan on starting the 17th and if it gets pushed out again then we go online the 17th but recognize it in so doing i will also make a motion to cancel spring or fall break um something i don't want to do but we have to assume that we have to make up those days we've had a long long tiresome spring break and i never thought in my life i'd say that about a spring break it's still spring we never went back it feels it feels like it's still spring break it's still for spring break um so my my my suggestion for the in-person option option a would be that we delay until the 17th uh knowing that we will be canceling uh that we'll make a motion on 6.02 or three whatever it is for the calendar that we would have to cancel that fall break and yes that impacts families and that impacts teachers and impacts grading periods and that impacts so many other things but that would be my preference just for clarification and you're saying that and that only makes up half the days by the way i recognize that no no no no i wasn't even talking about that just yet um we would only really have one option if we started on the fifth does that would true are you assuming flex as well well i'm i'm saying for the end go ahead and start the well the flex would have to wait too yeah that's why i wanted to yeah that's that's that's a good point yeah um it's not ideal and and we would have to clarify how we can pay teachers and not take it out on the backs of teachers and their and their salaries um there's probably not a whole lot we can do for support staff and i i say that feeling the real weight of that decision and that's my recommendation i appreciate that and and i think you described my terms of being boxed in extremely well i mean i i really think you did i think uh everybody that you up there on the dice as well as us out here that are bringing recommendations to you have gone through those same scenarios in our head and and uh like i said i don't this isn't this isn't exactly what i want to do but at the end of the day i think it's our only move um so sorry any other commentary ms wood i think my one concern with the 17th is that we there are districts around us that might start before that yeah i i would be online though it would they would have to be online as well correct nobody can go in person not not not that i not that i'm aware of i don't know anybody bucking the system just yet yeah but you know we're not so that scenery is are we actually then are we because my my first preference is that as well i'd rather be in person oh sorry let me let me speak here i'd rather be in person if we're in person i just worry that that but at the same time then i think okay and i worry about the families again trying to start on that online when they it's just a huge effort for everybody it's a huge effort on our teachers who aren't planning to teach online but are going to need to do that although at the same time we know that there were probably going to be some types of disruptions here there there might have to be a maybe a a class or a school two-week quarantine or different things is what kind of what i imagine more than whole shutdowns hopefully but right um so we do want to be familiar with this new platform and maybe this would give us the time to get familiar with that in a good way is that too much task of our teachers though to come back and do that i don't know and families i don't know but i'm i'm kind of back and forth now on august 5th just my thought is if you were going to change the date and not start until the 17th and cancel fall break i would almost prefer sending out a survey to parents and having a special meeting before we would do that because i think that is a huge change and i think i'd want to hear some feedback from families about which option they would prefer going online on the 5th and then having their fall break if they can go somewhere we'll have to see where we are the trend is not good for that but um i would i would rather get some feedback ins before we make that big of a change to our calendar that that's a huge change i would think that um if we decide to go online on the fifth and um it's looking like that date may be pushed back um in terms of starting um yeah we could we could go out with a survey i think it would be a little difficult right now in terms of just timing and not that i don't want the feedback it's more of just a matter of time to be able to get there and so um looking at and you know we can get that into that calendar discussion um you know we have looked at some possibilities of when school would start and taking away some other days that we have within the calendar you know if we started and we just started everything on august 17th mr martin our calendar expert over there we calculated that we could end the school year everything being copacetic on june 3rd and that would be taking away days such as october 12th which is the day after fall break that was an extra day looking at taking away and starting on january 4th which would be the end of winter break and then the day after spring break which is march 15th we could start there and add that day back in and then the day after um the spring holiday weekend which is april 5th so again that would take us to the end of the school year for students on june 3rd last day for teachers would be june 4th if we left all those intact we would probably end on june 9th and so again that's making up well i think a lot of these things are assumptions but just looking at some numbers and trying to create something that is normal but yet knowing that we would extend the school year and again knowing that people wouldn't be starting to get paid probably until a later date in august if if we took that approach would we still end the high school semester and i highlight high school because of finals uh whereas elementary don't has a little more flexibility would we instill in the high school semester before the christmas break that would be my assumption yes i mean you're looking at how it's balanced out right now it's 87 and 93 days so you'd be taking well you'd be taking a a few more days out of the first semester so your first semester would be even shorter but we can entertain the idea of coming back in and doing finals after winter break i would really rather not i haven't had personal experience but i've watched lots of nieces and nephews do that in other states and it's just what ends up happening is they ended up studying the entire break instead of getting a break correct so looking at this you'd be you'd essentially be taking nine more days off the first semester so it would be a shorter first semester as opposed to a second semester and if the state then decreased the number of days to 180 to 170 would we could we further adjust and end in a more traditional sense we could we could it would be after the fact and so that's that's sometimes difficult but we can do it oh we did it last year yeah by quite a few days oh what do you mean for the online yeah i mean effectively yeah yeah do we know testing um is the state going to require testing i mean effectively we lose four or five days to testing anyway we know that we have to provide benchmark testing that was in one of the executive orders just last week we have not been given any definitive answer when we've asked specifically about spring testing or what else that will look like we know that we have our students who miss the a.c.t and we wanted to provide that for them in the fall i don't know if we would still do that or not but we don't know for sure what that will look like in the spring but we do anticipate that we would do something i i feel similar to miss humphries if i mean if if we had the opportunity to seek input from our parents you know i feel like we're under the gun to make a decision so that people can plan but if we even could call a special meeting a week from now and have time to survey parents and perhaps survey members of our legislature or the governor's office as to whether they can allow us to start to pay period start start a pay period so that we don't tickets out on our teachers if they can give us some options along those lines i would still really prefer to let the in person meet in person beginning from the beginning of the year if we come back in one week and we hear from parents that they don't want to do that and we hear from especially those parents who prefer the in person and we hear from the governor or from the legislative office that there is no option within the gifting element then that might alter our decision because we can't make a decision that rides on the back of of employees um i i don't want to put off the decision but i also want to put it off as long as we can if it gives us additional information to make a better decision i don't know if that's an option well we have a couple of things to vote on one is to vote on whether or not we approve the plan that's been presented and we can take that vote the other relates to the date when we gilbert unified school district determines to start albeit that we would start with one mode and that would be the online global academy feature it's tough to fly blind and i can appreciate all of the angst that all of us are working through making assumptions about whether or not starting on the 17th and there's an additional pushback and adjusting the calendar and the assumption is that parents haven't already made decisions about their recreational time or whatever those time frames represent for them already it's been my experience in this community that people here make decisions well in advance sometimes a year in advance at least so for us to forestall on an assumption that we're not going to impact family calendars is not realistic in my view at all rather than not have and i'm going to use a very hokey analogy a piece of cake for dessert that is there for me as opposed to taking the whole cake knowing that i will get the whole cake at an appropriate time that's the toss-up you know we're not losing in my opinion uh anything by one approving the models and two starting on our calendar appointed date we're simply pushing back the implementation date of the two models that we've already presented so i guess on one hand is something better than nothing or waiting until we get the model that we want right away i don't know which of those options really flies the best i have i have a real sense that keeping our calendar intact as much as possible makes sense to me i think i would concur with that because i think that that at least gives predictability and and under the circumstances some predictability seems um very valuable right now dr santa cruz mr jetty uh i totally agree with what you're saying um can we clarify exactly what we're going to be voting on for both of the issues yes ma'am because we will we will need a second motion under item 6.02 the first motion really relates to the approval of the plan and the discussion has been open because we we threw in august 5th but the second motion would have to be related to august 5th as the start date or not that is my understanding is that correct document okay so go ahead so we're just gonna vote right now we're gonna vote on just the three correct plans the option i mean that's the option okay correct and then then we'll have motion for the second part correct correct is that is that everyone's understanding as well yes we're just voting to accept the plan that was presented tonight and then we have to have another motion to decide the dates on the school calendar beginning the school year correct so are we ready to vote on item 6.02 the plans if we're ready to vote then all those in favor of the reopening school plans for 2021 please signify by saying aye aye those opposed the same motion carries i think i heard an eye mr eugetti is that correct correct motion carries 5-0 so the plans are approved now we'll entertain a motion for the start date related to august 5th i make a motion that we start school august 5th online and then resume um the other options on august 17th or when allowed to by the governor there's a motion on the floor is there a second second thank you mr jetty motion and a second we've had discussion around it it is open for additional discussion should you choose so i guess my question goes back to santa cruz yes miss eugenie i'm sorry i i i just think that that whatever we vote on tonight could change in the next week depending on so many factors i would concur with that assessment mr carr had a comment mr carr very similar and my suggestion would be well my first my question i guess would be uh what's the likelihood that we could clarify those questions um about paying teachers or and or adjusting the calendar if we were to table this for one week and have a special meeting in a week [Music] my answer would be clear his mud to you and when i say that i don't know i mean you heard mrs betts earlier you know you've had a group of lawyers interpret certain things i i don't know i mean we would try as hard as we can to be able to do that i mean i have a problem with that just the time frame i mean it was 24 hours and you've gotten a lot of different opinions since 3 pm yesterday so we would do all we can to do that i'm not sure they would have answers even if you went to try and clarify i'm not sure that the state would have the answers to give us that would help us know because they i don't think they've worked it out in their minds how how it's going to work and we haven't had a legislative special session yet some of that may need to be acted on by the legislature rather than just the governor that's my concern and i don't disagree with that ms humphries um at the same time like i said if if we don't have you know if if the decision to move forward with our previous motion allows the school to start moving putting in place all of the options that we just approved and delaying the decision of the calendar by one week with the hopes of getting information additional information enables us to more successfully meet parents desires and pay teachers with more certainty and so on to me it's it's worth one more week of uncertainty if we're saying well it's only a one in you know one million chance of getting any clarification then it's then we have to we have to make the decision based on what we have and and if i if if i gave you an answer i'm afraid i would just not be telling you the truth and i and i wouldn't want that you look at um [Music] you know just based on today we're delaying them the families being able to choose one of those three options until starting next next week and so and that enables us to do staffing when it comes to 17th time if we decided to go online on the 5th and and i know that's a a huge task for otm but we can do anything i mean if it's your choice to to delay this until next week i may come back and give you more information than you've ever wanted in your life or i could just be staring at you i i can't promise you anything but i'll do my best i guarantee you that so mr carr are you moving to table until we can secure additional information through communications and public relations in dr mccord or that that's why i'm headed but i want to make sure i'm making it informed i mean dr mccord alluded to the fact that it delays staffing it delays things so we also have to understand the cost of that decision and we we want to serve our community but you can't do everything we have limited resources and we have time frames that are that are real and we have constraints as as ms humphreys use the word so i'm trying to understand what the impact on those constraints are i'm not trying to keep our administration up 24 hours a day for the next week to answer these questions so that's my question uh what's the reality of of getting any more meaningful information and the answer is i don't know yeah and and my intent is not to push any of you into a corner or a decision i i'm just telling you what our reality is and and moving forward so i i apologize if if any of you feel that way i just know that we also have a community that that's looking for answers one way or the other and so i get that too so if i understand what you're saying dr mccord and that is and i i apologize i do not mean to put anyone in a poor light here but a delay in a decision this evening would stymie talent management from getting information organized as it relates to communicating with our parent community about the mode of instruction they will select if i understood dr newman earlier if this was approved if we approved a start time along with the plans she didn't talk about start time but that's my verbiage then they would submit to our parents their options for choice is that correct that is correct um can i ask dr newman a question i think might be helpful that when we talk about and i'm sure you've discussed this with members of your task force but maybe not because there's only been 24 hours when we talk about starting schools online for everybody whether they want to be in person whether they want to do the flex schedule or whether they want to do global academy let's plan for the most optimistic outcome that we get to go back to school in person on august 17th what would those two weeks look like you know for somebody you know i mean say someone's starting kindergarten or first grade or second grade what is that going to look like for an elementary school student or a middle school student maybe somebody starting seventh grade where they haven't even had the opportunity to be in that school before or somebody starting high school how does that look for those teachers trying to teach students so that it won't be like fourth quarter where we're trying to figure out how to make it work and parents trying to help students through the next couple of weeks online we have not had a lot of conversation because this just happened yesterday afternoon right so um we the conversation we've had is that there will need to be extensive community building um that we would normally always do but even more so for our students because that was not necessarily what they had planned teacher-wise so there will be a lot of discussion related to that circling around social emotional supports and otherwise that we we would be putting in place anyways it would just look differently because it would be online okay i mean i just i i assume we'll figure that out because trying to build that online is going to be much harder than in person you know which is the one reason why i'm hesitant to start on the fifth but i'm concerned that there are other districts who are going to be starting and people have been waiting and waiting to get back to school and i i think that's a real concern and also the point as dr santa cruz said there are a lot of people that plan early and and may have planned things for fall break so hoping that they can do it well and likewise we'll have parents who were assuming that we're starting the fifth that are working parents and now the sudden they have a kindergartner or first grader who is trying to attend class online and we're essentially asking those parents to take a week or two off of work to support to support their children and that sounds great we live in a fluent community but that's something that many of the parents can't do i mean it's it's it's a no-win situation um and and i'm not suggesting that that's an answer but it goes both ways yeah absolutely are you ready to vote dr santa cruz can i i say one more thing please go ahead go ahead mr jetty i agree with what everybody has said and and my belief is that whatever decision we make tonight could change tomorrow or next week and so i think we just have to make a decision and then we also have to remember that we have to be flexible depending on what happens in the next few weeks agreed i appreciate that comment so dr san cruz would you please remind us what we're voting on and remind us we are voting on emotion thank you thank you mrs humphrey i made the motion i remember but it can get very confusing so i want to make sure everybody knows my understanding is that we are voting on a motion to start school on august the 5th on line to begin with any additional commentary discussion questions a motion to table would scuttle that motion hearing nothing it is time for the vote all those in favor of the motion to start school on august the 5th with the online platform only please signify by saying i i all those opposed signify by same motion carries painfully five zero dr santa cruz maybe may explain my vote please i still believe that we should wait till the 17th however i would still like to ask the superintendency to gather as much information as they can by voting in the affirmative that gives me the right to to reconsider this motion whereas if i devote voted in the minority i could not do so so i would like to ask you to see what other information you can gather around the possibility of paying that this allows you to move forward this allows you to plan if we can get additional information in the next week or so i may request a special board meeting depending on that information for a reconsideration of this vote thank you mr carr appreciate that and i think that's a wise move all right dr santa cruz go ahead miss you jay can i just say one thing sure um i really appreciate what mr carr just said and i concur you know like i said earlier this could change tomorrow or july 6th or july 15th or whenever so thank you mr jetty and the commentary from mr carr and your concurrence is consistent with what we have said since we began our deliberations and that is this is all fluid and flexible so we are at that point we'll move to item 6.03 discussion and approval of changes to the 2021 calendar uh dr mccord did you have anything by way of introduction or i i no i don't think it's it's actually a necessary item at this point in time i put it on there just because it was we run out of time to post and i didn't know exactly what this was going to look like so item 6.03 given our last vote is a moot point so we will move to item seven item seven point zero one dr snackers beforehand before we move to adjourn can i just thank everybody in the room thank you parents for their patience and understanding uh thank our superintendent and administration and staff for all the work they put into this but i also want to thank my fellow board members i know that we have uh varying opinions on how to proceed i appreciate that each one of us have listened to each other and the professionalism and i appreciate that i can look each person in the eye and know that that their whole intent is to do what's best for this community and what's best for the teachers and what's best for the children so i just want to thank each of you for for your efforts on behalf of our community even when we disagree thank you thank you mr carr and i would echo your comments and share appreciation with all of you as well also would say thank you to those of you in attendance tonight it's been a lengthy discussion and would also thank those of you who continued and stayed with us through live stream all evening with that said item 7.01 is before you is there a motion to adjourn so moved thank you mr carson a second second thank you mrs humphries no discussion we are adjourned thank you very much have a good evening you

Walston just we're going to have to have a more rigorous routine to doing that in answer that right now probably more often than then then we could anticipate depending on the usage but we'd have to keep a close eye on them have had it deaf and keep them as clean as possible that's all you have to do and then monitor it daily some days are probably more than others you know it depends but it's a high priority for us to make sure that they stay clean and who will enforce that the masks stay on well how old are you 12 will help me out you know I I could see where it's gonna be difficult and we're gonna have to cooperate the adults are gonna have to crawl this is very unusual so you know we don't have a police state this is for medical reasons and health reasons I think most students will just follow someone's having some real challenges with it so we'd have some timeout areas so that they could take the mask off yeah we have to be reasonable and I want we don't want to catch the start being put out of school and all that stuff because they won't wear a mask we're looking for cooperation so part of it is that we're going to have to ask parents to help us work with their youngsters tell them how important it is and then when when something happens at school and it will happen that we work with that person so it gets back on reasonably so we work together as a team thanks for saving your heart questions for my boss I appreciate that chat box choose we're getting some good conversation in there as well I just couldn't I couldn't get the audio to work and I kept knocking it but I did hear something good questions Alberta please hi hello yeah summer student indeed yes I'm gonna be a senior this upcoming year so I just wanted to ask if like if we will be able to like as you said like we have to wear masks in school so will you guys provide them for us or we will be providing them for our so because at this time is very difficult for everybody to get masks and as if you've seen them like in in Amazon or like some other places they're really really like really expensive so will you guys be able to provide them for us or we have to provide them for ourselves well right now we're still talking about it we'll probably have obviously we'll have the some masks of for those that during the data that did that don't have them and then we'll work with families if that we need to purchase some so right now we're working through that okay great thank you very much and we'd like to Kiera McCarthy next hi um I was just wondering again how old the hallways are going to work like do you think it's a possibility that the bell like send one section of the school and the hallways at a time like all 3,000 kids at the hallway at the same time because like very like pushing in the hallways yeah that's a great question the height did you say you're at the high school now yeah I'm gonna be a junior well it would have been easier if you were a k5 I couldn't answer that question but I'll try to answer that question 4 K 5 6 8 and 19 but specifically for 912 add in very high school your principal you know school administrators and us we're all trying to think through that the safest way the best way to keep all of you guys safe and and and and that could mean a number of different things from different ways on how you guys are gonna different times on how you're gonna into different days on how you're gonna enter school different times on how you're gonna be released from classrooms and so we're still exploring all of those things and so we don't we don't have anything definitive for you right now at k5 in 6/8 particularly k5 wanted you know some of the things we talked about in terms of hallway movement is following the normal traffic patterns that we typically would have and and you know keep in keeping us students socially distanced you should know that your teachers are asking the same important questions the administrators are asking the same questions and in the superintendent dr.

Walston if you could read Christopher Borges comment in the chat box and and replied attacked verbally I think that's a good question for everyone um so Lauren can we hear from you yes um I'm curious because my daughter is going to 11th grade at DHS and she has a hearing problem so she reads lips I have not gotten her an IEP so I'm a little concerned about how she's gonna function in a classroom when she can't see the teachers lips hi hi Lauren um please please please if you need help you can email me after this calls over or you can just you know just we can stay on the line we can exchange information but I think it's going to be important for your principal and teachers to be aware of this modification is going to be needed for your child because for us it could be a simple adjustment for the teacher and we could just be asking that teacher to wear a mask where they're where their face is exposed so that so that this is a non-issue for your daughter so you know it's important that you're your principal is aware so they can make sure the modification is is met and make sure your teachers are aware and with that with that slight adjustment there should be a non-issue as a district we've already talked about ordering special masks for those for those staff members and making sure they're available in fact we just had a call this morning talking about the populations that might require this whether it's reall community whether it's our special needs community or even students you know requiring a 504 and even if they're not identified if it's ports of our attention we will make the adjustment okay so should I should I try to get her an IEP for this we'd never really needed it she's a pretty decent student but I don't know if I need the writing a piece of paper and writing saying she has this problem or if we can just work without it yeah that's a great question I think it's I think it's best that you have the conversation with your principal and and you're right and then you know perhaps guidance counselor etc and they'll make the determination locally cuz not knowing your specific case in most cases you should not need an IEP for this but again I don't want to speak out of turn here you know there are cases where this can be handled with a 504 and in the 504 it's just you know making sure we're all in the same page about the support that your your daughter needs but you might not need a 504 you know it might just be an adjustment that we can make or we might need temporary 504 right because right after this you know these these rules are relaxed we won't have to worry about mask again and your daughter can continue to move on and those adjustments might not be necessary okay perfect thank you so much you're welcome you're welcome good questions so I'm going to go to hamaji tralana a sixth-grader that's a great question so you know we've been encouraged to leave doors open we've been encouraged to to leave windows open we've been encouraged to socially distance to the best extent possible and and right now that with within our means anyway that's our best way to try to help address the ventilation concerns so I hope that answers your question you're welcome thank you and mr.

so are there concerns that we might have a shortage of substitutes under the circumstances are are we concerned about having a shortage of substitutes under the circumstances until i get the survey back it would be hard for me to guess um we are working on developing plans so that we could have site coverage with substitutes those those who are willing to come back we could assign to a campus so that way when a teacher or another staff member is out there's already a pool of substitutes on that campus to help cover um during that time so we're still in the developing plans with the with that but i think that we'll get there we've had the highest number of substitutes in our pool last year than what we've ever historically had but in our current situation until i get the survey back it's unknown just exactly how many are willing to to come in and help gps okay thank you i'm learning to enunciate better so you can hear me through the mask this is not related to that so um i'm not sure where this question comes in but since you've been talking about health protocols under employees this isn't necessarily related to employees but traditionally when there's an outbreak of some kind of illness at a particular school we report that to the county health department and they intervene what role does the county health department play at this point with with ongoing covid and if we have an outbreak miss jen frost is here specifically to answer those questions and if we're going to address this in the future we can i'll wait for an answer to that this is perfect okay this is great thank you good evening dr santa cruz members of the board um dr mccord so i've been working with department of health probably every other day we meet and they currently don't have a percentage typically with things like measles chickenpox those types of things there is a number directly tied to the virus that they want to use in order to know that they're going to shut down a classroom or excuse me a campus at this time we are reporting each case that we know of as positive and confirmed but they have not decided because this is a community born virus they have not decided what number that would take for a campus in order to shut anything down does that answer your question well we don't know is the answer so yes dr santa cruz go ahead go ahead ms eugenie i am i have a question for uh mr mcintosh okay let him come to the microphone go ahead and ask your question he and i talked about this this afternoon uh it has to do with the fact that the first coronavirus response act only covers 80 hours of paid leave for a staff member but what happens if that staff member gets exposed again and i know chandler has said that they are going to cover the teachers or any employees that that happens with so what are we going to do hi josh go ahead missy jenny it's shane um mr mcintosh and i talked about that i did speak to chandler as well it's something that they're going to propose to their board which is something that i would propose to you as well and that is if somebody has confirmed case of covid that is their second go around with cobid would we be willing to cover another 10 days for them to be able to recover quarantine for that time so i think i would be willing to propose that to you as a governing board but we would need to look at what policy that specifically speaks to and suspend that portion of it or reword it for the time being one of the concerns is that sometimes people are sick for quite an extended time with this virus and and they don't necessarily necessarily recover in just two weeks or even three or four i have heard of cases where it's gone on much longer so i think we're going to have to be a little flexible on a case-by-case basis depending on what the employees need mr jetty did you get the response you were looking for i did but but my question it has to do with even just being exposed not necessarily having it well i would think if they're if they're reporting it and they need to quarantine and whether they're exposed or whether they have it again we would be able to work with them based on direction from the governing board related to that again it's it's something that within our policy because the cares act takes care of the first 80 hours the assumption would be then the employees sickly would cover that moving forward but if we want to do some things different as a school district we i'm more than willing to do that but if they don't have enough sick leave and they keep getting exposed we've got to figure that one out right and and and again even if they had enough sick leave we could suspend them using that sick leave if they've been exposed again and need to quarantine that's that's something that we could decide as a as a school district and governing board your observation's a good one thank you dr you bet i i think that is another item for policy committee we'll have to as dr mccord has suggested take a look at the policy that applies and adjust the language accordingly for this moment in time so your your point is well taken thank you thank you dr santa cruz and dr mccoy dr santa cruz it sounds like our policy meeting is going to become a retreat it it does thank you mr carr go ahead dr newman all right um so there will be additional obviously training and support our teachers will be trained um and receive professional development as i mentioned initial and then ongoing professional development on the platform and also on best instructional strategies with whether that be for a blended model or whether that be for an all online model and how can they continue to engage the students in academic rigor like they would be used to in the classroom we want to be sure initially in july we once we have um approval to move forward we will train all of our teachers and at least one hour of training that we will pay them it's optional for them to do it in july but we know that some teachers want they want to get trained now because they have summer and they're used to summer time and working and preparing and so there will be an optional pd just on the overall common knowledge of what the virtual platform is we initially also knew that we need to have additional training for our flex teachers and for our gps global academy teachers now with recent news just as of yesterday there might be a need for us to train all of our teachers in much more detail on the florida virtual shell and how teachers can access that and how they can pull their own resources in there and do some more things that way sooner rather than later and so with that we know that with the return to school before our students would begin their calendar our teachers have their contracted calendar and so those days would be while the teachers on contract that we would be sure that teachers not only received the additional the initial training if they did not get it in july but then all of the additional training as well and support we've talked about having additional um almost an expert on each campus a go-to in addition to our ties who are such a great resource they will be doing the majority of the training along with dr barton at gps global academy and we have four teachers that our on our at our brick and mortar campuses right now that also are gps global academy teachers part-time and so that will be our team in addition to our professional development educators as well ms human just for a quick break is he jetty are you still there i i think i am i i think i get disconnected you're there here we got you i just i i heard a couple beeps and i didn't i just wanted to make sure you were still there thank you sorry to interrupt i wasn't leaving [Music] i'm afraid miss eugenie might have said something and that's why we heard the beep but um miss newman sorry poor attempted humor very funny miss newman you made a comment about when teacher contracts start with contracts starting as as uh as documented but now with us starting school later are we suggesting that the teachers still report on the report date and begin their contract if that's the case not knowing whether they're going to change the number of school days our teachers then gonna have to report and teach more days um and again if if i'm if i'm being a segway i'm not intending to so please if that's already addressed i can wait but well it's it's not necessarily addressed because it's it's kind of what happened yesterday in terms of the discussion of of when do we actually start school you know the governor said uh august 17th is when we can go back in person but also left the door open for us to start at our regular date online and so if that was the case the teachers would report not new teachers they'd report a couple days before that but all other teachers would report july 31st and we would continue teaching or start teaching online and then as you got to august 17th or up two if things haven't changed then we would segue in and into those three models of those that chose in person those that chose flex and those that choose to continue online and so that's how we'd move forward if for some reason we didn't do anything and pushed everything back and in person can start or those three options could start on the 17th then their contract would start three work days before that and so um everything would be pushed back but at that time and we don't know the answer to this today but the assumption is is that the pays would be delayed until uh that started so and that was one of my questions i mean from past experience or past discussion if we don't start the teacher pay we can't begin to pay them or if we don't start the contract we can't begin to pay them by state statute correct and i haven't seen any executive order to change that nothing in writing that would say pay him and start whenever you want because otherwise it would be considered a constitutional issue of gifting public gifting yeah um so i just want that clear to teachers i've been asked by a few teachers the simple answer at this point then is we don't know that is correct and and and i think that's something that we should probably discuss at further length this evening in terms of what our intentions are for august 5th uh as we move through this again not necessarily part of the presentation but definitely part of the discussion and also you know we talk a lot about teachers we need to recognize our support staff and again the same type of concept of gift of public funds if we go online or even if we wait and do nothing until august 17th there's still uh a lack of them being able to be paid and even if we start online the question is how do we or do we pay them because they won't be performing there'll be a handful of course that will continue to work but there'll be several paraprofessionals out there that we will not be able to utilize we might be able to do some trainings for a lot of different groups but that won't be a full-time job 40 hour a week it might be a few hours here and there so that's that concerns me greatly because our support staff and it seems like when things like this happen it seems like support staff is always left out of the loop and and they're extremely important to the operation and the functioning and the education of our students and so i don't know what there's a fix for that but i unless again like in the spring the reason why that was able to happen because there was an executive order well this executive order does not address that and i don't know if a future one will or not so again gray and related to that dr mccord the a executive order last week uh i believe it was last week indicated that they would guarantee school funding at at least to 98 percent of last year which the purpose of that is to allow us to to move forward planning because we simply don't know with only weeks to to come how we're going to support parents in their choices of online in person or or flex or you know whatever model they choose but the executive order that came out yesterday seems to indicate that if we start online that those even with the plan of transitioning the full time that those students who start online will be treated as an aoi online arizona online student for funding purposes so we seem to have con conflicts in those two executive orders the older one only a week old indicating we will receive funding the newer one indicating that our funding may be diminished um i understand it's just a two percent maximum decline right well i don't know i mean the newer one supersedes it doesn't reference that so that's my question if we could seek clarification because if that's the case and then again if funding is based on 100-day then maybe it doesn't matter because we're back in person by 100 day anyway right um so i i think there's some some questions where those two executive orders are in conflict with each other the newer one of the two seeming to give us a lower amount i think that impacts our our decisions and our ability to make decisions and we need to seek clarification on that very possible i i see it as irregardless of what we're funded at for aoi we're going to be held harmless up to 98 and but and i want to yeah i want to uh interpret it as i will leave with that but but anytime you have a newer document that says something that typically supersedes the previous document so in my mind it left it unclear i don't know that was the governor's intention to leave it unclear but i would like to if we can seek some clarification on that so that we're making smart informed decisions and we'll have uh mrs betts come up and a few talk about some dollars she might have a little more info to be able to share and i agree with you mr carr i also to add additional confusion as i listened to the governor speak yesterday i latched on to the word maximum flexibility in the financing i can interpret that any way i would like but i'm not sure that my interpretation would be equal to his interpretation or to the legislature's interpretation but we we need to capitalize on that maximum flexibility terminology and i did speak with mrs betts yesterday and she and i had a very good conversation and she's doing some research on our behalf i feel like i've been doing yoga i'm so flexible for the last four months this is awesome we also want to be sure that we're providing parent training and support as well training on the platform and how to access the platform how to best help students who are learning online or in blended situations that resource navigation and where to find things for students or where to look how to access progress of students and then again that strategy for student support what does that look like in all of our settings and so that will be also a focus when we look at training and support with that too we want to provide technical support tech services did an amazing job it was always fun to watch you know the cars driving through and whether that be because they had questions about a device or there was a device that perhaps needed some a little bit extra help there but they are prepared to support they are prepared to support at even a larger scale than they did before their students will have access at k-6 to not only a device but also some insurance options that they obviously did not have during fourth quarter and obviously they did not have it previously because our students did not have devices but they have expanded that opportunity for parents to purchase insurance for those devices also that internet accessibility and the importance of making sure that our families who may not have internet access do and so continuing to work with that cox connect to compete program making sure the collaboration between tech services our title offices and our parents and then for our parents that might live in locations where cox does not service those subdivisions making sure that there are alternative hot spots that are provided from the other vendors other than cox as well i have a question on just devices and i probably dr mccord can answer this we had a robust one-to-one um seven through twelve program and we've been able to roll down a lot of our chromebooks to the elementary will we need to purchase more chromebooks in order to give access to students or have we had sufficient chromebooks we've had sufficient chromebooks we've also ordered more because some have aged out and we're in the process of replacing some and also the city of mesa has graciously donated the funds to the tune of 420 chromebooks for our district from the money that they received from the federal government related to or the state actually i think related to um covet 19 so that's actually on the consent agenda for this evening okay i just wanted to make sure that we we're covering those elementary students as well thank you dr newman that we're not talking about all elementary students we're talking about elementary students who are either in the flex or the online the global yes any of them that would need that in either those options though knowing too we're going to we need to be flexible and there will be times of disruption so if an individual student for example all of a sudden is needs to be home for a length of time we'll be able to provide that for them as well okay thanks so as you can imagine um just i'm sorry questions keep coming up and this isn't related to this this is going back to our three options but uh as this is new information questions arise as they come to mind within all three student options uh how does evit work at the high school level if they choose the hybrid they choose online does eve it just work the same way are there special accommodations in all of those not only eve it but also our cte programs we've take have plans in place of how our students can continue for example our even our cte part of cte is that you have to have a certain percentage of hands-on experiences so when our students are there we want to be sure that they continue to have as many hands-on experiences just in case there is another disruption for whether that be student or otherwise and they also are utilizing some online programs that have some virtual experiences as well but we definitely would be able to um with just like the flex is a partial day gps global academy we could do the same thing with our students and then of course our brick and mortar and we'll follow what ebit says as well in regard to what their plans are we do not have those yet either so as you can imagine our district operations have um been working overtime did you have a question i do and and this may have been observed and i might have missed it but if in a classroom a student exposes a a whole class with a teacher and the entire class would have to be quarantined for two weeks what are is going to be the solution for that so if i think i heard her i'll try it okay if a classroom for example that would be a disruption of an entire classroom we would then continue to support the students the teacher would be able to if the students were having to be at home for a certain length of time during that quarantine time then the teacher would continue to support them through online learning they would already be used to the virtual platform they would already be used to some of the access in regard to the curriculum and our parents would also have knowledge of that so students would be doing some element of that throughout the um throughout the week and so we would continue with working with their classroom teacher whether that be an individual student is experiencing disruption or a classroom the same way thank you dr newman so for transportation times on buses will be minimized with new routes created buses will be cleaned twice a day once after our morning runs and once again at the end of the day base coverings will be provided to students who do not have them as they um as they arrive and and get on the bus in the morning or after school question about bus is will we it's been said that if if we can have the windows open will we have the windows open to help there be more airflow in the bus or or not i believe that we would we would have one or two windows open so there would be airflow okay thank you and of course we would take temperature into into i mean we're going to be careful that we don't um heat the students up you know in a manner so we'll we'll we'll do the best we can when it comes to that but yes that's the original okay thought is to have a window open okay thank you um as you know there have been cleaning protocols and materials that have we've changed some of our practices and we've added additional ones the we've standardized our practices acro throughout the district there are high use areas that are cleaned more frequently for example as we mentioned before bathrooms auditoriums multi-purposes the high-touch areas that we've purchased pro texas cordless electrostatic handheld and also backpack straight sprayers that are purchased for schools and for bus fleets um every school will have one depending on the size um they may have more than one and then also that sanitizing liquid that is used in those machines will also is already available and will be there at our warehouse as is needed the hand sanitizers will be mounted and available throughout our buildings in classroom surface cleaning materials will be available throughout the day we have approved a deployment of additional five-member custodial work team so as they're needed whether that be due to absences or an outbreak or a situation where they might need some heavy cleaning they are ready and able to work in that way there will be enhanced training for all our custodians and our non-custodial staff on the use of the disinfectant application um the the use of laundered and sanitized color-coded microfiber cloths for specific surface areas so that we're avoiding some of that cross-contamination do you have any questions about any of that or what i haven't mentioned maybe related to this so the disinfectant wipes would be available to teachers in the classroom we would be providing those there will be one of them whether it be a disinfectant wipe or whether it be the sanitizer that they're able to spray and utilize those cloths in that way to clean yes in every classroom okay thank you right so the financial and advocacy piece we've touched on that a little bit already tonight continually monitors state and federal funding as well as student reporting guidance that we receive sometimes always almost on a daily notice we will apply for and manage the cares act grant monitor warehouse supplies of our personal protective equipment and cleaning materials with that working closely to make sure that those are not only available in the warehouse but budget lines are already set up for our campuses and departments so it allows for quick acquisition for those needed supplies without any kind of delay for that facilitate that budget also again so that is quick for them but also make sure that that's readily available and it's there as they are requesting those materials it's important as i know you know to report the status of budget regularly to all of you and to the leadership team to make sure that we're making wise decisions and decisions that are fiscally responsible and then continue with that legislative advocacy for funding and accountability as well how is the legislative advocacy advocacy going to take place what are what do we have in mind there that's discussions with superintendents who actually have uh active lobbyists who are working for school districts as well as our local legislators i've been in a lot of contact with jennifer pollock i know she's probably watching us right now and uh very good with information and passing along information they they've done a really good job of keeping us in the loop and listening to our concerns okay thank you i'm going to ask mrs betts to come and explain the next slide because i think i probably could do it but certainly not give it the adequate justice that it deserves if you don't mind doing that i could try but you know that you'd still have to come up for a question or two anyway so dr santa cruz governing board members dr mccord um yes i just wanted to share that based upon the governor's first executive order which happened last week we did run a calculation based upon a presumption that we would be funded on ninety percent of the fiscal 2020 adm in addition um that was that nine zero or 98 would be funded at 98 percent 90 sorry maybe i may have um 98 of the 2020 adm actually the greater of the two but the worst case scenario would be 98 of the prior year so based upon that that would be a total loss of 664 students in addition to be extremely careful we also made the assumption that the 664 students were at our high school level which has the highest weight so in doing that calculation we determined that the maximum loss would be 1.5 million dollars note that we already assumed a 400 student loss so it's a 264 additional student loss and if i could address mr reed's question regarding guidance so we just received it i don't know maybe two hours ago there was a a school finance lawyer consortium group that came up with their interpretation of the two executive orders and simply the first the second executive order which does supersede the first one potentially expires august 17th or when we go back to in-person school so at that point it expires and therefore the first executive order then comes into play so based upon that guidance they are um their their interpretation is that the of the prior year adm would still be the enrollment stabilization still available to give us some clarity going into the fiscal 2021 school year so so assuming that the start of school does not get pushed out again and again and again past day 100 then the 98 would apply so the the presumption though is that the as part of the second executive order the governor did make a request that the department of education look at the impact of the a decrease from 180 days down to 177 down to 170.

Pascal has been pushing us to think through a plan to answer that very question you know how are we going to meet or mitigate the risk in our hallways how are we going to mitigate the risk in a hawk and you know going to the cafeteria how we gonna mitigate the risk you know when when classes release and where kids are getting off the buses and coming in the building all congregated and we're still trying to figure those things out and again and trying to see if there's any flexibility on how we into school in the fall so we're still thinking through those things and we're still reaching back out to the state to see if there's any flexibility on how we answer okay I just have one more quick question so do you think it's like it's probably gonna be like this um so we're probably gonna just like leave the classroom doors like open at all times and unlocked so we avoid like touching doorknobs and everything and for all that we wanna fresh air is good leaving windows open we don't expect a lot of movement in the hallway so I would hope things like that to work out I think what's going to happen if it when we get back we're just gonna have to try some of these things they work best for us we don't have air conditioning as you guys know in all the areas but so we have the windows open it's gonna be healthy doors dancing true so we're gonna have to play that through all of those things as I said before we're all gonna be it's gonna be very unusual very different for all of us it's gonna take some time to figure this out we'll try to do what's right and that's why we enter school today keep these things in mind we do some of this we planned that way as best we can so ensure we'll keep them open again a lot of reasons one is the ventilation okay thank you good question Kara thank you and let's hear from Scott G next so i'm also student EHS and like i mean after listening to like a lot of things we were saying like there's clearly many concerns like you know with going back to school and everything so I think distance learnings okay apart whether it's like fully distance learning or some sort of hybrid um so as far as distance learning is going like this year well I guess last year we went into the school we went into distance learning already having like relationships and stuff with our teachers there he knew how to teach us for the most part very late like things were pretty much down pat from the most part it was the end of the year um you know if we go like right into distance learning this year or we don't you know see teachers a lot like how is that gonna work is the distance learning gonna be like it was this year were they justice honest work or is it gonna be like some sort of I don't I mean I don't know if has to be zoom but like some sort of something like that like zoom meetings where it's essentially like your normal school day just at home if that makes sense right now the state is putting the platform together to to make it a better system across the state everybody shut the way you did and it has to be enhanced remotely more synchronous work where you're actually doing some things those are all improvements and mapping as best we can yeah now the assignment achieved is an interesting question depending how you start doing you know it's just like we have credit recovery it's warm there's no relation sort of the pendulum that is not what we want so we have to work that for it should be a better system in the state I was talking to us about having a different system we need to see what mute their mic while other people are talking and we'd like to hear from many next many are you there with us or your son Minnie you're on mute okay thank you sorry about that okay good afternoon so um this question is from Cyrus who is who's a broad view student next year and the question he just text me the question the question was we're trying to are you trying to limit student interaction beyond the classroom it was one of my questions also so along the lines that do you have a plan for teachers to move between classrooms rather than children so that you know to mitigate what's good the way that's been obviously k5 easier that keeps youngsters in a cohort in the school middle high school becomes challenging if students talking about before about all the way but the idea is to minimize the number of folks that come into a class that there's going to have him cut contact with each other the best we can we'd have to work that was into it you know folks on the outside field trips things that nature I'm just gonna have to curtail all yeah try to minimize the movement and those that come in contact with them with the students during the day well okay five easier said than six seven eight wasn't even harder at the high school based on the specialized content it's going to be a challenge and one other question was are they going to have the temperature checks done at this point we have to rely on the medical folks to do it guides us on that certainly anything with symptoms and that we would do but as they come through the doors and stuff got something conversation with the medical folks with their advice yeah when you have thousands and thousands and causes but everybody that couldn't send my aunt in to us but if we have suspect the reason to believe that has to happen obviously something and advise parents not dispensed to disclose their do that temperatures so we're gonna work in the Schism we're with our health the point menu which is the best way around them thank you okay thank you so I'm going to move on to Solange please Kevin thickens the things going in and out on me okay I'm doing problems again I don't know why people are in the classroom or separatist if you could hear me but we're going to try to do is yeah we're working with some specialists to go through classrooms and try to set him up the state saying as long as we're wearing masks that you know that that'll that'll help us with distancing but we'd like to give away as much distance as possible so we probably will have to move furniture out of rooms where we can to get everybody more room so that there is some space in between so that's something that's a goal shorts to work on yes we have to work on take the mask or still wear them we're not sure about the gym classes in specials we're working on that that's that's a good question don't have a good answer right now we're gonna ask education teachers the rest to help us with that and they've got all the specials with art music lessons that may have to be I'd be much different than what we used to and I understand amanda had a question and she had include it in a group chat but honestly there's so many now I couldn't follow it long can we just ask Amanda do you want to ask that question for everyone can you yeah I think so um so my question was should we like be able to go to recess because I know I go to the PMBOK and lead you to rage from behind and that's a lot of people and it's dazzling more than 50 show and we're all just finished and look what about Rita yeah Amanda that that that's a great question I'm sorry Sally still there we want folks to go outside so we're gonna figure out how to do recess in area so that it's safe but it won't be the same but we want to go outside when we can so yes we're gonna have some kind of reset it'll be a little bit different but you can Amanda you should also know there was some some points raised earlier that we actually may need to build in mask-like recess for our students and just kind of go outside and just take the mask off and just breathe and get a break and so the recess is an absolute yes but we may also have to build in some recess for you guys just to get some air go outside where everyone socially disadvantaged question I think I saw fabulous success fir that we live in the Northeast and it rains a lot in the fall and it's snow then early winter so is there a plan in place for these things to happen within the building as well environment I know spaces issue yeah yeah so I I could be honest with you I have not heard any alternative plans to for recess I'm outside of the building you know certainly there's opportunity to take advantage of bigger spaces like a cafeteria or you know depending on a school that you're in or a gym but no we have not talked through you know alternatives to outside recess today but your point is a good one we'll make sure we we think through what that looks like thank you so shuri-chan please hi I'm maybe a sophomore in DHS questions sure go ahead so my first one will be about masks I do understand that we're gonna have to wear them when we're in class and I would think that considering that the school days like Oh like more than five hours I don't know how students will be able to like have it on the whole time like it would be pretty uncomfortable so how are you going to handle that and also sharing materials in classes like gym and science we're gonna have to share materials and sit in desks probably other students have sat on so how does the Sanitation well those are some great questions and so let let me tackle try to tackle the the first part first can you tell me what you said at the beginning is like a three-part question can you tell me what you X at the beginning all day and so and so we recognize it's it's going to be a challenge for our students and for our staff and so which is which is one of the reasons why earlier on the phone call because we had a similar meeting with teachers this morning and they encouraged us to think through you know mask breaks if you will for our students and staff and finding opportunities for you guys to have built-in breaks throughout the day you know literally what you guys can go outside where it's safe everyone's socially distance and we can take off our masks and just kind of and just kind of get a break from the mask itself I think we're gonna have to be intentional about making sure these things have built in as part of our schedule because we understand it's going to be a significant adjustment you know all of us go out now and wear a mask and you know go to the supermarket or maybe even go to the mall now but it's very different to your point to have to wear one all day and so I you know our thoughts particularly coming off of our meeting this morning is that we need to think through and have someone set with intentionality make sure our kids have an opportunity to get a break from the mask so we're not exactly sure what that's gonna look like but we're gonna have to come up with a plan because it's probably unreasonable to think everyone's going to be having on for five consecutive hours so it's a great question and your other question can you repeat that again I'm sharing materials in art and science and gym and sitting on desks that probably other students have sat on because we're gonna have to switch between classes and so just so you know I have a very nervous and anxious colleague on the line she's a director of Finance and facilities and operations and everything else and and and and we have talked through a plan where so for example I'll just start with you know subjects like art but to your point it also applies to subjects like science will you guys work in groups we work in teams you share materials in CTE classes you know we share materials in there and the expectation is to look to to the to the extent possible we will have individual will need to order and make sure we have individual materials for students and so you know in our k5 classes elementary school classes where you know it's sharing of art materials sharing of you know science materials group work it's going to have to be separate in students contribute a little differently and and and so you know going up to the middle schools if we have our classes where they share materials or group work in our classrooms it's also going to have to be we're gonna have to provide students with their own materials I mean we've gone as far as to talk through you know individual packets of materials for our students so that so that we limit or reduce you know they reduce sharing of materials in class we we have not and that's a very good point you know in every case where classes are changing there might be a need you know there's a need to possibly you know wipe down the spaces and and honestly I don't know if we've thought we've taught that part through we you know certainly we had talked about internally you know at the end of the school day every classroom will be disinfected and and that's certainly something that will be able to happen but I think if in absence of being able to wipe down chairs you know in between periods we may not be able to get to every single seat but we can encourage every single students and make sure their hands are clean in between classes going in and out of classes so if we have disinfectant materials for you guys to disinfect your hands when leaving or enter in a classroom I think that will certainly help us mitigate the risk I know it's not a great a great response or great answer and that's why this form form is so important to help us think through these things by I appreciate the question thank you so much yeah welcome thank you so our next person is Michael snow hi I'm a student high school and I had a I know we touched on the subject before and I just wanted to touch back on it just get a more solid answer sure so will my ets1 right okay well will we be able to participate in extracurricular activities such as like clubs sports tutoring hours and more upcoming school year I'm asking this because especially for high school students this can be a very important part in making them well-rounded students and adding to their college application and in and if the pandemic can become a problem and making this happen we can very well meet in different locations to make it easier or even have the students disinfect just in fact disart disinfect the locations that they meet in if if the problem is that janitors don't have time to clean up those spaces after they meet yeah Michael great question great point about how important it is to be a portfolio I think and because we received some initial guidance about extracurricular activities not necessarily for clubs in in particular I think Michael as long as we can demonstrate that we can congregate safely and certainly if we can demonstrate we can congregate safely in a classroom I would like to think we can congregate safely in a club right where typically we may not have as many as many students in the club as it is outside of a classroom so my answer would be yes without without seeing that explicitly in the plan but again if we're back to school fully you know we're gonna be back to school fully if we're back to school with conditions then we'll certainly need to spell those conditions out you know beyond wearing a mask but I anticipate if we're back to school 100% capacity in the fall these actually curricular activities that you're talking about will be employed I do have one more question should I wait no please go ahead - so if we were to implement a hybrid education system I would I'd like to share my opinion on not having the school days be cut short and it's a hybrid system were to be in play set I as a student would prefer that some students would go in for a full day and other students would go in on separate days for also a full day rather than some students going in for the morning some going in for the afternoon because I could see how this can waste time with all the buses and a disinfection that are disinfecting those locations the students have been this can also make getting to extracurriculars more difficult and for the students that aren't at the school at the time and can even cut the education Shore we're having to leave from the learning and look having to leave the school to go to a different location - there can be proven as difficult yeah so so these are these are great questions and points that you're raising honestly and I'm learning something new on every town hall forum that we're in I'm learning something new every time and and and not to see I mean as a as an educator former principal's not as if I haven't experienced these things but it's it's reminding me of how important these things are Michael so I appreciate you raising these these issues we will because you know with so many things in play and worrying about and thinking through how we're going to make sure the buildings are safe we also need to make sure we have school right and that your school that your school experiences is is honored and innocent as consistent with what how we know schooling and we have to we have to make sure that happens and so you have brought up the point about hey if they're going to if there are options out there these options that I would like and these are the reasons why when there will be a need for us to push out another survey to everyone and when we do push out a survey we will likely have a survey that's going to articulate the different options that are available if because the the governor has access to one at this low low level of instances in a community to go back to school at a hundred percent however if we ever if there's ever a place where we are designated as a community at moderate instances of koba 19 in a community on then we would enter school at a reduced at a reduced um at a reduced at reduced levels and it's important for the community to have some feedback to help inform this decision and so although right now we have a thought exchange out there that is eliciting feedback on what you feel like our top priorities should be but we will explicitly have some type of survey once we know exactly what our plan is folks will know exactly what's what's available what's in front of us and then they can make some choices and one of those choices definitely needs to be if we're gonna have a reduce model what are the models and what are the options and it will make sure that that's that's in there in some way so you guys can give your feedback so Mike I appreciate you asking the questions the way you have so we'll go to Christopher Borges next [Music] yeah over 19 you're gonna have to learn more can you put your message in the chat box we're not able to totally understand you but I think your question is very concerning to everyone so please put it in the chat box okay so and again there was also a question about orientation it looks yes Eric EDX and and maybe Serena is well incoming actually I'm not sure if Eric access question but Sarina executes asked about freshman orientation okay and and you know we we have freshmen orientation in place for a reason because we recognize how important that transition is so we will we will make sure we work with the principal to figure out what the alternative is going to be you know some of the some of some of the things that I've heard so far is not necessarily dimmer you high school but I know Ace was talking about perhaps some type of virtual orientation whether you know the prince will be walking around the school on and provide an orientation for students that way if we can't get students in person for the orientation so I will make sure you know when we connect with Dan that we're helping Dan in the high school through this because we again we understand how important that transition is and not you know for our private school students coming into public school and then just for our eighth grade students moving up into the ninth grade it's it's important make sure that they feel comfortable they feel safe going into this new environment so and we have a we have students there like two students on one video maybe we can get like extra credit if we ask them see if they have any questions for us absolutely so we still we still have three people in the chat box and yeah so if we can go to Jennifer grant I was wondering also about the lockdown drills and the fire drills because I know that those are common that we have them like just to make sure everything's working and that everybody knows what to doing what's going on but with lockdown drills we all have to sit in the same area so I was wondering how that was gonna work and how it would work to get students outside for fire drills yeah Jennifer that's a great question so that that question was actually talked about with our director of security recently in and we are reaching out to the powers that be to see if those are going if those expectations are going to be relaxed at all in the fall you know so as of right now the plan would be that we would still need to administer those drills but we will be asking a question while those drills be real will the expectations be relaxed in the fall kind of given you know given the pet return from the pandemic that that is a great question that is a great question I'll move on to Lauren our cherry but I'd like mr.

Walston would you like to answer Christopher's question or give some feedback about the budget sure oh yes the budget one so Sir Christopher I'm I'm gonna i'm gonna start responding to your question but then i'm gonna ask my colleague who's the true expert here to also give some feedback so if you don't mind I'm going to read the question for the group because I'm sure there are a lot of people on this call who are wondering students and parents alike so regarding the school budget due to colvett we know we have you know decreasing budget we don't have as much money as we've hadn't you know typical years and although this might be true I know there might be a need to buy more supplies and increase sanitation and maybe even more buses so how are we going to pay for these things if indeed our budget is decreasing and we have less money where is the money coming from to pay for this stuff and Courtney I can take the easy one to just hand it off to you but maybe you should just take the easy one and I'll just get out the way on this one thank you Kevin I don't know if any of them are easy um it's really really great to see all of you and to hear your feedback and I'm so so glad that we're getting the opportunity to speak with you yes you're right Chris it is a very challenged budget that we have given that you know the city isn't collecting the revenues that it would normally have collected and that said there there are additional federal funding that's been made available to Danbury and there might be more we're worse you know scanning the environment for every single possible resource we can we can find I know we have senator Kushner here on the line so I'd encourage folks to reach out to their legislature and encourage you know challenge districts that like Danbury to be treated uniquely like they are we have an incredibly vibrant you know urban population which also means that we're pretty crowded and so our needs are great we did get funding about two million dollars from the cares Act it's the elementary and secondary school emergency relief fund to take care of some of the sanitizing things that we'll need but you know as you can as you know as a student that's in the school Chris can I ask if you're if you're here are you high school are you in the middle school ice I think you've chatted possibly because it's hard to grade level crisis oh yeah so um but you know what all the challenges that Kevin's talking about working through we've been we've been modeling out different scenarios and the cost so the resources are going to be part of the decision at the foremost is the safety of of you the students the teachers the faculty and all the administrators so within the resources we have we're going to do everything possible and so you know that means sanitizing the classrooms that means distancing you know getting decals where we need to have details to remind people where to stand you know like dr.

Walston if you could read Christopher Borges comment in the chat box and and replied attacked verbally I think that's a good question for everyone um so Lauren can we hear from you yes um I'm curious because my daughter is going to 11th grade at DHS and she has a hearing problem so she reads lips I have not gotten her an IEP so I'm a little concerned about how she's gonna function in a classroom when she can't see the teachers lips hi hi Lauren um please please please if you need help you can email me after this calls over or you can just you know just we can stay on the line we can exchange information but I think it's going to be important for your principal and teachers to be aware of this modification is going to be needed for your child because for us it could be a simple adjustment for the teacher and we could just be asking that teacher to wear a mask where they're where their face is exposed so that so that this is a non-issue for your daughter so you know it's important that you're your principal is aware so they can make sure the modification is is met and make sure your teachers are aware and with that with that slight adjustment there should be a non-issue as a district we've already talked about ordering special masks for those for those staff members and making sure they're available in fact we just had a call this morning talking about the populations that might require this whether it's reall community whether it's our special needs community or even students you know requiring a 504 and even if they're not identified if it's ports of our attention we will make the adjustment okay so should I should I try to get her an IEP for this we'd never really needed it she's a pretty decent student but I don't know if I need the writing a piece of paper and writing saying she has this problem or if we can just work without it yeah that's a great question I think it's I think it's best that you have the conversation with your principal and and you're right and then you know perhaps guidance counselor etc and they'll make the determination locally cuz not knowing your specific case in most cases you should not need an IEP for this but again I don't want to speak out of turn here you know there are cases where this can be handled with a 504 and in the 504 it's just you know making sure we're all in the same page about the support that your your daughter needs but you might not need a 504 you know it might just be an adjustment that we can make or we might need temporary 504 right because right after this you know these these rules are relaxed we won't have to worry about mask again and your daughter can continue to move on and those adjustments might not be necessary okay perfect thank you so much you're welcome you're welcome good questions so I'm going to go to hamaji tralana a sixth-grader that's a great question so you know we've been encouraged to leave doors open we've been encouraged to to leave windows open we've been encouraged to socially distance to the best extent possible and and right now that with within our means anyway that's our best way to try to help address the ventilation concerns so I hope that answers your question you're welcome thank you and mr.

Sal mentioned you know if NASA masks are mandatory having available additional masks if students aren't able to provide their own yeah it's very expensive it's going to be it's gonna be a big challenge mm-hmm thank you and that's Courtney Love worry she is our director of business and oversees our budget has done a wonderful job on our finances this year being new to the district so Thank You Courtney thank you if we got a Robbie hi Grafton this is Robbie I have two kids one is going to Westside 7th grade and one younger one is shale rock my elementary third grade so I was curious about two things one is the bus are we going to have any capacity restrictions in the bus and then the second question is are the kids going to be checked for temperature checks or health checks as a precautionary measure every day or how are we dealing with that kind of you know health checks so I will start with the bus restrictions on there they we have been guided to socially distance where to the greatest extent possible where appropriate but at the same time we've also been asked to open up schools at 100% capacity for up to 100% percent capacity and so my my short answer is no restrictions the restrictions would be students wear a mask and and that will be the key restriction when when getting on buses and in Robbie I'm not sure if he will own the call earlier but one of ours one of our students had raised a question and you know and and reminded us quite frankly that we need to learn quickly from the from our parents and our students who was going to take advantage of the school buses and who is going to select to drive in to school every day and be picked up from school every day and that will help with the district's plan except for planning the efforts to to figure out how much we can truly social distance on the buses but without that certainly information we were really not going to be able to plan for it I think and going back to Christopher's question about a no we know the budget is tight and courtly just-just-just talked about where there is additional funding coming in but that but that funding has already been spoken for in additional buses quite frankly has not been part of the budget and an additional buses and ditional runs would mean we would probably spend all of our monies down without even getting to all the other necessary things to help with schooling and so we're hoping that surveying our community will help mitigate the risk learning from our families who will be driving to school who will be taking the bus and then kind of have in kind of a you know kind of a an attendant role on a bus and hopefully we'll be able to reduce the numbers on the bus we don't necessarily want to encourage families because we don't want to be a burden on the families but if they are going to drive their kids to school and they'll remain committed to that that would help us tremendously and then your your other question about we at this time we are not we have not been given the guidance to administer or temperature checks for our students when they enter the building however there will be strong recommendations and guidance for families and staff to self-report and that something will be making available for everyone thank you Kevin I I totally understand that we are all trying to find you know solutions for these problems which we haven't come across any time in our lives I do really appreciate all that we are going I mean you guys are taking care and seeing us all but I want to just two things one is our kids like especially the elementary Skip's very too young for them to have masks were all the time you know and it comes with discipline but at the same time Lord of Moyet ring and things like that second thing is the profiling of the students you know in case I don't know how to put this but it will help if someone is sick at warm or anything like that how do we know how do we get kind of you know I don't have answers but at the same time I don't expect answers we have to look something around those scenarios right yeah I and I'm glad you asked that last question in particular because as part of our self reporting and no different from the beginning of this pandemic it will be important for us to ask families to ask students to self-report you know have you are you experiencing any of these symptoms or have you been in contact with someone who's had had Kovac 19 and and then you know having mechanisms in place for folks to self-report so that you know we can help mitigate the risk in our schools and in the important thing in and honestly we're going to need everyone's help help in cooperation on this you know whether that's you know establishing expectations of students staff and Families because we're really going to need everyone we're really going to need everyone to to all be part of the solution Robbie in cases like this in order to keep our schools in our community safe thank you thanks and appreciate all your hard work yeah Thank You Allie so we have three more people so I'm going to do Scott and then Griffin and Alberta so Scott G you would like to give your feedback yeah it kind of goes off of actually we were just talking about but it has to do with like with the attendance policy uh you know I think I saw that in the chat a little bit ago you know I'm not gonna why I kind of like the previous years it's almost like you were encouraged to come to school if you were sick just with having so few absences um plus you know also just the work that you miss in general um so you know as much as you know you can say just stay home is something is there gonna be a change with that because otherwise is you know people that are going to be very encouraged to come to school or to do something like where you're not going to miss because there's so many ramifications for doing so yes so Scott so what number one Scott you have a great voice you might have a future in radio one day and secondly I don't have a great answer for you I can I can share with you that the state guidance they did recommend strongly that we have an attendance policy in place but you and I also know in most folks on this call a high school attendance policy is is is strict it does not have much flexibility and and I think and I think what I'm hearing from you you know one the attendance policy encourages our students to be in school every day and and in some cases it encourages it be in school even when you're not feeling well and so I and and and I can't tell you how much I appreciate you raising this point because we will have to develop some type of attendance policy whether that's you know whether that's you know full-time in school or even in a hybrid model with this partial school of partial distance learning or even at a distance learning format we you know we need to come up with some type of attendance policy but if there's any combination where students might be in school by all means we want to discourage students from coming in if they're gonna compromise their own safety and the safety of others and it has to be flexibility and being mindful of their own grades because we don't want you to compromise your your own grades when you know choosing choosing a safety of others so Chris we will definitely make a note of that and make sure and make sure that's reflected in our attendance policy if that flexibility is reflected in our attendance policy something's got to that question gosh thank you thank you Anna Griffin yeah to second that the current policy allows you to miss five core classes and with the incubation period of Cova being two weeks people going on vacation and showing any symptoms that just instantly gives them a 65 so I appreciate that you don't know what it looks like right now and we may not for a while but I have a question about what if there's any current discussion about a hybrid distance learning plan is it are we thinking about staggering at all and having some people go on some days and some people go on other days yeah great Griffin that's a great question so one you should know everyone should know we're actually required to have some type of hybrid model available in propose to the state and so that requirement alone suggests that we have to be think beginning to think through this so so that's one and so but we're also and given some of the concerns and challenges that we talked about when we first got on this call where one of the students was talking about her experience walking the halls of Danbury High School and she didn't understand how she could possibly be socially distance given how crowded our hallways are and frankly our middle schools have you know our middle school students have a similar experience at their buildings because they're also overcrowded we we are will be looking to see if there are any options to going back to school 100% and and see if any in the end see if there's any flexibility and a hundred percent return to school if they're not then again we'll have to do the best we can to make sure everyone is safe but if there are then we will be exploring all of those all of those options Griffin including the ones you know some of the ones that you just mentioned okay thank you great Alberta I do hear from you okay so we were just talking about my question so I had the same question as griffons I was I'm just gonna like explain it in a different way so like are you guys considering going back to school like in a period in one day like having one wave of student coming the morning and then one wave coming in the afternoon or like are you planning on going like one wave of students in Monday and the other way from Tuesday so what is your plane oh yeah yeah so that was Alberta we just talked right yes yeah okay so Albert I'm not trying to be funny when I when I say this one we don't know and - we need your help to help inform that decision and so one of one one of our students earlier had asked a similar question and I think it's going to be important for us to think through a couple of options and I think you just mentioned a few good ones but propose a couple of different options for our community you know for you and your other students and parents that give some feedback on so that we can land on land on some options that that makes the most sense for our community and I just wanted to thank all of you teachers and supervisors and everything you're really doing a great job like trying to help us learn in our future thank you very much thank you thank you Kiera McCarthy hi so I was wondering if it was a possibility to like so maybe like it'd be a little different depending on the amount of students were out in the building but so split like the population of the school in half and have half of the students attend on Monday and Tuesday and then either have Wednesday off or have virtual school on Wednesday and like deep-clean the building and then have the second set of students in on Thursday and Friday Courtney did you just have a conversation with Kiera like so Cara we were just talking about that very plan a couple of hours ago like in between meetings so I really do think it's going to be important for us to explicitly detail provide some options for you other students you know moms dads families for us to consider because we want to make sure that we're landing on something again that makes the most sense for our community because we know we have folks to who have to go to work we also know we have you know families with with younger children they have to go to work but at the same time we also need to meet the needs of you know our older students and you know Griffin to raise the point talk about hey I'm going into my senior year and extracurricular activities and my portfolio is really important to me and you know we have to be mindful of all those things when we when we finally land on a model for Danbury and so that's why it's really going to be so important for us to you know get this feedback in this survey but that that was a great question and thank you for raising okay and also so for like when we were normally in school - oh my goodness that was like forever ago yeah um to be able to attend like your teams for any extracurricular activity you would have to be in school so say it was a day like if we had a hybrid program and if it was a day when you like had distance learning from home like if you checked in as president would you still be allowed to go to your sports if like for a lot of sports absolutely cure the challenge for us is and this may have been your next question is for our students and families that may need transportation because we don't have an answer to that right now and so if if we were in these are some of the implications of being in any kind of hybrid model if if we're gonna continue with you know full full extracurricular activities and you know hypothetically we have students you know going back to some of the models that Griffin was proposing we have students in for certain days of the week you know that may not necessarily neatly aligned with extracurricular activities and so the expectation is we would still have the extracurricular activities but the students that they're not in school that day or if they left for half a day early you know getting them back could be a challenge if we're going to provide that transportation so we it's it's probably helpful going to need from the community on this and again it's another it's another thing that we have to consider when when when landing on a hybrid model of any kind okay thank you thank you so we have two in the chat box I'm going to combine because they're very similar so the first one is if you go on vacation out of state what does quarantine look like before you go back to school and the second part of that from another person is what would happen if someone is sick at home and you don't know that you're coming down with it or that you're a super spreader how would that be dealt with in the school buildings yeah and can we take the last one first sure and I think it's going to be important for us to have some kind of self reporting protocol for our community you know I was I was on a call earlier this morning with teachers and and they had acts they said hey you know Kevin we we we need to know what the expectations are the expectations of our our family's expectations of our students and not and when I say expectations I mean what is the expectation of my wearing a mask all day what's the expectation around you know providing masks for a student and so you know no different here we need to talk about you know kind of general expectations for all of us and and I'm sorry that what was that the second first a second question so the second one was if you go on vacation out of state thank you quarantine yeah are we doing contact tracing okay and so it's it's important for us as part of that self reporting that that we bring this to to someone's attention right and that's why again that's why it's so important for us to have the protocols in place of self reporting and so it's gonna be important that you know Courtney and I you know she just went to a country that was on high alert and she's just coming back into the country and I just came off of a cruise I I need to report that to HR Courtney needs to report her trip to HR and so in our schools though it will be necessary for our families and our students to report you know perhaps to the school nurse or to their to their administrator and then we will have kind of further guidance from there and so I'm glad you guys are raising these questions because it's going to be next for us to make sure it's incorporated in the plan and frankly I don't even think there was a space in there for right now from the guidance from the state but we're gonna have to make sure we have something available and then second part and I don't I don't know maybe I had didn't have my second cup of coffee the first part of that question was I think you hit you know what if there was someone at home that had it but along with that self reporting and will we will the district be using contact tracing okay and in contact tracing is is something that district will definitely be doing there's an expectation in our we will be working with the local health department and our school nurses have all been trained on on contact tracing in fact every nurse my understanding is was contact tracing last year and in collaboration with the local health department and so moving forward in the fall the expectation is we'll be continuing with that effort all right so that brings us to the end of questions which I think have been wonderful I certainly have a few asterisks more than I had this morning from our other first earlier meetings and so I'm gonna turn it over to Kevin I don't see that dr.

Walston would you like to answer Christopher's question or give some feedback about the budget sure oh yes the budget one so Sir Christopher I'm I'm gonna i'm gonna start responding to your question but then i'm gonna ask my colleague who's the true expert here to also give some feedback so if you don't mind I'm going to read the question for the group because I'm sure there are a lot of people on this call who are wondering students and parents alike so regarding the school budget due to colvett we know we have you know decreasing budget we don't have as much money as we've hadn't you know typical years and although this might be true I know there might be a need to buy more supplies and increase sanitation and maybe even more buses so how are we going to pay for these things if indeed our budget is decreasing and we have less money where is the money coming from to pay for this stuff and Courtney I can take the easy one to just hand it off to you but maybe you should just take the easy one and I'll just get out the way on this one thank you Kevin I don't know if any of them are easy um it's really really great to see all of you and to hear your feedback and I'm so so glad that we're getting the opportunity to speak with you yes you're right Chris it is a very challenged budget that we have given that you know the city isn't collecting the revenues that it would normally have collected and that said there there are additional federal funding that's been made available to Danbury and there might be more we're worse you know scanning the environment for every single possible resource we can we can find I know we have senator Kushner here on the line so I'd encourage folks to reach out to their legislature and encourage you know challenge districts that like Danbury to be treated uniquely like they are we have an incredibly vibrant you know urban population which also means that we're pretty crowded and so our needs are great we did get funding about two million dollars from the cares Act it's the elementary and secondary school emergency relief fund to take care of some of the sanitizing things that we'll need but you know as you can as you know as a student that's in the school Chris can I ask if you're if you're here are you high school are you in the middle school ice I think you've chatted possibly because it's hard to grade level crisis oh yeah so um but you know what all the challenges that Kevin's talking about working through we've been we've been modeling out different scenarios and the cost so the resources are going to be part of the decision at the foremost is the safety of of you the students the teachers the faculty and all the administrators so within the resources we have we're going to do everything possible and so you know that means sanitizing the classrooms that means distancing you know getting decals where we need to have details to remind people where to stand you know like dr.

Sal is still on here but Courtney or Cara Kazmir oh who is our director of instruction and curriculum and Kevin any last comments and we'll close out for today sure Thank You Anne so so one I want to thank everyone for making themselves available for this town-hall meeting this afternoon we were unsure what kind of presence we would have and happy to see that we had up to 60 plus people earlier the set and earlier in this course who was it was really great to see so many faces and so so many folks involved as you know we are taking this very seriously I I hope you I hope part of you take away is the district is taking this seriously we we know that we will not have a plan and whatever plane that's presented to the public we also know everyone's not going to be happy and it's not gonna reach and meet everyone's needs however any plan that we put together the spirit of that plan will be to ensure everyone's safety in our schools in first and foremost that's going to be our students that's going to be our staff and that's going to be our greater community because we understand and recognize the implications it has on a Danbury community to help inform the plan however we need feedback from you and if there was if it was if it was if it wasn't obvious earlier it was certainly obvious in this call at least for me that we need feedback from students and families to help determine what those options are you know as mentioned earlier the district is required to have landed on a hybrid model in the event of increased cases in the city and so and then if there's any flexibility on you know original back-to-school model we're also going to need feedback from you so you will hear from us again soon by July 24th we have to have an official plan submitted to the state we're hoping to have something publicly presented a couple of days prior to that I believe the superintendent is going to be requesting that we have a board meeting and so this means in the next two two-and-a-half weeks we will have probably a couple more surveys shared with the school community to get their last minute feedback to further to further update the plan before its year you know finally with the public I'm sorry I can't thank you enough for your participation today I can't thank the students enough you know folks anytime we have these meetings but any time the students are involved we get a different level of participation in questions and answers and so I can't thank you enough and and thank you for putting this together for us this afternoon appreciate it Courtney any comments no I'm just I'm just really looking forward to a return to school and knowing what capacity that's going to be and seeing everyone again in the fall so between now and then I'm sure there'll be more opportunity for us to get feedback from you all and just know that we're working really really hard to ensure that you're all safe and I wanted to thank Kevin for his leadership and dr.

Sal mentioned you know if NASA masks are mandatory having available additional masks if students aren't able to provide their own yeah it's very expensive it's going to be it's gonna be a big challenge mm-hmm thank you and that's Courtney Love worry she is our director of business and oversees our budget has done a wonderful job on our finances this year being new to the district so Thank You Courtney thank you if we got a Robbie hi Grafton this is Robbie I have two kids one is going to Westside 7th grade and one younger one is shale rock my elementary third grade so I was curious about two things one is the bus are we going to have any capacity restrictions in the bus and then the second question is are the kids going to be checked for temperature checks or health checks as a precautionary measure every day or how are we dealing with that kind of you know health checks so I will start with the bus restrictions on there they we have been guided to socially distance where to the greatest extent possible where appropriate but at the same time we've also been asked to open up schools at 100% capacity for up to 100% percent capacity and so my my short answer is no restrictions the restrictions would be students wear a mask and and that will be the key restriction when when getting on buses and in Robbie I'm not sure if he will own the call earlier but one of ours one of our students had raised a question and you know and and reminded us quite frankly that we need to learn quickly from the from our parents and our students who was going to take advantage of the school buses and who is going to select to drive in to school every day and be picked up from school every day and that will help with the district's plan except for planning the efforts to to figure out how much we can truly social distance on the buses but without that certainly information we were really not going to be able to plan for it I think and going back to Christopher's question about a no we know the budget is tight and courtly just-just-just talked about where there is additional funding coming in but that but that funding has already been spoken for in additional buses quite frankly has not been part of the budget and an additional buses and ditional runs would mean we would probably spend all of our monies down without even getting to all the other necessary things to help with schooling and so we're hoping that surveying our community will help mitigate the risk learning from our families who will be driving to school who will be taking the bus and then kind of have in kind of a you know kind of a an attendant role on a bus and hopefully we'll be able to reduce the numbers on the bus we don't necessarily want to encourage families because we don't want to be a burden on the families but if they are going to drive their kids to school and they'll remain committed to that that would help us tremendously and then your your other question about we at this time we are not we have not been given the guidance to administer or temperature checks for our students when they enter the building however there will be strong recommendations and guidance for families and staff to self-report and that something will be making available for everyone thank you Kevin I I totally understand that we are all trying to find you know solutions for these problems which we haven't come across any time in our lives I do really appreciate all that we are going I mean you guys are taking care and seeing us all but I want to just two things one is our kids like especially the elementary Skip's very too young for them to have masks were all the time you know and it comes with discipline but at the same time Lord of Moyet ring and things like that second thing is the profiling of the students you know in case I don't know how to put this but it will help if someone is sick at warm or anything like that how do we know how do we get kind of you know I don't have answers but at the same time I don't expect answers we have to look something around those scenarios right yeah I and I'm glad you asked that last question in particular because as part of our self reporting and no different from the beginning of this pandemic it will be important for us to ask families to ask students to self-report you know have you are you experiencing any of these symptoms or have you been in contact with someone who's had had Kovac 19 and and then you know having mechanisms in place for folks to self-report so that you know we can help mitigate the risk in our schools and in the important thing in and honestly we're going to need everyone's help help in cooperation on this you know whether that's you know establishing expectations of students staff and Families because we're really going to need everyone we're really going to need everyone to to all be part of the solution Robbie in cases like this in order to keep our schools in our community safe thank you thanks and appreciate all your hard work yeah Thank You Allie so we have three more people so I'm going to do Scott and then Griffin and Alberta so Scott G you would like to give your feedback yeah it kind of goes off of actually we were just talking about but it has to do with like with the attendance policy uh you know I think I saw that in the chat a little bit ago you know I'm not gonna why I kind of like the previous years it's almost like you were encouraged to come to school if you were sick just with having so few absences um plus you know also just the work that you miss in general um so you know as much as you know you can say just stay home is something is there gonna be a change with that because otherwise is you know people that are going to be very encouraged to come to school or to do something like where you're not going to miss because there's so many ramifications for doing so yes so Scott so what number one Scott you have a great voice you might have a future in radio one day and secondly I don't have a great answer for you I can I can share with you that the state guidance they did recommend strongly that we have an attendance policy in place but you and I also know in most folks on this call a high school attendance policy is is is strict it does not have much flexibility and and I think and I think what I'm hearing from you you know one the attendance policy encourages our students to be in school every day and and in some cases it encourages it be in school even when you're not feeling well and so I and and and I can't tell you how much I appreciate you raising this point because we will have to develop some type of attendance policy whether that's you know whether that's you know full-time in school or even in a hybrid model with this partial school of partial distance learning or even at a distance learning format we you know we need to come up with some type of attendance policy but if there's any combination where students might be in school by all means we want to discourage students from coming in if they're gonna compromise their own safety and the safety of others and it has to be flexibility and being mindful of their own grades because we don't want you to compromise your your own grades when you know choosing choosing a safety of others so Chris we will definitely make a note of that and make sure and make sure that's reflected in our attendance policy if that flexibility is reflected in our attendance policy something's got to that question gosh thank you thank you Anna Griffin yeah to second that the current policy allows you to miss five core classes and with the incubation period of Cova being two weeks people going on vacation and showing any symptoms that just instantly gives them a 65 so I appreciate that you don't know what it looks like right now and we may not for a while but I have a question about what if there's any current discussion about a hybrid distance learning plan is it are we thinking about staggering at all and having some people go on some days and some people go on other days yeah great Griffin that's a great question so one you should know everyone should know we're actually required to have some type of hybrid model available in propose to the state and so that requirement alone suggests that we have to be think beginning to think through this so so that's one and so but we're also and given some of the concerns and challenges that we talked about when we first got on this call where one of the students was talking about her experience walking the halls of Danbury High School and she didn't understand how she could possibly be socially distance given how crowded our hallways are and frankly our middle schools have you know our middle school students have a similar experience at their buildings because they're also overcrowded we we are will be looking to see if there are any options to going back to school 100% and and see if any in the end see if there's any flexibility and a hundred percent return to school if they're not then again we'll have to do the best we can to make sure everyone is safe but if there are then we will be exploring all of those all of those options Griffin including the ones you know some of the ones that you just mentioned okay thank you great Alberta I do hear from you okay so we were just talking about my question so I had the same question as griffons I was I'm just gonna like explain it in a different way so like are you guys considering going back to school like in a period in one day like having one wave of student coming the morning and then one wave coming in the afternoon or like are you planning on going like one wave of students in Monday and the other way from Tuesday so what is your plane oh yeah yeah so that was Alberta we just talked right yes yeah okay so Albert I'm not trying to be funny when I when I say this one we don't know and - we need your help to help inform that decision and so one of one one of our students earlier had asked a similar question and I think it's going to be important for us to think through a couple of options and I think you just mentioned a few good ones but propose a couple of different options for our community you know for you and your other students and parents that give some feedback on so that we can land on land on some options that that makes the most sense for our community and I just wanted to thank all of you teachers and supervisors and everything you're really doing a great job like trying to help us learn in our future thank you very much thank you thank you Kiera McCarthy hi so I was wondering if it was a possibility to like so maybe like it'd be a little different depending on the amount of students were out in the building but so split like the population of the school in half and have half of the students attend on Monday and Tuesday and then either have Wednesday off or have virtual school on Wednesday and like deep-clean the building and then have the second set of students in on Thursday and Friday Courtney did you just have a conversation with Kiera like so Cara we were just talking about that very plan a couple of hours ago like in between meetings so I really do think it's going to be important for us to explicitly detail provide some options for you other students you know moms dads families for us to consider because we want to make sure that we're landing on something again that makes the most sense for our community because we know we have folks to who have to go to work we also know we have you know families with with younger children they have to go to work but at the same time we also need to meet the needs of you know our older students and you know Griffin to raise the point talk about hey I'm going into my senior year and extracurricular activities and my portfolio is really important to me and you know we have to be mindful of all those things when we when we finally land on a model for Danbury and so that's why it's really going to be so important for us to you know get this feedback in this survey but that that was a great question and thank you for raising okay and also so for like when we were normally in school - oh my goodness that was like forever ago yeah um to be able to attend like your teams for any extracurricular activity you would have to be in school so say it was a day like if we had a hybrid program and if it was a day when you like had distance learning from home like if you checked in as president would you still be allowed to go to your sports if like for a lot of sports absolutely cure the challenge for us is and this may have been your next question is for our students and families that may need transportation because we don't have an answer to that right now and so if if we were in these are some of the implications of being in any kind of hybrid model if if we're gonna continue with you know full full extracurricular activities and you know hypothetically we have students you know going back to some of the models that Griffin was proposing we have students in for certain days of the week you know that may not necessarily neatly aligned with extracurricular activities and so the expectation is we would still have the extracurricular activities but the students that they're not in school that day or if they left for half a day early you know getting them back could be a challenge if we're going to provide that transportation so we it's it's probably helpful going to need from the community on this and again it's another it's another thing that we have to consider when when when landing on a hybrid model of any kind okay thank you thank you so we have two in the chat box I'm going to combine because they're very similar so the first one is if you go on vacation out of state what does quarantine look like before you go back to school and the second part of that from another person is what would happen if someone is sick at home and you don't know that you're coming down with it or that you're a super spreader how would that be dealt with in the school buildings yeah and can we take the last one first sure and I think it's going to be important for us to have some kind of self reporting protocol for our community you know I was I was on a call earlier this morning with teachers and and they had acts they said hey you know Kevin we we we need to know what the expectations are the expectations of our our family's expectations of our students and not and when I say expectations I mean what is the expectation of my wearing a mask all day what's the expectation around you know providing masks for a student and so you know no different here we need to talk about you know kind of general expectations for all of us and and I'm sorry that what was that the second first a second question so the second one was if you go on vacation out of state thank you quarantine yeah are we doing contact tracing okay and so it's it's important for us as part of that self reporting that that we bring this to to someone's attention right and that's why again that's why it's so important for us to have the protocols in place of self reporting and so it's gonna be important that you know Courtney and I you know she just went to a country that was on high alert and she's just coming back into the country and I just came off of a cruise I I need to report that to HR Courtney needs to report her trip to HR and so in our schools though it will be necessary for our families and our students to report you know perhaps to the school nurse or to their to their administrator and then we will have kind of further guidance from there and so I'm glad you guys are raising these questions because it's going to be next for us to make sure it's incorporated in the plan and frankly I don't even think there was a space in there for right now from the guidance from the state but we're gonna have to make sure we have something available and then second part and I don't I don't know maybe I had didn't have my second cup of coffee the first part of that question was I think you hit you know what if there was someone at home that had it but along with that self reporting and will we will the district be using contact tracing okay and in contact tracing is is something that district will definitely be doing there's an expectation in our we will be working with the local health department and our school nurses have all been trained on on contact tracing in fact every nurse my understanding is was contact tracing last year and in collaboration with the local health department and so moving forward in the fall the expectation is we'll be continuing with that effort all right so that brings us to the end of questions which I think have been wonderful I certainly have a few asterisks more than I had this morning from our other first earlier meetings and so I'm gonna turn it over to Kevin I don't see that dr.

Salim everyone on the call today for taking the time to be here with us so thank you very much I hope you have a really wonderful summer from now until when we talk again yeah and and I just want to say thank you to Julie for joining us Amy Rachel Gladys Kate I believe also so Kathy's name in here I know you guys have been in and out of meetings all day with us maybe we can't thank you enough for your support in this effort thank you for your leadership and everyone that's helping make this happen so thank you and thank you all have a good rest of the afternoon but bye you