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all right good evening i'm going to call this meeting to order dr thomason roll call president keller please let the record show that all five board members are present tonight thank you very much we are going to have a moment of silence followed by the pledge i move that we approve the agenda second any questions or concerns all those in favor aye aye aye motion carries five zero uh superintendents report dr thomason president kayla are members of the board we do have some exciting things coming up in two weeks we have our last board meeting before the first quarter is over and then we go into fall break starting on september 28th going through october 9th so we'll have a two-week break for for the entire district and then on october 21st we'll have the next board meeting and the only board meeting for the month of october thank you very much fall we felt a little fall last night i do believe it was such a delight i thought okay arizona i'll love you again all right board comments mrs wilson i just wanted to thank all of our staff especially here at district but then even lower our admin our teachers our staff everybody who made tuesday possible it was a big heavy lift and even our online teachers they did a great job i've heard very big praises i also was driving near cooley today and saw a gilbert police officer pull over there's a lot of construction up there on wrecker and he pulled over and was able to cross kids at that little cross there and i just want to thank gilbert pd and probably maricopa county sheriffs because i'm sure they're out in high force and helping our kids stay safe on the way to and from school so just thank you to all those people thank you mrs wilson i also noticed there was a lot of people out cleaning up trees today and even community members were trying to help so um there's still quite a few down around here so yes beautiful thank you thank you mr witovic yes um i i'm just i just prepared something because i think it's important that the community that's watching knows everything that that took place for us today so i'm going to read something to you here our schools reopened yesterday our community can be proud of the higley administration teachers and staff who have dedicated countless hours to ensure our schools have met the state and county and public health dashboard guidelines for a safe and healthy environment we want our students to be excited not fearful as they begin their school year whether online or in person as our students returned to school yesterday the staffing teachers needed to be adjusted to accommodate both types of in-person and online students we have amazing teachers and staff who are doing all they can do to ensure each student will be served to do this particularly administration and staff completed countless hours they worked over the weekend they worked on labor day people you cannot understand how many hours it went in just for to say let's open school and they all wanted this to be a safe and successful opening our buildings were disinfected new higher tech air filters were installed and tested classrooms were rearranged to accommodate social distancing and additional cleaning supplies were ordered students schedules were reviewed according to their online in-person preference and were assigned to be taught by our qualified higley certified teachers no matter what their preference took place that took place on september 7th and that was huge in reference to they had to move all the students that were online or the ones off online it was an incredible task and what that took place and i just applaud them the it infrastructure was reviewed and enhanced to accommodate online learning classes additional safety procedures were determined the staff was trained and new signage was put into place these are extraordinary times the response from the higley staff and teachers have been extraordinary to meet the challenges of reopening our schools no matter how our students have selected to learn i as a current board member of the higley governing board join the community in wanting the best for all our students i would like to publicly thank every single employee for working together to ensure a safe and successful opening i'd like to further say for the people that are watching out there on television or anything like that anytime you come in contact in the near future with a higley employer be it a bus driver a school person the secretary anybody just say thank you because what they have done is an incredible task and i want this community to we need to begin to show some kindness first of all and i think this is a great start for all of us to start acknowledging all the good work that we have done together to bring our kids to school today thank you thank you mr witovich and i echo both of your sentiments and i know that several many of our teachers thanks to great leadership are doing six fifths they are um getting we are getting those ap classes for those kiddos we are getting i heard about a student that goes to drama for first hour and then goes home and goes online so we've made some accommodations and i am too so grateful that we are trying to reach every student's need to the best of our ability and it's with great staff and great leadership that that's been taking place all right we're going to move on to request to speak i have a couple thank you mrs reach stretch okay we value input from our constituents the time has been aside for anyone from the audience who wishes to address the board please remember this is not an appropriate venue to evaluate discuss or criticize district personnel policy keb provides a process for complaints about personnel speakers should be aware that false statements about individuals may result in civil liability members of the board may not discuss items that are not specifically identified on the agenda therefore pursuant to ars 38-431-01h action taken as a result of public comment will be limited to directing staff to study the matter responding to any criticism or scheduling the matter for further consideration and decision at a later date please limit your remarks to just three minutes mrs amy ludwig oh thank you i'd like to start out mr glover um thank you thank you so much for your continued support of teachers and students in this district i greatly appreciate you i'm so sad to know that you're not running for re-election okay so to the rest of the board um this is my fourth year teaching i thought that the first six weeks of this this year were hard that is nothing compared to how this week has been and it's day two um you said all of these lovely words about how much you appreciate how hard teachers are working but i don't think you you really understand fully what's going on inside classrooms right now every teacher that i know is working a minimum of 12 hours a day they're working weekends that's time sacrifice from our families time that we're not getting compensated for at this point if i incorporate those hours into my pay i'm making about 13 an hour 13 an hour um we are expected as teachers to do so much extra sanitizing to keep students and staff safe i appreciate that the pacing guide is not being adjusted at all we are still expected to teach students the same amount of content that we are in a regular year because they're getting tested on it not because that's what's best for students not because it's what's best for teachers but because they're getting tested for it so um i don't how were we supposed to do that i don't understand how we're supposed to teach the same amount of content in um a limited amount of time because transitions take much longer now because we have to clean and sanitize everything we're supposed to keep track of when a student keeps their mask on and off i am 90 students i have 30 students rotating in and out of each of my classrooms i can tell you right now there is no effective way for me to tell you who took off their mask in a class at what time it's not possible unless that's all i'm doing all day but of course that the pacing guide as i said has remained the same so i'm still expected to teach them content as well um it's it's a lot it's very difficult and um you made this decision by cherry-picking your data and you were not up front and clear about that so the metrics were not met they were met for the county and they were met for the district and you combined them which is the opposite of what what you did prior but i digress so um you made this decision by cherry-picking the data if teachers were to do that um i think we'd probably have a lot more a-plus schools throughout the state but of course we're not allowed to do that and nor would we because we like our data to be accurate because that's how we effectively teach um and you did this with one week notice one week notice for families and for teachers so that was so nice of you to do it over labor day so we could sacrifice our three-day weekend to be in the classroom preparing because guess what my classroom was not prepared because my hours and hours and hours of time were spent creating my online canvas and then we had one week and two days where we we didn't have to teach we had those two days to do everything that we needed to do wednesday we had our meeting that gave us our policies and procedures wednesday we open school tuesday it's like a 44-page playbook that's constantly being updated it doesn't even have the contents on it because it's changing so often i submitted my resignation to the district today i'm at a school that i love to be out with the team that i i is so strong with students that are amazing and parents that are so supportive and i had to quit my job today because i am unhealthy due to my stress level because of the decision that you made you could have waited you could have waited and given teachers the time that we needed given families the time that they needed we could have wrapped up first quarter and gotten everything all squared away but you didn't do that you gave us one week notice and you're sitting here saying thank you for all of our hard work but i'm um those words are lost on me i'll be honest i just wanted to stand up on behalf of all of the teachers that i know in the district because they are working just as hard as i am uh we're actually teaching online and in person so i wanted to stand here and say that the decision you made was not based on accurate data you are not clear in the way that you represented your data i hate to ask you i'm almost done and because of that i had to quit my job so because i can't get i could just get a second job i can't do that because of the amount of stress and work that i already have to do that is a direct result of the actions of the board cherry-picking data and giving teachers one week notice to do everything so i appreciate your thanks i'm i'm i'm i'm so glad in my heart that it's meaningful to you thank you thank you mrs ludwig miss ludwig sorry molina rangel hi good afternoon um that's a credible story um i certainly want to echo that sentiment for weeks i've watched patiently completely impressed with the online schooling my personal students doing fantastic hearing a bunch of families struggle so fortunate right feeling very fortunate that my teachers are prepared and my students have the support they need i understand that's not every family what i asked on the last school board meeting when i submitted is that you just please take the time to make a good decision because we cannot all go back to school as a high risk family as other high risk families we have to make decisions on what's best to keep our child safe my children are doing fantastic at home my husband and i do a lot to make sure they have everything they need we work 10-hour days we work on the weekends we work on the holidays there's no compromise if you're not a teacher as well we have to do both my concern is that they went back to school with very short notice very little information from sauceman junior high on what our options were you can get more information later but make your decision now who does that i give job offers to people and they won't accept them unless i tell them how much money i'm going to give them what's the difference i would expect the same consideration the problem is my daughter was told yesterday she has no instructor at 12 years old teach yourself that makes no sense to me so what i'm asking is i understand there needs to be time these teachers have done an incredible job so far i have no doubt that it can happen again i'm asking to please consider for the for the children that have to stay home at sosman junior high please please get them an instructor i mean my daughter wants to learn how lucky am i can you please give them some teachers can you please give them an option to learn in an equal manner as every child that gets to go back well i'm asking thank you this is mr philip rangel uh my name is phil rangel uh molina is my wife we're in the same uh situation with our daughter uh currently everything uh that she's doing online i've talked to the principal i've talked to um i've lost a message for the superintendent to give me a phone call back also um as it stands right now we have a daughter who's struggling at age 12 to deal with online learning it's she wants to learn that there are no teachers willing to help we were told that she has the ability to speak to a teacher on wednesday and all of her teachers have combined within one hour of her if she has any questions on any of her assignments whatsoever so she's supposed to go to every teacher within a one hour period she has no interaction with anybody else she deals directly with a module that she has to figure out herself colleges don't do that my son goes to centennial elementary he's got a platform and the one thing that i look at is we were there we were out there at centennial elementary with signs honking horns for red for ed because it was a cause we believed in i feel like this is the time where we need to be paid back our students should not have to suffer because you chose not to give them a proper education my daughter is in accelerated english she's in accelerated classes and as of today one of her lessons that she had to do was she had to do a point of view who is telling the story my son did that last year in third grade so my daughter is currently going to suffer when she goes back if she goes back and she's going to be behind for everything that she worked for from kindergarten through sixth grade on accelerated she's in she's in the honor society she worked hard on an application throughout her uh this summer to make sure she got into her yearbook class that year of class was taken away from her because it's an elective she can't have anymore the school messed up and headered in-person learning so everything that we have regarding online we were given within a day to to process this so the school messed up our enrollment and didn't have us in anything so we were not receiving any emails so we we all go in now uh we have a zoom call tomorrow at 11 a.m with the principal but we work 10 to 12 hours a day just like the teachers do how are we supposed to take the time off from our schedule when the uh the in-person learning has a zoom call at 5 30 so it's a lot of inconvenience so me as a parent i have to teach my child because the resources aren't there for a zoom class what is the reason why we can't have a a computer in the class with just a camera on during while the teacher gives the lessons to the people in the live class no one can answer any of the questions like this her schedule is completely changing i don't want to see my daughter suffering there's nothing like seeing a a child that is sad and and frustrated and has no one to go to other than her parents because the teachers are are not there anymore i guess you can go to the teacher from you know 11 to 12 on a wednesday but she has to pick and choose which one the online is a complete mess and i'm all i'm asking for is the time to get it fixed right we've been in this pandemic since march i work for wells fargo we transitioned from home and figured out everything within two months we're a multi-billion dollar corporation we had the resources to do it but it's now six months for higley unified school district i know our tax dollars are going to this somehow we can figure it out i hate to cut you off but thank you thank you very much okay we're going to move on to six i move that we approve 6.1 to 6.8 seconds questions comments and concerns all those in favor aye aye aye motion carries five zero okay we are going on to a president taylor yes can we thank for the gifts can we do a thank you to the school for the gift oh yes you can i believe anybody remember it was coronado i think again pto i just thought it would be nice to thank them yes absolutely i did have that on my notes earlier but yes thank you to the pto of coronado they've done a lot already this year okay now we're going to our information update from educational services president kayla members of the board at this time i'd like to turn it over to mr luttenselder to give us an update on our educational services president kayla members of the board dr thomason members of cabinet uh dr foley and mrs richards can't be here tonight so you're stuck with me so um we've got quite a few different topics for discussion uh that we're going to go through today next slide please so if you'll take a look we're going to have an update from jillian fulton our district nurse we'll talk about elementary specials tonight we'll talk about the secondary online options different things that we've done to help fill you in i have a short athletics update and then we have a food services update as well so those are just some of the tasks and i would like to thank you for recognizing the hard work that many many of our people have done behind the scenes and forward-facing it was as we know the split was a very big task and um there are a few people that i'd like to thank before i forget we have a team in research and assessment who did all the back and work and when you talk about people who came in over the weekend they started saturday morning on making this split happen for us and so i'd like to thank dr susan borzitch brian campbell lori collins julie shipman billie jean welsine and julie cutler that group came in really worked behind the scenes then to allow the schools to start making some of those decisions and making those changes it was a very very huge lift and so i'd like to thank them president kayla and members of the board dr thomason members of cabinet my name is jillian fulton and the district nurse i have a little health update tonight the first slide here just to recap what we've already gone over and what's already in our guidelines the exclusion guidelines the maricopa department of public health require that anyone who exhibit a covit 19 symptom or symptoms must be excluded from school may return when the following criteria is met those have not changed as the 24 hours fever-free without reduced fever-reducing medication improvement of symptoms for at least 24 hours and 10 days have passed they can have a negative lab test which is optional not required in place of 10 days so those are things that we've already had in place this right here the maricopa department of public health services additional component that we have added is the exclusion of students who have an absence related to covet 19 symptoms what that means is if the student is called in absent for any symptom of clovid 19 we are monitoring that it's going to our health office and they are following up with that they'll be screened by the school site health aide that screening includes any active cova 19 symptoms and we do take into consideration the pre-existing conditions from there we have them on our watch list and we're watching them to make sure that they're feeling better if things are escalating if they're being tested if they're not if a student has active cova 19 symptoms that are not related to a pre-existing condition we're following those same exclusion guidelines to be able to bring them back to school and these are the exclusion guidelines and the highlighted sentence at the top is what i added this includes students who are reported absent due to any one of the above symptoms and this was given to me by the health department and i find it very easy to follow and it's just nice little picture so i added that in here tonight you can see screen for cova 19 and you can go through all of those no flags they can come to school exposure close contact no symptoms cannot go to school home for 14 days all the way through there and you can see on the right where this new component was added at least one symptom cannot go to school um 10 days since first symptoms no fever for at least 24 hours so same guidelines underneath that mrs fulton can i ask a question on that um when we talk about pre-existing conditions it's arizona it's allergy season it's it's always allergy season i don't know that arizona has an off-allergy season for something congestion runny nose is very common with allergies do they need to have some type of medical record saying that they suffer from allergies um you know not not everyone goes to the doctor for allergies that it's something that over-the-counter allergy medicine takes care of because that's what it is so can can you help on that a little bit yes um president killer board member reese i can give you a good example too but to answer the first part of your question yes so if sorry i can't see if they have um pre-existing conditions those are documented in our health system in synergy and so sorry i'm thinking of a couple different things to say but parents when they're updating all their contact information there's also medical information and they can update at that time and they can put in something like a pre-existing condition a diagnosis that being said i have had examples where there wasn't something listed of a pre-existing condition however we pulled the data that we do have how many times that student had been in the health office for the same situation in the past year in the past two years and we collected that and looked at that and talked to the parents so this wasn't a absolutely you're going home sorry you have a runny nose we look at absolutely everything i will say if they don't have any documentation and i don't have a history of it they need to go home for those 10 days so okay so if they didn't put seasonal allergies in synergy will you accept a medical diagnosis of seasonal allergies i mean and i get it because unfortunately every symptom of kovid is the symptom of everything else too and just because you have symptoms of something does not mean it's covenant and i i get that and i um i understand frustrations um but i i know more so right now that it's the congestion and the runny nose it's the allergy piece um if they never marked seasonal allergies on their form i mean i would hate for students have to miss 10 days of school when they do have seasonal allergies and a parent's never thought of marking that because if they think of allergies they think of a food allergy or a medication allergy president keller and board members the parents that i have talked to i remind them to go in and update that information unfortunately if there is nothing documented and we don't have a history of those symptoms being consistent they will go home for the 10 days however they do have an option to go get tested with a negative test and i have been giving out resources just today of a testing site that is testing all ages and i'm getting results back in 18 to 24 hours so they do have a choice to to be able to do that and help come back and they can go to the doctor after that and have things documented and bring that to me but it is not a free one time okay you wouldn't got a note and you get to come back we're not allowed to accept those notes per the health department so if we can start documenting that and we have that history of course we take that into consideration thank you for our online elementary specials update i will do my best mrs richards for you it has been a great start for our elementary students but when we look at online basically one of the challenges that was had to be addressed is how a special is going to be happened so i have a statement that i'd like to read or some notes from mrs richards our elementary online students have will have access to art music media and pe while they're learning online special area teachers from all of our elementary campuses are contributing to this very important initiative ms stephanie watovic our online specials teacher on assignment is coordinating the collection and uploading of these lessons weekly into canvas as you can see that's a picture of what the canvas page would look like when the students log in grades will not be taken as these are enrichment opportunities and really when we when we talk about our moving forward together this is an example of how we have an example a good blending and teamwork opportunities from teachers all over the district that are coming together found a need moved forward there's an organized way now that we're going to be able to provide specials for online learning elementary students so we would like to give a shout out again to the special teachers and to our specialist teacher on assignment who's coordinating all of this work for us additionally when we took a look at our online elementary students how are we going to be able to fit in the band and orchestra opportunities and so with those discussions of those teachers we really need to thank mr alexander rivera and mr david jakes because what they're doing is providing an enrichment course almost like an after school enrichment opportunity that parents can volunteer and opt in for their students regardless of what school in the district they go to and so they meet on wednesdays at 3 30 well given because we need that music instruction to continue and we don't want people who are unfortunately are having to make the choice to stay at home to miss out on that and so these two instructors stepped up and are leading this opportunity so it's a free abandoned orchestra after school course wednesdays at 3 30.

so some of the plans that we had set in place now when we're doubling the number of kids we're having to make adjustments and once again the principals are calling each other working on those things calling hr then and say i'd like to offer another course i had another teacher willing to step up and take this opportunity can we have another six fifths and how we can work on that together and so i for those of you who are listening we understand that there are some issues that are still we need to address and we are addressing and please be aware that we're doing the best that we can for our online students thank you mr lotzenheiser and i agree with you we're only day two and again we don't have a handbook we're rewriting everything as we go just watching today i mrs wilson and i i think mrs martin's too we were the asba law conference all day and um again we're all on this ship and building it at the same time and it's this is so enlightening though to all of us to seeing spanish for as an elective online i mean before we were saying we weren't going to be able to do that now we are able to do that so these are amazing things happening and i again i i know thank you seems so cheap but truly it's from our hearts right now i mean all of us president kaler so i'm just going to reiterate a lot of the stuff that was just said because i i think it's so important you know i think i thank you for clearing up some of the misconceptions that people had about what what is offered and what is not offered um and uh a grand thank you to the teachers who voluntarily said i'm gonna do this extra work now we've figured out how to we're not asking to work for free so in earlier in the consent agenda we approved some stipends for that extra work and and uh i know it's probably uh you know a money a money loss but it's the right thing to do and i want to thank ms richards and and mr bottenheiser for all the hard work in doing that and you know one of my responsibilities our responsibilities is budget so i am willing i know you said that it seems like you may have it covered but whatever i'm supportive of any adjustments we have to make in order to compensate our teachers so that we can we can make all these offerings so um i know it hasn't been easy and i know there was a lot of misconceptions so if anyone is still at home maybe angry that something is not offered i would say urge you to just double check because like everyone said a lot of changes are being made so that we can do the best we can and you look like you have a comment dr thomason president caleb members of the board there are about 60 teachers that stepped up to teach an extra section that has 60 teachers that are going above and beyond their their call of duty to help our students and our community have the opportunities that they wouldn't otherwise be able to have within the district that's 60 teachers across the district i echo those sentiments that at this point we do have to say whatever the cost to provide the very best we possibly can for our students and again paying for our teachers i mean nobody wants to work for free today and i know that there was some you know there was a lot of people working over the weekend and i'm just i'm just so thankful thankful next time please so a really quick athletics update on september 2nd the aaa aia board followed the recommendations they called the smack the smac sports medicine advisory committee and the calendar was not changed there are ongoing discussions dealing with metrics and different things because different parts of the valley definitely have different metrics and how that's working but as of right now the sp fall sports calendar is continuing we did have uh tryouts that started in different sports that have already started football was allowed to start practicing on monday and so that's when that happened they outlined health and safety protocols i'm happy to say that our protocols we were doing already were what was they outlined and asked for our coaches to do as they were coming and so the next step in ours is the continuing to evaluate how we are going to be able to host events i'll met today with the athletic directors in gilbert and queen creek as we're going to try to be consistent with some of the different things we're doing here in the east valley in terms of how we're doing with the different teams that come onto our campus and what are those expectations and so um i will be able to provide you more specifics as we get closer within a superintendent's report about how how we're going to host events on campus and you know one of the things we continue to look at is we know that there are a lot of people who want to come to our events so how can we provide opportunities for that and for people who don't feel comfortable with that how can we live stream all of our events as well and so um that's kind of where we are with the high school athletics uh competitions will start within the next couple weeks and so we we will be getting that to you but i think there's a good consensus among what we want to do in the east valley about being consistent because let's face it we're going to go play the gilbert schools and they're going to come play us or down in queen cree you know so small within our pocket we're going to be playing each other we just got swim and dive schedules today so there's four they're going to have four contests and they basically left it up for us as a district to figure out how to do it because our public pools are they've allowed us to open and practice some of the municipalities have not and so that's creating different challenges with swimming so that's kind of a harder one so we'll have a game plan put together how we look at that thank you very much for that update any questions for mr lotzenheiser okay we're moving on to our food service update president and kayla are members of the board um very recently as of last week the usda and arizona department of education have opened up waivers to allow children ages 18 years and under to have free food service again um you remember when the coven 19 first started we gave out over half a million mills across the district and then they had stopped it uh starting uh july 1 and now they've opened it back up again which have caused a few issues with the staffing because people had jobs and then they were laid off and then when they opened it back up with just a week's notice that they were going to start again a lot of those individuals had already found jobs so we've had a lot of people step up and do extra duty in that aspect too so our cafeterias are fully running not just fully running but running harder and faster than they ever have before because there's free breakfast and free lunch for any individual in the school that is 18 years of age and under not only that they have stepped up and done a service to our community you do not have to be a higley unified school district student to take advantage of this so on tuesdays and thursdays they also have food packages that can be picked up for those individuals that may need extra support and these are littles too you don't have to be in kindergarten or preschool to take advantage of this if you have some littles at home that need food service or you just need extra support because of conditions that at your home we do have food service available to pick up on tuesdays and thursdays at higley traditional academy and all students within the district would have the opportunity to have free breakfast and free lunch while they're at school also including our online students dr thomason is it beneficial for our community members to pick up that lunch and for us on our financial goals yes president kaler members of the board mrs wilson we do make money on those food service lunches it's not a great deal of money it's about 25 cents for breakfast and about 45 cents for lunch but the district does benefit from from being able to provide those lunch services to our community and our students and so that is something that is beneficial for our employees for our students and for our community so if you need that please take advantage of it thank you dr thomas and do you know like if you're in a high school setting is it any free lunch or is it a specific lunch that that goes for that free lunch uh president kayla moves to the board that is a specific usda certified lunch which includes a milk component of fruit component a vegetable component a protein component okay so it is it's not like where all the kids get go have free nachos every day at lunch no it is not an a la carte and you do have to take all components of the lunch right so don't pick it maybe you don't want your apple but maybe you can take the lunch and give the apple to your friend or take it home and feed it to your horse okay all right i just wanted to clarify that and this is through december 30th so far is that what i also read that is correct it's through it's through the end of the calendar year at this time all right very good and it's also beneficial for our title families to still continue to fill out those applications correct absolutely that is still because those will still take place after december 31st should the the waiver not continue after the the fiscal year but also to if there's somebody out there that is looking for a job or position we do have food service openings within our district so i think that's important to to let our community know too because of the way the the waivers were granted and then they were stopped immediately some people were furloughed and let go they did find other jobs and now they opened it back up full to more students than we've ever served lunchtime before we do have openings across the district thank you dr thomason for that update okay anything else so we're going to move on just go ahead doc uh mr glib oh thank you one more just one more uh i guess comment i guess and i'm kind of blending it in with uh the presentation we just had but back to some consent agenda items you know and and and one of our earlier speakers you know we we have lost teachers we have lost a lot of paraprofessionals we've lost food service we've lost other classified and it's it is a it is just a shame and there's just such a human cost to all of this that uh it really has taken its toll on everybody and i hope that at some point we can come out of this and and and somehow be okay but um it's just worth reflecting on on that a little bit you know when you get wound up about something that maybe isn't as important that there are people who are greatly affected by all the things that are going on in a variety of ways so absolutely mr glover thank you for that okay i move we're going to go on to 7.2 i move that the governing board approves the proposed updates to the calendar for the 2020-2021 school year and this goes back to adjusting the middle school and elementary teacher conferences after speaking with our administrators they did want to continue with those in the future perhaps not as soon as that they were scheduled from the september date but after fall break when the teachers have had more time to be with their current students in person second i think you need a second correct oh yes i think you need a second second questions comments mr glover thank you i just have one question and you guys may not be able to answer it at all but when i was looking at the calendar i saw there was october 28th 29th and 30th are all half day half day half day and i was just wondering if there was any thought at all given to uh and it's too late now probably i get it but um to make it a 28th like a full day i'm just i worry about some of the parents who have to find child care and everything else and i just thought maybe that was an opportunity that that could have been maybe a full day and then the other two could have been half days did you guys talk about that at all or laura am i catching you guys way off guard no i should have sent that in i know sorry president kaler board member glover we did discuss that and if you take a look i guess one of the reasons we we looked at the original calendar and it was set up that way we did have the early releases and so while that was a consideration uh we also looked and thought well maybe that has been a practice that has been used previously and how we'd look at the half days and the early releases and you know on the early release days and we even had one today you know on the second day of school because we wanted to be consistent with what our border proof calendar was and the important time that it still applies but we do understand as we're transitioning back especially the the idea of these kids being at home okay any other comments or questions on that all those in favor aye motion carries five zero okay we're going to move on to seven point three i move that the governing board approves payment of a hundred twenty seven thousand dollars two hundred and sixty two dollars and sixty cents to high tech network and security solutions llc and this is um for the renewal of our cisco phone system second questions comments concerns all those in favor aye aye aye motion carries five zero wow are we all ready to future agenda items anyone have anything dr thomason i i still would like to um [Music] and this can be like an information item but um i know we're back to in person school um a hour and the late start and having programs for our high schoolers i know once our media centers are completed i'm hoping that we can get some more activities or scheduled the we've talked about the not so much lunch and learns at 6 30 in the morning seven o'clock in the morning but just um getting back into that we need to probably figure something out for these um secondary students that are on campus for that gap time president caleb members of the board just to uh make sure we're clarified on what you're asking is that you would like information on a late stock opportunities for high school students absolutely thank you mr glover um just one more thing for dr thomason i know i did see you reach out to uh miss ludwig but will you also reach out or did you also get the contact information for the other couple i have it right here and i was going to ask too that all right yes president caleb members of the board i i normally do also reach out to individuals that speak with a high concern i knew that i was able to find their information online so um but with mrs ludwig it's not as easy because she's not in the student information system it's easier for me to just to give her the information and have her give me a call okay thank you yes very good i was going to ask that we could have um the zoo meeting at a convenient time for the rangel family so um definitely i have their information here anything else all right with that i move that we adjourn second all those in favor bye motion carries 5-0 have a good evening you

a good idea a bad idea is up to you all right we are live right now so um welcome welcome to this session we're start sorry we're a little bit late getting going but we appreciate you being here and i'm superintendent mike morris and i'm really pleased that jastree and molly who are two of our distance learning coaches are with us today to work with caregivers and families about google classroom they're going to present a few slides but the intent is to be interactive so if people have questions as we're going we may wait till the end to be able to answer them but really we know that this distance learning you know is a challenge for caregivers and we want to do a really good job making sure that all families have the tools they need to be able to support their children in school so with that i'll turn it over to jay shree and molly and welcome thank you mike my name is jay shri and i am the tech teacher at belham elementary and i'm also one of the district's elementary distance learning support specialists for this year and i will now give over to molly thank you um i'm molly and i'm also a distance learning support specialist and i also teach special education at crocker farm i should mention i'm sorry to jump in before we do the slides uh if there are comments along the way or later the way this program works as you're following on youtube is in the lower right hand corner there should be a box that you could type in a question or comment i also want to note in the chat already if you're looking to hear this in spanish there's a google meet that's been set up telephone or link where translation's happening we're going to do our best you might hear us speaking a little bit slower than what you might normally come to expect and that's really because we have live translation that's happening simultaneously and with that i'll turn it back to jay shree and molly thank you um and so we're going to if we could present our slideshow this is also on our website um so don't worry if you don't get everything right now um because you will have access to it later so um this is training is just for google classroom so google classroom will be used for grades 3 through 12.

okay i pledge allegiance to the flag of the united states of america and to the republic always bro [Music] of course uh joseph britton jose he will be late okay rachel chaleski yeah kate canetta here gladys cooper yeah lauren daley joe da silva president katherine hodgston here rich jannelli kathy molinero here al russo here amy spelina here and present one coming okay thank you all uh dr sam do we have any recognition tonight um welcome everybody i'm recognizing everyone for being present okay [Music] okay uh kate will you do the public participation information please of course uh due to the unique nature of the covid19 crisis and the limitations of technology members of the public who are danbury residents are invited to send brief comments and questions via email in advance to dps underscore public comment underscore boe at danbury.k12.ct.us thank you um sandy do you want to do the uh two comments that you have sure first one is from demesha moore i have a few concerns regarding the school system and mr hannah how do you intend to handle the threats that mr joe hannah made threats of bullying and threats made to families what is your stance on bullying during the principles breakfast mr donovan said that he was aware of the behavior of mr hannah before the newspaper article when did you all become aware of mr hannah's actions why was this information withheld from students and their families were you aware of prior misconduct at past employers of mr hannah i am looking for accountability here who is responsible for hiring mr hannah we the people deserve to hear publicly who this is and does he or she or them share the same views as mr hannah will there be training to directly address these issues why was mr hannah given the option of resigning moving forward what is the plan to prevent the hiring of such individuals why do we have racial tension that is obvious in the school system with teachers the next one is from donna bosworth i am writing to the board to ask what mitigating strategies and resultant tests have been conducted within our buildings in preparation for any potential partial or full return of our staff and students the following guidelines come from the cdc evaluate the building and its mechanical and life safety systems to determine if the building is ready for occupancy such as hazards associated with prolonged facility shutdowns such as mold growth or issues with stagnant water systems and take appropriate remedial actions ensure that ventilation system signaling facility operate properly there have been concerning reports of legioneer's disease across schools throughout the country consider taking steps to improve ventilation in the building in consultation with each with an hvac professional based on local environmental conditions and ongoing community transmission in the area increase the percentage of outdoor air potentially as high as 100 percent improve central air filtration increase increase air filtration to as high as possible without significantly diminishing design airflow the test of each system should show co2 levels below 800 ppm consider using portable high efficiency particulate air hepa fan filtry i'm sorry fan filtration systems to help enhance air cleaning especially in higher risk areas ensure exhaust fans and restroom facilities are functional and operating at full capacity when the building is occupied consider using ultraviolet germicidal radiation as a supplemental technique to inactivate potential airborne virus in the upper room air of common occupied spaces in accordance with industry guidelines most of our buildings are old and don't have this infra infrastructure set up has the cares money been allocated to remediate these issues we can't simply change filters and hope that it is enough to protect our staff and our children especially as we see the rates of cases in the young rising at an alarming rate the cdc guidelines also specifically note that plans should include all employees in plans for example management staff utility employees relief employees janitorial staff and maintenance staff i feel that this mandate has not been followed in regards to these issues or the many other encompassed in the reopening plan there has been an absence of teacher voice and our reopening plans which i hope that the board seeks to rectify as we embark on the challenges that this new school year presents and i am just hitting refresh on our emails and that is it for public participation tonight thank you so very much stan um kate will you do the consent calendar please of course i'll make a motion that the board of education approves the items on the consent calendar exhibits 20-82 through exhibit 20-90 as recommended motion made by kate could i hear a second second second about show are there any discussion on the uh consent calendar yes yes a comment um i just want to thank sandy first for the very detailed recording of the minutes and the many minutes that are in our packet this evening um i do would like i would like to point out that in the june 24th meeting minutes that it's not recognized who and how members voted um as in with the our other minutes um you know if passed unanimously it should state it was unanimous and if there was one abstention it should state who that was made by then [Music] can that be corrected for next time okay any any other question concerning the meeting uh we will have those corrections uh hopefully at our next meeting okay thank you seeing that all in favor uh could i hear i'm sorry i'm used to the old way uh joe britton is not here rachel chaleski hi kate canetta gladys cooper aye lauren daly aye joe da silva aye catherine hodgson aye rich genelli hi kathy molinaro hi al russo hi amy spolino hi that's 10 votes for us thank you all the motion so careful um do we have anyone from the uh employee's booth here no any of our students here it's cooper i'm yes yes okay how are you good evening how are you i'm very well thank you nice to see you sorry i i was a little delayed getting on um no problem no those zoom waiting rooms anyway how are you everybody i'm doing fine how are you very good very good for pumping jumping from meeting um i just wanted to take two minutes of your time to um speak about the um efforts that your teaching staff has been putting in not just the past two days of opening but the two weeks prior to that with the new learning the knowledge that we've all been working hard to acquire and implement and just to let you know um that our teachers are tasked with as you know um a ridiculous amount of workload on their shoulders right now and to please be um cognizant understanding um gentle because one of the things that is happening throughout the community as our teachers are getting the the the comments and the directives from parents when things are not going so great with technology so as things are breaking down and we're working out all the tweaks with our technology issues throughout the district and some of them are not even district issues they're they're google issues with our google classrooms um you know who gets gets all the emails and the texts and the communication are the teachers and oftentimes the teachers are getting the direct blame for those issues that are issues that are well beyond our control um especially somebody who is you know not a tech troubleshooter but someone who considers themselves very tech savvy um you know we we've i've had colleagues speak to me about parents um already on day two sending you know very angry communications to teachers so i just wanted to put it out there for you know the board record to let our community know and to let our board know that you know teachers are working an incredible amount to make sure our parents are up and connected but there are some things that are beyond our control that you know need to be addressed within uh the administrative realm and not the teacher realm and perhaps within the google realm and i just wanted to go on the record to commend the teacher effort and commend the uh the amount of collaboration that has taken place in the past few weeks just to get up and running and just to say how incredibly proud we are of our teachers and um the efforts that they put forth make sure our students are getting the best if we can so i just wanted to say kudos to them and i hope everyone has a great year thank you no thank you and thank you for your leadership and and fully support those comments that you have just brought forth to us and and we know that everyone is working hard and we know that everything is not going to fall in line just because you said today is monday or whatever today uh sometime it takes time but we thank everyone for all their efforts that they're doing to make sure that the students receive what they're looking for or need in school but thank you again aaron thanks miss cooper we're doing the uh presentation on the facilities update yes ma'am okay uh during our last special meeting we didn't get to this part and um i've asked rich chalbert and courtney to update the board of all of the happenings that have been going on this summer if um you would include conversation about um i know i know kelly is here about granville to update him as well that would be helpful so courtney take it away okay thanks dr cell um hi everybody totally good to see you all at our regular board meetings um so uh we were going to do this a few weeks ago and now we're in a little bit different of a space so i just wanted to let you know first before i go through building re-entry plans for hopefully in october if our students are back in person learning um where we are today um so right now um the buildings are open the administrative staff is in and teachers are invited in if they choose to work remotely from their classrooms the custodial staff is is in our safety advocates are there and we're running our food service distribution from all of our elementary schools right now for the remote learners that are in need of a meal we just got approval from the state to continue running a waiver for our summer seamless program which gives us a great deal of flexibility in that any kid can show up they don't even need to be a danbury student it just needs to be a meal for a child um and a family member can pick it up on their behalf so we have some flexibility so if you could let all of your um people know out in the community um that you speak with that there's a lot of flexibility around that they just have to show up and let us know how many meals they want we're doing it monday through friday 12 p.m to 2 p.m to be able to give a little bit of time for people to get into their learning for the day um and um and and so we've heard so far that that's going decently well um so we wanted to tell you what our planning process was just very broadly speaking um kevin assistant superintendent kevin walston myself um the health services coordinator kathy o'dowd and rich jalbert as well as richie torres um set up sort of building templates that included every aspect that the individual principal leadership needed to address we can't be in all 18 buildings and we know our principals are the experts in their individual buildings so we thought through every piece of guidance that we had from either the cdc or the american institute of architects um the the parent that just um called texted uh emailed in some comments quoted all of the requirements that were supposed to be falling for guidance for the buildings and i'm gonna address that as i go through that's one of the aia american institute of architects guidance that we did follow to ensure that our hvac systems were up to standard and running as well as testing the water quality in the buildings so we developed a template for all the principles to touch on each of the points so so arrival and departure egress in the hallways classroom setup cafeteria meal distribution and then every other common area we thought through every aspect of when a kid gets on the bus to come to school to when a kid a student leaves the bus or their family driving them or they're walking so from arrival to the building to going into their classroom doctor style engaged a consultant to work with us um to advise about signage and flow protocol based on the size of the hallway for example and the particular setup of the building whether we could do one way where it was practical or if we had to maintain two-way we also purchased a signage that would encourage that distancing of six feet in the single lines and set up all of that in the buildings now if someone went to look at this in mid-august i think it was like actually early august um i know the date because it was the date of the um mini you know hurricane that happened august 4th um actually on the fifth rich myself and kevin were in the buildings with flashlights because we wanted to get everything ready but if you looked on that day it wouldn't look like that we were it was ready because in order to put things together we had to pull them apart so you would have seen that all the desks were pushed out to the side of the classroom and a lot of the teacher materials were out in the hallways we were getting everything ready so that we could space out everyone in the classrooms to the maximum practical amount possible and so the the guidance was to have have the individual principals work with their custodial staff to follow certain templates depending on what the size of the classroom was and what the particular furniture in the classroom was um so in addition we addressed the egress so the movement from when students arrive and this will you know continue to be the protocol we set up these templates and then we met with the principals um individually for each school and then we did building walk-throughs so from those four staff members i talked to kathy o'dowd myself um kevin and um and rich albert and rich torres walked through each and every one of the schools to clarify any questions that they had for um you know their particular space so for example one of the guidance was use as many building entry points as possible so if you've got some you know normally kids would have arrived at one or two locations open up as many doors as you can handle so that the students could remain cohorted so for instance great plane had a way to open up great plane i'm sorry hayes town had a way to open up one of the back doors so that all of their kindergarten and first graders were coming in one way and they go directly into their classrooms and they're remaining cohorted so they're not coming in the same entrance as other students um the same thing with for just missiles we opened up as many you know points of dismissal as practical within any given um building um cafeteria so when we open as you probably know the secondary um are going to be schools are going to be grab and go for their um well grab and bring bring into the classroom for the breakfast and then grab and go for the lunch and the elementary schools are grab and go bring into the classroom for the breakfast and then um they're um going to the cafeteria in most places sometimes it's a it's a hybrid so sometimes it's some of the students are in the classroom some of the cafeteria it depends on what coverage they had and what they could handle in terms of the infrastructure of the individual building we also addressed playground and outdoor use which said that you know maintain cohorting on the playground within classrooms the identification of isolation rooms so we visited each and every isolation room to make sure that if it had it had a window if it didn't have a window we purchased um air flow that was rich on here i don't remember the name the air filter purification that has a particularly hepa filter um for each of the isolation rooms that don't have a window um and we also have swapped out doors so that there's a window in each of the doors for the isolation room so that staff can monitor the children and still be safe we visited staff lounges and offices and took out extraneous furniture so that we were encouraging um you know giving people places to be so that they could do their planning and eat their lunch but not congregating in in mass um the city ventilation so um i have an email from sean um he hanley he's been working with us he because i couldn't describe all the work that they did you know directly so i wanted to read from his words they went through and looked at all the rtu's which are the rooftop units and the air handling the units and they checked all the belts monitors controllers actuators linkage arms dampers and filter racks and they replace them with what's called the merv 8 filter or where appropriate and the airflow could handle it what's called the merv 13 filter which is just a finer finer mesh of filter and um that's only where the flow can handle that type of a filter in addition we addressed adjusted all of our building controls to allow for to flush the air like an hour earlier in the morning and then two hours after closing at night so there's more constant airflow in the building than would normally be set on our building maintenance system our building management system they also looked at all the exhaust fans and did performance maintenance on them and includes replacing belts and motors as needed um in addition we walked through with sean kevin myself rich and and used i don't know the name of the device but it's uh um it measures the carbon um the co2 within a given room and the the parent that wrote in mentioned levels below 800 and they were well below 500 in most cases and where they weren't there were adjustments made to the airflow so we were well well within the range and there are plans to revisit as staff and students return because the co2 is a little bit different when you have more people in the building but we're well below the levels that you would expect to see with people not in the building so we would expect that it would remain the same when people return which is a good sign of fresh air coming into the buildings we do have old buildings we do have upgrades that we need to do there are capital plans to address that and i can say that we're within the guidelines for what's recommended for for airflow in our buildings now um okay in addition so this is just talking about the process so dr salle engaged an architect we established all the building specific templates and we pushed those out to the building principals who then planned out every classroom every common space i mean they really thought through every single aspect of the kids being in the building and i can't say enough about the custodial staff i was so so so impressed with how the majority of the buildings were just spotless and i was so grateful to them for making the the buildings look so beautiful this summer because they spent so much time painting and cleaning and getting the the stuff ready before while we were developing that models because while we didn't know whether we were going to be falling or hybrid we couldn't tell them how many desks to put in the classroom and how to set up the egress once we had that information they just they they went with it we do still have things to pull out of the buildings we paused on that to let all the staff come in that that is coming in all the staff that wants to be in the teachers to see their classrooms and to take out the rest of those extraneous materials and then we'll go in and pull them out and put in storage whatever needs to be stored um [Music] so we conducted all the walkthroughs and we did revisits as needed where people needed additional guidance there were questions about what was purchased i just wanted to say we did purchase a lot of um district-wide equipment we did not push it out to the schools over the summer because we were concerned that it would walk um you know we didn't want to see all the ppe that we spent money on um you know just people taking it home and the sanitizer so we we've to date um earmarked and or spent about five million dollars on what i would call um pandemic preparation whether that's from academic you know pieces so online instruction and distance learning to the purchase of ppe sanitizer disinfectant you know rich rich his entire warehouse is taken up with pallets of disinfectant so when the kids come back we're really ready to and sanitize we're really ready to supply even if you know the country supplies run low i think we're pretty in pretty good shape we purchased through kathy o'dowd all age shields for every staff member that would like them and we also purchased backup ppe that the nurses are keeping in case a student comes in and doesn't have the appropriate ppe or or doesn't have any at all we also push that out to our bus company so they have a supply on hand so if the kid shows up at the bus you know we have additional ppe supplies so that the kid can ride the student can ride a bus we purchase additional high school science desks um because they were actually five foot desks and there was just no way that we could get the number of kids that we needed to students in the classroom the very old desks so we purchased those to be able to do the distancing uh paper towel dispensers replacing the um airflow the hand flow dispensers which are not recommended um and wall dispensers for hand sanitizer placed in key areas and sanitizer for every classroom that doesn't have it's like a big gallon jug every classroom that doesn't have um [Music] um every classroom that doesn't have like hand washing sync in addition we provided it in the classrooms with hand washing sinks but we're encouraging hand washing through signage and through reminders with training so we also established some policies and procedures so we limited restricted school access to only essential employees and that means that there's a table outside and if a parent comes in and you know wants to bring in a lunch for a kid that forgot to bring their lunch to school they're reminded to stay outside and some will come in to get it from them we establish new cleaning protocols for the bathrooms and we we are in the process of hiring when kids come back um additional um seasonal custodial staff for every school and we establish updated fire drills and lockdowns because there's going to be floor signage that's directional floor signage and we wanted to make sure that students and staff know that it's you know go to your nearest exit do not follow the signage on the floors so there's guidance on that and each school established a reopening and safety reopening committees and safety committees with representation from all members of the community school community so that includes paraprofessionals lunch staff custodial staff teaching staff everyone that's involved in keeping staff and students safe in the buildings um we've conducted training series um one that cathy o'dowd put together which is what school personnel need to know and it's very fact based and it's linked to all cdc documents and there's a lot of really great videos that we train staff in about hand washing mask wearing water appropriate masks six foot distancing all the things that staff needed to know to keep each other safe fire safety protocols we trained our custodian staff in appropriate cleaning and use of supplies so making sure that we're still complying [Music] with the requirements for keeping asthmatic children safe and making sure that we're not just disinfecting but we're also sanitizing and um people also were trained in their regular bloodborne pathogen um on training series so our next steps while we're getting ready for a hopefully october re-entry is to continue to review the airflow maintenance with building staff so you know continually look as people come back into the building as i said keep testing the systems and um distributing the ppe to the nursing staff so kathy has done that this week um and so they're ready to go with backup ppe for people that don't um that show up without it and um kelly has also worked with kathy to purchase special ppe equipment for all um special needs staff that work with students with special needs which includes gowns and gloves and additional face shields and protective desk fields and things like that and as you can see on this slide there's um stickers with one way directional and reminders most of the stickers are down in the schools now and are placed but some schools said can i pause on this because i really need to get up and running with this full remote model so they pause for a minute you know while school gets started and we're going to go back into the buildings next week to make sure they have the help they need to continue to finish putting down the signage and then we'll revisit the furniture and room setup depending on you know when we re-enter if the numbers have shifted a little bit um we'll have to look at the classroom setups and help to space kids out more if we can do that and make adjustments as needed um so that's that's our update on on building safety and building readiness um yeah that's pretty much it dr zell we can't hear you though you're still i think you're still on view is kelly there i'm here would you update on granville ahead guys like sure um so we're still working on um working with the builder to finish the project at granville which will house eight of our preschool classes um for this year um he is on a tight timeline to try to get it completed for um the first week of october for us um he's been working with the district with the it team regarding kind of the technology infrastructure um we're working with a police officer who's also in security to make sure that we have top notch security installed um you know visual cameras uh you know inside and outside of the building security systems and protocols in place he's also customizing some of the areas and spaces to make sure that we have sufficient um space for our related services such as our ot and pt um so they don't have to uh share joint spaces with uh the physical education teacher like they currently do um and i'm really excited i think it's gonna be a nice new facility um you know rich and his team are on kind of standby to help move in our stuff as quickly as possible um and as soon as we get the um green light from the city that we're approved to start moving in we will go ahead and do so but um there are some finalizing things that still need to occur and so i keep in regular contact with him to try to ensure we can get get in there as close to the start of october as possible thank you i don't know if you have any questions of course it'd be a good time are rich albert um is he there richard he is i'm sorry that i didn't even get to acknowledge and rich has worked incredibly hard all summer he is here rich rich anything to happen thank you uh no just to you know uh [Music] you know reinforce uh what courtney said you know we've been working very diligently school by school making sure the you know social distance stickers are on the floors we've put up approximately 200 pieces of plastic gas dividers for secretaries and safety advocates um we've done more painting than we've ever done in the past 10 years with the amount of time so if you go to schools they're looking cleaner and and nicer than they ever have been and we just keep on working towards the goal so so question i would have of vietnam richard courtney wednesdays where we've decided as many districts to use it as um making sure our staff and students are not in for um extra cleaning so you want to talk a little bit about your protocol during that day so people are aware why we're doing it sure the the the goal is uh to the only people in on wednesdays are school lunch because they're still distributing food and we're basically doing a deep cleaning every wednesday which is a thorough king of every room and disinfecting it is a two-step process you have to clean first and then disinfect so that's what we're doing on wednesdays all touch points uh bathrooms light switches doorknobs uh desktops out of the game and the board did hear a little bit about some extra um personnel coming in during the day any comments about that to help with the cleanliness sure we have uh job posting for what's called a temp custodian uh when we go to a hybrid plan we plan on bringing in an extra custodian at all the schools uh specifically to clean the bathrooms and disinfect during the day uh state guidelines recommend bathrooms that are cleaned twice a day as opposed to just at the end of the night so that's what we're going to be doing and i i can't let's go without asking kevin kevin's is the liaison with the uh with our program in terms of the um the established mitigation program and i heard a comment about no teacher input i do any comments about that kevin well i i think we mentioned this in some of our previous meetings the the the true teacher voice is going to be found in the reopening plans of all of our schools so courtney in her presentation earlier she mentioned that every school is going to have a local reopening committee and so these plans are going to come alive at our campuses throughout the district all 18 schools with the support of teacher safety advocate nurses para professional all of their voices and participation in the process and so you know i i think we had heard some of the feedback earlier in this process when we were you know first um revealing the plan um and accepted responsibility it certainly could have been greater teacher participation but we made sure as part of this implementation process where really counts in our schools is that we're asking our principals to make sure that the teachers paraprofessionals they have appropriate uh representation so we we did note this from one of our previous discussions and feel like you know it's everyone is going to have the voice that they deserve um as these plans are being played out as implemented at the schools thanks kevin i think i'd be remiss if i didn't thank the city sean and antonio for their help um you know they have over 70 buildings and they did come in and prioritize and work with us it's been difficult so it's been a good team approach a lot more work to do i think this dl time has permitted us to do some refining we're learning from some of our suburban surrounding district what's going on to help us out but um i need to thank the city for all of their assistance as well so i think unless people have questions we can move on guys i just have a quick question yes cat okay um i just was wondering if there's an update about the osborne street facility no i mean i i go well let me just uh update you in general the matrix uh things are still moving forward uh what does that mean that means that people are looking at it that are decision makers so i have not been uh told anything about other than um the state department the building group they look at they're um they're comfortable with the idea so from that standpoint i guess going on but that's all i know the osborne project um courtney do you have any update on that i'm sorry i was on you i think um as far as i know we're still on track um the funding was approved and it's for next year like one year from september um so september 2021 um that would be yeah so as far as i know if that project hasn't shifted and it's it's timeline at all the only thing we're doing kate we're trying to anticipate and look for um particularly now because we have to move a lot of desks and things out of schools we're looking for another site that may may be available um to to take care of us while this year goes through and then we figure these two years of construction so we have a place for everyone to um put supplies and and park our uh are added uh storage issues so that's what we're working on okay but that's all i know at this point dr sal if i could add um the city is in the process of uh you know finalizing i'll consider the project um i've met with three architectural firms this week to show them around osborne street uh so you know they are in the process of narrowing it down to uh selecting an architect oh okay well i don't know if the whole board heard you um because you you so you were engaged this week to meet with some architects and they went around looking at osborne so this screening for architects is what you're saying yes okay all right thanks richard i've got a question for courtney any other questions yes i do uh gladys i have a question for courtney uh and that is important at some point in the near future is there a way that you can give us a cost analysis in different categories not specific details i don't care how many faucets and stuff you you you bought but uh how much do you spend on these um pandemic situations in terms of last year how much we spent on the last year's budget and how much we spent on it in the current year's budget and can you determine from what sources of revenue that came from in other words was it all uh cares money or part of this food from our budget etc etc if you can furnish us with that when you feel you're at a completion date uh i'd appreciate it oh i'd be happy to rich yeah it's a little a little bit of a moving target in that depending on what we continue to do i can tell you right now what we've committed and encumbered based on you know our assumption that we'll be back in in mid-october or october and then if that changes we'll just give you updates but yeah we do have something that we have been tracking all the spending for last year this year against the cares act money the new coronavirus funds the additional technology um that the state gave us um directly as well as um our our you know grant carryover funds that we had this year so i'd be happy to share that yeah great well the question may be kind of difficult in these figures and i just suspect what we're talking about a material cost is there any way to estimate or evaluate what a labor cost is attributed to to do this i know the labor that you purchased for outside contractors etc is there but our own internal staff in terms of man hours used you know is that a possibility to to try to estimate something like that that's a good question you mean um man hours used in preparation and planning for exactly such as you know risk job is spending you know three months of his time basically on this and other things i could work with you on some of the concepts on that but i think it'll be an interesting exercise when we put both these numbers together a firm number for material costs and another realistic estimated cost for labor i think we'll find out that this cost is a huge huge outstanding process oh for sure yeah even just in the time commitment that cabinet and rich and principals and and teachers oh my gosh yeah yeah yeah i'd be happy to work with you on that thank you thank you very much and you guys have done an outstanding job personally i want to thank you all uh i'm going to ask glass that's okay to speak on behalf of the board because i'm sure the board feels the same as i do both the teacher janitorial staff the administrative everybody has done an incredible job uh and and uh i i do adhere to what aaron had mentioned that people have to be a little bit sympathetic to the opening of this to basically be patient so that we can debug stuff that we've never done before and thank you again for your help thank you gladys uh okay uh courtney thank you and thank rich and your entire team for doing a great job we certainly appreciate it and we know that we will continue to do uh um a job that's going to uh continue to make things uh better for our students once and our staff once they come back to school thank you again thank you gladys that means a lot to us thank you okay uh before we move on to our action item uh rachel i want you to do to make the um the motion for the the action items we need some uh we we're going to table uh the four action items until our next board meeting and uh once we make a motion to take there's no discussion so uh mr wallston would you want to come on and just briefly uh let us know why we're going to table this and just wait until next month to um accept the uh four action items yes miss cooper so we we just asked um so that the board in the community has more time to review um the the four policies we posted the cape version of the policies um but the policies that this board of proof of first reading were actually the appropriate ones the right ones however we posted the cave version and we just just want to make sure that the community has an opportunity to see the appropriate ones uh for the next meeting so we did make the adjustment uh that joe had recommended i know he's not i don't think he's on yet that joe had recommended and so we did make that update um and so that was actually noted um in the agenda um and then we'll we'll have everything ready for the community to see in time for our next board meeting uh thank you mr watson and thank rachel who's chairperson of the policy committee uh because you make the money we're gonna do all four of them at the same time okay sure i'll make a motion to table action items a through d until our next meeting [Music] by uh rachel could i hear a second yeah uh second who's i amy sorry okay the motion was uh made by rachel's second by amy all the uh kate could you do the roll call please of course uh rachel scholeski aye hi cal russo uh amy spolino i passage unanimously thank you all uh superintendent's report thanks and listen to this one this is this is going to be overwhelming but if you look at the um the agenda uh cara aptly put three put a goal out there and i just want to reinstate it for the board what was our goal for the opening was to get students connected and we'll comment about that tonight with gina build relationship and community in the classroom on social emotional is something that has been very important and uh missing link in many respects and we and uh we're acknowledging that need um the orient students to the norms expectation and tools that they will need to be successful in the digital environment no easy task the high school is still handing out uh computers we are handing out computers setting up hot spots doing a number of things so our kids are engaged and uh it's evolutionary keeps happening daily uh for us um you heard what aaron said um i thank the board for your indulgence and permitting us to have those extra days because i think they were spent well um although we would like to have had them in person but we had to make a modification and uh the work that kelly with her staff and kara and her staff and all of them it's just been incredible um to roll this out because it doesn't happen with without the teachers in the classroom each and every day and those three that goal is really relevant to us um so i will start with um kara uh i will reserve some time at the end i do want to make a comment regarding uh a situation that was mentioned at the beginning of the meeting by a parent but i would like to go through this first if we can so with um we'll start with uh with cara in terms of um unlike hartford and some of the other communities we were able to start without a uh without a hitch somewhat uh but go ahead kara so just to dr sell's point you know there's been a uh just a tremendous amount of hard work that has gone into the planning to get ready for um for the opening that was this week um so i i do want to commend all of the um teachers and administrators who put in extraordinary hours administrators for probably at least a month and a half leading up to this nights weekends vacations uh they're around the clock and um you know planning and preparing for eight days of professional development was no small feat and receiving that professional development if you were a teacher was also not easy to do so there's a lot of information to take in there was a lot of planning involved and then we're also kind of trying to make this shift with uh new learning as well as working in an environment that that we're not used to receiving professional development and so um it went relatively well again there's a lot of information in over eight days um and a lot of hard work that has gone in from all parties and it's been a true team effort on everyone's part so i just want to make sure to put that out there um so the one of the things that i think is really important for the community to understand is that um you know we're in a period of making sure that we are number one priority connecting kids and that we are um ensuring equity so there's been a a huge uh push to get kids connected to technology gina could talk a little bit about the laptop distribution but that has been an ongoing process to anyone who needs a laptop principals have been meeting uh students and families needs round-the-clock with convenient times to to do pickups robocalls multiple languages you name it to make sure that we get the access uh to students as soon as possible um we have really good connectivity rates i spoke to every school principal today um except for one um to just you know how is it going you know what do you need how is the connectivity what are the biggest issues that um that you're dealing with in terms of connectivity and and we had some definitely had some um initial google glitches there was a nationwide uh issue with google meets of course our i believe it was uh in part due to the fact that every probably 75 of the country was logging into google classroom and google needs um on the same two days so they're probably working on on their bandwidth and how to handle all of that traffic but um we definitely needed to manage to get through today as well um and it was it was intermittent it wasn't everybody and it wasn't at all times but there was definitely a few glitches there we had some typical connectivity issues in terms of um my password how do i get in how to how does this work um and people kind of maybe waiting until tuesday morning to try to read through some of the information that was shared and teachers worked through the day to connect students and at the end of the day on both days they reached out and circled back to students who maybe didn't connect in the classroom um every single principal particularly k5 and even six eight mentioned that the pleasantly surprised with you know one or two kids missing maybe three in each of the classes and that in many cases they had accounted for at least one or two of those students as either new students that were still registering or had they had contacted the phone in the office to say that they were having some issues and they were working through some of those so um there was a pretty good deal of connectivity um and that made many of us very happy and i'm sure carowinds will update you on sort of the overall percentages but um over the last couple of days it was it was pretty good um and not too far off from what we would normally maybe see during a typical year where people are still coming back from vacation or they hadn't quite checked in yet so i'm relatively pleased with the general connectivity um but number one is to make sure we're connecting with kids and then the next piece is really so now we get kids connected how are we engaging them how are we um attending to their needs how are we building community and navigating this new environment building relationships all over again um particularly being sensitive to the fact that we may have new students who have never stepped foot in our buildings just yet and are and need to um they need to orient themselves to their classmates and feel that connection with their teacher and with the students that are in that room in a digital environment which takes a little bit of extra finesse um to be able to do so um big push on the social emotional learning and building those relationships and eliciting from kids sort of how they have been where they have been and letting them know that we really miss them and that we're happy to have them back um along those lines uh while this is taking place in the classrooms we've had kindergarten orientation taking place uh this week and finishing up this week and principal after principal mentioned how fantastic that was um the having the tents outside was a huge success kids were coming in um we got a chance to meet the parents as well as a student and really do that one-on-one walk through with the technology which was so needed with the kindergarten students i wish i could have done a maybe a first and second grade orientation too but that um has ship has sailed a little bit so we're doing that orientation now uh through through the regular regular means but the kindergarten orientation has been going well um the other issue the other piece too that was a real focus is it's going to take some time for students to understand how to navigate their google classrooms um we put in some new structures and organizational pieces and teachers are walking students through just how to navigate that environment where to find links um how to you know hear where their where their weekly planner is where the course syllabus is um will be open houses that will be upcoming where teachers will walk parents through those google classrooms and how to get information and what they can expect in terms of sort of the weekly overview um so we're happy about you know that those organizational pieces but they do take time to um orient students through um they're also asked to kind of work on digital citizenship and so for those of you kind of you know what is digital citizenship it's really about understanding what a student responsibility is in a digital environment how to navigate that environment responsibly um understanding a little bit about cyber bullying appropriate behavior and how to sift through lots of information that they'll have access to and how to navigate that appropriately um and with integrity so um there's a lot of work ahead there we also have lots of programs that we've been able to resource for students you'll hear things like ixl razz kids imagine learning ingenuity there are read 180 math 180 we have all sorts of different programs at different levels for different reasons and so students need to be able to understand how those programs operate what their responsibility is for those so you will see over the next couple of days at least next five or six days or so the teachers will really spend time working on that as as classes become ready and students are connected and they're operating um as a as a whole and ready to go they'll start moving into more academic and curricular pieces but for now it is connect build those relationships and orient um to the digital environment and when those things are done well then this um the students can and teacher can move more efficiently through curriculum um and be able to concentrate on on those next pieces so um we were very pleasantly surprised today with that um the last two days with the reports um and over the some students have already received their supplies the district purchased um a fair amount of supplies for students so that everyone has access at home to be able to participate and to utilize tools that they'll need so we've sent home markers dry erasers pocket pals art paper will be going home math manipulatives and a variety of other materials composition notebooks art pens so if students haven't received those bags yet the schools will be scheduling a pickup time that works um best to do for distribution uh very soon um and trying to think if there's anything else that we had we did have a couple issues with um a little bit of bombing in google hangout so we did have a couple of students where um you know they had accessed another classrooms link so students shared their google me link out on social media and other students access that so um we we have uh you know we'll be addressing that with students but that is also part of the division did a digital citizenship which is why we um have to have good conversations with students about how they should behave in this environment so um you know these things will come up and we'll address them as they as they uh surface um i also want to address a little bit about um a couple things about special areas so there were some sticky issues k5 in special areas but it was mostly along if you can envision a virtual handoff to another teacher so instead of a teacher walking their class down to art music or pe we have sort of a virtual handoff um where students are are guided to another link and so we're working through sort of practicing that with both the students and the teacher as well as making sure those google meet links are up and running so we'll be pushing through that um and then there were some questions about um flex and asynchronous uh learning and so we did receive a couple of emails about uh wednesday high school and in some cases at the middle school and so on wednesdays wednesdays is primarily a small group instruction day basically for the district and so um our program is made up of both synchronous and asynchronous experiences as well as some defined times for small group instruction so on wednesdays particularly at the high school where flex is noted um and particularly once school gets underway more and more the academics start to flow out of the high school there'll be a lot of expectation for students to be completing asynchronous assignments on wednesday but also plenty of opportunities to access small group instruction and one-to-one support with their teachers and so we thought that that was a very important day for students to be able to do that um you know some some parents uh got an email today that they were thrilled that that was built in because they're worried about screen time and flexibility and we have some parents that are not happy about it and want it to be pure academic uh driven day so in terms of like direct and direct live instruction so um i just wanted to clarify a little bit around what flex is and how it's used typically during the regular school year and work week there's uh 40 40 minutes a day dedicated to flex that's over 200 minutes and so we have sort of tagged that up and compacted that on the wednesdays so it also provides some flexibility for students to receive the small group but then also to complete some of those asynchronous um coursework that they'll have as the year gets starts to progress i'm trying to think if there's anything else along those lines i think that is so all of this going on uh question sometimes comes around i know and me jiren here how can we support parents to support the youngsters are you on in i am could you briefly tell the board what we're doing with that good evening everyone so over the last um three or four weeks we have um at the family and community engagement center spent a fair amount of time working with parents that have come in that have questions about connectivity about how to navigate the different platforms that we're using um so my staff has been working with them as well as supporting central registration from that we have um just recently this week deployed a fair amount of staff to help out with interpreters as interpreters at the kindergarten registry or kindergarten orientations big kudos and thank you to staples who has provided us with over 500 bags of materials that we have distributed to the schools to go out to students in addition to what we already have purchased so families were able to buy either five dollar or ten dollar bags to um distribute and they're already packed up and ready to go so they're out in the schools ready to go to the families um we were able to add to cara's and her team learning manual guidebook a whole family and school partnership guide onto that so that fam so that teachers have more resources at their fingertips to be able to connect with our families out there as we know once that relationship is built then we have smoother sailing um especially in the digital environment we um are working with jen um to update the website and under family and community resources we have a new resource page there that is chock full of tutorials and multiple different languages we actually did one on zoom and google etiquette um so that parents can review that i'm thinking we might want to put up something on digital citizenship as well and then we have a child care program that begins next week at pow with at advance and that is enrolling families we are seeing a large uptick in family child care homes taking more children the office of early childhood um let the family child care providers normally they can only have school-aged children for a very small amount of the day have them now for longer periods of time so older children may be in a family child care home with their younger siblings so that's helping cohort families together a little bit more and the children are getting support while they're there lastly through our priority school grant and our 21st century learning um program we will begin tutoring next week after school with certified teachers for children that have been identified either by their teachers or by their principals as needing more help and so we'll start that um roll out after the teachers regular day around 3 30 or 4 give them a little break and then be able to work with students that still need more help so my office as small as it is um really does work hard at um getting the parent the resources that parents need um answering the phone we take over 150 phone calls a day from families um looking for everything from food to supplies heating fuel things like that so busy office and we're looking for looking forward to finding our new space temporarily while we move out for the construction at osborne street thank you gina as long as you're on could you just quickly update amber up to registration on how that's going because you remember what happened to us last year gina are you there yep i'm here yeah speak up okay can you hear me no hello no yeah that's better that's better okay um yeah i i will speak about enrollment and um and then move on to devices and technology is that okay no just stay with enrollment okay so um we're still seeing enrollment come in certainly not at the rate that we did last year and currently we have about 130 kids in the queue who are handing in their paperwork and we're verifying their information um some kindergarten um kids and um but we're definitely not seeing what we saw last year uh as far as a big surge right that's been what i've been that's what we've been uh monitoring um i know that was always on his mind so um before we get to the next phase here seeing how we're talking about parents and technology you talk about the hot spots and and how you're working with parents and then we'll go to kelly will be next to talk about setting up for her special programming go ahead go ahead gina gina okay so um so if we do have a few hot spots in the district and um and any parent who has reached out to me we have given access to the hot spot for them my big push is going to be with comcast and the internet vouchers which we were awarded through the state and um i got information yesterday that we should be receiving um some more information on when we're going to get the vouchers and how they're getting to us next week they were just the state was just finalizing their deal with comcast and they've already finalized deals with um smaller internet providers and um cox and comcast were the last two that they had to update so i anticipate once that happens uh we'll be able to hand out our vouchers um currently many principals have reached out to me um with families who have reached out to them about um a better internet um connection and um so so we're gathering all that information and as soon as we can we'll get those vouchers out anything else about technology update then you'd like to alert the board to as long as you're up um just that the device uh continues we're concentrating on kindergarten last week it was all new students and anyone who had a broken device and we will keep keep along with that and any anyone who needs help if they have a broken device and they don't know where to go can visit their school website there's a link on each school website to reach out to a technician um for help and and we monitor that on a daily basis so technology connectivity carol um maybe it's better to go to carawanza and then the kelly keller runs you want to talk about the connectivity i think a lot of administrators were pleasantly surprised at the amount of students gary you're going to have to speak up it's hard to hear you so um i think a lot of administrators were pleasantly surprised around how many students they had in attendance um when they were working um with their staff and speaking with their staff um we had an overall rate of 90.4 across the district which is a couple percentage points below um are normal for a stay attendant we are working out several procedural issues and protocols around attendance that we need to kind of sure up the state gave out some guidance at the end of last week around more specific definitions and reporting that we have to do um so i i imagine that this um this number will change as we go in and make corrections um through friday um i i believe you know we're seeing a a higher rate than expected kind of at the uh the 912 level um it was pretty close to where they were last year considering um that were remote um i think there was a three percentage point difference or four i'm sorry four percentage point difference at the elementary it's slightly dipped below what we normally see um but that's to be expected as our youngest learners are learning to navigate this new system um we'll be working with um elementary and secondary principles tomorrow to speak more closely around what the protocols are going to be around attendance and and how to identify students that are not engaged at all those students do have to now be reported to the state so we'll be closely tracking those numbers and those families and and reaching out okay uh kelly um so beginning tomorrow we will um start in the special education department in bringing students in to conduct evaluations we will be using rogers park middle school as well as sacred heart which is our um one of our current preschool location so we'll be doing preschool evaluations at sacred heart or early childhood center and we'll be doing evaluations for students in kindergarten through 12th grade at rogers park middle school we'll be using one floor of the building it'll be one staff member one student per classroom all ppe has been provided or will be provided as well as sanitizer lysol wipes spray to clean materials in between students we are scheduling students either one or two students per day to come in and work with a staff member and we have staggering start times so myself as well as a special education supervisors will be present and on-site we will be having parents drop students off at the door with a few rare exceptions for students with certain needs but parents for the most part will be leaving the students with the staff member the psychologist for example that's conducting the evaluation will walk the child down to their designated location all things will be sanitized and cleaned in between students they will work with the students we'll make sure that you know we give them appropriate breaks between evaluations snack breaks and so forth so we should we're excited to bring kids in we'll have about 15 kids at rogers park tomorrow and about seven or eight students at the preschool level so it is a small group um we'll have at least one staff member for every student that is present probably a few more with the administrative oversight um and we've worked today with christy a big thank you to her and her team for graciously letting us to work in the building as well as kathy for making sure we have all the ppe set up and courtney and her team for helping us to do the extra cleaning that's needed as a result so this will be one step in bringing some of our meteor students in to do part of their programming that's required by law um and then moving forward uh depending you know and working and partnering um with kathy and the health department as well as our medical advisors one of the questions that we are considering is um depending on the decision that gets made on october 1st particular consideration to our high needs special education students so those students that are in self-contained programs and whether or not we can bring in small cohorts of those students into school safely for the month of september um you know the health advisors did not feel that it was in children's and staff best interest to do so um but certainly um it is something that the state has asked us to give special consideration to um and so my team and i are already working on preparation um you know should that uh be a reality across the district we have about 1700 special education students um and what we would deem as the high needs as outlined by the state and their guidance um would be about 300 of those students um so a much smaller subset of our special education population but still 300 students and so is a sizable number and how to go about doing that safely and that doesn't mean all day every day but that does mean for some time with live instruction with their special education and related service providers um just for the board's knowledge um in looking at the evaluations that we're conducting starting tomorrow we did slightly alter uh the evaluation responsibilities uh typically our school psychologists don't do our academic testing it's just policy and protocol and the way we've done business in danbury um they are fully qualified to do those evaluations and so in an effort um to utilize their time and energy to get the evaluations and connections with kids through that done and keep our special education teachers who usually do the academic testing in front of kids so that they continue to receive that live virtual instruction um we've made that alteration um it will be a slight change we are getting parent consent to do that um but we did feel it was uh in the best interest of kids to have them have the time with their special ed teacher through the distance learning on virtual instruction and then designate a majority of our school psychologists time to work on the evaluations so that's enough quite a bit um kim wanna update the board with the staffing how we're putting this all together yep sure so um this year we're just rounding the bend on completing teacher hiring we still have a couple of um vacancies open that we're trying to fill now um but so far this year we've brought in 113 teachers um to give you an idea of scale last year at this time we were about 163 so we're definitely lighter but 113 certified staff members were processed by my two full-time staff team members we did all of their onboarding virtually this year which went very smoothly we figured out how to do their id cards remotely so that their id cards and laptops can be ready for distribution upon their arrival so those certified staff members have all been processed and onboarded at this point in addition to those 113 we've also brought on 30 of our regular either building subs or interventionists people that are working daily in the building with students or as substitutes those folks are now in place and they are serving primarily as substitutes on the occasions when we need them in the full distance learning model at the same time we've opened our substitute teaching pool we have about 250 substitutes currently in there we're in the process of continuing to stay in contact with them because they won't become active until such time as our students return to the hybrid model so we're trying to maintain connections with them so that we can keep them engaged in danbury so that when we're ready to call upon them they're available and that will include rolling out some training some video modules for them to watch just to keep them as i said engaged in addition to that group of people we've also onboarded 22 non-certified staff members outside of the pera and tutor ranks so this would be for example new nurses and other non-certified staff members so an additional 22 of them we have seen an uptick in resignations from our para and tudor staffing we believe that some of that may be because it they have been remote now for quite some time and some of them have found other positions in other career paths in other places so we have so far held off on backfilling those tutor spots in particular um and i'm working with kelly closely so that we'll be prepared to pivot to in-person learning in whatever form it is that we have it and we'll have the staff available to cover those needs at the time that we're ready to enroll them so right now we're on a pause for um filling those tutor vacancies of which we have quite a few as well as edge albert mentioned earlier the seasonal custodians who will move slowly through bringing those folks on board with an eye toward having them in place when students arrive in the building in addition because we are not engaged in in-person learning we are not running our elp program right now so that is our before school and after school programs those employees have been furloughed for the moment um so they have been told without a fee-for-service model in place that we can't um maintain their status as active employees for the moment we're hopeful when we flip back to the hybrid model we'll be able to staff again many of those folks are existing danbury employees so they're our teachers our paraprofessionals our other substitutes so um they're at the ready for or will be at the ready when we're ready to move back into that in person model with elp i've spent a lot of time over the last 10 days or so working very very closely with union leadership of all kinds not only with the teachers but also with the administrators but also with all of our non-certified unions um we've spent a lot of time talking with them answering questions about what it looks like to be back in the buildings and i'm happy to say that those folks are all back in on a full-time schedule with the exception of wednesdays except by invitation and so those folks have been moving through the preparation process and helping us to get ready for the moment when we all hope that we can welcome students in some fashion back in person so a lot of conversations a lot of um tweaking and a lot of really listening to the feedback from the folks on the ground about what we can do to make sure that they're comfortable and safe feeling good about being back at work in addition to that um what is new this year for us is the accommodation process as we've talked about repeatedly in the past we have quite a few staff members who are very concerned about the impact that um this their serious health conditions have on their ability to report to work in an in-person model so right now we've had a total of a hundred of our employees requesting some sort of accommodation of that 161 of them are teachers certified staff members requesting accommodation and among those the breakout is 24 at the elementary level and 37 at the secondary level in addition we've had 36 non-certified staff members similarly request accommodations the requests range from enhanced ppe or enhanced cleaning protocols to the opportunity to work fully from home without entering the building and interacting with students or colleagues um so right now um my team member jen gonzalez has been my right hand left hand and middle hand on this and we are in the process of engaging as required by law but also just by good labor relations to meet in person with every one of those hundred employees so we have started that process everyone was asked to submit medical information and as a follow-up now we're sitting with each of them on zoom calls and we're having discussions with them about what we can provide to them in terms of reasonable accommodations without an undo hardship on the district um so the non-certified folks are more or less finished and we're moving into um with the exception of tutors we're moving in now to the certified staff members um and we'll be meeting with them um daily we've been doing this for about 10 days and i would imagine probably for the next two weeks and part of the conversation is not only do they have what they need in terms of accommodations for right now in the full distance learning model where there may be teachers that are coming in certainly in the special ed context but also when we flip back to the hybrid model what can we do to for them in order to accommodate in some cases that's going to be the ability to provide a distance learning teaching opportunity and only distance learning but those will primarily be focused at the elementary level and so the other conversations are can we provide similar accommodations across all levels so as i said those hundred or so meetings are going on now in addition to that we have seen a small handful of our staff who are seeking assistance through the family's first coronavirus act which has a variety of provisions in it that include provisions not only for their own health and safety but also provisions for child care in the event that their child care situation which could include school has been closed so i'm working with those folks again under the auspices of the family's first coronavirus act and the provisions there um for leave or intermittent leave and we're proceeding through that handful although um we do anticipate that we'll see an uptick in those requests when we are ready to pro to move back to the hybrid model lastly as we round to the bend on those pieces um we are turning to reporting obligations because those continue so my team is working on making sure that we know who is where which certified and non-certified staff members are located where and we're in the process of compiling those reports that are required by the state with october 1st numbers so that starts and lastly um the negotiations continue and um thank you to the two board members who are going to participate in the nurses negotiations with us um many of you might recall that that contract actually expired on july 1st and so we are working under the old terms but have been collaborating closely with the nurse's leadership in this interim period um and so we're ready to schedule that meeting for the end of september and we'll hopefully move forward to at least get them an interim agreement so that they can have their terms and conditions set anew with this turn of the new school year so it's been very busy um great kudos to my team they are working around the clock and i think they've got everybody where they need to be at least virtually with what they need to do their jobs and i will say you know i have had the great pleasure of talking with so many staff members including teachers and non-certified staff in the last two weeks in circumstances are really really difficult these are people who have got some real real issues to deal with and they have been um kind they have been generous and they are working very very hard to do the best they can right now with our um opening this week and um i echo aaron's sentiments from earlier tonight i applaud the efforts of the teachers um some of them are working under some really difficult circumstances and um i say to all of them we will get through this and we'll get you what you need so that's the end of my report thank you kim because it was asked just you know who hires teachers just tell the board that process is because we were asked at the beginning of the meeting sure um so the way this works is when we do a posting typically many of our postings are for backfilled positions so people who have left the district and we need to replace them but some are new postings or different kinds of postings the posting goes up we check to make sure that we've budgeted the the position and the posting contains what it needs to contain and through that we consult with administrators often central office folks and building principles posting goes up and then at the building level we have a really decentralized process so building administrators are typically responsible for screening it can be volumes of applicants for an elementary position we may get 300 400 applicants who go into the pool apple track is a great function for us for sorting so we're able to kind of sort through and help our administrators to do that with what they're looking for they whittle down a list they create a short list for interviewing often the interview includes a panel of other teachers in the building or other staff members there's often a demonstrative task it might be a lesson it might be a live lesson it might be a writing sample that committee then will make a recommendation through the building principal to central office we have what we call a final hiring report once they have checked references they've checked kind of check to make sure that the people have or at least purport to have what they're looking for they send that to central office where it's again vetted by dr sao myself often other administrators in central office we take a look through and set the process of placing them into the salary scale at which time i will personally call to make the offer to employees or potential employees talk through with them any questions on certification if they need alternate certification or a durational shortage permit whatever it might be and and that's where that process ends so um in some it's a it's a very decentralized process but it has the checks and balances of coming through central office for that last kind of big picture look okay well thank you because the question was asked i thought she's so that's how we hire also um the next biggest thing that we have going has been the review of uh our mitigation work particularly with the uh with kathy o'dowd and with cara prunty and they're with us tonight and the two things i want would like to first update us on what's going on with athletics because we've been working with that diligent as we mentioned two weeks ago when we had to go to remote and also the review process for looking at data in terms of our return so um cara parente are you there i'm here and kathy so we'll start with karen then kathy you can chime in go ahead kara uh so just a quick update about athletics uh we started or we will be starting um we made the recommendation to dr cell today to be able to start modified practices friday with following the same almost the same exact protocols from july with the understanding that we will be monitoring this very closely and if anything changes then we'll have to make adjustments to that um in reviewing things for uh going forward in october we have um a time set up to meet towards the middle of the month where we're going to be kind of looking at how the numbers have been trending what's going on with the metrics um specifically you know in regards to labor day weekend uh two weeks after that and also with all of the other schools opening in the in the area in danbury so we're going to see if that has any uh implications on our metrics in danbury is there anything else that you want to add kathy um thank you cara um and again thank you for um your collaboration and all of your hard work uh karen and i continue to communicate pretty much on a daily basis sometimes more than once a day we will continue to look at the metrics and we're also collaborating in with the health department and the community health centers to offer coveted screening sites at our schools we've had a number of drive-through screening clinics um and you know that's certainly certainly helping us to get the testing numbers up and getting the data that we need so that we can make a safe evaluation kathy and cara i think as a board member i'd like him to hear this i've been talking to surrounding superintendents learning because they're opening early uh one thing i could tell you that not many folks are riding buses that was a question i think someone had asked um but um that that's that's something to observe but also we observed three districts the last two days that have entered into covert and they've had to alert their community regarding the event and what procedurally and i know it's in our our re-entry plan but uh kara or and kathy could you just briefly review for the board so they hear what it is the process that we were going through if in fact a student uh is reported to have covert so that they are aware about what will happen sure um so if if i'm notified that we have a student or a staff member that has tested positive for covid um of course dr sales notified our medical advisors and i immediately contact cara at the health department and we have to evaluate this on a case-by-case basis um depending on the situation if it involves someone a classroom that's been in a cohort we will have to determine whether we have to close one classroom two classrooms or an entire building um sometimes we may have to close for what we call uh presumptive uh for two to five days so that we can do a proper contact racing um and as i said it would be on a case-by-case basis so the closure would go how how just the board here is how long the closure the closure um well if it's once we determine the positive case and say we determine if a cohort of just one classroom uh then those students everyone would be uh sent home to quarantine for 14 days and to be covered tested i have a question i'm sure gladys there's a question um i had the mute oh yeah i just have a quick question for kathy or cara um i i'm just trying to get an idea of how we're having the course of events influence what we're doing and what's going around us today new milford schools are closed for the next two days because they had a positive covenant test newtown public schools is a positive cova test now mind-bogglingly they won't say whether it's a student or staff member and it doesn't appear that they've closed anything naugatuck high school is closed because of a positive code test with a student so obviously we did the right thing by not opening because the dominoes are falling and they've been open less than a week how are we taking what the those experiences that other districts are having and how are we going to use that to influence what we're doing and decision making going forward so we will be following on addendum 5 which was presented several weeks ago at the board meeting we have the scenarios from the state on how to respond if someone tests positive how we would respond in terms of closing we have if a student presents with symptoms uh we have criteria for how they're assessed who goes to the isolation room who gets sent home what the response is if they test negative or positive um and again it's on a case-by-case basis because it may differ for example at the secondary level um where students once we're back in the building um they're not as cohorted as in the elementary schools it's just not possible with their schedule so depending on the contact training we may have to close the entire high school versus just one or two classes i i think maybe i think i asked the question badly to where we're gonna be doing going forward analyzing and deciding which point in the next few weeks whether we're coming back in to what degree are you using so let me let me try to hand so let me try to answer that that that's not enough yeah i will tell the board right now i was uh contacted yesterday by the commissioner uh who was asked by the governor what is danbury doing uh in terms of re uh returning so the question to me was what are you doing and what we're going to do is follow the law which is to look at the data just as we did with the athletics and to make an informed decision regarding our situation winston's has been distinctly different than the surrounding towns uh i don't know much that i could take away to say what happened in newtown would necessarily impact us what i can say that will be impacted what's happening in danbury relative to our our data which would would help us to make a healthy decision that's the best way i can approach that and what i told the state is in conversation with kara and kathy um we are going to wait the uh the two weeks now we're particularly concerned regarding the uh labor day and what it may bring and at that point at that point you know me with our two medical advisors and the whole team as we did when we went down when we decided to go dl to make a decision uh cara parenti any any advice to us on that scale bring us some other perspective yeah i think that right now everything is data for us to collect so that's the advantage that we have right now is that we can watch and assess how the community spread is happening and how other schools are are handling these situations um we can see you know if their mitigation plans and their plans are working um there's a couple of things that are happening that are that we want to watch uh one is the labor day one is the other schools reopening the private schools and also um the fact that wescon is coming back so those are some some things that we want to watch very closely and monitor and that will all kind of impact how our metrics are going and then see where we are in a few weeks i don't know if that answers a joke but that's about it absolutely absolutely yeah terry had everything i was talking about and tara is very detailed you know whenever she has she has the data available so we can look at the metrics whether it's a low moderate or high risk based on the positivity yeah much as we did with the athletics which yeah just a quick um comment request for mr 20 doing what we're doing [Music] in the numbers and damn right now still support distance this morning i can't i'm gonna repeat back [Music] yes okay sure [Music] i'm not i'm not sure what you were saying um i also might not have a good connection we're not receiving the information the question clearly and and we can't you know answer it we can't hear i don't know if anyone else can clear it [Music] i think dr sal may be trying to call him okay yeah i couldn't get i couldn't get through i can't unless he wants to write in the chat yes okay mrs cooper i've got a question all right excuse me mr janela do you have a question yes yes to tim um can you mention that on the new hiring that's exactly 100 and you can't hear him either yeah he again you had mentioned this year from the new high risk was 113 and it was down from last year of about 160.

60 years difference and they will probably laugh and talk like peers that's a good thing i think the reason why having a program like the veterans heritage project is important for students of all ages is because we're able to really connect with those who have given us the opportunities that we have here living free in america our generation looks past a lot of things and we seem to kind of just shrug it over like yeah they're veterans yeah but they're they're not just veterans of people and i think that it's important that we that we remember them and our generation needs to remember them being able to really hear firsthand from our veterans just added a new level of respect for everything that they've done and for our history textbooks and learning in the classroom is the beginning not the end and something like vhp allows us to have students pursue learning and patriotism and character development outside of the classroom it if you will shows them a commitment to the community and by learning to be committed to the community they're learning how to serve others and just by association to serve themselves and that's been one of our main goals of ehp here at canyon ranch wow that was incredible and such a pleasure to have mr rosso canyon ridge students families honored guests mike fish president of the saguaro chapter of the sons of american revolution and dennis grau vfw post six nine five 10695 and both are long-standing volunteers it's a pleasure to have you all here and uh such a neat project at this point i'm gonna turn over to mr razo and students good evening honored governing board members and leaders of the dysart unified school district my name is grace forensic i'm a member of the vhp group at canyon ridge school for the third consecutive year canyon has participated in the veterans heritage project we have been sponsored on campus by mr rosso and mr and mrs galindo we are proud to have four veterans featured in the hardbound vhp publication for 2020.

thank you mr croto i appreciate the insight and the brief uh explanation of the policy i've read it over and i definitely agree that in this day and age it is um something that we knew i need to spell out and also need to just keep an eye out on the communications especially as a representative of dysart i know i've i've been suckered in a few times into some some friendly battles in some social media that uh now that that i'm on the governing board i i definitely appreciate not being a part of anymore so definitely uh it's it's it's one of those fine lines that we all tend to walk and i appreciate the time and energy that was put into this and feel like it's a great policy for us to to adopt anybody else have any comments i did have a couple of questions mr croto um before this policy came about what did we have in place before this president leonard member sawyer sink bill we do not have a policy per se of staff use of digital communications that doesn't exist in our policies right now many districts do have that we do have an electronic an eis which as you log on every time but that's more use of our electronic systems and using that appropriately as pose of code of conduct with technology so it's two different things majority of the districts i won't say all because they didn't check them all they run two parallel so they understand that if you're using our electronic resources you agree to agree and then also there's a code of conduct for technology so we don't have the code of conduct piece currently so will we be having our staff um signing something that's stating that they have read this and they will adhere to it um that is correct we we have dysart essentials so we do our essential trainings every year our sexual harassment training bloodborne pathogens all those necessary trainings that we have to do every year this will be become part of that dysart essentials training we will make up a module once the governing board approves it that way they understand what's the expectations of the code of conduct for technology i just want to make sure okay thank you and so so when will that happen then is that in the in the new year um president leonard um remember densmore um it will happen this year so it has to go through a second read obviously the next board meeting and then we will develop it so we do quarterly dice art essentials every quarter we push out some new essentials so we will obviously quarter one is pretty much almost done it is done in our times that we use so it will come out in probably the third or fourth quarter and then we will probably start i say probably we haven't fully planned it but it will be our first quarter every year so as people start the new year they will see it but we will definitely introduce this to them this year okay and just to clarify one piece um i know that this is using the term technology but this is not limited to district owned technology correct correct and there are some legal rights to what people can say and do however it's also use of personal technology when you're representing the district so a lot of people you will see that you know if they claim they're a teacher an administrator support staff member and and they're representing themselves as a district employee there's still expectations of what they can say or do as a representative of the district so it is across um all forms and uses of technology thank you you're welcome i did have one more and it was uh i think it's the third bullet from the bottom um shall not use district load logos or district intellectual property without the written approval of the superintendent or designee so um approval of the designee is that um will it fall under you or will it will it be something that's uniform um um it will let's see i'm trying to look where you're reading oh the fourth bullet third bullet from the bottom okay yeah fourth i'm sorry um district logos or dis intellectual property that will probably fall under miss ryan okay so she would be the one that would be signing off on okay just wanted to make sure all right sorry renee she was on the committee so she's that's not unexpected she really was smiling under her yeah any other questions on this one awesome thank you for the update on that i appreciate you all right we'll go ahead and move forward my screen to adjust here we're going to go to action discussion items i1 policy governance board monitoring of adopted policy section 2 board governance dr polling yes thank you president leonard let me check my notes here i'm going to try over mr croto oh thank you dr pulley president members of the board uh dr polling and cabinet tonight is the second read of section 2.19 i believe that's what we're on and that is if you remember we this will allow us to move all future second reads so policy 6.7.67 which we just looked at will be put into the consent agenda instead of having to bring it for discussion this allows us to do that by taking out the word discussion on the second read so that is what we're presenting tonight for you to approve thank you for that is there any discussion on that all right i'll make a motion to approve the revision to policy 2.19 school policy process second read second motion made by jay leonard seconded by tracy sorry sink belt let's go ahead and vote and that motion passes thank you we're going to move on to action discussion item i2 board identify board identified meet and confer iba process standards dr polling thank you president lard i'm going to turn this one over to mr croto thank you dr pulling president leonard members of the board dr pauline cabinet tonight we bring to you the standards that we have worked on for iba in our policies that said the board will review provide input and take action regarding the iba standards these are standards that have been used in the meet and confer process for many years and those processes you can see listed are legal affordable alignment sustainable viable efficiency necessity judicious and equitable and as we start the process we are asking the governing board to approve these standards that we will drive us in the meet and confer process for this year excellent thank you for that any questions do you happen to know and this may be a jim dean question how many years have we had this in these particular standards in play mr president member sawyer sink bill to the best of my recollection i've been in the district 16 years i've been involved with ibn 16 years and to the best of my recollection i believe that we've had them 14 years the standards it's between 12 and 14 years is what's coming to my mind please don't quote me on that but that's the best of my recollection so but it is these are the standards that drive um the decisions that come to the board from ibm right and they continue to be the the foundation they are the foundation correct and and a very good guide post for us to move forward with okay as i was looking at the agenda you know i have the ability to look back at other agendas and everything and they it still stands true year after year after year and so i was thinking like how many years have we had this and so of the four of you i knew you would have the answer so thank you very much i would say that the best part about it is that there was great thought put into them in the beginning and great things stand the test of time and so they've been good standards for us to keep us on track moving forward thank you very much thank you mr dean any other questions all right i'll go ahead and motion to adopt the iba standards is established for the 2020 2021 meet and confer second motion made by jay leonard seconded by don densmore let's go ahead and vote motion passes thank you we'll go ahead and move on to action discussion item i3 recommendation to appoint trustee to the employee benefits trust board dr polling yes thank you president leonard i'm going to turn this one over to mr hicks assistant superintendent for business services thank you good evening mr president members of the board uh superinter assistant superintendent dr pauline colleagues and community members thank you for allowing me to bring this agenda item back to the governing board um at the last meeting this jenna item was presented and it had some errors and so um just like to clarify that the dates were wrong on the press release that was communicated out and that was communicated out incorrectly the also the press release indicated that there were only four days that the application was available to the public the application was actually open until august 7th but the press release was never corrected and so i just wanted to clarify um at the last board meeting there was just brief conversation and not clarifying communication i apologize for that and so trying to put bring this agenda back and then in the body of it to clarify all the errors that were presented in the press release and communication that went out still stand by the process of identifying people and making the recommendation to the governing board of the two trustees excellent thank you for clarification updating that any discussion on this item no i just appreciate you meeting with me and going over all of this before the meeting um it was really helpful to for me to see the step-by-step process that you took to get to your decision and just thank you again you're welcome i i apologize as i was reviewing the last board meeting the question i missed the question and only answered a part of it and so that led to the errors that continue to be uh that led to the decision making so i apologize for not clearly explaining all the errors on the press release as it was going on so i appreciate board members reaching out and getting more information so thank you very much thank you excellent any other discussion all right let's see here i guess we're are we making a motion um i moved that the governing board approved the appointment trustees to the employee benefits trust board all second motion made by jay leonard or motion made by tracy sorosenqual seconded by jay leonard let's go and vote and that passes thank you all right we'll go ahead and move down to j1 request for future agenda items any future agenda items yes and yes and no um um no it's just a probably some type of update as to um landmark or dates that we will be doing even though we're in a covid type period having to do with our 100 years for dysart what has been done thus far what is soon to be on the horizon just some type of update just to let our community know what's going on yes president remember sourcing pops like an information item yes yes informational item thank you anything else all right we'll move on to k1 and i'll make a motion to it during the meeting second motion made by jay leonard seconded by tracy's for your seat belt go and vote and we are adjourned thank you everybody for attending and we appreciate your support you

currently right now we have 66 students in the district that are taking advantage of this situation and so once again i think it's a wonderful way for our students to continue their love of music and the fine arts and thank you again to the teachers stepping up outside of their normal duty to do this yes i just want to say again thank you for all these um teachers that have stepped up in these difficult times and it just um i know it's helping their programs too for the future and that's you know been a concern for all of us making sure that so next year we'd still have a robust band and orchestra program going and even if a student does need to stay home if they can come even in an afternoon this is an awesome awesome i'm really thrilled with all of this it's happening thank you so let's jump into a secondary school's update and the idea of collaboration and you know we talk about professional learning communities amongst our teachers and things i truly feel like our principals we're in a very very professional learning community over the past two weeks i know some of you visited kind of our war room as we were outlining how many kids were taking what different courses and where we could turn around and offer those courses online and the collaboration that happened not just between the high schools together but the junior high or the middle schools in with each other and figuring out how we're going to get teachers and coverages is it perfect no it's not still a work in progress and we're still working really hard to get the kinks out and we knew that it wasn't going to be easy but we're working really hard to make this important split happen so our online courses are taught they're not school specific and so you might be a student at higley high but we might have a teacher at williamsfield that's picking up the section and actually it might be a highly qualified salesman teacher that could have been able to pick it up or cooley teacher and vice versa and so that's where i think the really unique part of sharing who we have available and how can they help and then we got to a point where we had to make a decision how are we going to offer these courses online and so this is where to go back to our teachers we came to them and said would you be willing to teach a course as a six fifths for those of you aren't familiar teacher teaches five classes during the day has a prep hour the six fifths is basically them saying i will give up my prep hour to teach an online section and because of that we had an overwhelming majority of our teachers that said let us help and so we did that there's a significant number if you want to know the specifics i think ms martin's has that specific but they stepped up and allowed us to offer more than we thought we could and i think at different depths than we were anticipating earlier and so i publicly would like to say thank you to all of those teachers we're stepping we do know it's stressful we know that these are hard times and we know that their commitment to our kids is outstanding because the bottom line that's who this is for this is for our kids let's just tag on to that i think the community has to understand we don't have any manuals you don't and and for for these teachers i mean they could just sit back and say you know let's just let it happen nothing happens in this district and we don't have it but these teachers have stepped up created some fantastic programs to the point that other districts are looking at them online and it's it's wonderful sure there's going to be some hiccups but as as a group of us we we just need to be patient with each other and we're going to get through this but please please thank this group of people for taking the initiative and taking the step forward to making a difference for our kids here okay thank you we will and one thing i i'm happy about this because i feel like we're able to look at the funding for this out of the grant money stabilization grant money and so instead of paying third-party vendors to come in or do other things the money's going directly back to our teachers who are picking up the lift and the load and i think that's an important thing for them and so the next couple slides just kind of shows once again at the high school level this is where we're taking a look at the different courses that are listed it's a little bit different than we anticipated because we have been working with chandler gilbert community college to make sure that we have those duel and rob enrollment options they're actually extending uh the the deadline the deadline was supposed to be this week we're extending it to the 22nd so that we can go in and promote more hey please sign up for dual dual enrollment options we have these available for you we have now some a lot of our teachers so if you look under cte a lot of these teachers originally were not signed up to do a six-fifths but they said that they would and continue to do it in this in a dual enrollment option and so that just provided more opportunities for our students who are making the choice to stay online so they can continue to get these same opportunities next slide please now once again if you look at more online course offerings just an example electives obviously is the hardest one is the biggest one as we're going through and um these are just once again different teachers who have been able to step up for us and courses that we're putting in not necessarily all the courses are florida virtual courses i have that supplementary uh curriculum some of them are teacher created curriculum as well because there is no florida virtual that aligns to them but the teacher said i will take on that role and help have a robust online uh you know i know that we were only two days into it and we're still making adjustments on what needs to happen we're still balancing there are still things that we need to do to be able to help and support our families as you heard and and our teachers and doing the online course offers at the middle school we've had a tremendous amount and i need to be honest one of the challenges was when we went into the beginning of last week we probably had less than 200 kids that had told us they wanted to go into the online option i think by the end of the week we're up to 400.

tonight we wish to share our efforts with you by presenting challenge coins to our governing board members and copies of the book to our district leadership team first we would like to recognize veterans in the audience who have been featured in our canyon ridge school in bhp publications would our veterans stand and be recognized thank you mr grow at this time with members of our community organizations that supported our vhp chapter with donations please stand thank you we will now present books to superintendent dr kellis assistant superintendent for education services dr polling and assistant superintendent for support services mr dean and mr russell would like to add that the very first book will go to the assistant superintendent who hired me mr dean i want to get that right this year mr dean thank you oh everybody ready one two three good thank you thank you so much for uh all your hard work and um for being a great representation of dysart and thank you to the veterans for your service and also for the people that have supported on this program it's amazing to be able to have this and to have seen it each year it's it's an awesome accomplishment and really represents our district um in a great way so we appreciate that and uh mr ross how we i know he snuck out but he's still back there thank you for heading it up and we're glad that uh jim dean hired you it'll wipe away a few of his other sins but now we definitely appreciate having you as a part of the uh the dysart team so thank you so much all right let's go ahead and move on to item d1 um audience with individuals we do not have any requests nobody thank you all right we will go ahead and move down you're gonna do superintendent okay we'll go ahead and move down to e1 which is superintendent update and we'll turn it over to dr pulling it's a pleasure to be here on behalf of dr kellis we're very excited about the reopening of schools you know excited to see students and staff in classrooms for teaching and learning you know currently we have students in learning labs k-12 and we have preschools open and it's been heartening walking through classrooms seeing students and staff just enjoying learning experiences and just been off to a great start starting next monday k through fourth grade and ninth grade will be beginning and the following monday fifth through eighth grade and 10th through 12th grade will begin in person learning i've talked to lots of students and families and staff there's just lots of excitement out there and a special thank you to the students and families for your extra hard work during remote learning and a special thank you to our very hard working staff it's truly extraordinary efforts and so a special thank you to you we've been continuing to monitor county health data we are happy to see that trending downward right now we have no reds in the district for any of our three categories so we have greens and yellows and we anticipate that trend will continue positively for the community that's all i have for tonight excellent thank you all right we'll go ahead and move to e2 governing board updates i'll start out just really excited to get students back to school i'm excited for the teachers and for the students and i know that it's uh it's an interesting world that we live in and there's a lot of anxiety getting students back in the classroom and i'm excited and appreciate everybody who is embracing that and up for the challenge i know it'll be some transition but i'm excited to have the kids back where i believe they'll they'll get the best of the best um and that direct interaction with our amazing teachers thank the staff and and everybody for what they're doing and for the adjustments that they've made the extra cleaning and sanitizing and i don't think any of us will get that smell of sanitizer out of our nasal passages for a really long time and also dealing with masks and all of the protocols that we've had to update and change and we're continuing to monitor that the information that dr pauling had talked about when he talks about the reds and greens and um yellows is on dysart.com so if you're curious of the numbers that he's talking about please feel free to visit our website and look at that it's basically us monitoring the information that we get and that's basically how we're scoring if there is such a thing as a score how we're scoring and keeping track of the information that will help us make decisions based on what is best for dysart and the teachers and the kids so that's that's the information that that we're relying on to make most of the decisions as well as any health data that we're able to to get and i appreciate everybody who's been involved in that and respect each and every one of you for the hard work that you've done thank you anybody else just echo president leonard's comments regarding um getting the students back into class teachers and everybody moving forward and also for uh dr polling to pinch it for this evening and yes pinch it and also just recognize um and i know they've already taken off mr razo and mr growl they do a lot of work for our veterans and it's it's very humbling to see over the many years how this has affected students that have come through canyon ridge and uh so i know they will continue the work and um i will definitely be holding on to this coin this is this is an awesome thing so thank you that's it anything else um just ditto to everything that you said i'm just seriously excited that our schools are are opening for students and staff and getting back to some sense of normalcy um not just at school but in our lives because it affects so much more than that very appreciative of our staff our families that have made so many adjustments for remote learning to be as successful as it has been just really grateful for everyone's work on that so that's it excellent thank you all right we'll go ahead and move down the agenda we'll go to item f1 and that's a motion to approve the consent agenda items and i'll make a motion to approve the consent agita consent agenda items as presented second motion made by jay leonard seconded by tracy saw your sink belt let's go ahead and vote that motion passes thank you all right let's go ahead and move on i'm going to move on to section h um one and that's going to be policy governance board monitoring of adopted policies section 3 board superintendent relationships and we'll turn it over to dr polling thank you president letter i'll turn this over to mr croto assistant superintendent for human relations thank you dr polling president leonard members of the board dr polling cabinet uh tonight we look at uh our continuance of board monitoring of adopted policies and tonight we have section three and there is no changes to sec section three so i'll stand for any questions that you may have excellent thank you any questions on section three excellent thank you we'll go ahead and move on to uh section h2 edition of policy 7.67 staff using use of digital communications dr polling thank you president leonard again i'll turn over to mr croto thank you dr pulling president leonard members of the board dr pauline and cabinet tonight we bring you 7.67 it is a new policy entitled staff use of digital communication this will be the first read this policy allows us to establish a standard of conduct for our employees in regards to the use of technology nothing in this policy shall be interpreted to interfere with employee speech rights established under the constitution or the arizona constitution or applicable legal precedence so however district stakeholders are responsible for the content of their communication or posting on or through any form of technology our stakeholders must be aware of their association with the district and ensure the related content of any posting is consistent with how stakeholders wish to present themselves to colleagues community members parents students and consistent with district expectations this policy was developed by a committee of representatives from i.t hr ed services and on pr and additionally our legal counsel jennifer mclennan has reviewed this policy and has approved it so with that i stand for any questions on 767.

in addition we are starting the process of having adot manage all of our fleet maintenance and replacement this will make sure that our fleet is up to date and well maintained so our teachers and staff are able to reach students in every location throughout the state providing an equitable use of resources we're also adding gps systems to all of our vehicles and that's quite the change so we can monitor where all of our fleet is throughout the state uh as noted asdb operations is making sure that our current challenges are being met while looking towards the future so we're dealing with the cove pandemic but also making sure that we're not falling behind on our other obligations which is something that our team is doing a fantastic job of making sure that uh all of those things are are being handled and with that um i would like to say thank you for the time thank you albert and that completes my report thank you dr x now i think we can move on um to item 1.05 information item superintendent's report superintendent eichmann hello everyone good afternoon president negro members of the board um assistant superintendent rex and the asdb community i'm happy to see you all here as you have been hearing from our leadership team we've all been focused on and working very hard on two very important goals these goals are embedded in our mission statement which are first of all to provide the best education and support possible to all of our students and second is to ensure as much as we can the safety and well-being of our students and our staff those two are the most critical goals we are meeting during this time of the pandemic at the last board meeting on july 23rd you will recall we showed you a video and that video showed our preparation and planning for students to come back on both campuses at that time we were planning for students to come back on august 18th and if you recall who was during that time to have to come back to school districts back to the campuses the arizona department of health services established three metrics and we've been using those metrics to make the decision on an ongoing basis as to when it would be safe for our students to come back to our two campuses and as we know at that time we realized it wasn't going to be shaped for students to come back on august 18th so we made the decision to go ahead with online education starting on august 18th and we've been providing online education we're in our fourth week right now you've heard from principal chrissy and principal fritz about their work their teachers work their professional staff work to give the best education possible online to these students so with that you've heard from the early learning program we continue to provide hella early intervention to families with children with zero to three that are zero to three we are also our preschools are providing online education similarly to the schools with a lot of support from parents of course we're talking about children that are three to five our itinerant itinerant services as you heard is providing online specialized instruction and support and some in-person specialized instruction and support depending on the student and the school district this has required a lot of creativity a lot of changing and trying to figure out how to meet student needs um i was going to share with you two stories one story i was stealing from mr jay johnson but he already shared that story with you the story about the student learning o m instruction online and will be getting actual practice with his parents taking them to a city to learn the second story i wanted to share with you is a student in an area with no cell phone reception a deaf student you were able to deliver a chromebook to that student and the student found a nearby school with wi-fi so every day he's been getting on his atv and driving to the school so that he can connect his chromebook to the school's wi-fi and get his education from the tucson campus that is a really terrific example of when we provide the opportunity and the resource to sometimes student is motivated we can successfully provide the online education access to online education while we've been addressing this very dynamic covert pandemic environment working very hard to meet the needs of our students at the same time we continued our work in what i call second order change you remember it was a year ago in the fall in the november board meeting i shared with you that the agency was just beginning to engage in second order change and at that time i decide i defined it as a systems change a system change that is that is discontinuous this discontinuous and yes disruptive well obviously with the coverage pandemic it's already been very disruptive at the same time in this time of disruption we have continued to focus on the second order change the other point that i want to kind of add to the second order change when we implement a second order change the only way we can maintain it is to also have a cultural shift and our agency is right now going through a tremendous cultural shift and what i mean by cultural shift is we are changing how we think how we make decisions how we plan plan for the future we are using data to make decisions you just heard some of our leadership team talk about data so we're much more focused on what do we need to know what data do we need to collect collecting the data analyzing it and then using that information to inform our decision-making process are we doing that 100 of the time not yet but we're getting there we're doing it much more often than just a year ago the second piece that's happening now is we're engaged much more in planning you've heard some from the leadership team about some of the plans that we have developed and again this is a real change in our thinking that we are becoming much more proactive instead of reactive we're thinking about the future and we're trying to plan contingency planning if a doesn't happen then b and if b doesn't happen then g really trying to think through and plan for what may come so depending on how long you want me to speak i can go on for quite a bit but for now i'm going to just talk about five examples the first example is last fall set up a contract with lma which is a group in tucson that does different kinds of research projects for school districts and other organizations lma has been working on a demographical study of asdb enrollment trends they've been looking at our historical data and they're using that to predict the future enrollment trends almost done with their research they're writing the report right now we hope to get the report i think sometime in october maybe early november they will be presenting to us sharing their findings and then training us on how to do our own demographical analysis in the future that will help us with long-term planning the second example is we just set up a contract with lma the same group to do the first workforce analysis and we're going to be focusing on related services personnel like physical therapists occupational therapists speech language pathologists and so on we want to take a look at their work in meeting the student needs as you know every student has an individualized education program and in the iep it spells out what kind of services are needed including the ot and the pt and the slps and others so on we want to know are we meeting every iep has written is our staff successful in meeting every iep in terms of the kind of services provided and the amount of time that's provided we also want to know do we have sufficient professional staff to meet the student needs are we understaffed are we overstaffed we really don't know we don't have any data to tell us if we have the right staffing with the right skill set and the right number that really meet the needs of our students so that's the second thing that's happening right now um a third fourth examples are i think you heard about these two from the leadership team one example is the digital learning plan if you look at our asdb web page you will find our digital learning plan and in that it spells out what we are doing to provide digital online education to our students the other plan i think is up on the web page now is the risk mitigation plan mr duff just referenced that that risk mitigation plan is for when our students come back on campus we have protocols to keep our students safe and our staff safe as well so those are planning documents that we have created and put up i think final example i will share with you is that you heard from mr johnson he talked about attendant services just want to remind you that it was i think a year ago that dr sims suggested that we combine our five regional co-ops into one statewide delivery system we are moving towards that goal um with mr johnson starting last april one of his first paths was to look at how we can move forward with streamlining our regional cooperative services july 1st we combined three regional co-ops the eastern highland region the north central region in the southwest region those three regions have been combined into region one they're under the leadership of miss michelle lucie and she's been working with the three cooperative centralized of course she discovered very quickly that each region had their own way of providing services she's been working very hard to streamline and to make consistent between the three areas how services are provided to our students and that's an ongoing process that again is a great example of assistance change that we continue to be engaged in even while addressing the needs of our students during the pandemic i have many other examples i'm happy to share them with you at another time if you want to hear more this concludes my report and i'm happy to take any questions uh do any of the board members have any questions for superintendent reichman don't see any um thank you superintendent reichman for your continued uh work in this period both in uh reading the agency uh to handle covid uh and the return to school uh next month as well as uh some of the changes that you discussed in particular the um the changing of the management of the co-ops um the next item on the agenda is 2.01 action item approval of the consent agenda consistent with board policy items 3.01 3.02 4.02 5.01 7.02 and 7.03 uh would any of the board members like to remove one of these items from the consent agenda and i i don't see any uh one wanting to speak um would anyone like to move to approve the consent agenda i see su k raising her hand i i move we approve the consent agenda items 3.01 3.02 4.02 5.01 7.02 and 7.03 okay thank you do i have a second uh mike manley this is my family all second uh thank you um so all in favor to approve the consent agenda um you can turn on your video and make a sign of ascent uh so i have such i'm voting yes uh csu k z yes mike manley is yes lynn is a yes my coordinator zs linda bova's esteem howard is the sn dr sims is a yes all opposed and there are none so that carries thank you moving on we are looking at 4.01 information item finance report from gina cooper uh shayna are you on the call now yes i am but it looks like i'm having some difficulties with my video yes i see well you can uh proceed with voice as as needed i'll mute myself okay anna cooper executive director of business services good afternoon board president nigro superintendent reichman assistant superintendent rutt members of the board and the asdd community provided to each of you is a financial report that was presented to the finance committee based on data as of july 31 2020 for comparative purposes the reports also show data as of july 31 2019.

welcome everybody thank you for joining us um Maribel can you please take roll today is a regular board meeting of September 10th 2020 at 5 30 pm members of the born attendance Ronald here vice president member Linda Chavez present and this meeting is being recorded remember presence okay thank you everybody so we have a quorum and as was mentioned tonight's meeting is being recorded um as we I think last month may have been the first month that we requested this but for everybody as you participate tonight in the zoom session if you'll notice at the bottom of your Zoom screen there's a little what looks like a globe um kind of on the bottom right hand side and you'll need to click on that I'm sorry um I'm gonna have Mr Tripoli actually explain this in English and Spanish uh sorry Mr Tripoli I forgot I was going to call you on for that so go ahead foreign thank you Mr Tripoli thank you um okay and as we have been doing in recent months your ability to participate in public comment will be via the zoom raise hand function similar to how we've been doing it in the past several months anything new on that Mr Gill or does that sound accurate for the public oh that's effort okay thank you very much so with those things I believe that's what the the pleasantries out of the way we can go ahead and start with our Pledge of Allegiance so if you're able to stand at this time you can stand and join us or if you can find by your microphone or whatever it may be you can stay seated but please join me in the Pledge of Allegiance I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States and to the Republican which it stands one nation one nation under God indivisions liberty and justice okay thank you very much okay so we will go ahead and get started with um item 1.02 any modifications to the agenda for tonight I have not received any requests um and they do not see any hand raise Quintero I know you mentioned you're having some bandwidth issues tonight so I will be looking for your little um hand raised symbol to to see whether or not you have something I don't see anything now so that's it for me thanks okay I'll keep an eye on you but if I don't if you have something to say and I don't see you also first trustee Marquez as your cam can't during the time your camera is off um same thing I'll keep an eye but if I don't see you please um just just speak up and request to be um given the floor trustee Chavez yes I'm having the same thing my my screen is sliced in half and I have a cloud on the left hand side so I'm having bandwidth issues too okay but I guess mine's my comment goes for everybody and trustee hopefully I'm not having issues tonight but um I wanted to actually move 609 uh before 6.09 before 601 okay any other uh any other modifications to the agenda yes I do I'd like to move up 610 chapter 302 after 302 okay 16.

we are live streaming okay good afternoon everyone uh it is four o'clock now is the time set for the regular public board of directors meeting for the arizona state schools for the deaf and the blind um thank you uh for joining us today we we are meeting again via zoom uh in terms of etiquette uh the same as previous meetings if you can keep your uh zoom on mute and no video unless you'd like to speak and then you can turn on your video and indicate by raising a hand or being some other visual indication that you would like to speak i can recognize you then and then we can take turns that way also i remind everyone to uh wait just a bit for the interpreters um to uh finish interpreting what you're saying um so there'll be some pauses at the end of every sentence and that will keep everything flowing smoothly so now we come to item 1.01 call to order and roll call [Music] sue k can you read the roll call absolutely linda bove here dean howard here president nigro president mike gordon mike natalie i'm here mark sims here myself is present and then um absent today is shelley herbald lynn davison is here oh sorry lynn that's okay i can't get my video to work i don't know what i mean okay great thank you sue k so it looks like um shelly and mike gordon are the ones that are not here today we can move on to item 1.02 call to the public call to the public on agendas items as we had done in the the last meeting we solicited public comments via an email address uh set up for that purpose uh limited to 500 words or less we received one email um to be read as part of this meeting sue k if you can come on and read that email certainly the email is from marcy berenberg and that's spelled be as in boy a-r-e-n-b-u-r-g and the subject is the school reopening and the comments are as follows i am concerned about the negligent stance asdb has taken regarding schools the state has met the metrics two weeks in a row and we are anticipating a third week tomorrow yet asdb has yet to open and move the date further even with strong trending many other districts are full time and those that aren't are at least meeting the needs of iep students some teachers are choosing to use inaccessible programs ieps are out of compliance and children's educational language and social needs are not being met classroom sizes are already below a typical classroom we can socially distance with ease we are fortunate to have large campuses that work well within the recommended parameters of this pandemic our cases are low risk is low now is the time to get back to focusing on education and our students it's time to open the school and our allow our kids to thrive uh thank you sue k um next on the agenda is item 1.03 information item executive team reports um the uh reports were provided um in the uh in the board book uh superintendent reichman are there any uh comments that you may have on on this is annette speaking um i just want to let you know that in addition to the written report um the next item on the agenda under the assistance assistant superintendent we will have both albert duff and paul creasy providing a short presentation so you will get a verbal report from those two individuals uh okay um excellent uh are there any questions among the board members for these individual reports i i don't see any um is um is albert duff on the call now i am sir oh hello um i just wanted to thank you again for your report um and thank you for the information that you uh uh provided regarding these um uh i iq air hepa filters um can you let me know where are these going to be deployed and how many we have so we purchased two of those and they are going to be deployed in the student health centers and so as students come to the student health center with any sort of symptom like uh for covid this would be used to make sure that if there was a coveted positive case that it would be contained and the air would be scrubbed in the area that they were primarily housed before being transported or picked up by parents okay um so in other words these are going to be placed in areas where we believe they're going to be students that have either coveted or suspected covid um so that we can keep the staff and the other students safer by cleaning the air in those in those areas correct that is correct and those are true hepa filters the the filter on it's about four inches thick um and is designed uh to work in hospital settings as well okay uh great are there any plans to to purchase more of these devices i know that some of these are in short supply but are there any plants that purchase more of them put in other areas where there might be more traffic or more students to get congregating in one area although i know we're you know we're limiting that as it is yeah the the cost is fairly high on those but um looking at the cdc recommendations was primarily to increase air flow and we've actually started that process and made sure that we're following the cdc guidelines for increasing outside airflow into all of our areas and then our next step is actually looking at a different option rather than an air scrubber it's actually looking at either uvc or different forms of ways of actually treating all of the air inside of our school buildings and all of our office buildings as well so a little bit different a design because of the size those air scrubbers are kind of limited in the amount of air that they scrub of only about 2500 square feet so when we think of multiple classrooms and multiple areas and the the noise that those make um it would be more conducive to actually uh change the hvac system on the roof rather than inside the actual classroom right and that's that uh you know from a long-term perspective i understand that uh preferred can you tell me more about the uvc systems that you guys are looking at sure there's uh uvc which is um a way of actually killing the organics inside of the air which then the virus has a hard time replicating without the correct amount or the um a substantial amount of organics inside the air there's also ionization which actually uh were ozone machines which actually uh clump um molecular items together and then it allows for the filtration system to actually take those items out of the air um so it actually increases the size of the particulate so that way a standard merv 8 would actually catch the virus okay and our filters we use merv 8 or do we use something higher right now correct we use a merv 8 on all of our units and that's because that's what the hvac systems were designed to handle so by using an ozone machine to actually increase the size of the particulate matter it would actually make those effective for viruses as well as other contaminants okay um and is there a time frame for when we might deploy one of the uvc systems uh right now we're in the quotation process as you can imagine pretty much every school is starting to gather these quotes so we're still in that quotation process unfortunately um and moving as quickly as we can to get that quote finalized in the meantime we still implemented the cdc guidelines of increasing outside air flow which by doing that actually we've gone to about a 25 outside airflow um or more in all of our buildings which allows us to actually change out all of the air inside that building uh four times in an hour okay oh that's that's great and how are we doing that um all of our units that um our commercial grade units they have uh an outside air damper and so that damper up on the roof you just merely open it up and that draws in more outside air as it cycles it through and then it pushes inside air out and commercial units in order to avoid what's called sick building syndrome which has been known since the 1970s normally had about a 10 change all that we had to do was increase uh the damper to about 25 percent and then that meant the ashrae uh or the hvac guidelines from the cdc okay great well that's that's great news to hear i know as we are preparing to have students that are going to be together and you know indoors that we have a way to get get clean fresh air um from the outside in there um and also to have other systems either the uvc system or the hepa system uh to try to remove uh any any uh droplets or or aerosolized particles from the air that may carry uh uh covet so uh thank you for correct yeah thanks for your attention to uh to these i know it's um uh hvac is usually not top on on our list i think but it's it's really important right now so thank you for for uh being on top of this it absolutely is thank you sir okay um if there's no other comments for 103 uh then we can move on and i don't see any uh we can move on to uh 104 information item assistant superintendent report dr rex so dr x good afternoon president nigro and asdb board members today my report has been submitted in writing and i wanted to do something a little different today with the net's permission we are going to let you have some direct information from the principals as well as the directors who have been working all summer to prepare and make sure that our students are ready for school but before i turn it over to those specific groups i want to give you just a little bit of great news not just good news but great news we have some preliminary information that we have been awarded what is called a cops grant cops cops grant it's a federal grant highly competitive as an administrator i've applied for this grant in other districts off and on and this is the first time that we've been awarded and i'm very proud of the asdb tucson campus school safety committee along with principal creasy in collaboration with it and business services the odd grant writing expertise of melissa devries as well as albert's input through facilities they wrote a grant and requisitioned four hundred thousand dollars to help support safety on the tucson campus this is a national grant and we requested four hundred thousand dollars and we have preliminary preliminarily heard back that we will be receiving about 306 thousand dollars in this grant there is a 25 match on the agency's part but only 160 grants were given to the awarded to the to the schools nationally and we are one of two in the state of arizona that received this grant so i wanted to give a little shout out to the asdb campus and their school safety committee that hard work that they worked last summer on has certainly paid off and i look forward to bringing back more information on the specifics of what we can use that money for and what that grant was written for but now i'd like to turn it over to director kendra benedict for the early learning program to give you an update of what's been going on what has been accomplished and how we are doing in our current reality hi good afternoon um thank you for allowing me to speak with you all today given the charge to share with you how the elp is connecting with our families and our students three things immediately came to mind for without any one of them what we do wouldn't be possible that would be our community partners our teachers and our families the elp has long recognized the importance of community partnerships we value our community partners and see them as an essential member of the asdb elp team we know we are only as strong as our relationships and never has this been more evident in the last six months during which time we have brought in approximately forty thousand dollars in grant funding to support our families and students from a three thousand dollar donation from a church member in tucson will to our program to over a thousand dollars worth of books from parents in the birth to three program to the parent of one of our former preschool students at ptsd who stepped up to assist us with technology needs as families in the birth to three program continue to receive intervention services to a thirty thousand dollar hurster grant funding through the ear foundation that allowed for the immediate deployment of tablets to 105 families 70 with sim cards right when schools closed last march and then finally to a five thousand dollar micro grant from the communication service for the deaf out of austin and a one thousand dollar grant from asl love out of san francisco that together allowed us to support our asdb families on the navajo nation as the kovid 19 crisis took its toll and it's not over the ear foundation is currently applying for a grant through the association of maternal and child health programs that if awarded would lend additional financial support to go toward enhancing our existing tele-intervention programs with better connectivity and larger screens for our families in the early intervention and deaf mentor programs our teachers shortly after schools closed last spring i had mentioned to you in a board report that our teachers had come together in unprecedented fashion i am so proud and happy to report that they continue to do so the tucson preschool team recently participated in a profession excuse me in a professional development opportunity online during which they were asked about their hopes and fears and what is working and what could be improved regarding online learning this is what one teacher had to say this year has been my best year by far the preschool team decided at the end of last year to create an environment that is positive and proactive kind of take control versus being lost we acquired two new teachers over the summer and have introduced them to our vision we collaborate talk share laugh and we rely on each other we have decided to work together and focus on creating an atmosphere that is kid-friendly yes we have one-on-one sessions and work toward iep goals individually with our kids but our learning centers are child-based and fun in the building we do not vent we problem solve we enlisted our ias to be teachers and they work alongside us to create fun and safe places for our students we only vent on walks outside the building and usually end up laughing our way back inside this positive atmosphere has created a team i am learning with my colleagues and building professional relationships for the first time in my 15-year career lastly families and students as early intervention providers whether birth to three or preschool we have the extraordinary privilege of families welcoming us into their lives so that we can better help them and their children in their children's early development i think the following quote from the original sky high manual a curriculum we use in early intervention explains what we do well i enter here with respect for where i go is so sacred that few are ever invited in they bid me enter not only their living room but also their lives they share their questions as well as their kitchen they let me glimpse into the sanctuary where fears and damage dreams are kept and bid my heart to tug on the burdens that they will bear together we will laugh and be excited over a sound a phrase a response yet sometimes we will shed tears and disappointment this is not a solitary journey but a shared odyssey of discovery i cannot betray their trust moving from an in-person to an online instruction took a certain level of trust on everyone's part building trust virtually can be challenging but with the patience and kindness of our families the fortitude of our teachers and support from colleagues i strongly believe that that trust has been created families from across the state have expressed their gratitude to us for equipping them with the technology necessary to access their child's education as well as for providing instructions in both english and spanish on google classroom in turn i'd like to take a moment to thank rit department as well as well as all of our amazing asl interpreters and spanish translators without you we would not be able to in turn help our families so thank you thank you community partners elp teachers families and asdb colleagues we appreciate you fantastic thank you kendra and now i'm going to uh turn it over to courtney fritz and kelly creasy to give you an update a principal's report for our two schools good afternoon board president nigro superintendent reichman assistant superintendent rex and members of the board hopefully you've had an opportunity to review the report that courtney and i submitted this report is due several weeks before this meeting so we wanted to take this opportunity to provide you with some updates to this information as of today only one student did not register on the tucson campus and was dropped at the 10-day mark the student's home district has been notified and they worked closely with us to try and connect with that family but unfortunately we were unable to do so in order to monitor student engagement a team consisting of administration counselors and school secretaries meets to discuss any student that has been flagged as having attendance concerns someone from the team reaches out and connects with the family to offer support and assistance last week we had 29 students that were identified as concerns as of today 26 of those have been resolved these numbers fluctuate from week to week and so this team is critical for staying on top of potential attendance issues and for the ptsd campus just like what kelly was sharing we too have established the same systems and procedures and trying to reach out and really make sure that none of our students are are falling through the cracks although this is something that we would do in normal circumstances certainly there's a heightened level of concern and a little bit more leg work in trying to get in touch with some of our families just because it has been such a a long time since the school closure so for our numbers here phoenix we had two students that we were not able to register we tried every contact that we had emergency contact phone number address you name it any type of way that we knew how to contact with them and unfortunately we were just not able to to reach those families and we are unaware of whether they have moved or what their situation um is and just like what kelly mentioned once they hit that 10-day mark they were dropped from enrollment but of course that does not mean that for either campus they're completely off of our list we're hoping and looking for signs and communications that one day they'll just kind of pop up and there they are and we'll grab them and and run as quick as we can um to get them re-established and set up on our campuses as far as concerns with engagement as kelly mentioned we have the same system here and it's really to try to not only help us respond more in in a prompt manner but also to show parents and students that we have a whole team on our campus that are that are trying to support you that are working through the challenges and offering solutions um and that's just been a really i think a positive thing that's happened although the concern is there it's nice to see people coming together to help our students so at the beginning of this week we had 17 students that were listed on the spreadsheet as concerned and as of today 10 of those have been resolved so we are still working on seven of those from this week and as kelly mentioned it's it's a fluctuation every week and and some of them do have a better week and then they go back into that concern category or some had really strong start and starting to slow down a little bit so the the ryman reason are are all across the board but definitely something that we have a plan in place we have a system established and we are monitoring that daily to make sure that we continue to provide the support answer concerns come up with solutions together as a team and in regards to the concerns of course that is in the digital learning environment so at this time we are continuing in the digital learning uh program all schedules that have been established follow the recommended direct instructional recommendations from ade through digital learning as well as the total instructional minutes that are required for the the various age groups so the schedules have been established to make sure that all of those minutes are being are being met through the digital platform all of the related services have reached out to the teachers first and then reached out directly to parents to make sure that those direct iep services are scheduled and are part of that child's program and are built into their school day we are using our instructional assistants everywhere you look everywhere you turn so they are an integral part of being involved with the digital learning and definitely helping us to provide that specialized instruction as being an additional set of eyes set of hands available for office hours available for support and so they're really helping us in a variety of ways as an agency we do have a team that has been meeting we had our reopening committee and now we've kind of shifted that to the school data committee so we do have an agency group of individuals that meet every friday morning to review the data review the metrics look at the benchmarks not only as a county but specific to individual zip codes as well the state has done a nice job of providing a variety of reports that provide us a wealth of information and data so we really come together every week look at that information and have discussions because we have students coming from all across the valley on my campus and all across the state on kelly's campus it's really important that we look at the the bigger picture and look at those individual zip codes it is different than a home school district that's only pulling students from one certain area based on our original plan the next date where we will be making a decision is september 25th the data is looking promising we are very optimistic that we as long as things continue on the same trajectory that we will be ready to open in person on october 6th in regards to student services like we said digital learning another component that we did was we developed a protocol to bring students on campus when necessary so that protocol follows cdc recommendations we have a very clear step-by-step guide of what staff should do and what communications need to happen between them and the parents so it really is case by case but that allows us to move forward with evaluations that might need to be it might need to happen in person whether that's manipulatives whether it's hands-on whether it's physically getting up and moving with the guidance of the evaluator the the need is really to have the student in person we do have a protocol for that another example might be the audiologist our audiologist typically provide support for hearing aids cochlear implants those type of devices and that is something that we can still do on campus if needed and then the last example is technology we did deploy technology to all of our students unfortunately id can't be in each of their homes we can't have you know an id rep for each home and we wish you know that was possible but it has been great i think kendra mentioned that as well of just providing any and all support whether that's troubleshooting on the phone i know kelly and i have gotten on the phone and tried to troubleshoot um again really truly a team effort but if the need is to troubleshoot that might be another reason why we would bring students onto campus but that protocol is established and is communicated on a case-by-case basis depending on the need in addition to the i.t department we have to really thank our transportation department who has been absolutely phenomenal on august 17th they literally delivered materials statewide every student on both campuses received technology any assistive technology and educational materials we still continue to deliver items through our transportation department and through the mail for students so if they need additional materials if we have to switch out a chromebook deliver a hotspot our transportation department is on it and have been delivering those materials for us on a daily basis um unfortunately both campuses had to make the decision to cancel fall sports due to the delay in person start date we were concerned with the ability to adequately prepare our students for competition and we thought it was in the best interest of our student athletes to cancel we are hoping to resume our athletic programs when we return to in-person learning and finally for the tucson campus we currently have 13 students living in our dorm this option was offered to parents of dorm students who did not have access to reliable internet and for whom we were fairly certain that a hot spot would not remedy remedy that situation we are currently using three out of our five dorms to house these students and everything is going really well huge thank you to our dorm staff that is providing that support for those students to engage in online learning so moving forward um we know that uh covet is not going away tomorrow unfortunately i think everyone on this call and everyone across the world would probably wish that that would would happen but um moving forward although like i said the data is looking promising and we are optimistic we do know that for a variety of reasons there are some families that are going to want to continue on the digital um platform and digital mode of learning so over the past several weeks we've been working on a plan to make sure we can provide both in person when we are safe to reopen and for those families and students that that want that option as well as continuing with the digital platform and being able to do both of those simultaneously although it is a challenging task and and really having to look at all of the staff and how we can continue to commit to providing that specialized instruction through both modes of learning it is something that we are moving forward with so in our written report we provided um most we we took most of the the document that was shared with parents i think we you know removed some of the the content that wouldn't be applicable in this setting but really that document was communicated and was sent home to parents that really outlined digital learning as an option we provided questions and some critical components that we felt families should consider and think about prior to making the the choice of whether they wanted to continue with digital learning or have their student return in person that has been like i said sent home to parents and we will be sending it home to parents again with our progress reports the original date we asked parents to respond by was the end of august we have now um pushed that date back to september 25th so again giving them a little bit more time to make that decision for their family and for their child depending on what their circumstances might be that will allow us approximately one week a little bit more than one week to prepare those individual classrooms and individual teachers to be prepared to provide both in-person and digital learning simultaneously once we have that information from the parents like i said we'll move forward with the logistics of how to set that up but what we do know is that the accessibility piece is huge for our deaf hard of hearing blind visually impaired students we want to make sure when they're joining in from home and through video that they're able to clearly see the the teacher that might be using american sign language and or clearly hear the teacher if they're using spoken english to make sure that that accessibility piece is what each of those students will need additional classwork and support will still continue through google classroom as it has been up until this point once from when we started on august 17th um as i mentioned we did have an initial due date and we've since extended that so from the initial due date currently the numbers are there's 27 students from the phoenix campus that want to continue with the digital learning option and there are four students from the tucson campus so that's kind of our next step in our next phase in looking at what those numbers look like in preparation for running both programs simultaneously starting in october we know that there was a lot of information in our report and a lot of information that we tried to update you with this evening so at this time we'd like to open it up if there's any questions for either of us hi this is mike so i don't have any questions but thank you very much for that uh presentation is very informative and i appreciate that no problem thank you and i was just going to add that it seemed like there weren't any questions so we both want to to thank you thank you for your support um you know we we are both fully where these are challenging times and challenging times in education and especially um education for deaf hard of hearing blind visually impaired students kelly and i meet every single day at 8 a.m and i think early on we thought there's going to get to a point where we don't have anything else to talk about but we haven't gotten to that point yet we both have a list every day at 8 00 a.m so um the positive to all of this is i think it's really strengthened our um consistency and aligning our programs our philosophies and our approach to educating our students on both of our campuses so that's definitely been a a bright light a shining star in in all of this covid so thank you for your time and thank you for your support this is lynn i do have a question um if there is an outbreak on either campus we do have a plan we do have a plan um all of the devices that are currently deployed to students will remain assigned to them for the entire school year so if we had to close those devices we'll go back home with the students so everything is is being maintained in google classroom as well so that we can quickly turn around really the next day and move right back into online learning if we need to thank you ladies and now i think we're going to move into our statewide director for itinerant services um jay has had the opportunity slash challenge of having itinerant teachers that are still working remotely going into schools in a blend of a lot of things that he is going to be sharing with you next thank you dr x and thank you board members for allowing me to come in and speak with you for a few minutes about some of the work that we're doing throughout the co-ops statewide as well as how we're supporting our partnering school districts and charters first off and foremost i want to let the board know that our focus has always been providing the best services possible to all students statewide during the pandemic last spring our goal was to deliver uninterrupted services as much as possible and as the board knows last spring we were able to service about 85 percent of our population during the pandemic and after partnering with some of our special education directors statewide and speaking with all of them we found out that we were far beyond what they were able to do within their own school districts and charters this goes back to our goal of putting students first part of that goal is building additional partnerships and strengthening partnerships statewide and throughout the nation one of those partnerships that we're working on right now is with vocational rehabilitation we're working hand in hand with two of our northern arizona school districts to connect our vr team with our own co-op team and the school district teams to make sure that we're meeting the needs of students in each one of those districts in addition to that work we're also connecting our vr team members to each of our co-op directors and having them attend meetings to share information from vr as well as selling providing information back to vr from asdb in addition to that partnership we're also strengthening partnerships within arizona and outside of arizona with our state universities we have individuals that are coming to us already looking to do student teaching as well as internships throughout the state we held informational meetings this year with special education directors statewide about our distance learning model and how we could partner with school districts and charters that we had not worked with in the past through all of this it comes down to the services provided we've wanted to make sure we're providing the best service possible and the way that we're measuring that is by currently collecting data and providing support to staff to deliver services but to accommodate students and families to individualize those services the proudest moments i can tell you so far working with asdb is about the collaboration the communication and the reporting that has standardized our work moving from phase one to phase two the focus this fall will be to continue to ensure the equity of all students and really to make sure that we're using data to drive decisions for all students in the co-ops to end this verbal report i wanted to share with you a story that will warm your heart this comes to us from one of our o m teachers and i'll read the email that was sent to us i've been working remotely and virtually with a student who is very in a very rural high school throughout the hybrid o m program during his iep meeting the parents agreed to meet with me in an urban area either in phoenix or tucson two times this year in order to provide an immersion of actual application and practice of the concepts and skills the student has been learning through our online instructional sessions this is awesome for two reasons first the student will be well prepared to know which street crossing strategies to use at various intersections so that our time will be mostly spent the practice runs with much less time introducing and teaching the concepts and theories behind the skills secondly it'll be greatly reduced the transportation and travel time expenses for the agency also i just received permission to conduct an o m assessment for a middle schooler in this case i will first work with the student online to start to develop relationships by gathering background information current knowledge and understanding of o m concepts and skills and the insights to the approaches i may want to use when assessing the student in person i'm excited about this process of figuring how to conduct part of the o m assessment through the remote platforms this is one of many stories that we receive weekly from our team statewide each week we share these stories out with the entire co-op team so we can see the strategies that we're using statewide to deliver services either remotely in person or a blended model again i want to thank you for this opportunity to speak with you today and i appreciate your support moving the co-ops from phase one to phase two and i look forward to the work that we'll be doing this fall thank you for your time thank you jay i think some of the themes you've been hearing is adaptability and tenacity on the part of our staff members no one has given up everyone keeps pushing forward and adjusting and you also board members have heard that this would not be possible without i.t so at this time paul can you share a little information on how you have been able to deploy devices and make sure that we are we are able to provide the accessibility in our programs thank you good afternoon board president nigro superintendent reichman assistant superintendent rex and members of the board the it department has been focusing on ensuring that our staff and students have the ability and unnecessary tools for digital learning we have inventoried image prepared and sanitized computer equipment for assignment to staff and students we have deployed 640 chrome devices 350 windows laptops 500 windows desktops and 485 tablets we have procured and deployed 130 webcams to equip every classroom on both campuses so instructional staff can use their classroom computer for digital learning we have also provided 45 cellular hotspots with internet filters that have been deployed to students without internet access every campus student has been assigned assigned a device for the entire school year this includes chromebooks ipads and braillenote touches students served by our regional cooperatives have been assigned devices by their home district or by asdb we have worked in close partnership with lisa yancarelli and her team to help with the deployment of assisted technology devices we have worked successfully with 15 school districts and one charter school to connect itinerant teachers with the students that they are providing services to we have procured 200 google voice licenses so teaching staff can communicate with parents and conduct agency business this is more cost effective than acquiring a cell phone we have successful transitioned our web conferencing from webex to zoom and google meets both platforms are much more student-friendly and have also proven to be accessible on the devices such as braillenote touches the start of this school year has been unlike any other in partnership with the campuses and the regional cooperatives we have ensured that staff and students were ready for digital learning throughout the school year the it team will continue to provide support and address technology needs as they arise i have provided you the i.t department board report in your board packets and i'd like to take this moment to make myself available for anyone any questions you may have hello paul um hello thank you for your uh presentation um just a question i know we talked about uh you know the hot spot distribution one this is you know an excellent um and large-scale deployment of technology so i'm happy that we're able to get uh devices into the hands of of our students so they can be supported um during their uh the virtual uh education period uh we talked about 45 um virtual hot spots for for those students that needed internet access i know that we have students that have or live in areas that are a bit remote and may not have reliable lte service do we have any kind of solution for them or or how have they been been served in this period yes um first of all uh we we recognize that cellular services hit or miss in a lot of the outskirts of locations of the state and in those situations we have gone as far as to look for other types of support and that means either contacting the local school districts working with them to see if we can get them our students on their their wireless network if it's close by um we also have um use state resources um there is a website and i forget the name of it but it's it's uh sponsored by one of the state agencies that collected a map of the state of arizona and identified all the local public wi-fi access areas areas those are at schools libraries other public spots that the state is or others are allowing public free wi-fi we have looked at resources with local isps cable service providers and anytime we've seen reduced cost or those types of specials that come up we send the information out to our our instructional staff to get into the hands of those parents that that do not have access to wi-fi um and in some of those cases where specifically on our tucson campus i believe kelly did refer that uh we have some of those parents made decisions if they didn't have internet access for their student to um allow the student to come onto our campus on tucson and stay in the dorms so that they can uh be able to get educational opportunities through that okay um thank you uh you also mentioned the use of a google voice in some cases is there any plans to to move more of our telephony services to google voice um actually at this point this was one of those um unique situations where um in the past we didn't really need to look that hard as far as getting cell phones to everybody but because of covid and everyone working from home that was a unique situation that we had to deal with quickly and since we were already a google g suite domain we looked at that option because it gave us flexibility of being able to have staff forward their desk phones to this number and be able to access their voicemail and also use their computer their chromebook using headsets and video conferencing to make calls if they had wi-fi and so that is something we're looking at just recently um with in october i believe there's going to be the new asnet 3 contract and we're really hopeful in that they have uh will be providing more uh benefits for us as a state agency through soft phones through cisco and so that's an option we're really looking forward to and seeing if that's something that would benefit us and give us improved flexibility uh great uh yeah i know a lot of the uh you know those those ip you know ip phone solutions are typically a lot less expensive and and they're more distributed and easier to use in a work from home setting or a remote setting so i'm happy to hear that we're we're looking into some of those items uh because we we we're not necessarily going to be at our desks in person uh all the time soon or for the time being uh were there any other questions um for the board members for any of these any of these items no i don't see any hand so thank you dr rex um and and all who have spoken uh we can now move on to we have one more sorry yep okay oh sorry dr x we we we let albert talk a little bit at the beginning but i actually asked him to prepare something so if you let let him just finish up and then we'll be good yes of course i i apologize for that uh go ahead albert no problem president nigro good afternoon board president nigro superintendent reichman assistant superintendent rex and members of the board my name is albert duff and i'd like to thank you for allowing me to take a moment to let you know about the current actions and accomplishments of the asdb operations team first asdb operations has been supporting the implementation of a mitigation plan for kobe 19 this includes prevention protocols in the form of administrative engineering and ppe controls to reduce the likelihood of exposure on our campus and regional co-ops we have sourced and begun to distribute ppe cleaning supplies barriers and other recommended forms of protection such as the air scrubbers for our student health centers we are also going to supply our campus students and all staff work work directly with students with a clear face covering to help protect them while supporting their communication needs with the addition of the safety coordinator asdb has begun partnering with arizona state risk management to ensure that not only are we working on the current situation but also reviewing and starting the process of implementing multiple safety programs within the agency we will be communicating and partnering with all of our departments to make sure that every staff member is supporting a safety culture within asdb as of right now during remote learning asdb operations team has come together to ensure that our students are being cared for and ready to learn as kelly already mentioned this includes delivering needed material prior to school starting including i.t and classroom equipment throughout the state of arizona second we have begun delivering meals to our students to make sure they are all well nourished and ready for the school day no different than as if they were on site this includes cooking boxing and delivering over 1600 meals a week in the phoenix metro area and over 500 meals in the tucson area this also includes a weekly box offering for students outside the metropolitan areas this coordination and teamwork between transportation and food service is outstanding and shows what dedication asdb operations has to the success of our students while all of this is going on the task of facility improvements has not stopped on our pdsd campus we have replaced the elementary school playground flooring in the preschool and now scheduling the replacement of flooring in four additional buildings we're also starting the process of plumbing upgrades within the preschool on pdsd to accommodate for our little ones on the tucson campus we have started the process of building a new science lab and scheduling the replacement of flooring in our elementary and middle school building in addition we have replaced over 50 percent of all of our food service equipment on both campuses to ensure that our food production is of high quality asdb fleet operations has been working towards right-sizing our fleet in partnership with the arizona department of transportation and replaced over 25 percent of our antiquated light duty fleet in fiscal year 20 and fiscal year 21.

our most recent finance committee meeting was held yesterday on september 6th with board members manali ann gordon and superintendent reichman the meanins of the meeting have been included with today's consent agenda items in summary we reviewed and discussed the budgetary and fiscal year budget to actual comparison reports the available cash balance the grant revenues and expenditures report and reviewed student enrollment as of august 1st 2020 and compared to august 1st 2019. before i begin summarizing the fiscal data i would like to inform everyone that the agency's fiscal year 2022 budget submission package was successfully submitted to the governor's office of strategic planning and budgeting last week the submission comprised of our operating budget request totaling 59.2 million dollars federal funds grants information totaling 3.4 million and the five-year strategic plan i would like to give kudos to the budget team as they have played a tremendous role in implementing new processes for budgeting across the agency as well as utilizing financial methodologies to determine fiscal needs the process also aided in the development and recent submission of our annual budget package to ospb ongoing efforts will be made to analyze specific programs in order to improve both effectiveness and efficiencies and i will continue to provide support as we develop our agency's strategic plan so we can ensure that our fiscal and operational resources are aligned with the plan now that the school year has started oh sorry about that now that the school year has started our vouchering team along with the campus and the regional cooperatives working with the data registrars have begun with the home school districts to begin vouchering our students so that we can in turn receive the associated revenues for our enrolled students there have been a few hiccups though i must admit due to the recent changes abe has been uh made but we are working through them so hopefully we can start to receive those voucher revenues within the next few weeks with several months into the kova 19 pandemic though it still is difficult for me to really draw some conclusions about the potential impact to our operations for the year especially since we are new into the school year we're continuing to have everyone think about how to spend less and continuing to try to implement the cost saving initiatives where we can look at other available sources to use unfortunately a lot of covid 19 related expenses have not qualified for reimbursement as the federal government has been more focused on agencies that are more impact by the pandemic such as the hospitals police health and social services etc as such though our general fund has been impacted by these costs in addition to monitoring our spend we're also looking at our revenues which is mostly tied to enrollment if enrollment declines and our revenues will also but if our enrollment does increase our revenues will increase since jlbc is still projecting a shortfall of 62 million dollars for fiscal 2021 based on the gene fiscal reports there are possibilities that the agencies may see some reductions to our general fund appropriations to help offset the state's projected shortfall jlbc and our ospb staff have indicated that there are still a lot of questions and concerns about the revenue shortfall for the state for fiscal year 2021.

foreign so let's see we have trusted here Mr Gill Mr Ruiz um crusty Marquez and that's a quorum do we have any oh trustee Quintero I see is logging on do we have any um notification or anything from trustee child oh that's trustee Chavez okay so it looks like if trusty Quintero is on that we have everybody here um Maribel or Mr Gill do we have everything ready on on your end ready to go yes sir okay is Dr Bauer here [Music] okay I can't say trust each other you don't see trustee Chavez Mr Gill oh okay got her okay Christy Marcus trustee Marquez is I'm on yeah she's here do you have video trusty Marquez tonight or are you calling in no you know you're calling in or you have video no I have video I'm putting on my makeup so I'm not putting okay but you have the ability for it I didn't have time for mine tonight so I'll just unfortunately you get what you get with me so you didn't shave or anything huh nope okay so we have everyone here and everything's ready so I'll go ahead the bomber is not in who's not in superintendent Oh I thought she was logging in she's not in yet um okay let's give her a second um okay give us one second absolutely hey Dr Bob is joining okay good okay there I see her now all right so um I don't think I think I was interrupted so I'll call the meeting to order at 5 34 today for the regular board meeting for September September 10th 2020.

3.02 okay any other modifications all right so see none I will we'll go ahead with those and again if I happen to Overlook those as we progress please remind me if I'm if I forget to make those switches but I'll I'll keep an eye and try to make sure I remember can you give me the order please I kind of didn't hear it 609 before 601 and 6.10 after 3.02 after what 3.02 correct okay um sorry so it's going to go 302 6 10 then 609 no no no 609 directly F before 601 and 610 directly after 3.02 okay thank you okay thank you all right so we can move forward to item 2.01 public hearing Gan limit calculations uh Mr so Mr Ruiz can I open the hearing for all of the items um at once or do I need to open each one individually there's items 2.1 through 2.03 stake of order um you might want to just open one at a time because I believe 2.02 is a presentation as well as the hearing on the um on the lcap okay okay so I will open item 2.01 public hearing again limit calculations um Mr Gill do we have any public comment on 2.01 none okay um is there any questions or comments from the board on 2.01 okay and so I'll just close these all at the end Mr Ruiz yeah yes okay I'll close them at the end of the meeting so we will move to item 2.02 presentation and public hearing on the 2020-21 draft learning continuity and attendance plan um I believe I'll pass it to Dr Bauer thank you for president I'm going to be passing it on to Miss Sandra Garcia who has a presentation and just please um open the public hearing right after that okay thank you hi can I share my screen please um superintendent Dr Bauer and members of the board and the community my name is Sandra Garcia and I'm the director of state and federal programs and this evening I am going to present information on our learning continuity and attendance plan the first draft of this plan so in order to begin I would like to share some background on the learning what the learning continuity plan is um in the past we have been asked to update um the lcap which is the local accountability control plan on an annual basis and if you remember this summer I explained to you that um the state was looking at um a different plan for us to implement this school year for one year and this is what we have been asked to do and the name of the plan is the learning continuity and attendance plan so for the 2021 2020 2021 school year the local control accountability plan which was to be due in December is now replaced with the learning continuity and attendance plan this plan is to be approved by the school board by September 30th 2020 to be in compliance with the law so this evening I am going to be presenting a summary of how our district will provide continuity of learning and address the impact of covid-19 on our pupils families and staff I'll begin with an overview of our initial plans the plan um if you've taken a look at it is broken into uh buckets the first bucket is the continuity of learning bucket within this bucket we have uh distance learning and in in this area of the plan we share information on the logistics of our distance learning program including device access daily instructional minutes by grade level guidelines for attendance and Grading and communication platforms that we will be using during this distance learning time the second part of this bucket is devices and connectivity the section of the plan discusses the way in which we will provide devices and connectivity required to connect to online classes all students that needed a device and or needed for this year a device and hotspot have received either an iPad if they're in TK in Kinder or a laptop or Chromebook for students in first through eighth grade uh all students that needed a hot spot to connect to their online classes have been provided a hot spot in addition Jeopardy of nine taking these days extended their tech support until 7 pm on weekdays and ten to four on weekends the port um tech support is offered in English Spanish and Vietnamese the next part of this bucket is professional development and in this section we are to summarize the various professional development opportunities for staff including curriculum-based trainings as well as trainings on the use of the various platforms and tools that we will be using for online instruction people learning loss is another area that needs to be addressed in this part of the plan and um the the plan addresses the need to assess pupil learning loss and develop a plan to intervene for students showing gaps in learning this section discusses the various ways in which we will assess student performance and monitor their learning throughout the year and check to see for gaps that need to be addressed during the school year with additional interventions the next area of this bucket of continuity of learning is the support for students with unique needs in this area of the plan we are to address how we will provide additional support to our English Learners our displaced families Foster Youth and special ed students and just a couple of the ways that we have uh described in our plan are the the continuation of integrated and designated English language development services within the school day additional programs that support our English language Learners specifically PD continuous PD in this area for our teachers and um our support for displaced families and Foster youth are the support with our schooling Services providers and our counselors they case manage these students to ensure that they have the necessary um materials and supplies and services to be successful in school and some of those are prioritization and after school activities which are being done through distance learning school supplies uniforms tutoring and others our special ed students will continue to be monitored through their IEPs their progress will be adjusted and their progress will be monitored and goals adjusted as needed um so that we can ensure that they meet their goals they are receiving their IEP services to the greatest extent possible through distance learning through synchron synchronous and asynchronous methods and once we return to school we will assess them there I we will assess their learning to see if there needs to be any adjustments in their IEP goals the next bucket that we address in the plan is mental health and wellness and social emotional learning in this area we describe the ways in which we will provide support to our students in the areas of mental health through professional development that our staff has been receiving since the um school closures last March there's continuity in the professional development the site-based counseling services that are offered to our students and families after after hours Crisis Support wellness support and through requests and what we call Wellness Wendy Wednesdays for staff um social emotional learning is addressed through again professional development to help our staff really implement this um these techniques with our students and to make sure that our students are feeling connected not only to their teachers but to their classmates and that their growing and feeling safe and and supported through their classes one of the things that we implemented uh this fall is the morning meeting for all of our students every student begins their day at 9 00 a.m with the morning meeting so that we so that students and teachers and can connect first thing in the morning and start the day on a positive note um and we we feel very strongly that this is going to help children um feel connected to their classroom and their teacher and their and their classmates we've also um some restorative practices in komochis um to help in this area as well the next bucket for the plan is the student and family engagement and Outreach in this area is very similar to what we have in the lcap when it um talks about parent engagement but the other part that's added here is the student engagement how are we going to reach out to student how are we going to keep them engaged and how are we going to reach out to those students that are having a difficult time attending their classes what is our tiered re-engagement plan when we see that a student is not attending their classes it's a very specific plan that it's in tears and there's a different action as students reach a different tier in this plan so it's a very specific plan for re-engaging those students and also for keeping students engaged in their classes by making sure that you know we offer the site-based counseling The Crisis Support and Wellness Resources that they may need to to fill um like they they want to be in school and that they can be and that they're supported for family engagement we'll continue a lot of the things that we have been um doing throughout the years um connecting families through schooling Services through the frcs making sure that they have the support they need um during these challenging times and connecting them with Services when we cannot provide the services ourselves our community Liaisons have been working hard and trying to make sure that our our families are feeling supported and that we're connecting with them and just making sure that that they have the resources needed um during their Outreach calls and home visits um and then offering parent Tech workshops I know our schools have been very busy this month implementing and offering parent Tech workshops for parents who really need the support and and how to use a computer and how to use the technology how to get onto zoom and Google Classroom so that they can also be supportive to their students at home the last bucket is student nutrition and as you know our wonderful CNS department has had a plan in place since the very first day of school closures to offer meal support for our students and we are able to continue that um for our families this fall so that we can offer meal services from 12 of our school locations students will be receiving breakfast lunch and supper daily from 12 locations at our school district and once we get back to on-site we will continue to provide this type of support to our families via grab-and-go models to just ensure safety for everybody so that is the extent of the plan and it like I said it's a first draft and um this public hearing is is an opportunity for me to share what we have done so far in terms of writing this fund developing the plan um to hear from you to to see um your thoughts and um we will be finalizing the plan and bringing it back to the board at a special board meeting before the end of the month so that we can um have this ready to submit to the CDE one thing I also wanted to mention is that we did have a parent survey go out it is the links are posted on our website our District web page so please pens go out and take the survey give us some additional yeah close the door please so we can use for our um final draft of this just FYI your microphone is um not muted right now so we can hear you thank you very much um I appreciate your attention thank you Sandra um let's see I got thrown off there okay so do we have any comments from the public on this Mr Gill you're muted if you're saying something Mr Gill oh so yes um there are public comments okay so um as we've been doing and as per our board bylaws for all of our public comments tonight we will stick with what is in the bylaws which is two minutes for per individual and uh total time per item of 20 minutes that has seemed to work for us on practically no items have we gone past those 20 minutes and we've been able to give everyone their two minutes so we'll continue with that tonight to make sure that we can try to get our meeting done um and as always if you have to to save time and provide time for other speakers if you have a comment that is similar to a person before you you can always just use your time to ditto or second or support the person that spoke before you um but you can use your time however you wish so that being said who is the first person is Brenda zendejos before you get started I just want to um put out a reminder there's been a few times when profanity has been caught on the microphone so this is just a reminder to you and to the public that your microphones May remain open and unmuted a few seconds beyond your speaking time but miss and that has Please be aware of that yes thank you what type of language is inappropriate for these meetings so when you begin speaking your two minutes will begin yeah thank you I don't I believe that was not me but thank you for the reminder um I had a question um just a quick question about the survey I know that it's posted on the arusd website will this survey be linked through parent square and seesaw and other applications that parents are using with the students and how many uh schools are using the kimochis I really like that I I'm just curious um if we can get uh maybe more schools included with the kimochis because I think that's a really great idea for students with um to voice their emotions and stuff like that but uh that's my only comment on that and thank you so much Sandra and thank you everybody on the board thank you next person Mr Gill Veronica hey Veronica when you begin speaking your two minutes we'll begin great thank you so much Ford um again my name is Veronica um and I do want to thank beforehand uh Sandra and her team I think they did an amazing job with the presentation and thank you for presenting it um my only feedback and I think is something that I have talked already I believe rotunda is that um I was able to attend the Spanish one and we had over 200 participants and we were not able to get through all of the questions which was it was reasonable because there were so many participants we want to see and I know Sandra mentioned this is a first draft but um I would definitely love if we can have something ongoing for families to participate even more often now um you know as the whole district and as a at schools as well because I know some schools are doing it but um just as a whole District just to make sure that all of our schools are coherently doing or are within similar range um because that's what I've noticed some discrepancies here and there but thank thank you Sandra again and would I I'm really excited and want to see more and wanted to see more parents being able to participate as a whole thank you thank you Mr Gill next person uh if I could just remind I don't know which microphone is open but I did make the the reminder just a few minutes ago about profanity so everybody Please be aware that there is the potential for your microphone to be open and this is a meeting that's appropriate for families for children for students and profane language is not appropriate for this meeting so I would ask that everyone Please be aware of that and and very conscious of the language that you use thank you very much and sorry for the interruption who was the next person Mr Gill yes when you begin speaking your two minutes will begin members of the board my name is I just want to echoa Veronica said um I would like to um um to give my props to Sandra Garcia and to the whole staff for this amazing Zoom meeting that it was done um two weeks ago I believe Ferris film were included they were more um rooms divisions where parents could talk and actually give their feedback um also to the amazing staff that was able to follow directions let everybody raise their hands and and also Echo what they would like to see in this continuity plan I would like to also say that there wasn't enough time unfortunately there's not really enough time to go through the whole questions and through the whole items that we wanted to talk to but other than that I really like to see that we had teachers we had um other other kind of Staff we have principals and we have parents and Community giving their input and um just thank you for for that and thank you for making changes that always favors that community and the way that we engage so have a really good night thank you next person Mr Gill de Leon Miss de Leon when you begin speaking your two minutes will begin hi good evening everyone my name is flor de Leon I am a part of this on on the district and also our community organizer and um I unfortunately I was not part of uh of um of these uh events that happened with uh getting the uh input from the community I was on vacation and I just came back this week and I haven't even had time to review it and I know that today is a day to give the input and I know we also aware that uh it's gonna be a proof it's just a draft this is why did you have to speak I'm sorry can you hear me yes we can hear you there's someone's microphone again open Mr Gill um can we do our best to make sure uh don't worry yeah your time I'm gonna we'll make up for that but Mr Gill if we could just I know there's a lot to keep an eye on but um if we can keep an eye on those microphones because this thing seems like we have a lot of uh a lot of chatter tonight for some reason with open microphone so thank you and and um Miss de Leon you can continue speaking and I know you have some time still yeah but are you taking away my time because no the time ran down no okay so I I I'm probably not gonna use the whole time but I just wanted to say that um uh that I will love that uh sometimes uh that the district gives more time to do these things because I think the first time I hear uh it was on Thursday and sometimes I know there is a lot of things going on that we have to be uh doing at work and I would like to see there is more time uh for having uh time to meet up with uh the community you know and not only let uh Sandra by herself uh been able to to draft everything and I know that part of those uh forums or time or meeting that you had was to get input from the people but I always hear that there is not not always enough time you know and I think we need to make sure we always provide time in advance and recruit people and maybe that's why it's good to have an an oversight committee that can help uh and and be ready and with people that is experts you know people that is experts like teachers principals like we want to have a group of different uh backgrounds so that way we can make better decisions but thank you very much and I will uh definitely review it and also give my input and send it to Dr Bauer through an email thank you thank you next person Mr Gill none okay thank you very much so trustee Chavez I did see your hand up and I see trustee after that I want to thank God I want to thank Sandra for the presentation it was very clear and concise and I also wanna uh thank all of the speakers Veronica Brenda ditza Floyd that also uh asked the same questions that I did and I was just uh I had asked Dr Bauer when they had uh some of those uh for the parents to to get the the tech um I guess the tech classes up but um I would like to see more advanced notice for the parents to be able to attend those uh classes or just give them some um I guess a little bit more time so they could redo their schedule so it could work for them better thank you thank you trustee yeah um I have a question for Sandra Sandra um in regards to this being a draft and uh the final one eventually coming to us um when do you need feedback by to then have the final one um what's that date is she on maybe uh Dr Bauer maybe you can well I think she's her microphone is muted so Mr Gil can take her off mute do you see her Mr Gill I'm waiting for Sandra to respond she is on mute you might have to mute herself as she's at okay there we go okay um I would like um to have any information by the 21st we have that'll give us the week to finalize the draft will start working on the final draft right away but yeah if I can have any comments by the 21st that would be great okay um and then I just uh you know wanted to ask you that to clarify um so just reminding all parents to send any information to Sandra as our you know as our superintendent gets a lot of information so if you have anything in relation to this please send it to Sandra um and then I did talk to Dr Robert yesterday about the uh technical aspect of the plan um and so uh basically I was wondering in regards to our students and um not being able to connect um I I've gotten you know we've gotten some feedback that there's certain areas that get kicked out a lot more than others depending on the uh company that they have um so just you know focusing around that and I I don't know that the specifics this is a place for specifics of that um but I just wanted to you know see and and talk a little bit more about that Sandra so I'll connect with you later thank you sounds good thank you president yes I'd like to have some clarifications from Mrs Garcia okay go ahead um Sandra this is um in regards to the mental health um you were as you were reading them out I was wondering um the site-based counseling um can you explain what the counseling is going to be about when you say site-based counseling we have counselors um we have counselors and or counselor interns at every site in our district and that's by uh referral and they have been able to support students um based on their caseload so we are not talking academic counselors we are talking counselors at um our families or our students need you know need help with yes we have we have counseling mental health counseling mental health counseling I think that's um that's what I needed on there to see to identify what kind of counseling counselors we're going to be using um and so if we can this is a draft we can somehow change this you know or add site counts you have side-based counseling you can put mental counseling or well however you want to identify it um I have also um a question uh if you have any idea how many of the parents um to has taken that parent Tech workshops you know on relevant topics and supporting um during the school closures um but also we also started giving the parents um some you know uh yeah training on you know getting getting this distant learning down about how many parents have we reached here in Alum Rock so far that's a really good question and I don't have exact numbers for you but I definitely can um get those numbers and I can have Dr Bauer share them with you I do know that every school is working on um getting some workshops together for parents some have already started and we've had great reviews on how much support that has provided our families but I can get some numbers for you okay great and if if we can uh talk to our principals to reassure the parents that we're not able to be when they were being given at their site that they will have another opportunity I don't want the parents saying nope would I eat I couldn't go because I was I got off of work late or for whatever reason I wasn't able to be there um if we can reassure them that you know because they didn't make it on the day they were offering it that perhaps you know we can get that kind of support for them somehow okay thank you can I uh piggyback or just add on to that or I guess ask for clarification um Miss Garcia so I think I read the I believe in the packet that um that actually some of the schools their their trainings have are available um either on YouTube or or I guess I think YouTube primarily but many of the schools do have those trainings available even if they missed the the live training is that is that accurate wonderful principles are getting very creative with this they are recording their Zoom sessions they're recording some of them are recording their live sessions and they are they are putting them on YouTube and uh for other parents to access yes and I think that's um I mean I think that is a good idea I think the a live training and a YouTube kind of after the fact training are a little bit different but for people even for people that did attend in in person I think those YouTube or whatever they are um recorded versions are helpful sometimes to kind of review because you don't always remember what you got or what you did in the live version so I think it's helpful in that way and then it's helpful for those until there's another date potentially for another live training that they can at least try to get on and get the the basics of it so um you know I would just definitely support as trustee Marquez said the principal is kind of championing that that model of the recorded versions and making sure that parents are aware of that those are available to them as well um your helpful resource is RIT department has put together a list of resources for online videos as well um just basic how to how to get log onto a computer you know how to use and how to use Google Classroom so those are all resources for our families as well thank you any other questions or comments from the board trustee challenge um that be posted to the Alum Rock website that it the uh what the IT department did so that way they could go to those links if they need extra help please they are posted on our website oh thank you yes uh yeah I just had a couple comments and I want to acknowledge the hard work for our staff uh and um all the work that has been going into making sure that this reopening plan um is able to provide access to all of our students um particularly I want to thank the the technology component of providing those hot spots uh some of the comments that have been made make it seem as if there's you know people are not able to access and that's not the case uh here at Alum Rock if you if you need a device if you need a hot spot it's available so very grateful and thankful for that um I personally have been able to observe the Outreach by my children's School we've been inundated with um text messages emails um if somebody does not want to participate it's because they've had to forcibly delete those emails or the text messages because we've received plenty I'm on the district website and I'm able to see that on the main page there's access to um the information about reopening as well as uh access to that survey so thank you for all the work that's being done by our great staff to uh go ahead and connect our students and provide access to um in this education that they're entitled to um I I was uh I'm sorry trustee sorry so sorry trusty Quintero can I just briefly interrupt Dr Bauer needs to it's time right now right Dr Bauer Dr Bauer needs to step away for about a half hour she's um congratulations are in order to her she's receiving an award this evening and um I think it was originally on a different date but they had to reschedule and so it's in the middle of our board meeting so she will be stepping away but congratulations and maybe you can later on you could tell us a little bit about it when you come back but I believe Mr Sanchez will be in your place okay so thank you and enjoy your your award and sorry trusty Quintero I just I know she had to leave right now so no no thanks for clarifying that um I would have thought that she was born out of her mind for my commented taking off for that reason no I'm just kidding no but no and just in general thank you all for the work that everybody's been doing um and the Outreach uh to the stakeholders of the district making sure that there's an opportunity before the stakeholders do me involved I think that's very very important that the opportunities are there I know that our staff does go out of its way to go out there and encourage participation there's unfortunately only so much you can do and so very appreciative of the efforts that you do put forth to make sure that people have the opportunity and the Outreach that we do get tends to be above industry standard in terms of surveys and participation you do get out there so kudos for that work that you're doing obviously we want to get 100 but um you know thank you for the work that you're doing so those are my comments president thank you I actually would would like to pretty much Echo everything that trusty Quintero has just said I I agree I think that um as we've talked about on many occasions prior to this we are all learning we continue to learn through this process and we're learning some very significant things about our processes things that work things that need Improvement um parents are learning new things I mean we're stepping into a whole new world and you don't just flip a switch and move into this whole new reality overnight and so it's an ongoing process and I think we are doing very intentional and thoughtful work in that direction and you know there's always room for improvement for all of us I did want to ask just a few questions one on on page eight at the bottom of the um the like the Matrix not the PowerPoint presentation it's the other document that we received it's in the pupil participation and progress section and it talks about a report that will be available to to uh where did it go um there's a report about student participation the um during synchronous and asynchronous instruction and so I was just wondering that report do we have yet the the process or or the frequency or any information about how the board or or that report will be um available or just any general information about that I know as I just mentioned this is learning a whole new thing and and tracking of of the with the weekly log is is a can be a beast potentially to get that going but we do need to see what that participation is looking like so what will that report look like you're referring to the student engagement log I believe uh yes I believe that well and I I think Mr Sanchez could talk more to that but uh it is an engagement log that teachers will be asked to monitor um engagement in various ways um you know for students so we I believe it was just rolled out this week so um some training probably needs to be done on that but we will be implementing that very soon and it is a requirement that we have to um to take note of how much engagement we're having and how we're reaching out to students that aren't engaging in their classes so if I can add um the the weekly engagement log has two components to it uh one component is basically outlining the assignments that students are receiving both synchronous and asynchron goodness and the other component is where we capture how students are being engaged right whether they're completing an assignment whether they're doing an assessment whether they weren't able to connect and we had to communicate uh via email with uh the parent or the student and all of these are are part of the requirements from the state so we have been in communication with area trying to come up with a template that makes sense for everybody uh we are looking at using our data management system illuminate and we do have a draft of that we've shared some of that with our principals we're finalizing those details and we will be bringing that uh to the team next week so those are um State requirements where we're trying to make it a seamless process for teachers to be able to capture how students are are engaging and the assignments and the lessons that they're doing both synchronously and asynchronously okay thank you and again recognizing the challenge of this I just want to at least for myself emphasize that for me this this report and and how intentional we are about taking it serious and not just seeing it as like a check the box kind of thing is is very important to me because I think one thing that we know kind of in the professional World about um working from home and that kind of stuff is that communication and engagement especially when you're doing stuff virtually is is important and so I want and for me it's very helpful to see how we're doing with that and where we can where we should continue to do things that are working and improve things that are not um the other question I just had very generally is as I think we know that our County this week has been um upgraded or modified or changed or whatever to a different level um in far in terms of like reopening things and and all of that all of that stuff um and so just the fact that that has happened I'm just wondering as that process potentially continues to to increase and we move closer to some some decisions at the county level about what opening looks like of schools does that in any way impact the draft that we have here or how we're thinking about potential modifications or are we just trying to just get a grasp of the reality as it is right now notice the very first part of the plans speaks to um learning on site so that's when we're out of distance learning and how we return to school so what we had to talk about were the safety protocols that we would use returning to school and then also you know it would be up to um the board and I'm not sure if we would go back to the original plan the 90-10 plan or rolling it out you know some students at a time and definitely making sure that we're following the guidelines from the county okay perfect thank you very much everyone are there any other comments or questions from the board trustee Chavez uh I was in that meeting yesterday with scoey and one of the things that they said that yes we moved from purple to red but one of the worst things that you can do is also open up and then have to close the school again so that's something that we need to consider as well how soon we should open once we do get the green light thank you and even even if the county does start opening up schools it would be to depending on the County Health Department um based on the the area of the county that we live in if I can make one more comment I just wanted to make sure I recognize all of my colleagues um at the district office because there's no way I could have written this plan on my own um in the short amount of time that we had and I had to go to the experts and definitely reach out to them and say we need to write this together and they came forward and helped me get it done so I just really want to thank them and give them credit for supporting with this and also for our um our input sessions so thank you thank you everybody so we'll leave this item this hearing open to the end of the meeting as well and we'll move on to item 2.03 public hearing regarding sufficiency of instructional materials is there any public comment on this item Mr Gill no okay thank you so this so just so that we'll move on to 3.01 but just so the public knows at any point during the meeting until we close the hearing you can during public comment you can make a comment on any of these three items that's correct right Mr Mr Ruiz okay okay so we will move on to item 3.01 presentation of the citizens Bond oversight committee school size visits and information only item um is it missing galani that that we'll be presenting and if so does she have access to the screen I do okay one moment whenever you're ready um you can go ahead with your presentation all right can we see that yes thank you so good evening community members superintendent Dr Bauer who has actually left sorry about that Educators staff and trustees my name is Allison singalani I'm the proud parent of two arusd middle schoolers and the chair of the citizens Bond oversight committee we'd like to share with the community the School site visit we conducted late last year so what is the citizens Bond oversight committee when voters approve Bond measures to pay for repairs and improvements that our schools need California's prop 39 requires that a cboc be formed the cbic actively reviews and reports on the way that taxpayers money is spent for school construction to make sure that the bond funds are spent the way the voters approved when they pass the bond measure the cboc is accountable to the public we are not under the authority of the arusd board or District the cboc's purpose is oversight of the bond program transparency and communication with the public about Bond expenditures we do not have authority to choose or prioritize or direct Bond projects we're not the decision makers we're here to empower the community with the information you need to fully participate and also to hold our elected officials accountable the state law requires a committee of at least seven volunteer community members required by law to look at the way the bond money is spent and report that back to the public to make sure committee members represent different parts of the community the law requires that the cbse has a member of a business organization a parent of an arusd student who's also a member of a parent organization a member of a taxpayers organization a member of a senior citizens organization a parent of an arusd student and two at-large community members District staff provide Technical and administrative assistance to our committee the cboc does not currently have a limit on the number of members Beyond those required by law and we're always accepting applications for membership applications are available in Spanish and in English on the arusd website and um and community members with experience and construction accounting bookkeeping working with contractors or any related fields are especially encouraged to apply we would love to have you join us Fleur de Leon will share the next portion of the presentation with you thank you uh let's see if she unmuted I don't oh yeah she is whenever you're ready Miss de Leon it looks like you're your microphone is ready to go and I guess camera oh there we go yeah um uh good evening again my name is flor de Leon I also part of the oversight committee on November 2019 members of the of the oversight committee um we visited um uh three School sites uh The District staff uh help us with that so Lucha and Foreman Maxwell building um and and the one that is a maxim middle school and dorsa so uh we wanted to see some of the work that have been done with the bonds money we also wanted to see the max the building which was built and operated but the Mexican-American Community Services Agency on land of um of the district and um and when matzah collapsed in 2016 the land um and the building revert to the district who now must decide what to do with it can we go to the next slide uh thank you both Lucha and dorsa had installed uh HB AC systems installing the summer of 2017.

in addition we are starting the process of having adot manage all of our fleet maintenance and replacement this will make sure that our fleet is up to date and well maintained so our teachers and staff are able to reach students in every location throughout the state providing an equitable use of resources we're also adding gps systems to all of our vehicles and that's quite the change so we can monitor where all of our fleet is throughout the state uh as noted asdb operations is making sure that our current challenges are being met while looking towards the future so we're dealing with the cove pandemic but also making sure that we're not falling behind on our other obligations which is something that our team is doing a fantastic job of making sure that uh all of those things are are being handled and with that um i would like to say thank you for the time thank you albert and that completes my report thank you dr x now i think we can move on um to item 1.05 information item superintendent's report superintendent eichmann hello everyone good afternoon president negro members of the board um assistant superintendent rex and the asdb community i'm happy to see you all here as you have been hearing from our leadership team we've all been focused on and working very hard on two very important goals these goals are embedded in our mission statement which are first of all to provide the best education and support possible to all of our students and second is to ensure as much as we can the safety and well-being of our students and our staff those two are the most critical goals we are meeting during this time of the pandemic at the last board meeting on july 23rd you will recall we showed you a video and that video showed our preparation and planning for students to come back on both campuses at that time we were planning for students to come back on august 18th and if you recall who was during that time to have to come back to school districts back to the campuses the arizona department of health services established three metrics and we've been using those metrics to make the decision on an ongoing basis as to when it would be safe for our students to come back to our two campuses and as we know at that time we realized it wasn't going to be shaped for students to come back on august 18th so we made the decision to go ahead with online education starting on august 18th and we've been providing online education we're in our fourth week right now you've heard from principal chrissy and principal fritz about their work their teachers work their professional staff work to give the best education possible online to these students so with that you've heard from the early learning program we continue to provide hella early intervention to families with children with zero to three that are zero to three we are also our preschools are providing online education similarly to the schools with a lot of support from parents of course we're talking about children that are three to five our itinerant itinerant services as you heard is providing online specialized instruction and support and some in-person specialized instruction and support depending on the student and the school district this has required a lot of creativity a lot of changing and trying to figure out how to meet student needs um i was going to share with you two stories one story i was stealing from mr jay johnson but he already shared that story with you the story about the student learning o m instruction online and will be getting actual practice with his parents taking them to a city to learn the second story i wanted to share with you is a student in an area with no cell phone reception a deaf student you were able to deliver a chromebook to that student and the student found a nearby school with wi-fi so every day he's been getting on his atv and driving to the school so that he can connect his chromebook to the school's wi-fi and get his education from the tucson campus that is a really terrific example of when we provide the opportunity and the resource to sometimes student is motivated we can successfully provide the online education access to online education while we've been addressing this very dynamic covert pandemic environment working very hard to meet the needs of our students at the same time we continued our work in what i call second order change you remember it was a year ago in the fall in the november board meeting i shared with you that the agency was just beginning to engage in second order change and at that time i decide i defined it as a systems change a system change that is that is discontinuous this discontinuous and yes disruptive well obviously with the coverage pandemic it's already been very disruptive at the same time in this time of disruption we have continued to focus on the second order change the other point that i want to kind of add to the second order change when we implement a second order change the only way we can maintain it is to also have a cultural shift and our agency is right now going through a tremendous cultural shift and what i mean by cultural shift is we are changing how we think how we make decisions how we plan plan for the future we are using data to make decisions you just heard some of our leadership team talk about data so we're much more focused on what do we need to know what data do we need to collect collecting the data analyzing it and then using that information to inform our decision-making process are we doing that 100 of the time not yet but we're getting there we're doing it much more often than just a year ago the second piece that's happening now is we're engaged much more in planning you've heard some from the leadership team about some of the plans that we have developed and again this is a real change in our thinking that we are becoming much more proactive instead of reactive we're thinking about the future and we're trying to plan contingency planning if a doesn't happen then b and if b doesn't happen then g really trying to think through and plan for what may come so depending on how long you want me to speak i can go on for quite a bit but for now i'm going to just talk about five examples the first example is last fall set up a contract with lma which is a group in tucson that does different kinds of research projects for school districts and other organizations lma has been working on a demographical study of asdb enrollment trends they've been looking at our historical data and they're using that to predict the future enrollment trends almost done with their research they're writing the report right now we hope to get the report i think sometime in october maybe early november they will be presenting to us sharing their findings and then training us on how to do our own demographical analysis in the future that will help us with long-term planning the second example is we just set up a contract with lma the same group to do the first workforce analysis and we're going to be focusing on related services personnel like physical therapists occupational therapists speech language pathologists and so on we want to take a look at their work in meeting the student needs as you know every student has an individualized education program and in the iep it spells out what kind of services are needed including the ot and the pt and the slps and others so on we want to know are we meeting every iep has written is our staff successful in meeting every iep in terms of the kind of services provided and the amount of time that's provided we also want to know do we have sufficient professional staff to meet the student needs are we understaffed are we overstaffed we really don't know we don't have any data to tell us if we have the right staffing with the right skill set and the right number that really meet the needs of our students so that's the second thing that's happening right now um a third fourth examples are i think you heard about these two from the leadership team one example is the digital learning plan if you look at our asdb web page you will find our digital learning plan and in that it spells out what we are doing to provide digital online education to our students the other plan i think is up on the web page now is the risk mitigation plan mr duff just referenced that that risk mitigation plan is for when our students come back on campus we have protocols to keep our students safe and our staff safe as well so those are planning documents that we have created and put up i think final example i will share with you is that you heard from mr johnson he talked about attendant services just want to remind you that it was i think a year ago that dr sims suggested that we combine our five regional co-ops into one statewide delivery system we are moving towards that goal um with mr johnson starting last april one of his first paths was to look at how we can move forward with streamlining our regional cooperative services july 1st we combined three regional co-ops the eastern highland region the north central region in the southwest region those three regions have been combined into region one they're under the leadership of miss michelle lucie and she's been working with the three cooperative centralized of course she discovered very quickly that each region had their own way of providing services she's been working very hard to streamline and to make consistent between the three areas how services are provided to our students and that's an ongoing process that again is a great example of assistance change that we continue to be engaged in even while addressing the needs of our students during the pandemic i have many other examples i'm happy to share them with you at another time if you want to hear more this concludes my report and i'm happy to take any questions uh do any of the board members have any questions for superintendent reichman don't see any um thank you superintendent reichman for your continued uh work in this period both in uh reading the agency uh to handle covid uh and the return to school uh next month as well as uh some of the changes that you discussed in particular the um the changing of the management of the co-ops um the next item on the agenda is 2.01 action item approval of the consent agenda consistent with board policy items 3.01 3.02 4.02 5.01 7.02 and 7.03 uh would any of the board members like to remove one of these items from the consent agenda and i i don't see any uh one wanting to speak um would anyone like to move to approve the consent agenda i see su k raising her hand i i move we approve the consent agenda items 3.01 3.02 4.02 5.01 7.02 and 7.03 okay thank you do i have a second uh mike manley this is my family all second uh thank you um so all in favor to approve the consent agenda um you can turn on your video and make a sign of ascent uh so i have such i'm voting yes uh csu k z yes mike manley is yes lynn is a yes my coordinator zs linda bova's esteem howard is the sn dr sims is a yes all opposed and there are none so that carries thank you moving on we are looking at 4.01 information item finance report from gina cooper uh shayna are you on the call now yes i am but it looks like i'm having some difficulties with my video yes i see well you can uh proceed with voice as as needed i'll mute myself okay anna cooper executive director of business services good afternoon board president nigro superintendent reichman assistant superintendent rutt members of the board and the asdd community provided to each of you is a financial report that was presented to the finance committee based on data as of july 31 2020 for comparative purposes the reports also show data as of july 31 2019.

updates are expected in october while we still continue to wait and get our answers on what we don't know related to our finances we will continue to focus on ensuring that the budget adequately funds our operations and meets the needs of the agency to include developing the effective mitigation strategies as well as exploring new opportunities similar to last year the budget was constructed with reserves to meet unforeseen contingencies and or anticipated opportunities that may arise throughout the school year so those were just some informational items i wanted to give updates on if there's no questions or comments at this point i will just provide a brief summary on the financial reports that were provided to the finance committee as well as to you all previously to today uh for comparative purposes the reports also as i mentioned before do show data as of july 31 2019 as referenced on page one as of august 1 2020 there were 530.37 full time equivalents that were filled and 76 vacant positions as of august 1st 2020 we had 2117 students this time last year there were 20 excuse me 2054 students so a little bit more last year at this time we're still continuing to monitor enrollment for september um but you'll be able to see the details for the august first enrollment comparing both years on the bottom of pages one and two of the report page three begins the financial summary um and what i've done is just compare last year to prior year our collected revenues is 51 compared to 35 000 last year uh which is a little bit about 86 000 primarily from the decline in the medicaid as well as the e-rate revenues that we've received thus far for 2021.

welcome everybody thank you for joining us um Maribel can you please take roll today is a regular board meeting of September 10th 2020 at 5 30 pm members of the born attendance Ronald here vice president member Linda Chavez present and this meeting is being recorded remember presence okay thank you everybody so we have a quorum and as was mentioned tonight's meeting is being recorded um as we I think last month may have been the first month that we requested this but for everybody as you participate tonight in the zoom session if you'll notice at the bottom of your Zoom screen there's a little what looks like a globe um kind of on the bottom right hand side and you'll need to click on that I'm sorry um I'm gonna have Mr Tripoli actually explain this in English and Spanish uh sorry Mr Tripoli I forgot I was going to call you on for that so go ahead foreign thank you Mr Tripoli thank you um okay and as we have been doing in recent months your ability to participate in public comment will be via the zoom raise hand function similar to how we've been doing it in the past several months anything new on that Mr Gill or does that sound accurate for the public oh that's effort okay thank you very much so with those things I believe that's what the the pleasantries out of the way we can go ahead and start with our Pledge of Allegiance so if you're able to stand at this time you can stand and join us or if you can find by your microphone or whatever it may be you can stay seated but please join me in the Pledge of Allegiance I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States and to the Republican which it stands one nation one nation under God indivisions liberty and justice okay thank you very much okay so we will go ahead and get started with um item 1.02 any modifications to the agenda for tonight I have not received any requests um and they do not see any hand raise Quintero I know you mentioned you're having some bandwidth issues tonight so I will be looking for your little um hand raised symbol to to see whether or not you have something I don't see anything now so that's it for me thanks okay I'll keep an eye on you but if I don't if you have something to say and I don't see you also first trustee Marquez as your cam can't during the time your camera is off um same thing I'll keep an eye but if I don't see you please um just just speak up and request to be um given the floor trustee Chavez yes I'm having the same thing my my screen is sliced in half and I have a cloud on the left hand side so I'm having bandwidth issues too okay but I guess mine's my comment goes for everybody and trustee hopefully I'm not having issues tonight but um I wanted to actually move 609 uh before 6.09 before 601 okay any other uh any other modifications to the agenda yes I do I'd like to move up 610 chapter 302 after 302 okay 16.

deltera will stay what has both attraction manager and program manager for the project which plays them in a position to Super supervise their own work that was a decision made by the previous board majority war was a sign of as complete and acceptable by Louis Moran the district's format director of the bonds and Facilities uh before we go further I want to take a moment to thank colvera and the rest of the District staff the brought this issue to our attention with honestly integrity and Condor of facilities are conducted or or facilitated or visit that that took uh um courage because what we saw there was not pretty um can we go to yeah uh the installation was very poorly done there where there are visible gaps in the dark work coolant is leaking from the units through the ceiling tiles in the classrooms the units in the classrooms no longer could acquirely do it to coolant leaking there is a 10-year warranty of the system from the manufacturer but that District can't exercise the warranty with a vendor until the installation problem are corrected however the soup contractor the Terra hire to do the installation when out of business shortly after that in the meantime teachers use a portable heaters and fans uh to try to keep classrooms comfortable to uh children's to learn and um can we go to the next line yeah alucha the hbac system installed in the cafeteria is too small for the square footage of the space um Alison can you go and and uh share our dorses torsa yeah so dorsa had HVAC systems installed in the summer of 2017 and all of its wings and again deltera real estate was both the construction manager and the program manager for the project which placed them in a position to supervise their own work this was a decision made by the previous board majority of Esau Herrera con Tran and Dolores Marquez work was signed off as complete and acceptable by Louis Moran the district's former director of bonds and Facilities the HVAC systems again are leaking coolant you can see the leakage coming through the ceiling here at the edge of the ceiling tiles in all 20 classrooms at the school many pipe connections were not to code pipes were hung with zip ties instead of the required metal straps so the edge of the zip ties cut through the pipe insulation at dorsa just like at Lucha the HVAC system was installed in the cafeteria is too small for the square footage of the space so it doesn't adequately cool the room So Not only was the installation poorly done but the choice of what to put in the building in the first place was poorly done and this is the work that the district paid for in July the Los Angeles Times reported that the CEO of deltera real estate who did that work Luis Rojas has been charged with making illegal campaign contributions to a school board candidate in Southern California and 2015 and 2016 and he surrendered to authorities there following those campaign contributions deltera went on to be rewarded with more than 13 and a half million dollars worth of business in that Southern California School District in Montebello what our district is dealing with now is a direct result of what was at best a highly irresponsible decision by the previous board majority in failing to end the contracts with a company that did poor quality work and repeatedly displayed unethical and illegal Behavior the cboc along with many others in our community state and local lawmakers and Auditors asked and then demanded that the previous board majority end the district's contracts with deltera over and over again that board majority refused and defended deltera's contracts I want to acknowledge that two of the three board members who voted to keep deltera are not on the board anymore but it's critical that the board and the district continue to move forward more responsibly so now what can the district do about the faulty HVAC systems the subcontractor who installed them has gone out of business the manufacturer of the HVAC system won't honor the 10-year system warranty since it was never properly installed to begin with deltera real estate it was both construction manager and program manager for this project does not accept responsibility the HVAC systems must be repaired while schools are closed and there may be legal recourse against the construction manager and program manager so that is something that the district is currently pursuing and can't really speak further about at this point so the former moxa building sits adjacent to the Massa Middle School on Sinclair Avenue the land was leased from the district and the building was built by Maxa the Mexican-American Community Services Agency the building holds classrooms Clinic rooms a commercial kitchen meeting spaces a large Central Courtyard and a basketball gym and 2016 Maxa collapsed and the building reverted to the district it was vandalized almost immediately there are about 70 broken windows all of the copper wire was stripped out of the electrical room and security cameras were stolen however the scope of work analysis the district has had done previously shows that the building is structurally sound it holds a truly incredible collection of community art that tells some of the history of the people who live in our neighborhoods the space could provide many opportunities for recreation learning and services for this underserved neighborhood the board must make decisions about what to do with the building and floor will tell you more about a building that's been very special to the Alum Rock Community to share with you some um before and after photos so you can see how the building used to be used and how it looks today I remember participating in two events here one was a conference with the janitors Union and the other band a native Indian Powwow I remember when we had a red truck in the courtyard sorry in the courtyard uh with an old Elder with a conversation of history and wisdom from our ancestors can you go to the next slide in the courtyard you see uh on the right on the left on 2015 you see a picture of 2015.

our most recent finance committee meeting was held yesterday on september 6th with board members manali ann gordon and superintendent reichman the meanins of the meeting have been included with today's consent agenda items in summary we reviewed and discussed the budgetary and fiscal year budget to actual comparison reports the available cash balance the grant revenues and expenditures report and reviewed student enrollment as of august 1st 2020 and compared to august 1st 2019. before i begin summarizing the fiscal data i would like to inform everyone that the agency's fiscal year 2022 budget submission package was successfully submitted to the governor's office of strategic planning and budgeting last week the submission comprised of our operating budget request totaling 59.2 million dollars federal funds grants information totaling 3.4 million and the five-year strategic plan i would like to give kudos to the budget team as they have played a tremendous role in implementing new processes for budgeting across the agency as well as utilizing financial methodologies to determine fiscal needs the process also aided in the development and recent submission of our annual budget package to ospb ongoing efforts will be made to analyze specific programs in order to improve both effectiveness and efficiencies and i will continue to provide support as we develop our agency's strategic plan so we can ensure that our fiscal and operational resources are aligned with the plan now that the school year has started oh sorry about that now that the school year has started our vouchering team along with the campus and the regional cooperatives working with the data registrars have begun with the home school districts to begin vouchering our students so that we can in turn receive the associated revenues for our enrolled students there have been a few hiccups though i must admit due to the recent changes abe has been uh made but we are working through them so hopefully we can start to receive those voucher revenues within the next few weeks with several months into the kova 19 pandemic though it still is difficult for me to really draw some conclusions about the potential impact to our operations for the year especially since we are new into the school year we're continuing to have everyone think about how to spend less and continuing to try to implement the cost saving initiatives where we can look at other available sources to use unfortunately a lot of covid 19 related expenses have not qualified for reimbursement as the federal government has been more focused on agencies that are more impact by the pandemic such as the hospitals police health and social services etc as such though our general fund has been impacted by these costs in addition to monitoring our spend we're also looking at our revenues which is mostly tied to enrollment if enrollment declines and our revenues will also but if our enrollment does increase our revenues will increase since jlbc is still projecting a shortfall of 62 million dollars for fiscal 2021 based on the gene fiscal reports there are possibilities that the agencies may see some reductions to our general fund appropriations to help offset the state's projected shortfall jlbc and our ospb staff have indicated that there are still a lot of questions and concerns about the revenue shortfall for the state for fiscal year 2021.

total expenditures have decreased though slightly by about 91 000 mainly due to the decrease in payroll and other operating expenditures payroll has decreased slightly due to the decision to not pay employees for work performed for work not performed until the start of the school year so that has helped a little bit as a result of the coven 19 pandemic other operating expenses have also decreased due to the timing of our electricity payment we didn't make that until august although expenditures are showing a slight decline from last year to this year we do have some expenditures that were not originally budgeted for as i mentioned before for example covert related items but funding is being provided to respond to the pandemic where we're ensuring i believe mr duff did indicate where ensuring ppe is provided such as face coverings humanity shields are being provided as well as making sure that the needs and safety of our students teachers and staff are being met this also includes improving the use of education technology and supporting the distance learning similar to what um mr creasy has talked about as illustrated on the budget status report on page nine you can actually see though we are showing a deficit for budget fiscal year 2021.

3.02 okay any other modifications all right so see none I will we'll go ahead with those and again if I happen to Overlook those as we progress please remind me if I'm if I forget to make those switches but I'll I'll keep an eye and try to make sure I remember can you give me the order please I kind of didn't hear it 609 before 601 and 6.10 after 3.02 after what 3.02 correct okay um sorry so it's going to go 302 6 10 then 609 no no no 609 directly F before 601 and 610 directly after 3.02 okay thank you okay thank you all right so we can move forward to item 2.01 public hearing Gan limit calculations uh Mr so Mr Ruiz can I open the hearing for all of the items um at once or do I need to open each one individually there's items 2.1 through 2.03 stake of order um you might want to just open one at a time because I believe 2.02 is a presentation as well as the hearing on the um on the lcap okay okay so I will open item 2.01 public hearing again limit calculations um Mr Gill do we have any public comment on 2.01 none okay um is there any questions or comments from the board on 2.01 okay and so I'll just close these all at the end Mr Ruiz yeah yes okay I'll close them at the end of the meeting so we will move to item 2.02 presentation and public hearing on the 2020-21 draft learning continuity and attendance plan um I believe I'll pass it to Dr Bauer thank you for president I'm going to be passing it on to Miss Sandra Garcia who has a presentation and just please um open the public hearing right after that okay thank you hi can I share my screen please um superintendent Dr Bauer and members of the board and the community my name is Sandra Garcia and I'm the director of state and federal programs and this evening I am going to present information on our learning continuity and attendance plan the first draft of this plan so in order to begin I would like to share some background on the learning what the learning continuity plan is um in the past we have been asked to update um the lcap which is the local accountability control plan on an annual basis and if you remember this summer I explained to you that um the state was looking at um a different plan for us to implement this school year for one year and this is what we have been asked to do and the name of the plan is the learning continuity and attendance plan so for the 2021 2020 2021 school year the local control accountability plan which was to be due in December is now replaced with the learning continuity and attendance plan this plan is to be approved by the school board by September 30th 2020 to be in compliance with the law so this evening I am going to be presenting a summary of how our district will provide continuity of learning and address the impact of covid-19 on our pupils families and staff I'll begin with an overview of our initial plans the plan um if you've taken a look at it is broken into uh buckets the first bucket is the continuity of learning bucket within this bucket we have uh distance learning and in in this area of the plan we share information on the logistics of our distance learning program including device access daily instructional minutes by grade level guidelines for attendance and Grading and communication platforms that we will be using during this distance learning time the second part of this bucket is devices and connectivity the section of the plan discusses the way in which we will provide devices and connectivity required to connect to online classes all students that needed a device and or needed for this year a device and hotspot have received either an iPad if they're in TK in Kinder or a laptop or Chromebook for students in first through eighth grade uh all students that needed a hot spot to connect to their online classes have been provided a hot spot in addition Jeopardy of nine taking these days extended their tech support until 7 pm on weekdays and ten to four on weekends the port um tech support is offered in English Spanish and Vietnamese the next part of this bucket is professional development and in this section we are to summarize the various professional development opportunities for staff including curriculum-based trainings as well as trainings on the use of the various platforms and tools that we will be using for online instruction people learning loss is another area that needs to be addressed in this part of the plan and um the the plan addresses the need to assess pupil learning loss and develop a plan to intervene for students showing gaps in learning this section discusses the various ways in which we will assess student performance and monitor their learning throughout the year and check to see for gaps that need to be addressed during the school year with additional interventions the next area of this bucket of continuity of learning is the support for students with unique needs in this area of the plan we are to address how we will provide additional support to our English Learners our displaced families Foster Youth and special ed students and just a couple of the ways that we have uh described in our plan are the the continuation of integrated and designated English language development services within the school day additional programs that support our English language Learners specifically PD continuous PD in this area for our teachers and um our support for displaced families and Foster youth are the support with our schooling Services providers and our counselors they case manage these students to ensure that they have the necessary um materials and supplies and services to be successful in school and some of those are prioritization and after school activities which are being done through distance learning school supplies uniforms tutoring and others our special ed students will continue to be monitored through their IEPs their progress will be adjusted and their progress will be monitored and goals adjusted as needed um so that we can ensure that they meet their goals they are receiving their IEP services to the greatest extent possible through distance learning through synchron synchronous and asynchronous methods and once we return to school we will assess them there I we will assess their learning to see if there needs to be any adjustments in their IEP goals the next bucket that we address in the plan is mental health and wellness and social emotional learning in this area we describe the ways in which we will provide support to our students in the areas of mental health through professional development that our staff has been receiving since the um school closures last March there's continuity in the professional development the site-based counseling services that are offered to our students and families after after hours Crisis Support wellness support and through requests and what we call Wellness Wendy Wednesdays for staff um social emotional learning is addressed through again professional development to help our staff really implement this um these techniques with our students and to make sure that our students are feeling connected not only to their teachers but to their classmates and that their growing and feeling safe and and supported through their classes one of the things that we implemented uh this fall is the morning meeting for all of our students every student begins their day at 9 00 a.m with the morning meeting so that we so that students and teachers and can connect first thing in the morning and start the day on a positive note um and we we feel very strongly that this is going to help children um feel connected to their classroom and their teacher and their and their classmates we've also um some restorative practices in komochis um to help in this area as well the next bucket for the plan is the student and family engagement and Outreach in this area is very similar to what we have in the lcap when it um talks about parent engagement but the other part that's added here is the student engagement how are we going to reach out to student how are we going to keep them engaged and how are we going to reach out to those students that are having a difficult time attending their classes what is our tiered re-engagement plan when we see that a student is not attending their classes it's a very specific plan that it's in tears and there's a different action as students reach a different tier in this plan so it's a very specific plan for re-engaging those students and also for keeping students engaged in their classes by making sure that you know we offer the site-based counseling The Crisis Support and Wellness Resources that they may need to to fill um like they they want to be in school and that they can be and that they're supported for family engagement we'll continue a lot of the things that we have been um doing throughout the years um connecting families through schooling Services through the frcs making sure that they have the support they need um during these challenging times and connecting them with Services when we cannot provide the services ourselves our community Liaisons have been working hard and trying to make sure that our our families are feeling supported and that we're connecting with them and just making sure that that they have the resources needed um during their Outreach calls and home visits um and then offering parent Tech workshops I know our schools have been very busy this month implementing and offering parent Tech workshops for parents who really need the support and and how to use a computer and how to use the technology how to get onto zoom and Google Classroom so that they can also be supportive to their students at home the last bucket is student nutrition and as you know our wonderful CNS department has had a plan in place since the very first day of school closures to offer meal support for our students and we are able to continue that um for our families this fall so that we can offer meal services from 12 of our school locations students will be receiving breakfast lunch and supper daily from 12 locations at our school district and once we get back to on-site we will continue to provide this type of support to our families via grab-and-go models to just ensure safety for everybody so that is the extent of the plan and it like I said it's a first draft and um this public hearing is is an opportunity for me to share what we have done so far in terms of writing this fund developing the plan um to hear from you to to see um your thoughts and um we will be finalizing the plan and bringing it back to the board at a special board meeting before the end of the month so that we can um have this ready to submit to the CDE one thing I also wanted to mention is that we did have a parent survey go out it is the links are posted on our website our District web page so please pens go out and take the survey give us some additional yeah close the door please so we can use for our um final draft of this just FYI your microphone is um not muted right now so we can hear you thank you very much um I appreciate your attention thank you Sandra um let's see I got thrown off there okay so do we have any comments from the public on this Mr Gill you're muted if you're saying something Mr Gill oh so yes um there are public comments okay so um as we've been doing and as per our board bylaws for all of our public comments tonight we will stick with what is in the bylaws which is two minutes for per individual and uh total time per item of 20 minutes that has seemed to work for us on practically no items have we gone past those 20 minutes and we've been able to give everyone their two minutes so we'll continue with that tonight to make sure that we can try to get our meeting done um and as always if you have to to save time and provide time for other speakers if you have a comment that is similar to a person before you you can always just use your time to ditto or second or support the person that spoke before you um but you can use your time however you wish so that being said who is the first person is Brenda zendejos before you get started I just want to um put out a reminder there's been a few times when profanity has been caught on the microphone so this is just a reminder to you and to the public that your microphones May remain open and unmuted a few seconds beyond your speaking time but miss and that has Please be aware of that yes thank you what type of language is inappropriate for these meetings so when you begin speaking your two minutes will begin yeah thank you I don't I believe that was not me but thank you for the reminder um I had a question um just a quick question about the survey I know that it's posted on the arusd website will this survey be linked through parent square and seesaw and other applications that parents are using with the students and how many uh schools are using the kimochis I really like that I I'm just curious um if we can get uh maybe more schools included with the kimochis because I think that's a really great idea for students with um to voice their emotions and stuff like that but uh that's my only comment on that and thank you so much Sandra and thank you everybody on the board thank you next person Mr Gill Veronica hey Veronica when you begin speaking your two minutes we'll begin great thank you so much Ford um again my name is Veronica um and I do want to thank beforehand uh Sandra and her team I think they did an amazing job with the presentation and thank you for presenting it um my only feedback and I think is something that I have talked already I believe rotunda is that um I was able to attend the Spanish one and we had over 200 participants and we were not able to get through all of the questions which was it was reasonable because there were so many participants we want to see and I know Sandra mentioned this is a first draft but um I would definitely love if we can have something ongoing for families to participate even more often now um you know as the whole district and as a at schools as well because I know some schools are doing it but um just as a whole District just to make sure that all of our schools are coherently doing or are within similar range um because that's what I've noticed some discrepancies here and there but thank thank you Sandra again and would I I'm really excited and want to see more and wanted to see more parents being able to participate as a whole thank you thank you Mr Gill next person uh if I could just remind I don't know which microphone is open but I did make the the reminder just a few minutes ago about profanity so everybody Please be aware that there is the potential for your microphone to be open and this is a meeting that's appropriate for families for children for students and profane language is not appropriate for this meeting so I would ask that everyone Please be aware of that and and very conscious of the language that you use thank you very much and sorry for the interruption who was the next person Mr Gill yes when you begin speaking your two minutes will begin members of the board my name is I just want to echoa Veronica said um I would like to um um to give my props to Sandra Garcia and to the whole staff for this amazing Zoom meeting that it was done um two weeks ago I believe Ferris film were included they were more um rooms divisions where parents could talk and actually give their feedback um also to the amazing staff that was able to follow directions let everybody raise their hands and and also Echo what they would like to see in this continuity plan I would like to also say that there wasn't enough time unfortunately there's not really enough time to go through the whole questions and through the whole items that we wanted to talk to but other than that I really like to see that we had teachers we had um other other kind of Staff we have principals and we have parents and Community giving their input and um just thank you for for that and thank you for making changes that always favors that community and the way that we engage so have a really good night thank you next person Mr Gill de Leon Miss de Leon when you begin speaking your two minutes will begin hi good evening everyone my name is flor de Leon I am a part of this on on the district and also our community organizer and um I unfortunately I was not part of uh of um of these uh events that happened with uh getting the uh input from the community I was on vacation and I just came back this week and I haven't even had time to review it and I know that today is a day to give the input and I know we also aware that uh it's gonna be a proof it's just a draft this is why did you have to speak I'm sorry can you hear me yes we can hear you there's someone's microphone again open Mr Gill um can we do our best to make sure uh don't worry yeah your time I'm gonna we'll make up for that but Mr Gill if we could just I know there's a lot to keep an eye on but um if we can keep an eye on those microphones because this thing seems like we have a lot of uh a lot of chatter tonight for some reason with open microphone so thank you and and um Miss de Leon you can continue speaking and I know you have some time still yeah but are you taking away my time because no the time ran down no okay so I I I'm probably not gonna use the whole time but I just wanted to say that um uh that I will love that uh sometimes uh that the district gives more time to do these things because I think the first time I hear uh it was on Thursday and sometimes I know there is a lot of things going on that we have to be uh doing at work and I would like to see there is more time uh for having uh time to meet up with uh the community you know and not only let uh Sandra by herself uh been able to to draft everything and I know that part of those uh forums or time or meeting that you had was to get input from the people but I always hear that there is not not always enough time you know and I think we need to make sure we always provide time in advance and recruit people and maybe that's why it's good to have an an oversight committee that can help uh and and be ready and with people that is experts you know people that is experts like teachers principals like we want to have a group of different uh backgrounds so that way we can make better decisions but thank you very much and I will uh definitely review it and also give my input and send it to Dr Bauer through an email thank you thank you next person Mr Gill none okay thank you very much so trustee Chavez I did see your hand up and I see trustee after that I want to thank God I want to thank Sandra for the presentation it was very clear and concise and I also wanna uh thank all of the speakers Veronica Brenda ditza Floyd that also uh asked the same questions that I did and I was just uh I had asked Dr Bauer when they had uh some of those uh for the parents to to get the the tech um I guess the tech classes up but um I would like to see more advanced notice for the parents to be able to attend those uh classes or just give them some um I guess a little bit more time so they could redo their schedule so it could work for them better thank you thank you trustee yeah um I have a question for Sandra Sandra um in regards to this being a draft and uh the final one eventually coming to us um when do you need feedback by to then have the final one um what's that date is she on maybe uh Dr Bauer maybe you can well I think she's her microphone is muted so Mr Gil can take her off mute do you see her Mr Gill I'm waiting for Sandra to respond she is on mute you might have to mute herself as she's at okay there we go okay um I would like um to have any information by the 21st we have that'll give us the week to finalize the draft will start working on the final draft right away but yeah if I can have any comments by the 21st that would be great okay um and then I just uh you know wanted to ask you that to clarify um so just reminding all parents to send any information to Sandra as our you know as our superintendent gets a lot of information so if you have anything in relation to this please send it to Sandra um and then I did talk to Dr Robert yesterday about the uh technical aspect of the plan um and so uh basically I was wondering in regards to our students and um not being able to connect um I I've gotten you know we've gotten some feedback that there's certain areas that get kicked out a lot more than others depending on the uh company that they have um so just you know focusing around that and I I don't know that the specifics this is a place for specifics of that um but I just wanted to you know see and and talk a little bit more about that Sandra so I'll connect with you later thank you sounds good thank you president yes I'd like to have some clarifications from Mrs Garcia okay go ahead um Sandra this is um in regards to the mental health um you were as you were reading them out I was wondering um the site-based counseling um can you explain what the counseling is going to be about when you say site-based counseling we have counselors um we have counselors and or counselor interns at every site in our district and that's by uh referral and they have been able to support students um based on their caseload so we are not talking academic counselors we are talking counselors at um our families or our students need you know need help with yes we have we have counseling mental health counseling mental health counseling I think that's um that's what I needed on there to see to identify what kind of counseling counselors we're going to be using um and so if we can this is a draft we can somehow change this you know or add site counts you have side-based counseling you can put mental counseling or well however you want to identify it um I have also um a question uh if you have any idea how many of the parents um to has taken that parent Tech workshops you know on relevant topics and supporting um during the school closures um but also we also started giving the parents um some you know uh yeah training on you know getting getting this distant learning down about how many parents have we reached here in Alum Rock so far that's a really good question and I don't have exact numbers for you but I definitely can um get those numbers and I can have Dr Bauer share them with you I do know that every school is working on um getting some workshops together for parents some have already started and we've had great reviews on how much support that has provided our families but I can get some numbers for you okay great and if if we can uh talk to our principals to reassure the parents that we're not able to be when they were being given at their site that they will have another opportunity I don't want the parents saying nope would I eat I couldn't go because I was I got off of work late or for whatever reason I wasn't able to be there um if we can reassure them that you know because they didn't make it on the day they were offering it that perhaps you know we can get that kind of support for them somehow okay thank you can I uh piggyback or just add on to that or I guess ask for clarification um Miss Garcia so I think I read the I believe in the packet that um that actually some of the schools their their trainings have are available um either on YouTube or or I guess I think YouTube primarily but many of the schools do have those trainings available even if they missed the the live training is that is that accurate wonderful principles are getting very creative with this they are recording their Zoom sessions they're recording some of them are recording their live sessions and they are they are putting them on YouTube and uh for other parents to access yes and I think that's um I mean I think that is a good idea I think the a live training and a YouTube kind of after the fact training are a little bit different but for people even for people that did attend in in person I think those YouTube or whatever they are um recorded versions are helpful sometimes to kind of review because you don't always remember what you got or what you did in the live version so I think it's helpful in that way and then it's helpful for those until there's another date potentially for another live training that they can at least try to get on and get the the basics of it so um you know I would just definitely support as trustee Marquez said the principal is kind of championing that that model of the recorded versions and making sure that parents are aware of that those are available to them as well um your helpful resource is RIT department has put together a list of resources for online videos as well um just basic how to how to get log onto a computer you know how to use and how to use Google Classroom so those are all resources for our families as well thank you any other questions or comments from the board trustee challenge um that be posted to the Alum Rock website that it the uh what the IT department did so that way they could go to those links if they need extra help please they are posted on our website oh thank you yes uh yeah I just had a couple comments and I want to acknowledge the hard work for our staff uh and um all the work that has been going into making sure that this reopening plan um is able to provide access to all of our students um particularly I want to thank the the technology component of providing those hot spots uh some of the comments that have been made make it seem as if there's you know people are not able to access and that's not the case uh here at Alum Rock if you if you need a device if you need a hot spot it's available so very grateful and thankful for that um I personally have been able to observe the Outreach by my children's School we've been inundated with um text messages emails um if somebody does not want to participate it's because they've had to forcibly delete those emails or the text messages because we've received plenty I'm on the district website and I'm able to see that on the main page there's access to um the information about reopening as well as uh access to that survey so thank you for all the work that's being done by our great staff to uh go ahead and connect our students and provide access to um in this education that they're entitled to um I I was uh I'm sorry trustee sorry so sorry trusty Quintero can I just briefly interrupt Dr Bauer needs to it's time right now right Dr Bauer Dr Bauer needs to step away for about a half hour she's um congratulations are in order to her she's receiving an award this evening and um I think it was originally on a different date but they had to reschedule and so it's in the middle of our board meeting so she will be stepping away but congratulations and maybe you can later on you could tell us a little bit about it when you come back but I believe Mr Sanchez will be in your place okay so thank you and enjoy your your award and sorry trusty Quintero I just I know she had to leave right now so no no thanks for clarifying that um I would have thought that she was born out of her mind for my commented taking off for that reason no I'm just kidding no but no and just in general thank you all for the work that everybody's been doing um and the Outreach uh to the stakeholders of the district making sure that there's an opportunity before the stakeholders do me involved I think that's very very important that the opportunities are there I know that our staff does go out of its way to go out there and encourage participation there's unfortunately only so much you can do and so very appreciative of the efforts that you do put forth to make sure that people have the opportunity and the Outreach that we do get tends to be above industry standard in terms of surveys and participation you do get out there so kudos for that work that you're doing obviously we want to get 100 but um you know thank you for the work that you're doing so those are my comments president thank you I actually would would like to pretty much Echo everything that trusty Quintero has just said I I agree I think that um as we've talked about on many occasions prior to this we are all learning we continue to learn through this process and we're learning some very significant things about our processes things that work things that need Improvement um parents are learning new things I mean we're stepping into a whole new world and you don't just flip a switch and move into this whole new reality overnight and so it's an ongoing process and I think we are doing very intentional and thoughtful work in that direction and you know there's always room for improvement for all of us I did want to ask just a few questions one on on page eight at the bottom of the um the like the Matrix not the PowerPoint presentation it's the other document that we received it's in the pupil participation and progress section and it talks about a report that will be available to to uh where did it go um there's a report about student participation the um during synchronous and asynchronous instruction and so I was just wondering that report do we have yet the the process or or the frequency or any information about how the board or or that report will be um available or just any general information about that I know as I just mentioned this is learning a whole new thing and and tracking of of the with the weekly log is is a can be a beast potentially to get that going but we do need to see what that participation is looking like so what will that report look like you're referring to the student engagement log I believe uh yes I believe that well and I I think Mr Sanchez could talk more to that but uh it is an engagement log that teachers will be asked to monitor um engagement in various ways um you know for students so we I believe it was just rolled out this week so um some training probably needs to be done on that but we will be implementing that very soon and it is a requirement that we have to um to take note of how much engagement we're having and how we're reaching out to students that aren't engaging in their classes so if I can add um the the weekly engagement log has two components to it uh one component is basically outlining the assignments that students are receiving both synchronous and asynchron goodness and the other component is where we capture how students are being engaged right whether they're completing an assignment whether they're doing an assessment whether they weren't able to connect and we had to communicate uh via email with uh the parent or the student and all of these are are part of the requirements from the state so we have been in communication with area trying to come up with a template that makes sense for everybody uh we are looking at using our data management system illuminate and we do have a draft of that we've shared some of that with our principals we're finalizing those details and we will be bringing that uh to the team next week so those are um State requirements where we're trying to make it a seamless process for teachers to be able to capture how students are are engaging and the assignments and the lessons that they're doing both synchronously and asynchronously okay thank you and again recognizing the challenge of this I just want to at least for myself emphasize that for me this this report and and how intentional we are about taking it serious and not just seeing it as like a check the box kind of thing is is very important to me because I think one thing that we know kind of in the professional World about um working from home and that kind of stuff is that communication and engagement especially when you're doing stuff virtually is is important and so I want and for me it's very helpful to see how we're doing with that and where we can where we should continue to do things that are working and improve things that are not um the other question I just had very generally is as I think we know that our County this week has been um upgraded or modified or changed or whatever to a different level um in far in terms of like reopening things and and all of that all of that stuff um and so just the fact that that has happened I'm just wondering as that process potentially continues to to increase and we move closer to some some decisions at the county level about what opening looks like of schools does that in any way impact the draft that we have here or how we're thinking about potential modifications or are we just trying to just get a grasp of the reality as it is right now notice the very first part of the plans speaks to um learning on site so that's when we're out of distance learning and how we return to school so what we had to talk about were the safety protocols that we would use returning to school and then also you know it would be up to um the board and I'm not sure if we would go back to the original plan the 90-10 plan or rolling it out you know some students at a time and definitely making sure that we're following the guidelines from the county okay perfect thank you very much everyone are there any other comments or questions from the board trustee Chavez uh I was in that meeting yesterday with scoey and one of the things that they said that yes we moved from purple to red but one of the worst things that you can do is also open up and then have to close the school again so that's something that we need to consider as well how soon we should open once we do get the green light thank you and even even if the county does start opening up schools it would be to depending on the County Health Department um based on the the area of the county that we live in if I can make one more comment I just wanted to make sure I recognize all of my colleagues um at the district office because there's no way I could have written this plan on my own um in the short amount of time that we had and I had to go to the experts and definitely reach out to them and say we need to write this together and they came forward and helped me get it done so I just really want to thank them and give them credit for supporting with this and also for our um our input sessions so thank you thank you everybody so we'll leave this item this hearing open to the end of the meeting as well and we'll move on to item 2.03 public hearing regarding sufficiency of instructional materials is there any public comment on this item Mr Gill no okay thank you so this so just so that we'll move on to 3.01 but just so the public knows at any point during the meeting until we close the hearing you can during public comment you can make a comment on any of these three items that's correct right Mr Mr Ruiz okay okay so we will move on to item 3.01 presentation of the citizens Bond oversight committee school size visits and information only item um is it missing galani that that we'll be presenting and if so does she have access to the screen I do okay one moment whenever you're ready um you can go ahead with your presentation all right can we see that yes thank you so good evening community members superintendent Dr Bauer who has actually left sorry about that Educators staff and trustees my name is Allison singalani I'm the proud parent of two arusd middle schoolers and the chair of the citizens Bond oversight committee we'd like to share with the community the School site visit we conducted late last year so what is the citizens Bond oversight committee when voters approve Bond measures to pay for repairs and improvements that our schools need California's prop 39 requires that a cboc be formed the cbic actively reviews and reports on the way that taxpayers money is spent for school construction to make sure that the bond funds are spent the way the voters approved when they pass the bond measure the cboc is accountable to the public we are not under the authority of the arusd board or District the cboc's purpose is oversight of the bond program transparency and communication with the public about Bond expenditures we do not have authority to choose or prioritize or direct Bond projects we're not the decision makers we're here to empower the community with the information you need to fully participate and also to hold our elected officials accountable the state law requires a committee of at least seven volunteer community members required by law to look at the way the bond money is spent and report that back to the public to make sure committee members represent different parts of the community the law requires that the cbse has a member of a business organization a parent of an arusd student who's also a member of a parent organization a member of a taxpayers organization a member of a senior citizens organization a parent of an arusd student and two at-large community members District staff provide Technical and administrative assistance to our committee the cboc does not currently have a limit on the number of members Beyond those required by law and we're always accepting applications for membership applications are available in Spanish and in English on the arusd website and um and community members with experience and construction accounting bookkeeping working with contractors or any related fields are especially encouraged to apply we would love to have you join us Fleur de Leon will share the next portion of the presentation with you thank you uh let's see if she unmuted I don't oh yeah she is whenever you're ready Miss de Leon it looks like you're your microphone is ready to go and I guess camera oh there we go yeah um uh good evening again my name is flor de Leon I also part of the oversight committee on November 2019 members of the of the oversight committee um we visited um uh three School sites uh The District staff uh help us with that so Lucha and Foreman Maxwell building um and and the one that is a maxim middle school and dorsa so uh we wanted to see some of the work that have been done with the bonds money we also wanted to see the max the building which was built and operated but the Mexican-American Community Services Agency on land of um of the district and um and when matzah collapsed in 2016 the land um and the building revert to the district who now must decide what to do with it can we go to the next slide uh thank you both Lucha and dorsa had installed uh HB AC systems installing the summer of 2017.

uh where the community is having an event on the right you see an emptin abandoned useless building during the date of the BC as soon as we open the doors of maps that a couple of neighborhood kids I showed up and use the space and that tells you that our kids and communities the space to be open again the community around maths that needs uh more Community Open Spaces can we go to the next one here you see a picture of um 2015 on the left and at 2019 one of the pictures in 2015 you see a group of kids uh doing sports and on the right you see the same mural well preserved can we go to the next one so much beautiful art it is really speaks to the power of the art that as much as vandalize has been done here the r remains almost entirely intact even the bundles can feel to can feel in strained and Power can we go to the next one right here you see all the pieces of art the pictures remind of resilience to be disappeared uh let's go to the next one I don't see them yeah so it is so disappointed that our kids and your Generations in our community are missing the opportunity to see and use this space um can we move to the other one here you see a vandalized part of the mural and it looks like he's uh uh Dolores uh Huerta next one please another picture in the hallway that's that's the hallway with more murals those people you see on the picture are members of the oversight committee and the staff from the district that make the school beats it possible and accessible next one some rooms are frozen in time the picture of the uh in the middle of the computer is a picture of the main entrance the reception area the pictures on the left is a conference room uh and the one on the right is the dining room of the kitchen it is so fortunate to see this space have not been used by the community at some point uh it felt like all you needed to do was to clean the place up and put it back in service and the last picture but so much bandel is too you you can see where all the copper wires have been uh striped um out of the electrical room graffiti garbage paper paint this is the last picture of the presentation and I ask you all to erase this picture from your memories and try to imagine a an image for the future an image where these community centers upper opens its doors again and uh last uh Alison will conclude our presentation Alison the board must decide how best to use the former moxa building and preserve its community art the last bid the district received for the cost of refurbishing the building and repairing the damage was more than nine million dollars so this is not a decision to be taken lightly but this would be an incredibly valuable not only preservation of this beautiful community art but also a real value to the community the years ahead are going to hold a lot of financial challenges that the pandemic has worsened our Alamo Community is going to face a lot of competing priorities and the economy is going to make meeting these needs a challenge Above All Else the community's money must be spent wisely in ways that benefit our students Educators in the future of Alum Rock schools this board has two seats up for election in November and we as a community will need to make wise choices about who we trust to make decisions that place our students and Families First our arusd community works best together we hope that you'll join us we need parents families and community members to be involved in making decisions we need strong ethical board governance that is focused on students and responsive to the needs of the community thank you that concludes our presentation thank you miss singolani and miss de Leon before we go any further I just want to recognize not only the work of the committee but very clearly the passion um you know as a community we obviously we don't always degree agree on on the direction that we go or the decisions that we make but I think the Common Thread that that unites us is is for the most part is the passion that we all have for what we want for this district and this community and uh you know I acknowledge that very clearly in Miss de Leon's presentation and and also miss singulani I know to be very passionate as a parent and as the the leader of this Committee in their work to to try to get this done so before anything else um Mr Gill so again thank you both um ladies for the presentation Mr Gill do we have any public comment on this item none okay um so uh trustees do you have any questions or comments regarding the presentation and trustee Quintero I'm not sure if that is a request for a comment then you can go ahead and go we'll start doing double duty there uh you know thumbs up to the presentation as well as okay as requesting to speak um I first of all I want to thank uh the committee for the work that you do uh and uh in in this capacity of being an oversight committee for the bond program thank you for that I also want to recognize the presidents of the rasa Historical Society there at that visit I I think I saw a board member of the Russia Jose Dr Ramon Martinez in those pictures and so it's great to see this collaborative effort of trying to catalog uh the artwork that's out there in our community um and I I completely understand the passion that um that some of the board some of the presenters exhibited uh you know it definitely hurts to see the building in the state that it's in um unfortunately it was far from a quick uh paint job in a fix-up um I I used to go to those meetings as a staffer uh for um for um County supervisor shirakawa and Chavez and uh and actually that's where I first met Karina all right we were in a breakout session for uh mayor's guide prevention task force meeting and uh you could actually smell the unfortunate uh you know it was not being kept up well you could smell that there was a there had been some leakage of pipes unfortunately in the location and so um there was a lot of deferred maintenance so when you see that number it speaks to that unfortunately those last years of the organization that was holding on to the building were not its best and they were not in a position to fix up to do proper maintenance to the building so uh with that being said I I want to express my support towards making sure that that building is a is an asset for our students for our community um I know that we were looking to build uh gyms while we already have access to one there and so it is my desire to see that that is a facility that's available to our kids here in Alum Rock and so um thank you for all your work once again and then those are my comments thank you trustee Herrera Loretta and then trustee Marcus disappeared I'm assuming she had a comment she was asking to be unmuted so potentially after you will go with trustee Marquez go ahead trustee yeah thank you so much uh Alison Floyd and the rest of the committee um for doing the work for you know working so diligently to bring this information to us um you know floor in regards to your emotions I'm there with you you know I spent a lot of healing moments there um with children with youth with parents and Community um and you know as as uh Andres mentioned with elected officials as well coming together to make our community better so I look forward to you know having that you know come about again um and as Alison mentioned you know nine million dollars is a lot of money and we get to figure it out right um if we don't have those conversations soon enough then you know we'll never get there but we get to make that happen and so um we get to figure it out and we get to um open those doors again um in a creative way uh and you know I know that we've talked about having public hearings you know special meetings where we can really spend the time um that it's is needed you know we we get emails all the time we get phone calls all the all the time of people that have ideas for this um site you know very good ideas and we all have great ideas for the site and I think we need to come together and hear one you know one another out um and then also see the plans you know the night not just the 9 million dollars to open it uh but then the money to sustain it right to keep it going for future Generations um so that it never sees you know um a time like it is now and so I look forward to being a part of you know a leader in this and making that happen um and opening it up you know as soon as possible and with you know the right um infrastructure in place so that we can continue to have it open um and so you know I I know we've talked about having those uh public um special board meetings uh I know it's a public hearing um and we get to we get to hear you know we get to hear the people and um you know the ideas that are that are in place to then pick the best idea for our children and our community here in Alum Rock um you know and think of us first uh right um unfortunately you know I think of buildings or spaces that we've kind of let go and so this cannot be one of those we need to keep it in our community we need to keep it in our district and so I look forward to uh being a part of that thank you Allison and Flor for keeping an eye on it along with the committee um and I look forward to continuing to support um your work thank you trustee Marquez did you have a comment I did but I think I'll just wait until um you know what um the board members will be making their comments and stuff later on too okay I'll just wait okay any other questions or comments from the board okay I I just a couple comments that I wanted to make um is number one I think to me one of the the key points of the presentation um is is kind of the well we talked about the nine million dollars for Maxa but it's not only that it's obviously the repairs at the schools that were mentioned tonight and all of the other um facilities challenges that that we have because of the things that have occurred in the past because of the decisions that have been made and because of the external challenges in the world that we don't have any control over but that being said those are all the fact the facts that we have to deal with and so I agree with a lot of the comments that have been made and that how we decide to use the Maxa facility and whatever that process looks like it's going to need to be very strategic and very future oriented as trustee said the sustainability of the of whatever happens there really needs to be at the Forefront because not only the sustainability of that facility but the sustainability of the impact of its use on the remainder of the district so it's a very it's a very large conversation to have and it's a very important conversation but it it all is within a very a big picture of the entire District but I also look forward to that I I do believe that there is a lot of opportu all those challenges being said there's a lot of opportunity for for the community and for the district to to face the challenges that we have and move forward in a electricity in a creative um thoughtful and strategic way so so I look forward to that work but thank you to the committee for again for the hard work the dedication and the passion very clearly evident for for our children here in the district um so with that being said um no it is information only okay so we can move forward to item 3.02 presentation of the fiscal crisis management ficmat team um who am I turning it over first Dr Bauer to you or do we have Dr Bauer she's back I'm back yes uh I'm gonna turn it over to Mr Chang okay um Avatar if you can unmute Mr John Von flu and Miss Julie o'ville um and also give them the ability to share their screen um they're going to be the ones who will be starting the presentation um then at the end the districts will have a response and then we'll have some time for questions thank you actually can you hear me yes yes okay and you can you see uh the beginning of the slideshow screen yes yes excellent okay good evening president barano the members the board the um Alum Rock Community superintendent and staff I'm Julie auville and we also have I also have with me um John bonfu we are both um staff members of thick map the fiscal crisis and management assistance team and we performed a fiscal health risk analysis on the district but before we get into that I wanted to show you uh to talk a little bit about mcmad who we are and why we aim to do this work so we were established back in 1990 by legislation to help local educational agencies Lea comply with fiscal accountability standards we provide management assistance fiscal Crisis Intervention and other services to Lea School District community colleges Charter Schools County offices we are an external independent agency of the state in other words we don't report to anybody at the state we have our own sets of working strategies and that we report next John next slide should be there okay um the 19 18 19 the state budget act uh added a little more prevented service for us to and there are certain conditions that trigger that uh intervention and those five upon yourself uh fiscal health risk analysis to determine the level of risk for fiscal insolvency so next block and John that one that one's yours John um muted good right now on flew okay now I can immute okay sorry about that um so Vic Matt's engagement as triggered by the conditions that Julie just mentioned um built upon the County's oversight the county uh superintendent has oversight um of the fiscal oversight of the district and this process the process of being proactive builds upon that because uh the Department of Finance and the legislature asked us to engage under these conditions uh they've given us some funding to do so and so there is no cost passed on to the county office or to the district for this analysis as stated by Julie that uh the one of the triggers is three consecutive qualifieds well Alum Rock Union School District had qualifieds for the 1718 1819 and 1920 first and second interim reports so six consecutive uh qualified certifications they also had conditionally approved budgets and in 1819 had received a disapproval from the county office in their budget so you might ask why has uh why did we delay so long in engaging with Alum Rock well the county office every time each and every time at the certification I was in contact with the Santa Clara County Office of Ed and they expressed confidence in the district they knew that they were working closely with the district um and uh and you were working closely with them they also had a fiscal advisory team established at the district so while you had six consecutive qualifieds they convinced us to delay our engagement and that's why it took us we didn't engage after three qualifieds um next slide thank you so fikmat developed a little bit about the Tool uh figma developed the fiscal health risk analysis tool based on our 28 years of experience in in different issues that we found uh in districts of risked fiscal insolvency the tool has over 135 questions 137 to be exact in 20 different areas as well as there's a uh 18 of the questions indicate material weakness so are are elevated in weight uh each of the questions are way better weighted and the areas are are based on a high moderate or low risk assessment when we come to the total risk score anything considered over 40 percent is considered high risk moderate risk is between 25 and 39.9 percent and low risk is below 25 percent but I won't also want to point you to uh pages eight and nine of the report and eight and nine of the report there's two different sections a budget and fiscal status section and a material weakness section if you have conditions evident in those areas it will elevate your your score above the percentage level and you'll find that is is uh the issue here with alumra so looking at Alum Rock in particular we visited Julie and I visited the district virtually because of the covid uh pandemic on the first uh four days of June of this year uh we conducted interviews over four days and reviewed various documents and financial reports provided by the districts even after our visit we continued to review and analyze the documents um and our our report identifies a fiscal risk score of 37.2 percent recalling back what that would be on just a score alone was moderate risk however uh the score also identified some issues in the budget and fiscal section again page eight and the material weakness section page the bottom of page eight and nine which elevated the risk to a high risk of fiscal insolvency hopes I'm not getting overviewing the uh the summary of responses I want to remind the district that fitment works on the deficiency reporting method so we we focus in on not all the good things that you're doing but the things that we find as deficient and so with this summary of response and overlooking this I want to draw your attention to the 56 nose deficient areas and in further as we talk about this and look at this looking at the areas such as budget development budget monitoring where there are significant no's in the areas um the certain category areas so budget monitoring and deficiency cash management contributions and transfers area the deficit spending facilities fund balance general fund and non-voter approved yeah we will talk more about talk more about them so with with regard to the report these are the major risk factors the areas within the report that we found to to come to the the Forefront and as you can see by the little uh symbol there there are several of them that came into the material weakness section and the next slides we'll talk about each of those areas so you can get a flavor for what we found So within budget development and adoption we found that this and remember all of these findings are based on the 1920 stack Nano report that point in time okay so that particular report found that the multi-year projection included other adjustments so for the the 1920 year that was about 4 million and 1.7 million in 2021.

updates are expected in october while we still continue to wait and get our answers on what we don't know related to our finances we will continue to focus on ensuring that the budget adequately funds our operations and meets the needs of the agency to include developing the effective mitigation strategies as well as exploring new opportunities similar to last year the budget was constructed with reserves to meet unforeseen contingencies and or anticipated opportunities that may arise throughout the school year so those were just some informational items i wanted to give updates on if there's no questions or comments at this point i will just provide a brief summary on the financial reports that were provided to the finance committee as well as to you all previously to today uh for comparative purposes the reports also as i mentioned before do show data as of july 31 2019 as referenced on page one as of august 1 2020 there were 530.37 full time equivalents that were filled and 76 vacant positions as of august 1st 2020 we had 2117 students this time last year there were 20 excuse me 2054 students so a little bit more last year at this time we're still continuing to monitor enrollment for september um but you'll be able to see the details for the august first enrollment comparing both years on the bottom of pages one and two of the report page three begins the financial summary um and what i've done is just compare last year to prior year our collected revenues is 51 compared to 35 000 last year uh which is a little bit about 86 000 primarily from the decline in the medicaid as well as the e-rate revenues that we've received thus far for 2021.

that deficit right now is showing 2.9 million dollars when you compare actual revenues of 2.1 million to the actual expenditures of 5 million again what that really means i've said it before is that we're our fiscal year ends june 30 2020 so we're having to use our available cash balance although this is not of any particular concern because again typical to the start of the fiscal and budget year we don't begin receiving voucher revenues until mid to late september so as i mentioned it's very important that we receive those voucher revenues within the next couple of weeks last year at this time we did have a deficit of 1.9 and remember again the budget fiscal year begins in july so although the fiscal year begins in july the school year begins in august there's still payroll as well as other operating expenditures that are continuously being incurred as a result of that though i'm still continuing to closely monitor our cash balance as well as making sure that we have a fund available funding sources and that we're trying to use those other funding sources until we receive our revenues we are working on preparing our august monthly updates based on a review of that preliminary financial data there are no immediate material concerns based on what i do know other than what i've indicated previously where we'll continue to monitor our revenues expenditures and cash balances very closely as well as monitoring student enrollment and identifying hopefully if there's no cuts to our general fund appropriations we will continue to plan for uncertainty with budgeting prudence and ensure that our expenditures do not exceed our revenue sources any continued unforeseen needs or requirements created by the kova 19 pandemic will require expenditure reductions across the agency to ensure fiscal solvency if there are no questions on any of the information i presented this really concludes my report for the agency's informational and fiscal data thank you are there any questions for ms from any of the board members and i don't i don't see any thank you thank you um thank you for that report um and i know we'll be closely looking at this especially as we we look at the budget next year and uh see how the agency may have to adapt to um you know to the overall context of the of the state budget uh thank you so that the next item on the agenda then is going to be 7.01 that's information item introduction of possible discussion of policies a c a g b b g c g i h a and k b uh maria murphy miss murphy if you are on the line could you start your video and you may begin i am good afternoon board president nigros superintendent reichman dr rex members of the board my name is maria murphy i'm the director of policy and government relations for asdb you have before you the red line revisions of the policies i did not receive any concerns of the policies that were presented from any of the board members they were posted to the public on the asdb website i did not receive any concerns in regards to the policies presented and with that i would like to make myself available for any questions at this time okay are there any board members that have questions for miss murphy uh seeing none uh thank you thank you okay um as we move to the next item uh 7.04 uh action item approval of strategic plan development works session dates for 2020 uh superintendent eichmann yes um just wanted you to consider um an edition of a work-study session for november 5th at the last board meeting you approve to have work study sessions on september 24th and october 1st we're now adding one more for november 5th so just present it to you the board to determine if you want to add another work study session uh linda yes um i am thinking about hmm one moment here give me a moment at the last um work study session that we had i found it to be kind of less effective than i had expected it to be honestly um i was hoping it to be more collaborative and maybe have more of the discussion um allowing the board members to be involved and not like um the board meeting sessions that we have here so personally i just felt that i don't know during a work study i think the purpose of that maybe we can change the purpose of that and maybe you know have a different approach as far as the board meetings um there's a lot of new things going on we have the pandemic and everything there's a lot of responsibilities and things we need to take care of so i think it's our responsibility just to make sure that we can make it a more collaborative and effective meeting um i'm not sure maybe if we could have you know a focus a complete focus on a specific date this is the interpreter i need to clarify we froze for one moment what date did you say okay so i'm just wondering if we could move the dates um forward um to january just to give us some time to contemplate and to think and to see what thing how things are going and you know to know more about the situation as far as the pandemic it would just to give us you know more time to be prepared to be able to support the school and support the support the leadership team and all of that i think it is critical um you know because we're talking about a plan for five years out just this is just an idea that i'm considering and i wanted to put it out there so that maybe we could kind of push that forward um i mean time is getting quite close and then we had we did approve that but then we did have the pandemic and we do need to think about those individual board members as well and the school staff they've been working so hard trying to take care of everything that's going on all that we've heard tonight i'm so impressed with the wonder creativity and everything that they've all been doing um online learning and the like so i think that we need to kind of pause and take a breath um and just that's that's what i was considering and i'd like to put that out there for the board to consider uh thank you linda and i i see that mark has his hand up as well but uh just to clarify uh linda would you like us to propose that we move that next work study session from november out into january is that is that something that you'd like to see and also uh have an agenda that's a little more open-ended than it was last time is that right yes let me clarify and thank you um for asking that question um i believe the next one is september 24th is that correct that's correct right we have the 24th and then that's what we have let the other ones that we have left in 2020 could we move them on to 2021 and that's what i'm proposing um because we don't have dates for 2021 yet correct uh correct that's going to be our next agenda item for the regular board meetings to discuss those dates [Music] right okay so i would like to move those two extra sessions out to 2021.

deltera will stay what has both attraction manager and program manager for the project which plays them in a position to Super supervise their own work that was a decision made by the previous board majority war was a sign of as complete and acceptable by Louis Moran the district's format director of the bonds and Facilities uh before we go further I want to take a moment to thank colvera and the rest of the District staff the brought this issue to our attention with honestly integrity and Condor of facilities are conducted or or facilitated or visit that that took uh um courage because what we saw there was not pretty um can we go to yeah uh the installation was very poorly done there where there are visible gaps in the dark work coolant is leaking from the units through the ceiling tiles in the classrooms the units in the classrooms no longer could acquirely do it to coolant leaking there is a 10-year warranty of the system from the manufacturer but that District can't exercise the warranty with a vendor until the installation problem are corrected however the soup contractor the Terra hire to do the installation when out of business shortly after that in the meantime teachers use a portable heaters and fans uh to try to keep classrooms comfortable to uh children's to learn and um can we go to the next line yeah alucha the hbac system installed in the cafeteria is too small for the square footage of the space um Alison can you go and and uh share our dorses torsa yeah so dorsa had HVAC systems installed in the summer of 2017 and all of its wings and again deltera real estate was both the construction manager and the program manager for the project which placed them in a position to supervise their own work this was a decision made by the previous board majority of Esau Herrera con Tran and Dolores Marquez work was signed off as complete and acceptable by Louis Moran the district's former director of bonds and Facilities the HVAC systems again are leaking coolant you can see the leakage coming through the ceiling here at the edge of the ceiling tiles in all 20 classrooms at the school many pipe connections were not to code pipes were hung with zip ties instead of the required metal straps so the edge of the zip ties cut through the pipe insulation at dorsa just like at Lucha the HVAC system was installed in the cafeteria is too small for the square footage of the space so it doesn't adequately cool the room So Not only was the installation poorly done but the choice of what to put in the building in the first place was poorly done and this is the work that the district paid for in July the Los Angeles Times reported that the CEO of deltera real estate who did that work Luis Rojas has been charged with making illegal campaign contributions to a school board candidate in Southern California and 2015 and 2016 and he surrendered to authorities there following those campaign contributions deltera went on to be rewarded with more than 13 and a half million dollars worth of business in that Southern California School District in Montebello what our district is dealing with now is a direct result of what was at best a highly irresponsible decision by the previous board majority in failing to end the contracts with a company that did poor quality work and repeatedly displayed unethical and illegal Behavior the cboc along with many others in our community state and local lawmakers and Auditors asked and then demanded that the previous board majority end the district's contracts with deltera over and over again that board majority refused and defended deltera's contracts I want to acknowledge that two of the three board members who voted to keep deltera are not on the board anymore but it's critical that the board and the district continue to move forward more responsibly so now what can the district do about the faulty HVAC systems the subcontractor who installed them has gone out of business the manufacturer of the HVAC system won't honor the 10-year system warranty since it was never properly installed to begin with deltera real estate it was both construction manager and program manager for this project does not accept responsibility the HVAC systems must be repaired while schools are closed and there may be legal recourse against the construction manager and program manager so that is something that the district is currently pursuing and can't really speak further about at this point so the former moxa building sits adjacent to the Massa Middle School on Sinclair Avenue the land was leased from the district and the building was built by Maxa the Mexican-American Community Services Agency the building holds classrooms Clinic rooms a commercial kitchen meeting spaces a large Central Courtyard and a basketball gym and 2016 Maxa collapsed and the building reverted to the district it was vandalized almost immediately there are about 70 broken windows all of the copper wire was stripped out of the electrical room and security cameras were stolen however the scope of work analysis the district has had done previously shows that the building is structurally sound it holds a truly incredible collection of community art that tells some of the history of the people who live in our neighborhoods the space could provide many opportunities for recreation learning and services for this underserved neighborhood the board must make decisions about what to do with the building and floor will tell you more about a building that's been very special to the Alum Rock Community to share with you some um before and after photos so you can see how the building used to be used and how it looks today I remember participating in two events here one was a conference with the janitors Union and the other band a native Indian Powwow I remember when we had a red truck in the courtyard sorry in the courtyard uh with an old Elder with a conversation of history and wisdom from our ancestors can you go to the next slide in the courtyard you see uh on the right on the left on 2015 you see a picture of 2015.

I'm sorry 4.7 million 2021 and 1.7 million in 2122 the Assumption of the 4.7 million was based on uh reduction of 30 uh certificated ftes and administrator FTE and two classified ftes however we were unable to find board action related to those reductions because we're talking about the current year we're studying in so the board would have made that action back in March of 2020. and the Assumption attached to the 1.7 million was related to a reduction of 20 certificated FTE and an unspecified reduction of 517 almost 5 out of 18 000. uh another concern was that the district's budget has not been approved unconditionally for the last three years and a 1819 budget was disapproved uh the third item within the budget and development in the area was that the district uses negative Contra expenditure accounts within its general ledger on next slide uh budget monitoring was the uh the second area that concerned about uh our comparison of actual revenues and expenses as of June 19 showed that some account lines were over expended uh budgets have been provided to the board in your adopted budget first and second interim reports for all of the three years 17 18 19 and 1920 however they were not present in the third interim report that report that uh ends as of May 31 you get it usually beginning with June uh the district has not addressed the deficiencies that were raised by the county office and its oversight letters such as concerns raised 15 18 19 and 1920 balance sheet accounts were not consistently reconciled for 1920 and lastly in this area the district 1718 unaudited actuals were not approved by the board until October the 11th 2018.

total expenditures have decreased though slightly by about 91 000 mainly due to the decrease in payroll and other operating expenditures payroll has decreased slightly due to the decision to not pay employees for work performed for work not performed until the start of the school year so that has helped a little bit as a result of the coven 19 pandemic other operating expenses have also decreased due to the timing of our electricity payment we didn't make that until august although expenditures are showing a slight decline from last year to this year we do have some expenditures that were not originally budgeted for as i mentioned before for example covert related items but funding is being provided to respond to the pandemic where we're ensuring i believe mr duff did indicate where ensuring ppe is provided such as face coverings humanity shields are being provided as well as making sure that the needs and safety of our students teachers and staff are being met this also includes improving the use of education technology and supporting the distance learning similar to what um mr creasy has talked about as illustrated on the budget status report on page nine you can actually see though we are showing a deficit for budget fiscal year 2021.

um i see that mark does have something to say so i'd like to hear what he has to say yes um uh dr sims i i agree with uh linda's sentiment that it was not very collaborative um i think either we need to go to what i would consider an unmuted situation i think the refereeing actually prevents uh spontaneous conversation which would be normally what you would get during a work study or one of those things it it was i i don't think it was your intent but it was almost like a meeting with you david like we were all talking to you rather than talking with each other i think the other option frankly is to for the people who are willing to go into a space and be socially distanced um there's enough uh space within the campus and honestly if the expectation is that the students returned to campus i don't think it would be unreasonable for the board to do the same with social distancing i think we should keep those two dates i think if the dates were more productive i think people would be more excited about adding an extra date but i did feel it was very restricted in terms of being able to have spontaneous conversation and so i'm fine to keep the current dates and you know if need be we could add another but i i do think this is something that we need to move along even though we do have the pandemic uh in terms of giving the overall feedback and getting a plan personally that's that's my take on um are there others that have would like to talk about this uh lynn yeah i agree with the sentiment i i don't feel it was as productive as it could have been when we've been able to kind of feed off each other and come up with ideas and counterpoints um but a different structure i think would be good and as linda said right now there's so much thought concentration and effort on just making sure we're servicing students were obligated under our ieps to make sure all that's done and then to put an added uh thought into what do we do in five years i think we're having a hard enough time figuring out what we're going to do tomorrow anyway that's my thought okay uh mike gordon yeah i i think i think if we're gonna continue with the sessions which i think we will in september and doing him virtually i think what mark said also uh it's it's really important that we stay unmuted and maybe even stay on video if as we can because that's what we do here at savvy for most of our important meetings we we we make sure everybody is unmuted and that way you kind of can't i don't want to say you hide behind your mute but but everybody is is kind of feels free to be able to participate in real time and you're not waiting for somebody to unmute to come in and say their part and you can really you know you can talk over each other if you have to just like a regular meeting it's not it's not nearly as uh structured as raising your hand and coming in it's more spontaneous and and uh you know if if we're going to continue remotely i think anything we can do to open it up and make it a little more free to uh participate will would probably be to our benefit okay uh sue kane well i agree with most of the sentiment my concern is um that will not allow for the folks relying on the interpreter to participate as freely because trying to bounce back and forth from who's talking and finding you know watching the interpreter and then having the interpreter identify who's speaking and that type of thing i think that's going to really cause for some communication um breakdown for those folks utilizing the interpreter so i i i would like it to be more you know free-flowing but i think we need to be conscious of that and so in that way i would agree if we had the ability to be in a location where we were social distancing um that might be a more accessible option uh thank you sue and linda i see that you would like to speak yes i'd like to add to what sue k had just mentioned you're right i mean with overlapping of conversation i do depend on an interpreter and it may be one or two of us that definitely depend on that and we don't want to be behind you know as far we want to be able to keep up with the information um i understand definitely it would be great to be able to be spontaneous but i think in person would be best if we have that type of structure it definitely i would be able to see who is speaking and it would definitely be more visual for me as well it's tough here on this online platform so i think maybe for the next meeting are we thinking about possibly being in person um of course social distancing as well so that we can you know have that open discussion so for the next meeting it's the 24th how do y'all feel about meeting in person um annette is it possible that we could do that yes we we can do that we can set up a group that would be large enough to allow for in-person interaction and social media at the same time you may have to limit the number of visitors so that we can maintain the social distancing okay um are there others who would like to to speak now and i don't see any um yeah dr sims the you know the the zoo format obviously is not ideal um i think one of the reasons we have the kind of refereeing part of it is you know one the platform and two that use the interpreter so i agree that being in a room together is much better um i think that based on the various benchmarks that maricopa county um has been meeting in recent weeks seem to suggest that thus meeting in a room and being socially distant uh would would be feasible uh and i think i think we can do that um and that's for the meeting on the 24th so i don't think we need a board action to set the time in place right now for the 24th but i think what we are looking for now are um at least one thing to make sure that to see if we can get some guidance on when the next two sessions the october 1st and the november 5th session are going to be we're hearing you know we're hearing that some board members may want to move those into early next year um and uh there's discussion on on that so uh dr sims um i would suggest that you schedule them as they are on the agenda and if after the next one people find they're not fruitful then we can push them into the following year um i think some of the desire to move them was maybe based on the fact that they didn't think they got much out of the last one so there's no reason that if you commit to these and the one that happens on the 24th happens and it's not productive and people could say let's pull the plug and not get together the other two times okay uh linda yes i absolutely support what dr sims just mentioned yeah i think we go meeting by meeting and see how everything goes and see how we can improve that communication and then we'll talk about the next one and kind of move from there um but i think that's a good idea i think it's excellent i support that uh lynn i agree okay um are there others that would like to speak on this i have a motion to approve the schedule on the agenda second okay uh all in favor of approving the agenda as proposed say hi uh i see sukay mike manley mike gordon lynn linda and dr sims and myself are all and dean are all approving all opposed uh none okay that is complete uh the next item 705 discussion possible action item set the calendar for the 2021 regular board meetings um we have a proposed calendar here do any of these dates not work for for any of you lynn would you would you like to speak no okay um there all right sue so am i to assume that we are continuing in our positions because i'm i'm really attached to the acdh for now i mean there are you know the for the entire year we've had three board members that have been serving uh that whose terms are expired uh but are serving under the statutory provision that allow them to keep their seats uh until the governor appoints uh new um people to those seats or reappoints them to those seats though and as of now the the governor hasn't done that i've reached out um since kova but there there hasn't been um any any movement from the governor's office in that regard so i think for now uh we should all assume that we you know the folks that are serving on those expired terms are here until they're not um until the governor either makes a reappointment uh or or some other um change i will i will go with that answer um i only have one um conflict and that's the july 15th the um i have another wedding okay um so i i actually don't the march 11th one i'd like to move probably a week before if that's possible um so let me get my calendar out um if we can go to march 4th is probably better for me um and then does anyone else have an issue with uh with july 15th uh you know we could do july 8th or july 22nd um david yes i'm mike uh if i'm looking at the right one the uh november one is on november 11th which is veterans day yeah i do see that um maybe november 4th might be a better day or before the 18th i'd say one of those two probably the fourth might be a little bit better david the other thing to consider is do people want to go to somebody uh to yuma or flagstaff uh that is that is right um i know that you know in the past we've been to flagstaff and we've been to yuma uh i think the you know we moved away from that because our attendance uh wasn't as good for those meetings as it is when they're in in phoenix or tucson um that's why we've been meeting in phoenix and tucson the last two or three years but nevertheless that is an option i think the ability to attend remotely has made that much better so some of that was because you either um showed up or you're kind of telephonic or not at all i think it at flag it was not telephonic even or it was difficult so i think the the remote attendance has gotten better but i don't disagree with you that attendance went down yeah the in-person tenants i mean you know through technology like this we can meet and that's helpful but you know there are some limitations uh to it i i would still expect everyone to attend you know in person or telephonically but i always try to have as many people in person as we can i you know again that that's my preference i don't know if that shared with it with others but uh so in terms of the these dates um can we say can we tentatively say march mark four let's see um we say march 4th and then november 4th july perhaps we move that back to july 22nd okay all right so i think if we have those dates clear is there anyone that would like to move one or more of these meetings to a place that's other than phoenix or tucson uh sue k no oh no no uh linda oh sorry i was looking for the interpreter okay yeah i actually from here on out i would prefer to either do phoenix or tucson as well that's my choice maybe sometime in the future maybe if necessary but we are able to change it later throughout the year right locations uh yeah we certainly can i mean i think we need the time if we were to change it we need time for the staff to uh you know prepare for the uh you know for the production um so we could do it probably at least one board meeting ahead i wouldn't want to do it much more than that uh but in the past i think we've had the you know for obvious reasons we've had this bullet shot yeah because it's a bit cooler up there um i think the fall meeting if i recall was in yuma that was a number of years ago i forget and they yeah i think that you know the purpose of having it at a flagstaff or yuma would be so that people would physically be there for the meeting and if people are still going to be electron doing it telephonically or virtually then it kind of to me it kind of defeats the purpose of saying we're going to be in flagstaff and none of us are in flagstaff yeah that's certainly that's certainly a concern um you know if we were talking about the january or march meeting uh i i'd be more concerned if we were to schedule the july one for flagstaff i i hope that we can all be together and have the public you know there in person or at least have it open in person um in july of next year i that could be wishful thinking on my part but uh and again as linda mentioned we could always change it i mean that's many months away we can we can change that if we need to okay so um if if that's the case um if there's no other discussion about about tentative locations uh or dates um then i would like to move that we accept the revised schedule so that's march 4th uh that's as produced but with the exception of march 4th july 22nd and november 4th and moving the july 22nd meeting to flagstaff and again we can we can always change these locations as conditions permit or don't permit um you know depending on on covet and other things so if that so i i would like to make a motion to uh to adopt that schedule is there a second a second okay all in favor uh so i see uh sukay saying yes mike manley's saying yes lynn davidson saying yes dean saying yes mark's saying yes and linda's saying yes now all opposed mike are you um abstaining all right he voted yes okay all right so let's let's set that for the schedule um i i hope that again that the work study session i think that we can do with social distancing um the regular board meetings uh we'll you know continue to take a look at data as we come up to those meetings um and make a decision as to whether or not we think we can safely do um an in-person meeting i i'd like to say that i hope that we get our next board meeting in person uh perhaps with some some guideline or some distancing in place uh but you know we're always looking at the at the data and the benchmarks to make that decision okay um moving on 801 call to the public uh on non-agendized items uh again we we set up an email address for the purposes of receiving these comments we did not receive any uh by the deadline so we are going to move on to uh i'm sorry the discussion item for the next regular board meeting 8.02 discussion item agenda items for the next regular board meeting scheduled for december 3rd 2020.

uh where the community is having an event on the right you see an emptin abandoned useless building during the date of the BC as soon as we open the doors of maps that a couple of neighborhood kids I showed up and use the space and that tells you that our kids and communities the space to be open again the community around maths that needs uh more Community Open Spaces can we go to the next one here you see a picture of um 2015 on the left and at 2019 one of the pictures in 2015 you see a group of kids uh doing sports and on the right you see the same mural well preserved can we go to the next one so much beautiful art it is really speaks to the power of the art that as much as vandalize has been done here the r remains almost entirely intact even the bundles can feel to can feel in strained and Power can we go to the next one right here you see all the pieces of art the pictures remind of resilience to be disappeared uh let's go to the next one I don't see them yeah so it is so disappointed that our kids and your Generations in our community are missing the opportunity to see and use this space um can we move to the other one here you see a vandalized part of the mural and it looks like he's uh uh Dolores uh Huerta next one please another picture in the hallway that's that's the hallway with more murals those people you see on the picture are members of the oversight committee and the staff from the district that make the school beats it possible and accessible next one some rooms are frozen in time the picture of the uh in the middle of the computer is a picture of the main entrance the reception area the pictures on the left is a conference room uh and the one on the right is the dining room of the kitchen it is so fortunate to see this space have not been used by the community at some point uh it felt like all you needed to do was to clean the place up and put it back in service and the last picture but so much bandel is too you you can see where all the copper wires have been uh striped um out of the electrical room graffiti garbage paper paint this is the last picture of the presentation and I ask you all to erase this picture from your memories and try to imagine a an image for the future an image where these community centers upper opens its doors again and uh last uh Alison will conclude our presentation Alison the board must decide how best to use the former moxa building and preserve its community art the last bid the district received for the cost of refurbishing the building and repairing the damage was more than nine million dollars so this is not a decision to be taken lightly but this would be an incredibly valuable not only preservation of this beautiful community art but also a real value to the community the years ahead are going to hold a lot of financial challenges that the pandemic has worsened our Alamo Community is going to face a lot of competing priorities and the economy is going to make meeting these needs a challenge Above All Else the community's money must be spent wisely in ways that benefit our students Educators in the future of Alum Rock schools this board has two seats up for election in November and we as a community will need to make wise choices about who we trust to make decisions that place our students and Families First our arusd community works best together we hope that you'll join us we need parents families and community members to be involved in making decisions we need strong ethical board governance that is focused on students and responsive to the needs of the community thank you that concludes our presentation thank you miss singolani and miss de Leon before we go any further I just want to recognize not only the work of the committee but very clearly the passion um you know as a community we obviously we don't always degree agree on on the direction that we go or the decisions that we make but I think the Common Thread that that unites us is is for the most part is the passion that we all have for what we want for this district and this community and uh you know I acknowledge that very clearly in Miss de Leon's presentation and and also miss singulani I know to be very passionate as a parent and as the the leader of this Committee in their work to to try to get this done so before anything else um Mr Gill so again thank you both um ladies for the presentation Mr Gill do we have any public comment on this item none okay um so uh trustees do you have any questions or comments regarding the presentation and trustee Quintero I'm not sure if that is a request for a comment then you can go ahead and go we'll start doing double duty there uh you know thumbs up to the presentation as well as okay as requesting to speak um I first of all I want to thank uh the committee for the work that you do uh and uh in in this capacity of being an oversight committee for the bond program thank you for that I also want to recognize the presidents of the rasa Historical Society there at that visit I I think I saw a board member of the Russia Jose Dr Ramon Martinez in those pictures and so it's great to see this collaborative effort of trying to catalog uh the artwork that's out there in our community um and I I completely understand the passion that um that some of the board some of the presenters exhibited uh you know it definitely hurts to see the building in the state that it's in um unfortunately it was far from a quick uh paint job in a fix-up um I I used to go to those meetings as a staffer uh for um for um County supervisor shirakawa and Chavez and uh and actually that's where I first met Karina all right we were in a breakout session for uh mayor's guide prevention task force meeting and uh you could actually smell the unfortunate uh you know it was not being kept up well you could smell that there was a there had been some leakage of pipes unfortunately in the location and so um there was a lot of deferred maintenance so when you see that number it speaks to that unfortunately those last years of the organization that was holding on to the building were not its best and they were not in a position to fix up to do proper maintenance to the building so uh with that being said I I want to express my support towards making sure that that building is a is an asset for our students for our community um I know that we were looking to build uh gyms while we already have access to one there and so it is my desire to see that that is a facility that's available to our kids here in Alum Rock and so um thank you for all your work once again and then those are my comments thank you trustee Herrera Loretta and then trustee Marcus disappeared I'm assuming she had a comment she was asking to be unmuted so potentially after you will go with trustee Marquez go ahead trustee yeah thank you so much uh Alison Floyd and the rest of the committee um for doing the work for you know working so diligently to bring this information to us um you know floor in regards to your emotions I'm there with you you know I spent a lot of healing moments there um with children with youth with parents and Community um and you know as as uh Andres mentioned with elected officials as well coming together to make our community better so I look forward to you know having that you know come about again um and as Alison mentioned you know nine million dollars is a lot of money and we get to figure it out right um if we don't have those conversations soon enough then you know we'll never get there but we get to make that happen and so um we get to figure it out and we get to um open those doors again um in a creative way uh and you know I know that we've talked about having public hearings you know special meetings where we can really spend the time um that it's is needed you know we we get emails all the time we get phone calls all the all the time of people that have ideas for this um site you know very good ideas and we all have great ideas for the site and I think we need to come together and hear one you know one another out um and then also see the plans you know the night not just the 9 million dollars to open it uh but then the money to sustain it right to keep it going for future Generations um so that it never sees you know um a time like it is now and so I look forward to being a part of you know a leader in this and making that happen um and opening it up you know as soon as possible and with you know the right um infrastructure in place so that we can continue to have it open um and so you know I I know we've talked about having those uh public um special board meetings uh I know it's a public hearing um and we get to we get to hear you know we get to hear the people and um you know the ideas that are that are in place to then pick the best idea for our children and our community here in Alum Rock um you know and think of us first uh right um unfortunately you know I think of buildings or spaces that we've kind of let go and so this cannot be one of those we need to keep it in our community we need to keep it in our district and so I look forward to uh being a part of that thank you Allison and Flor for keeping an eye on it along with the committee um and I look forward to continuing to support um your work thank you trustee Marquez did you have a comment I did but I think I'll just wait until um you know what um the board members will be making their comments and stuff later on too okay I'll just wait okay any other questions or comments from the board okay I I just a couple comments that I wanted to make um is number one I think to me one of the the key points of the presentation um is is kind of the well we talked about the nine million dollars for Maxa but it's not only that it's obviously the repairs at the schools that were mentioned tonight and all of the other um facilities challenges that that we have because of the things that have occurred in the past because of the decisions that have been made and because of the external challenges in the world that we don't have any control over but that being said those are all the fact the facts that we have to deal with and so I agree with a lot of the comments that have been made and that how we decide to use the Maxa facility and whatever that process looks like it's going to need to be very strategic and very future oriented as trustee said the sustainability of the of whatever happens there really needs to be at the Forefront because not only the sustainability of that facility but the sustainability of the impact of its use on the remainder of the district so it's a very it's a very large conversation to have and it's a very important conversation but it it all is within a very a big picture of the entire District but I also look forward to that I I do believe that there is a lot of opportu all those challenges being said there's a lot of opportunity for for the community and for the district to to face the challenges that we have and move forward in a electricity in a creative um thoughtful and strategic way so so I look forward to that work but thank you to the committee for again for the hard work the dedication and the passion very clearly evident for for our children here in the district um so with that being said um no it is information only okay so we can move forward to item 3.02 presentation of the fiscal crisis management ficmat team um who am I turning it over first Dr Bauer to you or do we have Dr Bauer she's back I'm back yes uh I'm gonna turn it over to Mr Chang okay um Avatar if you can unmute Mr John Von flu and Miss Julie o'ville um and also give them the ability to share their screen um they're going to be the ones who will be starting the presentation um then at the end the districts will have a response and then we'll have some time for questions thank you actually can you hear me yes yes okay and you can you see uh the beginning of the slideshow screen yes yes excellent okay good evening president barano the members the board the um Alum Rock Community superintendent and staff I'm Julie auville and we also have I also have with me um John bonfu we are both um staff members of thick map the fiscal crisis and management assistance team and we performed a fiscal health risk analysis on the district but before we get into that I wanted to show you uh to talk a little bit about mcmad who we are and why we aim to do this work so we were established back in 1990 by legislation to help local educational agencies Lea comply with fiscal accountability standards we provide management assistance fiscal Crisis Intervention and other services to Lea School District community colleges Charter Schools County offices we are an external independent agency of the state in other words we don't report to anybody at the state we have our own sets of working strategies and that we report next John next slide should be there okay um the 19 18 19 the state budget act uh added a little more prevented service for us to and there are certain conditions that trigger that uh intervention and those five upon yourself uh fiscal health risk analysis to determine the level of risk for fiscal insolvency so next block and John that one that one's yours John um muted good right now on flew okay now I can immute okay sorry about that um so Vic Matt's engagement as triggered by the conditions that Julie just mentioned um built upon the County's oversight the county uh superintendent has oversight um of the fiscal oversight of the district and this process the process of being proactive builds upon that because uh the Department of Finance and the legislature asked us to engage under these conditions uh they've given us some funding to do so and so there is no cost passed on to the county office or to the district for this analysis as stated by Julie that uh the one of the triggers is three consecutive qualifieds well Alum Rock Union School District had qualifieds for the 1718 1819 and 1920 first and second interim reports so six consecutive uh qualified certifications they also had conditionally approved budgets and in 1819 had received a disapproval from the county office in their budget so you might ask why has uh why did we delay so long in engaging with Alum Rock well the county office every time each and every time at the certification I was in contact with the Santa Clara County Office of Ed and they expressed confidence in the district they knew that they were working closely with the district um and uh and you were working closely with them they also had a fiscal advisory team established at the district so while you had six consecutive qualifieds they convinced us to delay our engagement and that's why it took us we didn't engage after three qualifieds um next slide thank you so fikmat developed a little bit about the Tool uh figma developed the fiscal health risk analysis tool based on our 28 years of experience in in different issues that we found uh in districts of risked fiscal insolvency the tool has over 135 questions 137 to be exact in 20 different areas as well as there's a uh 18 of the questions indicate material weakness so are are elevated in weight uh each of the questions are way better weighted and the areas are are based on a high moderate or low risk assessment when we come to the total risk score anything considered over 40 percent is considered high risk moderate risk is between 25 and 39.9 percent and low risk is below 25 percent but I won't also want to point you to uh pages eight and nine of the report and eight and nine of the report there's two different sections a budget and fiscal status section and a material weakness section if you have conditions evident in those areas it will elevate your your score above the percentage level and you'll find that is is uh the issue here with alumra so looking at Alum Rock in particular we visited Julie and I visited the district virtually because of the covid uh pandemic on the first uh four days of June of this year uh we conducted interviews over four days and reviewed various documents and financial reports provided by the districts even after our visit we continued to review and analyze the documents um and our our report identifies a fiscal risk score of 37.2 percent recalling back what that would be on just a score alone was moderate risk however uh the score also identified some issues in the budget and fiscal section again page eight and the material weakness section page the bottom of page eight and nine which elevated the risk to a high risk of fiscal insolvency hopes I'm not getting overviewing the uh the summary of responses I want to remind the district that fitment works on the deficiency reporting method so we we focus in on not all the good things that you're doing but the things that we find as deficient and so with this summary of response and overlooking this I want to draw your attention to the 56 nose deficient areas and in further as we talk about this and look at this looking at the areas such as budget development budget monitoring where there are significant no's in the areas um the certain category areas so budget monitoring and deficiency cash management contributions and transfers area the deficit spending facilities fund balance general fund and non-voter approved yeah we will talk more about talk more about them so with with regard to the report these are the major risk factors the areas within the report that we found to to come to the the Forefront and as you can see by the little uh symbol there there are several of them that came into the material weakness section and the next slides we'll talk about each of those areas so you can get a flavor for what we found So within budget development and adoption we found that this and remember all of these findings are based on the 1920 stack Nano report that point in time okay so that particular report found that the multi-year projection included other adjustments so for the the 1920 year that was about 4 million and 1.7 million in 2021.

that violated a Education Code which requires that baby um approved by September the 15th uh also the district's 18 19 third interim report was not reflected in the minutes of May 9 2019 meeting where it was to be presented so next slide in the area of contributions and transfers the district we found that the district lacked a board approved plan to eliminate reduce or control contribution and transfers from unrestricted general fund to restrictive programs and keep in mind contributions represent resources where expenditures are exceeding revenues thus requiring a transfer of contribution from the general fund in other words they're overspending in that particular resource um we found that contributions had been growing over fiscal years and uh 5.3 and contributions um from 1718 to 0.9 2018-19 special education in one particular area was had the largest increase that we saw 93 percent from its 1819 contribution now oweing contributions signals growing expenditures and a lack of attention to controlling them is one that's not just the list of reduction ideas that's presented to the board by the CBO or the superintendent those can't that can be a fortunate but it should be a holistic sort of that the government board approves and the governing board um follow in order to effectively reduce expenditures next Slide John just as suspended that was an area that the county office identified and it was an area that we saw that needed some attention um the second interim report projects deficit spending in the current year and both for the two uh subsequent physical years now the unrestricted side of the general fund uh projected deficits 0.4 million in 1920 2.2 million in 2021 1.6 million in 2122 and again there was not a plan approved to implement uh in order to reduce and or eliminate or eliminate spending to ensure fiscal solvency next slide fund balance and reserve for economic uncertainties um your requirement is to represent and the second interim report did predict that the district could maintain their three percent minimum Reserve in the uh for the current year in two subsequent years however that was based on the assumption that the district can affect reductions and that we talked about those earlier 4.7 million in 2021 and 1.7 million and 21 22.

that deficit right now is showing 2.9 million dollars when you compare actual revenues of 2.1 million to the actual expenditures of 5 million again what that really means i've said it before is that we're our fiscal year ends june 30 2020 so we're having to use our available cash balance although this is not of any particular concern because again typical to the start of the fiscal and budget year we don't begin receiving voucher revenues until mid to late september so as i mentioned it's very important that we receive those voucher revenues within the next couple of weeks last year at this time we did have a deficit of 1.9 and remember again the budget fiscal year begins in july so although the fiscal year begins in july the school year begins in august there's still payroll as well as other operating expenditures that are continuously being incurred as a result of that though i'm still continuing to closely monitor our cash balance as well as making sure that we have a fund available funding sources and that we're trying to use those other funding sources until we receive our revenues we are working on preparing our august monthly updates based on a review of that preliminary financial data there are no immediate material concerns based on what i do know other than what i've indicated previously where we'll continue to monitor our revenues expenditures and cash balances very closely as well as monitoring student enrollment and identifying hopefully if there's no cuts to our general fund appropriations we will continue to plan for uncertainty with budgeting prudence and ensure that our expenditures do not exceed our revenue sources any continued unforeseen needs or requirements created by the kova 19 pandemic will require expenditure reductions across the agency to ensure fiscal solvency if there are no questions on any of the information i presented this really concludes my report for the agency's informational and fiscal data thank you are there any questions for ms from any of the board members and i don't i don't see any thank you thank you um thank you for that report um and i know we'll be closely looking at this especially as we we look at the budget next year and uh see how the agency may have to adapt to um you know to the overall context of the of the state budget uh thank you so that the next item on the agenda then is going to be 7.01 that's information item introduction of possible discussion of policies a c a g b b g c g i h a and k b uh maria murphy miss murphy if you are on the line could you start your video and you may begin i am good afternoon board president nigros superintendent reichman dr rex members of the board my name is maria murphy i'm the director of policy and government relations for asdb you have before you the red line revisions of the policies i did not receive any concerns of the policies that were presented from any of the board members they were posted to the public on the asdb website i did not receive any concerns in regards to the policies presented and with that i would like to make myself available for any questions at this time okay are there any board members that have questions for miss murphy uh seeing none uh thank you thank you okay um as we move to the next item uh 7.04 uh action item approval of strategic plan development works session dates for 2020 uh superintendent eichmann yes um just wanted you to consider um an edition of a work-study session for november 5th at the last board meeting you approve to have work study sessions on september 24th and october 1st we're now adding one more for november 5th so just present it to you the board to determine if you want to add another work study session uh linda yes um i am thinking about hmm one moment here give me a moment at the last um work study session that we had i found it to be kind of less effective than i had expected it to be honestly um i was hoping it to be more collaborative and maybe have more of the discussion um allowing the board members to be involved and not like um the board meeting sessions that we have here so personally i just felt that i don't know during a work study i think the purpose of that maybe we can change the purpose of that and maybe you know have a different approach as far as the board meetings um there's a lot of new things going on we have the pandemic and everything there's a lot of responsibilities and things we need to take care of so i think it's our responsibility just to make sure that we can make it a more collaborative and effective meeting um i'm not sure maybe if we could have you know a focus a complete focus on a specific date this is the interpreter i need to clarify we froze for one moment what date did you say okay so i'm just wondering if we could move the dates um forward um to january just to give us some time to contemplate and to think and to see what thing how things are going and you know to know more about the situation as far as the pandemic it would just to give us you know more time to be prepared to be able to support the school and support the support the leadership team and all of that i think it is critical um you know because we're talking about a plan for five years out just this is just an idea that i'm considering and i wanted to put it out there so that maybe we could kind of push that forward um i mean time is getting quite close and then we had we did approve that but then we did have the pandemic and we do need to think about those individual board members as well and the school staff they've been working so hard trying to take care of everything that's going on all that we've heard tonight i'm so impressed with the wonder creativity and everything that they've all been doing um online learning and the like so i think that we need to kind of pause and take a breath um and just that's that's what i was considering and i'd like to put that out there for the board to consider uh thank you linda and i i see that mark has his hand up as well but uh just to clarify uh linda would you like us to propose that we move that next work study session from november out into january is that is that something that you'd like to see and also uh have an agenda that's a little more open-ended than it was last time is that right yes let me clarify and thank you um for asking that question um i believe the next one is september 24th is that correct that's correct right we have the 24th and then that's what we have let the other ones that we have left in 2020 could we move them on to 2021 and that's what i'm proposing um because we don't have dates for 2021 yet correct uh correct that's going to be our next agenda item for the regular board meetings to discuss those dates [Music] right okay so i would like to move those two extra sessions out to 2021.

um are there any specific agenda items that the board members would like to see on the next meeting agenda david this is mark sims um my comment would be um more about us getting the type of update we got today from the staff in the interim right in other words you know we're looking at three months which i think is fine but getting maybe a repo just and you know it doesn't have to be a lot of work like them just sitting down and cutting a video and sending us a video about how opening up went and what are the challenges just to kind of keep the board prized i don't want them to have to do a lot of work to do a formal document but it'd be really nice to just let us know and actually i think it would help the public uh some sort of art to be clear you want an update from the from staff members on on how the the reopening is has been proceeding well like similar to what we got today from all the staff members i mean actually even what they did today could be done on video and sent to us before the meeting but in the interim doing that as well might be helpful okay this is linda just wanted to clarify when you're speaking of a video are you talking about what staff and students etc are doing for the reopening and we watched that prior to the meeting or is this some kind of can you clarify what you're looking for in the video a little bit not clear with that sure it was uh similar to the reports that we got today not all of them but you know i'm not as concerned about the hepa filters um on a regular basis but for instance the reports that lynn gave out outreach gave birth to three and the principals gave they're all telling us which students are and aren't coming in and things like that that's kind of changing very quickly so it'd be nice to know after the open in october sometime or it could be added on to the agenda of the work study but getting some sort of update okay so and this is a through video before the board meeting so i see what the objectives would be as far as updates something more consistent through video and sent to us so that we can view that prior to the board meeting rather than reading it in paper form or english form correct yes that would be correct okay understood just wanted to make sure that uh annette and david we were all on the same page okay thank you are there any other others uh seeing none um you can move on to action to item 9.01 action item adjournment uh do we have a motion to adjourn lynn i move we adjourn this board meeting and a second linda all right uh linda is seconding yeah um so all in favor yes i second i see that we're all saying uh we're all showing ascent uh all opposed all right uh thank you very much everyone um appreciate your time and the effort of the of the staff um thank you again board members and uh have a good night thank you david thanks so much thanks dude thank you good night everybody thanks everybody later best job jay