001Welcome to our school board meeting. We had a special board meeting at 6:30 tonight. So, we already said our pledge of allegiance. So, we're just going to jump right in with um any translation needs? None. Okay. At this time, I'll accept a motion to approve tonight's agenda. >> I'll make that motion >> and I'll second that. >> I have a motion and a second. All in favor? >> I. >> Any opposed? >> Motion passes 5-0. At this time, we'll turn the time over to our superintendent for board recognition. >> Yeah, thank you. Uh special evening tonight for us. We have an opportunity to recognize uh one of our own board members, former board member now, um Miles Glasgow. So, I'm going to invite Miles forward just for a moment. I'm going to say a few
002things about him and then invite others to to share their perspective on Miles and his work. >> Yay. >> Give it up for Miles. >> There's your name plate. I know you didn't find it today when you walked in, so you can take it home and hang it in your room somewhere. And then a a little plaque to celebrate your work. So, I do want to share with with everyone in the community and and those of you who know Miles and a lot of our students. Uh for a number of years now, the school board has been really um intentional about selecting students to share their perspective and to be part of our board. And we always have a difficult time selecting from a talented pool of students. And some just rise to the top.
003And then when they get on the board, they perform at various levels. And I can say with a lot of certainty over about the last 10 years, Miles is right at the top of that list. He was very engaged, very active, shared his perspective, stayed positive, didn't always show up on time, but always showed up. And uh >> but worth the wait. >> Always late, but there you go. And I've appreciated Miles and his sense of humor and his quick wit and his thoughtfulness. Um and so I appreciate Miles, you and your time and dedication to the board, and I'm sure other board members might want to share a little bit about you. All right, so here you go. Congratulations. Thank you, >> Miles. I just want to say um how much I appreciate you
004and you are a bright shining light, not just on our school board, but for the school district. Um it's a been a privilege to get to know you and with kids like you today, it gives me hope that things are only going to continue to get better in this world because you are such a bright light. So, thank you for all of your service and thank you for being our friend and our fellow board member. >> Thank you. Thank you. Does anyone have anything else before we move on? >> Um, I have something to say to you, Miles, because you have just been such a great friend to like not only me, but literally anyone, any student, anyone you ever talk to. You just you're so open to them and you're so understanding and like
005it's very hard to find those people these days. So, like how she said like you just give us like a sense of hope that like oh my gosh like our students have such a bright future because of you and you're just like a ray of sunshine. Like there's no one no one else is Miles Glasco. You're yourself and you're just so funny and like you're very unique. Like no one else is you and so just be yourself. [Laughter] Yeah, we love love love Miles. Like since we me and Isabelle started, we cannot stop talking about how inspirational you are. How like the words you use are like so big. Like I don't even understand. But like, oh my goodness. Like wow. Like Miles, you're like is such wise words. I love it. I love listening
006to you talk. And sometimes I'm like, Lily, do you not have anything to say? No, Miles, I'm listening to you. You're like, I don't know. I I love listening to you talk. It's like I can't sometimes I don't even think of the things you say, but yeah, I like it. >> Thank you, Miles. >> Director Prow, would it be okay if we had Miles come forward in the board, take a photo with him? I know I'd be thrilled. >> We like to use that stuff on social media, and Miles is no >> um stranger to social media, so he probably he probably wanted, too. Thanks, Mom. [Applause] Thank you again. Um, okay. At this time, we're going to turn it over to our other student reps. Do you guys have anything? Um, we did have
007a successful MMS like orientation for like all upcoming middle school students. And I thought it provided a lot of benefits for upcoming middle school students. And to tonight was also um the locker night, how to figure out how to do your locker. And there's also one for tomorrow. And I just think that's very helpful for middle school students. >> Great. What are students looking forward to this year? Our student reps. >> Well, tomorrow's our all stop day. So, we're going to see all MMS, all elementary, and all OHS staff be at tomorrow early and bright at 7:00 a.m. Um, we're going to be cheering them on as they walk in like if it's a normal school day. I'm so excited to see all my elementary teachers like all my senior year. Um, I'm also looking
008forward to the first day of school. Yay. >> What about you? >> Um, I'm just looking forward for senior year because it's my last year. Also, just love like senior stuff, senior sunrise, prom, homecoming, and lots of lots of events. >> Yes. Our first football game, home football game on September 5th. >> Yes. >> Yeah. >> Great. Thank you. We will move on to board member discussion and go into our legislative report with director Gerber. >> Okay. For legislative reports, WA was general session is September 20th. So, we're getting ready for that. It's going to be entirely over Zoom and they've limited it to just one day this year. Um, so they have published all the proposals and we get to review those and decide how we want to vote on those as a board.
009So, that's coming up and we'll be preparing for that. >> Great. Thank you. Moving on to required approvals. At this time, I'll accept a motion to approve required approvals. >> I'll make that motion. >> I'll second it. >> Motion made and seconded. All in favor? >> I. >> Motion. Any opposed? Motion passes. 5-0. I will accept a motion to approve required approvals early accounts payable warrants two. I'll make that motion. >> I'll second it. >> Motion made and seconded. All in favor? I. >> Motion passes 40 with one abstension. Now we'll throw it over to our superintendent for superintendentformational items. >> A couple items tonight that are I think will be rather quick, but then another more lengthy discussion around secondary grading practices. I want to start with a facility update. You'll notice some changes
010in the room tonight. we uh changed the way we're situated. Um uh Mrs. Garza and I will be seated on this side of the room to have access to a new control panel and a new set of speakers that was put in to enhance the experience here in the boardroom, but also to make the um it's it's a set of slides um no anyway uh >> yeah there you go. It's um uh to enhance the experience also for the folks watching on YouTube live. So, we have that facility update. It was a mention of the home football game coming up on September 5th. I think you shared uh there's still in process and some of the equipment for up enhancing the um audio equipment out at the football field. Um the new target date is
011probably closer to homecoming, but that new equipment is going to be in place and ready to go. That was in response to some feedback we got about graduation and improving again the audience experience. So that stuff's well underway. This is some imagery. I took four pictures at Alello High School uh on Friday. This is looking out from uh what most of you in the room would probably know as the home building towards the Catholic Church. And so you can see fencing and a couple gaps there where there's going to be some gates um to control traffic out towards uh Juniper Street. The next slide is on between the uh old tech building which is now the Husky hub and the bus loop there. Again, you'll see some gates that will be put in here shortly
012and some so you'll have a man gate and a and a a vehicle gate there that'll be put in. I think there's two more images. This is just a a further out view of that. So you can see the experience the driver will have as they approach that area and those gates will be locked during school hours. Okay. So, uh, the other images would have been of and they were still in process. There it is. That's, um, off of Hemlockk out near, um, just past the Ox Gym. And so, that's fencing that we replaced, brought it up to standard, and there'll be additional fencing and gating to connect that fence to the auxiliary gym. When that's all completed, uh, here in the next couple weeks, that entire campus will be fenced in. And so, Principal
013Cat Aterson and her team have been working hard. They've been communicating with families expecting a a closed down campus option and opportunity starting in October. So, we're going to ease into that. Uh we've got some strategies and some technologies to help students who are still going to be able to leave for lunch, but this will give us greater control, a little more security around the facility. And so excited about all that work that happened over the summer. Any questions about those brief facility updates? Uh the football stadium is going to get uh new you said speakers. Is that also in the gym as well or is that later? >> The gym one didn't require as much replacement as we thought but upgrade and update. Yeah. So they're going to they're going to um tomorrow when
014we have orientation day we'll be in the main gym one speaker. You know the new setup will allow um connection between the ox gym and the main gym. It'll be improved speakers. Uh just a refinement. This is actually what happened here too. There's some new equipment but refining what we already have. So that's that's coming as well. Okay. Uh the next item is orientation day as was shared by the student reps. Uh tomorrow we'll have all staff orientation for just uh about an hour in the morning at Ollo High School. We went away from that model during the pandemic. We weren't all able to gather and then when we came back we met in two groups because MMS wouldn't accommodate all of us. Uh we had a request from our associations. It was an experience
015that people enjoyed. They don't often get to see their colleagues at other schools and they really like the idea of getting back together. So we did some work in the last month to put that together. Now Miles, who we recognized earlier, will be our MC tomorrow and uh there's going to be a number of of speakers in the first for about 30 minutes and then we'll be dismissing staff to their uh union meetings and then they'll go back to the schools for their orientation day and a kickoff for the school year. So looking forward to having about 700 people gathering at the high school tomorrow for uh orientation day. Okay. Uh the next one is about secondary grading practices. I know that some of the feedback I received from the board uh about last year
016and and the last the last couple of years and the standardsbased grading process and secondary grading in general. Uh there's been some improvements made throughout the summer and spring based on teacher feedback last year. And I know Cat and her team at the high school, Dr. Meek has been supporting all that work and and uh Will von Brock and his move to MMS um is getting up to speed on these practices. I wanted that to bring them in to share their expertise and the feedback they're receiving from their staff, but also to get feedback from the board about what you're hearing. And so I'm going to invite them to share a bit of an update on secondary grading here in the Oello school district. >> All right. Well, thank you. As we talk about secondary
017grading, we're gonna we're going to approach this from a couple of different angles. Both what's what's been happening with our standards referenced grading and also uh just revisiting some years ago. Uh start though with we'll start though sometimes when we talk about grading, it's always important to remember uh what is grading all about? I think sometimes we lose focus about that because uh grades are tied to so many different things. They reduce your car insurance. They generate GPA. They um some people equate them to college readiness. I mean, there's a variety of things, but the important part uh that really kind of frames all of our work is that grades should always be clear and accurate indicators of what students know and are able to do. And that's been one of the driving forces behind
018all of our kind of what I would label as grading efforts to improve our practices. Last spring and over the summer, we talked a lot about what are we doing to uh clean up some of our challenges we've had with our standardsbased grading work. And I'm happy to tell you that uh we are ready to go with all of those things come the first day of school. And I want to remind you of a couple of them. Uh first of all, uh we knew that uh both from staff and parents, we were hearing concerns about the timeliness of when grades could be updated. They had to wait. There was a delay in that. And so, um, now it is with Skyward, it's live. And so, as grades are input into the system, uh, both teachers,
019students, and parents can see them live. And there there's no delay in that. Uh, in front of you, this this document that's got the red, yellow, and green on there. Uh, we've launched our graduate profile skills. So in addition to getting feedback on progress towards academic standards, students also now will get feedback on are they really ready to be a contributor contributing member of society once they leave high school. And so um those of you that have been here for a while, we have a really robust graduate profile uh in the district and we decided to to marry these things two things together. So the on the left hand side there you'll see those are the five uh standards and strands that are sit in our graduate profile. We want graduates that leave us being
020a learner, a communicator, a critical thinker, collaborator and an advocate. And so this grading structure um probably feels a little bit familiar to you because you've heard Mrs. Aerson talk about uh their buckets at the high school of red, yellow, and green. And so this this feedback strand helps give kids and parents uh information. for example about uh how are they as a collaborator? Are they future ready and so they have they can consistently and respectfully share original ideas and openly incorporate or they the far other extreme where they need urgent support which means they rarely contribute original ideas and frequently communicate disrespectfully. They're resistant to feedback or give up. And so this uh we're our this has been wellreceived by our staff as we've done the training with an opportunity to really talk and
021give more specific feedback around all of the things that don't necessarily fit into a nice little grade package. And so uh when you get time, I'd really encourage you to to spend more time reviewing that one. Uh parent access uh returns uh fully all through Skyward family access. So now parents will see uh whether the class is standards referenced teaching. Um you you'll notice a little bit of a vocabulary change. We've we've shifted away from standardsbased teaching or standardsbased grading to standards referenced reporting or standards referenced teaching. And that really is coming at the feedback of both staffs from McFarland and the high school who've had an opportunity to learn this summer and and really want to be clear about what they're communicating with it. In essence, it it means a lot of the same
022things, but it really is that the reporting and the grading is like this much of it. what we're really talking about is the the the focus on the clear standards that that we know we're targeting. But that parent access uh now students and families can see that uh instantly like I said, but also they don't have to log into Empower or to Skyward. Now it's all in Skyward. And then finally um you've heard this us talk about this a lot, but this work has really coupled with our scope and sequence that commitment to a guaranteed and viable curriculum. And so where this overlaps into the standards reference teaching part of it is um part of that that scope and sequence is talking about the what and what what kids will be learning. Those are exactly
023the same standards that are referenced in that standards reference teaching. So all four of these have big been uh accomplished and are ready uh come the start of school. Uh we also made some pretty significant changes uh to our late work expectations. uh feedback from lots of people including this group was that our four-week window was too long. It uh created some bad habits and bad traits being developed in in kids and so that has been reduced to two weeks. Uh teachers do have some discretion if the the nature of the project or the assignment or the task lends itself naturally to to extend that but the two weeks is is that minimum. We've also uh and this one really has emerged over the last week as as put it uh there still was some
024discussion about so what happens after that. So if the twoe comes and goes and the student still doesn't make up the work how is that properly accounted for uh in our grading feedback and so you'll note on there um that in Skyward uh they will um I see a typo on there as I'm reading it so I'm distracted by that. should say skyward not empower um but uh they will have an opportunity to earn a zero noting that the there was no evidence provided and Mr. Ron Brock will talk a little bit about um how that really pulls into the whole trend grading and and what that does or doesn't do before we move on to this next one. Any questions related to our standards reference teaching uh components that we've talked about so far
025before we get to the next part. So the real-time feedback actually isn't real time because we're still waiting on a two weeks of leniency for somebody to turn in their work. Is that correct? >> Not necessarily. So if the if I'm a student and I turn it in on time and I get a score in there, that's live at that moment. So the whole class isn't held up. As well as if the if I don't turn something in, it's noted right away for the parents to know it's missing. So they um if if we all are in a class, Will turns his assignment in, I don't turn mine in, Cat turns hers in. What Will's parents and Cat's parents will see is the live score and and what was actually earned from it. Mine would
026get a notification that it's missing and I didn't turn it in. >> The other one will be later. >> I know it's coming. >> Yes. So, um, let's switch over a little bit because, uh, as you know, at Oll High School especially, uh, we are, I don't have the exact percentage off the top of my head, but, um, we have some classes that are utilizing our standards reference teaching and some that are using, uh, what we labeled as traditional grading. This would be a points and percentages based system. And with that, uh, in 2020, the Othala School District committed, uh, to really implementing a grade four floor and with some really intentional purpose. And so I want to start first back to the 2020, uh, research and and thought that went behind it. And these
027are summary uh, little images from what what went into that thought back in 2020. Um, keep in mind 2020 was, yes, the pandemic, but it was also a time when there was a lot of question going on about grading and and what's really happening to keep kids both motivated and giving them accurate opportunity to show what they know. So, um, a grade floor, in case you're curious, uh, if you haven't, if that term is is new to you, really means that there is a minimum score that any student could earn on on an assignment or a on a task. And that assignment is um, you know, in in traditional grading, usually uh, there is a range uh, between zero and 100. and a grade floor lowers or increases that floor um from zero to a
028set number. Most research you'll find uh sets that number somewhere in the 40 50 60% range. And we're going to we're going to approach this from a variety of angles, but that's what the floor really means. And there's some reasons uh very intentionally for that. One being um remember our goal in our true north about grading is giving an accurate measure of what has been learned. And um which leads right to the second one. Uh if we're really trying to get feedback about measuring uh student learning, we all know that outlier scores in any piece of data, we're going to say score, outliers really skew that amount. So, if I get, just to play with the math a little bit here, if I get 200% on an assignment and then I don't do the third
029one, my total grade for the class, even though two of them were perfect and one of them wasn't submitted at all, my total score for the class is going to be somewhere in the neighborhood of 67%. Because if I take those three numbers and divide by three, the average is going to there. So, that that outlier is what we're really talking about. And statistically um in any other element of statistics you would eliminate outliers. You would you wouldn't consider them as part of of the trend. But in traditional points and percentagebased systems um they've stayed. Uh which is really part of the root of this whole focus on what is a zero culture really mean. >> Dr. Dr. Meek, I'd like to add a a anecdote about the um outlier perspective that I think the
030students that we met with this summer would share. And so if you go to university and um everyone in your class takes an assessment and the highest score is a 70 and they make that 70 the new 100, that's called grading on a curve, right? Pretty common practice. It's been around for decades. Um, and some people might, as they will with the 40% fluorescent, you're giving somebody something for nothing, but it's it's a really common practice to say, well, this is really what's happened in the course based on what I taught. So, it's not that unusual. Also, outliers, you will have professors from time to time as we're thinking about because a lot of arguments around this issue are, are we preparing them for the real world and for college? Well, you take a university
031course and u at the end of the uh semester or quarter, it's not unusual for professors to say, "Hey, you get to pick one assignment um your lowest grade and toss it out. Which one?" A, you've been here every day. You've been showing up. You've done really well. So, well, in fact, I know you learned what you need to learn. You don't have to take the final. Right? Those are common things that occur in schools and still demonstrate that we're holding kids accountable and that they're accurate. And so this idea about preparing kids for the real world, I think there's some some examples in this model that we're actually doing that. >> Thank you. Uh in 2020, again, this is a rehash from that. Uh there was a commitment that this was one of our
032first steps in transitioning to a standardsbased grading mindset and model. Uh this is were some of the early steps to get there. Uh this is one of the rare things where there was a a commitment across the system at the time between McFarland Oll High School and Desert Oasis High School. So that standardization in all three secondary schools when this was implemented in 2020. And then the two that are um what our research tells us about the student experience is that uh having something like a grade floor promotes hope. uh there are many humans uh I won't even put it in a kid classification that when you know you are sunk you're no longer really encouraged to participate or or try and for some kids mathematically uh you do reach a point where you are
033doomed for failure uh without some of that um protection there and so promoting hope and then keeping uh kids engaged our you know our ultimate goal is for kids to be engaged in learning from the beginning till the end and imagine the student experience when halfway through a trimester or halfway through a semester, you know that there's no hope for you to pass. Your level of engagement is is pretty well checked out at that point. And so, um, those were some of the things that drove the decision and the thinking back in 2020. And I want to, um, we want to kind of fast forward it now. So now we here are 5 years later and and I want to clarify when we're talking about a grade floor, the grade floor still exists with our
034traditional classes only, which are just a handful at McFarland High School or McFarland High School. There you go. McFarland Middle School and and then a little bit more at the at OS primarily in classes or in areas where uh we just haven't got to the point yet where the standards reference teaching makes a lot of sense and it's it's one of the the things that we've transitioned to. So Will's going to actually take over uh this next part. >> So um our seventh graders were really nervous this morning to come and open lockers and they're going to be more nervous when I tell them that Josh just promoted them to high school. Um uh I want to speak a little bit to um the zero. Um I think um all of those reasons that that
035Josh pres presented are really valid. I'm going to speak more to the mathematical side of it. Um I think unfortunately um some of this practice due to the timing of when it was adopted uh kind of got lumped into some of the practices that the state was pushing down with co um and things like that about like hey we knew that that was an unusual time and so they were worried about putting kids too far behind. We didn't want to have kids have to repeat two years because of co and that was understandable from the state but I think this got lumped in. Um, I actually started this practice due to some reading that some of us were doing at the high school in 2015 at the high school. So, this grade four practice, when
036I first heard of it, it didn't make sense to me. I said, "Why would we give kids a 50 when they didn't do anything? That doesn't make sense." And then it would have shown to me mathematically and actually some of the teachers that we were doing this with and that were promoting this were some of the more rigorous teachers. They were the ones teaching some of the college level classes and things like that. But the mathematics of it is what made sense to me and helped me understand what a zero was doing to a score. So, here's just a couple of examples. This actually makes even more sense now that we have some standards referenced and some traditional grading classes. To have them too different and have the vast difference in the power of a
037zero in a traditional grading class as opposed to a standards reference class would be really difficult. You would have such dramatic um impacts from that zero in these two classes. Um and the whole I'm actually going to start with the next slide. Sorry. The whole concept of it is is that when we look at a traditional class, um the grading scale goes in these 10% buckets, right? So 90 to 100 is an A typically 80 to 90 is a B, C, D, right? But an F has this 60% range, right? So you have this whole 60% range there. Well, what that does is it creates zeros as these dramatic outliers that bring your score down, right? way down to where it it really can't come up. You gave the example and we're going to see
038it down there too. So if we have these a zero in essence is not a zero. And so I think that's where the misunderstanding is is when we we give a 50% we actually do 40% but but I think a lot of the research says 50%. When you give a 50% when a kid doesn't turn anything in that really is zero because when you're at a zero and you have these 10% buckets that zero acts as a negative 50. It really acts in the in the statistically as a negative 50%. Because to get it back up to that 50% and then those make those 10% jumps, it becomes disproportionately difficult. And so if you see this 10 ways during a way A, 10 ways during a B, 10 ways to a C, 10 ways to
039earn a D, and then 59 ways to fail, it just it it'll brings you all the way down. So if you see these on the right hand side, this is standards reference teaching. So, in our in our classes, this will happen now. And and we promoted this. We talked to our teachers about it. I think it's a really good transition. Um the conversation's been really good about this. In the past, if a kid didn't turn something in after 2 weeks, not only did they have the big long um opportunity to turn it in, but if they never turned it in, it would always just be called um incomplete or or or not turned in. Now, we say, "No, after that two weeks, give them the zero." But if you see this on a four-point scale,
0400 1 2 3 4 um that zero is in here, but it and it impacts that line, but it doesn't pull it all the way down, right? It doesn't pull it down to that zero. It still acknowledges the learning that did happen. Um on the other side, I could do, you know, let's say it's beginning of the year. I'm struggling with the concept, but I'm still getting 60s and then everything. Okay, there we go. I'm still getting these 60%, 60%. I miss an assignment. Now I'm getting the hang of things. I get an 80%, I get a 90%. That grade in that scenario right there, which is very similar to this scenario on the right hand side, is still an F. Right? So that one zero acts as an outlier and and and pushes that
041away. So >> yes, Isaro has a question. >> Oh yeah. This one, this one's a little special to me. So, let's say you turn in an assignment. >> Mhm. >> And you got a 58. You failed. You tried, but you just failed. It's different when somebody doesn't turn anything in, doesn't put the effort, they should get a zero. If you come to work and you come and you do everything you're supposed to do, half, I'm pretty sure you're not going to get a second chance the following year. What are we doing? Or why are we allowing that if to come here? And you're telling me that there can be somebody who struggles but is still coming in taking the test and maybe getting a 58, a 57, finally they get a 62. And somebody who
042comes in with a zero because they didn't want to turn anything in. They don't show up to class. They don't do anything. Remember, and it goes back to the question you said a little bit ago, adversity is good for these kids. They have to learn how to stand up and keep fighting. It's not always, hey, I've I've failed and it's over. That's not how the real world works. Let's just be honest. We we wish it wasn't, but it is. You have to show these kids resiliency. And by keep giving them breaks doesn't help them get there because the first time they hit it, they're going to want to turn and go the opposite way. Where do we start teaching kids that I don't believe? Cuz I'll tell you, it's this is me right here in
043school. I struggled, but I my mom never let me quit. I took extra classes, had tutors, and I man, it was hard. But I'd be pissed if I did all that work, put all that effort, and have somebody next to me get a 40 because they showed up and didn't do nothing. That is wrong in every sense of the word. Because that would give somebody like me, what am I even trying for? What it would have turned me into, I hit a brick wall and instead of turning down, somebody said, "Hey, let's go." And that's why we got to where we are today. Not because somebody gave me a step or gave me something that I didn't deserve. That's why I don't like this 40%. You're not teaching these kids any resiliency or how to
044bounce back. And you have to be able to come in and do some work if you want the grade. Just they're not a zero and you turn nothing in. I could understand you failed. You got a 48. It's not a zero. But when you turn nothing in, you do no work, and you're giving them a 40 for a kid who struggles, that's a slap in my face. And a lot of these kids know. So I think going back um that's what we're trying to illustrate is that um and that's where the misconception and that was why the push for standardsbased grading. So this is accurate. The 40% we're giving them is not giving them something for nothing. It's making sure that we're not taking we're giving we're not giving them negative for nothing. The 40%
045statistically speaking, actually the 50%. So we're actually below that threshold right now. The 50% statistically speaking is a zero. It's the equivalent of what a zero would be for that kid. That exact um scenario that you just put out. If I get a 58% then a zero what would be the equivalent in that that step would be a 50%. There we are saying 40% right now cuz what wouldn't be fair especially with the what our our the way our setup is right now is I'm in a standards reference class I get this zero and it impacts me less than the zero over here which is a negative which actually acts statistically as a negative which is what leads to when you see those college professors grading on a curve that's those professors that like the
046statistical stuff and they say hey this should curve and this should all shift up based on what our highest score was. What these bell curves, >> you're going to shift it up to a 70. You're not going to shift up somebody from a zero to a 60. I don't have a problem with standardbased grading or whatever the new term is because you get to learn that they're actually learning what they're being taught. But in a standard grade, you're not even showing me that. You're not putting the effort in, but you're getting a 40 to show up. I I guess my question is what is the difference between 40 and zero if they're both an F on your transcript? >> My deal is is that the guy that got a 40 actually came in, took the
047test, just wasn't wasn't making it, but you showed that he was actually trying to where somebody who doesn't turn in a grade. >> But on your transcript, they're both an F. So, it literally doesn't matter. I mean, and I'm not saying it that the effort doesn't matter cuz I own a business. I want someone who shows effort. For me, effort is more important than, you know, a transcript. But on the transcript, the guy who works really hard and gets a 40 and the guy who does nothing and gets a 40, either way, it shows up as an F on their transcript. >> So, what's it going to make me want to sit there and actually put an effort if I'm struggling, but the guy next to me who isn't coming to school, I might as
048well just pull him and just sit back and do nothing. >> I know. But if you want to succeed, that that floor of 40 is going to >> But if I'm seeing somebody next to me doing absolutely nothing and getting the same grade as I am, and I'm actually putting an effort, I am trying to learn, it's a struggle for me, and he comes in and we're both getting Fs and I'm actually putting in the work. What makes me want to fight to get any harder or to try to get a D? He can he the person that got a zero can technically come in get three or four papers in get a high grade. Boom. He's above. I've worked my butt off. I can't seem to pass the test, but I'm stuck at 58
049with an F. You see what I'm saying? The guy who's doing all the work and just can't seem to pass the classes is still getting an F. The guy who sits there and is has a 40 the whole time, has done nothing, and then all of a sudden, two tests in, three tests in, he gets lucky, gets an 80%, he's above a D. I think >> what what encourage what encourages what what does it give me to keep fighting to get better if I'm seeing somebody next to me do absolutely nothing and ends up with a better grade. >> Yeah. >> Whether it be a transcript or not. >> Yeah. And I I think it's um when paired with uh these kinds of dispositions from the graduate profile, I think it could address some of
050the concerns that you're sharing. So, imagine a student who um doesn't do the bulk of the assignments, knows which ones to pick, does well on those, and and somehow passes the class, right? They get a D. And the conversation with that family is something along the lines and maybe a potential employer or a college recruiter or military recruiter. Yeah, Aaron Aaron did pass his classes. Um but, you know, he wasn't a great collaborator. He didn't work well with others. Um he really didn't advocate much for himself cuz he was gone so much and and didn't really care. he just knew he needed to get by and yeah, he passed, but you know, we're not real proud of of Aaron as a student, and we wouldn't recommend him. And then another student who works hard like
051you're describing, puts in incredible effort, advocates for themselves, connects with their family, says, "I need extra help. I need extra support." And gets the same grade as Aaron. The conversation and comment we might have about that student would be very different. Hey, Pete struggled with the content, but man, he's a hard worker. Man, he knows who to ask for help. Like, those are the kind of employees you guys want. I I believe that to be true. Um, the other thing that would happen in that experience, I want to believe that our best teachers would have some accountability for Aaron, who's just going to come in when he wants and put in minimal effort. And Pete, who's working really hard, might get some extra supports because the family might call and say, "Hey, it was another
05258. it was another F. What can we do? What can we do? Can we have some more time? What else do we need to work with them on? Where where this other family might call in and say, "Now, we have a two-eek deadline. Your kid didn't put in much effort." I think there are ways to address the the concerns that you're sharing through the graduate profile skills, and it's not a large number of students who are doing nothing and still passing. If they do nothing at our high school, they don't pass. It's just not occurring. >> I was going to allude to that. We had some conversation with some teachers the other day and especially with the 40% floor which they had done those scenarios in hypo in hypotheticals are like yeah this this looks
053really bad. That's not the reality in there. Those students that are working really hard are not getting the same grades as students that are trying to coast by. Those kids that are coasting by are still accumulating those 50%. And we know statistically when you have 15 assignments in there at a 50% it gets harder and harder to pull it up by one or two%. But if those other kids have sat there, the other thing with traditional grading is we know that we have things like, "Hey, you turned in that assignment that we worked on in class today. 10 out of 10, 10 out of 10, 10 out of 10." They're not getting 50s all the way through. Yes, some of those tests are, but those other things that that other kid isn't doing that you're
054alluding to with that they're just not doing, those are pulling their grade down throughout the class period and throughout the throughout the semester. And your other kid has has 10 out of 10 on some of those participation work that they're doing in class. That's pulling that grade up. And normally that kid in this scenario because those students that struggle sometimes get those bomb tests and they benefit from that floor as well that's well below 40. They benefit from it. And when you're at that I remember figuring this out in high school when you're with this zero it's so hard to drag it up as the year goes on and then but if I was right there I could pull it up much faster. And so all of those that student is benefiting from it as
055well. Um, and it keeps everybody engaged. So, I can turn it on. Cuz you alluded to that, wanting to see the learning like in standardsbased grading. And if we look at a student on the left, we know that is not a kid that should have earned an F because of the one zero, right? We look at a student like that and we say, "Hey, that that's not accurate grading." When we go back to the definition of grading to be able to do um demonstrate learning to to students. So, um that's why the floor is there. And I think as we've talked to our teachers and we've we've looked at it in the whole group, they feel like, yeah, this is fair and this is what what gets um students there um you know, unfortunately some
056like to take that kind of pound of flesh and that that negative and really that negative percentage that really is a zero um can really hinder kids um and and that's what we're trying to avoid with this policy. >> Can I ask you a question? >> I might I might not like the answer, but [Music] looking at so that uh the illustration on the left there we put that gray bar over there kind of representing the 40% floor at the bottom but I think the other stupid thing uh the other thing to keep in mind and I'm curious your thoughts around this is there are still and I think this is what we're trying to say mathematically the student who does absolutely nothing they're still they're still sitting right down here at 40%. And what
057we know from 5 years of doing this is there's a whole lot of kids that live up here and they they sit right on this line between, you know, the 58, 59, 60, 61, 62. Those are the kids that are trying. They're putting in some effort. But is this mathematically do you see why they still have double the number of ways to fail than they do of any other thing? And I'm I'm trying to figure out how to explain it unless you've walked know how to you know how it is to go to a piece of paper and you can't read it because everything's backwards. Do you know the feeling? Do you know that feeling? >> I know it. I know through my son who's dyslexic. >> So for me, this was super hard. >>
058Mhm. >> And I busted my ass to try to figure this out and it took a long time for me. I wish I was in that 58 60. It took a lot of hard work for me to get above that. Pete, you can look up the transcripts if you'd like. It was tough. And I believe that that's you. You earn what you get. That's why you always will always hear it from me. Are we getting these kids ready for the real world? Pete knows that. That's the first thing that comes out of my mouth. Why? Because if you don't I if if I would have just quit, nobody would have pushed me. Nobody would have ever Roxy Mahandro sat there and said, "We're going to figure this out. If we wouldn't had teachers like that,
059I wouldn't have passed. But it made me who I was and it made me go out and learn. Plus, it a mother that probably decided to hit me over the head with a frying pan. But I don't believe that you get something without earning it. That's just who I am. I I in every scenario that you put out here that you guys you guys are you guys you guys have PhDs. You guys you guys have gone to school. is I I I live in the real world where it's completely different. Lindsay can attest to that. It's completely different out there than it is here. I don't I want somebody who's going to fight to get out of a hole. I don't want somebody who's going to get help to get out of a hole. >>
060I have a question. What if you didn't have your mom to help push you? What if you didn't have any of that? I had Roxson Mahandro who's the one that started it for me. >> Was that a teacher? >> Yep. >> Okay. Well, you had that one teacher like we're talking about and Pete was saying there should be that that one teacher who's paying attention to their students and what they're doing. Cuz granted, I feel like what about the the the children that don't have parents at home actually pushing them? They're already set up for failure. They already have these adverse childhood effects that are going to affect them for the rest of their life. So, it's like why not put these students at a little bit of of an advantage? Because you're right, the
061real world is hard and you have to work for it, but you still have to do something here to pass cuz it's only a 40%. Cuz I'm just thinking, right, my dad's the same way as you. Successful, had to get through the get through the mud to get to where he was at. Granted, he had parents, but there's so many people who don't have that. And as a school system, I believe we need to be the people that are going to provide the students with the framework to keep going. So if your teacher's like, "Well, sorry. You're crap out of luck. You're just going to get a zero." It's like, "Well, now I have no hope. I don't believe in myself and I can't go home to someone to push me to be better. >>
062So, there's a difference between having a teacher who's going to push you >> than a teacher that's just going to say, "Hey, I'm going to start you off at a 40." >> Well, I agree with you, but there needs to be a middle ground. We still have to provide some type of support. >> That's why this little guy that they were saying halfass makes me >> feel like I'm okay because then they can go off of this >> to try to but to sit there and give somebody a 40 and not do no work, I I I I can't get behind that one. Okay, let me ask you this question. >> When when I grew up and my grandpa was farming, everything was siphon tubes. Circles didn't exist. >> Nope. >> Every every ounce of
063water that touched our crops was touched by hand. Now there are circles that you can literally start from your cell phone. So is every farmer today lazy and getting something they did not earn or is it just a different way of applying water? Like as you get you you work smarter not harder. there is it doesn't make the farmer today less of a worker than my grandpa even though there were different methods of farming at the time like you things change. So so the education you got 30 years ago isn't going to be the same education that our student reps are getting today. >> So I'm going to ask you a question. I'm going to keep it in the same realm that you did. Uh siphon tubes. You change siphon tubes. That's how the water
064hit every every field. Right now it circles. Does every farmer go out to their field and look at that crop every day? Has that changed? >> I don't know. Maybe they don't. >> Then you're not a good farmer. >> I mean, it doesn't mean that they're not. >> I can name you the biggest farmers around and everybody will touch there. Why? Because they have something invested in that crop, >> right? So you got kids showing up every day. Okay? They're coming to school. Maybe not every kid, you know, has has the circle, but it doesn't mean that that the that the what I'm saying is by by seeing their field every day, these kids are coming to school every day. So, there's a new way to water. It doesn't mean that these farmers have it
065easy and they don't do any hard work like they did back in the siphon tube days. Like, it's still farming. This is still education. You still have to work to get a non-F. But the they at least the the opportunity has just changed >> is is how I think of it. >> Can I tell you a little bit more about some of the things we've talked about buckets with you guys around how the high school's been working with green, yellow, and red buckets. I've heard you guys loud and clear about holding our kids accountable. The fencing idea, we have the fencing going in. So that's going to help us close in and have addressing truency issues that we have. One of the things that's also coming out of that is it's now going to be
066a privilege for our kids to leave. My admin team and our counselors are going to be meeting once a week and we're going to be looking at kids grades. And if a parent has cleared their kid, but they're not getting their grades, we're going to be making sure they're going to a Saturday school, they're coming in in the morning and getting academic support because I care too dang much about our kids not getting a passing grade and not being on track to graduate because I I want them to be set up for success and I want them to learn those skills because as Mariah has mentioned, sometimes our students don't have that. They don't have a teacher. They don't have parents at home. So now that's going to be my job in making sure I'm
067aligning my systems and my supports so that I can get a kid who doesn't have that help to that academic help. I totally understand what what you're saying because you're address you're frustrated over the the behavior aspect of what the kid, you know, not doing the assignment and that sort of thing. So, we're we're trying to address the accountability that has um not been there at the high school through um providing privileges with off-campus things and aligning more academic supports so that regardless if it's a 40% floor or not. Um there's there's a way that we're we're making sure all of the kids are set up for success. >> Can I ask some questions around that? Um, so, so what color on the graduate profile would the kid would the student be in in order
068to not leave for lunch? >> The kids would need to be in green. >> So, if a kid is is failing one class, they're not going to be able to leave campus. >> Okay. And is that >> if they are tardy, they're not going to be able to leave class. If they don't have attendance of 90% or better, they're not leaving campus. >> Okay. Tardy for that for a class. for any class period in the day they're not leaving for great and so will you guys have one entrance and one exit is that how you're going to monitor >> we'll have the ox gym doors the main gym doors and the breezeway because a lot you know just for the flow um are going to have multiple and the main entrance of the school and
069the kids are going to use scanners to be able to scan out and need their IDs so that was part of the reason why we were really advocating and getting kids to come and take their pictures for their IDs because they're going to have to scan out to leave campus will there be monitors at those locations as they go in and out. >> Yep. >> Okay. >> And and their entrance back in is going to be them being on time to that fourth or fourth period or that advisory class. So if they go to fourth period or advisory and they're Mark tardy, then the next week they're not going to have that privilege. >> So it is on a week-by-eek basis. Okay. And we'll be making sure and we have other supports where we're going
070to be making sure if it's um a Monday intervention where you know we'll have bus transportation to go pick up kids and bring them to school at 7:30 so they can get an an hour of academic support. We're going to make sure that happens. We really learned a lot out of our Husky Pack program and the supports and the things through Saturday school and how myself and my admin team has really been intentional around the messaging of we care too much about our kids to be able to, you know, say I'm not going to let you come to the school and not be held accountable and also not have it so you don't graduate on time. So Saturday school, like I had our leadership kids, they're like, I want to do Saturday school. We had
071a lot of parents in the springtime that were like, "Hey, I have a 10th grader. Can I have them come?" We just weren't equipped for that. We were just really focusing on the ninth grade and learning a lot of new things through our Husky Pack system. And now we're we're at a point where we're able to address all of these concerns. We're going to be learning a lot ourselves with really making sure we can capture and work with everyone um and getting the right supports for our kids. Um, I know that the the athletic director is really trying to crack down on this as well. Are there enough supports in place to actually is Skyward going to make it a little bit more um accessible for him to be able to run the grades so
072that >> Yep. Okay. >> Yeah, definitely. I think we're working on having really clear reports and being able to run those things. >> Okay. >> Many of the the last meeting when you looked at the almost gave the presentation about the athletic code updates. Yes, >> they also align with those graduate profile skills. So when we're defining like what it means to be a Jew, you have to come and participate and turn in your work, you have to show up on time, you have to stay out of trouble, those are the same things. And so that that same document has kind of driven all of those different conversations. >> Um I have a question going back to the slide with the danger of zero in this um standards reference teaching. It looks like you're still
073going to do like the one through four grading system. When will that convert into a letter grade that like parents can understand and students understand? >> That's the real time piece. It's all the time. So when you log into Skyward, the first thing you will see is a letter grade. And I love that for our parents. That's the language they've spoken always. So it'll be converted all the time into a letter grade. When you click on a standard referenced reporting classroom, it'll open up proficiency scales and then you'll start seeing why they got that based on the one, two, threes that they've gotten in their classes and then um if you click on a traditional one then you'll get kind of what you've always seen the percentages on based on their things. >> Okay. >>
074Um >> so it's the big change of that is it's it's live in the moment and then it's also live in the obviously posted on report cards and and transcripts. Caveat about that though is just like in a traditional grading class, I could be doing really well today because we've gotten through this standard and I've I've been a rock star with it. But if I check out for the rest of the semester, my trend line is going to go right down the tube and I'm going to fail the class. And so we we one of the things that we heard is people talking about how kids reached a point of proficiency and they just said, "Oh, I'm done. I I can coast for the rest of it." That's no longer a reality with the standards
075reference. They have to stay engaged and they have to continue to achieve at that level if that's the grade they want or if they don't their trend line will not follow that suit it will go down. >> Yeah. Previously they got three threes and that was kind of what we told them was the magic number and so they said I'm done with that proficiency scale. No, if you don't continue because that's what learning is not that you can do it right now, it's that you can do it again in 3 weeks like then you've learned it. So if they don't maintain that it goes down. Um, what about teacher accountability when it comes to I I understand that kids lie, right? So, when they're like, "My teacher hasn't updated my scores." Odds are they're a
076liar, my kid specifically. Um, but I I I hear that from lots of parents. So, is there an accountability aspect with teachers to actually stay in real time with their grades to keep because that's also a teacher accountability thing, too, where you know what I mean? Like if they don't input the grades, then it looks like my kid's passing when she's not. >> Yeah. One of the beauties of Skyward is that all of our administrators have access to to first see very summary level information. So you can see schoolwide um teacher byte-teer breakdown of when the gradebook was updated, how many level three assignments they've had, when was it last updated. So there's a lot of um really quick ways to see that that empower was cumbersome to get to that. So if I'm CAD
077and I'm sitting, it's really easy to see what's happening and where that trends are. It also this graduate profile skills. Um because these are in this case grade buckets, it allows them to track at the class level who are our kids who are in the red in math in 9th grade. So they can get really granular very quickly with a few clicks to then know where do we need to apply that support, where do we need to figure out what's going on. So far, their work has primarily been like at the end of the semester or at the end of the term. This allows it to be real and in the moment to go along so we don't get them to failure. Instead, they can respond right away. I don't know if you want to,
078but >> Okay, another question about the lunch schedule. Can can we accommodate that many students? Like, let's say there's a huge amount of students that are tardy to school, you know, especially in the beginning of school as they're getting used to all the things. Um, but you know, if you have a bunch of tardies or you have kids that aren't doing well in classes or whatever, can we even accommodate to have all the kids stay on campus, that's why we're going to be easing into it so we can >> to kind of see what the impact of knowing that we have, you know, off-campus is a privilege. Um, but we've been having conversations with nutrition services and um trying to figure out facility use and what does that look like if we do get to
079a point where um we can accommodate it. What does that look like? >> In the in the old model, what would you say percentage-wise of kids stay on campus for lunch and leave campus for lunch? So, um, our data shows that first period and lunchtime, which is fourth and advisory, um, a good percentage of our kids, I would say about 80% of our kids leave to go off campus and then about a third of them return. >> Yeah. So, that's part of the reason why we went to a model of lunchtime's a privilege because kids aren't coming back. And one of the biggest takeaways when we were sh sh sh sh sh sh sh sh sh sh sh sh sh sh sh sh sh sh sh sh sh sh sh sh sh sh sh sharing
080our um discipline matrix at a pack meeting back in the springtime, the parents were pleading with uh Mr. Schwarz and I to do something about a lunch because too many of our parents are worried about where their kids are because they leave and no one knows where they're at. >> Mhm. >> Okay. >> I'm going to I'm going to agree with the sorrow here for a second too. It's might be the first time. But um I also believe this is one of those places where we have smart kids. And when I say smart, I don't mean necessarily in the traditional sense that they can you get a four on that scale or whatever. But humans when given a high expectation know how to step up to that expectation. If you set the bar low, they
081crawl over the the low bar as well. So I really believe what's going to happen with that behavior component with the lunch. If I really want to have lunch with my friends, I'm going to figure out how to get to class on time. I'm going to figure out how to turn in my assignments. I'm going to turn figure out how to stay there. Just number-wise, right now, there's about 1500 kids >> and the current number, I think, is 503 parents or somewhere, >> okay, 549 kids have been approved by their parents to leave campus so far. So, right now, a third of them are authorized to do so. I think if they're people are going to figure out that if they want to keep that privilege, they've got to work for it. And I I
082think it will come true. I really do. Um those that don't probably weren't working very hard in the beginning either. And so they're going to continue down that those habits that they're going to find themselves staying on campus not getting to take advantage of that. >> If there's not more questions about that, I wanted to circle back to you and and agree with him again. Right. We're going to go two for two. Um, circling back, I think you've heard with these these other pieces. Um, I think and and you've worked with us closely enough and you've worked with me closely enough. Um, I think that philosophically we agree right with what you're saying. Um, we want to hold kids accountable. We want we want um kids to um have a high bar and be held
083at that. Um, tell me your teacher's name again. >> The one that helped you. >> Mahandro. >> Roxy. Roxy. Mahandro. >> Roxy. What? Mahandro. >> Mahandra. >> Mahandro. I was close. Okay. Roxy Mahandro. Right. Um I don't know her personally, but it sounds like a teacher that, you know, Pete always talks to us about our most important job is to hire, and it sounds like a teacher that we would be wanting to hire. Um did you have that level of relationship with every single one of your teachers? >> All but like probably two. >> Yeah. Right. Yeah. And sometimes there's those. Um and I'm not speaking of anybody in our system right now. I'm not even speaking um specifically, but like I said, I I started this work and we started talking about this work
084in 2015 when I was a teacher. Um and like I said, a lot of the teachers that were advocating it for it were the ones that had the conversations exactly like you're h having right now that that in other topics were saying, "We need to push kids harder. We need to hold a higher bar. We need to do these things." They didn't see this as lowering this bar. Some of the conversations that happened in the staff room were from some other teachers, right? Maybe those two that you weren't. No, I don't know who it was specifically. There are sometimes teachers or individuals in the system that wanted where that teacher came and said, "How am I going to do everything I can to make sure Isao gets there." There's some that for poor relationships or
085negative things that happen or negative um you know, relationships that happen that say, "How do I put up every barrier for this kid to make sure they don't?" Right? And I know I've worked and I'm not saying again I'm not speaking about anybody in the system. I don't want this to go crazy. But um I just want to share a story about what that means when we give a kid we we create a system that's more fair and gives hope for those kids to turn it on and absolutely get there. Again, we've talked about it. They get there and they eek out at that 61% and they have a D, right? That's still a D. And for that kid that Pete described earlier that had every ability to get an A and they just earned
086themselves a D, right? That should feel like a slap in the face, right? And their parents should be like, "What the heck are you doing?" Because you you just close doors on your future because we know what a D does. But we have some kids that come with struggles, whether it's learning struggles or home struggles or whatever. And we want to keep those doors open as long as we can, right? And and just a year or so ago, um I met a student of mine, right, who as a senior in high school, um in a different district, um I worked really hard to do what your teacher did. And we got to get there. You got to graduate. you're too smart. You got to get there. You got to get there. You got to get
087there. And he had every barrier in the world, right? And um at the at the end when we were advocating and he was turning things in and he got that grade and we had some individuals in the system and again in a different system um a different district that were saying, "No, I don't like this kid. I don't think he earned it. I don't think he earned it. How are you going to pass him?" And I said, "No, he's got a 62. He passed it." Right? And he got a D. We did not send this kid off to Stanford. We weren't shipping him off and you know like sending out college ready transcripts like they learned about in Avid, but he got that right. And so when I ran into this kid at Costco and
088he was with his wife and he was talking about his this fulfillment that he felt in a in a job as a plumber and doing these things because he earned it. He turned it on and he earned it. Um these were jobs that he could not have gotten without a a high school transcript that had a D on it. Right? if he had not graduated, he would not have been able to move into the positions he did to get where he was. And he was at a different place. Um, and sometimes we think our our job is like as a gatekeeper and to say, "Hey, we want to we want to meddle with the grades and things and and move it." And so these are what we found is statistically they're fairer systems. We're not
089trying to give kids things they haven't earned, but we are trying to keep them in the game and keep as many doors open for them so that when they turn it on, those things are available to them. and we find more and more kids are able to do that and be available. And again, we're not saying, "Hey, let's get that transcript and application ready to to Harvard." We're saying, "Hey, now you can go out into the workforce and have a few more opportunities, right?" And that workforce is going to kick them in the pants if they show up late and do all these things. We know that and we've taught them that and we've we've illustrated that to them in a whole lot of ways. But they're in the game as long as they can.
090And we see that as our role is holding them accountable and keeping them in the game as long as they can instead of filtering out which was kind of the that old like 40s50s60s education model is filter out who we don't want. We want to keep as many kids in the game as long as we can and then put them on there. But we're holding to a high standard. I think we agree on that and I think you've seen that from us in the way we interact with kids and what we're doing in our systems throughout all of it. So I don't think philosophically we're off. I think it's just like a and I totally understand and like I said the first time I heard about it I heard I thought the same thing. Why
091are we going to give something for less it was when I had to look at it mathematically and realize I know there's a 50% there but that's really a zero. That's really a zero. And and and the kids that are get earning a zero or earning a zero. We're just not trying to slam them into a hole that they can't ever get out of so that when they turn it on they get what they earn. And sometimes what they earn is a D, right? and and they should feel if they were capable of more, they should feel feel that. And it just keeps kids in the game because some of those kids that are really struggling, they say, "Oo, all these zeros." Cuz those kids that struggled throughout their learning for a long time, often
092times they just quit, right? They don't have that teacher that's pushing them and they they quit and they get those zeros. Well, this keeps them in the game so when they turn it on, they're there and it's available. >> We might even have more slides. I'm not sure. >> We do. You don't? Um >> Okay, got you. Um, so just to kind of go back to we will be using a a 40% floor and you guys have a a page about using the 40% floor and kind of some of the um takeaways on on why um as Will talked about the the zero skew the math and we're really trying to focus on making sure that when you see a letter grade that's being representative of the learning that's happening and trying to take the
093behavior component out of it which is how um the graduate profile came about so that even in traditional classes we've shared the graduate profile piece so that you can also have some communication around how is my student behaving in class because that's often times something that the parents when we sit down and talk about grades or a concern with a student well how are they acting behaviorally ly, not necessarily about the learning that's happening in the classroom, but the behavior. And so that's where um trying to encourage persistence and communicate the learning component. Um and also making sure that um regardless if a student's getting the 40%, a 40% is still an F. It's still, you know, a student who's not going to engage is going to get that 40% and still fail. Um, we've
094talked about how it's backed by research, um, and using a 40 or 50% floor. Um, as well as trying to c cultivate a growth mindset, a growth mindset for our students and not kill their motivation. Um because regardless if they're going through something in life in a moment during school, having some grace for our students when they're going through it, um and being when they're able and in the right mindset to get back into to school, um knowing that they haven't killed their grade midway through the trimester and then there's no way for them to dig out of a a zero situation that they've um gone through. So, it's not about lowering standards, it's about fairness, it's about motivation, and it's about keeping our the focus in traditional grading on on the learning. And this
095is just the way that we're um doing it through the traditional grade book. >> Go ahead. >> Well, there's been certainly a number of questions and discussion and and perhaps there'll be more, but I do want to uh share a perspective about um I certainly want to honor Director Puneda's perspective on it. I think he shared very passionately with me privately and here in a very very similar fashion about his concern about this philosophy and I give a lot of grace for particularly um non-educators I'm going to use that term who don't work in schools because it's a difficult concept to wrestle with and understand. Where I have a little less patience is with some of our staff. Um we've been doing this for a number of years and I think there's some irony in
096the response of some of the loudest people around us. the um I asked a group of teachers the other day. I was with Cat and and some of her team I think on Friday um how they were feeling about this concept and and where they thought the high school was. I said, "Is it 8020? Like are 20% of the people still upset about this?" And they wouldn't even give it that much. It was closer to 9010 and maybe even less. There aren't a lot of people making noise about this, which for me is very encouraging. the people who are making noise, what I think is ironic about their experiences as educators in the state of Washington and their contention that we're giving something for nothing and that uh you know we're not setting kids up
097for the real world. I've had a number of conversations with this board and others whether or not public educators are real world employees. Um you know I think your industries can be different. you have some uh you can move quicker on employees who maybe aren't performing at a certain level and I I think this board for certain would understand the difficulty in providing feedback to staff who maybe aren't performing appropriately and not only second, third, fourth and fifth chances that they get to demonstrate competency. So I would hope those same teachers and individuals would consider their own world of work experience and the benefits that come with um people investing in them and giving them other opportunities to learn. and they're adults, right? People who we say they should know better. Um, second chances are
098are a great part of what good employers do and what great educators do. And I just want to end with thinking about proficiency from that's what we're talking about ones, twos, threes, and fours. Also, some of these employees that uh raise this concern over and over and over. Um, they're the first to attack administrators who evaluate and rate their performance on the exact same scale and when given a one or a two will challenge the credibility of a a trained and certificated administrator and the system rather than acknowledge their own struggles and deficiencies. We have to address the accountability not only for our kids. We don't want to lower the bar for our kids and I don't believe we're doing that at all. But another layer to this is what we're trying to do and
099what you've charged me to do which is hold the adults in our system accountable. Those are the people I have a responsibility for so that there are a lot more Roxy Mahandros out there than other teachers cuz I had Roxy Mahandro too and she made an impact on you and she made an impact on me and I want to believe that if Roxy was thinking about this kind of work she'd be in support of it. Uh it's good work for kids. It's the right stuff. It can be confusing and our job is to provide clarity and leadership around that and I we've taken some great strides since the springtime. We've had some hard times around standardsbased grading and I don't know we're on the other side but we're we're making good progress and I don't
100want you to be derailed by it or us and so appreciate the opportunity to engage in the discussion. Appreciate the passion that was shared and uh would welcome any more questions if you have them. I have a question more towards um uh college and a high school classes. How will that work with this grading? >> College and the high school um because of some state level changes that that are happening with it. So the short version of that is um colleges are governed by a different agency within public education and so they have very specific rules on how their grades are generated and so the college and the high school classes will all maintain traditional grading that's aligned with the grading structure of the college or university partnership that they have. So that was kind
101of a new development in the spring. too. >> Yeah. Cuz I heard we were going towards like standardsbased grading and I was like, "Oh, completely. Well, how would that make sense with >> the college offered an opportunity that if like if Othell High School wanted to keep standards based grading for those classes is that the teacher would need to keep two separate grade books, one for the OELA high school grade and one for the college grade, it doesn't make a lot of sense. And so it just makes sense to to leave it with the college grade. Yeah. Well, thank you for the presentation. If there are no additional questions or comments, um, I'll turn it over to Director Prow. It looked like we had a hand up in the crowd. I'm not sure if you
102want to address that or >> I just have one question. >> I mean, we we are moving into public comment. So, if you'd like to come up and and address this with a public comment, that would I think that would be appropriate. I heard it touched um on briefly about the um barriers and I was just wondering at what level of grading would barriers be looked at for a student? So if you see them in the, you know, I don't know if you're going to look at 55, what I guess what percentage would you be looking at students with those barriers or is that even going to be addressed because we've heard that barriers were obviously >> dyslexia. >> I think uh I'd like cat to address this, but I'll get it going. Um, we
103talk and and I think the conversation started this evening around accountability and this other piece for the way we think about it in the district is are the supports and resources in place for students to be successful. And so what I think Cat would talk to you about are the supports that are available, a student success team, particularly at the secondary level to determine whether or not a kid's on track and what supports or resources they might need. >> Yeah. So, one of the um things that my admin team and our counselors will be looking at that we've had feedback um from teachers as well and and these thresholds is um when it comes to academic and on-time or not on time but grades um we're looking at it from two different lenses. One is
104on-time credits and then if they're passing their classes. So, if a kid's not passing one class and that's an F, it doesn't matter if it's 55, 68, whatnot. if they're getting one one F, we're going to be aligning them to a resource or a support. Um, and also getting other minds in the room because sometimes a counselor might not have all of the answers. It could be the school psychologist, um, a student's case manager, but we're all going to be in the room to be able to say, "This is what's going on with a kid. How do how do we align our supports and resources to set up a to set a kid up for success?" And then what we'll begin to look for are patterns across the system. Which barriers are most common with
105this type of student? Which courses are we struggling with the most? What should we offer at Saturday school? Where do we plan a remediation course the second or third trimester because we know kids have struggled this first semester. That data will help inform all of that work. >> Yeah. Just going back another move that we're making at at McFarland that I think shows this dichotomy between high expectations and high rigor and then also supports. Um, one of the things we're pushing, I know there was frustration last year where we would say, "Yeah, I go on and I look and my kids are two, but they've only gotten two-le work, right? They it's just like, hey, they're a two, but like when are we going to move?" We've set the expectation for our teachers that um
106in a unit, you have to be at three level work at least oneird of the way through the unit. So getting to three-level work quicker, higher expectations, getting there quicker. It also creates more opportunity to demonstrate three-level work. So some of our teachers said, "Well, what if they're not ready?" Right? Going back to barriers and supports, if they're not ready, we're going to identify that earlier in the unit so that we can provide supports and intervention throughout the way because sometimes kids were getting to the very end of the unit, getting a few assignments on a three-level work, and they weren't successful, but we had moved on. And so an intervention was when that subject and content had moved through. And so again, high accountability, higher rigor, we're going to move faster at a higher
107pace and hold you to a higher expectation. But it also provides for more support, more intervention, and more opportunity. So those two things, we can be caring and um join people together and help and support students, and we can also have high expectations at the same time. And I think that's when we've talked about the educators that have impacted us in the past. That's what they've done for us. Okay, I think that's it. Thank you guys so much. Um, Superintendent Perez, were there any other public comments? >> None submitted? No. >> Okay, we're going to move on to our upcoming events. August 26th, which is tomorrow, we have the all staff orientation. And then on the 28th is the first day of school. This says 1st through 12th grade, but I think it's just 1st
108through 9th, isn't it? And then 10th, 11th, 12th goes on Friday. Okay. And then our next regular scheduled board meeting is September 8th. And then we have our site visit on September 15th. So be thinking of someone that you're going to invite to that site visit. And then we have another meeting on the 22nd. So that's what we've got coming up. We'll move on to the board self assessment of the meeting. Appreciate the presentation tonight. Rating. >> Yeah, that was a lot. you're kind of in the hot seat, so that's never fun. But I appreciate all the information and all of the updates. Really well planned agenda. >> Appreciate the updates to the way the meetings are going to be televised to the public. I I appreciated the healthy discussion. I think it's uh when
109we do disagree, it's important that we get a chance to share our perspectives and opinions, and we do that um as a as a public entity and as a publicly elected board members, we do that in public. So, I I appreciated the healthy conversation. Agreed. Anything else? Okay. At this time, the board will recess into executive session for 20 minutes to discuss potential litigation and performance of a public employee. No action will be taken following executive session. This meeting.