VASD Board of Education Meeting--November 1, 2021

001[Music] thanks everyone we're waiting just for a few more minutes we'll get started in just a minute as soon as john is here we can hold tight okay thing okay okay everyone um i'm gonna go ahead and call this meeting to order i'd like to establish that we have a quorum for the meeting beginning with the roll call vote i'm gonna start over with jen here jana here christina here nicole here and i am here as well and so is john i'm gonna hear on john's behalf we have a quorum um jen has this meeting been properly noticed it has thank you i want to remind our in-person attendees at tonight's meeting that masks are required to be worn at all times eating is not permitted and failure to abide by the rules may result

002in removal from our venue but i very much appreciate everyone's cooperation in respecting um these requirements so to help ensure that we're centering our board work around our shared values and serving students we begin each of our board meetings by reading our district's equity and mission statements which can be found at the top of the agenda um jen i believe you are up would you please do the honors i would be honored our vasd equity statement reads each student has access to the resources and educational rigor they need at the right moment in their education regardless of race gender ethnicity ability language family background or family income our r1 results policy reads each student will acquire the knowledge and skills necessary to achieve their personal goals thrive in a diverse global society and lead a

003healthy self-fulfilling life thank you jen i appreciate it um are there any questions or comments on the remainder of the agenda hearing none are there any motions to adopt tonight's agenda i have a motion from yana do i have a second a second from jen thank you um all in favor signify with eye any opposed tonight's agenda has been adopted okay our first agenda item is our finalist interviews for the at-large board position so that's very exciting thank you everybody for coming back again this week um each board member or each um each candidate is going to have 10 minutes to provide a brief opening statement and then our vice president christina will ask the candidates questions on behalf of the board if time permits after the predetermined questions board members will have an opportunity

004to ask the question the candidates any clarifying questions about the information that was presented tonight and after all of our candidate interviews there'll be some time for board discussion before we vote and the board should have an alphabetical list of candidates and a list of the questions in front of them and they'll also be a list of the questions at the table for the candidates okay so the order for tonight's interviews will be again i feel like it's the lottery we have corby white will be first younley rush will be second johannes will be third and carissa huntington will go forth tonight hand those down okay jen can you read that one more time the order of our candidates yep uh first up will be corby white second will be yanley rush third will be

005joe haines and fourth will be carissa huntington thank you okay so if we could have mr corby white come on up to the microphone thank you for joining us tonight we appreciate it and i should clarify we are giving 10 minutes for the whole interview with the open brief opening statement and then the questions from christina so i just wanted to make sure that i hadn't misspoken earlier um and it'll be the same timer oh there it is all charged up and ready to go so those are the questions there they're a bit longer just so all the candidates know so you might want to be able to reference the sheet that was there as you came up oh that helps you to be able to read along excellent thank you okay so anytime that

006you're ready we will get started i'm ready let's do it okay so let them go right ahead yeah i thought you were gonna ask the question so well we're gonna give some time for an opening statement and then we'll head right into christina oh okay well thank you for having me uh for the second round um i'm very grateful to be here um after that first round a lot of things went through my mind as far as just ideas just to submit to the board just ideas i have dealing with the analytics that i looked at as far as something i'm going to talk about in my the first answer regarding diversity equity and inclusion uh with the district i did have the pleasure of speaking with some of the teachers in the district who

007were trick-or-treating yesterday and some of them um who didn't know me they i think they were surprised at who answered the door and so i talked to them and i talked to some of their kids for a little bit and i asked them i said are you excited and they said for what i said aren't you back in school and one of them one of the little girls who was dressed as a little mermaid she said to me i get to see my friends i said what about learning she said i get to learn with my friends okay all right so yeah so thank you go ahead christina cover to you so our first question and you have that sheet in front of you if you need to reference it yes as board members we

008represent our community through policy decisions what unique viewpoints or constituent voices would you bring to the board table and how will you balance the viewpoints closest to you with those that are less familiar to you to ensure that you're working in the best interest of all students absolutely so i think i'm a big proponent of diversity equity and inclusion and i have a little mantra model that i like to uh equate to diversity equity and inclusion and i say it's it's diversity to me it's inviting you to the dance right equity is asking you to dance and inclusion is asking what song needs to be played in order for you to dance so i think when we deal with diversity equity and inclusion especially as it relates to the children of this district that's what

009we need to be asking ourselves what song do we need to play that resonates with them to get them involved with it get them excited about their educational process um another thing i wanted to ask the board and i don't know if this is the proper uh forum to ask this in have has the board or has the district ever done what's referred to as an equity audit just to gauge and see where we are with relationship to equity and educational equity especially because i think that's something that's that's very important where we bring to the forefront the need and what resources need to be allocated to our underrepresented children of the community i think also implicit bias trainings are very important and necessary for staff teachers anyone that's interacting with kids and kids themselves

010to nurture them and let them know about the differences in what they're dealing with as far as the student population okay all right the next question is the role of the board is to govern by setting expectations for the district through our policies we do not make specific day-to-day operational decisions how will you balance the demands for action on issues outside of the board's domain especially when those demands are from well-known acquaintances or community members you have close ties to with the need to keep our districts district's focus on student results so when i read this question the first thing that came to mind was something i always equate to sports and that's people lie men like women like analytics don't lie so i think a way to address those those uh members of the

011community or people who may be you know purging a board member because they know you're on the board to try to get an action done on their behalf with their interest in mind is to simply point out the uh the analytics of the situation i'll give you guys an example so one of the teachers that i was talking to uh again at stoner prairie she asked me she said why exactly do we need these uh these type of trainings regarding diversity and implicit bias what's driving the need for that so what i did i did some research and i pointed out opportunity gaps and uh i i let her know i said look all i can find right now for you is what's going on in the madison metro school district you know as far

012as opportunity gaps and the literacy rate and when i pointed out those figures to her i showed her i said look at the national what the national data says it's saying our underrepresented students aren't reading at even a fourth grade level so what needs to be done is a huge focus on early literacy from 4k to second grade getting these students ready to read at even a third grade level by the time they reach second grade so that from that point on we can then get them reading at an eighth grade level get them ready for the sats you know so i say all that to say analytics don't lie and anyone who who tries to encourage me with their decision with their best interests i will listen of course i will listen but point

013out the analytics of the situation um you know when we look at the virtual situation regarding schools and paying attention to the time there as well um that was that was huge to look at the analytics of of how our students were failing during that time and the reasons why the lack of socialization uh our underrepresented students didn't have the economic means in many cases to even have internet access to have the tools to be successful um for example i'm a member of the 100 black men of madison just to give you an example we found out there was a a class of students on the south side of madison who didn't have the infrastructure for internet access so we even if they had computers they couldn't access the internet we paid spectrum to create

014that infrastructure for them and then we even supplied them with the laptops to be able to log in virtually that's just a small example of what i'm saying we took data we took information from the community that these students didn't have economic means to be successful and we you know do what we had to do to keep reinforcing the mission statement that every student must be successful hey mr white i wanted to say i think we'll add extra time just when we're doing our questions we never know how long the questions could take sure ask so we'll add on an extra you know i think three minutes so okay we'll keep that in mind and i'll yeah these questions are fairly involved so that seems that seems like a good idea okay third question yes

015the board governs as a single entity by majority vote not always a unanimous vote it's inevitable that at times board members find themselves on opposite sides of an issue that they feel very strongly about how do you personally handle differences of opinion or interpersonal conflict and what skills will you bring to the board to help ensure that this type of dissonance is productive all right so currently in my day-to-day job my nine to five from the state of wisconsin's health program manager i deal with the state of wisconsin's group insurance board and if anyone has ever set in or watched that board there are differences of opinion all the time regarding health care especially equity in health care so what i do when there's a difference of opinion with what i'm proposing is understand that

016i'm not always right and that i know this is for the greater good i use it as an opportunity to learn because many times with the difference of opinion you don't simply see that other person's side so hear them out respect their opinion hear it out in its entirety don't interrupt them let them get that full opinion out so you can see how it differs from yours because in many cases we find when we don't listen we're so strong in our opinion that a lot of times they're saying the same thing it's just being said differently so but when there's an absolute difference um respect the person's opinion keep the mission statement in the back of your mind why are we reaching this opinion what's the end goal it's not personal never take it personal

017that someone has the difference of opinion with you when the goal is to ensure that every student is successful i'm watching the clock remember that extra time and we'll add extra time then to each candidate so you you are our test drive on time you got to be the guinea pig okay the last question as mentioned previously the board's role is to govern through policy while the administration's role is to manage basd in a manner consistent with the board's policies however there may be times when administration makes decisions consistent with board policy that nonetheless take a path that's different than what you believe to be best what would your approach be in handling these situations yep so the first thing is understanding that you're on a board and that uh you can accept the will

018of the majority that's the major thing you're on a board you you're signing up to accept the will of the majority don't take it personal is the second thing it's for the greater good look at keep looking at the mission statement keep looking at the strategic statement understand that the board is backing up everything every decision that's being made with facts and data it's not just the decision that's being made based on emotion that the what the board is deciding is transparent you know the community will have access to what's being decided and how it's a collaborative effort understand that in order for a board to be effective it has to be collaborative all right so it's not personal against your decision it's looking at the strategic goal as well as the mission to come

019up with with a solution um the school board works for the community i will always understand that that it's not about me i always it's no football analogy that i have enom it's not about me it's about the greater good so if you keep that at the forefront you would never be offended or take anything personal when you come up with an idea that the board may not agree with or they go in a different direct direction understand that a board is a democratic process that's the main thing and have always have the courage to stand in your conviction but also understand that someone else may have a difference of opinion the board may differ from you they communicate it effectively it's for the greater good of the district thank you very much i appreciate

020your your time tonight i want to just open it up quickly to the board to see if there's any um questions and clarifying questions that the board might have on the information that was presented tonight and it looks like we're busy all taking notes so we appreciate anything from the board thank you so much again for coming in tonight we really appreciate your time um and just coming in and sharing your thoughts with us um this has been a great opportunity to get to know you so thank you thanks for having me absolutely thank thank you thank you thanks [Music] okay okay our next candidate is miss yonley rush welcome thanks for coming back tonight we appreciate you taking the time to come back and meet with us um as we stated before the candidates

021will each have a time to do a brief introductory statement and we'll move right into questions from christina i've updated the timer so we have some additional time and i'm going to turn it over to you and let you get started thank you so much for having me here so uh i at first i see the vacancy open i just say oh they knew something i think i can help but uh today i coming here i really want to be uh one of the members because i have great passion about education so i was a teacher in china for eight years i achieved my career zenith i think still not enough i have not done enough for my students so even though i was a principal i can make decisions and i also a city

022representative like for the education system i always like some students were just left out from the education system so i crossed another continent i come to us and i become a teacher here and then later i in my phd in education all i want to do is like i want to make education better for all the children so um after the first long interview i'm very happy for what the education my child got from the velona school district however i looked at the public data available at dpi so i learned a short legal research so come by comparing the data from 2011 to 2019 so 2020 is not available so i think velona has been doing a great job comparing other school districts however when i break down the data to racial and ethnicity and

023also students there from the economic disadvantage glue so it's all these students they identify as lega below basic or basic so um i hope become one of the members i can make some like a decision or also some voting and hopefully velona can become a pioneered school district uh in wisconsin to serve these uh children and i know the achievement gap is not surprising to everyone however we are working on it i hope like everybody can have contribution about that so that's my opening statement thank you i'm going to turn it over to christina okay so you have a sheet with the questions in front of you if you need to reference those the first one is as board members we represent our community through policy decisions what unique viewpoints or constituent voices would you

024bring to the board table and how will you balance the viewpoints closest to you with those that are less familiar to you to ensure that you're working in the best interest of all students so my viewpoint is to promote like a multicultural education like uh using cultural relevant pedagogy and also like i have innovation curriculum and have the curriculum really meet the students needs and i also like uh promote like a global education uh especially in nowadays like a uh globalization environment so i also want to values like the language the culture the access the student and the family bring to the class along and bring to this community so um so uh when i balance the the viewpoint so i will like for those like i less familiar so because uh as a person

025like i have been i had a long career in education i have a strong like a study ability and also always willing to learn so for those like i'm not familiar i will do research i will search any cases like a relevant to it and then like i make some relevant viewpoint and what can apply to our situation so for those i already familiar as my background is always education it's like a education quantity study qualitative study so for those i'm familiar so i will not shy to bring some evidence and bring some what research say and what is really happening in the classroom to to the board and see like what would be the best for our student and also i will always use the strategic flame wall to guide like our viewpoint okay

026the second question is the role of the board is to govern by setting expectations for the district through our policies we do not make specific day-to-day operational decisions how will you balance the demands for action on issues outside of the board's domain especially when those demands are from well-known acquaintances or community members with whom you have close ties with the need to keep our districts focused on student results so i'm bio ovia lika my personal viewpoint is not representing the school board even though i got i feel like i have enough knowledge like a political knowledge in education however that is my personal viewpoint and also i'm coming here it's not for my personal my own child i'm coming here to see like how i can serve with the community and also like uh i

027will strictly like follow the rules and all uh the policies of the school board require uh when like some people are familiar or not familiar with like an approach to me with some complaint or like uh say some good things about the school district i will like a very careful deflate my language is not let my personal feeling or personal viewpoint have any representation of the school board and i will recommend them if they have questions they have any like a conflicts or or some comments that they can welcome to the school board meeting or i also can encourage them to do like a written statement and then uh because there's some guideline in the like a web page if lega uh could be for some parents that they are not familiar and i will

028like interrupt them how to like uh express their view about the education in verona okay third question the board governs as a single entity by majority vote not always a unanimous vote it's inevitable that at times board members find themselves on opposite sides of an issue that they feel very strongly about how do you personally handle differences of opinion or interpersonal conflict and what skills will you bring to the board to help ensure that this type of dissonance is productive so uh one of the things i want to answer the last question first one of the strategies i teach my students they are the future teachers like uh in public schools so it's a growth mindset so when you have a growth mindset you like open to more like uh uh things like you haven't

029seen before and those like are different from you so like a fixed mindset like instead it's like oh you only see one like a single point so i have been like teaching this for five years and i personally believe i have the open mindset so if like anything like a conflict with my viewpoint and i will see like uh if i stand in another person and other family and other people different have different background what they will think and i will always please also related back to our student strategic like a planning so what will be best like for our student is not my personal interest or my personal belief so that will be the strategy i will also bring to the table is always have a growth mindset to see this like a diverse

030like a world okay and the last question is as mentioned previously the board's role is to govern through policy while the administration's role is to manage vasd in a manner consistent with the board's policies however there may be times when administration makes decisions consistent with board policy that nonetheless take a path that's different than what you believe to be best what would your approach be in handling these situations so the first i will try to present some evidence like all anything in research and anything in real life like can support my viewpoint and try to persuade members however if the majority rule is not like in my side i will totally list bet it and also try my best to support like what the decision will be thank you are there any follow-up questions from

031the information that we've heard tonight that any of the board members would like to ask and again everyone's frantically taking notes so thank you give everyone a second are there any final words that you'd like to share uh sure so as everybody here i say i am english is not my first language as a like a first leg uh immigrants coming here i always feel sad like about uh the english language learner and other like a family minority family they do not have like a high achievement academically like i really want to bleach like at this income gap because like the data i just telling at my opening statement they are not just data they are students they are families so i literally hold like yeah as my career as a teacher principal as a

032teacher educator and then through all the education in uh the education in education and i really hope i can try this new law and have my contribution in education and uh also like i'm not here to representing some minority family i want them to see as a model even though you english is not your native language and you are not familiar with lots of things but you can still stand up and speak for yourself and also for the community and you have ability to do that and one more thing is like i always have those if this and that question like i would say like if everybody's seeing like a minority student like a esl student if like we are seeing them like a full of glow for mindset is like a oh they are

033the emerging bilingual they are not learning just learning english as a second language so people people might see me differently they will not think oh you do not speak fluent like english so you're less intelligent than other so and i hope i can like a set up a model for those students for those family in verona as well so it do take some to come in here to talk because like i usually like those person oh i want to be just silent and i want to just listen so and i'm very happy to be here today and thank you very much thank you so much for your time we really appreciate you coming and letting us have a chance to get to know you more and answer our questions and uh again thank you so

034much thank you okay our next candidate is mr joe hey hey thank you for coming in tonight we appreciate you taking the time to visit with us again um like as i said before we're going to give everyone a chance to do a brief intro statement and then i'll turn questions over to christina and you have a copy of those in front of you because they are kind of long so you can refer back to them so anytime that you're ready we'll get started started oh great thanks everyone for having me back it's uh it's nice to see you all again and i appreciate the opportunity to talk with you all some more uh my name is joe haynes uh i uh i'm the one from the last round that has five kids in the

035district uh spread across three different schools from fort the pre-k program to to the middle school i'm also my day job as i'm one of the in-house corporate council for uw health so when this opening arose i had been searching for a while for an opportunity to give back to the community that my family loves so much that aligned with my passion and what i view as my skill set and i saw this opportunity as something that might fit that need i i do see you know i think we all do what's happening around the country where the the school board has become a battleground for some cultural issues i don't know that we've seen that to that degree in our community yet but we could um and i do think that that's something that

036i i'm you know prepared from my experience with to be able to handle um but i appreciate the opportunity to come and discuss all these issues with you thank you i'm gonna turn it over to christina okay so you have that sheet in front of you if you need to reference the questions first one is as board members we represent our community through policy decisions what unique viewpoints or constituent voices would you bring to the board table and how will you balance the viewpoints closest to you with those that are less familiar to you to ensure that you're working in the best interest of all students yeah that's a that's a great question i i'll start by saying that obviously i don't have a viewpoint coming from any minority standpoint but i do want to

037share that i support the importance of dei and recognize how important that is to be able to execute the district's mission of helping all students achieve and become you know good members of a diverse global society i do share that value in terms of my own unique viewpoint i would say the strongest thing is what i alluded to before having so many kids in the district spread across different schools currently we have kids in three different schools and will continue to throughout their education and to be able to provide a perspective of how a given policy or how enforcement of a given policy or a strategic priority affects kids of all ages not just having tunnel vision for one particular group of students i think is a viewpoint that i can provide to the board

038in terms of the second part of the question of how you balance your own viewpoints to make sure that you're not putting over you're not overemphasizing those things objectivity i think is a trait that i i pride myself on that's not to suggest i don't sometimes fall short of it but i do try and look at all issues objectively and understand that my own perspective is not the only perspective and that if i place if i overvalue my own the things that affect me personally ahead of things that affect all students in the district then that's that's a form itself of inequity in resources and how we attribute our or how we apply our strategic priorities okay second question is the role of the board is to govern by setting expectations for the district through

039our policies we do not make specific day-to-day operational decisions how will you balance the demands for action on issues outside of the board's domain especially when those demands are from well-known acquaintances or community members with whom you have close ties with the need to keep our district's focus on student results yeah i'm i'm a big believer in process process is very important and if you allow people to circumvent process because they they have more access to board members or they're a more prominent voice in the community community that does two things it number one it undermines your your staff and your administrators who are trying to execute the vision that the board sets and number two is that in itself is another form of inequity because it provides inequities of access that some people get

040better access to board members than others so i would say my answer to this is that process matters and if someone brought an issue to me that i thought was outside of the board's purview i would redirect them to uh the appropriate channel for handling that concern now that's not to say if if an issue is brought to our attention that involves a policy or enforcement of the policy that we think undermines the board's mission or the district's mission of the board's strategic vision then that can be addressed uh in the form of looking at that policy or that enforcement but in terms of that selective issue excuse me i would redirect to the appropriate channel to resolve that okay the board governs as a single entity by majority vote not always a unanimous vote

041it's inevitable that at times board members find themselves on opposite sides of an issue that they feel very strongly about how do you personally handle differences of opinion or interpersonal conflict and what skills will you bring to the board to help ensure that this type of dissonance is productive yeah it's another very good question um disagreement is something that i have a lot of experience with professionally it's part of what i do and i try and uh take an approach of of being able to disagree without being disagreeable and of i i go i try to go into every situation with a willingness to have my mind changed and a big part of that is listening so that's you don't get into an argument to try and win an argument you you listen to what

042another person has to say and you accept that you don't know everything and you might have your mind changed uh and a lot of times i do have my mind changed um it's also not about not necessarily about changing someone's mind all the time a lot of times what you discover when you listen to someone and discuss with them is that you have a lot of common ground and that the things that you disagree about maybe you don't actually disagree about them or maybe they're not as important uh as what you have in common and that you can find a consensus position that makes everybody happy and that comes from listening rather than trying to win an argument so yeah that's what i'd say about that okay last question as mentioned previously the board's role

043is to govern through policy while the administration's role is to manage vasd in a manner consistent with the board's policies however there may be times when administration makes decisions consistent with board policy that nonetheless take a path that's different than what you believe to be best what would your approach be in handling these situations so what the board's role in this in my view is is to you have the district's mission and the strategic plan to accomplish that mission and if a given policy or an enforcement of that policy is undermining or interfering with the district's ability to meet its strategic objectives then the board needs to address that in terms of either the policy or in clarifying the policy to make it to give better directives to your staff who are empowered to execute

044that strategic plan you can't do that in a way that undermines your staff um uh you you still your staff are who you have to empower to execute the mission the board can't do that so uh you need to make sure that you address those policies in a way that still empowers them to be enforced or administered in in the way that the board thinks is is the best means to achieve the strategic objectives are there any clarifying questions from the board at this time on information that we've heard i actually have a quick clarifying question um so joe um in the last session you talked about um the delicate balance or the need to teach children the power of technology versus the safety and difference of technology can you just clarify what are your

045specific views on what that looks like to you and and what um your kind of viewpoint is on that yeah that that's such a good question i'll start by acknowledging i don't know the the right answer um because this is very challenging and it's all new it's all very new what i do know is that technology provides such a valuable tool to um to teach our kids i mean i i look just at my first grader and he is using uh apps on his school ipad to teach him math in ways that are engaging for him and fun for him and help him learn in a way that he gets he he likes math and he gets engaged in it because it's it seems like a game to him at the same time that's when

046they get home from school a lot of times all they want to do is get back on their devices and so it's it's at that age staring at a screen and where's the right balance in terms of using i mean theoretically kids could could learn entirely on their ipads if we allowed them to and i think what we all saw a couple years ago is there was a lot of that and uh so that's an issue for that age group and then i also have a middle schooler who were also dealing with the danger of balancing the communicating online like they have their own district email addresses and they get they watch a lot of videos on youtube as part of their learning but then they get access to all the dangers that come with

047the internet that you have to worry about so i guess i'll i'll say i don't have the perfect solution but i think that it is an issue that we should be discussed that should be discussed and we should always be wary of the risks that come when we look at the benefits too thank you any other questions if not would you have some closing statements that you'd like to share with the board yeah you bet i see i still i still have time i tend to sometimes be very brief in in the things that i say but i i really appreciate the opportunity again to come speak with you guys and uh i i look forward to helping out the community in some way and hopefully that's with the board so thank you thank you

048we really appreciate you coming out tonight and sharing uh your answers with us and giving us a chance to get to know you better so we might very much appreciate it thank you thank you thanks our next interview will be miss carissa huntington hello hello welcome tonight thank you we appreciate you coming back to join us happy to be here um as with everyone we'll have a time for a brief opening statement and then i'll turn questions over to christina we have 13 minutes on the timer so if you're ready we can just get started i'm ready okay so again my name is karissa huntington um last time i was here i talked a little bit about my experience in non-profit administration and governance again 20 years in nonprofit administration 10 years serving on a

049board but i want to expand a little bit about the content of that work because some of that is also very relevant um so my current organization is called american councils for international education and the mission of that organization is prepare people for an increasingly interconnected world and the way we primarily do that is through exchanges so it's youth exchanges it's young professional exchanges it's americans going abroad it's international students coming to the united states and my particular projects mostly focus around helping international students access higher education in the united states and so we do a lot of looking at how to prepare students for careers what careers are important how to help students pick the right fit institution for them um and i think that um obviously as the board we're not involved in

050the day-to-day operations of that specific activity and honestly in my job i'm not either right those tasks are happening in foreign countries they're not happening here um but i think that i have a lot of knowledge from that experience that um sort of helps me keep the my finger on the pulse of like what's going on what trends are happening right now in terms of young people and finding careers and finding their own path in the world sort of launching into adulthood which is something that i really care a lot about and i think that the boar is a big part of what we're looking at as a as a board thank you i'll turn it over to christina okay and you have these questions in front of you if you need to reference them

051because they are a little lengthy first question as board members we represent our community through policy decisions what unique viewpoints or constituent voices would you bring to the board table and how will you balance the viewpoints closest to you with those that are less familiar to you to ensure that you're working in the best interest of all students sure um as i mentioned last time well as i've just talked about bilingual education is obviously very important to me it comes from career comes from what i'm doing but in addition my husband is latino and for him the bilingual education is really about heritage preservation um and so uh for me obviously more philosophical i feel really strongly about diversity equating inclusion i'm a very inclusive person in general i want to hear different viewpoints i

052want to see different viewpoints and different people and have some of those debates i will share fun fact which is that i have hosted in my home 35 international students um and i do it because i find it so fascinating to learn about different people different cultures different other different world views um but as we got to the end of that i'm gonna it's gonna really just give me a second um we decided a few years ago that we were maybe working with the wrong demographics um and and or helping out so a lot of those students are affluent right they can pay for their edu or their ability to study abroad and um at that time it was really when there was the crisis on the southern border still happening of course with um

053unaccompanied refugee minors coming over and so we shifted and we decided to become foster parents of unaccompanied refugee minors and we really obviously focused on the latino population coming over the southern border we speak spanish that's what we want and then all of a sudden once we're licensed they said we really want you to take these two afghan boys and we were like but we speak spanish um this isn't what we had in mind but ultimately you folk that's not important to me what i want is not always what's important i want to focus on who needs the most help and the people who are in the position to tell me who needs the most help have asked me to support some children from central asia and not from latin america and so we did

054and um and the last one has just gone up to college so it's great worked out really well okay next question the role of the board is to govern by setting expectations for the district through our policies we do not make specific day-to-day operational decisions how will you balance the demands for action on issues outside of the board's domain especially when those demands are from well-known acquaintances or community members with whom you have close ties with the need to keep our districts focused on student results sure i think it's really important that people feel heard um and so i think the first step that i would do with that is give people the opportunity to tell me what it is they feel that the community needs or that the school needs and engage in a

055discussion with them about why that's important whether they they really think that that's more important than other things that maybe the board sees as priorities and then ultimately i would set expectations right um this is our the board these are our roles this is um the limitations of our roles and and it's not my place to overstep some of those and i think um again just a work example like i mean most of my work is in the former soviet union where there is a lot of corruption like that there is a lot of back scratching and it is like a mantra of where we work that like we are impervious to that that that is you can do whatever you want but the system is set up so that doesn't happen um and i

056feel like that is one of the reasons that i really enjoy where i work because it feels that there's such a some moral orientation to like we don't believe in that and and we have to focus on what we need to stay focused on okay the board governs as a single entity by majority vote not always a unanimous vote it's inevitable that at times board members find themselves on opposite sides of an issue that they feel very strongly about how do you personally handle differences of opinion or interpersonal conflict and what skills will you bring to the board to help ensure that this type of dissonance is productive sure i am a really direct person um i am somebody that will state my opinion but i also um with experience on boards with just life

057in general like even however i'm doing things i want to have other people's inputs and in particular i want to have input from people with whom i disagree because i want to understand what the other side of that argument is um and so i think that debate is really important um and i think that it's important that for our community to see that debate and to acknowledge and be able to see that their viewpoint was shared or felt or acknowledged um and then ultimately a different decision was made but it wasn't like we didn't know that viewpoint it wasn't like we didn't hear that viewpoint it was that a decision has to be made at the end and someone will be happy about it and someone will not be as happy about that and so

058i think that the biggest thing that's important is that you have the debate and you are unquestionably behind whatever decision is ultimately made by everyone on the board that that you've made it as a group that the community has spoken and everything has been considered okay last question as mentioned previously the board's role is to govern through policy while the administration's role is to manage vasd in a manner consistent with the board's policies however there may be times when administration makes decisions consistent with board policy that nonetheless take a path that's different than what you believe to be best what would your approach be in handling these situations i mean i think it really depends on what i believe to be best right um i think that in most cases i would say 90 of

059the cases i will acknowledge that what i believe to be best or what i believe to be intended by that policy is my personal opinion and that as long as the administration can justify that they believe that what they're doing will lead to the results that we're looking for um that they should have the space to do that they're obviously the number one step is to ask questions right that's the starting place okay this is what i we intended by this policy it looks like you've taken a right turn what were you thinking why did you do that help me understand so that um we can get to a place where like this makes sense and then ultimately right i mean as the board if if we as a board collectively feel that that right

060turn should have been a left i mean we have the ability to adjust the policy but i don't think that that's something that should be done lightly that's something that should be a very serious i mean i i really believe that like you got to give people space to try things you've got to give people space to have a difference of opinion because i don't think i don't know i don't know all the answers that's what i know i know i don't know all the answers um so that's kind of i feel like how i would approach it is that it would mostly start with asking some questions listening to the rationale and figuring out if we were still headed in the right direction well thank you um are there any clarifying questions from the

061board tonight and again lots of note taking frantically hearing that would do you have time for a closing uh any closing room you'd like to share with us um i feel so lucky to be a member of this community um every single day i'm seeing articles about how school boards are like members are quitting and being attacked and like at the center of culture wars and like this community has had an unbelievable number of people show up and run into that fire so like that's super awesome verona um but you know i love that there's a lot of diversity and a lot of representation um in the applicants that have applied um and that is in all kinds of different ways right a farmer a homeschooler there's racial and and um gender diversity etc but

062i am a little concerned that um despite making up 19 of the student body i'm the closest applicant to someone who can represent the latino community that's here in verona and i think that we just need to pause and think about that because i know that i am not really the best representation of the latino community but i'm not sure why they didn't someone didn't choose to also apply themselves and so i i don't i don't really know how to fix this um but i'm committed to addressing it right it is important to me that there is representation that people can see somebody that they want that they feel more comfortable talking to um and i essentially i think my conclusion on it is that like i am perfectly comfortable making myself obsolete and so

063i feel like if i can be the best voice for the latino community now and work to get somebody else you can do that better than me i am super happy with that opportunity and that's something that i would be committed to i don't think it'll happen by december or by april but hopefully uh you know in three years or or sooner than that if another vacancy happens that we can really work to make sure that that all members of the student body are represented on the board well thank you so much for your time tonight we appreciate you coming and sharing more of your thoughts with us and answering our questions and at this time for the board we're going to open up the conversation to our board members particularly so we each have

064the opportunity to articulate our own decision-making process um we've had four phenomenal candidates come and apply and share their thoughts and really talk very candidly and openly about what motivated them to run and what they would bring to the board table and i would like us to have the opportunity to talk about what our decision-making process and criteria looks like so that we can share a little bit more with um the community as well this is a very difficult decision and again this just highlights how um what a great community we have and how well served they would be by any of these candidates sitting on the board with us and for that i'm i'm extraordinarily grateful i'm grateful for the time that our candidates have put in um two weeks in a row coming

065and sitting with us and answering questions and i'm just i'm grateful for the service-mindedness that each of our candidates has brought to this process and that um i think just represents our community so well especially in challenging times and i think the willingness to to advocate for our students is has come through very strongly and for that i just i want to say thank you to our candidates right up front this has been an honor to get to know each and every one of you and so i i really appreciate the time that you shared um as we talk about what our decision-making process looks like i can start or i'm happy to pass it on to somebody else to start i can start okay um so thank you to everyone um this last week

066was a hard decision and i can foresee this week being a difficult decision as well one of the things that i am looking for in our next board member is someone who can represent viewpoints that are different from those that are up here with us um we already have some differences of viewpoints but i'm looking for uh what's missing right like what is missing from what we have here and who can best feel that kind of missing spot um and so that's that's how i've gone into it who can who would merge well with us and not well um in a sense of there going to always be a consensus amongst amongst us because that already doesn't happen um but who can bring a viewpoint that can challenge our ideas that can help us better

067understand how we can continue to progress the district forward um and so that's that's what i'm looking for and that's what i'm basing my decision on thanks jana i can go next go ahead my my answer is kind of similar to jana's um i like in a weird way wish that these four people were not so talented and so different um but clearly i don't wish that because you're parts of our community and it's fabulous um i think my decision is um to yana's point and this is ridiculous i've had like a week to think about it and i still don't know who i'm about to vote for um but it is very much what voice is not represented up here and who can bring disagreement for valid disagreement's sake and not for contrarian purposes

068um but who can be that voice of someone in additional that isn't here so i just want to reiterate that i'm upset that we can't have four extra people that we're adding but for everyone if someone is selected it is not because necessarily that person was heads and tails above the rest it was because that person fits with this other mix of people who are already existing so thanks nicole mm-hmm john yeah i'll add as well um i think we often talk about wanting to have you know differences of opinion and people that disagree with us i don't necessarily think that we went that way last week when we picked people to come back um i'm glad that we have the people that we do um i don't see a whole lot of substantive disagreement

069and i do think there are a lot of people in our community that aren't necessarily represented with our viewpoints on this board and that's something that's missing but i also think that you know there are a lot of things that i thought i would be doing when i became a school board member and i heard a lot of those things echoed and we just don't do that we don't get into operational decisions around the curriculum or the technology or the ways that that school happens we have professionals and some of the best professionals we've you know been very careful to recruit some of the best professionals to do the to do that for us um so when i'm thinking about it when i'm looking at this juncture i'm thinking about you know how can we

070bring someone who understands the role that we play because it's a steep learning curve to have to tell someone that no we don't dabble in those things someone that understands the role of the board and can be kind of a calm deliberator because there are a lot of political storms out there that don't belong in our schools and there are a lot of districts that are biting on that right now and having those fights and we've been very lucky that our community has for the most part recognized that those political debates don't serve our kids so when i think about how i'm gonna vote i'm i'm really looking for where can i get that sort of calm deliberation where can i get somebody because it's already in the middle of a year in the middle

071of a term where can i get somebody that chris in a crystal clear way understands the role of the board in a way that i did not when i first got here um so that we can keep doing work that is focused on student results and not some sort of fantastical checklist of things that we may want thank you john oh piggyback a bit off of that um i just want to speak a little bit to the beginning pieces of the sharing of sort of the diversity of thought opinion and what this board is and i recognize how that word can take on so many meanings in terms of what we see is diversifying this board so i'm really sitting with that idea and to go to john's point to that end the answers to

072the questions this evening i'm really really thinking over heavily because these questions were purposely constructed to get at what what is this work that we're trying to do and having candidates that can respond to these questions in a way that set that frame up for me to feel like in this rushed sense of you're joining us to get right into this board work can that happen in a in a really productive way so i appreciate the intentionality of the questions that we asked and the thoughtfulness of the responses and because this is my way to know the four of you is through these questions that's what i'm really going to rely on are are the responses shared tonight in terms of that board work thank you jen christina do you so i think some of

073the things i might have wanted to say have already been said so i won't i'll try not to repeat what other board members have said i certainly want someone whose viewpoint is different distinct from other people here i think that can come in a lot of different ways shapes experiences all of that and i also do want someone who i think because this is a short appointment you know the reality is this individual needs to run an election so we don't know how long this person will have this seat so i do think it's really important for the individual to have a good understanding of what the role is what being on this board means or doesn't mean um so i'm looking for somebody who has kind of that deliberative experience and i think the

074from their answers to the question has the mindset of what it is a board does and does not do so i think our questions tried to get at that but i will definitely carefully consider the answers um in choosing and making my choice thank you christina i'm looking at this just as a very pragmatic approach um we've moved in we've moved to a um a process a new process as a board that i think has dictated kind of our workflow and i think that that is important as we are moving forward that we are process oriented but i think we are also moving to be a data driven board and i think that these are the two considerations that i think encapsulate what our board is trying to achieve and so i'm looking for candidates

075who who are in the same mindset um absolutely we need to have an understanding of multiple perspectives and the ability to um to debate and discuss in a way that is still productive for our community um [Music] i think this is going to be a very challenging decision but those are the the highlights for me and i think again we have excellent candidates that are all would be truly uh fantastic board members so um are there any other comments from the board at this time and i'm hearing a buzzing is there anyone else i'm sorry the lights okay it's the lights okay at this time um we're gonna have the board take a 15 minute recess and this is so that we have time individually to kind of process through our answers fill out our

076our ballots which you should all have sitting at your table and there should be the instruction sheet behind them at this time because all of our decision making should be happening out in public i'm going to ask the board to refrain from conversation interpersonally with other board members we should really be doing this individually and i want to make sure that our community is clear that we're not sharing conversation that should be shared publicly so i know our board knows that but i think i'm saying it more for our audience and all that um if we want to take the 15-minute recess we would ask that our candidates stay for 15 minutes so we have the time to deliberate think deeply about this fill out our ballots when you are done please bring them over

077to me and jen and we'll calculate um are there any questions about the process that we're using tonight i want to thank ms stanley for helping get us set up with our our ballots thank you um this is a very difficult decision and again i just i'm very grateful so at this time we'll take a 15 minute recess if we can turn mics off that would be fantastic and we'll oh okay everybody we are back from our recess thank you so much for um the board for your deliberations and thank you so much for our audience for your patience we we really appreciate it and i would also just like to extend yet again um my deepest appreciation to our candidates for coming and putting yourself out there in this way and i most sincerely

078hope that you stay engaged in some way shape or form because truly everything that came before us and the board table is is something that we would like to see um echoed at some level within our district um however tonight we do have um an appointee to make and um we would like to invite mr joe haynes up to uh join us at the board table so thank you so much to all of our other candidates again this was a very very very difficult decision um and we appreciate everybody's uh work in coming forward so thank you and mr haynes we'll have you just sit right down um you can join us at the board table right next to jen and we have materials set out for you so you have read we expect you

079to be fully versed on those two books by the end of the meeting thank you okay so welcome welcome aboard um at this time we um we can do the oath of office we can do the oath of office jen i'm gonna turn it over to you okay and i'm gonna turn away from you so i can look at joe while we do this all right so i recently had to do this i will try to read this in a slow enough chunk of words but if i say too many i'm happy to repeat all right your oath of office i and state your name please i joe haynes having been elected having been elected or appointed to or appointed to the office of the office of verona area school board member at large verona

080area school board member at large but have not yet entered upon but have not yet entered upon the duties thereof the duties thereof swear or affirm swear or affirm that i will support that i will support the constitution of the united states the constitution of the united states and the constitution of the state of wisconsin and the constitution of the state of wisconsin and will faithfully discharge and will faithfully discharge a place to stop the duties of said office the duties of said office to the best of my ability to the best of my ability so help me god so help me god well welcome aboard them thank you thank you so much we appreciate okay so um with our new board member installed we are now going to move on to the um rest

081of our agenda and we will move directly into the superintendent's report all right good evening everyone uh first before i move into the service report i want to welcome you to the board of education i look forward to serving with you as one of the seven uh that are responsible responsible for the voice of our community and also the accountability of our policies and me as the district administrator so thank you and it's a pleasure to meet you thank you really appreciate it i also want to make sure we acknowledge the phenomenal candidates that were here as i took diligent notes even though i was not a voting person there's not one thing that i cannot learn from each of the candidates that were here today and so i look forward to being able to

082reach out to those candidates still sit down and have some great conversations and also learn where they can support and their voice can be leveraged in our in our multiple advisories and other settings throughout our our district because each uh perspective uh was unique and genuine but i thought brought a a sound mindset of of centering students and student growth so today i'm very delighted to present the superintendent updates as i look through the data it's like how is it november 1st already but it is and we're excited [Music] to have some brief comments from me and then we're going to be joined by our academic services team uh to highlight some of our tremendous work so before i i jump in i i take honor in knowing a bit and that i am proud

083to serve for a board education and a community that value the development of the whole child and we do part of that uh through our extracurricular activities and at this moment i'm going to talk about athletics and some of the athletic accomplishments uh that have recently recently happened so this is we tried to catch all everything that's happened but we're a phenomenal district with a lot of phenomenal things happening so if i missed anything i definitely apologize and it's definitely not intended to be a slight but i wanted to acknowledge some very high level accomplishments that have happened in the past in the past week first the boys soccer team i advance to the state and will play in the semi-final in milwaukee this thursday congratulations to the boys soccer team we have aiden manning

084the senior who came in 26 of 188 at the state cross country meet in wisconsin rapids it's a great congratulations to our girls volleyball team for advancements for the sectional semi semifinals we have nation nepal the freshman who competed in the girls uh state tennis tournament at the at the nielsen stadium uh on the 22nd and 23rd and and last but definitely not at least by any stretch of the imagination we want to acknowledge uh and give kudos to coach richardson our our football coach who recently announced his retirement uh coach richardson joined the brawn area in 2000 and served admirably in his career here he was just recently awarded the big a football coach of the year following this season season so congratulations to both our staff and the students that we want to

085recognize and thank you for our community and our board of education for our continued support of extracurricular activities and co-curricular activities as we know the development of the whole student is is crucial in and them being able to navigate and succeed in a diverse global society all right i feel like there's a drum roll but i can't drum so we're not going to do that we are ecstatic to be able to be able to launch our vsad mobile app in alignment with operations policy 909 we know that communication and communication to our public and with our public and two-way communication is crucial to building trust and transparency and for keeping our students centered and to that end we beginning tomorrow we'll release the vsd mobile app to our staff following our families in public release

086on november 3rd as i got this slide i thought about you know my former science teacher and he's like don't show them a phone app because everybody's gonna throw their phone up and start doing it i'm gonna give it a presentation so just hold on to that uh it's ready for as we'll launch it with with every everyone else but if you look at some of the features that are available we'll have access to overall school information lunch menus uh news events weather alerts transportation social media posts uh we also do security updates and really keep our families uh notified especially as we encourage them to use the push notification which you can send instant instant updates we'd like to give thanks to our communications department rachelle ballet for making sure that we were able

087to do this work in alignment with our new website and we are encouraged and excited for what this will mean for our community and knowing that they have easy access to our data and and communication right in essence right there in their pockets or purse or wherever you keep your phone so thank you for the hard work so before we turn this over to our academic services team and they can start making their way up to for a second time uh as i do weekly uh we want to make sure that we provide an update on our on our cobit numbers uh this week we are a little bit higher than last week at seven for our seven day seven day total we noticed that new century we had a high of three and then

088single numbers at glacier edge stoner prairie and sugar creek as as well as one seven savannah oaks so i think the numbers are no it's not um again our website upstate updates these um basically every five minutes to make sure that we have the most up-to-date information on our kobe data i want to once again reinforce the mitigation strategies that have led to these very very low numbers the support of our community and the uh adherence to this uh to our mandates from our students and our staff really have contributed to us having the the safest environment possible in the midst of our pandemics so a lot of gratitude and thank you for the support of the community and making sure that we keep our numbers no low not just in brown area school district

089across dane county with that i'm going to turn this over to this dynamic team that's to my left um and the smile under the mask is that we are getting ready to talk about academics and why part of the one of the most reasons why we hear the results and how our students are going to perform under our results policies to do that we know we have to have great structures in place and including the development of staff clear alignment of our priorities and coherence across our district and this academic services team has worked tirelessly to put these structures in place so i'm going to stop talking and turn this over to the leader of our academic services team dr angela hawkins good evening everyone welcome so glad to have you aboard tonight we're going

090to talk about continuous improvement and we're going to take you on a journey and share with you where we were and where we are going so introduce introduction introduction to continuous improvement so i want to introduce amy armagash she is the director of technology and personalized learning and dr sylvia romero johnson director of bilingual education and instructional equity and then karen stocks glover she's the director of secondary education and then adam zingshein the director of elementary education and so let me just tell you the academic services team we are the backbone we are it we do anything and everything literally to help our schools be successful we work in partnership with operations and student services and together we work to make sure that our schools run we are here to support our principals and our

091leaders but most importantly we're here for the students and so we believe that every student must be successful and we believe that their path to success should be personalized and allow for every student to meet or exceed their academic potential we also believe that schools will engage in cycles of continuous improvement grounded in equity and that will lead to improved outcomes for students we also believe that we're here to support students we're here to support principals we're here to support leaders we're here to support families and that's what we do we live we breathe you'll see each one of our team members in schools their boots on the ground supporting principals supporting families i don't want to say there's nothing that they won't do but in essence there's nothing that they won't do personal shoutout

092we had a principal that was out because they were ill and i said adam guess what put back on your principal hat because you're going back to the building that unique um opportunity gave him a chance to live and breathe and learn about the school while also being able to simultaneously give information back to the principal and coach in real time what that principle means so i mean the opportunities that we have in these roles are endless and it allows us to do the work that you all want us to do so i'm not going to continue to keep talking because i can and i will i'm going to get on uh and tell you all about the vasd journey so several years ago a long long long time ago before many of you all

093were board members many of our schools operated under site-based management and what that means is that schools made decisions at the local level and that meant that while we were talking about continuous improvement school x could have their version of continuous improvement school b could have their version of continuous improvement school c could have their version of continuous improvement that being said we could have seven different versions of continuous improvement and while that's good because we're thinking about improving that's bad in that we've got lots of different things going on and lots of different language and lots of diff just just a mismatch of of of mindset and a mismatch of beliefs so as time moves on we develop the district the strategic plan and then our equity statement and so then it brings us

094to 2021 and with that um we have continuous improvement 2.0 so we have continuous improvement before and then we have continuous improvement 2.0 with an emphasis on the reboot of personalized learning i also want to direct you to the work of um or the belief in what we used to have was our traditional leadership structure where you see at the top of the pyramid small little triangle is the board of education and at the bottom is our classroom students and our families but what that what that first pyramid represents is that our students were the furthest away from the decision from the decisions that were being made and so my mother often says when you know better you do better and so that takes us to the transformational leadership structure we know better we know

095that students have agency and have voice we know that our families have um know their students better and we have to listen to them and so for every action there's a reaction we also know that equity is at the center but it's not so it's not at the center it's in everything we do so we keep equity at the forefront it leads and it guides our work that being said it takes us to where we are today and i'm going to have the rest of my team they're going to share with you all our work with continuous improvement and how that impacts what we're doing and where we're going thank you dr hawkins so before we start digging into our deep work that we've had this fall with our leadership team i wanted to share

096with you the continuous improvement cycle this wonderful visual and so we have to take a look at steps in order to go towards improvement so we start on the upper right hand side with analyzing data we cannot improve if we don't know where to improve so we need to first analyze our data for improvement from there we move to creating a theory of action a theory of action is an if then statement if we do these things we believe then this will happen from there we are going to put together a work plan that contains strategies for improvement we're going to implement those strategies and as we go around the circle support staff learning evaluate our progress reflect and adjust and of course celebrate our success two things of note about this graphic is all

097of those are around our shared equity vision and that's work that we've been doing with our leadership on what is that shared vision and this looks very simple but it just goes around in a circle but it's a lot more complex than that some of these pieces come back out throughout the process like analyzing data so this is just makes it very simple looking even though it's complex so as a team as we talked about and developed this continuous improvement cycle we had to have grounding principles so one of those grounding principles that we have as a collective team is that schools are at the center of our work because the magic happens in the classroom so all of our work has to be with the lens of the student in mind next this is

098sometimes easier said than done because we all have our own departments but we have to work together collaboratively in an unsiloed fashion in order to support our schools we have to be coherent and we're bringing our own talents and skills and knowledge to the team to develop the continuous improvement process next we're working strongly on building leadership capacity whether that's karen and adam working with the principals or dr romero johnson and i working with the coaches and the specialists on building that capacity and from there believing that we should cascade our learning into the schools where that magic is happening so for this year when we look at the eight pieces of the continuous improvement plan we've put them into parts of our school year so we're about to dig into the first two pieces

099of the continuous improvement plan that we've been working on this fall which are analyzing data and creating a theory of action this winter then we're going to go into the work plan implementing our strategies with staff support and professional development and then finally evaluating our progress reflecting and adjusting and celebrating our successes this spring so with that i'm going to hand this to dr romero johnson who's going to talk about analyzing data thank you the first phase in the continuous improvement process is to build a data culture in this phase we build the conditions and infrastructure that allows for making decisions based on data with a strong foundation on equity it is a disciplined ongoing iterative way of working to mine to display and then to support the interpretation of this available data our goal

100is to support the design of classroom experiences for students and teachers based on students assets during the first cycle of data analysis school teams have started analyzing start reading data in english and spanish for our three programs and will continue to build greater capacity over time the process has included so far assessing our current technology and data infrastructure and designing and customizing our data platform educator we're also building coherence by increasing the capacity to use our data platform and we have established lead data teams at each school and provide ongoing professional learning for these teams our principals have had the opportunity to learn about data analysis through their monthly meetings and you will hear more about the leadership institute but this is an opportunity that we provided our principles and who brought their teams part

101of their teams in order to continue to build their capacity around data analysis could i ask a question on this slide or would you like us to save our questions till the end we can save till the end [Music] so i'm going to take a few minutes to talk about the theory of action which is the organizing principle that we're using for continuous improvement what we know about a theory of action is that it's designed around those data-driven goals that dr romero johnson was just referencing and those goals are identified by our schools specifically to address the disparities that we see in student achievement and by focusing on those disparities in student achievement we know that we are also lifting all boats theory of action provides schools with a really disciplined way of working it's

102a way to articulate an equity centered plan for improvement and it's a way to monitor student progress based on the data analysis school-based leadership teams identify specific student-focused groups experiencing opportunity gaps and they set those measurable goals for those students then they identify strategic actions to meet those goals currently all of our schools are in the process of designing their theory of action the leadership institute which happened for us last week allowed our teams to come together look at their data begin analyzing their data and starting to identify what those strategic actions would be the theory of action document includes six strategic areas or for targeted actions that will improve learning for all students and specifically those success students experiencing opportunity gaps all of these actions are aligned to systems and best practices in teaching

103learning the coordinated strategic actions include a focus on content where the teams determine which essential content standards or work they want to focus on specific to the data and goals that they've set instructional practices which focus on applying specific instructional strategies with professional development support for our staff in terms of how can we improve those teaching and learning practices at the classroom level so that we can see that movement for students in terms of achievement and again as we indicated before one of the things that we wanted to do as a team coming into this new experience of continuous improvement in the verona area school district was to make sure that one of those strategic actions would be personalized learning because personalized learning has been such an important part of the work in verona and

104as in that theory of action the personalized learning is really about modeling a way to center student voice and ensure that student needs are being considered the additional areas of strategic actions are school culture and climate which is a way for schools to focus on how are we supporting student agency going back to that graphic that we looked at before we wanted to make sure that students who are the closest to the learning have the opportunity to participate in the design of the learning school culture and climate can help us to do that family and community engagement which is essential for us to be able to continue to move the needle on closing those opportunity gaps and then finally staff collaboration we know that collective efficacy among the adults who work alongside students is one

105of the most important factors in students achieving success and it's also one of the most important factors in staff satisfaction and their own sense of agency about the work that they're doing so as we indicated before we're in the fall we've been looking at analyzing data we've created a theory of action and now we're moving into planning the work implementing those strategies strategies and supporting staff learning all of our schools will deliver their final theory of action in december and in january we will move to our second leadership institute to continue moving the work forward so that by the time we get to spring we'll be able to evaluate our progress in this first iteration of the theory of action continuous improvement plan model reflect and adjust celebrate our success and move into what our

106progress what our process will look like next year so how are we supporting this work we in living our grounding principles uh want to make sure in keeping our students at the center and knowing that the magic happens in the classroom we understand the value that happens and that comes when um our staff are able to talk about their practice and they're able to learn with and learn from each other so how we center our work in doing this is one by providing direction and support to those leading the work at the school levels um our our students are operating as learners but so are we a staff and so we need to support that yeah in helping make that happen uh the second is in continuing to build a leadership capacity through um of

107our instructional leaders at the school level through target coaching and collaboration and focused professional learning which we lead each month for the different instructional leadership staff at our schools and then the last is ensuring that we're keeping our schools at the center by providing those learning opportunities that can then be cascaded down through school level professional learning through the sblts the school-based leadership teams you would know them as our continuous improvement teams those two things are synonymous we'll begin to use the term school-based leadership teams here in basd who are really the drivers of that work at the school level led by the building principle as instructional leader so what this looks like for instructional leadership staff at the school level karen and i are working on a monthly basis uh well really on a

108daily basis but through the professional learning sessions that are offered each month we meet as an entire leadership cohort once a month as a whole group um and then meet once a month uh for half day learning sessions as plcs by level so the elementary staff meet with me our secondary staff meet with karen the focus of those sessions are around our equity work and our continuous improvement work through those sessions we have been building capacity around developing the theory of action strategies using data to help develop goals at the school level and then thinking through the professional learning structures that will move the work at the school level ensuring data monitoring practices are in place to guide how we're doing in implementing those strategies and then lastly are supporting building cycles of ongoing feedback

109at the school level uh that can become normed beyond simply the educator effectiveness evaluation work that is a part of that but we know when we can build those self-sustaining feedback cycles amongst our staff um the educator effectiveness evaluation where it becomes an important part of that but not the only part of the feedback that's given and then dr romero johnson and amy are doing similar work with our teacher leaders our coaches at the school level those staff meet weekly that work is also focused on equity with a specific focus on equity through personalized learning and the coaching opportunities that those staff have been hired to give and again win their feedback cycle opportunities for building teaching practice for all of our staff through that work at schools so you see here is uh again

110beneath those mass all those smiling faces this was uh our first leadership institute here in verona last week uh with some quotes uh pulled from the feedback survey from that day of learning and like was mentioned this was an opportunity for the two groups that our academic services team have been supporting on a weekly and a monthly basis to come together as school teams to engage to engage in a day of data review and planning specifically with a focus are on strategy development for their theories of action providing that focused and facilitated time for them to work together uninterrupted around kind of setting the future of their buildings through development of those strategies um we will continue to have leadership institutes on a quarterly basis the next one coming up in january will be an

111opportunity for us to lean into implementation of the theories of action that have been developed and as we build towards our spring institute an opportunity to see the positive effect that the implementation of those strategies has had over the course of the year as we get into norming this process is just a continuous and normal way of working in our district every year within our buildings so with that thank you for the opportunity um to have us here to share this important work with you we're very excited about what's to come [Music] so i just want to stop and say thank you for being here tonight it is fantastic to have you join us and we are thrilled to be hearing about the work that you've been doing it sounds like you have been quite

112busy uh with the start of the year and heading into second quarter my goodness you've accomplished quite a bit and so it's very exciting to hear the overview of the work that's directly impacting our students and how you're empowering our staff to make this transformational work so thank you for all of your efforts first of all and it's really great to see everybody up here are there any questions from the board i know nicole you had one that you wanted to i have two questions now um okay so my first question and uh echoing meredith statement we're so excited to have you all here and we're so excited because this work is getting us closer to those results policies and focused on students so thank you thank you for all of your work and um

113i'll ask my questions quickly so my first one on your analyzing data i just wanted to kind of ask um the data that you're looking at and kind of the litmus tests you're you're adding for like the reading for example are those being looked at as what are also standardized ways so that our reporting can kind of be apples to apples across our schools or how are you addressing as well the twee programs and things like that that might be different in nature yeah so the first point is that this is the first iteration of this process so we started with the data that we have that is most actionable because it is accessible multiple times during the year we want to make sure that the actions go directly back to the classroom so for

114that reason the star data was selected also because we have it available in both english and spanish and so that makes uh ensures that there is equitable practices on all the sections of classrooms across the district thank you for picking something on those criteria because i think that's wonderful i'll jump in and ask my second question super quickly um on all of the professional development and coaching work that you're doing um how are you all working to make sure teachers have access to this but are not asked we know all of our teachers go above and beyond already how are we working that into their schedule so that they're not overworked fatigued not able to show up and be fully present for that amazing training um the goal is always it's very much embedded within

115within their day looking at existing plc structures within the schools where our teachers are already meeting to talk about their instruction to talk about the impact of that instruction to be looking at data that they're pulling from their day-to-day work that they're doing with their students a lot of that is embedded through facilitation within those meetings and kind of building particular habits of looking at data that then can be generalized whether you're working with a facilitator during that time or not um knowing the talent of our teachers to be able to do that they're already doing that and so it's working to build within those structures uh for some of them are individualized coaching many of that is happening in an opt-in basis for teachers to kind of sign in to that with a particular

116problem of practice they're looking at there's a particular thing about their instruction that they're curious about leaning into more and what that can look like is one of our our coaching staff at the school level um with an invitation observing the teacher and then having a conversation about that at a time that the staff member and the coach are agreeing to it could be doing some modeling i'm really curious about seeing an expert do this and then actually then the teacher is giving feedback on some of the things that they've seen and so it's really embedded within the day not happening outside of the day with real focus on some goal that that teacher team is working towards awesome thank you i might also add that we're also working very intentionally with our principals so

117that our principals have opportunities to get into the classrooms and observe instruction and provide feedback outside of educator effectiveness so we want principals to recognize solid instruction so that they can provide real-time feedback to our teachers as well nicole i just wanted to add on in uh the team answered this beautifully uh but to your question about the analyzing data component uh in this first iteration as we say we i think the decision for star wars right one because of the dual language capabilities but a as important process this fall has been understanding and learning what data is missing and then what data infrastructures we need to build to make sure that that data is no longer missing and how we looked at students uh not just from a demographic point but the intersectionality that

118goes as well and not all traditional data systems do that so we have to be intentional in identifying what may be missing and then building it or outsourcing it to make sure that we understand the individual needs of each student across across multiple layers i think selfishly that would be an amazing um metric or something to see i don't know if it goes in the results metrics whenever that r comes up for review but i think that would be a wonderful thing to understand even if it's just reporting out where are the gaps and then saying you know does anything need investment or things like that that makes a whole lot of sense absolutely and then to your second question i the adam nailed it and i just wanted to add and just reiterate the

119importance of first uh not being naive to understanding the um the wear and tear on staff on a national level in education in general um it was prior to covert and it was it has become exponentially uh more deeper since covet has has has been here and so when we talk about the teaming structures that are in play that is also a an internal support system so we know that education can be a lonely profession if we have a system that allows it to be such and a strong teaming structure where we can think about practices together whereas teachers can think about practices together they know that they have allies alongside them along this way and they don't have to solve the problems on their own that is a strategy in itself and and helping

120our staff uh know that you know we recognize that educating is as tough as it's ever been and probably and i can't imagine a tougher time as as being an educator but building that solid structure of teammates around you and also being kind of said that for everything that we have as an expectation we need to take something off and we're not naive to that as well thank you any other questions from the board i just have more of a comment maybe but i just want to say how much i appreciate the overview of this process it's a very nice professional looking process something i've been really eager to see um i think as as you know we continue through this throughout the year and in the next year i'll be very eager to see

121how that plays out with you know some of our results reporting um but it looks like this is a great pathway to get there so yeah i just wanted to say that i i think last time i saw a couple of you not all of you i voiced some concern around how do we maintain teacher autonomy with centralized kind of planning and initiatives and it seems like you're striking a tone um with that where information is coming down but also going up and so i really appreciate that i just want to throw that appreciation out there thanks jen i would highlight too i agree i think when you have these you know schools are at the center but the magic happens in the classroom i think that is um just great to recognize especially here

122at the board table that we're at at a high level but really the the work is happening at our schools and then down in our classroom is truly where the magic happens and so the work that you're doing to support that and to help guide that and be intentional in that transformational process is incredibly important and appreciated um and i do love seeing the you know continuous improvement 2.0 thank you for the roll out um are there any other questions or comments that the board would like to make and you're welcome to come back any time because we do love having you all the time come back all the time with lots of pictures great job thank you everybody thank you so much for uh for your time tonight so uh as i close the

123superintendent's report i just want to quickly thank the board of education for the foresight in developing an organizational structure as you've seen leveraging this academic services team and knowing that to build coherence across our district they would even need a team mindset and i am truly appreciative of the trust that you've placed in me as a district administrator to both hire a tremendous team as well as leverage existing team members to make sure that we are meeting the needs of all of our students and truly uh live to the vision that every student must be successful so thank you for your leadership and allowing that to take place well thank you we appreciate that this has been a an ongoing process of re-evaluating our leadership structure and we're incredibly grateful for the way that you

124have put it into uh practice and brought it to life with such an amazing team so thank you thank you so much and that concludes the superintendent's report [Music] okay um if we're going to move on to public comment i have one public comment that was sent online if there are any other members of the public who wish to address the board on any topic related to board work or policy they are welcome to do so at this time if you filled out and turned in the public comment form please form a line by the ramp on the right side of the stage and you can approach the microphone on the table when your name is called i don't know seeing that we have no public comments from the audience i will read the one

125that we have from um that was submitted online it was from mr jeffrey becker dear vasd board i'd like to understand why the district has not implemented test to stay as an alternative to quarantining healthy kids that have been deemed close contacts daily rapid testing of kids subject to quarantine is safe and effective and can keep all kids in school obviously there is a cost to rapid testing but this is money extremely well spent in view of the harm caused to students from even short quarantines as the parent of a strong high school student who was quarantined for several days i can report that this was extremely challenging for him academically and he has still not fully recovered from the experience test to stay should be made available to all students immediately it is unacceptable

126to be quarantining students when we have a safe alternative that can keep them in school thank you mr jeffrey decker so thank you to mr becker for sharing his comments i'm going to pass this on to dr clarity for follow-up if appropriate and we appreciate the thoughts are there any other comments from the public at this time if not we will move on to board business so the first item on our agenda is for the board to review um the interpretations and indicators um for oe9 that were revised we are now in the remonitoring process and i'm going to first start with dr clarity to give us an overview of the revisions that were provided first i'd like to thank the board of education for the feedback and the opportunity for revision to operation policy

127nine uh both in person and then going back and listening to the conversation provided us against site and i was able to we as a team collective team i always want to give a shout out to my team who who contributes to our work we're able to provide some insight into not just the policy and interpretation but what is the essence or the spirit and we listed those out now in the uh the vsd board of education value and value statements to make them more explicit the three items that came back for re monitoring were uh as i just mentioned the addition of value statements and it was a four to one vote uh the modification of a indicator to identify efficacy and then the third modification was to exclude the interpretation of two-way with

128with new language and all three of those were highlighted any of those changes are highlighted in green for easy easy review uh these were sent to you [Music] about six seven days ago and so selfishly i feel like they've hit the uh hit the new mark as far as the re-monitoring and expectations uh and also as i i completely agree that when you put it in the terms of value the things that i wanted to make sure that what the board and our community understood was like that it's not just about the statement of the policy but it's the culture of the district and what is the culture that we are trying to build in verona area school district that will be supported and guided through policy um so if there are any specific questions

129about anything in green i am not going to deliver by reading the green areas to you i'm happy to answer any questions around what the mindset word was on any of those three areas just as a reminder for the board this would be the time to ask specific tangible questions about the content but we'll do the discussion of reasonableness um separately and thank you for reminding us that that uh as we reflect on chapter four which i think we all know by the back of our hands now as well as chapter five the thing that i both appreciate and understand can often work in conflict is that we are in service to our community and services students so we want and desire perfection and as we've known in chapter four we we need to stay

130in a place of reasonable expectations that are met and know that we will work to get to that perfect state which is probably infinity away because there is actually no true perfect state so keeping that in mind um i i wanted to present these as a reasonable yes and uh with the desire to continue to execute the on the journey to perfection through our continuous improvement thank you any questions at this time for dr clardy okay hearing no questions i'm going to go ahead and i'm going to move to accept this report for the board um and again we are still learning the process and i've already pulled up my monitoring process packet because i still don't have the language but at this time i'm going to make a motion and ask for a motion

131to accept an approved dr clarity's monitoring doc document on oe 9 as presented do i have a motion can i just say so moved her do i have to repeat what you can just say so move okay we have a motion by nicole do i have a second second and a second from jen thank you okay so the board has now accepted ownership of this document so we can begin our deliberations if anybody wants to pull up the monitoring process that we have that's i think can be found in um board docs um for the october 18th meeting um it's probably something we should have handy as we kind of go through this process because it is still confusing and uh for our newest board member joe we will give you plenty of time to

132catch up on this but we are in the learning process about this too so you're really coming in at a time where we're still getting the hang of it perfect timing this is excellent timing so we're still kind of you know working through the nuts and bolts of this um we're going to do this interpretation remonitoring to accept the amendments that we we discussed at our last meeting on the 18th two meetings ago yes when we do our next oe monitoring report next week we're going to move back into the workshop um set up so it's more you know conversation is a little bit easier to to manage but that aside when we're looking at these amendments we're looking again are we are they reasonable do they capture the board's intent do we have any

133conversation anybody want to weigh in i have one question do we and this is like more for formatting than anything else the language is inconsistent about has and will so some of it is present and some of it is past i'm just curious do we have like the preference of if it needs to be past tense or previous i know it's gonna be i know we're like looking to the future but i know we'll bring this document back when we look at it later so i'm just not sure what are you looking at specifically the indicators so the yeah the indicators so um i mean indicator 1 vasd has completed the survey um but then you look um results of the family and community survey in the spring of 2022 will indicate should it say

134has indicated i'm just not sure if it's like supposed to be future tense or past tense i think the way to resolve that is imagine we're going to be pulling this out in a year from now and we're going to be reading it kind of retrospectively looking back over the course of the year has this occurred so you think they could just maybe past tense yes okay appropriate tense i don't think it needs to come back to us i just think as we think consistently to just make sure that we're using yeah intense um i would like to say i think the interpretations that have been added truly capture the intent of the board i think they capture the words values in a way that really demonstrates um the administration's understanding of what our intent

135behind the policy was and i really appreciate the time that went into these our policies are are basic but you having sat with us you know how much time the board spent debating each word of these and you've truly captured that in the interpretations that you've provided so these um to me are absolutely reasonable and much appreciated and definitely help flesh out um the intent of our policies in a way that i think makes them more meaningful more effective truly come to life in a way that is um targeted for the needs of the asd so that is hits the nail on the head for me i i agree with you meredith i think i really appreciate the interpretations and i vote that these be on all of the policies um i also appreciate the

136inclusion of timely because i think it gets at that real time and addressing the communication need as appropriate to the situation so um i've reviewed this and i i didn't have any comments or questions but i appreciate both of those so looking at the indicators are there any other comments from the board you don't mind i'd love to add one because i was absent for the first round and admittedly i i i kind of used that to my advantage and i dug much more deeply into this and kind of played ignorant to the previous discussion to really read this with a first a first draft die um and i also agree i i like reading the value statements i appreciate how they're worded and just how that does to use your words surface the culture

137of what we're thinking about not just the policy um and i do also appreciate the indicators are definitely not processes they are quantitative and measurable so i also find this to be a totally reasonable interpretation of oe9 yeah thank thank you and i am going to unfortunately be using interpretation and indicators interchangeably because they are far too you know close in in words so what i said before was indicators are there any other um opinions about the interpretations um any other thoughts or can we move on to the indicators i'll just add i i too appreciate the interpretations i know i was big on the value statements from the board um but it definitely helps me to understand how you came up with the indicators that you came up with and what like how you

138took what we mentioned interpreted it into your own words and now i have a clear understanding of how you and your team are actually going to execute many of the policies that we that we have here so i really appreciate that i know that was something i was i was big on the value statement so i'm glad to see them and they they capture everything we talked about so thank you thank you i just wanted to add to what yana said that i think the interpretations for me helped me i think i made this statement before kind of start to think what is the verona way of doing this because it's sometimes when you're using models or examples it's hard to know how to customize it the interpretations are helping me kind of get around

139to that okay maybe we are now figuring out what the verona way is so i appreciate the interpretations okay thank you guys um let's take a look at the indicators and again we're looking at the indicators we're looking at whether the indicators are reasonable and whether or not they're going to give us the data that we would expect to see based on the interpretations as i'm looking at these i really do feel like the addition of the indicator to uh gauge efficacy is one that i find to be reasonable and i appreciate the inclusion of that i'm open to other comments so from the board as well i had a quick comment on indicator three um i don't think it's a comment to take back and re-interpret but i would just find it interesting just

140for the concept of is the juice worth a squeeze of it would be great to eventually know um which of the modalities are the most effective right so if there is one modality that is not two percent of people listen to it or you know xyz views um not not that we need every modality right but i think it would just be interesting just from the perspective of we have a very talented superintendent that is pulled in five million directions we have a talented communication team that is also so just want to make sure that we're keeping track of what are the most successful ways and making sure that our time investment is worth that but again i don't think it needs to go back to be rewritten for that because i think this is

141very appropriate thank you john um i will kind of echo that and my kids will be the first to tell you that i'm not effusive with my praise so i'm going to skip the praise part i think thank you john we'll just fill in the blanks there may be crazy that's good you ever thought about a career hallmark card we're all adults here let's get right to the criticism i think that this is a fair and reasonable first step i think once we go through this process we're going to find new questions to ask around the indicators in particular and i'm eager to get there as i'm sure a lot of board members are to get to that next level of questioning but i think we have to go through the process first and then

142in chapter four one of the dictums there is that we not pursue perfection on the first one that we are trying to work um and this works for me um but as a first step for sure there are many more questions i'd like to ask but i think this is the first part of conversation jen i think that's a valuable point i mean this is part of our continuous improvement too right and i i appreciate that any other comments from the board on the indicators i'm hearing quite a bit of consensus and we have a motion on the table to accept and approve this oe as presented with the amendments are we ready to vote okay all in favor of accepting and approving this oe as uh presented signify with i i any opposed this

143has been approved as presented thank you very much for your time dr clarity we appreciate the uh process that we've engaged in and we appreciate the uh the intentionality in the work that went into this um and i really feel like this captures exactly what the board had expressed so we're very appreciative of your time so thank you thank you so much i just very quickly and this is just for knowing that the our borough members are have busy lives as well um oe9 in essence had two sections the one that you'll have in your fingertips probably in two days has 12. and so i i'm really excited about that john we're skipping a lot of praise there so i just wanted to remind the around the team just as we this process is we're

144going to get better at it each time but we will get this in your hands um in the next in the next few days knowing that we will have a discussion on november 15th that will allow us to get a cadence going uh so november 15th and then followed by december 13th for oe4 back-to-back which are 12 indicators and 13 indicators respectively and again as we go through the next oe monitoring processes we're going to continue to utilize the uh workshop um format at least in the beginning part where we're kind of becoming more familiar um i know it's hard this is not the most conversational setting so we can kind of readjust to accommodate good board discussion okay so if we are done with that we're going to move on to board development a

145couple things that i just wanted to pull up we've kind of engaged in some preliminary discussion about having a january our january quarterly retreat um potentially looking at january 8th and dr clary please jump in if i'm misstating anything but i think we're just still in the preliminary planning um and discussion and so that's why we wanted to bring it to the board um potentially again these are some ideas working with linda and randy to kind of go through our oe and results monitoring process now that we've done this a few times i think we've seen that there's been some nuts and bolts process questions that have come up um to the forefront and it would be nice to just have some guidance as we go through that that's one possibility um and that's one

146that i do think i've heard echoed through from several board members that they would find valuable so this is something that we're kind of putting out there any um initial thoughts questions this is again we're in the preliminary phase right now kind of figuring out what january what a january quarterly retreat would look like i think that we should have a focus also on onboarding because that will become pertinent around about april yes pertinent today too [Laughter] guess what we don't know i'm working on it and to that end um jen who has been our like teacher mentor in her career when she was here at basd has stepped into the role of a new board member mentor as well so joe you've got a terrific mentor sitting right there thank you for all of

147your questions but you also have the help of any board member here um who wants to help you get up to speed and like we said we're all in the learning process together um right now so perfect timing um the other thing we have january meeting dates that i think there was some concern expressed about um wanted to talk to the board about moving the january third meeting date back a week to january 10th in order to kind of accommodate coming back from break i know jana mentioned that she might not be able to make it to the third i know that's really tight with travel schedules um and again this is not an uncommon switch that we make so i wanted to talk to the board and see if there's any thoughts on moving

148back one week in january i might uh have a conflict my partner's on another council which also meets that night um but i can see if i can retain some babysitting services um so i would say that's fine and i can i can work together so the tenth would work is that yeah i don't i don't need to be the only student is there any um any concern about moving the meeting date back i would also probably not be able to make the third so the tenth would work for me it's just does it affect anything later in the month that's what i'm wondering like does it shift anything else or we keep it are we thinking the rest of the calendar stays well the way the calendar would work out is that it would

149still be a two-week gap between the next meeting so it would fall it would continue the the calendar of two-week meetings so that would work can you clarify what you just said meredith so does that mean we would meet the 10th and 17th of the 10th and 24th the 10th and 24th so we were already set to meet on the 24th for because it's dr uh martin luther king day on the 17th right so there would have been a three week gap and now this just keeps us done or two week gap um time schedule and if anything timely comes up where we need to call an emergency meeting i mean we can always do that but just as far as a a regular meeting for we have oes and results that are going to

150be coming so we need to make sure admin has time to plan so just to clarify our board meetings will be december 6 and december 13th and then we wouldn't have another one until january 10th correct okay okay so informal are we okay with that moving those dates sorry can you restate what was the one after the 10th so if we look down at future agenda items we have our meeting on the november 15th we have december 6th yep we have december 13th and then we would move january 3rd to january 10th instead and then it would and then the next one would be the 24th okay awesome thank you okay does that work for everybody we go ahead and make those changes all right and then i decide is there someone in charge of

151changing that officially on like the google calendar or is that something because i kind of watch that and it doesn't quite shift as we shift me yeah okay well everyone yeah okay just making sure that one of us should be just because i liked so we will not have me do that um yes yes we will make sure that it reflects that it's impressive thank you for that um and the other thing i also just wanted to highlight you probably all got this in your emails the the wasbee annual convention is january 19th through 22nd and if anyone is interested in going please let rhiannon know so we can make block hotel reservations and um register for the convention they i i think the agenda is out it's either in that email link or it's

152on the lesbian calendar and it is if you haven't been it's very interesting am i remembering correctly that i was i'm the official delegate so i'm going just making sure that i remember you know that evening when all the roles were getting decided that that this that preceded my time as president so that would be up to noah all right yes you are you are okay okay so if there is i would you know i encourage it i think it's uh it's i know christina and i went a couple years back and it was we came back with tons of ideas it was very very exciting and we also have the uh waspi regional meeting um for those of you who can attend this wednesday yes do we need to notice that meeting we'll have

153a notice just that there'll be a forum but there'll be no action taken and it's not an official meeting of the board got it thank you yes okay so um and i know we've also discussed um bringing back to the board development section on december 6 discussion about how we'll move forward with community linkages so that is on the future agendas thank you so we have our superintendent consent agenda has everyone had a chance to review those items are there any objections or discussions that the board wants to have on any of the items contained in the consent agenda hearing none the consent agenda is approved and we'll move on to the board consent agenda has everyone had a chance to review any discussion on the items or concerns hearing none we will move to

154approve and then just as a recap of future meeting um dates we have november 3rd for our wasby fall regional meeting november 15th is a regular board meeting and workshop december 6th regular board meeting and december 13th and then january 10th now so we'll have that change made for everybody's schedule all right so at this time we are going to take just a couple minute break um we concluded with the business the regular business of the board and we're going to just move into a brief board debrief but at this time we can be give everyone a chance to to uh scoot on out they don't have to stay for this car thank you everybody for coming tonight we do appreciate it and thank you for all the presentations we really appreciate the time that

155went into that so we'll take a couple minutes and then we'll circle back for for debrief before we adjourn but i'm nice to meet you great oh giving you these [Applause] [Laughter] it seems like a good time to be jumping in at least i'm learning alongside you guys i'm sure yeah well every board needs to have someone that knows yeah nice to meet you nice to meet you yeah i've got some good nighttime reading coming up but the bottom one's the first one this is a good overview and this one this one's like the morning it's written it's written to be boards in general okay but they use a lot of examples yeah so at the end usually [Laughter] okay guys let's uh okay everybody i'm gonna tell us back to the table so we

156can finish up with our board debrief and finish up for the night i'm gonna turn it over to john if you wanna pull up the board debrief doc in board ducks john i'm going to have you go ahead and lead us tonight thank you i will thank you very much do we we don't need dr clarity for this no no um i will admit that i love the uh self monitoring and self reflection at the end because so often i just say what's on my mind without being self so this is a good chance for me to like go back through and go man i actually said that out loud okay um so i'm just going to go through focusing on me did i come to the meeting at equal prepared yes i did last

157time i reflected on not doing a good job of that so this time i did very much so um and i came with an agenda anyway did i not interrupt other board members i don't believe that i did though also i'm not self-aware so i'm sorry about that did i not engage inside conversations failed miserably at that again i'm always joking with nicole we might need to be split up um don't do it then we'll just yell across the room at each other yep did i not repeat what was already said you know this i think is where i would love some feedback from people because oftentimes i say something that i think is new or is a summary of what's been going on so that i can rethink it out loud and it might

158seem a little bit repetitive so being told that would be helpful um you do that right right now but like i'm going i'm going tell me just punch me in the shoulder when i do it not monopolize the conversation um i think i did a good job of this tonight though admittedly like i have to like physically restrain myself from talking sometimes because i have a lot of opinions as we all do that's how we got here right support the president's efforts to facilitate an orderly meeting i try to i think i feel like when i when i try to pop in with a statement it's usually to try to take the next step i think so i try to wait and say something when i think i can move this forward instead of just

159something that's stuck in my craw so i will say that something's stuck in my craw as a colorful euphemism to get going um but it's usually just i'm trying to manipulate people to think like me um and that's just a colloquial way to do it um communicating openly and actively in discussion preparation for me because i do tend to want to ask challenging questions so being able to look at the board documents ahead of time and fire off any clarifications that i need to has been really useful so that i'm not being surprised or surprising anyone encourage balanced participation of all members um i think by listening hopefully though sometimes maybe not as much um and i think i will often be guilty of shutting people down without knowing it when i have a difference

160of opinion because i will try to assert my opinion as strongly as i can and if you're timid it's gonna shut you down sorry about that practice i did not do a good job of practicing respectful body language i was a little bit tired i was doing some leaning back folding my arms you know if you're like in the teaching profession folding your arms is bad news you don't fold your arms right jen my hands are in my lap yeah i can't do that either my that just emphasizes my belly so i really struggle but i did not do a good job i could feel myself doing it and i couldn't stop myself as a pro protect individual to privacy by not referring to individuals by names i did not use anybody's name that one's

161applicable tonight right i did i did want to use joe's name when i was talking about how i was going to vote i fought the urge i appreciate that enough about me let's hear about you thanks jen for staying self-reflect if he wants to tackle it next i'll go next okay go ahead um today i i'm not gonna go through the whole list but i think that i maintained myself really well i will say this was a long meeting if i'm being honest so um by the time we got to the presentation from staff i was tired um i mean it just like just just me being honest i was like oh man there's more so i was not as attentive as i would have been had that been 45 minutes earlier um so but

162other than that i think that i i did all of the things above that's not listed being attentive oh my goodness my phone is ringing who could possibly be calling me from alabama um i did not do a good job of being attentive but that's not on here so if i go with this list i did everything right but i know i know that it started to get long so i don't know if i don't know if i just got used to our meetings no longer being five hours or what the deal is but by that like 7 30 8 o'clock mark i'm done all right thank you jana who's next i can jump on to yana's um so a couple things um i uh i realized that one of the things um that a

163simple thing we could maybe do is ask people if they don't offer it before they give presentations if they'd like us to hold all questions or if they'd like us to ask questions in between i hopefully didn't throw the team off too much i hope um i did i was we'll make sure that there's always time provided at the end yeah yes uh you all got the memories there's always the last slide there is a lesson so i will do a better job of holding my questions because they were in such a great flow i also like yana was very tired by the time they come up but i'm selfishly very glad it was a topic that is interesting because i was all of a sudden very re-energized um i also i think i practiced

164there were a couple times where i was sitting with my arms crossed and i was like oh this is not okay um i think my body language was maybe a little um awkward during the interviews because i like to help you and i hate this voting thing um so that was a little hard um and it's not on this list but i actually think the presentation by the academic services group was super cool because it shows the benefit of us doing the board's work and trusting all these super talented individuals to do their jobs and i hope that was a good example of like we can still have that good keen eye while letting the experts be experts so thank um and i also engaged inside conversation with john and i'm really sorry it's okay

165thanks our side conversations are okay we've decided okay christina or jen who wants to jump in so next time you hear that in the parent teacher conference we're going to give your kid a break from this shoe you know we have to move your kids unnecessary we got to wrap it up turns out we're going to stay on target and we're going to finish it up okay i'm not going to go down this list but uh i think i did a good job i don't think i interrupted and yeah i mean i think we had a fairly orderly meeting it did feel lengthy i get that because we had the appointment process and then we had our regular business so i think the appointment process kind of tired us out but luckily we don't have

166to do that often so hopefully that's not a part of future meetings um and i will say the academic services presentation was great the thing that like i really liked about it was having been on the board for a while finally got to see like the panel of people who occupied all those spots that we as a board talked about right restructuring and such and i think that's the first time i ever saw them all up there to give the presentation and thought there we go like that's like the way that things presented to us right when we when we did that restructuring so that was very like gratifying to be able to see and then the products of their work would look great so um so it took a while to come around to

167that but it was great to see let's keep it let's keep focused on our this is just the self-reflection so i felt i just felt like it was a great presentation and the meeting was good i mean i i don't really have a lot else i guess i could have asked a question or two more but i just really was listening and i think it was okay it was good i need to get one but yeah i thought you did an excellent job reading the questions i did too yeah thank you for that that was really really helpful jen i'll just quickly self-reflect and say i feel like i was adequately prepared but i am struggling with not asking a question just to just for the sake of asking but also wanting to ask questions

168and trying to untangle my position because i think of questions that are not board questions i think of questions from 20 to prior years of involvement in various capacities so i'm i'm still trying to sit with that and kind of process that so that's why you're doing a good job self-reflection thank you i think i'm still just trying to get the hang of facilitating orderly meetings i think that's the area that i'm i'm focusing most on to make sure that we are productive and that we're using your time in a way that is most beneficial um so that is what i will continue to to work on and i know it was a long meeting tonight but we i think did good work so joey won't ask you to self-reflect that's good i was just

169going to say that prepared where you just i don't think i don't think i monopolized the conversation i will just say as someone who's observed a lot of boards as a relative outsider here i think you all do very good at all of this compared to a lot of the boards that i see see john that's what it sounds like this you know you guys don't do that very often at all and i've been to some meetings where that's the whole meeting thank you that's great i thought i thought you did an excellent job of leading our meeting thank you this time [Laughter] all right at this point uh let's adjourn the meeting can i have a motion to close i move which who was that jen yeah who tied jen i wanted second okay

170second from the pole yeah all in favor signify with i i opposed no need the meetings