001it is 6m and I call this meeting of ly County school please join us in doing the pledge of allegiance we don't have the kids to and Justice okay do you have any adjustments to the agenda Mr chair there are no adjustments to the agenda this evening Mr chairman I move to adopt the agenda I second here a motion to adopt the agenda and there aren't any changes to it all those in favor say hi hi hi those oppos no passes and we do have H trusty asby on Zoom tonight because she's not feeling very well so everybody else is here in person again nice to see a full almost full bench up here there one thing I wanted to do before we get started tonight is um at one of our recent meetings we
002had somebody kind of coming up all over up here taking pictures and we don't mind if you take pictures but for safety reasons we would like for you to stay on this side by behind that where the podium is there and on this side where the doorway is and you can certain to come up that far to take pictures or video whatever you're doing but please stay back just for safety reasons thank you all right so our first businessday will be um recognition of staff and students throughout sing achievements and that'll be South High School yeah thank you um we're here to celebrate an fbaa student and um we're really excited because they got an opportunity to go to Nationals um in Florida so they had a little bit of fun there too but um
003the best person to talk about this young man is Kate tan she's our fbl sponsor so could we invite um Miss Kate T and Neil hush Pi up please thanks you good evening um as Miss Gentry said I am Kate T I'm the adviser at South High School for the FBLA this is Neil hushbeck he will be a senior at East or at South this year um we did uh so back in March uh we went to our state competition here over in larmy and Neil competed in three different events over there and won first place in all three events at the state level which then qualified him to actually go to Nationals he could have chose he had to choose which event because you can only compete in one event at Nationals so he
004chose to do Public Service Announcement which he prepared a 30- second video on the topic about FBLA and then he had to present that at Nationals and the whole process of creation how he came up with it his research all of that into the creation of that video um at Nationals in his section he placed first with a score of 95 and then in the finals um he placed fifth overall in the nation there was over a 100 people in his competition and he played fifth overall in the nation with a score of 92 point something something which is awesome you have to pretty much Ace everything in Nationals to be able to place in the top 10 so really proud Neil's only the second um student from South High that's placed um in the
005top 10 in the nation so that's great it's really hard there's like 14,000 competitors when you go to Nationals Wyoming usually has five or six that place nationally so to get a national Placer is a real achievement and it speaks to his work ethic his commitment to his event he actually wants to go into media when he graduates so he's very committed and now he's gunning for first place next year and I'd like to introduce his parents Neil and Lisa Neil Walt and Lisa Lisa hush who have been and other than that just thank you to the school district to South High School Miss Gentry for all of the support that they give FBLA throughout the year good job congrats that's all our recognitions we have tonight so our next thing will be item and
006visitors and this will be concerning agenda topics I have four people that have signed up I had five and one of them Council so work signed up um just reate the r stat your first name and last name keep your comments two to three minutes so others have time to voice their comments keep your comments General nature not directed as specific individual or individuals and Su language content for K12 grade students also don't it's probably not a good idea to name any groups or any or try to be drory about any groups also and additional information try not to be rund all right so our first person coming up will be Patricia McCoy turn it around again feel free to adjust if you need to thank you good evening chairman Bolin members of the board
007and superintendent Dr Newton my name is Patricia McCoy and I have been a parent of four children in this district for 17 years since 2007 three of my children have graduated and the youngest has two years left I'm glad that we are finally here and we have made it to the Finish Line I want to thank each of you for your time your dedication and your determination to listen to parents teachers Librarians and the community both the parental rights policy and the library procurement policy need to be passed and finalized placing necessary limitations and restrictions on books in the library is not Banning books it is simply placing necessary limitations and restrictions if a parent wants their child to read religious stories it is up to that parent to take their child to the public
008library or book stores available in person or online to access those books for their children it should absolutely be the same for sexually explicit books we are also at the finish line for the parental rights policy in accordance with the new state law recently passed in the last legislative session I want to thank trusty Clawson for reading our comments and adding the six required notification in this policy it is very much needed I have shared my family story with you we have seen the QR codes hung in our schools we have seen repeated attempts to undermine parents' rights and trying to cut us out of our children's education as if we couldn't possibly know what might be best for our own children because we might not be as educated or degreed as their teachers they
009are our children these policies are not anti-teacher they're not anti- student but they are very much needed to protect the innocence of our children and the rights of us parents who are involved in our children's education registration for my student was not only easier this year but I was also impressed with the new forms at South for parents to sign giving permission for their students to change their classes or their teachers it allows us to be part of the partnership with our students education we will not always agree on all things but protecting our students and giving the parents a voice and more inclusion in our students education are things that we should be able to agree upon I am sad that it was not so on these policies thank you very much yeah I've
010I've asked in the past is we can save the Applause please or let's not do Applause at all it does take a little bit more time to do that and delays me getting the next person up there so our next person is going to be George Powers good even I'm George pow and I raised three children in this town all of whom attended schools at at L School District number one they had graduates back in 2004 2006 and 2009 and I'm happy to say they did very well with the materials and the teachers and the people that work with them what I'm here to do today is to as you know from previous appearences I'm opposed to your plan to adopt a new procurement system I've already made this speech several times and I'm not
011going to repeat myself but I did have one new piece of information that I wanted to share with you tonight back in last back last spring I asked the school district to give me the numbers of the parents and who had registered under the various classifications that your new policy establishes the no sexually explicit materials the parental limits materials the Open Access materials and the no access materials well at that time the Figures were were incomplete I was told they only had about 80% of the students that had been registered and that had been processed so this week I asked the school district to update those and I've got them and what that shows is that the overwhelming majority of parents in this District have chose open access for their children Open Access means Open
012Access they have the right to have their children read freely and the numbers haven't changed really since last April uh it's 62% have voted for have gone for Open Access only 35% have gone for no sexually explicit materials 3% of the parental limits and happily very few have chosen with no access limit ladies and gentlemen I would ask you to please listen to the results of this survey because this is a survey from the parents of the school the parents of the students in your District this is a vote for people who want to have you respect their rights they are asking you to respect their rights to let free people read freely and how that we are just months away from an election these are the people who are going to be voting and
013I hope you remember that please stop this nonsense and let's put an end to this process once and for all thank you thank you next SE up is haly re hi everyone my name is Kaye ream um I'm a larmy County resident I'm a mom of three I have two kids in the district and maybe more importantly I'm a taxpayer and that's why I feel I have a stake in this conversation um first I would like to speak on the parental rights and education policy specifically about the amendment that was proposed by trusty Smith I agree with that Amendment and I think it's very important as a parent I would want to know if my child is asking to be called something different than how they were registered um I also think that the amendment
014follows the intent of the law um secondly I want to talk about the procurement policy um I would like to speak from the perspective of an East High Triad constituent um I want to speak to those of you on the board who represent me I want to speak to those of you on the board who I had a sign in my yard for during campaign season and those of you on the board who specifically said you're doing this for your kids I want you to protect your kids I think it's very admirable that you want to be on the board to do that but I want you to protect your kids my kids and all of the students in the district um I know that we've heard that many of the comments that were made
015um the public comment are against the policy rather than for the policy however it's not a public vote the public already voted and we voted for all of you on the board to protect our kids and that's what we expect tonight at least from five of you I know two of you won't thank you next is Dylan Ford got raise it that you can just hold it too if you want I have so many hands excuse me uh Mr chair members of the board uh my name is Dylan Ford speaking individually and I'm here to ask you to vote know on the library procurement policy Amendment and to amend uh this new version of the parental rights policy so I'll begin with the parental rights the language in the policy is just unclear and confusing
016for teachers it requires that Educators who have quote actual knowledge of a change in well-being report that change which seems great I mean obviously if that's what it did it would be great um but when you look closely at the definitions and you see uh that it defines a change in well-being as a requests to be called a different name you see that's not really about wellbeing a nickname is not a change in wellbeing and Reporting everyone is going going to be a nightmare probably pretty annoying for parents uh actual knowledge is another term defined in this policy the definition includes the Line quote a reasonably observant person would notice the purported change end quote and so my fear is does that now mean that our educators are required to observe and report the names
017that students call each other or the contents of students conversations with each other when I got into teaching I wanted to teach kids the power of effective writing that was my passion but without an amendment this proposed policy reduces me to a cheap spy I appreciate that the exemptions uh in other parts of the policy given in the instruction definition and my idea was could we also add exemptions to the actual knowledge definition to include student to student conversations uh that way our teachers can focus a little bit more on teaching than on spying on student conversations which if you've ever overheard them it get a little weird um and making Conant reports to parents the first thing that we should always establish before considering a Schoolboard policy is that it is something that will
018help kids or at the very least not harm kids however the policy as a stance could delay or even prevent a student from receiving help in their most vulnerable moments while the policy carves out exemptions uh to parental approval for first aid and ambulatory Services there isn't an exemption right now for suicide assessment which is uh um which prevent which helps our counselors which would help our counselors from uh to be able to help them in potential emergencies when a kidden crisis Falls the cracks the results are devastating and without an exemption those cracks get wider shifting out to the procurement policy it stipulates it's small thing but stipulates that the proposed books for procurement have to be posted but it doesn't say really why it also doesn't say who has to post like is
019it going to be Educators who has to update the list how long the books have to remain on the list if a Challen will remove the book from consideration or more importantly if it will identify the library or Worse personally identify the librarian who requested it which could obviously have serious consequences um that's all I have thank you and that's all the people that have officially signed up so is there anybody else here in the audience who would like to go and speak and start with your first and last name you should have some of these memorized by mail but keep online my up Kathy sigano um larmy County resident I did not bring a utility bill to prove that though um but I would like to say Choice um originally I think most of
020the people in this room that's what we were looking for was choice for the parents to choose what they wanted their children to have access to we wanted the school district to be more transparent with us so that we didn't have to read 3,000 or you know 300,000 I don't know however many our previous superintendent said that there were books in our school libraries um and try to know what those authors were what the titles were what the genre was um so having this previous policy that was passed in December has helped parents decide whether or not they want books that include certain material so that was accomplished moving forward with a procurement policy um a lot of people like to say that our Librarians are using book reviews from National organizations and that's great
021I'm glad that they are using reviews um they should be the other side of that argument is that they like to say that people aren't reading the books The Librarians aren't reading the books either they are only going based off of what a review is telling them so I don't think that it's fair to say that if we haven't read an entire book we we know whether or not it has sexually explicit content in it you do it's not that hard um but ultimately I think giving parents a choice to decide what their children are going to have access to is what's the ultimate decision here and kids don't always check out a book they go into the library they grab it off the shelf and they may sit in a chair um so the
022parents may not know that they're reading a sexually explicit content book and that they're being exposed to something like that so I don't know how you can prohibit or how you can make sure that kids aren't reading something that they're parents wouldn't want them to read if we don't have something that's already ensuring that those type of books are not being bought and brought into our school district by taxpayers who are paying for that thank you thank you Mr chairman members of the board Ben horach uh represent representative for house district 42 here in Nur County um I wanted to walk through the parental rights and education Bill a little bit but uh three minutes it's it's pretty impossible so I'll just kind of hit some highlights uh first of all let me let me
023just say uh I've heard that uh there is kind of a a push to um you know with the name changes students want to be go by a different name or something like that let me just uh kind of address that a little bit um the bill actually never dealt with name changes uh on the student level it dealt with the educational physical mental or emotional health or well-being of a child that was what the bill was specific to there were amendments brought during the bill um that would have allowed a a student to go by a different name and and then you don't tell the parents uh there were specific amendments that tried to push that kind of thing meaning that it would have been a positive change for this student well those amendments
024actually failed those amendments did not pass uh in this in this bill and that's uh so the bill requires the school districts to set policy which you are doing which this is the effort of of what you were doing now and it requires you to do that so um each School District shall and let me just I'll skip down uh procedures adopted under this paragraph shall reinforce the fundamental right of parents and Guardians to make decisions regarding the care and control of their children and then another paragraph the School District shall not adopt or Implement any formal or informal rules policies practices or procedures that prohibit School District Personnel from notifying a student's parent or Guardian about the students educational physical mental or emotional health or well-being uh or a change in the students related
025Services uh authorized under certain paragraphs so uh we would all say that name changes on students are part of their emotional health those are changes to their emo Health student so it's up to the board to decide how you're going to set policy when it comes to name changes for students um also uh it's interesting to be that uh there is a way to change a student can change their name at any point in time they have been able to for years you talk to your parents if you're under 18 you go to the courts and you go through the court process so do not allow you cannot allow a student to do something in schools that a court is not even able to do because a court requires parental consent to go through the
026legal name change that that they're going through so so please keep that in mind as you as you pass this policy thank you thank you and thank you for giving up your time on the eeve before the election all right anybody else anybody else line please raise your hand if you're online would like to speak Mr chairman there is one hand raised one more can you hear us can you hear me um kind of barely so okay can you hear me now we can now yeah okay thank you uh my name is Carol maiah and I just wanted to clarify um people keep saying that you're not Banning books um because you can get them at the public library but they forget that not all students can go to the public library not all of
027them have the the the means to get there that's one of the reasons why we have school libraries and Librarians are supposed to be giving a list of the books they want to procure before um they can be bought that means they're going to be denied um having book sells and being able to get them and by um having to give this list and people saying oh this book cannot be bought you are in effect Banning books because you're saying that book cannot be bought it's going to be banned from our library thank you thank you anybody else online if you're online would wish to speak please raise your hand Mr chairman there are no other hands raised anybody El in attendance let's see good evening uh board trustees thank you for this opportunity uh
028I think when you say first and last name please oh sorry uh Steve millia Chey Wyoming I think when you start saying book Banning Banning books book banners I actually think that's that's sort of like hate speech because people just don't like what uh another person be would be saying so maybe we should just not uh use that particular phology the other thing is that uh as Mr maah sort of alluded to but a little more depth in that is that uh you can buy any book online I mean people buy books people buy everything you can possibly think of online so there's nothing out there that's that's really being banned all right also uh believe it or not when I was 16 a friend of mine in high school when he turned 16 his
029parents bought him a playboard magazine for a 16th birthday like whoa okay but they paid for it themselves so if there's books like this out there that are somewhat controversial then people can just buy them on their own homeschoolers have to buy everything on their own there was no tax dollars out there at all and uh having been in public health for 30 years and having dealt with sexuality sexuality is a very important topic it needs to be handled properly carefully uh people don't always get along uh in that particular uh subject matter and whatnot so uh teaching about how to uh value yourself value your sexuality have respect for yourself uh we really don't want uh kids or even adults uh being sexual predators out there as far as hey you know when I
030was much younger and I would read this sort of stuff I sort of had a different it's very very difficult to look at other people going oh that's a person that's a person with knowledge skills talents and abilities uh it does have a tendency to uh shade one's person's uh Viewpoint of others and we want to look at everybody uh as a person uh with respect and uh not to have different types of uh immoral or improper thoughts we want to have respect for everybody we don't want to respect for our sexuality without that none of us would be here it is a very important topic it needs to be handled uh not necessarily with kid gloves but appropriately and so uh there's a lot of books out there that can be also put into
031the library there's one that I read called renting Lacy and it's a story about child trafficking and it's a organization called open doors that what they want to do is stop all that stuff and they work with uh children and uh organizations to stop a uh the child tra trafficking that's out there and there's also other books out there that are really excellent so we're going to have these books in there then have some of these other books in there to you know at least balance it out and if people want to have these books hey there's plenty of time out there uh Avenues to to buy those on on their own thank you very much for this opportunity evening thank you anybody else either online raise your hand or here on up Sheila kler
032um I had not planned on speaking tonight but I get a little confused when I keep hearing about this Banning books these books are still located in the library they're still available to anybody that wants to read them what we're doing is we're giving parental rights and that's what we should do hold on just a minute can you stop timer would you please go back little forur it please thank you right and so that's what we should do we should allow the parents to make that decision I keep hearing the comment free people read freely yeah all of us are free and I'm free to say what books my kids read and what books they shouldn't read so I'm just floored this Banning books at such a uh fear-mongering term that needs to stop and
033we need to respect parents and as a teacher in this District I need to partner with my parents and I need to work work with them and ensure that they're they trust have the trust in me to do what I'm supposed to do just as we need to have the trust in you that we voted for you to be put here on the board so that's the book Banning thing the the the situation with the names changing the names for I've been in this District 33 years and parents can put in parentheses what uh what name if they want a nickname for their student so we know that part but with that being said I take the safe School Vector classes and when I take those I'm Bound by those I have to certify in
034those courses and within those courses it tells me that I need to use their legal binding name when I'm addressing them unless the parents have given permission otherwise so I just don't understand why this is a big issue we already have things in policy we're already expecting teachers to do certain things uh and being certified about it and back to the situation with the books with those books we are told in our policy if we hand out or distribute any kind of material that is pornographic material we can be federally fined and we can even go to jail for this I've never said they should go to jail that's that certification class that I have to take to say that I know that I'm responsible for this and what the ram ifications would be if
035I do it so we need to just look at this stuff Plus board policy says when we purchase books they're to support the district curriculum so are those books supporting the district curriculum thank you anybody else online raise your hand or here like to speak there no hands raised online yes turned out to have exactly well I guess because of one verion that dropped out we had nine today so that was 10 there is one more chance for you to speak on any Topic at the end of the meeting so if you remember something you want to say you'll have that opportunity then all right our next thing is going to be um information reports I would like to start off this section by um allowing anybody who has filed to uh Run for the
036for our school board here um to please stand and and just give us your name introduce yourself we're just going to do name so first last name go ahead she I that that's in the audience I'm Tim B and I'm incumbent and I'm running and on Zoom is uh Britney and she is um running also anybody I guess that's it okay so now we're going to go to items from VIs board Communications and reports so our next meeting is going to be on August 23rd not a meeting August 23rd 2024 at 11:00 a.m. to 1: p.m. will be the all staff schol school picnic which is in story gym and then it kind of overflows out into the area between story gym and administration building very nice thing I won't be able to attend that
037because I'm going to be out of town um on August 26th is the first day of school I'm sure parents are probably eagerly waiting that kids probably not so much and um the August 26th at 5:30 p.m. the woming School Board Association have their fall Roundup for trustees in ly waming and I believe Today Was Your Last Day to sign up for that so if you haven't signed up yet it's probably going to be too late it's always a good little conference get together with other people from this region um September 9th 5:00 P PM is a work session 6 PM is our next regular board meeting okay next we're going to go to individual board Communications and reports anybody have goe thank you chairman Poland I'd like to be the first trustee to congrat
038to say congratulations to our principal at South High m Gentry for completing her doctorate Dr Gentry would you stand up please so that we can congratulate you that's quite an accomplishment anybody else I was one of four trustees who attended the grand you probably were going to talk about the grand opening of the new 56 School Coyote Ridge or Coyote Ridge um last week anyway quite an impressive celebration we had a ton of folks come out from the community um there were I at one point we asked that somebody maybe Dr Newton asked the students in the crowd to stand but all kinds of children that were there because this is their new school and it's opening next week and um they're just really thrilled to be a part of it but um just want
039to thank the the folks from the district um tons of folks who've been instrumental in making that building happen and getting us to the point where um the doors will open well the doors are already open and the school is ready to go but the doors will open to kiddos next Monday morning and um just really an exciting time for our district so was it was really exciting to be a part of that grand opening though last week so you there anybody else i' just like to add about that it was great to see a good crowd there um it was a long way in coming I mean my first year on the board in 2013 is when the merser study was approved to move us to the 56 model we've only gotten one of
040those we prior to this one only had one of those open three or four years ago and now we've got our second one and hopefully soon we'll have our third one so we'll have one in each Triad so and the reason for that the main reason for that was because we at that point we were growing at 1% per year in our student population and our schools many of them were already very overcrowded we had people waiting in line for 3 or four hours in the morning on for Kindergarten Roundup so they could make sure they got their child into a school so the easy the fastest way to take care of the uh population several schools was to move the fifth and sixth graders up to the fifth and sixth grade school and that
041immediately opened up a bunch of space in those elementary schools so our East Triad was the most crowded at that point so they got the first one and uh Central at the time when we were making the approval again was growing fastest and now South is is in need of one also so um they do have some other advantages in there that supposed to be a step towards Junior High because they go from a self-contained classroom into working with a team of teachers we can also give our advanced classes there within the building without having to get a on a bus and riding up to the junior high school although I think some of the kids enjoy that first taste of the junior high school gets some a little taste of it but at least
042they won't be missing that time um from education on the bus and last is and my wife is into music so I want to mention this first um they get to work with larger music groups a larger singing group a larger band and so there's many advantages to being in the 56 school and I look forward to that being our second one open and and being successful so any other comments okay so now we're going to go to work superintendent thank you Mr chair um it's no secret that the fall is upon us and we're getting ready to begin the New Year couple of uh quick updates along those lines uh we greeted our new teachers last Friday we hired about 85 new certified positions and so we're very fortunate to have a great group
043joining us um today we had a districtwide PD event for all of our athletic coaches to um help grow their skills in the in the very important role that they play in working with our kids um building professional development for returning teachers will be on Wednesday with a district PD to follow on Thursday um after that they'll get a planning day on Friday and then the kids will be upon us so I also want to report that we have approximately right about 80 or excuse me 18 certified positions that are still unfilled of course those numbers change by the day that um is a combination of hard-to-fill positions many of which are in special education resarch teachers occupational therapists um social workers and the like and if you'll recall we have some virtual options um
044that we approved a couple of meetings ago to fill in some of those gaps if we are just unable to find anyone uh the other thing that sometimes happens is people who promised they were coming um change their mind um and then sometimes people um at the last minute have decided to move on in their career or resign or retire and so that's why we're we're kind of um still where we're at with some uh vacancies um of course the schools do great work and trying to recombine some of those um rosters in order to be ready to go when we go live with kids um we also have a couple of sped parap positions that's very typical uh this time a year we're still looking for that and uh and a call out to
045everybody in the community if you like to lend a helping hand and come be a substitute teacher we would love to have you so um with that Mr chair that's the end of my reports as far as being a substitute teacher we have a program The District still I think where you can earn that certification be a sub through something that we do in our district correct that's correct Vicky Thompson and HR would be happy to Correll you anytime that you want to ask more questions about becoming a sub in our district we make it very very straightforward and streamlined to do so and that's if you have no College all I think it take maybe 60 hours of college credit to be able to qualify to put in for it through the um P
046ptsb I guess it is and so you can do that so those are the qualifications that we need to have and of course very caring individuals also is is very helpful to that Dr do you mention the fact that that we did something for coaches this year was that new or is that something we've done in the past yeah thank you um Mr Bolan uh this was uh this something new in the district and we will be having an event again um at the beginning of the new year um right around January for all of our winter and spring coaches as well um you know that the the role that the coach has is very important in the lives of our kids and we want to make sure that not only do they have the
047training um to teach the students the the skills of the sport but also um increase their skills in working with kids in a positive and healthy way and so they spent a day of PD today um in doing just that and probably also helps build a little camaraderie among I know that there's a fierce competition among between schools and to get together a Daye when you don't you can put that aside probably very helpful so all right so next thing we're going to be doing is moving on to the consent agenda and all agenda items listed with designation of CA are considered to be routine items by the governing body and will be enacted by one motion there'll be no separate to these items any item removed from the considered agenda will be considered in
048this normal sequence on the agenda does any board member request to remove a motion from the consent agenda hearing none Mr chairman I move to approve all motions listed as consent agenda I second okay a motion second to approve consent agenda all those in favor say I I I those oppose no motion passes we're going to move down to new business Mr chairman I move to approve the propo proposed revisions to chapter 9 section 16 parental rights and education and chapter 2 Section 10 complaint procedure for violations of chapter 9 section 16 second okay motion second to approve um the board policies in chapter is chapter F9 section 16 Miss PA did you have anything to advise us on on that or I always check with you first on these policy things Mr chair unless
049there are questions from the Tres um I think we've been through this a few times so so nothing has changed from the time that we um did this an emergency vote till now sure so Mr chair the um thanks uh the one thing that did change it's it's not a a substantive change it was really a typo that was in the policy so if you looked under the definition of change um at some point we must have hit a backspace and it deleted a number so number two actually combined two changes that are kind of distinct from each other so if you look now originally there was um six uh items listed as a change but it now list seven it wasn't an addition of a change it just broke up two into two distinct
050changes so number two um relates to health or medical condition that necessitates intervention or treatment at school or a followup with a community mental health worker therapist or medical provider and then number three uh which was combined with two now it's Standalone it requires a modification of the students educational program services or supports um so you can see that those two aren't really related to each other um one is meant to address kind of those um things that you would be referring more to the outside provider that requires treatment the SEC the third is um make making changes to the students environment in the classroom so those are broken out now into two and three so now there are seven instead of the six that were originally um included in the emergency policy but again
051that's it's not an addition it's just breaking those two up into two distinct again just for information um we originally did this on an emergency vote um which is authorized by there but then we have to take a in order for it to be permanent we have to take a vote on within 90 days am I right or is it Mr Sher it's actually it's 120 days that emergency rules or an emergency policy are in effect under statute so um how the board did it last um go back in June I believe um is you adopted it at an emergency basis so those rules are in effect for 120 days but also put them out for the same identical rules out for a second public comment period so that 45-day public comment period has run
052so it's now time you can adopt um with that and the reason we had to do that was because the statute which she was being referenced earlier had a June 30th deadline for July 1 deadline for getting it approved so we had to do it under emergency rules and now we're coming back to it again to make it permanent so comments at this point from the board Mr chair yes go ahead um I miss Paulie said that they're identical I believe we actually part of the reason it went back out for 45 day comment is because there was an amendment um that went on um um that I questioned as to substantiative change um so I don't know that they're identical um Mr chair uh trusty Ashby just as a point of clarification it's identical
053to what was put out um for 45-day public comment and what has been adopted at the emergency rules um that when you when the amendment was made to add um an additional um category of change that moved it to number six and that had been what was highlighted as as the amendment um but two was simply broken up into a new a two and a three which pushed that amendment number six down to now number seven correct but the 45 day period that happened in June did not include that um um additional category at the clear at the bottom with the names um Mr or Mr chair trustee Ashby uh the 45-day public comment period that ended in June that is correct the 45-day public comment period that that um began after your last uh
054meeting in June that did include number six and that is what we've you've received these um additional public comments on I answer your question Mr askp yeah okay I think you had one go ahead yes uh thank you chairman Bolan I would like to make a Amendment to the uh policy um to add uh on page seven to add suicide assessment to the screening tools that do not require permission I'd second thoughts any discussion did you want to explain um I think as um our representative for the ctea um expressed that that is an important Health assessment that um should be able to be done immediately and would not allow uh would be appropriate to wait 48 hours so you can allow for parental permission um and a suicide assessment just strictly is by the
055counselors to say whether they feel somebody is a suicide risk else good Mr chair um we got a second on that didn't we yes um I'd like to ask what what is current practice just to be clear somebody answer that you're looking for somebody back there yeah Mr PR I'm sure will come up one one of the things that I think um I would say is anytime a student needs life saving measures um we immediately are responsive currently to make sure that they are not being put in arm's way for that or any other reason so I would say um that is our current practice Mr Fry do you have anything to add to that thank you Dr Newton um chairman Bolan members of the board uh do have one additional we do include our
056Mental Health Service Providers uh we have counselor we have social workers that we include in this process as well as our building administrators uh and so they are notified uh immediately and parent contact is made Mr chair if I might add um one kind of clarification to this piece so the reason that um the specific Health screenings are that are listed are those are specifically taken from the statute um those the statute requires that health screenings and assessments that um unless they are one of those listed require parental permission um as Mr Frey said we've been working very closely with our um head counselor um and and working through what this what this will look like moving forward so this is not an area where you need to provide um advanced notice um like you
057do an instruction right so instruction requires uh the the 24 hours um you have to get parental permission 24 hours ahead of instruction on gender identity or sexual orientation that piece is not included in the health screening tools what is required though is that parental permission and so when we were working with our counselors and talking through what this looks like moving forward in practice for things like suicide um screenings right now the screening is done before a parent would be notified um how this would work would be the screening would be done or excuse me that the parent would be notified um that there is a concern that we would like to do this this screening um if the parent denies permission we would refer to outside we would um release the child to
058the parent which is again even with with the process now I believe and Mr Frey we've been involved in a lot of conversations so I don't I hope I'm not getting this in correct um right now you could say that yes this student is at is at risk we wouldn't call notify the parents um and then the parent it's it's sort of up to the parent what they do with that at that point um if it is a true health and safety emergency I believe that there is a you know an immediate threat um there is kind of an exception where first aid um provision can can be allowed which first aid does include mental health care right so I think that you know we're flip-flopping the order of of how we would implement the
059screening so you know again I think current practice is the screening is completed and then the parent is notified this would be I'm notifying the parent that I have these concerns and I'm asking for permission um and statute does allow for verbal permission on these ones to move forward with the assessment if the parent denies permission at that point the district or the school would would um you know keep the child safe and and at the school until the parent could come and take custody of their child as Cher um Miss Polly just as a point of clarification because I'm a parent and sometimes I'm hard to reach on my phone during the day um if you have a child who's in a crisis situation like that and you cannot reach their parent or legal
060guardian on the phone what happens do we just wait or or then that that prompts us to go ahead and take f um Mr chair truste Smith um I'm going to look at Mr Fry again to make sure I don't misstate what what I've been being educated on the SE past several months so if you know continued attempts would be made to reach the parent um at that point if it's if we're if we're truly concerned about the Child Safety or the or safety of another child right so Health uh safety of of self or others um we would continue to keep the child safe in the school setting um continue to try to reach out if it's um you know imminent threat that's a point when I think that we would reach out to
061to um law enforcement to um assist in that question so I just want to just clarify um with the policy in any way keep us from providing life-saving care to a child who needs it when they need it does the policy the way it's written right now to comply with the the law keep us from providing that uh Mr Bolan uh truste Smith no so again that that first aid piece is specifically Exempted out um if a child is in either physical or mental health crisis um emergency type Services would be rendered by the district we would never um the policy is written to allow for that as a statute further comments or questions okay so right now we've got a motion to amend and a second for that so the amendment is to take
062the um suicide what are we calling it assessment assessment out of no to add it in we're gon I'm sorry chair the amendment is to add in the sentence that says health screening tools that do not require parental permission to add Suicide Prevention there so suicide without having to get a hold of the parent and then obviously our current policy is to get a hold of the parent as soon as possible but this would just allow that assessment to be done and not have to wait on parental permission that's it's a student sa issue is that part of it with about suicide mention is that in another part of that is it mentioned in another part of the policy uh Mr chair no uh Suicide Prevention um any type of screening along those lines so
063if we go back to um the language of the statute um and we try to stick straight to what the statute required um before administering a well-being questionnaire or health screening tool to a student or a group of students each School District shall make available the questionnaire um to the parent or guardian and obtain written or verbal consent prior to administering um and health screening tool means any diagnostic diagnostic excuse me assessment that detects preclinical mental or psychological illness or disease um and then it only accepts nothing in the subsection shall be construed to prohibit School District Personnel from conducting Audiology Vision scoliosis or body mass index assessments required by federal law unless a parent withholds consent for the assessment in writing um so that's the part where we wanted to put this is that
064correct if if you were I would say I would be careful there because again the statute specifically exempts what does not require parental permission and says all other screening tools do require parental permission so that would be my word of caution any else have any comments or any further clarification that you need go ahead ask one more question if we were to adopt that change would this go out for 45 day review again it would um Mr chair truste Smith and I I kind of hate to say it but I think that it would probably would necessitate going out for another 45 day um this the policy as written doesn't contemplate for that to be something that would be um that would not require parental permission so we would be changing um we're requiring parental
065permission for and what we aren't and I think that's a a significant um enough change that we would probably need to go back you do um with that side you do have additional time those emergency rules are in effect right now um and we'll continue um for I could do mouth off the top of my head I want be an attorney um for a pretty significant period of time at least another um 45 days so you could certainly do it within the time frame you'd still be in compliance with the law that says that you had to have a policy in place by June 30th um it would just require another 45 day public comment period go ahead and then we go down there thank you chairman ban go ahead either order Miss Paulie if
066we or maybe I should state it as could we pass this policy with trustee clawen and then turn around and add trusty Hinkles and send that back out do it in Mr chair yes um trusty ederton so I think what you could do is is at this point where we are I think you would to do that right so you would need to um vote down the amendment you would vote the policy um in and then you would put out a revision to the newly adopted policy out for the 45 day public comment period so yes it could be done thank you for the clarification but we already had that change that change was in what we did last 45 day right so correct okay go ahead now uh thank you Mr chair I I
067just want to state for our audience and um that while we try to be as clear as possible policy we're not real specific because that's left for regulation and the staff thinks through these questions and clarifies and make sure that there's Clear Directions in the RS that go with the policy so um I feel satisfied with what Miss Paulie explained on this issue because I did I did hear um the testimony and I wondered about the question so thank you for bringing it to our attention and thank you for the clarifications Miss Paulie Paul Paulie on how we would proceed if if in fact we couldn't reach the parent right away and all of those regulations I believe are in the policy manual that's online we just don't vote on them is that correct uh
068correct Mr chair the um policies are our board approved and adopted the administrative regulations are set by the administration to um support uh the policies that you've put in place the board does have the opportunity obviously to review and to uh request revisions to those procedures and administrative regulations if they if you feel like it doesn't um line up with the intent of the policy but they're public facing on our website yes yes with the you're normally right behind there in a different color or something correct okay any further discussion go ahead thank you Mr chair I just have clarifying questions just to make sure I'm understanding this properly so if this amendment does not go through um currently What's Done in practice is if there's a student that's suspected to be suicidal the parent
069is called ask for permission to run the screen is that correct uh Mr chair trusty Humphrey yes so if the policy goes through as written that would be the procedure so the the parent would be called before the the screening would be administered um our current practice without the policy is that the the screening would be completed so that the the parent would have um yeah the full kind of AD information that they need to act on okay any forther discussion or questions again we're voting on the amendment to put that into that section that would exempt the um suicide suicide temp um from being having notified transfer so all those in favor of adding that Amendment say I I okay all that was opposed no no no okay looks like we have five to
070one so that does not pass all right so now we're back on the regular motion any further discussion on the the first the original motion um can I ask a question on um just the definition that on the as soon as practical practical definition it says that uh for any change in a student's health or wellbeing where a school district employee reasonably believes the change itself is the result of suspected abuse or neglect it needs to then be reported is there anything in the policy um you know so if there is reason to believe that you know reporting the change will cause abuse and neglect through past history or some you know if there's reasonable you know if if a teacher is like I know this is to cause a problem because um the parent
071doesn't believe in mental you know I don't think this is the norm by any stretch of the imagination but I just worry that we're you know if if it's not caused by the abuse and neglect that we may be putting some a very small percentage of students In Harm's Way you have any answer for that uh Mr chair uh trusty as so I think as we're as we've been working through this um District employees like everyone actually in wyom mandatory reporters so if you suspect um abuse or neglect you are required by law to report so if you have you know a right faith belief and you work through the process with with um you know we require it's not an individual teacher who's making that decision there's Administration involved um encourage you social workers
072counselors to be involved in that decision of whether or not to report abuse or neglect if it would rise to that level then absolutely um the sus the suspected abuse or neglect would be reported um and I think we just have to make sure that's that is a good faith belief that that is is reasonably likely to result in in abuse or neglect of a student now would that include if you're speculating that there might be some abuse as a result of an action that that's reported does that fall under that too uh yes Mr chair so if if you do report and then you have reason to believe that because of the report that that that uh student was abused or neglected um again we would work through our our standard procedure with with
073how we treat um suspicions of those and neglect and and um that would be reported too but just your suspicion that it might happen would not be a reporting offense right correct okay any further discussion okay we're voting on no I sorry more on that particular topic thank you Mr chairman um we had a lot of this discussion um at the last uh meeting uh before it went out for 45 day review but I do think the name change is um a poor addition to this policy and not was not required by the law um and so I am very much against that we already voted on it last time so I'm not going to make another amendment to try and get rid of it um but I think referring to a child by their
074preferred name or preferred gender will not in any way hurt the person that is speaking to that child but it can harm the child themselves um by increasing feelings of possibly depression or anxiety by increasing their me any kind of mental illness that they may already have um and that can cause harm to the child possibly self harm possibly suicide so there are harms to children that will be done so I believe that adding that definitely is anti- student I think it definitely is um a a a bad addition to to um this policy obviously as I said I'm not going to say anything because we already voted on it last time and I will Vote for This policy because the legislature has tied our hands and we have to have this policy in place
075and so I do understand that but I do think that this policy the way it's written is harmful to our students and I want it on the record that I fully oppose it even though I will be voting for it out of necessity thank you I appreciate your comment anybody else okay time for the vote all those in favor of the uh policy to chapter n no chapter 16 section n is that what it is chapter n section 16 say I I I those oppose no motion tests okay that's the first one of all two PES now we're going to go into second Mr chairman I move to approve the proposed amendments to chapter 7 section 21 library media Services related to the procurement of new library materials I second okay motion the second to
076approve the uh Library procurement which is in policy chapter 7 section 21 of library library media services and the reason we put this out 45 day review is we made a change at the last meeting and so we wanted to make sure we got our comments back so any discussion at this point on what you've seen on the comments or in general yes um yeah I have a lot to say but I won't see it all um we have already addressed the changes um that have been requested um for this policy in the um opin opt out portion of this policy and it that that particular Library uh policy does address all of the issues that have been brought forth by all of the commenters um who are in favor of this type of legis
077or policy in that um our current policy does allow parents to have a choice and so the procurement policy does not do anything to improve that choice um there will still be um the choice of full access limited access for sexual explicit parental and no access so we have already addressed all the issues that this particular policy is trying to address according to the people who have made the policy I also um feel like we need to CL clarify some of the language that has been brought by um people who have spoken about this policy number one there is no pornographic material and never has been pornographic material in any of our libraries there never has been pornographic material is not allowed and by policy it's already not allowed in our libraries even prior to
078these current changes so that's one so there are no pornographic materials in our library and never has been um so saying that um you know you're worried about being you know as a teacher you're worried about being um uh prosecuted over pornographic materials there isn't there are there books in The High School junior high school possibly uh libraries that do contain some such explicit language yes there has been um but they are approved and um assessed by national groups who look at age appropriate material and those age appropriate materials have been in our liaries does that contain what our current sexual explicit definition is maybe they do but that is appropriate for kids in the high school level kids in the high school level want to have books about topics that they are interested in
079they want to have books that show what they are doing in their lives they want to have books that they can look at and say oh that's me or they want to have books that give them information that they're looking for and kids in high school are thinking about sexual topics that's a natural part of growing up and so having some sexual explicit language in some books Is Not Unusual and will continue to happen whether it's in our library or not in our library they will get that material and they do get it from other sources as well reading a book that has some sexually explicit language in it is not going to cause kids to be a pedophile it's not going to cause kids to be a porn addict it's not going to do
080any of those things reading books about these types of topics literally can increase their empathy can help them understand complex topics and it is an important part of growing up um these books have been approved the books that the vast majority of the books that are listed as sexually explicit in our uh list that we have now are awardwinning books that happen to address some sex expit material um and so stopping the ability of our Librarians to not trust our Librarians to know what is a appropriate books for these children is not trusting them and so we are saying to our Librarians who are the experts in what kids of those ages should be reading to say no we think we know better than you and no just because 30 some odd percent of our
081kids of our parents don't want those books in the library we're going to make the other 62% not have them unfortunately that is a ban and I know that that is a horrible word for you guys because you know we don't want to hear that we're Banning books but when you limit when you say that certain books cannot be brought into our libraries because a small proportion of people don't want it there that is a ban um so this policy is anti-teacher this policy is anti-child it takes away their first amendment rights so I I I think you know we have to be a little bit practical about this keeping awardwinning books off our shelves is Banning them by definition plain and simple we need to trust our teachers and our Librarians they are the
082experts we need to let them do their jobs um thank you that's good yeah thank you um Mr shair I I want to make some clarification that we have lots of award-winning books in our library um that don't have sexually explicit content and and it's correct we don't have uh you know this this whole conversation has been around semantics and it's really important that we all understand what we're all talking about because some people might use the wrong words to try to describe the content in which we're discussing we actually came up with a definition and put it in our policy so everyone would know what we were trying to to discuss and there wouldn't be um there wouldn't be other words used that might mean different things to different people um but we do
083have award-winning books in our library that don't have sexually explicit content according to the definition that we came up with um what we have done though is we have provided choice and not everyone's chose chosen to exempt their child and that's perfectly fine the the problem was is that these books when they come in they're not descri they don't have a a warning that hey there's rated R material in here or sexual explicit content in here they just come in maybe with a title like youth um adult and so as one of the speakers said before parents would have to come through and read all of these books and we have we have hundreds of thousands of books from what I've been told in our libraries so what we've done is we've created in the
084last policy PED in December a choice not everyone's going to choose it and that's fine but everyone now is free to make that choice and that's the point and with this procurement policy just to clarify it wasn't addressed in that policy although I think initially we intended to take that issue up but to clarify is we we make choices all the time about what's going to be made available to to our students in our district and right now we have National organizations that are dictating that this content come into our district and I believe our community is saying we'd rather spend that money that those precious resources that we have on other content award-winning absolutely um even themes that we might not agree with but when it comes to actually sexually explicit content and go
085back to our definition so we all understand what we're talking about we can just hit the brakes so from my perspective it's not about opposing your point of view or or or um trying to prevent or create a ban it's about how do we use our resources the best that represents our community's points of view and our values we always hear about Wyoming values these are Wyoming values that we want resources on other types of materials that will lead to and we and we make those decisions as a board all the time we make those decisions so if you're going to use the word ban we'd be banning on curriculum we'd be banning on all the other types of materials that we approve or don't approve and so I think that that whole you know
086it's a nuanced conversation and it's really it's really irresponsible to just put blanket make blanket statements about all these issues like all teenagers want to read this or all you know people are curious about about this I think that's misrepresentative and and quite honestly if we're going to be truthful let's talk about the nuances so I just needed to say that thank you so Mr chairman and board members I just typed up what I wanted to say tonight so if if everybody will he I'm just going to read this um so I don't miss anything and if I happen to get Miss which seems to happen from time to time um I know what I've said so um I to be honest I just there's really not much more um that's left to say about
087procurement we've had this policy out for review now for two 45-day periods and if you've been paying attention you already know where I stand on it however I do want to address a couple of things tonight before we vote the last time that we visited about this as a board I advocated that we not consider public comment from the first 45-day um review period and my um that was voted down by the board it's fine but my reasoning was twofold first we were told um that some community members uh were misled about the policy at hand and that they'd been reacting to and commenting on the wrong thing um Second and a bigger issue for me was the duplication of remarks that we might receive and the fact that they'd be counted as individual comments
088when we finally got all of the public review and and could take a look at it so after the second public comment period ended um I worked with Miss paully and she was kind to get me spread a spreadsheet with all of the public comment we'd received combined into one spreadsheet um that comment when you as the public look at those comments you don't see names of folks who have submitted the comments the version that we as a board we able to see actually does include the names so I took that Excel spreadsheet and I did some sorting in different ways and then started categorizing the comments just for my own sake and getting a real clear picture of what we were looking at um I went off script hang on just just a second
089um but in doing this I found that approximately 30 of all of the comments we received probably were ones that came in during that first period when people were confused about what they were responding to because 30 of the comments really didn't even apply to the procurement policy that that we are talking about tonight 48 of the comments were repeats from people so in my mind I'm disregarding those I'll take your first comment and you know we know where you stand but your third or fourth or fifth time telling us your opinion iion right we've already got it so you get one comment per person in my mind as I'm reviewing public comment so 48 of those were repeats this left only 203 individual persons comments some of those were multiples from families which is
090fine I I wish I'd lined my family up to contribute because that would have been six more comments that we could have looked at but some families did that which was great to have that input um from kids and adults but that's 203 comments out of a community of about 65,000 people um and those 65,000 that we would consider stakeholders for lcsd1 um they live in our district those 203 comments when you start breaking down the numbers only account for 310 of 1% of our City's population three1 of 1% of our City's population even took the time to comment it's not enough to be statistically significant and if we just looked at our student population and used a low number because we're over this but if we took 13,000 students and we just assume that
091only one parent for each kid would respond we got 13,000 responses our public comments rate the 203 individual things that we received is only 1 and a half% of that potential sample size again it is not an enough to be statistically significant when you look at comments received and how our community feels about this policy maybe the ones that took time to do it but um it's not statistically significant so who took the time to respond not most people and you know what as I look around this room most of you didn't take the time to respond if I had done as one activist group and our community had done and really started rallying people I know to S to submit comments we could I just from my efforts could have had another hundred or
092two comments and that's just me one person but I chose to stay out of that Fray but most importantly I need to put out or point out that public comment when we receive it we've tried we've tried to say this before as a board I believe miss paully our legal counsil has tried to say this but it is not a vote for a policy there's different times types of representation in our government everybody on this board is here as a trustee trustee representation means that an elected official official ultimately relies on their own judgment when they make decisions we've been elected by the members of this community who trust our judgment to make the right decision and Advance the interest of of our school district we were not elected as representatives to Simply cast the
093votes of the loudest majority in this community and I want to point out before I close it on average the numbers would say there are about 30,000 young adult titles that get published every single year and I am positive that our Librarians who are endeavoring to choose material that does not con Ain sexual explicit content will be able to find some incredible award-winning books for our young people to read from those 30,000 new titles every single year um and I personally the word endeavor um leaves I I would say a lot of leeway for them um but I will no surprise I will be a yes vote on the procurement policy I appreciate the 203 people in this community of over 65,000 who took the time to respond but those 203 are not it's just
094not representative enough to for me to think that the majority of this community feels one way or another comments save you PA we don't need that yes go ahead thank you Mr chair um I also had to I'm not texting I had to type out my thing as most of you know I have really wrestled with this policy I've gone back and forth read comment after comment email after email and if you didn't get a response from me I still read it I just am busy with my kids so I'm not taking the time to reply to every email so forgive me um been really unsure of how I would vote tonight but ultimately I was elected to protect our kids to protect my kids people are trusting that with every vote I cast I
095would be doing my best to follow through with the promise I made that the to those that put me in this chair my vote tonight is something I've wrestled with because I have a community pleas but I had to take a step back and remind myself that more than I have a community to pleas I have a district to serve I have to trust my gut because those who voted for me are trusting me to do just that I'm me go off script um an argument that I have heard more often than not is that our kids um need to see themselves through books and one specific area that I've heard that in is with sexual abuse and as someone who is sexually abused in high school I can guarantee you that reading a book
096that contains stories of other victims that have been sexually sexually abused In the Heat of that trauma would not have been healing it would have taken a knife into that wound and just dug all around it exposing so much more now there's power in the me too movement it helps to know that I wasn't alone in what I was going through so the argument of with with the whole sexual abusing like oh it was helpful to read about rape maybe for some people but to have that as an argument to have those books in our school I completely disagree and those that I know that have also experienced that kind of trauma even after you've healed from that kind of trauma that's not enjoyable to read That's not healing to read if anything get you
097fired up and want you to I'm in Tangent okay um and another way is so that again kids can see yourselves through books so with the LGBT community and people of different types of communities um there are books available where they can see themselves in them without containing sexually explicit material so that alone just doesn't have a basis of an argument this is not black and white this is not an attack on teachers librarian students or specific groups within our community this is to help our district get back to what's important teaching our kids getting back to the basics of Education with that I'm so grateful for how hard our Council and Administration has worked on not just this policy but on ensuring that our kids in the district are getting the best education possible
098thank you anybody else thank you chairman bowan wow it's going to be really hard to top all of these great trustees and their thoughts this evening so I'll just be really quick and add mine when I first started coming to board meetings before I was a trustee we had a woman that got up hiked up her jeans and read a portion of a book with sexually explicit content and it blew my mind because I never for a minute thought in a school district we would have books with that subject matter I just never it blew my mind so here I am I've gone through my campaign process and I think I was pretty transparent with that saying that books with sexual explicit content and I have not I never have used the word pornography or
099pornographic from day one it's been sexually explicit content I've said that I didn't see the educational value in it I've been pretty upfront with that so when it came to the procurement policy I honestly wanted all the books stopped I didn't want any more with that but Dr Newton and his incredible staff sat down with each of us and talked to us about how that actually works and the national organizations and how it actually works for our Librarians so I took a step back and I got the stance do your best AKA Endeavor I'm not bashing Librarians I don't envy their their title or position in any way I'm just going to say one more time please do your best Endeavor and I'm going to be a yes vote I'm going to say that there's
100a lot of things that we make choices of as trustees curriculum being one of them we've had a lot of votes on that and uh I think that this Falls right in there with that there are other school districts and other part of the Nations they offer things like Chinese Korean and some places languages like Russian and Arabic and farsy and we don't do that here we have other school districts across the country like I grew up in Portland Oregon we had gymnastics and baseball and water polo not that I played any of those but we had them that was great and every school district makes a choice with their dollars as to what they want to support and not and so I'm going to be a yes vote on the procurement policy I I
101just all I can say is Librarians please do your best and if a book gets through it's going to go on the list thank you anybody else Mr chair anybody else Mr chair can you hear me yes go ahead Your Voice Sounds I too have just a just real short um I don't think it comes as any surprise that I have real concerns about the policy um I you know we've started from the very beginning saying that you know this is just to set standards just to make those choices well my hope would be that the majority of the choices we make are based in knowledge expertise and best practices and the education industry and right now we have a set of standards that people are that are Librarians that people are using to choose
102the books and to rate them according to their grade levels and and according to Age and what this policy does is ask them to change those standards to be based on opinion and feelings and I I can't get there you know policy based on opinions and feelings is bad policy um and second you know we've heard you know there's a lot of talk about the policy that originally the majority of the community wanted it and then it was well at least half the community wants it and while no 200 people is not a statistical um is not a statistically valid for the whole Community all of the information we have says that that you know it's not 50-50 and it's not the majority from the feedback we got last fall to the enrollment data to
103the feedback again for this round um you know I'm not it's not a vote but it is pieces of information and it says to me that the majority of the community doesn't want it um and so I I'm a no vote for this evening any other comments i' just like a little bit of clarification um either from Dr Newton or or paully have you anticipated what the administration administrative reg look like for this if somebody finds a book that we put online that's going to be ordered what's going to be we anticipate what address us will look back Mr chairman I think um it's a bit premature to start writing regulations around a a policy that may or may not even pass and so as soon as it becomes our policy we will immediately begin
104the administrative regulations around it yeah I'm assuming though that it's GNA have some kind of a panel like we do right now to look at anybody that suggest a book is probably not shouldn't be ordered it's going to be reviewed I would assume that's going to be a case we will certainly make very clear procedures and put them in place and it'll be open for everybody to view and and um for the board to make suggestions to improve it and do we have any idea now how you said you haven't got those regulations and somebody was asking how long are they going to be there you know how long how much time will they have to um identify books we have any idea on that St right now Mr chair I'm not sure we can
105anticipate that just yet but that'll be the first order of business in the division section tomorrow morning if this were to pass thank you any other comments okay we're voting on let's see here chapter 7 section 21 library media Services related to procurement of new library materials all those in favor say I I those oppose no no no like we have a 4 to2 vote motion passes all right that's a long time for two items of business next regular board meeting will be held on Monday September 9th 2024 at 6 pm work session will begin at 5: PM the business of the district is done except that I need to ask who would like to come to the agenda meeting and because I'm starting bowling by then my bowling starts at at 1:30 so have
106to move it up a little bit so um instead of starting at 1 you're when you come you'll be starting at 12:30 instead of 1 so is there anybody who would like to be there and it's going to be on September 4th I'm sorry Wednesday September 4th oh oh that's a Wednesday forget might B on Tuesdays forget what I said it's we'll still keep it at the same time I'm sorry I don't know why I had the wrong day when I was think the third okay is there anybody interested in being there that day okay anybody else I can do okay did you get those and those are always very informed I appreciate all the information that you share with us at those times that's eventually share to everybody just give a little preview of
107it so let's see here comes our second item from visitors time and we have nobody signed up at this time but you can come and talk to us about any topic anybody's online and would like to talk to us about some topic please raise your hand you're GNA come again okay Mr chairman trustees Ben horox uh representative for house direct 42 in Wyoming I just want to uh say something kind of in in broad spectrum of the meeting and what you've been through over the last uh months I suppose sometimes the legislature paints with a very broad brush and relies on others to fill in the blanks and I think that's happened a little bit here sometimes we also do box your corner because that's the way that the legislature has voted and the way
108that um uh we believe our constituents and the people of Wyoming kind of uh lead us to go so both of those things have kind of happened tonight and um just want to thank you also for your commitment to this your time dealing with this uh the public comment that you've allowed during this process I think that's very important um it help helps me as a legislator to see how careful we need to be with legislation with what we do with legislation as well because it does have Ripple effects that then uh are passed down to other elected officials to uh you know enact and hey we got this done in 20 days what happened I'm just I'm totally kidding I'm totally kidding about that but uh you guys have done your best um and
109I just want to say that tonight I think what you've done is good for teachers it's good for children it's good for parents it's good for Wyoming uh as I've been knocking on doors over the last months something that I've heard over and or something that I've said over and over again that resonates with the people every single time regardless of if they agreed with me or not I say um that we don't want to lose Wyoming we don't want to see Wyoming go the way everybody else is and I think we still are there I think we can probably all agree to that so uh thank you for your time and what youve done appreciate it about how long it took for US State statue does require us to do those 45 day review
110so there's no way we can get it done in 20 days so and you also have a lot of time during the year to do committee work before you get to the legislature so we did a pretty good good job anybody else online P oh go ahead I'm a semi-retired teacher uh only been in the community five years and uh but I have a real interest name and first and last name uh Ruth bow b o l e have a real interest in in education and I and I as an educator I always wanted my library to support education not just pleasure pleasure is all around us there's only a few short hours to really educate so I believe in our American Heritage these libraries are there to support what kids can't get you know
111they they can't get the books that study history they have to go to the library they don't have them at home and that was always my goal and or desire is that my library supported what we were teaching educationally that there were history books that there were classic English books that there were you know there were books that would take them further than where they were at just themselves and so I appreciate the time that you have spent in doing that I think you've you've done a good job and um and on the other hand part of me agonizes because we've talked about banning some and you know there's a part of our culture that's been banned from the public library and that is anything to do with our Christian foundation so we talk about
112U books that are popular books the most popular book is the Bible the one that's been published most and and that is typically I don't know about here for sure but I know in different places we've lived where that has been banned from the public library so we have to be careful to make sure that we're we U aren't just focusing on one segment and not the other as well if we're going to worry about banning books and let's make sure that a child has access for everything but I think we've done a good job tonight so thank you thank you anybody else online or anything and if there anybody in the Overflow out there I'm not sure whe there's anybody there anymore or not think it's exciting out there probably Mr chairman there is
113a hand raised on okay can you hear us hello can you hear me we can hear you first last name please great my name is Rachel Martinez I currently help take care of my grandson who's in kindergarten in this district and the mother of three lcsd1 graduates um we had a lot of word smithing tonight but according to the American Library Association the oldest and largest Library Association in the world as you are probably aware a book ban is the removal of a title from a library because someone considers it harmful or dangerous a challenge is when someone raises an objection to library material or program or um challenges have been an option for parents in this District so what was passed tonight is significant because I believe it restricts others access to books and
114the ideas contained within those books based on another person's often ideologically or politically motivated objection a recent analysis found um by pin America found that abandon challenge books focus on a lot of underrepresented communities including minorities the disabled or characters who are different in fact one in three books restricted by school districts in the past year featured lgbtq themes or characters so let's call this what it is and it is an assault on anyone who doesn't fit the norm and those individuals will continue to be marginalized that is my fear so I think the true fear mongering that happened tonight is saying that my kindergartener is going to be coming home with actually explicit books and tonight I believe we chose not to trust Educators it's not missed on me that the next step in
115this community of concerned parents is to start looking at who knows what's next the public library books and research shows that book banding groups don't stop at school libraries this policy is a slippery slope and one last thing I also heard tonight the conversation about statistically significant things school board members are voted in by the public yes yes but a lot of you if you go to lman County W um website you're voted in to this school board with sometimes less than 3,000 votes definitely not statistically significant so it should be noted that the majority of parents wanted Open Access and those parental rights were ignored I would encourage everyone to look at what five of our Schoolboard members just passed and thank you to the two who stood up against book Banning thank you
116thank you anybody else here online a ground line please raise your hand Mr chairman there are no other hands looks like we have somebody approaching the microphone good evening uh I'm Mason M um what was your name Mason M uh can we please look at removing phones from the classroom um inappropriate material is on devices and uh they're con there are constant distraction in our classrooms uh could we please look at the value of the cell phones in the class um these are actual ways to show um inappropriate material not having somebody read it from public thank you thank you anybody else online or here and I would like to say I don't normally respond to people on the comment period but that is certainly something we've had discussions about as a board you want
117to elaborate on it yeah thank you Mr chair I I just wanted to clarify because this is the third or fourth person recently that's mentioned this we have a no cell phone policy in this district and if it's not being enforced I don't know why but we have a no cell phone policy in this district and so talk to your principles about that thank you anybody else want to speak to us okay have a motion Mr chairman I move to go into executive session at this time prior to adjournment for the purpose of possible student long-term suspensions and expulsions Personnel legal advice and potential litigation I second motion second to go into executive session all those in favor say I I those opposed no motion passes so we'll be an executive session I don't believe
118there's going to be any