001okay and just to the presenters I should probably told you this before but we need to reserve maybe 10 15 minutes but maybe 10 minutes so we have a chance for everyone to take a little break too um before we get going so to pce yourself accordingly with that I'll turn it over all right thank you Dr Newton would you like us to stop with questions or is there a place you questions I think we're fine if you'd like to stop us and pause and ask some questions I think it goes smoothly then and and relevancy is is always good and ke so uh thank you for being here the uh I wanted to start off with um you know the why first of all um because I'm very passionate I know Stacy is it's
002one of the reasons why we um are speaking to you tonight on this important topic um so the kind of giving the overview of of the significance of why we're here and that's basically uh talking about um all of our students and how to meet their needs of success and inclusivity and when we talk about inclusivity with students in the classroom and general Leed um all specialed students are first general led students and that's we have 2,000 of those students um or approximately 15% of our um nearly 14,000 students in the district um have special needs and um have some sort of IEP not range would be uh for little ones that are having a struggle saying there RS um to medically fragile students and and any everywhere in between and then some so we're
003talking about a pretty wide spectrum of student needs um in our special education department um and throughout the throughout the years it's always been one of those uh pieces that uh you you may hear in schools that's special ed they do their thing we don't okay and no longer are we trying to you know do business with that barrier like separate s type of environments and so together and that's why I thought this bullet point was very important is because it's a it's a collaborative inclusionary model now that we're working under and that's changed um even when I started in the mid 90s that has come about over the last two decades of of more inclusion into classrooms and so that's why that piece is important because it's a whole system approach we're only as
004good as those uh students who struggle the most and it's kind of the old chain you know you only as strongest as your leak wink that's true in this school district with those 14,000 students um we're only as good as our our most struggling student and so when you look at that um by Martin Luther King what he said decades ago that Rings true right now and there's a sense of urgency around this to get that message across okay okay and um that's why we're here tonight to share the significance of where we've been over the last few years um since I've been here um and I could answer some institutional knowledge around that as a teacher as a principal and and definitely then rely on Dr Kern to share presently where we're at and
005in the future and so I first start off with um that's what we'll do um is is I want to share just recently recent history around the past few years years we've had um several aits audits that have been conducted to show where we need to focus in this district and throughout those uh few audits the state department helped us with some we approached um Consultants to help help us with others we've identified some goals in these areas uh one our multi-tiered system of supports when folks think of mtss some of them think of it as just at risk students academically or behaviorally they don't think of it as involving special education but it does mtss is kind of the big umbrella under that is general and special education academically and behaviorally and so defining
006and implementing those practices that common language that common understanding is is one of those goals that we've defined um several years ago to improving those programming Services uh that Continuum of services like I said maybe the kindergartener the prek student who can't say they're ours and the students who are medically fragile will chare bound those um students everywhere in between have programming needs that we are going to focus on and have focused on um and then to increase the capacity because students bring to us every day things we need to adapt and to change our programming for and so looking at developing that that knowledge base through training through development uh professionally that will need to uh focus on as well so we've outlined those pieces through some of those Audits and have been successful
007in some areas that I'll I'll share um our cap is our corrective action plan uh from our state department one of those pieces was to focus on our professional development uh for our staff teachers PA of professionals principls senior leaders as well we started right away uh around that area on November of 2022 we held an all District staff development um day at at South High School uh we brought in several Consultants we also throughout the year um brought in folks to come help train in areas like manifestation determinations um a program called y TR for our resource teachers so many different types of things that we've done over the past two and a half years to try to build that capacity through through professional development um we also looked at developing a Common Language
008and common process and developing IEPs so we published a handbook um primarily that uh took um part over about the full semester that first year and we developed that and then and then implemented that in the spring and this year is our full year of implementation under that handbook it's more of a guide book to help teachers administrators navigate through how we do things and fluid it it adapts with sped law it adapts with needs of of different types of programming that we may Institute but uh finally we've got one document um or guide book for uh new folks coming in as well as veterans that um are putting into practice IEP types of uh types of programming so is that handbook electronic or is it a paper we do have both um a hard
009coffee as well as electron it depends on how the the principal would like to use it or the coordinator but we have both so when you make changes it's easy Electronics you have to reprint it then it's we would in a revised date yes little adapt more adaptive electronically for sure um another big piece is that support at the school level and at the district level I'll start with the district level first although it comes second um the district level we had to increase our capacity for supports at the school level so we implemented a model that uses coordinators it was highly successful a decade and a half ago uh when we had Consultants they were called so we brought that practice back um State Department really looked at that as this is what several
010districts do not only Statewide but Across the Nation that that consult or that coordinator model then was implemented and has really paid off in a big way so we have coordinators um in each Triad we also have a coordinator the deal with high needs students uh student behaviors academics um that do a nice job helping with tough IEPs helping with difficult conversations with parents Advocates and that has been a a huge win for us um as far as that Staffing go and support for schools we've also um increased in other areas uh for our staff supports and and training in those areas to try to help that capacity in each building grow and knowledge base because like I said earlier when there come presents a student with different problems than maybe that school has ever
011seen we bringing those coordinators or some um behavior um bcba's Behavior certified board certified Behavior analysts to come in and really help with those behaviors for those students we have uh three of those or two of those and one BC ABA thank you um but but similar types of of Duties to help and then at the school level trying to come up with through that programming and Continuum of services um programs that you may hear at say um Freedom or Davis or Anderson um types of programming that meet specific needs of students say with autism um just to speak of one um breaking apart some other life type of programs that we have to try to meet the needs behaviorally and academic um for those things we've done that just recently as well as this
012full year of implementation so that gets to kind of some big pieces we've done in the district over the past uh two and a half years um we've also improved our Communications um and relationships with external ta stakeholders um stride Volunteers of America Health Works um Youth Alternatives just to name a few some advocacy groups out there we've really tried to bridge that gap of communication as well as support on both sides so there's a wraparound services for students in needs and families in needs peeps is another uh great example internally that we've built that programming to help parents when they struggle and so uh that falls under kind of the external internal stakeholder group that we've really tried to improve so support certified people is there a program nearby that people can get certified
013to that name there are there's there are several you want to speak to some of those most of them are online the ones that our folks can access our online degrees um nothing not any close in person and it is a master's level um certification so it takes a lot of time and a lot of hours to to go through that program and to get the certification it's hard to find those people very very hard we're lucky to have our to and our assistant is there any way we can encourage anybody in the district just start working on that yeah I think there are quite a few a couple that I know that are are currently working on it and I think our tuition um reimbursement sement would cover a lot of that there used
014to be a big internship component with several hours outside of their their job to really get embedded and and and learn um and so that was kind of a deterrent I don't know some of those programs may have adapted because that was a big deterrent they have to take some time work but yeah there are there are multiple levels of programming to try to become a BCBS would it be possible I know we do that with our principles allow them to do some internships in the district that's so yeah we could support that so um it's not all roses we've had some challenges as well as as you've probably heard um some have come with changes in in leadership so as as Dr Newton um shared our new director U we've had uh three in
015three years and that comes with change it comes with um a vision message and and communication um that we try to maintain some consistency around but it is what it is um when a principal changes we had three over three years it's going to take some time to adapt and so with that um you know that just takes that comfortability and to try to improve um some of those embridge those those challenges when you have leadership changes um also have had Staffing shortages and changes um we have quite a few uh teachers between 20 and 30 teachers on exceptional authorizations this year and so that's been a big challenge to try to meet the needs with classrooms um uh supports for students uh in in an increasing population of students with special needs I know
016there were a lot of us came from the regular teaching positions are any them want to go back or are they pretty happy with what they're doing yeah I don't know as far as the you know the today what they're what they're foreseeing uh I would hope that they you know been mentored in a way that they want to continue I haven't heard anybody that has has decided to opt out for next year so great um time for training is another one with uh you know pre-existing types of professional and staff development days that are already established um several years in advance that's difficult to find some time for that so we're relying on um you know stealing some time from what we have but also providing um Consultants to come in to our district
017and work in specific Triads or schools to try to support new training and ideas um and then lastly won't um belabor this too much but a corrective action does take a time away from from kind of the day in and day out operations to pay attention to that as well as state complaints um it's a lot of man hours um we're we're Lean Like I said and me and so we uh work hard to get those accomplished and the state department has been very graceful and helping us and supportive not only financially but kind of boots on the ground calling and they pick up the phone right away to help support us but it does take time away from implementing some some big things so those are the four types of big issues or challenges
018that we've seen a locked in PE J you like um I'm curious if there is quick ways easy ways for um teachers who may have students whether IEP or otherwise who is giving them a hard time and they're having trouble with their classroom management skills and um are they able to contact their coordinator for their dis their Triad and get quick feedback and ideas or or how how have you guys set it up or how do you envision it if it's not set up yet to make it something where it's fluid and and there can be a quick back and forth before necessarily have to have someone come in in the in those situations that's a great question I I'll take a stab and I'll let you follow up too um you know first would
019be to involve their special team you know get together with the parent um and that that IEP team to develop an IEP that can be deliverable um with the resources they have if not then they can expand that approach um of course on that team they can call in folks to consult like our bcbas or our coordinators um assistant directors director to try to help problem solve those um difficult cases I want to say K12 right they you know we realize this issue sometimes pre K12 um and so that's where we'd start first of all um maybe there if it's if it's a resource teacher doesn't have a lot of experience or or a Genet teacher that is struggling too um we' first of all get that team together just to try the problem solve
020first okay I was just wondering if there was something thicker than having maybe the team can be on that day but can a teacher just send out an email and say you know what had had a kid throw it in the chair or whatever knock over a chair and steal a backpack away um and and it's been happening on and off for like two weeks and I talked to them I talked to Mom and Dad they're not they have an i let's pretend they already have one um is there a quick like resource for them or do they have to go through a team and you know I mean not saying that that's a bad thing I'm just asking if there's there's people they can consult with to problem solve before it gets to the
021team level or maybe prior to the team meeting concerning like that there are and that's one of the pieces that I um thanks for bringing that up that I didn't share is that they can kind of reach out to the bcba or the coordinator um you know with help from the the principal um and to try to help that student with with the need and so that's what they present is kind of certain we see students who may cycle once a month or once a quarter or so once a year and they just need that intervention or maybe it's you know more trauma coming out right and so yeah we um frequently utilize our coordinators and our bcbas along with our principles or or Abes in in our classrooms or or students excuse me teachers
022as well to try to help support right away get get them to Baseline um from from escalating so high and then get them Baseline and then if it's developing that pattern over a week or two or a month definitely making some bigger sweeping changes within their ieu or replacement status no we're not we're making sure not to put that in as a mark against the teacher for saying I need help or some advice when they come around for their their evaluation right yeah that tier one instruction right it takes it it does take a team effort to to deal with these big Behavior challenges and it's in moment it feels like there certainly is a sense of urgency um through idea and special education we're obligated to uh educate a student in their least restrictive
023environment and try some what what's called positive behavior interventions and supports and so there there's always um an Avenue to remove his child from that environment to help them regulate and um get back in into a you know a state where they can learn but we can't just keep doing that we have to to approach it uh through a team effort and make sure that our answer isn't just to remove them from the classroom but to give them the skills so that we don't have to take them out as much and they can stay in in the classroom more so there is always that that feeling of the process isn't quick enough and and I know that's one of the the things that we have to focus on for special ed is our Behavior programming
024needs a lot of work we don't have a a really clearly defined how does a teacher get help um in the moment when a student is throwing a chair what does that look like and so that's something that that we're working really hard to to build in the meantime it I I know it can feel like a there's there's nothing here to help us but but we want to build the skills within the buildings and the teams within the buildings because they you know we we have the resources for the mental health professional available to all of the buildings School psychologists the bcbas can be brought in we want to build the skills of the principal so that they can help help respond um so we know that that's going to be a big part
025of our work is to build the skills of the building team so they can they can help a teacher out immediately sure so with that um let's sty kind of pick up of where you we are current well thank you so much first of all for having me I'm excited um it's not not very many people want to talk about special ed because it can be it can be tricky and um you know there's a lot of feelings and emotions that come with it but I love to talk about sted and and I could talk about it all day so thank you so much for for having me come um this is I I uh just had a meet and greet that Jim had said up for me um I this is what I presented
026to our special education staff who who chose to come to um I spent quite a few of my first well still am but my first couple of weeks just listening learning meeting with people just to kind of get a lay of of what's going on with special education in lar me1 and these are the big three areas that really stuck out um that we we need to focus on and and um plan for going forward especially um finishing out the remainder of this year and going into next year but focusing on our people our programs and our processes so I'm just going to spend a little bit of time talking about each of those areas this is a little small so I apologize for that um the big we can't do the work of special
027education if we don't have good people working with our our kids and so our staff are an essential priority for for me and as we go forward um where I'm going to prioritize our budget our professional development just flood our folks with resources so they can do their job um do their job well I talked a little bit about um one some of the things that we are focusing on for Staffing and Jim mentioned um training up our our folks we have quite a few new teachers who are not yet fully trained in special education and we got them in those positions by offering some education incentives will will pay for your part of your a lot of your degree if you come work for us in special education um so kind of our grow
028our own model um we are hoping that they stick around um and enjoy the special education work so that um we're investing in them and we can keep them for quite a while um are so there are some recognized ratios within the special education world that it's kind of The Sweet Spot of how many students to staff members we um would like to to be at so that our our special Educators can do do their work effectively so we're really working on those ratios and the ratios of students to teachers get smaller as the student need it gets greater so our more sign ific um cognitive disability students are students who are um on the more severe um end of the spect Spectrum with autism our um you know our life skills students uh those
029require uh fewer students to to teachers so um and then as our students um are are in the general education study more we don't need as many teachers for them but we would like to really um strive to to meet the the recommended State ratios for our special education positions how close are we getting to those ratios you know um as far as financial situation we can we can get those ratios can we hire them um which is incredibly difficult it seems about each year the last couple of years a third of our positions have gone unfilled or filled with um exception authorization folks who are working their tails off but they have to learn a really hard job do that job and go to school at the same time it's just it's pretty taxing
030um for them as well as for the system so um so yeah we it's it's very difficult to fill all special education positions right now I mean to pair professionals all the way up to school psychologists ot's speech pass it's it's very difficult so how about rooms for those people do we have that as far as I know that's not something that has come across my desk as a concern we don't have anybody working in a closet or anything like that um as far as I know everybody has a home um there should be plenty of space but what happen in buildings where home their home was in a closet through that I've not heard of that yet but we can certainly yeah that that definitely helps boost Morales when we give people a space
031that they can effectively so Staffing we want to make sure our numbers are there to support the work that we need to do as students professional development um I've spent quite a bit of time meeting with the principles and just um starting to increase our Collective knowledge about special education um we also are offering ongoing professional development sessions and options for the principles they can attend as they you know something that catches their interest or is in need of theirs they can engage in that um we have folks who are really working hard with um learning more about the autism programming and our Ed which is emotional disability one of our um disability categories uh they're working really hard just ongoing training with some Consultants uh to uh boost their skills in their programs that
032they run we've also had a lot of teachers engage in the letters and Wilson training I think you guys are probably all familiar with those literacy uh professional development opportunities man's another one it's not it it's kind of one of those those trainings we have to do by State Statute it's not something we love to use but it is our our um crisis deescalation and Crisis Intervention training when we need it we've also got our teacher apprenticeship program um teachers as well as our exception authorization teachers who are receiving ongoing coaching support professional development throughout the school here I may that does speak to the question you asked earlier about um you know those escalating behaviors sometimes we notice that General ad or special ad teachers or Paris won't wouldn't have that man training man
033is a preventative model as well as a crisis model so looking for those types of anant or those behaviors that trip um some students that may have some you know some quirky types of things that just set them off whether it be tapping or something like that um taking a look at mant could be a preventative um training that that teacher era or special a teacher hadn't done we sent them through that training and then that would help hopefully for those students uh parents is another uh part of our people group parents are so incredibly important um as equal members of an IEP team in the special education process uh we have a lot of work to do with our parents uh in in the district uh just to build that trust and collaboration with
034them so that is something that myself and my staff have really been focusing on the last 10 weeks or so uh just just rebuilding that communication and trust with parents we have a lot of work to do but um I think we're we're getting a good foundation going uh with our parent groups and our advocacy groups which are wonderful um I think it's great to have a really strong advocacy group um for our parents it's it's incredibly intimidating to sit in a room of equal professionals but as a parent who probably doesn't have a that Professional Knowledge of special education it is such an overwhelming process for parents and um we throw a lot of information at them in the special ed process and it's it's just incredibly powerful when they have an advocate who
035is alongside them and you know helping them navigate the process so we love our parent advocate groups and we're spending a lot of work spending a lot of time with them well so so it's not an outside group we have yes they're all outside and there's several in the state and specific to our community uplift is the biggest one in Cheyenne but there's the parent information center which is pick which is Statewide and they will um assign Advocates to any parents in the state so those Advocates are are paid to be there with the parents or are they volunteers or if they're with the the parent you know one of the organizations they're paid um if if it's somebody if it's like an independent Advocate um sometimes they volunteer their time other times they charge
036for the advocacy work so so just sitting at the chamber mention with some uplift so yeah I don't believe that I might be misspeaking but I don't believe uplift charges parents at all no I didn't mean charges parents I mean they at least paid so certainly are yeah yeah they're with one of the organizations I believe so Community Partnerships um we have a lot of work we have to do and we can't do it all in our district alone so we um are are relying on those Community Partnerships to to help serve kids whether that's mental health Partnerships um the uh you know a lot of our students outside therapies uh throughout their day the school year that we we try to partner with outside therapists as much as possible um the DD waiver the
037department of BU rehab um just a whole bunch of different Community Partnerships that play a role in successfully getting students through through um school what are legal issues with trying to share information with those outside groups yep we we can't share any information without a release consent or release of information from parents most parents are generally willing to to provide that release of information the next are programs we have a lot of different programs and a lot of good things going in the district uh we just need a little bit of Co cohesiveness with um with those programs and I'm a firm believer I I I love the Triad system but it shouldn't matter what Trad or school you're in your child that child should get get what they need um regardless of of their
038school or Triad so I I would like to you know on a big picture level make sure that all of our our offerings um our our Continuum of services are um Equitable across our Triads leaving flexibility every building is different their needs are different their student population is different so leaving some flexibility um for individual buildings but a really cohesive Continuum of services District Drive why is one of my big goals um I know that um so we do one of the the big areas is for Behavior I know that that is just in education in general we are are seeing more complex student um difficulties than ever before our developmental disabilities are on a rise Nationwide and they are a lot of them are um Behavior based so we we know we um in
039general need to to beep up our behavior supports and then our our Behavior data would indicate that we probably have some big gaps to know in the area of behavior um and discipline for students with disabilities so one of the big things that we are um we've already got in place um for next year so our we get um State money for special education each year and federal money and out of the federal pot of money I can set aside 15% of that that the federal money H has to be 100% spent on Special Ed but I can carve out this 15% um for coordinated early intervention services and that pot of money can only be spent on students in general education not on special education yet because the idea is if we intervene early
040they may not need special education so with that 15% and I think they might be posted already Vicki but you can you can tell me we're gonna we're gonna um fill seven behavior intervention positions for next year we're not haven't quite decided how those are going to be allocated but certainly going to be allocated based on student need um in the schools and likely focused on the elementary schools because early intervention so um we're doing that as part of our special ed process we also are um there's a gap from you what you know when we exhaust our Continuum of services at the building level and then are you guys familiar with our um Elementary day treatment program it is it's still part of our school district but it's a separate program and a separate
041building for students with big behaviors um that need more than what's offered at the building level we we have a huge gap from what happens you know when we've exhausted our um building level supports to EDT so we have identified uh three center-based programs that we're going to implement for next year and they are going to focus on that gap of behavior um hopefully not hopefully they will be a therapeutic environment we'll be focusing on on building skills self-regulation skills um behavior skills so so that students can get back to their home schools as quickly as possible we'll have that in place for next year what that's what we're calling our effective needs um Center based programs and we already have our life skills center based program and our our Autism Center based programs districtwide
042will'll continue to to develop those and um one of the things nobody knows really how kids get into those programs and how they get out and so we we have a lot of work to we've been doing a lot of work it's about ready to be published but just guidelines in a rubric for how do we how do kids access these these um such Center based programs um any questions about that so we got we we've got a lot of work to do for Behavior but we're definitely working hard it so those three be a lot one for each Triad or we just going to do a need basic no it'll be per Triad so if one Triad has more than could go the other on yeah we'll have to look at that for sure
043yep we definitely don't want those to be over so I have a question but yeah not so what have we been my understanding is when we were funding the bses that is how that money was spent but when we no longer funded the buses I'm not sure that money was spent at all so it's still growing in the account we didn't lose the money we just haven't spent it yet and that that's money that has to be spent every year we get in big trouble for not spending it so it's I can't just sit there and grow we have to do something and so the seven best jobs I just checked VI's got them posted and we are ready to begin entertaining interviews for okay yeah so when you say programs how does that look
044in implementation it's not a it shouldn't be a classroom or a setting right it's a program so offering um what what each individual student needs while also being able to keep them in their General Ed environment as much as possible so um you know it can look at um it should be a spectrum a a um a Continuum so it could look like um one student who is in in a classroom all day long with you know two adults because they cannot regulate their behavior they they might be incredibly um violent to a student who maybe has epodes of violence but also periods where they um are able to go out into you know the the general setting for maybe PE or music or art or or be in the classroom for some reading um
045it or it it hopefully um as students progress through the program that's going to be focused on we're going to have some a lot of trauma informed practices in there they'll have access to um Social Work services and school psych Services we're going to have all of those programs fully staffed full-time staffed with mental health professionals so it might look like individual or group counseling um therapy for um Behavior emotional regulation um where was I going that um we're so the program is going to probably look different for each student but there's going to be this underlying best practices of trauma informed practices um how we prevent behaviors how we respond to behaviors um there's going to be Pro a um a a Data Tracking System so we can make sure that students are growing
046we're going to have a consistent way to measure growth with that so I don't know if I'm answering your question very articulately but that's wonderful you gave us a lot of details help us understand and think about what you're thinking um my a followup to that just prompted what you just said then will parents get sort of a report on a regular basis how their student is doing in this program best practice would be most of the time we do daily Behavior notes back in fourth between the home and the school with this level of programming it really is the best um so at a minimum I mean at a minimum weekly but honestly I've not ever seen one where there isn't a daily communication laog that goes back and forth and there's not like
047this canned canned curriculum or canned program that I can tell you it is pulling best practices from from what we know in the um the the behavior world and social emotional world and and putting it all together to making sure and if I may I think the entry and exert requirement for each piece of the Continuum really makes it clear to everybody involved when have we decided you need a little bit more help and when have you developed the skills to where we can lessen the Restriction in the environment so I think those those will be very clear indicators of where they need to go next and the desire is that from the moment before from the moment the team decides they should go to one of these programs the team already has an idea
048of what those criteria are for that child to come back to their home school and back and be a part of their their home school so that that is our will be our Focus all right we have some work a lot of work to do with literacy um we need to train up our our teachers um a lot more in in evidence-based interventions for reading um for students with disabilities and then our transition programs um it is our job as students turn 16 until they're 21 to make sure that they are ready for Life After High School not just are they progressing grade to grade in high school but are they ready to go be successful adults um so we'll be focusing on that as well and I can talk more about that later and
049then processes I've talked quite a bit about wi wing need to have some standard processes I or special ed is all um mandated by law but there's a lot of nuances and and how we Implement that law how how does the law translate to Everyday practice for folks um we need to make sure we're pretty standard across the district we're consistent and clear with communication um our practices are aligned with policy and law a lot of our corrective action plans will go away if our processes are are um so that's also a focus ultimately we want to improve outcomes for students with disabilities that's what we're here we want to make sure they're grad that's what we're here for we want to make sure they're graduating they're not dropping out that they are proficient in
050reading and math um so they can be successful um for whatever life looks like for them after school or after high school we want to make sure they're gainfully employed they have good um long-term Health outcomes um we want to make sure that uh we stop removing special education students from the General Ed environment as much as possible for discipline reasons although uh you know when we have big behaviors it's important to um to keep everybody safe including the students so those are just those are the things that we need to relentlessly focus on for our special students our staff we want to make sure they're trained and they have um really good uh they feel good about the work that they do it's hard to be a special educator right now really hard and
051so we want to make sure that the culture and climate is is good for our special education folks so we can keep them and then um parents like I said we have to make sure our parents are um feel welcomed feel part of the process feel heard and equipped to to navigate the special environment so so do we keep track of the graduation rate for our students that special we do and how does that compare with districtwide let me I'm not sure districtwide let's see the last I can't the last reported graduation rate that I could publicly report was 68.8% I believe for our special our students with disabilities I'm not sure how FOC 20% difference yeah roughly over the past three to five years how about drop I me that's they kind of go
052together but not exactly so it's way higher than we want I can't I can't publicly report that data because the N size is so small but it's it's oh it's we're in the green we we've met the state goal but it still is too many kids are dropping I know it got higher during CL we just seem to lose some people for whatever reason I know they've been struggling to find where they went so far so would that be a part of this problem right now potentially and I might also add that remember that graduation rate that they give us is a fouryear on time Y and so you saw on that that slide that we fully intend to keep a lot of these kids to age 21 every one of those students will count
053against if they don't get a diploma exactly on their fourth year and so to equate that with not successful just is um just as inacurate but they don't really make that Nuance as they report it out um the the student in the life's classroom who has Down syndrome is going to count against our graduation rate and against our special education graduation rate and um we knew from the very beginning with some of those students that we would keep them long past their fourth year of high school so um there's there's always some Nuance in that that um that we know going in every school district has that same problem right so when we're comparing to other districts it would certainly compared to other districts yeah but it could be it could be harder on us
054there was a larger amount of special kids stay longer than District so that information yeah well and of course you know the the underlying disability right if if we have a student with a mild speech articulation problem we wouldn't suppose that they're going to fall behind in the same way as somebody with severe cognitive disabilities so it it really depends on we have a higher special it percentage than a lot of places by a little bit and it would depend on what the nature of the dis ABS I just want to conclude uh our bit if if we don't have any questions with how much you appreciate having a director like Dr K already in a few few months um caring is the strategy believe it or not right we go into meetings we go
055into um difficult either IEP meetings or staff uh issues that we may have and that level of care and empathy um that she's presented within and that courage that we're going to do something about this problem has has solved a lot of problems in itself and I appreciate that of her she's tackled some big issues not only with State types of complaints um corrective action plan issues but um also just on that you know granular level of what does this student need today um types of things so it's been very encouraging to see the progress did a great job of talking about special ed talk the other day at the uh at the chamber so Mr chair with that that is the end of our report okay so it's about five about 10 minutes mind
056e I have be he okay it is 6m and I call this meeting of lar mechanic school one Board of Trustees to order and we will have the um first grade class A Elementary whose teacher is Aon Milburn doing the pled liance force and you can talk along just listen voice all right one two thank you to them are they're just so darling when they do that um all right next do we have any adjustments for the agenda Mr chair we do not have any adjustments to the agenda this evening okay bless you Mr chair I move to adopt the agenda I second okay we have a motion to adopt the agenda and a second all those in favor say I I those oppose no motion passes we got everybody here tonight which is great
057we haven't had that for a while okay we're going to be doing the classroom recognition for the or the recognition for the teacher the classroom did that and sast will be coming up to do that for us good evening um thank you chairman Bolan and members of the board uh at this time I would like to invite uh principal Craig Williams and teacher Erin Milbourne to the front of the room and uh they were responsible for that wonderful Pledge of Allegiance video um also lurel Walter uh with Western Vista Federal Credit Union they sponsor that and she has a little surprise for them I'm sure they're not always as darling as they look on there but great work with them thanks thank you so much okay next up we're going to be doing student of
058the week and it's going to be Johnson Junior High School first good evening we have such a slew of amazing kiddos back there that we're out finding Miss Autumn so as we out trying to look for her um I'll go ahead and get started a little bit with how much Autumn Tu aula Jones our 8th grader at Johnson Jr High is absolutely spectacular um not only is she in basketball and has been a great teammate um helping others understand persistence great determination even when things get hard you go harder and you make sure that you own what's going on um she exemplifies that not only does she do that at school she does that at church as she does the child care during Service as well as in jiujitsu where she has been so amazing
059she had to level up to the adult category and even then the week before spring break during that tournament she um got two gold medals right and there she is Miss Autumn if you'd like to come on up so again miss Adam Tula Jones um said that she has learned all of these things not just at Johnson but from her parents Rodney and Anique she's learned that grit that der termination and to make sure you push through even when times get hard so with that I'd like everybody to just cheer on and go ahead and appreciate parents another cool thing um I don't know if you all know but my husband runs the me Lumber here in town and after talking to Autumn she said that one day she has a couple ideas of what
060she'd like to do when she grows up uh two things crane operator or interior designer so I'm going to make sure that I'm going to hook her up with uh me Lumber to make sure she can learn all the ins and outs and maybe be on my husband's watch list for five years from now so um I would also like to introduce Miss Anna gross she's our science teach teacher of which um Autumn has said has been her favorite teacher we're going to go ahead and let Autumn talk a little bit why Miss Anna gross is amazing and then Miss Anna you get to talk about Miss autumn the teacher I pick to recognize is Miss gross Miss gross is extremely kind and committed to what she does at Johnson she is hardworking and makes
061sure every student is on task Miss gross also does her very best to make sure everyone passes and understands what she is teaching not only that but miss gross is willing to listen and connect with her students she has inspired me to learn more in science and pushes me to do my best every single day I truly value Miss gross here at Johnson Jor time Autumn is an extremely vibrant young woman um when she walks in the classroom she not only gets smiles and gratitude from myself but also her peers um she is an influencer to all of our um students at Johnson in a really positive way I know Miss Bradshaw said a field in crane operating and um interior design but I think she left out maybe a possible career in stem as
062Autumn has been selected to be um one of the students to attend the women in science stem conference at the University of Wyoming uh May 14th so um thank thank you Autumn for being a part of my classroom and part of our school you truly are a wonderful um role model for a lot of our students as well as adults too you're definitely a reason why I come to school and teach every day you can't go back got a good picture and as I mentioned it's a little chaotic out there in the lobby because we have the uh larby County school one art show is being set up now and the judging is going on right now I believe it opens up to the public tomorrow so if you want to see some of the
063wonderful artists we have that is going to be available I think starting tomorrow okay our next person is from Central High School so I am pleased to uh introduce a senior Sammy shamway from Central High School and so our committee met and Sammy shamway has been described as a great leader as having an outstanding work ethic as having a great passion for everything he does and as having a genuine concern for others so I have got uh to watch Sammy grow up over the last four years and he is such an amazing young man and so Sammy I'm GNA let you just talk for a moment maybe let us know what you're going to do after high school and then I'm going to let you introduce Mrs Lance our counselor who you um said was
064your favorite person at Central I'm a little hurt but that's okay um yeah so after high school I am serving at year church mission um I'm going to Brazil so I'm super excited for that that'll be a really fun experience and then after that I plan on attending uh BYU um haven't really decided what I'm doing with that um but this is Miss Lance um she's who I chose as I guess favorite counselor favorite teacher do that yeah um but yeah Miss Lance has been someone for past four years for me that um whenever I really need anything I can just go down to a room and she'll talk to me or she'll give me some candy or some snacks and um yeah um yeah if I need help with my schedule if I need
065help with classes with online classes um she's always been there to help me and so that's what I'm really appreciative of one of I always one of the things I love the most about Sammy is his smile he always put a huge smile he always has a huge smile on his face and he's always just happy and that's what all of his teachers said about him he's there to help kids he's there to help his other classmates he's there to support all the kids in the school so I told him whever if I see him in school if I see him on the basketball court if you see him playing soccer he's always got a huge smile on his face so that will get him far in life and you will always do great things
066so and Samuel and Kimberly shamway would you stand up parents please thank you so much for raising such a nice Jo and next up is South High School unfortunately my student wasn't able to make it today um they just got out of soccer practice and weren't able to be here right on time so but what I do want to say about Savannah is um she is a true member of the herd She's a mentor um she uh does her best in just about everything academically um she's part of student council she she's also a true leader additionally she has a 4.38 GPA um and one thing that's amazing about her is she's also taking LC classes because she's trying to pursue her career in Health Sciences and so overall um she's just a model student
067and citizen um she nominated her favorite teacher even though um she moved on from South High School as Dr Kaufman I don't think Dr Kaufman is in the room either and what she had to say about Savannah is that she loved her passion while working with her with We the People was able to go to Nationals last year and um she exemplified perseverance um and strength for her team and for um herself as well because she's accomplished something great so uh there you go Savannah Kagen parents are not here either okay okay mqu will come up again thank you again actually I'm going to to bring lurel back up and um she has a few words to say and then we'll take a photo and congratulate all our students good evening good evening everyone my
068name is lurel Walter I'm the chief marketing officer at Western Vista Credit Union we are the proud sponsors of student of the week we've been doing this for several years and it's always so much fun to get to see these kids and hear just a little bit about what makes them amazing and about the great things that they're doing in their schools so congratulations to you all um I think I heard Miss Brad Shaw say even though she didn't use these words perseverance and tenacity and those are two of my favoritest words favoritest favoritest words ever and so those are amazing characteristics um Sammy so I hosted last year last summer um Miss Rodeo America 2023 Kennedy Rigs and she served a mission trip in Brazil as well so when you come back I fully
069expect that you're going to be fluent in Portuguese just as she is and she also has a fantastic smile so you guys definitely have a lot in common so um and you know a child not being here because they're coming back from soccer practice I mean that's an overachiever at best so we're sorry she's not here but we hope that you extend our congratulations to her and wish her the very best almost always want to give these Awards the kids can get Awards in several areas so and be careful that little step there [Music] one [Music] more [Music] congratulations your pH thanks congratulations again A lot of times during this time we're giving wordss for sports but tonight we have an academic hearing we're giving um our wordss in this is the state math competition
070so Mrs Castle will be coming up with her giids that she's having to get from the lobby got a messy Lobby tonight it is my privilege to recognize our state math winners this evening um these folks come to story gym they take four individual math tests and they do a team competition uh so they spend all morning doing math and they're really excited about it so it's really great to have them all here this evening at this time I'd like to recognize their coaches they're going to help us hand out um Awards this evening so we have from McCormack we have John Scott from Carrie Junior High we have Ryan Mary from codair we have Sandy Arnold from East High School Heather ter from Central High School Fred pant and from South High School Dan
071Markham all right we're gonna we're going to start with our seventh grade team um our individual winners in seventh grade were Lucas ladesma from kry Jude Dixon from Johnson and Kenneth zisy from Carrie Junior High and don't believe any of those were able to make it from our team award from seventh grade at Carrie Junior High um Lucas Kenneth and Oliver Abram also from eighth grade in Carrie Junior High we have our team award uh Maggie Dixon ethony frent who is here all right Lola H Hickock and Devin kaser all from Carrie Junior High let's give our seventh and or carry team a round of applause all right from 8th grade our top three individuals Susanna Scranton from McCormick Wyatt helig from McCormick and Gabriel Neil from podair we have an A Team award also
072from McCormick with Susanna Wyatt and added to that team Iris Beatles and Sophie Reynolds all right in ninth and 10th grade are individual Awards in first place Ashley Olsen from East High School Josie habar from East High School and Henry Maguire from Central High School and South South took our grade nine and 10 team award and the following members were team um following people were members of that team Aaron Walker Eli Greenley Ross tenk and Neil hush back all right in class A these are 11th and 12th graders um from Central High School first place Nathaniel Thornell David Habor from East High School and Ruben Maguire from Central High School and our class A Team award went to Central High School this year Nathaniel Thornell Ruben M Maguire sorry and gppi Ferrera I'd like to
073take a moment to recognize all the work that the kids the coaches Jane Jane can stand up um do to make sure this event takes place um in addition would all the parents of these folks please stand up we we thank you for your support Circle through Circle just right in front of your people good congratulations good J good jat congatulations thank your work thanks one thing I would like to point out that the first year I think I've seen this we had winners or team and individual events from all three Triad so great great work South Triad to get in there with all the rest of those so thank you all right next is going to be U one of our club activities this will be the fbl uh champions from South High School
074well I'm here to introduce um our FBA group we have a robust group this year and our sponsor Kate tan she does amazing things with students um fundraising and working extra hours to make sure that these students are prepared they're constantly in the school I see their faces all the time and we're it's a pleasure they're definitely an amazing group of kids so K thanks Miss Gentry um so yes this is the group I we took um now I forget 19 students I took 19 students to the state conference back in March for three days over in larmy um these 11 all placed first in at least one event and will or earned their Nationals trip to Orlando this summer so we'll all be traveling to Orlando this summer to compete again in their events
075at Nationals um some of a multiple qualified in different events so it's going to be easier for me to go by event than by student so I'm going to do it that way and then we'll get you guys your certificates so raise your hands as I call you name each time so broadcast journalism was Aiden Cabrera Neil hushbeck and Caitlyn gansow and in computer game first place with Neil and Aiden and public service announcement is Neil financial data analysis um is Kobe McLean and he wasn't able to be here tonight local chapter annual Business Report was Jaden and Anna rifer community service project Jaden rer and Caleb Brewer business management race Barta electronic career portfolio Kaitlyn gansel marke marketing Jack artery sales presentation Jack artery and Tyson McMillian and Entrepreneurship Caleb Brewer and Caleb Greenland
076I get off I think I got it everybody so that was a lot and these students put in a lot of time obviously working on all their events for two months leading up to our state conference and so we're looking forward to having a good time this summer um I would like to take this opportunity to thank the South High Administration and the school board and the school district for all of their support of fbl across the district and atth we truly appreciate it and it wouldn't be possible without all the support from the schools um also all the parents if you're here tonight will you please stand I truly appreciate the parents and all their support that they give their students in backing up their students and everything they do as you can see
077they do multiple things and so it takes a lot of work and time and dedication on the parents part too I think Caleb gy wanted to say something real quick hello all welcome back I am Caleb Greenley I'm very excited to announce that I have got the Daniel spun scholar in a full right to pretty much any school I a few quick words about FBLA where school is the sandbox the playground for many people to strive and make mistakes FBLA takes it a step further and gives you real world experience and without this real world experience I think that achieving greatness isn't really possible so one more hand for fbaa conratulations congratulations congratul T thank you congratulations congratulations thank you congratulations I know Caleb's grandfather so it's always a little scary when you ask him
078to come up and talk because he he's like his grandfather in the fact that he loves to all right next up is going to be um the World Language day champions from our district got good evening trustees good evening community members um the people who are walking in are our world language competitors my name is Reagan Koffman and I am the social studies and World Language coordinator for those of you who don't know much about World Language day it is a state competition for languages um you can turn in events before the competition such as writing or video there is a Linguistics Olympiad and then in-person competitions the students standing before you all took first place in their divisions first up we have Quincy darer from Central High School Quincy took first place in wri
079a Spanish essay I apologize the person helping me is um is Mrs Evans and she teaches French at Central High in the area video um in the intermediate level is Kaylee fisbeck from East High School taking first place at the linguistic Olympiad were Andrew Lance and Nathaniel um Thornell sorry at from Central High School for the in-person competitions um for French level one there was a group first place there Iris beetles and Josephine O'Hara and they are from McCormack junior high school for French level four first place Cameron ker Jones from Central High School and German level two we had a first place with Julian Edmonds from East High School and in level four German for first place era shank from South High School and last but not least in Spanish level five for first
080place Paloma arago Medina from East High School thank you to all of the community members and parents who support learning World Language we very much appreciate you and we hope you continue to help your students um learn languages one more round of applause for our Learners thank you if any of the parents are here from these wonderful foreign language students please stand up and be recognized congratulations and again we had all three Triads representing great so that should be something become very regular here so all right next we have the wyomi academic challenge champions from East he it's my pleasure to introduce uh Mr Matt pivel the coach of our Wyoming academic challenge team and before we go any further I want to thank Mr pivel before the year started uh the coach of the
081academic challenge team was unable to continue coaching and he stepped in at the last second was glad to do it and obviously did a wonderful job with a wonderful group of kids so thanks Mr pivel so um Wyoming academic challenge for those who don't know is kind of it's a quizbowl kind of thing Jeopardy for nerdy high school kids the team at East uh this year was with not much coaching I'll be blunt they uh they badgered me to do it and I was glad to in the end but um they were an awesome group and they just dominated the whole season um we had six tournaments basically and at four of them we took first and second place which is pretty good because you can only take two teams and um then at State
082these three and then two others um simply dominated the event um we basically beat Thunder Basin by a score of about two to one and this is is the second state championship in a row for them and uh so they uh deserve all the accolades they get because they're excellent and uh not only that they were very nice to a new guy who didn't know anything and treated me very well so I enjoyed the heck out of it and I'd like to recognize him uh there are a couple who are not here Kensington dobler who's off visiting colleges and uh David hyber Corn who I've been told is at scouting we'll have a talk with him tomorrow anyway the three that are here I'd like to recognize uh so we'll start with Carson Costa first
083Carson was our expert on all matters geography history and arguing with judges he was and this is he's been a part of both state championship teams and an allaround good guy and I'm very proud of him next we have Thomas Dixon now so Thomas he was the main Badger he wouldn't let up on me um and sometimes you know you kind of find the best things in life when you're forced in and Thomas um really to me is kind of uh well his talents are many uh but for us he was kind of our expert in science of all sorts and he also is into music and I could go on and on but um I would say this he is also one of the kindest kids he was he he was very nice to
084me his fashion sense at the tournaments was a little odd um but got a notice so I guess that's what matters he's also been a part of both state championships and um I have him in class in IB and he's also uh a joy to have in class too so congratulations then fin we have Simon wolf so where to begin with Simon Badger number two wouldn't let me off on the hook and unfortunately I have him in class and couldn't get away so here I am but uh Simon was our expert what I would say kind of General but also lingu anything to do with languages uh is what he was good at also um all around turning around in rounds and apologizing to me when they gave a bad answer as if I whatever
085one out of 50 I'm not going to be upset so uh Simon has um been a part of both state championship teams and Simon is also um what I would consider kind of the glue of the team whenever I needed anything done I would just hey Simon send a message out to everybody so kind of like an assistant coach that's not being paid so anyway congratulations are there any parents or family members that were able to be here this evening please stand to be recognized congratulations congratul good good conratulations congratulations thank you Stephan after all those wonderful academic Awards and Club Awards we now are going to go to Athletics for a little bit so East High School State indoor track come on keep coming ad mention State indoor girls track I'd like to introduce
086Coach Amanda Brinkman the coach of the indoor State Track Champions this past year from East High School coach so we are GNA introduce our indoor uh state champions um we have 20 of them not all of them could show up today but um what an amazing group of young ladies great leaders just inspiring resilient and um if everything could go right in in our direction that we did we have great senior leadership I can't even begin to tell you how awesome are seniors are um many of them have been with us for four years and we're going to be extremely sad when they go because their leadership was invaluable like you can't put a price on it um and so with that being said uh they were an amazing group of kids every single um
087athlete here participated stepped up to the plate and we went and scored in every event we had our kids entered into and we even had individuals on our team that outperformed where they were projected to be and with that being said we came out to be the state champions and it didn't matter if they won the event or if we got five points from the event or if it was a half a point every Point mattered and they were supportive of one another just a great group of individuals to be around love them to death and I'm super excited and proud to be a part of their Journey um none of this would have been possible with just me at the the the top of the range I have a great supporting staff um from
088my coaches um coach bourier coach Becky is here to help represent that because these kids um couldn't get where they were would need to be if it wasn't without our supporting staff so coach Becky is our distance coach um coach BOS is our throwing coach coach pedal is our assistant uh student teacher that was like multitasking and just doing anything and everything we asked her to coach Sawyer who is also the girls head coach and I don't know if he's here uh he was our pvt Sprint coach coach box was our hurdle coach and um our Sprint coach and then Coach re is our high jump coach and without any of those individuals a part of our program um I don't think we would have been nearly as successful as we were I'd like to
089also thank the parents that came and supported us 5:30 in the morning for sprinters jumpers and hurdlers is a miserable experience um not very many happy faces to be shown that early in the morning but they all showed up and they represented um um and then what else can I say our administrators were super supportive so I thank coach slabs and Mr merage for just being the support system that we need so these are our state champions and I'm extremely proud of each and every one of them we havea Morris Maggie Matson um and Maggie are going to be represented again here shortly so they get two certificates Kendra Upton's home sick Nadia verette is homesick Anna Anderson um is at poy right now so don't mess with her Emma Smith is unable to make
090it tonight ANZ Runo here we go Sydney Sawyer Maggie Maggie did I give you moment oh no okay mag sorry we have sisters on here we got two of sisters gra you mol maton Ella right over here Julie Taylor Nelson's at volleyball Izzy leanda Evelyn right there sorry I always look over everybody's head gy Crystal Alena is not here Melissa was one of our managers and then Avery was one of our managers and she did a fantastic job of scoring points and then spoiling the kicker that we had an opportunity she ay so she was keeping track and figured out that we had an opportunity to win and decided to share the the news with everyone so those are our state Champion um if we have any parents or family members here of any of
091these student athletes can you please stand so we can say thank you to all your efforts pring amazing individual all right and I also have um a couple of two in or a couple of individuals that had one some State events without these two individuals they account we wouldn't have had 60 points um they each won three uh total individual events um together they had over two-thirds of our team points and um incredible performance by both of them so I need tiah Morris to come up here and I also need Maggie Matson to come on up here um I get to uh talk about tiia um I said said it four years ago that is she's going to be here quite often and she's been here every year since her freshman year she's an amazing
092track Talent um something um that I was blessed and had the greatest opportunity to work with um you don't get athletes like tiia very often and um I am super excited for her to be at Wyoming so we can see her progress and just continue to get better she won the 55 the 200 and the long jump individually she has the overall state record in the 200 um the overall state record in the long jump so that means of all classes she has it and then she also has a for state record for both of them and then obviously she has our school records Maggie um I would love to take credit for I just get to be super excited to talk to her um but coach forier is the one that is uh the
093one responsible for honing in on her talents so I'm going to let Coach forier talk to talk about her because um I'd love to take credit for her Talent uh but coach for is the one that gets to uh to work with her so come on up I also can't take credit for Maggie's Talent um her parents that's who is yeah um but there were also a few things so Maggie won the 800 the mile and the two mile and then she was also part of our third place 4X 800 meter team so she ran two 800s a mile and a two mile um Within two days of competition and she just excelled at all of them um and during the indoor track meet they're very close together so she had very little rest for
094all of those and she just came back each race and um just grinded and grinded and grinded there were kind of three main things I think that that gave Maggie a lot of success this season and one of those things was just her like Precision basically and her preparation she came to practice every day starting in the summer all through cross country season her offseason between cross country and indoor track and then indoor track um and just did any and everything that we asked her to do and she did it very precisely if I said ran it this fast she ran it this fast if I said go this far she ran that far um very coachable kid and she was just really really prepared to kind of go through those two days of hard
095work at State um and that's why she didn't really falter and came through in the end um just kind of Head and Shoulders Above the Rest of the state and then the second thing I would say is just that she gained a lot of confidence Maggie is just a freshman we forgot to mention that um and so she wasn't really sure how she would do in high school coming into this season and every day she just gained more and more and more confidence through practices through preparation through racing through racing some of the best people in the state and in the country um and really holding her own and um by the time we got to State I think she was pretty confident in her abilities and then the last thing I want to say
096and this goes for every single person here is that it was really just the support of all of her teammates um looking at to Leah all of our seniors all of our distance girls that train with her every day her sister um everybody just really lifted her up whenever she would doubt herself they all just kind of reiterated over and over again how talented she was how capable she was and they supported her through all of those things the line conratulations congratulations con congratulations congratulations your hard work thanks forers don't okay next up we have East High School with the they're State Wrestling champions out there it's always great to see the room full when we start the awards and it's thinning out quite a bit so my pleasure to introduce coach that heel the
097head coach of our wrestling team and his three state champions I'd like to start just by thanking and recognizing the parents of these three athletes um you I know you guys are all here please stand up we just really appreciate the support they they give these guys as parents but just as supporters of our program as well and um traveling around providing great opportunities for these guys to be the best they can um we'll start out with Liam Fox Liam's been here before a couple times um he's a three-time state jamp the third in our school history he's one of that three different weight classes he's a junior um placed in every in state in Colorado tournament we wrestled in this year um he had one really big National Tournament he went to that he
098he didn't place at but um pretty par for the course wherever we're at he he does really well um next is Kobe Olson Kobe is a senior he's a four-year State Placer for us I think the eighth in school history so pretty pretty cool accomplishment there um he was a state champion at 190 pounds um one of the coolest matches of the the state tournament it was really tight the whole way and um hit a big throw to kind of go up ahead and hung on at the end but against the guy that had you ever beat him that he'd never beat um really only one other guy in the whole state had had beat that kid all year and that individual was just second at high school Nationals um the guy Kobe be was
099just seventh at high school Nationals so had to accomplish pretty big feat to do what he did good job last but not least we have Charlie green Charlie was a state champion at 285 pounds uh Charlie was a three-year State Placer for us um two years All State as well um kind of a little redemption in his finals match he had to wrestle a kid that he lost to earlier in the year in a really close match and um Charlie pretty much just dominated the match um wrestling aside the things that these guys do for our program I think are a lot tougher to measure just with their leadership and the way they carry themselves in our school um and the kind of people that they are and again that goes back to a large
100part of of how they're raised um but we're just proud that these guys represent us and thank you guys for having us and recognizing there any parents of the addressers here in the audience please stand conratulations congratulations thanks for all your well that concludes our awards for tonight so the next thing on the agenda is the uh items from visitors and we do have some people on the list for tonight so just let me since we really haven't had many these for a while I'll just review the rules first of all state your first and last name when you first come up keep your comments two to three minutes so others have time to voice their comments you will have a three minute timer keep your comments General nature not directed at any spe a
101specific individual or individuals and suitable and language content for K12 grade students add additional information or perspective and try not to be redundant so with those things in mind our first person will be Kathy skan I know I never get your name right so Kathy sigano first I just wanted to say thank you to the district for moving so quickly on handling the book reviews and I hope you continue to move towards a good procurement policy moving forward to make effort to keep sexually explicit content out of the hands of minors I would like to read something from a book that was discovered that has been one of the reasons why discussing a procurement policy is so important moving forward for this district from a book called deal with it going down on him giving
102him a blow drop felacio oral sex on a guy using the mouth including lips and tongue to stimulate a guy's sex organs I try to look into my boyfriend's eyes when I'm sucking it seems to get him off faster I also like to SL to lick and suck his balls but not too hard please think about what our miners are reading in our schools thank you your next up is Patricia McCoy good evening board members my name is Patricia McCoy I'm a mother of four ly County School District students resident of shen since 2007 I'm here to say thank you to each and every one of you thank you for the new library policy and for the procurement policy being discussed thank you for your dedication to the education not indoctrination of our children for
103the first time registering my child for next school year was the easiest in all of my 17 years of registering my students in our district I didn't have to try and list every specific book author or genre or fill in a blank box instead I made my selection from the four new options and moved on with my day a few people want to convince you that this puts too much work on the Librarians and teachers however this couldn't be further from the truth my son's librarian and I had a wonderful conversation about next year during our regular quarter check-in it took no extra time it was included in the conversation we were already having my son is all set and ready to go next year and I have confidence in his librarian because of the
104relationship built between my son the librarian and my myself yet again we're going to be hearing the same tired Scare Tactics to cry wolf over book Banning being used at almost every me meeting at this point if a book cannot be read aloud here in a room full of adults because it's inappropriate then it shouldn't be in our schools or in the hands of our children if parents want their children to read inappropriate books they're available for purchase for them or they could get them in the public library they do not belong in our schools or in the hands of our children I thank thank you for your courage to keep doing what is right and needed to protect the children we see you and we stand here with you in support of the work
105that you are doing you are not alone in your fight for the Lord says have I not commanded you be strong and courageous do not be afraid do not be discouraged for the Lord your God will be with you wherever you go I thank you again and I hope you all have a wonderful evening thank you next up is somebody who is online Carol Maia can you hear me Carol you should be able to speak can you hear me I unmute you yes we can hear you now okay um this is Carol maah um I wish to express my concern regarding the proposed change in the library procurement policy at lc1 if the new policy is enacted it will be an indirect way of banning books by limiting the purchase of books by certified Librarians
106based solely on the fact that they contain more than a passing phrase about sex will preemptively pan ban books the board will effectively be choosing the limited access option for all families for all future library book purchases please do not take away parents rights or students First Amendment rights to access information in a free choice setting like the school library I would also like to say that um quoting experts from a a textbook taken out of context is not correct because a book needs to be read in its context for the usefulness of that of that book as a whole uh thank you okay thank you next up is Ann Lucas Miss Mr chairman members of the Board of Trustees my name is Anne Lucas I'm a resident of laramy County I'm a mother a
107grandmother taxpayer homeowner and a voter I was pleased to see you all approve and put into place the current Library policy I think it's a great start the next step of course is to control how clean and dirty books get into the school libraries a former school superintendent here spoke at a board meeting not that long ago and referenced the clean list and clean books so I know that if we have clean books we have dirty books it must be um so how did they get there so I've asked several times and I'm still waiting for an answer and I've been coming here and visiting with you folks for a few years now what is the educational value of puant and lewd materials where our children does reading about adult sexual conduct help a child
108get better test scores will reading about anal sex get my children higher ACT scores I don't think so so my question then is why are they here at all the draft procurement policy references transparency and I applaud that it's about time let's please not continue to acquire Library material under stealth and dark of night referring to a an unreferenced and unknown ala list that comes from outside of Wyoming local control is said here a lot and it means that parents decide what their children reads it doesn't mean that the Ala decides what all laramy County students are um subject to or have access to you know yeah I appreciate your hard work so much because you're doing something that most of us cannot and will not do so thank you and keep up the good
109work I appreciate your consideration this evening thank you uh next up is Barbara cook good evening and thank you for allowing me to speak this evening my name is Barb cook I'm a retired educator from laring County School District 1 a grandma of three students in this district and a current classroom volunteer I was disheartened when the board voted to disband the opt out policy and replace it with a four-step much more confusing policy for parents to enroll their students in much like the perfectly good opt out policy our district now has a very good procurement policy already in place one that other districts elsewhere have modeled their procurement policies after so tonight I will address my concerns about this proposed procurement policy which I believe will fur further regulate and interfere with a librarian's
110job to obtain great literature I believe parents are teachers first excuse me I believe that students first teachers are their parents and parents have the right to make whatever decision they feel they need to in order to keep their own children safe how however now you as a board are taking one more controversial step with regards to children's literature to limit the procument procedures for librarians Librarians are bright highly trained educational professionals with expertise in administrating a library including book selection yet now through this new policy Librarians have their hands tied when it comes to acquiring new literature for their libraries these Librarians who have teaching degrees along with master's degrees in library science or a compar comparable certification are far more qualified to make decisions about book selection than anyone else behind this policy
111and isn't that why you confirmed the decision to hire these individuals for their expertise and if this policy gets accepted the parents who have chosen Open Access will no longer have that option as now their students my grandkids will no longer have access to some award-winning literature if it's omitted by this new policy today I spoke with two Librarians both very disappointed with this proposed policy they both stated that they wondered why any librarian would seek employment in this school district if they were not allowed to do their job when I taught in this school district one of the district's goals was to attract the very best teachers the very best Librarians and Paris and principles but I believe that's the this would essentially squash that theory I'll end my thoughts the way that I
112began it I'm so deeply disheartened by the decisions that this board is taking you are interfering with the jobs of professionals that you hired so many teachers Librarians and parents Paras that I have spoken to do not feel that you as a board respect them or the the Marv marvelous work that they're doing please think about this as you vote on the policy thank you you thank you and that's all the people that have signed up ahead of time is there anybody here who'd like to speak on one of our issues that's on the agenda for tonight want up and start by give us your first and last name yes Wendy vulk parent of a student at Central High School who has received award tonight just want to say I am against book Banning I
113am against the procurement proposed policy I do think we have some very trained people in our individual um School District that makes some amazing decisions I think as a parent I should decide along with my student and our family what's best and appropriate I don't trust the rest of our community to make that decision so I would like us not to change that second thing I'd like to speak about tonight was the fabulous job that Central High School did um on Saturday night for prom um it was very well attended very well organized I would like to thank Dr uh delbridge Melissa shant Max Vega and Courtney Paul and all the student leaders that pulled that off it was just amazing and I was very impressed as a parent and third I'd also like to
114say thank you for our Athletic program at Central High School is our athletic director and the new soccer coach for the girls team let the exchange student that we are hosting from Uganda be able to um try out and play on the soccer team so just thank you to our award warning I think just tremendous School District so thank you for all your hard work thank you for your kind words about some of our staff even though you tried to sneak this in a in a place with exactly appropriate for that so all right anybody else here that want to speak on an agenda item go ahead pathy Russell resident of Cheyenne Wyoming I have a student in the Central High District I have a teaching degree and I worked in inner Library loan at
115CSU and uh my particular area of expertise was uh secondary head science our limited um shelf space in the libraries should be filled with those things that will enhance the education of our children and so the people who should be recommending what's going to be on those shelves or the teachers what do you need to enhance your what you're teaching at CSU um we had an award-winning collection and what was looked at is what will further research what will further the understanding of a particular topic it wasn't the librarian job to choose that it was the librarian's job to do acquisition and to properly uh catalog and document the uh use of those materials um I am at a loss to understand the value in our limited shelf space of these kinds of materials I
116don't understand what we're trying to emphasize to our students they're not this is not B book Banning this is this is we're in an educational environment we need to be stimulating our children as a teacher when I was teaching physics or chemistry or whatever I was doing when I was working with Indian kids at a at a Learning Center do being a tutor the most thrilling thing for me was to explain a subject in a way that made a light go on when you saw that light go on in his kids eyes you knew you'd stimulated their mind they were already thinking ahead to the next part it got them thinking and asking questions what are we doing where is the literature that will do that it takes a lot of literature to find that
117right connection for each kid that's what our Shelf space should be filled with thank you thank you anyone else let's go back over here everybody don't get a chance not gonna cut anybody off name is Tim Moser I don't have a dog in this fight I don't have any kids but I am an American citizen when I went to school there were books like Call of the Wild catcher and the Ry um Uncle Tom's Cabin and I am assuming that most of those that are saying they want pornography in these in the the education system are Banning these other books to me that's that's uncalled for I carry with me the constitution in the United States this gives us the ability to have this debate to have this argument to have this discussion this should
118be taught in our classrooms it should be brought up more than once and it should be on our bookshelves in the libraries I've heard that many teachers and Librarians want this other stuff in the schools I've also heard that many teachers and Librarians are begging you not to allow this stuff in the schools as an American citizen I'm saying it's wrong it's wrong to have our children forced to have to look at this stuff if they want to go to the public library if their parents want to teach it to them that's great that's America but our education system is not supposed to be teaching this kind of stuff it's supposed to be teaching how to read how to write and how to do arithmetic and from from what I saw here earlier today there
119were lots of students that got a lot of awards Pro and very deserving and of I came from a school that often was the way you said often not often and that that's I guess change in life but this is never going to change and this is what each of us need to stand up for and say these 56 men gave their were willing to give their lives that we can have this discussion and debate thank you thank you okay just got to stay is there anybody else in this section who'd like to speak okay we'll move over here anybody over here okay and the black sweater I'm sorry I missed you we'll get to you members of the board thank you for your time uh my name is Lindsay henin I am a product
120of Cheyenne schools and I'm holding in my hand this book is gay by Juno Dawson which is one of the books that was recently declared sexually explicit and a few people tonight have asked about what the value is of these kinds of books and I am standing before you as the value of these kinds of books um April 6 was known as asexuality visibility day we're visible I am an asexual person and I would have saved myself years of grief and thinking I was broken and thinking that there was something wrong with me if I had had a book like this in my high school library the people who are concerned about pornography should be overjoyed being asexual means in general you don't want to have sex it's not something that is going to turn
121kids towards pornography it's not something that is going to turn kids towards any malevolent Behavior this is a book that can help you understand yourself it's is a book that can help you understand your community it is a book that can help you gain empathy and it is a book that again if I'd had access to when I was young I would have spent many fewer years confused and hurt and feeling alone because I would have had access to information which is what you were supposed to be able to find in a library I worry that with this new procurement policy books like these will no longer be available and instead of future Generations not having to suffer like I did we are just going to see the same things happen again and again and
122again thank you thank you make him up now thank you Mr chairman and members of the board my name is representative Ben horach I represent house district 42 here in larmy County um as you are well aware the state statute has a very uh distinct definition of obscene material and um I think what you're doing by enacting this uh you're setting safeguards around that obscene material definition and as you probably know there's some interesting things with that obscene material statute that we have that uh allows teachers and Librarians to uh be exempt from that state statute however uh a parent is not exempt from that state statute so a parent goes home and disseminates something that qualifies under State statutes as obscene material they they uh they disseminate that to their child they are actually
123committing a crime in in the state of Wyoming it's a misdemeanor it's punishable by up to $6,000 fine if a child has a book that is considered obscene material that can meet that definition and they give it to a friend they become a criminal under our current state statute so what you're doing I think is setting some safeguards some very important safeguards to not allowing that information that those books the obscene material something that would fit that definition to be given into the hands of of students and we have the same thing um you walk into a liquor store you walk into a smoke shop there's a sign on the wall that says You must be 21 to enter this there's safeguards put in place and so I believe what you're doing is actually putting
124those saate guards in place I appreciate it and I um I hope that that you continued this path forward thank you thank you representative and thank you for being willing to serve um your constituents and I know that you just got finished with a interesting session and uh that your work goes on all year long so thanks for putting yourself out there with that all right anybody else not these yeah just good evening I'm Todd Reynolds I think you know me I wasn't going to speak tonight but it's time to get some facts put back into the discussion just a little bit first of all the policy that you decide to wrote apologize policy that you wrote does not follow W and state statute you decided to go for a completely different definition the policy
125that you wrote does not follow federal law you decided to go for a completely different definition in fact the bar you set was so incredibly low that all you have to do is take one little outof context passage to determine a book in lcsd1 is sexually explicit but even with that though you decided to create a sham of a process the book has to go through to be labeled as sexually explicit that process includes one nominator it includes three readers two two parents and one teacher no sorry two teachers and one parent it includes a district coordinator and includes Ela coordinator it includes a superintendent and if there's an appeal it includes four of you at least that's what have book has to go through and LCS do want to be labeled as sexually explicit
126if it doesn't go through that process it cannot be labeled sexually explicit which means these books that you're talking about buying cannot be called sexually explicit because they haven't gone through the process because you chose not to follow federal law and you chose not to fall State Statute so this procurement policy actually goes against the very policy that you wrote in December read that policy again also in that policy you're not going to remove books that are determined to be sexually explicit that wasn't your point you keep saying over and over again you're not going to remove books you wrote A Beautiful oped on November 1st from the board saying that you were not going to remove books that you were going to respect the right of parents who wanted access to books that oped
127said very clearly the books were not going to be removed you're policy says books aren't going to remove but now in your procurement policy you're going to remove future books you either lied to us then or you're lying to us now I'm guessing both quite honestly the discussion that we're having tonight is not about pornography that word keeps getting thrown about by people who don't understand what the law is who don't understand what the statute is these books are not pornographic books these books have small passages taken out of context that you don't like and that's fine don't read them don't have your kids read them opt out of them follow your own policy and don't let your kids have them but to take them away from the rest of the community shows a complete
128disregard and disrespect for the other people in this community now we know that you don't listen to us we already saw that with the procurement policies was 75% told you not to do it and you still did it because you listen to your small minority who again are talking about the wrong definition this isn't about pornography this is about a definition that is so far below federal law and state statute that you have to go through a special process that you created out of nowhere to even call something make sexually explicit this is a bad policy it's even worse than the one you passed in December just ignore it send it away thank you somebody else back there come on up I'm Don odm I'm a Cheyenne resident I don't have a school a child
129in school or a grandchild my son passed away two years ago at the age of 31 but since that day I've tried to dedicate myself to doing what I can to help my community and to make our state and our country a better place for everyone's children that are still here and the passage that Kathy read earlier I don't know on what plan that you got to live on to believe that context matters for that to be in a book in a school library for a minor to read That's mental gymnastics I can't comprehend so School Board y'all know what's right and I would appreciate if you vote that way thank you thank you I'm sorry for the loss of your son anybody else there anybody online that has raised their hand would like to
130speak we have one person who already spoke would you I already spoke okay so anybody else one last chance okay so we're going to close that section and we're going to go on to board Communications and reports um the upcoming meetings are April 22nd 6 p.m is a regular board meeting May 1st 2024 6:30 p.m. parent advisor meeting in the boardroom here and on May 6 500 P PM work session 6m regular board meeting okay now individual board members reports who would like to start go ah thank you chair so last week South High had a we the people and I'm looking here they had a Showcase of their we the people they were one of two teams from Wyoming that were selected to go to Nationals in DC and several of us made it
131out there to watch and I just want to say thank you to those who judged in that and also for Aaron Lind and her team that got them ready not only for state but continue to get them ready to go to Nationals it was very entertaining there's two categories that they're competing in the citizen and the Constitution competition and we watched Tim how many teams six five or six well there were six questions and there was um I didn't see the sixth one I saw five of them okay so I saw I think there was a different team for each question I think there was too so I just want to say best of luck to the We the People team from South High and uh just from the board thank you for the invitation
132what else yes um I just like to take a minute to um uh offer our condolences to the family of gerl Fanning who was a a fabulous librarian and teacher in this district for many years a big supporter of the school Foundation who passed away in the past week thank you for mentioning that anybody else not I've got a few things to mention um first of all um we've started the second um round of negotiations we did some negotiations earlier think starting back in February where they were just looking at at non-financial issues and there was a lot of great work done there a lot of work that was assigned to committees and uh so there's been a lot of work done between them and we're now starting the second round we're actually talking about
133some of the financial implications for the contract so um so far we've done that with CTA and we did it with the combined um unit for U most of the non-certified staff and all those are finished except for the transportation department which is going to um do some finishing up on some language on Wednesday and then CTA actually has to is almost done but they're coming back on Wednesday afternoon do a little more also the par professionals decided to do their separately so they are going to be I believe next week they're going to be coming back to do their negotiation so that process is ongoing and continuing and again board members are always welcome to come there and if there's more than three of us there I certainly will leave since I'm there for
134most of them so um it's um I guess trusty Edon came for one time was there for a little bit and I think she would sayest it's interesting to listen to sometimes it's hard to sit back there and not say anything especially for me since I have been on the negotiation team at one point but I sit back there and I listen and I you learn about an awful lot of things that are going on the districts and interviews that are going on and it's great to see the two teams the ad and the teachers coming together or employees coming together to solve those problems um I also went to the Triumph platform graduation um and I think you were there with me and that's always a great thing because we had 12 kids graduating
135at this quarter which is fabulous only only eight of them could be there with us on that day but they ask them three questions there and it's great so they ask them what's your what do you like most like about Triumph and that's always interesting to hear and it's there's great answers and what their plans are for the future and I can't what what the other oh what their biggest challenge has been to to get to where they are to get and hearing those different answers from each of those kids is great they don't want to talk but this year he did a new thing and that is he would not give them their diploma until it answered all three of those questions so and we actually you know that's it was just kind of
136a ceremonial thing but um getting them to get up there and talk I think is is a great thing and I always enjoy listening to that um because lot of those kids have lot challenges they've gone through um I also went to the South High School We the People competition I've heard about We the People competition for many many years and this is my first time to ever actually see one in action I am so impressed with the knowledge and the way they can express that knowledge and answering those questions of those students that are on those teams it's just fabulous um I'm sure many of those carry a constitution with them like the men that spoke to us earlier today because they certainly know the Constitution and the wiing Constitution and a lot of
137the LW so it's a great competition not one that I don't think I could judge or be any part of but it's it's it was entertaining to watch um I went to the chamber luncheon this last Friday and Dr Newton was was speaking there and did a great job of doing that and so we appreciate and I was there were two other board members that were there with me um trusty ederton and trusty no oh no not you usty Ash okay and again it's it's great to to hear that and you had a few good questions which I thought you did a good job of answering and they were I think they were kind to you with the questions so that was good but you covered many many things that are very very important that
138are going on in our district right now um um in the next couple of weeks there's going to be um some training um that is now required for all public officials to take and woming school War Association has put together an approved training and I hope all of you have signed up for one of those because it is a requirement for all of us to do that so and I that'll be a great opportunity we're also going to have a um the committee that I was on I told you about earlier where we're going to be looking at some of the bylaws for w School Board Association we're getting us I guess the first meeting wasn't very well attended so we're going to the chance this week on Thursday to do a a zoom session
139so we can again talk about those B I'll be representing not only our district but most of the larger districts as we discuss any of those changes that might happen and that's all I have anything else okay now we have reports from superintendent staff thank you chairman Bolan um there is an item on tonight's consent agenda that isn't terribly obvious what what it um is all about so I'd like to call Mr mckenny up to explain to us um what that agenda item will be approving and while he's getting situated I'd also like to give a shout out to the Capital City Art show that is set up story gym right next door to us I believe it's available uh the 9th through the 12th 8:00 to 5:00 p.m. with the awards on the 12th
140report is six I was able to judge a small piece of it today and there's just incredible work done by our kids in a lot of different media so um I encourage you to pop by and check that out Kyle it's all you Mr chairman members of the board um the item on the agenda uh is for classroom Edge switches and it's not very descriptive like Dr Newton said um these uh switches are on the walls in all of our classrooms or the majority of our classrooms and old the buildings and uh they're what printers plug into uh the muine displays uh any computers in the room wireless access points and uh we have a a lifespan to those switches and we're at the point where we need to replace them and uh and so
141this is that opportunity these are also a little smarter they give us security features were required to have by the Wyoming Department of audit thank you K I know K's here at every one of our meetings but he prefers to stay in the background in the back roow there running our computer system far so thank you any questions thank you right thank you with that Mr chair that is it for my report that's very short okay so now we're going to go on to the consent agenda all items listed with the designation of CA are considered to be routine items by the governing body will Beed by one motion there'll be no separate discussion on these items any item removed from the consent agenda will be considered as normal sequence on the agenda does any
142board member request to remove a motion from the consent agenda Mr chairman I move to approve all motions list to this consent agenda Mr chairman I second okay we have motion a second through the consent agenda all those in favor say I I those oppose no motion passes buiness now okay so new business Mr chairman I move to approve the laramy County School District number one Board of Trustees regular meetings scheduled for the 2024 202 school year I second okay we have motion a second to improve our school board meeting schedule and you have all everybody should have a copy of that in your board packet was there any concerns anybody had with anything on there there's one thing that I would like to bring up and that is we discussed last year that we
143wanted to have most of our months have two meetings so um last year in September we moved the meeting that's canceled which was on September 2nd this year to the 9th and move the meeting from the 16th to the 23rd that still allows us two weeks after that 23rd meeting before we have our first meeting in October so um is anybody interested in making that change again this year or do you want to leave it as is yes Mr chairman I would um I would agree that two meetings a month seems to to be best um so if we could do that in September there even with that holiday still four Mondays so we could have one on the 9th one on the 23rd have the break and then go back to the first and
144third Wednesdays in October I think that'd be wonderful so I would be in favor of doing that okay any other discussion on it okay so since this is presented to us in the way it is we'll need a motion to edit it I believe okay is that R am would have motion to amend yes motion to amend okay would somebody like to make that motion okay we have a motion to amend to change it so that September 24 we'll have meetings on the 9th and the 23rd and and no meetings on the 2nd and the 16th do we have a second for that I'll second okay motion as a second any further discussion on this I'm just think okay so we're Mo we're we're voting right now on just the amendment all right so any
145further discussion on that particular but let's just do this one first all right all those in favor of that Amendment say I I I oppose no motion passes any other amendments anybody would like to make to the calendar doesn't sound like it so now we're back to the regular motion we've had a motion and no we haven't had a motion yet have we yeah do we have a motion to okay so we have a motion a second to approve this all those in favor say I I those of those no motion bests okay so any will get a new revised calendar out to us at some point Mr chairman I move to approve bid Proposal with helis construction and the amount not to exceed 1,444 five broken down as $41,800 for major maintenance and $7
14642,552 for Associated governmental fees and requirements for the East High School Oki field and track replacement second okay we have motion to second to approve some bids for doing the Reconstruction of the track at the East High School um Can somebody up there out there come and give us an idea of why we're needing to do this since it's only maybe 10 years old Mr chairman members of the board um the track uh and field both have about a 10-year life expectancy so that um field is is at the end of life and the track as well and the track has also had some issues with some drainage uh starting to delaminate and come off the ground over there I did want to make one correction in there though um I just realized there's a
147typo uh that that's purchased 400,000 is Major maintenance the 742 th000 is wreck Mill not not special building funds okay we do kind of funnel that through the special building fund so it does have a role in there right um somewhat but it's not the same money so okay I didn't realize we're doing the field and the track is that correct yes we're doing both it's probably a great idea to do both at the same time I know at Central we we did them separately which caused some issues so we did do them separately that was sort of a Time timing issue because we had to replace drains under it so we didn't have enough time in the summer but um we had done them back to back so right and that's very nice field
148we got there any further discussion yes Mr nap when will this work be done and will it interfere at all with any of the Sports Seasons uh Mr chairman trusty Smith the work will start um as soon as school gets out and we should be able to be done before football season starts thank you any other questions all those in favor say I I those oppose no motion passes thank you Mr chair I move to approve a contract with construction Specialists Incorporated in the amount not to exceed $260,900 including a 10% contingency for Associated governmental fees and requirements for the central paint booth replacement at Central High School second have a motion as second to approve the replacement of the paint booth at Central which I'm sure is very old any any further discussion yes
149Mr nap could you please explain for me what a paint booth I mean I know what you you would paint there but where what are they painting what is it Mr chairman trusty Smith it's a paint booth for the auto body program okay CTE program we have and it's uh it was just old and outdated it was it had been shut down so we couldn't use it so um it's a replacement of that piece of equipment great all right thank you any further discussion all those in favor say I I oppose no motion passs Mr chairman I move to approve placing the proposed revisions to chapter 7 section 21 library media Services out for 45-day public review and comments the proposed revisions add a new section related to The Selection procurement of Library materials you
150want me to read all this um talk about reading policy no okay no there all the text oh said no okay uh I second okay motion second to improve what we saw a few weeks ago as a a draft propos any discussion so I uh submitted an amendment to this policy and um I had a request to break it into chunks um so it as of this afternoon was broken into chunks um the purpose of the amendment overall was to sort of clarify what the role of of the people procuring the books was um and then I as you all have heard me have concerns with how the sexually explicit piece was written um and have a variety of thoughts on that but um would be willing to move through them in um in the
151order that they were presented this afternoon if we would like to do that U do we have those available to bring up on the screen since they're not available in our packet Mr thank you makes it much easier for us Mr chair you should also have those available um within your executive content in board Docs okay go ahead let's take care Amendment one first so for Amendment one is as I move to amend the draft policy language related to selection procurement of Library materials as follows after the sentence that after the first sentence insert the regulation the regulation will require that Librarians use standard professional tools and reviews to guide their selection of age and educationally appropriate materials so then the change will read the district shall through administrative regulation develop a clear procedure for
152SE selecting new library materials this regulation will require that Librarians use standard professional tools and reviews to guide their selection of age and educationally appropriate materials okay so is that a motion then that you want to amend yes okay so we have a second to that yes I second okay thank you I'm not sure who that was all right so we have a motion a second any further discussion on that particular um Amendment yes so um truste Ash just to clarify this is a sentence that was in the previous draft you've just moved it and moved it it around to make it clear as to what the requirement is I think that's better placement for it right at the beginning um I had a question sorry I'm going with different drafts here um so standard
153professional tools and reviews Dr Newton those are um specified more in the the working documents such your your staff the administrative regulations that your staff is using internally is that correct correct and and those administrative regulations would need to be modified appropriately depending on what the policy was approved to say okay thank you any for discussion okay so we're voting on the amendment to add that um I guess it's moving that and adding a little bit to it anyway bring at the end of that paragraph there um all those in favor say I I I I okay so let me see Hands here okay some of you were kind of light with that okay so um those poos no okay and we have a five so so that's passes so we do have that in
154there okay let's go to amendment number two I move to amend the draft policy language related to The Selection procurement of Library materials as follows move the first sentence of the third paragraph to the second paragraph it fit this is not part of the motion but I believe it fits better there and move the second sentence of the second paragraph to the third paragraph it clarifies more specifically who does what the change will read selection and acquisition of Library materials at the elementary level will be supervised by District Librarians or content area coordinators selection and acquition of Library material at the junior high and high school level should be made by District Library Library materials selected for elementary schools whether free or purchased will not contain sexually explicit context content when considering for Comm of
155Library materials at the junior high or High School levels um and yeah so for that Amendment that's what it does so this still isn't the great what you had right what's up here it is oh oh that is so that bottom piece is still there that isn't addressed that is my part of my Amendment for Amendment Three and then I have a question in a minute but I need to read through this again here you don't have a second though I I will second okay thank you okay any any we have a motion in a second to do amendment number two any discussion yes um my concern with this change trust be Ash is we in the original draft that we looked at um the text was broken up so that you had a a
156clear section about elementary and then we moved into secondary this really kind of splits that up um you talk about uh Elementary and then selection and acquisition of junior high and high school and then it goes back to talking about elementary I'm really I'm not opposed to the content but I don't think that the order um of that material in this makes sense uh so that's part of why I hesitated to divide out my Amendment um I what I had done is uh that first paragraph is specifically around who and what selection and the second one was around the sexually explicit and how that is dealt with I wonder if it might be helpful to with draw the last proposed amendment and do what we're looking at is amendment number three first and then see
157if this change if if if amendment number three that you're going to be proposing makes this make sense we should look at that first any other discussion if that would I would withdraw the amendment for now if we would like to do that in that order okay you gave the second so are you okay with that yes okay so we're removing Amendment two temporar and we're going to go on to Amendment Three which is going to include some of amendment two okay so go ahead so I move to amend the draft policy language related to The Selection procurement of Library excuse me Library materials as follows in the third paragraph delete when considering the periment of Library materials at the Junior and high school levels Librarians will endeavor to select materials whether free or purchase
158that do not contain sexually explicit content and insert any newly procured junior high or High School material that is identified as containing sexually explicit content following the above following the previous process will be placed on the list of materials containing sexually explicit content so the new change would read Library materials selected for elementary schools whether free or purchased will not contain sexually explicit content any newly procured junior high or High School material that is identified as containing sexually explicit content will follow the process above will be placed on the list of materials containing sexually explicit content and that's going to be in addition to the two changes that you had an amendment to correct so I am not sure I can read it without the changes from two um Mr chair um trusty Ashby so
159I believe that that paragraph Without the changes from uh your second amendment would read um selection and acquisition of Library materials at the Junior and high school level shall be made by District Librarians and then that new sentence would be uh added that any newly procured Junior higher high school material that is identified as campaing sexually explicit content following the process of blood will be placed on the list of materials containing sexually explicit content so the Second Amendment had kind of flip-flopped so this would still be everything um related to elementary school libraries would be in one paragraph This would be um the things related to Junior High and high school would be in one paragraph I I didn't change my um language because I of the way that we had drafted it but that
160that would be the reading of that paragraph it' be your first paragraph Yes so first paragraph will deal with the junior high stuff and this new sentence down both the new sentences and then the elementary one reads like Library SE for elementary schools where the free of purchase will not contain SE all right so has everybody understand what that what we what's being proposed I'll for a second okay thank you all right so we have a motion and the second any further discussion Mr chair yes I just have a question um if the books that we're going to be purchasing are going to be identified as sexually explicit we've heard a lot that it's difficult to identify when purchasing and so my question would be I'm not I mean I'm not completely against this amendment
161but if that's the route that we're going to go how then in the process of procurement are our Librarians going to know whether or not they do identify sexually explicit content U so I'm not sure I did a very good job of that and so I'm open to language changes on that um I wonder if it's not they will be placed on a list for review and if identified as actually explicit within that review um Mr chair uh trusty Ashby I think that the language as it's written that it will be placed on the list we could we could say well it says following the process above and so the process above includes the nomination the identification and then um being placed on on the list of materials so the process above is in the
162the process above would include someone would need to nominate it and then it would be reviewed and then it would be identified okay so we're not expecting the Librarians to know whether or not the book is sexually explicit while purchasing correct Mr chair uh trusty Humphrey that's correct so it would go through the normal kind of procurement process if if it was nominated as sexually explicit um then it would go through the the um identification process at that point Thank You Now isn't it true that somewhere in our procurement policy we say that all books that are going to be ordered are going to be put onto the website uh Mr chair that is correct so um the all all books to be procured in that language isn't part of this because it's it's not
163something that had been requested to be amend amended but if you go back to the original um language that was proposed um it's at the end of it's at the very end of that new language it says to ensure transparency with District stakeholders an ongoing list of all Library materials to be procured will be maintained on the district website and will be updated at least once a month so that that language will still remain regardless of what what the board does with these Amendment that's still part of that um so so that would give members of the public chance to see those I don't know if it's sounds like it's before they're ordered right um yes so um the library materials to be procured and so does our previous language allow even though we haven't
164purchased a book for it to be put on if it's procured do we need to change the something in the other one so the procured or to be procured materials and ones that are in our libraries can be um identified um Mr chair I don't think youd need necessarily A Change um I think that the two be procured could be nominated um you know it might be difficult if we had um because they hadn't gone into the library yet to know where they were going to be and but that's kind of the internal process that we have within the um administrative regulation the kind of information that we include so I think you could leave it as is that you can nom Nate um a book that's to be procured or we could add in
165you know if after this amendment um we could do a second amendment that um would just add language to that last paragraph that says um books that are to be procured may be nominated okay any further discussion thank you chairman Lan so I like the sentence that got lined out perhaps word endeavor could be changed to do their best and that would mirror what we're expecting of classroom teachers is that correct to do their best well because we know that the system's not perfect even with their professional sources good so I think when we referenced teachers doing their best it was um to prevent students from accessing books that the parents had chosen for them not to access this here is to prevent them from buying books um that are either similar to or um
166are currently on the naughty list um and I have real concerns about that I the you know the books The Perks of Being a Wallflower me orl and the dying girl I'll give you the sun The Bluest Eyes blist eye the nowhere girls you know those are books that I feel like if they weren't in our library would negatively impact the learning environment of my children um they provide you somebody asked what kind of value they brought they bring to me those are some of the most valuable books liter literary books that we have they provide culture context they provide an understanding of other people they provide so sociology kinds of background those are really pretty intense books that provide access to hard topics that students don't really get anywhere else and somebody said meetings
167ago that they thought there were books that had similar impact and I read a lot and I don't I disagree I don't think there are books that have the same impact I'm sorry um and so I really do think that by saying you know they will endeavor not cure you know if that I think that's going to shut it down all the way because teach or Librarians are going to say well if I accidentally buy one somebody's going to come back and say you didn't do your best and you're going to get in trouble for it and I you I think books like the ones that I named there should be in our library they should be part of the educational system you know people keep saying oh they pornography or they um don't meet
168the state or they are meet the state definition of um I lost my word pornog you know pornography or absity obscenity but they don't none of those book none of the books on the naughty list meet the definition of security they don't meet the Miller test um they you know there's very specific things and they don't meet those rules nobody's going to get charged with anything um because that's not not there do they include sex yeah they have sexual descriptions in them um but I think the sexual descriptions and all of the ones that I've read are very relevant to the the to the plot they develop the characters they are very relevant to the story that that is there and in they're very age appropriate you know we keep saying we don't have a
169rating system or we don't have a way to know who should be valuable well do that's what the Librarians are looking at is they are they age appropriate to go into the library because we disagree with what that doesn't make it mean it's not there and so I you we have a system that we put into place for parents to choose and I think we should use it if that's the way we're going to go um but saying that we can't have the books in the library is infringing on my rights as a parent yes um i' like to reiterate that this is a very small sample of some of the books that would probably not be able to be procured by our library should we Endeavor to get rid of every book that has
170the incredibly stringent um sexually explicit definition that you go by if you look at the nominations of the books on our list um on the website you will see that many of them have one or two two pages or one or two paragraphs referenced these are large books and those small amounts of things that um are found to be sexually explicit again are part of developing the story are part of developing what is happening in these people's lives if we get rid of all of these books we will get rid of books that allow people on some of the fringes of society that allow people who have had bad things happen to them who who have had those things to see themselves in books number one number two it will take away uh amazing literature
171many of these are prizewinning awardwinning books that have been procured by Librarians doing their job and their job is to look at National reviews to look at National um award-winning books that the majority of the people in the country feel are appropriate for these ages these reviews um that we reference in the other uh in the other change to the amendment those are review Systems that Librarians use to procure these books and they do have grade range references to them these Librarians are buying age appropriate books for our libraries um these are these are things that our kids are interested in reading about we want our kids to be literate we we want our kids to read awardwinning books and if we get if we do not procure these books they will not have access
172to them and if they do not have access to them that is Banning these books from our school libraries and again as Dr Reynolds said we as a board said we would not ban books this policy if that sentence is left in will ban books from our libraries and I assume we will be sued for that and these are award-winning books they're appropriate for our high school age kids I agree we don't need that in our elementary schools absolutely and those are not part of awardwinning books in elementary school levels but in young adult high school age levels these books will have in some cases sexually explicit material that are appropriate for that book and if you read the book as a whole it makes sense one of the books I keep quoting is Monday's
173not coming which was found to be sexually explicit in our system there are two pages in that entire book and it is a description of something that happens to This Girl's Best Friend sister and it is part of what their life entails and so it goes to what she lives with in her everyday life that's important important in developing the storyline that's important to the overall idea of the story it is not OB cinity it is not inappropriate for our high school age kids and if we get rid of that book it's a travesty for this um District so taking that leaving that sentence in definitely bans books and if we want to have a award-winning books in our library that our children want to read in our high school level we have to allow
174those books to be in our libraries um I can't go are those are those your personal books or did you get those out of the library most of them are from the library the county library yes okay so they're they're available in the county library to whoever wants to check them out correct most of them are some of them are personal one of them is my personal books I'm reading it because it's on the list thank you any further discussion um I appreciate your display down there but I would think we're actually really giving our Librarians this slight to suggest that that small number of books or the the small number that have um actually been nominated at this point are the only award-winning books out there I would venture to guess we have thousands
175of Award winning books in our libraries um and we may not actually need to have books that have explicit text in them to provide our students with quality reading resources if they choose to v um I'm GNA vote no on this amendment um written actually I really like the sentence that you have suggested adding there about what happens if a if a book has been um identified as containing that sexual explicit content but I um I I think that as a district it's okay to set a standard and to set a bar and um I don't think it's too much to ask that that our Librarians um that the folks who have the we we have given them the privilege um and that that um it really is an honor I think to select what
176gets put in front of our kids I think that's a high calling I have great respect for our Librarians I appreciate what they do I appreciate what they're choosing for my own children to read um however just as I would um expect that a classroom teacher is not showing a rated R movie with nude scenes to my children in the classroom I would expect and hope that that adults in the district are doing their very best to make sure that they are not books with those type of scenes that you might find in our rated movie um very descriptively laid out on the pages of the book for my minor child and your minor children to access there are other places kids can get those books I don't believe we as a district have to
177provide them all their other hundreds of other award-winning books that our children can choose so for this amendment um I I think that sense is important I agree with trusty Ash or trusty ederton I'm sorry that perhaps ort Endeavor is you know maybe we could use um do their best or something along those lines to mirror what we already have in the policy for our teachers in terms of their classroom collections but um I I am not at all in favor of removing that sentence we've got to set a standard and we've got to have a bar to strive to or strive for um so although I I like the addition of the last sentence I I am really opposed to removing the one um thank you I'd also like to say that um if
178a librarian is using the appropriate reviews um to choose the uh books that our library uh procures uh there is no way unless they read every single book that they procure for them to know whether there will be any sexually explicit material the example I used is Monday's not coming there is nothing in any review anywhere that says anything about there being sexually exposive material in that book because it is literally less than two pages of the book and so it is not considered sexually explicit um so there is no way unless they read the entire book for them to know that that material is there and that is why um taking out the sentence about what the librarian will endeavor to do is so important because there is absolutely no way with our current
179system that they will be able to avoid any books that have sexual material it just there's there's just not a way for that to happen and to put our Librarians in that position of being punished whatever that looks like or being shunned by a certain portion of the the uh board or certain portions of the community um I think is inappropriate and very disingenuous to say that you appreciate what they do and then tell them that they can't do their job because that is not a possibility to do um and 75% as we heard from people who who commented at the uh policy advisory committee you know 75% of the people who chose um the in our new library policy who chose the open enrollment for their children it you're you're making a decision for
180them for the 75% of people who choose open enrollment instead of the 23% who chose to limit to the sexual explicit and that does not seem appropriate to me um I did and I got a little sidetracked by the 75% I believe actually and to be fair the 75% was um looking at all grade levels including Elementary and all I mean we've do matter a lot well it does matter because that's a lot of a lot of families and students or parents responding to that who um you know are not their their kids aren't even exposed to that um but back to um the word endeavor um this I mean it it sets a standard it's sets an expectation but there's no punishment tied to it we're just saying Librarians just do your best and
181so the book Monday's not coming that you are talking about I'm not a librarian obviously I don't have the same resources I don't have the databases I don't have the tools to get on and search the professional sites to look for these books however I have Google and um today I just typed in my Google sech actually was Safari search Monday's not coming sexually explicit content the page that came up had five or six websites and links to articles or review sites not the professional ones probably that gave examples of sexually explicit I mean it talked about why Monday's not coming has sexually explicit content this is not rocket science I have no Library science degree but I was able with with a very very quick search in less than a minute to determine that
182Monday's not coming might have objectionable content in it I've not read the book I don't actually want to read the book um but I um it they it did not take me very long to determine that there there might be a problem with that book and that perhaps you know I might might need to look into it before I would let myself 16-year-old daughter read it I obviously parent or see some of those things different than others but it's it's this is this is not hard and I I think we're just saying Librarians I mean folks in the district who are involved in this process just do your best I mean protect our kids a little bit just just take a look at this and think is this going to be a problem for some
183parents a librarian who really wanted to could go ahead and order all these books they'll still go out on the list for review as you know as if if this something passes that we're going to be um ensuring transparency and Publishing that list of things that we're procuring but I I think we can be a little proactive there are other books to choose there are a lot of other books to choose the thank you chairman ban so trusty hle by your words what I heard from you and I guess I just want to clarify this that the only books people read in the library of our Junior highs and high schools are sexually explicit and I don't feel like that's true I also I can't tell you the number of emails that I've gotten since
184we started this very long process that our Librarians are experts in their field they experts at what they do people have come up and talked about that about how they're we should trust them they're they experts I have no doubt in them that if we ask them to do their best Endeavor however that comes out that they will do that that they will use whatever Source necessary and if a book does get by no I've not heard anyone up here talk about shunning them firing them scolding them I haven't heard anyone say th those words so I think that's a moood point I just like trusty Smith said I think that we should set a standard as to what goes into our library and focus our time on the business of educating the students in
185larami 1 thank you great so the intention may not be to be that but if it's in a policy it becomes a legal option then for people to come forward and say I am going to I'm going to file a complaint I'm going to sue the district because this person did not follow the policy wait I'll just I'll just Mr chairman answer that that we have all kinds of directives in our policy um in all different types of policies so I think the word you have to look at what does endeavor mean and Endeavor means to try which means that you a possibility of failure and I I do agree there there is the there is the challenge of not always knowing or not always having reliable resources for identifying um if the cake has
186nuts in it but uh I think when what we're talking about are two different perspectives on whether or not kids read these books or not and the re and I almost want to say the real issue is is we are in charge as a governing board of our taxpayer money and if we have such a divide in our community about how that money should be spent on and and we can't reach agreement then I feel personally we should not be spending that money on controversial um materials if the materials you know we have them in our we have them in our district now we've created we voted in December on policy that would allow the materials we have to stay and to identify them for the people that want to know if the cake has
187nuts um and that I thought was a great compromise for people because there are people that disagree and they want to choose and we gave them those options which they couldn't choose before unless they knew the name of the cake and what page the nuts were on now we know now parents are informed they can choose so I really think that for me this is not a question if it's such a controversial and divisive issue should we be spending taxpayer money on it and I would say no any forther discusss yes I just have a couple comments number one if you Google headache it tells you you have cancer so you cannot always trust what Google says number two um no are our children are reading many many things in the library but many of
188the award-winning literature that is produced for young adults does have more than a passing phrase about sexuality in them that is just the nature of the Beast of people going through puberty and dealing with uh growing up and becoming an adult so yes there are many many books in our library and many many other things that people can read but many of the young adult awardwinning books will not be available in our library if our Librarians can figure out that that this has some kind of sexual exposit material in them and I disagree that Librarians will not feel uh punished or whatever word you want to use if a book ends up being Cur that ends up being on the sexual explicit list if this passes and I think with a dur of teachers and
189Librarians in our state it will not do us any favors in filling any future librarian positions they will not feel respected yes okay you'll have to forgive me it's late and I'm super pregnant so my brain is mush um but I I expressed when we started the procurement conversation that I um was having a difficult time kind of wrapping my head around it because we had just put a policy in place that gives parents all options and I'm kind of still there and so Britney I like this sentence of the addition of any new procured the last Amendment we were just talking about I like that because then that still puts the choice in the parents hands while giving those parents who chose Open Access a choice as well um obviously as a parent I
190would have my own preferences but on this board I don't represent just my kids I'm representing the entire community and so to be honest I'm really wrestling with that because as a parent there's a way that I would go but as a board member there's there's just something that doesn't sit well with with me with putting Librarians on the hold for doing their best um or endeavoring to not purchase sexually explicit material I think I don't I mean if if that's all we're going to ask of them then I don't even even see why that needs to be in policy because if we're just asking them to do their best like are we saying that they haven't been doing their best like moving for I I don't know so um again as a parent there's
191a way that I would go but with the policy that we just put in place where parents have the option to choose I don't want my kid to have access to sexually explicit material we have the Open Access for those who want their kids to have access to that um yeah that I'm just rambling now but that's I'm just having a hard time with with this policy period any further discussion okay we're going to be now voting on the amendment kind of two and three put together all the discussion just three well but we isn't there part of two in it that's next oh this is just three this is just three okay so three is removing the last sentence and adding the sentence on in okay so it's removing the sentence when considering procurement
192of Library materials Junior High and high school levels Librarians will yeah correct select materials whether free or purchase that do not contain explicitly explicit content and then we're going to add the last line there is that right that's the proposed and that's going to go that would go with the Juni in the junior high section okay so that's what we're voting on all those in favor say I I hi okay so and let's see Hands okay there's only three votes motion fails all right so we're back on the original motion of so just to be clear you voted no on that I didn't vote so it's three and three three and three cor right you have to have four votes for it to to pass that means you have to vote for that means you
193would vote does not pass it good all right back on the original proposed can can we clarify that with counil that's not my understanding of how that works so uh Mr chair if it's a under normal circumstances the chair wouldn't need to to vote your vote is to break the tie so you have a three three vote three in favor three um not in favor so your vote would be the determining vote then my vote is no right all right now we're back on the original policy anybody want toose any other oh I'm sorry we got another I I so I I believe minute to only makes sense in the context of the change and I would withdraw that okay so any other amendments anybody like to make I heard several people talk about the
194fact that they like that last sentence we want to put that in there in conjunction with what's crossed out so are you Mr chair are you proposing that we still add any newly procured Junior higher high school material that is identified as containing sexually explicit content following the process above will be placed on the list of materials containing sexually explicit content yes that would be after what's already there I second that can you make a motion you you need to make the motion I I make the motion to add that sentence okay so is there do we have a second I'll second okay we have a motion a second to amend this by adding the last sentence that's there which is any newly procured Junior higher high school material is identifi as containing sexually explicit
195content following the process web will be placed on the list materials containing sexually explicit content that will be following the sentence that is not pressed out now is everybody sure what we're voting on yes go ahead I'm not sure that doesn't muddle the issue if it we're saying up above that they're not going to buy anything with sexually explicit and we have the AP policy from above I'm not sure that doesn't just add a layer of confusion Mr chair um I think that's not it's not a necessary Amendment we already have the policy in place if a book that is procured is found to have sexually is nominated to have sexually explicit material it will go through the process whether we put this sentence in there or not since we already made a policy that
196says that we may need the other change in the other policy though if we we don't put this in here is that correct um Mr chair I think that you would be fine so if a if a library material was procured and um someone nominated it went through the process it would go through the normal process the um change that you had discussed a little bit ago was down on the list of of materials to be procured and whether or not those could be nominated so you could um I think uh trusty Hinkle is correct if if a book makes it onto the library shelves it would just go through the normal process um where you would um potentially need and I don't even know if need is the right word but you could clarify
197that um following you know um when you'll publish the the list of books to be procured and that those books may be nominated even before they make it I guess onto the shelves before they're purchased so you're right I think I agree that this says any newly procured books that means it's already been purchased right correct so well maybe that would fit more appropriately in the first part of this policy um correct Mr chair I think that that you don't it's not necessary to add this language in at at this juncture um where you might want to clarify though is just on um your list of books to be procured and whether or not those books um can be nominated because I think there's probably a difference between books that you're going to purchase and
198books that you've already purchased so you would be clarifying that the books that are going to be purchased um could also be nominated prior to being on the shelves would be um I believe what you would talk about a little while ago um but nearly procured if it if it is procured then it would go through the normal process F the discussion okay so we have an amendment right now if to have that last sentence Oh Mr chair yes I need I need more clarification yeah um I think the intent behind my seconding my intent behind seconding this s and I agreee with some of yeah I like the language um trusty Ash is that um we do want to take care of that issue of okay we endeavored some got through we realize that
199they have nuts in the cake and um I mean I understand trusty Hinkle's position that maybe May it's not necessary but is there if we have to do some other work shouldn't we be looking at this or or do you think we need to do any work at all if we just take the sentence out and just they come in we put them on um the shelves and then someone nominates or are we skipping a step and and trying to be thorough let's say the librarian discovers before they go on the Shelf do we want to address that that scenario that's the question for the board so I think I think we can address that scenario up above so where it says there's a sentence and I don't have it open in front of me
200I'm sorry before full policy it says that newly procured books will be put on a list for review maybe it says newly procured and potentially or books to be procured or something on this um right Mr chair uh trusty Ashby the language is to ensure transparency with District stakeholders an ongoing list of all Library materials to be procured will be maintained on the district website and will be updated at least once a month so I think um trusty Claus into your point I think that would be where you would um you know kind of address so so if I'm following your question you know we've got um Librarians will endeavor um to not procure sexually explicit materials and then once they're on the shelves we've got sort of this idea that um they will go
201through the process this would address those books that have been procured or in the process of being procured and those can be nominated and go through start going through the process um as well does that make sense am I following what you're asking yeah I forgive me if I'm not getting it but I think that the way you just described it might I believe it relies on a parent nominate or yeah it would be apparent in our policy nominating the books saying does the board want to address if the librarian or the you know librarian professional um that's the wrong word but you know what I'm saying the uh area content coordinat for the Librarians yeah content area content area coordinator discovers it first is that is that needing to be addressed that's my question
202potentially I don't know that it's you okay I I don't know that this policy addresses that yeah I don't think but I'm looking at the piece that we did in December I could see parents guardians or District employees or District I don't know I don't know what that I haven't thought through that I don't know what that is yes um my my sense would be and I don't know the ins and outs and the protocol for our um Librarians but if they have the um as part of their their responsibilities if they can select which books we are purchasing and will be on the shelves it seems logical that if they've ordered a book and they realize in the meantime hey is not a good one to put on the shelves that perhaps they could
203just make that determination just as they made the determination to purchase it without anyone over their shoulders but I don't dror Newton is there is there a rule that if we've purchased it it has to go on the shelves gy Smith I think the way we've operated in all other aspects is once we have expended District funds it is something we have purchased and it it falls we we treat it as there's nothing magical about the moment it goes under the Shelf Mr chair have a question or clarifying something um instead of saying any newly procured could we change that to say um any book on I mean I don't know how you would word this but to kind of go in line with that last sentence where it's talking about the materials to be
204procured could we just give um parents and Guardians the opportunity to nominate book nominate books that have yet to be procured using that sentence and just kind of tweaking in a little bit um Mr chair uh trusty Humphrey I think so I think that the better place for might be down in the where you identify that you're going to have a list and then you could just simply add um a sentence that says parents or guardians of lcsd1 students May nominate Library materials to be procured for review that they believe contain sexually explicit content as defined in this policy following the process of so I think you can accomplish what you would like to do I think the better place where it was is down at the end where we talk about that the the
205to be procured list y um just orderwise so that policy is already G to have 45 day review so if we change that uh Mr chair no this is new language that's part of the procurement policy so you also all all Library materials are um oh are are part of the other and this is the newly procured piece those are that's part of the new language that's being proposed is books that we're going to purchase just adding it that last sence is what to do yeah that's fine okay so whoever proposed this amendment do you want to withdraw it yeah I withdraw and the second the submit I have to say this sorry I withdraw my Amendment thank you and the second's been withdrawn okay so now we're back on the original policy and we're
206looking at an amendment to the last sentence which I don't have with me so it says to ensure transparency with District stakeholders and on list of all Library materials to be procured will be maintained on the district website and will be updated at least once a month I think that's where she's been saying it would then say essentially pulling this sentence putting it there um Mr chair truste Ashby I think you would just say um parents or guardians of lcsd1 students May nominate Library materials to be procured for review that they believe contain sexually explicit content as defined in this policy following the process above so it's essentially kind of mirroring some of that language that you have in your process above um or what the nomination and identification process looks like I would move
207to do that I'll second that okay so can we one one more time read what it would sound like at this point this change Mr chair as amended the last um sentence in the policy would read to ensure transparency with District stakeholders an ongoing list of all Library materials to be procured will be maintained on the district website and will be updated at least once a month the new language that's being proposed would read parents or guardians of lcsd1 students May nominate Library materials to be procured for review that they believe contain sexually explicit content as defined in this policy following the process above okay any further questions or discussions on okay now I guess we need somebody to to make a motion did we have that already I did Britney did okay have second
208okay so any further discussion on adding that language at the end all those in favor say I I I let's see can we see Hands again okay we have five some passes passes all right so that's the amendment now we're back on the whole draft with the amendment which is to the I just want to clarify it only has one Amendment so far and that is the one we just Amendment one passed oh that's right number one passed that's the one about this regulation shall require that Librarians use standard professional tools reviews to guide so that and this last one thank you the original motion is to put the policy with the Amendments out for 45 Day reviews yes okay so any further discussion I'm putting the twice amended draft um for procurement water materials
209out for 45 day review any further discussion all in favor say I I and see Hands one two three four five five okay so it passes by are those oppos no for official no okay everyone a chance to be heard all right so we pass all right so now we're going on to our that's maybe our last thing anyway we have 3.5 okay on the 3.5 Mr chairman I move to approve the appointment of Chuck Kern as the assistant director of instruction and to place them on the appropriate step of the administrative salary schedule for the contract year 2024 2025 I second okay a motion of second to approve Chuck k for the assistant director of instruction and this is a vacancy that kind of was domino effect from hiring our new superintendent so um
210all those in favor say I hi those oppose no motion is Mr Kern here Mr chair I do not believe he is uh able to be with us today as I'm sure he's busy hard at work right now all right okay future meeting days the next regular board meeting will be held on April 22nd 2024 at 6 pm and I want to know who would like to go to the agenda meeting that goes with that which would be on April 17th anybody want to join on April 17th okay I'm happy to attend again if you m body okay so have chrisy and Alicia all right so we have our second time for items some visitors for you talk about anything is there anybody here who would like to speak on take it out of there
211too so but you're reading so you you need your hands um so I want to see what language we were going to end with before I talked um so my main question based on what we ended with is how's Library explosive now um what meets The District's new definition of sexually explicit and the simple answer is they as an individual are going to have to make that gut call um and this is an individual so normally our opt-in process involves a pretty large team from start to finish um but this change is going to put a all on the individual to make that call um we're setting up these individuals to be attacked by parents who want more choice for their kid in other words like why how could you not order this book at
212won awards um we're also setting them up to be attacked by parents who want the absolute blanket protection uh from any sexual content for their kids so what happens when the librarian makes a call that you don't just that you don't agree with so it may like you can look it up on Google and you can be you can be certain within a minute like you don't want your kid reading this but somebody who's read the whole book and it's one of their favorites they know it immediately that they want this book in their Library so you're putting we're placing individual staff members at the center of a culture war that getting increasingly aggressive without any kind of process or system to back them up in that choice of procurement and so I didn't support
213the original opt-in policy but now I just ask that now that we have it let's use it thank you well we G speak for a second time today I guess oh what was your name did you give me your name when you started no yours sorry your we got it we got it okay I moved from a state that was BL mot here because it was red I hear about Librarians being pressured one way but isn't they're going to be Librarians pressured the other way I think we need to we need to defend our culture we need to defend the we are a red State and that we do care about our kids that we don't want them to be the National Review our country is going down the tubes our our our legislature our
214governor did a$ 10.7 billion budget that's not okay you are the last line of defense between the children and the and and the left I I you know I can't put it any other way but you're the last line of defense of that and I respect and admire each one of you that stand up and say you know what I don't want my kid to do it I don't want their kid to do it either and if it comes down to a litigation about it so be it this this what gives us the right to say what we do and what we don't do with our kids let them grow up to be adults and then make their decisions a a a 12year old a 14-year-old a 16-year-old is going through all of this emotional
215trauma and they pick up a book and say oh I think maybe maybe I'm this today but what about tomorrow what about gender reassessment I mean I mean all this stuff lumps together and we got to stand up we got to we got to take our country back thank you was there somebody else yes come on up Brian picket good evening I do appreciate the board what you all are doing but I need a small education does the library fall under the Board of Education it seems like we've got some issues about if the librarian takes a book and says that's not right that's good that's not right that's not right it seems like they're being accountable for this why can't you take a book that the librarian takes a look at it says this
216is questionable bring this book in front of the board have the scriptures or the paragraphs or the pages copied so that you could read them and then read them and would you read them in front of your 16 177 15 12y old child and then vote on that book whether it should be in the library or don't put the responsibility on the librarian the responsibility needs to be here thank you very much and I do appreciate what you all are doing thank you uh greetings good evening uh Jen solise mother of three in the district my oldest is a junior in high school my youngest is a fourth grader so I've been with the district for quite a while have quite a while to go uh I very much a mistak holder in this um
217recently my family was quite blessed to spend spring break in Washington DC uh it was a bucket list item for me uh my husband and I have been talking about doing it since before our first was born uh and it was really really wonderful to do so um while we were there we got to see all of the documents uh that founded our wonderful Nation uh and I'm just happy to report that all three of my children products of laramy County School distt number one all had wonderful things to say about these documents because they learned it in their classrooms um our teachers do a fantastic job raising American citizens here in Wyoming uh and I am so eternally Greatful for them um I'm also grateful for our Librarians for providing a diverse selection of
218books for our kids some of them people don't like some of them I don't like that's the way it goes today is National right to read day um also on our trip to Washington we were fortunate enough to visit the Library of Congress which I consider to be a shrine to the idea that free people read freely um it is important that we have a variety of books whether we like them or not they challenge us they piss us off they upset us they disgust us they make us fall in love they make us see the world through different sets of eyes all of it matters that's it and please read Monday is not coming it is a lovely book I promise you you will love it thank you thank you anybody else anybody online
219Mr chairman there is somebody online okay I'm gonna go with the online first and then come back to you can you hear me yes we can hear you okay I just wanted to mention that uh my uh stop I need your name and first and last name I'm sorry it's Carol Mah okay I just wanted to mention that my Christian book club read Monday's not can you hear me I didn't get your name Carol maiah Carol okay my Christian book red M's not coming when all of this new policy thing started to see why people were against it and we came to the conclusion that we could not understand why they thought this was a bad book that it should be um banned or uh put on a on a special list and I also
220wanted to say that there are no books in our school libraries currently that meet the definition of obscene or pornographic thank you trus almost just talk um I'm Todd Reynolds uh moment I'm speaking to you as professor of young adult literature and of English education this is my field of expertise this is what I teach and this is what I do and what I've been studying now for 26 years uh I want to do a couple things in this brief little two and a half minutes first of all now that it is a public review I do challenge you to read all of the comments take the time and really digest what they all say pay attention to what they all say I'll be submitting my comment as soon as I have a chance to
221but please listen to all the comments as we go through this time uh the next thing I want to remind you is that your definition for sexually explicit is not the federal definition of obscene you chose not to follow that your definition of sexually explicit is not the definition of Wyoming state statute it is not Wyoming law you chose not to follow that it's not the definition followed by professional practices of librarians you need to keep those in mind as you talk about sexually explicit because what you are saying is sexually explicit does not meet any other professional or legal definition anywhere else outside of this particular district and this particular policy so if it doesn't go through that policy in the process it's not label sexually explicit because your policy is at such a
222low bar and is so unique and is so different from everything else it doesn't matter so paid close attention to that the other thing I think is very important as we're talking about these books I love that we have the stack of books here I've taught many of them um I don't think we should go without pointing out who is being represented on the board right now and what community you represent as a whole as seven of you that's a very different Community than what those books represent for example the poet X which was on this list it's take off the list now because it's part of the curriculum is uh about a character Nam Zamara who's a Dominican fantastic character but one thing she says though is I have no more poems my mind
223blanks so Roar tears my mouth burn it burn it this is where the poems are I say thump with a fist against my chest will you burn me will you burn me too you would burn me wouldn't you if you could these books are about the representation of the people who aren't represented by you right now it's about our Hispanic population it's about our black population it's about an lgbtq plus population it's about people who don't currently have seats and if you take these books away you are taking them away I love that Monday's not com it's being brought up because it's about the Eraser of a black girl that's what it's about and it's by you're trying to be erased now that's where the discussion is you are trying to erase populations when you
224eliminate these books when you pull these books out despite what you say and despite your your Shak in your heads that's what happens when you take those books away you eliminate and you erase people representation is those people the last thing I want to point out very very quickly is a threat that you just put in here with will endeavor you may not have lived under a policy of the school board but that line will endeavor is a direct threat and a direct admission to all Librarians in this district and they will feel threatened because of that line thank thank you anybody else need to hear online Mr chairman there are no hands raised online Okay so in this section Mr chairman I moov to go into executive session at this time prior to adjournment
225for the P the purpose of possible student long-term suspensions and expulsions Personnel second one second okay have motion second to go into executive session for the reason stated all those in favor say I I suppos no