4/12/2011 Board of Education Meeting

001okay we're going to go ahead and get started with a non-agenda [Music] testimony okay I'd like to uh call up Doren Diaz Carolyn Smith Louise Lucas Melinda fensa and FY Abdi during this pester my address is on file and my original topic is I want to speak to you and I'm hoping you take my suggestions literally and you really research this because I think it's going to end up costing you a lot of money you need to look at your disability policies for San Diego unified employees that get injured on the job you need to look at them because your insurance for liability is going to go up unless you change some things and you need to look at the way HR department is implementing return to work issues and how they are treating employees

002that have been injured on the job and I've heard other employees talk about and complain about the way that they have been treated any one of you are welcome to email me secondly since the other topic was um postponed I'm here to talk about par educators I'm here to talk about some comments none of you are responsible for the budget none of that has been the budget problems from the state you didn't create this MK but you are responsible for comments you're responsible for insensitive comments that have been made at these meetings you're responsible forgetting for forgetting to mention par Educators when you're apologizing to everybody else namely teachers counselors nurses gardeners you didn't mention the par Educators I noticed that writing and many of you are aware of that you all the par Educators

003in apology because we get cut more than anybody else the other issue I want you to know is years ago we had a strike there was a strike in the '90s and during those five days when the teachers were gone this District still operated albeit there were problems but this District was functioning it was operational one day just one day without no special AED technician no special ed assistant no cafeteria workers no bus drivers this District would be shut down you need to keep that in mind because if they ever comes a day where you get a strong enough organizer that's going to happen and some of these things that have gone on will you'll think twice about it par Educators which were accused of not being in the classroom by one of your board

004members they're picking these kids up at 6:15 at their house they are with most of these kids all the way to 3:15 many more hours even than some of their parent parents more a waking hours than their parents more waking hours than teachers and I'm not here to put put people one group against the other I'm here to state facts par educators are in the classroom and I did not appreciate the comments that were made by board members we are in the classrooms and the other thing is who's feeding your kids you know I mean who's taking care of your kids your kid falls down and gets injured any of these students it's the par Educators and the nurses it's the health techs the special ed Health techs the health assistant and the nurses and

005we need to keep that in mind and when you're looking we need to have something done where all these cuts are not balanced on the back of the classified thank you thank you Daren and I personally apologize for any time that I've uh neglected to mention the par Educators as we talk about everybody that has a role in educating our kids but thank you for for calling us on the okay uh Carolyn Smith Louise Lucas Melinda fensa FY Abdi Erica Ali Ethel Lin Kent Buck holds I don't see Carolyn Smith so I will go ahead and begin my name is Louise Lucas and I am one of a number of Library fairies throughout the district I happen to work at Perkins K8 school okay maybe I'm not quite a fairy but I am a library

006technician and perhaps full full disclosure compels me to say that I love my job and I want to keep it and I want to keep working full time maintaining any school library requires full-time work silly get up aside I hope to impress upon you the magic that we Library Personnel do every year and to persuade you to keep every Library open at my school I protect and maintain a collection that is worth a quarter of a million dollar that figure does not include textbooks last I heard 31 schools are planning to eliminate their Library positions for next year if those schools have collections like mine who is going to defend those books we are talking $7.5 Million worth of materials that figure does not include textbooks every September every school goes through the ulcer and

007hair loss inducing exercise of getting into compliance with the Williams Act textbooks it's all about the textbooks the $80 average a piece textbooks the typical student has four each textbooks at the middle and high school levels guess who maintains and tracks all those textbooks you want to see some real magic watch us Library fairies flitter and fly through those first weeks of school we get compliance done if we aren't there who will have that work added to their already full loads at this time of year when textbook distribution is as far from our minds as is Santa Claus it can be easy for Budget stressed administrators to look at library personnel as non-essential indulgences luxuries as a taxpayer I hate waste years ago I voted to have some of my money spent on building new

008libraries for schools sort of assuming they would be staffed as the parent of five Sons I have been grateful for 20 years for the library people who let me know when school books were late or were missing those people have helped me teach my children about their own responsibilities if I truly were a library fairy If there really were any magic in this wand I would twinkle and smile and wave it and you would see and understand our value to you from the instructional Media Center down to the smallest Elementary School not only do we welcome your students to the wonders of reading we maintain protect and defend assets you already have that are worth tens of millions of dollars our value to you is immeasurable your life libraries and your staff are one of

009the best investments you have don't put them at risk thank you hello I am Melinda fensa I'm from Lomo Portal Elementary School I've been an employee of San Diego unified for 14 years I'm your cheapest and best date because for 12 out of those 14 years you have not paid for me a PTA has paid for me 2 years you have paid my salary but that aside I agree with everything Louise says I manage a smaller School site but my services are invaluable just want to briefly tell you in a minute or so a really wonderful story my beautiful golden wings that match nothing about my perilously wonderful tutu were given to me by a boy a very reluctant reader fourth grade boy who after his class helped me make a video of the library

010rules for the year decided it was not fair that a fairy should not have wings so he went out and acquired wings for me brought them to me and I did not want to wear wings and I expressed this to him said I'm not sure about the wing thing and he said but Mrs fensa we need magic in our world libraries provide that magic they connect the right student to the right book that has that personal connection moment that can sometimes be a Miss in the classroom but I know all the students at my school because I see them all not just one classroom there's a very Personal Touch in a library that's very important but you know I've been at this job as I said for 14 years for the first four I sort

011of did what I thought was best then into my world and into this District's world came someone who is beyond being a library fairy the IMC Source librarian Deborah Ford she works an utterly different kind of magic she takes people who are on library assistant levels as well as certificated personnel and turns them into wizards of knowledge and ability to run resources you have purchased at Great expense yet did you know you pink slipped her it's outrageous she is she provides training and things that no one else can do and you know what she does it most incredibly magically for all of us and yet in this pink slip process what you have done in effect to me is you have said anyone with a masters in computer science can take Steve Jobs place or

012you know back when Rak coko run cly Chrysler anyone with a Masters in Business they can run Chrysler it isn't true you have pink slipped the wrong person and your libraries will not be the same henceforth if I could take off my wings and give them to you I would because it's almost worth that to me if in some way Deborah and her immeasurable knowledge could be kept she's an international speaker on Library management and she's written books on connecting boys and literature and you have chosen to pink slip this resource bad choice Ethel Arkin chapter president o OSS 724 uh addresses on file as you know our represent the support services which are those custodians those landscapers those Food Service workers those transportation bus drivers those po those painters plumbers all of those divisions

013but this year our OSS department is going to be most uh hit in our transportation department our transportation workers school bus drivers those services are essential to ensuring that all students have equal access to the district's Educational Services since students use school buses to get to magnet schools in schools that have specialized programs to meet their needs I like all classified workers in the room to stand up because these are the faces of the people that you're cutting that you cut year in and year out not only OSS but par Educators and O2 BS people they have faces they deserve to continue to keep their jobs stop cutting what anybody else that was once a classified worker they need to stand up also all right there you go you you know you guys see us

014just as names and numbers on a piece of paper but we all have faces we all have families and we have lives and we all want to to keep our job so that we can support our children so they can continue to go to these schools as I said our transportation department is going to be hit hard and I keep saying this every time I come up to the board I want to make sure that the district informs the parents that about the busing situation come September thank [Applause] you Ethel um I and all of my colleagues are also classified workers for the district all right well then hey don't cut yourself don't cut us [Applause] I'm Kent buckolz I'm Labor Relations representative with the California School Employees Association currently assisting and representing the workers

015in the Support Services Unit uh folks we can ill afford any more of these layoffs and cutbacks that are proposed cutting transportation services to magnet schools vep along with the elimination of the oile program would be an absolute travesty for students and parents an absolute travesty in fact let's remember the transportation department has already been cut by over $12 million in the last few years alone you've already resented several upper management positions I think that this is a question of what your priorities should be all classified staff all classified staff provide essential support services to our schools and to our students many of these Services have already been cut to the Bare Bones by some who apparently believe that classrooms get cleaned all by themselves that students get from home to school and back by

016some sort of magic or some sort of slate of hand that the only grass that needs mowed weeds to be pulled Hedges to be trimmed are those in front of their own homes well that's not the case these proposed reductions are not only an insult to all in the community they represent a willingness by some to callously turn a blind eye to the most basic and fundamental needs of our kids parents and staff we can only hope that all of us are better than that we can only hope but more importantly we hope that you are better than that thank you hi Erica cly my address is on record um I just came back last week you know we were off for a week I just came back from the par educator conference up in

017Sacramento I took 3 days out of my vacation time to go up and learn more about what is happening with for the par Educators one of the things that I really need to point out is that in special ad we have come great we've come a long ways from where special kids with special needs used to be at um you're cutting 0 positions and special ad and it just makes me wonder um because in my program and it's not just me but there's people in the schools I work from with mild to severe disability but as you're cutting these Paras that work with the um these kids who have special needs are we going to end up now that we have them included in the classroom are we going to start segregating them again and

018make them feel like they're not people anymore more um because who's going to be there to take care of them where's the health Tech that's going to come and um give them their meds you know where's that special ed technician who's going to be there to help feed them you know where is the the the U bus driver who knows our students and the parents trust that bus driver to get their students to and from school safely you know my heart is with kids with special needs and and it kills me that you're cutting Health text you're cutting Library AIDS all these people that make these kids feel important I mean if you look back at the history of special education these kids didn't feel like that they were put away in classrooms and way

019in the back of the school um forgotten now everybody knows them I'm out in the public not only am I out in the public educating people to my students my students are learning that they there's a whole world out there that they can conquer so please when you start looking at cats and you're looking at par Educators please remember that because you're not affecting you may be affecting the schools but you're affecting these students that we are so much to them and they are so much to us thank you okay Carolyn Smith fzy Abdi Erica Lee Jane Bowa Josie Alves Mike Martinez and fardosa Osman um good evening ladies and gentlemen my name is fosa man I'm here speaking on behalf of Eric Al um my address is 5052 whitean Street Apartment 2 I'm I'm

020the treasur of m fatha a national math Honor Society at Crawford high school I'm here to invite you all to the third annual mtha induction ceremony um this year 107 students will be inducted and we're anticipating about 400 community and family members attending um the event will take place on Thursday April 21st 2011 at 6:30 p.m. um is in the Crawford Auditorium uh we will follow you up with an email invitation tomorrow thank you thank you uh hello ladies and gentlemen of the board Mr Koba uh my name is Mike Martinez um I believe my address is on file I'm a teacher at Patrick Henry High School uh on March 15th my world kind of uh was was shaken up for the second year in a row um I received a pink slip two weeks

021later uh my wife received a pink slip also uh uh she's been in the district for for a believe four years uh she's a special eded teacher at Lincoln High School loves her job does a fantastic job uh I myself have been an educator since uh I was 29 years old 18 18 straight years in public education uh uh throughout the county here and in another state um I came on to Patrick Henry High School uh two years ago uh to take over their football program I'm also a social science teacher um I teach world history and I teach apus history um I I kind of apologize to my to my uh uh brothers and sisters here from the union not wearing red but uh I thought it more appropriate to wear black because I

022am in mourning uh for my career for the career of my wife and uh about, 1300 other individuals that teach alongside me in this District uh I was extremely proud uh to move back to the city and live in the city pay taxes in the city and and and to work for this District uh I'd been in other districts I'd heard plenty of bad things about this District but I heard good things too and uh I you know I felt that being a Community member uh would would make a uh a sincere difference um I'm not willing to give up on my kids like like these 1300 other teachers are not willing to give up on them and you know we all have our stories and you know I I'll just let you know what

023what my next couple of months uh uh come down to uh at the end of this month I have to have about 97 students prepared for the csts and for them to do their best at the beginning of May I need to have 31 US History students prepared to take the AP exam and May 16th I got to have about 150 kids ready for spring football and I don't know if I'm going to be back and they don't know if I'm going to be back I haven't even discussed this with them cuz I don't even know what to say to them and like I said there's 1,300 other stories just like that don't give up on these kids you take 1300 teachers out of the classroom and I guarantee you we are going to raise

024a generation of third world children I appreciate your time thank you good afternoon president Barrera Board of trustee superintendent belova my name is Jane Bowa you have my address on file I'm a guidance assistant in San Diego UniFi School District as of the end of June I will be 31 years employee of this District which every year I wonder do I have a job but let's not talk about me let's talk about the classified employee that you're laying off we all say who will do the job and I know they says oh then it's not going to get done but the fact is it's just going to move to somebody else death or they're going to hire an hourly position so that job can be done we are important you might not think so but

025we are important we are the part of the educational process I'm a guidance assistant in the morning I see all the children and the parents I cover classroom for the teacher when they go to IEP I make sure that the list of the tardy the Sangle every other things that needed to be done so you you guys can get your Ada this is just part of the guidance assistant job beside the other classified employee the driver pick them up a bus assistant help them get to the bus to where they're going another classified employee meet them when the bus come to the site Food Services feed them the custodian The Gardener clean the school so they will be ready for the student par educator take them to the classroom is Special Ed sea special ed

026assistant is being eliminated sat IBT there are two there are many different classes that being eliminated that the children really need important part of the school I know some of you doesn't think that the classified employee is that important but like what the other person said during the assess if one day we don't show up there will be no school thank you my name is Josie Elvis and my address is on file president Barrera trustees Mr Co superintendent kova I'm here to talk about I really feel that if children were adults I think they would have more respect and we would think about more about what we're doing to them since they're you know it feels like they're not noncitizens to you know treated because I would like to know if one day that if

027you could take time and be a classified for a day just like you have a child for a day in school in in your jobs maybe you need to go to be a classified for a day just to see what the classifi employees do and how you know we are important to the children because we know their needs and we're there for their needs and if we're not there who will change them who will make sure that their their tube fed are on time and properly and the medication they need to take you know if we don't have our uh Health techs what's who's who knows what every Health Tech knows sure they have a closet full of medic medication because there's a lot of children that do take medication or they have medication in

028in there because some children just in case something happens they need to take this kind of medication of a beung or so forth okay uh who's going to be there to to know whose medicines is who and what their doses is if we don't have our health tis or our um nurses there are they going to call someone by the time they get there what's going to happen to that child we really need to take think of children you know not as non-citizens but really give them some respect you know because if they were adults this wouldn't be happening they I'm sure they would be all in here talking but you know since they don't know all this we as as pars that and classified employees that work with the students we're here to talk

029about them you know there needs to be more respect for our students to give them what they need and I would like really to ask you to please if you have time be a classified for the day just so you can know what classified employees do for a day sure we could talk about it and tell you but until you experience it then you're really going to know what we are about so please I ask you first before you make this decision be a classifi for a day and in at school not here in the offices be there in the school where the students are okay thank you very much hello my name is Carolyn SMI and I my address is 3692 Alexia Place San Diego California 92116 I work for the International Rescue Committee

030in San Diego we've been resettling refugees in the community for 35 years and running after school programs at Crawford for 15 years we've worked closely with the El population at the school we've seen the benefit that the small school model has had on our students has given them personalize attention from caring adults and more opportunities to become leaders in their school we thank you for supporting our school and keeping the small school model and we also thank you for reallocating 0. five principles to each school we thank you for supporting the a through G requirements for all students as well we hope that IRC can support the district in making sure that all elll students who are enrolled in ESL 1 2 and 34 have the opportunity to earn enough English credits to fulfill their

031requirements and we also hope that students who are learning English as their third or fourth language will be able to test out of the foreign language requirement easier than they are right now now thank you you okay I'd now like to ask the Army jrtc Color Guard from San Diego High School to present the colors please stand colors order colors left face carry colar callers salute ready begin I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands one nation under God and indivisible with liy and justice for all order colors right face for arms half step Mar left left thank you I'd like to welcome everyone present today and those watching the broadcast and call the April 12th uh 2011 regular meeting to order with

032all board members present if you wish to address the board today and your name is not on the blue sheet located at both entrances to the auditorium and if you've not already submitted a request for public testimony form please complete the form and submit it to miss Ward speak ERS on agenda items will be called on to speak during the discussion of the agenda item once the discussion begins on an item no additional public speaker requests will be accepted non-agenda item testimony was heard at 5:00 p.m and will also be heard at the end of the meeting at this time I'd like to introduce our ASB uh student representative Nancy suus uh from Patrick Henry High School to tell us a little bit about what's going on at the school but before we do that

033i' like everybody to join me in congratulating Nancy for accepting admission to UCLA one of our superintendent Alma mods you you'll do us you'll do us all proud thank you thank you um I'm Nancy suus and I'm the ASB president at Patrick Henry High School and currently at Patrick Henry we're preparing for our CST and AP testing we also have an improv show coming up in the next few weeks and we are also preparing for our senior dodgeball tournament which will be in the end of April thank you all right thanks Nancy okay and now we'll move to our student presentation from the Mission Bay cluster this is the Mission Bay High School cyber uh bridge program Dr Meer do you want to kick us off I would like to ask Diana Carberry area 7

034superintendent to the podium please to introduce the student presentation thank you good evening president Barrera superintendent Koba members of the board cabinet and members of the audience tonight area 7 is represented by the Mission Bay cluster and you're going to hear about a special program initiated through the vision of UCSD um uh Dr Lauren Thompson and Dr um Bender as well as San Diego State we know that Science Education and the need for future workers in this area is crucial for our nation's economic recovery Mission Bay High School is the only School in the San Diego Unified School District participating in the National Science Foundation cyber Bridge Grant uh principal hilders will introduce the team and the program welcome I hope you uh enjoy this presentation really is a unique opportunity to bring higher education

035and our K12 experience together I'm not going to talk anymore going to let the kids talk so I'm going to introduce Anna Schultz thanks good evening before we begin our presentation I want to introduce the Mission Bay cyber Bridge team Mr skuma from the science department at Mission Bay High School and my teacher Mr Kell Gary teaches the multimedia and video production course at Mission Bay and Maggie from us UCSD cyber Bridge students from Mission Bay include Michael Juan Celeste and Carlos also with us is our very supportive principal Mr Mr hilders I also want to wanted to acknowledge our scientist from SDSU who has been working with us all year Dr Clive Dorman who is not with us today but very helpful to our program um good afternoon my name is Michael Martinez and

036the Cyber Bridge Project is a joint effort between Mission Bay High School SDSU UC and US UCSD to promote science at the high school level together we have created The Rose Creek Water and settlement analysis project which we are demonstrating to you today this is a map of Rose Creek showing the various sites that water was sampled from the purpose of the project was to find relation the relationship between Rose Creek and Mission Bay anything else can hi uh my name is Celeste and I'm Juan and well we're going to explain a little bit about the process for that we did for the program um so we began by collecting water samples from from the various sites from Rose Creek since it's like a large Creek so we collect it from different areas of it

037as you can see and after we collected the samples we then perform performed field analysis measuring for the salinity of the water the ph and the temperature this was all done and the site of the outside when we collected the water back in the lab we measured for nitrates phosphates sulfates and alkalinity and for our demonstration we are going to test the pH levels should we get it yeah just tell them that we're going to have okay well right now we're going to have you guys um test the pH of the water so you guys can know how it feels like what he's passing around right now is the pH strip which is used to check um the salinity level of the water like a whole different reaction you tast the coke I taste the

038coffee and they can tast all right we have different you know different so what you guys are going to do now is going to open the bottles and dip in the pH strip it's not poisonous and pull it out and okay talk do not drink the water stop well Carlos you're supposed to explain what the colors are good afternoon ladies and gentlemen from the Board of Education I my name is uh Carlos Gallardo and um this is an ongoing project that is going on and basically what you guys have in your hands right now is a pH strip and what that indicates says if yours is red yep hold your hold hold it up if your yours is red yep okay if it's red it's a girl it's a girl it's a girl what you're

039holding in your hand right there if the if the strip turned red is that it's acidic so as you can see on our chart over here you have to compare your strip to one of those uh one of those colors over there and if it's in red that means um that our the pH balance the acidity inside of the water is really high and that can affect the fish's reproduction and if you're holding a Brown Strip raise your raise your strip if it's brown yep that Brown strip that means uh that means that the fishes uh it might affect their the newborns the new newborn hatchlings that are in the river that's what that's what um it could it could affect them then their growth and and if you have a yellow one who who

040has a yellow one there we go if you got a yellow one that means that the water is normal that's how it should be and how it should stay all right so like I said like I said in I'm challenging your theory let's quote him on that I'm normal like like I said it before this is an ongoing project so we we have some more information going on with this uh project and uh regarding the pH levels we found that levels were safe in Rose Creek the river next to Mission Bay High School and and it's in perfect condition for the ex existing fish uh the results from the water chemical analysis demonstrated that Rose Creek is not badly polluted I wouldn't assm in it though but the overall health of the creek is is

041uh was normal and you guys might ask uh what we measured there we measured uh nitrate phosphates sulfates and we also measure alkalinity and you guys might ask yourself why do we why do we uh why do we measure that and not anything else well CU these specific uh things nitrates phosphates and sulfates they are indicators that show us the present condition you know the present condition of the creek the if the creek is healthy or not and for example if nitrate if we have too too much levels of nitrate in the water that it can uh develop algae and algae blocks US air circulation that's in the water so the fishes won't be be receiving that um oxygen that they need and also the plant life will extinguish cuz the as we all know

042photosynthesis that's what causes uh plants to grow and uh it's like an like a little blanket of algae and as you can see in our video here we went um to a science fair and uh this we the whole reason the whole purpose of uh us bringing this information out to the public is uh is something that you know everybody should be aware of it's something that you know we have to bring out to our community so this this video up here that you're watching is uh that shows us Mission Bay High School this team of cyber Bridge us going out there you know we're not just concealing this doing this for a grade we're also doing this to advise the public and uh I would like to conclude with uh Celeste here thank you

043for your time thank you good job all right well like he said thanks for your time and we're hoping that with these tough budget cuts um programs like these I mean programs and activities like these will be going on for schools cuz it's a great um opportunity for students thank you all right thank you guys thanks for letting us present tonight one of the other things you should know about the Cyber Bridge Project is that it's actually a multi disciplinary project so our students um we have teachers from uh the media Department English social studies and math working together in teams to create this so a kid who thinks maybe I don't want to be a scientist because I'm an English major can actually find a way to do this and at the Science Festival

044which is not a science fair but an actual Festival here in San Diego County um one of the teachers said to me which was really exciting was was that even if this process or program doesn't exist SE year in my multimedia class all kids are going to create a video that mirrors this kind of practice because they could actually get a job out in the public world uh because they need people to document the science experiments and things that are going on so it's really been great and thanks for hosting us tonight thanks Dian okay we're now going to move up on the agenda items F2 and F3 item f to is something that I'm uh very very proud of uh that that it's come together so this is our bullying harassment and intimidation prohibition

045policy superintendent this off thank you president pra uh I think that this whole journey to uh tonight to this policy is a reflection of uh great work on a community based effort that Nelly LED with uh uh Dr Dolores Jacobs from um the center and many other community uh support groups um if I can all go back uh to last fall when we had the vigil out on our lawn here Community coming together to recognize the tragedy around safe campuses kids of all background with a particular focus on LGBT that night but the whole underscored need for safe teaching and learning environments uh it's been a uh terrific engagement on the right cause and I'd like to turn it over to Nelly who's been leading it again with Dolores Jacobs to this point Y thank

046you superintendent Koba I I'd like to say that the safe schools task force has been meeting since December since this board initiated the action and we're very very proud of the work that we bring forward to you today I'd like to say that we came together with somewhat of a um and I shouldn't say somewhat an extremely strong moral imperative in which we all believed that bullying is absolutely acceptable in any place particularly in our schools and I'd like to also uh recognize some of some of the people here who are here tonight who are part of that effort and particularly as superintendent Koba mentioned um Dr Dolores Jacobs who is here um from the center and she's right here and at this point as well if I could ask everyone who is here tonight

047who participated in the uh task force and who is a part of the the safe schools task force anti-bullying group to just please stand for a moment so we can thank you [Applause] publicly um our particular group has completed a policy that you have here before you today and the approval tonight of this policy will give us the green light to move forward for Ward as a group towards the procedure that will detail information for our school sites including training including a communication plan and then also including um the reporting requirements that we would like to to look at that are mandatory if we want success I also want to note there's another item that's coming up next that perfectly aligns that will be brought forward by board member viser very shortly that aligns with

048this effort that will help protect our students so lastly I would just like to ask that this uh be approved tonight and give us the green light so we can move forward we recommend full approval and are very proud of this collaborative effort that's great we move approval of this item got a motion in a second we've got several uh public speakers and I'm going to ask us to limit uh uh speaking to two minutes a piece um ingred sedeno emlin Arondo Samantha Arondo Mira s brano and Colin Pierce hello board members um superintendents my name is Irene Sagat my address is on record record and I have been a teacher with San Diego Unified School District for over 30 years my final assignment was at scrips Ranch High School where I was GSA adviser

049and since my retirement I have been a volunteer with the gay straight uh the listen gay lesbian straight education Network and I'm also the proud mother of two gay sons who graduated from San Diego High's Bor PR program in the early 9s in my capacity as a glisten uh volunteer I have met some extraordinary students at the Hoover GSA and they are here today to speak before I introduce them I would like to acknowledge their advisors teachers Ellen howenstein and Amanda Robinson these are two of the many teachers in the district District to take their time to be GSA advisors and it is their hard work that makes this possible and now I would like to present the president of the Hoover High School gay straight Alliance ingred sedeno she has also brought with her

050other members of the organization emiline Alfredo and Samantha thank [Applause] you hello my name is ingret sel I live in City hi and I am a senior at hover High School I am currently the president of the gay stade Alliance being gay lesbian bisexual or transgender should not be a label that separates us from society we're all human as a GSA president I have witnessed the kind of homophobic harassment that has affected my friends and I in the LG lgbtq Community according to Aon National School climate survey more than 91% of lgbtq students say they hear homophobic slurs or Expressions frequently or often when I became a member of GSA and later became president I felt I needed to be heard and understood to support others who felt judged and less worthy my goal was

051to provide a safe and environment at our GSA meeting where students can be accepted and can also come to accept themselves we come here today to inform you and everyone of the danger or Community faces because of anti-gay bullying many of us suffer daily and that and that often includes our allies we need support from our friends teachers administrators family and school Community but we don't always get supported sometimes we feel isolated neglected did and traumatized and we're aware that our sexual orientation is not always conceived to be normal by Society but in the end we're human and we're starved for equality each one of us standing before us um has been harassed or label more than once in their short lives for a weight skin color religion national language or sexual orientation but we

052stand strong today knowing that San Diego Unified School District is about to adopt the anti-bullying harass ment intimidation policy and a rights long denied are about to be recognized and affirmed we will be proud happy and and validated when the San Diego Unified School Board adopts this policy and we urge you to do so I would now like to introduce Emil Arondo a member of for GSA who would like to make some remarks thank you as in good said my name is emond and I live in City Heights I would like to share a personal story I was once labeled as a lesbian because I was a part of the GSA this made me feel uncomfortable but later I realized that I didn't care what people thought about me but unfortunately not everyone is as

053calm or strong about such a situation having having lived through that experience opened my eyes to what labeling can really do to a person how much confusion and Devastation it creates within we stand before you today and ask that we we help change this vicious cycle of pain that have led us to that have led to suicides murders through the years and construct a safe and caring environment where everyone can liberate themselves thank you and now I'd like to present Alfredo and his speech hello my name is Alfredo and I live in City Heights I'm a member of the GSA at Hoover High School I've known about my sexual orientation since a young age and like many I didn't approve of myself and I noticed that many people around me didn't as well after constant

054years of harassment these words became immune to me but that doesn't mean that they it didn't devastate me I resented myself each word thrown at me was slowly killing me I hid my sexuality from my family and friends and you know there's only so much harassment one can take in my freshman year at Hoover I finally got the strength to come out and to tell you the truth it felt good yet harassment still came to me I am certain that hundreds of students are not as courageous as I am and these harassments can turn fatal with the help of this policy not only will homophobia not be tolerated but many LGBT students can feel safe in school thank [Applause] you good evening I'm era Zambrano on behalf of senator in kho um she has a

055statement that I'd like to read to you uh dear president Barrera and board members I wholeheartedly support your adoption of the proposed bullying harassment and intimidation prohibition policy before you today every California Student deserves the opportunity to do their very best in school without fear of harassment or bullying this policy should result in a Better Learning environment for all students and a safer one for LGBT youth I applaud superintendent Koba District staff and especially Dr lores Jacobs and all the Community Partners who worked on developing the policy and the school board for taking it up it is long overdue I urge its adoption to give students on every campus a greater level of comfort and safety that is conducive to a better education Senator Christine kho thank [Applause] you my name is Colin Pierce and

056my address is on file I should like to start by saying how inspired I am to be here today I'm inspired by my partners on the safe schools task force and the extraordinary passion and dedication that they bring to this cause I'm inspired by the decency and strength of superintendent Cobra and his staff and I'm inspired by you the board and the stand that I expect you to take today a stand for a school district in which every student is valued equally I'm proud to be here representing the San Diego chapter of glisson glisson is the gay lesbian and straight education Network and for 20 years glisten has been the leading National Organization fighting to ensure that our schools are safe for all students we envision a world in which every student learns to respect

057and accept all people regardless of disability gender nationality race or ethnicity religion sexual orientation or gender identity it has been glisten surveys of almost 20,000 students that provide the off qued statistics that quantify the crisis of harassment that shapes the school experience of so many young people today the national school climate surveys High that nearly 90% of LGBT students have been verbally or physically harassed or assaulted leaving three out of five feeling unsafe at school as a result they are four times more likely to miss school than their straight classmates their grade point averages suffer and not surprisingly they're less likely to choose to continue to further education glisson's research has also been able to point the way toward the effective measures that Educators can take to create safe and affirming classrooms we urge the

058board to adopt this anti-bullying policy specifically as it enumerates sexual orientation and gender identity among the groups to be protected against bullying intimidation and harassment we also urge you to support assembly Bill 9 glisten San Diego looks forward to working with District staff as they develop the procedures training for both staff and students and LGBT inclusive curriculum that will be essential for the policy's successful implementation we will continue our own support of the gay trade Alliance clubs that exist within schools in the district these gsas and the Educators who step up as advisers provide safe spaces and critical support for LGBT students and we're very proud that you were able to hear from GSA students this [Applause] evening okay Isaac Gomez Mark Dylan Jan garboski Ernie McCrae Reverend Mary Sue Brookshire Dolores Jacobs I can

059just start whenever I want please all right hi my name is Isaac Gomez I'm 16 years old and I'm a junior currently attending hiek High International I'm here to promote the bullying harassment and intimidation prohibition policy and I think the best way to do that is to share with you guys my story so when I was in seventh grade I came out as female to male transgender not only with my friends and family but also to my school I was in Middle School High-Tech high no Hightech middle media arts and I think they did a great job my current my principal at the time was alul tones and I remember my mom went to to go talk to him about how she wanted to make sure that I was safe because I was going to

060start my transition I was going to change my name and basically start becoming who I wanted to be and she asked him if I could go to the bathroom in the nurse's bathroom just to be safe and he said that he thought that the best way that I would be comfortable is by going into the bathroom that I identified myself with so I started going into the boy's bathroom and I felt completely comfortable and now while I'm saying this is because I want to promote say that um programs where training training for schools to be this helpful and to help students transition and become more unified as a school not make them different or make them stand out but make bullying um not there I guess that's the easiest way I can can say it

061you know make everyone equal and that's what my school did to me and I just want to share that with you guys to try and promote more training for schools and get that in every school thank you very much thanks uh good evening my name is Mark Dylan and I'd like to thank the board for the opportunity to speak uh I'm here uh as the chairman of the Anti-Defamation League regional board and as a City Commissioner on the San Diego human relations commission uh I think though that I've been outdone by the kids that preceded me in terms of the eloquence and the reason why it is a good idea for you to have done what you've done and to get move this this policy forward unfortunately we're in a period of transition and we

062can't wait them to get our age for this not to be an issue anymore we have to step in and help and assist in the social controls and institutions that will help them lead a normal life at the point where they are in their lives so that when they get to our age they can be talking about other issues instead of as we are here uh but it I would however like to acknowledge some of the things that are being done and the reason the ear action is not a straw in the wind but a straw that is bound together with others and other community organizations that are trying to do things uh as you may know the human relations commission and the Anti-Defamation League are in the third year of sponsoring a cyber bullying

063conference for educators administrators and parents that's going to be going on again this next month the uh human relations commission and has been involved in this issue for considerably fact uh Nicole Ramirez who I think is in the audience was instrumental and working uh to bring this forward and we have him and others to think for for helping surface this uh this issue now this is just a policy and it will not make our children bully proof but it does provide guidelines for students behavior and a clear statement of the district's intention to respond should bullying occur in itself it sets an example for the kind of behavior that's historically proven most effective to combat bullying in any time or place stand up to the bullies don't let them take control of the sandbox of

064the street or the country by putting bullies on notice they will not be tolerated by giving clear guidelines for District employees how to respond we educate and Empower our children to stand up for themselves because of your efforts we're going to continue what we do and we hope we'll be more effective because of your engagement in this issue again thank you very much for hopefully passing this policy recommendation thank [Applause] you good afternoon my name is Jan Garbus and this is my wife Bonnie Russell we reside at 5194 68 Street San Diego 92115 we are here as former San Diego unified employees having worked in this District a combined total of 62 years we started as babies the the vast majority of those years we worked in integration programs in schools and at the district

065level uh working toward gender and racial ethnic equality including monitoring and evaluation of the district's court ordered um desegregation plan since 1990 we and other district teachers and administrators have been working to make schools safe for all students parents and staff including those who are LGBT despite fearing for our jobs and uh our own personal safety although the district's non-discrimination policy was expanded in 1992 and staff were trained bullying and fear continued even a state law AB 537 the California safe student safety and uh violence prevention Act of 2000 did little to lessen bullying and you've heard about uh the continued bullying statistics during our careers and since our retirements we have been fearful that one day we would open the newspaper to find that a San Diego unified student had not been able to

066continue tolerating the bullying and chose suicide it's an honor for me to serve on the safe school's task force and experience a District's deep commitment at this time to prohibit bullying based on any and all perceived or actual characteristics it's taken more than 20 years of hard work to get to this goal Bonnie and I believe that implementation of this policy will do much to change the culture of schools and make them safe for everyone to learn to work and to participate in their child's education your Vote for This policy and for assembly Bill 9 will make that difference thank you so much dear friends of mine I've been very fortunate other than dealing with Jim Crow in my life to not having I haven't had to deal with bullies but I could well imagine

067how horrible that must be to show up at a school and to be uh mess with all the time and in spite of all that you face today nothing is more important than San Diego City Schools adopting a policy that would make schools safer for LGBT students I just want remind all who are present that this is an issue of equal rights not special rights as some would like to have us believe so much in our country indicates that gay students still have a way to go to receive the level of protection that straight students receive the validation as human beings deserving of love that all human beings need I'm hoping you will unanimously so that the kids will have absolutely no doubt as to how they their valued in your eyes adopt this beautiful

068document that the safe schools task force has put together for their well-being it's way past time but what you're doing is [Applause] cool good evening ladies and gentlemen my name is Reverend Mary Sue Brookshire you have my address on file this evening I'm representing California faith for equality and the 13 congregations throughout San Diego County that have identified bullying as an issue of great importance those standing with me here are representatives from the 10 congregations within San Diego City working on this issue representing more than 3,000 members of their faith communities many are graduates of this District have worked for this District or will one day have a child or grandchild attending this district for the past 6 months our congregations have been engaged in a number of activities to gain knowledge and find ways

069to work together to make schools safe for all students especially lesbian gay bisexual and transgender students it is with deep appreciation and gratitude that we as people of Faith support the work already accomplished by the safe schools task force to bring you the draft of the bullying harassment and intimidation prohibition policy we celebrate their work and your willingness to address this issue during such difficult budgetary times you have many difficult decisions to make I hope this one is easy your vote on this policy will affect the lives of Untold numbers of students family and staff thank you so much for your efforts to ensure San Diego's schools will be safe for everyone you have our support and will continue to have our support in implementing this policy thank you [Applause] there's not a lot left

070for me to say I'm Dr Dolores Jacobs it's been my pleasure and my privilege to serve with Dr Meyer as the co-chair of the safe schools task force um working with the definitions of bullying provided by both uh California law in the Ed code and California code regulation the task force has helped to devise this policy that is the first step in creating safer schools in this district and tonight I want to just do two things I want to thank you for your leadership and your vision in creating a partnership task force between Educators parents community members all of the available research on bullying and harassment says it will take all of us to create effective solutions to what is a horrific crisis in schools second I'm here on behalf of all students including LGBT

071students those who are perceived to be LGBT and the children of same-sex parents I'm here to thank you for your support for this policy in these contentious times we believe with you that one of the things almost all of us can agree upon is that schools ought to be safe and children need to be free to learn develop and Achieve um we applaud your ref s towards that end we believe this policy is a step in that direction and we thank you for your leadership your support and your protection for all students in this school [Applause] district okay Mick Raven Elanor Evans and Doug case thank you school board members for hearing me speak today my address is on file my name is Mick Raben and I teach at Oak Park Music Conservatory I often

072say that I specialize in the absurd but I have some wonderful fantastic and fabulous students having taught in elementary school during the 10 years of five superintendence I can attest to the need for children of color and diverse racial ethnic and religious backgrounds to be protected from bullying harassment or or intimidation this kind of protection requires a curricular foundation and honest dialogue that affirms and acknowledges these students cultural identities it would be Unthinkable for a teacher who works in a modern classroom to maintain a library and deliver a curriculum that neglected these children but for the estimated 10% of the student populace who will grow up to become a part of the LGBT community the current message is we don't want to talk about you because some people will be offended and frankly we are

073not comfortable either by ignoring these children the message is that it's better to pretend that you're all going to be straight we not talk about you nor tell you that your life is of value because essentially it is better that you don't exist no child should be faced with that kind of isolation and despair no child should walk to school fear fearing for his or her life no child should feel that it would be better to be dead than to appear at school I can't imagine my own ever feeling it that way can you imagine it for anybody else's child I want to acknowledge the absolutely critical work that the Trevor Project the it's getting better it gets better project and glisten the organization that I've been involved with for a decade now that we've

074been doing to address the crisis that so many young LGBT people are facing at this time in American history but I think that most people would agree that our respective organizations would expend far less energy and res resources if we tackled this societal malady in ways that are more proactive than reactive embedding dialogue about the LGBT community that elevates their visibility to one of value and equality instead of as pejoratives and tabos is an absolutely crucial component of the San Diego Unified School District's path I've taken on these challenges in my own classroom for more than a decade but I know that most Elementary and Middle School Educators even those who are allies feel like they won't be supported by their own District when they explain that the word gay is not a bad word

075but rather a word that describes our neighbors our colleagues our best friends and our family members this policy is a clear message that my colleagues will be supported in protecting these students I'm so pleased that superintendent Koba assistant superintendent Meyer and the entities that comprise the safe schools task force have faced this issue with passion through an analytical lens but most importantly it is soldiered forward with an eye for action instead of the indifference and down downright hostility that these students have endured for so long as a parent of two children a board member of glisten San Diego County and a teacher in San Diego Unified School District district for 17 years I fully endorse this policy as the first of many steps toward the day where every student is met with affirmation and can

076feel safe and valued when they enter the classrooms and campuses of our schools thank you [Applause] hello my name is Elanor Evans and again I have to say everyone's been very very eloquent in what they had to say I'm a I am the um female co-chair for the glbt caucus um CTA as well as a board member for um sdaa and I'm also a product of San Diego Unified School District and actually from first grade through 12th and from first grade through my senior year I was harass bullied you know Etc um there were times when I really didn't want to go to school I thought about dropping out and as fast as I could I got through school I also actually thought about and actually did attempt to do away with myself and end

077up throwing up you know I just want to say though I had support of parents which for me was the key but most glbt students don't have that statistics show that 40% of students who drop off are of that 40% 70% are glbt students in terms of runaway over 90% of The Runaways are glbt students are youth and suicide there seems to be uh for one of a better word an epidemic of middle school students who are attempting suicide because they've been perceived or act are coming out as glbt um youth we need this San Diego as as far as I know we haven't had the issues that other school dist districts have in terms of students um doing those kinds of things committing suicide or being um done away with by their colleagues because

078of their um sexual orientation but we definitely need this policy and I would ask you to support it thank you very [Applause] much good evening my name is Doug case and I am the current president of the San Diego Democratic Club an organization that advocates for equality for lesbian gay bisexual and transgender people I would like to congratulate and applaud the board on considering this item tonight and but also would like to especially thank the safe uh schools task force for their hard work on this on this effort it's too bad that a series of tragic suicides have caused us to focus public attention on this important issue because it's been going on for Generations but I'm glad that our U our community and communities across the country are finally dealing with this issue it

079has often been said that the true major of the moral fiber of a society is how it treats and protects as most vulnerable and I would suggest to you that the uh kids who are the targets of bullying are among the most vulnerable a couple of suggestions that I would suggest to you in implementing this policy number one is to make sure that it's clear that uh the policy not only includes the protected classes that are included in the policy but also those uh who associate uh or associate those classes in other words for example a couple of students tonight mentioned that their member their allies their members of gsas they may not identify with or be perceived as being LGBT but they are targets of harassment because of their association with them likewise U

080students who have uh LGBT siblings or LGBT parents of also often the target of uh discrimination and bowling and they need to be protected too um finally I would encourage you to interpret uh broadly and um as widely as possible the last phrase there of any other distinguishing characteristics it's not just the people that are in those classes that uh are the targets of bullying uh in particular I would encourage you to include uh physical appearance or personal mannerisms U because many of the kids who are the targets of uh building fall into those categories again I thank you for your efforts and urge you to adopt this policy in also encourage you to all to adopt uh the resolution in support of ab9 thank [Applause] [Music] you okay we have a motion in a

081second to uh accept the staff recommendation comments questions uh Mr Barnett I want to commend the uh pass board who started this process and um Mr Biser and um president Barrera who sat on this task force as well you know the the promise of our country is that you really can believe say worship or be whomever you want as long as you're not hurting someone else and it's ironic that today it was 150 years ago today was the start of the Civil War which ended up resolving you know the one of the worst stains in our nation but it didn't end discrimination and we still have discrimination today and have had it since our founding and unfortunately there will continue to be that but I think policies like this and boards and people willing to

082work together and say that it is wrong and um as public entities so I fully support this policy and um commend the board ppard and current board members who've worked on it Jackson um again I want to commend all the staff and the committee who worked on this particular policy um I know that from the visual that we did in October and the expounding of it to sure that we had included every student and while we know that we recognized the difficulties at the time it's important for every student within our district to understand that we do not tolerate bullying of any kind and that our learning environment is safe and uh we say that often and we work very hard to to ensure that and this policy is just another one in that direction

083so I'm proud to support this particular resolution tonight thank you yes I also want to join in commending this group and particularly the the communitybased uh nature of all of this I mean this is what we're trying to do in the district is being persons from the general Community parents and students all together and this is a really good example of that I'm also happy that we're acting now uh there has been a lot of the news recently across the country but we're acting before there is a current uh major tragedy here it reminds me a lot of cases where there's a dangerous intersection and action is taken to put up a stop sign you know after after a tragedy or something has happened nevertheless the the on another level there's a constant tragedy going

084on and there a um psychologist I deal pretty much on a daily basis with people who have scars from childhood uh for specifically uh different types of bullying um especially from the LGBT community as well as others and uh I just want to comment that I know we have some good things going on in the district um the I was at John mure School a while ago and there was a bullying anti-bullying assembly and it was was very remarkable how they were really teaching the kids to to work together that there were ways without physical Force to really use pure price sure to isolate somebody who was uh uh bullying others and and while this is is very commendable and makes us feel very good to do this today I really want us to follow

085up I would like the um this particular task force to come back another point and report to us on on what difference it has or or has not made uh I know within the um operational expectations I don't remember the numbers of each one when we kind of visit current policies and programs in the district uh this one would fall under uh one which covers learning environment and I would hope at the time that we have the report on that that we'll have an update on on what's going on with this very good work so once again thank you very much for everybody who worked on this um I want to also thank you uh to all of my friends and uh brothers and sisters that um have come out this evening to support this

086very important uh beginning uh to creating a different climate and culture in our schools the character uh is so important in the development of the children not just in education but also helping them to become good people uh you know and and this is very very exciting for me on one hand and very very emotional on another um you know this is an anti-bullying policy um in our schools that will protect our children the school district's primary role is to ensure students have a safe learning environment so that they can Thrive this is an important step to establish the expectation that we will act swiftly as a board as a district and as sites and schools uh to protect students and create a climate of Tolerance not hate uh this is this is so important

087and some of the stories that we heard from some of the students in our schools uh give and I don't know about some of the other adults in the audience that remember what it was like to be in middle school or High School uh for the taunting the name calling being beat up in the locker room those episodes are so powerful at destroying children's lives and we have to take a stand we have to stand up for these kids in our care that are not uh that are not being treated as equals we have to create a safe environment and make sure everybody understands that you cannot turn a blind eye you cannot turn a blind eye When You observe bullying of your students at your school so I I I strongly urge and appreciate

088every single one of my friends on the board and and in ant and in anticipation of a unanimous vote in support of this historic anti-bullying policy um and to Seth who is the namesake of the next action item on the agenda uh assembly bill number nine Seth's law Seth was a 13-year-old kid who couldn't take it anymore his mother complained to the school he complained to the school he couldn't take it anymore and at the age of 13 killed himself and for the other people that know what I'm talking about no more this resolution these are words on a piece of paper but we must make sure that we follow up and that they become action in appro active positive way to help the other children at our schools to understand what's at stake Lawrence

089King an eighth grader had another student put a gun to his head in class and [Music] shoot right in front of all the other students in the computer science class right in front of the teacher well we all know the story of Lawrence King he passed away a couple days later in the hospital you know being a teacher of seventh and eth and nth grade students I never want to have that happen at my school I never want that to happen for any of our kids in San Diego and so I I I really am grateful uh for the leadership of the superintendent Mr Koba and Nelly Meers for her guidance and Leadership with the safe schools task force and I know that we will be continuing this process of refining the policies that we

090have so that we can have Swift action timelines reporting uh guidelines for folks when they overhear observe or aware of bullying of LGBT youth in our schools thank [Applause] you thank you Kevin and again I I'll just add my thanks to Dr Meyer and to Dr Jacob uh for uh for heading up this task force uh thanks to the community actually for uh you know having the uh courage to bring this issue forward in the first place to work on putting this policy together and especially thank you to the students who had the courage to speak tonight uh to to be leaders in your schools every day we think about the uh the students at Madison High School taken such incredible leadership on these issues so it's uh I think it's our honor as a

091board uh to to pass this policy tonight so with that please vote [Applause] Barn Mr Barnett raise your hand if you support there [Applause] [Music] [Applause] all right and now we'll move on to the accompanying resolution Mr Biser um the uh it uh action item F3 is the resolution uh to support assembly Bill 9 I'd like to personally thank assembly member Tony Atkins for um reaching out to me and the board uh for support in her efforts to push Seth's law uh introduced by assembly member amiano uh this assembly bill will basically establish uh the law for the State of California that every single School District must pass an anti-bullying law uh and ensure that all LGBT youth in in the entire State of California um is protected um this is a very important uh

092piece of legislation because it speaks to the fact that that many school districts in the state have no uh reporting policies um have and and there there's a real need for uh to ensure that the people in all the schools in all the school districts um have training and the resources that they need uh to support the students and uh as I just mentioned earlier the the law ab9 is um Seth's law a little 13-year-old kid thank you Mr boser we have a second second okay any further discussion if not please vote thank you Mr boser okay we'll now move on to the uh superintendent information report and administrative assignments super intendent thank you president Bara we have uh one administrative assignment uh to note tonight uh Lee dgov from director project management department to

093Executive Director 2008 Capital Improvement Bond program facilities planning and construction Department if I could move on to comments um I have a couple items I just want to highlight uh and then defer to a couple of speakers uh we have been uh returning from a spring break in the past week uh I know that the campuses are uh shaking a little bit of dust and rust off and trying to focus we have our standardized testing the next 60 days of um uh wrapping up the school year um I had two events I want to note uh one is that uh I had a good visit to Roosevelt Middle School on Monday with area superintendent Dr Hector Montenegro and with principal Arturo Cabello uh a very good walk around observations uh and discussions with the staff

094uh Roosevelt Middle is one of our IB schools and what I'm really pleased to hear is the exchange between two IB feeder patterns that's ongoing now between the San Diego High and the Mission Bay High feeder penants because I think there's best practices and solid teaching and learning to be shared between the two and we talked about that a little bit uh my other item is that I was able to be at a um ribbon cutting ceremony yester today at neighborhood house uh remarkably uh just barely 90 days ago uh Rudy Johnson the Chief Operating Officer and I spoke about creating a safe haven a safe academic Haven for kids after school in one of our very high needs parts of the uh the district Neighborhood House stood uh stepped up uh have provided a

095computer room uh staffed it uh with adult supervision outfitted it with about 25 workstations and are strongly encouraging middle and high school kids from around the area providing them transportation to the site and allowing them to do their homework provide that guidance and even throwing in snacks so I thought it was a great uh Community engagement another success story in partnering between the district and some very viable uh allies in the in the community uh what I'd like to do now is very quickly is um I've asked Bernie Ryerson and Ron little uh we don't have any formal line in the agenda tonight to talk about what's happening or what's not happening either in the legislative or the budgetary world just two or three minute soundlight from the two uh folks that have been tracking

096this for us Bernie thank you superintendent members of the board um what we wanted to talk to you very briefly about and really for members of the public and those who are watching this presentation tonight is where we are with the budget and what's going on with Sacramento today is day 100 of Governor Brown being in office and we follow what the governor is doing every day uh in fact there's a column in the Sacramento B that talks about what he does every day so day 100 uh his proposal was for a balanced approach to the budget with half cuts and half revenues and he had been pushing uh the legislature to place a measure on the ballot in June for tax extensions that would have a significant positive impact on schools throughout California and

097as this board knows and we want our public to know that would have meant another $4 to $50 million of revenue for our district and significantly change the tough decisions that this board had to make what I'm encouraged by is that the governor hasn't given up he is now visiting parts of the state where Republican members of the legislature are taking his message about this the tax extensions and while we won't have a ballot measure on on these available for the voters of the public to vote on in June that doesn't mean that it couldn't happen in September it couldn't happen in the fall and I think where he's headed now is to look at what are his options in the legislature what can the legislature do uh on its own are there other options

098for an election so I think uh the message that I'm hearing from the governor is let's not give up let's keep the pressure on the legislature to solve this problem your resolution from this morning that uh uh board member Evans brought forward uh calling on the legislature to pledge not to cut education any further is something all of us would hope that every school district in the state of California would do and we'll be delivering that with with you and the board to uh to our members and asking them to take that pledge because we certainly know uh from the tough decisions your board has made what these budget cuts will mean and if the option of an all Cuts budget is something that the Govern Governor has to bring forward in the May revise

099uh we know how impossible that will be so we'll be watching very carefully every day today is day 100 we'll be watching on every single day and taking that message to the legislature uh about the cuts to uh to education and really supporting our representatives and the governor to see if there are any options available uh right now um we're waiting for the May revise uh and U our CFO Ron uh little will talk a little bit more about the the fiscal impacts that we're looking at good evening board members uh thank you Mr reiners uh I would like to share in Mr ryerson's encouragement and uh enthusiasm for the the work that the governor is doing to try to uh encourage uh the electorate to come to the plate and to uh extend the

100taxes that are currently sunset uh scheduled to Sunset June 30th as you know uh we built our draft preliminary budget for next year uh not on the tax extension but we did build it on the assumption that prop 98 would be maintained and honored by our state legislators and that of course provides a minimal funding floor for K through 14 school districts throughout the state uh we know in in in our model that we we buil that we built the draft Budget on uh we were anticipating prop 98 being honored but that the floor would be decreased by about $2 billion and that's how we got to the minus 3 $349 per Ada that we built the budget on and the action that the board took uh last month which was very painful and very

101difficult the frustration of course that we all have is that we don't know anything more really than we knew a month ago and that the level of uncertainty continues uh not for lack of trying on the governor's part uh but we're continually charged uh with offering the state a balanced budget and the county a balanced budget by the end of June and we don't have the luxury of not meeting that uh that ear Mark uh with respect to the other two scenarios so that's where we are that's what we've built the budget on so far for next year uh as Bernie mentioned the TA the tax extensions if they materialize uh probably one thing we could be certain of today that we weren't certain of 30 days ago is that the probability of those taxes

102extensions coming to pass uh has been reduced uh it's going to take a lot more work on the governor's part and bringing those Republicans on board to make sure that that they get on the ballot or that some action is taken prior to going to the people for approval if they were to be extended certainly we would have some additional revenues to work with in an ongoing nature somewhere around $30 million a year uh more uh perhaps drastically and and more frighteningly is the worst case scenario uh which I won't spend a lot of time on but that's the all Cuts budget I think we all recognize including uh the consultants and the experts that an all Cuts budget really is undoable and then the amounts of of money and reductions that they're talking about

103are just Draconian at best and uh impossible to enact at worst um they're looking at650 to $825 per Ada reductions over one year time we know that to us that would mean an additional 35 to $55 Million worth of reductions next year and that of course would be ongoing uh regardless of what scenario we're looking at we also know that 2012 2013 presents a challenge of its own so even with the action that the board took last month we're still in the $65 million range with respect to that Year's deficit I just want to highlight some uh you know as as Bernie said the May revive is really our next step we we have to wait until till we hear a plan from Sacramento and a plan from the governor with respect to how we're

104going to move forward uh and what can we plan on uh with respect to K through2 funding whether it be with reductions or additional revenues what we do until then uh we have many people advising us about what to do and I'm just going to share some of the advice uh certainly the county is part of that group certainly School Services of California is part of that group certainly casbo the California school business officials society as part of that group I'm going to quickly go through these to let you know what they recommend and what we've been doing maintain Reserve balances at the highest possible level level and as you know we continue to manage and monitor our risks we'll bring to those to you again next meeting and uh we intend to implement a

105spending freeze on the unrestricted side uh of our revenue and our expenditures uh effective next week number two establish a cash management plan to deal with the referrals we've shown you a cash management plan the last meeting at second interim and at first inter we continue to update that and to amend that as necessary we're finalizing the trans work uh that will will certainly uh happen after the May revise if not sooner and we're looking at some accelerated timeline if possible the use use federal job I'm sorry number three use federal jobs bill money uh judiciously and as you know we've reported that we've used this federal job money to fund 200 44 elementary teachers this year with those restricted resources so that we could free up unrestricted resources to offset the deficit next year

106so that was about 2.35 billion million doar sorry million dollar number four initiate a hiring freeze for all positions uh that's already in place we continue to work with uh the direction that the both Deputy superintendents review all requests for hiring and approve them uh at as as they see fit number number five develop a plan to close schools if necessary uh W superintendent uh Stover reported yesterday at cabinet that that committee met again yesterday and continues to do that work and to look at the possibility of closing schools if necessary number six and only two more to go maintain a seniority list seniority list in case there is a second layoff window uh HR of course is maintaining that list and updating it as as they need to and the final one I'll just

107mention is uh the advice that do not resend layoff notices given in March and again this is just you know staying the course not reducing the flexibility uh prematurely um and I would just add that you know with respect to the risk that reported uh last time we we're looking at about $7 million worth of risks in the current year that were not buil into next year's assumptions or this year's budget uh and the $3 million at this point for the following year so we have taken some good steps and some solid steps to uh Shore our Reserves up and to uh to work towards the budget adoption at the end of June and um we're here to support and to encourage the board to do the same thank you okay thank you thank you

108Mr little and Bernie superintendent okay we'll move on to the board uh information reports Mr B Barnett uh real quickly um I think the one activity I'll discuss is I had the opportunity to sit on a senior project panel at uh UC High School and I'm it's it was very enlightening to not only sit on that panel with a teacher but with 11th grade students who will then be going through that the final year and you know obviously there's a lot of focus sometimes um by people but what doesn't work at schools and our system but I say it's very inspiring process and I encourage uh parents community members and others to participate in that and see not only the quality of the senior projects which are required for graduation but the the types of

109diligence that the 11th graders mothers put into learning questioning involved it so uh it was an excellent experience thank you Jackson um a couple of things um um just prior to our spring break I had opportunity to to the fifth grade violin at Fulton they were able they've been practicing for a while and this was part of our Arts music program and this was the third uh instrument they had been playing and it was a enlightening experience um but this week i' been out with some High School uh Crawford uh ID EA and Champs looking at their was accreditation uh inum visits so that's been very nice as well um last night I had the privilege of having two cluster meetings uh they both wanted to be on the same night I I guess spring

110break reasons um both cord and Lincoln um both of them had a great turnout um both are preparing for the testing window that's coming up and they both uh not both but there was some concerns raised um across uh both of the groups and concerns about uh the budget and um one request um was that we the board um we ask for a good budget that people can read a readable budget to the public and we know that we have to do one according to our Ed code but they like to have one that people can read that average Jo blow Can Can Read um they were concerned about area soup uh rename and reorg and we met this morning and I think the consensus this morning that we would keep the area soup name

111but we still not um ready to do the reor yet because of the budet AR um items and then they had a question they had some was they asked me and I can't answer the question yet was that uh the last board meeting we delegated authority for principal selection to the superintendent and wonder what criteria he was going to be using for those selections and I said I don't know since we delegated to the superintendent I guess he knows and he can share with us what that criteria will be but um I just want to say to both of those clusters and to um to the public our cluster um we started this Mission a little over a year or so ago with this board trying to we did our 2020 Vision which was giving

112um uh power back to the community and I'm just very thrilled that these communities have taken a hold of it and they're they're working they both have uh working groups uh committees actually and as part of their cluster group so I'm again very proud of them thank you and superintendent those two items are for you okay thank you Dr EV somebody's phone is ringing she okay uh I'll have a couple of things so I'll take U Mr Bizer's time also [Music] um there we there's a lot of focus here at the board in terms of the cuts that we have preliminarily made and I think we really need to remember that on the at the state legislature that two votes in the State Assembly and two votes in the Senate can change the entire direction

113of this District District as far as K2 public education and I just wanted to share a couple of things um from the last week or so I got a note from a teacher and and my response to her uh where she wrote my name is Miss Kay the recent massive layoffs that you've deemed necessary have not only directly affected me but over a thousand other highly qualified teachers and staff and I would add that it also I'm talking about a teacher here but it certainly includes all the classified staff as well however I feel confident that you will be resending many if not all of these pink slips in the future that being said I'm urging you to do this quickly because I have to attend hearings uh very soon I won't go into the

114details about that this is my eth year teaching in the San dieg Unified School District my eighth year and I feel that I am highly qualified and I have a solid understanding of my students needs I know from experience that the weeks before c CST testing are critical for the teacher to be in attendance and now we have these hearings to attend if you're going to be resending many if not all the layoff notices that you have issued I urge you to do it before the upcoming hearing dates it's in the best interest of the students and the school board I understand this is a hard time for the school board because the budget and you're being forced to make many difficult monetary decisions however in the past somehow the board has always come up

115with the funds I hope you can do the same and do it quickly I'm just sharing my response to Miss Kay I said this is a horrible situation you're being put through after years of dedicated service to the kids in our schools that's one of the reasons why I campaigned so hard for proposition J to raise nearly $50 million uh which would have cut our layoff numbers in half unfortunately we did not have strong enough support from the voters now the governor is trying his plan for a June ballot measure would have replaced some of that 50 million that we did not get from proposition J but the legislators did not come through in time now all the layoff notices that we have issued may not even be enough for us to have a workable

116budget for next year at this point we have no idea how much more the state is going to cut us unfortunately all the school board can do is work with what other money we are given one I being idea being discussed by some people at the state level is to cut one to two months out of the school year besides all the layoffs we are all including myself on unstable ground at this point if they do not give us enough money to balance the budget the state would take over the jobs of both the school board and the superintendent and because the state is so delayed in paying us we have to constantly borrow money and pay the interest if we cannot keep getting these loans we would not be able to meet payroll by

117the beginning of the school year we have until June 30th to approve the budget I hope the state gives us a clear Direction by May or June about how much money we can count on until then there is not much we can do the school board has no authority to raise the taxes needed to support our schools the schools are being held hostage to the Republican and Democratic party battles and right now no Republican is blinking to save public education it's in their hands and they have the power and the authority to do whatever is needed including raising taxes we had to tentatively eliminate 900 plus certificated positions as well as many more support staff um in the meantime they're holding us H hostage in the mean time you need to do whatever you can

118by attending the layoff hearings and protecting your rights I will keep you posted I wish I could make this all go away but this year is much different than previous years the cuts the past 3 years have been cumulative and now we are at the break point and then following that I just wanted to mention what was discussed this morning at a board Workshop we adopted a resolution to have put the focus where it needs to be on the specific legislators who can during the coming days and weeks make an absolute difference I Believe Miss ward has put on on um the screen the resolution which is very uh legally worded but I'll just take out the key points we' we've cut over $490 million over 5 years to cut any more is to going

119to our system is the second point the third point is that the board of education is required to do two things to safeguard the education of the children of San Diego and to protect the fiscal solvency of the district as well we've taken a a an oath to uphold the constitution of the State of California which guarantees free public education for all its children the fourth point is that our responsibility to balance a budget and responsibility to protect education are are at odds the fifth point the school board has no authority to raise revenues that are needed for a successful educational program and the next point that the state leg legislature has the exclusive Authority granted by the people of California to establish priorities and raise revenues this the legislature can do this even if

120the governor wasn't trying and finally whereas members of the San Diego legislative delegation as a united front just the eight members here in San Diego there are five assembly persons who are Mr wo uh Mr Fletcher Mr Jones uh Mr Block and Miss Atkins our three Senators Vargas um help me um Anderson and kho there those are the eight right within San Diego we have the power with these and and one or two others within San Diego County if all of our local legislators were to support public education and to vote to raise the proper revenue for education we would change the situation for the entire State of California so we don't have to travel to Sacramento we just have to go to the eight offices of the legislators in our County and we have

121at we we had part of the resolution is is for the Board of Education calling upon the legislators who represent these same constituents to sign a pledge that they will not vote for any further cuts to education beyond what the governor has has in his original proposal the governor was realistic he said we can we have to do half painful cuts and half increased Reven continuation of uh of taxes extension um and that is what we support and we want everyone who represents San Diego to take a stand to say yes I will take a pledge uh to support public education K12 education in San Diego or I will not so that we will know where everybody stands and we want to do this in a very public way so that the Board of Education

122would lead a group of of educators of parents teachers students uh community members to to these offices to get this Mage across so that when we come upon the following month we'll have a very clear picture now this is something we need to do together I had an idea which I don't think the rest of the board necessarily agreed with was to have that basically with the passage of in uh of time last month the June ballot measure died which was our Salvation um at this point we really need to resuscitate the funding for public education so I was saying we should have a funeral procession um going from here to each of the offices of our legislators in in San Diego to let them know they have the choice of keeping alive or letting

123die we had our classified workers saying you know if this this worker doesn't show up if this person doesn't show up things are not going to operate the bues are not going to arrive the students are not going to be taken care of this is the reality uh and um I'm taking over the role of a previous board member to be the Doomsday um drama person uh to say this is you know we can be optimistic that the governor is trying really hard but it all depends on two people in the State Assembly and two people in the Senate who are live right here in Sanu County can change this and we need to hold them responsible thank you for your attention that was my board report I your time while you were out long

124no that's all right um normally you're very um concise Norm uh yeah uh just having um a lot of uh Community meetings and site visits um last night also attended the uh gifted and talented education District advisory committee meeting that was a really very constructive good opportunity for parents uh with a lot of children in our gifted in education program to uh have a dialogue with area superintendent um and and to learn more a little bit about educational opportunities and make sure that all of our children are realizing a Year's worth of growth and that we're measuring that and that we're working at helping teachers to become more effective through professional learning communities uh observing other teachers and also that we're you know looking at what does rigor mean in a classroom uh and sharing

125ideas so that we can actually continue to increase expectations on children academically um also working with Nelly Meyer on uh the progress towards uh classroom observation forms that are tied to California Teaching Standards that's very important to me uh that we have some consistency in the district towards making sure that we're helping to support teachers to get better and improve the quality of instruction in all of our classrooms thank you is Karen children sens here Karen could you please come up so uh I had the honor uh yesterday of uh uh representing our board at the uh National School boards Association um we received uh just a a terrific award from the Kennedy Center Alliance for the Arts as the uh National School District of the year uh for our uh commitment to uh uh

126music education Karen could you maybe talk a little bit about what this award uh is about oh my I sent you all this stuff um this is a very um prestigious award it is a a school board uh uh award this is not a VAP award this is a a national school boards Association award and a Kennedy Center for the Arts award it's coveted uh it comes with $110,000 um yeah um can we make sure that $10,000 goes to vaa yes yeah thank you no I've got the check you're not getting it no uh no uh we're going to be using that $10,000 to um uh fund a third grade exploratory visual art program next year for every third grader in the district and uh that is really cool um I've been wanting to do

127that for for a while this particular um award uh was very interesting because I know some of the people that have been telling me the progress of the award as you know we represented the state of California and that was as as far as I thought we were going to go because I mean you got you've got amazing cities with a lot of support but the Kennedy Center and the um National School boards Association panel of Judges were most impressed by three different things The Continuous support of the board over the last four to five years in face of 490 million dollar worth of cuts um the second one was the amazing amount of things that we do in the in the department from K through 12 extensively Dance Theater visual art and music it's

128not just music but it's all these different things all of the in-depth integration and the um and the um number of classes uh the types of courses that we involve our students in and the third one that they kept saying over and over again in in the judge's report was how do you do so much with so little and truly this the reason we can do so much with so little is because every single one of you up there in the school board the previous school board members everybody's that's sitting up there right now you understand you get it um the superintendent has been 100% behind the Visual and Performing Arts and it's not like we're the favored child or anything we are we are standards based instruction but it's good for kids and and

129it makes it helps kids achieve so that this is what this award is about and really I want to congratulate every single one of you up there because excellent job thank you so much Karen thank you for your leadership thank you to to everybody in the department and the entire uh we've got such a great uh community in support of music and the Arts in San Diego and it really is an honor and it was uh it was pretty amazing uh to to to hear uh folks honor our district uh specifically about you know what we've been able to do in the middle of the worst budget crisis that anybody's ever seen and it was terrific and the names of uh all five of us are on that Award of course the names of everybody

130in this District that educates kids every day should be on that award but also um two other names should be on that award and that's John debeck and Katherine Nakamura um who who who commitment to music and arts um was always steadfast so thank you again for thank you and I want to have it uh hung right outside your door please absolutely yeah thank you [Applause] thanks okay can we get our motions without the agenda please vote okay consent agenda uh besides items E7 e22 e24 e26 and e27 which were okay Miss Jackson wants to pull items E12 and e13 any other board members uh if not can we get a motion move the do we get a second uh all in favor please vote uh items E12 and e13 and we'll take those up

131at the uh end of the meeting okay let's move on to item F1 uh this personal financial literacy instruction superintendent thank you president perero um one of the things that we want to recognize as a valued part of a Young Person's education is financial literacy and uh we've been able to sustain that program with a partnership I think we've said that time and again tonight that the success in the district comes largely to how we link together with those in the community and I'd like to turn it over to Nelly who has brought a team together and you recogn nice a couple of faces uh from our past as well Janet yes it is my pleasure and honor to introduce the financial literacy team uh before I I bring up the first Speaker though I'd

132just like to uh share that within our 12th grade economics classes we teach this financial literacy course and the course has been recognized nationally as something that that we need and our students need and it was recognized pre- recession so now it is even more perent so with that I would like to introduce Matt Hayes who is our program manager in social science and he will start the presentation thank you Matt thank you good evening um president Barrera and distinguished board members um we're here tonight to present to you an overview of the district's personal financial literacy program um this the Board of Education actually adopted this curriculum unanimously on April 22nd of 2008 and so tonight we wanted to present to you with an update as to the um what's transpired since that was

133that was passed and really I'm going to step aside because I have with me a group of of community members and dedicated Educators who have been working on this program since its Inception in 2005 and they'll um talk about the littleit little bit about the history of this and where we are today I did um provide for your um benefit copies of the curriculum I brought them over to the board office office this morning so you can read them um in all your spare time um this evening um so you can get a little bit more background but without any further Ado I'm going to pass it off to um our retired director of community relations Janet Delaney and she'll talk about the history of this program welcome back thank you I just have to

134say I've just seen one of my former students when I was teaching yourself vilia Kang I don't know what I don't know your last name now oh my gosh she was a wonderful student it's been many years my name is Janet Delany and I retired from the district in June of 09 and uh am back again and gave 33 years of my life to the district and I love this district and I think it's a great one in uh 2005 the community relations department along with support from the school to Career office convened a meeting at Madison High School and it included teachers principes uh business partners nonprofits along with uh the the then presiding bankruptcy judge for San Diego we discussed how we could provide an instructional program that focused on personal financial literacy

135for 12th graders no single curriculum that we reviewed resonated with our teachers it was decided that we needed to develop our own curriculum and with that decision teachers wrote and field tested a curriculum that came to be called financial literacy The Game of Life teachers volunteered to to field test the curriculum and the units were revised based on teacher and student feedback and we found that this curriculum began to really resonate with our students and in turn they were sharing the information they were receiving with their siblings and with their parents for me this whole effort sprung from a very simple question that I posed to students a question that many struggled to answer and this basic question was what is the difference between a need and a want students were struggling with what the

136answer was to that question and then as Matt stated on April 22nd 2008 the Board of Education endorsed this curriculum because it was custom made by teachers here in this district and we were sharing it with students that were just soaking it in because these were life skills that they could take with them when they graduated so the committee's recommendation was that all San Diego unified seniors receive personal financial literacy instruction embedded in the 12th grade economics course currently in California there is no mandated curriculum on financial literacy however through our Partnerships between private and public organizations we believe we can get the word out and that this is needed our task force asks this board to please consider helping us Advance a bill to Sacramento making financial literacy a high school graduation requirement state

137Statewide embedded in the 12th grade economics class I want to thank you all for allowing us to present today I do want to say one thing that financial literacy is not only about the basic skills of balancing a checkbook or Computing interest rates but the ability to use that information to make informed decisions about one's financial future and stability I would like to thank uh superintendent Koba for meeting with our committee uh several weeks ago we appreciate that and I think he was also impressed with our curriculum special thank you to Nelly Meyer who has been with us from the get-go on this effort and to my former boss Bernie rhinerson who we met a few weeks ago and he also offered uh support um as well it is now my privilege to introduce uh

138John Hargrove thanks Janet president Pereira superintendent cooba and members of the board uh I'm Joan hardgrove um a retired bankrupcy judge and uh Christy Greg who's the vice president of community relations at US Bank was here earlier tonight she wanted to speak and she had another commitment so she asked me if I would read her statement to you and if you don't mind I'd like to do that right now again this is Christy Gray who's been a member of the task force from the uh beginning and she said the reason I got involved is this while it is much more obvious in today's economy why it is so important to make sure our kids graduate from high school knowing how to manage their money it was not as recognizable 5 years ago our economy was

139doing fine and we didn't think too much about it as to whether our kids knew what a FICO squirrel was or not some of us however including judge hardgrove knew the lack of financial education was going to come back and bite us coming from the banking world I also would see the struggle of customers of our bank their lack of knowledge about how to manage their money many banks provide Financial education curriculum to both adults and in the schools but it just wasn't enough and it obviously wasn't working young adults had the attitude that I want what I want when I want it they weren't thinking about how to pay the money back additionally there were surveys done by California jumpstart that indicated students who were tested for financial literacy missed more than 50% of

140the questions not a very good way to send them off to college or into the job market so in the fall of 2005 on a Janet Delaney's leadership and guidance we established this task force and I believe it was highly successful because we had all of the right people involved principles teachers School administrators community members and financial institutions and we were all of One mind that our students needed to be taught Financial education in the classroom by teachers the financial institutions as well as United Way have paid for the development and implementation of this curriculum it was a win-win for everyone involved now while we don't have the outcomes at this point I I would guess that the impact of this curriculum that was designed by teachers for teachers will pay high dividends in the

141future thank you for allowing us to keep us keep you appraised as to how we continue working to keep Financial education in the classroom where it belongs we welcome your continued support and hope you feel as we do that providing our students this curriculum we will make a difference in their lives and we will Empower them to be happy successful adults the way they want them to be that's Christy Greg and again she she uh wishes she was here she was earlier again now I'm I'm John harrove I'm a 39e plus resident of University City my three daughters went to University City High School and Mr Barnett I had the pleasure also a couple of weeks ago of sitting on the senior presentation boards I've done it for the past 5 years and I got

142to tell you I'm very impressed the the students prepare hard for these senior presentations and the communication skills are out standing so uh again I I Echo your comments I served as the United States Banky judge for 23 years I retired in January of 2008 and I be I became a member of this task force from its Inception in 2005 the reason I was asked by J Janet Delany I had started in the in the S die Unified School District The CARE program which was actually formulated by another judge in New York and Care stands for credit abuse resistance education and a bunch of Banky judges around the country saw the need to educate High School seniors about in this case credit cards and and credit scores we saw this huge ride a huge spike

143in the early 2000s uh of bankruptcies filed by uh people in the 18 to 24 year old age bracket and and the reason the culprit was credit cards these were young people most of them weren't married some had student loans but it was credit cards and as one commentator calls it demon credit cards the kids just didn't know how to handle credit cards responsibly so that that led me to start The CARE program which I still do I retired three years ago I am still involved uh in giving the presentations in the class care has been rolled into you might say this program book which consists of 11 lessons and one of them is credit cards the other one is FICO scores um I also want to advise you that one of the sitting judges

144now Judge Margaret man who she's been on the bench about a year is also interested in this program she has she's going to be involved too she wanted to be here today she could not because of a prior commitment um just one other point I found it kind of interesting Janet dely just gave me this information uh today or not today but this month is National financial literacy month there was a proclamation issued by the the president of Obama uh the top guy you might say and the Preamble reads this Americans ability to build a secure future for themselves and their families requires the navigation of an increasingly complex Financial system as we recover from the world economic crisis for the worst gener economic crisis in in the generations it is more important now to

145be knowledgeable about the consequences of our financial decisions uh I I understand you've been you've been given a copy of this book you probably have it back in your Chambers but uh read my opening quote in the front I I indicate that it is critical for students to increase their financial IQs they cannot afford to learn the lessons of financial personal finance the hard way the consequences are too great and as a Banky judge I've seen this uh the average college student carries a $3,000 balance on his credit card Deb here's a her credit card debt in addition most of them have student loans which they cannot get rid of in bankruptcy so they're faced with tremendous Financial burdens those who go to college and come out of college um we get the feedback with

146a with a poor credit score you have a very difficult time in getting a job you have a very difficult time in in buying a car so uh I urge you to continue your support of this excellent program I'm an outsider so as to speak I I know some of you were here in in 2008 when we made the same presentation so for you new members please uh continue your enthusiastic support for the program uh we on the outside particularly the Banky judges appreciate it thanks all right thank you judge harrove and thank you Janet and thank you Matt [Applause] we we're the tag team um at the end of that I'm Vicky Banks I'm a teacher with San Diego unified at Hoover High School and this is Ellen Towers a teacher with San Diego

147unified at San Diego High and we are two of the teachers who actually wrote and uh put together this curriculum so we just wanted to give you the update and hope that you will continue to support it right okay when we began this both Vicki Vicky Banks and I were career Changers so we had financial literacy and our backgrounds to make that career transition we began with the end in mind to make sure students all students should succeed in in the real world so many students were looking for the materials um most of the materials when we did look for them were based on Stu people that were already in trouble our students have the luxury at this time in their lives to learn before they get in trouble and that's what we worked on

148um we wanted to make it teacher friendly so we're both teachers and we've both taught the curriculum as well as people that fill in can teach their curriculum right out of the box we also did something Beyond this in collaboration with the parents we do in the back of the manual collaboration projects with the parents that are required for them to talk about budgeting for your senior year which cost on average between five and $500 to up to $1,000 that the parents open up the discussion most parents are more comfortable talking about sex than they are about talking about finances and we wanted to start that dialogue with the parents and finally um Vicki and I have been asked because of your support support of our curriculum we've been asked to serve on the state

149level they love our curriculum so much that they Jo asked us to join in writing curriculum for the Banking and Financial curriculum for the state level and we're going to be going up to Napa next week all right great um finally we just want to um tell you that as long as you continue to support us we're going to continue to update this curriculum it's currently has not been updated for the last couple of years and we have spoken to uh superintendent Koba and uh Deputy superintendent Meyer about those updates we are have plans right now it doesn't cost the board or the district anything we're getting our own funding through the United Way who has funded Us in the past we'll be updating the curriculum to make it current to 2011 putting it um

150available on the district's website and then hopefully also beginning to create uh lessons that can be incorporated into our new i21 technology so we're hoping for your support and and Janet would like me to mention again to um work at the state level to make it mandatory in the economics 12th grade class thank you thanks very [Applause] much okay that was an information item let's move on to item F4 and this is a revision to our policy to include specific anti-segregation language for education of home with students can we get a motion of course I move approval okay and we get a second any discussion just a comment certainly this is very important and given in our economic climate today we have more and more homeless students and I know this is required because we

151receive some funding for these students um but again um it's a necessary item that we make sure these students are getting the educational needs met as well thank you okay thank you uh please vote thanks okay on to item F5 this is the notice to remedy to promis Charter School superintendent thank you president BR if I could have Moses AI to come forward um what I'd like to do if I could have him stand for both F5 and F6 uh these are next process actions that we bring to the board tonight for approval with regard to correcting items that we have uncovered as a result of an investigation that two charter schools and turn over to Moises at this point appr good evening board members and super attendant this evening we have before you an

152action item to authorize staff to issue letters to remedy to promis Charter School in this particular item um as Charter Schools retain their nature as publicly funded educational institutions promised charter school is obligated to meet the requirements of its Charter comply with applicable laws operate in a fiscally responsible Manner and ensure pupil outcomes it set forth in its Charter the dist District as the chartering entity is responsible for monitoring promises compliance with these obligations which requires the district to take action in the face of deficiencies in the charter schools operations this is done by issuing a notice to remedy violations a public document that affords the charter school an opportunity to fix the violations it has committed if the charter school fails to do so the district May issue a notice of intent to revoke

153the charter earlier this year the district and the Board of Education were presented with information alleging serious and going misconduct by promised Charter School including but not limited to the issues with the Charter School's governance student discipline conduct toward staff Charter compliance principal qualifications health and safety of staff and student issues with the school site Council and fiscal management the district has conducted an extensive review of oper of promises operations including interviewing Witnesses regarding the allegations presented to the district requesting 25 different categor St of documentation from promise and thoroughly reviewing and analyzing all the documentation produced making site visits to promise under the district's statutory Authority as well the district's review revealed several violations of the charter the laws applicable to Charter Schools and fiscal mismanagement based on an evaluation of all the information

154gathered District staff has concluded the following promise committed material violations of its Charter by failing to comply with the Charter's element ments on the Charter School's English learner program extended instructional hours class siiz restrictions pupil outcomes governance School site Council administrator's qualifications staff evaluation and student discipline promise committed several violations of law including Charter Schools act Brown act corporations code conflict of interest laws child abuse reporting laws several provisions of the Education Code by which promise is bound constitutional Provisions is applied to school uniforms and federal education rights and Privacy Act promise engaged in serious fiscal mismanagement by failing to comply with governmental accounting and auditing standards failing to retain documentation of transaction summaries cash receipts and dispersement allocation of Title One funds of to legal fees by the ssse failure to maintain cash flow

155worksheets as well as engaging in various misconduct with financial implications and the magnitude of these violations calls into question promise's ability to meet or pursue the pupil outcomes as identified in his Charter given the seriousness seriousness of these violations on top of the fact that promise has been uncooperative with the district's efforts to provide oversight District staff believes that Swift action is necessary to ensure the protection of the parents and students who have placed their trust in this Charter School moreover the district's oversight obligations require it to take action in the face of violations of the charter and applicable law and fiscal mismanagement therefore District staff requested the board authorize staff to issue a notice to remedy to promise Charter School pursuant to the board's authorization of the notice to remedy promise will be obligated

156to remedy the cited violations by May 20th 2011 the district also requested the charter school to provide an update as to its progress towards remedying these violations by April 29th of 2011 depending upon the Charter School's response the district will determine whether further action up to and including initiation of revocation proceedings should be taken move approval second okay we've got we've got several speakers yeah um so I I'm going to limit uh testimony to one minute of piece Uh Kevin La Chappelle Sheila solorsano Marissa dragu Lisa banga Stephanie Hernandez good evening board members promise charter school is this successful charter school with one of the highest API scores in our community for 2010 keep in mind just months before this we received notification of being placed in program Improvement in 2010 we want to know

157what is behind the district's animous why is the district not championing our success during City School site reviews for two years Bill Taylor another promise board member and I were told of the systemic problems many of which you mentioned in this report and a lack of proper governance at promise even giving us advice on the changes needed in fact City Schools rep was present during our board meeting when a cting member was removed due to having a felony conviction for carjacking as soon as the self-appointed leader lobbied members of this board everything changed no longer was their cooperation from the charter school office it turned adversarial promis Charter School principal Mr Osco had made more progress in correcting the issues of this school than in its history of eight principles that most have been ousted

158I would ask the members of this school board to be objective and see that there's obviously more to this story than you have been told since members of this board began inserting itself in the day-to-day operations of promise it has undermined some of the needed changes interestingly you report false Mr Rosco for not having it ad been credential yet you approved that Charter information Amendment removing that requirement after Pam Clark made the change I ask you Mr Beretta and you Miss Jackson to reconsider your staunch loyalty to Pam Clark as she is the one who has orchestrated the alra of numerous former principles of promise I ask you for your cooperation for your time so that you can review all the facts and be impartial in this matter ask you to be fair and to

159provide this High achieving school with the support it deserves from his chartering agency how many more principles need to be asked before you realize that when you have someone willing to have the courage to change corate behavior that have been systemic for years you as a chartering agency should support that I was impacted this just real quick just a few more words I was impacted this evening with Mr Biser his passion for advocating for young people being bullied and for you Mr beta and all of your support throughout the state for funding issues and you guys take hits for those kind of things but you do it because you know it's the right thing to do even if it's not popular likewise Mr Osco and our board we knew we had to stop the conduct

160and stop the things that had gone on for years thank you all for everything you do for our students and for our families thank you good evening president barera superintendent board members my name is Sheila solorsano also known as Sheila Solara up until recently you have my address on file I am a retired administrator with over 30 years experience as a classroom teacher resource teacher curriculum writer both site and central office administrator and most of this of these years here with San Diego Unified School District currently I am working as a part-time teacher at the Ballard center with the district's par engagement and Outreach department and most recently I started working at promised Charter School Mr ooso enlisted my services to ass system with both the instructional and the academic components I have been working

161closely with Mr Osco for about a month providing my professional expertise as he continues resolving the numerous concerns he encountered upon accepting his position as principal of Promise Charter accepting this position has allowed Mr Osco and me together the ability to carefully analyze the situation and ISS isues at hand many of which are the same issues and concerns you have outlined in your recent letter to Mr Osco and the promise board these boy these are exact issues Mr Osco voiced to me when we first met and which we had I can say without reservation that based on my experience as an administrator working alongside with Mr Osco coaching him providing the necessary instruction to leadership the instructional issues in question can and will be resolved promise is moving towards being a compliant High performing child

162Center School with the academic progress and the welfare of every student is at the Forefront thank you okay good evening president barera superintendent and board members my name is Marissa dreu and I'm an attorney for promised Charter School um I'm I'm here to mention a few different things first of all I wanted to let you know that it really is very disappointing that this board has decided to go contrary to act contrary to theou and the district um in in not providing this 35 page legal document essentially this notice to remedy directly to the Charter or to its legal council now certainly there's no legal prohibition against this and the district uh can provide Public Access of this document as it wishes but it really doesn't evidence an investigation that's conducted in good faith and

163promise would really like to know from this District whether it's truly amendable to working with the school um and considering certain changes at this charter school or whether this is really just the unsighted um investigation or pretext to revocation also uh promised charter school is being asked to respond to this 35 page document in less than 30 days when the investigation of the district actually exceeded 60 days to conduct that just seems entirely unfair also promise would like to know whether the extent of the investigation and the demands being made of this school are being uniformally applied to all other Charter Schools as well thanks very much hi Lisa berlanga California Charter Schools Association um I too am disappointed um I actually supported the investigation when the charter schools called and were nervous said that

164the board is responding to parent concerns they have to do something so work with them on the investigation once the investigation's complete we can sit down and talk about the findings and work and that didn't happen there were no interim meetings there's been no communication we jump from you know complaints and investigation to very formal you're beginning the revocation process with these two Char schools and to my knowledge that has not happened in San die unified before um so we're missing a bunch of intermediate steps also in especially in promises remedy there's a lot of citations that we would not agree again overstepping this is the education code that charter schools have to follow and that are applicable as you see over here your general Council has the one that district schools have to follow

165there's a big difference in the size of ours and the size of yours so um I would ask that the the board make sure that all references to Ed code are actually applicable to Charter schools um promise has been struggling they've they've made great academic progress this year was significant over 800 but this problem did not start with Mr Rosco and Mr L Chapelle this been going on for a long time two two principles have not made it very long at the school this is something that's been ongoing and they need supportand School gracias good evening I'll be interpreting for step hello my name is Stephanie Hernandez I'm a seventh grader from promised Charter School good afternoon to everyone and thank you for giving us the opportunity to all the students something uh I never

166thought that you would pay attention to us I feel so humiliated that I did not want to go to school uh so again so once again I thank you my parents taught me to respect my elders and I do respect them uh I give them all my respect but when I am humiliated being called stupid abnormal and a liar they don't deserve my respect so and I thank my parents for supporting me I ask you to please help us to please help to get rid of Mrs Spears and principal Osco they have no because they have no ethic and they're always intimidating us all the time and so we ask you for your cooperation and thank you very very much hi good night to everybody um my name is Lorena Granda uh this is my

167child's first year of Promise uh promise was a positive choice for my family uh from the neighborhood school you know my daughter didn't have such positive experiences at our neighborhood school I am a product of San Diego UniFi School District I arrived to this country as an immigrant uh not speaking the language and I went to the neighborhood schools and I feel very strongly about not busting my child out of my neighborhood unfortunately she couldn't attend the the neighborhood school because like I said she had very negative experiences there and promise to my family was a very positive choice and I enjoy the commute me being able to drive my daughter and have it that right um in the morning um I know that changes always bring upon some sort of chaos and some sort

168of resistance I choose to remain neutral I am very shocked to see like the protest and the protesting outside of the school um at one point in time I did question the fact you know was I write to move my child from the other school to this school and hearing about all the problems um however I do choose to remain neutral and objective in this situation I do understand that change brings all this chaos but I also believe that change with planification clear objectives um collaboration from the parents the teachers the student the administrations can um and if we leave the past behind and acknowledge the fact that promised charter school does not belong to the old teachers or to the older students that the the community this the school belongs to the community and

169you know whether we're we're manipulating children to speak up and you know and and come up with stories you know I I don't want to hear it I'm coming in the mornings to drop off my child I want my child to not be scared to see all these people handing out flyers I don't want my child to feel intimidate I don't want to feel intimidated I don't want to question myself when I drop off my child on a public school um just to wrap it up um as a parent I trust that all parties in this matter carry themselves in a professional manner that both parties in this matter um keep in mind the focus that the children here the education of the children here it's at stake and I encourage the board members to

170please accept the remediations that uh the current Administration is proposing um I trust that the changes are going to be if they're embraced and and like I said it promotes collaboration it it can be worked out and you know charter school is a positive Choice like I stated for my family so please consider that thank you thank you okay Francisco Cortez uh Mariel Wrangle Jose Valencia uh Ramiro Batista Cindy Rios and Jose Orosco prom charters promise Charter School Spears the okay thank [Applause] you I'll be interpreting from Mel uh first of all good afternoon to all of you my name is marel Rangel and I am one of the 76 families that signed for a total of 128 stud students from promised charger School uh before anything uh thank you very much for listening to

171us to all the parents uh for all the problems that were occurring at the Charter School uh my children did not want to come to San Diego we came from Tijuana uh uh because of family problems but we have to come we have to come to San Diego and before enrolling my two students at any school I try to get information about where to enroll them and I got I had very good references from the for for the teachers and the school and I was very surprised that very soon after that my children after my my children started going to school the problems began uh for instance they fired Mr tiado teacher Mr tiado uh who was my daughter's teacher and who was an excellent teacher recommended by one of my nieces and so I'm

172not uh I did not enroll my daughter Stephanie Hernandez so that Mrs Spears could be humiliating her that way calling her stupid abnormal and a liar only because she doesn't understand her because my daughter is is barely learning a second language and so we taught our children to respect their the adults and the only thing that I ask is that you please change the school board uh to please remove principal Orosco and Mrs Spears and because of all the irregularities that have occurred what they do instead of protecting our students is that they see them as their enemies they are children and they feel intim they feel intimidated that is why we're asking you not to close the school as the rumors are saying we don't want that we don't want all the sacrific that

173the teachers made Mr tiado and Valencia and all the other teachers about going to our houses and inviting us to enroll our students we don't want all that to be thrown away and lastly what I want to tell you is that as a mother as a parent oh I'm sorry what I would like to say is to the mother of the of the one of the parents at the PTO meeting that called this ignorance I would like to tell her that if her children had been treated the way my children were treated they would be here as well thank you very much and again I repeat to you that we don't want you to close the school thank you [Applause] uh good evening my name is Ramiro atista par of two students of prary school

174in okay thanks thank you I would like to I'm interpret from Mr Ramiro uh I would like to publicly Express that representing more than 60% of the parents that represent apparently 76 families a promised Charter School our most sincere thanks for having listened to us and having listened to our voices we are convinced that taking immediate action on the recommendations that you have suggested our school will work work much better with more transparency legality respect and democracy and it will benefit the education of our students of our children we believe that with the irregularities the lack of respect towards students teachers and parents the illegality and the lack of discipline and abuses committed by the present Administration it is our children's academic development is being affected directly and being put into risk I will also

175like to we would like to avoid that our school be we would like to our school for not for our school to not be closed because of these irregularities corruption and abuses committed by miss sosco the president of the school board and the other members that is why we are here for you to correct all this and avoid that our school be closed we will work hard parents teachers and Community with transparency legality and respect to better every day the achievement the academic achievement of the students our goal is to reach and to reach and make better the grade the grade of 106 that was obtained last year thanks to the effort of the students and the dedication of effort of the uh teachers and the dedication of the students and not to Mr Orosco

176who is who this achievement is attributed to okay okay thanks thank [Applause] you good evening my good evening board members and superintendent my name is Francis Cortez this is my first year at promise Charter School well the reason I am here is to tell to let you know how I felt this last month when Mr I I felt like I I was learning especially math I was glad of myself when I got a 3.5 with Mr T when Mr Orosco told told us that we were going to be in two different groups because supposedly more than half of the class would had been failing I got sad because it was fun learning with Mr T after everything changed I felt like I wasn't learning with my new teacher name is Spears whenever someone needed help

177she would ignore them I wanted to talk to Mr Osco but he didn't listen one day he told me to get out of his office I got mad because how does he want me to respect him if he doesn't give me the right to to tell him how I felt one day miss bearce miss bearce was told me that she was going to suspend me and three of my other friends also she was going to suspend my friend Elizabeth because she HD herself and I just started laughing she sent me to the office with Mr with Mr Osco to talk and he suspended me for for 2 days I expect him to take away that suspension from my record I'm not going to let him ruin my future Miss bear is not a great teacher

178but Mr Rosco makees it seem like he's she's a professional in for Middle School how can someone suspend me for just laughing for me that's the most lame reason to suspend someone right now with Miss Spears I have 3.0 but I have 3.0 because she make us do like she make us thanks Francis good job thank [Applause] you my name is Cindy Rios I was AUD student in promise charter school for 6 years promise was the kind of school you wanted to get up early in the morning for everyone was like a second family to me if you ever had troubles at home going to school was the best way to forget about it I loved going to school and not every eighth grader can say that this school was unlike other schools learning was

179actually fun the teachers taught us fun methods to remember facts in our stud in our studies the teachers actually cared about our grades they would give us extra help if we needed it it was great when Mr Osco came to promise as principal for the first time he was kind and polite however the next school year he had changed completely he punished us for not wearing uniform when last school year he really didn't enforce the uniform policy he punished Us by making us stand in a line no matter what the weather was hot cold or raining we as he had said himself we had to stand in that line he changed the school completely students voices weren't being heard most of the time he wouldn't let let us speak and when he did he would

180change the subject because of his disrespect towards others and me and the way he is slowly tearing our family apart I left the school I hope for the sake of my younger brother and sister that promise can go back as it's caring loving and academically challenging environment thank you for listening thank [Applause] you um good evening board members and superintendent my name is Valencia I have been teaching for 14 years this will be my ninth year teaching at promise Charter School um first of all I'm here to thank you for conducting the investigation and validating the concerns of many parents and teachers of Promise charter school so thank you um I'm also here to let you know that at all my years I promise this has been the most difficult to endure I have witnessed

181the destruction of a promising learning environment a wonderful environment that took eight years to create an environment that consisted a high academic expectations and outstanding collaboration um the current administrator together with the support of the current Bo pushed 29 of our top performing students right out of our school this were students whose parents spoke out against his dictatorship and furthermore in January the administrator together with the board chose to let go of an experience dedicated Seven Grade teacher a teacher who have been with the promised Community for the last seven years no reasons given just because they could um lastly it took eight years of hard work and dedication from students parents and teachers to surpass the API of 800 right and I find it shameful that a brand new administrator with no administrative credential

182and no teaching experience has tried to take credit for all the hard work in our accomplishment of 806 this 806 belongs to the students parents and teachers thank you [Applause] thanks good evening board members uh superintendent Bill Koba my name is Jose Rosco and I am the principal for promised charter school I have read the report and I found that many of the allegations are false but there are others which at some point were true but we have already corrected them since I started last year we have brought proper governance fiscal stability and increased our student achievement before you take action tonight please consider the effects of your timeline our students in in a few weeks will initiate their STAR testing during that time our teachers and students need to be focused as it is

183important that they succeed on their exams that's what they've been preparing for the last several months given us 28 business days to to respond to a 35-page report it will put unnecessary stress to our teachers our students and hence the deadline is [Music] unreasonable I ask that you consider this this this time and I ask that you consider the approach to our charter school as it is aggressive and is unfair as well thank you okay we've got a motion and a second to approve the staff recommendation any further comment from board members uh Mr Barnett excuse me um first of all I just want to State I guess for the record that I have in the last several weeks met on two occasions once with um several promise teachers and parents at their request and

184then also with principal arasco at his request and told them I listen to their concerns which I did and um um but I think it's also important to know that the district's action tonight is not to revoke the charter the district's action tonight is to ask that responses be made to violations that our staff found in their investigation and I expect that there will be a good faith effort to respond to these allegations and it's all part of our fact finding process in order to make a uh objective uh decision bottom line clearly there's a lot of dysfunction going on at the school I don't know what the ultimate blame responsibility issue is but when you have a school that's just divided there's something wrong and we need for the kids benefit to to ultimately

185resolve that so I do support the motion and I urge the uh staff of and the board of promised Charter to act in good faith to respond to all the issues we've raised and then I along with the other board members would review those um when they returned thank you any further comment if not please vote V for for the staff recommendation yeah okay [Applause] let's move on to item F6 item F6 this is the notice cedy uh Harriet tubin Village Charter School what us again good evening board members and superintendent um the district received information alleging serious misconduct at Tubman Charter School and accordingly the district initiated a review of Tubman's operations based on an evaluation of all the information that was gathered um District staff concluded that tman committed material violations of its

186Charter um by failing to comply with the charter elements on governance and brown act compliance and tman committed other violations of law including Charter Schools act Brown act corporations code and educational employment relations act so given the seriousness of these violations District staff believes Swift action is necessary for the benefit of parents and students who have placed their trust again in this Charter School moreover the district's oversight obligations required to take action in the face of violations of the charter and applicable able law in L of Tubman's violations of Charter of the charter and the law District staff requests the board authorize the superintendent and staff to issue the notice to remedy pursuant to the board's authorization of the notice to remedy T will be um obligated to remedy decided violations or respond by May

18713th of 2011 depending upon the Charter School's response the district will determine whether further action is required at that time approval got a motion in a second we've got uh again several speakers that will limit to one minute a piece Lisa berlanga Michelle me Bo Paul leedman Lydia shinsky Elizabeth Morris thank you president barer Lisa berlanga California Char schools Association um I'm glad to see that the two schools have been separated all along it's been one issue it's not one issue it's two separate schools with two separate issues the report's pretty obvious the there's big differences between the two um again a little disappointed this in particular I think could have been resolved in a much less formal way when it gets to this point it's a remedy to notice it requires attorneys Charter Schools

188don't have a lot of money to pay for attorneys but now they're forced to spend money they're in the same budget situation you are on attorneys to resolve what you have presented with them um again I wish there had been informal communication before this step um one of the issues that cited in here is the lack of of a contract between the teachers and the teachers union and Tubman and one of the reasons for that is that the union is suggesting that Tubman s accept the SDA contract that was developed for the district the district is 130,000 students correct in 180 schools that contract does not fit Tubman of 300 students and 20 some staff members Tubman deserves their own contract and that's not falling on Tubman that's something that needs to be worked out

189good evening my name is Michelle me um I or we are speaking in favor of item F6 because this is such an important statement about the future of Tubman Charter we love our school we our parents and our students demonstrate our commitment to Tubman through our hard work and many accomplishments Tubman is a wonderful school and there is a strong support in our community for these changes we truly appreciate your hard work on our behalf in bringing forth this report these changes will help our school thank you for demonstrating that the voices of parents and teachers matter in San Diego unified we all want fairness and justice for our school thank [Applause] you hi my name is Bo Morman and I'm one of the PTSA presidents and I have a fourth grader it's my first

190year there I'm here in support of principal Lydia sinsky at Tubman Charter um the school was moving in a positive direction and scores have went 88 scores have went way up I thought everything was great until the fall of 2010s when the teachers and Union uh members dropped the bomb on the parents at the school saying that Mrs sinsky was unfair and unjust I went to the teachers first meeting with the agreement that it was not going to be a he said she said High School drama which it was there was so much drama there I thought Snookie was going to show up a couple of parents told some stories that did not hold water I personally thought it was a form of a Lynch Mob I returned to the school the next morning spoke

191with Mrs sinsky she easily Justified all the misinformation as far as the union goes I dropped off my son one morning in front of the school there were teachers and Union people handing out flyers that were negative and had missed information I thought it was unprofessional and had no class it was no secret to the students that there was major issues between the teachers and Mrs sinsky but running up to my car and handing me a flyer and trying to explain what they were doing before my fourth grader got out of the car I thought it was in poor taste um okay thank you very much okay just to let the board know that all the people holding up signs there there are no Tubman families up there my name is Lydia sinsky and I

192am the proud principal of Harriet Tubman Charter than thanks to our board's hard work and commitment to putting our children first our Ada has increased from 244 to 270 in just under 2 years this is phenomenal while the district is laying off hundreds of teach teachers Tubman will be adding two more teachers to our staff 20 hours of counseling Avid schoolwide and hopefully Sports Tubman is offering our teachers higher salaries than the district and hopes to soon offer annual bonuses to entire Tubman staff for meeting our academic Targets this year our goal is to become an 800 School Tubman assures you that we will fully cooperate with the district and comply with the requirements of its Charter and the law and we are respectfully requesting that the board delay approval of this notice to remedy

193so that Tubman can work collaboratively like we have in the past with the Charter office and to amend and discuss the vague and ambiguous findings the draft notice to remedy violations does not comply with the legal requirements of this stage of revocation procedure Ed code States a charter may be revoked by The Authority that granted the charter if the authority finds through a showing of substantial evidence the emphasis here is substantial evidence legally required Not Mere allegations as written the draft notice to remedy includes no substantial evidence the district identifies a number of alleged violations of the brown act the corporations code the E the charter and the bylaws but does not provide any supporting documentation or evidence for the board to review issuance of the notice to remedy without remedy of any evidence is

194a violation of the law additionally the draft notice to remedy violations contains a number of vague statements of alleged violations for example there are no factually supported violations articulated under the E findings there are only references to alleged complaints and there are no specific facts presented with regard to alleged board composition violations without the specifics of the alleged violation of the law Charter Tubman will be enabl to respond appropriate to the district's notice this is an unfortunate example of being failure to comply with theorum yeah I got to really agree with that [Applause] good evening distinguished members of the board my name is Paul leedman I'm a parent of three children and also I'm a board member at harri Tubman Village Charter School first of all I would like to thank this board for giving

195Tubman's Administration advanced notice about today's agenda item and for acknowledging that Tubman has made significant strides in student achievement and financial soundness we are excited about upcoming State Testing because we are confident that Tubman's children will knock the csts out of the park when children's interests come first schools like Tubman prove that the gap of achievement can and will be closed Tubman assures you that we will fully cooperate with the district and comply with the requirements of its Charter and law we are respectfully requesting that the board delay approval of this notice to remedy so that Tubman be given the opportunity to work with District staff to amend and discuss the vague and ambiguous findings I would like to point out that because Tubman is not presented with the final outcome of the the investigation

196nor has Tubman been provided an opportunity to respond to any conclusions made by the investigator there are factual inaccuracies the notice to remedy Tubman would like the opportunity to work with the District staff to correct those factual inaccuracies in addition we hereby respectfully request a copy of the completed final investigative report which is apparently forming the basis of the draft to thank you very much thank you Elizabeth Morris good evening my name is Elizabeth Morris I have been a proud parent at Tubman for 4 years I got involved with the board because I was I saw how my children's school was failing I feel Lydia and the board are picking up the pieces of the past administration's mismanagement many of the specific Brown act findings took place over a year ago when Tubman had a

197different board president Tubman took huge strides in correcting its practices since Linea came on board ada8 scores have are up enrollment is up as well as attendance people need to stop looking for problems that are not there and we need to move forward and focus on what's important the children's education and for the record as well there are no other Tubman parents here with the signs we keep getting put in with promise and we function differently we two different schools thank [Applause] you all right Dell UB Banks Maran does and Sher Wallace hello War members my name is dorsel Yanks and I'm a parent of two children at Harriet tutman school I am here again to tell you that the Harriet tutman parot committee stands firmly behind Tubman's current governance board and its principal I

198am also disgusted by the fact that the teachers in their Union would rather see such a great school shut down just because they don't have any of their Union buddies running our school I am also sick and tired of Union people passing out fers when nothing belies on them trying to scare parents into believing that there are problems at our school the only problem is the fact that Miss Shan a third grade teacher at our school is trying to get on our Tubman's board I'm here to tell you that no teacher that says the word Niger to third graders deserves to be on Tubman's board my daughter came home devastated that day based on her teachers poor judgment and exposing my child and other third graders in that class to the word and she said

199n ggr without parent or an Administration consent kids are calling each other on the playground because they heard a teacher say it thanks very much your time African-American committee was strongly picked against such an ignorant teacher joining tman board unfortunately if people are going to continue to disrespect the time when on I'm not disrespect is my last thing that I'm going to say I think that teacher should have been fired for her inappropriate behavior thank you okay good evening my name is minin does and I'm no stranger to San Diego UniFi um I want to address the comment of violations of Charter provision uh by the board one I am the only teacher that is on the board and it states that uh the only teacher on the board of directors does not meet the

200requirements to be on the board and I just want to set the record straight that my qualifications are that I've been employed by Tubman Charter School for two years I've uh been the ELD teacher the music teacher and a classroom teacher also helped with the recruitment of preschoolers to be enrolled at Tubman um I also want to uh say that I have helped in fundraisers and as well as academic uh proceedings at the school so this statement is is false and I want to set the record straight thank you thank you hello my name is Sher Wallace I'm the Harriet Harriet tutman board secretary I just wanted to say that the brown act findings happened when the old chair president was there I agree that we need to approve our agendas and meetings and with

201me as the board secretary that's what I'm working on to approve our agenda and meetings all I'm asking is that you give us a chance to do so thank you thanks very much okay we've got a motion in a second to support the staff recommendation any further comment if not please just one com I mean I I think people need to understand that there was was an investigation done in both these schools um our charter school office has diligently looked into this um this is not a statement for or against any particular person or any particular faction there were findings uh of the charter school office and these uh there are things that need to be remedied and both of these schools have been given notice so I approve I approve support uh giving notice

202to these schools when they have violated uh what they are required to do okay thank you please vote okay [Applause] can we get a uh one motion for item you want to G2 the consent agenda board consent agenda oh we we do not well I hav got a comment on okay so let's do you want to separate him then yes okay so let's take G1 approval of minutes move for approval second okay any comment on the approval of minutes okay okay item G2 uh propess I COC bylaws we have a motion to approve second okay Miss Jackson um I just want to go on record again um I I disagree that um we the people in San dieo that voted for our prop s the oversight committee and this board now is tonight confirming it

203I I can't support having the business person that represents us on the ioc or the taxpayers person not having to reside in this District I think that it is a travesty because we went out to the voters of San Diego and we asked them to to support us in it's proper s measurement it is is their money it's our taxes but we're telling them the people overseeing this can come from anywhere and I disagree with that I just want to be on record saying that so I would not support this measure thank you Mr Jackson bylaws any further comment if not please vote on item G2 did we get a motion yes all right please vote on GT we already voted okay uh why don't we take a 5 minute break and then we'll get

204to the the meeting we don't have that much more left you guys want to keep going yes all right all right all right so um then a very quick update on the tiger teams Mr Biser 30 seconds quick tiger team update yes sorry the uh superintendent was whispering and passing notes and um and you were and I used to get caught in school doing that um tiger team is that an item yes okay the tiger team uh will um have a general meeting on Saturday the 16th at 1:00 at the Ballard Center and those tiger teams who are have completed the recommendations will give them to the whole group and anyone who wants to attend at that point and then they will uh come to the board of education at a follow meeting and there

205are other tiger teams still in earlier stages and encourage anyone who wants to attend it's 1:00 to 3:00 on Saturday the 16th at the Ballard parent center right any no no Roar okay the next item I'll go ahead and start um certainly this is just a small item and what I'm asking the board members to support is that if we have any districtwide surveys not the ones that we do at schools just to you know departments but if we have any districtwide surveys that need be brought to the board for approval prior to them being released to the public okay do we have a second okay we got a motion and second any comment Dr yes um I know that there's been problems sometimes with certain surveys and so forth but I I I see

206this as as micromanagement that the board members have to be provided with any survey that was given the district I think should be accessible and available and I think we have to trust the discretion of the superintendent and dispersing surveys okay any further comment on this motion if not please vote okay that measure passes 3 to2 okay um formation of ad hoc committee on District liabilities yes um the as this board and passports know this district has Beyond its just budget issues uh significant amount of long-term liabilities from deferred maintenance of over $700 million regular routine maintenance Fleet placement and maintenance um the issue of i21 sustainability will we have money to um continue the program when the funds run out and other areas so the recommendation is is that we actually form an ad

207hoc committee um which would have the um which would come up with a plan and in dealing with all these and then of course would come back to the board of ation to um to uh for approval and implementation because obviously it all comes down to Dollars and cents I will second your motion and I would join the committee as one of the board members that's okay with you great all right uh let's take the motion that's that's a good thing to volunteer we've got a motion in a second to to develop the committee any further comment besides Miss Jackson just briefly I mean I do agree that one of the things we've done is we've moved money around from one place to another to kind of get by and we at least have need

208to have it very visible what is suffering in terms of physical plant and so forth um while we're making these other Cuts so I think that's very important support uh president B I just make maybe a comment or observation clarification do you want to include liabilities or put the term unfunded in front of liabilities it's some it has a different interpretation in the accounting both some other things there are in the general accounting practices do talk about unfunded liabilities I don't know if that was a factor at all did you have any motion I'm sorry well I mean we obviously there are there are liabilities uh as far as we're self-insured and issues such as that um I wasn't necessarily looking at those was that the type of issues you were I know just point

209of clarification um talking about our ongoing maintenance of facilities um well and also there may be I don't know what other liabilities there may be in in healthcare and other things l so those are I've been waiting for this moment okay good and so I think at this point let the committee come back and and I would I would enjoy serving with Miss Jackson too if the board is uh is so um let's do this let's um let's approve let's approve the committee I've got a motion in a second to approve the committee and I move for the appointment of Barnett and Jackson to the committee I would second that motion and they cannot resign can we can we get a vote on our first whatever this okay now Dr Evans making a motion to

210have Miss Jackson and Mr Barnett serve on the committee I second that any further comment you're not voting on your own appointment to the committee V really all right okay item H4 I am bringing back back uh a motion that I made at the last meeting and I second any further comment or discussion if not uh Dr this is a restoration of uh service using 7.3 million yeah yeah this is to resend pink slips some of them some okay any comment I can't support the motion it's it's to me it's imprudent to make any decision of this sort at this time given the fact that we are facing another 50 million of likely Cuts we don't even know what the governor's May revise is and it's just it's imprudent uh to make this decision at

211this time in this uh ad hoc way so I can't support the motion I will let a comment for just a second um well I I do understand the magnitude that it's facing as far as the budget crisis is concerned but what this motion actually does is we're providing we're providing funds to cover a decision we've already made this is not so we are resending those that are within this particular uh uh 7.3 million the other thing is that and we haven't been as vocal certainly about this Redevelopment funds but the builders and I'm not oppos to people building building and providing jobs but they have taken money from students for far too long and we cannot provide an educated Workforce if the people that have the ability to take money from students continue taking

212money from students and this is our first step I hope our first step in getting money back from the Redevelopment people for our students okay we've got two speakers let me call the speakers up and then we can continue our discussion uh Sarah gerlene and Sylvia Alvarez well I've been here so long now I lost my notes but I I will make my remarks anyhow uh my name is Sarah gurling 3643 37th Street I will be having um a new kindergartener Marcus I brought him with me tonight he's going to be starting hopefully at the neighborhood School Cherokee point this is not my first time um that I will be engaging the uh City Schools my 19-year-old daughter who just started uh this is her second semester at city college um was the first kindergarten

213class of Cesar Chavez Elementary the year that school opened up so the reason I'm here is because here we go again I I want to make sure that this little guy has every opportunity to have that engagement with the teacher and to the extent that you all can make the decisions here that the public can trust um that that you were elected to do this job and to look out for little guys like Marcus and all the other little guys um that need to have that interaction that that's him um we we want you to do that we will support you and um the community will stand behind you however difficult it is I think I speak for many parents who don't want to see our uh schools suffer those um losses of good teachers

214um you know what it does to student morale to the teachers themselves when they get those pink slips so I understand Mr Barnett your um you know concerns uh but I also as a parent want to urge you to consider um tonight's vote um that what you can do now to alleviate that kind of anxiety that we're feeling um as we you know get ready to register our kids this year for next school year thank you very [Applause] much hello my name is Sylvia Alves I'm the chapter president for the office technical Business Services Unit chapter 788 and as I look at this I just wanted to um ask you to as as you consider restoring I'm reading your the agenda item restoring of services to students and as you and the board work with

215the superintendent to restore essential services to students I ask you for this time at least once to re consider restoring some of the classified positions because we are essential workers thank you okay so uh Dr Evans yes okay um first I want to make very clear I mean these these Redevelopment funds definitely do need to go into our educational programs and that so that is going to uh happen no matter what we decide on this uh particular item as far as how it is used uh my concern is and I think we had a comment about someone going to kindergarten who is not going to be affected by this I want to be able to restore all 300 of the uh K to3 teachers have been laid off as well as other staff uh ranging

216from uh nursing to music and other programs and the the point at which we can do that is when we know how much money we have to work with we're just shooting in the dark at this point when we're saying okay we've got some money here we've got $7 million here but we may have $80 million taken away over there and so for that reason um I support the idea I just believe uh for the interest because one of the problems too is if you restore 100 uh that does not mean that the same first grade teachers and the same classes in the same schools are going to be there there's going to be a big shuffling around if we're able to restore all of them they will stay in the same classes at the

217same schools and it will particularly help the hardest hit schools so that that's the reason why I'm voting against it now but I am supportive it um when we have our revised budget in in May forther comment yes um to the lady that spoke um with Marcus I I have two daughters who attend San Diego Unified Schools and both of them told me they came home and their teachers said they got pink slips um it's affecting all the grades in in the school the question is how do we resolve the overall problem what this action does tonight is take money in this year's budget $7 million in a piggy bank in this year's budget and saying we're going to spend it for next year's budget when we've already been told by our by our financial

218director that we think we already have a $9 million shortfall in this year's budget and we're saying we're going to allocate it next year and that's be and that's just without looking at the big picture this is one of the reasons we are in this mess now is because in the board's honest genuine desire for years to say we don't want to hurt our kids and don't want her teachers make shortsighted decisions which ultimately hurt us more in the long run and at some point um we need to get real and maybe have that financial management class that we're offering uh students that members of the board should look at these issues as well so it's just I agree with the motives I did not support the layoffs but I think this way of restoring

219them is is is very likely that within 30 to 60 days with another $50 million cut coming that they're just going to have to be undone again so it it's just imprudent okay with any further discussion please vote okay that motion sorry Scott did you mean to yeah clear CLE CLE clear the board we'll clear the board and vote again what is it the red one no Scott it's the green one uh Kevin can you vote no we W two two two two all right one more time how am I suppos the green button there we go all right excellent motion passes okay let's move on to um item H5 I'm not going to approval okay and do we have a second second all right I won't read this in detail however I will say

220this um obviously we're in and we've got a we've got one speaker obviously we're in difficult uh a difficult situation right now and that is creating current tension uh that's unfortunate but understandable between this board and this Administration and uh several of our uh of our employee groups and our in our uh unions um but let's be clear about one thing we uh earlier uh this morning we were talking about um Kevin made the point and told a story about you know I can't wait till this recession is over um the point is this recession is over and has been over for a long time for some people in fact some people never experienced the recession they are the people who caused the recession they're the people who gambled with other people's money and threw

221the economy into a tail spin and subsequently taxpayers bailed them out and they're sitting on record profits today uh and and are doing nothing to help us out of this situ ation that they caused and with that reality we hear day after day attacks on paraeducators and uh office workers and custodians and counselors and nurses and teachers and I bus drivers and I apologize landscapers I apologize for who I'm leaving out and nurses and police officers and firefighters uh as if the people who serve us every day and in the case of our school district the people who take care of kids every day are responsible for this economic situation that we're in there's an awful lot of rhetoric going out there that blames the people who serve us every day for the problem and

222therefore the argument goes the way we get out of this problem is by further cutting wages health benefits pensions of the people who serve us every day and I think it's important for us as a board to on this issue to stand up with our workers and make a clear statement that the people who are going above and beyond and we talked earlier about you know San Diego unified getting this national award for music and arts education and doing so much with so little the people who are doing so much with so little don't deserve to be attacked for creating the economic situation that we're in and it's a it's a small thing that I think that we can do here in passing this motion but it is a statement from this board that we

223acknowledge and honor and are grateful for the work that we see every day from our public employees we're honored and we're grateful for the work of other public employees to keep our kids safe to keep our kids healthy and let's keep some attention here on what we need to do as a society to get ourselves out of this crisis and it's not to bring the hammer down continuously on the people who are doing right by our kids it's to bring some focus on the people who put us in the situation in the first place so that's the point of this uh of this resol soltion and we've got one uh one speaker Lance Ren thank you very much I'll be brief um I have never spoken in favor of a a resolution or anything that

224you've done here before agenda item so uh I wanted to speak on this one very much because it's it means a lot to my heart and uh Universal Declaration of Human Rights that um was adopted by the United gen nation's General Assembly December 10th 1948 says that everyone has a right to join trade unions for the protection of his interests and uh the words of Dr Martin Luther King the labor movement was a principal force that transformed misery despair into hope and progress out of its bull struggles economic and social reform gave birth to unemployment insurance old old age pensions government relief for the destitute and above all new Agee levels that meant Not Mere survival but a tolerable life the captain captains of industry did not lead this transformation they resisted it until they

225were overcome when in the 30s the wave of Union organization crested over the nation it carried to secure Shores not only itself but the whole society it is not teachers custodians that caused this problem it is not secretaries it is not Librarians you're right it was as Martin Luther King Jr said it was the captains of industry they're put they put our nation at Peril and today they put our children at Peril and what we will do is we will resist and we will fight them as we did in the 30s we will fight them because bargaining with our Employers in the 1930s causes us the greatest pro prosperity in this nation through the 50s and 60s and we have destroyed that ever since but we will overcome thank you Dr I just want to

226make a comment I know that um during this time when there's a lot of difficulty with bargaining units in terms of this this massive uh layoff issue that may seem a little strange to be bringing this up at this time but I think it is really important important that the board is recognizing the right of all of the the workers within this District to uh to or to be organized and collectively bargain I I remember some years back uh in the early 8 ' 80s in Poland a communist Nation where everybody was uh obviously a public government worker uh and they rose up at the shipyards for their right uh to organize uh I think it's unfortunate the situation in Wisconsin where they're having difficult budget situation and they to ask for certain concessions that

227at the same time they're asking to do away with um collective bargaining rights we have entered into negotiations previous previously with our bargaining units and have gained uh concessions which have uh saved our classrooms and helped our kids and at other times when we may even ask and have asked our bargaining units to uh reopen contracts and talk about concessions and so forth but that is far different than um doing away with their right to do that doing away with their right to to um protect their rights and and to agree or not to agree what we propose so I think this is a very timely thing that we need to speak up and do and clarify no further comment please vote okay thank you okay Dr Evans this is another actually is is an

228issue about uh recision of layoffs and it is is is something that doesn't cost any money and we had discussions about this with staff um prior to the layoff notices and uh and have continued on since I am not satisfied with the basic state standards of um uh a very conservative approach in terms of uh calculating attrition in regards to layoffs and just taking the uh the ultimately safe route of of noticing more people that uh then uh need to be notified uh I I know it is a complicated issue uh but it's but it's also very that it's not as simple as if one teacher resigns or retires that that means one less layoff because it depends what kind of teacher uh retires or resigns or leaves the district in some other way but

229I do want to really direct this my motion is basically to direct the superintendent and the staff to regularly check the attrition figures in terms of what teachers have announced that they are result resigning what classified certificate everyone who has um besides uh resigning who has announced they're going to retire and at that point be able to immediately issue uh a recision of one layoff notice for each uh each person that does that and that's for right now up until the time when we're really getting close to develop the budget at which point we need to do a projection of how many a a reasonably calculated projection of how many people will continue to uh resign or retire otherwise separate from the district so that we are not laying off more people um than we

230need to lay off so so I my my emphasis here is that this needs to be scrubbed very carefully and that's why I'm asking the superintendant and Senior staff to work with human resources and go through this line by line and come back to each meeting between now and the time we adopt the budget with a report on on the attrition within the district and how many um layoff notices can be rescinded as a result of that and to take immediate action those a sec second that and making sure that we do include the classified people I heard you mentioned that but I want to make sure that that is included as well that they are that exactly it classified and certificated certificate I was using the example of the the teachers as only an

231example but for all employees and certificate and classified okay we've got one speaker David Fernandez good evening uh David Fernandez California School Employees Association otbs bargain unit staff person um Miss Jackson I do appreciate that last comment because that is something that we have fought this District um for pro I've been the staff person here in unified for 5 years and it's a reoccurring theme that each year uh the board lays off close to anywhere between 80 to 100 otbs vacant positions and this these positions usually become vacant because of retirement or because the district sits on on those positions um I just wanted because this got brought up um on one of the tiger teams um I as you guys scrub the more information that comes out um I've been noticing about the hourly

232work that's going to be budgeted for the 2011 and 2012 year I believe in one of the um tiger teams there was about a $1.5 million line item for actual hourly work for the 2011 2012 so as this goes with that I hope that you guys look for the 2011 2012 as you scrub the information of how much hourly work because um president Alvarez and I we do get a report each month and with those vacancies that do not ever get filled there's typically anywhere between oh I don't know maybe like 100 to 200 different names on those list of otbs hourly people that are working in our positions and some of these positions go back as I've said before and other staff or board meetings have gone back almost for a year and a

233half that these positions have gone vacant if there's a need for the position we should be filling it thank you thank you and just very quickly cuz I know you want to move on uh certainly and I can only speak for this particular board member we have had a time in our past history that we used a lot of hour Le rather than paying giving people jobs and and allowing them to work and I hope that we're not going back to that because we have a budget crisis that we're laying off people but in return we're going to bring a lot of hourly back on board so I hope that part is not true absolutely we are safeguarding that and regrettably I have to tell you that we've had to cut into the hourly program

234so there are no options left but even for those that are available we're going to be mon those very very carefully no further comment please vote great thank you Dr Evans okay M I'll make this quick too um in order for us to be uh more transparent and to allow vetting of items that come before the board for stakeholders and staff I'm asking that proposed items on the open Agenda presented by the superintendent and or board members be agendized as a first reading uh and uh first for first reading and then agendized for action with the exception of consent agenda items and informational items okay is there a second to this motion uh like no second okay we'll move on to item h8 Mr Brett as this board knows and the public knows the the

235interim budget that we approved has approximately $115 million of cuts in it and that's the layoffs and reductions of services and all the other horrific things that people have been testifying understandably against U this evening and for the last several weeks um but I think there's a ter I don't I hate to swim in Dr evans's Pond but isn't there a term in cycle analysis called reality testing uh at some point where we need to okay at some point we need to face reality the the tax measur is not on the June ballot if it is put on a subsequent ballot it won't be a tax extension anymore it will be a tax increase the taxes expired June 30 um even if it's put on um once again I supported those being on the ballot

236I would have supported the extension of them but we have a very clear likelihood that we're going to have4 to 50 million of additional Cuts in next year's budget there's a additional 12 billion at the state as much as I hope they say no more cuts to education and suspend don't suspend prop 98 they can't find $12 billion without doing it but you know what they're going to do what they're going to do what I'm saying is that we need to at least start preparing for what before we called the Doomsday scenario and now I think is the more realistic scenario that we're going to have to face another $50 million of of reductions of revenues from the state of California and to that end what I'm asking is that this board direct the staff

237in preparing the budget for next year that they develop a variety of Alternatives which recommend how to deal with the additional $50 million or the reduction of $50 million to us from the state and that be brought back to us as part of it because we have very short timeline left and we have to start dealing with these issues in reality and so all I'm saying is let the staff make sure we direct the staff to actually look at what is the real reality likely to occur now so if we do have to deal with this it's not going to be as reactive and that might include significant additional reductions in transportation it may include closing schools it may include cutting a lot more programs that we all support but we can't ignore the fact

238that it is now a very likely scenario and we have to do our job and that means looking at those Alternatives so so what I'd like to ask is that we uh direct staff in developing the uh 1112 budget um develop a variety of Alternatives which would recommend how to deal with an additional reduction of $50 million in in state revenues and bring that back as as part of the budget process okay is there a second to Mr Barnett's motion I will have uh I will second that motion in terms of directing the staff to uh begin investigating that so that we're not um scrambling at the last minute if we're in in such a situation and I think furthermore it we need to as we're leading up to June we really need to look

239at a two-year picture in terms of what's going on between now and this year and next year because you know we could do something in June and be right back in September talking about reducing it again so I I think it's important to to consider that and and also it's as important too to um um let the public know what the possibilities are um I mean I've continually said it's impossible um to do with another $50 million but I think it makes a little more real to say this is what it would look like uh with $50 million uh more of cuts uh the public needs to know what what the possibilities are yeah I'll I'll support this motion as well um but again I I come at the reality check idea from a different

240uh angle uh the reality the reason I think it's important to do this is to as Dr Evans is saying is to reveal the reality that it's impossible it's impossible simply cannot be done and I I don't believe that we can educate our kids with the draft budget that we've been developing but I believe it's legally uh and and functionally impossible possible on top of $15 million of cuts to add another 35 to 55 um but I think it's important for us to do that to do the analysis so we can we can show you know what what that is um and I I certainly have no intention of accepting any uh uh idea that reality is that that's what we're going to do to our schools I think we have to push the reality

241back at people who would um uh act or fail to act in a way that uh would put school districts in that position superintendent yes president BR I think um I think that this effort will indicate that um we probably can't cut enough program or close enough schools without creating some other unintended and probably catastrophic results but I understand where Mr Barnett is given the very very uh serious sobering downturn we have in the discussion in Sacramento I mean even when we talk about closing a school in a averaging way particularly for uh let's say a small Elementary School we're only deriving about $450,000 in generic savings and that's a very loose number uh think about how many schools have to be closed even to come up with something like $10 million or $20 million

242um I think the effort will will result in proving that uh it is a uh a task for doomsday uh scenario I would just caution that if we do this that we not start listing names of programs and or schools I think that sometimes in our zest to want to get information out we forget about the consequences of saying those things if we start coming out now talking about what schools we may close what programs we may cut that it's only going to increase the anxiety that our staff already has we're going into the testing window and I'm not saying that we should not have the staff start looking at and considering things but I really strongly caution against trying to say that if we have this doomsday scenario we will cut you know 10

243schools and here are the 10 schools we will cut that type of thing riddles fear in people um the question becomes and this is what was brought up this morning and I know that uh rers is working on something now we have to and and I I know people say well you're out there um we have to do something dramatic to let the people know that this this cut this significant cut to education is detrimental to the future of San Diego and the future of our state and i' I've tried to be very quiet and and let people try to get things whatever they're going to do but it is time time for us to start saying that this state cannot survive we cannot and and and I said don't open schools in September it

244is irresponsible for us to sit up here and say we're going to open schools when we know that we we can't afford the teachers we can't afford a support staff so what we need to tell the governor and the county and everyone else is that if you're going to take money away from our children and you're not going to give us money to educate them then we we not going to do it but but to sit up here and keep saying well you know what let's go squeeze that towel again let's go shut half of these schools down let's get everybody you know in a panic about cuz people going to fight for their schools we don't want them fighting for just their area we need to send a message loud and clear to the

245state that we cannot educate students on the funding that we're currently getting and what we have done year after year is we've taken it we've taken it we've rolled our sleeves up and we've made it work and because we've done that they're giving us the shaft and it's time for us to turn around and say we're not taking it anymore no more and I know that the union say well we've been down to these uh other legislative delegations offices well no we need like you stand out here in front of the board office with your signs you need to stand in front of their offices with your signs okay we need to stand in front of grocery stores with their signs because it's it's it's ridiculous for the Republican Party the Republicans in this County

246and throughout the state to hold us hostage our children our future and we we have to say board members we have to say no more we have to say we're not going to let you hold us hostage no let's go ahead and tell the parents that you're not going to educate their children that's where we are and and and this yes go back and look how you can find $50 million I'm going tell you you can't find it without coming out saying we're going to close half the high schools in this area half the middle schools in this area you're not going to find it okay so so are we going to it's time to go to war you're an admiral let's go to battle I I I just want to repeat I mean I

247I certainly agree with the point that when we go through this exercise it is going to show that it can't be done in any any any reasonable sort of way I I was answering reporter's question the other day and she was saying well what about 50 million more what are you going to do and I said well we just did it legally can't be done we have too many limits in term again what I said before we have these requirements and these requirements uh we can't do it and I do believe that we need to have that information because in in June it's going to be D-Day and we are going to have to take uh if that is the case and that is the direction that's moving I mean it unless something changes dramatically

248that's the direction that's moving we we're going to have to take a stand and and it may be something like U saying we're not going to open open school in September which puts um our jobs in Jeopardy I mean that's fine the state will have to take over because there won't be any system to operate anyway the state will not have enough balls to take over this District number I'm sorry I'm I'm up to here with this and and so my feeling right now my feeling tonight is is that yeah and you can tell him that I said I'm sure but my but but my my point is this is that we have great organizing skills um that that I don't think we need to wait till September and I think this morning Bernie was

249saying as early as Friday morning when the legislators come back to San Diego our delegation we need to be in front of their doors okay and and whatever parents we can get together whatever science we can get together we just need to organize and those of us that are working I'll adjust my schedule I'll be there and and I think the media should be there too saying are you willing are you willing to shut down the schools put it in their face put it in their face you want to sit here and say the board no put it in the people's face who have the ability they have the ability to fund our schools to take care of our children and they'll run on a platform saying they love families that's a bunch of BS

250I control it that time all I I want to I want to to talk about um a certain person that is in Sacramento that says publicly that they support public education and I don't want to name names because this person got a couple of phone calls from parents and was like oh my gosh and this person got a few emails from parents and Educators that wanted to try to communicate to this representative of the people of our families that if you support public education then you know show don't tell me what you value show me your budget and I'll tell you what you value this person I found out from several people their emails started getting bounced back so this person in Sacramento who is an elected representative of you and me turned off their

251public email address give me the email I'm not going to tell you who this person is because I even started getting some phone calls from some uh dignitaries and other officials saying that I was putting too much pressure on this person did this person Vote or support letting the voters of California decide on a tax extension to keep our taxes the same so we could restore basic funding to our schools and provide basic Services no this person did not so it's one for an elected official to say they support public education and tell parents that were running into them at brunches running into them at dinners that were talking and confronting these El this specific elected representative and that person looked him in the face and said I support public education and funding for it

252and and I just don't I just cannot believe that that's unconscionable to me at least look Us in the face and say you know what I'm not going to support the tax extension for whatever reason and that's going to result in extreme Financial Dire Straits for the public schools and and there are let's be honest let's put it out there on the table there are people that think that well you know what school districts you should just cut everybody's salaries that work in the school districts well if we cut everybody now first of all that let's just talk about the teachers for ex first the teachers in San Diego unified have a starting salary that is that is my understanding and I could be wrong correct me if I'm wrong Emily it's my understanding that

253the that the starting salary of teachers in San Diego unified is one of the lowest in the county that's a little secret that's why a lot of teachers that live in San Diego teach in other school districts in the other 41 school districts in the county um so we're going to take low wages and lower them even more how are we going to be competitive in the labor market to keep and retain quality Educators and then I'm sure you can multiply that effect a thousandfold with all the other people that have dedicated their lives to help kids a and dedicated their lives to public service to help our children learn how to read write and do arithmetic so that they can be productive taxpaying members of society when they get older so this is what

254is so frustrating to me you know I I never thought in my life I would ever run for elected office never I was always happy to volunteer and help other people get elected that are going to put themselves out there but for an elected official to look parents in the straight in the face and say I support public education funding and then turn around and not vote for it not support it remember if you ask anybody in Sacramento the tax extension bill did not get on a June special election by one vote in the assembly one person said no and they this one person will cause every single School District in the state of California to be an economic upheaval and so I welcome the cfo's projections on where and how we're going to cut

255another $50 million okay any Mr can we uh forward our emails to assemblyman Fletcher oh I'm sorry you didn't mention his name he's not running for me there are eight you should know there are eight assembly there are eight legislators from San Diego everybody needs to memorize those eight names we need to stop fighting over the crumbs between us all of us who believe in public education and go to the people who have the power to make the change thanks for instigating us uh all right we got a motion in a second uh please vote M Jackson okay all right I'm so yes there we have just restored education all right okay let's uh now to a super uh intense item the resolution adoption of the mitigated negative declaration approval speaker please no speakers amazingly

256on this one okay okay and then I this is I we got a motion do we have a second Sor that's the amendment of The PKS it's the updated PKS based on the recision sorry that you last week but now wasn't around what item again is item I2 okay sorry I just want to make sure it's the one which we resed last meeting okay so this is to resend based on what yeah so why don't we allow the superintendent this is the tiebreaking rule requirement if you recall directing the staff to resend the 30 FTE that created the other two 240 plus we determined that because there's significant same date senority to proceed with that Rec to complete it there's a tiebreaking protocol that has to be expanded and this allows the letter to go

257those 240 people the letter of recension yes yes okay y all right okay please vote okay uh now we consent agenda items each 12 any 13 um I would just ask that we bring these back U these it these two items are for something that starts one July but my concern is that what I ask the staff and I want first of all I want to thank the staff for them providing the information back and so among the questions that I asked them um was because in this item is saying there's some counseling going on and I'm like if we're laying off counselors why are we hiring outside counselors to do some of the work um so so what I would ask is that why this why the staff started working on that they didn't

258quite finish and I would ask that we bring this back at a later date so the staff has a chance to go back and look at how how this funding is and I think was aware of the multiple questions and I thought it was good to discuss this in the public setting I do think what I uh read into your inquiry too do we have any past performance Rec we to be indicating where we are reviewing these types of service provider what's the uh the track record with right I'll work with Dr F very much appreciate that table those motion to table or I move the table this item 812 and3 82 13 yes okay with that our meeting is a ger thank you everybody okay Bernie we need calendar yeah let's go