001regular board. Welcome to the Santel Foster City School District regular board meeting. Today is um Oh, wait. >> Yeah. Yeah, I'm moving along. Today is August 28th, 2025 and we will call this meeting to order. Uh we will call Samale Park up for the lead and the flag salute. Please. Can you join us in the pledge? >> Join us in the pledge of allegiance. Ready to begin. >> Put your right hand on your heart and ready begin. I pledge algiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. >> You welcome. >> All right. Uh, now we'll do roll call. Trustee hope >> here. >> Trusty Tran >> here. >> Trusty Proctor >> here. >> Trusty
002Camp >> here. >> And I am here. Trusty Brooks. Uh, may I please get an approval for the agenda for um August 28th, please? >> Motion to approve the agenda for tonight. Second. >> All in favor say I. >> I. And may I get a motion to approve minutes for May 22nd, 2025 and June 26? >> I'll make a motion to approve those two sets of minutes. I did want to note that there are some clerical errors in the May 22nd uh meeting. And just as a future note, um when public comments are made, it would be nice to keep those forms so that we can make sure we get the names of the folks who spoke correctly as well. So other than clerical edits, uh no substantive corrections to those. So make a motion
003to approve those minutes with direction to staff to uh make some corrections to spelling errors on the May 22nd set of minutes. >> Second. >> All in favor say I. >> I. >> All right. We're going to move to um all public statements related to agenda items. Persons will be called on at appropriate times. And um we are now going to do our updates from uh SM FCA. >> So either can speak in here one of these. Distinguished board members, Superintendent OOA, parents, staff, and all joining us both in person. Good evening. My name is Dustin Mackis and I currently serve as the assistant principal at Fiesta Gardens International School. >> I also have the privilege of serving as the president of the San Mato Foster City Administration Association for the 2025 2026 school year.
004We are here tonight to personally introduce ourselves and share our roles as a Smith Fica board. This year, our board members consist of Janette Ramirez, POSA for multilingual and community schools team, Dr. Ryan Haven, director of facilities, M, Stephanie Gibson, coordinator of enrollment, Leah Passums, principal at Foster City Elementary School, Natalie Dela Hunt, principal of Leed Elementary School. >> And I'm Carrie Hazelton. I'm the vice president of the um Sanonteo Foster City Administrators um association and we'd like to share our vision with you tonight. Um it is to aspire, empower, champion, and elevate the voices of our leaders to support our students, families, and the community. Our organization is dedicated to uniting the leaders of Sonteo Foster City School District, including the directors, principles, assistant directors, assistant principles, managers, and coordinators towards a common goal
005of advocacy, collaboration, networking, and relationship building. Our plan is to carry this vision forward by fostering meaningful collaboration among our site leaders, actively listening to the needs of our administrators and communicating those needs with directly with our superintendent ooa. Additionally, we aim to create opportunities for our leaders to connect and build relationships in settings beyond the workplace. Thank you. And then can I bring up Highlands next? All right. Come on up, my Highlands crew. All right. So, as you know, I'm Carrie Hazelton. I'm also the principal up at Highlands Elementary School. And um tonight, I had three outstanding student um leaders. I have Gabby, Leah, and Miranda. And the first few weeks of our school have been truly exceptional. Highlands is a special place and we are fortunate to be part of such a strong
006um supportive school community. We are excited to share some highlights that capture the spirit and success of our school. My name is Gabby and I'm in fifth grade. One of my favorite memories at Highlands is the fourth grade overnight field trip to Col. It was so much fun learning about California's history with my classmates. I also love our beautiful new NPR. It's great space for assemblies and events. My name is Leah and I am in fifth grade. Each year we do a fun tie-dye shirt event with the PTA. Every grade gets a different color. TK is gray, kindergarten is red, first grade is orange, and so on, creating a schoolwide rainbow. I'm really looking forward to fifth grade outdoor education this year. My name is Miranda and I am in fifth grade. Some of my
007favorite memories at Highlands are being part of school plays. My favorite place that I did was Willy Wonka and Beauty and the Beast, which I got Belle. I also really loved our fourth grade overnight trip to Col. It was such a cool experience. >> Thank you. [Applause] >> Thank you very much. Uh we're going to move to uh CSA >> check online >> checking I don't see uh Miss Bishop >> we can circle back >> we can come back yeah and anyone from Smeita. Good evening everyone, members of the school board, Superintendent OOA, district staff, and community members. I'm happy to be here tonight on behalf of the educators of the Sanonteo Elementary Teachers Association as we kick off the 2526 school year. As always, the first weeks of school come with a mix of
008excitement, nerves, and a whole lot of to-do lists. But thanks to a huge collective effort, our classrooms are open, our students are learning, and we're off to a strong start. I want to take a moment to especially highlight the incredible work that went into the campus swap between Fiesta Gardens and College Park. Moving two entire school communities is no small feat and yet it was done with care, teamwork, and good humor. We want to recognize the deep collaboration between district leadership, school site teams, and our amazing classified colleagues from custodial and maintenance crews to IT front office staff and beyond. The level of coordination it took to get both campuses cleaned, moved, set up, and ready for students by day one was nothing short of impressive. Everyone rolled up their sleeves, stayed flexible, and put
009students first. That kind of spirit is what makes our district special. We're looking forward to continuing those positive partnerships as we tackle the work ahead, supporting students, advocating for safe and well-resourced classrooms, and making sure every educator and staff member feels valued in the work they do. In addition, I want to share that Sama along with the California Teachers Association is closely following and supporting efforts around the temporary redistricting of California's congressional areas, recognizing how critical fair representation is to the future of our schools and communities. Here's to a strong and collaborative school year. Thank you. Um, we will move to Okay, we'll take uh foundation, please. Is this already on? Okay. Good evening, Superintendent OOA, board of trustees, public, and our honores who are here tonight. Welcome back to a new school year. I'm
010excited to share some updates from the education foundation. This summer, we coordinated a school supply drive. This was Gilead Medical Affair Department's third annual school school supply drive for the title one elementary schools in our district. We added to this effort our new partner, Vericotta, and we shared it out with the community. The end result was donations of 756 items worth $4,700 which were delivered to the schools before school started. We also worked closely with Susie Riley and we did a backpack initiative for all 22 schools. So the end result of that is we distributed 940 backpacks thanks to Samaritan House and Costco with school supplies provided by the quiz collective and some of our funds. Now to our big check presentation. I'm going to ask Janelle to Is Janelle here yet? Okay, Christina is
011going to do it. Tag her in. Each year, the Sanonteo Foster City Education Foundation presents our big check, which is our gift to the district for this school year. The funds were donated during the 2425 school year by parents and community members through our annual drive, the readathon, and our community and partners and sponsors who support us. This check for $670,287. I know you have to come all the way up here. So, this check funds $180,000, which is school grants that go directly to our 22 school sites for assemblies, bus transportation to field trips, and staffing for outofclassroom programs like the Lego labs and middle school clubs. The check also provides to our district middle school athletics, summer camp scholarships, matching grants for the SMIA teacher grants, Best Buddies program, middle school musical instruments, library
012books, and our newest advancement in STEM education project, career map, which you'll be hearing more about later tonight. I am now going to hand it over to our school board president for recognition of our sponsors from our 2425 school year. >> Thank you. Tonight, the school board superintendent Diego OOA and the education foundation are jointly acknowledging and honoring 10 entities whom sponsorship and grant support has benefited the students in our district this school year. We would like to present those in attendance with their recognition certificates and take a photo with each group. This year sponsors include at the platinum level for the Gilead Foundation. We have Feder Rico Pacheo joining us this evening. The Gilead Foundation has been crucial, a crucial partner of the education foundation and the district since 2018, funding science, safety, and
013STEM, investing over $2.4 million on behalf of our students and their futures. We will hear more about Gilead's most recent grant during the superintendent report. While a Woodline Foundation representative cannot join us this evening, Woodlon has been a district partner supporting the education foundation's mission since 2003. Their grants enabling programming for students in music, arts, outdoor education, and athletics over the years total $180,000. their 202425 school year. $25,000 donation funded new musical instruments for our middle school music programs. At the gold level, Michael Kai is here this evening and has been instrumental in helping us provide funding for school grants that principles use for outofclass experiences for students such as cultural assemblies and staffing for clubs and Lego labs. The Lego labs are the highlight of my tenure here as a trustee. when I see
014the kids um laughing and smiling as they do their Lego projects. At the silver level, the Sanatel Foster City Education Foundation is thrilled to announce Verata as their newest sponsor. We are excited to begin this partnership and deeply appreciate their commitment to supporting Sanel Foster City School District students. Sabrina George is here representing Vicata tonight. At the benefactor level, we thank all of these benefactors who represent local small businesses and municipalities who have helped support programs for our students. This year in attendance we have let's see ALRR represented by our very own Scott Hullbrook and his colleagues Sam uh excuse me uh the city of Foster City represented by city council member Phoebe Vancat Camp Galileo represented by Douglas G and Nicole Bowler Happy healthy teeth represented by Dr. Jonathan Lee and his father Brian
015Lee who founded the practice in 1972. PAF reading program represented by Magadelina Zealia who would also we would also like to uh thank the following sponsors who could not join us tonight. Apex Power Electrical Supply and Solutions for their consistent support year after year. Mhm. Now we will move to the PTA council. Anyone from PTA council online? No. >> No. >> After after break, take some photos. year after year. >> Yeah, we'll do that one because we have students present. >> Okay. >> Let's take some pictures, folks. >> Let's do it. [Applause] All of us >> over there. I mean, >> just go home. >> What's the point? It's like 30 minutes for class with your >> time. Let's do it. I'll follow you guys. I'll follow you. >> I wouldn't let it fall. Am
016I holding it? I guess I'm holding it. >> You come around this way. >> Still too wide. >> No, you're good. >> You're good. Thank you. >> Ready, set. Everybody looking at me. Set. Go. lottery. Go ahead. Yeah. [Music] >> And everybody else stay in position. She doesn't want to be in the rest. She's like, I did the one. >> Perfect. Everybody looking at me. Ready, set, go. >> One more. >> Thank you. [Music] >> Okay. A A Do you guys want to leave your bags here? Just put them right here. >> Earlier. Oh, I have a twin sister named Erica. So, >> I'm nice to meet you. >> I've been called Erica like all my life. to the side. Turn to the side. >> Good to see you guys under the letters mean something,
017right? And when you use the same letter, there's 27 different letters to choose from. You choose a four four billion times and they all mean different things. Am I supposed to remember that? No. Why not like or J or S? [Laughter] >> Would you mind looking this way? Ready, set, go. One more. [Music] >> We'll get the We'll get the yoga block. >> Come around. >> Yeah. >> Right there. >> Yeah. On that side. >> So nice. I saw no way. >> Everybody looking this way. Right. Go. Me too. pictures. [Music] >> What's happening? Everybody looking this way. Thank you. >> The final one. One more. One more. >> I got home at 3:45. [Music] your shoes. [Applause] I'll just right now Magina here everyone like >> I know it's on the back. So he
018has your name and [Music] I got this marketing team lately. Whatever school you I really appreciate [Music] >> a student. >> Sorry, I do this. So exciting. >> Sushi stand out. Yeah. >> I don't eat poison. I don't have any chicken. >> Oh my [Music] It's okay. >> Okay. Thank you everyone. >> Now we will move to the announcements. >> Do we have any announcements from the board? >> Okay. Go ahead. We can do committee reports. did uh >> okay um we had a meeting with the city of Sanonteo today actually and um one of the things they wanted us to know about is that the Marina library is getting a re renovation so it's going to be closed for about a year while they do that and there's also been paving and safety road
019safety improvements throughout the And then um yeah, I think those are the major points. Um and then we had shared with them also that our as uh some of you probably already know a lot of our construction projects are nearing completion. So it's really exciting to see all of those happen. And then I just wanted to um shout out again the Ed Foundation's backpack drive. It was a lot of work, a lot of um a lot of people um putting together things at the district office. So, a lot of um just, you know, we're really grateful to our community partners and then also to um some of our kids showed up and helped us stuff backpack. So, there was a lot of singing K-pop demon hunter at the top of our lungs. Um yeah, that's
020it. >> Move to the superintendent. >> All right. We have um some pretty cool presentations for you this evening, but I am going to talk for just a minute about an experience I had on the first day of school. I was at Barisford Elementary School and a parent stopped me and asked me if I was principal ooa and it's pretty common to have people, you know, at one of our schools ask me if I'm the superintendent. I thought, "Oh, principal, that's kind of cool. I always like that job." So, yeah. I said, "Yes." And and he said, "I'm from San Diego." and I used to be a principal in Southern California. I realized it was a student of mine from 20 years ago >> who was a good >> who was a 10th grade student
021um who used to read um books in the afternoon in the office >> um any book he could get his hands on and he has a very powerful story and at some point you know I hope to uh introduce him to many of you um but suffice it to say it was like a dream for him at that time. So, he has two students at he and his wife has two students at um Barisford and another on the way. And he's a scientist at Merc. >> And I think it has a lot to do with what you're going to hear tonight, which is what it means to have structures and what it means to have guarantees about kids having access to a career map that is really powerful for them uh and that makes a
022really big impact. So with that, I have a couple of people who are going to speak to you tonight. We have students that are here to address you. Uh and we have one of our colleagues uh who works for um the district office and she's the former principal of Northshore View Monastery and and Laurel Elementary Schools, a longtime employee in the district and she heads project career map which is part of a partnership that we have with the Gilead Foundation and with the Sanato Foster City Education Foundation. Um and you're going to hear directly from them. So, with that, I'll pass it uh over to Karina and then uh she'll pass it on to other folks who have something to say. >> Thank you. Gilead is a wonderful example of a global company making deep
023impact in their local community through their commitment to building a pipeline of future STEM professionals while exposing kids to careers they might not otherwise know are an option. Over the past eight years, the Gilead Foundation has generously provided $2.4 million in funding through the Sanonteo Foster City Education Foundation. These grants have brought to our district a three-year science uh teacher on special assignment, the Lego Labs, we labs we've been talking about all night, um our middle school college and career exploration elective for seventh and eighth graders, and the career discovery labs for fourth to sixth graders. Each one of these has opened doors for students to discover their talents, explore possibilities, and dream big about their futures. This year, the Gilead Foundation donated $500,000 for a new STEM career discovery project that is really innovative
024and different. We are very excited to share more about Project Career Map with you. But first, you'll hear directly from the students whose lives are being shaped by these opportunities. I welcome up Sachi Singha from Bowish Middle School, Juliet Whiteitman from Burell Middle School, and Ayali Maldonado from Bayside Academy to share with us how they have been impacted by these programs. Come on up. [Applause] Hi, my name is Sachi Shinha and I'm an eighth grader at Badage Middle School. So, we've all heard the question, what do you want to do when you grow up? And for many middle school students, the honest answer is, I don't know. That's exactly why it's so important to start exploring careers now, so we have time to discover our strengths, interests, and goals before making big decisions about our
025futures. This program is so powerful because it doesn't just let us imagine some careers. It lets us try them while creating a safe learning environment to fail and succeed. And when we connect connect those experiences to real information like how much that job pays and we learn how to connect our passions to what our practical needs are. Understanding living wages means that we're not just chasing a dream. We're learning how to turn it into a dream that is sustainably re is a sustainable reality. Sorry to the people and the organizations that fund this program. Thank you. You're not just supporting a class. You're investing in students futures that gives us the tools to succeed. My hope is that every student leaves this program with both the inspiration and the plan. knowing that their dreams are
026possible and knowing that they have the knowledge, confidence, and skills to make them real. Thank you. [Applause] Hi everyone, my name is Juliet Whiteitman and I have I'm from Burell Middle School and I'm in eighth grade. Last year I had the privilege to take the CCE class or college career exploration at Burell. This class was such a great bridge to get me interested in starting looking at careers. I took many different modules, but some of my favorites were medical imaging, where I learned to read X-rays. Nursing, where I did a phabbotomy, culinary arts, where I made scrambled eggs in a panini. I love that one so much that I bought a panini press. And now I make dinner for my family almost every week. I also took forensic science where I did a blood splatter
027analysis, a tire truck analysis. [Laughter] >> My point is that class helped me so much to find what I was really interested in. Thank you. [Applause] Um hello board members, superintendent ooa teachers and students. My name is I Maldonado. I am an eighth grader at Bayside Academy. CCE is a class that impacted me in many ways. It made me think about what I want to be when I grow up. I wanted to consider being a nur nurse or doctor. I enjoyed the hand the fun hands-on activities like making paper rockets. CCE is a class that helps us as students prepare for the future ahead. Thank you for all the people who made this class possible. [Applause] >> Thank you for this opportunity to speak today. I now invite principal on special assignment Lori Bukumoto to
028speak on project career map. [Applause] [Music] I was going to say, boy, is it hard to follow great students. So, I'm going to do my very best tonight. [Applause] All right, here we go. So, good evening, Board of Trustees, Superintendent OOA, our district staff, and our community. I am so excited to be spending the next few minutes sharing um project career map with all of you. This project as um Karina said is innovative and it's unprecedented. So I have been here for almost 35 years and I've not seen a project like this before. So students are going to be asked to um give us their input and then we're going to follow up and do what they are interested in doing. So this is that's why it's so different. This is all possible because of
029our wonderful donors Gilead Foundation. So we are so thankful for um what you're going to be doing for our students. So let's learn about project career map. So over the course of the next two years, fifth and eighth grade fifth through eighth grade students will have the opportunity to approach science careers with curiosity. They will reflect on their own skills and interests as it as they tell about their science career journeys. What makes this project so unique? as I said is that participation is going to be based on student interest rather than for example entire grade levels going on a field trip or entire classes. Students will choose to explore a particular field and will be able to go to the universities, colleges, industry sites and natural environments that have been planned around specific interests
030and careers. So far, we've been planning for visits to UC Berkeley, Kinyatta College, CSM, San Jose State, Stanford, and San Francisco State. Industry and nature exploration visits will include Gilead, Shabbo Science and Space Center in Oakland, the Oakland Zoos Veterinarian Hospital, and a trip based on student feedback. Because we value student input, we are currently surveying students to see where they would like to go on a trip, as well as what their interests are for other science-based learning. So during school breaks in fall, spring, and summer, interested students will have an opportunity to attend a science camp where they will get hands-on experiences related to their interest in a science field. Our middle school students, as they just described, are being offered robust science experiences through college and career explorations or CCE. And our elementary
031students will have access to career discovery labs. All giving students additional learning beyond their science curriculum. And all of this is possible because of the Gilead Foundation. For sixth through 8th grade graders, this project affords students some additional opportunities such as connecting to professionals based on student interest in particular careers, joining some science clubs, and a district-wide exhibition where students will plan the event with the goal of sharing their love of science and their project career map journeys. and with their other students and families across the district. So throughout this entire process, students are not just going to get to go on these trips. They are going to do some work around it too. So there there will be some pre-imposed questionnaires for students to be able to um respond and then there will be
032a student career map that we're going to ask students to um complete at the end of the year. And for us, these responses will be the data that we'll use to evaluate the effectiveness of the program and what we believe is the power of this model of learning. So in summary, project career map is a new strategy for us designed to open doors for students starting in the fifth grade. So, in most cases, it's usually high school or maybe seventh and eighth grade where students get this opportunity, but we're going to be starting in the fifth grade. The enthusiasm around Project Career Map is amazing. Each time I speak with an administrator or a teacher or a community member, they're all so excited when I describe what this program is all about. Recently I was
033talking with a Horal student. So she went to Horl but currently lead and I shared project career map with her and she was when she was in middle school she said that in a after school program she was able to go to one of the colleges and she said that she wishes that project career map was around when she was in school. I want to just tell you that Jackie is now a doctoral student at Stanford. So, we really never know where an experience is going to lead a student. So, if you want to learn a little bit more about Project Career Map, there's a QR code. This is the actual grant and you're able to see it if you'd like to take a little deeper dive into it. And I just wanted to say
034I'm always looking for a chaperon. So, if board members or guests if you're interested in being a chaffron on any one of these trips, please let me know and we'd love to have you. Thank you. I am now pleased to welcome senior manager of public affairs for Gilead Foundation, FedEo. [Applause] >> Thank you so much. Can you guys hear me? Okay. Even though there's already a degree of separation between me and the students, it's still hard to follow them. Uh on behalf of the Gilead Foundation, I'm honored to accept the recognition that was provided earlier today and to celebrate the launch of Project Career Map. This initiative reflects our shared belief that every student deserves the opportunity to explore their potential and imagine a future full of possibility. Our $500,000 grant is just the beginning.
035We're committed to partnering beyond the check, creating meaningful opportunities for students to engage with Gilead Sciences. That means opening our campus to students and connecting them with Gileia colleagues so that they can begin to see themselves in these careers. These students aren't just learners. They're our future leaders. the next generation of scientists, innovators, and change makers is sitting in these classrooms today in this room here today. So, it's our it's our responsibility to help him see what's possible. I've heard a lot of thank yous uh to the Gileia Foundation and really appreciate that. But in reality, we want to thank you, our educators, our students, and our community partners. You guys are doing the hard work and we appreciate you all. Thank you. [Applause] All right, I'm going to invite the school board up to
036come join us up here for a wonderful photo opportunity. We also have an award for the Gilead Foundation. We'll try not to mess it up here. Um, >> I'll read the inscription of it. It says for the 2025 Sato Foster City School District Partner of the Year, the Gilead Foundation [Applause] Couple [Applause] [Music] calls. Call Thank you. We will now move to our proposed consent agenda. Yes. Yes. Yes. All right, we're going to take a five minute [Music] Are they offside? from recess. Um, let's see. We will now move to uh take any public comment related to non-aggenda items. If there's anyone in the audience in person, Joel, can you please check online checking? Uh John's iPhone. Are you ready to speak? Okay, looks like the hand was lowered. So, no public comments at this
037time. >> It doesn't look like there's any. >> Okay. I'm sorry. Was there anyone online for public comment? >> No public comments at this time. >> Thank you. >> Okay. We'll move to the uh proposed consent agenda. All items on the consent agenda are considered by the board to be routine and will be enacted by the board in one motion in the form of excuse me in the form listed below. There will be no discussion on these items prior to the time the board votes on the motion unless members of the board, staff or public request specific items be removed and discussed from the consent agenda. The superintendent and staff recommend approval of all consent items. Movement of any recommended consent item is appropriate at this time. Uh at this time I would like to
038pull for a uh 4 a uh six. Is there anyone? >> Um I would like to pull items 4 A3, 4 C5, and 4C6 for discussion. I'm sorry. You said 4 A3. >> Yes. 4 A3, 4 C5. >> Okay. >> And 4 C6. >> Okay. >> It's like when you get those notifications on your phone and you have to like remember all three digits and like repeat it back. >> Yes. >> Okay. Um, can I get a motion to approve the remainder of the agenda? I mean the um the agenda and then minus 4 A6 4 A3 4 C5 and 4C6. >> So moved. >> Second. All in favor say I. >> I. >> You want I I'll go first. I um would like to uh bring to the attention uh on page six. Uh
039there are two um there are two um extenders here that has no um identification of what these payments are for uh or who uh they actually belong to. Um, it just indicates a blanket PO for visa payments and all of the other items in this document has specific details listed. Um, I would like to request for um transparency in this um in this these charges that are um listed here. And the amounts are $2,572 and 38 um,187.82. Um, and also these Visa payments, are they a personal reimbursement uh of a Visa card that belong to an individual or is it a district provided um Visa card? So, if we can get a little more detail on what these payments are, that would be greatly appreciated. >> Absolutely. >> Can I ask a question on that
040item? >> Sure. Sure. >> So, going forward, are like we're not going to see every single charge, are we? Or how how will it work if you want detail on visa card? >> Well, so we're we're providing with the registers. If there's a question regarding the content of it, that's that's we can provide the detail for that. I mean, if you have if there's a particular item on here that someone wants detail for, we can provide that to you, the depth of it. But I mean, for some of these to show you all the detailed information associated with like I just I'm scrolling this page, I'm seeing an NPS, we're not going to have all that, you know, all the the micro detail, but we can absolutely for the visa charges, we can certainly provide
041that level of detail. Superintendent, you say something? So that'll be something like offline separate. I'm just wondering going forward if we see Visa, are we going to expect to see like every single charger or how like how detailed are we going to get on these? >> Want to say something? >> Yeah. So we have a variety of departments with Visa uh credit cards. Um so this would be um the Ed services department, the student services department. Um Patrick, you might know the list. I don't really know the list. >> I I used one recently for >> your department. So, it's a it's somewhat of a practice in the district. So, I think we would need to come back to the board with your direction on um if you would like for us to um just
042simply add it as an attachment, which we're happy to do, or if you would like to just be able to access them and we can share them with you. They're certainly all public uh documents and there's, you know, on our part. Um it isn't um any different than the other expenses we have in the district. I think what what this item is is this is an item detailing a sort of the business end of paying the visa card. So I I would just say that would be something for the board to either consider a separate item or in the future asking us to bring the item um with different type of documentation which we could you know look into our our preparation for meetings and just make that available essentially. >> Thank you. and even
043just listing it here. Um there is a format um that is listed on all of the other items um whether I mean even if it's a reimbursement it does even the blanket PO let's say for instance for field trip uh bus transportation it does have some details on there that we can refer to um and understand what okay >> you know the reimbursements are so yeah we would like more >> sure I mean for the visa we can do a maybe summary in there in terms of like >> I recently used mine just as an example I use I had a district vehicle I took it through the car wash the other day for $15. So >> right one example >> that's just an example >> right one example is like prior to school um
044our principles and our maintenance department know that I'm sort of famous for I drive around to all the schools um because I don't want to see any um basketball hoops with nets that are torn. I think it just makes kids think you don't care about them. You know, even though we put, you know, a thousand hours into reworking the school in the summer, a ripped net, in my opinion, is signifies like we just kind of left details unattended. So, right around August 1st through the 5th every year, I call Patrick and I call various other administrators and say, "Hey, go grab your credit card and drive to Big Five and buy basketball nets, and I want to see this fixed by such and such date." Um so and that you know on a given year
045that might actually be paid for through the business department or it might be paid for by the facilities department. So it just kind of depends on the year and I think your suggestion to actually as board president um Brooks pointed out actually just having the more detail in the description itself I think works too. Um, so we can start with that and then also just at any time that the board or the public ask for any detail on any expenses, we can always provide that too. >> Just as a protocol question, I guess what is our internal policy for those credit cards? Are they monitored by the district office in terms of usage? I understand it's probably set, you know, things that we can spend it on, things that you can't set spend it on,
046but is there, I guess, a month-to-month day-to-day oversight of the specific charges? because I think from our perspective, I I agree with Trusty Proctor. It may not be realistic to review every credit card statement at the board level. Um, at the same time, when we don't have that visibility, it does make us nervous because when you see those alarming articles come out about public spending or waste, it's usually something like the credit card. It's usually kind of luxuries or other pieces put on the credit card that the board didn't have visibility into. And so, just so we feel that we're doing our oversight and our diligence, it would be help to helpful to get that top line. But also if we know the internal protocols and who on staff is responsible for reviewing those statements
047to make sure nothing in there is egregious or against policy, I think that also helps with the board views. Yeah. So I don't recall exactly what the board policy says. I can look that up because I I just don't off the top of my head. But um all those um visa statements come through me and I go through the itemization of things that are on there. Um and uh we have conversations. There's very few that are issued. Um, and it's often times for things that, you know, you can't you can't use a purchase order for. We might get a call from a site that says, "We're trying to get X, Y, and Z. Can you help us get that?" And we have a district credit card we can use that for. Um, David has periodically
048some materials that, you know, we might need to acquire that we can't use a purchase order for, but all those receipts come through. Our auditors go through those. They pull those every year and go through those in detail to address exactly you're talking to uh Trusty Kim to make sure those expenditures are um appropriate and um so yeah, we we do go through that process. >> And just a quick question um uh and I guess what flagged it is the the $38,000 you know payment. Um I guess my question would be is this over a period of time? Is this you know in different departments >> right >> clustered together and then it just this is the total for all of the cards that we're making payments to. >> Yes ma'am. Yeah. Yep. Yeah. >>
049I think the other um piece to discuss is how we process reimbursements. So reimbursements work differently in that um when employees have to incur costs for a variety of different reasons. Um those go through a separate reimbursement process that involves uh providing original receipts and having prior authorization and you know demonstrating that this purchase has to do with this like my program that I'm operating and um and we don't process those through the credit card as to my knowledge and I'm pretty sure you know you would point that out if if we did. Um and so that that's the other part of it is that the credit card purchases facilitate as you pointed out um because some vendors are not open to using purchase requisitions uh you know in order to provide uh products or
050services that in some cases are needed immediately. And David's shaking his head back there as the guy who buys the math manipulatives that we So like just an example is like when when we need things that we were some somewhat slightly unanticipated or just a greater need existed and we say oh we need to order one more set of that product and then that you know necessitates a purchase that goes a little bit faster. >> Yeah. And the reimbursement forms have information on there as well too, instructions for people they want to be reimbursed, >> a process to have a discussion with folks before the purchase is made um that they go through a process talking with folks at their site. Um also if they want to acquire something um and we try to for
051me personally I I try to minimize the out-of- pocket expenditures for people are trying to do something for the environment for their classroom. Um that we want to do whatever we can to make sure that they don't have to be out of pocket for those expenses. At the same time, you want to make sure that those as you're suggesting too, trusty Kim, that those uh expenditures are appropriate, that folks aren't going out. And I know, you know, over the decades, you hear about different things that people have done and it's that's why we have these process play. There's very few that are issued um in the district. Um and we do review those, the auditors review them, too. And then like superintendent saying too, there's a a reimbursement form that's available and that has information
052on there too in terms of what what steps to go through. I would just I think uh echo what President books asked for in terms of having slightly more description, but I will say just knowing that all those processes either for approval or for review go through you already kind of alleviates my main concern. So that's just good to know. But thank you. >> Thank you. >> Um so I wanted to discuss um item 43, the Zoom licensing renewal. Um I'm you know first want to say I'm very supportive of the use of Zoom and I know it was really critical essential during COVID. Um at the same time I know a lot of schools and school districts you know across the country are really re-evaluating how many licenses are actually being used um and
053used efficiently um because they're not we you know honestly most schools have gone back to kind of life as normal and so um Zoom's not being used kind of at the same level as the pandemic. I would love to ask, you know, if these licenses are are being um, you know, I don't want to just blanket say yes, renew all of them. You know, can we make sure that they're going to be used or used efficiently before renewing. >> We're having those exact same conversations about this process, too. Um, we use Zoom for this platform. Um, and there's licenses associated with that and and the director of technology, I've been having a conversation about almost verbatim what you're talking about, too. who's using it, why, what are the other options, what are the costs of
054those other options, and um can we walk people towards another option? Because there is a cost associated with this. So, we're going to have those conversations too with folks too. Um there are some unique uh functionality characteristics that Zoom has that some of the other platforms don't have. Um but um my experience I know there's a couple other platforms and for what we use it for um you know the Google uh option is is a good option. It's been um it's been evolving as well too I think to compete with Zoom. So I think there may be some familiarization process that needs to happen too. Um so we're having those conversations as well. And you want anything? >> I would just Yes. Thank you. I would just add we're currently in negotiations with the um
055vendor to try to get a little bit closer to the total number of licenses we had last year which was closer to about 150. Um and we think we're going to make some headway there. Um my team knows I've been on the um let's just use Google for everything uh >> team for five years. I can't really convince everybody because there is that memory of, you know, there are a lot of tools with Zoom. Um, but it, you know, it does cost us, you know, six figures every year to be able to offer it. So, I always kind of lean more towards let's just use Google because we already pay for it. >> Yeah. >> Um, kind of go round and round every year about that. >> We've cut it in half from last year
056to to this number and we'll just keep working on that part too. I think the familiarization >> until it goes down to just one >> till the board meeting. >> Yeah, >> great. Thank you for the clarification. >> Can I add something to that point? So, I was going to pull this item as well, but I know Trusty Ho had already flagged it as a issue of concern. I think beyond just assume licenses, I know the I think 4A 4 dealt with hotspots and other materials. This is a question I've raised previously and it's more of a comment at this point, but I am very curious to see how the district tracks utilization management and especially for something like Zoom licenses. I've been a part of organizations where we might have 500 licenses and at
057the end of the year we realize 200 were dormant. No one logged in. They were assigned to individuals who completely never used that account, but it was still being paid for. And I understand that to a certain degree things like hotspots, we plan to have extras in case one breaks down, in case of a new hire that requests it. So definitely I'm not saying it needs to be perfectly right-sized, but I do think to Trusty Ho's point, as our approach towards using Zoom and other similar tools has evolved, it would be great to get some visibility into how the district tracks the usage, tracks the number of seats that we pay for, how many were used. Um, and I think I've applied that to a lot of our technological solutions that we've adopted here at
058the district, just to know that as we keep reupping these contracts, we're reupping them at the right size for seats that we're actively using as opposed to ones that historically we've renewed. But it turns out, you know, half of these accounts are, whether it's student accounts for teachers, for administrators are just dormant and unnecessary. >> We did that exact same exercise for the hotspots and we those by about a third um because they were dormant. Exact. Yeah. So, we're doing that. >> Thank you so much. >> Um I also wanted to um discuss item 4C5. Um it's the leading educators contract. Um I was reading through it and I noticed that um it only so the contract only covers literacy instruction um in eight schools. Um I think for me the question is what will
059those eight schools be and you know do we have a plan in place to cover the remaining schools? You know, I think a lot of the work that I'm I've been seeing with the Bayed Fund, they really value that comprehensive view. And so, I think I just kind of wanted to get a little bit of clarity like how are we getting eight out of 22 and you know, is it really going to provide us a comprehensive view of liter literacy instruction? >> Yes, thank you uh trustee ho. I think um two things are unique about this association with leading educators. one is um we are at the very beginning part of our next community strategic plan process. So the Bayad fund in their partnership with the district has an interest in in helping us bring
060on um consultancy services that push our thinking and that get us um reflecting on our current practices. But also um we had I would say David maybe 6 months of negotiation with leading educators and with the Bayad fund back and forth um landing on eight schools. Um we vacasillated somewhere between four and eight. >> Um for two reasons. One is the contract size. Um the type of depth of consultancy services we're going to get. It can get very expensive. So, if we pushed it to uh 22 schools or 21 schools, it would be, you know, much closer to a half a million dollars. And that's actually, you know, part of how we negotiated with leading educators. The nice thing about being able to select schools um for this initial round of consultancy is that we're
061able to show a little bit more care to schools who might have a new principal um or who might have a really different instructional design that would be difficult to compare. So like I'll just point out uh either Fiesta Gardens or um College Park um would both be an odd sort of view because they are learning in multiple languages at the same time. Um, and then I'll just pass it over uh to David for any remarks because David's been uh you know critical along with uh Ala and and Pam and Kenetta in doing this work with uh leading educators and maybe just talk a little bit more about the idea of of how we put it together. >> Sure. Um the you also probably noticed that this is a one-year contract and really what it's
062focused on is uh is really coming to an understanding of you know what's the nature of our uh language and literacy instructional practices um in the district. It's a sampling approach absolutely um but it's meant to be a year of sort of gathering some data and gathering some knowledge. Uh we're not going to draw any big patterns. We're not going to make any grand statements certainly one way or another about u but it's really to try to see what's going on in a variety of schools. Two of the schools of course are the two schools that are sort of the leading edge of some of this innovative planning um innovative teaching and learning that we're we're envisioning for the second strategic plan. So that's Bearsford and and lead elementary schools. Um, and then we've uh
063we're actually currently just now kind of securing the other five or six. Uh uh um executive director Bartfield is is talking with the principles. We want to go to the staff and basically it's saying, you know, we're going to ask you to open your school to a series of uh classroom visits with with folks from the out outside the district. So just wanting to make sure you know folks are comfortable with that, understand what it's for. And um so we're going to go through that process and working with leading educators and just kind of getting that uh thicker view of of the state of our district and then that will inform any decisions later on in subsequent years about what work are we going to do what work are we going to do with leading
064educators because that's uh another you know we want to make sure if it's work we can do ourselves we'll do that but if it's work that really needs to be uh effectively supported by outside eyes then we want to do that as well. >> Great. Thank you so much for the clarification. Um I wanted to move on to the next item unless there's any further comments on that one. Okay, great. Um item 4C6. Um this is approving Parkside Monator's outdoor ed overnight field trip. Um so I also want to say, you know, I'm very supportive of um the district and how we send all fifth grade students, you know, to attend outdoor education. uh my own child participated in it last year and really enjoyed the experience and I didn't grow up in California but
065I understand it's a very quintessential California education experience to to do something like this. Um so I guess my question here really isn't with necessarily the fifth grade students but that we're also covering fourth grade. Um, you know, if we look at other items in the consent agenda, we see, you know, for example, the Coldo Discovery School for Brewer Island, those are fourth graders, yet that was being covered by parent donations. Um, you know, I think for me, what I wanted to point out here is I would like to see some consistency here. Um, you know, it it feels weird to be covering fourth graders at one school and not others. Um, and so I, you know, I think I want to caution that this could open a potential can of worms. um you know
066if we want to be able to just like we did with fifth grade you know make this kind of blanket available. Uh so the the decision with Parkside, it's really just a question of scale. Um we have um it's a smaller school, it's a smaller number of students with fourth and fifth. Um and the history of the program before we moved to uh district-wide support for all fifth graders going to outdoor ed, which you you may or may not know was just a few years ago, uh was that it was always fourth and fifth graders at Parkside. And so given given the arguments about the efficiencies of sending you know uh 25 students in a bus for 50 you know that kind of thing we we agreed that we would continue to support that four
067five uh so it's really based just only in that we've had this discussion with a number of schools because uh actually Brewer is a good example where um uh they approached us about doing fourth as well and we said no the program is focused on fifth grade and it and this was only an exception. based on really kind of the financial considerations of that efficiency point that it was really not um efficient to send so few students in fifth grade from Parkside. Um so that's why we went with the decision to do fourth and fifth. But I definitely appreciate your point about you know we don't want to open up like some question of unfairness. Um and uh you'll know that you know there are other examples of where the Monasuri schools or our um
068language immersion programs get some different considerations that other schools don't because of the kinds of programs they are and it it kind of falls into that that decision-making paradigm. >> Thank you so much. com. >> No. Yes. Any public comment on the consent agenda >> in person? >> Checking. >> No public comments at this time. >> Okay. Uh, with that said, if we don't have any other um any >> Yeah, >> I'll make a motion to approve 4 A C I mean three I can't read 4 A3 4 A6 4C5 4 C6 >> second. >> All in favor say I. I >> All right. We will now move to um business finance. >> Yes. Uh we have some colleagues with us tonight. It's going to share some information with us on a recent poll that
069they conduct on our behalf for an upcoming bond measure. We have Jessica Sanchez from EMC and Jared Buyen from Team Civics. [Music] Thank you so much. Can you hear me through this? >> Okay, perfect. >> Well, good evening to the board, superintendent, and staff. I will pull up a quick presentation. There we go. Okay. Thank you. I'm Jessica Psolki Sanchez. Pleasure to be here. Uh I will walk you through very quickly a summary of results from the recent survey conducted among likely 2026 voters here in San Mato Foster City School District. Um this was a survey of likely 2026 voters and the demographics are modeling likely June 2026 voters. Uh we used in order to obtain 600 interviews with these likely voters. We used mixed mode methodology. So that incorporates not only live telephone interviews
070but also online interviews uh where we reach voters by both text and email. uh we conducted the interviews uh in mid July July 8th through 15th as I mentioned 600 interviews overall which carries a margin of error of plus or minus 4 percentage points uh and in one instance we'll share uh a comparison to prior polling uh conducted here in the district. So what we'll share graphically in a moment I'm going to summarize for you here and a few key findings. Uh we do see that while voters are um generally optimistic about the way things are going uh in this local area uh they're also expressing some anxiety anxiety about worsening economic conditions. Um we do see that the vast majority 2thirds see at least some need for additional funding for the schools here in
071the district. When it comes to a potential bond measure, uh we see that support initially in this poll is uh right near the 55% threshold that's needed for passage with 57% of respondents uh saying they would definitely or probably vote yes if the election were held today. Um when it comes to the projects that they prioritize for a potential bond measure, um we see essential repairs like uh repairs to roofs and uh windows. Um classroom updates for science, technology, engineering, and math, skilled trades, modern learning. These kinds of classroom updates are prioritized. We also see that safety upgrades and affordable housing to attract and retain teachers and staff are also important to many voters. Um, and one thing that uh comes through from these results um is that voters who are also parents of students
072attending the schools seem to need a little bit more information on the need for additional funding. So, we'll share that with you momentarily. Uh so first as I mentioned uh voters here are feeling good about the way things are going locally. We start off the survey with a basic question that is not about education or schools. It is simply do you think things in your city are generally going in the right direction or do you think think things are pretty seriously off on the wrong track? And it might surprise some people to see um that people are feeling pretty good. Um 74% say right direction, 25% wrong track. So very nice to see a happy >> it's pretty necessarily like >> it's to scale. >> That said uh we can um clearly see that despite
073that optimism about how things are going locally. Um we can see some economic anxiety coming through here when we say thinking about the future. How do you expect economic conditions to be six months from now? Um, so here there's a lot more red. Uh, we see 62% saying much worse or somewhat worse, 13% saying they expect conditions to be much worse. And so we only see 16% expecting better conditions, 22% the same. So on this slide, we're sharing what we heard from voters when we asked uh when it when it comes to the schools in the San Monteo Foster City School District, which oversees preschool through 8th grade schools in your area. Do you think that there is a great need for more money, some need for more money, little need, or no need for
074more money? And what you can see here is that generally most voters do see at least some need for additional funding. um 66% total saying a great need or some need. But when we look at those results um when comparing those who have students in the schools to those who don't. Um what's interesting is that um those parents of student districts um are less likely to see a need for additional funding. In fact um more than one in four in our survey um say that there's no need for additional funding. >> Jessica, can you speak to the 16% and 76% on the on the slide here? the >> the parents are 16%. >> Oh, absolutely. Sorry. In uh in these when we look at these subgroups, we also like to look at the size of
075the subgroup relative to the overall likely June um electorate. Uh the portion uh that is in parenthesis there represents uh the the portion of likely June voters. So 16% um in our survey are parents of students attending the schools. Uh and that models the the likely June electorate and that amounts to just under a 100red interviews. So we feel pretty confident about those results. >> Thank you. >> Okay. When it comes to a potential bond measure, respondents were presented with this potential measure. Um we said there may be a measure on the ballot next year that reads as follows. And so you can see this is a measure uh that is something that could potentially be on a ballot. It's about 75 words. Um, and it mentions improving elementary and middle schools, updating science, uh,
076technology, engineering, math, and vocational education, uh, classrooms, providing affordable housing to attract and retain quality teachers and staff, re replacing leaky roofs and old windows, improving, uh, safety and security, um, and other repairs shall the measure be adopted, providing the bond measure for the district. And you can see here initially 57% would definitely or probably vote yes, 43% definitely or probably no. So support in total is above the 55% threshold in this poll, but it is within um the margin of error, which is plus or minus four percentage points. And when we take a a quick look at support by a few demographic subgroups, um we can see uh that female voters a little more inclined to support than male voters. They're at 61%, male voters at 52. Um we do see overwhelming support among
077voters uh under 50 years old. Um and certainly something that we um found noteworthy um is that those who are uh voters and parents in this survey are less likely to say they would support the measure than those who are not parents. So um maybe counterintuitive result and certainly again um reinforcing this takeaway about how it seems like um parents in particular um aren't yet aware of the need for the additional funding. a lot of data on this slide, but we wanted to share with you the results uh when we broke down the various projects that could be funded by a bond measure. Um so we presented each each one as an independent question and asked on a scale from 1 to seven where one is not at all important and seven is extremely important.
078Uh how do you consider each of these? And so these were presented to each respondent in a randomized order. Um but what you can see here is uh we've stacked them um based on how important um they are uh overall to voters. Um and we're looking particularly at those fives, sixes, and sevens. Um all of those meaningful, all of those um meaning that the voter considers them important, but the sevens in particular, we see we consider higher intensity. So if a voter rates that as a seven, they think it's it's very very important. Um, so rising to the top of the list, uh, replacing leaky roofs and old windows, uh, restoring shop classes, updating classrooms and labs for STEM. Um, these are top priorities for voters overall when it comes to bond expenditures. Um, and
079we also see safety upgrades and affordable housing, uh, to attract and retain teachers and staff are high priorities for many. Um, and as you move down the list, uh, priorities, you know, fall off a little bit in terms of totals. Um though everything um that is uh presented here on this slide is important to uh 55% or more. Although um we often do look at those intensity numbers um as being particularly important. So looking at if if you just look at the sevens and the sixes, um we kind of home in on those top four um projects around essential repairs, uh classroom updates, um uh career education, classroom updates, uh safety, um and these kinds of projects. So we also presented in the survey a a few different message uh themes where we provided additional
080information about the benefits of a potential bond measure and the need for a potential bond measure. Um so there were a series offormational statements and we asked again using a one to seven scale where one means not at all convincing and seven means very convincing. Um how would you rate each of these as a reason to support a potential measure? Um, and so we're highlighting uh the the messages that were the most convincing on this slide. Um, those are the ones that talk about expanding career technical education, which we've heard a lot uh about this evening. Um, exciting stuff happening. Uh, safety uh making sure students are uh safe while they're here at school. Updating uh systems like uh uh electrical, roofing, fencing, fire alarms, and emergency communication systems. uh emphasizing that there will be
081accountability and oversight uh of the measure, protecting local funding at a time when education funding is in jeopardy. Uh and then lastly uh the um recruiting and retaining high-quality educators um through provision of affordable housing. So one last slide um we'll share and then I'll hand it to Jared. Um just wanted to give you a quick snapshot of uh historical uh polling and election results. Um not all of these are um from bond measures but both parcel taxes and bond bond measure polling results in the darker blue, election results in the lighter blue. Um certainly we have seen support historically in polling and in elections um above the 55% uh level that is needed for passage but the support in the current poll is just a little bit softer lower overall than the um overall
082support that has been seen in uh polling in the past and in past elections. Um so I want to keep that in mind. Um and I will hand it to Jared for next steps. >> Thank you very much Jessica Jared Boen with team civics. It's a pleasure to be back in front of you. I just have the one slide here and then we'll take questions on on the entire presentation. Um, just on a personal note, it's nice to be back here. Um, I worked uh with uh Miss Proctor and and uh um several of you on the bond in 2020 most recently. And the the first measure I ever did here uh was actually your measure B parcel tax in 2003. Um, and I don't even think I could grow a beard yet, much less
083have all this gray in it. So, um, it's nice to be back. Um, and I appreciate it. So this slide uh basically explains the process of preparing for a potential bond measure. All right. And this is uh when we look at think about a bond measure, we know all the things that are on that yellow column on the far right. Those are the instantly the things that jump into our brain. We're going to have to have yard signs. We're going to, you know, have to have direct mail. There's going to be a campaign. We're not going to have to have phone banks, are we, Jared? Please don't make us do phone banks. So, and no, we won't do phone banks anymore. Those things are true and those happen, but they happen at the end of
084the process and the district cannot pay for those things. Private fundraising will be needed, volunteer leadership will be needed. Um, so those are not the things we're really talking about today. What we have found in doing this for as many years as I've been doing this for, you know, your district and many, many districts, hundreds of districts around the state, nearly 400 times, my firm and I, um, that the three steps in the blue arrows, there's three phases and milestones that the district can direct, uh, that you can undertake prior to the board making a final decision about being on the ballot. that if we take these three milestones seriously, we put ourselves in the best position so that by the time you vote to put something on the ballot, you can feel confident that
085you're setting that volunteer-led, privately funded campaign committee up uh for success. And so what Jessica's presented tonight is really the the most important part of that first column, the testing, right? A feasibility study. Can we pass a bond in 2026? Um, and the answer to that question is yes, but there definitely are some flags in these polling numbers that uh suggest we shouldn't take it for granted and there's probably quite a bit of information to provide to the community. Quite a bit of work uh yet to do. As she noted, our support is at 57 when we need 55. We'd we'd prefer it to be uh you know uh a bit higher than that. Um honestly, that is within the margin of error. Um we saw that our parents actually are less supportive than our
086non-parents. That's a good sign in a way because it's easier to talk to your parents than it is to talk to your non-parents. Uh it also is a good sign I think that they believe you guys are doing a great job and they don't see necessarily an urgent need. It does suggest a little bit that we probably need to focus a little bit more on some of the school improvement projects, maybe a little bit less. There's been a lot of discussion about teacher and staff housing and I think that may be confusing some parents about what this is about. is it really going to help my school site or is it really for this other project which I'm sure that they believe is important but we can tell from the poll they don't feel quite
087as directly impacted by um so uh that's going to lead us to the second of these two blue arrows which is where we vet the idea so we know from Jessica's survey that there's feasibility here but we have to make sure people really understand the potential of this proposal and they have a chance to ask their questions and we have a chance to really improve the information that they have again before you make a final decision on what to do. So, beginning in the fall, I know that there are lots of plans to go out to every school site. Um, you guys have have been doing facility master plan updates. Um, that's actually a really nice dovetail with the bond planning. So, we're working closely with your team to make sure that as the school
088site conversations happen, uh, we talk about the bond and we talk about it in a way that's informed by the information we got from Jessica and her survey, um, so that we really help keep the focus on what the bond will do for school improvement projects. Uh, and it's also important to recognize that sometimes the language we use internally for facilities is not the same language that average voters or even parents that they gravitate to. So, a lot of what we learned from Jessica's survey is sort of the kinds of things to be talking about. We don't like to point out that our schools might be older in some places, have think problems like leaky roofs, uh, in inadequate wiring, but the voters actually have to hear that because they have to know that there's
089a need for this kind of money. So, we're going to be working on making sure that they understand the scope of the problem and that that's why we have a solution in front of them. Uh, so that process of vetting the proposal and this is non-advocacy communication. We're not out there telling people they have to support a bond. We cannot do that. Um, the district cannot advocate. However, you can inform and you can answer questions and solicit feedback. And that's what this process will be about. And it will also include the non-parents. So, um, when Jessica talked about the 16% versus 76% of the sample, she's modeling a June primary likely voter sample, right? Which is smaller than a November general election. That's more voters in November than in June. Uh, and when you get
090that electorate smaller, it tends to get a little bit older. It tends to get a little bit more conservative. So, one in six of those voters, 16% are going to be parents in your schools. That means five out of six of those June voters are not current parents in your schools. And those folks, luckily, they start actually a little bit more supportive than the parents, but we still can't take them for granted. We're only at 57%. So, there's more work to be done informing them. And there's some work for the superintendent probably and for all of you as ambassadors of the community so that you understand kind of what the talking points are and how do we get out in the community when you're, you know, at a Rotary Club, at a chamber of commerce,
091at a SAMA event, something talking to people in the right way about uh what the district is planning with a focus on those school improvement projects, not really just on the housing component, so that they really understand kind of what what's at stake here. Um, and all of that, you know, will be happening. Um, and then the final step in the process before a potential board vote is to build a strong measure. That's when we would make final judgments about the total amount to pursue, the tax rate that we might pursue, uh, what the actual project list looks like in legal form. You guys have been working through the 2020 bond, so you know kind of what that how that project list works and how it limits your spending authority only to the things that
092were included in that resolution. We'll have to write another resolution like that. Um, and if you're going to be on the June ballot, we're going to end up bringing that back to you in uh probably February for a vote, right? It's August now. It's like six months of work that we can do before that. We may even have Jessica come back in January or February and do a tracking poll, a second version of this study that you saw tonight because 57 is is is, you know, close. You're within the margin of error. And so we may want have a little bit more confidence um about what that number is before you actually pull the trigger uh and do this in June because again we still have a November option. It's not optimal to do it
093in November because you also have a partial tax renewal that's coming right behind it. So our goal would be ideally to get the bond done in June. Uh and that's why we're working you know as quickly as we can. But, you know, looking at these poll results, it's clear that we do have someformational uh um goals that we probably need to meet in the next 6 months before we put this on the ballot uh for a June election. So, that's an overview and I think Jessica and I are both available for any questions that you have about the polling data or the next steps in the process. >> Thank you. Do we have any board questions? Um, just quick question about um I think more the Oh, sorry. I'm I think my question was more
094about the um second step of this um is I guess like who works typically to like co like coordinate these efforts? Um I just want to understand sort of the division of labor here. >> So we have a good working group internally that uh with Pat and Diego and Amy have been working closely with us. We're going to create or we actually have been creating a a suite of materials. So there's um you know a one-page handout, there's website content. We're working on slides that will go to the school sites but could be easily adapted for like a you know Sam breakfast or something like that. Um and then uh all of you should have access to all of these materials as well so that at any point if you find yourself going to an
095event where you feel like hey I'd like to have you know 21 pagers you know about the potential bond you know that's available to you that you can have them if you need some sort of a message training you want to talk to us directly about hey I'm running into these kinds of questions or I'm sort of not sure I know how to talk about this we're more than happy to do that. Um it's been coordinated. You know, we have a good working group that meets regularly and uh you know has been kind of preparing to do all that. But it is really important that all of us as district officials and district leaders, we're saying the same kinds of things about the prospective measure, right? If they, you know, hear from a board member
096in one event and they hear from the superintendent the other event, it's got to sound more or less consistent um about what the priorities are. Uh and I think again as we start to elevate really the school improvement projects um people will start to I think understand and feel a little bit more of of the need and awareness um you know and we have some time to do all that. >> Thanks. Yeah, I'm I'm actually it's interesting to see the the data about the parents. Um and I'm actually wondering if you know all of the improvements that they're seeing on the campuses are especially like the the newer parents that don't know what it was like before. >> Um maybe they're like it's great. Like what do what do we have to do? It's it's
097all good. you know, but obviously um not everyone knows that we had this, you know, super long list and we could only meet some of the um some of the needs at in during the in the first round. So, um I really appreciate your work on this. Thank you. >> Yeah, I think you're 100% right about that and that's why we have to sort of take that extra step of explaining there are still needs. It's great that we have all this construction and these are some of the needs. you know, by starting sight by sight, we'll be able to say at your site, these are some needs, but even in a more general way, we can do some of that communication where we can say, you know, these are the needs, uh, you know, around
098the district generally or for elementary parents at the middle schools, right? So that they as they think ahead. Um, yeah, we do have to do that work though. >> Thank you, Jared. Um, thank you both actually for this information. I had a just question. Um Jared, we worked before and we had a very like tight timeline because we did it very quickly. So, um in general, like I know you're starting kind of behind the scenes now, but when do we like what what can we expect over the next like 10 months? When does when do we convert to this like no longer district run, now we're >> hitting the streets? >> Yeah, that's a great question. The deadline, if we're going to be on the June ballot, the deadline is 88 days prior to the
099June election, which is March 6th. So, the board would have to take a formal vote prior to March 6th and then those election documents have to be submitted on time to the county clerk. And so, I think leading up to that time, uh, you do not have to wait for that moment for the volunteers to begin organizing and getting ready. But, you know, probably around the first of the year, we would we would want to start thinking ahead about, okay, who's going to be on this committee? You know, who's going to take a lead in fundraising? Um, you know, how are those pieces going to come together? Um, so if we use this fall in particular to do school site outreach and then some of this other community outreach that we need to be doing,
100city council members, um, county supervisor, you know, obviously should be should be supportive of this. Um, uh, you know, other community leaders, neighborhood leaders, uh, then by the first of the year, if we start to feel confident and we do a tracking survey that says, "Yes, we're still on track. We can make this happen." That would be a time for volunteers, I think, to start organizing themselves. >> Okay. Thank you. And then one other question I had was do we know or when do we know when there's like our cities are competing with us for also wanting to get bond measures or parcel taxes on the ballot. >> I mean there has been talk uh at least in San Monteo about some potential measures but I think that's likely to be November of 2026 not
101June of 2026. Um so that potentially is another reason for us to continue thinking about >> you know trying to focus about the June election. Um, and look, voters in California are used to long ballots. It is not disqualifying to have two measures on the ballot at the same time because they'll be for different things. Whatever the city is trying to fund is not going to be schools. Whatever you're trying to fund is not going to be streets and parks and public safety and the kinds of things that cities talk about. And voters can tell the difference. You know, they will say, "Okay, does this agency need it? Do I does I do I trust this agency to spend it? Are these things I think are important? Do I think I can afford it?" and
102then they'll go look at the city measure and they'll ask themselves the same sets of questions. So, it's okay if there's some overlap. Uh but um certainly it's important to make sure that the council members know that you're thinking about doing this, that they're on message about it, that they understand why you need it. They're not just thinking about housing, which benefits them. They probably excited that you're thinking about the housing component, but they they have to understand it's about school improvement also and that that's needed and that we really start to get that into their into their consciousness and um you know that they also understand, hey, we're not none of us are in competition here, right? You guys do what you have to do. We're going to do what we have to do.
103We don't want them out there badmouthing what you're doing. And and and if they get nervous that you're out there badmouthing them, then they might, you know, do that the same way. And that that only hurts everybody, right? So, um, we don't want to be in that situation. >> Okay. Thank you. >> I just had two questions. Um, one is kind of following up on Trusty Proctor's point. So, just to get a just to clarify, it sounds like the recommendation now in terms of timing and strategy is to target June partly to avoid conflict with parcel taxes, but also it just gets more noise as the ginatorial race picks up leading to November. So, I definitely agree with that approach. Again, assuming the data as we move forward tracks it. I did have questions on
104the polling generally. So, one thing that stood out to me, um, so I was curious since I I know you guys work with other districts as well or historically, how much of what you're seeing in this poll tracks, I guess, what you're seeing in other statewide polls, because one thing about having non-parents have certain perceptions to me means that they might be looking at it through a statewide or nationalized lens since their own children aren't at the school. So, I saw the local funding that's, you know, controlled by district being one of the stronger seven arguments make sense because they're seeing so much news about all this funding being stripped away. And so, I'm just curious to know whether or not what you're seeing is pretty consistent across the board with other similar districts that
105are considering measures like these or if you're seeing any type of irregular moves specifically in our district. Mhm. >> Yeah, I would say um there are other districts that that we are working in where we're seeing higher support among parents than non-parents and there are also some where we see a similar pattern um to here. So, it really depends on the circumstances and it very often will depend on the kind kinds of work that's being done um inside the district and what parents are seeing and hearing and and things like that. And um I would say other interesting things that stand out in this poll are pretty consistent with what we're seeing elsewhere. Um like a overall kind of um I would say u you voters are being a little more choosy about what they're
106willing to support these days. Um and we're also seeing a pattern at least locally here in the Bay Area. um was that that what you saw high level of optimism about things locally um you know against a backdrop of concerns about the economy. So I think those are interesting but also very consistent um results for Northern California. >> Yeah. >> Anything else? >> Yeah. I mean I think Jessica's point about the e the optimism and the economic pessimism is is interesting. This is a democratic area and so what we're seeing there's a weird crisscross on the partisanship where Democrats are actually more economically pessimistic because of the sort of way that they're interpreting national events. Republicans are less e they're more optimistic. Uh but of course Republicans are much more skeptical on school bonds and
107taxes. And so when you add the economic pessimism to Democrats, um, and then this generally, even though this is definitely a a a plurality majority Democrat district, you know, the Democrats here are fiscally conservative or or you know, this is you still have to make your case to them, right? These are these are folks who who want to understand that you need the money. They, you know, that it's it's it's not like some other parts of the Bay Area where um it's just sort of a a knee-jerk yes to new taxes regardless of what they are. You know, these are Santo Foster City voters. you know, want to kind of understand the details a little bit and they want to understand the need. Um, and so we do have to get out and kind of
108make that case. And so I think all of that is sort of baked into these numbers. >> And I guess if you're looking at the fact that we have a historically low level of support, at least starting off for this measure, is our view that's tied to the economic pessimism, is it just that the fact that we've passed so many bond measures and parcel taxes in recent years have created a fatigue in the voters? What's our kind of theory of the case moving into it? I my theory is that um voters are uh when I say they're being a little more picky, they are they really want to understand how the funding is going to be beneficial. So they're sort of withholding support a little more and saying I want to see results. Um we're
109seeing that in all kinds of polling and all kinds of measures. And so I think that's at play um here and elsewhere. They want to make sure they're putting their money into something that is going to produce results. So that's really really important um for them to understand this is going to get get them something that they want. >> Yeah. And I would I would say that I wouldn't consider the voter fatigue as in fact kind of the opposite. I actually feel like your >> strong relationship with your community, parents and non-parents alike is is a real benefit. You're starting from a strong foundation. People think these are excellent schools. That is the perception of them. They don't seem to have concerns about the fiscal management. They think you're, you know, you're fine. Um it's
110more I think these bigger issues that create some concern for us and in fact if anything in some ways with the parent community might be a little bit of a victim of your success and we have some extra work to do there as as you pointed out earlier but um I would think that these are more global issues uh and again we have the ability to you know overcome them I think with good information outreach over the next six months. >> Great. Thank you. All right. Do we have any in-person comment or questions related to this agenda item? Joel, can you please check online? >> Yes. Checking. I don't see any public comments at this time. >> All right. >> I guess maybe your chance. >> Um, I guess I just have a question. Oh,
111I have to go. >> I'm sorry. What? >> I'm sorry. I just see a card. >> It's my first meeting. >> No, we don't need Yeah. No. No. No. Okay. >> Just go. >> This is related to an agenda item. So you're fine. You can just Yeah. >> Um I guess my Oh, and I have to stand up here. >> Thank you for >> Okay. Well, my name's Maresha. Um I am a parent at Parkside Monastery and um as I sit on schoolside council and other odd things in the district. Uh my question is I guess with the parcel, is this the parcel tax? I just wanted to know um what we're talking about and if parents even know that like what the surveys like the bond and the parcel tax are they the same
112or >> they are the that's >> sorry um I'm happy to jump in but this was a bond measure that we tested in this being considered and this is a ballot question that was presented um you asked about a a bond measure and it laid out details um So although we are aware that sometimes those two things are confused um they pay for typically different things measure to infrastructure um projects tax general fund. >> This is the bond. >> Oh it's the bond. Okay. All right. Well that clarifies it because I guess then I was going to lean in maybe this is for the next election or something. But um when I spoke to some parents at another meeting regarding there was a question on the survey about the parcel tax and I think unless
113you're a homeowner some parents didn't know what the parcel tax was. So you don't know what you're voting for and or you don't know um perhaps if they're renting if that is being discouraged by their landlords like who wants their property tax rate. So that's why I was just wondering how um with the sample of the parents of the 600 I was going to ask how many were homeowners and if they clearly understood what they're voting for. >> I mean that's a great question and we do have this was an executive summary of results. Um one of the questions that we didn't share tonight but we do have is a open-ended question um that we asked in the poll after we asked if they would support or oppose the measure about why they would support
114or oppose. Um, so we can certainly take a look at some of the responses and see um, if there's anything in there indicating confusion around what it is for additional information to do that. >> Thank you. >> Jo, can you please check online to see if there are any uh, questions or comments related to this agenda item? >> Yes. >> Oh, I already went already. No, no public comments on Zoom at this time. >> Okay, thank you. Um, with that we're gonna take a five minute, please. Recess. All right, welcome back. We will move to uh education services. Okay, good evening. Um superintendent and board of trustees. Um it's that time of year where we have an opportunity to um come back to you and uh share a little information for you about the professional
115development work that has occurred over this um summer 2025. So give me a second here and I will share my screen with you. All right. Um, just to just to provide a little bit of context before going into the specific activities, recall that, you know, of course, we're in our going into our fourth year of our strategic plan and uh we heavily invested in professional development for all our staff in the first few years and the key um strategies and programs. Um so in these last two summers the um the emphasis has really been on um uh bringing our new uh staff, new teachers into um the priorities that we have as a district and also offering you know optional opportunities to returning teachers if they want to uh go deep in you know uh
116back around with for example our benchmark our ELA curriculum in elementary school um and that kind of thing. So, uh, but the emphasis has really been on, um, the work that we've been doing, um, with our new certificated staff. So, uh, we're focusing, uh, this this, um, presentation on the week before school started, which was August 4th through the 8th. And that week began with um our district orientation um where um we had of course um um actually a smaller number of new teachers or new certificated staff than historically um and some of that is I mean that actually is great news. We've had a lot of stability um and um that has meant that that new group is a little bit smaller than it has been historically. But you can just see there some
117of the items of the things that we we did with them um uh at the morning or uh orientation on August 4th. And then uh we sort of paired that with the next day in the afternoon they had an orientation at their site. Uh if they were a teacher, they went obviously to their schools. If they were uh certificated staff in other capacities, they they would work with their supervisor. Uh so again it was almost a full day of folks just kind of getting oriented to our strategic plan and to uh the site priorities. Um and then um that same day we also as you know we've been for the last many years we've been focused on the work around our English learners. And so we did just a very brief introduction to uh the
118strategies and and priorities that we have for our multilingual students and particularly our instructional EL signature strategies. Um again remember that we have these systems and infrastructure in place uh to teachers on special assignment. uh the PD days during the school year. Um a lot of staff already well grounded and so new folks to our district have multiple ways that they're they're being brought up and and supported um with the priorities that we have uh the the professional learning priorities that we have as a district. Um, I would add at these sessions, you know, the um the the tone is very positive and actually it's it it's remarkable each year how the new staff that we're seeing are not often, for example, new teachers. They're actually veteran teachers, but now they're coming to our district.
119They're new to us, but they're not new to the field. And that really means they're walking in with a good deal of experience and readiness to to provide um instruction to our students. Uh multilingual services team, of course, they they touch a lot of different pieces of work across the district. And this is just a list of some of the additional um things that they did. Um you know, we you know, we're building out the Spanish immersion program. Um and and particularly this was at Abbott uh helping our ELD teachers with our our SAS curriculum which we adopted last year. Um we are um continuing with summit K12 but actually shifting the focus of the actual work to our schools that are funded by title one and also our community schools. So the informed K12
120academic intervention is going to be embedded in the afterchool programs at those schools. So we had to train those uh like boys and girls club um folks in how to support students to to use that online curriculum. Um and then um you know related to some of the shifts that are happening with Fiesta Gardens and the impact of that on uh on Abbott. Um there's a new Spanish language um art and arts course um at Abbott which is really you know very exciting and it's going to give students who um already bring a lot of Spanish skills to um their learning. Um and that's a new curriculum. Uh so we did some training with the staff teachers around that. Um and then a a big part of our our um four days was working with
121all of our teachers around um uh the safety care work. Um of course you all are familiar with the importance of that training um and the work that uh the expertise that it provides our our our staff to work intensively with students who who uh may have other social emotional challenges in school. So really making sure that we're bringing you know a positive, supportive, real humane um uh staff to support those students. Uh so this is a regular certification and then reertification that needs to happen. Uh so obviously taking advantage of the August days was very important. We we we either certified or reertified. You can see there upwards of 72 um folks. We also rolling out uh imagine that um Dr. Rubakaba and um and direct director Heredia will be coming back to you
122with more information about the wayfinder curriculum that we're new curriculum we're implementing. It's a social emotional learning curriculum we're implementing at the middle schools. Uh this was really a trainer of trainers training if that makes sense in that we're we're embedding folks at sites who um have been trained who can then uh who can then train their staff in how to um implement the curriculum. It's very much sort of intuitive. It's not overly complicated, but these 18 folks will kind of spread out during at the start of this year and train others um and how to use the curriculum. And then um uh the uh middle school work is really continuing and kind of deepening around building instructional leadership teams. Um, of course, the um the complexities of working with folks who who are single
123subject credential and specialize um in one subject area. This idea of building instructional leadership teams that set priorities for the school. Uh that'll set the PD work that's happening. U we're we're kind of making a transition at the middle school level where uh for the last several years there have been more gatherings and trainings. uh whereas now it's going to be much more sightbased rather than convenings. It's going the work is going to happen based on site priorities. You can see um these are all members of the um of the the 24 participants are all members of their ILTs at their at their middle schools. And then a variety of elementary teacher professional learning opportunities. I mentioned there were a couple opportunities to um kind of either introduce new teachers or refresh uh returning teachers
124in our benchmark curriculum. Uh you may recall that we um we are implementing an additional sort of supplement supplementary um history social studies curriculum at the elementary level. That's TCI. Um and so this was an introduction to that curriculum for um any teachers who were interested and particularly for our new teachers. And and both of those together had a had a total of about 80 participants. And then um recall that we are launching um a pilot uh process this year in elementary mathematics. So uh we we brought together the the pilot teachers from across our elementary schools that 35 folks to um to begin the the thinking about now this was in in OVAD is one of the curriculum that was selected to be piloted. there will be a second curriculum um and a and
125PD to support teachers as they as they implement um those pilots and you can see some makeup um information and then again the amplify Desmos uh curriculum that's being piloted there'll be a PD opportunity on that uh on November 4th. Um, so that you know, of course, we want to make sure that those folks who are going to make final recommendations about the elementary curriculum we we adopt, we're trying to make sure that they're, you know, well prepared and supported to to implement those pilots. And that's essentially it. It was a busy week. Um, as I said, very positive, kind of upbeat um, vibe to the week. I'm happy to answer any questions u, and engage in discussion with you. Thank you for this wonderful presentation. I want to just um mention I want to
126well first of all this entire um uh presentation is amazing um that we are implementing um these pilots. Um I'm particularly uh happy about the financial literacy that we're going to be integrating into our curriculum. Yeah. >> Uh that's very important. Thank you so much. Are there any board members who would like to make any comment or have any questions? >> Um, >> oh um I had a question about the Abbott um Spanish >> um language arts curriculum. So, um can you kind of describe to me um how the leveling of this um or I guess the leveling of the language arts course compared to what it was in previous years for those um rising from um rising from Fiesta Gardens. um you know since we have the Fiesta Gardens campus that's expanding to middle
127school like can you I guess I'm just trying to understand like what is the um target audience for this um this language arts course. >> Yeah. Um well on one hand it definitely is targeted at those uh Fiesta students who chose not to do the middle school the immersion experience at Fiesta in sixth seventh and eth >> but um had an interest in keeping going in you know the advanced Spanish language learning that they they're doing. Uh so it's definitely that group but it's also meant actually to start bringing in uh students who may not have gone to Fiesta but um by you know family circumstances or other background actually have a fair amount of of Spanish competency and so to give them an opportunity to go even deeper with their language learnings. Um I
128think we we are envisioning there you know a sequence of sixth, seventh and eighth grade an elective that students can pass through that um would make them still you know we could qualify them for um sort of the the state assessments around proficiency in Spanish and things like that. >> Okay. Do we have a sense of I mean I guess if this is new for this year how many students approximately are enrolled in this program for like sixth grade for example. Yeah, I don't have that number off hand, but I'd be happy to to come back to you with >> Okay. Yeah, just be curious to see B, you know, compared to previous >> Yeah, absolutely. >> Historical. Thank you. >> Anyone else? >> No. Any in person? >> Joel, can you please check online
129to see if there are any comments regarding this item? >> Okay. No public comments on Zoom at this time. >> All right. Thank you. We will move to 7 A uh superintendent services. >> I think we have >> she's uh in the webinar. We just called her up. >> Joe, we have the principal of um Le Elementary School. online if you want to um bring her on as a as a >> panelist >> and then um she can take us through um the work over the last two years. >> All right. Good evening everybody. Um can you hear me? Okay. >> Yes. Okay. Great. Thanks. Um, so yeah, I want to talk through a little bit of a journey. Um, Diego, if you wouldn't mind. Um, I you have this slide deck unless you wanted
130me to pull it up. >> Well, while we're waiting for him to pull it up. Yeah, this journey actually it started before I even it got to lead itself. Um here we go. Thank you. So um just a little background on the name. Uh originally of course we were Horal and then we moved to lead and then we moved were hoping for a change. So for me I've been in Sano for over 22 years living in this this district and I did not hear of the name LEAD until I got to work in the Samato Foster City School District three years ago. I hadn't heard of the name before and so when I first heard about it I'm like lead what is what is this school um and then of course I discovered that it
131was Horl and I thought oh yeah Horl I've heard of Horl that I had heard of but I hadn't heard of Lee and the conversations around the name started right when I got there and I had conversations with teachers about the name and I'll talk a little bit about that again in just a minute. Next slide please. Thank you. So again, started out as Horl Elementary named after a former superintendent and then uh switched to lead many years ago. Um and my understanding around the name change from Horal to lead was that it was an executive decision made by the principal at the time. Teacher input was not taken into account. Parents weren't surveyed. Um it was just we were going to be lead because at that time they we were an art sort of
132magnet school literature engineering arts and design school but as you know we are no longer that school and so the name lead is a little bit confusing. Is it all caps? Is it just a capital at the beginning? It's a little bit of a confusing name. Um, and now of course if you look at just those three pictures, we are completely different than who we were even a few years ago when I started. The school physically has gone through a remarkable transformation. It is a beautiful place to be with our new MPR and our new turf fields. Um, classrooms have new flooring. The layout, the design, fences were taken down within the school. It is a different space. When you walk into that campus, it really feels light and open and airy and bright. Um,
133of course, there's always things to be done, but physically it is just a wonderful place to be. Next slide, please. >> So, why do we want to become Cottage Grove? So, for for us, uh, when I talk to teachers and staff and students even, we want a name that truly belongs to all of us in the community. um that name be lead doesn't really fully capture the richness and the diversity and the experiences in the community. For those of you who don't know, Cottage Grove is actually the name of the part of Samonteo where you're in. So just like Sunny Bray School is in Sunny Bray and Sano, right? Barisford is in the Barisford neighborhood, Baywood is in Baywood, Lead didn't really capture who we are in the neighborhood of Cottage Grove. We are a
134really rich and diverse community. um and we like to do things together. The other thing that is is really I think telling about the name is that there wasn't a huge amount of say in it from students and families. There wasn't a buy in. So when we started this process the first year it was kind of just talking it through with teachers but last year in earnest we really began that work of wanting to hear every single voice. Um what what was the thoughts around different names and we toyed with different names. We also on we are located on Ocean View Avenue. So there was conversations around could it be ocean view? Um could we go back to Horl? That was also a conversation. There wasn't much um folks weren't really interested in doing that
135but we did put it out there. But it was a process that has taken time. It took um conversations. It took um principal chats, surveys, and trying to get the information out in more than one way. I think it's important that we did like a digital survey, but we also did a different kind of survey, which you'll see here in a second. Next slide, please. Um, so for those of you know, we've gone through a tremendous transformation, I think, in the past few years. We really are a different school than we were. Um, we need a name that really sort of reflects who we are and where we're going. Um, we are a school now that are a community school. We are and that is a big deal. We are providing a lot of enrichment
136opportunities for our students after school. Um we are providing parent education. We also now feel really grateful that we have this opportunity to really pilot projectbased learning and create this space for our learners. Um it's all part of a sort of rebranding of who we are and how we want the community to see us. Next slide please. So it's I think it's really important to know that we did lots of community feedbacks on this. We met in site council. We met in our community school steering committee. We talked about it in ELAC meetings. We talked about it in principal chats. Any venue that we had, we started listening to voices and hearing what folks had to say about the name. And I think one of the first real conversations we had about it was actually
137in a community school steering committee where I was listening to parents about the name and teachers talking about how they felt around the name. Um, so community feedback was really important on this. Next slide, please. um we worked together with this. This was a combination of teachers with a voice but staff, parents, students, everybody sharing ideas. Um the again I think the reason I feel so strongly about this is that this is a true collaborative effort. Um now having said that there are some folks who you know really remain committed to lead and we heard those voices um and we listened to them and shared feedback with them. Um, it's important to acknowledge that there are some folks who love that name. There's some nostalgia for them there because maybe they were um their younger
138children started at Lead or whatever the case may be. And so I want to acknowledge that some folks feel strongly about the name, but overall the collective community um really feel like a name change is something that we really want to do going forward. Um, next slide please. So how did we do these surveys? Um, we did, um, we asked folks a couple questions. Did we want to keep the original owl mascot? Did we want to have a new mascot? We did a digital survey, a Google form, but we also realized that our youngest learners, like our kindergarteners, a Google form was not going to be an appropriate way for us to do that. So, I think it's important that I show you the next two slides um, in succession so you can understand why
139paper surveys are going to change the results a little bit. So um if you go to the next slide, you'll see the results of the survey and this was the Google form survey. So right here it's 58 51.8% wanted Cottage Grove and 48.4 wanted to stay lead. Um and then you can see there in terms of a new mascot folks who wanted a new mascot, the new mascot actually that they are choosing um is Cubs. That's the one that everybody seemed to really want to do with the Cubs. But if you look at the next slide, the data that's not reflected in those Google forms is are these surveys, which are equally important. These are our youngest learners. These are our kindergarteners voting on whether they wanted to stay the lead owls or if they
140wanted to be Cottage Grove and what which um mascot was really important to them. And you can see them there writing with their little either they wrote their names or they did little tally marks. We were teaching them how to do tally marks. So, this is just one sampling of two of our kindergarten classes from last year voting on what they wanted. And their voices are important, too. This is their school as well. So, we, you know, we took input from outgoing fifth graders who the name change wouldn't affect, but we also took we're taking this input from our smallest, littlest learners as well. Like, what is it that you feel strongly about? And so we put all that data together to really get a consensus of yes, the community is for Cottage Grove and
141yes, they are for a new mascot, the Cubs, which I think really reflects who we are, too. If you look at the next slide, I we have we we've done a little bit of work around that. Um we talked about the owl, if we kept the owl, what it would look like, what it would look like if we were the Cottage Grove Cardinals. Um, that bear in the bottom corner is sort of the most I think accurate mockup of what we were kind of heading towards. The kids really like that friendly kind of scrappy bear who's um ready for action and excitement. Um, but we we presented the community with lots of options so they could see what some possibilities were. Next slide, please. Um, so this new identity, I think it's it's important for
142our school. Um, we've come a long way. I've said that before. Physically, um, test scores are rising, ratings are rising. We, we are not who we were just a few years ago. Um, we are a place where kids want to come to school. Um, teachers are excited to be there. Uh, we are really transforming our community. Not only are we a community school, which I think is really important, but we also really now are embracing PBL in a way that I think is really exciting. Some of the board have already experienced some of the things we're doing around project-based learning. Um, and you can see how our teachers are really embracing it. Um, the kids are loving project-based learning. They are it. We're only three weeks into school and it is already the part of
143the day they are looking forward to. It's just a completely new way for them to learn and the ownership that they feel around this learning is so important. Um, so I just make sure we really highlight the fact that, you know, we a new identity, we're moving in a new direction with some of our educational practices. They go really well together. Next slide, please. So, these are some of the things that we're working on too going forward are these um who we think we are. Cottage Grove cares for itself. We for others and we care for the environment. The nameless our shared story this time and the future we are building together and I want to emphasize that together all the work we have done could not have been done without the support of the
144district support of parents teachers all of us together are making this shift on who we are um we stand chance for who we are what we value and the promise that every voice matters and that's kind of who we are and why we feel so strongly about this name and I really the board will consider this um as not just good for our school community but for the district itself. >> Thank you. And I'm happy to answer any questions you may have. >> Thank you, Miss Delh. This was really cute. This is I I really love the um the options. Uh I love the bear. That's I I'm voting for the bear. Um, >> do we do we have any board questions at this time? >> Yeah, I actually had a question about u maybe
145I mean I don't know if this is a question for principal Delahun or more for superintendent ooa but like this isn't a a voting item. So what is um like what are the next steps I guess in this process? So I think um part of the idea of bringing this to the board is we really want to um demonstrate a real interest in community input and community access. Um I trust Natalie and her team at the school implicitly and I think having met with her and discussed this all the way through they've done a really wonderful job. But you know changing the name of a school is a big thing. So, um, we felt like tonight's presentation would, um, certainly serve as a way to announce to people in our larger community that this name
146change is being requested and is being considered. Uh, and then we would bring this back to the board at a future board meeting. Um, September is an option. I might lean more towards October because it would just give more time to be able to meet with the community a second time. Um, pull more information for the board. Um and then at that time uh get a a really strong written um uh proposal from the school and then for the board as part of a resolution because it does require some work on the back end in terms of actually changing the name. Um and then that would become you could say permanent either at the October meeting or at a future meeting uh depending on board direction. >> Thank you. Um I don't have a question
147but just a comment. Um first um principal Deah Hunt thank you so much for the presentation. Um I think all of us you know we we've all seen the transformation of Lead soon to be Cottage Grove. Um and we've just been so excited about the progress and you know it's like a transformation both physical on the outside and also on the inside. Um, and I just wanted to say that the little tally marks um, for the kindergarteners and their little votes, that just slayed me. That was just the best thing I've seen all all night. >> What did you What did you say? >> It slayed me. >> Oh, that's what you said. >> I just had one, I guess, question or comment. Um, do we have any policy or procedures for name changes of
148schools? And um I don't know do are middle school names different than our elementary school names? I don't know if they're name like human people or >> We do have the policy. We uh attached it to the item for tonight. Um and you know it's >> it's sort of generic. It's you know it's probably in effect in like 99% of school districts in California. Um, so it's not necessarily super specific to Sato Foster City School District, but um, you know, it has the, you know, the very explicit language about like why why and how you would name a school. In this case, it falls under the sort of the geographic area, the sort of the neighborhood name, I guess you could call like Bearsford as as Natalie pointed out. And then in this case, you
149know, the Cottage Grove neighborhood or community um that does have some historic relevance in the area. I don't see the policy attached, but I also maybe I'm missing it. >> Oh, later. Oh, in a different agenda item. >> It's in a different agenda item. Oh, wow. Okay. >> Um All right. Well, then I'll >> Oh, in our board agenda. Okay. Gotcha. But we can attach it to this item, too. If we can just do that after the fact, that'd be great. Thank you. >> Okay. >> I guess I don't have a I I love this and I think this is a cute cute name, cute um logo. I like the process. I'm just I'll do my homework and I'll read the board policy on this one, but just wanted to make sure that um since
150she mentioned that how the name was changed previously without a lot of input, just want to make sure that we have some structure around how this goes um in the future for other schools who may also be interested. And actually, she did point out, you know, obviously as the principal of lead, she's going to hear that backstory, but there are numerous schools in the district that have changed um the mascot in very similar ways. Like a new leader comes on and says, "That's not a very good mascot. Let's sh change it to something else." So, right now, we have a lot of duplication actually, which is sort of unusual for a school district, but we have right now three schools that are the Owls. And so, you know, just things like that. Um, so yeah,
151there's quite a bit, but only one leopard shark, and that's the newest school. >> Very little very little uh chance of that being revealed. >> I'm I'm glad we brought up the uh board renaming policy because I do have comments on that when it comes up later in the agenda. Um, I do want to thank Principal Delah Hunt for this uh for the presentation and I think actually one of the first conversations we ever had at LEAD was specifically about how that name didn't really fit anymore and especially with your experiences there and how much that uh site has transformed. It's really great to see this process. I echo what the superintendent said. One thing that I've heard consistently from parents at that site is just how much trust they have in the principal and
152the leadership and a lot of changes that are happening. And so trust that the principal has a good pulse on where the sentiment is in terms of buying community support. really appreciate kind of showing the work in terms of how we've managed to actively engage everyone from the students in the classrooms to parents. I did have a few questions and some of these might be premature. These might be more related to when this item comes up for a board vote, but I imagine these are items that will come up. And so for the survey findings themselves, when I see stats like these, I'm always curious to see what the participation percentage was, whether this is reflecting say 10% of folks who actually responded or 90% of folks that responded. Um, and I think a second
153question that I've heard before because I don't believe uh lead is the only school that's explored name changes and one of the comments I have later it's about some of the other schools that raised that conversation is specifically around whether or not the district or the site has any estimate about any cost impact to the district to go through these changes. Some of them are going to be very marginal minor things like updating a sign. Um, but I wasn't sure if we had that figure available because I imagine that is something that folks in the public will be curious about. If it ends up being a much bigger number than things people might expect, it might change folks's opinion about taking this direction. I just want to reiterate though, I am supportive of the name
154change. I am supportive of this direction. I know that this process has been done in a way that was very intentional and inclusive and thoughtful, but I do think it's helpful to have that information at our fingertips before we take the final vote. um whether it's next month or the following meeting. >> Thank you. Are there any inerson comment or question? >> Joel, can you please check online? >> Yes, President Brooks. Uh I don't see any uh Zoom uh public comments at this time. >> All right. Thank you. We'll move to 7B. Was that workforce housing survey results? >> How's that thing? >> Yeah. Welcome back. >> Good evening, Board of Trustees, Superintendent Oawa, members of the public. Diego Perez, director of communications, San Monteo Foster City School District, here to present you all the
155workforce housing survey results. Uh, as we scroll down into the document, we did put very front and center kind of like the overarching themes that we had as it relates to what we saw from the current data set. And as we scroll down to the next slide, we'll be able to see that very clearly. 96% agree that the cost of housing was a barrier in attracting and retaining qualified staff. We do have affordability as being a top priority with 95% rating it as very important. And then also in terms of the data set, we did have an overwhelming of 610 folks that did the survey, but from those we cut it down to specifically look at the renters that are classified and certificated, which we had 73% of certificated employees saying that they're in favor,
156as well as 84% of classified employees expressing their um interest in looking for housing solutions. And of course, as it relates to the introduction of the methodology, we did, of course, send out a survey to every single staff. We used all the emails relating from what our uh human resources department has as well as technology. We sent that over to our uh surveying partners and they sent that out. But in addition to that, we did also have flyers in the staff lounge for folks that may not have had access to that specific email when it was sent out. Though there were reminders, we had QR codes available at staff lounges for them to be able to access it as well. Um, as we continued down the survey, we did see, of course, as I mentioned,
157the 84% of classified staff interested and 73% of certificated interested. Um, but one of the really nice things to kind of highlight here is the factors that influencing influence housing choices, which in this case, affordability and proximity to work were the highest rating out of five being um strongly agreed that they're very important and influence um housing factors when they go about their uh renting, of course. And um from there we can look into the current housing satisfaction. In this particular um question the satisfaction was asked that if one was very satisfied and five was very dissatisfied. So currently we do have a median of 3.1 and a 3.2. 3.2 being our classified staff and 3.1 being certificated staff. In that same sense we do have some datas of course as it relates to commuting
158distance. We do have some staff commuting from some areas. Of course, we did list some cities that are over 21 miles just to give a sense of the distance and how many folks are are traveling to get to work. And at the same time, the commute times are shown there that highlight approximately we would say 10% are doing 31 to 45 minutes in commuting for our classified. And then we do have 35 to 45 minutes um of commute time for our certificated at 36%. Just some um data sets here to highlight. And of course the cost of housing being a barrier uh with five being strongly agree. Um both renters in certificate and classified of course know that um that is a a cost of a barrier to entry of course when it comes to
159navigating the the h housing rising costs. And then the uh concern of affording rent. We do have our 3.4 4 and 3.7 similar in the sense that they are in the higher ranges of being concerned in terms of being able to um to pay for rent in in in this area. And then again rehighlighting that the 96% um that 96% is actually inclusive of everyone everyone as it relates management certificated and classified staff that took the survey noting that there is a common sense of or a common sentiment that we do know that housing right now currently is a a barrier for folks in navigating the the changing rates of how much we pay rent monthly of course and then the respondent demographics as mentioned we did have about 608 eight respondents to the entire
160um survey. Um but from there we did nich get a niche perspective of our renters being certificated and classified. Um the really nice thing about this data set is we kind of do categorize how the age rates are regarding our certificated and classified staff. So in terms of um the age range down at the bottom we do have our classified staff being within the 45 to 54 age range and also within our teachers as um kind of David Chamblers alluded to earlier that we have hired less now but we do have majority of those being 25 to 34 years of age which are younger teachers currently um noting that they are about in favor or are looking to have better opportunities when it comes to housing here in the Sanonteo And then going up a
161bit, we do have within the areas of how long they've been working here between 1 to 5 years. I know we have had a push of hiring new staff recently and those are the folks that are currently seeking the support as it relates to this data set. So in conclusion, affordability has emerged as the most significant factor influencing interest in workforce housing with 95% of respondents rating it as very important. Of course, as we continue with this um project and con communicating with the uh workforce housing leadership subcommittee, we want to continue to see maybe if there's a potential to reservey staff as it relates to the work that we're doing with the facilities master plan and the bond. So that way it does go uh hand in hand and then there's no kind of
162uh turbulence as it relates to voters, you know, maybe not looking at housing as one of the highest needs, but knowing that it's still a need that we have here in the district to make sure that we do have our our quality educators and staff um living where they serve. And I'll uh turn it over to the board for some questions. >> Thank you very much. Do we have any board questions or comments? Uh thank you so much for the presentation. Um I really enjoyed like the data on slide seven. Um for me it was really um eye opening to see the you know how you broke it down by age group. Um and to learn you know just kind of the average age of classified and certificated staff renters. Um I was really you
163know I think for me the visual of especially the our classified staff you know and how much closer they are to retirement you know um than our certificated staff. Um, I I think I, you know, look at all of this and it's like, okay, I want to be Oprah and be like, you get a home, you get a home, everybody gets a home, right? But I really, I think for me, just looking at that data, I want our all of our employees, but especially because I'm seeing it so much more clearly with our classified staff, people to be able to retire from our district with dignity. Um, and so I just wanted to kind of ask, you know, when, you know, one day when we get to, you know, there's going to be limited housing,
164right? Um, we're not Oprah. And, and so I wanted to know what role does age play, um, interest, you know, another one of your demographics, how how many how do those factors will they play in kind of that ultimate determination of who does receive housing? >> I wouldn't say that would be in play in terms of who receives housing. Rather, it's just important to note the different demographics that currently are seeking that support. Uh, of course, we are still in conversation with the workforce leadership subcommittee as to how we are going to navigate what an application may look like. We did visit Jefferson Union High School District. They did give us some tips and tricks on how they've navigated those forms. Though we haven't seen one formally, we are still in the feasibility studies to
165see how many units we can house. Um, which was recently shared at the last um workforce housing um leadership subcommittee. And that would communication will go out tomorrow for the community to see the physibility studies as well. >> Yeah. >> Thank you. >> Anyone else? >> I have just a general question. Do we have data on how many people employees we've actually lost due to not being able to afford to live here? Because I think not only for this but um in the other topic that we talked about with the bond measure. I wonder like just pulling some data on that. I don't know if we have it. We haven't historically. We do it during our exit survey process. Um we get better numbers on the certificated side because the resignations come almost always at
166the same time of year. Um but it was in the 80% range each of the last three years for the reason why I'm choosing to leave this job is the cost of housing was was um showing up 80% of the time. Um so you know it's it's a really big factor. I think this first this current year is a bit of an anomaly because we had so much um continuity. So many fewer people chose to leave. Um but when we uh conducted our stay survey um many of them cited the possibility of workforce housing. >> That's great. Thank you for the sharing that. >> Thank you. Joel, can you please check online to see if there are any comments? >> Yes. Um, no comments on Zoom at this time. >> All right. Thank you. >>
167All right. We will move to 7 C. Thank you, President Brooks. Uh, tonight's item is a first review of proposed board policy and administrative reg regulation updates. Approximately 6 months ago, I assigned uh two of our administrators, Diego Perez and John Cosmos um a task of coordinating together to uh pull um board policy updates that were recommended through the California School Board Association. Um as members of the California Schoolboard Association, we have access to their um their bank of uh proposed and recommended schoolboard policies. and those policies are available for school boards throughout the state to consider making updates and changes um to board policies. So, what the board and the community are taking a look at tonight are a litany of redlinined um board policies, which is showing you what the current board policy
168says with the actual proposed change um in red. And then in some cases new board policies where in um we didn't have a previous board policy covering that topic. Um and some of those are are notated in that way. Um, and part of the board policy review um, recommendation that we make is for the board and the public to be able to access these uh, proposed changes and then ultimately take a good month to look through them and give comments. We're going to post on the district's web page a link uh for members of the public to log on from wherever they like and make remarks, ask questions, suggest changes to the board policy updates that we um have recommended and then we'll bring those back to the school board. Um this is a lot
169to review in 4 days and then have comments on. So, um I definitely want to at in just a minute pass it back to the board for any questions or comments, but also I want to suggest that we take the full month to do that. Uh and then our administrative team will make those updates and bring it back to uh the September meeting for a second review and potential approval if the board uh feels that we're ready to do so. Then we give ourselves a few months off and then we restart in December. So, we basically would do it three times a year and follow that 60-day um timeline. Um, and then always with transparency in the community, access to the redline versions, and then once they're approved, we do need a month to go
170in and actually take down the old board policies, send copies of the new ones to every school, and um make sure that all of our documentation online uh is updated. And with that, I'll pass it back to the board for questions. Thank you. Do we have any questions? >> Um, thank you so much for the explanation in the timeline. Um, I did look at all these. I was like, I don't know if I have enough time to do this as thoroughly as I would like. So, that makes me feel really good. Um, the one that did catch my attention was, um, AR5145.7. Um, I was noticing um, so I think part of it I was a little bit uh, confused at the end um, on page four. The red line parts weren't actually red. They
171were actually black, but they were um they had the striketh through. But I guess for me, what beyond the red black coloring thingy, but I wanted to ask, you know, I was concerned about where the lines about confidentiality were lined through. Um, and I kind of just wanted to understand a little bit what the reasoning was behind taking it out. Um generally in these cases I feel that confidentiality especially for the victim um should you know and I can imagine in circumstances where um you know confidential can't be fully kept um and for expediency reasons you know as I was reading in this you know sometimes it's harder um to keep it confidential but I I really feel just for the privacy of the victim that would be something that I would um want to
172understand a little bit better of why that would being struck out. Oh yeah, this is for AR 5145.7 with the redlinined parenthesis afterwards. >> Definitely. Thank you for pointing that out, trustee. We'll do two things in this case. Um so Diego, if you can notate this for our followup um with our um legal counsel is address the issue of the um in this case it's not a red line. So we have to address that issue why this why this error is in there. The second thing is um determine um where in the policy confidentiality is addressed um and why the recommendation is or I don't want to rule out that it is a clerical error. So I want to be able to come back to the board with that one. Um and then in cases
173where like where uh substantive meaningful uh questions like this arise, we might actually choose to bring this back in a in a subsequent batch just to give ourselves even more time to confirm uh the accuracy and the completeness of the document itself. >> I think it does say that the report shall be confidential, but yeah, it's it's a little bit less detailed that way. But thank you All right. Anyone else? >> Uh, unsurprisingly, I do have some comments on the section. Um, so I definitely understand this is initial draft. I'm not going to go through every single version out here in the purpose of the meeting. A few things I did want to call out though. So I think one example of this is in 5145.7. Um, and again I think that we have several
174attorneys unfortunately up here who have done a lot of red lines. One thing that happens with those, if you look at the line that says superintendent or designate shall and then it goes into a capitalized sentence, those types of formatting errors, I would just flag. I think also one thing I noticed is several of these related to sexual harassment policies, but one of them, if I can pull it up, was different from the others. So, I don't know to what extent we're trying to be consistent across the board, but several of the sexual harassment policies were changed and the language is altered to specify that they only applied to other persons with an employment relationship with the district, but one of them kept the original language of other persons on district property, which has a
175very different meaning. And so, just trying to figure out if that was an intentional difference or just an oversight because I think all the other drafts were changed to fit the um only those with an employment relationship. And then I think to the earlier comment, it would be helpful whether in some kind of side comment or elsewhere to have the rationale for changes. So for example, if it's reflecting changes in the law, for example, a lot of the uh student data privacy type issues that have changed or if it's addressed elsewhere in the policy and therefore redundant, no longer necessary. I think that can help us head off a lot of questions. And so having the red line is helpful to show changes draft over draft. But having a side comment or some kind of
176explanation or footnote that explains why certain changes were made will help us head off. I think a lot of questions especially from the public related to this. And then lastly, I think when I heard the internal process, I know we have internal staff making the actual edits. To what extent are council, our partners at CSBA and others involved in this initial set of drafts? >> Thank you for that. So we definitely have uh direct involvement from council in these and so part of the process from um the selection of the items uh because the list is very long as you know uh there are several hundred board policies and there uh on a rotating basis they're being updated um or suggested changes are being updated by um CSBA and so we initiated created a ranking
177process uh relative to which board policies we would bring in this first batch. Um our legal council was involved in that conversation. Um in uh vetting the policies themselves, we relied on the CSBA process uh the gamut process. Um but uh given the questions related to uh the specification of uh the sexual harassment pertaining to employees and then the question as to um policy update recommendations that don't specifically state that or or or refer to any person on a school campus and we'll uh have direct more uh meaningful engagement with legal counsel in order to provide the board with a summary um you know, essentially giving some clear uh response to each of those questions and we'll actually add that as part of the cover document for this policy. >> And just just to follow
178up on that, thank you, Superintendent. Um 4219.11 redlinined is the draft that I was referring to. Mhm. >> Several of sexual harassment drafts make the same edits in terms of adding sex to the list and harassment based on pregnancy, child birth, but that was the one that didn't include the follow-up language about other persons with an employment relationship with the district while also striking into other persons on district property. So, I wanted to make sure that was intentional. And then one other comment I wanted to make, one of the new policies we have added is actually related to our earlier point, uh, 7310 naming of facilities. M >> so the language in this as I'm reading it seems to be somewhat restrictive. It says the board of trustees shall name district schools and other district
179owned or leaseed buildings specifically based on individuals who have contributed to the school community individuals living or deceased who've made a significant impact to national worldwide events or the geographic area in which the school or building is located. I know that when we had our campus swap with Fiesta Gardens and College Park, both of those schools internally had had discussions, not necessarily with district input or oversight um about whether or not they wanted to explore a name change. And for Fiesta Gardens, the comment was it was tied to a community. It's no longer in that community. And so in some ways that already violates the the process that we would have committed to forward-looking. I know um here College Park has nothing to do with any of one, two, or three. Um Lead Elementary's name
180doesn't have anything with one, two, or three. I agree with the general intent that as a starting point and maybe most of the time if not all the time looking forward it makes sense to restrict naming to one of these three or at least for these to be the starting point. But I do wonder if it makes sense to have something that explicitly tying our hands when clearly our district and communities in our district have gone a different direction. So I would just caution against making this unnecessarily restrictive while we can maybe state a preference for these three categories. And I'm sure I'll have comments on other similar measures as well, but appreciate the process of updating these and also making sure they're open not just for board review, but for public comment. >> Yeah.
181I mean, we could just change Shell to May >> to May, right? >> And then >> I would have right now. >> Yeah. And I think, you know, we're the temperature on the on Cottage Grove and, you know, just the situation that we have in our district currently, you know, we're this is a good time to be considering changes and and uh we can bring back to the board a version that has a more flexible um word that that would facilitate a name change. I think um you know it wouldn't take very much work for you to just Google school considers name change and then people get really really tense about that. Um and schoolboard meeting rooms fill up really quick. Um and and it can sometimes get political and it can sometimes like get
182divisive. So, I think what's nice about using May is it really does give that option um without, as you pointed out, locking us in um to to be able to do so. >> Yeah. >> What like so on that same policy um there's a section that says um you shouldn't name a school that's going to cause confusion to the members of the community. Like what does that mean? Because I read the article about um Horl changing to a lead and they said horal was confusing because it rhymed with Laurel and now College Park and Cottage Grove sound similar. So what is like what does confusion mean? Because >> what is intended is to avoid uh because some districts are very large. So again, this is like um a process to try to give a policy
183recommendation that's so broad that it can sort of work anywhere. Uh but you know there are districts with hundreds of schools and so you want to avoid having two I'll just use an example of a typical name but like two Westview schools like well there's Westview Academy and there's Westview K8 or two Abraham Lincoln school you know those those sort of duplications um because it does you know create confusion ultimately in terms of like what school uh people are talking about and I think in our case um the sort of the sound of it. It is similar to Laurel. So, um, but I think that was also during a time where the school naming process maybe didn't follow the board policy super closely. Um, and now we're just sort of in a different place, but
184someone was here when we were debating that. So, let us know. Susie >> Laurel used to be Laurel Wood and they took the wood off. So, that's where that if you think about >> Blank Park, there's So many college park and >> beach park and on and on and I remember when they were saying oh we think we're going to do >> Samato Park >> yes something park and everybody when they came up >> although they just call that park school >> I know another park so it's been a long time there's been a lot of that so >> but lead was not ever brought before it was just a change that happened and people were surprised >> and if I could just add I think to echo trusty proctor's point. One concern I have
185with some of the new policies is, you know, making them unnecessarily restrictive when they don't need to be. I think there are things that we have as preferences that don't need to be explicitly laid out as policy that will then tie our hands and tie the hands of future boards or require a much more dramatic process to overhaul. So whether we're dealing with things like bylaws or board policies, I definitely think obviously some of the ones especially on harassment need to be outlined explicitly um just under existing law under the policies that we've set forth previously. But I do think there are some like these that I understand why we're exploring them. But I would just caution against having words like shall name district schools that unnecessarily restrict us. Or to Trusty Proctor's point, even
186just that point in general when we only have a little over 20 campuses is very different than if you're LA USD. >> Thank you for that input. Thank you, Susan. Um, are there any online comment related to this agenda item, Joe? Uh, I don't do not see any public comments on Zoom. >> Thank you. All right, we will move to item 7D. >> Thank you, President Brooks. Uh Joe, if you could put on the um community visioning uh one pager. Um for members of the community who have been receiving our emails now for um multiple months talking about our new community strategic plan process, um tonight's update is an opportunity to share some what I think are some pretty exciting um developments in the last 30 days. uh and to invite uh people's participation through
187um the very um multi-layered and accessible uh ways that we plan to do so. Uh so for the sake of uh bringing everybody up to speed um about a year ago we initiated a process with an organization called the Bay Ed Fund. The Bay Ed fund are our partners. They are folks that work with us hand in hand. Um they are committed to helping our district um move education forward um in a manner that reflects the vision of the board and that ultimately addresses the needs of our community. And uh to that end, they have made an $850,000 uh commitment to us for this school year um to initiate and implement and guide a community strategic plan process that you see before you. Um as part of our contract with the Bayad Fund, we've brought
188on a partner called the New Teacher Project, or you might hear them referred to as TNTP. TNTP is an organization that does a wide variety of uh consultative work with school districts, classroom work, visioning work, uh uh analysis and and data work. Uh and in our case, they're going to be the engine behind our community strategic plan process. On September 3, next week, we're going to have a big party uh twice at Meadow Heights Elementary School. First is going to happen at 11:00 in the morning where we plan to have 40 middle schoolers from the Sato Foster City School District representing every school that educates middle schoolers in attendance and we plan to take them through a initial student visioning process for the district. Uh at 6:00 p.m. that night, we will have a follow-up
189event at the same school at Meadow Heights. We currently have 200 adults registered and RSVP to attend and the list of attendees is some really really fun people that the board knows and a lot of families we don't know yet but we are going to get to know. Um at present all 21 schools are represented. Um at present we have um multiple languages represented. We will have food and child care translation available and it's going to happen in one of our new facilities and it's a gorgeous facility. So, it's going to be a great opportunity to create community and the outcome of the meeting will be uh folks in that room understanding what it means to volunteer to serve on the vision design team, what it means to volunteer for our working group, um what
190focus group meetings will look like, and then how many surveys and what different ways we plan on interacting with the community. Um, for the sake of tonight's presentation, the design team is a ton of time and a ton of work. These are like full day sessions that people are signing up for. It isn't for the faint of heart. It's for folks who have the time and want to make the time uh to be on um at the table. The visioning working group will come up four different times throughout the year. And these are much bigger convenings. This will probably have 120, 150, maybe even 200 people at these meetings, really rigorous meetings, like wonderful experiences um and and really an opportunity to source more feedback and more ideas uh from a larger group than the
191vision design team. Um the focus groups, we actually have a list of 20 different focus groups um throughout uh the district's um broader community, Capital C community, and we will initiate a process to invite folks to participate in one-hour long focus group interviews. Uh you can think of it as like sitting in a in a room with 8 to 12 people and having one topic be discussed and then just essentially having a TNTP uh staff person guide you through a group conversation. And then we'll have community surveys that go out um in multiple languages throughout the year um sourcing and and gathering feedback um at the same time. Where this is going and what this is about is this is about our school board having an opportunity to through this one year of community uh
192visioning to essentially get the encyclopedia from your constituents on where folks in this district want uh us to go in a way that's very aspirational, in a way that's student centered, in a way that's equitydriven. So, it aligns with all of the board's um vision and and point of view. Um, but it's going to be a really exciting time to um walk in and listen and talk less in um and in that vein, I'm going to wrap up here by saying I also want the board to be and the community to be aware in order to achieve balance and in order to achieve um a a well-roundedness of conversation, we are being very intentional about finding schools where we don't have as much participation and picking up the phone and calling people. So, we're not
193we don't have like 73 people from one school and two from another. We are going towards a lot of balance. Um and so when we walk into those spaces, it is going to be very special because it's going to be the first time for many people to be um in one place with people from so many different communities. And um Maggie, you showed me a picture of the Sunny Bray back to school night, which was like there were like 150 people in it was so many people in that picture. >> All the people >> I was like, how many row how many chairs do we have at that school? But um but you know, you're all Sunny families, so you're going to have one conversation. It's going to be really rooted in Sunny and that's
194great. What's going to be really fascinating about this process is you're going to have 10 Sunny Bray families with 10 Brewer Island families with 10 Northshore View families and so on and so forth. And I think that is a very exciting dynamic and a really um you know wonderful opportunity that we don't necessarily always get because as you know we are stretched out over a pretty big you know piece of land here but we're also like 22 school community so it can be hard to really get that sense of unity. Um and that's that's what's before us. So um the update tonight isformational. No vote is required, but I want to be able to uh pass it back to the board for any questions on the process or any comments you have. >> Anyone? >>
195I just I'll do just a quick comment. I I will say I I'm very grateful to the Bay Fund and TNTP for being partners with us on this. I actually had lunch with several trustees from other neighboring districts in the past week and many of them commented on the fact that they're really excited that we're launching on this. They were envious of the fact that we had this partnership. They were closely following their previous work in South City and Ravenswood and so very excited to see what comes out of this. I think all of us on the board are very excited about it as well. I also wanted to say I really appreciate what the superintendent said about how intentional we're being about including voices and I think Dr. Rubakaba with community schools, but so
196much of the work we've done previously has been recognizing that typically the folks who show up to the meeting, the loudest voices in the room, the people who always make public comments are not representative of 100% of the families and communities we serve. and the fact that we are so intentional about that in terms of reaching out to make sure different voices are included and to the superintendent's point even chasing folks down essentially because when you talk about the heavy lift of being on the design team we know that there are certain folks who will naturally not gravitate towards a role like that but the fact that we then have the working group we then have the focus groups um and we're again through all the work we've done to build trust and to build
197community we have a much better methodology and approach to making sure those voices are included I think that gives me a lot of hope about how this process will roll out and just again always grateful that our staff is so in tune about those realities and making sure that those are all going to be a part of this conversation. >> Um I just wanted to echo Trusty Kim's comments. Um you know having been in different districts just like you were saying this is something that really I haven't seen you know it's very rare um that something of this scope you know is accessible to us. And so I just really appreciate just how comprehensive each piece is, how well thought. Um it really shows a deep understanding of our communities um and you know who
198we serve and making sure all voices are at the table. And I also like that the action plan created is going to be homegrown right by our communities and having a third party in the Bayed fund. Um I would like to hope and think that it allows the communities to be more honest um you know with their feedback. Um it's not like you they're they're talking directly to us, right? But they're going through another group and built in systems of accountability. It's just really um I'm very thankful for the Bayad fund. It's just a really amazing gift for our district. >> Thank you. Uh Joel, can you please check to see if there are any uh comments online? >> Yes, President Brooks checking. No public comments on Zoom at this time. >> Right. All right.
199We will move to 7E, >> approve of employment contracts. >> That's me again. Exciting. And one of the folks is here with us. So, congratulations to her. And uh as we've done uh in other uh school district organizations, um part of what we do uh strategically, myself, um Patrick Gaffne, the school board um in conjunction with us is we analyze the needs of the district. We create new positions, eliminate other positions. Uh we find savings where we can. Uh we are looking forward to um a really strong school year and that's already begun um on a really positive note and we have three administrators uh that are listed here, Heather Morgan, Stephanie Fermeni and Dr. um Margaret Eraia Peltz who are all being recommended for four-year contracts under the title of executive director of human
200resources, special education and student services. uh the term of the employment is uh through uh July 2025 and June 30th 2029. Um, one of the benefits of these u multi-year contracts is the uh culture it creates of consistency and continuity. Um, um, ensuring that our programs are led by proven, qualified, effective leaders um, who are committed to ensuring growth and achievement uh, wellness and equity, which as you know are our three strategic plan goals for now. Um, and with that, uh, those contracts are, um, are publicly posted, but, um, I'll pass it to the board for any questions or comments, and the recommendation is, uh, that we approve these multi-year contracts. >> Well, I would like to say that I appreciate the um, efforts that we make to um, bring these contracts. uh you know
201stabilization of our staff is very important and so for me I'm greatly appreciative of the contracts that we um establish for our staff. Anyone else? >> Yeah, I had one comment. Oh, sorry. Go ahead. I didn't see you down there. You sure? Okay. Um, I appreciate all of this being brought forward and um, happy to approve this eventually um, in a few minutes, but I did want to make sure that on this item we don't show the financial impact and I want to be super transparent when we're bringing forward new contracts like what are we talking about in terms of increases or changes. Um, so just going forward if we can make sure that's included. >> Thank you. Um, my comment was that, you know, these three individuals are, you know, have made such a
202wonderful impact already in our district and it's so welld deserved for the three of you and we're really I'm really glad that we've locked you in for four years. Um, any inperson comment? No. Okay. Can you please check online, Joe? >> Yes. Checking. No public comments on Zoom. >> All right. Do we vote on this? All right. If we are ready to take a vote, I'll take the motion. >> Motion to approve these three um contracts. Second. >> All in favor? All in favor say I. >> I. Uh, all right. Board member requests for future agenda items. Do we have any? Yeah, I just have a very um brief one is to revisit um I think we had talked about earlier the the statement at the top of the meeting to kind of explain um
203where like public comment comes in and um to kind of make it more clear to anyone who's showing up for public comment uh for non-aggenda items that we can't really respond to them. Um, and then I think we had uh I think we've kind of moved things around. When students are here, we try to put them at the top. And so like maybe just setting that um expectation for people so they understand like when we're going to call on them. That would be great. I would love to just get an update on that one. >> So that that request came in before I took um presidency. Um that was my request. I'm not sure why it hasn't been updated. >> Okay. So, yeah, that that should have been moved a while ago. Thank you. Uh
204and then um I would like to um revisit the request to um prioritize um our TOSA assignments and really consider um uh placing a uh TOSA um to uh focus on um bullying and um you know human kindness and bringing a um an ongoing um rotation of these um important things um especially in light of this most reading most recent um school shooting that has happened. Um it's really um devastating to our school community and um I think it's in important that we um prioritize these efforts in our district. >> Just to kind of add to that, I know I'm guessing some of the other trustees did as well. I got a lot of messages this week after the tragedy in Minneapolis um about our district's own preparedness and while I know that those policies
205are fully in place that the sites are, you know, have rehearsed everything and we are even having a session next week somewhat related, I do think it may be helpful to have a public session for especially the benefit of parents and others in the community to know what those types of protocols are, what those policies look like, what they should expect in unfortunately the worst case scenario. And so if there is room on the schedule for something along those lines after the meeting next week, it is something that I'd be interested in having mainly for the public's benefit to let them know um about all the kinds of scenarios and protocols that we put in place. >> Thank you. Um all right, we any board uh member statements at this time? Just a quick um
206mention of um at the end of the first week of school, I was able to visit Fiesta Gardens with Superintendent AOA and also um take a quick impromptu meeting with the um preschool program as well. And it's I just um am so excited about the changes that are happening at that campus. um a lot of families walking to school. Um just like you know all the all the kids can kind of go together from prek all the way to um it'll be soon it'll be 8th grade. And so just seeing the transformation and all of the improvements that are being added to that campus are really exciting to see. >> Um I just wanted to echo the comments from um President Brooks and Trustee Kim. Um last week I attended my you know own kids
207back to school night and you know when we all heard of the tragedy happening in Minnesota that was their back to school mass. Um and you know the student victims who had passed away were 8 and 10 years old and there that's about the age of my own children. And I I you know first I I grieve for the families. Um, and I wanted just to kind of take a moment and say, you know, it's not about thoughts and prayers. These kids were literally praying. Um, you know, and echoing what President Brookke said, I really want to make sure that what we do value are our children's mental health. Um, creating spaces of kindness and inclusion and gun control. >> Thank you. I I'll echo Trusty Ho's comments on that as well. Um I did
208want to speak specifically about the campus swap. I think um our speed of representatives spoke to it earlier. Um Trusty Tren addressed it as well, but especially as a College Park parent who was involved with the whole relocation committee, having the site meetings with Amy and others, going back and forth, all the planning that led up to it. I literally just got a text an hour before a meeting from a current College Park parent talking about how thrilled they are about the new site, about how things have gone well, have obviously heard about all the families walking to the new Fiesta Gardens campus. Um, something like that sounded like a logistical nightmare. It sounded like something that both communities kind of were very confused about, concerned about, and to see the aftermath of that come
209together the way it has, to see the traffic patterns improved, the commutes improved. um both campus communities really thrilled about the changes especially because for two years we're engaging a lot of the PTAs and others about their concerns in that process. It's just been really great to see our ability to take on those types of tasks. And so for whether it was a campus swap, all the new construction, a lot of what we covered in this meeting today, it just feels like there's so much going right in our district and just great to see the team that we put together and a huge appreciation for all of our site leaders, all the administrators we have here for their ability to execute all those tasks. And then just going back to the start of our meeting,
210I did want to thank um the Ed Foundation, the Gilead Foundation, and all of our other community partners, I think when I talk about so many things moving in the right direction to see the way our community comes together to address those issues. Also, I want to specifically call out the student who said she learned how to make paninis um in middle school because now I know what I want to encourage my kids to go learn because that's exactly what I want um in my own home. But I just think at a time when we're constantly talking about national uncertainty, fear, threats, um, and just a kind of general mood across the board. The fact that we here in our district are meeting with law enforcement and with our communities to talk about how we're
211going to address concerns around immigration. the fact that we are moving forward on so many projects whether it's increasing sustainability or other values that are important to us and making our campuses more accepting, more inclusive, more thoughtful at a time when other states or areas are retreating from that. It's just again really great to be part of this community of leaders both in the district but also our parents, our community partners, the foundations that we work with and everyone else really coming together to address the reality of the situation we're in to move us forward in a way that we're collectively trying to do. And so, as I've said almost every meeting, being a trustee in the district during this time, I think it just take a tremendous amount of pride in being part of
212the work that we're doing here and always just excited to work with you all. Thank you. Okay. Um future mute meeting dates uh we have a board study session scheduled for September 11th. Um that will be uh f uh equity focused student achievement and our next regular board meeting is scheduled for September 25th. Uh Joel, can you please check to see if there are any public comment on closed session items? >> No public comments on close session items. >> Okay, with that we will take a recess to close session. to reconvene. All right, we're ready to reconvene from close session. Uh open session. The board of trustees took action to approve a settlement for claim 20002 uh 50 uh approved unanimously. Uh item number 12A uh 50 to approve the um compromise the compromise agreement
213and office of administration administrative hearing case number 20250 692 to resolve claims against the district in exchange for a total not to exceed 174,000. um $750 in funding for student private education placement and services and the total not to exceed uh $7,000 in associated attorney fees. With that, we are um ready to I'm ready to take a motion to um adjourn. >> Motion to adjurnn. >> Second. All in favor say I. >> I. >> Good night. [Music]