001[Applause] good ass yes we celebrate you - I'm not put also for you for being here good evening Mona's noches welcome to September 18th 2019 meeting of the Berkeley School Board if you want to follow along on the agenda you can do so in your phone you can borrow a computer from its Chinese I don't know if she has that many though I'd like to remind everyone that our board meetings broadcast live on YouTube this means our meetings and anything captured on video will be archived and will be online forever I would like to now call the open session of tonight's meeting in order we started our closed session at 6 o'clock at 7:30 and we started our closed session at 6 o'clock miss try this for the community members you present you trans did
002you do the translation OCME ambrose del público kinase andrey he said i'm a direct evil until período de comentario público in necesitan traduzione england i spawned Espanola England sovereign several civilian super gar attempt additional durante su scoping Terios gracias director Julie Sinai here troika Judea pal here director Estelle ahem thank you everybody khadijah Brown nice president I out [Applause] bernie's labor cutler thank you will now prove the agenda are there any requested changes if not then we'll have a motion picture movin motion by vice president al per second second second by board member Brown and now return oh I vote yes all in favor aye okay now go to closed session we had two items on claim number 3.1 on claim number 1 0 B ad zero zero nine seven a motion by director L
003for a second by director repeal it was all in favor on item case number DSC one five zero three five nine five we heard and discuss and then on 3.21 Berkeley Federation of Teachers we heard an update provided direction yay okay so board meeting closed session report and we approved the agenda so now we'll go to our public comment yeah yeah okay so we have several cards so we're gonna it'll be two minutes for every speaker please come to the to the left over here my left and please stand in line so that we can move along real quickly and it'll be for 30 minutes or public comment because I know everybody has school tomorrow we'll start with Lila Wilkinson [Applause] my name is Lila Wilkinson I've been a special education teacher at Malcolm for
004a decade now I'm the product of Berkley public schools I went to Malcolm and as a child I struggled to learn to read after graduating from UC Berkeley with honors and getting a masters I came back to Malcolm to work with kids that I relate to and the joy that I find in my job is very personal last year bu SD experienced a mass exodus of special education teachers we started the school year with nine special ed vacancies and I've watched dedicated colleagues flee this position and this district and the crisis level of turnover is demoralizing and it's detrimental to our students and our school communities we've been coming to the board for years suggesting solutions warning a burnout that the workload is preventing us from sustaining the level of service that we know our
005students need and deserve Berkeley's full inclusion model is unlike any nearby district our services and teaching depends on collaboration with gen ed with families with D is with speech with ot with behaviors with instructional assistants and we're required to maintain and write mountains of legal binding paperwork and documentation last year I was part of B of T of special ed working group where we research surrounding districts and we collected data and information from our members pre-k to high school caseload size and high number of assessments result in less student support the USD is now at the bottom of Alameda County for total teacher compensation raking 18th out of twenties districts but thanks to our community Jenna teachers in Berkeley have significantly lower class size than the state average meanwhile especially teachers caseloads are uncompromising ly
006too high and they don't reflect our full inclusion model for the first time I'm considering leaving my job and it's extremely painful we believe that students in need of the most support should be our collective priority and we demand caseload caps and assessment limits in our contract now because our students deserve better professor professor Douglas Spindler Wow I'm nervous I'm biased you Berkeley Unified School District members parents teachers I'm a taxpayer here in Berkeley and everybody wants to fund the schools right yeah let me tell you in 1980 taxpayers voted to have a special assessment tax to fund Berkeley schools do people remember that that's one of the highest taxes that we is property taxpayers are paying the city auditor through this sorry the city auditor found that the City of Berkeley finance department is
007cheating Berkeley Unified School District out of funds my wife and I have sued the finance department in the City of Berkeley were still under lawsuit and without with that action going on busy but as a result of this we found that the city finance department is cheating the taxpayers and the school's out of funds that they should be receiving so if you're looking for money go to the city finance department what I would like to ask is a motion that the school board not have the City of Berkeley Finance Department collect the taxes and have Alameda County the Alameda County Tax Board collected taxes and give that to the school board directly instead of going through the finance department is that fair in doing so I will also tell you that the auditor found that
008people are not being fairly taxed in the City of Berkeley which is again cheating the taxpayers and cheating the school's cheating the teachers out of funds that the taxpayers voted that they should be receiving so I ask you can you be can you accept the motion to have the taxes collected by Alameda County Tax Board instead of the City of Berkeley david meiyan amazed miss Ouiser excuse me the board does not respond to public where you listen to the public thank you good evening board members dr. Stevenson members of the BU SD administration my name is David Mayer and I'm representing be home Berkeley housing opportunities for municipal employees I'm here this evening to provide a brief update on be home's recent activities and to continue to stress the broader community support and the importance
009of continuing to push forward as quickly as possible with the establishment of educator workforce housing 4b USD educators over the past months bee home has expanded our communications platform this includes an updated website with easy access resources on workforce housing what other communities are doing and a place for registration for our newsletters and bulletins members of be home have also met in person who attina rap worst of the Jefferson Union High School District a district that is recently moving down the path with building workforce housing on one of their school properties ms rapport shared a lot of information it was very eager to continue to collaborate with us in exchange for how we might do our program here this we discussed and gained approval from UC Berkley cities and schools program to utilize the data
010that they produced for Berkeley Unified School District when they were doing an assessment of the need for workforce housing and the impact of housing insecurity on B USD employees they have permitted us to use the data in part of our communication strategy the first of which is a poster which I'm showing you here that we're using to educate the community that 69% of educators who rent in Berkeley say the high cost of housing threaten their ability to work for our schools we are going to continue will continue this campaign to bring attention to the community at large about how impacted our CLE Unified employees by the cost of housing lastly we participated in the Solano stroll engaging with many members of the Berkeley community there's tremendous support for workforce housing now I want to close
011by just letting you know we're here to support you and hope that you continue to move this item as quickly as possible Thank You Vicki Davis DeLeon followed by Vicki Davis [Applause] my name is aya villian I happen to also represent you see aft local 1474 I'm a lecturer at UC Berkeley go Union go Berkeley teachers but I'm here today representing for the PTA I'm the vice president of community outreach on the PTA at John Muir and I'm here yes John Muir make some noise we are here many of us to talk about our concerns about the John Muir cafeteria renovation there was a meeting that took place last year and no parents were included they finally had a meeting last month and the and many of us in the parent community are very alarmed
012the project with the renovation is scheduled to begin in November phase one includes two months of demolition likely with jackhammers while school is in session and children are eating lunch it is a very old building there is danger of asbestos and other toxic risks also on our campus there are a number of hearing-impaired students and that kind of noise would be especially disrupted to that vulnerable population but we're also concerned about overall disruption of Learning noise and the construction chaos we understand renovations need to happen but parents have coalesced around a demand for a delay of these renovations until June of 2020 so that school is not in session and these renovations don't have these effects on our students one of the district one of the folks from the district suggested that perhaps the program
013had originally been intended to happen in June of 2019 but has been pushed till November please push it to June of 2020 thank you Vicki Davis Faulk Ricky Davis followed by Alexis studious hi my name is Vicki Davis and I have students at Malcolm X elementary and Longfellow middle school all of you receive emails from me I've sent two in regards to these issues so I'm going to do a very brief summary I was standing here in 2012 when my then preschooler needed resources and started a special ed program in the preschool and did not have a teacher for the first six weeks of school and had a string of subs I was again here many times but in 2016 with my daughter in second grade who advocated herself for her special ed teacher when
014our then school over a hundred students larger than the other schools did not have enough special ed resources and I do appreciate that our large school did get additional 0.5 I'm here again now in 2019 and my daughter is in middle school where her schedule was recently changed because some of her classes had over 11 IFE students in them and the mounting of the balancing was reshuffled we her caseworker had an increase of over 50% in her caseload within the second week of school and now is over her max of the number of students that she should be serving which is going to diminish my daughter's serving I was on a committee that recommended co-teaching this would be a great opportunity to do that I fear that my child will graduate high school before the
015board does anything to resolve all of these issues we need to not change full inclusion but fully support and resource it when I have when I have friends from other districts come and play with me in the parks here they have kids in special day classes in Fremont in Richmond and Alameda San Francisco and comment about how amazing and inclusive the children are in the parks and I always say this is because we are a full inclusion district and students learn how to accept all students in the district so don't change full inclusion instead fund it thank you next up Alexis Studios Alexis estudia swallowed by Kathleen Evans [Applause] [Music] hello my name is Alexis Darius and I'm a moderate severe inclusion specialist at Krogman elementary school I started my second year as a teacher
016the best parts of the year are seeing students have that aha moment or realize how independent they can actually be in order to continue having these moments I need to have time to work directly with my students and right now that time does not always exist I started off last year my first year of teaching with a caseload of eleven five of my students had one-to-one all day support written into their IEP and only four I a showed up for the first five weeks of school so for the first five weeks of school I was reliving my paraprofessional days while learning to assess students and write IEP s and all the other stresses of being a first year teacher my days began at 7 a.m. and ended around 9 p.m. teachers at my school were
017getting antsy asking me questions like when will you start instruction and where is the modified work the student needs and have you find have you found the time to assess this student all questions that I couldn't answer be USD boasts itself as a full inclusion district so much so that families are flocking here to enroll their children my fellow case managers and I work hard to make full inclusion work but there needs to be more of us to make our full inclusion program function the way it is intended in these forms funding for materials for students and higher compensation to help me continue to live in the Bay Area and work for be USD K sold caps so that I am NOT spending prep time finishing hours at paperwork instead of modifying work for students
018relieved from the ever-increasing initial assessments that deserve more time than I have in a day training so that I can do my job better more case look - sorry caseload caps and a limit on assessments would completely change the quality of my work and allow me to thrive here because my students would be getting the support that they deserve there are some supports that will make these are some supports that will make a difference if I don't get the support my students are never negatively impacted and I'm not sure that I can stay in this district you have the power to change this [Applause] Kathleen Evans followed by Yvette falaqa I don't see Kathleen all right Yvette valerka followed by a Janine Widow my name is Yvette falaqa I'm on the Executive Board of the
019BFT representing Martin Luther King middle school opportunity now by any means necessary caucus I also am here speaking on behalf of a growing number of teachers and bft members in Berkeley as well as many BCC II members who I talked to who are ready to strike we're ready to strike for 11.75 percent increase or more in two years we're ready to strike for more certificated staff members and bcc II members to support special education programs and caseload caps we're ready to strike for independent studies teachers to be added to our salaries it's become permanent status but teachers like me are also ready to strike to make sure the bcc e members are custodians our bus drivers are also treated fairly and get the same or more of a salary increase than we do and also
020ready to strike to hire more black and Latino and Latina teachers here in Berkeley the home of the first voluntary desegregation program and the nation stands behind us the strike wave is growing and it didn't stop in Virginia or West Virginia or Arizona it didn't stop in LA or Oakland or New Haven see Joe but we also it's spreading to all the sectors UAW workers are going on strike and are on strike right now Kaiser is gonna go on strike and right now normally what I was taught in my labor history is that a contract represents labor peace but guess what we're working without a contract now so we don't have a contract you don't get any peace get us a fair contract in the contract we and our students deserve thank you Janene Waddell
021followed by Garrard German good evening superintendent Stephens and board members my name is Janine Waddell and I'm the vice president of the Berkeley Federation of Teachers I'm also a third grade teacher at Washington Elementary a community that I have been a part of for almost nine years when I began my career in Berkeley as a student teacher I quickly fell in love with our full inclusion model it felt both challenging and rewarding to create a supportive classroom community for all kids as a student teacher I watched in awe as the all of the pieces to the full inclusion puzzle magically occurred each day yet over the years I've realized that behind that magic there lies a struggle a struggle to make sure that all of those pieces come together each day even if it means
022a teacher missing time with their own kids and family and the struggle to stick with it as the demands become more and more I still believe in our full inclusion model I believe it has the potential to provide a sustainable working environment for the teachers who have never stopped serving our Berkeley students I've had the privilege of working closely with our moderate-severe full inclusion specialist Hilary trainer at Washington year after year Hilary has operated with grace with a caseload of up to 17 kids some years she and I both agree that the keys to success was vulnerable is that special education teachers nights and weekends it means we're on the side of a road to send the mass text out to a student's team at 7:00 a.m. alerting them of an unforeseen schedule change coordinating
023several parties to all shift and accommodate teachers do this every day because we love our students yet there comes a tipping point the point where our special ed teachers know that this level of work is not sustainable the point at which teachers start asking themselves if they can make a long term career in Berkeley when there aren't enough special special ed teachers to manage students consistency and stability fail we asked you to prioritize all of our students Thank You Gerard Jemaine followed by Sherif who says my name is Gerard Jamin I've been a teacher in the independent study program for ten years here in the district and I just want to share an experience I've been looking for housing in Berkeley recently because I have to move from my current place in San Francisco and
024I just had a disturbing experience with a landlord I want to share when talking to a landlord and they kind of casually asking you know well so what do you do for a living and I mentioned that I was a teacher I kind of noticed a change in their face they were sort of interested but also like a teacher like and then when I kind of had to explain well I'm also I work for this special program it's an hourly position it's not paid over the summer there's a there's a cap on salaries at nine years I mean even go inside didn't tell him that last one but just telling him I didn't get paid but I didn't get paid over the summer and having to share with him what my salary was even after
025ten years at the district the landlord's face just kind of took this sinking appearance where he could sort of tell he was losing enthusiasm and said to me okay well but you should do an application and we'll be in touch you know but you can tell by the look on his face that there's there's quite a number of competitors who make quite a bit more so it's a strange position I have a one-year-old now new family need a place to stay trying to move it to a place that's closer to where I live and had this experience like wow I'm doing something that's great I love my job I love teaching and I'm trying to live in the place where I work and I've been working for a long time and in the face of
026this landlord I'm being told that's probably not possible so I just want you to take into account we need a better contract independent study teachers need to be salaried we need to be paid equal for our work we are more than 3/4 length wreak orders of our workers are temporary some of them after five six seven years on the job they're still temporary we have a cap on our salary at nine years we don't get any credit for master's degrees or anything else where there should be no second-tier fully credentialed teachers in Berkeley chérif Musashi followed by Bruce beg now [Music] good evening my name is sharif Musashi and this is my first full year as a teacher at Berkley hi this is also my second year as a father when I found out I
027was going to be a dad I realized it was probably my last chance to pursue my dream of becoming a teacher so three months before her due date I started grad school when I made this decision I knew what I was getting into the stress the low pay the student debt I still made this choice because it was my dream because I believe in and I love the work and I was ready to make all those cliche sacrifices early mornings and late evenings meetings cramming or whatever time I could find lunches taken up by student crises so many tissues so for students that's just part of the job right yet even in my short time teaching I've seen how the sacrifices can become too much and I wonder how long until they become too much
028for me in fact part of the reason I teach at BHS is because the sacrifices became too much for another teacher who was pushed out like me they had a new child but after their child care fell through they had few options and were forced to leave the district to work somewhere else that was more affordable that teacher was just as passionate and idealistic as I am they love their job and their students just as much as I do daven went to the same master's program yet one financial emergency forced them to make an impossible decision and for the sake of our students teachers should not be one crisis away from being forced to make those impossible decisions it is it is absurd that with the master's degree teachers struggle to pay for everything a
029new family needs if we do not act if we do not show that we truly value our students it is a time before more teachers are forced to make those impossible decisions thank you [Applause] there is Bruce but I think Bruce and Kathleen both left so it now it's Suzie Lopez and Lisa Billings so Lisa Billings okay right Stephen Hopkins that's it okay so we reached our 30 minutes thank you very much thank you everyone for coming out you appreciate very much all your words will now hear from our unions we will hear from Steve cop who's going first BC BC C do you mean winners no chance my name is Liz Ortega I'm the executive secretary treasurer of the Alameda labor council representing a hundred and thirty-five thousand union members across this county standing
030up for fight for working families and I'm here tonight to say just ice like I said it Oakland and I said in New Haven this labor council has your back I'm also here as a mom with four kids in the public school system and a graduate of Oakland High Fremont high in Oakland myself to say that I'm angry I'm angry because time and time again I've had to come to meeting after meeting after meeting two rooms packed like this across this country fighting for what every elected officials say they support their number-one priority public education and yet here we are time and time again fighting for a fair contract fighting for decent wages fighting for small class sizes sizes fighting for additional staffing none of it is just about wages all of it is about
031caring for our community caring for our children fighting for what is right fighting for what every elected official says is their number one priority well I have a message for you as the school board and the rest of the community and other elected officials who are listening tonight we will fight we will win just like we won in Oakland just like we won in New Haven and just like we're winning across this country workers are standing up fighting back and we are winning and Berkeley is no different so tonight I asked not only that you support these workers in a fair fight for a fair contract but read the signs that they have here one of the signs that I just saw says everything not only do I want to live and the community that
032I work but I also want to make a wage so that I can eat we shouldn't have a sign like that in the Bay Area of all places so Berkeley the labor behaves your back Alameda Labor Council will with you thank you next we have dççe president good evening Lynette Robinson president of the Berkeley Council of classified employees I want to start this off by saying in our inner district male although this is two years old this is a check for two hundred and twenty eight thousand dollars and two hundred and twenty eight thousand and thirteen dollars that has never been cashed whether you got it replaced or not is another question this is from 2016 in the inner district envelope that we just happen to find and I'm happy we found it today so
033what else have you guys carelessly done with the money our children suffer because of your carelessness two hundred and twenty eight thousand dollars look at who we have done with that I know we could have saved some jobs we come here time and time again like she said promises are always made we always hear that there is no money how can there not be money to educate children how can there not be money for our tomorrow's how can it be possible that you don't care enough to invest in our children all of our children our special need children seem to come up the shortest you take from them and take from them and take from them and expect all of us because everyone in here is an educator I don't care about titles anymore we're
034all educators struggling [Applause] a difference and it's like we keep begging and picking and I keep saying if you invest in our children you will be supporting us we started school just a few weeks ago short-staffed we shouldn't have as many subs as we do classifieds have over a hundred positions unfilled why that's on you we have more people leaving education and what happens we seem to find more children in prisons that's on you and it's like I'm speaking to brick walls I really do feel that way because what you guys do in each meeting you come here you let us vent and then you go do the same thing over and over again you cut our children read for Edie it's because our children are bleeding in education that's what the red is for
035they're bleeding you are bleeding them dry we want to get a parcel tax we want the people in this community to invest in us we need to show them that we're worthy of that investment we need to show them that our children are actually leveling up because right now we're on the same loop and that's failure I don't do good what failure I keep telling you that I invest out of my pocket and I will continue to invest out of my pocket and I make absolutely no money to do your job your job is to educate your job is to lift up your job is to clear the path of opportunity for all children color creed sex gender that does not matter because see they're supposed to want to be like us you take that
036away no one wants to starve we have to face our children after being with everyone else's children and say I can't read you because I fed the kids in Berkeley hmm that's a problem but I like this $228,000 check right here so I hope you go do your investigation and see if you ever had it replaced and I would like to hear about that from you guys so later on please make sure we know what happened to this two hundred and twenty eight thousand dollars because somebody needs to be watching the books because whoever is cooking them has it burned them up [Applause] [Music] [Applause] yooba dooba is Janet Levin's principle Levinson here she comes [Applause] good evening superintendent Stephens members of the board teachers staff students families and our entire Berkley community I'm Janet
037Levinson president of the union of Berkeley administrators and I'm here speaking on behalf of our bargaining unit members who share my sentiments tonight we're here to show solidarity for BFT and BCC II and all the other staff represented here tonight in an amazingly strong show of support quality public education system former superintendent bill Hewitt used to say very proudly Berkeley is the place to be remember when he rebranded us Berkeley is the place to be there was a really strong sense of pride and Berkeley was the place to be and in terms of hiring candidates for open positions it was the truth we could interview and select exactly the right match for our schools at a small school I could pick a candidate that I knew was going to be created really cohesive team because
038sometimes the team was a team of two and you needed to match carefully and we could be picky and in all the years I never had a single candidate turned me down in an offer took pride in my staff parents commended me on what a great ability I could do in putting together staff fast forward several years now to this time of rising healthcare costs slipping wages in a bimodal income distribution that has led many in our community to scramble in order to make ends meet suddenly I had teachers driving rideshare in the evening safety officers who work all night long at a second job Ayase fearing eviction due to one lost timesheet the change came quickly and in full force we weren't ready for it site leaders have had tremendous difficulty staffing our schools
039in this past year the central office experienced that difficulty with teachers on special assignment coordinators and other positions for three of the past four years I opened King middle school with openings I'd never experienced anything like that I had classrooms that I sat in on him back-to-school night parents ready to attack me until I told them all of the things I had done to try and get a teacher and they could not believe that we just couldn't attract teachers site leaders all over the district have experienced the same problems expiring people in many positions that used to be easy to fill PE history Spanish dance school psychologist instructional assistants instructional technicians hiring now drags on with one principal reportedly having to interview 14 candidates for a fifth grade position until he could find someone to
040fill the position who was except willing to accept the wages and the benefits that the USD could offer we're using interns long-term subs contractors and cutting classes that are just too difficult to staff we absolutely should maintain our high standards and what we're looking for in the teacher but the pool of applicants just keeps getting slimmer when we offered positions to candidates across the district this year we thought we had chosen people who would be excellent for our schools we had many offers fall through once the candidates checked the salary and the benefits I actually began to screen candidates by sending them to the BFT website and saying look at the salary and look at the benefits and let me know if I should waste your time or my time with an interview and often
041I never heard from the applicants again beyond the difficulty in staffing the schools their significant impacts on the school community when the staff can't live where they work our teachers lose the connection to our community and don't even unnecessarily understand the importance of be SEP don't want to attend evening s GC meetings due to the long commute skip out on school concerts performances school fairs on the weekends and so on when our staff can't live in Berkeley it no longer feels like the place to be I actually feel that this board is aware in supportive of a living wage for all employees but it's important for our larger community to support our school so that Berkeley which has led the rest of the nation so often can once again lead with a superior education system
042that's staffed with high quality teachers thank you good evening board members and superintendent Stevens my name is Matt Meyer and I am the president of the Berkeley Federation of Teachers you can see tonight I am joined by hundreds of my fellow educators certificated and classified as well as parents students and community members as you know we were here in masse last March to speak to the board about several critical needs in our district here we are again in September working on an expired contract because these needs have not yet been addressed these critical needs include both sustainable compensation for all educators and supports that make our full inclusion model sustainable our special education teachers are deeply committed to their students education specialists believe in their students advocate for them and support them in general education
043classes in fact our full inclusion model is built on the premise that with proper support all of our students can find success being fully included in general education but right now our students don't always receive the proper support because their teachers aren't supported case managers current assessment loads are unbearable each initial assessment takes on average 20 hours to complete and our teachers sometimes have many to do concurrently oftentimes teachers have to trade off serving their students directly in order to complete hours and hours of legally defensible assessments their jobs are impossible to do and our teachers are frankly just burning out as a result the students are not getting served in a way they deserve when I talk about special ed make no mistake I am also talking about general IDI classes case managers worked
044tirelessly to provide general IDI teachers with the tools they need to adapt the curriculum guide the behavior of their students with special needs they respond to urgent behavioral crises allowing the general ed teacher to continue teaching and all students to continue learning our model relies on veteran teachers to mentor new ones on how to implement full inclusion experienced teachers are exactly what we are losing there were at least 18 new special education case managers hired this year this is a 28 percent turnover rate in one year we still have two vacant positions in some positions currently covered by interns who have not yet finished their credential programs we are losing our experienced teachers to work in other districts with more sustainable models where they can support their students more successfully we believe that our proposals
045will reduce costs in special education as it will reduce legal costs settlements and hearings because we will have improved the integrity and quality of the program efforts a cost containment have failed and we need to do something to address the root causes of our high legal costs the current situation is unacceptable we have been discussing this issue since last year and now it is time to act we need the district to take our proposal of caseload caps and a limit on assessment seriously because it is the right thing to do for our students and to retain our teachers all last year you heard from us heart-rending story after story about how difficult it is to remain a teacher in Berkeley this isn't just about new teachers at the low end of the salary schedule although
046we hold a special concern for them because they are the future of Berkeley's teachers and Berkeley's schools many veteran teachers are also one eviction or financial setback from being forced to leave the area many of us live paycheck to paycheck in the 2018-2019 school year Berkeley teachers will be one of if not the lowest paid teachers in Alameda County new state revenue will not change this position since Berkeley will receive a smaller amount than nearby districts based on state funding formulas as of the week before school we had 25 direct teaching positions that were not yet staffed there were at least nine subs on the first day of school due to openings our openings were across grade levels and subject areas there are at least four vacancies today these are symptoms of a problem that
047cannot be ignored our district must play catch-up we need to make Berkeley an attractive place to work and Comp our compensation must reflect the value Berkeley educators bring every day to the lives of their students we know the port is discussing how to address this we appreciate the district thinking creatively about how to solve this crisis and we call in the district to significantly raise our compensation in a permanent manner if this does not occur our teachers will continue to leave PUSD not because we want to but because we need to take care of our own families all of us are here to serve our students to be part of this Berkeley community but we need a significant raise and increase support of our full inclusion model to make this happen thank you thank you
048thank you Matt and all of you to all the speakers tonight I wanted to tell you that the student representative from BHS sitting next to me said that she really hopes to have a chance to speak to you as the teachers and I think the voice of students is really important so it's not a request but it's not obviously I can't make you stay but you know I'm requested a and here this student representative thank you everybody all right so my name is Estella and I am the student representative and I am a current senior at Berkeley High School so just looking out across this crowd I just want to say thank you so much on behalf of all the students and especially from me personally Stephanie shoudl my current governing Khan teacher sitting right
049there she is teaching us right now about people power that is exactly what I see right now in here people power I'm seeing familiar faces representing exactly what they taught me to do stand up advocate for myself and fight for what I believe in some of the teachers in this room are the exact reasons to why I'm up here tonight so on behalf of all the students and me as well thank you so much for dedicating your career to educating us you guys are doing an absolutely amazing job and we all appreciate you so much thank you [Applause] [Music] [Applause] so we're gonna start with our committee comments do we have a PTA I don't know we hi good evening I'm Rob Collier president of the PTA Council and I'm here to speak regarding item
05013 regarding the ballot measures for the March election our PTA Council Folies recognizes the general need for these three measures and we as a port tonight's proposal to move forward and develop them for the ballot of course the PTA Council can't make a formal endorsement because there's no contract develop measures haven't been written yet and we haven't voted yet we need to vote to formally endorse them however it goes without saying that the fundamental needs are real Berkeley needs to continue improving its buildings and facilities it needs to continue maintaining them properly and above all our teachers and staff need substantial raises sustained over the long term so they can afford to live here and continue to teach our children these three are existential needs for the health of our school district and the education
051of our children at the same time we have to recognize that for many voters the details of measures matter the PTA Council and and individual school PTAs trust that both sides the district and the B of T will interpret wisely the results of the voter surveys that have been carried out and here are being carried out the one that's being carried out this week together the three measures that you're planning of course will raise taxes considerably many voters many Berkeley residents in today's gentrified Berkeley can easily afford to pay more money others however cannot and we urge you to ensure that the low income and Senior exam it's written into the measures are as fully inclusive as possible of all who need them fairness is crucial so we asked me you to move forward tonight
052and in the accompaniment coming weeks please plan judiciously for the long-term health of our schools our teachers and our children thank you do you have any other committees No so now we have time for board members comments board members Judy Julie okay um all I got quiet I want to really thank PFT and BCC E and all of the community members who showed up tonight it's a big sacrifice to get school open to work all day and then to come here in the evening and you know or I say all the time that our schools reflect the strengths of our teachers and our staff and when our teachers and our staff are struggling to survive and to get to school every day and to be able to to work the hours that they work it
053suffers you know and our students suffer and I can tell you know I was thinking for a minute that I continued to be baffled and I'm not really baffled I'm really outraged that the super majority of Democrats and our state legislature didn't have the guts to get a ballot measure on for full and fair funding of public education in the state of California we continue to be at then you know we're not just bottom of teacher salary in the region we're bottom in the state for per pupil funding and it's up to us as a community again and again and again to raise money for our schools our programs our teachers our staff our administrators and so I'm looking forward to the discussion we're going to have this evening for the compensation looking at the
054measures I do want to clarify that you know as we look forward to the maintenance tax in the bond hopefully we will not be increasing those dollar amounts but the issue would be you know how do we really support our teachers and our staff and our educators so I'm committed to continuing to look for creative ways for us to be able to increase the revenue so that we can pay our teachers and our staff and also continue to pursue as as was mentioned earlier our housing opportunities and really look at understanding that you know even when we give raises in the city the cost of living is still off the charts work on workforce housing while we're at the same time looking at is extremely important so I really again want to thank everybody for
055coming out tonight I want to take a couple other comments to just I want to thank the really I think hundreds of volunteers throughout the district parents community members who helped open school I saw an email on the Berkeley high e tree that listed the names of all of the volunteers that helped get school open and it's you know over a hundred and I know that that's reflected in the schools all across the district so I really want to thank all of the volunteers and another issue that's in the news right now and it's something that numerous people have been talking about for the last year is the crisis that vaping is causing on our youth in our community and I'm hoping that we can look at whether it's within our wellness committee or our
056tobacco prevention work that we can reach across our jurisdictions and work with the City of Berkeley Public Health Department to address the issues of vaping among Berkeley youth and then lastly my office hours will begin in October and they'll be the third Sunday at 3:30 at Cafe Leila and so October 20th will be my first open office hours so thank you so now I will go I first wanted to thank everybody who's here and then hopefully everyone who watches this online later I want to thank you all for the very warm welcome kind of blew me away I have been back a few a few meetings but this is the first meeting that you all have organized to come to and I just feel really great about that so so I want to thank you
057for that I'm really proud to be back here I recognize that this is really a in some ways a very challenging time for our district you know we're in the situation where the quality of our school district which is based entirely on our staff has made this a very you know attractive place for the I income people who are entering the tech community and have families to move and while it makes me really proud to be a part of such a high quality School District I'm also you know we we I agree we have to find a way to to pay our employees in a way that we can afford to still you know provide the high quality education to our students and you know where we have income sources that you know kind of
058added income sources so we don't have to take away so I just want you to know that I'm really proud of the dress district and I'm really proud even of how it has become such a magnet for people looking for a place for their schools and I know were we're challenged by that because the very same things that attract families to our dish to our town and tourists in large part because of our school district also increase the cost of living that then educators teachers and administrators and classified staff then have to struggle with and you know the stories about good folks leaving the district is really real to real to all of us we are aware of the openings that our district face at the beginning of this year and it makes us really
059sad because Berkeley should be because of so many things the quality of the education the quality of the community the quality of the union's you know the the commitment to equity and the really forward-thinking views on education I when you know when they can't come here for whatever reason because they can't afford here that is a tragedy that's something we're all very aware of and I just a couple people got up here and really talked about kind of I think are understandably angry and directed that angry at us almost not caring and I just want to make sure everybody knows that there's not a thing person up here who doesn't care right now I came from an activist community I became involved in this district as a parent activist advocating for LGBT inclusive curriculum and
060you know so I'm off you know I think it's great that so many people came out tonight and belong and our advocating strongly and I just want to make sure people know that we are work I mean I I know we're in the positions of power now I'm sitting on this side of the table but we also want but I think if you know us personally every single person to just have building quality community so I just that's what I wanted to tell people I also want to spend a moment recognizing my just a moment recognizing my step my step mother I've been at my stepmother my mother-in-law who died last Wednesday and actually I found somebody when we were going through our stuff found the video from our third wedding and I was like
061and Gayle who now really is my mother-in-law she's never it was our third wedding but you know so she's actually only been my mother-in-law for five years but she's been my mother-in-law and in Harts for 25 years I also wanted to wish Liz Sharra's the best she's going to be taking a break to have that baby that's growing been growing inside of her that you may have noticed and so we're all very supportive and so I wanted to thank you for your hard work and your you've also taken really good care of me as I've been coming back so I'm not sure now I'm gonna be on my own like standing on my tooth the own two feet so I wanted to to thank you for that all right so I think that's all I
062wanted to say I just really wanted to oh I guess I also wanted to add that both of my kids did go through be us see one of them's 18 and one of them's 21 so I personally really understand and value the importance of having dedicated and loving teachers and qualified teachers and administrators Janet Levinson where my was my kids elementary school principal and so I I'm I am worried to hear that like your struggles with hiring because we need to be attracting the very best to this district thank you I add good evening to everyone who is left my comments are pretty that was a joke I guess a bad one alright my comments are thank you pretty short tonight I would just like to first say thank you so much for sacrificing family
063dinner grading lesson planning and overall self care to be here this evening and I'm appreciative of B of T and BCC and community members for your presence here this evening knowing that your advocacy isn't just about higher salaries or smaller caseloads but an overarching overarching outcry for a more equitable educational experience for all of our students especially our most critical learners so although many of them have left thank you for being here and in echoing Julie and Judy's sentiments I'm excited to be a part of a board that does actually care about our educators and are doing the work to show that level of support on another note we received an email that the live stream there the sound for the live stream wasn't working tonight and so we would like to apologize for that
064and we're hoping to get that rectified pretty quickly my next office hours will be held next Wednesday August or not August September 25th this one I think everybody is well into the union leaders who are here please thank your members on behalf of me and the board for being here tonight for all the reasons that my colleagues have said it was energizing and inspirational to see so many people here tonight I'm looking forward to not continuing to negotiate and come up with a fair contract I thank you everyone for staying and hearing us a little bit more but I also wanted to thank our superintendent this is suspect ISM this was his inauguration the other meetings have been just a few people in the audience so this is officially this Berkley showed up for you
065so thank you it was the messaging decided contract the messaging the stories the experiences our teachers are having it's not lost on us it stays with us and we listen and we carefully listen to the stories so that see how we can find solutions to and many of you have given us solutions to in terms of what we need to do so we will continue with that hard and we know that everyone on the stairs and our staff I'll hold this and and listen carefully to what we can what actions we can take to positively move our district and support our teachers and our classified and our administrators because we all want Berkeley to stand out and be the place where everybody wants to be so thank you I also want to say that I
066now have two granddaughters that are in Berkeley schools and so I was fortunate enough to go visit open house and see the hard work that all of our teachers are doing even just to be present there's about four teachers that were new to the district and they were amazed at the showing of parents from Berkeley schools that come out to open house and so it was really heartening to see that they were surprised but that's us that's Berkeley and that's our teachers who are really happy to embrace and welcome our families into their classrooms and to share a little bit so it was a wonderful experience I look forward to going to Berkeley Hynix and also welcoming our new teachers on behalf of Berkeley so I did do that so thank you very much and
067also want to congratulate Liz you know I don't know if you noticed I think it was in it was it in June that all of a sudden we all looked at her and said what so we were surprised but we will miss you but we know you'll be send us pictures okay thank you super Tim hello again so I kind of already said everything that I really wanted to to the teachers again thank you all all so Liz I appreciate everything you've done for me how welcoming you are to me and how you told me everything I needed to know for this position so thank you so much I wish you the utmost best time all right so really quickly I would just like to take this opportunity to kind of talk a bit about
068what I would like to do and see as student board rep for this year basically I kind of want to mainly advocate for mental health resources for students especially as the at the higher levels of education so like middle school in high school especially as a student I see firsthand how direct of an effect mental health can have on a student success and then also the whole entire nature of a learning community and so I have my own ideas I'm sure lots of people have theirs as well so if you ever can find a chance to talk to me reach out to me I will be talking a lot more about all of that and later on meetings but I do want to give my airtime to the superintendent and the rest of the meeting
069so thank you good evening my name is Brent Stevens I am now now on my third board meeting here in San Berkeley I I wanted to pass along several experiences that I've been having just in these opening weeks so it's been my distinct privilege to get to spend time over the last few weeks visiting classrooms across the district in all of our schools I have had the experience now in my career of working in multiple communities and I've been so impressed with the overall quality of our school buildings our classrooms our teachers the families engagement and the smiles on children's faces more than any other thing I've worked in many communities where the effective teacher turnover is far more pronounced and it has been one of the difference makers in my mind that there are
070so many veteran teachers working here in Berkeley and that the skills they bring on a day to day basis make a difference for students you feel it in the hallways there's a sense of calm of purpose and of learning I recognize in many of the comments made by our teacher colleagues that the pressures on teachers right now could in create risk in our schools that that no longer be the case and I thought that I would offer a sort of a quick historical lesson for folks who are watching on YouTube about why we're in a particular moment where the actions of the board the staff and teachers really make a difference so going back to 1978 for folks who are around in California this was the moment when school funded shifted profoundly this was prop
07113 prop 13 tied school funding to the rollercoaster of state revenue which meant that schools were buffeted by the booms and the busts that were taking place in the state economy there were good times and there were bad times but rarely could school districts survive for more than a cycle of three or four years before yet another round of cutting took place that changed temporarily in 2013 when the state enacted something called the local control funding formula and for a period of five years California began to invest more in public schools and so for folks who have been participants in public school education you will recognize that the resources seem to have increased the state last year achieved its funding targets and for the first time now we are living on what's just called colas
072cost-of-living adjustments which means in effect that we are back into the same situation that existed prior to the lcff so if you think back to what was happening with the budget in the period from 2010 to 2012 that was a recession we are now living in the same structural deficit that we were back then which means in effect that the revenue were provided by the state is not keeping up with the pace of our expenses we continue to experience cost increases in a number of areas those things are common across multiple sectors they include things like energy cost they and think include like transportation and they also include cost increases to special education so while we're having these conversations about the cost of living and compensation for all of our educators we're experiencing in effect
073flattened revenue and increasing costs so this evening very importantly we're beginning the second in a series of conversations at the policy level about how to address this revenue gap and so shortly colleagues and I will be presenting on a proposal to the board to introduce an educator recruitment and retention tax as a way of addressing the many many needs that educators expressed very eloquently earlier in the evening so we hope that you'll continue to stay tuned and listen as we describe more details to the Board of Education about this very important conversation I have a couple more things that I would love to do in the time I'm allowed I want to welcome a few new colleagues to central office um several of them are here in the room so I'd like to introduce Bo
074jtr our new associate superintendent of educational services welcome our very first board meeting she got a doozy Samantha Tobias Espinosa a second meeting with us and assistant superintendent of Human Resources welcome to you as well we have a new public information officer who's also here I'll welcome her to stand up her name is Trish McDermott welcome to you and finally a new district compliance officer her name is dr. Marty Walters and she joined us just a week ago so we're very happy to have all of you on board welcome director Appel you are not the only one feeling you've now got a stand on your two feet with Liz's departure I also share that sentiment so I want to wish you the very best Liz you have just been well you're an amazing person and
075you've got a daughter that's going to have an absolutely amazing mother we're gonna miss you very much we're expecting I think daily pictures is that is that the commitment you made okay excellent and then I thought I'd use just the last couple things for a few more notes um so I would love to make educators aware of a really remarkable resource that was recently published by the New York Times it's called the 1619 project it is a phenomenal collection of resources that attempts from a historical perspective to unpack the many features of systemic racism in our country it is designed for educators it's got a lot of very useful resources that are appropriate to the secondary level and it is really a remarkable body of work that the New York Times has collected I also
076want to thank educators for any efforts that you make to celebrate Hispanic Heritage Month that starts on September 15th and runs through October 15th and then finally quickly wanted to make a note about the September 20th climate action so we are anticipating a fair number of students from our high school are going to jump on Bart and head across San Francisco to join you through protest so about the state of climate we have I am confident that our high school staff has been interacting with students about how to participate in the rally safely we've also reached out to colleagues in San Francisco Unified and with San Francisco Police Department to let them know that our young people from Berkeley are on their way over to the city to join and participate in this important event
077so that is all for now I just want to thank again all of the educators that I've been meeting in classrooms very much appreciate the work you've been doing Thank You superintendent and especially talking about our students in terms of what's happening will happen on Friday so now we'll move to our consent calendar do we have a motion move there Oh Cal second ok sick first by direct advice person out there second by director pal all those in favor aye okay so now we'll move to the update on Berkley adult education program by our principal Tom Reed so what while tom is getting himself set up and making the computer work I thought I would offer just a sort of one quick note one of the many remarkable things that I'm discovering in Brooklyn is
078that Berkeley has an adult education program it actually distinguishes from many of our colleague districts across the Bay Area when in leaner times districts decided to peel off their adult education programs and it was simply a function of the local community college so the fact that we are able to serve a broad cross-section of our community through a really interesting array of programming I think as much to Berkeley's credit so the principal of the Adult School is here to give us an update on the goings on in the program is that on very good thank you super Dennis Stevens and thank you board for giving me a few minutes this evening this is I'm beginning my fifth year as principal of Berkeley Adult School and this is my first opportunity I've had to tell you
079what's going on in Berkeley adult and we I'm beginning here with this image here this is a photo that you see that was hanging in the office of the principal at Berkeley Adult School when I arrived there and on the back it says Berkeley Adult School citizenship class no date given but it reminds me that we have a long long heritage in fact the history of Berkeley Adult School goes back to the 1880s now in the 1880s there was no particular funding in the state of California for adult education no mandate it was a matter of this local community choosing to provide learning opportunity to all adults not just University students but to all adults and that's a legacy that I'm proud to be a part of as a resident here in Berkeley and even
080and as an administrator here in this program so we've been around a long long time and and in the last four years there have been some significant changes in how adult education it is ministered in the state of California and some interesting developments within Berkeley adult and so I'd like to outline some of those for you here this evening first though some just basics about us we've had a mission statement for a number of years which I've seen as the key words in that mission statement to be around equal access and as we live with this statement longer we recognize that equal access is not only about having classes in many different locations in the community and at many different times of day and through the week but equal access also has curriculum and instruction
081implications and ensuring that the manner in which we deliver instruction is genuinely accessible to as broad a sector of the diversity that is in our classrooms so and we understand our mission more as we live it longer we have this statement of these school-wide learning outcomes which is sort of umbrella outcomes of what we aspire to have happen in the lives of students who participate in our classes and if we think about the Adult School being a vehicle for increasing human capital in a community this is what that capital looks like these statements here these skills that we foster in our learners lives make them more resilient individuals and make our community to be a more resilient community as they grow in these skills we have outcomes the easiest outcomes to see and to look
082at least in a quantitative way are some standardized test scores each of these pairs of bars represents a level of instruction in Adult Basic Education adult secondary education and English as a second language programming the blue bar indicates how we at Berkeley Adult School do the red bars indicate adult schools in Alameda County on the average and so you can see that Berkeley Adult School is near or above the average of the county at levels across the board so we're doing well we're performing well for our learners by this index the funding for the Adult School is designated for adult education by state law it the adult ed funding cannot be allocated elsewhere it could for those number of years of flexibility beginning in about 2008 until 2015 when these significant changes came to affect
083us but you can see that the bulk of our state money we have a significant grant of federal dollars that support our literacy programs that is again our high school diploma and our ESL program fee income supports some classes that are help support our CTE classes we also do some classes that are supported exclusively by student fees in a broad range of topics that are of general interest to the community I should note here while we're looking at this that our board for three years beginning in 1516 made contributions to the Adult School to support the lifelong learning program serving about a thousand older adults here in our community every year that commitment was outstanding to have that support for engagement of adults again all adults in Berkeley to have access to those learning services
084so that is an important piece of the history in the last few years there have been changes at the state how the state is organizing adult education one of the important features in the changes is this that adult education is now structured and organized so that larger units are the units for planning so in our area here in northern Alameda County the Peralta Community College District boundaries define a consortium boundaries that includes the for Peralta colleges along with five public adult schools that are in this area so this is new to have this regional approach and the purpose of the regional approach is so that collaboratively we can plan together to address the the learning needs of the community reducing duplication of services among the providers and so on the aim in particular is to
085see that the students can advance and when I say advanced I mean for example this a learner comes to us to improve their English they're in our ESL program and after some time when their English skills have improved they advance to our high school diploma program they earn their high school diploma program they move on to the Community College so much of this is helping students we plan collaboratively to make the pathways as smooth as possible for students to advance to college advanced to career and this collaborative planning actually gives us new opportunities to think about how we can meet the learning needs in our community for example the 77,000 people in our region who is yet do not have adults who do not have a high school diploma or equivalent so this consortium structure
086is brand new in adult education since 2015 with this policy priority of advancing we have come to appreciate a new the tremendous gift that we have is Berkeley Adult School of a building with a roof large enough to house many of our programs and not only the Adult School programs we're also housing some classes of Berkeley City College for example classes to support employment from the workforce development program our services so our ability to host all these things in one place facilitates the transitions from one program area of the school and transitions into the college and other services that support and meet our goals in adult education so I'm very grateful we're in the adult school are very grateful for the gift of that large significantly large building the other significant change since 2015 is
087that there has become a brand new funding stream for adult education and while previously for many many many years adult education was funded by hourly attendance a DA and the new funding a brand new funding is strictly by allocation so Berkeley Adult School PUSD has its amount but it's given for adult education because it's not a DA driven we have different kinds of decisions to make or different [Music] considerations much more mission-driven decisions rather than business black and white are there enough students in this class to make it go so we have some flexibility to meet the learners needs that come with this allocation based funding this also helps us be in the business of advancing students to up to higher levels of learning rather than holding them in one place where we can guarantee
088the income from 88 the amount of money this is a gratitude point here the graph here represents the amount of funding state funding that our consortium here receives about eight million dollars here in Berkeley we're receiving while there are nine members funded we're receiving about 40 percent of the dollars that come to our consortium why would that be here's a history lesson in the days of flexibility a categorical flexibility when adult schools could diminish or the districts could choose to reallocate their adult education funds to other important purposes in Berkeley Berkeley's leadership chose to retain a large portion of the Adult Ed funds with the Adult School that maintenance of effort is what keyed the initial scale of funding share of funding for Berkeley Unified School District the adult education program that commitment from 2010
089through 2013 2015 is what resulted in Berkeley having such a large share of the services right now today so we're grateful to have that so those were changes on the outside at the state level with some regional implications there's been some interesting work happening within the Adult School in the last two years we entered our accreditation process self-study very much with a posture that we are doing this self-study for ourselves we're not doing it for an external audience but we want to draw a map for ourselves of how we really are in how we're serving our students the map was for ourselves so that we could chart our own course of how we wanted to grow as an organization and improve as a school this openness of process opened the doors for us to change
090you can see here I've listed the three key areas for us that we've chosen to grow in a visiting from committee came from the Western Association of schools and colleges and granted us six years of accreditation when they and and validated our findings our direction that we were setting for