001good afternoon everyone I would like to welcome you all e we have no public comment good evening everyone good evening I would like to welcome all of you to our board meeting tonight to access translation please click on the globe icon below or at dejon you can go to the corner of the room to get materials we are returning from Clos session after our opening procedures the public will have the opportunity to make public comments the board has changed the public comment format we have opportunities on non-agenda items in person through the Zoom app and by telephone at the beginning of the meeting public comment will last one hour the time allotted for each speaker is two minutes if you are attending the meeting in person you will need to submit a request to address
002the board form to indicate your desire to speak on an agenda item after it's been turned into to staff they are placed in the order of when they are turned in we also call on speakers one at a time in alternating between public comment at Deon and one on Zoom if participating if participating via Zoom you would need to raise your hand by clicking the appropriate icon in the Zoom app or by pressing star n if accessing the meeting by phone no yielding of time or sub substitution of speakers permitted the public will also have the opportunity to make public comment on agenda items after the staff presentation for each discussion and action item the public will have 10 minutes per item and one minute per speaker due to the brown act board members cannot
003discuss items that are not on the agenda and do not usually respond to items presented in public comment now let's move to our opening procedures first we have the Pledge of Allegiance if you are willing and able please rise ready begin I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands one nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for all thank you very much Dr Hurst we are now moving to our land labor and body acknowledgement staff do we have the video thank you very much we're now going to go to our labor and body recognition I acknowledge that the burden of environmental exploitation and systemic Injustice falls upon the labor of black and brown bodies in the building of this country and its
004institutions I remember that black and brown people were born and died work this land against their will for Generations also acknowledge the continued contribution of the labor survivors over the centuries to today of all immigrant labor including voluntary involuntary traffic force and undocumented peoples in the building of what we refer to as the United States we are now going to agenda item B4 West contracosta Unified School District board anti-racist statement the West kraasa School District Board of Education is committed to the work of anti-racism the conscious and active effort to identify Challenge and correct racial inequities and systems and institutions within our schools and Community racism explicit or implicit stands in direct conflict to the fundamental principles of wccusd education to carry wccusd education into the future we recognize that we must continually renew and
005reflect on the roots of racism and develop new ideas to meet the times unjust ideas and policies and the racial inequity they produce have shaped us our schools and our society we strive to uncover unconscious biases and practice anti-racism as individuals and as board members we challenge ourselves to persist through the discomfort necessary for growth and learning to deepen our listening and our examination of racism and oppression and to develop a strong understanding of how our personal experiences and feelings fit into the larger picture of continual oppression each member of the school board individually collectively is responsible for creating and nurturing an anti-racist learning environment where each student staff member and Community partner is respected and a value member of wccusd community we are uniquely positioned and it is our responsibility to identify and dismal
006racist ideas and inequitable practices in ourselves and across the district therefore we commit to supporting anti-racist policies programs and practices for our children's education and well-being while building strong and inclusive School communities we commit to holding each board member accountable towards these goals and moving the work of anti-racism forward we also commit to holding West contracosta Unified School District staff students and Community to living the standards of anti-racism in our schools Dr HSE we are now on B5 roll call thank you ma'am president Smith folds good evening everyone present clerk Gonzalez Hoy good evening presid trusty reckler good evening I'm present trusty Christian good evening present trusty Phillips is absent trustee Jorge Espinosa Jr good evening president student trustee Luke Wilson presid thank you thank you so much Dr Hurst we're now moving to agenda
007item B6 report and ratification of closed session sir do you have a report out yes ma'am regarding item A2 2.2 the board took action to reject claim number 64744 7 per government code guidelines the board voted as follows truste Christian yes trusty reckler yes president Smith FS yes clerk Gonzales Hoy yes with trusty Phillips absent regarding agenda item 82.4 the board voted to appoint to approve the appointment of Lori Wong Roberts as Chief technology officer the the vote was as follows trusty re yes trusty Christian yes clerk Gonzalez Hoy yes president Smith fge yes and with trusty Phillips absent thank you very much thank you very much everyone please forgive my technology problems I am trying to log in okay we are now moving to student performance Washington Elementary School Miss Katherine this is your
008item ma'am good evening president Smith FS board members and members of the community tonight we have a treat planned for you tonight with not just one but two school performances and so first up we'd love to invite Washington Elementary School and welcome to the podium principal Zapata to introduce her amazing kindergarten students hello good evening Buenas noes uh my name is Karen sapata I am the principal at Washington Elementary and tonight you are going to see our Kinder class perform a Tango um this is with their amazing teacher Miss paa the dance was part of our school's Latino heritage month which we don't do small we do big at Washington Washington is a very special school in West Contra Costa we're a dual language in our entire school is a dual language um bilingual Spanish
009and English program and um we're so proud of our performers our Kinder performers and the work of their teacher Miss paa and it's an honor to be here tonight for our um superintendent I know it's his final meeting so it's a it's a real honor to be here so so let's welcome them artina does it right artina out of sight Argentina is located in southern South America its motto is an Union libert the capital and largest city is Buenos the official language of Argentina is Spanish or castano [Music] the glaciers of [Music] elal The Vineyards of CF FAS tasas and ala hor Tango in the night the Valley of the moon shining bright when by daylight Argentina does it right Argentina out of sight the 23 provinces of Argentina are Hui salta Formosa Katara tucuman
010Santiago de Estero chako cores Mission San Juan loha Cordova Santa Fe Entre Rios buenos Mendoza San Louis laa neuken r CH Santa Cruz and [Music] Tiaro violin the drums of FL ju Martin Leon Messi valer mat Pope Francis mariaan Diego Mar Tango in the night the Valley of the moon shining [Music] bright by daylight Argentina does it right Argentina out of sight what do you call an Argentinian with the rubbertoe Roberto the population of Argentina is approximately 44 million people the official unit of currency is the Argentine peso Jaguars gu national animal rof horo the foury Frog the banjo catfish pink fairy armad pears apples Peach National flower Arina chista potatoes zucchini Le and Jacka trees Tango in the night the Valley of the moon shining bright whenis by daylight Argentina does it right he
011go in the night the Valley of the moon shining bright way no s is by daylight Argentina does it right Argentina out of sight you will not believe what you can find at Michaels this holiday I know [Music] right this Christmas be Legend Dairy when you give a farm animal or two you help e e e all right before we get if everyone could grab their seat come on [Music] kids all right if I could get some help from our families thank you okay so we are incredibly lucky to have one more student performance this evening so I'd love to please welcome to the podium [Music] here here good even good evening everybody montalin Manor K8 is very excited and very grateful to be here tonight our mafanikio program which is gr been going strong
012for many years is excited to share and sing an amazing song for you tonight we are excited to share all of the amazing things that our program does for our students and I'd like to introduce Miss Miller Washington our teacher lead for our program to share a little bit more about our program before our students sing for you miss Miller Washington hello hello oh I have the microphone hello everybody I am Miss Miller Washington a 17-year teacher in this District I teach sixth grade math and science at montalvin and I am the Cor orator of the maiko now program at montalvin it is our fourth year and we are so happy to have had it for four years together we learn black history we learn about the principles of K Quanza and we celebrate K
013Quanza together we build community at our school and we showcase our community to our school together we build pride in ourselves and in our culture and today our students are going to sing for you lift every voice and sing the first stand of a song that was written in 1900 as a poem um at the end of reconstruction for the uh birthday of Abraham Lincoln and later the song was the poem was turned into a song by the author's brother and was adopted as a song during the Jim Crow era and also again during the Civil Rights and we often sing this song before special events in the African-American community and this is definitely one of our most special events and I have my students now to come up from mon talvin to sing that
014SP stand up for you all right on up you guys all right know we going they know where they're I don't know where they're going they're going up there he go ahead then that's gonna work you okay all right do you want to take that you want he come stay right here you can see yeah yeah me too you know the whole song Right iing me can up how about right here is this good enough he want Hello okay you know testing okay we got start I mean you're going to have all right you guys ready you're being very patient thank you so much all right thank you all right like in the middle a little every voice and sing till Earth in heav ring ring with the harmonies of Liberty let our rejoicing rise
015high as the ring sky let us wa down loud as a rolling SE sing a song for of the F that the dark has us sing a song full of the hope that the president has brought us facing the Rising Sun of our new day be let it ReSound loud as you guys [Applause] Wonder wonderful all right you guys thank you guys so [Applause] much e e e all right thank you so very much thank you to Washington Elementary School and montalvin Manor Miss Katherine thank you so much for arranging this principles thank you so much parents thank you so much for coming we appreciate it we're going to let parents take the little Bitties home if they have to take them home because we know that it can be a long long board meeting
016so if you just give us one more second e e e ladies and gentlemen we are going to take a five minute recess we are uh truste Phillips is in route and we want to make sure that he's here for this next next session section of the agenda so we're going to take a f minute break we will return at 7:05 thank you everyone president Smith fos asked me to lead the next item which is our recognitions tonight we are recognizing three very important individuals we are recognizing uh trusty Christian trusty Phillips and our superintendent Dr H for their service to our district trusty Christian trusty Phillips and Dr Hurst on behalf of the board staff and our community I wanted to say thank you thank you for your time your leadership and your commitment
017to our kids we know that being in this positions is incredibly difficult at times we feel powerless to create change change that takes a lot of time and education but the urgency is of yesterday you all have made a difference and we thank you all of you have made professional and personal sacrifices to do this work whether missing your kids birthday party to attend a meeting or had to resign a good and stable job to do advocacy and in this level our community thanks you tonight for your sacrifice and for your commitment and as part of our thank you we have a few plaques for you guys I would like to read all of them and then we're going to take a picture this one is for trusty Phillips says in recognition of your years
018of service and dedication to the children of the West contracosta Unified School District since 2016 can I please give him a hand of Applause the next one is for trusty Christian in recognition of your years of service and dedication to the children of the West contracosta Unified School District since 2020 please give a hand to trusty Christian and the last one this one's for Dr Hurst Dr Hurst superintendent in recognition of your years of service dedication to our students and staff of the West kraasa Unified School District please let's give in my hand as well and what we're going to do is we're going to uh go down take a picture with everyone on your plaques we're going to come back and then each one of you is going to get time to share thoughts
019and uh reflection um with us and the community thank you e e e okay thank you so much and congratulations to the three of you um now you get some time um if you have any thoughts we also obviously have our ending comments um and the president is giving you three minutes instead of two so watch out uh uh but any of you would like to go first if or if you don't have any that's okay but Dr go ahead yes thank you I wanted to first take the opportunity to thank the full board um I know it was the board's decision to uh bring me on board myself and my wife um this was an opportunity that we prayed for I'm not shy to say that uh to work within the community that we
020could serve uh so first I want to express my thanks to the full board um there's been um a lot that's happened over the past three and a half years a number of accomplishments and I thought I would just share a few of them with you because I think it's worth mentioning but I catch this with saying that I understand that this was not me this was a collective impact um to make all of this happen so one of the things that happened when I first got here was the equity audit and we know that led to the Strategic plan uh we're proud to say that we now have a refresh Mission Vision core values graduate profile skills and skills of uring adult as well I think I'm most proud though of the work that
021we've done together around anti-racism and it's been really extensive and I wanted to take a moment just to highlight that at work um we've had work with the board executive cabinet we have 16 immersive schools and they are creating a plan to address racism and they're putting that within their spsa we have advisory groups established to continue the work once Dr Roger art leaves we have student conferences student Summits in place we have an anti-racism policy now and in tonight's agenda we'll be discussing an anti slur policy we also have um every leader every principal created an anti-racism message and delivered that message as well other things I think we're proud of is our reduction in vacancies from 143 to 64 which is about 55% um over the past three years and 20% for classified
022a decrease in chronic absenteeism from 34 % when I first got here to 21% that's a difference of 3,380 students by the way um also an increase in middle and high school School connections meaningful uh participation perceive school safety and carrying adult relationships and finally I wanted to highlight also a reduction in out of school suspensions 358 when I first got here down to 236 but I say this to say that none of this progress would be possible without any of you it takes Collective impact to address complex organizational issues and to move a complex system so ID like to use this time to say thank you for this great opportunity to serve as your superintendent specifically again I want to thank our okay thank you I want to thank our president for for your
023Unapologetic commitment and advocacy of all kids especially our black kids and for having a big heart for us and we see that in every meeting clerk Gonzalez Hoy thank you for your intentionality and your calm leadership your wisdom and our personal conversations um I appreciate you and our friendship that we have a trusty Christian thank you for your faith your spirit your sincere desire to affect change especially in your area sir for trusty Phillips thank you for your wisdom for your friendship for constantly keeping before me to always stand on my beliefs and values and what's right for students and constantly reminding me to be the superintend and I have to admit I didn't understand that um when our we had our initial conversations but I get it and I appreciate that and for trusty
024reckler you know sometimes we care a lot about all the questions that you ask but I really appreciate your questions they're really tough questions but they're designed to make us better I like to say thank you to my community all of our employees Rosa Genesis Nancy who's not here security translation our cs's all of our amazing principles our managers our leaders and especially this great team that's sitting before me I've said it time and time again this is the best executive team that I've had the opportunity to work with want to call your names out I have more to say later on but thank you Dr Moses Dr Johnson Katherine summer Melissa Mr Booker Guthrie and congratulations Guth by the way Michelle lri and even and Ellen I wish nothing but the best for wccusd
025and Dr Moses please know that I'm available for you any time for anything thank you so much for the opportunity right um trusty Christian or trusty Phillips trusty Christian okay go ahead first I would just like to take this time to thank everyone who supported me throughout my four years being in office back in 2020 the beginning of becoming the Schoolboard trustee but at first I also like to thank also Mr Phillips who actually um encouraged me to run and not only that but he helped me to run and I just want to thank him for all the work he did for me to help me out and I appreciate all the things he has done and um and will always be appreciative um as I look at the four years being in office it
026was a challenge and we learned a lot we was on training wheels come up the training wheels but I appreciate all the the community who supported me and those who work with me um and I thank everyone um for encouraging me to continue to push forward being on the board is I care about our kids in this District our students all of our students I started from Elser high school was dedicated dedicated campus safety officer at Els High School I was dedicated at and I made sure that I work with every student I didn't I didn't discriminate didn't make no difference in students I I I treated everybody the same and I I show love to everybody and um you know now I'm I'm I'm transitioning going to another field I would become a teacher
027thank you Lord and um and I'm going to be the best teacher there is I'm going to be dedicated in servicing our kids empowering our young people to go to the next level and um I'm going to be the best I'm going to just not look back but look forward um and just to say to the board uh trusty reckler I appreciate you we went to the csba conference I appreciate that we learned a lot and we got a lot of information and and not only that but we um we communicated and connected with one another um clerk galez Hoy I appreciate you a whole lot you was my clerk and I was the board president wow man you know but you helped me and you have a lot of info you have a lot
028of knowledge and and you've been around to know how to put it together um and um you you you're doing a good job man keep it up and and cler I mean um um um president Smith fo I appreciate you because me and you communicating and and um and you always encourage me you know you know you you have what it takes to be the best that you can be I thank you for everything that you said to me and and and I cherish all of those words um Dr Hurst I appreciate you yes we were the board that hired Dr Hurst and um and and I appre appreciate you know the our communication and and uh many things that we have communicated about and I I thank you and um um and also um
029being the superintendent here and also I appreciate you you know um for everything you have done and um to my student trustees I'm G miss you guys well no I'm you know I'm G still be around but you too you know are real cool you know and you're ready to go you're ready to learn and I appreciate you guys too and so um and once again trusty uh Phillips I appreciate you too man um and you know it's so much to be grateful for you know and I'm thankful for all the help that I have received and so um so um I just want to it just break tears to my eyes and to the uh cabinet and to everybody um I appreciate all all of you guys because you guys work hard and diligently
030uh and um making sure that things are put together and and I thank you for everything that you do because your work doesn't go UNL you are working hard and um and there my good friend um Mr Booker appreciate you man you know we go back a long ways long ways so um to everybody I love wccusd and um and I also want to say congratulations to the new board members that will be coming AB board um um starting on the 18th and congratulations to those to to our two new school board members uh you have a lot of task at hand a lot of work to do um to as you come on board and so um so to the community or Richman area 2 I appreciate all those who supported me in this
031election and and thank you thank you thank you I'm sorry I took so long but my heart is overwhelmed and I love everybody God bless you thank you thank you trusty Christian trusty Philips thank you um it has always been my desire to be of service to my community and I have prayed uh uh to be in a position uh to be of service so I want to start by um thanking God uh for giving me um the desires of my heart um and keeping me uh in check uh to make sure I'm doing what I'm supposed to do um I also would like to thank uh my wife uh and my children um I have more children now uh than when I got on the board uh but my wife uh and my children
032dropped me off here um eight years ago were my swearing in and um they're here now so um to take me home so Angela and Marist and Sterling and amanzi I love you very much I am very grateful and thankful to all of you for allowing me um to be away um as much as I have been um to do this work so I appreciate you uh and I thank you and I will say that my biggest campaign supporter has always been my wife uh even before we were married so thank you so much Angela um and to uh the residents of West Contra Costa Unified School District when I got on this board we were still at large um so um I have received votes um from all over um this quarter of the
033county and you know I thank God for the opportunity to serve and I thank God for my family um but I also thank God for you all um because um the Lord wasn't the one knocking on those doors for me um and and donating to my campaign and my family didn't knock on all of those doors and and donate all that money to all of those campaigns uh the residents of West Contra Costa did um in my current district and at large and I just want to say I appreciate you um from the bottom of my heart and I thank you too uh for giving me the opportunity to serve this community uh just like my father did and my mother did there were peace officers in this community um and I am proud to
034keep up that tradition so thank you for trusting me um quite frankly with the most important possession that you have and that's your children um so thank you for that thank you to uh Dr Hurst um I want to say I appreciate you very much uh for coming here um and uh changing your life to be in this space you and your wife I want to say thank you very much uh to my colleagues um not just on this board uh but on previous boards as well um I have uh learned a lot um I have gotten a lot of lessons um since I've been here got a lot of gray hair since I've been here too um but a lot of lessons and a lot of relationship and I'm thankful for that and um
035last but not least I want to say thank you to all of the staff uh because the truth is um we're the ones that are on TV but you're the ones that are in the classrooms and you the ones that are downtown at the administration building you're the ones um really who do all the heavy lifting um and every single one of you in this room uh has made a huge impact um and I just want to say I appreciate you and um this is my community I'm still here I'm not going away if there's something I can assist with let me know but I promise I won't call in the board meetings and tell you all what to do and say hey you should do it this way um that's you know I chose
036not to run again um and I'm not going to try to govern from uh the next phase of my life but I want to say thank you very much for your commitment to these children uh which include my children because they attend this District um there's always more to say but I I'm going to stop now thank you for the time uh to express myself um and thank you for the opportunity to serve all these years thank you trusty Phillips president I'll pass down to you for the next item thank you so very much we are moving to agenda item B10 wccusd public comment how to address the board members of the public are invited to speak to the board about any matter that is not otherwise on the agenda and is related to issues
037affecting public education in wccusd public comment will last approximately 60 Minutes the time allotted for each speaker is two minutes individuals wishing to speak must submit a wccusd public comment form or if participating via Zoom individuals will need to raise their hand due to the brown act board members cannot discuss items that are not on the agenda and do not usually respond to items presented in public public comment staff do we have any public comment yes we excuse me I'm so sorry I'm a hot mess uh Dr HSE you wanted to make an announcement or have an announcement made please yes ma'am thank you so much Madam president I would like to have um Ellen Mahia Hooper just kind of give us an update on what's happening at Richmond High School facilities lights and field
038good evening community board uh yes my name is Ellen Mahia Hooper I'm the director of facilities planning uh con uh and construction and I would like to report tonight that the Richmond field uh depression that we had in the corner by the uh the corner kick area uh the subsurface was um repaired today tomorrow they will be coming back out to put back down the safety mat as well as the field carpet uh and the infill so the field itself will be usable um by the end of the week so that's great news uh I know there is also a concern over the lights we do have a uh contractor under contract now to make that repair the uh materials are being ordered and as soon as the materials are in uh those repairs will
039also be completed uh we also are in the the process of purchasing a goal thank you ma'am thank you thank you Dr H thank you Miss Hooper uh staff I'm sorry we are now ready for public comment thank you for that our first public comment is duvara Wright pressy Phillips will you help right here make sure that the baby can there it is okay thank you I think you got it okay go ahead friend you on hi my name isaria right um I'm in the second grade and I heard that MN is going to get clothes and MN is not just about learning black history it's about doing art having fun learning games watching movies doing projects and it's so much fun and every kid likes it and if somebody um blocks down mafanikio then
040the kids will not be happy so what I just want to say is um please do not um block MAF nikio that's DK I'm d next public comment is Tanetta Thompson please unmute yourself good evening board um and uh well wishes and best of luck to Dr Hurst and Mr Christian um what I want to say is and I've been saying this repeatedly at every board meeting is that this whole attack on elero High School's football team is based on a white family's word and that their word is law that black families are not not allowed to be homeless they are not allowed to be in transitional housing this is all a fishing Expedition because this white family didn't get their way and use deceitful tactics to play sports at elero and basically destroy a
041community no one in the district right now or league is in the playoffs our own area board member for being a whistleblower Mr Phillips is the only one to take a stand against the unjust acts of Malcolm Norrington there are over 20 title N9 complaints against Mr Norrington and yet he is not put on leave this same principal called me a pit bull which is another word for a female dog for advocating for our coach but you all put other staff on leave for a conspiracy because you believe that I received information that I spoke about at the board meeting and sent to Mr Phillips how did I how did I know that the district requested um athletes of the football team's addresses because I sat in with the district lawyer and the district ad
042and these parents told me because your own lawyer contacted them it's not rocket science to decide where um how I got this information but yet and the district ad is also communicating with the parents per Dr Hurst instructions you are also telling our coaching staff that kids are ineligible to play and really going to the kids and telling them and saying that we're looking at your addresses running their addresses and telling families that you're looking at their utility bills and popping up at their homes so now I know that every time I speak at these meetings and explore and expose the corruptness and illegal tactics of the district you all will then retaliate against an employee I sent board member Phillips an email on November 4th about the illegal tactics used to access our kids
043addresses asking him to help I spoke about it at our board meeting if you thought I got the information from this employee on October 22nd our next public comment is zon Harrison hey good evening boy how y'all doing get my life together right quick so everybody leaving and I feel a little abanded I got attachment disorders and the people that saying y'all cool but I want to just um take this time as a parent and tell Mr Phillips thank you so much for all you done you helped me um when I started off in this journey and we've been on a long path seeing each other's children and just all the work that we had to do and while the children grew and thank you for all that you've done to serve on our board
044and to make changes for our students I want to thank El re for what he's done the four years that he's been on here um and how he's contributed to the APAC and the the support he's given us and I want to thank Dr HZ for um doing doing what you could with a district that had a whole bunch of Shenanigans going on before you set in the seat so thank you for doing the best you could to try to straighten things up and for the rest of the board that's left to deal with the shenanigans and coming on to deal with Shenanigans I will be coming to y'all in different capacity I'm on eight of y'all parent committees in y'all District which is overwhelming so I will be kind of pulling back a bit
045a little bit and um I just want to say when you come somewhere you want to leave it better when you leave you want to leave it better and I thank all that you all have done because you all have made a way to leave it better I now see Ruby Bridges signs on Lupine schools I now see black um African-American history um month flags and Banners at schools we now have more sites recognizing black parents and black students which wasn't happening and the staff that did contribute to that I want to thank um them because you guys are the leader so you guys have people under you working really hard to support parents and students it's definitely not enough and it's still a lot more work that needs to be done but you all
046won't be here in the same capacity to see us do it but I want to thank you our next our next public communist Rodney Alam Mo Brown please unmute yourself like to say good evening board um to those that are leaving the board uh may you continue upon your future endeavors those who are coming on the board I wish you well indeed I want to speak about um the resolution that we're assuming is coming forth on December 18th concerning Steve School uh as we all know that is a work that needs to be done and complete and uh I'm hoping that Mr Hoy will lead or continue to lead in this particular item so that we can get this finished and complete as a community also I do know that Dr Hurst was under immense
047pressure as a superintendent of our board uh there were a lot of things that he wanted to achieve unfortunately he couldn't achieve whether time permitted or otherwise but I want to salute DOC for hanging in there and doing as best as he possibly could uh brother 03 thank you sir for serving as well uh I know times get tough and things can become a little over unated at times but you hung in there and did as possible as the best that you possibly could uh Mr Phillips thank you for being informative uh educating the community about issues that we didn't know about and always there when I call to the rest of you continue to serve um hang in there I know it's tough but at the same to hey we all we got we
048all we need God bless you all good night our next public commment is Rosie Hernandez hi good evening uh my name is Rosie Landes I was here um a couple of weeks ago with the Richmond High School um soccer teams coaches and parents and um thank you so much for the update that's actually why I was sent here I'm here to um representing the five different teams and the varsity coach Renee celes um and to thank you because the work did start today the sinkhole um was being repaired today and and it looks like they will be back tomorrow um there is still the issue with the lights and with the goals but um we thank you it's it's amazing that um you were able to hear us and that um our parents came together
049our our players came together and that this means so much for our community and um for just our entire district and so we really really want to thank you um it's not always that you get positive feedback so we definitely want to be here and and let you know so um yeah we hope you come out and see our games so thank you than you our last public comment is Peter best hello board cabinet y the cabinet okay I just learned something today um I'm Peter best uh I'm a partner as well as a parent at montalin Manor Elementary School and I just want to stress the importance of the mafanikio program for our African-American students and not only for our African-American students but also for our entire culture and Community there um not only
050do our students our African-American students get to be together and learn about their culture and share their experience together but they also get to share those experiences with staff and other students and um also keeping in mind how we're always trying to push um or or yeah push our anti-racism um in schools and remind um others to look into other cultures and accept other experiences the mafanikio program has done that the last four years at montalvin um personally um my kids came home last week after their first week at my Phio this year saying they want to celebrate kuanza now so just the impact it's having on them and the impact it's had on our community is very very important and I just wanted to make sure I um took the time to stay and
051advocate for Miss Miller Washington our families our community and our students at uh montalvin so thank y'all sorry thank you very much for your public comment um we really appreciate it we are now moving to our standin reports the first standing report we have is from utr utr would you like to have your your turn please uh good evening board trustees and superintendent H community and cabinet my name is Francisco ortis I'm a fifth grade teacher at Ford Elementary currently I'm released to serve as the president of United teachers of richm first I want to take a moment to acknowledge and thank trustees Christian and Phillips uh for services to our community being a public official is challenging and often a thankless Endeavor and utr Educators appreciates your dedication and hard work over the last
052four and eight years respectively we wish you and your families all the best as you enter the next chapters of your lives additionally we extend our gratitude to Dr Hurst for his service as superintendent over the past four years we congratulate you on your upcoming retirement and we wish you health and happiness in this new phase of life life now I'd like to transition to share some more serious concerns on behalf of utr members and the students that we serve at stge elementary educators are being denied access to instructional materials they have purchased over the years to enrich their students learning the district's demand that these Educators produce receipts for materials bought out of their own Pockets often years ago is both unreasonable and unfair these materials were purchased to fill gaps where the district
053support fell short and our students are now the ones who are paying the price for these bureaucratic barriers after a meeting held with stge Educators there was a promise of a follow-up meeting with cabinet and high level staff however that secondary meeting didn't occur they received notification of this decision on a Sunday email before break our students and our Educators deserve better and these types of action lead to um resentful feelings of disinvestment and Deval next I also want to address the multilingual counseling grant that is designated or designed to provide Mental Health Counselors to the Kennedy and the Richmond High families of schools and this would also establish stge as the first Elementary School in West contracosta Unified School District with a mental health counselor this is inexp inexplicably stalled in Business Services utr
054wcaa have completed every step that's requested by the district that we continue to face barriers and getting this critical funding released families at Kennedy and Richmond High are waiting stge students are waiting every day that these mental health supports are not uh moved forward our students are denied mental health support that they urgently need and deserve finally I want to again bringing attention to the vacancy crisis that continues to destabilize our schools there are currently 80 certificated vacancies across the district and 260 classified vacancies including over 130 special education par paraprofessionals alone these numbers are staggering every unfilled position represents a classroom without a teacher a special education student without support and the school Community stretch thin the district must act urgency to address this issue and this crisis we really can't wait our students
055families and Educators deserve a district that prioritize equity and stability these issues such as denying the access to the instructional materials at stge delaying critical mental health supports and failing to address the vacancy crisis demand immediate attention and action we hope that you will join us on this fight together thank you thank you so much our next standing report is from asset good evening Bor thank you for calling us up um my name is Alon Harrison and y'all didn't if y'all didn't know that I just wanted to be official and I am the chair of ASAT and um what we are experiencing right now is kind of a different transition um also of what we can expect going forward um for the rest of this school year and I have seen some different things I
056was in a presentation yesterday um the elders Council invited me to that the cabinet level did um for support for our black students I want to say I was totally and completely impressed and anxious for the rest of the ASAT and APAC parents to see this presentation it will it it shows that the district has seen us it shows that the district is thinking about all children including black children and I feel that this is something that all the parents that have students who identify as black and African-American need to see that our district is seeing our parents not just really seeing the parents but they're setting up structure to see our children and educate our children getting our children reading and doing math at a level that they can be productive citizens that they
057can go to college and addressing the College and Career was a big piece for me um getting our students ready to go to HBCU and then coming back here and having counselors that are ready to support them so I was very impressed and I hope that that presentation that they showed with the elders Council will be available to other parents to see and for other community members to see that was very act and I think the district needs to um highlight that more also um I did hear about um St having a resolution the black um parents and black and African-American parents would like to know how is parents voice going to be part of the siege resolution um the there are parent groups there that I feel should have input and I feel that
058we've done several resolutions before and I was told by the last superintendent that a resolution is just in good spirit so how do we know that this resolution will not just be in good spirit and I feel that this district has done the the sge family and Community Injustice and I feel that the people that will be sitting on this board should do something about it not looking back at the past but looking at the future on what can we do to brighten the future for that community and our future students we cannot get doctors lawyers um Scholars artist Architects out of a an inhabitable school and moving them to a school that wasn't meant for them to be there is not going to do it either so I hope that you guys have some
059compassion and um make this a priority if it's a resolution I feel it needs to be a policy you guys need to be held accountable um to do this and if all you guys don't come back tomorrow go for bit that whoever sits their butts in these seats will do it because they have to not because they it felt good and it was a um a resolution because we seen that those sometimes don't work like they're supposed to and another part I would like to get a lot of support on is when you do your professional developments parents would like to see how those are being effective for the Educators and the children in the classroom so if you guys can um come up with more creative ways to share that out when educators are
060taking professional development classes and the district is spending a lot of money on professional developments parents don't understand how that's affecting our children and how that's really going to change outcomes whether it be a a curriculum training or um social emotional training and also one more thing I feel is really important I was in a couple of meetings and working in supporting people uh families in the community as a resource parent I would like to see programs set up for gifted um preschool children because we have a way to expel and suspend our preschool children but we don't have a way to celebrate or Advance them when they're gifted all of them don't go into preschool just drawing circles and coloring some of them know how to read and need to be more challenged and
061there's nothing in place in our district to support that so I would like to see our district be Innovative and do something that we can do that to support our gifted preschool children that may need other options okay I'm complete have a good night thank you thank you very much asset we are now moving on to agenda review and adoption Bo or any changes to the agenda cloy thank you president I just want to remind you that uh we are removing item B13 from the agenda thank you that is correct I appreciate that thank you for that reminder any other Corrections or additions or changes seeing none the agenda is adopted with the removal of B13 pulling it I'm sorry Jesse reckler go ahead I'm sorry may we remove Vada from the superintendent's report and
062move it to discussion item repeat that please may we please remove V verada from the superintendent report and move it to a discussion item point of order I'm so sorry I can't hear you I was asking the superintendent is if he's okay keeping it under his superintendent report because we had the opportunity to ask questions in close session so have discussion and ask questions in close session so I think it's okay and appropriate to keep it under here because we are still allowed to ask questions under the report but we can have discussion and make comments no okay we can't we can't make comments under the report okay um seeing no objection trusty reckler thank you for that but we're going to keep it under the superintendent report seeing no other Corrections or objections the
063agenda is adopted we are now moving to consent items do we have any consent items that need to be pulled trusty reckler go ahead yes thank you ratify contracts just the whole ratified contracts for comment and then C that would be C10 and then C12 revised by law 9150 student board members okay anything else okay seeing none the consent item is approved with removing items C10 and C12 okay Dr H we are now on superintendent communication go ahead sir thank you can we pull up the presentation please e e I can pull it up thank you thank you next slide we wanted to share a few memorials that we have the district would like to take time to recognize the contributions of members of our school Community who passed away first we have Lawrence Williams
064I regret to inform you that Mr Lawrence Williams a teacher at deanza high school passed away he started teaching in 2006 at Peno Valley High School in 2016 he transferred to Kennedy High and then to deanza high school our thoughts and prayers goes out to the Williams families and friends please join me in a moment of silence thank you our next slide we have another Memorial Mr Mark Armen we regret to inform you of the passing of Mr Mark Armen a special education teacher at Hercules middle school and a deeply valued member of the Titan Community Mr Armen began his wccusd career in 2005 teaching at KATU Middle School Helms Middle School Peno middle school and Hercules middle school before retiring in August 2024 we appreciate the contributions he's made within our community again please
065join me in moment of silence thank you and then also uh we had shared this into the last board meeting but we have a correction Miss Deborah Brittain we regret to inform you that Miss Deborah Brittain in English teacher at Helms Middle School recently passed away the correction is prior to the helm Miss Brittain also taught at Adams Middle School we appreciate her commitment to student excellence and achievement within the hams and Adams Middle School community and within the district again please join me for a moment of silence thank you so much a picture is worth a thousand words just look at this picture everyone Miss Lori Wong Roberts she exudes um enthusiasm energy motivation and I just have to share this story about um Miss uh Lori when she became a um a member
066of our executive team she came up to me and said hey Dr hearse did you know that I used to be a mascot and I said excuse me and then she says yeah I was a buying and I was wondering where is this going and then she said I want to have us huddle up before we start the school year I was like okay and she literally gathered the entire team that you see there had us Gather in the circle and she was our little cheerleader she was cheering us on to start the school year off right and then to close I mean she was all in and then she had us put our hands in and then WCC on three and we braced our hands up it was truly amazing but I'll share with
067you that's who uh Lori has been for us uh she's inspirational she's motivational she is a leader she's Dynamic and we wanted to take an opportunity Miss Lori lri to recognize you and to honor you for who you are can you please come forward to receive some flowers e e e thank you so much lari for your leadership we appreciate you our next slide we want to uh recognize December 6 to the 12th as Computer Science Education week and really uplift stem but specifically computer programming and then also there's some ways to celebrate that we put in here we put in some resources we put in also a free virtual kickoff event hosted by computer science Teachers Association on Monday December the 12th at 4M and then also inviting you to join in a global
068hour of code on Tuesday December the 10th our next slide is in recognition of special education day December the 2 2024 this commemorates the historic signing of our nation's first Federal special education law which is the individuals with disability Education Act idea by President Ford in 1975 this groundbreaking legislation guaranteed access to public education for all eligible children with disabilities and ensure they receive necessary supports for their Learning and Development and then also December the 3 is International Day of people with disabilities and also it says in 1992 United Nations proclaimed December the 3D as a day about promot promoting the rights and well-being of persons with disability at every level of society and development and to raise awareness so we wanted to lift that up as well and then also we always want to
069share about our parent advisory committees and we have information here on our apack ASAT dlap our mdac our cac's our DLI pack our cboc and our 71 committee that concludes our superintendent report and we do have a presentation from Bata that we want to go into and we're going to introduce miss summer Sigler and Mr Michael Booker for that presentation good evening Dr Hurst board president Clerk and trustees this evening we're going to be presenting the verata guest management and volunteer clearance system presentation next slide please I will give a brief overview with regard to the visitor management as far as the volunteer clearance goes miss summer Sigler will give that portion the ver presentation will be done by Brendan Haley uh who is the account manager from verata and then at the end we'll
070talk about the workplace cost um for this pres or for this platform next slide please the verata guest management overview the verata guest management system includes an optional security screening feature that allows administrators to enhance visitor screening by checking them against sexual offender Registries and criminal databases this alerts staff to potential risk to Children students and Personnel by using verata guest for electronic screening schools can collect more detailed information and proving their ability to manage site access and ensure safety for the next slide Miss Sigler will talk about the volunteer management system good evening Dr Hurst and board uh so this system has streamlined our ability to process volunteer applications parents and Guardians can now apply through an online portal that screens uh their driver's license consulate card ID against a number of databases and
071so it does take staff manpower to clear and do a check uh but the actual processing and background check can be done in minutes which is an improvement of waiting weeks before for results to return next slide please so the family engagement office is currently doing our clearing of volunteered once cleared parents receive a QR code that they take to the school and that QR code actually can be scanned and show that they are cleared as a volunteer where we used to hand out the plastic badges they can get a visitors pass now for the day uh this system also will allow us to without undo duress to our amilies allow people to reapply annually which is really important for our safety and the safety of our students next slide please there have been some
072bumps in the roll out and some learning curves so we went back through the system to see really what are the common errors why are people when they get rejected typically being rejected so the most common errors we found were that the driver's license photo photo is not clear and or the address is hard to read so we do have to have a clear image of that driver's license um in some cases an ID was not uploaded at all and the system does ask that you take a selfie and you put your driver's license so that there's a check that it's the same person uh in some cases the selfie doesn't show the whole face or it's not clear so those are the most common errors or just that the application itself was incomplete in
073those cases the face team is working to get emails to let people know why their application was rejected next slide please we just want to talk for a second about visitor management versus volunteer system the functionality is a little bit different obviously we want volunteers who are with students um often to be cleared and fingerprinted but the visitor management system itself will actually allow us to know who and how often people are entering our buildings and at what frequency we will now have the data to know how many volunteers or visitors either or enter our building at what frequency and if there is any sort of safety concern have a digital record of who was with where uh and this type of information is invaluable when we think about the safety of our students so
074really visitor management tracks those visiting I came there's a Halloween parade there's a Class party I'm here for today not just as a volunteer and volunteer we're tracking the volunteering and the more um continuous access to our students next slide please so uh we really appreciate our new partnership and uh Brendan Haley we would like to introduce our representative from verkata who's been incredibly responsive and supportive can you click on the link please thank you summer thank you Mr Booker um good evening Dr Hurst members of the board and the cabinet uh really honored to be here tonight um it's really been a joy working with your district and you know I've seen some familiar faces like Ellen and not surprised of the work she's doing on the soccer field um as far as the
075verata presentation goes I'm just going to give an overview on the system yeah you can go back a couple slides that's actually perfect um you know to talk a little bit about verata um you know when we started this This Is Us preo uh we've been around since 2016 we've been the fastest growing physical security company in the world uh fastest growing cloud-based security company in the world as well and if you want to click twice uh forward we'll show you where we are today one more time right there um as of today we actually have over 28,000 organizations companies Fortune 500 companies and uh school districts around the country and world that trust us with their with their security and what this presentation about is about tonight is really about student safety um next
076slide please uh this is the platform of ricot so we don't just do visitor management we don't just do a volunteer check-in we do a lot more than that we do it through a single pan of glass so you guys the district actually already uses our cameras in some locations um and now it was it was a transitioned into the visitor management I'm sure you seen in other districts if you guys have visited um they'll take your ID they'll have you type in some information uh and it's kind of going away from the days of signing your P your name in on a piece of paper um where we don't really know where those papers go no one's going to go through a Year's worth of a log of 55 different schools and read who's
077actually visiting but on a with our database you can track those visitors uh for an entire year it'll have a log for you uh with a lot of data points how often people are visiting what kind of visitors are you getting um and also the most important piece is doing a background check right so as a father of two I understand I want to make sure that the people visiting my children's School are cleared and that's what we're doing we're really just giving you the information uh and you guys can can take action on that next slide please once again this is just a platform overview everything that we make and create uh is seem ly integrated together so whether it's visitor Management in our cameras Access Control in our cameras uh it all plays
078in together right so there's a lot of cost benefits to it that I'm not going to get into right now I'm going to stick to the points um but having one cohesive system is really where we're where we're going next slide please uh one more time and next slide so this is what it looks like right now as you guys visit your schools I'm sure you guys are signing in on the piece of paper like I mentioned this is going to be just a digital record right so I would come in click on uh you know visit volunteer guest whatever it may be fill out the questionnaire that the the district has decided to put in there scan my ID uh and within a few seconds you'll be cleared to you know have a badge
079printed for you and be on your way to you know help with your class pick up a kid drop off lunch whatever it may be um it's actually a pretty simple process uh and once we get the iPads out on the schools you'll feel free to check in yourself and you'll be able to go through and and see what the visitor system is is really like um but really it's taking it from paper and putting it in a digital record that's and and running a background check that's the most important keys to it next slide please one more time like I mentioned it's going to modernize your your systems and your facilities as well it'll have uh you know bringing technology and security to your your visitors um you also have the ability to check
080in ahead of time so when you do go to the iPad you can scan a QR code and you'll be prev vetted and it'll have a badge printed out for you um you know it's going to also we have like I said our cameras at some of your facilities already so it'll be able to seamlessly integrate those cameras and show you video feeds on where your visitors are going we've had certain School District tell us hey we found people that have checked in with your system and going into closets that they're not supposed to be in uh areas that they're not supposed to be in and it actually gave them insight and they were able to talk to those visitors and uh and and fix the issue next slide please guest uses specifically for K
081through 12 uh verata is in over 30% of the school districts around the country in some form of capacity um kind of the same things that we we talked about instant B background checks um sis integration so for your secretaries that want to run reports and check it against your uh whether it's clever or whatever your sis system may be uh you can actually you know for the older students come in and say hey I'm tardy and I can even print them out tardy slips as well so there's a lot of different capabilities built into the system uh and obviously the most important thing is protecting the students not only their physical safety but their privacy as well next slide please this is a a good look at what the um background check will look
082like on the secretary's point of view uh so let's say you know someone comes in scans their ID and they get a hit right uh this is what's going to pop up on the secretary's screen it's not going to alert the individual who's checking in uh the secretary will be able to cross reference the ID with the picture uh and make sure you know the dates match up uh the physical picture matches up it's pretty easy to to notice when someone's checking in with an ID a person checking in the ID is 55 years old and this person's in their you know early 30s it also give you the information right there on the spot uh and at that point if it's a match you continue to hit it and you'll understand why that person
083is being denied uh so I've been working with Mr Booker whatever is up to um it's up to the district to decide what they want to do with that information who they want to let in and out uh and how they want to go about the business of denying somebody um but that is that is the feature that a lot of school districts are using and what we're excited to bring to the table to ensure the safety for your students and your staff next slide please that concludes the visitor management portion of it um for the volunteer portion I think summer was going to talk about that um but really nice to be here tonight congratulations Dr H and the other board members on a great tenure and look forward to the continued partnership thank
084you and we did Cover the volunteer portion so that concludes our presentation turn back over to you ma' thank you board do you have any questions we're going to do three questions no comments on the superintendent's report I see trusty reckler you have your three questions please thank you so for the ver rep thank you for being here um just recently this year a couple of months ago verata was uh through the just justice department in the FTC fined $2.95 million uh penalty for you know a number of uh serious infractions the one I'm most concerned about is Hippa and we're a school district Hippa is very important to us so what were the changes that were made to the system and how can we ensure the data is safe um thank you for your
085question the what I was going to present if a question like that came up was actually uh a reading from our website and our actual legal response I would suggest on that one since I don't have access to bring it up I would suggest going Googling verata uh settlement and you'll see our website and our legal team's response to that but if I could um kind of put it in bullet points I want to make sure I'm speaking clearly on this that settlement came in early 2021 we had about 6,000 organizations and it was regarding our marketing practices over emails and then also a data breach so that data breach took place when we had 6,000 customers uh nine over a little bit I think it was like 90 or 91 customers a hacker got
086into their camera system we curtailed that within two hours we notified every single organization that was breached every single customer that we had at that point um I'm not going to talk about all the details we went in that'll be on the link that I that I mentioned all I will say on that is that the fine that we settled on was regarding the email practices and not even the security breach that we took uh in addition to that we've gotten some of the most incredible cloudbased physical security companies in the world who've actually become customers some like Amazon and others um and since then we went from 6,000 organizations that trusted us since that uh data breach to over 28,000 organizations so we actually feel that we are we took that as a learning
087lesson we've gotten better made our system even better uh We've became sock 2 compliant we've became fed ramp ready which takes three to five years to become fed ramp ready uh which basically means the federal government and Military can buy our equipment because they trust the standards of our data uh in addition to that we have I think over 250 school districts in California alone that have trusted us with their data and their privacy other than that I would I would say let you should read our settlement um response from our legal team because I don't want to speak at a turn okay thank you um next is I'm not sure who answers this but the presentation says that everybody should reapply annually so that seems kind of loose to me so are people reapplying
088annually or or it's optional or could we find out a little bit more about that so historically people have not reapplied annually we've badged people one time which is problematic um people get badged and 10 15 years later are using the same badge this is the first year that we are now rebadging everyone and we will need to reinforce this and send out reminders next next school year because now we will and so thank you for grabbing that language because that's something that we will do and because of the speed of this process we actually have the capacity to do it in a timely manner which would have been a challenge before given the delays in the process okay and then finally uh can you explain how field trip people who are going on field
089trips in over Night Trips how they're being cleared because the system seems to be very on the minute um and when you um do a field trip here you we used to slap our badges on a Max machine and hand in the packet with your driver's license and your badge and your insurance card for your car and now since our our volunteers now just showing up at the and scanning in the morning of and they're cleared and they're going how how is that going to work yeah good question and please correct me if I there's an echo so I think I caught the question but if I missed part of it this is why we do want our volunteers cleared ahead of time although we can now do it in a timely manner verata will
090actually hold the list of who we clear so I can get in the system and see who has been cleared and who hasn't and so that's something when they turn in the field trip packets we can actually check the verata system even without a photoc copy of a badge okay thank you well since I only get three questions I guess I'm done thank you thank you very much any other questions from the board okay seeing none thank you very much for the presentation thank you Miss Sigler and Mr Booker thank you very much thank you we you're welcome we are now going to move on to our action item first action item is E1 provisional internship permit Dr Johnson this is your item I apologize for some reason I can't get my video to my
091camera to turn on um thank you president Smith folds on board a provisional internship permit allows our newly hired teachers to enter into an internship program with our school district thank you so much do we have public comment we have no public comment thank you board questions three questions two minute comments trusty reckler you have questions yes hi hastim been this late this question late I'm sorry so for both the PIP and the varial ter variable term waiver we have one person who's on both lists the person is Tiffany Marie huie Scott I don't think I've ever seen this before can you be on a pip and a variable term waer at the same time um I have also not seen this before so in full transparency I will have to follow up with our
092staff um because usually you are on one for one year and you have one opportunity to be on it so if you would allow me to go back and confirm that um I can do that but I also don't want to hold up anything well I I would want to D go back and confirm trusty reckler would you be okay with it going through and then Dr Johnson telling you the answer to your question at a different time yeah I do not want to hold up anything Dr Johnson would that be okay for to go ahead and vote it through and then you tell trusty reckler the answer I'm really struggling to hear I don't know what it is is today can you repeat that yes ma'am so is it okay if we go ahead
093and vote on the PIP and then you get in contact with trusty reckler and answer that specific question when you have the opportunity to go back and double check yes that would be fine thank you thank you is are there sorry are there any other questions from the board seeing none is there a motion president Smith V say move that we approve the professional internship permits thank you is there a second second thank you any comments uh sorry wait for the clock and then go ahead two minute comments please um it sounded like Dr Johnson was saying that she wanted to confirm that that was okay I mean that's what I heard but maybe not my question is if the board votes for this and it's improper what does that mean does it mean that
094staff has to come back for the board to undo an improper action um so and I'm just talking about this one individual right so maybe it might make sense to approve everybody except that one individual and then come back or not but you know what happens if you're not supposed to do that sir would you like to make that motion no I'm just putting it out there this is you guys thing now would anyone like to make the motion that Mr Phillips just spoke about which is I would be happy to amend my motion I was feeling a little uncomfortable anyway so I'll amend my motion that we approve the profession uh provisional internship permit for Jeff road is there second I'm sorry I'm having trouble hearing too could you repeat that again yes is
095um that I move that we approve the provisional internship permit for Jeff road which is the other pip on the list there's only two so it's for the other one but not for Tiffany un until we get confirmation from Dr Johnson okay may I put another motion on the floor what about if we approve both candidates and then Dr Johnson comes back and we if we have to revisit it we revisit it to make it correct okay so hold on so clerk Gonzalez Hoy made a motion he needs a sec because he amended his motion he needs to see if you are okay with his amended motion Trust pres I'm sorry um because I'm okay with anything but um what could we ask Dr Johnson for opinion before absolutely Dr Johnson can you hear us
096yes it is a little muffled down here but I can hear my thoughts were that we approve her um the employees name on both and then we can come back with a correction and remove her from one if that is necessary if it's not okay to prove her on both and again I apologize I've never seen two one name on both before okay so Dr Johnson's recommendation is we approve the name on both and then if we have to make an amendment we'll make an amendment when it's time trusty reckler that was your motion Clark Gonzalez Hoy are you okay with seconding that motion not to put pressure but yeah okay so Clark Gonzalez Hoy are you you still hanging on to the first motion or you going to remove it no I I I
097remove it thank you okay so we are now going to vote on truste recker's motion that was duly second by clerk Gonzalez Hoy which is we accept the Pips and then if something needs to be amended Dr Johnson will come back to us and let us know that an amendment has to happen that's what we're voting on now okay all right seeing no more comments we're going to go straight to the vote trusty Wilson your votes are yes trusty espanosa Jr your vote yes thank you truste Phillips your vote yes thank you truste Christian your vote yes thank you trusty reckler your vote reckler yes thank you clerk Gonzalez ho your vote Yes and I'm a yes thank you very much Dr Johnson we are now moving to item E2 Education Code 44258 do3 variable
098term waivers Dr Johnson this is your item yes this one also authorizes the school district to assign teachers based on their subject matter competency thank you so much for the presentation are there any public comments we have no public comment thank you do we have any questions seeing no questions do we have trusty reckler is out a question no I was going to make a motion go ahead please so what I would like to do is uh approve this variable term waiver as well with both names and have Dr Johnson come back if we need to resend uh since one individual is listed twice but I don't want to stop the process is there a second on that motion I'll second but for this one there's only one name so it's just for that one
099individual yeah thank you very much all right any comments board just at a uh point of order they cannot hear us so we have to get very close to our microphone okay uh people who are watching on Zoom cannot hear us all right thank you so seeing no comments let's go straight to the vote trusty Wilson your vote yes thank you trusty espanosa Jr your vote yes thank you Miss uh trusty Phillips your vote yes thank you TR Christian your vote yes thank you trusty reckler your vote reckler Yes sorry thank you clerk Gonzalez ho your vote yes thank you and I'm a yes we are now moving to thank you for that we are now moving to E3 recommend approval of employment agreement for associate superintendent teaching and learning Dr Hurst this is your
100item thank you the board is being asked to approve an employment agreement with Katherine aosta rascus to serve as associate superintendent of teaching and learning the employment agreement has been attached to the agenda online for a review the employment agreement provides number one the contract term is for three years from July 1st 2024 to June 30th 2027 number two the associate superintendent teaching and learning annual salary is $2,926 17 with Health and Welfare benefits consistent with educational administrators of the district thank you ma'am thank you so very much do we have any public comment we have no public comment thank you so very much may I have I'm sorry do we have any questions board seeing none let's go straight to the motion is there a motion person Smith FS I'll make a motion that
101we approve the contract for Katherine prascus be our social superintendent of teaching and learning thank you is there a second second thank you very much Bor do we have any comments I do go ahead sir two minutes on the clock I just want to say that I'm rooting for you you did a great job at montalin you've been doing a good job here um and I just hope that your ability and your skill is able to radiate through this organization and touch the kids at all of the other schools so I will be rooting for you from afar thank you very much do we have any other comments I do have a comment thank you so very much for all the hard work that you do please understand that the vote that I give tonight
102has nothing to do with you is just longevity I want to see you grow in this position and do it so well which I know you will do so I just wanted to let you know that um from me and I do think that it's one of those things that it's hard to have a new superintendent not be able to pick their cabinet but I know that you will be picked because you are doing a fantastic job but I just wanted to put that out there um thank you again so I just wanted to let you know and I appreciate it any other comments seeing none let's go to the vote all right trusty espanosa Jr your votes are yes thank you trusty Phillips your vote sir yes thank you trusty Christian your vote sir
103yes thank you trusty Rey your vote ma'am reckler yes thank you clerk Gonzalez ho your vote Yes and I'm a no thank you congratulations Miss Katherine we are now moving on to E4 recommend approval of employment agreement for associate superintendent K through 12 operations Dr HST this is your item the board is being asked to approv the employment agreement with Summer Sigler to serve as the associate superintendent of K12 operations the employment agreement has been attached to the agenda item online for review the employment agreement provides the following number one the contract term is for three years from July 1st 2024 to June 30th 2027 number two the associate superintendent of K12 operations annual salary is 2,920 $6.7 with Health and Welfare benefits consistent with educational administrators of the district thank Youk you thank you
104very much do we have any public comment we have no public comment thank you board any questions seeing none is there a motion president I make a motion that we approve the contract for summer Sigler for social superintendent K12 operations thank you is there a second second thank you so very much do we have any comments wait for the clock and go ahead trusty Phillips um although I'm leaving um this is the third superintended transition that I've been somehow connected to right so uh basically I didn't uh hire Matthew Duffy but I was there when he just arrived we like arrived at the same time so like the transition from harder to Duffy was one right the transition from Duffy to Hurst is to and now I'm still kind of now at the tail end
105right or the beginning of this transition from Hurst to the next ver three um I used to think that the superintendent should be able to just come in and choose uh whoever he wants or she wants to be on the cabinet I don't think that anymore um because I've sat through it a few times um but I don't think that the superintendent shouldn't be able to choose anybody I think that there should be a balance because what I saw happen and for those of you who are around the district I'm not going to name any names but you know what I'm talking about right um we had an Mass Exodus um from this District during one of those transitions um because you know the superintendent's able to pick whoever they want right and they brought
106in all of these new people and people who have been here for years were um you know stepped on um to be quite Frank which is not how it is right now um You don't want you don't want to do that again um because that actually set us back um quite a distance so where I am now right is I'm actually kind of somewhere in the middle personally and and in my opinion board this is you know for what it's worth you know free advice what they say I would um strike a balance and give the new superintendent some leeway but not the ability to just wholesale uproot everything it didn't work when it happened before thank you any other comments Clark Gonzalez Hoy go ahead thank you um I wanted to first thank both
107Miss Sigler and Masta Basquez I did not make comments with Masta Basquez but I'm making comments now I'm going to make them both since also people call you the twins since you're like go everywhere together as well um I've been so incredibly impressed by both of your leaderships since I was a teacher and I met you at a PD and you were both there in your capacities and since then I continue to be impressed in every capacity that I've gotten the privilege to work with both of you in so I'm just so thankful that you continue to make the commitment to be in this District I'm thankful that we're able to provide you a contract uh and the safety net um feeling so unfortunately the contract I still think that I disagree with my amazing
108president I think the superintendent could choose different people if they because that's how the contract's written so I actually disagree with that so that's that's the the lines of the contract but I think we're doing it we're doing these contracts because we truly do believe in your leaderships and why we believe in the leaderships of the rest of the cabinet as well um I think we have an amazing team I haven't felt this way since um I think the leadership team that uh maybe trusty Phillips was talking about many years ago um and I'm just so thankful again that uh you continue to bring that work ethic priorization and your commitment to this community um and your work so so thank you thank you very much I have a thank you Clark Gonzalez any other
109comments okay I have a comment thank you Miss Ziggler for the work that you do my vote is about longevity how long you've been in the position so I'm waiting to I do have a I do have an issue trusty Phillips with the superintendent not being able to pick it but I do agree that there should be a balance I don't think that we struck that balance yet so I think that that's something that we need to work towards if that's being in a position as an inter room for a certain amount of time and then moving to another one or I don't know exactly what that is because of I mean we're five people and we have to come to a consensus and that consensus is with the majority but I don't want any
110of you to take this personal it is not a personal attack on your work or the ethics or anything that you do this is for me about longevity that's just what it is for me and I know that the commitment that you have goes past the piece of paper because if it didn't you would have left a long time ago so thank you for that commitment to the district and to what you do for these children every day um all right so let's go to the vote trusty espanosa Jr your votes sir yes thank you trusty Phillips your vote sir yep thank you trusty Christian your vote sir yes thank you trusty reckler your vote ma'am reckler yes thank you clerk Gonzalez ho your vote sir yes and I'm a no thank you congratulations we
111are now moving on to item E4 recommend approval of employment agreement for associate associat nope we already did that one sorry we are moving on to E5 approval of contract for interim associate superintendent maintenance and operation Bond Dr Hurst this is your hold on one second let me let you get it together it's all right all right sir this is your item that's okay I'll do it okay so there here we go thank you the board is being asked to approve the employment agreement with Melissa Payne to serve as interim associate superintendent maintenance and oper ations the employment agreement has been attached to the agenda item online for review the employment agreement provides one the contract term is for seven months from December the 1st 2024 to June 30th 2025 the interim associate superintendent maintenance
112and operation annual salary is $2,926 17 with Health and Welfare benefits consistent with classified administrators of the district all right board do we have a do we have any public comment we have no public comments thank you board do we have any questions seeing no questions is there a motion president I'll make a motion that we appoint Melissa Payne as interm associal superintendent for maintenance and operations and approve her contract thank you thank you very much board is there a second hold on one second trusty Phillips you have something I have a question go ahead ask it is it real and I'm not you know I'm not able to uh attend close session because of my work right now um but unless the board is going to be putting out some kind of search for
113the position which it may be and I just I'm not don't know about right um is that what's happening would you like to answer go ahead um trusty Phillips we um we did discuss this in close session I think we can answer your question but we have to go back in close session okay um my only comment then and we don't have to go back there my only comment is unless the board is doing a search okay hold on sir we're not on comments yet but hold that comment because we're gonna be the comments or is this attached to your question yes it is okay go ahead unless the board has decided it's going to do a search and unless that search is going to happen before like now right because of when people look
114for jobs in you know in administration it's like February unless all that's going to happen is it realistic that the board is actually going to find somebody new for July 1 and if that's not realistic why is her contract just not through the entire next school year that's my question I'm not asking for anybody to go back in the back you all know what the conversation was back there but and I'll save the rest for a comment but that's the question it's a you know it's a rhetorical question thank you very much we are now going did we have a motion clerk Galo you did motion correct yeah there was no second I'll second okay now we can go to comments two minutes on the clock please you had a comment sir wait for the
115clock and then go please um personally I think that um Miss p should be not be the interim I think she should just be named to the position um that's my personal opinion um but based on the questions that I I just had right um like I said unless the board knows that it's hiring for the position and it's going to do it basically before February um to me what makes the most sense is if we and I don't want to just put a motion out there and it's not seconded but what makes the most sense to me is that her in she's the in I think she should be permanent but the contracts for interim what makes the most sense for me is that she's actually named interim through June 26 so the end
116of the following school year because that would allow you all to have continuity in the position and not in s months unless you know that you're going to be hiring six months unless you know for sure you're going to be hiring somebody and you're going to do it extremely quickly that you're not like coming back to her in June and being like uh will you sign him for another seven months that's my thought but I don't know what you guys discussed in the back any other comments cing none and uh trusty philp to walk this very fine line there was a thorough discussion in the back just to make just to give you a little bit of ease there was a very thorough discussion about this in the back all right we are now headed
117to the vote uh student truste espanosa Jr your vote yes thank you truste Phillips your vote yes thank you trusty Christian your vote yes thank you trusty reckler your vote reckler yes thank you clerk Gonzalez ho your vote yes I'm a yes all right thank you very much okay I don't know if I did that okay we are now moving on to discussion items and reports we are on D absolutely not sorry we're on F1 new District anti-s slur policy you good sir if not let me know I I got you covered all right go ahead sir if you're ready thank you so much ma'am we wanted to introduce this policy for discussion for the board this evening it goes off the hills of our anti-racism po policy as well excuse me I'm a little
118under the weather when you look at the beginning of the policy it's our purpose statement and I want to share that with all of you it says the WCC USD board of education is committed to fostering a safe inclusive and respectful environment for all students staff and community members we seek to eliminate language that interferes with District educational Mission including slurs that demean marginalize or inflict emotional harm on individuals or groups based on race ethnicity gender sexual orientation religion ability [Music] or other personal characteristics what we really like about this proposed policy for discussion as well is there's a policy statement that talks about exercising responsibility and being safe and a policy statement says being safe and responsible Al means being accountable for the language and understanding potential harm that it can cause further uh
119in this policy um you could see that it clearly defines a slur so it covers it being an epith a threat verbal abuse use of profanity a derogatory comment a rumor a joke a note a story drawing picture or a gesture that demeans a person's perceived ethnicity race national origin immigrant status religious belief gender sexual orientation age disability manner of spe speech or any other physical cultural characteristics further what I really like about this is it's not limited to verbal Communications it talks about written Communications Digital Communications as well and it talks about this being on school grounds during school activities so when they're at contests extra curricular activities and what I really like about this proposed policy is it covers online interactions um I think one of the things that we had discussed in
120the governance committee is that this would be just relegated to students only so I would recommend when this does come back that we strike the language that says staff not that we don't want to deal with staff but we had discussed in the governance committee that we would take that up at another time but this is just for students so I would say that we would eliminate where it says and staff and staff member or Community member and just make this policy this slur policy right now about students um I think one of the things that we would have to do um in this discussion is come back also with administrative regulation and just share with um the board the details of how this would be implemented if the board agrees with this direction of
121a policy you can see also in this policy there's guidelines and expectations there's um education and awareness and I know I've been part of decisions and conversations even with some of us on the Das here where we talked about what does it look like when this happens not just a consequence but restorative justice as well but also how do we educate the entire school where happen where there's assembly and everybody participates in that assembly from K through whatever the grade level is not just the grade that's impacted we also talk about in here reporting and response how we would investigate and hold one another accountable accountable as well support for the affected individuals also and again we would have to spell some of this out in the administrative regulation as well and then um you
122can see number five a commitment to anti-racism and we include um the focus on our anti-racism policy and of course we know that we have a discipline Matrix we would abide by our discipline Matrix um and it says here the consequences for violating this policy would be proportionate to the nature of the incident now that may seem a little vague but I think we would have to spell that out also in administrative regulations so if they're called any of that that's describing this policy what does it look like at every level the first instance the second the third so again those conversations would have to continue and we would have to share with all of you on the board here's what the administrative regulation will look like and here's what the specific path for a
123school principal um so that's what I would share with you for discussion um this originated in a conversation at the executive cabinet level with those sitting before you we also included Dr Rogers Ard who's been leading the anti-racism work and this also has gone to our governance committee for betting as well also this is going through legal counsel just to make sure that there was no liability concerns uh there were some edits that were made by legal councel but nothing significant that deterred from our original intent so I'll turn it back over to you ma'am thank you so very much do we have any public comment we have no public comment thank you so very much board do we have any questions we're going to do three questions and two minute comments trusty reckler your
124questions thank you thank you for your work on this so I think I know the answer to this but I think it needs to be explicitly included um where or can can um Intergroup Communications be included more specifically in the text in other words as a Jewish American there are things I can say to another Jewish American that would be fine and all cultures and races have them but if you said that to me it would be a major problem so I'm assuming that this would cover it but I would like to see specific language around that so some of the things that we have talked about and I'll let um I'll ask Dr H to please comment on this also some of the things that we talked about is place not at school it's
125not at school it is a zero tolerance not going to happen at school it does I don't care if it's you to you you to you you to her you to brother to sister not at school it's not in our buildings and it's not going to be around where it can impact other students because it's not just saying it it's hearing it there's trauma in hearing not just saying so we are hard drawing a hard line do it over there you're not going to do it here that's my opinion I believe Dr Hurst I think that's what we agreed upon but feel free to go ahead and make a comment to that clerk Gonzalez Hoy also but let's go Dr HSE first and then clerk Gonzalez Hoy Dr HSE yeah absolutely correct ma'am and I
126I hear you also lot in clear trusty reckler and I did write that out um really spelling it out being more intentional and clear around the communications I think sorry trusty re just so I can add when we discussed that specific item we discussed that it was it would fall under paragraph three if you look at paragraph three on what a slur is it says specifically religious belief um so in our discussion at the governance committee we said that this paragraph covers what we think every injured what it could be every injured group but if something's missing we definitely would like to hear that trusty re but I think what I'm saying is a little bit different like if you said it to me it would be a it would be an issue but if
127I said it to another Jewish person we could probably internally laugh about that so what I'm what I'm trying to get at as this Intergroup what may be acceptable as and I agree with president smithf that not here you know like but I really think that needs that there needs to be a sentence about that uh in some in some way shape or form so um even though know this is a little bit of a comment I'm hoping I would you please look to include that how does that how does that make it a question CL Gonzalez Hoy do you have anything to add I mean I would just I would like to ask maybe Dr Rogers art to think through that just because I do think that there can be racialized harm within a
128group right so like if a Latino individual made a comment to me that was race related even though they're laat you know I could consider her to be racist right um and that doesn't mean that she be okay right so I think that we would just there has to be like a really flushed out maybe statement by an expert in the field on that piece um I'm not saying that I'm opposed to it I'm just saying that like I also see it going the other way and that it could allow perpetrate I guess what we're trying to avoid if we're not careful and I think that what and I would never want to speak for Dr Rogers Ard but with the books that she has offered us to read what she's what the books are
129allowing us to understand is harm is harm you can't split the baby if you say it it's harmful if you say it to each other it's harmful if you say it to each other and you accept it that's because you have been conditioned to think that it is not harmful it is harmful racialized slurs create racialized harm no matter who is saying it to whom and no matter who is hearing it I think that one of the things that this District can do on its journey to anti-racism is not split the hairs because I think if you split the hairs then you impede the the retraining and relearning that has to happen because then it's now a 15minute conversation in the office with a principal saying well no I just said it to my friend
130and that's not the same thing and then the friend is like well no it hurt me so it don't say it don't use slurs in our schools at all do it somewhere else so uh Mr Phil that's just my opinion again I think that it's okay to flush it through Dr Rogers R just so she could give us a clear understanding but from the reading that was my fault trusty Phillips you had a comment to this I do so I um I got off the bar in Oakland about a year ago and there was this young man uh he looked like he was in his early 20s could have been late te but I think it was the early 20s and he was scoping people out like he was up to no good and so
131he was he was scoping me out and he he turned to me and I said something like young man can I help you I spoke to him and he looked at me and he said young man and I stood there for a minute and then he wisely turned around and walked away but the point was this he was offended that I called him a young man and that's exactly what he was and that let me know that people don't refer to him as a young man he's not accustomed to being addressed as young man and this was a young black man I'm just going to say it the biggest issue I had in that whole the thing that Disturbed me the most in that whole interaction was not how he was standing not that he
132was eyeballing me it was that he was shocked that he he was referred to as a young man I understand that we call each other different things depending on what groups that we are in but and I know somebody may get upset about this but uh African-American children in this District should not be walking around calling each other the nword they should not be doing it and the reason they should not be doing it is because they grow up to be that young man who does not know how to be addressed as a young man or that young woman who does not know how to be addressed as a young woman and it makes it difficult for them to take their rightful god-given place on this Earth because they walk around thinking that they are
133less thin because they've been conditioned to do that so no black students should not be referring to each other that way on this campus and if you go to different schools they go to morous or wherever they may end up in this world they will be addressed look my name is Mr Phillips I was born with a title and it's the best title that I will ever have and my son's name is Mr Phillips and all of these other kids that are here they are mister and they are Miss and they should grow up learning to carry themselves that way and so I agree with what you're saying interracial inter religious somewhere else because here you will learn how to respect yourself so you can grow into your full adulthood thank you so very much
134this was a really robust conversation do we have anything else to add prusty re you have something to add I I do have comments when you're ready for that I think that we're kind of just free flowing let's just go ahead and make your comment we'll put a two-minute clock up just to keep us all kind of tight but go ahead okay so I hope that you will involve students especially in the roll out and how this happens on the ground um I think that their input is either going to make or break this honestly and whether they buy in and you know I I think that's really important I also am really curious about how you will keep current because language changes and um you know who's going to stay on top of the
135new the new vernacular um so I think that's important uh Intergroup you know Communications I think that's really important and my answer is not here not now not ever not you know I I feel very strongly about that I think something needs to be written in I think also that something in the policy needs to refer to the administrative reg regulation maybe it could say something like the superintendent or designate design will create and maintain a standards Manual of some sort like you know like something where you have the policy but then you know you've got how it's going to roll out and then even though this went through legal counsel I would ask that you ask again once again I am not an attorney but there W there is case law which is Tinker
136versus de Mo and apparently their worst standards or a test was determined and the standards are the substantial disruption standard and the inference with the rights of other standards school officials do not violate the First Amendment if they can reasonably for that a student speech will cause a substantial disruption of school activities once again I am not an attorney but I did some research on student free speech and this popped up and so I just think it's worth a another look at thank you any other comments okay seeing no comments we're going to move to our second discussion item clerk Gonzalez Hoy can you take this one it is E2 non-discrimination policy yeah of course course thank you so much uh board and Community um we are making a couple changes from our non-discriminatory thank
137you policy um I want to make it clear that the change that I'm going to share um uh came out of our anti-racist work that we the district's currently leading um there are still a lot of changes that need to be made to this policy and some changes that have been sent to me from people on this board uh but we felt like this needed urgency um because it comes kind of as a package with everything else going on with the anti-racist uh work group so uh this will come back for further changes in the spring uh as we take in consideration some of the feedback that uh we've gotten from some of you about the changes I think trusty reckler has sent me some as well so those will uh will the governor committee
138will take those on um so the change the first change on the policy is just a change of who gets uh the complaints uh some staff has changed so uh we we uh we put new staff there and and their contact information and then the actual uh language addition is around racialized harm and I'm going to read the paragraph short paragraph the governing board recognizes the impact of rationalized harm and racial trauma on the district's ability to provide such an environment racialized harm occurs when biased speech conduct or expressions are made against someone of another race harm can also occur when racialized slurs are used within within schools by people of the same or different race racial trauma refers to the mental emotional injury caused by encounters with racial bias and ethnics ethnic discrimination racism
139and hate crimes any individual that has experienced racialized harm is at risk of suffering from racial trauma and I believe that was the that's the only change that we're bringing tonight but like I mentioned we will see this again in the spring with additional changes that are coming from feedback from the board thank you president thank you so very much clerk Gonzalez soy staff do we have any public comment we have no public comment thank you board we're going to do questions trusty re you have some questions I do and first I want to apologize because I thought I ran eight cop but eight copies did not show up so I profusely apologize for this and I can email you the um electronically the document again that was this was completely not intentional maybe you
140can share so I first want to acknowledge Lauren Levan and um second I'm sorry hang on one second now I'm flabbergasted hang on one second I'm really sorry so I want to thank Lauren Len and Kate Sterns from Fairmont and we together are going to bring back a policy that really addresses transgender Community um non-binary issues things of that sort but they contacted me and they end we ended up today spending spending time talking together about some of the things that're in this policy and this proposed policy and they made some really good suggestions and so I'd like to just honor them and say thank you really for excellent discussion today so that's first the second is um so do harassment and non-discrimination have legal definition under the law they do okay um so my
141first um suggestion would be is that those definitions go in the policy and as we were reading this the reason why we would like to include that is that we feel like it would just make the document flow a little better and make the Pieces come together a little more and be a little bit more explanatory and have it hang hang together better so that's the first suggestion the second is in racialized harm we think that there's a piece of a sentence that has that is incomplete or has been left off and so what the sentence says is the governing board recognizes the impact of racialized harm and racial trauma on the district's ability to provide such an environment so I don't think that's the environment that the district wants to provide and so I
142would ask that you go back and and see what dropped out of that sentence as it seems incomplete and then uh Lauren did a lot of editing to the gender identity and expression section which we also think should have its own little header so that it uh becomes its own little piece in this policy and so um if you would in the next governance meeting take a look at what she has here and perhaps run it by others who uh have different gender identities or expressions and get get a kind of a feeling about um maybe maybe what they'd like to see in it and her other suggestion is that perhaps the racialized harm section should be run by ASAT and maybe even mdac just to get a feel for if you know for parents
143what what they think about it um and then you'll also see on this copy uh she added a little thing about citizenship or immigration status I don't really know if it fits here but because we were talking about the resolution that was pulled from the agenda we were kind of like all right maybe it maybe I don't know now that I think about it more maybe that doesn't really go here maybe that should go somewhere else but um the main the main things are the to relook at the racialized harm section and uh to look at the gender identity and expression section and um you know give that some thought another couple of things are um this section on for questions and complaints where we list area one area two and area three how would
144people know what area one schools are what area two schools are and what area three schools are and could it could a link directly go into the policy that goes to the website where you can find that or list the schools like I'm not really sure how that gets solved I think a link to to a website is an easier idea and then um I think that the definitions of non-discrimination and harassment would kind of be like okay this is what we're talking about this is how it's defined and then these other parts um you know as as she has here further information and definitions which I think would kind of pull the whole thing together a little more um and make it make it uh flow a little bit better and those are my
145comments thank you and I apologize again that was totally I feel really stupid I'm getting red clar Gonzalez go ahead thank you president um I appreciate the feedback I like all the changes that um trusty reckler worked with so the community folks um so if it's okay with you and Dr H I think we can bring him to our committee meeting which I think is next week um for revisions so that we can if we make the changes then we can uh agendize it for the 18 um and then I would ask trusty reckler though uh that if you are working or or she is working sorry through the chair um on a policy around LGBT q and transgender harm or whatever we want to call it um we are working on one as well
146so if you could actually send us that draft or feedback we'd appreciate it because um I think uh I mean it's the problem with the brown act right I mean like we can't all work together on things that are really good for our community so um we can mesh it together at the governance committee um because I'm sure that good things will come from from trusty reckler and and the and the um individuals who are working with her so thank you thank you I want to just say that the racialized harm part was passed through Dr Rogers art so that's our expert in the district about um our anti-racism and all things kind of Under the Umbrella of racism trusty reckler I wanted to give you a little bit information about what the Senate was
147imparting is the board recognizes the impact of the harm and the trauma and the district's ability to provide those spaces for that to be normalized and to exist and that we have to stop providing those spaces so that's where it's coming from so I hope that gives a little bit of clarity if I'm wrong I'm sure Dr Rogers AR will correct me but that's where that's how I read that statement that it is the the governing board us we recognize that there is an environment for this harm in this trauma to exist and we are actively saying stop it that's where this comes in to where we have a clear definition of what racialized harm and Trauma is because that's what we want to stop so that's hopefully gives you a little bit more clarity
148okay any other comments on this discussion item seeing no more comments on this discussion item we are now moving on we are going to go to pulled consent items the first pulled consent item was C10 trusty reckler you pulled this item go ahead thank you just um I'd like to see ratified contracts just um be um far in few between and be really really urgent um just a personal opinion when I look at them I don't feel like there are things that um you know our Rush jobs are needed to be approved before the board uh got a chance to look at them and that is my comment on that and with that I will move ratified contract thanks second thank you we it was properly moved in second we are now going to the
149vote trusty espanosa Jr your vote Yes trusty Phillips your vote yes thank you trusty Christian your vote yes thank you thank you trusty Christian trusty reckler your vote rler yes thank you trusty sorry clerk Gonzalez hold your vote Yes thank you and I'm a yes we are now moving to C12 C12 uh clerkes Hoy can you speak to this one please yes of course um so for C12 if we recall we actually passed um this policy in July of this year um in which we were able to now pay our student Trustees for the work that they do and then also give them uh credit school credit for for doing this work we put a lot of thought into some of the responsibilities as well as the uh how they get elected um unfortunately we
150got feedback from legal council we couldn't pay interestes how we wrote it on the policy so we had to go back and we had to change the structure on how s interestes get paid uh practically we have to be able to um show an account and like how like it's not just here $500 for showing up to the meetings but there's work behind that so we separated it according to the work that we believe stent Tres do already uh which leads to the amount the same amount that we had agreed on previously so the only change that we're bringing with tonight um is around the pay just to clarify that piece so that we can pay our St in trustees moving forward um I have I want to be clear clear though that I have
151been talking to trustee Wilson and trusty Espinosa Jr they want to propose some changes to this policy so we're going to be agenda ing it in our our January meeting so that we can take some of their feedback especially as they have been sitting in the seats um on on what changes they would like to see so this will come back but there is an urgency of us passing this tonight as is because of the pay issue because otherwi we can't pay our student trustees um so um so anyways I hope that we can pass it in again I already see that we got feedback about some changes happy to take that back um because we we're gonna do that anyways thank you thank you so much trusty reckler you pulled it would you like
152to speak to it yes thank you so I was not at the July 17th meeting because I was out of the country um and could not submit any comments nor speak to it so I'm taking this opportunity to add some comments to this um policy so the first part is that I took the opening out of the governance handbook and just mirrored it in the policy so just to streamline documents um in what's in one could show up in the other so that's in red um and that's straight out of the governance handbook as an opening the second is it's my recommendation that all of the language about the all student Congress and how kids are elected that that gets taken out and gets put in a u i don't know if you want to
153call it a administrative regulation or a standards manual that the superintendent controls and the reason for that is we already said in the governance manual that the superintendent of schools or appointed design is responsible for ensuring student trustee selection and service aligns with the California Education Code 35012 that governs the selection and service of student trustees including Equitable access Equitable accessible and well publicized selection process so in our government governance handbook we've already kind of we we actually kind of said that and my recollection from that conversation was when we used we used to have a youth commission which was written into the old governance handbook and then a new Administration changed it into an all student Congress which was fine except that we had a process already written and honestly the all student Congress
154is better than the youth commission work and it really to me it really is the superintendent's responsibility you know the board is to say we want student trustees and maybe give some small parameters but it really is the job in my opinion of the superintendent to carry um that work forward so if you put it in the policy anytime it changes it's going to have to come back so I thought maybe that could you know be removed um the next piece is um oh and I thought it was fine to leave like one you know like one student coming from a high school with 60% or higher free reduced lunch and trying you know trying really hard to recruit candidates those felt like to me like parameters like and I was okay with it um
155I just thought the other part was like really down into the weeds of like H how people got elected so it's just an opinion that I've always wanted to make the other thing that's important is that um there's some language around student trustees making motions and the board has to have a has to have passed a motion that allows student trustees to make motions or we have to pass a resolution that allows student trustees to make motions and we've we checked with legal council when we were writing this part of the government's hand handbook and we don't have that so I changed the language to say that you know they can make motions provided that the governing board has adopted that resolution and hopefully that resolution can come forward so that we are in line
156in Ed code and then I have no issues with paying student trustees so that that actually add have any problems with and then I thought maybe there's a lot of training there's ethics training there's rosenberg's training and now and since student trustees do not abide by The Bard the brown act I thought it would be okay to make bran act training optional instead of required um since it doesn't apply to them even though you know it uh is something that we have to do and so those were the changes that I wrote up and hoping that um they will be considered in a in a revised copy thank you president thank you trusty reckler I have no problem with a majority of the changes um like I said I hope that you're okay with us
157passing this tonight just for the pay issue but um I do commit that we will bring it back because we're already doing that in January to meet with our student trustees on some of the changes they they want to discuss so so if I may though I am a little skeptical about that because I'm still waiting for the cboc policy so you will understand if I have some skepticism that that's going to happen yeah I've purposely not brought back the CBC policy because you have submitted so many we are trying and doing our best um with all the policies you've submitted um but yes and like I said we are discussing it in January um but if we don't pass this tonight then our student trustees can't get get paid so I think that there
158is that urgency um I mean I'd be happy to make a motion that we proove the uh change to the uh policy and that we bring back uh new policy for us with new revisions according to feedback we have gotten in February um which would allow us to have a conversation in January meeting bring it back just to make the commitment even stronger through a motion I'd be happy to do that to show Goodwill thank you so much trusty Phillips you had your hand up okay Clark Gonzalez Hoy is that the motion that you are making uh yeah let me just simplify okay uh I make a motion that we approve the policy um with the commitment that we will bring back um a revised copy in February after the governance committee has reviewed an
159in January thank you I'll second that okay uh any comments I see trusty Phillips has a comment go ahead trusty Phillips um if the board is going to um pay student trustees um I think that it is doubly important that there is uh an equitable process uh for trustees to be student trustees to be on the board I understand that student trustees are coming from the all student Congress um but only uh you know no offense to any trustees current or past that's a certain kind of student um that may not be representative of the majority of the student body right and so um and what I mean by that is using the example of the free and reduced lunch um thing that you know certain number of the students need to come from a
160school with free and reduced lunch well there's a difference between being at a school where the majority of the students are on free and reduced lunch and actually yourself being on free and reduced lunch it's a different experience and so all I'm trying to say is that the student trustees don't always have to be the cream of the crop sometimes it should just be regular average middle of the rad kids which is the majority of the kids and so I'm just asking that as you move forward and figuring out how folks are going to be in this space that is just not the best of the best especially if you're paying them right that everybody gets a shot um regardless of what their station is now I'm not saying that I know what any student
161trustee station is including yours but I just want to make sure it's Equitable you're paying folks okay go ahead clerk Gonzalez you want to respond to that yeah thank you Tristy Phillips actually um what you just said is exactly what the student trustees want to bring in January so um there's always good intention with changes right Our intention was exactly what you're talking about right on creating the language about free and roduced lunch but as pointed out by our student trustees um elero does not fit that criteria yet there's a lot of students that go to Alero who could who are free and reduced lunch themselves right or who would fit the criteria of what we're trying Our intention to do so um that's why it's coming back in jary because we want to have
162that discussion and maybe detail that a little bit better um because we might unintentionally um be doing the opposite of what we're trying to do do some schools thank you for that Clarity go ahead trusty espanosa Jr so not only just I going just that um what clerk Gonzalez o has mentioned but me alongside trusty Wilson and one of the upcoming Trustees for the next term we are actually working really closely with all student Congress and and the PE the directors from the Outreach Department to actually make sure that our recruiting process aligns with the policy as well we tried finding a person to fill in the vacant spot for the next term but a lot of the people that come from who Fe who meet the criteria that you just brought up were having
163low attendance into these all student Congress meetings or low engagement in these meetings so that is actually something we're going to try to work on if anything have a complete Swit on so that way there's more efficiency and consistency with all student Congress how it operates to make sure that that criteria is not only met but that it's at its best as well thank you so much I think that this is such a good discussion and it needs to be a both end right there's only a certain limit of people that can be student trustees because of just that's the number but what do our sites look like that are actively wanting student engagement and student voice what are how are we getting feedback from the clubs that go to the the that are on
164the site how are we getting feedback by kids that never go to a club and I'm not talking about a survey how are we having relationships with kids who don't fit certain criterias but we are charged and Duty bound and determined to make sure that their experience at school is a healthy one wholly healthy and safe and encouraging so I think that when you are with all student Congress I think that you go one step step and then go 10 steps more right what does it look like on site for students who don't have the ability to be part of all student Congress right so I think that the I'm looking forward to the policy coming back because I want to flesh that out that's why you guys are so very important to be looking
165at the same thing that we're looking at and you have that very clear perspective also think that this is why we have our anti-racism lens that we look through because it helps us catch things right um to trusty Phillips point just because you're at a school that has free and reduced lunch doesn't mean that you're the student so I think that that's something that again both and let's bring it all together and make sure that we're centering student experience through their voice in all avenues so I think that was very good um thank you so much for we need to you made a motion I second it we are now going to the vote do you need anyone need the motion restated nope summarize is coming back all right trusty Espinosa Jr yes thank you
166trusty Phillips yes thank you trusty Christian yes thank you trusty reckler yes all right Mar Gonzalez Hoy yes great and I'm a yes we are now moving to comments from the Board of Education and future agenda items it is 9:37 we should be able to do this before 10:00 everybody gets three minutes all right here we go if you have a comment pop your little hand up great oh sorry all right let's go trusty reckler then trusty Phillips trusty regler go ahead great thank you so once again I want to thank Lauren and Kate today from Fairmont I had a great time today it was just really great exchange of ideas and I think we're going to bring back some really great powerful stuff so it was a lot of fun I want to thank
167them fur their time um and then for those of you who are departing I want to say that I've enjoyed serving with you and I will miss you and I hope that you will stay in touch and uh thank you for your service to the district we know it is not easy and I also want to thank your families because your family serves to your family runs for office your family serves in the position and I want to to acknowledge their contribution and their dedication and their sacrifice as well of your time and your presence while you do other things and um I hope you I hope you'll stay in touch and uh best wishes thank you thank you very much anyone else trusty Phillips oh I'm sorry let's let trusty Espinosa Jr go first
168go ahead sir you don't have to I'll let Mr philis go oh I love it look how polite we all are okay trusty Phillips go ahead wait for the three minutes sir trusty espanosa made me feel old he said I remember hearing about you when I was a little kid no no no I'm I'm I'm joking with you I'm joking with you it's good to be in a space um for so long and and to have the chance to to help folks so that's all means to me so um I want to do some congratulations um I want to congratulate um all of our new associate superintendents um I'm happy for you uh and your families uh and the new positions uh that you have and I look forward to all of the great things
169that I know you are going to do I also want to publicly congratulate the interterm superintendent to be um I know you two um are going to uh continue to do great things uh as will the rest of the cabinet um I want to congratulate Dr Hurst uh publicly on his retirement you have put in a lot of long hard years uh helping folks uh doing God's work um and sometimes uh we have to take take a step back for ourselves um and our families and rest uh and get revitalized so I know that uh this retirement is not the end of the good work of Dr Hurst I know it is a break and it is a well uh deserved break but congratulations to you and Crystal um on your retirement uh it is
170well deserved and you are a great public servant and thank you for being my superintendent um I want to tell the rest of the board um the remaining board members um that I am rooting for each one of you um trusty reckler clerk Gonzalez Hoy president Smith fos I am rooting for each one of you because if you are successful the district is successful our kids are successful I wish each one of you the very best because of what that means not just for yourselves but for this school uh Community I want to give a congratulations to the incoming board members um this is a a great place uh to be it's not always an easy place to be but it's a great place to be and you can get a lot of personal satisfaction
171from being in this space so I wish you uh the best as well and to West County as a whole God bless bless you I love you and thank you for the opportunity to be one of your Trustees for the last eight years thank you uh es uh trusty espanosa Jr I feel so guilty now after Mr Phils just mentioned that he feels old you look very young I'll just add that so um but to trusty Christian thank you for your service thank you for the public service that you have offered and for making me and Luke Luke feel very welcomed very comfortable into this transition it has been an experience but you have made it very easy alongside with the board not that this is easy or anyone can do this but that you
172made it enjoyable you made it very interesting and very impactful especially for me so I thank you for that and I thank you Mr Phillips for your service once again like I say you're very young so you're very very young young man matter of fact so um but thank you for your public service and just everything that you have done like I said I remember just hearing about you but hearing good things about you and just the amazing service that you have done within our community and within the schools I remember growing up Washington Elementary to now be here serve alongside with you it is a full circle moment and something that only God can write and I just thought that it's just amazing you only hear from from a movie and so I want
173to give thanks to you and um congratulations to the associate superintendent as well you guys have made me and Jessie Wilson's job a lot more understanding um answering all of our questions um just congratulations and thank you once again for all the services you've done to our public thank you trusty s manosa Jr that was well said trusty Christian you have something yes uh thank you president Smith fos um to the rest of the board I've enjoyed serving with you and it's been a journey over these four years many challenges um but I look at it it's it's a it's a growing process where you continue to evolve and continue to develop and so um that trusty reckler and clerk exelis Hy president SM fos you guys got it you know take it from here
174and and and push it along with the other new trustees that will be coming on and so um to help them um become acclimated uh to the board and um to the rest of everybody um to the staff and everybody enjoy working with you and appreci it you know I'm still rooted in in you know still going to be rooted here and um taking on another road but I know the god of Heaven you know has blessed me to go into another role and I look at it where when people think you know they doing harm to you but God has a plan and you can't stop God and you know so um he's the one that elevates and he would take you to another level and um through my experiences and from working at
175Els Sero I mean I enjoyed those days and then 2020 and here we are 2024 about to go into 2025 and I just know that the hand of God is upon me to do some great works and so I still will be involved in the life of the community and in the life of the people so the journey continues to move on may God bless you all and and going through this holiday uh Merry Christmas to everybody and to the whole district and to everybody I enjoyed you love you guys and appreciate you God is good amen thank you clerk Gonzalez Hoy go ahead thank you president um I want to thank you for yet another great meeting I know it's your last full meeting as president I just want to thank you for everything
176you've done your hospitality uh we're all wearing this ugly sweaters because so that was supposed to be our contest on who was wearing the ugliest Witter uh and I think that I'm rivaling Miss uh director Forest over there for that gift card so we'll see who wins it at the end of tonight um but I think that there are very few people that truly understand the sacrifice and commitment that it takes to be in these positions and I'm including cabinet and really the people who are here our labor partners and people who watch every single meeting uh we give up a lot to be in these positions and people don't truly understand some people think we're doing it for the money which I find really funny every time someone says that to me um let
177put into context I mean my wife's eight months pregnant she's a teacher and she's taking care of a two-year-old at home and I know that I'm missing so much for being here right I'm being here every two weeks and I know that's the experience of all of you I know that's the experience Dr Hurst that led to potentially you deciding to retire and being with family and being healthy um and that's of the decisions that we all have to make eventually um so I want to say that like I'm actually really happy for you I'm happy that you're going to be able to have time with your family with your kids with your grandkids and your friends um I feel like sometimes I talk more to you than my own wife so we have become
178real close and I am going to miss you very much uh our you know 7:30 meetings uh but I know you wake up at 4:30 so I know I can call you now you know wherever you end up but uh I want to thank you because um whenever I see your calendar I get stressed out uh and I think I have a difficult calendar when I see yours I just I can't believe it and I think that people don't understand right what do you go through every single day um I've gone now through three superintendant as well in different capacities not like trusty Phillips but um as a teacher and then as a union leader and then now in this position and everybody's really hardworking but what I really appreciate about you that you taught
179me is not allowing your values to be to be put aside as you do this work and it's very easy to do sometimes to let go of that to just please someone or just to do something that someone wants uh and then put in your values aside and I think in the last three and a half years I never saw you do that even if it meant having a harder Road Long Term and I just want to appreciate that about you because through that journey of learning through you I think I've become a better leader so I just want to say thank you to you for that um and with that I end my comment for Theon night um anyone else that we missed president can I pass it back to you thank you so
180very much I would like the following people to please come to the front Demetrio Gonzalez Hoy Miss director Forest director wrong Wong Roberts Dr Johnson Dr Moses Miss Rosa miss henness and miss Chamberlain please come to the front come on henness and Rosa don't make me call you twice come on right here in front okay okay listen Linda listen listen all right the most disturbing the most disturbing ugly sweater goes to clerk Gonzalez Hoy you're welcome you're welcome the the ugly sweater but classy goes to Dr Moses uhhuh the clever sweater goes to miss Wong Roberts you're welcome the most classic sweater the most classic sweater goes to Dr Johnson the cutest sweater goes goes to Dr forest or director Forest the cutest sweater one of the ugliest sweaters goes to miss Rosa the sexiest
181sweater goes to miss henis and is that a sweater goes to miss Chamberlain but we have to have an overall winner so the overall winner the overall winner of the ugliest sweater contest goes to and there is a tie there so take your shade down there's a tie the it is the the two winners are clerk Gonzalez Hoy and Dr Forest come forward oh everyone thank you so very much for this meeting our next board meeting will be on December the 18th this is the last time I will be gathering us out thank you everyone we are adjourned at 9:52