001good morning everyone and Welcome to our Retreat there excuse me one second through my computer is it g to come out of there could we turn off the owl completely okay ready no ready yeah okay good morning everyone Welcome to our board retreat we are going to be doing a conversation and training around race um there will be an opportunity to make public comment in a minute uh but first we're going to do our welcome procedures um if Dr Hur could you please take roll call present good morning everyone present trust Christian good morning pH thank you Dr hurse okay now we're gonna do our Pledge of Allegiance if everyone could please rise I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands one nation
002under God indivisible with liberty and justice for all thank you and now to Al land acknowledgement we recognize that we are presently on the lands of the Cheno MMA kin alonei peoples and acknowledge them as the first inhabitants of the land we currently occupy excuse us one second addition volum have been added to and yay congratulations Frank you 13 p.m 11:45 a.m. you caller center with question [Music] okay thank you so much so that was uh our students from Richmond High School doing our morning their morning announcements thank you Richmond High for hosting us today um now we're going to move to our public comment um Miss cor miss m do we have any public comment great okay sorry I'm trying to pull up my agenda okay board um for agenda review and adoption if
003there are no objections we'll adopt the agenda say wonderful so adopted and now we're going to move to our main and only item for today which is our Equity training um and I'm going to pass it to our facilitator who is Dr relle Rogers Ard has been doing work with us in the district for uh the last six months um and uh we thank her for doing this so I'll pass it on to her um let me meet yes oh yes and then we can unmute the AL now now sorry good morning Happ to be here and happy to be sharing with the board super excited about this work um I'm Michelle Rogers Ard and I am doing work to help ensure that we are moving our district forward um on our journey towards anti-racism
004and so today I'll be working with the board but having um part of the work is meeting with uh central office leaders meeting with uh principles uh meeting with students and so creating an opportunity to do this work across the district is part of the work this year but today excited to be with the school board so um wanted to just say that these screens uh this is proprietary screens and slides but screenshots are okay please take care of yourselves um my labor and body recognition acknowledges that the burden of environmental degradation and exploitation and systemic Injustice Falls solely upon the labor of black and brown bodies in the building of this country and its institutions I remember that black and brown people were born and died working this land against their will for Generations
005I also acknowledge the continued contribution of the labor of survivors over the centuries to today of all immigrant labor including voluntary and voluntary trafficed force and undocumented peoples in the building of what we refer to as the United States so in order to build community for those of us in the room I'm wondering if you could share your first name and its meaning and the person for or persons for whom you were named and then one hope you have for our anti-racism work at the board [Music] level to start um my name is O Christian and you ask what dominum my name yes uh o is um I was named after my my dad and um all I know it came my dad came from Texas East Texas and so um so that's where he
006got the name I don't know what the meaning of it is but I just know I'm name that for my father I love it what's one hope that you have uh one hope that I have is that we can eradicate first you know feel cohesiveness in our district thank you call on the next person Hi everyone my name is Jamila Maisha Jamila means beautiful Maisha means living or life U my father wanted to name me or my mother wanted to name me beautiful flower so she wanted to name me Jam kamaria my dad said no in this country she needs to have a beautiful life so he Nam me Jam Maisha um one hope you have for anti-racism work at the board level we set the tone so if we can get it right and
007tight here then there's it flows like a river and then we will be able to see active anti-racism policy in our district and we can hold those all the way down the stream accountable I'm complete uh Demetrio thank you uh my name is Demetrio Gonzalez um the meaning of my name my name has like many random meaning meanings but I was really named after my dad who was named after his grandfather um so it's just a family name that's been passed on um one hope I have for the work of the board um I mean I think similar to what my colleagues have shared I think that in order for us to really go racism in our district I believe has to be done in like a sandwich approach which is we're supporting the people
008on the ground and pushing them to do the anti- racist work but it also has to come from the top at the same time um otherwise I don't think that it can be done appropriately so I think that we leave by example um and I think that we have to set that tone as mentioned um so my hope is that we're able to do that part do our part in that work um even if it also means having very difficult conversations with each other I'll pass it to thank you so much my first name is actually Kenneth which I don't go by um my middle name is Christian my first name means Hansen I had to throw that my middle name means Christlike so um handsome Christian there you go okay that's that's gonna come
009back later sorry about that a hope that I have uh for this work at the board level just listening to uh our board members I agree 100% but I would also add um I've always been a big believer around clear expectations so really and what I shared from the board with the board from inception when I first got here was I really want clear expectation from the board level here's what we want our district to be here's what we want you to do and implementation so really looking for some clear direction from the board phenomen who will you [Music] call Rosa Coro first Rosa ma Coro um I was named after both my um grandmothers from my mom and my dad's side um My Hope Is that we like Dr H says I we get
010clear Direction and our board members I'm soorry I missed the second part of her name you said no you didn't but Happ did I miss something is it inside joke okay okay who are you calling Ona Genesis hello everyone my name's Genesis and uh the meaning of my name is the first book in the Bible uh but it was also my parents name me that because it was the beginning of their life right yeah I was I'm the oldest so I was their first child um a hope that I have is that we can all get along well hi thanks so much for participating in that so I'm Michelle and my name literally means little lamb um I know you can tell that because of the way I act um but my mother had a
011my mother went to Berkeley High and she had a friend whose name was relle and she thought it was really pretty because she had met Roselle's Rachel's and rael's but she hadn't met a relle and so she set me up for a life of having to repeat my name three times but it is what it is um the hope that I have for this work is having done a little bit of work a couple of years ago when we were remote and in the pandemic I felt like that was a good start but I really want to move this forward and so the hope I have at the board level is that when we get through this time next year right it's like maybe August or September 20124 we can really see some growth metrics
012that have that we are like the expectations are really clear and we can do this work I do know that it's slow and it really takes time to build so thank you so much for that here are um here's the scope really and our theory of action the 5Ds is a um is my own framework that I've written with my writing partner the notion of defining disrupting dismantling so we can dream and design we are in the defined stage just so you know where we are as part of our framework um and when I'm meeting with leaders when I'm meeting with uh those of you who are here today when I'm meeting with principles even with students it's imperative for us to move forward as a board but speaking the same shared language and I
013think a lot of times when we use terms they can be polarizing and can also uh incite fear right and what we want to do is alleviate that by making sure we all know what we're talking about all at the same time when we move past defining which I'm hoping to start doing um um second semester then we start talking about what does it mean to disrupt and disrupt literally means um dominoes are falling and you place your hand or something in the middle of these dominoes so they've Fallen here but these dominoes are in a are still standing you've literally disrupt the pattern of behavior what I'm hoping for the board is that we're going to put some policies in place to literally disrupt what's happening then we have to talk about how we
014hold people you know accountable but let's talk talk about what does it mean to disrupt at several levels beyond that what I see for you years 2 three four and five is how we are dismantling some of those systems and that's the hard hard hard work but we can't just tear down you have to rebuild so when I was coming in today you know there was a conversation there may be some things that are that might be torn down but what I love is like but what we rebuild is going to be beautiful and that's what I think about as we're looking at how we can dismantle some pieces and then dream and design what's possible so the 5Ds are the framework today we're going to continue to build some Community among those of us
015who are in the room we're going to Define some terms we're going to ask you about your personal anti-racist commitment um look at understanding for we're going to look at policies I have a framework for you that I think is going to be fun Maybe not maybe Fun's a bad word maybe it'll be interesting um to help us really start to interrogate policy so at the board level we need to know how to look at policies we can't just walk up to a policy and be like this is bad get rid of it move on we have to have a framework for figuring out how the conversations happen to move those policies so I'm hoping to do some of that today our flow is a little off because we got started late these are our
016community agreements that um I shared with our leaders and they added the two in if you could look those over and then if you could decide upon one that you want to really focus on today I'm going to give you 30 seconds to just look those overp qtip thank you if you have any questions about any of them that would be a great time to ask so qtip means quit taking a personal a lot of times we have a norm and we feel like or something happens we feel attacked right so let's just make sure that we have care um any other Norms that are here or agreements about which there may be questions and if having none if we could just go around and say what's one Community agreement that you're just gonna we're
017going to abide by all of them but what's one that you're just holding dear um I would say we honor everyone personal experiences we are we're honor everybody's personal experiences yes thank you um because I have a takeover Spirit I'm going to work on we will step up and step back thank you uh I'll I want to come we will be accountable to the group love it thank you personally for me we will suspend judgment and be open to new ideas yeah that's really important what about for the two of you we will respect confidentiality and remain present thank you it's good to remain present I think we'll step up and step back thank you thanks so much in that all right so I would like us to also agree to create a brave space
018I understand this is recorded I understand it's public I understand you're the board I understand people talk back to you I understand you hear from people but look we cannot do anti-racism work without having an element of courage and bravery courage literally from the Latin core meaning the heart right so this is hard work and so I know your board members and I know it's like oh somebody might say something to me I'm gonna encourage you to be really thought thoughtful but also Brave right and brave does not always mean safe right safe space sometimes happens and we're like I I'm not going to say anything because if I say anything it could be construed that's difficult anti-racism work means that we're literally pushing against what's the norm the norm is is pulling and we're
019pushing back right when you push back against something there is resistance I don't go to the gym as much as I should but when I do go right there's resistance that I'm doing that's hard work I can't move those weights unless I'm literally pushing pushing requires bravery and so I'm going to ask us to accept that we're going to feel uncomfortable I'm going to ask us to think about taking risks but with compassion with care with accountability so that we can do this work and if I can get a thumbs up for everybody we're gonna be brave okay I'm gonna hold you to it all right if somebody could read this quote for me the beauty of anti-racism is that you don't have to pretend to be free of racism to be an anti-racist anti-racism
020is the commitment to fight racism wherever you find it including in yourself and it's the only way forward and it's the only way forward I use this quote in everything because I think a lot of times we're either waiting for someone to be like hello I'm an anti-racist or we have resistors who are like I'm not gonna I'm not going to step into that and what I'm suggesting today is that as a district we can no longer wait and so when we have resistors I'm not asking you to pretend to be free of racism we can't do that it's baked into everything but what we can do is make a commitment to fight racism and that can happen in a variety of ways we're going to talk about that at the end what are our
021next steps but if we can all make a commitment that we're gonna at least name and fight it that's that's one huge step and the fight might be within and what um olulu did not say in this quote the fight might be in your home right it might be with family members right like that might be your fight right now how can I even have this conversation with people I love because that certainly might be easier than having a conversation with people I don't love right so let's remember that as we move forward let's start with some definitions there are four levels of racism there it's personal it's interpersonal it's institutional and it is structural personal racism is about this notion of what do I believe right I used this example before if I believe
022that everybody with orange hair can sing better than anybody else that's my personal belief and I can have personal beliefs and I think what happens when we're in schools is we get really offended when people don't immediately change their personal beliefs and I want to say something hugely unpopular that I cannot go how many people work here 80,000 I don't know I can't go up to 880,000 people and PLL each one of them and make sure that their beliefs have shifted that's an impossible task all right so I can have the belief about people with orange hair when I enact that with someone you don't have orange hair so you can't sing I'm personally enacting that against you that's interpersonal and it becomes about my behavior right so I can start to go hm I'm
023not happy with your behavior it's based on your belief I can't change your beliefs but I don't like your behavior what do I need to do to monitor your behavior I need to go into my institutional policy institutional racism happens within an institution so if wccusd was the only educational system that had that was founded on racist principles we could fix WCC USD and would be done but it is not right and so institutions across our country banking education um Federal home loan like every single institution is inherently built on racist principles but when you are within an institution and you experience discriminatory treatment policies practices that where you can start to um start to attack I don't want to use the word attack you can start to monitor behavior on the interpersonal that happens
024from beliefs and feel free at any time while I'm talking to stop me and engage me in questions all right structural then is what happens across institutions so again because wccusd is not the only educational institution then what happens structurally is education is built on that same system of that same racist systems so you know all of the Bay Area um school districts right would be structural and then together institutional and structural creates systemic racism why do I spend all this time talking about the different levels of [Music] racism understanding of what we are going to be approaching looking at dealing with absolutely when you spend all your time worrying about personal racism it really can be forget tiring it can feel overwhelming I would literally have to go to every single person and go
025do you believe that the right that's that's just overwhelming first of all it's all overwhelming but I feel like I can have a little bit more of an impact when I understand the level of racism here's the thing I do not in any way I mean I'm dope let's just acknowledge that but I cannot possibly say if you work with me we can get rid of systemic racism because it's the institution and the structural together that that's beyond that's beyond my control I also cannot say that I think if we do something then every single District in California CN is suddenly going to make a shift but what I think we can do is we can work with especially at the school board level institutional racism this is key because some sometimes somebody's gonna say
026to you I think this person is racist I think that and they may be and I need I need us to understand that they may indeed be racist or at least hold racist beliefs probably can't stop that probably can't change it but what we can do is create a policy to shift their behavior and how that impacts our students okay want to make sure that we get that also I want to talk about why Dei is not enough I'm sure You' heard from many constituents like why don't we just do Dei why don't we just do Dei Dei listen Dei is not enough diversity just means the presence of difference that's all it is so when people are like we do diversity I was like you really don't actually right now there are diverse books
027in this Library they're all different types of books there are paperback books and hardback books and short books and Tall books and what we could do is we could spend time looking at the diversity of books in this library but that only means that we have a quantitative measurement of books it doesn't talk about the quality of the books it doesn't talk about how old the books are is anybody reading this like like it's just right it's just a quantitative measurement it's not enough it's insufficient do we want diversity yes is it enough no okay diversity inclusion can we really have what happens when we have diversity is this when we have inclusion folks are collective are are more together but even with inclusion it's not enough because I don't want to be included in
028spaces that are not designed for me so inclusion then can't happen without also belonging you see how they all are knitted together there and I asked this question before is this [Music] inclusion this is a conversation I am not going to lecture for two hours is not inclusion why not sorry U the majority it's not mixed okay what about others it's not mixed so this this may not be inclusion what about others is this inclusion this is textbook inclusion but this is not the inclusion that we are wanting to have at any level in our district why is a textbook inclusion because it two women are included they're there so they're included but they are not wanted and they do not feel belong a belonging yeah they're pretty disgusted by their you know by their
029arms being folded someone recently mentioned this to me and I even missed it when I used this example they're like nobody is talking to them I was like nobody is talking to them that was like brilliant and they're not part of the joke everybody else is smiling everybody else is smiling and happy and they are not included nor do they belong but it is textbook inclusion I would offer this is what happens when we put students in certain classrooms and we call that inclusion classrooms weren't created for them the classrooms remain as they are and don't shift the structure Remains the Same but we put students who were formally left out in those classrooms and we call that inclusion without changing or Shifting the practices or Shifting the classroom or doing anything to make it
030more meaningful so it is definitely Tech inclusion but not the inclusion that we want and this is what often happens to our students so diversity not enough inclusion requires a lot more Equity we all like to say we doing equity in fact I would say that 87% I just made that up 87% of the districts in California are like we definitely do equity and what we do is equity because we do Equity right Equity is about providing access now am I going to say that people who are really working to provide access to our most overlooked students are not doing a good job I am not GNA say that what I am GNA offer is that it is insufficient be in a moment but is active I think I put active and and all the
031yeah I used active like three times in the slide it's active which means you cannot possibly be like yo I feel like I'm be anti-racist but I'm just gonna sit here like it requires movement right and it's an approach there is never a time when you just are it because it's consistent right and then finally it names white supremacy white supremacy culture that uh it names whiteness it names all those things that we don't like to name that becomes very very painful it's much easier to do anything because we don't have to name anything being anti- RIS means we need to name that which we are pushing against remember when I said you're pushing and I did that whole thing about the weights that I did this morning right it's about naming and challenging and
032actively being able to disrupt whiteness there's no way you can push Against Racism unless you understand how racism began and what racism is and all those other different pieces and in order to do that you need to name that and that becomes anti so the framing that I want to offer is that to be anti to work towards anti-racism it requires all of these and I have them in Gears because they all work together so the framing I'm offering is yes you do need Equity but you also need diversity and you also need inclusion you need belonging you need Justice you need identity you need values and all of those work together to create anti-racism and it's a naming of whiteness throughout as a lens that you use towards anti-racism this is a slightly different
033Framing and I recognize that because I've done a lot of reading and I've done a lot of work and I do a lot of work in schools and I'm like it's not one thing and I finally came like this aha it's not this one thing where okay I'm doing anti-racism so all I got to do is this one thing it is an amalgamation of several different pieces and strategies working together to create a structure that is pushing Against Racism and then you have to really understand the the foundation of racism which is whiteness so I feel like I'm going to rebuild this to have like the foundation down here and somebody stepping on it and then like lifting up but until I can figure that out understand that you cannot push Against Racism unless you
034understand what racism is it actually goes back to the origin of the foundation of this country how was built absolutely and and what it stood for so it goes all the way back to the very beginning of the founding Propet absolutely so yes no I mean we need to understand that while oppression existed race was created in this country right because there have always been differences but they were always cultural right I don't want to go into my history moment but here's a thing since you brought brought it up it's going to be your fault so the reality is right that even when um even when we were in colonial times people were always identified by their country of origin so if you were from Italy you were Italian and if you were from Poland
035you were Pol for sure right it was not until Bacon's Rebellion in this country that those who were of the lower class not the ruling class started to um uh try to have a rebellion against those who were the elite and when that happened the elite looked and said they are all ganging up against us and there were more of them than there were the elite it was not until after Bacon's Rebellion that's the first time you see the word white in language right and I have a whole thing on this that I could do but really for bullet points that what the ruling Elite said was how do do we stop people who are um people who are financially oppressed poor right how do we stop those people from ganging up against us it
036is the first time that we understand divide and conquer and their answer was we need to create a system by which those people who look closest to us will not even though they're not the ruling Elite will not no longer see themselves as part of those who are being oppressed what should we do let's create a series of laws that privileges people who have a certain type of skin tone against other people and that was how race started in this country yes I to find Justice For Us absolutely so um when I use Justice around anti-racism it is justice that allows for um the ruling class and the ruling Elite to be held to the same or um even better standards than the people that they're oppressing is basically what Justice looks like and so
037understanding again naming whiteness naming white supremacy naming privilege allows us to seek Justice for those who are most frequently oppressed thank you sidebar happy to do a longer piece on the history of how race started in America by the way it is fascinating um but okay yeah we can do that for anyone I would love to do that for students too so can we turn and talk as board members even though we're in the system okay so like if we could do a turn and talk how do these definitions help you understand the path forward so maybe if I could have a Turner talk here and a Turner talk here let's just take two minutes to do that we're going to get in turn and literally talk Genesis is there any yes there I'm really
038interested to to finish what you going to are [Music] we are [Music] you doing what they want to do [Music] the word I used the beginning [Music] EnV ESP it's all right for but not this inad bringing everybody together everybody okay I'm going to bring us back together thanks so much so these definitions are may may be different than what you've heard before how might they help us with our pass well we talk about I can sh I think we talked about how to be able to express and call out what we we are seeing that it's not happening or it's being done like we are really good sometimes within our system to say that we are diverse or that we are incl you know very inclusive but then this is helping me with a
039Clarity of like the difference between anti-racist space and a diverse space right or an inclusive space um and I think that it helps give us Clarity of about what's happened in the past but then it helps us with what needs to occur moving forward I'm love that that makes me feel great as a teacher but also it's not bad to have an inclusive space like I want to make sure that I'm not presenting something where it's like oh inclusivity we don't no we want inclusivity we want belonging um I'm just saying that it's not sufficient and so we might want to push past that but yes let's work to create inclusive spaces especially in our classroom well and I think our board is a good example of that right like we have four um bip
040we have three black board members one Latino one black superintendent right and we are not out of place that I could call ourselves to be anti-racist right right which is really shocking but at the same time it's not because of what we are experiencing within the system and this institution right so I think that it's giving me that Clarity of like okay what is it that a group need to do to push past that [Music] right yeah so so you're diverse as a board and then the question would be does the board do board members feel like they all have access do board members feel like they're inclusive do board members feel like they belong right like in what ways are your values represented at the board level and all that just requires time together
041to process those pieces I think it's part of the community thought that it was going to be a Barack Obama moment when we turn black and brown yeah but it's no Barack Obama moment he didn't even have a Barack Obama moment because the foundation is whiteness the foundation is white supremacy the foundation so I think for even us on the board we're three years in and it's like yeah we are walking quick in right so we are we have to kind of look at each other like are we moving like are we sinking are we in the expectation that we have inside and the expectation that is put on us on the outside you have this um you have part of the community that has this Messiah complex well y'all are there change it now
042y we trying to chip away at 400 years of stuff and we can't just do it like that it just doesn't happen like that but the expectation is you're a black and brown board you got a black C CAO you had a black CDO you got a black superintendent you have three black board members you have a a Latin next board member you have two women on the board why can't you break all of these ceilings and things down and it's one of those things that it's because we fighting over crumbs and not taking over the kitchen it's the same thing it's the same normalization of you put us all in the room we end up fighting over front instead of literally saying let's take over the kitchen and B our own bread so we're
043L doing that instead of doing real chopping that head off that SN so I think that that's the anti-racism work is like really getting in there say we all intentionally focus on choing this head off and I think um and I think that's great I would wonder if if we're going to have a brave space all right I would wonder how to do that when two of our board members are missing I would wonder how we do that when we've not maybe in um well getting ahead of myself but have we actually said as a board we are working towards anti-racism as a board right and so I think there's work that has to happen everywhere and we're at the very beginning is November how do we come together to have those really rough conversations
044that will help us move forward so that our constituents are like oh okay I see that they're moving towards some things and if I might also say when we start talking about policies in about 15 minutes we have to be all in the same um canoe rolling in the same direction to get down that river that you mentioned and I I don't know where we are this is my first time meeting with the board so I don't know so I think we stop focusing on the personal I can't bring you here I can't make you come here I can't love you into this space all I can do is throw your life jacket because we moving it only takes three it takes three people to make policy you have three you take it takes three
045of us to set a vision for this superintendent and then he goes based on the three so I think what it is is we are in the boat together and we got the motor running and we're going down the river you grow light jackets because you don't want to drown nobody but it's not my intention to make sure you can swim get on the boat have a good time and have a cocktail we moving no I'm not suggesting that but I do think that there could be people who puncture the boat slash the tires absolutely right and so when we want to avoid they get a they get a long string right all the way over there we're going to work this metaphor till it's dead for sure what about this group how do these
046definitions help you understand the path forward well I was just gonna kind of build off what you were saying I do agree um that three board members set Direction um but I'm glad you said that because I wrote it down in my book what does this look like for the two and I know I have to get to a point where I sto concerning myself so much about the other two but in a brave space there's so much Havoc that those two can do behind the scenes um to to staff that just causes a lot of weariness frustration a lot of everything so even though I try not to worry about the other two they insert themselves you know behind the scenes even though I know the three people board members are going to set
047policy Direction but the question is how do we still those to try not to worry about them but still I think it's good to be worried about opposition I think it's good to be uh maybe not wor but I think we need to develop strategies and you'll notice when I give you next steps the way to avoid the way to um try and mitigate harm is to know Harm's coming yes right so that's why we go to the doctor once a year right we get even though things are okay we know there could be some things that come up and we go we get tested and make sure everything is cool but we make a plan you know what we're going to eat better we're going to exercise we're going to go to the gym
048because we know that if we don't along the way something else is we have to have a strategy right and we can't just go I I wonder if something's going to happen something's going to happen how do we know yeah because we have data that shows that things always happen we must be active we're gonna talk about that in about uh 15 minutes if I think I oh I'm so sorry yes I'm so sorry if a structure had been in place for so long yes so long yes even as us new board members we came home we came into a structure that was already there and and now we trying to clean up and make it better and so it it's a challenge and um and the structure like the way it is abolutely what's
049going on and they prefer to keep it that way yes but we have to be strong to endure and to de deal and and eradicate the best you know the best way that we can we inherited the structure in which we were born right we were born into a racist structure correct then we all agree I know we're excited because swag is exciting but we're born into a structure so what we have to do is we have to stay the course but we must make a plan so this is a good a really good time for me to take a one minute so that because who can who could work when there's swag walking in hi everybody Welcome to all of your sizes and all of the and all of the I'm bringing you options
050so at any time youo you want a hat okay the hat is yours call you call the we have more hats and more scar one or the other like hat what was like this was great I'm so glad we were able to take that quick break let's um let me really quickly run through this notion of neutrality I have these slides here so that you know how to address your constituents so when someone says but I'm not racist why we why are we doing anti-racism right your answer is it's neutral it's a claim that signifies neutrality there is no neutrality in the racism struggle right so the opposite of not of racist isn't not racist it's anti it's pushing against right because racism is a passive response to generational trauma when you say not racist
051it's a passive response to generational th in other words I'm not racist and I've got three black friends so I'm good that is a passive response to more than 400 years of generational [Music] trauma and not racist says I'm not really part of that stuff that other people do that that's what those other people deal with I don't I don't live in Alabama right I live in California I'm not racist and and I'm cool and like look I played basketball I used to hoop with some brothers right all the things that I keep hearing right as if I'm a part from racist society when I was I've been born and bred and it's the air that I read yes sir the difference between the South and here South is blun what they do back there
052in South here they cover it up um that used to be true sir but um we're hanging people in California we are um having very very very racist conversations there are NES at our schools there are I mean there um what I want to say I'm been recorded right there are um to be brave I'm gonna say that there's been a shift in our um in our national discourse as a result of our politics and so while I used to say that like if we're just not in Alabama we'll be okay but there's some spaces in California I can't drive through at night either and reason why I say that when I went to school down there in Texas yeah every time we went into the grocery store you know people ask we gooc grocery
053store they follow us around the grocery store absolutely and I had to tell turn around and say I'm not steing nothing all I'm doing is BU what I need so I can go you know this this police officer will follow us all around the right and and my son who is 19 and his friends were on Bay Street and emry bille and the police were called three boys three black boys what are you doing on Bay Street should they be on Bay Street I mean where I mean there's nowhere else to hang out out here right so I mean you know like so I believe that um it's definitely uh a larger more in your face issue but it's still super prevalent and the shifting of our national discourse has allowed what I would call
054permission being granted to um the ways in which we see particularly anti-blackness in this country permission granted and we're gonna be in trouble next year if we don't figure it out and Y know but Alabama palm trees Alabama got better weather better weather and worse food but you know yeah it's definitely so this is what I hope that you can share with your constituents can somebody read this quote from KY one either allows racial inequalities to persevere as a RAC or confront racial inequalities as an anti-racist let's pause there your people come to you and they're like I don't think we should be doing this anti-racism thing your constituents parents community members I find the best way to respond is not from attack but from using a quote feel free to use ky's quote feel
055free either either there's no two ways either either you allow and I would say racial inequities in our schools because your board members to exist as a person who is allowing racism or you're confronting them as s someone who is anti-racist there's no in between space of that there's no in between space right so either I am pushing pushing pushing against what we know is not good for our babies or I'm allowing it and if I'm allowing it I'm allowing racism and people who are allow racism the worst thing that you can be called in America is a racist but people who allow racism are racist it's a heavy quote and that's why I'm pushing on it but as board members I heard you say we have to set the tone I heard you say
056we have to make have to model then this is the model all right so to that I would like to offer you a proposed vision statement read it out loud yeah yeah I was letting it marinate at first you know because you know I dropped the mic on it so I worked on this woman so I'm suggesting and you can work Smith to depth right but I think we need to figure out who we are and set our tone as a board institutional structural and systemic racism has been ingrained in US history and throughout its public education system right so that's a factual statement as a school board we understand and recognize the racialized root causes of barriers to Equitable educational outcomes for each child but particularly for African-American children and so we're naming antiblackness
057in that statement we are uniquely positioned to shift these outs so as a board let me tell you what we do we set goals we approve policies we adopt curriculum we set budgets and we oversee administrative aspects for West Contra pasta but we also serve as a direct line of communication from the community Through The District therefore we acknowledge and recognize that we are ultimately responsible for fulfilling the promise of public education to students at wccc and we will do better we're not GNA be perfect we're not going to eradicate racism but we make a pledge to do better and I'm going to send this to you so you can have it y'all can play with it because I know you know what boards have to do but what I heard you say today was
058we set the tone we are the the people at the head we you know all the things that you said when I ask you're holy as a fan of okay thank you thank you as a fan of therapy and as a fan of someone who has been working with how do we grow the first thing you do is set an intention when you're trying to make a change and I think as a board we need to set an intention it doesn't have to be this language this is specifically um when I worked on it I was like what would I want to have a board say if I was a parent and what would I want a board to say if I was was on the board so it doesn't have to be this language
059but as I worked on it I was like this is what I would want all right so what I want you to do with this is to take some time I think what I'm going to do because of time I was going to have you do a turnning talk but what I would love you to do is I want you to let this marinate because I really want to get us to policies today and I'm going to have to move it quickly I'm going to send it to you I want you to think about it it doesn't have to be this but you must set an intention quick like at at the top of your head quick thoughts on this well I guess my question would be how this will tie to the superintend vision
060that he's creating District um so you know how are we going to match them together how does it TI to I couldn't hear Dr her is creating a vision for the district writing a vision I love it I wonder how it ties to that yeah yeah yeah um because he's also created an anti-racist statement love we should work together yeah I think that that that great almost like almost like I planned it that is great so it do this is proposed right but this is like my best thinking for the board happy to word Smith play with see how it can be embedded happy to have a working session with you I just want yall to have my intention I think this is great yeah thank you PR I think that it's I think that
061one of the things that I'm finding in these sessions is that you're allowing um and creating words to feelings so for me this just adds to words to feelings I feel like this is what we should be doing but now we have the verbage behind it this is what we should be you know what I mean so I think that there's a there's a level of thank you for kind of putting it in words and I'm not even necessarily think we should play with it I think we should stamp it publish it and move on but I do I I appreciate it it's always easier to to change something that's already in front of you than to be like hey y'all get in the room and crap up so what I wanted to do is
062be like let's start from here and then um given your work Dr H that you're doing I'm swimming across Right Start From Here play with it put it together and let's just make sure that we don't go another year without having some intentionality I like red white and blue too that would lost on me is it isn't that orange orange you know I'm color blond okay it's orange white and purple wow in my mind I was like I probably would not use red and white I'm not thrilled with my country right now um okay so I want to give this to you I was going to have you do a whole thing with it but given our time I'm not going to be able to do that but I will definitely send it to you
063so you can have it yeah all right uhhuh skip that all right so so how do we do it where do we start right we understand our definitions and um notice I'm using a different frame of uh frame of voice because we would have come back from our from our break and now we're all calm yeah yeah okay I'm good all right how do we make a shift at your level we got to look at policies and procedures and so what I want to do for us today uh what time is lunch coming we're done at 12 aren we we're done at one oh oh told me 12 who was it okay not gonna get into that somebody else business tab lunch coming we do so um Richmond High is going to be providing it
064so I'm checking with her to see what's Happ okay so what we can do certainly is I'm going to try and be through in 30 minutes then maybe we can just talk and have just talk over lunch and have time to be together uh I got to go real quick okay look here's what we're going to do today I'm going to give you a pretend policy okay I have to do that okay so real quick what's the difference between a policy a practice and a procedure right a policy is usually a written document and it should tell you who does it and why the document is there right so a policy like a school attendance that's a Statewide policy um the grades needed to pass a class should be a policy that is schoolwide right
065uh graduation standards are also Statewide those are policies right a procedure should also be a written document that tells you how to do the thing that is the policy what we often do is skip over procedures and then people are like I don't know how this happen I've been doing it for 20 years that does not mean it's the procedure right a procedure is like a driver's ed manual that tells you how to drive the car to observe the the written rules right tax instructions I don't know about you but I spend an inordinate amount of time reading over tax step right how do we pay people that should be a procedure I'm gonna get off of that all right but a practice is where we really in education we tend to be Road right
066a practice is an activity that's generally repeated and thought to be effective but we get road because we we all feel like we should be doing our own kind of practice we all kind of right that looks like if any of you watch Steph he spends a lot of time dribbling he spends a lot of time figuring out his stuff I mean he can have 38 points or he still lose so what does that tell you um creating lesson plans as a thing or um my son's a drummer and rudiments right you need to know what you're doing you're creating policies but also you are many times creating procedures and that's going to be really really really important and what you want to do is have an eye on the practice that is the result
067of the procedure that tells you how to implement the policy so I want to say again the practice is what happens on the ground if you will those are what your teachers are doing your principles are doing you want to have an eye to that because it needs to follow the procedure that implements the policy okay so can again says every every policy in every institution in every community in every nation is producing or sustaining either a racial INE Equity or Equity between a policy that's racially inequitable or that's racially Equitable every policy every policy every policy every policy every policy every policy yes it's call and response every policy every policy that means the ones that you have approved and haven't approved every policy so what I like you to do is I'm gonna
068put you in small groups and as much as you guys want to participate feel free um let's let's look at this policy I know this doesn't happen in West Contra Casta uh School District but some people have a policy of no late homework let's say that's a policy it's written it's probably part of a um part of a syllabus right so it's written there's a procedure and there's a practice all right so uh Feldman in grading for Equity says when teachers accept late work learning becomes more important than deadlines it is more important for students to do the work than to make them conform to a teacher's timeline if the work was important it was important whether they did it by the due date or whether it's later this is controversial and I chose it
069because all the policies you'll be dealing with are also controversial right so I would love for you to get into small groups here's your policy review I'm going to send this to you as well these are six questions you as a board should be asking and I would also argue anybody who's making policy decision these are six questions you should be asking to talk about whatever the policy is it is called a policy review what's the intention what is it aim to accomplish does it align with what happens remember those practices and practice is it realistic who benefits who's negatively affected who has a voice and whose voice is currently silenced and then deciding is this a policy that is fighting Against Racism or is it allowing racism to continue so I was going to
070put you in small groups do you want to do this whole group so group we do whole group all right well let's jump in let's talk about no late homework what's the intention of the late homework policy what is it aim to accomplish most teachers want children to learn time management so most teachers say okay I gave it to you on Monday it's due on Friday I'm not going to take late work because you had plenty of time to do it and you should be able to manage your time that's what I would say mostly most what does it aim to accomplish to your answer I just want you to like Su simply uh it aims to accomplish time management time management is that what the homework assignment was though no this is a time
071management class no I think it aims to standardize potentially um the work that needs to happen same one uh so so for example that uh I think that if a teacher is by the way I think that I'm putting myself in the shoes of the person who WR this even if I don't personally agree but yeah um I think if I was implementing that I think that I would be thinking about how can I make it quote unquote Equitable for students so that um the person who's Turing on time has the same I don't know how say has the same right as the person who uh turn next time um so you might have a point system by which um a student turns it in this time on time and then a student who turns
072it in late next time when they turn on time they can then have access because that's what Equity is about yeah yeah yeah what does the policy aim to accomplish and what's the intention behind no late H is this the first time you guys have heard of a no late homework policy okay so what is it what's the intention of the policy it's also to keep me on track I'm a teacher I got a pent guide I got to get to chapter 13 by December to make sure that you're able to take the test that covers chapter 1 through 13 that's a district test that I have to give you so it's also you can't slow me down so I'll put in deadlines but so we all can get there whether I leave you behind
073or not because I know I'm going to leave some people behind but I've got to get to chapter 13 because my boss is going to come in and say what chapter are you on and I'm going to be held to level accountability so your homework is able to help me Pace my class the aim is to Pace my class all right what about other inten what about like from the four of you over here what's the intention of a no late homework policy and what does it to accomplish I don't believe in that policy so it's hard for me to come up um i' I've had this conversation in a number of different districts bet and I actually I'm not even sure if I believe in the homework policy period because it's really for students
074in practice it's for practice for the students um but I think what you all said is really the intent it's really for the adults so number [Music] four homework is what is supposed to benefit students like in practice so why are we penalizing them if it's late if it's for their benefit so that gets to um two and three and four right how does the policy intention align with what happens in day-to-day practice what is the purpose right this is why when we're looking at policies and of course this one right doesn't really have a lot of um it's not high stakes but the policy that you will be as a board that you will be approving or writing are high stakes policies and I want you to think about I feel like this is
075a policy but what's the intention behind it and what does it aim to accomplish is it align with what happened do children turn in late homework yeah so let me say this isn't like a weeding out you weed out or you know certain group certain students going to turn in and then you weed out the other we're not going to turn I don't know maybe maybe I mean that could certainly happen the question is is it aligned with what happens in day-to-day practice if you have a policy that says no late home word but you know people gonna turn their work is that yeah I the reason why this has always bothered me is because we we should be trying to think of a system that allows students multiple opportunities right to get it like
076Mastery learning right right so how do we make sure that a student has opportunities during the day after the school day to understand the standards and for me homework falls into that as well so why why would we penalize students if we're really trying to get them to understand because it's controlled yes if I have if I have a hundred kids and they can turn in their work at any point during the time that mean I'm constantly doing work and this is a system that doesn't allow me to have the bandwidth to constantly do work I have this time to this time to grade if you're telling me I can let a kid turn in homework anytime that means I have to grade at home I have to grade on the weekend I have to
077grade because that's what y'all are looking at is my grading policy with the homework being part of it and it's this system that we created that I got to get a 4.3 GPA or I got to get a 4.2 GPA if I stop grading homework and it's all about the test some people test different so then Jimmy's like well how am I supposed to make up my grade because it's all on my midterm and my final you're not accepting any homework or classwork or whatever then it's also a sense of control as a teacher if you play football I control gr I control your access to then having trajectory outside of it because if you're lower than a 3.0 and I don't take late homework and I got a classroom full of football or basketball
078players or whatever I know that you at least turning my stuff in because I wait my homework heavier than I wait my test so it's control and ownership that the teacher in this situation is having because I need to have maintain some type of high I'm complete yeah I think I appreciate what the both said because I think that it speaks about probably a little B of the intention of like the teacher potentially but it's not just about them but it's about wanting them wanting the student to to have a sense of deadlines right which is going to be important in their life but the reality the day to day in all of our jobs is that if a deadline is missed there's usually a good reason for it and space is given to the
079individual to be able to not like if there's a death in the family right like most likely any work will be like yes please take another few weeks right as an extension right right it's not it's not so much about like removing the deadline but it's about giving students and ourselves the wiggle room in case something spread out right and I think that's where it does not reflect this policy to day today because even if we're trying to teach students about deadline important or that um it does not follow the practice that exists right I did this with a group of teachers and I and they were all you know and we got to teach them and and I said how many of you turn in your lesson plans on time than thank you there
080was silence in the land right and I said how many of you are late on some other things and then you turn it in when you know and it's acceptable in work right so there's notion um um that um I've never been on a job where they fired me because I turned into something L that just has never ever happened for me will my manager be like yo I thought I was supposed to have I was like you know what I totally forgot let me get that to you and then I get them to you but I've never ever been fired for turning in something late so what is this that we're preparing our students for because that doesn't happen realistically in life right folks be late and are still working right and so I
081understand the need to um create boundaries but I also think that this is a great example to your point dris of what happens when we have these policies but we haven't gone through a critical review right and number five that we've just jumped right on over at what point do we ask students how they feel about homework policy and so therefore if we're not asking them then their voice is silenced and is that Equitable do they have access do is that Justice I mean you know like we have to go through these questions and I know you're thinking you want me to have these conversations with every policy but if we don't start to have these types of conversations and really think about that we create policies that are intentionally or unintentionally holding up racism
082as opposed to shifting against it we must look at these types of questions right is this policy intention realistic is it realistic to say no late homework and I know they teachers that are going to jump on me and I'm okay with that but when I was teaching I didn't do homework number one everybody's home is different so that was an issue of equity for me number two people had jobs after school because I taught in deep Eed openland and folks were was leaving and kicking and going home right and number three there were people who had really great opportunities and there were people who didn't and so I didn't do homework but I did leave my classroom open after school for additional blah blah blah yeah I was just say this is really a
083big issue and I've seen it you know in a lot of different districts and we really in situation are penalizing them and it's part of them to kind of get out of the hole especially when you have like some teachers and I've seen this where they have the weighted test the way to quiz and the way to homework and if you miss homework that's given on a regular basis and it's worth x% then it's almost impossible to catch up and another policy is like this zero like the case against zero where you have if you don't turn on your homework or if you miss a quiz or if you miss a test that's worth about 30% of your grade and you get a zero it's almost impossible and it's based on like kids who are
084working or have responsibilities or something else happening but we do have a system where we're penalizing kids we have that growth mindset gain without growth mindset policy I'm totally in agreement with that like we have the growth mindset policy everything you know people are farting Bubbles and chasing rainbows but we don't have it in the classroom my push back to that would be are we setting them up for a world that does not exist right are we setting them up for a world again being from the south it was like you got to be the bionic woman you got to be better smarter faster quicker on time never late it's always on you better be early cuz if you on time late right and then you are you're going to be the black person that's
085late you're going to be the black person that's unrel if you don't turn in your work on time or before or double check so at what point are we repeating and entrenching those norms and at what point are we creating black children and children of color to say treat me like you treat them Betty got a pass why am I not getting a pass right so I think that's what I wrot yeah it's all about what's the fear what's the fear that is underlying this type of policy the fear is I will not be able to teach you what I need to teach you in a timely manner and my question is if you can't teach me what you need to teach me without homework then maybe we should look at instructional strategies what's happening
086in class the second fear is I won't be able to control when you turn that homework in and so what I love from some teachers that I'm noticing is they have a I forgot what they call it but like it's an ever increasing grade book they don't close the grade book until the end of the year that does make more work for teachers but it also provides the type of opportunity that I think is what happens in our world yeah I have all the time if I tell you I'm sending you something by Friday I send an email and go I'm gonna be able to get it to you on Tuesday right and that's what happens in the work world so if we wanted to really do what happens in the workall finally you'll notice
087what I didn't include here is does this privilege or not privilege a certain race and why would I not include that in a critical policy review I'm having a hard time answering that I see six similarly uhuh um so look why I see it the same no it's it's definitely yeah that so I didn't purposefully though say what race does this privilege oh I see right and that was purposeful because our schools are based on white supremacy right right so I don't want I didn't want to give you a policy review that someone could be like so you're just talking about white right like I want you to be able to think beyond that understanding that that's the lens that we use but it doesn't have to be one of the questions so I was
088being very very specific in this I believe that our policies need to be interrogated and it doesn't have to be just you right how great would it be to have a committee of people who start to look at you know three or four policies a year because this takes time right to really view them and be like what's the intent like what's one policy that's that's sort of dress perfect to really really understand dress code you really need to have a critical review there are pros and cons to dress code right I'm a mom I get it been through it and we have to review it in a way that is um passionate but also allows us to see where that policy land which is different from somebody going I don't like it cuz it's
089that right like being able to really have um some critical thought around it and to get into rooms where they would be help sir yeah well I going to say that you know once we push policy the right policy now it's up to the principal and all the counselors and all those who are at at the school sites to be able to assemble their staff together and to be able to put do the same thing is to you know have dialogue and and and push the policy so they can understand that hey this is the policy and we all going to buy by the right Poli you are correct and this is why I began with the difference between policies procedures and practices once you have a policy someone needs to decide with the procedure
090is and this is I said it before this is the section that we miss right we do the policy you're like okay we made this policy wo we worked on it for six months high five board policy then we go into the procedures because somebody's gonna go how we supposed to do that and we don't do that we do the policy and then we're like yo go figure out the procedures no ma'am no sir we do the policy and then the addendum to the policy and this is how we want to do right so it's just like the driver's education manual there's all these laws that are policy about how we drive right but then they give you this thick manual that are the procedures of how you do it we know that you stop
091at a red light right or we know you're supposed to yield everybody does yield a different way what does the book say though what does the driver's manual say about yielding we all Drive every day right both ways and then go for how long three seconds yes ma'am yes ma'am that is the procedure that that follows the yes that follows the policy yes sir sorry didn't me to interrupt that's okay I just I guess I'm really curious in your thoughts though because I think that I'm so glad you're calling this out and what is our role as a board I I'm gonna say it and then I want to figure yeah I see our role and this might be between the board yeah right um because I see it in practice we all see it
092right right um so my view is that we set the policy yeah we have the long conversation yes and it's dror h and his staff to come up with the procedure right and then the expectations and then the practices are created at the S so you ask for my opinion or how it normally happens no I want to hear your I think that here is done differently right depending I think on everywhere depending on the superintendent absolutely on the board yes even now right like when you have a board president who is like top down versus one who is collaborative or absolutely you know like it's it's done every different everywhere is done differently right and so what happens here in this little section is that it's a free-for-all and we have to avoid that
093at all costs so you are absolutely right and it depends on how people feel about it you know like it's crazy the reality is and that's why I'm going to go back to driver's education manual the reality is the state set the policy for how we drive right and for the rules and all those other different pieces and then there was a committee it wasn't necessarily people who work at DMV because they clearly could care less right but the folks who wrote that manual were probably not the same people but I bet some of them were there has to be procedures when we skip procedures it leaves it up to you know whatever it's very Loosey Goosey the way that I've seen a couple of now small districts not your your size a couple of
094small districts set the the board set the policy and then there's an additional committee that makes the addendum to the policy that are the procedures that's a best way but again it's a smaller District so I don't know how wcc's us I would not just say it's just the superintendent and his staff but I do think there could be a community because this also helps to break down racism when we have a group of people who are usually overlooked especially those who are being greatly affected by the policy to set the procedures that's awesome then to your point sir the practices is where it all breaks down I'm in my room I'm gonna do what I want to do my door is closed so this is where accountability happens at the practice level I'm not
095sure that's the board issue but I just want us to know that we have to hold people accountable and how the way we do that is to help them with the procedures and our policy would have in it the ability to have the level of accountability it can be baked into the policy into the procedure it's got to be in the procedure so if the policy whatever the Ed code says about dress codes right and then the procedures are we have a committee including students that talk about what the procedure is for our dress code right and then we have is that I'm sorry to interrupt is that by District or is that by school I would assume it have to be a district policy students transfer from one school to this is where we
096had to get grandular right and then when you get to the practice part of it that's a sight level set of rules yes that everybody has to follow at that site the procedure is this is a district policy the district this is a district policy here are the procedures and if you don't follow the practice going back to the policy and this is what will happen yes and then also just on what you before is that um when you look at all the schools is everybody doing the same thing or proced they doing what they want to do because every School site is basically doing what they want to do yeah I call them the Rogues they're just out in the wild doing what they want to do I watch a lot of Westworld in
097case any you watch that on HBO anyway that's not neither here nor there but I agree with you but that's where the procedures have to stop so I want to go back to this driver's educ let's go to the tax instructions okay so we know the state sets up all the taxes and the United States sets up all the taxes and we know we all have to pay them right and there's a a long set of procedures right and some of us try and fudge our way past those and when we do that we may be okay the first time but eventually somebody's gonna call a Sim back on that on that policy and they're going to pull out the the tax instruction be like here's where you were wrong and then there's a penalty
098right and that's where accountability is so to your point um I'm not suggesting we become a police state but it'd be great to have some procedures because what happens is we often start doing our own thing and then when our students are harmed we don't have anything to fall back on because we didn't have those procedures we even when we have a policy if we don't have the procedure we don't have anything to fall back on so let me give you a really concrete sure I'm G say it um I was like this is um so I used to work at AC and my then boss told me ac is alme County Office B and my then boss told me that I at my level I couldn't wear G and I said is it a
099policy and um she was like well no but we just at this level you don't wear jeans I said show me the policy and let me be clear you know if I'm you know if I'm going to an office R je I would you know I was appropriate but still I was like where's the policy there was no policy but it was a practice right that somebody talked to somebody in somebody's ear and somebody else was like girl don't wear J no you don't wear J no we don't right and it was a practice but it wasn't a policy I got there new I said where is it in my anything that I got in my employment contract where does it say that there's a dress code that does not involve jeans there was no
100policy nor was there a procedure of how to deal with that therefore I could walk in there and j i darn well wanted too right the practice though was part of the culture and that's where we get in that's where everybody not just done it this way how always it becomes part of the culture the only way to shift that is to go back to the policy and then have a procedure because then otherwise we get to go has they said so has they told me so because this is why we do it because the teacher that we love has been here for 30 years and we love her and she said so that's not Equitable that's not Justice yay all right well listen thank you so much for um walking through that I have
101a lot of homework to give you oh I'm past your time let me just um let me just run past this real quick okay here your next steps board members I need you to do some reading I know you're like I don't have time to read but the holidays are coming up and um you don't need during the holiday I need you to read punish for dreaming it is a 2013 book by Latina love whom I you know forgive the pun love um it is the best book around educational policy that I've read because she intersperses um a US education policy that you know it's is comprehensive over the last like 30 years she intersperses that with story so all the other policy books that I've read it's just like here's the policy here's what
102happened here's the policy here's what happened she takes you on a journey where she's like this was the policy and this is how it affected me or the children around me or what have you and she humanizes the policy when she gets to NB we were left behind yeah come on no child every child right and so um and she doesn't leave anybody out it's in 2013 she comes for Barack she comes for K I mean you know like she is across the board saying this is what it is this is a necessary thing for anybody who's about policy so I strongly urge that we read it happy to have a board session where we talk about it it's amazing um speaking for all the board members let's do that s is available on Amazon
103um we need two additional sessions and we don't have any schedule so we need a session I would love to do a read over this I would love to do it seems like I got some energy about how race started in America so I would love to do that and basically anything else y'all want me to do um and it doesn't have to be during the day to be in the evening um but we we got to have some more sessions so at least two additional sessions with board and one of those could be I could walk you through one of the policies that you're graveling with so literally whatever you need hi I'm Michelle I'm available okay um I said we got to read love we need to discuss the ways that we Center
104black and latinx voices within every conversation like and I know we have two student board members I would love to figure out how we get them uh more present um so that we can hear the different voices because we often don't hear those voices I know we not gonna worry about it Dr Hurst but what are our strategies to engage even if that means we are having a strategy against the resistance that we know is coming let's let's not be passive Let's Be Active let's play football let's not do what the Warriors do let's actually have some defense I'm just not gonna walk up and just hit a you know just hit a two and then walk back right let's um let's actually have some defense going on okay and then let's start to look
105at the strategies on the North by which we're going to engage as board members in Brave conversations which means we have to be willing to be ontable and and that in not always feel good so these are concrete next steps I'm going to send this to you I guess I'm G to send it to your Genesis and then you can send it out to everybody I need y'all to be on this and then let's get some let's do some work right yeah yeah yeah I'm excited about it thanks so much y'all and here's my contact information if to contact me thank you no absolutely I can't believe I got that done that was F okay thank you our next schedule board meetings this Wednesday at L thank you so much