001okay good morning everyone uh welcome to our school board meeting uh if you would please rise with me and say the pledge of allegiance i pledge the united allegiance of america and to the republic for which it stands one nation under god indivisible with liberty and justice for all right first thing we have up this morning board is our consent agenda um i think everything's been in your board package have you had an opportunity to review it and so what supplies your support i move approval i'll second it we have a motion and a second to approve the consent agenda and further discussion without hearing any all in favor indicate by saying aye aye motion's been approved thank you financial reports mrs clackenbush thank you each month we present our financial reports and calculate a
002ratio comparing the beginning fund balance for the year to the ending cash balance for the prior month if the ratio equals one the performance of the fund is good if the ratio is greater than one the performance is excellent and that if the ratio is less than one we explain the reason we look at the education fund we are up to 1.18 from 1.13 in august no change with the debt service fund no change with pension fund the operations fund is down to 0.84 0.93 which is due to cash flow and pending the receipt of property taxes also the referendum fund is down to 0.93 from 1.05 also due to the receipt of property taxes there's no change in the capital referendum and no change in the rainy day fund we've expanded 69.53 percent of
003the education fund which is 5.44 under budget we've expended 62.2 percent of the operations fund budget which is 12.77 percent under budget we believe the review of the fund shows a positive financial condition and we ask for approval of the financial reports all right thank you mrs bakkenbush any questions what's the pleasure of the board a motion to approve second we have a motion and a second to approve the performance of budget fund report all in favor indicate by saying aye aye motion's been approved contract considerations dr mccall thank you mr president this month we have three contracts for your consideration uh one with purdue university northwest partnership agreement for teacher candidate preparation the second is with claudian leasing on a new postage meter and then the third is a gibraltar design for the upcoming
004uh boiler pump replacement and construction documents uh for flint lake elementary all right so we have these three uh contracts for up for our consideration what is the pleasure of the board emotion approval last second we have a motion and a second to approve uh the contract considerations all in favor indicate by saying aye aye motion's been approved okay next we have grants this is alaska good morning board i have three grants for your consideration today the first one is sr-3 this is the third of the federal grants under the elementary and secondary school emergency relief it has a total allocation of four million four hundred fifty two thousand nine hundred eighty six dollars and seven cents bcs plans to use this allocation in line with allowable expenditures for learning loss summer school remote learning
005targeted interventions via smaller class sizes improvement of air quality and also improved food distribution our second grant is the non-english speaking program grant this is a state funded grant with a total allocation of fifty three thousand four hundred ninety nine dollars and sixty seven cents vcs plans to use this grant to offset the salary and benefits for personnel needed to provide academic support for our english learners our third grant is the high ability program grant this is also a state-funded grant with a total allocation of fifty four thousand four hundred eighteen dollars these funds support our international baccalaureate program purchase of screening tools the purchase of supplies and funding for professional development if you have any questions i'll be happy to answer those otherwise i ask for your approval any questions for mrs molasto we
006certainly appreciate the update and note that these grants especially the esser are significant for assisting us with our learning programs here at the schools all right not hearing any others what's the board's budget a motion to approve the grants a second we have a motion and a second to approve these three grants all in favor indicate by saying aye aye thank you board thank you all right up next we have donations and gifts dr mccall thank you mr president uh we have several uh donations and gifts uh for your consideration and approval uh first for valparaiso high school indiana indianapolis colts foundation two thousand dollars for the tickets to colts game for every senior football player this was in recognition of coach bill marshall's uh being honored for uh the coach of the week in
007the state of indiana by the colts uh mr mrs stewart summers donated twenty four hundred dollars to our academic teams uh jeff and nikki templin thirty three thousand dollars for stadium jackets for varsity and jv softball and at ben franklin middle school jeffrey and cara carlson fifty dollars for the volleyball program central elementary i received the book are my thoughts as big as they say by christina cherup who is the author at vail julie douglas and lisa houser representing dress for school donated vail t-shirts to the veil and panda express donated plastic bags district wide we have target valparaiso donating plastic bags to the backpacks and snacks program as well as liv lubeck donating 50 to the same and hungry hound donated school supplies for our students in need throughout the district i recommend that
008we approve the donations and gifts and i will be sending thank you letters to all those who donated thank you dr mccall these are very important to our school system and we're just so appreciative of all these individuals and corporate donors to donate the things that they do to make our schools even better what's the pleasure of the board this morning a motion for approval i'll second it a motion and a second to approve the gifts and donations all in favor indicate by saying aye aye aye motion's been approved all right uh now coming up under old business um board consideration school year 2021 22 calendar change mr allison thank you mr president as we discussed at the last board meeting the high school was looking at a proposal to change the date of graduation
009due to a number of big events that we were able to host or signature events that were able to host on campus so the baseball sectional as well as the track regional both are going to be hosted at valpo high school at the new west campus it's a great opportunity to showcase those events but additionally with memorial day weekend last year there was a number of concerns cited with having enough staffing and security um teacher staff and and kind of impinging on family holiday traditions you know traditional family gatherings and open houses during that weekend so the administration did send out a survey to senior parents and students they were able to reflect on those results last week and got me a report on that along with a new proposal for a date change the
010survey revealed a moderate response i would say about half the class was represented in the survey response hard to tell because it was parents and students and trying to break out whose were what and how many of them were repeats but ultimately at the end of the day it looked like about 85 percent cited not having any concerns with that day or the day change that they were looking at the other concerns that were cited were a myriad of concerns there was no one area that stood out among the others the majority i would say revolved around either cobit protocols pleased to make sure that we do have the graduation ceremony and some concerns with the work week whether it was going to be that friday that was originally scheduled for or the wednesday after
011that being said the high school proposal that you guys have in your board packet is to move the commencement date to wednesday june 1st and have a rain date available for thursday june 2nd one of the things that also came out both in the survey and feedback from last year was the importance of having that rain day and trying to make it so that ceremony can be outside so they're proposing the rain date on thursday and then at you know last effort would be in the gym on that thursday afternoon the reasons just a general overview of the reasons that they're looking at is to not force students to choose between a capstone event and commencement the holiday ensure we have enough staff and security avoid holiday weekend for traditional family get-togethers and open houses
012host the signature events that will be at the high school keep the date as close as possible to the last day of school and maintain a rain date importance of outdoor ceremony for the grandeur of the event and for cobit protocols so that's their proposal i'm happy to answer any questions that i can at this point um but you guys have that in your packet and i'm asking that you uh would approve that and this is the only calendar change under consideration today yes okay questions from mr allison on this proposed change i appreciate the high school's efforts to um you know really be thoughtful about the impact on different groups of students and parents and as well as a survey to parents and say here's what we think but what do you think and
013i really as a parent of a senior i do really appreciate that so good and it's also great that we have a number of events happening this time of the year that we can showcase our beautiful facilities so i'm appreciative that high school thought about how can we accommodate everyone involved in this okay what would the board like to do with this proposal i hope that we accept the change that's presented in this proposal i second it we have a motion and a second for the proposed calendar change any further discussion not hearing any all in favor indicate by saying aye thank you all right i believe next we have a public hearing on our 2021 our current year amended bus replacement plan mrs walkenbush thank you i just have a brief summary of the
014amended plan the plan amendment was posted on the gateway site and also on our website on october 7th which is at least 10 days prior to the public hearing the plan details include a list of all of our buses and it also identifies all of the buses that are scheduled for replacement in the next five years along with the estimated cost by year these expenditures are part of the operations fund this is a copy of our original bus replacement plan for 2021 you'll notice on this list that we have 69 buses that we show that we own each year our amendment is showing that we owe 73 buses the estimated cost remains the same the reason for the additional four buses is that we are requesting to purchase four activity buses the buses will be
015purchased through sr2 federal grant funds so there will not be a cost impact but we have to add these buses to our plan if there are no questions from the board i would ask that we would open the public hearing all right any questions that seem pretty straightforward so at this time uh we will open up to the public public comment on our amended plus replacement plan that's the only item we are considering at this time so anyone wish to speak in favor against the cemented bus replacement plan all right anyone push to speak in favor against not hearing any we will close the public hearing so now we i believe now want to have approval of this amended bus plan that's correct following the public hearing we are asking for approval of the amendment
016of the 2021 bus replacement plan and so we're now asking for approval of the resolution okay board and the resolution is in our packet what is the pleasure of the board a motion that we approve a second we have a motion and a second to approve the amended bus replacement plan for budget year 2021 all in favor indicate by saying aye aye all right next is the purchase of activity buses mrs crockenburg thank you we're now asking for approval to purchase the four activity buses through the central indiana educational service center cooperative bus bed based on the tabulation prepared by rich spicer transportation director we're recommending that the bid be awarded to midwest transit equipment as the lowest responsive and responsible bidder in the amount of two hundred seventy one thousand eight hundred dollars if
017there are no questions we would ask for approval of the bed and dr mccall you want to just give us an overview as to the purpose of these activity buses absolutely the activity buses are being purchased through the federal dollars the sr2 grant as a strategy to overcome the barrier of transportation for our before and after school tutoring sessions tutoring clubs in order to mitigate the effects from the kobig pandemic on our learning oftentimes that transportation has become a barrier for participation for many of our at-risk students given the dearth of available bus drivers and long buses after school to run routes an activity bus allows a traditional staff with regular driver's license to operate it which of course increases the pool of available drivers and allows for individual schools to run a route and
018take home students who would otherwise be unable to attend those after school sessions and i presume then some of the schools will be sharing a bus as they absolutely they'll be sharing buses or coordinating their after-school events to be staggered so tuesday thursday versus monday wednesdays i think this is a really good idea and help further tutoring kids who maybe need the additional help especially maybe caused by as a result of the pandemic and just in general and i think that will benefit them in the long run all right any further questions not hearing any what's the pleasure of the board a motion to approve second we have a motion and a second to approve the purchase of the four activity buses from midwest uh transiting equipment on favor indicate by saying aye all right
019next is now that we've finished up with the 2021 amended bus replacement plan we have the approval of the 2022 bus replacement plan mrs boppenberg thank you in order to use the operations fund to purchase buses in 2022 we're required to adopt a 2022 bus replacement plan the plan was posted on indiana's gateway site and also our website on september we held our public hearing on october 4th if there are no questions we would ask for formal approval of the resolution to adopt our 2022 bus replacement plan all right thank you and ford this is just something that we do on an annual basis and as mrs brockabush has indicated to allow us to purchase buses in our operation fund what's the pleasure of the board on motion for approval a second we have a
020motion and a second to approve the 2022 bus replacement plan call in favor indicate by saying hi hi hi promotion's been approved all right thank you uh next we have uh approval of the 2022 capital projects plan this is block bush thank you also in order to use the operations fund for capital projects purchases we need to adopt our 2022 capital projects plan the plan was posted on the state's gateway site and also on our website on september 21st and we held our public hearing on october 4th we asked for formal approval of the resolution to adopt our 2022 capital project projects plan all right board what's uh your pleasure this morning i motioned for approval second we have a motion and a second to approve the 2022 capital projects plan as required all in
021favor indicate by saying aye aye motion's been approved all right now under new business uh we have board consideration for device repair fees they'll be postponed okay we'll do that at a future meeting and now we next we have first reading and board policies dr mccall thank you mr president uh in your packets are a couple of policies for your consideration no action necessary uh this morning uh but any uh questions comments uh revisions can be submitted before the second reading which will take place next month all right any questions for dr mccall all right let's move on then district data adm and graduation rates dr mccall thank you mr president um as is custom i want to provide the board with an update on our membership for 2021 as you might recall the adm
022day was september 17 2021 at which time we take our membership accountants submitted to the state this year of operative community schools uh was registered with 6 389.71 students uh which is the highest number we've had since we've started counting many years ago a significant increase and of course 0.71 we don't have actually three quarters of a student walking around it's we get credit for some of our parochial students based on instructional minutes provided for general music we provide a teacher as well as orchestra instruction and so based on those number of instructional minutes we get what you might call slivers of students uh credited to us are we able to put that graphic up do we have okay mike can you there you go uh it's color coded uh to make it easier for
023the eye to track a cohort as they progress through our grade levels you'll notice trends as you go but just to summarize a little bit uh we have uh increases uh in seven of our 12 grade levels uh from one cohort to the next uh as well as uh kindergarten first and second grade experiencing their largest populations at those grade levels again in the last uh seven eight years uh that's that we've been tracking that um significant increases um registers of you know classes i think it just credits our community uh being welcoming and our schools being that school of choice for our students and i'm sure this data is also helpful as we're kind of planning you know future you know into the future to see that we have adequate class spaces and sizes
024at each of our schools correct with both staffing as well as any sort of rebalancing that might be necessary [Music] any questions for dr mccall on this thank you i always appreciate the different colors to be able to follow different classes to see you know how the numbers change over the years it's very helpful thank you see no questions on the adm report i'll turn it over to mr allison for the graduation rate report thank you dr mccall um i'm not sure if it's in your board packet or not but i'll report the graduation rate um for last year's graduating class is up from the previous year from 92.9 to 95.26 and this is significant for us i'm seeing that 95 is always a really good number for us to see um and there's there's
025several people that i want to acknowledge and some programs i want to acknowledge as far as why i believe that we're getting there one would be ashley monroe the associate principal at the high school she is as the senior associate principal she has made it her personal mission to get to know every kid's situation and she works directly with the counselors in our counseling department who have been meeting with the seniors multiple times a year in order to understand their comings and goings their plans for the future and any interventions that they may need in order to get across that finish line at the end this has allowed us to capture you know another 10 to 15 students who may or may not have gotten there but we really have been able to put the
026focus on and i'll get to the programs part of that here in a minute but having that extra counselor in the counseling department having the extra social worker having the veil alternative school all of those have allowed us to uh support the students in a more whole child manner uh particularly students who might have struggled to get there in the end so another person i want to acknowledge is erin lee she's our data specialist here at the ad building she has spent a lot of time working with the counseling department the registrar and with ashley monroe to identify who those students are and what supports they may need based on the data that they're presenting that she's reporting to the state and so she's been intimately involved in that process as well next i would
027say that what they've been able to do with the better data is put into effect uh some better tier one supports from the teacher side of things a better early warning system for when students may be struggling or maybe off track as early as their sophomore or junior year and i would say even now down to our freshman year as of this year we really started looking at incoming 8th graders and and where their placements are what their psat data says about them and attendance data discipline data and really start to put together more of a whole child view to help our students i also want to mention uh had it not been for dr mccall's foresight several years ago with the veil alternative program and establishing that as its own support school within a
028school and then dr bendixon and his ability to bring that vision about and the work that he's doing there with those students we also had one student who earned their ged in this class and they don't count towards the graduation rate but i think that's significant and worth mentioning each year we seem to capture capture anywhere between one to five students through that process which comes through the veil and some of the work that they do to help students earn that high school equivalency in in in summary i would just say that the things that we've been able to do the last few years the foresight that was there before any of the last few years occurred have really helped us respond well and that's during a pandemic so pretty exciting stuff i think it
029holds for our future and i'm just happy to report that we're seeing some increases in some really positive gains from the people and programs that we have in place thank you mr allison uh questions or comments on this copy i want to i want to say something to all you guys about this this these were two issues five years ago when i got on the board that were personally really really really important to myself number one was increasing our adm because as everybody knows in this room school systems are paid by number of students you get paid per student so the more students you have the more financial resources you have so we can have programming for your children so that was a very important thing to me personally the other thing of course was
030graduation rate when i went to school here in the 80s our graduation rate was very high and it had dipped a little bit and that was very very important to me when i joined the school board having over a 95 graduation rate was the goal and we've achieved it um i agree wholeheartedly with your comment about dr mccall having the foresight to hire dr benickson um i had number of conversations with jim about this how we raised our ranking whether it was with the u.s news and world report ranking and a lot of the information we got back after making several phone calls to washington dc was graduation rate and how you do it based on uh social economic status whatever within your school system and that's how schools get ranked and quite honestly it's
031very good for our community i being a community guy this was extremely important to me uh because uh there's probably nothing more important than how we treat our children in this community and um how we educate our children and it's it's very very important um that our kids leave our school system prepared for the world and um i can only speak as a parent from this standpoint my three boys that have graduated from valparaiso schools have more than more than succeeded at the next level against kids from all the you know private schools around the city of chicago my kids were more prepared than 99 of the kids that went went off to college and again i can only speak from a parental perspective i want to give our administration a lot of credit for
032a lot of the foresight you guys have because you guys don't think the next month you guys think two three four years down the road the bus replacement plan ideas of course everybody knows there's a shortage of bus drivers right now everyone's reading about in the paper you guys had the foresight let's get shorter buses let's put people driving the buses let's get more drivers let's figure out a way to do it so i really want to say thank you for always thinking one step ahead two three years down the road because this matters i don't see this stuff changing or we're gonna all of a sudden get a whole bunch of truck drivers we're gonna get a whole bunch of bus drivers um i don't see people jumping back to go back to work
033right now everyone's reading the same news that i'm reading watch the same sunday shows that i watch and it's great that you that you know sharon brought up the idea of getting the shorter bus we got it past and now we have the ability to stay one step ahead of other school systems so i want to say thank you to the administration for always being 10 steps ahead of everything well thank you dr barron um and i think your comments are spot on when you allude that the statistics are nice you know the data points are important but you know kids are what they represent and every child has a story and although it's really the theme this year you know know to grow i know our kids to help grow um it's really been
034at uh the center of what we do you know every data point is a kid and uh who has a pathway or dreams and doesn't know the path to get to those dreams and it's about the people we have in our schools who help make those dreams a reality by first making it into a plan you know dreams are visions without plans and they attach those plans to those dreams and make them goals uh and then help them work to get it and it's a it's a whole community effort um you know i appreciate your comments about the leadership behind it but it's really the people walking the halls in our schools in our community who give our students opportunities to explore those worlds that just a few months ago maybe didn't even know existed
035uh and it inspires them um and that that's really across the board whether uh they're going to uh college and professional schools or uh just you know one of my former flint lakers i ran into at the high school yesterday when i was there uh who is uh in the trades program and looking forward to becoming a carpenter uh and building up the community those are the things that we cannot lose sight of among everything going on and the data points is that you know our students are what matter and continue to grow and dream and then have those dreams turn into goals those goals have plans and those pathways to achieve it so i appreciate all the support and kind words are these are uh we're in a good place but we continue to
036work to get better so thank you [Music] all right well i echo the comments of my board members and this is really a great achievement and especially for our kids i think you know the more that can accomplish their goals i think they'll be well prepared as they for their future endeavors so thank you to everyone involved and this is a great accomplishment for our schools all right i think next we have board consideration transfer tuition statement form 515 mrs clockenberg thank you the state of indiana requires the use of prescribed form 515 to calculate the cost of educating students for each class level for the purposes of transfer tuition a separate calculation is completed for kindergarten elementary middle school and high school the form is routinely completed each year to determine the actual expenses
037for the prior school year and each year we also complete the estimated calculation for the next school year we submitted copies of the forms to the board through board docs earlier this week we are asking for approval of form 515 transfer tuition statement for 2020 2021 actual and 2021 2022 estimated also as we do each year we are asking for approval to waive charging cash tuition for the 21 22 school year based on the amount of state funding we see for the students is there any questions from the board i would be happy to answer them all right board any questions for mrs clockenbush this is something that we have to do each year it's required that we do and so this is just more of a formality uh same process and procedures that that
038this is done in the past so i believe this does require board approval what's the board displeasure a motion to approve second we have a motion and a second to approve the transfer tuition statement forms 515 all in favor indicate by saying aye aye motion's been approved all right i believe that concludes our new business um anything else under new business dr mccall uh no mr president okay um i think next we have a public comment um i'll just as a reminder to the patrons of the valparaiso community schools you'll be given three minutes to give the board comments on education issues patrons are reminded a quorum is expected discussions charges or complaints involving personnel litigation student discipline will not be permitted this is an opportunity for you to provide information to the board and
039not to enter into a debate or personal attacks we are valpo and we expect comments to be done with that in mind so i think we have several people signed up correct we have seven uh this morning uh first up will be uh jennifer j hora followed by ruth vance [Music] and then please uh state your name and address for the record thank you sure i'll follow the rules uh good morning my name is jennifer hora i'm at 1953 grass fort court valparaiso indiana and as i signed on the sheet i'm here with three concerns in particular this morning your meeting time coveted safety and diversify our narrative part of me if i speak fast but there were many more people that wanted to be here today but the 7 a.m meeting time is not
040friendly we know this there are studies of government bodies which is what you are and when people put when organizations put meetings at inconvenient times it makes it very difficult you again refuse to move it to a larger location there's at least one person outside who wanted to be signed in but has been told that they were that they could not it's not made available to them it really saddens me that a school board would seemingly go to extremes to not invite public comment and concern second a large group of the velpo school covid safety working group has been contacting you repeatedly asking for a meeting there are over 50 active members there were a thousand people that signed a petition those come from the zip codes that attend your school they have contacted you
041repeatedly not only do we not get a meeting of concerned parents which i would think administration would want to meet with we don't even get replies to our email we yes we supported masks we thank you for doing that but we have been asking since july for so much more than that the medical community knows there is so much more that you can do starting with better communication better testing better dashboard there's a science of it more outdoor events more information on air quality more open windows and as we've been asking more information on implementation of mask policy which considering on the door there was a sign that masks were required in school district meetings i don't think that um asking about implementation no there's a sign that says that's required so um i'm very
042concerned about why you continue to hold meetings at unfriendly times refusal to respond or meet with a large group of professionals additionally michael marachna has been a representative of over 30 medical doctors in porter county and he continues to write you pretty much every friday all board members a superintendent a variety of other people um have been included as well and and he just simply doesn't get responses he is unable to be in this room right now no 30 second warning another friday another a lot of dear dr mccall in valparaiso community schools this is october 1st letter another friday another letter i want to reiterate my thanks to the board for issuing the mass requirement since last week my doubts about the ability of the school districts to communicate and manage the mass requirement
043have grown anecdotal reports continue to demonstrate that kids failure to wear masks flaunt mass requirements and they're slacking support from teachers can you please wrap up your comments here please wrap up your comments i'm sorry please wrap up your comments you have dr morocno's statement i wish you would reply and meet with the medical professionals additionally diversify our narrative has been trying to come this is horrifying for three meetings your time is up would like a chance to meet they are very disappointed that two meetings in a row high school students cannot come very much thank you ruth vance and then jessica jepson can you add veronica to the list she walked in and the list was already gone two minutes later doctor dr mccall she walked in just before the meeting started i will
044vouch for her to come again okay that's fine we'll go ahead and good morning good morning are you ready for me to start okay i'm ruth vance you have my address on the sign-in sheet i do not want to give my address publicly lately this board has made last-minute changes to the timing of its meetings that leaves one to believe that the board is purposely trying to avoid being observed and purposefully making it difficult for working people and students to attend and participate this board has also changed the time limit on public participation from five minutes to three minutes which is hardly enough time to make your points what's more this board should be willing to listen to parents taxpayers and students for more than the time that is allotted currently for public participation despite
045knowing that there are several important issues surrounding k-12 education these days which many people want to address meetings are being held in this small room with even fewer chairs than normal so that only about i think 20 people can come 17 what i'm trying to count okay and you have larger venues available and that was evidenced when you held meetings at the gymnasium at cook's corners or at the cafeteria at the high school you can do this so i encourage you to do that all this taken together leads one to believe that this board doesn't really care what parents taxpayers and students in this community think and instead wants to squelch their speech and impose its will this board's accountable to the city council and has a duty to parents taxpayers and students to act
046in their best interests and this duty requires transparency and a collaborative approach which in turn requires free and open discourse that's not been happening and this must change thank you [Music] jessica jepson and then lynn hahn all right jessica jepson 1259 sherwood drive hello again um i actually wrote something this time instead of a much better public speaker than going through here reading so bear with me it's going to be quick as a mother of four children three are school age and only one is attending school in person still i try to quickly obtain an exemption for them not to mask hard to do at 2 30 pm on a friday of a holiday weekend and it was ignored they were sent to the office and denied a public education unless they conformed to a
047rule that is harmful for them mccall you saw what happens to their own mother in a picture last year when i wear a mask you saw my face my son shares a similar skin condition lathering steroid cream on a child's face will not be done anymore he's being homeschooled you lost a national junior honor society all honors all a student he is missing his friends dearly because you guys refused to accommodate him medically and denied it my seven-year-old who already had a 504 plan in place was denied even having a conversation about her ability to have an accommodation at school she was sent to the office and shunned away from all the other students up on arrival and it's now safe at home with us completing an at-home program as well and flourishing because you
048guys spoon fed her as a 504 program my husband's a teacher and witness to this so your curriculum is not working our our seventh grader who is still attending in person has an iep took us three weeks to get into a physician to obtain a medical letter letter for her to not wear a mask this was three weeks of her disability showing up at a higher level than normally because of attending school after sending the formal note over to all board members mccall principals and sped teacher about a month ago no acknowledgement has been received not a peep the community if you see here is on a trend starting to bond together on either side that we're on because of the lack of leadership we have what form of measurement are you guys going to
049give us as parents to to give us choice back why do you continually deflect responsibility for this decision onto the county health department who on the board is voting to support masking our children versus allowing parents to make a choice as to what is best for their child speaking of that every single board member put their hand on their heart except for you erica watkins when we said the pledge no personal attacks and no calling out board members no polling why do you think you have the right to decide what is best for my child rebecca spoke last month in regards to liking the board's new masking roll after coffee and 90 minutes of learning about one another she's an amazing woman who has the best interest of her family at the forefront of everything
050just like many people who share the same ideals i do despite having completely different perspectives and having a mutual respect for one another we quickly came to came up with ideas on how to move forward with things in the community communicating those perspectives and ideas is key for others to understand and learn from as well from my understanding rebecca wants masking in place so her child can obtain a vaccination that actually has a time frame as leaders you have done an awful job of bringing people together you have created more division and dislike in this community it is closer than um it is clear that there is no transparent no authentic answers you are using our children as political pawns hiding from the community and have no accountability communication is key this is why we
051have first amendment rights in our nation's constitution those very rights you keep wanting to silence by continually moving the board meeting times is the next meeting going to be at 3 3 a.m regardless i will be there and so will many other community members we want communication we want accountability we want transparency as to what is occurring within our schools not deflection silence non-response and blow off answers thank you glenn hahn and then stephanie pals pretty adversarial isn't it doesn't have to be masks don't work i have a list of 30 peer-reviewed studies that say that they don't feel that soggy rag on your face right now every filter has a clean side and a dirty side your mouth and nose are on the dirty side okay we're getting staph infections we're getting bacterial pneumonia
052more than anything what we're getting is social and psychological damage to kids who have to wear these things eight hours a day they're not meant to be worn eight hours a day you know that and you know that forced masking is child abuse that's right so it doesn't need to be adversarial if you can't get with this program then resign thank you amen [Applause] thank you for your comments who's next stephanie pals and then jennifer bernard it's always my problem okay my name is stephanie pals my address is on the sign in sheet i'm here today representing porter county parents for freedom we are a growing number of parents concerned about our freedom i'm here to let you know that we are officially launching a campaign to encourage voters to vote against the renewal of
053the referendum in november of you promised us in the return to learn plan that masked would be optional no matter what the status our county was in we are not under any state direct directive to wear masks per the county commissioners dr stamp cannot direct the school board only advise you betray parents who enrolled their children in bcs with the understanding that they get to choose whether or not they're going to put a medical device on their children's face we understand that in 2015 the referendum passed by a margin of 2 to one it was an easy vote with bipartisan support and you guys did a great job of convincing the community that you were for our children's flourishing and you need that support right now for the renewal for the operation oh renewer renewal
054of the referendum but now it's 2021 and you have a large majority of people in this community that no longer trust you our country is in political turmoil and many are fearful of the future we are also on the verge of a giant recession food gas and our basic necessities are going to be at an all-time high the energy cost to heat our homes is estimated to be 50 percent higher this winter families are going to struggle even more than they're struggling now this is our understanding that in the in 2015 the average family saw a 600 increase to their taxes we all know that that is going to be higher with the way that home values have soared we don't know if this is a sacrifice that families can make at this financial time
055you're also asking businesses whose properties are assessed at seven hundred fifty thousand to pay over three thousand dollars in new taxes do you know how hard it is going to be to run a small business in the upcoming years this is enough to put them over the edge whatever amount of money you're asking i don't understand how you can ask it in 30 seconds when for more money when you know that you are not meeting the will of the student's parents how can families afford to renew this it can be very hard for someone to put their name on a petition come to a rally or speak at a school board meeting i hate that i am up here this is not my thing but once someone gets into the privacy of a voting booth
056we think that people are going to speak very clearly we are going to hold rallies we are going door to door we are not staying silent we are going to educate people and let them know you do not deserve more of our money when you treat our children like this [Applause] jennifer bernard and then cara bolts hi my name is jennifer bernard i'm at 3054 sega road valparaiso good morning i'd like to state for the record that this is that my last speech last month was either cut off or edited midway through you're trying to silence us parents i hope that it doesn't happen again today my children have been with the valparaiso community school system for 12 years now i have never had to speak at a school board meeting until last may last
057school i never spoke about masking my child because we are unaware of the risks of coveting children we are now 21 months into the pandemic and we know that it's extremely rare for a child under the age of 18 will die from covid as a matter of fact 419 total deaths of school-aged children in the united states to date almost exclusively had severe comorbidities but you all know this and continue to mask our healthy children i made a visit once again to porter hospital here in porter county there are zero children at the hospital to date yesterday the day before no one is admitted under the age of 18 from covid there are six school local schools that are unmasked right now the total number of cases in the last week for all six school
058systems are 13 total cases griffith has seven cases this week five middle and high school two elementary east porter county schools are three schools in one district couts has zero morgan zero washington township zero union township also unmasked has three positive cases and hebron all middle and high school kids unmasked have one positive case with three being quarantined i personally checked each of these in october the 19th on their dashboards contrast that with a single school system valparaiso has five cases this week this is evidence that the masking provide no additional benefit for the student's safety but it does have a cost to our students there is no mass mandate in the entire state of indiana yet our children are massed up all day are you really concerned about the health and the safety of
059our kids if so did kovid not make its appearance at homecoming this year how about the football games come on we as adults are running around town going to grocery stores bars restaurants football games concerts and more you think that my child's at risk at his desk at school you're making children who ironically are the ones that are not dying from this virus wear a mask all day we will not give up fighting for our children we are all aware of the crt and the seo that is being taught right now in our schools why is valparaiso trying to make a race issue where there is none is valpo trying to divide our children farther apart we will not allow it and we were we are wide awake now i've never had to speak at
060a board meeting in the last 12 years because i assume that teachers and administrators had my child's best interests 30 seconds i had been blind but trust me i now can see we demand that these mass come off our children immediately our county is in yellow the numbers are dropping dramatically we will not stand for this any longer we want to make that choice that's right for us parents it sickens me that six of you are standing before me made the decision to mask our kids yet outside this building you all walk around masculists by the way for this school board to place a 7 a.m board meeting is evidence that you are trying to prevent parent involvement how do you expect a single mother to choose between coming to this meeting or getting your
061child to school today this is disgusting and reprehensible pair of bolts and then veronica when you come up please sign in hi cara baltz 266 westport road um i got to go off a little bit of script from what i prepared because i feel like i'm living in a twilight zone when i was listening to you all speak about how you really love the community how you appreciate our input you survey the high school parents about graduation and truly want their opinions because you're literally not doing any of that you haven't even sent a survey to literally see what people want masks and don't want masks one thing that all the people in this community and room can agree on you're not listening to either side at all you don't respond to emails either side
062you don't comment either side that is completely unacceptable um so anyways i want to thank you also like everyone else for moving the meeting to 7 a.m you again tried to make it so that people could not speak or attend but it doesn't matter if the meeting's at 7am 8am 2am down in indy 3 30 in chicago i assume those things are also illegal to not have it in the county but legality but what is that minor right it doesn't really matter um but we're not going to stop coming either way we're all going to be here both sides so you might as well start answering to people and our questions both sides we all have questions um we're not gonna stop coming until we have choice um do you see parents suing school boards
063because they want masks mandated i've literally heard zero incidents of that however suing school boards against tyrannical unconstitutional mandates that include masking our kids with a mask that is literally proven to be 12 percent effective to prevent the aerosols from entering it 12 percent um that's what we're doing here we're focusing on science right um vcs again as we've already heard has five positive cases we have over 6200 students here that makes the percentage of students in valpo .0008 that have coven it literally makes no sense that they're wearing masks another hot topic that you probably think none of us are paying attention to would be the indoctrination of critical race theory through social emotional learning uh just last week a racist article was passed out to students at the high school that was claimed
064to be on the back of a field trip form and use as scrap paper which i find really hard to believe i would assume we got enough money to have the copy machines full of blank papers right um however 30 seconds it was extremely racist um it only exists because we're allowing it to exist i urge everyone to look up caring school community and second steps these are the curriculums that the school is intending to implement in the school and vote on um there are questions on the panorama survey that was given to six through twelve also that are related to racism gender fluidity and your child's sexual orientation um one last comment cause i know i'm gonna run out of time here i got two things is i know two down syndrome children in
065valpo that we're not making medical exceptions someone said that right two down syndrome children one of them rash all over her face no exception for her to not wear a mask i'd like to know i'm a icu nurse what doctor would not advocate for a child with a rash all over their face to have the mask off it's never going to get better another student i witnessed this with my eyes down syndrome child came home with the mask tied around his neck when his mother asked the bus driver what is this mask on my child's neck for she said i i thought that you sent him to school like that the bus driver didn't have a clue her child does not have the mental capacity or ability to be able to take the mask off
066the school his teachers forced him to wear a mask by tying it around the back of his head he doesn't know how to remove it how is that acceptable okay last thing again porter county parents from freedom we have a website pcpf we are taking donations to pursue a lawsuit veronica you go thank you good morning my name is veronica wilson my address was 2154 blarney stone drive thank you so much for changing this meeting to 7 am today my 11 year old son will be getting himself on the bus with no parent at home so that i could be here once again to advocate for him and the 6200 other students that are being bullied and discriminated against by valparaiso school board i invite all of you to go out and velpo this weekend
067go to the football game go to a restaurant go anywhere in porter county take a look around count the masks it's almost zero when given the choice almost no one wears a mask why is it different for our children than it is for us adults have a higher risk of getting seriously ill even though that percentage is also less than one but in school and on buses we're forcing our children into masks i watch my son grab his mask and go out for the bus every morning i go about my day traveling to many places all over porter county no matter how many people are in a room i'm never mandated to wear a mask why are we discriminating against our children i've heard that the schools are getting paid incentives to mass children this
068is what some refer to as bribery my child should not be masked to bring money to the district the teachers administrators should not be relying on the masking of our children for funding bribery should not be allowed in our school district not for any reason the school board along with dr stamps recommendations are covering the smiles of six thousand two hundred children for no reason there are no statistics to support the masking of children feel free to look them up yourselves i'd like to give some examples of discrimination that are taking place in our schools the schools you are the governing board over last year at heveland my son was forced to eat lunch at a table alone he felt like a leper at all the other tables there were two kids they were allowed
069to converse through lunch he was last because of his last name and he was forced to sit alone for an entire school year but it was worth it to the school because he wasn't spreading germs while he ate he wasn't sick he never got sick he didn't get others sick but for an entire year he was treated as though he would cause other children to die if he ate lunch with them that is a heavy burden for a 10 year old child this year julianne jepson was forced to the back of her classroom to sit alone and eventually sent home and denied a public school education because she had a mental medical exemption for wearing a mask she was made to feel like the girl with cooties but not by the students by the school
070administration we spent the good part of the last decade fighting against discrimination based on race color gender sexual orientation we spend so much time in school teaching our children to be nice to others no matter what they look like or what their background is we have fought against racism and sexism for centuries but now we're discriminating discriminating against and segregating our own children in schools for not wearing a mask or for maybe possibly carrying a virus that hasn't harmed one student in the nearest three districts in our county since this all started prove me wrong our students have rights our federal and state constitutions guarantee those rights to us we can talk more about this when you're served with our lawsuit i will leave you with this people always say that i didn't give up
071my seat because i was tired but that isn't true i was not tired physically or no more tired than i usually was at the end of a working day no the only tired i was was tired of giving in rosa parks thank you we took it up at the beginning of the meeting were you here before the meeting started the officer had said i would be able to draw please come up and sign in i got your own penny yes hey good morning uh mike morocco 3254 toscana court i was just reading the room like to uh ask everybody here to save their applause to the end so i just want to say thank you to the school board for moving forward and following dr stamp's guidance about six weeks into the school year starting
072and in the communication i've sent the board i just i think would help sort of defray some of the hostility would be using uh the medical experts in the community i think would be really helpful whether it be having a coveted safety health officer things like that i think would be really helpful i think associated peds is you know i think has helped the school district in years past for 50 years is what i've been told using their advice i think would be great continue to use dr stamp's advice i thank you also too there's been a lot of mention of the constitution and i think the most conservative principles are local control so i applaud the school board using local control to try to help improve the safety in the community i also like
073to remind probably mostly people in the room that it's not just about death from covet but a lot of people are still alive that have had kova that also are suffering from other issues so to wrap um that up i just want to say thank you to the school board for protecting the safety of the kids i you know obviously reading the room uh i'm in the minority of the people here but again just wanted to say thank you for that thank you to the board letting me speak and uh you all have a very good day thank you very much for your time thank you thank you thank you doctor dr mcconnell do you have any comments this morning several thank you mr president thank you to everyone who spoke uh recently valparaiso high
074school received recognition from the ido and uh college board and senator charbonneau passed that along uh that that recognition was that over 25 of our graduating seniors had a score of at least three or above on at least one ap test and that's that is a significant statistic again referencing statistics equals kids uh being exposed to a rigorous curriculum uh does them well just with their critical thinking uh in writing and moving forward in life last night i had the opportunity to attend the academic letter ceremony for students at valparaiso high school who had earned a 3.5 last year well attended lots of students were on the program kudos to them on their achievement and thank you to the valpo schools foundation for sponsoring and spearheading that recognition in regard to some of the comments
075um such as regarding masks uh deflecting responsibility i've said repeatedly it's been my decision with of course the full support of the board and in alignment with the updated guidance and direction from the porter county health department as well as in context of the revised control measures and mandatory quarantining of direct contacts by the indiana department of health at the time that we had made that decision that was through the first three weeks of school we had over 300 students quarantined due to a school-based direct contact since september 7th uh there have been almost 240 students who have been who have remained in school because of the mass environment including 27 this week due to nine positive cases we sincerely hope that the community numbers do continue to improve uh and that we will continue
076to monitor them and consult with the porter county health department to determine uh such time where mitigation strategies would be appropriate to change that would maintain a safe and healthy environment and keep kids in school where they would have the best education which is of course in-person learning just to clarify i've heard this over time but schools are not paid to mask or unmasked kids there is no strings attached no incentives to deploy that as a mitigation strategy again that is following the direction and guidance and keeping kids in school um the comment regarding the panorama survey uh touching on different topics uh that is not what the survey was about dr hawkins i hate to put you on a spot but could you speak very briefly about the panorama survey that was issued to
077grades 6 through 12. uh yes um our panorama survey was given to sixth through twelfth grade students um with the opportunity to opt out either the student or the parent could could do so and really to gather information on how our students are doing in a number of areas so one was positive and challenging feelings as well as emotional regulation and we also asked some questions that had to do with their um engagement in their classes their sense of belonging the school climate so that we could be responsive and continue to improve our practice in that so our social workers have have been supporting students in some of their responses and we've been continuing to look at the data to see how we can improve and take care of students and were any of the
078topics that were outlined by previous speaker in this survey it's not related to critical race theory general fluidity or anything like that no thank you [Music] i'd just like to remind everyone too that the board meeting is being live streamed and will be archived to our youtube channel for asynchronous viewing as well so uh that concludes my comments dr mccall thank you for clarification and your comments this morning i think one of the things you have reminded us is that as a result of the governor's directive to the state health department on whether students need to be quarantined by wearing a mask and a student came in to direct contact they would not necessarily need to be quarantined is that correct that is accurate in a in a classroom environment when all parties are masked
079uh you still must conduct contact tracing and identify direct contacts and report those numbers to the state however those direct contacts because of the mass environment are not required to quarantine they are exempt just as those who have fully vaccinated status athletes who are unmasked and unvaccinated are subject to quarantine hey um please dr mccall speaking please [Music] so i guess the point is 240 kids that we were able to keep in school since early september that's that's a big number and i think that's exciting it is it is a significant number uh because it not only impacts those individual children and their ability to maintain in-person learning for anywhere between 8 and 14 days as well as their families who are impacted when they're quarantined and have to find child care for them as
080well as the teachers who would be responsible for maintaining engagement as well as catching them up on any learning gaps that result during those eight to fourteen days on a constant revolving cycle of students who have been in person versus students who have been quarantined um you know 240 students is a very significant number uh in the last five to six weeks well thank you and you know i think all of our hope is that the cases keep going down and i know there's not a day that we don't think about what's happening in a school with coven and i know you're very involved in looking at these policies and our hope is that things will get better for us in the future so or any other comments you'd like to make this morning i
081would just um give an input i do uh appreciate i'm never concerned about being called out particularly uh regarding the pledge of allegiance because i always recite the words but i actually find it befitting because i had an opportunity to listen to the v-a-l-p-o-p-o-c plus piece that was aired and i've found it interesting that one of the scenarios shared about the pledge of allegiance and the emphasis on all that scenario was regarding my daughter and i feel like i probably should have done a bit more because my daughter that that particular scenario in class that day when the pledge of allegiance was recited and she was looked at and said and justice for all white people and i'm very glad at how i raised my daughter because she did not respond negatively on that she
082went and got the support that she should have received from the social workers at the school who did an excellent job on responding to that i feel that i should have said more as her mom but i've taught my children to have their own voice i'm really also pleased at the rosa parks quote that was rendered today this is not something that should just be used at points like this but at all times we should have conversations and continue to communicate as people we have to learn to communicate and not be um and i shouldn't say anger because i love protests i believe in protesting and i believe in people having a voice and saying what needs to be said i appreciate hearing that i want to see more emails and forgive me for not
083always responding it takes me a little while to just reflect and make sure i'm saying the right things and appropriate things because no one wants to be offended offended will allow us to separate ourselves as a community and what we need to do is bind together more we hear of the racial things happening i think we all choose what we want to hear and what we want to respond to but there are racial things that are happening not just in our schools but in our communities so i want to thank them for inviting me to hear that piece on the email i need the websites that were presented today i'll go back and i'll listen so that i can really hear i'm interested in the porter county moms coming together i'm interested in what people
084think and what they feel however i want us to do it in a way that's respectful to each other and also mindful that the things that we are teaching our children to do that we as adults continue to do those same things all right um not hearing any other comments um we have a com motion to adjourn so move a second we have a motion in a second all in favor say aye aye aye approaching has been approved thank you for coming over again