Asheville City Board of Education 5/6/24

001e e e good evening and welcome to this um work session for Asheville City Schoolboard for uh May Monday May 6th um first of all before I forget I want to acknowledge that this week uh is teacher and staff Appreciation Week at asille city school so thank you to our dedicated staff who work with our students uh each and every day uh inside of our buildings we really appreciate you there are events happening throughout the week um to celebrate you our staff um who are in our buildings and in this building as well um throughout the week anti-racist policies for all students and staff to learn and Thrive we recognize that our positions come with power responsibility and public service for the entire ACS Community we will model our commitment to equity through our practices

002and decisions during this meeting we invite a pause if harm has taken in place papers on my desk right now I print everything out because I didn't have papers on my desk right now I print everything out because I didn't have the opportunity to to read everything that's was sent this past week good afternoon members of the school board and Dr Ferman my name is Samara Jefferson and I am a senior at Asheville High and the senior team lead on this racial Equity ambassador program presentation team we are here to share our work and to ask for your support as we continue to create a culture of belonging dur during a time when attacks against creating Equitable classrooms of belonging increase in our state and our nation I think it is important for you to

003know that my grandfather Leo Gaines was a part of the Coalition of black students demanding Equitable spaces during ashvah High's integration walkouts in 1969 we are a part of a long line of student Equity at activists from aore I decided to join re because my mom inspired me and helped me and told me to get more involved and I wanted to help make a change brief gives me hope for the future just because of the people I've met and the adults I've been in communication with during my time here they've really helped me regain my faith in what I think people are capable of I get to be an advocate for the Latin X and Hispanic Community it's not only going to help my generation but future Generations as well as we educate ourselves about

004the topics that we have gathered we can further that information to the community and to teachers around the school it's a program that continues to grow and Amaze not only me but this whole entire community the Ashville 6 are strategies that the students have decided if the Educators in our building now use Educators intentionally so that's their teachers the counselors the social workers the folks who sit in the front office if everyone uses these strategies our school can be a more inclusive community and that will move us towards racial Equity within our [Music] school visibility is making every student feel acknowledged and included in the classroom connecting to student lives making connections between classroom content students perspectives and experiences are of this experience reap to me means impact building connections and building equity and inclusion

005in my school I decided to join reap to make a more drastic change in people's lives and with this program we can voice the students concerns and use their extraordinary contribution to better the school we are the future and as a part of reap I'm glad to say that I'm helping shape it it's uncommon for folks to have conversations about race because it makes people uncomfortable but I think if we can Norm how to have the conversations that this uncomfortable space is temporary because we're moving towards a different future for future students we would like to share with you some highlights from our work together this year from local events to Statewide and national conferences our team has accomplished a lot reap was invited to be a Workshop present presenters at this year's ACS curriculum

006conference our team of Juniors and a sophomore delivered three presentations throughout the year um and August we spent time sharing where we as students felt visible and connected at school and we had a revealing Fishbowl with the teachers in the room where we found some interesting qualitative data when asked why did you go into teaching white teachers listed a love of a subject or children or an opportunity teachers of color described wanting to support bikebox students by being the role models they had or never had this is important to remember when we look at student data later in this presentation in October we met again to begin working on creating an equitable classroom practices packet we organized the Equitable classrooms practices document from central office which largely originated in 2012 in a Maryland school district

007into our own Ashville six practices we found that there were no concrete practices for strategies five addressing race and racism and only one for strategy six connecting to Future selves after sharing our findings with the equity collaborative and the whole reap group we worked on adding adding practices and then presented our final draft to teachers at the curriculum conference in March to get their feedback we added three more strategies from our original 15 highlighted in yellow um to make the checklist as clear and comprehensive as possible Marta reviewed the document for asset based language and what you have before you is a resource to be used by the district moving forward looks like this right here in addition to working locally a team of seniors presented at the color of Education conference in Raleigh in

008October and western western universities Equity conference in February our presentation was entitled co-creating Equitable spaces and we discuss the Asheville 6 and the importance of having Affinity groups and heterogeneous working groups such as reap we also experienced amazing presentations by black black authors and educators so to ensure that all reap members have a shared understanding of systemic racism we hosted a REI training youth REI training in November and we invited bunkham County County students who are seeking support to start Equity work at their school we screened to a group of our team went to Ashville middle school and introd a group of our team went to Asheville middle school and introduced reap as well as the Asheville 6 to their teachers we had discussions on the six strategies one of the most exciting outcomes of

009our time at AMS is that reap junr will begin at AMS this fall so one of our biggest events was Jason R response rates have varied um the winter 2023 administration of the survey was the most successful with 830 responses being submitted the data reported in the bar charts comes from this winter 2023 data set but results from all the other surveys have been very similar students perceptions of the ashel 6 strategies have been quite stable over time in general students have reported observing evidence of all ashal 6 strategies 1- 4 more often than strategies 5- six the greatest opportunity for growth has repeatedly been observed in strategy 5 addressing race and racism when we look at students experiences on strategy 5 more closely we see some differences in perceptions across racial identity groups examining

010the never category is perhaps the most revealing as we see the slides race and racism were reportedly never addressed in 34% of classes that number goes down to 32% among white students but goes up 37% among bip bipo students and up to 40% among black students these differences are important to note as they suggest that black student that students racial identities affect how they're experiencing the classroom so after seeing this pattern across multiple um semesters the reap team has tried to focus more our energy in addressing this um problem with race and racism and keep in mind that they and we wanted to promote discussions about it throughout the school with students and staff yeah and we also know from our work with teachers during the curriculum conference sessions that if white teachers didn't enter

011the field with addressing race and racism in mind um and if they did not have concrete practices as part of the schooling of professional development then it is no surprise that this already difficult work is more challenging to implement um our winter 20124 survey data also includes some interesting results about students perceptions um about adults on campus who they knew and trusted very important to note um is that the number increases for yeah the number number increases for students of color closer to 17% of black students didn't have an adult they trusted when you look at all students of color um when you look at all students of color including black students it is 19.1% so almost 20% of bipo students reported not having a trusted adult on campus we are happy to report that

012over 80% of students said they had at least one adult whom they trusted on campus but obviously this is a big problem in honor of of educator appreciation week we would like to honor some of the our staff who were mentioned by names by students in our winter 2024 survey we are grateful for educators who have been willing to learn with us and apply the ash 6 into their classrooms and teams going further we would like to highlight 12 teachers who were mentioned multiple times by both white and bipox students thank you school board for inviting us to your meeting and for being engaged in our presentation our ask is for you to continue to vote courageously around issues of equity and belonging to ensure our district continues to be a leader in facing and

013responding to disparities and we'd also like you to prioritize recruiting retaining and compensating a diverse staff who can foster authentic connections to us please continue to support and seek student voices and input we would also like you to continue creating time and space to listen to students it recognize that students have valuable contributions to make in shaping the evolution of our district thank you [Applause] we would now like to open the floor for like any questions that you guys may have if you have any thank you so I'm sorry I have a question yeah um do you mind putting up the final slide about the recommendations the the final the final one the continue creating time and space to listen to students um and recognize that students have valuable contributions to make in shaping the

014evolution of our district which I I mean I love all three um but this one just from a board perspective is one that I as board chair tend to concentrate on a lot um and you may or may not know that one thing that we've done over the past year and a half is um Reserve um seats at this board table during our work sessions for any student who chooses to come to come and have a place at this work session and we and we offer time during the course of our work just for you know to engage with those students and say you know anything bubbling up for you questions you may have I understand that's not a perfect system you know there are um you know first of all five o'clock on a

015Monday afternoon is not ideal I get that number one um and I know I'm somewhat putting for students here on the spot to speak for an entire student body and I don't mean to do that but um would just just love to kind of think collaborative like what are some ways that um that we can as a board kind of think about ways to make those seats um much more of a collaborative Collective thing that you know that's that we are we um and then kind of maybe like listing someone who they can contact you know and figure out kind of collaborate and figure out who's who can go um on that certain day and uh yeah for me that would be that would be definitely first step is to get everybody to kind of

016know about this um yeah great thank you [Applause] yeah thanks again so much for for taking the time to and all that work right yeah yeah thank you good evening thank you for the opportunity to share where we are with our Equity efforts and our community engagement and have you seen the litts that are waiting very anxiously out there so I'm going to try to speed up through that so that they can come and talk to us um but if Dr de would you the thing that I want to say to all of us is we're going to watch a 308 second video that we've watched before and so everything that you hear tonight be it from myself the district equity team the leaders Community whatever to just really Center this right that equity for

017us is a practice right instead of like a matrix and the written thing right we need the both end and as we're thinking every decision that we're making like we say in our Equity statement and stuff it's that Equity is a practice right of my foundational critical claims is that Equity is a practice it's not an idea or Theory it's not a conversation or a debate it's not a sympathy or an empathy that one expresses rather it's a story of human dignity that you embody over and over day after day until it becomes a part of you and you become a part of it Equity is a practice thank you Dr de okay and so next I just want to say that I want to say to our board members first of all and foremost

018that I am so honored that you all made such a priority about centuring students and equity and anti-racist policies so much so to in June adopt the equity statement to be read at every board meeting and how that shows your commitment when I meet with Equity officers monthly and I share that it is a really big deal right that we are centering that and that we are really committed to what this means sometimes we're working towards it right and we're practicing that's why I wanted the practice to be said to us over and over again because if we had this figure out we wouldn't need to be doing this okay and so now I would like to invite all of the district Equity team members that are present to please stand I wanted all of

019you to see who is present at the table because what we have done with a district Equity team is that we've created a container where at that moment hierarchy is absent doesn't matter if you are the board chair if you're a teacher if you're an instructional assistant bus driver whatever your role is at that moment when we are together we all get to speak equally about what is going on in our school in our community and we are able to really practice what we hear the board saying at our opening every time right if harm is present we invite the pause and we model and practice repair on the spot right so those are all things that as we're talking about all the different things that you'll see and you already saw that reap showed

020us a lot about what that looks like it's just every single time we're making a decision every single time that we are talking about what Infinity group and we are meeting monthly and it's to create space right where you heard the racial Equity Ambassador students saying it is important for us to have Affinity groups right and especially with everything that is going on in the state in our community in our buildings we sometimes have to have space to talk about what goes on in black and brown communities or in our personal lives and so you can see here that we had a really nice representation and we're going to and we're not it's about how do you engage when you are guest in a community and how are you being received in the community right

021and like how are we practicing something different to get out of our comfort zone and us be the Learners okay I think I already said that part so I'm going to call go ahead one more time Dr de and these are the impacts that we see because normally we want to see you know but what are the grades and what are the things that is important and that's what we normally do in regular every day school and so for us we want to see enthusiasm confidence leadership skills sense of belonging math identity connecting with families learning together and community and we do this all the time and so now we're going to hear from the leaders [Applause] are you going first okay well I don't know where's Parish Parish will you be first come I

022have a question first uh the person that's the school what is it called question can we cancel wi wisdom lar go ahead hi my name is Lamar and something what we make in Marv's math club is a family it to somebody else my name is pill and us one about um M and um and us so we this SI so in our leadership Circle we um how we close every which is how we close every um after school session um we talk about the stuff we did in the math we learned of how we demonstrated leadership my name is at school we only learn at Marvel's math club but at school I only learned one digit multiplication but at at my my uh my name is wild I uh my name is wild I work

023in um early childhood and Elementary education um and marvelous math club has been probably one of my favorite experiences with good to be here hi my name is Maya Resnik I'm a senior at silsa um I've been involved with Marvel's ma Club since I was byebye did you want me to St thank you all so much for allowing the space for that um as you see it takes all of us right community members um students like you saw Maya like she said from sixth grade and here she is graduating and um also participating in Building Bridges REI just so that cross pollination is happening at all levels um and then now did Dr Kaplan leave okay Dr Kaplan do you want to say a little bit about the asset based model I'll go ahead and

024tell you about a little bit of a um so asset and Justice based philosophy thinking we started with asset and Justice based language and then we very quickly realized that if we just do the language instead of the thinking and practice then we're just using words right and if you're not shifting the practice then it could actually be harmful right because then we know that we could use it differently and I'll tell you years ago um we said to the math leaders that you're a math leader and we're math Champions right and so someone said to one of the kids the kids are you being a leader right now we said oh that's not how we use it right we're talking about I'm so glad that you're demonstrating leadership in your building at marvelous math

025cup in the community and always right and so it's then when we thought well we have to do acid in Justice space because of the space that we're in and we're learning and also that is thinking and the practice like we're talking about if you're shifting your practice this type of language shift that is asset based is going to shift all of us and it works for every single human right like if you say to someone do you need help right or I'm going to empower you or things like that it lands a certain way for all of us and so in community we were able to create this list that many of you have and we practice it all the time I don't know if you heard when one of the kids said help

026the other one tapped me said you mean support right because it's a practice right we're constantly checking each other and it isn't with shame or blame it's just really from a place of Love of we're all growing together right and so you'll see here we say improve or grow well for some people improve is just fine right and I'll go ahead and say this that I had a friend that lives in a body that said Martha I can go with you to a lot of places but improve I like it and I said I know because you know where you're going and you've known for a long time but when I hear that if I hear and proov that means that you thought there was something wrong with me already then I have to listen

027and then we shift it together and we come up with what does that look like and so we put the example up there that if somebody gave you a plant and you came to visit the person the following week what would you say would you ever say the plant I brought you last week has improved so much you would just say grow or Blossom or Bloom right which ties back to that sense of belonging and so if we do this together that's how we can shift it you like to say something sir hello again thank you for the honor of addressing the body uh um so in thinking about language as U Miss aala was saying it's not just about using the language it's a whole practice of like this is really magical really listening

028to language and how we're using language and using language on purpose to shift narratives and I will also tell you that when I go around and talk especially in academic circles about marvelous math club it takes less than two minutes for somebody to say oh so you do remediation uh Authority and so we all contribute and participate to make this happen um and we love to have residents to be part of how do we shift how do we move how do we grow and because we do know that impact and outcomes are important ours is a little different right we have a little sheet when you come in and that shows you how you're feeling today how are you feeling emotionally how are you connected and as you can see up there 100% of the

029leaders reported that they strongly agree that they're good in math or that I'm a leader at school 64% I belong to a community and 82% everyone can grow in math and that's very different for even many of us sitting around this table right what what are narratives that scared us about math and so we're making that difference um also you can see here that 14 of the leaders are in the ab range for Math and tells us about we meet every Monday and then we were asked by the community if we could have a second day so now we meet every Monday and Thursday um between 300 and 5: we the Champions St afterwards for a debrief what went well what was magical and where are areas of growth and where are we requiring support

030that happens all the time so thank you for that part Dr ke you're happy to welcome to stay or whatever but I got to go to the next part let this Happ any questions for marvelous math club or how this Partners she came to be your asset and Justice based thinking practice I just want to thank you for your leadership um and for always being thinking about how to expand these ideas across all of Asheville City Schools so thank you Dr kapan I was just going to say that thank you I'm here I know I'm just everywhere my voice um and as you were describing marvelous math and this longevity that it has now I feel interest and thinking about how this grown that like you heard at first it was from 2012 so we

031made one here through the cni department and with different um departments how do we connect this to the three promises and we made that happen and then as you saw the students are always also making one and then added pieces that they felt that were missing and so we're going to be working together on making it a little shorter and then how do we Encompass all of the pieces so that we can integrate everything that we're talking about with the three promises because every single thing that we do if we link it back to that it makes so much sense right um also I have on here the unlearning why Supremacy culture traits and antidotes you've seen these before and what I want to invite this time through the links is to really focus on

032the antidotes because sometimes folks get stuck on like but why is it bad that to have a sense of urgency why is it bad to this it isn't ever bad to have a sense of urgency with wanting to bridge the outcome Gap it is never a you know a sense of urgency when we want to make sure that students feel safe right so it's just how are we using it and how we applying it so that we can feel a connection to what this means instead of getting defensive or service right and so now um you also see on here accountability partners and a lot of people say well what wanted to ask several people that are part of the district Equity team how have your practices shifted in your role copin don't be hiding

033I I'll say as a community partner just being able to connect with um staff from all different aspects of the district and to work together and practice together has been just a huge blessing and I think it's changed the focus of how um we see Equity work at the foundation as as integral to everything we do so um but being able to practice that has been a gift so thank you Marta Matt that's you good evening everybody I'm multitasking a little bit making sure things go right and YouTube's not happy tonight so sorry if you're at home but Equity I've been on this uh Journey for several years and um one of the more concrete things outcome in my little area around Equity has been some hard and uh Rich Work and conversation among our

034media coordinators around how they work with the idea of the annual book fair right that's when our media centers turn into book stores and kids bring in money and buy books this through the years we identif ified as a very painful experience for some of our students particularly students that might not have a lot of money in their pocket and we did um a lot of trial and error and a lot of error but we got there um and found some different ways to still uh so yeah I'll be happy to speak or um I'm really grateful for the for for what accountability Partners have have done for my S my sense of defensiveness for when I make mistakes and especially as someone who now is now board chair in you know all my time

035on the board um I've made very public mistakes um and have um sat in this chair um and um either you know ignored a moment when I could have and should have um asked for a pause when I should have recognized a moment of harm that was happening when I could have steered the conversation in a way in place that it should have gone um and some of those moments might have been I consciously didn't I didn't do anything other were moments that I unconsciously it just what it it flew it was not not on my radar in that moment but because I have accountability Partners through this Equity work when those moments have been brought to my attention in years past I would have been defensively saying oh I didn't mean that oh I

036I I meant to say something else um but I've learned through this process to that that it's loving accountability it's the the those things brought to my attention are not to shame me they're not to um to make me feel lesser than their moments of learning for me to to to recognize this is going to come up again right I mean that because as Mart is so good about reminding us that Equity is is a practice it is a process there is never a Finish Line in this Equity work that when it comes up again that by because of these conversations the hope is the expectation is I'll have my My Lens will be better more finely crafted more better polished that I might be able to recognize at that moment that I can invite

037that pause or I can recognize that or call out that harm that kind of thing so for me that's what that accountability partner has been is a recognition that that I can let down those defenses I do not have to be defensive it is a moment of inviting me in to learn from what has happened to um you know if we want to go to that age-old um metaphor of of that muscle being built it is is a moment to to to lift that weight um and so I don't have to be defensive anymore and I can say yep thank you thank you for pointing that out I'm not I don't need to explain my actions now I learn from this conversation and I'm ready for the next time I'll go as a member of

038the equity team I think that what I'm what I find most powerful and effective about it is the space we create for the practice we've used this word practice a lot and I think doing the work that we do in a bureaucratic system words there's a lot of words there's a lot of policy there's um but none of this is a thought exercise and as long as it's just a presentation and something that you learn about it stays very intellectualized and what the equity team creat director at ashal Middle School um we've started this student athlete of the month or the week um and like being intentional in the language around who we're highlighting and it's about kids that are like already being successful but there's an equal portion of that the both and of

039this work um to highlight kids that are growing and so just like very simple thing but it it creates a conversation amongst teachers like who are we highlighting what are the things we're celebrating um and that's what this work does for me it starts off individual and it grows into policy procedures systems [Music] well I just I wanted to point out everything that was said um one that strikes the top of my head is the opportunity to have a space to grow um starting or ending this conversation with Equity as a practice just like George said I just feel like that's you know our opportunity to have dialogue with individuals that we work with and that we collaborate with and understanding that the work we that we do there is an alignment of why we're

040here and as we go in this journey walk in this journey that we're going to make mistakes but we also have to understand our biases our our differences of opinions and having the accountability partner for me is um an Awakening is an awareness of the language that I speak and how it resonates to them and it's reciprocated has to be reciprocated and I think we have to understand that that aware Ness that you know we are moving together for a common purpose so that's what this work means to me that we are together uh we not we may not agree immediately but as we travel together we are trying to meet a common goal here and that's to make sure all of our students are are successful and are achieving and growing so and and

041and with that that we're all [Music] growing um I'm the last one um this work and Equity that we embarked on so so many years ago when martyr went to the first REI came back like a shotgun and was just like we got to do this we got to do that we got to do and we all were not on board we were all not on board to watch that first beginning to where we are now is amazing the one thing that I can truly say about this work with equity is at its Grassroots here we know what our issues are we know what our needs we know what supports and we have to build this work of equity as a Grassroots we have to customize this work based on where we live who our

042stakeholders are and what supports they need that has been the most powerful piece of all of this is US transforming individually and we're adding just another root to the tree because it's a truly Grassroots opportunity for us so to rub a stamp it with anything I don't think it would be as power where you are in all the steps that we have to do like racial Equity Institute the board charged me with making sure that the cabinet the so um it's very exciting time and you have links there if you have any questions or if you have any questions right now just like like right now I'm going to invite a a quick like twom minute recess before we move on to then to our next item um just because I personally need to use

043the restroom and so two-minute recess and then we'll move uh to our next um agenda e e e all right we're going to come back together in the interest of time we're going to come back together thank you and and for having me and let allowing me to speak just a couple of minutes in regards to and represent Asheville Peak Academy it would be remiss of me not to also acknowledge some of my board members that are here if you would please stand and some of the staff and colleagues that are here from Ashville Peak Academy would you also please stand I also have Miss Joyce Hicks here she's our financial controller and the vice Vice chair David Robinson so um I see that my presentation is not up on the board there we go

044so I would like to start with a quote from meel Nelson Mandela education is the most powerful weapon in which you can use to change the world education is the most powerful weapon in which you can use to change the world just hold that while I go over some bullet points that are going to be the headliners of my presentation today we're going to talk about transforming spaces empowering Futures let's build hope together I am a cougar I don't want y'all to forget that class of 93 wo fostering future cougars recent Building Inspections and the findings financial status and sustainability purpose and accountability I heard a lot about accountability here in the room today I'm not new to it I'm used to it because I used to sit right here in this room so I

045can appreciate that you guys are still putting that in the Forefront of your minds transforming spaces Ashville Peak Academy respectfully seeks collaboration not competition collaboration with Asheville City schools for the purpose of securing 441 Haywood Road formerly known as Asheville primary to house our thriving School Community our unique demographic makeup underscores our commitment to equity and closing the achievement Gap while our Scholars face various challenges as we all do our track record of Social and academic growth and proficiency demonstrates our dedication to their success we uphold a CO a culture of expectations accountability and Excellence with emphasis in fostering mental well-being y'all know me resource costs so all SCH Scholars have the Equitable Equitable opportunity to be successful our ask is that Ashville City Schools CLE collaborates with us by providing the footprint needed to

046sustain this crucial Endeavor we aim to fulfill our Charter application commitment by expanding one grade level until we reach 8th grade Pride one more time and 100% of Asheville City Schools alone like myself that work for Peak are bip so we had um some Building Inspections done because I knew that was going to be a big ask of my board and your board and the community what happened I thought the report we anticipate addressing the concerns at no cost to Ash Peak Academy or Ashville City schools for that matter additionally donations and grants Embark for renovation that will enhance the I'm sorry additionally donations and GR opportun unities identified by our newly hired sustainability and resource strategist will be in marked earmarked for renovations that will enhance the building's functionality and Aesthetics let's talk about

047the finances this is the hard part asop Peak Academy boast a positive financial position projecting a surplus by the end year 2024 our academic SU uccess will continue to attract retain and increase donor commitment we are diligently procuring Grant and Grant and donations to continue strengthening our financial position we are not the typical Charter we are the charter of choice um we are a village committed to nurturing confidence those nurturing confident High achieving Scholars who will thrive beyond our walls with your support and partnership we can create a brighter future for all Scholars families and communities will you please join us in shaping the next generation of cougars are there any questions you Mr afternoon hi how we doing good good um I have visit Peak probably your first or second year uh there and

048I think you guys are doing excellent work seem like seem like you are um I have visited 441 approximately two weeks ago myself and James had a uh appointment there and um I went there and I walked around and I saw without knowledge of this right here no knowledge whatsoever right um are you by chance looking at other locations besides 441 also we have engaged other locations a couple um we will not fit we look to have over 200 Scholars next year um and a couple um we have not heard back from but 441 um is the ideal space being that is the capacity helps us to be able to extend come down from Raleigh to Asheville to make that happen for us our school we start the end of August but our staff and

049teachers will be there in the beginning of a August during our professional development we also would need time to transfer our um materials and to let the community and our families know that we will be moving building on that the presentation mentioned the DPI initiative us kids and and um scheduling us for their transition here so basically because we have 96% bipac population the priority list was not large I mean not in this area to be honest so we kind of are at the top of the priority list and they're ready to move on down they're just kind of waiting on us actually I shared this information because it is something that Asheville City Schools can too look into if you want to save some money and not have to address l or as best

050as in your schools it's just that we are prioritized but that doesn't mean they will never get to you guys so just to restate what I think I heard is that you have to apply for it and our agreement has to be part of the application that's like a component of how you apply but based on what you've all the research you've done and all the communications you don't think you'll be turned away like I'm I was actually curious is there a chance you apply and they say we've had hundreds of applications but we can only we can only do a few and you don't actually get it I'm sorry I'm sorry for the miscommunication I don't have to apply okay because we're a DPI Public Charter School there's no application okay I just need

051the approval from the boards and I have to upload it into epicenter because we have to do a change of location to get a COI and then you are approved at that point for lead and as bestus remediation projects that they come in and do the building yes maam thanks for that clarification yes ma'am miss when I have a question um I think it's fantastic the idea of partnering with Peak we um have always viewed you all as allies and so I'm very excited about that where my head is it's a very practical question um space in our district sort of comes and goes and it's sort of ever changing and you all may know that the county has um done specific work with us about that space um if this space is the best

052space for now and the remediation is done but a year from now or three years from now there's a better space either you all find a better space or we have a better space like how flexible is it does DPI say You must stay there for five years if we're going to pay for it like I'm just sort of curious what the future could look like that's a great question um DPI doesn't put any stipulations on how long you have to stay anywhere um however I am not a fan of uprooting children you know but if there's something in place that I can let the families my families and staff know that within the next two years we're looking to move again so we can have some sense of continuity um I'm okay and I'm

053very flexible I'm a team player a lot of people in here know that and if we partner I'll do what's best for the team as a whole so kada if you don't mind I want to raise up a couple of things that um one is kind of the elephant in the room of that building and what it was when when you were a part of this District only three years ago um as Ash Asheville Primary School um and um at the time of that vote the real concern about that building one of the things that was brought to the before this board was the safety of that building um and from my recollection you know it it was it was lad in asbest but it felt like it was even it wasn't only let it

054asbest the age of that building uh and so so first of all Beyond just a question just an acknowledgment that um you know recognition of what what Sarah just said about the the amazing things that Peak has done with um with the student the The Scholar that you serve right you you all are doing amazing things that frankly this district for the time that I've lived and my children have gone to this district has have not been able to do for our black students the majority of our black students you know so so youall are doing things that we as a district have been talking about for a long time and you in the in a very short amount of time Peak Academy has done it and so figure out a way to to work

055together to share best practices um to figure out how we can be in Partnership I really do want to make that work in whatever way we can and also want to hold that right that we three years ago closed that building um and impacted families in a very significant way and you know families children staff right um so just thinking about like asbest lead and the other reasons that we Clos that building and and um so have there been other conversations Beyond just the remediation that led in the asbest about what it takes to get that building up to speed for children and staff I mean it's set other than you know the the gym which is now our facilities essentially our maintenance department it's sat relatively empty and we've been told on this board

056that it's basically like out of compliance for student use so what does it Beyond just that remediation what does it take to become at school again from my inspector's um walk through and they walk through with a couple of Ash City Schools maintenance guys the only thing that's making it not safe for children or any occupants at at this time is as best as in Le okay I was a part of Asheville City Schools when all of that happened and those um families and babies were uprooted but I was not a part of of the decision so I have no idea what what that entails but I am very very serious about keeping my my Scholars our Scholars and families and ourselves safe that's why I wanted to have my own inspections done because I

057knew there was a reason I had professionals go through and those are the two things they told me I needed to remediate and I took that as a blessing honestly because those are the two things that DPI will come in and fix at no cost to us um if DPI finds that there's something else according to when we have the per permits drawn in the city walks through then that's a different story but from their thorough investigation there's nothing more than as best is and Lead that's keeping the scholars our families or people from being in there and occupying the space it's sad that it's set for two years and I have a school that's growing and we plan to reach two 200 Scholars next year we don't have a gym we don't have a

058library we don't have a kitchen we don't have a Teachers Lounge we don't have teachers bathrooms we use the bathrooms that the scholars use every day and all we're asking is if we can and I believe we can get the finding remediated that you all we a partner with us and allow allow us to use the building for expansion and growth in Partnership thank you for that um and then if I can uplift the other kind of elephant in the room which is what we what we talk about sometimes in this setting is um and I first of all I so appreciate the one of the first things you said As you stood up here is that it is not competition right it is it is about collaboration and and you know you and I

059have talked Beyond these walls um over the last few years and and I I've even said it in this space right I mean I think it's Raleigh who has done a very good job of making the the the thing between public schools and public Charters a real competition for for dollars right um and yet that's the reality we live in you know as soon as a child goes from Asheville City Schools into a school like Peak or any Charter School the dollars follow that child right um and so um I know this is probably a question you can't answer right away but thinking about partnership Beyond just the sharing of the space like what other just for the the benefit of the the other board members and the people in the room um what if

060you're able to share what other kind of ideas of partnership could that look like if Peak were to occupy that building I think that it'll it'll Force us to work together see Peak isn't the typical charter school we offer everything free of charge we say yes to students that come through this is our first year having a weight list so we decided to come and find some some space to try to lift our weight list um we offer free lunch breakfast Transportation etc etc so we are not the typical charter school that takes those money the money we get per a the ADM for granted in fact we use every penny on our Scholars I think it would force us to align our strategic plans meaning that we will create a plan together that will

061include our Scholars going into their high school years at the phenomenal Ash faha and silsa school I mean I was a part of that school and it's only gotten better I want the scholars to go there although I already have private and other schools asking where they would go in ninth grade because of their third grade scores I think it would improve diversity in ashvah and Sila's advance courses our Scholars are going to come already closing the achievement Gap and knowing how to advocate for themselves so when they're put in remedial I think I heard that that word before I mean today unfortunately or just basic level classes they will be able to advocate for themselves and and say I want to be a part of the AP and honors courses with that said it

062will diversify those classrooms that for have de AES not being honestly it assists with the reduction of the achievement Gap so our Scholars come to you all in high school that's going to raise the the end of grade testing and scores for Asheville City Schools not for Asheville Peak Academy it's intentional and has been from the the first board meeting with a board member a founding board member that after 8th grade we would not do high school because we wanted to collaborate and partner with you guys it would strengthen our communities as a whole a lot of our families have their own trauma and and experiences coming through any school system as I do I mean that's just the real of it if we can build relationships amongst each other like Dr Ferman and I

063in front of the paper with raising hands together I think the community will follow and it'll build a sense of Co you know community and collaboration that that we're not finding in school systems so far um it were leverage Prof professional development Kamisha MTO is our um testing accountability and curriculum and instruction and all those things that Ian is Kamisha is for Peak and she always speaks very highly of Ian it will leverage our ability to teach and train each other that's what we need to do we're doing something right but so are you guys and together we can do more right I think it also make sure that all Scholars have the opportunity to learn discover and Thrive through Asheville City Schools that's what y'all said y'all were going to do another another thing

064that it can do because like anywhere you may have a a student start off and peak in kindergarten and they may discover that peak's not the right fit right so if Peak isn't the right fit I'm looking at 96% of your Scholars population is Bod right yes if you did come within as City school I mean you know if you did we have that working relationship we that 96% could go down to about 50% and have other kids come into your classrooms that there are none byart I mean is that a will you w well I'm not I don't know I hear what you're saying we have not told anyone that wanted to be a part of peak no the the reason that our school school population our scholar population is 96% BAC is because

065those are the families and Scholars that came to us asking for a seat in our classrooms now if the the partnership with Ash City Schools means that more students not of color come to our classroom of course they are welcome and we would teach them and we would do the best we can as if some of them want to return to Ashville City Schools we'll make sure that they have the most sound transition back it's it's not a competition it's a collaboration this year we're hiring our first Spanish teacher we're excited we're going to be bilingual we want the all cultures and races um represented in Ash Peak Academy so that would not be a problem I have another question if are you finished Miss wi sorry yes yes yes Jesse are you finished yes

066I'm done you done Mr are you sure you didn't look like you okay okay since you brought it up uhhuh now I've been in Ashville for since 03 I've seen changes as we I I have seen changes throughout the community and everything else we brought in silsa we brought in North uh Northstar we brought well then there's Peak M will Peete become another North Star maybe Northstar is going well I mean not just say wait wait not not another northst star but as a another school that people will come to I mean you know I mean would it be another form of another saying uh maybe I don't know but Mount uh mford Northstar and silar are doing phenomenal so my hope is that we can mimic some after them and the people that want

067to be a part of Ash for Peak they just have a choice it doesn't have to be Ashville middle it doesn't have to be mord Northstar it doesn't have to be Ashville Peak our Scholars will have a three-prong approach and a a choice what how how can you lose with maford Ashville mle and Peak so maybe maybe I hear what you're saying maybe a certain demographic of people might be interested in Asheville Peak maybe but that's okay because our teachers and our staff are there to serve each and every one of them but I believe if we collaborate more that those three schools will become more diverse I'll just lift up that we've recently made the very difficult decision to close Montford Northstar I want that to I don't I don't want that to just

068be hanging right and I think Jesse some of what you're bringing up I I appreciate how like far into the future you're sort of thinking about the challenges that when what this district has faced is we're not a growing District Asheville city is not growing with we don't have affordable housing for families to move here and raise their kids here so as a district we're really looking at what does that mean for the size of our district and the terrain of our schools and had to come to a really hard conclusion about can we support two middle schools when we have a facility where all those kids could go and I heard you say earlier and I I walked it back that the vision for Peak was always K8 I think I was under the

069misunderstanding at the beginning that it was going to be K5 and as a as an advocate here I was excited for those kids to come to Ashville middle to be in our music programs to be in our Sports programs and to matriculate into like secondary education all through middle and high school um and I would still love that because I think that would be great I think we have a great facility I think we're doing amazing things and so you know what that Dynamic would be how it would impact our partnership we'd have to go in eyes wide open and really show up with honesty with each other about those Dynamics because it is really playing out and what it might mean for the changing face of peak when you're in a partnership with us

070and how more people find out and really want what you're offering that you know different types of people start showing up at your doorstep but I appreciate that and wanted to lift that up I also wanted to ask about from a financial standpoint I think I've heard you say this would be net neutral is sort of the expectation we are using that facility so we would have to take out the things that are there and move those into other locations and I don't know what that would entail for us so has there been any analysis at a deeper level of of the financial impact for us on giving up what we do there now no not yet yeah um we could house some of our facilities at the monford location office space um however where

071we're struggling to find some space uh assessment done uh from the county at next week's meeting uh because as I know you've heard there's been several inquiries from the county about that that space um so and no telling how long that would all take um but that's something I want to throw out there and third really the biggest first year um I'll be completely honest this would be a PR nightmare for this District as well um we uh had maford Northstar uh was voted to close um one of the things that kept coming up was why can't we use the 441 property uh for students and four other groups um and we sat here at this deis and at these T well 2.7 million would do even more uh but how can we as a

072group justify uh 283 million uh CH changing the co uh back to a school um it was my understanding from our con conversations with the county uh that if this does if we do ever put children back into that building that that building has to undergo not just a batement uh for ASB bestus but there's a there was a laundry list of I know you had your inspectors in but what has the county said what has the what has DPI said what has other groups said um because again um again I look at it from a financial standpoint um I would much rather have $283 come 283,000 th coming back into our district rather than going out okay thank you for that Mr Carter DPI does not um approve of building just for the safety

073of children it has to be for the safety of people Al together because our staff and myself we all are going to be in there just like the city and the county so they would walk through and tell us as they did what the finding are to make it safe for people to occupy the building again I wasn't a part of before I'm just a part of what happened now and that was solely asbes and Lead which DPI would cover the cost for that in regards to money I really really have a difficult time placing a dollar sign on a back of Scholars I think what you would get in return is some high level highly educated confident well-rounded Scholars to enter into back into Ashville City Schools district at the high school level who

074would then be groomed and brought up to attend a College University or some sort of higher level of Education or military or whatever their heart's desire so I hear your concerns the pr and the community I beg to differ I have some Community people here that are with with me today that said this would really in a positive way change the trajectory of a lot of people and our communities as a whole so I don't mind calling Community people in or calling DPI with you to make sure that we're headed in the right direction but please believe me when I say that I've done all my due diligence and the school can be readily available and safe for people by our first day of school which is August 27th oh oh one more thing I'm

075sorry there's also a a statue a general statue that says that if a school is not being occupied with students and Scholars in it that a charter school can approach the district and ask for occupancy if we hadn't heard anything in 90 days we go to the County Commissioners ourselves so again I don't M sitting around the table with the County Commissioners to see which way or to see if they approve or think that this is a viable option I'll give you the the statute number no I appreciate that I know that journalist statute very well um that is why that building was not designated as a school anymore that building is not as designated as a school that's why when everything en closed with APS and I was chair back then so um we

076looked at this very closely um that General statute does not apply to this building it applies current currently it does not apply to this facility or this building it's the facil it's the facilities General so that particular statute would not mandate any kind of use of the building um then one thing we would need to clarify unless there's something that we didn't see when we looked at the clean classrooms and there might be but I don't think so they would not remediate that and that's what we need to get clarification on because again what the program says online is that you have to pay for it a new roof at 500,000 uh window replacement 758,00 um a new hot water a separate building but not right now so they did think what more immediate one

077to two years if we stay there one to two years then they went out 3 to five and 10 and out so the things that need to be remediated right now for two to three years is as best as in l they did go line by line in regards to the um what we got as public knowledge and again they gotcha so you'd be looking at a capital campaign to try to address some of these because they're big ticket items is the only reason and and I'm um what they also told me is they are big ticket items but they are not sure that it will cost the dollar amount that's stated beside it for instance the HVAC at whatever cost 3 million 3.6 million million they were not in favor of saying or could

078not with Integrity say yes it'll cost you 3.6 million gotcha I'd also just um for the purpos of as much information as possible um would love to have the clarity around as first of all is it is it true that the building is coded differently right um and if it is coded differently if it does need to then be recoded for student occupancy doeses that trigger um those things that it's been that have been grandfathered in so let's say ADA Compliant things right because if if by recoding other things need to be done Bo um these are hard decisions to make without knowing the full ramifications to that decision so if you're if you're waiting to find some of that information out uh if you're waiting on a decision from this board to find some

079of those things out I don't know if you're going to get that information from us I think we need to this Board needs to have some of that stuff because it could you know there could be some real dollar figures for both this district and for you that could really affect both of us significantly right so um so you know the more information we can have around those things the better so I um Ash in trying to figure those things out before I got a okay from you and my board I still hadn't gotten the yes from um the Asheville Peak board either CU everybody juggling the same the same thing so with her um okay I was going to reach out to Dr Ferman and see if it was okay if I can push

080a little harder with the prelim preliminary work so I can give both of you boards more answers Miss W I think I want to go back as you think about what's the next information to get like and the timeline that you're on and you know un uncovering what we need to uncover but I'm not aware of what's the pressure on you just for where you're going to be next year that's right so I don't know yet kind of in terms of how we might collaborate in the long-term sustainability of peak as a partner in a moment that isn't permanent but it shows up to keep Peak open and you I don't I just don't know yet I tell you okay so full transparency I have also called AAL we're friends with you guys for the

081last two years and I did not know that she had proposed that but we need something in August and she said and I didn't know you needed something in August so maybe it is that we um start building our partnership we move there for the next two years they take over when they're ready to do what they're going to do and Asheville city with the partnership with Peak helps us find another space I'm okay with that I'm a team player I just really want the partnership to be with Ash City it's not that other counties or the other county is not seeking it's just that I'm a cougar and I prefer here but if not and we'll be geographically outside of the scope of the Dem graphic of student that make up the achievement Gap

082that we want to reach so I'm I'm okay with sitting around a table and seeing how it can be a win for everyone our time constraint is a lot more tight than ail's um but she also was like well let me see what we can do along with Dr fman she's been great thank you Dr fman thank you for that that's helpful I see you than you anything [Laughter] else um I don't need details I'm just looking for a big answer okay and I know you have a board that would give an answer to this I see lots of benefits and I I put myself in your shoes and it's you know a place to be without paying rent and I I don't know this for a fact but I assume you're paying rent now

083right and so that's a benefit for you all and if this particular partnership for this particular physical space lasted two years three years whatever that might be can you just give me a little insight about would you all does that two years give you all the chance to have a little more financial stability to then so a little bit Break Even but where we win so a little bit Break Even but where we win is some of the things kadada mentioned Library cafeteria and some other places so we may be able to good evening board as you can see we have a long long one two three four four pages of students we were so focused on making sure that um we finished up open enrollment and and all of the things we had just

084started a laundry list of all the releases that you see before you now so this is is for uh the 2425 um and as you can see it's broken down I know you guys like the reason and all of that and so I hope this format is to your liking for approval Miss foret can you tell me what uh remind us or remind me uh what is continued placement that means annually they've been going there and then they have to do the uh discription AR release every year so that's what the continued placement is okay uh thank you is there a way [Music] to so we have continued placement and it's like work proximity uh is one of the reasons here um so that's someone who they they are going they're already going to bunam

085County Schools we just have to continue to release them at the beginning of each year okay and they have to do the same for us and they have to do the same is there any um I guess is there any way to kind of divide those out because sometimes I mean that when I saw this number I was like wow that's a lot but now knowing what continued placement means I feel like that's kind of an unrealistic number uh if that makes sense you know that it yeah they are not going to be with us next year but they weren't with us this year cuz this makes it look like we are losing a bunch of kids to next for next year already um but if is there a way to break that out to

086where you have just continued placement we've given them to you every month but this time we were really focused on um getting the notifications out to our face before the charter started their lottery so that was our goal this year uh and then this is a more of a question for Dr that this is for your review if you've got specific question about specific students you can ask those in Clos session later this evening and otherwise this list will appear on your board agenda in a week under the consent agenda for approval North Carolina Association of Educators and the National Education Association the largest Union in the country aca's membership consists of a majority of all permanent ACS staff our continuously growing membership represents both classified and certified job classifications and reflects the diversity of

087the ashpa city schools work force as a union our vision is an equitable quality public education for every child we believe that every student in ACS deserves the world and we work to serve our students through our jobs and and Beyond we know that school staff's working conditions and work experience become students learning conditions and school experience and we believe our students deserve an education where they are valued and feel a sense of belonging we want to work together here in ACS our members joined acae and more of our co-workers join every day because they want to work together to find Solutions tackle challenges head on and make changes that will improve outcomes and experiences for our students we believe that our district will work best when our voices have the opportunity organizing committee and

088building level organizing committees which engage all workers regardless of their membership our organizing committee structure allows member leaders in our buildings to strategically connect with 10 other staff members each to share information collect data gain insight and understanding into individual co-workers priorities and build districtwide staff collaboration on the issues that matter most to school workers for example in March of this year after hearing a common theme from co-workers around a desire for collaboration and decision making our executive board and organizing committee thought it might be time to bring a meet confer and collaborate policy to you all but in order to make sure that we were in agreement we brought the idea to our co-workers and over half of all staff in ACS signed on in just four days through face-to-face conversations alone about the

089policy with each one we got a resounding yes this makes sense to us this is what we've been talking about in just those four four days through those face-to-face conversations over the half of the district signed on endorsing meet confer and collaborate acae leveraged the organizing committee structure to quickly gather staff responses about the state of our district and collaborate on a possible solution in the past three years acae has engaged over 70% of Staff in our process of crafting our budget Visions the primary tactic used again was face-to-face conversations as an organizing Committee Member in my school I have personally had dozens of in-depth conversations with co-workers about their vision for our schools and where they think we need more resources is Frontline employees thank you hello um my name is Bailey Griffith I

090am the media coordinator at Claxton Elementary and I have for you a layout of our organizing structure um so as you can see that the acae elected executive board relies on members at all of our School sites across the district to identify the needs and priorities of ACS staff and so specifically this looks like building based staff having conversations with colleagues to share information and gather important feedback Carson just gave some very good examples of how we're able to use this structure to reach our staff about a range of issues as our membership grows uh we anticipate an increase in reach and an increase in feedback uh with school staff across the district acae has consistently been able to have direct two-way conversations with staff in our school buildings those conversations are vital in shaping

091the priorities and the work of the elected Executive Board of acae as Carson mentioned our formal voice petition was the fastest petition to reach majority in the state and last year our budget petition had the highest percentage of any school district's Collective action in the 21st century that demonstrates our model's high efficiency and wide reach the building level structure of acae is what helped with that quick turnaround we were able to identify what ACF staff ACS staff wanted to take action on and then to develop a proposal that meets their needs and that is this meet confer and collaborate policy that you have in front of you it's a direct result of conversations with employees of Asheville City Schools as a member of the organizing committee at my school at Claxton what I see as

092unique about this structure is that it's based on these face-to-face conversations with trusted colleagues they work in the building with you and they see the same students as you every day and that's a type of trust that we try to build on those conversations lead to hearing organic ideas from the people who are most qualified to problem solve our educational issues the staff working in our school buildings when we discuss issues or we have complaints we can also take time to gather vital context for all of these complex problems and that leads to better Solutions I want to emphasize that this structure for feedback that we use um um and for data Gathering goes far beyond a Google form or a quick survey and that's what makes it special and that's why it's so highly

093effective thank you ay my name is Timothy Lloyd I'm the elected president of acae I'm a little bit taller um Carson Bailey and Shonda just shared information as to how ACA functions locally and at a school level I think it is necessary as we proed proceed f further to share some kind of broader National context that we work in in the vast majority of school districts and states in the US there exist formalized mechanisms in school districts and um for for school districts to collaborate with educator unions on how to improve both student outcomes and create a workplace that recruits and retains School staff I say vast majority and I mean it in in 44 States plus DC out of 50 Public School worker Public School worker unit have the right to full or limited

094collective bargaining this means that the extreme majority of public school workers in the US have the right to sign a contract that is negotiated between their Union and the district that they work in these contracts cover topics ranging from compensation to counselor ratios to curriculum and everything in between currently collective bargaining contracts are not offered to Public School Employees in North Carolina like us because of a law that has existed on the book since 1959 and the North Carolina na CP actually calls this law the last remaining Jim Crow law in North Carolina on the books because of the context that it was signed in and also kind of still the effects that it has so in Six States like North Carolina where collective bargaining is prohibited or limited school districts often use what they

095call a meet and confer policy or a consultation policy that give Public School staff a seat at the table with District administration for the purposes of promoting collaboration transparency harmonious relationships between employee and employer and most importantly Improvement in student outcomes in total 47 States and DC have some form of District to employee organization collaboration uh it says here some examples of districts with meet and confer Agreements are San Antonio Texas Mesa Arizona Nashville Tennessee Norfolk Virginia and Butler Alabama and and there's many more as well uh even districts like these with these racist collective bargaining bans have figured out how to work within these Antiquated laws to cor to collaborate effectively with school staff in National perspective among school districts with majority union membership like we have here with astral City Schools we are

096in the Super minority by not having that formalized process for our Union and our school district to work together and because of that we are missing out on key opportunities to work together to improve outcomes and experience good evening I'm Tracy Barrett excuse me um I'm a proud K12 Alum of Ash City Schools I currently teach at Asheville High School um and I'm the incoming vice president of acae and you all have the full policy language already so I'm just going to try to be as brief as I can in summarizing the key components here um as stated we want to work with the District administration to solve problems facing our Public Schools we're proposing a policy that would create a meat confir for collaborate team tasks was sharing leadership between employees and administration for

097the purpose of developing quality proposals that improve student learning conditions in order to qualify for this policy an employee representative organization or an ER would need to represent at least 50% of ACS employees and ACA currently meets this threshold we are suggesting 10 members each from acae and central office serve on this team but we'd be excited to work with the board on finding the right number um aca's Representatives on the team would be elected and represent a variety of building sites and job classifications central office Representatives would be appointed by the superintendent the recommendations developed by the meet confer collaborate team could cover topics um such as budget development curriculum achievement data districtwide initiatives compensation and benefits any other topics that are important to school staff important to central office or that the board

098charges us with considering taking up this policy proposal calls for a recurring set of open public meetings between employer and employees we believe that our schools will be better served by us not only meeting when something goes wrong or when we're at the height of budget season um this proposed policy includes a mutual commitment to a calendar with the option to cancel scheduled meetings as needed or add special meetings by a agreement of the co-chairs agendas being set by agreement of both co-chairs will ensure that we know who owns the meeting and that topics that are important to both School workers and central office are discussed furthermore section h of the policy which is quoted here on the slide calls for timely and equal access to information for administration and members of the meet confer

099collaborate team this will allow the team to make well-informed recommendations to the board based on consultations with our co-workers using the organizing structure um that Carson and Bailey described employee trust in the district would increase by making it easier for employees to get our questions answered in a timely way and following open meeting requirements means that all ACS workers would have the option to attend and observe the work of the meet confer and collaborated team hi my name is Samy sheer I work at Asheville middle school and I'm the elected treasurer for C AE um I wanted to talk about what we want this policy not to turn into or to become um a meet and confer collaborate policy is not an expectation that all district decisions originate with this team we understand that District

100administrators do invaluable work and every decision cannot be made through a collaborative process we um do not want the policy to have the expectation that a GU there's a guarantee of consens consensus with every issue that the team takes up um we know that there will be times of disagreement we all care deeply about our schools our colleagues our students our community and we don't have the illusion that this meet and confer collaborate process will always put us on the same side of every issue but we do um want this to be a partnership where we're we all have the same goals to strengthen our schools and our working and learning conditions um we do not want this to become just a venting session we know um staff and faculty have concerns and there's a

101place to bring up those issues we want this to be a problem solving space not just a problem raising one we do not foresee this being a replacement for the other advocacy work of our Union aca's Collective understanding of what the problems are and how best to solve them will continue to be rooted in our engagement with all School workers we will continue to gather survey information and look at budget priorities we will continue to use a variety of strategies to advocate for public schools at the district county and state level there are many benefits to a meet confir and collaborate policy um one being that the recommendations to the board will reflect a broader and more representative range of Staff perspectives both certified and classified you as all board members would receive policy recommendations

102informed by the experiences of employees on the front lines of our school system and assessed for validity and factual reli Reliance by numerous experts before being submitted for your consideration another benefit would be to have access to information that ensures that all stakeholders are using the same set of facts to inform decisionmaking having the ability to access information relevant to our students learning conditions ensures that we can communicate that more effectively to our co-workers and our advocacy can be of greatest benefit to the district we see a strength where we capitalize on the and Dem excuse me capitalize on and demonstrates respect for the expertise of those who work most closely with students every day and lastly we foresee a shared responsibility among the board the district leadership and acae for owning and addressing the

103challenges facing our district we know that there are more hard choices is ahead of us for our district and we want to partner with you to navigate those challenges in a way that has the best possible outcomes for our students oh sorry one more um this MCC this meet and confer collaborate policy is an opportunity for us to change the culture in this district and hopefully in the state of North Carolina I'm nearing retirement age I would love to see this partnership permanently established for our future and our younger teachers our incoming students the future of our district Beyond who is sitting in this classroom I'm sorry this room um we have an opportunity to really change and help stabilize our district we know we have the highest turnover rate in the state that's no

104secret when staff is part of the decision-making process they are more invested in their schools they are more invested in their students and their community so thank you for considering this and we would love to take some questions I have a question um and the answer may be that the meet collaborate I think I screwed that up is a model that's done other places but I mean I love so much of what you guys said and I think and I've talked to Tracy and Carson point where you all don't hear from point where you all don't hear from us except for twice a year right now and we would love to be in a more constant and ongoing state of or the leadership of acae meets with Dr Ferman um instead of having this I'm

105just I'm trying to wrap my head I've read the policy I looked over it I read read through your presentation it was a great presentation but I'm just trying to wrap my head around why a policy is needed we don't do a good job of on the Committees that we're on necess necessarily uh getting that information out to the rest of the group but is it necessary to have a policy is is I guess is my final question can I that could that also though be as this board is already trying to craft our board Norms could that not be a board Norm versus a a policy um again I I don't I appreciate the the hard work that you all do and and and I have really appreciated the this right so how does

106this change things yeah I think I think that's exactly right both um I would strongly agree with George's point about a policy being something that can Outlast all of the people in this room um and Rebecca absolutely um this is more about how School Employees relate to central office than it is directly about how School Employees relate to the board because we have our ways of advocacy to to get to y' right like and we we use what what you're working on yeah I think that's a process that would be cuz I wonder if is that an opportunity CU I wonder if is that an opportunity to sync up and maybe get some representative of AA at the EAC like can we work within that structure to kind of meet some of your goals I

107I'm I'm on the educator advisory Council and and hopefully that will evolve and grow it's still a young um committee but I see that it's limited in its function right now and I think we have an opportunity to really expand our communication and then maybe somewhere down the line the policy could be uh approved somewhere somehow but I just need you guys to come and keep have any conversations with us because it is important he was where where I interpreted some of where he was going so this is a a policy proposal I've also heard you mention you know there may be there's room to decide together even in how the policy is written you're not I'm not hearing that you're making a demand that it's this or it's nothing you're saying we think it's

108you're ready for just are never enough hours in the day to you know meet with your grade level team or whatever the need is um how to to maintain and open the the dialogue with with all staff regardless of whether they're um um and we know that much in the same way that you know staff working conditions are student learning conditions Union member working conditions are non-union member working conditions and what affects everyone in the union also affects everyone at the school um so you know there there's no disconnect there and we greatly greatly need need their input um to be effective in what we're doing does that answer your question sort of I guess I'm I'm asking about like what the what the structure on the school level would be like I mean is

109it are these like hallway conversations or are these conversations that are going to take place in a monthly staff meeting just back in here um I have been I mean we have been working really hard to build this organizing committee structure um I've been saying it's kind of like building a ship while you're already sailing yeah um but we have done like an excellent job in finding member leaders who are willing to take up this work because it's not just a little bit of work it's a lot of work um and so right now at Claxton we currently have seven um organizing commit one thing that I really appreciate you mentioned in the presentation was the idea of having shared a shared understanding about um practices data language right that something like this um sorry

110what's the um mm me confer collab start talking about budget but also the fact that it's a o an open shop state right so you know like when you listed the the different districts where this has been affect noticed a change in the last year so consciously using the word Union in a state that technically doesn't allow them um so I'm just curious um what I'd love to know the reason behind it I don't I'm not saying that with any kind of judgment I don't oppose it I think it's probably very great thank you super quick question but first a compliment that was an excellent presentation please tell Miss Robinson too but I really appreciate how thoughtful and sensitive you are to all these issues and second is I know it's urgent I did hear

111that but to the extent we probably need to confer with Maggie and think to bring you a policy that would then feed into the process you have to initiate that process so I think step number one is to have some discussion with your superintendent after she can process it and then normally you do ask for a recommendation as to whether or not a it should be a policy because this obviously is not required to be a policy and then B if it were were to be a policy what would it look like so that's how it would follow the normal process but it would begin with this board on rooll out in the community and um as you see um we're trying to hit all area of Asheville and so for West Asheville it'll be

112the Burton Community Center uh for Central it'll be Stevens Lee [Music] um and interested in coming interested in coming to our enrollment events um you will have transportation um this this event is to Showcase all the wonderful things that we do have um we'll have our it Department we'll have offering this option but that will be on the table for this summer to go out into housing so you so so we're going to be doing two different things bringing them to us and going out there we can't okay we just need an MOA they have a process now that we must follow and so we are going to follow their process let's follow the process we're going to follow their process but we are we do have every intention of going into housing but until

113then we're going okay I'll add you okay I'll add you to the calendar events yeah that'd be great okay thank you okay anything else no no it's on the consent item just for next week yep all right um do you also have that acsf ACS initiative t or is that part of it what about the that was just information only so you could see the um outline of the event every everything that's going on just in case you had questions thank you okay thanks T all right next up we have Ian Nelson the summer testing plan uh good evening board so DPI requires that our summer testing program be improved by the board uh and so um this is the official document I realized that it's not super user friendly so I actually created a

114new print out for you that's in front of you that kind of lays out the logistics of this but in short um uh it is optional to participate in the summer testing program we allowed our principles to make that decision um and as it has been for the last three years our uh middle and high schools decide not to participate but our elementary schools um will be participating in the program uh we're going to house everyone at Jones for sort of cost efficiency sake um essentially what DPI says is that additional instruction must take place prior to the readministration of any EOG or EOC so the the what the plan is essentially is to do a day of um instruction that will focus on the U major content standards of each grade level and subject

115area along with sort of test taking uh strategies um and preparation and then the following day the students will have an opportunity to retest and so what you see is uh we will do Science fifth grade first um on June sorry let me get my dates right 13th and then test on the 14th the following week we will do reading the reason third grade is not there is the read to achieve legislation requires that third graders have an opportunity to retest during the regular scheduled testing window at the end of the year so they they don't have the opportunity to retest in the summer that's why third grade isn't there and then we will do math um Wednesday and Thursday [Music] um so um we required to uh get board approval for this plan um

116we are we have a I was very surprised actually we have a large number of staff interested in participating we'll get that sorted out in the next week so questions all right thank you man Ian just a quick question does this need to get action tonight or is this okay for Monday and consent um it'd be great if if there's action tonight I've already talked to DPI they I've submitted our plan they have our plan the form documentation so if it happen tonight great if it needs to wait till Monday any contract do you have any any questions about that contract do is this is this new or we've had this before this is a new contract and is it really $130 an hour and every hour no matter what position but we're going back

117and revisiting um a con like permanent hire with another individual and and they're being paid as their call and we're have some custodians who are retiring soon that's just off the top of my head Mr Warren but the plumber is a huge problem with old buildings just say it sure right and for sure they can go out and make more on the in the private sector to compete and yet looking at a contract like this it just makes me think like the amount of money we're paying for contracted labor makes me feel like uh you know I understand that a budget crunch but it feels like bullets and things happen and so we just have to be mindful yeah and I would say if we don't if we if we don't one of our uh

118biggest Plumbing issues is is where the greatest expense comes from is Vape pins being flushed down the toilets at the at the high school level so um I mean that's a that's one of the sorry Derek uh as you requested last month we did go ahead and Survey our um classified staff members about the question about comp time versus overtime uh we also invited acae to send out the survey so I do appreciate the assistance with that and the assistance from Communications on getting that survey out very quickly for us so we could turn this around um as you can see in your materials we did ask just one simple question to ask what was preferred so there to get as few comments as we uh received but we did receive a number of comments

119and most of them centered around the fact that because they do have other leave available annual leave sick leave when they do need to be out that the priority for them was to receive more income for their families um and they would prefer the overtime which honestly I really kind of expected that too um what we do have to be careful about is continuing to educate you were actually requiring class we were actually requiring classified employees to take either half or whole day increments of leave just like teachers well the only reason that teachers had that requirement in the DPI salary and benefits make sure that we allow increments of hours and not just straight half half day full day or hour increments of leave and that way we allow our classified hourly staff to

120have the most flexibility possible with their leave time is that a new policy that would need to be or a policy would need to be amended procedures for some reason and then what was it they mentioned can you make me work over 40 hours knowing I'm going to be getting over time wants to spend the time to complete the job but the employer may not want them to so there is not a black and white answer it's what is reasonable in the context I mean the Asheville City Schools works very hard to not require necessarily overtime there's not a black and white answer to that if somebody is concerned I think this is the the the root of your question if someone's concerned that they're being asked to work every time that they don't want

121to work they need to talk to their supervisor and HR about that that could have been the question they asked but they asked the other question also but yeah I was with the I'm just saying that I know it says the board policy says that supervisors are continuing to discourage overtime work but that's kind of a grandfather group in terms of this policy stuff I mean as as far as anyone's particular job if it is structured to be two different jobs then we obviously understand that that's going to where you still get early pay for where you still get early pay for Christmas but you don't go that six weeks before the pay comes again in January and um we also as a part of that process and I don't know if I remember to

122mention it last month um I'm also bringing a practice with that that I brought um we did in Rutherford where um right now the kind of standard answer to folks I reviewed the policy and it does offer either comp or overtime I I just wanted to bring it to yeah okay yeah see if you had any further input okay thank you thank you oh you go ahead they felt like that was a trade-off for no longer being able to re no longer receiving calm time they had those other options for the other meeting I think we'll have more time to get into that um instead of tonight so if you're okay with that we'll move that to next Monday um and in relation to that um the Handover uh research was one of the groups

123that presented to the board um earlier on about strategic planning um and what I'll present and Monday on next Monday about strategic planning is a way that I think we can manage the majority of the strategic planning process inhouse um but I do want to contract out for services to do a very good assess current state of Asheville City Schools so Handover contract is um going to work with us on collecting all of our data putting it in manageable understandable graphs presentations um they'll also audit our data and see if we have any areas that are missing so you know we'll give them all of the qualitative data gathered from the survey that's together they'll get a notebook with all the pages in it and then can write in it it'll be available online as

124well um and just it be a nice state of a district assessment for us so I'm trying to remember which one Handover was they were the two guys and they were the two guys yep Handover was the two guys okay yep and because we're only doing the data analysis piece that is really their expertise okay um so that's why went ahead and just went got an agreement with Handover to start moving this process forward yeah I got a question for you I'm sorry this and have an opportunity for the board to to ask questions and have a discussion here so first I just wanted to give a little bit of um make sure I get the right there we go so El education what is e education it stands for Expeditionary Learning um and their

125motto is really creating a better world um there's a graphic there that really shows what they're about and their core practices what they really believe um and some of the areas that they uh really focus on as a as an as a as a company and it's about leadership using good curriculum good instruction and waving in culture and character and then they focus on something they call student engaged assessment which is really building Agency for your students in how they understand what they're learning are able to communicate what they're learning and what they need to take it their learning to the next level um Expeditionary Learning was born out of Outward Bound um so they kind of there were some Partners in there that separated from Outward Bound but still keep that partnership very close

126um we are going to send some of our Educators through the scholarship opportunity on the summer Outward Bound Educators um session so I'm really excited about that um an e really is focused on creating Equitable classrooms um they're very focused on building teacher agency helping teachers see um that they can do their best and meet their highest aspirations and one of their big big focuses on build is like I said Building A Better World um they have three dimensions of student achievement that they focus on and as I've already mentioned character which is social emotional learning becoming an ethical person um another one that they focus on a lot is called high quality student work and that is building high quality student work through the formative assessment process so looking at student work making sure

127that that student work is what that student can reach is that potential so and we talked about this at the last work session so do students just meet grade level or do they meet their potential and highquality student work really helps you being eel in the schoolwide model teachers would be talking less students would be talking more you'd be empowering your students with complex text and issues for them to problem solve um um really lifting up those big Ideas um and to for students to connect their learning with real world work and real world opportunities um so just a little bit about e um I shared this presentation um so one of the things you might wonder is what is the Expedition um and this video and I'm not going to play the video because

128it's about 11 minutes long but what it captures is how this program um an approach to instruction creates that authentic learning for students and what the video shows you is a seventh grade group of students at a public school coming together to launch their e their learning Expedition so it's a science Expedition where the students are given a challenge of how are you going to create reusable energy um so it's about giving students that agency of how what how what am I going to do as a student to solve a problem um how am I going to engage in this real learning opportunity um and one of the other that I've always loved about the Expeditions is it's about giving back to the community Expeditions focus on building that better world so this problem solving

129um that the students will do um in this one is how are you creating less of a carbon footprint are you being more um carbon neutral how are we you know really investing and saving in our our planet um as I've said before and crew is a structure and a culture it's two things so it's building that sense of community that's almost the result of what you get when you implement and use the structure of crew um and it's focused on building um an environment where all your students and staff Thrive um emotionally socially uh academically so that students can see and staff can see how they're making a contribution to improving um their school system but it's also a strategy it's a structure um and it's about those tools and Frameworks um for our

130schools to build that culture we can say very aspirationally yes we want to build build a sense of belonging we want to create that um but if you don't have a structure to do that you're not going to be able to create that structure you can have you can have a plan you can say here's what we're going to do but you need a formalized structure to achieve something with goals look fors here's our action plan here's the steps that we're going to take and this structure of crew really helps you do that in a way that centers Equity It Centers the voice of the teachers of the students so that it's not hey this is a top down initiative they can build this the way that works for their school so I've asked um

131two of our principles that have been involved in kind of assessing is this a good structure is this something that we would be interested in doing um and then have experienced some of the crew work that we've started just for professional development for our leaders um so I asked uh rafik and Derek to share a little bit on uh what they've learned so far about crew and what they've learned through crew and then how they can see as leaders that crew could impact the culture at their school so I'm going to let them take it for a little bit thank you for the opportunity to share um I guess I'm first since Derek passed the mic to me I'm okay with that um so I want to start by sharing our school's mission statement with

132everyone and the reason I'm doing that is because we try to ground everything that we do um staff across the building cuz we're trying to staff across the building cuz we're trying to figure out ways to celebrate our staff and we're trying to figure out ways to this is not easy work what has resonated with us um is that we wanted to go um this prover that says if you want to go fast go Al but if you want to go far go together and so this African proverb resonated with us as we were sitting and we were trying to come up with how do we make the shift in culture and climate at our school take Ro in our Collective success so we wanted to continue the work together to support each other and

133celebrate our achievements as a team so this was just some of the background information just kind of help you understand how who has a puzzle piece that would fit together with my puzzle piece so that these are color Crews to help divide up for friendly competition and we try to remind them as friendly competition although I have a very competitive staff um it is shocking right um we also use our Color Crew for that celebration so that was a really fun way um for us to again have this schoolwide celebration and it really didn't cost us very much organize and execute the courses of actions required to have a positive effect on students and that was by um Gord Hoy in werk and so we put that question up and we asked or that reading

134up what resonates with you from the reading so so we did um was Jo on the inside of the circle if you and that was like fun to see oh we have these things in common that some of our staff who have been working with each other for some time did didn't even realize they had these things in common um we've played games like minute to minute to wies which again we say friendly competition but it gets really fun um the culture whe card game which was something that from um the Foundation that we've also incorporated into our staff and again these are just ways that our staff is getting to know each other a lot better um we've also implemented Friday huddles and so every Friday for 10 minutes our staff joins in the

135front um office area and we are intentional about where we join because that increases the chances of everyone being able to to participate including our office staff people who are still responsible for answering the door or telephone our custodians join so everyone who's in the building we just kind of do this big circle up and we ask two questions share a celebration from the week and is there anything that we need to know about for the upcoming week and those 10 minutes have been pretty powerful because I see people who I know have had a pretty hard week they're leaving the building they're smiling they're laughing they're talking to each other and that's because we're ending the week on a positive note as opposed to going home being really grumpy um we've also noticed that

136our staff seem to be more accountable to each other so if a staff member needs to be absent for a reason and if they have a duty spot they have done a better job of communicating with all the people that share that Duty spot with them who may be impacted by their absence we've also noticed that the temperature so to speak in the building has like come down drastically so where there was that level of intensity and just the the energy being just intense um we've noticed that people just seem to be happy we've um noticed that again our staff they're having more authentic conversations with each other rather than just School related items and we often hear which I think is has been interesting that was a really fun meeting and it's like oh

137okay thanks um that was really fun to do so we've heard that more often since we've been more intentional about and incorporating these different types of activities um and either our staff meeting or during our PD time or just an event that gets planned and because Mr shimer is the fun one of the atmin group he plans all those fun activities um for our crews to do but they they tend to be fun and they tend to be um activities where that leaves our staff looking forward to the next time that we're doing something together um we've also seen less resistance right from people wanting to or volunteering to do certain things and I definitely think there's been a shift in our culture and climate in our building and I'll leave you with a direct

138quote from one of our staff members who said I love doing those crew things um that was her way of saying like this has really made a difference and how I feel when I come to work every day so so I will try to be brief um because I'm know I'm standing between dinner and everyone but I will say this is interesting when we started this kind of Journey when I guess when we went to the National Conference in Denver and we were there for the first day and a half and and it started to um some things kind of percolated up but I was like I need to see what what it means for a high school right because High School is just such a different beast and and then Maggie and I happened

139to be I think it may have been the last day in a specific High School um session that was about crew and I think most of you all know we worked really hard part it was a teacher-led school Improvement team Le initiative to add a fifth period into our schedule this year and we're stting in this session and we're like huh this is exactly what we were trying to create all on our own um and so it felt really good one to know that we weren't crazy um but two to know that there's this this movement to support students support students in a sense of belong but also the staff so we are being conscious now to make sure that we get get there with our staff before we get there with our students because

140that's really important um so the focus has been on crew uh and this messaging that it no one finishes first or last you finish with your crew I mean there's so many similarities to a high school setting when it comes to Athletics where we're super competitive and even in theater where everyone is working together and culinary and Robotics all these things that we sit here and celebrate in this room fit perfectly into this crew model but what it does is gives us common language from kindergarten through 12th grade and there's an immense value in that there's an immense value in that our students can hear common messaging going all the way through so when they get to us and we talk about what crew means or what our you know cougar acronym is going to

141mean like they know that getting there like we're not building that we're building that from kindergarten on so that part I'm really really excited about um but I'm also really excited that this builds a sense of self-responsibility authentic feedback uh independent Learners and and those aren't just our students right those are our staff members that we're talking about too um and honestly it feels like to me the real focus is is about building very real relationships not a hierarchical relationship between you know students and then staff and then principles and wherever everybody falls in but very real authentic Rel relationships built on trust and you know that broader sense of love that we're all in this together um and so I guess that's where we're at I'm committed enough that I think um we're sending

142a group of staff to a high school specific um session this summer um we a diverse staff that come from different departments um and we have some folks coming to work at some sessions this summer here um at the school board um there's something else I was going to say oh longterm the thing I may be most excited about is this idea we've not we've talked about crew in general now but this idea of really high quality work in the Expeditions some of the things that we were seeing I think about how Dynamic my campus is where we've got I mean just amazing kids doing amazing things but there's so much of it that is just kept inside right inside the campus whether that's you know doing great things in classrooms or whatever but to

143flip that on its head and think that our students go out into our community I wonder I have a really deep Wonder how much of our own internal issues could be solved by us focusing on improving the community around us um so that's something definitely down the road I'm very excited about but we've got a lot of work to get to that point but that big kind of goal down there could see at our campus our secondary students really being a massive force in our community to to change to change what our the city of Asheville looks like okay so I also wanted to pull some data um to share with the board about what we see in our school district and we're going to put the presentation back up and the first two couple

144slides are going to look familiar I asked Copeland I was like can I use these in this presentation because I think they resonate with a need um and what we heard from our reap students is strategy number five on the Asheville 6 is is an area of growth for us our teachers are not comfortable in addressing race and racism and crew provides a structure and a culture that we can start implementing how do we address race and racism when we see it what are the tools what are the strategies when we feel like we really feel like we have a sense of belonging we can tackle some of those really hard issues together um and then just the second slide um or second graph breaking it out by the students um so the full sample

145you can see with our white students our black students and our bipo students and that difference in our black and bipo students to our white students is how they perceive um that race and racism is being addressed is much different than how our white students perceive that um and then just again resonating the surveys from our students that um about 15% 15.75 overall percent of our students feel like they don't have a trusted adult and implementing crew through this structure will help those students have that person that they can identify with um and then just that last slide that they shared is um our students of color 20% are feeling like they don't have a trusted adult in our building and that's just that's too high we need to work on that um the other

146piece of data that I put in and you can't read it up there I'm sorry I didn't realize that would be so small um is our teacher working condition surveys the results came out um now I will say we've seen growth from two years ago so there's positive direction in that but when we look at how we compare to the state we are still really significantly lower on results where we need to work on um so some of them that I think using crew will really help us with is this first question overall my school is a good place to work and learn um the state average was 9 1% Asheville City Schools overall 86% um atmosphere of trust 80% as a uh as a state 74% as a school system um so I think

147those are some of the major issues that we can address through implementation of crew um I'm going to go to the next one um this one was our Equity the equity question um so a big difference here on question number one all students are treated equitably the state average was 81% our average was 66% this is the teacher working condition survey yeah um another one that I I know will really help is uh teachers uh number two teachers require students to work hard 86% here 66 69% um 86% at the state 69% um the one we were higher on than the state was question three I do want to shout out there teachers show respect for all students cultural beliefs and practices um we were above the state average by about 2% state was 92

148and we were 94 um I think again here another is another one number six is our school uh recruits and retains diverse teaching staff we know that that is an area of growth for us and overall we can see um based on the teacher working condition survey that our staff feels like it's an issue as well um and then I wanted to dig into a little bit of the professional learning section which I think a couple things here really resonate with me when it talks about we need to invest in our staff um I think a historical approach has been more and more and more people to solve the problem instead of investing in the people we have to help help them understand that together they can solve the problem um so that then two

149questions here an appropriate amount of time is given for professional development at the state level it was 82% District 63% the question number two professional development is differentiated to meet the needs of individual teachers 64% across the state and we were at a 46% so we have some really key areas here that I think we need to work on and support um another area is leadership development um our school leaders need this support as well because the single most important factor of a student being successful in school in life is their teacher and then the second most important person in that is the school principal so investing in not just our staff but our leaders is an area of big growth for us as a school system so then I want to share some data

150um about eel um so this is a school in Escondido California um had implemented crew the e professional learning strategies um to support School Improvement and over three years was able to come up for all of their students grades three through eight um to increase their learn to increase their achievement to be in line with the state average so I think that's a pretty dramatic result for three-year Improvement um this same school um when they looked at their students who were economically disadvantaged saw them outperform form State and and District um when they were implementing this uh the El professional learning strategies and crew some other research um related to closing the Gap this is an older study that was done um back in uh after at looked at a couple schools in the um

151Rochester and New York City school systems um and they looked at Gap and it said our schools that are implementing El closing the gap on achievement and you can see that over the course of these five years they only looked at students as well that were in the school for two consecutive years um so you can see that they are working on closing the Gap it takes time but we know that good things happen when you work together and you dedicate your time to um focusing on student achievement um so the second school um another school that looked at the progress they made um you can see significant gains closing the achievement Gap and then a third school um also um looked at some mixed reviews here in different areas but overall positive gains in

152closing the achievement Gap does does that say 2004 yeah 09 from 2004 to 2009 okay yeah um this was a research study that was done um focusing on culture climate when schools have implemented crew um and you can see the Red Bar are your e schools that implemented crew the blue bars are the comparison school so when you look at relational climate the ratings were much more positive in schools as well as shared leadership and I think for shared leadership is a key when we talk about how are we improving teacher working conditions we need to distribute leadership we need to involve them in decisionmaking and helping address and come up with those problems which is what we heard from AC cie tonight is they want to be involved in the problem solving process so

153talk a little bit about what does this look like so and this is kind of the model that El uses for continuous Improvement um is that you have these El resources you've got their core practices they have a curriculum that's not something we're recommending at this point that we invest in but with those resources come a coach and a school designer so it's people that will come in and help us facilitate the work and be accountability partners for us so with those resources we identify key strategies that we want to use for improvement um within the school system so right now looking at crew as one of those major initiatives to really look at how do we build that sense of belonging um as our C strategy and then what they do with that is

154really take it through this continuous quality improvement process and progress monitoring and leadership development and being that again that accountability partner um so that's kind of their model is really helping get the resources identifying the right thing and then using this continuous Improvement model to help monitor progress and Fidelity of implementation more so than mon monitoring like student like not mtss monitoring it's something completely different so as we talked with um eel and got them to kind of see where we were what we've been doing um and then we asked them to kind of outline for us what kind of supports you think we need to help start moving this project forward um so the first one here is leadership development um at the district leadership development for our staff at the school level too

155um so they outline these in what they call Direct service days so it's a day where the El um coach that gets assigned to us uh would come in and help support our development um we did kind of a smaller contract to help um to close out this school year to help develop leadership crew um and that's a little bit what Derek and rafika were speaking of is some of that work already happening that they're taking and implementing little bits um at their schools so the first part is this strategic planning and leadership development at the district level and at the school level to really identify you know what are what is going to be our Focus what's the initiative we're going to do and they address this in what they call their core practices

156so they've picked out a couple core practices um alongside with us that we feel will really help us move this work forward um the lining that with the work we've already started through Management in the active classroom um and then building in that accountability model with monthly with Gathering data on a regular basis to look at how we doing are we moving the needle forward um the second part of the um proposal is really working on implementing crew with our staff um and they're very adamant that you cannot have a strong student crew before you have strong staff crew um you know there's that old saying you're your chain is only strong as your weakest link so we need to have a strong sense of Staff efficacy and Collective efficacy as a group before we

157can do some of the hard work that we know is in front of us um so the purpose here is um again coaching days so these are days a full day at each school but this isn't where you shut everything down and staff just ages in PD all day um so an example of what this might look like is let's say um they're the let's say the high school is identified a core practice that they want to gather some data on so Derek might put together three teams um that go out at different times in the day and they say okay let's first identify are we all on the same page with what this looks like then they would do some group walkthroughs collect the data analyze it um then another group would go out

158and look at those indicators and at the end end of the day they've been able to collect a lot of data that then they can share with their staff and instead of it being like well Jesse did this really great in his classroom Rebecca didn't do this great you look at it as a collective and then you can develop plans and steps to say here's what we need to do to move this needle with this area and then can collect data again the second time so this whole work is about embedding not just the sense of crew but also developing our leaders and their work on how do they monitor continuous impr Improvement at their schools so it embeds that leadership development with PD and direct coaching so we can support the work that's happening

159um in our schools and then the other area here is just adding additional leadership development um for our teachers um or for our leaders at the school at the schools um to really focus in on how are we making sure they've got the leadership skills to make sure they're showing up as the leaders we know they can be so just kind of ending um then if there's questions um we have to invest in our staff it is it's a big ask it's not uh hey this is a light investment because our staff is ready for this we see in the working conditions survey that they want to be invested in they want good professional development they want to be engaged in the process they want to be at the table with this um we've got

160to invest in our staff because our most important our greatest resource are human resources and we keep adding and adding staff we see that that hasn't been helping us move the needle so we've got to make an investment somewhere else and that is investing in the staff that we have because I know that with the investment in the right spaces we can do some really great things what's the cost of this investment so all of this which is um all those direct coaching days all of the leadership development days plus um slots for um at the at the they have a National Conference they have um Regional leaders leadership development conferences so the total cost is um it's about $83 per student um which totals up to about um $330,000 it's expensive but it's an

161investment and where do we where where would that where would those funds come from so some of the funds can come from our eser funds that we are not spending um also looking at redirecting other conference funds that we've been investing in others like little bucket here a little bucket there really taking a look at what we're doing we're not asking for additional money to be allocated in the budget for this we're reallocating what we have in a way that we believe will pay bigger dividends in the end so instead of doing a little bit of this a little bit of that a little bit of that really focusing in on something that we know will help us move the needle can I ask a question oh I'm sorry you good oh well can I

162be honest yeah I guess I can uh maybe I should not have read this around 2300 2400 last night um then I was asking myself have I seen this before over the years then my mind went to another program and then by the time I got down and looking at the total cost of about 330,000 that you mentioned I think I went to sleep yeah I mean do we I mean it's a program it's another program that we're trying to bring to the to ask for city scho right um is is there another way that we have already contributed some of it to lower the cost out so that we don't have to spend 300 there's I mean yeah we could pair some of it down a little bit um I just in my honest

163opinion I think the what the package offers the way it's designed is crucial because it touches all of the pieces it touches staff development touches quality improvement cycling with our sta with our leaders it touches leadership development it helps us create that consistent language kindergarten through 12th grade um so it really builds the foundation for great work to happen I I'll reflect that one of the things we heard as a board after years and years of leadership change and when we went on the look for a new superintendent you know I think that in our community we've had some real rough experiences of of a big investment in something that then it didn't pan out it didn't get implemented in a way that we got to see the see what see it come to fruition

164and so it can feel a little jarring um and concerning and I think about the I also think about the elements of what I see here and they are very logical to me about what it means like everything that this is uplifting aligns with what I would want to see in our school district so I don't have a concern about that my question before Jesse's comment was what have you seen and what do you know about how when you bring crew when you bring in the crew part of el how does it uplift your existing strengths how does it take things that are really working that you've built we saw those reap students right because I think for our community to say oh I see this it can't be you're going to throw out everything

165you've been doing we're going to start using this whole new language you're all going to speak a new language now and you're going to it has to feel like it honors what what we do well and uplifts US CU can you say more about what how that would go yes so e the the the structure of crew isn't replacing something it's I think of it as a catalyst so it is you guys have heard of a catalytic converter everyone has one in your car they're really expensive if they break and they make Chemical reactions happen faster my dad actually invented the catalytic converter little known fact um but anyway so they make reactions happen faster and that's what crew would bring to us it would allow us to create that culture and structure where we

166are TR trust is an issue it builds it will help build trust it will help build that Collective efficacy like when you hear rafika talking about hey I feel good about this um it helps build that structure um to for for us to do hard things together um so and that I think is something that you can't put a price tag on because when it happens and it feels like we're all in it together we will move much further than we ever thought possible but now we're very disjointed there's this happening here there this happening here we're bringing in this person we're bringing in this person and taking all of that and reinvesting that in one thing that will help us bring together our Focus I I think is something that we'll see exponential growth

167from I know we will I've seen the results so Shannon oh so are you sure okay um so couple thoughts uh and then a question um one Rebecca when you mentioned just like our the the process of of going through the listening sessions around hiring new superintendent the thing that one of the things I took away from a lot of listening and thinking about the my experience as a parent throughout my whole my children's time here in naville City Schools was the understanding that as a small District District we can be nimble as a district and we have the opportunity of doing some very transformative Visionary things and having been with Derek and rafika um and Shannon um at and and you in Denver for that e conference and seeing the impact that El has

168had on schools and districts I saw Visionary things happening and so I and I so I want to lift that up like it it's it was powerful what I experienced in um and I and I I fully believe that you have that Vision in your mind for sure I I feel that no doubt I also need to hold in my hand right now um that looking at a 330,000 price tag for just what is looking to me like step one of could be something much much larger down the road staring in the face of what's next on our agenda right now is our next budget you know our budget conversation with a with you know with County Commissioners right now that I think this year are saying that there's probably not going to be any

169increase in our in our budget ask and so um and so that you know there probably isn't even a question behind what I'm saying it's just that that almost that kind of resignation almost and so maybe I'm maybe there is a question maybe it's like asking from you as our leader how how we as a district can balance this this real idea of visioning about what and and maybe it's not eel but let's just let's just go ahead and go with it right now something like eel and what it what something like this can really do to transform our district inside of the crucible that we now are in in this district and in the state etc etc with the financial constraints that we now live in how does how how do all of us

170sitting around here understanding that right now and the resignation that I have to live with how do we reconcile that with looking at a $330,000 price tag for I guess this year and what might then come thereafter you know you said you can't put a price on that but we have to as a board put a price on it you know so anyway there's not sorry that's a very disjointed oh that's okay um and I me it's about investment we can invest our money and our resources over here or we can invest them in developing our staff um because we're going to invest money in staff development anyway so are we going to develop invest that money in continuing all these small things or can we reinvest this money in a very clear way and

171we've seen how the sense of belonging has really taken off and our staff want to feel a sense of belonging our students want to feel a sense of belonging and that really has taken this whole I never expected it to but it's resonated with everyone in our district that I've seen and has been shared with me we just don't have a structure to do that we can come up with ideas but we don't need to reinvent the wheel and the other thing we have is we don't have the the leadership development built in and the continuous Improvement built in and yes if I drop everything else I'm doing and Kim drops everything else she's doing yeah we can start doing that but we have limited resources so this is bringing in not only additional resources

172it's not just bringing in this idea it's bringing in the training it's bringing in the professional development it's bringing in that support for our principles for our district leaders and for our staff um so I think it's to me it's a when you look at it as an investment per student per staff I think it's a it's a really worthwhile investment because our staff need training they need support and they're asking for it [Music] so some people have been trained in this where I mean I'm I'm a little confused that that there are some people so before I really explored is this something we want to invest in I wanted to see if it was something that resonated with key Leaders with other staff um so we did a a small investment in sending a

173group to the El National Conference as I've shared before just to get an idea do they does this resonate with you do you think this is something that we may want to look into if it is great if not keep moving um and then when we got back from the conference um it did really resonate with rafika and Shannon and Derek um and they said yeah let's send some of our staff to a crew an online crew training so we picked about 10 staff to attend a crew training just to see once they get into the full details um is it worthwhile um and the reson resonating response for those teachers counselors um instructional coaches was yes they feel like this is something that will really make a difference um for our staff so when

174I say that we've just explored it to see is this something that's going to work or not um with the staff that are at the schools going to do the work um and then what we did next is knowing that we've got to do some leadership training some leadership development um had a smaller kind of just three days for E to come in and help develop that crew with our leadership team I'd like to hear feedback um beyond what rafika and Derek have shared with us oh sure I think everyone here has sat around and attended that so you're all free to I just want to say that George I totally understand your question with myself and rafika and Derek each of us have 20 plus years in this District we've seen a lot of

175change we've seen a lot of programs come and go we've seen a lot of things not stick this is the first thing in a very long time I truly believe in I've seen it work I've seen bits and pieces of it already working in some similar things that we're doing across the district we're just not using the same language but as Dr Maggie said I see this as a vehicle as a tool by which bringing all those really good things that are working to build that sense of belonging those relationships hopefully we'll have more than 20% of our bipar students saying that they don't have a trusted adult goto this is the vehicle to make that change to make some transformation really happen I really believe in it I know rafika has put a lot

176of it to the test already in her school we've been doing it in bits and pieces and I really feel like this is not just another program that's going to come and go this is an investment in people it's an investment of our staff that we really need that they're leaving in droves and if we don't do something to build a collective efficacy like we've been talking about to have have that shared vision of our schools have that shared vision of our leadership we're just going to we're we're we're just not going to stick so I really feel like this is the first thing that I've seen in a very long time that will bring us together and it's not just I don't see it as another program I see it as a way of

177being I see it as a way um it's a practice right it's it's a practice uh and it's an intentional structure so I wasn't a part of the core team that went to Denver I was part of the when when training came back for district leadership and school leadership so that was my first like toes in the water experience and immediately it was things that I know have been successful like the implementation and the building of silsa for example like the characteristics the listening to teachers pulling in what would work and all that structure 15 years ago is really when that started um the work we did with the teacher leadership and how we would support teachers with teachers observing teachers and building their lesson plans and linging in all of those things are all

178little bitty fragments and there's countless others but what has been missing is consistent leadership not just the superintendent but principals assistant principles Department chairs the a board that um is brave enough to stay consistent and really believe like just throughout Transitions and the culture but what we really have to have is an intentional structure and I know I'm a recovering math teacher so that's part of it but I'm also a very compassionate person and I know that we have to have that accountability the other big thing that I think is important is the principles Buy in and their support like it was very intentional that principles were trained and they were around the table I don't think they all feel the same thing to your point Miss Kelly like I think they have some varied

179opinions because they're principles and that's just what we do um but the collective in those moments those principles meetings that can be not so awesome it did shift that climate it did shift that in that moment even when things are just kind of yucky like March is just a hard month right it do it you definitely felt a difference and I don't know if if other people agree with me on that but um because it's a it's a hard time so okay I got one question there's one two three four five six seven 8 9 10 11 there's 11 of us that have known each other for at least 10 years at least 10 we all have if so if you all I mean I think I mean I know most of everyone in this

180room and I think we all know each other if you feel that this is going to work it's going to help you it's going to help our school district it's going to help our kids and everything else to the fullest right that's what we're going to have to go by because like I said we all have worked together for at least 10 years all right but if you feel that way I mean that's how I look at work is the people that has been there and they know it's going to work if you know it's going to work all right and make it work I guess it's going to have to work I mean I'm looking at you guys I mean you all been here for so long you know and I'm going to trust

181I mean it's the no we but Mr Warren it's like it is it is the the structure the intentionality the calling each other in and that support system it cannot be half this a half that hodg Podge that we just can't do that so it we can say we know but we all have to do and that has to that means when people aren't feeling great about it and they're complaining about it we we know so that we can address it immediately before gets too big I hope we all can address it among each other since we know each other so well right and so I mean I really appreciate the way you're characterizing it and I think that what I would love to see something along the lines of like a crosswalk of you

182know yeah it's a hodg Podge but it's what we got and when you build on what's working then you you know the I think there can I can feel a sense of fear in me and in the people who have said to me please like ash City schools has got to like get this right you know that if it feels like we're going to throw things out to start with a new language and a new program and a new it's all different and everybody get on to this new way that that's that doesn't feel like belonging so I think that what what some of us are bringing is is our ignorance we don't know it yet we you know we don't have a lot of exposure we've not I've not been to anything so I

183don't have this understanding and I look forward to getting it and I look forward to learning more because we do need something what you said Dr and like we are spending money it's not that we're not spending this money we're spending it on all kinds of different things we're talking about strategically bringing it together so that we can see our whole District go somewhere which was the charge it was the ask I think my trepidation can feel like are we doing it or are we buying it off a shelf and I need to see that we're not buying it off a shelf what what but we're going to do it and we're going to go far are as slowly as it takes to go together because that's there no quick fixes and that's what I

184don't want I want to see all the things that we have built when we see these reap students come and do you know 2017 they started that work to get to reap so you know that H how does this crosswalk where we just keep lifting up the beautiful parts of the hodge podge and I'm bringing it together to me that's what I look forward to learning more about so I have a question when when would when would this start um would this start for this coming uh the 2425 school year um I I'll be honest I I kind of like Jesse said you know having sat here for years on the board but also being being associated with the district I've seen the different initiatives come through and come through and come through and come

185through and and um I I don't see this looking through the presentation and then actually listening to you it this feels to me personally this feels not like an initiative but as a strategic way of of going and and I can see this falling in line with our strategic planning um as we move forward um I I I think to to Liza's point I I and I I hate that I'm actually saying this I would love to hear a little bit more on the staff level not I love you but not you I'm talking about the teacher level the staff level the the the IIA the custodian the if if we could and I'm not saying that I'm not for this at all because I am I'm very much for it but I I just

186would love to hear on that level um a little bit more just on on how what they think about it I know they're always going to have the tractors I I know that but um from you know rafik's um uh description of how her staff has done I would love to you know hear just from some of those individuals not tonight uh maybe we can get them to come back I don't know um but just just anecdotally I love love to hear what their thoughts are on it um yeah I the back the intentionality of the of how to implement this is through leadership development then staff development um so the the next phase is um there's one final leadership crew training um it's actually next week and then for our Leadership Retreat um it's

187a two-day Retreat where the schools will be bringing in more of their team to build their plans for next year so if the board doesn't approve this it kind of stops at the end of June um so this is the services that we would Implement for next year um it is kind of like a branded thing so if you want that support you've got to kind of drink the Kool-Aid a little bit to to move it forward in that structured way um and have all those embedded supports to help you move that along the way um so that is kind of the that's where we are in the in the implementation process and then what the principles will do our plan for convocation was to do a launch of crew how that looks um working

188with the teach working with the principles on hey what is your initial crew training look like um when you bring your staff back in the fall um we're working on right now on kind of the crew preview lesson um which will also help launch the characteristics of the cougar um which is what we're headed towards we're looking at what are what are these expectations we have for our students Beyond just when they leave with their graduation cap with their diploma you know is it critical thinker is it Problem Solver is it do they approach with curiosity um so this is one of those programs that you know it wasn't just something I picked up and said hey this would be a great idea I've seen it work I've seen it make a huge impact um

189and I've been in education for you know 20 some years and I've seen lots of initiatives this isn't an initiative it's a culture shift um it's a culture change and we know that without having that sense of belonging our staff will continue to turn over so creating this opport opportunity for our staff to really build this Collective sense of we're in this together no matter what and it's not my it's not it's not a district it is like Hey we're going to build this sense of belonging but the schools will determine how they do that the district says hey you we need to have a sense of belonging before we can do anything hard because if we don't I'm going to scoot because guess what I've got a better opportunity down the road that isn't

190as hard as this but when I'm invested in my school I'm invest Ed in for my students I'm invested I'm showing up here for Shannon and Mark and April and everyone so not just in it for me we're in this together because if I don't show up and bring in my everything other stuff doesn't happen as well and that's what this building this structure is a it's the culture shift that I believe we need as a district if we're going to make progress um we started talking about theory of action you know the board said make change faster than slower this will help us make that change faster I'll just I'll I'll say this um you know sitting here our reap data says that we need a our working condition survey said says that we

191need it and somebody who's been in the district you I'll Echo for 20 plus years the the the shift and culture has been the missing thing and you know that is why people walk out the door and I have to say I'm behind this 110% and I don't think uh I think we're in a position where we we can't afford not to do it t how do you how do you feel about it I I'm I'm very tired right now and I hope I'm not misreading your faces just being tired but excuse me Dr Maggie had asked me I was out Friday I I I have no comment I'm just I'm the two-day training we took was really good [Music] um I Echo a lot of what's been said um of course my love for

192the district and all the initiatives that we've done um I'm I'm I'm just here so uh just one caveat I just want to place on that you know I do not recognize that last time we did say we want to we want to go as fast as possible but of course that needs to be with that prop of mind right like often times we have to go slow to go far right and so this is a this is a thing where we're trying to go very far no I know that but it's also like in in a lot of our Equity training we talk very often about we we go slow to go far um which also brings up another point that that I because people know that I went to this conference in Dem

193I have heard from some staff who um who have raised um a concern that they're not hearing from some of the E people enough around really hearing a the the real racial Equity the land and just so as you're continuing to work with them if you can um remind them that you know this is a district very much committed to it so that's the the session next week is really gu getting in you can't have those difficult conversations about Equity work until you break down the barriers and start liking each other so we needed to do that first before we could really have those deep conversations about Equity good thank you y my last can we get it down to maybe 20,000 instead of 30,000 I teach a class if I need to for [Laughter]

194free oh boy hey thank you Maggie for that um so I guess my question is do we put this can I put this on the board agenda carry it over to the next meeting 20,000 okay thank you um okay so we have finalized our budget presentation that we will share May 9th at the budget work session with the County Commissioners um so if we want to go ahead and put that up you want to do the cell phone policy you oh sorry I forgot about that um so the there was a request for examination of cell phone policies so board in your agenda I had attached two examples of cell phone policies um so wanting to know if the board interested in moving forward with examining a creating our own cellone policy currently we have

195nothing about cell phones um or electronic communications as a school um districts Across the Nation are struggling with this I will tell you at the high school this is probably comes up as the number one issue for their staff and things that they're addressing I know they would support um from what I've heard and when my interactions with the high school early on in the here they want more help on addressing use of cell phones in the schools so are you wanting to craft are you asking us if to to go move forward with either crafting our own or like taking bits and pieces of these two orating our own using some of the language from these yeah can I ask oh I'm sorry sorry Jesse I was just going to say if it's if

196it's a matter of us taking that onus off of the principles of the high school so it can be like the board has said that I'm more than happy for us to craft a policy so it does not fall on them and we can say this is what okay district is saying that's what I would say but I would also can we get feedback I mean I'm looking at one principal two principal three principle four five six principle can we get you guys to what you have seen what you didn't like inside of your classroom inside your schools to come up with some type of I'm if you want a policy from the board on cell phones yeah I was going to say I imagine that we should take it down to the elementary level

197based on staff feedback no it would be District W okay it would be District white yes okay um in in onus also of student voice I think we also then get some input from our Student Government on what could a cell phone policy look like and how do they hold each other accountable so that would be part of the vetting process and getting input um from students as well okay um so there is really no updated information um or changes to this budget proposal this is now the kind of the polished version for final feedback from the board on anything else that would be additional to add to our budget uh presentation that will be this Thursday at the county commissioner's work session um so I'm going to highlight for the County Commissioners that you

198know last year was this board's first budget that they had um passed and that we are now working with this board on creating their second budget um which is a it's a process um to learn budgeting and to understand how uh School budgets work also highlighting we have new superintendent coming in also a new CFO um learning kind of how North Carolina budgeting works for school districts um for me and and um a very seasoned CFO but also one that's still learning how Asheville City schools has done things um I'm going to highlight how I spent initial time investing in listening and learning to generate these three promises um for our community and for our school system so I'll highlight those um and then we have several slides here just celebrating the successes um and

199achievements that we've had so I'm not going to read all these but um these are just what the things we want to highlight also we've got several great slides on amazing things that have happened in Ashville City Schools over the past year yep graduation rates students from silsa went to Costa Rica I know it yeah mm no idea that's yeah Andi this is one that I'm actually really proud of um for our school system is are the percentage of our students that complete the fatsa form compared to other schools this is huge fbsa is a gateway and a huge barrier to students getting into college and the fact that we are so successful and getting such a high percentage is is huge um we also wanted to highlight some of the commissioner um County Commissioner

200uh Capital commission funded projects so we've got a highlight here of those and then also wanted to then highlight some of the challenges that we face as a school system um expansion of the opportunity scholarship on the horizon our cost of living versus salaries um in our area the high staff turnover H particularly in some high leadership positions um seeing that we've got decreasing enrollment um but we have growth of charter schools um I think there's three charter schools that are adding grades next year um we've got the consolidation study we've got our aging facilities Rising maintenance costs um and just minimal growth in our local Revenue anticipated so some highlighting some of the challenges um and they also asked us to put in a slide on staff retention and recruit and recruitment um so

201I've just highlighted here some of the things that we've done to address Recruitment and Retention um the increase in our local supplement I think was was a big um check there um the stiens that the board increased last year when it came to coaching stiens and principal stiens and AP um we've also been piloting some retention bonuses for hardto fill positions and as particularly in exceptional children um and then just listening to our staff and engaging them in decision-making processes I think has been really helpful can I ask a couple of questions M for these last two slides um and this may be a question for you and others on the board is it worth putting any because you have for example increased local suppl by 2% is it worth putting any figures or other

202percentages for any of these other bullet points do you think that would be helpful for the commissioner's uh atic stiens and the principal St like expansion of the opportunity scholarship roughly 1.5 million you know like I don't know maybe maybe it's not but I'm just thinking like yeah I can try we can try to capture what that would look like it's there's some data on it um what the proposal is if that you know yeah um the private school voucher that's what they're calling yeah yeah exactly right the opportunity scholarship I was just going to really talk through more of the details the vouchers I yeah yeah but I don't you know if it's going to if it helps our case I don't know can you just vouchers yes uhuh there's also the the confusing

203piece of calling it vouchers is that there are vouchers for um early childhood education which is a separate thing and it's based based on we yeah we could call it private school voucher call Private School vouchers versus the opportunity scholarship but that's just yeah I'm I'm dead is De is um okay so I made a note there I'll work on that any anything else on the challenges um that you think we need to highlight do you do you do you see the I know you have consolidation study down as a challenge do we do we want to highlight it h i mean I'm just asking is that something that we want to I mean my take County and the Commissioners from Commissioners I've been in conversation with has been that yeah it's a it's a

204challenge that's distracting us from work okay I'm open to taking it off I mean the irony is they put it as a as a budget priority yeah or say hey how you going to fund this but anyway okay I've got one but yeah maybe I just oh bugger Kim can you go and put that back on presentation for me please thank you thank you uh okay then we get into what our request is for this coming budget year um and this is all the same information that we've shared I did kind of collect some of the information in a different way um so we this slide has not changed sorry Maggie that previous c um slide do you need that calendar yeah do you need the calendar for the presentation to the Commissioners I mean

205I could yeah no I don't think you do sorry I don't mean to be nitpicking no no it's not nitpicky deleted it right there done uh okay so then looking at our projected Revenue loss projected increases exp expenditures um our budget request um to cover some of the enhancements and then I go through some more data on um student mental health so added to this um slide that we did complete 41 suicide um screenings um this school year so far and 13 threat assessment so did want to capture that data based on your feedback before um the then this slide talks about the office referrals and how many students are really creating those office referrals just building the case for the need for our behavior interventionists um and then I looked through all the student

206support specialist data and tried to capture it in a little more of a succinct way um so that it made I think a little more sense so as we studied the data um at all schools came up with some averages so that each school um student support specialist is usually being is being called to respond to events daily um between 5 to 10 incidents um they spend between 15 to 20 minutes per incident um deescalation is the most frequently um asked for support and then also just some of the outcome data so as those students are then going and returning to class we are seeing that they're leaving that um support feeling better so we are seeing marks increase in how the students are actually feeling after they leave so we're seeing some value um

207and positive results on the use of our student support Specialists any questions on how I've summarized that data okay um and then these are the slides you've already seen about what we're going to about what these what the funding is that we're asking for and how we're going to use that um so that's the SR Cliff funding request um one piece of data I did add here u based on um Amy Ray's feedback was just some more specific data on student mental health that it isn't just a covid issue like this is something that has been kind of of as a problem for um or as an area of Need for for a while so these are charts and graphs that I pulled from the CDC website um on student mental health and particularly towards

208student um suicide um challenges so you can see the the historical data there is showing that um we are seeing much more um much more increase in students needing mental health support and some of the challenges so I'll walk through some of those slides sorry would you go back one will you change that to by gender 10e 10 Trend description by gender oh yes I will see if I can do that because it's on um it there a snapshot oh okay yeah see if I can put something over it but thank you yeah cuz there it's probably on there again too yep okay y it's a second one I figured would be on there okay thank you um so our ask or two additional social work um full-time two additional counselors um and then went

209through what our budget um expenditure reductions would be um highlighting our two-month operating expenditure um goal is keeping that in our fund balance highlighting where we were able to try to help uh meet some of those requests from acae um and then looking at what our ask is so asking for an increase in funding of 3.8 million and then the request to restore the pre-tax or the pre pandemic tax level um for the local supplement tax and that would generate 1.57 um and if that additional tax is generated then that could take down our 3.8 um so that's kind of the conversation there and then also adding what our historical funding and current request is so that they can see kind of where we've been and where we're going um and then this is a

210really small slide but they also asked for fringe benefits um and what that data looks like there do you do you think it would be helpful to put in um anything about well as we just had a presentation from a charter uh about how much our district does pay out to Charter Schools I mean I know you have it in there up there 500,000 but is there like a total number of I like a total number of the charters that I mean because I I know that bunkham County also experiences the same thing and actually probably on a higher level because of just they have more students yeah but I just think that it's something that sometimes I don't think the Commissioners really understand it um or or get it um exactly how much money

211we pay out to Charter Schools because of the way the state is um so yeah we have that actually um do we have the actual number yeah Heidi pulled some data we got kind of our change in enrollment numbers um we still haven't gotten our state allotments um but we do have some additional data that we can see how our numbers have shifted in Charter and it Compares she pulled the data for bunkham County as well just that was just a suggestion yeah we can add yep okay um I was just going to say I don't I don't know that that would necessarily be helpful given that there are new Charters every time we have closed a school I could just see some of the Commissioners pushing back on that um yeah um let me

212just say that you know the County's view counties don't always understand the presentation but they're required to obviously pay for every student that resides in the county so even though that's coming out of our budget they don't deem that any additional responsibility on their part to come up with any difference in funding because they've already funded that student okay thank you and I appreciate that feedback so that's a good point and I hadn't thought of it on that level so thank you but I mean mind do think the totals are pertinent I mean and bunam like you said has about four times as many students they're paying for we do that framing is very different yes yeah all right well if you have any we have to send this to the Commissioners tomorrow morning along

213with the budget letter um so if you have any changes that you think we need to make I really appreciate your added slides thank you those are yeah very helpful all right and then do we we need to approve this is that right do we need to make a yeah S I make a motion that we um accept or approve the uh budget presentation um the 2425 budget presentation there's a motion on the floor [Laughter] was been moved and seconded um first but is there is a motion moved and seconded but I'll also ask if there are any questions because I I know I didn't ask for that any other comments questions all right then um all in favor I I any opposed all right great thank you Maggie welcome yeah concludes all the regular

214work session agenda items yes soral items y okay um so contracts andus there's a link attached that uh Howard's plumbing company is on there again and that is on the agenda for consent so um and then uh policy 8100 is the budget planning and adoption and so that is um the policy that Heidi reviewed and wanted to make sure that we added that piece about maintaining two months worth of fund balance and then the 3610 is the counseling program and I did verify with Kim Robinson that the additions that we are in compliance with the additions that are noted and read and then 4135 p is tuition for discretionary um out for out of District students and we just wanted to put a clarifying statement in there about when tuition has to be paid so

215that's that's a procedure and so that's just information only questions all right thank you okay anything else from the board do have one go for it you yeah on the Middle School uh school it yes oh yes yes yes um so an principal selection um timeline um so we posted the job it came down last Friday it was up for two weeks um I think we had 13 candidates submit applications for it a wide range of internal and external candidates some with experience as principles some with um experience even above being a principle um district office principles that have moved up to district office um so we've got a a wide range of candidates um so right now we're in the process of vetting the candidates um collecting some feedback from the two middle schools

216on what they want to see what qualities they want to see in the next principal for the Middle School um that will take that information um Mark uh Dr Dickerson is working with um both middle schools on forming a selection kind of an interview committee um they will complete a around one interview of qualified candidates and then those candidates uh they will select kind of a smaller they'll pick you know top three or four to go to a second round interview second round interviews will be with a smaller subset of interview team one and they will send me no more than three candidates that I will do an individual one-on-one interview with as the final interview um and my plan is to bring the Bard a U Middle School principal um for approval at the

217June board meeting right well um leave it to us on um Teacher Appreciation Week to have our longest work session um so thank you those of you who are still in this room for being with us this long um we also have learned that our mics don't last 5 hours um but thank you for sticking with us U we knew this would be a long meeting and so grateful for you for being with us uh this evening um just a quick couple of notes we have our uh next regular meeting this coming Monday May 13th uh and then we start preparing for the end of the school year um we've got an early dismissal for students on Friday May 24th that's not the last day of school um but that is an early dismissal um

218and then that's um ahead of the I always get them confused that's Memorial Day weekend yes um and then we have no school Monday May 27th mon um May 31st um thanks to the foundation is Teacher Appreciation Day um details to be forthcoming and then we get into June and there'll be more announcements about that like graduation last day of school and all that forthcoming so um with that that I will ask for a motion to move into closed session and let everyone else and we can say as printed in the agenda which is A1 for personnel and A3 for attorney client well there you go uh as printed in the agenda so move yep been moved and seconded all in favor I I any opposed all right we are in