001you can you all check to make sure that you can unmute yourselves Chuck that's a casting is that does that work crystal yep okay there's one person on line who I cannot identify based on empty embalming today you can Bob and James sharing your hand is up you want me lower it no I just wanted to see if people can't hear me the headsets yes okay agree can you hear me yes sir all right I'm just gonna mute everybody and then Susan it's 503 so we could probably get started so let me mute all then I will unmute you Susan don't see anyone else in the waiting room okay Austin you good to go down there Austin don't hold on Chet okay all right so whenever you're ready to record Susan we can hear you
002I'm happy here at my tube can you hear me now yes okay sorry I have the mic turned off good evening everyone the April 7th 2020 electronic zoo meeting of the Lynchburg City School Board is called to order before we begin this meeting I have some statements that I need to read that must be made public before we can hold the electronic meeting that City Council adopted on March 24th 2020 a continuity of government ordinance that allows City Council and the city authorities boards Commission's to hold electronic meetings in appropriate situations so the long as alternative arrangements are made for public access to such meeting that Virginia's executive legislative and judicial bodies at all levels have declared states of emergency based on the advice of health directors and take an unprecedented restrictive actions to limit
003physical contact among citizens that the coronavirus makes it impractical and unsafe even life-threatening for quorum of the public body to physically assemble in one location that there are important essential matters pending that the public body needs to dress in order to continue the work of government those alternative arrangements have been made for public access to the electronic meetings by streaming live on YouTube and broadcasting on comcast channel 17 at 5:00 p.m. meetings are rebroadcast daily or Comcast at 10 a.m. and 7 p.m. and available online on the LCF LCS YouTube channel before we begin our meeting I want you to make sure that you meet your speaker your seekers should be muted muted unless you're speaking if you want to ask the question or make a statement send me a message through the chat option
004wait for me to call on you before you start speaking because there's a delay from sound and you could be seeking overs from one elf voting tonight will occur by roll call I am now asking each board member attending this virtual meeting to identify themselves starting with board member Evans and proceeding like we were going around the table mr. Evans Bell Evans I'm here thank you Dr Brennan Brennan is present Thank You mr. Carter Sharon Carter present dr. Coleman James Coleman present we can't hear you Mike can you go down to the left-hand corner where your little mic is and there's an arrow and make sure it's on the headset I'll come back to dr. Miller's dr. stern I incident present Harvey Gary Harvey present Thank You president thank you dr. nihlus my nillas present
005thank you dr. Edwards would you identify the staff that's going to be joining us tonight or we have CFO Kim laconic we have our board clerk Christina servi going across we have our supervisor I teach up your girl we have Ho towns attorney dr. copelan our director CNI Janine Daniels bocher who is a supervisor for special ed Austin journey who is in our tech department who is also recording this in live streaming it marici our director personnel dr. Copelan who is our deputy superintendent at the Reeves director of face and engagement and opportunity the Gatzke we have director facilities maintenance and I'm Hal Garcia a blog a mr. a who is the director of Transportation did I miss anyone thank you dr. Edwards the first that takes us to the first order of business which
006is the approval of the agenda for the tonight's meeting the school board chair recommends that the school board approves the agenda for the April 7th 2020 meeting if their motion to approve I move that we approve the agenda second mr. Carter made the motion and dr. Coleman second is there any discussion dr. Gupta what is your vote yes mr. Harvey yes doctor yes dr. Millis yes mrs. Morrison yes dr. Coleman yes miss Carter yes dr. Brennan yes miss Evans yes thank you all very much there is no special presentation tonight that leads to the public comment part of our program in accordance with policy B DDH public participation welcomes requests and comments as established in the guidelines within that policy and as modified to comply with the governor state of emergency our special groups wishing
007to address the school board they do so by choosing one of the following it's in the written statement to the school board clerk at missouri CA at LSBU net statements will be read during the public comment section of the school board meeting to leave a voice message on the school board clerk's phone line at four three four five one five zero seven seven and the message is what we played during the public comment section of the school board written statements and/or voice messages should include the name of the person submitting the comment the subject of his or her remarks and be limited to three minutes per individual and five minutes for group all written statements and/or voice messages must be received no later than fifteen minutes prior to the start of the meeting we have
008five that were submitted today by email and I think one voice and dr. Copelan dr. Coleman is going to read the messages that we received by email thank you dr. Coleman thank you madam chair and these are three minutes and so you'll let me know when to stop if I go along any one of them the first is from Libby Fitzgerald and she states I am speaking in favor of changing the current LCS policy of automatic prohibition of returning prison inmates volunteering in our schools this change is up for a formal vote tonight per the recommendation of equity task force and since it has been studied and researched and discussed and committed for several years now I am hopeful the time has come to make a final decision on the issue if judges after studying
009nonviolent and non ciao predatory felons cases make decisions that are changing people and are ready to safely return to society who are we to say they are somehow of less worth of less value to our schools than others I know many of these guys they played football with our son at EC glass and spending years in our home we cook for and ate with ex-felons at the Gateway they all may stupid and terrible mistakes at 18 or 19 due to bad influences in their lives decades ago as you probably know they got slapped with huge sentences often disproportionate to their crimes which were for the most part nonviolent drug offenses because they couldn't afford good representation and often because they were black now many are out at middle-age desperately trying to cobble their lives back
010together to do the right thing as you know in our sometimes unforgiving society they face almost insurmountable odds against their success so my question is why should we at LCS peril on with yet another roadblock another note when the ex felons who have children wish to volunteer in their schools and be a role model for them and for other children well we all know we have plenty of kids in our schools who are walking a fine line between choosing a good life or a life of crime and coming into contact with someone who made a big mistake paid a big price and now it's being productive again and can be an inspiration to many of them so the bottom line in my mind is when you have served your sentence like your crime and been
011released it should be done you should be restored to first class citizenship and not made to pay for the rest of your life for something you did long ago how do you and dr. Edwards implement a new policy is up to you and her but at the very least please get rid of the automatic and demeaning prohibition against ex-felons volunteering as many school systems and the Commonwealth have done I know you worry about liability but to our knowledge none have experienced any issues of that kind so I urge you to have the carriage to be enlightened and creative about how you make a more forgiving and welcoming volunteer policy work for everyone the second is from Brianna Pattillo from Longwood University local science pre-law criminal justice minor and a part of a National Society of
012leadership and success Sigma Alpha PI good afternoon I am Briana Patil oh I'm very proud to see that the school board is making changes to the volunteer policy and getting rid of the automatic restriction and moving to a case-by-case basis I am hoping that the school board has found a process to make this equitable so that people like my uncle are able to volunteer at the schools with their children that concludes Briana Patil OHS statement thoroughly we have with us comments from Tyler Milton he here's to the Lynchburg City school boy I wish you all well in the midst of such a strange scary and unprecedented time in our world the time social distancing in my home has allowed me to reflect upon feelings of loneliness that has arisen from the isolation I envy the
013folks who are able to social distance with their loved ones and define comfort from their presence and embrace as a gay individual there exist a number of barriers within this culture to finding someone with whom I can share my life one of the most prominent barriers to this is the culture of silence and shaming that shape our collective narrative towards the queer community the impact of this can be seen in numerous ways including fear of being out about one's sexuality and or gender identity hesitancy to be in seen or in a queer partnership and paranoia towards the persistent threat of discrimination while the world indoors a collective experience of fear I ask that you alleviate a more localized threat from Lynchburg city queer students by adding sexual orientation and gender identity into all non-discrimination policies
014you can help to craft a culture of greater inclusivity safety and love that concludes Milton's report statement all right fourthly we have a Sawbuck key Jessup from Lynchburg Virginia thank you for this chance to give input on the issue of discrimination in our public schools I refer to all types of discrimination ridicule and demeaning of individuals should have no place in our society and especially not in our school system our children should feel safe whether they are rich or poor gifted or needing special help whether their background is Asian or African or European tonight we are talking specifically about gender and sexual identity how do we best handle those issues in the public school setting sometimes our prejudice is conscious and overt but many times we are unaware of our hidden bias white privilege has
015been the context in which we have lived for generations homophobic ideas have been the norm it is impossible to comprehend the pain that has been carried down through the years by persons who have been considered different and for a child or teenager to feel disgrace for who they are is intolerable I am grateful that superintendent Edwards has already begun holding training sessions the title of these sessions is brilliant speaking about the unspeakable it is hard for all of us to talk about these things but to build a better community we must address them finally I would urge you to move forward quickly boldly GLBT kids have waited too long to be affirmed and lastly ma'am chair dr. Phil stump professor emeritus of University of Mitch Berger I'm writing to urge you to approve the proposal
016to add sexual orientation and gender identity to the LCS non-discrimination policy for students at your April meeting I applaud the board's resolve to add these categories to the non-discrimination policy and their recognition that we are not just talking about categories we are talking about real individual flesh-and-blood students there seems to have been a reluctance to translate that resolve into action I am thankful to board members who have openly expressed their concerns about possible legal ramifications of the policy change and the need to carefully construct regulations to implement the policy in this way minimizing the legal risks they have injected a needed note of realism into a discussion that to some may seem too idealistic there is a deeper realism I would urge you to consider a realism that is not unrelated to the correct epidemic
017dr. Wilma William barber says epidemics emerge along the fisheries of our society reflecting not only the biology of the infectious agent but patterns of marginalization exclusion and discrimination we are seeing that our society is only as healthy as our sickest person our country is only secure as the least secure homeless family low-wage worker indebted student or uninsured person paraphrase dr. Barbara our schools are only as secure as our most harassed and bullied transgender students are secured my LGBTQ and transgender friends and my church and elsewhere have told me how important it is for the school board to add sexual orientation and gender identity to the categories covered in the LCS non-discrimination policy for students these students are harassed continually and their lives are made very unsafe action is required now that is cognizant of the
018deeper realism we must not allow reasonable concerns about the security of our school system to impede our action on behalf of security of our students who do not need to have perfect regulations to enforce the policy prior to enacting it regulations can be carefully crafted and the policy changes me in reality regulations are constantly evolving after policy changes are adopted allow me to conclude by saying after much mention about the bill itself please act now and your April meeting to do the right thing for all students because they are only as secure as our most vulnerable students are secure thank you dr. Coleman I think we have one phone message yes this is Robert flood I'm calling to speak on the behalf of the ex-offenders volunteering I like to thank the school board for giving
019me the opportunity to speak again and I hope everybody's staying safe I just read the email I got from someone stating that everyone everyone convicted of a southern offense or a misdemeanor may be disqualified depending upon the nature of the offense and the volunteer activity if I could get some quality get some understanding exactly which I'll mean by that I understood that what the the superintendent laid out and I agree with what she laid out at the last school board meeting because I think this has been gone long enough that we need to sit down and make a decision and go forward I know the situation is going on there with the virus and everybody needs to be on board to help them kids any way they can and this is definitely tunity for ex-offenders
020with nonviolent crimes to volunteer show that they would like to be a part of something positive although I don't think nobody really got a callback because I have some people to call just to see if they needed some help and I called myself and I never got a call back but I understand you know so hopefully y'all come to a decision and decide on what what would be good for the students and the school and I'm hoping that at least the non violent crimes as felonies that can be looked at and determine if they will be able to volunteer not only to work with the kids but fathers athletic coaching system coaching after you screen case-by-case I notice how you I think y'all talked about doing it but anyway I appreciate the time and I'm
021glad y'all made this called open to the public to call in and to give at least have some kind of communication with the people that fight to get this Jim Crow law change to let people volunteer to help thank you that concludes the public comment section of our agenda we now move to e finance report dr. Edwards good evening um tonight I want you present the February finance report and the first section on your agenda item on the agenda report you'll see that the operating budget has increased by the twenty four thousand twenty dollars and thirty two cents and that increase is because we've received some insurance proceeds and those funds got allocated back to the departments in which the damage was done so they could get the items prepared majority of this was bus
022accidents where the insurance company did send in those proceeds the revenues received to date or fifty six point nine two percent the expended expenditures today or fifty eight point seven three percent expenditures including all encumbrances or ninety two point six six percent the third section on the agenda report is the health insurance transactions for February this is what we've presented to the Finance Committee meeting our beginning balance was nine hundred and forty three thousand two thirty three ninety nine and our ending balance is eight hundred and fifty thousand dollars eight eight hundred fifty thousand eight hundred seventy seven dollars and nine cents our additions to the to the pot was eight hundred sixty seven thousand and we have spent nine hundred and sixty thousand so we did spend a little bit more than we took
023in but we still have a balance and we are seeing that our claims are going down right now because a lot of the doctor's offices aren't doing a lot of the non-essential procedures I would like to say that this is our report that is our pre coded 19 report since February a lot of things have changed and we have instituted an essential only spending model because of our unknown oil revenues and I just want to let the board know we did discuss it the other week but there are some factors that we're looking at as far as some of our state funding that is based on things we can't control such as your sales tax there's this lottery funded items so we are monitoring this at this last quarter we're going to be monitoring it
024very very closely because we do have those unknowns and just to be proactive in that we want to stop any essential spending just so we can cover any of those shortfalls do you have any questions I know apart from short short while I'm talking at least I share this me commander Chad Oh Chad dr. nihlus has a question okay so yeah I guess the question that I had had to do with the state funds you know lottery and sales tax and is there any open source you know that the state provides to tracks those revenues semi real-time that we can and kind of anticipate what the our impact might be and and if there is an impact when is that going to show up for our budget for the sales tax there's a there's a
025two two-month delay so where's that works expecting to actually see this in May and June the state cannot tell us at this point you that's one of the things they do not guarantee is what your sales tax revenue is going to be because it is an unknown but in light of businesses and I'll close it and we know that there is going to be some impact and we're just monitoring and try to be proactive to cut on the nut unnecessary expenditures so that we will be we will be able to stay within budget thank you any other questions I know you talked about sales council on the revenue side on the cost side do you expect savings going forward because of this only essential personnel only and how much will it be able to mitigate
026the negatives of loss in revenue and I have another question once you answer we're still trying to ascertain all the savings that we may experience there's a some non personnel that we're going to see and you are going to have some savings because we're not going to be having you know some of the overtime the substitute costs so we are diving into all of those not having the fuel for the buses every day the rcent you we are going to see some savings from that and we are monitoring that and work with every department to look at their POS when you look at this when you look at this finance report and we say expenditures including encumbrances a lot of our departments have put in their POS for the year and if there are things
027that aren't going to happen now since the situation is changing and schools are closed in we're asking that they go back and let's reevaluate all the open QIOs and adjust accordingly we're expecting some of our utility costs to go down we expect the water we don't have this children and the in the buildings so we are we're looking at every avenue of savings but we want to just you be proactive to make sure that we stay within the limits and then if you somehow we do not get the hit that it could be for the sales tax and the revenue does demand higher then we will have that too you look at maybe shirring up the future year I have a follow-up can I ask them so the other question is I know savings we
028are trying to do but I hope we avoid in my personal opinion savings of prorating coach's salary because they are year-round you know they're dedicated to the students athletes for all year so I hope that's not on the table as we move forward dr. Brennan has a question is guys that one of my questions was the idea of saving if we have any savings so dr. koop has covered that the other is I know there are a lot of unknowns but theoretically on March 31st their average daily enrollment do we have any idea what what's going to happen to that as far as our using that to be paid by the state we are still using the March 13th ATM to determine our enrollment so that shouldn't be a problem and everybody was worried about
029with us not being in school how would we do the average daily enrollment thank you miss Carter hold on Sharon yeah dr. Brennan asked the question that I had any other questions dr. Edwards at our last meeting we gave you the authority to move money from Lana items has have you had to do any of that as of yet no we have not okay thank you any other questions for Miss laconic okay thank you for that report hey miss Evans has 107 I do have a quick follow-up to dr. Gupta with the coaches is that the time to talk about this or not the time to talk about this you can ask the question I'm just asking if if we looked in any further into the stipend for the spring coaches because I know they're
030paid twice and they were not going to be paid this second part of this stipend so I was just wondering if we looked at that again sure what we decided with that one and as Miss laconic said the biggest revenue that's unknown for us is the sales tax right now so one of the things that we tried to do was make sure that we could cover regular salaries of our teachers our transportation folks nutrition workers included and even with the nutrition department they typically during the regular year are reimburse for meals that they serve and that reimbursement covers their salary and we're not sure right now if they are to be reimbursed the same way or if they're actually serving the same number of meals to cover all of the salaries so we did put
031a little contingency in our operating budget to say if we needed to cover the salaries of the nutrition workers who have been serving meals since this began we want to make sure that we could do that and we put in a spending freeze including giving the coaches the first half of their stipend with a hold that we can revisit that once we a little bit sure about what our revenues are in your we stand we certainly don't want to get to the end of this and not be able to pay our staff their regular salaries as well and we're also wondering how the stimulus money will factor into this so there we will revisit it I just didn't want to promise everybody that they would get every-everything without knowing really what our status of our
032revenues them okay I just I just want to put out there they acknowledgement that they do work year-round their sport may be in the spring but I had children that play sports and they start in September they may not be paid until the spring but they're working the whole year through basically without getting paid for that part of it four days a week so I just want to do a knowledge that thank you Belle any other questions or comments that concludes the finance report and we now move to the consent agenda which consists of it gets good school board meeting minutes March 3rd regular board meeting student discipline committee meetings February 20th March 5th March 10th and March 12th the personnel report in the Lynchburg City policy descriptions and program policies and regulations school board
033instruction and program policies and regulations and that bliss is on the agenda is there a motion to approve the consent agenda I move that we approve the consent agenda Thank You mr. Carter is there a second I'll second thank you dr. Shin Hye so we have a motion and a second miss Evans how do you vote yeah dr. Brennan dr. Brennan I'm sorry yes mr. Carter yes dr. Coleman yes Morton yes dr. nihlus yes dr. Sanaa yes mr. Harvey yes dr. Gupta yes thank you all right we do not have any student rep reports tonight that takes us to H school board committee reports I'm not sure that we have any but I will ask Finance Committee dr. Gupta we didn't meet you governor School Committee mr. Harvey yes the governor school is moving forward
034with their their current programs because they were already set up to do distance learning they also are moving ahead with their selection process with the with a very strong applicant pool from LCS this year they understand that that budgets could be in question next year with ever changing federal state local levels but they're grateful for the votes that have been taken by the Lynchburg School Board and support of serving more LCS students at the Governor's School in the future thank you Laurel Regional School Committee miss Carter the an emergency meeting to discuss the issues relating to the Koba 19 meeting was held to make sure that we were able to compensate the teachers who would still have to continue on with instructions and that meeting was held dam Academy dr. Brennan so I have to
035get used to the mute and unmute button but yes the STEM Academy did meet on March 31st and most of this question was regarding the co vid effect on the students and that CVCC obviously closed after spring break and also discussion regarding the grading policy all of which was I think that's very thoroughly by the board and we plan to meet again by teleconference next time thank you the legislative advocacy committee dr. Brennan so we we have not met but we have had some activity which is dr. Coleman was nice enough last week to reach out to our state and local representatives under the virtual vsba week for school boards and send a note to all them to thank them for their services and what they're doing for us and letting them know what the
036school board is doing so I really appreciate Holman reaching out and taking care of that and then at some point either now or maybe during comments that I received an email from Christy a very appropriate one saying whether we should continue to meet at later time I think it's also a question about finance also so at some point miss Morrison I'll leave up to you when we should discuss that okay we'll do that after we finished we get into work up for thank you moves to section I advisory committees to the school board the CTE of Hazari committee meeting scheduled for April 24th has been canceled due to the Cova 19 pandemic equity task force meetings scheduled for March 25th and May 14th have been canceled due to covet 19 pandemic the school health advisory
037board meeting scheduled for March 25th and May 14th have been canceled due to the kovat 19 pandemic the Special Education Advisory Committee meeting scheduled for March 24th and April 21st have been canceled due to the cogut 19 pandemic mister section J there will be no not be a comprehensive strategic plan discussion tonight now losers - unfinished business the wet fresh is the k-12 English textbook adoption and I'm going to ask dr. Edwards to explain where we are with this yes so at our last meeting dr. Coleman and members of the CNI Supervisors presented the reading textbook or English textbook adoption it's on for the second reading however I have temporarily put that on hold for approval and spending of those funds given that we are in the middle of this pandemic I recognize that those
038are textbook funds they are restricted funds but we are also in unknown territory so we don't know what the future may hold and whether or not we may need those funds that may be flexibility for those funds so we still will do you know moving forward with the textbook but right now I just didn't think it was prudent to approve and spend upwards of a million dollars for what it might cost us for all of those textbooks at this point in time thank you any questions for dr. Edwards on this thank you dr. Edwards that now moves us to k2 let's rock city school board instruction and program policy review at the January 14th 2020 school board meeting the school board requests additional details regarding the pros process for reviewing applicants who wish to volunteer
039bullets for city schools the information presented tonight is in conjunction with the board's guidance provided at the December 17th 2019 work session to modify the volunteer policy regulation based on the recommendations which is met by the equity task force during the August 19th 2000 work session the option 2 was the one selected modify the existing language and regulation hi I see Bri I see CR which reads anyone convicted of a felony offense or a misdemeanor may be disclosed on the nature of the offence and or volunteer activity and before I take questions dr. Edwards I just want to thank you and the team for all of the hard work and the detail and really working through this process I know it's been time-consuming and I appreciate your efforts in that of your change any questions
040for this this is up for vote tonight dr. brennan has his hand up dr. Brennan thank you thank you miss Morrison and I like to thank attorney towns for the nice explanation she sent to us about misdemeanor and felonies which we had requested our last meeting I thought that was very helpful and a very clear list of definitions that helps us move along you know as everyone knows this is a topic that that I have been interested in for a long time since dr. Coleman and I were on that great task force back in 2017 and I think it's moved a long way in in the last three years particularly on the last six months with the help of the direction of Lynchburg V school administration and the equity task force and I just like
041to set a briefly review a little bit of what's happened in the last six months so we're also on the same pace as this is a topic that's been going on for a long time and is a little complicated but in in in August the equity task force did a presentation to us where they pointed out really several things and really requested several things but their main conclusion was that they felt that our students are best served with a diverse and engaged volunteer population the current policy prevents an equitable and inclusive learning environment and the current policy disproportionately impacts our african-american african-american community and they asked that the they requested and their recommendation was that there should be a consistent review process so that potential volunteers can be screened and decision rendered promptly to allow
042them to volunteer or not and as we all know as a result of that presentation we had a work session shortly thereafter in December to discuss the different aspects and there we talked about the idea that we felt there should be three aspects to this one is there should be a protocol for the review of applications which consists of a panel of administrators and school representatives and representatives from the engagement equity and opportunity division we felt obviously that there should be parameters for evaluating applications for felony convictions whereas any convictions involving a crime against a minor related to child abuse would exclude an individual from voluntary unless burg City Schools that was going to be step number one and then exceptions the volunteer policy regarding a felony conviction is not related to crimes against minor
043child abuse but includes some other parameters which included things like the severity of the crime the circumstances surrounding the underlying act where the crime was a violent crime or involved a weapon etc we've seen that list and I think it was a very appropriate list and then lastly we asked that if there was a change in the policy that it would be a pilot project pilot project and then we were done on a case-by-case basis with regular updates to the board to to feedback the results dr. Edwards and her team took those three ideas and ran with them and then in February we had a board meeting where she presented a very impressive volunteer review tool that walked us through what the different levels would be of individuals with different crimes including their relationships their
044probation and a variety of other ways that we spent a lot of time on and then lastly we asked attorney town to report back to us to talk to help us understand what were felonies and what were misdemeanors and and that those issues so I think we have the board over the last many years and particularly last six months it's been a lot of time on this topic and administration is obviously also spent a lot of time I think there three or four points that I'd like to just finish with that I think have been repeated in the past but would like to do so one more time versus that one of our main goals with this revision is that we want to have safety first which is what state would stated on the the
045review tool that any volunteers under the guidance of a school official and approved applicants may chaperone and/or assist with the supervision of other people's children only under under supervision by a school official at point two one of the things we're really trying to do with with changing the volunteer policy and increasing the pool is who really want to establish in the future a dynamic mentoring program in LCS that uses volunteers who are interested and committed to helping our students the long term plan and this would be one step towards doing that and then point three is that we've been asked in 2017 again 2019 by the equity task force which is an advisory committee of community community representatives to change this policy to allow individuals with felony convictions to apply as volunteers in our schools
046and we've also had a multitude of individuals from the community including Reverend Carl Hutcherson Eugene tweed Danny McCain Robert Fludd and a variety of other people asking us to to make this change lastly as I've already said I think there's been a lot of information that the administration has done for us we are way ahead of other districts you know there are other districts that will do a case by case basis including Danville and Nelson County and Harrisonburg there's some districts that don't even include this on their application anymore like Charlottesville Albemarle town in other areas we have taken I think to a higher level the idea of doing a case-by-case review with what dr. Edwards and her administrative team have given us as a tool to work on this so in conclusion I hope
047that we're going to have a meaningful and detailed discussion tonight about this policy but I hope that we will end with being able to make a motion to make the change that stated in that one sentence which we think would then allow the our position to change as far as allowing individuals to volunteer who have had a felony conviction in the past thank you dr. niller has a question yeah based on the recent legal advice that was passed out administration believe there any change is needed to the evaluation tool and the sort of hierarchy sorry try that again we have not made any changes in the hierarchy of the tool we are going to get together to look at that list that miss town said I had an opportunity to see it but my team
048has not reconvened to do that but remember even with our tool one of the things that we wanted to put in place was to kind of use it reflect modify as needed so that we wouldn't be stuck with something that didn't work for us so and you don't expect to have to come back to the board for every little change for that that's something that's going to be under administration's purview yes exactly so the tool may change but that's more like a regulatory tool for us I will keep the board informed however in terms of any changes that we made and remember one of the things that I said I would share is just some statistical broad statistical overview of how it's going where we see some of the positives some things that we might
049have had to put in place including some of the training things yeah I just want to follow reiterate that and I know all the board members feel this way but it's you know the safety of the kids is paramount and and I thought but that's certainly my my position on this and I feel good about where we're going with this overall so thank you dr. Coleman dr. Coleman has a question I would like to make a comment yes thank you madam chair dr. Brennan you know outstanding job over viewing where we started and how we've gotten to where we are I'm very very proud that each of the board members to my knowledge has had an opportunity over this long journey to raise questions and I think that our superintendent and staff have addressed as
050many of the concerns as could possibly be addressed and of course looking at the other policies in the Commonwealth where regulations are allowing what we're asking to be done our revision would be in harmony with what is written in the regulation provision to allow this to happen and all of the details of course would be in-house and so I'm just very proud of our board I hope it does anyone else who wants to say something will please share it and and know that it's okay to share your thoughts and I'm certainly prepared to to make a motion at the appropriate time that that could happen but not right now mr. Harvey would like to make a comment thank you madam chair I'd I'd also like to reiterate my thanks to the administration to all of
051our staff who have worked on this policy to all the members of our community who have passionately spoken spoken out and encouraged us to move forward with this the only request that I would like to have is I would like to ask that the administration give the school board a report in December and what I would what I would like to to have shared with us is just sort of a review of the protocols and procedures you know how how successful the implementation was I mean I'm expecting it to be a huge success but I would just like to know what might have been some of the some of the unknowns or some of the changes because I know we talked about that there are going to be some unforeseen conditions that we that we
052do need to address I would also like to see if we can keep a tabulation of the number of applicants that have been submitted that fall under this policy I'd like to know how many of them were approved and if any were do not I'd also like to know that as well and I would like to see if we can even possibly make a judgement on how this might have impacted their overall volunteer hours that with making this change we are actually able to see an increase in the number of volunteers within our schools so it's just more of a request that some feedback come back to the board regarding this this process thank you miss Evans I just wanted to say as well thanks the administration for doing everything you've done and hope that
053paper that you sent out for us to read this weekend was a huge help for me to break down what everything was so thank you and I'm excited that we're at this point and sounds like that it's got a half of it and it makes me happy thank you miss Carter well I just wanted to say that I do thank the administration for all the work there they've done but I also see that we have other pressing issues like the middle school GiftA Studies program and also looking at I see this almost as ironic to our alternative ed and the students there that they may have some of the same concerns like what is their process we've never looked at I've been on the board for almost five years I've never seen a report about
054how many students and alternative ed have a way to get back to their base schools what is a tool like that for them to get back to their base those because they can say that they made one most mistake it may be a huge mistake but they've made a mistake and they've gotten to alternative ed and now what's their process to get back but here we are looking at this for about 2% of volunteers and like I said in five years I've never seen this for the students that talked of the alternative ed school and the other thing is I still think about what the legal team told us about how we are inviting a risk and as a foreseeable risk and the other thing is we have placed these in place for due diligence
055which is the criminal background check and and that is the way they are measure that we've been measuring everything according to that standard and now we're open the door for who knows there could be a lot of still undone intended things or unintended circumstances and what's the next what's what's next and I know there are a lot of others divisions or hiring places that will not even consider you if you have used or taking marijuana regardless of how long it's been and I don't see them changing and it's almost like Ruben asked to change some of our systems and that's where I stand anyone else have comment I have a comment and that is I still have a great deal of concern about the workload that we're putting on our administrators and our teachers I
056have a concern that parents don't have a say in this and I also have a concern that there are a lot of places where people can volunteer that parents can decide to send their students they cannot not send them to school but they can send them to after-school programs that it could volunteer it is also my understanding that this is about volunteers in the school not coaches or assistant coaches is that correct dr. Edwards yes that is correct thank you any other comments is there a motion this is up for vote tonight is there a motion madam chair as moved the adoption of modifying the existent language in the stated regulation to anyone convicted of a felony or misdemeanor may be disqualified depending upon the nature of the sense and all volunteer activity dr. Brennan
057we had a motion from dr. Coleman in a second dr. Brennan any other discussion we were going to do this our roll call vote dr. Gupta yes mrs. Evans yes mr. Harvey yes dr. Brennan yes dr. Chen I yes miss Carter no dr. niller yes dr. Coleman yes mrs. Morrison no the motion passed seven to two all right Matt now Texas 2k3 the non-discrimination policy and the language that we use there the new language that we are looking at is the Lynchburg City School Board is committed to non-discrimination with regard to race color religion national origin ancestry political affiliation sex gender gender gender identity age marital status genetic information disability or any other characteristic protected by law this commitment prevails in all of its policies and practices concerning staff students educational programs or services and
058individuals and entities with whom the board does business soon you might have a question or a statement I see dr. Shanghai yes looking at this list is very thorough although it doesn't include sexual orientation which I do not think was the intent that it that it should be on that list and then secondly the the list appears to be consistent all the all the way through to I believe it's the last one jf haz where in the second paragraph political affiliation was it has a strikethrough and then believe on that same page in the bottom one-third that list is not the same as the list everywhere else I think it just need to copy and paste the list of gross or whatever we want consistent language that's yeah so you could tell I mean it's
059blue everywhere else and I think it was this a global copy and paste which is fine but I think one was missed there at the bottom if I can find that page its jfh AZ which is I think one of the last policies yeah so that page so if you that first bullet under the school division okay I think you need to replace that list with the list that we've changed any additional questions or recommendations this is not for action tonight it is for discussion and it is for vote in our May meeting but I mean I have a have a I guess a comment about a few of these policies especially the regulation you know dr. Sena pointed out you know the one problem with having this long list of protected classes in multiple
060places in the same policy would be cleaner if we could for example in jf haz have that have the list at the beginning and then in the remaining paragraphs somehow refer to such harassment which refers to the list will not be tolerated and instead of trying to repeat that list all the time that's true in jf haz as well as a couple of the policies or regulations before that and then the other comment I have is about political affiliation was struck through for the student regulation I don't know that that seems relevant to people or not so it's just I mean that's why that was there was a question mark there was to say what's what's the input of the board on this do we do we really need to have political affiliation there for
061students or not so thanks any other comments I have a comment that the sentence I just like what dr. Millis just said about maybe just having that list at the top and then referring back to it I think it's less confusing I think it gets very wordy and I agree with you but I had a question kind of - Kim you said that ug mrs. Morrison did you make a note that she said sexual orientation wasn't included okay I just want to do some work it yes that was that was a mission but that was I thought our intent was to include that okay thank you question okay dr. Coleman I'm sorry I'm having trouble looking at three things here no ma'am no no madam chair I'm doing the same thing I hope you all
062can hear me I certainly want to thank dr. Millis for all of the work that he has done trying to clean up all of the language and kind of looking at it and understand what dr. singer was stating about the sexual orientation piece and as we continue to ponder I just wanted to put on the table madam chair that Senate bill 868 has not been signed by the governor as of yet but it actually deals with prohibiting discrimination for sexual orientation and gender identity in all facets of our communal life I can send that link House bill 145 has actually been signed by the governor already to be in law July the first deal with prohibiting transgender orientation type of issues and so this most recent iteration of the General Assembly has made some bold
063steps in dealing with this matter and so I don't see where we would be going out of order in following what we what we're being given at a higher level let me make sure that I'm understanding that we did intend to include sexual orientation in the policy and that we liked the idea of putting the list at the top and then that we furring to that list and the regs is that what I'm hearing I hope so I hope so yes yes thank you any other suggestions so that we can clean this up and then get it in the right order so that we can vote on this in May well one other thing there are a couple of places where we refer to he or she and I would recommend replacing that with the
064Universal them and most often that was found under the complaint procedure under file a report where it says any person who believes he or she has you could change it to any person who believes they have so the the singular they there that's kind of just a minor detail and then I had a question in excuse me if I'm showing naivety or whatever but I have a question about the use of the word color does that go back to the day when we referred to Pete so and I'm often confused about this because calling somebody colored inappropriate but we caught we talk about people of color so I just want to make sure that we're doing the people of color versus colored people it might be a little bit too nitpicky it just the word
065just kind of hung out there for me so I just thought I'd bring it up that's all and I can speak to the Union uncommon it goes to the racial discrimination that someone can be discriminated based on the color of their skin so it isn't attached to any um intimidated to terms for race it just goes to that someone um based on the color of their skin may be discriminated against it could attach to a certain racial group thank you come to Fred answer your question yeah that's what I thought I just wanted to be sure thank you I appreciate that are there any thoughts of inserting say in them and so P and she you know still there would be more than appropriate any other board members have comments from that if you want
066to make it neutral then you can you can reword it so you don't need a he or she some of the vsba policies that we have have he or she in there so I find it seems you know in conversation they seems to be a little natural when you're referring to just kind of in general it's sort of a casual colloquial but when I see it written down and you don't have an agreement there with the pronoun plurality your singularity it just it's it's a real clunker for me so that's my comment dr. Coleman did you have a comment it's very brief comment I just want to say to attorney towns I like that word she just said a few seconds ago text that to me because I like that word and you explained that
067which doctor sent our state of river and any additional comments on they and them or he is she the well what the they them has now been more widely accepted and you'll see it more frequently in use so that's one aspect of it but another is it speaks to the policy itself where gender identity and non-binary and things to that so I think for that reason it's also appropriate to have a non gendered language read which you have any thoughts on business oh no I'm okay I'm just trying to keep track of all the changes so that when it comes back up for at the next meeting that it's presented with the changes that you guys are discussing okay thank you dr. Coleman does the SBA have any um looks like are they going to
068change their language in their policies I have heard no discussion of any change as of right now Elizabeth you and could be the person that could be contacted for further information on that I will do that tomorrow thank you all right so we have adding sexual orientation putting the list at the beginning making the consistent the language applying back and we are doctor nillas question political affiliation for students I think if we're going to do it one place we need to do it all the way and we need to look at Bay in them and I will call Elizabeth tomorrow I know I have our home number and then I'll get an email out to you all how does that sound but we are going to get this language consistent so we can vote on
069it in May any further thoughts questions if you do okay crystal I took dr. Edwards I took notes on this too and miss my survey and you and I can work on this and see where we can get it consistent make it consistent okay great thank you all right that now moves us to new business special education annual plan Part B 2020 21 and the standards buster disappeared there you are all right madam chair the rest of the board dr. Edwards what we're submitting for informational item tonight and for action item in May is a special education annual plan Part B section 611 flow through application and the 611 I mean is section 619 preschool grant for 2020 2021 this is an annual plan that is a formal agreement between the local school board and
070the Virginia Board of Education for the implementation state and federal laws and regulations related to services mandated for students with disabilities and accordingly the disbursement of funds to the school division is contingent upon the school board approval of this plan annually Lynchburg City is applying for the special education flow through funds the application must be approved each year and submitted to the Department of Ed the total amount is two million one hundred and thirteen thousand six hundred and ten dollars and ninety cents one hundred and ninety seven thousand four hundred fifty three dollars and twelve cents of that is the 611 fro through funds and it will all be used for special education staffing as well as special education services and speech services that are provided parentally to prevent early placed students attending local private
071schools or that are home-schooled we did send letters out to all of the private schools that we deal with they were invited to the February staff meeting today we have not received any comments from them but we will continue to get those until the next approval in May due to the fact that we were not able to meet with the sea at committee in March we sent the plan out to them for their review that is a requirement that they review it and to date I haven't received any other comments the plan has also been on public comments since March 30th in a modified manner we had to they get to call in to us and we will take it out to them out front of the building should anybody ask and to date nobody
072has and we're also just as part of this also applying for the 63,000 $50.00 for the 619 preschool funds and this is for Hutchison Early Learning Center as they provide special ed and related services to preschool children ages two to five and this will be for private preschool placements that we have staff development and instructional materials thank you very much any questions or comments dr. Brennan has one dr. Brennan there we go I'm sorry is this for information is this for action tonight this is for information tonight in it will come back for action at the May meeting okay I'd like to make a move that this be ad the consent agenda for the next meeting that we prove this with the consent agenda it sounds like a very straightforward proposal and we could do
073it easily we have a motion to move this to consent agenda is there a second second thank you miss Carter is there any further discussion all right we will do roll call vote miss Evans yes dr. Brennan yes miss Carter yes dr. Coleman yes miss lorrison yes dr. Millis yeah yes dr. Sinha yes mr. Harvey yes dr. Gupta yes thank you we'll move that to consent agenda for the next meeting that now takes us to the adoption of the co bid 19 resolution this um encompasses many things and you're going to have to bear with me because I have to read all of this whereas out loud whereas on March the 11th 2020 the World Health Organization declared the novel coronavirus kovat 19 outbreak a pandemic and whereas on March 12th 2020 Governor Ralph Northam
074issued executive order 51 declaring a state of emergency that executive order stated that the anticipated effects of COBIT 19 constitute a disaster and directed local governments which includes school boards to render appropriate assistance to prepare for the event to alleviate any conditions resulting from the situation and to implement recovery and mitigation operations and activities so as to return impacted areas to pre event conditions as much as possible and whereas executive order 51 authorized executive agencies including the Virginia Department of Education to waive any state regulations as appropriate and whereas on march 13th 2020 the President of the United States declared a national emergency and response to the print spread of covet 19 and whereas on march 13th 2020 gonna Ralph s Northam ordered all K through 12 schools to close for a minimum of two
075weeks and whereas on march 13th 20/20 vision is superintendent of public instruction encouraged local school divisions to consider options and ideas to engage students in reading thinking and learning while schools are closed and whereas on March 18th 2020 HR 6 2 0 1 was passed by the United States Congress and signed into law by the president HR 6 201 now PL 1 1 6 - 27 contains the emergency paid sick leave act in the emergency family and medical leave expansion act both of which will be in effect until December 31st 2020 and whereas on March 23rd 2020 governor Northam issued executive order 53 which closed all public schools throughout the Commonwealth for the remainder of the 2019 2020 school year and whereas on March 30th 2020 the United States Department of Education gave permission to
076Virginia to cancel federally mandated standards of learning test during the 2019 2020 school year and whereas on March 27 2020 Virginia Superintendent of Public Instruction stated in superintendent's memo 0-8 2-28 attachment a which was later converted into a website and is being updated frequently that he will provide as much flexibility as his prudent and allowable by the Code of Virginia for students currently enrolled in graduating with the 2019 2020 cohort and whereas public law ones 1 1 6 - 1 2 7 also contains the kovat 19 child nutrition response Act which gives the Secretary of Agriculture the authority to grant waivers related to the Richard me Russell National School Lunch Act 42 USC Section 176 0 L which which authority expires on September the 30th 2020 and whereas Lautrec Superintendent of Public Instruction has announced
077that numerous regulatory requirements will be waived as authorized by executive order 51 and whereas on April the 2nd 2020 the Virginia Board of Education indicated its approval for waiving certain regulatory requirements regarding awarding standard units of credit and locally awarded verified credits and whereas additional waivers of existing state and federal regulation and chain just-just state and federal laws may be announced during the pandemic and whereas many Lynchburg city school board policies reflect requirements of state and federal laws and regulations that have already been waived or maybe waves because of the pandemic and whereas Lynchburg city school board's usual practice is to make changes to policies only after the proposed policy change is considered at - school board meetings and whereas the Lynchburg City School Board needs to be able to adapt school division operations to
078rapid changes in law and regulation and whereas enforcing the requirements of existing colleges could result in outcome inconsistent with current laws and regulations as they exist after waivers now therefore be it resolved that the Lynchburg City School Board suspend such policy or provisions within policies which reflect legal and/or regulatory requirements that have been waived by the governmental authority which enacted those requirements and now therefore be it further results that the suspension of policies of the Lynchburg City School Board is in effect for the duration of time that the waiver of laws and our regulations reflected in the policies are waived and now therefore be it further resolved that the superintendent is directed to inform support of any regulations that suspended by the superintendent and the duration of such suspensions now therefore be it further resolved
079that the larger City School Board will comply with temporary laws and regulations without enacting policies to implement most laws and regulations and now therefore be it further resolved that the execution of this resolution is conclusive evidence of the Lynchburg City school board's approval of this action are there any questions or comments regarding this resolution sorry dr. Brennan has a question dr. Brennan you did a great job reading that thank you I'd like to make a motion that we approve the resolution we have a motion to approve if there a second second dr. Coleman we have a motion by dr. Brennan in a second by dr. Coleman do we have any more questions or comments I have have a comment that this is a model resolution put out by the vsba for all the divisions within
080the state I expect a majority of them are going to be adopting something similar to this just wanted to make sure the public was aware of that Thanks thank you miss Corder did you have a comment no I was trying to second it but I forgot I get the mute will get better with Tom Wright or any other comments or questions before we go Pamela do roll call vote on the motion to adopt the resolution for suspension of school board policies due to the covet 19 miss Evans yeah dr. Brennan yes Carter yes dr. Coleman yes Morrison yes dr. nihlus yes dr. Finn aye yes mr. Harvey yes dr. Gupta yes thank you the motion is passed the resident motion for the resolution that now takes us to superintendent comments dr. Edwards yes the both
081the parent and personnel Advisory Committee meetings that were scheduled for April 3rd are canceled in light of the covent pandemic with regard to my comments just a couple quick things first just a huge huge thank you to my staff my transportation nutrition my administrators secretaries all the people who are Manning those for command centers and have been every since school was closed have done a fantastic job along with my directors and my teachers and assistants and everyone who's worked on the learning activities that we put forward my tech department works behind the scenes the guidance department who you can imagine have taken a lot of questions about seniors and graduation volunteers and just everyone has been so positive and so helpful during this time and I couldn't ask for a better staff some of the
082things that have happened have been truly amazing and you know you never know how well people band together and work together sometimes until there's a crisis and I will say during this crisis I have seen the absolute best of folks here at Lynchburg City School so I'm so proud of my staff to my families and my students I just want to say take a moment and just breathe we have been thrown into this whirlwind rather quickly all unexpectedly and I know a lot of families are now out there in addition to finding yourself being your child's first facilitator of education right now which for many of you is a new experience but even trying to do that and manage that with your own employment and your own concerns medical things that are happening in your
083homes I just want you to know as your superintendent that we are very sensitive and we are very mindful of what is occurring in our families in our homes and we want you to know that take care of your home first we will get through this we will make sure that no child is left behind every child by me and by me to graduation and beyond but more importantly we want to make sure that our families are well taken care of and that you have the resources that you need to not only survive during this time but to thrive so just know that we're here for you and we're work with you in any way possible we have been able to do some things and I'm gonna try to share my screen just briefly if
084the can hear a second just want to share this little quick blurb from our website in addition to where you can find information about meal delivery partnerships with the parks and recs department it was come stepped up and helped us with some of those meal delivery food for thought and Parkview and everybody's provided you know additional food bags for our children our staff have really worked on the extended learning activities and enrichment and looking at all things that kids need to know so that they can move to the next grade level or great or content area next year so if you haven't had an opportunity to check out our website please do so we did it in a way that we try to have a weekly plan for folks and give students the ability to
085have choice in there so there's some really great things as well as the video in here again kudos to all of the folks who have worked on this to make this possible so I just wanted the board to know that that is continuing we are also thanks to some efforts of some community groups and dr. copelan partnering with the Boys and Girls Club and the YMCA to provide emergency childcare for workers who are healthcare workers and those who have to respond during this pandemic we are also on board and just waiting for providing some childcare for four or five and six year olds as as needed so there are a lot of people out there on the front lines who are doing a whole bunch to keep our community safe and we are doing our
086part to make sure that they can continue to do that so we're grateful for our partnership in the leadership in that area there's a lot of discussion about now that we have our learning activities up what does that look like for the fourth marking period or the remote learning at home grading graduation credits credentials and all of that and we've worked on a few things which are being shared with our teacher tonight and should be posted on a website tomorrow for families and parents to take a look at so that will help an answer it a lot of the questions some of it is still unknown as we go through this and learn more but we're moving step by step and trying to keep the community as informed with everything as possible most importantly my
087senior class I know this is not the senior year that you had in mind when you started the senior year but we're going to get you through it we're going to do everything possible to make sure that nothing is dropped and that you are you know in line for graduation and everything that is in your very bright future we are counting on you all to lead us in the future so rest assured that that will be taken care of and thank you to this board because I have asked you to do so many things in such a short period of time and you join you've been responsive you've learned along with us how to do these things and I am so grateful for your flexibility your willingness to really do what's necessary to keep our
088kids and our families on the learning train here as we go helping us with meals and just being so available to do everything I'm truly grateful for your support as well thank you dr. Edwards that takes us to board comments it's going to go around the table and ask dr. Gupta I just wanted to thank all the teachers bus drivers and everybody in our school district for realigning in terms of what they have been doing for the last few weeks so thanks a lot Evans I'd like to say like I know all of you don't want children in LCS but the communication that I've had this week from the teachers of my child it's been amazing it is unbelievable the communications they had put out there and I'm super impressed and I'm very thankful it
089makes very easy to follow along with what's going on you know exactly what they need to be doing and I'm just super happy that communication goes on Thank You Harvey yes I would reiterate the thanks to all of our staff our bus drivers or nutrition workers or teachers our administration and the leadership of dr. Edwards but also I also want to thank the community for its flexibility and support of the actions for our school system seeing some of the letters to the editor that are praising what our staff is doing just really makes you feel good and and I am just thankful that the community is behind us and I just want to say thanks to our community and also thank you for to our students for their flexibility this is a scary time for
090them just as it is for us adults and they have risen to the occasion and and we just want to be thankful to them for their flexibility as well thank you dr. Brennan I'd like to make two comments one is going back to the personnel report I would like to to make a comment or a shout out to several people on that list who are going to be leaving LCS that has been here for a long time one is Karen Reardon who was leaving rs paint but was a previous principal at link horn Elementary School the other is Karen Nelson who we know it from from paramount principal who has been for this for 30 years I think been at Paramount most of that time and then lastly a shout out to somebody behind one
091of those little boxes there miss Marie gee who has also had 38 years of experience at Lynchburg City Schools who retire I just want to say on behalf of an individual board member thank them so much for all their service and what they've done for our schools and for our children and then I went to backs just momentarily philosophically as a this disease physician as well as Lynchburg School Board member you know one month ago we met we made a comment at that time that were there were 100 cases of COBIT in the United States at that time and as of this morning there were 1.3 million cases worldwide and there were three hundred seventy thousand cases in the United States things have changed so much in in one month's time and we all know
092it's affected everyone at every level of our society but I am so inspired by the sacrifice that people have made and as a as dr. Edwards and mr. Harvey pointed out our school staff have been amazing and done such a great job also our community has done a great job the dr. Gupta was nice to comment about my contributions to medical system which is a very small cog in a big wheel but our health system including our nurses and our staff and the hospital is they really are out there doing a great job individuals as mr. Harvey said with letters the editor but also small businesses the nice article dot vector space is making shields for our staff you know I think this is going to be so difficult to get through but I know
093we're going to get through it and we're going to see a peak and we're going to do better and it's going to be very difficult for everyone but I think we're gonna come out on the other side much better because I think we really are understanding that we are a community and we need to pull together and we've done such a great job doing that so thank you all very much for that I do want to echo what everybody's been saying about the way the community has pulled together but I really gotta say for those feelings of us who are working at home with our kids who are used to being on the go all the time and now are stuck in our homes and in our yards for the most part I can't tell
094you how big a deal it is to go to the bus to pick up lunch it is the high point of the day it's a real more morale lifter it does so much more than give nutrition to children and so I am just extremely grateful we see the whole neighborhood come out for it and it's just a wonderful wonderful and very important thing that the schools are doing for this community and so I appreciate the bus drivers and nutrition workers the volunteers everybody who has mobilized to do that for our families and children it I just I don't have enough superlatives to to describe how wonderful and valuable it's been thank you so much partner I just wanted to say to give a shout out to our superintendent doing this time anytime there's a crisis
095you see how a true leader rises to the occasions and looks for alternative and seeks input from different people and for different different parts of their staff and the composite of their teams so see how they can meet the challenge and just to think outside the box and be creative and be willing to try different things and that's just remarkable and we're proud of that also I know the issues of equity you know now and everyone's online so if you don't have the fastest internet connection then you're bumped and to go through an entire application or process and then to reach an error or to get frozen you know those are the things I know some of the children are facing now and also or if each child doesn't have a computer or just when
096they're ready to do their and if the parent has a telephone a child can be on it all day because they need to get and do things so they want to do and even making calls there can be frustrating so just for us to take care of our mental mentally and spiritually just to just take time and just relax and things do work out and that you have the support of LCS and that's a good thing even if you just take a break and go to them to one of the bus stops or pick up a bag of lunch I know that was just a highlight of my experience what's being on the bus you know being older and getting up and down I suffered the next day but just being on the bus and
097that was just so wonderful this the little kids and the parents come out and just be you know just to say hi the other thing is also and as dr. Brennan said the number I noticed a number of experienced administrators and teachers that are leaving that are retiring and that's always a challenge to find new or recruit different people but one thing is they that I hope people see then we're trying our best to make sure we're maintaining our staff then we're just are laying off people because you have to when this is over over with we're going to need staff and people remember how you treat them in times like this so it's great I know there are some little health places that laid off and you think that you know being in that
098field that you'd be really cognizant of this but I'm so proud of LCS trying to maintain as many staff as possible because you'd have to fill these positions when things calm down but just to be encouraged for everyone thank you yeah I want to recognize the efforts of the part of dr. Edwards and her team that staff bus drivers teachers food workers I think it speaks well of everyone how they have stepped up to meet the needs and the needs in the situation changes every day the teachers are having to adapt and the I'm sure the students are having to adapt to you know it's it's a really I think it speaks well of Lynchburg the city in the community and I want to say give my thanks to all the staff administration teachers people
099working in buildings keep those going to and bus drivers thank you it's it's it's really gratifying to see everybody stepping up in a in a real time of crisis thank you thank you ma'am chant this in that we're dealing with now is something that federal state and local leaders have never had to contend with at this level and true leadership as has been stated by several of us already it's how you operate it in times like this when it's Rigler but you still are mindful of relationships and so I'm just wanting to join in with everyone to give a shout out to each and every one of us to do all we can to reach out and to let somebody know no matter how big or small what you're doing for kids it's truly making
100a difference that in a very watershed moment in in the history of our nation in our local community and to that end dr. Edwards and every last member of this staff in all of the capacities in which people serve thank you for what you're doing and we're going to keep reaching out to tell you thank you because you are true heroes thank you dr. Coleman um my other board members have stated so well how proud we are to be part of the list for city schools and a part of the Lynchburg community and dr. and mrs. Evans said it in a meeting that she has never been more proud to be a part of the district City School Board and I would like to say that too because this board has been flexible they've attended
101meetings they've worked around their schedule so that we can keep business going so I am grateful to you I am grateful to every single employee unless Ric City Schools and I want to end with the funny story dr. Edwards received a call or nail from a 14 year old student today who said curse so much for what the LCF teachers were doing and that he was enjoying it so much that he recommended that we continue school this way forever it's not going to happen look we're doing a good job I'm going to end with some informational time items the next school board work session is scheduled on Tuesday April 21st at 5 p.m. the next school board meeting will be held on Tuesday May 5th at 5 at both our 5:00 p.m. thank you all
102for coming in tonight thank you hope for your guidance with the volunteer policy language hope you all have a great evening this made me miss adjourned