001can we all stand for the pledge please you're on video like i can i know i pledge allegiance safety purposes the exits are there thank you i need a motion for executive session to discuss paraprofessional negotiations csca negotiations nicer litigation update csea section 75 hearing and a student matter chris all those in favor thanks everybody thank you mm-hmm hello can we please be quiet we could stop the meeting thank you our board of education is committed to having in-person board of education meetings in order to do so it is imperative that all in attendance adhere to the new york state requirements that include the use of masks starting with tonight and until january in accordance with the commissioner of health of the state of new york determinant pursuant to 10 nyc rr 2.60 the state's
002masking requirement is extended twenty gathering on school grounds which addresses or implements educational matters where students are or may reasonably be expected to be present in the event that officials presiding over public meetings implicated by this directive are unable to guarantee compliance with such masking requirements they are advised to implement full virtual access to public meetings in accord with the september 2021 amendment to the new york state open meetings law in accordance in accordance with this requirement we are asking everyone to please wear their masks so that we continue our meeting in person thank you anyone who does not have a mask is going to be asked to leave so please put your masks on i don't want anyone to be excluded from the meeting geez i got something to say i need two minutes
003of your time and you can get on without me we cannot sit here as a school board and claim that our top priorities the health and safety of our kids without realizing the mental health crisis they are currently going through because of the mass mandates they are following when you don't allow students to perform after school activities whether in sports or clubs they are stuck in their rooms which have led to depression anxiety suicide and even drug use i believe that planned walkouts and students begging for help with guns to their heads and others starting to shoot up our school is a direct result of these madnesses which starts without being able to see any smiles on our kids throughout the day if the teachers are unable to tell us what our students are showing
004signs of depression or anger because their face is covered how are they supposed to help them this virus is not going to kill your kid but taking away their freedoms is going to like so many other parents that are here tonight i have sent numerous emails and made numerous phone calls to multiple politicians asking for help to no avail we as the trustees right now are being forced to wear masks at meetings and i cannot fight to unmask your students while sitting here wearing one myself i am fully vaccinated and will not put on a mask condoning this governor's a reasonable mandate with all that being said i will not be attending meetings so we're a force on the followers that is did you throw that paper at me good night i'm not gonna start
005this meeting until you put your masks on if you don't put your masks on we'll adjourn the meeting you need to follow i'm calling governor johnson's caucus stating that there is no executive order and that nancy is not involved and i've seen several of your panels walk through the hallway now since they sat down so what does that show is displayed to us listen i don't make the rules i don't agree with all the rules i have to and i have to enforce the rules the rule is indoor you have to mask up so when you guys were walking through there was just no you're all you're all out of line you're all out of line i'm not gonna i'm not gonna interact with the audience you need to put your masks on or leave
006we have masks people in the back also i'm not going to interact with you please put your mask on we we we don't we don't interact with the audience this is a board of education meeting we're here to do business we want to hear you we're not going to interact with you and i'm not going to start until you put your masks on i'm gonna ask them to be removed i don't want to ask i don't want a security guard to have to remove anybody so please put a mask on i've got all night i'm retired well for all of you who have something you want to say you you're not going to be able to say it until those five people in the back put their masks on um you know what we have
007the option to go full virtual which means you won't be sitting here we'll just go virtual you'll have to zoom in from your homes so you know that's our option if you don't want to comply to the rules then that's what we'll do this will be the last meeting here [Music] you're a terrible speaker okay roll the masks on okay i'd like to start the meeting i need a motion to approve the minutes of the following meeting of november 23rd 2021 kathy second matt all those in favor that's everyone i need a motion to adjust i'm waiting for quiet please i need a motion to adjust the order of the agenda and to approve the consent agenda chris kathy all those in favor thank you now i'd like to welcome you all to the meeting
008we encourage participation of the residents as i have stated time after time this is a board of education meeting as the board president i am the chairperson of this meeting and any statements should be addressed to me our current policy is 15 minutes three minutes per resident is the time frame also as a courtesy we request if your statement has been previously made by someone else that you allow another resident to speak perhaps about a different statement i will now call for a motion to combine both statements of residence sections of the agenda and to allow our residents to give a statement for a total of 15 minutes three minutes per resident kathy matt all those in favor that's everyone thank you dr family good evening everyone we appreciate you joining us tonight the week
009of january 3rd through january 7th is paraprofessionals recognition week i did want to i didn't want to lose tonight without on behalf of our board of education our administration team thanking all of our paraprofessionals for all that they do and continue to do during challenging times to support our schools and our students due to the ongoing situations at the senior high school we have rescheduled the presentations that were previously announced and scheduled for tonight those will be rescheduled for uh january and february board of education meetings this afternoon during ninth period we heard students were contemplating a walkout while we do not condone students leaving the school in the middle of the afternoon without parental or administration permission we do understand and we do appreciate students wanting to have a voice on a student on
010a serious matter as we have done in the past we welcome a conversation with students about the seriousness of any matter and help them and will help them organize in a safe way for them to express their thoughts and ideas as educators and as parents we understand the gravity of health and safety situations our board of education and our administration team do not take the safety of our students staff and faculty lightly we are employees in our schools we are parents of children when a safety matter is brought to our attention we immediately enact our safety protocols tonight i will take this opportunity to address quite a number of topics as it relates to health and safety first it is important for everyone to know that due to both state and federal student privacy laws
011we are unable to discuss specific student information with anyone other than a child's parent or guardian i repeat due to laws we are unable to discuss student-specific information with anyone other than their own child their own child's parent or guardian the district is investigating continues to investigate all situations involving the social media posts that have been shared with us at this time we have not ruled out the fact that multiple people may have been involved in the initial posting of images and that some individuals may be impersonating others online it is important to reiterate the district will not differentiate between those that make threatening comments to our students to our schools and those who impersonate others online with that same intention or those who create or share false allegations in accordance with our code of
012conduct policy 5300 students found to be in violation of our student of our school district code of conduct are subject to disciplinary action whenever this occurs particularly when the code of conduct violation is a matter of extreme health and safety concern severe discipline and mental health supports are included in the outcome as part of the school district superintendent's hearing process students who are subject to such discipline are not allowed to be in the school or on school grounds for both instructional and co-curricular programs during the suspension period last week we were also made aware of an anonymous social media account entitled confessions pages it is imperative that we as school officials emphasize to our students it is imperative that our parents emphasize to our children the importance of bringing safety matters to the attention of
013a trusted adult by notifying a parent a guardian a family member by contacting an administrator or school official directly or by asking his or her parent or guardian to call the school and of course notifying the police department posting anonymously on social media or reposting concerning posts only hinders the ability to investigate and of course causes additional disruption and anxiety again it is imperative that we partner we teach our children ways to communicate matters of health and safety through the proper channels throughout the last decade our district has made significant investments to ensure that our schools are a safe place for our students for our staff members for our visitors for everyone in our school building as a reminder several years ago we revamped our security systems and hired a phenomenal team of armed security
014guards our security team has extensive law enforcement background and training they're stationed at all of our schools each year additional cameras are installed throughout our schools we have a district-wide command center staffed by our security personnel all visitors are required to show valid id through our visitor management system at every building per policy our secondary students are required to have their id on their person however in light of recent situations we are now asking students to have their ids visible on their person if a student lost his or her id a new idea is being issued our exterior doors remain in locked positions we have internal communication systems internal private communication systems set up with suffolk county police department we have also made many we also have many other security protocols that obviously would not
015be disclosed publicly for safety reasons we went through that process years ago and that process has continued to evolve we continue to enhance and update our safety protocols and policies as this work is just simply never done this is the first time that we immediately pivoted to remote learning to allow for time for the police department and for the district to investigate the social media threats that we saw thursday evening we did so again to allow for time and focused again on safety remote access remote learning was never part of our original process right prior to covid our protocols have now been revised to include immediately ensuring student access to remote virtual classrooms are deactivated prior to the start of remote instruction in this situation that was clearly not done and for that i take
016full responsibility the use of social media offers tremendous personal professional and educational benefits for many people it does however it also brings with its serious concerns and the potential to create harmful repercussions we are absolutely living in a new world right now where so many students and so many adults are completely consumed by social media about two weeks ago went through a session that attended that focused primarily on the negative impact on social media on children and adults throughout this coveted pandemic the information was alarming we ask for your support in assisting us with this social media challenge please take this time to speak with your children about the use of social media the amount of time on social media what is said in social media matters what's posted on social media and the consequences
017of words and images on social media as school district officials we will be doing the same thing we will also discuss and emphasize that the use of anonymous social media pages to share concerns does not allow for school officials or for the police to immediately address and investigate a situation if any student has been the victim of harassment of assault or any wrongdoing that constitutes a violation of law families should immediately contact the police do not hesitate call the police so that it can be investigated if there is such a situation students that if they're being bullied or harassed in any way shape or form we are asking our families to reach out to admin teams so that we can investigate again no hesitation call i must reiterate that there's nothing more important than safety
018for our board of education and this entire administration team when the district is made aware of any actual perceived or potential threat to the security of our students staff or faculty we immediately enact our district-wide emergency plan we have and will always continue to review practice and enhance our safety policies and internal protocols following such a highly emotional week i would like to remind you of the resources that are available for our students and for our families we have a student support team that consists of social workers guidance counselors psychologists can reach out to any member of the support team contact information has of course been posted on our website hard copies are here and have also been emailed to families chain of communication contact list is on the website and is also available here
019again i urge anyone any specific concern any allegation right to reach out to the police department we all as we sit here today and i'm just going off script for a second we sit here as administrators we sit here as board of education members who are committed right we are parents first and foremost grandparents um and we do not take this lightly we are in the buildings too on other district matters students um were recently added to the school messenger system please be aware that yesterday we made changes to the system so that any future district-wide email blast that i send out to families does not include and does not have a student's link to them i just learned of that recently during our previous board of education meeting we had our third board of
020education presentation on energy performance projects that we are now pursuing just in a quick effort to clarify information that has been previously shared i just would like to emphasize that the cost of those energy savings projects that was were discussed will not be added to a future proposed general fund budget nor will it be paid out of any covid grant or any other grant funds for that matter the savings generated by those projects like the lighting upgrades and unit ventilators throughout the building will be used to pay for the project itself the payments don't begin until about a year after the savings have been realized and it's about an 18-year payoff project so i just wanted to clarify that so that everyone has a clear understanding on that also during a previous uh the previous
021board of education meeting there was a statement made with regards to parents not wanting to complete the state survey that was placed on the portal as previously highlighted during a board of education meeting this state survey consisted of several questions from the state focused on technology equity and asking specifically the parents if they received chromebooks and internet access from the schools we removed the survey for the three parents that did reach out uh not wanting to complete them those were removed at their request covet update as you know covet information can be found in our district website the covet dashboard we update that with regards to the positive cases just want to share with everyone that last year in the first two weeks of december we reported 27 covet cases this year within these first
022two weeks we have reported 99 positive cases in the school in addition to being of course concerned with any student or staff member that is sick i just would like to share i'm concerned about the ripple effect of not having enough staff members right to fully be able to provide transportation and appropriate classroom coverage i truly truly hope that that doesn't happen and we are not required to have to pivot to remote because we don't have enough adults and again anyone that works in a school district in the school system understands what i'm sharing with you right if we don't have enough um adults to be able to cover all classrooms right then obviously that puts us in a difficult position if we don't have enough drivers so hopefully and please trust me that is
023the last thing that i want to do and will only do so of course if we have no other option on behalf of our board of education and our administration team i would like to take a moment to thank our community and parents for partnering with us on the academic social and emotional well-being of our students and of our entire school community i would also like to thank a moment take a moment to thank senior high school admin team for the dedication and professionalism the last few days have certainly been challenging and long for everyone in our community um and that's inclusive of the admin team and there's certainly no other team i'd want beside me working through this a truly happy and healthy holiday season to all of you to all of our employees
024in our school district all of our staff members our faculty members our board of education and a wonderful wonderful holiday season to each and every one of our students thank you dr farrelly we have no statements policy policy 5420r i need a motion to adopt kathy second matt all those in favor that's everyone policy 8112 i need a motion to adopt chris and matt all those in favor thank you policy 8220 i need a motion to adopt john second chris all those in favor thank you first time reading i need a motion to wave the reading and move policy 5460 to second time discussion john kathy all those in favor thank you policy 5460r i need a motion to waive the reading and move it to second time discussion chris ray all those in favor
025thank you old business sure finally ask um during the last meeting we began a discussion in terms of on the scoreboard obviously you know um things have shifted a little bit in terms of tonight could i suggest that maybe a couple of board members for me to reach out anyone in terms of interested that we can go through kind of a pamphlet of different scoreboards kind of narrow it down and then we bring it back to the whole board during the january meeting with a scoreboard committee exactly uh a mini committee in terms of on that is that acceptable to the board because then again rather than in terms of booklets and pamphlets you know we can narrow it down and then we can bring it to the whole board is that okay so i
026will reach out and see who's interested in joining me and then thank you and then under new business there is a um whoever request the west babylon alumni foundation um is hosting their hall of fame um ceremony in the pack he receives in terms of the letter ultimately the request is for us to be able to use and have the assistance of the um our pack technicians to be able to stream it obviously based on the physical distancing um you know requirements um it will be uh live streamed you know for anyone to be able to attend so i just have that request from the alumni foundation to the board a motion to accept to do this kathy i'm going to abstain because i'm a member so okay well i am too so i just
027want to do okay all those in favor good thank you okay okay at this time residents wishing to share a statement should come forward to the microphone state your name your address and any organization that you might be representing or write your name and address on an index card and give it to mr hanley i am going to just reiterate for the audience if you have a complaint of some kind i cannot allow you to use any names if you have any information that we should have i ask that at the end of what your three minutes that you give it to either mr hanley or mr payne so that we can follow up if there are any allegations as long as you don't use names i won't shut you down if you use a
028name i will shut you down i'm talking to the whole audience so you know just wanted to reiterate it thank you very much you have three minutes all right thank you my name is jose crean um i'm coming up here maybe for a different than reason than most of people that are here and that's okay i'm here to say thank you to the students that saw something and said something i'm here to say thank you to the parents that opened their mouths and informed the district and the police or whoever they needed to and thank you to the district for doing what needed to be done to avoid a catastrophe because in the end we avoided a catastrophe did everything go perfectly no because we're all human and we hope that everyone's going to take
029what the mistakes that did happen and learn from them and make changes but in the end we did not have a school shooting and we did not have a catastrophe thank god thank you for keeping our kids safe this could have gone very differently and it did not so thank you and this is just proof to me and many other people how important sel social emotional learning really is these kids need everything that you guys are giving them and this is just telling us how much more we need and i know and i feel very confident that you're going to make this more of a priority and we're only going to hope that it's going to continue to make a priority um and just a suggestion that i know i brought up previously um to
030calm some parents minds another parent may put a video on social media today about it and just um in my district the rave panic button that's used just one way to just have communication open more and just something to kind of ease people's minds just an idea but so thank you very much i appreciate all of you thank you thank you the administration's lack of care and knowledge of the situation of sexual abuse that has been happening within their schools is ridiculous i could walk through the hallways and see five to ten people that i know have been raped in the past and they did nothing about it my foster sister is one of those girls who was hurt and they did absolutely nothing to help her case they didn't even take the kid out
031of her classes the lack of care for their students well-being and mental health is so evident within our schools our own social workers have shut us out of their rooms and now we have to make appointments to see them this defeats the purpose of a safe place when kids are forced to hide how they feel and lock it down we see stuff that is astronomical we watch suicide rates go high we watch people go through hell trying to kill themselves we watch students keep their secrets about the administration not letting them come out about it i'm coming to you to tell you that there is a huge problem within our school and that if it isn't fixed we will continue to show up to board meetings they will continue to walk out of the school
032until they get the attention and help they need we are yelling out loud this is our last straw you have to hear us we are being abused in your schools and you are doing nothing about it you need to pay attention to the smaller guy you need to help us out in order to have an environment in the school that is both beneficial for students and teachers you need to be able to communicate freely throughout the school without fear of being shut down by adults or getting in trouble we need the school to give resources to protect us not be against us there were two separate threats of the school of school shootings your students do not feel safe and we need your help thank you no one else i need a motion i'm sorry
033i just would like to say to the student that just spoke if you have a few minutes afterwards because i would like to schedule an appointment with you tomorrow to discuss specifically exactly what you just indicated in terms of who is involved okay so i if you could just stay a moment so that i can just gather your information and your family's information and we'll be following up thank you hi hi everyone april marisco just open up my phone i am wondering if you are aware of the first amendment i am i'm wondering if you're aware of that children are also covered under the first amendment our children's rights to peacefully protest were infringed upon this afternoon in several ways the lack of support intimidation and threats to be written up is alarming just to
034say the least after last thursday night's traumatic incident and friday's remote schooling mainly safety policies that that should have been implemented were not which i understand you wrote an email and i get it uh i apologize i lost my place i believe it or not uh this is a great concern the community would like to know how and why these policies were overseen and when exactly were our school security guards notified how long did it take for the administration to get the pictures of the child to the security team how frequently does the head administrator communicate with the head of security these questions should be answered tonight for transparency for the community thank you how are you um my name is richard crowley i live at 271 3rd avenue westfabalon my my in in light
035of everything that happened this week i am a single father of two boys divorced primary custody i i'm like a mother and father to my kids and i'm always on top of them and i just want to tell you that i urge other parents in light of what happened you have to take more accountability in monitoring what's going on in social media with children you really do from me monitoring my own kids and seeing what the other kids are saying to each other it's not my place to say but i can tell you you definitely need to take more accountability in doing it okay there's third-party apps they can monitor their actions so snapchat is the primary one with the auto advantage feature if you don't get the third party app you're not going to
036be able to read their conversations um i'm telling you a lot of this stems from these these apps like like snapchat okay the cyber bullying the impersonations the all the bad stuff that's stemming from the school is happening through there be more accountable they have iphones you can put parental controls on the iphones you can limit what apps they download what they do and don't download times everything be more accountable take more action you know just don't leave it up to the school the school should be doing more but we should be doing more as well um secondly you know just just in addition to that you know there's also safety and private concerns with snapchat i can go right now on my son's phone and look at probably a hundred people that he's connected
037to and see their exact locations right now if i was a predator i can go and kidnap you your son or daughter right now luckily i'm not luckily i have safe ties to to law enforcement and a concerned parent and i know that this stuff happens every day so i'm telling you right now take action on your own stop wait waiting for the school to do something you can look you can stop this now so so that's all i have to say for now thank you very much [Applause] okay sean ferris class of 2009 um here to talk about not necessarily the allegations and the severity of those allegations because those are very severe allegations and those are things that need to be handled in a very specific manner when you talk about the gravity
038of some of the assault allegations and i'm not accusing anybody of lying but i'm also never ever ever would i advise any student parent teacher employee anybody random to start posting things on social media without properly verifying it or taking it to the authorities so if something did happen let's reiterate what the board has said let's reiterate what a lot of people have said if it is a criminal act obviously you go to law enforcement if it is something that happened in this building you obviously have to go to administration you must go through all of the necessary hoops so that you can check off all those boxes to make sure that the proper actions are taken and if they're not taken you keep going up the ladder and you rise to proper authority that's
039the way it's got to go these allegations are serious whether they're true or not it needs to be handled the right way because if they're not true there are people's lives who are going to be ruined and if they are true well then people's lives may already have been ruined and they need to be handled appropriately what i want to talk about is the real pandemic that is sweeping across the united states of america article and newsday june 11 2021 and you have an article from cnbc news june 11 2021 both written on the same day that teenagers age 12 to 17 are committing suicide at 50 higher than they have over the course of the 2019-2020 year that should alarm everybody for district for a state for a board for a group of people
040for a community who cares about the social emotional health of the students hearing that suicides are up over 50 percent seeing pictures of a student holding a weapon even if he's joking threatening to shoot a school because of things that he's heard means that society is failing its future society is failing its kids everybody is failing the children if we have created a world and we have created a district that students no longer want to come to school if we have created a world that teenagers no longer want to take part in we are to blame folks everybody in this room is to blame for that in part we can be better we can do better it was brought up that the negative impacts of social media we sat through a session i must ask
041the question has anybody sat through a session about the negative impacts of masking and social distancing i know that's not going to be answered and i know that's not the purpose of me it is a rhetorical question but i urge you if you are looking into the negative impacts of social media you must also look into the negative impacts of masking social distancing social isolation and the impacts that that has on the mental health of the kids because it happened here it's happening nationally and the real pandemic you want to talk about children that aren't going to make it through this pandemic it's not because of this virus it's not because of respiratory droplets it's because of the atmosphere and the environment that is being created in public schools in the state of new york
042and quite frankly it's happening in the entire country there are kids who are giving up they're giving up because of what we are subjecting them to it all ends when we say no now i understand legally that may be challenging but correct me if i'm wrong and i'm going to quote a democrat john f kennedy said we do these things not because they're easy but because they are hard pressure is what creates a diamond okay we are failing we can be a lot better i went through this district i never had a gun threat we had two in one night what's changed everybody here knows the answer these times aren't easy but we're built for this and we can get through this thank you thank you sean tammy diana 54 pershing avenue i would like
043to open with a discussion of a notice to take legal action that was offered early fall by a law firm representing massapequa and locus valley school districts none of the board members here joined the lawsuit nor did you share with the community of reasons for not joining we have learned since then that the lawsuit was denied based on the grounds that board of education members as representatives of a school district and under the control of a corporation known as the university of the state of new york according to case law represented by judge henry zwack the presiding justice on the massabeco locust valley lawsuit this board of education is under the control of the municipal corporation as board members were each of you aware that you're acting against you are acting agents of the state
044clerk can you please record the response when the opportunity to take legal action was presented to you why was that not disclosed to the public clerk can you please record the response our compute community is under the impression that the control of our board of ed is held by taxpayers and the families of west babylon the truth is it is not why our townspeople why are towns people being misled has the law firm or the superintendent or the national school board association advised any of you board of our members of this clerk can you please record the response the hard truth is that the good people of west babin are essentially paying into an enterprise as if we are nothing more than union members paying dues this is taxation without representation does this board of
045education admit that they were aware that you are an agency to which the state delegates powers and duties controlling a school in a school district and therefore a municipal corporation clerk please record the response west babylon deserves the truth our taxpayers are funding a criminal enterprise enforcing illegal mandates implementing dangerous curriculum that causes injury and hostile environment throughout our deliberate indifference and partaking in the existence of a state-created danger the parents and taxpayers have been denied the right to local control without our consent to save our sovereignty we ask everyone in attendance and watching to go to save our schools dot me and join join the fight to end the control of our schools by the corporation known as the university of the state of new york which is governed by the 13 members of
046board of regents and chancellor lester young orders are then carried out by the new york state education department through commissioner betty rosa and then further pushed by the board of cooperative education services known as boces your time is up if you would like to leave that with us so we could read it thank you good evening folks has the law firm van nostrom and martin or william c morrell advised you that this school district is a subdivision of the state and a part of the municipal corporation of new york state no response from the board members and or the law firm will constitute an answer of now district uh clark i'd please like you to record that response you were were you or were you not advised by the contracted law firm that you are
047agents of the state first and foremost and not accountable to the people of this town it matters involving state dictates the community at large appears to have no idea that this relationship between our school district and the state this law firm is paid through the school taxes collected by our townspeople district clerk please let the records show that as a parent and a taxpayer west babylon school district the law firm the board of education members and the superintendent appeared to have acted in concert to mislead our community as a parent and a taxpayer i am fearful of this appearance of impropriety and the harm it has inflicted it has come to our knowledge that the superintendent had to apply for the arp gear and esser funds to sign and signed off on a very concerning
048list of what was called assurances in order to receive these monies included in these assurances is that our children will remain missed in this contract there is no indication that our children will ever be unmasked again also in these assurances is to arrange more medical staff to further push a socialized health network using the school system is the board aware of the application and the assurances that were agreed to please make sure that you note that there was no response is this board aware of the number of bills that further remove parental rights aware awaiting approval right now in the state of new york legislator i would like to speak about the sel and the dei framework that has been implemented into west babylon are you aware that the new york state education department developed
049the culturally responsive sustainable education framework in 2018. on page six of this manual it is clearly states that the educational department enforces multicultural pluralism and not cultural assimilation meaning american assimilation you have one minute left no problem are you aware this document enforces that the american education system has disenfranchised select groups and asserts claims of systematic racism are you aware that the major focus of this document is to strain students to become agents to excuse me train students to be agents of social change on page 11 the crs manual also hearts on sexuality and gender are you aware who david kirkland is kirkland is the architect of the crs framework kirkland is an avowed marxist admirer and the author of critical race theory books did this board vote on this curriculum to be implemented please
050note their response are you aware that elaine gross of a race racism was also involved in the creation of the crs document please view the uh please view the document elaine gross used in training the long island in the long island library association i'll hand that in in just a moment i just one more second lucy i promise as board of education members it is has now come to our knowledge that you are acting as agents of the new york state and did not disclose to the public in a transparent matter in addition because you applied for and agreed to assurances under arp gear and user funds you are hereby placed on notice that your actions in signing off and implementing state creative initiatives without transparency to the public you have placed my children in
051emotional mental and physical danger a follow-up email is expected no communication or response from this board will constitute deliberate indifference thank you [Applause] hi um my name is heather soriano i have five children one already graduated one in high school one in junior high one in jfk and one not yet in school from day one i have always been extremely involved in the pta and i've always been a class mom in fact i was even on the pta board i have never had an issue with the school but i'm honestly so fed up it's getting ridiculous i'm here to address a few topics i do not and will not ever agree with masks do they help sure maybe just a little bit but in reality let's face it most of us are smart enough to
052understand that it's doing more harm than good to our children my kids do not want to complain about going to school they've never missed more than maybe 10 days in a whole year they've also never been the type of kids to get sick several times in the school year that is until covert happened since the mass mandate my kids have been absent from school 15 days possibly even more and it's only december this is because they get sick they get better just enough to be able to go back to school and then they go ahead and get a relapse all over again last month my eighth grader begged me not to send him to school he cried and he pleaded to stay home because he couldn't breathe he was getting all stuffy and the mask
053was only going to make it worse he keeps getting nosebleeds and he keeps getting sick when he puts it on this isn't only happening to my son it's happening to both my daughters as well my heart breaks for not only my kids but everyone else's innocent children who have to go through life thinking that this is normal and safe for them these masks are seriously harming our kids mentally and physically most of you just sit there and let this happen you can do something about it and you're choosing not to that's disturbing it's a complete disgrace you were helping these kids crawl onto a shelf you were helping these kids go through life miserable and depressed this is not right and it's not normal my bubbly outgoing talkative daughter came to me last year and
054told me she has thoughts of wanting to die she she said she knows it's wrong and she's not going to act on it but she doesn't like the way she feels and she doesn't know what to do about it so what did i do as a parent i grabbed her and i hugged her and i immediately started researching therapists she's doing better now but it never should have gotten to that point you were letting these kids you were letting this happen to these kids as for the vaccine tell me how is it okay actually how is it even a thing that as long as you are vaccinated you are allowed to go back to school even if you or someone around you has covered if you had the flu you would not go to school
055or work so why are you allowing vaccinated people with corbett in our schools and yet my unvaccinated second grader got sent home sick and had to get tested before coming back to school and now all of a sudden you don't accept the rapid test anymore she had to get tested earlier in this year and the rapid test was perfectly acceptable by the urgent care but now it has to be the pcr by their private care doctor only this is absolutely ridiculous these doctors offices are so overly booked that they are pushing the real sick patients away because they have no spots available for them available for them they're sending them to urgent care where there is an hour or sometimes more of a wait how do i know this because my child's doctor specifically told
056me on top of that my 16 year old nephew had to wait two hours at an urgent care for an infection going on with his foot he couldn't even see his own doctor because you're requiring everyone to get tested over a silly little cold the vaccinated are the ones getting everyone sick and how you don't realize that completely boggles my mind i would also like to just quickly add that why do you have a policy that if your child has an unexcused absent but yet they spend hours making up all the work the teachers are not allowed to accept it i'm sorry but that's just stupid if the kid is willing to sit there and do the work have the decency to accept it i also want to address the sexual assaults that's going on
057i know for a fact that there has been rape in our school district and it was completely brushed under the rug the teachers that knew about it are still working and this and the kid still roams freely so now one of you can sit there and say that you have something that you do something about it and that you have our children's best interests at heart because that is so far from the truth it's disgusting and lastly threats made to the school i'm sorry but you do need to do better the way you're handling this is not good enough my daughter has two classes with this kid and from day one she said he's a little strange and she doesn't feel comfortable around him he's only suspended for a week this is a serious matter
058only a week i'm done thank you thank you no one else i need a motion to adjourn kathy chris all those in favor yes