001for hi everybody hey there okay okay we're getting pretty close to 6:30 do we have all of our board members is Victoria was up before I'm here oh there you are thank you sorry that's all right um just wanted to make sure we had everybody thank you okay um Mr Smith or um Mr ped I don't know who's doing it will somebody put up our um agenda thank you Tyler thank you Mr TR okay um being that it is 6:30 in accordance with Ohio Revise Code 12.22 and House Bill 197 I hereby call the Board of Education of the Bexley City School District regularly schedule board meeting for Tuesday August 4th 2020 to order Mr Smith will you please administer the Roll Call Mr barno here miss Mino here miss Mitchell here Miss Powers here
002miss Snowden here thank you all right um can I have a motion to approve our minutes which is one item one C on our agenda for both the June 29th meeting and the July 30th meeting so moved second thank you are there any changes I did have a couple Marley uhuh um I just need to pull it up hold on one second yep I forget that I can't manipulate I know screen same thing I'll ask a question while you're at it um okay go ahead Mr Smith can you tell me I noted in our on the June 29th meeting for public participa participation we put it on file but but um not oh you know what and I think this is wrong it's the July 7th meeting um yeah and in our in our approval
003of minutes under um item 1 C on our on our agenda for tonight it's um an action recommended it says July 30th just mistakenly so we can um change that but my question was we've had so many meetings now I just want to make sure the public participation was on file for the 29th because um we did not have live public participation then right and on the 7eventh we did so it's captured it in in its place is that correct uh correct the with the um June 29th there were um so many submitted comments and instead of um writing out 90 comments or copying 90 comments comments we just put those in the minute file which we do with several other reports you'll see that in a minute several times but with this particular one
004we also posted all those 90 some comments on board docs too so they're they're available okay perfect thank you sorry Miss Mitchell yeah I'm sorry I'm just trying to if I made my notes and now I'm like can't find the which meeting it was in yeah I believe it is uh under items for discussion on the June 29th meeting uh hold on let me just get [Music] there we just made it oh is Item B under items for discussion um on I just want to clear uh June 29th not July 29th sorry juneth special meeting item B was roll call um this would be under items for discussion be 6B 6 sorry that's okay thank you could not read my little handwriting there um I just want to make sure that um the letter from
005the board that we drafted was not regarding social matters particularly with the black lives matter organization but was um in response to uh um the collective Community um call to action as well as our own um I just that that that is not accurate as far as referring that as social matters with black lives matter um we do um but the letter was really just to to um make a commitment that our board will continue to do the work that we've been doing but to do take it to um another um another level I guess you would say I don't know how to word that I just want to make sure that that's C clear how would you like it worded do you just want to say statement of the community regarding equity and inclusion
006in our district you want it to be more General well because it's it's I I mean when I read it social matters with black lives matter is I mean it's kind of the point but the way it's it's um capitalized gives it a reference to a specific organization and we have multiple organizations that we are going to be I guess you could say calling on our work or or supporting our work and so I don't want it to just be one particular organization so I'm happy to amend it um if you want to give us an idea what you'd like it to say any regarding social matters Alicia what you said was um statement for the community in response to the communities and our own call to action regarding um and then do you want
007to say racial Equity or yeah I like that that racial Equity okay all right great so Mr Smith would you please amend it to delete the social matters with black with black lives matter Ms instead put racial Equity yeah thank you thank you Miss mitel and just what and and just so a matter of um I I'd say recordkeeping so right now we see this document posted um when you because when you vote to Amendment we will repost these minutes in this same location um so so the public knows that we we do change this um after you you've modified it so the updated minutes will be posted same place but with this revision okay thank you um any other additions or changes to our minutes all right hearing none we have a motion in
008a second all in favor of oh there we go I knew it would happen at some point sorry um here we go all in favor of item 1 C please signify by saying I I I I I any oppos same sign that motion carries thank you um so um as for our approval of our agenda I just want to make a few notes before I entertain a motion to approve it um I'll note that we moved our public comments uh today it's to better allow our community to hear the administrative reports before making their own com and then um I think we can sorry trying to figure out how to turn that off um and and but it's before we make our own comments so um it is we get to hear what our community
009is thinking before we vote but they have had the the opportunity to hear the the administration presentations so um I that's the the reason for a public comment the second thing is that I am going to move items 3G and H and uh till after our vote on the plan because they um involve matters of the plan the calendar and um theou with our um uh with the Bea and so we need to know whether we approve the plan before before we approve those two items and then finally I will note that board members have requested a Break um because we have a long meeting so we'll take about a five minute break after the treasur report and before the student and staff learning report so given all of that um can I have a
010motion to approve the agenda Marley I will make that motion but I have a just a typo comment I think uh so do you want me to make it after I make the motion sure thank you so so move D thank you second second thank you and then um 7D it says copy of recommendation to approve item seven does it still say that no it should be erased thank you got it ah no it does Ming quickly copy of well I don't know actually I'm on my old page uh Mr Trill do you have the do you guys see the agenda up yes to approve item 7 C okay that's perfect that's good uh okay great thank you thank you um all right thank you all in favor of app of approving 1 D please
011signify by saying I I hi I I any oppos same sign thank you that carries all right we'll move on to our board reports um I will just say Miss minia will will take our policy committee tonight I will say on my operations report we will hear from um Dr Williams about uh Athletics um we ALS later in the in the evening um I will also note that the tennis court um proposal to redo the tennis court which is in dire need of replacement um that is we have had now $185,000 committed toward that so the administration is requesting $14 $40,000 from our permanent Improvement fund for that so you'll see that resolution later tonight I know Dr Williams um and Mr Iber have been working on that for a long time the um Dar
012Williams also talked about the fact that um they are still looking into custodians and whether we're going to need we will need some more custodians um uh through all of this and so he's looking at hiring some custodians most likely and also we're looking next um next month we'll probably be looking at a busing policy um for our students on buses and whether it's one student per seat or two or whatever so that's that's yet to come um we had some of those conversations but they're not finalized yet uh and I think that's it so miss minia okay oh good okay I'm not muted um I have nothing to report um the policy committee we covered um the osab legislative um that email just came in today I will forward it to you or summarize
013it forward to you and um staff and student learning that's a lot of what we're going to hear um tonight from Dr Miller and from uh Miss AB Miss Abraham thank you I should just not also um we were will be approving our uh or look to approve our contract ebea today or sorry not contract policy on Facebook coverings but just as a note um for those of you who saw the governor's press conference today he did now require that for K through 12 students it's mandatory for them to wear their masks in schools so um it's it's still important that we have a policy but we also have the backing of a of a state order so that is that on that front Mr berno I do not have any specific reports uh Mr
014ped and I hopefully will be meeting by the end of the month um I we we haven't scheduled a meeting for our technology um committee but um hopefully well we should have a meeting and be able to report back in the September meeting otherwise I have no other additional reports great thank you Miss Mitchell you have to unmute sorry you find it I was looking at my agenda while while also um talking and not paying attention um I just have a couple things to report out um the bef um completed the spring um installation of the brick pavers they had 45 new um installations this year um they are gearing up to launch the um fundraising campaign to support our one toone device um needs uh that will look to to kick off in September
015uh they're still kind of iron ironing out some strategic um planning around that to make sure that we get um a a really effective launch um going and then they also had um a school Tech consultant come in Lori Ramsey who um did a really really fantastic presentation I thought um on the value of um of going onetoone and making sure that uh students have access to technology and so I was really um thankful to participate in that presentation uh and then Victoria and I uh both attended the um district meeting with um Miss lean Smith and Dr Miller uh to uh with barp the uh Bexley anti-racism project um members of those of that particular organization met with us uh and um presented some of the their um ideas um shared uh stories um
016and and gave some feedback for us to um to um continue our work that we've uh been doing as a district um I just want to say what an incredibly engaging uh and dynamic group of students in alumni um and you know I sent my report to all of you um via email um but the thing that I I I think I took away from it was um how we can uh continue to amplify their voices in all aspects of our district going forward not just in this particular conversation um and I think the sadness that I had as a mom as a parent um as an African-American woman was just that it took um this particular Injustice of uh the loss of George Floyd um to be the Catalyst but I I I do
017think that there is a tremendous work that can be done um they shared with us um their pillars of their um organization um provided some feedback um to the district as students which is a fantastic lens to have because they're experiencing it I think the biggest reflection that I had was and again another sadness a point of sadness that um the students that some of the work the district has engaged in for the last seven years that directly impacts them there was um not enough um experience for them to to call on that to say I see this and I I've experienced it so it it was a call to action for me personally but I think for um us as a district to continue our work and to be um Vigilant with it and
018to continue um uh prioritizing that work as we go forward so um I won't repeat our report here that I I sent uh I know that as a as a board we um are about to embark on some pretty significant work as well so um that's all I have I'm sure Victoria will report out some more as well thank you all right um so Miss Powers thank you um and I appreciate that update from Alicia about our meeting with the Bexley anti-racism project it was incredibly powerful and um I'm going to talk a little bit further about that later in our in our board agenda um I'll just say at this point that um I'm grateful for the meeting and I did separately send a report out to the board members about it including the
019letter uh with the statement from bar that um informs us specific Al as to their um ideas and hopes for what we can accomplish uh as a district going forward um on my other areas uh the rec Recreation Bexley Recreation board um has not met since our last meeting they're trying to get their next meeting on the calendar I'll report at our next board meeting Finance committees I don't believe we've met Mr Smith you can correct me might have lost track of one in there but I don't believe we've met you're correct thank you um osba Town Hall meetings I've tried to attend those weekly meetings they've been helpful um but um you know we get the it's helpful and and um we we do have other places where we get that information including um
020the osba legislative piece that Michelle reports to us on um in the last meeting we were provided with information about safety precautions remote learning plans and updates on legislative matters so it's it's helpful and I've got one on my schedule for tomorrow um the reopening task force I think Dr Miller has done a great job of differentiating between the development of various learning models which the task force has been working on the all-in the hybrid and the distance learning models and um the other piece which is determining which model would be the model at the beginning of the school year the task force really was tasked with developing the models and um has worked very hard to gather information develop the three learning models that are being presented and were discussed in depth at our
021at our meeting last Thursday and we then broke into subcommittees and those subcommittees were reported out at our Thursday meeting um around the areas of learning experience health and safety extracurricular social emotional special populations Communications and child care we had our last full task force meeting prior to Thursday's board meeting but the work of the subcommittees is continuing um and you'll you'll hear more about that I'm sure this evening and going forward as the subcommittees which include members of the community that weren't on the 25 member task force um continue to to address issues as we go forward and that's all I have thanks Marley thank you okay so um we will move on now to the heart of the matter such that it is um for a lot of the work that we're doing
022tonight and Dr Miller thank you um so we're g to start with the uh again the back to school plan which has a couple of edits in it from last week and then really what is of most interest to everybody tonight which is how will we begin School in August here in just a few weeks and so I'll go through that in detail as well um and then there are other items obviously under my report and action items my question to you U Miss Snowden is do you want me to just go through this and answer questions now or would you like to hold questions until we get to the part of the meeting where there's actually a resolution to vote on the plan um do you have a preference no it doesn't matter to
023okay well then I think what makes sense is if if board members have questions about the plan um about what Dr Miller is presenting then please feel free to jump in and ask if there's something unclear otherwise I think we'll save most of our comments for the section where we have the opportunity to discuss the resolution that would approve it or not okay great thank you um so thank you to um Tyler or Kyle I'm not sure who's who's managing the screen but thank you to the support people there um so the first thing you'll notice on the back to school plan and this is the overall plan that once again as Miss Powers indicated was developed with the task force um this is the work of of many many people um and it is
024the plan for the entire school year we've said all along that we need to have all three learning models ready to go because we knew that as we went through the the course of this year we would likely have to shift from model to model I know that's very very difficult for our parents it's very difficult for our staff for our students and for our administrators and our board but that is the the environment that we're in and that we've been told to prepare for so unlike last spring when we didn't have preparation time we have had time to prepare so again this model is designed for the entire year so the first thing you'll notice in red is that the document was last updated on August 3 so this was updated again as of
025yesterday as I've reported I am having weekly conversations with not only Franklin County Public Health but also Columbus Public Health officials with all area superintendent and so as we get updated information we update this um since last week you'll notice if we scroll down can keep scrolling I'm looking at your screen as opposed to mine so um if if you keep scrolling down to when will the change when will the learning plan change and when we first um started putting this information out to our community and we indicated it was in draft form so um I know sometimes people ask well why did it change well we knew it was in draft form and so we balanced going ahead and and Publishing drafts knowing things would change with waiting until the plan was was finalized
026um but we originally were were looking at committing to a full quarter of whatever plan we would Implement at the beginning um and only to make plan changes at the beginning of the next quarter however last week what we learned was that in Franklin County there had been a two- week decrease in in the positivity rates and so there was a two-e decrease still at a high rate of community spread in Franklin County but we were on the downward Trend and the guidance from both Columbus and Franklin County Public Health was that you're looking for a four-week downward Trend and so um when the plan will shift is really more going to be related to if you look at the second book when data and guidance from Franklin County Public Health indicates um BC Bex
027City Schools can transition to a different different plan and that would be with at least four weeks of downward trending before making a shift and so um rather than if it's possible to return students to in-person learning sooner or if even to go from a hybrid to an all-in model we would be looking at that Trend data and then have a transition plan and when I get to the restart plan for for August I'll talk in more deta detail about that so that's a slight shift so rather than committing to a whole quarter we're looking at that Trend data so again we're we're keeping um with the science and what the scientists have told us um make sense um but we would still be doing this in a collaborative fashion we wouldn't just shift um
028if you scroll down a little farther down to um nothing has changed in any of these areas since last week but if you scroll keep scrolling down to the um where it talks about extracurricular activities is all the way toward the bottom um I think it's in the oh I gotcha yeah here we go if we look at before and after school programming um what we what we did was we removed a bullet so last Wednesday we received guidance from both Franklin County and Columbus that during distance learning um Athletics should be suspended and so um most school districts made the move to suspend and then we um access legal guidance from our our legal um departments and also was looked at there were some Ohio Department of Health um guideline changes so there there
029it was an active weekend it was an active time so we've removed the the language around suspending during distance learning first and foremost we're not in distance learning right now school is not in session and so we're not in distance learning um and secondly when we continue to look that Trend data being an influencer um so there there is the possibility that we could um continue with Athletics in some format and I've also had some additional conversations with some of our local um experts in our community so again when I move over to the other to the restart plan I'll go into a little more detail so that basically now just says that we will assess activities on an individual and ongoing basis and that's really what we need to do if we've learned anything
030through this is that we need to assess situations on an on goinging basis and that's sometimes dayto day and sometimes it feels hour to hour um but but we've removed that we would automatically suspend activities and for for the record we never completely suspended um our activities I I had when I issued that guidance based on what we were told from the health departments um I was going to make that go into place on at nine o'clock on Friday night and then we got changing guidance before Friday o'clock at 9 Friday night at 9 o'clock so it never really um stopped so I'm going address that again in our other in the restart plan so those are the only two changes on the overall plan so if we could shift Dr Miller I'm sorry to
031interrupt you I just I'm sorry to interrupt you the the extracurricular the guidance that we got on Thursday night at least from Franklin County public health health was that was kind of tying what whatever learning model we were doing to extracurriculars at this point it it appears that according to the plan that we're not tying extracurricular to what our learning plan is it's more going to be individualized on a separate basis on sport or whatever it is it's not going to be depending on what we're doing with our learning plan is that correct correct so as I get into that with the with the restart plan you'll see what I mean by that and again um I I if anything I hope that our staff and our community who are watching can can at least
032appreciate the complexity of trying to make plans when the guidance changes quite regularly um I I would love nothing more than some stability in all of this but um we're trying to be responsive and and so so things change so if you open up the back to school and I've called this an appendix because this is part of the overall plan but it is the restart plan um and so what you see here is um this is more outlining the details of how we would begin school so what you see is the school reopening procedures um or opening procedures so August 3rd through 13th um staff are preparing for the start of the school year in our negotiated agreement with the Bexley Education Association teachers have one day between August 3rd and 13th to prepare
033individually for the start of the school day that was part of our agreement that we negotiated um that went into effect in um 201819 school year then from August 17th to 21st staff will report for or in person to the schools physically for professional development and worktime and um the guidelines around this is that staff gatherings in classrooms and offices should be limited to allow for at least six feet of physical distancing one of the strengths of being small is that um if our third grade team at a building wanted to meet together that might be three or four teachers they could easily be in a classroom working together well dist apart wearing masks and be able to be safe um and be able to do work in person which um for those of us
034who've returned um to offices and and workplaces across our city um there's a lot of value in being able to work together seeing people um problem solving in person and so um we want to provide that but also make sure that physical um distancing of at least six feet is always in place um staff meetings for full staff could be conducted via video conference um or in where where staff members could maybe join either individually from their their workspace or um there would be um times when we might want the whole staff together but we would only do that in a theater cafeteria or gymnasium where the staff can distance at least six feet so again that that guideline of always being six feet apart and always wearing masks is always in place um one
035of the reasons we feel it necessary to bring our staff in is that they need to access their materials and supplies in order to maximize learning we also as Miss Mitchell has already eluded have some important work to do around equity and anti-racism those conversations are important and they're also sensitive and um can be um challenging sometimes but there's there's something about doing those in person that is better um behind the screen may not be the best way to have those kinds of um what can be very emotional conversations the administrative team has been engaged in those throughout the summer we've done all of those in person um again wearing masks and in distance and um I I would say from my personal experience with it um doing that work having those conversations when you
036can see people at least their eyes being in the same room is so much um more valuable than doing doing the work um VI on the screen so we recognize that there is work that needs to be done in person and so we need our staff to come in for that and that is an important part of the work that we need to do um to begin our school year um also if we are able to transition to a hybrid plan we're going to need our staff to have been comfortable in the school setting um again the administrative team I put together a transition plan to bring the administrative team back over the course of the summer um and we did that in in small steps um but when you take the time to transition
037and then you get comfortable in the space um it will be easier to bring our students in um it would be beneficial for teachers to be able to participate in in all those risk mitigation protocols um and get a sense of how the buildings are going to function um even as you walk through our hallways to see the uh Direction arrows for oneway hallways just being able to see that and experience it is extremely helpful getting comfortable yourself in the space is the first step toward being able to welcome students back and so um for that week we would like our staff to be in person of course if any staff member has a covid related situation that would require a modification they should reach out to Dr Williams to um work through that process
038um August 24th would be the first day of instruction for students um students will begin the 2021 school year in the distance learning plan um I am continuing to follow the guidance of Franklin County Public Health and Columbus Public Health also um The Centers for Disease Control the American Academy of Pediatrics our governor the Ohio Department of Education and in fact our own Bexley um emergency operating procedures all state that in a pandemic or in this particular pandemic we should be taking our guidance from our local public health department and for th that is Franklin County Public Health and so I am continuing to to take their guidance in recommending that we begin um at a distance and I'll talk more about though how how long would that be um school will take place as
039we reported last week five days a week and follow student days as closely as possible so the elementary day again is 8:15 to 3 and the secondary day is approximately 8:30 to 3:30 there may be five minutes here or there and that will really be communicated directly from from the building principles um I want to remind everyone that a school day will not be spent fully online just as a regular school day in person is not spent fully sitting at a desk listening to an adult speak at you um or to you but um that does include time our day would include time for live teaching for Teacher directed Independent Learning research and group work just as we would do in a regular um School setting um I will say until we have full receipt
040of our onetoone devices live teaching will be limited by access to technology at home um I want to again thank the Bexley education foundation for the work that they're doing to support that transition we are still transitioning to one to one our devices have been ordered our challenge is is like a lot of businesses is is the supply chain and getting the devices here but we are still committed to that we still need those devices and so again thank you to bef and their efforts to raise funds to support that that transition fully um we haven't we haven't deviated from that but we are in a situation where we are having to make some adjustments um our sec secondary principles um in in collaboration with Miss Abraham and and Mr Pettit put out a survey
041to our six through 12 parents to find out exactly how many devices they would need in their home um so that every student in grade six or 12 would have access during the day they'll be working on Hotspot delivery as well um there was a similar survey going out to Elementary parents so that to the extent that we are able with what we have we're trying to get devices into the hands of our students so that they have as much access as possible but I do want to be clear that until we have all of our devices there will be some limitations but we will have expectations around live teaching um as well as we move on um and then also as a reminder our students have study hall they have lunch and they have
042recess and that's all part of their school day as well and it will be in distance learning as well um the staff will follow their regular school day schedules um specific times again will be communicated by building principles but I'm just rounding things off for the sake of our presentation so as a reminder our Elementary staff day is 8 to 4 and our secondary staff day is 7:30 to 3:30 um one of the um pieces of guidance that we we or i s from from Franklin County Public Health um was the ability to bring small groups of students in what we know is that there are services and there are student needs that simply cannot be met from a distance there are certain therapies and programs that need to be met um that students need
043to be seen in person in order to do that and So within the Franklin County Guidance we do have the ability to bring in small groups of students um nine or fewer with one staff member again using all of our risk mitigation protocols masking um six feet of distancing this is not just for students who might have an individualized education plan or a 504 plan this could really be for any student for whom their needs are such that they need to be engaged so for example um if we have student we know that we had students who had difficulty with distance learning in the spring if we have students who in the first few week two weeks of school I believe it's two weeks they're not engaging they may be asked to come in because
044that would they would need an intervention plan because we need to make sure that that we are figuring out how to engage them and so students can be come into school we're not under a stay-at-home order and schools are not closed to students as they were through June 30th under a Governor's order so um we are able to um be more flexible the dis the recommendation for distance is really around significantly reducing the number of students in the building the number of people in the building at one time to reduce spread but we can meet with small groups of students and I'm very grateful for that um I already talked about risk mitigation so we are um require masks Etc um as you as Miss Snowden mentioned today the governor issued a a mask order
045for all students in grades K through 12 we had already planned on that and so um that doesn't require any type of shifting on our part which is a nice change of pace um because we had already gone with a more conservative uh approach there and we will continue with that um how when would we change the plan so I'm I'm referencing to a little bit to what I said earlier about maybe not sticking with the whole quarter but no sooner than September 18th uh we would determine if a shift to the hybrid plan is appropriate we again have seen two weeks of downward trending data on my calls today there was optimism that they expect that to continue in Franklin County in part because so many people are wearing masks so thank you to
046everyone in our community who is comp um complying with that um order to wear a mask in public um if by the time school starts we could see a four to five week I don't have the exact count in my head but a four to five we downward Trend I still would recom I'm still recommending distance to begin because our teachers are planning for that and to shift the plan would almost necessitate a delay in the start of school year if we were to try to shift to something different at this time we would probably have to delay to the start of the school year to be um to be ready yes I'm sorry really quickly I thought um though you said the goal would be to prepare for all three plans at all time
047well the the the overall plan has all three plans but when you start getting into the details of planning the nuances gotcha the nuances being able to zero in on this is the one we're going to implement in the next couple of weeks that's where we need to be and so because you made this recommendation you you and your staff have been moving towards distance yes as opposed to hybrid yes knowing that nothing is final until the board votes um we ever ever since the guidance came out last week which really hasn't been that long we've been able to really turn our attention specifically to distance learning um rather than trying to plan multiples this is probably a good time to to say um well I'll come back to this but we want to have
048four weeks and one of the reasons that I'm recommending we stay in distance learning for at least four weeks before making any determinations of shift is that we'll have the opportunity to see what happens as districts around the state do go back in person there are part parts of the state who have significantly less Community spread than we do and they're planning to start in a hybrid or even in Allin to have the opportunity to see how that impacts students we've already seen some small cases in Indiana where schools have gone and have all to make some adjustments um and shifts and so we have this opportunity there's it's twofold one we were allowing our teachers and our principles our administrators to know what they're planning for and to plan for that and then we're
049also giving ourselves the opportunity to see how this plays out and to gather data about how this um plays out in other school districts the other very real challenge we have is that we do have at last survey and this was not binding but about 25 to 27% of our families who said they would not be having their children returned to school at least for the first semester possibly the entire year they also want a Bexley teacher and a Bexley curriculum and we certainly understand that um we need more time to figure out how we do in person learning if we're able to go to that while also managing students who may not come to school at all with the exception of two districts locally everyone is using a thirdparty vendor they have their staff
050supporting those students but they're using content from other vendors um to be able to have the time to um try to find uh staff who may be able to to do the in-person and um the the distance learning at the same time for students who may not come back and this is if we go to hybrid um we would have some time to to work that out or to and to work individually with with those families to make uh their educational experience as um much as they want it to be but um that this is a this is a complex problem when you're asking staff to plan to also then start to bring kids in the school but also have kids who may not come in so quite frankly taking another four at least having
051four weeks to plan for that gives us more time to work with those families who are not planning to return their children to school in person this year and to make a plan for them um so if we get to September 18th and we've continued to see that downward trending data in Franklin County um and Columbus then we would look to begin the shift to the hybrid we know you can't just flip the switch I mean we did it in March but it wasn't the best so couple of things here we would want to be able to notify our families and our staff when the shift would begin because that will change Child Care Arrangements that will change work work arrangements and so if we made the decision by September 18th that we're able to
052shift then we would give um our families the staff the next week to make arrangements and then we would actually begin the transition to the hybrid the week of September 28th and that transition would be what we had talked about previously when we thought we would start in a hybrid which is bring in about 25% of the students at a time in one day that allows them to learn about the ration protocols it allows them to learn how to move about the building it allows us to do some instruction with them on how to work in this type of environment in in person um and we would do that over a course of of three weeks and then be able to be fully hybrid by October 19th so we would start that transition process um
053and again I talked about the importance of transition and allowing people um to become comfortable and and for a lot of it would be for students to learn a very different way of even doing school in person but Dr Miller when's the um quarter end October 16th so we're staying fully distant for nine weeks well transitioning transition would be starting to have students come into the building 25% of those students okay sorry just I'm just making sure I'm following no that's a good question so during that transition time there's there is sort of a it's definitely a hybrid because you're distance learning and some in person but that's what the hybrid is when you're fully hybrid it's 50% of the students at a time but 50% of the students aren't aren't in school so it
054is a hybrid what some people would call Blended learning there's a component of iners and there's a component of distance going on at the same time but we start to be able to bring our students into the building for more personal connections which we know is important and then the last um part of the return plan we wanted to address extracurricular activities so Athletics marching band theater um and any other extracurriculars and um I had to um want to thank Dr Allison Norris who spent some time with me today and helped me with some language around this um so going back to the guidance to um to suspend Athletics at distance upon some additional conversations with our Public Health they continued to reiterate the importance of those four weeks of downward trending data to start
055to move to more in-person experiences and so we really want to apply that to our um extracurriculars as well so um Dr Miller I'm sorry to interrupt but the direction from Franklin County Public Health did specific spefically State athletics and all extracurriculars right so this was in a conversation so the I don't believe the written guidance has changed but in our conversations with Franklin County Public Health and with Columbus Public Health the notion of the downward trending data over a four-week period of time is important before making any moves to more in person I I meant stepping back in the original when they said last week we want you to suspend and all they said extracurricular activities during distance learning it wasn't just Athletics and that's why we're covering all of these things here well
056it it really was very specific to Athletics um but but really we we need to look at all of our extracurricular activities as a whole um and again that was part of my conversation today with Dr Norris was was really it makes sense to look at everything that happens outside of the school day sure as a group so yes it really was specific to Athletics um so we what we've added here is a section on extracurricular um activities and just some general statements that again I I thank Dr Norris for helping with um that extracurricular activities should be practice in light of evidence that singing and shouting May contribute to covid-19 transmission so we have to be aware of that when we're when we're either singing um for a musical or Athletics almost certainly involve
057shouting at some point in time so um group and Ensemble singing should not occur inside until mitigation techniques have been tested and proven effective and I don't think that we have that yet um we're that's something people are continuing to work on instrumental groups should be limited in size to meet physical distancing requirements in play should take place Outdoors During the period of distance learning um extracurricular activities should not include traveling with non-family members in small shared Vehicles during a period of distance learning I'm going to come back to that in a minute but um it's not just the supervision and the guidance that happens when students are with us but what they're doing when they're not with us that that is impactful um splitting teams and troops into smaller groups reduces intermingling that's part
058of what what we've U done with some of our groups um asking that all students who participate in extracurricular activities sign a waiver acknowledging they are assuming some Risk by participating our athletes who have already been participating have had to do that but with um school starting and theater um our marching band students had to do that as well but we would want to make sure that we do that across the board for all extracurricular activities and then um talked about having students sign a pledge committing to Safe behavior that reduces risk even when they're not in extracurricular activity so our students um have to sign a pledge to re refrain from alcohol and drugs while they're um in season and it doesn't matter um it's not just when they're at school or at the
059event but it's all the time they're not to be um violating our drug and alcohol policy and so similar asking students to pledge to that safe Behavior so again if if four students drive together from different families in a car to practice um keeping them six feet apart on a field may not really help um that that may not be where spread would happen it might be happening elsewhere and so um while while these things are are on you know really on the honor System but helping part of what we have to do is help our students to know what keeps them safer um what are the behaviors that allow us to be able to continue activities um and these are them and so again I want to thank Dr Norris for her support here
060um in helping to to craft some of that language um then moving into sports non-con sports golf tennis cross country and volleyball are able to continue with practice and competition per the Ohio Department of Health guidance that we've recently received um we are asking that are not asking but volleyball players must wear masks indoors at all times are in practice because they are indoors um to the extent possible that they could do conditioning Outdoors that would be um preferable it's the only false sport that takes place indoors um and so that's why the masking although when other um non-con Sports athletes are near other people they certainly should be wearing masks as well so again all risk mitigation Protocols are to be in place at all times um contact Sports and marching band um we
061we've laid out um a a system here to allow to to watch that downward Trend so August 3rd through 14th would be back to phase one um again the guidance is um from from public health is that Sports could continue in those small cohort groups nine students one staff member um and um if if we get to the 14th which would allow for four weeks of downward trending data because we've already got two we could get two more weeks of downward trending data then we would look at allowing um our coaches to move to phase two so again we're looking at those those weeks of Trends if we get four weeks of Trends then we could move to phase two um which is what we were in before the the guidance came last week and
062then um by September 4th um we would either be able to possibly move to fa phase three but also this would be the point at which we'd want to determine the feasibility of continuing The Fall season based on um County covid cases access to competition and also the guidance of Public Health um there may be a point at which um if we're unable to have competitions if we're unable to proceed that we may not continue I'm not I'm not saying that now I'm laying this out as a timeline to allow us to to respond to what's going on also we do have a pay to participate fee um we would want if if there was no possibility of competition in the fall season and to be honest many people think that would be it's going
063to be difficult to have contact Sports compete um one do our coaches want to continue coaching if we're not having competitions and two do our parents want to pay the participation fee for their students to stay in in essentially a phase two environment so we have set September 4th as a date by which to make some uh further recommendations about how we move forward then for all other extracurricular activities again we're we're sort of using that phasing system that the Ohio High School Athletic Association has set forth um that we would base those phases on local health conditions um so again we don't start those until really school begins so August I'm just still saying August 17th to September 4th which is that first chunk um we we'd have people in phase one so if
064theater was going to do something we'd want to keep it at those nine students um masks worn if they're inside and maintain the six feet of distance and then again watching what happens with the trends May potentially move to phase two um make I want to make a note for all EXT other extracurricular activities if if at any time directors want to work with their students in a virtual format that certainly can go forward at any time and this is more about imperson uh meetings so that's that's the the plan to reopen um obviously this is a a relatively you know this is a two-page document to try to get at the high levels and when we get to the resolution I want to again give you a chance to ask any questions about any
065other details that you might have I have a few questions if if I can just on this the specifics that you have here Dr Miller can I go through those now or do you want me to wait sure um up at the on the first page of this I just want to make sure I'm understanding in the section August um there's in the bullet point a sco underneath second secondary student day 8:30 to 3:30 and then the next bullet point of school day will not be spent fully online but will include time for live teaching teacher directed Independent Learning Etc um and then live teaching will be limited to access by technology at home so is that when you say live teaching there is that like synchronous teaching versus asynchronous or um yes everybody has
066a different term for it but basically um what we're doing right now is a live board meeting it is happening in real time we are on here live the people that are watching are seeing it happen as it as it's as it's rolling out this is not a recording so this would be live right right and I'm just using that to distinguish because I think and I'm going to talk about this later I think there are going to be times when we actually have students with their teachers a few students perhaps at a time um students with special needs who need to be in the building or somehow actually live you know really personto person and so I'm just making that distinction if that makes sense as I indicated we have a provision to allow
067for students to come in in small groups if that is what is is needed for them to progress in the curriculum absolutely so there's the live teaching through technology and then there's the actual what I've been calling inperson teaching that would happen so we have both yes and that makes sense I'm just clarifying um so later towards the end here where we're talking about extracurricular activities um Athletics marching band theater and then other extracurricular activities I'm aware that there's a study being conducted at the University of Colorado now that um will provide information and guidance about how to do um those types of coral events Etc um back you know distanced and and in other ways and I assume that that kind of guidance will be helpful to us in making those decisions so I'm
068just putting that out there that we will be looking if we will um look sure if you look at the second bullet Under The Heading of extracurricular activities group or Ensemble singing should not occur inside until mitigation techniques have been tested and proven effective so once we have that research and can apply those things then we can move forward with that and I have a a strong feeling that both Miss Reinhardt and um Miss bler and uh Miss goodney and those people who are teaching choir will most definitely be following that as well and uh appreciate our teachers who really stay on top of that and help us with that information absolutely and so I just want to confirm that that would be under exactly that same bullet point that you just referenced yeah um
069under contact Sports um you've got non-c cont Sports per the Ohio Department of Health and then under contact Sports we're referring to the Ohio High School athletics Association um I thought it might be helpful to um just bear in mind that the um Ohio Department of Health's order that was signed on August 1 also governs contact Sports so I'm just sort of clarifying that that the pur Ohio Department of Health there there are August 1 order I assume that we would be following that as well absolutely the the difference is non-con sports can compete right for contact Sports this is just a plan for like working out essentially this this doesn't even get to competition and we may that's as I said we may never get to competition in contact Sports I want I would
070like to be optimistic but we know that that that's um unlike like the NHL and the NBA we're not in a bubble and so um our we can't completely uh protect our students um from outside um influence and so we know that contact Sports may not ever be able to compete but but the this is around working out being part of a team some of the things that were talked about last week the importance of that connection it's really um less about competition for them at this right um and I'm just just um noting that the order does cover contact board practices as well as non-c contct board practices in addition to the distinction between um you know what who can compete and who can't right now and then my last one um at the
071very bottom I just I think you said this um is it the case that the phase one and phase two that's under under other curricular activities August 17th through September 4th that we're going to start in phase one and we may move to phase two during that same period but it'll depend on um you know local health conditions right we'll W we'll be watching those downward Trends um as well as as you indicated other research that may come to light about how we can proceed safely yep good that's it thank you I appreciate it sure Dr Miller I have one I have one quick question question I want to ask now I'll save the meat of my questions the specifics for when we get U later down the agenda but one question I wanted to
072ask you now is um nine to one seems to be the magic number we talk about it in Phase One in sports and then I think we talked about it in the inperson learning like we could have small groups come into the building I I I believe it says up to nine students is that correct that's correct yeah what so that number only applies like during distance learning once we think about shifting to a high hybrid that 9:1 is not the ratio anymore is that correct or am I right right know ratio is there what we've been told is that the key when you go to any type of in-person learning is the six feet of distance but I'm going to be honest I don't know where the number nine comes from I mean it
073was it was the it was the number for uh daycares to be able to operate during the pandemic um those specialized dayc carees um it it's it's the number that that we've been given um for for this so um I'm I'm going to guess that that somewhere somebody looked at the average daycare size and maybe figured nine kids was what you could get in there with distance but when we come back um you know it's it's not so much the nine as it is six feet so for instance if we were going to hold a class in a gymnasium we could in know you know for all intents and purposes we could put a full class of 25 students in a gymnasium and have them six feet apart so it's it's the distance once we're
074in a hybrid okay thank you for making that distinction between the distance versus the hybrid sure real quick Dr Miller I just had a couple of quick questions um reading through the appendix which I greatly appreciate the um looking at the the the training 17 to the 21st teachers will be in the building correct correct when uh whatever plan is put into place um on August 24th or start of school Under obvious ly if we went all in the teachers will be there right if we were all the students reporting to school yeah or even in a high yes yes so in a distance learning um I couldn't tell from the document and and I think you had mentioned we we I'd ask you this on Thursday in the distance learning our teachers are not
075required to be in the building um for their school day let me pull try to read that so you know what I I appreciate you saying that Mr barno and in trying to get this created as you know again very quickly I I left that off but I did I think put it in in some other uh communication so my recommendation is that um our teachers come in on the 17th to the 21st for all the reasons that I said and that um during during distance learning to the extent that their work can be delivered at home they would but we would need to be able to have teachers report to school um in order to provide those services in small groups that would need to happen um there's also the potential that District goals
076or other work that needs to take place in person that we would um expect our our staff to come in um I shared this was a question I had and I'll share it now um as we as we look around um Central Ohio at this point in time nine other school districts nine school districts are looking at having teachers report every day to their classrooms whether they're in distance learning or hybrid or Allin um and so um then a couple one other Miller is that nine nine districts out of what like the six and Central Ohio some of those some of those go into some other school district so into some other counties so I see um I didn't I didn't count all this was this is the information I was able to get from
077talking to colleagues but um two districts were undecided and one other District was um where I am which was we would have teachers come in as we need them to come in um but that if their work could be done remotely that they could do that that's also related to last week I talked about Bexley Rec wanting uh working with us on being able to provide some uh Child Care during the day while we're in distance learning in our buildings because they don't have the space at Jeffrey Mansion to do it um and keep those groups of those cohort groups of nine um if our teachers were to come in um though we could still use our gymnasiums and and maybe cafeteria large spaces and and do some dividers for that but that was another
078um component which was trying to uh partner in it's really beex Rec would run the child care but we would as we've done this summer allow the use of our buildings so that we can support families um we know we know this is difficult in a hardship um for some of our families where um people need to go to work physically go to work and as more people are are called to go back to work so if we could provide that um but again if our staff was in we can still work around that we still have other spaces in our buildings that we could use one other quick question Dr Miller I'm sorry on the extracurricular activities on the uh I think Victoria asked about it on the um the guidance I Ohio Department
079of Health and Governor dwine well through his press conference talked about it as the Ohio Department of Health working with the ohsaa for guidelines for what we're going to follow for our specifically for the sports obviously we we have our issues with we have other issues that we have to deal with marching B and and music but for athletics specifically the um under where you have under phase one it lists per ohsaa coaches I can't read it because it's too small but uh but I think Mike I wasn't sure what your answer was maybe and I wasn't paying attention or maybe I'm just a little thick that's okay the the how Department of Health and the ohsa are going to be providing guidance for us um this is going to be we're not going to
080be really looking at Franklin County Public Health on this this is going to be more of an ohsaa odh recommendation on Sports is that that is my I'm sorry that is my understanding as well is that the Ohio Department of Health will work with the Ohio High School Athletic Association for guidance on contact Sports okay thank you sure Dr Miller it seems odd that districts would receive guidance from multiple different agencies but pick and choose I like how do you know which one you know Athletics and extracurriculars are going to use Ohio Department of Health we're going to use Franklin County um public health so can you just explain the relationship and why that might happen for me it's a as best you can as best I can so um when you think about starting
081school we're talking about hundreds of students coming in and hundreds of Staff members when you're thinking about Athletics you're talking about much smaller groups and in the fall almost predominantly outside with the exception of volleyball and so um the as we heard the the tie to the suspension of Athletics um during distance learning for Frank County Public Health um and I and I think when it characterize for Columbus Public Health was that if we should first focus on and getting students into into school before Athletics and there's a certain logic to that um I don't dis disregard that logic um most of us have probably If we're honest have have tried to look at this thing from from multiple angles to come up with what's the most logical um but if you think about just
082our on our if we just look at our high school we have about 800 students in our high school so even in a hybrid 400 students plus 100 staff members are coming in every day so 500 people indoors um and I'm not saying that that's unsafe um with all the risk mitigation but if you're looking at and I'm not going to have my numbers right but if let's say we're even looking at the full football team which is maybe 40 students outside it's it's significantly different numbers and we've been told repeatedly from all that being outside where um the droplets can dissipate is a much safer place to be um and so when we look at the Ohio Department of Health um we are we are trying to you know they're they're not really giving
083us guidance on the opening of schools um there is an athletic association to give guidance on the open on on Sports um sometimes the guidance is is conflicting and so what we're what I'm trying to do what my team is trying to do is really look at all the different guidance and also talk with our own local um epidemiologists doctors to get additional guidance and so there there does seem to be disagreement about Athletics and and being outside and and being in much smaller groups um than coming into the building and so um I don't want to say we're not disregarding but we're looking at all the different agencies but we're not getting multiple there are there's one group really giving us guidance about the opening of school and even the Ohio Department of Health
084their guidance on opening school to students is is to follow your local public health department so that's that's the consistent guidance on the opening of school but when it comes to Athletics there are multiple groups that are that are weighing in and and I think for the Ohio Department of Health though one of the things we're looking at is there is a provision about testing students in contact Sports before um before a a competition well that works at Ohio State that works for the Cincinnati Reds that works for the Columbus Blue Jackets but that's a little more difficult in a high school um we don't have the same you know funds available so um you know there there's some Provisions even from Ohio Department of Health that seem to be aimed toward division one Athletics
085and the professional world not so much the K12 world so um still working with these multiple agencies to try to put the best um plan in place but also going back to Franklin County Public Health and Columbus Public Health and that guidance to look at downward trending data for four weeks of time so we're trying to incorporate all of it Dr Miller sorry to interject is it also fair to say um at least one of the things that a distinction that I've made because I've obviously we've all really struggled trying to figure out which of this guid that you say that sometimes contradictory to follow um and the distinction that became important in my mind was that um school is and our our academic programs are compulsory children's are children are required by law to
086attend our schools um or to attend a school um and to get an education um and but no child is is required by lot to do an extracurricular activity so to me it feels like a different um it feels like a different process that that we need to to go through a different mental Pro process for what category we put these these risks in in addition to all the things you talked about but to me it's it feels very different when it's something that's required by law and something that's not you're you're absolutely right and I I should have mentioned that myself earlier um so thank you for bringing that up um we talk about signing the waiver we we won't have students sign a waiver if we are able to go to hybrid or
087all-in school learning because again it is compulsory but but any parent who isn't comfortable with their child participating participating in sports does not have to have them participate in sports or in um any of the other marching band or choir or theater if they're not comfortable with that they don't have to do that um and so there there is um I think a little room to also to to take all the different guidance and try to to work that together because again you do have an agency that specifically overseas Athletics um you do have Ohio Department of Health saying we're going to work with the Ohio High School Athletic Association and we're still incorporating that that Columbus Public and Franklin County Public Health but again this is a this is a choice for families not
088a requirement thank you thank you are there any other questions for Dr Miller about um either the appendex for the plan itself at this point I think I'm going save the rest of my questions for after the resolution yeah I mean thank you and and for our public that's listening um what we generally do is have our Administration um present to us um their recommendations and then we have an opportunity as a board um the five of us as the decision makers to um discuss it amongst ourselves in a separate section of our agenda so that will be item seven that we'll discuss that so um assuming that we have no others um on on 3A at the moment we will move on in the agenda to 3B with Dr Miller okay so 3B is
089certified staff um and um we have um three uh certified appointments uh Taylor Irwin Carrie Dietrich and Stephanie Langley and um both Miss Irwin and Miss Dietrich are coming to us to fill second grade positions um if we go all the way back to May when we were talking about class sizes um we added some sections at elementary to maintain smaller class sizes and so one of those was at cassingham um that was originally going to be filled by uh Mr Eric Acton and moving from from the Middle School you'll see further down Mr David shner who's been teaching fifth grade at cassingham um has um secured a principal's position in um Reynoldsburg schools very excited for him very sad to lose him but um that allowed Mr Acton to move back to fifth grade
090which was the grade that he was teaching before he moved to the middle school and so that opened up that second grade position so miss dietr is coming to fill that and then um with the reinstatement of a full-time theater director uh Miss Beth Parmer who was the librarian at Mar Maryland she had been going to go to second grade during the hiring freeze um again with Miss Reinhardt moving back to her full-time position as theater director where obviously would like Miss Parmer back in the library so she'll go to the library which opened up that second grade position and so miss Irwin is coming for that position and then um Stephanie Langley is coming to fill the um I'm gonna say this uh Miss yes Miss Bennett Jessica Bennett has resigned her position also
091very sorry to lose Miss Bennett but for um her family she's making that decision and so miss uh Langley will be coming to take that position and so I've covered all of the certified changes um classified changes um we do have the um just the movement of of um a couple of custodians to to different shifts with some retirements we had so we're making some moves there um what you see under um stiens these are all fairly standard you do see um what these are um a couple of stiens that we've done in the past to cover some additional um work that we need web custodian that sort of thing um we had held normally we were hiring I'll just point out supplementals and stiens in the spring but because we were working through salary
092change or um Revenue changes and budget reductions we held a number of these until now um and so so those are on again all fairly standard um and then we talked about the face covering so even though there's an order we still need a policy in place for face covering so this is a first reading in temporary approval because AS school opens to staff um and even students coming in we need to have face coverings um the details of this are also in our plan which we've gone over then you see second reading and approval for first policies that you saw last month um and then we moved I know G and H but I'll go ahead and mention those um should you approve the opening plan we would need to make a revision to
093our calendar for next year and that's what that would be and then again we've been working with our Education Association on a memorandum of understanding to address a number of issues around um that are that are impacted because of covid so we have language to PR rate um pay for our athletic coaches should we not be able to continue with our Seasons um we also worked on PR rate pay for our marching band directors again should we not be able to continue on with our football season um those supplementals for music um choir choir uh concert band and Orchestra for the concerts that they do um we have some prate language again if we're unable to to manage through all of the concerts and things that we normally do and then again we have um
094are suggesting that we change the the of the school year to include those five professional development days before students come in so that's an um article 7 section D of our negotiated agreement with the Bea and so this just updates that language so that we can um move forward with that so I know you're going to to talk or vote on these later but that just covers those for you so you you have that information thank you and just to be clear um for our board members you'll recognize the mou with the Bea from one that we previously adopted in the in the July 7th meeting um but it wasn't as complete we adopted it under the at that time um and it was not yet signed from by the board so sorry by the
095Bea so um Dr Miller took that opportunity to include everything else in it so um once we approve this tonight we should get the signature from rbe and have this as a um as our plan going forward so given that can I have a motion to approve items 3B through F I'll make that motion and I will um I have one comment okay can I have a second on the motion seconds thank you all right misss um Paris I just want to um because Dr Miller mentioned um when she was talking about the certified um changes that um you know that was when we were in a hiring free so I just want to clarify that all of these hires are within the existing revised hiring frees because they they're just replacing people is that
096right yes that's my understanding that's correct yes Dr Miller yes thank you all right any other questions on items 3B through F Dr Miller I have a quick question um congratulations to Mr Shatner um with his um uh position to Reynoldsburg schools as a principal but I am curious like normal um contracts have a cut off correct like I mean he since he's not going to a teaching position it's okay for us to release in this in this case can you help me understand that because to see that on our agenda this late in the year kind of gave me a little bit of pause so um yes so a a teacher who asks to be released from their contract after July 10th the board has the right to not release that teacher but we
097had his resignation prior to July 10th it's just we didn't have a board meeting um we did we we agreed that in the special meeting we kept it just to um a couple resolutions um to to hit hit contract deadlines and then also the the reopening plan and so this is our first board meeting since we received that but he he did resign um prior to the 10th and a board of education always has the discretion and the opportunity to let a person out of their contract um we had that twice last year when we had teachers who had to move with their families during the middle of the school year they were still released from their contract so it's to your discretion but prior to the 10th um that's perfectly legitimate okay all right
098thank you for clarifying for me absolutely thank you any other questions on 3B through f all right thank you Mr Smith will you take a roll call vote please Miss Powers yes Mr barno yes Miss Mino yes Miss Mitchell yes Miss Snowden yes thank you all right so we are now moving on to our treasurers report um and our uh report from our uh Department of operations Dr Dr Williams um Mr Smith thank you um so July is our income tax payment month um or one of one of our four so I'll spend a little bit of time talking about this and as you um have heard me say several times now that um with the tax uh delay or tax filing delay we would probably see a delay in our income tax payments because
099with the deadline of July 15th um we would not see uh quite a bit of Revenue and that is the case um so comparing um July 19 to July 20 we received $2.1 million less pretty significant that's a 60% reduction in some conversations I've had with other districts they saw a 40 uh 30 or 40% reduction um so ours is um quite a bit more but I think it's a reflective of of how our community files our taxes so we won't know this full story until October um and again this is on um the when you're looking at this form the the blue filing the numbers in the blue are primarily um filings for the calendar year of 2019 um individual quarterly um is uh filings on 2020 so that's red green is employer and
100um so the the the biggest um I guess takeaway that I'm looking at on this report is the employer payments so um Mr Trill if you could scroll down a little bit make the um the bar graph might be a little bit easier to talk to um on the far right you see the July 2020 payment um and the green section is is what I'm referring to 97,5 in employer payments if you look two bars to the left you see 951 685 in the green so that's a reduction in employer withholdings of about 3 and a half% um these months of employer holding withholdings are um March April and May uh so this is I think telling of what uh what we could see in um o overall reductions I think a portion of it
101um with payroll lag it could be just we we may not have seen any reductions in March it's hard to say if if April or May um but that's the most consistent uh piece of our income tax when you look at fluctuations if you look at the blue on this graph you can see some pretty significant fluctuations um so um it's not it's not great news that we lost um some some income in in that green section but not too significant um so a couple other things that um that kind of jumped out at me is uh it's it's in the orange right above the the months and the year $103,000 in refunds for this small of a payment seems a little concerning um when you look at July 2017 um we had 219 so
102um or I'm sorry if you go if we're looking at a year ago Ju July 2019 we had the same amount of refunds um so it's going to be interesting to see if we have even more refunds in October with with more collections um so that'll be something uh we'll be watching um so again $2.1 million less than last year but I would say um July 2019 was $550,000 more than the year before four so like 2016 July 2019 could just be an anomaly and a high year um again we have fluctuations in income in Bexley which we're familiar with and um that's why we um need a a healthy cash balance so that's probably my um my main point for tonight is the cash balance of the district um cash flow is extremely important
103for districts and not only uh but just like us as individuals um Bexley specifically receives 30 last year received 30% of its Revenue in July so if you're thinking as an as a individual if you got 30% of your pay in one month and you had to live on that you would make changes or you would plan ahead for that and when when someone is is paying you and they may change how they pay you you you've got to have cash on hand to maybe live through that that delay in revenue and that's kind of what we're able to do we're fortunate enough in Bexley to have a cash balance to to kind of live off our our reserves um while while this delay in revenue is happening so um we'll we'll see U more
104Revenue hopefully in October when the next income tax payment comes um in conjunction with that Mr TR if you could go to the next um um oh okay so this is uh this is just when payments are made um and so normally right now in July we would see um individual returns um and quarterly quarterly returns for 2020 but most of those have been delayed unless someone would have filed um on time or probably by the end of May so those yellow highlights will probably most likely the bulk of those revenues will will be shifted down to October 2020 um Mr TR if you go to the other attachment in the um so just like I was talking about a delay in Revenue um July is also a month where we receive uh quite a
105bit of property taxes as well and that was delayed um to a deadline of I believe August um 22nd I believe um but this just shows um what we typically have seen in July uh property taxes uh so you can definitely see a drop from the last two years uh in revenues so again this goes back to my point of having um cash on hand so we can meet payroll keep the electricity on um and and survive a delay in revenue or even a drop in Revenue so while we may have a lot of um cash on hand for the everyday person uh we we especially need that in in times like this when our revenue is delay um any questions about the income tax report I have a question I hate to even because
106I'm not sure I'll know I'll understand the answer the the July property tax collections why was it so low in 2017 that's what I was about to ask to Mar thank you that I I believe there was uh a change and I may have even said this during the the levy campaign I believe there was a change in financial software that year I'm I'm not 100% sure um and so there's some delays in in payments and um not necessarily collections but the ability for the county to distribute the funds to to school districts um the the other explanation was um the county allowed for one payment and depending on when you asked for that payment uh depending on how much you got so right now we get a payment every week and in July in
1072017 we only um received one payment um and I believe that might be a reflection um in in change in operations but also I believe um a technology update prevented July payments in 17 good question thanks any other questions for um Mr Smith yeah really so Kyle really quick can you I know you said this but let's let's talk about it again so the fact that like the numbers are the revenue is decreased right now because the of the late people file their taxes later than they usually do but next year we have different concerns because of changes in current income like we're not even seeing the full picture yet is that right yeah so um one um sorry I'm going to pull up I'm just looking at something real quick did I jump ahead
108so um if we would go back to the um the income tax so I'm just going to talk in colors I guess so that that blue column the individual tax return right now that's solely based on calendar year 2019 returns that represents 36% of our Revenue in a calendar year so I think what you're getting to miss Mino is the concerns of calend year 2020 which is when covid is happening and how that that Revenue could be impacted so we won't see that impact really for that blue column until July of 2020 okay but I I will Pro so when I when I do some forecasting um in a couple months um with the October payment that green column I believe is going to tell me some information of payroll taxes um that'll give me
109a hint I think um of of where that that blue column and that red column could be but um individuals in that red and blue um have more wild or the the income fluctuates a little bit more um in in Bexley based on um the data that I've been seeing yeah thank you which isn't much but it's funny we all kind of say oh I can't wait for 2020 to be over but then I look at this and I'm like I I don't want to see 21 just yet yeah so we're um I think you heard me say we're we're fortunate fortunate enough to have a a cash balance to weather storms and um I believe I've even said this to one of you it's um we we don't have to um make our decisions
110harder um based on our financial s situation where I know if I was in another District um we might be making decisions based on financial reasons instead of what's best for students or staff um so that's um I think a great thing about Bexley is um we we can weather the storm financially but we may not know what that is going to look like or or how or how this falls out for another year actually well thank you for that thank you I I'm always so appreciative when I see that thank you for that um so the the monthly financials are just kind of a reflection it's it's just one month um into the fiscal year and the biggest story is kind of what I've already talked about is the uh reductions in um property
111tax and income tax um so everything else is um still fresh in the year so variances don't um worry me too much but the the revenue um the financial story in July is always uh the revenue and which I've covered so but happy to talk about anything else in the month report okay that's all I had sorry any other questions all right thank you um then moving on to the handbooks I think this will be Dr Williams do you have any hi do you have anything do you want to tell us about these we've had the opportunity to review these that are for second reading and approval I think you've received feedback from board members um do you have anything you want to tell us specifically about these uh not particular I think uh I
112just want to thank the ministrators because it's been a crazy summer um y trying to get these kind of details finished I appreciate all the work uh we have made significant changes um in formatting and language with our parent volunteer handbook to make it easier to understand you'll notice we went from four levels to two levels and I think uh the the people that provided me input and suggestions such Mary Davis uh Amy n people gave me some great advice and we put that put those changes into effect so um I'm presenting you the hand the handbooks for your approval great thank you any questions for Dr Williams all right I do actually Dr Williams I apologize um to be honest I just got a little buried leading up to this uh meeting with the
113all of the stuff around reopening um and I can send you um some of my notes um but I just noticed that there were some formatting issues between it looked like it was in the um middle or excuse me in the volunteer handbook um there were different fonts throughout so I'm guessing that you were going to catch that before you go to print um and most of my my feedback was more formatting issues between sections um to just make sure that you know we don't have like four or five different fonts um and then the only other thing that I was curious about I noticed that each one of the handbooks had a different logo and um I don't really care which logo we use but Dr Miller I don't know if this is something
114that they should is there a reason we're not using one specific one I identify with all of them they all say Bexley Lions to me like when I look at them I think Bexley but it just if it's an official handbook that we're sending out I'm just curious why we have different ones from elementary M say they're all brands that were approved um and I guess we left that up to the discretion of the principles to put on the cover of their handbook I never really had that thought or conversation till really I mean till now something we'll consider and I have no problem with changing it all of the those are just my you know little marketing quirks but you don't have to you don't have to follow my feedback on it I just
115was curious if there was um any note to it and then I'll send you I'll send you what what pages I noticed where there were like some formatting issues from like page to page where there might have been like like a huge gap white space um but then on the next page we we seem to SC squeeze everything onto one and um so I'll send it to you before you go to print please okay thank you I'll have that to you by tomorrow thank you all right um can I weigh in Marley really quick yeah I will say uh to respond to Alicia and for Dr Williams having like last year having different a student in every single different building sometimes like any any distinction from one to another is like sometimes like identifying like
116easy I mean like I don't realize that most people aren't going to have them printed out even though I I now have a printed copy but I do think sometimes like something distinguishing on the cover helps me tell one versus the other when I'm that's just my personal observation all right H having multiples and different levels I you know I didn't even think about that either Michelle like when I'm going to look to see wh which one like it might make sense to have them all different so all right any other thoughts on handbooks um I just want to say thank you very much I know you guys have been working hard on it and it's a lot of information um and especially in this in this environment so thank you very much for doing
117that um all right so moving on with return of advances um I think we all understand the bookkeeping around that does anybody have any questions for for Mr um Smith or or and then I guess also on the White Hall education agreement um I think we're all pretty familiar with that that would be Dr Miller probably if there's any questions about uh that all right so given that let's move on to this the renovation of the tennis courts um we had an opportunity to discuss this at our last meeting and I brought it up at a in my board reports um the desire of the administration to um refurbish and restore our our um our tennis courts which are in a poor state of repair at the moment um are there any questions for Dr
118Williams about this um resolution it's Victoria I don't have a question about it I just want to bring up again the comment that I made when we discussed this last time and and Marley you mentioned this but I just want to make sure that people understand that this expenditure that we would be approving would not be coming out of our operating funds um but instead would be coming out of our Improvement um funds our Capital Improvement funds and um those monies are sitting there for these kinds of purposes and can't be used in operations as I understand it so um I want to be sure that our community understands it as we are being cautious and putting money aside for PPE and things that we're going to need additional custodians and all the things that
119we anticipate we may need and after this discussion of our um uncertainty about our Revenue I want to make sure that people understand that we're not um spending our operating funds on this but that it's a it would be a decision to spend those funds that have been set aside for this kind of work that can't be used for other purposes yeah thank you very much for for highlighting that and we do have language in this resolution which specifically states that the funding will be coming from our permanent Improvement fund in addition to generous community members and our booster organization who is paying for more than half of it right thank you okay so going back sorry that we are now um at the point where we I would like to um entertain a motion
120to approve item 4H please so move thank you a second second all right so that would be all in favor in favor sorry all in favor of approving for H which are items for B through G please signify by saying I I I I any oppos same sign okay thank you that motion carries um so as I stated at the beginning of our meeting um we're going to take a short break it'll just be five minutes in order to um stretch our legs and and um take a break and we will be back within five minutes thank you this is the same problem as we have when we take live breaks we it's hard to get everybody back together oh there's tell me the cat's name again Trevor Trevor Trevor the Schoolboard cat we' we've
121all adopted him meanwhile I'm looking at Duke like don't say a word zip it it's the only way to keep Trevor quiet there's Mr Verno okay great so if we can start ahead with our item 5A uh with our report from our chief academic officer uh Miss Abraham okay great thank you um just a couple of items to update uh you with this evening first of all I want to thank uh a number of our staff from our instructional coaches to our Librarians to our Nationwide clinicians um our our school counselors and Lon Smith who have been providing PD and we continue to provide PD to our staff uh through this week and next and so we've had a number of Staff who volunteer their time to participate and this has allowed us to continue
122to support our teachers with the number of our district initiatives with everything from um diversity inclusion sessions as well as seal and just how to set up a learning space in a in a virtual environment so I'm thankful to our presenters and I'm very grateful to our staff who are taking advantage of these opportunities and preparation for the start of school our principles are similarly very busy right now within the last week we've really turned our attention to be uh to put final Det details on what will the distance learning experience look like for students and staff and we have a work session planned for tomorrow uh some of the outcomes of that day will be that we'll have a very clear communication plan that we look forward to sharing with our parents and staff
123about what the next couple of weeks will look like so that will be decided we'll also um put final details to what the week of August 17th will entail for our staff and the level of support and design that will take place so that they're prepared to welcome students uh on the 24th and then the other uh item that I would share this evening is that our elementary principles have identified two dates they're working with our new kindergarten families and they are hosting um a meet and greet for incoming kindergarten students so that's on August 6th then August 11th and uh this is a modified experience from what has been uh from last year but we'll offer that outside for families who are interested in um bringing their kids and being able to engage in
124a story outside it also gives our teachers time just to get to visually see and meet those kids so um that's just a little bit of the work I know you'll have additional questions as we get later into the evening um but lots of work happening and again I'm just very grateful for the number of Staff who have been volunteering their time to help us put plans in place for our upcoming school year thank you um so we are moving on now to our a director of student and Community engagement um Miss lean Smith there she is oh L we need you to unmute can you hear me yes we can okay my headphones weren't plugged in all the way sorry about that I did unmute okay um so this is our uh spring semester
1252020 bully incident reporting and as you know in compliance with orc the district is required to provide semiannual written summaries of reported bully incidents to the president of the board and to post the summaries on the district website um again I'll remind you that incidents may be reported in a variety of ways so we do have a link posted on our district website um and folks can also report directly to staff um to make sure that those incidents are captured from there principles investigate all reported incidents and determine if they are substantiated or unsubstantiated as defined in the Board of Education policy JF CF and then all of the results of Investigations are put into our power school system and so as you'll see these are the numbers for reported incidences for um spring semester
126um a couple of things that I would like to highlight these number numbers do reflect reflect the fact that of course we weren't in our school buildings for two and a half months so you'll probably notice that the numbers are lower um we did receive one report while we were um doing distance learning that did come through um and we've since received one report for summer from Summer back in June you'll also note that there are um a higher number of unsubstantiated reports specifically at the middle school and at the high school levels but again um I want to remind you that this does not mean that the investigation found that the incident didn't actually happen it just means that the incident did not meet the definition of bullying harassment and or hazing um according
127to our board policy and so what we have to report to you is whether not it met that definition um it does not account for incidents that happened um but did not meet the definition um the other thing I'd like to point out is that um as we're preparing to possibly start the year virtually um I've already started conversations with our Tech director about online and virtual booing and what we need to do to be um proactive in those cases um and so uh Mr pedit has updated me on some updates that Google has been working on over the um which is one of our main Platforms in order to enhance their security and control measures um to align better to what um Zoom offers which we also use for meetings at this current time
128um and we'll continue to look into those especially as we move more into the onetoone world to identify um better uses for students the other thing to keep in mind is that of course security and um structures can eliminate or capture the behavior that is reported um but we do have a digital Wellness effort that um has already been established and just needs to be reiterated and rolled out that had to pause because of covid and going to distance learning and we'll also be utilizing the talents of our new technology integration coach who has just started with us to help promote and integrate um with all of our stakeholders when we're able to do so so I just wanted to provide those updates that's the end of that report thank you unless there are any
129questions I do have a question but it may not necessarily be related to um lean needing to answer Dr Miller is probably more appropriate for you um as we're moving into this onetoone online policy or excuse me um learning situation because I don't have the policy in front of me but would we need to incorporate new language potentially as a board in our policy to accommodate you know addressing bullying and hazing from a a digital format we do have something in our policy already that accounts for online bullying umu go ahead yeah I think I think a if the question might be um whether or not that's something that the board felt like needed to be um expanded on because we do already account for right um online bullying so I thought we did I
130just wasn't sure if that's something that we should maybe consider reviewing even just have the policy Review Committee like look at it um we can do that we have a policy meeting on Monday so we could we could pull that policy and just take a look at that I do think it it still um applies within our current environment to take a review though is a good idea thank you and then um I'm sorry are there any other questions about the report you answered my question so thank you okay great thank you okay so I will move into my second report which is um an equity update for what the district um is currently working on and so I've chunked this out into sections so the first section I'll talk about is around curriculum um
131as you all already know we have a 5-year curriculum cycle and the English language arts curriculum work was started this past school year um and one of the things that has come out of that work is Hallmarks for our Ela curriculum one of those Hallmarks that I'd like to highlight is diverse text um around students engaging with a variety of materials and experiences representing diverse perspectives um I just want to call attention to this because even though um this is work happening in another committee it does um connect to the diversity equity and inclusion work that I have been leading and that the school climate has um been helping to lead across the district the other thing I'd like to note is that um our chief academic officer has been working with Harper's Corner um
132to secure um diverse literature for our elementary school libraries um and she worked um Miss Abraham worked with Rachel regler to identify what titles we already had and it was nice to know that we already had some of those diverse titles um and the plan is also to continue to partner with bmpa who will be submitting a grant to the bef to help to get additional books in our classroom um the next section is about um what's happening with our staff and so um as both Dr Miller and Miss Abraham have alluded to we have been doing a lot as a a leadership team over the summer and so during our administrative Retreat which happened in June um I facilitated a racism anti-racism um professional development for our full leadership team um this touched on
133White Privilege we talked about racism and the difference between um not being racist and being anti-racist um and I recommended a book to Dr Miller which we started reading so you want to talk about race and in the past we've we've done summer books so this is um nothing new and usually we come back in the fall to discuss that book the leadership team asked if we could meet weekly to have discussion so we've been meeting um every Thursday discussing a couple of chapters talking about how it impacts us personally and then moving that conversation into what needs to happen in our roles in the school district um Miss Abraham also alluded to professional development work that's been happening that our staff has been volunteering to participate in last month I worked with our instructional
134coaches um to make to collaborate and make sure that uh diversity equity and inclusion as well as social emotional learning was embedded in the professional development that they were already planning to um provide for our staff and that turned out to be a wonderful collaboration and partnership um for the August PD um based on feedback that we had gotten at the meeting that U Miss Mitchell referred to that myself um her Miss Powers and Dr Miller were at or with the Bexley anti-racism project um I put together a session specifically on microaggressions to start to start for some staff and to continue for other staff a conversation around what microaggressions are and how they really impact our students because like you Miss Mitchell I think that message was clear about what they've been experiencing and
135how that um has impacted their time as a student in Bexley City Schools um I believe we had we've had 112 staff sign up for at least one PD over the next two weeks and 56 of those staff members attended my session on microaggression so I think that speaks highly to the commitment of our staff to engage in this type of learning which was which was great um the other PD that will be upcoming will be led and co- facilitated by myself and our district wi School climate committee and that will happen during that week that Dr Miller has recommended staff to be in the building um and this PD will start our school year off around racism anti-racism and implicit bias um and we will continue professional development monthly with each building separately I've
136already um talked with with each building principal during the summer um and they have committed that time so that staff can continue in that learning the other work that is happening with staff of course has been around the um task force and I am overseeing the seal Wellness work group and I just wanted to highlight this because we have also talked a lot about equity and making sure that students have access where they need it and we've also talked about um how we're making sure to support our student social emotional Wellness um with everything that they're having to see especially our um black and brown students who are seeing racism play out firsthand um in social media on TV and the impact that that's having on them um let's see oh the other thing I
137wanted to highlight is that um as you know we've been working with Dr Hassan Jeff um at the Ohio State University and he came and did um professional development for each of our buildings last year um from that he reached back out to our district to see if we would be interested in participating in the global Arts and Humanities K through 12 summer Institute for teachers and he selected um I believe three school districts to participate so we have six staff members from our Middle School and High School the goal of this institute is to help improve St student learning outcomes particularly around the study of difficult subjects and the subject for um the summer teaching Institute is around American slavery um they're launching a cross-disciplinary Institute with a series of online sessions now the
138plan was of course for it to be in person when it um was thought up um and it will last for the next two years and it will culminate with a a three excuse me the next year it will culminate hopefully with a three-day in-person Workshop in the summer of 2021 I've also um already been in contact with Dr Dr Jeff um to be a part of our November professional development day so that we can continue the conversations that he's been leading Us in around race and racism um and then in terms of students um we talked about the initial meeting with the Bexley anti-racism project I was able to meet with four of their leaders again yesterday um to follow up on things we had talked about during our first meeting um and to
139talk about how we can better collaborate to help move this work forward I think to your point Miss Mitchell having that student voice is going to be extremely important um and it's important for our staff to hear not just what's happening out in the world but what's actually happening in our own District to our own students one of the things we talked about in our first meeting within which relates to my first report was around better ways to ensure that students know how to report bullying and harassment and and that they are comfortable engaging in those ways and so that bullying and harassment piece also relates to things that have to do with race and racism and so we started that conversation in our meeting yesterday and they had some ideas of ways that they
140thought they thought that students might have better access to make those reports um and then the last two things is have to do with networking and collaborations um there is a central Ohio Equity Network we have been meeting off and on for the last um several years so several um folks across central Ohio who are doing diversity and Equity work in other Central Ohio school districts and um I reconvened that group last month and so we're working to support each other and talk about best practices and ways that we can support our students and staff in each of our buildings also um the Ohio State University College of Education and human ecology has started what's known as the racial social justice work group and the point of this work group is to support the dni
141work Dei work that is happening in public school systems in central Ohio and Bexley is a part of that conversation and I'm representing us on that committee and then the last thing is that uh Miss Abraham and I have been talking about um Ane Equity task force and really been trying to be intentional about how do um what might that look like and who are the important stakeholders that we need to make sure are involved in that conversation the plan would be that we would have an opportunity to think critically about diversity equity and inclusion in our district um and again have that representation not only from our school district but from other entities in our community who we know are committed to work around um equity and diversity and so I have started reaching
142out to people um to see if they would like to be a part of that committee including students um and it's also something I talked with the bexi anti-racism project about yesterday um and I've already heard back from several people who are excited and have agreed to serve on the committee um including at least one of the students from the Bexley anti-racism project right so that will conclude My Equity update fantastic questions I have a quick question um Miss Miss Smith um you said you had 112 participants was that PD over the summer that you just did where you had 112 participants so um if you remember Miss Abraham referred to August PD that's happening over the next two weeks that's the PD I was referring to there are several sessions within the next two
143weeks um and what I was saying is that we've had um 112 staff who have selected to participate in various PD opportunities that we're offering and I just wanted to call out that we had um 54 staff members participate in the microaggression session that I led earlier this week um I am curious how much of the PD that you're doing um when staff comes back is that how much of it mandatory is all of it mandatory they just to pick what they no the the PD that is happening during the summer um so the PD that happened um last month with instructional coaches and the PD that is happening over the next two weeks is voluntary but the PD um that will happen during the week of August 17th is mandatory for staff to participate
144in and so will the PD that um the district school climate committee will help to lead monthly with each building that will also be mandatory for um staff so I was just curious how often I was curious how often that PD would happen so you just answered that question thank you yes and the other thing we're looking at doing um uh and and our school climate committee has talked about we talked about this last year we H we'll have that mandatory PD that happen during um the school time for staff so either in the morning for our secondary staff or after school for our Elementary staff but also maybe offering some opportunities to take some deeper Dives with staff that would happen after school and that would be voluntary but we would still have that
145monthly ongoing PD that would be mandatory great awesome I have other questions I'm Sorry Miss Powers thank you one um comment question anything um you talked about the bullying reporting and it was one of the issues that you discussed with um in the second meeting with the Bexley ARP group and it just occurs to me that um you may have already done this Miss Smith but if there you know is information that could flow from that into the policy discussion that I think is um we were just talking about would take place on Monday um information from bullying reporting and the microaggressions and all of the work that you've done on those issues whether that can inform the review of the policy um it would be helpful to get that information to the policy folks
146I I hadn't really um had a chance to think about that but I will say that just from conversations we've had um more of the issue seems to be on getting students to report I think once the reports are in there um you have to mark where the incident happened so it automatically goes to that building principle I also get the pleasure of getting a copy of every single report that is made as does I believe Dr Miller um our director of student services and Miss Abraham and so I read every report and one of the things we talked about with the Bexley anti-racism project um during yester yesterday's meeting was you know they had a concern that perhaps um a report would come through and the person looking at it wouldn't realize that maybe
147there were some racial undertones if it wasn't explicitly stated and so I do think that that's a good call out um and so I started thinking and doing some processing actually with Miss Abraham earlier today to think about how white how might we use our district wide School climate committee a little differently to also have them involved because that is a diverse group of staff that could also make those call outs I know that that's often what I have my antenna up on just automatically but so that that doesn't just fall on me we might expand what that looks on so I think we have some ideas to um look into that's great Smith that's a great point to to make um in fact because I had asked Dr Miller what substantiates um you know
148something as being considered bullying or harassment or Haz hazing according to the policy and I think it is critically important to always be focused on who the lens that that is receiving that information there's there's someone that's sending it and then there's someone that is receiving it and it is um which is part of the reason why I was asking how often PD is occurring um because that's that's that antenna has to happen in multiple front on multiple fronts not just on yours um right and I think um with the conversations that the leadership team has been having over the summer that um all of our antennas are starting to to raise one of the things we talked about specifically um with the book that we were reading there was a chapter on um I
149won't get the exact title right but it was something about like how do I know if it's about race and we had a really tough conversation about um incidents that have happened in our district in the past that perhaps um folks didn't initially think we're about race and now that we were involved in this convers could really do some reflecting on why that those incidents were about race so um I I can acknowledge that um me being the only one with the antenna up is a lot um and that the leadership team um is really working and has made a lot of growth in terms of having a different lens on things so I think we're making LIF yes I I'm acknowledging that other questions or concerns about the equity update okay um Marley I
150don't know if this would be the place that we would talk about that uh in particular because obviously the board has a lot more constraints um in terms of the work that we can do because of our um the legality around open meetings um and this particular work uh as Miss Smith has already alluded to is sometimes requires a deeper dive um is emotional to say the least and for for me personally sometimes can even feel traumatic so that is not a place mentally that I like would want to dive into in an open board meeting um and so I shared with Marley how how we will my concern is how the board will move forward because in order for us to make policy level authoritative decisions the entire board has to be collectively informed
151about the same things that say the staff is doing um and I think to your point Miss Mitchell if I can interject um the book that the leadership team is reading I've also recommended for a schoolwide book read like we did last year with what made Maddie run and I if I'm not mistaken I think Dr Miller is also going to be providing those books for the school board and we we have talked about um I I I just I I can't say enough how um indepth and enlightening the conversations with the leadership team have been and I have told Dr Miller that I would be more than willing to engage in those conversations with the board as you're reading through the book so I think that might be one of the ways to make
152sure that across the entire district from the board members to teachers to all of the staff in the building the leadership team that we all have at least that framework to refer to are you thinking about like I'm sorry go ahead Dr mil oh I just wanted to to say I have ordered that book for all of you it did come in so I need to get those to you um I've also H had a conversation with um a parent and one of the professors and researchers at Ohio State and I haven't even had a chance to share this with with Miss Abraham or Miss smth but one of the things of course we do is our parent Institute um and just as we ask our community to read what made Maddie run last year
153and really this is part of our be well this is part of being well is anti-ra being anti-racist Equity um that we might want to ask our entire Community um to read the book as well so the more that we have common learning the better but I do have the books for you um we'll continue to work on how we get this information out to parents as well because just like the mental health work that we did last year and contined to do this isn't about schools this is about societies and communities as a whole so so you're thinking that if we did a a book study we would do a community book study that would alleviate the the open meetings I I think I think the the board um Miss Snow and I were
154talking a little bit about how to have this conversation with the board um because as we said it it's it's difficult conversation it's good conversation but and I chew their their ears off individually all the time but but as we think about how we expand the work just as we just as we talked about mental we Health mental health and wellness is it's not just a school issue we have to expand and so we had a great model of how to bring a whole Community together around that so this may be another way through this book or other books um to to start conversations because so much of this as I've learned from Lon and from the work I've done with various people over the years is you have to first and foremost be able
155to understand what in yourself you know what are your own what are your own biases that you have that you don't maybe realize their biases um so there's a lot of personal work that has to happen as part of this and so um I want to thank Miss Smith for the work that she's been doing with us um over the LA I mean I can speak to the three years that I've been here um but but especially over the summer but I think we have a lot of opportunity um obviously the you know we're we're we're juggling a lot of really big big things right now but this is just as big as restarting school but I think as we get kids back to school we can then turn our attention to how do we
156engage our community as a l at large as well what's interesting is that i' had actually reached out to um Ben Ben Heckman the director of the Bexley Public Library last year about this book and about duplicating um what we did for what made Maddie run as a community read um and then all of these things happened and I thought we could bring the author in I don't know if we'll be able to do all of that but I definitely think that um now more than ever if we can all have um a Common Language and something to refer to it will help move our work along um that much more quicker yeah I think that's critically important especially when um as the Board needs to I mean we we as a district have never
157called out specifically um on record the difference between racism anti-racism in terms of our efforts we've often addressed implicit bias or we've talked about diversity and inclusion and all of those things are sometimes used as interchangeable words in this work and they are not um they they are Standalone um Concepts and issues that sort of um flow into that construct of you know a a a system and so uh I do think you know it'll be important for us to figure out how we can do that work um collectively as a group because I know we all at least have expressed that deep interest and I believe um a deep commitment to it the work that we've done all these years leading up to it obviously demonstrate that um but when you start diving it
158as you know just leading that work with staff that's that's a different process when you have to do it in an open board meeting yeah we had to we talk talked a lot about um the work you have to do with yourself as Dr Miller alluded to and then the work we also have to do in terms of um the system right and so we have to be able to talk about both um and one other thing I want to call out that we have discussed as a leadership team on multiple occasions over this summer is that it is not enough for us to just not be racist and that when we say that we are making a commitment to do work that is anti-racist that that actually requires us to have action behind that
159is not passive it is active um and that will mean that as we're making decisions um as a district we have to look at how that does that align with us saying that we are moving towards anti-racist practices and a lot of times we don't see the connection or the disconnection and so we have to get to a place where we can have those hard conversations that's absolutely right thank you just gave me goosebumps thank you good ones though okay um so Miss Smith as as we've been kind of alluding to here I think we have it and we have this under our under our board item 7B to discuss about discuss it as a board but since we have you right now um I think we're all committed to reading the book um but
160we do have this ISS as as Alicia has mentioned about having kind of the five of us discuss things um because if the five of us do anything it has to be in public right oh okay I I get what you're saying okay public work um or sorry open meetings act requires that so I would and I don't expect an answer now but I wonder if you could give it some thought of what you think the best way to go forward would be for us whether it's to maybe split us up into a group with maybe some other administrators if if that kind of work is going on or um in a larger group if we are able to do something like the be sleepy well SE um subject where we have the opportunity to
161have conversations like our leadership team has had um but we can't do that the five of us or is it do you think there's an opportunity for good work to be done with the five of us and the um and our governance team just like at a retreat at some point but um I don't know how how useful you think that will be um and so if you would just give that some thought and maybe we can next you know over the next couple weeks we can talk about what you think that might be I we would certainly welcome your guidance and um leadership and and however we do it um so I think like I said I think we're all dedicated to reading the book I just think reading is one thing and it's
162an important First Step but it's not again to your point about actions we need to get a little bit further than reading so if we get your recommendation on what that might look like for the board okay I'm ding down some notes okay thank you right you're welcome thank you all for your time oh thank you for your time um anybody else have any questions for Miss Smith okay then we are sorry I'm looking at Tyler's screen and I want to be looking at my own so that was 5B and we are now on our um special education resource handbook um Miss Abraham do you have something to tell us about this I can I can just jump in if that's okay oh is it are you there too Sam oh thank you even better
163not that you aren't great Jo unless still wanted to say something but I'm happy to jump in thank you Sam I appreciate it I would I would like to just say I appreciate uh Miss mcmaster's efforts to put this document together for her team and and for the district and so I know it's been something that she had interest in doing last year and so I appreciate that in the midst of the business of the summer that she's been able to put it together so um I'll let her tell you a little bit about her work and it's its purpose than um so essentially we've spent the last couple of months putting together this resource handbook that's designed for um for that purpose in general is for our staff to be able to have a
164resource to go to to look for um guidance in terms of compliance for procedures and protocols and how we do things districtwide so that we can continue with this consistency that we've developed across the district and have that documented the idea is is that this is available we keep this in a go Google Drive um that's available to our administrators and to our special education staff so that they can access it um myself and then Kathy rer who's our new um special education coordinator who started yesterday and hit the ground running um we will be updating this as new things happen and we find a need for um new information as it becomes relevant to special education and we'll be updating that on a regular basis but we wanted to make sure that the foundation
165was in place for the start of this school year and so spent some considerable amount of time reviewing um resource handbooks for other districts um getting some input and then putting together what we thought were the priority topics for our department to get the year started and then we will continue to use this as a resource as it's intended so if you have any questions I'm happy to try to answer those so is it not for um necessarily for public consumption like will it will it also live on the on the website for parents to look at it's intended to be a resource handbook for staff there is a section for parent resources that we may expand on and just publish that section in coordination with our parent Mentor so it's that section will continue
166to be under development um but we wanted to put some resources in place for staff to be able to share with um with parents but the handbook in general um is for use by staff thank you I would hope at some point in a in the future in a in a non-co world we could get to the point where we have something like this for our uh for our parents as well yeah Marley actually I was actually about to ask if if a a a companion document is being worked on to sort of Follow the because I think it's really important for staff to know what their Protocols are to follow but parents being empowered by knowing that the staff knows those Pro protocols because nothing's worse than sitting across from someone and you know
167more than they do and they're looking at you saying oh I didn't realize that and it was right there in a document so I just you know not saying about this issue I'm just saying I can share just a little bit about our thought process as we go into the school year we're working with Rachel Holland our parent mentor and we are already planning out for our special education PTO to put topics um of interest for parents related to the topics that are in the handbook so as we're talking about each section of the I we will do some training with parents and make that available to them the goal is then that that would create a resource for parents in terms of what are the pro processes and procedures that we're using as a
168district it's very special education is very over overwhelming for anyone um so to hand a parent a resource handbook that has all of this information it would be very challenging so our goal is as we go through the year and provide that in little increments to families that we would have a parent resource document at the end of the school year does special education produce a newsletter um that goes out to spe I don't I think you we started that in the spring our parent Mentor sends out a newsletter every quarter and we that's I thought I saw one okay it's very helpful the discussion and the Q&A on this and your presentation Mrs M McMasters I'm sorry um because when I reviewed the handbook I didn't really appreciate the difference and now you're making
169great sense to me of how you're managing those two different pieces so that's very helpful thank you it's a great thing to have thank you thank you um Okay so we're approving that as a first reading tonight um and I assume um is Masters or Dr mow that'll come back as a second reading next next month yes consistent with what we've done with the other handbooks we put it out there for this month and then um I think there were a couple pieces we were going to add I think to all of our handbooks regarding how covid may make some things a little different but um there I think there might have been a few minor edits to make on this but there'll be a second read September okay great thank you very much okay
170can I have a motion to approve item um 5c then so mooved second thank you um all in favor signify by saying I I I any oppose same sign thank you that motion carries all right all right so we are now moving to our public participation section of our of our evening um and this is a little different um for us um we've done this one other time with um on Zoom where we're having people uh call in their own comments which we prefer so I will turn it over to Mr Trill who should have the information of those who are um who have requested to join the meeting sure I'm going to stop sharing my screen for just a moment this will allow me to go through the participants a little more easier uh
171we do have three uh people that have submitted public comments the very first one would be Rachel Lang so I know last time we uh invited them to become uh participant uh in the meeting tonight I'm just going to click allow to talk we're going to try this out to see if that'll work out so Rachel I see that you're in here if you could just click uh raise your hand to signify that you would still like to uh speak that'd be [Music] helpful all right okay uh Rachel's in here now so uh can you hear me I'm having some connection problems I can hear you can you hear meel Marley right before can you hear me I'm I'm having some connection trouble I'm moving I'm out I was at a baseball trial I apologize
172not personally no do we need to read do we need to read our public comment statement before we start we do I would like to do that if Miss um thank you um one sec miss m now Tyler just took it off um I think I have it here too hold on one second always a challenge okay thank you okay so um public participation conducted tonight um will be within the similar parameters uh that we have had in the in the past um you ask to limit your comments to five minutes or about um a thousand words and although under state law the board of education is not required to offer public comment um during our regular board meetings we do welcome the opportunity to hear from our community members so as such we encourage
173your participation within those parameters um and we just know that public comment is just that it's the public The public's opportunity to be heard it is not a Q&A session with the board so while we look forward to hearing your comments per our board policy we will not respond to public comment in a meeting or as individual board members but you can be assured that we are actively listening and taking notes for future reference and review thank you if I'm up first and I can be heard I think I hit a good connection point is that can I be heard yes thank you wonderful um so I was just commenting to say thank you to the back to school team Dr Miller and the Board of Education and I um see the task before you
174as finding the best solutions for Bexley families and staff in a very imperfect situation and to balance a laundry list of important and conflicting interests and I think you guys are doing that so my husband and I and our four kids definitely wanted to be back in session five days a week so we were rooting for for that level one level two um and we were I was a little grumbly about it when I saw we were level three but still going fully distance but then I made myself read all of the recent superintendent district updates and the FAQs and the Franklin County Public Health document that was distributed and the back to school draft plan and I got it and I think it makes sense and um and I think it's balanced and and
175honestly even though it's not like best for my work schedule I think it's best for the kids so I do cringe and winse when I Envision trying to work full-time in my position I still have to report to court um and to simultaneously help our four back SLE students learn from home but I actually feel good about it and after listening to this meeting I feel better about it it seems really thoughtful and um and of course I'm hoping for that four weeks of declining numbers that we can get those kids back in school but I just I'm just saying good job that's it thank you very much we appreciate your input okay our next comment uh was submitted by Doug endle I searched uh that specific name is not in the chat right now
176but we do have two Dougs that are in attendance so if uh Doug endle you're in here and would like to speak please uh raise your hand so I can allow you to talk all right [Music] all right Doug you are uh the floor is yours awesome thank you can everyone hear me as well yes great um again I um second those comments I appreciate the uh I'm sure a number of I still feel uh pretty disappointed with the recommendations that this point um I feel like the um to uh the contradictions of allowing groups of students uh of up to nine to meet in the school um even though it's not with a teacher the contradictions of um allowing students to uh with with certain educational restrictions to to still be in the class
177um and expect the kids at home to continue to get uh the same level of Education I just don't see um how those are going to mesh and and realistically be fair to all of the students um I guess as you develop plans moving forward um I would like to see um some ideas around what uh is deemed safe for returning um besides just what the public or the Frank frin County Public Health Department recommends are there being measures in place to um as far as independent to our ZIP code um are those uh options available to um I guess return even if the we don't reach the exact level that the Franklin um County Public Health Department deems necessary um so I feel like I have a lot more questions than um comments at
178this point but um those are just a couple of the um I guess comments about turning that I feel are very contradictory thank you do you have anything else that you'd like to say all right thank you that's all I have okay good I'm trying to keep things on timers okay good um thank you Mr Troll and then our last public comment that was submitted is from Kate misar if you believe she's here so hi Kate I'm sorry what's the name uh Kate H Katherine Mazar Mazar uh hi my name is Katherine Mazar and I'm currently a doctoral candidate at the Ohio State University with a MERS in Reading education from Vanderbilt University Peabody College I've taught middle school for three years in both Urban and private environment and I've taught pre-service teachers at the
179Ohio State University for the last three years and supported their field experiences my research focuses on secondary science Urban classroom teachers um and how they can make their lessons more inclusive and Equitable while using scientific argumentation to support student academic achievement I speak today as a member of the Bexley diversity equity and inclusion Grassroots organization and chair of the educational institution subcommittee of that organization ganization I am also collaborating with the Bexley minority parent Alliance and the Bexley anti-racism project I am disappointed with the Bexley Board of Education and Bexley City Schools response to the racial and homophobic harassment perpetrated by students calling themselves the George Floyd Brotherhood at Bexley high school and Columbus Academy on July 20th 2020 the Board of Education received a letter signed by more than 200 members of the community
180asking that the boys be held accountable for their actions and we have yet to see any actions taken this letter cites the Bexley City school policy that the schools can address incidents that occur outside of schools if those incidents adversely affect the educational process harassment racism and the kinds of attacks perpetrated by the George Floyd Brotherhood can most certainly affect the um the kinds um affect the emotional the educational process of the victims being being harassed and attacked by your peers no matter where it occurs has a detrimental effect on one's ability to learn effectively and the action of these boys has made local newspapers and placed the spotlight on our district um to address their behavior I would like to remind the Board of Education that federal civil rights oblige you to handle this
181situation appropriately if this cyber bullying and discriminatory harassment is not handled appropriately by the superintendent of Bexley City School then this has the potential to be escalated along the legal ladder uh to the Ohio Department of Education and the United States Department of Education Office of civil rights I think it is imperative that Bexley City Schools inform the public on their policy regarding discrimination and harassment and targeting any population the public has yet to be informed of the disciplinary policy and incident report process or how the victims will be supported by the schools and kept safe from further attacks Additionally the board of education's statement on racism on June 24th 2020 is not enough we need funds and action behind your words it is clear from the action of these boys that the current environment
182they felt it was acceptable to conduct this kind of behavior on July 21st 2020 the Bexley anti-racism project submitted their letter to the school district leaders and members of the school board with examples and act and of action Bexley City Schools could take to address institutional racism and to create a more inclusive and Equitable environment I wholeheartedly support the changes that they called for in their open letter these recommendations are made based on current and previous educational research on diversity and Equity that is conducted Nationwide and around the world and if this school district wishes to be an anti-racist School District as they stated on July 25th in their Twitter then it is imperative that they make these changes and continue to support minority students Bexley teachers need ongoing professional development not just one workshop
183and I don't know if monthly is going to be enough I've been listening to this meeting professional learning communities around diverse books grade appropriate diverse books for their classrooms and Library more than just Elementary School our middle school students and our high school students need this as well teachers also need lesson plans which will support their ability to diversify their educational materials while not traumatizing or exceptional students of color teachers need to feel comfortable leading conversations with their students about race and having those discussions often enough in all content areas and grade levels in order to change the current climate and culture in Bexley City Schools the achievement Gap needs to be closed by several means including but not limited to supporting minority and marginalized students in honors and AP classes minority students deserve to
184have a safe place in school where they don't have to be an activist where they are not being tokenized students deserve to to focus on their academics and have a safe place to to relate with one another with our close proximity to The kirwan Institute at the Ohio State University there is no reason why students should be victimized by their brace and their background Bexley City Schools is one of the top school districts in the state of Ohio and the nation there is no reason why Bexley City schools has not addressed these problems until now and continues to not fund or take action to change the culture in a more inclusive and Equitable environment while I understand that the schools are facing a large budget cut this needs Financial Resources now Bexley City School says
185that they will engage equip and Empower each student for Success today and tomorrow what does this mean if the school refuses to talk about race does not have adequate policies addressing harassment and discrimination and has yet to make a public statement about the behavior of these boys and how the district will be addressing it and when the district has an achievement Gap at this moment the students parents recent alumni and members of the community are focusing on their not on their careers in academics in the midst of this pandemic but rather on rectifying the institutional racism which exists in their community schools because the district hasn't taken action or devoted funds necessary to make institutional and cultural change thank you for your time and consideration thank you so that concludes uh Mr trell I believe
186our public participation section of our meeting yes thank you very much for your assistance with that so moving on in our agenda we have two quick um board well one quick board item I think to address under 7A and that's our Communications we made a a commitment to one another to keep this item on our agenda every month because we um have stated that we think it's important that we work on our Communications um um plans and um and work so that our community is is continues to be informed um about what we do um we had conversations about it last um meeting about inperson coffees whether we could do that um just virtual or otherwise um in addition to social media um and and how we might be able to um communicate on social
187media I um understand that it has been an excessively um busy month for for all of us um and so if anybody has anything to offer for the good of the order around this I would be eager to hear it um I can say that I have I have uh the only thing that I was able to do I reached out to henis communication group to try and talk about um getting a crisis um um management kind of session for our Retreat and I have not heard back from them um and I think this this might be you know something that is better suited in a lot of ways for a retreat but um if that's the case we need to find a retreat date to get on um and and that's something I wanted
188to to discuss in this section as well so um I guess I'd like to hear from other board members if you have thoughts around communication and also um when you think we might be able to meet for uh board retreat umk one of the things what you just said I think is important this is a good Retreat subject for us um obviously we have a lot a lot of other things going on and we'll still have going on but one of the things that I thought about is um I I was going through some of my old materials and some of the things that I think were a couple of years ago maybe it was actually 2017 about uh board Communications and and one of the things that we talked about last meeting is is
189social media um and and from a legal aspect let alone kind of a practical aspect of getting our communication out um I'm glad that you reached out I I do have a couple of names of of previous previous um not mediators um facilitators for this kind of a discussion in regard to looking at the legal aspect of what what I talked about before but also figuring out a way that as as a board um that we take charge of it and say Here's how we can do it within a legal thing it's it I I'm I'm just picturing it as it can't be anything real extensive or not a big discussion but just like um like I looking into other districts and return to school and some of the things that they put out it's
190it's a lot of the district is putting stuff on their web page but some of the a couple of school boards around the state of Ohio see that they they like have a something that's actually posted on the website too of of just like a bullet point thing the difficulty get again becomes what we've always talked about is how do we discuss it how do we know what we want to put in it um and it goes beyond just the five of us um how we work together but in the future how that would look for future boards um that you know that maybe there wasn't um the the ability to work together that I think that we have um I I think it's it's a complicated issue and it helps to get maybe an
191outside voice outside of the five of us um so that's kind of my thought on it I think a retreat is a great idea um and a couple of of people maybe coming in and helping us wait through that or a facilitator to help us wait through it would kind of be my idea Marley I would say um just in in my research that I did um on the various uh Central Ohio school boards and then also did some research um Nationwide just to see what sort of information got pushed out I think to John's point it would be helpful for us to um one prioritize it as a a retreat topic so that we can uh fully dive into it and and really look at the various uh examples um I think we all
192attempt in in our own way to try to get information out to our individual networks and um no good deed ever goes unpunished because it almost always blows up and goes sideways without um that's all I'm gonna say about that so I I think you know we tend to take care of a a myate topics in our Retreat and it might be helpful for us to narrow our Retreat topics down to like our top three PRI priorities for the remainder of this year in and communication obviously needs to be one of those um and then we maybe choose so that we do have the time to bring in a facilitator look at the legal implications of whatever we decide to do because to the other point um that Mr uh barno just made whatever we
193decide has to one be sustainable for whoever fills these seats ongoing and if we set a standard that is not attainable or we set a standard that is not sustainable that that's not fair to um the community because they'll grow to expect a certain standard in the next two to four years of the sitting board um and that may not always be something that we can continue so I I'd advocate for us to move it to a retreat that it needs to be a priority discussion along with whatever other um items that we have prioritized um but keep that Retreat to those few topics instead of what we typically do which is go over you know a lot of a l larger list so that's what I have yeah thank you um I'll just jump
194in really quick I don't have a lot to say um I think my opinion I don't want to say my opinion on communication has changed but certainly um we're looking at it from a different perspective than we were even like two months ago we have had a lot of communication back and forth like I feel like the I hopefully the community feels like they have been heard we I couldn't even count how many emails we have received and responded to so I feel like I can I have a I have a I have a spreadsheet of them into the hundreds just so you know right so do you know what I mean so I think I like to think that people are reaching out via email because they're hearing more the information's getting out and
195they're coming back to Give opinions or to um share information or ask questions so like I said I'm not saying that I don't think communication is important I just think I have a different I'm looking at it from a slightly different perspective than I was even a month ago because the communication has been different so I guess that's my that's where I feel like my starting point is is what how we've had this we've had a a pretty communicative summer really when you think about it not just even the last month and how that that to stand back and like reflect and say how I mean like I know I feel very informed about what people think I'm not sure how they the community feels about the information we're putting out so I guess that's
196where I feel like that's that's my question or that's our start starting point is now that we have had um a lot of communication going do we do we feel like it was effective what can we do how do we how do we change how do we take what what we're doing and make it um add to it so I guess that's my my thoughts are um in keeping with what Michelle just said I believe that what's missing in our communication now is face- tof face um discussion uh as oppos and I think I totally agree with um the concept that we've had a lot of communication over the last several months um and largely we have relied on the district which gets out information and then we hear about it through emails from our
197community it's been ex extremely helpful but um what I will advocate for going forward which is what I've advocated for since the first time we had this discussion in January is um in person and before we can do that some other kind of face-to-face uh communication where we can actually have a discussion instead of it just being in right um and I've never been super hopeful about um uh social media for this um that has a place but I think what's missing for us right now is the uh inperson whether it's you know on a video or um live uh person things that we talked about in pastimes that's what you're referring to yes okay Victoria I think that's a good point because I I think um Marley I didn't realize you kept a spreadsheet
198that's probably a great idea um but you know we get an instrum manable amount of uh communication that comes back to us that's very very helpful and helps us sort of process the information as well in terms of like what the community uh temperature is if you will but we also sometimes get not sometimes we often get emails that are vitriolic um combative accusative St um and a lot of times it's because there's a level of frustration um a desire to be heard um and to Victoria's point I what I have found is when we have the opportunity to face to face sometimes that tension goes from here to here and then when an opportunity to provide exchange and perspective that brings that down even more um so you know I I think it's it's
199not a bad idea to um put this idea of doing some sort of face-to-face engagement um back into our our our sphere of how how's that going to work what's required by law if anything um because again I I I think ultimately by the time someone gets behind a key board and they are gassed up you know if they had an opportunity to reach you otherwise and just have a conversation um would would that help and you know sometimes people don't necessarily they still don't agree like you can have an agree to disagree moment um and that does often happen and that and then sometimes you do have that moment of okay we aren't necessarily on two different sides of this issue or even even if we aren't I now have more perspective than I
200had before um so let's say so let's say this since since we are getting late in the evening and we haven't even discussed our most important thing as a board um um on 7A let's um commit internally to getting a date on that we can have a border treat um and I actually would like to put 7B in that same category um to me you know we were talking about having a a kind of more focused Retreat those are the two things I think that are really hanging there for the two for us um so let's think about um and really because we had the opportunity to talk um with Miss Smith earlier in the meeting about our anti-racism racism Equity um approaches and knowing that we'll be getting the book and reading them I'd
201really like to hear what her response is to that before we go too deep into this um I like to defer to the experts on that so why don't um why don't we put those on and I will send out um I'll send out a calendar you know request to try and see if we can get a a date on for a retreat um okay so that moves us on to our resolution to approve our back to school plan which is hot ticket item such as it is tonight um and I think um what I'd like to do is I know that you know it's important to have conversation around this and um have PE have our have our um board be heard by our community so I just want to start by um acknowledging
202the near impossible nature of this task so I spoke at the beginning of all of this the need for Grace as we navigate these Waters and it's um even more so true now so um I feel like if you believe that you know exactly what we should do I submit to you that you probably have not spoken enough people who believe differently than you we have over 24 student 2400 students in our district and 13,000 citizens and Beckle from those families we received hundreds of heartbreakingly impass pleas that were are well supported by medical evidence on both sides um so we have to acknowledge also that the that the science around this virus is not well settled uh the best we can do is make educated assumptions based on what we know thus far so
203simply put we're performing a precarious balancing act on the one side we can weigh the benefits of a return to building our buildings that would provide mental health benefits arguably stronger teaching and thorough and learning through in-person teaching human connection with caring uh Educators and child care concerns being better addressed those benefits must be weighed however against the very real concern about spreading the virus fears are returning to our building and subjecting our students and our staff to the health risks both known and unknown of covid-19 we also need to acknowledge that we're a small district and although we are well supported by our community our resources are not Limitless we employ about 190 amazingly talented teachers nearly 30 of those have asked for information about leave for valid reasons due to covid so we
204also have to balance how we keep our staff safe and engaged I want to be really clear about something that I feel strongly about there are no special interest groups in this community in my mind if this virus has made one thing very obvious to me it's that we are all in this together and we have to share the burden and the hopes of it together we all need to accept this reality that we have a razor thin balancing act with very few good answers so given that as your elected officials we're here tonight to give our very best efforts in adopting a plan that will make that will take us forward educating our youth in the best way possible given this pandemic um and finally I just want to say everything we hear indicates
205that the more people who wear masks the closer we're going to be in getting back to school safely that's how we're going to control our community spread so please do your part and wear your masks and that's what I have to say is a lead into all of this um I've done a lot obviously spent a lot of time in research around all this I feel very um confident about uh the superintendent's plan but I'd like to hear from other board members who wants to start I'm happy to start thank you I want to say that um I would Echo what Marley just said about Grace the process we've gone through to um weigh and balance the various needs of the school Community during the Corona virus pandemic has led us to coming together tonight
206to um make a decision about what's best for our reopening plan we're balancing where we're going with the desire to get back to something more normal but the issue before us tonight um is which plan to start with for the school year I don't believe there's any doubt that the best learning situation for our students is an in-person learning situation in our classrooms in our buildings with their teachers and the other supports that are provided there this is supported by the data that we've all become very familiar with the American Academy of Pediatrics the CDC other National organizations have provided us with guidance on the health and well-being of our children and we all want to get back into the schools it's also however clear that all of these sources provides us with guidance that
207when we make these decisions about whether to reopen the schools in person we have to look at what uh is going on in our own location we are um advised to work with our local health department and be in close communication with the state as well as the local public health authorities our local health department has issued its recommendations that the schools start in distance learning model it's not a mandate it's not an order but it is the recommendation and Dr Miller has made it clear that she's working closely with those folks and um believes that it's important for us to follow follow their recommendations while we've done a great job in Bexley wearing masks and following guidelines we do need to continue to keep those numbers low we've been successful so far and I'm
208really grateful for it but I don't feel comfortable putting myself in the role of an epidemiologist or a doctor um and second guessing the public health officials who are making the recommendations I believe that those public health profession care about us and our children and are making recommendations as they have told us based on all of the data and what they see at the national level at the local level and through talking to our state representatives as well I'm really encouraged by the number Trends I believe that all of our local school districts will participate and if they do in an effort to help bring down the occurrence of covid in our community we will be able to return to school at least in a high hybrid model as soon as the September 18th decision
209date and then perhaps as soon as September 24th um for the transition in that Dr Miller has outlined tonight I support the proposed plan of starting with distance learning and I'm in favor of taking a longer View and holding classes in distance learning to to begin with the district has committed to getting a commu a computer device to each student who will need one for distance learning as at the beginning of the school year this is a little different from the on to one we've heard this evening and previously about how we don't have all of our devices in we do have a number of them that we purchased in the past including through the generosity of the bef when we do get to one: one that's going to be a transformative difference for our
210students in the meantime what we are committing to is getting devices out as needed along with hotspots um to provide for the Wi-Fi access access that we need I know that work is being done to prepare for providing in-person tailored opportunities for targeted instruction Sam mcms has talked to us about that and reported on that in our last meeting is going back into the classrooms later and not at the very beginning of the school year a perfect solution I would say that it is absolutely not a perfect solution is it what we need to do right now with the hopes of moving to in person learning on a more permanent basis that is what I believe while all of the school board members may not agree and this is you know in keeping with our
211most what we were just discussing I want to say that I respect the different voices of our school board members as they may come out this evening and I respect the different voices in our community it's a challenging question there is not going to be one right answer there are going to be differing opinions as Marley said we are in this together our community will not all agree but no matter what I believe that we will and can come together as a community to make this work and to go forward together our children are learning from us as we show them how to make um a decision based on different perspectives different points of view come together and move forward and I'm very pleased to be part of the group that is doing that in
212support of making an very important decision about what we do this year I'm hopeful that we can be in the classroom soon I support starting in the distance learning thank you thank you Miss Mitchell um Mr bar did were there I think Michelle had mentioned that she had some other questions for Dr Miller I just had a couple follow-up questions um that I didn't want to get into too much in the initial presentation sure is that appropriate to do that's fine okay um Dr Miller I just had I actually had a couple of questions that um I was wondering about with after our discussion on Thursday with with Mr Maola um and I know I asked them a lot of questions I guess a couple of things that I and I mentioned this in the
213in in the initial the um and when you talked about it initially um when we're talking about a return to school on octo I'm sorry August 24th um what is the what what things do you see as a drawback for maybe even moving back to August 31st or maybe even September 2nd or September 8th are those are those things that we've considered to give us an additional time not only for to look at further Trends because I think as Victoria correctly pointed out I think even if we're in school sometime that's probably a better model and certainly Allin is the best but giving us that additional time not only to see these Trends continue because even according to the data that I pulled up today that I shared with each of you uh at least
214according to Ohio Department of Health some preliminary figures show show a a decline um Franklin County Public Health hasn't updated since July 31st um but not only that additional time to see those Trends but also some additional time for our teachers to to to train a little bit if we're talking about a transition that that you mentioned earlier so I guess what I'm looking at is is moving back the the calendar um a week 10 days or even a couple of weeks to September 8th to give us additional time for not only to look at the trends further but also um for additional training for our teachers while we're trying to figure out how to go back to school so if if you could kind of give me some insight into that um I'd appreciate
215it sure so we we have looked at all of that we've looked at moving the start back to the 31st we looked at moving the start back to after Labor Day and um to give teachers more time we only have our teachers under contract for 186 days so if our teachers begin on the 17th but we push back our student days we are effectively losing student instructional days because the 186 St contract for our teachers doesn't change now if we had our teachers start later um I don't know that that answers the that doesn't really address the issue of giving teachers more time to plan or or giving them more time you know under contract to do this work um I want to acknowledge quite a few of our teachers have put a lot of
216time into this over the summer um because it's important because they are dedicated to our students and and to their um profession and and to doing what is right for again our students but I we've already reduced student Days by um five because of we when we decided to have three additional you know prior to covid we decided we would have three professional development days before school started and now we've extended extended that to two more so um we've already reduce student days and if we push back the start then we reduce student days and when you consider that we're com coming off of uh the fourth quarter of 201920 knowing we have gaps that we need to address we've talked about achievement gaps we've been talking about those um those gaps for some of
217our student groups um for the past few years um knowing that that is a priority to start to close and reduce those gaps less student instructional time doesn't help us to get there we can do that but um if the team teachers begin on the 17th we're just losing student time I also think that there's we've talked about the importance of students getting back to routines getting back into learning getting back into structures um and the longer we push that with the just uh the more difficult that can be so um just earlier today Miss Abraham uh told me that she talk to the building principles about can we be ready and they feel confident that we can um will it be perfect no but we will we will keep working to improve but um
218we're weighing a lot of different angles here how many student days closing learning gaps that that were created last year and that have been created over time um getting kids back into routines and structures so um for those reasons we felt that the recommendation to begin on the 24th was the right one so the U the task uh the task force which um and and as you know Dr Miller these aren't questions questioning the ability of of you or the taskforce or anything it's just questions that I that I before I can make my decision that I I have a lot of questions about so I guess from the task force standpoint when they when the task force was looking at the different return to school models um the task force and and I know
219that you and and Miss Abraham just we went through a lot of this on Thursday but the a lot of these return to school plans have been kind of put in the structure but the details it appears or it sounds like that we've already start kind of started pointing toward distance learning at least to start with is is that a fair assessment since G since receiving the written guidance from Franklin County Public Health yes we did start um zeroing in to more of a distance learning start um I will say when we we were thinking that we were going to be able to start in a hybrid those first two weeks beginning the week at the 24th were transition dates those were transition weeks to transition students in now it's looking like we'll be transitioning
220to hybrid learning down in the future so you still have transition time so again the the if you if you lose student days you just really never get those back um and and I I will tell you from the you know the the many years that I was in the classroom teaching even one lost student day uh made me nervous as a as a teacher and so um we we we buil in transition time at the beginning of the year thinking we would start hybrid now we're just shifting that it'll probably happen later but we'll still need transition time and so another question that I have um and I brought this up a lot um on Thursday the the accountability for teachers because from the plan that that set forth and then the recommendation is
221that they will be there the first week and then they won't even in distance learning if that is what the board approves tonight there's no requirement for them to be in school so I guess and maybe this is for um U for you or for someone on your team maybe um Miss Abraham on how we are going to account for if some if I I'm not being critical of of all teachers but we all know of how some things can go sideways for some teachers how we're going to have that accountability to where if there's a teacher that is not doing what they're required to be doing how that accountability is going to take place with them out of the building so again um my recommendation at this point was that um after that first
222week when when staff are able to perform their duties from a distance that we permit them to do that but that when we need to have specialized services for different students whether intervention or therapies or or part of a a plan um that can't be delivered from a distance those staff would come in in order to do that those those was those would be very small groups um those would be students working directly with um either teacher or or maybe one of our instructional assistants depending on who's the most appropriate person but um so teachers would be coming in when we need to do that or when we have um particular work that we need to do as a group that we need people to be in person um but but in terms then of
223of I'm I am going to let Miss Abraham jump in here a little bit um earlier today um Miss Mitchell had had sent or actually late last night sent some questions regarding this and I did reply to all but it would be good maybe to review those with every Everybody the ways that we're looking at accountability first and foremost we've already said we're going to be following um as closely as possible the regular student days and the staff would have their regular staff day so you know our teachers uh at elementary their their staff day is basically 8 to 3 and at the secondary level it's approximately 7:30 to 3:30 so that is the expectation in the spring we were looking at a couple of hours of online but we're really looking at full days
224of learning and instruction so let me let um Miss Abraham talk a little bit more about some of the other components of accountability yeah and I think where I would start is as I've worked with principles one of the things that we've done is we've taken a look back at fourth quarter to figure out what were challenges what didn't work the way that we had hoped it had worked where did we get feedback and and one of the things we reflected on is because we were thrust into the fourth quarter in this very unknown territory we didn't have the technology that we needed that we we allowed a lot of flexibility in what that day would look like so for example it might be you know instruction can happen between 900 and 11:30 or there
225might be office hours and so as we look ahead to that accountability and starting a first quarter and a a brand new year principles have worked really hard with teacher teams to develop a very defined structure so as Dr Miller said knowing that our six through 12 students will follow their schedule and that's the reason that we made it a priority to make sure that they would all have access to a device to ensure that that happens that that was a first step um other things um the you know the requirement for our teachers to take attendance by period with our students to ensure that they are online that's something that our our principles are prepared to be checking to make sure that that's happening because we're developing common structures in canvas so the way
226that teachers set up their work for kids to work through or in Google Classroom that allows our principles to also have common look fors and they've said to me we're going to be checking our Google classroom and canvas Pages weekly to see the student experience that is happening and to ensure that it's following the look for is that have been really established as commitments that teachers feel um would would be evidence of a good flow of instruction and work um we also talked about looking at our students who maybe had difficulty engaging in the fourth quarter and so I was even in conversations today where they were talking about uh purposefully transitioning kids across levels for maybe students who were in fifth grade who had a hard time being engaged so that when they went
227into Middle School Mr coddle is prepared with his teachers to be um following those students for the first two weeks to monitor their level of Engagement and to work with teachers to develop specific plans for kids who might be having difficulty engaging the same thing for students who've transitioned from 8th last year up to 9th those conversations with Mrs Robbins and uh Mr McMillan to ensure that again teachers have eyes on kids that were meaningfully transitioning them and that we're engaging in plans from the beginning are developing this for students if we see that they're not engaged enging between plans attendance a specific structure um within the learning platform within the flow of the day we feel like we've put more specific um supports in place that will allow teachers to know exactly what they
228need to be doing and for students to have predictability and families to have predictability as well thank you and and I again um Miss Abraham and Dr Miller you uh I highly appreciate and and value your opinions and your work and your abilities um I I guess maybe just a a a Flatout question is why can't the teachers be in the building when if if they're if we're doing distance learning I I'm not I'm not quite understanding why that is they can be in the building during distance learning and as we've said there would be times when they would certainly have to um I just didn't make that recommendation again my thinking being that um if they can do on the days they can do the work from home that that's fine um also we
229we talked about our partnership with Bexley Rec and they're trying to work out some Child Care opportunities and so they used our buildings during the summer um we can certainly have them use common spaces like our gymnasiums with dividers to do Child Care um but but we had talked about using some of our classrooms for child care but that doesn't have to be the teachers can be in the building that's just not that was just not um as we discussed it as a leadership team we didn't feel that that was something we needed to require um we we know that we are expecting a different level of of instruction um this year and it's going to take an entire school day to do it and um that's our expectation I would say um I if
230parents see or or have a concern we would want them to let the child um either talk with the teacher right away first and foremost um or make sure that you're reaching out to your child's principal because we we don't want to find out that a week later or two weeks later there there's been a concern um the one thing about distance is we need to we need to uh communicate very very rapidly and and to let us know if there is a concern so that we can make sure we have the supports in place necessary for the the teacher but the short answer to your question is the teachers could come in every day that that is what they're contracted to do that's just not something that as a leadership team we felt we
231needed to require but but we've been clear we will need teachers to come in at times we will need staff to be in and and that can't really be an option that that's what we can't meet the needs of all students and talk about these small groups if we don't have that right and and I guess that's that's kind of you hit what I'm what I was getting at and what you talked about the the great plans that both you and Miss Abraham talking about of all the plans and the planning and the and the assignments and attendance and having kids having to come in it just it seems to me um and again I know that when we're looking at this as a school board we're looking at educational decisions we're looking at medical
232decisions but honestly um I think a of what we're talking about a return to school is a community decision that we've talked about before uh you and I Dr Miller about like when we did the busing thing there are certain things that that as a school board we're tasked to do and I think even I think the CDC um and even the Franklin County Public Health their the recent clarification of their statement it is it's just simply a recommendation and it's up to the local communities to the governing boards which is the school board to make those decisions and then of course the CDC talking about making decisions uh taking into account the community level of transmission so I I guess from a standpoint and and that's kind of all the questions that I had
233um and since um I kind of have the floor my my review of this and and maybe based upon my frankly disappointment and some of the answers that I received from the Franklin County Public Health um and some of the information that I've tried to glean um there are two things that come to mind when when making this decision at least from the background and that the way that I look at it one is for instance if I'm in a courtroom and I have an expert that's giving testimony and this expert has information I question not so much their qualifications but what facts and data are they relying upon um and and I understand as a public school district that we have we have to be maybe air on the side of cautiousness but when
234I look at the data that Franklin County Public Health they were very late to the game which is discouraging too in this recommendation um and some of the answers that he provided to me at least from my personal standpoint weren't satisfactory to to support that recommendation the other thing too is as as I mentioned just briefly earlier about this being a community decision and it's a difficult decision and I agree everything what Miss uh Power said about making this is a community decision I I guess from from my standpoint um I think we should be I think we should be going hybrid I think that we have the capability we have the ability to do this um um and it's not a a second guess of the recommendation it's not a question of of your
235abilities Dr Miller or your administrative team or the task force I think that this is a community decision and from from my standpoint I I just can't support a distance learning at this time especially the way that the trends are looking at least three and a half weeks or two and a half weeks almost three weeks I'm not a medical expert but I can look at data and look at what the trends are and it especially for Beckley and the trends and the very very low level of community transmission I just can't support a distance learning at this point I think hybrid would be appropriate and again as as hopefully you know Dr Miller I highly respect you and working two years as president with you I admire your your work your your tenacity Your
236Community Development everything that you've done as a superintendent has been a great hire for us I just think that in this this case I obviously respectfully disagree with the recommendation and I don't think I can support um a distance learning at this point so um I just wanted to make sure that I had a few other questions answered before I kind of made my made my thoughts known thank you Dr Miller I just want to say thank you first of all for allowing um me the latitude to send you like a huge list of questions in the 11th hour and I want to thank your uh executive team also for providing the answers um um that I had because uh like Mr barau I kind of came down on the side of I wasn't prep
237I'm not prepared to um support this measure not because I don't trust um you and you said something to me this afternoon even when we spoke you know you're like Alicia you just got to trust us um and I it recalled back for me when we were making that very difficult decision to uh reconfigure our grades and we were asked to trust our Administration and the one question that um I remember asking in um my administrative meetings was do you think you can do this can you be ready and each one of those administrators said yes um so I just want to on the record say this isn't a matter of trust um I do trust our Administration implicitly I think um we probably have some of the finest uh in central Ohio um and
238so the work that you have done tirelessly through this through this process it seems like a lifetime ago that we were you know discovering covid to now and the breath of work that has gone into um preparing is not lost on me um but a as an essential worker myself um I live in a household with a first responder Frontline worker um you know I see the mitigation efforts that the district has made to be in uh line with the CDC recommendations um as well as the Franklin County Public Health and the Columbus Public Health and oh my goodness Ohio department at health and you know every other acronym known to man um who's giving us recommendations and guidelines ultimately this is you know that they they punted the ball back to districts and said
239well these are just recommendations these aren't um mandates um it says to me that our job is to question not necessarily the science but to question the recommendations and that those recommendations should follow with data and and when we look at the the low transmission rate um incly and and please let me just say I have a child who was covid positive um and we had to go into the whole um well she's not a child she's an adult but um had to go in through the the whole um quarantine process and and all of that so is it lost on me you know all of the the the nuances that come with making a decision here but I come down on the side of we still have to look at the data the Franklin
240County data is still showing downward Trend I like the idea Mr barno of pushing the date back but I also understand Dr Miller um your point about not losing student days so that's where I'm prepared to trust you to say that these five days that you have planned and um UMC Dr Abraham thank you so much for the um uh detail uh in terms of like accountability that was really really helpful um because to just pretend that we didn't have um significant missteps in the spring that weren't all you know any one person's fault or it was the deal we got dealt um so I felt better about the fact that you know you looked at those areas those deficiencies and put in some some stop gaps and plans I agree uh I think do
241uh with Mr barno that there isn't a reason for the teachers not to be in the building um I think it will enhance their ability to provide that instruction um that um you our Administration has built in and that guidance and that support uh and that would be my recommendation if we go distance at minimum that our teachers are in the building Monday through Friday I ideally would prefer a hybrid plan because I think it's so needed right now we have so many students um that were already struggling and the inequities are still there and have only increased and we have not been able to fully resolve all of the challenges because we are like everybody else stuck in the CH supply chain um and so we we haven't resolved those issues so those those
242learning challenges and and hurdles are still exist still exist and to not attempt to give those students and any other students that kind of fell by the wayside along this process of Fighting Chance going back even in a hybrid method just to me just seems like you know here we are taking up taking the recommendations from the Ohio department or excuse me it's hard keeping track of all of them from Franklin County when the recommendations are a blanket statement for the entire County they aren't even specific to Bexley and we as a school board are tasked to make decisions that are specific to our school district taking into account all that's going on around us and I don't know that I fully agree with that recommendation from Franklin County that is not um questioning the
243science that is the job of our our that is our job to ask those questions that is our job to question recommendations that we receive with with to make sure that the data balances the with the recommendation so at this point to support this measure I would like one to see um teachers in the building to ensure that some of the um robust um approaches that uh Miss Abraham uh s or provided to me that we have accountability built in place and that that is happening and that we're in in essence able to to start offering a a better educational experience than what we kind of got thrown into in the spring that was a long- winded statement I apologize and I will shut up there's a lot there's a lot here we appreciate it
244um Miss Mino I think that leaves you I guess it does if You' like if you have anything you'd like to say sure I do um so first of all I have a question um for Jill for Miss Abrams um which I probably should have asked you earlier but that's okay I'm going to ask it to now um you definitely commented on um ideas for kindergarten transitioning kindergarteners in but I'm hoping you could just kind of speak to if if we were to start in a distance model what the other transitional um grades would look like specifically six and I I think the transitional grades are six and nine I kind of throw the fifth grade in there too because they're changing they're their model is a little bit different too so can you speak
245really quick to like what um what it might look like for the our our children who are um starting a new school or starting a new learning experience absolutely and I'm going to invite Mr coddle to join the conversation actually so he can talk specific to Middle School um before he does that though you know one of the things the principles and I have been reflecting upon is as you slightly referenced in your comments we're also students just completely brand new to Bexley and so how do we make sure that they get acclimated into the system and so again being very mindful of who those families are to be able to make the personal connection um even with the group and the work that uh Miss Smith LED as part of her work group they
246really looked at how do we build those relationships and make connections to families from the beginning so our counselors have been um working with her and within that work group to be very mindful of folks who are new to our district and um I believe even Elementary principles had a new teacher Orient or new family orientation um that they were hosting as a zoom meeting um to make connections from the beginning so I had talked about our newest our youngest students coming in and our kindergarten meet the Greet meet and greet and Mr CLE do you want to talk about the plans that you and your staff have as our students transition into sixth grade I'm sorry can you hear me now we can devices [Music] on thank you um so we will be doing
247many of our same transition activities that we do with our sixth graders um that's going to include our web program where everybody belongs um just today I made the purchase to get all of the digital materials so that that can be delivered uh virtually we've already um been connecting with our um eighth graders who will will serve as the peer mentors and our school counselors leave that work so um um it will look different in fact I was looking through photos and seeing some of the fun games and things like that they've traditionally done and thinking I can't use those photos um but um I I trust that the materials that we receive will provide a meaningful transition experience um it also is um to be noted that our sixth grade teachers in particular have
248been very thoughtful of as we started to talk about the beginning of the school year we know that our incoming sixth graders did not use technology in the same way at their elementary schools that we've used at the middle school and so while we may be able to start in a different place with our canvas with seventh and eighth graders we know um we just have to get the kids to click on that first link to get into that first Zoom session and then we can start building um so intentional redesign of our canvas uh pages to make it easier for both parents and students to use um uh more communication around how to properly use power school and then um continued utilization of Google it's it's easy to remember you know we weren't a
249Google School District um 18 months ago you know and so our teachers have really ramped up and learned a lot of new things and I've seen some leadership from our staff showing other teachers how to how to best use those tools um so um in some way we're going to do what in some ways we're going to do what we've always done we're going to welcome kids back to the school year we're going to know that um there's going to need to be a lot of handholding at the beginning um and uh that they're going to need to learn some new routines and some new systems um but it'll just look different but those are things that we are used to doing and we've always done um every single school year and then for our
250incoming freshman our high school has um hosted a freshman Focus program that really flows throughout the entire freshman year so and again talking with Miss Robbins as she works with her counselors and I believe she mentioned Mr Nolan um in my most previous conversation in designing very intentional plans to as Mr CLE referen to give them the support that they need to make that successful transition in to manage the rigor of High School courses um to know who to go to for help to again manage canvas it'll look different than it did last year because the high school's established a very specific structure of how those lessons should flow and as we've talked as as a leader group one of the things that'll be important for our parents to remember as we start school in
251any year we spend the first several weeks teaching structure and it will be no different when we're in an online environment it'll just be that the structures are different and so it'll be things like how do you turn in your assignments how do you look for feedback where do you look for your grades and again the importance of being able to ask questions and who do I go to for questions so they are very intentionally planning how do I communicate to all students um but especially to those who are crossing levels and are just beginning a new level how do we ensure that they um are equipped to utilize the structures in place and the resources and and staff that are available to them so they they are they're having conversations for sure um and
252even today we were talking about just how are what are your plans to connect with all of your kids regardless of if they are new to the building or new to a level what will that look like um so our students can see faces and get to know our staff as they make that transition in thank you both um for that information that's that's good to know and I have to say uh Mr cuddle specifically um this is having a rising sixth grader this is maybe my opportunity to finally learn how to how how campus Works um I might be watching um if it's if it's virtual I might be watching over his shoulder to kind of finally figure it out so thank you both for that very thoughtful um I'm glad to know I
253had every confidence that that had been considered but it's good I think especially for families who are F families of children who are transitioning as you mentioned new to new to the district or new to a to a specific building I think it's gonna I think it's comforting to know that it um there's a well thought out plan and I have to say that I do think um when things AR uncomfortable anything familiar is good and so the fact that even if we're doing the same thing we always do we're just doing it differently there's a certain level of like comfort and support there that I think we talk a lot about the mental the mental health and wellness of our students and I think um that connection with the familiarity is going to support
254them no matter what learning model we're in so thank you both for that report okay so to kind of I don't want to like go on um go on and on forever but I will um share my thoughts about the learning plan um so first of all I want to say um I want to say thank you to Dr Miller um to Dr Williams to miss Abraham and like to the entire like administrative team um you've done amazing work to the task force to all to all the volunteers on the task force people from our community who took the time to kind of like contribute uh it's greatly appreciated and um to all the community Advocates out there we have heard Marley said she has a a spreadsheet um and how we it has to
255be at least 200 emails I've had phone conversations everybody has kind of like weighed in and I think it's important for you to hear that the questions you ask or the conversations you raise sometimes like shape the questions that I ask or give me things to think about that I hadn't considered so I truly appreciate the community effort to um try and determine what's best and so I will say so so with that I will say that um first and foremost our students and our families are like at the heart of this decision what is best for them um and then I'll immediately start talking about myself and say um something that I want to share for anyone who doesn't know me is I have spent my entire professional career um working with special education
256Learners people um with challenging behaviors and um people special education like special education Learners that's um that's my those are my people and I think that um one of the first tenants of like special education is the least restrictive environment we want to we want to support our students in the least restrictive environment and so to everyone in the community um I think this is important for you to hear um the first I feel like the first time I had a serious conversation about what school might look like this fall was like right before July 4th it was probably like July 2nd and at that time that plan was was like the kids would be all in like do you know what I mean and it has changed and um it's changed and it's changed
257and it's changed and it's changed again and it's not because we can't decide on a good plan it's because information changed the factors around us have changed and um we you know so we started at the most independent level that we could be the full end and we had to shift and then we had to shift again and so I think I like I said I just think it's important for everyone to know that it really wasn't like a a straight line decision it was based on all the information that was coming into us about what um what what was what was what's what do we need to know what do we need to consider so that being said um uh that being said I do want to say that um I think one of
258the things that Dr Miller has said all along is that we need to follow um the health guidelines and I am in full support of that um I'm a speech therapist I'm not an epidemiologist um if you give me data about what somebody's uh articulation sounds might look like I could probably interpret that for you pretty well even though I that's not even my area of practice anymore um I could probably interpret that for you pretty well but I don't want to take somebody else's data and give it meaning I think that's the job of the um the Professionals in this case the Franklin County um the Franklin County Public Health uh the Franklin County uh Public Health Board and so um and I think Victoria said in which I have to just Echo I'm
259not an epidemiologist I have to like I have to take into consideration what they're saying and what they're recommending um that being said so that's in regards to like academics when we come into extracurricular and um sports that's a little bit more gray um especially in part uh based on the presentation that Mr mola gave last week that seemed to be a little bit less data driven to me and I will say so that seemed to be a little bit less data driven to me and um one of the things that I have said really to anybody who would listen or ask after his presentation was I think we need some clarification from uh Franklin County Public Health on what extracurriculars what what what do they this the original statement was just like a little
260bit too broad and so to her credit Dr Miller I feel like and other superintendent kind of have been having some conversations I know that there people in the community have reached out to them too and I feel like they came up with some um clarifications to their guidelines um to give us a little bit more information about what we um if we chose to offer extracurriculars some guidelines about what that might be and then of course we have um the doctors the epidemiologist from our community kind of weighing in on that too and so I'm I'm I I feel like I'm in a comfortable spot there with where we are I don't I don't relish going against um I feel like I'm okay where we are uh with that so that's that um and
261then the other thing I have to just say is um again to give Dr Miller and the team credit they're very willing to Pivot based on new information and so we you know and I have always been and we're going to talk about this in a minute but consistency is a big thing to me again because special because special education Learners and people with challenging behaviors are my people um consistency is everything and so I really kind of was in support of the idea of like nine weeks is good we don't want to be changing things up and down but when we got more information and we found out that we are already kind of like in a downward slide well then it makes sense to say well maybe we need to have a shorter
262window um maybe we need to reconsider this sooner um because the information has changed and so um I appreciate that that and that that also came from feedback from the community I appreciate the ability that we're going to look at it in less than a nine week window um to make to to make a pivot if we need if if we can and we need to and um I think and like I said I have to I have to say it one more time before I like finish up it was like consistency is everything and so I feel like if we're starting remote while it's not ideal we would rather be in a in a in a less restrictive environment we'd rather be hybrid or we'd rather be all in the opportunity to give the
263kids some consistency um and again I can speak only to my own children we have had a pretty rule-free summer it's going to be we've had a pretty rule free existence it's going to be a big transition back into um what school feels like and it's going to be a different transition than any other August has been and so I feel like having some consistency there is a there is a benefit to that to the kids and um I guess to to conclude I think that um I know that there are a lot of us who are disappointed that Franklin County came up with these guidelines really and truly like I think July 29th like do you I mean like really and truly we had to Pivot in less than a week and we're disappointed
264that maybe some of us at least are disappointed that we're not going to be in a hybrid mode but I think it's also we have to look at as found opportunity what can we do um to support our students how can we how can we make this time valuable and worthwhile to them so that if we when when I shouldn't say if when we are able to transition into a hybrid mode we've taken um we took that extra time and we got everybody comfortable and ready because as Dr Miller said part of the plan was always a transition we know we're just not going to walk in and everything's going to feel back to normal it takes you know you know well some of you might be Dive Right In people I'm always a stick
265my toe in the water person and so I think that this gives us our a chance for our kids to kind of like Get Ready our staff to get ready to kind of figure out what it's going to be like so um in conclusion I'm in support of um the learning plan as it's presented um and I I thank everyone for their input and their work um Miss SN can I ask just for a point of um discussion from our group um because my goodness this is the only time that we ever get to talk to each other collectively um I'm just trying to wrap my head around um the reasoning that we don't question um the experts when it comes to extracurriculars or we don't question the experts when it comes to academics but
266we do question the same exact data when it comes to Extra curriculars I'm just trying to get an idea from each of you why you have C come down on or where you've come down on it and I think Marley you and I kind of briefly talked about it um uh and we kind of spoke about this earlier with the Ohio Department of Health designations but if we could just kind of because now we're fully talking about this now um just trying to understand right and Michelle since you you were just last talking you can waigh I'll jump in I'll jump in because it is it's un comfortable it's it's my comfortable place to say well you know consist like I said I just got done saying consistency is everything to me but I felt
267like in his presentation data was solid or he had he he he had information about why he's making the recommendation for academics but really and truly the recommendation for extracurriculars was well why if we're going to be in distance learning like why would you have academics or if we're going to be in distance learning why would you have extracurriculars it didn't feel as data driven to me and like even then I probably would have been more uncomfortable with it but then when you have the Ohio Department of Health come along and we've had many conversations about which one like supersedes the other and there really wasn't an answer well you should follow one versus the other so if one is giving you one recommendation and the other is giving you other recommendation and it's just
268more information it's just more information to weigh it's it's definitely and for me at least a very that's the most uncomfortable place of all of this is that is that zound right there I'm in the same place and when you asked that question earlier this evening Alisha that's I mean honestly my inclination would be to say I think we need to follow the Franklin County public Health's recommendation consistently um but I am essentially in a place where I'm compromising um because I've listened to the community I've talked to a lot of people as I know all the other board members have and for me it's a place of compromise for the reasons that Dr Miller expressed earlier and and and also Marley it's it's outdoors it's not mandatory I think we can um you know
269and and the Ohio Department of Health has put out an order that says you can't do the context you know it's very um defining in terms of what can and can't be done um so it's a it's a place of discomfort for me as well my inclination would have been to follow the Franklin County Public Health recommendations but I'm willing to compromise on this because I think with the order from the OD it being outside it being elective I think we can um manage it um so I totally um understand that question that you're raising Victoria you know pretty much in exactly the same I mean yeah I would I would just say ditto to all of that um my one addition is that um and I can't sorry remember if we said this here
270but I had a conversation with Dr Miller about um our Sports and how much like we did with our theater department and our and our um music teachers you know those those athletic departments or those athletic um teams are the best able to kind of EX to come up with creative ideas and a lot of people said you know bexley's small and we have ability to to really make individual um decisions I mean according you know making sure we have all the health regulations in place but um we can be really creative and um I want to hear what those individual leaders and and Dr Miller said that this is part of the work that um Eli and Harley will do is talk to those coaches and say all right how are we going to
271successfully you know create a plan around this if our numbers get better um so our numbers meaning the Franklin County numbers so um I feel like it's a good it's it's a balancing act like everything else is but I feel like um I can I can tolerate that level um again because it's it's extracurricular Miss noden May I add one point Thank You Franklin County Public Health did update their guidance to allow for contact Sports in that Phase 1 n students at a time that's what I'm recommending right now also using their guidance and Columbus Public Health guidance at looking at downward Trends before you move to any more in-person work so that's why we built in kind of a timeline but that that is incorporating their guidance as well as the odh guidance um
272as well as the Ohio High School Athletic Association guidance so just to reiterate we have different entities giving guidance On Athletics versus only W um giving guidance on on school but the Franklin County Guidance is reflected in the in the recommendation that I made to start to go back to phase one for contact Sports and that is thank you driller for clarifying that to be clear that that's from the August 3D letter so they have yeah so they they issued one July 29th 30th something and then another one on August 3rd after actually on July 31st superintendent met with Mr mola and uh that was one of the questions that we asked about and and and he was willing to make that as part of the guidance as well as the allowance um to allow
273for small groups of students to come in when their educational needs necessitate in-person Service delivery and so um in fact I sent him some language around that and so that's in the guidance uh the updated guidance that we have from Franklin County public both of those points that's what I was trying to be clear about so if our public is looking at trying to look at the documentation um and and I apologize I I didn't quite figure out how to how to attach it here um but it's the August 3D 2020 um statement regarding K12 school recommendation from Joe Mah and then did Mr Mah provide any updated data because they haven't updated their data since July 31st did have you seen any Dr Miller like changes in that data since July 31st no what
274Dr Roberts from Columbus Public Health indicated today is they get the data from the organizations um on Fridays and so that's why Friday was the 31st so that's that's my understanding was that they don't get the data until the end of the week than I have to just jump in and say like I listened to him last night again um with the in conjunction with the city council and city the city of Bexley I know some of you some of the rest of you were on that call too I I really thought he alluded to the fact that like Dr Burks was here the weekend before the July 29th recommendation whatever that was July 24th and that some of that the some she indicated that Franklin County was a hot you know that we were
275a hot that we needed to like get it together so I thought I I thought that that was part of where he was coming up with that recommendation in addition to the numbers for sure but that that was um came out conversation that she had um with the mayor and with um what did you Dr biller Dr what's her the Columbus City uh Dr Roberts yeah does anybody did anybody else get that from last night well but when I asked him the question on Thursday night who else what other information who else did he discuss with and he he basically said uh that group resolved to save lives which is International Organization um he didn't mention anything about Dr Burke so if that was the case I'm curious to why he didn't mention it on
276Thursday night when talking to me when I asked him specifically well and I by no means I'm putting words in his mouth that's why no I I know that Michelle I'm not saying you're doing anything wrong I no no I don't never he never mentioned Dr Burks at all I want to be clear that I that's what I thought he said okay oh no you're fine a and and so one of the things that I I guess again this is totally understand and respect everyone's opinion but like on the second page of the recommendation um it's kind of a question PO on on this July 29th 2020 letter of recommendation that that that's now superseded by the 30 by the one on the third is that what you mean not in regard not in regard
277to I'm not talking about extracurriculars I'm talking about return to school okay sorry no that you're fine um where it the on the top of the second page it's kind of posing a question to themselves could reopening schools lead to increased rates of covid-19 so that's that's part of the kind of the the formula because the last sentence of the paragraph indicates it's it's the opinion of Franklin County Public Health Community is actively experiencing significant and sustained Community transmission of the virus um and then it goes into its updated recommendations talks about the CDC uh that there's evidence suggests reopening schools may may be low risk in communities with low Co transmission rates the CDC goes on to say that schools reopening May further increase the spread in communities where transmission is already high it's
278it's almost like the question being asked by by the Franklin County public health sites to the to the CDC in regard to uh low-risk communities which the CDC specifically talks about lowrisk commun ities like I think New Albany um did that but part of what the questions that I asked earlier and and moving back even a week understanding we might lose a week of of instruction the data at least even from what Ohio Department of Health has and on their website they have Franklin County they have the Franklin County um they have each County broken down the the data that appears even in the chart that was contain in this July 29th 2020 letter um it even shows a further decrease uh some of the data also that was cited in that letter appears to
279be information that's not available and hasn't been provided Statewide I think our um what do they call it the positivity rate is 5.6% I don't know what it is in Franklin County because they don't publish that information he give that information he he he he listed the positivity rate and it's been in several um news articles in the last no I I understand that but it's not available like the update is not available Franky interestingly I thought the it's it states on the state um website on the um the the Ohio state of Ohio um website that they're developing those those last three and they should and um the last I heard they said they're they're looking to publish that by County starting in the beginning of August so I mean we're we're there hopefully
280we're we'll see it soon right and I checked this morning and Statewide they have the positivity rate at 5.6 I I guess what um where this all comes down to is um as as Michelle pointed out with the extracurriculars that it was almost like an is it is he admitted as much this is just a blanket statement for all of Franklin County and and as Community elected officials I think we have to look locally like we do with a lot of other things and and I mean maybe I maybe I'm wrong but it sounds like that if if we were able to do even um if we were able to do even um hybrid certainly Allin would be best but hyri would be better than distance learning um it to me and I guess I'm
281not arguing my point but just you know since we're having the discussion um that I think that we have to make the decision and why I want to make the decision that we go hybrid for our local community again it's it's just it's a it's a community decision based upon expertise from our Educators or medical but it is a community decision and and I think you know what is the word there's statistics lies damn lies and statistics so obviously anybody could pull out statistics to support but when I asked Mr mola and again I'm not criticizing him personally but the answer was this is just all of Franklin County without looking at individual school districts and that's kind of stuck with me for the last four days and what has troubled me the most and
282why why like I said I can't support the recommendation because it it's it it seems to be um based upon information that it's more of a blanket for Franklin County as opposed to Bexley so sorry I didn't mean to take up that much time of everybody but I think that those are the points that that really struck me with Franklin County Public Health well I think we've all had the opportunity to um State our opinions on this um I'm curious to know so you know we can look at this a couple different ways but there are two things in the two parts of the resolution really that um if you could choose to view it that way so I think there's the plan itself um and then there's the appendix and I think that from
283what I've heard from everybody we all seem to be quite clear on our opinions about the plan itself the one that I've heard um a little bit a little bit more um movement on is the appendix as it would apply to the teachers in the building if um if we're in distance learning um and so that's that's by my um understanding of of listening to you all that seems to me to be the one piece that there might be some movement on that we would like to pull out separately um um and so I'm pulling up resolution again um because we might need to do something a little bit different to the recommendation um maybe um M Mino and M um Powers maybe you could speak to that topic because I I both M Miss
284Mitchell and Mr Barner were pretty clear on their desire to have our teachers in the building even during distance learning it's my understanding that the plan and I'm just I've got a bunch of pieces of paper here and I'm probably don't have the right one in front of me and I'm trying to look online but my understanding is that the plan as Dr Miller has proposed it permits teachers to be in the building yes that's true and so the does not require and and so the idea would be that we would require the teachers to be in the building starting on you know if we adopt SE or um they're going to be in the building the first week August 17th through and but then we would require them as the proposal to be in
285the building from the 24th yes going forward yes and my understanding on that is is um for account excuse me for accountability and for the ability to um begin to transition them elves so that they feel more comfortable in their environment before they bring students into that environment um this is and I think it it helps to have like just the the in-person staff support um access to all of their um classroom tools that they use in teaching and in those event in the event that they would bring students in for for small group supports or whatever I just think that that's a lot easier to manage and ensure that that delivery model is is happening in a in a a clear and consist consistent I'm stealing your word there Michelle consistent way um so
286sorry mean no you're fine exactly and and my point on that I would totally agree and kind of add a add a little bit to that is if if kids you know and I'm not talking about with IEPs or other other uh special ed issues kids that are struggling and we know that kids struggled with the distance learning um in the spring is knowing those teachers are there that we don't have to worry about oh well I'm not I wasn't planning on being there or I'm not there that day or to have them there and again I I think it's especially with distance learning we have such reduced traffic if if if this is what the the recommendation is approved I I think that that makes the most sense to me to add on to
287what you're saying because you're concerned about I mean as we all are your concerned making sure that we've covered the health issue around the staff which would be the most important Dr Miller um do you feel confident that that um the teachers if they broke up there Marley maybe that was my computer was that my computer no it was like um like uh bad Wi-Fi or something was that just my computer got me yeah okay I heard I heard it all you heard me okay oh I'm sorry that's okay um I was just questioning Dr Miller if you could tell us do you feel that um the teachers could be safe safely brought in the building I mean when I think of it you know kind of in my Layman's approach to it I think
288well there one person per a whole room and if they're masked there's that ought to be that not ought not to have the many of the issues that we're concerned about um have that some thought I sure you have as as uh Dr Williams has worked with his work group with our um doctors nurses epidemiologists Health Care uh experts um that you know we we've heard this repeatedly there are four key components to stopping the spread of this virus wear a mask keep six feet of distance regularly washing and or sanitizing your hand well not Andor but or washing is preferred hand washing sanitize if you can't and stay home if you're sick or have have symptoms um with only adults in the building um there's even less movement um around and so the um
289even if we if if the cases get to the place where um we can go to hybrid it would with all of those risk mitigating protocols what our what our Healthcare people have told us is it it would still be safe now there is always some risk but there's risk during Flu there's always risk of everything I mean every living is there's a risk involved but um it would be even safer just with staff because you'd have obviously not have the students there when the cases in the community go down far enough and we can do hybrid it will still be it will be a safe as possible to have students in because again we're looking at um a a myriad of risk mitigation protocols in place and um so I the the administrative team
290and our support staff in central office and in buildings we've been back all summer long and you know we've gone through the transition and we meet in person we wear our masks we're really careful about handwashing we keep distance um we we know we've we've been able to be very successful working in the buildings over the summer so let me just finish up my thoughts on that um and I I appreciate that and having worked with Dr Williams on the um uh Health Plan I feel confident that um the teachers would be safe in the building I think um the question of accountability is one that has been discussed a little bit and um I believe that there have been um lots of um things put in place so that there won't be a problem
291with accountability of our teachers um you know obviously I can't say that with certainty but I have a level of trust that that we're going to be um okay there and that we um don't need to worry as much about that as um you know as as some of us are I guess um I think it's also okay to let the teachers decide for themselves when they're ready to come back into the building I agree with the concept that when we go back into those places it brings some uh comfort and it makes it easier and I'm I I think that our teachers are um capable of you know sorting through that uh Alicia talked earlier about giving our students who may be experiencing gaps a fighting chance we all know that there have been
292some uh increases and gaps in learning through um the remote learning that you know came without planning or warning in the spring and we do need to be concerned about uh working hard to fill those gaps and to do what we can to identify them and so I've talked a few times in our earlier meetings about making sure that for example if our teachers need to have assessments of our students in person that we figure out a way to do that so I'm I'm really in favor of encouraging our teachers to come into the building when they um can help our students on a one-on-one or two on-one or three-on-one basis or come to the building or find ways to make that occur um and we've talked a fair amount about um what we can
293do for our special populations to make sure that they're getting what they need um if and including if it needs to be in person um our seal folks and they has talked about what she's going to be doing and I know that the teachers are including um social emotional learning in their daily plans uh at least I know that at the elementary level because I've seen the plans for some of the prototypes that have been discussed under um Jill's leadership um but I don't I personally and you know I'm just one board member I personally don't see a need to require our teachers to be in the building I certainly would be in favor of encouraging them to be in the building but um I I just I'm I I don't need to see that
294in the resolution just one person's view thank you Miss Mania do you want to speak to it um well I have to say I'm pretty much in line with Victoria on that one I'm like pretty neutral on it I want the teachers to be where they think I want our staff to be where they think they're going to be most effective and so if that's in the classroom some of them are going to feel that way if some of them have cool ideas that they can do from home or from their backyard or I mean you know what I mean everything's an opportunity like everything's an opportunity to do things differently so maybe you know being in your own kitchen and doing something different that you couldn't do if you were in the classroom maybe
295there's a new opportunity there that we hadn't considered so I I I really want them to be I think wherever they're most effective and to that I guess Dr Miller is recommending that's what she's I'm with the Victoria too encouraging people to come in but also encouraging creativity and like I said to be the most effective where they are and I have to like Victoria I just thought like pretty much everything you said was like spoton um so thank you thank you for paav me the way but um I think what I want to say I think to the entire team is there were many times personally in my job during March and April that I thought oh my God what do I do like I don't know like there's no there's no playbook for
296this and so so um Jill I'm really appreciative of what you talked about about how we've come up with we we we we took that no Playbook place and we're have a Playbook now so that principes know how to support the teachers and teachers know where to go when they feel like they don't know what to do because we were I I don't think there's any person who had a job well I shouldn't okay I shouldn't say that I would say that 75% of the workforce in in March or April at some point in time someone said oh my gosh like different I don't this is different I don't know so I'm appreciative of I think what you spoke to about how um we're going to take attendance and how we're going to make sure
297students are engaged in ways that we couldn't measure before and how we're going to support teachers when they feel challenged and how we're going to support teachers when they have a cool idea and they want to share it with their other Educators or whatever so I'm that was a long-winded response to I'm I'm neutral I want them to be where they think they're going to be the most effective Miss Snowden may I clarify something yes thank you the my recommendation to allow teachers to work from home when it's possible I I just want it's not about wherever the teacher feels most comfortable there will be times when we will need to tell staff that per their employment with the district they need to be reporting into our school buildings and it it's everyone will always
298be welcomed to come in and work in the building and encourag to do so as we've said but I want to be careful that we're not saying if some if we say we need you to come in to meet with this group of students if a teacher says I don't feel comfortable doing that there has to be a reason why they wouldn't report in that would be related to fam's First Corona virus Relief act and it would have to that would that's work that that's uh conversations that have to be had with Dr Williams around those kinds of things so um I just want to clarify something Miss power said it's it's not where every you feel most comfortable it and I don't want to make it sound like we don't want teachers to be
299comfortable we do which is why my recommendation was that they could work from home but any staff member has to be able to come into work when we need them to come into work for reasons that we would deem necessary um we have had some requests already to even in hybrid maybe not come in or you know who would who could somebody else deliver that service it's it's not a pick and choose it it's if we need to come into the office or into the buildings you need to come into the building so but when we don't need you to come to the building you can work from home so I just want to make sure that that's clear to the board what I'm recommending and Dr Miller requests for accommodations happen regardless of whether
300or not we're in a covid environment um could and likely those those requests some of them are going to be related to covid by sheer fact of the type of disease it is and the type of accommodation that they need and then but I I guess in my mind there there's so little traffic in the building if students aren't even there um teachers in schools don't move around in their buildings unless in elementary they're taking the group of kids to point A to B in the first place but what is there is if you don't know where to go to m Miss mino's point you have someone that's in say at montros that's literally right next door to you um that you could at a Breaking Point hey can I bounce something off of you
301there's some immediate um collaboration that can be done you can socially distance in that collaborative environment um and if you you know just don't feel comfortable coming to a staff meeting which I get um you can zoom zoom in to that that staff meeting um there you know know there's so many Industries and organizations that have had to rethink how they do business every single day in a covid environment um that involves all of those mitigation steps that Dr Williams and his team have um probably they probably have nightmares about all this stuff you know is just swimming in their head least I know I do um and everything for example as an essential worker for me everything about what I do on a daily basis has changed from how I interact in the buildings
302that I have to go to meetings that I have and so there's no expectation it to me there the expectation um that teachers would have to change their behaviors is totally in line with what we need to do to sort of survive this this thing but giving them putting them in an environment where they can collaborate and be supported all the time and I'm sorry if you hear my kiddos um but to me just to be able to to not have the distractions of home like I work from home full-time I can tell you you will have distractions like you can't promise that you won't like it's not even a realistic statement to make um you know and we cannot afford with all the there's so many kids that just are we cannot afford not
303to make put make that a priority and you know saying they don't feel safe in in the school they're they've got a report on the 17th I have an opportunity to see all of those mitigation efforts they can make special requests if they have special needs you know all of those things are are doable I to me personally I just do not I I trust the work the Administration has done and I trust that there were a lot of teachers that did their very best but we know for a fact that we had some accountability issues and even by building in what you have a Playbook you still haven't tested that playbook out I have a I had a question Dr Miller real quick that in the hybrid and then obviously in the Allin in
304hybrid teachers will be in the building five days a week right in the hybrid they would be in the building four days a week the idea of hybrid was we'd have half the students in on Monday and Tuesday used Wednesday for a we've been saying deep cleaning but that's a day to really sanitize that takes quite a bit of time and then have this second group in on Thursdays and Fridays but there would always be five days of instruction so Wednesday is not a day off it's just a day of remote learning for all students okay thank you sorry I didn't mean to interrupt you Dr Miller so um my thoughts around this are very conflicted um because I honor and respect deeply are teaching staff um and I wouldn't want any decision that I
305make to indicate otherwise um that being said I feel like there are some very sound educational and practical reasons to have our teachers um in our buildings because I believe they can be in there safely I mean certainly if I believe they can be there in a hybrid environment safely I believe they can be in there alone safely um and the consistency of having a student see their their teacher in their in their um classroom appeals to me very much um it also on a practical level it makes me think that you know like I was mentioning at the beginning of this meeting we know we're going to have that we are likely to have some teachers who are going to need to make some difficult decisions about whether they can safely um for their
306own personal reason you know health reasons which you know we won't be purv to their their own private reasons um but when they're medically substantiated there may be people who aren't coming to our building and we don't know those yet um and so this gives us a way to start to phase in all of this to understand what our limitations are around our teacher commitments and um whether we're going to need um you know back up with substitutes or or replacement um if if it teacher you know can't come in um and I really like the idea when my first day back in to to work at the courthouse you know was scary and then I had to then you get used to it you know you see people and you get accustomed to the
307um to the the building and the differences and I like the idea of having our teachers um have that opportunity without the the difficulty of having you know the needs of the children pressing literally physically pressing upon them um so I think we've all had this you know it's getting light we've all had a lot of conversation around this I think it makes sense um to go ahead and um my recommendation would be to um have a vote on the plan um so it seems to me that our that we have some kind of differences opinion on the board um and so what I would first like to do is um entertain a motion let me look at this resolution um to approve the plan what I'm trying to do is get out two two
308different votes one for the plan in general such it that it um is stated and shown in our attachments and one um to to board dos right now and one is the appendix because the appendix is where um I think it would properly live where the um information about the teachers requirement to be in school during distance learning would live so um I think I had to sorry get to this in my in my own board docs um so under the superintendent's comment which are 3A the Bexley back to school plan does not say anything about um about our um where our teachers will be for distance learning so preliminarily what I would like to do is um entertain a motion to approve the and bear with me um because this is different um um
309we'll break it down and then we'll wrap it back up but the an a motion to approve the Bexley back to school plan as um attached in 3A and um and then once we vote on that back to school plan then we will have a separate vote on the appendex and then we'll vote on the resolution given that um information does that makes sense to everyone I can't hear you yep yes Tyler can you um pull them back can you pull one up and then the other as we're voting on them or can you show can you screen thank you thank you yes so there we go so there we go that first one which is the back to school 2020 21 that's our plan that I would like to entertain motion to approve so
310moved so my motion is to approve the Beckley City Schools back to school 2021 plan which outlines the the three the three separate returns and I think that's a five-page document that's the first one listed on board Ducks is that correct yes with the recommended learning plan as distance learning oh okay so are we so maybe I'm confused so just wanted to make sure so look at your screen now yep that that what Mr um what Mr TR has pulled up is that the back Bexley City Schools back to school 20221 um plan and then the first day of school is August 24th the recommended learning plan is distance learning and then it has alline hybrid and the rest of it oh does that I didn't see that document so what are we doing with
311the resolution so what I'm saying is I think what we need to do is break out the two things the plan the back to school plan and then separately the appendix so we'll vote on those separately and then we will look to the resolution to um to create once we know the language that we want into the resolution into the resolution know how we're going to vote on these two on these two separate UMC okay so maybe I'm so so what I'm trying to figure out I'm sorry go ahead Victoria well I was just going to offer to make the motion because I'm thinking you don't want to move for this one because you I don't know so my question about it before we do that and maybe I'm maybe I'm missing it um because
312I've read through a lot of stuff in the last well however many days is there a recommendation in the back in the back to school 2020 is there a spe specific recommendation in that one yes it's on your screen right now recommended learning plan distance learning learning I'm pulling up I'm okay okay you see it yeah I was looking at the I was looking at the wrong document I'm sorry no I know it's hard like we got a lot of screens going on this is noty process I appreciate it you you were correct uh Miss power I I am not moving to approve this oh I will do that so um I have a motion to approve Bexley City Schools back to school 20221 as um attached in three in the first document of 3A
313can I have a second for that motion a second thank you all in favor of approving the back to school plan and distance learning um please signify by saying I I I hi um any oppose same sign how do you same sign say I I I I oppose I I oppose approval of this thank you than so that is a 3-2 vote I'm going back to distance learning um then Mr TR if you would go on to thank you to our appendix so in the the appendix it does not currently State other than well what it does state is that the staff will be gathering um in from the 17th to the 21st but it does not state that um that the staff would be required to attend during distance learning in the buildings um
314Mr barno or Miss Al uh Miss Mitchell would you like to um offer any language that would make that requirement I would just the language would just simply state that the staff reports the 17th through the 21st to do the professional development and be prepared to report in their um classrooms daily um for regular scheduled classroom instruction uh as of the 24th if that's when we're going to go back okay um so don't know how to Wordsmith it pretty um I think Dr Miller did you do you feel like you received that um that or uh Mr Smith are you taking notes on that do you need me to take it I think what you're wanting is to amend the appendix to say that the teachers would return August 17th to the 21st for professional
315development and then um um begin school on August 24th I mean you I don't know that you really need to make any kind of special statement that teachers report to the buildings for work that is the standard right doing something different is but if you set a precedent or that right right well we have a lot of recommendations I think there the recommendations are different from Clear directive yes I thought you were going to put that language in the resolution sure like and I just just acknowledging that this that's not my forte is to come up with the fancy language I'm happy to okay I I just trying to figure out where we want to put it so what I would suggest where it says under August 24th uh because it's would be consistent with
316under August 27th to 21st um where it says staff report for professional development and work time um under August 24th first day instructions for students and staff is to report in person something to that something simple just add staff reports in person staff to report in person where it says first day of instruction for students and staff to report in person right in that boldfaced larger font and that I would move to approve the appendix August 2020 with that additional language under August 24 um okay so Mr barno will you restate that motion pleasa in the form of a motion please yes so um I would like to move to approve the appendix August 2020 back to school 2021 with the addition under um the August 24th heading that first day of instructions for students
317and then add on to that sentence and staff is to report in person thank you can I have a second for that motion second all right um all in favor please signify by saying I I I any oppose same sign I'm having a hard time I I I am too I support most of this I'm not sure it's worth my voting against it because I think at the end of the day it's going to pass um so what I would like is for us to all recognize that we're going to come together over these plans and and and I am going to do that um that's for our protocols I mean so regardless of how we we end a vote we support the the the work of the district and the the superintendent so I
318don't think that's a question no I'm not raising it I'm just recogniz all I I'm just saying that I'm recognizing that that's what we're all going to do um so I'll go ahead and um think about it um it's not it's not it it's not simple it's it's it's a difficult because your vote matters to you because you care so I'm not worried at all about the safety of the teachers I think they'll be completely safe going into the building under these circumstances I'm not sure that we need to add this as I've already expressed um but I support the rest of the document um so with that c caveat that I don't think we need to add this and I would prefer not to I'll vote um against it but I support all of
319it put that one piece and I think it'll be fine may I go ahead go ahead Dr I think it's important that that my recommendation is captured my recommendation was that teachers would report to the buildings when we needed them to yeah so since this shows up as my recommendation I I don't know if we are able to reflect that it's been amended by the Board of Education okay I'll look to that we need to finish the vote okay um all right so you're waiting for me yeah okay I'm in line with Victoria I I'm fine with all of it I don't think it's necessary to say put that one sentence in okay so you're voting against it yes okay so um now I'm looking at the resolution itself and the meat of the matter
320is about halfway down the page so be it fur the resolve that the board directs the administration to put into effect the distance learning plan for return to school pursuant to the um plan incorporated into this that doesn't even make sense I think we have a typo um all right I'm going need a minute to review this think you need to add language about the appendix unless the um back to school plan included a reference to the appendix which I was looking for but didn't find yeah so maybe we just need to um say you know have yeah have a resolution in here exactly that just you know a whereas clause or something that refers to it as Alicia says and then um say that uh we direct the administration to put into effect the
321plan and the um appendix appendix as amended okay and Dr Miller I was also reviewing it to make sure that your um recommendation was not reflected in that the resolution did not reflect that it was your recommendation to include that so I think I've done I think we do that by putting this in the in the um in the um in the resolution does that just do you have objection to that to putting it in the resolution that the board it no the board so what we will say is be it for the resolve that the board directs the administration to put into effect the distance learning plan for our return to school on August 24th uh and its appendix pursuant to the plan incorporated into this res solution Marley how about this after August
32224th 2020 but as recommended by the superintendent and pursuant to the plan and amended appendix incorporated into this resolution does that help I hate doing the word Smith at meetings but I think it's important that's fine but we need to refer to the appendic somewhere before that probably um because that hasn't been Incorporated so about where it says pursuant to the plan and amended comp amended appendix well let's let's address Alicia's okay I'm sorry after the first after the last where as be it resolved the Board of Education and the superintendent is directed to put in place the back to school plan [Music] um and appendix that was developed in collaboration with the BCS task force and the beex education yes comma as a me you know as amended so but no first what we
323need to do is just make sure that that second that that has um the be it resolved language in the first um so there's whereas whereas be it resolved that's first one the first place that we Define the plan in including parenthetical that has it in quotes we need to say and appendix right before that parenthetical Mr Smith does that make sense plan and appendix is what you're saying as just say yeah with appendix with appendix Mr Smith are you keeping record of this as you generally do in our yeah yeah I'm certainly trying to keep up with it yes okay thank you I just know you doing live but I can't see you so I'm hoping luckily I have a printer [Laughter] um okay so the resolution would include that addition of the appendix
324there so then we know that we're talking about the whole plan has the appendix now John do you want to give the language after um the resolution section that has August 24th 2020 yeah so put into effect distance learning plan for a return to school on August 24th 2020 as recommended by the superintendent and pursuant to the plan and appendix incorporated into this resolution did you get that Kyle yes okay because it's hard for me to repeat a second time I'm still taking notes okay um after you get it Kyle will you read it back sure yeah thank you or can you could you attach it so we could it would probably take me a minute or two but I mean I could do that it's a matter of downloading and and editing so right
325now what I've got is I'm going up to the first the it resolve um that the superintendent is directed to put into place the Bexley back to school 20121 plan uh with the appendix uh that was developed in collaboration with BCS reopening task force and Beckle Education Association is that part does that part reflect did that part also reflect it that it was amended because if you don't say that it's amended I don't know what the rules are yeah but here's my issue if I the back statement Education Association is not was not in that that por the appendant was not developed in collaboration with them right I what I would do is I would say at the end of that sentence the plan you know quote the plan end quote that was developed in
326collaboration blah blah blah blah blah and the appendix there too Modified by the Board of Education that makes more sense yeah okay Marley and I have been on the board long enough to can remember well I think Alicia too I was about to say remember when we used to do this all the time right on policies and all the policies that came before us and then we can Define appendix right there the quote appendix and then the plan I guess the next one is fine we don't really need those quotations um and then the third resolution just add pursuant to the plan and appendix because we've defined dep pendex now as the thing that was amended yeah and then in the fourth one the plan I agree I don't think we need the um quotations
327because we've already defined that the plan is Right does that take care of it I believe so Mr Smith can you read that back to us yes going back up to um the second be it further resolved that the board directs the administration to put into effect the distance learning plan for our return to school on August 24th 2020 as recommended by the superintendent pursuant to the plan and appendant incorporated into this resolution and did you change the first beit resolve section uh yes so I'll go back to that um be it resolved by the Board of Education of the Bexley City School District Franklin County Ohio that the superintendent is directed to put into place the back to school 2021 plan the plan that was developed in collaboration with the BCS opening reopening task
328force and the Bexley Education Association and the appendix um the appendix as amended by the Board of Education defined term should actually come at the end of the as amended by the Board of Education I'm sorry Victoria should the um definition of appendix come after we're going to amend the appendix right the way Mr barno suggested so we'd want it to be and the appendix there too as yeah as amended are modified by the Board of Education the quote appendix end quote okay and then when you talk about it in the third resolution Clause you don't need to say the appendix as amended because that's how it's defined Y and there's a typo in the second whereas just the academic success of our students lower case since we're F oh thank you I fixed that
329last time we must have had some yeah a little glitch there's just so much going on right now um can we um Mr Smith I would appreciate if you would make the changes and put them on the screen yeah I can do that thank you um it might take me just a minute unless someone has the original resolution Dr Miller do you I do but I don't have all the new language Mr Smith I'll share it with you right now yeah that'd be fine I think I have the language hey Marley yes I'm I'm sorry well he's working on that language can I just step away to go to the restroom yes I had coffee rather late sorry thanks for almost done I appreciate it thank you I think what I'm going to do is
330um since we're word smithing I'm going to share my screen that way would that be okay m okay I hope you're able to see it I'm testing her little our eyes okay could you make it a little bit larger for us yes I certainly can thank you so much thank you oh not that big yeah thank you so removed the um where was the capital uh the academic take took the capital there and then this was the change to this section so just a couple things um can you just move that parenthetical quote the appendix end quote can you move that to after the word education if you just pull that whole parenthetical there the no no no no sorry take the T take the take the from the par the open pen and the
331quote and all that down to the Clos pin and just move that whole thing over here at to the end of that sentence so it would be after the word education right perfect so right there that's right here the appendix yeah getting to see me type that's great and then yeah and then in the next one you can take out those quotes around the plan it's just yeah yeah like you did in the other place I'm still reading thanks sure okay so I'd be more comfortable um if you put and the appendex down here in the the part that we messed with in the middle of the um be it for the resolve right in there exactly after the appendix after that section um I would include the language as amended by the Board of
332Education [Music] here I want to be clear that it's not the superintendent's recommendation Incorporated herewith it should say Incorporated here with all one word and then into this resolation I don't know why it's all like some stupid Old English I don't know why sorry that part here with the as amended by the Board of Education Incorporated here with and in this resolution thank you thanks yeah it seems like it would be super helpful if resolutions could be more modern and how it's I mean I guess there's legality in that I guess but I was going to say it's I guess it's probably what you're used to oh yeah you guys probably look at it all day long um okay so I feel comfortable with that has everybody had the opportunity to read it and such
333that you can vote on it yes yes okay all right um so can I have a motion to approve the resolution as indicated oh and as modified can you put it back up there sure and attached under 7c correct that's where you're attaching it is 7c no I I'll attach it here so can I sorry can I have a motion to approve um the resolution as modified under 7 C complicated because now we have um you know potentially a bunch of no votes I was just thinking like if we voted no right on the distance plan but now we're voting for The Distance plan or are we voting for all three because we have to vote for all like we're voting that so this is an opportunity to um have have a generalized compromise of
334each of the pieces that the others have um have approved so um I feel like we we're gonna I'm sorry yeah that so that was my intent if we um if you think so if we're going to have a bunch of no votes I think we're gonna four knows if people vote the way they did before maybe what we need is two resolutions one on the um plan be a stand alone yeah all right yeah we need two one on the plan and one on the appendex and they if we vote the way we did before then you they'll both pass you all didn't like my my uh opportunity to come together huh um I just don't think it like it represents how we voted and our vote is our voice regardless of how that
335vote ends up yeah that's that's that's that's a good point okay so um I I'm thinking that maybe the thing to do is to um we have we have voted to pass the plan we've voted to pass the amended appendix yes um can we do a a Voice vote without redrafting the resolution that we would do one resolution that contains the language that we just put together with respect to the plan and vote on that one and then that we would agree that there would be a second resolution with the language that we just put together with respect to the appendix and vote on that and draft it later or do we have to go through it I think we have to go through it so um all right well the first the first three
336paragraphs can be the same right okay and we just go back to the language that was there before in the first resolution Clause just refer to the plan yes the next resolution clause also can just stay the same as it was before because it just referred to the plan uh Kyle I got to Kyle I need to get to your yeah give me just a second um I'm having technical difficulties with my mouse so I'm going to see if I can grab another one from another office continue talking this is co world that we're living in um if you want to copy it to me I can do it I think if we just go back to really if we just go back to our original one that's what we should do so we should
337the original one as the plan correct I mean vote to approve that and then we need a separate resolution um with the same right so we but we've already voted for the plan and that passed three to two so we just need to vote on the appendix no no no we need to vote on a resolution resol for the official minutes sorry I think you're right that we can just vote on this resolution that is still in the you know it's still it's still there I mean I'm looking at it on my screen yeah Kyle you see what we're talking about yeah I can pull I can pull it up well the thing that we're looking on on the screen right now is um I'm looking at a different screen that's it's just got the
338board Doc stuffff and when I click on the resolution it's the old one right so we can vote on that yeah I I think you're right can you put pull up that um this is when it would be nice to be in person yeah sorry just just a second the original board do 7 7 c c which is basically approving the distance learning pursuant to the plan right okay just making sure you hadn't just given up and fallen asleep from the dining room table so this is the original resolution okay can I have a motion to approve the original um resolution in item 7 C so moved thank you second second thank you all in favor please signify by saying I I I I I'm sorry Victoria I didn't hear your answer I thank you
339any oppose same sign I thank you that motion carries um so now we need a resolution um that okay K if you can just use the um do you want to go in and start editing as I'm talking yeah okay give me one second again for yeah wasn't that figure um let me just do it this way Mr barno do you still have the language with the appendix I haven't no because I I I'm going based on stuff that I I'm just very little paper in front of me I'm going off of tabs that I have open on my desktop and I don't have it anymore all right to Victoria I think we were going to use the same first three things there the introduction the two whereas Clauses there and then be let me
340just read what I think it might be be it resolved by the board of educ so this doesn't change the board of education of the Bexley City School District Franklin County Ohio that the superintendent is directed to put into place the appendix of the back to school plan correct the appendix to the back to school 2021 plan as Modified by the board of election pen the quote appendix and quote andaren I think that's all we need uh no let's keep in this language at the bottom right I think didn't you want the next one the the not the next one but the third resolution Clause that the board directs the administration to put into effect the appendix together with the plan or something um I mean put in place I don't know yeah we probably
341I don't know what that adds I don't think it adds anything I think only think we need to put in is the second to last one that it's specifically limited to the 2021 school year and the and the last one okay so KY are you ready for our yeah I believe right all right Victoria why don't you go ahead and direct it be it resolved by the Board of Education of the Bexley City School District Franklin County Ohio that the superintendent is directed to put into place the appendix to the back to school 20-21 plan as amended by the Board of Education pen the quote appendix end quote anderin okay I think that's right you may have to go slower for Kyle Kyle are you going to put it up on our board or no
342can you can you see I can see it yeah oh I got you I was on the wrong swipe thanks see if that works the back I think it's the appendix to the back to school plan see where you see where you've got in the second line put into place the I'm just looking at the title of the document so I would say is directed to put into place the appendix yeah right there to the back to school 20 20-21 plan yep there you go right okay then you can delete the next two yep three paragraphs yep and the next one just that one yeah right just that one great right there you go yep perfect grab that space out of there yep there you go okay um flashbacks Marley if word smithing I know
343well I'm having a lot of anxiety around this whole thing I think it's you know like we said at the beginning of all this there are no perfect answers there are so many different viewpoints around this people who um feel very strongly about this from lots of different angles um and again I and no one's wrong like no one's wrong about it like how they feel or think about it right um yeah thank you for saying that and I I just want to I think I feel very personally torn again I've said this because um I don't want this to be seen as any reflection of disrespect to our teachers um or Administration who I know um are are incredible professionals um so that's not at all my intent and and my vote so um
344all right can I uh Kyle can you insert this into um a separate so um section so it would be under seven d as in dog as opposed so we can have it as a separate resolution yes um do we need to amend our agenda then yes and we have a second amendment maybe also Marley because you've got two uh earlier pieces that we were going to go back to the calendar right so um can I have a motion to approve going to get good at Robert's Rules let me flip through sorry get to the beginning of my agenda um can I have a motion to approve an amendment to our agenda that will insert a resolution under 7D and allow us to vote on items 3 G and H so moved thank you all
345in favor please signify by saying I I I any post same sign was that was that Michelle Miss Min on the second yes thank you all right so um can we put in now can I have a sorry Kyle am I on your page now did you put it in Kyle I can't see I'm doing it right now okay for so Mr Trill if you'll refresh or I can share my screen thank you thank you all right can I have a motion to approve item 7 D so moved is on yes I'm here I'm sorry I thought I was not muted second thank you all in favor please signify by saying I I any opposed same sign I I thank you that motion carries all right so we now need to go back to items
3463G and H can I have a motion to approve items 3G and H so moved thank you a second am I muted second thank you um all in favor please signify by saying I I hi any oppos same sign we're voting on C and G and H G and H Ty can you pull your can you pull your screen there you go let's do it let's sorry I had to go back and see what I was voting for it's the calendar and the calar the yeah so I'm voting I I thank you any oppos same sign thank you that motion carries all right um given the lateness of the hour um and the fact that Dr Miller has worked um I guess we all have since whatever six o'clock this morning um we were to
347have executive session tonight but I think we'll look to reschedule that um and and um we did not have a um we did not have a a vote after that so we will um we'll we'll look at our calendars I'll send you out another calendar request as we will with the um with um our Retreat and I want to make sure because the hour is late and we may have lost most everyone um but I want to make sure I go back and um make special notice of 7B which is our anti-racism and Equity um conversation um I think I just want to make sure that we were purposeful in stating that that will be a larger discussion at Retreat it's not that that that that discussion was breezed over or that it is not
348something that will be an ongoing conversation it was a recognition that it would after we discussed things with um Miss myth it's better suited for a larger topic conversation it will remain on our um on our agenda with communication so that we're sure we we review it every month so um given that um and the decision not to have executive session um actually can I entertain a motion to amend our agenda to strike executive session so moved thank you second second thank you um all in favor please signify by saying I I I I thank you uh any oppos same sign that was nigh for me too Kyle okay then that motion carries um can I have a motion to adjourn our meeting so moved and a second second thank you um all Mr Smith
349is this a roll call is that just when we're going to ex that can be a no that you can do that by Voice vote Voice vote okay all in favor please signify by saying I I I I I any oppose same sign all right and so that is that for this evening I thank you all very much for your um dedication and time tonight and um we will I will be sending out a calendar for executive session um and our Retreat thank you you thank you everyone night