001e all right we're going to begin start the meeting by calling it to order and roll call director Assad Lucas here director belli here director Goldstein here director Marsh holen here director here all right I'll entertain a motion to approve the agenda so moved second I'm sorry direct Potter was that you that seconded thank you director Assad Lucas I director belli I director Goldstein I director Marsh holen director Potter hi okay rise if you are able for the Pledge of Allegiance I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which stands one nation God indivisible withy and justice for all okay well next is the superintendent update so I gave a fairly good update uh back and work study session so I have nothing further to add
002at this point Thank You Board of Education comments recognition Awards and vision start with director Potter I will keep it really brief I just want to thank all of the staff that handled um some of the power outage things going on and helping get our students back with their families and back on track as well as wish all of our kid was a good night's sleep and lots of rest and healthy breakfast lunch and dinners leading up to se Mass okay director Marsh hson uh thank you welcome back everyone from spring break I hope everyone got rest for the final push um I uh attended the unified basketball game at Horizon which was strangely my first time in Horizon as an Adams 12 graduate I don't know how I never went but um it was
003Legacy um vers Horizon and it was just a really great game and so fun um to see everyone come together I was able to go um with uh um Paula to the to the art show um to look at the high school art that we were able to pick but I was happy that Paula was the one that actually had to pick because there was too many to choose from they all did an amazing job um and I went not as a board member but as a mom to the um burfield Community connections at Mountain View which was um a night that all the community was invited to um to learn their social emotional um learning skills which was just really nice to see and it was nice to have um community members not just
004parents and there learning what our kiddos are learning so I unfortunately will not be at next um our next meeting our next week's meeting it will be in DC um but I yeah that's it thank you director belli um the first thing I want to note is that uh it is National poetry month so as a former writing Professor poetry reading and writing is near and D to my heart um and I also thought it would be helpful to share um some information on why it's important for kids to learn how to read poetry and uh from one of the national nonprofit called reading Partners they work to help schools get kids ready uh to read by fourth grade and they write that kids who read poetry um they're motivated to read they teaches them
005sound like voice pitch volume inflection it builds their vocabulary and it encourages creativity so um yeah it's National Poetry Man thra um I visited Shadow Ridge Middle School on Tuesday it was a wonderful visit I met with principal Matt olert and vice principal philipos who will be moving on soon to Legacy I believe where he's going to be the athletic director so he'll be missed um they are a school that are on a priority priority Improvement plan uh principal olert started there two years ago and for the first year he spent time just trying to get to know the environment and how the school functioned and um what some of the barriers to success were and since then this year they've been working on um uh you know exploring their approaches to discipline building Community
006morale uh focusing on school pride um and their motto moving forward is in sync which is why I'm wearing their t-shirt today and I thank principal olert for giving me a t-shirt to wear um I visited several math classes while I was there I or several classes while I was there they um they had I visited two math classes a social studies class an English class a music class art class they have a Spanish class in their middle school which I thought was phenomenal um they uh also in their art class the kids were building really complicated sculptures and I couldn't help but think about all the connections that probably has to good engineering skills as well um it was a Sentimental visit for me because a lot of the kids at um Shadow Ridge
007Middle School were kids who had gone to school with my son at Glacier Peak and it was great to see them growing and thriving in that new environment um and finally I just want to thank principal olert the students and staff for weling me welcoming me into their Community um I always appreciate the trust and faith they put in me being able to see all the wonderful things going on there and I always I'm thrilled to share that with all of you um like uh Alexis noted it was a pretty busy month for me I did uh do the jurying I guess for the high school Arts um competition at the Front Range uh Community College and it was wonderful seeing all the high school artwork but I also need to do a shout out
008for the Middle School artwork which was equally phenomenal we have a lot of really promising up andc coming artists and it's just wonderful to see the work that they do um I also attended the unified basketball games at first I was sort of embarrassing admittance on my part but I was like what's a unified basketball game so for those of you who are asking the same question it is when students with diverse abilities play basketball as a unified team and I saw some of the most I went to The Horizon versus Legacy and I saw some of the most amazing feats in basketball um for instance and I had to research what some of these uh shots were excellent oneand layup by one young woman and a great free throw from the center line from
009another young man it was really it was amazing some of the things um the moves I saw uh so yeah that's it I mean I think that's enough oh Northland High School pbl I always love going to those if you um have a chance to volunteer I encourage everyone to do so it's great to see what our kids are doing learning how to problem solve and really getting in there and doing those sorts of things this time around they were writing children's book or working on children's books on genetic conditions and my the what I really hope to see is a lot of those books in our kids libraries um about six months from now wouldn't that be great so thank you director Asad Lucas good evening everyone and thanks for being here um I
010had I had the privilege of judging uh middle school art and it is probably one of the hardest things I have to do there was just so much talent and same I was you know going through and looking even at the high school and thought like I'm so glad I only have one level that I have to pick art because it was incredibly hard um but it's yeah it's fun to watch or to see the potential and um the growth of talent for students um I want to remind everyone if you have not already registered definitely do so for the Adams 125k uh run on a or August April 20th um you you can register up until the date of the event but this is such a great event uh wonderful family um engagement for
011a Saturday morning and one of the possible guests if he doesn't have to leave the country during that time will be Jason Romero who's been um a special guest in past years but for anyone who may not know who he is he is the first and I guess only at this Point blind athlete who ran across the United States in four months yeah he ran about on average 50 miles a day so uh but yeah he has such an incredible story and it's a former par Olympian and um yeah he's will hopefully be able to attend but it's just a great event overall and great way to come together as a district there will be another special education advocacy committee meeting on April 25th unfortunately I won't be able to go but I really want
012to get this out there for anyone who is interested because this is such a great opportunity and especially this meeting they're going to um really connect parents and Guardians family members whomever who have children that have i APS 54s um and their specific needs with other parents that have have those uh students with those same needs or similar needs and uh to be able to just to build those relationships and collaboration and so it's definitely a wonderful way to connect ask questions and um just make some connections as parents lastly as a therapist who works with disabilities and in the process of getting one of my own children Poss identified it is Autism Awareness Month so I want to just highlight that and the importance of well just recognizing the needs but also the growth
013we've made in understanding autism in the past decade and I mean even professionally I think of where we were in the field 10 years ago and where we are now has just made a significant difference so continuing to learn more and bring awareness to better serve um our population individuals with disabilities so that is all I have thanks again for coming this evening thank you welcome everybody um before our spring break we had a pretty intensive IBS session where we're actually um getting things squared away um I too went to the genetic diversity p over at North Glenn um and I guess that they are going to pick a few of them to publish the books and it's kind of interesting too because um I was a biology teacher and I know somewhat a little
014bit about genetics and the genetic diseases that they had chosen it was very um interesting just thinking oh yeah I remember studying that 20 30 years ago and just that you know and to see that part of the whole thing of making the children's book also was learning about the genetic disability and they some of them picked genetic disabilities that we really don't see a whole lot around but some did that was that was great they um put a lot of work into that I to went to a couple of basketball games for the unified um basketball teams for Special Olympics um I think I told you I'd gone to Thorton at northen before break and then I went to northen at mountain range um also and um it's it's always a a pleasure to
015see how everybody you know cheers everybody on it's not like it really doesn't matter who wins because they all win and then afterwards they all have like ice cream and stuff and and the teachers there um they do everything from um running the clock which I don't know if you've ever notice but they take Liberties to make sure that kids get lots of time to do what they need to do um there's no shot clock but um sometimes the clock goes kind of slow so that the last bucket can get made and then um you know when when the teachers will ref and the kids just have they just genuinely have so much fun and yeah I saw a three-pointer too I was like wow um I got to attend my first meeting with the
016Broomfield urban renewal Authority um we have we were we we have one representative on that that represents all the school districts who touch Broomfield County um there's like five of them and then I went to Federal Heights on Monday and um they must have gotten the memo about poetry month because the third graders had done made poem H and and there was a a template for it but then they also you they had it posted outside the room and then they had a QR code and if you scan the QR code it went to a recording of the student reading the poem so listen to a few of the kids recordings of the poems and then my break I really um went back to my uh well Vincy went back to my origins of taking
017kids to Washington DC I took them with Vincy once um and I took my son and my husband and I made sure that they got the eighth grade filter of experience in DC and um they were pretty tired and we did it all in the rain and on the bikes and we went to the capital we went to the White House into all the Smithsonian and The Monuments and and you know director said Lucas you think I wear you out you should have seen what we did for 5 days there so it but you know what it was an educational experience and it is it's just a massive educational experience and I think every person should get to know the nation's capital and what it has to offer at some point in their life so
018that's that so with that being said we'll go on to the next item and it's the board committee lay on report so we'll start with the DC so this time I'm doing a better job than I did last time I made them that promise um so the Dak is the district accountability committee um and the discussion this time around was um it's important to know that one of the things the Dak does now is it sends Liaisons to the school accountability committees at at each school they have those and um they start out with the sack minute where they report out on their liaison activities um they've continued to make the Sachs aware of the spending priority survey um that I've previously referenced in other meetings and they're realizing participation in Sachs is also a
019good way to recruit for the district accountability committee um they also discussed membership engagement over the past year in essence membership has been much more robust in the past year um and on a side note sometime this month I believe and maybe superintendent gdowski or one of our other um admins can confirm this is that that you should see invitations to apply for or the DC or the festar leadership academy soon um the Dak committee also reflected on their experiences participating in it uh people generally noted that it was a great onboarding experience and that they find the time commitment doable um they also noted that it allowed them to access access to understanding how the district functions that they wouldn't otherwise have like getting involved in Blueprint budgeting and other background knowledge um as
020the DC prepares for new applicants they plan to update the FAQ page for those of you who might be interested to show the new schedule and answer other relevant questions another future plan is to work more fully work to more fully offer a liaison to every sack in Adams 12 and they'd like to advertise particular areas where Liaisons are needed on the DC web page so keep your eye out for that and that's it thank you V I do not believe we had a meeting since our last board meeting so you'll notice that casby is inserted here afterwards on the agenda and I I felt that since I was representing us at casby on the board of directors not just us but region five which we're part of I thought I'd just keep you guys
021a little up to date or what do we do there okay what's about so um one of the big things that we did um was so our exec director juble Yenni is somewhat new and so he's getting developing his vision of where he wants to go with things and so um he had hired PBC um Dana senson some of you might know because she used to be Adams 12 she was our facilitator and she came out to help us start thinking about what we wanted as casby organization the color Association of school boards for strategic planning and we spent a lot of time with that and and I really enjoy this group of board members they're really from all over the state there really are uh some great heads in the room there and different
022perspectives you know um West East rural urban it it's real interesting to hear the things that go on in different school districts that are very different than ours um we certified the dues for casby and I'll let you know that our dues went down about a hundred bucks or so so that was good um they're already planning the next convention at the Broadmore in December and various committees reported um and I do chair the federal relations Network and I filled people in on what was going on there um we're planning a bus tour just so you know in the fall and we did it last fall too um but this fall I'm trying to get um some um consensus to go visit the rural more rural areas and we're kind of focusing um more like
023in um Glenwood Springs area Roaring Fork where that's kind of my vision for that um also we um got a report from Angelica Scher who represents the State Board of Ed and we got a report from jubani so um that board meets four times a year and uh we met at C at Thea case office casby case office down on um Evans and Monaco so don't have to go too far okay now we're on to General Public comment Adams 12 festar schools honors and ackn I'm sorry I've done that again Adams 12 festar Schools Board of Education welcomes you to the meeting this evening and welcomes folks to participate in public comment each person will have three minutes to speak I will hold up a 30 minute sign at when you are getting close to
024the end and we ask that you start ending your comments at that point and then I will let you know when your time has expired when we ask you that you please conclude clude your comments at that point the first Speaker uh uh when you do come to the podium please use the microphone you will need to turn it on um and it takes just a few seconds to warm up uh that's so that everyone can hear and to facilitate the recording of the meeting as well um and please state your name and city of residence when you come to the podium the first speaker is vincera ulberg okay is it on okay good evening Mr gdowski board president Goldstein and board members my name is Vinci yolber I come to you tonight wearing three
025different hats as a grandmother of two Adams 12 elementary students as a taxpayer who moved from Jefferson County to be able to vote for all things that benefit children in the district where I work and a fifth grade teacher who is in the final years of a magnificent career here in Adam 12 as I began tonight I am asking a question for each of you to ponder while I am speaking if we are in the business of doing what is best for kids working to achieve our mission to engage and inspire all students to innovate achieve and succeed in a safe environment by ensuring high quality instruction in every classroom then why are we increasing class sizes rather than looking elsewhere for viable options and potential Cuts I work at Silver Creek Elementary School as
026a fifth grade trade teacher my team was reduced from four to three during the current round of reduction in force our building also lost a kindergarten teacher and a first grade teacher due to a reduction in enrollment I understand it is necessary to cut positions with declines in enrollment however according to the regional educational laboratory research this shows that if our children are not at grade level by third grade they are 25% less likely to graduate from high school the rates are higher for below basic grade levels class size is what impacts kids my biggest concern is with the primary grade levels no primary classroom should have more than a total of 22 to 24 students to ensure that each child is receiving the high quality instruction they need on a daily basis from his
027or her teacher this cannot be done effectively when we have primary classes with 25 to 28 students I ask why as a district and Board of Education you have decided to cut teach who impact our children on a daily basis instead of considering other options such as those in a staff position that do not work directly with students Silver Creek is a high performing school with teachers who independently seek out professional development to grow as Educators wouldn't it make sense to differentiate School needs from building staffing needs when budget cuts are going to be made I know that with the financial challenges in the district parents do not readily feel the impact from the loss of these positions but will quickly voice their concern when class sizes are too big I urge you to please
028reconsider the cuts you have made that directly impact the primary education instruction and well-being of our children my grandchildren and the future educational system at Silver Creek as well as Adams 12 school district thank you for your time this evening thank you Vincy glori on that one uh I just want to share some more information on that I hope gives some perspective on this topic so let me pull up something real fast that I had until a minute ago so I share your interest in having lower class sizes I share the interest that um a number of Educators have reached out to advocate for recently in terms of Greater compensation I share the interest in having more Middle School sports uh outdoor education greater specials opportunities and things like computer science that right now are
029just at a few buildings instead of throughout our system and yet at the same time I've uh spent spring break and a good chunk of time uh over the last two weeks building the case about why our state needs to think about school funding differently because a lot of the reason why we have class sizes that might be larger than we want and compensation that's lower than we'd want it to be andless programming than we'd like to offer is that our District's at a huge financial disadvantage comp compared to just everyone just about every District in the Metro region so I'm just going to share a few statistics um one of the things that I've gathered is how much mevy override money we get per child in Adams 12 compared to the other 15 school
030districts in the Metro region we are 13th out of 15th we have more mevy override money only uh only more than Adams 14 which gets about $900 per student and 27j that gets a little bit more than 1,00 per student we get $1,993 per student your former District Jeffco it's 2009 so they have about $100 more a kid but the big differences start to happen as I go up this list so St vain they're at 2595 per student so more than $600 almost $700 more per kid there Mapleton has $2,792 per student Aurora $3,198 per student Cherry Creek 3,400 19 per student Westminster 3512 per student Littleton $364 per student Denver $3,989 more per student or or per student and Boulder $4 4,478 per student so when you start to think about what does that
031mean uh for a school district when you multiply by 30,000 plus kids which we serve what it means for us is Boulder Valley if we had the same amount per pupil as they they do we'd receive another $91 million a year if we had the same amount of money as Denver we'd have another $74 million a year if we had the same amount as Littleton it's $60 million more 57 million more if we were Westminster 53 million more if we're Cherry Creek $46 million more for Aurora $31.5 million more for Mapleton almost $25 million more if we're St brain more than $12.6 million more if we're even Douglas County um so it puts us at a huge disadvantage and the challenge that often also comes with trying to get more money in the door here
032is out of those 15 school districts we have the lowest amount of property value per pup of any District so on assessed value per pupil basis which basically translates into how much money you're going to pay in taxes in Adams 12 that's along with Englewood it's $340,500 th000 home they currently pay about $400 a year to raise that $4,500 per kid and Adam's 12 a $500,000 homeowner would be paying almost $1,200 a year almost three three times the amount so we are uh I think we're often a misunderstood Community people often feel like there's got to be places that are poorer than us when it comes to a tax base and you often think about places like Westminster Public Schools or Mapleton Aurora Englewood Sheridan and the sad truth is that we're bottom of the
033Barrel in terms of property values and it creates uh real significant challenges for us to keep up with all these other districts in terms of Revenue if we had 91 million more like Boulder you'd be paid more uh one of the stats that I heard to um two stats I've heard recently one is that 40% of Boulder Valley teachers make $100,000 a year or more in Adam's 12 that number let me pull up the text with this data we have 106 Educators out of our 2450 who make $100,000 a year or more so it's about 4 and per compared to 40% plus in Boulder I'm saying this not to like um have people feel like gosh it really is no good to be in Adams 12 and this is a an awful place to be
034but I'm just trying to create some perspective about why we have to make some choices about class size about programming about compensation that are not the ones that I would want to make and I'm sure my colleagues here at this table would want to make and at the same time you know often the place you would look to to try to reduce uh class size increases at the elementary level or throughout the system is in terms of administrative support there's 178 school districts in Colorado and we're 172nd out of 178 and how much we spend on Administration we're at 6.32% the only District uh that's credibly lower than us is Jefferson County at 6.2% there are some smaller districts out in the state who are lower but we're 172nd out of 178 we try to
035keep this place as lean as possible even though that's not often The Narrative out there there are other districts around um Adams 14 spends close to 12% of their budget on admin Mapleton that's 12 uh 27 JS at more than 10% looking at some of these numbers littleton's at 9% St V at 8.45 Boulder eight so being at 6.32 um I think there's a lot of credible data to say that we try to put as much money in the classrooms as we POS possibly can there's other data that affirms that too so it's a long response um and I have this not because of you coming here tonight and saying what you did but I'm advocating uh with state legislators and I'm going to start speaking with principles tomorrow with our IBS team with our
036five star Leadership Academy with the media and anyone else who will listen that these huge inequities and mevy overrides have resulted in a system of Education that's not thorough and uniform like our state constitution requires and I think it's time to change that thank you the next speaker is Amber Jas I did sign up twice so I apologize for the thir one okay is it on my name is Amber Jas and I'm from thoron and I'm sure it's nice to put a face to all of the emails that everyone has gotten over the years I want to say Courtney thank you so much for actually being an advocate for me and my family um this is my daughter Tean jce she's getting bullied at Woodland ele and she has dyslexia and she's being called stupid
037she's the smallest one in her class and I brought it up to the principal and the day before I brought it up to the principal there was a um a suicide threat with a fourth grader that was getting bullied and there was so there was PD there at Woodland and it was a huge thing do you know what the principal told me and another mom who called crying and complaining that one little girl was traumatizing my daughter who now is so afraid to go to school that oh just wait it's going to get way more worse in middle school and even worse in high school that's not Zero Tolerance bullying that's tolerant tolerance and that's disgusting and I don't think any of my kids should have to deal with this my daughter is on an
038IEP and she gets called stupid she gets discriminated against and the principal has she puts the perpetrator in with the two victims and doesn't have any kind of wherewithal to call the parents of these little girls to be in the same room and my daughter is now too afraid to go to school and I know everybody knows about this this is my son Noah Jas he has severe non-verbal autism he was locked in a storage closet by a principal Matt havland from Woodland and do you know what all they did was they let him go with all of his salaries and he's still getting a pension right now that's one way you guys could pay them is stop giving him his pension he's a child abuser and I've begged and begged and begged for the
039video evidence because it's proven for that he was not only just manually locked in it but the his foot was against the door he went in with his hand above his head and my son came home with bruises nobody checked on my child and do you know what everybody said nothing I had a meet with um the lawyers from here and they said nothing but I learned a whole lot about Legacy and Horizon's um lawsuits that are going on because of the lawyer speaking out against it in front of everybody sexual assault and that's just these these cases of bullying and everything else my son deserves this and I'm demanding from everybody here and all of you witnesses that I get this video tape and my children get the justice that they deserve cuz it's
040disgusting and this is this is bullying at its finest from from the people who are supposed to be those who are supposed to keep them safe I can't even trust any of it so I appreciate your time and I thank you Courtney and I've emailed everybody so I know everybody knows my name and here's my face Amber dce thank you thank you Amber the next speaker is Jen kefir hi okay I didn't plan you didn't even plan on coming here gosh I don't even know how to turn this on I turned it on hi I'm Jen keeper I a kindergarten teacher at Silver Creek I've been in our district for 24 years I've actually had some of lots of kids from parents in here in the building and I wasn't even going to plan a
041speech but on the way here and viny was going to speak for our school I thought started thinking about 2023 election and how kind of what platform a lot of you ran on and how you ran on the platform about smaller class sizes and what's best for kids and and I even got some quotes on my phone um by making sure that resources get to where they're needed and to make sure every school gets what they need to meet the needs of their students was one quote from one of you and and Mr gdowski I love your response to Vincy but sitting there I'll tell you like a couple things went through my mind first I've been working for the district for 24 years oh my gosh if some districts are paying that much yikes
042that I waited that long but more than that like I feel like now we're just being like teachers are getting consequences for what we're doing because we have face-to-face interactions with students so we work so hard with these kids on a day-to-day basis I teach kindergarten I teach four and fivey olds because they're allowed to come at four years old I have to get these kids to be somewhat proficient in Reading using the bathroom tying their shoes building a Rel relationship with a kid I can't build a relationship with a student if I have 26 kindergarteners in my class I have 28 Cubbies that I can use and our projected numbers are going to be pretty much overflowing my cubbies in my classroom so if I have 28 kids or more in my class how's
043that Equitable it's going to be Equitable for the kid who has to put his clothes in the hamper at the end because there's not enough room but we're losing teachers and I understand we want to pass M levies and get all that stuff going but in the meantime we should not be the ones who are taking the grunt of it we are coming in every day doing what's best for kids making sure they're learning making sure they're safe but I'm told that administrators are paid this much and and then we get an email that all these new District people are hired and I don't know that any of them have ever had face-to-face interactions with kids and if they have awesome I hope they have but if they haven't all I hear is here's some
044more curriculum here's some more this here's some more that make sure you form a good relationship with these five and six yearolds and again like some of you board members are just reelected ones I'm pretty sure that's a lot of your platform was make sure we're not having huge class sizes the other person's going to be cutting teachers other person's going to be cutting this person make sure you get out there and vote well we did and now we're getting teachers cut left and right so thank you thank you that concludes public comment okay um next instructional materials presentation good evening board members Kim Brady executive director of curriculum instruction and really excited to have Valerie Miller from student Support Services here with me this evening and happy to walk you through um our instructional
045materials Review Committee and the meeting that we had in March so um the purpose of our 6230 instructional materials review process is to make sure that we bring any um instructional materials that we are looking at adopting um in our district that are aligned to the Colorado academic standards and aligned to our Adams 12 guaranteed and viable curriculum so um this is aligned to our current 6230 policy and um our committee when we met in March and anytime that we meet we work off a consensus model if no consensus can be reached then we take whatever um recommendation or any um notes that we have from that committee meeting to our chief academic officer and then um that report is given to you you'll notice when you look at um the results of our committee
046meeting um we were able to reach consensus on all of the materials that we brought forward to you in this particular um meeting this time so um we look at um how those materials are brought um to our committee they can either come from an individual School a Content team or whether it's a new course or program or if it's an update to a series that we already have in um our content or in our curriculum so in this particular um you know committee meeting these were all brought um by content teams and so we'll talk about um the materials that we're going to be looking at but before we do just a little bit about the process our instructional materials committee is a multi- shareholder group um that is facilitated by me with um
047the district appropriate staff that um comes with those recommendations we have District principles classroom teachers parents community members we have students that are part of the committee and then we have staff members with relevant expertise that are also part of um the committee that um work with um to ensure that we have all the relevant um expertise that we need to um provide the committee with and then um we use a criteria to um ensure that the materials that we're looking at meet a set of standards and the first two um criteria that we look at are does it align to our um state standards and does it meet our um guaranteed viable curriculum and it does this fulfill a need for students in our um in our system so those are the first two
048criteria and then um we use a rubric to determine um and the committee looks at um how well does each material set um meet the rest of these criteria does it um enrich our Curriculum by really um representing various students needs interests and M and abilities does it present the material in a manner that's appropriate for all grade levels or the grade level that it is um we're particular recommending it for um does it represent factual knowledge literary appreciation um aesthetic values and ethical standards um if it's a piece of fiction does it have mirrors and windows for students um to not only see themsel in but also see others or other um you know perspectives and then um lastly does it set a set forth opposing sides of controversial issues so that our students
049can develop um critical analysis of media or um become critical thinkers and um does it represent all various different um perspectives with religious ethnical cultural groups and really think about how all um people represent the contributions to our American Heritage and then does it show fairness towards those individual groups and those individual perspectives so those are the criteria that are on our rubric you'll notice this time around we looked at a couple different um sets of resources we looked at resources from our culturally linguistically diverse department for resources for ele elementary middle school and high school and then from our student Support Services Department um Valerie's going to talk about um a resource called circles and then we also looked at a resource in the fiction lane from the 1619 um project called born on
050the water and so let's first talk about our um culturally linguistically diverse curriculum and their resource adoption um part of the work and part of the reason why they brought this to us is because there was a change in the standards and so weeda 2020 which is the standards for our English language development um program there was a shift in their standards and so with the shift in their standards they needed to revise the guaranteed and viable curriculum for educators in the field and with that they needed to adopt some new resources so in the PowerPoint presentation in those um links for you you'll notice that there are um titles that are coming from a vendor called TCM which is teacher created um materials and those are titles that they have um in particular curated
051like here is a title at kindergarten that could be a read aloud called join in and play and then they also have um Raz kids and then another title called the Buddy bench that they would choose to purchase from like Amazon or another vendor because it just may be cheaper or not um available through TCM and then they've got that available the same curated list for first 2 3D fourth and fifth so when our committee looked at this they looked at the curated list um for each grade level and then for each unit and that's what they were looking to review and then similarly um for so Elementary really was um not only the text in hand from TCM but also Brad's kids and then new news Ela which are some um online resources and
052then for Middle School this was all virtual resources from news Ela and you'll see again a curated list of sample nonfiction articles that our committee looked at to see if these were grade level appropriate and met the standards of the rubric so in looking at that the committee scored those appropriately and felt like for not only Elementary Middle School and High School that everything um received the full score and was appropriate so moving forward I'm going to let Valerie talk about circles okay thank you so as part of the work that has been done to expand the Continuum Services um for students with disabilities student Support Services um conducted a pilot of a social skills curriculum called circles um this fall with three of our middle schools to of our high schools and then two
053transition teachers in our 18 to 21 um grades um programs circles is a curriculum that's targeted for use with students that have developmental disabilities the circles curriculum is a multimedia teaching curriculum that makes information about relationship specific social skills available for students with functional challenges um it's for students that are non-readers or students developing those kind of reading skills or kind of our non-traditional readers um for concrete Learners and for other diverse Learners such as students that would be in our significant support needs programs um the curriculum teaches social distancing or social distance appropriate levels of touch such as waving high fives hugs and other skills like that identifying feelings and appropriate interpersonal skills and also social relationships through the use of colorcoded concentric circles so this starts with teaching the center circle which they
054call the purple circle which starts with the self and then it teaches through the last Circle being what they call the stranger Circle so it's teaching all of these skills in each one of these circles um the lessons are presented through scripted lessons um activities and then also through video modeling um we concluded this successful pilot within our seven sites this winter and we're happy to report that it was very successful and very well received within all our programs through our teachers and our um students and then finally I would just add in relationship to circles you can see the scoring on the rubric that this also received very high marks from the committee and the committee appreciated that there was also um access to um common language for all of our students with special
055needs to talk about what was appropriate boundaries um in relationship to personal space and then also um in relationship to how they might interact with other staff members and other adults um within their building and then moving forward um our one piece of literature that was up for review this time around was um born on the water from the 1619 project and a group of fifth grade teachers that are working on um revising the curriculum and to ensure that we have more culturally diverse perspectives um wanted to bring this particular read aloud forward in order for consideration and um as you can see part of the standards in fifth grade with history standard 2A and history standard 2 C really require that we have more diverse perspectives around the teaching of American history and with
056that um within the unit it also talks about um not only ensuring that um we talk about the interactions between diverse groups of people and how they impact life on the colonial regions and so this particular text um um was brought forward to consider how um our you know people of color contribute to the colonial regions um and that they have a history prior to um slavery and so that it just provides a more humanistic view of um of this particular population and um the development of the southern colonies prior to the enslaved labor period And so um you can see the committee's thoughts perspectives all really positive lots of comments about um the beauty of this particular text and how um you know it was really appreciated that this was a perspective that was
057maybe lacking in our curriculum prior to so I'm going to pause and any questions about the process or questions about committee scoring comments or any of the materials anybody have any questions I have a comment I really was excited to see circles we use parts of it um in our practice working with our clients with intellectual and developmental disabilities that need that behavioral support and it same we've seen such great things with it so I was really excited we don't use that particular one but others that are very very similar to it so I'm excited to see that that was been adopted okay all right thank you I I was going to say I do like the in the rubric we include um the cultural lens piece and taking a look at making sure we
058have diverse perspectives that mirror and also um what was the phrase you used mirror Windows mirrors and windows and windows yes that we have um that as a criteria um my question is whether or how we also um and I know the material is suggested by CDE and I'm wondering whether there are also other avenues to Source really excellent material not that we're not sourcing it now but just for consideration like I would love to hear recommendations from other committees um on potential materials to include like the American Indian parents Association or is that the complete title I can't remember um and also the special education um advocacy committee and things of that sort um to create an even bigger pool um the other thing I would love to see is um some sort of
059review from a a person directly being mirrored I guess in that text right so um a case in point I would think is with circles it would be fascinating to hear just hearing from Amira having used this and having a child child who might may qualify as having a developmental disability they might have interesting Insight perspectives um suggestions to share that the committee might find helpful so these are just some things to consider um some ideas I have off the cuff but the process as is is a pretty robust process well and I do want to add APAC did um they do have a lot of conversation around text like how to get more that they feel would align better with their culture beliefs and things like that and we also provide additional books to
060them so I do know that that committee specifically does try to feed more back to our resources I don't know if this completely answers your question but with circles um a big piece of the curriculum is the video modeling so I guess the best way to describe what the video modeling is is almost a reality kind of video where the kids are where the person directly speaks to the kids and then talks about her life and shares kind of what's going on and the kids um that participated we did a lot of observation while the teachers were showing the videos and they were super eager to watch these some developed little kind of like what's she up to this week and what's going to happen and what's going on in her life and they wanted
061to see and they had these kind of um kind of attachments to what was going on in her life and seeing what was going on and drawing these kind of um Connections in what was going on in her life and what was going on in their own lives and so it was kind of fascinating to see that connection that the kiddos were making um in in those videos and in their own lives yes so what you're doing with with the the mirroring there I think is excellent you have the kids in a sort of piloting situation they're testing it out they're giving you feedback you're able to take it use it iterate on it um that's all wonderful stuff and it's just a matter of uh my question I guess is more like how can
062we make this like with everything that has a mirroring component right yeah I think anytime we can get that real-time feedback from students it is this reflective of your experience and have more of those authentic engagement kind of opportunities yeah definitely okay thank you thank you okay on to the board Department budget you have the proposed budget in your packet and um look it over it's not like we spend a ton of money but there are some things that we have to spend it on and some of the things we have a little bit of leeway one of the biggest differences that you're going to see in the proposed budget is budgeting a little bit more for professional development for us um as you know um Amir and I go to nasby advocacy and equity
063qu in January um just for the record we fund our own hotel and airfare for that um it's I've gone several times now in soer and it's a very valuable conference so we um propose some that in the budget nasby has an annual conference they just had theirs last weekend um we didn't go but we did go to San Diego a couple years ago so those are things that we can think about maybe differently um and one of the other differences is that francis's um expenses and salary have always been our full responsibility or should I say our Administrative Assistant um and then moving and when we get our new Administrative Assistant we're going to be having um we're sharing her with other departments so we don't have to budget for her whole salary because
064another department is taking that uh the biggest one you know as you see is the audit and the election fees um you never know what the election's going to cost but you know we have to predict within a reasonable amount and then um the AER the comprehensive um audit too does anybody have comments or questions okay if any come up just holler all right we also um okay actually I'm sorry I have a quick question when we create this budget are we when we plan for nasby and casby are we planning um do we pay as a whole for our district to go or do we pay per board member each board member has an entrance fee a registration fee right I don't know it's probably what about three or 400 a person it is
065a per person it is a per person um and I believe the the entrance fee last year or the last time was 800 something to nasby and it's about 500 to the January conference per person and same with December so it's not that we have to go it's just we're giving ourselves an option if we want to go I think at this time hearing some of the concerns we have about class sizes and some of our budget issues I'm going to um excuse myself from nasby casby and some of these conferences to allow us to help better utilize some of the expenses that would be spent here to help um in other areas okay well and then the philosophy behind going to some of these conferences is to make us better board members and when
066you look at the dollar amounts um 10 and $20,000 doesn't pay much in terms of a classroom teacher well I'm grateful that casby has a lot of these resources available also online okay we're not voting on this tonight we'll vote on it next time there is no vote on this the board actually approves this in conjunction with the adopted budget the whole budget yes okay thanks for that clarification okay all right okay the next is a resolution and opposition of House Bill 24 1363 Charter School's accountability uh director Potter would you like to address this yes first I want to thank everyone for making time for this tonight I know it was a shorter turnaround um we've had about five to seven days notice that this was going to be heard tomorrow um and so
067there's two big reasons that I bring this resolution forward um this is an opposition to house bill 24363 which is specifically around Charter Schools um One is because I have heard ongoing conversations from a lot of our Educators about new Charters um and the potential for professional flexibility often times our charter schools have some smaller class sizes they pay differently there's different calendars there's different options there um there are some teacher-led charter schools that have been talking about this area um and so I want to make sure that we consider some of our educators needs but also the second reason is um because I I believe that we should support all amazing Adams 12 choices and this 54-page bill has the potential to significantly alter how Charter Schools operate without adequate input from stakeholders there
068were 40,000 plus emails sent to legislators many of which were from Adams 12 in opposition and I believe that we should follow our pattern and respect our community and rise in opposition on this bill comments so I I guess what I'm Wonder okay so from what I understand with this bill it's about requiring transparency with public tax dollar well tax dollars for public schools so what so what I understand is is the bill is requiring that all schools provide the exact same level of transparency of how those tax dollars are being spent um without the I guess lack of transparency or hidden or whatever is occurring in some schools throughout the state um and so and if they are requiring and correct me if I'm wrong on this one because I I remember correctly if
069they're requiring waivers um to have a better explanation of what those waivers are for why um just as public district schools have to do so again what I'm and maybe some things have changed I followed it but what this bill is just requiring is that all public charter schools that receive public tax dollars follow the same rules as our as our Public District Schools is that and that is correct a portion of the bill but it is not the entirety of the bill there is some verbiage in the bill that I find to be a little bit concerning regarding um funding when there's declining enrollment there is some verbiage in there about automatic waivers which I believe every single Charter School in Adams 12 is currently operating on and while I understand The Importance of
070Being transparent I campaigned on transparency I believe every charter school that we have had has gone through a rather intensive accountability process with our DC um and they come in front of us on a pretty regular basis to show us that they are meeting these standards they are holding up to the expectations and regardless of whether this bill is in place or not all of our charter schools are operating in a transparent way no I agree I think I think our Adam 12 schools are doing phenomenal with that and doing a great job with being transparent I mean that's why we have such a great relationship with our Adam 12 Charter Schools um and I think though too like what this really is so and I can understand some of the opposition but you know
071our our Adams 12 charter schools are doing a lot of what pretty much everything that I think this bill would require unfortunately that is not the same many charter schools throughout the state um and so I guess that's really my at least personally it's like our our Adam 12 charter schools are kind of a shining star um and that hasn't always been the case either I mean just a handful of years ago Stargate was not in a great place for transparency and so I think now that we have great leadership there um things have definitely change and so I I just think though this if I I have such a hard time that if people are getting public tax dollars they need to be transparent and I will say that it is not necessarily our
072job as elected Adams 12 board members to make decisions for other school districts and when our Charter School Community has spoken out about this bill it is somewhat our responsibility to look at that and listen to our Charter Community who are going to are they're more subject matter experts than we are when it comes to the charter schools and that is why again I had asked for opposition they can bring it back next year usually they they take bills if they die they revamp that and they bring it back um and they can then use some of that time to listen to the 40,000 emails to talk to the Charter School leaders and come back with a plan that does not um completely gut the charter school system which this bill will do I I
073guess really quick I be C I have not personally received any emails or any communication from any of our Charter Schools about opposition to this I mean and so I that's why I'm I'm kind of surprised um I mean I feel like I have I mean you can reach out to any of the charter schools to ask send question um and if they reach out to one board member you know that's um I believe that director Assad Lucas was in the middle of a sentence and you interrupted her what I was going to say was that I'm happy to reach out and ask but I just I think if they felt this strongly about it they know I mean especially we've frequented and visited these charter schools and we have a really good relationship with
074the leadership and I I would like to think and I could be wrong and that's why I'm going to reach out but I'd like to think that they would have reached out and just shared their concerns and their feedback and so I will definitely do that but I have not received any information yet Alexis um thank you so to Echo that I think um I would really like to drill down with our charter schools on what pieces of this um Bill you know obviously the bill summary is very different I went on um the Secretary of States and looked at the lobbyists that had registered for it and against it um which which was definitely interesting but I mean is it is it the 5% cap is it the um because there's a lot of
075pieces in this bill that I think are extremely important when we talk about transparency the fact that a board member can't have financial interest in a charter school we've had that in the state we've had that in multiple districts and that is inappropriate these are public dollars so I would just I again understand and I I very much uh in my own work as a government relations person worry about uh the unintended consequences of policy so if there are very specific pieces in here that our Charter Schools worry about I'd like to hear that but otherwise there's so much in here that that I know Adams 12 is doing I know that's why I trust our Charters I know other charters in the state aren't doing and and I think that they should be held
076accountable do you have anything to say Paul I mean and I understand Courtney's had like it came out seven days ago and Courtney's had like a few few days to put together the resolution at this point I just don't feel like we've heard enough from it enough from various stakeholders um and I don't feel like I know enough about the bill um and I feel like I being the person that I am I need to know more before I do anything with it well I do know that the Bill's been out for a long time and it's been scheduled for quite a while the hearing's tomorrow I know that um and I think too that I'll just Echo what mea said our Charter Schools I don't think this bill really affects them at all um
077and I and I think that our Charter Schools we do have a good relationship with them we do have you know they do have they're transparent um I will say you know as a school board us elected School Board we don't really have much say in what they do um except when it's time to renew their Charter um I think this pertains more to Charter Schools who are in the charter school Institute system um is there anybody from the district that wants to um reinforce that or so I don't know that staff has a lot of detailed knowledge about this bill um to be candid it's 54 pages long there was a conversation I had recently with our Deputy general counsel about it and given other pressing things and our perception that um monitoring the
078bill was likely uh the best path forward there was some discussion that the bill was likely to die in committee my direction at a deputy general counsel wasn't was not to spend hours and days looking through it all and preparing a memo so I don't know if there's any more review that's happened since then I'm surmising not but Phil if you know anything more about the bill would appreciate your thoughts when this matter was placed on the board of genda I pulled the bill and it is 54 plus I think it's 55 pages long I read the summary and I skimmed it um it does a lot you know um and it's I believe easy to predict that charter schools in general would not be in favor of this bill um but I don't think
079it has much effect on Adams 12 today thank you so this is in its committee's first tomorrow tomorrow reading right because as as I know we have multiple options which are monitoring support oppose or nothing yeah or support if amended I just I I don't think we have enough certainly tonight to oppose um information I think monitoring is the best and seeing how it comes through committee um is that I mean are those the direct we take or nothing I mean we you know we don't take action a lot on bills as you know you might know I mean we do but not all the time um but there would have to be a motion in a second and we'd have to vote so at this time is there a motion for anything well just
080inate a motion you know starting with do we wantana to has their a motion to um adopt this resolution does Robert's rules say I have to ask that three times I did my wait time okay okay I always thought it was okay is there any other discussion on this at the moment again I just want to thank you guys for taking the time to at least have the discussion around the bill um and thank our general counsel for looking it over as well so I would like to thank that um this is a moment where we are greatly appreciative of Phil spare and his willingness to wait into a 54-page draft bill for us um and offer his take we it's um thank you so I've said this before and I'll say it again if
081there is a piece of legislation that you want us to play co pay closer attention to feel free does that mean we're going to always agree but it's fine to bring it up all right on to minutes I will entertain a motion to approve the minutes of the regular board meeting of March 20th 2024 and the minutes of the March 20th 2024 work study session as presented so moved second is there any um discussion director Assad Lucas I director bastelli I director Goldstein hi director Marsh Holan I director Potter I motion to approve consent agenda items D2 and D3 is presented so moved second any discussion director sad Lucas I director pelli I director Goldstein I director Marsh holen I director Potter I okay um future agenda items next meeting's next Wednesday um 17th this
082meeting was out of order because of Spring Break um you can see the topics here um yeah anything anybody wants to add uh president goldine you had indicated at the last board meeting uh that you wanted to say something about that the board would be meeting with Dak uh in a work study session and just to remind members if they had yeah and that will be on the 17th I believe yeah so that's what our work study session will be um a couple of years ago when um the deck was in their norming phase of their storming they were going through some um can I interject for a second I believe we got that date wrong um yeah it I apologize it's the it's in may not not April the first meeting in May first
083meeting in May yes apologies thank you um the deck is a board committee and the deak would like some direction from us so we will meet with them and have a conversation with them as far as giving them um some guidelines of how to what to do next and I hope that you've been listening and can give us some suggestions good okay anything else all right have a good evening and thank you for those of you that came you actually came for a short meeting