May 21, 2025 Board Work Session

001Oh, one here. All right, everybody. All right. Good evening. Welcome to the Gram Board of Education regular board work session, Wednesday, May 21st, 2025. Roll call. We have in attendance Chris Howard, chair, Paulie Migleman, vice chair. Lake Peterson is excused tonight. David Ligitage, director, Dr. Myra Gomez, director, and Dr. Sean Barnes, director. We also have an attendance, John Cook, interim superintendent. And we have one vacant position that has been unveiled. So, with that, is there a motion? I don't have any changes to the agenda. Is there a motion to approve the agenda as presented? Uh, sound like Holly got the second. So, it's been moved by Myra, seconded by Holly to approve the agenda as presented. Any discussion? All those in favor? I. Any oppose? Thank you. So, our first item of business is a

002termination hearing. This will be an action item after we receive a presentation. The procedure for the hearing is as follows. Uh we want to also make sure that uh as I read all of these to keep it in mind that we don't use either the parent name or the student name in any um conversation or presentation. Do we have online Sarah the Oh yeah. [Music] I did send anyone that was supposed to be speaking um panelist links. So they should have a panelist situated. Okay. Because I don't see because I'm looking for the attorney and the employee. I realize I don't want to go into the whole the employee and not Oh, okay. Okay. I'm sorry. I didn't know. Well, no one no one clicked something. I was told you were going to be virtual,

003so I was looking at the board. I'm sorry. with that. No, I was told that you were going to be online and so attorney attorney. Okay. All right. I misunderstood that part. So, and Isabelle is one of those the attorneys. So, she's joining now. Okay. All right. Okay. Sorry. Should have had a name tag. Just saying. Thank you. Should have had our name tags. All right. So um this evening we will have the superintendent or his design shall present to the board the superintendent's recommendation for the dismissal of probationary teacher Natasha Graham. This presentation shall ask no long uh as I was starting to say we are not using the parent name or the student name in any conversation about this matter. Following the presentation of the superintendent is designate. Miss Green and or her

004representatives will have an opportunity to present any statement or documentary evidence that they wish to have the board consider prior to considering the dismissal recommendation. There will not be an opportunity to call witnesses or cross-examine district representatives. This presentation shall be limited to no more than 20 minutes. Following Miss Green's presentation, the superintendent and his design shall have up to 10 minutes to present any rebuttal information or make any desired closing statement to the board. Miss Green or her representative shall then have up to 10 minutes to make any desired closing statement to the board. Um, so I'm adding members up and the presentation itself is 20 minutes and then the followup is the 10 minute 10 minute part 10. So it could be a total of 60. Okay. Okay. Thank you. I just want

005to verify that. And I do recognize that there are a number of people here in the room with us in our work session and in this particular agenda item. We will not be having um public comment regarding this. The only people that will be speaking will be Miss Green and her representative. So [Music] um where are we starting? Dr. Good evening um Chair Howlet and members of the board. I am Angela the assistant superintendent here school district. Uh Natasha Green is a temporary employee. She was hired on on December 9th, 2024 and her employment was set to conclude on um no um they have some information that they wanted to hand out to the your documents have been given to the board already. We have so pass them. I'm not sure if these are the

006documents that you've been you've received. I apologize. Um I can't hear very well on the recording, so I'm not sure what's being said in the background, but we have documents that we will hand out during our section of the proceeding. So Natasha, you can hold on to those for now. And in terms of my audio, I'm having a a really hard time hearing anything on my end. I'm not sure if there's anything that can be done for that, but um just want to flag that. We'll just try and speak up a little bit. All right. Sorry. Dr. All right. Um so she was hired on December 9th, 2024, and her employment was set to conclude on June 13 of 2025. Regardless of the outcome of this dismissal hearing, her employment with the district will terminate

007in accordance with the terms of her temporary contract at the end of this school year. This is also a probationary employee. According to the standard for fair dismissal, any is any reason deemed in good faith sufficient that essentially that is an essentially an at will standard under which only an unlawful reason such as discrimination, retaliation, whistleblowing or something similar would not be sufficient to support the attorney and recommendation. This is the com this combination of temporary and probationary status which Natasha Green has means that the district has the highest level of flexibility to determine whether an individual's employment should be or should not be terminated. It is it also means that the district is generally not going to wait very long before determining that someone should not continue their employment. This is not a long-term

008employee or someone with a lengthy history or connection to the district. It is someone who is typically filling in for a regular employee who is on leave or when someone is um when there's someone or some other expected midyear absence. In short, the district is not going to invest a significant amount of time and resources correcting performance or behavior of someone who will be the with the district for only a brief period of time. The record in this case establishes that there is good faith reason to terminate this temporary contract. Specifically, the evidence demonstrates a pattern of physical interactions with students and their clothing in an effort to correct or redirect behavior despite the employee receiving notice that such behavior is unacceptable. Regardless of whether the physical contact is forceful or malicious, it is not

009the way that teachers are allowed to modify the behavior of students. The teacher herself acknowledges that she engaged in this physical contact. Pages one and five through six of the rebuttal dated April 30th from BLJ Law Firm. Although she attempts to excuse it by calling it non-disciplinary or insignificant. On January 9th, a parent reported that the teacher pulled her son's arm. video confirmed that the teacher placed hands on the student. The teacher was asked the teacher asked to watch the video and she did with an administrator. The teacher was advised of the importance of keeping hands off of students. Again, on January 23rd, the assistant principal observed the teacher pull on the back of a student's hood to get his attention. She met with the teacher and followed up with an email to remind her

010to be careful when approaching students. On March 19th, the parent reported that her child claimed that the teacher put her hands on his forehead and squeezed uh squeezed the forehead the previous day on March 18th. On March 19th, a student reported that the teacher pulled his chair out from underneath him when he got to class, causing him to fall and hurt his elbow. Same day, March 19th, the teacher was placed on paid administrative leave. During the three individual investigative interviews with students, they stated the following. Quote, "The teacher pulled them by the arm when they were goofing around." Quote, "The teacher yells a lot and scares the student when she slams her hands on the desk. Quote, "The teacher grabs everyone. When they are lining up and wants them to be somewhere in line, she'll

011grab them by the arm, the hood, the coat, or the shoulders." Quote student heard another the other student say, "Don't pull my chair. quote, "Even though the teacher yells a lot, I know the teacher loves me. The teacher puts her arm on his head all the time when she walks by." Quote, "The teacher pulls my arm when I'm not doing what I'm supposed to do." Interviews with two staff members stated, "The teacher seems overwhelmed with the class, moves students to different locations by putting her hands on their shoulders and moving them into different positions when she wants them in. and she does this in frustration rather than using verbal cues. The teacher puts her hand out towards the students faces and says, "No, sit down." This teacher has cried in front of the class, overwhelmed.

012Part of the evidence in this case is video evidence that clearly demonstrates the teacher using physical interactions to modify student behavior. This video was viewed by administrators and the teacher was allowed to view it as well on January 13, 2025. As a result of systems limitations, the video overwrites itself after a period of time, so it's no longer available. While that's regrettable, it does not change the fact that she was allowed to view the video and respond to what was seen. You will hear allegations that the CVA or the collective bargaining agreement was violated during the processing of the complaints and the investigation into this teacher. Those claims are irrelevant for our purposes tonight as this is not a grievance hearing. The only entity that can file a grievance under RCBA is the GBA and

013the ECBC and they have never filed a grievance on this teacher's behalf alleging violations of the contract. She had association representation along the way. So if GBEA believed that there was a contract violation, they would have had knowledge and the opportunity to submit a grievance. They never did. And therefore, this is no there is no grievance for you to consider at this time. The district has not received any formal complaint from this teacher alleging any mistreatment or violation of her rights. as a staff member of the Gresian Barlo School District. You may also hear that this situation is driven by a difficult student and/or a parent. This is akin to victim blaming. She is attempting to excuse her behavior by painting the student and his parent as the real problem. This does not change what

014is documented by her own admission and the evidence, including the video evidence. The teacher repeatedly put hands on students in order to gain compliance even after being instructed not to. In conclusion, the district simply cannot have teachers putting hands on students even when they believe it is a minor contact that is not forceful or disciplinary in nature. This behavior is prohibited by the district and it creates potential legal liability. When this behavior is engaged in by an employee, particularly a temporary employee, the district cannot wait and hope that the employee stops engaging in the behavior. This termination is for good faith reasons and therefore should not be overturned. Thank you. Okay. And I just want to confirm um the process. Would you like for us to hold any questions that the board has until we've

015heard both and then we'll do questions at that point? I understand. Okay. All right. So, with that, um, Dr. Freeman has completed her presentation at this point and we're now at the opportunity for Miss Green and and there I will be speaking on Miss Green's behalf. Can everybody hear me? Okay, got you. Awesome. Thank you. My name is Isabelle Harris. I'm an attorney here at Bryant Lovelin and Jarvis. Our office has been retained to represent Natasha Green. I'll be speaking um throughout this hearing on her behalf. Um at this time, I'd like uh to ask Candy, it looks like she already is, to hand out the materials we have prepared. Um, in this packet you will find our official statement for tonight's hearing as well as various statements of support um on behalf of Natasha

016from former colleagues, parents, staff, as well as a statement from the association. First of all, thank you for allowing me to participate virtually. I know it's not ideal. Um, I appreciate your willingness um to accommodate that request. Um, I also want to thank everyone who is in the room tonight who has come to support Miss Green and stand up against false assertions made against Miss Green. If you're here tonight to support Miss Green, would you please just raise your hand? Thank you for coming. I know I deeply appreciate it and I know Miss Green does too. This is a very serious situation as I know the board is fully aware of. Therefore, we appreciate the board's willingness to listen to Miss Green's objections and concerns and to fairly and thoroughly review and consider Miss Green's

017response to the allegation and the situation generally. The situation in front of the board is the district's attempt to terminate Miss Green for an unlawful purpose without due process. We are gravely concerned with district's treatment of Miss Green throughout the investigation. The allegations made against Miss Green are uns unsubstantiated and unsupported by any evidence other than hearsay from one or two second graders and a parent. District has failed to conduct an impartial and adequate investigation into the alleged conduct. Had district completed a proper investigation, it would have found the alleged conduct unsubstantiated and meritless. Furthermore, as I will discuss in more detail, district's investigation was overall flawed and suspicious. There's alleged video evidence that no longer exists, dates that conduct occurred where Miss Green was not on school grounds, and meetings that there are no

018records or notes of. Upon newly discovered information, it is highly suspicious that shortly after a problematic parent made a comment about Miss Green's inability to teach effectively due to her Christian faith, the district then initiated this investigation. District's prompt investigation into Miss Green following these comments may constitute retaliation, discrimination, and an unlawful employment action. Given the failure to conduct a reasonable investigation into the alleged serious misconduct and district's potential discrimination against Miss Green, district cannot in good faith terminate Miss Green even if she is a probationary status. First, I want to acknowledge that Miss Green unequivocally and categorically denies all allegations of unprofessional behavior, unwarranted physical intervention, or otherwise. Miss Green has not engaged in any corrective physical interaction, nor have these instances been made known to her by district. Second, in connection with the

019district's investigation, the district has violated the collective bargaining agreement between the district and the association in many instances, including those pertaining to video surveillance, failure to permit union representation at disciplinary meetings, and adherence to the complaint/investigation procedure contained in the CBA. In addition, district included six new allegations in the letter of reprimand in uh submitted by principal Shauna Sewell that were not made known to Miss Green throughout her investigative interview. This not only constitutes a violation of the CBA, but it's a gross violation of Miss Green's due process and demonstrates the district's failure to conduct a reasonably fair impartial investigation. Furthermore, in its investigation recommendations for dismissal, the district has failed to provide Miss Green with specific policy violations she has allegedly committed. Instead, the district has relied on vague and ambiguous statements without reference

020to specific board policies or procedures. Mr. Ko's assertion that Miss Green does not have standing to bring a claim against the district is false and contrary to relevant case law and state and federal statute. Miss Green has all the rights afforded to her under the CBA as a third-party beneficiary as well as state and federal law against the district for its failure to provide Miss Green adequate due process, its contractual violations under the CBA, and its termination for an unlawful purpose. With regard to the specific allegations, the allegations made against Miss Green remain unsub unsubstantiated. Miss Sewell did not complete a fair, thorough, and impartable investigation. In many instances, the allegations are vague without unsupported documentation or evidence, making it extremely difficult for Miss Green to respond to the allegations. In addition, we have not

021and Miss Green has not been provided with any of the notes from any interviews conducted throughout the investigation, which seem to consist solely of conversations with several of Miss Green's second graders and potentially several parents. Miss Sewell's letter also did not identify the students or when these interviews occurred. Again, these are vague, ambiguous, and unsubstantiated allegations. Specifically, Miss Green denies pulling or tugging any student on Jan June 9th or January 9th or January 23rd or otherwise in an aggressive, disciplinary, or corrective manner. Any hands-on contact that Miss Green has ever had with students, including high fives, fist bumps, or otherwise, have been positive in nature, gentle, and or for the safety of her classroom or the student. Miss Green has always acted as a reasonable teacher in the same or similar circumstances would. I also

022want to raise several concerns regarding the investigation. Generally throughout the investigation, there have been missing documents, footage, false statements, and a general lack of substantive evidence. District asserts that there once existed a video documenting Miss Green's physical conduct with a student. Miss Green has not seen this video, and it has apparently been deleted from the district server. Although that may be the district server's typical practice, had the district exercised reasonable care, it would have preserved the video knowing it had a duty to produce the video should it be used in a disciplinary proceeding. Not only does the video no longer exist, in the letter of reperand, Miss Sewell claimed that Miss Green had viewed the video in a meeting with Miss Sewell and discussed its contents with her. Miss Green has not viewed the video.

023And in fact, during the pre-termination hearing, when asked about this meeting, Miss Sewell admitted that she actually was not the one to meet with Miss Green to show her the video, but that it was a different administrator. There's no record to show this meeting has occurred or it has not been produced to Miss Green. To date, there have been no notes from any interviews with any witnesses or students or anyone district supposedly interviewed throughout the investigation process. I also want to point out that two of the allegations in Miss Sewell's letter of reprimand purportedly occurred on March 30th, 2025. Miss Green was placed on paid administrative leave on March 19th, 2025 and has not been on school grounds since. It is factually impossible for the alleged conduct to have occurred on the stated date. At

024best, this demonstrates district's carelessness in its investigation. At worst, it demonstrates district's actions to invent false facts and events that never occurred to retaliate against Miss Green. It seems that the impetus behind the investigation/disciplinary proceedings is the complaint made by the parent. The parents son is a student in Miss Green's classroom. On one or more occasions, Principal Sewell informed Miss Green that this parent is known for submitting complaints to the district in making false or unsubstantiated claims against district personnel. In addition, this parent took issue with Mrs. Miss Green's religious affiliation and made comments that because Miss Green had previously worked at a private Christian school, Miss Green was not qualified to teach. Clearly, Miss Green is the district scapegoat and represents the district succumbing to the pressure created by this parent. We believe the

025district may have discriminated against Miss Green for her religious beliefs and we are reserving the res the right to pursue this claim. I also want to highlight the policy and precedent that the board will establish if it goes through with the termination of Miss Green. If the board terminates Miss Green tonight, it will make clear that it is the district's position from here on out that every single instance in which a teacher has any hands-on contact with a student in any capacity, including positive or including for the safety of a student warrants investigation and that the teacher who engages in any form on form of hands-on contact, whether positive or for the safety, may be subject to disciplinary proceedings and possibly termination. By memorializing Miss Green's termination and accepting the allegations against her, the district

026will be establishing a policy that a teacher may never engage in any form of hands-on contact with their students. Furthermore, the termination of Miss Green tonight will show the district's careless disregard for proper and reasonable investigations into alleged physical conduct as is in this case. At this time, I'm going to read one or two statements that we've submitted to the board from various people that have worked with Miss Green in the past. I'm going to start with Miss Wardle's statement. The board has this attached to whom it may concern. My name is Katie Wardle and I have taught in the educational field for 34 years. I have known Natasha Green for 27 of those years. Over that time, I have seen Natasha grow in her desire to help further each student she teaches in their

027individual educational endeavor. This may seem to be a lofty goal considering considering the many challenges teachers have. Yet, Natasha perseveres in her desire to help each student learn and more importantly to learn to love the process of learning. She finds joy in seeing each student gain both educational and life skills. As she instructs and guides the students, she does so with poise and caring demeanor. She treats every student with dignity regardless of the students background and behavior in the classroom. She sees potential and giftings in each person she encounters. Natasha is a valuable teacher in the classroom. It would be a disservice to any district to take this type of quality teacher out of the classroom. If you have any further questions, you may contact Miss Wle about this statement. I'm going to read one

028other one. Again, there are several included for the board to read over. Um, but I want to highlight the second one is from the superintendent at Spring Mountain Charter Academy, Miss Hannah Gishkovich. My name is Hannah Gishkovich and I am writing in response to the request for the dismissal of Miss Natasha Green on the grounds of alleged inappropriate interaction with students. I had the opportunity to hire, work alongside, and closely observe Miss Green during the three years she was employed at Spring Mountain Christian Academy. Based on my professional experience with her, I can attest that these allegations are not consistent with her character or her conduct as an educator. At no time did I witness any behavior from Miss Green that could be described as physically inappropriate or harmful towards students. On the contrary, she

029consistently demonstrated professionalism, care, and a genuine commitment to the well-being and development of her students. During the time Miss Natasha Green was employed with us, she consistently demonstrated the qualities of a conscientious and respectful educator. She maintained strong classroom management, treated each student with individual care, and fostered a collaborative, growthoriented learning environment. Her dedication to creating an academically rigorous and emotionally supportive classroom was evident not only in her interaction with students, but also in her communication with families who often expressed appreciation for the respectful and inclusive atmosphere she cultivated. Miss Green communicates clearly and positively, both verbally and non-verbally. Her tone has always been calm and respectful, and her use of gestures when interacting with students has been consistently gentle, kind, and appropriate. At no point during her employment with us did I observe her

030receiving or receive reports suggesting otherwise. The current accusation is inconsistent with her character and with professional conduct I witnessed over the years. I strongly urged the board to reconsider the recommendation for her dismissal as judgment being proposed does not align with the person and educator she is known to be. As I said, I for the sake of time, I will not read the rest of the statements, but I trust the board will review them and consider them in their recommendation. In conclusion, again, Miss Green unequivocally and categorically denies all allegations of unprofessional behavior, unwarranted physical intervention, or otherwise contained in the formal complaint or the letter of reprimand. Miss Green requests that the board vote against Mr. Ko's recommendation and immediately reinstate Miss Green to her teaching position. Miss Green also requests that a letter

031be placed in her personnel file clearing her of the alleged unprofessional behavior and misconduct. If the district move forward moves forward with terminating Miss Green tonight, district will have lost a teacher with excellent recommendations, decades of experience, and one who cares immensely for the well-being of her students without conducting a reasonable investigation. Further, in terminating Miss Green, district will have committed numerous violations in the CBA, infringed on Miss Green's basic due process, and committed religious discrimination and retaliation against Miss Green. Furthermore, we believe that the district's egregious misconduct, continual violation of Miss Green rights, and blatant mistreatment of a teacher with decades of experience warrants press intervention into district's handling of such matters. If district terminates Miss Green, it will set a harmful precedent of violating teachers rights and investigating every single instance of hands-on

032contact. Thank you for your time and consideration. Dr. Thank you. Um, I wanted to correct uh council has mentioned that there was a typo on the letter of reprimand. It says March 30th, 2025 and I think Miss D has has stated that there was a typo instead of it saying incident. It should have said investigation and it is it was obvious that Natasha's not there on the clearly nothing could have happened. So I wanted to make that correction there. So you are correct on that. Um I also took a note that just to be clear that the teacher was not investigated for high fives or fist bumping or you know celebrating students. Um, she was investigating for using her hands to physically redirect students who had not comply with her directions. Um, this was stated

033in the rebuttal from the attorney on page one. Thinking this is the same, but this is what was given to us for the rebuttal. On page one, um, to get the students attention, Miss Green lightly tugged on their shirt and talked with him. Um, on page five under number one, Miss Green lightly grasped the student by the shirt to redirect them to initiate a conversation. Um, because the student consistently ignored Miss Green's directions and she wanted to speak with them. Um, there's another mention of a tug that was admitted. Um, down at the bottom of page five, Miss Green lightly shook the student's hood um because the hoodie was cinched up so much that she couldn't see the student's eyes. Um, page six, there's another mention that her practice has been to redirect students by

034gently placing a hand on their back, head or shoulder. uh down on number five. At times, Miss Green has directed students through a gentle, appropriately applied physical redirection. These are the kinds of things that we just can't have teachers doing in Russian Barley School District, redirecting students by putting hands on. Not that there was anyone hurt, but we just can't take that risk, especially with a temporary um employee. The final thing that I will re remind the board, it is uh the district's right to um dismiss a temporary probationary employee with um for any reason deemed in good faith sufficient and we believe that we have that and then um is there additional rebuttal from either Miss Rain bureaucracy. I just want to add to clarify on on the event that I believe is asserted

035on January 23rd for the hoodie event. Miss Green lightly shook the hoodie because the child's eyes were covered and he could not walk safely in line and he posed a threat not only to himself but to others. Her intent was not to remove the hood. Her intent was not to correct the student for the way he was wearing the hood. her intent was simply to ensure that him and the students around him were safe. That has been her intent in any of her physical interactions. And so I just want to clarify that. Um otherwise we have nothing else to say. So there are questions from the board uh regarding the information that has been presented. Um, we did have the information ahead of time. I believe most of that is is the information that we

036were just handed to handed as well. Um, that that was that was information in there. Um, and I can start. I had a couple of just clarifying questions directed to Dr. Freeman. Um if you would just very very briefly so that the board uh is aware um the general grievance process that that how that takes place. Um and then I have a couple more but if you wanted to start with that one. Uh the general grievance process for a probationary or a temporary employee is if there is a a if a supervisor notices or gets a complaint or concern from um a community member or a student, a teacher, a concern in our contract or a complaint is any any comment that reveals the teacher in a negative way. So that is very broad. So

037if there could be anything that um is negative upon the teacher that would would trigger a grievance process or a complaint process. So the principal would start at the level one with just a simple conversation. Um hey don't don't do this or did you know that this was happening or can we rectify at the lowest possible level? If it doesn't get better or something happens again, it can be elevated to a level two, which would mean a more formal conversation, maybe something in writing. Um, and then possibly a level three, where there would be something um like a letter of directive or something more formal. In the case of a a temporary employee, that those things are are non I won't say non-existent. there's pieces that are protected by the the GBA, but for a

038temporary employee, uh the state gives us the right to dismiss a temporary employee for um uh reasons that are good things. Yeah, that yes, thank you. I think Mr. was just a little bit confused and we're doing the complaint procedure in the contract versus grievance. grievance. Grievance. Uh if the union sees that we have violated the contract in one way or another, they have a timeline to abide by uh to say that hey, we've noticed that you've made this mistake. Let's talk about this. And then there's different levels of agreements as well. There are three of them. So you can try this format that you can try to solve at the lower level, level two, or level three. uh in this case at the pre-term hearing because that was brought up. I asked the uniser

039rep Bruce Sheir did you notice a violation contract that I need to know about the pre-term hearing and he said no. So yes, I mean no I'll come back and I don't want to do it all. Go ahead Dr. Um couple of questions. Um it is alleged that the um video is not existent. Is that true? It is true. Unfortunately in our um cameras and and John we call this better over operations every so many days it rewrites itself. If you do not pull it and download it then it will start reporting over itself security cameras. And just to clarify, she is a temporary employee. Correct. So if we decide there wasn't enough evidence to justify firing or whatever, she would just continue out the last six weeks and then be done. Correct. It's about

040three, but or whatever. Three weeks. Yeah. She would be on contract for Yeah. and the the servers for the video. It really depends on some ser or some video cameras are triggered by movement so they're not running all the time. If a lot are triggered, sometimes it deletes about every seven days. Sometimes it goes as long as 14 to 30. It really depends on how much cameras throughout the system are being used. So the server just keeps freeing up space for it to be able. Okay. Um, a question um to whoever wants to answer as far as the um the video surveillance um uh principal sto is it known by staff that there are cameras that are in common areas that may be recording activity that happens in the hallway? Yes. Okay. And it's at

041a regular um it's not turned on or turned off. It's on and it's available. So it's it's monitoring one more way to monitor. Did you want to think about it for a second? Okay. I guess I will ask is is it would it be general practice to pull those and download when there's a when there's a complaint that's being investigated? Is that is that normal practice and it just didn't get done this time or is that not normal? It is normal practice. I'll let Sean speak to that specific circumstance. But as a principal, there are times when if I'm dealing with an employee and it's a first time occasion, don't do this. Do you see this? I might not think to pull it. It's not appropriate necessarily in full, but it is appropriate to review

042that. Um, so yes, if it's if it's like for an investigation, um, in this situation, it wasn't viewed. It was viewed because of an altercation between kiddos. And so then it was noted that there was this, um, grabbing of the student. Um, and so then that it was addressed and Natasha responded very appropriately when it was like she asked if she could see it. Um, I was not and I never I've never said that I viewed it with her. I was not in town when that happened. She watched it with another administrator in the building. Um, and so it was more like we don't put our hands on kids. You could see that he was trying to pull away. And so it was a reminder of that's not a value based behavior that we condone

043in Russian nor at North. Um and she responded very appropriately to that. Um and said that she absolutely did not mean any harm um to the student and that she would not hand so Sean that from the information we received that happened on January 9th. So she stated that she understands that you don't have physical contact with my kids. But then there was another conversation on this visible where she was reminded again to not have any contact with kids when it came to reprimanding or directing. Uh feel free to say this is not an appropriate question, but there was the allegation that there was a that this particular parent makes false accusations. Is that a true statement? The comment was that I would like to have Dr. or Mr. answer that. I would say that's

044not to character. Yeah. Okay. It's hard. Students have to post teachers. They have several different students. It's hard. But I guess my question is if if she stays, you said she's still under contract. Does that mean she goes back to the classroom? I think that would be determined. That would be what it would be determined after your vote on what would happen if if she didn't return. So if she doesn't, she would stay on. Well, yeah, it is an option. I think you have three options and then we would work through whatever the consequences are. You have an option about you have an option about pulling and then you have Well, I guess those are the only two. If I may add, um, and feel free to let me know if if this is not

045appropriate, but just in response to district's answers about the video specifically, I just want to make sure the board is aware that in order to use video surveillance in a disciplinary proceeding under the CBA, there is a just cause standard. and the fact that the video does not exist is problematic for proving a just cause standard. In addition, um, Principal Sewell just acknowledged the fact that she did not state that she was the one to have the discussion with Natasha regarding the video. Um I just want to again remind the board that in the letter of reprimand which I believe is drafted from principal sewell. It says from principal sewell and signed by her. It is written in first person and says she was the one to have. It says in our discussion you acknowledge

046the incident viewed the video and stated that it was your intention not to cause harm. We're unaware of who the administrator is that supposedly had this conversation if not Miss Seiwell. I'd like to comment on the video chart. Okay. Superintendent. Uh at the time the video wasn't used as discipline. There was noticed because of a fight and it was an opportunity to critique an employee performance. So as the pattern of behavior started or continued with hands-on kids then that incident on January 9th became part of the pattern. The video wasn't used. So from a just cause standard that is not relevant. I also want to put forward that um Mr. Mr. Hungerford, our legal representation has been through all of this and assures us that we are on very solid ground. Any other questions from

047So I want to um to just for the benefit of the board as well um it clear it's very clear in the um the CBA the contract bargaining agreement page 12 um for J I believe it is is it article 4 I don't remember what article it is um where it does talk about video surveillance it talks about being ensuring the health and safety of all members and students They may be used as deemed appropriate by the superintendent. Um they'll be notified if it may occur on district property which if it's in a common space and then um if it's been obtained without the consent can be used for disciplinary purposes. So um and this was one that they did spend a lot of time in the last target to make sure that it was

048clear about using video. Um, so are there any more questions for Dang? Okay, Angela, anything final? Well, Isabella, I don't know if you had a final short statement after hearing the questions of the board. I'll offer that opportunity to you. Okay. No, not not at this time. I like No, I I think again we've we've called attention to the video. We've called attention to the fact that although she was a temporary employee, the board may not terminate her for an unlawful purpose. And although she is not afforded all of the just cause standards as a regular contract member, she is afforded not only basic statutory due process, she has all of the due process rights within the CDA. All right, director. Yeah, I guess um my last question is just in regards to I guess

049it's number five under district illegitimate investigation. Um the parent it's in regards to the parent taking issue with Miss Green's religious affiliation. Has that been part of the investigation? is um because the reason I ask that is because I also don't want to set the precedent that parents who disagree with the teacher get to make an allegation and drag teachers um in our district. I don't want to speak for Miss S because I haven't spoken to her today so she can comment on this. We had no idea this was coming. The first time we heard this was today. Okay. So I guess then that would prompt a question whoever wants to answer. Um is that is that comment made by the parent documented in some way or was it just the fe the feeling of

050um the teacher that that was their thought? We have recently come to the knowledge that this was going on in the background. We haven't fully explored or investigated on our end what that looks like. And that is why the district is just now becoming aware of it. But we certainly are reserving the right to do so and to pursue district for unlawful retaliation or discrimination should we find merit in those claims. I am going to stop that conversation now that if the district is just now finding out about it then that does not seem like it's part of this conversation. You are correct chair that had nothing to do with any of the investigations. It's new knowledge to us. Okay. Well, I will say that um part of the process is allowing um the member

051or the staff member to be able to have representation at meetings and the GBA Bruce Sheer I believe was present at uh the meeting where there would be disciplinary action taken. So she does have a humanation [Music] And I and I do want to address that Raven's question too because I'm sorry I didn't have the the numbers in front of me, but the union does have 20 days from the time that they're aware that there is something that might be wrong to um initiate the grievance process. And you're saying is an assigned person on the behalf of the the union that handles grievances? There are two people Mark Kim from the who works for us and then you have Bruce Shear. Okay. So either one of them can accept agreements. Um and then there's the

052formal complaint process as policy through the policy. So if there was any um you know Miss Green could have filed a complaint on her own. There's a board policy for complaint which you referred to and then there's a complaint procedure within the contract as well. Right. I can think again. Oh, I'm sorry. All right. Just checking just making sure. Um, so um, Mr. superintendent. Um, again, it's it's fairly clear in in the contract as well as in policy as well in um operations that unless a student is in danger. We don't touch students. That's correct. And is that fully explained to people? They know that this is this is the practice that students are And added to that staff with a more with a higher likelihood of having contacts student or staff that serves students

053means they actually get extra training and this is not a student. Correct. The question from Myra is not a student with special needs. Okay. Um doesn't sound like the board has any more questions or any more comments. Um there is an action item that is uh requested to either so presentation is done then at that point do we close the hearing? I need to make an official recommendation to you now in the hearing. Okay. All right. So if you are ready to do that, I believe the board has asked their questions. Okay. After consultation with our legal council, because we've been involved with internally the entire way through this and for the reasons described in Dr. Freeman's statement, I'm recommending that the board take action to dismiss Miss Green because of the evidence because the

054evidence meets the good faith sufficient standard for dismissal of information. Okay. All right. So, uh, we'd have a recommendation from the superintendent, um, which is listed in our agenda and in order to accept or not accept that, it does require action by the board in form of a motion. And so, if there are no other questions about this, is there a board member that is um, ready to make a motion? I move that the board adopt the superintendent's recommendation that Natasha Rain be dismissed for an appointment to the district effective today May 21st. Is there a second for that? I will second. Is there further discussion about the motion? Okay, there being no further um discussion um I will call for a voice vote. So Dr. Gomez I myself I uh Dr. directors. I guess

055it's kind of moot since we've had three eyes. Um, you know, I do have some serious concerns. uh there's new evidence presented, you know, but I also think it's a serious concern if the teacher does trick their hands on the student. Um I find it concerning that the video is not here for the counselor or teacher to review. Um so you can come back to them. Um, I will because I might have a question. Dr. Sorry, director of I'm just going to get everybody directors. So, can I maybe for a clarification, we've talked a few times about the video. We also have numerous other times where there were hands placed on YouTube. A video showed a particular time. A video showed a particular time staff reported time that wasn't mentioned before. It was always focused

056on kids. Staff including sister have seen physical contact that caused concern for them to report. Uh I think that was two different staff members and then kids repeatedly in their statements talk about physical contact with the future. So regardless of the video there are other and in fact in the documentation that we received there were numerous times when it was noted that it was brought to their attention that a student had been handled. And I do need to emphasize staff. These are very strong staff members who have witnessed things and it wasn't mentioned before. Well, no, you asked a direct question. I will leave it there. Okay. So, um I guess I'll ask another clarifying question and and maybe that will affect my vote. We have the recommendation and this is a new system for

057us. So, maybe I'm not seeing it wrong. I have all of this paperwork. Do we have the documentation that has the um what we received is saying that she didn't receive notice and that is part of our process. So do we have that documentation in writing? It's in the letter. Yeah. That's how I base my book because there's multiple instances mentioned. There's one with a video that we don't see and it doesn't exist. But regardless of that, it's just been printed. We'll have a conversation with you afterwards in a different, right? So it it says that those things happened in the letter, but do we have that documentation to back that letter is what I'm asking. It is are there emails between the principal and the teacher or between HR and teacher? There are notes

058that we don't have here, but do they exist? They do. There are investigation notes and I didn't I don't recall and maybe you do that um council asked for those notes or that the union asked for those notes because they they have a right to have those if they wanted but I didn't realize they had asked or if they have I don't submitted everything that was asked for. So I guess I guess I I would feel like in order to do our due diligence we would need to see that we have documentation to show those things. I would actually push back on that because we have highly professional trained HR director attorney who have reviewed those. The board does governance. We don't do operations. We do accountability as we do and this this would be

059an accountability piece. So, I'm not saying that that wouldn't be my bow, but I I think that it's we have to do our due diligence to say, "Yep, we checked all the boxes." And I'm not saying that those things weren't done. I'm just saying that's us doing our due diligence. I'd like to remind the board as well uh the documentation there. Mr. Hungerford has been through this with us and he is an expert in state war. So he has been down through this. He's our labor law attorney. Uh the other piece is when you have an employee of this status, it is a very very low bar to meet when it comes to termination. And at this point, even just the staff statements, the assistant principal and the other staff member who witnessed physical contact,

060that would be enough. We need 10 years. And we So that's two staff that we can bring in and verify for you that this these things did happen. What we do have to add to that is a longer pattern, not just those two staff members. We have kids, we have um we have the video, we have a principal with concern. there's a prepoundonderance of evidence to meet this standard. I I would I'm not saying that those things don't exist. I'll just reiterate that. I'm not saying that they're not there. I'm just saying in order for us to do our due diligence, we should check that they're there before we make a decision. And I believe that we'll be either we believe the staff or we don't. And I would like to circle back. Um Dr.

061Barnes and Dr. Latin, you have not voted yet. We currently have three yes votes votes. That is not enough. Um we do have to have a quorum vote and a quorum vote is of the members on the board. So a vote to do this would require for yeses minimum. If I could would I be able to respond to district's comments in terms of the the notes and our requests for the notes and whatnot? Um yes. Thank you. So again, I just want to reiterate, we have requested all notes from all meetings. To date, we have not received any notes from a meeting that supposedly occurred between Miss Green and an administrator where their video was viewed. We have no notes or record of when that video or when that meeting occurred or what was said

062or when Miss Green supposedly viewed it. I also want to note that the district has made several comments that it expends very little resources into investigating temporary or probationary employees. And while that may be the district's standard based on its obligations, if the district moves forward with terminating Miss Green, this will be in her personnel file and there may be allegations that were unsubstantiated and untrue that harm Miss Green for the entirety of the rest of her career. So although it may not impact the district and the board and their fiscal responsibility and their just cause standards, this is a lifealtering decision for Miss Green. I'd like to respond to that as well. We did not say at any time that we didn't expend resources. In fact, there's been a lot of time. I have

063here the uh the union's notes where we did talk about this uh and no rebuttal came from the union when they employed. So, I want to go back to that standard and our kids. This is a low bar. Even if I were just using we could reduce it to one an assistant principal witnessing a concern and bring it forward and us talking that would be enough in this circumstance to move forward. What we've presented to you is more than that. Uh we've addressed the other issues regarding video surveillance and just cause and that is an accurate statement on my part. Uh, I do have concern. We do not support when staff members put hands on kids. And what we started this meeting with was an attorney saying, "Did the teacher denied all of that?" Now,

064we're to a point where that's not the case anymore. We now have it. Yes, this has happened. So, we've transformed from the beginning of the hearing to, yeah, we do know some hands have happened. We started off in a different place. And that concerns me. So, we did have hands-on. We do have a probationary teacher who did do that. We do have staff members who would say that even if you want to discount all of what the kids said, and the kids have said a lot, this did happen. And that's my concern for our building. Kids must come to school feeling safe. And we do our best to do that every day. Dr. No. All right. Put me to So I understand very low bar because it is a temporary employee, but I also don't

065want to make a decision that will truly impact her career, you know. Um, and I I kind of wish that we had those notes so that I could be confident and be like, "Yeah, this is this is the thing. This is the right thing to do." And I don't know if I feel comfortable enough to be like get ruin somebody's career without seeing that. So I'll share a little bit more information. We were concerned too. We saw this as potential to do exactly what you're saying. So we have offered settlement agreements regularly several times uh because we thought that was the best way out and we wanted to give the employee a chance to recover from that and they weren't accepted. I definitely would like an opportunity to respond to that. Oh go ahead Mr.

066Cook. Sorry. Okay. So even even though they may not have agreed with the settlements, it was yes, we will we can make this be done and we can go away. We get a sub in for the end of the year and those were denied. That's a challenge for me too because we saw the same thing you did. We don't want to damage somebody. And and for me as an educator and as a parent and knowing knowing the school and knowing the population, I feel like we're just gonna someone who was given several warnings is going to be allowed to continue in this field and then we hear about worse things happening in the news when the previous district was very aware and they were just allowed to continue in this field when we know that

067kids took place at harm and didn't take responsibility and it wasn't one conversation. That's why I asked that clarifying question because regardless of the videos, there were multiple conversations and some people credible the report listed in the information we have had conversations with and we're just deciding to allow it to happen. And we do have a standardized process for completely whenever one comes in, we send the principal or whoever the supervisor is a folder. There's timelines, there's documents for how to do it. all the board policies a reference that they can review and they do go through that process each time. So just so that you know that too it's not done halfhazard for sure. Uh, I don't know if this would be appropriate to ask. Um, but before I render my decision, would it

068be okay for her and her attorney to consider that last offer you made? No, Isabelle wanted to say something. If I could respond about the about the resignation offer. So, we did receive communication from the district I believe yesterday with another offer of resignation. within this offer was um agreement to pay Miss Green through today which she is already titled entitled to as of her administrative leave and she would have to concede and wave any claim against the district. There was no additional consideration offered to Miss Green for resigning and in addition there was as of today no additional payout for her. So, yes, we were in receipt of the resignation agreement, but there was no benefit to Miss Green, and clearly the district was not interested in negotiating. We were working back and forth

069with Mr. Hungerford, and as far as I know, we didn't hear back on our most recent offer to him um several hours ago. the uh we believed and I still do believe that that settlement met what your interest was during fines uh and it does hold the staff member harm as for the no legal remedy that's a standard plate that we get that people saw that's just it doesn't it is what we ask for sure but that's standard when we come to a settlement agreement so we're not asking for her to do anything the other employees have done. And again, our request specifically for the district, actually to Mr. Hungerford, was to delay this hearing by no more than a week to allow our office a chance to propose a counter offer of resignation with

070specific terms as to how Miss Green's personnel file and third party communications would be handled. And we did not receive any type of um negotiation on pushing back or delaying the hearing. If the district is interested in pursuing negotiations with us on our resignation agreement, we're more than happy to do so. We were willing to do so this morning. I was emailing back and forth, like I said, with Mr. Hungerford, and if we would have just had an additional week before this hearing to work with the district on a resignation offer, I think we could have come to some sort of settlement. It was my understanding the district was not willing to do so. This was the second. This was the second. We have tried from the beginning. Tried from the very beginning and there

071was a lot of time and here we are today going back to we do hold employees to a high standard as well. There are employee watching tonight. Yeah. And we do like this come out just as a summary we did want to put the employees interest at heart and not damage their career forever. We tried that wasn't accepted. We have even again we have one staff member who's an assistant principal and a very reliable one who witnessed behavior that meets this standard for termination. And we also have from beginning to end a different story tonight. We have an unequivocal denial from the beginning and now different. There were things that have happened and we have kid witnesses. That is a challenge for me. I I guess my question is is before I render my decision

072based on all the data, are we able to give her 30 seconds with her attorney out in the hallway to make a decision? Because the last thing I want to do is ruin somebody's career. as of where it is right now. If they don't need to talk about it because it still affects her future when going to get another job to resign and saying I did these things and she didn't. So it it I disagree that it affects her future. What does affect your future at this point was we didn't want to be here because we knew we would have to submit evidence publicly to you because we wanted public hearing. That was the damage that we talked about behind the scenes and we don't understand why this is going here is we have to

073submit these for the public to review. Uh and we were concerned about that from the beginning. So we're here we have offered twice starting at the beginning a way out of this. I'm just asking would you like 30 seconds out in the attorney to give her a call? If the district is willing to allow us time to actually come up with new terms for resignation offer to propose as a counter offer, then we're absolutely interested in that. But at this time, 30 seconds in in the hallway to deliberate on the same offer that the district has continuously given us. We're not interested in signing has certain implications in her future as well as being terminated. And so it that's that's why they would have to communicate more with the attorney for other I just want

074to reiterate the resignation offer that has been supplied to Miss Green today offers her nothing in addition to what she is already receiving in forms of compensation or there otherwise. All it does is benefits the districts and waves Miss Green's right to pursue any action further down the road without offering her any additional consideration. Can I just say that I know that a termination in your file is much more damaging than a resignation. Resignation you are able to create your own narrative. you are able to we did agree not if they call and say is this employee rehireable. We agreed to we agreed to a neutral um reference so to be able to not mention things left to in the termination or anything like that. So there's one parts of the termination agreement validity and

075the respect of I just want to reiterate again the neutral reference aspect of the resignation agreement if I remember correctly was just added to the newly offered resignation agreement that was offered 2 days ago. That was language that was added that we just did not get a chance to thoroughly review. Again, I communicated with Brian that we were requesting additional time to work with him to come to a good faith decision and communication on a resignation agreement with mutually acceptable terms. And I just have I did not hear back. I haven't heard from him um since we communicated early this morning. And I don't want to believe in this anymore. It just wanted to clarify is what you sent today your final offer for the resation. I believe that is true. Yes. I believe it

076is. Okay. So, one last time is I don't want to ruin. Are did you want some time to talk to your attorney before I make a decision that could potentially Isabelle, do you guys need time to talk? No, nothing has changed on our end, Natasha. All right. Well, with that, while I do see concern with lack of video, this that and the other, um I also do know that the bar is very low for employee. Um and so for what I do for a living is I work for insurance and I'm the director of HR. They are we are all at so I know how dreadfully my require is for everyone and while I may disagree with some of the assertations and findings I also have to make sure you know to you know that

077bar is so low I don't know if there's anything that us as a board could do about So for that I am forced to vote I we show that being then in four votes yes to accept the superintendent's recommendation and one vote no Dr. Freeman um would process that at this point and they will debate the check and send with all the proper documentation in charge and I think usually sends an email that I'm sorry. Oh, I'm sorry. I turn up until Sarah usually sends a final email from the board that documents the determination from tonight's decision. All right. So, um I think it's that um we're going to take a break. We'll take a 15 minute break and then come back immediately. Yes. Yes. Yes. Sarah. All right. So, we are back. Um, first

078of all, Board of Education, May 21st work session. Next up on our agenda, um, looking at this. So, Tracy, do you mind if I let them do the Senate Bill 3 implementation update and we'll surf that because do you have anything else on the agenda tonight, Dr. Holmes? I do. Quick update on curriculum, but that will be super fast. Okay. So, what things are you doing tonight? Uh, let's do curriculum first. Okay. Which one is is that Sarah? Oh, Sarah. All right. Okay. Tuition and fees. Thank you. My son has a lacrosse. Try to get to the first. Yeah. Go. Go. Okay. So, um this is an action item in which we are seeking approval for fee schedules for the coming year. Of course, you're aware that over the last several years following the pandemic,

079we've been able to use ESER funds to cover fees so that our families weren't incurring any of those um or very very few. I shouldn't say none, but very very few fees. So, what we're looking to do this year is to reinstate some fees, but not all. Um, one example is that we will not be looking to reinstate any course fees. select elective type fees to take a class just to ensure that equity of access and we're working on budgets with our high school principles so that they can still get the same materials. We will use appropriate funding some of the grants a lot of big grants through high school success to support those programs. However, we are looking to um reinstate um some of the fees that we have had in the past. One

080thing I want you to know is that almost all of these fees, with the exception of just a very few, are flat from what they were prior to the pandemic. So even though our costs may have slightly gone up, we also recognize this is a change for families and they haven't been paying these fees. So we already know for some people this is going to be something to adjust to. So, we thought to be fair, athletic fees have stayed flat for student participation, activity fees have stayed flat, student body fees have stayed flat. We had one small increase in the uh family passes for athletics. I think we went up by $10. And we had a small increase for banned rentals at middle school because we aren't generating nearly enough money to cover the cost

081of the repairs. But these have been minimal $5, $10, not massive increases. Um you can see from this the basic list and also within the attached documents the proposals. There are other changes such as um we are no longer requiring an AP exam. However, we are offering an AP exam. So that's not a fee that we put on here as a regular fee. It can be done with the AP teacher in working with the students. Um we no longer have a PE fee for the t-shirt. There are things that are just obsolete that we just don't do anymore as well that we removed. So it does probably look pretty paired down from what you've seen in the past and that is intentional um to try to make sure we're really only focusing on what we

082feel is really needed at this time to help offset. The last thing I will say is just that athletic fees I think sometimes there's a misconception any of these fees really ASB graduation um yearbook these fees offset our costs they do not cover not even close but they do offset and that is important especially for something like OST that might need new jerseys this is a fund that we can use to like replace equipment and other things that is needed. So sometimes people think, oh well now we can have everything and that's not the case. We will still be putting in our own funding to support all these programs to a great degree. Question was this offset does this go back into the yearbook or to help offset the cost? Yeah, perfect. It just offsets

083those costs. Um that was one of the things the general fund. It doesn't necessarily offset that giveaway. Well, offset like does it go into like an athletic general fund? It does. I don't believe so on how it's funded because we have our expenses that are just budgeted for and then we have revenue that comes in and so they just offset each other in the maps of the general fund. But we do track what we take in so we know that's that's all is like you know I would hate to cut a program right addition I mean the daily but you know we will serve um I will also say that with built into these fee schedules even though we no longer do free and reduced lunch which used to kind of be our basis for

084deciding who may get a reduced fee or a waiver we have other systems and other forms any request that is brought forward a parent is offered that form. Even if there's a suspicion and a coach is having a sensitive conversation with a family, for example, we help people to have the application that they need to request a reduced fee or a waiver. So, that is still a possibility and we know that that will be utilized by our families to participate. We want all kids that want to participate to be able to do so. How does that go? How does that information get out to the parents? Um, it will be put with when these fee schedules go out that will go alongside it. There should also be a link for that. And then also just

085through requests one way or another. Oftentimes it is the teacher or the my guess is that when they register for the sport and they're having to pay the fee, it'll be listed there on the form. Books and stuff like that. I mean what's a student body? Um that is a part of the fee. They're a little bit different at both, but it's basically just uh something that helps to pay for activities throughout the year. So, let's say that we're going to be having um a reward of a pizza party for all the classes that reach their highest attendance rates. It offsets those kinds of activities and things for kids. Maybe it's a speaker at an assembly or a career day, things like that. ASB sticker gets them into like football games and school dances instead

086of paying a separate They don't pay the and it's not required. Yeah. They don't they can or they don't have to have it. It's reduced fee. So you can pay for the student body fee up front that you get in the dances, football games, basketball games for a fraction of the price. Yeah. Okay. One uh question I had just about the um recommended motion, which I think in our leadership meeting today, we talked about this possibly not being an action item so that people had a chance to make comments and then we would do it in our June meeting. So what what the deal is is that these all show up because of the new um agenda thing. Yeah, they all show up as action, but this is first reading in a work session and

087so then we will adopt an approve of action in June. So that's just procedural. The question I had was as part of that motion there is if we wanted to do that. Uh we don't have to um it's different because of the new not board docs but whatever this one's called board book it listed it as an action but it wasn't intended to be an action. have to be the recommended motion automatically. It'll just move over to I think that's what it does. It it just puts it in there as So my question was about the non-resident tuition fee. Is has that gone up? Is that based on a state number? Yes, I got that from um our business business office. Okay. What is that? So it's just whatever. Okay. Yeah. All right. So um

088yeah. So review those. look at them. Um look for um making sure they're affordable and where they're optional fees. Are they truly optional? Um and then it will come back to us at our June meeting. Yeah. I I would just say the only reason I see the benefit to us having it be a rating and bring it back to June is so that if the community or anybody Yeah. So that they could see it and give comments if they want to. I think for me it's a necessary thing that needs to happen because I think it makes it more equitable for our students as opposed to right now where students are either participating club sports messes this all up and so we we want it to be affordable for everybody but in order to sustain

089this is part of it and I'm not sure um I think as far as when we get to the point where we actually do a motion I would I would suggest suggest that we do them as two motions. Approve the proposed fees and then the non-resident tuition because those are kind of two separate okay concepts. And so that just makes it clear because when I read it, it sounds like the proposed fee is 11,000 if you forget and move past the non-resident tuition part. It It's not a clean sentence. Does that make sense? Sure. Okay. We can do that. It's just we pulled the motions that we've done right every year in the past. Well, I'm just We decided we don't like our problem. Yeah. Yeah. Um Okay. No, we didn't mind the plastic. All

090right. So, that'll give us all a little bit of time to look at it and then bring back and make sure as well. Uh just because historically in the work session, we don't often approve things unless they're on a timeline, a short timeline. Okay. All right. Thank you. And was that it? Okay. Are you leaving? I am. I'm going to my son's lacrosse game. Oh, that's right. I'll get I'll get the second half. Beaverton. My son goes to high school. Drive. No problem. Okay. Number nine. So Sarah the agenda like this. Okay. So So do you want to be really fun? She's got the transformative social love which is really new for me. Is that really quick? Uh I think and do you want us to do it tonight or we have to do it

091tonight? We have to do it tonight. And it's not a it's not an action item. It is an it's the first reading. It's kind of like the Yeah. So it's just the first reading. No formal action tonight. Okay, first you can go the yours is like two seconds anyway. Whatever you want. You're the chair. All right. Um so number seven on the agenda. I'm ready get to know your agenda. Yeah, I I did just as a you can uncclick little things in the left hand the description so it makes it so you can actually see the whole agenda without having to read just so [Music] um I'm sure there's supposed to something more formal but this is this is a work session right the boardation I don't feel like there's a difference not the presentation

092the biggest one not for presentations um so just as a little update before we launch into the slides that are attached um Oregon adopted transformative social emotional learning framework work and standards by the state board of education on June 15, 2023, so two years ago. And it was required to be implemented in districts by July of last year, 2024. So during the 2324 school year, the district began um implementation of the standards by training teachers in adopting a new set of materials. Actually, that's not quite right. During that year, we began to put together a plan for training and adoption um and adopting a new set of materials to support social emotional learning in K12 count uh classrooms. So last year 2023 24 this committee of counselors, leaison, teachers, administrators and coaches spent multiple sessions

093kind of evaluating and um this is not reading correctly. Uh this year we had a committee pull together all these folks and evaluating multiple curriculums and resources. Um and then we piloted it in K12. We piloted two curriculums at each level. One at elementary, one at middle or two at elementary, two at middle, and two at high school. Student feedback was gathered from classrooms in kindergarten through high school across the district. And then a final committee recommendations are what I'll be providing if authorized to move forward on the adoption of these materials um as our foundation for social emotional learning. They'll be implemented this fall. So the way we began to comply this year was by convening this committee and doing training with our adults and then adopting curriculum for next year. We felt like

094it was important to train our adults and make sure they knew what they were adopting and why before we just launched into something that was brand new. Okay. So that is that's what we did. So um then what you can see and what Sarah's projecting is the um slide deck. So, um, in alignment with our equity policy, the adoption committee's charge is to provide every student with access to high quality curriculum grounded in evidence-based best practices that supports collaborative opportunities embedded with a culturally responsive framework. So, you can see and then we came up with a set of non-negotiables. collaborative process grounded in effective and equitable teaching practices prioritizes the variabilities of our learners and center student voice. That was really important to us. Um, so the process that we went through was we first

095created a shared mission and vision and we created it in Spanish and English and that was during the um 232 24 school year to create our plan and I presented some of this at a board at a work session or a board meeting in in November I think. So um we don't have to spend too much time on this but this is our mission and vision in for our transformative social emotional learning plan. Um the next slide shows a little bit about the difference between SEAL and what is transformative and this is really important in terms of our curriculum adoption. So what has typically been social emotional learning is on the left hand side and this is a lot of times what you'll hear in classrooms is like we just want our kids to know

096how to do blah blah blah that in a single grade we're teaching you how to feel or we're teaching you how to talk about your feelings and we're teaching you how to behave right and all of that is super important but what we know is that when it lives in isolation it doesn't always translate into different settings and that also if the adults don't feel grounded and calm and engaged with kids um and they are having a hard time managing their emotions then it also doesn't help kids stay engaged and feel safe and welcome and worthy. So it's a it can't happen as a I'm just teaching you this and therefore you're going to go implement it. It's not like teaching 1 plus 1 equals two. Although I would say that to get kids to

097engage in 1 plus 1 equals two, they need to have a sense of like, oh, you I belong, you know, like you care about me as a human being. It's I'm important. So um a lot of the stuff on the blue side is how we have traditionally thought about SEAL but it hasn't really incorporated teachers and students understanding of the variability of their identities and their experiences and where they are at that day. you know, maybe their kid, you know, cursed them out, their teenager cursed them out and then they got to school and they have a headache and, you know, there's so many things that our adults are going through that and then and maybe that happened to the student, too. So, this isn't just about teaching kids how to behave. It's about giving

098them the skills to feel like they um they can belong and feel safe and welcome. And that's the same for adults. So that transformative part becomes more of it's a community responsibility versus an individual responsibility. You can go ahead and go. So I'm I'm gonna request um a lot of Yeah, I think a lot of this I'm going to put the onus on the board to read these over them. um just because we're running a little bit later and so kind of just high level you know centering is gay. Perfect. Okay Sarah, y'all can read centering student voices. We care about that the most but we're going to skip it for tonight. So there's a timeline. We're skipping it. We're going to be making it our responsibility to make sure Ex excellent. So this is

099the timeline um about the curriculum adoption and um we began piloting it at all levels in in January or February for one set of curriculum and then we piloted a second set of curriculum in March through the beginning of May. End of March through beginning of May. So these so this was embedded from what I saw two slides ago. All of this stuff is being embedded in all contents. We're getting there. Um, so next slide talks about so there's going to be two different ways that we implement, but right now we're just talking about curriculum, not necessarily how we embed it in other content, but yes, we will get there. The materials review, these are the three. Um, we looked at Wayfinder. We looked at another one called Harmony Academy for elementary. And Wayfinder was

100one that was piloted K12. And we looked at we do it for the culture which was piloted middle and high school. Um, and so when you keep going, the pilot team feedback was that they did a deep dive into planning with the materials and piloting lessons. And then students had lots of opportunity to give feedback verbally and also in writing. So for next year, we want to keep going. At elementary school, our teens after looking at all the feedback and if you go to the next slide and we chose wayfinder because the teachers said students were given a lot lot of opportunity. Well, you can read it. I really like how easy it was to pull up the lessons. This is from teachers. My students look forward to SEAL now. In the past, this was

101not the case, very engaging, and each lesson is different. Students are very engaged, especially at elementary, and they built in lots of games in the lesson. So, the kids really loved it. So, it didn't feel like they were being told how to behave. They got to actually practice it. Um, student feedback, if you go to the next slide, has we bolded some of the key elements that they get to talk about their feelings, talk about the stuff they're talking about, taught me about community, which is something that's like caring for one another was fun and I felt included. So, that was the feedback at the elementary level and why we chose Wayfinder. Um, for middle school, we chose Wavefinder again. Um, and I can address why we didn't choose some of the other two, but

102this was the teacher feedback. Accessible, comprehensible, comprehensive, lots of deep questions, and easy to use. Um, and then the middle school feedback was it was sometimes it was fun and sometimes it wasn't fun. And you know, I think the older we get, the f the harder we find that integrating teaching an SEO lesson versus integrating into content gets harder and harder. They get more skeptical. Um, the Bad Bunny one was interesting because we got to learn about an artist before they were an artist. So they they also highlight real life characters and talk about things um social things that kids are interested in now. They try to pull from that and have it be appropriate to what resonates with students. Now um and we've gave them a lot of feedback about making sure that they

103are keeping it relevant to the local context as well as the you know kind of pop culture to keep students engaged. So is it a digital curriculum? Yeah. Think that right? Yeah. Yeah. And then wait, what? And then at the high school level, we decided to not adopt curriculum um at all. And I'll tell you why. We're going to do that. And that gets to your question, Maida. We're actually going to leverage our relationship with the MESD to to um provide some professional learning and push into our high schools. So the thing about transformative SEAL is it's not just a curriculum. It's really about how it's not about following a set of standards. It's about how those standards or behaviors show up in other content in math, in social studies, in science, in reading, in

104literacy. And the older you get, the more important it is that kids can see it in the other content areas that are relevant to them. So while at elementary and middle school we found that it's important to adopt curriculum to give teachers some tools, we did not find curriculum uh the only the only place in the high school schedule where it would really work is advisory. And I'm sure if you have high school students, we all know what what their perspective is. And so we thought, why push something that's supposed to be about enriching and helping students um develop their social emotional skills into a 30 minute space that they already have a negative association with. So instead, what we're going to do is really focus more on the adults and um on teaching and

105learning and how when we're talking about math or social studies or science or language arts where or health curriculum, we just adopted a new health curriculum like where are we seeing these standards show up and how do we name it and then kind of take a moment doesn't have to be a long moment to really illustrate it with kids so they start to draw those connections. kind of along those lines, every new curriculum standard that gets released will include standards as a part of what's outlined uh for state content. So the social studies standards that we just released have within the embedded TSCL standards highlighted draw and then we will also be integrating it into middle and elementary. Um the reason why we went with Wfinder is the platform is really easy for our teachers

106to use. We wanted something that was accessible, but it's also adaptable. And it also comes in multiple languages, so we can pull content out. We had a middle school person who was like, I didn't really love all the content, but it's so easy to go, oo, I want this part. And then they just plug in a video to add to it and then they push it out. At middle school, it will be through advisory. That happens four times a week. Um at elementary it'll be during their morning circle times and more intentionally at least once a week during um their longer chunk of time. And we will be sp and then wayfinder will be providing both an in-person training and then a series of online training. So we're in the process of negotiating with them

107what that cost and what that would look like. That's within our budget. And that's why on June 4th when the next board meeting then we would have an action item for you. Um but and then for high school we will leverage we will leverage our relationship with the NESD. Um we may be purchasing some um staff books to support integration of SEAL into content but that's a conversation I actually need to have with Dr. volunteer see what we think about how that how that might work for high school question. So um partner with MSD does that look more like PD for teachers or what? Okay. Yeah. And they um PD and also um some ongoing modeling and then they already are work like like Tim said they're already working with us on where is that

108standard show up in XYZ content. So just being intentional, explicit around help they already help us develop um professional development for all schools. So um they just really leaning more clearly into them being a resource for us for our high schools in particular. Are teachers going like how are you I'm just wondering you'll have been waiting for teachers to be used to go in the train. No, we will pull we will have MESD come to us. Okay. and they already have been really willing to do that. They have their climate and culture team and it's led by Dr. um Natasha Jackson and she um her team has been phenomenal um we're actually going to use a lot of their materials for our for our administrative retreat in August um to um to help build some

109knowledge of our administrators around how to integrate the content into their professional development that they lead as well. So it's not it's not a check the box. It's very much an ongoing process to help build capacity of people to see where and how they integrate it. And that's truly the transform transformational part of it versus here's questions. Okay. Right. So now yes. So let's do number except that one have a just pick your next agenda item. Tim said nine first. That's right. I can choose your adventure. He's chosen nine. Seven check. Well, I think nine will be really fast actually. Okay. So, I'll read the description uh if I may and then I'll do a brief explanation in terms of why we're back. So, uh at May 7th, uh the at the board business meeting,

110you approve the selection of the health curriculum at the middle and high schools. Thank you very much. Following the meeting, the administration led that the health curriculum materials currently being piloted by the schools need to be purchased directly from the publishers instead of through Northwest Textbook Depository. The administration recommended that the board bring back a previously adopted motion for amendment. The recommended motion is included down below. So, just a brief update. When we reached out uh to the publishers and said, "Hey, thank you. We'll be going with you. We'll be working with Northwest Text and we'll send you the check through them." They said, "You can't do that because we sent the materials directly to you." So the only way to purchase everything from Northwest Tax, it would be we boxed up everything that we

111have, pay the shipping cost to ship it back to the publisher and then pay the shipping cost to ship it back to Northwest Text in order to get the materials back to us. So um they said or the other option is to pay us for the books you've already purchased and then you can purchase the rest of the books and then the subscriptions through Northwest Tax. And so the money doesn't change the money. The money does not change a bit. In fact, it's actually a little less expensive to go that way. Okay. Um the only thing that changes the mechanism of who we're paying. We're paying the publishers. So the books we currently have in our possession. Uh we've got about twothirds of the books physically on hand. We'll get the other third through Northwest

112Texas and then this uh the online or the electronic part of the subscription is handled entirely through Northwest Tax, which is the role of the purchasing. What's what's the benefit if we're not if there's no money changing? But you know what? It's just that the motion said to me so that they can't do it the more efficient way. The motion restricted us to Northwest X. Historically, we haven't identified in a motion for curriculum purchase who you're going to purchase it from in the same way we do like we're doing some other big contract and Blake kind of brought that up and was like, well, why don't we say who we're buying it from? And so then we did and now we're finding it's mostly through Northwest Tax. Well, and the curriculum initially was through, but

113it was through it was the way we got it was different. It's still the same pilot. For pilots, we always get the curriculum directly from the publisher. Um because oftentimes they'll weigh the shipping costs which is less expensive to go that direction through Northwest Texas because we're testing or piloting the materials. Um and usually like for language arts or for math or science, it's a it's a smaller pilot and then doing Northwest Texas is much larger. health is much smaller. So we almost have all the materials that we need because the pilot was simply so much smaller because we only offer health one semester at grade 9 or 10, one semester grade 11 or 12 as opposed to every year each year sort of thing. So it's just a much smaller purchase. So I am

114having to make the recommended motion. It looks like it the same thing is listed twice. Is that Yeah. And I was just Sarah can you? So I it is the same. Okay. I couldn't italicize it in the like recommended motion part to show where that change was, which is why I left it in the executive summary part. So either one of those you can read. It's the same either way. I was trying to compare really fast. Okay. So I move to amend the previous motion on the purchase of curriculum approved by the board at its meeting May 7th, 2025 to read as follows. I move to approve the selection of GW publishers comprehensive health skills for middle school curriculum in human kinetics live well comprehensive high school health curriculum for not to exceed amount of

115$244,255 through Northwest textbook depository and currently piloted materials directly from the publishers. Second David. All right. So, it's been moved by Holly, seconded by David to amend the previous motion that that was completed at the May 7th business meeting to add um Northwest Textbook Depository and currently piloted materials directly from the publishers. There is no change to the cost that we originally approved. It's just a purchasing mechanism. I'm not going to read the whole thing because Holly Conception may be the job. Um all those in favor signify by saying I. I. Any opposed? All right. Thank you, Dr. Collins. And okay, so we've got through number nine. Now, are we up to number 10? Lucky number 10. Have I missed any? Okay, Senate Bill three, otherwise known as financial literacy, right? Well, there's two parts.

116There's financial literacy and postsecary pathways. Got it. So, following the meeting back in April, we wanted to come back and update the board on implementation plan and implications of a waiver versus no waiver so you can see what that looks like. So following the board meeting in April, we had a chance to go back and talk to our high school principles. We met twice uh and then from that uh created an implementation plan both without a waiver and then also thinking what would a waiver look like just to compare the two back and forth and provide a little more specifics. So I'm just going to work my way through the document. Uh Chris, you said if you can keep it about two and a half minutes, I'll do my best so I can talk fast.

117Um up at the very top just some information in terms of background. This is the work we've been doing so far. Uh the meetings from May 29th down through April 23rd those were day long meetings just looking at what would the curriculum look like for postsecary pathways. The state only provides the standards but it doesn't provide how to actually teach the standards and there's no about content. So um the team did phenomenal work getting together looking through the standards identifying what that course will look like. um work yet to do. Uh we still need to identify the personal finance curriculum that made to use that will be in the fall starting in 2025. Um we're already getting interest from publishers. Uh the census materials will be evaluating and looking at kind of the same process

118like Paul just talked about um with same sort of process, same sort of idea. So um excited to start that process in the fall of 2025 and then finalize an implementation plan um following what we're talking today. So as you look at the table down below, it's going to be easiest to kind of read it across each of the lines as opposed to trying to read down through the columns. So um when we went back and talked to the principles, the first question was thinking about what does it look like if we have to implement postsecary pathways next year with our juniors which will be the graduating class of 2027. Um there's really two options that we were debating or looking between. I'll start with option number one. Um as we met uh in the

119previous meetings looking at the curriculum and the content um we started off thinking that maybe uh the advisory would be a great way to look at implementing the curriculum with limited impact on the schedule. The more we looked at it the more to a person we decided um it's not going to be a good use of our time for students tracking students and those sorts of things is going to be a challenge. So option number one um if there's no waiver would be to implement inside the master schedule a class for our juniors as we've mapped out and the implications are pretty drastic. What we would need to do as at this point is we need to go back and rebuild our master schedule because what we'll be doing is taking a path credit out

120of all of our 11th grade um students courses as I currently stand replacing that with the postsecary pathways either first or second semester. So we need to go back and rebuild the schedule. The FTE for that would come from measure 98. So that FTE is currently allocated at this point freshman success courses. Right now Gresian has their class at 250 nth graders in those courses. Those section need to be collapsed and those nth graders need to be reallocated to different classes. Bar right now is a little slower on filling up their classes. only 40 freshmen right now covering most classes with that FTE, but those classes will fill as they continue to build out their master schedule. Um, so the implications as far as the master schedule goes. The challenge is we're taking our FTE

121from a ninth grade course, moving it up to 11th grade. And so there's the the challenge of we have these 11th grade classes that now have fewer 11th graders in them because you're taking the postsecary pathways. Some of them freshman students can take um but others they cannot. And so it would require a full rebuilding of the master schedule to make that work um between now and August. And I just want to add that um the freshman at Graham High School are forecasted into that. So it would eliminating that gives them other elective options, but there aren't as many elective options for freshmen in general because um the CTE courses are primarily built on sophomores and juniors seniors. as a freshman can't jump into a junior level Course which are the majority of the electives.

122So it's a it's a to Tim's point it's a it's a tricky balance in this moment in time. Yes. Um just thinking through the advisory option uh we are going to be putting together the course in Canvas just so that it's ready to go. splitting it up to follow an advisory sort of 18week model isn't the way the course was necessarily designed although we can we can design it that way within Canvas um but uh to both Ram uh and Barlo's staff as they gave us feedback their recommendation funcl is not the place to really off this curriculum it'd be a check the box sort of opportunity as opposed to legitimate like an opportunity for kids to engage with the content um the other piece with it is trying to track the requirements of what

123we want students to cover becomes really challenging and problematic. And so that's where we are. Um with implementation without a waiver, we would jump right away into the building master schedule. Um and starting to do that work over the summer counselors and admin ones primarily responsible through that. As far as the go did you want to cover like do you want to cover personal guidance first and then go to the labor? Yes. Okay. Oh the other piece before I forget um for students that are at Cal we've been working with Jessica specifically Cal in their pathways already has built in a post-secary pathways course for each of their programs of study. Um sometimes they happen the junior year sometimes they happen the senior year. It just depends on what pathway they're in. So students in

124Cal will not necessarily be impacted and be able to use and utilize what Jessica's been developing here. Also, our students in AVID, which is about 50 of our students at each of our high schools in grade 11. Um, if you look at what AVID outlines for their curriculum for grade 11, it matches almost perfectly onetoone with the postsecary math requirements by the state and AV's actually done that work for us to map out what requires versus what Abid covers. So they could do it next year. some of them. Yeah. Yeah. So, students at Cal and students in AVID, we can recode those courses already. And Jessica and I actually just talked earlier today about that process. Cal's already using the Ramsey Education Foundation. They are um so in Jessica only one of their pathways uses

125the Ramsey curriculum, but that does follow their Oregon standards for post or for the personal finance. how many students and just give me a ballpark uh for regression and uh borrow attended count and would be able to pay this credit because that also you know that about total um it's about 200 200 from both buildings total maybe 250 okay out of class size when it came to your calculations of FTE was that considered in there for section yes okay Yes. Um the other thing I want to point out before I get to um waiver no waiver um waiver no waiver only impacts the postsecary pathway force because following the conversation we have with you David you said the personal finance piece that's really important. So as we went back and looked at the plan, we

126said why can't we implement personal finance on the same track that we would have before right um so that the seniors in the class of 2027 get personal finance just as if they had the waiver if they didn't. So the plan at this point in time is to move forward with waiver or no waiver personal finance. The curriculum will be adopted by the middle of this next school year and we'll be able to implement that for the seniors in the class of 2027. And our goal for that or the FT for that is going to come from repurposing some of the FTE for measure 98 for our college and career coordinators um in the two positions as college. Well, yeah. I mean and I think depends on if we do a way I mean they're

127related between that and the how we what positions we repurpose is part of the conversation. So I wanted we but that is part of the plan. How much time do you have to apply for w so that's a great question. So I reached out to the state um a week ago and said I've got colleagues in other districts who've applied for waiverss and they've not heard anything. Um and so Audrey Moore who's in charge of the process emailed back and said we're making our rubric to evaluate waiver requests. Waiver requests we anticipate will be approved the beginning of June. That's that's OD timelines. So I think thank you for digging into this. It makes a lot more sense to me now. We put it for a vote. Do you can I just offer that if

128you did a waiver um if you did do a waiver for plan A just to finish that like that would have been our preference. Um, we it would allow us to still repurpose Measure 98 FTE as Tim is saying, but to be more thoughtful and leverage potential retirements or vacancies in a different way as we move forward for next year. Um, there are sensitivities to there are many positions paid for out of measure 98 at our high schools. And so being really thoughtful about how we collapse, repurpose, redefine some of those positions so we don't lose the work. Ninth grade on track is one of them. So like eliminating nth grade classes in addition to the master schedule nightmare is that's plan B. Some that's plan B. So with a waiver, we could potentially move

129that ball down the court a little bit because we also haven't evaluated the impact of those classes and we don't want to if we can avoid it inadvertently impact our ninth graders in order to build this in. We know we're going to have to impact our master schedule somewhere and our measure 98 FTE is going to play a very significant role in what that looks like. Um, so we know we will be repurposing those funds, some of those funds. Which positions and what that looks like really has to be considered in terms of the impact on our overall measure 98 compliance as well as the impact on kids in our building. So that's the that was that's one of the reasons to think about it. But we do and we did come up with some

130creative ideas on how to repurpose some of the FTE. But we we have a few more details to d to dip into to figure that out. What we believe is that in doing so we would be able to have start both the personal finance and the postsecondary pathways in the fall of 20 a year from now. So it isn't it isn't a information item and you only have seven days. Yes. To get a waiver. So the waiver can be applied anytime between now and June 2026. Okay. June of 2026 is too late. But we need the waiver if we don't want to have to blow up the master schedule because that work takes a lot of time. So we would want to get it in right away if we were going to avoid it for

131this year. Even if we apply for a waiver, there's no so one of our conversations was today like we need a go date like we need to select a date where regardless of what we've heard we have to move forward because of the implications for the master schedule with the hope that we can pressure OD to get us a timely decision so that we can take more time to develop that pathways course knowing that we have first appliances figured out. So if you get the waiver Yes. You're not cutting any of the ninth grade success classes and class 27 is still going to get personal finance with personal finance regardless. We can do that for okay never done this before. You got we're recording. I move to implement the 2026 27 with waiver plan 8.

132I second. All right. So, it's been moved by David very eloquently, seconded by Myra very efficiently to amend. No, we're at um Well, what you're actually approving is the district submitting a waiver, right? Okay. Right. So, um, do you want to amend you want to amend your motion because it's already been moved and seconded? Yeah. So, hang on. Do we want to maybe grab a scratch piece of paper now and write it out first so we kind of have it in writing to know what I move to amend uh to amend the you just say amend to amend the motion is that the motion move to amend the motion the motion to state you can I mean you can amend the motion Should we just vote it down and then redo the vote? So, I

133move to amend the motion. Oh, god. Never mind. Stop. I was just trying to help you speak. So the the motion was David to implement the 2026 27 with waiver plan a where w document it's on the document the implementation plan. Gotcha. Gotcha. Okay. I was looking on this the right word. So, it has been moved and seconded and I believe that there is a preferred uh position. All right. So, with that, I I vote no. Myra, how do you vote? I voted to I made the motion. You made the motion. How are you voting? That I want to move forward with the wrap. No, you want to vote no. If you were asking [Music] no. Okay. So, it's unanimous. That motion wasn't quite didn't quite hit the mark. All right. The recommended motion could

134be to approve district staff to submit a waiver request to the Oregon Department of Education staff to submit a waiver. Uh, do we need to I'm just curious. Do we need to make any reference to the previous motion? Nope. Cuz that one went down. He might be referring to the He's referring to the other one. It went down. It went down just like this. You're right. Yeah, it went down. It doesn't matter. I'm just learning. Okay. So, approve the district staff to submit to OD a waiver request regarding the implementation of uh waiver request to postpone postpone implementation of S3 SB3 financial. What is that? No, because it's pathways and post. [Music] I move to appro approve the district staff to submit to OD a waiver request postpone implementation of SB-3. Second. All right. It's

135been moved by David, seconded by Holly to approve district staff to OD for a waiver request to postpone implementation of Senate Billy. Is there any further discussion? All right. So, all those in favor? I I This one's for this. Okay. All right. Thank you. It approves. It passes. Um, are you done? editing them by tomorrow. Okay. Like we got seven days and so um we're on 11 I think. I think we through 10. Is that what you're No, we haven't got six. We skipped six. Do number 12, Mr. Cook. 12. Yep. Okay. Thank you, I think. Yep. That's a brief one. Yeah. Um, I we had planned to give this update to you all in a business meeting in June, but since this system is up and running, I wanted to give an update now

136so we can announce it to the community. So, I'll read it directly to you. Uh, the 2016 bond upgraded the district's camera system with modern equipment. With this upgrade, the district has been able to enhance the monitoring of this equipment in order to detect guns in schools sooner. The district has contracted Zero Eyes to install AI gun detection software on cameras that will alert the detection of gun when in the camera's field of view. Zero Eyes delivers uh Zero Eyes delivers a proactive human verified visual gun detection and situational awareness solution that integrates into existing digital security cameras to stop mass shootings and gun rellated violence. Time has been set aside the agenda for the administration to provide additional information to the board. So, what this does is um and we started working on installing

137these things back in January and I think that's when I had my first one-on- ones with all of you to say, "Hey, this is what we're doing." Uh the and again, the reason that it's coming earlier than June is the system is up and running and running effectively. So, the AI technology is designed to detect silhouettes that look like dumps and get a real rapid response time to us if one is detected. So, we I now know it works. Uh because on Monday, it was not a real gun. I want to start off with that right away because I don't want to startle people. Uh kids were on campus playing with Nerf guns. Uh and a game that they should not be playing on campus. Nerf toys. Thank you. Uh and it is a silhouette

138of a gun. Within about 10 seconds, we knew because that went to the zero eyes people. It was verified by humans that monitor the system that it wasn't it was a toy gun. Uh but they still notified us that they had found it so that we could talk to the kids about that. Uh so if in if it didn't work, 911 the bells would have gone off. Police would have responded. In this case, in full transparency, police did respond because a staff member also thought it was gun and called 911. So that's also great. That's what they should do. And that way we have that verification. But we knew very rapidly that kids were out there playing with those Nerf guns and that there was a gun that kind of gun was on campus so

139that we could address the kids. That's pretty effective. Uh what that does is what we'll teach principles now is if we do get that verification, if there's something real, they're just going to hit the lock down button right away and secure the building. That way we don't have any delays. We already know that zero eyes will be calling 911 and then we can it it extends our it pushes our perimeter out a little bit is what it does so we can respond quicker. I have no idea where that was either. And so is that in all our buildings now John or the test is in one building? It is. Uh no we have it in all of our secondary buildings of 100 cameras that it has been installed on. Okay. Each camera is licensed to

140do that and we zero eyes came out to do a facility assessment because they're the experts on which camera would be the best and that's what we have to solve on. So when you say secondary is that high school only or middle and high school and that includes um our three high schools and our it does. Okay. Yeah. All right. We've watched the tests too. They've come to test the system. We've had police come into buildings when kids aren't around and pull weapons to see and those tests have done very well. It's an oil tax where the gun is pulled. Yes. Got it. That gives you a lot more time. Yeah. Okay. If you can detect within 10 seconds and then we'll be unless there's more or questions obviously. If you can get a response

141in 10 seconds from these people, the ability to secure the ability to notify staff by hitting that lock down button is fast. Now, I do have a question. Go ahead. Quick question. Could take 30 seconds. Sure. Uh, the shooting at Reynolds High School was discovered because a student walked into the bathroom. Are these zero eyes in the bathrooms as well? They will not be in the bathrooms. We can we can't put cameras in the bathroom, but the second they come out of the bathroom, but the kid walked through the courtyard. So, there if there had been that technology that would have 10 minutes to walk across the Yeah. Yeah. But good question. And yes, we will not Let's be clear on the record. will not be installed on campus in the bathroom. Just wanted to

142make that toys not allowed on campus. We Yeah, we don't want gun fake guns, whatever it is on campus. So, we address that. It's obviously addressed differently than if it's real, but they are talked to and we don't. Okay. All right. Thank you. Thank you. Get that one done. Um, yeah. I really can I can I really can make it this quick if people are willing to do um some work before our next meeting. Okay. Um what number is this? Number six. This is number six. And a lot of it was deletions. A lot of it was. So I can give you I I have gone through and made little notes like what's the like main thing you need to know about each policy. So I can kind of give you that super high level

143without looking at all the markings. And then I also want to clarify. So on the on the agenda item which now I got item number six, there is a packet for the policies. So the revised policies with recommended changes, those are the ones that the board will need to adopt. The ones that are the ARS, those truly are just for reference and we'll get to those. We'll talk about that, but it's just so that you can see in the policy what it's then wanting you to go look at. Um because there's a big change of the instructional materials on one. We just felt like it was better for you to have that to look at. Um so I'm going to go through these [Music] quickly. The bidding requirements and um real fast. This is this

144is first reading. So then what I thought Yeah. typically would then go to consent agenda in June unless there's questions in between or you can pull one at that time if there's something that you need to dig into. So there is a delete policy and a replace policy for bidding requirements. That's something that we know that they've been doing and as a part of the new bidding requirements policy they embedded the personal services contracts language. So basically DJC has DJCA language kind of embedded into it in terms of personal service contracts. So there's three pieces that are in your packet that all go together. A delete, a readdopt, and another delete for those three. Okay. Um the naming of new facilities policy is one for us to have. It's a separate agenda item that we

145could have um some conversation about. I think it's agenda item. Yeah, it's like something. So, so that's on the list, but we'll come back to that. Um, the staff HIV AIDS, that one is deleted because of legislative changes. Um, the instructional materials one. So the main changes here are they really took down instructional materials can be such a broad umbrella for all kinds of different things that are in schools. It can be library books that are in the real library. It can be books that a teacher has on a shelf in a classroom. And so and it also can be the curriculum that you all adopt as a board. So what this policy does is really differentiate between the different types of materials that are included in this policy. And then along with that, all

146of those ARs that I referenced share in a really much more clear way than I had before. If people have concerns or questions about those materials, it makes the process clear for what they do about that in terms of a reevaluation process that's either facilitated at the school level or the district level. Make sense? So you will see through here reference to a variety. I think there's six ARS that are all connected to this one policy and that's what that separate packet in your board um item is. Okay. Um graduation keep moving. Yep. Graduation requirements. I think we look at this every year. This year there is a change um from us having an alternative certificate. It's now been renamed a certificate of attendance. So this reflects some changes there. We also have the updated

147language around personal finance and pathways. Those credits are now included in this policy. And then we did some cleanup things that were related to this policy as well. That's a lengthy one. This one, just a quick question. The graduation requirements, there's a change from the board will review this policy to the district will re review this policy. The the board has to approve the policy anyway, right? So it isn't. Sorry, the second line of the graduation requirements. What board establishes the uh the second sentence says now says the district will review this policy annually, but it previously said the board will review this policy annually. The board either way would have to review it to approve it annually, right? I don't think I think that's the thing is that maybe we don't need to review

148it. So the implication is the district will review it every year and if there's changes then board establishes graduation requirement requirements for the award. So I think we're still included in the loop. I think that's um does it bring up it was a a quick question that we had. I don't know if this falls within there or where it falls, but the question came up about weighted. I don't know where that falls anywhere, but just keep an eye on that. Let's surface is a question, but not as a part of our graduation. Yeah. So, I just it somewhere goes. Yeah. Okay. You have that on? I do. Okay. All right. I can put that on the teacher. Yeah. Perfect. Okay. Okay. um section 504 students. There's just a little bit of clean up there um

149that was recommended. Compulsory attendance I want to talk about just for a minute because there it lays out the policy. The policy of it in and of itself is our current practice. It does reference that we may site parents if their students are not attending. That is not a practice that we have been doing in this county for a number of years. But we can technically we can. What do you mean by sightings? Like give a fine, have you go to court if your kid is not going to school? Yeah. I would have got one this year. What was that? I would have got one this year. It is not a practice that we've using used in this district. Not for a long time. For a long long time. never given a citation to a

150family. When we went down this road in 2011 and 12, it was not successful and parents were not happy because sometimes they didn't have the control that they wanted and it just penalized parents. So that was our biggest trouble. I mean I would say it's different in elementary than high school maybe because there are no elementary school kids driving themselves to school. No, but if you have families where they're living one custodial parent back and forth, you know, there's there's there are adults that should be responsible to get their kids to school where in high school the students to it in a citation thing. It's not the best way and our our DA and our courts don't support it either. They don't have capacity to do that. So, I just want So, that's right in

151the middle of this policy that we may do that. our practice is that we don't but in the event that we did in the AR packet the separate packet is the process for what that would need to look like. So it's not something we do and we have a process if that because legally we don't have that right if it ever became a thing there's a process. Okay. All right. Did you have a question? Yeah. I'd like to have the arrow and equa that have the ability to if it if it would ever be an appropriate situation to do that. So I I think this policy is good to have for sure. Yeah. I just didn't I want to be super like we don't do this on a regular basis. We don't do this and

152um there is a process if we needed to. So, um, after compulsory attendance, immunizations, immunization has some cleanup things and a bunch of strikes. It's pretty straightforward as well. Okay. Okay. So, that was it. So, these will come back. So, read them again carefully and uh they will come back on the consent agenda at the business meeting, right? Um, and any suggestions should be Yeah. And then we didn't Oh, because we're going to discuss that in a minute. Okay. Back to here. Policy that you want to do your economic forecast or what we'll do in policy. Oh, sorry. No, I'm just gonna while Tracy's on a roll and policy, what's number 14? Okay, quick. So, number 14 and maybe this is an email me your thoughts and feedback opportunities. Yes, that would be great. So

153one of the things so this is the naming of new facilities and um heard board uh talk members talk about um how spaces get named, how buildings get named, when a plaque can go up and a request for us to review the policy. And with that, we'd like to have some conversation and get some additional input from the board in terms of what are we hoping to try to accomplish through our policy because we can sit and draft some policy, but if we don't know that what we're trying to accomplish, then we're just going to probably be wasting some time. So, um, some of the things that I've been thinking about is there's a variety of different types of spaces. So we have like physical buildings or facilities like we have Warden and Russell Middle

154School that's named after a person, right? Um but we also have some different spaces gym um a farmer library at North Gresham that's now been torn down different examples across the district. Some of which are named after folks that are deceased and some that are not. So there's not any consistency in how we're naming different spaces or rooms across the district or how long those names stay stable and field right when we've got lots of we don't have any guidance or or policy around how we actually address that. So we have some questions around um I think more about spaces than about buildings. schoolbased health center maybe a plaque. Well, in plaques, we've we've t typically done a plaque for a new construction on a building that has whoever the board members were at the

155time. Um, I think we started taking off whoever the project manager was. It's on some I think we started taking that off. Um, it usually had the superintendent separate policy for that one. There is names on building. What I'm specifically looking for is naming of spaces like a gym or a swimming pool or you know sort like that. And then my other concern is naming. It says in there you can't name someone. You can't name someone until they're deceased. And I don't we have spaces that are named for people that I believe are not that are still alive. That's correct. And I'd like to my my what I'd like to do is change that. Um but I think there needs to be a stipulation under that because I think the original reason why it was

156deceased is if something comes up if somebody does something that you no longer want to have the space named after them still alive. And I think you need to have a a quiz proquo or in there kind of like a something exchange or something like if they do something we can remove we can remove that name but don't we have people that are alive gym I'm pretty sure what is where's I don't I haven't heard that he's not and that's and there is uh the field at Gordon Russell is named after Reed well there the counseling counseling is named after the former council retired who is still alive. So, and buildings have taken some license that we didn't know. We do need your input because then we can reaffirm this policy with principles. What do

157we need to do? I think this is a good time to do that. I I I do agree with David. I would like to see a change to to obviously there has to be some sort of like Bruce was a known staple in this forever. So, it totally makes sense. But um you know I think as it would be nice for so many to be recognized while they're alive and then and kind of the question too is is as part of that whole thing as well. How long can we leave something named and who's naming it? Yeah the board the principal. Yeah. Because in in like my two examples, we have Stapleton Field that's been named after the former mayor of Gresham. Is that who that was? The mayor who passed the first bond to

158build the comprehensive high school. All right. And then we've had a space within Gresham that was named for a teacher who was there for 40 years. And when they tore that down and rebuilt, the clock went away even though it was actually a board uh adoption to name that library after the teacher and it's not anymore. So, how does that kind of work? My two cents is the community owns the buildings. You all do represent that community. So, there does have to be an approval process that I think should go through the board. Uhhuh. Uhhuh. Uhhuh. Yeah. I'm not saying that it shouldn't, but I'm just saying, you know, we've been inconsistent about how the school or the teachers or the brought it to us. Yeah. Exactly. Exactly. Exactly. Because I remember that's what we

159did with the um the teacher at North put it out there and then there will be some interest. Where are you all at on time? Like in terms of like is it re-evaluated every five years? Is it a decade? That's a hard one. Is it a forever? It's a hard one because like was it Stapleton Bill that was named in the 1950s and then who named in 1915 or 16? 1915 or 16. Yeah. So on one end, if you ask a student today if they know who Stapleton was and and the story behind it, they they probably don't know. They may. They may. But you said, you know, I didn't know. Yeah. But then also If this person puts such an impact in this community, maybe it's like we need to know why. And I

160think your hardest decisions are going to be we do have retired people who have had huge impact and we have 12 or 15 here. So your your criteria will need to be pretty tight. And does that person have to agree that they want the thing right? Yes. I mean I I I think which they need to be a as far as like how family but some people are also very humble and don't want that. Right. And then and right and part of that also came up um around when we did student based health center. We had a former board member that was very much a huge part of making that happen. they are deceased and I had put in a request to have a space within the student based health center, you know, a room

161um a student intake, whatever, but a room with a plaque with that board member. Did we see that? Yeah. Yeah. And um and then the final part that we haven't really had to address. So I probably shouldn't even say it because then some say we should. But when we've had a space that has been named for someone that over time is maybe not is an unsavoring character and you want to either change it or you want to change it to be more representative of the community, then how do we how do we have that at least as a process? someone can request that. Tons of watched other school districts that have done that where they've renamed a high school where they've renamed a new building, added something in on a a sports field. Um, but

162we have a couple of our schools that I'm not real fond of the name and uh because of the the history that continues to come out. That is really not what I want to celebrate. However, where does tradition fall in versus how are we honoring someone that would you honor them knowing what you know now with with that? So, um so it's not policy and I wanted it to try and somehow be consistent. So, if the question comes up, how do we work with it? You know, someone says, I really want to change the name of our building. I'd really like to not have so many east, east, east, west, west, west so that we have a name for I wouldn't have known where to Yeah. They tell you which direction to go. Yeah. Yeah.

163But I said something the other day about being out in east and they're like east which which east Russia. I don't know. Yeah. So that was just it was just kind of a a broader question from space knowing that we had a space in a building that was named for someone still alive that we didn't have any part of it down to a space that got moved and wasn't renamed down to Stapleton Field. How do we collectively respond and respect namings of our facilities and buildings? I think two things. One, we should probably look at another district's policy also to give reference maybe. Yeah. The other one is in my mind if if a space is named and the building gets remodeled there needs to be a a procedure to either re choose to rename

164choose not to rename or not rename to choose to leave that name up there or choose not to leave that name there can get intricate. Oh yeah, it could be a big big red and orange for everybody which is why I recommend Titan. And think about it as well if it's a space maybe in this one instance that happened at North Perhaps if it had been a fiveyear you know and then really wouldn't matter when they redid the building because it would have said we did this got to go. I do wonder about a process to at least revisit like it'll be revisited by the board every five years or every 10 years or something because of that like you're talking space or whatever. Yeah. Yeah. Because you get to a point where it doesn't

165hold meaning for the people that are there, right? Well, and I would say the buildings that we have with things that might not be savory now, the people who are in those buildings, the students don't know. Yeah. And it's but on those I'd like for them to know. I would like for them to know if they don't know that to me that's a part of history they're not learning kind of. So that's that's kind of but I I would think at least revisiting space in because it's easier to rename Charles. Yeah. I wonder if we're more really tight on naming of new facilities and and more lenient on plaques because to me a plaque you could have a lot more of, right? There's one gym in each elementary school. There's one or two gyms in

166each middle school. I mean, those spaces run out really fast potentially, right? right? Um for options, but a plaque, there's something cool about like you can hang plaques down the wall and it could tell the story and the history of that school and and this teacher was there for 40 years and then oh this teacher was here for these 40 years and then these like that could be a really cool history piece within our buildings that could stay for longer because it's obviously smaller and you don't run out, you know. So, do you want the policy committee then to kind of rework this a little bit and look at some of the other policies from other school districts and see I can think of like three or four that I know. Yeah, maybe we maybe

167you guys pull policies and then we think about this more than this moment and then we bring it back to work session and you guys can share that and then we can share thoughts about right because it's not an urgent a month or two it's probably going to be a good year. It's a project. Yeah. So, we're not under a timeline that this policy has to be updated. It's just we brought it and it's it's more, you know, I would like to have a space in the student based health center and I just start trying to figure out how do we do that. Yeah. We didn't have policy on it. And I will say that the plaques, one of the things that I was saddened by, I think maybe was in the district office. There

168used to be a plaque for all the teachers and educators that would have served for 20 years or more. That's gone. M and like when I was when I was working here that was my like oh someday I'll be because I mean that's a lot of time now and well and we did have quite a conversation when we've rebuilt or added buildings during the ball because we have on the outside of the buildings the plaque that has whoever was the current board member, current superintendent, contract, uh project manager, year it was built and and that. So that's a plaque that's on the building. Is there a plaque we put on? On where? On. We haven't put one up yet. Well, to me, a plaque is also something that if policy changed in 15 years, whatever

169it is, and we decide that's no longer how we want to do it. We're totally disregarding. A plaque is also something that you could give to that family. Yeah. Right. But yeah, we're using like plaque in in different way. Well, that's why I'm saying I think we should be more lenient and do more of the plaques and be tighter on on fac naming facilities. I'll throw cans out there. Yeah, we name the space and then we have a plaque to tell the history of the name. Okay, that would be nice. And I think having a history in general if you can name something like staple other things whether you want to change it or not the fact that people don't know maybe they would want to keep it if they knew that maybe but having

170a history out there. Yeah. I think it'd be great schools. Yeah. happen. Well, and I guess what what does naming it mean? That we just say it's named or Well, is that a requirement that something or we have a ceremony to dedicate or do we because when we did Hogan, you know, Springwater Trail, we had community engagement with that. We reviewed the history of Brussam. We reviewed the territory of the area. Did not want to come up and use a name. We wanted to use a descriptor, but also not call it east, whatever. Um and that was how we came up with holding cedars because of the cedar tree spring water. Um the kids had a different idea. We did not go with that idea. And then across the street, the Braden Sport complex. Do

171you know who that's named? No. Mr. Graham. It's named for Mr. I mean I could have guessed who was science science teacher that I had. Do you know because they just changed the name on View to Shane T be Miss Park. I would say park I would but I would look at the city's policy. Yeah. Sorry you too much. That's okay. All right. Y that will help get us started. PD work in progress. Okay. All right. Where are we at still? Um economic Yeah, economic forecast. Okay. What number 11? All right. Treasure. Go to number 12. Knock on the door. This update is really for the board. Like it says the May or the May forecast 14th last Wednesday came out. It was 798 million short or less than the March forecast. that has an

172impact on the discretionary money available to the state. Uh what that means is there's a couple of significant things. They need to get back to the 11.36 billion that they um proposed that the governor and the legislature proposed. They need to come up with 170 million. Kosa is confident that they're going to be able to come up with that. So we're not going to be in a position where we're getting less than what we thought we were because that's what we budgeted on. the um the other things and there are many of them. There's a couple hundred bills that require financial support such as by cost of disabilities and the um percentage rate of students with disabilities that they fund. We're not going to get that money doesn't see it coming. We're going to be

173where we are. And we were kind of hoping for that money but didn't budget on it because it would have helped us a bit. Uh but right now they just don't have the revenue to support it. uh and including those impacted by wildfire. A number of other bills are not going to get funded because of that. There's a few other things still in ways and means class size and some other things. Oh no, the class size is not in ways and means. There's another one that is skipping me now that may get some money, but I just don't see it at this point after having two meetings with KOSA. So, I want the board to know that right now I think we are going to be at our budget and we don't have to worry

174about budget committee piece. Uh I don't think we're going to get any additional revenues and that's KOSA is pretty confident in that on just about anything. Uh and um we still have that federal uncertainty going into August and September hanging over our heads there too that may change some things. So this just your information open for questions if you have. Right. Thank you. um 13 looks like it's just it's mostly information, right? Okay. So, there are some um draft dates. We're not going to have anything with it tonight. Read it to look at it. Be ready to discuss it June 4th at the meeting and then adopt it on July 2nd, 2025. Okay. So, heads up. Um uh I think we are down to future board agenda topics. Do we have anything on the spreadsheet

175that are that we had not addressed or looked at? Holly, you said you were adding to the weighted grading. Yeah, right. The weight GPA. Yeah. Whatever that kind of I'll get into. So we have that when we talk about it. We don't weight our GPA currently for kids who take like if you take normally that's a higher weight in a lot of other districts. So so like students would finish high school with a 4.3 or 4.2 or something like that. Our cap is at 4.0 know because their eight classes are they're still the same or dual credit or yeah so so I didn't know why we did that and it it does affect college application and and financial aid so yeah even though GPA doesn't say there's no research that says a higher GPA means

176that you are more successful right right but your college admissance and your financial aid is dependent on it and so we I I hope that we just give our students the most opportunity possible and if there's no good reason that we're not waiting them, why not do that for them? Okay. All right. But I'll I'll add it to the future. And I think I think we're closing in on the end of it. I think I don't have any other things that I looked at or anything like circled off. So, um, we are at June 4th, 2025 is our budget hearing at 6:45 in the council chambers at the public safety and schools building. It's a uh, typically it's a 15minute meeting. We go out, we open the budget hearing, if anybody wants to make any

177comments or or requests to the budget because then in the regular board of business meeting that follows at 7 p.m. on that same day, June 4th, we adopt the budget. And so it's it's one last opportunity for people to um have comments. Typically that one it doesn't change a whole lot. And uh I don't believe there's anything else. Um you guys have information John and Tracy anything that we need to follow up with Angela we do. Um we are counting down to folks leaving and so we will be having celebration after this meeting. There will be treats. There will be tears. There will be stuff. Is that your Well, that's Oh, I thought you said so that will be an opportunity as well that we have to um well wish people along their way. So,

178with that, thank you very much for your time this evening. It was a little bit of an emotional meeting tonight. I appreciate your questions and comments and engagement. And with that, we are journ. Thank you.