001[Music] [Applause] [Music] good evening the Board of Trustees of Cypress Fairbanks Independent School District is now convened in a regular meeting on Monday October the 8th 2012 in the boardroom of the Cypress Fairbanks Independent School District instructional support center 10,300 Jones Road Houston Texas at 6 p.m. a.m I want to welcome the members of our audience and our television viewers to this meeting of the Board of Trustees as a Cypress Fairbanks Board of Trustees we are here to set goals listen to reports from the superintendent approve budgets contracts Personnel appointments and make policy for the district it is not the role of the board to make day-to-day operational decisions the management and day-to-day operations of the district are the respons responsibility of the superintendent we have policies and procedures in place to resolve concerns and
002issues this is a meeting of the public of the Board of Trustees not a meeting of the public prior to this meeting board members received information related to items on tonight's agenda agenda agenda items will not necessarily be handled in the order listed on the notice the meeting is O open to all who wish to attend and hear the matters discussed during the course of this meeting the board May determine that a closed session is necessary in that event the board will meet in closed session to consider matters duly posted for this meeting as permitted by section 551.071 to 551.074 inclusive of the Texas government code these proceedings are airing live on CFTV Channel 16 and CFTV online on the district website they will also be rebroadcast throughout the month on channel 16 and available
003as video on demand on the website for the tape to adequately reflect the proceedings I respectfully ask that you please refrain from talking while others are speaking and that cell phones are turned off or in silent mode thank you for taking the time to join us this evening and for your interest in Cypress Fairbanks Independent School District tonight our AVP students are from Cypress Ranch and they are Joel rosson Daryl thorman Chase parisher Javon lafur Kate ramlin and the AV advisor is Dusty Bower tonight's invocation will be presented by Teresa Hull associate super superintendent for government relations Communications and Chief of Staff Langham Creek High School jrc Cadets presenting the flag for the Pledge of Allegiance are Juan Rios Kayla Herrera Aurora procu Junior HOSA sponsors are Lieutenant Colonel Paul Marx Master Sergeant Anthony Bullock
004please stand for the invocation and remain standing for the pledge of allegiance to the flag let us pray Lord as we come together tonight we thank you for our board members who generously donate their service we ask that you grant them the wisdom as they work together with the superintendent and staff to solve the many challenges our district faces as Educators and board members parents and Community supporters we give thanks for the opportunity to be doing what is the most important work in our nation providing for the education of the young people in our community help us to be passionate about our work and focused on our success so that we not only enrich the lives of our students but enhance democracy as well as always we ask you to protect our men and women
005in the armed forces and we pray for peace in our world in your name we pray amen amen under guard oh ice oh [Music] he I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to for which it stands one nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for all [Music] you may be seated also in attendance tonight uh we have a community leadership committee uh these people are pulled in from all over the community and they get together about once a month uh to learn more and more about cair uh those in attendance would you please stand uh Craig sharp lesie Martone Stacy Anderson Stacy okay I'm sorry Stacy I was given the wrong last name okay thank you for being here and Stacy I told you I was going to
006say something good about you you're here Thursday and I forgot to do it so and so I get your name wrong so what the heck I'm sorry we'll now move on to the special recognitions portion of the agenda the board will recognize Cypress Ridge High School student Cadet leutenant Colonel Jared ree I'm sorry oh I'm sorry excuse me it's a regular K night we need to go back board member Tom Jackson will read this District's vision and mission statement for the benefit of the audience the vision statement for the district the Cypress Fairbanks Independent School District will be an exemplary educational community dedicated to the highest standards of quality at all levels and in all areas of endeavor all students parents community members and District employees respecting and valuing each other will be committed to
007providing all students with an education which enables them to live successfully in an Ever Changing Society the mission statement for the district the district will provide the environment and learning opportunities for all students so that as graduates they will possess the qualities which will enable them to live meaningfully and successfully in society and in the workplace The Graduate Will Be an Effective Communicator a competent Problem Solver a self-directed learner a responsible Citizen and a quality producer this is the portrait of the Cypress Fairbanks graduate thank you Mr Jackson we will now move on to the special recognitions portion of the agenda the board will recognize Cypress Ridge High School student Cadet lateral Colonel Jared ree who was selected as outstanding Junior rooc Cadet by The National Society sons of the American Revolution honoring him tonight
008are also John Thompson who is vice president of tssar and Alan Green who is the local chapter president the presenter is Mr claudo guard claudo thank you sir good evening president Cy uh Board of Trustees Dr Henry and guests it's uh an honor to present to you a student this evening that is distinguished himself from Cypress Ridge High School through our Air Force JC program after being selected as one of the outstanding Junior Cadets in the state of Texas and honored by the Texas Society sons of theic Revolution Cadet Lieutenant uh Cadet Lieutenant Colonel Jared Reese I've got to get used to the new title there was selected in in July as uh as as a recipient of the outstanding Geral Cadet for the United States this occurred in Phoenix uh where approximately 40 states
009were represented by Cadets he had previously uh and Jared was presented with a with the award and a $2,000 scholarship and and dipen he had previously received an aggregate of $1900 scholarship fund at the state and local level the extended Geral TC medal is awarded to an exemplary Junior Cadet the cadet should be in the top 5% of their unit with respect to leadership qualities military bearing and to and the top 10% academically they should also be the top 20% of their School academic class and exhibit leadership and bearing befitting of a good citizen within the school and Community I would also like to note that his parents were recognized and honored for their civic contributions and Jared's mother has been a spotlight teacher at posma elementary as well it's my honor and pleasure to
010present Lieutenant Colonel Jared ree thank you very much and thank you so much Mr Jackson for all your help in in this whole process appreciate your help thank you Jared do you have parents family teachers anybody that knows you here would they stand up please your parents thank you foring me I'll need help later tonight so that's okay congratulations ation Jared the board will recognize Felicia Haye Cypress Creek High School for being named Texas council for the social studies tcss outstanding High School teacher for 2012 presenter is Dr Linda msas good evening president kovi board members and Dr Henry it gives me great pleasure to introduce one of our great secondary Social Studies teachers Felicia Hayes Felicia come on come on up Felicia is a social studies teacher at Cypress Creek High School and also
011serves as a coordinator for the Human Services Career Academy she's being recognized today for being named the Texas council for the social studies outstanding High School teacher for 201 12 Miss Hayes was selected for this award for her outstanding teaching contribution to the advancement of social studies education within the school and for her community and active participation in local state and National social studies councils Felicia was a president-elect for the cipher Council for social studies this past year and let the group book drve for needy children in the district Donna Palm the director of instruction for Cypress Creek High School said the following about Felicia Mrs Hayes is the epitome of the 21st century social studies teacher she is committed to social studies education as well as the welfare of the students at Cy Creek
012High School please help me congratulate Felicia Hayes the 2012 Texas council for social studies outstanding High School teacher any any family members colleagues I know that there are members here from the Texas council for social studies if you'll please stand to be recognized [Applause] congratulations Miss Hayes superintendent will make remarks and announcements including the honors and achievements earned by staff and students in recent weeks Dr Henry thank you Mr kovi just a couple of quick announcements I would like to announce that the State Controllers Office has awarded Cypress Fairbanks ISD a five-star rating for academic and financial performance for the third straight year the financial allocation study for Texas or fast assigns every District a rating from one to five stars five stars reflects the strongest academic progress and growth combined with the lowest spending
013of the 1300 public and charter schools in the state of Texas Cipher ISD is one of only 11 uh of that 1300 to receive this five-star riging uh for the three years it's existed also based on the fast uh study the com rollers office has awarded cfd the honors Circle award for 32 of our campuses these schools were recognized for achieving academic success through costeffective operations the following campuses uh uh received these Awards this award excuse me Adam Andre alt bang Burks black Copeland Danish dur Farney Gleason her grve Hamilton Joel Keith lamin Lee Lowry matky MC Milsap Moore Owens post postma Robinson tips Warner Wilburn Wilson and joerger elementary schools and Cypress Ranch High School congratulations to all of our talented students teachers and staff we're going to take a real short two-minute break
014to congratulate the people here and then we're back up here uh starting on with the meeting if you didn't know the Texans are playing tonight so we're going to enjoy a short 2 minutes that's it I will tell you that we overlooked one person if there's more on the CLC committee Sally Ramsey is out there Sally would you stand thank you for serving is there anybody else I overlooked okay thank you at this point any board member may make a comment during this portion of the agenda without prior posting being required common items may not pertain to the character of any student staff or board member and may not be discussed or deliberated upon at this time uh the last weekend in September the board attended the Texas Association of school boards an your meeting
015State meeting in Austin and there were five of us that were able to attend and so I have asked them because there's a number of sessions that we attend during this and I thought it would be a good idea for each one of us to to share a little bit about the session that they wanted to uh tell you about so we will start with that and then the two board members that couldn't go then we will no we're not going to start with Tom uh cuz I saw his it's three pages so any no I'm just kidding so anyway the two board members that weren't able to attend uh then we'll have them if they have something to to report later then we'll have that report so Mr Ryan you want to start sure
016uh actually the best session I went to was Dr Ole Tre session was awesome uh he did a great job he presented he'll talk about that uh one of the sessions that Tom Jackson and I went to is uh a UT Professor was presenting and the topic was why our schools need digital media and design thinking and the funniest thing about this is this technology didn't work at all literally videos with no sound but but what it what it really we we still got the gist of what he was trying to say because what it was talking about was uh with social media today and you know how the kids are are constantly on it is is bringing that into the classroom and kind of integrating with what we're doing currently uh with our technology
017so it was a good session thanks Don Miss Wood well I um this wasn't exactly a seminar session but uh Bob and I spent a good deal of Saturday in our delegate assembly and this is the Texas Association of school board uh there's a representative from every district and we all gather together and we vote on the legislative agenda moving forward and uh it was really interesting there's always uh a little bit of debate about certain items but um as a rule everyone agreed with all of the resolutions and uh those are available online at the tasby website but uh it was really nice to see that they are truly thinking of all students moving forward and their work in the legislative agenda so thank you Dr ogry thank you Bob as a part of
018my uh uh matriculation and gradu graduation through leadership tasby uh we grouped off and had to take a a project and the project that um uh Kim um butcher from Greenville ISD and Frank Shaw from Carolton uh Farmers Branch ISD and I took on was uh the uh health issue uh dealing with the Obesity crisis uh uh that is not just in the United States but also in uh Texas a very prevalent an epidemic among our young people and the title of our Workshop was let's get moving and we uh attempted to address underachievement through uh two aspects through uh nutrition and through exercise and and we found a number of studies that U have shown that if we focus upon those two uh vehicles that our children will be more focused be much healthier
019and will achieve at a higher level on the academic level and um uh we were quite fortunate to get into that I one of the highlights of the presentation was I was able to show a video from one of our own schools um from renell elementary who uses the catch PE uh program and to show how fun uh physical activity can be uh and how it can embrace the whole student population so uh real happy to study that and hopefully uh we'll get to do that Workshop across the state some more thanks Dr o I'm going go cuz I know what Tom's going to report on and that was probably one of the best sessions of the entire meeting so I'm going to save him to the end uh I attended one that was called
020Moving Team forward as a leadership body and it pretty much uh started addressing the vision and the mission statements that districts have and there you'll be amazed at how many districts don't even have a vision statement so it was wonderful that we have one but it also said that we need to take a look at our vision and mission statement and update it to 21st century education and I will tell you that the board has agreed with me and this is something that we are going to be tackling in November and I just wanted to let you know it it was a great uh session to go to and it was sponsored by tasby and a great presentation and there was a lot of uh I would call it sitar around input from a number
021of districts so we learned a lot from that Tom [Music] during this time period I also generally have my tip of the Hat section which I will go ahead and feather into my comments uh so so board members uh relax if you're so inclined on September 12th I attended an event where local police officers were honored including our very own officer Brooks uh I would like to recognize the fact that former policeman representative Fletcher helped to honor the these Law Enforcement Officers so a tip of the patrol hat goes to the good representative and also for his support of our school district September 20th I attended the Houston A+ uh speaker series to hear NE Kingsland on the Miracle of New Orleans I'm sure everybody has seen the HBO special on what's happening in New
022Orleans as well as Chris barck who's a superintendent for the Tennessee achievement School District a couple of my takeaways both gentlemen were very pleased with the progress going on by the introduction of charter schools into their Community Mr Kingsland did note that he wanted New Orleans or Houston or Memphis to be the first urban school districts in the United States with 100% Charter Schools he noted that his efforts had raised the New Orleans schools from F To Mediocre uh and we wish both gentlemen with continued success uh I should note that Mr barick was assigned taking over the bottom 5% of the schools in Tennessee following upon the heels of that I then drove to Austin on the evening of September 24th to hear the Statewide conversation on high stakes testing I would like to
023give a tip of the hat to CLC members Karen Miller and Stacy Anderson for driving down to hear the presentation it was a panel discussion as well as coming all the way back these all volunteer hours they were also joined by Teresa Hall and Dr msas and I note that we do not pay overtime thankfully uh it it was a long drive down and a long drive back uh it was in fact a distinguished panel it included representative acok Dr M mcneel of rice Dr Valenzuela of the University of Texas at Austin uh it also included commissioner Tom pocken from the Texas Workforce commissioner paen expressed support for multiple Pathways including Pathways to vocational education there is widespread concern regarding the excessive testing going on in the state of Texas that unintended consequences could occur
024including increasing the dropout rate as opposed to increasing achievement standards I also found it very significant on these multiple Pathways that very significant concerns were were expressed by some of the panelists and many of the speakers at the microphone that if Pathways were adopted then students could or would be ushered into those Pathways based upon ethnic or socioeconomic characteristics uh this will be a topic that will be discussed uh in the coming uh Springtime in the Texas legislature and I think as a board and also as a community it's another topic that we need to have sensitivity and awareness of as it continues to progress I also had the opportunity to attend the VIPs General board meeting on September 27th a big tip of the hat to the volunteers the meeting room over at the
025Barry Center was full you actually had people standing up at the back there were over 150 individuals there uh they spent not only their entire morning but extended past lunchtime so thank you very much to the volunteers of our district uh the keynote speaker for the event was uh chief of police Bragg uh a couple of comments that I wanted to take away uh he did remind us that any of the tickets they issue the school district does not receive the financial benefit from unhappily uh he also reminded us that those individuals that we on the board are the General Public public May refer to as uh blue shirts are in fact and should be referred to as cosos uh our cso's campus security officers uh and his presentation uh showed the transition of the
026police force and I certainly appreciate the update that he gave to the parents who were there that morning October 4th I attended Chamber of Commerce Roundtable of approximately 20 featuring Senator Patrick who's our newly appointed chair of the education committee he applauded the district for the ability to achieve despite lower funding throughout the United States a tip of the capital uh read Granite goes to Senator Patrick for his ongoing support of the district through very difficult Financial Times and despite pressure from other groups suggesting that that perhaps the district does not Merit his support I did in fact attend with everybody else the session in Austin a brief comment the advoc advocacy and and legislative update session I attended they pointed out that the funding Gap has in fact uh started to close as evidence
027of that the differential between Tomball and cciir has gone from $1,400 a student to ,200 to $800 a student however they pointed out that instead of the bottom where cciir is being averaged up the top is being average down so I think it's a case of be careful what you wish for because it may happen and you may not like the unintended consequences the most significant of all of the seminars that I attended uh was involved the speaker of Diane radit Diane radic was the deputy secretary of education under Bush the Elder she also served under Clinton she continued to serve uh in various educational Endeavors since then she was one of the Prime architects of No Child Left Behind she was an advocate very strong ad advocate of the carrot and apple approach she
028has since reversed her position which is very significant based on 20 years worth of data interpretation and research some of her comments that she made in New Orleans she pointed out that 80% of the schools are now Charter Schools 79% of those schools are still failing I should point out that they also receive thousands of dollars more than we do here as do the Tennessee schools which she pointed out have not achieved the results that everybody had hoped for she also commented on the the famous pieza test that's the international test given by the French for students and school children across the United States she pointed out that in one area our children out test everybody else and that's our children of poverty our children of poverty test the best of Any Nation unhappily children
029of poverty are always out tested and outscored by those children not in poverty and we simply have higher percentages of children in poverty in our Public Schools taking that International test than other industrialized nations she definitely challenged the kot and stick approach she argued that it has not shown to deliver results in public Ed and of course it didn't work very well at Enron or or Goldman either uh she also looked statistically at the concept of Merit pay in many different states where it was fully in effect and she pointed out that the statistical results have shown it to be a failure uh she also examined the issue of charter schools and vouchers and noted that the results obtained from those corporate reforms were not what all had hoped for all of these are significant
030issues which will in fact be brought up in the springtime and I would suggest to the board that the board consider revising what the typical board agenda is and perhaps some of these topics should be placed on the board agenda in the near future either starting in December or perhaps uh in the springtime when the legislature is in session these are topics that we need to be informed of so I thank the board for uh uh for your time and attention and I apologize to the general public for taking up so much of your time but I do think all of these comments thanks Tom did have value Mr do you have anything uh yes I do it's completely unrelated to what you're talking about so that's fine this is Bo comments all right uh
031I've noticed that in the past uh three years there's uh has been a uh political action committee has been formed for the election of a trustees to this board uh in looking at some of the some of the paperwork it seems like there are some uh corporations or companies that have given money to this pack and that money has been passed on to past trustees or present trustees in uh which could be in direct violation of the law uh there there have been problems like this in some of the larger school districts in the state of Texas so for that reason I want to ask this district for an investigation as to the contributors to uh to that pack in the past uh two elections and in this one as soon as that paperwork is
032in also there have been out ofate contributions made to uh to this pack also so I want all that looked into and I'm also going to forward this information and and request an investigation from the uh the uh Texas ethics Commission and perhaps the the Attorney General's office also so thank you thanks Mr Morris Miss heartley on a different note I wanted to say thank you to all the local businesses who constantly support our schools and our booster clubs so often I see come eat at Raising Canes tonight there this money goes to the band or come to Orange Leaf you know they're supporting our group I want to thank these and other businesses such as Spring Creek Barbecue uh just to name a few uh in addition I wanted to say how I appreciate
033the parents involvement tonight it's great to see involved passionate parents supporting the cipher students I hope you will add your enthusiasm and passion as we look towards Austin and our state legislators and we fight for Equitable funding your voice matters and we'd like to hear it thanks thank you one final thing I will tell you that uh I've been invited or the cair has been invited to partake in a uh a group called impact that is being sponsored by the Harris count County Department of Education and they're bringing in school districts from around the Harris the Houston area and there are 12 to 15 that have agreed to get together and talk about what we can do as districts that we can help each other and uh then also how we can speak as a
034single voice when it comes time for the legislature uh so I was very pleased to be involved in that uh I will tell you that uh all around us are are the districts that are participating patents who have duly registered per policy bed local May address the board regarding matters of concern or interest to the district other than the character of any student staff or board member I would like to remind the audience and the viewers that the comments of the speakers reflect their own positions or opinions the board may not discuss or act upon any matter that is not listed under the action item portion of the agenda therefore board members may not discuss the comments of the speakers please understand that a lack of a response from the board members does not indicate
035agreement or approval of the comments each speaker will be given three minutes to address the board Mr Don Ryan Secretary of the board will be the designated timekeeper if you have never spoken before if you'll come up to the podium on my right uh there is a box up there that's got a red yellow and green light so when you start start speaking the green light will come on at 30 seconds before your time is up the yellow light will come on and when the red light comes on we would like to ask you to summarize and complete your statement uh we do have uh a number of people speaking tonight so uh we appreciate your attention and uh listening to what the comments are our first one is uh Stacy kiner uh Stacy would
036you like to come forward it's a shame we're not held to the same standards as the board are with some of our comments good evening my name is Stacy kener the following is my opinion and does not represent any community board or committee on which I serve I am here because of the sexed controversy I am okay with certain elements of the curriculum and find others inappropriate at best I'd also like to say this District I love so much could have done a better job with proactive communication on a topic we surely all knew would be controversial but what Mo bothers me most is not the actual back and forth of what belongs in sexed curriculum but the slow and steady erosion of our children's entire education caused by continued funding Cuts does not draw
037the same level of ey resource and commitment to change from our community if we are willing to fight to change the curriculum in one class based on moral grounds or parental rights why would we be content to stand by when our children's overall education is at risk do you know the 82nd legislative C legislative session cut $5.3 billion from public education or that for the first time in our state's history growth for new students was not funded how about that our state continues to pass mandates down to local districts without providing the funds necessary to meet their requirements some of the more obvious ways these actions directly impact each child in our district is increased class size a decrease in the actual number of days available for instruction due to increased testing decreased Transportation offering
038that makes an impossible for some students to get to school on certain days because of their neighborhood safety as well as the elimination of an additional certified teacher and inclusion classroom this impacts General and special ed this is just the tip of the Iceberg on how our children's future is being sacrificed all of this is happening while the rainy day fund grew to a record 8.2 billion these are facts you can verify them on our State Controllers website in Texas we have the opportunity to change legislation every two years our Chan is coming this January with the 83rd session and other than the usual handful of people I do not see an energized Community ready to come together to fight for a cause that will not only benefit every single child in our district but
039anyone who owns property or operates a business I don't think this really represents who we are as parents or a community if you're here tonight or if you're watching on TV you're involved in or care about your child's education let's Harish this energy the sexed controversy has created and expand it so that it can covers the complete education of all of our children if you'd like more information drop me an email at fun cfd atbc global.net thank you for your time thank you Stacy Christine comach did I say that right okay thank you I wish I was meeting you under different circumstances um but I wanted to let you know that I feel very passionate about something I've been a member of this community for 34 years I'm a product of cciir Independent School District
040I went to Arnold and I went to cyer high school and graduated class of 85 Bob K fite Never Dies I wanted to come before you because I am very opposed to the school district implementing this particular curriculum it's your game due to the inappropriateness of language in the curriculum that does not meet sciare ISD student standards of conduct this is a level three offense of profanity or vulgar language or making obscene gestures um there is incor inappropriate information in the video and inappropriate skits in the curriculum they also have inappropriateness of students dress suggestive and gang-like dress and that's uh prohibited by being in a gang free zone in the schools um violation of established dress code this is not what ciper condones or tolerates I'm very shocked that this program was chosen for
041our students a lack of communication and options by the school district information about this program could have been sent home in the spring to alert parents to the curriculum change along with meetings to view it and the videos in advance nothing was sent home to parents until the September 2012 meetings many parents weren't able to attend due to the conflicts on the on September 10th or 18th including myself nothing in the in the booklet sent home with the new curriculum indicated that this was a distinct change from the past parents were also not given a full opt out option of this curriculum why this has not been the case in the past with CI ciper has been very transparent in the past with the information that's been presented to the families and students of this
042district and let me reference the student health advisory Council minutes from February 22nd parents are notified when the unit will begin and when they may attend the parent information at the information meeting parents will review the videos in the curriculum taught during the unit they were not we were given information in a PowerPoint presentation but their videos and the curriculum were not available for review with the parents at those meetings um also Cipher and their code and their handbook um have four options that their CH child will receive the information parents may allow the students to remain in the science class and study the reproductive unit two May teach unit objectives at home and the student will be held accountable for the meeting objectives and the um or the they may be excused from a
043particular topic or they may be given an alternative unit to study on their own we have not been given an alternative unit to study on our own we were told we would have to teach this curriculum on our own to our students and we're opposed to it Miss Hill said in her own words this challenge will be to find something that is not Way Beyond the scope of middle school students grasp she said the goals will be written and expects the entire process to take about two years Miss Hill said the unit is emotionally impactful and cannot be put together in a short period of time why is this being forced on us after merely six months thank you my I would just like to give you a handout that I have I'm not one
044to come and complain and not give options there's another program that I found called choosing the best that has a sexed curriculum for sixth through 12th grade for every grade which I think it's that important since our district is facing such tough issues that they would have an option where students would educated every year next speaker is David M Wilson president kovi uh Board of Trustees and Dr Henry thank you for the opportunity to speak uh my name is David Wilson I represent the cyfair uh excuse me I represent the Cypress Texas Tea Party I wanted to speak to you about one item that's on the agenda tonight and uh it's regarding the uh you're going to be awarding a contract for uh demographic services I was at the uh the meeting of the whole
045on Thursday and there was no discussion about this item as I got more information about it I found out there that uh the uh the vendor that is being uh recommended that you approve is population survey analyst and uh they were uh they submitted a bid price of $234,600 uh they were given an evaluation score of of one to 100 each one of the bid and there were eight biders there and uh they this particular population survey analysts were given a evaluation score of 79 the next and and again that uh their bid was $234,600 the next highest bid was only $992,000 uh the second recommended bidder uh was at 91,92 to JN rter they had an valuation score of 7 78 which was only one point less than the recommended bidder but you know
046as as you can see their bid was $140,000 less than the one that's being recommended for you to approve tonight uh I want to thank uh Marty Edwards he took opportunity he took time out of his day today to speak to me about this particular contract and he mentioned the differences between the bids and that uh all the services this other uh this uh other you know the recommended bidder was able to supply and really what you need here is transparency when when you put this forward and this goes in the record like this uh there there's nothing to explain what all this is there was no questions asked at the meeting last Thursday and uh you know if you just let this going on through it looks like over $140,000 being previously wasted and
047I know it's something different than that so what I recommend you do is send that back and get bids that are Equitable you know explain the differences if you want more services from one vendor than another can provide rather than have it reflected in an evaluation score get everyone to bid on the same project and and the same thing but I thank you for your time Dr Francis Smith good evening president kovi board members and Dr Henry cyer sta members are looking ahead and wondering what sorts of catastrophic bills might be submitted and even passed during the next Texas legislative session let alone what the lame duck session of Congress might produce the anti-public school teacher mode is still intact the anti-union position is still continuing vouchers continue to threaten our public schools and one
048of the continuing horror stories for teachers is Merit pay there is nothing meritorious about it equating a teacher's salary increases with student scores is not at all scientific and does not fairly evaluate a teacher skills to any degree our student products are all different unlike the business world we all begin at different places with our students and we end differently as long as we do not pre preest our students in the fall with a test which is another version of what we use in the spring we are testing apples and oranges there are no pretests for tax and especially not for EOC benchmarks don't count as they are other tests our classes are different each year it is rare for us to have the same students more than once students due to different personalities bond
049with some teachers better than others what happens when the mix just does not blend well most teachers can work to overcome those discrepancies but believe me there are some classes that do not work and the only solution is to intervene with schedule changes which always take time if they even happen one could not get good scores with this situation there are some teachers in each School school who do not teach the subjects which are tested are they any less important than the rest of course not everyone plays an important part but we would be remiss if we were to say that we would not care if any extra pay would depend totally on other teachers success or lack of it teachers do not choose the teachers the students they teach the classes based on past
050achievement or the lack of it are given to the teachers usually without any discussion and some do get lower achieving students more often than others while that is not a big issue normally if pay were dependent upon such achievement there would be an obvious disconnect here if there were Merit pay and classes were not rotated among teachers evenly and fairly those who would bear the brunt of this unfairness could hardly be expected to support it in addition we all know that student progress is quite dependent upon our students parents and the support they provide for their children so to devise a pay system upon classification of so-called teacher progress which does not and cannot make equal compar is misguided at best we hope scair continues to ignore this trend thank you next speaker is dedri
051T Wilmer did I say that right is dedri right okay good evening first like today superintendent hearing president kovi and Schoolboard members the reason my existence tonight is a represent as a parent homeowner business leader and taxpayer when I relocated here at Houston back in 2002 I asked everyone around where where can I live that believes in an area that believes in education the consensus was sfair as a young man with a one-year-old child at the time I was anticipating not a perfect school or assister but a district that believes in world class education and Educators that brace diversity both ethnicity and economics if they're from northwest Houston or from Black Horse Ranch Educators and and and administrators has to embrace this as well if they reside any school regardless if they're Title One or
052not this will prepare my child for for higher education and I ever competitive Global Workforce now as 2012 and years later I'm very disappointed in Lev of Education which really concerns me on a middle school level which some schools prepare for what I said before and others are not when the school district made a decision to integrate level one classes with traditional students I have major concerns how do you prepare your child to take AP courses in high school if you're not preparing him in Middle School by not having preap courses my board members today please ask yourself this question when I was watching a program yesterday morning on msbc that was talking about the current Supreme Court case Fisher versus Texas and I said to myself I want my child to be admitted to
053the University Texas regardless of a 10% rule but Bas based on the Merit of his overall achievement this starts while now he's in sixth grade it's about preparation for high school and high school is a preparation for higher education this will allow my child to be on the same playing field regardless of race my family consists of Educators administrator Chancellor of a major university when you leave this evening on your way home board members please keep in mind that there's a lot of parents out here every single day they work hard to make sure and day and day out to make sure that kids are challenged so they can compete for for careers not jobs please encourage Mary galoski and shot Shepherd to reconsider was perceive a budget Crunch and opportunity but allow kids who
054are reading at a level Beyond a grade level I have a young boy that I know that whom exceed expectations at math a kid who have a dream of being a scientist a colist and physician a young girl who wants to be ambassador to the UN because she loves social studies we focus so much on separating our athletes by having an AM team why we came to do the same in our classrooms I conclude tonight we have to keep focus in our commitment to our children it doesn't matter if you have a child or not in any schools but it's a commitment as the children of God to protect all children to maintain the souare portrait thank you may the Lord bless you all thank you next speaker is Mindy Lucas thank you for your
055time I'm here to speak about uh some of my topics of concern about the new sexed program it's your game my name is Mindy Lucas I'm a Fairfield resident I'm a registered nurse and a mom of three I have a daughter that's also a bobcat fight Never Dies graduate 2007 I have a son that's a junior at cyranch high school and a daughter who's my youngest at that's a seventh grader at sard's I'm an everyday mom in the trenches with you serving our schools and just trying to make some memories with my kids my youngest is the last of three that I will escort through these exciting Discovery years of growing up education is powerful just as dangerous as under educating our kids though is the damage that we do when we give them too
056much information too soon this program is packed with content that is really too mature in concept for the average 12-year-old they just really don't possess the ability to disseminate it appropriately the various videos situational dramas in this program show vignettes that involve older teens not 12 and 13 year olds it's just too much too soon the content of the program reaches far beyond anatomy and physiology it targets a very small percentage of middle school kids who have environmental or socioeconomic peripheries that place them in a group that needs more in-depth information biology is a pure science urban slang in an edgy hip fashion has no place in an academic classroom uh this is one of the most sensitive and controversial topics that our kids will ever be taught as an elementary or secondary student in
057cyfair schools I really don't want my daughter associating the miraculous gift of a sexual relationship with terms like hooking up or getting it on and these are used over and over in this program and I've watched almost all of it let's teach them this age-old concept without giving it an inner city slang that really makes it take on a degraded form uh as a Bachelor of Science prepared registered nurse I have never remember being taught um on the Collegiate level about controversial topics like alternative types of sexual acts involving other non-standard body openings and those are covered and it's your game I do not think that the situational dramas should be reenacted in a formal classroom with situations dealing with the issue of sex there's never been a time that you had a problem getting
058a 12-year-old's attention when you mention sex and I don't think it's going to be a problem this time some kids are there they're willing to talk about it some aren't and this is forcing them to take on something that I don't think they are uh really from a growth and developmental perspective able to handle the past the post program statistics that were given to parents at the overview meetings didn't demonstrate that the students from all socioeconomic de demographics have been captured and I quote the statistician and I'm closing 1500 HISD students mostly Black and Hispanic were sampled and it doesn't give an accurate snapshot of all cciir middle schools if we're teaching this to Target an atrisk population which is about 5% what are you going to do with those students that you over inform
059how are you going to handle the negative repercussions that come from that uh the past program was outdated but this one is not the right answer let's try again next speaker is Don [Music] tamborello um hello um this is actually the first time I've ever done something like this so bear with me but the previous speaker um did an awesome job and said a lot of the same things that I was getting prepared to say but let me add to it that um I have also lived in the school district um and had three children um two are in their 20s and have graduated from cyfair high schools and I have a daughter who is in fifth grade and will be in the seventh grade program in two years and she'll be 12 years old
060she will have turned 12 a month before she starts seventh grade and when I found out about this program um which was just Saturday two days ago and um I am speaking as a parent and I'm not representing the school district but I am a teacher in the school district and I have tried um since Saturday to find out as much information as I could um and I'm going to be very blunt because when this is how it was told to me on Saturday and then I started doing my research and talking to people and um if it bothers you to hear the terms oral sex and anal sex it bothers me too and I don't want my 12-year-old to be exposed to that in school in a co-ed environment and I can I can
061assure you that the majority of parents and Educators teachers that are in the school district are not aware of this terminology and this um overexposure um to sexuality in this way that that our 12 and 13 year olds are going to be exposed to in the class CL room um I just totally object to that uh let's see I I have heard that there was an opt out of the program where you would keep your children out of the program um I've talked to several people that say it should be more of an optin but I really personally think that there's better choices out there and the parents that I've talked to that did attend the meeting said that this information about oral sex anal sex role playing was not shown to the parents so
062they have not been given a true picture of what this sexed class is like and what our children are going to be actually have already started to watch and um I know people that are keeping their children home from school to not have to see this and not be exposed to it of course those of us that are trying to protect our children and their youth are also um going to have other children that are going to be telling them about it in the same Junior High environment thank you next speaker is Billy Dixon my name is Billy Dixon and I'm a parent of a middle school student in cfd and and my objections to it's your game uh risk Reduction Program are twofold one is common sense and one is uh the law I
063am an attorney licensed to practice law in the state of Texas so I'll talk about that in a minute excuse me but from a common sense perspective the curriculum asks the students which are 12y olds um which even the the statistics in the program itself say that less than 10% have had any sort of sexual ual activity or contact by the age of 12 it asked the other 90% to Define what their own sexual boundaries are so the students themselves without any guidance morally from uh the the teachers because you know we live in a Godless secularist Society so the teachers can't tell them that this is right or this is wrong but they're going to ask them to Define as students what is your own sexual uh boundaries so they're going to teach them
064first about every one of the sexual activities that the former speaker just talked about and then the students are supposed to Define for themselves without any moral guidance what their own sexual boundaries are and then after that the students are going to be asked to role play with other students so let me just set the picture for you you've got 12-year-old boys and 12-year-old girls that have just been taught every form of sexual activity possible they have written down or defined for themselves what their own boundaries are and then they're going to sit in the classroom together and talk to each other about well do you want to do this and do you do you want to do that I mean what are we creating here some sort of environment for hooking up at school
065I mean this is ridiculous you're promoting the activity you're not helping the students so briefly I do want to go over the law Texas Education Code 28.4 subsection e specifically tells the school board what is an allowed sexed curriculum program I'm going to read a couple of the subsections that you're violating uh the law is any course materials and instructions relating to human sexuality must present abstinence from sexual activity as the preferred choice of behavior in relationship to all sexual activity for unmarried persons of school age number two devote more attention to abstinence from sexual activity than any other Behavior okay this program does none of that I've seen the videos they're teaching kids who want to hook up how to use condoms how to use birth control etc etc there's just no uh abstinence
066uh teaching in this in this program next speaker and I may get this name wrong is matey whitesman how close was [Applause] I what's your first name m m thank you my T and thank you all for being here thank you for your time volunteering I'm sure M much of this that you're hearing is news to you because unless you're a parent who has Grave concerns over their child you wouldn't spend nine hours looking at these videos and looking at this information and I am sure that's the case with the board that decided on this you we just didn't have the time it's kind of like other things in law but we did a key search I know you don't want to break the law and there's only abstinence mentioned twice when they did it
067in the manual of the information I was in the lobby and I wanted to talk to you about some of the statistics about abstinence education that there's more it's better and they have recent reports that have shown that it really does abstain children from sex more so than these safer sex programs I wanted to tell you that there is links to the people who develop this program to plan Parenthood even though they categorically deny it we don't want I mean as a school district I don't want my school district being involved in something so controversial and I just wanted to tell you we were in the lobby and as parents were walking in I you know I'm looking at them going is she for or is she against and I hated that feeling because we
068are all for the kids we're all here for the kids we don't want it who wants their 12-year-old to learn something like oral sex and to have that in their heads so you know I'm crushed that I had that feeling in my head when I was walking there and I was trying to make out who was who and as everyone walks up you kind of have that same gesture you're all here for the same reasons it's our kids and I understand now there's bigger issues you know there's funding there's legislature but this program is not for them they deserve better we deserve to give them something better they're 12 they're 13 down the road we as parents need to be involved and teach them this but I respect that you are here I thank the
069parents that are here and I really pray that you guys can pull this because it shouldn't be it's too late a photograph is an image that lasts in your mind I watch those videos and I can't get brainy guy out of my head he's a casual guy who picks up hooks up and has sex since my children were tiny I have taught them sex is a gift from God for marriage you the Educators The Authority are putting them in my classroom where they obey you day and day out and then you put a video in front of them that says contradicts everything I've teach I've taught them that it's okay and if you go for it these are the ways that you protect yourself this program isn't for our kids and it's not for our
070school district thank you last speaker tonight is Kevin Brewer Mr President board members Dr Henry thank you for the time this evening uh I would tell you I come up here with concerns I did not come with prepared remarks tonight uh so I will not be near as articulate or eloquent as some of the previous speakers but I do come here tonight as a concerned parent and I'm not going to reiterate all the things that some of the previous speakers said about the issue game program I would implore any of you who have not taken the time to to watch these videos and to review this content to please do so I was at this meeting In This Very Room on September 8th to a packed house September 18th and the vast majority of those
071people in the room who had taken the time to review the content were very opposed to it but it was being presented to us and told this is not up for debate it is not up for change we're just here to give you some information and you can opt out as one of the parents said earlier I can't opt my kids out of the lunchroom I can't opt them out of the hallways I can't opt them out of the bus ride when the state in the district puts that information in the classroom when they put those Graphics in the classroom you have put it in every child's mind whether I opt my kids out or not you have taken my ability as a parent to raise my children away now I'm not going to argue
072that there's no place for sex education cuz I believe there is unfortunately too many parents have given up their responsibility but there's a better way to do it than what this program does the very statistics to support this program and by the way I watched I I reviewed the presentation that was given to the shack in February and I set through the presentation given this night and it does not go near into the details it talks about the problem we have and how this program is the Saving Grace it does not get into the details of this program yes we can all agree there's a problem but there are many different views to how we solve it and this is not the answer the program goes too far and I want to protect my kids
073from it I'm not going to argue that there's no place for sex head because there is but let's do it a better way let me see I'm watching my timer any other points want to make I know I'm going to forget I know tonight I'm going to go home and think of all the things man you had the opportunity what didn't you say I the one analogy I'll tell you that I use with people is this I said it's just like mathematics we don't teach our kids calculus in 12th grade we teach them building blocks and in e8th grade we teach them more and in 9th grade we teach them more we teach them what is age appropriate and teaching our kids and I hate to say it tonight because there are children in the
074room tonight but teaching them about anal sex and the definition of it in seventh grade is not the right answer so I would ask you again if there is anything that can be done at this point we're going to opt our kids out of those offens of sections but if there's anything that this board can do CU I have four children two in seventh grade and two more coming up I would please ask that you take that under consideration thank [Applause] you with the board's permission I would like to rearrange the agenda and address item 9A 9A the administration will will provide an oral report on the district's 7th and eighth grade human reproduction unit presenters are Linda msas Mary Jad lki and I'm afraid Deborah Hill could not be here because her father's quite
075ill good evening again addend president kovi and board members and Dr Henry thank you for the opportunity to provide a reprise of the Middle School human reproductive unit and program that that uh is being used here in scair as you know the name of the program is called it's your it's your game keep it real and I wanted to provide with you provide you with the areas that that I hope to to uh provide answers for you or provide information for you again so why are we teaching this content the Middle School how was the it the it your game keep it real program selected and how was the program funded how is the program organized and how does a parent opt in for their child to participate in the program so by the end
076of this of this uh revisit of this material uh these answers will again be provided for you a recap of this information so why seventh grade well at seventh grade we are required to teach state standards that include the anatomy and physiology that make up the female and the male reproductive SE uh system so you will see here with the with the standards they talk about reproductive they talk about the endocrine system the organ systems and the sexual reproduction so that's why we provided here in in uh in seventh grade so that we can cover the Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills that the state had set for us in addition to the science standards a science Tex we also have health standards that we are responsible responsible for providing for our seventh and eighth grade
077students and I'm not going to read um all of these for you uh to you but I do want you to just make note of the of the highlighted or the or the underlying areas um the standards talk about growth patterns among adolescents the onset of puberty it talks about the endocrine system on growth and development the changes in the ma in males and females the compare and contrast of that it talks about um examining the physical and emotional development during adolescence um it talks about uh diseases and behavioral factors that that uh contribute to those dis diseases and it talks about risk factors associated again with uh communic and non-communicable diseases so these these are some of the standards in addition to to uh to those standards we also have standards that that we
078are to provide that talk about HIV infe uh infection and sexually transmitted diseases um it does talk about most definitely about the importance of abstinence from sexual activity and that that be the Preferred Choice and and also behavior um it talks about uh discussing absent from sexual activity as the only method that is 100% effective um in preventing pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases and it also talks about uh uh the text related to to risk avoidance peer pressure and refusal skills and how to cope with that type of peer pressure per the Texas Education Agency the school health advisory committee makes recommendations to the district to the board actually on coordinated school programs and its impact on student health and learning including recommending a human reproductive health program for our seventh and eighth grade students
079the the council uh met for months reviewing different options and they determined that they wanted uh a program that was evidence-based meaning that it was based on Research a program that would change behaviors And Delay sexual activity among middle school children the data regarding the this this program um indicate that students who participate in the program had a 1.5 times greater odds of delaying sexual um initiation by ninth grade and these students who were sexually active had reduced odds of engaging in frequent sex and also had a 1.5 times great odds or greater odds of using condoms if they were sexually active so this is some of the the research regarding the program Additionally the law does provide guidance for for the for the for the elack and the the the the guidance is emphasizing
080an absence program and making sure that that that that um that everyone is is clear that absis is the only method that's 100% effective in preventing pregnancies and and U and other diseases it does say that that to teach contraception and condoms used in in in terms of typical use rates in such instruction if it's included in the content and it's very clear that a school district may not distribute condoms in connection with instruction relating to human sexuality so we may not distribute any any condoms um at all the lhack the El Shack committee includes parents and community members most meetings of the lhack have between 20 and 30 members in attendance at the time that the that the elhag decided to recommend this program there were 25 members 26 members at the meeting 25
081of the members voted for the program and one voted against the program in addition before the commit the the lhack um met to vote on a program parents were invited to come to a meeting so they could View and and see the uh this 60 I'm sorry she's making a presentation yes please so parents were invited to come from the different schools 60 parents came to this program and of these 60 parents that came after they viewed the program 87% felt very comfortable with the program 5% felt comfortable 5% were comfortable with an OP opt out of some of the lessons and 1.7% were very uncomfortable and 1.7% were undecided so you had the lhack committee who who made made a recommendation and then you also had these parents that were invited to to come
082and who also were able to view and make a make a uh uh give their input regarding the program how is the program funded the development of the it your game program and the Effectiveness study was funded by the National Institute of Mental Health and the funding was uh was there from 2002 to 2007 the developers of the of this program were all UT Health faculty and in visiting with the with the with the UT um University of Texas prevention and Research Center we were informed that plant Parenthood played absolutely no role in the development of this program a sub a subsequent study was funded by the US Centers for Disease Control and prevention from 2006 to 2007 this study tested the effectiveness of the it's your game program abstinence until marriage version as well
083as the original it's your game program again the developers of this version of the program were all UT Health faculty and again in discussions with the University of Texas prevention and Research Center plant paren Hood plate no role in developing this version or in the study of this program in June in June we came to you the board with this program and and um and for a vote on the program I would I would like to share though that previously the the pre the program that we had previously to this we had it for uh about 20 years and the prr program was taught in its entirety in seventh grade and it was taught during the second six weeks um of the school year and and it included the use of contraceptions in fact the
084language that that you that uh that is in this program was also found in the previous program as well as the different types of sexual activity were also found in the previous program when we came to the board the the elsha came to ask you if you would if you would vote on on dividing the program up for for um a better way of saying it meaning that they wanted to be able to to provide part of the program in seventh grade and part of it in eth grade remember previously it was all provided in seventh grade so seventh graders got the entire program uh previous to this year but they came to you and they asked if we could divide the program into to seventh grade and eighth grade so that we would have
085a more age appropriate program for for both uh for both levels and you agree and and you voted for that and in fact the eighth grade part of the curriculum is not being implemented this year it will not be implemented until next school year because remember that the seventh graders uh the seventh graders this last year got the entire program they are now eighth graders so the e eth grader the the the kids who are who will be eighth graders next year that will be the first time that they actually see the program not this year's eighth graders they will not be participating in the program so let's look a little bit at um at the at the actual program it's your game and and and what lies behind it game game to the program
086refers to life and remember these are middle school students so they're trying to make it appropriate age appropriate for them real means telling it like it is being respectful being responsible doing the right thing being yourself being healthy and being happy and then it talks about how do you keep your game real respecting yourself respecting others and playing by your rules the program talks a lot about your rules and making decisions that are appropriate for you the general topics that that are that are covered in this program are friendships setting limits identifying risky situations using refusal schools to get out of risky situations puberty and consequences of sex and there is role playing that occurs in this program most of the role playing has to do with using refusal skills to get out of risky
087situations so so role playing about how would I get out of a situation that I'm not feeling comfortable with the material that that um will be on the science test will actually be through day eight lesson six it's not the entire it's not the entire program that's actually offered the curriculum has for both the seventh and eighth grade curriculum remember eighth grade is not till till next year each has 12 lessons for each grade level and in the and in the class and in the lessons there are classroom lessons role playing and discussion there is journaling there's individualized computer based uh based component and during this computerized the individual computerized basedon uh component is when you will find the the um the parts of the curriculum that are more sensitive that kids might be even
088a little bit more embarrassed about this is where you will find it in the individualized computer component and then there's also selected activities tailored by gender uh and sexual experien for example the the system will will will ask the student whether they have whether they they plan to have sex so if it says no they go on one track whether they're thinking about having sex if they if they say yes it goes on one track or whether they are having sex and it goes on a different track hold on hold on just a minute Dr msas we were very considerate of y'all when you got up and talked I would appreciate your consideration for Dr msas as she's presenting please so the so students will not see the entire the entire curriculum it is based
089on whatever answer they have they have uh they have provided but as I was saying the material that will actually be on the science test will actually go through day eight lesson six and this includes the the human reproductive system the the the anatomy and and the uh uh physiology of the of the male and the female reproductive system just to kind of show you the scope and sequence this is this is actually level to the eighth grade curriculum and again this will not be shown until or will not be used until 2000 the 2013 2014 school year we will not have a program for eighth graders this year because they received the entire program last year as seventh graders but you can again see that there's that there's classroom components to to it there's
090computer compon uh and computer components to it as well the last unit uh of the eighth grade science uh program which again is 2013 and 14 does reinforce and reviews everything related to to the uh to identifying personal boundaries and rules and it does give more information relative to the pros and cons of different contraceptive devices and it does give information on the correct use of a condom that is provided during the eighth grade year the last two weeks of the school year but again we do not have a program that will be used this year for eighth graders not until the 2013 and 14 school year the program has actually been transpar to our parents our parents can go on the website and they can see every single lesson they can see the teacher
091component and they can see the student component every single lesson it is very transparent for for uh for parents to see we did provide written notice to our parents uh of each student who would receive the human sexuality instruction which included a summary of the content a statement of the parents right to review the curriculum material a statement of the parents right to remove their students from class uh from class or any part of the unit and then parents are also invited to come and participate in the El Shack the El Shack continues to meet all parents all parents are invited to come to the L Shack and to be able to provide their input and help make decisions for future programs so parents are able again to access the entire program um online and
092the next lhack meeting is on November 20th the next lhack meeting is on November 20th and parents are invited to come and share their information this program is an optin program this is the this is a permission permission slip parents have to opt in a student must bring a permission slip to be able to participate in the program parents have to opt in to participate in the entire program parents have to opt in to participate in uh in in only certain lessons parents have to opt in for their students to not participate in the program no child will be will be uh will be allowed to participate unless one of these forms is completed and parents have opted in to one of the one one of the sections there and finally we have been asked
093if Cipher is the only School District that is using this program it is not these are the school districts that are that are actually uh using they've been using the the uh the program you can see that there are several that are that are in and around the Houston area and finally I would like to just share with you board that we have a question and answer document on the district website and you can go to curriculum and instruction departments and Science and you will see the question and answer document regarding this program thank you I will I will um entertain any questions that you may have thanks Dr missas board members ready Mr Morris according to your your information here we voted on this in June July in June Mr Morris okay did did
094y'all have a video at that time we did not have a video for you we had we had an uh an oral presentation for you why why why didn't you bring us a video well we didn't have a video one of one of the reasons would be time however you were provided with the information on how you could access the videos this doesn't say anything about uh about a video I'm sorry maybe you could bring the video now and let us see it so then we can vote it down well Mr Morris um again the information for how you can access the video I can certainly provide that for you where you can access the entire video because it takes a while to go through through all the different videos that's fine we got time
095if you bring the video we all need to look at it Mr morite what I might remind you is is the board is a governance board and what is presented to us are the daytoday Runnings of this District so if if you want to see that you can certainly see it I personally want to see it but I don't think demanding it to come to the board meeting is what we need to do if you want to can certainly see it you know you folks man if if it don't smell right you you automatically think it's a demand I didn't demand anything I was asking them to bring it to the board you're asking them but we don't do that at the board meeting this we don't have them bring the science curriculum we don't
096have them come here and explain math to us see all these people out here they got a problem with it don't you should have a problem with it I know but if you want to view it and I'll be glad to view it with you cuz I'd like to view it myself we'll be glad to sit down and view it when can we just vote this stuff down when can we just vote it out and that's it do something else well number one it's not posted on the agenda to vote okay well uh we'll get him to post it and maybe next next month we can vote it out then everybody will be happy would anybody else like to excuse me you all this is a meeting in the public it's not a meeting of
097the public and so time for citizen participation has passed and so audience members are not participants in the meeting and I just would respectfully request that you watch and observe the public meeting and if it continues you you may be required to leave if it becomes disruptive I do appreciate Morris when when we did the presentation for the board we shared with you uh the link to be able to go to to the websites and be able to view um the the video be able to view the entire program just that just as our parents are able to to view is is there a way that we can delay this being implemented until we look at the video Yeah well it possible what I'm I'm sorry we we've already had how when was the link
098given to us well in June when when we present it to you we've already had several months to look at it did you look at it yes I did did you like it well you know I I think I represent a lot of older people who wish that we didn't leave live in the day and age where it was necessary for us to be required to provide this uh curriculum do I did I like it is is really not Germaine is are we fulfilling Our obligation to the students yes I think we are at at that age I I beg to disagree with you well um and and one thing I was going to ask Linda about if I might ask a question just to go over I heard you say that that the information
099that I think most people are finding offensive is really given to the students the last two weeks of their eighth grade grade right before they go into High School the the the majority of that information is is in the the eighth grade curriculum and it's given to them the last two weeks of their eighth grade school year and it is not going to be used this year okay and so the information [Music] um if someone opts out of it in the seventh grade this year next year when that information is presented will they be able to view that or does the optin or or opt out um the next year both years next year in in eighth grade they will be opting into uh the eighth grade curriculum okay and I'm assuming there there felt
100we felt a need to replace our original curriculum that we were using um do you have any information about the pregnancy rates that we have in our schools not per school just within the district at this time um I didn't I didn't ask for this ahead of time I'm sorry Linda I I do not have that information with me Miss W I can certainly uh get it and send it to you but do we have pregnant teens in in this District do we have pregnant middle schoolers at in this District yes we do we have pregnant M middle schoolers and that's not counting STDs that's correct all right um all right um let me see and so the meeting that the parents who were not on the committee when they came and they viewed all
101of the information you said 8 87% of them felt very comfortable with this yes ma'am they did and only 1.7% were uncomfortable with this these were the 60 parents that came to to uh learn about the program and and and view the program and we're also giving the links to be able to go to go and see the the links have been out there to be able to see the the the entire program and I think the difference with with the program we had before and this program is that this one is completely transparent everything is out there technology has it out there everything is out there the other one was not set up like that that how were the parents notified that this program was was going to be changed and that it was
102available for them to view there was an email sent out to uh to parents via VIA the school regarding that meeting that meeting where we had the 60 parents that was that was the the first time and then the lhack um has been worked on this on this most of this past year and the lhack again parents are invited uh representative is invited from every single School to come okay and and so the lhack they started in 2011 they on this they started uh last year late late uh well early in the in the fall last year is when they started looking at looking at a different program and looking at different things and they were really looking for an evidence-based program they wanted something that that had some type of research behind it all
103right and so if I was the parent of a seventh grader I would have learned of this then and they would have they they they would have learned about it if they if they received the email to come to the to the parent meeting that one was in February I believe this last February February of 2011 yes okay no February 12th yes 2012 okay okay and this was on the agenda in June yes ma'am okay and so they felt strongly that it was important to decide to split the program up so yes they want they wanted it to be more age appropriate for the kids instead of all of it being being uh placed in in seventh grade including contraceptives they wanted to make sure and split that up and put more of that into
104the eighth grade okay I hate to be graphic but I have to ask this question because we've heard Lots about putting a condom on a piece of fruit when is that image shown in eth grade but it's not a piece of fruit but it's in eth grade okay the last two weeks of the school year in eth grade okay right before they're going into high school with the 9th 10th 11th and 12th graders that is correct which is okay okay I think you've taking care of my issues that I had Linda thank you very much Linda thank you for the presentation um one of the things I wanted to ask you this this group um of uh 26 uh who review this program did they watch all 8 to n hours of the video before
105they approved this program they were given the opportunity to to watch the video uh Dr oot tree they were the presentations were done and then they were they were you know they were sent away with the information and with the links to the video and then they came back and they met again uh I believe two months later before they actually voted and the committee is is the committee that actually voted is made up of parents mostly parents cuz that's what the what the what the uh Shaq has be made made up there's a nurse also that served on the committee along with our district nurse was there any inquiry as to whether they those who serve actually watch the video I'm I'm sure if we okay ma'am I'm going to ask you I'm sorry
106you cannot speak out so this is just a meeing of the board and because I'm last last warning because I'm thinking of us at at the board we saw the presentation and and we didn't go watch the videos except for l so was there any inquiry as to whether they had watched the videos Dr I was not at that meeting okay so I cannot tell you that but what I do know is that they were they were provided with information they were shown some of of the of the the program and then they were giving the link so that they could go home and watch the information come back regroup together and be able to to provide uh an informed decision about the program the the 60 parents who then uh later on uh reviewed
107the program who answered the email did they watch the videos they were also given the same opportunity same same situation yes sir okay there was an uh a statement made earlier by one of the speakers that suggested that this program was really geared toward inner city poor Black and Hispanic children and it shouldn't be for these children out here in in sair is there anything in this program that is uh racially uh geared or uh directed or socioeconomically Geared for those type of kids rather than our kids out here the big study that was done Dr o was one out of HISD so there is a lot of diversity as as you know in HISD however we can't forget that there's a lot of diversity in our district as well almost 50% free and reduced
108uh lunch and we are a minority majority District um now as well so it it uh the the the study encompassed all different kids but it was done in HISD so the film filming the language the video are all from HISD no sir not the videos a study that was done on the effectiveness of the program was from HISD it was done it was done the the the the um the group that was that was researched was was Ani was an HISD okay did were there any other uh studies from any other District that use this program other than HISD there were other studies this is the one that I'm familiar with okay and to your knowledge were any of these other studies done for a district that was not uh heavily populated with inner
109city poor Black and Hispanic children I do not know the answer to that I do know that some of the other programs that that were looked at were heavily were heavily uh geared towards just Hispanics and so that was one reason why why uh they didn't the committee chose not to look at that they wanted to see a little more diversity than just Hispanics is there any potential in this program since there is role play is there any potential in this program for there to be role play when it comes to oral sex or anal sex no sir there is not who controls what the role play will be in this program well the teacher does and the role play is on specific topics as I said most of the role play has to do
110with with uh uh risk type factors how how you would handle being put in uncomfortable U situations and how how you would handle yourself to be able to get out of those uncomfortable situations but the teacher is there when when the role play is is uh is happening and the of course from my uh background of course I'm heavily uh uh um an abstinence person yes sir uh why why is do you agree with the suggestion that this program lacks a strong abstinence uh influence and instruction the program talk the pro actually the program first talks about abstinence and and and the importance of abstinence and that that is the only way to to uh avoid pregnancies and avoid and avoid uh different diseases it talks about that it it it that that that has
111to be a primary function of any program that that is adopted but then it goes beyond that to share per our our our uh standards to share about different different types of diseases that that that uh that one can uh can get and how those diseases and I understand that but if we talk about the uh the diseases of course they could all be prevented by just plain AB uh so uh did we look at any other programs that uh that would heavily lean toward abstinence because that would that would even cure in in the role play no I'm I don't do this uh disease that would abstinence would they did look they did look at at um at several programs actually they were they started out by the curricul department started out by looking
112at at quite a few programs Dr ogal tree but most of the programs were geared towards Community Center type type uh type uh activities not not school districts and then as I said the lhack felt strongly that they wanted to look at an evidence-based type program they also wanted they also believed in in in uh in the abstinence piece but also wanted to do the abstinence plus which is actually what this it's an abstinence plus program and that's what our former program was also it was an abstinence plus program so we teach abstinence but we also teach about uh different all the the all the different uh ways and and and opportunities to not get into situations to be able to uh to uh contract different diseases and to avoid pregnancies [Music] okay are you
113if the there was also a s suggestion to that the parents uh we're not fully made aware of the opt in this is an optin program not an opt out right that's right you can't you can't you have to have the permission slip sign to to participate in any way with a program okay so how would you answer the the parents would you I mean the there's quite a bit of discussion here uh about they didn't want their child to to uh become aware of these things that are being taught and how do you answer them on keeping their child away from from this information how to keep their child away from from hearing about about uh anal sex oral sex cont like I was trying to figure out what what does a eighth grader
114need to know about contraceptives uh you know how do they keep them from from that well Dr let me ask you a question and I'd like for you to think about when you were 12 and 13 and and and 14 and in my house we didn't talk about about oral sex or we didn't talk about uh contraceptives but the kids did the kids went to movies the kids watched movies the kids I mean there were just different ways that that that that that you you learned about different things and sometimes you learn not sometimes many times you learn the wrong information yeah you're you're right you do learn some things and of course back in my day I want to date you uh what I learned was primarily from my parents and from my church
115uh and it was not from the school as as I as I did too but you know kids I mean kids talk we had we had a a we had a parent who who came to one of the parent meetings and and she she wasn't quite sure about the program or what what part to opt out M uh opt in on and um so she decided she was going to go home and talk to her child thinking her child didn't know anything about condoms it was actually about condoms and she came back and called us the next day because she was shocked that her son said oh yeah all my friends are buying condoms and and too I think that point was made to even if a parent opts out be their child will still
116hear what's going on in in the class is is kids kids hear all kinds of things going on in in the classes Dr or whether whether it's about sex or contraceptives or using drugs or smoking cigarettes and so I know from my from my standpoint it was my job as a parent to make sure that that that my children learn the the morals and and and and the values that I as a parent imposed on them because they were going to hear about everything including sex and cigarettes and drugs and everything else and and one last question um because I think Christine probably cover all the rest of the things I want to ask the if uh a parent wanted to not have their child in in any any of this what are the alternatives
117for that that child during that class period if if the parents opt in was to not have the top participate in any of the program none of the program that's definitely an option for for the parent we will provide a study guide for the content that is needed for for the science test the child will will be um in the library uh it'll be like a study hall type period for the child all right and one more question this program assumes and I'm sure it is basically true that our our children know a whole lot more than what parents think they know but this this program assumes does it not a knowledge of every student and and it says well since they already know let's talk about this um actually not quite Dr go because
118if you recall when I shared that that the program does kind of like a preest and so and so the the the child will will will um announce will tell whether he knows nothing about sex whether he's thinking about sex whether he's had about he's H he or she is having sex and and then that's the track that that uh that they will actually be exposed to and and and that's what that's was another thing that got because I believe you gave the the question you're asking this 12-year-old child uh are you interested in having sex was was that the question are you having sex thought about having sex are you having sex have you thought about it and I'm trying to figure out why that line of questioning is that very kind of suggestive
119of planning you know uh rather than what is your general knowledge about the subject you're the question is you're asking what the child is interested in and what the child wants and that seems to me kind of suggestive my comment you thank you thank you Dr alre Miss heartley thank you and thank you for doing this report tonight um I know that it wasn't on the agenda and y'all added it as an addendum um I have thought a lot about this program recently and I have gone through and watched and and played the game as a student would and um and I did find and and it is interesting you you set your boundaries that not not very much or or extremely or in the middle and it kind of sets the tone and and
120I know working through through the STD part you know the end result was the program shows the best way to avoid an STD is to wait that was my result that was my answer um this is all uncomfortable this is all I have three daughters it's all an uncomfortable topic um but I did want to ask were the three types of sex that we spoke about mentioned in the old um curriculum you know like the oral the anal and the was that you know I I'm wonder if it's just like definitions or if that was mentioned in the old curriculum they are mentioned in the old curriculum I'm going to ask Mary come up here for a second I just want to make sure that I'm giving the correct answer for this one and I
121do understand that with Deb Hill having her father being so ill I mean it would have been great for her to be here but we we all understand so thank you for yall spending your time it they were all present in the old curriculum they were all okay what all of that was in its full content present in the old curriculum okay I think the issue here is the the level of transparency okay okay well that's that's good of you to say thank you um I was thinking it's unfortunate that we live in a very sexual world and I know part of this program is is is a little more shocking because of the slang or because of things but unfortunately it's a world that we live in and even the new you can tell
122them a girl of a mom of moms in the new One Direction song they say tonight while we're young let's get some you know and we talked about we don't want that sling in the program but it's in a song that's probably going to be number one on the charts and so it's if this is out in the world you know as a parent yes I'm going to talk to my girls about our morals but what about the kid who doesn't and they hear the slang and they don't know what it's about and here we are in a kind of a medical educational fashion being to be able to have teachers there with them so that leads to my other question what kind of training are the teachers having that will be with our students
123during this the teachers are being trained by our um science coordinator by by Depp Hill and uh we're actually providing some subat for them to come and get trained well I know and I know whenever um I did have a meeting um with one of the developers and we talked about that the teachers that our teacher manual is accessible or or can be accessible and that while y'all have there's strict guidelines that the teachers should go by that things could be won't say added but about the roess of the words with that the um characters use and things like that so that it's not just a hey all these words are okay the teacher can can talk to the kids about appropriateness and respect for others absolutely okay okay thank you Mr Jackson Dr msas
124does the school district decide to teach this in seventh grade or are we directed to do this by the state of Texas we are directed to teach components of this of uh this curriculum depending we get to choose or the the with recommendation of the of the Sha choosing what what it is but we are required to teach uh the different standards as I as I shared with you on the in the program and we're required by the state to teach this in seventh grade is that correct we are yes we are because uh the the standards are in um in that grade level is this curriculum I know for our other curriculums uh we have the opportunity to choose from curriculums that have been approved by the state of Texas has the state of
125Texas vetted this have has the state approved this or not no there is not an uh a state approved list of these curriculum will questions on this material be included on any into course exams um no no CU this is this is uh seventh grade no will it be included on the e8th grade into course exams or is it too early to know that it may because because the standards are there are there for science so it may and the standard there for for for health as well since this is computer based and since we include access to seventh grade is it possible for students uh and I'm sure no student would ever think about doing this about fast forwarding through the material to get from the beginning of the seventh grade lesson like one
126or two and go all the way to lesson 10 or 11 they they could for that grade level not for the not for the eighth grade program so a student could move around all the material uh available to a particular grade but they could not go from 7th grade up to 8th grade they cannot go up to eighth grade they can certainly just like you know and most computer type programs you can watch it and and then you know answer whatever activities very quickly and then move on to the next one you mentioned that this uh the one difference between this program and the program that we had last year and we in part uh have some this year since it's not being done in eth grade was split uh Are we devoting more instructional
127days to this program than what the old program was or is it the same amount of instructional time it's about the same amount amount of instruction my children graduated from scier schools quite a while ago uh I recall when my son went through this that it was not on a co-ed basis uh this is completely on a co-ed basis this is uh the uh the middle school is the elementary is not but the middle school is I do have a concern that that we may be in a situation where we have good science but bad bad politics certainly our governor with one of his recommendations certainly viewed this his recommendation as having good science But ultimately bad politics uh and and he revised his recommendation the how soon do uh will this curriculum be implemented
128how soon will the students start addressing the curriculum on the 28th of October and do we have any 24th of October I'm sorry do we have any feedback as to percentage of students that are either opting in or not students but parents who are choosing for their students to either opt in or to opt out I do not have that at this time Jackson but I can certainly get that information uh I would also like to to say thank you to to both Bob and Mark uh for going ahead and adding this to the agenda I know there's certain uh legal requirements and time requirements so adding things to agendas are not uh uh it is not done easily and I appreciate the extra time and effort that it took to to accomplish this is
129that a tip of the Hat you you know I would I I would hate to ever tip my hat to anybody on the board or to the superintendent but but but that was at least a a touch of the uh of the brim um is it possible and it may not be to find out from the members of The Shack how many of them actually viewed all the material and before you answer let me explain my question um I went back and reviewed the presentation that was made I reviewed it several times the board voted unanimously to approve this based on the presentation I have no doubt that we made the right choice we we did in fact rely upon the information that was presented and the question is for the Sha which is an
130integral part of the recommendation process and I appreciate all the time and effort that the volunteers for sha did by coming to the meetings is there any way of our finding out how many of them viewed the entire program prior to recommendation we have a signin sheet for the for the membership that was there that day Mr Jackson so I mean we we could send out a um an email or survey to them to to ask whether they viewed viewed the videos I I know that when we were given the presentation you did in fact provide us with a link to the curriculum uh and that was part of our board book uh I didn't go through all of it after the first 30 or 40 minutes I decided I I needed to spend my
131time elsewhere and so I did uh but I do think it's important for us to know how thoroughly sha the Shaq individuals vetted this process because they're an integral part of it and it and it may be too late to to fully contact them I don't I don't know how you have it organized we I I we have the as I said we have a sign in sheet we have to match it to to um um emails and addresses and making sure they're still in the district and I would also like to say thank you to all the parents who came out tonight you are also volunteers this is an important process you are spending your time uh as well as all the individuals that have contacted us by email and phone calls and stopped
132Us in grocery stores uh the these are never easy questions uh but we all are trying to do the right thing for our children uh and it's also important for us to understand that the times have changed I was one of the parents who objected St strenuously to this District when Lang Creek High School first opened up and they had daycare facilities I'm a little embarrassed at what I said and I won't repeat it here tonight I think I've matured in in some of my thinking and appreciation that we have to educate all children irrespective of their uh of where they are in in the process of Life uh but my personal views on the matter were were quite well known at at the time uh but we still have to educate uh children uh
133as best as we can and it is a difficult process uh and also thank you Dr msas for your for your second presentation welcome Mr [Applause] Ryan one uh gentleman mentioned and this might be for you Marne that uh during the board not the the community comment section that that uh he thought that we were violating the Texas Education Code could you address that since it was brought up please I don't share that opinion so that would be a no as someone who practices education law and I do not share that opinion okay and then on the uh is the ability for a a parent to opt their child out for any reason the same from last year to this year yeah yes sir it is okay and so if if Don Ryan wants to
134have his son opt out uh I just select the classes that that he or she or my daughter would opt out of uh and then the plan is that they would go to the library it would be it would be like a study hall type uh time period now if the parent says I I want my child to opt out uh of the discussion on on contraceptives uh do we turn around and say okay your child's opting out and hand them the material to take home the material is is online for them they can access in it any time anytime they want but but your but the parent can choose to to have the students sit for day one four and five and opt out of everything else so if I I I just want
135to make and I've gone through through the site and gone through all the stuff if if my son is is not participating in the program and there's uh the SE the uh section on oral sex M can can is he blocked from going into that section via the site yes okay yes there are there are different there are different lessons that they can go to and so you as a parent can select the day remember this this is all based on every lesson is based like on a theme and so you as a parent can select the the the the lessons the days that you want him to opt in for or not opt in for and then but all of that's available for you at home to view and if you gave your student
136the the access to it your student can see it all at home too okay okay thank you so that is yes Dr MCAS just and to follow up with that question because a while ago you mentioned that at seventh grade level they can peruse through the entire program and if they wanted to they can go look at the last lesson so tell me how that control works within each day there are lessons Okay okay like for example as as I mentioned on day eight lesson six that's as far as you need to know you need to go to cover the the the science uh information that's going to be tested so but it's that day that that day and then and then that day has all these lessons well he could progress through through the
137lessons but it is for that day that that that uh uh that specific content that that is for that day so he can't go to day seven he has to just stay in the day that they're teaching is that what you're saying that is my understanding yes sir all right let me ask you one question and that is well it's probably a dual course question why do we teach this at this time and we're teaching 8th grade at the end of that year why are we teaching that why wouldn't we teach this at the end of the seventh grade year because this is this is where where uh this content falls in the scope and sequence for Science and and so we want it's the scope and sequence for science so because it is content
138that we are to cover uh during the year and that's because they're going to be tested on the Texas Essential skills that is that that is correct the the the content is specific to to the the science uh curriculum the part that that that we've reserved for Middle School it is not specific to the science curriculum I mean that we've reserved for e8th grade I'm sorry it is not specific to the science curriculum so this is so the eth grade is not for the science curriculum the seventh grade which is human reproduction that piece that that's that's uh taught the last two weeks it's not specific to the science curriculum but but the piece for seventh grade it is it is in the scope and sequence of when we teach the the the Texas Essential
139Knowledge and Skills and if they opt in those that don't those that don't send in their Farm will not their kids will not be taught that is correct they have to send in and I know we called it out before I'd heard that before but it actually is they have to feel uninform and they have to say my child is in this class that is correct so that's why we're saying the real terminology is opt in I know that people are thinking we're we're going different ways here but I think the terminology we used before was given the option to opt out or not be a part of it but they have to feel in a formed to be in included in it that is correct okay so uh and I guess I'm going to
140ask this next question and that is is there a way that we can teach this later in the year or is that tell me what the problems are with teaching it later in the year well the the the science the science um standards okay fall within the scope and sequence the health standards we don't have a separate health class so those standards are Tau within the science class that's why they're that's why they're all they're all embedded together in science because we don't have a separate health class those standards that we are required to teach we're teaching them through the science when you refer to scope and sequence for those that are not education teachers what what does that mean scope and sequence the scope and sequence means means uh the plan the layout of
141the of the curriculum and when we cover all the different components to make sure that we do cover the entire curriculum okay all right all right thank you Dr mercus I know it's been a very long uh discussion and I appreciate your presentation I too along with the rest of the board thank y'all for being here uh if there's no more questions I'm going to ask the board to take a little bitty break because I need one and uh then we will come back and continue the meeting okay thank you thank you about five minutes look at live also during the course of the committee of the whole meeting it was a consensus of the board that the following action items be approved as submitted or amended action item 4A the board will consider the
142awarding bids contracts and are authorizing purchase orders for the following items Automotive lubricants renewal year two of three demograph service grease trap and line cleaning hazardous waste disposal renewal year 2 of3 HVAC C Electric Motors HVAC refrigerants renewal year two of three tree trimming and removal renewal year 2 of three B the board will dis will consider approving the second reading additions deletions and revisions to District policies 1 EFA local instructional resources instructional materials for C the board will consider approving and submitting to the commissioner of Education a request for maximum class size waiver D the board will consider cancelling the special called board meeting boundary workshop on October the 29th 2012 e the board will consider approving the tax refunds of 500 or greater for Cypress Fairbanks ISD F the board will consider approving
143the minutes of the September 10th 2012 regular meeting on Thursday the following non-consent item were placed on the consensus agenda 5 C the board will consider approving on first reading the revisions to District policy DHE local employee standards of conduct searches and alcohol drug testing Revis D the board will approve the process and the charge for establishing attendance boundaries if any board member wishes to remove one or more of the items for further discussion please do so at the this time if not I will entertain a motion to approve the consensus items as recommended or amended does anybody want to remove anything I would Mr Ryan uh if we could remove 4 a 4 a uh the entire thing well is it all together it's all together okay so we're going to vote on each
144one of those independently okay a we'll vote as a whole as a vote as a okay okay all right I'm okay with it 4 a uh and that is we we're going to remove that do we need a motion right motion okay I move that we U approve the consensus agenda except for 4 A okay do I have a second second all approved all in favor raise your right hand that's unanimous okay uh then we will go back to uh item 4A the board will consider awarding bids and contracts and are authorizing purchase orders for the following items uh the one Automotive lubricants renewal year 2 of three demographic Services grease trap and line cleaning hazardous waste disposal year renewal year two of three HVAC electric motors HVAC refrigerants renewal year two of three tree
145trimming and removal renewal year two of three we have any questions Mr Ryan uh Stuart and I think during the citizen uh participation that that we that we had the question uh come up tonight on uh 4A from the from Mr Wilson uh and I do think he made a a really good statement where when he said that we need to uh probably be a little bit more open uh and transparent when we have something that uh that on the surface looks like a it doesn't pass the smell test uh could you go over the difference between I guess just one and two a little bit and why we're we're looking or proposing that we spend that much more money than than what the second place vendor is saying um sure and um uh I
146would also like to respond to another comment that Mr Wilson made during the citizens participation uh part of the the agenda tonight and then uh uh any other further questions I may ask uh Marty Edwards if he would uh step forward to to help me with these uh any questions that you might have but um first of all Mr uh Wilson recommended that we send out that we resend out all of the rfps again to the firm so that they had an opportunity to uh respond to all areas of the scope of services uh for your information the detailed scope of services uh that we are requiring were clearly identified in the RFP document that was sent out and to which all of those firms responded uh each of the firms had the opportunity to
147respond to that scope of services equally uh if they were qualified uh to provide those Services um and and I will get to your second part of the question about comparing uh this the um uh second highest proposer but I I just want uh to make a comment to say that uh uh the district is Seeking a consultant to provide comp detailed comprehensive long-term and uh long range enrollment and planning projections that also include enrollment projections uh mapping geocoding uh long range planning for site purchases uh the buildout analysis of the school district itself uh as well as the school capabilities and the development of future attendance boundaries that are available and also to be available to the board board uh to present their findings and their reports on an ongoing basis to the Board
148of Trustees as well as to Administration um of the eight proposers or of the eight proposals that we received uh five are located out of state uh and one respondent is a software sales only um and two have credible School District experience in Harris County uh population and Survey analyst Passa uh who is the recommended consultant is the only consultant that responded that has the extensive School experience School District experience in this area and the only one that can offer all of the comprehensive services that we are requiring um in in in our RFP uh as as far as the second ranked proposer that was mentioned um uh uh that firm is located in in Ohio uh and is primarily a facility ities planner um they have limited experience in Texas uh and they are
149not readily available to uh to be present uh at the board and make bo uh presentations to the board uh in addition um uh it's Texas clientele uh that were that were referenced uh were the the references were not favorable for that company so does that answer your question thank you Mr Jackson I did in fact spend approximately 30 minutes uh and trying to respond to observations from many people that I reduce the amount of time that I consume during board meetings uh I'm trying to ask more of my questions offline I will go through all the questions that I asked once before uh you know it's kind of odd as a stutterer it's easier for me me to read questions after I've typed them and so I I know which questions I have asked
150uh so if you've already have answered these don't worry about it uh question one this proposal appears to be for Professional Services I know from my mud board days that we could not ask certain groups to bid a proposal such as attorneys and CPAs for these groups we needed to make a request for qualifications how do the lawyers interpret the law as it pertains to to these types of consultants and that may be a question for our counsel if she was yeah I would ask our general counsel to her help on that issue well generally um is is the question about how do you define a professional service or why did we do an RFQ um no we did an RFP and my question is why did we not do an RFQ well for one
151steuart and I talked about and Dr Henry talked about this and we talked about did it meet the definition of a professional service and we even you know kind of looked at the tea guidelines and the tasbo um Tech Association of school business officers guidelines and um arguably arguably it could have been determined to be a professional service my recommendation to the superintendent and to our CFO was that um we do do some sort of procurement an RFQ or an RFP and um I I base that on it's a three-part standard I won't go into it I know Don Ryan dozes off when I get into my long- winded explanations but um essentially the third element that talks about it being a discipline that is um a specialized attainment of skill and schooling is required
152I just questioned whether or not it squarely fell into that I tend to read the Professional Services exception narrowly as opposed to broadly and um also so we thought we would you know see what was out there and that was my recommendation superintendent he accepted it thank you your answer was in much more detail than steuart's I think he said that we just didn't need to steart steuart's the assistant general I'm I'm the assistant general counsel yes prer to my assist general counsel was this work handled inhouse before or have we hired outside consultants for this scope of work I'm going to ask Marty to help me uh with the rest of the questions and I will be certain to chime in when I think I know something so please feel free to do that
153se you if you need to do that uh this was handled in-house before uh not to the extent that we are asking uh this firm to do uh but we did in previous years use Docker Forin uh to do our demographic studies and our projections uh as most of you I'm sure know Dr foron has retired uh however during the time when he was here we did contract out a lot of the work that we're asking this group to do uh the the mapping and the gis Services uh we were not able to do in house because we did not have the the software the the capacity to do that and John couldn't do that so we did have Dr Forin do uh projections uh he did a lot of boundary uh Zone proposals uh
154but there were a lot of other parts of this of this type of service that John could not provide but but we did do it in house before and and I would add that uh including Dr fkin salary as well as other fees that we were paying to the uh the other third parties that uh uh we paid about $160,000 a year for the services question three if we handled this inhouse and the person in charge of the person charge of the process retired did a prior board abolish the position as a matter of budget cutting I believe the answer to that is no I don't believe that was part of a budget cut it was not necessarily a budget cut when he retired the position was eliminated uh but it was not uh part
155of the uh budget cutting Pro or the budget Reduction Program so we no longer have that position we do not no 3A why can't we just hire someone and do this work in house and I think Stuart had kind of already touched on this before and and I previously stated uh if if you look at the salary that we were paying Dr Forin Plus the services that we were having to contract out for it actually I think range a little closer to the $175,000 range in what we were previously paying when John was here uh for his salary his benefits and for the services that we contracted um if we were to do everything that and we've never done the buildout that we're asking these people to do uh these groups to do and go
156into detail like this like this company is able to do because we didn't have the maner power to do that um we would have to hire additional staff beside a demographer uh hire have additional software that we would have to have access to uh additional computers there's there a lot of different materials that we would need to provide that der demographer which is going to drive up that cost uh which it it could actually be more than what we're looking at with hiring an outside demographer to do everything that they can do you know steuart if your answers to me were as long as as everybody else's I would stop asking quite as many questions uh question number four it's already been answered why is it appropriate that we should use the services of Passa
157out of college station well uh I think paa is uh considered the foremost demographer in this area and uh they have the extensive experience that that we're looking for and and they've been in this area they've been uh uh doing demographic services for school districts in this area for many many years uh we have been able to um view uh uh examples of their reports and they are very very comprehensive and it's exactly what we're looking for and and what we're needing in our district and if I can add to that Tom just if I can stend Stewart's answer for him um Pasa does things that a lot of other demographers do not do uh it's almost comparing apples to oranges um most demographers use Trend data and look at past histories employment data housing
158Trends Uh current data that the school district is able to provide them and then project off of that data uh pass it goes further than that they actually look on they actually interview property own every parcel of land that's within the district that is more than five acres they outline that property and they contact the property owners and they find out what the future uh buildout is going to be in that or is there going to be a build out what the time frame is looking at for for a sale of that property uh they contact every apartment complex because apartment complexes tend to turn over to to see what uh impact that's going to have on enrollments uh they contact all the Brokers and real estate uh agents in our area to find out
159what their projections are uh they contact all the private schools in our area to talk to them about their enrollments or projected growth um they look at flood planes uh areas in our district we especially out in our Western end there's a lot of uh land that we have that's currently vacant that will never be built out because it's in a flood plane or it has oil and gas pipelines on it and it so it has large easements um passive eliminates that eliminates that property as as future growth areas where most demographers just take your unused acreage and divide by a set amount uh that is determined by how many acres you have and how many students are currently enrolled in those uh areas to determine future growth uh so they're they're much more detailed
160they're much more precise they actually send people to our properties to drive our neighborhoods to look at current build outs how many lots are available uh what are what's the construction rate in those neighborhoods um and the big thing about this company compared to uh the second company that we chose this is a company out of uh College Station Texas compared to Dublin Ohio uh our project team would be made up of eight members of those eight members three of them have doctor's degrees uh the lead person in that is actually taught demography at the Texas A&M University uh we have a lawyer who's currently would be on our staff or on our project team uh one other person with a master's degree and three people with bachelor's degrees um the second place company would
161have five people on our team three of them would be located in Ohio and two in Texas one in San Antonio uh and I believe the other one is uh somewhere north of the woodlands the conro area uh all five have bachelor's degrees so the expertise is is much higher the years of experience is is much more uh in depth with uh Passa compared to the second group uh and the the level that they that they uh the quality of work is just much higher can we save money if we peace Mill the work for example there were some with lower bids can we uh can can we use the the cheaper folks to come in and do some of the work and then uh save money by having the more expensive Talent uh do
162that uh that requires a higher degree of expertise and skill s is that one you want to answer uh I don't believe that we would uh I think that the cost would be higher uh in addition uh I I really think that it would be uh impossible to peace meal that out and have any any sort of meaningful report because uh uh each portion of the scope of work uh is dependent on other portions of the work and so when you have different companies doing different things in different scope of of uh of work and uh it would be very very difficult to kind of pull that together and have any any kind of meaningful report uh all in all yeah and I think to do the long range projection you're going to have a
163lot of duplication of work if you try to peace maill that out and the quality of work might not be the same with all your companies that you're dealing with and so it it would be very difficult to to pacem it out number six I looked at the websites of the top two firms I have the following questions it was pretty easy for for pass it because I had pictures of people I did not recognize any of my uh cousins or or sisters or brothers is it possible that there are related parties that exist between either of the top two uh bids and not just members of the board but members of the evaluation committee I'm not aware of any I I you know the board would have to speak for themsel if they have
164a relative that works for either one of those firms uh but I am not aware of any relation uh with either one of those companies 6B I as I often do always ask the same question twice a little differently you don't have to answer it the second time 6B was how would you differentiate between the two firms uh number seven there's a considerable difference in the bit Amounts is is there a difference in the amount or anticipated quality of the work Don Ryan asked that uh I asked it and you all have answered it is there anything that you would care to add to it that you haven't already said um I think we've already answered that question about the quality of work and the methodology that it's used but the two different types of
165methodology um there there's definitely a difference in the quality of work um not to say that the second company is not a very legitimate firm uh but they There's issues that we would have to deal with um location and plus the other things that we talked about that there were things extra that um that pasta could provide us one of the other things that pasta does can provide us uh that can't be provided by the second firm is well I mentioned the eight people that are on the team uh if we have questions and we need to sit down with them and have them bring maps and have them us talk about different projections or School sites or uh boundary changes or whatever we're going to have to do those top people that I mentioned
166will come to Cypress Fairbanks free of charge uh it's a turnkey Service uh there's no limit on the number of times they will come to visit us uh and so we have access to their very top people the people who are teaching demography uh to come to us to to talk to us where on the other side the people who are the top people in the other company are in Dublin Ohio uh they didn't Express the interest in getting on an airplane and flying down whenever we wanted to talk to them uh so that that is another critical difference between the two question eight can we rebid the work and request everyone to sharpen their pencil and I think steuart addressed it a little bit um I did speak after we after our committee met
167and we had a number one candidate I did call them and ask them that exact question you know is there any way we can uh reduce our cost uh receive some additional Services uh and basically they you know they reply was we we've given you our best price that we can give you uh we we are we are available free of charge and that does mean a lot uh for us to come down to visit in in your building whenever you want uh we're not going to charge you travel expenses as some other firms would do uh but but they really could not justify lowering their rate but we did ask that question and did ask them if they would consider that also if I heard your question right uh you you asked if we
168could uh request everyone to sharpen their pencil and and I think the evaluation committee determined that the other seven responders to the RFP could not provide the scope of work uh that we were requiring and so asking them to sharpen their pencil really would serve no useful purpose I do have one question that I didn't ask before okay oh my word it's the top 10 for you Tom uh is that written you mentioned use of the gis software if we go with these folks and do we have access to that software and and and I have some awareness of the software because mud districts uh rely upon it as well and the concept is once you put the data in you can then update the data and you should be able to dve reports at
169a much lower cost on a going forth basis uh so the question is who owns that data do we or do they or do we know uh that's a good question I'm not sure um you but to go along with that I'm sure we own that data uh but they have expressed the interest or not interest they have expressed that they are willing to give us reports upon request so if we have a a particular type of report that we need create it for us they will create those reports the the book that they provided I wish I would have brought it tonight they brought we actually got two examples that they had done before uh one was for Conroe ISD and the other was uh for KD ISD they they're both clients of Passa
170uh I'm not sure what else we could ask them that was not in that report uh it was very very extensive um the book literally is this thick um it's it's it's very very detailed uh very extensive and uh it is truly a turn key te type of company uh they do everything that we would require them to do very good I uh the other questions have are not particularly gerine uh to the decisionmaking process and I'll ask those offline thank you Don Ryan you have one a question Oh I thought you you were okay Dr o Tre okay and I asked the other night and thank you for pro providing the information on what we generally were paying Dr forren and our outside Consultants I asked the term a question about the term the
171length of this U agreement with this de demographer is it a oneyear deal or how long it do are we uh engaged engaging them for and I believe uh Teresa answered that uh uh I may have misunderstood your question what I was saying was the amount of time that it would take them to provide provide the information to us so that's why we were not recommending using them uh for the attendance boundary for elementary 53 but it's a yearly contract it's a yearly contract it's a one-year contract that is renewable each year right but but for 53 we will not use them but for the following two schools we will that's that's exactly right 54 we'll start for uh they'll start work for us immediately because it's going to take that amount of time in
172order to begin uh the collection of the data and information but as far as being involved in any attendance boundary process that will be uh next year for the opening of Elementary 54 in Middle School 18 but beyond that uh we still have elementes 55 56 57 as well as Middle School 19 and high schools number 11 and number 12 over the next few years that we're going to have to consider uh that would uh require some significant changes to the boundaries right and another part of that and I should have mentioned this with Tom you about cost uh when I called Pasa and talked to them um one of the one of the things that I did ask them is do you have to do all of the services every year because they they
173do break their services down into different pieces uh and sometimes the long range study might have not have to be done every year uh so there there's a possibility of some price reduction in future years where it's not necessary to do parts of that study uh so the cost could go down some because they had already provide that information the the previous year one other item that that we had not mentioned is that of course part of the scope of services is uh the enrollment projections and the projection out for for the out years and I just wanted to to say and remind you that it's very critical that uh those enrollment projections are are are as accurate as they can be because that's the basis for which we receive our state revenue and as
174we budget each year uh and develop the budgets then we will be relying on uh uh hopefully very very accurate enrollment projections from this firm so uh that's a very critical part of um the scope of services that we're expecting Mr mors well it seems to me that uh you know what you you're pointing out here about how how often we going to use this service don't you think that it'd be in our best interest to recreate that position that you uh elected to uh not fill well as uh Mr Edwards mentioned um by recreating the position would ultimately probably cost us more than the contract with Passa uh we would have to hire somebody we currently do not have the expertise nor the manpower to be able to do these uh these types of
175of services that pass is uh is going to be able to provide as well as hiring a staff hire uh uh providing and or purchasing the required software and computer equipment that he also mentioned so uh you know I I think that uh it's there's value in obtaining a third-party look at uh all of the the the needs that we have regarding our facilities planning and enrollment what was Dr Forkland uh what did he use is see I mean he he's not dead or anything is he's not here can reach out to him and get some help well again he did not have the expertise to do everything that we were uh that we're needing to do in the future for that that we're asking Passa to do Dr fkin was uh primarily working on
176enrollment projections and that's just one small part of the scope of services well I think I think I think I think Mr uh Edwards uh talked about uh the the impact of uh Dr fn's leaving and and the what we could provide or what he could provide and the and the services that we were able to uh uh to provide in the past while he was here and it uh it is not the type of services that we want to uh or that we desire desire on a go forward basis so when we did the boundary changes with the in the elementaries in the middle he did them right he did okay thank you we also had contracted services that he used to help him do that that was Rick Stein wasn't it that we
177that came was he the demographer that came in and helped Dr Dennis Harner as well but I do think Dr Stein helped us you're remembering correctly okay okay uh just to kind of finish up here the the the price that we see then is going to carry us through uh another Elementary a junior high and is that as far as that goes or is that also including some long range planning for the additional schools you mentioned uh that will give us a chance to really take a look at where we can save money where we can build where we don't need to build the the the price that you're looking at does include longrange planning a 10-year um projection for all schools it also uh provides some buildout projections of how many schools we will
178need when this when the property is completely built out so it includes not only projections for the following year and for the schools that that steuart mentioned uh But it includes the entire build out of the district so if all that property out on the west end of the district was completely buil out how many schools would we need what are our projections of of uh of sites that would we need where would those sites need to be located uh you know that's a very important piece to bring up uh and Roy might can speak about it a little more but uh that's one of their their their uh strengths is looking at uh properties and lands and uh projecting where those schools are going to need to be built in the future long range
179projections even if it's more than 10 years uh so if you buy a site in a in in a property uh that you really can't can't access properly or can't use there's a lot of cost involved in that of buying it in the wrong site so there's a lot of factors that you can factor in on the cost uh to look at but we do feel this is the best value for for what we need Marty do they also take a look at our existing schools and the enrollment and kind of what they see is going to be happening there too they they look at existing schools and capacities uh they also provide services uh in the uh event that say we have our one end of our district is an older community district and
180those schools begin to decline uh in in enrollment compared to the schools on the western end of the district uh and they've done this for Frisco and they've done this not Frisco I think name some other schools Dallas ISD and some uh other schools around d d uh that they had looked at where um how they could redo boundaries and try to keep feeder patterns as clean as they could uh so they provide all those Services as part of that package of how can we go in and uh look at utilizing the facilities that we currently have to prevent us from having to build additional facilities that we really maybe not possibly may not need if we could utilize those facilities effectively okay does anybody else have any questions thank you very much so the
181board will consider awarding bids and contracts and are authorizing purchase orders for the following items Automotive rant renewal year 20 three demographic Services grease trap and line cleaning hazardous waste disposal renewal year two of three HVAC electric motors HVAC refrigerants renewal year two of three tree trimming and removal renewal year two of three can I have a motion Mr President I move that the board award bids and contracts and or authorized purchase orders as recommended do I have a second a second uh Miss Wood second it all in favor raise your right hand all opposed one opposed moving [Applause] along the board uh will consider the 2012 tax rate resolution to support the 2012 2013 budget a 2012 maintenance and operation tax rate and B 2012 Debt Service tax rate uh presenter is Stuart snow
182and Anita Henry uh you presented Thursday Did you not right yes sir I made a do we have any I made a presentation Thursday anybody Mr Jackson this is my 23rd year year of sitting through one of these uh and I always have a standard set of questions that I always ask uh I think it's it's instructive at least to remind myself uh where we are in the process the following Homestead exemptions it's my understanding are currently in effect State mandated all homesteads 15,000 State mandated age 65 or older 10,000 State mandated dis disabled 10,000 local option age 65 or older 15,000 local option disabled 15,000 local option percentage all homesteads 20% uh the question that I have for you is uh have we voted on uh these additional Homestead exemptions for the current year
183and if so when did we do it uh uh Mr Jackson We I I took a uh resolution uh to the board for your consideration for approval at the June 28th 2012 meeting and did we approve that resolution yes sir um uh six trustees out of seven voted to keep the uh all of the exemptions including the 20% optional homestead exemption and which six board members voted in favor well uh you did uh Mr Ryan did M president kovi did Miss Woodall did Mr ogal tree and Miss Hartley U Mr Morris was was absent and voting on exemptions is something we do every year isn't it that's correct something else that I asked you at at that meeting uh uh when we vote additional Homestead exemptions we protect homeowners but isn't it also true that
184we shift the tax burden from rooftops to businesses with taxable property that's correct thank you any other questions I have one uh Mr Morris you said I was ABS at that meeting I remember making a motion to leave the the the uh homet exemption as it was no sir you were absent at the June 28th meeting all right I don't remember Mr Ryan Stuart you gave us a uh a debt per Ada report uh that Thursday night you kind of you kind of mentioned and uh it's got us pretty far down the list and we compare to uh I think Tomball is the highest a lot of our neighboring districts uh the size of the district for this and I'm tell me if this is correct the statement the size of the of our district
185compared to the size of of of a Tomball or a smaller district is irrelevant cuz we're talking about pure Ada on this is that statement correct that's that's correct the size of the district has no relevance really in this analysis uh for this purpose uh what we're trying to do is compare and that's why the uh the analysis was made on a uh a comparison was made on a per Ada basis because it reflects uh well that's the most relevant but it reflects the um the district's Capital needs whether it be uh building new schools to accommodate student enrollment growth or whether it be uh uh renovating or replacing old schools but uh uh the size of the district really has no relevance in this for this comparison okay thank you Miss W all did
186you have something um yes Stuart um you know whenever we're talking about taxes and and I just always like to touch on the optional homestead exemption and and ask you now um if if it with the funding formulas that we are are using right now is there any benefit to the district to consider taking away or reducing the optional homestead exemption well uh that's a obviously a decision of the board it's an annual decision uh that uh we we really have to uh Analyze That on a yearly basis and where the legislature is and what the funding system is like but uh uh to give you an example uh the uh elimination of the optional homestead exemption would provide uh at the current property values about $38 million of operating revenue and about $15 million
187of Revenue to uh to to devote to the ins tax rate uh to um pay for the principal and interest on our bonds now that $15 million of additional revenue on the ins side would allow the district then to reduce the tax rate by 3 to Four Cents three maybe even five four to five cents depending upon the amount um so there's there's benefit to uh looking at that each year and that's why we bring that resolution to you each year so that uh it makes you aware of that and and by law and by the tax code you're required to either approve that or or make any changes on an annual basis prior to July 1st of each of each year now I I know over the last several years um there wasn't an
188advantage to taking it away from our our community because the state would be receiving most of the money is that correct under the uh under the prior uh School Finance system that is correct um uh with the with uh Senate bill one uh changes were made to the school Finance system that is moving away from a hold harmless or a Target Revenue type of system uh transitioning away from that and putting districts more on a formula based system so um it is possible we don't of course we don't know what's going to happen with the legislature and school Finance over the next several years but it's still possible that uh uh the district would not benefit uh on the operating side certainly on The Debt Service side they would benefit because that's not part of
189the school Finance system that would uh or the Robin Hood system as you as you may think about it um I don't know if I answered your question yes yes you did um and and in weighing because of of course you say now we don't know what's going to be happening in the legislature but um so at this time you would still say that we should um I think we should look at it each year in consideration of the current funding system and how that might benefit the school district and where we are with our budget uh and um the needs of the school district yes and and I appreciate your diligence and asking the board for that because um as I will no longer be here uh after next month I I do want
190to make sure that that our kids are able to continue to Excel and and we are still able to offer them a quality education so I appreciate it tabs on you steuart thanks thank you Dr all do you have something oh okay Christine Mr Ryan you ready for a motion oh well I had one thing to say because I think I did yeah okay uh basically you told us on Thursday night what the implication was on the two cent based on $100,000 home and a $200,000 home could you reiterate that for anybody that doesn't watch Thursday night but they watch tonight's meeting certainly what what I said was um the two cent tax increase on the ins side The Debt Service side uh the impact on a home valued at $100,000 uh is $13 uh
191for the year annually uh what I I didn't I didn't give a comparison of the home valued at $200,000 but what I used was uh in in in cciir the average home value is about $152,000 and so the impact on that home at that value is uh if I recall $21 per year okay and correct me if I'm wrong here but the the raise in the tax is basically on the interest in Sinking tax rate which only applies to our our buildings and what we're doing it has nothing to do with maintenance and operation and our teacher salaries that's correct but let me clarify it's not it's not our buildings it's our the principal and interest on the bonds that we've sold to construct and renovate those buildings yes but that has nothing to do
192with the teacher salary does not okay uh can I have a motion please oh I'm sorry John we are doing this double take on I asked on Thursday nights and for the viewers and for those who who think that we don't ask questions um that in the past few uh board meetings we have uh voted to sell bonds and have uh experience some great savings millions of dollars in savings and the question I asked was if we are saving money uh by selling bonds why do we need this tax and and that's a great question uh we have through uh refundings of previously issued bonds generated uh significant savings over the life of those bonds uh and that has helped to mitigate the impact of this two syic tax increase in other words it it
193may have been much higher uh without the u the benefit of of those savings through the refundings however uh because of uh a property value decline last year and actually the year before that even uh as well as a reduction in the funding from the state in the uh um existing debt allotment which we get to help offset uh and pay for our uh interest and uh principle on our debt uh because of the the decline in values and the decline in the funding for the uh Eda program uh that has caused us to actually have uh proposed an increase in the ins tax rate uh we've been uh this is the this is the first increase in the ins tax rate over the last two years uh we did not ask for a a
194tax increase last year nor the year before although we probably should have uh and we've been trying to hold down that tax rate uh as long long as we could uh but because of those declines and values and the and the funding then we just needed to to be able to provide that uh increase this year any further questions may I have a motion I move that the board adopt the 2012 tax rate resolution to support the 2012 2013 budget 2012 maintenance and operations tax rate and 2012 Debt Service tax rate thank you Mr Ryan do I have a second second M Dr ogry thank you all in favor raise your right hand all unanimous thank you the board will consider authorizing the superintendent or designated to negotiate and execute an interlocal agreement and related
195documents with the Clay Road Municipal utility district for the donation and installation of playground equipment at M Robinson Elementary School uh Roy spray could you come up and just I know that the uh gentleman that were with the clayr municipal Utility District had to leave and could you just tell us what the value is and what they're going to be doing be glad too we had a representative who was the secretary for Clay Road Municipal MUD district uh president but she had to go be a parent and take care of her kids so she apologized for having to leave but we also have Kathy Dixon in the audience the principal of M Robinson I'd like to at least recognize her as well for being here and helping uh promote this uh partnership that we have
196with the MUD district and the value of the donation by the mud is $10,000 to uh support additional and upgraded playground equipment well it's certainly appreciated so we uh we appreciate that may I have a motion please go ahead no I'm not in place I'm sorry I move that the board authorizes superintendent AR need to negotiate and execute and Inter local agreement and related documents with the Clay Road Municipal utility district for the donation and installation of playground equipment at M Robinson Elementary School second second thank you miss heartley all in favor raise your right hand that's unanimous thank you C the board will consider I'm sorry we did that I'm moving on the board will consider a level three transfer appeal of a level two decision made by the transfer Review Committee uh presented
197uh was Deborah Stewart and iy O McKay yeah he did it I've been working on it iffy for almost a week a week okay okay uh do we have any questions uh concerning this Mr Mr Jackson I'm sorry Mr Jackson I would just like to make a comment uh often as board members we have to make a a decision that goes against what our uh personal thoughts are in the matter we have to make the decision as a board based upon evidence that has been presented as opposed to what our feelings on the matter might well be uh and although in in this case I don't know that that it matters to explain the decision-making process I just thought it was necessary to make that observation thank you thank you anybody else Mr Morris I
198agree with uh Tom uh I think the I don't like the the way I'm going have to vote on this but I think it'll be the it'll be in their best interest to get past this and start the process again and and do it right and I think that's where the this thing failed that the approach they took initially wasn't what they should have done if they had we probably wouldn't have been here thank you Mr Morris anybody else Miss Harley I just wanted to to um agree with Mr Jackson and say that you know it is true that we go by the evidence given to us at that time and the evidence that was given to level one and level two and and even though um you know we are are human and have
199feelings we we have to go on the evidence so thank you anybody else may I have a motion Mr President I move that the board uphold the decision made at level two by the administration second a second a second Mr Ryan all in favor raise your right hand I unanimous thank you last the board will review and consider adoption of the revised board operating guidelines outlining the duties of a public officer the board met in a closed session uh the last two months and we have revised uh the board operating procedures I don't think there needs to be a lot of discussion because we've discussed that but I will tell the listening audience that as soon as we accept this if it's accepted this will go on the website and you will be able to
200review it and take a look at it I am very proud of the document as I am proud of this board for working on it and making it happen so may I have a motion um Dr ogry Mr President I wanted to say thank you for your leadership um and um and getting these uh guidelines uh put together for us much needed long uh awaited and thank moury for her assistance and I'll move the acceptance of these guidelines for our board thank you Dr ogre I have a second Mr Morris second all in favor raise your right hand unanimous Marney thank you item 6A has been moved to the November 12th board meeting we will now go on to the superintendent's briefing portion of the agenda Dr Henry make comments and provide information on the
201following topics and I'm going to read this as fast as a southern boy can read them I would like to remind the board and Community sponsors about our salute to the Stars Gala on Thursday October 8th at the Barry Center the gala is sponsored by the cciir Education Foundation and is underwritten by the sciare credit union scair Medical Center Hospital IBI Architects and Methodist willbrook Hospital to honor our 2011 Spotlight teachers representing each of our campuses in addition to honoring outstanding teach teachers this event also raises funds for student scholarships and staff development grants for teachers our heartwalk the Northwest Harris County heartwalk will be Saturday November 3rd last year cfd had over 730 participants and raised over $16,800 the the three mile walk uh will start at lonar college cair and raises funds for
202the American Heart Association most of our campuses and support facilities have a team that any staff student or Community member can join cfd will celebrate Red Ribbon Week October 23rd through 31st the national campaign is designed to encourage healthy drug-free and violence-free Lifestyles among youth we ask parents to take special time this week to talk to their children about the dangers of drugs and alcohol parents students and staff are invited to attend the district's 21st annual Health Organization of physical Educators Our Hope fund run which will be be held on Saturday October 20th at the langum Creek High School track last year more than 2,000 students staff and community members participated in the event in an effort to help raise funds to provide scholarships for graduating seniors planning to pursue degrees in health education physical
203education Recreation or dance contact your campus or our elementary PE Department to sign up I want to remind employees and community members that they will have the privilege to exercise one of their greatest Rights Voting on November 6th for cfis board trustee positions three and four early voting dates are October 22nd through November 2nd the early voting locations within scier ISD are lonar college Cypress top Park Tomball Public Works building uh frons Road storefront Jersey Village City Hall Bear Creek Park Community Center Champion for Forest Baptist Church a candidate form is scheduled for October 16th from 7: to 9:00 p.m. at the Barry Center this form is a formal question and answer session for our candidates in front of an audience of interested voters if you cannot attend in person the event will be aired
204live on CFTV Comcast channel 16 and can also be viewed live online on our website for more information on polling sites on Election Day go to www.h harrisvotes.org governor Perry has proclaimed October 10th as Texas Education Human Resources day to honor our HR staff who ensure our schools are staffed with highquality employees we want to recognize their important contribution to hiring individuals who embody our sciare principles and values I'd like to remind the community that uh Monday October 29th is a student holiday a professional workday for our teachers and a regular workday for our Administration parent teacher conferences will be scheduled for this date for our elementary students back to you Mr Ki well also uh you might make note that October the 10th is college night at the Barry Center so if you have
205Juniors and seniors you probably know about that but you probably ought to go and this meeting is adjourned [Music] B oh [Music]