SUSD Governing Board Regular Meeting - 08/24/21

001Am I showing up? Is it? I'm not sure his mic is working. I got it. Good. All right, Randy. I call to order this regular meeting of the Scottsdale Unified No. 48 Governing Board. The date is August 24, 2021. The time is 6.01 p.m. Vice President Sanowski, will you please lead the board in the Pledge of Allegiance? Sure. i pledge allegiance to the flag of the united states of america and to the republic for which it stands one nation under god indivisible with liberty and justice for all the chair will have a roll call starting from the right zach lindsay libby hartwells julie sanowski jan michael greenberg all five board members are present and there is a quorum The board will now move to agenda item 2D, approval of agenda. Board action required. Are there

002any requested changes to the agenda as presented? Apologies. Board member Hart-Wells. I'd like to pull item 8R out of the consent agenda, please. Okay. Board member Sanowski. Vice President Sanowski. Apologies. No request. Board member Hart-Wells, did you want 8R to be read alongside 9F? Yes, please. Okay. Are there any further requested amendments to the agenda tonight? Okay, the chair moves to approve the agenda as amended, the amendment being that item 8R will be read later on with item 9F. Is there a second? Second. Board Member Hartwell seconds. It is moved and seconded that the board approve the agenda as amended. All those in favor say aye. Aye. The motion carries 5-0. And the agenda is approved. The board will now move to agenda item three, public comments notification. I just want to take a couple

003minutes here to address why we are in this different format tonight. Usually we would have audience present, and I know we have notified the public that in order to speak tonight. They will have to complete the comment cards that are outside the board meeting, and they will be called one at a time to come into the boardroom. The reason why this change had to be made is after consulting with the Scottsdale Police Department and looking at the protests and the desire for a large attendance, we thought in light of the May 18th meeting, where we had a disruption to our normal orderly conduct of the meeting. in light of the fact that we've experienced a number of recent events related to our meetings in our schools we thought that this would be the safest way

004to ensure that everyone can participate in our democracy everyone will be physically safe in doing so and everybody has that opportunity to come speak to us i do want to comment just more generally on this point because i think these events are important i've seen a number of questions about what exactly has occurred at scottsdale unified school district that would lead us to this decision. And if we look back a couple weeks now to the first day of school, an exciting day for all of our families and our students and staff, a new year, hopefully one that is more normal than the one we experienced last year. That was an exciting day for our students to come in and go to school. But unfortunately for one of our campuses, thankfully before our students came, but

005unfortunately as our staff arrived to the school, they found a number of packets, envelopes on the campus. When they inspected the packets and envelopes, those envelopes contained neo-Nazi propaganda, a 1993 neo-Nazi comic book written by William Luther Pierce III, the same author of the Turner Diaries, which was used by Timothy McVeigh to justify the Oklahoma City bombing. And this individual actually struck our campus three times, three separate occasions. brought that material and laid it out in places where we assume he hoped that children would come into contact with that. But thanks to the very swift actions of our staff members and the Scottsdale Police Department, that individual was apprehended, and hopefully that will no longer happen again. Then last week during our virtual board meeting, an individual ignored police direction, ran past police officers, and

006tried to sneak onto campus. I go into one of the board rooms believing that the board was actually not meeting virtually but was meeting in person in our board buildings. And that individual had to be arrested by Scottsdale police, spent the night in jail, and pled guilty, paid a substantial fine. That individual does not live in our community, is not a parent in our community. But I think that that shows kind of the scope of how many people are invested in what is going on here. And then, of course, on Friday, we had protests at some of our school sites where we heard some pretty unfortunate comments about... um uh comments that covet is a chinese bioweapon and encouraging our students to not follow uh district policy and remove their masks so we face a

007number of incidents i would consider them escalations really in behavior in the pattern and practices and what i do just want to comment on in terms of this public comment is you know, ask that you remain civil. I understand that there are passions. I'm fully okay with being called names. That's not what I mean by civil, but what I mean is no violence, no harks to violence, no calls to violence. We want to hear what you have to say. It's on the record. It's on YouTube. You know, everybody will get those three minutes, but we don't. want tonight to get out of hand to the point that we have to to cancel this meeting and that really comes down to the tone that our community takes on these issues i think we've seen some some

008pretty unfortunate comments coming online comments that are anti-catholic comments that are anti-immigrant comments that are racist or against our LGBTQ community and our students, comments that are anti-Semitic. I do have a list. I did prepare a list to provide some examples. I don't think that that's necessary tonight. But what I do think is necessary is that we just understand that things do seem to be escalating and we really are asking. for tensions to be calmed and i i don't want to have any more meetings where we have to take these additional safety precautions just to hear what the public has to say so again if we could keep it calm tonight keep it civil and hopefully at our next board meeting everybody will be allowed in the public audience as per usual and can can

009give their public comments as per usual so thank you for that the board will now move to agenda item four student and staff recognitions and celebrations Thank you, President Greenberg, Vice President Sanowski, and members of the governing board. At this point in time, we do not have any specific celebrations. Typically, these will start up again in September, and we're looking forward to highlighting successes of our students and staff throughout the school year. Excellent. Thank you. The board will now move to agenda item five, superintendent's comments. Dr. Menzel. Thank you again, President Greenberg and members of the governing board. Just a couple of quick comments so that we can move on with our agenda. First, we're looking at our enrollment numbers and through the first 15 days, we have a total of 22,113 students enrolled in

010pre-K through 12th grade. That is down about 124 students from a year ago. And our enrollment in kindergarten through 12th grade is at 21,431, and that's down 222 from the same time last year. Those numbers can and do fluctuate, but we continue to track enrollment trends, both positive and negative, and we'll be working with the marketing company that was approved at the last governing board meeting to focus our efforts there. Secondly, I want to speak just briefly on the mask requirement. Beginning last Friday, the requirement that the Board approved started on our campuses. It was a soft launch because we didn't have time to process all the requests for exemptions and or other accommodations. To date, we have received just under 500 requests for exemptions or other accommodations. This represents less than 2.3% of our

011total enrollment. Of the requests that we've received, less than 20% have been denied. So the majority of the requests have been approved. The final thing that I would like to talk about this evening is that we know that there are families that don't support the mask requirement, and we know that there are some strong feelings about that. We've had reports this week of verbal abuse targeted at teachers, assistant principals, principals and others using language that I don't feel comfortable repeating here. Our frontline staff, building secretaries, nurses, teachers and administrators are following the Governing Board directive and the guidance from public health officials related to the mask requirement. None of them should be subject to the verbal abuse as a result of implementing practices designed to keep our schools open for in-person learning. While we must

012allow for differences of opinion, it is important to honor our core value of empathy, which focuses on welcoming all with kindness, love, compassion, and joy. This year, in many respects, has been even harder than last year. And my call to the public, to our families, to our school community, is that we engage with each other respectfully. We can have differences of opinion, but like President Greenberg said, we need to lower the temperature so that we can have those discussions. ultimately the goal for all of us is to do everything we can to keep our schools open for in-person learning thank you thank you we will now move to agenda item six public comments um how many public comments do we have do we have the public comments well it's okay there's a little bit of

013time delay for people watching so do we well uh we I think we should have the names and we call them in groups of numbers to let them know. So because some people will be sitting in their cars, we're trying to kind of forecast that for staff. But if I have an idea, I can also waive the 90 minute. You know, if there's only if there's 30 or 35, then we can let the final five speak. Mr. Doerr, do you know how many total comment cards we have? 45 do we want to wave on 45 that's 15 uh might as well um just for the the record the meeting was originally noted um in item 1b of the agenda that there would be a 90 minute time constraint um that would be about 30 comments

014give or take i'm going to waive that since there are 45 50 more comments that's that's not an issue so we'll accommodate everyone's right to speak okay uh can our first speaker uh free to approach and if you could just state your name into the microphone so we can get it for our meeting minutes Yep. Okay. My name is Charlie Kirk, and I'm a new resident of Scottsdale. It kind of feels like I'm living in San Francisco because of all of you and your self-righteous measures that you're putting to abuse the children of this wonderful state. I'm going to have children here one day, and I sure hope people like you aren't in charge. You are defying Arizona law and measures to mask children even though there is zero evidence to show that children are

015at a significant risk of catching or dying from the Chinese coronavirus. In fact, children... who drive to school are at a much larger risk of dying on the way to school than from COVID-19, according to the CDC. The CDC's research says the following. Children 5 to 14 years old have a 0.2 chance of dying from COVID. Yet from all deaths... Suicide is 1.5. Homicide, 0.7. Cardiovascular disease, 0.6. Drowning, 0.5. Flu and pneumonia, 0.3. Suffocation and COVID are the exact same measure. Yet this district has decided... to go in their own direction against the will of the taxpayers of this area and want to mask children. We know what masking children does. This has a serious mental health toll on young people. The inability to communicate, the inability to even hear what teachers are saying. In

016fact, masking makes people unfamiliar with each other. It makes you less likely to be able to empathize with another person. God gave us a face for a reason. Dr. Macri wrote a piece in which he studied 48,000 cases of children under 18 reported to have COVID between April and August of last year. How many children died? He said, quote, our report found a mortality rate of zero among children without a pre-existing medical condition such as leukemia. So why the mask craziness? There was a 22.3% spike in ER trips for potential suicides by children aged 12 to 17 in summer 2020 compared to 2019, according to findings published in the CDC's Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report. And we know there's a direct link between children not being able to empathize with their peers and their parents

017and mental health issues. This district has decided to go in its own direction against the will of the voters and the legislature here in Arizona, not to mention the social-emotional learning guideline that you mistakenly sent out to parents in this district, the consultant group that you passed into law here, and the violation of the Open Meetings Act, which, by the way, I hope the Attorney General of this state acts with criminal intent against this school district for breaking the law and passing a curriculum without allowing parent input. In closing, I'm going to say this. Your time is soon up. The people of this state and this school district are rising up. There are recall measures in place. You have awoke a sleeping giant. I hope you enjoy your masked short-term future here while it still

018lasts. Thank you. Thank you. Hi. If you could just state your name clearly on the record because we have to keep minutes of who speaks. But otherwise, you have three minutes. Okay. Hi, my name is Erica Fransve. I'm a former SUSD student. I would like to use my three minutes today, Mr. Greenberg, Mrs. Sienowski, Mrs. Beckman, Mrs. Hartwells, and Mr. Lindsey. And I would like to have a moment of silence for the SUSD students who have committed suicide. because of the mental health issues you all have created by enforcing reckless rules and regulations implemented in the 2020 school year. And I would also like to include within this moment of silence, all of the kids who will end up committing suicide this upcoming school year in 2021 and 2022, because of your reckless and ego-centered

019leadership and lack thereof. Mr. Greenberg. I would like for you to not be distracted on your computer during the moment of silence, please. I've had friends who've committed suicide, and I would appreciate your attention. Thank you. As Christians, we're told to pray for our leaders, and that is what I will do every day. May God have mercy on your souls for everything that you guys are doing in this leadership position. Within the last 25 seconds, I would like to continue the moment of silence. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. I wear my husband's glasses because I forgot mine. If you could just state your name clearly into the microphone so that our board secretary can write it down for a minute. Of course. It's Kate Taylor. Thank you. Hello, and thank you, Superintendent Mentel and

020SUSD governing board members for allowing me this opportunity to address you this evening. My name is Kate Taylor, and I wanted to offer my perspective as an SUSD community member on your recent mask mandate. As a member of the SUSD community, residing in Scottsdale and a parent who has sent two students through a K to 12 education at SUSD, I was very pleased to learn last week that our local school district has followed both science and other area public and private schools by passing a mask mandate. With each passing day and week, it seems like more and more K to 12 public school districts across Arizona are enacting a mask mandate. ASU, NAU, and U of A, employers full of highly educated individuals, have also joined virtually every other major university in the nation with

021a mask mandate for indoor spaces. And while the agitators from outside our district would have you think that mask mandates are only in place at liberal public schools, the list of private and parochial schools also enacting mask mandates is far from short. I applaud SUSD's governing board for joining Brophy College Prep, St. Mary's High School, and even South Point High School in Tucson and many others. Currently, South Point High School in Tucson is requiring masks until the school's population is at a 90% vaccination rate. They are even offering a vaccine incentive by holding raffles for great prizes for anyone who's vaccinated. In fact, my son's large public university, incidentally in a very red state, is also offering a vaccine incentive raffle. And my daughter's university already has an over 80% vaccination rate. We all live

022in this community together. So we need to work together to practice whatever mitigation strategies we have available to us to protect the health of the broader Scottsdale community. While as of May, 2021, I no longer have kids being educated within the district. I am a part of the Scottsdale community. And the actions of this school district directly impact the health of me, my family, my neighbors, and the entire Scottsdale community. Thank you for following the facts, the science, and doing whatever is necessary to offer our community's children the best chance for an opportunity to continue to have in-person learning. Thank you very much. Thank you. If you could just state your name clearly for the record so that our board secretary can write it down. Sure. Kaveh, K-A-V-E-H. Last name is Najafi, N-A-J-A-F-I. Thank you.

023Ladies and gentlemen of the school board, I want to thank you for having me here today and the opportunity to speak. I stand before you a trauma and critical care surgeon at a local level one hospital. It means I take care of the sickest patients in the hospital. I also stand before you as a father of a first grade and fourth grade student in the SUSD. So I want to applaud you for your courage and for what you're doing. You put their health and their wellness above all else. It's not always easy to do the right thing, especially when it's unpopular. I want you to know that I and the medical community stand behind you. As physicians, we look to these national societies for guidance of how to provide care. One of these such societies

024is the CDC. And the CDC right now are the experts in disease prevention and control. And they're recommending for masks for kids two years and older who are in school. They're also recommending it for staff, teachers, anybody who visits the school, regardless of vaccination status. The CDC, as you know, is primarily made up of physicians, PhDs, and scientists. They're experts in this field. Truly, the only way we're probably going to defeat this pandemic is vaccination. The unfortunate part, without total vaccination, that virus replicates and mutates into more and more virulent, more and more stronger virus. So as we move forward and we're trying to kill off some of those bad viruses, the other ones are becoming more and more virulent, and that's what we're seeing now. So in our ICU, I see folks who used

025to have medical conditions were in their 70s and 80s. Now I'm seeing 30- and 40-year-olds with no medical problems who are dying from this. That's how much more powerful it is. More importantly for our children I have colleagues at the Phoenix Children's Hospital and they're completely full out of 45 ICU beds 40 or full out of 350 floor beds 305 or full in their ED out of a hundred beds. They have 125 patients What that means is if there is a massive? Emergency there is no flux there is no flex kids will get shipped to other states so If I want to learn how to make and sell ice cream, I'll ask the governor. If I want to learn how to protect health and prevention, I stick with the CDC. So I appreciate you guys

026today. We stand behind you. Thank you for all the work you do. Thank you. Hello and thank you, Superintendent Manziel and the Scottsdale Unified School District Governing Board members for allowing me to address you tonight. My name is James Taylor. I am a resident of Scottsdale who has put two kids through SUSD schools. While I no longer have a child in SUSD, I am concerned about some in the community who are reacting to this board's decision to institute a mask mandate. Last year, prior to the availability of vaccines for COVID, this board required mask wearing as part of an in-person instruction at our schools. That made imminent sense then. Now, with the more aggressive Delta variant circulating, this board is again requiring masks to protect both students and district employees. That makes imminent sense now.

027Nonetheless, we have a vocal minority of science-denying parents who are upset at having students take this simple precaution to protect others. Indeed, this minority is so enraged that they have cultivated a climate of intolerance and hate. that threatens the peace and safety of the public wanting to attend a school board meeting tonight. What a sad reflection of where parents choose to devote their energies. Last year, when this district suspended in-person learning, the same minority cried over and over for a return to in-person learning. We were told that we needed to have in-person at all costs to protect the emotional health of our kids. Well, clearly this board heard those demands. Now, with over 2,800 SUSD students affected by COVID in just the first three weeks of school, clearly a mask-optional policy was quickly threatening the

028ability of SUSD to continue offering that in-person learning that we all want. So thank you. Thank you for placing in-person learning as the priority. and for enacting a mask mandate as one of the tools to give us the best chance to give our kids that opportunity. For those who screamed the loudest last year for a return to in-person education, I would hope that they have the sense to understand that the new SUSD mask mandate is 100% about supporting those demands. Finally, I need to comment briefly on the spectacle outside. The public has a right to attend our school board meetings and learn about what's happening in our schools. While SUSD is live streaming the content of this meeting, I find it reprehensible that a group of people, many not even residing in this district, have

029ruined our ability to gather together safely with masks and social distancing to attend this meeting collectively in person. Thank you for your time. Thank you. hi my name is lisa fitzgerald and my daughter is in sixth grader in scottsdale unified school district i'm truly disappointed in your recent actions considering you as the board are supposed to represent your voters match should be a choice and not mandated i work in the mental health industry and i will tell you masking our children has negatively affected them more than coveted would Reach out to the local child and adolescent psychiatrist, the psychologist and therapist in the area, as they help these children that you continue to disregard because of your lack of knowledge or care or even thought to reach out to the parents. And Libby, please get

030your facts correct, especially when you are on record. Twice in last week's special government meeting, you are quoted stating 2,000 students in Scottsdale Unified School District were quarantined due to close contact when the correct number of students was 600. That's a 330% difference. As a board member, it is your responsibility to have your facts cross-checked and correct before stating them. And define close contact. Is close contact of a positive case or is it just a parent reporting symptoms that could be COVID? And speaking of close contact, why would a child quarantined due to close contact get, once they got their results back, being negative? Why are they still having to be quarantined an additional 10 days? You're supposed to be for our kids and not against them. Mr. Greenberg, I would be interested in knowing

031where you got your information from when you quoted saying 70% of Scottsdale Unified School District parents wanting masks in room. 70%. I didn't get a survey this year. Was that last year's survey before the vaccine was available? I'd like to know. No one that I've spoken to have gotten a survey. Tonight, I ask you to listen to your fellow board member, Zach Lindsay, who spoke up stating it should be the parent's choice, not a mandate. I ask you to reverse this mandate and be with the state of Arizona and the 75% of other school districts in Maricopa County that are not mandating masks, but allowing masks, wherein be a choice. Thank you for your time. Thank you. You may begin. Thank you. Hi, my name is Patricia Pellett. I am very proud to be here

032speaking before you for parental rights in my boy's education during this COVID crisis and on his ninth birthday. Happy birthday, Isaac. I have suffered from a disability myself, epilepsy, since I was 21. As a parent with both a disability and a child with a disability, I'm very passionate about fighting for his and other children's educational rights. Some quick background on Isaac. He was born with both Down syndrome and a cleft lip and palate, but also has a blessing in disguise. Due to his palate issue, he leaks liquid through his nostrils. This causes him to suffer from navel cell blockage from time to time. He also is a very smart and capable boy, but he can't be left alone. This idea that virtual learning works for all, especially for some disadvantaged children, is a joke. It's

033been a complete failure for my boy. He doesn't focus on the computer, and he fights the whole time to wander off. My child needs to be in class. He has been sent home more times than the average child over his nasal blockage issues. The Scottsdale School District has also decided to outsource his transportation to third parties. during this COVID crisis due to a shortage of bus drivers. Last year, he was dropped off multiple times at school at Cochise in the wrong spot without any contact with any adult. Luckily, a parent, I mean, luckily a teacher found him walking around campus. Last week, he was dropped off down the street at the wrong house by the third party transportation. Luckily, I have good neighbors. Where is the accountability for my boy during this crisis? What parent

034wouldn't be livid as I am? I'd like to end with saying that being a parent and a teacher is one of the hardest but most rewarding jobs. Teachers honestly deserve more pay for what they do and especially during this difficult time. Thank you, teachers. We also, as parents, deserve our parental rights to our children's education. Thank you. You may begin. Greetings, Chair and SUSD Board. My name is Patty O'Neill, and I live in North Scottsdale, and I have raised my kids here in Scottsdale. I'm proud to say that my daughter was in kindergarten the first year Cheyenne Traditional School opened. Back then, I spent many evenings in these meetings as I was the PTO president several years running. It's never been easy to be on a school board, but my guess it is probably harder

035than it ever has been. I for one want to thank each and every one of you for your service. An additional thank you to the board members that voted yes to mask mandate. It was the kindest vote you could have cast. Today I am here to just remind you of what a gift you gave our community by mandating masks. Even though I no longer have kids in school, once school is out, those same students and staff roam through our city doing grocery shopping, dining at restaurants, or simply heading home. For every move they make has an unintended consequence of infecting others. So thank you for thinking about our students, teachers, administrators, and the community at large. a simple math mask over our nose and mouth is not much to ask and i thank you thank

036you good evening ready ready my name is jody galassi ainley and i am not a parent i know many would say why am i here what does it matter to you you don't have any skin in the game you don't have children in this district you know i was thinking about coming today and i thought about that question You know, our lives begin to end the day that we're silent about things that matter. This matters to me. So I would say to those individuals who would criticize me for being here and never giving birth, please listen up, people. I have something important I'd like to say. I've lived in Scottsdale for 21 years, and I deeply love this city. It's my home. I want our city to thrive and to lead on issues like reversing

037climate change, economic development, justice, equity, and most of all, education. To do so, we need a strong, healthy, well-educated children, right, taught by incredibly dedicated leaders and led by people like all of you. Patty, Julie, Jan-Michael, Zach, and Libby. Your collective commitment and singular focus on the well-being of what is the future of this city, our children, fills me with hope, a hope that I have not had in these uncertain times in many, many months. You have been subject to unthinkable personal attacks, threats to your family, baseless accusations, anti-Semitic rhetoric, and outright blatant lies. to say it has been disgusting is a complete understatement it sickens many of us to our core the revolting behavior has no place in scottsdale it has no place anywhere so this is what i want you to know what

038you do matters to so many of us Your steadfastness in the face of attack after attack is extraordinary. And it demonstrates to all of us that no matter how deep your personal sacrifice, your goal is singularly the welfare of our children, our future. And we just can't thank you enough. In the end, it will be easy to forget those out there. grandstanding spreading lies, that nonsense will go away and we'll never hear from them again. And it can't be too soon. This nonsense will go away, but in the end, it will be you who will be remembered for your professionalism, expertise, and kindness in the face of hatred. There's nothing more memorable than this which you have shown us is possible. For this amazing lesson, the vast majority of us in Scottsdale owe you a

039deep debt of gratitude. Thank you for your bravery and your commitment. Good night. Thank you. It's hard to speak with this can I take it down sure great When do I begin whenever okay? My name is Tom Fitzgerald. I've never come before a school board meeting before I have a daughter and a grandson that are both at Cheyenne Elementary School. I also have three daughters that are college graduates Last week, I received the tragic news that one of my high school friends, who I played four years of high school basketball with, had passed away because of COVID. And my wife and I were also gravely concerned when our parents, who were both in their 80s, contracted COVID, and fortunately they survived. My only reason for sharing this with you is to let you know that

040because of these personal experiences, I put a lot of time and effort into learning the facts about COVID. My reason for coming before you, this board, is because it has become extremely evident that this board has not put in the time and effort to learn the facts about COVID. If you had taken your time to learn the facts, you would not have come up with your ineffective decision. In your email to parents of the Scottsdale Unified School District, you provide zero facts or in-depth analysis that brought you to your decision. Had you done your homework, you would have learned that the largest study in the United States, done in North Carolina, they studied 90,000 school children, and in the study, there was not one student-to-teacher transmission. Not one. Furthermore, there were... There was absolutely no

041statistical difference in the COVID cases between schools that wore masks and those that didn't. None. And that's proven across the nation. There is very little statistical difference between schools that have masks and schools that don't. So why are you mandating it? Makes no sense. Our kids under the age of 25 have a one in a million chance of dying from COVID. Our kids are more likely to die by being struck by lightning or by the seasonal flu than by dying from COVID. And that's statistically proven. If you were seriously concerned about the health of our children and had learned the facts, you could not have come up with these theatrical pieces of cloth. They don't do anything. There's no evidence that they do. There's not one study that shows that these theatrical masks make any

042statistical difference in preventing the spread of COVID, and yet you've mandated a decision without any supporting evidence. Not in your emails, not anything. Dr. Fauci is on record for saying that these masks are ineffective and nothing more than theater. Your unintelligent decision to force children to wear ineffective masks actually does more harm than good. The entire country of Ireland. Please conclude. Lastly, if a child is banned from school because he or she is in proximity to someone with COVID, they should be allowed to come back to school if they test negative. It defies common sense to keep children at home if they test negative. And yet your current rules, you are banning children with negative tests from attending school. Scottsdale School Board, you've made an ignorant decision that has no facts or evidence to support

043it. I ask that you look at the facts and your evidence. Otherwise, we parents have no choice than to recall you, which is underway right now. Thank you. You may begin whenever you want. All right. So my name is Jill Lassen. I am a parent as well as a librarian. I realize that I may be preaching a little bit to the choir here, but I wanted to remind everyone else in attendance the importance of good teen and young adult books and their ability to knock the reluctance of reluctant readers right out, provoke critical thinking and sophisticated readers, and universally provide hours of pleasure for most all readers. All topics are important for teens. this innate fear from adults that teens cannot handle the subject matter needs to stop. Teens and children are tougher and smarter

044than many give them credit for, often their own parents. So a few points that I just wanted to get across here on rape and sexual abuse yes this is a tough topic whether a student is a victim of rape themselves or not the message of speaking up and speaking out is worth promotion many teen novels available now are exploring rape and rape culture at deeper levels looking at how young women and girls are often failed by institutions when they are a victim of rape It can help in understanding a friend or even a sibling who has experienced it. On suicide, books that touch on suicide often explore the idea of suicide packs, which have been seen a lot in the news in recent years. And how suicide is something that must be combated, but not

045alone. These books are not promoting suicide, and it's been proven that the more teenagers know about it, the more likely they are to reach out and seek help. LGBTQ topics. The large abundance of LGBTQ literature is giving this group of teens and their friends and families a voice that has been sorely lacking for decades in teen literature. Tackling difficult subjects but with an LGBTQ slant assures these teenagers that their voices are just as diverse and important as well as their families. You must understand that by excluding anything LGBTQIA, you're excluding whole families and their experiences. Please do not allow our school district or any of our schools to be put through the public embarrassment of being listed on the website of the Office of Intellectual Freedom and in the Journal of Intellectual Freedom and Privacy

046as having challenged any of these books, whether they are in our curriculum or not. I'm speaking to a previous meeting where some books were challenged that are very important for many, many, many teenagers. And unfortunately to the teachers, Too often they're unaware or do not seek help from people and cultivate goodwill before censorship strikes. Let it be known to them that no community is so small that it lacks concerned people who care about their children and that we are your allies. So thank you. Thank you. All right. you may be getting ready okay hi my name is brian king i'm an susd parent and hospital-based physician first i want to thank all of the board for your unpaid service to the community during this really difficult time i also want to thank dr menzel for

047his calm compassionate study leadership i know how heavily each and every decision you all make must weigh on you i also wanted to express my support for the temporary mask requirement in the middle of our current surge we all wish the school year would have started differently and with more normalcy but flexibility as our friend here masks are a simple measure with plenty of data that tells us it helps reduce spread As a working parent, I'm grateful for any non-onorous policy that keeps my kids in school. As a hospital worker, I'm grateful for any measure that helps reduce the strain on our hospital systems and on my fellow healthcare workers. I'm also grateful for the community of members who approach mandates with caution due to their concerns of overreach and slippery slopes. I trust in

048the vigilance of the people to prevent policies that become inappropriate or unreasonable. And so I hope that we maintain perspective when it comes to masks. Masks in school in the middle of a surge where other mitigation tools are limited is just common sense. It's about keeping kids healthy. It's about keeping schools open to minimize any more disruption to their emotional lives and their education. I also hope we remember that masks and COVID are temporary, but our public schools need to be forever if we truly care about our community, our country, and our democracy. I hope we as a community can focus on preserving and building up our public schools instead of tearing them down. And I hope the community sees how lucky we are after years of disruptors and bad players that we finally have

049a board and superintendent full of builders for our schools to guide us through. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. You may begin when ready. President Greenberg, Superintendent Menzel, and members of our school board, thank you for giving me the opportunity to speak tonight. SUSD has a long history of educating and supporting students, and my family has a long history of attending our schools. My mother attended Scottsdale High, my husband attended SUSD schools, and now our children do. We proudly support you and respect the strong history of education in SUSD. Our oldest started attending our neighborhood school when she was three. We have been SUSD parents for four years now. We have absolutely loved the SUSD preschool and pre-K programs and our teachers are truly like family. Our early elementary experience has been equally outstanding. Our

050teachers' degrees, experience and awards are far above our charter and private counterparts and their level of dedication and caring natures are unmatched. We are also proud of our dedicated administrators and school board. Our neighborhood school is growing. Almost half of our school, over 200 students are entering and exiting at Northgate every school day with the same number of parents and guardians. This is a pride for our school. Northgate is an area for meeting, greeting, and planning school activities. However, as our school grows, we must widen our sidewalk. We have one narrow sidewalk for entering and exiting. Otherwise, people are walking through gravel or tripping on the curb. I urge you to approve the widening of our sidewalk before the City of Scottsdale meeting. We understand our shade and seating may take longer, but we urge

051you to get started on this step in the name of safety. Likewise, as our school grows, we would like clarity on the status of volunteers on campus. I recently heard nutrition services is looking for parent volunteers on campus. Our school would like to have a parent volunteer on campus for gardening, as well as running club during the school day. Volunteering outside is low risk with social distancing. Please consider allowing a limited number of volunteers on campus outside during the school day. It will add so much to our neighborhood schools. Finally, I wanted to say that I respect your dedication and support your decisions. I am an allied healthcare professional and I support requiring masks indoors if it keeps our students learning in person. And I support the exception option you've given families as well. Thank

052you for keeping our families safe. Thank you. Two minutes. Hello. Am I allowed to take off my mask while I speak? You are. Okay, great. Thank you very much. Hello. My name is Trish Olson. I have three children in SUSD, two in middle school and one in high school. SUSD parents have been told since May 2021 that face masks would be optional for the 2020-2021 school year, giving parents and caregivers the opportunity to make the best choice for their families. We are in the third full week of the new school year and already things have changed. Personal rights and the ability to choose what is best for our children is the cornerstone of who we are as Americans. I believe the backlash you've received for reversing your position on masks speaks to that. It has

053all become so political. The divide is growing, the divisiveness in the district is palpable due to the politics that the governing board continues to push on parents. We've elected the governing board as a non-partisan group to make decisions that affect our children every day in one way or another. We did not elect you to use our children for your own political battlegrounds. It must stop. As parents, we want transparency in all school-related topics. We want to know that when you say something at a board meeting or send something out to families of this district, even if it's something that people won't agree with, that you mean it. That provides parents all of the information that they need to make decisions about where their children will be attending school. I think I said this to you

054last week, but I'm going to repeat myself and say that I often say to my children, if you say you're going to do something, do it. And that's my message to you tonight. The messaging coming from SUSD isn't always as clear and concise as it should be, nor does it come in time for families to decide if SUSD is the best fit for them. We need to be able to trust the district leaders. We need to be able to know that you're going to follow through with your commitments. We need to be able to trust that SUSD has our children's best interests at heart. Sorry. And that students are at the forefront of the decisions being made in this district. Dr. Menzel, I've had the opportunity to discuss many topics with you over the last

055year, and I've appreciated the time you've given me, truly. But as I recall during one of our discussions, you mentioned that you didn't like surprises. And I can tell you that parents don't like surprises either. Please understand the need for transparency for parents and caregivers does not change because of a pandemic It is vital to maintaining a good working relationship between all stakeholders of this district. Thank you Thank you Thank you. Maybe again when ready good evening It's unfortunate the way you've structured this meeting tonight because I've been standing outside since 4 for an opportunity to speak here and I understand that there's been some interesting reactions particularly around some news pieces that you have dropped into the media specifically about a I'm going to change my comment here about a neo-nazi propaganda comic book

056being distributed around campus and I want everybody to know that that was actually one of your own employees that chose to drop that around. I'm sorry, that isn't true. I just want to be very clear that that isn't true. I don't think you're allowed to speak during my comment. Am I wrong? I'd like to have some time added. You can have time added, but I want to be very clear to people watching that's not true. So you've embellished these incidents and feigned victimhood in an effort to paint us as a disruptive and dangerous group. You've even pushed a narrative that we are responsible for these comic books, when in reality, it was an SUSD employee. that dropped these books, as evidenced in your public record emails, and you called police on your own employees. So

057back to my planned comment. You have a practice of operating outside of the public view while pretending to allow involvement. The strategic planning team was formed in February. And while you included community in the application process to demonstrate parental involvement, all of those committee meetings were held behind closed doors. No minutes, deliberations, or votes were made available to the public body. So unless you were one of the few parents chosen to participate, you have no insight into these discussions, which means you only want parent involvement when it's on your terms. There were discussions about my home school of Cheyenne and whether or not the traditional model fit within the new direction of SUSD, with the ideation that all schools should fit inside the same box and further diminishing parent choice. There are many parents in

058the Cheyenne community that would be interested to know that these discussions are taking place. Another lack of transparency from SUSD. You've gone to the media and claimed that 70% of parents want mask mandates. However, I was never surveyed. When masks were optional at my campus, less than 10% of students opted to wear them. And I'm not anti-mask, but I believe parents should have a choice. And using Let's Talk and Thought Exchange is not the substitute for a survey. You haven't surveyed us because you don't want to hear from us, which is obvious when you make parents stand outside in 100 degree temperatures in order to have the honor of speaking in front of you. Julie, you've equated to masks and guns in social media, which I think is pretty disgusting. There's no point in doing

059that. Your intent was to divide and disrupt this community. I don't think you can refute that. I just want to be very clear for the record that no employee was involved in the neo-Nazi propaganda incident. That is incorrect. That is a reference to a pre-existing investigation that was not concluded and now has since concluded, and no SUSD employee was involved. You may begin when ready. Thank you. Good evening. I'm Sarah Solom, an SUSD parent. Governor Ducey said, safety recommendations are welcomed and encouraged. Mandates that place more stress on students, families aren't. Your mandate has absolutely caused stress on students, staff, and family. Your commitment to being a mask-optional district in at least six emails from May 14th to August 17th with patronizing language of, let us reiterate, we will be mask-optional for 21-22 academic year,

060was a commitment to our district. at the July 29th staff rally, it was said the district was not a lawmaking entity, but educators. And somehow just a few weeks later, it doesn't feel like that. The second you found a window of opportunity to wield power over our community, you took it, calling an emergency meeting without even sending notification to our district. It seems like you just didn't like that SUSD staff and students had already made their individual choice whether or not to wear masks, and you decided that you knew better. You determined that your analysis and understanding of the current world situation is more superior to your constituents. Their choice is now void. Families made their decision to stay with SUSD or come to this district based on that commitment. Staff expected that they would

061have a choice too. Chandler and Higley listened to their constituents on the topic of mask mandates and decided a mandate was not in the district's best interest. Yet we at SUSD have not had a district-wide opportunity to speak. However, Board President Greenberg just claimed to a reporter to know that the community supports a mandate with about a 70-30 split. Where did you get this number from? It's definitely not from a district survey because we, the SUSD community of families and staff, have never been asked. And when some did try to call in and make a comment, just so they could get some sort of feedback to you, you could just cut the mic. Making up your own number to support your narrative and vote does not show integrity, trust, transparency, or unity, values the district

062claims to embrace. You've put everyone in impossible situations with your mismanagement, lack of communication, short-sighted, fast-tracked mandates and policies, and no one knows what's really going on. My own five-year-old kindergarten class had to wear masks during PE activity, and it was confirmed on camera. And these educational plans to skirt excellent education are sad. Let the parents decide how to best manage their students' unique and individual health care needs, and let staff manage theirs. And as more information becomes available, everyone can continue to manage their own best choices for their own health needs. I do want to thank board members Lindsey for recognizing the challenges and heavy impact mandates would have on the schools and students, and board member Beckman for realizing that students do not fit into a one-size-fits-all program. Your back to school district

063email on August 6th before the mandate commented on the many, many smiles on the faces of students, teachers, staff, and principals. And I don't see any smiles here tonight. It's because they're either masked or you locked them out. What a welcoming, inclusive environment for a school district. Thank you. Thank you. You may begin when ready. All right. Hi, my name is Amy Carney. Thank you, Governing Board members, Mr. Greenberg, Dr. Menzel. I appreciate the opportunity to speak tonight, even under these odd circumstances. I'm here to talk about if maybe this latest mask issue you've created is just to distract everyone and keep the attention off of our failing schools and declining enrollment in our district. Why has there been no emergency meeting called to address our district's failing test scores? Since when does mask policy

064trump what should be the primary focus for all of us here, education? In June, it was reported that 16% of eighth grade students are performing three or more grade levels below where they should be. Further, test results show that only 60% and 66% of third grade students tested as proficient in English, language arts, and math. You see these results form a starting point for improving academic achievement. So who's going to call the meeting to design the crucial plan for raising these percentages? We must prioritize and get honest about the education or lack thereof that many of our students are receiving in this district. What are you doing to strengthen all of the students in our district who are failing or who are falling behind because they're not getting the help that they need? Instead, you're

065throwing money at things that don't benefit our children. Last meeting, you all approved to spend $156,000 on the district's 125th year anniversary marketing campaign, which doesn't include any printables. But while I myself am a sucker for a good logo and a fun marketing campaign, and it's certainly a milestone to celebrate, I'm not sure that's where our money should be spent right now. Unfortunately, I think you wasted that money because with this latest mandate, no clever social media post your marketing team can dream up will make anyone want to move to our district right now. Frustrated parents are once again pulling their kids from Scottsdale schools, and I thought the goal here was to build backup enrollment, not further the decline. I hope that you're talking with these individuals to hear the truth about why they're

066leaving the district, or do you really care? You would have been so much better off investing that $156,000 in the classrooms and helping our struggling students raise their math and reading skills. This is where we the parents want your focus to be and where we want our money to be spent on educating our children. We don't want our money going to smoke and mirror social media posts. We want the money in the classrooms directly benefiting the students. If people are interested in sending their kids to the SUSD schools, believe me, they'll ask us. They ask us. Our neighbors ask. How are experiences and the strength of the education our children are receiving? So stop the distractions, stop wasting precious funds, stop sending emails personally attacking parents and community members who don't align with you, and

067start focusing your efforts on the betterment of the educational experience for every child in SUSD. Thank you. Thank you. Hello, good evening, board and Superintendent Menzel. My name is Ann Myers. I live in Scottsdale, and I'm the grandmother of two children who attend Kiva. We are living in a time when craziness has infected our country. Where the crazies believe that if you shout loudly and often enough, whatever they say becomes true. Where we are told not to believe our eyes, our ears, and our common sense. Where down is up and the sky is green and vaccines put tracking chips into your body. We share our precious children with you. to be prepared for the future, and to be protected in the present. You have a difficult job, but please know that it is not thankless.

068We, and I speak for many in our community, we thank you from the bottom of our hearts. Thank you for being a school system that we can be proud of. Thank you for modeling rationality, sanity, and empathy. Thank you for mandating masks and thank you for your courage in standing up to the craziness. Thank you. Does someone want to start the timer? You may begin when ready. Good evening, board members. I'm here today to represent myself. I'm Jeff Steffen and my two children that attend your district. And also Cassidy Carell. Cassidy was a 39-year-old nurse living in Ogden, Utah. She died four days after taking the second dose of the Moderna vaccine. Her liver, kidney, and heart shut down four days after taking the poisonous mRNA vaccine. And if you guys are recommending these and

069kids die from them, I would suggest that you take responsibility with the Lord for recommending such vaccines. bad products with the FDA. I wanted to quote Anthony Fauci here. Dr. Anthony Fauci, one of the most corrupt persons I've ever seen in government. He said, there is no reason to be walking around with a mask. When you are in a middle of an outbreak, wearing a mask might make people feel a little bit better, and it might even block a droplet, but it's not providing the perfect protection that people think it is. You gotta be kidding me. As educated as you guys are to think that this is going to stop a Chinese militarized virus bioweapon that China gave us. Bill Gates, on September 30th, this terrorist right here, Bill Gates, this guy is a psychopath

070animal. He says the COVID vaccines will allow us to save millions of lives. They'll also have enormous benefit. They will allow us to develop a plan for the world to globally eliminate COVID-19. The vaccines are not working. Doug Ducey, totally corrupt. He banned hydroxychloroquine, the life-saving medicine. If you take 200 milligrams once a week of hydroxychloroquine, it has an 80% chance of preventing COVID-19. I contacted Walt Chandler and other great people I love in the school district. I'm like, you guys need to have Doug Ducey get rid of this stupid ban. He never did. The government literally wants to kill people. It is horrible. Also, over the weekend, Donald Trump said, everything that goes woke turns to shit. And that is obviously five of the six of you in the school board. Zach, thank you

071for voting against the ridiculous mask mandates last week. We are at war with globalism, folks. Klaus Schwab, I want you to remember this, he says, by 2030, he wants to make sure our kids and you will own nothing and be happy. Whatever you want, you will rent. The U.S. won't be the world's superpower. You'll eat much less meat, not a staple, only an occasional treat. and we'll have to do a better job at welcoming and integrating refugees also joe biden is importing the virus 10 million people have came across the border he is importing the disease thank you board members and i wish you the best thank you good evening everybody it's nice and cool in here you may begin when ready i'm ready by the way somebody was caught swearing fyi it's on the

072internet from one of you guys not very professional i am ready my name is karen warner and i understand as a board sometimes you can't reach consensus that is understood but the default always has to be its parents choice and parents rights be kind to each other is what we teach our children someone wants to wear a mask let them wear a mask be respectful somebody doesn't want to wear a mask be respectful that's okay too This board is playing politics with our children, conducting meetings from home and controlling public commenting by hanging up on people who mention masks and things you don't want to hear. And we know you are aware that the majority wants mask-optional, traditional education with true American values. Your need to control the narrative ad nauseum is getting tiring and

073appalling. When another parent and I met with school administrators on 810 for an hour and 20 minutes in a small boardroom, there was not a mask in sight, either of you, you, or you guys. And an hour and a half later, we show up for the board meeting, and lo and behold, everybody's masked, with the exception of you. When we asked what changed, we were told, oh, it's to set a good example. Well, a good example for what? You didn't have masks on during your work hours. Listening to your banter at the meeting on 8-17, you literally articulated incentivizing students to wear a mask. If they wear a mask, they don't have to quarantine. How many minutes did you spend on that? I would call that manipulation what you guys were doing. This mandate the

074four of you approved is nothing more than tiny tyrants wanting to take power and control where you can get it and further your own political agendas. Being more concerned with kids choosing pronouns and if their own parents are not aware of them or are they aware of them it's nothing more than a distraction for teaching and educating the students to research potential and excellence when my son said that he had to put down a pronoun first first or second day of school he thought if he did not the teacher would assume he was a day them and he was terrified i asked his teacher and i said where did that come from and i quote this is what menzel wants and this is what he said for us to do I'll follow up with an

075email. Really? So, this is really what's important to you. I ask you to stop the nonsense, let kids be kids, and stop playing politics with our kids. They are our kids. They are not your pawns. Let our teachers teach true academics and not your political BS. Thank you. Thank you. You may begin when ready. I'm sorry? You may begin when ready. Thank you. My name is Sherry Sapir and I come before you today on behalf of many concerned parents. I was asked to address comments made by Jan Michael in a prior meeting where he referred to anti-critical race theory documents as racist and anti-Semitic documents trying to dictate what is taught in our schools. The rise of anti-Semitism we see right now, especially among the youth in this country, trickles down from college campuses because

076yesterday's college students are today's teachers. Misinformation taught in biased college classrooms is not being taught in classes in public schools across America. As a fellow Jew, born and raised in Israel, I have seen the worst of anti-Semitism firsthand. I recently gave a speech where a spectator took a picture of me and posted the photo to Instagram with the caption, Hitler was right. That is racism. That is anti-Semitism. Critical race theory is a product of social justice warriors connected to BLM, BDS, and Antifa, all of which seek to destroy America and rewrite our history. If you think supporting these groups and their ideology will spare you when this country truly becomes anti-Semitic and racist, then you're severely mistaken. Don't forget the Jews tried appeasing Hitler, too, but we know how that story ended. In contrast, the

077Christian moms you think are against you are the most Jewish-loving, pro-Israel moms you will ever meet. Parents' questioning curriculum is not anti-Semitic. Far from it. It is the right and obligation of parents to question anything and everything their child is exposed to, especially when the district appears to go out of its way to conceal and mislead. Remember, you broke the trust, not us. Parents' morals and values cannot be challenged or conflicted in the classroom. Schools took it upon themselves to confuse our children on their gender, core beliefs, and worldview, all in the name of righteousness. Stop the virtue signaling, masks included. We all saw you at the SUSD back-to-school event with hundreds of district staff unmasked on July 28th. We were paying attention, and it was predictable you will change your tunes as soon as

078you got our children back in your territory. The alleged neo-Nazi propaganda being passed around the school as a cause for this board to conduct the public meeting in the manner that we're seeing today is another push of victimhood. And we all know this isn't representative of SUSD families. It is inappropriate for the board members to use religion as a shield from criticism. Whether it is CRT, SEL, or some other semantic, parents see a pattern of indoctrination. If it was one or two parents, I would say it's just a personal perspective. But you know it's so many of us. Why are you muting our voices? We want a dialogue. We're not the middlemen, and we're not going away. You see it emotionless when we speak. We expect nothing less, though. We want you, though, to understand

079that this is not the end of our movement. This is just the beginning. Thank you. Thank you. You may begin when ready. Good evening. I know it's been a hard day for a lot of you so I come in peace, but I do come concerned My name is Brian. I stand here as an accomplished Olympic athlete that has suffered a lot of things from a lot of people from around the world. And I really want to know, as a board, why it's okay to be teaching kids critical race theory. As a parent and as somebody who really wants kids someday, I want to know, as a board of beautiful Caucasian people, the benefit. of teaching kids that look like myself that the world is going to be a terrible place for them for things that

080they can't control. And it's very upsetting and it's disheartening, the things that are now being taught to my kids and kids of the future because the way I see it heading, the way things that are being dumbed down and kind of explained in ways that are now deemed acceptable at the young ages as low as five to six, kindergarten through 12th grade, I don't see any benefit from it. I've been places where I've been criminalized because of how I look. And I come here and I'm able to stand in front of you to express my opinion, not out of oppression and not out of a place of privilege, but as an American. And I want my kids to grow up in a district where they know that through hard work, character, and faith is what

081gets you success, not the color of your skin. And I don't want them to grow up in a world where when they see people like yourselves, they automatically demonize you. Because when that happens and that's taught in certain ways, what we're doing is we're arming our children to be criminals. And to start looking at you and your children and anybody else that looks like you as a threat. I grew up in the ghetto. I grew up in places where fighting and gun violence and drugs was just a means of survival. And I made it out because of good choices. Because I had good parents and I had teachers and a school board that believed in my potential. Now I know that there's been a lot of people that have been heavy and passionate and very

082concerned about a lot of the things and might have gotten their message lost in the translation of anger. But I just want to say it takes a very sick human being in the position that you are, who have the power in your hands. to really take control over the school systems to make sure that our kids are people of equity that add to the community, that make it better. Because where we're headed right now with what's being taught and what's being said, it's not going to be long before our jails, our streets, and our mortuaries are filled with a lot of people who are just blinded by blind hatred. I respect all of you for the positions that you have, and I don't blame or I don't accredit any of it to your skin color.

083You guys were smart and had to do what you had to do, and I want my kids to know that they can do the same. Thank you. Thank you. You may begin when ready. All right, thank you. Hi, my name is Heather Morawick. I've been a resident of Scottsdale for 27 years and live just down the street from this school for the last 22 years. I just wanted to come in and thank you for doing the mask mandate and for your bravery. I know you're not hearing a lot of that today. It's scary out there. I can see why people don't want to come. But I just wanted to say thank you for following the science. Thank you for listening to the majority of people in the school district. We know the masks keep us

084safe. Nobody wants to get COVID. Nobody wants to get long-haul COVID. We know Delta has changed the numbers. We know that it's affecting the kids a lot more. And so I just wanted to take a couple minutes to say thank you and know that there are a lot of people who are backing you, and we will continue to back you. Thank you. Thank you. You may begin when ready. All right. Do I press it? No, you can start whenever. All right. Good evening, Superintendent. First off, I'd just like to say that I think it's cowardice and it's really just dumb that you guys are not letting the public in. And perhaps that you guys should remember that you guys serve the community. SUSD serves the community and we don't serve you guys. So, do any

085of you have any idea of the long-term effects on the kids wearing masks? I didn't think so. None of us do, but based on the science, you pass a mask mandate at 10.45 p.m. Then I read in the news that our school board president announced surveys result that 70% of the SUSD community supports the wearing of masks. Masks don't work and Fauci already said they don't work, especially double masks. There's a woman outside wearing two, I think three masks right now. So COVID-19 isn't going anywhere. It's appalling that the district is unprepared to handle the education needs of the students in quarantine. While we're millions of dollars spent on in the classroom cameras and they're going unused in this year. So much wasted money. Why isn't streaming an option? We just assume the assignments posted

086on Google Classroom are going to provide any instructions. You're stressing myself out and all the other students in SUSD. And that burden goes on all of you guys and all of the teachers. So enough with this nonsense, all right? That's all I have to say. Thank you. Thank you. You may begin when ready. OK. um hello my name first of all thank you for having me my name is katie peters ray and i'm a mother of a high school junior at arcadia high school i just wanted to take a moment to thank the board for implementing the mask mandate i appreciate the fact that the board has put the health and safety of our children and its staff of our schools first With this mandate, I believe that it ensures our school can remain open

087and within school learning. My child is fully vaccinated and wearing a mask is an added layer of protection for her as well as everyone around her. So I just want to thank you. I'm sorry, I'm a little bit nervous, but thank you. It means a lot to me. I have a lot of extra time. Thank you. Hi, my name is Tracy Martin. I am a coach in the Valley and first and foremost, I'm sure you guys have heard everything you can imagine tonight, but I really want to implore on the conversation that I want you to think about the collateral damage that our kids are paying a price. I have kids that come in as coaching 14 years old that won't take their mask off because they're afraid they're going to kill their teacher. This

088is the language that's being instilled with them and it's not a lifestyle. We're treating healthy, beautiful, vibrant children as if they're sick. which is a which is a syndrome called munchausen by proxy and i think we all know that the mental warfare that is playing and plaguing our children right now is really imperative to talk about i have kids i work with from age 10 to age 26 this is not just high school this is college this is elementary middle school that are dealing with this and i think the conversation of a virus it's gone way beyond that i think statistics and emotion have been played out I think at this point in time, we have to look at the life and this is not a lifestyle to treat children as if they're sick. You

089know, statistics fly, emotions fly, but they're diluted at this point because we've chosen which science we want to listen to. And if you're looking at mask science or vaccine science, you can kind of dilute and decide who you want to listen to. But I want to speak to you guys about life and about these kids that are affected every single day and the families that I work with and the children that I work with. And when a child comes in and they hide behind their mask, this is trauma. This is trauma that we're instilling on our children. And these are beautiful kids that their life is not going to be the same. And I've done this for more than 25 years. And I want to implore you to think about what's going on in the

090schools. And you guys sit in a privileged position to be on this board. I sit in a privileged position to work with children and to work with their families. I take this very seriously, as I'm hoping that you do as well. And when you talk to kids and you realize that what they're willing to share with you behind closed doors and what they're actually dealing with. we have to understand they are paying a very heavy price with their mental health and we're going to see this play out over the next few years if we don't understand that we have to broaden this conversation you know educate or vaccinate shouldn't be in the same sentence if your whole goal end goal is to vaccinate every kid and keep them behind a mask then you don't deserve

091the position that you have right now because education is huge in this world and as we know Kids are the ones that are going to carry the torch on. So we're looking at a generation that you won't see the effects of this maybe right now, but you will in the future. Trauma starts when they're young and it perpetuates their life into the future. And that's how they actually are in the world. is what they've experienced so i would hope that an education is a good experience my kids the kids i coach were so excited to go back to school and not online they were in person to see their friends have socialization then all of a sudden they get hit with this again and all these different rules and everything changes again they don't know

092what's going on the only consistent thing is the inconsistencies of the messages i had kids that told me that if they would have gotten to school early they could have got an opt-out mask how consistent is that with the message it's not You have some that don't and some that do you have on the outside of the doors wear a mask don't wear a mask You do these things so I just employ you guys to think about the beautiful bright souls that are being altered every single day Thank you very much for your time, and I wish you a good evening. Thank you. You may begin when ready Okay, I'm superintendent and school board First I'd like to start off by just reminding y'all that your microphones are on And this is being live streamed

093all over the country. And as a dad and as a community member and as a Christian, I'd appreciate you watching your language on your microphones because we heard President Greenberg say, Jesus effing Christ under his breath after a parent comment, which is extremely disrespectful on a lot of different levels. So I'd like just to remind you of that. And I'll start the rest of my comment by saying. When you've tried to force a medical device on a child against their will the burden of proof is on you to show that the first that the medical device does no harm and second that it actually works. You've not met that burden of proof, and you should cease and desist until you have a solid randomized controlled data to back up your decisions. There are currently zero

094randomized controlled trials, which is the gold standard of medical research, showing that masking children reduced the spread of COVID-19 in schools. That's zero. We should all be appalled that the CDC and our local health authorities are making these recommendations with such faulty data. Of the 15 studies that the CDC cites supporting its recommendations, zero randomized controlled trials. Although if you want to know about masking hairstylists, they have you covered. It's been almost two years and they have not done one randomized controlled study proving masks prevent the spread of COVID-19 in schools. Nothing. There are 14 randomized controlled trials looking at mass reducing the transmission of other respiratory viruses. Of those 14, three suggest masks might be useful but were not statistically significant. The other 11 suggest they're useless or actually counterproductive. And then there's a

095study the CDC itself published in May which showed that most common mitigation measures in American schools including distancing, hybrid models, classroom barriers, HEPA filters, and most notably masks. Each were not found to have a statistical significant benefit. The only randomized controlled trial to test mask effectiveness against the actual COVID-19 virus was in Denmark. It showed that there was no significant difference between the mask group and the control group in infection rates. Furthermore, in Thailand, Japan, and South Korea, they have over a 90% mask adherence rate, and yet their cases are continuing to spike. Our children have a better chance of getting struck by lightning than dying of COVID, a better chance of being injured in a car crash on the way to school than being hospitalized with COVID-19. And probably one of the most frustrating

096aspects of all of this is the board member leading this charge has a PhD and teaches chemistry. The one that should actually be calling out the negligence is buying in hook, line, and sinker to this data that is just, it's terrible. You'd never get a drug approved with this kind of data. So stop the mask mandates. Stop quarantining the healthy kids. Stop attacking parents. Stop using district funds for frivolous cease and desist orders. Stop hurting low-income families. Do the work. Collect the data. Then we'll listen to your recommendations and watch your language. Thank you. Thank you. You may begin when ready. Thank you. Good evening, Superintendent Menzel. It's a pleasure to see you in person. And of course, the board, thank you for everything you've done during this pandemic. My name is Sheila Terara, and

097my two boys attend Cherokee Elementary within the school district. In the last two weeks, Maricopa's averaged new cases. have been above 2,000. With the numbers of new cases increasing, once again, my concerns increased as well. Last year, I opted to homeschool my two boys. Then last May, when school came to a closing and new cases were in the low 300s in Maricopa, we were really excited that we were going to be able to return to in-person for this school year. Then these numbers greatly influenced our decision to return our kids back to in-person for this school year. We look forward to enjoying our brand new school, which is amazing. And Mr. Chandler is amazing as well. And we wanted to put this pandemic behind us, at least we thought. However, today, in fact, we find

098ourselves right dab in the middle of it. And our kids right dab in the middle of it. something that I was avoiding by homeschooling. The adults in my family had been vaccinated. I was not excited to get a vaccination. Actually, I had a bad reaction to it, but it was okay. It was better than getting it. And I would encourage everyone to get it because the alternative is way worse. So my family and I, as the numbers have increased again, started wearing masks again. I don't like it, but I'm doing it. This time, I also understand the governor has absolutely zero interest in protecting our children while attending school. This is a sad fact for me, knowing that I rallied behind him for education. In fact, he's using all his powers at his disposal to

099tie the education system's hands. while it tries to do its job. To add insult to injury, he is doubling down by using public funds to further push his political agenda. He is no longer working for Arizona, but for a political party in which he only has aspirations for. As a parent, my aspirations are to keep my children safe while learning in person. If I make a decision to return to homeschooling, it will have a domino effect. Please conclude. I will not be able to pursue my own college in-person courses. I will not be able to get a part-time job how I wanted to. I understand your predicament as a district, but I believe you know just as well as I do what needs to happen. And that is to not yield to political agendas and

100keep education moving forward so we may all keep moving forward. Thank you. Thank you. Have a good night. Good evening. You may begin when ready. Our team will start the timer once you start. Okay. I'm ready. Good evening. I am here to say that I am opposed to students being masked. And I want you to indulge me for a few minutes as I talk about China. So it is getting more and more difficult for Americans to find American-made masks. Most of you are likely wearing masks made in China. Let's talk about China for a minute and the standards of China. They normally do not rise to the level of the United States, yet our students are being asked to don what will likely be mostly Chinese-made masks. And looking at the Chinese track record for

101making products, I have three articles I want to bring to your attention as well as a United States government report on China and its products that have found their way into our stores and on our shelves. So the first article, and I realize my time is limited, is from NPR. And it states, in recent months, the number of unsafe products imported to the United States from China, ranging from seafood and pet food to toys and toothpaste, has grown steadily. In terms of toothpaste, it talks about this. The FDA increased inspection of toothpaste made in China after reports that some of the products may contain an ingredient used in antifreeze. There are two other articles. I realize my time is running short. I will share them with you physically. But I want to get to the

102U.S. government report. And they have a couple of bullets that caught my attention. One, the ability of Chinese manufacturers to rapidly export large quantities of new products can outpace U.S. safety standards. The standard setters resulting in imports of risky products in 2015 alone, 4.5 million Chinese hover boards into the United States before safety standards could be drafted. I'm going to just skip down, there are so many in this report, I really urge you to read it. I will leave a sample with you and you can do research on your own. But the last one states, private US investigators and media have played a role in highlighting risky Chinese products. Concerns over formaldehyde in Chinese flooring uncovered by private investigators and broadcaster CBS resulted in the removal of affected flooring from US stores. Their track record

103is proven, okay, and they do this in their own country. So how much more will they do to our children if we mandate that they wear Chinese imported masks? If you cannot promise parents that the contents of these masks are safe, then I urge you to please rethink your policy. We should not be mandating that children wear masks if you cannot guarantee their safety. Thank you. Thank you. Good evening, board members, Superintendent Menzel. My name is Keegan. I am a senior at Chaparral High School. Today, I was denied my right to public education because I chose to stand up for my beliefs and not wear a mask. According to the Constitution of the United States of America, I have that right. Instead of allowing me to exercise my rights as a free citizen, I was

104almost suspended for defying the new mask rule. I displayed no disrespect towards my teachers or my principal and felt discouraged knowing I would miss my classes today. As a senior, this year is so important to me and I have been performing to the max. In fact, I have all A's in all my classes and I'm looking forward to applying and going to college. And the last thing I want is a bad mark on my transcript. Just four days ago, the Scottsdale Unified School District guidelines stated, and I quote, SUSD is prohibited by Arizona law from requiring students to wear a mask while engaging in in-person learning on school property. What changed? Are you deciding to interpret the law differently or just flat break it? By going against the law passed by Governor Doug Ducey, our

105school's funding is now going to be cut. And for what? Safety? If the board had cared about safety, we would have been in masks since the start of school, three weeks ago. If it was truly about safety, masks would be required at all times, including outside. This isn't about safety, but in fact about control. We are one of the few districts that have a mask policy, and I believe the only one without an opt-out form. An accommodation form is not the same thing. I am not anti-mask. I am anti-tyranny. I am against you taking away my rights and my parents' rights to choose what is right for me and my body and my health. Masks cause anxiety for some, severe acne for others. Just to name a few of the side effects, I am asking

106you to consider what you are doing to our youth. Thank you. Thank you. Hello. good evening governing board members dr menzel miss wagner i'm emmy cardella and i'm just here to give you your monthly svc update little break from all the rest so this past week we had or last week we had our first meeting our first general meeting it was very well attended both in person and then we had people watching on youtube as well our in person we have spanish interpretation so we're hoping to working to spread the word about that that that's available at all of our general meetings coming up in September our next meeting is September 15th from 9 to 10 a.m. at the Mojave District Annex we have dr. Kimberly Dodds Karen joining us the director of teacher teaching

107and learning and she's new to the district this year as you know so we're excited for parents to have an opportunity to meet her and then we have the SUSD foundation coming to tell us about their organization and how they collaborate with the district And then we have one special event for the month on September 14th. We have IEP training from Raising Special Kids, and that will be on Zoom for parents that are looking to learn more information about that. And then otherwise, we just opened up to principals to start appointing their SBC reps. Each school has two SBC reps, so that is underway as well. So thank you and hang in there. Thank you. Am I ready to go? Okay. Good evening, governing board members, Dr. Menzel, Ms. Wagner. My name is Martin Cardella.

108I'm a parent of three SUSD students. I came tonight to thank the board members that voted to implement a mask requirement in our schools. It was the right decision in order to provide as much safety as possible for our children and to increase the likelihood our schools can stay open. In particular, I want to thank the board members that are also SUSD parents for considering the needs of all 22,000 students in the district, rather than just their own child. The actions of individual students impact their classmates. The idea that everyone can make their own choice about wearing masks and that it doesn't affect anyone else is simply not true. If my masked 10 year old is seated next to an unmasked student that becomes ill, he is then exposed to higher risk of getting sick

109and will also have to miss school to quarantine. He has no control over those consequences. I can only imagine how difficult and frustrating it is for the students that have unique medical or educational needs. Throughout this pandemic, it has been disheartening to see so many focused on themselves with little to no concern for the broader community. Thank you for honoring your commitment to doing what is best for all SUSD students. And thank you for your time. Thank you. You may begin when ready. All right. Thank you. My name is Robin Galston, and my daughter attends Chaparral High School. I first just want to say thank you to everybody. Thank you, Zach. Thank you, Libby. Thank you, Patty. Thank you, Julie. Thank you. Yeah. Juan Michael. Thank you, Dr. Scott. And thank you, Gladys. You guys

110are in a very tough position. I appreciate you following the science. Dr. Fauci is right on the money. I've heard other people get up here and say that he's, yeah. Anyways, I just appreciate you listening to the science. I appreciate you thinking of our teachers as well as our children. They are more safe with a mask than without. My daughter went to school. It started on a half-dan Wednesday. That Friday, she got exposed in her class. We found out on Monday. We went out and we took a test. She's vaccinated. She was negative, so she went back to school. Then the next day, she came home and said one of her teachers was out because her daughter was positive. So she was down a teacher. Then we found out one of her best friends and

111her sister were positive. So needless to say, we ran out and did another test. It just goes to show that masks are needed. And again, I can't tell you how happy I am that you put it in. And I hope you continue to keep it. And I hope that every one of you keeps your job. I'm for every one of you. Thank you. Thank you. You may begin when ready. Thank you. I'm here because the fear that's been inspired by this hysteria is creating a lot of trauma with the children and the kids in schools. And it's basically over a cold. My son was a 20-year-old college student. His health care workers were treating him from depression. His clinic decided. because of COVID no longer to visit the patients and check on their meds. And

112he was anxious about the hysteria that had been thrown around by people who were scared. And they stopped visiting him. He didn't take his meds and he killed himself. 20 years old. Due to fear of a cold, which I had, it was two days of the sniffles. It's mass hysteria. Thank you. Hello. Is it time for me to start? Okay. My name is Pat Norton, and I'm a former teacher, retired teacher, for 23 years, and I've also been a counselor. And for the last 16 to 18 months, whenever it's been, I've been very concerned about what is happening to the kids. in this district as well as across the United States because I think with this focus on masks, we're focusing on the wrong thing. We need to be focused on what the kids, how

113the kids are feeling, what's happening to the kids psychologically, emotionally, socially. And the focus is on whether children are supposed to have masks or no masks and that should not be the issue. The other thing I wanted to bring up is the fact that about a year ago, I read an article about how Scottsdale was losing children, students, to the district, to other districts or to other schools. And one of the answers that they proposed was to do marketing. Now, as a former teacher, I don't think that's the answer because what you're doing by bringing in different programs like critical race theory, programs that really are teaching reading, writing, math, language, that's what the focus, again, should be on, not something that is not even part of the curriculum. You're adding to the curriculum. And

114I can tell you as a former teacher that teachers have enough to do. with the regular basic subjects that they don't need to have things added that are further going to divide their students. They want their students to be together, to be unified. Any teacher in any classroom will tell you that. That's what we do from day one. So by doing things like masks, no masks, focusing on other curriculums that have nothing to do with the basic skills, I think is mistaken. I don't think marketing is the answer. I think getting back to the basics and teaching kids what they need to do and have to have a good education. Thank you. Thank you. You may begin when ready. Good evening, Governing Board, Mr. President, Madam Vice President, Governing Board, Dr. Menzel, Cabinet, who is

115here. I had a long list of things to say, had facts left and right and center. You've heard them all. You've gotten everything. I think the biggest thing to understand, though, is you do have support of the families. You do have support of the rationale families. The people who are outside who are screaming and yelling in our faces and saying, take off the mask, unmask me, and all that, are a very small group. You could probably go 10% on that out of 223,000 kids or people in Scottsdale. I just want to say thank you all. You made the hard decision. You did it right. You debated. You showed everybody what government looks like. You gave a great lesson in civics for all the discussion you had. So thank you from the bottom of my heart

116and from the parents like me. Thank you very much. I'm not going to take up any more time. You do have our support. You do have our love. Thank you for making the tough decisions. Thank you. Good evening, everyone. Thank you so much for hearing us all out. We really do appreciate it. I know everyone's had such a tough time. I was stuck down in Antarctica at the start of COVID. So I know we've all been through quite a bit. And I appreciate all the effort that's gone into to keep our children safe as well as keep them educated. I'm here tonight to bring a story that happened to my son last week. My son is a cute little six-year-old, vibrant. He's so much fun. He loves school, he loves going to school. I got

117a call from the school nurse that I had to go pick him up. I have a six week old and I had a C-section, so I'm recovering from that. And so I picked my son up, vibrant and as excited as could be, come to find out he had sneezed. and that's why my son got sent home from school i know my school cares deeply about my son and but i want him to be in school and so i went on to the cdc website and sneezing isn't even one of the things and they didn't recommend a covet test for me to get my son back in school where he's six and a half years old this is first grade we all know last year was super trying i can't even imagine i pray for you

118all daily send good vibes your way whatever side of the field you're on in that um but i had to either keep him at home for 10 days or i had to provide a negative covet test when i showed up the covet test facility long long line of cars just full of parents having their children tested if we run the numbers they were so high from that week so i would like the school board to look into that because sneezing is not a covid symptom if you look at the cdc website i'm a chief compliance officer so i'm very familiar with the insides and outs and also how to keep people safe i know we've all probably gone too far into science this last year way more than we ever wanted to but i just

119urge you to please look at the numbers i believe that they could be artificially inflated but i don't know i'm just a parent with a six-year-old that i'm trying to not tell him that if he sneezes or snorts pepper that he can come home at any time so let's all parents keep that under wraps will never they'll be like yeah i'm super sick i can't return so i thank you all i'm gonna end my time shortly because i know there were other people that wanted to speak i would urge you to please hear them i think there's like two more people that are trying to get in um and i so i'm gonna give my time up to them if that's possible thank you all so much and god bless thank you you may begin

120when ready thank you First, I'd like to thank the SUSD board members for giving me time to speak. I'm a parent of three children in the SUSD school district, so your decisions have a great effect on my family. I'm here to voice my concerns over the lack of public and parent input in the masking policies that were recently enacted. The SUSD board is using a policymaking procedure that's affecting the general public, and I believe the process you used is a breach of your fiduciary duty. I also want to express my concerns over some recent public postings by board members and their personal views on a vaccination for all policy. So let's talk about masking. I'm pro-choice. You want to wear a mask? Fantastic. If you don't, I think that's your individual decision. But let's talk

121about the evidence behind masking. There's many studies out there that have shown that the effectiveness of masking, the preponderance of data, shows there is little to no correlation to the benefit of masking and the prevention of COVID-19 or respiratory viruses. The Office of National Statistics in England, August 2021, this month, there's a survey of all their schools, and it showed that schools are not a driver of COVID-19 exposure in the public. We had a trauma surgeon in here at the very beginning of this meeting, right, who said we should trust the CDC, the greatest scientists out there that we should know. Well, the National Institute of Health in April 2015, which is a part of the CDC, did a random control trial on masking situations and found that cloth masks are ineffective as stopping respiratory

122viruses. The University of Waterloo in Canada, August 2021, just completed a study of cloth masks showing only 10% effectiveness of stopping COVID-19 and respiratory viruses. The American Institute of Physics, July 2021, also did an experimental investigation of indoor aerosol dispersion. And what they found was that cloth masks are only 10% effective in stopping aerosols, which is COVID-19 and respiratory viruses. Surgical masks only at 12%. They said ventilation is what you should really focus on. So let's talk about the effectiveness of natural immunity, which is being overlooked by everyone, including this board. But first, I want to talk about the public comments on Facebook by Mr. Greenberg. His comment was, there's no excuse for not getting this vaccination. or getting the vaccine out that they're approved. Well, Johns Hopkins University and the Coronavirus Resource Center will

123disagree with you because their comment is, the typical vaccine development timeline takes five to 10 years and sometimes longer to assess whether the vaccine is safe and efficacious in clinical trials. Mr. Greenberg, that is why healthy individuals should not get the vaccine. It should be saved for those individuals who are in a high risk area. The Lancet just came out the publication April 2021. 30,000 participants that showed SARS-CoV-2 those with prior COVID-19 have an 84% lower risk rate for new variants. The Cleveland Clinic 50,000 people also showed that individuals who had prior COVID-19 should not take the vaccine and should be left for those in the high risk area. I apologize my time is up but I can go on and on. The last thing I want to talk about is natural immunity. Please, read

124the science. We've all taken biology. We all know the immune system. understand and do your research on T cells and B cell immunity. It is widely shown that CD4 plus and CD8 plus T cells have long lasting memory. SARS-CoV-2, the first one out there, 10 plus years of memory to produce antibodies to fight all variants known to date so far. Thank you for your time. I apologize for going over. Thank you. Cheers. See everyone today. My name is Madison Sealy and I am not yet a parent, but I will be. I am advocating for the choice of the parent and children and the decision to wear masks or to not wear them. I am an aunt to nephews and nieces, children who are being forced to place masks on their precious faces. These children are

125in the formative years of their lives. These children are developing mentally, socially, spiritually, and physically. What will the effects of these forced mask mandates for these children be? We are already seeing the effects with mental illness and suicide raising rapidly across the United States of America. This is a result of shutdowns, school closures, lack of socialization, and mask wearing. Where will we be in another year, two years, ten years, if this tyranny continues? I saw a poster in your school today that reads, when you find what's in a vape, you won't be relieved. The real cost with a warning sign. I would add another warning sign that reads, when you find out what these forced mask mandates will do to children, you won't be relieved as we have already seen. With the mental illness and

126suicide rates rapidly climbing, what will be the real cost of these unconstitutional mandates against children? Let me be very clear with every single one of you. Forcing a child against their will in a place of learning to wear a mask is child abuse. A child deserves to smile, laugh, play, and breathe fresh oxygen in their learning environment. The children attending these schools do not belong to the state. The children in these schools belong to God and to their parents. I am here to tell you loud and clear that Americans have woken up to what you are trying to do in controlling and abusing these children. And all the people that you tried to silence standing outside these doors are very much awake. Only more citizens will continue to stand up. if you continue to push

127these radical ideas and policies that do not offer freedom or choice. These schools are public and funded by the people by the people. This is the United States of America. We are a beacon of light and freedom to the world. We believe in freedom. What you are doing is not freedom. It is not choice. It is force. These children deserve better. School board members. Do better. We are not going anywhere. We are here to stand up for the next generation of Americans. Do the right thing. End these forced mask mandates. Let the people choose for themselves. May God bless this country and allow freedom to prevail for our children. Thank you. Thank you. Pursuant to ARS Section 3843101H, board members are permitted to respond to criticism made by those who have addressed the public body,

128may ask staff to review a matter, or may ask that a matter be put on a future agenda. Do any board members wish to address any criticism tonight? Board Member Hart-Wells. Thank you, President Greenberg. I'm going to refer back to one of the earlier public comments of Ms. Fitzgerald, who I'm going to show respect to, despite not receiving it. She alleged that I misstated data. that there were over 2,000 students in quarantine. I did not say that. And I think the record would show if you went back to the video that I had indicated that there were over 2,000 students that had either tested positive for COVID-19 or were a close contact and as a consequence in quarantine as of that Monday before our meeting on Tuesday evening. Thank you. Thank you. Would any other

129board members wish to address any criticism or refer, may ask staff to review a matter or may ask that a matter be put on a future agenda? Well, I will take my opportunity. As you may have heard, I did cuss on the mic, and I am very sorry about that. I apologize to our community. I apologize to my fellow board members and to staff and parents watching. These things happen. I have to admit it was... done out of frustration in the moment. I had interrupted the speaker to make clear that an employee was not the individual who was providing neo-Nazi propaganda on our school campus, and then the individual continued to reiterate it. It is true that in an internal investigation that was conducted we had initially thought it might be an employee but the

130complete public record will show that this individual was actually not a school district employee was apprehended by scottsdale police department and again i thank spd for their their work on that but certainly i apologize again and in general i think there are a number of items that were discussed tonight we will discuss them as part of our covet 19 update so we'll ask that question just a few minutes here once we move on to that information discussion item There were some direct comments the 70-30 comment Again, I think apologies here for this one. The 70-30 comment is a little Misleading. I think the public was a little confused as I confirmed with the reporter of the story he has responded to questions about this my comment was not that the public our public favors mass

13170 30 i was asked specifically what the reception has been since implementing a required mask mandate and i explained that the emails that have been trickling in have been about 70 30 in support uh thanking us for implementing the mass requirement not that our community favors the mass requirement 70 30 and The reporter has confirmed that that is true and has actually responded to people who have asked that question. So I just want to clarify that that is not what I said. I just want to see if there's anything else that won't be covered. To miss pellet you had commented about issues related to your To the third party bus services. It is true. We do have a bus driver shortage That's that exists throughout Arizona We simply do not have the funding to pay

132our bus drivers what they deserve there There aren't enough bus drivers in our state to take that job If you are having issues with that third party service provider, please contact us And I believe our district administration will reach out to you to clarify and make sure that that doesn't happen again, because we obviously don't want that to happen to any students. I think that's it. I think the rest will be covered by our upcoming presentation. Do any other board members want to respond to any criticism or comments? All right, great, thank you. We will move on to agenda item 7A, information discussion item, discussion of Arizona School Boards Association proposed 2022 political agenda. Dr. Menzel. I believe Vice President Sanowski is prepared to review the recommendations and engage the board in conversation about any

133recommended alternatives to the platform. Yes. Ms. Wagner has included for all of us copies of the ASBA's vision, mission, and core beliefs and the proposed 2021 political agenda. I hope you've all had a chance to look through this red line copy. I appreciated that ASBA put it together this way and what you see in red. are examples of other school district governing board members and their input to bring forth to the delegate assembly, which will be in September. I ask that you provide your input in directing me as the district's delegate to the ASBA delegate assembly to represent our board's determined position. Thank you. Do any board members have questions or comments about the proposed political agenda for the Delegate Assembly? Board Member Beckman. Thank you for giving us this draft. I would like the

134opportunity, since it is a discussion item tonight and not an action item, to just review it further and get back to you. Sure. Thank you. That's great. Do any other board members have any questions or comments? Again, this will allow Vice President Sanofsky to discuss this at the Delegate Assembly. Right. um if i may yeah vice president please keep in mind that anyone of us including superintendent menzel are included or invited to the assembly so if that's the wish of anyone let's make that no one okay um well i guess vice president sanowski will be available to receive any comments you might have via email so if you send those over to her she can bring those up dr mental do you have any comments about the asb okay the board will now move to

135agenda item 7b information discussion item on scottsdale unified school district covid mitigation strategies dr menzel thank you president greenberg vice president sanowski members of the governing board we should have a powerpoint up shortly Tonight, we just have a few slides, but there are some things that I think are important to review in terms of where we are as a district related to our COVID mitigation strategies. And as we begin, there were some discussion points this evening related to the status of the law and the decision the governing board made to reinstate a mask requirement. As you know, we did start the school year with a mask optional policy. That was our expressed intent. That was our plan. And we moved forward accordingly. We also reiterated our understanding of the law when the budget reconciliation bill

136was passed. It included a provision not only that would prohibit a mask requirement, it also had in section 118 a retroactivity provision. Our initial understanding of the law as it was read and reviewed was that that would be a prohibition that was enforced because of the retroactivity provision and therefore the board would not be able to act. So to the question about whether or not we were violating the law or what changed, our understanding at the time was that we didn't have an option. Then the judge... in the Phoenix Union High School District case ruled, the law did not go into effect until September 29th. That legal ruling changed the position and the opportunity for the board to consider additional mitigation strategies to address COVID-19 spread on our campuses. And so I wanted to put

137that on the table as the background. Our intention was not to... start with a mask mandate and then change. What changed was what we experienced when we came back to school without a mask mandate. So we can move to the next slide, please. We started midweek this year. And in that first week, we had 12 acted cases of COVID on campus. This second week, we had 66 active cases of COVID, and that was one of the things that precipitated the request for a special meeting where we discussed next steps related to mitigation strategies. Monday the 16th was when the judge ruled. Tuesday the 17th was when we convened the meeting to have a conversation about next steps. At the end of last week, we had 142 active COVID cases on our campus. The reason I

138put this up here is during all of last year, we never saw more than 73 active cases on campus at any one point in time. And when you see the rate of increase of cases, and Whitney Jennings, our COVID specialist, is here tonight, so when we have questions, she can answer much of this. This year, unlike last year, we've seen a number of cases where the spread appears to have been in school. That was not true last year, except for in a handful of cases. The number of outbreaks is already exceeded the pace of what we had last year, and so we've seen this acceleration. There are two things that are fundamentally different this year from last year. The first is it's the delta variant, which is more transmissible, more contagious than prior variants of

139COVID, and the second is that we had mask as an option for our students. So those were the two variables that we had at play. So if we can move to the next slide, I just want to let you know where we are this week and this is Tuesday. So from last Friday until Tuesday, we now have another 111 positive COVID cases. This is just the beginning of the week. So if you look at the rate of acceleration and transmissibility combined with the 833 COVID like symptoms that called in sick since August 20th, you see the numbers are concerning. It's an important part of why we've moved to the point of implementing a mask requirement while it's legally permissible to do so. We can move to the next slide. So just a quick reminder, we

140are at a place in our community in our 15 zip codes with overall high transmission of COVID-19. There is a slight ray of... hope on the percent positivity where we have some zip codes that are not in the red. But overall, we're still at 11.13% percent positivity and well over 200 cases per 100,000. And so these are numbers that are still disconcerting. If we do well next next chart, I'm going to move through this quickly because then I want to get to the Q and A. So I've had an opportunity last night to have a conversation with Dr. Son and shine and and was exploring some of the increased cases on a couple of our campuses. We have some where if we were using the metrics from last year, they would already be virtual again.

141The commitment this year is to do everything we can to keep our schools open for in person learning. But that doesn't mean we ignore what's happening on our campuses with spread of COVID. So what she pointed me to is this epi curve and it's broken down so I didn't include all the age cohorts. I wanted to make it so it was easy to see. That orange bar at the far right is students ages 6 through 12 or young people ages 6 through 12. For the first time in the entire pandemic the young people ages six through 12, the rate of infection has outpaced the high school students. And so we're seeing evidence of spread not only in our high schools, which has continued and it's been growing, as you can see by by the curve

142here. But for our elementary students, it's growing at a more rapid pace. So when I talk to Dr. Son and Shine, if we can move to the next slide, there are there are a couple of things that that she points out that are critical. And I'll get to that in a minute. When the board passed the directive related to the mask requirement, we didn't do so without any consideration for individuals who might have medical conditions or people who might have other concerns related to wearing a mask. And so the directive specifically had the superintendent develop a process. And so we have identified a process for application review. and approval of requests for mass exemptions as well as other accommodations. And we can talk more about some of those experiences, but to date we've had less

143than 500 of our families request an exemption or other accommodation, which represents less than 2.5% of our total enrollment. In the case-by-case review, we've looked at the reasons that were provided by our families. And if there was a denial and 15% of the requests, 15, were denied, another almost 5% were denied because of insufficient information, but not on the sole merits. It was just we needed more information. There's a process to review those so that if there is more information, they could be approved. So when we look at the numbers across our schools, we range anywhere in our buildings from zero requests for medical or other exemption to as high as just over 5%. But in the scheme of things for our entire district, we're under 2.5%. If we had 97% mask-wearing compliance universal within

144our schools, it would go a long way to reducing the spread and transmission of COVID. So the next slide gets back to what I was starting to say with respect to Dr. Sonensheim. There are it's it's called layered mitigation for a reason. There is not a single strategy or solution that will stop the spread of COVID. In fact, our goal is not to eliminate the transmission. Our goal is to slow it down so that our health care system can provide the support to the people who have serious reactions to a COVID infection. Fortunately, many people don't have serious symptoms, but there are many others who do, including many who have lost their lives, far too many. And from a medical practitioner perspective, the doctors that have spoken to me is these are avoidable deaths. These

145are things that if we had taken more proactive measures, individuals wouldn't have had to lose their lives. And from a public health perspective, the items listed here, vaccination is the number one. way to address and reduce these serious effects of COVID, hospitalization and death. Masks are the second, universal wearing of masks. And to all the people who say there's no science, Dr. Sonenshine has a list of 43 studies, peer-reviewed, well-done research that she continues to share with people. So there will be wars about whose research, and if you take one study that has a contrary finding, it doesn't change the preponderance of evidence. And so when we look at all of the things we can be doing, wearing a mask is one strategy. Staying home when sick is important. later tonight if you have questions

146about it, Whitney can share the data with respect to the number of kids that are sent home that are ill with covid like symptoms. And I feel badly for the parent with the story that was told related to sneezing. I mean, there's there's a level of symptom that that would warrant concern and others maybe not. I can't speak to that specific situation, but the point is when we've been told that there's a positive case and this is true in one of our middle schools. The report says the positive test came back on August 20th. When was the first time you experienced or maybe it was the day after that first time you experienced symptoms was the 18th. When was the last time you were in school? It was the 20th. So if people are experiencing

147symptoms and coming to school for two days, and that was prior to the mask requirement with the transmissibility of this virus, it's no wonder that three days later and five days later, we're seeing increased numbers of cases to the point where 40% of eighth grade class in one of our middle schools was not present in school either because of COVID. direct COVID infection or a result of being a close contact. The air filtration system, you know we've updated our MERV filters, frequent hand washing, physical distancing to the extent possible. And the other thing that's not listed on this chart here but is something that we surveyed our parents. on and that is the willingness to participate in pooled testing as a proactive measure to identify potentially asymptomatic cases and move more quickly to avoid spread

148within our schools and what we found is that 46 percent of the respondents and we had more than 6 500 parents respond to that survey 46 percent said no they're not interested uh another between 10 and 11 percent said undecided they wanted more information and then the other 43 percent or so said yes they would be willing to do so. Our recommendation is that Whitney work with principals and buildings that elementary in particular, because they're not eligible for the vaccine, that Whitney work with two or three of those principals to explore the potential for pool testing option. Because as a school district, we've said since the school year began and even into last year, our goal is to keep our schools open for in-person learning. We know and understand the detrimental impact of having kids

149relegated to online learning. And so while some may choose that and they work to make that successful, and it is an option for some, for the vast majority of our students, learning in person is critical. Mandatory quarantines create a major issue in terms of disrupting that educational process. with the with the masking when everyone is masked we've moved to a place where if you're not symptomatic you don't have to quarantine so as a district we're doing everything we can to keep our kids in school while reducing the potential spread of covid and and monitoring the data in order to continue to make informed decisions based on what we're seeing. Dr. Sonenshine shared that it's her first thing when I told her about the two schools that we're very concerned about. She said, my first recommendation

150would have been to implement a masking requirement, but you've already done so. The challenge is that it takes up to two weeks to be able to see the full benefit of implementing the mask requirement. The other things that she's identified are the things that we're doing, but she would not recommend that we close the school unless we're unable to operate it. So if we have too many staff that are out sick and you know that we have a particular program, it's a small program, but we had to have that program return to virtual until September 1st because we had too many staff and students infected with COVID and exposed as close contacts all prior to the mask requirement. So that is a quick run through of of the status of our COVID mitigation strategies. We

151are happy to answer any questions on any part of the strategies that we're implementing. Dennis has reconvened the operations and logistics committee. So they're having conversations about what other things should we be looking at that we implemented previously. Again, with the goal of keeping our schools open for in-person learning. Thank you. Are there any board member questions or comments for members, vice president Sanowski? Yes, thank you. I do have some questions. Do we still have the extended hand washing stations in place on all of our campuses? Okay, super. Mr. Raylor is shaking his head yes. Yes, he's shaking his head yes. Thank you. A concern was brought to my attention about whether students are actually wearing their masks throughout the entire day. So if we can ensure that The purpose of this is to try

152to keep students in school and in-person learning activities. And I know this is tricky for everyone. So how do we ensure that students are actually wearing their masks and there's a commitment by staff to also wear their masks and ensure that students are wearing their masks all day while on campus indoors. So I think you've mentioned a couple of things that are important, and if we refer back to the governing board directive from last Tuesday, it does indicate that the mask requirement is only while students and staff are indoors, not when they're outside. And so sometimes people will send an email or a comment indicating, I saw people unmasked, but they were walking from the car into the school, and they're not expected to be masked at that point. The other thing that is identified

153in this directive is educational exceptions. A staff member may, with the school principal's permission, permit students within their room to remove their mask during the delivery of core educational activities if the wearing of mask would otherwise render the class's core educational activity impossible or dangerous. So there's been some understanding that there are unique situations that may require it. And from my perspective is... We don't want to let perfect be the enemy of the good. The focus really is on teaching and learning. The vast majority of our students and staff are complying with the requirement and because we don't have the requirement both indoors and outdoors it provides a sufficient number of mask breaks for most people not all but then those who really needed an accommodation because they're unable to wear the mask they've been

154by and large granted that accommodation and so i think we've tried to account for the various needs of our individual students and staff in order to ensure that we both get the benefit of universal masking while also recognizing individual circumstances thank you and and then one more thing if i may um it's been brought to my attention the concern of the ffcra extension that we put in place as a governing board and that was to allow compensation funds to our employees when they are out for covid related illnesses is that for the whole time throughout covet or is it per school year of eight days I appreciate the question, and that is one that I have raised with Human Resources, and we probably have to go back to modify the recommendation. We didn't specify whether

155or not it was cumulative or that it was a roll forward, and I think the point that you're talking about is we've had employees who... previously had to use that either because of exposure or something else and then they subsequently got COVID themselves in a later school year and had already used some of the FFCRA time. And I think it's a good point to say is there an opportunity to reset the clock for those who were exposed before and had to use it. Now they got COVID even though they were vaccinated. They shouldn't be punished for that. I mean the intent was to be able to provide that buffer for staff members. So we're looking at that with HR and expect to be able to bring back a recommendation. Thank you, because we do not

156want staff members showing up when they're sick. And then when they have to stay home to take care of their own children who are in quarantine or testing positive for COVID, we want to provide that grace to our employees. So I appreciate that. Thank you. Are there any other board member questions or comments about this item? Board Member Hart-Wells. Thank you, President Greenberg. First, I want to thank all of the parents and the SUSD community members that spoke this evening, regardless of what you had to say. I think it is valuable that we hear from the community, everyone in our community, and their input is important. I feel compelled to explain a little bit, and then I'm going to stop, because there were a number of... inaccurate statements made this evening and I don't want

157that to be the last word so I'm going to simply leave it at there were a number of inaccurate statements attributed to science that could be easily corrected but I'm not going to take the time to do that this evening because at the end of the day there was one comment about we need to focus on the the grades and the kids in their education and i could not agree more which is why i had requested the meeting for our board to sincerely and earnestly consider using every mitigation strategy available to us right now to keep our kids safe to keep our community safe so that our students can continue to learn And I appreciate my colleagues on the board sincerely considering that request, their robust discussion, which is the way it should be, and

158everyone's vote, regardless of which direction it was. I explained to Dr. Menzel before the meeting my reasoning for requesting the meeting. It was a lot of reasons, but it came down to, I sincerely hope that if we can all put our masks back on, wash our hands, if you're eligible, get vaccinated, and hunker down by September 28th, we can have this in our review mirror. Because where this is going, these numbers, something bad is going to happen to one of our families. And I told him, I can't live with that. And that's why I requested the meeting. So I am sorry if you are upset. I truly am. But I am not sorry that I requested the meeting. I am not sorry that I asked for a mask reinstatement. And I'm not sorry that we

159have masks on. I think it's the right thing to do. I hope to God it's temporary. I really do. Thank you. Thank you. Board Member Beckman? Quick question on the D, educational exceptions. Yes. So I need a little clarity. I had spoken with a few of our educators. Let's take a kindergarten teacher, for example. These kids are learning their letters. And your kindergarten teacher is trying to stand up in front of the classroom and pronounce, for instance, a K. And when they have a mask on, that is... almost impossible for them to articulate that sound. So what would you say to those educators and how should they proceed with teaching those very young kids that are like at a really critical time and learning some of that so they can proceed to read and be

160proficient by third grade, et cetera? So I will give a response and then invite Dr. Hagegat, Dr. Sackos, Dr. Garan, and Lori, anyone who wants to weigh in here. I think there is an important point to be made with respect to that. We've already granted exceptions in terms of when we're doing speech therapy, for example. Again, something else that's really difficult to do and really important to be able to see the formulation of the words, sounds, and letters. It's all a part of that educational process. I think there's a way to be able to do that as a kindergarten teacher where you can be physically distant six feet or more from the students when you're doing some of that direct instruction. Then when you're moving and working more closely with students, then you can put

161the mask on. So there's a way to accommodate both the elevated risk when you're really close. and separate when you're doing that direct instruction and not have a mask on in order to be able to have the benefit of being able to observe the instruction and the formation of those sounds i don't know if anyone else wants to add to that okay thank you are there any other board member questions or comments well i appreciate those questions i will follow up on first board member hart wells's comments one i appreciate board member hartwell's asking for the meeting originally and I understand the reasons you requested that and I support you in that. This is not an easy decision and I think the facts for our specific district speak for themselves. You know, the public is

162absolutely right. We did say that this was going to be a mask optional year. That is what I said. That is what Dr. Menzel said. That's what our communications were. because we thought you know what we have this under control the vaccines are rolling out we can do this that that is exactly what we thought that is what we wanted to deliver i do not like wearing masks my the office in which i work started requiring mass three weeks ago it is not fun nobody likes doing it but we do recognize that we didn't account for this variant coming through and we thought perhaps naively, that even if it did come through, it wouldn't be as bad as it has been. And I think that what we hear a lot about is, you know, students

163don't die, staff members don't die, you know, this is just a cold. You know, I hope that's the case if you catch COVID. I really do. I don't want people to die. But you have to remember that even if you catch COVID and you get sick and it's mild, you're still sick. I mean, you can't be in the office working. You can't be working with our students. If you're a student, it's probably not smart for you to be in school. And you add that to the fact that, you know, we have flus, we have colds, we have all the other seasonal allergies and viruses that come around this time. And if you overburden the system, it's not just about preventing deaths, which we obviously hope to do, and which are rare, okay, but we still

164want to prevent them. It's about operating our school district. I do not like the fact that we had to close Arcadia's SCORE program for two weeks to be virtual. That isn't a good thing. That is a vital program for those 18- to 22-year-olds who need those skills and need that additional support. The fact is that we can't teach that class in person if two of our three teachers are at home sick, whether that's with COVID or the flu or a cold, what have you. But COVID is obviously very clearly overburdening our system right now from what we usually expect. And we have seen, I'm very appreciative to Dr. Menzel and Dr. Sonenschein working through a number of these issues about schools because we don't want to close schools. There's not a single person here that

165wants to close a school. Closing a school would be a nightmare. I could not imagine the disruption that would cause to over 2,000 students in this case to move them. I mean, it would be a nightmare. Nobody wants that. And so if the CDC and the Arizona Department of Health Services and the Maricopa County Department of Public Health say, you know, we believe that as part of these layered mitigation strategies, if you require masks indoors, this might actually help slow the spread and you won't have those situations where, you know, so many staff are getting sick or so many bus drivers are getting sick and then students are waiting up to 90 minutes, delayed by 90 minutes to get to school. I really think that's I mean, it just doesn't make sense not to impose

166them when we can or to incentivize their use one way or the other. And if the incentive is, you know, once the law comes into effect, the directive stops, so there's no requirement you wear them. But if the incentive is, you know, we have limited quarantine procedures then, and if you're wearing a mask and you're asymptomatic, you won't need to quarantine. then that's something I'm going to support because I want the students in-person learning. This is the best place for them. We've had parents of special needs students, parents of students who are immunocompromised, staff members who are immunocompromised, staff members who have to take care of kids when they get sick. They all are asking that we do this because they know how important it is to protect themselves, to protect others, but also to

167ensure that they can enjoy their right to an education in person. And I know that that sucks. I know that it sucks for many people who want the choice and don't want to wear masks. But sometimes, you know, sometimes we have to make a few accommodations, not just for ourselves, but for others, so that everyone has the benefit of in-person learning. and and i stand by uh board member hartwell's on this uh 100 percent um and and i think again the numbers speak for themselves we have a two-week delay on the covet cases and we're already at 111 you said for for this week i mean that's that's not good we we don't want that that our peak last year was 72 cases 73 cases was our peak last year 73 cases was the most

168cases we ever had in a single week And we have already broken that record twice. So I hope that gives a little bit of explanation that when people are asking for data and evidence of this or that, you know, I can't tell you what happened in North Carolina. I can't tell you what happened in Canada. But what I can tell you is what's happening here in Scottsdale Unified School District. And that's who we lead in this issue. And, you know, again, yes, it is frustrating. We constantly repeat this and explain this, but... We're getting the same response back and we're trying to make it clear that nobody wants to do this. I mean, nobody sits around all day thinking, gosh, how can I make a 10-year-old's life more difficult? i you know we have full-time

169jobs we have other stuff we're doing this is a volunteer unpaid position we're just trying to do the best we can with the information we have available we would follow the county health department if this were a polio outbreak we would follow them if it were a measles outbreak we would follow them if it's a rubella outbreak why all of a sudden on this one issue we are supposed to completely disregard everything that our federal and state health authorities say is It's just unknown to me. No one is able to answer that question. Not one person. And I can tell you, speaking to my grandparents, none of those things were fun. That was the thing where you went away for the summer on summer break and you came back to school in August and three

170students were missing because they were dead from polio or an iron lung or in any other situation. Or a staff member caught it because you can catch it as an adult. Franklin Roosevelt caught it as an adult. We're just trying to do what's best and what we're recommended to do. No one here, not a single board member cares at all about the political ramifications. They only care about keeping our schools open, keeping our kids and staff safe, keeping in-person learning going. And if we continue down this path of fighting over this issue, we are never going to get the business done that we have to get done on all those other issues. Absolutely right. 16% of... 16% of our students in eighth grade who took our math standard were three or more grade levels behind.

171That's unacceptable. But the only way we're going to fix that is if they're in-person learning. We're never going to fix that if they're in virtual learning for the next year. It's just not possible. Those are my thoughts on this issue. I appreciate Dr. Mentzel and Vice President Sanowski for requesting that this be, I apologize, not Dr. Mentzel, I appreciate Vice President Sanowski asking for this update to be given tonight. I think it's very useful and very timely. And I hope that our community can understand that we're really just trying to do whatever we can to make in-person learning possible. Vice President Sanowski. Thank you. Actually, this proposal of having a discussion on COVID came from having a conversation with a community member. So thank you to that community member for bringing forth ideas on how

172we can improve our systems and working as a partner. Thank you. Are there any other comments or questions about this item? Very good then. The board will move to agenda item eight, consent agenda, board action required. This agenda item has been amended. 8R has been pulled and will be discussed alongside action item 9F. The chair moves to approve the consent agenda as amended. Is there a second? Second. Vice President Sanowski seconds. It is moved and seconded that the board approve the consent agenda as amended. All those in favor say aye. Aye. The motion carries 5-0. The board will now move to action item 9A, appointment of audit committee. Dr. Menzel. Thank you, President Greenberg and members of the governing board. As you know, we've had conversations over the last year with respect to, first, our

173agreement with the city of Scottsdale for internal audit services, and that's been going very well. We anticipate a preliminary report sometime probably early September. And one of the things contemplated in board policy, DEI or DIE, I don't like those letter acronyms, but anyway, is the appointment of an audit committee, which would allow for an independent group comprised of three non-school board members and two school board members to work with the auditor, in this case the city of Scottsdale, to identify an audit plan for the year. ultimately would be approved by the governing board but also then participate with the the auditor in reviewing preliminary findings and ensuring that the process really identifies which risk require and should be prioritized in terms of the review process. And so tonight we're bringing forward a recommendation with three

174individuals to be appointed. We had a pool of eight, and I appreciate all of the community members that put forward their name for consideration. I do not know who the two governing board members should be, so there's not a recommendation there. I will turn that over to all of you. But I would recommend that we appoint the audit committee so that they can get started. There will need to be an orientation session. i appreciate the fact that sharon walker from the city has indicated she would participate in that orientation she's got such a wealth of knowledge and experience that the committee will benefit from that and then their first order of business will to be to receive the uh report on the hokum audit and then from there the next steps in terms of a

175more fleshed out plan for the remainder of the year thank you are there any board member questions or comments or recommendations for board or community member appointment. Board Member Beckman. This is a question for Ms. Byrd, if possible. Can you speak to our committee process, please? The difference, again, between a superintendent committee, a board appointed committee. Are we going to keep minutes? Please describe what the best practice is for us to do as we vote on this tonight going forward. with all due respect uh board member beckman i don't believe can you hear me yeah it's on okay um i don't believe that we've exactly settled on a process we have some information that we might have to fine-tune the way that some of our superintendent committees are running however we do have a board

176policy that authorizes the superintendent to have committees. So that is clear that we are definitely in line with our existing board policies. There has arisen a potential legal question as to what type of record keeping and how public those documents need to be. And at this point in time, I can't completely answer your question. We will be working in conjunction with Jennifer McLennan on this issue who has a particular expertise and knowledge in that. So she'll be working with me and we'll be working. to see how best to make sure that these committees go forward so that we're in compliance uh extra compliance even uh as these committees move forward to do their work but there's no question that this audit committee would not be a problem is my Okay, thank you. As it goes

177forward. Can I just add that as I read the board policy, it says the governing board may form an audit committee. So this would not be under policy CE, superintendent committee. This is a board forum committee pursuant to the language in the policy itself. Are there any other questions or comments about this agenda item? Board Member Hart-Wells. I can see you clicking. Thank you. I have a kind of general overarching comment because when we had a second read of the policy DIE, it was afterwards that there was an article directed to that second read that had been published. And if you had read that article, you could be forgiven for thinking that what we arrived at in terms of policy had lacked purpose. I don't think that could be any further from the objective fact

178of what the policy is that we adopted. I can attest that in this article specifically, indicated my questions and i will agree that i definitely was seeking a more conservative approach to the policy but i also want to clarify to the community that all of my comments were in suggestions were invited discussed sincerely considered by both president greenberg council and miss walker the city of scottsdale city otter the final product which is approximately seven pages is a policy of substance and it's the culmination of many good efforts of not just this board and the policy committee but also members of the previous board and specifically miss former president of the governing board miss beckham and i want to thank all of them for their effort, their leadership in developing a robust framework by which internal

179processes and controls can be objectively evaluated. So I wish to just hopefully maybe set the community at ease should you have read that article. But I believe that the policy originated out of examples of healthy organizational leadership in our unanimous vote. in favor of the adoption attest to that. Thank you. Thank you. Are there any other board member questions or comments? Board Member Hartwells, just to piggyback on that again, I thought it was a very constructive process and I certainly don't... I thought it was great. So I'm sorry if that has been portrayed any differently, but I think it's a great policy. I think our board is doing a great job on this, and I'm really excited to actually appoint some members to it. Are there any requests, either nominations or people who wish to

180put their name forward for consideration as board members on this committee? Okay, I'll put my name forward. We need at least one board member. If any other board member would like to serve on this committee. I think we need two. I think we need two, yes, because we have three. Three or five. Yeah, it's three or five. And just to be clear, this is going to be more of a quarterly committee meeting. This won't be every single month unless there is some big audit project going on that it has to be. But it is anticipated that this is really going to be kind of like the self-insurance trust where we meet once a month. So are there any other interests? well now okay now i have two julie sanowski vice president sanowski um i would

181like i would like to recommend that libby hart wells dr hart wells be a member of that i i do believe she has i think all of you do have a very keen eye for contracts and details and language but um i i feel like she has been a big part of spearheading our progress this year and i'd like to recommend that And board member Beckman Correct. The committee, because it is a board committee, must comply with open meeting laws. It must post notices of its meetings. It must keep minutes and records. To be clear, it will post notices? Yes. Yes. Yes. Board Member Hartwell, do you accept that nomination? Yes. Okay. Well, that was difficult. pulling teeth there in that case we have five members proposed that would be sarah reagan danielle martinage and

182dale belt and board members hartwells and greenberg in that case the chair moves to approve action item i don't know i'm losing the numbers what number are we on To approve action item 9A, appointment of the audit committee, the committee comprising Sarah Reagan, Danielle Martinage, Dale Belt, Board Member Hartwells, and Board Member Greenberg. Is there a second? Second. Vice President Sanowski seconds. It is moved and seconded that the board approve the appointment of the audit committee featuring Sarah Reagan, Danielle Martinage, Dale Belt, Board Member Hartwells, and Board Member Greenberg. All those in favor say aye. Aye. The motion carries 5-0. the board will now move to action item 9b approval of instructional time model for 2021-2022 in accordance with house bill 2862 dr menzel thank you president greenberg as you know last night we had

183our second required public hearing for this instructional time model and there were a couple of questions i think that surfaced in the course of that conversation and dr garan is present and able to answer those questions and if you have any others she is available to answer those as well Thank you, President Greenberg, Vice President Sanowski, Governing Board members, Dr. Menzel, Ms. Wagner, and guests. We are seeking approval of the instructional time model for 21-22 for House Bill 2862. Last night in the public hearing, we had a question related to hotspots and the hotspot usage. And hotspots are allowing students to access internet at home through a small mobile device. that we provide and activate. So just have some data from Dr. Watt and her team. So from the spring throughout the summer 2021, we

184provided 874 hotspots and activated them for students. This fall, we provided each school with 10 devices to pass out to students when needed to help with ease of implementation now that all students have devices at home. All schools were, did not, only one school asked for an additional three devices. We still have 600 hotspots available. Those are not activated. We don't activate them until we need to use them. So I just wanted to provide that data that we have robust support to provide internet at home for not only learning for when students are at home, but also to... close and bridge the homework divide as well so that is available for families that need it and they can certainly contact our i.t department if they need that level of support we also had a question

185related to special education services and the challenges of students learning at home virtually and i think we had a robust discussion on those additional supports and how we continue to work really hard to meet the spirit and as many minutes as possible of the individual education plan when students are at home during quarantine or a COVID-like illness. And I want to commend our special education staff, teachers and support staff for being incredibly creative during these trying times and really developing unique strategies in response to each student and developing relationships with the families to support not only the student, but the families at home as well. I'm happy to answer any questions that you have. Thank you, Dr. Guerin. Are there any board member questions or comments? Board Member, Vice President, Zanowski. I really appreciate how

186this has evolved since the first read, taking into consideration the input and the questions. I really appreciate that because that shows that we are really working hard to take the input from individuals in our community and our staff members and be better. So thank you to all that had a role in that. Thank you. Thank you. Are there any other board member questions or comments? We had received a question about technology yesterday and whether hotspots and computers are available to students who might need them when they're in quarantine. Were you able to find an answer of what resources are available to those students and families? Yes, absolutely. We have many hotspots available and computers. Thank you. And there was also the question about professional development for staff on using the technology that's available to them.

187Should they need it or just in general, can you talk a bit about that level of professional development? Absolutely. And I want to say that I've taken advantage of that professional development at myself because needing to have some virtual committee meetings. So our amazing instructional coaches in the teaching and learning department have. uh so many different virtual and in-person supports for staff and they have an i.t page that you can go to that shows you quick snapshots of how to build a google lesson near pod screencastify best practice when streaming and they will visit your classroom and provide support they work hand in hand with our i.t team so it is a point of pride teachers are very creative and we continue to learn from each other on how to support students at home so

188we We will also be offering additional PD on our early release day for professional development on how to support students when they're at home due to illness or quarantine and just best practices in using all the tools in the tool belt for technology now that we have more tools than we've ever had before. Thank you. And my final question is the question of live streaming and lecture capturing. We've been over this multiple times, but even so, we have members of our community who rightly say you have invested. million dollars into this project equipping all the classrooms with state-of-the-art cameras last year you use them in many cases for enhanced distance learning as well as current students in quarantine and we had that kind of hybrid system where students could attend in that format now they're

189saying well why do you not require that and mandate that of our staff now. How do you respond to that question? So that's a great question. And it's multi-layered. So I met recently with the ICS Teaching and Learning Subcommittee. And we've had robust discussions around this. And I think it's important to know that through every step of this pandemic, we have never said this is on the table 100%, this is completely off the table 100%. We have had to, we use our favorite word, pivot. We've had to be responsive to our current situation. So the cameras and the streaming were a critical tool last year, just as the laptops were, just as some of those enhanced microphones, the Jabra microphones, all of these were important. tools the difference last year is this was an instructional

190model that students were choosing for a semester or a school year so teachers were navigating having especially at the secondary level having students in person and virtual there was a lot of positives to that in regards to choice and connection to home school there was a lot of challenges with that in regards to teachers having to stand and deliver and limit some cooperative learning opportunities opportunities and students having to manage trying to hear the kids at home and the kids in person. So though it seems an easy solution, it is extremely complicated and teachers spent hours making it work. Fast forward to where we are now. The absence due to quarantine or illness, though it is a challenge that students have to navigate, it is not a semester-long or year-long learning model. So to mandate

191having the cameras on will really impact the student learning in the classroom and the toll on the teachers. Teachers are masters and are creative. And just in the past couple weeks, we have seen incredible innovation. Teachers will go above and beyond what we mandate. So this is what we are seeing now. And yes, it is very true that we did not expect the numbers of students quarantined related to the Delta variant. But what we've seen is teachers not only posting their curriculum on the Google Classroom or Teams. We have seen a dramatic increase in streaming or capturing direct instruction portions of the lesson. or screencastify or near pod which is the teacher voice over to the lesson this benefits students in person it benefits students that are home it benefits the in-person students when they

192go home and need some review so all of that has been building and schools and teachers that have a larger number of students in quarantine are absolutely we're seeing increases in streaming maybe not every moment of the lesson because when there's practice that would be sometimes you have independent practice in a lesson we know that it is very challenging to stream in the elementary classroom which resulted in a model change last year to edl at echo canyon because being a passive learner watching is not actively learning we are so excited to launch formally launch our tutoring program this week and we are seeing we have some initial results um 70 of teachers that were that responded said that they will participate in tutoring their students that are in quarantine or kova like illness or will

193stream or will tutor and stream or will have a designee tutor for them 30% are asking support for varsity tutors. And that is a very robust support that we're excited to provide as well. So what we're doing is going to track how that support is used, if it's effective, how can we enhance, and we will not take a streaming mandate off the table. We are having... engaging robust thoughtful discussions we've added many more parents through our community hub to get some fresh voices to our committee and they've been very thoughtful in their problem solving so i apologize for the long-winded answer but i just wanted to share a little bit of our journey these decisions are not easy and we will continue to be responsive to our situation the hope is that this tutoring will

194provide engaging just in time specific to the learner support instead of passive learning. But if the scale increases, we absolutely would consider mandating streaming. Right now it's a tool in the tool belt and it is being used quite a bit. We're hoping our quarantine numbers are going to drop with the mask mandate and the close contacts being able to stay in school. Thank you for that. Do you have any... Any hard numbers or estimates on as to how many of our classes are live streamed or lecture captured at the moment? We're capturing that data right now. We are asking teachers. how they're going to support their students and in that survey we're asking them if they're planning on doing the tutoring some streaming both so we are capturing that we just have a small sample

195the forms are all due by the afternoon of wednesday but teachers are very busy right now so we'll continue to capture that data and we certainly will share it with you Okay, thank you board member Beckman. Just a quick question and I know every teacher is different in their availability But do we have any idea for parents of when these tutoring hours will be available and obviously they'll be after their contractual day hours, but are they gonna be Is it all up to just the individual teacher and trying to work it out and availability or are we giving kind of some idea? So we're definitely having some parameters, but we're trying to be as flexible as possible Not only because if we had everyone do it after school Then it would be really hard for

196a secondary student to hit all the the support that they could with the four different sections So they can do it before school. They can do it during their prep period They can do it after school even into the evening. We are we had do have a cutoff um so we're trying to be as flexible as possible in regards to that and when teachers provide that schedule if a family cannot take advantage of that because they're busy family schedule but they still want additional support then we can look to varsity tutors to meet that need because varsity tutors will schedule you know to create an individual schedule for that family or for that student okay okay thank you thank you are there any further board member questions or comments Okay, the chair moves to approve

197action item 9b approval of instructional time model for 2021 2022 in accordance with House Bill 2862 Is there a second? second board member Hartwell seconds it is moved in second that the Governing Board approved action item 9b approval of instructional time model for 2021 2022 in accordance with House Bill 2862 all those in favor say aye aye The motion carries 5-0 The Board will now move to Action Item 9C, Approval of Retention Agreement regarding Litigation Against Electronic Cigarette Vaping Manufacturers and to direct the retained attorneys to file a complaint on behalf of the district. Dr. Mentzel. Thank you, President Greenberg and members of the Board. You'll recall a couple of weeks ago we had a special presentation on this proposed litigation. I would like to turn it over to Lori Bird to talk about the

198agreement that you have in front of you as well as the authorization to proceed. The agreement you have in front of you is a fairly standard retention agreement for attorneys. Please note that the terms of the retention agreement provide for no cost to the district and that win or lose, so to speak, there will be nothing that the district will have to pay. Jennifer McLennan has vetted this agreement. her feeling is that there is nothing of concern in the agreement and if you have questions about the agreement i will be happy to answer them for you are there any questions or comments about this agreement board member beckman okay could you just for the purposes for the public go over the fee structure again please i actually don't have the agreement in front of me

199but i will tell you that there are no fees the attorneys are working on what's called contingency meaning that they are going to front the up the costs of any investigation any filing that they up front those costs and they do not seek to recoup them should this litigation be unsuccessful okay so there are fees but not up front fees um because while i'm reading the agreement it says it is the attorney's intent to divide the work and fees or costs in the lawsuit 50 50 between keller rohrbach and the woods tan and woods tan so i'm just Right. So what would happen is if the litigation were successful, they would deduct first the costs and fees. Correct. They would split it, whatever those costs and fees are, they would split 50-50. I thought you

200were asking me whether or not there was any expense to the district. Right. Okay. So I guess my question then, fees are... It's easy to say there are no fees if you're not paying up front, but then the costs come out the back. And I know the question was asked by Dr. Hart-Wells or Board Member Hart-Wells in the last meeting about how they were going to track their expenses along the way that they were going to deduct. And if I'm correct in the... payout it will be and please correct me if i'm wrong because i just saw this again it we will receive a 75 percent or 25 it's on page one under attorney's fees 25 70. you should be 25 of the recovery and then it indicates no attorney's fee shall be paid if

201no recovery is made correct that is correct and again that is is not out of line uh for litigation of this type If the litigation is successful, then the attorneys that have done the work certainly want to get paid for that work that they have done. Okay, so they get their, if there is a settlement, they get their costs first, and then we get 25% split between the districts that have all signed up. No. Well, this is an individual retainer. We're not joining in this litigation with other school districts. However, the cases are all consolidated and will be heard. a settlement should be individual and it's not a collective settlement to be split amongst multiple parties because we are the single district in this particular lawsuit and so forgive me for getting more clarity what

202is that percentage that we will get if there is a settlement and is it after the fees are deducted or is it before? I'm just trying to make sure we're all very clear on how this will. So the total amount of whatever any settlement or court award should this go to litigate, you know, should this go all the way to trial? There'll be a total amount in the settlement agreement. I can't even. hypothesize what that settlement amount would be. So that would be a lump sum of money. Out of that lump sum of money, the attorneys would then take their 25% and whatever fees that they've expended on behalf of the district. And do we know if those fees come out before the 25% or after the 25%? i guess i'm not understanding what you're

203asking me so is the 25 do they if say that they spent two hundred thousand dollars on this on behalf of scottsdale unified and we receive a settlement for two million dollars um are they going to give us 1.8 million dollars or are we going to um we have that the 200 000 come out first or we get the the flat amount does that make sense why not do in other words she's asking are they going to deduct actual costs or in fees or do they take 25 no matter what it's my understanding that the actual filing fee for example they would deduct the filing fee and then after those set costs they will not be billing for example at an hourly rate they will simply take 25 of the total settlement so there won't

204be hourly rate billing and then they take 25 on top of that the fees are things like a filing fee for example uh if and it probably doesn't apply in this case uh but you know if they had to hire a private investigator if they had or or something like that so those are hard cost fees um and those do come out of the the total amount and then they take They're 25% cut and we get our 75% cut. Fees are not usually. In this type of litigation, fees are not usually a large part of the total amount. What you really need to look at is what is their contingency amount, which is the 25%, that they're really taking instead in lieu of an hourly billing amount for this case. Okay, and then the last

205thing, and I'll be quick on this. I had asked them what type of resources we would be... providing them and it was a little vague and i need a little clarity as far as what human resources is what i mean primarily like for you for example are you are we estimating you are going to be providing 10 hours of your time they had said minimal but i'm just wondering if contractually that's in there meaning if this gets more complex which we doubt but is there something in there you're already overworked i'll give you that so is there something in there that that will say up to this number of hours for our employees that will be available to you to use? There's nothing in the retention agreement that says that. It wouldn't be expected that

206that would be in a retention agreement. A retention agreement really lays out... the higher we are going to retain you we are going to hire you to do the work and then it was my understanding from the presentation and again I have not spoken directly to either of these law firms that they will let us know what they need from us usually the attorneys will tell the client here's what I need from you here's the data that we need here's the information that we need to make the case it shouldn't it should take very little of my time okay and in terms of staff time it may take different departments time to collect the data that they will need, should they need to present their case either in litigation or to make a strong case

207that to jewel that this would need to be settled. So what they had said was that, yes, we need data. Yes, somebody is gonna have to collect that information, but because we are going to tell you exactly what we need. it's really just us collecting the data or the information. It should not take massive amounts of staff time. And of course we are the client. And so we do have some control over the process. We will partner with them in the sense that they will be directing the litigation, but we as the client. can may tell that we don't have that information for example or that's not something we can do and then they'll have to give us their legal advice as to well this is how that's going to impact your case okay thank

208you vice president sanowski and then board member hartwells you admit i appreciate your questions um board member beckman because when you mentioned um information and data so can we just have a conversation about what data they will be able to access with student information on it. Since it's regarding JUUL, I'm going to, I suspect they're going to be interested in the number of users of the JUUL products, JUUL type products by our students in our district. Well, here's what I know. because they haven't started the litigation yet. And I am not privy to all of their litigation strategy at this point. What I can tell you, it's my understanding they're filing on a public nuisance basis. A public nuisance lawsuit, which has been very successful in the opioid realm, does not require individual damages. And

209so when you ask about very specific student level data, it's not my understanding that they're going to need to know the names and the use, you know, what students used JUUL, what students didn't use this particular product. What they need to know is how vaping, particularly with the JUUL. impacted our ability as a school district to carry out the business for which a school district is charged. So how many students maybe do we think were absent? How many discipline referrals might have been made because a student was carrying the... the jewel, how many students were suspended and weren't able to attend school, how much teacher time, how much staff time was utilized. policing this addictive substance versus being in the classroom and being able to teach. So I wouldn't anticipate that they would need FERPA

210protected data, but certainly if they did need FERPA protected data, they would be required not to disclose that in a public way. uh and you know you can ask judges for all kinds of ways to shield that information but i don't believe that that's the type of information that they would be looking for thank you and then one more question if you would um what is it that you suspect that our district will benefit from this our students will benefit how will they benefit from this with all due respect that's a very very difficult decision to answer we as the client are in charge of the settlement terms if in fact there were to be a settlement uh and in some senses if it went all the way to trial and and to be quite

211candid you know it would be interesting if this did go all the way to trial the remedy might be fashioned by by the judge but certainly certain remedies are going to be asked for in the complaint and i think that that's where we need the expertise of attorneys who work in this realm of litigation all the all the time this this really big product liability type even though they're not filing on a product liability basis i mean i think we benefit by providing safer, healthier campuses for our students and helping them tackle the problem of nicotine addiction through these devices that allegedly were marketed and targeted for our students. And again, that would be the allegation, but as the client, we would get to see all that. And we do get to talk with the

212attorneys about... um what we want to see and would have to approve any settlement if there was one so that could be something that we put in place as we move forward our interests in how to help our students well we haven't gotten to that product we we haven't gotten to that point yet right now i understand so i think what if we get to the point where it's prudent to be talking settlement number one i think obviously we would have to approve any settlement the board would approve any settlement uh i think we need to ask them uh how are how is our other districts um looking to structure and benefit i don't believe and and this is its opinion not necessarily advice that there will be a monetary settlement to individual students in

213terms of of what their use was or to individual schools x school will get you know ten thousand dollars i think it will be more to abate the public nuisance and to assist students all students in not becoming addicted to this substance in the first place so potentially putting in place some better prevention education opportunities potentially for example you get money potentially to do that i i really can't tell you what you know what a settlement would would look like at this point and and i really can't speak on behalf of the attorneys and they're not here certainly you know we can ask them more of those questions that's fine thank you board member hart wells thank you president greenberg i'm going to circle back to board member beckman's questions because those were dovetailing very

214nicely with where my head was on this and that is while there may not be an outlay of hard costs there is going to be some overhead time administrative time that's expected in the retention agreement it does appoint a person and that person presumably is you that would be interacting with them and that makes sense to coordinate communications but I'm Also, a little wary of the amount of administrative time that this may consume. So I appreciate I'm not going to ask you to estimate how much time it's going to spend because you're not going to know that. But what I'd like to say is my intent. in voting on this is that that is a nominal amount of time that the administration spends on this case. And if it gets more than that, I would

215like the board to be advised and we can decide if we want to continue or not. I'm not quite sure that the risk-reward, the upfront outlay is going to be. administrative time and i i i understood um board member beckman's questions to be in the same space which is look we really have a lot on our plate and spending a lot of time pulling data for a case that may go nowhere frankly right this could go a lot of different directions and we can't i can't make you predict that that's right agree any litigation and i don't want you to which is why i would just like to reinforce that my vote is conditioned that there be a nominal amount of time spent because time is money board member beckman I would agree that I

216just don't, I would like to define it if possible at some point. I don't want to get six months or a year down the road and find out that our staff is overwhelmed. If it were to continue, they are not doing things they should be doing for our students to focus over here for this case. So I agree. If that's even remotely possible, it may not be appropriate to define in this, but going forward, some sort of... after this they've certainly spelled it out here that when they have expenses above and beyond 10 000 they'll get approval so i think we can probably identify if there are a certain number of hours that are deemed appropriate if they go above that they would come and get approval from if that makes sense what you're asking

217does make sense what you're asking though is something that's not typically included in a retention agreement and that's what i i didn't know it's not necessary here for these purposes right i understand your concern on the drain on staff time all i can tell you is that they said that that time would not be excessive but Again, as the client, we can only do what we can. we can do and i understand and when we get to that next point i've unfortunately heard we didn't anticipate so many times from people so i would really like to see if we can broach that at some point my next question is pretty quick and straightforward um does this engagement agreement mirror i think mesa is moving forward with the same is it is there have you looked

218at mesa's agreement i have not looked jennifer mclennan remember brought this over to you and she's yeah it's been working directly with the law firms okay Again, I hesitate to conjecture. I have not seen Mesa's agreement. I would tell you that retention agreements, for the most part, are fairly standard in these types of litigations. But does this look like Mesa's? I really don't know. Thank you. Dr. Menzel? If I can address where I think that may be covered on page 204, section 5, it indicates it is the intent of the attorneys to provide the client with the, and it says nest price, but I believe it should be best price attorneys offer for attorneys legal services to any district in this litigation. So in their presentation, they indicated that they would be giving us the

219same rate, the lowest rate that they're giving anyone else, and if that changes, we would get the better of the deal. So I think they have the wrong word there, but the intent was. say it's going to be the same as what they're providing for mace or any other district they're representing right but again i don't know if any of us have actually seen what what the agreement is board member hart wells There we go. To that point, the presentation, Attorney Woods, I believe, commented that there was a most favored nation provision in the retention agreements of both Mesa and what we had in front of us, and I believe the language that Dr. Menzel just read was what he was referring to because that's what it looked like. It looked like a most favored

220nation clause with an inadvertent typo. So I would venture to say that the answer should be yes, that it should be the same. Otherwise, they would be in violation of the agreement should it be signed. I am not going to tell you absolutely for sure that I know it's the same. But again, in this type of litigation that, you know, they're collecting school districts and filing individually, but the same type of litigation, it would be unusual. for there to be widely varying retention agreements out there. Are there any other questions or comments on this item? Well, I share my belief that the anticipated staff time would be quite nominal. My understanding is they provide us a checklist of information and we just pull it and give it to them. They will tell us what they

221need and we will provide it to the extent that we have it. Correct. depersonalized so there's no personally identifiable information. There's nothing related to our students that they need. So my understanding is in line with my colleagues on this that it's nominal. And I do support the outcomes here and the goals because the outcomes and the goals are very specifically to educate students and support them and hopefully ensure that they don't take up this habit as well as help those with addiction or who need support to stop using vaping products and I think those are the two most powerful tools that a district can have especially one which faces a lot of vaping use by underage students not that any students are allowed to vape on campus but by underage students in our schools and

222I believe it was the second leading disciplinary reason for discipline up until COVID when we moved to virtual and our disciplinary actions dropped. So I support it. I think it's a valuable mission and I hope it is successful as similar suits have been successful in other states. With that said, are there any final questions or comments? The chair moves to approve action item 9c approval retention agreement regarding litigation against electronic cigarette vaping manufacturers and to direct the retained attorneys to file a complaint on behalf of the district. Is there a second? Second. Vice President Sanowski seconds. It is moved and seconded that the board approve action 9C as presented. Actually, do we want to make that amendment? I would recommend just that technical direction. Okay. Let me restart this then. The chair moves to approve

223action item 9C as amended with the word nest changed to the word best. Is there a second? Second. Vice President Sanowski seconds. It is moved and seconded that the Board approve Action Item 9C as amended. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Aye. The motion carries 5-0. The Board will now move to Action Item 9D, Approval of Self-Insurance Trust Board Trustees. Dr. Menzel. Thank you, President Greenberg. Tonight we're bringing forward a recommendation for approval of appointment of trustees. We have several vacancies, and I'd like to turn it over to Shannon Crozier to outline the process for the recommendations in front of you. Could I just ask, can we get a short break, please, before we proceed? Without objection, the board will recess for 10 minutes and will reconvene at 9.42 p.m. The governing board is

224now reconvening its regular meeting on August 24th, 2021. The time is 9.41 p.m. The board will now move to action item 9D, approval of self-insurance trust board trustees. Dr. Mentzel. Thank you, President Greenberg and members of the governing board. I'm going to turn it over to Shannon Crozier to talk about the appointment process for the three positions available on the self-insurance trust. Thank you. President Greenberg, Vice President Snowski, members of the board, we do have a self-insurance trust board that reviews our insurance claims, helps to make decisions on spending for the self-insurance trust, and then those decisions are generally brought forth back to the governing board. It's a five-member team that's made up of a governing board member, myself, and then three additional board seats. Generally, those are staggered. We would have a one-year, a

225two-year, and a three-year term. However, for this year, we had extended a member's term for another year. We had another member who needed to drop off the board. And then we had a member whose... term expired, putting us in this situation where we had three board seats open this year. So that is not generally how we would do things, but that's kind of how we ended up this year. We did put the application to serve on the Self-Insurance Trust Board on the committee hub site. Didn't have a lot of response at first, and I know that there was some talk amongst the community and there was some calls to, you know, we do have these positions available. And so we did eventually pick up with the applications. I'm grateful to say that we had 14

226different people apply for the Self-Insurance Trust Board, which is great because, like I said, we had started out really slow at first, which kind of drug the process out a little bit longer than we had intended. We had 14 people who put in. We looked at a couple of different factors. And when I say we, Board Member Beckman is also, is the board member representative on the Self-Insurance Trust. So we looked at the applications together to see, who had applied. What we were kind of looking at is a few different things. One, that they live in the school district boundaries as a criteria. But we also looked at their background. Do they have financial background, insurance background, business background? And I didn't, you know, wouldn't it be appropriate to have everybody on the board have

227an insurance background? We wanted to have a little bit of diversity within them and what their backgrounds were. So we looked at that. We looked at how long they've been in the community. And not wanting a board that was all very new to the community, nor a board that had all been in the community for a long amount of time. We wanted a little bit of variety as to newer families, been here a while, and older community members. So we looked at that. And then one of the other things we looked at when we were narrowing down the process even more was where... if they were currently serving on committees. We've heard a lot of talk about the same people always serving on committees and boards. And so we wanted to look at, are they

228currently serving? And do we have opportunities to give newer members of the community who haven't served on committees or aren't serving on our different opportunities out there, give them an opportunity to also share their input. So we looked at all those things. We narrowed it down to seven applicants to meet one-on-one with. We did that through a Zoom meeting. And ask them just general questions. Tell us about yourself. Tell us about your background, why you want to serve on the committee. As well as, you know, are you, with your time commitments, what would be better, a one-year term, a two-year term, a three-year term? We had seven people that we narrowed it down to. We had one individual who later came back and said, thank you, but my time doesn't allow for this. We eventually

229had a second candidate say, again, I need to focus on my child and the commitments at the school. So they backed out as well. Through that, we narrowed it down to the three that we are recommending today. I will say, President, I'm sorry, Board Member Beckman, her feeling on it is that she's on the board right now. That could change in January because in January. you have the option to change that selection again. And so she really left it to me as to, okay, you have, this is who we narrowed it down, but you take a look at that final information and make those decisions. So the three that we're bringing forth to you tonight, based off of this meeting with them on Zoom, are the three that I looked at and brought forth. as

230the three that I thought would work best for the Self-Insurance Board. They have a variety of backgrounds. One is a lawyer, one has worked in, that did law specifically for insurance related. matters for several years. We have one that's been in the business community for a number of years. Another one who has worked with contracts and again finance type side of it. They vary from four years within the community to over 20 years within the community and community involvement. But for each of them, this is the, they're not currently serving on any boards or committees within the district. So this would kind of bring fresh. new ideas to it. So that was really the process that we that we move forward with. There was a board, there was a member who we are recommending that

231Patty had disclosed to me, I'm sorry, board member Beckman had disclosed to me on several occasions that she did know this person had worked with them. It's a person who's very prevalent in the community and so that was disclosed. We didn't feel that that was an issue again because One, this person had qualifications and two Ms. Beckman's term on the board may continue past January. It may not, it's dependent on what you all decide. So that was kind of the process we went through for this. And I think we have a great selection to bring forth and not an easy decision when you've got everybody that applied. was absolutely qualified and would have been great on the board. So we're fortunate that we had a great selection to go from, but that makes it also

232really difficult as well to then narrow it down to just three. Yeah. Board member Beckman. I just wanted to thank everyone that applied. I mean, we had some incredible people want to step up. And the one thing that I continually heard through this was not just, I need to add to my resume or whatnot, is they were excited to give back to the community and help our schools. for the benefit of our children. So that was a consistent thread through everyone's conversation. So some fantastic candidates. Thank you for taking the time to apply. And I hope if this wasn't the fit that you look in another direction within the district to show your value. So much appreciation. Thank you. Are there any other board member questions or comments? well with that the chair moves to

233approve action item 9d approval of self-insurance trust board trustees as presented is there a second second board member beckman seconds it is moved and second to approve action item 9d approval of self-insurance trust board trustees as presented all those in favor say aye aye aye the motion carries 5-0 the board will now move to action item 9e authorized expenditure navajo elementary mechanical and electrical d-wing build out dr menzel thank you president greenberg i'd like to turn it over to mr dennis raylor to outline the project in front of you this evening president greenberg Members of the board, Dr. Menzel. Since it's so early, I figured we'd just cover the whole thing since the fire. Actually, I have no presentation. I know that there are a lot of you that have spoken to me individually about

234the growth that Navajo has seen straight off of Dr. Bachna's desk today. The day on the 20th, which was a couple days before the fire, Navajo was at 397. Today they're at 497. So 100 kids easily equates to four classrooms in Scottsdale schools. They have an extra panda classroom that we've moved from a different location. So they are to the point that they need that de-building done. So our approach on this one, knowing that our current State of construction is a little difficult Lead times can be difficult We decided to pull the trigger on the air conditioning and electrical Components we had the construction drawings already in our hands We knew we could save a little bit of money by not going through a general contractor we hired AZPE, Arizona professional engineers to do the

235construction administration for the HVAC and electrical to the tune of some $5,000 for them to oversee that little component. And so the recommendation is to move forward with that work. We would like to see if we can't get the entirety of the renovation done come winter break. That might not be possible, but we're gonna work towards that goal. We would very much like to get them in there for this year as they continue to grow. And it might look like, well, we can release six of the classrooms at winter break and then the other six at spring break or something like that. So our next step would be to get a job order contract in place to do the finished work, the ceilings, the lights. the carpeting the paint things like that but that that'll

236be coming soon to a to a board room near you so for now i'd like to get approval to move forward on this hvac and electrical component board member beckman I'm just going to be short and sweet. I sat in that audience during the board meeting years ago when the entire Navajo community showed up in force in red because they were being put on an enrollment growth plan and they were worried about their future. And they spoke with passion and just... pleading eyes that they knew their community could come back from this fire and rally and they've done it and i'm super excited to see things come like this to our agenda that means that that school is thriving and doing well so a big shout out to principal paslop patsloff and his entire all

237of his educators and his staff and his community for for really believing in their school and making this this kind of thing happen thank you board member hartwell's I want to thank you, Mr. Ehler, for being responsive. I know you've heard from a lot of us about this de-building, being ready to go. And despite everything we've gone through, thank you for staying with us. It's very important, and I think it's great. So thank you. Absolutely. You're welcome. Vice President Zanowski. I second Board Member Beckman's comments. The staff is so dedicated, that community of parents so dedicated. walking the streets to let people know what they're doing, knocking on doors, canvassing their neighborhoods, having conversations. Excellent. Yes. So I'm very thrilled that this is coming to us right now. Thank you. Are there any other board

238member questions or comments? I just echo the sentiments that are already shared. And in fact, Vice President Zanowski reminded me of when we went door knocking and that was organized by the school to get the word out. And that was a great event. And I'm sure they've done so much more to really increase and improve their enrollment there. So congratulations to Navajo. And I'm very supportive of this. Are there any other questions or comments? The chair moves to approve action item nine E authorized expenditure, Navajo elementary mechanical and electrical D wing build out as presented. Is there a second? Yes. Second. Vice president Sanowski seconds is moved. And it is moved and seconded that the board approve action item nine E as presented all those in favor say aye. Aye. The motion carries five zero.

239The board will now move to action item 9F, approval of pre-construction services contract for RFQ number 22-2026, construction manager at risk for Pueblo Elementary School. Dr. Menzel. President Greenberg, I believe we've also tie-barred from consent item 8R. Yes, so I apologize. So that would be actually action item 9F, approval of pre-construction services contract for RFQ number 22-2026 and 8R. Consent agenda item approval of award of RFQ number 22-2026, construction manager at risk for Pueblo Elementary School to McCarthy Building Companies. Thank you for the reminder. Thank you. Both of these are connected. One is the selection of the construction manager at risk and the other is the actual contract. And Shannon Crozier can outline the process that they implemented in order to come to this recommendation. Shannon. president greenberg vice president sanowski members of the board

240we our purchasing department put out a construction manager at risk bid over the summer we did receive multiple proposals for that. From that, we narrowed it down to the top three and then the selection committee brought those top three back in. We did formal interviews with them and then from there selected the top one, which was McCarthy. It was the same process we've used in the past CMAR agreements for our other rebuilds as well. So we did follow through with that same process. In the process of doing that, It was disclosed that one of the members from McCarthy is the treasurer of the foundation as well as their child does attend school. We did not feel it was a conflict of interest because the foundation isn't making the decisions regarding the school rebuild. However, because

241it had been disclosed, I did reach out to outside counsel, Jennifer McClellan, just to confirm that there was nothing that we should be concerned about or anything that would be problematic. She confirmed that again, that would not be a conflict of interest, that that was not, there's lots of vendors that have students that do attend our schools. And so therefore that would not be. So I probably should have put that in the board agenda item that we did that, you know, there was none, but we did want to reach out, make sure, confirm. And that was confirmed that that was not an issue again, because the foundation is separate from the district and is not involved in the decision-making for that. From there, if approved, the next item would be the pre-construction or the construction

242fees for that. We did meet with the city of Scottsdale today, as well as with Jennifer McClellan. So we are recommending the fee that they've brought forth. What we are looking at doing a little bit different on this rebuild versus the Kiva rebuild is separating out the two contracts. um we felt that that would make it a little less confusing so that that's gonna that will happen this is just allowing us to agree upon this is the service fee that we're gonna put into that contract so september 14th we would bring forth a contract for the pre-construction services that would have that amount in it We can always, if down the road there's a problem that doesn't bind us to, we have to use them when we're stuck and there's nothing we can do if

243the GMP comes in and there's concerns with that. But we would have one contract that would be for the pre-construction services with the fee that we've proposed tonight or that was brought forth to us tonight. So September 14th, we would do that. Then they would move forward on their process and we would come back to the board again later on in the school year with the GMP, which would be another separate contract for approval. So a little bit, we've gone back and forth. We've done that in the past. Then we went to one contract that was brought back multiple times. It was the recommendation after meeting with the city of Scottsdale audit team that it would be possibly more appropriate to do it you can do it either way but less confusing to have the

244two separate contracts that are brought forth and and so that will like i said that first one will come forth on september 14th thank you are there any board member questions board member hart wells Thank you. Thank you for that explanation and additional description that is not in the consent agenda. I appreciate that. And actually, along those lines of conflicts of interest, the consent item that I asked to be pulled out, the statement about conflicts of interest is not in that description. And so you did... talked to the mccarthy component and that analysis that was done and legal advice that was given but the district evaluation committee there were also some folks on that was that same type of analysis done and could you give us just a confirmation of what the outcome was yes

245uh board member hartwell's yes we did um as a part of all of our bids but i mean even for this as well is that any person who was on the selection team is required to fill out a conflict of interest form so for the people that we selected there were no there were no conflict of interests that were brought up or any any concerns with perceived or real or types of conflict of interest. So those, we do have those forms for all of the individuals that were on the, on the selection team. Thank you. And then as a follow-up on the pre-construction services item. So just to clarify the approval tonight is for the fee, the 0.664 somewhat percent in the, I guess that number, that dollar amount being used for the deliverable of

246the design. with the architect yes that will be the first part of it where they're working with the architect and dennis you can help me if i'm saying wrong here but that will be with them working with the architect to come up with that what they need to move forward and then the next step is the gmp for the construction so just to clarify what the deliverable would be for this dollar amount for the action item the deliverable is the gmp ultimately so they work with the architects and the design team and the district and there are several milestones along the way of them developing constructability cost evaluations all of that and that's what pre-construction services are for to get to the point of gmp and then at gmp that's the different contract or the

247separate contract that's actually constructing the building thank you for clarifying and thank you for the evaluation on the conflicts of interest since it's important i have no further questions thank you thank you board member beckman i just want to thank you for separating them out i know that that's been something that has been discussed before and i think it makes it a lot more definable especially since it will come back to us again and we can vote differently on the second timer so i do appreciate that thank you thank you are there any further questions or comments piggybacking on that comment i will thank again the scottsdale city auditor and our internal audit process for identifying this in additional recommended changes but i i'm glad that these recommendations came through i'm glad that our district

248was very receptive to it and i think hopefully it'll create a better deal for for taxpayers moving on So we'll deal with each of these in kind First the chair moves to approve action item 8 are approval of award of RFQ number 22 2026 Construction manager at risk Seymour for Pueblo Elementary School to McCarthy building companies. Is there a second? Board member Hartwell seconds it is moved and seconded to approve consent agenda item 8 are as presented All those in favor say aye. Aye. Aye. The motion carries 5-0 The chair moves to approve action item 9F, approval of pre-construction services contract for RFQ number 22-2026, construction manager at RISC-CMAR for Pueblo Elementary School. Is there a second? Second. Board member Hartwell seconds. It is moved and seconded that the board approve action item 9F as

249presented. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Aye. The motion carries 5-0. the board will now move to agenda item 10a board members may propose topics for future consideration are there any topics for future consideration board member hartwell's i was going to sneak a drink of water in but oh sorry i thought you were reaching um i was i would like at some point soon if there is one on a status report on the phoenix rising negotiation are there any other requests for future agenda items Thank you, Board Member Hart-Wells. We will be sure to add that to an upcoming agenda. The Board will now move to agenda item 11, dates of upcoming meetings. Item A, our next meeting will be Tuesday, September 14th, 2021 at 6 p.m. in the Special Governing Board meeting room

250at the MDA. And then on Tuesday, September 28th, 2021 at 6 p.m., the regular Governing Board meeting here at Coronado High School. The Board will now move to agenda item 12, Governing Board reports. Are there any Governing Board reports? Vice President Sanowski. Yes. Since we last had one of these regular meetings, I attended a parent boot camp hosted by a few parents with children in SUSD. I had the privilege of visiting the staff and welcomed them back to Kiva Elementary. I participated in a Scottsdale roundtable discussion to learn more about what's going on in our city. I had the opportunity to listen to some students with the ASBA Black Alliance. and hear their conversations of their experiences in our public schools met one-on-one with several parents and community members to hear their issues and their

251ideas for improvement i look forward to continue to work with the mayor ortega's office on the upcoming education committee meeting i've had some phone conversations about that met with some of our saguaro high school leaders to discuss pilot program they are currently implementing and great privilege to attend the kiva groundbreaking ceremony and hoho com ribbon cutting ceremonies great community events both of those thank you board member beckman i know it's late so i'm not going to go through things and you have been busy uh board member sanowski i just wanted to give i thank you to first of all i attended the kiva ground break and the ribbon cutting for cherokee and those were wonderful events celebrating their schools and i just wanted to give a big pat on the back kind of to all

252of the staff and the principals for putting those together it's not easy to do that and have a really successful event especially with all of the things that are going on so both were amazing ceremonies that celebrated their communities and i wanted to say thanks for including us they were fantastic Thank you. Are there any other governing board member reports? The board will now move to agenda item 13, adjournment of the meeting. The chair moves to adjourn this regular board meeting of the Scottsdale Unified Number 48 Governing Board on August 24th, 2021 at 10.06 p.m. Is there a second? Second. Board member Hartwell seconds. It's moved and second to adjourn this regular meeting of the Scottsdale Unified Number 48 Governing Board on August 24th, 2021 at 10.07 p.m. All those in favor say aye. Aye.

253Aye. The motion carries 5-0 and the meeting is adjourned. Thank you.