September 09, 2020 Work Session

001So now we're moving to the work session. And actually, before we get started, I just wanted to, I know that I heard from a number of my fellow board members about an article in the local paper this week. So I just want to give people a little opportunity, but I want to start out by saying that I personally am very, very disappointed because I did prepare information for this article and I feel like the facts just weren't. weren't what people wanted to report. And so I think we had a lot of information about the meeting where all this was discussed and where the board approved things well in advance of any changes. So I just want to start off with that. And if other people would like to say something, Ms. Alterton. Yeah, thank you,

002Madam Chair. I just guess I just want to echo that, you know, when that article popped up in my newsfeed today, I found it very disappointing. It appeared to me to be very biased and ultimately very sad. You know, the question that I ask myself is, first of all, you know, the front page, you know, why is this on the front page? And why on the heels of opening our schools? I think we have to be very careful as a community, you know, to not actively and unnecessarily cause any increased anxiety at this time. This is already a difficult time. We have staff, a superintendent, and who are working very hard to do something that's very unprecedented on a massive scale. And that, you know, this story, which seems to, you know, keep popping up,

003it seems to be being an issue. That's what we consider as a community that should be on the front page. and that this is news. I'll be very clear, for me, this was not news. And it was disappointing. I think one of the things that you said that I completely agree with is the lack of actually putting in the facts that were provided for the story is very sad. And I do want to say, You know, as a community, maybe one of the things we might want to consider thinking about is calling out fake news when we see it. Because if we are going to be, you know, rage about fake news, then we can't accept it simply because it serves our agenda. So, you know, what I would. What I would have loved to

004have seen on the front page is that, you know, audacious and poignant and eloquent op-ed that was written by the two young ladies who are on this board. I mean, that's news. That's the stuff that we need to be, you know, reading and listening to because that is the future. That is what Alexandria is producing, even in the middle of a global pandemic. And, you know, and even on the front page, you know, I would say the eloquent way, I think it's very hard to deny the eloquent way in which Dr. Hutchings has led this community in such a very difficult time. And he's done it with cheer. He's been cheerful. He has, you know, even in probably his most anxious moments, which I know for sure that he's had, he has brought the staff,

005the students and the teachers together to feel like they can get this done. And that is what is happening. So let's focus on that. And let's call this stuff out as a community and say, this is not okay. So, you know, that's what I have to say about it. We need to be supporting one another right now. We need to not be tearing each other down right now. This isn't the time. And this is a time where our staff our principals who are working very hard, our teachers who are working overtime, our students who are working in an unfamiliar environment. This is the time to lift them up, lift everybody up, support each other so we can get this done. So that's all I have to say. Thank you. Ms. Gentry? As usual, Ms. Alderton's

006a tough act to follow. My comments are actually a little bit more mundane, but I think they might be helpful for reference. I've had the opportunity and the honor to serve on this board for two terms, and part of that tenure involved the ending of one superintendent's term, the hiring of an interim superintendent, and then the hiring of a new superintendent. And it was a very interesting process for those of us that were part of the interim superintendent hiring process and just once again, you know how grateful we were that Dr. Lois Berlin was willing to come and fill that important role for us. When we were doing the interviews, one of the things that that came up multiple times in the process was that it was really important for the interim superintendent to to

007not necessarily make, you know, sort of structural or organizational changes that, you know, that it was really key that when you were an interim, that that was part of your role, that they might, it's possible that, you know, hypothetically an interim could observe things, but that that wasn't really the role, but that, you know, as a, in contrast, a new superintendent. really and we're not even talking about school organizations we're really talking about any kind of organization when there's a leadership change a part of a natural process of a leadership change is um an assessment period for new leaders to come in um those of us uh that were uh following certainly saw dr hutchings talk about his first hundred days um and then um And then there are, you know, it's a very natural

008part of the process and one that was, as Chair Anderson alluded to, very much documented and publicized and discussed and deliberated at the time of a reorganization process. Basically just a very natural, healthy thing that organizations go through. And yep, so happy to continue to be part of the process and we'll go through some more natural, healthy progression and changes as we start making our shift from our last strategic plan into our new strategic plan. Just another example of kind of transitions and changes. So thank you very much. Thank you. Mr. Suarez. Yes, Chair Anderson, thank you. And I just wanted to ditto what had been said by Ms. Alderton and Ms. Gentry. I agree 100% with all of their comments. And just wanted to add from my perspective as well, you know, when we

009came onto this board, the thing we heard time and time again that was a fundamental concern was the instability at the top of the division. We had three superintendents in a five-year period. And it is absolutely vital to move forward as a division that we have that steady hand at the top that's going to lead the division through a lot of things that need to change over time. And I would just say that Dr. Hutchings has articulated a vision. for racial equity in this division that this board has adopted, that we are aligned with him on that vision and the personnel actions that were taken, you know, pursuant to the restructuring were aligned with that vision that he has and that this board has for the division. And so I think it's critical that that

010we focus on that, that we focus on what we are trying to achieve here as a division, all the positive movement and momentum that we're trying to achieve. And I do hope that those who put out information about that particular situation would look at the facts and look at the specifics around that and try to seek an understanding around why this was done and why we're trying to move forward. to division productively. So, you know, and the one last thing I would say is that, you know, as a board, you know, it is our responsibility to hold the superintendent accountable. And, you know, this board has gone through an evaluation process with Dr. Hutchings and the board won't hesitate. And Dr. Hutchings will attest to this. The board will not hesitate to call him out

011or tell him if we don't think he's doing something that is moving the division forward as effectively as possible. Those are conversations this board has with Dr. Hutchings. And the things that we do as a board are going to ensure that Dr. Hutchings is held accountable. But again, with that being said, the vision he's articulated is one that this board agreed to in a strategic plan nine to zero. And I just hope that becomes and maintains the focus going forward. Thank you, everyone. Anyone else? Okay. We'll move on now then to our... Our first agenda item on the work session, which is the budget calendar, budget process resolution, and the rules of engagement. So I'll turn it over to Dr. Hutchings. Thank you, Madam Chair. And this is the time for us to begin the

012whole process of us establishing our budget priorities, which is going to guide a lot of the work that moves forward. And this is all deriving from our five-year strategic plan. So with that said, I do want to turn things over to our Chief Financial Officer, Mr. Dominic Turner, just to talk to the board about our budget priorities, as well as about our process. Yes, thank you. I hope everybody's doing well this evening. So I will be talking about the budget calendar, the budget process resolution, and the rules of engagement first. And then I believe our second agenda item for this work session is the budget priorities for fiscal year 2022. So as you all are all aware, at the beginning of every year, we get the budget season kicked off by reviewing our budget process

013resolution. rules of engagement and setting the calendar for the public on how to engage in the budget process. So before you today, we sent the original draft to the school board back in June, got some feedback and incorporated feedback to make sure that our budget calendar doesn't have any dates that conflict with any other major holidays or anything of that such or school events. And we tried to ensure that we keep the adoption. the approval in February and the adoption in June on regular scheduled board meetings. So a special call board meeting doesn't have to be called to approve or adopt either one of those budgets. We've also made no changes to the process resolution or the rules of engagement as they were edited last year. One of those edits did include providing the school

014board with a draft budget calendar prior to the end of the current fiscal year. So before the end of fiscal year 2021, you will receive a draft budget calendar for fiscal year 2023 to be able to review during your recess over the summer and provide comment at the work session in September. With that, I'll open it up if there's any questions, any comments or edits that Any member would like to make to any of our documents, budget calendar, process resolution, or rules of engagement. Ms. Thornton? Thank you, Chair Anderson. And thank you to Mr. Turner for the report. I just wanted to follow up on a budget calendar question that I know was raised when we discussed this initially a few months ago. And although our budget approval is still in February, there's a two-day

015kind of difference between when we approve our budget and when the city manager presents the proposed budget for the city. And I know this has been brought up in the past by past board members and current board members, but I just wanted to see if we had further looked into the possibility of making it so that the board fully approves its combined funds budget before the city manager presents the city's budget. Just procedurally, it seems to make most sense for a lot of board members. And I know that requires a lot of reconfiguring on the calendar from the boards. general calendar, but have we looked into that possibility? If not for this upcoming budget cycle, then possibly for the next. So we haven't specifically looked at that for this particular budget calendar for this year.

016It is definitely, you know, up for discussion for the board in regards to proposing something like this for next year. And Ms. Thornton, I just want to have just an understanding of what is it that we want to get out of. changing those dates to a different time just so we can have a better understanding of like what outcome are we seeking from the change so that we can, you know, if the board provides that guidance for our future budget calendar proposals that we can include it and understand, you know, what we're trying to get out of that. Sure. And I think to the board, we've discussed as a body that we're trying to move towards this philosophy as a board where we ask for what we need fully. And I know that our past

017few budgets have been very reflective of making sure that we put fully what the division needs at the forefront without kind of limiting ourselves at the forefront based on what we perceive to be, you know, what we think the city might appropriate for us. And I just think, Going back on, you know, even the past cycle, when the city manager's report kind of comes out while the board is still deliberating on certain budget items, it can have an impact on some decision making and it can sway, you know, some board members decisions that they might not have otherwise made. So I think just the politics that's involved, even though it's just a two day difference, it really can affect sometimes decision making based on what's presented. And I think it would just make it more

018clear. and helpful for the board just as we deliberate to fully have made that decision as a board and to have approved it fully without having kind of that room for making last minute reconfigurations based on what's presented. And again, this is kind of like something that I remember when I was a new board member. It's something I heard a lot from past board members. And I feel like we experienced some degree of that with this current board. So, I mean, it's my personal preference, but I'm definitely happy to hear if other board members have any input on that. Okay, certainly. Suddenly my screen changed and I'm having trouble because of the sharing, but that's fine. I'm still looking for my hands. The hands are up. Ms. Gentry. So I'm just kind of chiming in

019to confirm that I think Ms. Thornton described pretty well, you know, recounted pretty well what has been heard and said over the years. I will say I think we are in a... a much better place than maybe in previous years. And I think we are not necessarily talking about huge differentials between what a school board might adopt and what the city manager might propose. And that is certainly due. uh i think in no small part to the uh work that dr hutchings has put into developing a relationship uh with the city manager and also likewise uh just the the sort of um uh the the kinds of relationship building that's been happening across the the you know the city and the and the school staff really on on all these different kinds of things so

020um you know having said that i i do think there is a value um to doing that. I think, you know, for... Even if I say for optics alone, but optics do mean something. I think what would be very helpful for the board and the community understand is this has been asked for in different ways at different times. I think there is some sense of how difficult it might be to do this, but we are not going to really know that if we don't actually see. a calendar laid out that actually does this. And that might promote some different reactions. It might be that if people see that and they realize how much earlier it backs up or maybe how much deliberation time is crunched, maybe people might have a different decision. But we're not

021gonna get to that point if we don't really start the process and create some optional calendar. You know, and, you know, I think there's also just a recognition that everyone has to embrace, which is that if we do go this route, we're definitely increasing the likelihood that there will be another round of discussion in May. And, you know, there are obviously some pros and cons for that in terms of deliberation. But I don't think we'll be able to do that if we don't actually have some kind of conversation with the city and come up with with with an actual calendar to react to um so uh yep but i i i i definitely think um miss thornton accurately described over the years um why this has been um uh uh you know what uh the

022why the request has been made Anyone else? I think when we do that, we will have to get, I see it says estimate for the one from the city manager. So we'll want to be really more certain about that. I'm not sure how soon that is determined, but I would think we'd want to be, oh, Mr. Turner knows though. So, yes, but they haven't published their budget calendar yet, just like we haven't published our calendar yet. But that date in there is most likely going to be the date of the city's proposal. But again, it'll come out once they actually adopt their calendar for fiscal year 2022. And then obviously, once they do, we can change the estimate to we can just delete those words off of our calendar. Dr. Reeve? Thank you. And I

023just wanted to thank Miss Thornton and Miss Gentry for bringing this up and just say that I also agree that it would be great if we could manage to get the timeline, you know, where the school board, I think the issue is that, you know, when the city manager is presenting his proposed budget, he has a number that he's working off of, and it would be ideal if that was the proposed budget that the school board has approved. But when it's coming from this, I think when we've gone through our training, one of the things that I know I've learned as a school board member is that approving the budget is one of the three major responsibilities that we have. And so I'll just speak for myself. It feels a little bit undermining to the

024school board and our responsibility when... City Manager when the timeline kind of works out the way it does. And then especially when there's publicity that says that the city has fully funded the superintendent's proposed budget, you know, which may differ from the school board's budget. So I just wanted to say that I, you know, if there's a way that we can get the timeline synced up. that would really be very much appreciated. I did want to ask one other question too about the public hearings. I know we had an issue with one of the public hearings. coming right after our school board budget questions were due this past year. And, you know, sometimes people will come during the public hearing and raise issues that school board may then want to ask and submit with our

025budget questions. So I noticed it looks like Mr. Turner, maybe you can walk me through this. There's a public hearing in January, which would be right before. the questions are due. And then there's a second public hearing in February. Is that typically, I just, it doesn't seem like we usually have two public hearings, but unless I'm mistaken, is that typically how it happens? I think we lost our second one this time, right? I think because of the shutdown. Mr. Turner, I guess. So, I believe we're only required to have one public hearing. I believe Miss Abouzevi can just confirm that or not. But we typically each year have two. We try to have one prior to the school board submitting their questions because what the public might say might spur some questions that you might

026want to ask. And then we have another one. typically prior to going into the add delete work sessions as well. But Jennifer, I see you on. If you could just confirm for us that one statement that I made. No, that's correct. We are required to have one public hearing prior to the adoption of each budget. So just looking at the February date, I guess what jumped out to me was we have the deadline to submit. the combined funds add delete requests on February 2nd. And then we have a public hearing on the budget on February 4th. So to me, that seems like maybe again, that timing, I think we're going to have that same issue with that timing where, you know, we would want the public hearing prior to submitting questions or submitting add deletes.

027So I don't know if we can look at... I guess it depends on what the purpose of that public hearing was. If that purpose was for the public to react to the odds and deletes, then it's before... we're like sponsoring. In other words, like it could mean the death or the promotion of a certain ad or delete based on the public reaction. But that being said, I mean, if we're looking for space, I guess, and we don't have to have that, that is a potential because people can reach us and they could also come to another meeting and speak or they could reach us by email. If somehow that, date makes the difference between, but I'd also like to ask, you know, is it really meaningful? You know, I'm asking this for anyone to answer.

028Is it really meaningful if we just sort of slip it in just before the, is that going to be enough? Is that what people are just looking for? Just slipping it in just before the manager presents his budget. But now I'm sorry, I spoke and there are people who have their hands up. But just think about it. If people want to answer that eventually. But I have Ms. Green. Thank you, Ms. Anderson. I do have a question, but I did want to say that I am also in agreement with Ms. Thornton with wanting to have our timeline moved up to vote on our budget before the city managers. proposed budget comes out. So I want to thank Ms. Thornton for being diligent in keeping with this as we've talked about it quite a bit since

029last year. So thank you to her for that. And my question would be, Mr. Turner, on the proposed draft 2022 calendar, can you tell me what the other dates are? Dates that were being held, I guess the ones in tan. I'm going to share my screen again just so everybody can see the same thing that we're referring to right now. Thank you. I could get a thumbs up when you all can see my screen. okay so so yes the the tan meetings are tend to be um you know retreats or two by twos that we have internally um they tend to be the uh public budget forum and those events versus uh school board work sessions or regular called school board meetings or the um subcommittee meetings that we have um with the city okay

030great thank you you're welcome Ms. Nolan? Thank you so much, Chair Anderson. I just wanted to, I apologize if I missed the response, Mr. Turner, to Dr. Reif's question, but do we, I do recall, thank you for bringing that up, Dr. Reif, that the board did discuss that, you know, we want to give homage and respect to the public comments and allow that to inform our questions and, you know, our budget recommendations. So it was a bit of a misstep last time when we had the public hearing after we had already submitted our questions. So I just wanted to confirm. Is that, did we adjust for that? Because I'm looking at the calendar and I'm just trying to understand if that's, if we, if did we leave that conversation all on the same page that

031that's what that public hearing, the first one would be for. So, yeah, so Ms. Anderson kind of articulated it a minute ago. So the first public hearing would be prior to your submission of questions, because, again, those public comments might spark some questions that each school board member might have. And then the second one is to be able to react on the ad deletes submitted prior to school board members co-sponsoring those ad deletes. So once the ad deletes are out there. then the public can react to that and then you can co-sponsor it and so forth. So that's why we have those two throughout the approval process. Got it. I apologize, Chair Anderson. I didn't interpret your question correctly. So thank you for that. Thank you, Mr. Turner. No worries. I was maybe not articulating

032it the correct way. So anybody else? I don't see any more hands. So I guess, so our people, I guess my question, then my question is, I thought, oh, we'll do it on Monday. But then I realized Monday's a holiday, like just that week, Monday's a holiday, which would be before the Tuesday. So I guess our people, I know, I know we've been talking about this, but I guess I want to know, we also weren't expecting a pandemic. So how are people feeling? Do they want, I see Ms. Gentry wants to say something, so I'll let her, maybe she will illuminate us. I think we do just need to know. I mean, I, again, I understand there were maybe some other issues with the, certainly with the pandemic, but this is definitely something that has

033been discussed. So, you know, I guess it is, is there a, you know, I think it would be great if we could get some confirmation on the city manager's, you know, date. And, you know, what are some possible options for shifting up? I would say that, I mean, you know, even Even if both add deletes happened before, you know, at least then you could say that the even if we didn't vote essentially our how do I put this? Even if the calendar still has has the city manager's proposal technically happening before we vote, but it is after we have finished our add delete process. based on our rules of engagement, we would have finished our deliberation process. And even if we know that we're, you know, even if we haven't voted on it yet, we

034would be voting on a budget that we deliberated on and finished our deliberations prior to the city manager's release. I don't know if that makes sense. But I guess we just need a reality check on if this is possible at all. And if not, what are the steps going to be for how we could determine this for another year? Dr. Hedgings? So, yeah, so I think that Mr. Turner, he can provide some insight to what it would look like if we wanted to change the timeframe. And if Mr. Turner, if you can kind of go through what are some of the things that we would have to adjust or take away or add to make that happen. Sure. So if we were to move up the approval date, and again, this is the approval in

035February, not the adoption in June. So this isn't the final adoption that the school board does for the budget for the school year. So if we were to move it up and we want to continue to have the approval be on a regular school board meeting, we're talking about moving it up two weeks. not two days. If we move it up two days, the school board needs to call a special called school board meeting to be able to do that. The two days would put it on the same day that the city manager proposes his budget. So while he's proposing his budget, the school board would be approving their budget. If we want to continue to have it on a regular call school board meeting, moving it up 2 weeks would lose 1 public hearing.

036You would lose 1 regular budget work session and 1 athlete work session. You would also truncate your time to submit your add delete request and you would truncate your time to submit your. Co sponsorships as well. So. um those are just some of the the things that would have to happen for the calendar to to fit that timeline um again i'm i'm unsure of of the motivation to to have it on the same day that the city manager were to release his um again as dr reese said earlier Just like we do our fiscal forecast and kind of know the amount of money, the structural deficit that we might be working with. The city does the same thing on their side. And with the school system being the lion's share of the general fund, they

037already really. have worked out their budget, just like we had to work out our proposed budget to present to our school board at the beginning of January. They have to work out their proposed budget to be able to present to the city council there in February. Dr. Reed? Thank you for that. I had a separate comment, but I guess I just, you know, I don't know if it's possible to do, even if we did a special called meeting on the the Thursday, like the day after we did the first ad delete or something like that. I mean, I would even be in favor of doing that. One thing that's different about the city council experience versus the school board experience is that we approve a proposed budget that we send to the city and then

038we get our allocation and we vote again on the final budget. But the city council, they only go through one process because they only have to approve their final allocation to us and their budget. It's a little bit, I understand it's a little bit tricky, but I also wanted to just make a comment about the public hearings as well. And I don't know if Ms. Abbruzzese wants to jump in, but I, you know, I. I'm a believer in like trying to get the public as involved in this process as possible, frankly, and I think the public hearings on the budget are a great opportunity to do that. And, you know, I guess my own sense with the public hearings in general is that I know we have some requirements about publicizing them. And I mean,

039we have a requirement to have them for a reason. It's so that our public can, you know, see what our budget is and submit feedback and be in. involved and engaged in this process of where their tax dollars are going. And that's really important. And I would love to see us kind of like even publicize these opportunities more and encourage more participation in this process. And for myself, like the public feedback. It is important. And so to the extent that the public feedback can come in advance of us submitting questions or submitting ad deletes, that is helpful. So I just kind of wanted to put a plug in for that. I know we are only required to have one. And if we, you know, had one and like we made a really big deal out

040of it and got a lot of participation, then that would be great. But if we have like three or four and like two people come because nobody really knows about it or is engaged in the process, then to me, it's kind of like, it's like we're checking the box. You know what I mean? So like. let's really use this opportunity to get support in our community for the work that we're doing, I guess is kind of what I'm saying. So I don't know if Ms. Abruzzese wants to chime in at all about the requirement legally. Thank you, Dr. Reif. Agree with all of your points. Absolutely agree. I was only commenting earlier on the minimum legal requirement, but your points are all extremely well taken. Dr. Hutchings? So, yeah, I was just going to add

041that the reason why I was asking earlier, Ms. Thornton, kind of like the outcome that we were seeking was because I wanted to just understand, you know, what we were trying to accomplish by having it earlier. Because I do know that if we were to move our date, meaning the board's approvals date. earlier that it doesn't provide enough time for any adjustments, you know, that were already going to be proposed, meaning to the city council, because they're on a tight schedule, you know, as well. So us shifting at it, I don't know if it's going to necessarily make a difference if that's an outcome that we're trying to seek. And I also think it's important to, you know, to make sure that the board as well as the community understands the city manager. when he

042is fully supporting the superintendent's proposed budget, it doesn't prevent the school board from, you know, approving a budget that asks for more money from the city. You know, that's the purpose in us having the whole process of the board saying, you know, yes or no to the proposed budget. The board still has the authority to make adjustments to that. And I mean, at the end of the day, the city council, they do control 82% of our budget. I mean, in our operating funding and 100% of our CIP funding. So I just think that, you know, I wanted to know what the outcome was that we were seeking, because I'm not sure, depending on how sooner we do it, if it's going to change anything in regards to like what the board, I'm sorry, what the

043city council approves or not. So I just wanted to put that out there to make sure if we're going to make a significant difference. let's make sure that we're going to get what we're trying to get out of whatever date the board determines. Yeah, I mean, I think there was, my memory was there was sort of a, there was a feeling that made for the push for this partly because of a press release that said, you know, they had fully funded the superintendent's budget, which was totally accurate. But then I guess the... You know, and this is just people can because this wasn't my thought, but this was my understanding of it, that then this is a little bit confusing if the school board does want to have a larger budget. But I also wanted

044to say something about the public hearings. I do think I mean, I don't know that more. And I also I was surprised when I got on the board that there weren't more people coming to speak. Because when I was PTA, you know, we had lots, every PTA came and spoke and PTA council had, there was a big deal. But then I feel like in the last years, our families. They were more putting their advocacy toward the city in order to make sure that our budget was funded, not so much about I want a thing versus B thing or whatever. I think that became less of an issue of getting some a lot of times, although we still hear from people. But I think there was a lot more advocacy around that going to the city

045and advocating for us generally. Miss Gentry. Thank you. Others can chime in, but I just to respond back to Dr. Hutchings to what you said, I would say, at least from where I am, I take your point about, you know, the timing and the realities and I, yes, I wouldn't, I would not expect that. you know considering the amount of of work and planning that uh the the city manager and his team would put into uh you know their the creation of their proposed budget that they would turn on a dime based off of what the school board approval number would be. I think what I have heard over the years from former and current board members is that there is a desire to have a clear, distinct communication moment from the board expressing the

046You know, the, the, the, the amount that that they that, you know, in in talking with Dr. Hutchings and talking with the staff and us deliberating among ourselves and taking input from the community, the, the, the, the, what, what, what, what, what. What the appropriate, um, you know. what the appropriate budget should be. And just giving everyone a moment to see that distinction. It might be that ultimately by the time we get to budget adoption in June, that that is. is not possible because of what other deliberations have happened in the city, but it is creating a distinct, clear moment for the board to to express itself. That's sort of what I've heard in terms of, so I think we do need to be clear that, you know, when we're asking for these things, that

047there are these trade-offs. You know, Mr. Turner's already alluded to them. It's definitely sounding like we'd be making a very truncated process. And I think the board has to decide if the the desire for that clear communication moment is um uh if the desire for that is stronger than um you know the desire for more deliberative moments or um you know some of some of the other things um and the reality that uh you know the the recognition that that that that clear communication moment might not necessarily translate into it getting the exact dollar amount ms alderton Thank you, Madam Chair. As I'm listening, I'm wondering if the question is more around, because I hear people's concerns. I'm wondering if it's a question of, do we put in an effort to make this change? right

048now for this budget cycle or take the time because it seems like this is a a broader discussion that would like I would want to have you know with counsel and you know Dr. Hutchings would need to have with Mr. Jenks and you know, do we set aside some time this year instead to really flesh that out so we can have a clear plan for the following year as opposed to a rush to do it now? I don't know. I guess I'm throwing that question out as, you know, maybe if that's something to consider. I'm not sure. Okay. I have Mr. Suarez next. Yes, thanks. Thanks for Anderson, and kind of actually going to this this point about a broader discussion I did want to raise one point, I feel like I may have said

049it before but since we're at the beginning of a budget cycle. I've been thinking about what's being said and, and just want to reiterate to I think a lot of the discussion around this timing and the date we present the budget to the council and our concerns about that is sort of an outgrowth of our dependence on council. As Dr. Hutchings mentioned, 82% of the funding. And now that we're at the front of a budget cycle, I did want to raise for the benefit of the whole board, the question of whether we want to be more proactive. in our budget calendaring process to discuss the revenue side just more generally. I think we always kind of assume everything's kind of static at the front end of the process and we kind of have to accept

050what's given by the council and then we're kind of stuck with that. And, you know, we've had some discussions as a board about, for example, how Arlington, you know, does their legislative advocacy day. And we're going to try to move off that this year and have our own advocacy day with our legislators to work with the state folks, you know, and talk, have that discussion. But, you know, so I'm thinking about how do we structure that sort of revenue discussion into our process. Also thinking about more broadly about. you know, public private partnerships, other types of sources of revenue that we can be bringing to the division and how the board can be a supportive ally to the staff in terms of getting us more resources, you know, on the on the revenue side, you

051know, we are having a national reckoning around racial justice right now. And there. are a lot of high needs in our division that cut along race and class. And I think there's just a lot of, I think, valuable discussions that we can be having in this really challenging time in our world that can maybe help us a little bit on the revenue side. So I realize it's kind of shifting the conversation slightly different, but this discussion kind of reminded me of this. And I'm wondering if there's a way to sort of structure into the budget process. more of these revenue discussions, whether it's a work session, you know, work sessions about, you know, public private partnerships, state level funding, federal level funding, we may have another administration which may be more willing to provide more

052funding to school divisions like Alexandria City Public Schools in a few months. And so I just want to get ahead of this now and think about, you know, should we have a plan for that? given how early we are in the year right now. Dr. Hutchings? So, yes, Mr. Suarez, I'm glad you actually brought that up because a part of our revenue updates will come out with during our two by twos that that's a point in trying to help the board really understand kind of the revenue structure. I also think that and you brought up this point as well, Mr. Suarez, in regards to this global pandemic that we're experiencing. We have to remember we cut our budget by $12 million three months ago. And. unfortunately, the economy is not back to normal right now

053in September. So we, and it doesn't appear like it's going to jump back into recovery in the next couple of months. So we're going to have to have some really tough discussions around this upcoming budget. This is probably, I believe, going to be one of the most challenging and mentally draining budget years. that we've ever had. I truly just believe that upfront and I haven't even had my briefing and we haven't started our process internally, but I can tell you based off the fact that we are virtual right now. And we're not sure how long we're going to be virtual. We're not sure if there's going to be a spike in regards to COVID-19 in the next couple of months, like people are predicting, medical professionals are predicting. We're not sure if things are going

054to be shut down again over the wintertime. Remember, we did the pandemic started in the spring. It wasn't in the peak of the flu season. So there's so many factors that are uncertain that we are going to have to really have some tough discussions. around um you know the fy 22 22 budget so i think it's important for us to go into this um knowing ahead of time and so i'm trying to give you all i'm forewarning um the board uh that this is going to be a very challenging uh budget budget season the city manager said several times and you know said this in the summer as well that you know, if the economy is not able to bounce back the way they're predicting, I mean, we could have conversations this year about the

055FY21 budget. You know, so we are going to have to really just keep that in mind. I don't want us to lose that. We don't have a windfall. We don't have a lot of money out there that's sitting waiting for us to spend. So we just have to be mindful and just cautious and be fiscally responsible as we go into this process, which we all are anyway. I just want us to have a very different perspective than we've ever had before because none of us have gone in through. into a budget season in a global pandemic. So this is going to be new for all of us. So Dr. Hutchings, just to follow up on that, because something you said jogged another point I had meant to make in your comments also underscored this. I

056think this is exactly why it's going to be so important that I think this was important before the pandemic, but I think especially in the light of the pandemic, we're going to have to be a lot more nimble and creative on the revenue side and thinking outside the box in terms of what we can do, obviously within those constraints. And so I'm thinking this sort of as a institutional skill building thing for the board and for staff as well, for all of us, just to kind of become more nimble. in this sort of situation and also to the points that have been raised by my colleagues about public hearings and so forth. You know, public comments tend to focus more on here's what we want, here are the specific items we need on the, you

057know, other side of the ledger. But I think too. how we can figure out how we can bring our public along to advocate on the revenue side and use them as an ally to support our work, whether it's the state level, federal level, you know, get making partnerships that get us big grants, all these sorts of things. So I'm just thinking about how we can be more systemic about that. you know, so that we have the public kind of arm in arm with us in addressing these real challenges. And I think it's great that you're being transparent about the fact that we are going to have a very difficult budget year on the front end. But the more we can, you know, proactively think about how we can bring the public along in that sort

058of, frankly, it might be a fight, you know. you know, to get the resources we need. I don't expect that with council, but I'm saying like to get broader resources, you know, we're going to have to think outside the box a bit on that. Okay, next I have Ms. Alderton. Yeah, so I feel like this discussion kind of brings me back to my question because, you know, given the intensity that is likely to be this budget season, Do we want to address the, which will probably be a little bit of a challenge, the change, the act of making adjustments to our budget calendar now at this time, or is it something that we need to work on throughout the year to make it a more smooth process for the next round? And I'm genuinely curious

059about what people think about that. I have, I think people will chime in, but I have Ms. Lorber who wants to say something first. But I can also, hi, I can also respond in a sense to that, because what I wanted to say, it's a perfect intro to the comment I wanted to make. For, you know, for those of us who've been on the board and those of us who've worked in the system for a few years, this is not a new conversation. In fact, for years, city and school system have gone back and forth about the budget calendar and coordinating, better coordinating. And I think Ms. Gentry pointed out that never have things been better in a sense of cooperation, collaboration, et cetera. However, we just need to remember that we used to be

060very out of sync and that where we are now with it's even a... It's huge progress that the superintendent's budget gets presented before the city and that then the city manager approves that budget and calls it our budget. As troubling as that might seem. it really does indicate a lot of progress in terms of where city and school system had been historically. So I just, this isn't anything new. So what I'm saying is, so Megan, in a sense, or Ms. Alderson, we've actually been in negotiations on this issue for many years. And I think at this point, the question sort of becomes, I mean, I think I agree with everyone now that we really have to be looking more at the potential, the economic situation given the pandemic, et cetera. I think we will have

061lots of support from the community. in the budget process. One thing a number of us have noticed, those of us, again, who've been involved for years, et cetera, is that the public comment in the last few years, it seems that the better the relationship is between the school board and the city, the more we seem to be getting what we're asking for, the fewer comments we get, which in some ways I think is unfortunate. It used to be in the old days, every PTA president would come and they'd have a series of eloquent statements to make. And I think in some ways that's a good thing. It means that we're working a budget that satisfies needs more effectively. On the other hand, I agree with those who want to see, you want to see the

062public input and participation. And I do think because of COVID, because of the economy, and also because of virtual education, we will see. lots of public engagement and we should see lots of public engagement. And I guess I'm agreeing also with Ms. Alderson, I don't see any need to drastically make a change in the schedule. I think it has been evolving. Our budget calendar is, we've definitely... moved it up a lot. We make decisions much earlier than we used to. I think one of the things the city's been asking us to do is combine our CIP and our operating budget or something like that. I can't quite remember. But in any case, I just wanted to share that perspective. I hope it was helpful. Thank you. There actually was some more recent that so there

063was there was a stuffy thing before maybe I was even on the board where it was backed up. It is true that we have one of the earliest, I think, combined fund budget. times for neighboring jurisdictions, but there was some that came out of the joint task force. There were some recommendations about the city's budget, actually, I think for decoupling them, I believe. I don't know if Mr. Turner could speak to that. And I think there was reluctance to do some of that. And I actually think if we really wanted to, we were probably late starting because we talked about before, I think that if we backed up, if we wanted to do what I think people want to do, we have to back up the CIP. further too, so that we could actually probably

064start the combined funds before we break in December. I mean, it would really probably, and people can, maybe Mr. Turner can give us an update on that kind of around the joint task force time period and some of the discussions since then. Sure. So one of the things that came out of that was they were saying to decouple the city's operating budget and their CIP budget. And what was able to come out of that was the city was going to move up their CIP work session to be able to allow the city council to focus on the two different funds. at two different distinct times but they still they haven't decoupled their budget they essentially just moved up the time that they would allow city council to be able to get information on the different

065capital improvement projects that are going on in this city and they extended an invitation i believe to the school board to have that joint meeting to talk about acps's capital improvement program as well The reason why it didn't go completely decoupled was just because of the mechanics of the timing of when things had to be approved. The city has certain dates that they have to hit by ordinance, so that's one of the reasons why they weren't able to completely decouple, but they were able to come to a compromise with moving up those work sessions for their CIP. Yeah, there's also was the discussion about, in other jurisdictions, I think Arlington does this, they don't have like a full blown CIP thing every year because they have their plan and then they more revisit it more

066in depth, I think, like every other year or something like that, which would allow us space. But we've had, you know, we're in a better position now if it hadn't been for the pandemic, because we had all of that information that we were able to put into our CIP. that would have made that potentially possible if we didn't have a pandemic and all of the economic damage that that may be going to do to our budget. But I think those are the kinds of things I think would be nice is not to have the full-blown CIP because if we do a 10-year plan, why revisit it in its entirety every year? It would be better to just do a little bit of tweaking that would really condense that. process and allow us to spend more

067time on the combined funds and maybe started earlier and get what we're looking for that budget approval before we get it now but but we're just you know there were so there were so many things I feel like we've been working on and just as we got them kind of all the ducks lined up in a row then this this happened so I I every time I say think about it, it just, it's so terrible. But Dr. Eve. Thank you. I know this conversation is really going on and on here, but I guess I just would like to say in response to Megan, Ms. Alderson's question, that I don't think it has to be necessarily an either or. I think we could do like a small tweak or two now, and then we can, it

068sounds like from listening to everyone that maybe we would like to just revisit the process a little bit more generally, see what other divisions are doing and possibly, you know, just think. think through the process as a total in totality. But, you know, just looking at the calendar right now, the city manager is presenting his proposed budget on the same day that we have our second work session. And that's a Tuesday. And the previous Wednesday is when we have the first ad delete session. You know, and sometimes we don't always need a second session. So, I mean, I personally would favor. you know, having a special called meeting on that Thursday to do the second ad delete session. I don't know if other people would be in favor of doing that. And then that hopefully

069wouldn't mean that we would have to change, you know, all these other things and push them back. And that would solve kind of, it would address the issue for this particular year. But I, but I, but I think a bigger conversation for like future budget cycles would be. helpful as well. Because I mean, speaking for myself, I really, you know, I'd really like to be to Mr. Suarez's point, you know, I really feel like as a board member, I would really like to be able to be a better advocate for the school division. And I'm looking for ways and opportunities to do that. And so You know, the more we can think about that and the more that we can contribute to, you know, the school division really securing the resources that it needs, then

070I think that that would be that would be great for all of us and all of our students as well. I guess I have a logistical question about that proposal, both in terms of posting and in terms of turnaround from the work session going to a meeting the next day. Does anybody see any issues with that? That would be my question. I guess I'm not sure for whom. I mean, I think, you know, budget things are generally not, we don't have the same notice, right, Ms. Abruzzese, but then I think staff of Mr. Turner is going to say something. Yeah, so I'm going to share my screen again just so everybody can be looking at the calendar at the same time. So to your point, Ms. Anderson, if it were to be moved up to

071February 11th right after the work session, assuming that everybody agrees to the add delete that they want at that first work session, we'd really be asking staff to turn around and then put in all of those things overnight, essentially staying back after the work session to create those documents so that they could be posted for the next day and the school board have the motion to adopt. With all of the figures and financial statements and so forth. After that work session, where to end that night. So that would be the challenge with doing it right after. The only add to the work session. From staff's perspective, and we were trying to provide that. What we talked about last year was trying to provide us some additional time to be able to get through some of

072the. you know, add, delete information from the board with the staff. We needed that additional time because we were trying to turn everything around so quickly in the past. And we still have other things that we're working through, just the daily operations of the organization, that it does make it a challenge. I guess the other thing would be the public notice, depending on what was decided at that work session. It would be a really, it would be very little notice actually for the public if we were to make a change, you know, either delete or add. There would be very little notice if we were to then vote on the budget the next day. I mean, I would be a little bit concerned about that, but I think we can keep. looking, although we are

073supposed to, are we supposed to vote on this calendar next week, right? Is that was the expectation? Yes. Okay. So I don't want to, I don't want everybody not to be fresh enough for the rest of the meeting because that's important stuff. So I'm thinking maybe people can make some some other, you know, suggestions this week to see if there are minor tweaks that can be had. Does that make sense to people? And then I can't see everybody. So I don't know how, but and then we'll see if we can do that. But, you know, I do apologize by. I know that we've been talking about it for a long time, but I think the last we talked about it would have been involved moving, shifting both budgets to really do a good job of

074having the time and space on the calendar for a significant change. And I think it is challenging and we should really look at what others are doing because I know our budget. is approved a lot sooner or sooner because we always find this to be the issue with compensation. We're always kind of guessing because we don't, we're the first ones out of the box. So anyway, so everybody put on your thinking caps, send things, you know, in that if you find other tweaks and then we can share those out and see what people think about it. So, okay. All right. So now I have Mr. Turner's screen and I have my screen. I have double spreadsheet on here. There we go. Okay. So now the next thing is I'm going to turn it back to

075Dr. Hutchings. Yes. Thank you, Madam Chair. So we're going to transition now. So we need everybody to put on their thinking caps, folks. I know we had an intense discussion and a lot of conversation. about the budget calendar. Now we're going to shift into really talking about the budget priorities. And we want to make sure that, you know, we're setting the stage right now with the board that we have to really go into this with a data mind. And we are going to be sharing, you know, some of that data and kind of going through like our strategy to help the board really get to the FY22 combined fund. uh funds budget priorities um so i'm going to turn things over to our chief accountability officer um mr page uh and team to take us

076through uh this not only presentation but also there will be some engagement and activities for for the board So Mr. Page. Great. Thank you so much, Dr. Hutchings. Before we get started, I do want to apologize for any excited noises you may hear in the background. It is the end of tubby time in the Page household, which is a very exciting time of evening for all of us involved. And also it is funny in parenthood and adulthood as those words start to sneak into your vernacular and you start to use them even in reference to yourself. I found myself, I think I told my wife I had to go potty the other day and then caught myself. I was like, what? What am I saying? What is happening to me? So anywho, we are thrilled

077and so excited to be back this year. I am joined by members of my team, Ms. Constantine, as well as Dr. Whitson, and through their work, as well as partnership with Mr. Turner, Mr. Easley, and Dr. Hutchings, are thrilled to bring back the budget priorities work that we started last year. So members will remember last year we started a new process where we facilitated a data-informed look at prioritizing our budget priorities and also focusing in at really honing in on specificity within those priorities and ensuring that as a board you all had the information you needed to get to that level of prioritization and that we were facilitating a meaningful conversation to inform the process moving forward. So we're excited to bring it back to you this year, albeit virtually. We all will be stretching

078a little bit this evening in our virtual chops and world as we go through some different facilitation processes to get us to where we need to be. So we are just thrilled to get started. So with that, We'll talk a little bit certainly objectives around key data and learning again to inform the budget priorities, that additional specificity and focus and our ultimate objective is to walk out of the work session this evening with 10 key priorities identified for the FY22 combined fund budget that support our new equity for all 2025 plan. So just kind of, again, with the new plan and the new strategic plan, really having the high-quality mission, vision, and core values that the board established through that process, ensuring that we are now organizing all of our work around that strategic plan

079to make sure that we have that alignment and that prioritization. So a little bit about the systemic alignment piece. We can see here. the strategic plan really being the umbrella and overarching of everything we do. And I know this is not a new slide for the board, but really that the strategic plan informs. the budget priorities that we're getting ready to set this evening and then remembering that these budget priorities then inform the focus areas that will be set for next school year so school year 21-22 and then also fold into the superintendent evaluation for that year for 21-22 which then folds into our department and school improvement planning processes so that we are assured that everything is aligned from top to bottom and that we have the structures and supports in place to make

080that happen to drive that purposeful action to reach the meaningful outcomes that we seek as espoused in our new strategic plan. So just a reminder for the board this again I know is a slide the board has seen but reminding the board of our goal areas and really within the strategic plan having racial equity at the heart. We did this evening want to go a little bit more in detail for the board into each goal area in terms of what's contained within. So for systemic alignment, just quickly really focusing on how we are all pulling the proverbial rope in the same direction and how we're focused on building a culture of continuous improvement to design equitable systems and dismantle the systemic racism and inequities that have been built within the institution of education across our

081nation for decades, if not centuries. So in doing that, again, rolling out and aligning everything we do with the mission, clearly communicating our why, so our vision and having a clear understanding of that across the system and ensuring that we are focusing our attention on a limited number of strategic areas that will allow us to be truly focused and implement things well and with fidelity. Obviously instructional excellence is the core of what we do as an educational institution and that we want to focus that on all students in terms of access and engagement to a high quality instruction and with that high quality wanting that to be engaging and rigorous, culturally relevant, that we are ensuring we are differentiating to meet the needs of our students and that not only are we focused on instruction

082but we also know that students need to be socially emotionally available to receive instruction. So that's SEAL component two in terms of focusing on the social emotional aspects of our students in order to truly access and engage with our high quality instruction. For student accessibility and supports, ensuring that we are reducing those barriers to learning. and reaching equitable access and engagement with the programs and supports that we offer, and that we are focusing on the whole child and that we're taking a strength-based approach in our focus on the whole child and not focusing on deficits, but really looking at what our students do well and speaking those truths as well, and also reflecting and supporting the high expectations for our students as they move and interact with us on the day-to-day basis. Family and community

083engagement. I know this is such a huge priority area for us as a division as well as for the board and really focused on ensuring that all families and community members get those three key bolded text here in terms of welcome, respected and valued. And not just overall, but in every single interaction that they have with us as an organization. We know that from a customer service model perspective, it only takes that one negative interaction. to undo a lot of positive interactions before it. So how are we ensuring reliability in terms of always hitting that welcomed, respected, and valued, as well as engaging our stakeholders in the decision-making process and ensuring that they're partnering with us in the delivery of education and services to their students. And then last but not least, and a particular

084import for this evening is around the strategic resource allocation so that we are not as an organization simply supplying resources equally, but that we are having the meaningful conversations and using data to inform how we are strategically providing differentiated resources and supports across our system. Certainly focused on efficiency and effectively reaching the fiscal health of our division and also wanting to make sure that we're focused on meeting students where they are to support equitable outcomes and also that key focus of retention rates, particularly among staff serving our low-income students and students of color. So with all of that and the high-level overview of our five goal areas, I wanted to bring the board back to a slide that I know you all have also seen before in terms of kind of why racial equity is

085at the heart of the work and that we define racial equity within ACPS as when race does not determine the quality of life. opportunities and outcomes for our students and that our goal collectively again as we state in our mission is to remove those barriers that prevent anyone from achieving their aspirations and dreams for what they want to do and who they want to be in their life and that we are placing racial equity at the heart of everything that we do in recognition that the creation and perpetuation of racial inequities has been deeply rooted as I talked about earlier. in the institution of education for decades, if not centuries. So with all of that said, I wanted to give the board a quick high-level overview of some of the data-informed and equity-focused information. I

086know we had several attachments, both to our last topic around the areas of focus a few weeks ago, as well as to this particular board item, to ensure that we are delivering the data so you all can make those data-informed discussions, and also just wanted to provide a high-level overview. of those attachments this evening. So certainly focusing in on some of the key areas we know from our data analysis that particularly Literacy in the primary grade levels continues to be an area. So looking at our PALS data and seeing the discrepancies and outcomes across student race, ethnic groups in terms of achievement and literacy over most recent years. We also know access is an area that we need to focus on. So speaking to TAG access here, we're seeing our black students at 15%. of

087our TAG population where we know they are approximately, I believe, 26% of our total student body. So underrepresented and talented and gifted. Our Hispanic students at 13% of our talented and gifted population where they represent approximately 36% of our total student body. So again, underrepresentation there. When we go into SW students with disability and identification, we know particularly within our emotional disability. group, we see discrepancies there in terms of by race, ethnicity with our black or African American students compromising over two thirds of our students identified as emotional as ED and our Hispanic students representing 22%. So again, over-representation when we start talking about SWD identification. Also, just wanted to remind the board, we certainly have our quantitative data through the data workbook and other sources, but that we've done a number of purposeful audits

088and evaluations over the last several years to truly take a deep dive and look at specific areas that we prioritize as areas of leverage to continuously improve our services as an organization. So in the areas of communication, family engagement, human resources. facilities, students with disabilities, and talented and gifted, those being areas that have been of particular interest and focus in the past two to three years within the organization to ensure those are areas that we're resourcing and continuing to improve upon as we look to implement those action plans that stem from those audits and evaluations. Last but not least, reminding the board of some of the more recent data that have stemmed out of our COVID-19 school closure period and subsequent planning for 4.0. So first, this is a reminder slide and a slide I

089know the board has seen before, but in relation to the spring closure period, knowing that from an instructional perspective, that students who were engaged in the academic offerings did show and felt they were making academic progress. However, we also know that engagement was a challenge in the spring and that we were not engaging all students and that continues to be an area of focus I know as we enter into 4.0. Technology access, obviously an area of focus. It is our lifeline to our students in this current state and time and finding that ACPS has been responsive to the technology needs and also continuing to push to ensure that all students are accessing online learning. nutrition, health, and safety kind of. from the very basis of human needs. We did find that a majority were feeling

090supported in the spring around their emotional stress and that on average we were serving over 30,000 meals per week, which is absolutely incredible in terms of the efforts that went into that in the spring. And then last but not least, from communication perspective, our stakeholders feeling well informed and connected and continuing to acknowledge that we need to push and offer the multiple modalities. in terms of how our families and stakeholders are accessing the information that we're putting out. Some high level information from the summer. Certainly, we heard from our families in entering the potential of a virtual plus world that instruction and technology were the areas of most need and support. So hearing that from our families, from our students, and from our staff. We also saw some differentiation when we started to break the

091data out disaggregated by different groups. So acknowledging that we saw increased needs in terms of communication supports from our families who are non- non-native English speakers, so our Spanish, Amharic, and Arabic families, as well as seeing some differentiation and increased requests for support by race, ethnicity around technology for Hispanic, Latino, or Black or African-American families. And then also knowing that we heard from all families loud and clear that physical health and safety is their primary concern within the context of this global pandemic. And how are we planning to ensure as an organization that we're keeping that front and center in both the resources that we're planning for and providing, as well as in our communication and outreach. So we also wanted to give the board a direct correlation from last year's priorities that you established

092at this point last school year for the current year that we're in and how those directly align to our new strategic plan. So one of the benefits of the budget season starting as early as it does outside of the fact that I know it thrills Mr. Turner and Mr. Easley to be on the clock. 11 and a half months out of the year. It also allowed us to have those priorities and allowed to fold them into our strategic planning and drafting process for the new strategic plan. So you'll see here within systemic alignment the ALICE training that was a priority identified last year. Within instructional excellence we have strategies highlighting the K-2 literacy need as well as MTSS. Within our student accessibility and supports, we have the special students with disabilities audit implementation, MTSS, including

093restorative practices, NPVIS, as well as the chronic absenteeism for our Hispanic students at the secondary level. Within our strategic resource allocation, we have strategies calling out the increased staff retention, as well as the implementation of the human resources and facilities audit. And then last but not least, in our family and community engagement. calling out the cultural competence piece for our staff, our targeted outreach to Hispanic families, particularly around graduation rates and chronic absenteeism, our outreach to our underserved communities to continue to push to increase that engagement so everyone's voice is represented at the table and can meaningfully inform our decision-making, and that we're continuing to push as an organization around the customer relationship services and management side. So with all of that, And I know that was a lot of information coming all at once.

094I wanted to allow the board a pause moment here simply to acknowledge the elephant in the room in this activity. And that is that we are in a time of uncertainty, right? This is a global pandemic. I don't know that we know what next week or next month or six months from now will look like, let alone a year. So that is an inherent challenge. in what we're doing this evening, but is not a challenge that is insurmountable. So I wanted to give the board a little time, just about 90 seconds, just to individually think and maybe jot down some thoughts about how you currently envision academic year 21-22 looking like and what students will most need to be successful. So we'll take about 90 seconds just to ponder that and potentially jot down some

095thoughts. And I am going to start that now. About 15 more seconds. All right. So thank you for engaging me in that. I'm trying to play some background music. I'm getting texts that you all are not hearing that. Is that accurate? Yeah. I got the best playlist. A little bit? I heard it. Intermittently, we're hearing it. All right. I wasn't even in that tune, so we get just three seconds. My apologies to Gray Boy All-Stars for not playing them clearer. All right. So thank you for engaging me in that and just wanted to give the space and time. To bring that into the end of the room and into your all's thinking, and so hold on to that as we go through what we are very excited to start now, which is our prioritization activity.

096So you'll remember a slide like this from last year in terms of getting us to the right grain size and the right level of specificity around the board priorities, board budget priorities. So remembering the three key W's that we're trying to answer in the priorities that we're putting forward is the what, the who, and the where. So an example of two general would be reading. An example of additional appropriate detail would be early literacy at the primary level. Likewise, where technology may have been a board budget priority in past years, this year we would be looking for something a little more rich in detail around expanded access to technology and support for Hispanic and Black families based off of the data that we received this summer. Social-emotional health. More detail could be student social emotional

097supports related to trauma from the dual pandemics. Health and safety, being specific and saying the necessary supports in terms of PPEs and other resources for return to in-person learning pre-K through 12. Students with disabilities, really being specific there around potentially identifying equitable identification of black students with emotional disabilities. Or communication, getting more targeted there to say supports for expanded outreach and communication to all families. So those are just some examples. But what I will say about those examples is they are all grounded in real life data in terms of what was supplied in the attachments and would be. you know, just examples of what we would be hoping to come up with this evening through our activity together. I think the other important thing to mention is that priorities from the previous year can, and

098quite frankly, some absolutely should carry forward, right? As an organization, we're not wanting to create wholesale change. year after year in terms of the priorities and areas of focus. So like we saw with the areas of focus presented a few weeks ago, we saw the continuity there in terms of the areas of focus from the previous year and how those efforts are continuing. Some of them may be reconceptualized a bit based off of the environment. but that we are continuing and not creating, you know, kind of the proverbial hamster wheel where we're having constant churn every single year. So thinking about that and what we'll be doing now is a brainstorm activity where each board member is going to add up to 12 priorities on a Google sheet and having at least one per goal

099area. So I am going to exit the presentation now and I'm going to switch us over. just so that we can kind of all see the Google Sheet that we will be working in. So here you'll see in the Google Sheet the respective goal areas within the plan. And so what we're going to do is two board members, and you'll see initials there, will be starting for about two minutes to list out the priorities that they feel should fall under that goal area. And then we're going to rotate to the next goal area. So you're just going to shift to the right. So if I'm starting on systemic alignment, I'm going to start there. And then I'll transition over to instructional excellence, you know, after we get that information in. And then after we do

100instructional excellence, then I'll transition over to student accessibility and support. The other idea here is as you go, there's going to be information entered into the goal area that you're transitioning into from other board members. So if you're seeing other board members have already put a priority that you have listed, there's no need to retype that priority. you know, you will, that will be counted and we'll transition it over to the next sheet, which is where we're going to go through the prioritization activity. The idea here is to make sure that every priority that you have as a board member is represented. And if someone else has already typed it, then that's great. It will absolutely carry over. There's no need to replicate the work of the board members who are in it previously. So

101we are going to probably spend around 15 minutes kind of doing this brainstorm and getting this information in. I did want to make sure you all receive this link. I see, I believe most of you all in there. However, it's hard to tell exactly who's here because we have, you know, the anonymous manatee and hyena. Go ahead. Can you show your Google sheet? You're sharing the PowerPoint. Oh my goodness. Still? Yes. Oh, well, let me do that. Let me see. Let me try this and then let me do this better. Okay. Sorry about that. So what you'll see is, you know, again, kind of as I discussed, we have these areas and then we'll have the two board members starting in systemic alignment, entering their priorities there. And then moving over to instructional excellence once

102we get through kind of that first period of pivot. And what I'll do as a facilitator is I'll just kind of read the document and the room. And we'll just give some time prompts in terms of when we should be transitioning to from one goal area to the next. And again, just shifting to the right. And then once you go from family engagement, which is on the far right, once you finish that, you're going to go to systemic alignment and kind of keep the train moving that direction. Before we start, I want to see if there are any questions. Jennifer, can you see in terms of participants if we have any hands raised? Can you call in the order that they appear? I'm not seeing any hands raised. Okay. Silence is golden. I am going

103to retry my DJ skills. So let's go ahead and get started in the goal areas as identified by your initials. And we are going to get rolling. The music is distracting. The music makes it hard to think, you guys. All right. Also, what if I can't type into this chart for some reason? Or are we not able to type into the chart? So you should be able to type into the Google document. I would say, Margaret, if you're having difficulty, it may be best to call Susan. and see if she can support you through. Yeah, okay. I had spoken earlier with Susan about this. For some reason, my laptop, it's here, but I can't write into it. Are we just doing one column right now? Yeah, so I was just getting ready to unmute and

104just see. It looks like most of us are ready to transition. So I would say if you're ready at this point to move on to the goal area to the right. to go ahead and do that. And if you're still wrapping up your first goal area, go ahead and try and do that as quickly as possible and then get on to the next one. We'll go ahead and make our first rotation now. Remind me again, if we see what we would have put, do we need to indicate that somehow or just leave it be? Nope, you can just leave it be. And they have saved you typing. No, I mean, but I mean, I wouldn't, I'm seeing, because now we're moving on to one and I'm reading what somebody else has put. If that's what

105I would have put, I don't need to indicate that in any way. Nope, because what we'll do is we're still going to pull that over. And then in the prioritization activity. That'll be how we do reflect in the prioritization. Got it. Great. Thank you. Yep. I would say in terms of the second goal area should be wrapping that up. And if you're ready to move on to your third goal area, you can certainly do that. And if you're still wrapping up your second, you can do that as well and then transition on to your third. 30 more seconds in the current goal area and then we'll be transitioning over to our fourth. I'm also open to live feedback. So if this is moving too fast or folks are feeling a certain way, please feel free

106to. to unmute and share. I'm trying to read faces on Zoom, which as a facilitator at times can be challenging. I'm in the last column and I think someone might be typing on top of what I'm entering and then it's like disappearing. I don't know. I'll try. Y'all stop typing over, Michelle. I'll try typing it again. So have we moved on or no? Have I missed? Sorry. Yep. Yep. Should be on fourth. Oh my goodness. Okay. All right. Thank you. Mr. Page, I prefer the dots. Just want to let you know, a little feedback there. Clint. I think he might be frozen. I'll just say for my own, I'm actually writing them on little post-it notes at my house and then typing them in just because it makes me feel better. It would be amazing,

107Ramey, if then you had butcher paper in your house and you used to put your own dot exercise in there. Yes. All of a sudden, it's a party going to the gentry house. That's what the priorities of ACPS should be. But I would need, I only have one color. You really can't, you need like, you need more colors. Multiple. Yeah. Okay, Mr. Page, I think you're back. I think I'm back. Can you all hear me? We can hear you now, yes. Okay. So we should be transitioning off of our fourth into our final goal area. So wrap up the fourth and jumping over to the final goal area. All right. So we should be wrapping up, and it is fine if you are still just completing thoughts in your final goal area. But members will

108recall last year. We had a process where after we kind of did the brainstorm and we had post-it notes and all the post-it notes got up, we then went through a process where members kind of reviewed the post-it notes from all the board members in a given goal area and kind of bucketed them into kind of aligned areas. So if there were repeats or other things and made sure they were aligned to the goal. So kind of given the virtual context, we're going to do that a little differently this year. So what we're going to do is I'm going to just kind of, I'm going to go through each of the brainstorm priorities and just speak to them. And then we're going to move them over to the prioritized list. And if things need to

109be, if we feel like we're seeing themes or things could potentially be collapsed. into a holistic priority, I'll kind of speak to that. And then certainly if there are any questions or concerns about that, just unmute and voice that in the moment. And we can kind of go through this so that we get a coherent list of the priorities for what we're gonna go through next, which is the prioritization activity. So I'm gonna start in systemic alignment. So the first one I see in systemic alignment is around the MTSS implementation with restorative practices and PBIS. So we can move that over to the priorities document, but we are going to regroup that under our student accessibility and support goal within the strategic plan, just given that's where a lot of the MTSS restorative practices and

110PBIS work falls. So we'll move that over. And I'm just going to do some color coding so that we know kind of what's been moved. Then we have a risk assessment update. So prioritizing, in essence, an audit or risk assessment, as has been done in past years. So we can go ahead and move that over. Then I can go ahead and stop my screen share. Then I'm just going to work in this document. And then we have a goal around a priority around the alignment of KPIs and metrics. So again, ensuring that systemic alignment is taking place as it relates to the strategic plan and monitoring and measurement processes. So we can move that one over. The professional learning and cultural competency training for all staff. We can move that over, but that's going to

111fall under family and community engagement. So we can move that one over and just put it in a slightly different goal area. Then we have oversight and implementation. Oh, go ahead, question. Yeah, I have a question. Why does the cultural competency go under? I mean, I can see why it goes under family engagement to a certain degree, but it really is about, I mean, it's instruction that is failing because of the lack of cultural competency and ability to. see the whole child without any stereotyping or. Sure. I'm confused. Also, I just want to say right now, you can take mine. I put in a thing for family engagement about continuation of the meal distribution, but this is for next year. So this, right, this is, these are priorities for the 21-22 school year. Correct. So

112hopefully we're not COVID. I mean, we'll want to assume. Hopefully, yes. Yeah, okay. Because I think I was sort of thinking into, but anyway, I just wanted to make the point about the cultural competency. I think it crosses more than that one area. Yeah, and to be clear, we are artificially bucketing these things into goal areas. And really, we're using the strategic plan as the framework document. Wherever a given topic was placed within the strategic plan that the board adopted is where we're going to try and place it this evening so that we're consistent. I should have known that. Sorry. No, no problem. Absolutely. New plan for everybody. I'm going through, I'm not 100% on some of these either. So oversight and implementation of budgets. So we can move that over. Then the... Glenn, would

113that go in strategic resource? Yes. Why don't we put that in, thank you, Jennifer, in strategic resource, given the budget topic. Then we have the HR audit recommendations implementation and specifically developing a monitoring system for that. I'm going to say... that we keep that at kind of that level of implementation of the HR audit recommendations and as a part of that ensuring that there's a monitoring system. And so I believe that then falls under our strategic resource allocation goal area as well. Then we have aligned staff professional development strategic plan goals. I think for this evening that can... day in systemic alignment. And then last but not least, the implementation of the new strategic plan. And I'm wondering if we can combine three, which is the alignment of, you know, that's kind of the measurement

114as well as the implementation, if we can combine three and eight into a singular priority. So let's go ahead and do that. Okay. We're going to work through these, I promise. So we have next up instructional excellence, the continuation of the K-2 literacy. So we can move that over and put it under instructional excellence. Then we have the implementation of teacher and staff evaluation. I think this is going to fall under the HR audit. So I'm going to say we fold this into that. That piece, which we have under the strategic resource allocation. Then we have educational programming for the high school project, so we can move that over under instructional excellence. Then we have the K-2 literacy focus again, and adding for the COVID learning loss. And we have supports for graduation. And I

115believe our graduation work falls under student accessibility and support. So we can move that over and we'll just shift it over to the student accessibility and support. And then we have professional learning around quality instruction, specifically virtually, and we can move that over under instructional excellence. And we have access to tutoring support that is widely communicated. And I feel like that piece also falls under our student accessibility and supports in terms of those additional resources and programs. So we'll move that over, but put it under the student accessibility and support goal area. All right, halfway through. Student accessibility and support. We have our specialized instruction action plan. So we can move. That over, I'm wondering if that should be under instructional excellence. Jennifer, do you have? I will confirm that. Okay. And that also may

116go to TAG too. So if you can, if we can work to confirm those two, just in terms of where they, where they fit, but we can absolutely, we'll move both of those over. Then we have counseling supports, especially around trauma. So we can move that over. Then we have L students are accessing the translation services. We can move that one over. Yes, I can. Sorry, I was debating about sharing my screen and if that was actually helpful for folks or not, but I can absolutely share. Here we go. So we just moved over that one and then we have a recommendation of carrying over the chronic absenteeism from last year which would be I believe focused to our secondary students. So carrying that over from last year then we have the extra support for

117students to compensate for the COVID loss. So I think, again, around the social-emotional supports for students, in particular, attending to our current dual pandemics and making sure that we have the extra social-emotional supports in place next year, knowing that that's going to continue to be a factor and a real thing in the lives of our students and families. So we can move that one over and probably consolidate it with the earlier one, Jennifer, that had around the social-emotional supports. And then we have TAG again. So we have that. We have the reduced disproportionality in students with disabilities, which I believe we had. And I believe is that folded into the, that is folded into the specialized instruction action plan. So maybe Jennifer, just add language there, specifically calling out the disproportionate identification. So merge those

118two together. Then we have a focus on the reduction of disproportionality and suspension. We can move that one over. And then we have another social-emotional supports, which I think we've captured in previous entries. All right, two more. We got this. strategic resource allocation. Sorry, I know this is dry. You're doing great, Clint. We're going to get through it. Going to get through it. All right. So strategic resource allocation. We have expanded access to after school programming for L, SWD, socioeconomic. So we can move that one. I'm wondering if that one, does that fall under student accessibility? in terms of the programming piece? I'm catching up to you. I think that belongs under student accessibility and support. Yeah, okay. Then we have additional targeted counseling. So I think that, to me, that dovetails in with the

119conversation we're having around the social-emotional supports, particularly related to our current context in terms of the dual pandemics. So I feel as though we have that represented under the student accessibility and support. Then we have necessary supports to return to in-person learning. So that's the health and safety piece. So we can move that one over. Then we have an increased staff retention for those serving underserved students. Can move that one over. Then we have implementation of SEAL. I'm thinking that one can go, we can move that over, but we're going to put it under instructional excellence in terms of not just focusing on the instruction, but again, that conversation of attending to the social emotional needs of students to ensuring and that seal piece folding under the instructional excellence. Then we have a equity audit.

120of school board policies. I'm going to take this as more so an implementation of potentially any findings from an equity audit. And so I think we can have that fall under systemic alignment in terms of wanting to make sure that our governance and policy structures are aligned to support the work that we're doing. Then we have our necessary supports to return in person. So we have that one. Then we have a thought here around serving staff to use. So I'm going to say this folds into our implementation of the strategic plan around how we are capturing staff and stakeholder voice to make sure that we are pointed in the right direction, both in terms of our strategic plan and the resources that we are allocating. I want to make sure I'm capturing that one accurately.

121So if you entered that and I'm missing it, certainly feel free to. Then we have our customer management system. So continuing that work here so we can move that one over. Whoops, wrong color. Then we have the necessary supports again. So we're good on that. The HR audit, I believe we already have as well. The implementation of the HR audit findings under strategic resource allocation. And then the communications audit. I don't think we have that one. So we'll need to move that one over. All right. Final one. Here we go. I'm going to have to move you all so I can see what I'm doing. So Margaret, I think, shared that we can skip that first one. Is that right, Margaret? Okay. She's nodding. So we're good there. Establish and maintain database metrics for success.

122I'm going to say I think this also falls under that measurement piece and gauging our progress throughout the strategic plan and folded into that is going to be our measures and metrics around how we're doing around family engagement. Then we have focusing on our increased outreach to L families, especially those who are non-native English speakers. So we can move that one over. We have our cultural competency training, which I think we grabbed in another goal area and already put in family and community engagement. That's correct. We're good there. And we have our continued engagement documents jumping around, continued engagement of Hispanic families to improve. So we can add that. We have our continued focus on customer relationship services and management. So we can add that. I think we've talked about that one. What is going

123on with my document? It's not liking me. There we go. Ensure students have access to needed materials when participating in virtual learning at home. That might be strategic resource allocation. Actually, because it's instructionally based. I'm going to say let's move that to instructional excellence for now. So you can move that over. Outreach to underserved families, communities to determine needed supports. I'm wondering if we can fold that into some of our already outreach. I put that. You could put L and underserved, but I don't think it's necessarily the same communities. Yep. Agreed. Did you get that, Jennifer? I did. Okay. Then we have targeted outreach and communication to our families of students with disabilities. So we can move that over. I think we have the Hispanic male graduation already. Is that correct, Jennifer? Yes. Okay. Continuing

124from last year. Hold on. Well, we have under family and community engagement already engagement with Hispanic families to improve graduation and absenteeism. Yep. Then we have targeted technology supports for families. So we can move that piece over. Jennifer, I'm wondering if in the high school project one that we already have under instructional excellence, if we can add some language to that. around involving community partners to provide more internships. So we're kind of combining the high school project into one bubble and have it fall under instructional excellence. Okay, I am there now adding which part? I apologize. That's fine. Community partners to provide more internships. And then last but not least. I think, yes. We have training PTAs and cultural competence. So I think potentially could we fold this into the cultural competency training for staff

125and say inclusive of PTAs. So for staff and targeted stakeholders. And then maybe a parenthetical that says PTAs. All right. It is goofy. It is zany, but we are through it. And I want us all to do our sparklers in the fact that we got through it. Congratulations, you all. It is 8 p.m. and we are almost there. I promise. We all survived the flooding rains. No one showed up in a dinghy to the meeting tonight. So that's fantastic news. And we have now brainstormed our budget priorities. So we are making work and headway. All right. So the last piece. I wish we all had our own music that we could like sing something like you're the champion or you're our hero or something. So that would be in our favor. Yeah. Veronica, at another

126point, I'll share with you all the story of my wedding music entrance song and the calamity that that was. Lion King and Elton John. So anywho, we're going to move on. So we have now brainstormed our priorities. I'm going to start my share again. I just needed to see all of your wonderful faces collectively, at least for a second, before we engaged in our last topic here. So we have our brainstorm list. And we have now moved them over into this document. So you all should be able to, as I just did, in the bottom of that Google sheet, you'll see two tabs. If you click on the brainstorm list, that's going to take you to that. You should now click on the prioritize list, votes. You click there. It will then pivot you over

127to this sheet, which is where we're going to be working for the remainder of our time together this evening. And so what we're going to be doing here is we are going to be going through our prioritization activity. So what you'll see in the first left-hand column there is each goal area. And under each goal area, you'll see the brainstorm priorities that we just worked through collectively as a board. And what we're going to be doing and what you'll be doing as individuals is you each will get eight votes total. So one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight. No more, no fewer, eight votes. And you will get to vote. You are going to have to vote for one priority within each goal area. So you're going to have to vote for one priority.

128So you have five votes. one in each priority area, and then you're going to have three remaining votes that you can place in any area as you see fit. So once you go through your five and you have one vote for each area, you can then go back through and say, I saw these in this area and I just feel like this is so, so important and vote and do that three times. And what you see- Can you make this a little bit larger? Is there any way you can make it a teeny bit? I know that it'll- You're limited on space. So what you can do, Margaret, on your screen, because you'll be working not on the screen share that I'm showing now, but once you go back to the live document, you can

129make it larger or smaller just by using this dropdown here on the Zoom. Right, right. But what we have here at the top is you'll see zeros. And as you enter, so when you're voting for something, you're going to put the number one. And then it's going to count how many votes you as a board member have put across the different priorities. And that'll show up here in this top row that I'm highlighting now, as well as for the individual priorities across board members as you're voting. There'll be some totals here on this left-hand row. So once we go through this activity, we'll have a clear sense where exactly we are. So I'm going to pause now. And I'm going to see if there are any questions. Please raise your hand or just, we can

130just call out if there are questions. Yes, Michelle. I'm just curious, and maybe I'm getting ahead of myself, but is the goal to have eight priorities at the end of this or? No, the goal is to have 10 priorities. So you will. You all will have eight votes, but we know that we ultimately will be selecting obviously the individual priority that has the most votes for each area. And then we'll be selecting the five others that have the most votes across areas. If that makes sense. For some reason, my laptop did not. I don't have this document. It didn't work. So Susan, Susan, if you'll call me, I'll just go through and tell you my votes by looking at his, by reading Clint's, okay? And I'm sure Susan can also read, you know, read them

131to you if there are areas that maybe you can't see on the share screen. So we 100% will get through it, Margaret. As Dr. Hutchings always says, better together than apart. So any other questions before we start? I can see some of you have already started. Just reconfirming, how many per goal? So you have to vote in each area at least once. Okay. That's the minimum. Okay. And then once you've done that, you'll have three more votes that you can put across, you know, vote. Got it. Okay, thank you. And Clint, those extra three that we can go across, do those also just get a one as well? It's not like we're indicating that with a two, that it's our second favorite or something like that. Yes, no twos because you're going to mess up

132my summing. That's going to be everything twice. So I'm going to be, we're going to have a keen eye out for any twos or threes in there. For those of you who are mathematically and arithmetically inclined, arithmetically, that's not a word. So, all right, I'm going to stop talking and allow you all to concentrate on the voting. Excuse me, Mr. Page. There's a, I don't know if this was intentional, the implement monitoring system for specialized instruction action plan. Does that? And I thought I saw that in two different categories. Let me see if I'm. Yeah, it's there twice. I put repeat on the second. Yeah, it belongs in instructional excellence. I'm going to delete it from. Okay, thank you. Mr. Page, you said we get three additional, right? So five plus three is eight, correct?

133Yes. Okay, just making sure. Okay, thanks. No, you're good. Hey, Mr. Page, Margaret here. I'm having a problem with where some of these are placed. Like, I don't understand why the special instruction implementation plan is not under instruction. And I don't understand why. I can't remember. Hang on. So I will say that the specialized instruction. We did have that accidentally twice and it should be now under instructional excellence. So we should be good there. Margaret, I think you might be on mute. We still can't hear you, Margaret. I think she's working with Susan. Margaret said that she's talking to me, not y'all. Hold on a moment. We'll just give Margaret and Susan a little bit more time to get those votes in. All right. Excellent job, Margaret and Susan. Teamwork makes the dream work. So

134I had gone through and highlighted in green. Thank you, Jennifer. Jennifer's making my work go away. So I've highlighted in green. The top vote getters within each goal area. So these are going to be the five that are going to represent the given goal area. So we see within systemic alignment, the implementation of the 2025 plan. We see within instructional excellence, the continuation of the K-2 literacy focus and particularly attending to COVID learning loss. We see in student accessibility and support the MTSS implementation with restorative practices and PBIS. We see in strategic resource allocation the continued focus on customer management systems and supports. And then within family and community engagement, we see the continued engagement with Hispanic families to improve graduation and chronic absenteeism. So that is kind of our first cut. So those are

135our top five. priorities and I also think overall our overall top five vote getters regardless of area. So then when we start to take the next cut, I believe our next cut gets into the fours. So we have a priority around the reduction in DISC Pro in TAG and advanced coursework within instructional excellence. Then I think that was the only other four I saw. So then our next cut is around threes. So we have the equity audit of school board policies and the implementation of that work. So that's seven priorities. Kind of love it when a plan comes together. Okay, then we have, there are no ties. Then we have the, educational programming around the high school project, so folding that in under instructional excellence. Then we had the needed attendance to stress and counseling

136supports, particularly around trauma, as we exit, hopefully, as we exit out of the global pandemic and meeting the unique needs of our families and students. And then we had the professional learning and cultural competency training under our family and community engagement, as well as targeting specific stakeholders, for example, PTAs in that work as well. And I believe if my counting is right, Jennifer and Tina, you can confirm, I believe that is going to be 10 priorities. So we have one, two, three, four, nine, 10. Mr. Page? Yes. I have a question. I see the equity audit, but I think we are planning to do that actually with this year's funds. So I'm not sure if we want to, because this is for the next year's budget, right? So I just want to throw that out

137and maybe Dr. Hutchings wants to speak to that, but also, yeah. So speaking of that, I think. Well, sorry, go ahead. Yeah. Speaking of that, I think that we should get confirmation now on if the board wants to use, you know, their dollars this year to allocate an actual equity audit of our policies. I know that was something that its recommendation that came out of our areas of focus for this year. But the board does or will have to commit to. you know, allocating funds to make that happen for this year. Yeah. And, and that's, that's a great segue because actually Ms. Abruzzese had, had dinged me during the meeting with the, with the tech saying we should really find out about that so we could move forward. So we, we do have funds that

138we have allocated for audits and we can redirect those. this year because I thought the urgency was to do it this year. And I see a couple of people who are supporting that for this budget exercise with their hands raised. So I will let them speak first. Dr. Reeve. Thank you. I wasn't going to speak to that specifically, but but that I mean, I would support doing it now if we've already allocated money to do that. And just also like. under the systemic alignment that implementing the KPIs. I mean, I just wanted to share that I had been thinking about that as well, but I felt like so many, you know, the KPIs encompass so much of like what we're talking about. So I was kind of conflicted about whether that made sense to actually

139be a budget priority. So I'm just throwing that out there. But what I raised my hand for was under under, let me find myself, instructional excellence. There was a tie, Mr. Page, for the high school project and implementing the specialized instruction action plan. And so just FYI, because you gave it to the high school project, but. That other one was selected also. No, thank you for pointing that out, Dr. Reif. I missed that three. So we currently have 11 identified, which is not the, you know, 10 was kind of our shooting for number last year. We had 12. So, you know, our goal is to continue to ensure that we are. getting better and better at prioritization. And, you know, there's no magic number that, you know, so I think if we leave here tonight

140with 11, that's okay. And I think we can certainly, if we do feel a need in the future to potentially have a discussion that we need to trim it down to 10, we can have that. But I think 11 is, I think 11 is fine. And I think keeping that in as 11, I think is, to me, it's a focus area that we're focusing on now. So it would be an extension from this year, unless we happen to see, you know, tremendous progress this year, right? And then we can revisit it and maybe it needs to go away. But I think because it is an area of focus for this year, I think it's sufficient to keep it on. Okay. And I do see that it says implement. It's gone now. Implementation of equity audit,

141but I'm not sure if that was it. I just changed that, Chair Anderson. You're not going to read it. I thought I read that and I didn't see the implementation, but thank you, Mr. Page, that it's not just 823 too late. Mr. Suarez, do you have your hand up? Yeah, I think my points have largely been covered by Dr. Reif. I was going to make the point about the specialized instruction action plan, so I'm glad that we clarified that. I was going to just make a comment about the equity audit that I would agree that, and I was assuming too, that that would be completed this year, at least in terms of getting the equity audit recommendations and also promulgating whatever policy changes needed to be changed. by this school year to the extent we

142can do that. But to the extent we want to keep that on, you know, next year as in terms of making sure the policies are executed next school year or something like that, you know, that could be maybe the focus at that point. So I was pretty much going to say the same thing. Yeah, I mean, it may not be, you know, because this is budget thing. It may not be that much budget. It may be a lot of policy work for the board because, well, you know, in order to get through them, it will take more than a single school year. Well, I mean, I guess we have to wait for the results to see how many of them are impacted. So, yes, before we leave, Jennifer said, you know, that the thumbs up

143sort of thing. Our audits so far, what happened is several years ago, actually, before anyone on the board was on the board, the board before that had a risk assessment and all of the audits that we have had thus far. have flowed from that initial risk assessment. So the communications one was the last one of that risk assessment and really enough time has passed now that if we were to move forward on other audits other than say the equity policy audit we should probably have we should probably start with another risk assessment. So we don't know how much we have always put in our budget, our board budget money to keep the continuous improvement going by doing audits that can inform us about various areas that need some. attention. And so we can decide with

144the amount of money that's budgeted this year to use it for the equity audit. And we can also see then beyond that if we have some leftover, if we want to start the process over and do a risk assessment. So I think though for this evening, it's probably good just to know that people are fine with using the funds to do the equity audits. And I cannot see you all right now. So a thumbs up would not. I can't make you all on my screen. Okay. So a thumbs up was. So let's try that again. A thumbs up if it's okay to do the equity audit. Okay. Is that good? All right. Ms. Green, is that all right? The equity audit? Oh. I'm sorry, I didn't think you'd finish the statement for this year. Yeah,

145I just, well, I didn't, suddenly everybody's face appeared in front of me and I had just said, I can't see everybody's thumbs. And then Mr. Page made it happen that I could. So the question is, can we use the current funds that we have? Is it okay to use that directed toward the equity audit? And so thumbs up or down. if that's good. Okay, I think I saw everybody else's before, so I think we're good. So Ms. Abruzzese will be happy that I've clarified that. She's giving me two thumbs up for doing that. So, okay, great. Madam Chair. Yes. I just had a question, and I know this didn't come up during the actual brainstorming piece, but I think that as we're talking about renaming, potentially, we can talk about the high school and also

146Maury Elementary School, which I think we received a petition or the board received a petition about that. I think that that's going to need to be a part of our budget priorities because if we change the name. to either the high school or Maury or both, then there will be budgetary implications for FY22, because then we'll be changing the name next year. This year, to my understanding, based on our timeline, is that we would be voting or the board would be voting to make the name change, as well as going through a process to identify a new name next year. we would actually have to go into implementation of that and there will be budgetary implications for that. So I think it's going to be important for us to include that now so that it

147is a part of the budget process this fall. So when the board gets to adopting the budget in January that we are. we budgeted for it. Right. Very good point. And good because that gives me another segue that wasn't on the agenda per se, but is part of the attachments. So I just wanted to, so yes, it has to be, I mean, if we're going to do that, that's going to have to be in the budget because it's going to cost, especially the high school, because there's more. And I think that we don't, we're going to hear about that more, but I think there'll probably be some in both budgets. for those both operating and CIP to do that. So I think that has to be one of the budget priorities, but also before I

148forget and I disappoint Ms. Abruzzese, we have the MARI petition attached to tonight's meeting and that is to follow normal order to have something about it in a meeting before we take a vote because it's on the agenda. we're going to be on the agenda for next week to start the process for Mari, the vote that could start the process for Mari. So so is there. So I guess, Mr. Page, can we add that? Then I'll add a dozen or a dozen. So we're back at 12 like we had last year. I mean, this year. At least it's not a baker's dozen, right? It's not a baker's dozen. It's just a dozen. Regular dozen. And, you know, I think that, you know, these are important items that are going to be important for us to

149really be able to develop or at least recommend or propose a budget to the board with the necessary priorities identified. I think as long as we have not exceeded what we currently have, I mean, I know our goal was to try to lessen and I think next year we'll just need to work towards that. But as long as we're keeping that same number, I think that is feasible. And we are done. And I did just want to bring back to the board and just reaffirm. the core values within the new strategic plan. And we will do this and make this explicit now that we have the board budget priorities for FY21-22. But just the amazing work that you all have done tonight. in continuing our work as an organization of truly living these core values

150and coming up with board budget priorities that align with our vision, with our mission, and that we are welcoming, empowering, equity-focused, innovative, and results-driven. It truly is, for me, as a leader within this organization and just as kind of a longtime member of the organization, such an exciting time. to see the alignment and the power in the work that's happening. So just wanted to say hats off to the board for the work that you all have put in tonight. And in addition to that, I just want to say that this is an idea of what schools are going through right now with having to pivot. Like I miss you all so much being in person. Let me just tell you that. You know, but having to go from in-person engagement to virtual engagement. very different

151skill set, very different experience. You can still get outcomes from it. So it's not that we haven't accomplished anything because we accomplished a lot, but it was a very different way of getting to the outcome that we were seeking from the beginning. So I appreciate that the board allows us, you know, that you allow us to be able to take you all through some of the things that our students and our staff members. are dealing with right now with this global pandemic. So and you all did a phenomenal job. It's just no preparation. You didn't go to any training to do all this. You know, you all just you just get into the motion, do it. So thank you for for doing that. Well, I think it points to the great direction and the great.

152you know, work that the staff does that allows us to do this. So, I mean, I'm even more encouraged, you know, for our students when I come to a meeting like this and it just seems to go off, you know. seamlessly. So, but I do miss everybody too. In fact, I still have like, sometimes when I'm thinking it's meeting day, I think about like grabbing a bite before we go to the meeting. And I, and I envision that. And then I realized, no, it's not happening. It's still not happening, but one day, one day, hopefully sooner than later, it will happen again. So, all right. If there's nothing else that anyone can tell me that I've forgotten, I think Madam Chair. Yeah. So I forgot something. Well, not that you forgot. I just wanted to

153make sure I wanted to make sure that before we wrapped up, we just got clarification on the rules of engagement and the budget kind of like process as well as process resolution and the calendar. I want us to know, I just want to know our marching orders of. What are we, are we not doing changes? Are we going to be sending in information to the superintendent, to the board chair? I just want to get an idea of what was the outcome from that. I think what I heard, I didn't hear any discussion about rules of engagement being an issue. I think the calendar was the only thing. And so what I would say is, you know, things have to be posted. You're going to post by Friday though, right? For next week. Yes, we post

154tomorrow. That's tomorrow. Yes, Friday is tomorrow. Thank you. So that makes it difficult for incorporating changes. I think, I mean, what I'm thinking is if somebody has just suddenly a eureka, you know, like aha moment about this one that we can figure out in the next week, because of course we could change it, you know, next week at the meeting. But I think if you have the changes, you really need to get them in. HAB-Charlotte Pitts:" By like maybe Monday, it's so that it can be vetted because like we we found with the one that seemed good, but it's not good because the staff can't turn around the information we have to find out if logistically, it will work. HAB-Charlotte Pitts:" So if you have something that by Monday and we can get it to

155work, then we can we can propose changes, but otherwise I think we really do need to look at probably backing up the whole thing. So I'm wondering if at all possible, if we could, so that we can get this so that it's right and that it's sustainable, if we could bring some alternatives for FY23 budget so that we can go in knowing that we would need to bring this up towards like maybe like when we do our work session in August. so that we're front-loading it prior to September, and then we're able to, we could adjust even our timeframe, if need be, so that it could work. But it just gives us some time. What I'm thinking about, I'm just thinking of having some time to do some, to have some potential alternatives, but also

156to work with the city around how... this all could work out and what are some of the implications of some of the decisions that we're making and I would hate for us to commit to something and then, you know, we haven't had, you know, the internal discussion with the city around any implications that that might bring. I haven't had that discussion this fall and I just don't think that's fair. Right. To the city manager, he would be surprised that now I've come back to the meeting and say, okay, now we've changed the calendar. So I just feel like it would give us an opportunity to really have some discussion internally so we can bring some options. and share with the board what the implications are. Yeah, because my memory is, because we'd have to back

157up the CIP, my memory is that that's when it gets tricky because of the way the work that has to happen before, and then you end up having CIP information that gets kind of old because you're backing it up so far. That was some of the discussion before, I think, about backing it up. Because of the summer months, Ms. Gentry, you're on mute though. Thank you. I just wanted to say, you know, if we proceed with that, and it does look like, based on a lot of different things, at least which is global pandemic, that might be the track that we have to use. I don't know what the plans are for joint meetings, you know, for this year. But, you know, I would say. you know if if that needs to be a part

158of the joint meeting or if that needs to be an agenda item that is maybe not that but i know um the the the city school subcommittee meeting um i would just ask you know can that be um an agenda item that's placed on on that uh and that way there is enough time i think dr hutchings made an excellent point that there really is going to need to be some um Dialogue back and forth on the city school side and and if if what's what this discussion has has brought forth is that you know. September isn't really a time when we can be making changes to the budget calendar, then we're going to need to really start this process much earlier. And so I would just say that I would hope that we could

159use some of the tools like the subcommittee or something like that to bring this along. Yeah, it certainly has been a topic before. I think when we've been... when we were there at the subcommittee meeting. And there seems to always be a sticking point on their end, certainly to make any changes. But we can bring it back, although I'm not sure we can bring it back soon because they're only allowing for COVID-related. topics, which is really a little limiting right now with our joint meetings. Maybe we can change that, but it didn't work last time. So we'll keep working on that. But I do think maybe it even has to be in the spring that we talk about this for next year, because I think as Ms. Gentry said, I think once we get to

160August, that's really almost September, and then we need to have Because it means that you have to do the work beforehand because there's a lot of work that the staff does before. As I see Mr. Turner, that's shaking his head, yes. So everything we do impacts the staff. So that's part of what gets into the way is that then it gets into the summer and that's a different animal in terms of what people are doing during the summer. So Madam Chair, I think I misspoke a little bit about the August piece because remember in June, we are to provide the draft to the board, the draft calendar for FY23. So this is something that in June, we could provide two drafts. We can provide one draft that shows like June with the traditional form, and

161then we can provide one that's like truncating their deliberation to move up, or your deliberation to move up. the approval in February. So you'll have two drafts and then we can talk through what the implications are. That will provide us time to actually have a discussion with the city about the proposal that we're going to be submitting or the draft that we'll be sharing. And then we'll be able to actually have some answers to the questions that board members may have. So that will allow us at least to have the adequate time. Right. That's important, really, because some of the revenue, speaking of the revenue side, you have to get some information that feeds into stuff, too. Am I right, Mr. Turner? That is. That is correct. So one of the reasons why we have

162the dates are the way that they are now is because of the timeframe that we get the information for the state revenue. So we want to make sure that we're moving into an approved budget with the most accurate state information for that revenue. Obviously, we could have another year like 2020 and that all change. But typically we get that state revenue numbers. in January February time frame um so that is able to help the school board be able to approve a budget um with the most accurate state revenue numbers so it seems like there's there's more work to be done here and and I know um people have been waiting for it I think it really given that we were kind of remote for for part of last year and into this year um But

163yeah, so we'll bring it back to the subcommittee. We'll have the multiple calendars of, you know, quite different in the June, May, June timeframe. And if people can send us emails, send Dr. Hutchings and me something this week, if you, with thoughts about that, if you didn't get whatever covered tonight. Does that sound good? I don't know. Okay. All right, everyone. It's, oh, Dr. Reeve. All right. Thanks for the, this is a budget priority question. I raised my hand a while ago. Thanks for the exercise, Mr. Page. I was just wondering, and I'm sorry if I missed this. Can you, will you all post the... the documents, the completed documents. I'm assuming you're going to share any, well, we have the access right now to the Google Doc, but I'm just thinking like a PDF

164document because it was posted with the meeting, but it's blank. So especially for people who may have been trying to follow along and been totally lost, like it just might be helpful to have those documents available for the public that we just worked through. Yes, we'll be posting kind of the final work through documents for the public to see. All right. Sorry, everybody. I see that people had their hands up. So Ms. Alderton, I don't know how long it's been up. So sorry. I'm sorry. I couldn't find myself to unmute. And my apologies. I just wanted to throw in one more budget priority statement, you know, in regard to the special education audit. The issue of targeted communication for families with kids with disabilities is a super hot topic right now. So I guess my

165plug to both Dr. Warner and Dr. Mozingo is if we could somehow, you know, figuring out ways that we can somehow sort of add that as a component to the specialized instruction audit, I think we can cover those. two bases but that is a very very um pressing topic at the moment so um you know if we needed a twofer for that one i think would be great okay so now i now that i found my my hands raised i think that's everybody so suddenly when the screen came by back i didn't i i missed i lost the oh dr hutchings you have your i think miss green was first miss green i saw her hand up first Oh, you. Okay, Miss Green, sorry. She was waving her hand. You know what? I had my

166panelists right in front of your face. I couldn't see the other one. So I just started waving. Oh, yes. Okay, Miss Green, sorry. No, I just wanted to see if Lorraine wanted to say anything. She sat through this whole meeting. And I know the seniors had their last first day event, which was very successful at the school. So I wanted to see if she wanted to talk about anything going on. And it's Spirit Week, right, Lorraine? Oh yeah, it is. Well, I've been speaking a lot like every week about with our leadership team and people who like to organize events for the school and everything. That's how we really got into doing the last first day thing. And I think it's just really important to have. to have like those types of events as much

167as possible because we really got blindsided with this pandemic. And I think that that shouldn't mean that we can't have, we can't have fun. We can't normalize a few things about, about school. I had to do them for this first couple of days of school. Our teacher would ask us like how we like the virtual learning and what norms that we should have and stuff like that. And I just and like all the time I kept saying it's important that like it's important that we most of the time see your face because we miss we already miss that interaction from our students and being able to. talk to our friends that are at the desk next to us and being able to be in the small groups. We really loved that part of school. And

168now we just, we can't do that. So we have to do what we can and interact in our breakout rooms effectively and everything. So yeah, and we will be definitely having more events like our first last day of school and everything pretty soon. Great. Thank you. Thanks. And thanks, Ms. Green, for bringing that up. All right. Now I think, are there any other? Now, Dr. Hutchings, here's his report. I just wanted to mention that next week we're going to be going through our CIP budget priorities. So today was the combined funds budget, but next week we will be sharing out about CIP. And one point that I wanted to make, because I'm going to be sending a board memo, or not a board memo, excuse me, a city manager memo tomorrow to the city manager

169in regards to our Douglas MacArthur project. And I'm going to also be sharing that with the board as well so that he can share this information with the city council. So one in particular thing that you'll see it in the memo that I'll share with you all is that we are seeing that, you know, based on right now our preliminary numbers, we are seeing that the Douglas MacArthur project may be more than what we budgeted. in our CIP currently. It may be a little under 10% more in regards to price for the final project. And right now our team is working with, you know, the city. We're also going to be working. with our designers and developers to try to cut some of those costs or decrease some of those costs so that we can

170offset the overage in regards to the Douglas MacArthur project. We're also looking at some of our CIP projects for the future that we might have to make some adjustments with. potentially, but we don't have concrete numbers now. We won't for the next couple of months. We're still in the design process, but we think it is important, especially with the city council approving our design on Saturday, us being explicit about that up front. not knowing what the actual amount will be. So we're going to give kind of a range in knowing that we're going to be working through that. But you will be able to talk through this in specifics during the CIP budget process. And I will share the memo with the board as well. So you all will have copies of that information. I

171just wanted to make sure that you were aware that I'm sharing that with the city manager. And it may be a topic of discussion with the city council on Saturday, but we won't have specific details until we get into it. to the CIP budget process. So does the new amounts account for the net zero rather than net zero ready? Does it? Does it address that? Isn't that a change they made? Yes. So it will address a number of things because we also, with the parking garage, remember it is underground. And now with the square footage and the amount of space that we have to make an underground parking garage, it's just a little more complicated than expected. So it does cost a little more to do. We have it. This is our first time doing

172an underground parking garage for school. So that is where some of the additional costs came from. Also just normal inflation, but the inflation in regards to funding was not 10%. So there are a number of factors that are causing the increase and we'll be able to lay out more specifics with the board once we get some of our final details. Great, thanks. Okay, anybody, is that, are we good? It's 8.49. We don't have to do anything else. We can just sign off. No adjournment. We've already done that. All right. Have a good evening, everyone.