001Good evening everyone. I'm calling the meeting to session at 5 31. Any public comment for closed session? Okay, then I will adjourn to closed session at 5 32. Good evening everyone. Calling the meeting back in session at 6 09. Roll call. Student board member. I can't I forget your last names. I'm sorry. Perez. Present. Ramirez. Present. Sandoval. Present. Trustee Wilson. Present. Trustee Frutos. Present. Trustee Arroyo. Here. Trustee Ornelas. Present. No action was taken during closed session so there's nothing to report. If you can all please join me please stand and join me for the Pledge of Allegiance. And do I have a motion to approve the agenda so moved I'll second that okay Student board members, can I get your vote on the approval of the agenda? All those in favor? Aye. Board vote on
002approval of the agenda. All those in favor? Aye. Opposed? Passes 5-0. Okay, moving on to staff reports, student board member reports. Good afternoon. Yeah, good afternoon everyone. Long time no see. So today I will start with the report from McEvitt. So McEvitt is celebrating the Random Acts of Kindness Month with several activities planned for students at lunchtime. Students will also have an opportunity to make friendship bracelets and trade bracelets with other students on the 23rd of February. Students who complete random several several random acts of kindness will have the opportunity to practice in a kindness ice cream party. For Isabel, the honor band will be playing on the 24th at 2 p.m. at VC. So if you guys have any time, come support the Isabel band. And then Isabel's very own mock trial will be
003having their comps on the 24th of February and the 25th at the government center. And then seventh grade step up night, the science fair, book fair, and book fair will all be on the 28th of February at 5 p.m. So if you guys want to go check out the science fair, book fair, it would be, it's going to be really fun. So if you guys want to go, I might go. And then the boys and girls basketball season came to an end this past weekend. And then both teams finished in fourth place for Ventura County. Not the result they wanted, but. it's still really good for this year. And then moving on to the high school. So update on FFA, one of our groups at the high school. So good afternoon everyone. Santa Paula has
004hosted the annual Ventura Section FFA public speaking contest with 150 students competing in various public speaking contests. Santa Paula, Fillmore, Ventura, Nordolph, Camarillo, and Carpinteria all attended the event. We will have eight students compete at regionals in March at King City High School. Thank you to all the teachers who allowed us to use their classroom for room competitions and waiting rooms, as well as the library, auditorium, and the cafeteria. All the students compete in the center courts area and it was easy to monitor all the contests. We wanted to also send out a shout out to Gibby who was a custodian who was on campus early to help us get the bathrooms and other facilities ready to go. Thank you to Jerry Cruz for coming in early to help us get the auditorium set up
005and get the stage lighting and sound system ready for us. Everything looked amazing. Our campus looked amazing. and we made sure that everything was left clean and organized. We also had a large group, a large number of alumni, industry members and teachers help us with our contest. We had our very own Andreina Contreras powered through two of the hardest contests, prepared and extantemporaneous public speaking contest. FFA would like to thank Danny Guzman, Celia Hernandez, and Mari Carmen Riveros for helping get everything secured for Saturday. Again, thank you everyone. Moving on to FVLA. So we had a competition at Westlake this past Saturday. That was crazy. That was very fun. So from FBLA, we're filled with pride and excitement to share our FBLA students' success at Westlake High School. They didn't just compete, they conquered, taking
006home a staggering 32 awards and securing a fourth place award out of 19 chapters present. A few FBLA members are advancing to the state leadership competition, which is held in Anaheim on April 11th to the 14th. Join us in celebrating our exceptional FBLA students and their dedication to excellence. Your support means the world to us as we continue to nurture and empower the leaders of tomorrow. Thank you for being part of our journey. We also want to thank Mr. Lopez and Mr. Haas for your exceptional work in leading our future business leaders. On behalf of myself and the other students of FBLA, I would like to thank our advisors, Lopez and Hawes, as well as Mr. Alamillo, because they helped us in purchasing our suits for the event. And it's just, it's really nice to
007see all the donations that came to help us get suits and look professional. Okay, moving on to... to mock trial of the high school. So mock trial helps to build creative thinking skills, adaptive skills, critical listening and thinking, and public speaking skills. Students become familiar with the justice system and learn judicial vernacular. The competition takes place at the Ventura County Courthouse in front of practicing judges and attorneys that volunteer their time. This year we got to take a field trip to the second district circuit court of appeals in downtown Ventura. Next year we hope to visit the Ventura County House prior to the competition so that students will be familiar with the venue. The mock trial team should be offered as a CTE class as it is in other schools so the students can receive
008credit for all the hard work they put in preparing and competing in the competition. So I really liked the experience here and it was nice to have something to do. My time commitment was, oh, sorry. From a student, she said, her name is Yahida. And she said, I really liked the experience here. It was nice to do something. My time and commitment was normal. Practice two times at home, Saturday practices. I learned how court manages their cases. A little info on what we did in mock trial. I personally was a witness. for our case. And then we went through 20 practices of two hours each. So we spent like 40 hours preparing before the actual competition. We had two scrimmages, which were all about three hours, maybe a little more. So that was six hours
009of competing. And then we had two days of competition, eight long hours each day, so 16 hours. for the competition days. So I just wanted to point out that we spent a total of 62 hours as a part of the preparation and competing. Since we were thinking if mock trial was a CTE class, it would help us in obtaining all the five credits needed. And mock trial is just an academic competition in this country, state, and nationwide. Ventura County is a very competitive county. We had 48 schools compete this year. 2024 was the first year that SPHS fielded two teams. I got to meet a lot of people at this. at the mock trial events. It's just so cool how like everyone that wants to like be in law or just is interested in mock
010trial like we all went to compete but we also like met different people and like we met people that are like that. that are like in the career of like being judges attorneys and stuff like that so I thought it was a really cool experience same goes for for FBLA there was tons of students and apparently not everyone went but like it was just meeting different people was astonishing and then moving on to um to the performing arts, well, the ones that I participate in. So this past Friday and Saturday, we had our senior WNAC productions. So SOAPS, it was really fun. We've been rehearsing since December, and we finally pulled it off just this past weekend, which was crazy. We saw a lot of people. We saw staff members come watch us. parents, family,
011friends, community members. It was just so fun to be part of the productions that four different seniors created from just their thoughts and they produced it. It was really cool. And right now, as of yesterday, we just started practicing for the musical, Wizard of Oz. So make sure to... To save a little space on April 18th because that's when our opening night will be So April 18th, 2024, 7pm at the auditorium. I hope you wrote that down. I will be Glinda the Good Witch as of right now. If I do really hard, I'll make it to the opening night. And then as of yesterday, we had also our first rehearsal in the honor chamber of choir. It's really fun. We're learning even more songs than the choir itself is learning. We're getting very experienced in
012singing and then we're gonna have We're gonna have events going on in the future of the semester. I'll get to those when I'll talk about those when the time comes, but we're really excited. The choir, we have a lot of events coming up and then theater is just we're rehearsing a lot for the musical. So I hope you guys come watch at least one of the dates. We're going to have a few dates, a lot of dates and shows so that you guys could come. I think that's all. Thank you. Thank you, Trustee Ramirez. Okay, so for Bedell Elementary, they had their kindness week, which Tuesday it was be kind to your family by doing something kind for a loved one. Today, students wore pink and red and were encouraged to show appreciation to a
013friend. Tomorrow is express yourself by being kind to yourself and wearing something that expresses yourself. And Friday is be kind to teachers and staff by wearing green and Bedell gear to show Bedell spirit. For Glen City, February 1st, they have their dual language immersion informative parent meeting for the incoming 2024-25 TK and kinder students. And then on Thursday, February 15th, which is tomorrow, they will have their LCAP meeting in the cafeteria from 530 to 730 p.m. So please attend for your voice to be heard. For Blanchard, tomorrow, Thursday, February 15th, they will have a coffee chat at 8 a.m., 815 a.m. All are encouraged to attend and bring any questions, concerns, or anything else you would like to talk about. Coffee and sweet bread will be provided. For Santa Paula High School, last week the
014WASC committee visited. And then this week at Santa Paula High School, we were having a spirit week with Tuesday was anti-Valentine's Day. And then today we wore pink and white for Valentine's Day. And then tomorrow is Minion Day and Friday is Rhyme Without a Reason and the Make-A-Wish Rally. On February 22nd from 5 to 7 p.m. in the McMahon Gym, Santa Paula High School will have their annual Cardinal Night where future and current students of Santa Paula High School are able to get information on all the pathways, clubs, extracurricular activities offered at the high school. And there will also be a food truck, so all are encouraged to attend. And then for the winter sports at Santa Paula High School, boys basketball unfortunately lost last night in a close match on the road against Estancia
015High School. Girls basketball plays tonight at 7 p.m. in the semifinals against Ramona Convent. If you can't make the game, you can always watch it streamed on Card TV. And then girls soccer lost by one goal last Saturday on the road against Palm Desert. Boys soccer fought hard and ended their playoff journey in the second round. And boys wrestling, Raul Santarosa and Elias Ramirez wrestled to the end with Raul just shy of qualifying for day two. And Elias was eliminated in the blood rounds on Saturday. So great job to all the wrestlers who met. tough competition but showed growth and press of perseverance for girls wrestling angie barrazo and kiana kiana cardanas qualified for day two and with kai finishing in fifth place earning a spot in the master tournament she'll compete on saturday in
016palm springs and then girls water polo from being behind and lost only one against louisville high school we hosted the match at real mesa high school pool since the santa pa high school does not meet cif requirements but it was really amazing to see that game being so close and then spring sports have started with basketball our baseball and softball games this week boys golf tryouts wrap up tomorrow and with track and field and swim placements by the end of this week thank you thank you um for b superintendent's report mr weinstein Thank you, Board President. So my report tonight, you go to the next slide, thank you. My report tonight is just really an opportunity for me to talk about an editorial that I put in the Santa Paula Times. It was placed also
017on our ParentSquare Instagram and our website. And the reason for the editorial was there was some confusion, some questions on particularly Measure A. But I'm going to go over both Measure A and Measure B. just so that we try to get all the clarification and transparency we can out to the public we also have the editorial in hard copy form being mailed to every residence this week in the community that way their questions can be answered um so measure a if you don't know is a 57 million dollar general obligation bond and property owners on their property taxes are who is responsible for paying the interest and um principal on those um we have two districts before 2013 so there are actually two bonds measure a is for the elementary schools uh or elementary schools
018plus isbell and then measure b is a 36 million dollar geo bond that will address facility needs at just the high schools so There are two different boundaries. If you're not aware, the high school boundary encompasses all of the surrounding areas of Santa Paula, but our unified school district or elementary school district has Briggs and Moopoo and Santa Clara surrounding us as feeder schools to our high school, so those residents that are in those districts are not affected by that. Next slide, please. So measure A, what are we going to try to use it for? As many of you have heard, we have some seismic issues with the main building. And so in our attempt to fix those seismic issues, we also wanted to renovate the building. It is very, very old. And there is
019lack of AD access. The classrooms are not the right size. It's very difficult to have classes there. In fact, right now, there are very, very few classes being taught in the building. And so we're looking to renovate the building and with using the existing facade, but doing new construction in addition to that. And basically, we'd also like to start replacing our 25 plus year old portable classrooms at Isbell. And then just adding and renovating classrooms and bathrooms and kitchens and multipurpose room, which is our cafeteria at the elementary schools. measure b next slide please measure b is designed to help us with bride and jim rebuild and pool renovation and ban and a new band room and also to update and renovate the performing arts auditorium those are the main projects the bride and jim
020rebuild insurance is funding but probably because as you realize that the size of the Bryden gym was a little tight and also some of the surrounding areas we're not we're negotiating for our insurance funding but it may fall short of the needs to rebuild the Bryden gym pool renovation so if as our student board member pointed out we do not have cif competitions here because the pool is not the correct size nor do we really allow the community full access to the pool when it's not being used by the high school so our goal is to renovate the pool to not only be for meet CIF regulations, but also to add an area for swim lessons for youth throughout the community, as well as giving access to the entire community to the pool who don't
021have pools. And then, of course, our band room. If you're not familiar with our band room, our band currently practices in what I like to describe as a basement below the cafeteria. It's very small. It's not designed for the 130 kids that are currently in our band program, and we desperately need more space for them. So in addition, we wanted to build a band room for them. And so we're calling all three of these projects and the Brighton Gym Complex. And then we also, as you know, our auditorium is... outdated architecture and and it's beautiful but the seats and and um the audio uh is is very outdated and needs to be replaced and so let's talk about the little next slide please let's talk uh briefly about the um tax rate confusion so as
022many of you are aware um measure d was approved earlier in the 2000s and as we sell these bonds We sell them in what's called tranches. So we sell bonds with different maturities. So if we're going to, say, get $10 million in bonds, we may sell some at two-year maturity, five-year maturity, 10-year maturity, all the way out to 24 years. Currently, all bonds, deep measure D bonds, should be paid off by 2028. So the majority of measure D bonds have already been paid off. And so your actual tax bill is lower than what it originally was when we first did Measure D because there's that many less bonds that you're paying interest and principal on. And so in our fact sheets and the things that we put out to the community originally, it was said
023that the tax rate for Measure D will just continue. But the tax rate is not your property taxes in dollars. Your tax rate is the max amount we can assess property taxes per $100,000. So there's confusion because people who read that thought, oh, the tax rate is not going up. Okay, so my bill is going to remain the same. Unfortunately, that is not true for the majority of the... community. So right now we're paying about $24 per 100,000 of assessed value on measure D will be paid off in 2028. And this will return the property taxes to what it was originally for Measure D, it's actually be $6 less. So instead of $66, it'll be $60. So that's really where the confusion came in because when you read that and you're not aware of the
024difference between a tax rate and also your actual tax bill that you, a lot of our community, when they called me or I looked on social media and we talked to different community members, they're saying, but you. but it says that my tax bill won't go up. But that's not, that is not correct. So that's why the editorial was put out. So we're looking at, Measure A will increase the dollar amount per $100,000 of assessed value to $60. So it will increase the property tax bill for Measure A, for the elementary school district. Next slide, please. Measure B, there was really no confusion on Measure B. It's very clear that we will increase the taxes $29 per 100,000 of assessed value for that district. And so when we're talking about assessed value, it's not appraised
025value. Assessed value is what is assessed by the county tax collector based on when you bought your house. So if you bought your house 25 years ago, obviously the market value is very high, but what you're assessed on is what your assessed value is, which is usually what you purchased the property for. So why the need for the bond measures? a lot of people realize that there are state funding programs for facilities. Unfortunately, they're tapped out and there's no plans currently um to open that spigot up again. So we're not just us, but many districts you'll see throughout Ventura County, L. A. County will be going out for um bonds because we can't go to the state. We can get reimbursed for some from the state. um with isbell and some of the other construction
026that we're doing but really the majority has to be paid by uh the community um i before i was here i was cbo and deputy superintendent at oxnard union high school district we passed a 350 million dollar bond um and it was desperately needed to renovate the nine high schools and um happy to say that it not only did that but it also helped build del sol high school next slide please this is the last Questions? So board members, any questions? Given that we're going to have an agenda item later about the bonds, probably makes more sense to ask the questions at that point. Okay. Moving on to 4C, committee updates. Trustee Sandoval? I had two committee meetings. The first was our special education district committee, which I'm glad to say is above my pay
027grade. We started talking about SSTs, which I believe are student study teams, and about how that process is working, which was interesting, right? But, you know, I'm not a public educator. And then we were also talking about inclusion. and how we can better integrate our SPED students with the rest of the population. So that was a really good meeting. I think that committee is doing really good work. I also was in Sacramento on Friday with the CSBA legislative committee. It's fascinating. It's really interesting going over certain bills that are... trying to be passed you know deciding which ones we want to say something about and which direction we want to you know either yay or nay on those we did also talk about the budget and how much um policy actually gets done through the
028budget so you know as uh as maybe we all know may the governor put out or excuse me in january the governor put out his initial budget it will be revised in may uh revenues are looking down from his projections already uh so everybody's kind of keeping a nervous eye on the governor's budget and what the may revise will entail because um right now we're in the optimistic phase but i don't know if it warrants that so you know as we go through our budget we'll have to keep that in mind so that was it thank you trustee wilson thank you We talked a little bit about the bond measures just again trying to clarify some of the confusion we had a good Talk with the new police chief about our SRO at the high
029school and their ability to meet the needs of the district for Any sort of police requirements. We've had a couple of trespassers on campuses We talked a little bit about the Bryden, Jim, and Isbell updates or construction that we're hoping to participate in. We got an update on the Harvest Sports Park and the delays there mostly due to the problems with the grass. Heard a little bit about the upcoming bridge over Santa Paula Creek at Santa Paula Street. That's hopefully coming in the next year or so. and our continuous updates on the lighted crosswalks that they're trying to do at seven different places around town. And the bids have been coming in much higher than anticipated. And so I'm trying to figure out ways to better fund those and do them at a more reasonable
030cost. And that's all for me. Thank you, Trustee Frutos. Trustee Wilson, well said. There's nothing more to add other than it's just an opportunity to bring district personnel and city personnel and start having roundtable discussions. One of my discussions or requests that I brought forward was school safety around schools before and after, so drop off and pick up. So we're looking at, I just, I've requested the city and police department to look into possible ways of helping out and assisting with, you know, helping parents understand the requirements of what's expected of them around drop off and pick up. But ultimately, it's just that opportunity where we get to have that roundtable discussion and good guidance with our city leaders and our school district leaders. Thank you, Trustee Arroyo. Nothing to report. And for committees, I
031have nothing to report. Is it considered a committee, the scholarship meeting, scholarship foundation? No. Okay, nothing to report for me. Moving on to public comments. Members of the public may submit written comments by 3 p.m. on the day of the scheduled meeting. to isanchez at senapalusd.org. These comments will be read aloud into the record. Written comments submitted to the board are limited to 300 words. Members of the public may also wish to read their own comments in person at the board meeting. Public comments will be limited to three minutes. In addition, if there are multiple public comments on a single subject or board item, the total time allotted for all comments will be 20 minutes for that subject or board item. And we do have public comments. Okay, for public comment, I have Javier Magana,
032and I have here that Arnulfo Vasquez will be ceding his time of three minutes to Mr. Javier Magana. And since we have so many public comments, we need to stay to the three minutes per person, in this case, six minutes for Mr. Magana. Buenas tardes. um good afternoon everyone um my name is javier mania and i'm here well greetings to everyone and i'm here to talk about my family So his daughter was involved in a fight where two girls attacked his daughter. So on February 12th, February 2nd, his daughter was attacked at the high school, at Isbell, my mistake, was attacked during school hours, and this was soon after the, I believe, So the first incident was December 12th when Student was attacked and then again on February 2nd. And here my concern is what
033strategy is going to be used so that students in general are safer in school. I am here not to attack, no, but to see if I can contribute some humble opinion, I do it with pleasure. So his main concern is not necessarily to attack or cause any problems, but rather how can we problem solve in a better way to actually have results. Because his main concern is like as a father, as an adult, you can defend yourself, but you can't really defend your child in school. And so he wants something to be done within the school district to better handle situations like these. In particular, he, again, he doesn't want to cause any trouble, but he wants to maybe provide opinions, input, something that things will actually be resolved. So, When we were returning from
034the independent classes, So what the daughter told the mom is that she hates her life. She does not want to go to any school because she doesn't feel safe. Yes, for an apologies. He considers schools to not be safe. You can watch the video, and then you can analyze it and then give me the reason or not. But from my point of view, I repeat, I consider that they are not acting from the security, from the staff, as they should act. That is my humble opinion. And again, we have to look for solutions. How can we make the schools safer? Yes, we can. In his mind, so he also mentioned he has 20 years of experience working in security and he believes that the security at the middle school did not act accordingly. Additionally, he
035believes that there are ways to problem solve. Of course, there's always going to be problems. You know, there will always be problems, but there are ways of approaching these in a better way that does not lead to someone not wanting to be there anymore. or hating their life. Additionally, he did mention the student really enjoys school, but just does not want to go back to Isabel for her own safety. With my children, we have six. She is number six. I have five women and one man. The motto has been, when you do something, I want the truth. Because if you tell me lies, I can't take my face off for you. So even if you have done something wrong, I want to know. That has been the motto from the oldest to the youngest. He
036has six kids with him. He always asks for honesty and transparency He does not care whether you know they get in trouble or not, but he wants them to be honest Once there's no honesty between the family he can't really help them and get them out of those issues And so that being said he wants to just make sure that or reiterate that you know with his children He's here because he believes his kids are good kids And he said that if he did not believe his kids or that they were good kids he would not be here They will have their reasons. I am here because I want the best for my children. That is why I am here. If they cannot defend themselves, they have their parents, even if we don't speak English,
037but here we are. We don't feel ashamed to speak because we know we have a voice and a vote. I will just say he hopes that you guys don't take this lightly. He's very aware that he has a voice and he wants to be heard. He would not be here if he did not wholeheartedly believe in what he's standing for. Thank you. Now we have Maida Magana. I'm sorry. Someone else is giving him their minutes. Okay, thank you. But you have to see, I think you've already seen the videos, the other time it was two girls who attacked her. And they gave her the same punishment. And now there's a second time, they didn't punish her. But that's where you have to be careful, not to punish a student unjustly. Why? Because what my daughter
038told her mother happens. So he does, sorry, he wants to add, especially when it comes to punishing students, the way that these things are handled, because oftentimes, as he believes this is the case, From you know from an outsider's perspective his daughter may come off as a problem child because she's been in fights and whatnot But when you take a deeper look at things that's not the case The first time she was suspended the second time she was not suspended But this is something that he also wants to highlight just how schools are handling punishment And just in general the way the approach is because oftentimes these punishments are leading to more issues with students mental health and their own beliefs just what happened with his daughter and how what he expressed to mom additionally
039one thing he did mention was that he sent the videos of the girls attacking his daughter to the board and so they should have a video as well and they can see that and analyze and he hopes that you guys don't take this lightly I'm just a father of a family, but I have experience and always have. Some people who know me here know that I've always been involved in the education of my family. I don't just speak for the sake of speaking. I don't stay quiet. I don't like to stay quiet. I say what I think and what I feel. But if I can carry my grain of sand, I do it with pleasure. Why? Because my daughters were born here. I've been here since I came here. And I'm always looking for the
040good of the community. I've always been working. I've always been involved in football. I've been a coach for more than 20 years. Right now I have two football teams. Thank you for your time. So he spoke about being involved in the community. He's been a member of the community for over 20 years. He's always worked hard, but at the same time has always been involved in his children's education. He's also coaching two soccer teams, one for his son, one for his daughter. His main... focuses or what he focuses on with his kids and any other kid that he coaches are academics, schools number one and sports. And that's something that he reiterates over and over again with his kids. Again, he's a community member. He will always be able to, he will always speak up
041for what he believes is right. And in addition to that, he hopes this isn't taken lightly. And again, he does, he's not here to like cause trouble rather he wants to help problem solve and find better solutions to a lot of these issues that are occurring in our schools. Thank you. Next, we have Iris Diaz. Good evening. So I have major concerns in listening to what Javier Magana is talking about. My daughter will be going into middle school, and I do not feel that she will be safe. Perla is my sister, and I fear that there will be retaliation when my daughters start middle school because they are relatives. How can you ensure me that when I drop my daughter off at school, she will be safe and I do not have to be worrying
042about whether she's going to get in a fight? Because these fights can lead up to death and we know that. So how can I guarantee that at the end of the day, I will be picking up my daughter safe? This is the second incident that happens that we are fully aware of. How many other incidents have happened? I really ask that you guys really look into this because I am highly considering not sending my daughters to Isbell and moving them out of this district. Living in Santa Paula my entire life, I don't feel like I should have to move my daughters out from their friends, from what they know, what they're used to, because Isbell cannot keep our students safe. So I really hope you guys reevaluate how incidents are being handled. and how our
043security can better or get more experience on how to handle situations in a faster pace. We have more parents that are very concerned. It's not just myself. Unfortunately, we're unable to make it. So it's not just one, two, three, four parents that are concerned of what's going on at ISPA. So that's a big concern, that there's multiple parents. wanting to pull their students from not going to Isbell. My daughters are currently going to Glen City and I am very happy of how our principal is handling any incidents that happen within the school. And to be very honest with you, if we can keep each elementary go up to eighth grade, that would be ideal. And that's all I have to say, thank you. Sherry Egbert, I hope I got that right. I can pass it
044down. All right, thank you so much. I have one. Spanish? Wow. I have a speech prepared. Coming after what I just heard, I realize now it's even more important to share what I have to share with... Santa Paula Unified. My name is Shree Egbert and I am Ventura Council of PTA's president and we serve Santa Paula and VUSD's PTA's and I came with you today to share some really good news. We were recently awarded a grant from the Center of Family Engagement. We're only one of eight out of PTA's across the nation to receive this grant. When I wrote the grant I actually did talk about the problems we're having in schools and the fights and after COVID and how we've lost social connections. We've lost social skills. Families have been more disconnected and we
045need to bring, we need to build the community to strengthen the community, to help us love one another, to connect one another, have a sense of belonging and bring that back after COVID. Yvette Johnson, president of National PTA states, strong partnerships between families and schools are critical to support our students' success academically, socially, emotionally. And she also says there couldn't be a more urgent time for this. I wanted to share with you that there's like we updated the standards they were or they did they were done in 1998 but they were updated in 2002 after 2022 after interviewing a lot of families and there's a more of a lens of focus on diversity equity and inclusion They used to be more on test scores and now they've learned whole child learning. And it really comes
046down to the root. When you support the whole child, when you support everyone, the socially, emotionally, our needs, if we can strengthen the families, we can then achieve academic success. So you got to start back. But again, this starts at home. The bridge from home to the school is connected. So there's six pillars on that postcard, you'll see. And if you go onto the little square, you'll be able to learn more about it. But these are proven templates that prove to reduce discipline problems, help achieve, help a student achievement, and just make. a more happy more meaningful community i want to say that the new thing now is transformative family engagement empowering the parents and the families because parents will have really good solutions and with transformative it's not just informative it's fully engaged i
047wish i could say more i know my time's up but i just want to say what a superintendent said today to bring love into the conversation so people feel connected they are more likely to respond and improve the school thank you thank you next we have thomas kauf and i have veronica solis uh seating her time to mr kauf so you will have a total of six minutes thank you all for having me here today i'd like to speak to the bond measures a and b that have been proposed and are on the ballot for the March 5th election. And so I wanted to start out by saying, how are these bonds actually, how did they come about? How do they originate? And unfortunately, the way it happens is there's... Some companies, in fact, there's
048one very large company that does a lot of business. And what they do is they canvass all the small school districts. They go out to the small school districts and they say, hey, you know, we could get you some money. All you have to do is float a bond, and guess what? We'll do all the work. We'll do the footwork. We'll do a requirements checklist, so you'll have everything that you need. We'll do the election filings. We'll give you the promotional materials. And they do this out of the goodness. Oh, no. They actually charge a very hefty fee for this. And additionally, they receive commission on the bonds. Now, the district sees this as free money. It's good. Yeah, because we need money. Everybody needs money. You know, I would like to buy a new
049car, but I can't afford one. The campaigns that our big city advisors are based on, in part, is deception, misinformation, and falsehoods. Unfortunately, they're 80% successful. Only 20% of the bonds fail. What I sort of wondered when I heard about these bonds on January 24th in the Santa Paula Times is why hadn't I heard anything about these bonds? And so I started looking around. There was absolutely no information. And then two days later, I got the voter information guide. And strangely enough, there was no argument. against or rebuttal to the argument for in the voter information guide. Now, why would that be? Could it have something to do with the fact that on October 25th, there was a meeting of the school board where you approved these bond measures and they were due on for
050to the election office on October 28th. Nobody knew. So there was no information. Now, there were supposed to be stakeholder meetings, but I don't know of any stakeholder meetings. And in the meeting notes, there was supposed to be, you know, a group, all sorts of groups that were stakeholders, but property owners and the public were not stakeholders. Now, how could that possibly be? Then you published a facts on measure A and B pamphlet, and it was misleading and factually incorrect. Why would it possibly matter that measure A will not increase the tax rate the voters approved in the 2000 election? And why was this stressed four times? It was repeated. And how in the world does Measure A extend the tax rate of $66 for an additional 25 years? By law, the maximum rate that
051can be charged is $60 for a unified school district and $30 for a high school district. Well, I guess we should be happy that we're paying the maximum. And the actual term on both measures, 35 years. The pamphlet makes it look like Measure A replaces Measure D, and in fact, I've heard this repeated several times, and it absolutely does not. They're totally separate issues. Now, this pamphlet looks to me like it was produced by the district, which is not supposed to campaign. And I don't know how they got around that. Then, Superintendent, you publish a nice article in the Times apologizing for the confusing language when referring to the tax rate on bond measure A, but you didn't ever say where that language was. So people, and I've gone around to friends' houses, and they
052have that handy brochure out, and they still think that that's valid. Well... You stated that our goal is to always be transparent. And then you go on to make exactly the same confusing and meaningless claims from the pamphlet. For example, in your article, you state it will extend the original tax rate of $66 per 100,000. And it increases the rate from $20.70 to $60, an increase of $39.30. This is untrue. We'll continue to pay $20.70 on bond measure D, and in addition, we'll pay $60 on measure A. Now, also you use an example of $200,000. That's not anywhere near what the average price is for property in Santa Paula. And in fact, anybody who's purchased in the last 15 years will have an assessed value of over $500,000. Just a couple more points, please. For
053the $500,000 assessed value, it'll be $447.50 a year, which doubles our current property tax for school bonds. In addition, it'll cost over the term of the bonds $22,000 for each homeowner. So for the 91,000, the final debt incurred, or 91 million, the final debt incurred is $189 million. That's a lot. We'll be paying on these bonds till 2060. We'll be paying on six bond measures. If the measures pass, And how many more bond measures will be passed, introduced between now and 2060? Our kids will never be able to carry the debt burden that we're amassing. Senior citizens and people on fixed incomes are already suffering. And I have a lot more, but because my time is up, I will cede the microphone. Thank you very much. Thank you. Next we have Diane Wilkinson. Good evening.
054My name is Diane Wilkinson. I am the labor representative for the classified bargaining unit at Santa Paula Unified. Thank you to the trustees, superintendent, and most of all the classified staff here tonight for the privilege and honor to speak on their behalf. In keeping with the holiday, I want to, I'm here to ask the board to show some love to Cal's classified staff. actually it's not love I'm looking for what they deserve is your respect this is the third year that the district has come to the table to negotiate an incentive payment during summer school this payment is contingent on an employee's attendance now I've heard some call it a recruitment um and incentive but I disagree with that characterization that would be a signing bonus a pay adjustment or some sort of stipend attendance
055incentives are by their very nature a retention incentive it's an incentive for these employees to be present and consistent for the students they're serving for the duration of this important program So why only offer this to 10-month employees that accept summer positions? Isn't it just as important to have those 11- and 12-month employees that also facilitate summer school be present and consistent? Payroll, IT, custodians, just to name a few. While their calendars are different, while their hours are different, and while their duties vary widely, bargaining unit members have the equal essential value and they bargain united i'm going to make one more point very quickly as i said this is the third year that the district has come to the table and there isn't a single classified staff member that takes this incentive for granted
056or expect it to last in perpetuity but what they do expect is for the district to come to the table in good faith when cse countered to include 11 month and 12 month employees in this incentive they brought back the original proposal and it felt very much like a take it or leave it offer at best this is uncharacteristic of this district first of all and disrespectful the process so i'm asking you to find it in your hearts to include the essential 11 and 12 month employees in this in attendance incentive while it's still possible so that when we return to the table we continue to bargain in good faith like we do and find a fair and equitable solution thank you very much for your time happy valentine's day next i have vanessa hernandez
057Good evening, Superintendent, Governing Board, attendings and administrators. As a CACA Chapter 891 president, I'm here to, one of the things that have a challenge as a president is the unification. And unfortunately, this sets a division among a membership. And one of the things that I don't want this to create an issue, but to unify, to be inclusive. One of the things that I'm looking forward is to have a collaborative relationship with the district and among each other with the negotiations team that some of the members are here present to have a open dialogue open-minded as We it's not just a ten months. It's 11 and 12 months. There's a domino effect going more into detail with the Tom 1 employees as A lot of the 12-month employees takes a lot of tasks like our labor
058relations representative, Ms. Wilkinson has stated, the 12-month employees, which are our tech brothers and sisters, our maintenance, other classifications of CNNs, they take other tasks. For example, the maintenance department, they have a lot of projects that they need to complete during the summer period so we could get ready for the beginning of the new school year. With that being said, when they're being pulled away, to help and assist with other projects during the summer it makes it a little bit difficult and challenging to accomplish the projects that they have in mind within their department so therefore i'm asking that we should you know break those barriers and think outside the box and be inclusive that is my main goal as a president and i'm here to represent not just the 10 the 11 or the
05912 months i'm here to represent as the whole membership Because I believe we're all value and we contribute and we're an asset to each team and department of the district So I hope there's a consideration here. Dr Bond Kevin Olsen to see we can have an open dialogue and think more of What can we do for our membership? I think it's important that it will all contribute it will be an impact not just for our staff but also for our kids that that's obviously the primary goal to have a good impact for our kids to be academically successful. And it takes a village to raise a kid. So it takes the whole membership also to work as a group together with the district. So thank you. Thank you. Next I have Carmina Lita. Good evening,
060Board of Trustees and student trustees. I come to you with the same message. we are like a village it all takes us as a team to complete the summer school work unless something has changed where our 12 month and 11 month are not going to be asked to support the summer programs unless you have other employees to do the payroll to order the supplies, to deliver the supplies. I don't see what has changed. The last two years we've been included and we should be included this year also. And it feels very disrespectful and that we're not important as our other colleagues are. And that's simply not true. So I wish they would come back to the table and bargain in good faith. Thank you. Thank you. Now I will read two public comments that were
061submitted by email. The first one reads, ladies and gentlemen, though I can't be there in person, I want to share my thoughts on why including 12-month employees in the summer incentive program is crucial. Firstly, it's a matter of equity. Regardless of the duration of their contracts, all employees contribute significantly to our district's success. 12-month employees work tirelessly throughout the year, providing crucial support and continuity to our operations. Excluding them from the incentive program undermines their efforts and diminishes morale. Secondly, fostering unity and teamwork is essential for our district's success. When all employees are recognized and rewarded for their hard work, it promotes a sense of belonging and camaraderie. Including 12-month employees in the Summer Incentive Program strengthens our team cohesion and motivates everyone to strive for excellence together. Finally, it's about respect and appreciation. Every
062employee, regardless of their contract length, plays a crucial role in achieving our objectives. By including 12-month employees in the Summer Incentive Program, we show them that their contributions are valued and recognized. In conclusion, let's uphold principles of fairness, unity, and appreciation by including 12-month employees in our Summer Incentive Program. Together, we can create a work environment where everyone feels valued, motivated, and empowered to succeed. Thank you for your attention. Corey Kabakungen, administrative assistant to 12-month employee. And the last public comment reads, is from Liliana Nuno. And it reads, good evening. I was just informed of the negotiations that are taking place with the district and our union. The proposition was brought to the table by the district to offer only the summer school employees an incentive and leave the rest of the working union members
063zero. While I was hoping to see a reasonable counter, I was told that this was it. 12-month employees, zero extra. I've been a 10-month employee and know all the work that goes into running summer school, so I can appreciate the incentive. I also know that I need district personnel to support me during this time. By extending the incentive to include 12-month employees, we acknowledge and appreciate their invaluable contributions to the success of our summer school programs. We stand united in this dilemma. Some of you may know union is spelled U-N-I-O-N, and U is taking I out of the equation. Thank you for your time and consideration. And that is the last of our public comments for tonight. And thank you to everyone that was here or sent in your public comment. Moving on, sixth presentation,
0646A, the Multi-Tiered System of Support. Dr. Bradley. Good evening, Board President, Trustees, Superintendent, and viewing audience. My name is Letitia T. Bradley, and I am here with Dr. Bond. We are here to give a presentation regarding the Multi-Tiered Systems of Support. And so just to begin before we move into the presentation, as you guys know, I came before you about a year, maybe two years ago and did a presentation about MTSS. And so this one is not necessarily to teach you about what MTSS is, but it really is intended to give a snapshot of not only where we are currently, but where we need to go. And so we will be very transparent with where we stand and where we intend to move. But for the viewing audience, I think it is important. just to
065get a brief understanding. And so I just want to share the fact that it's really a systematic continuous improvement framework. It's not one thing. It's not one program. It is a consistent framework in which database decision making, problem solving approaches are put together to ensure that every student throughout our district has equal access to the interventions, to the support, so that they can really realize their academic potential and ensure that they receive and benefit fully from the educational system that we provide. So it's a systematic approach and I think that's very important because you will notice during the presentation that there are things that are missing and that's what the system is about. You start with where you are and you make a roadmap to where you intend to go. And so we're going to
066go ahead and get into the presentation. Yep. Okay, so what we've done here is we've kind of tied together some kind of core systems that we are either have in place or we are putting into place. If you look at the center circle, that is our learner profile that we've developed over the last year plus, year and a half. Around the outside we have our learning model and basically this is sort of the vision of what we want our students to become, what we're all working towards in terms of our outcomes when students go through our system and complete our system. And the outside sort of tells the strategies and the teaching tools we're going to use to make that happen. And then the circle to the right is simply what an effective district leadership
067looks like, all the different elements that need to be in place. And on the left side we have the MTSS model. And basically what we're trying to show here is how all these things work together and how they're interconnected. On the multi-tiered system of support, as Dr. Bradley stated, you have three key areas, academic, behavioral, social, emotional. And in the middle, I believe it was referred to earlier, is what this is doing is trying to develop the whole child, which is also the goal of our learning model. And so there's where the connection is. And then at the bottom, we've got the four areas of... of what needs to be in place in the systems and those kind of align with the pillars that we are developing in our student learner profile. I'm going to
068let Dr. Bradley. Thank you. And we would be remiss if we didn't really take a moment to give a kudos and a shout out, if you will, to the other members of the team who helped make this come together. Because as you know, MTSS really takes every single person. And so we're very thankful for Tim Smith, for Christina, and for Dr. Garcia and all the other individuals who helped either contribute in part or whole to the presentation, as well as to our next steps of what we're going to be doing. So when you're thinking about this, your job is obviously to see where we are and what what guidance needs to happen to make sure that we can move forward appropriately. And I think it's important to notice that that continuum of support is going
069to. it reveal itself in various ways right and so if you look at the graphic that we have before you we know that with mtss it comes in three tiers right and so you have your universal supports that are given to all students and these are the things that every single student should have access to no questions asked it is what we do it's the santa paula way it's what every single student should receive when they're in the classrooms and this uh graphic just breaks down and you'll see a different version of this for each area the idea of how are we approaching that data, right? And how are we approaching it for academics, behavior, and for emotional support? How are we doing our continuous improvement process? And the one thing that I want to
070talk about is the thing that we are going to be most intentional about going forward is the use of data and not just data. to show a graphic to you to check that box. But we really need to make sure that we're creating decision rules and we're having daily monitoring. We're monitoring our success and our failure so that we can identify the next steps that are happening. But this takes a collaborative approach and it takes a coordination of efforts. And so we're going to talk about some of the pieces of the puzzle that exists for the academic and we're talking, yes, I am the director of student support services, but I'm not going to just talk about social emotional learning because this whole piece is the puzzle. You have to take all the parts together
071to make the whole picture. And so I'm going to pass it on to Dr. Brown and talk about what we would be looking for with our academic instruction. I'm also not over academics, but I think what all this shows you is how the entire system has to be coordinated and has to work together so that we are support. We're all doing our part to support the whole child. And so a comprehensive assessment system. But kind of a formative assessment system where we're looking at data that's actionable that we can use to make, as Dr. Bradley said, that we can use to make decisions. Not at the end of the year, how did everybody do? Like the CASP is a summative assessment, right? It's really not that actionable. So it's what we do in the meantime
072to determine where there's gaps in academics and we create some plans to make those things help student outcomes. And so we have... The universal academic supports, our curriculum, our core academic program, the supplemental interventions, those include things like our intervention teachers at the elementary schools, some of the other supports that we have from the district office, intensified interventions and supports for students that are really struggling. That's where we bring in our SSD process, et cetera, for kids that are really continuing to struggle. And then the UDL is a tool that we use universally to support students in there and meet them where they are. And if you were to ask where is our biggest area of needed growth and continuity, if you will, we would probably, we would definitely tell you that it's in the
073behavior and social emotional areas. Many of you are aware that SEL is actually integrated within every single standard that teachers utilize. But what I think is not necessarily abundantly clear is the fact that Since it's already integrated, we need it to be more than just the counselors providing SEL lessons. We need it to be more than just the administrators administrating behavior supports. It has to be every single person singing one band, one sound. And so as we talk about the things for behavior support, you're going to hear these things about what are we doing universally? And one of our bold next steps is to try to balance the many wonderful initiatives that we already have in place, but make some of these supports and provide some. professional development in these areas so that we can
074lighten the load. You have to make the case and say, listen, this may seem like something else, but what it's intended to do is to make that process and help the students achieve their academic success through strong behavior and strong emotional supports. So not to belabor the point, the theme is the same across the board. And so, for example, with SEL, we will be doing the Daybreak Universal Screener, for example. This gives us a... real time data about how many students fall in each tier. And we're going to talk a little bit later about kind of some of the supports that we're providing. And then this one is really just to make sure that we bring together that to truly be doing MTSS correctly, we need to integrate all populations of students. And we can't
075leave any group out. And as you know, we've been making great strides from pre-K to 12th grade and making sure that the students have the supports that they need. And so the directors got together and talked about, so what are some of the supports that we provide for all students? Like, what are we doing? One of our big next steps is to be able to truly Cal. catalog what we're offering across the district. I think that we don't have a clear enough picture. We have pockets of promise and islands of excellence, but we need to be able to say not only what are we doing across the board and how are we analyzing it to determine if it's effective. And so as you see here, this is just kind of some of the universal supports
076that exist for all students. We do have a curriculum, for example, and we want the sites to have autonomy, but we need to have a through line. Right. And so right now, different sites implement different levels of curriculum, including Second Step and Leader in Me, but we need to ensure that we're saying what is the base that we want all students to get and how will we know if it's effective and what support do we need to do to help remove barriers so that the teachers can do it a lot more clearly. We also felt it was very important because every single population is integrated to give you a bit of an idea of what the individualized programs are across three of our different groups and I'll definitely let Dr. Bond kind of start this
077process. Okay, so again, we're talking about universal access and Tier 1, and these students in these populations are part of that group. We do not treat special education kids as not Tier 1 students. They are part of our first instruction. They're part of all of our Tier 1 MTSS supports. But we do have... We do have qualified teachers to address all of these populations, but by definition, if you're in special education, you have an individualized education plan, and so there are some things that sort of make them a little bit different. But again, it's all about the least restrictive environment and how we can meet their needs. using their IEP, but also within the system that we give access to all students. Early education, again, you know how we're rolling that out with our credential
078teaching staffs. We have kind of a higher level of expectation there as well, and we're working really hard to integrate all the pre-K so that they seamlessly move up into our regular K through 12 education. Emergent bilinguals, we make sure that we have the right credential support for the students that are receiving that. And the EL shadowing is another strategy. And again, a lot of these, I can tell you that a lot of these strategies are just good teaching strategies. And so they're specifically targeted at the emergent bilinguals, but a lot of them are used for other students as well. Thank you. And hopefully what's starting to come together is this concept of the fact that we have many, many things that are occurring. But in order for us to truly have a multi-tiered system
079of support, not only do we have to know what we're offering, but we have to be able to identify the effectiveness of it. And this is the piece that is our biggest area of growth. How do we know what we're doing is working and without taking too long? Ultimately, what we will want to have, and this is like a snapshot, is like I said, a catalog of all the things that we're offering. And then we want to have targets of growth over time so that we can see if incremental growth is occurring, if there needs to be a readjustment to our strategies. Oftentimes, we move full steam ahead and we don't stop, look at the data, and decide what the next steps are. And this is a graphic that may look familiar. I had shown
080you this version for the student support services side. We're proud that our team has grown from three individuals to... right now about seven or eight total who are working together to provide meaningful supports for our students. And so not to just belabor the point, what I think I really want to point out is this fact that we are really starting to get more intentional and utilizing different task force and bringing different groups who've never come together before, who are feeling included in the conversation and the process. And so we have a mental health task force. We are going to be reopening our social emotional learning task force. And yes, we use task force a lot, but I think what it's meant to communicate is that we are including all stakeholders in that conversation so that
081the solution doesn't seem like it's top down, that we're getting the input from the people who will be boots on the ground. And I think that's very much important. We also know that the board wanted to know about the role of the mental health associates and how will they fit into the puzzle. And I will be very honest with you, right now we are trying to ensure that not only is the board aware, but that the public is very clear of all the different supports. We're fortunate to have received a multi-million dollar grant to build this support system. And what we found when we did the universal screener a couple of years ago is that we have a... large number of our students who need tier two support. Many of them have experienced trauma in
082their lives and they are trying to manage that trauma while learning in this in the educational setting. And so the focus of the mental health associates, we heard loud and clear from counselors, from families that we don't have enough supports for students who are on that bubble. They haven't necessarily. falling off the cliff, but they need support now and they need support often. And so as you can see here, we're slated to have. five mental health associates hired. And I will be very clear that attracting them is a challenge because as you know, many other districts also have the same type of setup with respect to either this grant or something similar. So attracting high quality individuals is our challenge to overcome and we will overcome it and space. And so we're trying to make
083sure we have where they are, but they're gonna be tier two focus. Their primary role is to catch students who are starting to show signs of decline. before it gets it starts to impact their grades and impacts their relationships with students and family we want to make sure they have on-site support and so these will be first year or second year graduates who don't quite already have their full lcsw yet because they haven't done all their hours so it's intended to create a pipeline and the interns on the right hand side their intent is we want to do things that will encourage our own students our own community members to be a part of this process and go into the field because they understand the challenges that our students face so the intent is that
084you have a set of interns who will receive a stipend and then we will encourage them to go the further step of get finishing their program in the hopes that we can hire them and then you may be asking well leticia how are you going to pay for this because we know that funding is a problem. Well, as you may have heard, there has been some increases in efforts for medical billing. to expand it beyond our traditional billies and this is a effort that's going county-wide we were the only at the direction of the board and the superintendent we were the only district in ventura county to apply for the first cohort unfortunately because they wanted more support we didn't get it but we got a guaranteed spot in cohort two so we are very
085proud of that fact because we will be at the table when this comes to fruition Do we know how long that will take? We don't know because this is new. We usually are under FERPA, but this will be a HIPAA situation. So we have to have different systems that we put in place to collect medical records, make sure that that information is secure. And so this is just a snapshot of what they will be focusing on. The interns have very specific things that they have to meet. And before we go into the bright spots. I want to invite Dr. Garcia up. And so we were collaborating on this process. And what she has put together is a phenomenal one pager that will give you a snapshot of our path forward, right? Because we didn't want
086to get up here and say, we're doing X, we're doing Z, a song and dance. We want to be honest about where we are, but provide a clear roadmap to where we're going. And so she's going to pass this out. I'll give her a moment to talk briefly about the document. Good evening board president board members superintendent and our student board members so in collaboration we put this document together just for a quick look and it's hot off the press we received or put together a nice image that we got in a training last Thursday with the Learner-Centered Collaborative. And so we wanted to update our presentation and also give you just a sense of how the systems are all going to work together. And so I will quickly take you through this. So the
087first page you should be looking at says building a multi-tiered systems of support through the integration of SPSD's Framework for the Future and our LCAP. And so if you are on that page. give you a moment just to make sure that you are there. And so this is really about bringing the multi-tiered system of supports together with our learner profile, our learner model, which constitutes the framework for the future. And so you can see on the right hand side, that is the work that we have been doing under the direction of Dr. Moore for the last two and a half years. We're launching our schools focuses. We are also launching our learner profile and embedded within this is our project based learning. And so this will all be students, student centered, inclusive and equitable, authentic
088competency based. That's the outer circle, which is the learner model. And then we see the pillars that uphold this. And that in totality is our SPSD framework for the future. In the center, you can see the MTSS umbrella that is California's image and model for MTSS, which brings together academic. behavior and social emotional and it's undergirded by the essential domains and features to support the whole child and so these images will help to really bring that to clarity for you and believe me there will be a lot more presentations on mtss because it's a lot to really wrap your mind around so if you flip to the other side there is a key question to help frame your thinking and the frame question is how does our spusd framework for the future support the whole
089child which is the mtss system and so this is bringing together our models so our framework for the future as dr bond alluded to earlier is our north star it's what we are pointing to for all of our students and it's very student centered it's connected to the whole child domain and then down on the left hand side that's our spusd learning model that i connected to you two on the front side of this and then we can see over on the right bottom right is how the pillars support and are directly aligned to the california mtss domains and essential features so thanks so much thank you dr garcia and so as we uh wrap up and come to a conclusion of this part of our presentation. We do have some bright spots, some things
090that are happening, but a lot of work that needs to be done. We are expanding our restorative justice in that we know that finances can be a bit of a challenge. And so we are training our peer mentors and I call some of the elementary peer teenies. We have individuals who are learning these skills themselves and now they are able to help provide services for students. And we have one restorative justice facilitator. Dr. Lawrence is taking over the student success team process, student study team process, depending on how you call it. She's going to be taking over that process and ensuring that we have a seamless alignment between when the student is starting to struggle and whether or not they get the appropriate supports potentially to prevent them from ever... getting assigned to special education
091services unless they truly need it. We want to make sure we don't have any disproportionality. And then we're doing things with our SAR process. We're very proud that our SAR process is being touted by the district attorney as one of the best ones that we have in the county. And they really say it's our favorite one to come to because of the approach that we utilize. And we ensure that special education is at the table and all individuals are involved. So on the horizon we mentioned this idea of that task force which will include the directors as well as administrators, associate superintendents, assistant superintendents, teachers as well. We want to make sure that all individuals are at the table. We need to analyze what we're doing and ensure that our learner profile is fully integrated,
092not just in deed and in images, but in what we do every day, as well as the integration with our LCAP goals. Everything, if it's not tied together, won't be successful. And then we want to share what we're doing this process and give them regular updates, have accountability. But we're honest in the sense that we have a long way to go, but we're doing a lot of amazing things, but they are not connected in a meaningful way. way. So we have pockets of promise, but we have to make that connection. And then we're looking at the possibility of doing an assessment, internal assessment to decide what our next steps would be. And these are the steps that we take that ensure that we have growth in a meaningful level. We do a lot of work
093every day, but the next step is to ensure that it's intentional, it's measured, and it's communicated on a regular and ongoing basis. And with that, we pause for questions. Thank you. Any questions from our board members or student board members? Well, this is somewhat new to me, and I know you discussed it last year briefly. Just a quick question, and maybe you did answer this, but mental health associates, do we currently have some? And are they, what's their role like at Isbell? No, great question. So we just got approved via the board and through the personnel commission to fly the positions. And so we will be flying those positions now. So we don't have any, but we do have one intern. And so the role that they'll have is ultimately to answer that part of
094your question is a member how we said we're going to we want them to do that mild, moderate group of individuals who are struggling in the regular setting, but not necessarily in the point at the point where they need the mental health counselors. So just to kind of create that kind of continuum, you have your traditional counselors, which handle every day, every day. issues that the students may see. And then the associates will be, let's say for example, if a student is having trouble with grief, they're having difficulty interpersonal with their peers that can't be handled by the traditional counselor, the mental health associates would be the ones to be able to step in on that. And then our mental health counselors tend to do the tier three, you know, suicidal ideation, more severe things
095than anywhere in groups as well with the students. And so ultimately, they'll be that middle. And one of the things that we do see is that it's a problem for a lot of our parents to access services outside of the school setting. And so having those associates on campus will allow us to integrate them not only with the wellness center, but also provide remove that barrier of access for some. So I just want to make sure I'm clear. So I'm on slide 13, mental health associates. How different is that position? to the associate mental health therapist that we approved back on December the 11th of 2023. So what's the difference in the two positions? It's the same position. Same position. Okay. So I was very clear. And again, I'm stating it from my perspective that
096because we're talking about. And my through observation, we're talking about whole child. We're talking about tier two intervention, tier three interventions, whole learning outcomes. I want to make sure that these are not classroom or school based individuals. Now, I get that there's a good portion of that their work needs to be on campus, but they need to be in the field. They need to be in the homes. If we're going to make an impact in our lives, in our students' lives, especially when we're talking about those Tier 2 and Tier 3 individual students, it cannot be a school-based position. I understand we're talking interns. I understand we're talking those that don't have all the expertise to be in the field. But we need to get them up to speed on that because that's where the
097intervention is going to take place. It's not a classroom. It's not on the playground conversation. It has to be at home because who are we really trying to attract here? We've got to get to the parents. And if there's one thing we've learned in many of the problems that we're dealing with, when it comes to behavior as you pointed out is probably one of our one of our number one issues it's the the change definitely staffing pbil i'm familiar with that that concept but it's really getting to the parents so thank you i can't understate that enough that that has to be an in the field position I'd go a little further, actually, because I think that one of the things that I notice is that parents, families are mentioned, but they're not integrated. I
098mean, why wait until Tier 2? I mean, we need to be working to gain trust and support. from our parents, right, when they're in tier one. Because once we start getting into the tier two, that's when problems are happening, right? That's not a time where we should be trying to earn trust. That should have already been established. And we do, right? I mean, we do a fairly patchy job at, you know, community and family engagement, right? Which is one of the things I've been, you know, over this last term, right? Kind of harping on, right? And fits, but, but I mean, I think, gosh, where do I start? Like, I have a ton of questions, right? And I don't, I'm not going to answer them all. Right. But like, when, when I see something like
099this, I'm like, okay, that's great. Pretty pictures, lots of acronyms, right? And lots of phrases, you know, I'm really, you know, really want to get to, okay, well, what does that all mean, right? So let's start with this learner-centered profile, right, which is... I think rightfully becoming the basis of kind of where we go from, right? And I'm glad to see it being used throughout these things, but I still have no idea how you measure whether we've created a compassionate collaborator or what that actually really even means. You know, and there's things like that kind of throughout these things where I go, okay, right? You know, I've been around long enough to know that, you know, Education is full of acronyms and programs and this and that, right? So I'm glad you're saying we need
100this data to support it, but we need to know what we're trying to measure. How do we know when it's a success? And it might be difficult to get to that data. I mean, some of these things are qualitative in nature. When you're looking at someone's social-emotional health, You know, what do we do? Are we, I mean, do we screen and create an index and do all that other stuff? Or, you know, is it going to be, you know, a little bit more qualitative than that? So I get the challenge for it. So, so I really do want to, at some point, you know, this is really for Dr. Moore, delve into that learner center profile, because I don't think as a board we have, right? And if this is central, And we're the vision
101and policymakers, right? We very least need to understand, like, what does this mean and how does this more directly impact how we're going to change things? So, like, you know, for instance, that task force, this MTSS task force, you know, I don't know if it's appropriate to have, you know, parents and students, you know, on that as well, you know, to always, dare I say, a board member, right? always focused on them, right? Instead of just imagining what we think that they need. You know, because, and again, and I get it, right? Like, you know, it's hard to get parents out, you know, and sometimes, you know, this is very technical in nature, you know, trying to bring them along and have them making meaningful contributions can be tough. But I do think we need
102to do it. I don't know if you guys want to respond before I go on to something else. You bring up a good point and and I I know that learner centered collaborative is the organization that we're working with That helped us over the last two years develop the learner profile They are very interested in doing some type of a board workshop to to Make sure that the board is clear on the direction that we're going in terms of measuring it We just we just finished up a two-day leadership retreat with Learner Centered Collaborative last week. And the next step. in the learner profile is then to develop what we're going to call a scorecard. And that scorecard, we're going to take the time to identify what is a courageous collaborator? What does it look
103like? What are some of the actions that a student could do to develop that particular characteristic? So that's the... the work that's coming up with with that organization and we hope to have that developed by the end of the year because we want to incorporate that into our our lcap and to add to the piece on measurement and data uh all three of these areas with mtss you know academic social emotional etc in addition to the learner-centered collaborative that dr moore just referred to there are robust sets of tools that are out there And I think what we will need to do, and this will be the work of the task force, is to really analyze those tools, bring them together in a meaningful way so that we can see aspects of all of these
104within the tools themselves. I spent the last few days just researching all of the tools that do exist for data analysis, and they're very robust. And I know that the team, once we collaborate, will come up with things that are meaningful. And I know that it's progress, not perfection. And so we are moving forward and have actually moved forward quite a bit. um with our learner-centered profile and its development and so thanks to dr moore's leadership it's the first time in my career here as an administrator that i've seen something of this magnitude because it has significant implications for the future Just some more kind of questions slash comments. And these are not in any real particular order because that's the thing that struck me the most, right? But like UDL, how much is that
105being used? right throughout the district like our because i've gone through udl training and it's a it's a bear like there's a lot to it like our teachers actually trained in delivering or like use utilizing udl in their classrooms and in their lessons Like, UDL, I hear that and it scares me. I want to run away. They do, and I don't know if it's every credential program, they do cover that in the credential program, but that is something that training that we're looking at for the future because it pairs well with the learner profile. Okay. The medical billing, my gosh, right? Like, that's awesome to hear. that we're moving forward with, you know, that program, which I only barely understand, but it seems good, right? But that's okay. You know, anything, again, I work with
106the CSVA and their platform, right? And anything that we can, you know, explain about that process to them so that they can advocate for change for us is really important and impactful. For instance, right, and I forgot to mention this, like I've told them about RTK, right? They know that we're one of the actually few districts throughout the state that offers it to everyone. And we're going to get tagged by the state because of it. They know that they want to work with us to understand our experience so that they can advocate that that's a bad idea to punish people who are trying to do more. right so in the same way the medical billing is a political nightmare right but we got to keep on advocating for that because which comes to my next
107question like how much of this right now is based on one-time money like if you guys had to get and i give us an idea is it and maybe this is let's get us all up there right you know like is it 25 is it 75 you know because understanding that is huge given what we're going to have to go through with our budget and also given the ambiguity of what the next budget cycle is going to really look like. Want to give it a guess? No, how much of this is actually being funded by one time? Because I know a lot of it is. I can add to it. So basically the entire mental health associate program is, is five, one time over five years, five, one time money. And that I'm okay with,
108right. You know, but I know like, cause that just started, we've got a clock, but I don't like, is ESSER done, right. You know, the L-E-L-R-E or whatever they're all the freaking names are of all these dumb programs. I mean, we've got a short clock on those COVID funds. Well, the post-COVID funds, right? Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Maybe that's the one. And I'm a little bit afraid that they're going to take that back, right, this year. Okay, that makes me breathe a little easier. And if I may add to the real work of MTSS is not necessarily, and I hope this comes out correctly, it's not position driven. It's just digging in and doing the work, right? So we could, even if we lost some of these funds, we can still take what we have, reorganize
109it and reshuffle it so that we can support the students accordingly. But that's how, that's why we have to analyze it to make adjustments. Okay. school counselors, mental health, wellness staff, psychologists, they're all part of different departments, right? How do we differentiate when they're supposed to be providing the universal supports? Like, how are we working as a team? Or are we not? And that's okay, because I kind of think that we're not necessarily, but you can surprise me, right? Listen, the surprise is that we are working far more better as a team this year than we have in the past. And so what we're starting to do with that mental health group that's going through... talking to each of those stakeholders to say, wait a minute, how does a kid go from point A to
110B to C? And what we acknowledge is right now that roadmap is unclear, but it's because it's a yes and. So what we're doing is we're going to create a visual that shows you. how many different people in our system can provide the same support and then we'll have a centralized group to help funnel them to the appropriate one based upon their case loads and availability so it's almost like a conductor you need someone that's taking all those cases and giving them to the appropriate people at the right time and i think we didn't have a quarterback that was focusing specifically on that and we do have that now with that mental health position I probably have too many questions and I'm going to stop right there, but I might be sending an email. So
111maybe not this Friday, right? But a board update on some of those other ones. Thank you. Student board members, do you have any questions or comments? I was wondering since... I got reminded of the public comments about Ms. Magana and her situation. Is she being helped by any of these associates? So we wouldn't discuss any specific case in this regard, but I can tell you that in any situation similar, they are getting access to those supports. Just wanted to make sure that it's like there's being help to students that are that need it. Thank you. Thank you. Anyone else? Any comments or questions? Okay. Thank you all for your presentation. Moving on. 6B, special population supports. Surprise, it's me. All right. This one will be succinct, yet hopefully provide a little bit of information regarding
112some of the special populations. Just to be clear. We were thinking about integrating it within the other presentation, but they are sufficiently different. And so we wanted to separate it to be able to allow for discussion and conversation. And so for the purposes of this presentation, I'm going to be focusing on a few special populations. And we know that we have many in our system. And so how do the how does the student support services team come together to support it? I couldn't put all the boxes. of all the different individuals that work under this umbrella, but I wanted to give you kind of an overview because I hear sometimes that there is a little bit of confusion of how it all fits together. I'm not claiming that this one graphic will fit it all
113together. However, I wanted you to be able to see some of the support systems that we have in place. And so currently with that program administrator, as we talked about in the last presentation, she oversees the trainees, the mental health associates, and works very closely. with our mental health counselors. Once we centralized the mental health counselors, it went a long way in ensuring that we can pull all the cases together, look at them in a united front, give consultation when necessary, and make sure that they get actual assistance a whole lot faster. We also have district nurses that actually play a surprising role in this. It's not just putting a band-aid on an ouchie or going to do a presentation. They actually are part of the screening process if they see warning signs, if we
114have suicidal ideation, when we do re-entry plans. They play an integral role, and we actually are utilizing them to help increase attendance by ensuring that they call families who are approaching that chronic. absenteeism rate. So we're saying, hey, if you're having so many illnesses, you may need some additional support from us. And so right now we know that some families are like, wait a minute, why are you calling me? I've never been called before like this, so I don't like it. But some are very appreciative of the fact that we're reaching out from multiple ways, working with the outreach specialists as well. We have a vacancy for our outreach specialist position, and we also have a restorative justice facilitator who is amazing, but thinly spread. He is going to every site every day. But what
115we're trying to do is improve his access to his training for the other people who are on the site so that he can expand out a little bit more. And then we also work with the SROs and we also have an LVN position that has yet to be filled. That is intended to supplement. And just to kind of quickly say with the district nurses, we do have supplemental contract nurses right now. As you may be aware, due to the high number of needs that we have in our district at any given moment. one could walk away and then we would be out of compliance. And so yes, it is as a cost, but until we get two permanent nurses that we know will stay with us, we can't take that gamble of being out of
116compliance and not being able to meet the needs of the students. And so just a little information about the four that we're gonna focus on today. We wanted to give you a little bit information about not only our migrant students. but our foster youth, McKinney-Vento, and teen parents. Oftentimes, some of these get conflated and people don't always understand what it really means to be in one of these populations. And so for the board and also the benefit of the viewing public, we wanted to just give a brief description of what would... qualify to fall in these categories and just give you some data about how many we're servicing and what we're doing for them. And so as you can see, and thank you to Dr. Ramirez for giving me all the information for the migrant
117workers, it was very much appreciated. And so migrant students, sorry. And so as we know, a migrant student is qualified as a child of migratory worker with some additional qualifications. There has to be movement between districts over a period of time, and it has to be. an economic necessity. So similarly to McKinney-Vento, if for familial purposes, if because we love living together, if you're doubled up, you wouldn't necessarily be considered McKinney-Vento. But if you're doing it out of economic necessity, then that double up would qualify you for services. And so we also have a number of teen parents here within the district. And it's important to note that in some cases, we have both the mother and the father of the child. in the district and sometimes we don't and so sometimes that makes it
118a little bit harder to pin down the numbers because we have both male parents and female parents who are taking care of their students and in some cases the father is the sole caregiver and so we're going to give you a little bit more information about that. We are fortunate to have a very small foster youth population. Foster youth students though have a ton of supports that are available to them. So much so that we need to make sure we're targeting, we have less than 10 foster youth students. And so we need to make sure that they're getting every single resource that is available to them. And so talking a little bit about the migrant students, and I'll definitely invite Dr. Ramirez to fill in any gaps if necessary. There are a number of services
119that are being provided to them on an ongoing and regular basis. And we collaborate. departments also when necessary. As you can see this is but a snippet of information and you may have noticed the difference in the number between the Santa Paula 70 that what you see on the left hand side is the district-wide snapshot of not sorry not district-wide county-wide snapshot of how many migrant students we have throughout our county and then i blew up the santa paula so that you can see um and so with the county they count other individuals beyond just your tk to 12 and in fact am i characterizing that appropriately and so um we have 55 tk to 12. currently but as you know this number changes sometimes on a weekly or daily basis depending upon our enrollment
120at any given time and then we also gave you a breakdown of how many we have at each at each level and we have 31 in the elementary schools and they get different supports that are included but not limited to transportation we have been fortunate to be able to provide additional transportation support not just to in-school activities but we can now get students to out of school enrichment activities so we can increase the likely that they are enjoying the learning process and getting access to education. They also get a chance to go to different conferences and they all participate in extended summer school and Saturday school and there's 20 days each for those so I wanted to make sure you guys were aware of that and then we're very proud of the district speech and
121debate program. As I mentioned, the foster youth is kind of a tricky thing because you know with data you normally don't want to identify when it's such a small number because you never want them to feel that they are singled out. We are not singling them out in this regard, but when we provide them resources, we really can't do the traditional come one, come all, let's have all the foster parents come to a single meeting because it can be a little bit sensitive and it's easy to know exactly. who all five are, so they get individual support. We have individuals from VCOE who come out and help them with FAFSA. They are entitled to, and I wanna make this plug, they can get free cell phones support, computer support. They will get someone to hold
122their hand to ensure that they get their FAFSA completed. And as you may be aware, the district is required to get 100% FAFSA completion. So we have to, regardless of their status, make sure that every single student gets the FAFSA completed, and we're very proud. the work that Santa Paula High School is doing in that regard and they just emailed me about making sure that that continues to go on throughout the school year. And so McKinney-Vento, as I mentioned before, that one is a tricky type of situation because it's not the traditional homeless on the street that you may envision. The McKinney-Vento student falls in a few categories and some of them include inadequate housing. See, a lot of times people forget that they could be living in a trailer. They could not have proper
123heating. It's not just literally on the street the way that we feel, but we think. But we've gotten additional funding to support them in unprecedented ways this year. And so, as you can see on the screen, we have the numbers. And I say that they're approximate because the reality is they change at any given moment. And one of the biggest struggles that we have right now, and I'm going to put it out there, is those individuals who are. free unhoused, meaning they're on the cusp facing eviction, not there yet, but we don't have enough supports for those individuals. And we know we have a wonderful community of supports. And so if there are individuals who want to support that group, we would really be appreciative in that regard, especially this idea of getting them. uh
124hot spots we see a lot of people come in we do sign them up for low-cost hot internet services because we make sure that they get access to that but we have a lot of individuals who are still struggling but not quite homeless that need some support but this just gives you a snapshot throughout the county there are 7069 we have 350 and unfortunately growing at this moment and so we are working with um the spirit of santa paula we work with all the organizations to give as much support to them as pos as we can I wanted to give you a snapshot of the budgets that we're working with with respect to the McKinney-Vento because as I mentioned previously, we're having amounts that we have not seen before, but we may not ever see
125again. And so as you can see on the left hand side, we have money that has been set aside. Thank you, Dr. Ramirez and our team. $20,000 to support them. We have two American Rescue Plan funds. And so one of them is $90,000 and the other is $25,000. And you may be saying, oh my goodness, that is a lot of money. And you would be right. However, our transportation, for example, right now we pay for a car service. each ride is in excess of $75 each way each day. And so as you can imagine, we can spend in excess of $7,000 just to provide transportation. We are very proud of the fact though that through our SAR process and through our attendance review team process, we have identified students. whose sole reason they weren't coming
126was transportation. And if they fell in the McKinney-Vento program, then we were able to eliminate that issue. And now their attendance is increasing. We've been very intentional on what we've been doing for attendance for all parties. But the McKinney-Vento, we're very proud of what we've been doing so far. On the right is just a snapshot of some of the supports we provide. And we want to highlight some of the ones that you may not necessarily know. We now with the ARP HYC grant can do things like provide support if the parents car breaks down. We never had the freedom to be able to do that before. We obviously can provide gas cards, glasses, prescription medications. We even buy pillows and and blankets for students and make sure they have the hygiene items that we need.
127And we allow them to pick it out because we don't want them to feel stigmatized by the, you know, the traditional sweatsuit or something that, you know, everyone can tell. So we try to make sure that they feel cared for and supported. And we also provide mileage reimbursement for families when they are driving the students to and from school. One of the things that we're starting to ramp back up is the internet hotspots. As I mentioned, this is an ongoing struggle for many of our families and we want to ensure that any of our students experiencing either they are experiencing homelessness or are unhoused know that we have that available for them and they can come to our department to get support. We also wanted to give you a little bit of information about our
128teen parents. Right now we have a total of nine known because as you are aware some may or may not ever tell us and unfortunately we've seen an increase in students who have either terminated their pregnancy or lost their pregnancy so it underscores the need for additional health care and awareness for those individuals who are experiencing this and we want all students to know that they can reach out for assistance and get guidance on prenatal care and anything as far as nutrition. and whatnot and our team works together. Our mental health counselors take this on and they help to make sure that those individuals have access. But we also are doing is not just handing them resources. We're trying to increase agency and teach them how to advocate for themselves and how to access the
129many resources that are available. We have one one student accessing child care at the moment and we ensure that that child care is available throughout the year and as well as during the summertime so that the individual can participate in summer school and we've. added requirements for that service. So we want to encourage those individuals to keep their grades up so that we can continue to support them in this regard. And we're very proud of the work that's happening with respect to the teen parents. And so that really is a snapshot of some of the things that we're doing with respect to our special populations. But what I wanted to bring up that I didn't. I think I might have zoomed past is one of the next steps that we really want to do. As
130you saw, we have about $100,000. We don't have that anymore, but we have been had we had access to about $100,000 that is expiring. We will be bringing to the board for consideration the purchase of a van because once. the funds run out we won't be able to get some of these students to school and we will be working out how the logistics will work but i feel like it's a use it or lose it type of thing and we don't have storage to buy tons of clothing and we don't want that to go to waste we want to do something meaningful that can be partnered with our other program so we can partner up with the middle schools and the high schools and other programs that exist and let them utilize that van as
131well and we really want to we've been working with vcoe and we're going to work on that process to try to try to bring that to fruition and that concludes the presentation thank you very much does anyone have questions student board members and now our board members Sure, just the McKinney-Vento number seems to fluctuate quite a bit. I remember in a presentation at some point we were at over 600. How do we identify? That is the challenge that we face. So one of the challenges is that we get this information during registration. And one way is through the registration electronic system. The other way is through a paper system that is given to the site. The sites turn it into us and we clerk it. So we believe that that number is higher. However, it
132has been consistently around the 350 to 400 mark during the last couple of years. So we think it's somewhat accurate, but we also know that there's a stigma associated with it and some don't want to answer the information correctly. But I will say we do not confirm. So we don't want to add any shame to it. So if someone tells us that's their situation, then we take it as at face value. Any other questions from anyone? Yeah, I've got one so on slide two it you're referencing school resource officers SROs plural At our two by two meeting the presentation was that we have one SRO Can you confirm that we do have one working with us? Is that? We have one that is correct. What I was trying to communicate is that that program falls
133under my purview. And so I'm thinking positively and that we will return to SROs. And going with that. So by all means, I mean, I would like to get there as well. One of the things that I'm struggling with is that just like we see it in classified services, we see it in certificated services, we have job descriptions that lay out what are the responsibilities for the person there. As I presented at the January 24th meeting, it takes a specialized person to be there. And I think Commander Starna and our newly elected or hired Chief Aguilar, i think they're hearing us and i think they want to work with us and and i and i respect that so at our two by two meeting they respectfully said that they have their own criteria but it's
134up to us to get to get ours so And I know that in Ventura, the three SROs that work at the Unified School District work under a department like yours, under the Student Support Services. So can I ask you to please get those job descriptions so that we then have something to fall back on? And then that gives you clearer guidance on how you can then encourage them or direct them on what type of work you want. Because I'll be very clear, we are going to be revisiting. SROs at the end of the school year and we have to make sure we have data that says that this program and its current status is working for us or is not. So start keeping your data because I will be asking those types of questions. How
135many times we're activating our SROs, SRO right now, what type of services do you see them more engaged in? Do you feel like we need an additional SRO? Those are the types of questions I know that I'll be asking at the end of the year as we evaluate the. the effectiveness of the program. So very good. And we will be building upon just to kind of give a little context. What we do have right now is through our MOU process, we have the duties that we expect them to do that we negotiate every year. But what I feel like we're also missing is the habits of mine and the characteristics necessary to be a successful SRO. And so we will combine I will get that information and we'll combine the two to make sure that
136we have a comprehensive document. Any other questions or comments? I'm happy to see that we're supporting our one student with a child or that we're actually providing daycare. I know we used to do that at number eight Palm Court and earlier the house down where we have the parking lot now. And I remember seeing strollers and what a benefit it seemed like to be able to offer that on campus. And I hope that the system now is working well for this student. Anyone else? I just want to say thank you for both of the presentations. Thank you for the breakdowns in the special populations. I, too, agree with Trustee Wilson on the one parent who is accessing the child care and for the four expecting. I hope that they too take advantage of the supports
137that our district offers. And for the identifying for the different populations, I know that there's a lot to do with confidentiality and the stigma of the different populations or the titles that come with them. But like for the migrant program. When things happen like in center courts or like at the schools where different services are offered or just information is given to the students, is something like that done for that program, for the migrant program specifically? I just see 70 students being a part of that program as pretty low for being the community we are here in Santa Paula. Well, good evening. One of the things with our migrant program is that in order for them to qualify for to receive migrant services, there has to be a move in the family. So many times
138our students expire. So it's a three year service. So then when they get re interviewed, they don't qualify anymore as migrant. They're still working in agriculture. Their families may work in agriculture and the fishery in the in the nursery, many different, but they don't make a. qualify and move. Therefore, they don't qualify any longer to receive migrant services. There was a time where the high school had over 300 students. Us as an elementary district, we had over 400, right? So, but because parents are not moving anymore because of the... because they understand and they say they need other children staying in one place so they can have that solid foundation they no longer move with the children so then they no longer qualify for services so In addition, we used to be in charge of
139our migrant program, but now our migrant program is managed by Ventura County Office of Education. So they do all the interviews. Before, we used to have our own recruiter, and I think that made a big difference because Veronica Solis was our recruiter, so she knew the family. She could go out and have meetings. So just recently... I want to say 2 weeks ago we had a day here on Saturday where we offered opened up to for the storm assistance program for our agricultural families. And then they also used it as a recruiting. Uh, method, and we're going to do another 1 on March 9th. So we're always trying to find families who may qualify. So a lot of our newcomer families that enter, we right away send that information out to the recruiters at the
140county so that they can then be able to, um, to interview them and see if they qualify. But that's why that number is so low because our families are not moving and that's across the, um, the, the county. Yeah, thank you for clarifying that. Um. Just thank you for the information and the presentations and the time going into them. Okay, moving on. Seven information discussion. 7A, the discussion on bond measures A and B. Okay, and we have Isarius. Good evening. Can you hear us? John, can you hear us? Yes. Yes, I can hear you. Sorry. I know. I'm mute. So at the request of the board, this was put on the agenda so that the board could interact with Mr. Isom on questions that they have or concerns that they have with the measures A
141and B. So we should open it up for questions. Okay. Who wants to start with questions? I'll go ahead. So I want to clarify the measure D and its relationship to measure A. Is there a direct line between the two? Like, for instance, I know that the rate... is set at $60 per 100K for measure A. So if we pull bonds, it passes and we pull bonds, will we see a line on our tax bill for measure A for $60 per 100K and a line for measure D for that continuation, right, of... $20.70 right now is what the rate is. So whatever it fluctuates to the next. Yeah, that's a good question. So there's a correlation between the two. They're technically two separate independent authorizations. So they have to abide by their own rules. Each
142one has its own tax rate cap. Each one has its own oversight committee, detailed project list, et cetera, et cetera. All of the safeguards that are part of these bond programs are uniquely part of each one. Where they connect is as follows. So back in 2001, 2002, voters approved Measure D. And they authorized at the time about a $66 tax rate. So voters said, yep, we're fine paying $66. And that's what they paid over time. But what has happened is that the tax rate has gone down. In part because you guys have been good stewards of taxpayer dollars and you've done refundings or refinancings when you could. And that saved them money. And also there has been strong tax base. growth. So the community itself has grown and it's done well in real estate values
143and developing. A combination of refunding and refinancings by you and a vibrant, robust economic tax base that's growing over the last 25 years has caused the tax rate to go down. So here's the connection between the two. So what measure A is structured to do is to go back to that $60 rate, okay? But it's not going to be at that $60 rate while measure D is still around. So we said, hey, you approved $60 back in the day. You're going to be paying $60 going forward. Let's extend it. And if measure D is at $20 and change right now, then measure A would be $39 and change. So the combination of the two would be $60. And then when measure D goes away completely, measure A would be a $60 tax rate. So the
144goal again is to say, this is what folks have been paying. Let's just keep paying on it. But what it is not is $60 on top of the measure D20, right? We'll have to kind of grow into that, so to speak. And when measure D goes away completely, then measure A will be $60. When does that kick? Right. So right now it's 2070. Right. So when we have money in the bank, we don't need the bond right away. We don't withdraw. When does that tax start hitting? Is it when we with when we go for bonds, when we issue out bonds? So like, well, if we if we sell gap, right? Yeah. The last payment on Measure D is 2028. So in four years, that's gone. So we could do one of two things. One
145is we could say, well, we're just not going to put any taxes on at all, not sell any Measure A bonds until that goes away. What we contemplated was that you would sell some Measure A bonds. So again, you would have kind of $40 for Measure A. $20 or so for Measure D. The combined, again, is the 60. That was the original approved tax rate is that 60. And that would go for a period of four years. And then in 2028, Measure D is done, and Measure A would be $60 thereafter. How does that change how much we can issue then? I would assume that that would, right? Because essentially we can only... add the extra $40 per 100k and whatever that funds, whatever that number funds. Is that correct? So if the first tranche
146would be, say, $10 million and the next one would be $15 million because D would expire and we'd have more to pay. I'm just trying to understand how those mechanics work. Yeah, I mean, the way that it's currently structured, and again, these programs are very fluid. And if folks that were around, you know, would know that, hey, you don't always get to just issue exactly how you would like. But this program right now with the 50, 50 some odd million dollars that's on the ballot, we contemplated 13 million dollar issuances every two years. So 13 and 25. 13 and 27 13 and 29 13 or so in in in 2031 but when we sell those dollars we can control what the tax rate is again the goal here is to extend the original 60 plus
147program from back in in 2000. That's the goal of this structure. So it doesn't really negatively affect us. You're giving up a little bit of money as a district. Had you said we're just going to do a $60 tax on top of the Measure D, then you would be getting more money overall. But we're not because you guys were pretty clear and the survey was pretty clear that, hey, we want to be mindful of the tax rate of voters. And so let's not go. and get more money until the old tax rate goes away. So we're limiting ourselves to the $55.9 million. But as far as being able to access significant proceeds every two years, we don't anticipate any issues there. Hey, John, this is Trustee Frutos. So you are saying, you are confirming that
148Measure A will not increase the tax rate. that was approved back on 20 or 2000. Are you confirming that? The tax rate that was approved back then was $66 in the year 2000. And this measure A would extend that and actually be a little bit less because you can't ask for more than 60. So we're extending $60, not 66 for that reason. But to clarify, and just to clarify, I want to make this point obvious, and the district's done a good job because I think there have been some questions about exactly, well, what does tax rate extension mean? To Daniel's comment, the tax rate that was 66 has gone down, down, down, down, and is now down in the low 20s. So a measure A success would bring it back up to 60. And then
149four years from now, measure D completely goes away and measure A would remain at 60. Is there a possibility that measure A can then be reduced over a period of time if we're refinancing, as you pointed out earlier on, so that we could take it from that 60 and bring it down? And then if so, do you have a time period that that might be a possibility? Yeah, no, great comment. 100% likelihood, but nothing is guaranteed. So this program, we're assuming 3.5% growth in your tax base. Now, if in a perfect world, you grew exactly at 3.5% for the next 30 years, which is, you're not going to grow exactly at 3.5%, right? That's a number that bounces around. If you grew exactly at 3.5%, then the tax rate would remain at a combined $60.
150But last year, or two years ago, rather, you grew at 10.4. The year before that, 6.5, 5.6, 4.7. So your 20-year average is almost 4.5%. We're assuming only 3.5. So if you were to continue and grow at... let's say average four and a half percent, then starting, you know, on year one, the tax rate would begin to creep down similar to what measure D has done over the last 25 years as it started at 66 and it's now in the twenties. I mean, just to, and just to be clear, I think on that, right. 2% is already given. Right. Because Prop 13, I'm not given necessarily. I mean, the values have to go up. But if they continue to go up the way that they have, we valuations go up 2 percent across the board.
151Right. Or is that totally predicated on new housing? Right. I mean, one of the things that we. Because one of the things that, I don't know if it concerns me or not yet, but we did have a spate of growth in new housing at Harvested at Lima Nera that's since tapered down. And so we don't know necessarily when that growth is going to start up again. If it does, will it be at the same rate? There are 1,500 units. I think they approved it last night. There's going to be 1,500 more units going out there. So there will be an appreciable amount of growth. But we don't know when it comes in and all of that. And that's going to affect the tax rate at any given time. Right. Because it's really what it's doing
152is every year it's kind of, in a sense, resetting what your valuations now, what your valuation now. Right. And what's the tax rate that I have to incur. Right. To pay off the bond. Right. I'm sure there's some formula in the back, but I mean, I was looking at my taxes. Right. That the number fluctuates. Sometimes it goes up, sometimes it goes down. It depends on whether we're issuing new bonds or whether we refied or whether there's new valuations or an increase in housing, etc. Yeah, that's right. I mean, the standard max increase is 2% on properties. And that's probably going to be around for quite a while, just given that the market value of most homes in Santa Paula is way above the assessed value. And every time a home changes hands or any
153property changes hands, so I have a piece of property, it's assessed at $200,000. I sell it after living in it for 25 years for $600,000. That singular property has gone up 300%, right? From $200,000 to $600,000. You have, like you say, the development of homes where you're turning dirt into a bunch of homes or into an apartment or into a restaurant or into fill in the blank. So it's that those three combination of factors, the people that don't change at all, looking to get typically a 2% increase across the board, dirt that gets turned into something. And that's in the thousand percent increase. And then properties that change hands. It goes from an assessed value of whatever it is to the market value of what is purchased. And that's why you get a 6% a
154year, 10% a year, 8% a year growth. So we sometimes get the question, well, why don't you assume 4.5%, John, if that's what our 20-year average is? Well, if you assume 4.5% and you come in at 4%, Or 3.5, then the tax rate goes up. It's the opposite of what's happened. So it's always good to be conservative. And so I think 3.5% is conservative. And I think there's a high likelihood that we will see the exact same thing of declining tax rates over time with Measure A. Does that cap at 60, though? I mean, is there a possibility we could go above 60? So 60 is just... That's what you can start your numbers at. Because you said there was a max of $60 per. But it can flow above that then. Yeah, so real
155quick on that. Yeah, so there's two laws that govern any bond measure, right? When voters approve something, they're approving the bond amount. And they're approving all these projects, all these great projects that we've talked about, right? Or that you guys have talked about. And then there's a tax rate. And in there, there's two, I want to say conflicting laws, but there are two laws. One is what's called the ad valorem, unlimited ad valorem tax pledge of a general obligation bond. And then the other is prop 39. Unlimited ad valorem tax pledge simply says, I am going to levy whatever tax I need to do as the tax collector in order to make sure. that these bonds are repaid. So if an asteroid hit Santa Paula and wiped off half of the value of Santa Paula,
156literally ceases to exist, then the tax collector would say, oh, well, I lost half the value. Therefore, I guess I'm going to have to double the tax, right? That's a pretty extreme example. But even that, think about that for a second. If you lost half of Santa Paula, and your tax rate is $60, the remedy is to just charge 120. Okay, so that is law number one is this the unlimited ad valorem tax pledge. Again, really not a real issue per se, but you could find yourself with a tax rate creeps above $60. So why have a tax rate cap? That's where Prop 39 comes in. And that simply says, if you are expected to be above $60 or you already are above $60, you cannot sell until you go back down. That's what the
157Santa Paula High School bond, for those of you that have been around a while, right? That bond passed in 2008. Bonds were sold. And what happened? The Great Recession hit and property values went down. And the tax rate went up above Prop 39 limits. And so that's why those dollars sat on the sidelines for years until there was kind of a comeback or a rebound. So it can happen. You could go above 60. It's extraordinarily rare. And in fact, in my 25 years of doing it, the only time I saw that was when the Great Recession hit back in 2008, 9, 10, 11. Now, does that rate fluctuate based on interest rates as well? No. I mean, once you sell bonds, it's a fixed interest rate. That's another positive feature about it. It's fixed, not
158variable. So you sell bonds and those payments get locked in. So those are fixed payments. And so every year, the treasure tax collector says, oh, what do I owe in 24, 25? I owe this much. This is how big the tax base is. Oh, I only need to levy a tax of, you know, $52 or $53. The next year, same exercise. Oh, I need to levy a tax rate of $57. The next year, how much do I owe? So each year they look at the size of the tax base and the ability to. you know, levy a tax sufficient to pay off that fixed tax debt service statement or payment. Sorry. Well, but I guess what I mean, where interest rate comes to play is that if I sell a bond at 3%, I probably
159don't have to hike up the rate nearly as much as if I have it at 7%. If I have a bond at 7%. Does that just affect the time? Yeah, no, because if the tax, if the, Yeah, if the interest was 7%, we're constrained at the $60. Or in this case, we would be constrained at $47 or $39 for the next four years. But you're constrained at that. So you would say, okay, the interest rate is 3%. How much does $39 get me? Oh, it gets me this much. Great. If you're constrained at 7%, oh, how much does $39 get me? Not as much. So the consequence is not to the district's taxpayer, but it would be to the district and how much you could get in proceeds. I mean, I guess my like one
160of the reasons why at least I wanted to have this discussion, right, is because it's different than I understood it right at the beginning. You know, and I think, you know. and you guys can speak your self about what your understanding was, was that, you know, when I heard, oh, it extends, right, I did think that's what we were paying, right, and shame on me for not paying attention to my property tax bills as much. Maybe they're not as inevitable as we think they are, or they have to be. So that increase, you know, from 2070 to 60 is substantial, right? I mean, it was one thing when we knew, right, very clearly that the high school bond was going to be 2950. We knew that was an ask, right? And we were... comfortable enough
161to as a board to do it to to vote for that right but i think that with measure a in in the thing that has concerned me right because there has been so much um concern from the community about measure a is that you know that really will be increasing what they are paying right now right by you know, triple, right? You know, essentially 20 going up to 60, that's an additional 40. So again, my concern is that, you know, originally I thought, well, we're doing 29 over 100K, but really what we're doing is essentially 60, 70, excuse me, 70 over 100K, which is a very different number, right? And I just wanted to make sure. Right. That one, we as a board discussed, you know, that right. And where we are with that into
162that the public does understand that that is what the ask is. I've been talking a lot. So I'll let anybody else jump in if they want. I'd like to take the conversation even in a different direction because we have been getting a lot of questions via email presentation today regarding. transparency and and and I and I just want to come forward and I even though I wasn't fully convinced that a bond needed to go forward I wasn't ready for it, but I then became fully convinced. No, let me start over. I wasn't fully convinced when I first became a trustee member that we needed a bond, but becoming a trustee member and having been through several community meetings. WHETHER ISBEL WHETHER BRYDEN JIM AND THERE HAVE BEEN SEVERAL AND TO I CAN JUST JUMP OFF
163A COUPLE THERE WAS ONE IN JANUARY OF THIS YEAR THERE WAS ONE IN AUGUST OF 2023 WE HAD A BOARD PRESENTATION REGARDING POLLING whether we thought it was going to be a positive for our district or not. And that was back in August the 23rd. Yes, we did make a decision on it on October the 25th. So I just kind of feel like. we've had information and it's been in the public. So I want to be clear about that. A little bit confusing about the carryover of Measure D into Measure A, no doubt about that. But I just want to make sure that that discussion of, you know, I mean, why weren't there any oppositions? I don't know. But again, I mean, you know, the data speaks for itself too. We've had those meetings. The
164community has been invited. I've been to Isbell meetings. I've been to Brighton gym meetings and it's been a pleasant. surprised to be there and hear our community speak up and speak out for their their needs in their community so i just want to make sure that that's that's being uh presented um regarding going forward i mean okay well we're in a pickle but i i mean we're going forward uh march 5th is around the corner and we'll know soon enough um whether we get to go forward on on on modernization of isbell Because we are going forward with Brighton Gym because we do have some funding there. But, you know, community of Santa Paula, I mean, I think it's in your hands. You tell us what you want us to do in terms of how
165we are going to spend the dollars at hand. Because, I mean, I'm clearly getting behind the bond. We need it. If we're going to do the things that we have been asked by our constituents, which is our community, and the planning, if we're going to get this done. So I'd like to ask my colleagues, what are your thoughts on transparency and going forward? Because that's kind of what we need to do is we need to have that discussion. I mean, even looking more personal, I've probably lived here now 28 years. Three of my kids have gone through the school and seen the needs just one thing that wasn't mentioned like the pool There was plans for there to be a community pool with the new development. It's too expensive We need the support of the
166community to do a pool that will benefit everyone in the community and the only way to accomplish it is with additional funds yes it hurts in taxes and i do the math and i'm going oh great i appreciate all the comments and i'm glad we had this meeting to discuss even further and be able to have this dialogue so i i appreciate all the public comments um comments on next door the newspaper um i too was a little um unclear as to the total 60 um total and you know when we start selling bonds after d um I think that comes back up for a vote I mean when we start uh selling off bonds if this does pass and Kevin can clarify that but or I think comes back to us before yeah that's
167what I thought So once again, please support this bond. Oh, we can't say that this meeting, right? No. So excuse my comment. The other point I'd like to make is the seeming haste to get it on the March ballot is important. I mean, we've heard a lot of feedback from the community about when are we going to get started on Bryden Gym. And we have conceptual plans now. but we're at the point of where we need to sign a contract with an architect to start working drawings and actually get into the reality of this. And in order to be able to sign that contract, we need to know what our funding is. If the bond were not to pass and we are reliant only on the insurance money, we'll be taking one path. If the
168community is as supportive as polling indicates, we're going to be able to support the pool and the performing arts center and hopefully the auditorium and much more than just replacing that dear old gym. But, you know, I don't think there was any... interest except in getting on the ballot so that we can know what our budget is so that we can start the architects and the same holds true for isbell at isbell of course we've got the whole um sequa and the historic building effort that we have to go through but at the same time we're close to being able to sign a contract with an architect and get that project ready to build and We need to know what the funding is when we sign those contracts with architects Anyone else want to add
169anything? I mean, I guess I'll say just my piece with where it is, right? Um You know, I think if I would have known that measure a was going to be that big of an increase i wouldn't have voted for measure a right i mean i get it we have the needs and we've done the stakeholder meetings for those needs right but you know it's true like no one knew the bond was coming until january No one did. Right. I mean, you know, in some ways. Right. That's impetus for the public to watch our board meetings. Right. Because we weren't hiding it. Right. But at the same time, we know that most people don't. And we didn't announce it. Right. You know, and I think it's a little bit different because I feel a little
170bit more personally because I'm so involved in. I mean, I'm the campaign chair, right? And so I take that responsibility very seriously. And I just feel like the messaging as it came out, right, was inaccurate, right? And inaccurate to the understanding I had as well. And I mean, at the very least, it's out there now, right? At the very least. You know, but, you know, it does not make me feel good, right? Because it's true, right? I mean, 80% of these things fly. And, you know, probably because it's reflexive, you know, schools need money, you know, do it for the kids kind of thing. But I wonder how people will feel when they see their tax bill next year, you know, and we've increased it 80%, which is about what the calculations come out to
171be. I just want to say, I hear my fellow board members and I agree the needs there. We all sat in one meeting or another where community members came out and said, you know, what, what they'd like to see us do as a district, but As the outreach person on the committee, I do have direct contact with a lot of our families. I work with their students at the youth center, but I also just get to talk to parents when they have a need for any kind of resource that I could assist with. So I have gotten, like all of us, I think, emails or texts or calls about what it really is and asking my opinion on what they should do. It was not very clear and I wasn't comfortable with it. And I
172also wanted this discussion to happen during our meeting so that we can all share as a board since I came on. We've always talked about transparency and being open and honest and trying to do what's best for our students and keeping that in mind in whatever we do. And I think that the intention, the right intention is there. We want to give our kids everything. We want to have that. awesome pool and the performing arts center that our kids very desperately need and deserve and everything else that's on those lists. But I also know the impact that it's going to have on people with a fixed income families that are already living together in a house with another family or, you know, all of our homeowners that I just want people to be aware of
173what it is, what that's going to be. And we all vote based on whatever it is that we see is best or fit in whatever way we want to look at it. I just wanted... this dialogue so that we as a board can share with our community members that the intention of bringing these bonds was a good one, right? We wanna offer and provide more for our students and community, but we want to be clear on what we're asking for. And that's what the purpose of this is and having John here to answer the questions. Just to make sure that everyone understands and like one of my fellow trustees said, I don't remember who it was. Not everybody watches board meetings. Not everybody cares what we're doing until it's something that's going to affect them
174because not everyone has a child that attends one of our schools. Not everyone stays up until, what time is it? Nine o'clock watching us talk about something that they could care less about maybe. But we're here because we care and we want to communicate that to everyone, whether you are watching now or later or will hear from someone. We just want you to be clear on what these bonds mean. and your future tax bill, but also for our students and our facilities and the things that we can offer and the things that we'll be able to accomplish. If they don't pass, we're going to have to look at everything and, you know, kind of... I don't know figure things out based on like trustee Wilson said what our budget is and how much funds we
175would have to move forward with all of our plans and if they pass then they pass but I hope that this helped everyone get some gain clarity on what the bonds mean and and that they see that as a board we're trying with this being transparent as we possibly can and I personally, and I think everyone on the board would agree that the intention was not to put out misleading information. I think that we misunderstood. I misunderstood what it meant and what the increase would be. And so, yeah, I just hope that everyone got the clarification that they needed from our discussion tonight on this topic. Does anyone else want to add anything? Yes. Go ahead, John. Is that yes to me? Yes. Okay. I apologize. My phone overheated and I got locked out. And
176so apologies for missing some of that discussion. But I caught the tail end and certainly part of the other comments. And I want to just give some context, if I could, real quick, because I know it's a long night and a long agenda. But your district, and I've worked with you guys going back to 2008, 2016, and throughout. You guys have gone. what I would say above and beyond what is typical as far as education and being transparent. So I want to be clear with that. There are other districts that we've worked with in the county that have just said, hey, we're not even going to do any education. Like I'm not going to send an email out. I'm not going to educate people. I'm going to put it out there. It's in the sample
177ballot. They can review it and they can make their own decision. So you guys have definitely gone above and beyond. what many of your peer districts have done. So I think that context is important. And yeah, you know, at the end of the day. voters have an opportunity to say, do I want to fix up our schools that clearly have needs? And if so, this is the way to do it. And if not, then people are saying, okay, the schools are fine as is. But that's the beauty of democracy, right? That's the beauty of these school improvement measures is voters get the choice. So glad to be a part of it. Glad to, again, answer any questions. If there are additional questions that come our way, certainly. feel free to send them, but I did
178want to give you guys some context relative to some of your peer districts and their level of involvement and transparency and communication. You guys really have this go around and traditionally have gone above and beyond what many do. So that's all I wanted to add. Thank you. Thank you. Moving on now is number eight action items, 8A. Mr. Weinstein, 2024 California School Board Association Delegate Assembly Election. Thank you, John. Thank you, John. For joining us. You bet. Thanks, guys. Have a great night. Happy Valentine's Day. All right. So this will be very quick. If the board remembers. prior to uh i believe it was prior to uh winter break it may have been just right after but we nominated dr daniel sandoval to be a delicate assembly member uh for csba representing sub-region 11b which
179is basically our area of ventura county so all districts have the opportunity to nominate candidates um for that those positions there are four open positions to vote for and luckily for us there are four candidates so what i'm asking for is the board to approve um using you know putting our votes on each of the four candidates and they are darlene bruno from wyanimi lauren gill from canelo valley marianne rodriguez from oxnard elementary school district and obviously dr sandoval representing santa paula so if i could get a motion and approval on that so moved i'll second that any discussion um We'll go with a preferential vote first student board members all those in favor aye opposed passes 2-0 Now we go to a board vote all those in favor say aye aye opposed passes 5-0
1804-0. I'm sorry. Wait. Oh, we're missing. We're missing. Sorry. 4-0. We're missing Trustee Sandoval. I could have said no. Okay. Moving on to 8B. Business Services. Resolution number 2023. What? 4-9. It's 2023-2024-9. Oh, that's, yeah. If you guys want to take a break. Yeah, obviously. You want to take a break? Five minutes or power through. Do you want a break? I'm good. I just want to get through. Okay, sorry. We're back on. Did I miss anything? You got voted. Yeah. So 8B1, resolution number 2023-24. 09 to authorize personnel to sign the tobacco law enforcement grant programs documents. Mr. Olson. It's on. It's on. Okay, there we go. All right. I was thinking for a moment that I might not get up here tonight to talk to everybody. This is just a quick resolution for the
181approval of to for administration to sign a grant. This grant's actually been awarded to the district quite some time ago, and we are finally organizing all the documents and things so that we can submit a claim for about $340,000 if I'm. if you have that number correct in my head so we would appreciate your authorization to claim that fund those funds so moved i'll second it any discussion okay moving to a preference vote vote oh sorry student board members all those in favor aye opposed Passes 2-0. Now a board vote. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Opposed? Passes 4-0. Now moving on, 8-2, Santa Paula High School 600 Wing Project Change Order. All right. So we're here to finalize the 600 Wing Project with the final list of odds and ends that were change
182orders throughout the project. So a final... I MOVE FOR APPROVAL. SO I'LL SECOND IT. ANY DISCUSSION? Okay, moving to preferential vote. Student board members, all those in favor? Aye. Opposed? Passes 2-0. Moving to a board vote. All those in favor? Aye. Opposed? Passes 4-0. 8-3, award of contracts, Santa Paula High School Library Modernization Project. All right, we're very excited to bring before the board the contract for our high school, our Santa Paula High School library modernization project. We had a strong bidding environment and we came in with a bid that was pretty close to our latest projections of where we thought we were going to be at. We were, you know, originally we had penciled like 2.5 million for the project, but once we got into it, we knew it was going to be 3
183to 3.5. uh this contract is uh 3.4 and change so we're pretty happy with uh a little bit better bidding environment than we had seen uh in the past no but she hasn't asked for one yet do i have a motion some moves uh i'll second that any discussion i'm glad to see that we got numerous bidders and that people are a little bit hungrier. And hopefully that carries on when we're ready to work on bigger projects in the future. Okay, we'll move to a preferential vote. All those in favor? Aye. Opposed? Passes 2-0. Moving to a board vote. All those in favor? Aye. Opposed? Passes 4-0. Moving on to 8-4, approval of summer camp program agreement with the City of Santa Paula. Okay, this is up back to the board for the 3rd year
184in a row, which is a, uh, an agreement with the city of Santa Paula to help operate our, uh, kind of. Afternoon summer camp, uh, addition to our normal summer school morning program. So, for the last 2 years, we've been successfully working with the city to provide a full day summer program to the students of Santa Paula. And so, uh, with a minor. adjustments from the prior year we we bring it again to our board for approval just a quick question so how many for how many students this year is it the same because i thought we had a cap like 400 it's four it's 400 it's 400 elementaries students no one can hear you from back there So last year they serviced 100 students per each site and I'm not sure if that's the
185agreement for now but we are estimating about the same amount of services for those number of students. Just to clarify, Ms. Ramirez, Dr. Ramirez, how many sites? So 100 times? So we are going to house summer school at Barbara Webster in Blanchard, and we're estimating to enroll over 300 students at Blanchard and about 200 in... 80 at Barbara Webster, but for summer camp, normally we're estimating 150 at Barbara Webster and about close to 200 at Blanchard. Thank you. That's the estimation. Do I have a motion? So moved. Second. Any discussion? Okay, moving to a preferential vote. All those in favor? Aye. Opposed? Passes 2-0. Board vote. All those in favor? Aye. Opposed? Passes 5-0. 8-5 donations. We have two donations. One from Jerry Burns for the Young Writers Contest of $100. And the second donation
186from BDJ Tech. The purpose of that is where it's needed most. And the total of that donation is $3,000. So thank you for those both of those donations. Do I have a motion to approve, accept both of these donations? So move. I'll second that. Moving to a preferential vote. All those in favor. I'm sorry, any discussion? Okay, moving to a preferential vote. All those in favor? Aye. Opposed? Passes 2-0. Board to vote. All those in favor? Aye. Opposed? Passes 5-0. 9, educational services. School accountability report cards. Dr. Ramirez. Good evening. So the, um, we are asking today for your approval of this, um, the Sarks, which is the school account of their report card. The purpose of the report card is to provide parents and the community with important information about each school. Something to
187keep in mind is that all the data is from the prior year. So everything that you see there is from 2223. Um, and that is just to inform our community of how we did. Thank you. Do I have a motion? So moved. Second? I'll second it. Any discussion? Question. Are you anticipating a SARC to move in a positive direction? That's our goal. You know, every year we want to... do improvement, especially with and when it comes to academics. We do know, you know, I just actually went to a community engagement initiative conference and we were discussing street data and really looking at data as a whole child and really thinking about that are all our state assessments are all norm reference. So they're meant to be to have that bell curve. So really looking at
188how do we best support our students, keeping in mind that the CASP is meant to create that bell curve and maybe looking at other data that's really going to showcase that the whole child is actually learning so we hope that's our that's what we are working towards okay moving to a preferential vote all those in favor aye opposed passes 2-0 board vote all those in favor opposed passes 5-0 10, consent calendar. Consent items are considered routine and will be enacted by a single motion. None of the items will be discussed unless a board member requests discussion prior to the vote of the motion to adopt the consent calendar. Do I have a motion to adopt the consent calendar? Before we do that, I don't want to pull per se, but there's a correction, I think,
189for the certificated personnel activity report. There's a number of positions that say end of semester. But I think they mean extended school. They're the summer positions. Or is that how they really referenced end of summer? Or end of school, I think is what it says. Just in the certificated activity report. Item five. So on page three. Of the certificated personnel report. There's a number of positions that say end of school year. Yeah. On the left side. Yeah. Should that be. That's the language that we usually use. Is it? Okay. Just following the pattern. I think the more important part is the information on the right side. The summer. Right. Okay. All right. That's fine. Thank you for clarifying. Do I have. So I'll motion to accept the consent calendar. Do we have a second? Any
190discussion? Moving to a preferential vote. All those in favor? Aye. Opposed? Passes 2-0. Moving to a board vote. All those in favor? Aye. Opposed? Passes 5-0. 11, board member comments. Board member Ramirez, any comments? Yeah, I would like to just remind everybody that Cardinal Night is February 22nd. Future and current students of the Santa Paula High School are welcome to get informed about pathways and extracurriculars and clubs. And it's from 5 to 7 in the McMahon Gym at Santa Paula High School. Thank you. Board Member Perez? Yeah, just a little... What's it called? Recap. So the theater successfully completed their senior one-act plays and began working on The Wizard of Oz. The cast and crew, as myself, are excited to begin working on the musical. Choir is hosting a Southern California Vocal Association Festival on
191March 15th in the Freeman Eakin Auditorium. So if you guys have time on March 15th. Please come watch us sing. It's gonna be very fun. We are also preparing to sing with the Los Angeles Master Chorale on May 3rd at the world-renowned Walt Disney Concert Hall. So we've been fundraising and I believe we have Popcornopolis coming up soon. So I'll be bugging you guys with that. So if you guys want to buy some popcorn, I'll remind you guys. And then, let's see, tomorrow there's going to be a Lions speech contest. I was going to join, but I kind of got too busy. But I know there's three people that I know that are participating, and they're very excited. And they've been showing me their speeches, and I'm excited for them. Hopefully one of them wins
192the $100 prize and moves up in. I think right now it's City and then it goes to County. And then I would like to congratulate the FFA, the eight students that are moving up to regionals again because they've put in a lot of effort in FFA and their speech contests. And then... I believe it was last week when some of ASB, Card TV, and other students got to meet Dr. Cesar Morales, and it was really exciting. I saw Mr. Weinstein there and Ms. Carrillo there taking pictures. I saw that the VCOE, I believe it's called, the website they posted our student from Card TV, Yesenia Saldana, on the front page of their website. with posing with Dr. Morales. It's really nice seeing a girl from Santa Paula on a website that the whole Ventura County
193could look at. So I'm proud of Yesenia. She's a senior, by the way, and she works really hard, one of our smartest students at the school. And then we had a blood drive on, I believe, I don't remember if I spoke about the blood drive. I donated blood. It was very fun. We had lots of students participate in that. I believe it was. it was January 31st and then recently we had our talent show Lindsay took part of that. She was one of the planners. It was very fun. We got to see all the different bands, personal little group bands that we had. We had regional Mexican music performed by Giovanni, Isaac Posadas, and I forgot the other student, sorry. Nathaniel something. They were all juniors and they did really good. We had dance performances.
194local greenhouse band, Only Obvious, just different people from freshmen to seniors all dancing together, singing together, performing together. It was really fun to see all those students. Personally, I was working in the backstage, so I got to like talk to them before they did their little stuff. Let's see. And then I have a little message from Mars. Ex-board member? Please give me a second. It's loading. So he said, hey, board members. I hope y'all's day is going good. I just wanted to let you know that I have officially graduated early and will no longer be at the board meetings. I know it's okay to cry, guys, but as sad as it is, I'm very thankful to be part of this board and grateful for you all. I had a great... experience as well as a
195great time talking to you all. See you guys around and take care of yourselves. And yeah, so as you can tell he's sad to leave and he hopes you guys cry too. And then I know I will be missing him more as he was just like a nice colleague. It was fun going to the conference with him. So that's about it and happy Valentines to those that celebrate or the single ones like us. So yeah, thank you. Thank you, Trustee Sandoval. Ashley, don't we usually honor our student board members when they leave? Right. So we'll have to make sure that we bring him back. Yeah. It would be nice to do that next board meeting. Mars will be missed at our place. Oh, gosh. Where to start? So I'll start with the Card TV with
196Dr. Morales because I got the tail end of that, which was really fun. Let's see. Went to the VCSBA meeting where we talked with a number of our colleagues from around the county on budget issues, right? And some other people, some other of us went to that, so they can speak on that too. I went to the Ventura College Community College. Ventura Community College session here, tail end, I was teaching. So again, those who were here, I know a number of our board members were there. They can speak more to that. Went to the Thespian induction, the International Thespian Society's induction. That was an interesting experience, but nice to see, because my daughter's part of the International Thespian, so nice to see Santa Paula's kids getting into that. I went to the initial WASC visit,
197got to talk to the WASC committee for a little bit, and then also heard their report afterwards. There were a lot of positive things, so we'll look forward to their report. But initially, it looks pretty good. All right, let's see. Did you guys announce the Cardinal Gala that's coming up on March 2nd? No, you didn't. I can't believe you did everything else. It's the band. Is it just the band? $25 a ticket. Unfortunately, I'm not going to be able to get there this year, but that's always a good time. Lastly, thank you for your vote of support for Delegate Assembly. It's fun for me and hopefully one of you will say, hey, it's time for me to do it. So I can share sometimes and that's it. Thank you, Trustee Wilson. I'd like to recognize
198the spirit of cooperation that exists these days between the city and the school district. You know, I've been on the board longer than any of these people around here. And it didn't used to be this way. And it's truly an improvement. And to Trustee Arroyo's comment about, you know, the pool not happening out at Harvest in the park, you know, or... the fact that we can conceivably do a community pool at the high school is significant and I just think we need to recognize that we're in a time of good leadership at both the school district and the city and that things are getting done in a positive manner in a lot of ways. Speaking of positive, the report on FBLA and Nilsen Lopez and his team and how they inspired passion in Trustee Perez.
199The same I see with FFA and Alex and Brianna that there are a lot of passionate kids out there and those are just the ones I'm exposed to. I know there are a lot of teachers inspiring passion in our students and I'm sorry I don't get to see it all, not having kids at this high school anymore, but I know it's there. And I'd like to recognize BDJ Tech, who donated the $3,000 where it's needed most. I have no idea who this person is, but it reminds me of one of the larger donations that the Santa Paula Education Foundation ever received was from the Yamamoto family. And with exactly the same spirit of where it's needed most, that they put no strings on it. We can use it as we need to. We've used it
200for Senior Awards night. We've used it one time the PSAT bill was forgotten and you know we were able to write a check in five minutes and make sure the students were taken care of and so I appreciate their community involvement and I looked on Card TV just now and saw that the high school girls beat Ramona convent so that's all I've got to say congratulations to our Cardinal girls thank you trusty frutos all right guys lots here but I'll try to be really short just want to give a congratulations to our 169 reclassification students dr. Maris excellent presentation back on February the 8th it was awesome to see that many parents and and staff members there just celebrating uh a wonderful accomplishment it's something that uh that we are trying to really focus on
201and i can see that number there working on improving our sark I attended the Boys and Girls Club annual fundraiser back on February the 3rd. Excellent turnouts. It's good to see many of our community members step up and support just youth in general. And I think that's a good show of a good faith for our youth. I attended the police chief, Don Aguilar, reception on also the 8th of February. Again, excellent showing of community support, people from all walks of life being there. Thank you, Trustee Ornelas, for organizing, being one of the organizing committee members. But it's just a great opportunity to network and continue to see and gloat about the things that we're doing well. uh and that's credit to again our cabinet team uh way to go fbla competition uh mr haas mr
202lopez miss contreras and i mean again we have some excellent examples of how and why this program works so thank you for sbla um i did have the opportunity to meet uh with the glen city dli parents and pta parent groups looking forward to seeing some bridges there and just just some positive work come out of the the discussions and collaborations that are Our wonderful cabinet team is is working on I to attended the BCBA dinner January 29th The emphasis was budget workshop. It was good to see our CBO mr. Wilson. Mr. Olson part pardon you know taking a lead and working with the tables out there uh good discussions um and they're important because we have to know um what our shortcomings are when it comes to budget um i'd also attended the ventura
203county community college district back on january the 30th i was super impressed with the amount of how many community members attended I think we were all five of us were there did all five of us attend as trustee members and council members former council members just just to see the show that our community for in the support for our youth and the direction that we need to move in but just just wonderful just showing of support for Santa Paula to come together that way Way to go to our winter sports. Hearing wonderful news with our girls basketball. That's awesome. You know, Santa Paula High School just does not get enough credit for... the type of students we are producing in this challenging world. And as a former athlete and as a coach there at the
204high school, it feels good to know that we are making a contribution in our community because when our kids do leave us, they do leave us with more tools, more resiliency tools. than we can ever ask for. So it's all that MTS that we're talking about. These are the kids that might have been an at-promise student, maybe didn't come to school, didn't want to work for grades and whatnot, but because they have something that challenges them, that gives them some sense of purpose and rigor, they rise to the challenges. And it's awesome to see them move up and move on. I'm saddened to see the to have our district experience the level of one particular violent action that took place over this past weekend. It saddens me because we know our students and we always
205want them to do well and make good choices. You just never know. what's out in our community. So I guess, you know, I want to honor our students that are battling, honor our students that have passed. Live your life. And again, to our young individuals here, our trustee members, live your life to the fullest. You never know what kind of impact you're going to make if you just stop trying. So never stop trying. And I just, again, I want to thank all the presenters. Excellent discussion. Trustee members, I know we don't always agree, but I really do appreciate my trustee colleagues here. And I just hope that we can continue to keep our students at the center of why we do what we do. And I think that is what's going to be our guiding
206light. Thank you and have happy Valentine's Day to all. Thank you, Trustee Arroyo. Wow. Thank you for sharing all of that. I know it's been a busy month and just refreshing on things that we attended, but I'll start with the reclassification. That was a wonderful event just to see all the parents and siblings and just shout out to all the staff who helped and was there to the end to clean up. So it was nice, you know, to. actually get to mingle a little bit after reclassification and just to see the number of students and to have the principals there giving them their their medals for reclassification and all the parents taking the photos so um kudos to everyone and thank you um as trustee frutos mentioned uh the ventura community college foundation um their
207meeting was held here and it was a great turnout so I appreciate staff to make it happen. You know, I was shocked that the meeting was here and not at a different location. So, thank you to everyone who made that happen. Um. I also attended a meeting here at Glen city since I was part of that committee. Um. When we're discussing about forming it, um, it's kind of dear to me and, um. It would be nice just to, you know, continue to get updates as to what we're doing with our DLI and what are the plans for the future. I know, you know, there's discussion of a second site, but just, you know, making sure that we're successful and, you know, that people want to come here versus other DLI programs in Oxnard, Ventura. We
208should have a lead and should be, you know, a class. So I don't know that should be like a feature item just or an update as to what we're doing with our daily program and what we're offering and how we're keeping with the program as to I Mean, I would like to see it in my emails when meetings are happening regarding DLI and what events are occurring for DLI I I also attended the FFA competition that was held on Saturday, and there were several schools, and it's just nice to see all the kids who participate and are willing to come on a Saturday, just like FBLA students going 6 o'clock in the morning. You guys leave to go compete. And just a shout-out to Julissa, who posts a lot of the information on our social
209media and getting the word out of our sports. athletes and academics and all the meetings and that'll do it and again happy valentine's to everybody and who's still watching thank you um my fellow board members have said a lot um they've covered a lot of the things that we've attended um i was at the community college meeting as well um I actually was approached about the district hosting it, so I'm glad that we were able to do that. And I was happy to see the turnout and happy that we were all able to make it. I was at the VCSBA dinner. I'm actually the secretary for VCSBA, so I kind of had to be there to take our minutes. But it was good. It was good to hear about the budgets and what other districts
210are doing. My usual... What do we call it? Plug on the youth center. It's open two to six every day. Parents and students are welcome to come check it out, sixth through 12th grade. And thank you to everyone for your presentations and the work you put in, all of our department directors and their teams and everyone from our custodial staff who shows up early and stays late. I see one of our custodians in the back to make sure that our facilities are clean and prepped and ready for our students. Thank you. Thank you to everyone, our IT department, everyone who... Helps this machine work and run every day Happy Valentine's Day to everyone I'll leave it at that. I'm sure I'll remember something later, but Our next board meeting will be February 28th, and I
211will adjourn this meeting at 935