001the board has already participated in a closed risk management session in a workshop i will read these reminders again for those who are just joining us viewers and listeners can access the meeting today by either watching on comcast channels 234 235 u-verse channel 99 or by using the youtube link on our webpage at palmbeachschools.org we also offer a listening only option which the public can access by calling 561-357-5900 or toll free at one eight six six nine three zero seven zero one five the meeting id is one five six one eight eight zero one one two four pound sign i now call the first regular board meeting of twenty 2021 to order at 504 pm on january 20th 2021 mrs bass please call the roll district one barbara mcquinn here district 2 alexandria ayala here
002district 3 karen brill here district 4 erica whitfield here district 5 frank barbieri district 6 marcia andrews here district 7 deborah robinson yeah we have corn with all seven board members president also joining us on our day as the superintendent dr fenoy and since we can't fit them up here during our cove separation social distancing requirements um we have with us also out there general counsel sean bernard inspector general theresa michael student council president santiago alvarez and our board clerk carol bass senior staff members will join us periodically as directed by the superintendent this meeting is being transcribed by a closed captioner so remember to speak at a reasonable pace well everyone please stand for the pledge to be led by president alvarez i pledge allegiance to the flag of the united states of america
003and to the republic for which it stands one nation under god indivisible with liberty and justice for all board welcomes public speakers who are joining us in person today while your attendance here at the board office is appreciated please be mindful of important safety protocols that the district now has in place to conform with covet 19 safety guidelines please respect this cautionary warning that in the event of interference with the orderly processes of the meeting failure failure to follow the safety protocols and procedures or otherwise disruptive conduct misconduct will result in removal of the person from the meeting please abide by these protocols so palm beach county school police officers did not have to take action thank you we have no minutes to approve today we have uh three items been added for four atoms
004have been added for good cause er el r2 2021 modifications of the collective bargaining agreement with the service employees international union slash florida public services union regular supervisory ecp prepare for paraprofessional 2 p3 revised salary schedules for school-based administrators p4 revised salary schedules for non-bargaining unit employees including administrative professional managerial miscellaneous confidential good cause exists for adding these items to allow for timely processing of raises for affected employees item p2 personnel addendum good cause exists to add this item so employees can start in their renewed positions as soon as possible mr superintendent do you have any items to withdraw mr chairman i have nothing to withdraw this time we have three items been pulled so far but two items been pulled so far by board members e-l-r-1 and p-o-l-a-1 board members at this point do
005you want to pull anything else see now we need a motion to approve the agendas modified motion by mrs whitfield second by mrs mcquinn any discussion all in favor posed motion carries 7-0 disclosures and obsessions board members seeing numbers superintendent comments yes sir mr chairman although we still have five months left in this school year our academics team are actively preparing for the 2021-2022 school year i would like to remind parents who haven't done so already to submit their choice program applications the school district of palm beach county is proud to offer more than 330 choice and career academies and gay in grades k through 12. these innovative learning programs engage students and contribute to their academic and postgraduate success the deadline to apply for choice programs for the 2021-2022 school year is quickly approaching
006you have until january 29th you will learn more about our programs and the application process on the district's website for those students and parents thinking about college check out an initiative currently underway called all in on hbcus from now through january 28th this event connects students and families with information about 34 historically black colleges and universities all sessions are virtual free and open to anyone who is interested in chatting with a representative in real time you'll also find information about this on our website and now for a quick update regard regarding cover 19 and the vaccine we have expanded the district's covert 19 web page to include information regarding where vaccinations are being administered in palm beach county who was eligible and how to make an appointment this webpage was created for your convenience so
007that you can see all of the vaccine locations listed in one place demand for the vaccine continues to outpace supply although i have appealed to governor desantis to prioritize school district employees who have direct contact with students that has not yet happened however i will continue to champion this priority status meantime i want all district employees who are 65 or older to know that they are eligible under the state's guidelines about 1100 members of staff are over age of 65 and nearly 500 of them are teachers you will need an appointment again all of this information is on our website i'd also like to remind everyone that this is not the time to let down your guard any students or employees who are not feeling well should stay home we all need to work together
008to combat the transmission of this virus and finally those of you who know me well know that i am extremely passionate about student literacy literacy is a fundamental cornerstone of academic success for children and motivates students to be lifelong learners the florida department of education is designated next week as literacy week florida this year's theme is humanity tells a story what's your chapter the division of teaching and learning has created a web page with grade level specific resources you'll find that information on the hub which is the district's intranet as always i encourage parents to share a love of literacy with their children at this time i now call our deputy superintendent keith oswald to the to the front table to introduce our formally introduce our wonderful new principal at hl johnson elementary school thank
009you dr fenoy and good evening board members it is with great honor to introduce you one of our new talented leaders that will take the home of h.l johnson mrs crystal amado kucharski krista thank you and good evening board chair frank barbieri vice chair karen brill and board members superintendent dr fenoy deputy superintendent keith oswald central region superintendent valerie haynes and central region instructional superintendent vivian greene i sit before you today extremely humbled and grateful for this wonderful opportunity as a former resident of the village of royal palm beach and h.l johnson students and a 14-year teacher and instructional leader at royal palm beach high school i know i am privileged to be a part of the h.l johnson family and community being principal for me at hl johnson is both a professional and personal
010dream my grandmother moved to the united states with her four boys she instilled the quality of hard work and service within them my father and mother they met in high school and they continue to ensure hard work and service was instilled within me so i want to thank my family for giving me the strength to believe in myself and know that with hard work anything is possible i want to thank my friends and co-workers who have always been my cheerleaders i want to thank dr jesus armas my mentor for showing me how to make my vision and turn it into a reality and finally i want to thank my husband he's over there nick kutersky thank you are my rock and without your support i would not be able to do everything the way i
011have dreamed of so i want everyone to know that i am committed to supporting every child every day and i will bring the enthusiasm energy and thoughtfulness needed to continue to make h.l johnson an exemplary school i recognize the opportunity to lead a school with an extremely dedicated staff devoted families and a supportive community is a privilege i feel incredibly fortunate to be a part of the school and to support all stakeholders most importantly i believe that students are at the center of every single school decision again thank you so much for this opportunity i will make you proud thank you congratulations mr chairman those are my comments board member comments mrs mcqueen thank you my comments tonight are regarding um a consent agenda item that was not pulled and had former school board chair
012and board member mr chuck shaw had it been pulled he would have been absolutely appalled so i don't want it to i don't want this to get lost though and for members of the public and perhaps staff members employee members to not see this honor that has been bestowed upon and earned by mr chuck shaw so i'm going to read the um the item to you i've got to find the item the new adult dead center building that i have not yet seen i'm very anxious to hear it's incredible the new building is being named at the recommendation of the adult ed center school advisory council members they are renaming the school to honor mr chuck shaw this recommendation was made for his 55 plus years of service to the school district of palm beach
013county and mr shaw's lifelong support for adult and community education programs along with his extensive community service so i want to take this opportunity to personally congratulate mr shaw on this well-deserved honor thank you thank you mr quinn miss ayala thank you mr chairman i'd like to start by thanking and recognize recognizing living skills in the schools their ceo dr suzanne spencer and project manager dr billy gaira who is here with us today in the audience lsis is an accredited and licensed district partner that brings credible age-appropriate and proven substance abuse prevention programming to students in our k-12 classrooms since 2000 they have reached over a quarter of a million students and this school year alone lsis has already reached over 24 000 students and her held near nearly 1 000 virtual presentations of programming
014and education after months of planning and anticipation and through a very successful partnership with principal patterson and her team at john i leonard high school my alma mater last wednesday january 13th a drive-through family box distribution was held on the campus and we fed and educated nearly 300 students and families i am grateful for this opportunity that was afforded to donate families and i look forward to continuing to work together to bring forward even more opportunities second i had the pleasure to visit with the palmetto elementary panthers and the grassy water owls these two amazing district 2 elementary schools have adjusted to so beautifully to the difficult conditions we're existing in and are working overtime to ensure that our students have the absolute best opportunities grassy waters boasts a biomedical and veterinary sciences program and
015palmetto offers an ib primary year program and even stem infusion thank you so much to principal harris and principal galindo and their teams for their warm welcome and their enriching tours your leadership and efforts keep our district running every single day finally i wanted to share that i participated on a facebook live put together by allianza for progress a non-profit organization that seeks to transform florida by organizing and empowering our latinx communities through voter education civic engagement and issue advocacy the conversation centered around ensuring success for our ell students our english language learners when it comes to the upcoming testing schedules it was an honor to be a panelist along with a growing number of hispanic or latinx school board colleagues currently serving our students throughout the state of florida that concludes my comments thank
016you thank you mrs whitfield thank you i just wanted to take a quick moment to recognize the inauguration today i think it was a wonderful moment to see our youth poet laureate speak i've was so impressed with her poem the hill we climb and i am hopeful that we will when the book comes out have it within our schools i felt that her message of hope and unity was was just absolutely wonderful one thing that she said in her in her poem was a nation that isn't broken but simply unfinished and i feel that way about the school district even when we go through some challenges this district is strong and growing and changing every day and so i'm very proud of this district and i'm proud of this country and really just getting to
017see a 22 year old speak and so just really everything that i was feeling just meant so much i think for this nation amanda gorman is her name uh the second thing i wanted to mention is um uh thank you to lakeworth beach boynton beach lantana and del rey i have had an opportunity to speak at lake worth beach and boynton beach last night and the week before to their city commission and last night was also joined by dr robinson which i was very grateful for and this opportunity i've used to reach out to the cities to let them know about the challenges at our schools right now the struggles that we're going through with children who are not currently in the building or trying to participate via distance learning and maybe having some challenges
018in their education and just the struggles that we're having as a school district so i want to say a big thank you to those cities and we have commissioner katz obviously here today with us in his other capacity but a huge thank you to the commission for allowing me to speak and the resounding support that i always receive for our schools from our city commissions thank you mrs andrews and thank you and good afternoon i just want to say again i know i mentioned it last week we're celebrating the national mentoring month our take stock and children mentors continue to dedicate their services to all of our student mentees it's a great month with a whole lot of activities to honor the mentors virtual mentoring for almost a year did not slow down the mentors
019mentees are very thankful and the school district wants to thank take stock and children for all that you do for our students and today it was my pleasure to see and listen to principals and sponsors of the international spanish academy and the dual language programs here within the district several board members were on the zoom call with me and it was impressive to hear all of the exciting work that's being done in our dual language schools and our international spanish academy programs wow i continue to appreciate the work that's being done in our schools during this pandemic it hasn't slowed down and we are not missing a beat and yes i continue to appreciate the wellington elected officials the wellington education committee by the financial contributions to each of the schools in wellington we continue
020to work so hard with wellington as a partner for the school district of palm beach county and the funding through the keeley spinelli grant has helped our school so much many of you may remember keeley she was beloved here in the school district of palm beach county and her grant helps so many students in the wellington schools it shows that it takes the village working together educationally and financially thank you village of wellington elected officials thank you to the education committee thank you to the principals all the parents and the students of the village of wellington for all you're doing working together to help our students and i want to tell you that i've been working really hard on several projects that you may not have known about i was selected to be the chair
021of the florida school boards association equity committee and i've also been selected to work with the state of florida as an advisory committee member for the lgbtq state advisory group and i will be presenting and i want to thank two people here in this district you've helped me so much to get ready for these two new jobs pete stewart and diana fetterman when i was selected i picked up the phone and i called them and i says tell me what i need to know as it relates to lgbtq and they've been working with me all along the way as i present at the conference that's coming up all together the state conference i will be inviting you to maybe check in and see what we're talking about but more than anything i'll be getting information
022to you of all the work that we're doing with the florida school boards association equity committee as well as all of the work i'm doing right now for lgbtq students and tonight i did make sure and i think all of you have these badges that you wear within the schools or wherever you go it's a way to let the students know that we appreciate students all over palm beach county and everybody deserves to be recognized thank you thank you mr anders dr robinson thank you so first let me just say um thank you to ms whitfield for inviting me to the boynton beach city commission virtual presentation your presentation yesterday uh was was very good very outstanding i think actually inspirational i also want to thank dr fennoy for responding in a positive manner to
023my request to figure out a way to make the covet vaccine available as soon as possible to our student facing staff the 65 and older hopefully we can we can work that out um dr fanoid mentioned the virtual hbcu tour um i shared with the board uh article from brookings institute about how hbcus do more with less you know we inaugurated our vice president today who is a howard grad um and so it's just hbcu love for me and then i also want to make mention of an outstanding presentation by brian knowles who told a more expansive story about the reverend dr martin luther king jr on monday that presentation is available on the coalition for black student achievements youtube channel um and it's a very interesting look so let me move to my data
024and i'm hoping that in the near future i won't need to present this data the staff will bring all this kind of data to us and we can have this collective conversation about what to do but in the meantime let me thank mark howard and the ireti team for pulling this data together for me for verifying it because i was going to present it last month but i wanted to double check it and for providing these bar graphs to show the data so i want us to deeply study the acquisition of foundational reading skills in kindergarten in third grade for the purpose of improving the work of adults this data comes from the i ready assessments done in august of 2020 for children in kindergarten and third grade this is not cohort data and so
025and i do intend to present the kindergarten data to early learning coalition the coalition for black student achievement as well as children's services council because we have to improve these foundational skills and this data actually proves some of what i've been saying for a very long time and so i will be waving it around trying to get people to respond um to change how we govern ourselves so if you go to the second oh i guess i'm supposed to do this okay if you go to this slide and i'm only going to do five slides so don't be overwhelmed by your printout if you look at this so orange is black is black students the turquoise is hispanic and gray is white that's the color coding you as males have a black rim around the
026bar graph and the socioeconomic status is represented by the bolder shade of orange turquoise or gray being students on free reduced lunch and the lighter shade being those who are not offering reduced lunch okay now i am going to skip to slide eight and i have to coordinate myself here so this is this very busy slide um shows acquisition of high frequency words in kindergarten and third grade sorted by race and socioeconomic status so girls are on the left and boys are on the right half of the slide so you will see in each set of of bars the first set the dark orange is black students on frame reduced lunch the next set light orange is black students not on friend reduced lunch or excuse me girls not on friend reduced lunch so and
027so on so you will see um that each group increased by 58 from 58 to 71 percent the lowest increase was for black males not on free reduced lunch the highest was 71 percent for white females on friend reduced lunch so um now we're going to move on because i know i have limited time so yes dr robinson and you're out of that time so please wrap it up you told me four minutes mr barbier oh the clock was running up there on the screen and it's down to zeros it started on four it did start on four okay so do you want me to end if you want to go through one more slide for us go ahead okay so so we do understand i would not be showing these slides if people were
028studying the data and it was being presented to us so um let me just okay so this next slide is phonics so it's the same thing k and third so the point here instead of focusing on the kindergarten what i was trying to show you and each of us was who was gaining in our system and who was not right so um this tells me that somehow engaging and accelerating some of our students in the early years we managed to do and others we do not so i ask that we you know continue to look at the data and i am going to if i can get ahead now from the board members i want to show one more slide because i had cut this down to to a grand total of five board members
029yes or no we made it we made an agreement that we were going to live in the four minutes dr robinson really this is something you can certainly bring to board discussion we'd be happy to look at all this stuff because you do bring us valuable information but board comments is really oh i'm sorry i forgot the board comments was the happy talk okay so i'm just going to ask the board to please pay close attention to slide 16 right which shows you this is vocabulary and so two two subgroups actually decrease their proficiency in vocabulary from k to third in our system guess which ones they are thank you so much for your indulgence mr barbieri you're welcome dr roberts miss mc vice chairwoman brill thank you so good evening everyone and what a
030historic day this has been a socially distanced presidential inauguration as we all held our breath for a peaceful transition and our teachers used today as a teachable moment in history i have just a couple of comments tonight first some of you may have read on the district's facebook page that chief operating officer of palm beach mask mike erickson donated 32 000 three-ply disposable face masks to our district i'll say that again palm beach mask donated 32 000 face masks mike is the same person who donated face shields and masks to our food school food service employees this past summer these masks were made right here in riviera beach i cannot thank you enough mike for your generosity as we continue to operate in this new normal and to my friend former colleague and now budget
031committee representative chuck shaw what an honor it is for me to sit on this dais as we vote to name the new adult education center building the chuck shaw technical education center your selfless dedication for the past 55 plus years to serving our students of all ages and our employees has not ended you continue to serve our community and i cannot think of a better way to honor your legacy and that was the end of my comments but i just since i have a couple seconds more just to the superintendent if we are going to bring back data like this which i think is good for us to look at i would just ask mister superintendent that the data include ell esc and also break out the haitian students thank you so much thank you
032miss pearl board members my the chairman's reporters attached the agenda but i wanted to point out one thing as all of you know i attended construction oversight committee meetings as the board's representative for the last three months cork has been unable to meet quorum requirements as many of the court members are in their late 60s and 70s are not willing to come into the meeting with 14 adults plus staff plus the public as all of you know cork reviews all large construction projects that those meetings question staff is to concerns and then votes on whether to recommend to the school board whether they believe we should approve the project and the results of that vote together with their comments are brought to the board before we vote on the project cork oversees capital projects which
033in most years total in the hundreds of millions of dollars i've asked the administration in the general consul council's office to explore the alternatives available that would allow cork to meet and bring those alternatives alternatives back to us as soon as possible and also to review the situation with the other board advisory committees to determine if any of them are also having quorum issues due to the pandemic as we customarily do at this meeting we recognize those of our employees who have passed away so i'd like to start with the vania de silva teacher ese autistic discovery key elementary born in 1960 died in november 2020. sylvia garcia a facilitator esau community language spanish river high school born in 1959 died in december 2020. carrie kelly district architect facilities construction born february 1961 died december
0342020. shanti kirk teacher elementary certified school counselor palm springs elementary born october 1971 died november 2020 ralph mitchell worker maintenance maintenance and plant operations born july 1960 died november 2020 and judith moore assistant food service one at village academy born january 1960 she died november 2020 if we could have a moment for these employees take a moment of silence for these employees and their families thank you we have no presentations while we're in the pandemic student government report president alvarez thank you good afternoon everyone i hope everyone had a safe healthy and happy holiday season i can 100 say i speak to you guys on a historical day today with i've i've only seen a few elections um but i can definitely say that this one has been historic and i was glued to the
035tv all throughout school today and my teachers weren't very happy about it but i think it's an exception for today since we returned from our break the county council has continued our work towards making this new year the best year possible student governments across the county are continuing to plan school and community-based projects our student governments are also continuing to get their committees ready for the upcoming district 5 rally convention in which student governments across palm beach st lucie and martin counties meet and share project ideas and run for elected positions additionally student leaders have continued to keep all our students informed on school-run social media accounts they have been providing up-to-date information about school events sports and college and career information the senior class executive boards from each school are continuing to plan and
036organize special events for the last semester of our high school as i have mentioned multiple times before racial equity and student representation have to be at the top of our agendas i am excited to soon introduce a new idea that i have been working on to allow for students to be more well represented and help us put us on the right track to this goal as always i would like to thank everyone on this board for your efforts to better our education opportunities and for making our students your very first priority thank you everyone thank you mr president uh academic advisory committee do we have a report play the report chairman barbieri school board members dr fenoy and staff my name is laura feldman i'm honored to speak with you tonight as the chair of
037the academic advisory committee since the requirement of meeting in person has been back in place we've had some difficulty with attendance at our meetings due to a lack of attendance in december the meeting was cancelled we held our january meeting this past monday even though we did not have a quorum again during monday's presentation we heard an overview of the implementation of the spring 2021 education plan and assurances including the enhanced outreach to students who have not been attending school virtually or in brick and mortar we also discussed the dashboard that is used to view this information and how the district is looking at instructional gaps through the district's student academic support plan staff is looking at instructional gaps for all students and how to fill these gaps they're creating this plan to include all
038students whether they are performing below at or above grade level and during the meeting we also heard an overview of the message that the district is using for progress monitoring we heard about the planning coaching and monitoring process we'll see examples of the process through the dashboard we also learned that it is up to the schools and teachers whether the fsqs and usas can be considered for students grades and as the fsqs and usa's are used in ela math science and social studies courses we also had a discussion about how progress can be monitored for other courses and that schools can develop assessments and put them on the scoreboard and then they too can be analyzed through this dashboard which keeps the information at the fingertips so to speak so we also heard a presentation
039about the best standards and implementation timeline and the instructional materials adoption for literacy that had a rubric developed with input from the community it was very exciting information and we're looking forward to the new rollout in our next meeting we'll be reviewing the district's data in edudata.sldoe.org thank you very much if you're listening miss feldman thank you the audit committee report is attached and i understand chairman postal is here for the district diversity and equity committee meeting please come up to the podium happy new years everyone um board chair members in every one of your respective places student alvarez um i too was glued to my my tv all day today a lot of tears a lot of smiles and repeat the report is for the work from the ddec for october and november as
040there was no meeting in december can you hear me clearly perfect yes thank you to the board for approving the contract for the rei and continuing the equity work in this district i had the pleasure of attending rei phase two along with 39 others virtually of course ms millen and miss starks also gave us an update on the cultural response of teaching for teachers and leaders there was 496 teachers enrolled 382 teachers enrolled in culturally responsive teaching track in addition 236 teachers leaders enrolled in 168 completed which 66 expected to have completed in december for leaders at a glance we're preparing for future principles program 26 out of 33 people interviewed made the cohort two we were impressed with 15 out of 26 are females 11 out of 26 are males 14 out of 26
041of color 12 of 26 are white five hispanics four latinx colombian brazilian peruvian five black eight elementary assistant principals six high school assistant principals and seven principals in the middle school with three and regional office administrators they're concerned with respect to haitian leaders and how we are preparing them to become principals seeing the growth of our haitian population as previously advised the ddc had two committees one dealing with the work the equity leader position on which that committee have completed their task and we will be meeting with the superintendent and his office the second was with respect to the diversity and business partners there was this diversity studies completed in 2005 based on that data to 2009 between 2009 and 13 findings were under utilization and over utilizations 39 live events and 49 virtual events
042so some of the things that we are looking into is engaging other businesses and doing the work with the district and how do we ensure other businesses are aware of businesses that are not in their language but they are qualified the challenges is what are the barriers preventing the teachers to become principals and the clarification of the actual covid dashboard which we did get clarification through an email after our meeting today during the inauguration the amount of diversity and cultural differences on display demonstrated the importance of continuing to fight for diversity equity and inclusion and everything that encompasses the eye and as amanda gorman reminded us there is always light if only we are brave enough to see it if only we're brave enough to be it thank you thank you it'll take us to
043elected officials and delegates james cabrillo's president ceo of the education foundation good evening mr president good evening sir i'm looking for my clock also just throw something at me when i hit three minutes um superintendent fenoy chairman barbieri members of the school board and respected members of the staff and honored guests over the the almost four years that i've been here you've heard me say repeatedly our basic mission is to be the nexus between the business community and the world of education this was made very stark to me early on i think i was only here about three weeks when a hurricane came roaring through and i had driven a truckload of school supplies out to the glades one of our board members jim moore who's a senior executive with united healthcare met me and
044and here's this executive for the healthcare industry helping me offload pallets of school supplies we got to kac canal point and there's this very tall distinguished gentleman took his tie off and he's helping us throw boxes around and i i looked at him and i said you're amazing i i have to tell dr hibbler how hard you're working and he patted me on the shoulder and said i am dr hibbler i say that because these are the kind of principles and leaders you have dr fenoy next thursday night your education foundation is pleased to sponsor the annual principal of the year and this year it will be also the assistant principal of the year celebration we'll be honoring both the principal and an assistant principal from the four regions who have each nominated uh one
045of their incredible leaders on tuesday night we're going to have a special reception and i hope many of you on the school board could come because our business partners just want a chance to meet you they want to share with you their passion for public education in palm beach county and get to know you um on thursday night at four o'clock we will have that celebration thanks to our great partners at the education network and the communication department people can participate virtually just go to the education foundation website and you can register and get the link to be able to watch that and that again is next thursday the 28th at four o'clock who are these people from the north region your principal of the year nominee is phillip d'amico from watson b duncan middle
046school and your assistant principal nominee is andrea walker from lincoln elementary from the glades region there's there's a good gentleman dr hibbler derek hibbler from kec canal point interestingly enough the assistant principal of the year is also from kec canal point altoria henley some good leadership out there at kc canal point the central region nominee for principal of the year is adrian howard from ub kinsey palm view and the assistant principal nominee is justin arnold from palm beach central high school finally down south your principal of the year nominee is rachel capitano from don estridge high tech middle school and the south region assistant principal of the year nominee jeanne plassel from banyan creek elementary that's the education side the business partners we can't thank comcast enough who underwrites the entire event the breakers coca-cola
047beverages florida dell computers hbk jpmorgan chase kaiser unit just listen to these business partners who love our principals kaiser university miami dolphins mosque construction office depot pnc bank skanska construction song and associates td bank tickets at work united healthcare verdicts construction and the white's company these are companies who are putting their dollars into education to honor the incredible principals and assistant principals in palm beach county members of the school board senior administration staff who have been invited we hope we see you next tuesday night for the reception at red apple supply get to know our business community and let them get to know you they love our teachers they support our principles and they will be there as we forge in to whatever this new normal is going to look like ladies and gentlemen this
048is the work of your education foundation to bring these amazing business partners and unite them to our incredible principles assistance assistant principals and teachers we will see you next thursday night online as we honor the great leadership in palm beach county dr fennoy chairman barbieri thank you have a good evening thank you mr gorillas dr billy jira of living skills in schools i'm sorry if i mispronounce your last name give him my best shot there pretty good okay good evening school board members and superintendent my name is dr billy guyra and i am here on behalf of dr suzanne spencer ceo of living skills in the schools living skills in the schools is a substance abuse prevention program that has been serving palm beach county schools with free programming since 1999. we are licensed by
049the department of children and families and accredited by carf last school year alone living skills in the schools reached over 50 000 students in grades k through 12 in 76 schools throughout palm beach county and delivered over 1500 live presentations in times where schools may be at home or maybe in times where schools may be home and brick and mortar our mission remains the same to build each child's resistance to substance abuse through age-appropriate education reassurance understanding peer support and access to help we are here today to share with you a collaboration that occurred with school board member alexandria aya and john i leonard high school dr spencer created the family box for substance abuse prevention to support families through these times of extraordinary challenge living skills in the schools knows that families are worried
050about their kids and the long-term impact of social isolation on mental health challenges with coping skills and increased risky behavior we wanted to assist families and help them reduce and prevent substance abuse by teaching kids the skills and perspective they need to resist substance abuse and addiction together we step in where parents families neighborhoods and schools may be overwhelmed out of their death and lacking resources the family box for substance abuse prevention is based on the research that suggests that regular family dinners with teens have been shown to help reduce substance abuse risk whether families already gather for family dinner meals or not we wanted this kit to help families have what for many is a challenging conversation we also hope that it provides resource support when and where a family may need it and
051ultimately increasing resilience in the next generation the 500 boxes were funded by the health council of southeast florida on january 13th in partnership with school board member alexandria aya and the leadership and faculty of john i leonard high school family boxes for substance abuse prevention coupled with family meal kits were handed out at a drive through distribution event i would also like for you guys to know that currently lsis is in discussions with miss elkerson from florida power and light to explore providing boxes to substance abuse for substance abuse prevention to schools at riviera beach thank you thank you chuck ridley from fpsuseiu superintendent board members happy new year to all today actually was a beautiful day um and these pearls and chucks i'm not quite sure what that's that's all about but i'm seeing
052some beautiful pearls going around so i'm here to talk about a couple of things first i want to talk about the collective bargaining agreement on behalf of seiu i want to make the board and superintendent aware that even in the middle of a pandemic while difficult it went quite well for the most part i believe our leadership will say that this election cycle was fair particularly given the uncertain times where we're in and this could not have happened if it was not for the support of you dr pinoy and for this board so on behalf of the employees we want to say thank you now i want to shift to an item on your agenda that will look at revising your school calendar as you know seiu represents some of the hardest working employees you
053have many of our employees as a result of the job they do are placed at extreme risk examples bus drivers yet they do their job why because they really believe in the value of your mission statement a statement that stressed commitment to providing a world-class education commitment to providing equity commitment to making sure each student reaches his or her potential a commitment to effective staff it is the commitment to effective staff that i will want to discuss now the economic hardship that will be placed on our bargaining unit if you delay the start of the school year will place them in a position that can't square up that mission statement if you really do mean those words that you have in that statement the group affected the most by this will be paraprofessionals school food
054service workers and managers bus drivers and bus attendants please realize only a small percent of these employees are able to get any summer work to make up for the economic shortfall they experienced during this the summer months now this was in place long before the pandemic so you can imagine how this impacts them now many could be in danger of losing their houses or their vehicles or unable to even feed their families because of the cash flow issue that will be created by this decision employees in our bargaining unit are dependent on their check coming at the usual times and like me many live from paycheck to paycheck it will be completely irresponsible for the school district to change their pay schedule without good reason and we have heard no good reason in the past
055and i don't really anticipate hearing a good reason now so if you decide to reverse or revise the calendar in a manner that places our workers at hardship then find ways to minimize the financial impact our union and staff and member leaders stand prepared to help you work through this process again thank you thank you mr really dr peter cruz executive director of leroy collins public ethics academy at fau that's recorded please play it good evening school board members this is dr peter cruz i'm the executive director of the leroy collins public ethics academy at florida atlantic university and i'm speaking on a non-agenda item i'm just wanting to remind you all that on february 1st 2021 the national high school ethics bowl will be held here in palm beach county this year virtually on
056zoom and the school district and fau are entering their second year of our partnership in providing this wonderful service to our high school students here in palm beach county the national high school ethics bowl promotes respectful supportive and rigorous discussion of ethics among thousands of high school students nationwide the department of teaching and learning with within the school district of palm beach county has partnered with leroy collins public ethics academy at fau as the regional organizer for southeast florida i'd like to thank dianna snyder and tara hughes at the school district along with diane ederman for helping pull this activity off this year and i'm looking forward to a number of the board members serving as judges and again thank you very much goodbye thank you dr cruz laura feldman president of palm beach county
057pta good evening chairman barbieri school board members dr fennoyan staff my name is laura feldman and i'm speaking to you as president of palm beach county council of pta ptsa as part of our advocacy efforts county council is advocating for the prioritization of school personnel for kovas vaccines as part of the learning first alliance national pta along with the national education association the national school boards association the american federation of teachers and the national associations of elementary principals and secondary principals sent a letter to the cdc emphasizing the importance of vaccinations for school personnel also i would like to take this time to share with you about upcoming county council and community events our general meeting will be on january 25th at 7 p.m via zoo our virtual reflections awards program will be on february
05811th through the reflections program pta shows the importance of including arts in our schools and our students lives we hope you will be able to join us for this virtual celebration of the fantastic artwork our students have created county council is also looking forward to participating in florida pta's upcoming virtual legislative conference on march 21st and 22nd where we will continue our advocacy efforts on behalf of all students for more information about the conference and to register please go to the programs and events page at floridapta.org we are continuing our letters of love program where students can earn community service hours for writing letters to the elderly in nursing homes for more information please contact sharon lubin at wellness.tbccpta gmail.com also please check out our facebook page for information about community health and wellness events
059such as joe dimaggio children's hospital's free virtual spanish epilepsy spanish support group meeting on february 2nd at 5 30 pm and basic life support provider courses at the lake worth campus of palm beach state college which will be held in person and cost 69 25 69 and 25 cents you are all invited to celebrate pta founders day with county council by participating in a co-vis safe scavenger hunt for more information please contact communication dot pbccpta gmail.com thank you for listening and have a good evening thank you president feldman we now have agenda item speakers come up to the podium when i call your name and please remember watch the clock you have three minutes mark black and then scott simon my name is scott simon i'm a parent of a freshman and a junior at
060spanish river high school before this horrible pandemic i attended watched and spoke at multiple board meetings regarding the 2021 school calendar with a proposed start date of august 10th 2020. at that time the board received significant opposition to that very early start date and was largely opposed to it or at least seriously concerned with it however despite many valid reasons to push back the start date the board ultimately approved that calendar primarily and understandably because it wanted to avoid a further pay gap for all employees in the district now for the 21 22 school calendar that logic no longer applies there is no pay gap issue because this upcoming summer starts a full three weeks later than last summer on june 19th this year as compared to may 30th last year nevertheless the calendar committee
061has once again proposed the earliest permissible start date of august 10th 2021. why why cut the summer down to just seven weeks i understand 10 weeks may be unrealistic this summer but why not at least eight weeks i would question whether the calendar committee has some ulterior motive in starting school on the very first permissible date every year what's the logic i also understand the board may want to complete the first semester before christmas break so do i but the proposed calendar already has an excess of days in the first semester for example the proposed 2223 calendar on today's agenda has 85 days in the first semester but the 2122 calendar has 87 days why do we need those two extra days next year also as chairman barbieri stated at a meeting last year no
062other industry in the world gives a full week off for thanksgiving why do we continue to do it shorten the break to just three days like it used to be for so many years and if necessary shortened christmas break by another day or two between ending school late on june 18th and starting early on august 10th palm beach county students would be hard-pressed to have a productive summer my daughter is a junior at the top of her class interested in medicine she wants to attend a six or seven week summer science program one that would quote look good on her college applications however with this proposed calendar it would be impossible so many programs in the country either start before june 18th or end after august 10th take the young scholars program at fsu for
063example it's an amazing six-week summer program for florida high school juniors with significant potential in the fields of science technology engineering and math and it's free my daughter would love to apply but it starts sunday june 13 2021 or a full week before school ends here or take the pre-college science program at nyu as another example it's another great program but it ends august 14th or a week after school is proposed to start here there are many more programs she would love to attend however simply because she's a public school student in palm beach county she's shut out of those programs i would urge the board to push back the school start date at least to monday august 16th thank you thank you mr simon we have three recorded agenda topic speakers emily baloff terry
064lopez and lisa reich with the i.t department after noon my name is emily bailoff i'm a parent of second grade children who attend marsh point elementary school i'm calling regarding the meeting that will be occurring on january 20th meant to discuss the 20 21 22 calendar dates i'm strongly urging the board to consider extending or rather giving our teachers students and parents a normal summer we're already extending the school year to june 18th which is three weeks longer than it normally is and if we start school back up on august 10th then our children will have less than eight weeks of summer break i'm an 80s child i have never experienced a summer that short in my lifetime i'm sure there are many others who can agree with that sentiment teachers have been taxed this
065year uh impossibly teaching two on uh students via two different platforms students have had their lives turned upside down parents have been dealing with the brunt of multitasking and turning their homes into classrooms workspaces and homes for the last year and a half and all of us need the break so if you're going to end the school year on june 18th i am strongly encouraging not starting school until at least the end of august and if necessary the first week in september miami-dade is not starting school until august 23rd they're ending their year on june 8th as is broward county we will be cutting summer short for everyone who has endured this year and a half and kids need to be kids teachers need to disconnect as your parents please if we're ending the school
066year on june 18th please push forward the start of school two at the earliest the first week in august to give everybody at least two months to regroup recenter so that we can start the 20 21 22 school year strong and ready thank you hello my name is terry lopez i'm calling in regards to topic e-l-r-1 regards to this proposed school calendar for palm beach county the discussion item is the expectation is that they would like to propose a longer school year i have a fundamental issue with that specifically because children and teachers are struggling not just this year but last year the volume of work that these students are being assigned as it relates to school work as well as homework it is outrageous my child specifically was formerly a honor roll student from
067kindergarten up until this year the sheer volume of work it is excessive so to hear people talking about extending the school year when there's so many things that you all need to mitigate you need to figure out how to get these kids back into the buildings safely you need to figure out how to do it safely for your teachers you need to figure out how you can better to support your teachers because a lot of these teachers are being put in an awkward situation where in some cases they are assigning probably too much work but they probably can't even grade quickly timely they're being asked to support students that are in person that are online and then children that are in the classroom and it's a lot that you're asking people to adjust i'm just
068asking for you guys to really stop and consider what your intent is what will you guys gain from a longer school year besides making these children and the teachers be even more fatigued than they already are one of the other main things that i feel like you guys need to mitigate and you're not doing a really good job with it's just mental health issues domestic violence certain things and people's homes have escalated as a result of covet 19 and there's so many other things that you guys need to prioritize that is not being prioritized the school year does not need to be longer you guys have taken away extracurricular activities these children are stressed making and now on top of it you want to extend it to take away time that they have over the
069summer to debrief and just breathe it's too much you guys really really need to stop and see what you're doing to these children children should not have the level of stress that they have thank you good morning my name is lisa wright i am a mother of three children in the palm beach county school district and they're all one of elementary students i'd like to speak with about um el r1 i believe it's uh referring to the calendar the um upcoming vote you're having today i also own a travel agency a local travel agency and i'd like to give you a perspective from what i am seeing i have booked over 300 families to travel spring break 2022. they were all booked on the old calendar now i know i'm not the only one that
070does this i know you know i spoke to other colleagues as well these people are going to lose a lot of money by changing the spring break week and moving it one week earlier i'm sorry removing it as you have proposed to do from the original calendar that was approved in july 2019 um this change in the spring break date is really going to be detrimental to not only my business but to so many families again that have already paid and booked for a specific week um in terms of looking for christmas i love new year's that also is a big issue because people travel the two weeks they go one week because they need one week for a rental a lot of house rentals are week to week so saturday and saturday so although
071you are keeping about the same amount of time what you are doing is cutting it off and not doing saturday to saturday you're doing it on a thursday to thursday which inhibits many many many property rentals vacation rentals resorts and such um i really strongly request recommend beg for you to go back to the original calendar that was proposed and not change that spring break week by one week spring break by one week earlier keep it the week of the 20th if you could that would be huge to so many families um and i'm seeing it every day all right thank you i really appreciate your consideration one last call for mark black are you here all right we'll move to board members the three items been two items been pulled