001thanks for the word you'd like to call this meeting to order and we'll start with pledge allegiance led by dr wright i pledge allegiance thank you dr wright tonight we have this afternoon we have a new system for youtube viewers and we welcome everybody that would be viewing this on youtube and hope you give some feedback the tech people our gurus have been working hard to get this together so it'll be a lot more functional and and friendly to the viewers first item on the agenda is a recognition of our br star awards for the month of march dr wright would you do that absolutely thank you from our maintenance and custodial department we have david heathman and we'll get that award to jeff akins rachel koleski is a teacher at the elementary school and
002we'll get dr eyerstone her award and then kathy palinsar is also at the front desk help support is also be our star for this month and we recognize each of these and we appreciate their exemplary efforts thank you thank you dr wright um two members of the well actually just one member of the board and brenda have been excused tonight for family reasons but margaret gabby won't be with us this evening um first consent agenda item number two is there anything that the board has looked over in the consent agenda that you would like to take out and vote on independently or we have a motion to accept the consent agenda as contained in the minutes which is basically the minutes of the past meeting and the vouchers from the past month chuck you need
003to speak right into the microphone so there you go sorry move that we approve the consent agenda as presented have a second from jennifer all in favor all right consent agenda has been approved item three i keep trying to turn pages and i need to lick my finger and it doesn't work so well with a mask item 3.1 recommendation to review and approve teachers and counselors contracts for the upcoming 21-22 school year any questions about that from any member of the board and dr wright would you like to just comment on that or we need just to vote i just have a question do we have any positions and this is a great list by the way do we have any positions that we still need to fill for this next year we do have
004a we do have a number of positions that are yet to be filled a couple are in special aid we have two english positions open at the high school it's hard to determine what will be at the elementary school yet in terms of teaching positions until we figure out our student count but we anticipate one or two maybe three elementary positions and i do not think we have any at the junior high am i correct one at the junior high and social studies position that we're one of those studies thank you any other questions if not we have a motion to approve item 3.1 a motion from chuck a second from jennifer all in favor that's also passed item 3.2 recommend recommendation to review and approve the disposal of equipment i read this list of
005equipment it's kind of sad yes dr right you want to tell us what the equipment was for those that are watching mostly old football pads and old sports equipment that has said broken or dated and equated well it just means it's been there for a long time cost to replace that is not cheap is it it's not not cheap so we can't actually sell this stuff we have to actually dispose of it right right if we were to sell it we would have to we have an auction we have procurement policies that we follow in this case there we need the board's approval to dispose of even property that is no longer useful right well if we were to sell it to somebody i'm sure we'd have a liability there because there's no we'd have
006to make lamps out of it or something like that because it's not serviceable anymore right okay so can we have a motion or is there any more discussion with item 3.2 a motion from chuck for item 3.2 the disposal of the football equipment have a second second from jennifer all in favor that'd be unanimous also recommendation item 3.2 recommendation to review and approve the e-rate for the application um dr ray do you want to explain this we we've read this but would you like to explain this for who's watching we we could and we'll do a better job if we let nate it's his wheelhouse i'll let nate explain it there you go nate sure so thank you um so e-rate is a federal program through the fcc which provides funding for internet um and
007network contin connectivity um for lower income schools and so it is based off of free and reduced lunch rates which qualifies blue blue rich for an 80 percent reimbursement on those funds and tonight is category 2 which covers internal connections as they call it but that would be switches any cabling fiber battery backups those types of things category 2 does not cover computers software anything like that um so this is an open bid uh sealed bid process with very very strict rules and as you can see we had eight vendors that put in bids and at the end of the day only two of them actually qualified to be evaluated and of that on those bids were we are replacing 31 switches which is all the switches on the main campus minus the junior high
008that was just refreshed a few years ago um we'll be replacing our core router um and the battery backups across across the main campus um and then we'll be adding a fiber line into the talon classroom and into the a plus cte classroom as well any questions regarding that thank you chuck i assume that we have the money budgeted for our share of that we do this is uh we're generally on a seven-year refresh cycle and so i work closely with brenda to make sure that those funds are allocated over the years we actually they extended e-rate goes in five-year cycles and they actually last year because of the the covid extended that out to a sixth year but it wasn't enough funds for us to really do anything with um and so we're at
009actually at eight year eight the current the current equipment that we have across the district is eight years old it was put in in 2013. um so we're a little um recommended replace those every five years we tried to do seven years and so we're actually doing it uh on year eight i see that the total cost was 160 000 plus and the government is going to fund us through the e-rate funding class 2 or category 2 128 000 so that only leaves 32 000 for us to come up with is that is correct yes and then we'll also with some with our old equipment as well we usually get some sort of a buy back some some monies back from that older equipment as well it's not much but anything helps all right thank
010you any other questions mark we have a motion to approve item 3.2 a recommendation to review and approve the e-rate for 2021. i have a motion from jennifer have a second from diana all in favor that's also unanimous thank you thank you appreciate your help information recommendation item 3.3 recommendation to review and approve the early graduating of a blue ridge high school student dr wright we have a student that has met all the graduate requirements um lauren has reviewed it and his recommendation is we allow the student to graduate early and so you've had the backup data i don't know if there any specific questions can be answered in general lauren would be glad to answer them you know i read through it sounds like an outstanding student one one that's really going to be
011missed really made me feel old because i can remember when he was born just a sad day when kids grow up but looks like he's grown up well any questions from the board if not then we need a motion to accept this early graduation for the student item 3.3 a motion from chuck second from diane hall in favor that also has passed unanimously item 3.4 we're down to uh dr wright a report from you thank you if it pleases the board i'd like principal hoffmeier to give us an account of the spelling bee we had a champion and a third place winner could you bring us up to date with that courtney you bet we had our um we had our navajo county spelling bee we had to have it virtually um so we proctored
012it from the school grace smithson eighth grade student um came in third and jackson woods was our was the navajo county winner so saturday he'll be um back at our school virtually again uh he'll be taking the state spelling bee um so when he wins that we'll see if that's going to be virtual in washington dc or not um so that was exciting and then our girls basketball team uh on march 6th beat st john's for the champion uh the championship and it's the first time in i'm not sure how long for the girls uh eighth grade team so that was really exciting win we're proud of them thank you i'm excited that girls basketball win that speaks well for the future congratulations one of our one of our elementary teachers sam rodriguez coached that
013team and so we're congratulations i wanted to also give a shout out jackson woods's mom as rebecca woods one of our teachers those who never bet it's unsurprising that she would have a very bright kid and so uh we we're thankful and then our uh having a first and third is is really pretty remarkable so we're proud of those kids and of our girls too so thank you courtney i want to provide a number of updates to the board uh with respect to some events that are upcoming and also to provide a little bit of detail and visibility perhaps for the upcoming months and so every everyone i'm sure is asking are we going to have a prom are we going to have morph in some of these seasonal traditional activities the answer is yes
014some changes and some adjustments will be made but they will they will occur and these are optional the volunteer including the staffing of those so the district office staff is going to pitch in and the principals to help i'm sure we'll have teachers that will volunteer but this is a voluntary activity and the kids are already exposed i would like mr webb to give a little bit of color around that provide some details if you would just his perspective we visited about this at length and one of the things that we agree on is that we need to start returning to some level of normalcy with our kids as quick as we can do so that has been our commitment all along given the relatively low frankly very low levels presently in our immediate community
015and the progress that's being made i do believe we could do so safely uh mr webb can you give us a little bit of just a preview on those upcoming events for us sir yeah so met with student council they are they've been planning in the hopes that we could have a prom and some of these other activities that typically go along with school so they are in those planning stages and as dr wright mentioned we feel that we're in a position where we can we are back to school in person the same precautions that we're following at school we would have in place at the prom activity or any of the other student activities that are coming up one of the things for example they want to give the seniors an opportunity to kind
016of get together with their classmates here in the last couple months and and spend some time build some memories so this friday they're they're having an event it's meet the sunrise so they're going to be out at the football stadium and be out there for the sunrise and just have some budding time with them bring their blanket because it's going to be cold but just get that opportunity to meet and have you know those memories that maybe they weren't able to have at the end of last year the beginning of this year and so those are things that we're looking forward to so we're going to have the safety protocols in place and whether the venue is a combination of indoor outdoor will have it fully staffed with those that are willing to participate and
017take that that added risk to be able to do that thank you mr webb as far as the graduate graduation commencement exercises they will look much more like a traditional exercise we will use both sides of the stadium position the stage in the middle it will read the student's name where they're going and what they plan to do will be in the program this year instead of you know nate is going to wherever he's going to and he plans to do this and whatever that takes time we'll just read nathan neal he'll take off or read another student it'll enable us to move the students through quicker we won't have photographs before graduation on the field like we've had that'll cause congregation we're trying to stay away from that but we will allow family members
018to bring in and we don't believe we're going to have to limit that number using both sides of the stadium i think and and the track as well we're sure we can space people out allow kids to have a more normal commencement exercise and proceed that way for the lock-in that will also is going to occur it'll be a combination of using all of our space both new gym old gym the area at the high school where the main commons we've got a lot of square footage there will keep kids spread out frankly the risk of them getting in an accident or involved in something after graduation is far greater than being in an area like what we were watching over them and and so we're very thankful to dr brown and doctors laura and
019john bratch and others that always pitch in and are on top of this so we will we'll move forward with our lock-in we'll also have our baccalaureate i believe on the 17th graduation is on may 21st i think those have i captured all of the high school events that are forthcoming prom and morph are prom prom okay we'll have prom and then we'll have the last walk at the junior high traditional around the lab okay good are there any concerns from the board or questions or comments that that we might be able to address for you are there going to be other events like mr yellow jacket or the peach fuzz and whatever those things are called we haven't discussed those i don't know if we're there's a lot of activities planned for the seniors
020and with that probably some of the others that will involve the other younger classmates i may be limited so i'm not sure if we'll have all the full spectrum of what we've had in the past chuck there going to be a senior trip to walmart [Laughter] no we're actually not looking at a senior trip they're they're actually looking at doing a senior field day and trying to do something here on campus keep it safe that way but still give them something different if there's something we can do to mr webb southwest foods is always looking for someone to help maybe we can provide food barbecue something like that too to help more willing to do that okay great if there's no further question about that i'll go on the next topic are there any others
021okay thank you we have a really unique opportunity to have our staff members and community members receive the johnson and johnson vaccine or the pfizer vaccine those shots will be given at no charge without appointment beginning march 23rd at 10 a.m until 6 p.m there'll be a large medical unit transport from the indian health services parked out here we'll need to make sure that we have that parking lot free of traffic so that allows the medical unit to be parked and the traffic to form and lines all is needed is id if they have insurance great if they don't that's okay too they need to have photo id and they have a choice do they want to have the one shot johnson johnson and that that shot is developed differently than the other vaccines and
022so there are some there are a number of people and over staff members that were waiting for the johnson jones so i'm excited that it's coming to our area we've placed that on social media we'll get that on our website we'll campaign that on the also the the all call and whatever vehicles we have we've also posted this information with the local newspaper so hopefully we'll get good participation everyone's welcome no appointment bring your idea if you have an insurance card bring it to even without insurance it's free of charge and i think the capacity is pretty significant he said a couple thousand or more shots he has okay which would be really meaningful for our little community any questions on that all right yes sir members will members of the public be allowed to
023join in yes sir anybody 18 years of age and older is may get there receive a shot good i also wanted to mention that nav apache dropped off a check for 14 000 today as a rebate part of the program we've been a customer for a length of time there after a period of years you qualify for a percentage so i got a nice check for fourteen thousand dollars which we'll use for junior high and high school extracurricular activities so that would mean music and sports those programs and i i i want to thank dav apache for that i got 12. did you good if you want to throw it in the hat that's good too dave we'll take it as as far as any other items of business as an update there have been
024no reported cases for any staff members students or family members of students for the last almost three weeks and so it is virtually absent in our schools at least undetected we have the effort the administration teachers support staff and students have made to do their part has been exemplary we're proud of them the question is are we going to have these masks next year i don't know the answer would be as soon as we can get rid of them we will i don't know yet it's too early to tell if we continue on that current trajectory our hope is maybe we wouldn't uh we're not going to uh as much as we love purple it'd be nice not to have to have these we don't know yet but we will have uh i'm sure by
025the middle of january we'll have greater visibility the the new schedule that has was introduced a couple of months ago a couple of tweaks was made to it but that has been also distributed widely for the 21 22 school year and it is aligned with npc is aligned with the navit programs and the surrounding school districts reflects it more closely are there any questions from the board on any of the updates provided if not thank you appreciate the time i do have one question about this survey can you give us an update on the survey that you sent out to the parents and uh regarding scheduling yes sir schedule absolutely absolutely it's a it's uh that's a great question i've had close to 300 responses so far and of that number 75 in 75 of
026that number are requesting some type of flexible friday meaning students have to qualify in order to participate in some type of independent whether that's online or some other activity on friday they earn their way into the program and so there's a there's a number of things and data points that we could look at to make it fair and equitable but also to incent student engagement and to make sure that there's to be clear this is not a what was that called reteach this is not a reteach friday that was a categoric disaster we're not doing that or suggesting that however we are suggesting that the students are perhaps proficient or highly proficient on the arizona merit their gpa is where it needs to be their attendance is good the behavior they're operating in such a
027way that we have confidence in their ability to do that we are looking for ways for those students in that group to be able to have uh experience a different friday different type of a friday and uh there is another uh about uh roughly 100 families are still wishing to remain online online only next year so we're working that plan k through 12 to figure out how to do that we have put out the notice for teachers if they're interested in doing that that will come with enhanced compensation given they're going to teach multiple grade levels it's a different body of work and a different skill set and that what we'll be taking those applications and determining how many will be need once we understand where they are per grade level but we will offer
028an online only component we're hopeful to be able to offer something along the lines of a hybrid or a flexible schedule at the high school it is complicated if you remember we do not have a block schedule we don't have a seven period schedule we have a hybrid of two schedules it's complicated already we may not be able to do it and so i don't want to create any expectations that are unrealistic i will say however if we had been appropriately funded by the state we would have had the budget capacity this year to do that we will not just by virtue of adding additional teachers for that expressed purpose we have to do it within the current allocation of funds which makes it more challenging but we are going to do something different one
029at a minimum create something flexible on fridays i've reached out to teachers the administrators are working with their staff to see what that might look like at the various grade levels the other interesting piece of information that came out of that was well there's clearly an appetite to get back to school and for activities but there are still a number of uh parents that are willing to volunteer out of the 300 i had about 15 20 percent that said they want to volunteer and one day a week so we're going to reach out and see what shape that takes we can use it especially at the elementary school level and in our classes where we're remediating math and some of those other things so our volunteer efforts we're trying to ramp that up as well
030were there any other areas the survey that the board might have had any questions on i that i could address as an update if not thank you i one other question about summer school what period of time during the summer would that happen early in the summer or right before class starts again good question the summer school will begin on may 17th that's almost that's the very next monday after the last day of school and for the k through six it'll extend for three week period for the high school of four week period and during that time we also provide transportation meals meaning breakfast and lunch and i think we might send them home with a supper for the high school four weeks high school junior high four weeks k through six is three weeks
031and and and that will be at no charge to the families how many hours a day and how many days a week monday through thursday and it's about it's roughly a half days so five hours a day roughly all right thank you you're welcome thank you any other questions from the board regarding anything all right uh next uh item on the agenda is announcements and just to announce our next board meeting will be april 13th 2020 on 5 pm at this location uh next item would be item number four in adjournment can i have a motion to adjourn i have a motion to adjourn from chuck have a second from diane all in favor of adjournment unanimous we're adjourned thank you