School Board Meeting 4/17/23

001All right, let me get my stuff. Good evening. Good a good evening. Late afternoon, actually. Okay. Welcome to the April 17th Board of Education meeting. Could I have a roll call, please? Auntie here. Livingston here. Here thank you. All right. So, our open session. Um, this is our early 5:30 meeting. Uh, Monica Rosen is with us. Hello, Monica. Can you hear me? Okay. All right. So, I've been told that Monica may have a little bit of difficulty hearing us. So, I'm going to ask the board when you speak, speak directly into the mic so that she can hear us well. Um, and the little owl on the top will capture the person speaking in that little box up at the top. So that's why I'm looking up there to see if I see me. But

002it's so small that I can't really tell if it's me. Hi me. No, it's not. It's not. Okay. Well, whatever. At least she can hear. You can hear me, correct? Okay. Very good. All right. Okay. By the time she finishes. By the time I'm finished. Okay. All right. Yes. Okay. So, um, Monica has sent us some slides. Um, so our purpose tonight is to review all of the feedback that we've received around um our goals. Uh, this is quite a a meeting uh for us to talk about all that feedback that we received from the the community talks. um our meeting with um staff, we did surveys. Um so we we have a lot and um I also want to reme want us to remember that we got some information during the superintendent search that

003Monica has also reviewed as well. Um so the board was excited to use the ALMA advisory group again because um primarily our experience was a positive one. Um we we got a really good superintendent um Dr. Campbell um and and we we heard from our community during that process. So it was really good to hear um from so many uh stakeholders as we tried to um identify our priorities and uh what we wanted to see and um and we heard many um voices regarding how they felt how our community members felt we should move forward. So, um this is one this is this is um uh this is one opportunity for us to hear again from our community. And um I think at this point Monica, I'm going to turn it over to you. Uh

004for Monica's slides, are we going to control the slides or Monica has them? Okay. Okay. So, Monica, you will share your screen and show the slides. Is that correct? Yes. Perfect. Yes, I can do that. Can everyone hear me? Okay. Yes. Yes. Okay. Good evening, everyone. Uh, it's a pleasure to be with you all again this evening. I'm so sorry I couldn't be there in person, but I'm thrilled to reach this point in your planning process. I I do want to give an opportunity to your superintendent if there's anything that he wanted to share um tonight as part of this goal setting work. So I'll ask uh superintendent just a moment if he has any comments um or any information he wants to include in this conversation. What I wanted to say as we start

005is that um you know when the board president and superintendent came to me uh about this opportunity, they knew that one of the most important first milestones um for Marcus was going to be taking a look at the goals that were established and revisiting those to see if they still reflected the needs of the community. And so the last several months, the district has met with many, many, many stakeholders. Tonight, we want to give the board an opportunity to share with the community what was learned in those conversations and to discuss the implications primarily for the goal statements themselves. Are there things that we want to adjust or revise or strengthen about the four goal statements? And um if we're able to, we'll also start to think about the elements of outcomes and measures uh

006that the board may want to continue to refine after today's meeting. Uh so that's that's kind of what the heart of of tonight's conversation is going to be. What did we learn and what do we see as those elements of the goal and measures? Now before I move any further, Marcus wanted to give you an opportunity if there's anything you wanted to share about your team's work looking at the outcomes from the previous goals or even your reflections before we dive into the conversation about what came out of the feedback that was provided. I wanted to give you that chance. Well, thank you Monica and uh good evening board. Uh I just like to say thank you to everyone who participated in the process, who took time to attend a meeting uh or fill out

007a survey or just to have a conversation. Each discussion that I was a part of I found invigorating and and inspiring. Um there's a lot of good energy in the room, a lot of good conversation. So uh I really feel that there is a synergy around these discussions. um and board just so that you know uh everything that we sent the Alma group you had in your packet right so there is nothing that the Alma Group has that you don't have and so that's so that you are uh well informed as to um how we got to the conclusions or maybe how Monica got to the conclusions that she did so as I said thank you to everyone who participated uh in these conversations and I'm looking forward to the discussion tonight and thank you

008for the opportunity Monica appreciate All right. Thank you so much. Okay. So, I want to share a little bit what were the key inputs that informed the the information that provided the information we're sharing this evening. The first is uh as Pat shared earlier, the super during the superintendent search, we had a host of community sessions, listening sessions to hear from the community what they were looking for. as the superintendent was named. He had his own entry plan and he met with many members of the community over the course of the year. Um in addition, there were a series of community talkbacks um where uh the superintendent reviewed the current goals and outcomes and discussed potential improvements. As a part of that and alongside that uh participants provided written feedback. The feedback was provided in

009Spanish and in English and delivered to the ALMA team, translated where needed to be. And individuals were asked to answer what they saw as strengths in the goal statements, what questions they had, and any suggestions they had for improvement. And finally, outcomes that they thought would help measure each of those four goals. I wanted to start by refreshing for everyone what the current goal statements are. And I wonder if board members would volunteer to read each of these. I'm wondering if there's a board member who would be willing to read just the goal statement for goal one around equitable and excellent education. Sure. Hi Monica, it's Meera. Hi Mara. Hello. Okay, so goal one, equitable and excellent education. ETHS will increase each students academic and functional trajectory to realize college career readiness and independence. Recognizing

010that racism is the most devastating factor contributing to the diminished achievement of students, ETHS will strive to eliminate the predictability of academic achievement based upon race. ETHS will also strive to eliminate the predictability of academic achievement based upon family income, disabilities, and status as English language learners. Thank you so much, Meera. So that's the state the goal statement itself which is what we'll primarily focus on tonight wanted to share for the public that there were specific outcomes connect and measures connected to that uh that the board established and they were primarily around college ready andor workforce ready andor independent. I'm gonna ask um a board member to read goal two around student well-being. I can do that. Okay, go ahead. ETHS Oh, goal number two, student well-being. ETHS will connect each student with supports to

011ensure that each student will experience social emotional development and enhanced academic growth. Thank you so much. So here the original outcomes and measures were really focused around attendance, behavioral referrals, GPA, participation in extracurricular activities, and improved social emotional wellness. Um, and there were certain specific measures and data sets that the board contemplated when they originally called out uh these particular outcomes. We're going to move on to goal three, fiscal accountability. Who would like to read this one for us? Okay, it's Stephanie. Goal three, fiscal. Yep. Goal three, physical fiscal accountability. ETHS will provide prudent financial stewardship. Thank you, Stephanie. So, here are the outcomes and measures we're focused on. maintaining your bond rating. Uh having achieving awards and recognition in the state, maintaining transparency to the community and to taxpayers and uh seeking and ensuring

012stable and adequate annual funding. And our la last goal around community engagement and partnerships. One more volunteer, please. I'll do that if it's Pat Monel. Um, goal four, community engagement and partnerships. ETHS will strengthen parent guardian relationships to create an effective continuum of learning and seamless transitions into and out of ETHS. Thank you, Pat. So here for the community, the outcomes and measures were all around alignment of partnerships. Uh the demonstrated involvement of parents and guardians in ETHS and the percent of students meeting freshmen on track. Um so that gives us an overview. It helps everyone to know what these four goal statements are, what the original outcomes and measures were. And you know what we wanted to share is that with the we knew the timing that with the timing it was time to

013refresh review these um and with the new superintendent wanted to have the opportunity um to check does does the community still align with these goals? Are these the things that we are that that should still be our goals? Um, what I'm going to do is I'm going to go through several slides with Alma's synthesis of the themes in the written feedback that was provided. We had about 300 or so um, submissions for each of the goal statements. We reviewed all of those and were providing a qualitative review of what the big themes were for the board. As you're listening, each of you received a packet of information. So, you may have your own idea of what big themes stood out for you as you prepared for this meeting. What I'd like you to do is

014to take notes as I'm speaking. And I want you to take notes. If there's anything in in the feedback synthesis that I'm providing that that should be anything that should be added to the synthesis, anything you want the community to hear or that stood out to you that for whatever reason didn't make it into this summary, I'm going to ask for a conversation around both what's resonating with you in the feedback and what feels like a call to action. So, as I'm going through each of the slides, I'd like for you to take notes on your own and then we're going to have a broader discussion as a group uh once I'm done. All right. So, first in terms of what we learned, we really saw strong alignment in the community. There were uh critics

015and there were some comments that um maybe didn't necessarily agree with the goal statement itself, but the majority of respondents in all four um really seem like the agreements still resonate and there's a desire to deepen the work in some very specific ways. So beginning with goal area one um what we saw across all of the commentary is that the majority of the respondents really agree with the goal are appreciative of the inclusivity the holistic nature of how it was written. Um the focus on different uh factors. Um and so by and large a ton of support for this particular goal around equitable and excellent education where people had questions it was all around how do we really know if we're meeting this goal. So there were many questions about how we can actually measure

016this. Um there were some suggestions though. suggestions for actions uh tied to this or outcomes included diversity training for staff. Uh defining what a successful student is and measuring against that. When we looked at suggestions for measuring this particular goal, the theme across those who made suggestions were around measuring student achievement in different ways. college enrollment, vocational readiness. Also looking at factors like dropout rates, AP rates, and test scores, but a lot of those measures, the connections were around um what whether or not we're seeing equitable outcomes across groups. So I actually copied one of the written comments because I thought it well very well represented this idea. Um, so what they were what this individual was looking for to know if the district is meeting its goal is that students from historically vulnerable or

017marginalized groups are graduating at the same percentage as historically more privileged students. That they would want to see a further increase in students from vulnerable or marginalized uh communities in your honors or AP classes. and they would want to see a decrease in disparities in enrollment in remedial class enrollment and decrease disparities in suspension or disciplinary actions. So in this goal, there was a real clear want desire in the community uh if this is what we're focused on that we should be looking at where there are differences um and and whether or not we're changing those differences or narrowing those differences. Now um I will say there were a fair number of critics on this one though they were relatively fewer. Um, and so what did come out in the comments was a question of

018why we're focused on race, the use of race as a predictor, why we're focusing on race instead of good teaching. Uh, wondering if race is a distraction. Uh, and so it's just helpful to know that that sentiment is out there, though it's not the majority point of view. Uh the other thing that came out in our review of the comments is some wondering about other factors like the education students receive before they get to ETHS and things that are out of ETHS's control like the home environment that students come from. Um so although the gold statement um is is making a connection their community is saying uh you know how do we account for um those particular factors. Um I'm going to go ahead and move on and cover the feedback in all four areas

019and then would love for us to go back and discuss each one one by one. In goal area two there and actually in subsequent goals there were generally fewer commentary than there was in goal one. The goal two was student well-being and this was one where by and large all I mean just vast majority of comments were saying there's a huge need for this goal. This is incredibly important. And the questions were less about whether this should be a goal, but rather how exactly do you define whether or not you're meeting this goal. So actions that were suggested included things like strengthening triage support, um more proactively and actively providing information to students and their families about what resources are available that support student well-being. Um and then measures that were offered were around a

020increase in percent of students that are accessing resources. So how many students are seeking support from a social worker, counselor, a healthc care provider and do we know that students are taking advantage of these resources? Um some mentioned the factors that affect student well-being and we saw a theme uh around individuals saying students are under a lot of pressure right now and that part of supporting student well-being is seeing if teachers could be could release the stress in any way around things like turning in assignments on time um schoolwork. And so there's a question in the community, again it's not it wasn't as widely held as others, but this idea and concern that the academic environment, the academics themselves might be a cause for distress for students and whether or not there should be something

021done at the teacher level uh to help relieve that. And then finally, a common question that many respondents had was sub centered around, well, how do you define that you're delivering supports? What are those supports? Um, how do we know what they are? Um what it said to me as an implication is and kind of starting with this second bullet on the slide uh for this one and the upcoming goals that there's some lack of understanding in the community about what these goals how you define these goals and how you are actively working to address and meet these goals. Um, so the lack of understanding in the comments really speaks to me to a need for educating the community around how the district is tackling these and how you even define these. Fiscal accountability had

022relatively fewer comments, but those that were there were all uh very aligned. Um, so what we saw was a lot of people asking for focus on transparency in the district and many comments had specific programs, specific needs that community members feel are underfunded and they want to see increased investment. Um so there was a focus on school programs, sports came up, uh science supplies, classroom supplies, things of that nature. Um there were a number of comments about the choice of the word prudent and just wondering what that meant. And then several and it was a theme for us that uh several members in the community noted that this particular goal statement seems very vague or broad um and and were suggesting that it should be more targeted or clear or specific in nature. We had

023a similar theme with goal four which was around community engagement and partnerships. So what I will say is for sure many people appreciate the explicit uh mention of parents and guardians uh in this goal statement. Uh there was a key theme in the feedback and a desire to strengthen connectivity of parents to the school and the the relationship with parents really was the primary thing that we that stood out to us in the comments. And so the recommended actions were around what could be the cadence, the structures, the routines that you could use to create more formal connections between parents and the school. One suggestion at least talked about the interaction between parents and counselors and students as a way of helping to inform parents, connect parents um to the students experience and how they

024were being supported in the schools. And similar as I as I started, there were some people who said they just didn't understand what this goal means. So, as we're looking at it again tonight, might want to see if there are aspects of the goal statement that might be confusing to some or might again you might want to add some definition or clarity. And here I I do want to um um just uh suggest and I know several board members participated in the talkback sessions. I know Marcus wasn't at all of them and so you might have a lot more color commentary for us about what people were grappling with around these things when you were in your discussions. Um, so that's my summary of the four goals in terms of, you know, our review of

025all of the feedback. What I'd love to do now is open this up to the board for discussion. And as I mentioned at the beginning, what stood out to you about the feedback? And as a part of that, is there anything I missed that you think is important for the community to hear? Would love to hear from those who attended the talkback sessions. Anything else that really resonates uh or that further clarifies what's on the slide? We want to talk about what feels like a call to action. And we will conclude with a discussion around any key shifts, adjustments, or additions that you would like to make to the goals as a result of what you learned in this process. So, I'm going to go back and I'm going to start with goal area one.

026And um want to start with Pat and Marcus before we open it up to the larger group. I do believe the two of you at least were in all those sessions. I'm not sure if others were. And if there's anything else that you wanted to add to this synthesis uh or share in terms of what you heard in the sessions themselves. Thank you. Um thank you, Monica. Thank you for that. um very thorough um feedback. It's really good to think about um all of the feedback we got and uh Mon'nique was also at that um community talkback session. Um so I'll also give her an opportunity to talk. Um we did get a lot of feedback and I remember this um first goal in every session was the one that we got the most comments

027and uh feedback and and it is the first goal. It and and I I personally like um the sequence of the goals. This should be the first goal. This is our academic achievement goal. This is this is kind of the what we do goal. Um so so that was that felt right. Um I I know that that there are um I hear I heard the concern about are we uh focused too much on race or or is why why focus so much on race instead of good teaching? And um I'm just remembering how when we track um the performance of of our students over the years, uh when we track our students of color who have been every time we we do an achievement report, we see that this the the black and brown students

028are at the lowest. Um but when we bring them up, all students go up. So, I just want to point that out that when we when we consider better ways of teaching students of color, we are really considering better ways of teaching all students. And I just want to make that very clear um because that's what happens. teachers think uh think very deeply about how to reach students and and um and and their teaching and their instruction and um I've seen over the years that I've been on the board and it's been 10 years. It's hard to say. Um, I've I've seen teachers working um more collaboratively, working in teams and um really looking at their um pedigogy and and how to strengthen that. So um so I do see that. Um, however, I do

029think as we we look at this goal and get all this feedback um that we might want to be a little bit clearer about um how we are measuring um these components. So, um I don't know that we will have as much time to spend on talking about specific measurements. Um but we do measure um students in honors and AP classes and we we track that we look at that. Um we we've been looking at that data pretty consistently. Um so I don't know Monnique, did did you have more that you'd like to add? Yeah. And then I know Liz was there as well for the first one, weren't you? Yes. Yeah. The talk back the community. So yeah. So um yeah, I remember this. Yeah. This first goal received a lot of feedback. Um

030and I remember us talking about being more bold in this statement. Um I remember folks also saying that um to really under the current conditions that we're all living in um what does excellent or excellence mean now as it's been connected to equity all over the the country, right? It's like are we saying or using that word to validate equity? Um there was another conversation around um um in being bold that the the second sentence should be the the first sentence. Um and and then I know we went into some of it has been captured in the notes so I won't um repeat that but but I do remember you know us being challenged or we should challenge ourselves to be a little bit bold in this um in this goal but that this goal

031was very relevant but it it says a lot and I know the feedback was that it was also busy. It was it was like it's the longest one. Um and so you get confused in what it's saying. And then there are words in this goal that um states that ETHS will strive to eliminate and and many thought that strive was a weak word. Um either we're going to do it, try our hardest, or fail at trying to do it. Do it the best that we can. But to put that in here with equity and excellent also again makes it not as um strong or or as bold of a goal that it should be. And Strive is used a couple of times in this statement. Yeah. Um which they picked out which is amazing. Um

032but yeah, that and then all the everything that's in the packet. I think that um I just want to be clear that um there was the community talkback and Liz was there, Stephanie was there, Mera attended as well. Um, but we still have notes and we were able to capture all the feedback that we got from from that conversation because we wanted the whole board to be able to hear or to be able to interact with all that was said. A lot was said at that meeting. And then there was another meeting with just staff uh that Mo'Nique and I attended, which is why I I said Mon'nique was there. But but um but these this feedback captures all of that in addition to the survey. So so I would like any board member, not

033just Monnique and I uh to to speak. Uh Mirror's turning on her mic and then Gretchen. Okay. Um and when you say speak, are we in discussion mode or are we Okay. Um because I I think what's coming up for me is well one the second sentence being recognizing that racism is the most devastating factor. Um I would want to maybe reframe that um as structural racism or situating it more within our system and less within individuals. But then I saw some of the comments that stood out to me as one of the prompts you gave us. Um and really if that's what we believe, which I I believe it is true, but um then the looking at inputs like the um idea of training staff, right? So we're looking at student output, but the

034problem is us as the adults and the the institution. So it would seem then that we'd want to look at us and the institution to measure our success. So the metric should be also tied to those elements. Yeah, I remember that coming up. Yeah. That we were putting the onus on our students. Yeah. So figuring out language so that we don't do that or don't even imply that. Yeah. Right. Go ahead, Christian. So, um I don't mean to ignore your prompt um to give feedback on this goal one, but I just wanted to take a further step back about sort of the structure and the process around the goals as a whole because I think when I read through the 1,200 pages of comments on the goals in my packet, um I The thing that

035leapt out at me sort of globally was um that we have failed to educate our um families uh the community, anybody who cares about these goals and I would argue everybody in Evston should care about them um about you know what not not just what our goals are you know what their purpose is um why why they should care, why they matter to our students, all of these things. Um and then relatedly um we all became very familiar when we first developed these goals, you know, many years ago, um with the idea that we have a very limited number of broad broadly worded goals. And then underneath nesting underneath each of those goals would be um strategies for achieving them. And that would be in the wheelhouse of our administrators and our our expert teachers

036to sort of figure out what those strategies are. And I actually like um Monica, I see in your document that you're calling those maybe actions rather than strategies. And that's a way better word I think. Um, and then thirdly is this outcome and measure piece. And I think I could feel bubbling up in all the comments. Everybody's frustrations about measurement. And it was very funny because the fourth question in connection with each goal was always, "What do you recommend we use as a measure?" And I have to say really nobody had had great ideas there. I mean you you do cite this one which I think was I agree was one of the best ones. Um but everybody complained early on their comment about the goal was always yeah this is a great goal but

037how are you going to measure it? And then we asked them well what do you how what do you think how should we measure this? And they're like well I have no idea. Um and and you know what that's fair and that's understandable. Nobody's an expert in this. We really grappled with those. So, I just wanted to say that um and I'm not sure how much was explained to people gathered in these groups about the fact that we we did have existing strategies. Maybe now we can call them actions and existing outcomes and measures. Perhaps we just didn't tell anybody that. Um but if there's one takeaway that people should know, it's that um we we do have these things. But I think it's also a message to all of us on the board and

038the administration that we have to do the thing that I've been complaining about and trying to urge for many many years and that is to communicate much more much better about this. You know for example you know every item on a schoolboard agenda relates to one of these goals and we need to make that relationship to our discussion at a board meeting crystal clear. and its relationship to the goal. So anyway, that that I just wanted to make sort of this this bigger point about the structure so that it didn't didn't get lost right at the beginning. But can I can I just say a couple things about goal one now? Is that okay? That that was my preamble. Um but I but I just I think it's an important framing. Um, with respect to

039goal one, um, I thought all the feedback was really good, except for the people who seem to think that race doesn't matter. And I'm just going to say I'm a white person, race does matter. Pat made the point. Um, you know, I I don't even know what there is to discuss about that. We lay it out at virtually every meeting, and you're going to see it again tonight in our discipline report. So, um, race matters. We called it out in gold one. I think we should continue to call it out. And I also think that, um, even though there were a few voices that disagreed with that point, the overwhelming majority of voices, uh, was in complete agreement with the idea that race needs to be called out here. So, I'll just say that um,

040I agree that it's a much too wordy goal. uh that word strive. I recall when we developed this goal got inserted because some of us and I would like to think I was not one of them uh chickenened out on the idea that we could fully eliminate um but I do think we need to be bold. I have no problem eliminating strive because first of all it's an extra word and I think it's mushy. Um, strive. Yeah, it's like there is a collective impact effort I think out of Cincinnati called strive. So I I don't mean to hopefully they don't take offense watching our Yeah. Yeah. I mean maybe if that's the only thing you're doing it's just striving. Um anyway, I you know there and I will also just say that there were a

041couple um people who called out you know the danger in in listing these other subgroups beyond race um is that you leave some out. Actually even if you identify race you you run the risk that you leave some out. So several people had made suggestions LGBTQ plus gender identity those kinds of things. Others had helpful suggestions around um uh it should be uh emergent multilingual speakers, not English language learners. That was new to me and obviously easy enough to include. Um I think there is a little debate around people with disabilities versus differently aabled people. Some people actually will take the disability. So anyway, we need to get to the bottom of that. That's it. Thank you. I I um I've been thinking a lot lately, not just in this process, but over the last

042several months during during the campaign actually, that we need to do a better job at telling our story. Um, we need to do a better job at um help helping our community understand what we're doing here at ETHS. Uh, Marcus and I just did that at a national um conference. We were at the white privilege conference in Mesa um over the last couple of days and Marcus is probably going to talk about it in his report, but it was really good and and our theme was the equity journey at Evston High School and it's it was clear as we were doing that and put it all together and and the board should remember some pieces of that because um we sort of started that a few years ago when we presented at the national summit

043and And I'm hoping that we'll get a chance to do it again and that we will all take part in that presentation not only at the national summit but also at the joint conference in November. Um I wrote a proposal and it was approved. I'm just telling you now. Um, so I'm thinking that we'll all be up there talking about our our journey and just, you know, how we have um have have done this work and and really um as we educate the community and talk about the work that we've done and why we've done it and connected with the goals. And we're also helping folks understand how boards work. Um because even as I went through some of these comments, I could see that many people don't understand really how boards work and what

044um you know there there's specific um there's some limitations that we have as a school board. Uh and some of the comments were not really for us. they were for the administration. So, um and and for the faculty and teaching staff to really kind of figure out, you know, how how they would want to um address some of these issues and as a board, we we would not um touch those. So, um so anyway, those are some of my comments. I see Liz and then Pat. Yeah. So, it seems like some of the feedback we were receiving that there was some denial and some skepticism over the words race and racism being used here. Um, some people that felt like they did not affect our student um outcomes. And for myself in the community, I've

045also gotten feedback of people saying um when we say that we recognize that racism is the most devastating factor contributing to the diminished achievement of students, how do we know that? How do we measure that? And I think they they need some clarification around that. So, I wonder if we are going to be keeping um this this content in the in the goal if there's a way for us to sort of clarify. How do we know that? And I you know, and I know it's it's based on data and everything, but um if there's some way that we can show that to the community so that they do recognize it and they do to do care. Yeah. You know, just a quick response to that. I think you're you're you're spot on there. Um I

046have begun some preliminary conversations with Pat about revisiting the equity statement that the district authored back in 2011. That needs to be revised as well. And that will probably be another step in this process so that we can outline the why, right? And really make that clear. uh you all can make that clear as a board and we as a district to the community why we have named race as such when we go back and revisit the equity statement that the board adopted back in 2011. So that that will be a part of the next part of this this process later. Thanks for bringing that up. Yeah, and we probably won't get to that this year. Well, and let's not forget that every report as you mentioned Gretchen and everything is always disagregated by race

047and we're always isolating. So, I don't want us to do too much work to serve what I would argue is maybe well-intentioned, but pretty ignorant in ways that not like in a bad way ignorant, but just like we come on. Yeah. I I think I guess what I was thinking is that it's already there. it's already there because we in terms of the why when we when we when we um review the achievement report it's clear what who are this what groups are are struggling the most. I mean it's already it's already there. Um, I do think though it would be helpful, as Gretchen said, for us to be more um intentional about naming how each report connects to the goals. And I and I've noticed that many of the presenters start that way, but

048but we can just highlight that more. Well, and this is exact I'm sorry. Well, go ahead, Pat. I'd love to comment on this when you're done. Okay. Um, so I think I can pick up right where um, this discussion just sort of left off, which is when I read through all the comments, it was clear to me that as a as board members, we know that when staff present, they always start with what goal they're talking about. We we hear that we see the dots being connected. Um, and I remember there was one particular person I remember, but I've heard this other times. When people come to a board meeting, they're always like, "Wow, there's so much information here. There's so much that I didn't know." And I think there's a big disconnect between what

049we know, and we don't even know everything, what they're doing, which is tons of things, and what our community knows. And I think that was very reflective particularly in the survey. Um I found the community conversation notes were a little bit and and some of and the staff certainly were were more I thought nuanced but some of the community comments were very removed from what I think is actually happening. And I don't blame them for that. I think it's a it's a communication issue which as you all know that's what I look through everything is through communications. But so I think that that there's a a need here to really engage with our community more and differently. So I you know and I'm I'm not going to put you know say that I'm come up

050with all these great ideas but like you know at community events we should always be there and I know some of us go but maybe we should be really intentional about that. ETHS events, maybe the board at the next play has free coffee for the families and is available there to talk to people in in a casual way, but also can answer questions and so forth. Um, so really being more creative, maybe doing one minute videos on some topic that we talk about at the board meeting and put it out on social media and have people respond. I mean, what I I'm just I'm just riffing, but the idea being being more creative and more intentional about a two-way dialogue with our community because we are we I say the entire institution are doing amazing

051things that people don't know about and and I think if we help them understand that then we can get some other questions, right? and that that could be useful to us in terms of how it's landing out in their families and with their students, right? Um the other piece that really struck me as I read through this was and and some of you have touched on this that the goals are sort of the big idea. They're the what we're stri sorry not striving what we're going for. Um and that's that's the goal. and we should have some measures and we should have some some bullet points beneath. But I also think that maybe what would be helpful is, and I'm not going to use the big sword, strategic plan, but some kind of outline of

052what that means this year, this school year, something that kind of encapsulates what is and that's not from the board, that's from the staff because the staff is doing the work. They're doing the how. That's not our job. So, for example, several people in the particularly in the staff comments mentioned that we should have a goal around hiring more teachers of color. Um, don't disagree, but maybe is that a goal or is that a how it gets done? Is that a Marcus and Pete and and the team? Um, is that their work? we just set the forward that we we're trying to do, you know, equity in our academic achievement. Is that what that means? I would argue there's a l, you know, there's a line there. So, I guess I felt like, um, our

053community needed to hear from us more in different ways. Um, board meetings are great, but not too many people come. I'm sure there's a a riveted audience online, but again, you know, we don't know. So what how can we be creative in that? And then secondly, how can we kind of a little bit more intentionally connect the dots between big ideas and goals that are board work and the spe some of the specifics that our fabulous team is doing in the building to achieve those goals or work towards those goals. So those were my my reflections. Thank you, Pat. I just wanted to jump in here because I think it's really important when when we're talking about what it is that people are struggling to connect or to understand. Um to exactly the point you

054ended on, um one of the things that I think would help people to understand, well, why do we think racism is the most devastating factor or how do we take action is to be able to note what you see as the levers that are in ETHS's control uh to be able to reach your goal. And so, um, and I do think to Pat's point, it gets at what are some of those either strategies or focus areas, but it might help the community to to further clarify what are the things that are part of ETHS's um, realm of control that could actually support uh, reaching this goal. Um the other thing I wanted to share is around the diversity of teachers. I think it's an excellent point Pat and I did see that comment um in

055there. Uh is that I agree with you that that's that's the team's work and not the board's work. However, there is something to say and it's a good example. If we think the diversity of the workforce is a lever towards achieving equitable and excellent education, you could consider a measure or an outcome connected to the diversity of the workforce. So I agree with you the strategy or an action that gets the result, but the board might make it a a measure that you're looking for. So I I I thought that I think the point is well taken there. You know, I think I'm Can I just say this before because I think this is with all the goals and what I realized during campaigning um that there's been a three-year gap. Yeah. Right. And so

056there are people being brand new, introduced to us for the first time prior to the deep dive of equity and all the training that we did prior to that. So they came into the district knowing that was um our northstar or whatever. They knew that because we were so public about that. Um, we were, and I've said this before, we were the first in the community to move in that direction. And so families from private institutions or district 65 knew that coming in. There's this huge gap of individuals that are trying to discover us for the first time. Um, and so some of the the questions on the campaigning trail and and so forth and so on, it just lacked knowledge because they just were not engaged in it. And then we spent, you know,

057a few years with a pandemic. So, I it's I'm I'm taking all that into perspective. Like, Liz, when I hear you say that they're trying to understand um how we validate racism and where, you know, like that's all we've been talking about for years, 20 years or so. um as a district it it's just it's beyond some of us, but I understand it because there's this huge gap where we've gotten to the point um where those changes or the work that was done earlier on has just been we're maintaining it or you know improving upon it. whereas in the beginning we hit it hard and and we've made it known I mean especially for those board members that were here um during that time. So I think this is a new discovery for a lot

058of people and I don't know I mean perfect time to well you all can certainly expect some of the levers to be discussing to be able to say yeah here we are hitting it hard again um because we are um definitely um looking at many different levers that we haven't touched before in the last 15 years that we'll be doing differently. So, there will be your opportunity for that. Oh, yay. And we've just come through a pandemic. So, we've come through a pandemic and and things are different. Priorities are different and um and we we we we need to think about how to capture those differences. I think certainly when we get to goal two, we'll be talking about um um just the emotional well-being of our community in general. Um Stephanie, you were going

059to make a comment. Yeah. I just I just wanted to sort of I'm thinking about the pandemic and you know that sort of empty space of you know what happens in that time when we're everyone is isolated and and things sort of slide. At the same time, I also feel and I've spoken with a number of you about this this opportunity that we have now to really deepen the way we do work. We've always been a forerunner um as a high school nationwide um and sort of pioneering this work, if I can use that word. Um, and and at the same time, I think we really have the chance, as we've talked about in the superintendent search, about leveling up and about being bold and about going deeper and sort of pushing that um envelope

060a little bit. Um, so so I don't really know how that gets incorporated into the goal. I mean, maybe that's a question of, you know, how um as opposed to what, but um I do agree with all of you that that it does it does need to be race needs to be called out. I do agree that there are other um aspects of student identity that can be perhaps addressed in the wellness goal or can be called out in the wellness goal perhaps. But um but I do think we really need to let this goal stand on race and and perhaps even peel away some of the other stuff that's kind of clogging up the verbiage there in goal one. I do think, you know, it's possible we could disentangle some of this because it

061it does, I think, detract somewhat from what we're trying to do. It's just very wordy. So, as you consider simplifying or stripping away, um, you know, I I understand it's the longer of the goals. However, each statement, each sentence has a message and a focus. And so, um, uh, the wordiness doesn't bother me as much if we agree that every sentence belongs there and is sending an important message about your goal. So I'm hearing in the room that we should simplify this. I think as we work to do that, we should really unpack a little bit. There are three statements, three sentences here or four maybe. I think it's three. Uh you know, what are the things that we feel might be either clouding or adding noise? We already talked about the word drive. We

062just love to hear from the group. What what would you take out of here that you think would have it be more clear, succinct, or targeted to the actual goal? Um, two two thoughts. The the word um or the phrase uh functional trajectory I find really really painful. I'm looking at Pete because I swear you had something to do with that language when we I I I probably typed it in as a note from what we were doing as a group. But to that point, I think to play off of that, if we just get rid of it, I think it's stronger. Yeah. Right. There you go. There it is. Yeah. So, that's that's because there there were certainly questions that came up. I I I know I'm jumping ahead, but that word prudent also.

063Okay. Um, and then I, you know, I I guess I would just toss out the question about, um, you know, to put this in a, um, positive isn't exactly, but but to flip it, um, an asset, an an asset frame, but yeah. So, so that I think all of these we should look at with that. I can't I I don't my brain doesn't always naturally correct for that. Maybe I'm a glass half full person. Um but one one of the things um maybe one of the ways to cut through some stuff here is to talk about our institution as an anti-racist an anti-racist institution. Um, and I don't know if there's a way we can incorporate that kind of language into this into this goal. So just going to toss that out there for to

064chew on and keeping m keep in mind some of these ideas might not be reflected in the goal but certainly when we look at the equity statement um we we have more leeway to incorporate some of these ideas. I have to say I'm I'm not that worried with the length. I mean, I I like Gretchen's uh two points, her getting rid of functional trajectory. I felt like that was very jargony. Anyway, um I I like the the notion of bringing anti-racist institution in. I think that brings the um the wording up to a more of a clearer definition as it is in 2023 than it was when this was written. Um, but I don't I mean there's there is a lot here, but there's a lot to say. So I'm okay with by and large

065because I'm looking at all the points being made and I can't see one that I want to cut. Yeah. So yeah, I can see one. Okay. Um, well, I while I love Kendi and I love the concept of anti- uh racism, I don't like the statement of what it is we don't want. I want to say what we do want. Um, and so I would just use this middle sentence recognizing that racism is the most well I would say structural racism is the most devastating factor contributing to the diminished achievement of students. ETHS will eliminate the predictability of academic achievement based upon race and because as Pat said that is the area in which we see the greatest impact and once we take care of that all will follow. We don't need to necessarily name

066every because there are going to be others. Um, so I would just isolate when I I remember when we wrote this. I remember you know what I'm going to say. We we were worried that if we we were worried we were getting pressured to make sure we name everything. And I wanted to put race out there at the beginning and and isolate race. And so the naming the list doesn't race affect everything else affects when you look at it, you know, race is a predictability and family income of those that are, you know, so it just went on and on. So I I agree with what um Mera suggested. That's what I think the last sentence in the first to um Oh, sorry. I didn't mean to talk over someone. Go ahead, Monica. Oh, I

067I was saying that um I uh I'm wondering if because I expected us to spend more time on goal one than the other goals, but I if I've got it correct, Pat, we've got about 35 more minutes left. Yep. Okay. Okay. So, what I'd like to propose for this is if everyone could send any thoughts on potential edits, you can send them to Pat uh or Marcus and either of them can get them to me. I will incorporate all of the feedback on potential drafts uh or potential edits and send you um either a revision or a few options of revisions both pulling from this conversation but also on any specific edits that you send my way. I'm wondering if that sounds okay. I want to make sure if there's anything that hasn't been said

068yet that any any board member wants to add to the conversation um before we move to the next one. I think we're good moving moving on. Thank you, Monica. You know, this is very uh similar to the way the conversations went. What was that? She must have a delay. Oh, are we okay? We good? I was just going to say that this is similar to how the conversations went in our discussions. We got to go one and stayed there and I think did a good job of unpacking the feedback for goal one and I feel good about this conversation that we just had. So, thank you board and so let's do move to goal two. Okay. Excellent. Thank you. so much. So, student well-being, what was interesting, I think, of all four goals that and

069I I feel like it gets back to what Mo'Nique was saying earlier about the time that has passed and this desire to really address student well-being, but that really the way people are thinking about well-being post pandemic is very different about how they were thinking about uh student well-being or prioritizing student well-being even just a few years ago. But would love to hear from the group just as we did with goal one. What stood out to you in the feedback? What felt like a call to action? What are the things that you know your re your reactions in response to what you heard from your community? Uh I like to start I think that um the way we like as you just said Monica the way we even think about goal two is very different.

070So that when we say we'll connect, we don't really think in that way anymore. Um, we all internalize and the work of well-being. And Dr. Kinsey made a really good point in one of the sessions about developing skills and competencies, right? You she had some really good language around like what this really is as not as much as connecting kids with resources, which is important, but also developing competencies and skills. uh in this area. And I thought that was a it's a it's exactly where we are and it's a dramatic shift from where this goal is, which was fine at the time, but that's certainly where we now are as a district. Agree. I agree. Yeah. Go take care of that. Take care of that. Yeah. Can you go language? So, one of the things

071that I really um I I completely agree that I think all of us and and it was reflected in the community's comments um view well-being very differently post or whatever we are uh co and so there was this real um hold on Monica's gone. Oh, is she gone? The owl's moving now. The owl's moving. There she is. Hey, Monica, are you with us? Sorry, I lost connectivity there. Okay, can you hear me? Okay. Yes. Yes. Yeah. No. So, um, so I was saying that I think, um, everyone and was reflected in the comments recognizes well-being is a very different thing now, um, after COVID. Um, and I think that what came through and a lot of people use the term belonging and we've talked a lot about that here and I know our team is

072talking a lot about that and working on that and I guess it's for me it's and I've used these terms before but all the the surface things that we're seeing in our community all the whether it's violence or guns just being more present in our with our young people or just struggles that kids are having or whatever it is that what we learned and I I I was really glad that I I felt I was hearing it from our community is let's dig into the root causes. Let's not keep putting band-aids on the surface of the problem because I would argue that's always been what we needed to do and I think it's just so everpresent for us now. And so I felt like that was a major piece of the feedback and that it

073really is a call to action for us. And again I think you know our terrific team is is already thinking that way but I really want to see this as a a major level up because I think like the goal quite you know nicely connects that this isn't just about there. We're a school so arguably we're all about academics. Okay. But if kids well-being isn't attended to and staff, people talked about that in the comments. Totally agree. Um, then we aren't going to be able to help them meet their goals in in other ways like academics. So, I feel like that was a really big call to action was to really go deeper with the root causes and to level up. So, one of the things I thought about as I was reading that was

074Marcus talked to us a while back about um sort of rethinking sort of supporting families and what that might look like. And no details and it's a conversation I think that's happening now. Um, but I'm really interested in what that might result in because I think that's one of the one of the level up ideas um to helping our students is also really wrapping our families um because there is just it's so obvious now but it's been like this before and those of you in the world like I'm looking at Ta because you know as the student services person for many years knew this was happening. This is what's behind the problems. Kids aren't just not coming to school because they don't like history. They're come they're not coming for a lot of other reasons

075or they're coming and not doing their work or whatever. Um and so we just really need to center that. So I think that was reflected and I feel like that's a big call to action for us as a board and as a um institution overall. And that's in here, the wraparound and and and really really looking at the structure and naming a healthy environment. Um it's it's it's in it's in the feedback. It's in all of the documents. Y I just want us to be I don't know how to quite say this. These goals are supposed to be long-term overarching goals. So, I want us to be careful and not use language that's going to be outdated in a year or two. So, um, so we just have to think about that a little bit.

076Well, and to be clear about what I was just saying, I wasn't clear that there's goals and then there's what the team is doing and that relates to those goals. And so I was I I want to be clear. I wasn't arguing that that everything I said was our seven the seven of us, you know, to do. We set the mark and then the team puts together the plans. That's right. And that's I that I absolutely agree with that. Right. They're the experts anyway. They are and they're good at what they do. And um and I don't know, maybe at some point we can even talk about how to revisit some of that language more frequently. Sorry. Um, I I would like um I think maybe when we were in the talkback session, we talked

077about um empowerment and I guess I'd like to see language in here that is uplifting to a certain degree and um and empowering and conveys dignity and respect for students well-being and personhood and um and sort of centers them maybe a little bit more as having capacity and potential. That that comment makes me think about something that was at the talkback but also yeah that that one community talkback where there was a frame for us either thinking about and revising these goals from what the student would experience right and what we desired the student experience to be and that's what that your comment Stephanie makes me think about uh which some of this language may stay the same as it is, but then um but then I would also imagine that there would need to

078be some adjustments to and I thought that was a really really good way to really think about uh to think about the goals as well. I know that's broad, but that's what you made me think about Stephanie. Well, and also related to that, as I pop back in with my coffee, um I do think what another thing that really struck struck me as I read through everything was the importance of feedback from um Oh, she's frozen. She's frozen. [Laughter] Okay. Well, should I someone text her just I'll tell her. She probably knows. Yeah. I wonder if she can hear, but she says my connectivity is breaking up. That was at 6:59. That was the first time we lost. Are you with us? Now she's gone. Okay, here she comes. Okay. I was just so pleased

079about how this was working. Sorry, I had that thought. No, I was just going to say that framing through the the student experience I thought was a great uh point. And but another point that came to me as I was reading all these comments was that we need to um we need to do some check-ins more frequently um with our students and and with our community frankly around the goals and how how we're doing and getting there because in in my experience when you talk to the people and I don't this isn't the for whom you're trying to serve curve. You learn so much about what you're doing. Again, it's that best of intentions, right? You mean to do X, Y, and Z, but it's landing in a totally different way or a little bit

080different way. And from that feedback, you can make changes that really um serve your your folks better. So I I think that's another piece is getting feedback from students and getting feedback from their parents and the community along the way. Not just, you know, not infrequently, but more frequently, which also gives us an opportunity to have that conversation back and forth and um and teach people exactly, you know, what we're what we're doing and why we're doing it. just kind of had the conversation. Why are we doing what we're doing? You can never overcommunicate. Absolutely. I mean, the fact of Liz's point earlier um makes you remember that somebody's hearing you for the first time, right? Maybe one person, but somebody's hearing you for the first time, right? Anything else on goal, too? Curious. I'm

081so sorry. I was curious from Marcus. What have your students been sharing with you about student well-being? you know, something a lot of adults worry about, but how do the students talk about this issue? I think it's a range. Um, I think it's a range given the the day, the context, the season. Um, some days are better than others during uh end of the exams. Um, around exams, it's one experience. Uh, and there's always a conversation with students being able to access personnel that they need when they need them. Um, and you know, us being able to um, you know, provide them with the resources to say, well, if you can't, here are the things that you do. And you know, that may or may not always be the case. But, um, the access question

082always comes up. and you know how they're feeling and what their well-being experiences are depends on the time of year and what we have going on um in the school. And what quite frankly what's happening locally in our community also has a huge impact on on how students think and feel about their well-being here at the school. Dr. Campbell, I remember them. I I remember um and I think I saw it in the notes, too. Um they gave an example like the democratic classroom. Yeah. Yes, they did. Right. So, and I I remember someone saying that um that it's a feeling, you know, and and so how do we put that on paper? Right. How do we describe the feeling of um the culture confinement and the culture of well-being? I I just got heard

083a presentation at the conference on a and mirror you appreciate this an inlash pedigogy right and that is this pedigogy that says you are my other me what I do to you I do to myself if I harm you I harm to myself and the person presenting that frame spoke of it as a democratic process and a democratic frame so um yeah being able to name that uh and actually that goes with goal one and go goal two. Um so yeah um being able to explicitly write out and put the put that in here uh would definitely be a part of the how. So I'm going to push it even further. I think it would be very interesting and cool to get student voice in that goal. right? So that we're they're supporting it or

084somehow I don't know how you do that with 3,000 stu you know I just don't know but um because that is truly where we are right now at this moment for sure right and and so that we're not writing it on their behalf. I was just going to say we could actually figure out from them what you know what it looks like for them. Yeah. Yeah. So that that raises the question for me. Was Nicole invited to our session tonight? Oh, our student school board rep because here we are talking about student voice and she's not here and I would like to think that she had been invited. We will and she's not. So I was going to offer that we'll definitely check on that. and she's also part of a student union committee that

085is addressing this very goal in terms of mental health as a mental health committee based on the student voice forum. So we've been in contact and you know definitely love the idea of how can we channel that not just to address our seal schoolwide not just our current services but thinking about helping to develop the goal. So we'll definitely add that. I think it's a great idea. I just felt badly when I saw she wasn't here that I hope that we didn't overlook that but too late now. We're follow we'll be following up. I was wondering the same. Okay, Monica. Any um Thank you. What were some other comments that were calls to action? other things that stood out to you in the feedback for goal two. Um, so when I saw some of the

086comments about remove the pressure, um, some of those to me felt like some of the things that I agree and it reminds me of the comment that Marcus made um, at the beginning of the of the conversation about how we define what we would like the students experience to be. Um, and I do think that that's in in the faculty's purview and with students, but that might be the channel towards addressing that piece around the pressure students might feel today. Yep. Yes. Always within reason. Right. Right. But just even having the conversation, even if it doesn't work out exactly how the students want it, being having that agency and having their voice out there is is always going to be a good thing and helpful. Um, and maybe the little changes you make will make

087them realize they were heard even if they didn't get 100%. So, I don't know. I think it's yeah it's a lot to take in voice but in my experience it's always interesting and usually very very helpful. That's great. Thank you. Well Pat I I can't quite see in the room. Do you think we're ready to move on to three or are there other things we want to make sure we cover before we move on? I think we're ready to move to goal three. Yes. Yes. Okay. I'm not sharing my screen because I'm trying to protect as much of the connectivity as I can here. Okay, that's fine. But let's talk about fiscal accountability. Um, and there's that word prudent. I think Stephanie maybe called it out earlier and certainly some of your um participants did.

088So, what do you where would you like to go with the goal statement number three? Well, I think um this is Gretchen. Can I Oh, can I speak or was that your I'm so sorry. Um uh I one of the comments that leapt out at me when people were asked um is this what do you think about this goal? And somebody said, "Well, it's um what do you think about the fiscal or the being prudent financial steward?" And and the response was, "Well, it's better than being reckless." Um and and I and I would agree I would agree with that. I mean I I think universally people appreciated that we needed to be fiscally responsible. I think where things fell apart was on this word prudent which nobody really likes. I can't say I love

089it. Um and my recollection is at the time we developed the goal. we we really developed the subp parts and then backed into a generic way of describing fiscal accountability. So so the the the complaints that I heard in reading the comments it seems to me are are principally addressed in the outcome and measures as they are now and I'm sure we can tweak them. Um but people wanted to know well what does it mean to be prudent and you know I would then point to the outcomes and measures maintaining our AAA bond rating maintaining our financial reporting having a balanced budget transparent you know all those things and I I think we address all that there and we can just come up with a better um overall overall statement that eliminates that word prudent

090because people think it's like I don't know your grandmother they're telling you how to behave. Be be prudent with your with your pennies, you know, that kind of thing. So, it's just not descriptive. I I don't think it's a strong descriptor. It's an it's an Yeah, it's a little bit like Strive. Gretchen, you're making me laugh a lot tonight. Hi, Nicole. Okay. Um, other comments? I really do think that the outcomes and measures really do capture the goal and explain it. I don't know if can you all hear me? Yes. Yeah. Okay. The the quality of the sound just um for the first time I just really couldn't hear. It sounds like maybe you couldn't hear me either. Yeah, we we just started hearing you. Were you speaking earlier? No, it sounded like someone was

091speaking, but I couldn't hear them. Uhhuh. It was Gretchen. I'll I'll do the very short version. Um, get rid of the word prudent. Come up with a better line. We addressed all the concerns in the comments in our existing outcomes and measures. Is was that it? Yeah. Yeah, who said something about grandma's panc? Yeah, she did. Just we don't we just don't like the word prudent or I you know I don't mean to speak for everybody but I think we can have a better descriptor. I think we all agree. Is that correct? Yeah. Yes. Pat, did you have another comment? Just two quick things. One is this spoke the comments here spoke to me again that we're our community doesn't know a lot about what's going on because uh Kendra and before her Mary do

092an outstanding job of talking about our budget where we are we have updates through the year there's there's all these documents available you have what is that report called the basic the popular yeah I love the It's a weird name, but it's a good document. It really is. So, I think we do a lot of what people were asking for. They just don't know it. That was one thing. The other thing that I thought was interesting in the comments was the notion of, and we can discuss this further at another time, but how do we center equity here? Um, we do we talk about values-based budgeting, but do people know what that means? I don't know. and and do we do that in a in a really intentional way? I mean, we the board I

093know the staff thinks about it, but I think we just need to be intentional and raise up and say out loud things that um that are happening that people just don't know. So, that's why I kind of agreed with that question of uh maybe adding equity somehow uh very intentionally in this goal. adding adding the word equity. Well, just that that's what I mean that's what we are doing. We're using valuesbased budgeting to ensure equity, but saying that sort of more clearly, I guess. Right. Okay. Um I have one quick comment. Um, I'm just I'm on the page that is the feedback page for the goal area and it it just says goal three fiscal accountability and I'm wondering if we can somehow if we're going to slightly expand the wording of the goal if

094we can talk about similar to the way we talk about race being the most devastating factor. if we could talk about what we mean by accountability um and and how that plays out in the goal. So it could be in our reporting, in our communication, in our equity lens. Um so maybe that's the way to sort of tie in what accountability is because I do think accountability is absolutely important for people to know. Yes. Okay. Excellent. Thank you. Um Pat, should we move on to our fourth goal? I can tell the people for the last portion of the meeting are are arriving. Yes, they are. Yes. Let's move on. Yes. out. Tell me about goal four, community engagement and partnerships, and share with each other your thoughts, reactions, and changes you'd like to make. Well,

095you know, we I feel like we've been talking a little bit about this this evening when we we've been saying that we need to really be more intentional about how we um communicate with with with our stakeholders what we're doing, why we're doing it, and tell our story. Um, so I think that's important. Uh, we we used to have a couple of meetings with the community. Um, and I know that we're revamping and looking at a lot, but we need to think a little bit more about how to have those conversations continue. Um, how to get to how to get to different community people, just being more intentional about it. And our our work, thank you for that, Pat. and our work on um family engagement um is a priority that we're we are discussing

096discussing our work on how students enter ETHS and now leave ETHS with all of our focused on post high school planning. This goal is still especially relevant um to exactly what we are focused on right now. So, um I just wanted to add that for um so that you all would know that this is a huge huge uh priority for us right now um post high school planning and family engagement. Right. Other comments go. Yeah. Quickly, I think the other conversation we had around community engagement and partnerships um was around ETHS stepping into um the space that we occupy but we don't say it that we are very much the center of this community. So what's our responsibility you know to um community engagement and partnership and how we define community because it you know

097we saw during the pandemic that the community meaning the city of Evston revolved around our decision making on reopening. You know what does that mean? What does that look like? How do we define that? How do we own that? um as one example, but the concept of of community and Evston Township within that community is so much more comprehensive than who we engage with. You know, it's it's it's a bigger who we engage and how we engage and how we engage. Right. Right. You mean being more intentional about stepping into that role. Yeah. And I Right. Yeah, you know, when we started talking about um issues that were happening in the community um around gun violence or whatever, you know, whatever the issue is, pandemic, whatever it is. Um, oftentimes, you know, we're named or

098or, you know, we're the first group that gets added to the the conversation and and the community is looking to us to decide how to fix that. So, you know, I know that's a big burden to to carry, but 3,000 of our students live in this community. whether or not we have anything to do with it. I mean, we we are named. We are named regardless. And I think what I hear you saying is um naming our level of responsiveness and our level of leadership with regard to connecting the dots for our young people in this community. That's it. There you go right there. Thank you, Dr. Camel. Did you get that? Monica, say it. Write it down real quick. Right. Don't lose it. Okay. [Laughter] Anything else? Uh Mera, you have your your mic.

099Um yeah, this is not in any way um formed, but I'm thinking about um centering parent and guardian relationships. Not, you know, strengthening sounds interesting, but um doesn't quite capture what I think we're saying. And then I just also think about how much we can learn also from our community. Um and so thinking about the wisdom and leadership that's within. And so I just would like a more birectional um statement versus what we're doing for I guess but something more with and so the goal is titled community engagement and partnerships. So I I like I like the word partnerships. Um Yeah. And that would have that exactly birectional, right? Exactly. That's what it means. Yeah. It's not paternal. And it's the engagement of Yeah. Yeah. I think is originally drafted even it was meant to

100include it's not just parents, it's not just families. It was meant to include the the other community partners and I'm not sure why that I almost feel like this isn't it. But anyway, that's we we'll check that Okay. So Monica, do you have sort of enough to start drafting some? Yes. So thank you so much everyone and uh really appreciate this conversation tonight. Our next steps are for the alma team to utilize what this discussion uh to develop a revised draft of the goals and that should be delivered in time to review prior to the May 8th board meeting. Um, so like I did with bowl number one, if anyone has anything additional you want to add or any specific edits you think we should consider, please go ahead and send them to Pat or

101to Marcus. They'll get them to to me so that we can incorporate them for your May 8th meeting. Thank you for your thoughtfulness as always. It's a pleasure to see you all and we'll look forward to continued conversations. Thank you, Monica. Thank you, Monica. Thank you so much. Take care. Bye. Take care. And so, B, we're gonna go ahead and do the tenure teachers while they're here, and then we're going to give you a little bit of a break. Uh, so Okay. All right. So, we're good with that. Okay. So, we're just going to continue our meeting, right? We don't have any Okay. Just gonna take a minute to uh Yes. which is written communication. Yes. Okay. All right. I think we're ready. So, I just want to I just want to welcome everybody to

102our meeting. We've had the first part of our meeting. We we've been reviewing our goals for the last couple of hours. So, thank you for coming in. You were also quiet. We just kind of just kept kept going. But, um, we're going to just continue with our agenda. So, uh, we are actually on, if you have an agenda, we're on item five, written communication. Um, so good to see you, Dr. Davis. Do we have any written communication? I looking out there. No, no, we don't. Actually, we don't have any written communication. So, we can move right on. Okay. Thank you. All right. So, the next item on the agenda is um introduction of tenure teachers. Dr. Campbell. Uh thank you u Madame President and I would just like to say and start by saying congratulations

103to all of our faculty who will be um granted tenure tonight. Congratulations to you and thank you for uh all of your hard work these last years that you have been a faculty member here at ETHS through many dangerous toils and snares and pandemics. Uh you've managed to earn tenure uh through a very difficult process. It wasn't easy. Uh we had a different school every year for the last four years and uh hey Chris for the last four years and um congratulations to you and thank you for your hard work and your commitment to ETHS. We are not perfect, but there is no place um like Evston Township High School given our our our reputation, our focus on equity, and all of the things that um make uh education uh a commitment in this community

104and uh for us as an institution, as an organization. So, thank you and congratulations. I'm going to turn this over to Dr. Scott Bramley, who will um bring up your direct supervisors, your department chairs, who will present you um to the board. Thank you, Dr. Campbell. Well, first and foremost, you only get me on two occasions at the board table. So, this is one of the most exciting meetings for me to be able to be here to present our staff for tenure. And so um I also have a little bit of a personal connection to this class of tenurees because this is the last group of teachers that I was able to observe all of them when in my former job and so I was in most of their final round interviews and was able

105to observe when I did all observations. So um I really appreciate that connection to teaching and learning that I don't have on a daily basis anymore. So I appreciate all of you. Um and Dr. Campbell said it this is the best institution and organization to work for. Um, and we are extremely honored to have you here tonight to receive this honor um, as you achieve tenure in our district. Um, I also just want to share a couple things. So, technically, procedurally, we'll have your direct supervisor come up to the podium and that person will introduce you, bring you up and read a couple statements about you and honor your service to the district and to our students. And then each department after the chair is done, you'll walk around the table here. we have a

106gift for you and kind of go around and just shake hands or fist bumps, whatever you're most comfortable with and then return to your seat. Okay? And I'll call out each department as we go along. But we're going to start with fine arts and then go in alphabetical order after that. So, u without further ado, Mr. Gail, would you like to come forward? [Laughter] Thank you very much. I didn't even have to do anything for that applause. Uh good evening to our board, administration, and community. It is my pleasure this evening to speak on behalf of two incredible educators from our from our music program. Please join me in congratulating Osperto Oavdo for being awarded tenure this evening. For the past four years, Ospero has led the orchestra program and taught several other music courses

107like guitar and AP music theory. Osperto has continuously proven himself as an advocate for students and music education. Leading an ensemble through the pandemic was especially challenging and his support for student well-being never wavered. He continues to build the orchestra program in a way that balances the students needs with those of the ensemble. His experiences and perspective on equitable outcomes and experiences in the music room are an incredible asset to our school and community. He consistently goes beyond the classroom by supporting our school's musical as the pit director, which he is literally in the middle of rehearsal right now. You're in town opens this weekend. organizing visiting musicians to work with students, creating a Latin music group, and recently taking students on tour to New Orleans. And anyone willing to take high schoolers overnight on

108a trip deserves tenure. Congratulations to Osper and the many more years of service to come. I am excited to introduce our second teacher this evening from the music program. Please join me in congratulating Carla Clark for being awarded tenure this evening. One conversation with Carla about students and learning is all it takes to realize the special perspective that Carla has for our young people or scholars as she calls them. Regardless of circumstance, she sees the strengths and potential in every student and consistently seeks ways to lift them up. As a leader herself, Carla is incredibly thoughtful and creative. Sever several years ago, I challenged Carla with the idea of a course that utilizes the arts to support student learning. I swear the next day, she walked in with what must have been a 10-page packet

109of an idea that included exercises, goals, assessments, the whole thing put together. And thus began the beginning of the program that she coordinates, Discovering Success Through Music and Stars, a two-year program that she coordinates that utilizes lessons in music and leadership to support student success. Her work has helped so many students succeed in the classroom and in life. Congratulations to Carla and all of her past and undoubtedly future successes. [Applause] And next up we have Dr. Pete Davis representing the CTE department. Hi there. Good evening. U I'd like to recognize uh Claudia Gladstone uh in the CTE department. She's a consumer uh science teacher. Uh Claudia is not here this evening, but I'm going to read these accolades because I'm sure that her and her family are watching at home. Um she's devoted her time

110and energy to teaching child development and culinary courses here at Evston Township High School. Claudia came to us from Thornton Township School District in South Holland. We are so fortunate to have Claudia as a tenured part of the ETHS family. Miss Gladstone's dedication to her students is evident when you step into her classroom. You will see a safe and supportive environment where students are encouraged to learn and grow. She has a natural ability to connect with students, making them feel valued and heard. Her commitment to student success is evident in the way she goes above and beyond to ensure that each student is provided with the necessary resources to achieve their goals. Claudia's child development students complete their clinical hours at the ETHS daycare, working alongside our little kits and learning invaluable skills. In a

111recent visit to her class, I observed students preparing lessons for the little kits. The students were doing three things: writing their lessons, asking questions of each other to improve their lessons, and smiling. Her classroom is a place of joy. Claudia's expertise in her field is exceptional. She brought years of experience to ETHS and has been able to expand our students experiences, particularly in our child development courses. During her tenure, our child development course has grown into one of our more popular electives in CTE, and her students consistently praise her for her engaging and insightful lessons. But Claudia has also taken the initiative to pilot our introduction to teaching course this year. We're looking to develop and expand it in coming years. With Claudia's insights and her connection to students and her love of teaching, I

112am confident it will one day be a model for growing your own teachers in Illinois. To sum it up, I firmly believe that Claudia's contributions to Emerson Township High School are invaluable. Her dedication, expertise, and commitment to student success make her a true asset to our school. as a tenure teacher. I'm looking forward to supporting her and making continuing and continuing to make a positive impact on our students for years to come. Congratulations, Claudia. All right, next up, I believe Dr. Davis is also uh filling in for Miss Jones and we'll be honoring our English department honores. I am putting my English hat on. As you know, I'm a former English teacher. Uh, and I would like to call up uh Brad Bomb and Marina Coopermanman if you could come up. Um, I'm going to

113reshuffle this. I'm going to start with you. Uh, I'm going to deviate from the alphabetical norm. Uh, Emirina Coopermanman is the sort of teacher you have to ask to go home. This made sense at the start of her career at ETHS when she was working hard to ensure that she was able to effectively do the work of reaching and teaching her students. However, after a few years and tremendous growth, Miss Coopermanman is still the kind of teacher you have to ask to go home. This is but one of the reasons I knew she was a hardworking educator who is dedicated to her craft. During our discussions over her first couple of years teaching here at ETHS, Marina always had questions about my observations in her classroom. She didn't simply want to know what I saw,

114but she wanted to know how she could be better without ego or interrogation. She would ask for examples and even ask how I might teach a lesson or assess students. If I went into her classroom in October and pointed out an area of growth, Miss Coopermanman will have addressed that concern by November. During the pandemic, when we were all home, I'm fairly certain I spoke to Marina more than any other teacher in my department. She went above any written or verbal stated expectation during that time. It was clear to me that Miss Cooperman was determined to do all she could to help her students stay engaged throughout what seemed an impossible time to teach. She was not going to let the reality of off-turned cameras keep her from seeing her students. Miss Marina Coopermanman has

115shown remarkable growth, demonstrated a high level of organization and professionalism in her work and her commitment to her students growth and success is evident in everything she does. Through her dedication and hard work, she has made a positive impact on the lives of her students and established positive working relationships with her colleagues. She has created a supportive and nurturing classroom environment that fosters learning and encourage personal growth. Her commitment to her student success is relentless and she continues to go above and beyond to ensure that every student has the tools needed to excel. Her passion for teaching is infectious and it has inspired her students to work hard, aim high, and dream big. This is a well-deserved achievement for Miss Marina Coopermanman. Congratulations on achieving tenure. I'm honored to work alongside her and forward and

116look forward to our continued collaboration. Sign Simone Jones, English department chair. [Applause] All right. Next up, I'm going to uh tell you all the wonderful things about Mr. Bradley Bomb. Uh Bradley Bomb is a remarkable educator who has just achieved a significant milestone in his career, earning tenure here at ETHS. This moment is particularly special because this teacher has had a challenging year, yet has persevered and continued to inspire his students with unwavering enthusiasm and energy. Teaching is not just a profession, but a passion, and Mr. Bomb embodies that wholeheartedly. Despite the hurdles faced, he has maintained a high energy classroom where students are thoroughly engaged in the learning process. His dedication to his craft and his unrelenting commitment to his students, the English department, and the ETHs community has not gone unnoticed. When Brad

117started here, he had a strong understanding of curriculum development and an understanding of skills in which students should be proficient. But over the years, I've watched him reflect and grow as an educator in various other ways. I thought to myself, Brad's a really good teacher, and who'd be a great teacher if he could slow down and let his students know him a bit more. I didn't share because I didn't want to feel like I was, you know, getting in there like that. But during our conversation, Brad said, "I think I could work on letting my students get to know me a bit more." I told him that I agreed. This is one of Brad's greatest strengths. He's able to reflect and and though he had a strong foundation when he came to ETHS, he is

118always willing to learn and grow as an educator. Brad navigated this year with grace, patience, and resilience. He's gone the extra mile even when it seemed impossible in an effort to ensure that his students receive the best possible education. Thank you for your tireless efforts, your resilience, and your commitment to our student success. Congratulations on achieving tenure. I'm looking forward to many more years of making a difference in the lives of our students. Signed, Simone Jones, English department chair. Join me in congratulating Bradley Bomb. Next up, we have Nicole Parker from the history department with one honore this evening. JHS and um I'm a bit of a history nerd. So, if you would indulge me, if you travel back in time with me four years from this date, do you know where you were? We

119were all in our spaces grappling with many unknowns. Danielle Tout had just taught one semester here at ETHS before the global pandemic sent us all home. And to give us a little bit more context, teachers and students, like all of the rest of us, we were thrust into this environment where we were trying to adapt to changes like Zoom, adapting content and curriculum to remote learning and a new learning management system. Didn't even know what that was until the pandemic. So needless to say, Danielle's start here at ETHS was interesting, but there is a saying, diamonds are formed under great pressure. While her start here at ETHS was challenging, Danielle has developed into a conscientious, dedicated teacher who is willing to grow. And I believe she has all the tools to become a master teacher,

120content and pedagogical knowledge, and most importantly, the ability to reflect on her teaching. Danielle currently teaches freshman humanities and civics, and she is an exceptional teacher of our newest wild kids, balancing just the right amount of nurturing with high expectations. Danielle is completing her master's degree in literacy education, and next year she'll be working for the first time in our literacy lab, which we're excited about. She has been a member of our our white affinity space, our district anti-racist working group, and she has uh adapted democratic classroom for her um as one of her pedagogical strategies. And this p past summer she took on another leadership role in our department. I I call her our textbook ambassador uh where she and another colleague went into our new textbook which is not easy to do a

121lot of technical problems and uh worked on developing uh lessons that accompanied our new our new uh textbook. and right away once we started at the beginning of the school year, she started to help her her colleagues acclimate uh to this new textbook. So, it is my honor tonight to present Danielle Tout from the history and social science department for tenure at ETHS. [Applause] Next we have Marie Levatina with two honores. If you could invite both honores to come forward with you. Okay, I'm g put these on. Good evening. I'm Marie Levatino, department chair for PE, wellness, and driver's ed. Let me see. I have the pleasure of speaking tonight about Mr. Dusty Benco. Although Dusty came to us four years ago from Chicago, Chicago public schools, he originally started at ETHS um coaching baseball

122in 2009. Dusty currently teaches our freshman boys and all gender PE course. We had just created the allgender PE course when Dusty joined our PE team. When I approached him to teach this course, he not only happily accepted it, he ran with responsibility and immediately started diving into the curriculum. Dusty took advantage of all professional development opportunities as well as any additional time needed to educate himself about gender inclusivity. He worked hard to incorporate this knowledge into his teaching practices and quickly became our lead teacher for the allgender freshman course. Dusty diligently continues to create an environment where all students feel safe, valued, and included so that they can express their true selves without fear of judgment or discrimination. He values and supports all student identities and has worked tirelessly to make sure that the

123curriculum and lessons model these messages as well. Dusty has also made a point of providing a variety of options for students when it comes to physical activities and assignments, ensuring that every student has the opportunity to participate in ways that feel comfortable and authentic to them. By embracing gender inclusivity and dedicating himself to helping every student reach their full potential, Dusty is not only helping each student discover the joy of physical activity, but also lifelong wellness, as well as helping to challenge and dismantle harmful gender stereotypes. Additionally, Dusty has been able to extend his knowledge and expertise by serving on several schoolwide and departmental committees. He is currently participating on the equity and grading pilot committee and has been an instrument in instrumental voice as we continue to reflect on our grading practices within our

124PE department. He's become a tremendous tremendous asset to the department by helping other teachers incorporate standardsbased grading options as well as professional guidance on creating multiple opportunities for students to demonstrate knowledge and achievement. Dusty has recently stepped up and volunteered to serve as our lead CPR instructor and liaison with the American Heart Association. He has taken on the initiative to organize the staff and the curriculum to ensure that all freshman students at HHS complete their CPR instruction and receive their certification. He continues to communicate not only the importance of learning this valuable life-saving skill, but also how this can improve confidence, promote leadership skills, and increase awareness on health issues. If you are lucky enough to have the opportunity to ever see Dusty teach, it is evident that his standards and expectations are met by

125each of his students, thus building a trusting relationship and strong community. Dusty loves what he does, and it shows. He is motivated by the opportunity to have a positive impact on his students lives every day that he comes to work. He has transformed how we teach our students to be responsible leaders. and his instructional style is outlined by a complete understanding of how each student's overall social and emotional well-being and a love for empowering students with life skills. However, his greatest attribute is his undemi undeniable dedication to creating gender-inclusive environments and lessons that allow students to see themselves in the curriculum. He has an unparalleled drive and enthusiasm for lifelong wellness that is contagious to all who are around him. To say he is appreciated and respected is a definite understatement. We are so fortunate

126to have a dedicated and compassionate teacher in our PE family and we're excited to see how Dusty will continue to have a positive impact on the lives of so many HHS students. Please join me in congratulating Dusty Benco. You can go over here. Let's do the fist. [Applause] It is also my pleasure tonight to honor Miss Keegan Joyce. Although Keegan came to us uh a as a new teacher just four years ago, she is not a stranger to ETHS. Keegan graduated from HHS in 2015 and went on to complete her physical education and wellness degree from the University of Kentucky. When Keegan was a student here, she was a two sport varsity athlete and competed in both volleyball and badmitten. She was the recipient of the HHS Boosters Excellence Award, and she currently still holds

127the record for the most consecutive serving aces in volleyball over Chris Levatino. Proudly. Proudly, right? In addition to the athletics accomplishments, we got a sneak peak of her PE acumen as she won our two 2015 PE senior leader award. But her experience here at EHS was not always rosy. I've just recently come to learn that Keegan attended the EHS preschool program under Miss Fuller, which didn't end up so well as she was a preschool dropout. Need needless to say, she has rebounded from her four-year-old failings and has become a valuable member of our PE and wellness department. Currently, Keegan teaches our wellness education and junior leadership course. Quick uh Keegan quickly took initiative and put her leadership skills into action when she joined our PE family. She's worked collaboratively on modifying our wellness curriculum to

128meet the everchanging state standards as well as respond to the growing mental health crisis. Keegan's ability to instruct on various often triggering health concepts as well as numerous social emotional learning standards has been critical to the overall well-being of our students. Keegan encourages students to ask questions, challenge assumptions, and engage critically with the material. Her ability to relate these wellness topics to individual student lives has allowed for greater student connection and engagement. Keegan has also stepped up more recently to become a lead teacher for our junior leadership course. She took on the challenge of revising the curriculum and created more opportunities for student- centered lessons, peer teaching modules, and authentic assessments that require high expectations and thrive on student voice. Keegan has built a classroom environment that supports student growth, builds curiosity, and focuses on

129real life application of leadership skills. All of this excellent work doesn't stop there. The second half of each of Keegan's day is spent at our HHS day school. She currently teaches physical education and wellness to all grade levels. Keegan's dedication to creating a safe and supportive space for our students to learn and grow is a testament to her unwavering commitment to education and the overall well-being of all of our students. She meets each student with an exceptional level of patience, empathy, and creativity. Keegan has truly helped to transform the lives of countless students, providing them with the tools and skills they need to overcome obstacles, thrive academically and emotionally, and reach their full potential. Her work at the day school is commendable and a source of inspiration. Outside of her daily obligations as a teacher,

130Keegan has been able to extend her knowledge and passion to athletics. She has four years of experience coach of experience coaching various levels of girls volleyball and bad mitten that range from freshman through varsity here at ETHS. In all of these roles and experiences, Keegan has been able to build strong relationships with her students and athletes while demonstrating the values of lifelong wellness. She's a tremendous role model and she consistently exhibits high levels of motivation and passion in all of her interactions. She bleeds orange and blue and she embodies she embodies the attributes most important to ETHS. She devotes herself to educating all students to their fullest potential and she's committed to excellence in all aspects of her work. Her level of commitment is rivaled only by her love of working with her students and

131athletes. I believe Keegan represents everything that is positive about our profession. We look forward to the continued impact and success she will have on our students and community in the years to come. Please join me in congratulating Keegan Joyce. Next up, we have Miss Terry EmbossoA honoring two staff members from the science department. Good evening everyone. There are many phrases and sayings that help us explain how we get to a particular point in time. One might think that standing here before the school board is an indication that the stars have aligned. Do stars actually align or does it depend on your perspective? Luckily, I have the pleasure of introducing you to someone who could actually explain the answer. Michelle Shelley Frankle is our earth science and astronomy teacher. Miss Shelley Frankle came to ETHS from

132U of I four short years ago. Don't let that cloud your judgment. Her knowledge and maturity are eons, I might even say epics, ahead of other teachers. While no new teacher can ever predict the landscape of education, Shelley and her peers have had the most difficult terrain to navigate these last four years due to no faults of their own. The confluence of a pandemic, remote instruction, hybrid, and in-person learning require flexibility, adaptability, and patience. Nothing that we knew uh nothing that we knew in education could be taken for granted. Just like Lava, Shelley was able to go with the flow and make the most of each situation. She is dedicated and passionate about earth science to her core. Since she started teaching here, she has become a boulder and revamped the geoscience and environmental curriculum

133to incorporate more about climate change and align the course to the AP environmental prerequisites. She is continuously working to make the content relevant as students learn about the Earth, how it works, and the impact humans are having on it. She designs open-ended labs to allow students to discover and model scientific information. Her astronomy and environmental science classes are out of this world as students create videos, TED talks, and graphical analysis to demonstrate their learning. She's a major user of our planetarium for both courses and continues to elevate her own professional development to support 21st century learning. Shelley is already back at school working on a master's degree. When asked what really makes her day, collaborating with colleagues, seeing the explosion of student ideas, and the rotation of the earth are high on her list. Sorry,

134I had to. Ah, I am honored to welcome Michelle Frankle as a tenure earth and space science teacher at ETHS. Shelley really rocks and I look forward to her future contributions to the science department. [Applause] Now, I'm going to preempt this. I did not know what Sajjude was going to wear today, but it will make sense when you hear me. All right. One spring day, I found myself in the copy room. You know, the place where all the school's problems and answers are found, uh, with everyone talking and waiting for the copies to come through. Well, a colleague came up to me and said, "Terry, I know this teacher. She's a seedling, very green, but I think with the right environment and proper support, she's going to grow here. I think I'm going to encourage

135her to apply." Fast forward four years. I know everyone has that time-lapse picture of a bud coming out of a flower there. Um, I am pleased to introduce you to that seedling that has grown and blossomed into an amazing teacher, Miss Sajjude Aman. Little did I know when I hired Sajjude that she would be spending much of her days in our greenhouse as a biology and urban agriculture teacher. Sjude has a natural instinct to treat each student as a different flower and has worked to cultivate a beautiful garden in her classroom. She knows the adjustments needed to help those struggling to get roots in the content, is calm on days when some thorns may come out, sees the potential in the buds, and can celebrate the fruits of their collective labor. She has patience and

136is willing to get her hands dirty, both literally and figuratively, as she can fertilize an idea on the spot to promote growth or simply stop the weeds from creeping in. When people retreated to their homes during the pandemic, Sjude went outside. She shared with students and colleagues her interest in birding and butterfly conservation. She used the garden as a metaphor, something that adapts to the conditions and always looks to the light. Her bright smile and infectious laughter helped us all through these dark days. So Jude keeps her hands in many pots. She supports the Mina and same organizations. She's on our sustainability committee. She's a sponsor of the movie review club, supports the seedling sale, and her newest job is co-parenting our flock of hens in the courtyard. She has embraced the democratic classroom ideas

137and wants to be a member of the schoolwide culture and seal committee. While locating her in the afternoon may be a challenge as she can be in the greenhouse either edible acre, the orchard, our nature center, the classroom, the office or collecting eggs in the chicken coop. I am ecstatic that Sajjude has chosen to lay down roots here at ETHS. Welcoming her as a tenur member of the science department is like planting a garden of annual flowers, knowing the joy she will bring to so many for years to come. [Applause] All right. All right. And our last department for the evening with six honores is special education. I know I saw Jamie and Amy and Tanal here. Are you all coming up or All right. Perfect. Wonderful. And then please invite your honores to come

138forward as well. Line up behind you. want to see it in alphabetical order and your last name. It's like a classroom community opener like figure out alphabetical order without talking. Good evening. Hi You're funny. Okay. Okay. I probably won't be as punny as Terry, but that's my only one for the night. Okay. So, we are going to start off with Britney Gato. Brittany Gato is a superior educator whose energy energizes her students and makes her classroom a place students want to be. During her time at ETHS, Britney has specialized in English, teaching co-taught and self-contained instructional special education classes. This year, Britney added teaching reading to her repertoire of instructional experiences. She is committed to supporting students in acquiring this essential life skill. I am not exaggerating when I tell you that I was nearly

139moved to tears when I witnessed the academic risks students take in Miss Sko's class. She teaches this is off the script. So, but um she teaches a sophomore reading and to see students um working on their reading skills openly in a class is amazing. Um so that brave learning space is a testament to Britney's focus on classroom community and connecting with students. Thank you, Britney, for the impact you've had on students so far and that which you will continue to have. Congratulations. We're gonna wait to the end. [Laughter] Stephanie Linton. Hi. Stephanie Linton has taught a variety of classes since she became a wild kid. She's taught chemistry, physics, English, history, and learning strategies. In recent conversations, Stephanie has expressed her passion for teaching history and English. She uses this passion to develop lessons that

140are engaging and relevant to students. Stephanie provides her students the opportunity to consider multiple perspectives, have courageous conversations, and time for reflection in order for students to develop perspectives of their own. those that are authentic to their lived experiences and not filtered through a false or single narrative. She is committed to her own growth and service of students, specifically requesting to maintain her current preps so she can continue to refine her curriculum and engage students even more. Thank you, Stephanie, for taking risks within your class and modeling for your students the importance of speaking your truth, examining the quote unquote truth, and thinking critically. The district and your students are fortunate to have a teacher with such a balance of emotional emotional intelligence and sound pedagogy. Michelle Lyle. When we talk about staff who bleed

141orange and blue, Michelle Lyle is at the forefront of my mind. She is woven into the fabric of this community and has made her impact in various roles over the past several years. Right. Whoa. I know. Yes, girl. As a teacher, Michelle was an instructor in our team's transition program and has since transitioned to what I believe is her true love, reading. Michelle teaches English and reading classes and supports the literacy lab, but her impact extends outside of the classroom and student learning spaces and into professional development spaces. Michelle is a leader in our district equity work and a facilitator of the EA or Evston Educators Academy. She puts her skills to use by teaching the current generation of youth and youth for generations to come due to her work with staff. Michelle, thank you

142for continuing to share your perspective, expertise, and passions with us. [Applause] Jennifer Powellski Jen has far-reaching impact and abilities. From the beginning of her time here, she integrated herself into the community in the special education department in service to staff and students. She sponsored the Special Olympics in the district and continues to build community in the department by planning outings and getting involved in committees. She has taught classes in most every subject area and excelled in all of them. Jen and her co-teer have one of the longerstanding co-eing partnerships, which speaks to her collaboration and commitment to teaching all students. She's taught science, specifically chemistry and physics since she joined the E-Town family. Jen's students are consistently engaged in her class and embody what it means to be independent learners. They navigate labs with ease,

143ask questions, and engage in the class, not because it's a task, but because Jen has supported them in understanding the importance of learning. Thank you, Jen, for sharing your enthusiasm for teaching, learning, and life with your students, the department, and the ETHs community. [Applause] Tina Reich. Tina is an amazing asset to the district. She is certified in both biology and special education, bringing in-depth knowledge of both content and learning needs to her classroom. Tina is extremely structured and responsive, which provides a safe and predictable learning environment where all students can thrive. Tina connects to students both in the classroom and on the field as a coach. Tina, thank you for your advocacy for students, your intentionality around connecting with them, and your high level of commitment to their learning. [Applause] Hi, I am Til Ter.

144I'm one of the assistant directors here and I oversee the day school. Last but not least, we are honored to uh be able to share with you tonight some of the ways with which Miss Toya Williams has made a tremendous impact on our ETHS community. Mrs. Williams is a teacher at our day school and as you may know the day school is anchored in the belief that we support students by creating and cultivating a sense of belonging, mastery, independence and generosity. that circle of courage. In her work as a teacher at ETHS, Mrs. Williams has supported these beliefs both in and out of the classroom. I'm going to get it emotional, so I apologize. We excited to share examples of how Mrs. Williams leadership has translated into the commu uh countless opportunities for our students

145at the day school to engage in learning beyond the uh courses which they are scheduled. Students at the day school often experience healing through reclaiming experiences. If you were to walk through the day school, you would see many examples of how Mrs. William facilitates these experiences. One of our favorite ways students engage in their learning and healing is participating in the reclaiming of furniture. As a part of their participation, Mrs. Williams class. Students participate in selecting, repairing, restoring, repurposing furniture pieces. They learn important academic skills such as decision-making, planning, budgeting, and how to use tools, and how to sell for a profit. The project-based learning experience goes beyond redoing a bookshelf or a bench through uh students have the chance to reclaim the furniture, giving them personality, color, new purpose, and a new opportunity in

146many ways. It is so similar to the work they do as students here at ETHS. Each reclaimed piece of furniture is an opportunity for our students to feel a sense of belonging, learn a new skill to support their sense of mastery, make decisions that support their sense of independence, and give back to the community and which supports healing through the sense of generosity. In addition to this, Mrs. William goes above and beyond every day to ensure students have that sense of belonging. She works with staff to ensure a student has what they need. In fact, I get nervous when she comes into my office and asks me for something. Um, Mrs. Williams has taught brought in health and beauty products, clothes, school supplies, and other items she knows the students might need or might be

147comfortable might not be comfortable to ask for. Her creativity is demonstrated not only by the reclaimed furniture, but also the planning and implementation that celebrate student success. She intentionally and meaningfully exceeds or executes activities that create positive relationships with students and other staff in the community. Toya possesses the qualities we look for in every educator. Even though this is my first year working with her at the day school, I have seen so many great things that she has done in the school outside in her personal life to make a positive impact. I'm so honored to have you um at the day school. A chance to work with her every day and I know she'll continue to do great things. [Applause] Congratulations forever, right? Yeah. She's like, "Wait, I want to be right. [Music] So that

148concludes our presentation for tenure. Thank you. such a great way to uh get our meeting going. So, um although you're welcome to stay for the whole meeting, I understand if you leave. And we're going to take a little bit of a break and transition to our next item. Okay. Are we ready to get going? We are. Here. Yes. I think they went to go get another clicker, but we're so fortunate to have a human clicker uh to help us out. A human clicker. Yes. That's that one. She's going to help us out. All right. Okay. Our next item on the agenda is the student discipline report. And Dr. Camel, you're going to introduce it. Thank you. Uh yes, we have um our uh esteemed group of administrators, uh Dr. Keith Robinson, associate principal for educational

149services, and our uh Dean Nicole Boyd, Dean Pedro Seraniano, Dean William Shanahan, and Dean Ariselli Canola. um who will share uh a little bit about uh what we've been doing in the dean's office, talk about that trend line, but also about some challenges that we still have uh as a district regarding discipline. So, I am going to turn this over to uh Dr. Robinson who will get us started. Yeah, thank you. All right. Uh so, good evening board. Um what you have before you tonight is a comprehensive report about the discipline for the 2122 school year. Uh with a new perspective, we've been able to kind of revise uh collaborate collectively uh on how we presented the data. Uh we hope that uh the board uh sees a difference in how it's presented and it

150seems to kind of be more concise. So, at the last uh year's reporting, we landed on the exclusion list for the state. We mentioned that just a little bit more tonight. And there's a reason that we're landed on this uh exclusion list, and that's for expulsions, suspensions, and racial disproportionality. Uh we are not on the list for expulsions and suspensions. uh but you will see evidence of racial disport deport disproportionality and how that has played out uh in many of the prior years but also in this one uh you'll also see some trends uh that are positive some good news but the reality is uh there is still so much work to be done uh when we were looking at the longitudinal data and you'll see it again uh throughout the years there's been just

151a tremendous amount of progress ress uh but things keep changing. Uh we are um evolving with those changes and it's it was so good to have some new perspectives on the jo on the um in the office today. So right on Q. Thank you. So tonight I'm joined by the deans who are presenting the data and what I love about this is they are humanizing the work that's done to the office. uh Dr. Campbell uh presented them already, but I also wanted to give a shout out uh to the administrative staff and support who uh also works uh with the team uh Angie Harding, Kevin Augusta, and Michael Williams. And with that, I will turn it over uh to my esteemed colleagues uh with reporting their uh most impressive work. Good evening. I'm Pedro Seraniano.

152I'm one of the deans here. I just wanted to start us out with the roles of the deans of success, safety, and well-being. As far as uh we have four categories here that we're looking at. Uh I'm just going to go through them and give you some examples of the things that we've done. But more importantly, I want to focus on on the interventionists. I think uh over the last few years or I I think since I've been here, we've been working on changing the narrative of what occurs in our office. You know, it's it's easy to to think of us as the bad guys, but I think here we work to try to develop the relationships and strengthen them throughout the their the students time here at ETHS for uh the best success. So,

153as I'm going to go through the list here as an interventionist, we work on student relationships. Um many of us, we are present uh as we rotate through our cycles of uh a four-year cycle. we were we will be coming in with our freshman class. we do. So we are present at the intervent at the uh orientations that we have um during in November in January and when they do in fact uh arrive here at ETHS during the summer we are also there and uh one of the different individuals that support and get to meet and uh introduce ourselves to our our freshmen with that prehs class, excuse me. Um we also you know help navigate the building those first few weeks of school. We are present at events uh such as football games, basketball

154games, dances uh social events throughout so we can connect with our students differently. As far as our partnerships are concerned, our partnerships, we partner with with everybody, the you know the stakeholders that we're all familiar with, you know, the the parents, the students, um but also with our our teams, our grade level teams, uh student support teams, uh counselors, social workers, psychologists, teachers. Um and we also of course partner with our our two uh in groups that we often are connected with our safety staff that uh keep our building very safe and our SRO's that are uh a great assistance to us upon our request. Um as far as committees that we uh we represent or that we are on, we are on the calendar committee, discipline committee, leadership team me building leadership team, crisis

155team. uh we support our senior class as as uh as I said when we rotate through our senior our four-year cycles we support the senior staff with graduation prom those type of events excuse me and in regards to the additional roles that we have we have additional various additional roles where we are involved in first of all we are uh in Wildit Academy we're the administrator on site for those uh Saturdays whenever we host that as far summer school is concerned, we have a summer school dean. We also, one of us is also the director of summer school and uh supervis we supervise the ALC um supporting our students. We'll discuss a little bit more about the alternative learning uh center uh later on. And also uh we've been active, we've had uh members of

156our um deans team also be a coordinator with the Latino summit and and uh involved in other summits. Uh at this point I pass it along to uh William Shanahan. All right, good evening William Shanahan Tina students. Um, so this uh slide here basically summarizes our discipline philosophy, but what I wanted to touch on is what what's not in here and it's kind of based off of our downward trends of incidents occurring um consequences being administered and and we've been having a downward trend and it's based off of three different sort of disciplines that we we live by and and uh work but with. So the first one's like a relational discipline and and this is based on developing trusting relationships with our students. Um we also go out of our way to build connections

157and partner with the parents and guardians of our students. And uh we do spend a lot of time collaborating with the different grade level teams that uh we work with whether it's the student support team, the IEP team or 504 team. And basically we collaborate together to help support each student achieve academic, behavioral and social emotional success here at the school. Our uh second uh item that we work tirelessly with all the time is restorative practices. This is kind of like the backbone of how we operate in our office and and basically it's a lot of conversing and conferencing with our students to help them understand what they've done wrong when they are sent our way. And we do guide our students in helping them repair the harm that they've caused. And we uh teach

158them how to learn from their mistakes, the mistakes that they've made. And we help provide strategies to help guide them in different forms of conflict resolutions and uh how to repair what whatever damage has been done and uh help them learn from their mistakes. Finally is progressive discipline. So uh basically we utilize the process of coaching and guiding our students teaching them how to hold themselves accountable. Uh we work to prevent the re reoccurrence of the negative behavior and we also help students reflect and learn from their mistakes. Um so it what I just went through is kind of in there but not as detailed. So I wanted to share that philosophy because this is the way we operate on a daily basis with our students. But um and and I really strongly believe is

159with our data going on that downward trend. These are big reasons why uh our numbers are going down. Um now we're going to oh I'm going to turn on the volume first. Okay. So now we are going to look at our year and review and we are going to get into the meat and potatoes of our report and share a lot of data. Um, and so it is important to keep in mind that we're reporting on the 202122 school year. And as a reminder that this is the year that we returned into in-person learning. We adopted the block schedule, which meant we had fewer transitions between classes for students, but we increased the transition time to 10 minutes. Also during that year um we had a bit of a change in the role of the

160deans and myself and Dean Canola came on board after uh Dean King um transition to a new new role and uh Dean Gresian Rhodess um took a position outside of the district. So some of the data reflected um some of the work reflected some of their work is reflected in the data also. In addition to this, um we should keep in mind we also had um some major incidents in the school and in the community during the 2122 school year. And um just as a personal um aside um some of what we're going to hear is a little bit sobering um even though we have some positive things to report um especially in light of recent um events in our in our community which absolutely has an impact on our students. So the work that

161we do in the dean's office um satisfies goal two which is a student well-being goal. 100% of students do not receive a behavior referral. So, we're really happy that 83% of our students are practicing the three Rs, which was our PBIS initiative, respect yourself, others, and the community. So, 83 per student, 83% of students did not receive a conduct referral last year. So, that's something to keep in mind. Um, and we will keep coming back to that. So first when we start to look at the data and things that transpired last year, we want to talk about the students, the unique number of students involved. We had 629 unique students involved in um or unique students who created incidents. Now the incidents come from conduct referrals written by various staff members um in the building

162which come to the dean's office and we um triage them, deal with them and escalate them to become incidents. So we had 175 incidents last year. Um about half of the students had about one in had one incident and a little less than half of the students had two or more incidents. So, here we're going to take a look at frequency. And um I apologize some of the the color is hard to see. Um but the majority of the students, thank you. The 90% of the students had um between one and five um conduct referrals that became incidents. Six to 10 35 students, excuse me, had between 6 and 10. 17 students had between 11 and 15. Six students had between 16 and 20. And less than 1% of our students had 21 or more.

163And we did take um a look at who these students were so we can conceptualize um who we were meeting with and the frequency with which we met with particular students. And I'm going to need to follow the paper because it's hard to see. So again, we're talking about the students involved in the incidents. We had 629 unique uh students, and we're going to look at it by federal race code first. Um 273 of those students, about 43% were black African-American. 21% or 130 were Hispanic Latino. And then 171 um 27% were white. We looked at the we see two percentage columns. The first one um is the percentage of students um out of the 629 and then we wanted to look at it comparatively to the student body. So when you see that 30%

164that 30% means 30% of our African-American students um were involved in a disciplinary incident. That's how to read that. Okay, we wanted to take a look by gender. We had um 391 of the students were male while 238 were female. So um as we could see the percentage of male students um is substantially higher. We wanted to look at the the cross-section between race and gender. And here you'll see that our black African-American males um were involved um in incidents more than any other group at 169 out of the 629 students. and then it's followed by white males and then black or African-American females at 115. So again, we're we're looking at the the percent of students with incidents and we're also looking at the percent of the sto the total student group. If you

165look at the white portion, there were 3,659 students um according to the opening of school report. So that's where that data is coming from. So again, we see um black males um at the highest. We looked uh by grad year um and we were pretty um pretty even um between all of the grad years. And here's just another representation of the same data. We looked by meal status or income status and we see that 340. So um over half of the students were students um who were um on free or reduced lunch and a little less than half were not. So we look again 30% of our students on free and reduced lunch were involved in disciplinary incidents. We also looked at IEP status. Um there were 105 of our students had an IEP. And

166if we look to the far left, that's 22% of students in the building with an IEP were involved in a disciplinary incident last year. And then finally, we looked um at English uh language learner status and uh you can see the numbers there. And of note is that 23% a little less than a quarter of our EL students in the building were involved in disciplinary incidents. We wanted to look at the trends over time and um there's a note about our COVID year um and um for the most part um the rates have been decreasing. So the 629 unique students um are lower than they've been in the last 10 years, nine years. Good evening. My turn. So I um have the pleasure to present on our actual disciplinary incidents. Um and so I really

167wanted to touch base a little bit about that. We get over, I think last year, Carrie, correct me if I'm wrong, over 3,000 referrals. And the difference is that when we get them, we may not escalate them. I know that in the last two years when I've received a referral and I was like, wait, this could this doesn't seem right. Let me have a conversation with teacher. Let me have a conversation with the student. So then I don't escalate it. So that that is where you see that we only processed 1,75 actual incidents, but we received over 3,000 referrals. Um, and that's important to note that that's the difference because of all the work that we are doing that Bill spoke about because we don't escalate all the referrals. Um, we could have we may

168have we may send it back to the teacher and say to them, we believe this is a classroom issue. Please talk to the student, please call home. Um so I wanted so now I the data that you're going to be seeing uh right now is specifically about the disciplinary incidents and again just to note again they were um 629 unique students created these incidents so obviously they've received some of them received multiple referrals. Thank you. Uh the top infractions that we have and if you want a full list it's in your board report. I think it's page 5 through 7, but we just listed a few. The top referrals um or incidents that have were created last year were for unauthorized presence was the top one. A lot of that could be a student just

169walking out of the classroom. Um walking out of the building without permission or simply walking the hallways and not being where they're supposed to be. And so a lot of that most of the time at least for me and I think for many of our deans here we're talking about students who have done it multiple times. Um so then it's like okay I have to give you a detention. This is like the third time that you're in the hallway you know. So we try to again like Bill mentioned is to when we sit with them they're the first time tell me what happened what was going on what's like why why are we walking in the hallway? What's going on? Right? Calling home asking questions. Um so the top one is unauthorized presence. Um one

170of the things that we're looking to do next year is because again I think it's an important data point to find out to specifically uh break down unauthorized presence. So we're changing our codes, our incident codes by saying unauthorized presence walked out of the building, unauthorized presence walked out of the classroom, unauthorized presence wasn't hanging in the bathroom. So, we're going to be breaking that down for next year and working with our IT department so that we can actually really look at what's happening and and where it's happening. Um, disruptive uh disrupting the school environment slashnot following teacher/staff directions. Uh, Dr. Robinson is looking at potentially breaking that a little bit further for next year because it could be used for different reasons is what we're finding. Um, for example, for some teachers, a student

171walking out of the classroom, they may call it disrupting the the school environment. The one of the things that we were able to do this year, we were given access is to actually change it. So, if I like, oh, well, they didn't disrupt the classroom. They walked out every classroom. I'm going to call it unauthorized presence. Um, so that's we're going to look at that one further, but that's 375 of the infractions. I want to explain action only because that's the third highest. Um, I'll give you an example. I had a student that brought um a knife to the building and um one she received a referral for the knife, but then she was also very defiant and disrupting the school environment, refusing for us to do a search for safety reasons. We always do

172a search. Um she also was refusing any direction and was walking around in the hallway trying to get out of the building, not taking any direction. So for example, she would have gotten three referrals. One for the knife, one for not following the staff direction and author unauthorized presence. But we're not giving her a consequence for all three. We bundle it and we take act then we call it action only for the other two. So we typically take the most egregious behavior which would be the knife that we apply the consequence to that but the other two become more of like an action only. So there's no additional consequences for that student. So they're all bundled at time sometime with the action only. Um the other like I mentioned um it's in your report if

173you want to full breakdown of every single incident. Um again here is by federal face uh race code. Um, as you see, um, this is what Nicole was talking about in terms of its, uh, sobering and so that we have a lot of work to do. Um, and we have black African-American students and our Hispanic Latino students make up of the maj make up the majority of our incidents created. Um, here you have it by gender. Um, it's not something that I believe is new. I think the district we've known that that it has been primarily males um that are creating the incidents. Here's by grad year. One of the things that we are going to start looking at the dean's office will be looking at is the historical trends. Um we do know that

174by senior year even though um it was a very hard year last year, you see that right? Last year, the current senior class had 489 incidents. Um, as Nicole mentioned, we had some very significant incidents that happened last year. Um, but we are trying to also track to see developmentally where, you know, freshman year is a very hard year for students as they transition. I think next year's data is going to reflect that. of Bill has a freshman class and um they're re receiving a lot of referrals and a lot of incidents with their freshman class um COVID happened obviously and then just hoping to support them in how to do school and a lot of reteing expectations that maybe weren't necessarily there in middle school and then them getting adjusted to a new building.

175So I think it's going to we will be looking at specifically by grade level just to see what the trends are there. income status. Um this again um something that will needs to be explored is that our free and reduced students um that is primarily where the disciplinary incidents are coming from and by AP status um 30 again not the student uh but the incidents come from students that have an IEP is 32.2% and 67.8 8 do not have an IEP and our EEL population um 89.7 do not are not uh identify as EL and I believe I'm going pass it over to Mr. So here we are looking at uh 261 incidences that resulted in suspension. The suspensions will include uh the details of 175 specific students that were suspended. And when we talk

176about suspension, we talk about the difference between a inschool suspension where they would be assigned to the alternative learning center or the out of school suspension. We try to avoid those, but in some cases, uh that is the that is the decision that we we take. Um as you look at the first chart here um we have the inschool suspension which in parenthesis we put the ALC we had 172 total incidences uh which which involved 131 unique students which then we get to 201 days. Typically when we go into inschool suspensions those are one to two perhaps three-day suspensions usually maximum. uh when we when the students are in there, they have access to teachers, they have their Chromebook, they have assignments uh made available to for them. Uh it's not, you know, downtime. The

177parents truly appreciate this. When we speak to them and we offer this and they said absolutely, we if they're at home, sometimes that seems like a vacation to them. So, they appreciate being here, somebody monitoring them. Teachers pop in from time to time. We have different teachers with different certifications throughout the day. So that really helps us to get the most of our out of our students even when they're receiving consequences. Um the out of school we had 89 total incidences uh with 80 unique students uh which a total of 315. These are usually the more egregious the more serious offensive offenses uh that require um out of school suspension and and it gives a breakdown right here for inschool suspension. Typically there's the order of it. uh drugs uh fighting uh physical attacks uh

178physical altercations and drug usage is for the in school and for the out of school. We've talked about some of our bigger incidences um weapons, dangerous weapons, guns, knives, uh tasers. Um so those incidences I think are are are seen as and being more serious and that's why they uh involve more suspension days, um physical attack, other more serious fights and then drug possession. As we look at the the federal codes, I think you see kind of the similar trend and it's it's you know it's shocking to see but we are also trying to work and and adjust those numbers through time. I know that over time we have worked to lessen the suspensions. I know that we've we've uh been very um you know pragmatic in that manner of of trying to work with

179that. Um, unfortunately, we still see that that upward trend that we don't like to see here. So, uh, in those that order, uh, black, African-American students, Hispanic, Latino, and then white for in school suspensions. Same order for the, uh, out of school suspension. Uh, by gender, we've seen it already on two other sets of slides. uh male students are are are are more represented in this in this uh this particular suspension and then suspensions by grad year. Now we have seen that trend where we see by senior year they're usually less um likely to get suspended. And I think they've figured out, you know, what there there's a goal, you know, there's a focus, you know, whether it's, you know, getting to the end of the year events that they want to be part of.

180And they've realized also that the maturity kind of kicks in where they're less likely to to be involved in in any kind of serious incidences of suspension either in school or out of school. So 72% of uh all suspensions have involved our low-income students and 82% of the outside suspensions have also involved our low-income students. Um so this this graph here is uh breaks it down for the uh suspensions by income status and we had 261 incidents with 175 unique students. So the the first chart is our the income status of our low-income students where we had a total of 131 um and 84 of those students were on free and reduced lunches and then 47 were full pay. So um and then if we go further down this is for out of school suspension.

181I'm sorry if I didn't say that but the first chart was for inside suspension and then the second uh lower graph is for outside suspensions where we had 65 uh students who were uh lowinccome and then 15 students outside suspensions for uh that were not considered low income. Our next breakdown of suspensions is by u IEP status. Um so again we had 261 incidents with 175 unique students. So for uh inside suspensions students who were in the alternative learning center um of the 131 35 of those students did have an IEP and 96 of those did not have an IEP. And then uh go down to the outside suspension and again 25 students served outside suspensions that did have IEPs. 55 students served outside suspensions that did not have IEPs. Um this one is the

182suspensions broken down by the EL status. And um so of the 131 students, 17 EL students uh served uh in uh inside suspension and 114 were non-ELL students. and uh going down to outside suspension be eight e students that did serve outside suspension and 72 non-ELL students. Um so this graph here u does show a downward trend of fewer suspensions going back to um what year was this? 201617. And um so what we do see here is uh our black students are at the top with uh 54% when we break it down by race. Then 21% of Hispanic Latino and 15% white. Um but if we look at the numbers from they they have been going down on a downward trend here. Um so the total number of suspensions have gone down in under all

183races. Um and then they've also go gone down from our IEP students and students who are considered lowincome total number has uh decreased. Um so this is a line graph going back to 2009 2010 with the total number of students suspended one or more times and this uh chart does start at 2009 2010 and as you can see um it is a downward trend going uh from all the way up to 500 now to between you know above 100 below 200. And finally, um, as you can see, going back to 2009 and 10, we are closing the gap among races. Um, as you can see from 2009, there is a pretty big disparity there among uh, black students versus the white and uh, Hispanic Latinx students. And uh, with the downward trend, we we are

184doing our best to close the gap. So finally looking ahead um from the data that we just witnessed uh we are going to have a very uh specific focused on restorative practices. Uh we're fortunate enough to next year have a restorative justice coordinator who is going to help us with those efforts. uh that person will uh work with students and staff uh to help create a restorative community and we're hoping that that will help improve the data. Um in past years we've typically uh looked at data as an annual deal. U we're going to make sure that we do that a little closer. uh look at quarterly data so that if we need to make a change uh kind of in midstream we'll have that opportunity to do it. Uh we actually took a look

185at that this year a little bit and noticed some trends uh right away and we're able to kind of uh switch some some ways that we were approaching them. Uh so you know we hope that that will make and have a uh an impact. It says also here with um collaboration with instructional departments. Uh we heard earlier uh there were 375 incidents that teachers labeled as disruption of the school environment. So there's some work uh and some collaboration to be done there with working with instructional departments uh to serve as a resource uh for strategies uh to help implement uh in the classroom. uh truency uh we are going to target that as well. That was the number one uh item that was focused uh I think I'm looking at a couple of you who

186remember or may remember uh some of the data that we um drew down before there were these big bucket um I think it was like unauthorized presence or unauthorized behavior these very broad defiance of authority. There it is. Yeah. And what the heck does that mean? Uh so we um in last year's work we reported on trying to define what that meant so that we could target those specific behaviors. Uh we did that and had some some um success. It's weird because it's that balloon phenomenon. You squeeze it here and now it's popped out into a new uh incident that we've seen with unauthorized presence. So now uh Dean Erscelli uh Canola talked about that a little earlier. What does that mean? Where is that? So that we can uh properly identify them so that

187we know to you know kind of where to target are these hallway issues, school issue, you know, walking out of the school issues, hanging out in the bathroom types of issues. So all that will will help us um target that behavior even isolating which restrooms, which floors, which wings. Uh so that we're super interested in doing that. And finally, um taking kind of a look in the mirror and really looking at the way that we're aligning our practices, you know, calling one thing collectively and collaboratively uh through all the practices in the offices. Uh so that will also help, you know, tell that same story. I want to uh extend a just tremendous gratitude uh to our um research department uh Dr. Harter and Drs. Levy who really helped us um navigate this data and

188and uh correlate it. uh Mid Stoker and Rosty Alinski, our team uh through it who helped us kind of pull and you know, we noticed some things that we didn't have last year. So, it really did make an impact on how we're now trying to uh capture what's really going on during the day. And I know that was a lot of information uh that we shared with you. Uh and we're happy to answer any questions that you may have. Thank you. Thank you so much. There was a lot of information. There was a lot of data. Yeah. Um board questions. Gretchen. Um not really a question because you already covered it. I think I just wanted to highlight it. It seems like that um a place to really make a difference um in in overall

189numbers is that truency within the building. That's right. Piece that and then you circled back to it at the end. I mean it's just far and away the biggest number, right? Um for discipline. So I mean imagine if it were cut in half or and I think you could we could do even better than that. It would just it it would really transform the way these numbers look. At the same time, I don't want to diminish the more serious problems which to me are the the violence, weapons, drugs, any of any of those kinds of infractions. But, you know, I really appreciate how you've put everything in perspective. those are just this this tiny it it really is a tiny percentage. um they're still very serious, but I I mean you really have done a

190great job in this report of of everything that we've kind of given you feedback on over the past few years to to paint the a proper picture of of what's actually happening here and in a way that allows you to figure out how to make even more improvements. So I you know I really applaud this. I think it was really um great work and in particular the percentages of the student. There were still a couple charts that got flashed up here. the when you were at the end where you were doing um breaking out English language learners and um I IEPs I think where you gave total numbers and rather than percentage of the student body and so again it's hard to make the comparison without that percentage of the student body um to know

191whether you're actually um giving more um infractions to the English language learners or students with IEPs if you just give a raw number without the percentage, you know, it's just harder to know. But you did it like almost everywhere else. So, I think that's great and it and it just paints a very useful picture. So, thank you, Monique. So, I I always see myself in this group because I'm on the committee and I get extremely um passionate about this. And I know serving on this committee until we get to zero, it's always a hard report. No matter what, it's always a hard report. And the the hardest thing about it is that it doesn't start here. It starts when that referral is written and it gets to you. Um, which is why we always talk

192about like breaking down the different um codes, like where is this coming from? What is this all about? Um, and so as I was thinking about that, you know, I'm I'm very much interested in knowing um how we can break down the the codes, the offense codes, how they can be broken down even further by race, ethnicity, and um and gender really to get to that point of um you know, what does that student look like? that is in that highest category that's been just disco, you know, created. Um, and I I agree with you, Gretchen, about just the the numbers and and how um how the percentage also helps, but discipline is such a personal thing um that it's also important to know that there are five students who had 21 plus incidents, right?

193Because if we just know the percentage, then we're not targeting the effort. Um, which is how we get to zero. So, it has to be that. It's it's like a prescription. We have to prescribe what's needed for that classroom teacher. um what type of support is needed and what's needed for that student in order to you know do the work in order to do the restorative justice that you know that we're trying to do. So it is that personal um and and I know that we're trying to look at it um in a very um layered way. you're pulling back the layers to try to understand. Um because if we see an issue in a classroom with a certain teacher writing referrals where you don't escalate it, there's an issue and we have to start

194calling that out or else you're you're not going to get to um to zero. That's my goal. I mean, quite honestly, I don't want our black boys being suspended at a record rate. And I I get the decline, but it it's still a gap and they're still at the top, which means there's still an issue of them not belonging, right? And so I am um you know I got a lot of questions but I'll committee is where we handle the that's coming that's for coming right the how we start getting um underneath it. I got a question about drug possession drug usage who like what I'm curious who that looks like. Um I know what it is. I know what it the difference is. I know what the criminal I don't need to know that.

195I'm just curious about who that looks like. Um that that could be just to to address that that could be anybody nowadays because of the accessibility, right? Um the the prevalence of it of what we see. Um it's even what it is, right? Even if it's pills versus Well, now now it's it's mostly we see t THC vapes. Okay. So, and which is even more difficult to identify, you know, and smell. Well, it's it's the smell is less like it's a vapor. It doesn't sit in the air as long as and I believe our white students still self-report more usage than our students of color, but that that's what it doesn't show in the data. So, what it's what you're saying on the committee. So, and I know that's committee, but I I think it

196it's and that's what I mean by it's so prescribed in detail when we're talking about discipline. I mean, we we really have to understand who the individual is and why this happened. We do have some of the data and I think if we can definitely provide it to the board through Car's office. I think we were trying to figure out how much data to present, but we do have a breakdown of the um offense codes and who they were like the students. But yes. And the one to answer your question though in terms of usage and uh possession um one of the things is that we when we get a referral for possible use of marijuana, for example, if I if we do not have a staff member that visibly saw the student with the

197pen in their mouth, the vape pen in their mouth, I can't call it usage. but they were in possession of a vape pen. Hopefully that that answers um the question because it's like we can't prove that the student was actually using in the bathroom, but I know that they had it in their pocket because we found it. So, and we can kind of get into the weeds at the discipline. No pun intended. Yeah. Sorry, it's late. And I see that pretty good. There's a lot of information, but I I do by close. Um, and I'm glad you said, Keith, that we're going to look at this um by quarter. Michael, no. That we're going to look at this by quarter because I am I mean I'm concerned about what happened, but I am so concerned

198about what's happening now, you know, because it has to change like that. It's not a basketball season and then we, you know, it is literally like now. And I know we talk about that like what trends are you seeing? You do share that with us. But um I think it's important for this group to also get an understanding of what's happening now. I I don't want to want it to get lost though. Um the power to act, you know, acknowledge, cartel, the relationships that our staff and just the effort that's given to cultivate those relationships is so important. And I can't tell you how many things are not in this report because of that. Great. So, I just wanted to give it up to our staff, our safety officers, our deans for all that extra

199the extra stories uh that are not represented and captured in the numbers here. Actually, I appreciate that because the data is really good to see and to go through. Monica, did I cut you off? Mm- I'm just Are you sure? Exhaling. Just jump on back in. Oh, I mean his last statement making me. Yeah. Well, that's what I kind of want to hear. I want to hear, you know, I know that it's important to look at the data, but these are these are people. These are students and we know the students. And while I know it's not appropriate to to sit here and tell every story, but I want to hear that human side. I want to hear the connection. You said that there's that that you're working with families and I appreciate that. And

200you're working with families. you're getting to know and develop these relationship with families which is why our numbers are going down. That is so important to lift up, to keep talking about that and and to keep doing that and talking about what our staff is doing because I believe that people here are working so hard to get to know these students and and yes, we we have the group that we have who are struggling, but we still know who they are. And I understand that each student comes with a a a history with quite a a a pattern um that has already been established. But um you know those those things are important too. So the the data is important along with some type of anecdotal like narrative about what we're dealing with and what

201we're doing because those th that's really impactful. Um the restorative practices are really impactful. That's really going to make that's going to make a difference. So I would like to share a few things um um about um a couple things, some anecdotal stuff and other stuff. So, we reported on um incidents created and that is a significant part of our work, but we this doesn't capture although we have that data too, but it's overwhelming. We see kids who walk in um to troubleshoot, to have problems, um to to problem solve, to meet, to talk, to decompress, to have a safe space um in addition to the social work office. So, we are meeting with students outside of um conduct referrals that happens all day, every day. It's really a revolving door. I literally can open

202up the door and there's somebody sitting there and I didn't even hear them come in the main door. and you just start working. And I think that's the experience for all four of us. Um Nicole, before you go, I just want to add you will have that data for next year's board report cuz we just started collecting it this year. So you will have that next year. Um thank you. So um that is a lot of what we do, relationship building, um earning and maintaining and gaining students trust. Um, one of the things, um, anecdotally in this data last year, we said, I've said it at every opportunity I could, so I'm going to say it again now, is um, our student, our school community was hugely impacted by the homicide at the gas station,

203and this was in last year's data. We had a lot of incidents take place as a result of students not being able to regulate feelings because of how they handled that. instill into this school year as well. So, um that's far reaching, that's anecdotal. And as um we met so much last year about so many major issues. And one other thing that came up for us, we speculated and then looked and corroborated the speculation about students and their reading scores. So, some of the kids that we were most concerned about aren't reading at grade level. um not in a position, not a researcher to be able to draw any conclusions or correlations. However, um wasn't surprised by that. And once you've developed the relationship with students, it shows up in presentation. It shows up in

204class avoidance. It shows up in so many different ways. So, in addition to the things that you've seen in your report, there's so much other stuff in the background. um it was really important to us collecting the data to be able to know exactly who we're talking about. It was important for us to do that. So we did um confirm and with those five students in particular, we could go back and say every intervention that was tried, everything that we did and have confidence in our work, confidence in our teaming, confidence in our problem solving, confidence in all of the things that we did to support those particular students, not just them, but um really a lot of students that we may have on top. So, um I hope that offers a little bit more

205context that isn't written. But, um and and I'm going to have to be honest, even with the the the most recent tragedy, we all are spending so many so much time with students who were impacted. There were so many students at the beach um in close proximity or, you know, um you know, feet away. So, um, that is stuff that we're going to continue to deal with, um, for who knows how long, but, um, that's definitely a part of the work that may not end up on next year's screen if there's no incident attached to it, but those are conversations that we're having um, quite a bit right now with students and with parents who are concerned. I I appreciate Pat you lifting that. Um because what I'm finding out more especially when it comes

206to this in our community and how our children um some of our students are struggling how we tell our story matters. Yeah. So it it has to be beyond the numbers. It has to be you know the work that's being done that you're doing like the story what you just said. It has to include that too because you are doing that and you're preventing a lot and you're you know teaching skills and you're doing restoring you're doing a lot of that and I don't think our community understands um that's being done I know they don't right and part of it part of that is is on us that we have to understand so that we can keep telling that story because we're not we're not on on an island here. It's not the island island

207of ETHS. You know, we have we we're in this community. So, when something like this happens in our community, whether or not it's one of our students, it still impacts us and like you said, it stays with us for a long time and you keep seeing this ripple effect. So, we have to we have to acknowledge that. There's one last thing I wanted to say. I know the Dean Controller wanted to say something I forgot. I'm sorry. I'll be quick. Um, okay. Real quick. Okay. So, one of the the challenges um in my perspective that I see with our um young people is um uh the difficulty with perspective taking. Um and that has come up quite a bit um in a lot of peer conflicts, arguments, verbal altercations, just situations, drama. um that is

208something that is hard for them. Um students um can tell me what they think somebody else's discipline should be. They should tell me what somebody else should have done or should have said or how they should have handled it, but they have a really hard time putting themselves in somebody else's shoes. So that is something um I'm going to just speak for my grade level. I have juniors that I find myself having to try to teach, partner with social workers to teach, retach, explain, um conflict, conflict resolution, communication, perspective taking is a major um issue from my point of view. She she was going to say what I mean you said it. I think one of the things moving forward is the partnership with student services because the same I have a background I was

209a former social worker. So when I'm seeing students, I'm realizing the teaching of how important it is to teach SEAL skills um prop perspective taking self-awareness, self-regulation. That's that work that I know I spend a lot of time doing it. So I'm so happy to know that the district is moving in that direction to incorporate more of I think that will over the years continue to show the trend going down. um like you said that you know it's hard when we get them by the time they're 14. Yeah. Right. And and so it's it's showing them a different way. You know I often tell my students you're not because they're like well I'm just a bad kid. I'm like you're not a bad kid. You made a bad choice and so how can I help

210you make better choices for your future. Um so that is really the component is going to be extremely important moving forward. I think you wanted to say something. No. And in conclusion, uh, I just, you know, I'm glad that this year we, you know, we presented the data a little differently. Again, I thought it was so important to have the deans hear their faces. They for so many people in the community, they're these mysterious decision makers, uh, you know, handing out consequences. Uh, so I was I just wanted to thank them, uh, for their work and effort and presenting tonight. I had a question. I know Mirror and Pat have Yeah. Sorry. Yeah. And Liz. And Liz. Okay. Just Pat, I've been waiting. Thank you for waiting. So, um, well, thank you. And Nicole, I

211really appreciate what you just added in terms of, um, you know, the work that goes into not being, you know, an incident. So, um, and I think that's terrific. And I want to go back way back, Keith. Earlier in your your comments, you talked about a few years ago this category of unauthorized presence, but I could never remember. I always asked Mo'Nique, what is that called again? Because I couldn't understand what it was and I didn't understand what it was. I couldn't remember the words and I couldn't understand what it was. And we had that conversation a couple years ago. And I I appreciate that you all did the work and you're doing more to define walking out of the classroom, walking out of the school. That's great. But one of the things we talked

212about when that dis that discussion happened and I I think this is a specific that sort of um supports the broader is that when we talked about that in the past I mean it just stands to reason based on the stats that more of those students being um you know written up for that infraction are kids of color and particularly boy black voice. So, and one of the things we talked about is that well, what does that look like? Is it a white kid walking down the hall, not supposed to be there, but safety kind of lets them go or, you know, or is more inclined to to call on a black kid that they might know personally or have had incidents with before, you know, all the kind of gray area that really is

213is challenging. And so one of the things we talked about was does does safety and other departments see this data and understand this data because it feels like to me I and I heard what you were saying about individual teachers if they keep writing a kid up and it doesn't get escalated there's something going on in the classroom with the teacher. So you're dealing with that. You're going back to that and that's great. But do I I guess it feels like this data needs to be socialized more broadly within and maybe it is with safety with teachers because I think that the gray areas those unintended consequence unintended actions of people's bias feed into this and again being in the wrong place unauthorized presence is a pretty you broad category, but a lot of kids

214are getting infractions. My guess is multiple infractions for that one that what if there was some kind of understanding and a little more clarity around uh some of that unintended bias that might be feeding into it. I I don't know if that makes sense, but I guess my big point is how much is this data being socialized across the district, across the various departments of teachers and safety so that people are mindful of, oh, maybe I am kind of singling out black boys and I really need to think about that because that's, you know, we all have probably seen that research that the more you are aware of things like that, the more likely you are to think about it in the moment. So yeah, I mean a couple of years ago when I was

215department chair that data does is shared with department chairs. So who in their departments are writing referrals and how can they support them? Biases absolutely exist. I'm not going to deny that. I think the difference is that I um you know having gotten to know our safety in the last year they do an amazing job in so one of the things that we do in terms of intervention for unauthorized and I'll just say unauthorized presence in the hallways the first step is like I'm going to walk you back to class without writing you the referral. However, if I see you 10 15 minutes later the second time, I'm going to take you down to your dean's off, right? It's the dean's office to have the conversation. Then the convers will maybe sometimes talk to them

216and say, "We want to send you back to class." But then we see them the third time in the hallway. Now we're going into the ALC. What's going on? Let's have a longer. So, so safety doesn't immediately write the referral. Then we've made that change. It's having let's walk you back to class where you're supposed to be. So there is like a triage level of support when it comes to unauthorized presence uh for those. And I also want to say there's many kinds of unauthorized presence. You know, you have students who want to socialize instead of going to class. You want to have students that, you know, they're having a hard time, but they don't want to go to the social worker and be left alone, so they'll hang out in the bathroom. Um you

217have students who just show up at 10:00 in the morning and, you know, just walk the halls. are like, "Well, I've already missed this much of class, so what's the point?" And and I guess there's so many different stories and there's so many different situations with each and every student that, you know, we're just breaking it down consistently, but then not only breaking it down, but collaborating with the support teams, whether if they're in special ed, you know, we're talking to the case managers like, "Hey, I'm seeing this. What are you seeing?" Or social workers, school psychor, and we're always collaborating and discussing the students. And every student has her own rationale. Like I have one student that uh doesn't get to go out and socialize on weekends or after school. So this is her

218time and she would rather be with her friends instead of in class. And so uh and that's just one example. Um so so that's one kid. So you can imagine all the different stories that there are for and again there is sometimes well I don't want to be in that class because my ex-girlfriend's in that class so I'm not going to go or I I don't like the way the teacher grades and I really believe a lot of it may have to do somewhat with the pandemic and kids haven't been able to like take a break so they turn their camera off or they get up and go get a snack and uh oh I need to go to the bathroom. So the so a lot of students will just get up and walk out

219of the class without asking to go to the bathroom. So then so it's just uh there's so many different reasons with the unauthorized presence but I was just last week at a CSL deans conference and every school in the CSL their biggest issue is also unauthorized presence and truency and it's a nationwide thing post pandemic. So, it was just nice, not the right word to say, but it was just nice to hear that we're not the only school dealing with the number of students that are not attending classes and that all the other schools in the Central Suburban League are also dealing with the same issues. Yeah. No, thank you. And Ariselli, thank you for talking about those steps because I think that's really important if kids are just getting written up that that really

220could be, you know, is there bias there versus three times where you've actually worked with this Joe Smith, this kid? I think it just is a much more personalized and better way to get at or break some of what could have been that unintended bias. So, thank you. Okay. and then Liz. Okay, I know it's getting late, right? Um, so one love printed out red. I'm going to use the report to write my own. You guys are amazing. Um, I'm going to try to ask these questions pretty quickly. Would you argue the um per pretty much the proportionality across grade level is indicative of your interrator reliability in that you all are kind of similarly working with our kids because I thought that was pretty dope. Yeah, we we try to be consistent. We try

221to make sure obviously there's case by case situations that may there's there's a different situation happening with some students that well they need to like like let's say they're constantly late to school. Well, they have to take their younger sibling to school or they're caring for someone at home or you know coming out of that pandemic there had to be a little bit more of understanding and grace with those type of things. But we try to be as consistent as possible with with with some of those situations like the bigger situations that we often deal with. Yes, there's the consistency. Look, this is what we found on them. This is how we have to deal with it. Unfortunately, this is the case. This summer, we created this discipline matrix using progressive discipline. So, we basically

222wrote down every single possible infraction and then using steps, step one, step two, step three, what could be possible consequences? um because we wanted to make sure that we're all the all four of us were in alignment. Well, good work because that really shows. Um the other piece that I think um was interesting is that I know we're the the bias because it's racially and gender predictive in the sense of the numbers in our we know that then there is obviously bias and racism that's built into our systems that's um impacting our kids. And so I was just thinking about um what you said I think regarding um looking at reading scores and you mentioned time um or location and I was thinking oh it'd be so fascinating as we're trying to blow out the

223pictures to look at um time of day but also type of class like are kids skipping English more let's say with reading scores or are they skip whatever those areas are um and then even across a timeline that where if an incident pops off, how many referrals do we see an uptick and so that we could begin to see kind of the the climate of over time? Um, so that would be really interesting and I think could add because I love the numbers and the data. Um, but I would it would be really fascinating to see it take shape in those ways. I'm also thinking about um the relative rates or risk ratios that you didn't really put in there, but you know, we could look at like, you know, like you said, black males

224are five times as likely to receive a referral, let's say, than a a white um girl. So, the protective coat then is what it can't be until we get into a system that isn't um full of racism, it can't be race. So then you were mentioning the relationships and so I just keep thinking about what other protective coats because there are so many kids who aren't in trouble and that 86% or whatever the and so I'd love to think about through the next iteration of your report your theory of change and what are those protective codes that we have control over that we can you know like the great America trip if that happened then do we see maybe a two weeks of fewer referrals so if that's a protection ive coat encouraging having more

225fun then how can we boost fun so then my last point because I know I'm getting long-winded here is let me just find it because I wrote it down um the question is do our current discipline policies and procedures present barriers andor what could be potential solutions that we could build in so that you know that we have to fund it and it has to happen like fun or whatever whatever it may be. So, those are some things maybe not to answer in this moment. All right. But I want to know. I'll be brief. No, no. I mean, I was just messing with you because you wanted us. No, no. Uh we did this year. This year we did as a part of our culture and climate committee. Uh we looked for ways to incentivize

226uh students who are those 83%. you know, students who are making positive choices and no detentions and uh to celebrate that. And so we had some kids go to the bowling alley. We had some kids go to uh Great America. We had some kids participate in homecoming dance. Uh and as the deans mentioned earlier, senior year typically a pretty significant dip because students want to participate in prom. Uh so we're looking at ways to strategically place these experiences to help motivate, inspire, encourage students who want to belong to those uh active um spaces and you know we appreciate that continued support. That's amazing and thank you. Hi. Um, so I'm glad to see that the overall numbers are decreasing and um, I'm really pleased to hear that you're expanding the restorative practices that you're doing

227and I'm excited that you have this new coordinator for restorative practices that you'll be working with. So, I'm really hopeful um, and curious to see how that'll play out over time. Um, I did just want to say that the over representation of black students, low-income students, and students with IEPs is very upsetting and very concerning to me. Um, regardless of of what the overall trends are, those numbers, um, that I just we can't we can't be okay with that. Um, and so my question is, what is the process for determining whether or not a student with IEP, if their disability is related to the infraction? Well, that's always a consideration. Um, if their behavior infraction is a manifestation of their disability, we have to think about that first. is a student with an emotional disability

228getting in trouble or getting an a conduct referral for a verbal argument with a peer. So we we do have to consider that. Um too um it's the law. Yeah. Right. So we believe in it and it's the law. Right. Yeah. And then the other thing I think it's really important is that we really have to for the three categories that you mentioned which are which are concerning that we really should spend some time um trying to determine root causes. Um while there could be some bias the reality there could be some bias and there can be some real lived experiences. I asked a a a classroom of students um raise your hand if you've seen a fight this year. Everybody raise their hand. Raise your hand if you've seen black students fighting this year.

229Everybody raise their hands. Raise your hand if you've seen white girls fighting. Two people out of 50 plus raised their hand. So sure for some categories and some things or some subjective things there can be bias and the reality that certain demographics students from certain demog demographics are creating incidents at a disproportionate rate. So, I think we can have a whole bunch of truths in both ends. Um, too, but if we can really spend some time on the causes for the behavior, the more egregious acting out behaviors, um, that'll be incredibly helpful. So for um when you're looking at a student's disability and whether or not it was a manifestation, their infraction was a manifestation of their disability, does that affect what the consequence is? 100%. And that's why that collaboration piece with like the

230case managers and the social workers and and the team is very vital to you know understand how the stu the student and background and and their disability and how they react to situations and to really get to know the student get to know the parents and the family and really work closely with them. So that that collaborative piece is is very important because we do learn a lot about the students and kind of figure out ways how we can curb the behavior or work with them and and you know get positive results. Yeah. And that that conversation doesn't happen just uniquely with the deans. There's a manifestation determination review called an MDR where the team gets together and have that conversation. And so it's a very collaborative effort which is required by by the law.

231Yeah. And that's only when a student with an IEP is rece that's more for egregious behaviors when a student is receiving 10 or more days of suspension potentially for an egregious behavior. Um so prior so the MDRs are very specific in that area. However, as Mr. Shanahan mentioned there is a lot of collaboration and I think also a lot of has to be a lot of patience and understand when a student is um escalated. And one of the things that we've been doing a lot with safety in our weekly meetings uh with our leads is trying to get them to understand when a student who has an IP is so dis deregulated um and understand like how to approach that student. Um so that we don't get more serious behaviors from that student in that

232moment. And that's a lot of work. It takes a lot of work but it's it's important work. Um so one of the things that we do a lot in collaboration with our IEP team for example would be does a student need a class change? do we need to reduce their schedule? So, there's a lot of interventions that are done, especially when we're seeing that trend if a student with an IEP is all of a sudden getting a lot of referrals and it's it's trying to peel the layers to try to find out the why. So, there's FBAs, right, the functional behavior analysis and the BIPS that we work with the special ed team to maybe we need to adjust something on their BIP, which is their behavior intervention plan. So, thank you. I'm good. All

233right. Well, before you all get up, I have permission to do this. Um, I wanted to thank Ericelli for her 16 years of service to the district as, um, social worker, director, student services director, department chair, um, dean of students. Um, you didn't chair the Latinx caucus per se, but you did a lot of chairlike work for the Latinx caucus before we were even thinking of summits. You and Fernando were doing very summit-like work years ago. Um, you have just been a pioneer. We have done beyond diversity together for the last over a decade. I mean, your your input and impact on the school cannot be measured and cannot be overstated. even here tonight. Pat said, "Well, keep just tell her not to go. Just tell her tell her she can't go." I did just

234I just turned to him and said, "Just tell her she can't go." That that was the mumbling up here. And member of the Dell, I mean, I could go on and on and on. Ariselli, we are going to miss you and your commitment, your advocacy, and um you know, congratulations on on um on where you're doing, where you're headed and what you're doing. And thank you to Of course. Of course, I do want to echo that, Arselli, having worked so closely with you for so long and yes, the list goes on. Lead social worker, you help bringing sore and all of these different components. So, we see you and I'm so grateful for you and I know the whole school is too. And I've seen the way you've impacted staff and students um including all

235of you here tonight. So, thank you, RSLI, and thank you to the whole team for coming together and looking at data in a different way and constantly reassessing on what are students needs, what are they saying to you, and how are you intervening differently. So, thank you. Hey, you want to come get your pen? Pat said you could have a pan. [Applause] I remember doing this. Oh, I was telling that to Leah. I was like, "Oh my god, Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Congrats to you. Thank you." Even before the high school, right? Exactly. What in the world? [Applause] And yes, thank you to your team and your other team, everyone. I know there's a lot of work into the discipline committee for continuing to look at this. This is hard. This is this

236is hard work and we'll we'll continue to keep drilling down and looking at all aspects and components. So, thank you. Thank you for supporting each other, too. I can feel that. And that's important for you to do and continue to do because it's hard. So, thank you. I know. We always like they're like nine in there. Yeah, they really are. They really are. It's like a You can tell it's like they did good though. They did really good, Marcus. They did good. I know you were worried about it. Okay, so our next item is we're going to go through this really quickly. Comments from the public. We have no comments from the public this evening. Okay. Sure. Sure. Okay. Next item is foyer. I think we have about 10 of them here. Yeah, we actually

237have 12. We have one from Espie, one from Jordan, one from Sternstein, we have Cox, we have Schmoey, we have Clay, we have Andelman, we have Shine, we have Hirs, we have Hirs, we have Chatterton, and we have Andelman. Okay. And the responses are in your packet. Responses are in the packet. All right. Okay. Board committee reports. Have we had any committees? I know we just heard from the discipline committee, so you don't have to give a report. I think we have another meeting coming up. All right. Yeah, you can do that. Any other committees? Nope. All right. Okay. Student board report. Nicole. Hello. Hello. Um, happy Monday again. Um, I mean they're always on Monday, so I don't know this. Okay, we met on Tuesday once. Okay. Well, anyway. Oh, okay. So, we just

238came back from spring break um and standardized testing last week. So, we had a couple days off and we're jumping right into things. Um the end of the school year is coming and the end of the quarter is coming because that's when the end of the school year is. Um so AP tests are in the next few weeks. So there's a lot of stress in the air as students are studying and preparing for their tests. Um again the school year is coming to an end with about six weeks left which means that the student union is working to make the most of the time we have left in the school year. Um the student union committees are making progress in their individual project groups including the mental health committee who have been in contact with

239Dr. Kinsey and Dr. Lizo. Um last Friday, April 14th, um the emerged leadership program organized and um facilitated a restorative justice panel. So that was perfect because they were just talking about that. Um thank you for coming. Um those who were able to come, thank you. Um there were a couple admin from the school um including Dr. Kinsey um Mr. Anthony King and Dean Nicole Boyd who was just here as well as other stakeholders in our Evston community including Pam Cit Citroenbomb from the Moran Center and our school resource officers um officer Lloy Spells and Grace Carmichael. Um they were it was a great panel. It was super successful I think. Um students left feeling mostly satisfied but still wanting more um with the opportunity to have a face-to-face conversation um centered around student voice

240with the change makers in our slash their community. So, um we're going to have peace circles um sponsored by Pam and the Moran Center tomorrow during lunch, both lunch um A and B, and then also on Friday, so we get as many people as we can to come to those peace circles. Um and then lastly, speaking of student voice, the campaigning process for next year's student rep has begun. So, it's kind of weird because time really has gone by and um that's it. Thank you. Thank you, Nicole. Can I just Can I just say one thing about Nicole? I was so I went to the to the um panel last Friday and I was just so impressed by your group and the work that you did to put that together and I was one of

241the panelists said um this was the first time that he'd met some of the other people on the panel and I just thought what a great example that was of bringing students bringing the community together and making connections for the adults. in the room and um I just thought that was incredibly powerful and I want to thank you for that. Well, thank you for coming. Um also I just want to give credit to um I'm sure my group members are out watching but um to them because it would not have been possible without them and also you all for coming or the people who were able to come. I understand that everyone was busy and I sent out kind of a last minute invite, but um it was super exciting and I think we want

242to have it kind of continue over the years, something that's sustained and also um like improved upon each year. So, we really are centering our school and discipline and restorative justice around student voice. Wonderful. Thank you. Thank you. And thank you, Stephanie, for that. All right, Dr. Campbell, thank you. Um, so, uh, community violence continues to be on our hearts and minds as, uh, Dean Boyd just referenced. Um although the individuals who were um impacted by the shooting at the beach were not ETHS students um they have certainly been a part and just a part of our hearts and our minds for a lot of students and and staff and parents in the community. Um it's uh a struggle and many students uh are continue to deal with their emotions and memories and their anxiety.

243As a matter of fact, Lisa not a day had a student in the office just needing a process and um so it's it's a work um that we need to continue to do. And right after last week's incident, ETHS offered support for our students who express distress and we continue to ask that every member of our school community practice acknowledge care and tell to keep each other safe. Students and families can access links and resources uh in their email. I also want to lift up community resources outside of ETHS that families can utilize to help cope with this trauma. Type community resources in the search box on the ETHS website and you can get the link for more information. And I want to note that our next community talkback is in the evening of May

24423rd um where the focus will be on community safety. um something that the board has been having a conversation about all year and uh we will continue to share details about the time and location of that in the near future. Um but um we continue to contend with the issue and the challenges of safety and violence in our community and so we'll continue to have conversations on what we need to do about it. Thank you. Thank you, Dr. Campbell. All right. So, we are at our items for action. Um, the first item is approval of textbook adoption and deletion of proposals. Could I have a motion, please? So moved. Second. Roll call, please. Yes. Yes. The next item is approval of course change. So moved. Second. Roll call, please. Yes. Yes. Next item is approval

245of 2324 and 2425 school calendars. So moved. Second. Roll call, please. Yes. Parson. Yes. Yes. Yes. Next item is approval of second amendment to the to intergovernmental agreement for recip reciprocal reporting and school resource officer with the city of Evston regarding sharing of digital images during health and safety emergency. So moved. Second roll call, please. Yes. Yes. Next item is approval of resolution granting tenure appointments. So moved. Second. Roll call, please. Yes. Next item is notice to remedy teacher and I'm going to read this resolution authority authorizing notice to remedy. Be it resolved by the board of education of Evston Township High School 202 Cook County, Illinois. The president and the secretary of this board of education are hereby authorized and directed to serve or caused to be served on the tenure teacher named in

246the minutes of the closed session immediately preceding the adoption of this resolution. A notice to remedy substantially in the form of exhibit one attached hereto and made a part of here a part hereof. The notice to remedy references deficits in the conduct of the tenure teacher which if not remedied may result in his dismissal dismissal. The notice to remedy also refers or references directives which if not followed may result in his dismissal. This notice shall be in full force and effect upon its adoption. adopted adopted the 17th day of April 2023 by roll call vote as follows. Roll call, please. Could I get a motion, please? So moved. Second. Roll call, please. Yes. Yes. Okay. The next item is the consent agenda which consists of approval of minutes for regular and close session from March

24713, 2023. Special meeting March 22nd, 2023. Approval of bills, treasurer's report from February 2023 and personnel report. So moved. Second. Roll call, please. Andy, yes. Yes. Yes. Parson. Yes. Yes. Okay. The next item is old and new business. Do we have any old or new business? No. All right. Any polling of the board? If not, can I have a motion for adjournment? So move. All in favor? I. Okay. This meeting is adjourned at 10 o'clock. No, we're not competing anymore, Gretchen. So, you can just