Gilbert Public Schools District Board Meeting 08/11/2020

001number one the executive session in the first floor conference room i'd like to call 1.01 for an executive session pursuant to ars 38-431-038 for discussion or consideration of matters relating to school safety operations or school safety plans or programs or do i have a motion i move that we move to executive session second thank you it's been moved and seconded um i'll call for a vote all those in favor aye any opposed none so it passes four zero we will remove for executive session and then we will return to complete our meeting and we anticipate that dr santa cruz will join us in the executive session thank you these are for them test test one two test good evening and welcome to the board meeting for the gilbert governing board this is a work study

002session and a brief board business meeting as is our protocol for work study sessions and brief board business meetings uh you will note on the agenda that there is no open call to the public that is typical and standard in this format when we have a regularly scheduled business meeting that item will again appear on the agenda we will be working in a work study session and we have four presentations this evening before we get started miss wilson would you please call the roll miss larry wood here mr reed carr here ms sheila eugetti here miss jill humphreys here dr charles santa cruz here mr president all board members are present you have a quorum thank you mrs wilson we will now move to item 3 item 3.01 which is the arizona department of health

003benchmarks to reopen and before i ask dr mccord for introductory remarks we have just been involved in an executive session discussing items of school safety among which the benchmarks related to this presentation this evening were discussed and we are discussing not just the metrics for the county but we are taking a look at whatever metrics we can discern for our local area and working those into our format and structure the reason for that is to begin the process of a phased-in approach of opening schools sooner than later and getting that process in place we expect that we will meet again have a special meeting next week and review some additional information provided to us by the superintendent and staff and we will also we have also given direction to the superintendent to take a look

004at that phased approach and present to the board at some time some point in our meeting i'd like to defer just a little bit to mr carr he had some remarks he wanted to make so at this point i will defer to mr carr thank you dr santa cruz and i'm going to echo some of what you just so well stated as we begin this discussion tonight uh we want to be clear that we are looking to direct our superintendent and his staff to continue to look at the data daily we know that that data is being updated although it's not being updated on dashboards yet it's being dated update data daily so we ask him to continue to look at it daily on a on the county level that we have it and to

005develop it to the extent possible on the district level we know that we're waiting for elements for that to happen it is our belief based on the examination of some data that things look much better in our district and in the east valley than it may throughout the entire county we are also anticipating uh based on preliminary data available from the department of health that the data is trending the right direction so we invite him to look at that in a statistical means and anticipate where that data is is heading so that we can move towards the beginning of school in a safe proper way as soon as possible so our direction to dr mccord and his staff is to continue to monitor data daily to establish a plan to to begin the start of

006school which may include a phase start or other measures as they as they deem possible in order to ensure safety and to prepare for the special meeting that dr santa cruz just mentioned on tuesday to present that to the board we want to assure our community that we are united as a board our goal is to return to school as soon as possible we recognize that there are many stakeholders that feel differently as to what safe looks like we are trying diligently to balance those needs we care about students we care about our staff we know that many want to be in the classroom now we know that many are concerned about their health for various reasons dr santa cruz if i may add on a personal note we know that sometimes as a board

007we have to discuss things in an open environment in compliance with open meeting laws that puts us at a real disadvantage compared to at least in my profession in business we would never we would never discuss some things in an open environment and we would have prefaced and been able to discuss both one-on-one and amongst ourselves prior to a board meeting sometimes because of that environment we respond and speak candidly in a way that is not necessarily perceived as kind and that while we have a relationship and understand one another well may appear to others inappropriately i ask this is a personal ask i ask the members of our public to treat both me and my fellow board members with respect and kindness even when you may disagree with us none of us are here

008to be heroes or to be villains we all ran with the right intent to try to do what's best for our community even when members of our community disagree so i would ask that even when you disagree ask if you're doing so kindly and act appropriately and i thank you for the opportunity to editorialize thank you mr carr and as i defer to dr mccord all of the issues related to a reopening plan as we look at the variables related to cdc guidelines the arizona department of health guidelines and any of the guidelines that might be available to us and for public consumption out there be factored in to their reopening plan design and that we ask members of our public and our community to understand that those guidelines are for their safety their personal

009safety the safety of the students and safety of the faculty and staff involved and while masks are a debatable item they will i'm sure factor into the reopening plan in some big way and so look at what is out and available and prepare yourselves for what may appear we don't expect to be unreasonable we don't expect to be onerous and heavy-handed we simply want to make sure that we are adhering to the things that will make us safe and our environments safe for all who will attend so with that i will defer and turn it over to dr mccord thank you dr santa cruz governing board members i appreciate all of your comments and we will definitely take your direction and come back with something that we think is pliable for our students and our

010staff next week i think the most important word is safe and we will design everything around that we have been working on the background related to this and hopefully we can come as come to you as with as a comprehensive as planned as possible there still may be some details that will need to be worked out but we will bring to you our very best effort up to that point on another note so we'll freestyle just for a second here a huge thank you to our our students and our families and our staff for starting off the school year we hit bumps i sent out a letter last friday and i used that i said we had positive comments and and we did get some positive comments but we also had some some very direct

011comments about some of the things that we ran into logging in on the very first day was a bottleneck that was difficult webex was difficult we think we've mitigated a lot of those issues and i know that there are still struggles out there for families you didn't necessarily have children to teach them k through 12 and that's our job and i applaud our staff our teachers our support staff our principals uh my team for uh running and doing the very best that they can given the situation this is heading into my 26th year of education um and i got to tell you well even over the past three years since i've been superintendent i don't think i've a lot of people have been met with the challenges that we've been met with as a board

012and administration and as a community and mr carr what you talked about you know about being cordial and kind is a very important aspect that we got to remember through all of this because the end of the day this is about our children uh ms wood talks about that on a daily basis all five of you do and we gotta do the very best we can for our students whether it's online whether it's in person but i know that we can and i know that we will so i just wanted to make some acknowledgments there and make sure that people understood that where we're coming from as a school district thank you so what i'd like to do now is talk to you as you know last week the arizona department of health they came

013out with health benchmarks to return to school and we were waiting for those especially since our last governing board meeting because a lot of school districts including ours have been waiting to see what we can do to make sure that we're safe when we go back and what would those benchmarks be and what would it look like in and where do we actually stand and so i'll go through some of this and and board members uh jump in at any point in time uh give any kind of clarification you'd like to give because i know some of you have done some uh background uh work on this as well the information i'm gonna present tonight is based on county maricopa county not town of gilbert not city and mesa this is just what's available right

014now maricopa county and i think one of you mentioned a few minutes ago that i think this week probably friday arizona department of health along with maricopa county they'll be coming out with hopefully a dashboard that speaks specifically to boundaries of school districts and so that'll give us more comprehensive information if the decision is going to be left up to the school district then i think it's important we have the appropriate information to make the decisions for our students that live within our boundaries and so hopefully we'll be able to get that and that's what we'll look at and talk about again next week when we meet so just going to talk about the criteria county trends local data assumptions for east valley data recommendations next steps and any questions you may have but again

015ask any questions you have along the way i am going to read through some of this because it's pretty important as to what was issued by the department of health adhs recommends county specific public health benchmarks to be in the moderate or minimal transition transmission category in all three benchmarks for two weeks in order to provide hybrid virtual and in-person learning the adhs schools toolkit defines community spread levels with the thresholds outlined before below cases a two-week decline in the number of cases can be used to meet this benchmark or two-week of case rate of less than 100 cases per thousand population then you have percent positivity for initial opening two weeks of percent positivity less than seven percent within the county and covet-like illnesses two weeks with hospital visits due to covet-like illness below

016ten percent and then this is what this looks like minimal spread evidence of isolated cases or limited community transmission case investigations underway no evidence of exposure in large communal settings moderate community spread they define it as sustained transmission with high likelihood or confirmed exposure within communal settings and potential for rapid increase in cases and the substantial community spread is large-scale controlled community transmissions including communal settings eg school workplaces um they further define community spread levels with the thresholds outlined below these thresholds consistent with the national standards set by the coronavirus task force and it just has those cases of percentages for minimal it's five percent moderate five to ten percent of course substantial at ten percent or above looking at this in order to get to those areas you look at okay what do we

017have to do when we're in one of those phases so for no to minimal community spread the delivery model would be a traditional setting face to face in person here we go with school hand hygiene and respiratory etiquette enhanced cleaning proper ventilation and monitor absence absenteeism for the minimal to moderate hybrid model you're looking at those i just spoke of with the inclusion of symptom screening physical distancing up to six feet cloth face coverings cohorting field trips and large gatherings cancelled communal spaces closed and then of course substantial you're just continue to be virtual until you hit those other areas dr mccord i know we're going to talk a little bit about on-site support services but if we could just highlight that that is causing a lot of confusion in the community as to why

018we're having some people on campus some people not that is something that's called for even when we're in a complete virtual community not only is ideal but something that's being mandated through executive order so for those who wonder why we are starting to offer that on the 17th when we're not offering full services it's because it's a requirement of the executive order i appreciate you pointing that out thank you looking at the county trends as of now this is data please note lags probably by two weeks so this is data as of 7 19. okay for the first category uh declining cases are less than 100 cases per 100 000 individuals for two consecutive weeks for that benchmark at that point in time it says we have reached that uh for the next benchmark two

019consecutive weeks with percent positivity below seven percent according to this the benchmark has not been met but again this is for july 19th uh i think mr carr has seen some more data that says it has decreased if you want to touch on that a little bit yes again pulling data from the arizona department of health services page which was where this data they they caution us about going to current data because it's not a complete data set it's the data lags however we we can watch that to see where the trend is taking us and where it's going knowing that while it's not complete data it should be representative so if we look at the subsequent weeks following that july 9th knowing that the numbers may change that july 19th excuse me date of

020a number of 13.2 percent has since declined to 11.2 percent and subsequently to 8.7 percent we would highlight that this week's data the data as of starting sunday 8 9 only has one data day of reporting in it so it may or may not be representative but we want you to know we're monitoring it with the idea of hoping that it is representative and hoping that it nears us to a decision consistent but as of the one day of data that's available for this week the the positivity rate has declined to 4.5 percent um our hope is that that trend and that's as a county that's a county that's not local level and as as we indicated we we hope to look even more local that is an indication that if that data trend holds

021through the week that we're we would be very close to meeting this benchmark you know and we'll hit this later in the in the analysis that you suggest one of the things that we can all do is respond to the cdc's the arizona department of health maricopa county health departments call for widespread testing as we have widespread testing that does two things one it makes sure that the data is a larger data set and more representative of where we really are two in the event that that comes back with a positive perhaps somebody is asymptomatic or pre-symptomatic it identifies that your positive early in the stage allows you to quarantine and slow the spread again helping us to get back to school sooner than later so i know you'll hit that point later but we

022know that that's where the data is trending we're monitoring it regularly we like where it's going and we hope that that allows us to return to school sooner than later and invite your participation in making sure the data is accurate thank you mr carr the last benchmark is two consecutive weeks with hospital visits for covet-like illnesses in the region below 10 percent again pulling this the benchmark has not been met but if you'll notice it is it has by on july 19th it met it and it is trending down so we expect to meet that benchmark and dr mccord if i can add again there is data available on the department of health subsequent to that and it indicates again those numbers may change because the data is always changing in the last two weeks

023but the week following that declines further to 6.4 percent and the early data for the week ending 8-2 is at 3.9 percent so all indications are is that we've met that metric and we continue to meet that metric thank you dr mccord can you remind us sorry can you remind us when when do we expect to see the data updated by the state weekly was it every thursday is that what you said is the projected date that that the latest yes the so this is from oh this is where it is yeah on the right side is is when they update it for what weeks oh perfect so i've got it outlined there thank you that's all right uh it looks like a class schedule i know um i think that i would i would

024imagine that it would come out the same if they do it for school districts specifically but i don't know yet just um here we are just some anecdotal type stuff uh arizona is currently 35th in the nation and tests done per 100 000 population via john's hopskin uh university this is pulled and here we are just a graphic showing where we're at related to that um local data the health department has not made opening trend data available by school district or zip code at this point in time you can get it for zipcode but you can't get it necessarily by the trend maricopa county is indicated again like we talked about they'll be making data available at the local level in our area town of gilbert zip codes have six gps boundaries zip codes again

025a third of our district is in the city of mesa we comprise 10 total zip codes east valley zip codes chandler mace queen creek gilbert tempe aj scottsdale is 49 zip codes and gps student resident zip codes 89 largest zip code is 85234 majority comes from six zip codes again some local data is available but it is daily case only which meets criteria one which would speak to criteria 1. looking at this next slide this is just a picture of our school district and the blue dots indicate different zip codes and those are notated off on the left and so just to give everybody an idea of where that's at if you'll notice you know we have some larger zip codes in the middle of course like the eight five two three fours eight five

026two nine sixes but we also have uh pieces that go much farther within the mesa area and so when that data comes back hopefully from maricopa county related to specific school districts they calculate are they using a logarithm of some sort to make sure that we're not encompassing all of those positivity cases in that area and that it just isolates it to our boundaries and that'll give us a more clear picture and sorry to ask again so we think that that data that we're hoping that that data that's more local to our district should be available this friday that is correct okay and then again just zip codes what i did was i pulled some of this information up by zip code in certain areas and again just to caution you uh those of you

027that are watching those of you that are sitting there on the dice for example 85204 is primarily in mesa and this is a sliver of what's in our school district but for the entire zip code you know they show 2150 cases and so i just lined those out and totaled them up again these change all the time and again not all of them are represented of what our entire district looks like because some of those numbers are a bit misleading in the fact that we take a portion of that zip code and dr mccord i think it's also important to recognize that a couple of those zip codes that have larger numbers i believe include some long-term care facilities that would skew that data and we highlight this so the community knows we're looking at

028the data granular to make sure that we're looking at the data that affects us uh and so that we can make a wise decision as we localize this data that's correct thank you for that and sorry one more thing just also those are cumulative cases that's not just active as in the last two weeks this is since this is since we started counting them okay so i think that's something to remember too just because there was a case at some point right doesn't mean that it even has any effect now except to say that those people might have antibodies correct although we don't know for how long so thank you and just to follow up with that miss wood i think also that doesn't reflect any contact tracing that may or may not have occurred

029with that aggregate number we know that that's been lagging as well so that 11 374 number needs to be taken very judiciously and very lightly in some respects assumptions for the east valley data for criteria one maricopa county is meeting east valley likely would be the same based on this is the same graphic that was on the other page for criteria two which is positivity percent positivity east valley testing is likely same or lower than maricopa county likely not meeting at this point in time but again the data is lagging criteria three hospital visits maricopa county is not meeting east valley is probably not different they're likely not meeting but again trending down just to kind of reiterate not just as a county but also for east valley just some data related questions that have

030come up and and we'd like to point some of those out uh the town of gilbert website says we have only had a six percent increase in the last seven days isn't this less than seven percent requirement well this data is case occurrence data criteria one which requires a two-week decrease seven percent is criteria two which is percent positivity town gilbert is not reporting this data next one is the maricopa county health department curve shows a downward trend doesn't this meet the requirement yes this is criteria one which is currently being met at the county level department of health website shows that seriology percentage positivity at 5.6 percent doesn't this meet criteria 2 no because criteria 2 is based on pcr which is nable's nasal swab or throat test which are at 14.1 positivity the

031seriology measure test measures antibody levels after you've had covid and then a local fox note news reports that gps zip codes had six thousand eight hundred twenty two covet cases with a population of two hundred fifty four thousand one hundred fourteen people this is an infection rate of two point six eight percent doesn't this mean we are okay to open this is criteria one case rate we do meet this criteria but the county does not meet criteria two and three at this point um where is the official data coming from and how accurate is it and this is the arizona department of health services and let's see well i won't have to click on it it's their website their dashboard that you can get that what is a data lag data seems to be taking

032about a week to be fully visible in the system arizona department of health services is only using historical data with a two week lag and as you guys saw when those get reported those the two weeks dr mccord can i insert here something here though i do want to say um that we have noticed that the turnaround in testing data it was taking a week to two weeks and now the average seems to be three to four days so we have a good um we have a good metric there that will help in all of us being able to actually know if we have it or not and be able to address it appropriately as well as that's something that will help i think with this data lag if we have the accurate results within

033three to four days i think that we should be able to start seeing more um accuracy sooner data data is in a in a more timely fashion i agree does this data include hospitals and care facilities that doesn't represent our local area should this data be adjusted we do have hospitals and care facilities in our local area and they would be included and so i don't know how you would adjust that but they would be included in that number because again they're counting people what is the importance of positivity rate and why was seven percent chosen higher positivity rates indicate an increased likelihood of community spread and seven percent is a rate that arizona department health services felt was acceptable to start to reopen schools on a hybrid basis are there other metrics that support

034these or would be more valuable in considerations well there's almost an infinite amount of data available these seem to be ones that other states and districts are utilizing in order to determine whether schools should be open a couple more should we be looking at demographic data i.e do children really contract the spread at the same rate this there they should say there's a lot of conflicting data and reports on this topic without many actionable conclusions i know some reports had come out recently and again i think part of this is that there's been so much information out there that people's heads are spinning when it comes to that that's why even having the arizona department of health or maricopa county coming out with a set of parameters benchmarks i think it'll help us out in

035the long run and what can we do to improve the metrics criterion one and three follow all the federal state and local guidelines criteria two that's the testing uh get tested the more tests that there are likelihood of the positivity rate going down if the trends continue to go also some recommendations continued again to follow the local state and federal guidelines related to cova covid actually we're probably getting this and that's request that arizona department health services make the trend data available by zip code and maricopa county doing the same um possibly using east valley zip codes for decision making encourage people to get tested implement all of the other adhs guidelines and monitor other states and school districts and learn from their experiences and again going back to what you directed me before is

036be ready with a phased-in approach that if we are able to come back sooner and later or sooner rather than later in a safe manner that we're ready to go so our kids are back in class and that's it for this moment any questions regarding that or anything that you haven't you want to add so dr mccord assuming as we start to look not just at the historical data that we know is lagging but also try to anticipate where that data is going in our decision making and we localize it we know we're going to come back tuesday in a special board meeting to to look at exactly that if the board agrees that the indicators show that we're moving towards the ability to safely return to school how quickly could we return to class

037that's a good question mr carr i'd like to say the next day but that's that's not how it works we also have to uh get a measurement of who we'll have in front of those children how many are available for that and so i would at least i would say would at least take a week but we would have more definitive information for you on that on tuesday any other questions board members any other questions comments dr santa cruz if i may go ahead if if we could just keep in mind um that we want to look for ways to meet the needs of our students and staff the very best way that we can that that we can find using this data and using all the um the guidelines that we have available of

038how to keep classrooms safe as we get back to school keep our teachers safe that's and keep our students safe that's our number you know it's a huge concern but also recognize that we need to find maybe creative ways i appreciate the idea of maybe a phased-in approach as we get back to maybe some of those other guidelines that we can really try and look for ways as the data is trending and allowing us to really meet the needs of our our families as well as our staff and i think we can do it and i i want i want um our families and our staff to know that this this is our goal and that this is what we've done and that's what we want to do and that educating our kids the best

039way that we can is is what we're about and that also we can do it in a way that you know will meet the guidelines it's going to look different but we can still have that in-person opportunity as we as we perceive thoughtfully and using the guidelines and data that we have and just but keep moving in that direction so thanks doctors i just wanted to add i think that the looking at the metrics and looking at the data to make sure that we're doing this in a safe way to make sure that when we open the schools that hopefully we can continue and not have to close schools down because of a raise a rise in cases i think that's really important for our community we want to continue the trust with our community

040that we're going to watch out for the best interests of student staff and the community in the way that we open our schools mr jetty any commentary i i just want to tag on to what everybody said i think that that all of us want to get back to school as soon as possible safely and that we that we follow the metrics and what is safe for our community and our school district and so on um i think that that you know we we need to make sure that we um communicate that we're doing the very best that we can and that we're going to continue to do the very best that we can and we will meet on a regular basis to make sure that what we have what information we have is accurate

041and i think that's i think you said it dr mccord that you know sometimes your head spins because there's so much information out there but hopefully the arizona department of health services will give us some more data that we can actually use for gilbert public schools and we're hoping i think you said this this thursday that maybe they were going they haven't done that before they've just made it county-wide um but if we can get some information that maybe can help us to know what we can do so that we can make sure that that everybody is safe in our community but that we also do the very best we can for our children's education and i would also like to just say that i know that i think it's this is an okay time

042for me to say this um one of the things that in many of the emails that we've received from parents that that touches my heart in many ways is that you know the frustrations that that they have with their kids being upset and bored and all of them i can't is there a way that we can get since all of our schools have social workers at this point and i'm not sure what the plan is and maybe we're going to talk about it a little bit more on the online learning art would it would be better for me to wait for that it's up to you go ahead okay you know just some some way where we can have something so that if kids are really getting frustrated that that the schools can help out

043with some of the social emotional with their social workers um maybe you know i'm not sure exactly what that would look like but i think that that is something that this year because our parents supported us having the social workers in our schools that that would be a very important factor so that maybe sometimes when parents are really frustrated they would have somebody that they could get in touch with or maybe some groups for some kids or whatever but i really i really feel that's important too thank you i agree thank you thank you ms eugetti and just as a concluding remark our commitment to faculty and staff to the community and students has been the safety of all concerned and our direction has been focused on metrics and data that will help us provide

044the appropriate rationale for opening our schools once we have done all of that then we will move as swiftly as we can in that direction and that continues to be our commitment as a board to you community and staff it continues to be the direction in which staff is going they have not stopped working as it relates to trying to interpret the data to provide information to the board and to provide the direction that we might need to make appropriate and cogent decisions so know that that is our focus aside from an occasional notation someplace over the last couple of weeks in all of the emails we have received i speaking as one board member and i think i speak on behalf of the board the politics of all of this have not entered any

045of our conversations in the open or in private and we are in communication with the superintendent individually as often as we need to be so the center of this entire exercise is working to get young people back into the classroom we know that teachers want to be in front of their students and we understand the frustration that almost all of you are experiencing as it relates to the electronics and the online service we hear you we're working but we're going to continue to put safety as our primary concern at this point dr mccord anything else no sir thank you board members any other commentary if not then we'll move to item 3.02 fall sports schedules dr mccord i defer to you again thank you dr santa cruz governing board members i have mr steve mcdowell

046our district athletic director um gilbert high grad state champion and all kinds of things i'm trying to give you time steve so you can pass all this out okay um he's going to talk to you about where the aia is in terms of fall sports and how we'll try to be moving forward related to that all right i'm assuming green light means i'm on uh before we get started i want to thank you the board for your contributions to our community um as dr mccord just said i've lived in this community and been a part of gilbert public schools for 40 something years now as a student first i'm not that old i've worked with all of you and for many of you as well so thanks for for what you do for our community

047dr santa cruz dr mccord i just gave you a schedule of what the aia executive board has approved as far as a phased-in approach for fall sports they are taking a phased-in approach as we've already talked about as well tonight for our for our school district they're starting with some of the lower impact lower risk sports like golf as you can see that their plan is to start that on august 17th other outside sports cross country and swim will start on august 24th badminton and volleyball and fall soccer will start on august 31st we don't have anybody participating in fall soccer and then football will start with practice on september 7th and their approach their their goal there is to as many of you have discussed to have a phased-in approach as far as that

048goes starting with the lower risk sports and ending with some of the higher risk sports as you know we've been going most of the summer we started back in may with our phased in approach to return to activity we were in level one for three weeks and then we went into level two for us which included throwing of balls and things like that sharing of equipment we followed all the cdc guidelines and all the guidelines we were given by this the county and the state and then we took a three-week break when everything in the states started to climb like a lot of districts around us and then we started back up and we've been going for three weeks again now and so i can tell you through that time our coaches and athletic directors

049have been diligent in following the protocol that cabinet approved and that you have proved to put before them and we have had three coaches and three athletes during that time have tested positive luckily two of those were during our three week break um i can say with confidence that those cases didn't arise because of our workouts because we haven't had any more than one person in any given program at any given time who's been testing positive so our coaches did take that to heart and they knew that we were taking a risk that the kid that you were putting trust in us and they took that to heart the picture on there by the way came from the aia website uh paragraph two of what i gave you talks about modifications for fall sports that

050the aia is also added if you go to their website and look for those modifications they actually have that picture which is a workout taking place at mesquite high school so what we are doing in our district was used as a an example for the rest of state as what could be done you can't see in the picture because it's really small on this all those kids are wearing masks you can tell they're socially distanced and they're working with their coach and with each other to improve their skills so that's just one example of what's been going on for the last nine weeks in our district with this phased-in approach we also feel since a lot of our students student athletes have been less active during this time than they would normally that it's time

051for us to prepare them for the schedule to follow and that we hope in the future that we can start going on to level three as we prepare our athletes to get them physically ready for the demands that will be put on them as their sport cont as their sport starts up in the fall any questions about the schedule thank you mr mcdowell uh just before i open it up for questions i would also like to ask you to convey our appreciation to the student athletes and the coaches involved in each of these fall sports for maintaining their level of diligence as it relates to all of the guidelines that you and your team set forth for them and offer our appreciation for continued success as they follow those guidelines and through their season as

052abridged as it might be thanks dr santa cruz i will pass that on to them thank you sir uh board members any questions and if i made to address one issue that misha getty brought up um we did have a lot of kids in our district that had the rug pulled off from one room last spring and um in the athletic department in our district we believe in serving you know the heart mind and body of our athletes and we took that time to actually train our coaches in addressing social emotional and physical needs of our athletes we had dead zoo meetings with guest speakers and we had co we have coaches and athletic directors who've been diligent this whole time keeping in touch with their athletes giving them an emotional support and and contributing

053to their overall well-being because obviously what happens in the mind and the heart is going to affect what happens to them physically and all three of those need to be addressed and so that that is a movement that started in our district three or four years ago and it's one that we will continue to grow and develop thank you for that as you know i know for so many of those kids sports is their their outlet and their life and so i'm really glad and you know i think being a sports fan myself it's been hard not to even be able to watch games and and you know deal with that kind of thing so i think every i think i really appreciate that you're doing that for the kids well and that originated from

054our coaches and ads they just wanted ways to help so we got on the resources to do that thank you sir ms humphries yes i i did want to thank you and everyone for the hard work that's been put into this i think this is really important and i appreciate that they're um being careful but trying to provide those opportunities to students i mean a lot of students you know this might make a difference for a scholarship or something um could you just remind us what it means when we go to level three because some people may not be aware of that thank you um yes level three would be still following social distancing guidelines as far as a number of participants in any given field or any given gymnasium level one was just physical

055workout level two added sharing of equipment like a ball level three actually involves more hands-on more one-on-one type drills and then level four would be opened up to to full full scale whatever the sport so um if when we go to level three that will actually add closer contact for our student athletes to be in closer proximity to each other we have districts around us who have been in their level three what we would call level three for ten days now and it this whole situation has opened up lines of communication among all of us district ads and ads across the state we all communicate on what's going on in our districts and those districts who have already opened up and gone to level three haven't seen any adverse effects yet that's good to know

056yeah they continue to monitor that um we also use data from other states i know texas they're like three weeks ahead of us they've already started their football in their eight weeks of summer open workouts that was actually regulated by their state they had 66 000 kids involved in football they only had four kids test positive during that time so it's definitely been closely monitored around the state obviously and across the nation thank you mr mcdowell mr carr i know at our last board meeting you had some concerns uh related to athletics have we addressed those concerns yes this was uh met this you know i think the questions were how are we moving forward and this addresses that i think related to that we also talked about some of the other activities that aren't

057necessarily sports extracurricular activities that don't necessarily fall under the aia that would you know our band competitions our performing arts etc and i know there's some people here asking that um meets my knee but i do have to ask the question um esports is it dangerous and that's why it's being pushed out to the last start of september 15th or i guess so i just don't like they put sports behind that i don't know it seems like my whole life we've been trying to get kids off the couch and now they're calling sitting on the couch playing a game esports so but it's definitely growing and that is one season that wasn't affected last spring so those kids still are and that is a game it's a team sport it's not just individuals so there

058are definitely a lot of positives that come from that mr mcdowell just just to ask the question on those other extracurricular activities your fine arts and so on they also have competitions that are outside of aia um and perhaps someone else needs to answer this question or we can get that are those you know the abode is and and so on are they moving forward with their uh plans with the performing arts do we know on that as well uh they are they have moved forward we we do apply our phased-in approach or level approach was applied to all activities not just athletics the cabinet's been done a great job in our district of communicating that so the band kids the you know rotc kids all those kids they're basically following the same phased-in plan

059last i heard i don't know if it's changed but last i heard that abode had decided to cancel their ban competitions um we do have another uh organization that runs those in the state that at least one of our schools belongs to is a lot as far as i know they're still moving forward with their competition i don't know if they canceled or not but they did decide to cancel banned competitions but they are still going to have marching band they are still going to support the sports and move forward as far as that goes it might take a bit of the stadium to spread out the band kids far enough about it we hope that's a problem we have to tackle okay ms wood any questions comments concerns just thank you and again just

060a reminder that this is in place we'll follow it we'll follow the guidelines the best we can we will follow the guidelines and then we're hoping that this sticks but there will be there will probably be changes that come up but we'll adjust and we'll do the best that we can and we'll keep the students in mind to make sure that we do the best we can for our students as i talked to the executive director the aia david hines he every time he i talk to him he'll say well as of 10 15 on and give the date this is the plan so yes it has been very fluid and change has been the one constant thing this far but it's great to have the dates there are areas of the state that don't

061think they can follow this plan but gratefully the aia has decided to move forward and not wait for everybody but for the majority who who you know can follow the guidelines and return to activity they're deciding to go ahead and move forward and then they'll make accommodations for those other schools that can participate at this time they'll make those accommodations as a year moves on steve do you think there'll be any repercussions at all from the major colleges conferences today that that are getting cancelled i mean in fact 12 in the big 10. they seem to be fall when the sec falls then we know something really serious is going to happen i think they'll be the last if anybody does i know those presidents and those athletic directors have a lot more things to

062consider than we do at the high school level interstate travel for one a lot of states have bans on kids traveling from across state lines and being quarantined and everything else and so luckily here in this state we did have some teams who were going to travel out of state but those games have all been canceled so we know that we only have to work we don't have to worry about interstate travel um there's a lot of finances in those decisions at that level that we don't have to consider as well and so does it make us nervous absolutely is it going to have a direct impact i don't think as a direct as some might think like i said when we have other states around us who are weeks ahead of us texas was

063another hot spot when we were hot in arizona and when they plow ahead and move forward and we find that they're able to participate without their number spiking then it gives us a lot more hope thank you mr mcdowell mr carr something else i i just wanted to uh i meant to do this when it was my turn but want to express my gratitude to mr mcdowell and to all of our coaches i think if our community realizes may not realize that back in i think it was early june we discussed this plan and and approved it and at the time it was before aia had a plan in fact they borrowed things from our plan so in terms of keeping these activities going uh are the extracurricular activities as a whole going our district

064has been at the front of keeping those activities going uh sometimes we fail to recognize that so we authorize that and so i i think everybody at all of the schools involved with athletics and mr mcdowell for your leadership because we have been in front of the state on these things well thank you for that but once again i think that goes back to you as a board and to our cabinet you know the gps cabinet's been very supportive of us and we all recognize it you're the ones that have your neck stuck out in this situation as far as that goes so thank you for that compliment but i think that really should be reflected back on all of you you're the ones that are in the line of fire for making those kind

065of decisions so thank you for your trust in us and for allowing us to continue to move forward thank you mr mcdowell board members anything else if not then we'll let mr mcdowell loose here for a little bit i'll mask up and we'll move to item 3.03 on site learning plan dr mccord thank you dr santa cruz governing board members i'll bring up jared ryan wherever he's at he's right there and i want to reiterate that and i think one of you said it earlier i believe it was item three of the most recent executive order um because a lot of people are asking why are you doing this why why why is this happening and and please know that i understand your concern and uh but we are we're trying to follow the rules

066the executive order and i'll just read this one more time it says each school district and charter schools shall begin offering free on-site learning opportunities and support services for students who need a place to go during the day as required by executive order 2020-41 and shall begin august 17th and then it has a list of other areas down below but this is where this stems from mr ryan and his team and our folks have been working in cooperation to make sure that we get this set up and ready to go and i'll turn it over to him so he can explain what that looks like thank you dr mccord president santa cruz governing board really appreciate the opportunity to be able to present to you this evening a plan that um has been in the

067works quickly it came to together for us but stem from a number of conversations that the entire group cabinet teachers principals parents have been involved with a number of detailed conversations to make this come together coach mcdowell just finished up presenting and and you have nobody better than coach mcdowell uh leading the way in terms of athletics coaches who respect uh his word and the things and his guidance and the direction and he's had a tremendous amount of success our programs have because of that our hope is to emulate much of what he has done in building confidence within our community and support for our students by rolling out an on-site learning support plan that both meets governor ducey's executive order as well as taking advantage of the opportunity to serve our population of students

068that are most in need there are a number of groups that fall underneath that categorization but we view this as an opportunity for us to be able to do some great work with our kids but also while while trying to ensure that all the safety and mitigation strategies that have served us so far throughout the summer continue and we learn and we get get better moving forward as dr mccord stated this is part of executive order 20 20 51 mr reid i appreciate the words earlier outlining the fact that it does seem fairly strange for us to welcome some students onto the campuses when we're saying that we're not open for online or for in-person instruction and that has certainly led to some confusion i've re received a number of emails phone calls what not

069asking for clarification regarding that and so hopefully at this point in time it's widely known that we're meeting the details of that executive order we had a few things to consider as we were as we were planning this we know some of our surrounding districts and we know some campuses that are opening up large areas within a campus and bringing in a number of students without much structure much detail to that plan we also know some others that are putting a lot of thought and and work behind it and we wanted to go that route we feel as though our our parents our students deserve the best that we have to offer that being said there is a reality of the number of staff members that we have to serve our families in this capacity

070our our staff members our certified staff members right now are assigned to students online and they're serving them day in day out and planning for them when they're not in front of them online and virtually this has us turning to our paraprofessionals and sports staff members as well as coordinators of various departments and instructional leads and other support staff members throughout the district otm has been very helpful for us principals have been absolutely outstanding to identify members of each staff that are able to assist in this there is a portion of the executive order which allows for us to look at staffing and look at campus safety and mitigation plans and and determine numbers and in this case we're opening our campus to 90 students each of our campuses for service in the areas as

071outlined through this plan these groups are divided into two categories we have our open lab students these would be students that qualify based on a specific bullet point within the executive order that talks about young children receiving supervision for parents who are working or students that are in need for a variety of reasons qualifying services is our second category the qualifying services would be special education ell gifted mckinney vento free introduced lunch different categories which a student may qualify and there is actually a third component which is specially designed instruction sdi and those students are being contacted personally by fran and her department as well as some others who have students who cannot receive their their requirements of their instruction in online format there are some specific examples to this and typically that's a team

072or on-campus decision based on iep and other design plans that have been put in place prior to this elementary campuses will be open to our on on campus open lab time from eight o'clock until three o'clock registration is actually open right now until 10 pm on wednesday so tomorrow night communication has gone out through dawn and her team to every parent within our community as well as specialized service instruction uh information going out to specify those specified groups that we've categorized that qualify for a variety of different reasons so once again elementary campuses eight until three o'clock for that on-site open lab the bullet point that talks about young children we've discussed that and believe that really refers to our elementary population which is why you'll notice the open lab setting is only available on

073our elementary campuses junior and senior high school or secondary schools all have specialized service or qualification area availability for students to go in and be able to work with support staff members that are assigned to those areas some questions have come up related to the specialized areas and qualification areas and what that means in terms of individual support and to be honest it really depends on one staff availability two scheduling in some cases and once again the the ell group the special education group and everyone within those qualification areas are creating schedules for whether it be in person pull out but those are set periods of time that is not in 8 a.m to 3 p.m service that is being provided but rather set periods of time where staff can go in and work with

074with those those specific students any questions related to the differences between what is offered on our elementary campuses and our junior and senior high campuses or specifics related to the um learning uh the on-site specialized support in general dr santa cruz if i may ask a question thanks i i appreciate that we are meeting the letter of the law as far as the executive order i'm concerned that we're not meeting the needs of these students who are coming to us because their parents are both working i know we're in a hard place but i'm just trying to figure out is there anything better we can do for these students or how do we better meet their needs if if they're going to be there from eight to three and they're trying to basically take care

075of themselves the best that they can and i know i'm limited on staff because of all the other things that we have but just i guess wanted your thoughts on that sure um obviously something we're concerned about something we've put an abundance of time into discussing and trying to organize i've had an opportunity to speak with a few parents there are pieces that we have in place in terms of our plan of action that are minimum standards if we can have we were even talking with our elementary principals earlier today this is our baseline based on the number of staff members we can have in a room the trainings that we're putting in place otm technology services a variety of others have come together and compiled trainings for paraprofessionals and support staff members who this

076is going to be a task that they haven't been asked to do prior this will be new for them so to have a support staff member of a different category even potentially you may have transportation assistance or transportation aids now in a classroom working with students it's going to take training it's going to take work to make sure they're prepared to be with our students we're following mitigation strategies which we created over the summer where reduced numbers within a classroom or adults per student so we're optimistic that as this rolls out we're going to begin to find opportunities for us to work more individually with students get more creative with the things that are going on within the day that being said the the actual letter of the law and the intent of the plan

077as is laid out was certainly to give a safe place for our students to be and we know we're going to be able to provide that and so step one is ensuring a safe place for our students to be who need that from a variety of categories and with a variety of needs and from there i believe we're going to be able to grow and develop depending on the length of time this this continues and that is certainly our our plan that being said i can't guarantee something right now and i certainly don't want to put something in front of the community that makes them believe something is going to happen that that may not be there on day one monday um given the timeline we had to uh to create this opportunity for our

078families thank you you might not be able to answer this question it might have to be fran but how how are we going to work with some of our children that have some more emotional needs um if they have meltdowns and things like that what what do we have in place for that that's right so they're sorry to put you on the spot i i can share it okay i can share also from susie kadena with our social emotional learning has a very strategic plan outlined utilizing social workers such as you mentioned prior and with identifying students targeted students groups outreach in person and a variety of other pieces that she is working with her social workers on on making sure in place as well and so just as to speak to the the piece

079that you mentioned earlier regarding social workers and their support but with all due respect there they don't have the training necessarily to work with some of these children no these are two separate yeah two separate pieces absolutely right so on the other side of the services that we will be providing as required by the department of education will be in person specially designed instruction and services that teams have determined students may be struggling or not able to receive completely or to to a proper extent online so if we have students who have some iep goals for example and social emotional needs and we're not being able to address those needs in an online format that might be a student that a team would determine may benefit from some time to come in for some appointments

080during that in-person specially designed instruction time and receive those supports so basically not every special ed student will be brought in correct okay and under for for the in-person specially designed instruction and services component that will be determined by teams based on students and how they're doing with online and it's primarily for those students have more complex needs who aren't able and one example would be a student who has on their iep to learn braille that's hard to do over webex but we could bring them in and work with them in person or maybe a student has physical therapy it's hard to do that over webex but we may be able to do that and provide that iep service it's for those iep services that we need to provide them with that the in person

081is being developed to me what about like students with autism um how are you i certainly expect there will be teams that will find some of those students who are not benefiting from online would maybe those students that will be recommended to come in for some in-person specially designed instruction one of the ways this differs from what mr ryan is developing is that in this in-person component it will be either a special education teacher providing specialized instruction or a therapist that's providing it there may be a pair of supporting but it's not primarily a paraprofessional and would those numbers possibly be kept you know the class size is smaller or maybe even just one-on-one is what i'm hearing you say to follow the cdc guidelines we've asked that teams not have more than six students

082in a classroom and then the teacher the parent and we know there may be therapists wanting to come in and out to also embed some of their service time within that time but if some i'm sorry if some of the kids are high needs you could keep it less than than than this absolutely absolutely sorry um my question is will some of these students just come in for like an appointment time only you know for that exact service or will they be there you know most of the school day what or is there a variety we've been advised that this type of support is more of an appoint it's on an appointment basis so what it might look like for a student is they may start their day online they might come to the district

083to receive this or to their campus to receive that in-person support for an hour or two go back home and then get back online and finish their day online so it's not taking the place of that online instruction that we're providing now it's to ensure that they're receiving the benefit they need from the instruction that we're providing okay thank you go ahead mr ryan continue a another portion this this piece was outlined by the arizona department of education was guidance related to registration and the ability to provide campuses with a registration list of students for them to properly identify ways of servicing them and so community education became involved with the registration process to ensure we're able to supply each of the campuses with rosters that way principals and actually we have campus facilitators at

084each location to help monitor and and guide this in the implementation on each campus today we trained over 100 people from campuses across our district on the registration process and how to pull those rosters earlier we talked about grouping of students and cohorting of students and whether we identify gifted as a need or ell is a need or special education or groupings in a variety of ways we'll be able to identify those students in advance and prepare for their arrival on on monday morning we have push out services and extension activities for our gifted students we have ell service providers rotating throughout the district as well assigned to campuses we have a variety of specialists that are in coaches that are going to be on campuses so the scheduling has certainly become complex and one

085that is going to be successful but certainly we needed time and so we've received questions related to timeline of registration and why that that exists as well as the two-week re-register window the reason that exists is because kathy hoffman has provided guidance that said registration every one to two weeks and so we pushed it out two weeks just to build a little consistency for that two week period of time and then the window reopens for new families to enroll if they should choose mr ryan you just said that you know you'd be having some therapists and mrs rosenbacher said the same thing too the people that will be coming in and helping do these things will they be also required to be teaching online too so that the individuals that will be working with us

086are not also instructing online or have part-time schedules online and then are free a portion of their day to then be assigned throughout the district to help support campuses and would that be the same with the special education students too they're special education teachers i'm sorry i'm sorry i just stay there get your steps in today for the in-person supports those will be the teachers or providers for those students because they know those students and know what their needs are so they will be providing they'll be continuing their online service or instruction and then they'll be including the students that are in the small group in person into what they're doing online so they will be given they won't be given quite as much of a caseload in terms of online so that they'll have

087the time to do both we we don't know exactly yet i can't answer that because we don't know exactly who they're going to find people yet to know how that will also but we'll make sure that they don't get on overload right we will be working with them to and we're giving them some strategies and ideas on how to make this work um and fit into the schedule of their online connection thank you mr ryan correct me if i misspeak but the services that are being provided in in what you're outlining this evening uh are are a part of the governor's executive order and in collaboration with uh superintendent hoffman these services in some cases could have been provided by partner organizations like boys and girls club ymca we just happen to have in community

088ed the service capability and so we've extended ourselves as a district is that an accurate statement absolutely we early on when this was presented or outlined in the executive order we we awaited clarification if you remember when the executive order was initially released the details within the on-site learning weren't clear we waited for the ade to supply further guidance and a piece of that was related to you may or may not provide on all of your campuses you may or may not provide on your campuses at all but if you don't then partner with a local agency and as we met and dr mccord was very very clear that we we support our community and we support our families and and so we've we've gone to task with the fact that we want to provide

089a great uh product understanding the limitations that might be standing in front of us and so that's where we are today thank you for that i just wanted to make sure that that was clear to our community because we we've stepped up essentially absolutely as i mentioned prior the social emotional learning supports will focus on providing sel activities on sel competencies within the buzz platform with additional supplemental support from sel programs students will receive tiered on-site in-person support based on individual need as determined from sel screeners social work referral forms behavioral assessments and threat assessments this may include individual support small group facilitation and or family outreach susie canadian has done an outstanding job putting together a plan for us to be able to support our community as difficult as that is when we're not

090together every day and i wanted to be able to share the plan she had in place this moves us forward on parent screenings and others of their children as well as adult screenings and and staff screenings this moves us into what it would look like to return in person with these screenings and tools being provided to our families as they screen their students each day prior to attendance we do have sign in and sign out procedures in place on each of our campuses we're actually utilizing a portion of our vik staff to assist our campuses and vik is opening on august 17th as well for before and after school care for our families and we have authorized vik staff to remain on campus into the school day for a period of time and arrive early

091toward the end of the school day to assist with the processes of both students registering when they come in or i'm sorry signing in as they come in it's something that our staff is very used to that we're working with our own campus staff to to kind of take a grasp on and we also have nine sites that are currently open as you're aware that began last week over a two week period of time um today we received from some great feedback from the site principles related to drop-off and and pick-up strategies for for mitigation and limiting the number of people on campus and coming in and outdoors throughout the school day while maintaining safety so you'll notice parent expectations student expectations and then the safety measures that follow referred to the 90 students within

092approximately six to eight classrooms within our world we like definitives we like blacks in black and white we like to know what is in front of us and this is a challenge we don't know yet what registration numbers are going to look like on every campus we don't know yet what the needs of each student is going to be who registers on each of our campuses we're not clear as to how many staff members we have available although we're dialing in on that right now and hopefully by midday tomorrow we'll have that ironed out but there are a number of pieces that are are moving and so i apologize if some of the responses that fran and i give you aren't as detailed as you may like but it is a moving target at this

093point well i do appreciate how quickly you've had to put this together i mean honestly we would have usually taken six months to a year to plan something like this and you're doing it in just a few weeks so thank you very much for all the hard work absolutely mr ryan i know that you've utilized the safety measures throughout your summer vik program and i think that what you have recommended here is is really good um in terms of everything and i think that really one of the good things that will kind of go along with what mr carr said at the very beginning of the meeting this is going to help us to the information that we get over the next few weeks will help us see how the safety goes and i i

094think you're you know you were successful this summer so let's keep it up thank you it honestly kristen stoltzman eric dactyl the specialists um it's been a i would be absolutely lying if i didn't tell you it's been been a challenge but i believe the way we're able to start the summer in terms of learning smaller numbers of students variety of campuses if you remember we're on each of the high school campuses and learning this is the next step the last two weeks have been another step coming up august 17th is an additional move toward opening to more students and i think that it's been a positive thing for for our students and our families so we'll continue to learn and get better as we go and just so you know when we get to

095the phase-in approach and we have students who are are now face-to-face this i believe would still be in effect for those that are uh online as well so we would still have to continue with this portion of it for those students that need support mr ryan if i can just comment first of all thank you to you and your team for all of the work um you know as was indicated by ms humphries we realized that you're putting together a program very very quickly in response to an executive order i think you've done a very good high quality job i i fear it's going to be under appreciated because people are going to be looking what they want and are used to from previous years versus what what we're doing in a in a very

096short time period that shouldn't take away from the quality and uh and the appreciation i commend you for your services and i and i you know i have to say i hope that the program is very short-lived because we're back in person and providing full services and that's not an indication of under appreciation for what you're doing we appreciate that and and obviously the support and trust from and cabinets work on this and advisement every morning as we put this together so um jason martin and marcy and barbara and john and the whole group don and her communication has been a lifesaver and as we continue forward it'll it'll keep growing so thank you dr mccord to your comment that this program format will remain in place even as we phase open and start in-person

097learning at whatever point that becomes available that will extend through the duration of the executive order is that correct yes sir that's my understanding and so the expiration date for that executive order in most cases is at the end of the school year that is correct dr santa cruz yes so i just had a couple questions about um the safety are we able to and planning to give our paraprofessionals and other support staff that will be there the like a mask and um or a shield similar to what we have secured for teachers absolutely so their option bonnie has been fantastic at getting product out to campuses and working with operations on both sets of supplies whether it be ppe for the individual employees or whether it be cleaning and sanitation products for the campus

098from the trainings that have been put together and our staff today i received a couple questions related to trainings friday is going to be a big day of training a number of employees and jen frost and her team have put together an excellent video jack barnes fran and her crew and so the number of people coming together between documentation online links and resources leanne lacey is all coming together that's being packaged dylan has access to that to share it with each of the facilitators on every campus we want individuals feeling comfortable walking in on monday morning regardless of what their assignment tasks may be that they feel trained and prepared and safe and supplied the necessities to be successful and then what's the process that if someone does have coveted if they are diagnosed with

099either a staff or students what is the process in place probably similar to what you've done this summer sure absolutely so nurse frost has created a a series of letters depending on the scenario if a student potentially was exposed by a staff member who is test positive everyone within that location obviously is notified the person who has been tested or the person who's symptomatic is removed from from that location and and is quarantined based on um based on their positivity or their uh symptomatic responses and and what may be going on we also report to the county any cases for tracing and to make sure that we are identifying if there is a pocket within our community or where we're seeing things um albert and his operations crew comes in and and takes care of

100the location where that staff member or student may have been those students are then if it's a staff member let's say those students are then placed in a different environment for the next period of time while we ensure that the the classroom is taken care of and cleaned properly and as i said everyone is notified through the letters that that is a potential and then they're given the option if they want to return um or not that family decision at that point in time okay thanks and i think like you're saying we've had these things in place during the summer and had great success and then here we are now doing it again i think we have some patterns of successful having students at our schools you know it's been small but we're we're growing

101it back and i think that we can learn from what we've been doing take confidence in the measures that we're having in place and continue to hopefully have ideas and things ready to implement as we get to that point where we can get back to school with everybody sure our um just so you know as well our promise to the community has been to if anything over communicate that hasn't been the stance of all school districts and we have felt strongly about ensuring that parents staff students anyone who may be impacted or affected anyway is communicated with and notified of of any potential scenario whether that staff member is in your exact class or just within a facility and we feel as though that's important and the responses have been very positive uh in terms

102of just gratefulness that they feel comfortable knowing that they would be made aware if there were any cases on campus board members any additional comments questions mr ryan you've been very thorough and again on behalf of the board we extend our appreciation for your work the work of your team and the collaboration of all of who's concerned we wish you good luck on monday as we go through and we hope that you will experience the same degree of success you've experienced during the summer so appreciation to you and your and your team thank you sir appreciate that thank you mr ryan thank you fran we now move to item 3.04 face covering policy regulations gb gb dash r j i c a r b and k i r rb dr mccord thank you dr santa

103cruz governing board members per executive order item number five and i'll read this to you as well this is all school districts and charter schools shall develop and implement a policy to require face coverings or such as face masks or face shields for all staff students over the age of five until arizona department of health services determines that face coverings are no longer necessary or recommended to contain the spread of the virus and so that's what we have done in consultation with asba and udall shumway they've developed a policy that is very standard and we will be covering that in the regulations contained in those three policies um gbgb-r staffs personal security and safety and then j-i-c-a-r-b student dress as well as k-i-r-b visitors to schools and let me read through this for you if

104you'll indulge me a little bit all persons including but not limited to staff students vendors visitors and volunteers shall wear a face covering while on any district property in any district facility at any district event whether indoors or outdoors and in any district vehicle including district buses or vehicles rented or leased by the district face coverings should not be worn by a children under the age of two b anyone who has trouble breathing c anyone who is unconscious incapacitate or otherwise unable to remove the mask without assistance students under the age of five are not required to wear face coverings students shall not be required to wear face coverings when students can socially distance or are outside in playground settings with distancing students shall be allowed breaks to remove their face covering in a safe

105environment the superintendent may make other exceptions to the requirement to wear a face covering while keeping in mind the health and safety of everyone involved face shields may be an acceptable alternative to face coverings face coverings are to fully cover a person's nose and mouth ideally fitting snuggly but comfortably against the sides of the face and under the chin they are to remain affixed in place without the use of one's hands and are to not have holes they are to be laundered regularly or disposed of appropriately a face covering does not replace the need for frequent hand washing covering coughs and sneezes and practicing physical distancing six feet away to the extent possible individuals are to be reminded to avoid touching their face coverings and to wash their hands frequently to ensure the proper use

106of face covering staff and students are to be educated on how to wear and care for their face coverings and again legal reference governor ducey's 2020-51 this is the exact same language in all three documents i just wanted to make sure you are aware of that and because of regulations they don't need approval by the governing board but i wanted to make sure that you knew where we were at and this is what we'll be implementing moving forward any questions thank you dr mccord questions board members i i do have a question when we're talking about giving students a break in a safe environment to remove their mask for you know a couple minutes give them a break what would that look like maybe in a in one of those classrooms where maybe students will

107be coming on the 17th if you have an area available to where you can social distance students so they can take them off and we would instruct the paraprofessional or teacher to be able to do that and i think that they would be able to as professionals make sure that they have those available areas and can read the room in terms of okay i think you guys need a break you need to to have a little breath when it relates to that okay all right thank you this is something that we believe is very important we believe that moving forward in order to get our kids into campuses to make sure our students are safe to make sure our staff is safe we need to have something like this and we will make sure to

108the very best of our ability that our staff and our students are following us board members nothing else move to item four which is adjourning this work study session if there are no additional comments then i will could i make a comment real quick i just wanted to thank those who have emailed who which we mentioned we've read many emails those who are here at our meeting tonight or some have left but i appreciate that they came those who are watching our meeting just for the along with our teachers and staff for um just want to thank our families and parents and students you know that they want to be part of our schools that they want to be back at school when have we ever heard high school students asking us to please let

109them back in their school i mean that's a that's a great thing about our teachers and our campuses should know that that means we are doing a great job because our kids want to come back and also just know that we're going to keep working toward finding solutions that meet the needs of students and staff ins and both safety and in their social emotional needs but just want to thank our community members and acknowledge all that they're doing and our teachers and staff as well thank you thank you mrs woods dr santa cruz go ahead and miss you judy i just i just had a a thought about having through my years of being principal when you said students under the age of five are not required to wear face coverings okay kindergarteners are generally

110five once in a while you get a four-year-old till october so what do they have to show their birth certificate no okay no okay so how are you gonna work that out well well generally it's first grade and above why would not be kindergarten well because it's if you read it it's h5 we look at it as h5 and below or that don't have to wear it so mostly okay so students under the age of five right okay hey don't worry we debated that for like a half hour in cabinet a couple of times so and is there any research about that being okay you know i i i don't know if there's research i did ask that question to will humble of the arizona department of health association i'm not sure if i said

111that association right but i did ask that question and um he responded that it's probably okay if preschoolers and kindergartners there doesn't seem to be a lot of spread among those young children so that was one concern i had i apologize i misread that that's what i did five times trust me okay any other questions for the work study session seeing that there are none then we will adjourn the work study and move to item 5 brief board meeting and before i open that portion of it is there a desire on the part of the board to take a brief break or move on i'm seeing move on okay so we'll move to item five point zero one miss wilson please call the roll again miss laurie wood here mr reed carr here michiela eugetti

112here ms jill humphries here dr charles santa cruz here mr president all board members are present you have a quorum thank you miss wilson and with a reverse order in mind item 5.01 is calling the meaning to or and then we move to item six the consent agenda and available for a motion i move that we approve the consent agenda as a as presented there is a motion is there a second oh second it has been moved and seconded that we approve the consent agenda as presented any commentary question at this point i i just had one question if we could just hear a little bit about the renovations for these three high schools and the security and the reasons for that um the renovations of course will include if you remember mesquite high school

113how we had some entryway securities that we refurbished over there looks really good it's a good model so moving forward as uh for our plan we have some thoughts and ideas and some plans for highland high desert ridge high and campbell verde high and um that's that's just continuing on with ensuring our campuses are safe and secure and eventually we'll do this to all of the high school campuses yeah okay that's all i needed any additional questions seeing that there are none then we will vote on item six the consent agenda all those in favor of approving consent agenda as presented please signify by saying aye aye those oppose the same motion carries five zero we move to item seven and that is adjourning this brief board meaning yes mr carr before we adjourn may

114i just take a small liberty yes please go ahead um earlier this evening uh mayor jen daniels tendered her resignation effective tonight i just would like to extend my personal gratitude and perhaps the gratitude on behalf of the board for her service she has been a strong supporter of our schools and has been a strong supporter of education in general and just in my role as liaison to the board from the from the board to the town of gilbert would like to extend my gratitude on behalf of all of us to her thank you mr carr and i appreciate that you have taken the time to apprise us of that and please extend our gratitude as well on behalf of the board to mayor daniels any other commentary questions then with none we will move

115for adjournment those in favor of a german please signify by saying aye aye those oppose the same motion carries 5-0 thank you board members thank you those of you who have been observing this board meeting and thank you to staff for your attendance and for community members who have been in attendance we are adjourned right