001e e e meeting to order at 7 p.m trustees sany would you honor us with the start of the Pledge of Allegiance [Music] United States America the stand na at this time uh we do not have a secretary present so trust Gator would you honor us for being the temporary secretary for tonight yep I okay no problem roll call please trusty milowski trusty Gator present trusty serini present trusty Anderson present trusty dyro present trusty wall present trusty Wy present thank you we have a for thank you so much this time we're going to go to adoption of the agenda we so resolved that the Board of Education accepts the October 2nd 2024 agenda as presented a board member May request an item be move be moved from the consent agenda to superintendent's recommendation may have
002a motion moved by trustee sterlini supported by trustee Gator questions or comments roll call please trusty Gator yes trusty sterlini yes trusty dyro yes trusty Anderson yes trusty winland yes trusty wall yes motion carries at this time we're going to go to public comment on a agenda items if anybody would like to come up on agenda items only please come up to the podium please State your Association and if you are talking on behalf of the board um only the president can speak on behalf of the board so do you need me to address that are you are you uh are you coming up to the podium as a board member or as not as a board member as an activist okay thank you you okay if I turn anyway I want to turn I'm
003addressing you I just don't want to look at you because you you just face the board please all right my name is Leslie X and my address is 23469 Annapolis Street Dearborn Heights Michigan 48125 my comment is on agenda item 13 public comment to president wall oh wait hold on this is not the one I want to do first that one's coming next so um rest in peace to Sonia Massie and the countless other black Americans that are DOA at the time of arrival by the en counters that happened with the blue we say their names over and over again and yet the system still fails them but today I want to speak to the other side of this tragic divide the ones in blue who are always being sacrificed left out to drive by
004a very system that says they're going to protect them what we're blue to I'm sick in the form of a blue I'm sick of dirty politics spending Reckless amounts of money to use bodies that are American to fuel a war between the black and the blue officers you're underpaid overworked and constantly left to fight battles you didn't start you're being thrown into a chaos expected to hold line in the communities that were already broken by systematic Injustice before you were forced to be the face of that oppression but ask yourself who benefits from this war who gains when we're pitted against each other when we're sent into our communities it isn't for justice it's for control and it's for fear they're using you just like they've used those in powers to keep the powerless down
005for years you may wear a badge but that doesn't make you immune to the realities of this fight you're being picked off scrutinized put on trial and hung out the dry too and it's going to get worse more bodies more pain more division unless we recognize we're both being used you with the badge and we who are the Pressed are both targets the powers that be the ones with the money the ones with the influence and the Caren calling the shot they're pting us against each other but it doesn't have to be this way you need us the mouth the mouthpiece or some people would call it the bullet and we need you the badge but the choice is yours either we come together and speak truth to power or We All Fall one by
006one in a system that never cared about any of us the more you allow them to pit the blue against the black the deeper this world will go and trust me there's no Victory here just more bodies more Bloodshed look around the state of your department short staff underfunded facing hate from all Direction this isn't our fight anymore it's yours too and man I never thought I'd say it but I sure miss Dan PCO and chief Meyers and the words of Pastor Dawson hide your kids and hide your wife it's a new day in Dearborne Heights and it's much much worse than 2020 we've seen enough bodies black and blue alike and if we don't wake up soon this war will continue to consume us out of respect for trusty belowski I will be protesting
007uh future meetings and I'm proud of her for standing in solidarity with us thank you anybody else for public comment on agenda items only seeing none you have the opportunity my name is Leslie Shakur and my address is 23469 Annapolis Street Dearborn Heights Michigan 48125 my comment is on agenda item 13 public comment number two president wall since you're the only one on the board that I'm able to address I'd like you to imagine being a slave master and your most vifer [ __ ] Barb came to the porch podium in broad daylight to give a speech about her concerns about the deplorable working and learning conditions and the cotton fields you call Public Schools which are causing psychological emotional physical and spiritual damage to these children who one day you expect to work these same Fields
008imagine being the plantation's least favorite overseer who is also a [ __ ] trusty winless is moved by Barb speech decides to speak up and well how did those scenario play out back in the day we sure seen last meeting so you can go view it for yourself the four the short version of this is the overseer was silent the viperous field [ __ ] was villainized and the working conditions the cycle the system it continues to detriment the voice of the parents and the students of color in this District today I'm here to speak on same on on behalf of those same voices that this boy this board continues to ignore it may not be a cotton field anymore but it is the school to prison pipeline A system that criminalizes our black and brown students familially existing
009in spaces that are designed to supposedly keep them safe just like the the plantation wasn't built for us to thrive neither are your school conditions this this is how the cycle continues by labeling us the problem and then using law enforcement to reinforce the narrative the same way overseers kept the uh the field hands in check you're trying to use the police to keep the community in check in the process you're exposing Our Guest to A system that will eventually imprison imprison them and rather than educate them I'm standing here because the decisions you make today will affect generations of students you may feel comfortable with this status quo but no this our students in our community will not be silenc we are watching and we will continue to fight against this oppression disguised as
010quote unquote policy thank you anyone else for agenda items only this time we're going to go to superintendent report uh Mr Klein hands thank you so I just have two items today the first one is I would like to welcome Wendy Anderson is our new trustee Who was appointed by uh Wayne Risa uh at their last meeting so welcome uh to the Board of Education um and what we'll do is uh typically we do a ceremonial oath so those that wish to participate um you can stand and raise raise your right hand and repeat after me swear s that I will support the Constitution of the United States I will support theti of the United States and I will Faithfully discharge the duties I will Faithfully discharge the duties back up and the constitution of
011this state and the constitution of this state that I will Faithfully discharge the duties and I will Faithfully discharge the duties of the office of the Board of Education of the office of the Board of Education according to the best of my ability according to the best oful welcome okay the next uh superintendent report um I'd like to introduce Steve Gary he's going to uh bring to us just just for presentation and information a rubbish removal proposal so Steve could you come on up introduce yourself and take it away this is exhibit two in your board packet good morning good evening sorry I'm Steve Gary director of operations Steve you might have to yep hell can you hear me now yeah anyways in in your packets um we uh teamed with the down river operations
012managers group um when I came to the district here back in uh March I noticed that the trash removal fees were a bit on the high side I tried to negotiate with our current um waste removal vendor which was our Public Services they gave us a a quote but the problem with their quote was it decreased 6% every year and then coincidentally the down operations managers also went to bid with this and we found that Waste Management um was more cost effective for the District of a cost of $2,725 36 a year for three years which will equate to a total Savings of $532 um the versus what we paid last year with the Republic and coincidentally Republic was also number two as part of that drone and they what I had negotiated they also
013came adapted to and waste management was ahead of them they're the best bid out of that process I forwarded some information all your email addresses to hopefully everybody received some stuff after I put this together for more information help for the decision so this is a project oh go ahead yeah so this is a project that the down river uh maintenance directors have been working on correct and they they um did this process went through all of the bidding uh went through all of the you know you can see the documents that are included here and then Steve joining that group um and talking to the folks indicated that they would honor D7 as well as part of this Consortium is that correct correct yes y y so that's kind of where we got today
014it does appear to be a significant Money Saver and can I ask a question is this the same amount of dumpsters that we currently have yeah so that so the first and it came through in the email was actually part of the packet there they actually came out to visit me here at the district and there's a table they provided that's where we came up with the for our district the annual cost of $2,725 36 and that's assuming if we have dumpsters picked up you know year round and I one thing I did to try to manage costs when I came in from Deerborn one thing they we always did over there we pause the service in the summer just to have everything dumped once a week so there's probably room for additional savings in
015so it might even come in less than that amount here if that helps answer any questions president wall yes truste trusty wless um thank you uh director Gary um you answered all my questions through email earlier and I appreciate you for that and um so did Mr Kennedy um one of the things that came up afterwards that I didn't get to send to you was um do you know why any of the surrounding schools that are like our next door neighbors are not a part of this consor like Westwood or Crestwood or Dearborn I do know that we've extended an invitation to Dearborn um the director Mark Andrews over there he hasn't responded this this started off as a down river group and I don't know if maybe we're kind of considered down river because
016we're at the south in the Dearborn Heights I I have no idea and I don't know if the other two districts you know fall into that that area but I do know they did we did reach a hand actually matter of fact I emailed Mark Anders today because we didn't hear back from him and inviting them to the group because our next meeting is next Thursday morning okay all right thank you that makes sense because I sometimes I will see deor Heights listed under down river and sometimes I won't so that makes sense yeah I guess we're kind of in a gray area yeah any other questions thank you so much I'm just trying to do all I can to manage the cost I just I me and Mark actually happen to notice that we
017we got the first couple invoices and it just seemed like our trash removal was high well we were actually out of contract for a number of years probably prior to my predecessor so the district was paying quite a significant amount of rubish removal so hopefully this will kind of you know save some funds there great catch yeah I want to put it back in the classroom obviously yeah great catch thank you thank thank you have a good night thank you that's all I have thank you Mr cleans but this time we're going to go to uh election of Vice President uh there was an email received uh September 20th uh for resigning from the vice president role so at this time the vice president spot is open and at this time I'm looking for any
018nominations and with uh uh that being there um I did receive an email and I do want to nominate uh trusty dyro for vice president would there be any other nominations seeing none I'm going to close the nominations and at this time uh I would like to uh get a motion I'm sorry I would like to get a motion to close the nominations um and put uh for vice president and elect uh trusty drro for that spot may have a motion so move moved by trustee Gator support supported by trustee winless any questions or comments roll call please trusty dyro yes trusty Gator yes trusty Anderson yes trusty sterlini trusty W no sorry I didn't mean to skip you okay but that's a no um trusty wless no trusty wall yes motion carries D thank
019you for you're welcome taking that role at this time we're going to certified staff appointments exhibit number three in your packet be it so resolved that the Board of Education accepts the following certified staff appointments Lucy hurt h l g t third party cont contactor health and resource Advocate o w best and Anapolis High School effective date September 18th 20124 Nancy Rodriguez r o d r i gu e z third party contractor health and resource advocate for o best and Anapolis High School effective date October 1st 2024 may have a motion so moov moved by trustee Gator supported by Trust winless questions or comments uh question yes trusty I think it's more of a comment there's a question is a question comment sure okay um so I reached out about the health and resource Advocates
020and I was wondering if we could speak a little bit more to these um positions because what was posted on uh I think the posting that we put out on the website and then what was provided from the company was two different job descriptions so in one of the positions it seems like it's more of a mental health um like Health Advocate resource type of job and then the other job description that I was given it was uh the most of the job description was like covid testing and covid reporting to the government um so I'm just trying to figure out what the role of it is and um you know how it came about and then the second part of it is with the third party contractors I want to have a little bit
021more on them because they haven't been that great uh according to staff and so I asked for information on BrightStar because it's such a generic name it was a lot of bright stars I didn't know which company this was coming from so I wasn't able to actually research uh this company that both of them are being hired through so thank you for the question these are Grant funded positions so they will not be ongoing uh this is through Dr Finny and I believe this is through the 31aa grant and it is for mental health both of these positions so these are to help our students uh with stress and the mental issues that they're having but the reason that they are through a third- party contractor is because the there's no assurance that the funding
022will continue okay and then the company that they work for a bright star is there can we get or can I I don't know if I need like four people to vote on this or whatever but I just would like to know more about the actual company that they're coming in Fr because the we're getting a lot of feedback about the third party companies we would have to get that information from Dr P and yes trusty sterley I believe trusty wi asked this are these are they in person or they how are they gonna be handled right you ask it did say in person they are in person any questions comments roll call please truste dyro yes truste uh no trustee wnis yes trustee Anderson yes trustee Gator yes trusty wall yes motion carries noncertified
023staff appointments theyit number four in your packet baso resolve the Board of Education accepts the following non-certified staff appointments ethany Hunley h n ly child care gsrp Madison effective date September 18 2024 may have a motion so move moved by trustee Gator support support by trustee sterlini questions or comments roll call please trusty W yes trusty thini yes trusty Gator yes truste Anderson yes trusty dyro yes trusty wall yes motion carries welcome first reading of proposed new revised and reissued board policies exhibit number five in your packet be so resolved that the Board of Education approves the first reading of proposed new revised and reissued Neola board policies as presented policy 2266 non-discrimination on the basis of sex and education programs or activities policy 916 0 public attendance at school events policy 97.1 advertising and
024Commercial activities may have a motion so move move by trustee Gator support supported by trustee windless questions or comments truste strini so this this one um sorry about that I have an issue with the 2264 or excuse me 226 6 2264 is coming later um I I prefer if we could separate these to vote on them because I do have an issue with the 2266 there's minor changes to to the 2266 we're just adding um you know a couple staff members names but for me the issue as a whole is this policy I have issues within this policy so I'm not comfortable with agreeing to it um I'm fine with the changes but I don't agree with the policy so I can't for me um so if we could separate it or if you guys
025want to vote all together that's fine but just understand it's my trigger is the two two so I have no problem like you know since I know that we can make that when it comes to Second readings we can make that one separate sure could definitely do that is there anything in particular that's concerned about that would like to like inform to see if there's anything that that way the other board members might know um I want to do more research on it and I don't have that time to do that right sure didn't have that for so don't want to speak I don't want to missp speake and then give someone wrong information but just from what I know I'm not if you do find anything could I ask that you send me an
026email and I'll for it to everybody so that way everybody would be aware for the second reason I mean again I know we're already using this I get it and state mandated I get it um and there's minor changes to this right now it's just I don't agree with policy some things okay any other questions or comments roll call please trustee sterlini no trustee wless I'm confused so she had asked if the the the three policies could be separated into two separate votes one for policy 2266 and a separate vote for policy 9160 and 97.1 you then responded to her that yes that would be okay but then you proceeded for a roll call vote for all three he said okay first if you have a sub huh for a second reading oh for the
027second reading then you'll make your changes and you'll do your research and he'll separate okay got it thank you uh yes yes it's my vote sorry trusty Anderson yes trusty Gator yes trusty dyro yes trusty wall yes motion carries unfinished business we have the masb giveback program which is exhibit number six in your packet um so that is something that we need to uh pick a choice of how we would like to uh spend that money um one of the ways is by using that money towards uh I'm just saying you know that I'm thinking of one of the ways is towards the um the annual conference that's one of the things but um would like to hear if anybody else has any ideas of what they would like to see the money spent on
028I agree pres wall yes Tristy okay um I would like to attend the annual leadership conference and the and and the pre-conference I think it's on page two and Page Three uh bottom of page two uh top of Page Three and then for the customized in District uh Workshop we had agreed on that uh dis Profile assessment before um and I think we were already had approved the money to pay for it so I it was my recommendation that we just stick with that one since we had already agreed to pay for it and now we can get it cheaper or possibly free um but if anybody has um suggestions on any of the other ones they offered then but that was just my suggestion we did talk about that yeah we did we did
029talk about potentially using it for the um the in-house right seminar review um and the one thing about that I think we also discussed uh uh welcome crusty Anderson we wanted to wait until we had a full board and uh potentially um some experience of being on the board and with the potential of a board possible change in um January so I think there was discuss about maybe waiting a few months after that is what I heard but I just want to double check if that's what everybody was thinking on that yeah we don't have until we have until June June 30 right right okay so at this time are we looking at then potentially just holding for the uh the in-house service then okay be me not speaking for any I agree any else
030pry Anderson any thoughts on this I know this sorry you don't know me you had to answer yeah we just have to ask that's all you know I know I agree pick an answer trusty winless no objections okay so it looks like the plan is then for this to be used for the inser and then new business oh wait I apologize is there any more unfinished business to come to the board okay new business the 2024 masb delegate assembly exhibit number seven um that'll be the first part and uh as you know truste sterin will be the one that will be the delegate voting um and um I would like to by the next meeting because that'll still be before the assembly is uh see if there's anything upon these um items that are going
031to be discussed at the assembly if there's anything that um you feel that uh we as a board should um maybe suggest changing or have any concerns with and uh just so we know by the next meeting so that way um we can have trusty sterlini act on our behalf at that meeting any questions or comments okay oh good okay all right uh the other part for new business is uh board member pictures um back in the day when I was uh in school uh we we did have um the school board in the uh yearbooks um oh stop uh but recently I haven't seen them in there so there was you know uh talk about potentially getting us as the school board back into the yearbook um but one of the things also was
032about um getting pictures taken um with all having the same background and um with this also I'm hoping that we can update the website and have everybody's picture on the um website also um does anybody have any questions or any comments with regards to pictures in the yearbook or on the website okay seeing none um I will double check um Mark you don't we did we get a date we don't have a date yet do we Okay so we're gonna have a date so that we know when hopefully it can just be done here like maybe before one of our meetings or something like that so that's the Hope okay anything else new business to come from the board all right District point of Pride Mr Clin hands yes thank you so I just want
033to say a special thank you goes out to all who were involved in homecoming festivities were phenomenal from the students staff Administration Board of Education we had community members volunteering um it just was a phenomenal event I received uh many positive comments while I was there um many of you were in the parade or were part of the festivities which I thought was really cool um it was just great to attend and um it was probably our largest uh crowd at a football game for this school year so the weather was good A little windy but um the weather was good and I just want to thank everybody for um I know many people were involved in that whole process and it turned out to be a very nice event um the soccer program if
034you go by the high school um you look to the north you'll see our new um soccer goals have been placed we took the soccer goals that were there that weren't regulation size they were smaller we moved those down to Bedford in that open field and then we uh put in regulation soccer goals in their place and then Mr Buchanan sent um this information that he received from an official who was working the D7 Romulus game so he got this information he received this and it said appreciate you checking in and hope to do more games like the last game your players showed the most sportsmanship I've seen out of any game I've done in the past two years so hats off to the coaches the players of our boys soccer team um really cool
035email that he received and he wanted to share that with me so the other thing that I just want to take a minute um uh information went out today to all of our families and our community and this information will be posted on our website about everything that's going on um in the world and for those that are feel feeling anxious or need support um so kind of a just a general you know reach out if your if your child is feeling anxious reach out to your school if um the care Solace is not just for people in our school but it's also um for our community and so this letter indicates it explains what caralis is and it indicates how to get to the link but basically carus is an excellent resource that offers
036a dedicated platform to connect individuals with Mental Health Services and we've already used this um as the administra administration and thank you to the board who approved the car solist a bit ago so it's 247 support personal assistance resource directory and then they've added two new Ser or three new services with this um so I thought that this would be a great time to let everybody know they also have a food assistance program shelter support and Community Health Services so with everything that's going on in the world today um I thought it was a good time to get this information out so this uh being sent out and um will also be on our web page that's all I have thank you very much at this time we're going to go to other business the
037first part we'll uh go through is uh board committees with updates and um there is is there the policy committee update uh we had a meeting today I don't have the minutes from last week I will have the meetings for you guys the next meeting um we do have a uh we're we're going to bring to the board next go around there's what about nine or 10 um policies that we had to tweak up a little bit so you guys are going to see that the next board meeting to um vote on and then our next more uh policy meeting is going to be November 19th at 5:30 will that be here Tuesday the Tuesday okay you say at 5:30 okay office and then the finance and then Finance right so we met yesterday for
038the finance we went over the budget um you guys are going to see that the next board meeting there will be uh the auditors going to have a presentation and you guys will have um you know extra stuff to look at the audience will have um screenshots of everything so they can take notes and whatnot so that'll be the 16th and we just had a meeting yesterday so I don't have a the minutes from that perfect and that everybody on the board will get the uh packets with their priday yeah okay perfect all right any other uh committee reports okay going to um upcoming then we have building and sights is October 9th at 5:30 p.m. at the board office and then uh policy was just mentioned it'll be November 19th at 5:30 at the
039board office and any other updated meetings that we know of okay and uh just want to mention just because uh it was mentioned at the finance committee because there was a question uh with the bond there was potentially like 6,000 in change left but it also looked like it was actually going to be cleared up like it's money that's been spent and accounted for but like they just don't have it out the checks or whatever right so that's what I'm still just waiting for so just let you be updated on that so okay so uh any other business to come before the board trustee Gator yes thank you uh president wall uh with your recent email informing the board of resignations from various committees I would like to know what is your plan of action
040to maybe announce that and allow people to fill the vacancy or something of the sort and I should have sent that in an email so I'm sorry if you weren't prepared that's okay okay no it's all right so um I did get um from trusty winless that uh she did want to resign from the uh SZ advisory committee um that was effective immediately on September 20th uh so there will be a spot open for that and uh the other is uh that I received from uh chrusty winless and uh would just probably need to confirm is that after the next policy meeting which you just had um her plan was to be um a non voting member which basically would be removed from that position I just want to check Christy winless is that still
041the same that is correct I um must have also forgot the finance committee I would not like to serve on that either okay thank you so at that point we're going to have a spot open for the finance committee the policy committee and the Citi advisory committee and um with that let me just double check here I don't think there's going to be any before the next meeting I know there won't be for policy or right right okay so hopefully at the next uh meeting that um uh if there's people who are interested they could send me an email and then of course I'll for it to the board of Lem know and then that way at the next meeting I can announce if there's any spots that are going to be filled in those
042spots thank you trusty Gator for bringing that up yes trusty dyro I also have other business and I have mine in the form of a statement I'm going to read after the last board meeting specifically public comment I was beside myself I was filled with fear angst anxiety shock and utter sadness I spent days afterwards thinking about sharing my feelings in an email to the board but decided against it that was until this past Monday when the president sent the board an email stating police pres presence would be at tonight's meeting due to events at the last board meeting and within our schools adding there has been concern of of safety at our board meetings from more than one member the board then received an email response sent from the secretary the board secretary to
043the president and I'm going to read that now she states and I quote I am not comfortable having a police officer present at our board meetings and I will abstain from attending the meeting as I do not believe our officers are properly trained to deescalate emotionally rot situations a mother was angry over the way she and her daughter were treated and she tossed some chairs you could have diffused and de-escalated the situation but you chose to use your power to add fuel to the fire so to speak a motion was made and denied to suspend the rules for that moment I'm sure if the woman were white you would not have had the same reaction this is a disgrace end of quote again that was from the board secretary to the board president now I
044want to share my feelings regarding what happened at the last meeting during public comment as well as my feelings about the email I just read and I want to reiterate again these are my thoughts and my feelings I will speak first about my version of public participation at the last meeting and what I considered to be a parents outrageous violent Behavior under no circumstances do I feel anyone who is angry black white red purple green Etc should ever be allowed to behave as she did and her bad behavior should never be minimized by anyone on this board as just tossing some sh some chairs like it was no big deal I don't agree it was a simple little toss of chairs as stated in the email I just read it was violent kicking of a
045couple of chairs in my direction with one hitting my chair it was a huge deal at least for me as I believed she was kicking the chairs at me I was afraid and it takes a lot to scare me but not for one minute did I think she was kicking the chairs at me because I was white I feel that as an important point for everyone to ponder so I have pondered that at length and I wonder if it would help everyone understand my fear and concern better if I were black if I were black would you all have run over to me after the meeting to hug me like you did with the black board member and make sure that I was okay that my anxiety and fear wasn't going to cause me to
046have a heart Tech not one person asked if I was okay apparently no one even considered that I might be upset and Afraid is that because I'm white and my feelings are irrelevant because I'm white or is it really because I wasn't the loudest voice in the room at the time the parent was angry and could have seriously hurt someone wrot a are you kiding me right now sir let her are you kidding me right now sir if you could please have if I were black sir point of order why we stood up here the way we did last week sir point of order please I'm asking for point of order the parent was angry and could have seriously hurt someone pure and simple it is a good thing that she missed hitting me with
047that chair because I would have filed a lawsuit the next day violent behavior of any kind is unacceptable we have that expectation of our students and our staff we have that expectation of irate people who come into our buildings I'd like to remind the board that the very next day a different parent was irate at this school and is no longer allowed in the building because of her behavior and she didn't even toss a chair I thought that we that I thought that we stood as a board against violent Behavior or does that no longer matter at this table it feels like the kicking of the chairs is no big de deal for some on this board and I'm literally shocked by that do we not care about all of us or just some of
048us when did we lose our civility to imply that tossing chairs in Anger at the board at anyone anywhere anytime is okay I was one of the people who asked for police presence because the way I felt during that part public participation everyone should always feel safe that includes board members at board meetings to have a board member abstain from attending the meetings because of police presence and further State our police officers are not properly trained is so offensive and undeserving to the police who protect our community quite frankly I'm appalled by the statement and consider it a disgrace furthermore police presence is not a new thing at board meetings and the president and or superintendent have every right to ask for it on their own or when requested by a board meeting check your
049policy and if only one board member feels feels unsafe or a Community member for that M matter not only should we all care and be concerned by that but if the request is denied and something goes wrong liability liability for the school board and the district could be huge moving on to what the president did or didn't do correctly is the next thing I'd like to address first of all the board policy says a person may speak for up to five minutes during public participation and the policy allows for that same person to come back after others have a chance to speak this is again my perspective of what happened when the former vice president made the motion to extend the five minutes the president reminded every one of the wording in the policy the
050treasurer said she agreed with an extension and she was allowed to continue on why but she did not second the motion the parent continued to yell from the audience then she came to the board table very much in the president's face and his face screaming at him she stomped away swiping the basket from the podium hitting her own husband in the face then kicked the chairs in my direction yelling she hates this effing district and she left the room I then made a motion to adjourn the meeting and the president shut me down as well stating others still wanted to speak her husband was at the P Podium waiting to do so I'm pretty sure president's wall Wall's reaction had not a thing to do with the parent and one of the upset board members
051being black considering he also shut down two white board members during this chaos the president even let the irate parent speak again when she returned to the room even after all of this President wall has been president for a hot nine months this is to my recollection the first time he has had to deal with anything like this as president I have no doubt he was as distressed as every other person in the room everyone was upset including him he's not always going to get it right and no one ever does in that role this is not a black and white issue for me everything I have said thus far is not one bit about the parent being black nor what she was complaining about it is however 100% about her unacceptable violent and frightening
052behavior and some board members brushing it off period I also want to address the issue of the board member leaving the board table and speaking at the post iium during public participation this was the second time now the third that the same board member has done this and it's unacceptable in a recent board Workshop I attended I shared that this was happening every board member present at that Workshop thought it was wrong and suggested censoring the individual when it is public participation time it is the Public's opportunity to speak to the board board members have every opportunity to share their concerns with the rest of the board at the board table under new business unfinished business other business pick one if a board member leaves the table to speak at the podium it also removes
053our right the rest of the board to ask questions and discuss the concerns and issues brought forward I consider it unnecessary and unpr unprofessional the form for board members is to speak at the board table and now we have board members abstaining from the meeting and or sitting outside the table yet another Prof unprofessional act in my opinion you were elected to this committee Community by this community to do the job and if you're incapable of coming to this table with the rest of us and doing that job I respectfully request that you resign from your position after you lastly the night after the last board meeting I attended the team building class I had signed up for a month earlier let's face it we are not a team and no amount of classes is
054going to change that we individually and collect I ly have to want to be one I personally would like to be on a team that comes together for the good of the students staff and Community we serve we don't have to like one another we don't have to be friends we don't have to always agree however we should adhere to our governance Norms that we all agreed to we shouldn't work behind the scenes against one another we should be able to agree to disagree and not threaten to take ourselves out into the audience or stay home we should be doing what is in the best interest of all of our students this discourse is anything but in their best interest however I will not sit in silence and fear through it any longer we are
055all better than this we can all be and do better than this and thank you for hearing me out anybody else for other business I do yes chy I don't know to start um I watched uh a lot of y'all meetings I'm not from this community and I'm actually proud of it because you think you got a lot to be proud of and you really don't and since I've been here and since my kids have been here they've experienced more racism and more discrimination than any school district I've ever been in and you can sit here and you can tell yourself whatever you got to tell yourself to sleep at night to say that this happens everywhere but it doesn't my kids came from the Taylor School District before here and I was just as
056rough there as I am here they NE never ever did I have to go to a PTO meeting to talk about my kids being asked for the n-word pass Never Have I Ever Had to go to a a school board meeting over any of the stuff that I've had to come to the podium for here there is a huge problem and when board members who have sat here and been board members for 95 years they're literally dying at the table you know you've seen you know you've seen the issues that are in this district and you have sat silent and you have not been appalled and you have not been disgraced by any of the things that have happen in this district from Grown professional teachers telling students in the middle of the classroom to
057take themselves back to Africa and then saying it's a joke from superintendent using the nword uncensored from the countless countless black bodies y'all have expelled out of here but different stuff than you have white bodies you know what we talking about and you you yourself have muted people saying that school board black black history is not a part of school board curriculum let now y'all talk about it all the time now y'all slap yourselves on the back now y'all reading black history resolutions like y'all black history of the of the year now you hiring black people but you told me it wasn't a school board issue you actually sent parents a ceasing to sent and said that black history is not a a school issue yet we have Dr FY coming up here talking about
058it all the time at the podium now oh now it is School Board business you ain't going to sit here and read a for page Les a list of all the times you have changed that public comic rule because somebody looked like me came up to this Podium and spoke like this you ain't going to list out how many times this public comic rule been changed behind the scenes and in front of the scenes to oppress the public not just black and white we talking about Rachel appoint we're talking about everybody that come to this Podium that speak against y'all and how you change it you ain't going to talk about how you and the rest of these board members bully the superintendent out of her job and you don't tolerate bullying and you don't
059tolerate that kind of behavior did you call the police up here when your superintendent was saying she was scared of the board members and the board members was bullying her and the board members was inag was you imp was you app PA then was you app when Marshall leard went off at this table was you up B when Lor Vegeta went off at this table you talking about I walked off to deescalate a situation that nobody else had the balls to deescalate I'm wrong you talking about she kick the chair I was right behind behind her she didn't kick the chair pull the cameras around here I was walking right behind her she grabed the chair with her hand I didn't Flinch I had both my hands in my pocket and I'm not easily scared
060that's what it means to not be easily scared to be standing right behind somebody who passing who walking out who throwing chairs and tables and not move a muscle because you ain't scared that's what it means to not easily be scared you're very easily scared you muted me on Zoom because you were scared of what might come out of my mouth you're very easily shaken and you don't get to sit here and pretend like you ain't today none of y'all anybody else for other business um yes I mean I I don't even know where to begin um I wasn't happy with the chair issue I I I didn't I didn't find that acceptable it off um do I think it was done maliciously to hurt somebody absolutely not we had a frustrated parent and I
061really think it could have been deescalate if we took a second and let her speak for we could have made a motion to let her speak for extended period of time we had four people in the audience again I'm not excusing what she did um correct and I don't think Miss winless is either um but to what Leslie has been saying I've been coming to these meetings where you guys all sat on the board I've seen it where people are you know um not led to speak they've had we've had police I shouldn't say me there's been police called come to meetings and you've got two three police officers when we have a city of hardly any sitting at a board meeting over parents parents trying to come with their feelings because nobody would listen
062and we had superintendent bullied off the school board because of the board so where do I go with this so to act like Miss winless is doing something wrong because she's there trying to give a speech I mean what what I don't where her she's frustrated I'm frustrated I don't like where this board is going we we need to do better for these kids we need to do better for the parents we need to do better for the teachers and and um to criticize Leslie for what she did I I I'm just she's done a lot for this district and it it she's done a lot more in this District trying to make a difference than most who have sat on this board for a long time um sorry I'm just frustrated right now I
063I was debating about speaking or not speaking and M to hold more of my breath to to to get it but having a police presence here I was not a fan of not a fan because I think that's intimidating to parents I I I I I really yes Tristin can I add one more thing I have also been more transparent than anybody on this board regarding my medal conditions and regarding the stuff that I go through in this District I have told y'all pretty much everything I told y'all countless times about my PTSD with police I have told y'all countless times about the bullying that goes on in this board with people sitting at this table that have caused me not to sit at this table so to sit here and be like oh if
064you can't sit at this table you shouldn't be here man you won't even ask questions if I ain't in the room I I am the table like you don't sit here and act like you doing a job better than me or you doing something when I'm not here y'all texting me talking about y'all don't even know what questions to ask in an interview so so don't play with me about who should be at the board table and who shouldn't be at the board table you should move out the way if you don't know how to do your job without bully so we want to talk about how y'all behave in Clos sessions when these cameras ain't on if y'all want to talk about how y'all behave in policy meeting when these cameras ain't around and
065y'all want to talk about why I'm really not sitting at this board table then we can get with it but it ain't for no reason and for your protection not mine ala can I say something please yes trusty Anderson as a pts diagnos vet I understand what Miss dehoff and I apologize if I misspoke your name we all have to understand that many of us in here have traumas and we don't know what could escalate someone's anxiety and right now my heart is racing because it's so much frustration and so many thing different things going on and I feel unsafe and I have been in this district for over 20 years I've had my issues with this district and I even spoke at the podium not too long ago but never once that I disrespect
066anyone because that's not what we are here for we are here to learn and understand and regardless of who speaks we are adults and we should speak as one and we are here to support one another and even if we do not agree we don't have to put somebody down or negate how they think and feel because that's not how we think or feel and I am literally shaking and it shouldn't have to be this way because I am again a diagnosed veteran and you don't know all of this yelling and screaming I can only imagine what it's doing to other people who may be in my same or similar situation and I agree wholeheartedly with you if we are not going to speak with one voice then why are we here I can agree
067to disagree and you know I disagree but I never raised my hand or made a threatening guesture to anyone because as a professional I want to be seen and treated as one and again we can all disagree but it offends me for somebody to tell her that she should not feel or that she doesn't feel the way that she feels and this is I don't know I'm just so frustrated right now and I'm saying this is not what I came to be a part of and I am embarrassed that we have all of this going on and we're supposed to be here talking about the children talking about what is in the best interest of the entire School Board not our personal thoughts and feelings I am very serious you thank you I know all
068right um I just want to make one statement um from the actions of what I did and that was I have as a priding officer you're supposed to make sure that the board meeting is safe for everybody in this room everybody in this room and unfortunately there's only so much I can do when there's actually some type of action that occurs and I don't care who did it but if there's an action that occurs then what comes to me is it's out of control so yes there's an officer here today if you notice he's in the back of the room he's not sitting next to me he's not sitting next to the podium to restrict you from talking he's just to make sure nothing of injury can occur that is the only reason why the
069officer is here so anybody who's coming up for public comment you can come up and you know speak your piece but please I do ask that you do caution on name use uh because of other people's you know protection of Rights of their names but other than that though uh yes you can talk I would love for every meeting to be so calm and Collective but I know I that can't happen and I can't control that but if there's any threats that occur yes I will ask for a recess if there's any uh danger that's occurring uh then that's what the officer would be here for but other than that I'm hoping that that officer never has to get up just like I think everybody else here would wish that officer would not have to
070get up you know uh trusty Anderson said it right what are we here for we're here for board actions we're here for the students and unfortunately some things are getting to become more personal all and I don't really know exactly how to resolve that because uh that takes two people wanting to get together to do it and honestly it's kind of like a divorce you don't get two people who want to uh agree on a you know their marriage there's nothing you can do to force somebody to be married and the same thing with the board we can't if we don't try to work as a team for our goals you know which is once again the students the finance our superintendent that is what we're here for and don't get me wrong there are
071times that I'm mad I just I just try not to show it and I do other things to try to calm myself down but once again we're here as a board you are here as a community to voice your opinions and concerns and also I just want to mention remember there's only so many things the board can do unless it's not being done uh from lower levels going up you know but other than that I just wanted to mention that so I feel sorry or I should say I apologize for anybody who feels threatened by the officer but once again I you know he's at the back of the room he's not sitting right up front in front of everybody so um with that I just want to see if there is anything else for
072other business before we go to public comment all right let's go to public comment um please state your name and affiliation and please just remember that barb young Detroit wait a minute bar Miss Young please let me just SM just so everybody hears I apologize so I just don't want to interrupt you later everybody gets five minutes and then after the five minutes if the time is up then we make sure everybody has the time to speak before we can offer the other five minutes thank you Barb on Detroit I came here definitely yeah to um because I did want to apologize for my actions because I am better than that so that's what that's the only thing I'm apologizing for nothing I said but my actions yeah I I I'm better than that so
073I can be better than that coming to your face that's something I'm apologizing for my mind you my hands were like this like I'm arrested because I had no intention real intention on hitting you if I to hit somebody that could have been done years ago I'm not here to physically fight y'all let's start there don't want to do it something's wrong with you you like seriously the fact that I came up here to defend my daughter and what was going on with her and y'all found a problem with that is insane yet y'all have no problem when somebody's signifant other brings a gun around threaten staff members that's not a problem though right and y'all was a part of that demented board that that did it when somebody every time we come up here
074and speak about racism y'all act like it's like a new light bulb just came on this is the same tune we've been singing since we've been since we came in this District almost 10 years ago St tuned you don't think that that's a problem by now seriously I love seeing when when the teachers come to the board meeting but it's always for their agenda it's never for something like this a lot of these teachers have taught my kids this is our third third child coming through this um school but I don't see a staff member come come up here and say you know what what's happening to that family is wrong racism is wrong so when you don't say anything you're not doing anything you're not helping all of your students when I keep bringing
075things that keeps happening to my kids you're not caring for all of your students so stop preaching that lane tune that you're teaching or helping all of your students when I get a mother that comes up to me while I'm standing in a restaurant to order my food I don't know that lady from cany paint she don't know me she starts talking to me about what's been wrong what's been done wrong to her kid what's been done being done wrong to her family but they're scared to speak out because of deportation this isn't the first family I've heard that about y'all are sad sad to even let her sit up here and feel something like that that piss poor letter that's that's that's real messed up my daughter was up here crying her heart out
076all she does is say I want to help I want to help I want to help if something was going to be done with y'all do you not many news trucks could be up here I mean violations seriously like are y'all serious right now you are very racist this same woman was up here just trying to Def her husband against the same racist board but now you singing a different tune because you on the end Girl by you ain't been here long enough to know nothing not a thing so until you actually go do some research at the past board meetings and say hey what's happened why is this family like that why has it come to death you you don't speak on people she can have her opinion all day all day you might
077have opinion all day I don't care what's right is right what's wrong is wrong I apologize to my husband a thousand times for hit him in the face with this lovely basket did I know I did it at the time no that chair didn't fly nowhere near her so having this officer here isn't the first time this has been done to me it's not the first board mean that this been done to me not the first time y'all have fake fear I don't care y'all can have 30 officers up in here and I'mma still come to Schoolboard meeting and speak on behalf of my kids and the other kids that y'all are doing wrong thank youth young Detroit Michigan I'm like I'm I'm really I'm really really appalled right now like I don't I don't
078even understand how y'all are saying some of the stuff that you saying your letter is crazy because you were part of the old board that allow all this stuff to happen somehow you made your way back on the board I ain't going to use names I'm just going to look at you you want to talk about the rules the policies the stuff that y'all supposed to be doing you didn't follow those same rules you muted my wife in a meeting how many times did we come to y'all and tell y'all that this stuff was going on and what did you say I'm sorry that you feel this is happening we brought you checks and balances are you kidding me and you want to sit here and act like we have no reason to feel the
079way that we feel are you kidding me right now y'all want to sit here and act like my wife is being crazy I've I've stood at this this this Podium and said stuff deliberately that you told my wife not to say and I'm not g to say your name I'mma look at you that you told my wife not to say and you didn't say not a word to me why cuz you scared for what I I have never been aggressive towards you every time we've talked at a meeting it's always been a nice smile talk handshake go about our business but you can't afford her the same respect that you afford me are you kidding me right now y'all got board members whose kids are bullies whose kids are bullies and using board members titles
080to get away with it are you kidding me right now y'all want to sit up here and act like we just bringing this stuff up out the blue I've been in this in this district for 10 years almost 10 years we told y'all about the kids asking for the [ __ ] pass a year before y'all said something about it are you kidding me right now we told y'all about the bullying countless time countless time are you kidding me right now you were a part of the board that blocked my wife from getting the pack rep vote are you kidding me y'all want to sit here and talk about policy and how y'all doing stuff and how y'all trying to make this place better the only thing that's going to make it better is when the old
081board is completely gone that's the only thing that's going to create the change y'all are still holding on to Old ideologies that no longer fit the district is changing it's evolving y'all can't do anything about it you can't stop it you can't change it it's happening I told y'all I I told y'all as this District starts to integrate more with more africanamerican kids you have to get a hold of the racism stuff because the fights are going to get out of control talk to Mr mlet about how those fights was getting out of control I told you but what did you do nothing why I still don't know all I keep hearing from people in the community is that people are intimidated by me most of the people in this community have not even talked
082to me because I wear a hat all the time because I got tattoos because I wear dark glasses guess what I wear a hat because I'm bald and I get cold easy I wear dark glasses because the doctor said I was close to having gloma that's it you want to know me that's it I have tried my best I tried my best but these lies that y'all spewing you going to sit up here and say look you you may be scared okay but you have no reason to be I stood right here when my wife walked out right here I was right here she was on the other side of those taable the other side how did she kick a chair and almost hit you and you're sitting next to her you know good and
083will she ain't kick no chair and almost hit her because by her being next to you it would have almost hit you but you ain't said nothing this is what I'm talking about thank you thank you thank you because she along with Miss wless Mr Klein hands they have been the only ones who have consistently tried to create change you went to all that diversity equity and inclusion training which is crazy to me right because we came to the board trying to get uh African-American history and study put into the grade books what did you tell us do you remember you said the board can't do that that's what you told us so y'all want to sit up here and act like we the ones that's crazy and my lion and my lion so stop
084playing thank you I oh God sorry beginning of the year laryngitis I'm trying really hard okay uh Jen Mass uh o best reading interventionist I live in Trenton um I have a long comment and then I have some questions hope get to all of them um before I share my concerns with the board I do want to acknowledge that the things that I'm sharing have already been shared with Mark by the teachers union I don't want the board to think that Mark is not responsive to the concerns that are shared tonight but rather keeping everyone in the loop so that accountability is ensured when I was gathering my thoughts to prepare what I would share tonight several ideas continued to come up in my thoughts those ideas were reactive versus proactive lack of communication lack
085of confidence and lack of competence effective leadership requires all of those ideas proactive thinking clear and consistent communication confidence in decision-making and overall confidence the absence of these qualities in a leader will result in many problems in our organization this is exactly what is happening in our special education department in our curriculum department and specifically at the middle school to be to piggyback on what Mark said earlier about what's going on in the world we need to be proactive we don't have the option to be reactive anymore that's just not the world we live in the special education program at the middle school has been in the co- teacher model for about 15 years prior to the school year we started this year with an unannounced change from the co- teing model to a resource
086model with self-contained classes this model was in place for the first two weeks of school with an entirely brand new special education staff then after two weeks the model changed again we now have no self-contained classes special education students who were in those classes are now spr sprinkled throughout the master schedule the students were given in exchange a resource hour in their schedule in place of one of their electives it is extremely disruptive to change all of those schedules to two weeks into the school year not only is it disruptive to the counseling staff who have to make the changes the most the teaching staff who now have new rosts but it is most disruptive to the students most of our special education students struggle with changes to their routine what a disservice to them
087that we couldn't be proactive about deciding on the special education program that would be best for our students while also being compliant prior to school starting we were told that the reason we made a change two weeks in is because we found out that our self-contained classes were not compliant with the least restrictive environment rules it's hard for me to believe that we couldn't have found that out prior to school starting and schedules being made this also brings up the lack of communication teachers were confused and upset about these changes why couldn't a communication be sent to staff explaining the changes that were being made was the communication sent to the parents of those special education students if so the same communication could have been shared with staff the curriculum department is equally frustrating to
088staff as we navigate new programs and new materials without training the Middle School changed from using NWA for our in-house assessments to using I ready for those assessments the staff was not trained on this program pring to it being prior to it being launched a small group of teachers P piloted the program last year but once the decision was made to switch the full staff was not trained we expressed our frustration with this and a two-hour training session was finally provided two weeks after school started the entire school had already administered the diagnostic and students were already working in the program in math and Ela classes another example would be when the new middle school math curriculum training was scheduled this year while we are teaching it for the first time one of those training
089days was scheduled on the same day as our first smart boot drill that first drill was very important and we certainly did not want all of our math classes to have a sub during the drill this resulted in the math training being postponed so teachers are teaching a brand new math curriculum and being train to teach it simultaneously more examples come with the new requirements that were sprung on the tit 131a funded staff a week ago we received a very simple email that explained in bullet points all of these new logging require requirements that we had to comply with but given no explanation of how when or in what way we would complete those requirements when the staff began to panic and push back a meeting was scheduled with our Title One consultant however only
090a handful of those staff members who were in that group were invited to attend when it was pointed out that the new requir IR ments indeed apply to all of the staff funded by these grants a second meeting was SC I'm sorry thank you my name is Tanya Wells I'm a social studies teacher at ow best uh living py um to take you back on what Miss Mast was talking about about um not being proactive at the middle school we've had an unusually uh High number of fights this year when teachers and administrators get reports that kids are going to fight we need to do something these kids are doing the right thing they're reporting it and they're still getting attacked I've heard the parents are pulling their students from best because they are worried
091about their safety we need Administration to be proactive so the fights are prevented and our kids are kept safe thank you hi Amanda mck o best Middle School social studies the list of ongoing issues and concerns that of w best is that since the start of the 2024 2025 school year there have been several incidents and issues that lead me to wonder if continuing to teach in D7 is truly worth it among the many concerns I and many other staff members have safety is one that has weighed heavily on me roughly two weeks ago the school was placed on lockdown the safety protocols and smart grot procedures that were taught to staff and students at the start of the school year were not followed when the lockdown was implemented an announcement was made that we
092were going into a lockdown stop lockdown whatever the terminology was there was then a delay in pulling the smart boot due to confusion staff was just trained on this prior and were told there would no longer be an announcement we would be using the smart boot when a smart boot was finally pulled the tablet displayed the threat being in room 32 which is located two rooms down from my classroom and not the office where the threat was actually occurring with the delay between the announcement and the smart boot system myself and the students in my classroom would have more than likely been harmed had there been a threat where the tablet set to clarify this is not a smart boot tablet teacher or secretary error this was the error of the building Administration who gave
093the directive to make the announcement rather than pull the smart Boo the following week owb staff was notified by the safety director of a concerning event where the proper safety protocols were not I'm sorry were once again not implemented and followed teachers sat for 6 hours that day with minimal information and no update until the end of the day Additionally the same day a high school student was granted permission to enter the middle school hallways to use the restroom this student then roam the Halls while carrying a backpack and did not have a visitor pack student I'm sorry staff is consistently told our safety matters however actions in response to safety threats and issues prove otherwise I am concerned not only for my safety but for the safety of staff and all students I would
094also like to note that safety is not my only concern and while the a lotted time does not allow for me to explain in detail I have listed my concerns not following the student code of conduct lack of communication in all aspects no consistency in everyday procedures and discipline staff morale is low and staff not being staff well-being not being taken seriously building administrators on leave with no communication and students are concerned I understand we can't have the details on that but students are asking questions and we're left in the dark when issues arise there is zero there is zero accountability but rather finger pointing from administrators which I should not have to point out is utterly unprofessional continuing to operate this way does not align with the D7 difference Mantra we have all stood
095by for years staff deserves better the community deserves better and students deserve better thank you thank you my name is Karen lower ow best midle school on the pera SRC perah I would like to know when we are going to start holding parents accountable for the actions we sent we set an example of holding students accountable but what about parents it is not okay for a parent to threaten a staff member and have no consequence I feel if a parent threatens a staff member in any way they should have their students removed from the district we you don't deserve the added stress of wondering if the parent is going to come back to the school ground or in my case the parent just showing up again because he was not banned from the building we
096have a major school safety issue and this is not okay I no longer feel safe coming to work and that's not okay either hi my name is Jennifer um we're from lws we have a couple concerns I want to make this brief into the point I'm very concerned in the lack of acknowledgement of safety concerns daily inconsistency and support for the ow best staff and student in the past few years there has been a drastic change in parent and student conduct leadership safety support and overall Security in this world today as administrators and Educators there need needs to be a better Direction communication and follow through through to support staff and students through these times as an administrative assistant assistant we are the go-to and the end all for many we see and hear but
097are not seen or heard it really upsets us that I have to get up here and get up here and have to say these things we are a team and I shouldn't or we shouldn't feel that we've let our teammates down or they have let us down so the couple concerns that I have within our building is one um I was walking down the hallway a couple weeks ago and I was approached by Two Gentlemen in the hall asking them who they were um had no idea who they were um they said that they were okay by our um maintenance director to be in our building um they stated that an email went out I Nora was on that email um I had to call over to the board office to find out who these
098two gentlemen were lo and behold um I was told that our these gentlemen told me that they were handed master keys from our maintenance director to walk through our building to check on our water fil filteration system I think this is a huge safety concern because we don't know who these people are I feel that that's like we don't know like there was no communication at all to any of us our neither our assistant principal or our principal even knew that they were in the building the email came after um I had called the board office also um you know there's been a lot going on in our building and in the past two weeks with the angry parents coming in Tina and I are in the office and you guys have all came in
099and you ask us how we're doing but never have you guys ever pulled us aside and asked us for like an individual like talk the last thing that happened with that parent it was a lot we had no communication in that front office from any leadership the only one that came over was when um the director of safety came through and told us to leave the front office we had no idea what was going on um I just feel like there's a lot of communication that's lacking in our building all over and I think this needs to be addressed I also am the assistant principal secretary and I don't even know what's going on with him I have phone calls coming into and asking if they could speak to him um I didn't know what
100was going on with him I went to go send an email to him and he has an x on his name there's no communication I understand that it's everything's confidential but students are asking parents are asking everybody is wondering where he's at and all I keep telling him is he's not here and then they call the next day and the next day and I don't know what more to say but the biggest thing is Tina and I are the Front Runners in that office we're the first to be talked to by everybody and we don't even have we don't even get answers there's stuff going on behind us the rest we don't we don't know nothing and it's very uncomfortable I don't know if you've ever sat out there and watched some of the stuff
101that's gone down in our building or watch the cameras there's a lot that goes on and we get no communication whatsoever we have staff members that come to us to ask us we're we're like we're fools as you are we don't know what's going on prior dat to the incident talking about was very tramatic I'm not going to it here um say it here but it was very tramatic and it wasn't the only event it was exical so it took a lot for both of us to get up we have to um we're not wanting to do this but for the safety and um so everyone's aware which is kind of how we are bringing it out um the last thing I want to say is it also makes us look stupid because when we're
102told to do something it's usually not the right thing I have to call over to the board office to say something it's like I'm saying it but I'm because I'm saying it it's coming from El so um I just can I just have one more question I'm sorry I got I gotta St You' can come after everyone's done President W prusty wless um I've never seen this happen at a board meeting before so I'm actually not sure what's supposed to happen but you allow two people to speak at the podium at one time they both introduced themselves separately so my argue me would be that their time Li is 10 minutes then she allow them to speak together five minutes for each person they came up together as one five minute thing so they want
103to come separately that's but I'm gonna just stay with the five minutes yes sir good afternoon everybody my name is Dr benjam Dr Benjamin we're gonna need to hear you a little louder sorry suffering from anxiety attack right now so piggy back when everyone else here has said I was room 32 that's me I pulled that boot before the word lock was it was done I had another kid pulling the boot on the other side of my door before the word was done lockdown was initiated okay we did that we did the right thing do you see me the reason I'm like this right now is because we're turning our school into a prison there are ballistic shields on the Windows there are Smart boots everywhere but no Hardware on Earth will fix bad planning
104and bad execution twice in the last two weeks I have been placed in a room with 30 12 year olds and they're looking at me to save them and sometimes I can't because even I don't know what's going on you want to call a lockdown that's good we need to do that but don't send me an email which I might not say because I'm doing my job to tell me that something is going on when you know what you could do you could pick up that phone and do an all call that says hey teachers check your email problem solved it's not that hard we don't write down procedures we don't follow them consistently half the time I don't know how to do things I need to do and I don't even know who to
105ask and this is my fourth year in the district we're not doing the things we need to do we're not doing them right okay you're going to start losing a lot of teachers if you don't get it together I'm terrified but not because we can't solve problem but not because we can't make our kids safe but because when I ask questions I don't get straight answers I don't even know who the assistant principal is right now and it's been a week it's a simple question is he coming back or not I don't care we need somebody in that position right now because I'm tired of getting threatened I'm tired of not having answers I'm just tired I want to teach that's what I signed up for and I'm terrified and I don't know what to
106do and I'm scared to come to work sometimes we need to do better and it starts at the top because we can't make it up from the bottom we can't fix it from the bottom I don't have that power you do and we need to see more action when we're asking questions when we need to know what's going on with special education I I have 22 kids with IEPs scattered in my course load and I'm expected to manage their accommodation I'm expected to log them every day and their accommodations keep expanding we we just seem to keep adding more I can't do any more and keep it together you have to look at what is going on in these buildings and talk to your teachers listen to them listen listen to the students listen to
107the parents even if sometimes you don't like what they say we need to do more listening and more following up on the listening it seems like we get proclamations and we're supposed to figure out how to execute them and then they change and then we're supposed to figure that I feel like we're constantly in this slow motion car wreck that never actually finish it we have to do better and I'll work harder if I have to but we need guidance and we need leadership and I don't feel like we have it thank you hi my name is Jennifer I just have one more thing to add so our security in our district sorry wait minut my name I'm sorry no point of order we got to let everybody else at least have one opportunity to
108speak first sorry Collins wless Annapolis Street uh I typically don't come to these meetings because it's typically just a complete circus with the whole if I were black unacceptable and I come because of the complete lack of reason to have police here gives my wife PTSD gives my entire whole family anxiety for whatever reason the district is not doing what they supposed to do like the man just said my son had an i AP in place last year still not in place this year so he had to miss a whole week because his emotions were IR regulated and he doesn't have the help that he's needed and this was in place last year we're already a month in the school year nothing's being done just until end of last year my son's been in this
109District since he was 4 years old has a peanut allergy in 2024 we're not a peanut free school I had to do 80 M an hour on the freeway to drive from Detroit to come out here because my son ate a peanut and what the fat principal told me was well he only bit that much that much can kill my son unacceptable and not doing things for the kids who don't look like everybody up here I'm much fair skinned my kids are not they don't have the privilege that of a lot of us have being fair skinned and the only way you can really do something and make change is you hit people where their pockets are that's the only thing that matters so that's what needs to be happening we need to stop showing
110up on count day until they do something for the kids that don't look like everybody else in this District anybody else for public comment first time I'm Steve Gary director of operations I just want to um respond to um basically a comment was made that the director of operations handed out a set of keys that's false um the the um contractors were going through filter first program they had checked in with our operations office we follow District procedure they signed out a set of keys and those contractors after I got them through the first building I came back and I sent a group email out to the administrators Ariel fell off the email for whatever reason and I had received a call from the board office because my understanding was the contractor had checked in
111at the office as they were explained to do when they went to the buildings and when I got the call from the board office they asked me if they were supposed to be in the buildings and then they called back to this building building secretaries and gave them the okay um I don't know about them being caught in the hallway this is the first time hearing about this and I wish this would have been brought to my attention because if it happened I certainly would have addressed it with the contractor because they were supposed to check in with the building offices and it's been standard procedure we had the boot company here we've had other contractors even prior to my arrival U my Administrative Assistant the procedure is we have given out keys but they
112are signed out and they're instructed to check in at the building office and I did do my deal due diligence and I did email the building administrators so I mean you know somebody didn't get email we certainly apologize for that but that was why they were instructed to go to the building offices and from that call I got from the board office they were being held in the building office before they called back so the secretaries could release them into the building just want to point a order and put that out there for everybody and that's was my understanding of what had happened so certainly apologize about that and um one thing I do want to bring to the board's attention I know my supervision is aware I'm actually working on the process of inventorying
113all of our cores in here and I'm trying to work on how we can figure out of putting a new lock system in because everybody's got keys to everything in the district here as far as staff a lot of master keys are out there Prem years so I'm hoping to get that you know tidied up with this boot system I want to be 100% secure all the way around for the safety of the students and the staff and I'm actively working on that now just wanted to put that out there so we're on the same page and I would uh yeah I would appreciate it in the future if you know if anybody in the district does have an issue like that send me an email we could try to work this out and uh
114rather than having to go to a board meeting because I was unaware that they had that concern I wish they would have approached me I work in the same building with them so that's what I put out there thank you thank you anybody else for first round of public comments seeing none we will now go to second round of public hi I'm Jennifer from owb I'm going to address what was just stated so I came out of the office I was walking down getting ready to go down the seventh grade hallway I saw the two gentlemen coming back up from the seventh grade hallway I said talk to the security do you know who these gentlemen are no so I said hi can I help you um do you need anything what your name I
115don't know who you guys are and they said they were here for the water filteration system and they were here to check the water fountain they did not come through the front door if they would have came through the front door you would have had them sign in and grab a visitor's P when I finally got the call from the board office that it was okay for these gentlemen to be in the building I released them from the front office to go ahead and walk I did not even allow them out of the front office until I was told by the board office that it was okay for them to be there I released them to walk around they came back to me in the office it was 2:47 they said can we just go
116ahead and leave and I said well where are you going we have to drop the ke's off in the maintenance department I said I cannot let you do that I will walk you over there so we walked to the maintenance doors the doors were locked I knocked there was nobody there they had the key to open the maintenance door I watched them put the keys on the administrative assistant desk all the lights were out in the director's office I was just blow sorry not say that I was just appalled that they are able to just walk in the in our building like this if safety is such a huge concern why are we giving strangers keys to our building now if this was the last person that we used to have in this spot before
117they would walk them around the building there was not even even an engineer cuz they were gone cuz they leave at 2:00 to walk these gentlemen around we're all about safety in our buildings that is a huge concern now about what I was going to say before my time is up our security in our building not Mr berlay but the other ones that come in like it's a revolving door they sleep every time we walk by they're sleeping or they're on their phone or they're eating noodles or they're just not paying attention it's a huge safety concern Mr Berle is the only one that we can rely on in the building when he's out I'm sorry but I'm afraid to be in the building because he's the only one that can address some of these
118things that go on I feel that maybe Mr blade needs a he's been here for so long maybe he needs an increase all the other ones that come through are just a revolving door we need better security in our building because it's a huge safety I don't feel safe being in the front office with people that are our security guards that are now walking around they're sleeping constantly our students walk by them they don't even pay attention to them I mean even the two security guards guards that were there that day that I don't know exactly who they were cuz I mean we were like a revolving door in this building they didn't even stop these two gentlemen walking around the hall I'm the only one that caught this person and I just want to
119tell you the stuff that was stated prior to me just coming up here before this is inaccurate and I'd like to talk to some ofbody about it if they would like to because it's not right I mean you're letting the rumor mill has it that you the one administrators let go or not let go but on leave because of safety reasons that's a huge thing is giving somebody keys to our building what happens if those people never came back what happens if those keys fell into somebody's wrong hand what happens if they were dropped I mean I'm sorry but if if we're talking safety for the kids that's a huge safety thank you joh asked best and try to pick up where I left off I was talking about Title One and 31a programs and
120requirements all right so there was a meeting scheduled only some of us were invited to attend um when it was pointed out that the new requirements indeed applied to all the staff that was funded by the grants a second meeting was scheduled this time with a 31a consultant again not all staff were present for this meeting because we were told that if we attend attended the first meeting we didn't need to attend the second meeting however the information shared at the two meetings was completely different the second me meeting also revealed that there are many areas in which the district is out of compliance and those things need to be rectified immediately so when will these things be corrected and when will those 28 staff members be told what the expectations are we're already a
121month into school and we're all just throwing emails around saying what should we do and no one's doing anything those examples from the special education department and the curriculum Department are very frustrating but not nearly as frustrating as the ones that are happening right inside our building every day the building examples are hard are a harder pill to swallow because they usually cross over into Safety and Security as you've heard 17 times when these Safety and Security issues are handled incorrectly an already tense situation goes from scary to terrifying in our most recent examples a proactive approach to the situation could have prevented the problem entirely with three administrators in our main office a decision to put the building in Secure mode was not made in advance the decision to get police support was not
122made in advance no Forward Thinking occurred the issue had started the day before so this was not a surprise the lack of communication is abundant at the middle school also we were not informed of the fact that we were without our SRO this year until I point blank blank at asked and was finally told that was two weeks into the school year and we have still not been formally told we have to beg for transparency with threats and usually don't get identification till well after the issue's over we've been without one of our building administrators for nearly a week now no one has said a word no one told us he would not be here we don't need details we just need to know the person is out it is totally unfair to that staff
123member to say nothing and let the rumor mill and the gossip chains run wild in the building no one deserves that no matter what they're out for none of this is acceptable we all deserve better staff deserves better parents deserve better and students absolutely deserve better that's the end of the statement now the questions sorry about this voice it's ridiculous um number one uh what will be the role of the health Advocates at the middle school and the high school I was really wondering if that was just another r r we have Rafia I think she's a health Advocate I don't know if she's the same position or if it's something different uh specifically what is their role and it doesn't include mental health if it does what is their certification were these POS positions
124discussed with our counselors as has been requested in this pth especially if they're dealing with mental health and last um I think it was said that it was a 31a grant position but some people heard 31a a which I don't know what is that is and so if it's 31aa what is the difference between those two things that's it thank you thank you my name is Lesley will my address 23469 Anapolis stre I'm speaking as a parent because I'm allowed to speak in any capacity I want to because I wear multiple hats in the district um so as a parent when we talk about fake fear and we're talking about the things that occur at these board meetings two Wednesdays ago when everything happened regardless of what you felt happened or did not happen if
125anyone had really serious fear about what happened really serious PTSD and really serious anxiety about what happened not only should that email have been sent to the full board so that we can address that concern the whole thing the whole thing should have been not allowed for you to do anything that's what happens when there is a parent concern in the district but instead you still allowed that person to be at PTO but you thought she was a threat so is the threat for the police concern only for the people that sit up here or is it for the whole District because then that whole group of parents was still allowed to go to PTO then they were allowed to go to a meeting about a vacation trip that the school was taken then they
126I seen them at the homecoming game serving Chile right at the front door I mean if they a threat why they at the homecoming game serving Chile to everybody last Friday when we was out there uh I'm pretty sure I seen them in in the parade I'm just wor worried about who we trying to keep safe here the students the school or just the board members um who need to be protected who feel scared only for a 2hour meeting every two weeks um if you scared about them coming to a board me meeting then be scared about them volunteering and providing y'all slave labor around here uh the next thing is uh the bounceback email you don't want to give nobody information everything's top secret everybody got rules and policies but then you allow the
127emails to bounce back when we email the person the email bounce back and we know whether it's a student staff like my kids even came to me like everybody figured out who the administrator on leave was they one because the emails were bouncing back and when you pulled his name up in Google no matter who you were it showed up a big red xmark as a ex Union president who's who was on many cases where people had to be terminated and on leave there is a place in Google where you can just put the um email as inactive so the person still receiv their email since there's an investigation going on which I don't know about because I really wasn't told anything but I'm talking about from my perspective outside looking in when there's an
128investigation going on that person is still innocent until proven guilty so their email should not be cut off anyway they should still be able to get their full access to their emails and anything they're missing from students and staff when they come back they should be able to pick up where they left off they shouldn't be having emails bounce back so if you want to keep it top notot you should probably like start there um the next thing um is the bully and they've already spoke to it um tremendously I have a student who was at ow best most people who know me know she was removed from the district and put in online program because of the booing in that building that she witnessed not experienced it about what she witnessed and how it
129made her feel and her her having to go to counseling because of what she witnessed not even what she experienced so I can only imagine what the kids who are experien experiencing this Relentless bullying and the staff who are watching this what kind of counseling and stuff that they need then your online program was trash so I had to remove her out the online program um to today but when before I was going to remove her out the online program I wanted to talk to an administrator that I felt comfortable with to see if I can move her back in the building to see what things were put in place and then the administrator wasn't there when I asked the secretaries do y'all know uh went to the board office first they told me I
130had to go to the O best when I got o best it told me they wasn't the right place but then they helped me anyway because that's just what they do they superheroes and then when we we figured it all out the person I needed to talk to wasn't here and nobody knew where he was at and nobody knew when he was coming back and nobody could answer me so I just I just decided to withdraw her all together so I couldn't get no answers to that last but not least since you don't want me at the podium we know you don't want me at the board table you don't want me at the podium then my next thing is to organize an allout School protest to stick out blue on your next school count
131day um and when all your black students don't show up then maybe it'll be a problem for you then I want to make very clear that I did not correction the board when I said what I said about what happened to to our son I made I made promises um until your kids are molested from school to school you don't understand or you can't tell me how to react to something that's happening in my kids until your kids have been attacked for no goddamn reason and then their parent says that that that that child that their child did a good job by attacking my son you do not tell me how to react you do not tell me where where I should voice my pain I start I follow I follow post so that means
132I start from the lowest and then I take it to the top I know the rules the reason I get by the time I get here or gets to the top is because I'm fed up about no about because nothing's happened this will be our second child in this District whose parent have threatened the first time that parent walked up to my son so the safety in this district is real what would y'all have done if something that if that lady would have DP under my son gave me these pittsb excuses that y'all keep giving me or would y'all have done another poor investigation after my son was molested in the bunt front of class but y'all told me y'all did an investigation so the safety in this school district is horrible y'all need metal
133detectiv to help stop these kids I'm letting you'all know right now the school shootings don't happen in Detroit public schools do y'all wonder why they have metal detective that's not that's not making somebody feel like they going to prison or that they're in a prison and then if they do if a kid or or staff does feel like that ask yourself what what what do you how do what makes you feel safe we talked about the security guards they're obviously not good enough what else can we do to help everybody feel safe I don't know just because just because the parent or whoever comes to the front door and when they get buzzed in that's it that's it they're in you don't know if that person is carrying what they're carrying nothing y'all don't know
134so this stuff about the certain things about the way the school is looking I don't feel like the schools are finally looking a little bit safe at least from the outside at least you going to have to go through something try to go through something to get to our kids in the staff now because at first it was just glass window and you told the kids well well now guys you can get up under the table if for shooter comes in I hope yall know we training our kids way way different because that's poor training back not knowing what's going on this is poor but this isn't new this this this mis communication between you guys and the community this isn't new why w the parents of this school emailed about what happened why weren
135we emailed about us our kids not having an assistant principal you have parents at home thinking that their kids school are is functioning the way it's supposed to I know the LI so not me but there are others who speak so highly of this district and think that these things are not going on I thank these teachers for coming here tonight to expose y'all I than them because now here's where the real work begins which I hope you guys really start doing the work the special needs Community here I've been complaining about the lack of resources you guys can get the lack of people La everything they want to come here is not by coincidence guys figure out why until you guys actually do the work to figure out why we're going to keep having
136this problem the staff is going to keep coming in here until y'all have no staff or until the district is eventually closed down because somebody has finally sued the spit out of y'all let's get this right so all of our kids feel safe all of the staff feel safe and like they want to be here I want our teachers to teach my kids the African-American um of the the African-American um the word I'm looking for um literature you guys need to do better we've been complaining about this for a long time we thought we got Dr PNY she was going to fix it nothing's happened like like what's what's going on I want you guys to really take all this stuff into into accountability and like take everything that they've said everybody said and take
137this back to the board and really say let's be proactive thank youa from ow B um Beville Michigan I just wanted to Pig back beginning of when on Jen had um started I think the first time she came up here um I didn't want this to sound like Mark not addressed a lot of this um he has done so much for us to fill a lot more safer with the surroundings and it's a little bit unfair from what we said to make you think he's aware of a lot of this don't think he's aware of a lot of it um unfortunately we took this to show the severity of what's going on um as an opportunity because it's just been to um and the safe route on safe route but I did want to point
138out this is not on um either of you um I know I'm not supp but um we just wanted you to be aware thank you feel a little better now okay I only have one thing to say I just wonder we don't have an Sr I don't think that's okay uh we should know these things I also point out that it's a little bit ironic don't have first and foremost I want to say Sir uh thank you for being honest about what you were dealing with I am a veteran who please address the board Please Mr Young yeah well okay thank you I too am a veteran who has ptfd so I know what it's like to deal with the anxiety especially when you know that you what you're saying is not going to be
139well received um I do want to say that I don't want y'all and my children's hereb I'm going to cut your pictures out and send them back to you specifically y'all and I do want to say thank you Mr kleinan because all of the issues that we bring up you always make sure to contact us you always make make sure to do your best to make sure that we're feeling involved and that we're feeling hurt I do appreciate that I also want to say thank you to those beautiful ladies over there that work at o best y'all always make us feel loved when we come no matter what's going on if a kids's sick uh it doesn't matter they always make us feel good also I would like to address all of the teachers that
140are here and I would like to say thank you I really would because I don't know if they realize it or not but everything that y'all said actually correspond or correlates with what we said see they they talked about all these these parents and stuff that be coming up to the school and making these threats and stuff like that although I act how I act here because I need you guys to to see me because you've been ignoring me ask him if I ever acted like that in the school always the utmost respect always always it doesn't matter who I'm talking to I hear everybody these teachers I want to say thank y'all because I remember before Co the board was trying to make it seem like it was y's fault that all this stuff
141was going bad with uh the online learning and stuff like that and my wife and I had to stand up and tell them like no we see these teachers our teachers are awesome y'all are not supporting you remember that CU you on the board you were on the board you remember that y'all try to blame it on them that's that old board mentality that I'm talking about that's exactly what I'm talking about these teachers are talking about how they send kids to the office and nothing happens they end up coming right back it's the same stuff we told y'all are you kidding me right now teachers can't teach because you get C kids that are unruly because they're not being taught to respect the teachers I can guarantee you my kids are being taught that
142I can guarantee you these teachers up here they spilling heart out to y'all they telling you they don't feel safe they telling you you're not communicating they telling you you're not hearing they telling you they feel like y'all don't care and the crazy part about it is I know how they feel because y'all been telling us the same thing for almost a decade so I feel for y'all I really truly do because for the most part there's been a couple teachers that I've had to call out and I I'll do it again but for the most part these teachers here they your first line the fact that that man is sitting up there scared that's a problem I noticed that a lot of the stuff that happens with my kids is because there's a lack
143of teachers a lack of teachers so you got multiple teachers trying to pull multiple jobs and do multiple things why because they're not being supported by the district we told y'all that I hope y'all listening because they just they just said it they just said it everything that they're saying lines up with everything that we told you telling you that there problems in the classroom they're saying it's falling on the death ear there are students that are afraid to come to the teachers because they know that the teachers can't go any go to anybody to get help so the kids don't say anything so then what happened they sit back they let the stuff build up then they become impulsive and ridiculous in class affecting the whole class you can't blame them for that that's
144y'all y'all Supply the resources y'all Supply the help y'all hire the teachers if you can't keep teachers in this district and I want to reiterate this if you can't keep teachers in the district then maybe you got to start looking at the district not the teachers if you having all of these issues with these students and maybe you got to start look at the looking at the policies that y'all the policies that y'all are only picking and choosing that you want to follow if something's wrong it's usually wrong from the top down top head that's thank you anybody else for public comments seeing none we're going to go to there any you got got one and one go ahead custy Gator there's two of them I no you go firste talk trusty okay if she
145goes first sure okay TR to get her all right to Jill is it D dri sorry if I'm mispronouncing that Jessica Newman from K makio on 924 2024 huge thanks to Jill and Jessica on our new library media staff at Bedford who have been working so hard to make our library space their own and to assist our staff and students these ladies were so helpful during bedford's back to school book giveaway their friendliness Smiles flexibility and creativity have helped to make the beginning of the school year a great one in our library and computer lab they had big shoes to feel when Mrs rahaman Mrs brand and Mrs Laver moved the party in pop full time but this dynamic duo have been a pleasure to get to know and to work with we are all
146so glad to welcome them to Fed for this year thank you ladies for your hard work and wonderful help I'm going to butcher Pat's last name because I always do I'm sorry Pat I love you Pat and thank you everyone uh from Megan and is it Jude Jud Sears Jud Jude thank you all give me this one right a huge shout out and heartful thank you to Pat for coming to the rescue of my son Jude and ensuring that he looked his best as a member of this year's AHS homecoming court she heard I was in urgent need of a seamstress and she kindly provided her expertise expertise to us on very short notice this type of care and concern for our school Community is truly the D7 difference thank you Miss Pat thank you
147Pat but this time just before I do adj I just want to thank everybody for coming out please drive safe and once again I want to thank everybody for coming be so resolve that the of Education adjourns the meeting at 9:05 p.m. may have a motion moved by truste Gator supported by trustee wless once again oh sorry roll call please truste wless yeah trusty dyro yes trusty Gator yes trusty ster yes trusty wall yes you you forgot oh oh apologize Mrs Anderson wasn't on there it wasn't on the roll call that's why I missed it but trusty Anderson yes motion carries