February 24, 2020 - Work-Study School Board Meeting

001(gavel pounding) - [Donald] I'd like to call this Work-Study session to order, for Independent school district 624. Would the clerk please call the roll? - Arcand? - Here. - Beloyed? - Here. - Chapman? - Here. - Ellison? - Here. - Mullin? - Here. - Newmaster? - Here. - Thompson? - Here. - [Donald] All right I'd like to go to our first discussion, I know the one school presentation Lincoln and Central Middle School. - [Dan] Thank you. Thanks for Chair Mullin, School Board members, Superintendent Kazmierczak and Mr. Collins for the opportunity for us talk a little bit about Lincoln Elementary. I'm real excited about coming up to the board approval because this this official now the gym is actually going. (laughing) It's now official, it's been something in the works for a while and we can't

002thank the community enough for the opportunity to put an addition on to Lincoln school. I'm here today with my colleagues, people who are in the trenches every day. They do a wonderful job in there, and they're willing to come outside of their comfort zone and talk with you this evening, I have Teresa Ogden, a fourth grade teacher at Lincoln Elementary and then obviously Alleks Kornbaum who teaches first grade, also at that point, which is wonderful for them to take two different topics of what we're gonna talk about tonight. Lincoln Elementary, if you don't know about the school, it's K-five school. It has about 475 students, really proud to host out of all the special Ed. programs that are available also a EBD cluster program for setting two and three students it's just been remarkable what

003that programs been offering to families. In addition to that we also house the gifted and talented area the Explorations Program, which is a multi-age program that's has three classrooms within the building. And then just recently we been honored and humbly appreciate the honor of being a national board. National School Red Blue Ribbon School award recipient and that is not done just with one or two individuals that's done collectively through the help of the district, through the help of the community that parents support group and really strong, dedicated staff. So that's been an exciting thing to celebrate this year. So if you look forward into our mission statement at Lincoln Elementary, you can see it's divided into three parts, you have the purpose, which is in yellow, and then you also move into all the identities

004in yellow, the purpose is in the blue and then the actual attributes are in the bullet points right there. We really are excited about being an empowered environment of learners and also the other part of igniting curiosity. Obviously inspiring students and unlocking their potential is really important to us, just as I'm sure it is in every school, and you can read the other bullets about how we plan on doing that through that strategic planning process, was a very exciting time to do that. There's really two major tactics that came out of that, two major action plans. And the first one, really focused on nurturing the whole child to a personalized learning experience. And instead of having all four plans laid out there, and we're just summarizing three key points. One is the student driven choice

005point in which we really embraced the the Makerspace concept within our school setting. It's still in the infancy stage, but I know that many of the grade levels in the programs are trying to dabble with that Makerspace concept. And I know what the district support are bringing in a mobile Makerspace Lab, that's been helpful too. We also have a concept under student driven choice called genius hour, and some of the grade levels just allow kids to kind of create and design their own projects or their own initiatives, in which they try to think about what they can do to help better the school or the community at large or just to try to solve a challenging problem and then to celebrate that by displaying it at the end. In the world, real world experiences, couple

006things fall into place because of our location at Lincoln was just a hop, skip and a jump from here, we are able to do some walking field trips to downtown White Bear and just really appreciate what the community of White Bear Lake has to offer around Lincoln Elementary. And then as you can see in the photo, we also like to do some service learning projects in the fall. We do the leaf raking project which supports about 20 neighbors that are close by within 10 minute walking distance of our school. We've been doing that for a few years. Typically, it's been after school, but going through the strategic planning process and thinking more of it through an equity lens. We realized that there were a number of families and students that weren't able to take advantage

007of that. So this past year, we did it for the first time as a whole school during the school day and Leah Citko, a fifth grade teacher took on that initiative. And we had four major groups going out in 90 minute blocks throughout the day, including kindergarten. And that was amazing to see all that take place we just took over the nearby farm. And it was a lot of fun. The kids, the leaves came down at just the right time, so they just had a great time with it all. And then in addition to that, we obviously do a winter service project, which many of you have heard from other schools, you create these fleece blankets for single parents. We also work with meals on wheels and provide some nice little care packages. And then

008we also connect with the Serenity Care Center falls by and we do some walking trips over to Serenity Care and interact with citizens over there, the residents over there. And then the last piece of this tactic is really about personal purposeful movement. Right now we're really focusing on the social emotional needs of the child within the school setting and a district setting. One of the ways that their needs need to be met is just to get out of that classroom. And just to get some fresh air. And there was the big smooth initiative that took place last year, which was pretty exciting. And John Barnes, a teacher from Monterey and Mary Malloy, a teacher from Hugo, said, hey, it was trying to figure out where to do extra recess. So we piloted last year in

009May, we did about a week we figure out where the bugs were gonna be, and trying that we started it up this fall, we tried to do some grade levels with two extra recesses. And somewhat one, we came to a conclusion that one was the best and we really focused on when that 15 minute break is gonna reoccur. So it's not at the very beginning of the day, or the very end of the day or right before or after lunch and recess or right around specialist. So we're trying to find that sweet spot for it and it's working out wonderfully. The kids really enjoy it and trying to keep it to that 15 minute time is just enough that they need that they come back re-energized and kind of focused on learning some more. So

010that's kind of in a nutshell what tactic one is about there's obviously more to it than that. But hopefully that gives you a little glimpse into that plan. If we as we move into the next tactic, which is tactic two, talking about creating a connected culture and Teresa was an even voluntold to come here today, she actually volunteered to come in and talk about our books that doing as an entire staff. So I'm gonna turn it over to Teresa to talk about our "White Fragility" book study. - [Teresa] So we've been as a staff reading, like fertility, and just gonna give you a little bit of a backstory of how we got to the point of participating and choosing this as a way to sort of think about a connected culture and building those diverse

011perspectives between ourself as well as reaching out and having that filter into our students. So Alleks and I and a few other teachers are on the leadership team. So we meet with Dan about once a month. So last spring, we were talking about these tactics and what our approach be, how do we envision connecting more culturally as a school. And so we brainstormed several different options and thought about possibilities. And then through that, we decided that we really need a starting point as a staff. So that we all had a common understanding, we had a foundation from which we could build upon. And it's then that we looked at some different book titles and options, and came to the decision that we move forward with reading "White Fragility." And so with this reading of the

012book, we have read the first few chapters, and it really is kind of a listen, share and discuss format. The neat part about the book study is that we meet in triads and so there's cross grade level teams of teachers that are part of the discussions. So on the team that's I'm on there's a fifth grade teacher as well as a second grade teacher. And then in addition to our triads, we have other support staff that will join our discussions as well. So the last discussion that it was part of our school psychologist was part of it, as well as a pair of professional. So to really think about the different perspectives, and the piece that we were really careful about as a team is rather than jumping right into these sort of conversations that

013need to have courage, and then we need to be careful about how we're starting an initiative like this. We really just did some getting to know you things. So for me to get some insight on the background of some of my staff members that I didn't know before they went back to their childhood, or some of their experiences in their own school settings, both elementary and high school. So it was really intentional on the team's part, to think about how do we create the safe environment to build this trust and relationship before we start reading a book that gets pretty intense, and gets into some pretty deep concepts and ideas. So that's kind of how our book study has been going, we'll continue to move through the book. The book is structured basically in two

014parts. So the author addresses "White Fragility." And just to give you a concept of the perspective of "White Fragility" it really is kind of addressing those defensive actions or fear, guilt, anger, that people might choose to argue or defend or possibly just choose to be silent about. And so that element of culture, and how it's discussed or addressed is kind of laid out and as you can see, the big topics that are sort of defined and addressed and making sure everyone has a common understanding of the concepts is how the book starts. And then that's tied with how, with that like fragility, how is that protecting racial inequality? So because of that fear, that guilt, that anger, those arguments that silence, how is that then leading to the inequality that we continue to see from

015a racial standpoint? So that's the first part of the book. And then the second part is, so now that we have this foundational understanding what can be done so that we can engage more effectively in conversations, as teachers, educators, people in the community, you know how with this knowledge, can we then take something that has been either silenced or argued and have courteous courageous conversations where we're listening, sharing and having discussions? So when I think about that as a teacher, and I think about what the book does for me, I just think about the different perspectives that I can see and I can consider, I also think about the insight that it gives me as well as just that continuous reminder that we all have biases. And to be aware of that, it's not anything

016that any of us can have awake. So just that understanding and just that awareness of it. And then just thinking about my voice, and the other voices that I need to listen to, to really think about equity and thinking about connecting more so from a cultural perspective. So that's kind of where I'm at as an educator. And then in turn, it leads me to think about, well, what does that mean for my students? And so I'm really excited about the second step curriculum that we've started to implement now. And so if you're not familiar with the curriculum, it really is a curriculum that focuses on the social, emotional and academic success of our learners. And so in the curriculum that I've been teaching so far, our first lessons were on respect and empathy. So when

017you think about respect and empathy, and you think about culture, and you think about equality, and equity and these elements, knowing that you have that, and you're building that foundation, and then after that, thinking about how to listen attentively, and then the difference between passive behaviors, aggressive behaviors and assertive behaviors, so really setting the stage and creating an environment, to have discussions and to be respectful of each other. And so with that, helping my students and the students at our school, figure out who are they, what is their identity, and feeling comfortable to share that story, to give voice to who they are, and to respectfully listen, discuss and be willing to share your story as well, is what's really exciting to me when I think about these bigger topics and equity elements that we

018need to consider in our classroom. So moving forward as a building, one of the big things that we're really thinking about is the district's equity commitment. So really thinking about the decision making protocol, the four questions the district is asking us to ask as educators and members of our school community, so thinking when I'm making decisions as a teacher, when I think about having a discussion in my class, how wonderful to take these and have my students be mindful of what to consider what to ask, what decisions you can make when you're thinking about understanding others, the culture they come from, and then really just thinking about how to be equitable, in our classroom setting and our setting our school and throughout our community. So it's really exciting when I think about all the pieces

019and all the elements and how it can all tie together as we move forward from to starting to talk about race. But obviously beyond race, we have so many other elements that we need to have discussions about, and be respectful listeners and to let people share their stories and have a voice in that. - [Dan] Thank you, Teresa. - [Donald] Dan, it's been interesting to watch the journey of trust that's occurring within the staff from the start of the year to where we're at now. I'm very proud of the staff for some of the conversations that are starting to occur and all the meetings. - [Dan] We're gonna move forward with-- - [Donald] Mr. Schmidt, thank you, I just wanna make sure that if there's any questions that we can ask real quick, if you

020don't mind. - I don't. - [Donald] Is there any questions, anybody? Okay, perfect, thank you. - [Dan] Thank you, I appreciate it. Our next stage is and the final stage that we'd like to celebrate is Alleks will share a little bit about the Ron Clark Academy. This tactic team really looked at a way to take all that's exciting within Lincoln School and see if we can hone in hand with a common theme or a purpose or focus, and so I'm gonna turn it off to her. - [Alleks] Right so last summer I had the opportunity to go to the Ron Clark Academy in Atlanta, Georgia through a classroom grant, Ron Clark Academy is known worldwide for its innovation and its student engagement. When I was there, I was able to learn about the House System

021and Ron Clark developed the House System. Well, he didn't necessarily develop it. It was happening in Europe for a long time before now, he creatively tweaked to the idea and now he teaches educators all over the country and all over the world, how to use it in their schools. How the House System works is essentially a house is a team just another word for a team and there's one of four a student or staff members placed into one of four houses. Amistad is the house of friendship and kindness, Isibindi is the house of courage, Reveur is the house of dreamers and passion, and Altruismo is the house of empowering others and givers, which ironically, we are all in the same house of Altruismo. These houses meet throughout the school year and they talk about character

022education and they do community building activities. Students also have the chance to earn points for their house by showing excellence in character. We spend this year educating staff about the House System and then in the fall, we will be teaching it to the staff and any incoming new staff members. Then I also I just wanted to note that the reason that we're doing this is all about the connected culture. When I was at RCA, there was just something different that was happening there. And when I looked at what they're doing and what we're doing, we already have a strong sense of community at Lincoln. I really feel like this House System will help us to be able to play off of that strength of community. It's a chance to give kids a chance to, sorry,

023connect with others across classes, across grade levels that they might not interact with during the school day. And it also helps them to gain more friendship. So we're building off of that strength of the community at Lincoln. I've used the House System in my classroom this year just with just in one first grade classroom. And I've seen the impacts of it already. Even today we are doing a closing circle. And we are sharing of the best part about our day and more than half of the kids that are doing our house chairs or meeting with my house, it was so important to them that they have this time to connect at a deeper level with just a few students in our class. So I can't wait to see what the impact is like school-wide if

024it's already making such an impact in one classroom. - [Dan] Thanks, Alleks, and it's one of those examples were the way through Liguria Education Foundation as the classroom parents. And Alleks took advantage of that went to the Ron Clark Academy and was able to bring it back to the building level strategic planning process and the timing just worked out wonderfully. And everyone embraced that through the process. So we thank her for her leadership and Teresa's leadership on the equity initiative. And we open it up now to any questions that you may have. - [Donald] Any questions? Yes, go ahead, Miss Thomson. - [Angela] Why was just set Lincoln for the read around that by the way, I went to school there and I'm very happy you're getting a new job because it's effect, may have

025been a little while ago. As far as the staff that's involved, this was also include all the staff, custodial staff and the staff that works in the cafeteria as well. How far? - In regards to the Ron Clark Academy? I just say for all. - [Angela] Absolutely probably more in the book and stuff? - [Dan] Yeah, so with the "White Fragility" book study, I personally went to all roles within the school and said, you are welcome to do it. We talked about how they if there was a need for them to get compensated, how we would do that. And so I was impressed with the number of support staff they're able to attend. But obviously, we also have some of the duties that they're responsible for when we have the book study. And so we

026just try to keep everyone up to speed through weekly updates. I do a weekly blog for the staff. And hopefully if they're reading that, you know, keep up to speed. And then with the Ron Clark Academy, Alleks has taken great pains to just make sure she's connected with everybody. So they're included to be a part of a house and what their role could be, even if there's other responsibilities now, that might pull them away from it. So yes, we're still working through it, but everyone is involved as best we can. - [Alleks] It's okay, high up and so even like our custodian, Miss Gail and Mr. Jim, they all have a house. So right now, this year, every staff member has been sorted into a house we had a little kickoff party, one of our

027service learning projects we even work together as our house to prepare them, to the note, not so tie blankets. And in the future next year, there will be people in charge of leading those character education topics with our house and even, we're hoping like Miss Janine, our lunch lady will be in the house, Mrs. Kendall, our secretary, everyone will be a part of those meetings. And the purpose of that is so that each child doesn't just have one classroom teacher that they can go to, but when they go throughout the school, they see a multitude of other adults that they feel comfortable talking with and have relationship with. - [Angela] That's great, thank you. - [Member] I just wanna thank you all for your work. This is great, thank you for the update. We really

028appreciate your work. - [Dan] Goes both ways, thank you for the partnership. Really appreciate it. - [alleks] All right, thank you so much. - [Donald] Miss Peterson is for Central. Welcome. - [Cathyrn] Thank you, well, I'm gonna go slow bear with me. Chair Mullin, school board, district leadership, student leaders, thank you for inviting me to come today. I'm really excited just to talk about some of the highlights that we have at Central this year. And really decided to just stay focused on what he said at the very beginning of the year as a new person to the district, new person, to the building, really taking time to build community and to build culture while also moving things forward. But keeping that at the center. As I keep reminding my staff that this is a marathon,

029it's not a sprint, we're in February. I'm a five K runner, I'm gonna be honest, like a good three miles is good for me. So we're at about mile 15 right now. And we all really, really need each other and we need to be cheerleaders for each other and we need to keep lifting each other up. So let me go through our strategic plan. Same piece, our biggest emphasis this year is that we've really been talking a lot about understanding and embracing differences. And as a leader, I said that really has to start with us as the adults. As the adults in this building, we are the leaders, we are the ones who develop the community and the culture. And we really have to understand and know each other. And so we spent some time

030at the very beginning of the year, just focusing on getting to know each other, learning from each other, building relationships. Two out of the three people on our admin team, our Dean is also new. So just taking that time to observe to say what currently exists, who are the people that are here, entering into those situations really focusing on using positive language and problem solving, rather than saying, when we're talking with kids about punishment or talking with each other about sort of like the what ifs, and how do we handle this? How do we problem solve together? Through the whole process, one of the best things that we did at the beginning of the year is we all stood in a huge circle workshop we've done here by decade of when people started at Central.

031And it was fascinating because I was brand new, and Amber, who was our Dean was brand new. And then Bob Brewer, who's my associate principal, was at the opposite end. And we went through in the, we created an image of what's happened in this school over the last 27 years, because that's sort of the years of service within this building, and what were the highlights and what were the things that we wanna bring back. And from that, what I found was, that's where the staff really got to know each other. And so they recognized, wow, those are the things that happen. That's what that room used to be used for. So like all of these other little stories that happen and it broke down a lot of barriers 'cause over the summer I had a

032lot of teachers step in and say, gosh, you know what? I just don't know people, like I used to know people. And in the strategic plan, not only from the district, but from the school is what sold me on coming to this district. But there's a lot of heavy lifting when we're talking about equity, and we're talking about race, and we're talking about changing grading policies. And so I wanted to really take time to build into know each other. Few other things that we have done along the way, just positive postcards out to families, as well as staff shout outs and postcards every single week. The staff themselves created a social committee, and it's a social community where we have done things like chili cook offs, or frosty Valentine cookies during lunch. Just little things

033during the day that people can pause and have fun and get to know each other a little bit better. In addition, there is a link I had no intention of showing the video. I should have said that too also, but I put it in so if at any point you are interested in seeing it, it's one of a couple videos that we're creating. And I would give a huge shout out to Heather Schmidt, who is our instructional coach. And she started the year by just going and talking to people to say, what is Central. We've also done one on grades, we have another one that's in the works with the passability. Now have some kids actually doing the editing and things like that as well. Which leads us right into student voice, huge emphasis on

034student voice. So as adults as we get to know each other, at the end of the day, it's the students that we serve. And I think it's a balance between the adults have lots of ideas of things that work really well. Students have lots of feedback to be able to give to us, but they're also really creative, and they know what they need. And so I actually started with the kids who are in our reading intervention classes and just went into those classes and said, how's it going? Tell me what you like, tell me what's working, tell me what's not working. And they intentionally started with the kids in the reading intervention classes. As opposed to the classes where we have kids who are involved in student council or NJHS, or web because their voices

035are present in the school, and sometimes it's the kids in our intervention classes that we don't hear. And from there, they gave us so many ideas. They said, we have so many ideas for how we can make the cafeteria better and different things. And is there a way for us to get outside? And from there, Mrs. Walsh met with them. And we're working on some plans to be able to be outside in the spring. They came up and I just met with them. They have fantastic ideas for what to do with their time next year. And by the way, none of them said, hey, it's because we wanna wear hats, or we wanna have our phones or we just wanna hang out. They talked about things like we need access to get extra help with

036homework. Sometimes we really feel like we need to move. One girl said, is there ever a time when we could just study something we're interested in it we don't have to worry about having agreed for it was like, I was like, yes, that would be fantastic. They talked about needs for mental health, and for support, and how do we handle social media, all of those things. And these were kids that were in seventh grade, and I chose the seventh graders because I said, I need you to be the leaders next year when we do this, 'cause you're the ones who are gonna be here. So I gather their information. I'm gonna go back in the next week or two and put together some different proposals for them to gather some other feedback. Few other things

037we've been doing I love to read month from our literacy committee, all student driven all of the activities are a month. Some teachers pulled that together. We had some students who came to me and said, what else can we do for Black History Month and they've put together slides that we have in our announcements and on our TV screens. They started a kindness challenge, things like that. So it's been really fun getting to know the kids that way. Literacy at the Middle School. Not a surprise with the other meetings that I've been at has been a huge focus this year. With all of the change to our Middle School schedule, looking at readers workshop, but also lots of conversations around inclusion. And how do we actually open up our schedule and pads so that students

038have more opportunities to interact with each other, as opposed to being tracked into different classes? And how can different teachers work together so that students who have similar interests, sometimes they can mix and match within their classrooms within different groups, different ideas that they have as well. And then also looking at the planning for next year. We spent quite a bit of time with Sunrise Park, Middle School, language arts teachers, and it was a fantastic day that we had together and just really fun to see the barriers break down and have all of the seventh grade language arts teachers together really talking and sharing about what are the best things that have happened? What are the things that we see really need help with, one of the questions that we have. The image here is

039of butterfly and this was part of the student driven piece for literacies. They said reading gives you your wings. And so every student of school was given a butterfly and they're all over. And they have written the titles of their favorite books. And so it was interesting with the literacy committee navigating kind of sixth grade ideas of what would be really cool to do, versus eighth grade ideas of what would be really cool to do. And so the language arts class, actually, this week is doing a table has been done at the high school, they're doing it through language arts, kind of with this scavenger hunt, around literacy and culture. And then, finally, I started the year you know, really saying, we're gonna get to know each other, and we have to know each other

040to do this heavy lifting. And yet, I told my stuff I lead with my heart. And I will share with you my staff who I am this year. And we're gonna continue to have these conversations and so we have been talking a lot about equity. We've been talking about race, we've been talking about mental health. Some of the things that we've done is we showed Anxit, which is all about anxiety teachers had just, I unfortunately, was not able to be at that session that had aha moments of like, now I get why this child was doing this kind of one of my favorite sayings is that is that giving you a hard time, he's having a hard time. And so the teachers kind of had this aha moment. And it was just enough there, that

041now they want more information. And so I'm working with some of our special education teachers, where we have done some work already to support but then going forward, this spring and into the fall, we've talked about being warm demanders because the Middle School behavior is the thing. And so how do we become more demanders for our students, and that I've shared a lot with my staff of like, hey, this is a book I've read that I really loved. Or you know what? I was listening to this podcast. And I actually listened to a podcast with Robyn D'Angelo, and I was talking to my staff, I said, I listened to it twice. And I listened to it three times, putting myself out to be vulnerable for them to say, I found myself being defensive. And I

042went back, but it made me pause and think, here's something else that we could do. And it has been fascinating now the people that are coming and sharing, and so a couple of different teachers who have picked up the book "White Fragility", we've started an equity committee with just the purpose of learning and talking together. Another teacher who said, it really made me think about that podcast, she said, so I went about critical race theory. And I went, I wouldn't have been where I probably would have started that she's like, I can't deny it. It's all true, and I need to talk to you about it. And so just kind of creating this momentum and energy. And then my job I always see is how do I remove that barrier, and connect people together within

043the staff. And people are anxious and they keep saying, yep, or maybe excited and anxious. Yes, let's keep working together and know that all of these things are gonna come into play. And we're moving forward. So, we've done a lot, I just have to say thank you. It is a fantastic community. The teachers have welcomed me with open arms, as have the students and the families. I have heard that it feels tangibly different. I don't know any different. I just know that when I'm there, most of the time. It feels really good, so if 90% of the time it feels good, I feel like we're doing something right. And nobody's gonna be happy 100% of the time. So those are kind of the highlights of things that we're at and that we're focusing on. -

044[Donald] Questions, comments, concerns. Thank you very much, thank you very much for your work. - [Cathryn] Thank you, thank you. - [Donald] Appreciate it. All right, we'll now move into our second discussion item B two, which is the American Indian Parent Advisory Update, said, Miss Paul or Dr. Gillespie. - [Alison] Straight in to it. So I'd like to introduce Jordan Zickermann. She's our American Native American cultural liaison and oversees our Indian Education Program. And she's here with an update. - [Jordan] Bonjour Dr. Gillespie, Chair Mullin, Members of Board, thank you so much for having me here tonight. The purpose of me being here today is I'm gonna provide a quick update regarding some of the work that's been going on this year regarding our Indian Education Program. And then on the march 2nd meeting, Andrew

045Adams, the Chairperson of the American Indian Parent Advisory Committee, will be presenting the resolution vote of concurrence to the board, but I wanted to provide some background information regarding all the work that's been shared with the parent committee that has helped them guide their decision. Oh, I got two of this one. Okay, and this I will start by saying is the same presentation that I've been sharing with the AIPAC on a monthly basis. So I'll start with February. The first ever student leadership cohort at Sunrise Park Middle School has started and this was a result of different leadership and team members attending the Urban Leadership Academy, where we heard about an initiative called the story squad, which was basically a different platform for students to share their story and how it interacts or what the

046different intersectionalities are between school and their home life. And this story squad they presented, students presented and crafted their stories through many different mediums whether that be a YouTube video, Graphics, spoken word, a poem, or completely anonymous, all of the above, it's really up to the student to craft and create their own story. And we partnered with mapping year at Sunrise Park and all the cultural liaisons are involved in this. And we created the first ever cohort of students to participate in something like a story spot. We don't know exactly what that looks like yet. We just knew it was a good idea for students to share their stories. And we brought it back to Sunrise during the advisory time to create a platform and see what do our students think of this idea? And

047how can we tweak it to fit here? So we're still in the early phases of that, but we have four Indigenous students who are participating in that. And we're really excited to see how it pulls out through the end of the year. And we have discussed potentially adding that as a concept where maybe all eighth graders do it. We don't know yet. We're really just trying to feel out the students and what they think of this concept. So we're really excited about it. In our elementary groups and in our middle school groups for we call them Indian Ed. clubs. We have been learning about the seven grandfather teachings, I did bring a little booklet. It's kind of just what we've been driving in in elementary this year of all of our different the seven grandfather

048teachings, and et cetera, which has been really fun. And I do have a picture of that later. So you guys can see it more close, but I can pass it around to if you like. Also in February, the Dream of Wild Health came to South Campus for a Many Faces Event. I'm sure you have all heard of the Many Faces initiative. Now in White Bear, it's an awesome, awesome initiative that started I believe, last year, and they very well incorporated the AIPAC last year and I'm super happy that we've continued collaboration this year and we offered it during the school day, so it's really fun to get our community interacting with our students to talk about an indigenous fun that we have right here in our community. So that was really great. And pictures, so

049that's kind of the word books that I have right here, and one picture I also added in late that I have to shout out to all of our students, Kalin and Helen from Omega had perfect attendance this year, so or for this month, so I added that picture, but I had it been late but I had to shout them out 'cause they're super fun. And they had a pancake breakfast, which they were super proud about. So January, so I'm gonna go through to November, so this, we won't do the whole duration of the year but Middle School Clubs focused on relationship building as a theme for the month, we did the step into the circle activity. It kinda reminds me of "Freedom Writers" if you see that movie with the students would step to the

050line if this was applicable to them. So we did a step into the circle activities. And it was really good and it created a lot of really good and healthy conversation. One of my favorite takeaways, though, was one of the questions was step into the circle, if you're bilingual, and one of the students who has been involved in our Indian Ed. programming, since she attended Birch, and she stepped into the circle and I said, what languages do you speak? And she said English and Ojibwe I said, where did you learn Ojibwe and she said, you taught me how to say my name at Birch. (laughing) And so that's the way. So that was just a really fun takeaway that I'm happy our students have that opportunity. Through student feedback in regards to Central in particular,

051we have identified that meeting in the board room is much better than us meeting in the commons. We have a big group, our Central group, it varies because it's up to student choice, every native student gets a pass to come, but they don't have to come, so it's up to them. And when we meet in the common spaces, sometimes we'll have like 35 students. That's a really large group. And especially with the the overhead hallway, and the hallway right there. It's like, hi, I'm in AD or nightclub. So we trying to manage that classroom management was getting difficult for me. But also, I noticed that it was starting to throw off our engagement a little bit. So I started meeting in here and we went back and forth and then we had an open conversation

052about it like, which do you prefer? So there are sometimes with that will still meet in the common space, especially when we're not trying to get so deep. There's perfect opportunities for the commons for us, but there's also really good opportunities for us in the boardroom. So it's nice to be able to have that flexibility. And our students also think that it's so cool to be in the boardroom, so they love that. (laughing) In January as well, three native students participated in a student panel regarding the Future of Learning at White Bear Lake, which was really exciting for them. It was a really big crowd, too. So a lot of the three of the two of the students, one was Miss Jennifer Adams, two of the other students were middle school students too. So it

053was a really large group for them. And they were kind of like, a little intimidated but after they opened up and the way that the event was set up for the students to share their experiences and collaborate with adults turned out to be very beneficial. And then talking with colleagues after I realized just how beneficial it was to hear all the different experiences and all the different feedback from different students but especially when students were reiterating things, so it was really good. Some and photos on the left that was our Future in Learning, and on the right that is from a student group at Hugo. So we are talking about and preparing for going to Dream about Health in March. Once it gets a little bit warmer, like it just has to get a little

054warmer, but we're making herb patches. So we've talked about the farm everything that there is there, we've talked about different herbs and plants that are important to indigenous communities. So we created that background and then we got into the crafts and making our own herb patches, which is really fun. Further, there's some more herb patches on the left and also the Future of Learning panel. December Elementary Indian Ed. Clubs had storytelling as a theme for this month, we talked about Hiawatha and the Peacemaker. And then we identified the peacemakers in our life, and what that means and what it means to embody being a peacemaker. So it was cool to make that connection to real life to with this story, in particular. Middle School Clubs focused on community building as an icebreaker for our field

055trips. So we do off-campus visits. That's a part of our Indian Education program plan, and our world's best workforce goals. So I'm super happy to say that this year was the first time we ever filled the whole bus of students to go to the University of Minnesota Duluth. It was super, super fun. The ride home was much easier than the ride there after the all you can eat ice cream. But it was in the past I will say we've had about 10 or 11 students. So and I think the real change is that this year, I kind of took a shift. So I kind of in the past, I focused predominantly on six to 12 field. And I noticed that there was something just not quite working right in our high school setting. So I

056decided to shift and focus more on meeting individual student needs regarding college and career readiness, connecting them with resources, but still continuing the social justice platforms, and then shift the Indian Ed. Club focus to elementary through Middle School, which I think like the bus was full of Middle School students. So that was a really exciting just to see how that shift can really impact and create a sustainable effort in the future. So yeah, we filled the bus to go to UMD where we met the American Indian Resource Center and also kind of talking about that shift that happened. It still didn't sit right with me that The Indian Ed. Club shit had to go. Not a way for middle schools but we had to think of something creative. So I collaborated with Tim Whalen. He

057has been coming to all of our AIPAC meetings. He's a rock star, and he told me like, hey, if you don't have the capacity to do this, every Friday or during various time, every time like, why don't you and I switch off, and it's the same curriculum. So we share the same curriculum as with every other student group, and create conversation circles, just about the indigenous experience that more so that is a good way to show how other staffers stepping up and helping out and volunteering to fill in these gaps for all of our students at the end of the day, which is great. December and photos on the left, that's the planetarium at UMD. And it was actually super cool because we had an indigenous Professor talk us through the planetarium and he shared

058with us all of the Ojibwe and Dakota background of the planetarium, which was amazing, but I would say I would restructure the planetarium just to come before our launch. (laughing) These are all pictures from our field trip. It was a really, really great day. November, this is the last in our culture year, Indian Ed. Clubs has successfully launched an addition to our elementary schools. This was a big deal this year. And I've really seen a lot of success come from it. Students are really excited and they know what's coming for them in years to come, which is really cool to kind of work that way instead of work backwards, which has been an intentional effort that I've seen the results in. Success story, full integration of native student population into programming with assistance, a pair

059of professionals and what I mean by that is our special education students are fully incorporated into all of our MDNA programming. So this is during our advisory time, apart from Central and Birch, we made it with elementary is it's kind of harder to scheduling. But it's been super helpful to have the paraprofessionals there and knowing that we have all of our students here and all the students who wanna be here can be here. So that's fine, great. 57 Middle School students created ideas regarding activities or community organizations, they would like to visit and participate in some of the activities. Cathryn spoke to it a little bit earlier regarding the difference between a sixth grader and eighth grader's opinion, but it was super cool. The ideas that they did come up with that were low to

060no cause that were community based. I was like, wow, like, that's actually extremely simple. And I never thought of that, and that's perfect. We can do that like this week. So some of the ideas I'll pull them up Dream of Wild Health, which perfect we got that down a powwow host a bonfire in the community, Tamarac Nature Center, we also have a teepee that our program has purchased in the past. So it's like, let's spend a day setting up the teepee and learning about it and then take it down together. So they came up with a lot of really cool ideas, which I was excited to see. And lastly for middle school and high school students participated in the Nothing About us Without Us Youth Summit through Equity Alliance, Minnesota. This feels like forever ago,

061almost at this point, but that day was the embodiment of student voice and student led. That's what my takeaways from it were, were it was entirely student ran, entirely student driven. And it was really great that our students were able to see what that looks like and then come back and talk about how can we recreate that here. So this is a picture of kind of that follow up conversation of how can we recreate that here. So, South students met with Senator Wiger to discuss their experience at the Youth Summit and shared ideas for legislative support. So it's kind of close, not closing the circle, but continuing on that circle to have those conversations and make sure it doesn't end with a really cool experience. But we keep having those conversations and keep creating those

062cool experiences where our students can be a part of them. So that is all I have to share today, but I'd like to open it up for any questions you all may have. - [Donald] Any questions, comments? Seeing none, thank you very much. I also wanna just take note and recognize that the annual compliance overview and that is in the packet, that's an annual resolution that we put forth at a board meeting. And we said Mr. Adams will be coming into present that to the board and that will be in the March, 8th. Okay, so just said, so I'm assuming it will go back into the board packet and we'll continue moving through. Thank you very much for your work. Sounds like a lot of good stuff, thank you. So now move to our next

063discussion on B three, which is the Achievement and Integration Plan, Dr. Gillespie. - [Alison] Hello, thank you for having. So I asked Chris Streiff-Oji, the principal at Willow Lane Elementary our racially identifiable school and Brian Morris, Interim Principal right now at Hugo. I'm gonna give you a pull out again, and you go like, I'm data guru prior to that. In case you have questions around graduation rate frame is knows all the intricacies about that in itself. Here to answer any question. Chris and I worked closely on the plan together, as you'll see, Willow being a racially identifiable school identified by the Department of Education also has its own specific part of the plan. So every three years, we put together an Achievement and Integration Plan that we submitted to the Minnesota Department of Education and

064we are allocated funds. And every year we submit a budget. And so they give, we are up to submit our new plan. So this plan covers next school year through 2023. And really, the purpose of the funds that we are we get are to look at racial and economic integration, closing study gaps that exist within our system, making sure students have greater access to supports and programs and such like that and really looking at how do we support our students in closing gaps. Based on racial and economic gaps, while also integration as a part of it, which sometimes gets missed in all of that. So how do we make sure that our students are experiencing activities that are meaningful and supportive with all different students from many different backgrounds? The MDE requires that we have

065three goals. One is around reducing disparities in academic achievement. The other is reducing disparities in equitable access to effective and more diverse teachers. This is a new strategy that was added this round for our new goal, I should say that was added this round as being required. And then finally looking at, again, increasing racial and economic integration. So our first goal for our whole plan, which impacts really our whole system is that our graduation rate for all of our high school students, or all of our students will increase to 96%. While disparity gaps between students of color, American Indian students, students eligible for free and reduced lunch and white students are eliminated by 2022-23. And so really, I took a lot of time working with our cultural liaisons, administrators, leaders, district leadership and built on

066a foundation that was very strong in terms of we've set a lot of things in motion and made progress on it. But how can we push the goals even further and then hold up our system and the people within our system accountable for progress in those areas. And so we've had a graduation rate goal, the target is increased from what we've had before and then adding the elimination of the disparity gaps that exist. The strategies, much like Jordan just talked about are really aligned to how do we positively help students develop, come to schools and their true selves and also develop an academic identity and so things such as amplifying student voice, giving authentic opportunities for students to impact our system, authentically engaging with our family and community and then obviously providing professional development for

067our staff are things that are based in a lot of research that show that these really have a positive impact for our students, and change our system so that we better support our students. So this specific actions which you had a chance to look at the whole report, so I'm just gonna highlight some of the bigger things that are new. We are implementing the BARR at our high school starting next year, BARR stands for Building Assets Reducing Risks. We were invited to participate in a Gates Foundation grant, and we gladly accepted, which means that for five years, we get support on implementing BARR and BARR is, how do I say, education doesn't always have tons of lengthy empirical research that shows positive impact on strategies that we don't have budgets like corporations to, you know,

068spend a lot of money on research and evaluation, and BARR has made it through multiple levels of federal research done by the American Institute of Research on the positive impact, that a tab for ninth graders. What that means is students are put into teams, cohorts. And so a group of three teachers has the same 180 students, and then they so at North Campus next year, there will be four different teams. And now the student is not like Middle School where they're in the same class and may pull together, but they will all some point during their day have those same three teachers. Those three teachers meet regularly and talk about students and really have a protocol of how to make sure that they're being successful. And so BARR provides coaching for us, we will have

069a student success Dean who will work directly with all the teachers that are involved with BARR, also providing interventions for students and supporting student success and still what our high schools Oneka School and they have seen tremendous results in a few short years. They started with a failure rate of about 14% I think, around that further nine theaters and we're down less than 3% in less than three years. We have a similar failure rate right now. 13% of our ninth graders had one or more apps. And so we're excited about that. And so BARR aligns perfectly with increasing graduation, closing disparity gaps. And so the Gates Foundation has given money to BARR so that schools can implement that program with fidelity. Additionally, students are taught what are called I-time lessons, which is talking about social

070and emotional strategies, their values, how to be strong students. And so it's really exciting. And we're excited to be a part of that. And so that is the biggest change. And then continuing to further and deepen around the other strategies that we had with working with Promise Fellows, our AVID programs are growing in a really strong, we're seeing positive results there. And then continuing with the support around engagement of our students and families supported through our cultural liaison and a stop after each strategy because I wanna make sure I get questions and I'm also conscious that we're slightly behind on the agenda, so trying to do both at once. Are there any questions about strategy one or any of the things that you may have read? - [Member] I do have a question. So and

071listen, if this is out of line, please just I know you can't kick me, but you can kick management, right? So out of the students that are the 13% that have fail, have you determined what percentage of those are students of colors and students that are not? - [Alison] Yep, and it's so approximately and this is really approximate, 'cause this year, I'm not at North but you know, Angela, I know someone was looking into it for me, approximately 30% of those apps are students of color, which would mean that's an over representation. And then we looked at gender, we're looking at free and reduced lunch. So yeah, we've changed our grading practices in our campus. So we have seen a positive impact. It's just not as far as we want it yet. So this will

072be another way how we support students and what BARR they just came and introduced this to our 912 staff a couple of weeks ago, they said what changes is now you have more eyes on all students and they're looking at the whole student experience. So your science teachers really know how their students are doing in science, but they don't know how they're doing in other subjects and this creates a structure. So you have more eyes on supporting students and reaching out and holding students accountable to, you know, some of the supports we're trying to do, so. - [Member] I'll be very curious on how far you guys dig into that, right? 'Cause I know as a father of a former student, right, and I'm not gonna tell you what his grades are, 'cause he's get

073really upset with me, but, you know, I would, it's interesting to me, you know, to where the barriers are, right? What's creating that environment of them, you know, and their grades kind of going down? As far as I mean, now, I get a weekly assignment, you know, tasks that he's, you know, what assignments and maybe he's missing. Again, I'm not trying to get into that personal information, but be a very interested to hear that or so. - [Donald] Other questions, Miss Ellison? - [Jessica] I just have a question, does this complicate scheduling? - [Alison] Because, so what we've been doing is working with Stillwater, and that's part of our coach is to help us. So in the scheduling piece of teachers on those teams will have common prep periods. And so we've, you know, looked

074at how does our structure, support structure work in terms of what we've done before, and how can we reset them a little bit, we're really treating this as the first thing we were doing as a 912 High School campus. And so it does complicate it, we were confident we can figure it out. And we're actually pretty far along in the process. But it has that we've been working on it for months now already. And one of the things that BARR really helps with is your coaches with you and they want you to have 80% of the at least 80% of the students with those same three teachers but knowing that students still need to have different classes and it won't be 100%. And so even with ours high school campus that makes it more challenging

075for us. So they have been a great support stand if you can't get to the end of the first year you will you'll figure it out. And so it's a five year commitment as part of a grant. But like I said, the data and how they're expanding it nationally, it shows tons of promise and I can't, I think walk see a huge impact on success in ninth grade and ninth grade is a predictor for success and on time graduation. So even failing one class, you're it just drops in terms of the chances of you graduating on time, so. - Thank you. - Any other questions, comments? All right, thank you. - [Alison] So then goal number two is about and this is really, we've been doing this work, we've heard about this work and again,

076extending us is limiting, eliminating the disparity between the percentages of students of color, American Indian students, come on it's stuck, it can't go. American Indian students, students on free and reduced lunch and white students who are enrolled and earning a grade of C or higher in rigorous coursework by 2022-23. We've done a lot of really great work and have closed a lot of the gaps that existed prior to our previous plan around students enrolled in our concurrent enrollment, which include AP classes, college in the schools, classes are career pathway classes that we have agreements with Century College and other different post secondary institutions that we're working with. We still have some gaps that we're working on. But now we really are also continuing to deepen the focus on student success in those classes. And so

077making sure that students are passing those classes and we've been tracking that data, but how can we use the resources in this manner to support that even further. And so we look at academic skills, support for students, culturally responsive teaching, professional development for the teachers teaching those classes, and then again, continued support for all of our teachers and leadership around culturally responsive strategies. So we're working closely with Equity Alliance, Minnesota for students will have a chance to attend a summer immersion experience and Equity lines will actually be leading that. And students will attend with other students in other member districts and then also have teachers of color who look like them and an art teachers. And so that experience is super exciting. How do we provide students a preview of what they're going to learn

078in their upcoming classes, they can earn a credit or an elective credit for that work in the summer if they choose to do a project, but it's another opportunity to give students a positive experience and build their confidence before they enter their class. We also are looking at proactive student support throughout the year. So how can we help students have before and after school study groups, study groups during their time and then provide coaching for teachers to use those strategies in the class. And then again, really looking at we've done a lot of professional development to support our teachers. And so how can we provide even more coaching in partnership with Equity Alliance so that when teachers try different strategies in their classes, they can process how it works. Sooner than is a gap in

079our system, it's hard for us to always put those supports in place. And so teachers having time to process I tried this, I don't know if it went well, it was someone other than their administrator which can sometimes be hard to really truly have those coaching conversations. Any questions on strategy number two? All right, so our third strategy and our third goal is 100% of White Bear Lake Area Schools educators will receive professional development and cultural responsive teaching pedagogy so that students have greater access to culturally responsive staff by 22-23. The strategies, one talks about recruiting and retaining staff of color, I could have had that as our goal. That is a goal for our system. We talked about it frequently we have strategies in place. I talked a lot with people and we put

080the goal number three around the professional development of our current educators to help us make sure that we move toward that in a faster way. We have a wonderful system that's been working on many of those things but really wanting to commit that 100% of our educators will receive that. And it supports the work that we've been engaged in with the district equity and achievement team. And so looking at some intentional actions around that is how Equity Alliance again, has an educator of color network and how can we partner with them? I reached out to our teachers union, have a new name, I don't remember the number. White Bear Lake Areas, Tiffany help me? (speaking off microphone) Thank you, I'm trying really hard. (laughing) So I reached out to our president Tiffany Monzer, Executive Director

081of HR, and really how can we partner together to provide true support for our staff of colors so that we retain people and they're excited about being here while he has allowed us to do creative things around recruiting high staff, highly qualified staff of color, and so we're still in the works, but this plan would support that and we're excited about the potential that's there. Also, how can we have our staff of color help co-create professional development. So when they're experiencing professional development around culturally responsive, it's different than having training that we would give to all our white educators as well. So it's not that that professional development isn't needed, but how is it created on the one's through that meets the needs of our educators of color. And then again, professional development for our

082leaders and educators. Any other questions on goal three, as I talk faster than I ever talked and I'm pretty fast, so. - [Donald] Yore doing great. All right, so then really I worked very closely with Chris on the Willow Lane portion. And so to be identified as a racially identifiable school, your demographics have to be greater than 20% of your districts, average demographics and so, Willow Lane is I've had the pleasure of getting to know that school this year. It's been super fun, I have a reading buddy there. And so I'm gonna let Chris kind of go through and highlight some of the work that we worked closely together and it's aligned to the other goals that we have as well. - [Donald] Welcome Chris. - [Chris] Okay, so this one was looking at our

083elementary students would be at or above grade level in reading as measured by multiple assessments, and disparities and achievement will be eliminated between students of color, American Indian students, students on free and reduced lunch and white students. Our strategies are to increase classroom engagement by reducing disciplinary action, and then a trauma informed of students of course, and our goal was around our goal was last year to decrease was it was the what was the previous one? - [Alison] No, I don't remember the exact one. - [Chris] So it was, no, was it I, by reducing disciplinary action at school, our referrals went down by you have an idea to actually, our referrals went down by. - [Alison] 74, suspensions are decreased by 40%. And then referrals were by, down by 17%. - [Alison] And I

084think we looked at it over three years and our referrals were down by 42% over three years. So we're pretty excited about that and where we are at this year, right now compared to last year, or mid year at the end of the second quarter, we were down 56%. So we're pretty excited to see some really good movement in that area. - [Donald] Please forward. - [Chris] Let's considered the referral. An office discipline referrals, so a major referral, a writer, I don't know what they call-- - [Alison] For getting teacher can do an office referral. - [Chris] Any teacher can write a referral. So it's really working with staff on what that, what is appropriate to write one for. And to give you an idea numbers over three years ago, we were for the whole

085year, over 1700. And this year, mid year, we were at 245. So it's huge, massive it this is gonna be, we're just super excited about what that's gonna look like in our academic achievement, okay, so next one. - [Alison] So the actions really this is where you'll see a majority of the funds allocated. Chris has a student success coordinator who supports that work and really takes some proactive approaches. So it does support with academics as well. But how do we use restorative justice? And I mean, it's been huge, obviously this one, yeah. - [Chris] So the kids have done a lot with restorative dialogue, we've done a lot with PBI. So a lot of different prongs in there that are really helping with the dialogue in the system, and our teachers and our thinking, and

086we've done some things like don't write a referral for the first six weeks. It's not that we won't deal with those issues. We just won't be doing it that way. So we still met with parents, talked to parents did things the same way that we would have but we didn't really apply consequences 'cause we felt like it was relationship building for the students and the staff as well and time to get to know you. We do have a student mobility, that's a little high for what I think is heights. I don't know 59 when we looked at that 15% 16% but so we wanna get to know our students before we start doing that. And then our Miss Kendra Program is what you probably heard of the live program that started at Willow three years

087ago with the counselor model with the grain and to the Seller Family Foundation. And now we'll be switching over to a more teacher driven next year and they'll be doing some training with that in April, and then taking over the teachers will be teaching these lessons. - [Alison] The second goal, this one is the same as what I just talked about in terms of our goal for 100% of our teachers and so the strategies are the same. What's different is I've allocated money in there for specific sessions for professional development once it's created and developed solely for Willow Lane staff that Chris will be able to work with Equity Alliance around in terms of supporting them. And then again with how we're supporting and retaining racially and ethnically diverse teachers Willow Lane has their own

088specific goals on how we increase staff members who are representative of their student demographics. And then the third one was really fun to talk about and open up is Willow Lane because it's a racially identifiable school and has to have integrated an integration experience for students and so our students have participated with Otter Lake and visited Timeric Nature Center for some time, and it's been a positive experience and Chris and then the principal at Otter Lake, Cynthia Mueller, I really looking at ways to enhance that experience and make it even more impactful for students. And so we talked, we have some details around that in the plan, and then adding an additional experience for Willow Lane students but students at Oneka. And so Equity Alliance, Minnesota provides professional development for students around being culturally responsive

089leaders in fifth grade. And so each schools, students will go through that professional development and then they'll have activities together. And really, how can that positively impact our school system when kids at Willow Lane and kids who go to Hugo or Oneka have experienced very different schooling experiences, especially around racial diversity. And so how can we help students get to know each other and build relationships and skills early on, much like Jordan was talking about to positively impact our system from the younger ages, and we often think of the high school age kids and kind of bookending both experiences so that we can make sure our kids have a lot of power in setting the climate and culture amongst themselves for sure in schools and so how can we positively do that? So the Oneka

090staff is really excited about it, I think Willow Lane super excited about it. And so, really, I opened it up to all our elementary principals. And so there's a lot of opportunity in there for schools to have professional development to impact our student experience with a positive. - [Chris] And we met with the Equity Alliance today about that specific culturally responsive school leadership. And they work with all kids around identity and culture, and helping them even schools like Oneka, where they don't have a lot of diversity. They have those conversations and teach kids how to talk about them. And then we talked about wrapping culturally relevant language around a super excited happening. The second steps curriculum that all elementary schools are using. So how do you when you thinking about empathy, what does that mean,

091when you're looking at empathizing with people of different colors, different races, different cultures, ethnicities. How do we, how does that play into it and how can we leave that into all of the social emotional learning throughout the district because they think I think it goes both ways. Actually, personally, I think it will overlap our kids know how to engage with lots of different cultures, it's when we have kids that don't, it's hard on. They don't know how to interact, they have to get mature. - [Alison] So then each one of the strategies you'll see has progress measurements. They are either academic measures that we have student attendance and behavior, family surveys, professional development, attendance that's required in the plan. And I really tried to push us as a system in terms of the results of

092data that we already collect, and then include different ways to authentically collect student voice and staff voice. And I've had a lot of support and creating this plan. And so I just want to acknowledge all the different committees that have worked and supported. It's been really fun, I got a little bit obsessed with it. It reminded me of my dissertation like, yeah. (laughing) So it's exciting, and it has a really an opportunity to impact our system for the positive, so. I didn't do too bad with the time, all right. - Well done. - Any questions before we end? - [Donald] Questions, comments? - [Member] Okay, what does the family engagement portion, where does it fall? - [Alison] So. - [Chris] Needy students who maybe struggling with environmental issues outside of the school level. - [Alison]

093So really our cultural liaison to a lot of that work right now ,Equity Alliance is putting together a structure for what that could look like in terms of how we support authentic family engagement. And so part of that would be our cultural liaison is getting trained in a method of how do we have parents feel like their voices are authentically heard in school, have impacts really use their experience to help us guide what we're trying to do for students there's a lot of research on often we think of family engagement as one way, we as a school needs something and we're gonna give it to you. And we need you to come here. And instead of how can we be partners in education with you. And we've been doing work, it's in our strategic plan

094as well around an equitable family engagement framework. And so that work will be complemented with that, which we just are finalizing some of that work. So we could definitely come and share more I, also our new director of equity position that we just posted would have a lot of opportunity to influence moving that forward, 'cause that's really this year has been more foundational in terms of just setting up some of the systems for it. - [Member] Great, thank you. - [Donald] Are there questions, comments? Miss Thompson. - Can you be able to make a general comment about all the things that we've heard about tonight. I think it's really easy to kind of get stuck in your world and the experiences that you have individually. But this is some really remarkable work that is going

095on around the district and it's really fantastic to hear about all the different ways this equity work is webbing out. So, I'm so excited about the trajectory of the district. And in this case, and thank you for all of your work. And I should have said this when Cathryn and Jordan when everybody, were here still, but it's really incredible stuff, so thank you. - [Alison] Thank you. - [Member] Thank you very much. - [Alison] I just wanna say that the board meeting next time, I saw that the budget that I gave you was not actually what I needed you to see. So I will ask for a resolution to look at the budget and the plan. And so I'll make sure you get the overview page in your next board packet. - [Donald] Okay, thank

096you. - With that we move to our final discussion. Oh, I'm sorry. Dr. Newmaster, do you have a comment? - [Margaret] I do, and I also appreciate it. All the exciting things that are happening. And for somebody that's been around a long time waiting, it's good to see things happening and discussions and readings and we started things before but I don't think they've ever quite gotten to first base. I mean, we've tried many things. So I really appreciate it everything that was presented. And I believe in our mission, and I believe in our academic achievement strategies, and the only thing I would ask is that we remember that your Elementary Media Centers hopefully will be strengthened again. We wanna increase student achievement and create equitable educational opportunities all of us do. We wanna reduce academic

097disparities. And we look at that in all of these ways. And the one thing that I have said before, and I'll say it again, is there's multiple national studies that provide data demonstrating that a robust Elementary Media Center is a significant variable in creating, playing a critical role in reducing the achievement gap between kids, especially kids that are marginalized, but also improving the achievement of all of our kids. So I do hope that we're gonna look at that, because that's another fact we've got lots of good factors in play. But this year, we've had a big gap. And I know that our Facilities Committee for the presented to us that all the media centers were going to be improved. The Board approved the financing for that big project. So now we're gonna have wonderful media

098centers coming down the pike, and we need to put our media program back so that they can provide that literacy, trans-literacy, programming, individual support for all of our kids that have these things that are just driving them as they have their own agency, they need somebody to help. I hope we look at that again. And that's part of the program because the data is there. We've got good stuff going on, let's keep it up and add. - [Donald] Thank you very much. With that, I know we're running a little long, but we'll move into our last discussion item B four, which is the Project Labor Agreement Consideration. Before I turn it over to Dr. Kazmierczak, I wanna just say and make kind of a statement and just let everybody know as we discussed this consideration,

099we discuss this project, I want to just say that, and most of you already know this about me that I am a member of the Building Trades, a proud member of the Building Trades, have been in the unique construction industry for 25 years plus, but I wanted to make sure that everybody knew that and also I want to make sure that everybody knows that at no time, in this consideration or depending on, you know, no matter how this thing turned out, would there be any financial gain for the organization in which I belong to? So, I will tell you that I would plan on abstaining from the vote just because I think it would be proper to do so. But I wanted to make sure that I said that before we move forward with any

100talks. With that Dr. Kazmierczak. - [Wayne] Thank you, Mr. Mullin. I'd like to welcome to Mick Waldspurger here tonight, and our school board's legal counsel design to facilitate a conversation around this topic, so thanks for coming mate. It's running a little late, but-- - No, no problem. - Probably a minute. - [Mick] Thank you for having me, everybody. Sorry, I have a sore throat tonight. So if I'm reaching for my water, that is why. I got talk today about the potential benefits and the potential costs of a Project Labor Agreement. And what I'm gonna really do for you is outline the arguments that are mayor just told me and it's going to be up for you to weigh those types of considerations and make your own determinations. But I will give you my view on

101it if you ask me. But again, I ultimately think it's your responsibility to weigh in the various considerations. I will provide you a summary in writing under the attorney client privilege after this meeting, not directly after but in the days following so that you have that with some additional detail. And the reason for that is in the event that you were sued, and let's say you decide to go forward with one, you decided not to go forward with one, I might include additional information in that attorney client privileged document that I wouldn't necessarily want publicly available in a school board meeting. So you'll have that. I would encourage you to ask me questions throughout the process, but I'm also gonna encourage you not to advocate for position until I'm done. And then certainly if you

102get one at full discussion, you can and the reason for that is as the board chair mentioned, there are potential issues of conflict of interest, and I want to talk about those, I wanna talk about the process. And that is really meant to protect you. It's not meant to be accusatory to suggest that anybody has anything wrong or anything to hide. And again, the information was just put out up front. But there is something called a statutory conflict of interest. There is a common law, conflict of interest, and of course, and there's something called an appearance of impropriety, which is something we can also talk about, but I just wanna do that to protect you 'cause I do represent the board. I don't represent any individual employees, I don't represent superintendent, I represent the board.

103And as part of that my job is to help you make informed decisions that protect you as well. So with that, some of you probably have a good sense of what a Project Labor Agreement is, and some might not. Project Labor Agreement is, the short version is an agreement between public employer like a school district and an exclusive representative. So a union usually a Trades Council, an overarching kind of entity. And as part of that agreement, the school district agrees to designate again, the exclusive rep as the exclusive representative of all individuals who are gonna work on that construction project. And as part of that, all contractors and subcontractors who work on the contract must agree to abide by the terms and conditions of the collective bargaining agreements, that the exclusive representative has an effect

104for the various triggers. So your pipe fitters, your plumbers, your carpenters, your painters, you know, you name it, each of the various trade groups, there's a collective bargaining agreement, and anyone who works in any of those areas has to be paid according to that and so the employers have to pay them pursuant to those collective bargaining agreements. Additionally, under some Project Labor Agreements, there can be requirements that all hiring has to happen through union hiring halls, or referrals through hiring halls, all selection of employees can I have to occur through union hire roles. So it just depends that there are some variations that occur with different ones. But the in the nutshell what I described is what a Project Labor Agreement is. The primary benefit of a Project Labor Agreement is you have a guarantee

105that there's never gonna be a strike. Because the Trades Council, the overarching exclusive representative can guarantee even if those collective bargaining agreements expire, you're not gonna ever have any kind of strike, work stoppage, boycott, picketing, you name it, they keep everybody in line. And so if you have a situation where you have a volatile labor market, that can be a significant benefit, you know, if you have strikes on the horizon, or things are happening around you, in that would be a concern. That might be a reason that take you toward a Project Labor Agreement, because you get to avoid all that. And when you get to avoid strikes, that takes you to the other major benefit is that Project Labor Agreements generally have a high level of assurance. The projects will be completed on time

106because you don't have work stoppages. So because you don't have the strike, you don't have the work stoppage. Now, you'll see as I go through with each of these, I'm always gonna give you the counter argument. And including to the the cost of Project Labor Agreements. The counter argument that non-unionized businesses will tell you is that you're saying that you want a Project Labor Agreement to avoid strikes, but what you're really saying is, so you're using unionized labor, which presents a risk of a strike, if you never use unionized labor, you wouldn't have a risk in the first place. So you're being asked to use unionized labor and then enter into this more onerous Project Labor Agreement to avoid a strike and non-unionized businesses say that doesn't make sense. That's a nonsensical kind of situation.

107The other thing that they'll say in terms of delay, non-unionized businesses is that delays can largely be avoided through penalty clauses in contracts, standard construction contracts, and that's generally how it is done, I would tell you is that if someone is over in the days of you know, the day point that something is due, they have to pay so much in liquidated damages, and that goes up a non profit. So that's another way to keep the project on time. And that's what non-unionized groups will tell you is that their way of doing that. The other main argument that you see in favor of a Project Labor Agreement is that and we've received letters, I don't know if the boards have been receiving them. I know that the district as a whole has been letters and

108emails, but folks will argue that it helps create careers and secures higher wages. It secures better health insurance benefits, it secures retirement benefits that wouldn't otherwise be available, and in turn, that benefits families in your community. And it also benefits the students who are attending then the schools in your community. And so the notion here is that by doing this Project Labor Agreement, you're really helping out societally, if you will, and non-unionize businesses then counter that argument by saying, well, that just confirms that you're praying a premium, you're paying a higher price for your construction project, because that how else could you pay everybody higher wages, higher retirement benefits, higher health insurance benefits, et cetera. So let's talk about the potential costs. Non-unionized businesses will say that require a Project Labor Agreement has a significant

109potential to divide the community that just came together and approved your referendum. And they argue that that'll occur because roughly 70% of the workforce is non-unionized. And it makes little sense to argue to exclude that 70% of the workforce in your community. Project Labor Agreement proponents or PLA proponents will say, wait a minute, nobody's really excluded. Anybody can bid on the project. You just have to agree to the terms and conditions of the collective bargaining agreement that's in place for the unionized employees under the exclusive representative. And I wanna talk about that for a minute. 'Cause this might be one place where, you know, the arguments kind of brought up. But there is some reality here. And the reality is that what if a non-unionized business provides higher pay and higher benefits that happen to

110be provided in their collective bargaining agreement, you're actually required to provide the lower benefits. If you in order to bid on the Project Labor Agreement, you have to change and provide the lower benefits. What if you have a very small business, let's say for example, a small business of painters, maybe five painters, and they're all equal owners in the company, and they live in the White Bear Lake community, and they can't pay wages, insurance benefits, retirement benefits as high as what's required and the collective bargaining agreement through the exclusive representative. They would love to bid on it, they bid lower. They're a small business there. They run lean, and they would all benefit and they're all in your community, but they can't do it. Not that they're shorting the workers 'cause they are their workers.

111They are their owners, but they can't afford it. And when I think of that, I think that the concept that no one would expect my law firm of 16 attorneys to pay the same as a law firm like Dorsey Whitney that has hundreds and hundreds of attorneys across the country and across the world. So there are different level benefits. Another tough question is what if the non-unionized business pays lower wages, what makes a higher health insurance premium contribution or a lower health insurance premium contribution for that matter? As you probably know, most insurers will not allow a business to change as health insurance premium contributions mid year. So the practical reality is there is truth to the notion that if you are paying different benefits than what the collective bargaining agreement requires your Project Labor

112Agreement, it can be very tough for you to bid and work on that agreement. And make those same kind of benefits available to your employees. And you have to ask too is it realistic to expect that your community businesses are going to do that or be able to do that? And I would just ask you, how realistic would it be for you to say, we're gonna take our teachers union here, and wipe out their collective bargaining agreement and pay them the exact same wages and benefits that are paid by a neighboring district? Well, depending which direction you go, it might be great. You might say that's lesser pay for I mean, we might save a lot of money. Teachers might be very unhappy. Well, maybe if you go toward nouns, you're not an old man's

113rupees higher than you or not, but maybe they do. And then what then so think of how hard that shift is, and that's really what businesses have to do in order to bid on the Project Labor Agreement. So that's the the primary criticism that you hear and there's some validity to some of those points. Just like there's a validity to the point that you're not gonna have work stoppages with a Project Labor Agreement. Community members, when you read our articles and you pull periodicals on this. Community members may conclude that requiring a Project Labor Agreement is I personally and politically motivated decision instead of a business decision that they expect you to make. In regard to personal motivation. You just have to review the emails that you get in support of the Project Labor Agreement.

114What do they almost always say? I'm a member of the Union. My life has been changed, my life has been bettered by being a member of the Union. And I applaud that that's great. But what are they saying do this because it's going to benefit me as part of the Union going forward. So there's your personal motivation piece. Non-unionized businesses will tell you that requiring the Project Labor Agreement can erode public trust and cause the public to conclude that you're using those public funds to further some interest other than finding the lowest responsible bidder other than being a steward of tax dollars that you should. In regard to political motivation, sometimes this is something that had not occurred to me initially. But when I did a lot of research on that, I found that typically,

115your trades counselors make significant donations politically. They don't make them equally to both parties. You know, in 2018, there was a lawsuit against the Minneapolis School District, which was ultimately dismissed voluntarily by the group that brought it. But as part of that one of the pieces of data that came out is the Minneapolis Building Trades Council contributed exclusively to candidates in Minnesota DFL. And so there is your argument for political motivation as opposed to a balanced approach. Non-unionized businesses argue that there are fewer bidders when you use a PLA and fewer visitors means less competition and less competition means higher costs. And the premise of that argument, I would tell you that fewer businesses will submit bids, I believe is undeniably true. But what we don't know is whether fewer bidders actually translates into higher

116costs. There's no way to know. So and, you know, part of that argument, you know, obviously, it's true part of it. We just don't know if that's true or not. But and non-unionized businesses will persuasively counter and come back and say, the more bidders you have, that certainly doesn't present a risk of higher cost. You know, there's no risk of having more bidders, there's only a risk of having fewer bidders. And they also point to a 2017 study, and I can't tell you the validity of the study, but it is out there from 2017 saying that Project Labor Agreements increase the cost of projects by roughly 20 per square foot. Again, I don't have access to that, I can't scrutinize that. But that is something that organizations point to. Minnesota courts have held it under

117the bid law. You may require a Project Labor Agreement as part of the big law so that that's not a legal concern. But what we do have is other lawsuits around the country that pop up asserting that there are other grounds for challenging these agreements. And one of the more significant grounds it continues to pop up lately is based on the Janice decision. And as some of you may know, in 2018, the US Supreme Court said that it is unconstitutional to require an employee to pay a public employee to pay union dues, because some of those dues go to advancing the union's political interests, which may be contrary to the employees, constitutional views or their individual views and constitutional rights. And so if an employee can't be compelled to pay union dues, non-unionized businesses argue

118that an employee can't be compelled to work for union, can't be compelled to accept the terms of a union contract. Similarly, they argue requirement employer to pay wage rates similar or wage rates of the Union raises similar concerns. Now I'm not gonna tell you I think those lawsuits are gonna succeed or not, frankly, it's uncertain. But what we do know is there is an increase living litigation. I believe, in my view of my heart, when you have a Project Labor Agreement, whether you win at the end of the day is a different question. And I believe that based on current law right now, you probably the end of the day, if you decide to go with Project Labor Agreement, but it's gonna be a fight, and we already know from other organizations, you know, ABC

119is your big anti Project Labor Agreement organization. And I'm not saying that's right or wrong, but we know that they've already corresponding with the district, they're watching it carefully. You've got the largest bond ever in the history of the state of Minnesota for school districts, you better believe folks are gonna be looking at this as the test case. There's no question about that in my life. So and when you have litigation revolving around contracts or construction types of things, almost never are they covered by insurance, which means you're gonna be funding that lawsuit out of your pocket. Again, regardless of how it turns out, at the end of the day, that's a cost that you have to be aware of going forward. I do wanna talk about potential conflict of interest, just so that you're

120aware of what's out there and the process to go forward to protect yourself. Don, you mentioned that you have a position with St. Paul, Construction Buildings and Trades Council. And I would wanna make sure that you have gone through that process so that nobody can come back later and accuse you of having not done it properly. And anybody else that might have an interest, one way or another that could raise some question. You always wanna be upfront and transparent about these things. So first of all, there's two types of conflicts of interest. There's a statutory conflict of interest, which is the most significant other it's a gross mystery here, you can go to jail for a year and $3,000 fine if you violate that statute, and what the statute says is that a public officer

121who is authorized to take part in any manner in the making of any sale, these are contract. So you sit on the board, you're authorized to enter into a contract a Project Labor Agreement is a contract. In official capacity shall not voluntarily have a personal financial interest in that contract, or personally benefit there from, of course, public officers are school board members. So as I mentioned, there's a significant penalty from that. In addition, you can be removed from the board and the contract is void if any board member has a statutory conflict of interest. The courts have repeatedly held that you have that conflict of interest, even if it's an indirect interest. All that matters is you have some personal financial gain, small as it may be any personal financial gain. So some examples that

122we know from the courts and from the Minnesota Attorney General's office are if you hold stock or shares in the entity that's entering into the Project Labor Agreement here. So let's say it's a Trades Council if you happen to hold stock or shares in that, if you have issue stock or shares, if you're an officer or manager of that company or that entity, you automatically have a conflict of interest. If you receive a salary, commission or other compensation that's affected in any part or any way. By the granting of that contract, you have a conflict of interest, you do not have a conflict of interest just by virtue of being an employee. So the courts and the AG really distinguish between kind of an officer manager position and an ordinary employee, if you're just a

123regular employee, there's no conflict of interest there. When it's a statutory conflict of interest, you can't cure the conflict by abstaining from the vote. You have a conflict whether you vote or not. And that's what makes it so difficult to have that. And in addition, the Attorney General and a couple of opinions have said that it extends beyond just voting. It extends to participating in discussions about it and that's why I wanted to hold off until I'm all done. Again, it can, if you're just trying to convince others, directly or indirectly, to enter into a contract that would otherwise have a conflict, you have a conflict. So you're filing a lawsuit. So what do you do? How do you vet this out? How do you make sure you're clean? Well, the Minnesota Attorney General's laid

124out a process and the courts have to this said that the school board decides in the first instance, whether a conflict of interest exists. And what you do is you have to gather all the relevant facts, and then you have to adopt a resolution with findings and conclusions about whether conflict exists. And courts give that a significant amount of weight and they could overturn it if it's ridiculous, obviously, you know, you own a company that sells vans and you enter into a contract or sold lands to the school district and you're on the school board. And you say you pass a resolution saying no conflict, obviously. The courts are gonna turn that over. But if it's a reasonable situation, they're gonna give it a lot of weight. So it's a process you wanna follow. How

125do you gather that information? There are a number of ways you could do it. You can use a questionnaire we can develop a questionnaire, provide information that way. We can have affidavits, we could do an interview, have somebody do interviews of board members. And ultimately, if you're not sure, you can ask the Attorney General, for an opinion, although this Attorney General and the previous one, have issued very few opinions, and in the past, they use to but over time but not very common. So let's move on to a common law conflict of interest. A common law conflict of interest is broader than statutory conflict of interest. You can have a common law conflict of interest when you don't have a direct financial benefit or gain from a contract, and what the law says is that

126you have a common law conflict of interest if you have any direct interest in the outcome. It doesn't have to be financial. And so the classic example I can give to you is, let's say that you're on the school board and your spouse as a teacher in the school district. And let's say you have completely separate financial accounts, but you share a house and you both contribute to your expenses in your home in some way, and your spouse is brought up for termination in front of the school board. That's a common law conflict of interest, you have a direct interest in the outcome. Head, certainly your marital happiness does. So you can't vote on that, and unlike a statutory conflict of interest point, at a common law conflict of interest, you can cure it or

127avoid it by abstaining from the vote. And so that's a critical distinction between the two, although the penalties are really essentially the same, if you go forward with that. So same process, you follow the exact same process for vetting out in determining whether there's a conflict of interest in terms of an appearance of impropriety. I don't wanna go through that too much. That's just a matter of undermining public trust and confidence in what you're doing. You know, the questions come up from the public, do you have some self dealing interest, some benefits, some motivation. And the way to really address that is being as transparent as you can talking about things as openly as you can, so that everyone knows where you stand as a board. And if there's a potential need to evaluate whether

128conflict of interest exists, and I would encourage you to do so here not because I am concluding that one does. I don't have nearly enough information to draw any kind of conclusions. But there's enough that would raise questions external to the spot that I think you have to build in time to that, to go through that process. Before you make a decision on whether you're gonna go for just one other consideration you have for Project Labor Agreement. And it doesn't have to take long, you know, I'm not suggesting this is a month by month by month. You can fill out questionnaires, you can answer questions, you can have it done in a week, and then come back and pass a resolution at your next board meeting. But I do think you have to make that

129decision before you vote on whether or not you had to move forward with the Project Labor Agreement. Because let's say you go forward, vote yes. Or one of your folks has a conflict of interest. Now you got a problem, that's too late to address it then. So that's the kind of the nutshell version of it, if you will. I'm happy to answer any questions. I do think this is one of the areas where I remember what my I clerked for a Supreme Court justice in Wisconsin. And I remember he would tell me all the time, which is like common sense beer guidepost, I think that's about the best advice I can give you when it comes to weighing out the considerations here. Don't jettison your common sense. 'Cause you you should have some sense of

130where to go with this, but one way or another, then make it move forward. So with that, I'll take any questions you have. And then again, it may be wise to delay in advocating for position until you've gone through that process, in my opinion, but I don't have control of that, your board chair has control that as the Presiding Officer at this table. - [Donald] So, before we go there, I just wanna the, as far as a survey goes, I obviously I fairly respect that I have a conflict of interest, right. I've said that in the beginning, I'm saying that now, I know that even without filling out a survey, but I think that probably the survey would be the best course of action to kind of move this thing through to make sure that

131we're all we're being as transparent as possible. I do have a couple questions that I'm gonna be very vague on my questions is that you had talked about politically earlier about the Minneapolis building traits. Do you know how many Republicans are inside of the Minneapolis building trades for them to make contributions to? - I don't. - In your research. - [Mick] I don't but I know it's the Union as a body as an entity, not the numbers that made the-- - [Donald] I'll typically tell you that in it's been my experience over the 25 years and being a political director of a union, right, that we give contributions equally across the board to both parties. But that being said, and then I also had a question, probably for Dr. Kazmierczak. At one time, you had

132said that this project would be also considered that we would enact prevailing wage on the project. Is that still okay? - That's what we currently do. - [Donald] That's what we currently do across the board, we would add to prevailing wage. So would that be would that be your intent to consistently do that? - [Wayne] I think that is part of this conversation as well. - [Donald] Okay, so you familiar what prevailing wages. - [Mick] Generally speaking you have to, so you're gonna pay once you be to like, your gonna pay. - [Donald] Well, I know exactly what it is, but I'd like for you to explain it to the group is if so, so that everybody knows what it is. - [Mick] Yeah, my understanding is, so you're gonna have an established wage, whatever

133the prevailing wage of the community is through the union contracts. - [Donald] Is done by county? - [Mick] Yep, and it's going to be provided so anybody who works on the project has to pay that wage rate. - [Donald] So in the wages is determined by the Department of Labor and Industry every year they collect all this dotting information every June right? They then publish that information in July. So every year, there is a prevailing wage that's set. - [Mick] As county by county. - [Donald] Yeah, it's by county, all 87 counties have a prevailing wage. Ramsey County being the one of the most dominant, that get reports in and Hennepin County typically set a wage and they have the Department of Labor and Industry has a system in place that manages that. So it's

134not set by any set person. It's set by county from the state. So I just want to make sure that everybody's aware of that. - [Mick] So I do have that that's separate from Project Labor Agreement, but certainly is a consideration for the board to have in deciding whether to go forward with you know, and how you want to go forward with the project, that's totally within your purview. Totally legal to do that, certainly within your purview one way or another. - [Donald] Okay, so did you have a question? - [Member] Yeah, I think you just answered that's completely separate from PLA to we would have to adopt policy to do that for this project, or how would that work? - [Mick] I mean, probably would make the most sense to do that, or, you

135know, take some guidance perhaps on that. But it is a resolution that's done and it's part of your bid process then so that when folks bid on the contract, they know that they're gonna have to pay prevailing wage, 'cause that it impacts their estimate of their costs. So for that. - [Donald] So, Dr. Newmaster so for that, would there be a conflict of interest for me, because the state sets that wage, I that the Trades Council does not set the wage. - [Mick] I don't, again, I don't believe that there will be, I don't know any way that it could be or would be, I would certainly talk with you about if you had a concern, I want to make sure you're protected. And, you know, again, we're transparent. We follow the process if you

136have a concern. But sitting here right now, just because of your position on the Trades Council, I don't know how that would impact prevailing wage determination. I don't see a conflict from that as I sit here right now, but I'm happy to talk about that with you privately and gathering information if you'd like. - [Donald] Okay, Dr. Newmaster. - [Margaret] I guess my question is for Wayne and Tim or whoever said we've had some big projects on what was the stadium some of the stadium work and I guess we never talked about PLAs or wages or benefits we just in my mind and just got bit. So how did we do big things in the past? - [Wayne] We follow bid law. We didn't have a, we didn't have appeal in place. Just follow the

137existing statue went through a bidding process. - So did we do. - So the lowest responsible bidder was awarded the contract. - [Margaret] And it seems to me likely pick the lowest bid. - [Wayne] Yep, and then prevailing wage provisions have been included. - [Margaret] Okay, well, that's what sort of happened, so was that included, so they didn't put it below sustainable wages. Does that say anything about benefits, prevailing wage? - [Wayne] So do, I am trying to go to make and but I mean, understanding that prevailing wage does determine benefits and everything else. - [Mick] On a more limited scope than practically what a prevailing wage does not-- - [Wayne] What happens, prevailing wage does not include as industry funds, for example, if a contract, if a collective bargaining agreement as a industry fund

138that management and the members all contribute into, it doesn't include that fund, but it does include benefits. - [Mick] But not like retirement benefits, for example, would include health insurance, health insurance, and I'll verify that for you, but. - You should. - Yeah, but I do not believe that there's a retirement benefit requirement. - [Donald] I don't believe, I believe that in prevailing wage, they include the retirement benefit, but the retirement benefit doesn't get paid to the organization which holds it. So for example, if Mick is working as a painter, and the retirement benefit is $10 an hour, let's just say, then that would get put on to his check. And he would then still get it and be able to invest it how he wishes, but it's still required that he pays the benefit

139is my understanding of what it is. - [Mick] And I'll certainly clarify that in that follow up communication to the board - [Donald] Miss Ellison. - [Jessica] I have several questions. So, my first question is, you said that 70% of labor in Minnesota is non-union, is that correct? - [Mick] That's the argument that is made repeatedly by actually the argument is slightly higher than 70% is non-unionized, that's made by the non-unionized workforce, so. - [Jessica] Okay, 'cause I did some research and I was trying to find some objective information on the internet, and it's hard, and the Bureau of Labor statistics say that Minnesota is one of the higher union percentages in the country. But so my question is 70%, non-union, my fear. And I guess, you know, maybe this is just a comment is

140when you were talking about eroding public trust, the idea that if we decide to limit our bids to a smaller percentage of the population, when we have just asked for $326 million. I mean, is that going to be something that people in this community really come after us for? - [Mick] I would expect you would face criticism for that, yes. - [Jessica] But when you say so face criticism, that's the next, my next question is then, what is the likelihood of us getting sued? - [Jessica] I think if you enter into a Project Labor Agreement, you're unlikely to get a lawsuit from a average Joe citizen, you're likely to get a lawsuit from one of the large organizations like ABC, and I can't remember the acronym I can look it up by from my materials

141but whether it's American builders and something company, and they're the ones that typically bring it and they look, you know, for there are certain test cases and the $326 million bond referendum is a test case. - [Jessica] Yeah, and I wrote that down that you said test case 'cause I was trying to do some research to see what other districts have entered into PLAs. And I found the one about Minneapolis and so forth. Lake is done one recently as well. Roseville just the-- - [Mick] It's amount to you, chair. Farmington did reject one recently as well. - [Jessica] North St. Paul, Maplewood, Eagan-- - [Donald] Farmington rejected one a while ago? - [Mick] I can't remember, is a few years but not too far. - [Donald] Can I just clarify something as you're asking this

142next question. She asked you where you got the 70%, can you tell her where you got? - [Mick] Yeah, I got that 70% out of the statistic and the lawsuit against the Minneapolis School District. - [Donald] And the ABC? - [Mick] And the union did not contest that number, by the way, they never contested that number anywhere in their materials, they made arguments, other arguments, but they never contest that, and that was the exact number is 70, I get to the exact number that was put in the materials, I believe it was 71% is what they said. So, again, for whatever you, those are the arguments are made. That was not a position that was disputed by the Minneapolis Building and Trades Council. - [Jessica] I mean, it's less than half. I mean, it's significantly

143less than half. So we're talking about, right, okay. Because and the reason I'm asking you about being sued is that if we have this, you know, this huge bond referendum, they might see it as a test case, and that insurance won't cover our litigation. Do we know that our insurance doesn't cover the litigation? - [Mick] I would be highly confident telling you that it's very, very unlikely because it's a contract dispute, and it's a construction dispute, and we represent roughly half the school districts in the state and I have never seen a construction display covered by insurance. - [Jessica] Can we know what it costs in Minneapolis Public Schools during their lawsuit? - [Mick] I don't. - [Jessica] I mean, there's no need to go to court or anything, but. - I don't know what

144they. - [Jessica] So in your professional opinion, it's possible, highly possible. - [Mick] I think it's likely you're gonna get a lawsuit. Again, I'm not gonna comment on I think that, in the final analysis, you would likely prevail given the current state of the law, but I can't say that for sure. - [Jessica] Right, but yeah, so the reason I'm asking all these questions is I'm thinking about our timeline. And I'm thinking about our students and I'm thinking about our teachers and our community. That I'm just trying to understand that if we made this decision, and then we were sued, how that would impact us financially, how that would impact our Community Trust. Because I'm trying to wrap my brain around why we would not continue with a bidding process like we have in the

145past 'cause I looked up the last two that we approved in February for the roofing projects. I believe we're both union companies. So it's not like we're not hiring union companies. We are, we're hiring union, we're hiring non-union. Your comment about small businesses made me think, too, that I'm trying to understand the benefit of signing a Project Labor Agreement, when we are already in a lower low bid process. And I know I wrote down I took a lot of notes on all the reasons that you gave. But I'm just trying to understand. - [Mick] Yeah, so and I will just tell you what I view it as, the arguments as they play out, and you're free to reject or accept this. I view this as a societal benefit. The main argument is that for the

146project look in favor of the Project Labor Agreement, no delay, labor, peace and harmony, higher wages for employees and so forth. Again, how are those happening? That means you're paying more, that's the only way that can happen. That's not a it's not that I'm making up thing, that there's only one way that can happen. And so it's a societal give, if you're thinking that, that societal benefit outweighs the other things that are there, then folks will do that Project Labor Agreement. If you think that's the expectation of your community, then folks will do that Project Labor Agreement. If you think the expectation of the community is we're going to be at a lowest responsible bidder, and we're gonna include as many community groups and businesses as you can, then you might look at not going

147in Project Labor Agreement. So in every community, I don't have my finger on the pulse of your community like you do. Every community is gonna have a different sense. But that's for you to decide, that's what I was saying ultimately, you've got to weigh that out and say, where is this community gonna come back? And without a doubt, someone's gonna be unhappy? The question is, what's the expectation as a whole? There's got to be vocal minorities on both sides or vocal groups on both sides. What's the expectation of as a whole of your community? - [Donald] Mr. Chapman. - [Kim] Mick, has there's really ever been to your knowledge class action lawsuit in a case like this against a school district or a municipality? - Mick] No, you know, the closest we had was the

148Minneapolis one, and but there are some missteps there, and I don't want to go through them all because I don't want to say how to create it. But I believe that they had in that case, and number ABC was essentially representing a number of folks who were potential bidders. But one of the problems, there are a couple problems in there. They're not I'm actually tried to go and go through the bid process. So they couldn't say they actually got their hands dirty, if you will even have standing to challenge it. But that was kind of the closest that we saw. There is a lawsuit, I think it's out of Pittsburgh that's going forward right now. But that's on a slightly different basis. They have a different bid law in Pittsburgh than we do here. And

149so I think that's the main thrust of that challenge. And there are multiple prospective bidders who are part of that as well. - [Kim] Didn't one just recently get leveled, though, Mick? - [Mick] I'm not aware they did, if it did, I'm not aware of that. But I get, I know that the thrust of that was under their state bid law versus you know, it's resolved in Minnesota that you can do it under our bid law. But it was the Pennsylvania bid law that they were looking at there. - [Donald] Miss Beloyed. - [Mick] No, maybe next time. - [Donald] Miss Beloyed. - [Deborah] So say we do a PLA and whatever group decides that they're gonna bring a lawsuit, does that stop construction? - [Mick] Probably not, it's not, the law, again, this is

150a developing area in law, but probably not usually what courts will say is that, in order to stop construction, you have to put up a hefty bond surety bonds and make sure that nobody's hurt. And courts don't like to do you know, they don't like to halt the process specially for schools, they really don't, so, probably not. That was the best answer I can give you. And again, I I believe that based on existing law, you probably prevail, even if you go with a Project Labor Agreement. It's just that I can't tell you you do because the law is not well developed in that area. What I can tell you is I think lawsuit's likely and you're I think you're gonna have to pay for it out of pocket. But again, right now based on

151the current law, I do think you probably prevail. - [Deborah] Thank you, one more. - [Donald] Sure. - [Deborah] So what's the difference then, if we're gonna do PLA versus prevailing wage at the prevailing wages, what we need to pay why, what's the difference between the two? - [Mick] Yeah, so the prevailing wage basically says that, as all of your businesses and White Bear Lake who wants to participate, just have to pay whatever that prevailing wage is, right/ But under the Project Labor Agreement, you have to actually abide by all the terms and conditions of employment for workers in that classification. So let's say you've got carpenters coming in. If carpenters get two 15 minute breaks, and a 45 or a 40 minute lunch, and, you know, there's work rules and that collective bargaining agreement,

152and there's the retirement benefits, and there's, you know, whatever it is, you got to follow that collective bargaining agreement as if it's yours. And that is a much more significant level than the prevailing wage. - [Deborah] Yeah, that's what I was wondering was the underlying what were the besides just the benefits and everything is that. - [Mick] Yeah, so you think about. - [Deborah] Also having, and is that included? I mean, is there like a template for PLAs but they're mostly all look the same. - [Mick] They look very similar, so when you look at them, they look similar, but again, there are variations like the union hall hiring variation, the authority of the exclusive representative. So the Trades Council to make some decisions, some of that changes from agreement to agreement. But the problem,

153you know, when you go across the country prevail and our excuse me, a PLA in California or New York is gonna be vastly different than one here because the underlying collective bargaining agreements have very different terms and conditions than what we're gonna see here through your St. Paul Trades Council or your Minneapolis Trades Council, but the key is you got to comply with those underlying collective bargaining agreements for the employees in that classification, as if it's your agreement. So just like if we jettisoned your teacher's collective bargaining agreement and said, you're gonna have to follow from this day for the rest of the project, you're gonna have to follow mounds views. That's sort of what it's like. - [Deborah] Can we negotiate any of that? - [Mick] No. - [Donald] Yes, you can. - [Mick]

154You can not negotiate the terms of the collective bargaining agreements. - [Donald] You can negotiate the terms of the prevailing of the Project Labor Agreement, it's a negotiable. - [Mick] Yeah, the question, though, as I understood is, can you negotiate the terms of the underlying collective bargaining agreements? The answer that is I've never seen that done. - [Donald] No, but is the terms of the of the, of the Project Labor Agreement, those are all negotiated terms. - [Deborah] Like, could you put in a penalty clause, could you-- - Oh, sure. - [Deborah] And all of that stuff could be included in the PLA? - [Mick] Again, subject to your power to negotiate, sure. - [Donald] Mr. Chapman, and then Mr. Arcand. - [Kim] Getting back to a Clerks' reading between the lines basically, I just

155wanna clarify what I thought you can send them directly and that is we could possibly be subject to a class action in this state. I mean, there's nothing statutorily or case law at this point that we're-- - [Mick] There is nothing that would stop that. - [Kim] This is enjoining or banding together worse citizen groups of that were not happy to file a class action against us. - [Mick] Hey, businesses in particular that you that would be bidding on the project. If they did certain things they could establish standing, I think, but citizens, I would argue probably do not have a right to challenge it. There's not, to my knowledge, any basis for them to challenge a Project Labor Agreement, because the courts in Minnesota have said you can do it through a bid process,

156you can include a Project Labor Agreement, as a requirement of the bid process. So I don't believe the citizen could challenge it. - [Kim] Could they not argue that we were not acting in their best interest malfeasance or-- - [Mick] Not unless you had a conflict of interest, you know, that they could go and that would, you know, that would void the entire contract, but short of that I'm not aware of a basis for them for a citizen to do that. - [Donald] Dr. Newmaster. - [Margaret] I'm listening to this. And then I'm thinking back to the fact that our district employs many different unions. And we respect the expertise of the people in the different unions, and we would be upset, if someone who did not have the certification or the requirements for the

157position, whether it's the Boilermakers lessons, or the teacher that's teaching the class or the bus driver that's driving, we would think that was totally reasonable. So I'm looking at that, you know, PLA sounds appealing, and we all want everybody to have a good job and rights and benefits. But if we don't look at the fact that most of the people that work for this district, are members of the Union, I believe, isn't that the truth as we settle contracts and things, we look at mutually organized and negotiated that's, I don't think that's a negative or a scary thing. I guess that's what I'm saying. PLA sounds like it's almost as good, I don't know, it is the thing that we're discussing, that we have this huge pile of money. And the community wants us to

158spend it. As, I don't wanna say cheaply, but or mentioned any particular store, you should shop it, but I mean, I'm a bargain hunter, too. So they want us all to be bargain hunters, rather than them look at the jobs that we're hiring. And I guess that's my question, that's the thing that gets me and I was a teacher, and I appreciate it, the support I get, and I have, and I don't know if that this, you know, means that I shouldn't weigh in on this, but I think a lot of was said family members who had good jobs because they were union jobs. And they had requirements does it mean that I was felt behind somebody with a certification. They were good at what they did, they had a good job. And they were

159responsible for the checklist and things like that at the end of the job. So I mean, that's just my opinion. And maybe that disqualifies me to vote on this, but I'm listening to it. And I don't know, I mean, we're supposed to be responsible for how we spend this massive amount of money. But we also want the job done, right, done well, done on time, by people that are experts, and maybe you can get that elsewhere. I mean, I haven't hired many people in my life. So, I mean, that's just some of the questions I have spinning in my head. - [Donald] Miss Ellison. - [Jessica] I wanted to kind of branch off of what Dr. Newmaster just said. Because I keep going back to some of the questions that you posed, what if a

160non union provides higher wages? What about a small business? What if there's a lower pay but higher health contributions? It feels like there's so many factors here, that there's not that, but opening it up to all the competitive bidders, whether they're union or not, and I'll just be upfront and say that I've never belonged to a union. But I'm an expert in the work that I do. And so I think that we need to consider that this is a really complicated issue and that, I support unions, I love our teachers unions and all the other unions in our district, but I think we have to take this into consideration the idea that there are a lot of factors that we might not know about in our community, what if there is a small company of

161painters that it's a family and I guess, I feel like I would be uncomfortable closing out a portion of our community. I'm really glad that we're having this conversation though, because as someone who has never been union, this is really helpful for me to understand. But I do think we really have to carefully consider the complexities of this issue, too. - [Mick] And I will add too, I really do not believe this is a pro-union, anti-union issue. If you don't use a PLA, a union can still bid, every unionized shop can still bid on equal terms with every non-union shop, everyone gets the same opportunity to submit the lowest responsible bid. They're all closed bids, there's no cheating. There's no peeking, you know, we open them all up at the same time, and the lowest

162responsible bidder gets the deal. So I would be very careful to make sure we're all again, it's not a matter of union yes or union no, I wouldn't want that by any means, I think that it's, again, the lowest responsible bidder model, versus a requirement to work through the exclusive representative. That's what you're really talking about here. - [Donald] Miss Thompson. - [Angela] Okay, first I'm gonna start off by saying conflict of interest. I am an employee of this improperly Trades Council. By I'm only an employee of the council and a couple of points. One, I would ask all of the board members to go on to the ABCs website and research what they stand for and who they support financially but third pack funds contributions, because it is very one sided. And the people

163that contribute to their patch funds is also very one sided. It is usually the owner or the CEO of the construction company that they are trying to push on us. They are the ones who come up with a 70% number. When they sued the Minneapolis building trades under the guise that their contributions mostly, it says in the article go towards one side of the political party, their contributions 100% go to one side of the political party. They are currently fighting to stop prevailing wage in multiple states, including our own. They are against, there's a bill out there that is trying to prevent hazardous work sites. Basically, it's saying right now there's like, no guarantee that apprentices who work on hazardous work sites have to be properly trained, and have to have proper protection. And so

164there is a bill being brought forth. And I believe it's on the East Coast somewhere. That is trying to make it mandatory that those workers have to be protected and have to be properly trained and the company has to provide that for them. To me, that says a lot about a company that would do something like that, as somebody who is a union member. So PIU not put foul. I am a granddaughter and the daughter and the great granddaughter of union laborers, I have. It is to me, the Project Labor Agreement guarantees that we are equitable in our hiring practices for the work that will be done in our district. And by not or by excluding, I guess, two things, Project Labor Agreements, do not exclude anybody from bidding on the project, everybody is allowed

165to bid on the project. Usually the ABC argues that that is not true because the companies who do not bid on a Project Labor Agreement, do not want to abide by the prevailing wage laws. That's just truth of it, they have not been able to stop Project Labor Agreements from happening in other districts because the support that came to pass our bond referendum, really, it came from everybody. But the union members that live in our district work really hard to pass that bond because they want to be involved in making sure that the work is done by skilled qualified, well paid laborers. When I was at Lincoln, the last group I read to there was a girl, I read a book called, "What Do You Do with an Idea?" And at the end that says,

166what do you do with an idea you change the world? So we talked about ideas of different ways that ideas have changed the world and one second grader said, you know, pipes, change the world. And I first was a little bit like, oh, no, where are we going with us? But she was talking about pipes that we build underground that bring clean water for health, and so that. Another girl in kindergarten who had her low 100 day pronoun was very excited raising her hand. And I let her speak and she said, "My dad is a pipe fitter." For a kindergarten girls know that her father is a pipe fitter to me says, providing that house that her father is a pipe fitter. And I could imagine that her father's would want to be a part

167of the great things that we can do with this money that we have, and a PLA does not stop anybody from bidding on the project. I don't know if I have a conflict of interest or not, as I'm only an employee, I don't have any stock in the company, I don't gain financially. The office doesn't gain financially, it's a council. There is no money from any construction projects that funnel into our office. But I would abstain from voting I don't know. I would wanna talk to you to make sure whatever I do in the situation doesn't cause the school board or the district, any financial issues or lawsuits, or anything of that nature. But that's the company who is putting out all of these statistics and misinformation. I would just ask everybody to research them

168and go on to their website and see what they stand for, and who, now they do have workers. I believe that workers that are not represented by union don't have a struggle for voice. I have not received any letters or communications from anybody who works for a non-union company, which to me kind of says that they don't have a voice. Sometimes aren't allowed to have that voice. It is something I feel very strongly about, just as a union person that, to me, it's kind of like an attack where the union represents everybody, and they don't just exclude anybody from working on the job. All they say is, if they work on the job, you must pay them all fair, equal wages, whether they are female, Hispanic, Native American, white, black, whatever. You could look at

169the Water Gremlins, and what happened over there as an example of what happens when people are not represented by a union. - [Mick] I just kind of respond to a couple things real quick. Just so we're so you know that my information I take my information from the original source. I'm holding the complaint in my hand in the Minneapolis case, and it is paragraph 44, in which the allegation is that the accounts contributed exclusively to candidates in the Minnesota DFL and the amount of $254,624, I'm sorry, that's the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, but the allegation is exclusively contributed. So I just want you to know, I'm not making that up. I know there's articles out there, but I took a break from the complaint. Whether that's true or not, I can't tell you that's

170how the complaint starts. That's how the lawsuit started. I don't know anything about ABC, I don't work with ABC, I don't work for ABC, I've never done anything along those lines. And I don't think, again, that this is an issue of prevailing wage, because that's a different issue than a Project Labor Agreement. The Project Labor Agreement is a much more overarching kind of requirement, if you will. So, and I do think, though, that there is some sense, I personally believe that it would be not possible for many businesses to simply shift on the fly, from what their current structure of pay, benefits and so forth is to complying with the terms and conditions of employment set forth in the collective bargaining agreement that's required on your Project Labor Agreement, and that's, I do believe that's

171reality. And if you look at these cases, the allegation over and over again, is show a single non-unionized shop that's done it. And so there's arguments back and forth on both sides of this. I don't, I'm not gonna get into that. But I do think that that point there is validity to that one point that Imagine if you're running a business, and you know, I just give you the example, even your business, which is, you know, in the world, pretty big, pretty powerful. You can't just drop everything and turn around and do what Malinsky is doing. You couldn't do it. I can't in a business with 16 attorneys and plus support staff just turn around and do what another business does, 'cause everything is crafted and developed based upon, you know, how each organization operates.

172And so I think that there is a real impediment there to thinking that your local folks are just kind of move forward and do that. Does that mean you should do a Project Labor Agreement Or you shouldn't, it doesn't, but I think the reality is there is a significant impediment there. - [Donald] Miss Ellison. - [Jessica] Because when I'm struggling with these types of things, I always wanna go to the facts. I looked to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, which is the United States government institution, which in 2019, said that union members accounted for 13.7% of wage and salary workers in Minnesota compared with 15% in 2018. So, I think we can talk about where these numbers come from. But I think that ultimately, I wanna be clear that I am pro-union. But I think

173we have to be careful that we are looking at facts, we are sticking with what is gonna be best for this district, this community. And I'm worried just based on what I read today, like I spent hours at work trying to figure out what to find online, it is emotional on both sides. And so I appreciate the legal perspective. And the more we can stick to what are the facts, I think the better off that our community is gonna be. - [Donald] So I think there's a lot of emotion already starting to move. I would ask us and I would look to you Wayne to excuse me, Dr. Kazmierczak to kind of talk is through where you're thinking the next step should really go. It sounds to me like we need to continue this conversation

174and set out some time at the next work study, or I think you need to kind of give a little bit of direction if you don't mind, just kind of your thoughts and I'm not closing the questions down, I'm not trying. I just wanna start to think about those next steps of the conversation. I'm not talking about, hey, I think we need to put a vote on tomorrow or anything like that. But I, I think we need to let people elect board members kind of go back and kind of dig into some of the information in which they got, kind of think through that process, bring another piece to where they are able to ask questions, and bring those questions forward. And kind of move things through. I think there needs to be a defined

175of if there are conflicts of interest, and where those are so that we can make sure that we're being respectful in that case. I think there's just a lot of moving parts that need to be brought forward. - [Wayne] Mr. Chairman, help quickly. And I guess a follow up to what Schmidt said, how quickly do we need to make a decision? That is before you would start impacting our timeline. We will be building on the DLC project this spring. - [Donald] Next in my, next month in March or April? - [Wayne] It might be April. - [Donald] So we would need to, so that's actually a pretty tight timeline. - [Wayne] I mean, we can still do that very well. - [Donald] And still move it through well, but if this is that, this conversation

176is mandated to stop this room in the head with the work that we have. - [Wayne] I agree with that. - [Donald] So okay, so then I would ask though, but is that do we need to come up with if we're going to bid it like we currently bit it that would include a prevailing wage, you were talked about some sort of policy or something of that nature. So with that I would really that-- - [Wayne] What I am, what I would do is I would follow up with Mick, there's been a lot of conversation tonight. And to come up with a strategy, for me to come up with a strategy like right now on the spot. - [Donald] I'm not asking to I understand. - [Wayne] That's unrealistic. So I think what we Mick

177and I would follow up, and we would determine where we go from here, and it does sound like there's probably an additional conversation. I think the first step is probably as you suggested is the conflict of interest determination. However, that looks, I would work with you to figure that out, and then strategize and as to how we would bring it back for resolution for the board. - [Jessica] It kind of just said, I'm not comfortable moving forward with anything until I know that the people who potentially have a conflict of interest are protected, so. - [Wayne] Right and that's the first, talked to, that I'm saying, I think that's the first step in the process. - [Jessica] The questionnaire that Mick was talking about? - [Mick] Yeah, I could develop a questionnaire or a survey

178or I could make phone calls to each of you, right. - [Jessica] Okay, but I mean, even before we have additional conversations about this, 'cause-- - [Donald] That's what I'm saying. - [Jessica] Okay. - [Donald] 'Cause that needs to happen first, before we would, and then the additional conversation soon should occur. - [Mick] And I'll provide that information to you in writing as well, that I talked about as the follow up to this meeting. And, you know, I did try to frame this as the arguments on each side, because ultimately, I don't know that you can say there's a right and a wrong, as I said earlier, I think it's a community, what's right for your community. And you know that I don't know that, this isn't, this is your community, you've got to make

179that call. And, you know, there's statistics and I one of my favorite lines is, I don't like to rely on statistics because 80% of all statistics are made up including the one I just gave you. - [Jessica] I had to start a stats class just said. - [Mick] So talk to me nice after. - [Margaret] Just as I try, I love a very simple financial life, it's certainly I look at this and think this is a humongous responsibility. But if I can see it in little pieces, it helps. So we've done many, many big bits before. Have we ever had a PLA before? - [Wayne] No, not since I've been here. - [Margaret] So with this humongous pile of money. We're still building it one piece at a time. Okay. - Yes please. - [Donald]

180So I just wanna finish and is there any other questions? I just wanna make sure that-- - [Angela] I just have a comment. - Miss Thompson. - I just want you to know that your information you gave tonight was very well put together and I wasn't, if I came off attacking. - [Mick] No, not at all. - [Donald] So Mick, if you can just do me one favor. I have two comments before we can and we'll ask that but the first comment is I just if you can remind everybody about Open Meeting Law and the laws around talking amongst each other regarding the conversation 'cause I wanna make sure we stay inside of the law and don't get outside of the law. And so if you can remind everybody inside of the memo that you're

181gonna put forward, I would appreciate that. I think it's important, right, just so that we make sure we move there. The last comment that I wanna make is that I know that the Bear She Bars had come out and I just wanted to recognize the fact that it's School Board Appreciation Week. I wanted to thank each and every one of you for all of your work, and for your service to the school board and the school district, especially to the community. So thank you all very much with that. And with that, if there are no other comments, questions or concerns, I will enter into a moment to, I'll enter into a motion to adjourn. I'm getting tired to it. - [Member] I gonna propose the motion. - [Donald] I'll second that and we are adjourned.