001to order our uh January 23rd 2024 regular school board business meeting um before I get to the agenda I'm going to go through our land acknowledgement we are gathered on the land of the Dakota and O jway peoples I ask you to join me in acknowledging the Dakota and jway Community their Elders both past and present as well as future Generations St Louis Park School also acknowledges that it was founded upon exclusions and erasers of many indigenous peoples including those of whose land this school district is located this acknowledgement demonstrates a commitment to dismantling the ongoing legacies of colonial power and a District's desire to support the ongoing work of local indigenous communities to thrive in our school schools okay the next thing I'm going to do is go through the agenda and on the
002agenda we have open Forum we have the superintendent report we have two discussion items the superintendent search um and at that point we may do a little bit of work to kind of reset the room so that we can do that it's going to be um our presenter is going to be presenting remotely uh then we have the American Indian annual compliance agreement um then after that we have the pay Equity report following that's the consent agenda then we have the action it action agenda and on the action agenda we have a school board policy 545 the Park Spanish Immersion admissions um policy and then 8B we have pay Equity report and then at nine we're at communications and transmittal item so do I have a motion that it's recommended that the school board approv
003the agenda for the January 2020 January 23 2024 agenda presented so move B second second vilia um all those in favor say I I I I any opposed okay pass 70 okay at this time we have our open forum and um we have uh a number of people who have signed up here and I have a couple of late breaking and I want to make sure that if anybody still has not signed up that wanted to that they've had that opportunity um to do that so we'll just go through in order as I've received them in terms of that um I know that a number of people are here to speak about the um the situation at the high school last week and um that we have uh superintendent Dr Maguire here to talk through
004some of that and her superintendence report so just want everybody to be aware that that will be some of the conversation will be happening at that point and the presentation will be happening at that point and as um open forum is set up it's an opportunity for you to share what your thinking in a Time limited way we have a and I'll read through that the description here in a minute but um it is designed for you to share information to us we don't um by uh nature respond to those things we're here to listen and take in that information so um so we will be listening and we don't respond to that information and again as I mentioned uh Dr McGuire will be talking through some more of the things related to the high
005school um in her superintendence report so as I uh uh read our description that is listed in our agenda it is in the interest of open Communications that the uh St Louis Park School District wishes to provide the opportunity for the public to address the school board if you wish to address the school board complete the yellow sheet which we talked about at the back or some of you have signed up online that is presented to the board chair anyone indicating a desire to speak at during open form will be acknowledged by the board chair and all lowed three minutes to present on the topic um uh Vice chair Ibrahim will have the time over here he will hold up this board uh this notebook to show you um when you're at 3 minutes 2
006minutes 1 minute and at 30 seconds remaining um during open quum the board and administration will listen to the comments Please be aware that disrespectful comments or comments of a personal nature directed at an individual either by name or inference it's not tolerated um one more thing that I will add is typically we ask if people want some followup I think some people um I would like to wait until after the superintendent has presented so that you can indicate whether you want to follow up with that and I think we'll work with um Barb D or um Barb mom over here to make sure that we do that followup with people as needed so I will go ahead and uh the first person that I have listed is um Natalie Cowell and if Natalie would
007like to come to the table here and speak at the uh chair here we have Natalie okay no Natalie then I will uh Andy do we have Andy okay how about Mindy I didn't want to go first sorry work come yeah come Jo at the table and sit right there y that way we can hear you and people at home hear um I'm Mindy and I'm here today speaking for myself and also for many other families some of whom are here behind me um I was born and raised in St Louis Park and purchased a home in St Louis Park 20 years ago we represent the families of our district who have always supported our schools and our St Louis Park Community as I said many of us grew up in park and we chose
008to raise our children in park specifically for the excellent schools we once had and for the diversity it offers many of our children are active in their classes activities and sports as parents we volunteer and offer to help our teachers and our staff we want our children to thrive in a community that is safe and not accepting of violence our children are at school to learn and to become contributing members of our society what has happened during this school year by a few high school students and their parents is unacceptable from anti-Semitism anti-Semitism threats to fights in the hallways and parking lots can you tell us why these fights continue to happen what is the safety measure going forward not just this week but for the rest of the school year to keep students and
009faculty safe why are these students allowed to continue to come back to school is a zero tolerance policy for violence something that can be considered myself and many other families that I've been talking to feel strongly that we need to limit open enrollment at what point do we determine that we have too many students for our teachers to effectively teach and for our students to effectively learn my son has some classes with over 40 students in them and in my opinion that's just too many many of us feel that the overemphasis on equity and inclusion and not focusing on academics and safety has actually made things worse than they have ever been and has created more segregation than I have ever experienced in St Louis Park are you willing to risk future referendums and good
010families leaving if we don't see positive changes in the very near future many of us are simply fed up with the direction our district has been going many families have left many families are planning to leave St Louis Park and we as a district should be worried about that and find out out the reasons why these families are truly leaving and and figure out how to fix these things in my opinion we have hit rock bottom we need change education needs to be our main focus and priority we need to get back to the basics and we need to get back back to a school and community and District that we are all proud of thank you all right um next up we have Rebecca Carlson no Rebecca then we have uh Roslin all right
011introduce yourself here Ros sure um so I'm Roslin Tu uh good evening and thank you for your time and providing a form for concern residents um I have a fairly public presence in our community so I've done my best albeit haphazardly um to craft an empathetic take here for that reason I'll be reading a statement as opposed to speaking off the cuff admittedly this year I haven't done a particularly wonderful job at keeping tabs on the various happenings at our local level of government um that said as an ally I was recently made aware through an article shared online that there is a paent group making demands of the school district and threatening to sue these demands as I understand it are to present any lgbtq plus content before parents and to allow them to
012choose to remove their students from portions of the lesson um I am so deeply concerned about this um as we all know children are all children are entitled to an education in our country um however children are not entitled to a religious education um it greatly disturbs me that our school district may very well be footing the bill for a timely and costly lawsuit um particularly when just last month we were discussing um potential levies to further provide our students the best education and tools that they are so deserving of the idea that those same resources that could be allocated towards technology the Arts Athletics um is instead potentially going to be funneled to the courts is deeply upsetting secondly and more importantly I'm very saddened by the impact of these proposed demands what does
013it tell um our children when their fellow classmates are pulled from lessons that do nothing but provide representation of the um many beautiful and diverse folks that we have in our community um if students can be pulled for a picture book that simply has representation of a gay couple for instance um what else are we going to allow students to be pulled from a class for there's a fringe branch of Christianity that recently opened a whiteson church in the state of Minnesota the acet true folk assembly um what if one of these families wants to move to St Louis Park um do we allow their children to be pulled from lessons um regarding slavery Jim Crow and the Civil Rights fights do we exempt them from Holocaust instruction um it certainly would be in line
014with their religious beliefs um this is an untenable ask and I would ask the school board to respectfully decline this demand these families have the right to hold and practice their religious beliefs but let's leave religious practices and perspectives outside of the classroom let's respect the separation of church and state thank you again um next I have Cheryl Cheryl gager Watson hi my name is Cheryl I was not as prepared as the others so bear with me thank you for your time tonight um I have students in the public school system here I grew up here didn't think I'd be back but I am and proud of it um and I am saddened and deeply disappointed in our our district and our high school over the past few months um I would like better answers
015to the safety of our students and staff um the students should I I I'm just at a loss I'm really at a loss I want to know as Mindy mentioned can we have a zero tolerance policy for violence um to my understanding the recent events that happened last week at the high school could have been been prevented if there was intervention with certain students earlier and I'm disappointed it wasn't handled sooner um I obviously don't know all the details I know there's a lot of confidentiality behind it and that's understandable but I just want us to see I want us to do better our kids deserve better our staff deserve better they don't go to school they don't get their degrees to teach to come and break up fights it's getting really redundant and we
016don't deserve this anymore so I I just ask that there's a plan that's productive and set in place again not just for this week but for the rest of the school year um I'd like to hear concrete action instead of just words I hear a lot of I get a lot of emails and it's it's I'm getting tired of it so I'm going to ask that um hopefully we can see some action and progress and better safety for our students and staff so thank you next up I have Alicia no Alicia then I have Caitlyn good evening my name is catlyn Sorano I I'm a little more off the cuff too and I'm a teacher so I'm having a hard time not turning and pres talking to everyone this feels weird but I'll go for
017it as I just mentioned I'm a teacher so I come on behalf of your teachers I come on behalf of my children who have experienced personally violence in this district and nothing was done and um my concern for the continuation of such actions I wanted to take a moment to share what happened to my child last year he was a senior at St Louis Park obviously um he was at prom went to an Afterparty which we agreed to we knew where he was the party ended with a group of four cars of students from the high school who went into the house and started to break things and went through the backyard my son was in the backyard with his friends said let's get out of here this is obviously not a good thing my
018son and his friends went to the car unfortunately his best friend who was a D1 football player this year decided to stay at the car as my son turned around to go look for their other friend he was hit in the mouth with a phone and lost three MERS um they found his other friend being curb kicked by a group of St Louis Park students the police came the video went viral the school resource officer said he was kind of dark which I agree on the video but the kids knew who it was by their tennis shoes because kids know sneakers that other kids wear um nothing happened at school we didn't push it because my son thought I've got a month left at school and nothing will happen at school so I don't want
019the retaliation to come back to me I mean if the district is saying that you know uh restorative justice policies are wonderful in practice but if they're not working there a change needs to be considered a a child apologizing is a start but there needs to be some type of action at this point we're seeing that it didn't work I was informed by a teacher friend too that the principal left the staff meeting on Friday crying because she was unable to talk about punishment for black students or minority students and I feel that she needs to learn how to separate and there should be fair punishment for all I mean that was a bit alarming to me um the the safety of the teachers at school I don't know as being acknowledged these are folks
020that gave up their lives their careers their weekends their nights and they're afraid to come to school because of the continuation of violence that has spiraled in the district over the years and I need more than 30 seconds I feel like I'm at the Academy Awards and you know um I just asked that there is a reconsideration for consequences for all uh at this point you're going to lose teach I'm a teacher I can tell you you're going to lose teachers you have to consider enrollment you have to consider the parents who are afraid to send their children here now I have another child here who has another year left and you know he feels a not attached to the school he doesn't feel there's a strong Community to you know he goes to school
021here he gets his grades I got time's up all right thanks thank you thank you sorry for mispronouncing your name um uh next up we have Ryan no Ryan then uh Julie Julie eggs hi I just want to thank you for the opportunity to uh speak tonight my name is Julie AES I have two Park grads in college and a sophomore I appreciate all the comments that have already been shared tonight but I really just want to talk about gratitude um I do want to thank the school board you do you have day jobs but then you come here and have a second career thank you Dr Maguire for stepping in during this trying time to lead our principal team principal Paddock parks and Garder for working tireless tirelessly to lead and keep try to
022keep our kids safe so they can learn our teaching staff they go above and beyond um just amazing Role Models balancing what our kids need across the board every staff member custodial uh the cooks the bus drivers I just want to say thank you we have 1400 students at the high school and there for roughly 1400 different versions of family values areas of focus opinions and beliefs and those 1400 students come with 14 different sets of needs things they bring to school each day both the good energy and the challenges our dedicated staff at every level navigates that to get our kids what they need to teach our kids how to be productive members of society and how to live and be in the world and that they are cared about within those four walls
023I'm an involved parent I recognize I'm very privileged to be involved and I see the absolutely outstanding things that are happening at the high school all the time my son who is a part of eoon gets to cover events and take pictures like a real photojournalist our Juniors get to take the ACT for free and when our career center chases you know every program like getting at St Louis Park involved so that seniors get a list of all the Minnesota colleges that they would automatically qualify for like when the career center provides the opportunity for each freshman to do strength finders so they can start to be to sort out who they want to be in this rur world and what gives them purpose like when a teacher who still works at the high school
024wrote a two-page letter of recommendation for my daughter she applied to colleges but before he did that he invited her to get involved in meaningful ways so that she had a place and a purpose and a way to learn to grow and to shine like how the certified nursing assistant program gets about 100 students a year certified which leads to living and real wage jobs how our business students get to do job Shadows I just hosted a student last week at my place of work it happened because a teacher connected us all our kids feel Pride um they have fun when they watch our sports team it's not perfect I'm not suggesting that um the play this weekend was so outstanding and full of talent from the actors to the kids Behind the Scenes leading
025and putting it all together there are simply a lot of good things that and I don't want any of us to forget that that that are happening within the those four walls so I just want to say thank you we don't say it enough we don't show it enough and we don't take the time to appreciate enough that our kids are lucky to be a part of St Louis Park schools even if it's a little flaw and I hope we can all continue to try to work together to continue to build a better school thank you next up I have matth you thank you for the opportunity to speak my name is Matthew Ern 3100 Salem I've been a resident for 12 years and I have two sophomore students at the high school um just
026reflecting on the newsletter that came out today from the principal um reassuring words of well-being of our students and staff remains unwavering that goes without saying so that's nice um students feel safe prepared ready to excel academically it's reassuring we are dedicated for a positive and secure learning enrollment for environment for all which is good um consistently inhering to the practices that we know that support student academic behavior and success so I look at these as opportunities to you know better the situation that we have right now she also challenges the um parents to go through the nine items in here as well as the handbook um is basically everything you should be doing staying focused on learning being in class on time so at least the the direction from the principal I'm thankful for
027this um thankful to the school board um merely for you know everything you do as well as uh section 514 of the student handbook by definition subsection 32A um bullying material and substantial interferences with students education opportunities or performance or ability to practice in school functions and activities or receive School benefits services or privileges the term bullying specifically includes all these items as well as cyber bullying so basically any interruption in class or at school by any person should be handled consistently K through 12 it shouldn't be an ad hoc it shouldn't be a by case scenario if it's held consistently then the students understand what the rules are if it's held inconsistently students get confused and I think that's why we see property damage fires fights these are the things that we have to
028hold consistent over time this hopefully will change behavior of our schools um I want to thank the district for seeing our wonderful Police Department as a resource as a visual reminder of rules and behavior I hope to see that the officers are there for the remainder of the year to bridge that gap between that and consistent protocols that we get through this change that needs to happen um mostly I want to thank the teachers and the student facing staff these this is the glue that holds us together without these teachers who I've received countless emails on both of my boys over the years independent uh emails on each boy about opportunities that they have you know different education opportunities things that we may have missed I'm really involved in the boys education and I miss
029things but these emails that come from the teachers show that they go above and beyond what's necessary and what's needed to show their heart is in this and if we lose more of these teachers we will lose more of our families so I hope that we can reinvest in academic performance raising our standards preparing our students to become residents in St Louis Park reinvest in the community and make St Louis Park the school the district and the community that I wanted when I moved here 12 years ago thank you next up uh I have Nigel U my name is Nigel Lane and I am in fifth grade in SLP I'm here because I think we should all be reminded that being kind and respectful is important and should be a part of daily life at
030school if we are not willing to hold all students of of all ages accountable for poor choices my education is negatively impacted negatively impacted please make some changes we can see in the classroom thank [Applause] you and the last person that I have listed to uh speak to us Patrick thank you uh my name is Patrick Baldwin I don't want to have to follow that but I will uh I wanted to speak very briefly on the issue that I was reading about in the sun sailor about the use of inclusive lgbtq materials and the opt out policies uh as I've come to learn them about the district briefly my family and I moved into St Louis Park specifically for this reason for the schools we are big supporters of the use of the diverse materials
031our our values and the way our family values diversity does not include caveats and we very much appreciate the use of these things in the schools I asked my son uh who was a fourth grader at Peter Hobart uh before coming here today if he remembered any of the books that were at uh for discussion in in the sun sailor article and he was able to say yes to two of them and he was able to summarize them and he I Then I then asked him you know were those were those confusing at all and he said no and within 30 seconds he was making fart jokes and I I I I bring this up to drive home that this isn't such a big deal our kids can be uh our kids are responsible enough
032to handle these materials when whether he was in second third fourth grade he didn't seem to remember when he when he first heard these books and uh you know I reviewed the district's policies about opting out and all the things that parents can do if they you know if they are very concerned about these issues and it seemed adequate to me uh you know it's not something I would ever do but having reviewed that I I I support the district's policies and I would encourage you not to change anything about them so I I don't really have anything else um thank you for your time yeah I think there was nobody else who had signed up needed to speak could you possibly Rego through the list in case they came late sure yep I had
033other people that sorry to use see here again um and then I crossed up uh was Natalie did Natalie show up Natalie or Andy or Alicia those were the three that I have marked that signed up that did not speak okay then I think what i' would like to do at this time is then turn it over to our superintendent to do the superintendent's report you're all welcome and encouraged to stay for that um because I think she'll speak to some different issues and we'll have an opportunity for um board members just to comment see some clarification after that and then um at that point we need to reset the room anyway so it would be a natural time you're welcome to stay but it would be a natural time at that point too if
034people wanted to leave that they could do that too so at this point I'll turn it over to Dr MC for the superintendent grou thank you CH C board members I'll begin my superintendent report the way I do every week uh which is by sharing our mission because it grounds our work and it's a reason that we gather St Louis Park public school sees inspires and empowers each learner to live their Brilliance in an environment that centers student voice and experience to create racially equitable learning that energizes and enhances the spirit of our community uh and it's the spirit of this community that I hope to speak to a little bit tonight so my report tonight is dedicated completely to the disruptive safety events that took place at our high school last Thursday January 18th
035because of the serious nature the incidents and the impact that it's had on our community I think it's important to share as much information as we can about what happened and about what we're doing doing about it I too want to begin by uh simply expressing gratitude I'm grateful for the leadership of high school principal Lisha Paddock and SLP staff who intervened in the incidents that occurred to protect students and for staff members Who provided support in a number of ways last week on Thursday and Friday I'm grateful to the SLP Police Department to the officer who responded to the first incident and who was present on site throughout the rest of the afternoon no and when the second and related incident occurred and to the officers who have been present in our building for
036the past two days I have spoken directly with Chief believe it's pronounced CR Chief K and expressed my appreciation for his team I am grateful for the students who responded to the disruption by staying in their classrooms and on their buses following the directions of Staff members and I appreciate the students who have shared their perspectives with me in a variety of different way ways over the past few days I'm grateful for our school board members who have shown steadfast leadership around this event I have been in constant communication with them over the last 5 days I'm grateful for the outpouring of support from community members business owners Civic leaders elected officials and city leaders including our new mayor Nadia muhamed here's what happened at approximately 1:50 p.m. last Thursday an incident occurred involving two
037groups of students that resulted in a physical altercation in the hallway teachers and staff immediately took action to respond to the situation including placing a call to the juvenile resource officer the high school administrative team initiated an investigation and was contacting families right up to dismissal about 75 minutes later the situation escalated further at the end of the school day when adults who were not SLP employees obviously who were aware of the earlier altercation and became involved in another physical altercation with some students in the parking lot after school SLP staff who are positioned in the parking lot every day at dismissal and the juvenile response officer who was still on site immediately responded to the situation to ensure the safety of everyone involved some students and staff sustained minor injuries including scrapes and bruises
038and were seen by the school nurse two adults were later arrested by police at this time there's no evidence of weapons in either altercation so here's what we're doing about it and while there are some things that I cannot share here's what I can tell you about what we're doing now first of all we're investigating two separate investigations are underway the police department is conducting an investigation and the school district is conducting an investigation and that's typical practice we're actively gathering information and working closely with law enforcement to understand the full scope of the incidents including whether or not incidents were motivated by bias we're also taking shortterm action to ensure a safe and caring environment in the short term we have plans in place to ensure safety and ensure a focused academic environment during
039the week of final exams this week and as you know these plans include an increase inreased police presence both inside and outside the building a schedule that minimizes student transition and maximizes instructional focus in addition extra support for students and staff well-being is in place the campus will be closed for lunch and access to entry doors will continue to be limited as they are every day I do understand that there has been some discussion already about closing lunch schoolwide beginning next year once the new cafeteria is open which from my perspective would be a wise decision even outside of this recent event we're also focusing on long-term actions that we know impact student academic and behavioral outcomes in the long term we focus on those Elements of Effective schools that we know positively impact student
040achievement and behavioral outcomes I believe that effective schools are characterized by five key elements I'm going to share those elements uh because of in my from my perspective of focus on all of those elements has to be in place in order to accelerate student behavioral and academic outcomes first effective schools and school districts have a shared vision for what they desire for students the St Louis Park strategic plan for racial Equity transformation provides a compelling vision for what we desire for our students and our community that compelling vision is one of the key reasons why I'm here I have shared that widely in the last few months I know that staff members share this vision and work each day to align their practice to the vision I see this as a strength of our school
041district second effective schools nurture a culture of safety care and relationship with students among staff colleagues and with families our organizational core values which include holding high expectations Collective responsibility demonstrating persistent effort being racially conscious and culturally competent are top of mind for me as we face this challenge we will be working with students to reinforce our expectations for being in this school space together and to further develop their skills to meet our expectations and because it isn't all about the students I have talked with many High School staff members over the past few days while they shared many thoughts with me I want you to know that without exception those staff members want you to hear that they care deeply about our students and our community they are committed to refreshing their Collective responsib
042ability to holding students to high academic and behavioral standards third effective schools maintain a sharp instructional focus a sharp instructional Focus looks like using relevant curriculum where students see their experiences reflected designing engaging lessons working collaboratively to examine data and improve instructional practice maximizing instructional time open opening access to rigorous coursework utilizing both formative and summative assessments providing support to meet the individual needs of students the staff and SLP are attuned to these practices and utilize them in their everyday work here's why that's important without effective teaching that keeps students engaged no amount of suspensions no amount of police officers and no amount of school administrators can help our community Thrive fourth effective schools maintain a safe and healthy work and learning environment foundational to this effort is setting and communicating high expectations for student
043Behavior holding students accountable to those high expectations in a variety of ways including ways that we might think of as traditional consequences and in ways that we consider to to be restored in practice also Foundation to this foundational to this element are crisis management and emergency plans which requires staff training this is an area where as a district we are working to improve and that precedes this incident I know at this moment many staff and community members are focused on in particular on this element of effective schools so let me be very clear that we have taken Swift and decisive action with each participant in the events from last week and while I cannot share some information about consequences I can share that actions will range from lesser consequences of dismissal and suspension to expulsion
044it is possible that some participants May face criminal charges however that is completely determined by the police not the school it might be helpful for you to know that I have reviewed disciplinary actions this week that have been taken at the high school since the start of the school year because some school and community members have the impression that no significant action is taken in response to inappropriate behavior at the high school ever the truth is that there have already been 52 suspensions and 65 dismissals this school year predating Thursdays event now I'm not proud of that data and ordinarily wouldn't wouldn't desire to be talking about it so publicly and I'm not proud of that data because I know what's underneath it I know that underneath that data is racial disproportionality and decreased odds
045of graduation from high school for every single student that we've already suspended from school the truth is that significant action has been taken this year year for every single fight that has occurred lastly effective schools employ a continuous Improvement mindset this most often looks like a school Improvement plan but it could also look like what we're engaged in right now examining a serious incident that has just occurred to try to figure out what each of us can do better in our practice as a school and as a school system specifically continuous Improvement efforts at the high school have led to Strong rankings in the state for college readiness an increase in the average composite ACT score uh for 11th graders for two years in a row an increase in math and reading MCA participation an
046increase in proficiency rate for Math and an increase in proficiency rate for reading attention to each of those Five Elements of Effective schools that I described is required to increase student engagement to ensure staff and student well-being and to improve academic outcomes here's what we're hearing from parents caregivers and community members in addition to those of you who have shared your perspectives here tonight we've received numerous notes of appreciation uh from families for our decision to close school many community members have expressed gratitude for our transparent communication they appreciate the police department's support and response and acknowledge teachers and staff for their Swift actions we've received many messages of support and offers for engagement we've also received a number of messages of concern regarding misbehavior at the high school fears about school safety and fights
047in general I understand the concerns and fears of families and students given the larger National atmosphere of fear worry and concern surrounding school safety it's only natural for a local event to heighten those emotions some of the emails that we received conveyed conveyed fear anger blame and shame I was disappointed to see those comments on social media platforms where individuals resorted to diminishing blaming shaming and stereotyping our children I wonder how this is helpful to our school community moving forward I Aon excuse me I agonize over how those comments perpetuate negative stereotypes and narratives about our students and I wonder about how the negativity negativity of some adults carries into our school Community don't blame the parents I believe I believe [Applause] that I hope what you'll hear me um continue to speak about is
048collective responsibility you're shaming I have I have changes to make in order to help assist us and each of the staff members here has changes um that we need to examine in our own practices to help us Thrive so I hope what you'll hear me talk about is collective responsibility because that's what I believe and feel I believe that all of the community members who have shared their perspectives care deeply about our students and our community I know that we have a shared interest in ensuring that our children Thrive and that we're in this together I have full confidence in our high school's capable and experienced principal Lanisha Paddock our high school administrative team and staff is comprised of skilled and talented individuals who have implemented significant and meaningful changes in the recent years I've
049spent a great deal of time at the high school over the past three months since I started in fact I was there last Thursday morning speaking to a class my experience every single time has been that the school is calm clean focused and welcoming in creating a culture and climate of safety and Care our ad administrative team will continue to ground the community in those high expectations and routines that we know support students academically socially and behaviorally I want to provide um just a little context for my perspective I've served as superintendent in both oio area schools the state's fifth largest school district and an Noah henpen School District the state's largest school district that means that over the past 13 years years I've been responsible for eight of the state's largest high schools what
050happened here in SLP last week is not acceptable under any circumstances it is particularly infuriating to me that adults who are not part of the school Community can interfere to cause such harm trauma and dis for me the distraction from the work at hand which is teaching and learning it is also unfortunately not unique I've experienced almost identical circumstances at multiple high schools over the past 13 years and the narratives that surround this incident are all too familiar to me this is a challenge faced by high schools across our state and nation and there are no simple Technical Solutions here's what I do know I'm here because of this community I know and believed when I came that this was a special place I know we're focused on the right work here I know we
051have work to do to get even better the uniqueness I know of our SLP Community which many of you described is an asset to us our children will Thrive and be positioned to enter the workforce or postsecondary education with skills that others don't have because of the diversity of our school and our community I believe this incident will not will not Define us but what we as adults and practitioners do next will how we treat each other and how we lift up our high school or not in this moment matters thank you um as a courtesy we um made it clear to the board that if people on the board here have um some things that they're seeking clarification on some questions that they might have speaking to what the superintendent presented that that this
052would be the opportunity this is not set as a discussion item we're not taking action on anything tonight but I just wanted to afford that opportunity and also reassured that um as Dr McGuire has said um all of us I think have been in some level of conversation with this superintendent to so if you aren't seeing conversation that is happening at the table right now know that we're having conversations we've had them and we'll continue to have them with Dr McGuire so with that I just want to check in and see if there's anything that any of our board members want to um add at this point for question any clarification Yeah question for Dr Maguire what are our critical response protocols do you mean like emergency response protocols well the school district has an
053emergency response plan um that would I don't have it in front of me at poize that addresses typical things that occur a a lockdown or a shelter in place I think there's different language that's in place here around those things so there is an emergency response protocol that is across the school district uh we're working this was occurring uh before I started actually even uh the school district is working to make those plans more robust Patricia Magnuson and Jim langaman and the team have been um actually visiting other school districts learning about additional protocols that we might put in place or different programs that we might put in place thank you uh thank you Dr Maguire um I really appreciate your sharing the plan I also spent the morning at the high school and um
054I've been talking with principal Paddock all weekend as well um so I appreciate the clarity that I got from you um about how many expulsions and suspensions that we've had and I also um got clarity about how many fights have actually been at the high school and although the number is up it's only nine um I've been an educator for 26 years and I have seen all the weird tragic frustrating heartbreaking and joyful things that that working with young people and working with human beings can bring about in a public education system where we want to honor the humanity of all of our students and I've had moments of fear for myself and for my students I'm also a mom my child goes to high school here fact five of our children go to the
055high school and I think that being a parent probably has made me feel more vulnerable than any other position that I've ever had so I understand the fear and the need to understand but I also want to express what I saw yesterday what I saw over the weekend what I saw today and I saw a community come together I saw parents reach out to us I saw parents reach out to the administration I saw parents and students reach out to teachers and I saw teachers who reached out and helped their kids help their students understand this complex world that we're living in and what that means to navigate through this um I'm going to talk a little bit about myself for just a second I have been a teacher for 26 years I've won four
056Awards um at the state level recognizing my excellence in education I have served for my state union and I have served for both of my national unions and I want to tell you there is nothing different between High expectation High academic expectation and Equity work they are the same thing and as a district why I wanted my child to go here why I wanted to serve on the school board is because I work and I travel nationally the work that we're doing here is the work of educ it is messy because it is human and we are like being human is messy so I appreciate so much of the support the the PE parents that came out they raised $900 in the last couple days to support our high school so yes our community support
057is great this is not the time to pull back and tell us that we need to go back to what we were doing because what we were doing before wasn't helping all of our kids and as we move forward I will be committed and and Resolute that we are going to find our way through this and we're going to build a community and a public school system that will be the Envy of our nation and I'm proud of it any other any other comments again yeah um I wanted to highlight bus number 626 I spoke to their driver and the driver was very impressed with those suit she said that the students didn't engage in any of it she watched them run out of the school to the bus and then they opened up devices
058or or started reading books and um that's impressive to me as well so thank you to all the students that didn't engage in this activity and all of the staff who helped to come to the rescue she I heard one the kids just start reading yeah yeah I uh similar experience I from one of my son's teachers where uh the teacher left the classroom and went out to deal with what was going on and the students were stayed well behaved and and continued on with their work in the classroom um again I think we each continue to have conversations I'm having personally I'm having conversations with my son about these things again as director manini spoke to um that we are you know we have kids that are in these buildings too and it's personal
059to me it's personal when this happens it's personal when um there's more when there's guns and when there's uh weapons that are involved in things at other schools and other communities too um so we are taking in this information we're listening I encourage people to continue to send emails to the entire board when you send that email it goes to the entire board we do take a look at them we do try to respond timely uh we say that it's 3 days we've been trying to keep up with that and respond to that and the uh tradition is that it's the chair that responds to but know that there are seven people up here that have seven that are seven different people that you can approach that you can talk to about these issues it
060doesn't have to be to all of us that it's helpful for us to all see that information but I encourage you to build relationships to connect with people on the board to seek out people to have those conversations I'm willing to have those conversations with you um just encourage people to continue to have that conversation ask the questions share the information that they're getting from what they hear um the uh specifics the things we can't necessarily react to some things that we don't know what they are we know we know that there are fights that is helpful but if we know that there was a fight yesterday if there was you know something that was happening that's going to be information that can be more acted upon so um at again at this point I
061this is not the end of the conversation it is for the sake of this agenda we do have other things on this agenda as I mentioned before we need to reset some things to present for our next um next presenter you are um oh sorry no because I want I want to move on to the next thing yeah I will be brief and short uh just Echo what my colleague says but uh you know what happened uh the high school is not acceptable and you know we all invested we all have kids at the school all board members most of us we have kids in the school I also believe uh we we should have zero tolerance violence discriminations you know uh growing up in war on country you know I have experience in Firth
062hand but but as Virginia mentioned you know it's it's not intersectionality with Equity work we are doing here too and we get a lot of feedbacks from the community we get email emails we get text we get calls we hear you and we aore it I have you know a Middle School uh daughter she is sixth grade and you know it touched me because she came to me the other night and she knows what's going on these kids they use on social media but she came to me like Dad I'm I'm not sure if I want to go to high school and I asked why and because she says I don't think I feel safe over there and I I feel the same thing you guys feel in it at the same time I know
063some people ask Dr share with us some people thinks we are not doing anything about it and the number the data shows otherwise too and we just like always you know uh it's one group you know that's and it's very important the work equ inclusives doing you know in the school here so like uh I join the school board because you know education in equity is extremely important for me I live here 12 years I feel welcome here I like the city I like the school so I I want Community also to understand that you know punishment is another solution too I know I'm emotional because like mother call me and uh her daughter was pet and and she she was diabetic and she didn't she wasn't part of the fight too she was just
064she doesn't even know why people you know they're hearing her but at the same time you know Community also they have to understand I also want to also I have to start that one to I have to be grateful with the uh the principal the staff the teachers uh the S police too who intervenes also you know uh thankful for my colleagues T muire to no I'm not scripted I'm just saying what I'm feeling I hope you guys understand but like this is how I see the equity this is example I always say to in when I'm talking about Equity it's we are in one boat and you know it has uh three floors and those who from the bottom says if they want to fet a water uh they have to dig a hole
065to get it and if those who live at the top hey hold on a second let's go the top and get I don't mind you coming you know up and get water over there if they don't say that that means they all going to drown it and I'm going to conclude that thank you guys thank you thank you V thank you again um I did want to make clear though too thank you for everybody who Shar again we continue to have these conversations we we welcome the conversation um Barb you have the list of people who signed up or do you want me to pass this over to you um I'll pick it up from the meting okay but in terms of people who want followup if you want to make sure I people spoke
066on issues not exclusive to this issue and to some other issues as well so I want to make sure that people have the opportunity to F if they want a specific followup to to be able to do that so if you can do that again we're going to set the room so we're going to take like kind of maybe like a 2 minute kind of like recess here basically to set things up so you're welcome to stay for the rest of the meeting but you're also welcome to the master choice is she going to be like on in this process was how important student voice is in St Louis Park so I want to let you know of of those responses that we received electronically 74 were students and so that's tremendous so a lot
067of students I want to thank people in the schools advisers who assisted with students being able to contribute their thoughts through the survey and I also want to um thank the students for doing that as well I think I'm hearing the one minute delay or so is there any way we could turn that off because I'm hearing myself looping back about a minute later Tom says it's just gonna happen so do your best here I'll ignore my own voice I think I can do it long as you can keep hearing me okay that's what matters okay so all right thank you so much so tremendous news on the survey um of course that's just one tool in all of the information you're going to be gathering so I can share more if you have specific
068questions but that's a really great number for the survey we also have the focus groups or listening sessions going on we held one with students last week and there were uh 30 students in attendance at that focus group we held one with Somali families last week I want to thank ter Robi and Rachel for their help in getting that set up and there were about 15 people there and there is one tomorrow evening with the Latino families and Rachel and Carmen have been working hard on that as well so we expect a big group tomorrow in the focus groups for that family as well so your numbers are going to continue to increase uh following the focus group tomorrow evening with the Latino families the Q&A session with msva is also online and it's being
069viewed regularly so far we're at about 74 views I would encourage people to continue to go watch that session for information about the search typically those sessions are half hour 45 minutes the one is St Louis Park had so many terrific questions submitted in advance about 40 to 45 questions in advance and many questions during the session so we went about an hour and 10 minutes for that Q&A session and I really appreciated the interest and the thoughtful questions asked by stakeholders during that session so those are three tools right now that um are being used utilizing your search to involve stakeholders and I do appreciate all the time and attention people have given to that so as the process continues to unfold I do want to talk a little bit about um what's going
070to happen next and that is the board meeting on February 7th uh February 7th at 7M we have a meeting for a couple of different purposes we will be conducting interview training discussing the stakeholder report and discussing interview questions and schedules for round one so I'm going to revisit those for just a moment and talk about each of those three things individually interview training with the board is what we'll do first and that is something where we need to uh we have a packet of materials for you of course we will review um the statutes relative to superintendent search we'll talk about the policies that affect the search process the EEOC requirements that you must adhere to uh we'll discuss how you'll handle private data as board members and then how you will discuss private
071data in a public meeting we'll walk through that as well as interviewing and deliberating about your candidates in a public meeting as well so there's a lot wrapped into interview training typically that's about 45 minutes if uh there's a lot of questions it might take more time if there's fewer questions it could take less but on average it's about 45 minutes the second thing we'll do that uh evening is discuss the stakeholder reports and that is what we are in process right now of coating and analyzing and preparing a report for the board to review I'll send that report to you by February 1st or 2nd so you will have almost a week to review it before the meeting I want to make sure the board members each have a chance to go through it
072and either contact me with questions or bring questions that evening so we'll review that report in the meeting we'll go through the quantitative data we will break out the quantitative data by response category so you'll be able to see for example what are the top six character ICS that are most important to your students versus your staff versus parents and caregivers so the quantitative data will be dissected by those response categories of how people self-identified their role when they took the survey and then when we're done discussing that report which includes qualitative information summarized with representative comments as well so there'll be categories of responses under each of the questions that are open those are the open-ended questions in the survey so those questions will be highlighted we will let you know what themes emerged
073good bad and other and then we'll have some comments to support those quotes so your stakeholders will recognize their voice in that report and again answer any questions you might have on that after you have seen that stakeholder report we're going to ask the board to think about stakeholder participation in round two of your interviews we always say it's definitely a possibility because you deal shape this search to fit your District we want you to wait however until you've uh read that report and we've discussed it so you can make a really informed decision about whether you'll have stakeholder interview committees or audience input forums if you will do meet and greets or Q&A sessions with candidates or candidate tours there's a lot of options for you to consider relative two stakeholders in round two
074so we'll want to discuss that and actually have you make a decision that evening after we talked through the stakeholder report that can take about 45 minutes to an hour between the report and making a decision on um how your stakeholders might stay involved in this process it can take longer again if there's more discussion or more questions it could take less so that's just an average about 45 minutes to an hour the final thing we'll be discussing on the 7th is round one interview questions schedules and the remaining steps in the process now when the questions are brought forth I'll have a list of questions we'll suggest that are built around a couple of things they'll be built around your leadership profile and hiring criteria that the board established we'll have questions we've included
075that are built upon what the stakeholders have shared in the report particularly if they're new to the leadership profile so we'll have questions basically from the stakeholder report that we'll want to suggest and then there were also a number of questions submitted during the Q&A that are actually for candidates they were not about the process so I want to make sure that you as a board will see those questions as well that were submitted by people in advance of that Q&A session you'll be going through it that evening and we'll be talking about question one two three and four we're going to try to avoid reading the questions out loud we want to try to create a Level Playing Field for candidates so not disclosing questions in advance will be key to that U but
076I'll be there in person and we can certainly talk through how you select your questions you can also look through the interview training packet there's about 200 questions in there uh that you could certainly pull ones that you think really fit your circumstances so that's the third part of the meeting on February 7th so I just want to remind you if I may and interrupt me if you have questions I can't hear much so just wave your arm or something but there are a lot of data points in a superintendent search you'll have a lot of different things to draw upon as you continue to make decisions of course you have the stakeholder report uh you will have the focus group information that we're going to contain in this in the uh stakeholder survey report
077the focus groups with students mly and Latino families uh we'll have the leadership profile that we want you to always refer back to in the hiring criteria you identified early on the Q&A session if you look online your Communications team is doing terrific job providing information on the search and one of the things they did is create an faq's in um based on the Q&A session so if you want to go through and read the questions that your stakeholders submitted about the process you get a really good sense of what people want to know about what's happening and why so those questions are in the FAQs on the website you also will see all of the applications and that's going to be a lot of information all of you board members will have access to
078those in a secure spot up in the cloud so we'll talk through that as well but that's a lot of information that are only for the eyes of the board and so you'll see that also you'll have interviews of course both round one and round two and potentially stakeholders involved in round two and all along you will be able to ask msba for our Impressions we'll be doing vetting of your applicants the same time that the board is looking at them doing pre- interviews uh social media sweeps reference checks all sorts of things to come up with our recommendations for finalists but again you're going to choose who it is you want to interview we'll recommend them but you'll decide who you'd like to bring in for interviews then in round one so all of
079those things in conclusion are really pieces of a very very large puzzle and you see parts of it now and you see parts of it back then and you see parts of it in the future eventually those pieces really start to fit together and it starts to coales for the board in terms of making this very very important decision so I ask that you be patient because sometimes it feels like there's not a lot happening and all of a sudden a lot of stuff happens at once but I do want to remind the board that all along we have talked about this being a search that you own as the school board in St Mo Park this is not a cookie cutter search that msba ever tells you what to do so my closing thought
080is really a question for the board with that update at this point in the search knowing there's a lot more to come I just want to check in with you and see how you feel about the progress of the search is this information helpful do you like the course in the direction in in which this is headed or do you feel for some reason you'd like to change course in the search process I'm not recommending that you do I think it's really unfolding nicely but I'm going to throw it back to the board because you are the ones that will make decisions about this and if you are uncomfortable with anything that we're doing at this point I would really love to visit with you about that so I'm going to stop talking I don't
081know if that was 10 minutes or not but I'd be happy to take any questions and I hope that information at this point was really helpful for you uh thank you and uh um appreciate you suffering through sort of the delay here and the Echo and all of that too um the uh and I've had a preview of this and feel pretty confident about the way we're going we do want to check in and just check some temperature and everything because if if there are some real grave concerns or some real strong things then that we would have to that would affect our schedule and affect some of the process so I just want to make sure that if there's sort of um if there's something that's out there that you really want to ask
082bark now really as we know the me of the conversation is scheduled to happen at our next meeting on February 7th where we can talk through all the things that we just talked about here but if there's something in that list that we've gone through that is a particular concern bring it up now or um you know again given the technical issues to potentially send that message to Bar um as soon as possible but realizing if if it's something significant how that can imp schule okay H thank you Barb for I don't know where if I direct my voice which PL like do you hear me better this way or if I did this way which is better no okay we'll do this way so that seems really weird um I guess I have two
083two questions um the first of uh regarding the interview training is there any way that we can do this beforehand like on our own like in the packet or did is it really really imperative that you teach us how to interview did you hear a question I heard it like three times and it was all muddled together my apology something about a packet and training you to interview is that corre correct I think the question is whether we can streamline the uh uh interview training if we can get that as a preview and then just streamline that so that we're not spending 45 minutes in the meeting through it or if there's some ways to speed that process okay got it thank you I can send you the interview training packet for your review a
084week or more in advance of the meeting and you could go through each page and come prepared with questions it would then take less time yes and then I guess this is more of a question for the for all of us is the stakeholder participation and making sure that um that we're doing whatever is possible in order to get information from our stakeholders I am greatly encouraged that um you know 1,572 people have responded and um to see the trends that that will emerge from that um I spoke with a ninth grader today who was a part of the interview um committee for the principal at the middle school name is escaping me it's Melissa K helenowski and um she was really uh she talked about why it was important for her to be a
085part of the interview committee and how she felt about it and like she asked Mr B today how the principal was doing and said I selected that principal so I want to know if everything is going all right and this is from a ninth grader um so I think that it's really important to me that we get that stakeholder um actual live listening where we're listen we're doing the listening and folks are sharing with us is that important to anyone else so Barb I guess um the question is if we don't delay this if we move forward forward um at the February 7th meeting are there still time for listening sessions or would it be more about interview committees at that point did you hear that main question was about listening if we have time
086for listening sessions or um if it that would be about interview committees or I think we talk about a choice or something possibly too beyond that okay I think I heard it so I'm G to do my best to answer that so on February 7th we'll be talking about additional stakeholder input and that would be relative to the interview process round two which would be March 13th potentially if you feel once you've seen the stakeholder report that there's not enough information in there and you would like to schedule additional listening sessions I would save between February 7th and March 13th there is time to do some more of those I'm not sure you'll feel they're necessary or not though once you see that report we feel that it's very thorough I was starting to read
087it the other day and it's 20 some pages of very very small font so there's a lot of great stuff in here if you feel though when you've seen the stakeholder summary report that your constituency's voices are not reflected in it then yes I think you do have time between the seventh and the second round of interviews to do listing sessions in addition to what we're talking about on the 7th which is the interview process specifically did that answer your question Virginia okay sorry there so yes she said uh for he like the timeline was um it was helpful to know some timeline does anybody else have I think I think I'm in well I I'm interested to see the feedback that we get it feels exceedingly challenging to try to add one today I'm
088hopeful that what we yeah can you agree people sorry I think options and it sounds like on the 7eventh we can have a conversation about like where we're at then in terms of sounds like weave options um okay then I is there anything else process question wise again the heart of a conversation is that we do some of more of this on the we will have Barb here in person to do that so that will go hopefully smoother um you requested that maybe we can get some of the interview questions beforehand and do some of the train s the TR the training for that beforehand and did I get General consent that people are interested in that so that yeah yep I understand yeah and I just want to make sure that people have that
089capacity as well so if that's sort of the the option obviously would be you can ask questions in the meeting as well about this but for some that want to take a look at the stuff that have that ability that they would be able to take a look at that so that um so we'd have that request has been made people are interested in seeing the results and taking the a good dive into that and then I think those were the main points that we heard so far today and we'll see if there's more that we need to do to adjust timeline for things as well at that point so okay then I would like to let go unless there is anything else and we can take down this temporary system here and um and
090then uh move on to the next on the agenda so thank you uh for joining us today again if you have questions feel free to reach out to that yoube box as well all right thank you everyone have questions about what we want to understand about it we have two brand new board members that have never been through this before and some of us have been through it a handful of times and so um and some we've been through many but anyways so I'd like to go ahead now that I think we're technically set up for you guys to present thank you for your patience yes thank you thank you so good evening shair Cox I want to say also to interim superintendent McGuire and other board members my name once again is Freda Bailey
091and I'm a principal of special assignment and I get to work with a lovely group of individuals who are very passionate about the work that has taking place it's really been an honor to partner with our American Indian uh parent advisory committee we have American Indian student um intertribal youth Council group as well and the peace that they're always bringing into the space is just that the wisdom and knowledge and their uh input and perseverance in making sure that we're doing the right thing for our students in the community but before I begin I do want to give a special thank you to some individuals who have helped us along the way um to individuals who are district members Deb probes and Sarah rard um when we have our meetings they're always there to support
092give guidance on what is taking place and then also one special individual most importantly I would like to just say a thank you for her dedication outstanding hard work and that's our former chairperson Samantha defo who helped us tremendously in creating our land acknowledgement and some other components that are still in our system today so I do want to say thank you to her for the great work that she did and uh supporting our youth and giving us and especially for myself as a black individual the understanding of how we navigate with our American Indian group so I want to say thank you to her um because what she did basically was pushed us to create uh what we see in our as far as vision for our students and youth and giving them the
093opportunity to feel the value uh that we always talk about and understanding their best selves and how we move forward so once again I want to say a big thank you to her and the members that were part of that committee you will get to hear from our new members that I'm really excited to once again collaborate with with learn from and just experience something different and new and so um they will be able to share some of their perspectives and um uh the ways in which they've been navigating our American Indian parent advisory committee and collaborating with us in St Louis Park um I'm excited to be able to work with them and once again learn as well so when I think about these individuals it once again remind me of our mission uh
094which is to see Inspire and Empower to create racially Equitable learning that energizes and enhances the spirit and when I think about our American Indian youth group and our families that's the part that I'm like holding on to because they are being seen they're inspiring and empowering me as an individual as well in the system so I just wanted to say thank you uh to those individuals that are helping us continue to live through our vision and Mission uh the lady that's sitting next to me um Julia MC babby is our um American Indian liaison and she will be able to share some information as well um so that you can hear some of the great things that have taken place in St Louis Park so we're going to um nice to be here with
095each of you and uh we're going to start uh Freda you've done a great job of keying this up for everyone uh I think I'd like to start by uh just introducing our new co-chair our new chair our new co-chair and our secretary for Apec which is your American Indian parent advisory committee members our newest members and our new chair would you stand up Scott and then our co-chair and our secretary Rachel King Rachel King and Tara T and uh I would just like to I'm sorry I'm getting a little tired at this point start here oh okay okay all right so for American Indian par advisory committee we know that this is a state statute right and so with that it states that a school district in which there are 10 or more American
096Indian students enrolled uh we have to establish that American Indian parent advisory committee and so that's something that we have been very fortunate to be able to do and collaborate once again the membership is comprised of our parents or and our guardians of our American Indian students in St Louis Park and those that are eligible to be uh part of the committee are are secondary students that we get to work with with our American Indian IND tribal youth Council which I'm really excited about our American Indian District staff members uh and we also have non-native members that can be a part of the committee but when they're part of the committee when it's time to vote they do not have uh the opportunity to be able to vote when things uh come up such as
097the concurrence our American Indian parent advisory committee also serves as an advisory role so a lot of the goals that you would hear talk about was in collaboration with our uh APAC committee our American Indian Youth and it's um involved around culturally relevant uh ways of being and for us and uh educational opportunities for our students in the uh in the system this committee is very critical uh which we I'm learning once again a lot about about the achievement and success of our American Indian students and it's also helping us to strengthen our community with our Native American Indian uh Youth and Community with staff included as well it's giving us a great partnership that is really critical for us to make sure that we are once again having those conversations receiving those perspectives in
098order to move forward so in St Louis Park we are committed to working collaboratively with our parents and families to meet the you unique critical uh cultural and educational needs of our students uh and these are just some things that we've done throughout and then what uh Julia will talk about is some of the goals uh that have been done or created with our youth and our families and then this is a goal that it we once we meet each month we kind of talk about some of the goals so I'll let Julia share some of the goals that um are part of our process sure thank you uh Freda in area one we support post American Indian parent advisory counil which is our Apec and our youth tribal counil activities by doing various activities
099uh timeline monitoring secondary preparation uh for American Indian pupils and that could very well Encompass uh our um College visits uh our college fair that we uh were privy to go to in October we um uh went to the Minnesota historical Society uh for um the Native American college fair and there were over 78 colleges and universities represented there uh everything from our 2-year uh colleges to our four-year colleges and universities represented there this is a golden opportunity because there's so much more funding and support for our native students right now so it's important that we make sure that they're aware of what they need to do to get get to that next step another area of support came from academic looking into our academic achievement for our native uh American students and it's not
100just Native American it is also comprised of our not Indian our um um Alaskan and our uh oh gosh Hawaiian Hawaiian from one stream to the other there so um you know we we're looking very closely at how we can take them to that Next Level and get them AC academically strong um with that uh we're also looking at making curriculum relevant to their needs and looking at their interests and cultural heritage of American Indian the American Indian student and part a huge part of that is preparing through literature and preparing through history and helping them become a part a bigger part of their community and what's going on there another area that we've looked positively in is we've provided positive reinforcement of the self-image of those American Indian pupils we had an interesting um
101conversation with some of our seniors a couple of weeks ago at one of our meetings last month uh we asked them what has helped them over the last few years what has stood out for them what kind of voice do they bring to U the table at this point as opposed to how have they grown you know and they shared with us how important this group has been in high school and how this has made their Community whole and how it's made them whole and it's part of a Brotherhood at this point and community so I thought that that was didn't cost anything but a little time and a little togetherness so I thought that was pretty special and it's also helped them develop an Intercultural awareness among themselves among parents among others around them
102and a respect for others so I thought that that was pretty special and just share just um so some of the things that you're me that Julia mentioned uh this is also in collaboration with our schools and so some of the things that we've been doing with let's say with the high school is having conversations about credits how many credits the seniors have what do they need in order to receive that board moving forward we've also had conversations about um who's taking acts and how many students are passing at CTS and so we're looking at who are they having those conversations um and then also we're looking at who's enrolled in AP IB honors classroom so we're having dialogue with our high school students specifically for our our uh seniors Andor the ones that are
103in the um high school and then we're also collaborating with other sites about about what a what type of curriculum do you have where the students can be seen heard and valued right and then how are they being culturally uh relevant to the students and the families what is it that they need and then what other resources do we need to bring into the space for the students to have that positive self-image one of the things that I can say that we're really uh proud about is that during graduation we've had students to be able to wear their regalia uh during uh graduation time and they were really proud of that and one of the things that was created for them to be able to have a what I would say a shadow box in
104order for that to stay with them uh some of the students were able to give us the title for the powow to provide that information and creating what they would like to see uh as far as the t-shirts so that's the collaboration we've had with students and then with staff about how are the children what is it that we need to do and provide so there's collaboration with every site along the way to make sure that we are matching the goals that were created not by us but but with the families and the students and then how do we support and that Collective ways of being okay well thank you uh St Louis Park public schools has two grant funding sources to support the American Indian uh students and their families in the district American
105Indian education a through the Minnesota Department of Education mde and the title six American Indian gr through the US uh Department of Education the goal for both of these grants is pretty much um the same they are to address the unique academic and cultural needs of our American Alaskan and Native um students um support these students to meet academic standards and support postsecondary preparation for pupils now when we talk about this we are also talking about at this point we have a few students who are looking at add a few little academic missteps here so we're going to be setting up tutoring and other uh areas to help them get to the point where they need to be to make sure they're on target for graduation and that so we are doing that um it
106says here again make curriculum relevant to the needs interests and cultural heritage of the American uh Native pupils uh curriculum is responsive to the unique culture language and educational needs of these students and the idea there I think is to pull in uh who they are and what their culture is and to introduce them to their tribal um affiliation and just help them be whole if they need that help and it's interesting because they actually do open up over time you know I think back 3 four years ago when I first started working with some of these students that are now senior and to watch them grow has been an experience and the questions they feel very comfortable asking now um in front of each other the community they've F it's almost like a family
107of students that come together so it kind of gives you a feeling of okay we are doing something good here we're getting this together uh but we provide positive reinforcement of the self image of the American Indian pupils we develop inter cultural awareness again saying the same thing among pupil's parents and staff and that was done through our pawow it was also it's also being done through our monthly meetings that we hold with the students and now we're going to an every two week type of um meeting so that we can um make sure we're staying on top of grades and making sure we're getting the support we need in place and the counselors working with the students and helping them decide the direction that they want to go so many of our students were
108not necessarily uh tribal members but their mothers they were born on the reservation in a lot of cases and their parents are both from uh Indian Heritage and uh so they've asked requested that we go help them go back and they've got their birth certificates and get their tribal affiliation so I have been in touch with Leech Lake and a couple of other reservations trying to help them support that endeavor to make sure they qualify for all of the scholarships and money that's out there that will support their higher education at this point um as we move forward uh part of reaching those goals have included um guest speakers that we have brought into house um Antoine truder T torer thank you promote and host informational sessions that are tailored to the American Indian students
109and their family uh we've talked about that quite a bit we've done that and we're continuing to do it uh purchase additional AI resources for classrooms we have been working and a couple of these parents here several of these parents here have been working over the years uh we pack bags Every Spring with reading materials for the summer and we take to each school and each child gets a bag a backpack with books in it for the summer and their culturally sensitive books um we of course scheduled a college visit our youth Tribal Council went on the college visit we've already talked about uh we have U done a lot of graduation uh regalia as we talked about uh Tara who's part of our uh team at the Point well she's been a part of
110our team but um she actually designed gift bags for all of the graduating students and I I just to say we were shocked to see her talents and how she just kind of pulled everything together with cards writing personalized cards for each of the graduating students um and then putting their um shadow boxes with their uh beaded caps and everything into the shadow box that they can take in and out and hang up when they get home but the bags that she created with feathers on them that she did she did by hand was remarkable and I just have to say thank you Tara um yeah and and then I have to I have to mention something that it just makes my heart swell when I think of Malcolm drum beater Malcolm is a senior
111this year and Malcolm all last year he was uh procrastinating I guess the about this t-shirt that he was supposed to help design for the group he was the one chosen to design a T-shirt and Malcolm would come in and he said oh I don't have time today or I'm busy and so finally the last meeting of the school year he um Malcolm came in the room and people jumped on him hey man where's the T-shirt design you know you said you were going to do it he sat down and in minutes oh yeah hi yeah and in 10 minutes he actually designed this t-shirt and the really beautiful thing about that t-shirt is the words on that t-shirt yeah the words on that t-shirt that was the words that they came up with themselves
112to S oh go ahead no I say can you read it just for people that are perseverance culture Equity pride and pride and those are the things that they felt they had gained over their experience in that console sure and the lady slippers did you the lady slippers yeah that's he's the one he he designed that and he did it in 10 minutes oh my God I was so impressed oh my God you're so gifted so yes yeah so uh we brought each of you one to share and uh yeah yeah to know what talented young people are coming um anyway that's malcolms and the rest of the group that we go with the next thing I want to talk about uh very briefly just to give you an idea of what's going on is
113um we have someone called Michael sheret Michael has been coming to our school for the last four years and he comes every uh October uh for indigenous people's month um Michael is um La you know he's a member of the Red Cliff uh band of Lake Superior jibway Indians he makes his own flutes and he visits all of the elementary schools and he spends a couple of hours at each school and he's amazing he's uh very talented and he tells Tales of uh all kinds of things that are going on in his on his reservation and growing up in the uh on the reservation and that sort of thing so so yeah so we also have been doing that sort of thing for our elementary schools so it doesn't start it's not just high school
114and of course um we have next I'm not sure that's the the logo and that's our intertribal American Indian intertribal youth Council those were our graduates a year ago two two years ago yeah yeah I got to get used to these SCS yeah anyway so at this point I would like to just call on um Scott and Rachel and Tara just for a brief overview of um their approval of what the board what we're doing as a community as a school district uh for the American Indian their children go to the school so they're part of this group and there's Tara there Saturday family engagement okay so we're going to let them okay we'll let them get up here and then I can set up thank you all I'll just roll up I'll just do
115this for you thank you as we mentioned earlier we're in a makeshift environment building and it just makes for very awkward moments like when we have to like bring people we appreciate your patience we're parents we improvise so I said hello my relatives good to see you all this evening and so I'm Scott shoem maker and I'm U yeah as freedom and Julia mention the recent chair of the American imperian advisor committee and I'm ass Citi in the Miami Tribe of Oklahoma and I I'm going a little off script here but I just wanted to share a little bit about um we moved into the district about three years ago and so prior to that we were um living in Indianapolis Indiana so I have two I have two daughters and um the challenges of
116um living in a place where you know uh Indians didn't exist anymore and so that was very reflective in um the curriculum and just kind of um the public perception um and how um you know as a parent seeing the struggles that my children had where they didn't see themselves being reflected in what people were learning about Native people what little they were learning about it um so and then you know a lot of that burden of me is the parent having to go into the classroom and you know um trying to un help people unlearn some of the things they've learned about native peoples um and trying to get an American imperian advisory committee started in the schools there but that's that's a whole other story um but then you know as I when
117we moved into the district um and you know I was like I I want to be a part of the parent advisory committee and I just I was just so welcomed by Sammy and Tara and Freda and Julia and flower and all the other folks involved um that it's been u a really wonderful experience um and already to see like the difference of my children's experience here so just wanted to thank everybody for that so oh yes okay so the um so yes so what we're here to talk about um is the the vote of concurrent so uh the American imperian advisory committee voted um that we uh the St Louis Park schools is um in concurrence with um the educational offerings uh extended to American naan students so um I guess maybe we could
118talk about some of the things that we've been doing and maybe Rachel and Tara want to talk okay well do you want me to go first to you goad okay well I'm Rachel king um I my I've got a kind of different I'm from Red Lake Minnesota um originally and we came from the reservation um down here so my son is in the high school he's nth grader he started he was he came straight from reservation and um and we started out in the middle school and he it was it was a culture shock for him um this is this is he's used to being surrounded by Natives and you know and and this is just it's very different for him and he grew up very traditionally native so um then we a house moved
119to moved to Robinsdale and he tried Robinsdale Middle School that was not a good fit for him we brought him back here we've been very happy love the parent committee here everybody's been very very supportive um when Elvis my son was coming when when we were trying to get him um open enrollment in the district um Julia helped us find the paperwork and whatnot um so so yes it's been a great I I I it's a great District I love it um but what we've been um last year I I work for a tribal College um in the city Red Lake Nation Tribal college and it's kind of the first big shebang here and and so what we do a lot with our college and and this is kind of one of those things that
120we do just across the board and this is what I feel like um St Louis Park does um by you know I I think a lot of times people think of natives as being Western you know riding horses and wearing breach class but that's not what we are we're we grew with times and we're we're lawyers teachers you know and and that's and and and I feel like you know that that we're totally assimilated we still have our culture but I think a lot of times our our our our our families have have have lost that connection with their home and so that's my focus is making sure that that natives know that they have Community here in the city and and I think that's that this the the district is a good thing at
121that good job with that so one of the things that we did before the PA was we did some um we made shirts and skirts ribbon shirts and ribbon skirts for the students to wear um to whatever events they go to um and this is you know again it's building you know in in those uh those goal areas I think that you know helps with the the finding um connection to the culture and um the significance of curriculum because it's also you know that it's a teaching it's a teaching moment you know that it's not just in the classroom but outside of the classroom as well so I thought it was huge and it was great and you know I loved helping with that um yeah um I'm taros um I've been a parent on
122this committee since um my son Joshua Blanco is a 10th grader he is part um Nez per or Nei poo like myself that and um he's also a CA from um Columbia so anyway um as far as our concurrence and and what not from last year I helped with child care um during during our sewing our shirts and our skirts and um drew a bit but my f main focus is for for my membership on this committee was to um I guess impune language back into the school district and I think the school district is doing a really good job of that for the fourth and fifth graders um and and our Council at the high school I think that's awesome and having their their voice in what we do extremely impacts how we um
123contribute to their growth well yeah so some of the other things that we did um last year was the first ever um St Louis Park schools and somebody said first ever in St Louis Park but I I don't know okay um powow so um you know um it was it was an amazing experience it was a lot of work but it was it was really wonderful seeing you know the the children that uh the students that participa in the art making series wore their regalia uh and just seeing the look of Pride on their faces you know as they were out there dancing um and you know the honoring of the the graduating senior seniors any of you been to a p there's you know there's a lot of Honor dances for you know um
124special things so that was really wonderful um honoring those seniors um as well and um you know just seeing the broader Twin Cities native Community coming together but then also you can see the picture in the stands of just St Louis Park so um there was there were a lot of people um you know that came to the pow Island so um I think there was also a lot of interest from other schools partnering with us so I think um I don't know if I can say who but okay yeah I think it was a Hopkins and Robinsdale I think um so thinking about how we can you know have a an event uh you know uh having thinking about like layers of or levels of community so thinking about how we're connected to those
125other parent advisory committees and I think you know with like the youth Council group and then I'm kind of getting ahead but um also like kind of as where think being in the year ahead of of creating more of those spaces for community so having like family um Day events where we the parents and the families you know we're connecting with one another and and seeing you know how the communities um really blossoming in the in the high school so just think there's um there's so much um I'm really excited about for this coming here oh is that did I skip ahead I already okay anyway we're we vote that we we voted that we're in conr no thank you for providing that and providing a lot of detail and at this point again this
126is not this is not an action item but this is we are accepting your getting receiving your concurrence U of this information and again it does open up the opportunity for our board to ask some questions to seek some clarification and what whatever they want to do so I want to I want to uh open up that opportunity to our board members to um with any questions kind you know I just I had uh I had students who went to the college fair from the school district that I teach in and I guess my only sort of observation or thought because it's such a great thing is don't forget about the middle schoolers um and one of the things that middle schoolers my middle schoolers are always so surprised about they're like wait you have
127to have wait wait you have to do all of that to get into college and it's like why didn't you tell us that in nth grade and didn't tell you in nth grade we should start sixth grade just saying well no I so my school my my middle school has really started to hone in on like what does it what does it mean to set up the um habits to start to really think about your future really so I will always I will always honor midle middle schoolers yeah that is something that we had a conversation with the principal uh principal um kinosi uh was that uh with our youth because they were the the American Indian youth tribal intertribal group they want to go to the middle school and have conversations so that's that's
128a conversation we're having now with just the middle middle schoolers and then they get to share their stories uh about the experiences being in the in the the council and the committee and then the impact that it has had on them that was sort of like the story that Julia was mentioning that's exactly what they were talking about in a meeting just two weeks ago that they would love to be able to go to the mdle school there's conversations about that so thank you I was going to say something similar so I I just wanted to say thank you for coming and um I really um I've only been on the board a couple years now but I enjoy this this meeting where we get to hear from you all about the way that you're
129engaging and um just really grateful for you all for for doing this with us um thank you and I'm excited to have a shirt you guys are like the only ones who bring gifts I just want I mean I really want to e What Sarah Said like we so grateful and like the um I I want to acknowledge that like having the vot of concurrence um means that you are putting trust in us and I and I'm really grateful for that so and hearing of all the amazing work you are doing um and glad that um that I guess that we that you feel that we are trustworthy of that work so well thank you guys for everything you guys do I mean seriously thank you that ccha and and please give our give our
130thanks to Sammy too it's I think I've been here once when she wasn't here so yeah I I do too oh um I also wanted to Echo the the things I'm when I think about why I'm so proud to be in this District it's because of the work that committees like yourself do and I I I'm actually my mind is blown by the scope of work that you're doing and uh I'm so incredibly impressed um and you know I I serve as an ad an advisory committee myself on the city uh that does not do nearly as much as as you all do uh but I'm incredibly sensitive to uh ensuring that you know the the district can be responsive uh to your needs and to your recommendations and that we continue that collaboration um
131is there any can can you say more maybe about how we ensure we're we're collaborating with with APAC and and how we're maintaining responsiveness recommendations sure sure so uh as Julia mentioned we have monthly meetings with our APAC committee and when we're talking about the grants and the not just the much of Grants but just looking at what are the goals that they would like to see occur and that's in collaboration with and they kind we just say what is it that you've noticed what would you like to see moving forward and then how can we support your group and that's the same thing that we do with our American Indian uh intertribal youth Council group uh having the monthly meetings what is it that they would like to see what would they like to
132do what what what experiences they're having and then we Tred to collaborate and move that forward so a lot of the work and or um the ideas are coming from the Committees and then we're just trying to collaborate in how we can make that work and uh what is it that we can do to make sure that it's living and breathing and not just a document that we say here's what we do but actually put it into action so that's what we've been that's why I'm really grateful I learned a lot from the group because of what is it that their experience are and then what is it that we can do to ensure that their children are getting what uh should occur culturally so I hope I'm answering no absolutely yes thank you thank
133you for that I I want to thank you all I want to thank principal k j all of you uh know it makes me happy hearing that you know seeing the vision and the mission yeah you know and uh you guys T us like as my colleagues said you know uh I remember attending one of your meetings I really enjoy it I learn a lot uh so I have a question you talk about it uh supporting academic achievement so I just want to know detail how I mean if you don't have the answer right now um last year um um Samantha defo was asked by Patrick Duffy to to um go through uh the um all the elementary schools for an hour a month was it a month an hour a month to teach language
134for fourth to fourth and fifth graders and that has expounded and gotten bigger and we have a grant now in the district and is being taught in the school in the scho elementary schools um by Karen joy and she's doing an amazing job of it oh my God all the kids are talking about you're you're here oh my God Miss Joy Miss Joy it's like this huge thing at pierart they get to have language debt hour and that's with the ojibway language and cultures so we're able to kind of work with them and providing students that exposure to the culture the language and then what does that mean I think it connects to what Mr Shoemaker was mentioning like we do have American Indians in our group in our classrooms and what does that look
135like and then helping them with that and then going back to the academic piece that's the collaboration that we've been having with like for instance when we look at Julia is able to uh gather a list of all of our students in the district and we start to look at okay how are they um academically and then what are some things that we need to Monitor and then who do we have conversations with about what's taking place for instance going back to high school because we know uh act FASA uh uh credits because when they get to high school they don't realize you have to have X number of credits in order to grad so we're monitoring the credits having conversations with the counselor and or whomever uh to say what's going on with the
136students and then how can we collaborate and support that in connection with the families uh so that they too are uh understanding the ways in which to navigate high school and then the credits indoor classes um academically uh what's taking place with the students so there's a lot of collaboration between the sites uh classroom teachers and then making sure that the students are receiving the support support that they need if it's tutoring we talk about what does that look like some of the students were able to share with us I'm kind of struggling in this area and may need help with that so some sometimes the students will let us know U math I'm chall I'm challenged and then we look at that and we have conversations and then what do we need to put
137in place to support the students academically so those are just some of the things that we've been doing to support uh the students thank you we would love to have you in our schools we are lucky to have you in our schools and I would love to come again in one of your meetings yeah welcome any time yeah you're welcome in we can do that just just let us know when you're going to come and then we'll make sure because they they're not there every day they're usually there a couple of times a week I think at a particular school so I yes just let us know when they're going to be there or we can let you know when the classes are yeah or the meetings yeah yeah go see um first I like
138to say I just adore how you all lean on each other and support one another and um broadcast everyone's individual creativity so I can only imagine what that means to the families and students that you support um second question is how do you have a percentage of um the American Indian families that utilize APAC that utilizes I'm sorry the APAC that utilizes oh APAC okay um not it's not a lot not nearly we have3 36 families listed uh and there might be a third of them have been online at sometime or another and then there's just a handful that's actually Super Active until you get into the powow until you're doing something that's inclusive of where they can go and sew something or they can go and be part of something it's it's you know
139it's like any organization there's a few people that do most of the work can I just say and and I think I think one of the things too is that um is that I think more parents would like to be active but there's work yes we we you know it's a lot it's a lot of commitment to to have to you know to to collaborate on that on that end I think people want to be but bills got to be paid yeah rents got to be paid and so so I think that um I think with the welcoming how how um we're we're we're welcome to come as we can to the Apex meeting like like um Miss Julia said is that it people will come in when they can um but it's not it's
140not always something that that that works in people's schedules so I feel like that's you know it it's nice that it's welcoming to where you can come in and and and participate when you can um and some of us have more flexible schedules that can do stuff like that so privilege sometimes oh we have a family day scheduled on March 9th is that an invite us for anybody well you know like I think it does kind of speak to that you know trying to like you create more oh that's right March 9 23rd or 30th sorry sorry choose a date we'll put it out and put flowers Flyers out and people will know the next event yeah I I have just a few closing things here one when you said it was the first Power
141in St Park I have reason to believe that there were many power ws and celebrations in this area as we acknowledge at the very beginning before it was technically I know that's iate secondarily I have a sort of a personal request which is that um that that that somehow we can learn some of that language too and I know that that's not one of the only language but I I felt kind of embarrassed that Scott you addressed Us in that language and we weren't able to reciprocate or to acknowledge that so like I want I want to be able like if we have an opportunity for us to learn some words in in a language or some languages that would be um really helpful um community community community at no you go ahead you're oh
142I was just going to say I mean it can't hurt to like some signs in different languages did you know Dakota were obviously here this was you know Dakota land at at one point um but we ASO J share this land with Dakota so so there's a lot of us here too um but yeah yeah I mean bathroom signs you you go to to Hawaii and and you know and and you know all all the schools have have different you know have have um language in in those you have have the signs in in their their native languages I mean so so there's other you know there's other schools and states and you know that that do stuff like that so I mean I'm just throwing it out there that it it can't hurt to
143to share some of those those language you know some of those signs in different languages um in the community um buiji just for example buiji has signs everywhere in ojay you know they're surrounded by OJ um but yeah there there's there's tons of things that we can do um I you know like again I work for a tribal College here in the city which is blowing up um and and we're we're we we would love to come and do you know anything in in the community um next year we'll be throwing some some uh Dakota Dakota into our catalog because we are too we we're we recognize that we're on Dakota land and that um that that's part of the community here in the Twin Cities is Dakota jibway hunk um and you know whoever
144else but it it's it's something that you know we we want to honor that and so um if you guys ever need anything let us know well like yeah for instance like with the welcome signs to you like to my kids school you know it's great seeing all the other languages but I'm like where's there's no native languages there there's a all are welcome jibway and auta oh really that been updated I have noticed that you would like me to reach out to Jamie chismer I'm there are several of us that could well I'm going to look for that next time B I don't know you would have to talk to but Jamie is like really open toen swear they didn't have Dakota on there I swear they didn't have dakot on there two in
145my classroom and I could have sworn one was doota and one was jway I know they had a jway but I'm not sure that because when we were at the middle school I'm not yeah no I'm in M oh okay okay so yeah never right we have a there's a different their land acknowledgement is slightly different so and I I feel like we could sit here and talk with you speaks to one of the challenges as of a board is that largely our work is um business we are here to approve we are here to acknowledge we're here to do things like that we do incorporate presentations like this some are that we you know we are here to to take in information sometimes we have discussions about different things I'm just appreciating tonight to
146just hear from you and to that you're helping us kind of um you know with us centering too on students and and that was the one thing that I liked about a couple years you guys brought students here and that was super exciting and I know that they were all like typical students they were a shame not ashamed but just kind of like I have to be at this meeting but it it does it does make feel really good this did a nice job of helping present and share what some of what we're seeing our kids doing hearing about it feeling that sort of real direct connection to is really powerful to us to I think every single one of us is sort of when we have that energetic moment of working and interacting being
147with the students reminds us recenters us helps energize us so you guys did a wonderful job thank you and I want to keep our dinner moving along thank you thank you thank you thank you thank you and the shirt um not bringing shirts to us but here here to talk about pay Equity you pity t-shirt like what pay Equity t-shirt yeah um uh but to present to us uh another requirement that we have again just kind of speaks mostly to our to the business side of things is that we have on our discussion item right now we have P Equity report and then later on in the agenda we'll be approving that we have an action today to this so um director CER is here to talk to us about the pay Equity report chair
148members of the board superintendent it's with great honor that I get to talk about our compensation system and structures and the pay Equity report we actually are only required to talk about the pay Equity report but I like to take this opportunity uh every 3 years at least to talk with the board about how we get there because the pay Equity report is a moment in time every 3 years where we have to submit one set of data as of December 31st to the state of Minnesota to show that female dominated jobs are not paid less than male dominated jobs okay but it takes a lot to get there to get to that to make sure it is Equitable and is early as 2015 we almost failed this this test and so um I just
149want to take you through a little bit of how we get there and all of the work and people that are involved in in making our pce system overall what we believe to be Equitable Fair transparent and um appreciated by employees so we're going to go over just kind of the overall compensation plant of guiding principles building blocks and how we put it all into place because we don't get to just mandate this we have to bargain it across 14 different groups and so it would be easy for me to go in my office whip up some pay and and then just apply it but uh we then have to go out and talk with all of our employee groups to implement it s uh uh unit by unit and make it all come together
150in some coherent plan so um just a little bit about pay Equity law it has some tests that female dominated jobs cannot systematically below be below male dominated jobs uh a female dominated job is any job that has uh 70% or greater females in that title okay so many of our teaching jobs are are female dominated many of our custodian jobs are male dominated but for example the director of HR is a male dominated job the superintendent of schools is now a female dominated job so it it says and it can fluctuate just like that as we have turnover of one person in a oneperson job or one person in in a two-person job so uh it can be very bitable based on um who's holding the job um at the time um it can
151also it's not just their maximum pay but it's the maximum pay plus the employer contribution to health insurance that gets calculated as a monthly salary amount and so we have to have uh the salaries and the health insurance in line with all the groups otherwise it you know they could throw uh the the pay Equity calculation off and male dominat jobs uh for example can't get paid longevity or other things that female dominated jobs aren't so we have another there's another test for for that and we have to report every three years and this is our year the next year will be 2027 okay um again our core values um equal intrinsic worth all jobs are important otherwise we wouldn't have them so that we should have a systematic way of creating um you know
152the value of those jobs we have a job Factor system uh we make that Equitable so that as a as a job has more points it gets relatively more pay uh we want to make sure our jobs are competitive so we're not only looking at our internal self but we have to Benchmark against the outside market and make sure our jobs are not only internally Equitable but competitive and Equitable with the uh labor market and we have to be financially responsible because you can't pay what you don't have and so we work very close ly with the business office to project you know our budgets and uh how much we can afford for uh salary benefits total compensation so the building blocks of all of this are to have job classifications or job titles uh
153do job evaluation on each job uh have those values linked to pay ranges then negotiate those pay ranges into labor contracts uh and get those agreements uh for salary ranges and then make sure our benefits are consistent across the entire organization um we do this with 14 groups we have 116 active job classifications uh and we have 157 assignments and what I mean by that is U you know a a a job classification might be elementary teacher but we also have assignments which would break that down into kindergarten first grade second grade third grade fourth grade so we we have some finer distinctions but those kind of get balled up into a higher uh classification when we're reporting um to pay equity and we have 710 contracted employees which um I note was actually uh
15427 employees less than we had uh when we reported um a few years ago so we we're we're we're a smaller and mightier group um as we do in our system um it's called the decision band uh method it's used by a number of school districts and cities and counties um there are six bands there are some sub and the bands have to do with um is your job fairly prescribed and you have tasks that must be completed or are you the superintendent creating policy across the entire district and so that it's broken into six decision bans and then there's sub bans about whether it's a supervisory or non-supervisory job and then complexity within those bands and I'll show you a little bit so it's a you know the superintendent would be up in the
155F and the directors and would be in the E and supervisors managers and principles are in the D range and our professionals like accountants and HR Specialists are in the cband um operational would be some clerical technical professional PA professional jobs and quite frankly I don't believe at this point we have any or maybe one or 2 a banded jobs because as you shrink jobs um they all get more complex because everybody has to do you know more than just have like I carry the mail around and I'm the you know I'm the mail room Clerk or something like that so everything gets a little bit more complex so I think we've ran out of most of our a-level banded jobs um so just for fun there's you know there's 30 different bands uh the
156different levels of points those points get put into grades those grades get put into salary ranges and we evaluate each of our jobs you know accordingly um as we're working with with creating a new job and where does that slide into our existing structure when we plot that you can kind of see the beginning of how does a salary range come about uh when we plot our points from for pay Equity you could see that there was I mean there was dispersion but it was a fairly loose dispersion in 2014 um it got tighter in 2017 uh it got tighter again in 2020 and in 2023 whoops this graph is uh it looks better in PowerPoint as I moved it to a Google doc my little band slid out but this is the tightest dispersion
157we've had um so far and it's continued to get better and better um as we worked it through so uh um and what I you know enjoy is that as I go through this with our groups they understand it um you know when we say you know we we can't cut this the custodian salary ranges down to three steps because you know we have this test about you know years to Max and in 2015 uh 2013 15 contracts the custodians had six steps to Max and the PA professionals had 16 and nutrition had 14 and the clerks had you know 13 steps to get to their Max and so now they understand oh that's not fair and so but it takes a lot of time to you know reinforce those ideas and I think we're
158we're in a really good spot now so um we're going to be asking the board to approve the pay Equity report I'm going to just I I hope you can see that here this is the actual when you put all of our data in it spits out this compliance report in the statistical p uh test it's called the underpayment ratio that number must be 80 or better uh meaning female jobs can't be more than 80% of those of the male dominated jobs we're actually at 129% so the female the females are doing uh okay compared to the male jobs uh in our in our um organization um our salary range test um is you know almost right on point it's uh 100 three 100 would be um you know like per perfectly Equitable between the
159the the two uh the two sets and know by the way there's also a balance class so there's female dominated male dominated and if the jobs like between 70 and 30% it's a balanced and that just gets thrown out of the of all the calculations so U you're only really testing female jobs against male dominated jobs and then the exceptional service pay uh test almost almost everybody in the organization has longevity except uh superintendents and directors so um and those are all single income of jobs and so to the extent that a director's changes from female dominated this exceptional service pay test um uh will fluctuate between 100% And um you know 97 98% so it's it's that's that we're never going to be out of compliance there as well um so we'd be asking
160the board to approve uh the district's pay Equity uh report uh if it's if it's uh approved tonight or um then we would submit it to state in final form tomorrow and then we post notices to all of the employee groups and in all the buildings and the St Louis Park public library um uh that we have submitted our report and people can request a cop yeah and people can request a copy um and I want you to know that we don't do this alone so we meet with Finance the superintendent board and we talk about our negotiation plans this is always in our minds when we're bargaining where are all the groups and and what changes do we need to make uh we have meetings with our employee groups again like I said we
161discussed these uh the concept of pay equity and where they are in relation to others uh the internal Equity um is always important and we want it to be legally defens Legally defensible phisically respons responsible transparent um if anybody asks for our pay Equity report we have to give them a copy and we do uh and I believe that being transparent uh as Patricia says clear as kind and uh you know being transparent about your pay systems and putting your contracts up on the websites promotes uh that feeling of transparency uh Recruitment and Retention goals people I believe you know we have a sense of being fair and hopefully uh if we're paying people well and they believe that their pay is fair uh hey we have happy employees so uh with that I would
162take any questions uh about what we're doing or are we're doing it my colleagues here I guess I just had one does this come out like other than if somebody asked for it I mean is there not that I don't trust your work at all but I'm just wondering is it a part of an audit at something is it a part like how yeah uh uh so it's it's submitted to the state of Minnesota every year and they they then hold our data and they have our results um so if we're out of compliance there is a fine um in terms of that and because we're required to submit our you know report to all of our um unions um I'm guessing the perception is that if the unions look at it and think that
163we're cheating they'll tell somebody you know and so um yeah I don't I don't think we would last very long if we were cheating on data that is held by all the unions so um thank you for this seems like a lot of work um how and I recognize this is a state required report um but how do we account for transgender and non-binary there is a male female and non-binary in the uh that just do people self- select yes yeah and in our new pay system we have the ability for people to um have a gender other than male or female okay yeah and that would get transferred to the you know into the report and we do every three years every three years great um I want to keep the meeting moving along
164we have another opportunity to ask a question here if we have questions that arise suddenly but um thank you director CER um for this uh information and for this update um it's now time to move on to the consent agenda on the consent agenda we have a number of the standard things that we always do including payroll expenditures uh fund transfers pay account payable dispersements investment Holdings um donations Personnel minutes and then I just wanted to call out that we have the board meeting dates on there we had gone through and we talked about the board meeting dates and making some adjustments and that has been put on here because these are meant to be non-controversial items that probably need no discussion um it sounds like everybody's in agreement on it so I just wanted
165to call that out so um Colin can I just when do I can I just mention Audrey sure if you'd like to so if you were paying close attention you would have noticed that my daughter has been hired by um SOS Park uh so she um I did when she wanted to apply for the job I did reach out to Patrice and I I reached out to Sarah I reached out to superintendent it was high at the time and I was like is this loud and we are not violating any sort of um policy by hiring my child for um a life card and I think that they're kind of short of white guard so if there's other people who want to play yeah there is there is something that related to and they always
166talk about it in msba training like if you hire a teacher or something like that if a board does that and it's a very like they go into a lot of detail and it's a very sort of like I think it was established a long time ago for like a very specific reason in smaller towns and things like that that you weren't just hiring your family to work in the school and stuff um but this this um uh seems s controversial so at this point unless there's any more I would um I would welcome a motion to approve the consent agenda um I could read it it's recommended that school board approve the consent agenda with the following business and Personnel items for January 23rd 2024 school board meeting as presented do I have a
167motion so moved so moved uh by Taylor and do I have a second second by Celia um and I don't think this really comes up for discussion so that's uh all those in favor say I I any opposed passes 70 as a consent agenda should hopefully do um let's move on to our action agenda we have a couple things on our action agenda one being our Park Spanish Immersion admissions this is I believe the third time right this is our third reading of of of of presentation third reading I don't know what we call it but it's the third time that we're bringing it to us we had some discussion healthy discuss disc about it last time and I think um I don't know if there's anything director Davis that you want to add um
168in terms of just just very briefly um thank you this is our third reading um I answered a lot of questions about this policy mostly with the help of Patricia and Corey um so thank you to them for helping but there's only one edit since the last time you saw it and there was a question actually during the board meeting about the annual enrollment report I can't recall who asked asked it but it previously said that would be the enrollment report would be submitted to the board by June 30th of each year and we just Chang that to say annually because it's actually just part of the annual enrollment data and I think the June 30th date was just confusing to folks because it made it seem like it would be at the end of
169the school year when that's not how we do it so um we just modified it to put section 7 annual enrollment report and modified that we see at the very bottom otherwise everything else that we discussed um last time is still here um so I don't know folks have other questions but I did get a lot of Engagement both Thea Facebook and email and about questions but not changes okay so it is recommended that the school board approve the school board policy 545 Parks manag immersion admissions as presented do I have a motion to do that so move it well I heard Virginia first and then I heard Sarah second so we'll let uh Sarah second it um and uh any further discussion I just want to thank you for all that work that was
170a lot of work yeah so good job policy committee way to go yeah and I and I know that this is something as we said can be continuous Improvement as uh like Dr McGuire talked about we're always looking at what can we be doing be doing better so this seems to be a good stuff in terms of that so uh with that all in favor say I I any opposed passes 7 Z director C's pay Equity report um again we've just gone through this and so I will just ask um uh I will just simply say it is recommended that the school board approve the 20204 pay Equity report um do I have a motion on I'll it moved by an do I have a second on it no second second by Sarah uh any
171further discussion anything pop into your head since we just heard from director carer Beyond t-shirts um no seriously though we really appreciate all this work um when I look at this data it looks like and I did not asked this question but it looks like you do a lot of work like this is like it almost I don't know if it's above and beyond what other places do but there was a lot of data a lot of information here maybe it is because we have so many bargaining units and we take all of our employees so seriously um so I really appreciate that hard workk that you've put into that and and appreciate this opportunity to learn a little bit more about that so with all of that said any other discussion then all those
172in favor say I I any opposed that passes 70 okay guess what we're up to Communications and transmittal um anything that people want to provide some updates hopefully brief it is 9:10 I would you know I want to encourage that we have an opportunity for people to share things but it is I just I will make it very brief I did go to the community event on Martin Luther King Day racial heal healing and once again our s students were absolutely fantastic in leading the table discussions I was super um impressed with our my table leader again and it was an opportunity to partner with benel um and I thought that was kind of a special thing so um I just I I I felt warm and fuzzy and all sorts of good things inside
173so it was really terrific so shout out to Erica Scott tce Howard darl Young from and and Jess Davis from um SLP because they did fantastic job putting this together foret updates yes I went to the msba conference um a few weeks back it was my first time it was a lot of information um I loved it it was a lot of vendors one vendor that stood out in particular was um to here so they travel around the world and they come up with healthy recipes from different cultures and then they bring it back and they educate our nutrition staff or we can also hire one of their staff members to help with that mission they um a couple of other of our school boards or school districts do utilize them so that was kind
174of impressive that they're already here and already moving so I have partnered with um Patricia Magnuson they already have a team that they're working with on um working around the nutrition and different variety of foods so I mentioned this uh company to her and I'm going to go to the school and kind of get a feel for how they do it why they do it what the budget is and see if there's something we can do with another company I think this is you are on our advisory committee for school nutrition as well right is that you is that me I think so right so if not then I'm just making that connection to you so maybe maybe you put that in there I know it's a lot to take in there so uh I
175am you are so there you're already doing it great other people yeah oh wait I just want to thank muu and Cilia for com on supporting me in the msba yeah yeah that's we received an award for going through the trainings I think uh director Casey mentioned me thank you yeah that you went through all of those trainings we're not all required to we find msba trainings to um that they are very helpful for understanding a lot of things and just getting the lay of the land when we are um amateurs in this when we don't we aren't we didn't go to college to become school board members to learn how to do some of these things and just to learn and have those resources um are particularly helpful that yes yeah I just want
176to say big event coming up on H Thursday night that I'm super excited about um it's from 6:00 to 8 at Susan LR there's going to be a Festival of Nations event oh cute um where several Susan lingin families are going to share their cultures and uh we'll have the opportunity to taste samples from around the world uh there's going to be a Chinese Lion's performance um also photo booth mask making uh fishing is listed on the event I don't know what that looks like but I'm excited to to check it out so I'll see you there be okay um I'll just mention th a couple of things I did attend the msba conference as well and I went to a couple of um sessions and one was about agenda setting and some things like
177that and it was in like to hear some of how other schools do it and I took in some of that information and I've heard from fellow board members about how can we be doing some things differently or in this case somebody was like every board meeting we say what is the student centered part of this you know and some things like that that we could look at in terms of what we might do in terms of some of that the other thing I went to was recruiting and keeping staff of color which I know that has come up um periodically and repeatedly and there was a school there that was presenting on that and it was um enlightening to hear some more there as well the um other thing I am now the dayss
178I'm to Aquila and I was there at their um PTO meeting last night and they had a presentation by Prince of the Arts that um so which I have a connection to through my wife who's the um board chair but also there's a connection to Aquilla they just got a grant they're going to be doing a mural outside so I think it's really exciting for them we also had a presentation by an thean locks who talked about um IB which I think was very interesting and the principls gave an update on a lot of things but we're really focusing some of the things they're doing for black history month coming up and sounded really interesting in terms of some things that they're doing with art dance music literature and how we're integrating that into the
179material set here so unless there's anything else at this point we again are at a 9:15 time I would um think that it is right to uh to make a motion for a tourament move so move by ABIA K do I have a second for that I'll second second by Taylor it is adjourned at 9:14 right