001okay we're gonna uh call this meeting to order at 6pm and we're going to start with the pledge of allegiance i pledge allegiance to the flag of the united states of america to through the holy which it stands one nation under god indivisible with liberty and justice uh can i have a motion for approval of the president so we are going to start out here in public comment and um we did have one request um for uh personal time constraint reasons for uh first on the list so um we're gonna start there and while that's happening if anyone else would like to speak in public comment please find your way to sign up sheet or if you're online there's a digital hand you can raise and we'll check that as well and each speaker will
002be given three minutes to uh talk on uh anything to do with the central school district so uh yep good evening everyone um i hope at your seats you have found your golden ticket uh to 12 tonight which will be performed this weekend on friday and saturday night at seven o'clock um for those of you that may have looked on facebook there is a really weird facebook bug with a like savings time where the article says it's at seven and the event says it's at eight and we can't fix it because it's a facebook literally a facebook bug um so we hope to see you all there we have been very excited we are in the second night of our technique here so on your way out if you are done before nine o'clock you
003might want to peek into the auditorium uh students will be in their costumes um running their seats and getting ready for our big performances we'll be performing here this friday and saturday and then um the following sunday the sunday before thanksgiving we will be participating in the 33rd annual fall festival of shakespeare with nine other high schools that participate in this program in lennox massachusetts this year the audiences are being very limited they're limited to the students performing and one other schools performers and and people like myself who you know need to ride the buses with them um but the whole thing is going to be live streams for free so you can catch chatham's show that following sunday i apologize i don't have the date my head um at 1 15 pm um performing
004live at the tina packard playhouse in lions massachusetts a special thanks um to dr d'angelo mr chudi and their staffs um mr thorson there are a lot of crazy things that we have to get around and over and through uh to get to where we are this week um and there was a lot of cooperation and a lot of support and assistance for myself and then when we just narrows the electrical advisor um and our 31 casting through our are rocketed and ready to go so thank you just one more thing just to clarify the in-person shows here in the building yes there's there's uh limited attendance or there's public attendance it's public attendance we've never really had crowds crashing through the doors um but there will be full you'll be fully masked the entire
005time you're in the building you will be able to sit directly next to anyone in your pod and pods will be separated by at least one seat and at least one row well that's that's great i know my family's looking forward to it um hopefully some of the rest of you will have a chance as well so anything else all right back to rehearsal thank you uh we have a poll on digital hands at the moment there are no okay and can you just give me um what do we have there okay so shannon e squared in chatham this stands for everyone every day you've all seen it on shirts on the website and you've all adapted it into the leaders of our school district the definition of everyone is every person and everybody it
006seems pretty simple and pretty straightforward however you people in front of me as leaders of our district have obviously changed the definition without letting anyone know this fall you changed it to only the unvaccinated have to quarantine only the unvaccinated need to be tested now it's only the vaccinated who can play and participate approximately 70 plus of the 82 schools in section 2 were not discriminating against their student athletes this winter those schools didn't base their decision on what their neighboring schools were doing they just thought the process through and did what they thought was fair and best for all of their students here in chatham our leaders which is you in front of me couldn't handle that decision you claim you just followed their guidance instead of making tough decisions that were right for
007our district you transferred the blame to someone else you didn't include everyone instead you discriminated and continued to discriminate against many of our great students and future community members what resources and data did you use for this did you do any research or did you just blindly follow the department of health in the cdc do you even know which age groups are being affected in our community and county by the color charge charts what specific data do you as board and superintendent have the supports you are robbing the students of their opportunity to have that supports robbing our students of their opportunities when will you end this discrimination are we waiting on the color codes to change are the cdc and jackmab to tell us or will you suddenly become the leaders you were supposed
008to be and start doing your own research and start making decisions that are in the best interest in all of our students sadly i think i already know the answer to all of these questions because you took the money you will follow their guidelines until you are no longer needed one last question what will you do when they try to mandate the vaccine for every kid where do you stand on them what is your plan then are you just waiting on them to tell you your next step as you have done all year you all sit in front of me and i'm assuming many of you are scared of the virus well guess what i'm just scared of the vaccine what makes me so wrong for that decision what gives students the right to harass
009my children or clients to come in and call me a murderer for my choice i do not in any way judge anyone for getting this shot i think it's great if that's what they think is best to protect them so why when people are just as scared of this shot we can't be given the same consideration um just key off of what shannon was saying the data is coming out every single day that the shot does not do anything to prevent the transmission of virus so there really is no justification for this policy to keep the students separated like this they're not separated any other time they're not going to be separated from other schools that are coming in and they're playing basketball with unvaccinated students it literally is ludicrous that our children are being
010denied this opportunity there is no justification for it um i have heard that we are not in the red zone anymore um perhaps that's going to be in the report there is one school in this district that is actually entertaining the idea of dropping this policy because it doesn't make sense and it's harming their students and in this particular instance you know i a board member was overheard saying that it's only four families we can manage that is not a big deal well in panther pride it's not just for families you take away good athletes from these teams they're not going to be competitive and chatham's had a long history of trying to be competitive and we have a lot of pride in that i was just at the football modified football banquet kids were
011thrilled they were all shoulder to shoulder vaccinated unvaccinated they're together they were having a great time they were just having a wonderful time there is no reason for this we really need to stop just following the cdc and the fda because they are being proven every single day if you look for it they are being proven that they are not giving good advice they are very politically motivated has nothing to do with the science science is screaming the opposite the people in the hospitals half of them are fully vaccinated half of these people dying are fully vaccinated is not a pandemic of the unvaccinated but they are not a danger especially in these age groups it would be safer and better for our school in the long run if you just let the kids play
012if you have to do a testing thing that's fine but please just reconsider this policy it is harming the whole school and there's really it doesn't make any sense it really doesn't you don't want to be the ones going down in history it's the ones that year those seniors couldn't play because of some because history is going to prove that all of these measures we're taking don't make any sense and you don't want to be on the wrong side of history because nobody will forget this senior year junior very important to these students they will not forget the whole school will not forget just step back take a breath look at newer data rather than the stuff that was decided back in august talk to jack mab this is not a popular thing the entire
013county is upset about this i am talking to politicians i'm talking to lawyers that is my version of everyone every day because i'm literally talking to them there's lawsuits being filed there's there are avenues being taken i just really want a simple solution step back take away that mandate from our kids and let them play that's all i ask just think about it thank you uh lauren montgomery but i think she's going to speak after the student council on student center okay um we're all set one more [Music] hi i'm jenna rossman i have two kids in the district one in the middle school and one in the elementary um first of all i'd like to thank everybody that volunteers their time to be on this board um i truly appreciate every single one of
014you um also to the people that work in the district that are uh have to be here i appreciate that i'd like to challenge you all to take a walk in the student's shoes for an entire week no breaks don't go to your office i'd like you to follow students in every building and see what it's really like to have to wear a mask my third grader um has to sit at her desk has come home with back problems and her back hurting because she can't really get up out of her chair without having to leave the room to go to the bathroom um extremely disheartening why do they have to wear masks when their desks are socially distanced i really don't understand that um she came home very beginning of the year with a
015self-portrait that she drew and i don't have it anymore i threw it away because i was so angry um in art class and she had a mask on in the self portrait and it really hit home for me as a parent and that's when i started doing my own research but if you could get anything out of this i challenge you to follow these students for an entire week because those that do work in the district you get to go into your office and take your mask off you don't have to wear it the entire day i just i think you anybody could benefit from walking in these these children's shoes thank you that's okay um hello everyone um so my uh official breaking point was six weeks ago that is when i took my
016kids out of chatham um they're currently online homeschooling um and that was a really really hard decision for me to make but as one of the leaders of my family i made that hard decision um i'm so sad that they're not in school with the kids in their community because that is where they belong but i've been left with no choice um that was what it came down to i had no other choice there was no way that i could send my kids back again with our face covered knowing that they were going to be hounded by teachers all day to keep them covered and um there was no way that i could go back to not knowing when i might get a call saying that my child had um been in close contact with
017the student regardless of their vaccine or not because last time that happened the student that my son was in close contact with was fully vaccinated and he had done quarantine um so i can't i can't live like that because that completely flips our life upside down for those weeks like how are we supposed to live like that never knowing when you're gonna get that call that your kid now has to be locked up for two weeks like that's no way to live and i cannot live like that and i cannot have my kids looking like that i cannot give anybody that kind of power over our lives and um as i said it's really sad that's not how i want it to be but that is how it is and it's because of the policies
018and the choices that you all are making and um it's so interesting too because there's like seven of you and only a couple of you have kids in our school um one of you isn't even a parent so it's really hard to understand how you're able to make these kinds of choices without involving us you know it's kind of shameful actually yes and um and now it's like a big slap in the face because here you are preparing to pass this policy for diversity equity and inclusion it is almost comical but it is not funny so um like i hope the task force you know when they do their investigating come back and tell you that you're actually discriminating against our kids um because that is what i think is happening um i don't know
019how you are putting so much time and energy into creating a policy for a problem that isn't even a problem in our school we have real problems are you been listening to the past few weeks we have real problems and you're creating a policy for diversity equity inclusion which needs a task force like i would love to see some of that passion um put towards our kids like to be their advocates you know um we got a letter from new york state regents saying uh there's a call to action you guys jump on it they haven't even um mandated this yet and i thought we're just going to go ahead and do the policy before they even tell us to well how about you just put the policy on the shelf and then if the
020time comes that they mandate it then you're then your go you have to be thought about you have a good plan um failing to prepare is preparing to fail so good for you you're all prepared um but um i really hope you don't pass that policy because it's going to say a whole lot about where your priorities are um so i have a feeling it's going to get passed but i hope you all proved me wrong that's all this again right now there is going to be another comment of course um and no new hands right i see a chat something oh yes go ahead that's just from lauren saying that when we're ready okay i'm telling you i'm coming again to the school board in hopes that you will reconsider the vaccine mandate that
021is keeping unpractical students from participating after the last meeting i have been approached by multiple teachers that are proud i've been standing up i feel the opposing views of staff and students are unwelcomed in today's society we should be able to openly debate without fear of retaliation this dilemma creates a toxic school and work environment schools encourage students to further their high school experience by getting involved in athletics sports also promote health and fitness the camaraderie of individuals on the sports team cannot be duplicated and the experience is lifetime lifetime benefits participating in sports is a way to use your god-given gifts one of the first scheduled games is to play vladimir christian school who will not be managing the vaccine that is where i become confused confused by the science thank you again for
022your time and consideration okay that's the end um so if anyone else wants to speak we will do one more public comment about today's video that then um so that's the end of board comment and we're gonna go right on into our uh student representative report which i'm i'm a little excited to meet our student government here all righty so first i'm gonna start off with my report okay so first of all first i'll start off with um congratulations to bryson hayner he finished second overall and tobias gerald's also finished seventh overall in their cross country and they're gonna go to the state championship meet and set on saturday in binghamton all righty next thing um that's missy oreo already shouted out shakespeare twelfth night is happening on the 12th and the 13th of this
023weekend so go check that out and then next um we're all very excited for winter sports to be starting um and that would be a nice fun thing um and then we also student government also had a meeting discussing other food options such as um vegetarian options and ways to have like more sustainable like trays and stuff um and vegan options for anyone um so moving on i have some of my co-workers here with me um you guys can stand up if you want okay so this is abby fartell she's our president of the student government then we have gracie gibbel um and she's our secretary and then we have john miles who's our treasurer and unfortunately um due to a emergency our vice president noah hutchinson couldn't make it but we're all really excited
024to work with you guys this year and um we have miss montgomery our advisor on the board there she is um would you like to say anything hi everyone thank you for watching i can speak now you can hear me hi everyone can you hear me you can hear me yeah no can you hear me now i don't know if it's me or them lauren give it one more try i'm gonna try to put the microphone up to the computer okay can you hear me now can you hear me nothing i can hear you just fine says larry and sandy on zoom or can you give it one more try sure can you hear me now anything we can hear you it's very faint um what we're going to do is i'm going to relay
025your what you're saying if that's okay that that's fine with me dr d'angelo um thank you for letting me be here online um i just wanted to let the board know that participation in student government has been promising so far this year especially considering the abnormal school year we had last year elections for officers were held at the end of september and we had more than one candidate running for president and vice president can you still hear me sal or no yes i can okay and um so after we had elections the elected officers they did a really great job this year um meeting weekly to discuss and solve a variety of student-centered issues they've been on top of increasing participation in school spirit and morale um okay so you came together in september you've
026been working on school spirit and morale they helped to organize a spirit week earlier this year which was successful and the students seemed to have a lot of fun um and a pep rally ending spirit and then now they're currently helping to organize a powder pro a powder puff game which is a long loved tradition at chatham high school so the students are excited and they're also addressing some student concerns like you heard the president mia talk about more vegetarian and vegan options on the lunch menu and returning those microwaves to the cafeteria for student use so as we reported they're working on lunch options and entertaining the return of microwaves to the cafeteria and just overall i'm extremely proud of these guys they've shown some really great leadership skills um and they've really put
027in a lot of effort so far this year and they put a lot of effort in for our apologies that we couldn't have you speak directly to the public we appreciate the time and effort you put in and of course the students who are participating in student government so thank you thank you everyone and because you're on zoom your audio will be fine on the recording which if people play this back they can hear the full uh explanation so thank you you'll hear me shouting for the record i'm pretty sure the back of the room couldn't hear but those of us on this side of the room could probably hear just fine um how does anyone have any questions for me yeah you know i would love to hear um like maybe like 30 seconds
028more about um what the student body is asking for in terms of lunches because i'm curious yeah for sure okay what that process has looked like for you and what the buy-in i guess is yeah so basically um we talked about uh first of all someone came to specifically the student government i'd be um talking about vegan options so obviously like maybe plant-based chicken nuggets as a substitute for chicken nuggets on the day we have chicken nuggets um or like you know vegan options for like pizza and other things also more organically sourced options also more sustainable options when it comes to the styrofoam trays that we have um along with that they also wanted um a variety of food so we have like different days where we have different foods from different cultures maybe
029like you know monthly or something so we get a little taste of that you know learn about other cultures um and also like different themes around certain like holidays or seasons does anyone else on the board want to drill down on one of these things last week we had a report on our cafeteria and then two weeks ago and um the trade situation is a problem and she's you know she's that's going to be dealt with um that's one thing that running from you um and you yeah and there are different trees at this and in the high school yeah it has all to do with dishwashers and different buildings so we're looking at that and we're going to try to um great yeah okay sounds good thank you and i think maybe um some
030supply chain concerns right oh yeah oh yeah we talked about that we're trying to move into sustainable uh disposable items there in the cafeteria but they're they're actually difficult to get a hold of right now um so i just said yeah i think the ideas you guys are talking about is um very exciting i i love to hear the dialogue and um considerations you guys are coming up with i think it's fantastic um so i encourage you to keep doing it and do more uh we'd love to hear more ideas yeah we do have a future propositions and hi everyone i hope you're all doing well um so the student government board and i have been talking about you know senior colleges and some other things especially since senior year has been stripped away from
031the past two years classes um we were proposing bringing back the open campus option um where students would be able to leave for their lunches um not to get too into detail because i do have to leave in a few minutes but um we have a proposition with that we have um standards to hold ourselves to rules and argument and everything like that we know that there's a very slim chance that this could get passed but i hope that maybe in the next meeting or the next couple meetings we can talk and come to some sort of agreement and accommodation for them but um but i'll save that for a rainy day and some other day so thank you alrighty that's it for all students um but i actually would like a chance to address
032the open campus topic certainly things have changed an awful lot over the last um couple decades um i when uh when i was in high school it was in the middle of a transition actually yeah because um it was open and then it was slowly headed towards closed um i'm actually interested in exploring that topic unfortunately i'm not informed enough on that there's there's a lot of considerations there so well i think we'll address that um maybe in the coming months here to at least have a board level conversation yeah we'd like to at the administrative team and i would like an opportunity to discuss that with [Music] was that a senior privilege or someone i think it could be structured a number of ways but i think they were speaking in terms of absolutely
033um so thank you for everyone joining us and presenting and thank you to lauren um we're gonna move on into the superintendent report thank you um just a brief report tonight um typically uh this time uh each year we bring to you um updates um from our buildings on academic progress with uh covert everything is um delayed we're just now receiving the three through eight testing results from last year from a perfect measure given all the circumstances around which those students took the test the administrative team under um and in collaboration with dr ruder looking at different metrics that look at different ways to present this information to you and we hope to have some uh firm dates uh either end of december or early january when we come with come with a comprehensive report
034uh indicating how our students have gone over the last year or so so i just wanted to make a note of that since that we've already done that in previous years um just a couple of things our sports our fall sports teams have done wonderfully this year and my compliment to all of our coaches and athletes for turning out and showing up and having a great fall season the um couple updates on testing we are in the process of finalizing the plan to test staff based on that september 2nd mandate from the state to test unvaccinated staff weekly we're unable to meet that mandate based on the availability of tests those are now starting to become more readily available in the supply chain and we've been informed by quest r3 that we are going to
035now start on november 30th here in district work uh we're compiling the list of um of those staff who need to be tested or supply tests on a weekly basis we also um next week we'll launch finally our point of care testing we're going to start giving billing capacity within our nursing offices we're going to start with staff the way that point of care testing will work that will be for symptomatic staff who are staff to become symptomatic when they're at work that'll give our nurses an opportunity to learn how to better use the machines and build confidence with that at some point shortly thereafter we had surveyed parents and asked those parents who would be interested in providing consent for both surveillance testing of unvaccinated students and point of care testing we left that
036survey open for about a week and a half that ended last friday and now we are compiling that information and for those students or parents who have indicated that they would give consent for appointment care testing we're hoping that soon after we um are able to provide the staff with the point of care testing that our nurses will be ready to do that either just before thanksgiving or just after in terms of the surveillance testing for unvaccinated students that's going to be a much larger undertaking and because this is being facilitated by the quest r3 boces we're still waiting on some final information in terms of their capacity to handle the volume of testing that will have to take place to have that um you have to have that take place uh i know vaccinations
037are a very hot topic but just as a public service there there is a vaccination clinic that we put on our website and on facebook for those parents who are interested in the 5 to 11 category and that's taking place november 17th at the chatham firehouse and there's a link to the new york state department of health website to sign up for those who might be interested in that the um one of our speakers tonight did ask um about the transmission rate and although it dipped to substantial for half the day on monday later yesterday afternoon and today it's back up uh the cdc columbia county seven-day venture is still not a high transmission that is my report [Music] okay is there an opportunity to ask a question oh absolutely just in turn of the
038first item mentioned regarding the metrics and reporting on the performance is you mentioned middle of december or january is that what the timeline i i'm looking for the administrative team and at least we get together this week and take a look at the different data points and give me recommendations when they feel that they would be prepared to do that once i have those days i can share those okay i i you know just i don't know if i speak to the board but certainly from my perspective i think you know we all would love to hear that information as soon as possible and keep in mind the 330 testing just was released a week or two ago so this is months later than it's usually available so i understand that thank you thank you
039thank you does anyone have any other questions for a superintendent report okay so we have three board committee reports i can't remember the last time that happened on on one day um but uh we're gonna start with policy before we go in there for the three committee heads who are going to be reporting i love to hear what you worked on last meeting what you're going to work on next meeting and what's blocking you or what resources you need to do so let's start with policy with uh pat wilson probably policy committee met on november 3rd we had an hour and a half meeting um first of all we um reformatted uh the brief change to the diversity inclusion policy that was conveyed to me from last year can you not carry um the first
040thing we looked at last meeting was the diverse equity collision policy there was a formatting change that was conveyed to me after apparently the last meeting that was discussed so we did that and uh that's what was on the agenda three months um there are also three other policies that we're in the process of of updating uh one on non-discrimination and quality another one on sexual harassment and the other one which is related has to do with uh dignity for all students um they they're all required policies everyone's mandated updates to them and they're all kind of uh to some extent related so um we are looking through um reviewing them updating them three four minutes to kind of be our needs here at chatham uh and we're in process of doing that and making
041sure that any changes you make is consistent with the changes in the law and all that and uh once we have that which we hope to do at the next meeting on next month uh then uh it'll go for a final review by the attorneys make sure there's nothing that changed that shouldn't have changed and then it'll come to you probably if uh maybe and december most likely in january um before we have fun um there are a few other um require changes that are coming down that we will be looking at at dot com first year uh they're not as as tedious and involved is the three that we're looking at right okay um the uh i don't know if everyone here caught that uh especially our public who maybe is not familiar with
042the process but all the policies you just named are all those updates are as a result of mandatory changes because of uh state ad law interesting um [Laughter] all right um c plaque in the library okay gracie black had a meeting um a week or so ago uh we're still looking for one or two more members um it's the library uh committee that and uh we're still looking for one or two new members and we're reaching out to some young mothers that might be interested so um if any would have been interested in being on a library committee with us please get in touch with me or bet or our librarian um a couple of a few things that we they've done is um they had a pop-up library at canfield again was a success
043and um they're gonna have two more in october and november and um can't fail very much appreciate that it was a grant funded program so um we appreciate it that we appreciated that the library reopening um has gradually happened bringing and they're bringing our children's programs up side to inside there's a limited number of attendees and registration is available um i don't think we'll be turning anyone away but it's very organized the ukulele jam which is one of the um bigger programs that's found a place in malaysia that can accommodate with the 12-foot requirement the ukulele jam was wasn't just channel students it was from students from all and adults from all over uh the front of the library was weeded in mulch thanks to andy david and his crew davey anna's crew a very
044welcoming entrance now thank you mike for overseeing that our author artist program sponsored by the friends continue to be a very big draw the last one for the sculpture george rickey was held in the middle school library to accommodate the attendees january and february programs are being ready for release i have printed out for the members the board members copies of the 2019-20 annual report there's some very impressive information in there you might like to glance at example being 54 of chatham school district residents hold library cards here at our channel public library 200 library visitors and over um during this during the 1920 um year and over 43 000 physical items were checked out and all there's also information on this report about our digital and a financial overview of that fiscal year here
045our librarian jen mccreery will be visiting us visiting our board meeting in in february to update um us more on our 2021 2021 to the present and that's the c black report i think um just just as a reminder here i think i heard an ask in there which is we're looking for volunteers for a community member volunteers to join the committee right yes um could you just spend like 20 seconds to talk about what's expected and okay we are um we only have like now like four meetings a year and we just oversee oversee um the program not the programs we oversee what's happening in the library the school board since this is one of the few public libraries that is attached to a school district we try to make sure that everybody within
046the school district is aware of what is happening in the public library because it is our responsibility to oversee the community and and we um we are we overstayed because our um the public library budget is out of the school district budget so um but then and you can also if you go on the website you will see all of this information too um the community members though really we count on them to lead uh you know program development right and um that's the friends that's the friends so that's my friend's library the friends of the library they're the ones that do the um author uh author signings and things right okay yeah so you're looking for community members to help with oversight we are looking for one or two more new members for c
047black and we'd love to have a couple of young parents because all of us on c plaque are getting a little long in the tooth and uh we would like to have some younger people not that we're going to be leaving but um well maybe we'll repeat that ask at the next couple meetings and see if we can okay okay that's it thank you thank you yeah one of the big items we'll be looking at we address every few years it's been a little while as a strategic plan so the strategic direction we're gonna get a lot of input from the community so new members would be involved in that process that'll be one of the bigger processes that's right thank you that's good yeah yeah so that's really an opportunity to really set the
048direction of the library for a bunch of years here thanks mike um finance um you know it's very seldom that i have actually an opportunity that mike hasn't steal my phone right now it only comes before me and it covers everything that we've covered in the finance committee meeting so i never have anything else to add to it um however we didn't meet last week we had a rather brief meeting um uh mike was in there um but he didn't have his budget calendar drafted for us to take a look yeah uh we got a couple comments so it's still in the works um like taking another look at it uh so hopefully we'll have that next month that's great um the other thing we did is you know like upgrading to we we've talked
049about the need to have a long-range financial plan but we need to start in on that um here um partly because uh again we're in a different center and there's a lot of you know a lot of new things happening in this world uh and our enrollment at the same time is is really been decreasing uh before we move out with any type of new plans or capital uh plans whatever we really need to know what direction this district wants to go and where it needs to go so uh that's something we kind of tossed around for a few minutes and it'll be more to come obviously as if it takes coordination with a number of dates and number of our goals on the floor okay um do you need anything from our group before
050you have uh we're about to go into the heat of budget season right so yeah at this point in time i know i think we're we're in good shape we i know i've been through for a couple years now we've you know mike has pretty much lined up and um so i don't foresee at this point in time that we have any real written news of course you have a comment yeah i just i think what pat is saying um you know speaks to me i you know i don't know the history of cross committee coordination in previous years but i you know to me it logically makes sense that uh if we're talking about say for example the facilities committee when we talk about facilities we're not just talking about maintenance we're talking about
051planning for our instructional spaces um modification set of instructional spaces based on the needs of the curriculum and forecasts for you know how those might change as an example that's just like that so how that plays into um budgeting for that how that plays into planning facilities for that you know everything ties in so you know i would like to see uh maybe if we can actually have a coordinated committee meeting between the two coming up at some point you know maybe that would make things i don't know if it's done well we'll have to meet here in public meeting what we're called special meeting um because the number of board members but just real quick on that topic um building condition report when's our next one sorry what's our cycle there december coming up
052yeah yeah um and that's when we actually get the report they have to complete the survey by the end of december and we have to submit to the state by march 1st so i would expect that probably somewhere end of january early february the architects that's just in time for budget season but only barely right um i don't mike or pat do you guys like should we stick something on the agenda to just touch on how that new information may impact strategic planning for the years or are we really going to be in the next it's in the next year this is the next year we're going to start we're going to review the planning we're going to capital the facilities to start meeting more frequently obviously when we start our next chemical project but
053remember we also talked about instructional space i have talked about so we're going to have a lot of discussions on that but we're also going to want to have stakeholders involved especially on that so absolutely and this plan remember it takes a while to get this what we're going to do for a capital project and then we've got to go out to vote so this is the beginning of this step but we're going to be heavily involved in you know this year into next year we're probably talking about next year next school year really yeah but we'll start addressing we'll start addressing when that plan comes out in facilities like we talked the impact with finance so but i think the sooner we start you know when you guys get the report back right um
054it definitely makes sense for us to maybe have you um hold together some of those observations and share them um uh certainly finance can add their um whatever's come up during this they're going to be by the time that happens right we're going to be basically at a budget approval season right um and then we'll be thinking about that the next budget cycle and we'll probably at that time also have um information back on the uh the pre-k-4 investigation we're also going to have information back from um some of the investigations that lisa's been doing that needs um so probably summer you know during during sort of the org season strategic planning season is probably where we're going to be talking facilities and um is there a strategic plan cycle other than the capital plan
055cycle that you need to be worried about that's multi-year hey i'm not sure what you're asking i think um the question was about the strategic um the long-range imperative but there's these are all things that are sort of in flight i don't think there's anything that's urgent coming up by the budget season right now this is going to be a long it's going to take a little bit of time a number of months to really get going on and it's not going to come together before the end of april for sure okay so no context for your question yes okay great um okay so that's in and out of committee reports and maybe record time for three of them um [Music] old business um so we have on tonight's agenda um a fifth policy reading
056um we also have a motion to adopt on the agenda um you know there's been some interest in this policy and it is only one page and it's not very technical i've been asked if i could read it out loud and i'm happy to do that although you'll have to uh excuse uh if i trip over any of this word jumble so it's it's it's one page or less than a page uh just give me a few minutes so um this is policy uh 34 this is 3860 or 3460 38 38.60 diversity equity and inclusion the board recognizes injustices inequities inequalities and institutional barriers that have historically marginalized various populations within our society due to inequal inequities associated with their identities the board is committed to ensuring all students have equal access to opportunity through
057the creation and maintenance of a positive and inclusive learning environment where every student feels safe included welcomed accepted and experiences a set sense of belonging and academic success to fulfill this objective the district will strive to provide diverse equitable and inclusive opportunities for every student to reach their highest potential everyone every day so that's the chatham motto the policy goes on to say educational diversity views being different or having differences within its population as assets these differences include but are not limited to the color of one's skin gender sexual orientation language cultural background financial background or intelligence level educational equity is based on the principles of fairness and ensuring that each student has access to the resources and educational rigor they need at the right moment in their education educational inclusion is based on the
058principles of acceptance and respect for all the existence of all three will help build an educational environment that meets our objective to ensure an inclusive environment is being fostered the district will examine current and future policy practices and programming the superintendent will oversee the creation of a district-wide diversity equity and inclusion task force which will seek to include representation from staff administration students parents and the community the task force will assist the district administration in assessing the need for any changes in policy practices and programming to promote diversity equity and inclusion areas for consideration may include but are not limited to workforce diversity student discipline course content and social morse district administration will then develop an implementation plan with appropriate metrics based on the task force recommendations this the board and the superintendent will monitor
059and review the district's implementation plan and metrics no less than annually to determine the extent to which the district is obtaining and continuing to meet the goal of this policy um so as far as i know that's a the first time we read the policy out loud usually they just read into public record um but i was happy to have that opportunity usually these policies are way too long to read out loud um so that was the reading um does anyone have any comments before we move on to the agenda we can't take public comment during this part of the agenda so we're gonna move on uh excuse me my computer's uh spinning how's everyone doing in board docs here where are you i just clicked in do you wanna oh i like it i'm
060fine are you looking into what um i can't motion turned up yeah i can't even uh yeah paper will work got that so now it's path loading r35 be it resolved that the board of education adopts policy diversity equity and inclusion as read at the may 25th june 8th october 12th october 26 and november 9th board meetings can i have a motion motion second questions or comments on this policy all in favor publishing process um so r36 be a result of the board of education designate the list of withdrawn library materials as presented by the child public library to be eligible for disposal in accordance with board policy can i have a motion motion second questions or comments this comes up annually and there's okay she's she's really doing a cleaning now and uh he
061does it probably a couple of times a year and our library does it a couple months a year okay all in favor um excuse me i'm just gonna need the audience to be quiet for the remainder of the meeting until we have public comment and then there'll be a chance to speak are you speaking directly at the moment yes okay uh jay new business uh and finance um r37 be it resolve the board of education hereby approves the memorandum of agreement buying between the district and the chatham central school administrative support personnel dated november 2nd 2021. questions or comments just a brief uh thank you to um the csea secretarial support unit leadership mr chudi and the negotiations committee of the board for bringing this to a conclusion and um were out of contract for
062a year during the epidemic we didn't have an opportunity but once we met we made a quick order of this and i'm thankful that this is the last collective bargaining agreement that we need to approve and now all of our units are in good standing with uh contracts that take us out several years i second that uh this is uh it's great to be able to move back to uh school business here at the board level and uh construction and i'm happy that we've got these contracts um down for another couple years here uh our 38 bit resolved that the board of education in the chatham central school district approved the substitute teaching assistant rate to be the same as the substitute uncertified teacher rate effective november 6 2021. can i have a motion motion
063did we vote on the last mostly no so just oh i'm sorry are we still on r30 we're still on our 37 i don't know i don't believe we uh there was a motion to approve oh on our 37 yeah can i have a motion on our 37th motion another second all in favor back to r38 um be it result of the board of education and the challenge central school district approved the substitute teaching rate to be the same as a substitute under certified teaching rate number six so what we did not just the point of clarification when we went through this last month you approved the substitute rates for substitute teachers and we omitted the rate for teaching assistance so this this just corrects an omission so that it brings historically the substitute rate
064for teaching assistance is always following the substitute rates for uncertified teachers we just raised that previous meeting we neglected to include the rate for the teaching assistant this is just the correct announcement uh can i have a motion motion second any other questions on this one all in favor all right okay and we're into consensus agenda r39 be it resolved the board of education accept consensus agenda k through m as written i have a motion motion second questions or comments on this list [Music] i have a relative in there oh okay recusal that's fine yeah so i abstain from that you got that okay that's k through m right this is my first time back to paper excuse me all right items for future agenda um we briefly talked about the uh the planning cycle
065um does anyone else have on the board want to table a question or a topic for future consideration uh if i could just um we briefly spoke about it uh we touched on it this meeting but in terms of the the substitute uh teacher uh issue that we have had um i'd love to hear you know some sort of you know has there been any change since we made the adjustment in terms of uh compensation have we had sufficient time to list that and get feedback in or it started on the 6th of november so so people didn't brush through the doors okay um okay so we're in uh anyone else we're into our second public comment time uh this one's a little bit different than the opening public comment this is specifically to comment
066on today's current agenda so any of the items that you've spoken about today on the board agenda if you've got a comment and we'll give you an opportunity to speak now um and also different than the uh the first public comment this one is um one minute speaker do we have i see maybe some badges in chat um those are just little oh oh i cleared them on my computer but not on okay if um anyone that's in the room um so you have one hand sandy fisherman yeah okay great and while while sandy's speaking if anyone else in the room would like to speak um just add your name to the sign up sheet and we'll come back to you in a minute what if we do the opposite so i can see if
067i can get sandy's audio here yeah okay you just take a moment here um okay who's first on the list there madison andrews evening my name is addison andrews i want to thank all the students and parents for their support and coming out tonight on behalf of the chatham students i have been very confused as to how myself along with the unvaccinated peers are allowed to attend open gyms for basketball but can't attend the actual tryouts and practices i've done my own research and made a choice and now i'm being penalized for using the right to make my own choice and it's very heartbreaking to me that i would be missing out on a season i have dreamt of furthermore excluding people even when we are the minority just doesn't seem to me that everybody
068everyday motto this challenge strives to achieve thank you or the quality diversity that you passed um you said parents could be involved in that or parents involvement decision or in or are you going to make parents involved in it um and i just only a little bit can you answer that or no um i i think if if you have a question that you need a specific answer to i would ask that you put it in the writing um on the sentence that would like to be involved because there are some things that i've seen that have happened um like a new pen that was professor that in front of like 600 students pulled up two students one one young man that was black and one young man that was white and the only thing
069he did by the end of the whole thing in front of 600 students was make both of the students feel horrible about how they were born so i just want to make sure that that's not going to be something in our school that's going to happen because kids should be treating equals like treating one the way you would want to be treated um no matter how you're born whether you're black purple white whatever it is so i just want to make sure that that's not the way that we're headed because um i've even sleep that night because if that was one of my kids or one of my kids friends that were um black or african-american i would be beside myself because all that professor did was make both of them if you're terrible because
070the black person was never going to be good enough to get a job no matter how hard they studied no matter what they did because the color was skin and then the white boy was apologizing for how he was born because he felt bad for his friend who was black so i just want to make sure that that's not the way that we're headed with quality adversity as well so i would just like to be involved in whatever it is to make sure that our kids are treating people like the way they would want to be treated so as far as the um the vaccine i don't know if you're even considering reconsidering that or not but um there are some staggering numbers as far as like the adversity reactions that are coming out the
071myocritis is now up again um and if you look at the flu which is um before the cause of death with covid in students in teenagers and young kids over the last 25.75 years there's been 193 um 712 adverse reactions with the flu and just this past 10 months alone diversity adverse reactions from the cold vaccine is 108 times that if you look at the total deaths from the flu um it's one thousand nine hundred one thousand nine hundred ninety six an average of seventy eight per year and the covet on vaccine deaths now are 17 128 which is 220 times so i'm just hoping that you all are looking at that and doing your research on that because more and more stuff is coming out that um there's a lot of more adverse reactions
072than what you realize from the vaccine in kids that are getting the vaccine out which i just watched um it was from senator um again number seven talk sorry sorry i'm senator ron johnson that had held the panel and there was a father that was pleading with them because his son got the vaccine a single father that lost his son he got the vaccine to protect his son and then the son wanted to get the vaccine to protect his father and got the vaccine and he he flat out at the basketball court got married had my arthritis and he died so and that's just one example out of like there's a whole bunch here that i could give you that you could look at from people that have had diverse reactions so um i just
073wish you would consider the vaccine mandate is all so anyway thank you for your time i appreciate it so i'm just listening to tonight i'm just curious as to why you can answer questions to the school but you can't answer any questions that we ask you we have given you guys a lot of research based on what we found what have you given us based on what you're doing to our students i'm not sure if you looked in the back of the room earlier but there were a lot of students sitting back there because we've we've gone over how we feel with them and they've done their own research and i don't know if you also realize that a lot of us if this happens and you want to mandate our students with you you
074talk about your enrollment going down it's going to continue to go down because a lot of students will be pulled out so i hope you all consider that because we're very serious about this and i think it's very unfortunate that all of the things that we have sent you guys have you even read it have you even looked at it can anybody answer that question because i think it's very unfortunate that we have sat here and done our research for what we find can you tell me that what we're finding is not true and what you have are the facts can anybody answer that question why we're so wrong on our opinion we're not getting a choice for our kids and now our kids have to sit home and not be able to keep active
075and not be able to stay healthy and you're doing that to them and it's super unfortunate that this is happening in a school that i grew up in and that i loved and i was so excited to send my kids to and now i'm thinking about pulling them out that's super unfortunate and i think it's unfortunate that you are not taking into what we have to say at all what happened to our executive meeting that was supposed to be with all the parents about going over all of this what happened to that meeting did anybody discuss it did it did you guys hear about any meeting anybody get invited any meeting because i didn't so what happened can you answer that question or no we're not allowed to answer the parents the parents of our
076your kids in school districts don't you think that's unfortunate just that there could be one more here in person yes one zener sanchez so one thing i would like to know is if we want questions the answers to all these questions i think that we brought us really great questions a lot of legitimate concerns and i think it's concerning that you're not more concerned um if we want answers to these questions do we just need to put it in writing is that how that works and you can't tell me right now what can you tell me because i want to know how i get answers to questions because i have so many questions and it's the most frustrating thing it's like it's like the climate zone this is so why what's going on and like
077we've sat here week after week and brought our hearts out and our concerns and like you just sit here and look at us and then like you know do your thing it doesn't matter it feels like it doesn't matter that we show up and then we speak up and and the one time that you all someone spoke or not i'm sorry not you um simmons he um got that moving for us to have potentially it looked at again the basket mandate for sports and you all were like okay we're gonna talk about it and then nothing ever happened nothing ever happened it's like apparently i guess sally you talk to your buddies and you guys all decided we're not doing that and then we get like the letter in the mail or in the uh
078email so um the other thing i would like to say is now that we are um doing this whole policy i would like to know how you are going to start implementing the inclusion because we have a big problem with conclusion and you're breaking your own policy so that's a problem um and i am going to be on you about that i really am because you want to put these policies on us well you better stand behind them um matt said i'm so i'm so mad right now i'm so unhappy this is wild do you guys think this is so wild that you just passed this policy and you are discriminating against students you read that one first of all i can read i did not need you to read that letter to me what
079i wanted was um what i wanted was to know what was gonna happen with that policy like i stated at the last meeting i said i want to know more i am in the dark i know more about your issues with your employees from coming to these meetings i know all about your employee issues but i don't know anything about the policy that you're about to implement on our school that's ridiculous so i don't know like we need to figure something out because this is unacceptable it's shameful so that's it i would think i'm not thankful right now are we how's our tech going right now can i just one more thing so we still have time so can i ask why we're only testing on vaccinated students do you know how long the vaccination
080lasts we're not we're not accepting questions at this time like you want to put them in writing um so like she said so can somebody actually send us an email about why we're only testing unboxing so if you while you're typing while everybody was talking why don't you type that down and answer that question on why we are only testing unvaccinated students because do you know how long the vaccination lasts why are you typing because you were typing while everybody was talking i have to i you know when you you're when you when you're talking yeah he is he is taking notes on what you're saying what i'm asking that they can answer our questions and then we get all of the he gives us all the information and and he's going to try to
081get back to you we've been here for multiple times and we haven't gotten but that's why he's just not typing he's writing down what you're saying but what would but he's not answering our questions what is that in his defense he's writing down what you're asking us that's all i would just like to ask why only because now we're talking about this equality and all of that but we're going against it and we don't even know how long the vaccine lasts and now we're only testing on vaccine and almost all the cases in our middle school in high school have been vaccinated students who don't have quarantine and you don't have to test and so that's just a question i would like answered why we're still doing that that's all so am i allowed to
082speak again if i didn't sign the piece of paper uh just just because we try to keep records about public comments still public comment period feel free to come put your name um down and um and we can add you i don't know yes okay hi um jenna rossen again um so i read that policy first of all when it first came out via email and it was extremely long um and i hope that you all read it um it talked about teaching our children about systemic racism um it's i have it right on my phone actually um and the senseless killings of black and browns at the hands of police law enforcement um i have a real issue with that i'm okay with you teaching my child about racism you guys also it's right
083there right supporting documents but did you read them i mean this was the first page the very first page um i don't understand how you can pass a policy and not have a call to action or an action plan of how you're going to put that policy into place i find it very concerning i'm not saying that there is not racism i'm not saying that that is not something that we need to talk about or gender equality or all of these things but i do feel that we are crossing a line and getting very close to that line where i now feel guilty as heidi pointed out for just being born white any time anybody says anything everybody gets offensive with being inclusive you also have to be open to the fact that people are
084going to disagree with you and that's okay i strongly disagree with you i think we all strongly disagree with you um and i have a question that i guess i will put in writing um when you say stakeholders need to be um brought into the decision-making process or the policy-making process um who are those stakeholders are they people who have financial gain or the stakeholders us who pay the taxes um because if that's the case then we are not being hurt at all and um i i went to a different district growing up and i always wanted to send my kids to chatham because i love the small town feel i love the three different buildings it's more intimate um the relationships with teachers are better here and i feel like everybody's at a loss
085right now and i think the reason why you're not getting substitutes is because of the atmosphere that's in the school buildings in general not just this district but others i think that's why there's not substitutes um not about money it's about how things are handled and being dealt with um you are 100 going against your inclusive act that you just passed by now segregating our kids vaccinated versus unvaccinated and think about it when it comes to race what if we were to separate them by race that would be um that would be illegal right but we can separate them by vaccinated versus unvaccinated where's the line being drawn where does it stop we're ready for uh for sandy can we lose sandy uh no i think she just muted herself there she goes sandy we're
086having audio problems uh in the room uh if you could give us a test to see if we can hear you if not my apologies in advance and certainly um they can hear you on the zoo can you hear me now no very little yeah keep talking i can use my teacher voice i can switch it sounds like it's coming out of the screen does it i don't know where if i talk really loud does that help my hearing's here i don't think there's any speakers i know the zoom people can hear me yes the question's coming it's gonna be tried again can you hear me now keep going test one two three keep okay happy again um is there something i could help relay a message to the board for tonight sure i can
087i'll i'll try to talk slow um so i just i i haven't i haven't spoken in a couple of weeks um and i just wanted to to speak as a teacher um and just you know just sort of tag off of what jen diorio said at the beginning of the meeting about the shakespearean company production that's coming up this weekend i'm just going to pause for a second she's like to speak like jen did about the shakespeare as a teacher coming up this weekend go ahead yeah so there were they had open rehearsals uh this past monday last monday not day before yesterday and where they invited classes to come and observe the rehearsals and just to watch the students interact with the actors and interact with the director and be supportive of their friends
088on stage and even if they didn't know the kids was it was just amazing to see and it was it just melted your heart to see kids supporting kids so there was open um open rehearsal and it was impressive how everyone came together together to support all the students in this endeavor is that affair you're kind of missing my my my enthusiasm here but yeah that's that's generally it but i could never replace your enthusiasm all right but then also with the sports i've i've been to most of the girls volleyball games and you know i've been to most of the home soccer games and just to see the kids come out and support each other just shows that chatham is everyone every day and you know i i said this before it's it's something
089that we we really need to to embrace that's our motto then we need to grab it and we need to hold it tight and we need to embrace it with everything that we are and do the the best that we can to make sure that everyone every day feels like they're loved and that they're included um and as a as a parent you know i'm i'm heart sick to hear that kids are not being able to play sports this winter uh because of the vaccination status as a scientist i have a lot of questions um and as a scientist and a teacher i have told my students to be the change they want to see in the world and i've always attributed that quote to mahatma gandhi but in doing research i found it's actually
090better attributed to a woman by the name of of arlene lawrence um and we need to be the change and if that means asking questions at the county level and pushing the county to ask questions at the state level and to to to tease out the data versus you know positive cases at the vaccinated and unvaccinated levels and to and to look at the rates of effectiveness of protection for those who have been exposed to covet and have uh have recovered from covid versus those that vaccinated if we ask those questions if we walk the talk and we and we push for answers then we're including all of our family and we're we're including everyone every day and i just implore the board and i am for the the the parents and and i can't
091i don't have my glasses on i can't see um the people sitting in the room that we we need to keep asking the hard questions and we need to just keep working together and and trying to find the answers and trying to find the best way forward because we are chatham community and these kids are great and they love each other and they love this school and we can't be divided by this um that's what i have to say um any other hands online no okay and that was it for the sheet right okay how many participants do we have virtually 15 15 15. i think sandy sandy was promoted so be 16. slow again but what we have paper here uh so that's the end of the public agenda of our meeting um we
092do have an executive session coming up um so to to speak about the collective negotiations and medical financial credit or employment history of a particular person or corporation so b it resolves the board of education enter executive session um and have motion and i i don't expect the return to open session right i don't have anything that urgently all right um motion motion to appoint salvador d'angelo as district pro tem for the executive session second all favored um so yeah okay thank you