001[Music] ready oh yep good afternoon and welcome to today's Hamilton City School Board meeting Mr Fraser if you could please call the r president Matthews here Mr Davidson here Dr Copus here Mr sprag here and I will make a note for the minutes that Mrs Baker is absent this evening perfect thank you tonight we will be having an update from one of our buildings Garfield Middle School so we will turn it over to them for them to make their presentation that we are most certainly looking forward to Podium is all yours sir you're welcome I'm not doing much talking all right so good all right um so thank you guys for having us tonight uh and letting us highlight some things about Garfield Middle School so those of you I know I saw a couple
002of you guys uh those of you that were able to to attend the state of the schools address a few weeks ago uh there was one theme that I felt like was throughout the entire production which was how are we as schools connecting our schools to our broader Community um and so that was one goal that we thought of when we uh introduced the idea of revamping our student council at Garfield Middle School um I believe that the hardest part about achieving that goal is it takes a lot of work a lot of planning and it also takes a lot of leadership um not just on the part of the adults but on the part of the students as well so I believe uh what you're going to see tonight is our student council under
003the leadership of two of our amazing teachers has done a really good job this year of Bridging the Gap between Garfield and the Hamilton Community um and I think during the presentation tonight you are going to get to see that uh so what we are going to start off with doing tonight is we are going to talk a little bit about what our original goals were of our Garfield student council um and to help me do that I'm going to introduce our two teacher leaders who I have had the pleasure of working with in two different buildings in Hamilton City Schools now or maybe they've had The Misfortune of working working with me twice um but uh I would like to introduce our teacher leaders for student council it is Rachel aonan and Jen Dixon
004thank you you um yes we were reunited here at Garfield so when we sat down and we really talked about the values that we wanted to bring into this Council um there were several things that we wanted to focus on as a group and that was to build school spirit and Community enhance student engagement and promote inclusivity and kindness we're also working to encourage community service and volunteering we are in charge of planning school events and we also develop leadership skills and respons responsibility and one of our first big projects that we did was Garfield we had our own student council elections and Parker's going to explain a little bit more about that for us and Parker sporting our shirt that the kids wear proudly around Garfield on November 8th at Garfield we did a
005student count we did student council elections there were three elected positions president vice president and secretary we made posters to promote ourselves we also made videos to explain why students should vote us here's an example students were brought out by student council members to vote during lunch they received an I voted sticker when they were done here are some pictures from that day now Colton Lynch will tell you about other events we did we were invited to attend a city council meeting we got to talk about our election process and how student council is helping to make Garfield a better place to be we did a toy drive Council memb collected organized and wrapped donations brought in by staff and students donations were privately given to identified families the week before we left her holiday
006break here are some pictures of when we wrap the presents we also volunteered at Community event Chris Kindle Mar we helped clean up trash escort kids through scun and sold Refreshments here's a video of that so we're here tonight middle school and we got our student council members with us and we wanted to get them involved in the community so we have them here tonight at Chris Kima Market what we want to do is we want to obviously build them into Future Leaders not just leaders in the school building so in order to do that they have to see things that uh leaders do in the community including getting involved in these events getting out to the community and interacting with the community the students response has been great I really don't have to coach
007them at all and neither do the teachers we have some really great leaders already and our student council our president's here tonight Sam Perez she spoke at city council a few nights ago and did a wonderful job I figured I joined the council for a reason and I wanted to come help out my city this year um we have two new teacher leaders that took over our student council Rachel Aon and Jen Dixon all I charged them with was to get the students more involved in the school and also get the students more involved in Hamilton at large the people are really nice it's definitely a community a good community they make you feel [Music] home so we're here tonight from Garfield Middle School and we got our I would like to now pass it
008on to S Perez hello my name is Sam Perez and I'm the president of student council Adriana r represents 17 strong at our student council meeting students were introduced to organizations and given ideas on how our council could get involved upcoming events neighborhood cleanup using the cube fourth quarter s of day with the cube 2 long games and other activities that will serve as a motivator for students to have strong attendance and grades in fourth qu quarter to end the year strong a few months ago I was invited to be on a Latino youth leading the way panel by Adriana Rees on that panel I got to talk about how it is being a Latina and in Hamilton and I got to talk about how us as a Latino Community how we feel in Hamilton
009how we could feel more welcomed and IID like to pass it to Mr maram all right um first off let's give a round of applause to our students did a phenomenal job this is probably the easiest one of these presentations I've ever done because I I just let them do it um so I'm going to elect for them to do it every other time all right so um I I want to I want to talk a little bit more about what Sam just showed you in that last slide uh at the neighborhood Summit for 17 strong this was a picture of us after that event and also joining us there is Ariana Harris um and she presented for the boys and girls club actually at that neighborhood Summit as well and she's A Garfield student
010um since Sam is not going to brag on herself I I am going to uh just to tell you how incredible of leaders these students are she was the only Middle School student represented on that Latino p Channel out of four uh students that were up there there was there was three high school students that were Juniors or seniors and then Sam as an eighth grader and you would not have been able to tell that one of those students was a middle school student she was incredible uh we couldn't say enough good things about it and also uh we were just talking about this uh it was a panel complete they they had a question and answer session just to give you the format of this and we had a packed house the whole classroom
011was full of all adults and and they had to answer their questions live on the spot which would be intimidating to even us and there was a couple controversial questions asked I'm just going to be honest with you the way that Sam handled that was better than I've seen most adults handle those things these are the skills we're trying to teach students through these programs and these students are helping lead that uh because those are the skills that are going to make them successful when they leave school uh we know that we say work hard and be a good person every day at Garfield those are the things that that are choices that we want our students to make every student can make that choice and these students have been making that choice and I
012really wanted to celebrate them tonight and I also want to celebrate all of the other students that make up our student council this is kind of our credit screen if you will and now I'd like to open it up speaking of a panel I'd like to open it up the questions for for you guys so we thank you for uh letting us join you tonight and thank you for letting our students present as well [Applause] well thank you so much for the presentation thank you um councelor for coming out and sharing um I guess my question would be how has been a part of the council how has it impacted your life personally president yes president to president when I got invited to be on the council um it definitely felt like an opportunity for
013me to be involved in the community and being on the panel just made it better and ever since since I was younger I always wanted to be a leader for my peers and I knew if I did the right thing others would follow and they would do it too so that's why I did that sweet well definitely it definitely shows and definitely um exud exuding here so it's so great um and our thank you for your leadership and your enthusiasm to want to be a part of this community so love it thank you I really appreciate absolutely I'm a griffin I'm the golden red and gold just briefly I just have comments really no questions um looks like the future is in good hands with our leadership I'm very impressed with with your whole process
014I think it's neat how you do the elections and they actually uh you know you know a Ballot Box where they go in what looks like where I go when I vote so it gave them the real experience and as some of the board members will tell you I'm all into research I'm always looking at different things and there are articles out there in research when you have a strong student leadership in a building the students take ownership of their building you have less discipline problems and you have a a tight group of of students and I think you have that over at Garfield and I think you have great leadership in your building and I commend your uh uh two teachers who have taken that on you're doing a great job and keep it
015up I guess I have have a question if I may uh were you were you guys in student council last year or was there a student council last year maybe I should ask that seventh graders well then you weren't in however they were at their elementary school right here student council so with the changes that you made are students more involved with student council this year than you saw in the past is is that work I mean it seems like kids are really excited if you've got that many students serving on student council you've got a a good thing going yeah I I I will say the excitement around it is definitely more than we thought it would be um and part of it is for some of the events we're showing there and that
016that only scratches the surface they're doing all sorts of other stuff too I think just more kids want to be involved in that because they're seeing on our school news and everything going on with student they're also helping support like our dances and other things like that most times you think of student council they put on the dances and stuff I think this idea of reaching out into the community and going going to all these different activities is I just applaud you guys for doing it because it's not easy to do when you're dealing with adults and it's kind of scary it's kind of scary we're scary people I hate to say it but we are but having that opportunity uh is going to serve you guys so well and it's Josh I want to
017just thank you Mr maram Excuse me I want to thank you for for your hard work with them because I know the uh what you why' you call me but they uh I I think this is what Garfield needed that shot in the arm and for kids not to just look into the building but how can they be involved in the in the in our community and it's it's a wonderful thing I'm seeing more and more schools going that direction it's it's a great thing for us to see so thanks kid I really appreciate you guys coming in and speaking to us scary people sitting up here and now you can go home and watch it on TV Hamilton so by the way TV Hamilton did a really nice that was a nice UCI him
018very much for coming yeah and I did want to say too we had over 500 Garfield students come through our voting so I mean weeks before that was just one commercial our our media team that we have which is a whole class at Garfield ran by um Sam white she um helped film commercials with the kids they had posters everywhere they were getting on the announcements talking about things like kids were so invested and engaged in the process so when um they started coming through the booth they were like who you know and then we had it where they could look at you know but over 500 kids voted that day and so these leaders were truly voted by their peers that's cool so and that's hard to do I mean being elected officials ourselves
019you don't know where you stand you really don't until you see the ballot um you don't you and you say oh I'm on the ballot and then you know get elected so I hope that you all will want to be here sometime to be part of your schools and Lead direction or in your community because I I will tell you we are all looking for leader Future Leaders in Hamilton and I hope you guys really consider that thanks guys yeah um principal arine just a couple comments and a couple questions first of all thank you so much for what you're doing I know you're doing a great job there i' I've had an opportunity to visit a few times and and that's just a pleasure I want to ask way in advance your permission to
020attend your veterans event again this fall assuming because you're always welcome well I mean that that's very impressive I really enjoyed that and thank you for that I I'll will certainly be there um I want to say to Mrs Ohan and Mrs Dixon correct I truly appreciate your involvement with student council and uh like Mrs Matthews and Mr spra and Mr David me mentioned anytime you can have student engagement paired with Community engagement that's just part of the winning equation so you that's a great idea um for the young lady on the left is it Parker okay Parker Colton and Samantha I'm gonna put you on the spot here I have a very important question for you how many different schools in the Hamilton City school district have you attended two probably three maybe two
021all right here's the question now think about this before you answer who is your favorite principal well maybe don't answer that then but anyway Mr or principal bar thank you so much for what you're doing Garfield's in good shape thanks yeah to the entire uh Garfield team tonight I just want to thank you uh Miss Dixon Miss Honan Mr mam I know you've got many team members out here supporting you you can see the passion um I always believe that our kids are our future and we are in great hands um to Sam I know you're going to be a freshman next year and um I've got you on a very short list to join a superintendent advisory team I want to hear from you what are things that we need and um to Parker
022and Colton as you hit that that High School level I want I want to know your thoughts and I want to know how we can continue to get our students involved because I believe when our kids are connected and believe in what they're doing it just makes the whole world better so it was a big deal to stand in front of all of these people tonight and Sam I also presented at the summit and it was terrifying so the fact that you did such an amazing job I couldn't be more proud that you are part of our district keep changing the world every day and we just appreciate the work that you're doing so thank you so much for being here tonight thank you thank you [Applause] guys it's nice to see parents here too
023yeah again thank you all for being here thank you parents for being here we appreciate it y absolutely thank you again oh yeah she was making mom ask her all the questions [Music] amazing absolutely thank you for being here and leading we appreciate it so I um consider a motion to adjourn to Executive session move second thank you Mr frer if you can call roll Mr Davidson yes Dr Copus yes Mrs Matthews yes Mr sprag yes