CPS Student Achievement Committee of the Whole Meeting -- January 18, 2023

001good afternoon everyone uh welcome I call to order the January 18 2023 student achievement Committee of the whole meeting for the Cincinnati public school board uh Ms Wagner would you please call the roll Miss Bolton president Mr Craig here Ms Jones here here Mrs Weinberg just say it here Dr Moffat here president Lindy here um we'll get started with just a couple uh notes of opening before our first uh item on the agenda this afternoon um the first comment was just on on the title of this meeting um that the title of this meeting is the student achievement Committee of the whole and we've chosen that title with uh some intention uh people who may have been coming to meetings or watching meetings for the past several years um we'll remember that we've had a

002student achievement committee and then we've had a monthly Committee of the whole we made a decision last year to merge those two meetings for a couple of reasons um I think chiefly the the most important responsibility of the school board is um student achievement and we felt strongly that all board members should be a part of monitoring student achievement uh and those discussions together um so we we merged the um former student achievement committee and the committee of the whole into the meeting today which is the student achievement Committee of the whole and we're just using the committee of the whole language because it's the full board all seven of us and not a group of three so excited to do even more of that in calendar year 2023 um and I think that uh

003today's agenda does a nice job of making sure that the um really all of our discussions today is focused on student achievement um second uh one thing we have not done yet but that I I hope we can do very very soon is uh get to a list of board priorities for the next three months um starting a year ago uh we did this at our first board retreat and calendar year 2022. um this was in mid-January on a Saturday uh and we did that again several times over the course of the year and it's my hope that at the upcoming Retreat not this Saturday but the Saturday after that um we can have a good discussion about what our most important board level priorities are for the next three months but I do have

004an ask to my colleagues associated with this um sometime between now and next Saturday it's a week and a half from today I would love the chance to connect with each of you for about um it could be as short as five to ten minutes I'm happy to talk longer too but to hear from you one-on-one um what do you think is most important for us to win on over the course of the national three months and then we can come in to that Retreat a week from this coming Saturday and discuss everyone's perspective as a group do any voting that we need to do but arrive at some clarity on what our most important board wins are for the next three months um any questions about any of that so far okay um hearing

005none we will keep going and the first item on our agenda for this afternoon is around evaluation timeline I think we are still waiting on our superintendent um so we will hang on for a second and we will pick up as soon as she is here does anyone have any other business or jokes or Mr moraski I saw you reach for the microphone immediately well I mean I I didn't want to say anything but I know that uh James wanted to say hello into the microphone okay so for killing time okay James you want to say hi hi hi thank you that is so cute thank you Mr Rosky James that was very well done very very well done uh uh Ms Jones yeah I just I think Karen just went to grab her yep

006okay any other questions while we are waiting okay I have something that we can kind of talk about to fill the time Dr Muffin we have Rob has done really good about creating a new link to the videos on the CPS website and we I think he's going to kind of roll that out and that people watching can get an opportunity to click on just the CP go to the CPS website and actually click on the links to the board meetings and um or differentiate committee meetings they've done a great job at differentiating that on the site and cleaning it up and so he's going to take us through that momentarily while the superintendent gets set up for the meet for her part of the presentation but can they see that now Rob so if

007you go to the website and click on Board of Education then it will take you to this page and now you can actually oh click on meeting broadcasts and voila you now have the board meetings differentiated from committee meetings um and um you can just see this in one spot so every we're now directing people back to the website you don't have to know about the YouTube but if you do that's great but now you can just go there and actually access Board of Education business meetings and all of the committee meetings directly so thanks Rob for all your hard work you and the communications team for all of that that you all did had a couple questions about how to find um broadcast and so now they they were able to make that much

008much easier so thank you that's great thanks for sharing uh and thank you everybody um for making that happen um so we'll turn it over to our superintendent for our first presentation and discussion on him tonight excuse me this afternoon which is the superintendent evaluation and attentive monitoring schedule thank you uh president Lindy so the first uh it's really not a presentation it's just a document which we have reviewed before to this document added the tentative date based on when our board meetings are of being able to provide updated information for the board to serve as monitoring so this document you've seen before the only thing that is added to the document is across the very top you see actual dates that have been placed uh placed in based on our um based on our

009board meetings and um when when information is available for us from those board meetings um so our first mid-year information would be on February the 27th that allows us to move through all of our testing that it allows us to move through testing and get the reports back that come with testing then we we believe that our end of the year data would be the most available for us by the board meeting in August so that would be the second time and then our beginning of the year data based on what was done this year with data would be at the October 23rd meeting and I believe that this is what I was asked for in terms of providing uh any updates around what what the monitoring schedule would be um thank you superintendent any

010questions for uh the superintendent on the proposed progress monitoring schedule Miss Bolton yeah thank you for this a couple of questions um uh then this might actually go to president Lindy what is before us does this match what we had uh within your uh contract because it was very uh unusual uh that as the evaluation will be put into a contract I thought was a good thing to do and I just wanted to make sure that this matches what that language was thank you Ms bolden's question for me I think so yeah so it does I'm sure she can answer and she says I imagine it's the same thing I think we'll find out um but this does match very well what was in the contract um and um the the the contract says a

011couple things one is that there will be an evaluation based on um targets that are determined in advance uh and I think the board did a really nice job of that over the course of earlier this year and you can see all those here um the second was that uh there would be a reporting on how close or far away uh we are from those targets um likely in the late summer early fall and so we had general counsel review that uh to check that it was there you know there's some State statutes that talk about requirements um that's fully compatible with what's required in the state law and this looks fully aligned to what was in the um contract but I'll defer to our superintendent in case I got any of that wrong I

012concur another question since uh we did this uh prior to doing the uh goals and guardrails uh would would we or should we anticipate that as you report through this that part of the um connections uh to our role to our goals and guardrails particularly our our goals and also uh your initiative of the present and then also the a the B of the C academics and behavior and culture are we going to be able to make connections between what you're reporting to those things that we've all committed to I would say yes because those are the driving indicators for what we would do even though we focused on the evaluation before the board approved the goals and guardrails the goals and guard rails uh if if we review what we have in the evaluation

013in terms of the goals I think that we see the alignment with those areas the only thing that would be different in terms of the evaluation versus what we have specifically in goals because all of our goals are student Focus goals in the guard rails we talk about how we're what our values are and how we're looking at reviewing information how we're looking at Equity so forth and so on so I think that that would pick up the rework that we added to the evaluation around human resources and around transportation that we're not specifically called out in the guard rails but are still very important and necessary as a part of the valuation great thank you very much uh Ms Johnson yeah a quick question on the Ohio superintendent standards were there only two competency

014areas I thought there were more I I just did not print out the other page because I was just this is all one document for me I was just sharing out the I was asked to share the monitoring process so that was in the first row so it's my fault I didn't print the other page okay so I might ask just for our reference because I like to keep the the current version of it um when and it's no urgency but if we could add that on there because I'd like to keep this and file it as a full document so with with the third page with the uh standards all the standards sure I can send that that to you as well um I guess my question is so this is a working document

015kind of for me yeah which is why I did not send it in advance because we were only looking at the monitoring date so for so um I did not send that it was only the dates that were going to be different um so you will notice that on here you're beginning to see us build in uh some of the Baseline information that was not on there before but that was not a part of the presentation today so okay the presentation the the first level of the presentation for this would be on February 27th however when I send out the weekly updates to you that I'll send today I will include this entire document I appreciate um if that is if that's helpful there was not a presentation and that's the reason that I did

016not send it ahead of time thank you um Ms Jones Mrs Weinberg I was going to also um ask if you could send that to us electronically even though I know that you're stating that it doesn't apply um I'm going to concur with my fellow colleague here I also would like the the whole complete thing and I know that it's a working document and I see here that you have that you're setting the Target on 131.23 in which I know that you'll probably fill in that number then so I think having that document um I don't know how you are doing the working documents so we don't have to keep having paper personally I just would like it through the email and the whole complete document as well so thank you so just for clarity

017what I am sending to you is this exact document I think you stated that you would send the complete as she asked correct with the other sheets on it that we've gotten before okay thank you thanks Mrs Weinberg um if people want to see it sooner than that the other items for the competencies are exactly the same as the document from this fall which people do have if you want it faster but we'll also make sure that it comes out so that everybody has it uh any other questions about the monitoring timeline Mr Craig vice president gray I'll get it it takes me a minute there's fine um I just in more of just a clarifying points of it for us as we are reading doing reviewing I think there are some things within your

018evaluation that will be a continuous where you'll get more and more information as we go along right and there are other things within there that are more of like a at one particular time that will be the complete wheelhouse of all the information at that particular time and so um I think just for our purpose is making sure that was clear that for some aspects of it such as like status responses surveys and that type of thing won't be something that'll be we'll only know it as much as we do the survey itself not as much as you come back from Southwest so if you haven't done a survey in between dates we won't have additional information that will come as a result right that's that's correct so the for the middle of the year

019um if we're going back to the Baseline information there was there were there was because much of the information was new in terms of how we were thinking about the goals for the evaluation um there wasn't Baseline information for that so the one area that we knew we would have data for um was the survey data so the way that it's set up now is the middle of the Year survey data would be the same as the Baseline information that so that number wouldn't change when we have the the end of the year information for the August 7th meeting it will include the survey data that we would have concluded in May so it would give us so then the Cadence then goes back to when we'll actually have the data from both so by

020the beginning of the year for October moving forward we'll have the survey data for that um and then when we do the middle of the Year data thinking about when that's done usually that will be done um right around April or May then we would share that information as well and then the other thing is just that you know and I think some of the data we're going to get with regard to the results for ELA for math for algebra one and these type of things or stuff that we will more than likely have brought before either this session or or this meeting or some other time so there may be something we kind of are collectively getting and that you'll use this as a way to compile that so we have all that information

021at uh to review when we're doing the evaluate the evaluation process right absolutely uh what we will also uh provide and I know that there's more conversation to have around the I guess the Tactical processes for the evaluation um but one of the things that that I will provide for the board would be um evidence that supports each one of the areas for the evaluation so that everyone will have that so yes you get it along the way because we're doing the presentations we're sharing the information but at the time of the evaluation you will get uh kind of a board book so to speak that will cover all of the areas in the evaluation so that you also have that in addition to everything else that we've done along the way yeah I think

022that's great I think that goes to what board member Bolton was asking about earlier which is that we will have so many different other initiatives and other things that we are also working on that will be part of our regular updates and that for this to get that compilation to allow us to be able to make take that information and use it'll be really helpful thank you vice president Craig any other questions or comments Ms Bolton just one comment I know that in previous years we have offered both the treasure and the superintendent the opportunity to do aspects or whatever as part of their evaluation either in public or an executive session and nobody has to make that decision now but I just think that we would be offering that same opportunity as we move

023forward and hoping for public but sometimes there are things within the evaluation too that might need to be more executive session but that is a choice that we should offer our superintendent as we offer our treasure as well thank you thank you Miss Bolden and I I have a feeling there'll be a play for both um and and I think as we as we close and move on to our next topic for the afternoon I just wanted to share some real gratitude um with my colleagues on the board uh and also with our superintendent and her team um this has come a really long way uh and I think when you walk around and you talk to people in the community through any of the focus groups we've done through any of the surveys or

024even our own networks I mean there's just no question at least in my experience that people really care about the things that are on here that we see Improvement in student learning uh the communication is good and people feel heard and informed that culture within the district is strong and that we make these big I think of things like make the trains run on time stuff like that we make real improvements in transportation we make real improvements in other areas these are the topics that come up and I think we do our job as a board when we're clear with our superintendent about what matters most uh what winning looks like and then publicly hold that leader accountable for getting outcomes for the community um so I just think this is um this has been

025a lot of work there's more to do as we actually use this but I wanted to share my gratitude both with my colleagues and with our superintendent and her team so with that we'll move on to what's next um and I think our next agenda item is a curriculum update on professional development day yes thank you so I think that Rob was going to put it up on the screen I did share it with you last week but knowing that this is a combination of the work that we're doing around um the Cal meeting but also including the work that we've done through um our student outcomes as well this is our next early release day the student release date is on January the 27th and so I wanted to share with you we're really

026what we were looking at in terms of professional development and professional learning this is our third professional development that we've had so far if we include the PD that was done as soon as teachers return or as soon as staff return from the Break um the one thing that I think is that I did want to call up if we'll go to the V we can we can start here so I do want to offer kudos to the team um because we've really streamlined the process and how our staff are able to get into the sessions how they're able to register for the sessions and how they're able to find the sessions that are the most appropriate for them um I do want to call out on this particular page as we think about what

027we're talking about around literacy I think many of you have heard the conversation around the science of reading and whether or not we were doing as a district the science of reading as it's compared to much of the work that were that was done by others um you know over the last 20 years and as a state we focus on the science of reading that is what we do across the state of Ohio and specifically our district has truly embraced um overall the science of reading and that's about how we are teaching our students how to read more specifically as we think about structured literacy if we'll go to the next page Rob as well that was the last one okay I'm sorry so more specifically there is a new requirement around dyslexia training where

028staff members teaching students that are up through the eight of K through second grade are required to have um uh training in dyslexia it is done through a a set of modules that are provided by the state I applaud the team because one of the things that we thought was really important is that not only do we look at the modules that are provided by the state but we also give some opportunity for interaction we give some opportunity for engagement through that process at the very end in order for them to get the certification they do have to pass an assessment that's done at the state level and so we wanted to make sure that we're getting a bit of a jump start on the requirement and so we have we are offering that support

029as a part of this professional development and will be offering as a part of the next professional development day as well we do also um as we're looking at the professional development information um it is a joint venture uh where we are getting feedback on what goes into the sessions um how how yes we identify certain sessions that individuals need to take but more importantly it is the the availability of those sessions and the teaching of the session so forth and so on so just wanted to give you just a brief update on that um so that you would have that information in case there were questions I know that there is some interest uh around what's happening in terms of professional development thank you superintendent other questions from board members Mrs Weinberg yes I

030just have a quick question going back to the dyslexia law you stated K-2 who is it K through two or is it K through three it's actually K through three I believe but let me verify that to make sure and then with that um I know you said that they would complete and then they would be given their certificate after completion so they're required to do the 18 hours will those hours obviously be divided among the year or based off of the professional development days well they have to do extra in order to fulfill those 18 hours so the actual course is done at the state level but because it's done by modules the modules are designed so that when they quote unquote complete the modules they can they've completed the 18 hours the certificate

031as well comes from the state it doesn't come from us so the state actually certifies that they've done what they needed to do in terms of the dyslexia law great to hear I know as a former educator that was something that was very big for me as well and I'm happy that we're implementing that for our students to be able to be recognized and also teaching teachers how to basically teach students who have dyslexia as well so thank you thank you Mrs Weinberg other questions about uh curriculum in professional development Ms Bolton yes I know that the superintendent has spoken with us a number of times about the PD or professional development being very much centered around curriculum where we've made a huge investment over the last several years and is that this is part

032of that obviously but does it also pertain to kind of the adopted curriculum of doing a lot of reading that indeed that's a good place to focus as well as more of a small group kind of experience so if you could it's okay with you there if we could is that still a ongoing commitment absolutely so if you will go back um Rob for me please to the second page so I wanted to call out the structured literacy piece just because there's been so much conversation about it nationally um and wanted to just be able to re reiterate for us that this is work that we're doing in the district so if there is a question at the board level around where our support is or what we're doing for our students around reading we

033all know that we're doing science of reading and that we also know that we are in alignment with the dyslexia expectations in terms of providing that support to our staff but more specifically this is we've we've automated the courses and the coursework for um professional development so to your question when our team members when our teachers go into the portal for professional development if you'll scroll down from Iran here this tells them exactly what it is that they're registering for and so when they go in they register for those all of which are curriculum specific thank you okay thank you Ms Bolton other questions about uh professional development I'll show you just a couple quick thoughts I think first thank you so much for pulling out the science of reading piece and addressing that um

034if people have not listened to the podcast called sold a story by a reporter Emily Hanford I highly highly recommend it um my wife listened to it in like 24 hours to be slightly longer but it covers um exactly this topic and how it in in some school districts you know a generation of kids grew up without the science of reading and what some of those long-term consequences are um and yeah we have a a second grader and a kindergartner who are learning to read right now uh and I'm grateful for I think the emphasis on this it's called sold a story uh and the the reporter is Emily Hanford um uh it was very good so since you also referenced sold his story um I have uh assisted in the pinning of an op-ed

035with some other um superintendents across the country around the leadership's response to sold the story um and it's really important that we connect with how um the kind of ramifications that have happened for our students as a result of that entire era of non-teaching of reading I can't say of teaching of reading of non-teaching of reading um and so many of us were at different phases and at different stages of our educational careers during that time but I would still venture to say that we are we're still seeing it show up in our classrooms um and so the the so the the focus on re-teaching teaching reteaching learning and unlearning information is really important and how the system level leader responds to that is of equal importance so when it when it actually is out

036there and published I'll share it with the group just so that you'll have that but there are several of us and and that was the lead on on pinning the iPad for it so just to share we hadn't talked about that but so the story is where it started thank you very much uh and so we'll move to item number three which is also on curriculum and about the program audit yes so I think that we have talked about the program audit quite a bit in different spaces I know that I've heard um uh our ad hoc committee talk about it quite a bit and I know um that remember Bolton has referenced it off often when we completed the program audit we did the presentation uh to the ad hoc committee but we did

037think that it was important because there are so many decisions and recommendations that are being done across the district that we thought it was important that we share the program audit with the entire board so what I provided for you was the actual document that showed each of the areas for the audit is pretty comprehensive so there's several Pages there to actually review but this kind of condenses the what we found out and really what we see as recommendations for Next Step as we're moving forward around really how we get to program alignment and also this was we had as you know the Finance Town Hall that was yesterday and the program audit was referenced there as well about building the budget where we go next how we're really looking at Equity instructional Equity is

038really one of those areas that's important so for many um we started this conversation and I don't know that everyone knows this but you know specialized programming was created in CPS uh over nearly 50 years ago and the individual that ended up um doing becoming the magnet schools of America actually was a superintendent here in Cincinnati public schools and so when we think about where we've been there's been an appetite there's been an interest and there's been a Forward Thinking to really School programming and specialized programming in Cincinnati public schools for for a really long time our executive summary is assist essentially we are determining where we're looking across schools in terms of our magnet what we're seeing in terms of vision 2020 programs our career in technical education uh courses our college credit courses

039our gifted coursework and programming throughout the district um the findings from from this particular audit show us that there are several things that we that we know as we begin to prepare our students for the future we want to establish program standards at each of our schools that are supportive of the programs that are actually in the schools we want to make sure that we expand access and achievement within College and Career Readiness courses and our gifted services and that we Rebrand schools to better match the current needs and strengths of the overall school so when we think back to as we're really digging in around programming you know what we did with with vision 2020 what what's happening with our magnet programs where we are right now we we want to make sure that

040we're answering the question if we are still responsive to the needs of the community that we serve and if we are not responsive to those areas what do we do to make sure that we are responsive so that we are offering the program and the types of courses that students and families are looking for um as they're looking to uh CPS as their first choice School District so by taking steps CPS seeks to create a framework to address our generational poverty and Equity gaps within the city of Cincinnati through inspiring students to pursue careers they are passionate about and providing them the support systems to ensure their success we do believe that these programs provide the why to the curriculum creating opportunities for students to see themselves in roles they may not have considered without

041exposure the result will be students who become contributing members of our community changing economic and social Outlook across the city so it's really not just about what's happening in the school every day but how what's happening in the school every day is allowing us to prepare our students for what happens once they're no longer in school once they graduate how they're able to go into Cincinnati and become productive or go anywhere in the world we want to make sure that they are prepared even though we want them to provide their service right here in Cincinnati so our method as we think about methodology um this did include this did include uh making sure that we visited every school in the district um through the visitation of every school in the district we use the program

042evaluation tool that program evaluation tool was modified was a modified version that was utilized across magnet schools of America and other school districts that have done work very similar to this in the document that I provided for you there was a full uh a full copy of the actual program evaluation tool that was used it was in that document so in terms of doing that it broke the visits down into five areas leadership Vision culture classroom practices and equity and for our purposes for the first level of the audit we opted to focus on Vision culture classroom practices and equity and the next iteration of the audit which will be done next school year will really begin to address the leadership component and what that looks like so this gives you just an overview of

043what the document itself looks like it is in the the the information that you have that's been provided for you but essentially it breaks down the standard where you would start in terms of knowledge building that means that this is at the core at the minimum this is what's happening at the school level and then where do you where you get to when you're looking at exceeding the standard I think one thing that's important about each of the areas is the rubber meets the road based on what's in classroom practice and so we make we we found that as we looked at um what may be their Envision uh what might be there in terms of thinking about and talking about the kind of programming that you're doing what are you actually seeing happening in

044the classroom and so in those as we look through each of the the slides we'll find that that's where when we're looking at rating it so to speak on a scale of a one to four that's where you see the differences because it's coming alive in the classroom as you're in the classroom environment this was the team collectively that was responsible for going into the schools and doing the audit it was really and and I do want to make sure that we are addressed it as the equity team instructional Equity so that included everything that wasn't content so when we think about content areas we're talking about English math science and social studies we're here in terms of this this particular audit we are looking at everything that's in the school around programming but that's

045not English math science and social studies so really working with those that are working in an expert area to go in and help to do some overall evaluation in what's happening in the in the classrooms our overall findings so the findings I think were and as we've shared with the with the um ad hoc committee our findings were across the board uh in terms of what we've noticed and what we've been able to call up and what we have been able to do currently in terms of next steps and where we would look at planning for so what we found is that the schools that are listed here have one program in terms of name and so just for clarity we're talking about when you go to our site and you look at the programs

046that we offer across the district this is the this is what you see in terms of that program so if you think about our magnet offerings and our offerings for for students so there's one program that's named as what's being done in the school but there's actually another program that's actually happening in the school in one of the instances we know and we've had this conversation the principals have had this presentation as well and we've been able to talk through some next steps with them but one of the things that we noticed here is at least in a couple of the schools we're looking at what is the best program for the school and I think that's very timely as we have the conversation even through ad hoc around you know schools courses alignment so

047forth and so on but how we're looking at the schools and what's happening in them in the programs Leader in Me is a specific program around leadership we have a cohort of our schools that are doing The Leader in Me program um and it's really supportive of looking at uh it's based on Stephen covey's work and so it's really looking at how you're working with students through that process to help them become leaders in the school building so that's being offered in in four or five of our schools but in these particular schools that's the program that they're doing even though in the booklet it shows that they're doing something else generally if you're talking about trying to rename or Rebrand a program around a leader in me it would be a focus around leadership

048and what we would be looking to do do with leadership so that opens for some additional conversation well um we noticed that on this particular list and we'll come to that in a moment but I'll call out Coalville and Silverton which we'll talk about in just a moment the other findings that we that we have that I don't think is is is probably a surprise for anyone that's sitting at this table but the data now supports it because we've gone into school buildings and actually looked at it we we know that there is a lack of access to accelerated programs across our schools and as we're thinking about acceleration we're talking about honors programming AP programming gifted programming I know that there are a couple schools of thought when it comes to this and so

049we would say that all of our programs that we offer should be college-ready programs it should be getting students prepared for college if that's what they choose to do and I wholeheartedly agree with that in terms of what we're offering but there there is another Paradigm that's also true and it's thinking about how we are preparing students for advanced coursework how we're preparing them for the AP coursework that students may take and where do we enter in that conversation and doing that um the other we offer we offer all of the strands that are required for Ohio now which is a huge plus we offer all the strands that are required or that are offered in Ohio for CTE programming that's the plus the challenge is many of the programs that we offer are not

050leading students to certification or are they desirable to students so we're meeting the expectation in terms of having the program available but is it a program that is going to get the students a viable job you know when they graduate if that's what they're if that's the area that they're looking to go into and there isn't a need for additional professional development to approve overall program integration across our school sites um now you know we know that we have more schools on the East than on the east side than the west side so that's just a given so obviously there's also more programming on the East than there is on the west but that is something to call out because as we were going through and looking at the analysis that was one of the

051things that was very glaring when we think about options and availabilities for students so I'll stop right here before we go into the other slides just to see if there are any questions for me just on this part before I continue with the rest any questions from board members on the content presented so far okay okay all right so this really then now we we will go through each of the strands that we offer as a part of our programming um on the slide you you're seeing across the bottom the name of the school and then uh along the um side is the number of individuals that are included in that as well as the breakdown is the ethnicity within the school building so it gives us the information by program by school by numbers

052and by ethnicity we start with ap enrollment I think that this is self-explanatory the the the district has done a really good job in in expanding um AP offerings across the the City by doing that with teachers that are going into buildings across high schools and offering AP courses but what we find is the overall AP participation is still not growing at the same level number one and the uh across all of the schools as we think about the pass rate we talked we looked at that before the pass rate is not commiserate with the number of students and so that would be an area for us to focus on across all of our AP enrollment college preparatory and there have been some different conversations around College Prep but again this is currently what we

053have listed in our options and it's listed as college prep so we have the four schools that are identified as College Prep High Schools we do find that the programs are not necessarily in alignment with the student achievement across the board so as we're thinking about what we're offering in terms of those programs what makes that program quote unquote College Prep what's different about that program versus a program in another school and also indicates the need for to increase support in accelerated programs across the board so again that whole thought around getting more of our students to accelerate a coursework I'm going to try to go a little a little a little bit faster Rob um our CTE programs all of our high schools offer CTE programming we have we have schools the first school

054that are included in CTE and CTE is of course for all of our ninth through 12th grade students and then we have five schools that have less than 50 students that are included in them as well and so the the next steps around CTE is really going back and looking at one what are the needs in the city in terms of Career and Technical education because that really needs to be where our conversation starts and then two looking at our current programming and what the offerings are in the programming and doing alignment work around that so this is an area that is an exciting area to talk about and think about but it is an area that we really do need to focus on the other thing around CTE is this year we know that

055it's also one of the seals for graduation so it's not just the other areas in terms of meeting the graduation requirements but one of the presentations that we talked about earlier talked about the the seals that we do offer again this this takes us to the Career and Technical education as well and this is for our two of our elementary school programs really doing a deeper dive on how we landed in that space for these two school programs you know what did CTE for the elementary school setup really look like um and why was that a particular alignment um even even there the at least one of the schools is looking for for new programming and I think when we think about the Career and Technical education piece the focus really was on careers not

056as much the Career and Technical education as we think about it in high school access to gifted Services was was a big one um and you know looking at how we're offering our support and how we're offering our access to students in our gifted programming one of the things that that I've noticed um through the process I do want to start with gifted services are not recognized by the state if support is not Equitable at each school so essentially what that means is if we don't offer gifted services at every one of our schools then it's not recognized as us having gifted support services so that's an area for us to focus on and how we do that work gifted Specialists are funded at the school level so not all schools really use this as

057a priority for the schools that do offer gifted services so you know as a district if this is an area of focus for us it's also something that we look at that we want to dig into a little bit more and specialist support with student identification so um just like there is a screener for dyslexia yeah that's that's a second grade I believe is where we screen um we do screening for our gifted programs as well um the the coursework that we're offering to the students allows for the screening to happen but making sure that we're looking at the different areas and how students can qualify for gifted Services based on various needs it's not just the one indicator that that qualifies a student for gifted so this is really an opportunity for us because

058as we do look in some of the schools where our students are going many of them offer gifted programming in those schools and it's and it's at an augmented way gifted and talented um is where we the the two programs that we have we have Cheviot for elementary and then we have Spencer that services our third through 12th grade students we do have gifted students that are sprinkled or students that are identified as gifted that are sprinkled throughout the district and other places um and so making sure that there's some opportunity to really um give them the additional supports outside of the supports that the teachers are providing for them but additional supports um in the gifted area and and that's just not been a huge Focus for us across the district so really something

059that we want to look at the one thing that we noticed and we had quite a bit of conversation with this about this in ad hoc is while Cheviot is identified as our gifted location um eight percent of the population at Cheviot is gifted so when we look at the number of Staff members that we have at the school that are gifted teachers I think we have four or five that are there only eight percent at thing and that I believe that that equaled to about 40 students that are actually gifted that are in the school so really looking at how we're looking at the next step and you know I know now um through the conversations with with the board and conversations at the school level that we that Spencer was kind of a

060brainchild to identify or really begin to address a population that found um support in a smaller space a smaller environment but they were still very high performing um the the the space you know as we think about where we have what we have at Spencer right now thinking about the the older students the 9th through 12th grade students and What that particular facility is to offer them is something that we're going to need to discuss at some point as a board because that is feedback that I received consistently uh in in visiting the school and talking to the team and talking to the staff and talk exactly the teachers even the students that they're able to attract they're not able to attract students that would otherwise go to some of our other schools that they

061would go to because they don't have the same kind of facilities so that's just something for us to consider arts and culture is a huge theme and one of the things that was glaring in terms of this space we see as we would expect that almost across the board all fours here was SCPA and I would hope that our school for the performing arts and arts and culture would be um that would be what we would see for it but in our other areas the needs for Arts integration to align with the Arts curriculum is really important and so there is a you know what's being offered and what that looks like in a school building is is varied across the other programs and so really if we're if we believe that that is the

062right program and that is the right Focus for the school then as we think about budget and think about recommendations how do we then continue to support and augment those programs Environmental Studies at our five schools that are offering Environmental Studies we want to make sure that the program is aligned to our overall standards that we're also looking at our organizations that can be connections for the for the schools some of our schools have connections with the organizations and some don't for example you know a possible expansion of Future Farmers of America that would be one of them as we think about Environmental Studies but there are many organizations that really support especially in our area there are many organizations that support the focus on agriculture the focus on nature and how we're truly making

063it an alignment and a part of what's happening in the school curriculum not just an addendum to that Expeditionary Learning is one of the newer programs that we started using across the district and Expeditionary Learning really is a curriculum that's used in our schools in the four schools that are identified um and within that curriculum there is a huge emphasis on um uh team and culture within that curriculum the curriculum is very aligned with standards as we think about the curriculum that we're using across the board in our other elementary schools it is very work intensive for teachers to to do the work with Expeditionary Learning but the focus on crew is really around how we're looking at at the community that's being in included in the school building one of the areas that we

064call out here is um for our school there's been a request already for one of our schools Reese price that's currently doing um the El curriculum which they really enjoy doing but their the curriculum that we're doing across the district really could be one that's more responsive to the needs of the students in the school as well as the level of additional supports that teachers need they're working with many different factors as they're working with the population of students at Ricci price which is a different conversation for us to have but I think that you're able to see that in the data when we look at the different areas that we're focusing on around Vision culture uh classroom practices and equity our Montessori programs um so across the board we see that one in six

065of our students in CPS attend Montessori programming the curriculum adoption for Montessori will complete spring of 2023. there is a a white paper that I do have that I will share with the board we did ask our researchers to um to to pull together a white paper for you because there is something there is something different generally in student involvement and Student Activity and student performance when there is involvement of parents as we know and so I don't think that we can just isolate just Montessori alone there is a lot more that goes into that as well in terms of where we are across the board but I do think it feels it's a really great place to look at where we are in the other spaces now we want to make sure that we're

066able to make sure that the achievement Factor meets the other areas project-based learning is one for three of three of the schools um there has been a desire to expand project-based practices project-based learning is kind of like as we think about and I've heard uh board member Bolton share this the most but as we think about um um college prep for example you know we want all of our students involved in activities where they can do projects and they can learn from the projects and the experiences that are happening with them so if we continue in the area of project-based learning what does that begin to look like in a school what makes that different from the experiences that you get just as a part of our overall General authentic curriculum and we and as

067we're thinking about this as well how do we and World interaction with students for the real world applications which is really the the core of the project face work theme and stem and the only difference we know in Steam and stem is the a in Steam is arts and so how are we looking at science technology uh engineering and math as an overall Focus um and I think that we see that there is uh definitely some level of interest in terms of where we are with that but the the goal is to really create more defined focus in terms of stem and steam um it could create a an actual curriculum that we're using in the classrooms around it you know we have uh across the course of the years increase the technology and Technology

068availability across all schools so again going back to the question what makes these programs different and how do we augment those programs so that the students are getting the experiences that they're attending the schools for and a lot of that also becomes the extensions of working with Partnerships across the district and across the city pay with technology um you know technology is one that we really need to give some thought to because we do offer technology in all of our schools now I think that the district was forward thinking and thinking about this as an area of focus but now knowing that we have moved ahead in terms of technology and Technology access what else becomes the area of interest in these schools here we also discuss as we think about trying to address um

069some of the needs around the 7th and 8th grade students and whether or not all we're still in alignment with all of our seventh and 8th grade students being at the high school level might be better with some of the seventh and eighth grade students to remain at the k-6 level and so one of those areas that we looked at in terms of digging in deeply into the data and where the students go was the possibility of change at Ethel M Taylor as one of those locations so that we we grow up you know kind of build up to a K-8 program which could address some some different areas in terms of implementation World languages we have our four programs that are focused on world languages currently we are in the middle of um actually

070we're at the point now to be able to share our initial findings for curriculum adoption around our world languages we've not had a curriculum so that's going to be really exciting the need for Pathways to extend learning and one of the areas here that is is is just the uh something for us to address is the number of vacant positions that we have currently for World languages I'm finding individuals that are able to become certified in the areas and then keep them in the locations is really important so that's something that we do have to address across the board our IB we have two programs currently they are both in the process of IB certification so far in their initial visits both of them have received um quite a bit of accolades for the progress

071that they're making toward uh or authorization as an IB World school so they'll be the first in our district to to look at the IB programming the new college preparatory option at data as well as robbers through the IB programming has definitely been a plus so all of that to say there are a lot of different considerations in terms of where we go next in terms of the conversations that we could have the one thing that I will share here is that as we share this in ad hoc we knew what actually happened um before we could really leave ad hoc there were already questions that were coming and there was already conversation that was that was coming and I do remember both our our ad hoc committee chair board member Moffett and board member

072Bolton kind of making sure that we reiterated that this is in conversation this is how we get information how we share information but more importantly um it's it's important for us to be able to do the work in the public but the risk of doing the work in the public is also having information taken that may not be the accurate way so we accept that risk we know that it is a risk so these are only considerations there are no changes that have happened at this point that would not be addressed is a part of what's already in terms of considerations so the first is to and I'm doing that is a huge area of Need for us and an area if I could say of deficit for us right now and so just some

073of the thoughts and conversations that we have have thought about as we begin to think about where we go next with the possibility around strategy is to establish Early College programs at our area high schools and starting that program with the work that's at Schroeder there's a lot of different dynamics that are happening as we think about the changes that are happening in the community around Schroeder and so looking at what are the options that would allow us to better align with both Schroeder and JP Parker and so the next is adding some additional theme work at JP Parker we know that we've removed the college prep theme from the school which was done several years ago I think it was still carrying it in the brochure but it's not really has not been identified

074as College Prep they've really been focused on Environmental Studies and that's a program that they've built at this School level and so working additionally with some pre-college work pre-early College work John P Parker is still one of our more underutilized schools even with all of the wonderful things that they have happening at the school they're still one of our more underutilized schools so thinking as you know really beginning to think strategically about how we are able to to move to the next level there and consideration um to repurpose Spencer as a k-6 school I understand that this was not um this was not a popular consideration but it's just that it's a consideration and one of the reasons is thinking about facilities now I know again as I shared earlier how we got to Spencer

075as the 312 that it is currently but there are some options and opportunities to think about how we might still be able to use the space to maximize the space but to also address some of the additional needs that we have at the district maximize building capacity and so our our three schools that are on the higher end of building capacity concerns would be Ethel Taylor Douglas in South Avondale um and you know as we've used the terminology we use this terminology in ad hoc I don't know that it's a terminology that's been used across the board but thinking about kind of the east side or the central you know in terms of conversation and and so the opportunity to expand I.E grow up the K-8 programming within those School environments as a possibility to

076also look at addressing some of the seven eight population that we know is occurring in the high school so that's something for consideration and as a cleanup really it was already done but the magnet boundaries were removed from Silver to Mount Washington and Covedale that was done prior to now what we what we determined through these conversations is and actually when when I came it was one of the first conversations that was shared with me by the board is that we removed the the programs that were at the school padea um is the one that comes to mind we remove the programs at the school but we did not remove um the information in the booklet for the programs or the transportation that went to those schools so we are moving forward now with closing

077that out and moving to the next phase this is a little small for you to see but you do have it in front of you as well and so these are additional areas that we think about in terms of uh overall consideration because we wanted to address the capacity and think about where we are uh what the percent to capacity so how close we are to getting to capacity and in some areas we are close to capacity um the school themes and how we're working through those themes this one was one that we pulled out specifically because in for these schools the area of classroom practices which by far is as I shared is the most important when we think about what's happening in terms of programming all of these were at the getting started

078phase um each one in each one of the schools so in some we notice that the culture is there we are or it's getting there that that the vision is getting there that there is the The View around Equity but in terms of classroom practices it's just not evident in the classroom that you're seeing the theme is there so these are schools that we are beginning to work with around what else needs to happen if this is first the conversation is is this the right program and if this is the right program then what needs to happen in the school building so that our students are able to maximize the learning that we expect for them to have as a part of that and I think that that's it for the presentation so I'll stop

079at this point for any questions that we have thank you very much superintendent for the presentation are there questions or comments from board members I know some of you have seen this before some of you are seeing it um we received it earlier but seeing it live for the first time Dr Moffitt so thank you for this presentation to the full board and as a member or the chair of the ad hoc committee I've had an opportunity to see it and to also field a lot of questions concerning it there's just been a couple of things that I want to reiterate that I don't think can be said enough but that these are indeed considerations um you've said it I think or remember Bolton and myself said this multiple times during the meeting but these

080are just considerations on a semi-objective perspective looking at us from a bird's eye view um if the public would like to watch the ad hoc committee we had an opportunity to have a little bit of historical perspective placed into the why some of the programs looked the way they looked um by board member Bolton and I believe board member Jones but and that's helpful to be able to kind of put some context into how Spencer came to be and how um some of our other schools migrated to what they currently are now I will say that part of what my expectation is with regard to the ad hoc committee um this was the very first foundational level of what we needed to for our work with regard to boundaries and um one of the things

081that I'm going to also be looking at is of how does transportation we want to talk about transportation and how does that impact impact us financially with regard to the buildings in the audit with what you've presented and also Partnerships to each building and each program that also is significant for me as well to look at for instance you brought up John P Parker and how John P Parker is a is focusing on environmental they have significant Partnerships that bring in significant dollars to that particular school that are also important to look at from a neighborhood School perspective so I want to reassure the public that these are indeed considerations we've made no we as a board we've made no decisions about um a programming or any changes we've definitely got lots of work to

082do with regard to ad hoc and we do have a committee meeting coming up so make sure you check that out but for anyone that is particularly interested I think that the minutes or the video from the last presentation which should be consistent with what you've presented but with a little bit more context are actually on the website with more discussion though um I would urge people to go and look at that as well but also this being a fundamental level just a foundational level there's more work to do before we work with the administration and the community voice regarding building changes regarding programmatic changes we really we will be finalizing the work timeline the work plan timeline but we really want to have Community engagement that is how we got here with a lot

083of our programming from a historical perspective was because the community wanted specific things and the board was able to accommodate that um and that voice is significant we also want to have teacher voice we want to have parent voice we've had community members attend our ad hoc meetings and specifically ask that we as a committee invite questions as to why do parents choose the buildings that they're choosing all of those things are significant and should impact the work that's being done to build upon the audit that you've done so I just want to assure or reassure if possible the community that we are really indeed wanting that Community engagement to shape some of the considerations and build those towards recommendations as an ad hoc but specifically working in conjunction with the administration and the community

084for those thank you very much Dr moffatt Other Board member questions Mr President Craig um so I want to just say quickly to uh three things so first is just I want to thank you and your team for putting this together uh I think one of the things that that all of us had questions about is what are our schools doing and in a lot of ways this goes to show that there are some things that we knew about some things that we um need to update and correct and then some things that they're doing quite successfully um I wanted to talk a little bit though in just maybe reference something I think you said in regards to some of the AP testing and some of the other programming with regard to like CTE as

085well is I think some of the struggles also is that it's not just a once they get their issue um so one of the things that I did hear from some folks is that some of the struggles with ap is that are the students prepared to enroll in and take an AP course when they get to that level and so in some ways it is about some of the goals that we're setting some of the other work that we're doing as a district to prepare our students as they progress to be prepared when they get to a level in which they would be able to be successful an AP exam so I thought I thought I heard you say a little bit about that earlier the other one that I wanted to just highlight is

086that as I look at the list of schools in consideration it is very very start to me that our high schools are not necessarily balanced in a way that works for how our district is set up and I think that's one of the things that you know we we eventually will look at it eventually we'll talk through and eventually work through as a district but you know we have one one high school that has under utilization of the space and then we have almost every other high school at over capacity it's you know it tells us something right it tells us that there is something that we need to think about and so we see that in other schools and at the elementary level as well that we do have an issue of just trying

087to address and give people information so they can make the best decisions for their students and put them in a school that works well so that you got from Office point we can look at other things like how does this affect our transportation how does this affect other resources that we're implementing into those schools because it does appear that there are some schools that have just a a space to grow and there's other schools where you ain't growing over the net like this that's where we at um so I again I want to thank you and your team for putting that together thank you very much vice president Craig so I think um on one of the previous slides I referenced it as our need to really focus on accelerated coursework um and accelerated coursework

088as we prepare students for higher level higher level courses and one of those higher level said of course is being our AP courses ultimately we are going to see the same thing in our IB courses because of the level of rigor of the course the content and the assessment the goal at the end is for students and again there are two schools of thought right the first school of thought is students are better prepared for college simply because they fit through the course right they take the course um they've had exposure to the course so that they are better prepared when they go to college however the goal is for students to take the course and pass the assessment at the end so they get the college credit um they're in a college level of

089course their coursework has to be approved in the case of AP by college board so the goal at the end is to make sure that students are able to pass the assessment so in order to do that however we have to think about supports along the way and it is not always a comfortable conversation to have around this is what Advanced coursework looks like or this is what honors coursework looks like but if we're really going to begin to challenge our students to get to that level we need to make sure that we have the students in the courses that want to be in the courses number one they're in courses that they they want to engage in number two and that they're willing to do the work that's necessary as a part of the

090course and they have the supports necessary for them to be successful so I do appreciate that the other to your other point around high schools I think one of the first areas that you know that I was able to identify that really needed some conversation and focus was high schools just recently we've hired our chief of high school transformation but aside from that we notice our high schools more specifically our neighborhood high schools and I say neighborhood we're not necessarily neighborhood because we're you know open enrollment but not our magnet schools and not our Montessori schools our neighborhood high schools you see the Stark difference across the board and what's being offered and the experiences and so how do we make sure that from a lens of equity we're making sure that we are providing

091the students what's needed in those environments and supporting the work that has to happen in those environments uh thank you superintendent and vice president Craig Mrs Weinberg followed by Ms Jones um yes thank you superintendent Wright for the presentation I just had a couple of questions um on the second part the program implementation and design Equity audit that you did attach um first question when I was looking at the CTE Pathways and as you stated or as it was stated within the documents that they're looking to expand programming um there was a mention about surveying students has that already been done or will that be done so that's actually a process it's like it's actually something that high schools um have talked about doing for a period of time trying to determine what quote-unquote pathway

092students want to go into I think this becomes the challenge sometimes students are signing up for their high school program without having all of the information around what's being offered at that High School in terms of programming and so I think that we've done a good job across the District of trying to make sure that we're exploring all of those things but there's a lot more work to be done in that space because we are open we still very much have and we have some of our Legacy High Schools you know we still very much have students that are going to schools because that's where the family went and that may not be where that particular program is offered so making sure that we're doing the alignment work around the programs once the students are

093there also trying to address what their needs are as they are there to provide level of interest for the CTE coursework that they're doing I don't think that across the board we are we have we have improved in what we were offering in terms of CTE we have increased the number of students that are involved in the CTE programming where I think there is still a disconnect from everything that I see is really making the connection for the students from this is what they got in terms of their certification this is how it looks in an internship front for them this is how they actually get a job that's going to be viable for them because of that certification that they received you know even while they were a high school student thank you and

094then my second question went on to um you discussed that there were some of um the barriers regarding um I guess my question is is what were some of the barriers that were moved that were removed for students in increasing their participation in the AP course no it stated within that form but I didn't see what exactly the barriers were so I'm curious about that yeah so the barriers are one um their variety I think one is the level of implementation of Core Curriculum that the lines of Standards so that students are getting to the point that they are performing on grade level that's one I think the second is making sure that as students are moving into courses that are accelerated courses or courses that are AP courses for example that they know what

095they're signing up for that they know that there is an expectation at the very end that as they go through the coursework they they're going through they are in a college level class as a ninth grader or as a 10th grader because at the end of that they're expected to take and pass the assessment I think the third that is that is a barrier is making sure that there are enough supports that are available to support teachers and support students that are in courses that they may not necessarily be prepared to be in number one or number two they are prepared to be in but they need additional work they need additional support they need test taking strategies they need to to learn note-taking skills all of the things that go along with being a

096an effective or an efficient you know uh college student they need those things as well and so um you know the the and also understanding that just as we talk about one of the activities that we did during the state of schools is really making sure that we are looking at how students are assessed in terms of the uh Ohio state test the same is true for other assessments that they take so teachers in order for them to to teach at an AP course they have to have their syllabus approved by college board but that's still not the assessment so making sure that all the resources that are available on college board and there are a lot of resources that are available around getting students prepared for testing that students are that those resources are

097being utilized and that everyone understands how to utilize those resources I think the third that we're also missing an opportunity around is looking at our AP potential which is done through PSAT testing so testing students before they get to the point of having an AP of going into an AP class to begin to identify students even as early as seventh grade that are showing potential already for having success in AP courses and certain AP courses so there are a lot of strategies that go along with preparing students to move to the next level moving beyond those barriers I think will also give us an opportunity to see improved results for the students and just my last comment um thank you to my colleague Dr Moffitt for bringing up the fact about community and student voice

098especially as you are presenting these considerations to the board I just really want to make sure that we do keep that in mind and I know that you mentioned with the gifted Services I am very happy to hear that you want to increase gifted services in our schools and all of our schools and I think that's very key and very important we have a lot of students who may not feel like it's cool to be identified as gifted even though that they are and I think that putting a push towards that and really making that and really getting the necessary staff needed to be able to um I guess fulfill the needs at our schools thank you for that thank you thank you Mrs Weinberg uh Ms Jones yes thank you um superintendent Wright thank

099you so much for the information this I mean just considering all the meetings and conversations that we've had in ad hoc I think this pulls a lot of that together in a context that that we can understand like where we started where we are and and also we're thinking about okay so what's next so I really appreciate the way that it was presented it really is helpful to see this um I just want to make a comment and remind us and our community that when we first started this conversation a few years ago and then bringing it up now it was centered around uh the impact of transportation and how Transportation impacts um uh it it had to do with the cost of Transportation being an open District especially for our high schools and we

100and it also uh had some implications for our start times which we did a whole process around developing early start times and that kind of thing I I it still is about that and I know that at some point in ad hoc in the ad hoc process we'll be talking about that but I think I wanted to say that because it whatever planning we do that's always going to be fundamentally one of the highest priorities about how we make these changes looking at current Transportation concerns and start times and all of that so that that's a that's just a statement and just for uh I'm sure that at some point it'll be on our agenda um I do have a question though um I I you know I'm trying to word this um in in

101the most politically correct way that I can um I am I am a strong advocate for Community engagement I do think that and maybe it's how I feel about the purpose of ad hoc and I'm not going to go in depth about that but at some point uh we the ad hoc committee will need to decide is this a strategic initiative or can this be integrated or incorporated as part of our strategic planning process which is a more full process of community engagement and I I don't know I I guess I'm making a comment about that I'm not asking a question or anything but making a comment about us maybe needing to think about that because we could go on forever and do this and it's all good work it's all good work and I'm

102not questioning that at all but I am questioning at what point does it stop being ad hoc and what point do we need to think about uh is this a strategic initiative that falls maybe as a higher priority as part of the strategic planning process and when and how does that occur foreign thank you board member Jones did you want to respond from the superintendent on that um he doesn't have to I wasn't asking okay I just wanted to check I'm not asking for one either I just wanted to make sure we got you a response directions anything else on your end you're good thank you um other other board members um Miss Bolton for those folks in the community and in the district itself deaf and everyone this is actually why what you've just

103listened to is exactly why this person was hired to be superintendent um like it or not from a standpoint of how you feel about any of these ideas it's great to have had the group to this school by school audit it's very important that that happened very very important I see the results of years of work to get us where we are now but fresh eyes I think are needed uh and and someone sometimes with a lot of expertise but not necessarily history and Battle Scars that created the particular schools that we have and programs this is incredibly useful and I'll say what I said in ad hoc I think this is great I only agree with maybe half of it and I'm sure that as we put seven board members together the other board

104members will disagree with the other half and that's why we're doing this uh I see this too as a culmination of so many initiatives that we've had to do over the years whether it's Montessori whether it's a high schools of choice uh whether indeed it's deciding not to have uh uh junior highs or whether it's in the midst of the facilities master plan you decide to go away from K-8 and instead you start to talk in terms of pk6 and then think in terms of of the upper grades I I see this too as an effort to uh jump start our our Career Tech efforts I see also very frankly in this um an attempt that's gone back a number of years about not seeing this District as strictly a magnet District or a neighborhood

105District we have faced that with our population forever with the belief that our neighborhood schools were being less treated well than our magnets and we are no longer just neighborhood and magnet we are a preschool system we are a yes shall we say International System uh we have all kinds of uh systems within our system a Montessori system this is a group of and this effort I think can help uh bring all those systems together real quickly um it's very unlikely that I would think that a board would agree that to me it shouldn't have gifted and I'm sure the west side I remember when the board tried to close sailor Park and eight buses arrived from Sailor Park to testify as to why we shouldn't sell it to a charter so these are things

106that you know we have an empty audience today but moving forward Community engagement will will be engaged I feel very very strongly that we have to have the engagement but I also and I think Mr moraski might agree we've been doing this already for a very long time very long time and there's stuff that didn't get done so I think if we could I think Carolyn said we could spend the whole rest of the year doing all this uh and I think once it starts to be a strategic initiative it doesn't get done that's what I've what I've witnessed that we have the great energy at the beginning and then we fizzle out this is a better start to a a a grand plan rather than a strategic initiative and this grand plan can be

107worked out with the community and the experts in the administration and this board uh and I would I'd like to think of it as a grand plan but it's built on what the ad hoc was first decided to be doing which was looking at the building blocks and boundary lines of all of our elementaries and what will be the end of this to Carolyn's point it all it is about our operations but I'll tell you what it really is about and I think the treasurer says this often it's the cost of choice it's the cost of quality and it's the cost of equity we can't keep doing what we're doing now in many ways the funding for covet helped save us the reality is if we focus on the cost of of quality the cost

108of choice the cost of equity and begin with this wonderful idea of at least getting enough knowledge to have a grand plan this is not something that we can spend 10 years on we can't even spend five years on this we got to be looking at three to four years and it can't be done in fragments bits and pieces because as you witnessed you change one school you're going to be changing other schools and we and we have to do it in association with our community and whatever is best but I I applaud you for doing this and I'm happy to fight over whatever part I want to fight over uh and with my colleagues or with the community or with you but this is in part why you are here and that's the challenge

109thank you Miss Miss Bolden um any other board members I'll share quickly some last thoughts but I think we heard from everybody um so just swiftly superintendent I wanted to say uh how interesting and helpful I found this uh and I think that the comprehensiveness of the audit and also the rigor of the audit um with the different rubrics that you and the team have used we're just very very helpful for me uh I just wanted to say thank you um I think some of the findings were just um so clear and also I think substantiated things that have felt true for a long time um but was really helpful to see made manifest with some actual research and and the comprehensiveness in the rigor just a couple examples um the titles of schools uh

110in this match between how we hold out a building and what's actually happening in the building and I I generally tend to assume that that that comes from um all good intentions all around like an original program an original team a lot of enthusiasm you know natural changes in leadership we've said that on our board we've seen that with our superintendent you know like but and yet it can still create this world um where there is this real mismatch and so I I found that fascinating I think that the clarity around Equity um it leaps off the page in that AP graph right but that's not the only place too uh where we see I think um just real differences in terms of opportunities and so I appreciated that coming through so clearly um in

111high schools you know and I think that the enormous variation we have across our high schools in particular Ms Bolton made a bold claim a moment ago that there was one reason why we chose the superintendent for this position I would challenge that assertion and say that there were likely several um but I think one on my list I think was was your particular experience as a high school principal and leading uh high schools where they're our wonderful kids and teachers who are working very hard and deserve more from us than we're currently offering and so I'm just excited to work through all of this together in the weeks months years that are ahead um I had only one question um which was uh I think the um this has come up in various forms

112but I have had a number of constituents reach out from Cheviot in particular uh and I I hear loud and clear that there is no plan there is no there's no recommendation uh we but here are findings and options so I I heard that really clearly and I will I will share that with the people who are reaching out to me about this I think that um piece I wanted to push for just one one follow-up question was um I think the answer may be no but like is there a sense of when community members could expect to learn more from us about what these uh what options might go into effect and also like on what timeline I mean I think these are even let's assume that we get an answer by the end

113of the school year which is a which is a massive assumption but it might make that assumption it still might be that the effects roll in over the course of a series of years um but but is there any sense of just when people could expect to learn more and see changes I actually think that that is something I have to that we really as a board and superintendent team need to have more conversation around um there are some of the things that are here in terms of recommendations that are recommendations that um you know have been socialized at school levels because it's things possibly that they've been talking about for a long time they knew that something needed to happen they just weren't quite sure what and so then when you you come and

114you give them deeper information around the what then it gives them more to work with with their iot with their lsdmc but I think the greater question becomes what is the will of the board and and really aligning what the next steps are because I see this as um as a process the first is determining where we want to go we have really good information about where we are but the next step is where we want to go so ultimately there are some decisions that have to be made around open enrollment right and and how we're going to begin to make those decisions so that's one I think the second it's beginning to have those conversations at school levels at school sites so that um they're able to community is able to come into schools

115to come into school buildings to give feedback to give get additional information around what we're thinking and what we're proposing um the third piece of that is using that feedback to then refine what the overall process is so I really see it as you know if we are given the green light to begin to move forward um then we can we can move forward in terms of what our overall recommendation for an initial plan would be and then that comes the starting place for us to then um add to or take away from but I don't know that that administratively um or for the leadership that we have been given the green light to say okay it sounds like this is where we want to go we know what the initial desire was you know

116what it is that we want you know let's take this and and work with us and bring us back a plan that we can then begin to pick apart um refine until we come up with something that's really what we're looking for and that we may be able to implement you know at the beginning of the um uh 24 25 school year that's helpful I appreciate it thank you everyone for your engagement on this topic we have one left this afternoon um and it's about 5 34 so I think we're doing okay on time um we're gonna move to item four which is a strategic plan process discussion so opening up the discussion um as a follow-up to the conversation that we started at the last board meeting um at the end of that board

117meeting there was conversation from Boardman rebolton around the the um larger components of the Strategic plan which included really having dialogue around vision and Mission and what that looked like from the school level and for for for me uh in terms of working through the Strategic plan really the process that we're looking to use how we're looking to do that process so that we're able to get the the initiatives the focus the strategies that will help the support the goals and guardrails that we've established um so with that I think that there there were that I would really like an opportunity to have more discussion around that second part so that we can really talk through what that portion would look like um so that we so that we are not waiting to get started

118on building the plan um and working with the community and the experts to build the plan but they were able to get started in that process so that was really kind of a place to have some discussion um I have ideas for what it looks like on the Strategic plan side but as board member Bolton shared I think the board agrees at this point that that is the how and that we agree that the how um sits with with the leadership and the team for what the how looks like on that side but there are some greater areas Mission Vision you know overall a term I used before was forecasting um as well for where we go next and what that looks like and what's the board's pleasure around that um thank you superintendent I

119think um my proposal for how we might move this forward a little bit is I think if you wanted to share just a little bit about um what you think could unfold in terms of um the the planning the how part of it I might then ask Ms Bolton about um how she sees what she was describing in her last meeting fitting within that would that make sense I'm also open sure so I see the the Strategic plan process in terms of a work plan for for me and the team as a about a six phase process um phase one has really already occurred where we did the listening and learning to start with that was the entry level of that getting feedback really looking at what are some of those high level lover um

120the high level feedback that came back for us to move forward and within that the development of the goals and guardrails the next phase moves into development and so really taking about a a six to eight week period to initiate a development process that would include the overall process and structure for development so I see that happening um you know from the onset starting February the 1st such that by the 24th we have eight we've been able to move through that process get the feedback look at the strategies um and really see if we're in alignment with where we need to go in terms of the goals and guard rails um then spend the next month or so really preparing for refinement right bringing it back to the board for this is where we are

121right now just for additional feedback going through a refinement process and then uh bringing it back to the board um to determine and I don't know if the board approves the Strategic plan or I don't I'm not I'm not clear on what the decision point was in terms of that but um having that done by the end of April with the goal of using then the time from May you know through the end of the year while we're moving into implementation in July but using the time from May through the end of the year and forward to really work through awareness make sure that our our Greater Community is is engaged they they know where we are in terms of the Strategic plan and they're able to consistently see themselves in that and provide feedback

122so that's just in terms of the phases that that I see um and what those phases may look like thank you very much Ms Bolton do you want to react at all and kind of share the overlap of what do it very quickly I think we have spent eight months or so uh already developing the goals and guard rails which should give you and and the team and everyone in the district uh what we're valuing and what your goals and guardrails are so I think that's done I think that and we've had thank goodness Community involvement in helping to determine the guard rails and the goals they weren't coming up with them independently but they were reacting and validating or changing or telling us to add stuff uh so that the community's been involved with

123that in a very significant way via the board so I think that's in that early part as you're referencing I'm I'm hoping that the part that you're referencing is you all pursuing how to get these things done and be able to report back and this is the plan of how to get these particular things done I believe the thing that is missing and I think other board members believe this too is some anyway uh uh is what's missing is that vision mission and forecast best and I think this previous discussion we just had lends itself to wanting to engage the public in what the vision which we've had since I think 2017 and Mission since 2017 and then to have the community the people is I think it's a great City Schools call them the

124owners of the district uh help Envision what they want to see in this coming decade as part of Cincinnati public and I'd like to spend time in a parallel and not redundant because you've got the goals and guardrails and boom but I think it would be important for us As We Lay the groundwork for some of this other stuff that we're going to be doing is to have eight or ten weeks of public engagement to help us determine and let the people that own the district determine what the vision and the mission is and help us all of us together uh kind of determine too what the forecast would be is it over the next five years and not necessarily the how but the what and the why we want to be there and we've

125got lots of fundamental things we've got our Equity policy we've got our racist anti-racism policy we've got all kinds of things that are ready now this this other uh School audits that you've been able to produce I think I would want to see in this coming uh winter months and and that would be like February and uh March of course in Cincinnati winter happens whenever it wants to happen but I think uh through through February and March we would be engaging the public so they have a sense of ownership about this and lay the groundwork of acceptance for what it is that you all are coming up with and that could help inform our budget it could also help inform um all kinds of dialogue that we need to have with the public not about

126the how but by the why and the what in the future thank you um there's a point of clarification and then I want to just ask reactions from either our Super Center report like what I'm what I think I'm hearing you say Eve is that what you're suggesting could operate really nicely in parallel with the sequence that the superintendent was describing yes I don't want we don't none of us have time to be redundant and we spend enough time coming up with cool stuff uh especially the technical terms yes this is this is done in parallel to re-engage our community to help figure out the vision mission and and and the the forecast the future I think it's yeah vitally important that with the community to join us on that and that we get it

127so that it begins to inform board work yeah and so I think rather than Administration will work but I think it's just helpful to hear that there's like a proposed way to work on the how in alignment with the work we've already done around goals and guard RAM and there's a proposal around some additional community around Vision Around Mission around where we want the district to be in five ten years that's how I'm interpreting forecasting if that's wrong tell me um but I just want to like the other people have um questions or um responses I think what I'm what I'm hoping for is we can get um you know I think the the strategic plan is is incredibly important I think the process by which we get to a final version is really important

128and what I'm working on is trying to get as close to a coalition approach to all of this as possible and I'm delighted that there's a possibility that there's a suggestion from our superintendent but also engage community members would think big picture and might and within this year so that in our next budget can actually reflect all of this um if there's a if there's a just a consensus or Coalition approach to that I think that's really exciting um but I also want to check to see if other board members have questions I would just add too that the RFP that we issued when we first began this work lasts until June of 2023 and it fits within that phrase that that time frame and in that RFP if you all recall the possibility of

129having multiple uh experts help us or get us through was part of that RFP and we even toyed with the idea of having to or what have you but so we're still under that I think it was a general counsel can correct me but I think we're still at least within that time frame and that time frame works well sort of well for our budget efforts and and the other stuff we're involved with vice president sorry board member Judds it'll take me a couple weeks I'm gonna get it right thank you thank you um I I agree with the the thoughts and the recommend the suggestions that board member Bolton have um put forward I I you know the community engagement piece I think um as she was talking I was thinking about what we

130did in the golden guard rails Community engagement and all of the information that that I know Dr Moffitt referenced this all the time that did not get incorporated or brought in and that there there were some important things that relayed and ties so very closely to what our mission and vision is and I think I do agree that it needs to be parallel and I do agree that it's something that we need to get started very quickly you know um so um having said that um I'm I'm in support of having those those uh be parallel outfits thank you um board memory Jones Mrs Weinberg I'm just going to agree with both of them I'm going to keep it short and sweet I totally agree with um getting the community involvement especially as it relates

131to our mission and especially as it relates to our vision and I look forward on getting started thank you thank you other questions thoughts Dr moffatt though having been a person who was appointed by the by the super Laura Mitchell um to this strategic planning committee as a community member I think that is super important to have Community uh engagement and influence regarding how we how we align ourselves with our vision and Mission as as a participant I was like one of 30 people and it was um it was a way for us to collectively unify around where we brought our interests to see us in the in the board and to see us working with the board and administration wasn't really in lieu of but it was definitely collaborative and I also want to

132point out we I know I did when we were doing our engagement sections and people brought up ideas just as board member Jones said we told them I told them this is not part of the strategic planning process and so to exclude or not have a process that's formalized when we specifically said that that's what we were we were not doing um I think I think would would not do well not fair us well with regard to the community um we we represent the community and we would I think we need to hear their voice in collaboration and at the same time as the superintendent is working on her how but as coaches we need to definitely inform the play and so I think that um to have Community involvement is significant I do having

133said that I recognize we're talking about a very short window which would require a lot of time on our part and effort but I think as board members but I think that it is significant enough to deal and I'm committed to doing that any other reactions questions thank you Dr moffatt Mr Craig vice president Craig it's coming um I think you know again I think Eve's idea to to do this kind of uh in in collaboration with the efforts of being done by the superintendent on the how to do our vision and Mission idea is great I think one of the things that we struggle with in our communication at times with the public is also defining what we are doing right and making sure that it is clear what we're asking of them and

134I think one of the things that we learned from the goals and guardrail conversations is that sometimes we can be very clear with what we ask of them they're just going to tell us what they want to tell us and so in some ways that's helpful and in some ways it's important for us to keep that in mind as we go through the communication process with them because one of the things I don't want us to be in a position of is um and I think it was we did a little bit of this with the kind of parking lot idea and to have the ideas that people were spelling as to the house that they wanted or the things that they specifically wanted done and I think there's a time and a space for

135the superintendent to have in her process for her to get community feedback on specifics of the how as well and so one of the things I think we can be very clear in communicating out as we do this is that there are opportunities to be part of both the conversation around the vision and the mission and the conversations about how does the district itself accomplish those things that is somewhat distinctly different in some ways right because you know to the point we already had this conversation today around some of the considerations that were proposed in the ad hoc committee that folks took as we changed the whole District tomorrow and then in a lot of ways we want to have them have that opportunity to have that conversation with your team and the folks working

136with you all as to what will happen in a specific school or what was what's going to happen with the specific program but for us as a board we want them to tell us look I want a district that does this in five years I want a district that has these type of programmings in five years oh my district that gives me this and you know that type of conversation that realistically yes you'll need to know about yes you'll want to hear about and we want to marry the two together but they are very different conversations and so I look forward to us building that opportunity up so we can do both of them while also uh communicating it out clearly to the public as to what we are reaching on and talking to them

137about thank you vice president Craig um superintendent any closing thoughts here we have a um this is a meeting intense week and a half here folks because we have today we have Monday then we have the work session on Saturday so this is not your only chance to talk about this uh we'll likely talk about it again at least one of those two meetings um but I did want to give our superintendent the last word thank you uh I think the this is long I think that I am hearing alignment from us on what this process is um I I know that we have made so many strides forward with Who quote unquote owns what um and to hear that this is a process that that will work parallel for the work that we really

138have to get started in doing around the building of the Strategic plan I think is very positive um the other piece of that that I think is also something that just you know it's kind of reiterating it just like we say in terms terms of the work that was shared today for the program audit that is in conversation it's discussed in discussion it hasn't been done yet and someone inadvertently will still send an email that says what are you doing at Cheviot right that's that's that's going to happen but in terms of this that the work for the board is really getting from the community any updates or clarification around the vision updates and clarification around the mission and forecasting whether that's five years ten years wherever that whatever that magic number is where would

139we like to see the district positioned um what I caution us about and and would really be interested in the facilitation around is making sure that this does not become another conversation around the goals and guardrails because we already have goals and guardrails that have been determined and so really making sure that the discussions are vision mission forecast as we move forward not necessarily what goes into this iteration of the Strategic plan I think it informs where we are because honestly having done this work for a really long time I don't think we're going to be really far removed from where we are now in terms of vision and Mission because we have because of the goals that we have for our students but we don't know you know maybe the community and what the

140community is looking for has changed but that doesn't stop us from from really beginning to initiate the work group the work sessions the conversations the strategy work around now we have the the goals that we want and this is the how for how to proceed in that area so I was hearing a little bit of both so I just want to make sure I think that I'm in alignment with what I hear but I do want to make sure that that is the space that the board collectively is in um so that I know that with the team that how we move forward the second piece of that it is um well um uh a board president if if you if we're discussing this again at the meeting on Monday or the work session on

141Saturday if we discuss at the meeting on Monday um I can have available because I do have a draft already of the project plan so to speak for the work plan um for the Strategic plan side of it um if that was except that's something that the Bible the board would like for me to share as well I can share that also I think if people are interested in seeing that sure I think um we have some other items on Monday's agenda too and we'll have more space and time on the Saturday perfect so I think it'd be a little bit easier but but if um uh uh that would that would be my request I think we'll just have more space for it perfect thank you yeah now thank you um and I appreciate

142everybody's engagement tonight I feel like we had a strong student achievement Committee of the whole um where we looked at evaluation that involves student achievement uh we looked at professional development let's focused on the science of reading we've talked about a program audit that shows different levels of student achievement and opportunity across the district um and then a good discussion about our strategic plan um so thank you uh and having no other business before uh yes Dr Muffin I do have a question and this is really I I don't know if we have discussed procedurally how this is going to work with having a liaison to the student achievement Cal but I am particularly interested in looking at and hearing from the administration regarding the data and where our students are um I I like

143the professional development information I think oh that's great but I would like to know academically where our district is um I don't know if that needs to be school by school or quadrant by or not quite Corridor by quarter but I and when I when I hear about student achievement I think that that needs to be about the achievement of our students within our district I like the professional development conversation don't get me wrong that's interesting information that's something I could have received on an email being personally but I really want to know what the needle is what how the needle is being moved for our students that's what I'm listening for in a student achievement conversation that is a collective I don't I don't need this other so can you please Dr Moffett board

144member gents yes um that I believe that question came up at our last meeting and I mentioned to folks that I had not the superintendent and I had not had a chance to sit down and talk about it we we've had a conversation relative to tonight's meeting um valid point that Dr Moffitt is making and yes we we are interested what what the next step because you were the one who asked about the process and I said we haven't sat down yet but that's our next step is to sit down down and work through that to find out what the interests of and the priorities of the board are I also think that it's important and so I appreciate that and we'll make sure we document that and as part of of the what folks

145want and I would encourage uh I would suggest that other board members if you have some really higher high priority areas just send that to me so that when we do sit down and and talk about it we can work through that process um most of the way I see it right now most of the student achievement Cal stuff is comes from what we've written in the work plan what is missing however which happened over the past several years is frequency of how reports with you know data reports and things come up and and that was a gap over the past two years but but a lot of things happened that impacted that and so I do take that I do take your what your your interest I do take that very seriously because if

146we don't know the information we can't see the data you can't you know respond or make decisions around that so I do think it's important um we we are going to have to sit down and kind of prioritize uh which I see fundamentally as a superintendent's um uh responsibility but uh in the context of what's in the work plan what's required of us as directed by our bylaws is what I'm using as the foundation for our discussion and then we can unfold all the other stuff from that does that make sense thank you vice president superintendent did you want to respond I I will I will defer until the other board members respond and then Mrs Weinberg I just had a quick question board member Jones um so do you think you would have that

147obviously for the next by the next Cal meeting who would have that information beforehand of I don't know by the next cow meeting oh yeah we'll have it before the next time thank you so I just want to clarify what what I'm what I'm asking for I think we have a work plan in place that you mentioned some of those topics what I'm specifically looking for is this is budget season and so if there are going to be um considerations with regard to the budget then I want to hear academics around that so I think that it's pretty simple that we've got kind of a timeline about what needs to be discussed already but particularly aligning it with what we have the decisions that we have to make with regard to the budget so if

148if there are considerations around specific areas I'd like to hear those academics around those areas and um that's what I'm looking for so I I I did hear you say send it to you um I guess then what we want for a topic to you is that what you're saying I I would say yes I would say for now you can send it to me again we haven't talked about what that process would look like but one of the things we have to do is we have to give this meeting the focus that it needs and so we're gonna have to prioritize that's why when we talk about a process if we have seven people feeding information to the superintendent our agenda is going to be yeah I would say I would suggest you can

149send uh those uh ideas and suggestions to me and we'll work we'll work on that now at some point I feel like once once we sit down and president uh Lindy should be involved in that too once we sit down and work through this it's the superintendent's responsibility to sort of make sure those things happen in this meeting so you know I won't need to be involved in that sounds thank you share more with the board about the process thank you appreciate it thank you for the question I'm working really hard to have a start on time and end on time it is 601 uh absent any objections with no other business before us I'll declare our committee meeting adjourned uh except that I didn't give superintendent a chance to respond like I said I

150would I'm so good it's okay you sure I'm sure okay I apologize no worries have a wonderful evening everybody thank you thank you