001uh wilson everybody's so quiet i think we're closing up to six o'clock to get started so i want to welcome you all tonight this is our combined meeting for november it's the only meeting that we'll have this month um which is the streak of oconee county board of trustees and i do welcome each of you here and as we can all of our meetings if you would like i ask you to join me in a moment of silence i mean um we have a new sound system tonight so i don't know if you can tell a lot of different we can tell a lot of difference i can tell a lot of difference um but we just hope it'll make things a lot cleaner clearer for everyone i ask you now if you will please
002to stand and join me with the pledge of allegiance to the flag attention salute pledge i pledge [Music] of the allegiance states of america and to the republic of david under god indivisible with liberty and justice for all and now we're going to take some time to recognize our teacher of the year support and support employee of the year finalists several of us had an opportunity i guess it was last month to attend a ceremony at west oak high school and it was so wonderful because each school has nominated someone for the special recognition and it was just it was a great time to see these employees and their parents and their families there um it was just a good good afternoon so tonight we're going to tell you who the finalists were and who
003the winners were so miss suzy waring is here from our hr office uh she's a director in that office and she heads up that process each year so we'll turn it over to her good evening to the chairperson of the board ms mccormick and the other board members dr sloan mr bear dr ketterman and mr herron good evening also to our superintendent dr thorpe and the leadership team ms simmons mrs hamby and ms moore my name is susie ray as i've been stated i'm the director of personnel services for the school district on behalf of the human resources department we are always excited to be able to host the employee recognition ceremony each year tonight i am pleased to present our district level reporting recognitions for the current 2021-22 school year unfortunately due to covert
00419 and the limitation on visitors in our school buildings last year we were not able to allow any volunteers in the schools so they will not be recognized this year we hope to continue the recognition of our volunteers of the year at each school this coming year however each school and department in the district selected a representative in two categories teacher of the year and support employee of the year all winners from each school in both categories were recognized at the sdoc employee recognition ceremony that was held on october 5th at west oak high school auditorium in the support employee of the year category the representatives embodied the qualities of a dedicated exemplary employee and were graded using a criteria rupert every support employee's application along with their essay and other pieces of information were
005included they were reviewed by a panel comprised of citizens retired educators college professors and business professionals no member of the judging panel is the current employee of the school district these applications were narrowed down to the three finalists then a winner was chosen each finalists receive a personalized certificate a special sdoc name pack for them to proudly wear each day a personalized school district blanket a gift basket from acclaimed silk floor designs and gifts and a 5x7 plaque announcing their accomplishments audience please hold your applause until all names have been called you will be asked to applaud our winners at the end of the presentation finalists please come to the front and stay standing until all the recipients have been recognized the support employee finalists of the year are as follows miss kim williams special
006services instructional aide at west oak middle school who could not be with us tonight but this is what was said about miss williams miss williams has a servant's heart and wants all of her students to reach their full potential her most rewarding experience is when she sees the joy on the faces of the students when they are successful our next finalist ms sheila shawna aludo please come forward she's the school nurse at west oak high school this is what was said about nurse aluto during this difficult time ms shauna has gone above and beyond the call of duty to make our students to make sure our students are taken care of she loves interacting with the student and making a positive impact in their lives we appreciate her dedicated service to our school family now
007the 2021-22 support employee of the year for the school district is miss nancy ratliff please come forward she is a receptionist at seneca high school this was this is what was said about miss ratliff professional cordial and helpful are words that miss ratliff lives by she is kind and caring and will go out of her way to help others in any situation once you meet her you will always remember her when guests enter our doors at seneca high they see her smiling face a positive attitude and a willingness to help them in addition to the gifts previously named ms ratliff will also be awarded a check for 250 in may of 2022. please let us now applaud our district support support employees of the year [Applause] thank you ladies moving on to the teacher of
008the year category each teacher representative from every school had their application along with their essay resume and the rubric which was reviewed by a panel comprised of citizens retired educators and college professors the 19 teacher of the year school representatives were screened to eight semi-finalists these eight semi-finalists received an interview with the judging panel comprised of yet another group of professionals after this interview process four of the eight candidates were then selected as teacher of the year finalists along with an interview they each had an in-person classroom visit so that the judges could could observe them in action with students view their lesson plans classroom management skills as well as student engagement the 20-21-22 teacher of the year for the school district of oconee county and i lost my place please forgive me the four
009teacher of the year finalists each receive a certificate a special sdoc name bag a personalized school district blanket a gift basket from mclean for designing gifts and a 5x7 plaque announcing their accomplishment they will also receive or be awarded a check for 250 in may of 2022. as i call your name please come forward the three teacher finalists are mr benjamin bolin mr bolin is music teacher at blue ridge elementary school this is what was written about mr bolin mr bolin takes the time to build a sense of community in his learning environment he brings positivity to our work environment even on his worst days he always looks at the bright side and is one of the most joyful teachers you need he comes in at 6 00 a.m every morning plays his clarinet to
010get focused and is eager to help where needed ben helps to provide a fine arts program each spring to showcase student talents and also started a safety patrol program and a student flag team he always has a smile and never shares a negative thought or feeling he is a joy to work with and i cannot imagine blue ridge elementary school without being rolling miss freda shaw ms shaw is the librarian at ravenel elementary school this is what was written about me miss shaw is a superior teacher who always eats students first not only is she our media specialist she also wears many other hats she films edits and creates our school news show she participates in school-wide beautification projects plans school spirit days serves as chair of the related art team and mentors new staff
011ms shaw has been a living example of perseverance during a difficult year her daily dedication positive attitude and efforts make our school a better place she really goes above and beyond in many areas and always has a service heart our third finalist miss brenda sisson mrs sisson is a special services resource teacher at seneca high school this is what was written about mrs throughout her 43 year career that deserves a hand right there system has long established herself as a natural and enthusiastic leader she works before and after school on her own time to provide exercise to provide extra support to students when needed she has even helped with students that are not on her caseload brenda has been the special service services department chair for the past three years as well as being recognized
012as a national board teacher over the years she has regularly been involved in community outreach through her church and through samaritan's purse she is an inspiration to her colleagues and is a valuable commodity to students and their families please let us applaud our three teacher of the year finalists [Applause] the 2021-22 teacher of the year for the school district of oconee county is miss cassandra owens moore she is a previous english teacher but is now the librarian at seneca middle school this is what is said was said about miss moore miss moore has unlimited enthusiasm and persistent level of commitment to our seneca middle students and to our school community if she has a new idea to help promote learning she finds a way to pursue it it is evidenced by the numerous amounts of
013grants she has received over the past several years she works with the morning book love summer school summer enrichment and the den program running the daily snack cart and promotes school by spirit week as well as the reading program contest hosted by the media center mir's more overall attitude toward life is what makes her a kind caring inspiring role model and teacher in addition to the other items received also receive a glass 5x7 plaque they all have their plaques with them she received an all-expense paid trip to the south carolina teacher of the year conference that was just held this past week in myrtle beach she will also receive a check for a thousand dollars in may 2022 congratulations miss moore let's give her [Applause] ms moore is also competing for the state teacher of
014the year and the process has already begun so know that our thoughts and blessings are with you as you go through the stringent process we applaud all of our support employees of the year as well as our teachers of the year for the 2021-22 school year your hard work service dedication and love for the students of oconee county does not go unnoticed thank you for the years of caring the years of love and tenderness thank you for your patience your generosity and your boundless thoughtfulness your imprint lives forever in the hearts and minds of all the students you teach the students you care for all the parents and guardians you have helped all the other school district employees and community members that you tirelessly serve day after day thank you for your attention and the
015hr department appreciates the opportunity to recognize our unsung heroes in oconee county now if the student school district board members want to join us below for a picture we would appreciate it so they can be seen all right thank you malfunction operator we certainly appreciate all the work they just make our schools as special as they are we also appreciate waiting for her working now at this time to approve the for tonight's meetings november 15th the combined board meeting for november um did anyone see anything we needed to change all right then without objection our agenda for november 15th will be approved and at this time we'll have public comment and i think we signed up to speak there's three um the first one is kevin larkin i was told i was going to be
016number two [Laughter] chairperson mccormick members of the board superintendent thorsland and administrative last month's board meeting prior to the first vote on the revision of policy ihac social studies education trustee kettermann asked about the origin of this policy superintendent thoreswood explained that this policy originated with the legislature chairperson mccormick later said she had heard concerns regarding the phrase adopt values which is in the policy proposal even though that phrase and she noted was in the previous version of the policy chairperson mccormick felt that the phrase now meant something different than it had in the past and the word value was of concern to some parents what are these concerns what has changed about values do honesty and integrity mean something different today than they did 40 years ago did the values of justice fair play
017trust citizenship professionalism that we just saw respect and discipline patriotism did they mean something different today are we now afraid of values is the word values too strong for some people if this board thinks it's okay to change the wording of this policy revision and water it down changing the intent of the policy that was authorized by the legislature then in the interest of transparency the public is owed a deeper discussion of why these members of the board think the words adopt values should be replaced by the words understand the importance there is a lot of difference between adopting values and understanding the importance of something a recorded vote by this board of this wording change should be called i think the public would be interested to know who on this board opposes teaching values
018if this board votes yes to remove the words adopt values from the policy ihac then i suggest you all take a look at policy i-h-a-k character education because you will have just basically nullified and contradicted that policy the values i listed earlier were all from policy ihak where they are referred to as ideals asked the board to look on the wall behind the chairs position at the mission statement this district wishes can this district fulfill its mission to develop responsible productive citizens if its teachers cannot discuss and teach values to their social studies students i ask this board to adopt policy ihac verbatim is written in state law and is presented and approved at the first reading members of the board don't water down policy ihac adopt the values thank you for your time and
019attention matthew smith hey hello uh my name is uh perry smith i'm speaking on on behalf of the oconee conservatives and more broadly taxpayers and parents of oconee county as i'm sure you are aware there has there has been a national awakening of concern regarding the educational system there is a growing lack of trust between the citizens and the people they have entrusted the education of our children to that concern is not only a national issue but sadly it is a local concern as well specifically some of the training of our teachers should alarm citizens and parents i know i speak for many citizens when i say i do not want my tax dollars used to fund training that promotes critical race theory or any political agenda it is the responsibility of the teachers to
020teach reading comprehension mathematics accurate history and science not to promote an ideology to shape a child child's world view that is the parents job that's the ch that's the parents responsibility and it is only their privilege it is also the right of all citizens and parents to be aware of how their tax dollars are being used to train teachers to teach our children for this reason a freedom of information act request has been submitted to the public so the public can review how the teachers are being trained transparency is vital to maintaining the trust and accountability between the taxpayers and those they have elected to represent them that's all the current effort to conceal this teacher training gives the perception that there is something that certain people want hidden the fact that we have to
021speak or seek help from an attorney to obtain the teacher training in question in its entirety for several months now we have been given four different excuses as to why we this information can't be provided in the formal in the format that has actually been requested we can actually i think get it in three formats the final excuse given was and i quote foia does not give people the right to take documents and spread them on social media or through the mail that statement only intensifies the fear of many that there is something to hide that's exactly what the foia is for it's for us to disseminate it and give it to us public information it's exactly what it's for we there also begs the question why shouldn't any documents or teacher training be shared
022with the public we should be proud not ashamed of how our teachers are trained one minute i have oh he's got team i just have to i know the other guy didn't get nothing to do um okay you made me lose my spot we should be okay so now we need to start it over they are they are after all the ones who have a very serious task of helping mold the minds of our children that's the teachers in their training if this training is so controversial that such great lengths have been taken to conceal it in its entirety other questions come to mind such as if there is something to be ashamed of what has been done to correct or reprimand if there has been such wrong doing worthy of concealment what actions have
023been taken to ensure it doesn't happen again these are questions that need answers it is time that all people who have their who have their rather substantial salaries provided by the taxpayers be accountable to us and the elective and the elected board members you are elected to protect the interests of the people of this county oconee county not to protect the school administration from the people if they have done wrong that's y'all's job it's what we led you for i hope when you go into your executive session to discuss this foia request that you keep in mind and demand transparency because that's what i'm doing i'm demanding transparency um from all of you i think we know what's happening across the nation we've seen it in all kinds of states you know parents have the
024fbi put on them because of school boards or states it's not right but we're going to start holding you accountable and i'm not going to back down on my foia request so thank y'all for your time thank you chad overhault [Music] good evening guys um want to just have a quick concern that i don't know like maybe what's the best way to address when there's an incident that happens in a school system is the best thing is there a better way maybe to communicate and try to get an answer outside of going to the principal of that school and i don't know if you guys are able to discuss this back to the public or to us in maybe your conversation or not but when it comes to substitute teachers i believe that there was
025an incident that happened at westminster middle where my son goes to involving an art teacher so some of the discussion that i've been a part of and there's not a clear understanding when it comes to substitute teachers who is actually responsible for getting does a teacher themselves find their own substitute teacher does that come through you guys's office or is that a principal decision on who substitutes and also i know that there was a couple months ago you said that we're going to do some um i believe y'all implemented which i really liked where a teacher has to stay on course with their teaching and dive off back and forth which i actually really appreciate that but somehow this teacher decided that it was okay to go south on a conversation inside an art room
026so just was a little bit curious about the the substitution as a whole for substitute teachers what that looks like i don't know if you're allowed to address that or not i don't know what's the best way if y'all guys are aware of that situation is that a school is that y'all guys decision or is that strictly inside the school themselves and just a shout out mr thompson is awesome and so is ms gambrell two wonderful school principals awesome awesome people um i don't i don't mind addressing a little bit i'm aware of exactly i thought that's that's all i wanted it was uh well yeah we have a system called front line where teachers put in their absence in advance and they can pick like a they call it a phase five they can
027pick their favorite subs if you have like a real good sub you have a system where you can pick those and list them and they'll be the first ones that the system tries to get but then after that five anybody who sees it can really pick it up and do it in this case as soon as we got word with that we had a meeting and that person was no longer allowed to is no longer allowed to sub in our district and we have have dealt with that and we have an issue if a problem comes up typically the school informs hr mr leroy who's part of my department that's why i'm sharing this stuff and he addresses it he investigates he does the the dens with and he does the discipline or determination or
028whatever we do with the um substitute and then in this particular case um we do have substitute training it's online there's a process that someone goes through to become a substitute teacher once they clear that of course if there was anything in their background check or anything like that we could certainly stop that but once a person becomes a certified substitute teacher then they're in that pool that could be called in this particular case um that person i think it was their first i think so i think it was a first time subbing in our building and a conversation was inappropriate we acknowledged that not gonna hide that from anybody i would tell anybody the things that were said in the classroom of course i wasn't there but what i've been told was said was
029inappropriate that person subbed in our district one day and will not sub in our district is there a shortage of substitute teachers absolutely there is yes okay that's part of a conversation that's coming up okay so y'all are aware of that okay but it's just been there's been more abscesses than normal too some of the people who used to sub and used to be really good ones are are retired teachers and that kind of thing and they don't want to come into the building i would just encourage our teachers our backbone so whatever it takes to get to support them like i'll make it happen i mean just in in their defenses charge they shouldn't feel guilty taking their family on vacation or whatever if they're if they're gone they should not have that pressure
030of not being able to have quality people to step in for we agree we agree okay thank you guys that's just was a concern thank you thank you thank you okay all right we appreciate all that being with us tonight um at the excitement our agenda's approval of minutes and these minutes are the october 18th 2021 from the regular board meeting um you were sent these earlier seems to be no changes so we will remove the minutes of october 18 2021 regular board meeting without objection and next dr thorsland we have your superintendent update sure uh just a couple of things of note that i want to make you aware did announce today we were going to have a community ipad sale some retired technology that we had been using in the schools those ipads
031are no longer being updated so they do pose a bit of a security risk to us but there's still good devices that can be used we had a lot of employees concerned about that because of the times we set on that so we've kind of backpedaled a little bit we're going to do that i think on december 20th so everyone will have an equal price anyone everyone who lives in our county will have an equal shot at those devices i do i know i saw um most of you at the uh business and industry night at hamilton career center a couple of weeks ago just wanted to brag on their staff for uh inviting people into the new building and it kind of in some ways a kick off to that building because of kobe
032we've had limited visitors but a great event i know mr lecroy and his staff were excited about that and then finally i'll just mention our fine arts department we had all county orchestra a couple of weeks ago last week was all county chorus and tomorrow night is all county band and those are kind of unique in school districts it is an opportunity for us to take the best and brightest students from each of our middle schools and high schools and create a county group whether at the orchestra chorus or band and we pull those students out of school for one entire day the teachers in our district select a guest conductor who comes and works with those student groups for that entire day and they practice a few pieces of music and then present them
033that evening just a great opportunity our fine arts instructors do a wonderful job with it and i know the chorus program was great last thursday and i'm looking forward to the band tomorrow night at west oak high school at seven o'clock if anyone wants to attend but just things that we can certainly be proud of and then i said that was final just in response to the public comment of course it is on the agenda for us to talk about it but i would like to just address publicly that the south carolina fourier law does say that an individual can request information it does say that it can request different forms of the information it can be paper form it can be digital form it can be viewed that's a third option that someone can
034come see the document i would argue that we've been very transparent two forms have been supplied a partial third form has been supplied there's no additional information it's in my way of thinking it's just um i guess i didn't give exactly what was asked for all the information has been supplied even if i mean no matter what was asked there'd be no additional information given um in this case i've invited multiple times to come view there have been paper copies given and an email was supplied with any additional hyperlinks that were in the presentation so so there is no additional information to be supplied nothing's being hidden and when there are cases just as we talked about just a second ago with a substitute teacher i will never pretend that the school district is perfect
035we've got 1500 employees i being one we all make mistakes so i'm not going to say that everything that happens in the school district's perfect i will say we try to address things that are less than perfect when they happen and uh when that happens with an employee we're not free just to talk about everything that happens behind closed doors certainly you're privy to that an executive session the public we can't just come out and share what might be a private employee record so anyway we'll we can discuss this further in executive session but i did want the public to know that it's not as if a four-year request has been ignored um not in the least so all right this is more our october financial report okay you all received that earlier in the
036week and i'd be happy to answer your questions one comment i would make is we are still in that time of the year when our expenditures are way ahead of our revenues so if you looked if you noticed we're about 14 and a half million dollars short so that fund that healthy fund balance that we have gets us through this time each year so proud to have that thankful for that it'll be better in january though february actually anybody anything they had any questions on all right in the next um item that we're going to discuss then is the substitute name like for who all right oh i'm sorry i just i just skipped one whole section for a hope update um yes before we watch the video um that jennifer dodd and anna gibson
037worked on putting together for tonight's meeting on september 25th we had our annual hike for hope where the school district partnered with making my mark and choose life and the blue ridge electric co-op to have our event we had a lot of participation from different organizations within our community to give resources out to community members families students on help and support we also had hal dunlap from making my mark and scarlett lewis from the choose love movement come and participate as speakers as our event and you'll be able to hear some of their messages within the video as well so without further ado we'd love to share the video with you of a desire to reduce the stigma that often surrounds mental health issues this event brings together community partners to bring awareness to mental
038was health plus forgiveness [Laughter] is [Music] doesn't matter who you are is [Music] thank you so much [Music] to share my message to share a little bit of my story but more importantly what i have learned for too long but i am going to give you a powerful formula for choosing love if you're listening to me today and you're feeling powerless in your righteous techniques to bring that power back to take your personal power back and to be able to choose love so the first character value is the most important character because it's the one that we need most courage bravery [Music] and that is forgiveness it's his favorite character value why because these things [Music] it's the gift of freedom from pain and suffering [Music] is compassion in action compassion is when we identify
039the need of someone and then there's a second component it's the action component to actively do something to help somebody so the science says that everything that we give comes back to us so that's my message [Music] is okay not [Music] so we just really wanted to thank our along with um making my mark and choose life we all work together we need all the stations to go along with the message and we just really want to thank our community those who came out to participate we had many volunteers from our schools our employees students we had a lot of involvement and we're looking forward to continuing to hold this event for our community as we continue to get mental health awareness out in our community and ways we can help and support people thank
040you it was a terrific event and we certainly appreciate all the part in it and put it together there's just it was amazing when volunteers came and set up and and how much information was available that day so thank you so much for doing it miss mccormick we also plan to work to put that video and then the video of her entire speech as you could tell that was pieced together to put those on our website and we hope to do that in the next week or so great that will be great um and now dennis will let you continue with um virtual mental health counseling options yes thank you um as you all know you know health counseling services has something that we've had in our district it has been a challenge to continue
041to find that additional support that we've been seeking mine for quite some time now so that kind of led us to look out at other options and avenues to be able to provide additional services in addition to what we're already providing at this moment so in talking shepard our um school district is presently using gaggle which is our safe management system that kind of flags if students are putting emails or in content and assignments things that kind of alert us for safety reasons within our school day so we can help and support students as needed they are actually now providing a mental health teletherapy virtually and so i had a meeting with the representative that works with our district with gaggle and then we also involved our district social workers and our present sdmc mental
042health counselors in a meeting with her and learned more about their services so i really wanted to tell you about that this evening and get your thoughts but through this platform they offer they actually match our district with an experienced licensed mental health counselor from the state of south carolina students that are referred for services would participate in a 45 minute weekly session every single week they would meet with the mental health counselor virtually the great thing about these services that they they can be scheduled outside of the school day even in the evenings and on the weekends so that would be convenient for families to be able to have those services for their child home and then also it does not require any software to be downloaded so they can literally participate in their
043session anywhere where there's internet connection and then also there's no out of cost pocket out of cost charges for the families if we decide to do this as a school district everything would come through the quote that we pay for as a school district so one of the options that we're looking at is called a retainer model and they figured about one percent of our student population so starting with maybe like i'm thinking about 100 students with an average of six sessions per student knowing some might have less some might need more but that would give us 600 um sessions over a 24 month period time we can just use them as we need them and in talking um with our district social workers our mental health counselors and with the leadership team we thought
044that might be the best option as this is something new that we're trying and that would allow us to be able to see how we like the services we would still be able to use our same rural process that we do now with our in-district mental health counselors which seems to be working very well within our schools but really they would take care of all of the other work on the end um by providing those services and searching for the therapists for us communicating with families and and then also giving us like a monthly update on how services are going as well so the cost of the retainer model that i just explained um it's 78 000 for the actual services and then a one-time setup fee of seven thousand dollars so a total of
045eighty-five thousand listen you said that uh this is due it hasn't been tried is that here or has it been tried anywhere else it's been um they've had the service for a little over a year now through gaggle we would be the first district in south carolina to use the services but they do work with districts in georgia and north carolina our closest ones around us that have used the service and josh has also talked with some of those districts and they have given good feedback on on how that's been working for them we've been we're still two counselors short right now and have been for a number of months we're trying to hire people it's just that it's hard to find mental health counselors to fill jobs so this would help us meet the
046need that we have in our district um so we would like to recommend that we take this option like this described and see if it's successful i think that's a great option i'm told by city officials that suicide ideation and suicidal attempts amongst school-age children is up drastically that's the same um like the same concern they've had a lot of concerning statistics that gaggle even shared with us on their end within the districts a big increase with that as well do you need a motion on this certainly if you passed it tonight it would allow us to start the process sooner if you want to wait until december and for us to put it back on the agenda we're happy to let you have some time to think about it either way are the counselors
047that they will actually being part of this training and and you know in the parents homes and kids homes are they certified do we know about their yes training they are certified and we are able to give gaggle suggestions on what we're looking for as well which is why i wanted our sdoc mental health counselors and social workers part of the conversation because they're trained to know like what are some common things they're seeing with our students that we definitely want this mental health counselor to have experience with and mental health counselors do not have teaching credentials but they are a job that in the state of south carolina you have to have a license yes so they would be licensed by the state of south carolina which would make it legal for them to
048do you said that this is a weekly session yes sir are there opportunities if there's a crisis or something escalates in a family that um in in talking with um our gaggle representative and with our district mental health counselors our district mental health counselors can still step in if there's an immediate emergency so that is something that we talked about as a group as well and then um communication with gaggle could happen and then email texting that can happen between the gaggle licensed therapist with the family um as well and of course now um they're as we do intake gather intake information and things like that our counselors now if there is a you know a really urgent need our counselors drop what they're doing primarily for things that are not as urgent um our
049counselors are going to take the urgent ones face to face immediately okay you know how long it takes to put this into effect once you decide you go this route um when we talked with a gaggle they'll get started right away and they said maybe about four to six weeks to find the licensed therapist so our school counselors are they're ready for us to do this i mean they're in favor of it well right now our three sdoc mental health counselors are helping cover schools that were outside of their normal um area that they were covering and we've been doing that now for this is going on the second year we're doing that and we um we do have um students from all so they're you know taking on even more of their normal caseload
050um yes ma'am we're not able to meet the need currently with it right and when i say meet the need again we see the most urgent but there's there's a need for additional counseling in our district so you have looked into this enough that you're comfortable with it and think that this is actually what we need to do at this point yes sir i mean even with mr shepherd's background information from talking with others and now that i also had the district social workers and our mental health counselors on with the call and we went through the whole system they were able to ask any questions they actually had another representative join our call from the company and we've been doing very well with the um student security management with this company that we presently
051use so it's it's been very positive change moving to that company for that as well so if it takes four to six weeks to get it implemented to start why don't we go ahead and vote on it tonight what do you understand i agree i think if it saves even one child's life absolutely absolutely all right then by here emotion that we accept the virtual mental health counseling option and go ahead and get started with that some move second okay any more discussion more questions all right ollie thank you all right this morning now we'll get back to you so first we're going to talk about the bonus options i understand that last month you all asked that i estimate what um 100 bonus would be for our employees that's about 170 000 so if
052you want to give two you know be two times 170 and on last year we prorated according to the fte of the employee and according to the hire date so employees who were hired in november didn't get quite as much as employees who had been here since july or august and i did talk to miss bright the apparel supervisor if you all decide that you would like to give opponents this year um she says they can process the payroll december 10th to make that happen so i have a question yes sir we're talking a hundred dollars per person that would be two hundred dollars per person that's for one hundred dollars would be 170 000 for two 340 510. okay would this be a bonus and i think i asked this before or would this
053be added to the salary and if it's added to the salary a hundred dollars are going to be government so they're not going to really it would be a bonus in a separate paycheck and it of course we have to withhold taxes and social security but it would not be subject to return still cut it down little bit he does and last year we did the minus of three we did 300 yes and we did that across the board well it's prorated for if right but yes yes that's right i would recommend that again i don't i don't think it's good practice to come [Music] no i you know and this conversation started because our our teachers have had uh administrators and support have all had a rough year i mean already and um i'm
054not so sure that it really passed it in the hospital today in its house spikes are going through different parts of the country we may still have another one but um i do think that they have gone above and beyond many many days and um if we couldn't afford to do it i would like to see us do a bonus again this year for them so i guess to start the conversation do i have do i have a motion that we um offer our employees a three hundred dollar bonus again this year some move second all right so is there any more discussion from anyone all right and all in [Music] favor of you will get that started okay and then for the substitute rate of pay um you've heard earlier tonight that we do
055have a shortage of substitutes or it's harder to get substitutes to come into the classrooms to cover for our teachers in september our fill rate was 66 percent so one out of every three absences was not covered in october 72 in november so far it's been 73 so it's getting better but we still you know have a need to um have more subs in our classrooms so um we would not change the substitute pay in several years i can't even remember how long it's been currently it is eighty dollars for a certified park a substitute with a degree they don't have to be a certified teacher and sixty five dollars for uh classified employees so we would like to go to one hundred dollars a day for classified employees or non-degree yes i have checked
056um with other districts the anderson districts we are are pretty close to the same amount you know some of them are lower than us or they're a little higher greenville is higher than we are i will tell you this anderson three is using some esser funds and they are paying two hundred dollars a day for teachers and a hundred dollars a day for classified only for one year they say it's only for one year but is it worth the conversation to bring in you know industry credentials so they might not necessarily have a degree but they have worked in you know a plant for all of their life or as a welder or in the trades and bringing that back into especially for our career and tech classes that might be short subs i certainly
057would be open to evacuating that on a case-by-case basis um yeah if we had a welding instructor who was out and we needed i i think we could probably have mr lee make an evaluation of that kind but it's very similar to us being able to hire an instructor at the career in tech we do do that when it's a long-term sub we do pay um their teacher if they're a certified teacher we do pay their certified right after 10. right i think dr ketterman's not talking about certified teacher but uh right someone that would be certified to teach a career in texas right same thing that's what i meant yeah there was at the experience had the experience i retired from some industry in town and wanted to give back to the community would
058that be worth i i certainly think that that's worth consideration and we can we can talk to mr leeroy and try to figure out a strategy to implement that but the main thing is when we have you know 30 percent 40 of our needed substitutes that are not hired because we just don't have enough we had to do something and we feel like um this would be one that i would love to um for you to approve like immediately as soon as the finance can get it in place to start paying that and you know after thanksgiving or after christmas i'm not sure which one would be i thought about that actually early this morning i would probably be best if we waited until after the next cutoff for subs which is like probably december
059maybe early in december since it's a short month so that the payroll folks don't have to have two rates yeah but we would like to implement it as soon as um possible to uh just try to encourage more people to be willing to substitute teach that's one of the most negative things our teachers have faced this year is if they go in to class and a school was not able to hire enough substitute teachers then the rest of the people in the school have to cover the classes for that day so a teacher on their planning period might be asked oh can you cover 30 minutes of this teacher's class so they thought they were going to have planning time and they end up without planning time because they're covering and that's just a morale
060killer at our schools so we would like to try to do something tangible to make that a little better get more subsidies all right so do i hear a motion that we increase our substitute rate of pay to um a hundred dollars for someone who yes a degree and eighty dollars for other for all other substitutes and second okay any other discussion at all i think that's is excellent we've we've looked for bus drivers and i think it's it's fair because this is very low rate of pain so all right all in favor okay and then you'll just start that whenever it's it's for you all right and our final item for discussion or action mr handy yes um we have when we're doing a new project uh sometimes we repurpose some of the items
061that we can to try to be good shooters that right now we have the surplus of four air compressors that we have stored down in maintenance and um just so happens that one of our employees also is a volunteer fireman and he said that the fire department was it was in a big need for an air compressor that and one of those four used ones would be very helpful and save them that we we have plenty and thought we don't think we're going to need the other three actually but we'll hold on to them just in case there's an emergency but um i talked with with them and i talked to dr thorsen and i thought i would ask if it would be possible for um to go to donate the oldest of those four
062air compressors to the walhalla fire department for them to have and use in their facility i have pictures on my um on my computer about it and share but uh bradley is the one that has kind of headed that up but we do need a new project just like when we're doing the project now uh when we start working at james and brown and pharaoh we're going to take the water tower from you know farah and replace the one at orchard park because it's newer and so we we try to do that and we try to store some of the things we'll take some of the air units off replace you know summit right now with some of the ones that are coming out of the other schools so these were just things that we
063got we've collected over the last couple of construction projects that we might have a use for you know you want one move in case but we up to four now so we we feel like we could let them have one and save the the city they're twelve thirteen hundred dollars probably and just for the public's knowledge um we have a procurement policy and uh it's very specific on how the school district gets rid of used equipment we can't just give it to someone or you know sell it on the side or anything like that so anytime we deviate from that code the school board has to approve it so we can't anyway that that's why this is coming up in board action because it would be a deviation from the normal way of us getting
064rid of unused equipment which would be through some type of public sale where people have an opportunity to bid on it and that type of thing so when we donate to a local non-profit the board has to approve that it's just being a good neighbor that's right all right do i have a motion that we donate um one's item of an air compressor to the walhalla fire department any more discussion more questions mr haley all right alan all right i'm sure you'll get that all right now we have a number of action items and i think probably um let's look at the first two together exhibit four and requirements policy um the additions that were there are right underneath where all the subjects and credit units were listed stating that keyboarding can no longer be
065substituted for one half credit of the computer science requirement and that is for incoming freshmen that began in the 1819 school year and then marching band although we don't offer it here in the school district of oconee county as a pe credit we did keep it on here because we could have a student that transfers in that has that as a pe credit the same information about keyboarding is also included on page two underneath adult education and then on page three the organization cognia was replaced for advanced dead so those are the only um changes on that policy and then on ikar are grading assessment systems some changes start on page four where we talk about reviewing students transcript along with other supporting evidence to make decisions on transcribing credits and then also on page
066five down under dual credit courses the changes that have taken place there kind of removes that articulation agreement that we've had to have in the past so students are able to have more options on where they would like to take courses and that is all of the changes on that policy all right did anyone have any questions and again this is the second reading for these policies all right if not then i will um would like a motion to approve and second reading policy ikf dash r graduation requirements and policy ik a dash our grading assessment system is there a motion madam chair i mean that we approve policy ikfr graduation requirements and policy ikar grading assessment systems second any more questions at all of those all right all in favor all right and our
067next um is approval as the second ruling on the um policy uh hac social studies education um week i asked that a part of that being changed and as you see on the second reading that we received tonight um there was a phrase that was removed and to adopt values necessary um i guess i would just like to clarify that i don't believe that as we stated last time that's this it still it doesn't say we don't teach right and wrong and we don't teach our our students the best that we can but again as we heard one tonight who was in favor of having it in there we equally heard another one that the values are to be taught by parents not by the schools that that's not part of what we teach so
068um you know there's kind of a split down to that but again i think this policy reads well because again it says we are to develop critical thinking and processing skills and help our students understand the importance of responsible social political and economic participation in a diverse and interdependent and changing world so i think that takes care of what our responsibilities as the school district are and um ms mccormack can i just jump in absolutely okay with that certainly uh mr larkin makes some valid points um i don't think anyone in this room would say that it's not a teacher's job to teach honesty integrity things like that that that kevin mentioned i think are important and i think we do need to teach those however in particular with social studies when you use the
069word political and attach value to it it's a lightning rod today and i don't think our teachers should be teaching political values and so if if we're talking about character traits yes you know we have the the poster in a lot of our elementary schools everything i needed to know i learned in kindergarten that talks about values we do need to teach those but i do think we need to be careful when it comes to a lot of things that are taught in the social studies classroom including politics governments different things like that we need to teach history but we don't want our teachers trying to sway students on either side of the american political spectrum that's really not something we should do in k-12 education um so i don't think that removing that word
070hurts this policy i don't think it handcuffs our social studies teachers so i agree with what you said 100 percent well at this point let's get it on the floor with a approval for second reading for paul the uh hac social studies education promotion did it be approved so move second okay does anybody else have any comments or anything they'd like to say about the way it was written all in favor i think it might be a really good idea at some point and i think for michael to to make that public statement you know not not just at a board meeting but representing the school district of oconee county i mean it makes sense if you think about it that way but if you don't if you think about just in one vein you
071can get sidetracked pretty easily absolutely well and when you put it in the light of actually social studies yeah yes are we wanting to teach our kids and i wrote down a handful here while we were watching the hike for hope values you know courage gratitude forgiveness compassion we want our children to learn these and adopt those and have those sorts of values but in social studies class that is where that is where i think this this is defined clearly is in social studies and our social studies teachers are still going to teach compassion and all of those that that are we would consider character traits that are kind of what's seen in america as as the character of its citizenry we're still going to teach that but because it's been such a lightning ride
072recently you know some people do see the definition of the word values expanding maybe beyond just those traditional character traits that 99 of americans would agree on and so again i i don't think the suggestion was outlined and i i'm comfortable with i have um definition here of values as a verb is to consider something to be important or beneficial opinion on welcome we will [Music] revise since it has been approved in second reading um then our final policy is called this policy as uh shared last time is an update there's some uh good in it um we will cut down the fire drill two a year one first semester uh one the first 10 days of school and the other in mega semester it maintains and we continue to follow the guidelines with the
073code red z was out of the school last week helping them do it we're doing them but just within the school talking about it showing the kids where they would go doing that kind of thing in the all semester we'll see what we want to do in in the spring but we will definitely meet our letter of the law there i've worked with our maintenance mainly richard alexander in that to work on this assessment piece that you're supposed to do every month where you go around and it's really going to be a combination of the facility specialists and some maintenance guys who will who will do that so it'll be falling under their job description but the rest of the things that we typically do anyway it's not going to change a tremendous amount as
074we move forward but we are happy that the fire drills can be cut down and we do the natural disaster drills just as as we typically would and what's required all right so do i have the notion that we've proven secondly cd safety twins and drills all in paper all right that is the last item on our agenda tonight and with that there are no objections executive session to consider personnel items employment recommendations and changes and also a legal update update regarding thank you all for being here good night uh