BoE Meeting on 12/13/2021

001[Music] good evening welcome to the regularly scheduled meeting of the jefferson county board of education on monday december 13th and if you'd please join me for the pledge [Applause] i pledge allegiance to the flag of the united states of america and to the republic for which it stands one nation under god indivisible with liberty and justice for all all right first on the agenda i see we have the architect concept plan for ransom and shepherdstown elementary schools mr randy jones first you're going to have miss joyce white how about that that works i'm going to set the stage for randy thank you um i just want to uh reiterate all the planning that's gone into this moment before we share the plans with you we've had a long and thorough planning process and i'm excited

002tonight to be able to show you all of the hard work foresight creativity and stakeholder input that has gone into the design phase of our new schools that we're going to share with you this evening the presentation of these plans is a culmination of several years work we began this process when the board had the foresight to purchase two properties with plenty of future growth and great building potential we then began the process of creating committees to develop short and long-term goals in our 10-year facilities plan otherwise known as our comprehensive educational facilities plan that process included stakeholder groups comprised of staff members parents and community members who provided valuable input into the needs of our current and future facilities tonight of which will be two new elementary schools thanks to the passage of a

003bond in november 2020. once we completed the process of the input for the cefp public hearings were held for further input we held a town hall meeting for the public to gather more ideas in 2020 and in november 2020 despite the pandemic hitting the community was gracious and supportive and passed a bond for forty three million seven hundred and thirty two thousand nine hundred seventy one dollars the voters said yes to the children of jefferson county and entrusted us with the completion of bond projects the planning process has continued we were one of eight counties that received school building authority funds to add to the funding of our two elementary schools over 30 counties applied for those school building authority funds the next step involved kicking off the official planning phase and during this phase

004we welcomed aboard an educational specification committee comprised of various staff stakeholders they provided valuable input into our new schools we then met with student groups at each school and incorporated some of their ideas into the new schools then we gathered input from our local school improvement councils tonight we're pleased to share the results of the planning phase with you our next phase we're going to enter is the design phase where we'll be doing some interior design and um with us throughout this process has been randy jones of vmm and bill shelton his civil engineer randy jones is the principal architect on the project his team have been with us every step of the way interacting with all stakeholder groups listening to what the staff and community want to see in our new schools so they've

005taken our vision and will now share the results with you through this partnership we will all work together to create a state-of-the-art elementary school at ransom and it's shepherdstown that will be the best schools in the state so without further ado i'll introduce randy jones and mr jones may i interrupt before you start for one moment please just as a reminder to everybody that we do have a mask mandate in the building and if you need a mask i believe dr gibson has some right here all right mr jones please continue thank you um it's great to be here tonight to share with you some uh conceptual plans that we've been developing for the new school i believe we have a powerpoint that will be coming up that will give you some insight into the

006planning that we've been doing as ms white said we've met with quite a few stakeholder groups and gotten a lot of really good input and we're really excited to bring these plans to you tonight for your first look there will be additional public meetings uh scheduled coming up so that we can share these plans further in more detail with the public our next step will be to submit these plans to the school building authority as our schematic design phase and that will happen this week following this board meeting i'm going to have bill shelton come up and show the uh the site plan it looks like harvard got cut off bills ask jason please scroll up scroll up okay thank you so we can go ahead and review the site plans real quick okay the

007site we're looking at here is in ransom and as we looked at this site it's a great piece of property a large piece of property with a lot of as ms white said a lot of area for future development we wanted to orient the school kind of as a first entrance into the property also leaving the rest of the of the property open for future for the future development the way the topography worked it was a great place to set the building and we're in in discussions with the transportation and utilities providers for the for the school getting things going next slide this is just a little bit of a closer look at what we have what we're trying to achieve is a separation of traffic pedestrian buses and parents basically trying to create a

008safe environment for for vehicles coming in and out a lot of stacking room for parents to drop off and pick up a walking trail around the outside we're working on connectivity with potential future developments in the area and trying to to encompass all of that into a all-around design for the school to keep kids safe and keep parents safe keep the traffic where it needs to be i'll move on yep oh and the next site we have is shepherdstown this property is also a nice large piece of property we tried to again situate the elementary school to allow for the future development providing some infrastructure with the roads roadway going through we always like to have multiple ways in and out of a site so that we don't get locked in if something happens at

009one entrance we have an alternate exit we can use next slide and again kind of the similar concept where we have the buses separated from the parent drop-off and faculty and staff areas keeps those a little bit separated just another note to point out are bus loops the way we design those those can be gated off during the day kids can get out there and they can use that as a track we try to maximize the efficiency and the site design and get the most that we can out of what space we have i also have walking trail there and can you just say which is that floating springs on the right and on the on the right hand side is shepherdstown pike yeah okay and the bottom is gardner the barnard was gardeners yes

010yeah it it got flipped on the on the blow up yeah so shepherdstown will be to the north of the site and the church is right right next door there next slide so we wanted to give each school a very individualized look the floor plans themselves are nearly identical ransom has some additional features that shepherdstown does not has a several spaces there is a a parent center with a conference room and a parent advisor office there's also some mental health services areas that are there so ransoms outside look is more of a uh has more of an arched barrel of barrel arch type roof this is actually the main entrance on the right and the gymnasium is on the left and next slide i think we're having a slight technical difficulty but uh this shows

011an overall view of the front of the building the way the building is laid out all of the common spaces are on the front of the building it's designed to where it can be used as a community center and then all the academic areas are towards the back and they can be locked off so the right hand side of the building can be used independently of the left-hand side of the building the academic wings can be closed off after hours on weekends the arts roof on the right is our dual stem lab and art room and those all have separate exterior entrances and outdoor classrooms as well the area on the left there of the glass wall is our dining room area and that is situated adjacent to the gymnasium and there's a stage in

012between so the stage can be utilized from either the gym side or from the cafeteria side next slide and then this just gives you a overall you can see as mr shelton was describing we had the bus loop on the right parent pick up and drop off on the left but we have many we have the main interest of school is right there in the center but students can also go directly into the cafeteria and they can also go directly into the gymnasium so there's multiple options for drop-off during the morning next slide as shepherdstown we have a different look it's a little bit more modern and streamlined this is a rendering of the front entrance next slide this gives you the look of the cafeteria on the left there's also outdoor dining area that

013is open to the off of the cafeteria next slide and then right here we have the main entrance into the school you can see the gymnasium is front and center to the right is the main entrance and to the left is the uh the cafeteria so same concept buses on the on the uh one side and cars on the other and then they have entrance into the either the gym the cafeteria or the main entrance next slide and then this gives you a view of the art room and the stem lab there are large on both ranson and shepherdstown and the stamina art rims we have large glass overhead doors that can open up during the nice nice weather and then go out into the outdoor classroom areas and students will have access to those

014we're trying to bring a lot of natural light into the building uh we've put a lot of effort into the front of the building the facades and then we're keeping the academic areas in the rear fairly simple and we may have one more i'm not sure that might be the last one so fortunately we didn't get our our floor plans didn't make it into the presentation but uh we will be getting those uh out and sharing those and we also will have some public uh meetings scheduled very soon or we can go into more depth with the floor plans it'd be very hard to read them anyway on the screen there's a lot of detail there and but i think that the overall concept is school is community center zone so it can be used

015in a lot of different ways and then during the normal school day we have access to the academic wings there's also another reason that we've zoned it in case there is for security reasons if there's an intruder situation the school will be zoned off in about five or six different ways to contain a person in one portion of the school so they can't just continue to go through the school so a lot of different uh functions a lot of different ideas went into that and i have to say the students that we may have met with really had some fantastic ideas and uh when we get into the interior portion of the design we'll be bringing some of those ideas to you so you can see those as well that's where the students really really

016shine with their imagination do you have any questions i can answer i have some questions um one of them had to do with safety i was wondering about any modern safety features that you mentioned something already so the schools will have uh secure entrances where they want to buzz in to into a secure waiting area and at that point there will be a transaction window where they'll be interacting with the school receptionist most likely during the day the parent the parents who are there to pick up their children will wait in that secure area they will not necessarily need to go into the administrative office areas and then students can come to them all exterior doors will have card reader access to to get into the buildings then we also have the zone features in

017the building where in an intruder situation doors will automatically close and will zone the building into separate secure areas so that students will be secure where they are all doors will have secure enhancement features on them for locking mechanisms and those sorts of things and you'll notice we had a lot of glass on the building but the glass is protected with a shatter film so that if you took a sledge hammer and you tried to break through the glass you could break the glass but you can't get through it okay kind of like almost like a windshield of car so those are just some of the features that we would uh incorporate um you mentioned shepherdstown part of the property could be used as a track you're not going to build a truck no we're

018talking about a walking track that uh it's kind of like a nature trail that we can utilize on the property um both schools will have the community center yes and why are they why do they have different looks and different each school want to have their own identity the floor plans are very very similar but each community has its own unique identity and they they wanted to try to showcase that what about the different features the extra meeting rooms at ransom why is that dr gibson do you want to address that a little bit there's needs specific to ransom that you might want to there in terms of the differences of the populations at the school uh ransom currently houses our largest population of students who need english as a second language they also are

019our school that has the highest level of poverty among our students so they often qualify for additional support services in terms of interventionists and parent resource supports so those have some additional areas built in because of the their title one status and the required services to be provided to them in terms of shepherdstown some of the spaces that we're looking at there are about community partnerships with shepherds university and we actually have a meeting tomorrow right tomorrow regarding um some opportunities for us to put in a um a very uh innovative preschool room that will have some features that that folks are excited about for us to train new teachers with so they each sort of have their own characteristics we tried to be mindful of not just building a cookie cutter box and forcing

020children into it but really listening to the ed spec teacher committees at both schools talking about what they needed thank you two more i don't know if you have just in the architecture do anything related to the air quality or is that a separate yeah as part of the uh once we get further into the detailed design our mechanical engineer will actually meet with mr caton and some of the school staff and we will look at the types of mechanical systems types of air purification systems that we can incorporate into the into the school whether it's uv filters that can be put into the mechanical system there's also several other mechanisms that we can look at to improve the overall indoor air quality because my last question is the capacity for each school of securities

021yes great question so the schools are designed currently for 450 students but the core areas the media center and the cafeteria the gym common areas are designed for 600 students so we have the ability to add an additional six classrooms to increase capacity to 600. you can add six classrooms yes there's space and you can divide it up later yeah we have it we have it planned uh if i had the floor plans and i apologize for that uh i would show you where the future editions are anticipated so have you provided a timeline maybe it's on the website sure so the overall timeline is we make our sba submission this week for the schematic design in february we make it what's called a design development submission to the sba and then in may we

022make our final submission which is uh final construction documents once we've been approved by the sba each one of these steps and we achieve the final step which is the final drawing specifications we get permission to advertise projects for bids so we anticipate advertising the projects in may early june and then hopefully have construction begin in august and then it usually is about 12 to 14 months for to construct a building of this size but right now everything is up in the air with covid and supply chain problems and material shortages so that may get stretched out a little bit thank you that's all my questions you all have any other questions thank you very much it's interesting how the shepherdstown building looks like a combination of visit um caperton's house and the yellow brick

023bank together and there you go thank you so but thank you very much bird you're very well not just doing the drawings but taking the time to meet with all of the stakeholders from that's the best part of the job the kids to the teachers to the community i know that's a time-consuming process but it's appreciated so thank you absolutely all right next we have a steam presentation part of the bond projects support our instructional goals one such project is the steam labs each new school will have a steam lab shepherdstown will have us one steam lab it has an outdoor space and ranson because it is centrally located will have two spaces one steam lab will be for use for ransom elementary and the other steam lab will be designed for elementary schools to

024be able to be bussed to the location so that they're able to participate in the steam lab as well so in thinking that out maryland shared an idea with me several months ago for an instructional method to assist teachers in a court for incorporating steam lessons into their teaching it's a level program that are progressive and the idea incorporates kits we want teachers to get started with it now so the concept is they can check in and out kits and they'll eventually be home to ransom elementary in that lab that will be designed to move on for the other elementary schools so we're starting something now and as mary will explain it will continue on so she's designed the kits and she'll provide training to the teachers and i'll let her explain a little bit

025about it this evening hi everybody i'm mary lind i am your pre-k tattoo coordinator here at the jefferson county board of ed so i'm just going to talk to you a little bit about steam steam is science technology engineering the arts and math and i'm so excited that we're going to have this opportunity to provide this for our jefferson county students so if jason could pull up the timeline for our steam timeline go to the next slide please so this is all going to begin in january and how's it going to look is we're going to be bringing in teachers from our classrooms to help create the lessons and the curriculum in the steam bins so in january of next year we'll be doing the postings and we'll be giving this opportunity to teachers to

026work with me in creating the lessons for the steam bins um also in january we're going to be passing out surveys to all the teachers that is going to be collecting data on how well do they feel they are covering their science standards we are going to be then using that data to help drive our instruction in terms of creating the lesson so we're going to be using what do the teachers feel like they need in their classrooms we're also going to be looking at the gsa data and looking at any gaps in math as well as to see what kind of standards do we really need to hone in on in these lessons so february that's the data compilation that i just talked about and then in march and july we're going to be

027having these teachers approximately six teachers from on the elementary schools and we're going to be meeting for a few hours a month while they're going to be working at home virtually with their partner creating original curriculum and what's so important about steem is that we really do not know what what lies ahead for our students in five years ten years or even in two years as we know from the last couple years that we've been in education but what we do know is that the skills that employers are looking for are those soft skills like can the students communicate can they adapt can they persevere can they problem solve are they creative and the steam lessons that we're going to be creating will be uh uh that those are the kind of opportunities that our

028students are going to be having with those kids as well as the academics and the technology piece that comes with steam so the cr lessons will be created we'll be ordering the materials teachers are going to be getting like tupperware bins with everything that they need inside to have a successful lesson then those kids can go back to ranting be checked out again refilled with any of the consumables and brought back out to the schools and then we're hoping that upon the success of this program that we can make a new steam team next january create new lessons that build on this year's lessons until the steam room is built and then we can start doing pd for teachers and bringing students into the steam room at ransom that's the um the quick version of

029the steam project so please any questions i have some questions definitely are these kits they're only for pre-k through second grade students they're for a pre-k to five they'll be for all elementary i am the pre-k to coordinator though that's my title so you're overseeing the three through five also well uh tara mahoney will be working with me as well um so what's an example of something that's in a kit oh oh i i would have brought something with you and we could have done a steam lesson so here's an example i did a really great lesson with ranson elementary and if jason goes back to the um original slide cover you will see a picture yes that right there this is a picture of a student at ransom last year this was an original

030lesson that i created using a really good picture book about frank lloyd wright who's an architect and it's about his house called falling water up in pennsylvania so the lesson um was all about cantilevers and so the lesson was very scaffolded where we just started off with a paint stick which is an inexpensive object and the kids were able to see how far off the yardstick uh the pizza could go before it fell so then we talked about the counterbalance which is the process of the cantilevers and they use washers to secure the paint stick then they were able to build their their cantilevers out from the table and that is exactly what frank lloyd wright used in his home in falling waters so that would be an example of a steam lesson where kids

031are working together they're collaborating they're partnering they're faced with just enough challenge that they have to think about it but yet they still can be successful and that's what miss white was saying was that the the lessons will be leveled we do not want to give a lesson to a kid where they face frustration immediately and give up we want to build confidence and to have it have success in the classroom um you mentioned gsa data and gaps in math right what is gsa so the gsa is the general summative assessment that we give our students in the spring so we'll look at that data to see uh where in math are the students seem to be having some difficulties though well that test is given to three to five anything else i'm really excited

032about it and i hope to come back and show you lots of great um evidence of the steam bins thank you very much miss linda i just want to know that we appreciate the fact that you know you're not waiting for the last to be built that you're moving forward with the actual lessons before the labs are built so thanks for thinking outside the box on that one and just moving forward with it and then once the labs are built you know increasing it but not waiting for the building to be built right thank you very much curriculum is my passion like i know that's my title but writing and developing curriculum for children and teachers is truly my passion so i hope it gets conveyed in this project it shows thank you thank you

033very much all right the deputy superintendent for instructional support update good evening everyone good evening i'd like to thank mary also she's a very very innovative creative mind that i'm glad she's the one who's behind these kits because i know they'll be done right and with a lot of thought so i appreciate all of her work i have a brief presentation for you tonight i told you last time that we would be bringing some data to you little by little tonight we would like to present to you some pre-k data and as you on the agenda it says boy that's beginning of the year so each year when pre-k students enroll in jefferson county schools we give them what's called an e-l-r-s assessment and mary's going to explain a little bit about what that means

034and then and we wanted to share that data with you and also data from previous years so for comparison sake so i'll turn it over to mary and let her speak a little bit come don't come on back up mary he said don't sit down hi everybody i'm mary lynn i'm the pre-k to court now i'm just joking okay so the ers we're throwing around lots of uh acronyms or initials tonight ers is the early learning reporting scale for pre-k we give this to every student that comes in um this is a graph that shows the beginning of the year data since 2015 the last six years just for reference the very first uh bar graph that says 2015 2016 those kids are in sixth grade this year so as you can see um our

035kids are coming into our school system uh knowing a lot less than they did in years past so i'm gonna break this down a little bit more for you so if you look at the graph we have language manipulation that's how kids hear and produce sounds to put it simply alphabetical awareness that's what do they know about the letters of the alphabet and sounds print knowledge that's things is as easy as can they hold the book the correct way can they turn the pages left to right and then production where are these kids in early writing stages are they writing from left to right are they using letters as symbols things like that so it's kind of generic what we test in the beginning it's all about their readiness for reading and writing in school

036and as you can see they have definitely gone down since uh 2015. and so that that's a little shocking but now we're gonna talk about what is my department and what am i doing about this information so i'm just going to outline a few of the projects that um i am working on with cni so every month pre-k has a parent workshop that i invite all pre-k families to in its own zoom and it's interactive and we play games but it's also to equip families with tools that they need to help their pre-k student be successful so and every month is uh built around a theme so it could be fine motor skills or it could be the uh the power of a read aloud or we've even done steam we've had guest speakers we've

037um we play i said we play games it's a lot of fun and it's only a half an hour and we invite every family that's in pre-k in jefferson county to this um pre-k family night um plus the every kid that attends gets a free book as well as an educational toy or a puzzle or something that has to do with the theme so for instance last month we did why cooking is good with pre-k kids and all the kids got an apron and a cookbook and measuring spoons and measuring cups and this month we're doing nursery rhymes and we're really excited about that because we're going to get a book about nursery rhymes and probably a puppet so that's one of the things that my cni department is doing we are also partnering with

038the june harless uh center at marshall university with imagination library and we have a ten thousand dollar gift from ball over library so that every child under five in jefferson county can get a book every month through imagination library with this with um funded by founded by dolly parton also to fill in the gaps in cater to we purchased hegarty phonemic awareness for all cater to teachers um and that just helps um the teachers address some of the things that the kids might have been missed might have missed in their um more formative years of k uh birthday sorry we've also partnered with the special education department um our goal is to have every cater to teacher uh trained in art and gillingham so that they are very proficient in teaching reading to our youngest

039guys we created a district literacy team last year and we've that was with coaches and lots of teachers and interventionists and we spent a whole year just researching what is the most current um research in reading so what else is next my focus is birth to four because that is what you saw on the graph those are the kids that are coming into pre-k so one of my next projects is to create bags for new moms and dads in the hospital with some educational literature but also to take that parent workshop and do it for parents of toddlers and do something i think i might call it toddler toddler days where any parent in jefferson county that has toddlers can come and it would be like a workshop model where we can provide some education

040and tools for those parents to um help edu to help with uh with their kids before school and i think that's about it so i'm sure there's some questions about that graph yes do all kids in the children in the county have equal access to pre-k yes and there's it's universal pre-k and it's in every elementary school no no we do not have a pre-k and every elementary school where um where are they located the preschool sure sure so we have two head starts and a pre-k and also a pre-k at blue ridge elementary we have um a pre-k at paige jackson we have a head start pre-k um at south jefferson we have uh two pre-k at ta lowry and four at the the little building beside ta lowry which are the head start

041building we have two head starts at drizzwood and two pre-k's at drizzwood we have two pre-k's at north jefferson and i think that's it so nothing at chapman's town no nothing is shepherdstown currently we have we have two i'm partners with shepherdstown daycare and children first daycare and shepherdstown daycare is in shepherdstown but it's not at elementary school um so they come as a third or four-year-old is that they have to be four by july first unless they have um some special needs uh and then they could come as a three-year-old and then they're tested yeah yes they're assessed what's that they're assessed yes uh-huh and then so they're they've been given this same test every year is this the same test this is the same test that's given to every pre-k student yes so

042it's the same test year after year then they these ch and i missed this part miss joy uh dr joy i'm sorry um they are assessed four times on the el rs throughout the year so we can track their uh progress but it's been the same test yes since i think since 2011 um so this is the average across the county for the scores these the data that you're looking at for the last graph was from 286 pre-k students and to put that into perspective we have 527 kindergartners this year so about half of our kindergarten population attends our jefferson county pre-k so like in 2015 how many preschoolers were tested then you know i i didn't i didn't dig that deep on that i didn't that's hard to evaluate these graphs without some basic

043information you know about the number that's a good point i can get that to you um i and i was wondering do you evaluate for socio-economic level do you find that students in a certain school district a certain socio-economic level are have a lower average um or do your do you not you know i have not picked apart the data that much yet yeah again it's hard to uh interpret it without knowing some of that but it's you know whether or not uh what type of social or economic uh situation they're in it's evident that the kids are coming in not knowing as much as they did in 2015. so but so my point of this presentation is to show you guys that we are working very hard to help the families of jefferson county

044because the last couple years have been really hard and we need to do everything we can to help um especially the parents of these young kids because we know that's the most important time in these uh these guys lives mary i have a question oh sure how are you i'm fine thank you uh the parent workshop is via zoom yes that appears it would probably target kids that aren't necessarily our most needy kits because probably our most needy kids don't have access to zoom nor laptops i would like for you to try to figure out a way for us to reach those additional kids that are most needy kids i agree you know i think that is a wonderful point and this was a product of covid you know because it's it's part of our

045pre-k policy that we have parent education evenings so this came about from us not being able to have live events but i think that that is such a good point and i agree with you 100 because i would love to see um all of the families uh participate i'd like it to be such a problem that i wouldn't even know where to host it that's why the data is helpful if you could just separate the data of you know what's pulling these numbers down you have a high a high rate of uh lower performing and it could be that that group is just so much performing that much lower without really you know looking at the data more closely it's hard to use it yeah i could definitely um what's that fancy word just aggregate

046yep thank you i have a question for you these are the baselines so this is when they first come in exactly and you said you did four assessments throughout the year so at the end of the year are they kind of all on the same level have they all caught up to each other or are we still in a downward spiral um that'll be that'll be interesting um i've i'm not going to hide behind the fact that i haven't been in this position very long but i haven't been in this position very long so this is going to be like the first real year that we're going to actually going to be able to see um i think accurate data with the ers okay i don't know if that answered your question it did thank

047you thank you hey thank you guys [Music] the next section is up just to give you a preview of what's coming each year we adopt instructional materials this year we'll be adopting two separate instructional materials first for ela the curriculum instruction department along with you'll see what's called the irrc which is the instructional resource review committee they have been working on reviewing materials and will have a recommendation to the board on january 12th they've been following a timeline which includes meeting with vendors hearing presentations teachers that are part of the committee going back to their school and also reviewing what they have heard and learned from the vendors and then having great discussions at the school about what's most appropriate and what the recommendation should be so uh in the next few weeks actually at

048our next board meeting in january january 10th there will be a group of people made up of that irrc that will be in front of you making a recommendation for ela which is english language arts adoption for this year secondly i wanted to mention that at the same time in january we'll be hiring our science adoption committee which will be the same format we'll have teachers from each school that will get together review materials hear presentations from vendors and then meet with their teachers at their schools and then finally make recommendation to the department and finally to the board of education so we have two two separate adoptions going on this year the first one will come to you in january the second one should be in april i would anticipate at this point so

049i want to thank all the teachers that have been so gracious in volunteering and and mary tara all the coordinators in the department of instruction who've been leading those groups so just to give you a brief um idea of the procedures i referenced some of these but first thing is that teachers express interest in being part of this committee so then they're hired by the board of education and then that same committee reviews materials and shares them with their teachers at their school the committee also ensures materials are shared with all the teachers in their in the district in their school not just not just some of them or grade level teachers that includes all teachers then the schools will vote on the options that are presented that that vote will come back to the

050irrc and that is how the decision is made it is a teacher-driven committee we know that our teachers are the experts and we rely on them to make the decisions with with our guidance so once that committee makes a recommendation it is brought before you following that there is a period of time when the public can review inspect materials and make comments on those materials and then finally we bring it back to the board for your approval and finally the last step is to send it on to the department of west virginia department of education so my point tonight is just to kind of let you know what is coming your way and uh at the next meeting in january we will have that irrc coming to you for the english language arts adoption so

051are there any particular questions about that okay thank you for your time next we have approval of the minutes is there a motion to approve the minutes from the regular board meeting held november 29 2021 thank you mr osmour is there a second thank you mr cable any discussion or questions i was just wondering if that was corrected yes oh okay all right all in favor of approving the minutes of the regular board meeting from november 29th say aye oppose thank you all right citizens comments [Applause] just a reminder that speakers are limited to three minutes and i'll set a timer speakers are prohibited from making negative or derogatory comments using a name or position by which an individual can be identified comments may not be threatening profane vulgar or abusive where the speaker will

052be required to see his or her comments so please just follow the rules and be kind first up we have judy york on zoom and following miss york is karen buck i go hi i'm judy york in fifth grade our son was invited here to be recognized by the school board in a feat that surprised us he had won his school's geography bee and that's pretty great we spent the entire week exploring west virginia on our way to concord university for the state competition it was a wonderful experience made more special by the invitation by the board and he dressed up and the whole family came and we took pictures and i thought about him at the last meeting when i saw the students and their presentation sharing where their ancestors came from and the

053memories of the grandmother's cooking the work they put in to plan and prepare the excitement and nerves they must have pressed through to present in front of the board the superintendent and the camera and it seemed like a great learning experience then later in the meeting i was disappointed to hear a speaker during citizen comments disrespect and ridicule their efforts suggesting they've been used as props in a board meeting i asked this in the last meeting and i'm asking again today for community members to stop using this platform to disrespect and make fun of kids it's not okay on the playground and it's not okay here we can't forget that our education exists to serve our students to equip them with the tools to listen and learn about our collective history and build a better

054future i first heard of critical race theory here at a board meeting to learn more last month i attended a discussion my pastor recommended hosted by the union presbyterian seminary you can find this on youtube one of the speakers was a lawyer who studied under john calmore who was a founder of the theory she explained critical race theory is one of a handful of critical legal theories that are taught only in law school continuing to man to demand that we don't teach crt in our k-12 schools is similar to asking that we don't teach brain surgery our public schools don't teach brain surgery because we're not medical schools and we don't teach crt or any critical legal theories because they're not law schools so i was happy to see in the last meeting the conversation

055shifted a natural lesson plan of concern was brought before the board and the video was part of a high school lesson plan about the global uproar around george floyd's death and his connection to systemic racism is not critical race theory systemic racism is an appropriate topic for high school students dr martin luther king jr specifically sought to dismantle systemic racism and despite all the progress we've made as a country pockets of systemic racism as a lesson explained still exists today that's why i'm grateful these lessons and their connection to current events are part of our curriculum and my children are part of that if we're committed as a community to realizing dr king's dream that we need to learn to collectively reflect be open to others perspectives and help each other notice racism what is

056occurring just as this lesson teaches thank you thank you next up is karen buck followed by chelsea giardina i'm karen buck on wednesday december the 1st this board of education received two freedom of information act requests from me they were sent via certified mail and they were signed for by a school person here are the receipts for the west virginia freedom of information act we have they have five days to respond it's now been eight days okay uh the information was due last wednesday ignoring a foia is a misdemeanor and the penalty is a fine of a hundred dollars to 500 or jail for 10 days or both the first foia was for a copy of the 20 uh taxpayer money check that we gave to the health department the second foia was for copies

057of surety bonds for elected board officials or high-ranking school officials surety bonds are insurance policy documents that protect us and pertain to school officials performance and honesty in office or those employed by the school just like any insurance the injured party can file a claim against the surety bond even if the injured party is 5 000 parents and taxpayers each filing a separate claim citing child abuse child abuse in the form of masking and other overreaching policies by this board and high-ranking school officials and they all took an oath that looks like this there's their oath after reading the west virginia code today i discovered that the surety bonds and the oaths of office were all recorded at the courthouse so i didn't even need that extra foia request i found the surety bond at

058the courthouse and it covers two people and here it is the western surety company the foia information that i requested could be used in a court of law to convince this board to listen to the majority of parents about the massive government overreach by this board which explains why i did not get the information but more importantly i contacted the western surety company and i asked how do i file a claim well i spoke i contacted mr t.w smith in minnesota and he's going to yeah t.w smith in minnesota he'll get back to me regarding this i have gotten no less than four emails from these people today from the western surety company they're very curious as to what the heck is going on in jefferson county now how do you stop the madness how

059do you stop this madness expedite immediately and in all four requests that were sent to you number two start listening to the majority parents thank you ma'am and number three end the mask mandate tonight vote on it tonight [Applause] is that was amazing first off i'm chelsea jardina i'm a parent of a six-year-old in first grade in jefferson county the last time i was physically in this building i was standing up for parents being able to have the choice to send their kids to school or not luckily the schools opened back up shortly after because y'all decided to listen that day to what the parents had to say after three months of the students not going to school it is apparent that this school board has chosen to not give us parents a choice in

060another strong manner which is the mass mandate after quietly and sneakily voting on an indefinite mass mandate in the end of october without announcing the decision or the meaning itself to anyone a june 2021 study published on jama pediatrics showed that when kids wear face pass the dead space volume of the mask collects exhaled carbon dioxide this mixes with fresh air and elevates the carbon dioxide content of inhaled air under the mask in jefferson county they have been there have been multiple cases of cases of students where children have fainted because of being overheated and unable to breathe with that mask on my daughter has expressed her frustration to me on multiple occasions saying i don't like them they make me hot and i can't see what my friends or teacher look like anymore i

061can't see what my teacher is saying when she's teaching me how to say words because her mask is covering her mouth when she is trying to help me sound it out during a media briefing west virginia governor gem justice made it clear that the mass mandate will be up to the people of west virginia but before he said that he said i can't mandate mask and i don't see a reason to mandate mask if our very own governor thinks it should be up to the people not just the school boards but the mass mandates how does the governor not have the power and authority and willingness to enable a mass mandate but our school board does have the power i personally don't understand that much like the flu and colds covered will be around forever

062when are we going to stop making our kids live in fear when are we going to allow the parents who have been raising our children all the all of their lives to have the choice if we want to send our children with masks or not i would like to also point out everyone in this room wearing a mask is either red in the face or sweating we've been here an hour imagine eight hours of this for our kids [Music] so have you put any thought into that no this is for our kids please you know finally do something right for our kids yes so i guarantee you that you haven't heard the last of us we will never stop fighting for our children [Applause] next up is jennifer krause followed by jennifer vigil and please

063be respectful of the person that's speaking and not interrupt them while they're speaking well they're fine my name is jennifer krauss been here many times before i'm the parent of five children three in jefferson county schools there have been 112 days since your useless mask mandate and today because i always share the current information with you since the beginning of covid deaths in jefferson county and people under age 51 0 why do you continue to count the number of cases when it isn't the number of cases that matter this virus is mutating and this virus is getting weaker follow the science when will this end where's dr reedy that's what i'd like to know hiding behind some zoom call all right some of you here might need to uh get your fire extinguisher ready try

064not to burst into flames because i'm about to quote the bible to timothy for god hath not given us the spirit of fear but of a sound mind it is past time to stop spreading your fear and have the courage to return to normal you must listen to the parents of these children thank you [Applause] next up is jennifer vigil followed by sarah tour tori good evening tonight i come to you as a parent of three children that all attend jefferson county schools as a parent i'm highly disappointed in this board and our school system we have children of ages three and up that are masked every day they come to school these children are only wearing masks at school they aren't wearing them in activities outside of school or during their own time if

065they're messed up it's because their parents made that choice for them on thursday december 9th our very own person over here to my left spoke in front of the board and took her mask off just this saturday december 11th at around 9 00 a.m i saw one of our very own board of education members at walmart without a mask on recently a principal at a local elementary school took off her mask and read to the class for over 15 minutes i've seen pictures videos and have watched principals take off their masking classrooms school gatherings and other events i'm so glad to see that they have a choice they can make that choice for themselves or their families they have a choice our children do not have a choice you have made that choice for them

066you have ripped away a parent's choice and rights for the children do you truly understand the mental impact you are choosing for these children you have made the choice to instill fear into them and you have made the choice to allow students to know their parents do not have a choice you have made the choice to mentally and physically harm our children each and every day i can spend my three minutes providing you with the facts but in reality you haven't listened or done your own research to begin with you are doing what your choice is not what is best for everyone this has become a personal matter for each and every one of you as we have been in school since august i can't begin to tell you how many inconsistencies this county has

067allowed based on coveted protocols i've been told each and every case is different however that's not so covid is coveted the lack of inconsistencies lack of knowledge and the fear that has been provided to our children teachers and families is unbelievable the public health advisor for jefferson county health department is unable to provide official documentation on why he feels he has medical rights to our children and can impose such a mandate of mass for our children he also put some students in isolation which is for the infected others in quarantine for the exposed and some in both if he's providing the directive for our children how come he's not being consistent how come he's not following the jefferson county pandemic protocols how come we as parents have not had to sign off on the fact

068that he's our children's medical provider but he isn't i stand here tonight and ask that this board puts a motion on the floor to discuss the mask mandate and to remove it i ask that the board thinks about the mental and physical mandates and aspects you are internally given to our children let the parents of the children make the choice what they feel is best let the parents be the parents and the board of education be the educators as i saw a recent quote taking things away from people until they say yes is not a choice i'll leave you with this a medical degree is required to practice medicine a mask is a medical device by definition if the person issuing a mandate is not on an individual's personal doctor and not a doctor at

069all they're committing a felony of practicing without a medical license [Applause] sarah followed by atticus tori good evening my name is sarah torrey i'm a mother of three boys who attend school in jefferson county i'm a licensed teacher with a degree in education and a master's degree in special education and i'm passionate about the well-being of children i want to speak tonight about the negative effects of masking our children it's okay a quick google search will tell you that the most important thing for children in schools is to feel safe a mask is a representation of fear masks are scary we are you cannot teach children who are in fear fear and safety cannot co-exist fear is a roadblock for learning masks are causing our children physical pain headaches ear discomfort my son look at

070his ear right now and skin irritations studies show that masking actually lowers the immune system masks make it difficult to hear what a teacher is saying what peers are saying studies show that children need to hear things seven times before they learn something those are studies without masks unmask our children so they can hear masks block human connection human connection is the exchange of positive energy between people scientific evidence strongly suggests that human connection is a core psychological need that is essential to a happy life human connection lowers anxiety and depression it helps us regulate our emotions and builds trust children spend roughly 40 hours a week at school feeling no human connection because of the mask unmask our children so they can feel human connection when i met my basketball players for the last

071time last weekend i forgot to mention that i'm a i volunteer in the community as a basketball coach they were all masked i couldn't hear their names i tried to facilitate them introducing each ot to one another they couldn't hear each other saying their names i didn't know who was scared i didn't know who needed an extra pat on the back because they were nervous about their first day the parents dropped them off they had to go out to the car it was absolutely heartbreaking being a teacher is arguably the most important job of all let's not make it more difficult by requiring face coverings please please please consider making masks optional in jefferson county public schools please allow each parent to decide what is best for their [Applause] story child by jody karan hi

072my name is attitus torre and i'm a fourth grader at cw shipley elementary school i'm speaking tonight because i don't want to wear a mask at school anymore i don't i don't like masks because i can't breathe in them when i have one on sometimes i even feel dizzy i make my masks often give me headaches and i can't think straight did i get behind on my schoolwork sometimes i can't hear the teacher and i know she said something important she has to repeat herself a lot and it wastes time i have trouble hearing my friends in class too sometimes i have trouble telling my friends apart because masks cover their faces i would love it if i didn't have to wear a mask anymore my friends feel the same way i know because they

073told me i'm not afraid of getting covered and if i do oh i will work first and thanks for listening [Applause] you need to get it together that's what you start listening to absolutely okay tonight's lesson is again in language arts similar to poetry is writing a motto can you guess what these two simple mottos are for it's a fill in the blank let's get started relationships before blank grace before blank patience before blank and love before blank you'd probably guess it was a church model or for a hallmark movie or maybe the pledge angels take to get their wings nope i'll fill in the blanks relationships before rigor grace before grades patients before programs and love before lessons and it is a motto of the jcea's website which i assume is the local teachers

074union though they never return my email it's no wonder our kids aren't learning anything fluffy feelings prioritized over academics here's another motto to fill in the blanks all the data in the world cannot accurately measure the love and heartbreak that goes into a single day of blank children whose needs go so far beyond blank i'm going to go with parenting in the blanks no teaching all the data in the world cannot accurately measure the love and heartbreak that goes into a single day of teaching children whose needs go far beyond the curriculum no that's not your job parenting is the correct answer here and the curriculum curriculum is your job period you'd serve your teachers better and maybe be able to keep them if you just let them teach teach lessons that can be graded

075we learn more and become stronger when we can see our progress instead teachers unions seem to think they're better parents than parents this attitude is called the soft bigotry of low expectations it is used by bigots against races cultures or any people groups such as parents who they think can't make it on their own schools genuinely think they need to help parents that is bigoted it could even be called a school supremacist attitude parents don't need the school to do anything but teach skills parents do the rest physical emotional social and spiritual health period the more schools try the more confused our kids become our next language arts topic is some new and quite overused vocabulary words such as the new popular word misinformation this word has replaced the former more tolerant word of opinion

076we all have different opinions that's why we say it's always good to get a second opinion even though doctors all view the same science and medical data they can have differing perspectives on the same data economists politicians have different opinions and even lowly parents can voice differing opinions and we used to still stay friends the intolerant bigots who overuse the word misinformation instead of opinions have removed the civility out of our schools and communities for instance one parents use the word mis information instead of opinion to suggest that gender confused students are the most vulnerable to bullying i believe that parents of say autistic children might have a differing opinion or learning disabled or fat kids or kids with glasses or kids that aren't good in sports or nerds and onychos and if this parent

077believes it's truly harder for trans kids then shame on her for waiting until it became a fad to speak up next time we may address the surprising history of the vocabulary word teenager [Music] [Applause] thank you next up we have the consent agenda yes ma'am there are a couple of corrections on here um first and foremost i will point out uh number one with a change in start date that overjoys me and i'll talk a little bit more about number three with a change in retirement date uh number six a a um typographical error that's not cw shipley that's charlestown middle school and number 22 with a change in appointment date so first and foremost uh the thing that i would like to uh announce with the board and with the public is that uh

078tonight we will be making i will be making a recommendation to the board for a new chief financial officer we now have concluded an eight month search with multiple committees to find someone who met our high standards as you know when we hire someone in jefferson we require that the entire committee uh unanimously elect them so that they know that they have everyone's support and we know that we have the best possible staff so with that i would like to introduce miss katherine russell who we are recommending for our new chief financial officer i see that your husband and your child needed to go outside for their own benefit um yeah there you go so um certainly miss russell if you could say a few words to the board miss russell if you come to

079the podium good evening and thank you for having me i'm um catherine russell and i'm so excited to be here i'm looking forward to this next chapter in my career um and i'm looking forward to working with everybody very closely getting to know you as board members and the community as well welcome thank you thank you mr russell comes to us with uh more than six years as the chief financial officer fiscal manager she has a bs in business and an mba from shenandoah university so she's had quite a strong history and we are very very excited to welcome her on board thank you any questions about the consent agenda is there a motion to approve the amended consent agenda for the changes that dr gibson suggested thank you mr cable is there a second

080thank you mr osborne any questions or discussion i have some questions um i i noticed there was a position advertised for social media and i was wondering when we approved that i mean have we approved that position so i'm not sure which position that you're referring to ma'am but if you're referring to the retention position that utilizes social media and other platforms for us to be able to get additional staff here that was on the retention and recruitment plan that the board approved yesterday now the board approved the concept but we haven't we didn't approve the job description or anything so i was just really surprised to see that it i mean it was just an idea so it just really took me aback because we still have a shortage of subs and i just

081you know the permanent sub question that i asked last at the last meeting i just wonder where they are where are these permanent subs and i just i haven't seen them listed are we advertising for them wait is that on tonight's consent agenda the question that you're asking well i feel like i feel like it's related because i noticed that there's um like permanent sub positions for various things but not teachers just are you talking about posted positions where are you talking about the consent agenda because the consent agenda is what's on the table right now right just about you know i just want to make sure there's no new positions created so i i guess i think pretty sure the administrative assistant that's just somebody is taking over because somebody left correct correct number

08222. yes ma'am okay any other questions about the consent agenda um i think that was the only thing yep that's all i have all right so there's a motion on the table to approve the amended consent agenda per dr gibson's changes all in favor say aye all right bye oppose thank you all right moving on to unfinished business we have the retention and recruitment update with possible action to be taken uh yes ma'am uh i wanted to give the board a very brief update on our implementation of the tier one items and the recruitment and retention plan and um approach the board for an additional action for teachers um so number one as noted we have advertised for substitute support for all the schools a permanent substitute teacher and permanent substitute aide in all of

083those to date i believe we've hired seven uh correctness if i'm wrong with lauren in order to help support additional subs in our schools um we have completed all the teacher mentorship assignments we have completed the payment of employment qualification costs for coaches and are in the process of doing the same for certified long-term subs they simply operate on a different schedule so we've had to work through finance with the timing on that the career service ladder has been created all of the process and documentation around that distributed to individuals met with the service senate and have applications in tow terms of the allocation of student materials for service personnel that allocation has been completed out to all of the schools we've met with the service senate and they have all um began the documentation

084process and the meeting to procure those materials for students the referral bonus is slated to begin in january based on our financing our priority ones with july implementations the master staff badging we have a number of committees principals faculty senate service senate and teachers each reviewing different badging systems and meeting with us to convey what content they want in those training staff development it's important that it's relevant to them rather than us just deciding for them the bus driver equity plan the bus drivers have met and we have developed bus driver one two and three job descriptions and are matching those up with our peers and looking to the state department to make sure that we have some equity in that area and that the job descriptions that we come up with are accurate um

085expanded preparation schedule you will note that we have placed that day in next year's calendar that we are asking to go out for approval by the public um so all of these are things that we have done and developed of that first tier of items one of the things that we would like the board to consider in addition right now because of as you saw with the preschool the incredible level of need among our students we are asking our teaching staff to take on many duties above and beyond their contract in terms of intervention in terms of professional development in terms of working with children outside of school hours to help them be successful during these difficult times so i recently polled all the eight counties in our eastern panhandle instructional cooperative and in those

086counties the pay rate per hour for teachers who do this work outside of their contract hardy thirty dollars per hour mineral forty dollars per hour pendleton 25 per hour hampshire 30 per hour morgan 25 dollars per hour berkeley 35 dollars per hour grant 40 per hour unless it's summer school and then it's 30 dollars per hour right now jefferson county sits at twenty dollars per hour we have the lowest um pay rate per hour for teachers outside of their contract of any of the eight surrounding counties so i come tonight to ask the board um to consider raising that rate to forty dollars per hour um a couple of caveats to be aware of um first and foremost this does not apply to service personnel because legally it cannot apply to service personnel under flsa

087they must be paid their hourly rate uh number two it does not apply to teachers who teach a class during their planning under west virginia code that must be 1 7 of their daily pay rate we can add something into an addition to that but we can't leave that formula and place put something in its place and finally um ticket takers uh that for whatever reason in west virginia code that rate is twenty dollars per hour regardless of whether it's service or professional personnel so those things would not be affected by a change in rate but all of the other work that we ask teachers to uh perform outside of hours for pay would be affected so with that i'll take some questions yes ma'am so so then who would get this i mean what

088is this teachers that are just teaching after school is that what that's for some of them yes ma'am some of them there uh it would be their writing curriculum they're coming like the folks who are creating this the steam kits who were paying to write curriculum outside of school hours ones who are running after school intervention programs are teachers who are teaching our three through five alternative education programs so there are a number of folks who complete work for us outside of their regular contract hours so um what can you give those people who are subbing during their planning time because i know that some of these schools are feel burdened by that and you know teachers that refuse to do it are being retaliated against pressured so it sounds like it's a serious problem

089i mean you said there's something else you could do for them what i stated is in west virginia code we must provide them with one seventh of their pay based on them utilizing their planning to teach that is a requirement if the board would like to set some um addition above and beyond that what we can't do is replace that with a 40 an hour pay rate does that make sense well what could the board do um you're the board if you wanted to um set a an additional um pay for any teacher teaching deer and their planting above and beyond the one seventh you have the capacity to do that as a board i thought you said we didn't have the capacity no ma'am what you don't have the capacity to do is to

090replace forty dollars an hour to replace one seventh with forty dollars an hour okay so we could keep the one seventh but add an additional 10 or 15 to that correct yes ma'am you could um and this lesson plan issue this is a state rule about the lesson plans where they have to do lesson plans because trying to alleviate some of the burden of subbing during your planning time if you didn't have to write the you know present the lesson plans that might help right we did meet with all of the faculty senate both elementary and secondary and asked them to come to us with a simplified lesson plan what they felt like would be the bare minimum we then took that lesson plan back to our principles and it is my belief understanding that

091we will at second semester we will go with the lesson plan template that was suggested by the teachers which is a a very focused version of lesson planning that allows the administration and any parent any student any substitute to be able to walk in and see what someone is teaching without it being in such significant detail or with references that it's a burden to teachers so we wanted them to come up with this themselves and they did my other question is you said that the long-term subs haven't gotten that pay increase yet correct number i think it's number five on the recruitment retention plan oh are you talking about the reimbursement for their substitute costs no i'm talking about these levy checks it's number five on the tier one that we approved but we haven't

092gotten yet none of them have qualified yet ma'am so they haven't qualified well what we stated was that any of them who would be in full-time teaching positions sign a contract and have no break-in service would receive the same levy checks that was slated to begin in the july 1 2022. now if the board would like for us to go back and retroactively look at every one of our long-term subs and whether or not they had fulfilled uh their full-time teaching positions signed a contract had no break in service and were currently becoming certified because as as you'll recall the whole point for this was long-term subs get the same pay with the exception of levy checks the same holidays they get the same benefits and sometimes that is not an inducement for them to

093go and do the same level of work to get certified as a certified teacher so when we've spoken with faculty senate and with administrators they felt like there should be some differentiation for a certified teacher so what this does the long-term subsidy substitute equity it says if you will go and get your certification as a long-term sub we will then pay you back three years worth of levy checks to get your certification as an incentive to get certified that's i understand what you're saying but the way it reads here on this plan isn't isn't clear so i believe these long-term subs thought that they would be getting levy checks from from this but you're saying that that's only if they get certified in that field that they're teaching i guess and then you'll go back

094and give them that money correct yes that's that if it's not clear the way that it's written we i have not been approached by any long-term subs nor has hr with that misunderstanding but if they will come to us we're happy to clarify and i'm happy to um write it in a different way if if folks are struggling to understand that okay and i guess for me i would like to make a motion if that's possible i don't know if this is the right time but i think that we should offer some people that are giving up their planning time i think we should offer them a little incentive because they're they're they're are having to go beyond their work time to do their lesson plans either way even if they are uh maybe minimized

095so um well i would like to can we take it in two parts first and i understand what you want to do and i think we'll get there but if we could address the first part first to um adjust the hourly rate outside of contract hours is that how you would phrase it the uh professional hourly rate of from 20 to 40 dollars for hours outside of their contract okay so increasing the professional hourly rate outside of contract from 20 to 40 hours to become more in line with the eastern panhandle rates is there a motion to make that change thank you mr osborne is there a second second thank you miss joy any discussion on that yeah i'm just wondering how how many people are talking about how much money what is your projection

096of how much fiscal cost just curiosity part of it was how much of it would come out of the general fund versus title one a lot of our intervention uh funding is title 1 funding it will again it's hard for me to say for this year because we're doing substantially more intervention than we have in the past so we had to go all the way back to 2000 and i'm trying to remember i think it was 2019 for the pay that we did outside of that and it was a little over half a million dollars i believe but again that was pre-coveted and when we had much smaller title one allocations because we have so many more children in poverty and who are struggling right now so those allocations have increased i for me it's

097one thing to to give intervention to work with children that need isn't for forty dollars an hour that's fine to make up kits for forty dollars an hour it's just you know it's hard to differentiate you know i i just the those teachers are actually writing the science tech uh technology engineering uh arts and math curriculum and then they are selecting the materials to go with that curriculum and then they are writing the lesson plans and then they are training the other teachers so i would certainly argue that that is a a skill set in terms of planning and certification that merits forty dollars an hour you didn't say it that way you said making kids understood all right so there's a motion on the table to increase the professional hourly rate outside of contract

098from 20 to 40 an hour to make it more in line with eastern panhandle rates all in favor say aye aye opposed thank you and then as far as teachers covering planning periods i do know that that is an incredible hardship on our staff right now and so i would suggest that we make a motion due to the extenuating circumstances of this school year for the 2021-2022 school year we increase the the rate for teachers covering those to be one-seventh of their day plus fifteen 15 an hour and um i know that's going to cause a hardship on the payroll department but miss russell has left the meeting she is not here to object so we can put that as other duties as assigned and you know just as a little welcome present to school

099system accounting is there a motion to increase the planning period by 15 an hour yeah i'll make a motion to increase by at least 15 an hour thank you miss joy is there a second second thank you mr osborne all right so we have a motion on the table to due to extraneous circumstances for the 21 22 school year to increase the planning period coverage of teachers by 15 an hour and um any discussion on that can we see a physical note on that by next meeting a whatsapp i want to know how much that's going to cost us yes sir we'll we'll be able to give you um an estimate based on again based on the number i will say we have an extraordinary number just this year it is tenfold what it has

100been in the past in terms of teachers covering other classes for 170. and i realized 15 is not a lot i wish we could make it more but we'll have to see where that leaves us financially and and understood it is on top of the 1 7 which we're required to uh give and i certainly wish i could make it a a higher lump sum but currently under west virginia code we this is how we'd have to do it but i do deeply appreciate i know that the teachers deeply appreciate the uh the ingenuity of the board and and being able to maintain legal compliance and still honor the work they're doing and do you think um mrs russell's department would be able to have this in place to start january third when we come

101back um that or please make it retroactive that is a retroactive for second semester correct like if she can't do it january 3rd let's say she can't get it done until february 1st for some reason i don't know what the procedure is back there but at least get people paid starting january 3rd when they come back for second semester yes ma'am we'll make that happen if it's as long as there's the grace to um if it takes us a while to put that mechanism in place because presumably that will be a manual process um that we can add it back to those certainly we can do that okay all right all in favor of the motion say aye opposed thank you thank you all right action on approval of substitutes in areas of critical need

102and shortage policy 3120.12. okay um thank you for this evening we do have action to approve the areas of critical need and shortage policy which is policy 3120.12 we did not receive any public comments on this policy therefore the policy is presented to you this evening with no further changes and asks for adoption so we can submit it to the state all right is there a motion to approve the substitutes in area of critical need and shortage policy 3120.12 thank you mr osborne is there a second okay thank you miss joy any discussion or questions hearing none all in favor of approving the substitutes in area critical need and shortage policy 3120.12 say aye oppose thank you thank you all right action on approval to place the draft jefferson county schools 2223 calendar out for

103review and comment until december 27th 2021. good evening good evening um yes we are the calendar committee is requesting that the board allow us to place the draft 2022 2023 calendar out for review and comment until december 27th to allow public comment for two additional weeks and we just wanted to note that we had already two public notice hearings um already where we have not yet received any public notice so we'd want to be able to provide more opportunity for public to um comment sorry i was trying to not say that again um to comment on our draft calendar for 2022-2023 all right and thank you for taking the time last week to run those two public hearings we appreciate that thank you all right is there a motion to place the draft 2223 calendar

104out for review and comment until december 27th thank you mr cable is there a second sure thank you mr osborne any discussion yeah one of those two meetings i pointed out that you have it's on the the family friendly calendar [Music] may 21st high school graduations there's two stars asterisks but there's no explanation provided oh i'm sorry i did not get that no um dr joy i will add the explanation to that it's the stars that are they are tentative dates based on snow and everything but i will add that explanation to the family calendar yeah you weren't there that day yes carol thank you dr joy all right so we have a motion is there all in favor of placing the draft calendar out for review say aye aye opposed thank you thank you

105all right jefferson county efficiency profile ratings for 2021. okay last week we received from the west virginia department of education our 2021 uh county efficiency profile this is a measure of a school district's operational effectiveness there are three areas instructional administrative and student health and safety uh each one of those is broken into programmatic levels uh under instruction there's uh career technical ed federal programs special education and universal pre-k school readiness under administration there is finance personnel what's called official collections which is actually our data keeping uh process a county board of education member effectiveness student health and safety is our facilities review our transportation and child nutrition so at the bottom of that sheet i included a url for everyone that actually is this uh 26 page document that shows step by step what

106each one of those areas is comprised of and how the west virginia department of education makes the judgment of whether or not a school system meets those requirements they list both what the criteria for judgment are and the pieces of data that they use to make those decisions so i am very happy to report um that in all 11 of those areas under the three different operational effectiveness areas jefferson county met all of the requirements so that is a testament to the hard work of the staff even during a difficult time and i just want to publicly recognize them and show my appreciation for their uh due diligence and wanted the board to know that thank you all right next up we have request approval for an rfp bid for the district's trash services good

107evening i'd like the board to take action this evening so we can go out for a bit it's time to renew our district trash services for the next three years all right is there a motion to put an rfp bid out for the district's trash service thank you mr osborne is there a second second thank you miss joy any discussion all in favor of putting an rfp bid out for the trash service say aye oppose thank you all right that's what i have a feeling this is you again request approval for an rfp bid for the district's pest management services yes again it's time to renew our pest management services and obtain another contract so i'd like an rfp bid for that upon approval of the board all right is there a motion to put

108out an rfp bid for the district's pest management service thank you mr osborne is there a second second thank you miss joy any discussion is that a three-year contract as well it is all right all in favor of putting the rp bid out for the district's pest management service say aye oppose thank you all right next up we have request approval for an rfp bid for the district's dry mop services this is the same for the dry mop services we need to put on another contract for three years so i'll await action for the board all right is there a motion to put an rp bid out for the district's dry mouth services thank you mr cable is there a second thank you mr osborne any question or discussion all in favor of putting an

109rfp bid out for the district's dry mop services say aye hi opposed thank you all right request approval for an rfp bid for the district's middle school athletic field maintenance this is something that's new um each middle school has kind of assumed they own their own care in the past for the fields and we would like to have equity for all of our fields and kind of centralized services so that we can obtain the best services and equal services for all schools the services would include mowing two fertilizer applications spring verification and rolling over seeding and soil testing for soil building fertilizer so this is a new contract that we'll be seeking for the next three years upon the recommendation of the board allowing us to go for an rfp all right is there a

110motion to put an rfp bid out for the district's middle school athletic field maintenance thank you mr cable thank you mr osborne any question or discussion is there any maintenance that will have to happen on the turf fields yes we do have equipment to maintain the fields part of that comes under warranty and the other part is equipment that we use to groom the fields that our own people have been trained on and taught to use so that's a whole different category it's a whole different way of taking care of a field yes all right all in favor of putting the rfp bid out for the district's middle school athletic field maintenance say hi opposed thank you ms white thank you all right superintendents comments um the only thing i would like to do at

111this point is to recognize the staff um our special education staff put on this year the sensitive santa program a lot of the things that you see in here we utilized this weekend for the parents of students with sensory disabilities autism spectrum disorders those families came in they had half hour slots to participate in some christmas activities and to have time with santa claus and mrs claus themselves including their siblings who often don't get those opportunities because traditional christmas venues can be overwhelming for their siblings all of the materials that were used in that were donated by central office staff and their funds and all of the staff who worked those days we originally started off with a saturday and we had such overwhelming requests we extended it into sunday so all of the staff

112who were there and participated were also volunteers who volunteered their time on the weekend to make that happen so as often happens people bring out their best when it's most needed and i just want to thank and congratulate them you and do we have any executive session this evening no ma'am we would like a photo we would like to make the motion and the mask mandate 8 47 [Music]