001[Music] good evening welcome to the regularly scheduled meeting of the jefferson county board of education on monday november 29th and if you please join us for the pledge 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 the liberty of jesus for all [Applause] thank you um just as a reminder i just want to go over a couple rules really quickly and the expectations of our meetings the jefferson county board of education consists of individuals elected by the community we serve our purpose in meeting is to conduct the business of jefferson county schools in ensuring the quality and effectiveness of the school system this is a board meeting conducted by the elected members in view of the public we
002welcome public comment on the business of jefferson county schools in the designated forum and format conduct and comment outside of public comment that disrupts the ability of the board to conduct business is unacceptable such behavior runs counter to the ideas and respect of civility that we'll work to instill in our students any member of the public who verbally or physically disrupts the business of the board will be asked to cease and desist if the disruptive individual refuses to cease and desist they'll be asked to leave a refusal to leave upon request will be met with a recess of the meeting and notice of law enforcement as elected as elected officials we're representing the people we serve and their children our commitment and service to them is to conduct the business of jefferson county schools we'll
003provide that service and keep that commitment under all circumstances all right this evening we're starting with a presentation by students which is always a welcome event so good evening and thank you we're really excited because today we have students from washington high school they are going to do a little bit of what the students did last month from jefferson high school except this group is going to talk about the respect civility themed month for november so i'm excited to introduce to you uh georgia bernanke as well as gabrielle wright isabelle rosa rosie fuzzini gina cooper alina excuse me alina cooper and brenda maraquin so i want to introduce you to these students and these are leaders and they're going to take over from here next slide so the november theme for the month is how
004do you end how do you honor your ancestors where do your ancestors come from my ancestors come from the caribbean my ancestors come from the uk and like ireland and england my ancestors come from china one way my family honors our ancestors is through food so we have recipes that have been passed down and every time we eat them we are thinking of them and remembering them my answers just come from ukraine my ancestors come from el salvador and i think this question is really important because we get to know more about every student and everybody can get along to try again next slide so in jefferson county schools we've only previously covered the tip of the iceberg as you can see on the visual um with standard heritage months it only like raises the
005surface of who we are as people so this includes a common concept such as cultural foods celebrations like what we wear stuff like that so while these are important to recognize we hope as a group to dive deeper to make stronger connections and start conversations in our own school and the district so the future of jefferson county will include going further than surface level beyond the tip of the iceberg talking about things that you won't be able to just visibly see on a person talking about things like beliefs status value systems and more next slide um tomorrow jefferson high school is celebrating this month by doing a cultural heritage clothing day staff and students can wear their ancestors clothing um yeah so [Music] at washington high school in the upcoming weeks to honor this question
006from november we're gonna have a really big here it map we're gonna hang it up um in the hallway to our lunch room and we're gonna have stickers and we're gonna ask people to put stickers where their ancestors come from so we can hopefully get people talking and discussing diversity with respect to instability like student life it's personalized it's respectful and constant likes for each school so they would get a choice for and there's different options like they can do a day before they can wear their traditional clothing that represents their cultures colors or their flat colors and yeah they can choose from here each school can do what they like we've developed the months um to discuss these topics within the schools so some of these are for november as we've discussed before as
007how you honor your ancestors and where do your ancestors come from december is um what does current and resilience look like to you and your family and january is what does the concept of time look like for you and your family february will have what the self-care look like for you and your family march will have what is a hero to you who are the heroes in your life april will have what does your family look like and may will have what does respect look like based on your age nice next slide um the theme for next month is what does courage look like to you um so each school will get a choice for us like she's holding for the activities or activities that relate to december's theme and they can choose one that
008best fits their school and get people talking i love it thank you thank you guys [Applause] and talk about what's happening in your schools how you are facilitating these uh respectful conversations with civility and uh modeling that for us i have some certificates here and i'd like to invite you all to come at the back of the room to get a picture with the board uh [Applause] you say that right yes isabel go that way yes all right okay everybody respect on three one two three all right christmas in three weeks how's that yeah okay thank you all very very much i appreciate it thank you [Applause] that was great i'm sure today was an especially long day for them after having you know nine days of sleeping in and then having to go to
009school all day today so all right deputy superintendent of operations update this is white good evening board members and everyone i'm going to start this evening with a technology update technology is currently upgrading our phone system this upgrade is necessary for our phone system because our former system was at the end of life and was beginning to fail even though we were taking redundant measures so to keep operational continuity technology began the process of upgrading the cisco phone system last spring by replacing outdated hardware in july they work with our vendor to secure pricing through a government contract currently most of our outdated hardware has been replaced thanks to mike davis and blue ridge interns we're really proud of the technology department for working with interns who are up and coming and fostering their growth
010while they do their work and they're very helpful it's a great relationship currently technology is upgrading our server hardware and software systems in collaboration with our partners at alpha technologies this is taking place this week there will be no disruptions to our phone service we want to reiterate that to everyone work will be completed after business hours and communicated out to administration to date our tech department has swapped out 450 phones and they have 50 more to go they're also working on delivering hot spots for all of our students every student who's asked for a hot spot has the hot spot and there are more on hand in case we need more in transportation they've begun work with our architects they're one of the first partners other other than our staff at each school that
011we work with to plan for site preparation they're working on creating safe and effective traffic patterns for our two new elementary schools transportation has been working to upgrade the software for the cameras on the buses as well the vendor is replacing end-of-life cameras many of them have been on there for several years and it's just time for replacement the software upgrades will make it more efficient for viewing video when necessary this project is ongoing and we anticipate its completion by july of in child nutrition mr bites has been working on serving virtual meals we have a delivery method that is new this year where we are delivering virtual meals for the same cost right to the homes of the students who asked for them last week or the week before thanksgiving we delivered two weeks
012supplies to 68 families and they're on schedule this week to deliver 80. the child nutrition department has partnered also with hr and they're going through the process of training potential substitutes and we're in great hopes this helps with the unfilled positions for cooks mr bites is also preparing monthly meetings with the cafeteria managers to help deliver a consistent message throughout the county in regards to certain aspects of food service he wants to be proactive and he's been assisting kitchen staff by ensuring that there is consistency across the district with all aspects of food service for our students finally this evening i'm very excited to talk about bond projects we've been busy behind the scenes with our planning and on monday november 15th as i said we met and planned with transportation for traffic patterns on
013the site we'll begin work soon with a department of highways for roadway traffic patterns as well for these two new sites we met at 1 30 pm on monday november 15th in the paige jackson room with the paige jackson alumni association we're working on getting oral stories um of the former students and the alumni gathering artifacts and the alumni members worked with the interior designer in order to get some concepts for the room ready so they have their homework they're going to gather some artifacts and prepare their oral stories and then we're going to meet again it was a very exciting and productive meeting and it's going to be a great and fun project we're looking forward to it we met the same day with the shepherdstown education specification committee which is comprised of staff
014from the school they were very excited to see the concept plan for the site they saw uh traffic patterns they also saw the interior what the school is gonna look like and they got a sneak peek of what the exterior's gonna look like and as that was unveiled i have to tell you there were oohs and alls it was very exciting they were excited with everything that they saw and they're ready for us to move forward today at 3 45 we did the same thing with the ransom education specification committee and they looked at the same things that the shepherdstown committee looked at and they're very excited about their plan they also saw a sneak peek of the outside of the schools and i have to tell you like that is the most exciting part
015for me very excited at the next board meeting to share that with everyone and mr jones our principal architect will be here in order to do that we'll be meeting with local school improvement councils from each school that's the next step we're taking tomorrow we're going to meet with the ransom lsic and on thursday december 2nd we're going to meet with the shepherdstown lsic all bond projects are on time they're in various stages of planning and if you don't have any questions for me that's all i have to share with you i have some questions absolutely what's the difference between the lsic and the specification committee right the policy spells out state policy spells out we have to have an education specification committee which is a steering group for the planning of a school so
016it is comprised of various stakeholders in the school including service personnel teachers the principal the architects are on that and i sit on that as the superintendent's designee so the difference between that and the local school improvement council that is a council that is in state code that has to have certain members on it and commute including two or three community members service personnel teachers so there are two different groups with two different focuses this committee we put together specifically for the purpose of building a new school where the lsic is a regular thing that's at every school okay and then um yes i was wondering if the community was a part of it the other question is last time you spoke about child nutrition you said that you would look into the healthier power
017pack options yes i passed that along to mr bites who is in the process of contacting diana wall about that so i will get back with him about where he is with working with her one thing that mr bites and i spoke about was that the meals for these children need to be ready we have to presume that these are meals that the kids can fix themselves if need be and they have to have a longer shelf life so we're or we're not involved with power packs but they look for food items that have a longer shelf life and that the kids can work to prepare themselves if necessary so those are the kind of things that mr bite shared with me that they look for in making those power packs but he was going
018to have a conversation with her and i'm happy to share with you the results the conversation i think thanksgiving break got in there so that might have been a little delayed thank you you're welcome any other questions well i can't wait to see the uh pictures just that sounds exciting yeah it will be thank you we'll share that with you at the next board man i'm sorry i do have one question i'm sorry sir all right next up we have um approval of the minutes is there a motion to approve the minutes from the regular board meeting held november 8 2021 thank you ms ogden is there a second thank you thank you mr cable any question or discussion all in favor of approving the minutes from the regular board meeting held november 8 2021
019say aye hi opposed thank you all right next up we have citizens comments first up we have judy york followed by maya humphries and just a reminder speakers are limited to three minutes and 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 or the speaker will be required to seize his or her comments first up is judy york all right thank you last week november 20th was the annual transgender day of remembrance to honor the memory of the transgender people who lives or lost in acts of anti-transgender violence so far 2021 marks the highest rate of violence on record for this community over the past few board of education meetings i've been disturbed to hear remarks
020during citizen comments promoting misinformation and rid of fuel towards transgender youth their families and the support being provided by jefferson county schools faculty and staff transgender kids are some of the most vulnerable in our community the human rights campaign's website acknowledges that support from parents teachers and guidance counselors greatly improves mental health and well-being of these kids and the opposite is true transgender children are more likely to experience anxiety depression and are at greater risk of substance abuse and homelessness when the important adults in their lives are dismissive or hostile towards them these kids are at the greatest risk of suicide compared to their non-transgender peers as a result of rejection bullying and other victimization as a community as a public school system it's important that we educate ourselves so we can better support transgender
021children of those who i know who are in or who have gone through the jefferson county school system i can affirm that there have been pockets of support among peers faculty and staff i have so much gratitude for this when students feel safe to fully express themselves they are better able to learn and thrive in school our board of education can take older steps in supporting transgender as well as other lgbtq and minority students by leveraging sources from the welcoming schools program after this meeting i'll send the welcomingwelcomingschools.org link to the board this program offers resources on topics such as creating lgbtq schools embracing family diversity preventing bias-based bullying and adopting welcoming and affirming policies i encourage the board to review these resources and explore how as a school district we can offer more affirmation
022respect and support of our transgender youth and to those in our community who seek to use citizens comments portions of the board meeting to spread misinformation and ridicule towards transgender youth i'm asking you to stop you stop using this platform to make fun of these kids and the people supporting them your stereotypes and jokes are a cruel and disrespectful form of bullying that promotes the misinformation and violence that transgender day of remembrance sweeps for transgender youth are some of the most vulnerable in our school system as a community we need to be asking what we can do to continue to educate ourselves and support these kids so they're better better able to learn and thrive thank you next is mia humphries followed by barbara fuller do we have to sign up for this yes sir
023yeah we're not allowed to make a comment no sir sorry can i put my mia humphreys not asked or shown it and i was hi good evening can you hear me yes ma'am uh thank you so much first of all i i hope everyone had a wonderful thanksgiving holiday i know you all deserved a nice long week of rest i apologize i had my toddler screaming in the background um i am hold on i i am um i'm sorry but you're good i am speaking on behalf of the mass mandate i believe that that was going to be on the agenda this evening while the vaccine is now available to the 5 to 11 year old age group which so many of those parents are so thrilled about it has not been available long enough
024to provide them with full vaccination status so i am asking that as we do discuss the mask mandate um a little later on in the meeting that we do consider the fact that it will take a few more weeks until these children do reach full vaccination status so i do hope that you consider keeping the mass mandate in place until at least the beginning of the school year um thank you very much for your time and again apologies for the for the interruption here thank you next up is barbara fuller followed by karen buck good evening how are you um my name is barbara farr i'm running for one of the upcoming empty seats for the board of education over the thanksgiving holiday i received an email and i'm really just kind of looking for
025some sort of clarification um maybe i actually opened up this morning in reference to dr gibson and her her website i was told and i couldn't get onto it today that it seems to be updated and that we should be concerned that she's going to be leaving us and do we have a plan of action in in place for her replacement um if she's going to leave us um like i said this was an email to me i was not able to get online to to verify it but it was a little alarming because i can't see our kids being left without a superintendent to guide everybody in the future that's really all i had to ask and maybe we can push that down the line for another time thank you next up is karen
026buck followed by joanne curran can you put my name down this place tonight i'm sorry so you have to sign up ten minutes prior to the meeting i know i did let me know when i was here first sir yeah he was best friends why'd you pay the health department 20 000 right before a vaccine clinic for little kids that you helped to organize here's a notice to you with regard to vaccinations and biological testing of our children you are hereby advised a child's mere presence in school does not count as implied or informed consent on the part of the parents or the child now what is pedagogy pedagogy is a teacher's favorite word pedagogy is not what you teach but how you teach your style of teaching you'll teach little kids to sing their
027abcs to make it fun older students might get extra points for finishing a tough assignment a feeling of achievement or you might use big bird to teach little kids that the covid vaccine is a good thing and they'll be superheroes if they get the vaccine or you might teach you might have a school person teach a group of hand-picked young people that they are diversity ambassadors you might truck them out in front of the board meeting and have them lecture parents about diversity using the cultural iceberg model developed by edward t hall an anthropologist in 1976 the cultural iceberg model is a study in human behavior and how to manipulate it using pedagogy you would change the model to make it more interesting for teenagers you would include things like skin color race gender sexual
028orientation and sexual identity as well as division whatever that means things that were never on the original iceberg model by edward t hall in 1976 these are subjects meant for college level studies not kids with no life experience behind them amen under the guise of manners and civility you might teach young people that we have to respect all kinds of sexual preferences including pedophilia now what does all this mean it's called behavior manipulation and the fbi calls it grooming a pedophile will groom his victim before the attack hitler groomed the hitler youth some even snitched on their own parents our kids are being groomed for what i'll leave that up to you parents you can figure this out teach your kids what their rights are question authority get your kids out of these camps and
029vote next may the 10th next up is joanne sir please be respectful i am next up is joanne curran followed by jennifer krause okay welcome to tonight's poetry class some of you may be familiar with tonight's style of poetic responsive reading maybe from your long ago church upbringing or from a song so tonight i will read a line and you will all respond silently with the phrase the world has gone mad remember to feel your lines because your masks mask the poetry in your heart let your expressions be your voice let's practice full disclosure i learned this from former new york times reporter barry weiss when she was on cnn and finished each statement that way for example she said when questioning lab leaks in wuhan is racist the world has gone mad so let's
030continue when rioters are not violent but parents are terrorists the world has gone mad when children are taught they are divided by race and it is called progress instead of segregation the world has gone mad when you can't say out loud in public that there are differences between males and females the world has gone mad when the most grammar that students learn is how to use people's chosen pronouns the world has gone mad when we ignore mlk's dream the world has gone mad when we embrace interracial marriages for decades and then tell their children one of their parents is a white supremacist the world has gone mad government says parents shouldn't be involved with schools the world has gone mad when schools believe graphic gay or any sex is valid literature for middle school students
031the world has gone mad when we force masks on children even when the labels themselves say they don't prevent covid the world has gone mad when politicians can keep healing medicines from the public the world has gone mad when invaders are welcomed unvaxed but frontline heroes are fired the world has gone mad when an african-american woman elected lieutenant governor of virginia is called a white supremacist the world has gone mad when feminists don't stand up for female athletes as males compete against them by saying they're female the world has gone mad when boys can enter girls bathrooms and adults can't foresee the inevitable outcome the world has gone mad and when people think defunding the police is a smart idea but are surprised when violent crime increases the world has gone mad and when they
032say gender is fluid but nobody asks why race isn't fluid too the world has gone doubly mad and when teachers use school time addressing social emotional feelings and all a manner of gender and racial absurdity over academics the schools have gone down the drains we the people are mad poetically speaking of course absolutely please thank you next up is jennifer krauss sir i'm sorry that's our policy first that's our your policy i would start first right please put your message out so we can hear the speaker please thank you thank you miss krause whenever you're ready six o'clock they're purposely doing it no sir stop miss krause whenever you're ready thank you at the last board of education meeting one of the members of the board claimed the critical race theory is not being taught
033in jefferson county and that was a lie last year my son was given an assignment that included a video produced by the far left organization act tv a self-described progressive media company for political activists they've worked for occupy wall street the bernie sanders campaign and the trump resistance movement to name a few i'm going to play part of that video for you tonight and if you'd like to see the full assignment as well as the rest of this video please visit my facebook page at krause for commission activities kevin and jamal live only a few streets away from each other so how come they're growing up in such different worlds with such different opportunities for success the answer has to do with america's history of systemic racism to understand it better let's look at what
034life was like for kevin and jamal's grandparents decades after the civil war many government agencies started to draw maps dividing cities into sections that were either desirable or undesirable for investment this practice was called redlining and it usually blocked off entire black neighborhoods from access to private and public investment banks and insurance companies use these maps for decades to deny black people loans and other services based purely on race historically speaking owning a home and getting a college education is the easiest way for an american family to build wealth but when jamal's grandparents wanted to buy a house the banks refused because they lived in a neighborhood that was redlined so jamal's grandparents were not able to buy a home and because colleges could prevent them from attending through legal segregation their options for higher
035education were really scarce kevin's grandparents on the other hand had a low interest loan to buy their first house and get accepted into a handful of top universities which traditionally only accepted white students this opened up a wealth of opportunities that they were able to pass on to their kids and grandkids even as late as the 1980s an investigation into the atlanta real estate market showed that banks were more willing to lend to low-income white families than to middle or upper-income african-american families as a result today for every hundred dollars of wealth held by a white family black families have five dollars and four cents a 2017 study confirms that redlining is still affecting home values in major cities like chicago today this explains how kevin and jamal inherited vastly different circumstances unfortunately the story
036doesn't end there a big part of systemic racism is implicit bias these are prejudices in society that people are not aware that they have let's go back to kevin and jamon against all odds jamal manages to be the only student from his high school to get accepted into a great university the same one that kevin and his high school friends are attending but after kevin and jamal both graduate jamal notices this is your warning if you disrupt and be disrespectful again i'm going to ask you to leave okay do you understand oh i totally understand thank you all right next up we have the consent agenda and i just want it to be now i was here at six o'clock so whatever you want to do that's not it this is right here sir charles
037take it and go you all are breaking the law okay i have a master's degree in special ed irene illegally all right they will not hire people i'm going to go ahead and call a recess call the meeting back into session all right so the consent agenda before we vote on the consent agenda i just want it to be known that i'm going to recuse myself from the consent agenda because of the fact that myself and my husband are listed on it to be approved drivers for washington high school so is there a motion to approve the consent agenda were there any changes before we make a motion dr gibson um number three ma'am there was an error in the assignment of the school it wasn't uh that retirement was from c.w shipley and not
038okay and that's the only change yes ma'am all right is there a motion to approve the consent agenda with that adjustment to number three making it cw shipley thank you mr cable is there a second second thank you ms ogden any question or discussion you have a lot of questions about it i i don't um on the at the last meeting the consent agenda a person was um given a position and then the person's resigning she was given the position to start on the ninth and and then the current one she's resigning from a different position on the 11th it would be very helpful in answering your questions if you could use the numbers or the number as long as there isn't anything um as long as there's no personnel issue with the with the
039person if you're just questioning process we can't i don't understand how they were given one job on the ninth um in last week and i just noticed when i was reading through the minutes that because they're on both and there's two people that show up on both if you could if you could point those numbers out perhaps on the public content um resignation yes ma'am as a substitute teacher yes ma'am and then on at the last meeting um they were somewhere down here um given they were they had a position that was to start on the 9th of november um can't find it right now you just i don't know do you have to resign yeah yeah we've we've processed a lot of personal actions so you're gonna have to tell me what she was
040on the left agenda 24 she was approved as a substitute eight to start on the nine correct okay so that that helps me right there so um basically what happens is that you cannot hold a service and a professional classification so the um service the substitute aid is the one that she wants therefore you have to resign as a substitute teacher because that's a professional role so but she she shouldn't she have resigned previously it doesn't matter the timing of it as long as we get a process the the last consent agenda is correct that this person is employed yes yep that's correct um and then there was another person in a similar well the other one it was she's resigning from different positions but these positions she resigned back in maybe september just trying
041to understand who can you give me more um yeah so number four on the previous agenda it's a similar position but on so she resigned on effective 1022 from um from a position do you know what position it was yeah it was um assistant fall cheer coach and then this time she's it says she's resigning but the date is earlier and it's it's winter to your coach but it's effective september 24th yeah i mean she's she's resigned from both cheer positions fall and winter and it started so the winter one started this effective day is before the season started so again it's it it doesn't really impact anything yeah so the other ones are just all these people like 11 12 listed twice 16 17. yep two different classifications so you can be a substitute
042um service personnel in two different classifications because it's still in the service category um i don't understand what you're saying but this person's approved for two different positions correct a substitute aide and a substitute secretary they can hold both okay so they can get a call for both if there's an absence or a vacancy for the day they can get a call in both of those areas and accept one of the other um there's no openings for to day so for somebody calls in sick or or a personal day then the system calls out an absence i'm just wondering why there's so they don't want a position they don't want a regular position they just want to be well you have to start so um basically what and i kind of explained this at the
043last board meeting is that for a service um you have to start as an aide or as a substitute i'm sorry you have to start at the substitute classification that's how you're appointed first and then you can get into a regular position so at this time miss kelly has been approved and is authorized to be a substitute aid and secretary and she will you should see her come up for another position where she will have she does have an opportunity to be hired full time but like i said you have to start as a substitute i was wasn't i was moved on to another it was i wasn't talking about her anymore you had cleared that okay i was referring more to the cook position because i heard to mention that there was this you
044know a shortage of earlier and so that i thought well why are there substitute hooks being hired again yeah again you have to start as a substitute and then as the bidding process goes on you can move quickly into a full-time position okay um position number 34. i just feel like if there's such a need for teachers why are so many moving into being coaches i mean shouldn't we be retaining our teachers well coaches serve a valuable role as well um that was part of the the developments that mr banks had spoke about with providing support to the teachers into the schools it is a longer contract so it is an opportunity for an educator to make more money so it has a financial benefit for them as well yeah i understand that i just
045feel like right now when they're such a teacher shortage i believe that the administrators are the technical academic coaches in the schools and to keep taking our teachers and you know moving them into coaching i mean you know what you're doing i'm just saying it i just keep hearing about this shortage so it's it makes me wonder you know why they would be um you know maybe anyway yeah and they and the coaches can also um as they're assigned an academic coach they also have the availability to substitute as well when there's um absences um there's several position creations 37 through 40 40. um what is this upstream aid yes um great question um as you recall we received a grant back in the um very early summer late spring that funded the early literacy
046program for the horse powered camp the early literacy program and so what that grant did is it also provided for after school clubs so um since we didn't have any positions created to provide that support for the after school clubs then that is what um number 38 is is to provide the teacher support for the program and then number 37 is the um aids support for that program as well and then um the junior accountant accountant 3 that is a new position that's being requested to provide support for the payroll department the biggest concern that we have right now is the amount of processing and demands that are placed on the payroll department at this point in time that they they need the support in order to process everything that is channeling through the department
047it's if you're if you're not familiar with um which i wouldn't imagine he would be but if you're not familiar with the payroll processing in west virginia schools it is a very very manual process especially when it comes to substitutes and substitute pay 1 7 pays anything that we do on a normal basis but anything additional that we're running through the the payroll process it's just the very nature of it is a very manual process with wevus that we're required to use and with the huge growth in substitutes has been very time consuming on our two payroll employees we've also made massive expansions to the summer program the summer experience program and this is also a separate pay and the responsibility falls outside of the regular school year with the number of new recruitment and
048retention strategies that we've passed both locally and also what the state has provided there's many other new payroll responsibilities that have been added to the department we have increasing intervention services with paying teachers and teacher mentors paying service staff and teachers to attend recruitment fairs these all require everything requires a change in the pay process which is not a streamlined or an easy process to incorporate we have the new micro badging program that we're going to be bringing on that's currently under development and will also result in additional paycheck processing added to the current ones based on their level and participation with this process we currently have no one trained in payroll except for the two people who currently serve in those positions and meet them they meet the minimum requirement for retirement at this
049time as i expressed with the payroll processing with weaves and the systems that we use this is an area where succession planning is absolutely essential we cannot wait for somebody to retire to fill the position and change appropriately that training has to start now in order to sufficiently provide the best payroll services for this school district it's going to take a lot of time and experience with using that system it is a very complicated system and very complicated payroll processing requirements well instead of paying teachers sir a pe teacher or a volleyball coach why don't we start training them and giving them incentive to you guys are just ridiculous i can't wait to come back no crt like you guys are just all right i'm sorry please how important continue accountants are and how hardworking
050they are i'm sorry what was that please continue about how hard-working and important the accounting department is because that's very near and dear to my heart so and um so that is the the basis for why the finance department is requesting an additional junior accountant to help with the payroll processing requirements and also to prepare somebody in order to fulfill that role when one of our dedicated and hard working payroll employees makes that very difficult decision to to retire from jefferson county schools um are we actively seeking a replacement for the current accountant um because didn't that position or person get hired for something else and is are these positions to replace an accountant um yeah well 40 is yes so we had somebody who has resigned and so um we want to bump that
051from an auditor accountant three position to a junior account accountant three and so when that position um is filled then we would eliminate that auditor accountant position so that would be a position change and not an another position added to that it sounds like it's a drop down nope it's a it's a bump up so a junior accountant is more advanced than the auditor account correct that is correct yes so how does number 29 play into this [Applause] that was the position that um the board approved previously to um uh to move a payroll super supervisor which is it's more of an account in three position secretary three to a junior account and payroll supervisor so that also bumped up met the criteria for that um and uh that position was was um created and
052that was approved by the board and we have the person reclassification who can qualify to move into that role are these positions 39 and 40 is the thought that these would be service personnel moving like that position uh 29 appears to be yeah so 29 gave the opportunity for the career service letter which the board approved to follow that plan and then 39 would provide the same opportunity if we have any internal candidates who would also like to be concerned for the career service ladder so not necessarily that not necessarily but it is our hope that that would benefit one of our current employees yes in the school district um i just yeah i don't know enough about that i guess um this skinner makes more sense of it than i do there was one
053more thing and it was um one of those [Applause] it's number uh 14 and 15. i i don't understand i i understand you said that they have to be a substitute first but this person is a substitute and a custodian at the same time this what i'm sorry which one uh 14 to 15. a substitute cook and a substitute custodian it's substitute custodian and then also a substitute i mean also a custodian three so he's got he's called a substitute he said oh wait hold on are you one of the superintendents okay sorry i was like wait a minute i don't see a custodian um yes okay yeah so so basically again um a brand new hire so he has to start as a substitute custodian so that's day-to-day substitute and then he we posted
054the halftime long term sub custodian three at cw shipley and he um from the bidding list he was the the one who um met the qualifications when we when we ranked the applicants he was number one so he was able to move into um that to be able to hold that position so it's still it's it's a it's a long-term sub-custodian three but no matter what his status is a substitute custodian but for this period of time starting 11 um 16 he's able to hold a long-term sub-half-time position at cw shibley okay any other questions um i don't know enough to know what to ask about this again but hopefully it makes sense to you okay all right any other questions or comments about the consent agenda all in favor of approving the consent agenda
055with the one change to line item three to cw ship please say aye opposed thank you all right unfinished business action on approval of testing out policy thank you yes ma'am at the previous meeting we had introduced uh the testing out policy when we had the review from the west virginia department of education they had noted that our testing out policy was not in compliance with state policy we brought it here it's been out for two weeks for public comment we received no public comment we did and you all have uh redlined copies uh at your seat we had questions from you at the previous meeting asking for clarification about um i'm sorry ma'am um there were two over there okay isn't that right this is it that one is as well ma'am so essentially
056the change was that uh we clarified because uh as you had noted in the last meeting uh miss ogden you didn't it wasn't entirely clear if the student doesn't pass at 80 percent and it's considered a failure the requirement is that they then take the class in person that failure does not count on their record they continue to take the in-person class until they pass or fail it um that they don't have to average those grades together and they can't test out again and the final grade is not weighted testing out cannot be a weighted grade so essentially they go in they attempt to test out if they get anything over an 80 percent then whatever they get on that test is their final grade and that's what's recorded if they do not get 80
057percent then they are not allowed to attempt to test out again they have to take the class in person and whatever grade they get is the grade that they get um they also and and we clarify this as well uh they cannot if they test out and they pass and say they pass at an 80 they cannot go back and take the in-person course in an attempt to bring their grade up and it's the state policy that says they have to have an 80 or better in order to pass yes ma'am our policy no ma'am not for the testing out and again it's interesting that that's not congruent with the in person i know it makes zero sense but a lot of things in education yes ma'am another one i can think of is they
058want to make sure you've mastered it not just past it i don't know which makes no sense because they do they're fine with it for every other class it's the steam i get it [Applause] all right do you want to make a motion do you want me to make a motion if we put this on the floor first because just a couple questions all right is there a motion to approve the testing out policy thank you miss ogden is there a second second thank you mr cable all right discussion questions so the only question i had was um the only other specific i guess from reading it is the the student will be supplied with a copy of the content standards and objectives and the textbook for the class which he or she wishes to
059prepare but it doesn't say when they're going to get that but then in the front when it talks about you have to make application by april 30th so that's the only other concern that i know has come up over the years that i've witnessed that sometimes they'll you have to sign up april 30th the test might be scheduled for we want to get them done before summer break right so we're going to do them may something well then you essentially had one month to study i feel like if you're going to give kids an opportunity you need to give them the material at the beginning of the school year and they get the year to study or they get a significant amount of time but four to six weeks to study for an entire course
060i don't know and since there's no date on there it kind of says well my guidance counselor didn't give me this stuff until three weeks before which could happen so how is that person being disenfranchised then than somebody else at the other high school who gets it six weeks ahead right i mean so we we need some kind of clarity of consistency at least an sop that outlines exactly how this is going to happen and if it doesn't happen then who's accountable for that and how that needs to work in my opinion so check them for understanding when um because typically kids do sign up in the late spring in order to test out for the summer are you saying and then you said giving them the materials at the beginning of the year would
061we be gauging people's interest and then anybody who gave us an interest form we give them the information for testing out or you just want consistency like here's the deadline everyone has to let us know by april the 3rd anybody who's on that list at april the 3rd you know when you sign up we hand you the packet like i feel like that would be fair you get a packet and a textbook on the same day because it's also been an issue where you've gotten a packet you don't have any list of content standards so you have to kind of go on online to find those and then they didn't have any textbooks at the time so to get your textbook that took another month well now you got two weeks to go through a
062textbook so it's very convoluted process so i feel like it just needs to be the same all the time if we don't have enough textbooks then you didn't sign up soon enough and i don't know what we're going to do but it needs to be consistent and then it also needs to be if they're signing up in april the test is always given or on or about x day so it's the same as well so you you have a minimum of how many weeks whether six weeks whatever you decide there has to be a minimum of that many weeks before they can administer the test to give students an opportunity okay so and certainly we can i'm always leery of putting those uh in terms of policy if we put exact dates and then the
063the date of the test changes or the day then you have to go back and re-pass policy so that suggestion of putting this in the sops um we meet with right now we have a monthly uh progress meeting with uh all of the high school counselors because we're ticking off all of those items on the planner and meeting with the state department they are returning at the beginning of second semester to do a progress check for the first semester and we'll go over these and set up an sop for uh timing in terms of the the distance between when they sign up when they get their packets and their textbooks and when the test is and try to make that a six week period of time and then within that packet if they can make
064sure that they get a copy of the west virginia content standards for whatever class that they're taking so that they can look at the content standards at least know these the areas that are going to be important yes ma'am any other questions yeah i had some also i had questions about the time frame also there's no for application part d the school guidance counselor will forward the application to the county office to the appropriate coordinator so when a student applies they i think ms ogden was suggesting to give them materials immediately but does that mean they're automatically accepted when they apply i mean they could be that they don't there's something wrong with their application so that um sounds a little flawed i'm not sure how it all works but just to give it to
065them immediately why bother the application process that's one thing but then um at what time frame is this school counselor responsible for you know getting this application to the right person so they you know within 10 business days so that the student knows when to expect you know to hear back so that they can plan so a date when that they can expect to hear back so that they can you know contact the right office where's my you know testing situation um so can i ask a question just for clarification so are you um saying that once a student submits their application and their their qualifying criteria have to be checked because those are on there that once they're once they've applied that we would tell them within 10 business days whether or not they
066were accepted and once they're accepted we would give them the materials then like that yeah whatever is reasonable um i don't know five businesses because you said if there's a holiday or so you just say business days um the other thing was part d under testing they have to in addition to you know being willing to receive this pass or fail within 80 percent they have to also complete projects in the class even if they're testing out that's part of the testing out yes ma'am um so if it's an english class where you have to read three novels and write these papers or you know do projects so they still have to do basically a lot of the work um yes but they're not simply walking in and taking a test and sort of it's
067not like college where you walk in and sort of take the test and you get to clip that course hey i know everything that's in here i get to move on um it's quite frankly it's more like here's a very shortened version of this class so that you don't have to have it in your schedule during the regular school year there still are and not every single one of them have um the same number or the same content in their laboratory but for instance we get a lot of folks who want to um uh test out of health and pe they don't want to they don't want a health class especially kids who are in band and other things uh taking up room in their schedule because they want a lot of electives in that
068um you know they'll send the kids uh like fitbit kind of meters and they have to log their work and so it is abbreviated and they can test out of it but there are still work assignments within that okay and the math tests that these students are are taking and testing out is that i don't know what that's called it's a special um yeah i'm afraid i don't know off the top of my head ma'am i could find out for you though well i'm just they don't really have to participate in a class i don't think they just take a test um instead of doing the gre it's the alternative i mean not the jerry the um the task ma'am yeah i think that's what it's called um it seems that that might be easier
069than doing it this way then testing out so you have it sounds like that that program that you just mentioned don't you they just take a test and pass and i i was referring to when you were talking about that math class task testing are the tests that the kids take when they want to get uh what essentially folks would call a ged so they would test out of that and get which is not the equivalent of a high school diploma but can't they just take it for one subject they that's a good question there's a certain and i don't i'm trying to remember off the top of my head how many there are but let's say you have math and then you have english and then if you take one and you fail it
070and take the other one and you pass it you just have to take again the one that you failed until you pass it does that make sense you don't have to take all of them all over again if you don't pass right so you can't just take the mac so when they're talking about testing out if you're asking hey i i know algebra very well and i don't want to have to take algebra one can i just take a test prove to you that i know algebra one get credit for the class and move on no ma'am we don't that's not uh that's not how the system is set up now there may be and i can certainly research for you if there's any provision that would allow us to do that as a system
071i haven't had that question before but i can i can research that and report back to you okay um i just recall students sitting in class saying i'm taking that test so i'm out of here you know well if they failed it and certainly ma'am if they failed it previously and are retaking it for credit they can move through it at that self-pace that you pick but so this seems to contradict that it seems that it would be easier for a student to just do that to get the math credit i see yes and they and apex doing that is only allowed for a student who is not uh who is who has failed the original credit they don't allow them to go through and i know exactly what you're talking about in terms of
072taking that apex they do not allow them to take that for original credit um but so they will sit there and say i'm going to fail it i'm just going to take this test that's that's very sad i'm sorry to hear that well it's a lot easier i mean if you have other things going on but that was my experience so that's why i'm you know wondering why um the difference is so so you could just anyway there is a difference traditionally though the this testing out policy no i understand i just wrote a higher i just want to find out more about the apex and how that works so it sounds like you do have to fail to do it and then the last question um i know that it's probably standard and maybe
073it doesn't have to be put here but for e under uh testing maximum time for completing will be three hours and 30 minutes um you know unless unless you have specific accommodations i think um most people assume that but it certainly wouldn't hurt to spell it out yes ma'am thank you you're welcome and would you put that into an sop or would you put that into the policy um i can do either um to her point it's a federal requirement if they have accommodations on there um but we can be explicit about it in the in the policy it's not going to change the board doesn't have the legal authority to to change that i'm just wondering if we're voting on it if we need to make that change now or if you're just going
074to put it into the sop i will do that at the will of the board whatever your whatever your preference is i would amend my motion to include that specifically documented in the policy yes ma'am all right so mr cable miss ogden amended her motion to adjust e to include any accommodations for students would you continue to second that motion i didn't i didn't hear all of that so i just made um an amendment to my motion that it adds the at the end that talks about you get through three hours and 30 minutes for the test unless you have special accommodations on your iep or 504 that we will obviously meet those needs i just feel like that i agree with dr joy that needs to be out there all right so we have
075a motion and a second to um approve the testing out policy with the amendment to item number e all in favor say aye all right opposed all right thank you thank you ma'am all right next up we have approval of the superintendent evaluation policy uh yes man that's another policy that we introduced at the last meeting and that's the one in which the state set up new criteria and process for superintendent's evaluation and provided a template form and then required that all school boards either adopt the template form or create one of their own and as i noted previously the content was one that jefferson county schools was already utilizing in terms of all the different categories i think the state had just seen some inconsistencies in other places in the state and adopting those
076so we placed that out for public comment and received none and my recommendation would be to adopt it all right and um i do believe that they're going to be providing training on that for us at the february meeting of the west virginia school board association yes ma'am that's my understanding all right is there a motion to the approval of the new superintendent evaluation policy thank you ms ogden as our second thank you mr osborne any discussion yeah i just want to clarify which policy the state were using the states um or the one that you said is already in line with the states uh we're adopting the states when i when i talked about us being in line i simply meant that the template that they created and their policy is in line with
077what we were doing previously so it won't be a big change for the board or the public when they look at the categories okay that's all all right so we have a motion in a second all in favor of approving the superintendent evaluation policy say i i oppose thank you all right new business action on approval to place policy 3120.12 substitutes in areas of critical need and shortage on public review and comment okay you will see that the policy draft was on the agenda for your review this policy is a neola template as mr sam spoke on at the meeting that was he was here about the neola templates and how they're processed um this template um became a board adopted policy on june 22 2020. is brought to you this evening to put on
078public comment the revisions for two reasons why we have the revisions number one is that we had more areas that we needed to add to the list of critical needs and shortage areas for code also changed to include notification steps you will see the revisions in a different font for background on why this policy exists is that west virginia code does allow for professional retirees to work as long-term subs beyond 140 days 140 days is what they're allowed to substitute in a school year but they can go beyond that if we have this policy in place that's one reason for having this policy the second reason is that areas of shortages and critical need are identified in this policy that is one of the requirements and the final piece is that the policy is approved
079by the west virginia board of education our policy is approved by them but for this year we have to notify them of the changes and resubmit it as i mentioned we have the areas in a different color we have school counselors health and pe teachers drivers education teachers social studies and vocational agriculture in addition i will be adding in the last sentence of the first paragraph teacher or substitute teacher includes speech pathologists school nurses and guidance counselors the sentence that guidance counselors cannot be designated needs to be struck from the policy because the state did change that allowed to allow for boards to identify school counselors as a shortage area so with that we ask for the board to approve placing this on public comments that way we can get these changes in place and
080then submitted to the west virginia board of education thank you miss lauren is there a motion to approve to place policy 3120.12 substitutes an area of critical need and shortage on public review and comment thank you ms ogden is there a second serious thank you mr cable any questions or discussion yeah i have questions i'm trying to understand what the pay will be for these um i say you're saying someone that's retired and they only they're only allowed to sub a certain amount of days right now right state code they can only go up to 140. so um we're extending that i'm wondering what their pay is as a sub if you're retired are they getting paid what they retire at yeah so it doesn't it doesn't impact their benefits at all but it is
081um if if they're in a long term sub where they're working in the year and they're going beyond 140 days then it's um based on code and how we have to pay it is their degree level and their years of experience that their daily rate is based on but if they're just a day-to-day sub yeah their daily rate yep it's it's just this day everybody gets the same right right yeah and if they work out yeah and then the permanent subs mm-hmm how does that work because i've seen i looked on the state on weevis and i looked up the permanent subs for elementary middle and high school and i noticed that there's people on that list that one of them is they're supposed to be permanent subs but i know one of them has
082a long-term subposition one of them has left the state so she's not even here she's not in the system i'm trying to understand how that works was it because you had to enter it on a certain day like the october deadline like the second month first week or something you have to tell the state you know how many uh in-house subs you have or permanent sub positions i'm trying to understand how that works because i saw some of these salaries like one was 69 000. and you know she's justified if she's a teacher but like one of these people goes from school to school she subs when she wants and i think based on my you know trying to understand it all it looks like maybe that's what the state reimburses the school system for
083this person who has 30 years experience but it doesn't mean they're necessarily paid that so you're saying because if they um and i i don't know so that's why i'm asking but i know that are you familiar with what i'm talking about on weebus the um it's under the finance and you just put in jefferson county and then you put in um permanent sub and you'll see the names and um so i know some of them aren't there and my concern and it's getting into it's a couple of questions and then but the reason i'm asking my concern is that some schools are still don't have enough subs it appears and yet they've been allocated maybe one of these permanent subs yet they're saying they don't have enough subs so you know how how is
084it going to work how do you determine um and i'm asking too many questions and let me start from the beginning so um how are these permanent subs paid are they paid at their rate they were making even though they've retired they come back they're they're just their permanent sub in the building they could just be filing for the hour they're taking over for a secretary they're still paid that same salary when they left is that correct well i would hope that there's enough teaching responsibilities up there and need that they're not filing but they're they are hired to be the teacher of record that's what a permanent substitute teacher is they're the teacher of records so they assume the full responsibilities as as a regular classroom teacher but they're not in the same class
085every day that's different from a long-term sub the permanent sub in the building right is just somebody no not the new the new the new positions yes but the ones that are the ones that um this policy specifically addresses is um you're not you're assigned into a classroom so that's only for long term so not that yeah i mean any longer yeah i feel like there's a lot of other questions about communication so i believe and you tell me if i'm incorrect when you use the term permanent sub you are talking about she's talking about jobs that we created where it is a job someone applies and your job is to be a full-time you show up to my school every day you sub wherever i actually go over 140 days too yeah so but
086we if but the but the policy that um miss loring is discussing is not some is not that position that is a regular full-time benefits position what she is talking about is retired individuals being able to come in and do day-to-day subbing that's that's and unless they are moving into the long-term supposition they're still making an hourly that they're making the same rate as anybody else yeah you get your yeah you get your deal and then once they become a long-term sub you make yourself they're making the salary that they made before they retired yeah these still permanent subs then um there are several positions created and for for this permanent sub those people are making the salary that they left with or that they yes yeah we have we have to we have to
087pay them on their degree level and their years of experience although i suspect we would not have very many people who are retired who do that because this is not applying to the permanent subposition because that's just they would be taking a regular full-time job and it would affect their retirement if they took this that permanent subposition would be just like coming back and applying for an english teaching position in the school so this would would not be considered that day-to-day subs and long-term sub-so yeah and this um this so the code so basically all this that's in the policy um is what's in code and really what the significance of this is is for us to actually identify what our shortages and critical needs area so that way if we do have somebody who's
088a retiree that goes beyond 140 days if they're in a critical need then it allows them to have expanded service that won't impact their retirement benefits it also has a dual purpose like for us to be able to identify these areas then you can put you can put somebody who um this is going to probably get even more complicated but who is permit eligible that means that they're in the process of completing their certification program and by the state's definition can go on a permit to be hired full-time as a beginning teacher because they're in one of these critical shortage areas so that the meat of the policy is for us to be able to identify what are our shortage areas for jefferson county so trying to understand why somebody's on that permanent sub-list yet
089they're going around the county subbing okay it could yeah it could be possible i mean i'd have without having the data in front of me it could be possible that um that they have gone over 140 days or that were that um that they would just might be in that that status that they could be in this this area but the state's recognizing them as a permanent sub in that system and they probably hold a long-term sub permit too which is also the permanent sub so these are t2 teachers that i've seen on there that are retired and they're listed as permanent subs assigned to schools but they're not there okay so that's what i'm talking about and i'm wondering well there are some things too and and there's been um yeah maybe if we're
090talking about yeah it's getting already gone into certified lists right the policy yeah in terms of that i think for those two individuals it would be good to sit down and see who she's talking about and then you can backtrack where they the state might be using different language or and it could be like a um sometimes the the process of certified lists doesn't necessarily um catch uh maybe some systematic because it's all manual data entry that goes into something so it could be where position inventory is kept it could be um some old assignment that's kind of lingering in there i just and so i'm concerned because there are some schools that are still suffering yeah they need um subs or a permanent sub there and um i don't know how that it doesn't
091impact that yeah it doesn't impact that yeah so they're still able they're still just them if you want to um shoot me who the names are and then i mean i only know of a couple that i yeah so i know at least one teacher there who's on that list and i know she's she's you know on a cruise somewhere yeah and it made it yeah it may depend too so maybe after the me i mean actually after the meeting if you want to just let me if i can jot down their names and i might even know off the top of my head if there was a a time lapse or a gap or anything like that so is there a plan though to help because like so one thing that giving the half
092day on friday i think teachers really appreciated that and i know that you got permission to do that and maybe you don't get permission again i don't know but things just like um you know alleviating lesson plans i mean this is the only place i mean i've worked in many different areas and school systems and you see the only place i've ever had really i was ever treated so unprofessionally that i had to have a lesson plan ready you know i mean after some teachers i could see if you're a new teacher or sub but teachers have been teaching for 20 years and they've got to have these lesson plans sitting out just something to alleviate because they're still covering classes and if we can't give them the half day then what can we do
093so i think we've gone pretty far afield from asking no no no ma'am although i do want to be clear and we'll update you guys on the recruitment and retention plan we have met with the faculty senate and we met with the principals to give us the criteria for a focused lesson plan where we distilled it down to um some very fine one page points because yes they they do need to let us know what they're teaching and the principals need to hold them accountable but when both of those parties have looked at the draft and given us suggestions and feedback and we'll have a final uh out to them so those are things that we're looking at to alleviate that so thank you for that but right now we're we're simply asking for this
094policy which is just another tool for us to use to get a couple more days out to put it up for public comment for two weeks it's just it's hard to get a conversation unless something comes up so it's just me it's and miss lauren it looks like we need everybody but possibly i don't see media center professionals on here anywhere no we've been blessed it might be easier to list what we don't need than what we do need but you know i guess that's not how they want the policy presented right okay so we have a motion to approve um to place policy 3120 point 12 substitutes in areas of critical need and shortage on public review and comment all in favor say aye opposed all right thank you next we have um discussion
095and possible action regarding the december 27 2021 regular board meeting uh yes ma'am obviously your second board meeting of the month for december falls on december 27th traditionally the board has taken a vote regarding whether or not you want to move the date of that meeting or not hold that meeting and cancel it traditionally it's been to cancel it simply because at that time of the year two days after christmas we have very little to present to you um so and we'll have a regular meeting on january the 10th yes ma'am all right since i can't remember not oh or i can't rem can't remember using that meeting i would support and remove to not have that meeting okay so mr cable's making a motion to cancel the december 27th meeting is there a second
096second thank you miss ogden any discussion we'll have meetings on the calendar next week and then the meeting on the 10th is that correct that's correct so if anything needs to happen we can always it's here we have the 13th of december we'll have our regular meeting and then um the week prior to that we have two calendar meetings so we've got three meetings between now and the end of the year yes ma'am and the board always has the ability to call a special meeting with three days notice should you require one for something yes ma'am all right so there's a motion to cancel the december 27th meeting all in favor say aye aye opposed all right thank you superintendent's comments do you have any comments for us this evening no ma'am all right and
097then um we have an executive session on personnel with action anticipated is that correct yes ma'am all right is there a motion to go into executive session for personnel thank you miss ogden is our second jordan thank you mr cable all in favor of going into executive session for personnel with action say hi opposed thank you [Music]