001um just as a reminder for everyone that is here there is a statewide mass mandate so we are in this school building it's required that we follow this law so i'm asking anyone who does not have their mask on currently and does not have a medical exemption to please put those on right now if you do not have one we have them up here for you um but um okay [Music] agenda that public comment would be by sign up only i do see that there are quite a number of people signed up so actually at this time i'd like to make a motion to move the public comment portion of meeting until after new business we have a number of guests here tonight that are in their 12-13 power of work and so in respect
002of their time we'd like to get the business all right moving just like to welcome ben a senior ben bogus doing a great job really proud of him making it all the way to senior year and he's going to be with us at the student representative actually ben because of the setup tonight turn around and wave hi to the camera so you can say hi mom make sure very important and i'll give you an advanced thank you and advanced congratulations on your first report go for it for tonight i don't have too much to talk about but just kind of report on how the school year has started off for the high school so i live here counselor i've gotten to walk around the building and help a lot of students to their classes and
003just from that i've seen that compared to past years a lot of students are like a lot more familiar with the building right away than they would normally be which is interesting but um it's kind of like walk up to a student they need some help you ask them for some help or if they need some help and give you help and then for the most part they become independent right from there so it's interesting it's interesting to see like that um i'm definitely happy with that we have a lot of the clubs that are going to be starting up again we'll get to meet after school right at the school so that'll be nice um the next item is written correspondence um issues thank you um the next item is exactly okay thank you
004rosa thanks everyone welcome uh this evening to everybody here tonight uh really an exciting time for the first day of school um just uh yesterday really really went well um the first people i want to thank uh is our brookfield police department they were fantastic in terms of being managing traffic and giving us a hand with everything in the buses and with dan very having a kindergarten center over at st joe's at the extra traffic over there that really really helped us out with construction and the like and still going around in town can't thank him not from chief purcell and major crazy and then of course our teachers administrators nurses custodians uh maintenance secretaries paris everybody really pulled together it's been it was really nice to see in comparison to the nerves of last
005year the energy and excitement in the building of the staff and the kids followed suit um i had to thank the parents um the kids are fired up they're excited as ben was talking about um i know joy as freshmen you know and the kids finding their way around the high school and some of the bigger schools and they're just doing a great job so that's the first thing really excited and thank everybody for a great first couple of days the other piece is one to let everybody know today was the first day for kindergarten first grade yesterday at center school kindergarten today and then tomorrow three days so we'll have a full compliment tomorrow at center school our welcome back convocation was held on monday to bring the staff back together mr buckley our
006district teacher of the year did a great job with his um with his message to the staff we also showed a video i showed a video called fish philosophy centered on some of the work at the pikes place fish market in washington uh seattle washington uh when some of the practices that go along with that building uh climate morale especially in the times we're in right now we've been really well received by the staff we also had our principals introduce all the new staff it was exciting to see all the new faces and everybody excited to get going i'd like to congratulate mr post uh our business director ken submitted the year-end uh educational finance system uh submission i know our finance committee gets very excited about that that was all submitted today and we
007received no red flags when it went through the first time so that was actually really exciting uh in addition to that um i shared an award late last week we received approval of the 828 thousand dollar federal grant for the ark esser funding and some of the things that we're finding in this school year summer school intervention supports chromebooks for the students and the tech integration specialists so we're really excited about that full approval of that grant now for the next three years uh kindergarten enrollment we are right where we were talking about two weeks ago as a matter of fact with all the ebbs and flows uh mrs diamond shared with me at 4 40 this afternoon that we are down two students in kindergarten from 179 to 177 at as a 440 today
008and down one student in first grade 167 and 166 so really managing and watching those numbers closely um a reminder for the board a big meeting on the 15th where the principals will come and share their opening week reports and introduce all of the new faculty in district that we introduced at next time is the board meeting and then let's see i did want to add that we are we have a memo on the executive order from the governor uh 13d about the covered workers which board of ed employees fall under um and so we're working on the collection of vaccination status and if there's exemptions and the testing protocols and all that so we're working with our staff on that uh over a third responded within 24 hours to the survey and that was
009on the first day of school so they're really responding and they're being very responsible and we appreciate the staff on that and then the final piece is um i invited um if there's no other questions for me i want to let everybody know invited dr garcia if any of the board had any questions regarding safety opening of school and you know he's a resource for us he's a consulting medical advisor he's a pediatrician in town um so i invited him to come to the podium if any of the board members had any questions um i wanted to talk to him about some of the follow-ups from last time you can do that thank you um the informational portion of the meeting um we're not here to make any decisions there is no decisions we may
010have already asked but because of all the public comment we've received and some of the interests in this particular topic we wanted to invite dr garcia to answer any of our clarifying questions that any of the board members might have so would anybody like to start so thank you for coming you're welcome uh i'd like to start first with a more environmental a discussion about what's going on in brookfield um last time you and dr sullivan came we were at a very low point in terms of our infection rate and i've been watching the weekly reports and had gone up steadily in terms of what you're seeing on the ground and could you just describe a little bit about where are we in terms of infections and in particular as a pediatrician you know the
011kids right what are we seeing with kids in birth i want to be very specific to vocal not the national like i think we have to make decisions about what's happening here [Music] so i'm gonna start with the office we can test we have a pcr test machine in the office all of the kids who are sick who come in with possible coping symptoms are tested we have had very few positives um and i was looking at today's numbers i don't have anything in particular about in particular but [Music] that my reference is covetacnow.org and there's a website that um numbers so [Music] the total new cases in fairfield county was about 17 new cases for 100k so according to the levels of community transmission [Music] put out by the cdc that is a moderate
012which means that the total new cases per 100k is between 10 and 49. um we have a the percentage of positive cases the past seven days in fairfield county is i think 4.7 that's the number today so if you if you track it and so the the website has a graph and the graph is steadily moving upward um it used to be very very low a couple of months ago and like you said and now it's coming back up i have a couple of i just drew a couple of um numbers of the american-american pediatrics there are two there were more than 200 000 positive tests in children in the last week and that is in the entire united states and between eight between august 20 and august 26 there were 330 children admitted to
013the hospital every day so those i that was not part of the numbers uh whether it was the delta variant it's assumed that it is it's not uh i didn't see any verification i think that one of the two best places to look at in terms of [Music] the current numbers are the kogidak now site and also johns hopkins has a site that keeps track of all counties and considering considering the data when do you think you might be advisable in the future um very good question [Music] i think the answer to that is if we consistently have low levels of community transmission so there's a a um description at the ctc website um the transmission is um the low level is the direct the uh the definition of low is zero to nine total
014new cases per 100k in the population and um the percentage of positive cases should be less than five percent i think that at that point if it's consistently um that low in the community [Music] it's hard because um it's hard to determine because this is new when we don't have uh a lot of data to base what consists of consistently but yeah that's frustrating so related to that the last time we met you and dr sullivan reported on the guidance that was coming in from the dph to stay low right it was and we learned a lot about the course of law if you will of the governor's degree at that meeting um what is the latest guidance that you're getting from dph or should that be something we asked i've sold about so um
015it's it's the same which is masks are recommended for kids to win up and all of the adults in schools nothing has changed since the the declaration last july the recommendations so the positivity rate so positive rate is positive cases by the total test correct percent of positive cases positively rate is positive cases divided by total cases correct positivity right yeah okay i'm just clarifying that sure so positive tests are total uh total cases uh what about actual total tests are they going up as well in your practice and around that one person can test positive twice in the same weekend get double counted have you encountered any situations like that you mean they go to two test places yeah two locations why would they go to because if they tested positive [Music] i'll step
016back so uh testing is up right we're testing more people uh we are yes uh are we testing whether vaccine it doesn't matter this matter positively rates around again um are we now both of those websites and i like tt go actually and it's all about the same you said 17 per 100k i believe brookfield has a 26-16 point whatever so it's really it's really interesting uh any idea of hospitalizations deaths i mean you haven't had the i did so would you think the increase in testing would could inflate the positivity rate if you're testing a lot more people than we did a month ago it can i was going to say that i don't think that we actually i think we meant i'm just talking about our office which is really small um i
017don't think we slowed down on testing um throughout the summer we and i'm there four days a week um we we didn't go we didn't decrease the um our threshold for testing so whether they're vaccinated or not uh if they have any kind of symptoms related to coping we tested the kids um and our numbers were very very low to nine four weeks in the summer and then it started to slowly climb up and that's just us across the board if i if i see if i look at the uh it follows the every hospital senses information about their positivity rate and their number of cases those zones are so hard to get hospitalization but yeah actually saw this in the last death of brookfield was invented because that's right i think dr sullivan has
018more information about that i don't dr garcia i'm curious about any um children presenting in your office with health conditions that contribute to mass wearing are you seeing any detrimental effects of children suffering from any respiratory issues that can contribute to wearing honesty i don't i for example for kids who have asthma and um are on masks all day we haven't seen an increased need for treatment with their medicine although beautiful i think it's more the kids get tired of wearing it and um they they they they just don't feel like wearing it at the end of the day um i've seen one of the things that i remember seeing is a couple of kids who i saw in the afternoon they were little they're like six or seven and of course they're masked in
019the office and then i have to check their nose and mouth right and when you take off the mask it's dirty looking inside and i worry about that you know um that's like the full day's worth of breathing but that's all i remember i don't really see any relationship with so illness sounds like the benefit of wearing them outweighs the risk of not wearing i'm convinced yes that it is definitely outweighing the risk of getting sick thank you you're welcome dr c have you written any exemptions [Music] for instance i have not i have not i have written some recommendations on modification um for maybe an increased number of aspects for a couple of children into practice very young children who um who could be in the spectrum may benefit from that so it's been
020mostly most immediate reasons yes are you making recommendations to clean those send multiple masks it's best to send a couple of spares and also to keep them clean every day and wash them but yes i do speak with the parents there's a potential that kid can break breathe in you know toxins everybody actually does get rid of um no i'm worried about just the you know the the the dirt that gets into the mask like mucus for example from your nose well okay [Music] thank you very much for being here i know that um answering some of these questions it's not what you're here for but thank you for answering our general medical questions and um do parents get to ask them questions no they do not thank you and i will actually pause here
021and remind you to keep your mask on um like i said this is a state law the board holds liability for following that law so if you're not going to keep your mess done [Music] um let's move on to subcommittee reports actually governon so we can run to the consent agenda um is that's unanimous um on to new business and we have first up is the summer technology update so um [Music] um good evening good evening everyone we're excited to start the school year again and get everything off and running um but i won't take too much time tonight to explain some of the projects that we got to work on this summer uh we have a couple projects that we got to finish a couple projects in the works a couple projects from last
022year that we didn't get to finish either um so first some of the big budget items that we're on um all of our high school staff got new laptops this uh this summer um most of them actually came and picked them up over the summer so that gave us the ability to repurpose their laptops to huckleberry and center for one over the year because those staff members will get new laptops um which in a replacement lifecycle works out perfectly for the new building so that will work out very very well um one of our other big projects was um the 15 display boards um that were to be installed and finish out the high school so we can move on to even those ones called the whiskey um those words can be completed by the
023starting school but with the shortages of everything happening there is currently a glass shortage um that uh the company that recorded um the smart the smart boards i'm using the word smartwatch they're actually digital display boards uh the company view sonic witnessing a huge um shortage um and so we're looking for installation hopefully from the end of september early october um the staff still has projectors and ways to show their screens up in the middle of the classroom so we're getting by there um excuse me we got our one-to-one chromebooks plus our additional 300 chromebooks that we asked for our team uh worked very quickly as they arrived we got them ready we got them sent over to the schools we got them ready uh chromebook handouts started last week at the high school also
024last week at whiskey here as well um i don't have the numbers to listen here um at the moment we're a little bit further behind on handouts there but um for the high school since last thursday we've handed out um almost 550 chromebooks already to the one-to-one program so that is a great start for the second day of school so we're really happy about that the team worked really hard to make sure that we made the process uh efficient for families to come in pick up the chromebook from the library while they were here for orientation or dedicated pickup times we followed the same procedure from the eighth grade at wisconia um we had some come in and pick them up they're in orientation uh we're having students pick them up during the year we
025collected chromebooks at the end of the school year from families that had them due to remote learning um or anything like that and uh so this year we are because of a lot of a lot of uncertainty in what the school year is going to look like um with the virus we are having devices available for students in k-7 we're giving three options we're allowing students to bring their own device again byod we're allowing students to obtain a device from their classroom we're handing out everything through the classroom this year they can get the device from their classroom bring it to and from school as needed um as we're doing we're not giving as much in front of technology all day anymore but we are utilizing this regular part of our classroom instruction through google
026classroom and other various resources that we use um and so they can take it to and from school another option is some may not want to carry it back and forth in their backpack they might have a device at home so they're going to have one assigned to them in the classroom they can leave it in school they can have one at home so we're hoping that um giving without some good feedback on it so far we're going to start handing them out um and assigning them to uh to students in k7 and huckleberry tomorrow at whiskey near next week once we get a determination of who's doing the byod so the chromebooks are going very very well it's a lot of chromebooks it's a lot of students but the team is doing a really
027really great job in getting those all done we spent a good amount of the summer working on some infrastructure work we were working on dividing up some of our wireless traffic from our wire traffic and our phone traffic create more reliable connections and really take advantage of the additional bandwidth that we purchased this year from the connecticut education network um and so to separate the traffic and um and dedicate the traffic going out of our network and back in has really made a difference so far um and we've seen um not only better quality wifi but also better quality phone servers too inside the districts and i'm talking about the district landline phones not so long so that's going very very well um our other big projects um have included we followed a couple years
028ago i think some of you may not have been on the board yet at that point we removed all the computer labs from huckleberry um to focus on using more chromebooks we followed suited wisconsin so um there's one out of i believe we had five computer labs at whiskey here we're down to one now um the influx of the chromebooks and the need for space in the classrooms and the ability to do more inside the classrooms has led to this and so we're really excited to be able to offer more chromebooks and and repurpose those computer lab spaces the chromebooks give us a lot more flexibility inside of school and so that's great everybody's really excited about that another big project we've been working on is addressing and i don't want to go too much
029into detail on this right now but um we've been doing a lot to address cyber security we're very aware of what's happening in education outside of education and you know nobody's immune to it um you know so we are looking at taking measures like multi-factor authentication for all staff and administrators enhanced device protections in and out of the district and that includes chromebooks even though they don't do as much necessarily and they can't get as many viruses as a windows device there's still a risk and um so we're taking a big look at that that's an ongoing project but we did kick off to do a lot of that over the summer um so those are some of our big projects this year um a lot of a lot of infrastructure work the chromebooks are
030always going to be our primary front and center and of course we're excited to provide staff with new technology as we can so any questions for eric that was a lot of work thank you very much the next item on our agenda is the summer fall athletics update um but our athletic director steve baldwin had a scheduling issue so we're going to have him back in the next couple of weeks so that would bring us to our public comment portion um i just want to read a couple of things before we get started all right so while others are speaking please remember that they are the ones that have the floor so there should be absolutely no commentary from the crowd um this goes for the remainder of our meeting if you choose to stay
031after that as well with masks again there's mass mandates i ask that you please wear it when you come up to the podium as well if you have a medical exemption for this which should be a distance from others when you step up to the po to the podium please just take your name your address for the record you will have three minutes to speak on matters that are within the board's purview we have these visual timers here to help you out so we'll also indicate to you when your three minutes is up we'll tell you to finish your thought if you go much beyond those three minutes we have the ability to turn your mic off so please just respect um the time that's here that's given so that everybody else gets a chance
032to speak as well um and that's pretty much it so we're gonna go run through this list and the first up is logan's cylinder hi my name my is and i have three kids in the district a first grader a fifth grader and a seventh grader and i'm here tonight because i wanted to ask you as you've done my last year to continue to follow the science the data the medical what i understand from the past board meeting is successful for normal transmission to no transmission last year so we would look towards that and determine the protocols for the future uh second i wanted to say that as this conductor evolves i'm glad to see that uh silhouette is one so i know our kids were in person last year and this year i could
033see a difference already in the two days of school or two of this come here and working and we have lunch with their friends again they love being able to move around the classrooms um even having some of their playground equipment back so they can play with their friends last year not having the desk shield has been helpful they always chucked them out sometimes to be able to see not having a computer is a huge thing they were getting pretty tired and sitting in front of the computer for all of their assignments and really for them the masks have not been a problem um for them they saw the launchers don't even notice that they're wearing it and when i ask them if they would prefer to wear it or out of school they say
034they would refer to their like they do not want to have to worry about increased potential for transmissions of the virus or going into quarantine or going back to the season they want to be in school and so the final point that i would read is that i know that there are um you consider the concerns of parents that would like to have asks the option i would ask that you also consider the concerns of your children then we'll be sitting in there some of the masks if i'm not and those are may be afraid of a potential increase of transmission from being indoors with other individuals that are unmasked near them for the risk of bringing it home to younger siblings to older ones or to families with health issues for me last year
035i went through treatment for cancer and the same time endemic so the thought of having coded brought into our house on top of that was something we wanted to avoid at all costs and knowing that there are actually things that you can do to minimize your risk to bring them into the home is important and so i would say the actions of one or two or two have an impact thank you next is good evening my name is ron jaffe i live at 21 white pine drive i'm also here to talk about masks in public safety a bit of context i sat where you now sit for seven years i was on the board of edge so i know the challenges and realities facing the world i can tell you that the one thing that
036guided my actions with the commitment to do what was right and then to spend time and energy explaining my actions to their feelings i also never wanted to be in a position where i had to tell parents that i wished i had done more to protect their children while apologized period if i were sitting in your chair right now i'd rely on the overwhelming consensus of scientists researchers the cdc the nih and more follow the science not the outliers then explain your actions and address the noise in clear language politics are complicated but doing what is right to protect the students teachers staff and community is not complicated at all regardless of whether the governor's powers are extended please continue to protect all of brook field thank you up next is tara carr good evening
037my name is tara carr i'm a resident of 54 indian trail a taxpayer and a concerned mother to four children aged 12 10 8 and 6. i have spoken with many parents who feel very strongly that they do not want their children wearing masks all day parents instincts tell them that masking their child has unhealthy ramifications and they have done their research which we all know it includes the harmful effects of this constant masking for example strep staph and other dangerous bacteria have been found on freshly laundered masks after just one day of wearing studying dr garcia alluded to an increased risk of chronic headaches depression anxiety due to lack of oxygen and increased inhalation carbon dioxide that they're being forced to endure and although dr garcia's small office which he said it is doesn't
038experience that doesn't mean it's not happening there are scholarly articles on both sides of the mass effectiveness issue we all know that and yet health officials tell us that keeping our mass kids in masks because we need extra layers of protective strategies well connecticut.gov statistics show that children have an almost zero percent risk to themselves or others when it comes to dying from this violence the social and emotional ramifications of this chronic masking is yet unknown but it's not hard to predict human beings especially babies and toddlers observe facial features to develop their sense of empathy with others and to fully comprehend emotions young children rely on visual cues that inform a lifetime of socialization and communication but we're putting our three-year-olds behind these masks beyond those developmental concerns there are psychological ones which i
039think mrs logan said we know that mass wearing depletes oxygen levels putting the brain into a relative state of fear and anxiety layer that with the constant messaging of fear that children currently receive from tv social media and other influences and it's not hard to see that the unintended cited unintended side effects of this precaution are anything but harmless we are conditioning a generation of fearful children who believe on some level that they and those around them are vectors of disease it's absurd we're also encouraging children to simply be compliant and unquestioning how does that encourage critical thinking all one has to do is look around society and see how mixed the messages are that our kids are getting it's okay to unmask at a crowded restaurant but not at school it's okay to be
040massive all summer playing with your friends going shopping at target well once you're back at school you're in danger again most kids want to please their parents and teachers so they comply and they go about their day they want to be able to be in school with their friends which mrs lokman said so they follow the rules even if they don't make sense to the kids in my opinion it is our job as parents to advocate for the health and well-being of our own kids and to not accept what i've heard some parents say that the kids can tolerate it that's from finishing i'm here to say i think our society will look back on this time with a sense of shame that people who are standing up for parental rights medical freedom and freedom
041of speech were mocked and censored in so many ways what i support is families being empowered to make their own decisions based on their own values beliefs research and in consultation with their doctors thank you [Music] [Applause] i'm here tonight because i'm tired of misinformation i'm frustrated with refuting flimsy arguments from the unmasking contingent most of all i'm sad to have to speak out in opposition to some i've known as friends for many years i watched video from the last board meeting where unmasters passionately cited scientific proof of their cause i don't have the time to counter every claim so i randomly chose one there was reference major research titled non-pharmaceutical measures for pandemic influenza in non-healthcare settings personal protective and environmental measures which allegedly concluded that mastering had no bearing on preventing disease a
042quick check of the pointer institute's politifact indicates this claim was a misunderstanding at best first the research does not mention coronavirus or copepit 19. second none of the 10 trials reviewed was done during a pandemic the kicker is said texas a m university texarkana fibrologist ben neuman quote just weeks later a group with the same senior author plus some coronavirus specialists produced a paper demonstrated that masks are indeed highly effective in stopping infected people from releasing airborne viruses unmaskers fact check yourself stop politicizing a public health issue stop trying to sway local officials to do the wrong thing based on junk science and half truths do better let me lay a few more real facts about masking and hope at 19 on you masking in schools is recommended by the american academy of pediatrics the
043centers for disease control and the world health organization among others in mid-june child cases of cobalt represented about 10.1 percent of total cases in mid-july that number uh jumped to 22.3 percent of public cases as of last week in eight atlanta school districts where masks are currently mandated student body copit positivity over the previous two week period range from 0.6 to 1.7 in seven where there is no mass mandate the rate range from 1.4 to 3.5 hardly a coincidence you think that great philosopher arnold schwarzenegger once said know your strengths and listen to the experts it takes strength that you don't know to admit that you don't know everything weakness is thinking you don't need expert advice and only listening to sources that confirm what you want to believe to close i'd invite you on
044masters to simply admit it you just don't want to do it at least be honest about that it's the only fact you have [Music] [Applause] i give you credit for saying it right so hi my name is luisa i reside at 1600 road and there's just two things i want to address so it's brought to my attention that some of the high school teachers may not be wearing math because they're supposed to be facts so if that's the case um if we're all to be wearing masks i expect that to be addressed immediately so um from what i understand whether you're vaccinated or not you can still contract and spread over it so let's not pretend that the vaccines are helping anybody second thing i want to address are iep students my son is an
045iep student and the whole thing was about quarantining and whether vaccinated you won't be quarantined and if you're on ambassador you will be quarantined regardless of the status to me if my son is in the unlikely event quarantined i want to know how he's going to deceive his iep services since there's no remote learning so i just did his case manager who told me they'll stay in contact with him that's unacceptable we have a legal obligation to provide services to my child and any imp student and i expect some kind of plan to be put in place to address imp students and whether it's a zoo for their iep if you don't want to do the remote part of thing that's fine but someone has to address services and if it's not going to happen
046over zoom in the timely fashion that it's supposed to at whatever number of times per week then it needs to be made up at some point when the child is returned back to school so that needs to be addressed immediately because my son needs services and he does well with his services so i expect a plan to be put in action soon because there is none so those are my two things i hope you address the teachers immediately if we're gonna be mad forever thank you [Applause] [Music] [Applause] uh uh so everyone in the room um want the same thing you know they want kids to be healthy masks uh i mean they help mitigate the spread of viruses which help protect the children as well as teachers and staff and there's less risk to
047them so nobody loves masks i mean it's an inconvenience more than anything but nobody said it's forever and uh i've observed most children they're not even phase 5 all right and they were you know they were wearing an ass all last year once it went in seven okay you got coconut numbers going up you got the other variants uh males are something you just you should accept for now and everyone's well-being and you know look why tend to faint by not learning uh just stay the course the last point um i'm not a politician not a scientist i'm not a doctor but um try looking up your average surgery open heart surgery for example that's six hours i'm pretty sure that a surgeon you know that's not they're getting plenty of oxygen so yeah and
048to say well you need to worry about uh strep or something building up if the strength is already in you what difference does it make if you're wearing a mask why was it going to hurt anymore if anything you should be protecting everybody else a little bit it's just you know coping aside you can touch it do a lot of the benefits there um [Music] yeah i i can't think of a reason logically why you stopped learning math now it's it's for kids it's with teachers you know we care his community for everybody thank you for your time [Applause] i'm speaking tonight to support them to voice my support from lasting in our schools i'm a parent of a seventh grader and the fifth grader the youngest one is not eligible for that solution and
049i was relieved when the state mandated its mass wearing was at the end of the month to give us a start to the healthy school and despite the increased vaccination around the brookfield we still have a large group of students and siblings who are not yet eligible for the vaccine the delta variant has proven to be more infectious and contagious even though the vaccine reduces the risk of severe illness vaccinated individuals and still spread the buyers i'm asking our kids even the vaccinated one will increase the risk for our young women on vaccinated community members and students in our return to school this year was closer to normal than how the end of the year which means that our kids are now moving around more and have more exposure as a result the class sizes
050are also closer to normal with all students in person and this is great for the socialization abilities for our kids and i think it's really helping them start off with school year but please keep the mass in place until our younger students are eligible for vaccination so i encourage the board of ed administrations to follow the advice of healthcare professionals and medical experts um who really are the key holders of the knowledge for vaccination and mastery um [Applause] grass good evening i'm a freshman in brookfield high school i'm speaking on behalf of my mother anna solomon who is a nurse practitioner of 17 years i'm here tonight to state my support for the brookfield school district in the following cdc recommendations to keep our students masked in school and ask that you continue to follow
051this recommendation after the september 30th day i come to you with unique perspectives not only as a high school student but also as a daughter of a professional my mother is an accused care nurse practitioner her mutual assignment is in the cardio thoracic icu however during times of the public search she has worked in the medical icu which has been filled with code with patients she has the heartbreaking misfortune of attending to her patients as they died horrible deaths they even have a patient of the almost 18 died with a code 19 infection additionally she was infected with covenant in december of last year which as a student was terrible for me to watch i share this to all for you of my mother's background and expertise opponents to the masking policy might think that
052your child won't get sick and exposed to this i would like you to ask to look at the rapid rise of pediatric admissions to the hospital recently the american academy of pediatrics report that the pediatric code cases have increased from 38 000 reported the week ending july 22nd to 200 for 204 thousand reported the week ending august 25th that's a five-fold increase in cases and the cdc has reported 309 children per day or 2 000 plus children per week with golden infections are hospitalized in the usa and maybe a child won't get sick but they can still bring the virus home and pass it along to others or pass it along to another student with a chronic illness remember asymptomatic infection accounts are nearly 50 of transmission if the hospital is filled with failed and
053pediatric medical collocations or will the child go with the acid attack if it gets sick when two people wear a mask the rate of transmission is greatly reduced cdc reports a multi-layered cloth mask can reduce 50 to 70 percent over carrying droplets signs have proven this this isn't taking away your freedom it's about the safety of others the schools are opening which is remarkable wearing a mask is not unbearable as i and especially my mother can tell you what is unbearable is losing more people to the pandemic especially if it's someone you care about please continue to support the cdc recommendations for masking indoors at school thank you [Music] um hi mary campbell 135 candidly pro today my husband tony and i lived in brookfield for 32 years our three children went to brookfield schools
054k-12 tony and volunteered in town for many things through the years as a matter of fact he would figure that he's serving the conservation commission tonight among other things i was a math teacher in richmond for 11 years most of us here tonight are parents from before our children are even born we want to keep themselves safe and healthy we go to doctors appointments take immune vitamins eat well don't smoke a dream while pregnant we give birth in clean modern hospitals with the best doctors nurses in medicine and technology we put our babies and children in safe car seats and seat belts we put our children in lifecast while out on the lake we love the healthy competitive social team building skills that our children learn while playing sports of course you buy them all
055the necessary productive gear for that in some cases helmets pads are not parts we can do a little more to protect our children having had children in school and been a teacher i know that everybody wants a safe learning environment for our students staff and teachers we have fire drills and active shooter drills we have enough free classrooms we keep kids home and off the roads during snow and iceland we can do a little work to protect our children right now so here we are in the middle of a panda i'll never expect you to be living through something like this these things happen in our history textbooks not my life i listened in class so i knew what a book says but i didn't really know i really understand but if a virus keeps
056spreading and youtube can become more contagious and more deadly well at least it's good to know there are some several layers of protection to try to stop the spread of the virus vaccination masking social distance and airflow these work best and everybody does it together in the community i know that we've worked with face diversity before we always work together to get through it we worked together when we found asbestos in the schools late on spring almost 20 years ago we got in the mood and even met our students several more weeks of school thanks to collaborating the bethel we worked together when our beautiful town and power grid were designated by rockworkers three years ago we put our children in sports and scouts for them to learn how to work together and help themselves
057we put our students in groups for them to learn how to work together on projects and to call themselves equally important we teach our children compassion for others and personal responsibility our children are watching us in this moment we need to show them when times are tough grown ups care enough about them and each other to work together i support growing massive school in all of us at this point because a delta variant is more contagious we our students are tuned in to be vaccinated yet see the sooner we work together regarding vaccination masking and social distancing the sooner we can defeat the virus and get back to normal indeed master safety we can do a little more our children and teachers from coming for a little while longer i want to thank the board
058of ed teachers paris custodial staff office staff administrators and bus drivers for the enormous work that they've been doing so thank you all for volunteering the countless hours of your time that you do i'm here tonight to encourage you to continue listening to scientists and health health professionals and following cdc guidelines and proven strategies to keep our children safe from the transmission of hogan 19. while i imagine most people would prefer to live life like we did pre-poked we're still in a worldwide pandemic with children being diagnosed and hospitalized more than four we've seen the preventative benefits of mask wearing and vaccinations worldwide the results are clear where vaccinations and mass wearing are low transmission and hospitalizations are high where vaccinations and mask wearing are high transmissions and hospitalizations are low the cdc guidelines state
059that when teachers staff and students consistently and correctly wear a mask over their nose and mouth they protect others as well as themselves i asked that school staff remind students and each other to wear their masks properly as many tend to allow their masks to fall below their noses we know that consistent and correct mask use is especially important indoors and in crowded settings such as on the bus and in school especially when physical distancing cannot be maintained this was proven last year with our low transmission rates in our schools vaccination is the leading public health prevention strategy to the code 19 pandemic the cdc recommends that schools encourage teachers staff and families to get vaccinated as soon as they can thank you dr burel for sharing the information about the vaccine clinic at the
060new milford school that was organized for students this summer i know many students received their vaccines there yet there are still many students who have not been vaccinated either by choice or by age therefore it is that much more important that masks be warned consistently and and correctly in school the the cdc recommends that this be followed in school during sports after school programs and on buses physical distancing should be maintained as much as possible doors and windows should be opened for ventilation where able and i'll add that if classes can be held outdoors it's a welcome opportunity allowing time for hand washing and sanitizer use and covering coughs even with a mask on should be encouraged students are taught to think critically learn the facts and consider reputable sources they are taught to make
061responsible decisions based on the days that they compile my 15 and 11 year olds both know that the most responsible thing that they can do to end this is to be vaccinated but my 11 year old can't be vaccinated yet however she knows that the best thing she can do to protect herself from catching the virus is to wear her mask consistently and correctly she also knows that the most responsible thing she can do to protect her peers is to wear her mask even if it's inconvenient she deserves a station she deserves the same protection from students and staffs that will surround her on the bus and during activities and in school please continue to keep our students safe thank you [Applause] i agree just uh scientific opinion is built on consensus is achieved through
062the process of qualified experts conducting professional research having professional debate and doing professional peer review it does not require a 100 agreement consensus is achieved when most experts agree about something there will almost always be a small segment of experts with minority opinions but consensus is enough to move forward with actions endorsements and plans the scientific consensus about masking is very clear it has a large consensus amongst medical doctors scientific experts and other people relevant to the concern masks slow the spread it is a mitigation it's not a guarantee the science is clear mass slowed the spread of this disease when ventilation and distancing may not be enough others have talked about the mental health of students as a school social worker of 27 years i've been working with students for a long time i
063work with students over the past two years few if any have had significant anxiety or other difficulties due specifically to maxwell are they having trouble with the pandemic like all of us of course specifically to mass not in my experience could there be exceptions of course but those would be rare while i have no doubt that all parents care for their children it's very clear when we hear these parents speak but there's also something else happening there is a well-organized and manufactured effort that is feeding some of these concerns that force definitely seems to be political this should not be the basis of health and safety measures finally in regards to parents being able to choose what is best for their own children i want to say this what is best for my children is
064for all children to be wearing masks while they're in school personal freedom does not include the freedom to make choices that endanger the well-beings of others personal belief of whether or not there is a danger is not a replacement for mass scientific and medical consensus so i'd like to say thank you to the le the town of brookfield the district leadership and to the state of connecticut following advice of true experts and implementing the mass mandates [Music] [Applause] howard last week 116 power road good evening i know the primary responsibility for which we were all elected is to ensure quality education in a safe environment for our children but we live in unusual times and your decision in this regard may have a profound effect on the lost call and i'd urge you to consider
065this in your deliberations now somebody say i don't have a dog in this fight and i hate to refer to as a fight because i don't have children in schools in fact my children are having children but children do not live in a bubble there are so many social interactions among our community that you cannot possibly isolate the impact this decision may have on this call now i listen to the public comment tonight and in previous meetings i'm glad to see there's a more balanced presentation tonight that's great i've heard citations of various studies and other information that was presented i'm confident that you know that in any issue there are outliers and if anyone's if you search for it you can always cherry pick some information to support whatever narrative you want but clearly
066and others have said this already tonight the overwhelming consensus among the medical community the experts is that masses are part of the solution to preventing further spread of this insidious disease and that the benefit of wearing masks far outweighs any ill effects including areas of mental health and linguistics now as for the suggestion that requiring wearing mask somehow takes away someone's freedom in any free society freedom does not come without obligation and responsibilities we all have a choice as to whether we follow the recommendations of the medical community those choices have consequences if the consequence of a choice is to be excluded from a public venue that is a decision we each have to make and accept now i just want to address one thing a question earlier that was raised that sort of indicated
067more testing gets a higher positivity rate um we've heard that before somewhere but this is personal for various reasons i've been tested four times all negative which in effect lowers the positivity rate so the suggestion that higher testing raises positivity rate would be ill-advised to make that conclusion and finally regarding the suggestion that there's low risk or that our infection rate in brookfield is low consider you know look at it when when there's an earthquake offshore there's a high probability that there's a tidal wave that will follow and to wait until the waves are lacking in our shore would be too late to save lives if we look to our neighbors to the south we can see the consequences of a failure to do the right thing and we cannot prevent people from traveling to
068our community so as long as the nation is in the throes of the pandemic it is incumbent on us all to live up to our obligations to our neighbors for the good of the community to take every reasonable and responsible precaution to reduce the risks associated with the spread of this disease [Applause] [Music] i am here to speak as a mother of three young children if you have any trouble understanding me it's because i am experiencing my absence and not my mask this is such an influence right but we should all be able to understand this importance in reducing the threat of others who are in favor of masking too many of us have been sitting at home and just listening to some other parents arguing against masquerading enough is enough for me tonight i
069i felt the urge to speak please keep everyone asked many of our children are vaccinated or at least until our health organizations and doctors say it is safe to do so i want to thank the board for listening and keeping in mind the well-being of our children and our community two comments that i want to make in light of other arguments i've heard from other parents talking about unmasking of children i'm not bathing my children's immune system by exposing them to closely and i do not want my child to be the one effected my goal is to keep my children safe so that they can outlive me and i ask everyone do you need to see a child close to you die before you keep before you respect and follow healthy guidelines that keep your
070neighbors safe thank you [Applause] 95 stonehenge [Music] since june the majority of public comment has been about masking specifically parents requesting that the board of education advocate that we abandon the mass requirement in our schools parents have spoken with great passion and provided information to support this request claims about freedom and my child my choice has come into play the role of the board of education is complex in that it requires members to set aside the luxury that we as parents have in advocating for just our own children the board of education must make decisions that provide a free and appropriate education for all organs children however when it comes to the decision of masks its role is also simple our board of education is not required to sort through all the data we as
071parents provide it is required to answer one question how does it provide the safest and healthiest learning environment during the cold nineteen pandemic the medical community which includes the cdc the american academy of pediatrics and our own health department is in agreement that given the current state of covid19 which is an airborne bias masks provide the best protection for our students that is the answer parents do have the right to choose alternatives to public school but when the medical community is in agreement about how to best manage a crisis of public health our public servants have done their job my request to the board of education is simply that you follow the recommendation of the medical community the experts in infectious disease control i think kids need to wear masks but i am not the
072one you should be listening to on this topic the issues that our children are struggling with from the pandemic are real but every hour that we spend debating masks in public schools against the advice of the medical community as a matter of personal freedom is an hour that we are not spending addressing the social emotional and mental health challenges that our students are struggling with no one prefers wearing masks to not learning parents who speak at these meetings want what's best for their child and their voices should be heard as input to meeting the social emotional and mental health needs of our students infectious disease experts should dictate the decision on wearing masks to keep kids safe and our schools open during the scandal [Applause] um and i encourage everyone to read the articles and
073study um that says holy doctrine people are at greater risk for hospitalizations that's a cool vaccine by the way that's the correct injection from the other ones so 13 times more likely to get um conveyed than those who have natural energy and 27 times more likely to get symptoms but i wanted to focus today on giving you some quotes from interviews dr chalk hoff who has doctor from canada and who has been practicing medicine for twenty eight years i apologize if this is two months ago so maybe somebody already talked about this but um he um can't quote everything he's the main cut of eight minutes um but he's played in detail um how this shocks result in many blood clots um so he describes the science and i presently it's a predictable mechanism of
074clotting and um these are not the clots that you hear about in the media that will show up in ct scans and mri those are huge clouds but he talks about the little class that are scattered throughout our capillary network and they're not going to show up in cg scan so the only way to actually prove this predictable mechanism is to do a de-dynamic test which only would show unfortunately my understanding is after only the new clocks not the old cloud so he was doing his uh testing four to seven days after the vaccinations and he founded of his patients had the body so that's a big number and i recently went to um listen to a local doctor our doctor um uh who said that his prediction our numbers are much higher numbers of
075plotting block lying and much higher and i again read some quotes um from this interview i encourage you to sing not only the kids but like your bus driver that drives the child to and from school that's already masked and has you know less oxygen while you know black modding of pilots who are probably flying you know our kids from locations that are so um which is much dangerous up there examples of patients who like could walk two miles easily but then after the shot cannot walk in the so the terrifying thing is not that these people are now out of breath and can't do what they used to be able to do but once you block off significant number of blood vessels in your lungs your heart is now pumping against much greater resistance
076trying to get the blood through your lungs that cause this condition called pulmonary pulmonary artery hypertension high blood pressure in your lungs because the blood is oh i'm sorry all right there is a lot more here and he says that it gets worse and worse with every shot so if it's accumulative it accumulates in your system and um so the damage will add in out of that and it's going to be cumulative because progressively getting more and more damage capillaries so that's think of this when you're going to be encouraging the third shot because you're going to say you're not fully vaccinated until you have the booster [Applause] hi it's actually kathleen charity calvin carter jerry 51 north mountain road um i'm here fighting for my future grandchildren i'm not really here to speak to
077the board because i believe the members have done nothing and are biased there's about five to ten people running our lives right now taking our freedom away they don't care about our children like we do this actually is political because info has been censored by anyone speaking up against the cdc the who the mainstream media i'm here to speak to the parents who have been protesting and begging you to do your jobs in the best interest of our kids but you will not dig for information parents if you do not want this to continue we simply must say no i have printed out a document resources data legal and medical that is not on the news go home and research harm yourself with information know your rights you will find that these mandates are illegal
078masks mitigate the virus so they say therefore it is considered by our government a medical device you must give informed consent for your child put a mask on they cannot mandate our government is lying to all of us we are essentially having war for our freedom but police are not enforcing this for lamont i got a call from the school police officer saying that he is all for us and that if kids remove their masks he cannot and will not arrest them he said there's nothing he can do mandates are not lost he said he needs the parents to speak up to end this the people who are enforcing this and standing on the enemy side of this at this point is us yes it is us every time we put a mask on our
079children we're enforcing lamont's mandates every time we walk into an established establishment [Music] we are enforcing lamont's mandate we are helping them take away our freedom there is no mass police go home and talk to your teenager encourage them to be leaders and do not fear this tyranny will the school kick all of them out the school can't arrest them the school will not function in your child's best interest until we take back our freedom tell them to grab friends and refuse get team captains to unmask their teammates build a group of soldiers if we do not say no we will lose more of our medical freedoms when they mandate this experimental vaccine that's killing people sterilizing people paralyzing people i asked the pharmacist for the vaccine insert he said there is nothing on the
080insert it says left intentionally blind because there's not a doctor in this world who can say they have data and that the vaccine is safe other countries in most states are not muslim children to the board lamont and dunn we the people do not consent we do not give informed consent to cover our children's airways i'm giving you a copy of this document take this document and consider yourself on notice you will be held legally and medically liable there's thousands of doctors and lawyers suing parents we need to re we need to unite and just refuse don't leave don't let these people take the spirit out of our children public school enrollment is at an all-time low because parents will not allow their freedoms to be stolen the most important video on this document is
081this it was from a doctor who worked on the task force at the white house he said in this video that the task force deliberately lied to america i can't explain it all because i don't have time but i will give you these documents if you want them and i pray that you people on board after you watch this i pray that you first of all will watch it okay because you will not see this on the news every single thing that i've printed out you will not see on the news because you're not digging so i pray for all of you that you will read this information and then make up your mind because you'll be very clear in those three minutes i'm done you'll be very [Applause] um the next item is the
082candle lake elementary school building project that also does not have any updates um the abc has not met since our last quarterback meeting so we are actually onto three big points it was a very brief meeting but um [Music] all schools will be closed on monday and tuesday september 6th and 7th and also on thursday september 16th center school has a virtual open house on wednesday september 8th and a pto meeting on tuesday september 14th alberta has a pto meeting wednesday september 15th and at the high school virtual houses thursday september 9th and underclassmen photos will be friday september 10th and monday september 13th during college classes okay um the last item on our agenda is an executive session um rather than give you the mic again also that the board entered into executive session
083for the purpose of discussing the superintendent's goals [Music] portion of tonight's meeting