001Heat. [Music] Hey, heat. Hey, heat. Heat. Heat. [Music] Heat. [Music] Heat. [Music] Heat. Heat. [Music] Heat. Heat. [Music] Heat. How are you? [Music] Hey, [Music] hey, hey. Heat. Heat. [Music] Heat. [Music] Where are you? [Music] Power. [Music] Heat. Heat. [Music] Hey. Hey. Hey. [Music] EV valuation superintendent evaluation conference with labor negotiator updated on negotiations with ABCFT AF SCME and CSEA government code section 549567.6 conference with real property negotiator one matter government code section 54956.8 8 will be discussing existing litigation. The board will be going into close session pursuant to government code section 54956.9D1 to discuss 11 matters, but has determined that specifically identifying these specific matters would jeopardize its ability to conclude existing settlement negotiations to its advantage. These court cases are LA Superior Court case 22 STCV13426 23 STCV 00374 NWCV1160 22 NWCV STCV1
00223 NWCV01964 4 22 NWC CV 00507 22 DCT DTC V1 9567 22 NWCV 0050 22 NWCV that >> yeah because there's >> a slight there's a slight difference um also we'll be discussing United States central District Court case number 2 colon 21- CV-061663- MWF-PD small X. Also in close session, we'll be discussing student discipline and we'll be deliberating on student expulsion case number 2425-12 pursuant to education code sections 48900R and 48900.2. Madame clerk, are there any comments, public comments on close session items? >> I see none. >> Thank you. Can I have a motion uh for >> second? >> Very good. All in favor say I. I. >> Motion passes. Six to zero. [Music] [Applause] [Music] Heat. Heat. [Music] Heat. Heat. [Music] [Applause] [Music] Heat. Heat. [Music] Doo [Music] doo doo doo doo doo. Heat.
003Heat. [Music] Number [Music] two. [Music] Gans. Heat. Heat. N. Heat. Heat. [Music] Heat. Heat. [Music] Data [Music] Heat. Heat. [Music] Heat. Hey, heat. Hey, heat. [Music] Heat. Heat. [Music] Heat. Hey. Hey. Heat. Heat. [Music] Uh ah [Music] ah [Music] ah hey a a a me a a a a hey a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a me hey Yeah. [Music] Heat. [Music] Heat. Heat. [Music] Heat. Heat. [Music] Heat. Heat. N. [Music] Heat. [Music] Hey. Hey. Hey. [Music] Hey, M. Heat. Heat. [Music] Heat. Heat. N. [Music] Heat. Heat. [Music] Heat. Heat. N. [Music] Heat. Heat. N. [Music] Heat. Heat. [Music] Hey, [Music] hey, hey, hey. [Music] Heat. Heat. [Music] Heat. Heat. [Music] Heat. [Music] Heat. Heat. [Music] Oh yeah. [Music] Hey [Music] Hey.
004[Music] Hey. Hey. [Music] Heat. Heat. [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] Heat. Heat. [Music] Heat. Heat. [Music] [Applause] [Music] Hey. Hey. Hey. [Music] Hey, hey, hey. [Music] Heat. [Music] Hey, Heat. [Music] Heat. Heat. [Music] Heat. Heat. [Music] Heat. Heat. [Music] Heat. Heat. [Music] Heat. Heat. [Music] Heat. [Music] Heat. [Music] Heat. Heat. [Music] Heat. Heat. Heat. [Music] Heat. Heat. [Music] [Applause] [Music] Heat. Hey, Heat. [Music] Heat. Heat. [Music] of [Music] Heat. Hey, Heat. [Music] Heat. Hey, heat. Hey, heat. Heat. [Music] Hey. Hey. Hey. Heat. Heat. [Music] Heat. Heat. [Music] Heat. Heat. [Music] Hey. [Music] Hey. Heat. Heat. [Applause] [Music] Heat. Heat. [Music] Heat. [Music] Heat. [Music] Heat. [Music] Heat. [Music] Heat. Heat. [Music] down. [Music] M Nat down. [Music] Heat. Hey, Heat. [Music] Heat. Heat. [Music] Heat. Heat. [Music]
005Heat. Heat. [Music] Heat. Heat. N. [Music] Heat. Heat. [Music] Heat. Heat. [Music] Heat. Heat. [Music] Heat. Heat. [Music] Heat. Heat. [Music] Heat. Heat. [Music] Heat. Heat. [Music] Heat. Heat. [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] Heat. Heat. N. Heat. [Music] Heat. Heat. [Music] Heat. Heat. [Music] Heat. Heat. [Music] Heat. [Music] Heat. [Music] Hey, Heat. [Music] Hey. [Music] Hey. Hey. Heat. Heat. [Music] [Applause] [Music] Hey, [Music] hey, hey. [Music] Heat. Heat. [Music] Heat. Heat. [Music] Heat. Heat. [Music] Heat. Heat. N. [Music] Heat. Heat. [Music] [Laughter] [Music] Heat. Heat. [Music] Hey hey hey. [Music] Ah, hey. [Music] Hey, [Music] hey, hey. [Music] Hey, [Music] hey, [Music] hey. [Music] Heat. [Music] Heat. Heat. [Music] Heat. [Music] Heat. [Music] Heat. [Music] Hey, heat. Hey, heat. [Music] Board is back in open session. Can I have a motion? >> Second. >> All
006in favor say I. >> I. >> Motion passes 70. Thank you very much. It is 707. Please silence your cell phones. I even turned mine off. If anyone is in need of translation services, there should be somebody in the back to help you with that support. Tonight in close session, the board discussed a lot of things. uh public employee discipline dismissal release evaluation superintendent evaluation conference with labor negotiator update on negotiations with ABCFT AFSCME and CSEA pursuant to government code section 54957.6 we had a conference with real property negotiator one matter government code section 54956.8 Eight existing litigation pursuant to government code section 54956.9D1. The board discussed 11 matters but has determined that specifically identifying the matters will jeopardize its ability to uh conclude existing settlement negotiations to its advantage. Have to read all these.
007>> Uh I previously read through these specific Los Angeles Superior Court cases. Um starting with uh number 22 STCV13426 which is in the agenda and the last one being uh 22NWCV and also United States to Central District Court case number 2- actually colon 21-CV-06163- MWF-PD small X Uh we had a motion uh made by Dr. Rios and seconded by Judy McChatten to approve a settlement agreement and release on Kota at all versus ABCUSD case matter STCV13426 in the amount of $250,000. The insurance carrier will pay $166,667 and the district will pay $83,000 and $333 of towards settlement amount. The motion passed unanimously. Copy the settlement agreement and release will be filed with risk management. It is a public document. Uh student discipline. Can I have a motion and a second based upon the board's review
008in close session that the board accepts the recommendation for expulsion in student expulsion case number 2425-12 and orders a student expelled based on violations of education code sections 48900R and 48900.2 2 pursuant to the stipulated terms and adopts a recommendation uh recommended rehabilitation plan and a student may seek readmission to the district for the period following the conclusion of the 2025 2026 school year. >> So moved >> second. >> All in favor say I. >> I motion passes 70. Pledge of allegiance call on Vice President Nyola. >> Can everyone please stand? Face the flag. Right hand over your heart. Ready? Begin. >> I aliance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for it stands. One nation under God, indivisible with liberty and justice for all. >> Thank you. All
009right. presentation spotlight on learning and teaching. We will now have a presentation preview our summer professional learning transcend. Mr. Lawrence, take it away. Okay, I now tested my voice. I'm warmed up. President Nishi E, Vice President Nyola, clerk Yoka Yamabou, uh Dr. Zitlo, and my fellow cabinet members and the broader community. Thrilled to give you a preview of this Friday's summer professional learning. Uh the theme this year is transcend and we are trying to transcend uh together. We're going to transcend learning, teaching, and barriers and challenges that we might face. Uh we have at this moment I just checked about 750 registered to attend. These are mostly teachers and nurses. We've also invited administrators as well and we're thrilled to have that broad ABC community join us for the event. It'll be held at Artisia
010High School this year this Friday and uh we have uh a breakfast that begins at 7:30. I invite all of you to join us. I know one of you at least is already coming. Um we have a full day of learning. The sessions were extended based on feedback from last year to be 75 minutes in length. So you can dive in a little deeper. Uh and we have topics that you see on the screen here and many others. A good feature of this is the universal design for learning or UDL student behavior features prominently in here. Of course, technology artificial intelligence will be woven throughout as it can support the curriculum. Um and you may wonder how did you come up with these topics? Where did you decide that this was what we wanted to
011share? And I'm glad you asked because we did a survey of our elementary and secondary teachers to find out what they most wanted to learn, what they most needed to support our students with first best instruction. And uh and this was what came out of that survey. So I put it in two columns for TK through sixth grade responses and 7th through 12 responses. And these are some of the highest scoring topics. So hopefully you can notice the match between the slide before topics and these topics that you see here as well. Um, so we wanted to be responsive. So we sought out speakers and we found amazing teachers and others, administrators within ABC Unified that were willing to share their time and speak. And uh, we also reached out to experts outside of ABC
012Unified. So we're really looking forward to seeing those sessions. We have 111 sessions scheduled and uh, 71 speakers. Of those 71 speakers, 45 are ABC Unified employees. And I just put a selection here of folks that you would potentially be able to go and see speak. Some of them also spoke at our winter PL. Some of them are regular fixtures at summer PL. And we're thrilled to have all of them. Our keynote speaker is Laney Raul. She's going to speak on um cultivating a culture of learning for students and uh she spoke at WinterPL as well as one of our spotlight speakers. And uh we'll be giving away some of her books. She's also sticking around after the keynote and doing three more sessions in that same gym. Uh 75 minutes each. So uh she's
013earning the lunch that we're going to provide her. Uh and then Michael Hernandez is also a featured speaker. He's a teacher. He's over in Mira Costa High School in Manhattan Beach. He teaches media. Talks about ways to uh defeat a uh to defeat cheating. Uh uncheable assessments is one of the things that he speaks on. And so it's how to utilize AI, but also use it in a way that students are it's very difficult to cheat because they're building project bases uh based assignments and they're responding to those. Um and all of that of course is listed on our website which is abcpl.app. We intend to keep that as a regular website short easy for folks to use. Here's the event by the numbers as I mentioned over 700. Uh we were at about 700
014when I turned these slides in but we're now at 750. So, we're seeing a spike at the last minute. Um, I already mentioned 111 sessions. We are also featuring five student speakers. We reached out to all of the high schools and middle schools and invited students to submit a 90-second talk on the topic of transcend. What do they think of when they think about transcending? And we have, I have to tell you, some amazing speakers. We've invited one of them to speak in person, and she'll be there uh to speak for three minutes. uh she's a rising senior senior from Whitney High School and I look forward to having you see her speak as well. Uh this is a collaborative effort. I'm here of course presenting but it is a team effort. Uh all the
015departments you see listed there um and many others that uh that collaborated to make this event successful and uh we hope that uh it works out that way. Uh we've got a functional app for you. Uh this is a company called SCED and I've worked with them for many many years and in fact I just found out uh ComicCon uses SKED to do their event and it's you know a couple of people show up for that down in San Diego. So looking forward to seeing how well we apply that here. Um and the agenda if you were curious check-in begins at 7:30. We're asking all attendees that would like to note that they are present check in with a QR code on their app and then we check them out at at 3:00 at the
016end. Um and uh so you can see in there Dr. Zitler will will provide a welcome after the student transcend talk and then Laney Raul will be our opening keynote. We'll have three rounds of breakouts and uh 34 choices per hour. So it's it's three by four 34 it's pretty wide uh of a conference. Um, but it's good to see the numbers of people that have already selected their sessions. And I'm in the process of sharing out those selections to the principal so they know not only who from their campus is attending, but which sessions are most interesting to them. And I think that'd be a good way to start a conversation. I'm happy to answer any questions you may have. Thrilled to uh have this event kick off in just a few days. Thank
017you for the opportunity to share. >> Great. Uh, board member Mendoza. >> Thank you, Mr. President. I I'm I'm sad that I won't be able to attend. >> I will be on my own teacher PD, but this one sounds like a lot of fun and and I'm just I'm happy to see that we have a lot of staff who are going to be presenting because I think as educators, we learn from each other, right? So, I'm glad to see that, but I'm also so excited that we have student speakers. I think this is an amazing thing to have our own kids, you know, presenting and speaking about their experiences. And you guys have that app. That is so cool. That makes We don't have an app. I want an app. That's so cool. >> Have
018your people give me a call. >> Is everybody going to get a lanyard, too? Like you're at a conference. >> Uh, no. You're using the the app itself as there's no badges. >> No badge. >> We'll have a speaker badge mostly for them to be identified as speakers, but it's not >> You're gonna have Oh, I don't want to give it away. I don't want to give it away. >> Yeah. >> Okay. >> And I do have good news for you. I know I'm sorry you can't make it, but uh and I don't say this because I I want everyone to come, but we are recording the students that are presenting and we will post that uh on social media so you can catch at least the students in the keynote afterwards. >> Well, thank
019you. This looks very organized and um I'm again I'm sorry that I'm going to miss it >> maybe next year. >> Next year. >> Thank you so much. Thank you, Mr. President. >> Dr. Rios, >> thank you. Yes, I I mean I coordinated a little tiny conference. I can't even imagine for 750. So, I'm sure a lot of work is going on into this. I want to um I'm just curious and would like to see if you can elaborate on the uh activities that are going to be addressing this teacher concern about behavior strategies. We know that that's an you know something that's continuous. So can you highlight some of the things that you're going to be doing to address this? >> Yeah, we have a dedicated strand on on student behavior management. It was
020a request that you saw in the survey and so um Dr. Lozano's team at the school services was able to leverage the expertise from within the district to produce those sessions. I don't have them in front of me, so I can't speak beyond that. Did Dr. Castra, did you want to jump in with that or share a little bit more about what we can expect? >> Thank you, Mr. Lawrence, for putting me on the spot. I appreciate that. Um, we can provide you more details in this week's updates, but also those behavior management techniques are proactive engagement and management prior to behaviors happening in the classroom and they align with our PBIS um metrics that we've been following through our LCAP as well as looking at our restorative practices. So both of those strategies are
021kind of embedded within those behavior management techniques and they're also differentiated for grade levels because this is 750 of our teachers that are preschool all the way up through adults. And so we do we do recognize that we differentiate, you know, strategies for TK look a little differently than strategies for middle schoolers as well as strategies for high schoolers. Although I will say from personal experience, sometimes my middle schooler is kind of like having a TKER again in the house. So, you know, some of those strategies we look at, how do we proactively engage students to prevent behaviors? And that's what we mean by behavior management, but I can give you more details. >> Well, 70% of our teachers are telling us that they want more information and support. So, yeah, I I like that
022we're being responsive. Thank you. >> Thank you. Uh, board member, >> I just want to thank you for all your work ahead of time. I mean, when I saw 111 sessions, it's pretty amazing. So, um I look forward to being there and um learning a lot. Thank you. >> Great. Look forward to seeing you. >> So, thank you very much. Um board u vice president Noella was there last year. This is a great conference. We I think I've seen many of us our team that's been out here. I think I even won a chair. So, apparently you can win uh the prizes whatever it is. They had a really great presentation. uh authors and um about AI and various practical ways of going through actually just uh anything and we even had outside people come
023in and and pay to come right >> for winter PL. Yes. >> And this is uh this is something that PE it starts at 7:30. So this staff is starting at 5 6 some some ungodly time on the mount on a on a Friday. >> We are coming in Thursday. We're cheating. We're going to come in on Thursday and set up in the afternoon. >> Yeah, but you don't come there at 7. You're going to be coming in early. I know that. So, anyway, thank you very much for your work on this. It is a lot of work and it uh provides a big benefit to our district, our teachers, our entire way of being together and improving our morale. So, whatever decisions that are out here, thank you for uh providing that leadership. We
024really love you. Don't go anywhere. >> I will stress it's a team effort. Dr. Bal Buena, Dr. Francois, the whole team, we all Dr. Ha, we all been putting in a lot of effort to make sure this is a success. >> Thank you. >> Well, our next presentation, student outreach and support. Uh Dr. Castro, thank you. As the street uh comes down, I just want to talk about the purpose of this presentation a little bit. U this past summer, we saw an increase in immigration enforcement activities in our communities and that created a lot of fear and anxiety for many of our families and we saw the evidence of that as we saw a decrease in attendance at summer school programs. We saw an increase in outreach from our families to our ABC community center
025as well as to our migrant education. And so we just wanted to make sure that the board and our community was aware of the toolkit that's available for our families in order to provide them support, in order to provide them resources, and in order to make sure that they feel safe to come to school, especially as we are about to start the school year. I think our number one priority is to reassure families that school is the safest place to be for their students and that there are options to provide that sense of security and that there's a lot of resources to help provide them with support whether it be mental health or actual resources in the community such as groceries or transportation or other things other services that we can connect them to. So
026I wanted to introduce the two people that were very closely involved with this. That's Dr. Dr. Evelyn Ha who is part of our director of special programs who helps to oversee our migrant education programs and Dr. Myra Lozano who is also um the director of school services who helps to oversee our mental health professionals and our programs such as the ABC community center. Um I don't see a thing for it. Okay. So if you can go to the next slide for LCAP goal two. So, I do want to remind us one of our major goals in our LCAP is to ensure student connectedness, well-being, and safe sense of safety. And that's really what we focused on in putting together this toolkit into engaging in outreach with our families. So, without further ado, I'm just going
027to have um Dr. Lozano come forward and speak to a little bit about the educational rights of students and explain some of the uh responsibilities and resources that she's been able to provide to our families this summer. >> Dr. Lozano. >> Yes. Thank you. Good evening, President Nishi, Vice President, Mr. Nyola, clerk, and Mrs. Yokui, board members, cabinet, public. It's a pleasure to be here this evening. Uh we have been making sure that all of our staff is aware of the educational rights of our students. And so we, as you can see here, uh we follow Piler versus Do Furpa and of course our board policy. And so it is important that our staff is educated uh during these difficult times to ensure that we have the correct information uh for all our families. Um
028as it was mentioned, one of the things that we had continue to update is our resources for families, our immigration toolkit and resources. And so we've made sure that this information is available to our parents. And you will hear from Dr. because we have reached out directly to families to make sure that they have access to this and we will continue to partner with our families. I think for goal number two, connectedness. One of the things that we've learned is that the most important thing we can do is to actually have the actual connection with our families to understand what they're going through. And our staff is very committed to that. Our principles, administrators, our teachers. And so we know that especially during the summer it was important to keep up and make sure that
029they knew what was happening. But we're truly excited for the beginning of the school year because we are going to have an opportunity to see our families, to see our students, and to provide any support that they may need. Um Scott is crucial in updating all this information. As soon as we get information, we make sure that this information is updated. We have to continue to equip our educators to be ready to support our families. And so what we've done is we've prepared um a deck of uh information. It's we call it always professional learning. Uh we have to guide our uh we have to be the first learners, right? And so we prepared trauma-informed practices in school uh to be able to be shared with all our administrators. and we did that during our
030first meeting and then our MHPs during the first staff meeting they're going to be sharing that with every staff member. Uh we will send a link to the uh to the slides that we prepared because they're very practical um tips for all our educators at our campuses to be able to do and support our students and be understanding of what's going on. One thing that we've made very clear is when we refer to trauma-informed practices, uh we're being aware that the adults have to be looking out for how our kids are feeling, what our families are saying, uh to be able to wrap our arms around them and provide them with the supports that we have. So, our MHPs are available, our nurses are available, and everybody knows that they have a plan to know
031who they need to contact. Um, within the deck that we're gonna also share with all the staff is a reminder of our referral process uh for anyone that may need support through our MHP uh because we want to make sure that consistently throughout our district all our staff knows how to have access to those services within that uh deck as well. In addition to referrals to the MHP, we're very clear with our referral process for our ABC community center, which of course supports our homeless students and our soio economically disadvantaged students. Um, as you can see, one of the things that we are very happy to report is that we have been able to connect with families. Martha Martinez who is our community liaison at the ABC community center um was also making phone calls
032uh because actually we do have uh also the information on our website and word of mouth is very powerful. Many families do know about our ABC community center and they contact directly and so she has able to connect with our families and she was able to find out some of our families who were not able to go and pick up things at our ABC community center. We were able to deliver and we also connected them with some of the local um agencies that were also having those services where groceries and food was able to be delivered to them. Uh, of course, the families that we provided this support were extremely grateful and we continue to find out what could be the barriers for their attendance to school because we want our students to be there
033on the very first day. And of course, we will continue with our backpacks and school supplies to be distributed right before school begins. And I'll pass it on to Dr. H. >> Thank you, Dr. Losano. And good evening, everyone. Um so you know as we all know that this summer has been very eventful with just a lot of um challenging situations across Southern California for many of our families and definitely a lot of some of our own very uh ABC families have been impacted and um just you know standing here to represent micron education we're very proud of the staff that we have to support this program to support our families in ABC um I specifically want to introduce um two of our recruiters who are here with us tonight we have IA Car Carlos
034and then also Sister Celia Perez and they've been instrumental. Um we also have other staff in the migrant education program to really reach out to families to be their frontline support u making sure that they have the resources that they need. So I just want to applaud them because really they've been the anchor of um just some of the things that we've been able to do for our students and families. So, one of the things um that you probably all know uh at the very end of June, we received word that we needed to pause our summer programs for Megan Education because of the funding instability and just uncertainty of um the federal funds. However, I was really um happy and proud to know that our district was not going to let that stand in
035the way and you know, stopping programs for our students. So, you know, ABC stepped up and we you know, we said, "Okay, we're going to use other funds to make sure that that program happens." We did have to make some tweaks because um it was real in terms of just the challenges that many of our families were facing. Families were very scared to send their students to the summer programs. But fortunately, we did have 150 students approximately participate in our migrant education summer program. We had um two programs, one operating at Hawaiian Elementary and the other at Neimus Elementary. we were offering math and reading support and they also had a lot of enrichment opportunities with cultural exploration as well as STEM related activities. Um the other thing uh that our migrant education um team
036was a part of was distributing the free school supplies. So also in partnership with our ABC community center, they were able to get the free backpacks and then also put together all kinds of school supplies. and especially when families weren't able to come to the summer program, our recruiters and our team went out to them to make sure that they had the the you know supplies that they needed to start um for the school year. Um one of the key things that have has been happening this summer, I know that many people are on vacation. They're taking their summer break, but ongoing um just reach out to outreach to uh the families in our district by the recruitment team. They were making regular phone calls um to check in with families. You can see here
037um providing the immigration related resources, the red cards, the education rights, any kind of information that our families needed and they were able to connect them to various community resources. So you can see here ABC community center was a key resource. Um also uh the LEO offerings that they had with professional learning or just information that they were um sharing with our parents, the mental health support session. So those were all resources that our recruiters were able to share with our families. Um, one of the things that they did in the latter part of the summer was conduct a telephone survey to really understand the parents needs. We started with our migrant education families. We have about a thousand families that we serve and those families represent multiple children in our district. And so you
038can see here on the next slide um just a few of the questions that we wanted to highlight. So one of the questions here you can see is do you currently feel safe and comfortable sending your children to school? And so overwhelmingly, you know, almost 70% said that they did. However, about 30% said that they did not. This reflects uh 301 responses, but this is an ongoing survey that they've continue to work on. So I believe that that number is higher now. But we asked specifically um for some of the reasons why if they did not feel safe, you know, what were some of those reasons? So you can see here fear of the immigration rates. Um just the community concerns, ongoing stress and anxiety. Um, one of the concerns was just rock walking and
039driving outside. And I know, um, just hearing from the recruiters, from our coordinator for migrant education, just some of those personal stories that they shared with our team just really hits home because those are things that we might see on the news, but it's actually happened to some some of our families in our district. Um, and then, you know, presence of ICE on school campuses. And then transportation was one of the key things that they felt was um a a a reason to worry. So lack of safe and reliable transportation to and from school. In our next slide, one of the questions we did specifically ask about additional transportation and would that help you know um our students attend. So uh we had 63.5% say no. However, 36.5 of our parents that responded did say
040that um they would definitely want um this option. So, one of the things that we found out, especially in the south end of our district, especially our high school students who are walking to Artisia High School, they're walking all the way from the south, you know, past, you know, Norwok, um, Carson. And so, just them having to walk up, you know, to go to Artisia, that that was a reason for concern. And so, um, some of the parents did express, um, the need for some transportation just so that they can, you know, not worry about their students being able to get to school and come home from school safely. Um, uh, other things that they did um, express the need for was additional mental health supports, connecting with the ABC Community Center, and then continuing
041to offer um, the programs that we provide. So, migrant education, afterchool programs. So, those were some of the top reasons um, that we received from our parents. We did ask specifically about short-term independent study if that was an option. Overwhelmingly though, um we only had about 1% say that that would be an option that they would be interested in. So, which is great in that 99% of our parents that we surveyed, they want their children to come to school. So, this is just some pictures that um we wanted to share with you kind of to end it on a happy note just to see the uh the students involved and really engaged in their learning. And this is definitely something just to anchor us as we continue for the rest of the school year that
042we want to continue to provide these services for our students. Turn it back over to Dr. Castro. Thank you. And as our final slide says, we are definitely here to help for any community members that would like to reach out to our ABC community center to our migrant ed families. Uh cabinet has met and discussed and under Dr. under Zeta's direction. We are working on uh transportation routes to help support additional transportation for secondary students and we'll be providing that information soon. >> Thank you. Also like to recognize in our audience uh Dr. Moore from Gar High School. Thank you for coming. Very appreciate that. So questions. Uh Dr. Rios, >> thank you. Before you said buses, I had already written that down because we know that some communities are being targeted um a lot
043more than others. And yeah, I mean in my mind immediately I'm um you know imagining kids walking to school and being being harassed or being being targeted and kidnapped. Um so the idea of buses is something that I would definitely like to have us move forward with. Um and let's be strategic, right? Because we don't want them outside of Food for Less and you know something happens. I'd like to see them out, you know, in a in a safe space where that they will be protected because that's our job is to protect our students um and keep them safe. So, uh please keep us posted on what those plans are because I think that that is one way that, you know, we're limited as to what we can do, but busing I think is definitely
044an idea to move forward with and I hope my colleagues agree. Thank you. >> Thank you. Uh Vice President Nyola. Uh thank you President Nishi. I just wanted to thank you know Dr. Zano, Dr. Huff for being here, you know, sharing the resources and and emphasizing that we are here to help. Um this has affected everybody in ABC I feel like. Um and I also want to thank our recruiters that have been working all summer very hard, you know, trying to establish that trust and you know they worked very hard to make our migrant edge program very very strong. So I want to thank them again for you know working in these trying times. So I appreciate you guys. Um, of course we are all here to help and I appreciate all the proactive measures
045that we're we're taking. So appreciate it. >> Thank you, uh, board member Mendoza. >> Thank you, Mr. President. Um, I just want to echo my colleagues here and I I during the summer it was very stressful. I'm going to be honest with you. I'm a Latina and I I basically had to stop looking at social media because it was very disheartening to see what was going on and I understood how our families were feeling and we may not have heard of the stories but it was happening in our communities. Um as you as we you know go around and go to different events people will come up to you and tell you their stories and it's heartbreaking. And so I'm glad that as a district we are focusing on our students because school should be
046their happy and safe place. And I know throughout the summer I was talking to superintendent and I staff and they were doing an amazing job. I visited Ferguson. I went to to Nez and the ladies over there seen. Um without them I think a lot of our kids would have stayed home. Um, and I I want to say this in Spanish really quick to our community who's listening. We're here to help. We're here to keep you safe. We're here for our students to to learn. That's that's the best thing. And I think um I'm going to echo u what Dr. Rio said is that whatever our our families need, we're going to be there. If it's transportation, then I think we need to do that, too. And then when I went to um NES and
047I was there for my m migrant education and whatever's happening in the world when our kids are at school, they're just there to learn and they're happy. I saw them making elephant toothpaste and I asked one of the kids, "Oh, you guys want to make elephant toothpaste?" and they looked at me like, "Oh, you're bringing in an elephant." I was like, "Oh, no." And and the students from Whitney High School were there helping the kids doing some STEM activities. So, it was really nice to see our kids being kids in a world that there's so much uncertainty and we may not know what's going to happen in in next week, but you can be certain that this district supports our families. So, thank you for all the work that you're doing and this is a
048priority for for the for the board. Thank you, Mr. President. >> Thank you. Maybe we should have some English translation, right? >> You want me to say it? >> I can say it. I just read I said that our >> that we follow the law and that students have the right to attend school. >> Punto finale. And I said information is kept private and protected and we follow our board policy that we protect our our families and we support them. >> Thank you. Uh board member Tatiana Yokoyama Buouie. >> Thank you. So, I do want to echo my fellow board members. Thank you, um, Dr. Ha, Dr. Lozano, to our district for prioritizing this this summer. Um, our recruiters, I' I've met a few recruiters as well at Carver Elementary. So, I'm I'm so thankful
049that we had a full-on team who took this very seriously this summer. Um, my heart goes out to the families who've been affected. And you know this this next year will be a period of uncertainty as well. So I'm glad that we're all sticking together and we're going to be strong for our kids. We're going to find opportunities for our kids to continue to have some semblance of normaly during these very difficult times. Um thank you Dr. Huff for also bringing up uh whether independent study would be an option because we know that that's a safe that's what what we kind of want to do is is keep our kids as safe as possible. keep them home, but that's not what's maybe the healthiest or the best thing for them. So, thank you for asking
050that question in the survey so I we at least understand what our families want. So, um but thank you everyone. Thanks. >> Yeah, I I have to echo all the board here. While we had summer, the superintendent, Dr. Ha, Dr. Lozano, the parents, liaison, everybody in the district was working hard. There's no playbook for this. How do you have a playbook for what happened? The It's not a challenge. It's fear. Fear of being separated from your mom. And I totally get the parents there. It's not just the Latino community. I' I've heard of my daughter's friend's aunt who was picked up because she just had a driver's license, not a passport, and she's an American citizen. your ability to be calm, stable, creative, to go beyond just what this is the playbook that we have
051here today, but to reach out into the community, for you to call for Martha Martinez to for the district to be there. There are other districts that had a different reaction to this. Uh there's districts out there that said, "No money, stop. Stop it. No money, no program. We're ending it." We didn't do that. We forwarded. we advanced out even if there's no guarantee of having the money and I'm very proud of the superintendent doing that without my direction without anybody here's direction but as knowing the direction of the board would be to do that your your job is while we're not there you're taking care of the dayto-day these quote unquote challenges which are really horrors for our our families so for you to be able to do that um is amazing that we
052provide these resources which are not cheap um to these this program which is extremely successful. If you've ever seen parents, they really get out to the parents on a Saturday to work with their kids and we know that that works. These kids are trying to succeed and these most vulnerable kids are being not targeted. They're not on our campuses but they're all around and and that can't be a good environment. So again, thank you for taking that extra step. It really from my the bottom of my heart, it's it's education is so important for these kids and all of our kids. Um it's a tragedy that not all of them got the full measure of the education that they deserve. Um, but I know that you guys are courageous enough and heroes enough to to
053keep this them not keep them from not losing. Make these kids successful. Let's make them so educated they'll become the president of the United States. Thank you. Thank you. I need a motion to approve the agenda. >> Second. >> All in favor say I. >> I. >> Motion passes 70. I need a motion to approve the minutes of the regular meeting of June 17th. >> Tatiana moves. >> Tatiana. >> Second by Niola. All in favor say I. >> I. >> My reports. Good a good evening. Hope everybody had a good summer. It's a good halfway point. Um, you know, summer is a great place and for some of us it was a comfortable time. For others it was a time of horror, right? It's time of fear and um and us as a board, we
054made some major decisions. The last time we were here in one meeting, we voted to approve a budget and we spent our restricted reserves over $15 million. Uh but that's part of the plan, right? We slowed the decline of our unrestricted reserve and we cut $5.7 million of our of our budget to address issues that the county had. And by the way, for those that you don't know, reserve is basically our savings account. So, we're spending into our savings account. Um, we addressed the county letter. We approved an LCAP. That's a huge major thing for all of us. We didn't come to a consensus regarding our facilities. And I think the public knows that we still have the issue. So, uh, we still have the issue just because we didn't come to consensus. So, I'm
055I'm looking for proposals, new proposals from this board um that we haven't already tried um regarding our facility under usage, how we can improve education in our small schools, something that we haven't done already. If you have an idea, talk to me. Let's put it on. Let's get it done. But also it has to be realistic. We have to be able to do it within a certain amount of time. We can't wait until October. The public demands that we act. Kids are going to graduate. We can't do this too off into the future. Uh uncertainty is not our friend. Although Tuan is our money guru and he says we can go on as ABC. Um but if we don't change what ABC represents will change. If we can't support critical education programs, teachers, staff may
056not be supported. We'll be just ABC and name only. We don't want to do that. So I need proposals from other board members direction so that we can move forward with what we have here. Um and I don't want just ordering something to make to happen. I want it to actually happen. It's got to be more than just words. Gotta make it happen. We have to actually make it happen. We have to address the educational challenges due to ICE, the deteriorating economy. We can't address that. But we have to know that if the economy is not doing as well, if our jobs report is is in fact going down, that means our tax revenues are going to go down and our money will be going down. We need to actually face these potential cuts to
057education. The community is relying on us for re leadership to deal with change. And I know we all look at leadership with different ideas. We all think it's it's something different. Some of us it's more analytical. Some of it is being popular and being responsive. Um, we are a team that will work together. That is the key. That no one of us is going to bear the burden of being a leader, but that we all work together, right? It's it's not Ernie by himself. It's not Francisco by himself. It's not um Tatiana by herself. All of us are responsible for taking on the burden of leadership and our community demands that I come to this new year with abundance of hope. I hope we don't lose any teachers. Um I hope that we can maintain
058our programs. I hope that we can do more with less. But we need to come up with a solution. We won't be able to just point to staff and say it's all your fault. And there are boards that do that. They go and point to staff say it's your fault and I'm not going to make the courageous decision that I need to make. Nope. It is our responsibility. It is us. We will bear the burden of the decisions that we need to make. And I hope at this midway point, we've done pretty well with budget, pretty well with LCAP, pretty well with a lot of great programs that we put forth. And I'm hoping to leave it in your hands even better shape uh despite the challenges that we have. We know I know that
059we can rise to that occasion, but not just with words, with action. Thank you, Dr. Zil. Thank you. Well, as we open this year, um we've had a a bit of a the word I like to use is interesting summer. Um we continue to see various changes. We're going to see that in federal funding, federal rulings, laws, and our goal will be to follow the law and create safe spaces for kids to learn. That's what we do. we focus on their learning. Um, I can't emphasize strongly enough that children come to public school and you come to ABC and we welcome you with open arms regardless of background, beliefs, language, immigration. Like what's beautiful about this district is that it is diverse and everyone here learns and grows together. Um, our goal, our commitment will
060be to continue to provide support for students as and families in any way we can. Um, we want to make sure that students can learn when they're with us and that they're able to get to and from school in a way that is safe and most reassuring to them. and we'll continue to communicate when there's changes, when something's new. Um, whatever it is, we want to work with our families. We may find families have really unique needs and so we'll work one-on-one to support them. That's our goal. Um, I'm excited because we're getting close. We're going to see new teachers tomorrow morning and begin their process of orientation to the district. Food service does their orientation on Thursday. Teachers and nurses on Friday. Um we had a wonderful time last week on Wednesday with directors
061and principles setting direction and expectations for the year. meeting with all of our management and confidential staff on Friday to again come together and remind ourselves why we do our work and that everybody's job regardless of what you do is about the teaching and learning of students. Um so I'm excited. Um our teachers officially are here back to work on the 11th with our seventh graders starting on Tuesday the 12th and everyone um back to school on Wednesday the 13th. Um my summer um really kind of had one key piece for me. Um I find myself um to be in a position where um I get to represent superintendent for the state of California in Washington DC each summer. And so I took advantage and um with the funding things that were going on, I
062met with some of our legislators and uh got them to help us also with that campaign of making our voices heard to say whatever you're doing, children didn't do it. Let's not punish children. Um children don't control where they live. They don't control who they are. what they control is they have a responsibility by law to go to school in our country. And so I was thankful to remind people that we need to all be saying that. Um we can't punish children for whatever it is that adults are upset about because it's not their fault. And so I work to try and make our voice heard that whatever we're going to do, whatever adults want to decide in our country, that's that has nothing to do with little kids, with teenagers, with people who are
063trying to go back to school and get their life together. And so hopefully we will continue to keep education as a sacred space because it is the one thing that we do as a nation that a lot of other places do not. And um we need to keep that for our kids and for the good of our nation. So with that, I'm excited for a new school year. >> Thank you, Dr. Zilo. Uh employee representative report Raair. Ray Gar uh president of the ABC Federation of Teachers >> and I'm Ruben Mancas. I'm the vice president of ABC. >> So, uh yeah, it's been an interesting summer for sure. Uh I heard one administrator that I worked with very closely during COVID say that uh that this is probably just as challenging and or even more
064challenging because it's shifting and changing all the time. And so u I think what ABC is doing is what a lot of districts are doing, but I think we're doing an exceptional job as far as treating uh all students with dignity and our community with dignity. And you know, people remember how you treat them in difficult situations. And we are standing up for the community, making sure that these students, you know, they're minors, you know, their parents that, you know, they have their own reality. But uh you're born into families, you're born into situations, and you do the best you can as a as a student. And we cannot punish our students as a as a country. It's despicable. And so, um, you know, whatever needs to happen with adults, let that happen in the
065adult world. But we need to be cognizant of what's happening to our students. It's going to impact the teaching in our classrooms. It's going to impact the emotional uh security of our students. and not just the students that are impacted at home, but every student in that classroom is going to feel the ripple of what's going on in our society. So, I'm glad that ABC is treating everybody with dignity and support and we're going to continue to do the right thing. And uh you know, I know we're here to tomorrow's a big day for us. We have new teachers coming in. It's always fun. Thank you board members who show up every single year to welcome. I think that's really unique. We were doing it long before it was mandated by the state of California
066for the union, the district, and the board members to get together and really welcome new employees. It's an awesome experience for them as new teachers. And so, thank you for that, and we look forward to the doing that. Thursday we'll be uh meeting with our rep council and uh that'll be uh our first time we actually some get to sit down with their new principles or principles get to sit down with their new site reps and that's really crucial because all year long they have conversations sometimes weekly sometimes daily about the things that are going on in their schools. They're the they're closest to the issues so they work out a majority of the problems or issues that are popping up. So tomorrow and the next day are really crucial. And then thank you Mr.
067Lawrence for setting up Friday for the technology support that we're going to in technology professional development. Those have been hot. Uh you know we have 950 teachers or so and 700 are signed up. That's huge. Um that says something about the quality and not and that in negotiations we were able to negotiate something that made sense for for teachers to go there. As far as compensation, I know in another district that, you know, my wife woke up this morning, hit the buzzer, said, "It's not worth $180. I'm not going." And if we had, that means she missed out on professional development, and she missed out on networking and starting the work. But if your time is more valuable to fix your classroom or do whatever, you're not going to do those things. So, I appreciate
068that the board supported that. That's a huge gathering at the beginning of the year to have like a uniform message and to everybody to hear the superintendent talk. There's a lot of power in that. So, thank you. Hope everybody has a good year. Ruben Mensas. I want to thank our superintendent for her inspiring words and um I echo um our board president in terms of his optimism. I too am hopeful um for the next school year. Uh I think that we we see many of the challenges very clearly. Um but the fact that we see them uh means that you know once you can identify the problem then you can work to solve it. And I think that that's what we model for our students and for our community right we solve problems together. And
069um Ry pointed out a lot of the the excellent things that we have lined up. New teacher orientation always very exciting. literally of a new lifeblood. Uh and that kind of generational uh kind of infusion of talent. Um our rep council uh is is is powerful and it gives an opportunity to kind of um instill our PAL culture into um you know the beginning of a year with new site reps and new administrators. And then of course Friday uh you know I thought last year's PL was fantastic. It's going to be tough to top it, but I'm I'm I'm pretty sure that we might be able to do that. Uh I do want to speak. I I'm I'm the vice president. I'm also the chief negotiator for ABCFT. And um I think um board president
070Nishi E spoke about this at it. We talk about summer. This feels like groundhog day. I feel like I was just here. But uh he he he spoke at a at a recent board meeting and I think he was eloquent in the idea of pointing out that um our achievement lies um with our students, not with buildings, not with physical places, but with the good work that we do with our staff and our students. Our the the golden bells, those are because of people. Those are because of personnel. Those are not because of a physical place. That's because of the culture and because of the hard work of the personnel of all the staff um who who who work together so well with the community. Um I am concerned about making sure that we can
071go to our staff and our community and say we have a long-term plan. Uh competitiveness, it's in the eye of the beholder to a degree, but it's real. being competitive is real and I am concerned about it. Um Ry just mentioned a concrete example. You know at at a certain point you can talk about culture but then you have to kind of follow that up with a real commitment in terms of things like compensation. And so I I I am concerned somewhat when we have excellent PD, right? I don't want our teachers who come here and I'm gonna, you know, give a real rahrrah speech tomorrow at the new teacher orientation and I'm gonna be super positive about the PL and then when they get to year seven, year eight, they look at the pay
072scale and they say, I really like ABC. I appreciate all the investment that has been made, you know, in me as a teacher, but for my family, I'm going to have to make a different choice and I'm going to I'm going to choose to go to a different district. That hurts. That that goes against my lifetime commitment. Um I'm a legacy baby here. I I I you know, this is my district and I believe in it. But I also understand, you know, realworld kitchen table decisions that families need to make. So, I'm here to to once again talk about the importance of being competitive, making sound choices, and putting us on the pathway so that we can maintain the success that we are so duly proud of. Thank you. >> Thank you. Item 15, public
073hearings, initial proposal from AAPCft. I'd like to open a public hearing on the initial proposal submitted by ABCA Federation of Teachers Local 2317, California Federation of Teachers, American Federation of Teachers, AFL CIO, to reopen renegotiations for successor collective bargaining contract for the 2025 2028 master contract. Copies of the initial proposal are available for the public to view. Are there any public comments on this particular item? >> I see none. >> Thank you. Public hearing is now closed. direct district response to the ABCFT initial proposal. I'd like to open a public hearing on the ABC uh unified school district negotiating team response to the ABC Federation of Teachers Local 2317 California Federation of Teachers American Federation of Teachers AFL CIO uh to reopen negotiations for the successor collective bargaining contract for the 2025 2028 master contract.
074Copies of the district responses are also available for the public to view. Are there any public comments for this particular item? >> I see none >> hearing. No public comments. The public hearing is closed. Initial proposal from AFSCME. I'd like to open a public hearing on the initial proposal submitted by the American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees, AFL CIO, Local 2229, Council 36 to reopen negotiations for the successor collective bargaining agreement. on article seven compensation, article 10 vacations and holidays, article 15 evaluation procedures, and article ant discipline, article 16 leaves of absence, and article 17 safety conditions. Copies of the initial proposal are available for the public to view. Are there any public comments on this item? >> I see none. >> Uh hearing no comments, the public comment hearing is closed. There's
075a district response to the AFSCME initial proposal. I'd like to open a public hearing on the ABC Unified School District negotiating team response to the American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees, AFL CIO, Local 2229, Council 36, Initial Proposal for a Successor Collective Bargaining Agreement on Wealth, Article 7, Compensation. Article 8, Health and Welfare Benefits. Article 11 calendar article 16 leaves of absence copies of the district response to the initial proposal from AFSCME are available to the public to you. Are there any public comments? >> I see none. >> Okay. Hearing no comments, the public hearing is now closed. We are now to the public comment section. Uh clerk Yokoyamabui. Persons wishing to address the board should fill out a card located on the table by the door and submit the completed card to
076the secretary. Speakers will be called in sequence during the public comment section or prior to board discussion on an agenda item. The board shall provide one hour for speakers to address non-aggendaized items. Each speaker is limited to one presentation of five minutes or less. Those who have a group concern are encouraged to select a spokesperson to address the board. Should there be 15 to 20 speakers for non-aggendaized items, individual speakers shall be allowed three minutes to address the board on the item. In order to ensure that non-English speakers receive the same opportunity to directly address the board, any member of the public who utilizes a translator shall be provided at least twice the allotted time to address the board. Please remember that the board is unable to directly respond to comments made during the public
077comment section. In addition, neither the board nor district staff verify the accuracy of the statements made during public comments. Persons wishing to address the board on a specific agenda item at the time the item is under discussion are limited to five minutes each and will be called to speak following the staff comments and prior to the board's discussion and taking action. The board shall provide 30 minutes for speakers to address agenda items. Should there be six to 10 speakers for agendaized items, individual speakers shall be allowed three minutes to address the board on the item. Adverse remarks about a person's race, ancestry, ethnic group identification, religion, color, national origin, sex, sexual orientation, gender, mental or physical disability, or age may not be made. Please avoid remarks or charges which reflect upon the character, motives, qualifications
078or ability of any school district employee regardless if the identification is by name, position or other s or other reference. Such comments may be presented through the proper administrative channels set forth in bylaw 9323. We have uh three public speakers. Um the first is Marty Powers. Following Marty will be Margaret Sto. Good evening. Uh I thank you Dr. Zeo, the superintendent, her administrative assistant, and all of the board members for this opportunity. I see Ernie. I met Ernie about eight eight nine years ago. You may not remember. I remember when you were running first time and you uh were walking. I live we live on Arabella Drive and uh my wife and I had a chance to meet you then. Otherwise, I've been a ghost since then. Just I um I bring I get my
079news just by reading the free newspaper that I pick up at the uh bakery. I mean, that's you know, just pretty much where I read about things. And uh um I want to just give you a quick quick story. Um, my wife moved here uh 31 years ago as a single parent, bought a house in Arabella, raised her daughter through Leo uh through uh Cerritos High School, and she's Ivy League grad. Um, my wife uh was able to do that in a different time. We own some properties in Leo, of course, because my wife thinks that's the greatest uh area of the city to own property in. And I will tell you that um the uh we don't have homes filled with children. They're not there. Um in fact, one of our renters is uh
080leaving in May. Um grew up here. His wife grew up here. Cerritos High Grads. Uh they're going to go away for a while until they can uh earn their million and then come back. But they're coming back. Um but the the the families have shrunk. Um, I bring this to your attention simply because I'm a retired educator, just retired a few weeks ago, 40 years, 32 as a school principal. Um, I did my dissertation on uh creating community and large schools. I was elementary uh principal. We're in schools between 750 to 1100. Um my my concern is um as you're looking to make your decisions. Um I got great faith in all of you from what I've read in the paper and I went online and actually looked. I just um I ask that you
081uh really work together as a team, make a plan, and then uh stick to it. my wife would have been with me, but she's got garden club at the house tonight. Succulents and uh but she said um you know it's a concern. Um ABC schools are the reason um people live here. They're is truly the reason. Now second reason is great opportunity. It's great community here but the schools. So all I ask is uh in my 40 years um there's two things. I uh spent half my time 20 years in Madison, Wisconsin. I was a teacher there and then a school principal, urban school principal. I have spent my other 20 years in uh both uh Sacramento and Beverly Hills as a principal. I will tell you simply that um when we're in a hole,
082stop digging, okay? plant something in that hole. Do you have an opportunity to plant something that will bloom? You're all smart. You're creative. I saw you with your doctor stuff. Um, you know, uh, it gives me calmness to have heard Ernie speak earlier today this evening to hear what everything's going on in the district. So, all I ask is that you focus and uh calm the uh calm the environment out there because um what you're hearing from some parts, you hear from other parts. People are concerned about the quality long term and we live in a very uncertain environment right now. So, thank you. Have a good evening. >> Thank you. >> Next speaker, we have Marcus Sto followed by Jacob Gutierrez. Thank you. President Nishi, um, Superintendent Zilo, members of the board, members of
083the community that may be here. Um, my name is Margaret Sid. I'm a community member. Uh, as he mentioned before, as speakers have mentioned, we're going through a very challenging period. And I think the board needs and we as a district need to prioritize what is important. Not just what is nice, but what is important. But put the priority and how is that going to help children learn? How is that going to help them learn to read, to do their math? Okay. So, whatever we do has to be f focused on that learning. Okay. I want to look at because we need to raise the level of what we're doing. Okay. So, we need to prioritize and focus our priorities on that and then from that we develop budgets. Okay? because I know and and
084I want you to look at practices too because I think you have a manual payroll and so this day and age there's no need for manual payrolls. You should be going to a web-based payroll and then you're going to eliminate a lot of uh time that is spent and culminating doing u manual payrolls and you're going to stay save staff hours. Okay, that's going to save money. bottom line and you need to look at like how you do different things, okay? Who does it? Is there a more effective way to do it? Okay. But also, you know, you talked about the immigrant families and the support you're giving them. I think that's wonderful. But we are going through really challenging times. You notice that we have $34 trillion in debt federal government and as such
085the government is cutting they're cutting their staff they're cutting agencies within the within the government. Okay. So people are losing their jobs and also like in the state of California every year you hear people companies are moving out of state. So there are a lot of families that may be experiencing the loss of a job. So I want us to extend that same support in terms of the ABC community center, you know, maybe giving them school supplies, mental health support, letting them we know, letting the families know that we're here, okay? Because when you have financial challenges, it causes so much trauma in a family, especially with one that had not experienced it before, but because we have also a very high unemployment rate for California. So, we really need to support those families also.
086Okay? So, let's look for ways to support those families that may have lost a job. Okay? and how can we support them just like we're supporting the these immigrant families. Okay, we should do the same for them. Okay, thank you. We have uh Jacob Gutierrez. Good evening, Superintendent Dr. Do Dr. Zitlo, Mr. President Nishi, Mr. Vice President Nyola, board clerk, Miss Yokoyama, and board members, Miss Manhattan, Miss Mendoza, Dr. Rios, and Miss U, and members of the community in person or listening virtually. My name is Jacob Guutieres, and I am a proud senior of Richard Gar High School, the school I have called my home since my freshman year. Let me take you back to a moment that changed my life. September 7th, 2022, at exactly 3:29 p.m., I walked into the ASB room for
087the first time after getting an unknown call from a number I did not know. I was greeted by Mr. VeZ, who asked if I wanted to take the position of freshman class president, something I had applied for on a whim a month prior. My response, yeah, sure. And the next day, I was on a bus to our leadership retreat in Palomar, San Diego. That weekend changed everything for me. This wasn't just another extracurricular to add onto my college resume, but rather I found a second family. Since then, I have served at the as the sophomore class president and made history as the first ever junior to serve as an ASB president, the first ever president to serve two consecutive terms, and the first ever ASB co-president. But I didn't do this alone. I did this
088with the guidance, belief, and mentorship of Mr. Vez, a Gar graduate himself who returned to give back to the school that raised him. and for nearly 20 years with countless hours in his office, that's exactly what he's done, which is why I'm standing here today. As of today, just one week before our school starts on August 13th, Mr. Vez was removed from the office of ASB director effective immediately and res and reassigned to the English department. No warning, no student input, no transition, and no respect for the student leaders of ASB. Let me be clear. This does not just feel like a simple staffing change. For years, ASB has thrived because we've been empowered to lead. That kind or that kind of growth that doesn't come from control, it comes from mentorship. And now it
089and now not only has that been taken away, but we the students are expected to train a brand new adviser with one year of experience as a teacher and class cabinet adviser on how to run a program Mr. Vez built. Tomorrow morning at 7:30 a.m., members of ASB are asked to run a senior registration for GAR with our brand new adviser who has yet to be trained. This is unacceptable for the fact that ASB may be studentled, but we should not be left without proper support at the very least. We deserve an adviser who is prepared and capable of guiding us when we need help. Expecting students to carry the full load and the weight of this event without an qualified oversight is unfair and sets us up for unnecessary stress and failure. We are
090ready to lead, but we shouldn't do it alone. Mr. Vez has shaped hundreds of students into leaders, including me. Removing him without conversation, context, or care is a disservice to all of us. Why strip someone with just three years left from finishing what he has started? Why dismantle the program that works? Mr. Veles isn't just an adviser. He's my mentor, a coach, and a guide. ASB under his leadership has become more than student government. It's become a home to me and many others. To remove him like this tells us that our voices simply don't matter. That leadership, legacy, and student trust are simply disposable. On behalf of myself, my peers, and every student that has been shaped by Mr. Veles himself, I'm asking you, the board, acquaintances of Mr. who have seen his impact on
091the students. Please step in and urge the GAR administration to reconsider this decision not out of sentiment but out of principle because it is right, it is just and because our ASB and our students of ASB and entire student body deserve nothing less. All we ask is to cross the finish line with our adviser, our mentor or as we know him, our Yoda. Thank you. No further public comment. >> Thank you. >> Can I have a motion to approve the consent calendar? >> So move >> second. >> Uh is there anybody wishes to move any items? >> Um I would like to pull 1.3 CC >> 1.3 C and 3.14 C. Oh, good. Thank you. Anybody else? Oh, you have the same exact ones. >> All right, let's start with uh 1.3C for campus safety
092group. I would like to uh inquire as to the uh compliance training and support that will be provided by the campus safety group. Um, I believe this is um sounds like it might be for the secondary campuses, but I'm I'm curious whether it's going to be for all campuses and whether it's for the um SIU team SIA network. Thank you. So this is not for the uh SIA or the student intervention um assistance team. So the u annually all schools are required to submit a comprehensive school safety plan and within that there's many components of the plan. Uh there's legal component, there's instructional continuity plan, there's threat assessment, there's many component going into the comprehensive school safety plan. So this group will be supporting the school in putting the plan together to ensure you know
093the processes is proper to ensure the different components are in the plan. So once it get to the the district level it have to get approval it would be timely and it meet all the requirements. So it just to support the school putting the comprehensive school safety plan together and it's not about training of the SIA. What is the compliance training? >> M it's not working. >> Thank you. There's different components within the school safety plan, right? So they work with the school and the staff to ensure the different components are in there. Uh so so we can for forward to you uh through Thursday notes a sample of a compliant school safety plan with the different components in it. >> Okay. >> That I hope Dr. uh actually board member mchattan did you have
094a question >> regarding uh 1. >> Oh okay. All right. So we'll move on to 3.14. Oh, did you have a did you want to pull an item? >> Oh, I'm sorry. Uh, lety uh Dr. Dr. Mendoza, board member Mendoza, >> it's okay. >> Would you like to make a comment? >> No, I just maybe maybe just for clarification, uh, Mr. Can you just explain like what's in a safety plan for for a community so they understand what a school safety plan is? So the school with a group of um leaders would put together a safety plan where they address all the safety components of the schools, right? from uh addressing emergency issues, right, to um threat assessments on unexpected I don't want to use the term um shooting, but you know, anything like that
095could happen within the plan. There's a way to to respond to that properly. Uh to train the staff on how to do that. At the same time when there's a discretion disruption of the school where they have to close the school what is the instructional plan to support the students with that. So all the components related to safety and threat to the schools will be addressed in the plan. >> Thank you. Yeah. I just wanted the communities to know that it's it's our safety plan. It's what our students our staff would be you know expected to do in that plan and that we practice it at school sites. >> Correct. >> You know yearly. >> Thank you. >> Another question. No, but just to follow up um and and to follow up on on what
096board member Mendoza has mentioned, >> I believe this safety plan is typically reviewed at school site council meetings. So, if there are any parents or families who are interested in in the safety plan at their specific school, they could review that at those meetings. Correct. >> Correct. And um you know, we have the director of secondary schools here to answer additional question if you need to. there are certain components with the plan that you want to make public they want to know but there are certain component to protect the students you know I don't want to say secret but it's it should be confidential to to protect the students but um you know if you like more information Dr. Louis is more than happy to answer the question but it's about the plan on how
097to protect students in case of emergency >> thank you let's move to item So, would you put it back on the consent calendar? >> Yes. Thank you. >> Thank you. Uh, item 3.14, start with board member Yokohyamui. >> Yes. Um, I I saw this and I feel like I've seen tutor zone before on one of our prior um agendas, but I did want to recognize that this is um bringing tutoring services into elementary schools and middle schools. I attended a town hall with um Dr. Rios and and Vice President Nyola where that was a specific request by community members is that they want more services in you know their schools. Something that maybe um other parents and other schools can afford to provide to their students but we may not have access to in in
098other schools. So, I do um recognize this and and I'm very pleased to see this um and I hope that our students benefit greatly from this. >> Thank you, board member McCannen. >> Um I just had a couple questions. A little more information about tutor zone. Um what schools it's at. Um it it looks like we've had it in the district since 2014. Um the instructors look like they have a good background for um tutoring services, but um what particular schools is it at? Thank you for the question. So, uh, tutor zone works to customize support at each school site and really what we do is, um, our elementary and secondary curriculum directors meet with the principles to talk about the plan for support in terms of an hour after school. This year, some of
099the guidelines are going to change because now we have attendance recovery programs that we can use to recoup attendance and we can use some of these tutoring programs for that. Our first priority when we meet with principles in addressing their plan for intervention after school is to see if their teachers are able to stay after school and provide that direct service. Sometimes that plan includes that they have so many students and that we don't want to overwhelm the teachers. We know small groups are are good to have for our teachers and so some of that is paired with a teacher. We hire tutor zone for some of our schools to create smaller groups. Some of our schools um because of uh limited staffing or limited opportunities um their main support is a teacher a lead
100teacher oversees the tutoring program with tutor zone and so it's customized and we usually meet with schools at the beginning of the year once we have the final uh data in and we customize it based on what we see in the data. So how many level one students do we have and how much support can we provide after school? I can give you information on how many schools we've provided support at in the past because again since it's customized it's based on who needs it at that moment in time based on data. So we've in the past we provided support to 10 elementary schools, two middle schools and we've even provided support for example at Whitney High School. So like at Whitney High School they have a very strong peer tutoring program but their peer
101tutors need support and training on how to actually tutor other students. And so the peer tutoring program um tutor zone trains the students to support seventh and eighth grade students on their campuses. So that gives you a little preview on some of the ways that we use tutor zone in ABC. >> So from year to year it could vary this at the school at the particular schools that it's at. Is that correct? >> Right. So, every school, just to be clear, will have tutoring support. And sometimes, at some school sites, the tutoring support is in the form of their own certificated teachers staying and being paid and compensated after school. At other school sites, it takes the form of a combination of tutor zone and the teachers on campus. And some other school sites, sometimes
102it's a lead teacher and then mostly tutor zone. So no matter what, our goal is to provide tutoring support at every single campus and this is just another support system that we have for the schools so that we can create make that happen for our students. >> Thank you so much. >> Dr. Rios, >> I'm just going to jump in because it raised questions for me. I mean, we're talking a lot about accountability and monitoring progress and you know, we have big aspirational goals. Are we monitoring the effect this program is having on our students and are we seeing results? >> Thank you for the question, Dr. Rios. Yes, we monitor our students using our benchmark results. And so specifically, our focus last year was around our math benchmark results. And so we monitor how
103many of those students for example on a class on a roster for tutor zone as well as just any tutoring program, right? So it's not just whether it's tutor zone but if it's whether any tutoring program even provided by our teachers where did the students start and are we seeing progress being made. So in general last year we saw that approximately up to um I'm sorry approximately 75% of students showed up to a 50 point gain from their initial benchmark to their final benchmark three about 15% showed a 51 point increase and then unfortunately 10% showed a decline in benchmark scores for various reasons. the students who are assigned to the tutoring program who are requested to attend are you know of course we try to support the students who are struggling the most who
104are below grade level. So we want to see even greater accelerated results and so we continue to work with tutor zone with our teachers to really target the skills based on data. So once we have the initial assessments, we look at the data and that's why it's customized per school site because at one school site the level of skills or standards that may need to be addressed at that tutoring program may look different than at another school site. >> Thank you for um Dr. Rios. Actually that's a great question regarding metrics like how successful are they in terms of what we actually want them to do which is increase scores. Thank you for that great answer in terms of specifically 55 point increase for 75% of our students. That's exactly what I want to understand
105in here. Or just one question though regarding the $100 per hour per class. Um, is that just one individual? >> Yes, it's one individual for 20 students >> for 20 20 students. Okay, got it. So, it's it's covering more than one. And what kind of qualifications do we pro uh do they have for tutor zone? I believe it's listed on the board item as uh some of the instructors hold bachelor of arts or bachelor of science degrees. Some of them are currently pursuing their college majors in those areas so that they have some of their credits completed. They are not I'll be repeated teachers as our own certificate. That's why we prefer to work with our credentialed teachers and provide tutor zone as kind of like a backup support to that um to assist our
106teachers as needed. Do do we pay our teachers the same amount? >> We pay our teachers at the contracted hourly rate that has been negotiated in the contract. >> Okay. So, if it's a 20-year teacher, they get more than say a a first year teacher. No, >> no. There's a specific uh contracted negotiated pay when teachers work with students after school. And I believe, correct me, the rate is at 55, no 50, I'm sorry, $50 an hour. That's a lot cheaper for a credential teacher. >> That's the hourly rate. It doesn't include benefits or and we usually pay more than that, but it's because it doesn't include benefits and such, >> right? That's um anyway, it's nice to have a credentialed teacher. I'll thank the teachers that actually go and do this. I know my
107wife used to do this for free. Um and uh but also we I recognize that we need tutor zone. Uh board member uh board clerk Yokoyama would you like to return this back to the consent calendar? >> Yes. >> Thank you, >> Mr. President. Thank you. >> All right. So, uh saying that all the items are back to the consent calendar. Can I have a vote on the consent calendar? All in favor say I. >> I. >> Any nays? The motion passes 70. Thank you. Item 1.7 I. Strategic plan for the 2025 2028 school um schedule. Call on Dr. Zitlo. Thank you. Um this evening I'm very excited to share with you the draft of our work that we've done this past year. Um we started out together last October some of us and then
108we shifted a little but getting that initial feedback setting up a plan. um as I shared then um we as a district chose to undertake um at my direction a plan building that included everyone and so it took a little longer um it wasn't a small team. Um and so we're going to walk through um what we've come up with and hear your thoughts and feedback um so that we can get a strategic plan in place and approved by you all at our next meeting. So, just as a review, um, in June of 2024, we looked and brought to the board an updated mission, vision, core values, a portrait of a learner, the things that set that key direction for where we're going. Um, then in September and October, um, we set the direction with
109our leadership teams. So we worked with cabinet, extended cabinet, we worked with principles, directors to really say, okay, what are the directions we need to go in? What are the priorities that we need to make based on student data, based on what we're hearing from our initial data from just student surveys every year and with the chick survey and the um family surveys and then the hard work began from November to February. Um we were working with lots of groups to get those strategies. What are the things that will help us accomplish that? Um we did that by surveying students, families, um teachers. We did listening and learning sessions, empathy interviews, anything we could do to gather information to find out if you want to see this happen for your child or if you are
110the child, if you're working with students, what does that look like? Um what is a strategy that would work that works for you? Um we then um shifted in March and May to drafting and it went through a lot of revisions. um cabinet, extended cabinet principles, directors, they saw this more times than they wanted to. Um just trying to refine the language, making sure that the pieces that we saw from our different stakeholders, from our different educational partners were really being found in what we put together. And so we are now here today um with an information item for you to see what we've put together. and then hoping to get feedback so that we can make our final plan and bring it to the next meeting. Um, just want to thank everybody who was
111involved. It's takes time to fill out a survey. It takes time to agree to be in a listening and learning session or to participate in an empathy interview. And no one said no. you all were part of helping um extended cabinet, district and school administrators, our employee group leaders, um students, families, the advisory committees for our district. Everybody participated and shared and gave input into this process. And so, um we're feeling really confident about what we've put together because it's based on what people say they need. So, um, we have a booklet, um, and in that booklet, we have a number of pieces, um, where it's laid out for you. But, um, I think just refining our mission, honing that to really be focused on the fact that it's about our students, the work we
112do, our mission is about them excelling. It's about them thriving and it's about them being ready for whatever comes in their life and they have to do that in a space that's safe and that's inclusive for them. Um, we updated the vision and this is where we acknowledge that if we want that growth for children, we have to make sure our staff members are part of that process and growing and building that because we want graduates who are confident, who know they have purpose and they have the skills. And even if they finish school and they're not quite sure what they want to do, they know they can read and they can think and they can write and they can move forward. Um, we then have clear values as a district and I think for
113me these are at the heart of who we are. Um, we want that love for learning. We want to make sure that we're partnering with families and our community. Um, and most of all, we want to value the diversity, the diversity of our community. That's the beauty and the strength of ABC. And so, our goal with this plan is that our graduates would be self-directed learners, achievers, that they would be critical thinkers, that they would be digital citizens knowing how to function in that world. Um, and then they would be effective in communication, that they would be good at working with others and solving problems, that they would be empathetic and conscientious leaders. Um, our hope is that they would have a skill set to do whatever they want when they leave ABC. So, our
114plan will be to evaluate this through a multiple measures model. There are lots of different metrics. We have standardized tests from the state. We have benchmarks through our district. We have grades. We have attendance. Um lots of pieces for us to look at to make sure we are moving in a positive direction each year for our students. Um, I think the biggest thing with this process is that whole child picture because we have to know that the services, the pieces that we're providing, which sometimes are support pieces are there to help them so they can succeed academically. And so those will be the pieces we will look at in this process. Um I want to thank um cabinet that works with me all the time. Um extended cabinet as well. Um they were key in
115leading conversations with principles um with our directors. They were key in looking at data and saying yes this fits or we're missing this piece that we heard from families or kids. And so um in acknowledging them I've asked them to share the parts they were part of and helping to shape and form. And so we'll start um with Dr. Castro and Mr. Lawrence with direction one for accelerated academic outcomes for all. >> Thank you Dr. Zaitlo. Um yes uh we were able to work with our principles, with our teachers, even with some students in these empathy interviews to gather information about the best ways to really reach this direction one. And you see our four priorities on the screen. Priority 1A specifically is a a focus for us this year, aligning evidence-based instructional practices with
116student needs to improve learning um outcomes. You've heard a little bit this evening already about how we're trying to be intentional in aligning, for example, our professional learning with teacher needs, how we're intentional in weaving in AI and technology into those instructional practices, and how we're really focusing on universal academic support systems, for example, the tutoring services that we provide as part of either our tier one or tier 2 instruction. Just a note about tutoring services because I didn't get to correct it. And I want to make sure on the record you hear me say it's not $100 per hour. It's $100 for every two hours. They have to arrive 30 minutes before. Provide an hour of tutoring and then 30 minutes after to do a data review with the teacher on campus. And it
117also includes a workbook. So I didn't want to miss saying that complete information. Um so now I've corrected that. But um some of the actionable steps that you'll hear about in terms of these priorities include the development of a learning continuum which we've already started and I've shared with some of you our learning continuum for engagement and environment um in ABC Unified ensuring that those researchbased engagement strategies are happening beyond just ELA and math but across content areas ensuring that we're providing UDL and social emotional learning principles in conjunction in the classroom and providing clear guidance and support to our teachers and our administrators about what we expect to see in the classroom to provide the best learning experience for all of our students in ABC. And with that, I'll hand it over to direction
118two. >> Thank you, Dr. Lys and Dr. Losano. >> Good evening. Um Dr. Zitlo alluded to it in her words that we're here more than just to educate a student academically. We're also responsible for their overall well-being as a whole child. So that means the social emotional well-being of the student uh promoting their positive behavior outcomes provoting promoting their attendance um and a whole slew of things. And luckily as a district we're in a position where over the last 10 years as a district we we've really um amplified our capacity to support students in those areas. things like having mental health professionals at every school site, I'm having nurses at school sites, um providing uh restorative justice practices or beginning that work in the last few years. So now our responsibility is to make sure
119that work is strategically aligned because those things don't work in a vacuum to the educational piece. If a student's struggling academically, they might have issues with attendance. They might need some mental health support. So our our job is now to make sure those services are integrated with clarity with everyone understanding the role within those services with everyone understanding exactly what those actions should look like in an effective manner when they're delivered to students by adults and to understand what the expected outcomes are so we could measure those outcomes and if at the end of the day or a cycle of years those services aren't effective we could come up with new ideas and services to garner the outcomes we want from our students in other areas aside from academics. With that, I'll turn it over
120to Dr. Lozano, my partner here. >> Um, so I think it's so important and we've heard, you know, loud and clear the importance of outcomes for students and data. Many times when we refer to uh students being successful in the whole child, there may be a misunderstanding that we're not paying attention to the academics. But it is completely the opposite because we know we want to prepare students to be fully ready for the world that as we know is not an easy place to be at times. We want them to be prepared. One of the things that we're really excited about is how we have worked to improve the coding of our services so that then as teams we can have conversations number one whether our practices are being consistent districtwide, whether our families are
121well informed of those services. uh whether um as a staff we are owning uh the connection with our families and we can actually correlate if the practices that we are having are the best practicing practices that are supporting students. I think it it has opened conversations within the team as we continue to look at student success team meetings. When we're discussing students, we take a look at the whole child and then we look at are we taking advantage of all the services that we have for our students to make sure they are successful. So, please know that we will be sharing with you some of the work that we've been doing to ensure that we can monitor um the progress that we're making with our students and that uh all our staff too is learning
122how to improve their practices as well. >> Thank you. For direction three, cultivating systems for employee success, Dr. Frasier's going to share. >> Hi, good evening. Um, obviously being part of human resources, this one really excites me because um, I mean I I really feel as we take care of our employees and how we do business as employees really trickles down to what um, how kids do and student success as well. And so when you look at our priorities of recruiting and retaining high quality staff committed to student success um, you know, obviously having the the best and the brightest in front of our students each and every day. Um, whether that's uh in the classroom or as a support staff. I think that that is the utmost importance in what we do uh in
123the human resource office in terms of of how we we um we we put the best out in front of of our students. And so um one of the ways that we're going to really focus on that is really fostering a a supportive work environment, developing support systems to foster environments where students and staff feel valued and empowered. And really that's the the work we're doing that whether it's with PAL um whether it's um our competitive uh compensation and working towards that um whether that's providing like Ray had talked about our our professional development and the opportunities for that um and continuing that work on on having uh all of our our our our employees have a seat at the table when we make decisions about how we do business. Um priority 3B providing competency
124based professional learning to enhance employee effectiveness. Um, and really that's about uh implementing district-wide operational standards to ensure consistent highquality practices that enhance student learning. Really about how do how do we create um common vocabulary and consistent strategies uh for our employees and how the organization uh works. Um, one of one of the things that we've been working on is really a consistent way that we deliver um customer service. Um, and so it it will be items like that where we can create these consistencies uh and that we're all speaking the same language about how we run the organization as employees. Um, priority 3C, fostering a workplace of cult uh workplace c culture that promotes professionalism and collaboration. Um and obviously just a focus on that is uh for this year is really uh that
125that level of professional conduct and that so so that when we uh message to our employees that we have the highest integrity when we are dealing with our children and our families in this community and so that's really important to us. Uh and lastly, uh priority 3D, the strengthening the labor management partnerships to enhance educational out outcomes and really the focus being facilitating goal goal setting between labor management to improve um student success. And really um that is the work that we do um with our associations and all all the hard work in terms of h how do we meet um how do we pre-plan how do we frame the work that we're doing uh when we go into years like um like a full contract. And so, um, it's important for us to have
126just like students and and teachers giving objectives to students that we have that relationship with our our associations that we're that we're providing opportunities for goal setting and framing our negotiation work together. >> Thank you. Direction for engage families and communities. And Mr. Smith is going to share with us. >> Thank you, Dr. Zitlo. Engaging with our families and communities has never been more important. Our goal is to ensure we are not only providing clear and consistent communication but also engaging with families in a meaningful way, creating dialogue and encouraging involvement. We have four priorities under this direction. Enhance family engagement through meaningful involvement. Establish a unified communication system to connect with families in the community and strengthen community partnerships to expand educational opportunities. In year one, we'll focus on several strategies under these directions.
127Under priority 4A, we'll expand translation support, offering multilingual resources and translation services to ensure equitable access to information for all of our families. Under priority 4B, we will align grade reporting systems, creating a standardized TK through 12 grade reporting system so families have a clear understanding of student progress. Finally, under priority 4C, we will create a community resource hub, an online space where families can enh uh access a wide variety of educational resources. >> Thank you. And our fifth direction, optimize resources for educational excellence. Mr. W. >> Thank you, Dr. Zitlo. Good evening. So um priority 5A would be implement practices to attract and retain and increase students enrollment right uh in in the time where TK and 12 population is shrinking in the state of California in the country how do we do that
128right we are we have a net gain always of attracting outside students to ABC we have out of about 17,500 students we have now 2700 of them come from outside the How do we hold on to those students and attract some more, right? Our academic programs top-notch. We have to do that, right? How do we make it easier for family to come to ABC and through registrations, through support, through outreach, how do we do that? How do we market to target effective marketing to target families with school age children that would want to come to ABC? So we have a plan and we're working on all of that to at least retain the students that we have and increase um if possible in in in the real world where you know that population is shrinking
129right and you want a bigger market share you have to try a lot harder that just the reality. So with that we also look at facility management right in in a time with challenging budget time how do we effectively managing out the resource that we have right do we want to look at long-term facility planning uh in term of the the with the land that we have but with the land that we have right now with the schools how do we make it easier for groups that want to use our our facility right to increase although it's somewhat nominal the rental revenues right would while at the same time protect the district with all the liability issues that come with that. So we are looking at different software that could enhance that experience and the
130unit form and consistent policy with facility management to to to support that uh and to work with with with the different organizations that need to use our school also. So it's a two-prong approach. And the last one is also this is something we have been doing since I've been here, right? We always going after the grants whatever is available out there that we think we can get right uh you know from the very old time with magnet grants to the different grants that we have now the latest thing would be you know uh EV grants electric bus electric vehicle that we'll go after. So we'll have what different is that we try to use our own resource to bring in grants but at times you might need outside help with a grant consulting firm. So,
131we'll leverage both and we'll bring in um as we have been additional funding to support our students. Thank you. >> Thank you. So, I want to thank my cabinet for just sharing their pieces. Um they are key in this work. Um they lead those areas. They help us to move in good directions. And um if you also look in your items for this evening, you also received a a one sheet. Um it has the mission vision on the front and on the back side it shows you the strategic the strategies we're looking to use this coming year. So we will then evaluate those and create a new one for year two. either adding new strategies or enhancing the ones maybe we haven't finished yet. Um and so um our goal will be to very systematically
132go through the strategies and things that have been recommended um to try and make sure that um we're meeting the needs of our students, their families, our teachers and staff so that the education provided is exceptional as always. Um I I think for me it's a big thank you to our community. Um when I said I wanted to include everyone, no one told me no. Everyone said yes. And um that to me is important because everyone's voice matters. Um we give people opportunity to be involved and I think that's really important. And so, um, hopefully you will see that the plan we've put together is very purposeful. It's trying to meet the needs of the people who shared their needs with us. And, um, with that, I want to turn it over to comments, questions,
133and other things we need to think about before it comes back for a final review and approval. >> Thank you. Uh, Vice President Noella. Uh thank you board president Nishi. Uh more of a a comment um just you know looking at everybody standing right there uh you know there's a lot of superhero movies that came out this summer. So I really glad to see that we have superheroes here at ABC. You know um you know Marvel has Avengers and Fantastic 4. DC has the Chelsea League but ABC we have our cabinet here. So you guys are the superheroes of ABC. So thank you guys. I appreciate it. >> Thank you. Uh Dr. us. >> Thank you. I am so excited to see all of this. Thank you, Dr. Zitl. Thank you to your team. I,
134you know, want to just point out that the challenge is going to be in seeing different outcomes in uh some of our schools like we have continuously seen excellent outcomes in schools like Leo and you know people talk about how they move into the city because of the amazing schools but unfortunately it's that has that's not true for all schools and so I'm really excited to see a plan that hopefully we will see those type of outcomes that people are being creative and you know I see the commitment I see the dedic dedication uh I especially appreciated that some of the directions explicitly stated that this is this the intention is to enhance educational outcomes. I'd like to see that added to all of our priorities because ultimately that is exactly what every single person
135is going to be dedicated to do is to make sure that you know Dr. Frasier is doing his work so that students thrive that Dr. Castro is doing her work so that students thrive. Um, again, I saw that in a couple of them and I like to see it in all of them. Just a friendly suggestion. Um, let me see just a couple of more notes. Maybe that's it. Um, one specific thing is um, you know, UDL. I really hope that this will leverage um, the potential that exists in our students. Again, I keep mentioning about schools that have traditionally not performed. And to me, that rings so true because I was one of those students. And I think that a lot of our students, we look at them, and I heard this in some
136of our town hall meetings, oh, but all the challenges. And it's this deficit mindset where it's like, oh, these poor kids. No, these kids, you know, face amazing challenges that a lot of us adults would have a hard time dealing with on a daily basis and they overcome them. So let's, you know, change that mindset and and see these kids as incredible human beings that have the potential to become what all of us up here have become. You know, all of us have faced incredible challenges and here we are. We came from communities like that. So I really want us this year to be that year where we see potential in every kid. You know, we use that phrase of for all students like let's really believe that. Let's really believe that all students can
137learn and give them that opportunity to prove it. Thank you. Uh, board member Mendoza. >> Thank you, Mr. President. Okay, so I wanna Dr. Zila, I want to make sure I understand this. So, we're gonna we're going to approve this at our next board meeting. We've already shared it with our principles. Um, so principles are going to go share with their school sites. >> So, um, we've shared it with principles, directors, we've shared it with all admin. Um, it will be part of what I share on Friday with all teachers and staff. >> Okay. And um once we have board approval, the whole world will get it as well. >> Okay, perfect. So, >> and the whole world will get it in other languages as well, but I didn't do that until I have up.
138>> No, that's perfectly fine. I just want I just want the community to understand our steps and how this is how this has come to be. And I want to thank everyone. Um I I I from my understanding, everyone got a say in it. And I think that's amazing because then we all take ownership of it, right? I want to thank your cabinet because I know as a teacher when I first started teaching the district had this vision but I never knew what it was. >> It was something that made supposed to make me want to be a better teacher and have growth but I didn't know about it. And I think as as education has has shifted we're coming to understand that there has to be a plan in place and everybody needs to
139understand that plan. They need to know it. And so I'm glad to see that that from the last time that I was on the board, I think we did have kind of a vision but not as detailed as this so that we can go back as a teacher as a pared like this is where we're going. This is the direction. Okay. My next question is there's a lot of priorities. um once it's implemented, everybody understands it. Um you as a superintendent and cabinet, when you go into schools, are we going to kind of highlight some that we're their look force? >> So yes, depending on the area and what we're looking at um we look to to also help keep you ab breast of what's happening. um looking to build the directions into board agenda
140items so that you can see that this item that you're approving for this event or activity or whatever is attached to this strategic plan priority. Um our hope is to build it in that way and when you have a strategic plan then everything falls under it. So, the LCAP will align to this and the single plans for student achievement at every school will align to that. Um, the goal will be that we're all moving in the same direction together. >> Yeah. And and I like that. I think that's that's where we should be as a school district. So, thank you for that. Um, just a couple things. I know when I was at the at the when we were presenting and I was listening, I was trying to be a fly on the wall and
141listen to everything and I left a little bit early, but I kind of said as a board member um like these would be the look fors that I'm looking for um because of our situation um is direction for priority 4A uh enhanced family in engagement through meaningful involvement. And I did mention that because of the circumstances that we're facing in our communities, I suggested doing live social medias. um our parents are scared to go onto campus right now. It's totally understandable. Um as a school site during co time, we had live social medias. I was a person who's doing the live Instagrams and parents really enjoy that because they could still be engaged. They could still be a part of their child's activities. They didn't have to take a day off of work and they
142really enjoyed that. So that was a suggestion that I made. Um, another priority that I I kind of focused on, I think, was um, direction five, priority 5A, implement practices to attract, retain, and increase student enrollment. And I think Twan, Mr. Newin um, kind of mentioned on it is as as a parent, as someone who's outside of the community, the first thing we see is with our eyes, right? I'm driving through and I look at a school and I did this during the summertime and I called the district and I said, "Can we please paint the doors on me, Mrs. Auditorium, the NPR, because they're looking a little bit um you know, not very nice." Because as a person who I'm just driving around, that's the first thing I'm going to see is our our
143facilities maintained. Um so I I would like to make sure that our facilities are always maintained. And then I think the last one I kind of said was um establish a unifi direction four priority 4 be establish a unified communication system to connect with families and community. Can you just tell me which is that parents where is that which one is that? >> So um right now we have multiple communication platforms and so our hope is to move to something more succinct. Mr. Smith, do you want to share a little bit or am I clear? >> I think you you you hit it correctly. So, it's just making sure that uh there's a one-stop shop where parents know they can go to to get the latest information and it's coming through. So, it's not multiple
144apps, it's one place. >> Yeah. I I know when I was when I was receiving I think it was Parent Square, it wasn't for me personally, it wasn't user friendly. Um and then translating it to Spanish was kind of like where do I do it? Where do I do it? I just kind of looked at it, breeze through it. So, I would like to have something that's unified and user friendly, easy translated to whatever language, you know, the parent would like to have it in. Um, but I want to thank you again. This is awesome. This is great. I think we're we're changing as a district. I see the change from the last time I was here to now. We have a vision. We have a mission. And we're all going to be on the
145same page. Um, it's but it change sometimes is hard, right? If if me as a teacher in the classroom, I've been doing things the same way. I'm like been doing it for 25 years and now we're doing something new. But change is good because we're all working towards the same thing and is to show growth in our students learning. So thank you very much. >> Thank you board member U. >> Thank you uh President Nishi. I know you guys are all standing and I just wanted to say uh from the bottom of my heart um I've known the cabinet members for like 13 years and most of the cabinet members have been serving for almost you know the time before I got here and except for the two new uh great folks but each and
146every cabinet members I think the fundamentally the most important thing is trust that I can uh say confidently that I have trust in this cabinet starting with Dr. Is it low? Because if there's corruption even, you know, within the cabinet, you're going to lose the trust from the te the principles and the, you know, teachers. But just every one of you, there's character. I saw you guys working so hard through the pandemic. I mean, at the time, Dr. Valencia Mayfield was here and like many times she was like this, so tired, working longer hours. and I saw you guys weather through and I really want to say thank you. Really appreciate all the hard work that goes in and your faithfulness despite uh all the pressures we get from Sacramento hit here blow here really
147appreciate it and the collaboration with all the stakeholders. I mean, President Rear and the teacher union just working so, you know, collaboratively uh partnering with the cabinet with, you know, the teachers uh weathering through tough times. Really, really appreciate it. And that's that's another reason why, you know, after 13 years serving on the board, you know, when there is a, you know, recommendation, I just don't have to have second doubt, second thought because I know that you guys really worked it out, you know, and so now that we are faced with budget crisis and I was a little bit shocked because I don't know all the information because we're we're a schoolboard member. we're not doing this 247. And um when President Ray Gar said this is a easy cut, I was really that was
148a wakeup call like is it really that bad? I was kind of shocked and I was looking at you know all these different data and um yeah I mean we have uh AB28 so much challenges but what I see in this cabinet is stability and the faithfulness and the hard work ethic. So my hats off to each one of you starting with Dr. Zidlo Tuan um Dr. Castro, uh, Dr. Joel Fraser, and Dr. Ricardo Louise. It was a challenging past few years since the pandemic, you know. I know that. And, uh, Dr. Myra Loausano. Everybody loves Dr. Loausano. And our genius uh, director, Mike Lawrence, and of course, go to all person, our um, Scott Smith, you know, communications officer. really thank you so much for your service. Really want to uh share that. >>
149Thank you, board member McCaten. >> I'll make this really short. Um I've only been here for two months, but I've got to say I am so impressed, Dr. Zitlo and cabinet with this plan and your enthusiasm for it. As each of you got up to speak, I could just see your commitment and that is means so much to me, to our community, and to our students. Thank you. Thank you, uh, Clerk Yokoyama Buouie. >> Thank you all. Um, you all seem so happy presenting up there and it showed in in your work and and what you've done um to get the strategic plan here. Thank you, Dr. Zitlo. Um, I will also make this short. I've been here since about December, so not much longer than board member McCaten. This this one pager is so
150simplistic and so straightforward that I really truly hope our parents and families review this and focus on it and understand what um change and and what they can expect in this next year. So, thank you for that. Um I will say the summer has been busy for you all. >> Um the board members got a a month break. I mean obviously we I have I have a job. I'm doing other things. I have my kids, but we were driving by on Norwok like we do a lot and my son goes, "Wow, there are so many cars at the district. What what's going on there?" And I I told him, I'm like, "Oh, um, well, sometimes sometimes like people get get summer break, but our district employees are working year round." He's like, "Oh, wow. So,
151um, we know you're busy. Um, I know you're busy. I hope our our families knows you're busy. So, thank you so much for all your help. Thank you. >> Thank you. Any anybody else? Okay, really quick. Um, yes, you guys are working all summer long. My daughter's like, I don't get summer vacation anymore. It's like, yeah, even though you work for a school district, you don't get summer vacation. It's it's a constant thing. I love the idea of a vision and a road and a way to go forward. You can't go anywhere unless you know what the road is going to be. You have it all mapped out as to what it what the plan is. Um I don't want to I I will I'll always be positive. So the next step is from strategy
152and vision and mission to action. So I love how uh Mr. Schwin and and Scott were very specific as to what that means in terms of actions, items, what we're going to the metric that we're going to use to go forward. And later on you can provide to me because we've done things like this in the past. Um, and we've done we've been a very successful and great school district in the past and we continue to do and make plans and improvements. I would like to see later on just kind of the delta, the difference between our previous uh strategic plan, what worked, what didn't, and the new one, how it there are some contrasts with the previous plan because I know that this is different than what we had before. But I would like
153to know specifically what is different and how we expect this new vision, mission, goal and then implementation. What is the how does that look down at the teacher student community level? You talked about a singular communication style which great that is actually a great idea. uh and you're talking about maybe uh um uh different finance things and that's great specifically going into those uh how it is different than what we did before so that way we all have an idea as to because I I love the words but I want to see what that means in terms of the action and I know that we'll be doing at the end of 2028 we'll be will be like the best district ever, right? That's that's our goal. >> So, thank you very much. I very much
154appreciate it. >> Okay. So, we have item 1A. Can I have a motion to approve the request to revise the calendar of board meetings for the 2025 calendar year and change the Tuesday, December 2nd, 2025 board meeting date to Tuesday, December 9th, 2025? >> Tatiana moves. Second. Okay. Uh, is there any public comment on this item? >> None. >> All right. Any board comment? Then I'll call for a vote. All in favor say I. >> I. >> Any nays? The motion passes 70. Can I have a motion to approve the revised board policy and new administrative regulation 7310 naming of facility? >> Second. Dr. Frasier. >> Thank you, Mr. President. Uh we're bringing forward tonight uh the revised board policy uh new admin regulation uh 7310 naming of facility. Um so basically the pol policy
155was uh minimally updated uh using the CSBA sample policy back in 1998. So we brought it forward to the committee. Um you'll see in the draft uh policy the underlined um is really kind of the added language that we put in. Um some of the highlights of naming the facility um are are talking about um you know what it means uh what are the what are what are the school and major facilities that we're talking about um covering memorials uh things like um the criteria and considerations that we're using how we come up with the committees uh that we're going to be using to to go through the process um naming and uh duration of naming rights examples are in there as well and So, um it's a pretty comprehensive uh uh board policy now
156comparatively to what it was previously. So, um it is there for you to preview if you haven't done that already. Um so, we'll bring bringing it forward for you tonight. >> Thank you. Is there any public comment on this item? >> None. >> Is there any board comment on this item? Uh I have uh board clerk Yokoyama Buouie. Um I'll just comment that uh as as you know I'm the chair for the legislative policy committee and we did review this the committee um prior to summer. So I am happy to see it now um as an action item. >> Thank you. I have actually one question though. Um it says this is in relation to buildings. Um, previously I remember there was a situation where um things like fields or different items um don't require
157board approval. Does this include things like fields or auditoriums? >> It it includes all facilities, all all district buildings and facilities. So yes, fields fields would be in included in this. >> Thank you. Great. All right. Well, let's call. Is there any other board comment on this? Then let's call for a vote. All in favor say I. >> I. >> Any nays? The eyes have it. 70. Thank you. Can I have a motion to approve quest contract with SH Toledo, a registered dietitian credentialed by the commission of dietetic registration to provide nutritional support educational services for the Head Start program for the 2025 2026 school year. >> So move second. >> Thank you. Doc uh Dr. Castra. >> Thank you. So I present you this item that's part of the requirement of our Head Start
158federal performance standards >> requirement. >> Okay. Is there any um public comment on this item? >> None. >> Is there any board comment on this item? >> So quick question. We also have dietitians on our regular staff. Correct. As far as I know, no other program require a dietitian. We have nurses in available to provide some support, but no, we do not have dietitians as part of our regular programming for our other programs. >> Okay. So, this person is specifically and only for Head Start and we don't have any other dietitian in our district. >> Um, I don't believe we do. I would have to do a little more research, but in terms of the programs that I oversee, this is particularly the one that we have a dietitian for. Thank you. Any other board
159comments or questions? All right. Uh seeing none, call for a vote. All in favor say I. >> I. >> Any nays? Hearing none. Votes yeses have it. 70. Thank you. Can I have a motion to approve request to enter into a class instruction service agreement between the trustees of the California State University CSU on behalf of the California State University, Long Beach. Not a bad school. on behalf of the College of Professional and Continuing Education, CPACE, and the ABC Unified School District to provide dual enrollment ethnic studies course for interested high school students for the 2025 2027 school years. >> Tatiana moves >> second. >> Dr. Castro, >> thank you. In an effort to continue to expand the educational outcomes for our students, we are presenting you this item in partnership with Cal State Long
160Beach. Cal State Long Beach has agreed to work with our high schools to provide four select courses on Saturdays. And I will repeat, these are optional courses. Students and parents have a choice. They will not be required to attend these courses. However, these are courses that we do not offer in our district currently. And so that's why it's a great choice for not only receiving high school credit, but they will also receive college credit for these courses. And that includes American Indian studies 119, Asian and American studies 121, Africana studies 121, and CHO and Latino Latino studies studies 101. >> Thank you. Is there any public comment on this item? >> None. >> Any board comment on this item? Okay, then I'll call for a vote. All in favor say I. >> I. I. >>
161Um any nazs? >> Motion passes 70. Thank you. I have a motion to approve request to submit as institutional changes to the name of the accounting oh actually I'm sorry I skipped one uh 3.27 may I have a motion to contract with Catelyn Rice Tucker DBA blend education LLC to provide professional learning on the topic of elevating instructional design with AI and UDL and blended learning for the 2025 2026 school year so that's this year >> second vice president Dr. Castro. >> Yes. Uh Dr. Catelyn Tucker will be part of the presentation group that will be here on Friday, August 8th. So, we're using educator effectiveness grant funds to support her providing professional learning at that training event. Dr. Tucker is also the co-author of our existing uh secondary curriculum textbook known as Study Sync.
162Uh so, it's really exciting to have her available directly to serve and support our teachers on Friday, August 8th. Is there any public comment on this item? >> None. >> Is there any board comment on this item? >> Okay. Then I'll call for a vote. All in favor say I. >> I. >> Any nays? Hearing none. The vote passes 70. Can I have a motion to approve the request to submit as an institutional changes to the name of accounting clerk program to accounting technician program? >> Second. >> Dr. Castro. >> Yes. This is in support of our adult school and this is to reflect our current job market and the way that our um positions are named and our programs are named. >> Is there any uh public comment on this item? >> None. >>
163Is there any board comment on this item? >> Okay, I'll call for a vote. All in favor say I. >> I. >> Any nays? Hearing none. The vote passes 70. Thank you. Can I have a motion to approve the agreement for legal services with Orbach Huff and Henderson LLP? >> Second. Uh, Mr. Luen, >> thank you. President Nishi is um the district uh have a need for um specialized services to support the district with our AB218 cases uh in looking for insurance coverage going back to um 1975. Uh these are specialists will work with insurance archaeologists to search through many different database uh state uh national to ensure uh where the district have insurance coverage uh during those years uh where we potentially may have claims against the district. So this is just specifically for
164those services. Um at this point uh we are not seeing the need beyond the 2526 fiscal year. So be just for 2526 fiscal year this agreement. >> Okay. Any public comment on this item? >> None. >> Any board comment? Have two questions real quick. Um so this is a tiny community in terms of legal services. Am I right? this uh this law firm is um pro providing very specialized legal services >> specialized services >> and it was uh we got a a recommendation. >> Yeah, we actually this is so specialized there's not many of them out there. We did um we um did not do a request for proposal but rather we contact them for quotes. So we contacted five firms up and down the state. uh Farmer Curtis McCormick Barstow Mcken Mckennon Law Demler
165Armstrong and Roland and um OHH OAC. So so we we did um contacted them. A lot of them were not available due to conflict because they were working for the insurance companies. >> Yeah. So we happen to found this firm which is um recommended by by our insurance carrier uh that could um potentially be able to help us but they also a premier company and something that hopefully we won't ever need is in term of judgment bond they have worked with different agency for that already. So um but this is right now just to support the district looking for insurance coverage u for the years between 1975 to 1980. >> Do we have an estimate as to what the this might cost? >> Uh the hourly rate is there. We do not anticipate that uh
166we'll spend more than $10,000 for this year. >> Okay, great. Thank you. Okay, I'd like to call for um is there any public comment on this item? Oh, actually we already asked that question. >> So time for vote. Uh all in favor say I. >> I. >> Any nays? Hearing none. The vote passes 70. Thank you very much. Can I have a motion to approve bid award ABC679 custodial supplies for the following as the lowest responsible biders? American Sanitary Supply Inc. Gale Supply Co. uh maintainex facility solutions, peerless pioneer chemical uh supply solutions, veritative and waxy sanitary supply as the lowest responsible bids for the 2525 2026 school year with an option to renew annually for an initial two years. >> So moved. >> Second, >> Mr. N. Thank you, Mr. President. Um periodically we
167do go out to bid for custodial supplies. Um we are recommending eight these eight vendors um two reasons right they have met the spec the spec specifications in the bidding document plus they are the lowest biders so we guess the best price for the items that and the quality that we need so uh it's for one year uh we do have the option to renew it annually for two more years. >> Thank you. Any public comment on this item? >> None. >> Any board comment on this item? Okay, I'll call for a vote. All in favor say I. >> I. >> Any nays? Hearing none, the vote passes 70. Thank you. We are now at our information item. Quarterly William settlement of compliance report for 20 uh for April through June 2025. Dr. Zitlo, >>
168thank you. Um we received our um information and our report from LA County Office of Education. We had no complaints in instructional materials, none in facilities, and none in teacher vacancies and mis assignments. >> Thank you, Dr. Zilo. Uh, board members reports. >> All right, the lights are lighting. Board clerk Tatiana Buouie. Um, so I am so happy to share that I attended uh Whitney High School's theater summer program production of The Little Mermaid. I believe it's grades third through early high school. So you just get so many um kids from across the district who who come and and learn in 16 days to put on a whole show. And of course we high school always does does a spectacular job on their shows. And um I do want to congratulate all the kids who
169participated in that. I believe the show I went to on on the evening show 7 p.m. was sold out. So on on Thursday, um I attended the City of Cerrito soccer awards night this past week. Again, so many cute little kids, ages five till high school and uh Heritage Park was completely full of families. So that was a really fun event. Concert in the park um last week with the Bruno Mars Tribute Band. Um, I heard it was double the attendees of Taylor Swift. No offense, Swifties, but that to me is so exciting because it just really shows um that our community was excited about this. There were so many kids there. Um, it was fantastic. And uh I I did also uh want to congratulate the city of Cerritos recreation services because a lot
170of what I attended what a lot of our kids um outside of maybe a district summer school uh ABC unified school district summer school attended were the summer programs hosted by city of Cerrito. So I do want to thank um them for all all their efforts with that. Um I'm I've been invited um to lemonade day for the city of Lakewood that is on Saturday. >> And there are actual ABC students have invited me. They're hosting lemonade stands across the city of Lakewood. I believe it's 10:00 a.m. to 300 p.m. You can look for a map on the city of Lakewood website. It was sent um it was sent I believe I saw one posted. But please go and support these kids. I mean, I I I don't even I don't even know if there's
171a cost. There's probably a cost, but who cares what the cost is because these kids basically invented a business plan for lemonade stands. And if you're not going out of town this final weekend, go support some kids. So, thank you. >> Thank you for your report. Thank you for inviting me to some of these events. And and I saw you at the uh concert in the park, that was really nice. By the way, the little clicker thing here turned off, so I have to remember that it's uh Dr. Rios and after that will be uh board member Yu. >> Thank you. So I will start off with um a couple events that I did I did enjoy en enjoy my time off but I did take time to attend the city of Lakewood's um transition
172meeting and want to again congratulate uh our new city of Lakewood Mayor Cassandra Chase as well as our new vice mayor Jeff Jeff Wood. Um it was an exciting event and thank you uh board member Yokyama Buouie for mentioning Lemonade Day. I am very excited to participate in this event on uh Saturday August 9th. Invite all of you. There is a map out there about the various um events. Um they are going to have a little kickoff uh event at 9:00 a.m. Um but anyway, we maybe we can forward you some of the information if you're interested in attending. Um, I really just want to finish off by saying how excited I am to welcome this new school year. I feel I think we've always had enthusiasm, but I feel like the sense of commitment
173and dedication to to really strive to achieve those goals that we set for ourselves. So, I really want to wish our district the best of luck. And, you know, we always say here's to the best one yet. I really hope that's true. Here's to the best one yet. So, thank you all. And I wish our students um, you know, sending them well wishes. I know the beginning of the school year can be a little you know filled with anxiety but also excitement. So I wish them all all our best and our educators and our entire ABC community. >> Thank you uh board member you. >> Thank you President Nishi. Good evening everybody. Um um today's presentation was very informative and very encouraging and inspiring. I wanted to just mention how um when I first started
174on the board, I think the students I don't correct me if I'm wrong, but I think we had 24,000 >> about 13 years ago. Was it 22,000? >> 22,000, right? And then uh now we have what 15,000 >> 17,000,000. Okay. So my numbers are really off. So 22,000 and we went down to uh 17,000. And of course our district is not the only district that had the you know declining enrollment and uh through throughout the years you know we had um I know the bond did not pass the first time but the second time after two years was it? We had the facilities um committee and we came up with the facility um priorities which was very helpful in passing the bond and we as a community bipartisan worked together to to pass the bond
175and we used that bond to the first thing we did with the pandemic you know we um secured and we had the cameras we had all the closed campuses security was done which I'm very proud of and one thing that I wanted to see happen was uh fix the bathrooms in all the schools, right? And um I know that our uh fellow colleagues wanted to mention about having a study session which I think is is a really good idea because um you know the the results from the ad hoc committee facilities ad hoc committee and then also um you know we had the the three couple years I mean that whole um consultant did all the data analysis of the of all the enrollments right and I know that it was um provided at our
176board report board notes uh in June was it Dr. Zillow >> all the enrollment data. >> It was June, right? >> Yeah. And so, uh, those were helpful. And I was kind of surprised that some of the schools in my area where my kids attended had like 40% coming from other schools. Okay? And that's not just that school, but many elementary schools in ABC, right? I think it's important to see the updates of those uh numbers so that you know board members will be you know informed. Um I'd like to request data updates on this new school year 2025 2026 with the school of choice. I think that that was a a area of interest to many of our um board members as well as community members. And if you can break it down into
177the schools in which city, you know, which trustee area and uh where are they going? You know, is that intra district? Is that interd district within the district? Intra I'm always confused. So if we can we can have um kind of break it down so it's easier for our board members to look at it the charts that would be very helpful. And you know because I like to see that too. And uh and another thing is uh if you can include also the board policy of the families that choose to go to other schools. And I think it is very ideal very ideal if you can walk to your you know elementary school but it's it's not a it's not real realistic because of the board policy as well as parents have a choice. Because
178when I first started serving on the when I first moved to ABC 30 years ago, right, ABC district, uh Whitney was the only magnet school, it was the most sought out school and then um Oxford started. After Oxford, um Troy, but Winnie was the first. So Winnie, we was the signature, right? But now we have competitors because uh some of some of the families will go okay Oxford will offer more Troy offers more right so we have to be competitive not only academically but for the teachers too we want to attract good teachers and so I'm now inspired to uh attend tomorrow's uh teacher orientation as well as Friday's 750 register which means that is also a real attractive ive point for to attract teachers with a lower pay. They will they would they want
179to come and teach at ABC. We want to keep up with that culture, but we want to be competitive, right? And so in order to be competitive, I think that we really have to be physically responsible as a as as a board and to, you know, weather through tough times ahead. So Dr. Zillow, really appreciate it if you can provide that data. Thank you. That is all. Thank you. Um, board member McCaten. >> Um, I also attended the Lakewood Mayorial Transition, uh, where Cassandra Chase was, um, made the mayor. Um, very nice ceremony. Um, I went to the recognition at Critos College of Dr. Fiero for his, um, 10 years being the president there. And, um, he's such a modest man, but, he has done so much at Cerritos College. and um I I so
180appreciate the partnerships he has done with our district. So um just extremely modest and and he doesn't he doesn't take credit for hardly anything but you know he's he's done a ton of things there. Um last week I went to Gar's band camp and I got to serve lunch and um of course one of my grandsons went to went to Gar and was part of the of the band program. So, um I always enjoy going back. So, I did that. And I also like the front of Gar's school now. It is looking really good. So, I I appreciate that. Um Dr. Ziglo and Mr. Nin, I would like for the next meeting if you would um I know school starts on um on the 13th and our next meeting is the 19th, but I would
181like some enrollment numbers because that so affects our fiscal situation. So, if you could get us enrollment numbers, uh, how it's looking like right away for the school district, I would very much appreciate that and I'm sure the board would too. >> Thank you. Uh, board member Mendoza, >> thank you. I apologize. I was busy this summer because I know during the school year I can't visit. So, um, the first thing I did was I attended the Norwok Chamber of Commerce installation and awards because I am also the less on to Artisia, but I'm the lelayison to Norwok. Um and I got actually got to meet the superintendent of Norwok Lamarada for the first time. Yeah, she's really sweet. Um I also attended the 2025 state of the city in Cerritos delivered by Mayor Yokoyama.
182It was a it was a wonderful event. It's different. It's changed. Um and we got lots of information about Cerritos and it was good just to network and and meet a lot of people that I haven't seen for a while. Um I got to visit some schools this summer. So my first visit was to Ferguson. Um, and I I was amazed to see uh well, not amazed because I think our our staff does an amazing job, but I was happy to see that our teachers were using UFly. Um, if you don't know what UFly is, UFly is an intervention program. It's easily accessible and the kids, it's it's very systemic. It's explicit and it builds upon the lessons. And I got to see the progression. I started off, I think it was in TK or
183preschool, and they were doing phmic awareness lessons. And then I got to go to kindergarten where they were doing um using the word math and I got to sit down with one of the girls uh in kindergarten and we were we were manipulating the magnets and we we did some words. Um and then I I was also able to go into um the upper grades and in there we were they were doing reading comprehension. So I got to see the whole progression of you there at the summer program. And then I went over to our our students with special needs and they didn't want to let me go. They were so cute. like each one of them was doing their own activity and I I was doing we had um the puffy letters and one
184of the students was doing ABC and so I would help him and he was really cute because he wanted them all to be capital and we couldn't find some of the letters in capital. One of the other students had a capital and he would go and and take that one like really quietly and sneak it over and then I would say oh but that's his and he was like no this is mine now. Um, but it was good because they were all working on foundational skills um, in their own way. Um, so I was really glad to see that that that even though during the summer it was uh there was a lot going on in that community that our students were still able to to go into the classrooms and and just learn and
185have and have fun. Um, after that I visited Burbank Elementary with their summer program. I didn't get to visit class because I was in the NPR and I passed out books to all the students. So, they all came in um and they got their I think it was a Scholastic bag, correct? Yeah. They all got a a bag of Scholastic books for the summer. And I said, "Are you guys going to read them?" And they kind of looked at me and they were like, "Yes." I don't know if they really meant it, but they had them. I said, "You know what? You're going to have it for the whole your whole summer school year. You can read it at, you know, your convenience." So, that was really fun to see. Um, and I also got
186to go over to NEIUS and see the migrant in and I I spoke a little bit about that, but the high Whitney High School students supporting and when I was there, I got to walk into all the classrooms and even though we didn't have the attendance for migrant ed that we wanted to, we still had students showing up. And so that was good to see. And in those classrooms, I went into my favorite classrooms. You guys know I'm a primary teacher. So I went into the preschool class and we were on the floor and we were building. They had those little magnetic um squares and we were building and we were talking. We were doing oral language and they didn't want to let me leave. They were like, I go, I gotta go. I'm sorry.
187And then I went over to kindergarten and they had just finished um I think they were doing art and so they were drawing and they were going to do a writing activity and and it was just great to see them there and just being kids. Um I also um had a couple meetings. So, I went over and met with um Hawaiian Gardens Coun Councilman Ernie Vargas and he was really informative and he gave me a lot of history about the city of Hawaiian Gardens and I a lot of stuff I didn't know. So, I was glad that I got to meet with him. Um I also met with the city of Artisia. It was the superintendent, the president. Um, we had the sheriff there and it was myself and we just kind of met because
188I wanted to make sure that we're collaborating as cities and as a school district to make sure we're supporting our families and we did talk about, you know, the climate of of what's going on and how we can support. And so, we have another follow-up meeting and I hope that that continues so we can make sure we're collaborating. Um, and then I also went over to Ferguson and it was Vice President Nyola was there. Um, Dr. Lozano was there. um council member um Hawaiian Gardens council member Ernie Vargas was there with the principal and so we just kind of talked about you know challenges and needs of the of the school and how we could support them. So I I really appreciated that because um you know I'm the trustee for for Artisia but I
189still want to know about our other communities and their needs too. Um and I just I just want to close out Oh wait I forgot one. Yes. last night I think pres you were there. You went to the Archesia Angels and >> Oh, that's right. >> Angels action. So, um, Councilwoman, um, Zila here, she actually, this was amazing because she got students from Whitney, from Certos, from Gar, and during the summertime, they did, um, presentations, and so they had a a competition and their their goal was to go out into Artisia businesses and speak with them and ask them about how what what they needed, the support that they needed. And so, they made presentations. And it was really good to see our kids going out during the summertime where they could be doing anything
190else but they were out in the community working with our businesses and trying to make a difference and trying to, you know, match the, you know, we have older generations of business people, you know, that are kind of like need help with like social media, you know, that kind of thing. So, it was good to see them working together. So, I attended that and I took some certificates over and presented them to them. And so I it was really good to see that um to see our kids working. Um and I think just to close out um oh I forgot one. I attended the ABC Unifi leadership launch with the principles and I went to go visit Dr. Feral. I took a little side meeting on the side and like um board member said that
191doc he he kind of caught me up on everything that he's working in collaboration with our district and he's amazing. He's he works really well with us and he supports us all the time. Um, but I just wanted to say one thing about that leadership launch and I don't think I got a chance to say that our principles are really the bridge from the district to our communities to our schools and and I think we charged them with with the with with the big with the big ask for this year. This year I I see this year as a as growth right as as change. And I think uh Dr. Zila was saying that we all have to believe that our students can show growth that they can learn. And I think that's for all
192of us is that this year is kind of I I feel different this year. I feel things are going to move in a different direction. And so I just I just hope that you know we we all look at those priorities and take them to heart and really work on them. But our principles are going to be the leaders who are going to do that for us because we can't be at the school sites. And I did ask our principles to find school leaders because there are so many teachers and staff members at our schools who are leaders, but we just haven't asked them to step up. And so I I told them, you know, find go back and find your school leaders and ask them because I wasn't a school leader. I was a
193teacher who kind of did a lot of things, but um until my principal asked me, I was like, okay, I'll do this. I may not know how to do it and I may be a little, you know, hit the road, you know, kind of slow, but I I I'm grateful that she gave me an opportunity to find my own leadership and my voice. So, I'm hoping that this year our principles will go and do that for our staff. Guard looks amazing, doesn't it? >> And I think that goes to our priority, making sure our facilities are looking really good. our students deserve um schools that are are appeasing, appealing, and our community needs to say that because if they see and they say, "Wow, Gar's looking good. I think I want to go there. I
194think I'm going bring my kids there." So, I think that's that's a great priority, and I hope to see the results of that. Um uh board member U was saying that um you know, she wants to have a study session. I think I I agree with her. I think we do need to have a study session to continue the conversation. Um in my mind, I know we need to go a certain direction. I just want to make sure that the district is doing everything possible before we come to the final outcome. So, I am not opposed to having a study session and having conversations and working together as a board to continue that conversation. Um, I there's one ask. I know it's the beginning of the school year. Um, but I know that we're our
195students are going to be taking our district benchmarks pretty soon. We call it boy. Do we call it boy here? Beginning of the year. We don't call it boy. Okay. I call it boy because that's what I've been calling for years. So, if we could please get those um results, if you could share them with the board and not in the notes, but a separate document because it's kind of hard sometimes to go in there and find that document. So, a separate document. And just in closing, I I want to wish everyone a great new school year. Um this school year, we're going to begin with a lot of unknowns, right? We're going into a school year with change, a lot of unknowns, a lot of, you know, there might be fear there. there. The
196kids might come in, you know, not knowing, but I want to make sure that they know that we believe in them and that when they come to us, they're going to be safe and we're going to do everything we can um as a district to support our families. Um and yeah, that's it. Thank you so much. >> That's it. >> That's I got that's it. I got through everything. >> Okay. All right. Uh thank you, board member Mendoza. Um Vice President Nyola. >> Uh thank you, President Nishi. I just wanted to start by thanking all the staff that worked very hard this summer. Um, I know not all staff gets the summer off. So, I appreciate, you know, district staff here, you know, working double time to getting school ready or doing a professional development,
197putting that together. So, I appreciate you guys being here, staying up late, you know, working weekends if you needed. I also want to thank our my school board trustee members here. Um, like Ernie mentioned, President Nishi, that this is a team and we are going to work together to, you know, come up with the best solutions for our district because change is coming and we want to be ahead of that change and we want to have a plan and we have our strategic plan. So now we're going to take steps. And lastly, I just wanted to uh pay my respects uh to uh coach Arasco uh from Gar High School. the head wrestling coach uh passed away this summer and he dedicated 24 years of his life uh being the coach at Gar High School
198and he was my wrestling coach and uh just want to give my condolences to his family and all the kids that came through Gar's door. Uh you know we learned a lot from him on not just wrestling but life working hard and if anybody is inclined you can always donate to the wrestling program at Gar High School. Um, so thank you. >> Thank you. Uh, board member Yokoyama, actually clerk Bokoyama Buouie, one more time. >> Yes, I had a quick comment. Um, Cerritos Town Center. So, going to direction for priority 4C, strengthen community partnerships. Cerritos Town Center is currently doing a vote for your favorite ABC unified school teacher. it. Um, you can vote at cerritottc.com. And I think this is so awesome because um I mean when I was younger I would go to
199Cerritos Town Center and hang out at like Smiths and develop photos or something. But the fact that they're offering this to their teachers um to our teachers and giving our families and students an opportunity to vote for their favorite favorite teacher um in the ABC school district because they know a lot of our families shop there. Um, also I think the top two teachers will get to um pick pick like various items, school supplies, all this stuff. So families go on there. Teachers, tell your students it's until August 13th. So literally like the first day of school um for elementary school it ends. So thank you. >> Thank you. Thank you um board members for actually reminding me because I was thinking what did I do this summer? Nothing. And then I realized, oh yeah,
200I went to Ferguson and gave away books and that was so much fun. But anyway, that's not so important for me. Uh, thank you for all your thorough and good reports. We're going to have a great year. Let's give to number 21 announcements. Next regular board meeting will be Tuesday, August 19th, 2025 at 7 p.m. at the district office boardroom. The committee meetings will be strategic planning board advisory committee, Tuesday, August 26, 2025 at 5:30 uh at the district office boardroom. If you want to see some legislative policy, we may have some uh interesting things there. So, we'll have that on Wednesday, August 27th, 2025 at 6:30. So, look at these times because they're specific. Each one is different. District conference boardroom, diversity, unity, equity, the due board advisory committee. This will be Thursday, September
20118th, 2025. So, this is going to be a little bit later. Uh 5:30 p.m. District office boardroom. So, August, August, August, September. Uh, finance and audit advisory board committee to Thursday, September 25th, 2025 at 6 PM district conference room dates to remember. Don't forget first day of school. Kids got to be there. We need you there for many different reasons, but including learning. Uh, 7th grade only is August 12th, 2025. First day of school, all grades, everybody else, if you didn't go on the 12th, you all got to be there by the 13th, 2025. And now we have a second public comment section. >> Yes, we have one uh second public comment speaker uh Megan Mitchell. >> Good evening board. Good evening board president Nishi. Um, I was at home listening to the board meeting
202as like every teacher's favorite thing to do on a Tuesday night before we come back to school, right? Um, but I felt like it was super important and I was listening to the strategic plan and one of the things that I feel like as teachers we have to do is we come up with like our learning objectives for our students but also with our learning objectives we have to come up with the plan for the how. And so as a teacher I heard a lot of objectives which was great but I think that what as at least for the conversations that we have within the teachers in ABCFT is that where we feel like we need the support is in the how the want is there right like I know Dr. Rios, you keep mentioning
203the data over and over. Like, we have data reflection sessions at our school. We are throwing the kitchen sink at our walls and it's scary because we're in a time when we are now facing a budget crisis. So, we're working with less money but needing to do more and do more support. And so, um, coming into the school year, something like this is great to have as a vision, but what teachers need and what we need to feel secure and feel empowered to do our job and to face the data head on is the how. And on top of that, I think something else that we need is to see more of our district leaders at school sites, not to observe like what's happening, but to observe what it's like currently. I think we have
204a lot of great ideas and everybody is on the same page with our wants, but there's a disconnect between the realities that we are facing in our classrooms, the supports that we are being given and what is actually going to make the difference to help us meet these objectives because these are amazing objectives. I think we're all on board for that. But coming into the school year, as we're going into the professional learning on Friday, as we're coming into our principal meetings, can we have the how so that we're not again faced with what is the what is the benchmark that we're trying to meet, but there's no road map for us to get there. Thank you. >> Thank you. Um I'd like to have a motion to adjourn in Oh, okay. Okay. Uh, we
205can't really comment on public comments. Um, but you can speak to her afterwards or subsequently >> and you can give something to the superintendent. >> We we always respond to public comment. >> It's like being a teacher and backwards planning. So, we've got the we've got the end goal and now we've got to backwards plan to how we get there. Yes. Thank you. >> I appreciate the comments. >> All right. So, um I'd like to have an emotion for adjournment if it is okay if you could give us a little bit more detail about the coach. >> Do you do you want to do that uh at a subsequent meeting or this one here? >> Um if we could do it at another meeting because I think he >> he deserves a special >> went
206to that school. >> Okay. All right. Thank you. then we'll just have a normal adjournment but maybe the subsequent meeting we'll have an adjournment in the honor of that particular individual who provided a lot to our students and a lot to the generations of u of our ABC. So can I have a motion to adjourn? >> Tatiana moves >> second. >> All in favor say I. >> I. >> All right we're closed. Can we take a picture? [Music] Heat. Heat. [Music] Doo [Music] doo doo doo doo doo doo doo doo doo doo doo. [Music] Heat. Heat. N. [Music]