001Good evening. It's 5:00 p.m. and I'd like to call the March 4th, 2026 regular board of education meeting of the Englewood Unified School District to order. I'd like to ask Dr. Bernardet Lucas to please lead us in the pledge of allegiance. Dr. Lucas, please stand. >> Please place your right hand over your hearts. Ready, begin. I pledge algiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands. One nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. >> Thank you very much. Miss Embrano, would you please call the role? >> Board President, Dr. Carlos McGee, >> present. >> Board vice president, Mr. Brandon Myers, >> present. Board member Miss Joyce Randall. >> Board member Miss Margaret Turner Evans. >> Present. >> Board member Mr. Ernesto Castillo. >>
002Present. >> Student board member Miss Amaya Hazard. >> Dr. James Morris. >> Present. >> Dr. Bernadel Lucas. >> Present. >> Dr. Brian Coffee. >> Present. >> Mr. Rafael Guzman. >> Please be informed that Spanish language interpretation is available during this meeting. Thank you very much, Miss Abrano. Moving on to approval of the agenda. I hereby approve the agenda with no modifications. Reporting out of actions from close session. In closed session this evening, the county administrator took action to issue notice pursuant to education code 44951 that the certificated administrative employees at identified by number 001, 002, 003, and 004 may be released from their administrative assignment effective at the end of the 202526 school year and reassigned for the 2627. 7 school year and directed the assistant superintendent of human resources or designate to send out
003appropriate legal notices. Additionally, in closed session, the county administrator took action pursuant to education code 44929.21B 21B to release and non-reelect from employment probationary certifica certificated employees identified as employees number 01, 02, 03, and 04 at the end of the 2526 school year and directed the assistant superintendent of human resources or designate to send out appropriate legal notices. In addition, in closed session this evening, the county administrator took action to issue notice pursuant to education code that the certificated temporary employees identified by number 111, 112, 113, and 114 shall be released at the end of the 2526 school year and directed the assistant superintendent of human resources or designate to send out appropriate legal notices. Moving on to public comment. We're now going to call for public comment on agendaized and non-aggendaized items to provide
004an opportunity for the public to address the county administrator and board on agenda non-aggenda items. A public comment card must be completed and submitted to the safety assistant who is stationed at the entrance of the meeting room before the beginning of the public comment period. Members of the public who wish to speak on an item on the postage agenda must indicate the item number on the public comment card. Three minutes will be allotted to each speaker and a maximum of 30 minutes for public comment on agenda and 30 minutes for public comment on non-aggenda items. If the public comment cards exceed 10 comments per cards per section, the time may be reduced to hear from more speakers. Speech or conduct that is disruptive, defamatory, or impedes the orderly conduct of the meeting is not allowed
005at the discretion of the presiding officer. Anyone who disrupts, disturbs, or impedes the orderly conduct of the meeting will be required to exit the meeting room in accordance with board bylaw 9323. The Brown Act does not permit the county administrator or cabinet members to respond to public comments. Mrs. Brown, public comments on agenda and non-aggenda items. >> Oh, >> do you have any who are here? Um, let me see. We can start off with non-aggenda items. It's Mrs. Johnson here. >> Please come to the podium to address your public comments on non-aggenda items. >> You three minutes. Um, you may begin. >> Hi everyone. My name is Kim Johnson. I'm the founder and CEO of the B Reit Math Collective. Our mission is to empower, uplift, and expand opportunities through math for all communities. I've
006been working in the Englewood Unified School District and after school programs and there's definitely a need for their math to be better. I'm here today because my board wants someone from the Inglewood Unified School District to sit on our corporate advisory board so that we can have access to just one of your schools, one of your grades to pilot our math app andor curriculum. And so, um, that's my spill for today. Um, I'm not going to keep you long. I We are having a gala where we will be demonstrating the app. I would like to give you um one ticket. We're honoring Dr. Darren Gray of USC who's one of our partners and Renard Turpin, a Boeing executive that works with us quite often. The kids need to see someone that looks like me also
007that owns the business that is helping them. Um, they really, really need to see that. And my husband is black, too. I have two kids. My husband is an electrical engineer for CALR. He's a supervisor. I worked in environmental engineering for the LA County Sanitation District for over 25 years. I left in 2019 to do this nonprofit Be Rellet Math Collective full-time. We are serious about STEM. If we help these students with math, the sky is the limit to what they can do. And so, basically how it started is we did this for our kids. We had one kid that was an overachiever. Then we had my other my daughter. Oh my god, it was so hard to teach her math, but we did it. We made it important. And so we can teach anyone
008on the spectrum because of that. And so, um, when you put math first, it opens doors for everything else. And so, I'm asking you guys to please make this a priority. I'm going to reach out to Dr. Lucas with the plan that I had sent last year for the high school, but we have a serious curriculum because we have to take all the way up to differential equations. And the difference with us is we explain the why. The why you have to do this. So we used to you remember they used to write on the board. You probably don't remember but you remember y equals mx plusb. And you really didn't understand what it was. We explain. We show a race car so that they can understand that it's movement. It has to do with
009speed. It has to do with velocity. All that stuff. So anyway, so I'd like to leave this. Who can I leave the ticket with? I gave one ticket to Dr. Lucas. You want? But I have another one. And then here's information on the gala, who we're honoring, and then who the performers are. And that's my whole spill for today. >> Thank you. And you can give the materials to Miss Infra. >> Okay. Oh, >> thank you. >> I'm moving um to public comments for non-aggenda items. Our second public comment is from John Hughes. Mr. Hughes, please come to the podium to address your public comments on non-aggenda items. >> You have three minutes. You may begin. >> Uh thank you. Excuse me. Um to Dr. Morris, to the uh board, to the cabinet members, and
010to the people gathered here today in the name of ITA. Um we're here today um because we represent the segment of uh educators who um who quite frankly have had enough of the procrastination in terms of um safety and on our campuses in terms of our um collective um morale just is at an all-time almost I want to say all-time low Um and our our message is are are we being respected. Um and we don't feel that an excuse is is an is a is honorable especially at this phase of of um where we are. I mean we focus on Figmat. We focus on getting out. We focus on all of the the um test and the different metrics and measures, but at the same time, we're fiddling while Inglewood is burning. We're sitting in
011a seat and we're ignoring responsible decisions that have to be made to keep uh students and staff safe to make sure that we have stability and and to make sure that this is a culture of learning and and it's student focused. Um I think we've lost that because we're into grandiose uh buildings. We're into projects, but we're not into into the person the personage of our students. And they are crying out to us. And we are here as their uh primary guiders, yet we're not feeling supported. We're not supported. We have every exc every excuse in the book of why we can't get paid a reasonable wage. We hear every excuse in the book of why we should be more involved. You know, we're tired of the fingerpointing. We're tired of of of the lack
012of collaboration. We're solutionoriented, but we're not listen to. Oh, you can hear just like we hear across this speaker, but listening requires cognition. It requires your brain to take in information and process that. And we don't feel that that is occurring. And it's not occurring. And it's evident that at the site level, people are feeling pain. People are feeling um afraid in the environment where we're supposed to be nurturing and guiding and molding. And quite simply, enough is enough. We have to get back to the basics. We have to support learning and we have to do it yesterday. Thank you. >> Thank you. Our third public comment is from Jose Reyes. Mr. Reyes, please come to the podium to address your public comments on non-aggenda items. You have three minutes. You may begin. Good evening,
013everybody. So, I want to talk about equality and equity. So, equality means treating everyone the same and providing identical resources or opportunities. Equity recognizes that people have different circumstances and allocates specific resources needed to reach an equal outcome, addressing unique barriers. Equality is saying this, equity is fairness. That's not happening in this district. It's not happening. Um let's talk about what is happening. What I feel is Bugs Bunny accounting. What is that? That's the district administrators. That's and everybody else. District administrator. Here's $1, $1 for everybody else. One $2 for the district, $2 for everybody else.$123 for the district, $3 for everybody else. Again, that's not equity and equality. Okay. Is there a magic sofa at the district where you can find hundreds of thousands of dollars in the seat cushions to give people raises
014of $20,000 or more? Um, get lobster bis from Panera Bread for your administrator's meetings and pay for other benefits that the rest of us don't get. When I look in my sofa, I only find nickels and quarters. Mr. Gooseman, can you see if there's any money for the rest of us there, please? On a personal note, um the district owes me money from services from last year and also other employees. So, we've been waiting up to a year for for this money. Can you at least uh have payroll and Dr. Coffee look for that money and pay us as soon as possible because this is money that we've earned. There are about roughly about 25 district administrators for about a thousand employees. That's a pretty good ratio of a 1 to40. And compared to students,
0155,900 students, that's a 1 to 236 ratio. Okay, that's a better ratio of site administrators to students, which is like about a 1 to300 and in one case a 1 to 800. That's a better ratio of uh coun school counselors and school psychologists to students, which is about a 1 to300 ratio. Again, we're not talking about equality and equity. You can easily cut about five to 10 district administration positions, say one to$2 million. And with cutting consultants and programs we hardly use, that's another million. So right there, two to three million. Easy peasy. Ingwood High School just started withmies, but I'm learning there may be cuts to the school at one administrator, a counselor, a few teachers. If that's the case, we're not offering what we're advertising to our school to our students and parents.
016What's the purpose of offering programs if we're not going to offer them what we're advertising? We should not do this to our students and parents. Finally, it seems at the district level, you treat each other like family, brothers and sisters, and the rest of us like flies at the family barbecue who are bothering your celebration. Let us all be a part of the family and share in the resources that should be distributed fairly and equitably. Increases for all. Thank you. >> Thank you. And our last public comment for non-aggenda items is from Kia Meyers. Please come to the podium to address your public comments on non-aggenda items. I brought some graphics. >> You have three minutes. You may begin. >> My name is Kia Myers and I have taught first grade for 25 years. I'm
017speaking tonight about instructional minutes in the primary grades. Primary teachers have 1200 instructional minutes per week. We are mandated by our district to teach 1,555 minutes of math, PE, language arts, EL, and think ed. This total does not include any science, social studies or or art which are also legally required. We have a deficit of 4 hours and 50 minutes per week. A full instructional day. Upper grades even with an additional two and a half hours per week still face a deficit of about two and a half hours. District officials have known about this issue for months. Despite insufficient time, additional mandates such as windtime and rethink ed have been added. When they know there is insufficient time, we are told to figure it out. We are unable to keep up with the district's pacing
018schedule due to insufficient miss minutes. We often cannot give the district mandated COI assessments because we have not yet covered the material. I am not questioning the value of any of our programs. They are all important and worthy. The problem is not priority. It is time. It is a fact that it is the law to teach these subjects. It is also a fact that there are not enough minutes to do so. These calculations do not include weekly losses of time for assembly, special events, PBS, and SST which happen almost every week. On a weekly basis, we must decide what to cut on a certain day. No math, no phonics, no what are we cutting today? This is not a classroom management or time management issue. The most troubling part is my students education is almost
019entirely devoid of fun and filled with pressure. I do not do art. I keep first grade and I do not read stories to my students because I don't have an extra 10 minutes in my day. It creates pressure on students and teachers and then we are questioned why we are behind in our pacing and this happened to me today. Please do not form another committee or impose a onesizefits-all top-down solution. The district the directors in this district are paid far more than the teachers. We need practical guidance and the professional trust to use our best judgment to serve the needs of our students. It shouldn't be this hard. I want to teach my students. That is all I care about. Stop telling me to give up instructional time for PDs and PLC's and win time.
020Thank you. >> Thank you. We're now going to move to public comments on agenda items. Our first public comment is from John Hughes. Mr. Hughes, please come to the podium to address your public comments on agenda items. You have three minutes. You may begin. Thank you. Um we're faced with a lot of um reductions of uh former services in a lot of different areas um for certificated staff and um to the point that's been made previously. Um I still don't see the um analysis that's necessary to see uh an efficiency model in business. um it's called proforma statement. It's the statement in which you decide um how many in businesses products that you need to sell to break even. Um however, these this we're we're dealing with um with students and services. And I've heard
021um uh the mayor on one of these podcasts for Inglewood state that uh people need to know business. So I beg to differ. I know business and um he needs to know education. Uh education is not that type of business. You know, we're in a we're in the business of serving uh uh students or the future and we're not we're not conducting that in a wise fashion if we're not analyzing the impact of of the cuts that we make um without a proper analysis. All of our analysis are relying on outside sources. I know more than them. I'm telling you, I do. This is Inglewood. I know Inglewood. I've been Inglewood over 30 years as a professional. I've been here over 50 plus years as a citizen. I know Inglewood, but we still rely on
022outside sources to do the things that we are capable of doing. We cite how Inglewood achieved in the early 2000 um in terms of our reading scores and all of the um accomplishments. Well, guess who was here doing that? That's us. And it wasn't from the outside. And and the lessons that we need to learn is that you have professionals here that are excellent. Actually, the best of the best because they stayed. And so, we don't appreciate that expertise. And we keep moving PE pieces around on a a shuffling on shuffleboard on a Titanic. That's what we're playing. That's the game we're playing because we still have not addressed the attrition rate in this district. We still um align that with state uh state statistics and other things instead of what are we producing. And
023so these cuts, these analysis, they have yet to come to us to find out what is really going on in classrooms and what our needs are. We have said it. We have u sent it in emails and the can continues to be kicked down the road and unressed and we're saying again that's not acceptable. Our students deserve be better. Our families deserve better and we sure do deserve better. Thank you. >> Thank you. And our last public comment is from is from Jose Reyes. Mr. Reyes, please come to the podium to address your public comments on agenda items. You have three minutes. You may begin. >> Okay. Again, uh good evening everybody because I want to show equality and equity to everybody by saying hello to everybody. Okay. So, I want to piggyback on what
024John Hughes just said is that we, you know, I see like in the previous board meetings and even in this uh past board meeting again, more outsourcing, more consultants. Like I I probably can't even count how many consultants that we have. I mean at Inglewood it's like we have a in and an outdoor where like consultants just keep walking in and out in and out and it's like we don't have anybody in our district that we can actually maybe pay a little bit more or pay a little bit extra to do some of the things that are um needed within the district. Um we have a lot of different programs and and yeah they are useful like uh programs for students for afterchool programs but again we have a lot of staff that can possibly
025do that. It's just that a matter of going back to it there shouldn't be two families the district family and our family. We should all be brothers and sisters and consult each other and work with each other so that we're not having all this uh animosity that sometimes happens. Um because again I looked at the uh the the reductions uh for this week and there was one administrative position that was on the list and again who knows maybe that position will be uh rescended before the end of the year. So then technically that would be no administr administrative positions but I noticed that there were some site administrators. Now that's one thing that I will say we do need site administrators. Um, I'm concerned because possibly with Inglewood, there may be a cut to one
026administrator, one counseling position, and some teaching positions. And right now, we're currently offering and pathways. It's not going to work. If we're going to be cutting people, there's no way, you know, people could try to put a band-aid on it, but it's not going to work. So, if we're going to have these cuts, then let's stop lying to our parents and saying, "Oh, we're offering these programs. we on paper it looks great but in reality it's not happening. So uh we need to start collaborating and coming together and see how we can solve these problems. Again going back to the situation with the cuts two or three administrators, four administrators, that's a a million bucks right there, you know, and some of our classified employees, just to let you know, are working two or three
027jobs just to survive. So hopefully there's no cuts uh uh to them in the upcoming weeks because again we're we're talking about people that they come to this district and they they work their their you know what's off and for a lot of times it's for little pay. So we need to be cognizant of this and again work together as a family and not as two separate entities. Thank you. >> Thank you. That concludes our public comments for tonight. Thank you. Thank Thank you very much, Miss Sbrano. Before we go on, I just wanted to ask Miss Myers, if you'd be kind enough to take a photo of your charts and email it to me because I want to study them. Um, >> thank you so much. Um, thank you >> because you told us
028to teach at our training. >> Thank you. I just want to study them. I I really appreciate it. Um, moving on to action items this evening. Uh, we're now going to move on to approval of human resources item 81 through 83. Um, President Mc Mcke to the board. Are there any um comments at this time? Hearing none. >> Thank you. 8A1 through 8A3 are each approved. Moving on to educational services 8B1 through 8B7 to the board. Um do you have any comments um under the educational service division? Hearing none. >> Thank you. >> We don't have any items this evening from measure GGI or facilities. So we'll move on to county administrators division 9A. Do you have any comments on the county administrator division at this time? Hearing none. >> Thank you. 9A is approved.
029Moving on to approval of the minutes of the board meeting held on February 18th, 2026. >> Do you have any comments uh for approval of the minutes at this time? >> Thank you. The minutes of the February 18th, 2026 meeting are approved and we'll move on to board member remarks. >> Um, Miss Evans, we'll start with you. I think you have a presentation this evening. >> Okay, Mr. Castillo. >> Yeah, I'll make quick remarks just because uh this is a rare opportunity to speak to the union body. uh that's present because usually by this point there's like a two-hour meeting and then it starts sprinkling out. But I'm excited to have this opportunity to speak with you all because given my union background working uh for SEIU 2015 and given my background working with other
030school districts, it's important that we have a relationship with the union and the board. Um I'm very excited that I was when I first ran for this position, I was endorsed by ITA and I took that endorsement very seriously. is it was the only endorsement I I I sought because I wanted to make sure that the teachers here knew that I was by their side throughout the whole process. Uh unfortunately during my re-election, ITA decided not to do any endorsement. So it doesn't allow me to show you where I stand on the issues. But we're about to start voting soon. The governing power is coming back to the district board members. And for that reason, we need to start building a relationship. We can't only we can't only communicate through this channel. We have to
031be able to be invited to your your meetings. We have to be able to be invited to have conversations. I appreciate a lot of the the teachers here who have invited me for class visits um and my school sites. That's been very helpful. It's been very insightful. Uh and I want to continue doing that. So, please understand that my email is on the website. Please reach out to me. Uh let's have conversations about how we could support you because we're a year away from having governing power, which means we could vote for these type of things that are being brought up uh during public comment. And we need three people to get through. So, if you want to make sure that we're not only worried about this year, but the next couple years, please reach
032out and and talk to your board members so we can start building that relationship. So, I appreciate you coming out here. Um, I'm always going to be pro union. I'm always be pro teachers because that's the reason why I'm here. I'm an England unified born and raised. I graduated here in 2012. And the reason why I'm here, the reason why I graduated law school and the reason why I'm here to serve on this board is because teachers like yourself. So, please, let's continue this partnership. Let's assure that we're using this opportunity to do what's best for our students and for the community as a whole. Um, adding to that, I want to thank Dr. Morris for your work on ensuring that we're updating our board policies to ensure that our students are safe during ICE
033raids. We are in the Trump administration 2.0 and that means we're going to be in this position for the next couple years. So, the fact that we're being proactive to asssure that our students, which is about a big population of our student body is protected. They understand that they're safe in our school sites and they understand that we're able to communicate with their parents if anything happens. These are big big steps that we're taking and we're using these steps to make sure that we're building trust back within the community as at moments these conversations show that there's a lack of trust, a lack of transparency and a lack of communication. So, I really admire your your leadership on these issues and I admire the leadership with my fellow board members to ensure that that was
034a part of the uh agenda last week as well and that our our staff at school is always prepared to deal with the worst case scenarios. It's um a lot of other things to celebrate. You know, it's women's appreciation month. And I just want to finish my comments by saying I appreciate all the women that I serve with here, especially board president Carlos McGee, board member Joyce Randall, and board member Margaret Evans. Um especially because you are all, you know, educators in your own sense. You have all always been influential in those who have came up here in the community. and I just want to say thank you for all the work you've done as someone who has been able to be nurtured and and and uh cared for uh and educated by women like
035yourself. So, I'm only here because of y'all. So, I don't want to do anything else without you uh working with you together. So, thank you for your work and thank you for everyone to be here today. >> Thank you, Mr. Castillo. Um Miss Evans, um did you have anything, Mr. Myers? >> Uh thank you, Madam President. So, um, just to address, um, our union tonight, I'll just keep it, um, kind of singular with with, uh, directed towards you guys. Uh, I appreciate you guys advocating for our students. Um, you see it firsthand. Uh, and I appreciate that you bring these issues to light to us. Um, unfortunately, everyone up here does not have the opportunity to make it out onto sites and and see what you see. So by you being able to uh come
036and share your frustration and the things that you see on ground level, it's greatly appreciated. Um I've always looked at this situation since I believe 20 since I got on the board as controlled chaos. It's my madeup word. So if you ever use it, you better give me my money. Um controlled chaos is a design uh it's specifically designed for it to look confused. it to look uh I guess impulsive, but in all actuality, it's designed to do just what it's doing. The reason why I take my hats off to you is because you guys fight through it. Part of that control chaos is for you to give up and quit. We don't have any teachers. We don't have a district. We don't have any students. We don't have a district. I can tell it
037to you straight because don't nobody give me a dime up here. I'll pay my own bills. So, I'm just Yeah, laugh Hughes. You you you you know what I mean by that. Um, but I'll just say thank you. Do not feed into the control chaos. Work against it. That's what I'm doing. Working against the control chaos. Even though we know it's been set up to lower our morale, to chase us out, fight. Our future depends on it. We have more and what I've seen since 2020, we've had more I guess hearkening to whatever these billionaire organizations are rather than our own students. And I'm just being honest. So in the future, we have to bond together. There will be something uh in the mix to make sure that there is that equitable stance that you
038say, Mr. Reyes. So, just um just know that I'm I'm there with you. I'm fighting there with you. Just keep your heads up. >> Thank you, Mr. Myers. Um is Miss Randall, is she available? Did you have comments? >> Yes, I am. Hello there, everyone. How are you? Thank you so much. invited to the Jordan experience. I had an issue there. I'm told that it was good because he was standing up the whole time. I would like for us to be able to understand that some folk have physical uh capabilities. I've started to call them that we need to make room for and I didn't realize that till I had physical capabilities, but it it's it's just something that we need to add to the table. So, I'm excited to be a trustee in the
039Inwood Unified School District, and I'm looking forward to great things to come in getting out of receiverhip. Thank you for the opportunity to speak. >> Thank you, board member Randolph. Well, um I think they said it all and I think they said it all from the heart. I think the um board that serves here currently were very sincere about taking on a position. I've been here 13 years. Try getting no compensation for 13 years, but it has been worth it because our students are worth it. This community is worth it. And I will always always I've been here since 1971. I don't think I'm going anywhere until the good Lord calls me home. So I want you to know that um we really don't have a whole lot of differences. We just need to figure
040out how we are going to center ourselves on these children because without the children and without the parents, none of us have a job. And I've always said to this board, if we focus on the children and the decisions that we make are centered around those amazing scholars, we're going to always have differences. But at least we will all be working in some capacity for our scholars. I want to take a moment also to recognize all of the women that have served this district during um Women's History Month. You have made a tremendous difference. No shade to the men, but like Miss Randall said, if we don't show up, y'all can't get up. Okay. And I'd also like to ask um Dr. Danielle Gooby, >> did she leave? >> Oh, can you come to the
041front for a moment? Dr. Eugima Hosea and um Kelly Hawkins Davis. She's not here, but I have worked with these two women long before I sat on this board. And during Women's History Month, we will celebrate them at a later time this month. But I just really publicly wanted to tell both of you how much we appreciate all of your efforts and trying to make a difference, not only as amazing women, but as amazing educators. So, thank you on behalf of everything that you do to service this school district. Kelly Hawkins is not here. She will be recognized, too. But that Coleman field that you see out there that we have not been able to use for almost 20 years, she is the one that brought me the money to make the difference. So, she
042will be uh recognized with those um our other two uh uh individuals later on this month. >> YES, PLEASE. YOU KNOW, THEY REALLY THINK I DON'T KNOW what I'm doing. I do know how to clap. Thank you very much. But um my vice president here, can we clap again? Let's just clap. But I recognize all three of them because if it's not for the Dr. Hosea's and the Dr. Goosebies, the the Kelly Hawkins, they don't get into the diff the district to make a difference. And I want to recognize all three of them because despite a lot of what you don't see, there is a lot of positive things that are happening in this district. So, I don't want to leave this evening thinking that everything is so bad because if we continue to think
043that way, we're gonna move that way. So, I hope we move together in the spirit of we going to get some stuff done. Thank you for your time this evening. And Dr. Morris, I turn it over to you. >> Thank you. Thank you so much, Dr. McGee, and thank you for your eloquent remarks. Um, our next board meeting is scheduled for March the 11th, 2026. And this evening's meeting is adjourned at 5:40 p.m.