001all right welcome everyone bienvenido atolos to the Mount Diablo Unified School District governing board meeting April 14 2021 it is 604 p.m and we're reconvening our Open Session and we have a new translator here welcome event um would could you explain to people how to find the interpretation button would that be okay escucha building needles thank you very much much appreciated okay great um so I would like to open this meeting um with a recognition of um saying his name Dante Wright to acknowledge the pain and Trauma this horrific recent incident has brings to his family and also to many of our own students and staff it reminds us of injustices near and far including miles Hall who was killed right here in Walnut Creek I wanted to mention that for educators there is a
002post on learningforjustice.org that's called don't say nothing um that helps to ensure students have space to reflect and process their feelings I know as we've moved into the hybrid a model that some parents have asked whether the afternoon time whether it's in person or online is is just a study hall I think this is an example of the kind of social emotional support that our Educators can be providing to students during this time I also want to just give a few thank yous before we get started first to Austin breidenthal our public information officer who is moving on today to new and exciting career opportunities thank you Austin for your well-organized work and dedication to Excellence and equity in mdusd we wish you the best in your new Endeavors and you will be greatly missed
003and also Welcome to our new interpreter Yvette Machado as well as thank you to our ongoing interpreters Rossi Franklin and Mariana Benson um and thank you as always to Mario Hernandez our technician for ensuring these these meetings run smoothly thank you so much all right with that I would like to open with the Pledge of Allegiance and roll call I don't know which way to face here I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands one nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for all thank you now we'll go to roll call vice president Mason here trustee Mayo here Christy and Zoe here trustee McFerrin here and trustee Ellis here and I am also present so we are all here thank you so
004much so next we have a 5.2 the review and potential approval of the agenda do we have any changes to the agenda or do we have a motion to approve I would make a motion we approve the agenda as presented second all right thank you motion from vice president Mason second from trustee Mayo we'll take that to a vote trustee Mason yes trustee Mayo yes trustee Ella yes trustee McFerrin yes trustee and zaywe yes I also vote Yes motion passes 5-0 with concurrence from our student board member thank you so much all right uh so moving on to 6.0 this is the report out from our closed session 6.1 negotiations the board may discuss negotiations or provide direction to its Representatives regarding represented employees pursuant to eera government code section 3549.1 agency negotiators Dr Adam
005Clark Dr John Rubio Dr Lisa Gonzalez Dr Wendy aguili Jennifer Sachs Dr Dan scadero Cesar Alvarado and Mike Berg agency's Medea dma mdspa CSEA CST local one and Teamsters Local 856. we received information and provided directions item 6.2 there was no case no not no action or information provided with that we will move on to item 7.0 public comment and mrenic how many public commenters do we have at this point we had about nine individuals who pre-registered for those of you who are in attendance we would prefer you to raise your hand and I can let you in one by one and call on you from there very good thank you um so then we can continue with our usual the three minutes uh for public comment the public May address the board for grading
006regarding any item within the jurisdiction of the Board of Education of the Mount Diablo Unified School District these presentations are limited to three minutes each or a total of 30 minutes for all speakers or the three-minute limit may be shortened if there are multiple speakers on any one subject the public comment period may be moved to the end of the meeting speakers are not allowed to yield their time so we'll continue with the three-minute uh amount and I'll let Mr renick take it from here as far as managing the public comment thank you thank you our first speaker will be Noel fructan not followed by Angie Angela beaver and Cora Mitchell First Noel yeah uh very good job Laura that was that was almost exactly correct um board superintendent Clerk the original agenda tonight had
007no mention of reopening how is that possible why are critical items such as reopening which every constituent in the district teachers District staff students parents everybody has an interest in no matter which side of that argument you're on why is that relegated to the catch-all bucket of the superintendent's report it's disgraceful my original public comment a number of months ago was about this exact issue and here we are again why does reopening keep getting pushed off the agenda and who is actively working to keep this off the agenda because that didn't happen by accident right this is the most important topic the Board of Education should be working on this is the most important topic the superintendent and his staff should be working on so that did not get left off the agenda by accident
008or a mistake somebody purposefully did that and we need to understand why secondly there are a lot of nice and important resolutions from week to week tonight's is is primarily around climate change obviously an important topic obviously one that needs to be discussed obviously one that deserves a resolution but why is there not a resolution declaring that school will be in full-time session five days per week starting in the fall and yeah I can already hear well we don't know what's going to happen in the fall the county might say this the state might say that in the resolution put all those excuses in it but we as parents deserve a resolution stating that there will be full-time school in the fall especially in light of the fact that we talk about a many resolutions
009from week to week that the Board of Education really doesn't have any purview or power over um but returning to school in the fall is something the Board of Education controls thank you Mr renick I think you're muted thank you thank you for your comment next we have Cora Mitchell followed by Angela beaver and Patricia Hamachi hello my name is Cora Mitchell I'm a mother of two children in this District a kindergartner and a second grader um I am calling to speak in regards to the reopening plans but from the opposite perspective I am a family that is going to have to stay in distance learning until a vaccine is available for my children um and I have to say that this uh transition back to hybrid hasn't exactly been smooth but we've been willing
010to sort of go with the flow for the betterment of community but I'm starting to hear rumors about the plan for next year with the distance Learners is to put them in a separate distance learning academy and that is not okay with me um part of the reason why we have um stuck with distance learning for this long is because of the sense of community that we feel at our home school it's something that I personally have put a lot of effort into with our PTA and volunteering in classrooms and we really feel connected with the community there and the thought of that being removed from my children um because we have complicated health issues that don't permit us to come back before a vaccine is available there's really no reason for me to remain
011in the district um distance learning is not easy for us my son in particular is really behind and it's been very detrimental to him to remain in this type of learning environment but going back isn't a choice for us so um homeschooling and the flexibility that that would offer to my family is something that would probably provide more benefit to him but again we've stayed out a sense of community and um wanting to sort of uh make it through this storm with everybody shoulder to shoulder and I can only ask my kids to endure that um for so long and so I really would like to start hearing about if that is in fact the case that next year we will be relegated to our own um separate learning pod that is removed from our
012school site uh because if so I will need to make alternative plans and I hate to put pressure on because I know that this has been really hard for you all and you've been getting a lot of push about the uh reopening for in person and I really don't want to add to that stress for you but I just have to be honest about how challenging this has been for the distance learning families as well um and again we've you know this this new hybrid plan has um made things harder for my family and um we're still here and we want to still be here but um if we're going to be removed from that sense of community that we currently have I just don't really see what benefit there is for my family to
013remain in the district any longer so I'm hoping that somebody can clear that up for me thank you thank you for your comment next we have Angela Beaver followed by Patricia Hamachi and Carmen torones Torres thank you um good evening Mount Diablo Unified School District Board of Education my name is Angela bever I'm an English partner dual language teacher who happens to be monolingual I feel it necessary to inform you that under your care you have a one very unique Elementary School in Bay Point Shore Acres Elementary we are a dual Language School in the Bay Point Pittsburgh area and we're proud to provide 50 50 additive partner teacher dual language learning experience for the Mount Diablo Unified School families throughout Bay Point and Pittsburgh please be advised that this program is in danger of
014being dismantled due to an decrease in Shore Acres FTE for the upcoming 2021-2022 school year the same cohort of student students was in danger of losing their partner-teacher dual language program going into third grade at the beginning of the school year again we ask that the board please take into account this valuable dual language program the following are my points of concern our first cohort of partner teacher dual language class will be moving up to fourth grade next school year but with the decrease in FTE this cohort of students will not have the option of a partner-teacher dual language class in fourth grade this third grade cohort signed up for this program in kindergarten with the intent of continuing the program through fifth grade and we'd like to honor this commitment to our families the
015partner teacher dual language program is the only bilingual program that provides equal emphasis on teaching all language skills in both the primary and second language eliminating the partner teacher dual language program for our incoming fourth grade cohort essentially changes this culturally and linguistically Rich program into a subtractive program placing greater emphasis on English and discounting the four years of effort in building this program and according to by literacy from the start literacy squared in action in a departure from the traditional early to late exit traditional bilingual programs and in keeping with a paired literacy approach children never transition out of Spanish literacy instruction in our framework instead Spanish English paired literacy instruction is maintained through fifth grade how can we honor the Integrity of our program without the FTE to maintain it please help us
016honor the partner-teacher Dual language program commitment that we have built with our Shore Acres Community please approve the need for the Shore Acres FTE to remain the same for the 2021-22 school year this really is a matter of urgency I appreciate your time and effort the school board puts into protecting the programs that enrich our students lives and I look forward to hearing from you on the needs of the Shore Acres dual language program thank you for your time service and consideration thank you for your comment next we have Patricia Hamachi followed by Carmen taronis Torres and Olivia oberbrunner foreign thank you everyone I appreciate your time thank you so much for to the school board for um listening to our concerns like my colleague Angela bever I'm here to speak on behalf of the
017Shore Acres dual immersion dual language program um the reason that we're coming to speak to you tonight is because the FTE is reduced as currently scheduled to be reduced at our school um this will dismantle our program in fourth grade of students whose families have chosen for their students to have a dual language program from K through five so that they have the best opportunity to be successful in both languages English and Spanish we are a dual Language School and we need the Equitable funding and support to be able to continue this program and support our families in the choices they made for their students this reduction of FTE will take away the opportunity for this cohort of students to be able to get that education that they deserve if we dismantle if we do
018not fund this FTE that program will stop and it might be a Snowball Effect for other years where our dual language program may not be able to continue even though it is the best option for our students to have support and Have Not only bilingual skills that are grade level but also by literacy skills that are up to grade level this is the program that will be most successful for them and their Futures but we need the funding and support to be able to continue this program if we do not have the extra the empty back that we had this year this program will not be able to continue how our families have chosen it to be for their for their students future and I would like to ask you to please consider to reevaluate
019the FTE that's been given to Shore Acres for the upcoming Academic School year thank you so much thank you for your comment next we have Carmen terrones Torres followed by Olivia oberbrunner and Blanca Vega foreign can you hear me yes Carmen did you want to speak under a public comment or under Communications I have a 13.2 and 13.4 uh I don't think it's related to my unit so I think the communication sure okay thank you um good evening board members on Dr Clark on Monte Diablo Unified School District Community my name is Carmen taronis Torres I Am A administrative secretary for the district I want to bring um I'm going to be speaking about 13.2 uh I am very concerned because I as a secretary I have placed two purchase orders for about 20 uh
020laptops since October of last year uh I've been trying to find out the status and it just goes on and on uh today I received two boxes of just the uh bags no laptops uh it's going to be almost a school year I have interpreters I have cwas we have nurses we have counselors that don't have the equipment I don't know what I'm trying to understand a logic explanation of why we're going through this with the laptops um that's 13.2 and then the 13.4 the review of potential approval of the fake Max study I just want um I think there's one board member uh Miss Mayo that probably remember that a couple of years ago we had a uh fake Mac study in special ed and student student services and I I just hope that
021the report that is sent to the board is not doctored like the other one was and that's it for me thank you very much for listening thank you for your comment next we have Olivia oberbrunner followed by Blanca Vega and Devin Jackson hello can you hear me yes we can hear you thank you um I just want to say good evening to the board and Dr Clark um and I wanted to Second Noel's comment um I do feel like reopening full-time should be number one on our agenda and the most talked about agenda item it's the most pressing and important issue in my opinion um I personally been fighting to get our schools open for months and months and months I'm sure you guys have heard me speak here before at these meetings but I
022do have to say my son returning to school he only got to back to go back one day before spring break but the look on his face and just the glimmer of hope I saw and he had a pep in his step and it was it was amazing and it was worth every hour of fighting that I've done over the months to get help get schools open um I do think that five hours a week is not enough it's it's actually pretty ridiculous amount of time it's just not enough but I I do understand we have to ease back in and I am happy to get feed on the ground um I know there's only six weeks left of school so I'm I'm okay staying with it my fight is for a fall we need
023a five-day full-time commitment not just a you know a statement that was released but we need a vote we need some sort of concrete decision that you will guys will be opening up full time for fall um I know many dozens actually of families that have signed their kids up for private school some have already taken out loans in preparation um waiting on your guys's vote so if you can't commit to 100 full-time reopening please just let us know um we need to do what's best for our children my kids cannot survive another you're on zoom and I know at private school as much as my family really cannot afford it we will be putting them there to get an in-person education that they deserve so please my I urge you urge you please vote
024on a five-day full-time opening for fall and if you can't do that and if it is wishy-washy please let us loose there's many families that would be so sad to leave but would just have to do what's best for their children so I just urge you to do that and thank you for your time thank you for your comment next we have Blanca Vega followed by Devin Jackson and Debbie hickey good evening dear members of the board can you hear me yes okay um my name is Blanca Vega and I'm currently a second grade dual language teacher for sure Acres Elementary hi I have many emotions right now and I apologize if I tremble but I've spoken before many many times um advocating for my school that is my home and my family as as
025much as my my co-workers I I dearly appreciate them and um I'm here tonight to speak about the FTE problem that we're having with this wonderful program that we've worked so hard for so many years I've seen students pass to our gates and our classrooms and I'm being bilingual it is a superpower that we can give them and getting rid of this program will represent their dreams and many other goals in their lives to not be able to come to completion as much as we want killed for them to be make them buy their being bilingual is their superpower having two teachers is their luxury and our school may have already many needs like a PTA or a program for the gifted or talented and many many other things but I am urging you tonight
026to allow us to keep the very exemplary teachers that we currently have in our team that losing any of them will really damage for years to come and above on top of everything that we've lost with this pandemic we cannot allow this our students resources to be gone for them and this program that brings uh my rad of resources and benefits for them for their life long term um the partner teacher do a language program is the only bilingual program that provides equal emphasis in teaching all language skills in both the primary and second language please notice that our partner teacher dual language program strives to create a more Equitable learning environment for our students this will be my plate tonight to you and I thank you for your service and for your care and
027your time and consideration thank you very much thank you for your comment next we have Devin Jackson followed by Debbie hickey and last Jill Watts walson yes hi thank you very much my name is Devin Jackson and I did raise my hand because um I wanted to do a public comment in um if in the fact if I could not speak on what I'd like to speak on which is uh 9.2 which is the review and potential approval of the resolution 2021-61 the call to action on climate change and so would you prefer me speak about my information now or can I speak during 9.2 I think the best thing is for you to speak now we've been combining all the public comment into one during the zoom sessions that we have so you can
028go ahead and speak on 9.2 thank you okay thank you very much good evening mdusd board members board president pound superintendent Clerk and members of the mdusd community thank you for having me here tonight and permitting need to speak first I would like to express my gigantic thank you for drafting this resolution 9.2 and incorporating new language about outdoor classrooms into the climate change resolution and I found on the resolution the creation of the ecological schoolyards that enriched traditional lessons in every discipline with Hands-On learning resources and living systems whenever possible and doing Outdoor Learning I am a middle school stem teacher environmental sustainability coordinator certified climate change educator and I can't I need my phone oh and um an educator with the National Geographics bars NASA Globe educator NOAA ocean Guardian educator Environmental Education
029vice president of an Environmental Education nonprofit called outside the box 925 I wrote a um thesis on place-based education and Outdoor Learning and my thesis was on the value of supplementing Science Education with outdoor instruction for sixth grade students and all students and I tried to improve improve the levels of Engagement and environmental content knowledge retention would increase if students learned any K-12 content and skills in an outdoor schoolyard environment rather than a traditional indoor science classroom teaching about the national natural world during the Covenant 19 pandemic and Beyond in the in the classroom only in the classroom has limitations even when supplemented with indoor lessons students have different learning styles and didactic education alone is not effective for students who learn by doing complex Concepts presented only in an informational manner in the classroom
030due to safety protocols and procedures can be hard for students to grasp students May memorize terminology and learn isolated facts but not gain an understanding of how the natural world works or be motivated to learn more about K-12 academic social emotional and equity-based Concepts in school skills in school moreover in science math and Ela where there is a progression of Knowledge and Skills and learning Builds on previous learning it is critical that students gain an understanding of Concepts and skills rather than memorize facts these realities represent a strong case for using a combined classroom and outdoor education approach or simply just an outdoor education classroom to teach students about K-12 Concepts and skills there is a growing body of evidence that a combination of classroom and outdoor instruction is more effective than classroom education alone
031in improving student performance particularly in Science Education and other um content areas do you see an eruption you do have 10 seconds left thank you looking back into history most learning occurred outside the classroom for example students were learning on a boat to New York Harbor during the 1912 Spanish Flu pandemic and we can do it today so I'm going to end there I have more to say but thank you very much thank you so much thank you for your comment next we have Debbie hickey followed by Jill walson hi my name is Debbie hickey and I am the office manager at Mount devil high school I'm calling actually in regards to 13.4 I'm a little concerned with the fact that this fig mat for mno is hidden in your consent agenda for the past
032two years we have heard nothing but how we are in um that we are not going to make our fiscal commitments to our district and how we're having to take out loans but you're allowing a thirty six thousand dollar fig mat in a department that could be looked at through so our district or through the county um understanding that the county is still looking at our fiscal department so why is that something that we can't do um my other concern is that we have members for CST that are in that unit and my gut feeling is is that this unit is about to be dissolved due to this big match but you still have you're paying all these wonderful managers and Chiefs all this big bucks but you haven't paid anything to the small CST
033members um and so that really upsets me so I'm hoping that you will consider this um take it out of the consent agenda start looking at it a little bit differently and consider maybe saving that money and getting someone else to look into that department thank you for your time thank you for your comment our last comment for the evening will be Jill walson hi can you guys hear me yes we can hi mdusd board members and Dr Clark I have to agree 100 that this reopening of our campuses full time should be the only thing on our agenda it should be on our agenda as an action item but also the only thing that we're talking about as elected officials you as the board are in a position to represent our voice a school
034board member is supposed to be a champion of the community we as parents are frustrated our hands feel tied at times even though we're trying to communicate what our children need things are moving too slow it's been over a year and our children can just now go on campus for four to five hours a week yet not be taught new curriculum This is Not Enough From A Parent's perspective and how are you okay with it we understand it's it's complicated with the unions we realize that Logistics are an absolute nightmare but to settle on this very modified hybrid that was presented in the fall of 2020 just because it does not interrupt most of distance learning does not mean that's what's best for our children's education I was the first to sign my children up
035for the modified hybrid because they thrive in Social settings and need to see their teachers we took what we could but that does not mean our children do not need more this is the first year of middle school for my son and the last year of middle school for my daughter they want to be around their peers they need to engage with their teachers this modified hybrid schedule spreads the teachers thin and my children actually have less direct instruction time now to adopt something that was proposed in the fall because it lines up with the mou guidelines what the union is not necessarily best for my children if you're okay with four to five hours in the spring then it's 10 to 15 hours going to be sufficient for you in the fall this is
036our concern as parents trust has been lost on so many levels what loopholes are going to be found not planned for and then applied that keep our children home in the fall we're hearing that if three feet is still a guideline that schools will maybe only open for half days five days but only half days that's not enough we're hearing I'm sorry we have already settled for Less this spring let's not find ourselves in that same situation for the fall being complacent since the current schedule appears less disruptive is not in our children's best interest any and if you ask most of our teachers they're not liking this schedule either I know many would go back five full days and definitely in the fall I greatly appreciate your consideration communication and I thank the teachers
037and principals from the bottom of my heart for all that they're doing for our children thank you for your comment and with that that will conclude our public comment section thank you very much Mr anik and thank you to all who spoke today it's always good to hear from our public and our teachers and our staff much appreciated uh we'll move on to 8.0 Communications 8.1 is District organizations at regular board meetings a single spokesperson of each recognized District organization may make a brief presentation items are limited to those which are informational do we have any speakers under District organization I have not been notified that we would have any speakers we did have two short statements that have been attached to the agenda okay should we read those statements aloud then I don't have
038that in front of me certainly we can do that I don't believe so so it the attachments are on the agenda where the public can see them that's correct yes they are on the agenda under the item 8.1 okay I think that's fine then thank you very much you're welcome all right so moving on to 9.0 recognitions and resolutions uh 9.1 review and potential approval of resolution 2021-60 in recognition of California adult education week April 18th to 24th 2021. Dr Clark great thank you so much and um I I announced at a previous meeting that our adult ed had um gone through a very rigorous accreditation process and uh passed with flying colors so so I do want to again give a shout out to our adult education program but today I'm here to to
039present this resolution for potential approval and it says resolution number 20 21-60 California adult education week April 18th through April 24th and I'll just do as I do with all resolutions I'll read the opening paragraph and the closing paragraph and then I'll turn it over to the board so um whereas from April 18th through April 24th the state of California will observe adult education week recognizing the unique accomplishments of California adult schools and the California state and not in this California State Senate acknowledges that K-12 adult schools offer quality programs meeting every ever-changing economic Workforce and lifelong learning need for our diverse state and so whereas Mount Diablo adult education is a diverse place of learning for students safe from discrimination or bullying regardless of race ethnicity religion sexual orientation or socioeconomic status and now
040therefore the governing board of the Mount Diablo Unified School District hereby proclaims April 18th through the 24th as adult education week and salute the teachers administrators classified staff and students of adult education programs Statewide honoring their effort persistence and accomplishments so uh president count it is now in the hands of the board thank you so much Dr Clark and I know that our former trustee Joanne Durkee continues to advocate for adult education throughout the state and they're finding success in that as well so thank you do we have a motion on this item yes I will Channel trustee Durkee and move for the approval of resolution 20-21-60 in recognition of California adult education week which will be April 18th through the 24th 2021. second all right thank you vice president Mason uh for the motion
041and second by trustee Mayo is there any discussion trustee McFerrin yes um well I'm I'm fully in support of this resolution um I just want to bring up a concern that I have about one line um and it reads um whereas adult schools bring or sorry provide critical opportunities to bring recent dropouts back to school and um and I just wanted to just bring this up because um I volunteered in adult literacy I spent four years um working for students at an alternative high school um I taught ESL Adult Ed and um just the term Dropout to me seems kind of unnecessarily pejorative um and judgmental um sometimes I hear um uh the push out rate instead of the dropout rate which I do think is a more accurate term um I don't think we
042necessarily need to include it in our resolution um but I'm I'm really in favor of um uh just especially because I think dropouts is an equity issue I think it really um is more the result of um students being underserved than individual choices um and so I'm really kind of in favor of maybe changing that language to um uh whereas adult schools provide critical opportunities to bring people who are unable to earn a high school diploma back to school and that's one change that I would that I would like to see if we can and set an amendment to the motion yes right I'll second the amendment thank you trustee McFerrin for the amendment to the motion and thank you trustee Mayo for the second all right any other discussion okay with that we will
043go ahead I'm sorry for too many screens go ahead I know it's okay um thank you trustee McFerrin for that for that catch and that change um that's a good um learning moment for us all and I really appreciate that and um I learned so much about mdusd Adult School from trustee Durkee too so I'm so appreciative for that and I just wanted to share that in my own adult life though not in the USD I've taken piano French and volleyball at my local adult school um I've not yet had the chance to take a community class here but I'm always eyeing the wine tasting um now those are for the communities but we we have our adult school does so much more as this resolution lays out um and it really makes me proud
044as a child care Advocate I love the connection and partnership our adult school has built in providing English classes for parents our style while simultaneously offering learning and care for their children and then the fact that those same adult English Learners can go to DBC and receive an ECE education early childhood education education um to enter the child care and early learning Workforce so I appreciate that over the decades that our school district has chosen to find Value and invest and maintain our adult school programs so I'm I'm eager to to support this resolution thank you so much trustee and Zary yes I think that's so true that family literacy centers the idea of having that housed on the elementary school campus where families can engage with their younger children while their older children are
045just beginning Elementary School it's just a fantastic model that makes so much sense I'm so appreciative that we have it all right any other discussions okay we will take this to a vote uh we'll begin with trustee Alice so what are we voting on first we should vote on the amendment first and then the resolution as a whole if the amendment is adopted okay thank you trustee Mayo I was thinking we were uh gonna vote on the motion with the amendment included but we can do both just for clarity's purpose I think that makes sense so first let's vote on the amendment all right so um we'll begin with trustee Ellis trustee McFerrin yes trustee vice president Mason yes trustee Mayo yes trustee and zaywe yes and I also vote Yes motion passes this concurrence
046from our student board member thank you so much 5-0 all right and now we'll vote on the resolution as a whole including that Amendment okay so beginning with trustee Alice yes trustee vice president Mason yes trustee McFerrin I think you're not you're muted trustee Mayo yes okay trustee McFerrin yes and trustee and zerry yes I also vote Yes motion passes 5-0 with concurrence from our student Board number thank you everyone for that wonderful resolution all right moving on to item 9.2 review and potential approval of resolution 2021-61 a call to action on climate change in recognition of Earth Day and I want to also welcome Lainey Klein King here as well who's a garden educator and I think did you say assistant program manager of our garden outdoor education program in Mount Diablo Unified and
047I want to thank you for your assistance in crafting the resolution today so let me turn it over first to Dr Clark great and as I as I've stated I read the opening and ending of the resolutions but I think someone may be catching on to me because the uh the opening paragraph is quite lengthy so so um so let me please present a call to action on climate change and recognition of Earth Day and that's resolution 20 21-61. so I didn't bring my glasses but I'll get through this so as we Traverse our wondrous Earth admiring its abundance appreciating its provision seeing its diversity of life life witnessing The Mystery of the starry heavens above and hearing whispered Echoes of Eternity in the Timeless cycles that surround us recognizing herein that the present day
048has afforded us Humanity a unique ability among all creatures to look ahead to prepare for the future and to preserve life sin now plainly the dire threat to this all that is climate change we believe that the people and leaders of the world and we the people of the United States of America with great responsibility to fellow countries Mankind and future Generations derived from our present power and scope of influence can and must-seize every opportunity to act and advocate for actions and policies leading to climate restoration and the sustainability of our planet for generations to come and be it further resolved at the Mount Diablo Unified School District Board of Education calls on all elected leaders to take expedient and bold action on climate change to protect and preserve current and future generations and be
049it further resolved that the Board of Education directs the district clerk to transmit executed copies of this resolution to the superintendent of County Schools the state superintendent of education and the California State Board of Education the Congressional climate Solutions caucus and the California State School Board Association the National School Board Association our state and National representatives in Sacramento and Washington D.C and the schools for climate action campaign with that I put it in the hands of the board Dr Clark for your excellent reading there all right uh trustees do we have a motion has resolution review resolution 20 21-61 a call to action on climate change and recognition of Earth Day I'll second that as a hippie from the 70s which we didn't do such a great job we started it but didn't finish all
050right thank you motion by trustee alas second by trustee Mason any discussion I would like to discuss one of the results please yes trustee man uh I would like some clarification in the final resolve regarding the transit mission of the document to various agencies because as I read the uh section that talks about transmission to California Representatives that number could be as few as uh seven or as many as um more than a hundred and fifty so um because that could be 80 assembly members 40 senators and at the federal level two senators and 53 Representatives the only reason I ask this is because I've had to do this work as the California state PTA Advocate at the federal level and um I know the T detail that's required it's important I do value the
051resolution and I think it's important that we distribute the information in my experience without a personally addressed cover letter with the resolution it will end up in a round file so I would hope that the individual that requested this to be placed on the agenda could advise us what uh the direction truly is that is a very good question trusty mayo and I'm not actually sure where that section came from I know that there was uh csba had a sample climate change resolution uh I'm wondering if it came from that Dr Clark would you like to respond yeah so what we'll do is that we will send the resolution to the representatives or to this Clerk of that particular body and let them distribute it throughout so that is that is how we will handle
052that so that we're not sending out 200 personal emails thank you because even the emails if you are trying to email a representative from an area not within their District you that's not you can't accomplish it typically the only way you can get it through is by the facts uh system so uh anyway thank you for the explanation and if everyone's uh content with that then I am also thank you trustee Mayo much appreciated I know your experience is important in these types of situations um thank you Dr Clark it sounds like a reasonable solution all right uh any other discussion um I wanted to just say way back in my college days long time ago um I first learned about environmental racism when I researched up and wrote a paper about um a company
053called Kim waste which is the largest chemical waste plant in the United States west of the Mississippi in my home county of kings and in the city of Kettleman City which is a place that many of you may stop through on the way to LA because it has lots of gas and drive-throughs um and in college there was um right before I got to college there was this huge movement in my community to stop Kim waste but like all of the Kim waste across the country it's nearly impossible to stop them from being located in black or brown communities and Kettleman City although it has a super small population it's almost 100 Latino and so now in our fight for climate change we can't forget about its link to racial Justice Black and Latino and
054Indigenous communities are the most most heavily impacted by catastrophic weather events they suffer the most from bad air pollution from water pollution and so on so by reaffirming our commitment to environmental justice doing those things that we're able to do as listed in the resolution to impact climate change we're taking one step towards upholding racial Justice in our own community so I look forward to approving this resolution thank you so much trustee and Zoe all right any other oh trusty Alex go ahead well I want to thank staff for for bringing this resolution forward whoever brought this resolution forward because we need to recognize that it's not just climate change it's the climate crisis right so we've we're seeing the recent storms in Texas and as Tristan Zooey said the power outages and the lack
055of food that mainly hurt black and brown communities so we are need to be taking actionable steps and the resolution details some actionable steps that we can take in our classrooms and in our homes and in our communities and particularly one of the ones that that caught my eye was the emphasis on implementing comprehensive waste reduction Recycling and compost programs at schools including the encouragement of on-site composting and reduction of plastic usage the reason why this is interesting is that up until last year my high school Northgate High School had a bunch of compost receptacles so we had trash trash cans recycling compost the three the three the three bins but we actually didn't have a large compost receptacle to then put it out to then throw it out too so then that went to
056the landfill so us students were thinking oh we're composting we're not actually composting and up until last year when we partnered with recycle smart we were able to change that so now we have compost recycling and a landfill but I'm wondering how many schools out there how many students think that they're doing a good job composting and they're separating their food but they're not actually composting because we don't have a large compost receptacle so I encourage you if you're at your school site and you're wondering um am I actually composting once we get back in person how can I do that to make sure you actually have a receptive when we're going through that that that three prongs system of because that is the easiest thing we can be doing in our communities so thank
057you for bringing this forward Dr Clark and District staff and I encourage everyone to continue Recycling and composting so that's it for me all right thank you very much trustee LS it's so important to have that student perspective to see what's really happening at our school sites much appreciated all right any other discussion before a vote all right we'll move that to a vote then and let's begin with trustee Ellis yes trustee Mason yes trustee McFerrin yes Justin yes trustee Mayo yes I also vote Yes motion passes 5-0 with concurrence from our student board member and we have a guest speaker here as I said uh Delaney Klein King and I wanted to recognize you for your initiative that you have taken to uh to make sure that screen greenschoolyards.org resources are available and uh
058to all of our school sites and our principals and I appreciate you coming here to be able to give a little bit of an update on how that project is going thank you very much and thank you for having me here tonight um I want to extend my deep gratitude to the board for incorporating new language into the climate change resolution most notably the addition that each school campus is to become a living working model of climate change education we as a district are truly putting our climate change values into action incredible progress on Outdoor Learning has taken place over the last two months in concert with the national covid-19 Outdoor Learning initiative co-founded by Green schoolyards of America organizations like green schoolyards have worked for decades to create long-term plans with school districts to
059thoughtfully add Green Space to their schools in an effort to ensure all children have Equitable access to Nature their initiative launched the emergency schoolyard design volunteers program to help schools bring children safely back to in-person learning outside as a response to the covid-19 pandemic being outdoors greatly reduces virus transmission rates and it also works as a long-term strategy in support of the new sustainability efforts listed in this climate change resolution some of the recent successes that we've had with Outdoor Learning within ndusd recently are that three of our schools have received Outdoor Learning site assessments from the professional Landscape Architects through the emergency school yard design volunteers program these outdoor site assessments identify areas for Outdoor Learning student capacity outside and both existing and potential areas for shade while they highlight no and low-cost ways
060to get children learning Outdoors they also help sites dream big with aspects like outdoor maker spaces amphitheaters and nature play or stem areas our facilities department is partnering closely with us on these efforts and has already followed up at Wren Avenue Elementary by preparing two sites identified as potential outdoor classrooms 17 mdusd principals have been connected to these emergency schoolyard design volunteers and are making steps towards renovating their outdoor spaces with seating and shade our facilities department has been coordinating with our fire marshal and the Department of State architecture to problem solve short-term and permanent shade Solutions we are also closely monitoring federal funds some of which are earmarked for these types of permanent outdoor infrastructure improvements our experienced landscape architect and educational facilities planning Partners have been invaluable consultants and are willing to do
061Master planning with our district to create ecological schoolyards for mdusd the mdusd Education Foundation contributed a generous twelve thousand dollar Grant to fund padded bucket seats and clipboards so classes at our Title 1 schools could take learning outside immediately seven of our Title One schools have already received a total of almost 700 bucket seats and clipboards and students have been learning outside since day one of returning to hybrid activating Outdoor Learning addresses other District goals like Equity covid safety mental health and Community Partnerships it is safe it is easy and it is effective there is a cross-disciplinary group currently working on resource sharing including creative ideas as well as nature-based resources like tree stump donations so I will say that if anybody wants to help with these efforts or to join this group to gather
062information for their schools to please feel free to reach out and contact me not sure how to get my contact information out there but um laineycline gmail.com and happy to include you in these resources and help your school out if you'd like to get planning for how to put some of these sustainability efforts in this resolution into effect on your campus thank you so much Lainey really really appreciate all of your all of your volunteerism and work on this effort and all of the schools sites that have made this possible as you said hitting the ground on day one so that's really fantastic much appreciated all right thank you so much moving on to our next resolution item 9.3 review and potential approval of resolution 20-21-62 in recognition of Arab American Heritage Month yes so
063I'm very pleased to bring this resolution forward for consideration from the board so this is resolution 20 21-62 and recognitions of Arab American History Month so I'll read the opening paragraphs and the ending um so whereas for over a century Arab Americans have been making valuable contributions to virtually every aspect of American society including medicine law business technology government and culture and whereas since migrating to the United States men and women of Arab descent have shared their Rich culture and traditions with neighbors and Friends while also setting fine examples of model citizens and public servants now therefore be it resolved that the Mount Diablo Unified School District celebrates the countless contributions that Arab Americans have made to American society in the state of California recognizing and honoring the month of April 2021 to be Arab
064American heritage month and be it further resolved that the Mount Diablo Unified School District Board of Education hereby encourages staff to review the district's Equity policy and review Cultural Literacy resources and urges the district to observe Arab American heritage month with appropriate programs and activities that celebrate the contributions of Arab Americans to the United States it is now in the hands of the board president count thank you very much Dr Clark trustees do we have a motion on this resolution I move that we approve resolution 2021-62 in recognition of Arab American Heritage Month we'll second that thank you very much motion by trustee McFerrin second by trustee Mason any discussion I would first like to start by saying Ramadan Kareem to all who who celebrate in this holy month inshallah that you have a prosperous
065and um and generous month and I encourage everyone who does not practice to be mindful in conscientious of scheduling meetings and scheduling different responsibilities during this time as the the the fast and and the prayers happen throughout the day so being conscious of any Muslim co-workers that you may have any Muslim colleagues friends to make sure that you are respecting this this holy month and being very very conscious but that is it for me I am very happy that this resolution has been put forward and I'm excited to vote Yes thank you trustee alas uh trustee and Theory um I'm so glad that we're pushing forward with all of these resolutions um to bring awareness and hopefully action to so many important issues and until earlier this year I'd never heard of Arab American Heritage
066Month um until mpusd parents are Multicultural education sent us the most comprehensive list of cultural months I'd ever seen and then even then I said to myself I don't want to just do resolutions to do resolutions um I want there to be action which we ask for in our resolution but tonight after our meeting I'll share um on my social media the Arab American History Museum which provides K-12 lesson plans and virtual tours of the museum it's just a Google form that teachers have to fill out or families whoever the museum is a Smithsonian affiliate and it's located in Dearborn Michigan which is one of the largest concentration of Arab American communities in the United States it's just outside of Detroit it's the first and only Museum in the United States dedicated to recording the
067Arab American experience and the only Museum dedicated to collecting Arab American art it's only been open since 2005 even though as mentioned in the um well sort of mentioned in the resolution Arab Americans began immigrating to the United States in the late 19th century so I really encourage our districts Educators and families to visit Arab americanmuseum.org to learn how you can request the curriculum for free and and request a virtual tour okay thank you trustee and say we I also would like to say we have invited Miss Baja eleganti to speak this evening after the vote she is the founder of ing.org and who also has incredible resources for for educators for Cultural Literacy and inclusion and they were featured in the California Department of Education webinar that you can access on Facebook that was
068about uh you know challenge challenging islamophobia in our schools and they have incredible resources so I'm really happy to have you here and um I also am really excited about this resolution as uh as a child I actually grew up most of my life in Saudi Arabia and when I moved to the United States I was really surprised at the way the media generally treats Arab Americans in this country and and um and the News um and so I think it is really important for all of us to educate ourselves on what the actual truths are about Arab Americans not you know many of them are Muslim and there are misunderstandings about Islam um but it's uh actually the Arab American the Arab world is Central to many religions um not even just Islam and
069so there's so much to learn um and so much to be aware of from our fellow students and our colleagues around the Arab world and their contributions and their presence here in the United States right now to correct so many understandings that are out there so really appreciate everyone who worked on this resolution to bring it forward and hope that it will continue year after year in our in our district here all right with that any other comments all right we will take it to a vote trustee LS yes trustee McFerrin yes trustee Mason yes trustee and zaywe I think you're muted yes trusty Mayo yes I also vote Yes motion passes 5-0 with concurrence from our student board member and now I would like to open the floor to miss Maha El ganiti um
070thank you so much for the opportunity to speak with you today I just want to begin by thanking the um uh the Unified School District governing body on their very first resolution that recognizes Arab American Heritage Month uh what this does is it gives the residents of our community an opportunity to learn more about Arab Americans like myself their long history in the United States and their many contributions to our lives today in really every aspect of society as the resolution States um one of the issues concerning Arab Americans today is islamophobia because Arabs which are an ethnic group are often conflated with Muslims and Islam when in fact as someone pointed out over 70 percent of Arab Americans in the U.S are actually Christian they're not Muslim nevertheless Arabs are often conflated with Islam
071and bear the brunt of one of the most harmful forms of bigotry and why education about islamophobia and how to teach against it becomes very important I prepared a very brief presentation a small segment of what I did with um with the Department of Education that I'll just share with you really quickly for the Educators that are watching uh next slide um and uh this is usually the outline of the one hour presentation it's actually two and four hours depending on how much we cover in this program uh but I wanted to show you essentially what it consists of I'm just going to talk about little bits of pieces of it so next slide uh next slide I'm going to first Define what islamophobia is and islamophobia is really anti-muslim racism and the reason for
072that is um religious groups such as Muslims and uh and ethnic groups regardless of their color of skin have been racialized as as blocks basically and so that's why islamophobia is now defined as anti-muslim racism even though um you know Islam is a is a is a religious groups but uh it would really also apply to um to uh to to Arab Christians um and and other and other groups and it usually portrays people and their culture as follows monolithic and static separate and other inferior to the West uh barbaric violent engage in a clash of civilizations and the last one I think is the most alarming of all as as a as a political ideology and what that does is it it divorces us from the um the religious rights that we have in
073the first amendment of course next slide and it's also become a systemic racism in the way that it is reinforced in society is particularly in education and what we choose to teach and not to teach about um so I grew up in the United States I'm born in Egypt I'm an immigrant I've you know I came here in the in the late 60s and my only understanding of course of of Arab Americans and Islam was in the context of the palestinian-israeli conflict uh that is is still going on and of course Arabs were portrayed in very in a very negative light and continued to be portrayed that way in relation to American foreign policy towards the Middle East and so throughout the educational system Arabs are usually portrayed in very negative light and so are
074Muslims but it's also found in literature in how the media covers news about the Muslim world and the Arab world how Muslims and Arabs are portrayed in Hollywood and video games and then the campaigns uh that have been fueled by something called the Islamic islamophobia in history and then of course government policies as well and so this is how it becomes systemic racism where people are now conditioned to think about Arabs and to think about Muslims in a particular way next slide the impact uh on Muslim Students and their families is as follows um so next slide bullying is a huge problem of Muslim Students which would include Arab students according to most recent surveys one out of two Muslim families say their child has been bullied for their faith um compared to uh which
075is double uh the level of families in the general public and according to another organization uh that has an office here um it's 40 of Muslim Students uh report being bullied because they are Muslim and so ver it consists of verbal bullying in the case of Muslim uh worlds who wear the hijab like you see me wearing which is the none like covering that some Muslim women wear uh they often get assaulted and have their scarves offensively uh touched or pulled off and then of course the problem has extended to social media next slide uh and the impact on Muslim Students is as you might imagine as it is with all kids that are bulliedius depression anxiety um you know Muslim Students describe their experiences in their own words in in some of these reports
076and it's really heart-wrenching to read uh for example uh one says my teacher stereotype Muslims and called on me to be the expert which is quite common by the way to explain horrific acts carried out by people in rural places of some Muslim countries I had never been to and so forth next slide um now how to counter islamophobia for educators next slide we recommend these three different ways I'm only going to cover recommended sources uh next slide educator resources and I'm so glad that one of the trustees actually uh mentioned the Arab American Museum we helped create or rather I helped create the one lesson plan that's in the ethnic studies model curriculum that was just released by The CDE by the California Department of Education and we include the resources of the Arab
077American Museum which is they're excellent resources we also have resources next slide uh in the form of actual trainings that we deliver to Educators K-12 and these trainings are you know from one hour to four hours depending on how long uh you're able to give us and then we have a lot of modules that we can include in this training um on teaching against islamophobia next slide uh we also have speakers bureaus that come into the classroom to supplement actual content standards so teachers are required to teach in social studies um several different topics and so we supplement that curriculum um in these four different presentations so we have trained and certified speakers that do this work that are trained on First Amendment guidelines and how to teach about uh people of faith in general
078um next slide and then we also do the same kind of work in the context of inter-religious uh uh and and religious pluralism in the United States so we actually go out as Muslims Jews Christians Buddhists and Hindus together to give these presentations to supplement these content standards that are related to uh people uh of various religious backgrounds and we have a dozen different topics that we speak on and these are just some of them that are the most often requested um panels that we that were invited to uh to do next slide we also have anti-racism uh work workshops and panels that we do in the classroom and uh we have two different types one is understanding the origins and impact of bigotry in the in the United States where we connect islamophobia to
079other forms of bigotry and so we root it in anti-blackness anti-latinx anti-asian anti-anti-jewish or anti-Semitism and so these panels again we go out together with African-American speakers Asian American indigenous people um latinx and and Jewish and and Muslim speakers we go out together and speak on these topics and we have two different types of panels that we do and this is supplemented by 14 lesson plans on anti-racism that begins with defining what a narrative is what the roots of the narratives are and it goes back actually as far back as the Crusades and the and the colonial period and how these narratives have been reinforced in our society and how that's really related to whiteness and and and white supremacy and how it has become really systemic racism and when we're conditioned to think a
080particular way about different groups of people and it's not just the white issue it's actually all of us are racist uh all of us have stereotypes about each other good and bad and and so that's uh that's what these lesson plans do the uh they unpack all of this um and they're wonderful and two of them are part of the ethnic studies model curriculum that was accepted by the California Department of Education but they promote all of them actually they they love all of them uh next slide uh and then we also have other lesson plans that are available for teachers that they can uh that they can download and um they supplement very specific content standards that uh that a teacher is required to teach next slide and then we have answers to frequently
081asked questions about Muslims so that's just open that's available and it's in this uh this webpage next slide and an educator uh an administrator can get all of our resources uh by going to this link and if you click on this link uh you'll go to the to the webpage and we have resources for administrators principles um for teachers in the classroom and staff and then we also have resources for parents as well Muslim and Arab parents so yeah so thank you so much for the opportunity to present to you today thank you so much and I think one of the things that's incredible about uh your group is I believe all of this is available for free is that correct that's that's yeah absolutely I mean that is so fantastic for public schools you
082know that's always that's always often the barrier to how to reach high quality um you know uh resources like this yeah and I wanted to give a shout out to the San Francisco Foundation Silicon Valley Community Foundation house senior fund Rosenberg fund uh Hellman Foundation that um that our funders of of the organization and and it allows us to produce very scholarly work that is it that is directly related to what teachers are required to teach in the classroom thank you thank you so much Miss Elkins we're taking the time to be here really appreciate it I have a question trustee Mayo yes I was wondering if uh the PowerPoint or the link to the website could be added to the uh docket or agenda in some manner so it's easy for folks to search
083when they're uh looking for the information or if it could be added uh in the um education parts of the website Laura has the PowerPoint thank you so much I also did want to briefly read we had one other person who was going to speak tonight who's not able to come but he sent um a statement and this is Dr popal who's a professor of University of San Francisco Department of international and Multicultural education he's also the president of our local nor Islamic cultural Community Center he says my name is Sadiq popal and I have been a proud resident of Concord since September 22nd 1981 almost 40 years I have two children and both of them graduated from Ignacio Valley High School Concord Mustafa my eldest son is currently working as a full-time tenured professor
084at Skyline College and teaches American history my youngest son Ramen popal is a lawyer and works for a law firm in San Francisco I'm very proud of Mount Diablo Unified School District for serving our communities so very well and for being committed to Excellence in education my children are prime examples of the success and the hard work of Mount Diablo Unified School District faculty administrators and staff my children who spoke a different language represented a different culture believed in a different religion and belonged to a different ethnicity were welcomed by Mount Diablo Unified School District mdusd not only welcomed them but also honored what they brought to their classes their first language and culture I believe that the district has always been in the Forefront of appreciating multilingualism multiculturalism inclusion and plural pluralism in the
085district it is in this spirit that I wholeheartedly support the recognition of the month of April as Arab American Heritage Month I wanted to share that with everyone as well all right thank you so much everyone and we'll move on to the next item Dr Clark If you have a comment okay you're ready okay let's see so moving on to 10.0 there are reports and information so 10.1 is to review the update on Mount Diablo cares expandedlearning program Dr Clark yeah so um so as as we have been working very hard throughout this year to um to reopen our schools for in-person learning although learning has been taking place throughout the year um you know a a big part of that was many parents need after school care um you know so we we do
086have programs that support these families and whatnot and so we wanted to um I wanted to and by Miss Roberts here who oversees those programs to just come and give us a an update give provide the board an update and maybe the public isn't quite sure on on our cares program but we really just wanted to highlight some of the exceptional work that Miss Roberts and her team are doing to support students extended care and um and so without any further Ado I am going to turn this over to Miss Roberts and she and her team will then take it from there so Miss Roberts thank you very much we appreciate the support we're going to co present tonight um Eric Rigo is our coordinator for expanded learning and is the boots on the ground
087doing the day-to-day work I fortunately get a lot of um compliments for cares and it is in my blood as a board member Mason and I know we we began it long long time ago um but the day-to-day work really lies with Eric and his team offering amazing services for kids so we have a PowerPoint presentation if that can be pulled up great um so that this is just a picture a little bit of what it looked like day one um we've got safe distancing and kids actually getting their hands on some manipulatives which I know they uh missed immensely um if you can go to the next slide just to set the stage I'm not sure if everyone knows but the cares after school or expanded learning program has been around since 1999 and
088it began with six schools um through a partnership with the Mount Diablo Unified Ambrose park and rec and the City of Concord and over the duration of time Partners changed and additional schools were added um we are now at 15 sites um or 15 sites that are funded and it's a primarily funded by the after-school education and safety Grant we have a 3.4 million dollar grant annually and we just were renewed for three years last February and we also incorporate additional local grants and foundational grants and then the district does utilize some categorical resources to support our high school programs and to serve additional students um in a normal year we serve approximately 2 300 students every school day and during a four week summer session and these Pro programs um is it the next
089slide you'll see in a second that you'll see which schools they are they're traditionally at our high needs schools um and the focus is around enrichment Recreation nutrition stem and academic support and we offer this program in partnership with our current partner who's been with us for many many years Bay Area Community Resources so they hire our staff and we work in Partnership to co-run a very high quality expanded learning program next slide this slide lists um our 12 elementary schools are three middle and are too high um and six of the of the schools were part of The Originals um that's one of our students doing some physical activity in the multi-use room um and it gets you a flavor of when we're talking about the cares program we're talking about these 17 specific
090schools so for our for those that are listening this these are the schools where we run these programs next slide we are so Overjoyed to share that we were able to start in-person programming on March 25th alongside the school district offering hybrid we have in-person programming at 12 elementary schools and three middle um our high school program is still primarily distance um but we're we're continuing to grow with that and are looking forward to a very um strong summer program as well currently our in-person program is using an A B model so around 28 students come on Monday Tuesday 28 different students come on Thursday Friday and we run our program approximately from 2 30 to 5 30. um Wednesdays is a distance only and um through our program they're getting enrichment engagement team building
091stem and Hands-On we want you know it's a lot of Hands-On um we're continuing to focus on physical activity nutrition and we have amazing Garden programs happening and then we are incorporating some Partnerships with our academic Liaisons to provide some skill building for those students that are in the program in addition we are offering the daily snack and the meal distribution as part of the cares expanded Pro program an additional component that we've been adding um starting back in March is working very closely with our principals to identify what services need to be happening in the morning and what need to be happening in the afternoon and so we have three elementary schools Cambridge meta homes in Ignacio Valley that requested some additional support to run morning programs it's not the traditional program you're seeing
092on the slide but it's really more supervision and support of their distance learning but students being on campus and Eric and his team continue to have the conversations with the principals around if and when they want to offer or can offer additional morning programs because some of this is based on space and staff availability so that's something that we're continuing to have conversations around and have already started to think about what our summer program looks like next slide and Eric's going to take over from here for the next couple of slides good evening superintendent Dr Clark good evening Board of Trustees it's nice to see everybody hope all is well um March 2020 that is a date that you know everything kind of just came to a close and we didn't know what the future
093held and all of that stuff but um our after school program moved on and right away we were thinking planning how can we move forward and continue continue to serve the community our students um so some ways that we did that was make and take activities the purpose of those was to develop compile and distribute Hands-On make and take activities for students to do at home um these activities were distributed once to twice a week and incorporates art stem nutrition gardening physical activity um we tried to coordinate these days with uh the Food Service program as well to try to connect with as many students and community members as possible as well as our online activities we created our cares YouTube page obviously social media is a very popular way to connect with the the
094students so we took it upon ourselves to create a YouTube page where the kids could still see us virtually doing Hands-On activities we all participated whether it was something recreational indoors doing Hands-On activities instructions for them to be able to have access music any kind of enrichment which was really fun we incorporated that with our class dojo as you can see on the slide here if you take the time to go on the district website and then go to the after school program Department you'll see our mbsd cares expanded learning platform and when you get onto this platform you can see that every door is to a specific School site now this is available for the students the parents teachers yourselves you click on that door and it's just magical stuff it really is it's
095contact information it's links for resources activities it takes you to our YouTube page uh Harvest of the month Community Food updates everything that is going on with the after school program past present future that's kind of our Network right there and it's just accessible right off the District page um with that I do want to give an absolute shout out to my management team Cherie Gann Rosa Palomino Cindy Morello my program coordinators a lot of them that I've had the pleasure to work with for over 12 years and the 130 line staff they in a lot of ways have been the front line staff when this pandemic started one week two weeks in being at the school sites passing out food helping with the principals check out supplies Chromebooks helping with the end of the
096year wrap up collecting supplies they've been there through thick and thin and this program would not be possible for them so for the 130 staff that work for the cares after school program I do want to take this time and say thank you you are what makes this engine go um last couple of things is our sports for learning um we're continuing to partner with sports for learning uh sports for learning the purpose of it it's a fun curriculum it's physical activity games it's all virtual safe and fun and then also our science curriculum uh We've partnered with the national Ventures Hall of Fame this past spring we're offering Zoom science clubs students participates in the clubs uh the clubs are offered once twice a week with the Care staff facilitating the curriculum um the
097Hands-On problem-based learning experience is for students through kindergarten eighth grade and the modules are all aligned with the Next Generation science standards which is obviously very important um next slide okay that's these obviously are a lot of numbers right here uh I think Stephanie's going to touch up a little bit on it but um the numbers right here is the data we wanted to make sure that we were tracking as much data as possible um when this all first started and our distance programming and the way that we were collecting our data was okay let's make sure that any student that takes a make and take activity any student that collects that gets uh the supper through the food program that accesses our class dojo our online platforms that we're making sure that we're tracking
098and connecting to these students and then referring back to how we usually collect our data and making sure that we are reaching out to the students that aren't necessarily have finding the ways or having the ways to access everything we're doing online as far as cross-checking making sure that we accumulate all of these kits and that was how we did it so it's been non-stop phone calls reaching out advertising and that's how we've been able to attract so many different students throughout this past year did you want to add anything Stephanie yeah and the only thing we just wanted you guys to see kind of a breakdown definitely we're seeing a lot more Elementary participation um and we we do look at our communities so we actually see a probably an equal breakdown of our
099three primary areas of Bay Point the monument Corridor and the Solano way you can go to the next slide um we are as I mentioned we are already looking for summer programming um our plan is to offer at 15 sites um there are two elementary schools that um we'll have to have it in a different location due to maintenance and operation work our program will coincide with our summer sessions that are being coordinated at the school so they will go from June 7th to July 3rd Monday through Friday tentatively 8 30 to 2 30 but we know this summer is unique and so program hours may be a little bit different um based on the specific needs of the schools cares is already working in collaboration with the principal and the school team to figure
100out what each School needs in particular but we know what we do well we do enrichment we do Recreation nutrition stem and social emotional learning and relationships I'll throw in their gardening as well um so we plan on doing those components but uh cares is very um flexible and creative and so we'll figure out what that looks like we are cautiously saying that we're going to serve approximately 50 to 75 students but if space and need and staff availability and safety is available will go higher we just need to make sure that um if there's a need in their space and we have enough staff we'll go to what is comfortable um because we know there's a lot of students that need that extra support in addition to normal in person during the summer we
101will continue to kind of have our distance learning platform because we found that that's been an area that has really been beneficial and has expanded this the reach to more students that don't come in person so it's kind of one of those glass half full parts of that was one of the positives of this situation I think we've really created an amazing program um that will I think will be sustainable next slide Steph you can have one last thing um so when it comes to you know we've opened up program and we're in coordination with the hybrid model we've taken all the necessary steps for our staff to ensure safety and non-cross contamination and so we spent a lot of hours making sure that every student that got enrolled in the cares after school program
102had their own set of supplies their own scissors their own pencil their own jump rope their own basketball our providing the necessary mass and everything for our staff so we so far have not had any issues and it's been going great so that's why we would like to enroll more students sooner rather than later if everything goes according to plan because how things are going right now it's going great um you know so it's it's been a blessing to be able to provide the students with all the necessary their own equipment but that's kind of the goal moving forward too and just I wanted I did not want to forget thank you to the principals um the list of school sites that are on there that have our cares after school program um they have
103been open arms and they have been wonderful to work with these last few years and they've been they've made this a very seamless transition to welcome a welcome us back on campus so I want to say thank you to principals as well thank you quick question Stephanie on this slide just before you move to the next one the 50 to 75 students is that per School site yes per School site okay thank you good clarification thank you all right next slide we are hoping that you're going to get a visual of what cares looks like so we have um I think Mario's gonna try to click the link and so you can see the video it's like a two minute video and then at the end we're open for any questions or comments so he's
104going to try we're not sure if it's going to work but fingers crossed if not we will get it on the district website there is music I guess we can't hear the music but you'll get a visual foreign thank you as you're seeing were these were the first actually couple of days of program and so we were looking at anywhere from 12 to 14 to 20. um it seems like every day we tend to see more and more students because the nervousness is subsiding and they are talking to their friends that's a picture of our make and take supporting the Food Service program and the meal distribution Perfect all right with that we will make sure that video with music is on the district website um and kudos to the cares team they are always
105so creative in putting together videos um and with that our last slide is just if you have any questions or uh comments or thoughts we're here to answer any questions and we appreciate the board and the superintendent's support yes thank you so much Stephanie and Eric and with that I'll open it up to questions from trustees well I want to thank Dr Clark because I had asked for the presentation as someone that was in on the ground floor and have lobbied around the state around the country for after school programs I know that they're uniquely suited to meet the individual needs of these communities especially in these hard times and I just wanted to make sure we were fully utilizing you and it looks like we are and I hope we could continue to grow
106as Eric said and get more and more kids in there as long as we can keep them safe so thank you all yes thank you absolutely thank you vice president Mason other questions comments trustee and zabi I want to thank you all um thank you the after school programs especially in our state and in our country are severely inadequate inadequately funded and so you do a whole lot with very little um I'm curious if as we've it's only it's really only been even though it's been a couple a week and a half it's only been a few days back and I'm curious if um if you're able to um to allow all of the families all of the students who want to attend at this point like if there's a waiting list kind of thing
107Eric do you recall if we have um waiting lists at each of the sites right yet we do we do and as soon as we have the opportunity to have additional resources whether that's more classrooms spaces on campus um we would love to add more students we are currently operating a two line staff to every 14 student ratio that was recommended from aces in the state as far as you know just ensuring safety and cross-contamination kids going to the bathroom and things like that but it has only been a couple weeks but it's been it's been going really well um so I'm hoping that as the resources become available that we continue to add more students yeah and I think we we definitely are committed to um keeping the board and the superintendent um in
108informed on how many students receiving serving what our wait list looks like in working in partnership with our principals if we have staff and we have space and we have a wait list then our charge would be trying to figure out how we can get those students served as quickly as possible and we like I said we're already looking into summer um so hopefully that will help ease some of our family's Minds knowing that they have some resources to attend um in addition to our Traditional School summer session um cares would allow that extend expanded time so that those families that are working might have a place for their kids to stay while they're working but yeah we will definitely look and we can update you all on what the wait list looks like and
109where we are moving forward and we can do that in our um super our board updates to you on the the month that would be really great because I had a similar question of uh you know what what are the limitations that you face um like when you talk about a wait list does that include everyone who responded to the parent survey asking for either morning or afternoon care because if morning care is only at three of the sites um you know at those three sites do you have a waiting list and then what and then the other sites that had requests for morning care we yeah um we tried our best to kind of coordinate and keep it consistent across the board with all 17 sites so that's why we really we worked with
110the principals myself and Stephanie we met with them as far as okay let's not the students that are in this hybrid model let's continue to have them come to the after school programs those longer days on campus and those parents can maximize their child being on campus but um it sky's the limit honestly like I want I would love to serve more students it was just let's keep it okay we want to make sure what we're doing at Cambridge we're doing at metal homes as far as how we're you know so that's why we wanted all the principals to be on the same page with how we're doing the enrollment process those conversations we we you know we do after school really well so we don't want to have to you know if we if
111if there's a need in the morning we don't want to take away from providing expanded learning during the after school time so we have to figure out if there's enough staff if there's an interest from students and their space and the capacity for the school to do a morning program we'll we'll say hey we got X number of people that can support but what we're looking at is trying to serve more than 56 students per School in the expanded learning program because we know we're serving way more people way more students than that during the day so what we're going to look at our wait list we're going to look at the capacity and then we will you know ensuring that we can create a safe environment and we have enough staff we will continue
112to kind of expand the number of students we can serve because we have been itching and excited to to be on campus with the students and I'm very proud and grateful for the team and the work they're doing so thank you so much yeah it's really incredible I just I think um you know what you've been able to put together so far both like you said uh Eric that you know that your staff's been um you know on the ground at our school sites from day one um yeah so I know um yeah so so it's fantastic um but now as we move into hybrid I know that parents especially working parents are looking for that full day solution and so and so that's like that's kind of like morning and after care right ideally
113if there was a way to do that um and so my question going forward um so you wouldn't have the answer to it tonight would be um you know are there uh limitations that you're facing in terms of you you uh don't have enough funding for more staff um you know or a situation like that where we should look at some of our one time you know ab86 funds to go towards this either to expand your resources for the spring and or the summer I Eric let me answer that um I think our biggest issue is staff we have to make sure that we have enough trained and prepared staff to provide quality programming and so once we know what the needs are and the the capacity of what can be provided in the morning
114program the principles know hey we've got a list of staff that can or you know can provide that morning program because we've got to make sure that they're in both programs so I think the biggest issue is not money because we were very fortunate I mean cares was able to carry over their money with the aces funding so we don't necessarily need District funds we need human bodies that that want to work and care about kids so I guess the message in maybe that's a great platform Sharice to share is if you're listening and you have um a individual who loves kids and who wants to work after school please contact Eric we um we like high quality motivated um creative people it's a great program you learn a lot of skills I mean we
115have plenty of staff that have been Rec staff who become program coordinators who are now classroom teachers some of our you know so it's it's a great program and people come when they come back from college so um that would be the messages if we if we would need more staff because that will directly link to what we're doing this summer if we're going to try to serve 100 kids we're going to need many more staff and if it becomes an issue around finances we will definitely share that with um Dr Clark because I know what Mount Diablo is very um creative with leveraging resources whether they're one time or existing resources that Target our particular population fantastic that's great to hear well feel free to share with us the the advertising you're doing for
116those positions because I know a number of us are out there in social media World be happy to share it out absolutely yeah so there's so there's not limitations in terms of requirements around uh um student staff ratios or like do you follow the child care regulations when it comes to that traditionally we're only a 20 to 1 ratio but because of CD's guidelines due to the coveted pandemic it's we're doing the two to fourteen so that does affect our ratio as we work with our CDE Partners if that changes that'll allow us to potentially serve more but as a grant um we're not at our maximum yet so like traditionally Cambridge would be able to serve 170 or 60 students right now they're only serving 58 so if we were able to grow and
117get that high then it would be a grant requirement that we couldn't serve more students but right now we're we're completely under the in person um student to staff ratio yes I know you have a full agenda so I don't want any other questions all right thank you so much much appreciated yeah I just want to I just want to thank uh Stephanie and well Miss Roberts Mr Mr Rigo for their work um you know seeing those uh a picture says a thousand words and and seeing those pictures were just um you know very just heartwarming um and just a PR thing is this is how this is how I started in the in the profession working in one of these programs and so so definitely you can join one of these programs as a
11817 year old and one day you can yeah lead a school district so thank thank you so much for for all that you're doing and continue to do to serve our students so so thank you very much hey thank you all right so moving on to item 10.2 review the hybrid memorandum of understanding and side letter with the California School Employees Association chapter 43 CSEA Mr Clark yeah so I'm gonna um I'm gonna turn turn these next four items over to our HR team who who I just want to um really want to recognize for their for their hard work for for them um you know really um working with our our employee group leaders in in bringing these mous forward this is something that that we haven't always done in the past in terms
119of bringing the the agreement forward to the board although we're not required to or there's no action that is taking place we just want to be transparent and um and again share the process share the outcomes and and show that we are committed to having a very transparent and professional relationship with all of our employee groups and so um so so again I just want to thank thank Dr Rubio and Dr skadero for their leadership in this area and and I want to thank the leaders of all of these um labor groups who um you know who are really working hard for their members to make sure that um you know that we have processes and procedures in place to make sure that everyone has what they need to do their jobs effectively so without
120any further Ado I'll turn it over to Dr Rubio for these next four items great I appreciate that uh thank you superintendent Clark I'm going to turn the first two over to Dan scudero Dr scudero is going to uh give us a little more information about the first two items so 10.2 we'd like to bring for your review the hybrid memorandum of understanding and the side letter with the California Schools Employees Association chapter 43 CSEA Consignment doesn't require any action but if there are any questions we'd love to answer any questions or comments seeing none thank you very much for the opportunity for us to be able to show this to the public and to the board moving on to item 10.3 review go ahead oh you know you go go ahead you were going
121to read the same thing so I'm gonna let you take it well I was just gonna say this is for the uh review of the memorandum of understanding with the Mount Diablo school psychologist Association also known as matsuka you'd be pleased to answer any questions if there are any questions and Dr skadero on the next one I think I'll actually hand it back to uh Dr Rubio great thank you and I just want to Echo what Dr Clark said uh we certainly um do also appreciate all of our bargain unit leaders and Leadership um they are all all unique units and bargaining units uh with different areas that we're discussing and I appreci appreciate really uh Dr scudero Cesar Alvarado and all the bargain unit leaders as we continue to try to work together always
122you know sometimes during challenging Financial time so we appreciate their help and support as we try to find Common Ground many times so that being said the next item uh 10.4 is the uh our usual board meeting review of the increase in decrease of certificated Personnel uh for your information if there are any questions trustees any questions on this item seeing none and move on to the next one great and similar uh it's at 7.4 10.5 is the review of the increase in decrease changes going up and down in our positions for classified personnel [Music] thank you very much Dr Rubio Dr Scott thank you um yes and as everyone has said we really appreciate the um uh coming to an agreement with our employee groups I think oftentimes in the in the public eye
123in the media there's a focus only on teachers and what's happening with teachers but really our Focus as an organization is and our values are for all employees and so we really appreciate each and every one of you thank you all right moving on to 11.1 board member reports let's start with trusty Mayo thank you very much edit myself thank you very much I appreciate the opportunity to speak and uh um this is our first meeting since in-person instruction began and I want to thank the negotiation teams and all the teachers and staff who made this a possibility um the joy and the sound of the children of our campuses has been heartwarming and I want to thank the parents and the caregivers who have been in isolation with their children they gave up normalcy
124in their lives to protect and educate their children they have appreciated teachers in public schools and many are grieving over their inadequacy to create the same learning environment at home I want to say to each one of these parents you are amazing and you are survivors our community I and educators are indebted to each one of you so thank you for the time and effort you have put in to caring for your children at the CAC meeting last night the CAC legislation team discussed AB 967 so I'd like to bring this to everyone's attention it's a bill that would increase special education funding for coveted relief alternative dispute resolution and other items and the support letter was issued by the CAC to push the bill along and perhaps gain enough support for its approval so
125if you're interested please reach out to CAC or just look up the bill ab967 and provide your support your personal support as well extended school year is from June 7th to July 2nd over 400 students have already been enrolled by their families and fall for all is the goal yes there is a transportation challenge uh there are 80 routes 85 drivers and 55 students are yet to be assigned a a bus driver or a bus route primarily it's a matter of distancing uh for the buses and a bus 460 can only transport 14 students also the short lunch hour transition period prevents a turnaround time for a second route so um please I'm just sharing this information to put so that everyone understands the complexity that's involved with transporting our students alternative lessons like County
126Connection can cannot be used because the highway patrol requirements require yellow buses there's special standards for the transportation of public school students uh this community advisory committee virtual legislation day is May 5th it runs from 9 to 4 P.M approximately in the morning there's a program with speakers and some very heartwarming uh presentations by families with special ed students and the success stories of those students and in the afternoon there will be some virtual meetings planned with legislators and if you're interested in attending please contact Chris at Wilburn C mdusd.org um and on May 6th I would like to invite everyone to join the celebration for the Medea Academy Awards uh it's at 6 p.m and you can view the nominees at our media not DOT org website and watch for meeting access on that
127same wedge web page there's a lot of names that are very familiar and to very uh new names and new staff members that have been nominating and it's always there's over a hundred and eighty different individuals that have been nominated so it shows how valued our staff members are throughout the district and I am fortunate to be one of the trustees to receive a notice to circulate petitions for recall um I want to share that I value our Democratic process which does include include elections and recall elections as a trustee the word recall has been used over time to generate awareness of particular viewpoints in frustration and in anger when I value the Democratic process I must appreciate the right to recall as well I cannot be frozen in my decisions by the possibility of
128a recall I must still make decisions based on what I believe is in the best district for our students I want to thank everyone who is participating in the process and what your review is whether you support the recall or you have concerns I want to thank everyone for the opportunity to stand up for our community and discuss what I stand for and what I think public education should be for our community and as a closing comment I would just like to say I support the return to five day a week in-person instruction for the fall absent akovitz Resurgence because I don't think we can make a promise that it will happen should there be a Resurgence so stay well and I'll see you on the campaign trail soon thank you thank you trustee Mayo
129let's go to uh trustee alas Dusty Ellis would you like to go next I think you're on me oh there we go sure my Wi-Fi was a little bit can you hear me now yes we can hear you now yes would you like to give your board report maybe you can't hear us okay we'll come back to you trustee yeah come back to me sorry I it was like did she call me I can't hear you yes okay we'll come back to you and hopefully it'll be a little stronger in a few minutes all right uh trustee McFerrin foreign all right sure um all right uh good evening everyone and welcome back from Spring Break um so I would like to share that um during the week before spring break I was able to visit
130three of our school campuses to see our students and staff um I visited Westwood El Dorado and Concord High um this was during my spring break and it was the absolute highlight of my week off um I was able to visit kindergarten classes um where students were coloring they were listening engaging in a book read aloud and they appeared to be building Rapport and friendships with their peers and that was really great to see and so special um especially in our youngest students and in the older grades I saw students actively engaged in class discussions and art projects it was great to see backpacks on hooks outside of rooms um the evidence that our students have returned to campuses and to see the buzz and excitement that is only on our sites when students are
131present at El Dorado and Concord High I saw students and teachers engaged in community building activities I also really enjoyed seeing the wood shops at both sites and it was really special to see students engaged in Hands-On activities offline um I really want to acknowledge that it was an incredibly heavy lift for site administrators faculty and staff to prepare for students to return When I Think About Educators I think about the the duck analogy which is that educators are a lot like ducks because a swimming deck because there's so much effort going on under the surface just in order to stay afloat but from the service everything looks completely calm and so I really saw that in the members of our um our site staff um visiting schools everyone looked incredibly relaxed and that really
132had to do with how much effort um was was put in in advance of students return um and so I want to thank every everyone um who worked incredibly hard to get our students back before spring break I was so very glad to see students um return to Campus before spring break and then for everyone to hopefully be able to relax during that time um I would also like to share that um that uh let's see that um that on March 26th I attended a ribbon cutting ceremony at the Boys and Girls Club in Martinez for their new little Free anti-racist Library it was provided by Rise Up Against Racism um this is a non-profit that was founded by Meg honey Sarah Foster and Jenny Roy Dave stated that the goal of the anti-racist book
133initiative is to bring the community together create a space for Vital conversations about anti-racism and ensure that both children and adults have ready access to books that elevate black voices and Inspire us all to understand and actively dismantle racism I was so very pleased to be in attendance at this event and I'm grateful to Meg Sarah Jenny and everyone else who supported anti-racist efforts in our community and continue to do so recently the efforts to bring a little free anti-racist library to Clayton um were fully funded so I'm very excited to see this um this effort continue and expand um also two weeks ago I was able to meet with the leadership class at Mount Danville High School on Zoom the student shared their perspectives on what's working well at Mount and what they'd like
134to see improved students reported in part that they have an excellent College and Career Center and that they're especially grateful for Brian Brown who's the counselor in charge of this operation students know that he will support them in preparing for and accessing information on their operations post High School students also said that their teachers are caring and try their hardest to understand students they also had some excellent feedback on where we can improve the experience for students at Mount one student reported that the library is inactive and that they'd like to see it refreshed and more accessible to students so I was pleased to see something on our consent agenda about that others commented on the physical appearance of the school and the impact that this has on students Mental Health another student spoke about
135the need for more funding for athletics and commented that it can be hard for student athletes to think of themselves as worthy opponents while wearing old uniforms and there was also some discussion about the wall-to-wall academy model which certainly has benefits and drawbacks um all these things considered the students comments that I think are most representative of the school are that mount needs to change and evolve with each new generation and that mount table high school has the potential to be the best school high school in the district and that mount is a school that gives students the freedom to be themselves and is a community that pushes students to try new things I want to thank the leadership students at Mount for spending the morning with me and sharing so openly and honestly with
136me I'd also like to thank Mr anatos who is an exceptional leadership teacher and a huge asset to Mount Abel high school and mdusd I'd also of course like to thank Brian Brown for his incredible commitment to providing opportunities for our kids the entirety of our Mount Temple High School staff has been working so hard this year and it was evident in my conversation with the students that they see this so thank you mount able High School administration faculty and staff for your tremendous efforts this year um last night I also attended the CAC um which trustee Mayo did a great job of um going over some of the main points um of the meeting um some one thing that we did um was that we met in breakout rooms to brainstorm some additional ideas
137to support students um and so I really appreciated the opportunity to work with parents um to identify um kind of some additional additional ways to provide more access points and more opportunities for our students in special education um and um see and that um that's all I have to share tonight thank you very much trustee McFerrin trustee alas how is your internet doing it is doing better I can thank you so much for your patience hello everybody good night I hope everyone had a relaxing spring break I want to start by thanking all the teachers and administrators in the bargaining units who worked so hard to get our students back on campus and I know that a lot of students are benefiting from being back in person and their social emotional learning as well their
138mental health um that it's it's very useful I know during this time of AP exams at least for high school students um to have that more robust support system in school so I'm very appreciative of that I want to start to buy advertising an event that the mdusd student advisory committee of the Mount Diablo Education Foundation is putting on this um Friday I can drop the link in the chat that we are let me know if that takes you where I want you to take that should be a Google form um to sign up for our slam poetry night it'll be the first one ever it'll be virtual we are going to have some keynote speakers including our very own Dr Clark anyone is invited to give a poem or to just simply watch we
139have some teachers going we have students going it's planning it's it's going to be a fun a fun night so very excited um about about that um yes trustee Mason do you have a question about the the same poetry okay she was writing down so you could register for it oh God good you raised hand on the screen there so okay okay all right perfect perfect yeah I saw her her hand um if anyone has uh any questions you can direct those at me but it's going to be a very fun night time we've been working hard planning it setting an agenda I'm getting their speakers so please sign up and you don't have to give a speech I mean you don't have to give a perform a poem but if you decide in the
140moment hey I want to perform a poem then you you can as well so that will be exciting I wanted to let some families know uh that very soon I'm going to actually starting today um I as part of my senior project I have devoted um my attention to learning more about English language Learners and English language learning families and bilingual families as well as low-income families um so I'm soon going to be a mgusd liaison at the monument crisis center on Wednesdays I was just there today helping hand out some food I know that we have a lot of families in mdusd who rely on the monument Crisis Center in order to receive food or other resources or receive information about what what is happening in your community so that I will soon be
141a point person there on Wednesdays in terms of of communication um so if there's anyone who regularly visits the monument Christ Center and would need some help walking through parent square or needs help knowing about our meal schedule our meal plan I will be there to assist you more than happy to meet you in person and lastly coming up I'm going to have a student District advisory committee meeting and opening that up to a lot more students we have close to like 30 40 signups now so I'm opening that up to a lot a lot a lot of students who express interest um we're going to be discussing um local electronic accountability plan and how students can get more involved in providing input and feedback for that document that is it from me thank you
142very much wonderful thank you trustee Alice all right uh trustee and Zoe good evening um like everyone else I hope that all of our students sorry all of our students staff teachers and to whatever extent possible parents enjoyed a restful and restorative spring break and are ready to take on this home stretch of the school year um and congratulations to the staff the teachers administrators parents who made welcoming students back to campus go off as seamlessly as anyone could have hoped and if you follow the hashtag mdusd is back um you'll get all the feels and you'll see just all of the the wonderful smiles and activity um that's been going on on our campuses the last few days um I'm pleased to work to be working with a volunteer to host a listening session
143for the community of Afghan parents in Area 3 who speak Dari um I'm hoping that we're able to organize and Host this so by zoom over the next few weeks but I'm really looking forward to hearing from another um part of our community that we haven't typically heard from um I think a lot of people should be interested and should know that this morning the California state senate Democrats released their build back boldly budget package for 2122 and it lays out their priorities as we reach as we're approaching May revise next month which is when the state has a more accurate idea of how much money it has and the governor revises his January proposal so in the Senate package for K-12 education they are proposing providing a record level of one time and ongoing
144resources to schools as the prop 98 guarantee grows with the rebounding economy they would like to ensure long-term stability of local schools by maximizing pay down of deferrals while why balancing need for new one-time Investments and provide additional support for school pension stabilization that's a big one I know they also want to provide support for mental health learning loss other pandemic related impacts by leveraging education and health policies increased School nutrition support to better ensure all students are better able to learn and I think in the discussions that I've heard it's more similar similar keeping in line with how we've had the waivers for the this whole past year of being able to feed every student no matter what and expand funding for special education programs so this is just what the Senate is prioritizing
145so they'll have to negotiate with the assembly and then the legislature together will have to negotiate with the governor to pass the final budget by June 15th peek into what's to come over the net starting next month um I've continued to personally help people in our community along with my husband and actually it's mostly him find appointments for vaccines but I'm especially grateful to have been able to participate in a planning call with the monument with Monument impact that President Khan also attended on how we can get vaccines out in the monument community in case you missed it on social media this week Meadow homes Elementary School is now a vaccination site I had nothing to do with that but I'm glad to see that in an easily accessible vaccination site in the heart of
146one of the hardest hit communities in our district and county is right here at one of our schools on the same front an adult ed teacher reached out to me several weeks ago looking for resources to help her ESL um students learn more about vaccines and many of them work in food service or even Elder Care industry and they were hesitant so I shared Fires for meetings from La Clinica because they were hosting it in both English and Spanish separately which allowed community members to learn about how the vaccine works and answer any and all questions they had and the really good news is two of our students who didn't want to get vaccinated attended their events got their questions asked and had decided to get vaccinated um so I just really want to thank
147everyone in the community who's doing whatever they can to help people who want them access vaccines that is my shortest report ever thank you thank you trustee and Sammy and trustee Mason okay since our last meeting I attended the um I believe it was since the last meeting the anti-biased anti-racist committee that the district has I participated in another webinar that was the equity talk listening to superintendents across the country and how they're dealing with bringing students back in person I've got my regular monthly report from supervisor Federal Glover as um he always reports to our local Mac which I chair and we had a groundbreaking ceremony for our new fire station that's going out in out in Bay Point engine 86 that people will be glad to know are using a lot of climate
148friendly initiatives as they move forward to get a new home for the other station that has been there since 1949. I said it actually something in Bay Point that's older than me that was that was groundbreaking in itself I also belong to the Bay Point Pittsburgh Coalition that deals with drug and alcohol use in the community we had a meeting I got a unique opportunity to sit in and listen to the CAC meeting which I usually have a standing meeting on Tuesdays that I'm not able to make it but that group wasn't meeting so I did make that and um I had the opportunity to walk around with Laney and um principal wood at Riverview Middle School looking at good places for kids to have outdoor education and to be able to sit and stay
149out of the famous Bay Point wind and Sun so that was good and I'm glad to see that's moving forward and thank you Laney for the efforts there and that's about it for me for this um my support all right thank you very much trustee Mason all right uh as for me um one of the first things I did was go and get my covid test so that was uh offered um through our school sites so I went over to Oak Grove Middle School and found it was really easy so I highly recommend to students and their families so parents and siblings can take advantage of it as well to go to a school site and get your coveted test there were a few things that I was thinking would make it even more accessible
150if they're if it's feasible one is to include Spanish translation in that online form I'm glad the online form is only a one-time thing but um I noticed it was only in English it also um has a line for social security number which is not required but it's still on there um and it would be great to ask the company to just remove that there's no reason why anyone would need to provide that and it can be dating just to have it on there and then just have an all-paper way for people to do that initial registration um would would create uh would remove one more barrier from from that process but all in all it's been great I know um my own kids uh have have used the the covet tests um one of
151them as an athlete and it's going very well and really appreciate that our school district is providing that um I also attended the installation of rise up against racism's little Free anti-racist Library along with trustee McFerrin um and I'm excited about the the way that they are growing and expanding Beyond Walnut Creek into other areas and they did mention they would be willing to partner with our district um you know such as a location such as perhaps in front of the district office or between the district office and Monty Gardens there are many possibilities um so it's a wonderful group I know in my own neighborhood I've checked out and returned a number of books from the little free libraries myself so much appreciate to uh to its mdusd parents who who founded that group
152so um I also got to visit schools as they were welcoming students to campus and just really enjoyed seeing all the smiling faces and all the hard work of the staff and teachers to make that happen um so thank you to everyone who put in the endless hours to really make make this all possible I also had the opportunity to just kind of make connections between groups as I was hearing about them that are so many groups are working to vaccinate underserved communities in in both Bay Point and the monument so I had the opportunity to volunteer out at Riverview with the new County Health bilingual ambassadors so they have an iPad with them that they right on the School site as parents drive in to drop off or pick up their kids they can
153sign up someone for an appointment for a vaccine right there on the spot on that iPad so that was a first step pilot that they were doing there they're making a lot more connections now with the principals and the Bay Point clinic there to create walk-up opportunities and just remove all of those barriers of the online confusing appointment system to make sure that it actually reaches the the neighborhoods that were really impacted by covid and so thank you to Monument impact Monument crisis center United Latino voices La Clinica and the county health ambassadors who are who are ensuring that that we really can the vaccines will reach all of our students and their extended families um and thank you also to Dr Clark who I know spent some of his own uh spring break time
154to work with FEMA um to uh to make sure that that Meadow homes site came to fruition so um really appreciate you as well Dr Clark um a few things I wanted to mention that are coming up I just want to appreciate again our mdusd counselors who are providing those Mental Health webinars on a regular basis there's one coming up on Tuesday April 20th at 5 PM around anxiety and depression and you can also watch all of the past webinars the most recent one was recognizing when to get help beyond the home which I thought was a really really crucial topic um that many uh many of us are facing and and need to know what to do so really appreciate um the the mental health of opportunities from the counselors It's mdusd.org mental Dash
155Health has all of the information about those um and thank you to our CBO for providing um common sense c-e-n-t-s um I don't know if everyone in the public is aware of the new column on our business services page that has answers to frequently asked questions um she's been taking questions from the public and then putting out short clear answers um and that is at mdusd.org bscc her March 31st post included some things that people have been talking about out there like the cost of a special election for a recall um why is there a deficit where do funds come from for our district and does District staff engage with with legislators to try to get more funding so check it out um and lastly I want to share uh drawing on Earth's Global creative
156challenge Mark Wagner is the artist who led our largest Illustrated story chalk drawing project a few the last couple of years pre-covered um at nearly every Elementary School site in the district and he now has a new project a new Guinness world record attempt that he's doing on Earth Day April 22nd um and uh it's a opportunity for you to join him online or in person you can go to facebook.com groups slash drawing on earth01 all of this is on my blog as well um and uh and join in be part of that that Guinness world record attempt chalk drawing so a lot of exciting things out there and I also did receive uh my recall notice and responded as well so looking for forward to continuing the conversations about what it is that our
157community is looking for in their representatives moving forward and with that I will move us on to our superintendent's report item 12.1 great thank you so much president count and I thoroughly enjoyed hearing about all the activities that our board members have been participating in over the last couple weeks I think it's just a Testament of the of the great work taking place some throughout our communities can I please have um uh technology pull up the presentation foreign I'm incorporating my my superintendent report also um at the conclusion of that report I will open it up to a discussion with the trustees on um on the fall of of uh fall of 2021 but some of that is included in my report can I have the next slide please so first I I just wanted
158to again just review some of these significant actions that um that this board has taken place and that things that have taken place within within our district so we we see back in October we set a date for reopening as January 11th um on December 8th we delayed that reopening um when we came back from from the holidays we set March as a target for reopening and um and then on March 10th we we set sort of a target of March 22nd as when we would reopen and on March 25th that was actually the first day for preschool through second and many of our special education students to return to campus and then I also just want really want to acknowledge on March 26 that we did release a joint letter from myself and the
159Medea president Anita Johnson that we were both fully committed to a full reopening in the fall so so you know I'm I I know there is some talk from some parents out there about wondering what's going to take place in fall and I think we this board and myself we have been very clear that um that we are reopening um five days a week for all students full-time in Fall 2021 so so although I guess we'll continue to repeat that but but that is that is what we are doing and then on March 29th we brought back all of our students third through 12th grade and they returned to campus and um and so and so that's where we that's where we currently are we had two um two partial weeks of school and now
160this week is actually our first full week of of um in person hybrid and so um so you know I'm gonna just ask our our I'm going to ask a segment of our community just to be patient with us as we you know continue to make sure that we get this right so that we can continue to have um students and staff and families on our campus um in the safest manner possible uh can I have the next slide please so just real quick I just want to go back to to January 19th um if we saw the state average there was a 105 cases for every 100 000 and here in Contra Costa County there were um 60 cases per 100 000 and at this particular time um we were in Deep Purple can
161I have the next slide please and then as we looked at March 5th as we were getting closer to reopening the state average was 10.2 per 100 000 and here in Contra Costa County it was 10.9 and we were still in the purple tier can I have the next slide please during that time between December 2nd and March 4th our district was notified either through the health department or through our employees that we had 55 employees who had tested positive for covet through contact tracing and through interviews we determined that we could not Trace any of those cases back to our school sites but we did have 55 employees 31 classified and 14 certificated that had tested positive for covid during that particular time can I have the next slide please um and now as
162we look at where we are um today um or this week we see the Statewide average at 4.8 cases per 100 000. um you know it was up to 100 at one point just a few short months ago um and and and where we are today in Contra Costa county is at 5.3 and we are out of purple and we're out of red and we are now in Orange so I think that the good work that the good work that we are doing as a community and as um you know as a state is really starting to appear as I plug in my computer I got it I think we're really starting to um see the benefits of those sacrifices and that hard work and and I can honestly say as as superintendent that I
163have been very pleased at the very um cautious um you know very um you know deliberate process that we have gone through to get to where we are now can I have the next slide please I also wanted to give a quick update on vaccinations so um so so just to show you how quickly things changed so this was a slide I shared back on um March 10th and it said that the goal of um our goal was to reach 1 million vaccinations by July 4th and at this particular time we were at 343 um uh doses have had been administered at this particular time and we were still in purple just a little bit more than a month ago and let's go to the next slide and now when I pulled this same data
164today you see at the top the gold now has changed just in a month it changed to now one million vaccinations by May 31st and we are currently at um a total of of 840 000 um vaccinations administered and then they break it down to um 544 000 people have received a um first dose or or received both their doses but are still waiting on the time period and 326 000 people are fully vaccinated so I again the vaccination efforts are just um you know it just just really high quality throughout Contra Costa County and and the health department is doing a great job at setting up clinics and making sure that individuals have access to the vaccinations can I have the next slide please so I wanted to give a snapshot of of where
165we are in terms of where our students are currently and so currently we have um eight thousand six hundred eight thousand and sixty four students 55 of our elementary students are attending a hybrid in person right and then six thousand um 665 45 of our students are still remaining in distance learning now I think that's an important number because some of them some of it could be Transportation issues some of it could be work issues but we have over 6 000 elementary students who are still home and receiving instruction from staff and so I want to acknowledge that that um you know out of our 14 729 um elementary students 55 percent are back in person and 45 percent are remaining in in hybrid and at the secondary levels the the numbers really skewed towards
166distance learning so 34 of our secondary students are participating in hybrid and 66 percent of our students are remaining in distance learning um so so so again I I fully understand that some of this could be due to Transportation some of this could be due to the to the hybrid schedule itself some people may want more time some people want less time some people don't want any time I'm on campus as you can see from our numbers so I think when we hear individuals speak about any one of these areas I think we we have to be respectful that um that different families have different needs as we're going through this Global pandemic and although you know we all feel that there is light at the end of the tunnel and that things are getting
167better depending on how you feel you should be able to express your opinion and and be respected and so I don't want to think that there's one voice that's guiding this District the the six trustees here are responsible for all 29 000 students and and have to make choices and decisions that really meet the needs of of those students and families I do want to point out if I can go to the next slide please no thank you um students this is included in those numbers so this isn't in addition to this is included in those numbers but for students who have an IEP 52 of our students um are are back doing face to face and um and of those um the other half 48 over 2 000 students are still at distance learning
168for a total of um 4 300 students but 65 of our moderate and severe students um are back and and so you know so I I think that is really indicative of the need that that these students you know distance learning just just was never designed for them was never meant for them they really needed that face-to-face support and um and so I think with that high number that's the highest percentage of any of our groups um well we did have 66 percent of the high schoolers but by one percent but that is a very very high percent of our of our students who who chose one way or the other and so those moderate and severe students um you know are are back so so I do want to acknowledge that can I have
169the next slide please one of the challenges that um trustee Mason um touched upon a little earlier we actually have this number has changed on us we have about 600 students who have um who who need Transportation but uh 600 are total but approximately 55 students are still in the process of routing and and what this comes from you can see this picture of the bus this still has the six foot distancing um and and so we're we're in the process of of um of working through this this challenge because there really is no um there really is no distancing that needs to take place on our buses it says that we need to make the the best effort possible to to provide as much space for our students but um you know to have
170a bus that carries 66 students to be only transporting 16 students on that bus is um you know is not effective and it's something that that we're working on changing um but but these things do take time um so so we are working with those families who still need transportation and um and um you know alternative options are being explored can I have the next slide please so I wanted to touch upon uh testing I know that um you know we we were providing testing at all of our sites but really the the um the need is just is just not there and so this is um this is going to be our testing schedule um it is on our website if you go to our covet information page there's a big button that says
171covet testing and all this information is there but um the the following testing schedule is available for the remaining of the year we will adjust if need be but we are providing every Monday at um at Concord High College Park Mount Diablo Northgate and Ignacio and this again is for um this is for staff this is for athletes this is for students and this is for their families so very clear on that yes you you have to fill out a form um and and we do have of um we do have those forms online and and we have those forms available I don't know how we can not have people register because there isn't there is pertinent information that the that the company needs in order to do the to do the testing but but
172we're open to work with families and if we have families who need additional support we'll provide them that support we we want to provide this testing you know we're doing this we want more people to be tested we have more individuals coming forward if there's a the need for testing um grows then we will um you know we will provide it but I think there's a misconception out there that if you've been vaccinated that you still don't need to participate in testing and that is not the case we still want we still want individuals to be tested and we still should be should be going through this process so um so so this is our testing schedule and again like I said it's on our website we have shared this out at our school sites
173so our school sites have this information you know we are really um you know we really depend on our school sites to communicate much of this information it all can't come from the central office because we you know we have different schools it's so different between high school and middle school and Elementary School and we have many alternative programs that if parents have questions or need information your number one place where you should go for that information is your school site can I have the next slide please so over since we've started testing and that's been over the last four weeks we've tested over um 15 1500 individuals and I think the number exactly is about um 1550 tests have been conducted and to date knock on wood please everybody there have been no positive
174results so um so this is very very good news but um but you know we if you don't test then you're not going to know if individuals have it and so we want to encourage people to participate in the testing program and so we're very excited about about this about this number and we want to keep it up and um you know it's not just of course you know I was I was joking when I said knock on wood but really what it is is we're implementing those safety those those safety measures and folks are following wearing wearing masks and keeping a distance and using hand sanitizer can I have the next slide please not just on just an update on on ppes um a hundred percent of school sites have Merv 13s so 100
175um we've we have 95 Air Purifiers that have been delivered out to school sites we have over 10 000 containers they're hand sanitizer and 17 1700 gallons of refills that are that are distributed these are out on the sites um we we directed our warehouse to empty the warehouse and send that stuff out to the sites where they where they need it 536 touchless thermometers you can see close to 20 000 face Shields we're almost at 500 000 student uh reusable and disposable masts 337 000 adult masks um 13 000 disposable gowns and we have on our on our um uh business or probably on the on the covet site um we do have um the data included on our foq section of the coveted response page so you can go on there and you
176can see all of the PPE that's been distributed can I have the next slide please so to talk about fall um briefly is we we basically have have three options for fall um and our number one option and this is what we want everyone to to participate in and that's all students five days a week full time with no hybrid so here it is again so I don't know if I need to post this online or or or something but this is what we are doing this is where we're going we we have an independent study program that's Horizons and and I'm going to talk more about each of these in my next in my upcoming slides so I'm just gonna so horizons is an independent study program that students transfer into the school it
177is a transfer process and then we are going to open along with many other districts um in the county and throughout the state we are going to open a Virtual Academy I do want to say though that there is very limited guidance from the from the state around these academies so what's going to be the attendance requirements what's going to be the the instructional minutes things of that nature so a lot of that has not been shared with us but we're planning on this now so we're we're moving forward with this now but but the goal of the state is to have everyone back in school all day every day and so they don't want to necessarily put a great deal of resources into these virtual online schools because cause they want students in person
178can I have the next slide please so we're going to be sending out a survey hopefully by the end of this week if not this week then by the by the beginning of next week and the survey is just going to have a couple questions I plan on having my student return to mdusd for the uh for the 2021 it's hard to even say 2022 school year yes I am or no and and again each family has to make their own decisions on what's best for their family and and I respect that so but if you are not returning if you will just so kindly let us know and we're going to put these put these choices out there we're moving out of the district we're moving out of state we're moving out of the
179country we're enrolling in an alternative Public School we're enrolling in a private school and if you could share that with us that's great or you could click unsure at this time but this is going to help us even further uh plan and be ready and this is when you you heard in the comments earlier this is when we're assigning um you know full-time uh employees to to each site this is as we're doing our staffing so we're gonna we're gonna need this information I hear a lot of parents saying that they're considering private school well now tell us what you're going to do are you going to stick with us or are you going to private school and again you have to do what's best for your family but we are planning for full instruction
180in the fall and then if I plan on returning for the school year I want my chill I want my child to attend the following right regular time right and here it is again preschool through 12th grade five days a week a full day instruction at your school of residence or attendance can I have the next slide please these are the alternative programs so the alternative programs would be Horizons home study and um here it is it's a K-8 program this is something that we already have and we've already been doing in the district but home the home study program consists of parents and Guardians you assume the responsibility for your students learning and the management of the curriculum student and their parent or Guardians meet with the teacher every other week right for support
181and monitoring purposes so so again you meet with your teacher every other week you get all of your assignments and then you take them home and you do them on your own speed you it's it's self-directed right it's your your parent Your Guardian is is leading students through this through this activity and then we also have the independent study for ninth and 12th graders students meet with their teacher at a minimum of one hour per week to review assignments progress assess skills and develop a graduation plan so these are programs that we already have in place in the district but again if you're interested in these please let us know through this survey so that we can staff them like this year we we didn't staff them to the level because as you can read
182what they require it's it's not distance learning right you're not going to have interaction with the teacher every day it really is for those students who are are self-go self-motivated or are independent workers or whatnot that is what our our our independent study program and this is the same independent study program that all districts offer in some way because there's a lot of guidance around these independent study programs so this is nothing new here I just really want to be clear with that than the other alternative program if we can go to the next slide this would be the Virtual Academy and again this is um there's very little Direction coming from the state on this but what we do know is that um this is for our district residents it is an alternative school
183for students who due to health concerns or other concerns want to continue in a distance learning environment the school day includes daily contract daily contact with uh with classroom teachers utilizing both synchronous and asynchronous digital instruction combining for a day that will be approximately the same as the length of a regular school day in person so this will not look like what students are currently doing right now this will be something different can we go to the next slide and at the elementary level there will be language arts math science physical education history and science that will be your curriculum at the secondary level um all core subjects will be offered with limited electives so you're not going to join this program and for example be able to do band or be able to do
184certain you know certain electives that the schools offer we will offer um you know a handful of electives and um and and that will be what students have to choose for from students enrolling in in this Academy they'll have to submit an inter-district transfer form and be disenrolled from their whole from their home school now we have to do this because of staffing needs because when we assign a teacher at the beginning of the year we need that teacher to work at least in that assignment until this semester um that would be the time to make the change or at the end of the school year and so um we're still working out the details on this on whether I mean students students will disenroll from their from their school however the they still will
185have return rights if there's Faith available so so again this is not a um you know this is going to be a challenge for for some families but again the goal is is to have all of our families back in person um and you can either do independent study or you can do the um or you can do the Virtual Academy if that's what if that's what you choose to do so more information to come out on on this very shortly but we do just want to get a a general head count and so that's what we're going to do with the survey that we will be administering later this week and early next week can I have the next slide please um so so I I just um just as I'm wrapping this up
186you know we we collect you know um income forms during the during the school year and with us being in distance learning it was very difficult for that but we we had staff who really did a great deal of Outreach to um you know to to to work with families and to to do Outreach to families to collect this information because this is how we get funding to um to provide resources to our to our students um from from our lower income families and so um so anyway this really helped us um secure funding for those for those students um you know we would have lost you know close to seven hundred thousand dollars um if if if it were not for the efforts that staff and families put forward to um in in collecting
187these forms I did want to give a big thank you to our office staffs and for food nutrition who really assisted in in collecting this information and then if we can go to the last slide so I just you know I just wanted to just just kind of acknowledge that you know we're we're one District we're one team we all have the same goals um this pandemic has impacted everyone everyone has been affected everyone's way of life has been impacted um we get it there are some there are some individuals in our communities who have who have suffered more and and what I mean by that is there you know when we look at Food Distribution and and if and if if you're coming in to get food then you then that's a that's a
188way to suffer rather than someone else who who they're suffering as well but maybe they're suffering because they're unable to travel or they're unable to go visit family or they're unable to do some other things and so I'm not here to judge which one is more or less but if your basic needs if you're if you're worried about feeding your family or you're worried about being evicted like those are your those are mazzo's hierarchy of needs those are your basic needs but everyone's been affected and our purpose in this district is to serve students that is our sole purpose that's why we exist and I believe and I'm confident that everyone who works for this District all of our parents you know this governing board our administrators we're all here for the same reasons we
189want what's best for our kids and I think at this point it is time for us to focus on the possibilities of the future and I'm gonna I'm gonna close this out with the just just with something that's happened in the news recently is the the cargo ship that got caught in the strait um you know so this car they have this straight right it's one way in and one way out and a cargo ship gets caught there and so what it does is it slows down everything right and so many people got impacted from that and then finally when they freed it the the initial reaction is someone's going to pay for this right so who was driving it was this person inebriated like like someone's gonna pay for this this is the problem
190right so this is the pound of Flesh we're gonna get but I think what we really need to look at is our system like is that the best system like there's ways that we have to work on on avoiding something like this from happening so we had this pandemic and we had to close down our schools to students well things are getting better and instead of spending time pointing fingers and issuing blame and things like that it's really is time for us to focus on the future to um you know there's new things that we've learned there's things that we didn't think were possible that we've had to do during this pandemic and um and I think that there's great hope for our students going forward and I'm excited to um to to be in
191this position to be able to lead those efforts I'm excited to be able to work with this governing board and doing and I'm excited to um to be able to work with staff and providing the best possible education for all of our students so I really just want to take this time that you know we need time to heal we need time to you know re-establish ourselves as a premier District that is that is here for nothing else but to serve our students so with that I'll conclude my report um I don't know if if I should put forward a um you know a call to the board to um to take a formal vote that we are opening schools for all students in the fall um I mean we've said it over and over
192I think all the all the board members are committed to it I know our labor partners are committed to that I know our parents want that well a lot of our parents because we did see half of our parents are still out doing full distance learning and and we don't know exactly why that is but we're here to serve all students and we are looking to open fully in the fall and if a um you know if a if if a vote by this board um you know would would help you know some families have have peace during these stressful times then um then I put it on the table that um you know we take a vote that we open in the fall and you know what for the rest of spring and for
193summer and in the fall we're still going to have to do the work and that work is not stopping but um but I think we're all committed to opening in the fall and so um I'll leave it up to the board on on if you want to take any formal action but I think you guys have been very clear with me um your direction that you've provided that that you want all of our students back so so again thank you all and I'll entertain any questions thank you so much Dr Clark for that comprehensive presentation that I think as you said really uh provides some of the details from the direction that we have been going um all along and so I think we can turn that into emotion I would like to move that
194we approve uh the plan for uh for fall 2021 to have three options for students one full-time in-person five days a week two the independent study or three the Virtual Academy point of order yes just email do we need to consult with Mr Alvarado to determine whether or not emotion is in order because it wasn't on the agenda it's just information or action beg your pardon under the update it says info or action oh okay I'm sorry I did not see that no I apologize thank you um and I was building that motion around the subject at hand so I believe it's appropriate all right so we have a motion uh by trustee count and second by trustee Mason is there any other discussion on this topic we're on the motion rather we can have
195additional discussions I think I have a question well I think it's a question I should ask before we vote um on the on the three choices of what type of schooling a family has next year I think you mentioned that someone could change mid-semester I'm wondering if also there's a choice of unsure on the survey for I'm not sure if I'm coming back but is there a choice of unsure on what on yes I'm coming back but I'm not sure which choice because I've heard like it's not unique I think we've all heard there's families who would come back if their children are vaccinated but we don't know that today if that will be if they will be or if it's a possibility yet um but they would return the moment their child is vaccinated
196and so it may be that they can't come in August they choose another option if you they have to keep that option through the semester um but is there will there be on the survey that that unsure because I want to be for whatever reason but because I want my child to be vaccinated right so so great question you know the the survey and none of our surveys to this date and we've been I don't know this is probably our third or fourth survey that we've that we're gonna put up none of them have been binding right and so so um even even the last survey we did we still you know called and and got verbals from folks and still you know so so they aren't binding surveys no matter what this is just
197again for planning purposes we're at we're on you know what is the date April 14th right now we're looking at starting school in August and so um so again this is just for planning purposes and so you know I I think also to your point is we can we see how quickly things can change in terms of vaccinations you know like just one month ago we were in the purple we were you know on the vaccination program was just getting rolling just getting started but you know so so we fully intend for for things to change but um anything that a family puts on their survey right now is not going to be binding um we're going to give folks time before we ask them to do that Compact and and that's going to come
198later on so so I'm I'm not really answering your question but I'm just saying that it's not a binding survey at this point no I think that helps and that takes pressure off of parents because that's when when the stress came on the last survey it's like how are we going to supposed to know this now and people feel making this choice is hard and that they'd have to stick with it to the end so I think it's good for folks to hear multiple times multiple ways that is to help with planning you can change your mind especially as as the district has more information as we as parents have more information and the community has more information and hopefully we just keep going in the right direction um right yeah very good point thank
199you other uh questions or discussion comments so would this vote simply be to provide uh like the more direction for staff like to go ahead to like keep planning for a five-day return because I'm assuming it has like this contract been negotiated with like our bargaining units and whether like those conversations need to continue before like there isn't there is a like an official like an official promise um so what what what does this this motion entail right so so again we um you know we already have a contract in place with all of our bargaining units for um for regular school the reason why we had to do mous with all of our bargaining units is because we did we went to 100 distance learning that was now that was the model that we
200were providing going back to five days a week full full students is what we've always done and so therefore um you only bargain when there's a change in working conditions and if we're back five days a week with all students all day long that's not a change in working conditions so that's not to say that we're not still going to work with our labor Partners we are but what this motion does and and what this what this vote does it lets the public know and lets our staff know and lets our students know that we are committed to opening schools up in the fall five days a week all day for all students and again we all know that if a new variant comes in and changes everything that the state of California can can
201pivot and go in a different direction but as a as a governance team we are committed to um to five days a week instruction and and staff we've been we've been working on this and planning on this and so um that's already the direction that we're taking but this just um again reassures the public and staff that this is where we're headed exactly well said thank you all right any other comments okay we'll take that to a vote we'll start with trusty Ellis yes trustee Mason yes just email yes trustee and Zoe yes trustee McFerrin yes I also vote Yes motion passes 5-0 with concurrence from our student board member thank you very much Dr Clark for that presentation and Clarity and thank you board for um I think you know sometimes people think about
202this as there's the board and then separately there's a superintendent and then separately they're the bargaining units you know we are uh we're a leadership team that works together for you know so ideally we are not these separate entities that aren't communicating right um this is that's why sometimes it appears that the board is not taking uh more action on something is because we're already in agreement we've already been working as a team with our superintendent and with the district leadership and um so there we go so we wanted to though make that motion as Dr Clark said to make it even clearer that this is where the board stands as well all right so any other uh discussion aside from that motion on Dr Clark's presentation um or any of the other details provided
203there is um I have one question is there a way to first of all thank you Dr Clark for the presentation I was wondering if there was a way for uh to gauge how students are faring I mean we've only been in hybrid for um a couple a couple days and I know like from what we're seeing the the pictures on on social media and anecdotes from students and teachers it's all been great but really as we're as we get deeper into hybrid learning and closer to the end of the year how how students are actually actually figuring and getting some some um a a better a better pulse of of of how beneficial this is this is to students and how it can potentially be improved yeah I mean that's a that's a great
204question that's something that I can you know tomorrow morning at 8 A.M I have a meeting with all the all the principals um and all of our all of our management and Leadership and I can you know and ask them how they think would be a good way to get this information or um you know ways that they could find that information to share with this board or share with the public or whatnot on on you know how students who are participating in hybrid you know are are faring you know I I just I just know that one thing I always want to be very cautious of is that half of our students are at home and not even coming to campus and so um you know I don't want to leave them out as
205well and so I just want to make sure that we're being inclusive for all for all of our students but I will ask the principals and and vice principals and and admin how they could assist us in getting that information thank you yes I think that's a really good point you know when the plan was made for hybrid one of the one of the important pieces that I think our district did was to make sure that that afternoon time was available uh for the same types of resources intervention tutoring social emotional for our distance learning students as well as our in-person students so I think if we want to look at how students are doing we could still look at how all of our students are doing not just the ones who are coming in
206person and maybe we can look at some of the data that like that you had provided back in the fall and then look at it now in terms of absenteeism how many students are participating whether it's in whichever way um you know how is that looking and you know how many students are uh you know passing their classes not getting DS or F's that kind of thing um and then also looking at um I know one of the focuses from the state and with our new lcap is to look at specific populations of students and so being able to break it down that way I think would be really important as well especially as we do our planning into the future for summer and fall and our three-year lcap plan for how to serve those
207students oops thank you that's that that's a great suggestion thank you other questions or comments trustee McFerrin I just have a comment um it was a really really comprehensive um uh presentation Dr Clark um and I just wanted to just um just briefly just acknowledge that there I think there's a lot of kind of um anxiety around the word plan and planning and I think in our community we have um in our community and and probably um every community that I'm familiar with there's been kind of um uh an uptick in kind of interest in what's going on in school boards and in school board meetings and so um I just I think it's important you know um you know as a teacher and just knowing this and knowing that not everyone knows this that
208um that this word planning we're always at this time of year we're always planning for the following school year we're planning things like Staffing Master schedules which is especially at the middle school and high school level are an incredible Beast to put together um we're planning um you know facilities and and how to improve our facilities over the Summers to welcome students to return and so I just I just wanted to mention that we're always planning at this time of year um and so I know that that word has caused people a lot of strife um but uh that's normal for this time of year um and then um I also just wanted to um just about the um the Virtual Academy I really hope that we can um put a lot of efforts um
209toward that because we we know how to do regular in-person school we're just returning to what we already know how to do so well um and so I just hope that um just for for Equity sake and for those students who really cannot return to school for medical reasons for themselves or their family I just really want us to make sure that we're we're serving the needs of those students the best that we can um and um and that that's that's all I'm very very excited to like return to normalcy um and so I definitely don't want um I don't want anyone to misunderstand that you know about me um and I do also want to report and just my first hand knowledge because I teach sophomores and seniors that I've had in the in
210the past couple weeks I've had so many students tell me they're not going to make it to class because they're getting vaccinated which is I in my opinion the best reason to miss class so I've been very glad to not see those students while they're getting vaccinated so um just that I just think that's really positive news for our community and I'm so excited to see us moving in this direction so that's all I really wanted to share no and I just just so briefly I want to just respond to what you said about the Virtual Academy um although there is little guidance from the state on that I know for Equity purposes that that um that independent study is not for everybody and so to have the only option for students who aren't coming
211in face to face for it to be independent study I don't think that is fair and I don't think that that is we've learned too much and we and we have invested too much in our distance learning program and although there are some that say it's not working for them I can respect that and understand that but there are some who have thrived in this environment and I think there's really some some key tenets and components that we can build off of to make a sustainable program for those who who it's a it's a it's it's something that they need that their students need to learn and to access the curriculum and so um we are going to you know invest a considerable amount of time and resources into making sure that this is a
212robust program and that it does meet the needs of the students who who participate regardless of the of the state guidance that we're that we're still waiting on we're not going to wait I mean we're going to move forward and then just adjust as needed so thank you thank you yes and just to build off of that I think that in future board meetings we'll see uh you know more of a description of what Virtual Academy is is looking like similarly I think it would be great to have a presentation on what summer school is going to look like and I wonder if you will need to also do a parent survey there of who's or maybe it's just the direct sign ups for what the various summer options are because I know last summer
213was very very limited and even the summer before that due to budget cuts was very limited but I know this year we are planning much more extensive summer options and one of the highlights of our summer options in in Prior years was the Robotics and Technology camps that we had one of them was specifically for girls that I know Shawna Haas and others have run and so I'm very curious as to whether those are going to come back this summer and what other summer opportunities there are I know you might not have the answer to that today so so just to say I do have the answer that I'm not going to share them right now because we're doing a presentation at the next meeting but but I I just let me just just lay
214this out just real quick is that is that I build the agenda for the board and then I work with I work with President count and vice president Mason on on the agenda so um so this is a this is a the boards business meeting this meeting that we're doing now this isn't a public relations meeting or this isn't a meeting to put out information we have other avenues for putting out information and um wework staff works all day every day on on these issues and right now we're we're working on on serving 29 000 students in our district each and every day and they need our full full attention so just because something doesn't necessarily show up on a board agenda or as a board presentation it does not mean that it that it's
215not happening we've been planning for summer school for months and we're actually going to have a very robust program um you know for for summer school and I think you guys are going to be be pleased when you hear about the efforts that have that have that have taken place with summer school so just because that hasn't come to the board I don't want you to think that that work isn't getting done and again with um you know with with the activities that are taking place on our campuses with our Athletics that are going on with you know the different extracurricular activities that are happening like things are happening throughout this District I mean just being able to see the presentation earlier on the cares program like there's so many things that are happening that
216don't necessarily come to the board and just because you know the board's not hearing a presentation or voting on a on a direct action it doesn't mean these things aren't happening we have you know close to 4 000 employees that are serving kids each and every day and there's no possible way we can bring all that information to the board but what I will promise you as we go forward from this meeting forward is we will be discussing academics and students from here on out so um so so that is something that definitely will be on the Gen on the agenda each and every meeting is some sort of update or some sort of document or included in some report on on student progress on curriculum on instruction on data surrounding our students so I
217do commit that to this board to do that and bring that forward thank you so much Dr Clark yeah I think in relation to summer school the key for a board meeting presentation would be are there any um decisions that the board can make that would help support the plans for summer school if there's any any limitations that you find in the process of planning and there's an action that we can take that will help ensure that we can serve more students this summer that's absolutely what we're interested in doing right thank you any other questions on this all right thank you so much Dr Clark okay it's supposed to be a short meeting and here we are at the word we're close we're close in the nine o'clock hour what's going on here what's
218that agenda we're here to the consent agenda all right items listed under consent agenda are considered routine and will be approved adopted by a single motion there will be no separate discussion of these items however any item may be removed from the consent agenda upon the request of any member of the board and acted upon separately trustees any items to remove or any motion to approve Madam president can you uh advise the public the change around uh item 13.8 please item 13.8 Dr Clark would you like to provide that right sure the latest update that was made on the docket is that what you're talking about yeah yeah so on on 13.8 we had a Paving project that was completed and one of the um one of the schools that received some additional or fresh
219covering of asphalt was was left off and that has since been corrected and so that is included on item 13.8 and it was the School site Bel Air Bel Air yes thank you trustee Mayo and the reason that was important is because there's a record for completion that is a public document that has to be um it's a testament that the contractor has completed the work so it was important to include that as part of the job in that document so thank you for making that change so thank you very much trustee Mayo for your detailed uh detailed notice of these things um okay any items to pull from the consent agenda at this point I'll make emotionally accepted as presented second okay uh motion by trustee Mason second by trustee Mayo any discussion or
220there wouldn't be discussion on that um we'll move it to a vote trustee Alice yes trustee Mason yes trustee Mayo yes trustee and zaweed yes trustee McFerrin yes I also vote Yes motion passes 5-0 with concurrence from our student board member that was the consent no items pulled no carry over closed session all right a few last thing future agenda items 18.1 anyone have future agenda items I'd love to hear about or may I go I'd love to hear about um gosh now I can't well I'd love to hear about how the tutoring um app for ell students is going um yeah as the second update on how that on how that is going and how that's working um because it seemed like such a great a great opportunity a great thing that would benefit
221all students and that's another possible one-time expenditure that we could consider for all students thank you trustee and say we I did have one more which is um uh AB 988 is um was introduced by our assembly member Rebecca bauerkahan of district 16 and it's called the miles Hall Lifeline act for it creates a new three-digit phone line 988 for suicide prevention and immediate localized emergency response for individuals in Mental Health crisis by trained mental health professionals and so I am interested in us submitting a letter of support for um for this bill so we'd like to propose that as a as a future agenda item if other students are interested I believe that's it any others okay all right [Music] 19.1 we adjourn at 9 22 pm