001e e e hello like to call the meeting to order and thank you all for being here I love it there's a lot of people I think but I think we do um reminder that if you want to speak during public comment get one of the little papers in the back and fill it out and bring it up um we have so many tonight that per our policy we're going down to three minutes instead of five minutes or will'll be here until tomorrow so if you have one that you want to speak make sure it comes up here and gets to Michelle okay um we're going to start with Cascades leading Us in the Pledge of Allegiance and the Cascade promise all stand when do I start I pledge allegiance to the flag of the
002United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands one nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for all and now let's say the Cascades pledge at Cascades we are leaders you will see this in my kind words and peaceful demeanor safe respectful and responsible are qualities I will be and I will think before I act and be understanding of others differ from me leading by example is what I promise to do and by following this pledge you can too I like [Applause] that okay at this point I'd like to turn the meeting over to Miss Jones oh I'm sorry let's have Michelle do roll call first uh Miss Hamilton present Mrs Brown here Mr does here Mrs Mitchell here miss Acton here miss hunt here and Mrs Fitzgerald here thank you
003and now let's turn over to Miss Jones all right good evening everyone to the members of the Board of Education superintendent Bill and Mrs Oxley the superintendent's cabinet I am Christa Jones principal of Cascades Elementary a leader in me school this evening I'm joined by my assistant principal Amy Tero and our dean of students Brett Keel and a group of our dedicated teachers and I see some of our teachers out in the audience as well and our talented students we are thrilled to be here this evening to share some of the amazing work that is being done at Cascades Elementary tonight you will hear presentations from our student council members Guided by their facilitator and fifth grade teacher Mrs an gleed on our leader and me seven habits and our PBS traits be safe respectful
004and responsible and from our playwork junior coaches from our steam Department steam Department being led by Mr Paige they will showcase some of their projects that they have worked on the entire school year and from our music department our music students Guided by our Mrs good will perform a song for you we hope that you enjoy what we've provided for you or prepared for you this evening and we want to thank the board of education for giving us this opportunity to showcase the wonderful work that is being done by Cascades elementary students now I present to you Cascade students [Applause] [Music] like silly body I like my stiffy nose I like my Wiggly fingers I like my ta toes I like my tummy when it's full I like the I think I [Music] like I
005make Planet each I live so I gently to each a new adventure who knows what we might find I love myly I love myly [Music] brain I'll sing again [Applause] [Music] hi my name is Rashad and I'm Hendrick and today we're going to be talking about Cas how Cascades Elementary is a leader in me school we follow the seven habits which is habit one be per habit two begin with the end in mind habit three per first things first habit four think when win habit five seek first to understand then to be understood habit six synergize habit seven sharpen the saw that's all the seven habits and now we have a song that was written in Steam class thank you for listening hi I'm George Paige I teach the steam class at Cascades uh one
006of the things that we were working on this year we were doing sound energy and we were working with the rubber band guitar so we were using rubber bands and cardboard boxes and we were designing different guitars for the students they were so interested that they wanted to play their guitars and see if they could make up a song so we mixed up the win-win which is one of our leader and me um traits with the music and the song and they wrote this song the first group did it in about 15 minutes so they created their own song together and then all the classes did it that whole week so I work with 400 students in one week and all 400 students were able to do this song and they're very proud of it
007and we did recordings and then we sent the recordings to all the teachers so they loved it so we want to um present this to you this afternoon we'll just put this mic up this way [Music] help someone it's a wi it's a [Music] wi win wi talking about a win a [Music] wi up [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] so the great thing about steam it stands for science technology engineering art and math and the students can be very creative use their imagination they've I've seen them done do some amazing things this year and I would like these three students to come up and just give you a glimpse of what has gone on this year um Addie and Lauren and Mason come on up hi I'm Addie and I'm going to talk to you today
008about the steam program at casket School steam is an acronym for science technology engineering art and math in Steam we do a lot of Hands-On science experiments including the pumpkin lab the tin fo boat lab PL anding Sol Eclipse models during the pumpkin lab we worked in small groups to measure the circumference and weigh the pumpkins then we open them up and count all the seeds we designed our own bows and tin foil and test the buoyancy of 3th models pennies we the most popular project project in Steam was a slime experiment in Steam we work with go Jackson study plants we've planted various different vegetables in our classroom Greenhouse under guide meds we learned about the plant cycle germination pili compost hi my name is Lauren and today I'm going to talk about the
009Ian steam in Steam we do a lot of engineering we use the engineering design process which is planning building and revising projects some of the engineering projects we worked on are toothpick Towers Bridges marble mazes paper helicopters toy Spinners bucket towers and foam cup snowmen that we repurposed sometimes we have steam stations where we use the engineering materials to be creative and use our imagination to create something ourselves engineering materials we use include Legos planks straws Plus+ puzzle pieces Marble Runs Lincoln Logs deboards and magnet tiles hi my name is Mason and in Steam class we often include art with our science and engineering projects some of our art projects include solar eclip drawings with oil pastel birthday dot paintings snowman chalk art abominal snowman Fork paintings pine cone Hedgehog paintings and leaf rubbings in
010summary the steam class at Cascades gives students a platform to use their creativity and Imagination through science technology engineering and math hope you've enjoyed this presentation today [Applause] and I would just like to thank the board and Mr Beal um Julie Baker for all of your support um we have some amazing materials engineering materials that we started right at the beginning of the school year so thank you for your support hi my name is zad and I'm be talking about playworks today as playworks junior coaches we build and use our leadership skills to have a positive impact in our school we do this through leading games at recess teaching conflict resolution skills like rock paper scissors and using positive language like good job nice try we applied in were chosen by our teachers principal and
011play coaches because of our leadership responsibility and positive attitudes being a junior coach mean being a role model and showing how research can be safe inclusive and fun our favorite part of being a junior coach is helping other kids at recess enjoy the time in addition we feel good about ourselves as a junior coach one thing we have learned while being a junior coach is how games can reduce conflicts during recess [Applause] hi my name is Lauren and I'm going to talk about the 3bs the 3bs is safe respectful and responsible safe means walk walk is one of our biggest rules while we are in the H we also use kafti that means keep your hands feet and other objects to yourself hi my name is Amari and I'm going to talk about respect respect
012means to not talk back and never be disrespectful and don't talk over respected or any adults a part of being responsible is getting a part of being responsible is getting your work in on time and getting to class every day and being on time to school hope you enjoyed the 3bs we follow at our [Applause] school this is a year project red this is a yearly Jackson County Rural education day the field trip exposes kids to food Productions in Michigan and AR agricultural farming our student council provided this field trip to every third grader at class Cascades Elementary we all learned about cows pigs chickens honey Michigan made products finally at the end of the field everybody was able to pet farm animals [Applause] do you want to you want to pass those out yeah
013we also um made we ran out of guitar picks here so the steam class made guitar picks with recycled plastic so they're refurbished um repurposing and Mod's going to pass them we'll pass them down to everybody thank you for a great evening thank you so [Applause] much thank you Cass aades yeah that's next I love it when the kids come in and we hear about the different schools because they're all doing such wonderful things they're all very different so I really like to see that okay at this point I will entertain a motion for approval of the agenda Pam i' like to make Amendment for that Madam yeah madam chair I would um Madame President I would like to make a motion need motion to approve the agenda first and then it okay discussion all
014right a motion to approve the agenda first and then we'll ask after that point support thank you yeah Amendment at this point yes Madam president I would like to make a motion to pull discussion item 23- 24-11 11 board meeting dates just delete it delete it remove it remove it remove it support Second support all in favor discussion we haven't had discussion we have discussion you're right discussion I think you're supposed to have some discussion by what you want to pull it from for so call for discuss I called for discuss any discussion I think sh did you have an you were supposed to have an opportunity to did you have something that you wanted to say yeah but no I just Robert's Rules I think allows you to go first with explain why to
015the community and to everyone represented here tonight back in December when I was appointed to city council I came to the board here today at school board and um made a request to the board asking if there would be consideration made to change some of the dates that we had already um agreed upon um two public hearings were held and um at our meeting in February it was voted on and passed by a majority vote to change the days in March our meeting date in March and in April those meetings have since occurred and again I want to emphasize that that meeting um it was voted and passed by a majority vote as a board that operates under the guidance that c clearly outlines everything that we do our parliamentary procedures is based on Robert's
016Rules of Order Robert's Rules of Order is designed to ensure that business our district business at this governance table is conducted in a structured respectful inclusive and efficient man manner during my tenure of being a part of this board and many others within our community our decision- making has been based on a majority vote given the fact that we are convened as a quorum a quorum is the majority for this board that means four or more members it is my recommendation that we pull this because it has already been voted on and thoroughly discussed and the meetings have been held it is been presented today as an agenda item because the idea of a unanimous vote is being suggested there is very little that we do here at the board table that has resulted in
017a unanimous vote so again as we have continued our work our board business and moving the district's initiatives forward based on a majority vote I am asking that we continue to conduct business under the operation of the Robert's Rules of Order and also considering for future incidents that if anyone at this table is Desiring to make a request to the board that we then at that time have the discretion to discuss the item and again make a decision based on the majority vote thank you any other discussion yes I have go ahead L um I was the one that put this on the agenda and the reason I put it on the agenda is because I didn't feel that it was fair to all the members of the board just to um change the dates
018for one person when the other people some of the other people on the board maybe um had already put it on their calendar all year for certain for certain dates and then um because of this vote it was changed and so their whole schedule you know they might not have been able to come to a board meeting because their schedule was already set my um perspective on this is to make the dates available at the beginning of the school year and then um you know make sure that these dates stay the same if they are to change the reason I said a unanimous vote is because people there might be one person even one person that this changes their whole agenda and they can't come to a board meeting and if there's even only one
019person then we should not um change the dates so I feel that the um date should be established at the beginning of the year and we should stick with those dates unless we have a discussion and a vote on if this would inconvenience anybody else any more discussion yes more discussion so um of course I'm going to be supporting Libby's position on this because in January of this year actually we came and at the organizational meeting that we do in every January we establish the dates of the board meeting um we established all the dates of the board meeting being the third Tuesday of the month and agreed that we'd uh go to this to six o'clock versus 5:00 at the time shelanda hunt did request that we change um the board dates for the
020entire year because she had accepted a position at the at city council which I opposed because again we set our meetings we've had these meetings for the past four years on the third Tuesday of the month and those days have been uh acceptable and they work for us um some of us travel for our jobs some of us just have lives you know I mean and some of us uh are very intentional myself being that some person that person um about ensuring that the third Tuesday of the month is the date that I set aside for board meetings so when sheland came in January and asked we changed the board meetings for her and her alone I said no because that does not work for my schedule now you all don't know because you might
021not remember we were on Zoom at the time when I was first selected in 20201 we started serving in 2021 got elected in 202 in 2020 Chanda asked us to change the day of the board at that time at that time it worked for my schedule and everybody else's schedule on this board to change the date and at that time I said yes we can change the date because at that time it worked at this time it did not work so this board chose to change two dates because Libby wisely pointed out that there were only two dates um that the boards overlap which would been March and April um the city city council's board and jpss boards are overlapping so Libby said well why are you asking to change the entire year when only
022two dates are are in in in question so then they modified it said we'll change it to just those two dates and I still said no because again those dates did not work for my schedule the complaint that I brought or the the issue that we both have liiving myself with this issue is that one person on this board should not be able to change the entire schedule for themselves and themselves alone particularly and specifically when it dis when it inconveniences another board member that's the issue now mind you you might have noticed in February of this year I was not sitting at this table because I had another meeting I did not ask the entire board to change their entire schedule because I had a meeting you also didn't see me here in April
023sitting at the board meeting because I couldn't be here because that was one of the dates that I could not be here because they had changed it so the issue that Libby is Raising is that we unanimously vote on board date changes so that if we decide to change them that everybody is agreed because again um if we're going to set the dates and then change them for one person that and when it disadvantages another person that's just not fair so now we have the rule of the law but we also should speak about the spirit of the law as a board as a board we can't work collaboratively if we're choosing to uh make the board work for simply one person again when it disadvantages another so that's the issue so of course on
024this issue um I would be voting that we uh if we ever change the dates once we've established them if we ever change them that we make that a unanimous vote so that again everybody's schedule can align and not simply one person's thank you anyone else Derek did you want to speak um no okay I do I know how difficult it is to get seven people together period And I know the importance of setting a schedule early on I do but I also know that we're human beings and we have things that happen Robert's Rules covers changing anything with a majority vote to go in at this point and pick out one thing like a meeting date on a specific month opens the door to change the next thing from Roberts and the next thing
025from Rob Roberts and so I vehemently disagree that we have to wait for a majority vote when we have very definite um parameters within uh which to work at this point okay so at this point I think we're all finished with our comments you want to say something else yeah I would like to just add I have here before me tonight our policy so policy 0161 states that the Parliamentary Authority governing the Board of Education shall be Robert's Rule of Order newly revised in all cases in which it is not consistent with statute Administrative Code or these bylaws policy 0162 defines a quorum four members present at a meeting shall constitute a quorum and no business shall be conducted in the absence of a quorum again that leads to a majority vote 01641 it says
026the board shall hold a meeting at least once each month on a date and at a time and place determined annually by a resolution of the board and I'll read a portion of 01651 it says our regular meetings within 10 days after the organizational meeting the board shall cause to be posted the board shall cause to be posted at the board office and in other locations considered appropriate by the board a notice listing the date time and place of each regularly scheduled meeting of the board the notice shall contain the name and address of the district and its telephone number and lastly policy 01 65.2 change of regular meetings within three days after the board adopts a resolution changing the date time or place of a regularly scheduled meeting the meeting notice shall State the
027date time place of the rescheduled meeting and well as as well as the name address and telephone number Etc again not only did we hold two public meetings discussing this in great detail a majority vote shalanda hunt vice president did not make a decision alone I do not have the authority to do so thank you okay at this point there's more comment oh okay so um I'll add to it I don't know you you've noticed me first are we changing that now or what we doing oh so you noce him first okay two times so that's okay but she spoke twice but okay you letting him speak now okay go ahead ke go ahead I'll defer thanks appreciate that so um I'll add to that this is my second time so we're going to make
028sure we put it all in there um I I mentioned to you all already and this is what I brought up the last time um one we have the spirit of the of the of the you know which was written the Roberts rules that they want to keep talking about um if there's not something that that I don't hear so often constantly from our uh parents teachers and students is this these rules that we have established that are making life very difficult for us so now while sheland is correct that Robert's Rule says that if you get a majority vote which is obviously you know more than half of the board agreeing to something then that's the direction that the board goes and that's the board uh conversation that you hear this is what the
029board said um so she's correcting that um what we do find all the time and and we're we are about to address an equity policy as well what we do find all the time though is that these policies these rules that have been created they make hardships for certain people and um we saw this even last month or the uh in March when we were bringing we were talking about our Equity our Dei officer and some of the things that they've been doing in their office and we discussed the fact that this District um is a priority district and that's not the exact terms for it but we are basically under State Control right now some of our school districts School uh buildings are because of how inequitable our data looks based on you know
030based on certain point of order Madam chair um the issue with this is that excuse me Shel have a point of order Shela is doub there four years four years of this is shelanda seriously anyway so the issue is that um this is a very point of order Point order through through the chair I just asked if we could uh speak to uh the amendment to the agenda as to whether we want to I guess debate whether we will discuss how we will decide on how to agree on meetings so um you still have the floor I was just thanks derck I appreciate that I'm still learning Robert's Rules just so you all know I'm studying it right now so I can better understand it thank you Dereck I appreciate that so back to what
031I was saying um this is what I mentioned to you all before especially on my Facebook page if you all are following do kha hamilt to JP uh for JPS uh you know my Facebook page anyways though um the issue that I have with this is that shelanda understood that this was a change that was um that she needed in herself she needed alone and she also understood as she you know just mentioned there was a lot of conversation around that this would uh disadvantage myself meaning that I could not come to two board meetings because of her the uh March board meeting I ended up bringing my entire meeting to the board which we should not have had to do for one person so again you know um my vote's going to be on
032this issue of whether or not we vote unanimously on board date changes my vote would be that yes we vote unanimously on board board date changes because again just because you have a vacation or just because you have another meeting or just because you have something that you are dealing with personally we should not have to vote change the entire thing for you and you alone point of order and actually I'm done now I don't need to speak again um great uh just for my discussion we are not debating the actual content of the discussion item we're debating whether it shall be placed on the agenda also um appreciate everyone here I know we have um we all have the same courtesy and flexibility to uh ask that uh meetings be changed um there's a
033process for that in Robert's rules to bring uh that stuff in front of us uh having said all that and with the uh the verbos uh nature that this has already been discussed I'll move the previous question okay calling for a vote all in favor do you want to do a roll call or just all in favor can you clarify what we're voting on uh the amendment itself we're voting to close debate yes to stop talking about this it requires two-thirds it requires five of us to vote Yes so we're not voting or whether or not we're putting it on the agenda just voting to close debate moving previous question is not debatable so I would ask that we take a vote whether we stop talking about this and get to taking a vote on
034the question so on the actual okay okay you want to do roll call pleas roll call U Miss Hamilton yes we can close debate Miss Brown Mr does yes uh Mrs Mitchell yes Miss Acton yes Miss hunt yes and Mrs Fitzgerald yes Madam chair now we're on to the now the vote passes unanimously whether we should amend the um agenda right the agenda okay at this point the vote is on whether or not we should remove this item from the agenda all in favor I I no no we are there yet all in favor I I I opposed no okay thank you it passes 5-2 now approval of the amended agenda we have another amendment the amended agenda just to accept the amended agenda agenda so now we have another amendment though we we voted
035on that one I would like to like to make a motion that we add a conversation um about a request that a parent has to make a formal complaint to the board any discussion yes I understand I have the floor for that one um so we have a parent um who has been uh engaging with the board um or attempting to engage with the board through email and she has requested to have a conversation with this board around concerns that she has um she has been told by the board president that she cannot have this conversation with her with us rather and I would like for us to um decide that we can have a conversation with this parent who would like to have a conversation with the board regarding a formal complaint that she
036would like to make do you want to say something I do not okay I wanted to say that the complaints already been made and that as has been the rule policy Roberts rules masb and Jackson public that the person who is being complained against is the person who can decide if they will have an open meeting where they sit right here and discuss or if they have a closed meeting where it's just the board itself and the complainant and whoever else you know that that she's bringing that's the way it's always been done the complainant the person that is complaining does not get to decide if it's open or closed the complaint whoever it's against that person says yes I'll go ahead excuse me point of order yeah so my request is not that she
037has an open or closed meeting but that we give her the opportunity to have the meeting we can tell her how once we decide yes or no but my my request is not that it's open or closed but that it's just a meeting that we decide to let her make a formal complaint to the board as she's requested at this point call for the vote D did you want to say something else no let call for the vote on adding an agenda item about a a one parent complaint about another employee of the JPS okay all in favor yes no no yes no uh no no okay yeah four to three and it uh failed to have another agenda item added okay now Pam what was the count of the vote pardon me what was
038count four to three thank you okay at this point um we're going to make a another we need another motion to accept the agenda as amended so Mo support all in favor I opposed was anybody opposed okay two opposes okay five to two Okay motion has passed uh approval of the agenda now at this point it's the superintendent's report so I'll turn the meeting over to our superintendent Jeff be thank you very much um lots of discussion this month but what I like to start with and uh just kind of Kick this off if I could invite Brandt Russell um our food service director to come and he's going to share uh some uh information uh from um taher our food service provider will you grab the micang i' rather use that sit yep um
039we had this planned in March and then um as you know we had a death in in the department so we decided to postpone it and this is when we could come so um we uh I brought Chef John here he's been in the district yesterday and today and I just wanted him to explain a little bit about what what we have for you and what he's doing in the district this week thanks BR again John simur I'm one of the corporate chefs for tahur for the food management mement company for the schools yesterday we were at the middle school um today we were at the middle school tomorrow high school and then at Lewis on Thursday so we're doing the Geodon the spicy beef bowl really the number one bowl for students and young
040people it can be spicy it's typically very spicy we're making it not so spicy but they can make it spicier um yeah and so we brought a sample so what we're bringing to you is the exact meal that the kids are eating we added to your meal that you have a sesame salad and some fruit so you can get all your nutrients but you have the Goon with rice and what's interesting about Japanese food is you are getting full off of protein and vegetables rather than starch so you're going to see a much more healthier portion of the beef and vegetables to it there you go that's how I'm often times you know welcomed at these meetings um but the truth is for the parents Japanese food exceeds any expectation on the USDA reimbursement program
041so other Cuisines you might have to trim off some fat a Japanese Kitchen has no cheese no Dairy so imagine taking that out of the recipes it's typically low saturated fat lower sodium and all of that so it the starting point is really great the reason why I'm here is because we're trying to expand the world of the students to include Japan what we're trying to do is for me to bring you food which has special meaning to me but when we present it to 1250 kids this week it has a whole different meaning for the students and tahur has learned through its Chef counsel and its Chef driven program when we bring food to students and they're all eating the same thing not as many options it's the one time that we take away
042the options not as many options but when all the students are eating the same food the immediate consequence is community and with that they have their own meeting and this all comes from a place for me as a second generation chef and a third generation Japanese American so I had a grandmother that was put in interment Camp my father aunts and uncles she was a chef she was a single parent so what we're trying to do is bring as much of that information and talk about Japan Japanese internment World War to present food with meaning really so we have all the food boxes for you to take a warmup nicely you have my grandmother's dumplings or guoa in there there's two sauces I have to explain the homemade sesame dressing for the salad and then
043it has the garlic ginger soy which you can use for the dumplings or the Geodon medium low spice okay and then you have some teas and some fruits uh drinks as well the whole point is to bring something yesterday might have been pizza for your children tomorrow might be Burger but today at Parkview was Japanese food scratch cooking lower sodium low allergen we were able to present it as gluten-free Etc how's that perfect perfect love that Focus um Angel Angela and I were smelling mine and it smells delicious so it looks I had some of that beef today it's it's very good Brant very quickly um how often do we have the guest chefs come to Jackson we have um at least once a quarter if not more um I did just we did just
044hire someone to take Chrissy spot um and um we have Tom who basically took over her administrative role and we just hired an executive chef who will take over um a lot of my duties where I can't get to the kitchen maybe as often so he'll be in the kitchens um much more often um talking about production and recipes and why doesn't this recipe work and all those kinds of things so we're excited about that he's actually in Minnesota this week uh training um I did just want to come um bring a few things real quick um just to know that that we do go into the classroom we do go into the cafeteria um not only with our chefs that we bring but we have staff that go in and um highlight different fruits
045and vegetables of the month um here you just see an example of potato leak soup that we served um then in November we had a harvest with parsnips and rosemary and then I don't remember what month it was but we did bral Sprouts um we do visit the high school in the middle school every month and then we visit uh two elementaries each month and they kind of rotate through on the Harvest uh the lto we do those at the high school and the middle school and basically it is a a monotony breaker for kids so it's not you know the same old I'm going to get pizza today or um get in the chef line and have macaroni and cheese or whatever it might be so it's just something different that uh we kind
046of peak the kids interest with here you see a uh uh ver uh oh my goodness it's an enchilada and it's got a green sauce and a red sauce on it and then we had kungpow chicken which we've done several times because the kids really liked it um then we've also branched out into a plant-based program where we offer at the high school middle school where we offer plant-based items as a limited time offering to get to get them involved in that in that look and uh U you know just expand their Horizons I do have to say that the adame noodle bow and the sushi Bowl were huge hits I was very hesitant about the fetuccini with the uh tomato um sauce with the um I can't even remember what it's in there that
047but that was really good too and we had a lot of good comments about that and we do take those whoops we do take those plant based offerings not as a an entree but as a a sample to the elementaries as well and just my last Point here were just some different Chef Vis visits that we had Chef John came during the pandemic um and went into different classrooms and taught people how to roll the gooa dumplings which you have in your your uh meal right there kids really um 13 yeah I think and how many how many dumplings did we roll while you were here like 3,000 or something like that so it it was quite a lot and there is something you need to know about Chef John it's not no it's very
048everything uh we did Sushi today at the middle school with Chef John and um 7 and A4 inches and 110 grams and so um it's a it's a big learning experience and we the staff really enjoyed it uh Chef Chris came and did a Hawaiian Taco uh Street Taco there uh the kids really enjoyed that as well we do also try to get as much exposure for Jackson as we can we have JTV come um they came and they did a u food circus with Chris um and then um mli came last week uh Fox 47 came last week with Chef Tony Chef Brian came and he actually went in the classroom again and talked to the kids about the latest Chef trip that they did in the Philippines and he uh talked with them
049they got to taste some um banana ketchup which is something that's a little different um and then he he cooked a soup for them a traditional soup and then uh in the schools we actually had a three cup chicken recipe that he did and then uh lastly uh besides Chef John here we had Chef Tony come last week and he did On th Wednesday and Thursday he did to Mongolian sauté at both the element I'm sorry both the high school and the middle school and then he came back for seniors last day on Friday and did omelets uh in the morning for in the cafeteria for the seniors so it's been a busy couple of weeks and months um but it's it's been very rewarding and uh we appreciate the opportunity to be here have
050any questions for [Music] me Brant thank you very much uh for folks out there I you know I remember my high school lunch meals you know the square pizzas that you s the grease up off of and the french fries loaded with ranch it's a fabulous program that we have here in in Jackson Public Schools I want to really thank to her um I know that we'll be talking directly here in just a couple weeks about our uh meet up to eat up there are thousands of meals that that your department pushes out uh to students throughout Jackson in the coming weeks and so we are very thankful again for all the work that you and T her do for all of our students thank you very much I do have a question absolutely I
051do have a question for you I do have hey hey hey what's his name BR brand is it brand a question for you um I do have one um do we know when you have your specialty days um so that we I don't know if you have a list of them or something like that that you could provide for us so that we might be able to come and taste food when you bring it when you special okay maybe Jeff can or you can get that to Jeff or some so we can get that okay I'd like a list because I'd like to come and you know enjoy with the students thanks okay perfect perfect I want to know when those Chef tables are you know so when so I can come thanks all right
052and that concludes the superintendent report for the month of May at this point we'll move on to the consent agenda move approval the consent agenda for motion support Derek Kesha okay all in favor I opposed motion passes thank you okay at this point we go on to Citizens um requesting to address the board and I'm going to uh try to get through this we're not all here until tomorrow morning um by maybe putting three people at the same time so you know this is when he sits down it's your turn and when she sits down it's you know your turn so thank you um so that we maybe at least know who's coming next for a bit and the time frame will be for three minutes so we will start with Pamela Lee Patricia Roy
053Fred tler and and to clarify they each get three minutes just so you all know yeah I'm sorry yeah it's just one at a time I'm I'm make sure we clarify she's just given the three names so you all know who's coming up next so the first Miss Le up first and then and then uh I apologize Patricia Roy okay and then FR trackler all right her mic is not okay yes hi my name is family and I'd like to address um school safety per policy 8400 uh it states that the students are supposed to be protected in school well we had an incident where my nephew was hit by a teacher and principal Martin pushed it underneath the rug because she said she didn't have enough staff to take over this teacher's position I'm
054concerned about the situation because my nephew was very upset and when he called his mother the teacher hung up on him one two I'm upset because at the end of the day my nephew told me auntie nobody apologized to me this teacher has admitted to her wrongdoing but was allowed to stay in that room with my nephew who was scared upset because he doesn't get disciplined like that we don't put hands on our children so he was very upset very scared and when he tried to call his mother he was told he should not have done that and that was per Miss Martin now I understand the teacher has been dismissed after we had to make complaints because I called Miss Kesha Hamilton I'm being h i called Kesha Hamilton asked her which direction should
055I go in and she directed us into the proper proper channels that we need to go but until then that teacher was allowed to stay and she told my niece that the investigation was over and not only that when she told my niece the investigation was over my niece asked she she told her then well I'm calling the police because this is an assault she made my niece leave the school to me this is not showing safety in the schools for my nephew or even for her because as a parent I would want to know that my child is safe at school this is not safe it was not handled properly I grant Mr beill did handle it the next day once he found out but this was three days later three days later my
056nephew was supposed to be in this classroom with this woman for three days negative he was scared and would not go to school and no one addressed it until I spoke to her there's a problem there and now I found out this not not only my nieces had this problem several people had this problem but they didn't come forward that's unacceptable and I don't think that Mrs Martin has gotten any repercussions from the whole thing when she should have because you allowed this teacher to stay there and keep my nephew in her classroom and was going to keep her in the classroom because you didn't have enough teachers to teach your class that's unacceptable that's all I have to say I'm done thank you very much I appreciate your time yeah uh Patricia Roy um
057good evening I do feel like we do have a bigger problem I've seen you guys argue over dates I I feel like we have a bigger issue here if we can't have adults even agree on dates um I am the mother of jvon Lee my son was assaulted May 3rd you don't have to leave excuse me you don't have to leave he can wait um Jayvon Le is my son and I do want to ask the school board who protects our children I'm a mother I work at Allegiance um hospital I work 12 hours a day to get a call from your child stating that a teacher assaulted him who protects our children when we're not in that building Sherry weager was Sherry wager is the teacher's name she was allowed to stay in that
058building with my child they told me my child was able to go to the school but she was not kicked out of the building my son was traumatized I reached out and I thank Kesha Hamilton she apologized to my son I think Julie Baker who I went in and spoke to in person who apologized to my son no one else gave reached out to my son to give him apology who is accountable for this Sandra Martin dropped the ball on my son and I want answers I want a problem solved I don't know who fights for our children but this mine will Northeast is not safe for our children and I am letting you know that I am going further with this I just want the board to have my back in this situation if
059it was your child what would you do what would you do in this situation no one no one called the police I did I'm pressing charges not only on Sher Reger but Northeast Elementary they failed my son my son was assaulted and she admitted that's [Applause] it Fred Drexler I'm addressing board policy 124 the equity policy one of the goals is to ensure Equitable outcomes I assume that you mean that you want to close the gap between the Black and Hispanic achievement on average an average white achievement of course as everyone knows each student has been given different gifts by God and not everyone can be an a student just like not everyone can be a winning athlete but you are uh trying to close the gap by hiring a chief diversity officer or or
060something similar and applying Dei doctrines how has that worked out how do you define quote Equitable outcomes unquote how do you know if you are achieving Equitable outcomes where is the evidence in a report by Dr Jay green Madison Marino and Katherine bednard uh published October 4th 2023 on the growth and effects of diversity equity and inclusion staff and public schools the chief finding was that having a chief diversity officer ass was Associated um with much greater learning loss during the pandemic by Black and Hispanic students not only did Black and Hispanic students EXP experien significantly larger declines in math achievement in districts that had Chief diversity officers but those declining uh on average exceeded the rate of decline um from White students in the same districts the chief diversity officers utterly failed to arrest
061the decline and actually contributed to minority student learning loss during the pandemic and exasperated the magnitude of the racial achievement gaps the report gave evidence that Chief diversity officers primarily served to articulate and enforce ideological orthodoxies opposed by majorities of parents rather than to assist with student learning or closing minority achievement gaps the research included 555 school districts with enrollments of at least 15,000 students if you focus on systemic racism and lowering the standards for minority students in order to produce equal outcomes you will undermine the motivation of minority mler I'm sorry your time is up and staff who serve them I ask you to vote against board policy 124 thank you thank you very much okay we have two and you can just come up one at a time um Nate Edwards and then
062Vanessa molix good evening so I'm also here to speak on the Equity policy uh first thing I'd like you to know is I'm not from this District but I am concerned for your students so I'm here speaking tonight um and for the parents or maybe people that haven't looked into this understand that when you hear diversity equity and inclusion the equity that we speak of is not aimed at equality of opportunity for your children but equality of outcome which is essentially a Marxist ideal it's never worked and it creates uh this victimhood mentality and I don't know about you I have three daughters I don't want them growing up believing they're victims equality initiatives make for Pleasant press releases for school board members and superintendant they temporarily plate a tiny but insatiable band of activists
063who demand them but they bring neuroticism anger ignorance suspicion and dysfunction for everyone in the end also they don't work Fred already talked talked about that some more examples this has been going on a long time 1986 a Seattle task force recommended a goal for the elimination of disproportionality and academic achievement and discipline by the end of the 1989 and 90 school year in 2013 the school board aspired to close the opportunity Gap by 2018 but the Gap was only getting worse in 2016 black students were the equivalent of three and a half grades behind white students meaning the average black eighth grader might perform as well as the average white Fifth Grader by 2017 it had widened to 3.7 grades the states with the smallest black and white achievement Gap when it comes to
064high school graduation rate as measured during the 201617 school year are West Virginia Oklahoma South Carolina Maine Wyoming Alabama North Carolina and Georgia Chris Stewart a black liberal former Minneapolis School Board member and CEO of Education Think Tank bright beam crunched the numbers reluctantly found one solid cor correlation the more Progressive the city the worse the achievement Gap they tried to explain it away by controlling for population size percentage of white students spending income equality and poverty rate but they couldn't the 2020 report the secret shame admitted the average gap between the percentage of blacks and white proficient in math is 41 in Progressive cities and 26 in conservative ones evidence on Dei programs Effectiveness is not missing the research demonstrates failure teachers parents and students don't need these efforts reinforced they should opt for
065something different say lessons on the shared American values of equality under the law freedom and opportunity policies like this one the one being proposed here demonstrate that those who write them and support them are either ignorant to the facts or are willing to sacrifice the education of and future of innocent children at the alter alar of their own political ideology thank you thank you Nate I appreciate you Vanessa could I get your address wasn't on the sheet thank you thank you Vanessa good evening my comments regard proposed policy 124 on Equity some Impressions from reading the policy words put together but no definitions or context for how those words are applied similar language is used in current board policies related to anti-discrimination bias philosophy and involvement of stakeholder parents student St and teachers which begs
066the question why have an additional policy for things already addressed in the current policy and to be and to be clear I support non-discrimination and non-biased treatment is the board implying that current teachers and administrators have been discriminating have been biased aren't listening to students and parents if you are then certainly there is a process to address that currently if not then this policy is a solution in search of a problem so what would the impact of this policy be on teachers and administrators performance how does a teacher teach when they are concerned about every word that comes out of their mouth and how it may be how it may deviate from their policy are their jobs at risk the policy reads like a social agenda not a solution to the challenging education of JPS
067students my evidence for this is a District's own proficiency scores available on the website which show Ela third grade at 26.5% of proficiency Ela fifth grade at 27.8% proficiency math third grade at 28.9% proficiency math fifth grade at a shocking 14.8% proficiency this is a proficiency rate not the failure rate I mean I have to review these two and three times perhaps I'm misunderstanding it um and missing something so if I am I I welcome correction I realize these poor scores reflect many factors um unrelated to the efforts of the hardest working teachers and administrators a recent study referenced by Dr Trexler found that those um school districts with a chief diversity officer performed worse than those without based on that this policy is like unlikely to improve student education at JPS that leads me
068to believe that the significant human and financial Capital expended to Define operationalize Implement and maintain this solution in search of a problem will remove that same human and Financial capital from the only mission that JPS identifies which is to provide a quality education approving and implementing this policy will not lead to a significant overall Improvement in the education of students certainly not in a time frame that is beneficial for the current students at JPS which again means F failing at the only Mission you identify approving and implementing this policy risks further division based on its application and losing qualified teaching and paraprofessional staff during a time of teacher shortage ultimately parents will choose the best Avenue to educate their children whether that be homeschooling Cooperative schooling private schooling or schools of choice please do not
069pursue this policy that puts student education at risk of further deterioration thank you thank you very much Renda Humphrey and then Cheryl VTO evening I'm in a disagreement also with this Dei this agenda that we're trying to pass on to to us make it look like it's a good thing for your students it is not why aren't you focusing more on getting the students math and reading scores up to their grade level and Beyond isn't that more important another big concern of mine is you're pushing this gender nonsense on nonsense onto our kids is this to be pushed onto our grade school kids this is very disturbing and wrong their little Minds cannot understand all this craziness could you understand it when you were their age I bet not so stick to the Reading Writing
070arithmetic arithmetic to prepare these kids for their future and to stop trying to make a name for yourselves at the expense of our kids thank you thank you very much okay and after Cheryl we have Nancy Thorp so hi I'm here to also speak about the jpss proposed Dei policies and policies you know that have the best intentions can also lead to a great deal of harm when the power is placed in the hands of a few that are then universally opposed imposed on the whole so according to a Harvard Business Review unconscious bias type training such as Dei rarely changes actual behaviors and has little impact on a person's internal biases the most popular interent interventions run the risk of backlash and strong adverse reactions that sustain or even worsen the inequity that PR
071practitioners attempt to eliminate so it's stated that the district will review practices procedures and and programs along with incorporating the voices of students family and communities to assure future Dei processes are unbiased the term District needs to be further defined who will make up the district and will it include people who are both for and also those who have legitimate concerns about the use and harms that Dei can cause or will it cons consist of people that are uh basically cherry-pick to include only those who support the JPS Dei agenda and other words how inclusive will JPS truly be uh JPS also suggests that districts whoever that might be shall differentiate resources and recruit and hire Personnel that reflects the students demographic but people should be hired to help our students achieve success based on
072their quality qualifications only and race of any type should not play into the hiring equation JPS may very easily find itself embroiled in future lawsuits if laws that protect against racial discrimination are broken or discarded so we are also told that the district is to be in charge of determining the Dei content and enforcing participation throughout JPS once again you know who is that in reality uh who will be in charge what content will be forced uh will the force Dei programs contain if not adhere to what will be the consequences will educational staff have to be in fear of losing their jobs if they should genuinely believe differently or disagree will it become you either believe as as we put forth or else and then the last thing I want to say is the
073entire JPS public school system and beyond will be impacted by the hands of a few this could easily spin out of control especially where big money and job titles are involved we Sher all your time is up thank you all right thank you Nancy Thor followed by Jeanie Brown my name is Nancy Thorp I currently have a grandson in Jackson Public Schools however next year he will attend elsewhere I'm here to speak regarding the proposed board policy number 124 the equity policy as it has been put forth by trustee Derek does and vice president shalanda hunt what problem does trusty does and VP hunt claim exists by submitting this policy are they stating teachers at JPS and JPS Personnel are biased racist and non-inclusive are they saying throughout the years the staff has been unable
074to teach the diverse population at JPS what are these barriers preventing students access and opportunities and resources our trustee does and VP hunt accusing teachers and staff of creating barriers and intentionally blocking students from achieving academic goals what are the specific measurable goals in this policy I find no specific goals nor can I find any way of measuring these goals what is the time frame within these goals within which these goals will be achieved there seems to be no time frame it just never ends what transparency and accountability measures have been put in place transparency and accountability also seem non-existent how will it be determined this problem is solved the solution put forth by trusty does and vice president Hunt is Dei Dei and more Dei so a Dei director has been hired the Dei
075director has authority to audit train teaching staff and Personnel this one person has been given the power to imple Implement changes in staff in procedures and even curricula this is a lot of power taxpayers should be absolutely livid parents should be extremely concerned taxpayer dollars for a Dei director who has given cart blanch to make changes in staff and Personnel how teachers teach and what students learn Untold taxpayer dollars doled out for trainings altering pedagogy revision of curricula and the entire education system at JPS Under the Umbrella of Dei this policy and the director of Dei have Limitless Authority in closing this policy has no practical parameters it has no specific goals no way to measure the elusive goals and yet it allows unlimited power in the name of Dei this policy needs to be
076[Applause] scrapped thank you very much for the time hi um I'm speaking about the quality policy um there seems to be a huge Mental Health crisis with our kids in the 20120 in 2020 suicide was the second leading cause of death for ages 10 to 14 years old I believe it's because of all this division in the school system this pre received notion that we need Dei to stop us from all being biased is a joke it does the opposite of what it stands for when is Jackson Public School going to tackle the real problem 10% of students are proficient in reading 31% of students are proficient in math this Dei program just a distraction from the failing school system I wonder how much money is going into the Dei program that has already been
077proven it don't work but JPS not knowing math and can't predict future outcomes from past wants to fund this program um first question who is the district referring to who is on the panel who is going to be asking young fives in elementary children about gender identity and sexual orientation the only people I know who ask about that to kids 10 years old and younger are groomers also known as pedophiles or Maps minor attracted persons why would schools want to ask these kinds of questions isn't it against the law to ask people applying for jobs questions about sexuality but it's okay to subjugate children what if a teacher decides to call CPS on a parent that keeps dressing their child as a gender appropriate close instead of the child's pronouns close they are mandated reporters
078are you going to have to set a mandate Pro a set pronoun list who decides that if not kids can have America first or only citizens vote as their pronouns if you do put a limit on the set pro pronouns that's not being very inclusive all this language and terms are very vague and can discriminate toward the teachers also teachers better bow down to these kids or your job will be on the chopping block the school board makes the rules and it doesn't matter how impossible they are you have the hard job of carrying them out I can see why Kesha wanted this policy nine pages long she knows how to say a lot of words but none of them ever make any statement the time time is up thank [Applause] you Jennifer bidinger and
079John Kaine Jennifer I need an address if you would please on this thank you so tonight I am compelled to speak for many parents and grandparents in our community who ask you to re reject the proposed board policy 124 Equity policy as I read through it just recently it contains so much questionable and controversial verbiage that I could not possibly address each item in it uh in my comment tonight so I will mainly focus on the first item it states the district shall review practices procedures and programs to assure that they are unbiased and non-discriminatory I think we can all agree on this uh goal and I believe believe we have existing po policies already in place to affirm this then it goes on to say the district shall use all available data not truth
080or facts just data from some Source but in any case it will um use all available data dis disaggregated by race ethnicity language ability gender and so on to inform all district to inform all district strict decision making I don't know about you but when I read through this it was very obvious that one aspect of the standard legal discriminate discrimination policies um was absent the Discrimination based on religion why is that it's listed in all discrimination policies I don't believe that that was an inadvertent Omission does the JPS District want to exclude data from teachers students parents based on religion I don't I know um I oh do they want to exclude data from them I know some do but in fact more of your community members are concerned about the small minority of
081those behind this agenda to exclude anyone with moral spiritual convictions and to persecute those who don't go along with their agenda this is not Equitable it is not diversity or inclusion what hypocrisy this proposed policy needs to iMed be immediately rejected if you and Kelly crumb are set on establishing an equity policy an ad hoc committee needs to be established which includes individuals that do not support the socialistic agenda uh propaganda of Dei and critical race Theory and will support the community of faith-based groups and ideology that God created us all equal and we want to obey him um please stop wasting our taxpayer money on the new curriculum and programs that promote this division reread the comments from parents and citizens from last year's Esser funds report parents want funds to be used for
082teachers and their support and extra tutoring for their children to raise their academic achievements they do not want to be labeled and put subp treat thank you thank [Applause] you John Kae and then sha Selby shaay good evening my name is John Kane I've lived in Jackson County for 21 years and I'm here because I care about our County and especially its students as a lawyer and a teacher I value critical thinking very highly um the first steps in this process are properly identifying the problem and defining one's terms because if you don't have a clear understanding of the problem you can't generate an effective solution to it and if you focus on the wrong problem you'll fail to solve the right one moreover uh trying to solve the wrong problem will waste time money
083and resources then that you won't then have available to solve the actual problem when you do accurately identify it so I think it's important to ask what evidence supports the theory underlying this Equity proposal which I take to be that the system is somehow inequitable uh there are several components to this inquiry first and foremost The Proposal uses the term Equity six times in its eight bullet points but it doesn't Define the term I can tell you with confidence that it means different things to different people I could go around this room and probably get you half a dozen to a dozen different meanings of the term we have to agree on what it means before we can say we're going to try and achieve it uh without a clear and correct definition of this
084key term there is no way one can accurately assess the validity of The Proposal that is simply a given so that is the first issue I'd like to see resolved second the policy asserts a need to prioritize the use of resources to establish this so-called equity which presumably is lacking at present now I've interacted with many of the faculty staff students and administrators here and I haven't uh seen anything I could fairly call inequity in fact I see the opposite I see a lot of dedicated people uh who are fair and compassionate and are doing uh an exceptional job under difficult circumstances so if you have any actual evidence of this alleged uh racism inequity whatever you want to call it in our school system I think you should share it with us uh once
085we properly Define the term moreover even if we assume oh boy I better speed up here sorry I'm going to cut down here uh there are other serious problems with the proposal including the fact that it gives as was mentioned uh certain individuals the power to determine what is unbiased or non-discriminatory or culturally biased uh without any Assurance whatsoever that this unnamed person isn't himself or herself biased in various dangerous and damaging ways I don't see any accountability mechanism for this person and I think that is very dangerous thing uh as it is I'm afraid you currently have uh we currently have no adequate idea what or where the alleged problem is or what you're actually proposing to do about it once it is properly identified it seems like you're basically asking whe whether to
086sign a blank check to buy something we probably don't need or want I think cultural awareness and mutual respect obviously are important uh have their place here but it's not what most of the actual Dei agenda is about from the evidence I've seen we have cultural awareness and mutual respect among our teachers students and staff I think we can build on that to the extent necessary uh and that should I'm sorry that's the of your time appreciate your time and your service thank you very much thank you very much for your time sh I don't think I put my address there sha and then John King okay um I'm sorry to keep to continue on this I'm addressing the equity policy as well and first of all my qu I'm not even going to call
087it a policy because I'm not sure what it is what is it is it a resolution a policy proposed bill I don't know what it is um everyone has already said my second thing is what are the definitions like the gentleman who just left up this stuff means different things to different people and so if the administration is going to be um you know assigned with carrying it out if there's room for interpretation you're destined for failure immediately um and I where are the guidelines for implementation where are the measurable elements there are none where is like that accountability piece and what I just said is proven by all these comments when you leave it up to interpretation we've had all different types of interpretation of what this means like what is the difference from
088this in a discrimination anti-discrimination policy I I just don't know what it is um and so it needs to be further it's like Equity is too big to be in one page um this is like a sheet like chat gbt wrote it or something it's just not nobody the push back is because it's not clear it needs then what are the consequences for it not being in there the yeah I just don't know what it is um and it needs to be further defined it cannot be pushed through in this space if I as a parent have questions on what it is um imagine what the people who have to carry it out is going to fill um so thank [Applause] you thank you Cho I'm John King 203 Third Street a few blocks away
089um first I wanted to mention that it was unfortunate that the governor was invited couple months go to JPS Schools she's anything but a friend of JPS schools if you go by her lockdowns including trying to get schools to be closed for a really long time um even though the data that the spring of 2020 showed that students were not at risk to covid at the time and but yet you know probably more for polit political reasons she wanted schools closed and it greatly hurt it hurt the students um her nursing home policy in which she probably sentenced to death a lot of maybe grandparents or great grandparents of JPS students um was really bad um she she wants to make Michigan the abortion capital of the Midwest which you know she doesn't get you
090know there's issue with Michigan's population not going up yet she can't understand her abortion policy that that doesn't exactly help JPS schools or Michigan's population so that was unfortunate a lot of politics there which gets me to Derek dolby's de Dei Dei politics um I say uh Derek's um instead of shalanda hunts because in the one letter he was saying I in multiple places or me he didn't say we so um I guess it was like dere uh doy the white boy for from Brighton who comes to Jackson and keeps telling us how racist we are in Jackson and everything like that you know it's the constant thing from him and and so uh um so there were a lot of issues other people mentioned like he wants quotas which are illegal and like especially
091in the Michigan state constitution so there's so many problems like that um he wants uh black students be taught that um in The Game of Life they're born with two strikes against them and the Umpire is uh Grand wizard of the clue Klux clan we got to get away from that politics I know this is a a presidential politic year but so that's where Derek does is coming from uh it was really unfortunate C crumb mentions like uh J JPS students were 58% diverse meaning 58% nonwhite that diversity is good or you know white students are bad you know there's just so much wrong with this and and so I'm strongly against this politics of of racism and hate and all that thank you thank you John John John you got to write John C
092King because I saw you come up to John King and I was like it sound I thought sound like me but just William Hastings then Jan torga [Music] um I'm also here tonight to comment on the disastrous and illegal Dei policy being discussed tonight the fact that this Frankenstein monster was even allowed to proceed out of the policy committee with the superintendent's blessing is truly shocking to me so let's get down to the Brass tax of this policy I'm sure you've all seen the bumper sticker before that says no Farmers no food um apparently this board is is very determined to learn the hardest way of all that the core layer of this is of this which is no teachers no schools make no mistake this policy is a direct frontal assault on the integrity
093and good name of the teachers and staff of JPS how does this policy degrade and diminish them well let us count the ways so Mr does began his uh initial screed and then now this is evolved into a second policy but by stating that he's addressing implicit bias at JPS so since we all know that brick buildings and libraries and PCs and electronics really can't be racist he is talking about the teachers of JPS if there are any disparities and outcomes the only reason is the teachers are closet bigots who neglect the children in their care and whom must now be made to wear a giant scarlet R for racism Derek does and Chala hunt neither of whom have ever had to manage a classroom with 25 kids for a single hour let alone a
094single day have determined that the only possible reason to explain the poor academic outcomes of some kids in this building has of whom half of whom skip a month or more of classes every school year is that that your teachers are are apparently closeted bigots who must be re-educated in the name of false god called Dei is the is the term re-education hyperbole oh it most certainly is not in addition to requiring forced participation in highly politicized Dei training uh this would also require that teachers need special professional development to quote integrate culturally responsive practices in other words if you're a teacher at JPS um we're really not very impressed anymore that you have a degree or several degrees but teacher certificate Decades of experience in the classroom and so on that go that's all
095going in the trash you need to be retrained and remade from the ground up finally this policy calls for open discrimination and racial quotas in hiring by demanding that the school only hire culturally and Rel and racially diverse Personnel that reflect quote the student demographics of the school well under title seven of the US Civil Rights Act is illegal it is illegal to consider any single candidates or employees race even with the intention of creating a more diverse Workforce in any employment decision this goes double for Michigan uh civil rights law so if you push this through and I'm just stunned that our our superintendent who wears a second hat as being an HR guy how you let this this ball roll between your legs this is nakedly nakedly illegal if this passes you will
096you will have created a hostile work environment on day one good luck recruiting new teachers with this and keeping the old ones it's a it's a disgrace thank you William Jan torga good evening I'm here to talk on the about the board policy 124 Equity policy which needs to be scrapped we the people would like you to explain the need to recruit hire develop and retain high quality Personnel that reflect student student demographics at all organizational Levels by doing what you propose is this illegal in the US and the state civil right laws does JPS not already have quality teachers if not why haven't they already been fired hasn't the basic principles for decades that teachers teach reading math writing history and geography just asking also God created a male and a female quit feeding
097the children lies thank you Jan um Nicholas thirston and then Ella help me out okay Ella e here we go um hi my name is Nicholas thirston I live here in Jackson Michigan um here in the Fifth Ward this is my neighborhood this is the school I went to I went to Jackson Public Schools my own life and um I wanted to address the the um discussion items uh Section 8 the district Equity policy as well this is this uh clearly discriminatory policy that encourages practices that have been banned at the State of Michigan constitutional level since since 2006 and that is what the school board should look to when deciding anything uh regarding the Personnel of JPS um because it could go one way or the other way one way uh one day maybe
098it is uh fashionable to uh look like me and then maybe the next day it is no longer fashionable to look like me and um someone else with whatever supreme authority could just determine that I'm no longer good enough because of what I look like and that I should be removed from my position uh my career that I was trained in and worked hard for um you know it goes without saying but I'm going to go ahead and read off a couple of these things and I'll try to be as fast as possible so um proposal 6 um or proposal 2 2006 state of Michigan uh the state constitution said it would ban public institutions from using uh any sort of a uh affirmative action style programming to get preferential treatment at groups or individuals
099based on their race gender color ethnicity and national origin for public employment education or Contracting purposes public institutions affected by the proposal include state government local governments public colleges and universities community colleges and school districts that means this organization uh it also prohibits public institutions from discriminating against any group or individual due to their gender ethnicity race color national origin and this was passed with an overwhelming support um recently in 20123 we also saw that affirmative action was banned again at the US Supreme Court level because the results that was producing was the opposite of what people had set out to do uh tragically it resulted in more discrimination uh more racism more systemic racism and overall worse outcomes segregated neighborhoods uh failing schools uh racially hostile workplaces and um just a generally toxic environment
100it negatively impacted race relations and and the most tragic outcome of affirmative action style policies and race based policies was people like Kesha Hamilton who absolutely hate all the white people on the entire planet Earth for absolutely no reason um we're talking about her customers here at JPS that she has described as evil because of the color of their skin thank you for your [Applause] time Ella there we go and Destiny Higgins after that thank you and that's hea hea hea cool you know it really is very phonetic I OB obviously wasn't paying attention as an English teacher yeah um thank you um first I want to say that this uh my U I'm it's admirable how you sit here so poised this is extremely stressful for a minute I thought we weren't at a
101Schoolboard meeting I thought we were just kind of here to just hear ourselves talk um but I'm actually here about a student so um I'm here advocating for my grandson Kiren Cleveland um he uh is a student was a student thank God of Northeast Elementary um Kiren was diagnosed with autism um epilepsy oppositional Defiance disorder and um what am I missing an intermittent explosive disorder um he started school and we're talking about a 5-year-old he's six today actually so he started school this year extremely excited to be in class um wanting to learn and it quickly turned um into every day he was measuring whether or not he was good or bad um so it started with my daughter doing exactly what she needs to do and I'm going to give her an opportunity to
102give you all of the details um but she started seeking out help um for him and begin to petition the school for help um it was suggested that he uh receive an IEP um the IEP was initi initiated in well requested in November um initiated in February and wasn't completed until May um I stepped in to help she's young she's a single mother um and I found that Sandra Martin to be an absolute joke she pretended as if she actually cared instead it was building a case so that my grandson who was obviously disabled could be expelled again he was five and was accused of um assaulting a teacher instead was insulted himself when when Sandra was um approached her demeanor was very cold and dismissive instead she claimed that she too was assaulted by
103this disabled 5-year-old that does have that does have behavioral issues which I could imagine would be frustrating however if they were skilled and trained to manage such a thing would be just another student just one with special needs what I ask for today is that each teacher be equipped with skills to manage children especially children with special needs um I also asked that the IEP process be evaluated it should never have taken that that long and I don't have policies to quote but I do know it was supposed to be 30 days and it took that long and it was strategic oh I'm sorry but that's okay because she's got the rest of Itor okay now we have Destiny Higgins and then Gina Hastings hi my son is Kiren Cleveland the one she was just
104speaking of um my son was diagnosed with autism ADHD um intermittent explosive disorder in September of 2023 I approached the school and requested how do I even request an IEP I had no idea how to even do it um his teacher set up an assist meeting that went nowhere and then in November I decided to write a letter I typed out a letter I printed it off and I hand delivered it to the office of the school um I heard nothing I reached out they told me it was never received so then emailed it and that's when that was when in February the IEP process was initiated um they asked me to extend it in April but at that point it was already past the 30-day Mark um then in May his IEP was finally
105finalized but it was after he was expelled from school from behavioral issues that I have begged and pleaded for their help with I've attended multiple meetings um had multiple conversations with Miss Martin and his teacher um my child was having very severe behavioral issues my like she said my child went from loving school to hating it and he's five he was five years old kindergarten my son was assaulted by his teacher and I was told that because of his prior bad acts he would not be believed and was kicked out of school how was I supposed to tell my 5-year-old that he could not go back to school it was devastating and it was heartbreaking my son was suspended over 12 times 5 years old called every single day I was advised to put him
106on ridland which I did not want all I wanted was for them to hear me my son was labeled the black the bad little black boy all I wanted was for my son to have a fighting chance and to have a proper education he deserves that he's smart at the top of his class at 5 years old um he he was doing the testing and was testing at the top of his class academics was not the problem nobody wanted to help him and they and Ella sharp is now where he is attending they were able to to take him in and it is night and day they treat my son with respect they treat we me with respect and they're very patient with him so I do appreciate that thank you thank you very much
107for your time and your story okay Gina Hastings then William Wagner I'm also going to talk about the equity policy and and I have several questions and comments some of them have already been addressed but there are lots of words in this document that are not defined and as we know words can have very different meanings depending on who is using them this policy needs to have full vetting and all of the language defined before voting should take place many of these buzzwords sound great but the devil is in the details and in the interpretations one phrase that stood out to me is Equitable out comes looking at one definition I found online this could mean the same outcomes for each student is this what you mean why would every student have the same outcome
108even if we could do that why would we want that why do we want kids to be identical diversity is supposed to be a good thing right so let's flesh it out Equity of outcomes go to your dictionary outcome it means the final result the end product so in education I think we're talking about grades right are we we don't know grades test scores Equitable outcomes so everyone gets the same grade maybe we don't even have grades anymore if I had two children um who both received the exact same grade or outcome no matter what they did I would be guilty of cheating them both now once kids learn that the game is rigged trust trust level goes to zero also in education the student and the family of the student have much more responsibility
109if not more responsibility than the teachers why do we not talk about that why is everything foisted on the schools and the teachers in requiring that outcomes be Equitable you are teaching students that effort is meaningless do we really want to teach this I think that many of you think that these words sound nice so they are good being in education you are going to have to delve into the definitions of these words and think about real outcomes outcomes like unfair treatment outcomes like destroyed student and teacher morale outcomes like adding to the teacher shortage no one can force outcomes Equity is not equality this policy is wrong for [Applause] JPS thank you Gina good evening board my name is Will Wagner and I live here in Jackson um I'm just a broken vessel that
110the good Lord uses from time to time um I'm a lawyer and a teacher served as a federal judge served as senior assistant United States Attorney and spent most of my life practicing constitutional law and fighting for civil rights this policy needs to get in front of a lawyer that's not a politician because whatever good intentions are behind it um there are numerous constitutional uh problems and when I say constitutional problems I mean constitutional problems that will result in constitutional um causes of action being brought against uh this school um and likely after everything I've heard today likely being brought against you individually because you'll be you'd be acting outside the scope of your Authority and wouldn't have your um the the normal immunity that you have as a as a public officer so please
111whatever good intention um is behind this um get it in front of a good lawyer and ask them you know how does the due process clause of the Michigan Constitution and the and and the US Constitution relate to all the questions of vagueness that you've heard people talk about here on both sides of the issue because you know the the very basis of due process and again I've been fighting for civil rights my whole life the very Pro the very basis of due process is giving notice to Those whom you are now using your power to make a policy over so um there are numerous additional issues you know depending on the way this is implemented Ed uh will it interfere with the free exercise of religious conscience you heard some your religious people here
112earlier will it interfere with the uh freedom of expression uh and will it interfere with what the Supreme Court has called the fundamental right of a parent uh to control and direct the upbringing of their child with regard to educational uh choices and medical choices um you've heard some compelling testimony on both sides of this issue I'm just here to suggest wherever you stand on this issue it's important that you get it right as a matter of law in the policy so before you do anything with it get it get it in front of a good lawyer who doesn't have a political agenda on either side and tell them what you're doing because uh I'm I'm a citizen of this County I'm I'm part of this school district and so there there's a there's there's
113a cost you know to all of us you've um and I guess I'll take two seconds and and address maybe the the substance of it maybe one second um you know we're all made in the image of God and you know every person is therefore deserving to be treated with dignity and respect and and if you want to do that get it in front of a good lawyer that's all I'm saying thanks for your time [Applause] thank you I personally really appreciate all the the input both sides just to get an idea of what the problems are seing to be from from both um areas support and not sure about support so I appreciate you guys coming out and putting yourself and your opinions out there okay at this point we are going into discussion
114items Jeremy World Language curriculum thank you thank you everyone we are bringing up the World Language Department from Jackson Public Schools Middle School at Parkside in Jackson High School this year they have been working on a curriculum adoption that we're going to present to you this evening so I'm Jeremy Patterson assistant superintendent for secondary curriculum uh my name is Mitchell Ernst I was a German student teacher here but have taken the position to be the German teacher at Jackson high school next year my name is Haley Kus yes yay um my name is Haley Kus and I'm a Spanish teacher at Middle School at Parkside my name is uh Esther W I teach here at uh yakon high school and this year also I may ask me to teach uh at Parkside I'm Wendy Adams
115I'm the one who's leaving so Mitchell could come in I stayed 32 years and been teaching German my mentor I'm Jamie Bing I teach German at the Middle School at Parkside okay so this is part of our Dream Team and World Language department and you see the other names listed here uh Marina faul was going to join us via Zoom but we thought it' be a little wonky today so we have been working with multiple representatives from Wayside and they want you to know they will make themselves available if needed but we thought we had it since they couldn't be here in person today so if we can continue on to our let's see this is Wendy yeah do we just use this one okay so the current textbooks we basically don't use them um
116this one is from 2003 for German and this one is from 2009 for Spanish um both of them have ancillary materials that we can't even use with our current technology um they we don't have cd drives in our computers anymore so we can't use the CDs the audio um we can't use the VHS tapes we can't use the overhead slide transparencies because we don't have overhead projectors anymore so we are looking for something more current and more relevant for our students and as I was looking I happened to cross Wayside publishing um I've known them for a while because they have been doing some readers but they just came out with a brand new German textbook and the title is actually Intercultural and so I was very excited when I saw the title because I
117thought that would really help with our students and our our issues that we have as trying to bring the culture of a very multi-ethnic um group that we have here and then when I was looking I also saw they have pretty close to brand new books for French and Spanish and that was an opportunity for us in order to have all three languages to have the same textbooks so we could kind of align our curriculum and work together so that was something that I was looking for one of the things that we have that is an issue for us is we are very lucky that Jackson Public Schools supports our initiatives that we have to have our two years of language which is required by the state of Michigan also at at the Middle School
118at Parkside but that is difficult to have teachers teaching the same course that are not in the same building and by having some materials that are in common it would really help to streamline that process for us and as one of our teachers that has been here now for three years Esther aola is going to speak to the fact because she works at both the Middle School at Parkside and at Jackson high so I'm going to start um by telling you my own story when I started teaching here um I remember at that time I we use the same old books that Mrs Adams you know shows you and also uh what I could find online you know to put together and he was a little bit limited but with what we have the new
119textbooks that um we have um um this year and we have started uh we have started using them in the classroom already and our students they love it they like it so whenever I teach and I ask them how do you like our new materials they will say we love it so it is really um good for us and we like it as we like them as teachers and U we have also it includes like videos and audios that we can use and the student can see how other um student from other countries um they speak and then um share with uh um what uh they have especially uh things related to food and uh identities and um um um the school systems uh in general so it is really great for us and um
120also this year I started teaching at paride and we have a high school credit right so we can see that the alignment will be great for us to have them and also to assist more you know our s they need it anyway yeah so that is uh what I wanted to say and also when we have like a new teer who come with all the slid that we are putting together it will be easier for us to share it with them as way yeah and that's one of the things that's uh very helpful the book has very clear performance guidelines the I can statements are already there it's very well scaffolded um we have students that have IEPs and 504s and with the digital program we can um diversify what they are doing the the
121they're doing the same activity but nobody else knows they're doing a little different version of it that may be simplified slightly for them and for their ability levels so it's been very helpful for us to Pilot this program and we've all been very pleased with how students have received it so I was just going to share some of the highlights from our piloting process um we did the pilot for a couple weeks in all of the language classes um um year one and some year two and overwhelmingly the students said that they enjoyed the materials and would like to use it in future classes specifically they referenced how interactive the online component was how useful it was for them to be able to speak about their own activities with sentence starters its versatility really um
122was repeated several times and it was relatable so we were able to use authentic texts that are provided with the textbook as well as infographics um so that they can see pictures along with words and not just one to one like this is a picture of a shoe because this is the word for shoe but it's like what kind of shoes are most popular and so they um have a more interactive experience with the languages in that way the yeah this kind of says sort of the same thing and then we also asked parents for their feedback to talk to their students about what their experience was like in the class using these materials and the families like the engaging authentic activities and the colors of the um online component as well that they can
123access from home of all of our teachers that used it I think um things that really stood out to us were in the past we've especially for German I feel like we spent a lot of time trying to find things that are appropriate for the levels of our students and diverse because Germany isn't just blonde hair and blue eyes like people still think of World War II um and and it takes a lot of time like hours trying to find something that I can bring to my middle schoolers that would be appropriate for them and make sense and be interesting and it's right there in the textbook already online the first informational thing about identity is a boy who who's got a work family his mom's from Kenya his dad's German and so they get
124to see people that speak German that look like them which is something that was not true for the previous book that we had um similarly after like actually part of the piloting process maybe it was a little bit left over happened to be a day that we were doing some of the Dei rounding at Parkside and so miss crumb was there and Dr Johnson and they commented on how wonderful it was to be able to hear native speakers using the language and um we got to see some of the video blogs that were provided by the the textbook company as well and um yeah so I mean it was just the the adaptability and the multiculturalism that's seen in all of the languages with this textbook is really amazing thank you um so I wanted
125to speak a little bit about about the alignment that exists um or that this textbook offers for us um so as Esther and Wendy have already mentioned a little bit so there are high school credit classes that happen at the seventh and eighth grade level in at Middle School at Parkside so that being said it's very important for us to be able to have everything connected um and to be on the same page about what is it that we're going to teach to make sure that when our students are entering high school they're feeling um prepared to be able to to use that language and to feel confident in it so um for for myself being a I'm a first year teacher um so this is my first district that I've worked at um I
126uh especially appreciate a resource like this because I know how overwhelming it was at the beginning to be like use this resource and this resource and this resource so it's really nice to see this and to see how it directly aligns at the high school level too um I'm teaching intro Spanish and Spanish onea this year Spanish onea is a high school credit class so it's offered me a lot of learning experiences and I really loved piloting this with my students because it offered that structure and I know that my students really appreciated that structure too um and I think that that's just about everything that we need to say with alignment so overall really good stuff thank you I just wanted to share again that this has been pretty much a year-long process us
127our teachers annually review their data at the end of every year if they were here last year uh and look to what improvements can be made and so like we said when we looked at the resource it wasn't just good for one department but all secondary programs and all World languages so that just gives you an outline of how long they've been going through this process of vetting uh what they are making a proposal to do moving forward uh Wayside has been a great representatives to work with we spoke with them on the phone we've done Zoom meetings they will continue to provide support so we're making a proposal for threee uh and their support will be there 100% so that's something I'm always making sure as they don't just sell us something and take
128off and leave and so we'll have multiple trainings as far as the onboarding once the teachers get into the school year they'll receive further training next year if somebody retires and we have the same system of of support set up and in addition um they're always just a phone call away and they've proven that every time we picked up the phone to speak with them so we're looking at a three-year subscription which gives us a discounted rate and um there's the overall cost that got mumbled jumbled up a little bit but uh it's um quite the bargain we think and this covers uh middle school high school multiple subjects and there's a you'll see the different prices for the middle school and the high school cuz they have much more students enrolled in World languages
129at the secondary level so that's the reason why you might see a difference in price from middle school to high school is because the number of sections and the number of students so the grand total is hidden right now but it is around $58,000 somewhere in there sorry and I think you have access to the quote I think it's in the board packet and uh next steps we're bringing this for discussion this evening that you will consider what our teachers are looking for to help their instruction from veteran teachers to firste teachers here in multiple content areas we've received feedback from our um students and families as well and we look forward to any questions that you might have for myself or teaching staff questions yes Kisha yes so um um three things I want
130to say um one I appreciate the thorough review that you all did you know and and brought this to us um I appreciate the different areas that you all assessed uh in the curriculum um down to you know um ensuring that diverse peoples who actually speak the language we're also represented I really appreciate that um and then the last thing I appreciate seeing uh input from our students our parents and then um you know I'm always you know each time I've asked for folks to come and give us a review of the curriculums that we're purchasing um I'm always grateful for our teachers coming um because I recognize you all as the uh professionals and the experts in this area and if you all like it if you all approve of it then you know
131my vote's always going to be a yes um so thank you for this thorough review um thank you for the work that you do and um thank you for you know just including all the voices I really appreciate that further discussion comments Angela um yeah I appreciated the presentation um I was just wondering about the timeline for receiving it that I feel like it's great that we should just vote on it tonight so they get it sooner than later because it's going to be summer very soon yeah I think and I think this is this is one that we can order um and if I'm correct from the main from the the textbook vendor we would be able to order this with our our June meeting and have it prior to the start of school
132year so the important part is obviously that we get these materials in into the hands of our our staff so that they can familiarize themselves and get into the the online resources to plan out um you know their their beginning lessons and I believe tell me if I'm wrong that's that timeline is is something that would be available if we purchase this in June yes so as long as we have the board support we're looking at using resources from next year so this will not come out of eser but this will come out of General funds so I think Marcus was working on some budget items for the 24 25 budgetary year but we could still move forward with an approval and and just know that it's coming and then we can work with Wayside
133and they can be prepared to um in advance so we're not just making a decision later once we get into the next fiscal year I um I like it very much the way we did the other curriculum requests in that we had the presentation and since there was nothing we were going to learn between this meeting and next month's meeting nothing that we asked questions about that were unanswered um the the cost is not it's still up in the air we know exactly what it's going to be is there any reason that we will learn more or have a better handle on it if we wait until next month there's no new information from us correct okay okay so all all we're doing is the 30 days to M Madam chair I'll make a motion
134to approve of the three-year World Language curriculum subscription for German French and Spanish at Parkside and J high at a cost of $61,900 for the 2425 is clear support support any discussion no okay all in favor I oppose the same okay passes unanimously no all right thank you very much for your support exced nice job teachers we have other world language teachers out there that can be recognized that we're in a par saw fantastic thank you okay at this point good job guys District Equity policy Jeff thanks for passing it to me not a problem you're on the hot seat I am in the hot seat and the reality for our district Equity policy is this is and has always been a draft um we we certainly didn't bring this with any intention of saying
135hey we want to um pass this particular policy but we did bring this as a conversation because uh it was shared with our policy committee and that's not something that we we would simply do do in that policy committee location but um there are as was mentioned earlier today um um missing definitions and there are pieces that would need to be reviewed um and we have not subjected our policy to a lawyer review yet and that's where all of our policies ultimately go through um when we send them through Neola but um I'm only sharing kind of the status of it I was asked to to to put it in the policy group and to bring it here and U mostly so that we could get the conversation moving because if we don't talk about
136it we we we really can't do anything about it so um to that end it's probably appropriate for the folks who sit on our policy committee um Miss Hamilton Miss Marilyn Acton doll Miss Marilyn Acton excuse me and um and Miss hunt if you guys want to kind of share a status of where you're at and and understand that again it's there's no action tonight we're really just using this for discussion purposes uh it's it's directional at this point um and I'm not sure if anybody wants to tee us off here um from the policy committee or yeah I kind of invited from policy start since you guys had a first blush at it and then brought it you know I was just gonna um make a motion to uh place this onto the June
137board meeting um under action items so that we can have a date to like discuss it add to it run it through legal counsel get the feedback from the committee and have something to work on then my concern at this point is this is an extremely important step and I don't want to end up uh jumping out of a plane and realizing afterward the parachutes didn't open I want to make sure when we go into this that we are absolutely prepared for every possible outcome we have all of our in a row we have our means of tracking success what do we call success it really hit me when I was listening to all people talk talk about the vagueness and right now we're in discussion and we're in discussion nobody second to that motion
138we haven't actually I I will thank you I thought for sure that yes second I'll support thank you now we're discussing okay I would love to have lots and lots and lots of information so we do this one time and we do it really right any discussions yes um some more discussion on that um um just from the PO policy committee perspective many of the uh concerns the community brought forward around um the incomplete completeness of this draft um it is a draft as they mentioned um were raised in that meeting um those were definitely my concerns the ambiguity of the uh the policy and just the need to do all the things so um I brought all those things up as well in the policy committee so and you know I'm definitely hearing you
139all I appreciate you know even hearing my my own words what you all didn't know you were saying being repeated back to my back to me um I look forward to you know seeing how we develop this further but um we UND that it was incomplete uh when they brought it to the uh policy committee I had a lot of questions about this also the ambiguity of the um the words and that really it seemed discriminatory to me also they just um why would you just include certain things and not everything so we had a lot of discussion around this um so I and my concern also was when the Supreme Court did strike down affirmative action this could open us up to lawsuits and so my concern also is we needed to run it
140by legal councel so um yeah and then I just think it's opening up a Pandora's Box what's gender identity what's gender expression what's Mobility what's ability these are words that people don't know and there's so many interpretations and so what's that going to look like you know are we going to have to address our dress code I mean just so many things that opens up so we had a lot of talk around this with the policy committee and um so we're just still working on it also so thank you speak I was a part of the policy committee as well and I'd like to just prace my comments with um emphasizing the fact that this draft Equity policy is not about black and white it's not about she or he it's not about they versus
141them me versus you US versus anyone it's a starting point it's a conversation we have completed an audit an equity audit for our district and we have results from that Equity audit additionally we have provided professional development training to our administrative staff to um our contracted um individuals and Beyond I appreciate this is a discussion item um we have to start somewhere we have to start somewhere what do we do with the equity audit what do we do with those outcomes with those results with those suggestions that have been recommended for our district how do we put something in place or begin the dialogue to better understand what our district needs we identify that there's gaps there are definitely achievement gaps how do we close those gaps so no we're not executing anything tonight it
142is conversation I appreciate this room was full tonight please come back we want to hear from you we heard a lot of opposition tonight we heard individuals that are in support of it I received emails I received phone calls about this proposed um Equity policy how do we provide a space that helps guide our initiatives we did hire a Dei director many of you think that that's counterproductive what do you as a community want to see our Dei director do for our district how do we continue to move our initiatives forward we're not looking to isolate or penalize one group over another overall our District's goal is to ensure that stud students achieve their Highest Potential and that JPS provides quality education I am a public servant and all of us sitting here have been
143elected and I'm going to just Echo what Pam said this is a very serious topic for many is sensitive um there's fear that comes with a equity policy individuals have interpreted as has been critical race theory that is not what our Equity policy is other fears well if we put this in place then what what if the individuals that are currently present at this board table are no longer seated sited here sitting here how do we ensure that what was implemented now will not provide latitude for others others that would Implement something that the district doesn't find appropriate and accommodating to meet the uniqueness of each of our students there's no secret to the current status of our district we understand that our proficiency scores reading math socially emotionally all of those things are an
144issue for our district and that is what we need to be focused on in addition to that a lot of these issues are deeply rooted in Access some of our students are not fortunate to have access that maybe another parent student has had access to so again how do we bridge this Gap we want to hear from students we want to hear from teachers we want to hear from the community it's important that the conversation continues to take place I do support definitions being included in the equity policy in the committee we did say and I agree that there is this is a draft it is incomplete what do you want to see how do we Define equity we're not bringing something forward and abusing our Authority decision makers we want to hear from you
145we want you to amplify your voices we want to hear those diverse perspectives My Hope Is that our director Kelly Crum will take in the feedback from our students from our teachers from our administrators our building principles everyone represented here today our cabinet this is not an individual Equity policy or a collaboration between Derek does and shalanda Hunt truste Hamilton has made um many different comments what are we doing with the audit this provides something tangible a framework of taking into consideration a better understanding of what our district needs I invite all voices in I want to hear from you if there's something that I can't see in my peripheral vision and you can enlighten me I want to hear your voices thank you thank you very much anyone else discussion Oh Derek go ahead
146yep thank you uh Madam president uh as vice president hunt said uh this is a draft um I appreciate the work that the policy committee has already done and the expertise that uh trustee Hamilton can provide um uh I anticipate that there's going to be amendments and changes um in fact what was provided at tonight's meeting was um different and looks like it's been um some of the different points have been moved around and and Consolidated um from what uh was originally presented to uh the superintendent and and the president pres and uh frankly I can appreciate a lot of those changes um and and can see them and can see um you know how they are uh better more concise more illustrative than uh what was originally provided um to answer some of the
147questions the dis about what the district means I mean uh the district is Jackson Public Schools that is our school district um I I think we can spend uh some time talking about what Equity means defining it um you know but frankly uh to me educational Equity means that each child is receiving what they need uh to develop to their full academic and social potential um I'm I'm sure we can uh talk about that um draft something along those lines but um for uh year uh and since before even my time serving on this board um the leaders on this board have talked about uh this work uh have uh frankly worked to uh Advance uh and enact tangible uh positive changes in this space and frankly that's why uh the district last year like
148October um hired Kelly as the Director of diversity Equity uh inclusion in curriculum I think that that demonstrates the uh board's LGH held commitment to promoting the ideals of diversity equity and inclusion for all students for staff for the families we serve um Pro providing that training um I've talked to and I know others on this board have um uh trust Hamilton uh talks about it frequently uh of being able to get out and uh interact and engage uh in our schools uh to do site visits um and talk about the importance of this work and hear feedback uh from the teachers from the administrators and I think that there is a tremendous amount of value in that um I've had positive reviews of the work that Mrs crom uh has been doing and I
149believe it's important for the board to create a policy that guides that work and envisions our future efforts to build a more Equitable and inclusive educational institution uh through policymaking and through an actual board policy uh which is what this would be um not a resolution it's policy similar to the other policies that we have uh I think we can ensure that uh what we want out of our um administrative and staff efforts are clear and transparent in terms terms of communicating our expectations um I'll be I'll be clear and and we can uh talk with our Council about it but uh there is nothing illegal or unconstitutional about uh this work or such policies they're growing more and more common in Michigan uh school systems in particular uh as they work to advance this
150work uh it's nothing new districts across our state uh from Plymouth Canton uh to GR Rapids a number of different districts have similar policies um and and I believe we should uh craft a policy that works for Jackson Jackson Public Schools um and I think that uh having a policy can strike the right balance between um communicating our values uh while empowering the staff uh to implement them and providing a way that we can build accountability in a system as we support an inclusive uh educational environment thank you we have a motion in a second to uh put this on the June oh I'm sorry Kea I didn't see your light on um so I just wanted to mention that um in the policy committee we also uh floated the idea that uh more voices
151uh from the board table and including the admin team and of course the Dei officer and potentially the uh uh uh Dei audit guy I forgot I think do Dr Johnson I think is his name anyway so um creating a committee where we could all have some uh conversation around this um it was very uh helpful tonight to see and hear so many folks uh speaking about the need to uh include voices which um like I mentioned on the policy committee a lot of the things that you all mentioned tonight we had uh already mentioned so it was really nice to hear that coming back but um I recognize there's a motion on the table for we'll have to repeat that because I forget what what it is but anyways though um the idea around
152us includ more of our voices and not just a policy committee which I don't know if that means a committee of the whole or an ad hoc committee I don't know what what that is and I'm not making a motion for that at this moment but um that is something else that I think that we should uh consider doing so that uh we all have voices I know some of us uh who were not on the policy committee would like to weigh in uh more directly to what will be created uh as we move along so just so you know that also that idea was out there as well okay um if discussion is is concluded on that aspect the original um motion was that we put this policy on for Action in June that
153correct or further discussion yes Madam president and I'm not opposed to soliciting more feedback from uh some of our uh contracted work um from uh Miss crom through the the superintendent and incorporating that um in terms of what we see at the uh June meeting can I ask question I just want to better understand what so are you saying the policy as present it we're to vote on in June what help me understand so if it if it arrives as a action item it would be on for us to take action for us to to amend to have discussion on and at that time to take whatever action the board would see if it's if it's to table it to to Jill to to do whatever so so that's a yes the policy as presented
154you want to put it on the June meeting for a vote is is I'm just is that what we're voting on right now for us to have further deliberation yeah so wouldn't that happen automatically anyways that mean sense we have it as a discussion item now and we we usually put it as a action item in the next month isn't that what normally happens I'm just trying to understand I guess that's what we normally do I think so what is there something different that draing then that mean with this so you don't want to hear your speak that's what normally happens um if there is a close if we're close to coming to an end result but I think that all the feedback we got from the community even one another uh let me know
155anyway that we're not that close um I hate to have it for Action I'd love to have it for further discussion a special meeting to do it you know whatever but if we could have it in June and then part of the options would be to postpone the final vote until July or August but I'm just concerned that we get the right motion going on here so we don't come in thinking we're going to vote on that in June so just just to weigh in on this and um what I heard was a motion to bring this back in June I'll make sure I'm clear because I there's a lot of work in my opinion and I think part of the policy committee's opinion that would need to be done on this particular policy um
156the board would either have to to act on the motion the the the the motion in the second that's out there and um but I candidly there's not time I'm going be blunt between today and our June meeting to be able to do the work that that's going to take that's going to be needed on this I I we would short shift the the efforts that that would need to go in in order to be able to bring anything forward that's that's my recommendation is to not say that we should act on this or that I would be able to even the school district would be able to bring the people together and be able to articulate this before the June meeting and I'm not saying that we throw the baby out with the bath
157and we don't do something I'm simply sharing the superintendent's perspective on where we're at I I I don't believe I would have the ability to be able to produce that committee work or the the timing work not with the budget season that we're into the technology that we're into the end of the year administrivia that that dominates this time of year so I'm I'm not I'm not throwing it out I'm just potentially saying that I don't know that I could do that by June and wouldn't want to do it poorly so there is overwhelming negative support of this tonight we heard the people speak so this cannot be this is a discussion item this whole this thing needs to be revamped it's very discriminatory you know you just there's it yeah there's no way we
158could vote next month it's got to be discussion that could be a possibility if you wanted to vote on bringing it back for further discussion um does a policy committee meet now then no see so there's nothing that's going to actually formally I also want to make sure that we have our Dei director heading this effort not as a participant but as an overall director if you will um because I think that's G to be a huge thing when we have someone whose job it is to know all and do all and the research and find out what other districts have done that were worked and didn't work and that's kind of a long drawn out process can the lawyer even review it in that short length of time so I'm not sure why to
159review it it wouldn't be point of order are we just we're just trying to decide whether or not we're putting this on next month's uh agenda as a vote and I think I pointed out that we always um you know go from discussion to one month to action out of the next month I don't know if there's a an amendment that you can make to what you suggested that you know maybe we just put this later but I was definitely going to be uh making a motion after this vote that we put together that committee and then uh you know spend the time necessary uh working out the details which could be upwards of six months like it could be some time to to to take care of this um so I don't know Derek
160we you know we do this anyway so what we got to do to to resend that what what we need to do um I'll withdraw my motion and uh if it pleases Angela um and I'll add it as a discussion item for June instead if that makes people feel more comfortable Kelly how do you feel about that time frame well I think we're going to need a motion before like like I I think where we're at Miss Hamilton was was spot-on correct that this is not work we can do in in 30 days and so the reality is is this is probably something that we wouldn't want to meet with our constituents once we would want to meet with them multiple times and we would want to have multiple layers of review from from lawyers
161and and the different different folks participating in the process so I um I again I I've shared my my contention and and you know the the challenge for me would be impossible to do this in right in agree the next 30 days so um I I would it work to uh just move this to a further discussion for next month so yeah I think um that's what I that's what you going for okay support I'll support that the motion that is made by trusty do that we move this to a discussion item for the month of June and during that process um during that time frame that we will have the opportunity to consult with our Dei director and get some feedback on um the projected timeline in which we can um if we are
162going to form a committee ad hoc group or whatever but come prepare to our June meeting with some of the expectations to provide to our community about what the anticipated time should look like realistically I'd also like to hear from MB because every District you know is in the same situation we are um but I I think that we will get out of our situation by just making sure everybody understands exactly what um the words mean and what the end result is expected to be and how we're going to measure that end result but I'd love to have masb input uh to see what other districts have done and they will they're great about saying oh don't do that it did not work or they're agre about saying that was the best thing we chose
163to do so I would love to reach out to um that group so so just to be clear and I I think I've got some pretty good direction from the board and I um I believe this is work that we could be prepared so why don't I propose that for discussion purposes we will um Miss Crum will bring a calendar of um events if you will or a calendar of of how we might interact and involve the constituents and a for this policy and that's not a a hard set in stone but she'll bring it to the board to be able to evaluate and weigh input on and and kind of have a look at are we doing our due diligence as a district to be able to have this conversation um so I think
164we could put together a timeline um to to be able to at least continue the discussion and that we could do for the board um to weigh in on next month I think that's perfectly good so so just to um speak to that part I do think that we might put the cart before the horse a little bit with a timeline um if Kelly you know our uh Dei director if she were um in doing this all alone then I think um it would be appropriate for her to bring us a a you know timeline with since we are one it's a board policy which you know granted she cannot be left out of that conversation she has to be Central to it you know considering her role um and the expected expertise in that
165role um but it is a board policy that board that board members as well as these different other fact uh you know uh groups and individuals need to be engaged in I think having her bring a a timeline is putting the cart before the horse um and that I feel like that should be created with the committee um I think she'd have a better idea of what that could look like with a committee since she has to kind of work with a committee um so you know I don't know when it's appropriate but I I feel like we need to have a and I don't know if we have to have a motion or if we just decide that hey look yes we're going to go ahead and create an ad hot committee and maybe
166you know her coming back in June May June maybe her coming back in June is just you know um here are some potential dates that the committee can meet you know would be and so that then we could start having conversations around what that looks like I'd hate to you know put something on her plate uh again because she's not the only one she's not the only decider so I think maybe um again maybe she can come back and and I don't know what we need to do right now cuz I feel like tonight we should be just saying let's create a committee and then you know uh in June you know we can say okay these are some of the dates that we're coming up with or some of the things you know something
167like that versus dates I I the timeline is appropriate for the your next meeting but I think we need to work toward having so otherwise we just going to float and not get things done but that would be the working towards it I think will be creating the committee or or at least saying hey look this is what we're going to do we're going to create a committee that will discuss this and and you know and then take all the steps necessary to to bring it to fruition so is that a motion do I just need to make a motion is that that's not a motion je what is that I don't think so we just put on for contined discussion on the agenda you think no I think we need a committee so how
168do we create that oh miss Hamilton if you want to make a motion to create the committee uh I will have director Crome work on that particular again and it everything that's going to come is still going to be a draft it's not but we will bring materials for the to consider at the June meeting and I think that's very reasonable for us to be a and the purpose of the committee is so that more more than just because you know we can only have uh three of us on the committee at you know these smaller committees the purpose of the this committee would be that so that more of the board voices Etc can can be included in the conversation so I do make a motion that we create a I don't know if
169it's called an ad hoc or whichever but we create a separate committee um a separate Equity committee to discuss and create and Etc the uh Equity policy that will be created and Miss Hamilton just so I'm clear and because I want make sure everybody this is not just a JPS committee this is a Community Committee is that correct one y definitely yes that we can include some of them in there make sure make sure that I'm hearing the direction correctly and I'd still like to see not just our board people involved but that Kelly takes the the lead on Direction definitely I don't want one more thing on your plate but the direction just kind of push us in the way you think the next step should be let me did a second that motion
170Madam president I have a motion on that yes oh we got to do yours first Oh I thought we I thought you resented yours no what what was your what was your last I withdrew my motion to put it on to the June meeting for a action item and made a motion that was seconded to put it on as a discussion item okay that's exactly what we're talking about that I get that I think when we come back in June after Consulting with superintendent Beal uh director crom um maybe at that point uh we'll have some further um advice and guidance on whether to form a committee who should be on it um things like that um not necessarily opposed to it but I don't want to just ad hoc form an ad hoc right
171well yeah saying a more permanent the discussion about the policy if we want to have further discussion about it and then W to uh deliberate towards a disposition of uh action at that time I think is fine so support okay all in favor no I I I opposed no okay passes 61 liby were you a trying to get this no okay 52 so we we'll bring it back for some measure of discussion again there's no action expected in the month of June okay now at this point Marcus you're on board oh wow for got one more I've got 113 okay Neola all right yep I'm sorry everybody so we have oops um we actually the policy committee did have some other policies that we reviewed and they covered um just primary changes in state and
172federal law so uh our policies are again reviewed by um niola there're a host of of attorneys that represent um the Great Lakes region um and they we we we tend to go to them for all of our policy work uh they've made several changes based on laws that have passed uh in Michigan in the last uh several months and that are coming into effect um so this is a first reading please take a peek through uh if you have any questions on it but what you're going to notice is the MCL uh or the US um law number on the bottom of each of those policies and this will be uh brought back for Action at the June meeting um again Lots it's it's either state or federal law every bit of it so
173uh take a peek at what this says and we will be back for Action in June that really is the discussion that I had on these particular Poli okay thank you okay um now we're on action items we can't have a discussion on that heard me we can have discussion on that too right we can yes what are we doing any other discussion on Neola really yes really okay go ahead you're welcome um so just a couple things I wanted to point out that we me we noticed in the uh policy committee we have a reproductive Health and Family Planning uh policy um that came up um in the the the course of that discussion we found out that there is a sexed committee that meets um that we're looking to get minutes from um
174and also to be added to that committee um I know our probably our family our families don't know that we have a committee like that out there with information um and so hopefully you know some of the discussion we had in the committee was that we'd have more transparency around what that committee is I think we're supposed to have something on the website but you know we can't find it you know would I imagine you all can't find it but just so you know when you're looking through the policies those are some of the things that did come up during that uh conversation um and some of us on the board a couple of us will be also sitting on that set set committee so we can have more information and and just be better
175informed um about what that is um moving through here uh getting them all we had a few of them I'm just trying to make sure my notes okay that was the last one that was it and kha just real quick for everybody who was out there um you will find reproductive Health and Family Planning under our family resource link on our web page good to know thanks sir hopefully you all heard him okay now Marcus you got food service you got a tax levy you got buying of ver vehicles and a bond contract go all right so the first item up is our bid award for a food service management company as we have talked about this before every five years we're required to bid out food service management company so we put that RFP
176out back in March um we did bring this as a discussion item last month and then again for further discussion at the April Finance or the most recent finance and facility committee um after completing the evaluation of the bidding companies we're left with two both tah our current provider and Chartwells as you can see on there taher came out on top as far as the scores and evaluation and after a lot of discussion we are pleased to recommend continuing our relationship with taher for another five years Madam president I'll move approve a five-year contract with taher as the district's Food Service management company has presented sorry about that second support okay second any discussion okay all in favor I I oppose the same motion passes unanimously congratulations Brent we're going to see you back at
177work tomorrow should we celebrate by eating this no you got to wa or okay there you go there you go uh tax levy Marcus all right so again every year we have to bring our proposed text Levy to the board before we're able to Levy it in the summer um for the July 1st 2024 tax bills again we are not subject to a Headly roll back this year um so we will anticipate leving the full 18 Mills allowable for operations and 4952 Ms for the recreation program at this time and then the one thing I wanted to make note of is our debt service millage so what we are able to do now currently our debt Mills are set at 6.2 and as you can see we have an opportunity to lower our debt tax
178rate to the community so we will be only leveling 5.95 Ms so we're lowering it a quarter of a mil so quick math if your home has a taxable value of about $100,000 that would be a $25 decrease just as an example so at this time we would recommend adopting the l429 for next year including that tax decrease for everyone some moved second support any discussion all in favor I post okay passes unanimously again Marcus nice job you you managed to get everybody to agree to a tax cut I appreciate that it was tough okay Marcus purchase of vehicles and these are not the buses right okay correct so and we brought this last year as well so what we found in trying to purchase vehicles for maintenance and Food Service there's a State Co-Op
179it's called my deal that um has State contract pricing due to supply and Logistics issues my deal is not able to offer School pricing at this time and we had an extremely difficult time procuring Vehicles just with the board approval process and if you remember last year we came and asked for an an approval from the board TOS spend up to to it was $200,000 if you remember we wound up purchasing some Vehicles we came in right around $199,000 and some change we added it up so we did really well um so we would like to bring this the exact same thing again this year recognizing we don't currently have a need for $200,000 worth of vehicles however we have identified at least two one for food service and for maintenance that we would like
180to look at procuring and um having the ability to do that with the board authorization we'll just speed the process along and this has been vited by our Auditors and as well Madame President I move uh to pre-authorize vehicle purchase of up to and not to exceed $200,000 okay second any discussion now why is it that uh we are not able to get that what what are they doing it's it's Supply chaines oh is it supply chain issue so they're not able to offer their state contract pricing just ah okay right well that it's like anybody else now so just so everybody out in in Internet land understands we would go to the the dealer we would order the vehicle get the board approval and then by the time the vehicle would come in the
181price wouldn't be the same and we would have to come back we came back I think this this was two years running to actually purchase the vehicle we we purchased last year and and having the the ability to act quickly um allowed us to be able to purchase three vehicles last year and I know Marcus is starting out with two and that's the expectation right now if he's going to purchase a third vehicle he'll be back before the board he doesn't need to reauthorize the 200 but he'll let you know we're going to go after a third right now it's a food service and a maintenance so the two is our Target but he's asking for enough that at least in the budget that we would be able to come back if another one were
182available I would equate it similarly to like a line of credit if we needed it okay is the best excellent thank you okay call for a vote all in favor I opposed okay passes unanimously yay thank you okay TMP prund contract marus and Jeff I'll go so at the April finance committee committee meeting um TMP has supplied us or a proposal to provide pre-bond services in anticipation of seeking uh voter approval sometime in 2025 for another bond issue TMP ran our previous bond with great success so they've uh created drafted proposals to continue working with us to provide those pre-bond Services uh there would be another contract down the road um should the bond pass for those Services as well so at this time we would recommend approval of their contract to help us get
183the next bond issue going motion so moved second supp support support want to support for discussion um discussion yes as for the community engagement campaign stuff um can we expend resources in that way so we contract with TMP for pre-bond work so they identify scope they help us put together the the the costs if you will um I know we're going to deal with a construction manager this is simply hiring a company to advise us on on the need we still have to go before the board or before the community and know they're not campaigning for us so it's not campaign funds we're not spending dollars on campaign this is simply we identified if you remember in 20 16 20156 we did a facilities audit we identified about $160 Million worth of work we did
184approximately $90 million worth of work in the last Bond um and there's still significant work to to be accomplished but the their work is not campaign work it's it's all based around facilities so where does that $115,000 come from am I calculating this wrong yeah it's the any the contracted Services would be with TMP and that would be a general fund expenditure I'm looking at the contract at the end it's got 75,000 yeah you are correct that that 15,000 is not would not be work that that we can pay for that's work that would have to come that that 15,000 would have to come from um [Music] would have to come from the uh fundraising the capital campaign it says Administration recommends approval of the contract has presented and then when I'm looking at it
185you are correct it says facility assessment 1,500 hours 75 grand program assessment and Community engagement 1,150 hours for 74,75 and then campaign 300 hours for $15,000 and then it the sou after the ballot initiative receives approval of the campaign phase will commence TMP will collaborate with the district to devise and execute a robust all- inpassing campaign strategy Mr does trusty does you are correct and I would either make a recommendation to um amend the the uh motion because I don't we're not going to approve the $115,000 or I will bring it back with a new bid in June because because we can't we cannot pay and will not pay for campaign activities out of general fund I would amend the a motion to approve uh the contract to um refer this to our June meeting
186with a contract that's reflective of um the preed work discussion pre-bond sorry I think I said pre-bid pre-bond work so what would the bond be on what's what's the potential bond for so part of this is identifying scope and and HVAC is going to be a a huge significant portion of it I would anticipate it was one of those pieces that was identified in the last Bond so uh everything from Air Conditioning to to controls throughout the district and these are not small ticket items um you know there's roofs that are going to have to be uh on the agenda there's a lot of infrastructure but I'm not we're not determining all of the things in the bond that that's done by a larger steering committee when we did the the previous bond that committee
187comprised of parents and students and teachers and staff and so that work is what TMP will be doing is is is organizing that scope and helping to inform and take that feedback we sat in this library with about 93 I say 93 because that was the number 93 different people uh for about every other week uh through throughout the summer 2016 um to do that work before and I'm anticipating that it's that work again so you ask me what what is the bond I don't I don't have that today I know that there's I mean I can share with you the stuff that wasn't done last time because we had to cut a ton of it out because you don't do 160 million with 90 million but um there's more work that has to be
188done I I you know some some surprises came to us last time we we reduced the the chimney out here that was falling apart the bricks came off we're going to be right out front doing the tower which is going to need to be reink the the masonry is going to have to be redone on this building not all over but significant so there's there's a lot of work that's done I don't anticipate a new elementary school but I do anticipate that there'll be work still it's not nearly as pretty as a new pool it's a lot of stuff that that's buried behind the walls but it's it's stuff that's going to be without question needed and Marcus I know you've been talking about a variety of different things but we're not really we're not
189setting the scope in this meeting we're going to talk about the community setting the scope yes that that's helpful um so I wasn't a part of the last Bond you know so just understanding the purpose of bonds is I guess what I was really trying to get at so I should have asked that differently um to better understand you know the potential so I recognize that we're voting on something separate right now which is you know getting these folks here to uh work in that effort but I I just want to know what you know what was the you know since we're going in that what direction what's the direction what you know and you because you've done the bond before you have an idea of what's expected or what what the 100% idea might
190outcome would be 100% you will see TMP engage our community that's part of the pre-bound work without a doubt and and it sounds like it's structural that those was the bonds are usually for structural work correct not New Pools you said no no there's no pool well I won't say anything about Parkside there's no new pool here at Jackson high but but but certainly you know we we'll be addressing the needs of our facilities that's the piece and the state doesn't have a structural vehicle if you were to go to other states in in across the country there's structural mechanisms to to apply to the state to to repair or maintain or or build buildings and so on in Michigan it's through the bond project a community-driven initiative thank you yeah can you clarify what
191we're voting not again I think it I'll see if I get it right we are going to bring back tmp's bid corrected so I'll bring back an amended bid by TMP next month um that will reflect correctly um only the work that we are allowed to pay for with um general fund is that fair is that the motion Mr dois great close enough yep that was it thank you iOS Madam Madam chair uh for purposes of uh potentially Expediting the meeting as much as I appreciate listening to Marcus um I would uh make a motion to approve resolutions uh under 23-24 4118 and 23-24 1119 to establish the public hearings at the next meeting second okay any discussion on this this is like a no-brainer it's on every time we have to do it we
192do it before the board meeting okay all in favor I I opposed so thank you goes sorry there's um these are just hearings and so my thing is a yes my vote is a yes but I just wanted the community know that these are hearings that we're voting on on just so you all can come and you know have conversation with us thanks okay all right so just real quick as an outcome so we will start our June meeting with a hearing and then we'll start with yet then we'll move to another hearing and at the conclusion of that hearing our board meeting will commence so a little bit different process for the month of June still starting right here at 6 PM okay um after all this discussion as late as it is do
193we have any board comments you got your light on do you want to talk okay move to Jour we have comments comments oh I love the little girl in front from Cascades that was dancing and doing her own thing love she was just great I want to say kudos to Cascades it was nice I love seeing the kids I love seeing the schools bring their kids and they are so proud of themselves and that's a that's a great thing kha so um we had the uh masb spring conference and I was able to go to uh three classes uh in between my busy schedule um but this is also you know part of my busy schedule board stuff so um one of the classes that I got to attend so he attended Advanced community relations
194which is you know great stuff budget Anatomy which was very boring but M Marcus might have liked it you know it was anyways though um and then collaborative conversations for Effective decision- making um one of the things that I would love to see this board do and one of our I think shaquay uh Shelby one of our parents who um has been speaking at the board more often mentioned as well is that we don't get to have um as a board we don't have conversations um enough um outside of this board table um or aside from not outside of aside from this board table to really discuss issues and actually get to a collaborative space um we're talking about an equity policy which you know should impact the board table as well as the district
195um if we end up creating it and it goes through it should definitely include the board uh part of that process would be understanding each other um I would love to see us as a board create um a second board meeting that we have each month where we are something like they call I think they call the committee of the whole where we actually can have conversations um to to better understand our perspectives which you know I've been asking for this since I got on the board um because we all bring unique talents to the board you know unique perspectives and we all represent different parts of the community um in the effort to you know make decisions that are Equitable that are inclusive that are that include all the voices and all the perspectives
196um it would be beneficial if we as a board uh decided to have a second meeting every month which we vote on in January because our board uh meetings have been established for this year already but um I would still love to see us having two meetings a month one where we uh have these conversations even even finance committee meetings I would love to be able to be in those meetings but I know we're capped um um you know for board members but just being able to hear everything that's going on in District so that we can better understand and better make decisions that are um you know more inclusive and effective and and and you know for decision making I would love to see us create a committee of the whole that means a
197second meeting each month where we are discussing these issues um and then when we come back to this space um we could just make the you know vote on it but anyways so yes I would love to see that that's a conversation that we got to have at the conference among the classes uh that one just definitely stood out a committee of the whole um Madam president um I appreciate uh Cascades Elementary um coming out had an opportunity to go and meet with um uh principal Jones and uh tour of the school and uh meet some of the staff um uh actually go into uh the stem room there uh which it is uh incredible I just wanted to play the whole day but um so appreciate um every opportunity that we actually get to
198um hear from the students and see their presentations um and I'll say um in humility that I also went to um Hunt Elementary and did a tour there um and challenged a bunch of uh elementary students to a tug of- war in the gym and I'm like 6'3 and like 190 lbs and they like pulled me across the gym easily so um appreciate the work that um uh all of our staff and uh Educators across the district do and uh the work of this board and look forward to furthering discussions on the equity policy thank you anybody else comment I loved loved loved watching the children Cascades the little girl dancing I went she's gonna be a dancer you just it's just innate and um and also just appreciated what they're teaching them in that
199steam class and then I was very impressed with the World Language curriculum presentation I just think it's so amazing that we can bring these languages even they can get credit you know in the middle school so and I just I'm so thankful for everyone that came out tonight and voiced your concerns because I'm an elected elected representative and I am listening to your comments and I will vote accordingly um yeah thank you so much for um taking the time to be here and I appreciate what the teachers do I I again I substitute Tau for two and a half years I can't imagine there's just so much that goes into it now and and the kids remember the teachers forever so so thanks everyone that's a teacher and teachers and paros and all those people
200thank you I enjoy the Cascades um children as well um additionally I just want to thank those parents and the grandparents that came to speak about the incidents that have occurred with their children my heart is deeply saddened I want to provide it up apology to what you have had to experience um we can do better we can do better um all children should want to go to school all children should have great experiences in their classrooms when they are amongst their their circle of friends their peers I appreciate the teachers is hard work I am not a teacher um I did want to be a teacher when I was in high school and life took me in a different direction but I want to just thank our teachers for the hard work the patience
201the empathy the understanding that um they strive to demonstrate and we are perfectly imperfect meaning we do make mistakes and we need to find ways to make it right so again I'm sorry and lastly I am here tonight and my baby girl just turned 16 today so happy birthday annia I will celebrate you later nice I also enjoy it when the kids are here we used to go from school to school and each school would um you know put on a performance and show us some things they' done and it's been wonderful to be able to continue that student interaction even though we always meet in the same spot which I think is fine because it's got air conditioning in it in this time of year um I was extremely pleased by how many people
202came and spoke um and I was really surprised at the confusion that they almost each expressed in some in some respect so I'm excited about the fact that we're going to work on definitions examples samples um right down to the maybe even interacting a reenacting a situation and how it should be handled and how the teacher should should be handled um I also was absolutely astounded by a couple of those of those things okay next we're going on to the calendar this is graduation week so we have Borat tomorrow everything is 6 o'clock too by the way um th uh yeah Thursday we have honors in the auditorium Pathways and scmb commencement is at 1:00 in withington stadium so if you're able to come to that it'd be wonderful um our Comm uh our jck
203high itself commencements at 6 board work session is the 28th from 10: to 3 that's that's instruction instruction manager yeah interviews for the the three uh remaining uh companies we have retirement dinner on the 4th public hearing on Esther that's before our regular board meeting masb training superintendent evaluation July 23rd regular meeting afterward and Derek is there anything you'd like to now do support support all in favor I okay oppos you can just stay here for e e for