001all right wow okay it is 5 45 so i will call the meaning to order and welcome you to our july board meeting um so at this time we will do the pledge of allegiance i pledge allegiance to the flag of the united states of america and to the republic for which it stands one nation under god indivisible with liberty and justice for all okay we are on number three the roll call so mrs oxley we are ready for that miss hamilton present mrs brown here mr white here mr simonetti miss hunt here mrs fitzgerald and mrs mitchell here okay we're on number four approval of the agenda so at this time i would entertain a motion for approval of the agenda i'll make the motion to approve agenda okay thank you shlondo support thank
002you aaron any deliberation okay hearing none all those in favor say aye aye opposed okay emotion carries number five is the superintendent's report so i will pass it over to mr beale thank you very much uh it has been a busy month uh lots of people think about the summer time as well schools are out and i will tell you that summertime tends to be a lot of filling of positions and in our case obviously when mr patterson rolled up into the assistant superintendent position that created a vacancy at parkside christa jarvie took over that position when mr dubois took the superintendent position down in reading that created an opening at cascades and we have that candidate here tonight and in a minute or two i'll introduce miss crescenda jones and then we're doing interviews
003currently for to backfill christa's position so some of those administrative positions are are front and foremost although we're interviewing right now for bus drivers for parapros for tas and we're down to just a handful of teaching staff so we feel pretty good about where we're headed right now with with our teaching staff other than that what i will do is i will uh close the superintendent's report by saying construction is rolling along at the high school locker rooms are well underway the field house continues to progress and sharp park is off and running so some construction updates that way as well and you know right now where we continue to struggle like everybody else with some of the the product acquisition if you will or the the supply chain issues and uh you know um
004i think that's just the the challenges with construction today so uh but otherwise the projects are moving forward as scheduled and kind of we've prepped ourselves for the the delays that are taking place and continue to move around i know marcus spent quite a bit of time uh today doing punch walks on multiple buildings to to kind of close out those projects and so we're happy as we get closer and closer to closing out all of those existing projects and that is the superintendent's report for the month of july okay thank you uh we are on number six the consent agenda so at this time i would entertain a motion for approval of the consent agenda support oh thank you libby and pam um any deliberation okay all those in favor say aye aye opposed
005okay motion carries all right and now that we've officially hired you miss jones if i could i abort i'd like you to welcome crescenda jones to us by way of detroit public schools and battle creek public schools she's she's done her term in education we are excited to have her take the leadership helm at cascades elementary school she's been in working with uh with our staff already so we're we're excited about the positive energy she brings and the experience she brings for that position welcome to the district it's great to have you as a viking miss jones okay thank you welcome okay we are on number seven citizens requesting to address the board i will call you up one at a time and just a reminder there's five minutes and we have a new timer
006that should help with things so everyone can see that as they're talking i already said there's no back and forth but we appreciate your input um and then also i just wanted to remind everyone per our board policy um comment should not be repetitive so the first one up is peter bormuth and we'll make sure once you start talking the mics working hello my name is peter bormuth i live at 142 west pearl street in jackson michigan the three boys i raised are all long gone they're all living out in san francisco i don't have there for any children or grandchildren in the jackson public schools that's why i've never been here before to address you i like to think that parents themselves are the primary source of feedback for the schools but um there
007have been some things that have happened recently in our national life that have concerned me and i thought i would come and address them um you know in 1979 jerry falwell wrote in his book america can be saved that he hoped to see the day when we don't have public schools the churches will have taken them over and christians will be running them now there was a three-step plan to institute this the first was vouchers that basically failed nationwide for the most part because people chose to keep religion out of their public schools and not to pay for religion in private schools the next two parts of the plan were home schooling and that has been quite successful as of 2021 there are 3.5 million homeschoolers in the united states and the final element was
008charter schools um originally they weren't part of the the christian takeover but then it was soon maneuvered to see that they could be very useful and as of today charter schools enroll about 3.5 million students or 7 percent of the public school population almost the exact amount of home schoolers now what brought me here and made me concerned were two supreme court decisions at the end of the june term in carson versus macon the court ordered maine to pay for religious education with tax dollars maine is a little bit unique and they have areas that don't have high schools and so they pay for kids to go to other schools out of that particular district and they were paying for kids to go to private schools but they would not pay for children to go
009to religious sectarian schools and the supreme court ruled that they had to i think that it was a very dangerous ruling seriously eroding the separation of church and state most parents do not want the government to interfere in religious instruction that is their prerogative and they do not want the state to interfere um the second ruling that was troubling that came out of the supreme court was kennedy versus bremington you may have heard of this bremerton it was the football coach in oregon who after a football game was going out to the middle of the 50-yard line to what he called have a private prayer along with his team supporting him um i find this extremely dangerous because prayer has been illegal in public schools since 1962 and in some schools going back to the
0101800s for instance in ohio um there was a case in cincinnati that made prayer and religious instruction illegal all the way back then this introduces an element of prayer into our public schools possibly and i certainly don't wish to see that here in jackson so the reason i came is to just to express to all the parents out there if any of you have issues with religion cropping up in public schools and if religion does crop up in the public schools through either a teacher or a coach or anyone associated with the school and the school board please contact me and we'll see that we get a good attorney and because under michigan law that's still very unconstitutional and i think parents alone should have the right in terms of any religious education or no
011religious education if they wish to be given to their children so thank you for your time and consideration and i appreciate being able to come here tonight and address you thank you next up is julie alexander good evening first of all i'd like to introduce myself i am honored to be serving as one of the two jackson state representatives i have been serving for the last five and a half years i have five and a half months left until my term is over so it's important to me to come here for two reasons number one to offer a legislative update and number two to thank each and every one of you for your service it is not an easy job always to put your name on a ballot and ask individuals to vote for you
012and ask you to lead so you are to be commended for that in regard to a legislative update many of these pieces of information i'm about to provide are probably you're already aware of but i was excited to be able to come tonight and talk about four categories number one what kind of investment is the state of michigan making in our children as you know we had a 76 billion dollar budget general budget and 19.6 billion of that will be going to our public schools more than 50 percent higher than a decade ago is the investment schools will be receiving more than one time covered 19 relief over the last two years in addition to the state investment our budget the base foundation grant will be 9 hundred and fifty dollars for every student in
013michigan that is up four hundred and fifty dollars and more than five percent this year from the current year and more than two thousand dollars per student from a decade ago great start readiness program we are now including the ninety one fifty dollar nine thousand one hundred fifty dollars per enrollee um that our schools get our k-12 schools get will also go for the great start readiness program we have invested 52 million dollars in grants to address the learning loss each child that happens to be receiving special education programs has the uh will receive an ongoing 246 million increase throughout the state for reimbursements and costs to help educate our special education students students that are at risk for academic failure because of a variety of factors our budget provided 223 million dollars increase for
014those that funding source raising the total of 747.5 million dollars and finally mental health reforms our plan for the next budget year provides 150 million dollars in grants to help districts hire counselors and support efforts to promote mental health for our children the next category is supporting teachers and understaffed school districts i've had many conversations with your superintendent in this regard when we talk about teacher shortage we will be investing 575 million dollars overall to recruit train keep our new teachers with scholarships stipends for student teachers and resources to help districts identify and develop recruits within their own community in addition career and technical education an additional 10 million for those teachers in the cte areas military veterans also receiving an additional 15 million dollars to help troops to teachers an initiative to help uh
015get those veterans in line with educational certifications the next category is improving safety and instruction we know that safety is always our number one priority and this budget included 168 million dollars in grants for schools to make their building safer 20 25 million dollars to support school resource officers and finally infrastructure improvements and if interested consolidation 500 million in that regard the next piece paying off debt and setting a stage for a brighter future we know that the the retirement plans need to be funded and we are allocating more than 1.7 billion dollars to pay off debt in our education employer retirement systems and this adds relief to the school districts as well and finally we believe there is value because we know economic times could be around the challenging times could be around the
016corner we plan to leave three billion dollars that is currently on the school aid fund balance sheet unspent so that when times get tough in the future those dollars will be available to you i appreciate the conversations i have had with your superintendent he knows how to get a hold of me it has been an incredible honor to serve for the last six years as a county commissioner and then five and a half years as a state legislator and i wish you all the best thank you uh next up is marilyn acton dowell hi everyone i'm marilyn actin towel you know i'm a product of jackson public schools my father was he went to jackson high my siblings my children so i i just really love the school district so i was surfing the internet
017today and i was just going to the jps website and i clicked on the board the board of education and it had a district annual education reports link and the national assessment of educational progress naep data provides state results of the national assessment of mathematics and reading every other year in grades four and eight the results are really abysmal really bad and this was 2021 to 2022. it's it's a worry for me that we are producing children that will not be able to compete globally in a market you know two plus two is still four and we need to know math to do bridges to make buildings you know the the scores were abysmal and so i'm just saying that i'm just a concerned taxpayer and um this is a school district and um i
018i'm just gonna say i think some of the money that we're spending could be better used possibly to tutor kids i know that we spent 59 thousand dollars for dr marks and obviously we didn't get the results we wanted the jps website definition of equity equity results from ensuring that everyone has what they need to succeed ensuring that everyone has what they need to succeed it includes identifying and removing personal and systemic barriers that limit the full participation of all individuals and groups we are failing based on those test scores i'm concerned that instead of implementing rigorous academic programs we could be pushing for equity initiatives that lower the bar for students thank you next up is amy gish [Music] five of you have knowingly and intentionally chosen to shield and protect certain individuals in
019this school district and lie to this community about it you cannot cover up for illegal and inappropriate behavior and act in the best interests of this district simultaneously it is impossible with the exception of libby brown and keisha hamilton this school board is and has been corrupt the superintendent has used this district for his personal gains in many ways and tax dollars have been at the core of his manipulations because you have allowed it to happen to happen he protects you you protect him that is why you will always support everything the superintendent wants you to support he misleads you mislead he lies you lie and the public for the most part believes your lies except for those of us who have been the target of your retaliatory behavior except for those of us who
020have abandoned ship and many have abandoned ship there is evidence to prove we're right feeding the sickness this is what you the board five are doing feeding the sickness this administration has broken laws board policies and created a hostile work environment for so many the board's constant cover-ups may bring a sense of comfort to some but there are strong winds in the forecast there are avenues that are open and available to those of us who are no longer waiting for you to act waiting for you to do your job waiting on time we are moving forward miss hunt just because someone says it doesn't mean it's true those are words coming from one of your fellow board members that holds true for those who are informing you from board members to hr employees administration including
021the superintendent i do my homework before i speak a word to the wise is sufficient miscellany you should check your white privilege at the door when you walk into the school board meetings you are constantly bringing things up to target keisha hamilton a board trustee with a strong background in diversity equity and inclusion and you keep trying to silence her that is not what this community needs it appears to be some type of a sick obsession that you have your friends may agree with what you say and with what you do but this community is diverse in many ways and your attempts to shut keisha down is really disenfranchising many members of this community i have heard many speak about this at prior school board meetings one even stated this is a black and white
022issue please remember this community is not represented by you it's represented by seven board members trying to lead with white privilege may work in some communities this is not one of those communities i understand you were raised in a different day and age and have beliefs instilled in you but those beliefs are being proven to be harmful to this community we cannot afford to lose any more students you are and have been part of the problem regardless of what you say we understand who you are and what you stand for there's nothing you can say that will cover up that truth your rhetoric and actions are and have been very offensive apparently you don't understand or you don't care different speakers have told you the same thing over time and you have kept doing the
023same thing therefore one can only conclude the disenfranchising beliefs you have must be ingrained you are stopping the potential of our families the potential our families can benefit from not only are you targeting keisha but you are targeting all of the families regardless of color she is advocating for shame on you and shame on your fellow board members who support you libby and keisha thank you for remaining true to the heart and soul of this community and for rising above the negativity that you two have to put up with from the corruption from the board five they have been scheming behind your backs then making you out to look like the bad guys same old play same old playbook they don't know what the future holds thank you for remaining true to who you are
024and what you stand for this community benefits from it i for one appreciate it thank you both thank you next up is joanna perkins i'm joanna perkin retired english teacher of over 20 years english chair and building committee chair this is a quote from one of the attorneys in the larry nassar documentary entitled athlete a i quote when you take the ability to love and express love from somebody and take it away or damage it it profoundly affects their psyche and at the end of the day that's really what he did he stole that part of them and they are all struggling to get it back and most of them should have never met larry nassar had people in charge of him had just done the right thing and the peace that's missing is the
025accountability for those who knew better end quote you board five no better in that same vein of thought many of superintendent bill's victims and there are litany you board five have been made well aware of should have never met superintendent beale had the several whistleblowers filed concerning his possible sexual deviancy with high school students in quincy community school been handled with due diligence several years ago and the mandatory reporting that you all board are required to do by law perhaps they never would have met superintendent bill and they wouldn't be struggling to get back a piece of themselves taken away by superintendent beale the domino effect continues to move had superintendent beal listened to teachers and union leader gina chim about zimbabwe as opposed to labeling her as a troublemaker when she came to him
026with sexual harassment she experienced from a fellow teacher that teacher wouldn't have been empowered to sexually victimize numerous young female students he was eventually convicted in a court of law and paid through the end of the year ironically after the findings per superintendent bill's directive all preventable when another sexual deviant basketball coach elliot months got a student pregnant it wasn't reported by superintendent beal or any well-aware board members and he was empowered to move on unscathed that young basketball and track athlete slated to be one of the greats didn't take a senior pick or continue with her athletics at that point she had the baby there's just a blank space where her pick should have been all preventable when a parent robin inwin reported her elementary son's rape by another male student in the bathroom
027at one of the elementaries that fell on deaf ears in fact when she came here a few board meetings ago to implore your concern empathy and action it was met by blank cold and unconcerned stairs you the board five again all preventable when i myself filed a whistleblower on behalf of my students being incessantly and ruthlessly sexually harassed by other students within the alternative fourth street program eight of whom submitted written statements detailed written statements nothing was done and the student handbook was not employed when i made a simple one-line professional inquiry as to why the handbook was not followed i was written up the message as i have stated in previous board addresses continues to be you talk you pay again all preventable when penny davis was being feverishly tormented by superintendent beal and
028principal jeremy patterson the board 5 empowered them to continue to harass her even after she won a 7 out of 7 slam dunk case of the tune of nearly 400k superintendent bill and principal jeremy patterson not only didn't cease and assist because penny actually wanted to continue to teach but they continued to fight through the court system thereby squandering elaborate amounts of the district's monies to the tune of now 700k as of late and she's now officially won all the way to the supreme court superintendent beale and jeremy patterson are officially guilty of retaliation in the court of law yet because the board once again have failed their due diligence these two received zero consequences or any discipline then or now in fact superintendent bill remains unbothered and happily in his position as superintendent hr
029director and foia coordinator but i digress shame shame shame on you this is all preventable the board five continue to fail at your due diligence as in the nassar case this the thing that continues to go missing is accountability for those who knew better you board five knew better and you know better consider this yet another whistleblower i had a lot more to say but i'll say it at the next meeting or the next one or maybe the next one after that or maybe ten board meetings from here until eternity until you guys get it thank you uh william hastings so no one no one is above personal reproach least of all elected officials and public servants however the degree of corrosive and cancerous public comment has taken a toll on this board and many
030months of public meetings there there is a false dichotomy at play it is regularly asserted that there is an asana and the end of them there's the community somewhere over there versus members of the board at administration that would obviously be you it is asserted that you are either with the community or against them it is a binary choice yin and yang and yet i cannot help to come back again and again to the fact that the people on this board being pilloried and spit upon are in fact almost all accomplished people in their own right there's two single mothers on this board who are performing public service in addition to raising feeding and taking care of their own school-aged children there are men with very high-flying corporate careers and professionals of all stripes who
031are performing what is essentially an unpaid role on the school board crabs in a bucket is a poor strategy in fact i'll say it's a terrible strategy for any person people group or community this can and should be a form these meetings for unfettered debate about school policies and priorities not character assassination though the race-baiting on display tonight only underscores my basic point as far as keisha hamilton being quote targeted her proponents really don't seem to be doing her very many favors at this point you may want to rethink that relentless negativity and personal attacks are clearly not a winning strategy at this point talk about beating a dead horse so i'm just going to wrap this up with an anecdote i had the opportunity to chant an opportunity to chat with a neighbor the
032other day about her nephew who had just passed his ap calc exam and is going on and is going to be studying engineering in college and i took some time to brag on my daughter and she was proud bragging on her nephew and it was actually a very nice moment so that young man's father who is seems to take a good deal verbal verbal abuse from meeting the meeting he happens to be sitting up on this days tonight and i just wanted to offer my congratulations to the father and his son alike thank you okay we are on number eight discussion items 22-23-6 volume 36 number two board policy revisions jeff all right there are several policies um that are up for revision they really fall into two categories this is the first reading and
033so yeah we'll bring them back for action next month um the first set of policies all really address dress code and they they you'll see it in the school policy in 1616. you see it again in professional and 3216 repeated into our support staff and 4216. and with our students in 5511. the next set of policies deal with the expenditures of federal funds and the requirements that we have for maintenance of effort underneath the grant funds for federally expensed funds which as you know and we talked about last month a significant portion of our funding over the next couple of years coming in through esser three so those are specific requirements for expensing those s or three dollars again what i would do is i would encourage you to take a few minutes read those
034policies if you have questions on any of that please don't hesitate to hit me up or ask me a question along the way but they really fall into two categories um and there's not a lot we can do by the way with either of the sets um you know when it comes to expending federal funds that's the the string if you will that comes with those dollars so you know we we have to adopt the policy in order to spend the dollars but if you have questions i'm happy to discuss them or like i said this is up for action a month from now so anytime over the next 30 days if you have questions please feel free to shout out i know cheryl you sat in um and that kind of encapsulated yeah it
035was pretty yeah it's it's it's it's the summer packet so there's just not it's not a lot of meat and potatoes in this particular set all right jeff can i ask one question about that yes so in addition to it says right here at the grand funds the superintendent you'll review and prepare proposal for programs in addition to yourself does anyone else have the autonomy to review the grants yeah it's it's actually the designee so typically julie baker oversees all of our federal programming but she does it in concert with marcus so again it's it's not it's not really targeted at one program or one specific and then marcus has a a representative from his office to make certain that it all is compliant so the dollars are spent accordingly and so it's there's multiple
036systems on that one thank you okay thank you we are on number nine action items so the first one is 22-23-7 it's the elementary handbook common pages jeff actually this is a what you've seen before you know so it was up for discussion a month ago you know it's the common pages that we approve every month consistent or every year consistent with our board policies the changes i mean these are based on school but the changes are highlighted in your pancake and there's not really anything substantive of change this year okay so this time i would entertain a motion for approval of the elementary common pages as presented thank you aaron thank you libby any deliberation okay so i i have one question jeremy and it's for both of these you and i had a
037discussion this week about the it's really not that big of a deal but on the titles for the parkside principles now they both say assistant is that i thought there was one associate one assistant it depends on who the hired staff is so currently we're going through the process the other administrator is an assistant and depending on what skill set the person possesses through the interview process will determine if we're going to bump them up so the associate does a lot of the scheduling and other duties so sometimes if they're both coming in and they have some things to learn and mrs jarvie or someone is going to assume those responsibilities it it's up to the administration on what level it's going to be an assistant or associate based on the person in place so
038once you're done filling those positions that may or may not change correct it will be updated and we'll spell them all out throughout the program any other deliberation okay hearing none all those in favor say aye i opposed okay motion carries next line item is 22-23-8 and it's the secondary handbook common pages jeremy and jeff same story so it's exactly the same scenario as before okay i would entertain a motion for approval of the secondary common pages as presented angela i have a question we can have a question now or not yet oh yeah we'll get the motion on the table and then okay yep thank you cheryl there's a second thank you shalonda okay uh deliberations so keisha thank you um so am i correct in and this might be jeff or jeremy i'm
039not sure and um assuming that the red and yellow the highlighted portions are new is this new or changed information yellow has changed the high although all the yellow signifies the highlighted or the it's just updating typically the year okay some of the names thank you so i'm on page 21 of the uh secondary uh handbook pages i'll give you a chance to get there i'm in the middle of the page where it says consequences will be cumulative for grades 6 through 12. that appears to be uh new can can you just kind of whichever of you explain to me um the newness why we needed it and some examples of what that means yes i can explain that because i was a part of the meeting it was been has been in there in
040years past and i think i don't know if it was pre-covert or whatever it was taken out because we were virtual and um we made some significant strides with discipline because that was a goal of ours which is going to be again and so that was language that was brought back into the conversation that had previously been there but not the year prior so can you give me some examples of um you know consequences will be cumulative what does that mean you know help me understand uh so the the discussion was obviously we don't want fighting in school so we want to have interventions and conversations and meetings with those folks to bring the team together to get those fights to stop so sometimes students go from building to building the building and and you
041know there hasn't been a conversation or the the issue continues the fighting or assault of behaviors so um the other added language to a second fight within one school year results in a referral to the superintendent and so again you're coming to the table with your parents and administrators and superintendent to discuss the issue and the next steps miss hamilton can i get your mic that might be a problem is that is that working now yes okay i'm sorry i apologize if i'm not being clear um i want to understand cumulative for example if they you know have a fight in the sixth grade and then they have one in the tenth grade is that you know now you've had the two and so therefore it becomes the you know second fight within the school
042year can you explain just that portion of it to me and maybe i'm not being clear i apologize i'm not yes so uh it's my understanding that we handle this by building level so cumulative would be sixth grade seventh grade eighth grade at parkside ninth grade tenth grade eleventh grade twelfth grade at jackson high school something like that would be an example so if they get a fight in sixth grade and they're getting fighting the eighth grade then that would be considered cumulative but not sixth grade and then tenth grade that wouldn't be considered cumulative that's my understanding i mean you said that we took this out do you remember why we took this out i do not have but we put it back in because uh we don't want fights in school we've seen
043an increase in fights or is that what the yeah just a concern because um i'm trying to recall the discussion around the table with the other administrators and it was sometimes that i think that administrators were unaware it could be a change in administration you know for example i was the principal last year and the next person might not know but just coming back to the table and having the conversation about how can we get this to stop or what happened again that we need to talk about as a team because it sounds like we took it out and then there was an increase in fighting and so we decided to put it back in because we wanted to have more measures in place to hold students accountable is that my understand that correctly um
044i think the meeting has been important so i think this triggers there's going to be a discipline hearing or a meeting and because we weren't doing that before not last year so it's just been a year's change you said i'm not exactly sure if it's been one or more just because the coveted it wasn't an issue because we weren't in school or kids were on course so it was significantly less and we've seen a significant increase this year thank you can you just one more question for you sure what's worse case scenario for a student with this with this language in there what's worst case scenario for them i'm and i'm thinking restorative practices versus punitive you know behav you know uh measures in place what's the worst case scenario um it could be change
045in placement maybe i don't know what the worst case scenario is obviously if it's a positive meeting and they come out of it and there's some parameters put in place it could be counseling services it could be obviously they're probably getting suspended from school if they're getting suspended and we don't want that and so that's the goal thank you you're welcome and just to clarify miss hamilton just because i i heard this in there i'll make sure that it's it's two fights in a single year even though this is cumulative and so we are tracking fighting from year to year to year because we obviously are looking at changing behavior or encouraging positive behavior no one ends up there's not a referral to mr patterson's office because of a fight in sixth grade and then
046another fight in eighth grade per se it would be i got in two fights in sixth grade and so i we've got more going on and so that ends up with the referral in a referral a discipline referral by itself is not an expulsion hearing by any stretch of the imagination it usually brings folks together it probably as a general rule an outcome might be a behavior contract outcome might be referring to counseling or social work um so there tends to be an action team around folks coming out of that discipline hearing so that's and that's probably new to jeremy something william did on a daily basis thank you jeff that's that's very helpful i don't know if we should update the language or maybe this is maybe this is just understood for you all
047who are in those you know in this area but me looking on you know if it's just within one school year it makes sense that you know second fight we gotta have a conversation that makes sense to me but cumulative consequences will be cumulative for grades six through twelve that just sounds like you know i can have a fight in the sixth grade i could have a fight in the eighth grade and now you know um i'm being held accountable to you know something that i did when i was 13 years old versus when i'm 15 or 8 or 17. so that i don't know if we can update that language this consequence would be cumulative you know within one school year i don't know or if that's just understood i'm not sure but it
048does reading just reading it it concerned me you know it's real punitive in my opinion but that makes sense what you just said you know and i understand exactly how i understand exactly how you read it i know how it's intended i i understand exactly what we're saying but i get what you just said it's not intended to be cumulative across it could it could end up being a conversation about placement if i've got and i always use my own name if jeffrey's in a fight every year and jeffrey continues to fight multiple times we might have a different conversation about jeffrey in that classroom however consequences stacking from year to year aren't something we do and that's understood in the education world yes yes okay thank you okay any other deliberation yes yes i
049had two areas i wanted to address um the first one was the dress code i noticed a lot of things that have been in place for a long time uh i think it's 19 or 20. let's see 20. yep it's 20. the thing is in yellow um and i just had some my question is entirely why were those things taken out of the dress code yeah halter tops muscle shirts sleeveless jersey tank tops with narrower than two straps tube tops off the shoulder tops backless tops why would that be taken out of the dress code yeah and jeremy i don't know if you're ready for that question today or not on dress code i know that william and monica and willie i don't know if you're ready to speak to that or if you have
050any contribution to that particular conversation i think it had to do with enforceability or enforcing um you know what we were dealing with but i think we just started at the top and so going in instead of itemizing everything out because there's always something new right and what are they going to do next year that we don't have itemized in here that we're going to say well that's that's not specifically here but the gist of it is students whose attire is otherwise interrupts the process so that's what the key language that we focused on and and there's a process in place that the student will be sent to the office for you know a viking apparel t-shirt or something so we we've as administrators felt like there was a good policy in place without having
051to have this long lengthy list of should we add this on here should we take this out um so i think that was the majority of the discussion thank you um i did want to mention that that's how it was before just kind of open-ended who's offended by what and not and this teacher does it doesn't which is why those things were listed individually because parents came in and said i don't see where it says that well how is that disruptive um even one that says um see through our mesh tops without anything under is is underwear good enough to be under i mean i just think that specific how having been there i think this specific is important i know when i was hired as principal of high school the board gave me two
052or three things to work on and their number one was the dress code and we did and we added all these things in because the board requested clarity my second question is what happened to lanyards and id those made a huge difference when we knew the kids were in what grade and stopped a ton of fights and stopped people from coming in the building um what happened to lanyards in ideas are you saying that was in with student dress code or somewhere else i was in i'm not sure where it was it wasn't somewhere and we don't know probably the dreams we often don't even have them at the middle school in the beginning of the year until we take pictures and then they get printed and then they get lost and then there's fees
053associated well i'm pretty much talking about the high school at this point because middle school kids don't have that kind of a travel ability the high school kids have to go here and there but what i might suggest is i probably set up a meeting with miss pierce and i apologize she's not here tonight she's recovering so as soon as she's on her feet i'm anticipating here by the end of the month um that's fine we'll get you set up and you can sit down and have it that'd be wonderful kind of a conversation to walk through some of that the teachers worked so hard to be consistent i'd like to know what happened to it one more question for us about this um so i'm on page 10 of the same uh student handbook
054and this is not really a question more so just a a statement and a request really i'm not going to read the entire implementation paragraph that we have here there are a couple sentences though that i want to highlight um it's about four five sentences down it starts the plan will provide and i'll let you all read those of you who have copies of this but it says the plan will provide for annual evaluation with the involvement of parents and families of the plan's content and i apologize that you all so i'll start at the beginning a little bit the superintendent will provide for a comprehensive plan to engage parents families and community members in partnership in support of each student's academic achievement i'm going down now the plan will provide for annual evaluation with
055the involvement of parents and families of the plan's content effectiveness and identification of barriers to participation by parents and families with particular attention to uh literacy i'm sorry particular attention to parents who are economically disadvantaged or disabled we have a lot of information in this implementation and that's all i'm going to read for that portion regarding how we as a school are working with our parents and our students and our staff teachers to create plans that you know parents are a part of as a jps parent myself i have yet to be involved in something like this as a jps board member who's also on the school improvement team i have yet to be involved in something like this again this is just a statement i would like to see us actually begin to implement
056some of these things i'd like to be not only as a parent and i guess i'd say not only as a school board member but more importantly as a parent it's really important to me that parents um be a part of what we're doing we do have this language in here when we're not doing it it kind of makes us as a board look bad because we're not standing up to and being accountable to the words we were writing in our handbook so i would like to see us begin to do this um more regularly even this year um so that was my statement i want us to be able to start implementing you know uh stand by the words that we're saying in our handbook thank you okay thank you all right any other
057deliberation okay all those in favor say i i opposed okay motion carries next line item is 22-23-2 and it's the valedictorian committee proposal jeff actually i think i'm going to invite willie lewis i know like i said i know ms pierce is unable to attend tonight so i know that mr lewis presented last month so i'll bring him back in case there are any questions specific to the valedictorian criteria and i believe it's the exact same presentation from a month ago 4.0 and any combination of six credits whether they are dual enrollment ap or early college is that affirmative that is exactly it so we'll do the motion part and then the discussion so at this time i would entertain a motion um for approval of the committee's recommendation to resend the approved 2018 policy
058and replace it with a following that's listed below there oh you guys are erin okay there's a tie between erin and pampa erin and libby thank you okay deliberation time so um i know we're doing our deliberation but i'm just gonna you know let you i don't have any questions for you so you can relax for a second so i'm gonna just tell you i'm gonna vote no on this um new rigger component um i understand you know the makeup of our team that we had um and et cetera you know i'm glad that you all tried to be uh diverse in who you chose to get on this committee um but the result of what we have here this new rigor component adding in that they have to take six um either advanced placement
059or early college or the you know the dual enrollment classes it's exclusionary um period um it doesn't hold too true to the model where community comes together it effectively excludes special needs students and students of lower socioeconomic status we also don't have the proper framework in place for informing parents of changes requirements deadlines and the importance of grades etc we have too many students per counselors i'm rendering our counselors somewhat ineffective because again there are too many students per counselor unless you have a connection at the school who is actively looking out for your student your student could be a valid that student who could be a valedictorian would be lost um in the shuffle because again we have too many students per counselor so we don't have the framework in place um we don't
060have you know the the the the stuff in place to make sure that every parent who might could be or would be every student who would be valedictorian we don't have that in place this rigor component effectively guarantees that only the most well-resourced those of higher socioeconomic status will become you know and those of higher economic socioeconomic status that those will become the valedictorians it's exclusive again exclusionary it's classes it's racist it's not equitable um and so for those reasons you know i'm the outcome of this you know any students who are you know uh have 4.0 status for four years and i said this is the first time we thought to even do this any student who's able to obtain 4.0 status for four years once they get to the high school level regardless
061to their uh ability to learn for example if they're special needs students us saying no to them um being valedictorian because realistically they're not capable of handling a you know dual enrolled class or a college ap class or even the early college classes it effectively eliminates them any student who is socioeconomically challenged they also too are effectively eliminated from um this this rigor component any student whose parent is not able to be as active in the school system who doesn't have a connection to a teacher who doesn't have a connection to you know a counselor again they're all effectively excluded so for those reasons i'll be voting no on this issue okay pam did you have any yeah turn your micah i'll watch his turn i was turning in um i've always felt that by
062having 312 valedictorians every year it sort of negated the the honor that it is and while i have myself minority children and many grandchildren i would be so furious if someone thought my minority children didn't measure up because they're minority i do not for one second see this is exclusionary any more than college or a job interview or anything else preparation is preparation and to have a whole bunch of people be valedictorian when that's like what the word means i've always thought i have thought for years was inappropriate in fact when i graduated from jackson i would even do valedictorian salutatorian because there was so much discussion about it um but i am 100 in support of adding a criteria to this 4.0 whatever it happens to be to make it clear and accessible dual
063enrollment classes are paid for by the school with transportation as are the jcec classes that pay for jc a degree a full degree at jc those are all things that are manageable and attainable in the period of time in which the kids are asked to do them so i am 100 000 in support of adding a criteria if this is the one that the committee decided on i have no objection um i'm happy to see the rigor added to the valedictorian criteria i think that if you look at the definition of valedictorian if you look at the national standard for valedictorian it is the highest achieving student it is the best of the best and i'm happy to see the rigor added i personally feel that the ap classes should be weighted differently than the
064early college in the dual enrollment but because the committee by majority voted for this i personally would not stand in the way of this moving forward and i thank the committee for their work thank you i would just add that some things just are what they are a gold medal is a gold medal a valedictorian as a valedictorian and the requirements to get that were very carefully vetted by mr willie lewis i think precious armstrong mr patterson monica pierce and i somewhat apologized on the board's behalf that the efforts that you just put forth were essentially called racist uh and that's that's sad that's a sad perspective that we just expressed to you all for working hard on this so thank you one more statement um so as a member of a minoritized community um
065i know we're in discussion right now so i'm going to discuss a little bit as a member of the minoritized community of minoritized community myself as a woman who strives for excellence and is fully aware of you know not only the capabilities of myself but also people who look like me and other individuals who are in a lower socioeconomic classes i am fully aware of our ability to excel and to achieve greatness and we do all day every day what i'm also fully aware of as a diversity equity inclusion specialist in my own right is that there are systems in place that effectively eliminate our and place barriers um up against us to be able to achieve as much as we would so you know i'm aware of how this vote is going to go
066so that's not really the issue but i do want the community to know that you know because sometimes different comments can be made to make people think otherwise members of minority communities are excellent and fully capable of achieving greatness like i said exhibit a you know be myself here i'm fully capable and have achieved greatness but there are systems in place that keep us in a space that doesn't allow us to um accomplish as much as we would again something like this this uh rigor component that has been added it effectively eliminates individuals from special needs communities and it also effectively eliminates uh individuals who are from socioeconomic lower socioeconomic classes and it is elitist you know it's elitist um and and so for that reason again i would not vote for it um but
067also you know i have no issue with you know having 500 valedictorians individuals who would be willing to you know work hard enough every single year of their four years of high school to get a 4.0 you know in my opinion we should celebrate all of them but um i don't want anyone from the minoritized communities or anyone else to be confused about what minoritized communities members are able to do or individuals from those lower socioeconomic statuses are able to accomplish um it's not a matter of what we can or cannot do or what we don't you know what we do or don't accomplish it's a matter of what systems that are in place and they are oftentimes racist they are oftentimes classes they are oftentimes elitist whether we believe it or not and then
068a simple study of history and current day uh practices will let us know that um but again i won't be voting in favor of this okay shawanda as a parent of a 2019 valedictorian who maintained straight a's for five consecutive years i am happy to see that the board has given some consideration to this first that it was not implemented immediately and that we took the time to unpack what students would be impacted by this decision i was studying up on it today and it was looking at the dual credits the dual enrollment early colleges and how early colleges if a student does participate in those courses that it is tailored to our first generation college goers to our social economically disadvantaged students so we're not excluding anyone here but we are putting in place
069a rubric a criteria to challenge our students to push them to tap into their hidden talents to go above and beyond outside of their comfort zone to excel and to achieve academic excellence i appreciate the community and the committee that took some time to really focus in on this and see what students need in order to and it's not about labels it's not about status it's about the hard work and yes we are looking for students to be resourced and have the necessary skill sets to do this hard work so i do appreciate the committee that took this time and again i mean being a valedictorian is not easy work i do have a question for you though mr lewis do we know if any of our special education students and or students with a
070documented iep has ever experienced having valedictorian status i don't know the answer to that whether or not last month's board meeting [Music] the question that i did answer at the last board meeting was whether or not our students with ieps have access or have been enrolled in in in our ap courses and the answer to that was yes we do have um we have structures in place that allow for those students to take part in that class and to be successful in those classes the resource rooms and the things that we've put in place around that allows for those students to be in those classes and be successful so they are participating in the classes they are actually enrolled in those classes and given the same opportunity yes absolutely thank you okay and i i
071just have to say my career has been in special education as a teacher and an administrator for almost 23 years now and this does include special education students with their ieps that iep is a legal document that everyone must follow with their accommodations their goals just because they have a disability does not mean that they cannot be part of this so i think it's kind of insulting to say that they are excluded i know parents that would be upset thinking that i also wanted to say i have high high respect for my colleague precious armstrong that was part of this committee speaking on behalf of special ed students and i definitely want to thank the committee for their work so thank you i wanted one more thing um the ieps and the 504s the fellow
072kids into college after i retired i've now been at jc for nine years and i'm retired from here jc for nine years and i work on the center for student success and we work with those students in addition to around the writing lab but in addition to that our students come in here with their ieps or 504 as we set up the accommodations with each professor every semester and make sure that they're they're followed through those kids are amazing i also one day a week am a liaison between jackson high school and the jcec program the early college program those kids 9th 9th through 12th are there to get help and they are not the ones you'd say oh that student is just really a valedictorian material they work hard these kids work hard their
073parents are wanting them to succeed obviously and as mentioned earlier quite often it's a first generation thing so it's it's open to everyone the accommodations are there for those who do have special needs the individual tutoring all those things that aren't special need kids are available to any of the young ones the old ones all the in-between ones so there are opportunities and there are accommodations and there are support systems for every single student who wants to take a class or an ap class or a dual enrolled class or the early college program thank you okay thank you i just want to make one more we'll ask one more question um do you know if our special ed students and our students with our documented ieps if when they're meeting with their counselors if the
074counselors are encouraging them to take these courses oh most definitely okay um if it fits within their framework of what their what their plan is and what they want to do um in in their in their individual id and their idp then yes that's that's definitely a part of the conversation okay thank you um all those in favor say aye i've got a comment or a question um i'd like to know why the um independent study isn't figured into this computation pull the mic closer i'd like to find out why independent studies aren't included in computation for valedictorian yeah um during the discussion we felt like independent studies just didn't meet the level of rigor when it came to the oversight that was that was involved with those students as as they took those courses
075so we wanted to ensure that we had um a body of work that we could point to and that we could validate that the student met that level of rigor maybe that should be looked into because i know when i gave independent studies they were far more rigorous than any class that i taught so um something that we could explore yeah um i believe that that is not a new component of the valedictorian criteria i don't think independent studies have ever counted i'm not 100 sure but i don't think that yeah i'm not sure okay um all those in favor say aye aye opposed no no okay motion carries next line item 22-23-10 is the sound system for jackson high school stadium project marcus thank you we received bids for the sound system for the
076new field house project down on the stadium property this down system will be paid for through the stadium project budget through that donation fund and the recommended bidders u.s systems in the amount of 25 983.39 so this time we would recommend awarding the bid to us sound systems for this project okay thank you at this time i would entertain a motion awarding the bid to u.s systems in the amount of 25 983.39 as presented um any deliberation okay hearing none all those in favor say aye aye opposed okay motion carries next line item is 22-23-11 it's the school bus purchase marcus so we have an opportunity to purchase a propane bus from grass lake schools grasslake doesn't currently use propane however they purchased one a while back to pilot a program which they chose not
077to go in that direction so they've offered it to the district for 25 000 it's a 2017 77 passenger bus with relatively low miles similar to the rest of our fleet the bus will be purchased through the general fund and account through that through our budget amendment process as we had not originally planned to purchase buses this year but this opportunity came up and it's it's a bus that's in good shape and helping out a neighbor district who doesn't have a use for it at this time okay thank you at this time i would entertain a motion to approve the purchase of the bus as presented in the amount of 25 000. thank you pam thank you libby any deliberation okay hearing none all those in favor say aye i opposed okay motion carries those
078are all of our action items so we are on to number 10. um so at this time i would welcome any board comments no comments tonight i would just say i um i don't really have much to say as far as board comments but i've been following the um stadium project on facebook and watching the pictures every week and it's very exciting i'm anxious to actually go in and see it i will piggyback on that i was able to see it and uh yeah it's amazing i also wanted to say it's great with the shortage we have and particularly education and around the state that we were able to hire so many people so i think that's wonderful and welcome them to the district i'd like to welcome our newest cabinet member to the fold
079he was a baby teacher with me when i was principal and i just absolutely am thrilled that he has pursued his goals and additionally if i can back piggyback one more time i cannot believe the changes in all the school buildings they look absolutely wonderful people are excited the community they talk about them i drove by sharp park the other day and there was a couple there taking pictures of them because their child is going to be a kindergartner this year and i thought it was just the cutest thing so i'm just so proud of how jps is getting out and making such a um a visual a concrete improvement throughout the district and that that's pretty much it i'm just really you know they say you know proud of your viking heck yes so
080i i just wanted to add on to the rest of them thank you since our last meeting i had a couple parents that contacted me and informed me that they are they have children that are at the school age level and they're happy to have scheduled appointments and have their child enrolled in jps i'm happy to know that you know regardless of you know many different opinions of jps that parents are still believing the hype and enrolling their students in the elementary education i also had the opportunity to meet with um jessica carter the hr generalists and go over the exit interview questions i was pretty impressed with the content of the questions that allow a free narrative of individuals that are exiting the jps district so that was very meaningful it was a rich
081dialogue and i was grateful for that opportunity okay anything else jeff yeah if you don't mind um this last month jps lost a uh a good friend um mr bob inman served on this board for 10 years at least he served on the isd board he helped pass multiple bonds he's a was a true servant to our community and so it is with regret that i uh recognize his passing but certainly we want to thank him for his contributions to our district uh and to the future of jackson okay thank you there's no new business number 12 is the calendar we have a few things coming up july 26th is just the filing deadline for the november 8 school board election um august 16th is our next regular board meeting we will meet back here
082at parkside in this room at 5 45 and august 22nd is when we will welcome all staff back at 11 30 a.m at jackson high school and yeah it's going to be here soon so this time i would entertain a motion for adjournment some of support okay thank you any deliberation okay all those in favor say aye aye aye opposed okay motion carries thank you and have a good night you