001all right we're gonna go ahead and get started welcome everybody it's nice to see everybody here um and we are called to order officially and I guess we can uh let's start with the Pledge of Allegiance and you know with liberty and justice for all great um we are first thing on the agenda for tonight is uh we have that approved I moved that the Board of Education approved the business meeting agenda for tonight October 26 2022. second comments all in favor any of those motion passes so that leads us to recognizing our own you're very excited about this and Dr Jordan and um Frankie come on up you're going to say yes that would be great okay sounds great well good evening everybody it is uh my great pleasure to recognize Miss funky sinovic
002as the 2022 Emerson teacher of the year for the Clayton School District most of you are familiar with Frankie and her work but I for those of you who aren't for those of you who are watching at home um a couple things that I wanted to mention so Frankie started her work at White on as a Truman intern um and she made such an amazing impact that when I even came as the principal and she wasn't there at that time people were talking about her it was she was a buzz about who she was and who's the kind of person she was so she took a brief Hiatus away from a lie down and was at Parkway Southwest and then we promptly stole her back to help them and be a sixth grade math teacher
003and she taught on the sixth grade math team alongside Joe suzar and Dr Liang and they really elevated their work to do some amazing work in the PLC some ham and assessments looking at standard of doing some awesome things and after she was in that role for a while there was an opportunity for we had a late retiree that was moving from the gifted program and I went to Frankie and said I need you um I need you to come over and be a part of the gifted program and she did so she stepped up into the that role and has really transformed what the gifted program has done and not only just in our school but in the district like really looking at their work looking at what it means to be how to
004service our students who have gifted needs it's been really amazing um she we know that we have a lot of amazing teachers in Clayton and specifically at why now um but Frankie is just above and beyond everything that we you have ever watched um because she is the kind of person that like when you see her teach in her classroom it is like um organized wonder I I it's structured but there is definitely a feeling that kids have the freedom to explore who they are and the leadership leader that they want to be and recognize their voice in all different kinds of ways um which is pretty impressive but outside the classroom she is a change it changes the culture at ydm and I learned very quickly that if she came to my door with
005an idea the answer is yes and how can I support you because her intentions are always about the kids it's about about how can I service the children at wydown how can I make their experience of Middle School the very best it can be so she's been a web leader and instituted that whole transition program with Webb did the training so that now we have a sixth grade transition program her and alongside Jason Thompson and Chris Chisholm she's taken over as Camp assistant director and they've redesigned the entire Camp experience to allow for the team building to be up front instead of at the very last day which was a very big impact on our camp this year um they even designed the covet Camp which was there but needed to be and she definitely
006has just Amplified student council where actually this year we didn't have a student council Frankie came in and then this year we actually had to have like recommendations because there's so many kids that wanted to be a part of student council when they do candy grams we do thousands of dollars in sales of candy grams with Frankie at the end of it working with the kids but then at the end of it making sure it gets done putting on our winter Fun Fest doing the pumpkin right now in the middle of pumpkin decorating contest I mean she impacts every single child at our school and we are so grateful to have her but beyond impacting the kids she impacts the adults um her energy is amazing and her support and positivity even I just was
007talking to Dave Powers just yesterday when we are filling out our educator plans for growth and she sat with a group of teachers and helped them fill out and figure out what to do and how to plan it together and worked as a team she just is a really solid person and that everyone goes to and looks for for that smile and for those wonderful hugs so I am so feel very grateful to call her not only an amazing teacher at our building but also a close friend and she is very very deserving of this award so I want to recognize those Frankie cinepack foreign would you like to see anything oh just um thank you so much I love my work here in Clayton I love all the things that I get to do
008with kids and I love that this is such a place where you're like I want to do this thing and they're like yes like how can we support you it's wonderful to be able to mix with so many different groups of kids um I love them like your kid and I've taught your kid like it's fun to look out and see that and have those connections with the community um and I just I just love the work that I do so it's really I feel really honored so thank you very much well very deserving for sure Frankie and truly well the first time I met you you're obvious you can tell her energy right but she's just so positive and she truly is kids centered when we say kids centered I mean she will do
009anything for our kids and she takes care of the adults as well and you're just such a good energy in the room we're fortunate to have you here thinking I'm so glad you got this honor and it's great to have your family here and I heard earlier just like literally I found out there's some a secret to YouTube that you do competitive dance yes I'm a competitive Sonia sorry also spare time in their spare time I don't know where she has that yet okay well thank you yes thank you again for being here thank you appreciate it congratulations we have the best teachers okay do we have any public participation tonight so uh I will turn it over to Dr Patel great and I think we actually want to start off with the the boards
010right oh you're right okay so I I want to take a minute uh to for us to acknowledge and recognize the tragedy that happened a few days ago at cbpa high school um I know it's all it's been weighing heavily on everybody's mind at all of our schools within the district and I want to remind the board some of you won't hear them but you know back in 2018 we we the board executed a uh gun safety resolution and uh we did that after the the shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School and um unfortunately about four months ago we with with the tragedy that happened in Texas this board uh reaffirmed that resolution um and here we are again today with yet another senseless tragic shooting and so I would um I thought that
011we could go ahead and reaffirm our resolution again and um just have each board member read their seven resolutions contained in in the overall resolution and so I thought we could go ahead and have everybody read one of the resolutions and then get everybody's signature to this the board has reviewed us um prior to this evening I'm sorry I just texted it to everybody so late um and it to the extent anybody wants to read it it'll be available on board docs too um so what I'm going to do is I think everybody does everybody have a resolution okay so I'm going to go ahead and execute and then I'm gonna uh just read we're at now therefore be it resolved that the Board of Education of the school district of Clayton support sensible gun
012safety legislation to protect students and staff including and so I'll have Stacy go ahead and read one and pass it around implementing enhanced background checks for assault weapons including raising the age to 21 to purchase assault weapons okay sorry yes we do we need all sensing one sorry about that I'm trying to start the second one all right so strengthening Universal background checks for the purchase of firearms Banning the purchase of semi-auto automatic rifles and of any accessories for example bump stocks designed to increase a gun's rate of fire foreign four Banning gun sales to domestic violence offenders five preventing access to firearms for individuals who through mental health evaluation or diagnosis could be considered a danger to themselves or others six increasing funding for programs and school Staffing for example social workers counselors nurses
013and psychologists that support student mental health and social emotional well-being and learning the seven providing funding for thorough gun violence research including the collection of data necessary to track monitor understand and prevent the extent of gun violence in America foreign I know everybody was more than willing to sign this and it's been a hard week and um I feel for uh the students at cvpa and our students and the crazy crazy unfortunate events that keep occurring over and over and over again so with that and we just turned it over to Dr Patel thank you um definitely I'll Echo that definitely heartbreaking news since Monday we've also heard a lot from our community our parents our students our staff whether it's via email conversation and you know we all feel the impact in different ways
014so I just thought I would take this opportunity to reassure our community in that we're constantly looking at our own procedures our own processes our own structures in our district to make sure that safety is a priority and I thought it would just take this moment to like really give the community an idea and a review of what we do because I did have several questions asked over the past few days from different community members and so I thought we would go through a few things and so when we think of Safety and Security in the school district of Clayton we really think of three Focus areas we think of Education like what is it that our staff needs to know to be safe we think of it in like a prevention method what is
015it that we can do in our buildings right structurally to keep everybody safe and then the last thing which I feel like is one of the most important things is we think of interactions like what type of relationships are we building with each other so that everyone feels like they belong in the school district so the first one when we think of Education right what is it that our staff needs to know in order to be safe that goes with the training that we do with our entire staff which is state law by the way so our staff gets trained on options-based Intruder response program is based on the 4E model and the E stand for educate Escape evade and engage so we train our entire staff every single year on that and they're trained
016by law enforcement and then we also do Intruder drills with our students can we do it twice a year we do them first semester and then we do them at the beginning of second semester and the Intruder drills are obviously age-appropriate depends on elementary middle and high and how in depth we go with that and it's also includes some of the four e components we may not be in all of them depending on the age but we do absolutely have Intruder drills Oliver pursue and so that's part of like under the education the training umbrella and then when you think about um the physical structures right prevention we did I believe was two years ago we had a comprehensive State safety study and out of that safety study came up a lot of different things
017that we as a district needed to focus on and we invested a lot in that and so one of the things that you've seen now it should be almost every building yeah it is um completed or the safe secure vestibules right there's one single point of entry and so that was completed and then we have we're making sure that our we have a visitor management system now installed in all the schools so if there's someone besides a staff member or a student wanting to get into the building they go we do have a visitor management system where we check their ID do a background check Etc they get the badge they come in um we also have we try to make sure we make sure all the doors are locked in the school building during
018the school day and pretty soon we're actually we've added sensors to the outside door so if a door is left open it should send a text or some sort of messaging to the building Administration we're just waiting for the computer like Hub to make sure that that's completely activated we are also adding something new called the intruder alert response system in all of our buildings basically what that does is I had a push on the push of a button there's one in the hallway and a push of a button all the fire doors in the building close this way compartmentalizing if there was an intruder in the building um and that push of the button even activates 9-1-1 so it's a one system like the entire system goes into it and effect for that um
019all our this was a question I was also asked by one of our parents I want to make sure we mentioned that the question was what about like the first floor Windows you know when you think of Merrimack or some of our elementary school all of those windows have ballistic film film on all ground floor windows so that was something that came across and then of course we have our school resource officers and and the important thing about the school resource officers are not only are they school resource officers there truly are two amazing individuals in our buildings that form relationships and they you know they have a bond with so many they know our kids they know the staff um they're part of the family so that goes all under the prevention physical safety
020umbrella and then finally the emotional safety the interaction this is the part I think that we can completely and absolutely control in our classrooms when we know our students completely right we talk about we want to be a place for everyone we talk about in head and heart are we truly making a connection with every kid and are we making sure that they feel comfortable and they know they have a trusted adult we do the Panorama surveys right so do you really have a trusted adult and We Know by kid who does and who doesn't and how are we going to form that relationship um as we know the Intruder on Monday had a notebook that was left in the car and in that notebook this is a quote this was what he had said
021I don't have any friends I don't have any family I've never had a girlfriend I've never had a social life I've been an isolated loner my entire life this was The Perfect Storm for a mass shooter those were his words and so I keep going back and reiterating the fact that we have to build relationships with our students every single one of them every single one of them so it takes all of us in this community to do that parents students staff all of us so with that I just want to thank everybody you know we've also gotten a lot of community emails just thanking us for doing what we can for our students and it is definitely heartbreaking to see over you know does any do any of you guys have any questions or
022I'm gonna say I'm not trying to put anybody on the spot but to the extent anybody does want to have any questions or say something okay um so the first part of this presentation is sort of a segue from what Dr Patel just talked about and I just wanted to take it take a second to talk about sort of how all the students have responded to this tragedy um the first thing is that the students have sort of responded how you can expect them to um in general you know this is an issue in our country that students are afraid of but it's almost getting to the point where this is like feeling like a normality in like and like this just is something that happens in our country and whether or not we can
023do anything about it like nothing really is being done about this at a legislative level and I mean students are tired of that like they want to be able to go to school and learn and feel safe so I mean just in general the students want these things to to change and I know our student body would 100 be behind the resolution we just signed um in terms of like specifically what we talked about in terms of things that our district can do better um like Dr Patel said we do a great job with prevention and security and um building the relationship so no one feels like they're ever in this type of position but one thing that some students did talk about is how the district can respond when these types of tragedies happen
024elsewhere and what we can do to support our students in the face of like these emotional times so some students talked about how they don't always feel like there's like this super comfortable place in our school where they can just go to talk about these issues and because like we have a counselor's office and we have teachers who we trust but ultimately it feels like going to like I guess for some students it almost feels like school is sort of like their job and so I mean I guess the best way I can put it is like if you guys would go talk to your boss when you're feeling like emotionally in a tough place and so I think just creating a space in the school where people can have a more personal relationship with
025their teachers or staff in general would be really helpful just so people have like a place talk about things which are on their mind just in general and this isn't just specific to the issue of school shootings like just in general just having a place to go to talk about personal issues will be really helpful and also making sure that it's separate of like the academic side of school so that was really the main thing that students talked about in terms of what we think could help um and the next part of this presentation is more about the presentation which is coming up next about diversity equity and inclusion so the first aspect of this is diversity so first we met with students across the district we talked to some people from BSU JSU GSA
026all these organizations and this is the overall feedback that we heard so first I just wanted to take a second to talk about like diversity in our district like as a whole um so the first thing that students brought up was they were a little bit confused about ending the bus program where students from the city would be able to come to school like Clayton um I'm I mean I'm sure there are reasons that this program ended some students just feel like these reasons weren't necessarily communicated as well to students and so some of them just don't necessarily understand why this program ended um I guess they just wanted to make sure like obviously like we know that you guys are always have diversity in like the front of your mind we just wanted to
027make sure that like why these types of programs are ending because this is obviously still a priority for students um and the second uh sort of issue is just a diversity between different types of classes specifically diversity and like the higher level honors AP classes so uh we definitely have seen an improvement in this front like there is definitely better diversity in these classes but there's still like a lot of room for improvement in this area so specifically like some students talked about how these classes need to be a little bit more accessible because in some circumstances it feels like sometimes it's almost on parents and students specifically to get themselves into those classes it would be helpful if you know teachers were the ones guiding this process so that it wasn't really on a
028student or on a parent to make sure that they could get into higher level classes so again just making sure that teachers are encouraging students to challenge themselves and ultimately I feel that we feel like this would have a much better experience not only for those students who would be moving into these high-level classes but for every other student in this class so that was definitely something that we talked about and then the last thing was about the younger grade levels and some students were actually glad to hear that like I'm extensions programs at the elementary schools were sort of sidelined because they talked about how it seems kind of unusual to be separating kids as like as young as first grade based off of like how they were perceived to be doing in math
029classes and like well I understand that like there are reasons to like offer a gifted program to kids ultimately like it might be more important to make sure that students aren't separated on this basis and sort of get the idea in their head when they're like six years old that like these are the gifted kids and I'm not so I mean that was just something that other students noted and obviously it's a complex issue but that was something in the back of their minds uh the second part of this is about equity and like how our policies can be better shaped to represent and to be fair to everyone so the first aspect of this that we talked about was in grading which again sort of connects to the presentation last time they were all
030really glad about the change from the zero to 100 to a 49 to 100 scale and how this has like been shown not just in our district but in districts everywhere that this has very good effects on Equity at school and also they talked about how not mandating homework has also helped on this front but there were a couple questions because the uh in terms of the 49 to 100 grading scale this year at least at the high school there's been like a slight change where now there's like a ins feature which goes in as a zero which essentially means like you just couldn't turn something in and so it goes in as a zero but I don't know like those are always makeupable so something that they were a little bit like confused about
031how this fits into the policy as a whole the second issue that we talked about with Equity is just like the structure of our day and our schedule so a lot of people talked about how Greyhound time was a really good thing because it's sort of like for the students who don't always have like equal access to teachers and stuff outside of the school day this offers like a really good chance to sort of even the plan field so that they have the time to meet with teachers if they like wouldn't otherwise have that time outside of school uh and then the third thing is just what students think teachers can sort of improve on and still continue to work on to make sure that our schools are even more Equitable uh first is just
032to always be aware and adaptive to different and unique circumstances as they do arrive uh arise and secondly is just to really promote Greyhound time to students we talked a lot about this especially at the last meeting how some students like it would be helpful just to know that their teachers like want them there at Greyhound time and just teachers always encouraging students to come would be helpful and then the third aspect of this is about inclusion and we talked a lot about this in terms of how we can like best uh have like a representative staff at our schools so specifically students noted that we needed like a little bit more diversity in our staffing and teachers at school because uh like sort of seeing people who you can sort of identify with teaching
033you in schools is really important and like obviously students understand that especially like with teacher shortages and stuff this isn't like an immediate fix but more like in Long Term always making sure that we're prioritizing diversity in our staff specifically they noted that it sort of seems like these this diversity is more focused and specific uh areas and like certain departments within our schools they noted that like almost all of our like diverse teachers are in like the humanities department and it just seems like in general like but it's like sort of split up between departments almost and like some students noted how they like haven't had a stem teacher of color like their entire time at Clayton and I don't know that just seems like something that we can make sure we're not only
034making sure our staff population is represented as a whole but also as you break it down by department so that you know students don't feel pressured to pick one area over another um and then the last part of this presentation is just about responses to when we reached out to various groups the main group that responded was the Jewish Student Union who talked specifically about like specific changes that we can make to like curriculums and education and professional development so what they said is that they feel we need more content in both student education and Professor professional development for teachers surrounding like teaching our students and teachers about various cultures and just how they can be more adaptive to different students who come from these different cultures and the needs of those students specifically they
035talked about uh the rise in anti-Semitism and different extremist beliefs around America and how it's important to not only teach our teachers but also our students about identifying this sort of extremist content and how they can respond to it because especially when we think about like the profile of a graduate and them being culture actually competent students I feel like it's important for them to be able to identify these hateful and extreme messages and also how they can properly respond to them that was something from JSU and that is everything I have thank you Carter Carter's smarter than all of us I have a question he is you are killing it with this job I just hope you know that Dr Poole and Miss Todd are going to address quite a few of those things
036yeah I was first going to say thank you partner every time you speak I am like so happy you're here and that we even just I mean first of all just have a student representative onto the board but I've learned something from you every time and your Insight to what our kids are feeling is so valuable so thank you um and I had a question actually I guess for Dr Patel Ann Carter is the first part of what you talked about and what Dr Patel done what we can control in these times of tragedy we talked about trusted adults and our counselors I started thinking and you saying it's kind of like a work relationship that you're maybe not from her counselor you know like why not in the high school our students are assigned
037a counselor like based on alphabet or grade and I I just started thinking that might not be the best fit for you when you're in crisis or have a problem or something you know more serious to discuss like if you were going to hire a private therapist you would pick someone that you fit with like your personality and your your needs and so I just wondered and maybe it is like this and I'm not aware do kids feel like or is this even allowed that it's flexible to walk in the counseling office and maybe not talk to your grade level counselor if you're having an issue but you might feel more connected or have more in common with another counselor in there I don't I mean I don't know if there's an answer to that
038but do you have to talk to your assigned counselor I would hope here's the answer I'm going to say I would hope that if a kid goes into the counseling center and their assigned counselor for some reason isn't available or they feel like I want to talk to somebody else that all the doors are open you know and I and that would be our hope I believe and I'm sure the counselors would be doing that it would be interesting to hear from a student perspective if they feel that sufficient is true that's the reality right yeah what I would say is like in general people will usually go to their grade level counselor just because that is the person that they have developed a relationship with but if a student does have like a close
039relationship with a different counselor like I can't imagine a scenario in which counselor would say no to a student wanting to talk to us okay yeah I just didn't want to it's like it's so like formulaic like it seems like that relationship should be more organic but I also feel like the like larger issue is not like having a signed counselor yeah but rather the counselor being the same person who you're like picking classes with and going over grades doing the business part right like you said just having that like sort of separate so I sort of pointed on that as well and so is it you know in theory in the work setting in the professional work setting you may not want to go talk to your supervisor because there might be some sort
040of negative perception associated with you stepping forward and clearly the district makes clear like we'll bring Mental Health Resources you know for you that's fine but is it your perspective that there may be some students that aren't stepping forward to have these conversations because they're worried about negative consequences I wouldn't say it's so much about like a negative perception of stepping forward but rather it's just a little bit more uncomfortable because you know this is just it just feels sort of awkward for students when it's the same people that they're doing all the school stuff with them so is there a concern like if if you go to the grade level kind of what you're talking about it's like you know they're taking care of the grades in your classes you go to that person
041that you know you know maybe it gets back to the teacher what they're saying or maybe it gets back to the parents you know I'm what they're saying and so they I don't know I'm just I don't know how often that specifically happens but I know that to some students it at least is a like in the back of their mind that okay if I do go talk to this counselor maybe they have some legal ethical obligation to tell my parents or any definitely in the back of their mind is it also a perception of skill set so if you go to a counselor who you've only had a conversation with in the high school about what are the best college fits for me and what are my strengths and weaknesses as a student do
042you go to that same person when you're talking when you're having an emotional issue so back to the work you know thing you don't go to your boss if you're having an emotional day right you might go talk to HR if it's an issue with another colleague or another right but but you don't go to necessarily your department head who you so I think that analogy that you used is actually very valuable and insightful at least help me to contextualize it in my own you know day-to-day setting and I can see how that might be um you know that's like a mental leap to to think about going to the same person that you've had conversations maybe for up to going on four years about your strengths and weaknesses as a as a student what's
043your academic course loan should be so that you have all your requirements for graduation you know where were you thinking about going to college and then you know you're in crisis at home or with friends or just personally or whatever the case is and do you go back to that same person I can see how that's right you know a perception challenge both from the student standpoint I almost wonder as mental health and social emotional well-being are coming more and more of the important issue at schools across the country are there other districts that are around the country not even in St Louis that are thinking about Counseling in a like separating that whatever there are crisis and Trauma counselors there that are not at all ever talking to you about what classes you're signing
044up for or college and then you know I just wonder if it's worth looking looking into it I mean I think and there are and oftentimes they're physically located in a different place so to Carter's point about having that you know it's difficult I can see Tony and HR they're going oh you know I don't think we want like a teacher student lounge together necessarily right because that there's all kinds of other potential issues unintended consequences of that but what you're talking about in terms of the separation of um uh counseling skill sets between those types of counselors in other schools what I've noticed is that they're actually physically in different places and even the layouts of their offices are different so you know it's a you know it's much more of like a business
045environment when you're sitting across talking to a to a college counselor versus like a you know comfortable uh like Lounge type of setting in a different part of the like a different wing of the building almost when you're talking to uh somebody that you're going to for help so and I'm looking at um right and she and I have talked several times about this whole idea of Mental Health Specialists here in our district right and so a question for you and then to to continue on this point even the nomenclature that we're using calling our counselors counselors I think from my point of view as a mental health professional is misleading um so something as simple as that saying I have an academic advisor and then knowing there's this whole other group of supportive staff
046called counselors or whatever it is we choose to use is a really nice way to give our district and our kids a mindset I have really good support in my academics and my my learning um that I do here academically and I also have these other wonderful staff and um that are there just for my social emotional means that I can trust and that don't you know there is no none of that conflict that you're talking about so I love all of what we're talking about here and I know Nisha and Robin have been talking about this a lot and I know that we all want to really see improvements here and that we will my question is though in the in the moment do you can you tell me when you are presented as
047a student with you come into high school and you are presented with what we now call your counselor your grade level counselor what are you told that they are there to help you do they mention both academic and social emotional if they do they do okay okay um but in terms of implementation like what they do when you first go to high school it's almost like you don't have to ask your counselor to help you with your academic stuff you do have to go to them yeah and sort of seek out all the other stuff so from the get-go it's sort of in terms of how they like what they actually do when you first work with them it's all academic right they are bogged down with the academics that's what I think too so
048um so what are we supposed to what are do we have an update or so played on our next board meeting yeah I mean I think this you know we can continue this conversation at the next meeting for sure and hopefully you know hear from Robin and you know what what they're doing to what's being done so that our vision that we that we have set forth in our strategic plan um around social emotional health is is being executed upon so I'm excited to hear that all right did anybody else have any other questions for Carter no thank you Carter yeah okay good job okay so we are now on to our course study item which is a place for everything everyone everything everyone foreign so as they're getting settled in um I want to
049welcome Jenny Todd here today she's going to be I don't know if everyone has met her yet but she's our coordinator of equity and inclusion and she's actually the school counselor at Glenridge nice so she helps with all this important work it's been a great addition today thank you nice to have you here thank you all right good evening Carter's a tough act to follow oh thanks for having us um Board of Education we're going to give you a strategic Plan update on goal one of our strategic plan which is building a place for everyone I kind of echoing what Dr Patel said this is Miss Jenny Todd who has been uh coordinator for equity and inclusion who's been working closely with me she brings a wealth of experience and knowledge in helping me and
050us as a district continue to grow in the area of equity she's got experience K-12 as a counselor experience at the district level in counseling has taught Middle School and High School multiple subjects including science including Spanish as well so she can like do everything so um it's been awesome to have her on the team and being a you know bounce ideas and get ideas from her as well so we will be co-presenting tonight and uh and giving an update I think you know this year the work is really starting to feel um extremely real I think coming into the district amidst the pandemic um that kind of battling with all of the issues that come with that um definitely make the work uh challenging and really kind of getting to know the landscape of
051the district and really address what those needs are so now that we're kind of in a semi normal year it's able to really hit the ground running in terms of implementing and as well as really getting a deep analysis and so I think Carter you know touched based on a lot of what we're going to speak about tonight um really focusing on that profile of a graduate we want to make sure that Equity diversity and inclusion touches every aspect so that we make sure we do have a place for everyone our students can grow as Learners and then that that concept of in head and in heart because in order for all of our students to feel valued we have to touch on everything whether it be that sense of belonging um which is what
052we're going to go into next So today we're going to update you on goal one of our district strategic plan which is that we will ensure all Learners regardless of their identity they feel safe and they feel valued throughout their experience here at the school district of Clayton and so we're going to present in three different areas we're going to start with diversity and our diversity initiatives and these initiatives touch on the presence of differences and they can include aspects such as race color religion socioeconomic status gender national origin ancestry even disability age genetic information and even other personal characteristics that we have not made we're also going to discuss some of the equity initiatives that we are currently implementing which promote Justice um so that we can make sure that we have an even
053distribution of resources um systemically and then finally our inclusion initiatives we want to make sure that all of our diverse Learners feel welcome they feel safe and they feel valued all right then one thing that we've been doing especially with our work is really making sure that we tie everything back to our educational Equity policy um and and looking at the different areas that um that we have pinpointed that we want to look at our data um you know annually each semester each quarter um and being able to kind of take a two-pronged approach one being able to look at um the data that we have whether it be qualitative or quantitative but also matching that with a humanistic aspect so as we get the data are we engaging the necessary stakeholders you know in
054the work and in the changes that we look to so now we're going to look into our uh diversity initiatives um starting with the diversity initiatives is our consistent professional development that was one of our you know big mountains that we were looking to climb last year and creating a structure of professional development for all of our teachers that is based in diversity equity and inclusion kind of just recapping through that our year one through year three teachers uh go through Equity professional learning sessions with with me and Miss Todd quarterly but then as we get into your score in years five um really focusing on having teachers picking uh individual Focus that really is focused on empowered learning and individuality with amongst the students and then as teachers get into their uh their tenure
055tracks creating opportunities to where they're able to you know get educational and diverse on different diverse experiences and diverse identities so right now our focus in that realm with our tenure teachers is around you know the experience of our African-American students as well as the experience of our lgbtqi Plus student s well as we continue to expand that we look to uh kind of have three uh three uh categories in which teachers will be able to choose menu items that have to do with race and identity along with culture and one with learning characteristics so for example race and identity would have to do with you know if we looked at a specific race of students or that had to do with race agenda culture would be more so based off of um what different
056cultures are we bring in you know based off on based off of ethnicity or geography and then from those learning um learning characteristics you know specializing in things like you know going deeper into dyslexia or gifted learners and how they are our students will guideps and disabilities so giving teachers an opportunity to choose from each of those three categories and choosing one that they feel needs to be an area of growth so constantly building on that um our place for everyone series that we started last uh last month that the communications team is leading and highlighting a different student or staff and we're really just asking them who they are um more like culturally who are they individually um and being just able to Showcase to our greater community the the first population that we
057have in the district and they're diving in and Carter touched on something that was like you know super on par with the data that we captured last uh last semester so relating our panoraminated to diversity so last semester we adopted the uh diversity and inclusion component to our Panorama surveys that we give with the high school students and we look to do it each spring and then expand that also to our middle school students as well so just to kind of touch on two data points um our best data point and then our worst data point just to kind of give us a frame of reference uh with the question at your school how often are you encouraged to think more deeply about race related topics this was probably the most even category we had
058in terms of 82 responding favorably and everyone being within six percentage points of that so that was something that was uh key as well especially when you look at how it's divided up amongst race but then on top of that what's the next step only 47 responded favorably to how well does your school hope students speak out Against Racism so we're having the conversations and challenging students to think more deeply but we're not equipping the students with the tools in order to speak out against it and in terms of really building up to that culturally competent component and our um profile of The Graduate that's kind of where we need some work so we're kind of halfway there we just need to take that next step with equipping the students with the two week out
059right so now I'm looking at our Equity uh initiatives one thing that's happening as we speak is a lot of revamping of our social studies curriculum um Paul holster who's our social studies curriculum coordinator um has been strategizing and meeting with all of our teachers K-12 in terms of really revamping what our social studies curriculum does how it highlights different identities and making sure that it's putting a positive light on each identity as well as really teaching into that hard history so K through 2 was really building up you know helping students develop a social justice lens and kind of what does it look like in terms of seeing different issues within Society um you know kind of the roots of that and how to speak out against them I know one thing when a
060particular subject that they've been looking at is uh really looking at the Mill Creek community um and how you know the new soccer stadium is right on top of that and really looking at you know what did you know um you know pushing African-Americans out of that area look like in terms of the development of the city and really seeing how those components all come and tie in together so really trying to develop that early glance with students being able to see how Society treats different groups of people and then when we look at three through five uh really preparing our students to get ready for that hard history so part of that is a humanization process which didn't take um or hasn't taken place as much as we would like so really looking at
061diverse groups um under you know what they look like in terms of identity and culture pre-colonialism and how did colonialism have an impact on that so it really kind of tying into those Early times to where we can build a sense of empowerment with those communities and then see how the uh the impacts of colonialism looked once it began and then um at the high school level uh there's a lot of work going on and really looking at trying to make our elective courses um more Equity centered and more culturally responsive uh we're also piloting AP African-American history um as an AP course for the first time this year so that's uh that's up and running as well and I know there was a lot of interest in getting into that course too so a
062lot of work in terms of what that looks like from a curriculum standpoint until our work begins with data data extremely important when we're trying to decide how to best serve our students and our community and so one of the things that we're doing this year is utilizing our Equity committee to look at actual real-time data to look for Trends and areas where we need to focus so we've already started that work with the help of the curriculum Department by pulling some of our academic data so moving forward for two months we're taking a look at academic data both in literacy and the area of math and as a committee we're looking at Trends and then getting feedback and recommendations based on those trends that we're observing after we take a look at the academic
063data we'll then take a look at our social emotional data as well because we want to see if there are relationships or correlations between both the academic data and that social emotional data and each time as a committee we take a look at the data we get additional input and feedback and as we continue to do that by the time the school year ends we're hoping that as an equity committee we can have recommendations that Dr Poole and I can take a look at and help serve the districts better also looking at tier two interventions when you look at a multi-tiered support system to support students again that Equity begins in the classroom and on all of our campuses and so we need to be aware of the data and how those two-tier interventions will
064help support any of the trends that we're noticing and so when we talk about tier two interventions those are interventions that are above and beyond what we already do for every student in the classroom in both the areas of academics social emotional learning and behavior so kind of tying all of that together it's really looking at okay from a Grassroots standpoint how are teachers implementing this on a on a daily basis and how can they grow to incorporate a lot of the same uh mindset and focus that we have at the systems level so here's an example from a teacher in terms of students needing to reach different objectives and benchmarks but not only are we using assessment to drive that but also asking students from a confidence standpoint how confident do they feel at
065each step and like for example on this chart if students are choosing the area in which they feel the most how far up they feel like they can go from a confident standpoint and seeing how that matches up exactly with how they scored on those assessments so really using um you know how they feel in terms of their self-efficacy and how that really matches up with how they're scoring so kind of how this would show up um again kind of going back and forth to seeing where four is uh kind of that's where we think you know we've achieved our objectives um and then five and six would be Beyond and anything below a four would still be kind of striving to get to that level so as teachers are going through each of those
066objectives and kind of using these anchoring charts with their students um really kind of putting it into uh those tiers so if you kind of look at you know once half the students mastered it and then kind of where were they at in terms of their self-assessment in terms of their confidence level so for example if a student was a one that was little to understanding and possibly many errors that they might have had so uh C is for corrected and rs were re-talked so it's kind of given teachers a chart and some data to look at so after we looked through three different um three different objectives we can kind of see some Trends so how are we seeing growth from objective to objective and what does confidence level look like as we move
067from objective to objective as well and are there some things that we need to do more from a systems uh from a classroom level for example if you look at the third one maybe there needs to be some reteaching there before a class as a whole but maybe as we look at the other ones really looking at okay if I only have one or two students that are struggling how can we individualize for them not only incorporate that in our everyday instruction but also give the management that they need individually so really trying to be data driven and kind of linking where are we at especially as we look at self-efficacy you know being one of our Focus points within our Panorama data how are we starting to build up that um that self-efficacy within
068our students at a daily basis and then also how does that match up with dark with that achievement level that we have our inclusion yes so we wanted to share some of our inclusion initiatives with you all um the first one that we'd like to talk about are the community engagement forums um we had one last fall and last spring and last spring there was a huge focus on inclusion equity and diversity and the areas that we took a look at were curriculum access to programming student Support Services sense of belonging and professional learning and it was a great opportunity for community members to come in and provide their feedback in addition it was a great opportunity for community members to Mentor I mean to network and so the second I the second initiative was
069actually born out of the community engagement Forum um because Dr Paul and I took a look at all of the feedback from the night and one of the nights is a lot of our parents would like more of an opportunity to network with like-minded individuals and individuals with similar backgrounds and so that's where the idea of parent empowerment nights come from and we're actually having our first one tomorrow night we're extremely excited it's for parents of African-American students in the district and it's an opportunity for our parents to network organically so Dr Poole and I have created some prompts and some topics for them to discuss if they're having a hard time coming up and and feeling comfortable around each other at first but we would really like for them to have the opportunity to
070have an organic conversation meet other parents from their same campuses meet other parents from different campuses there may be an elementary school family who would like to know what will the middle school high school experience be or middle school parents who have a student who just transitioned to high school and so we want the parents to have an opportunity to have those conversations in a safe comfortable environment and then we're also planning an international family night because a lot of the feedback that we received from the community engagement Forum indicated that a lot of our International families were also seeking that place to meet other International families and have those organic conversations as well foreign then moving into you know different district and campus cultural celebrations um you know I know a lot of our
071elementary schools have been able to get back to like have an international nights and international coffees and things like that um that were kind of placed on hold during covet so I know a lot of programming has gone into really reinvigorating a lot of the um you know the school to school celebrations that did occur pre-covet um and each building is focusing on you know different tasks that they want to do within their buildings as well and then from a district standpoint really continuing to add events and enhance events that we do each year like last semester we did our first event for aapi month and continuously to continue to add on different cultural celebrations that we can do as a district um we were looking at a possible Festival to do during Black History
072Month on a Saturday that would have different events and activities to engage the community during Black History Month as well um and then seguing on to that um yesterday and actually last night and last week I've got I got an opportunity to speak with um a lot of folks within our Jewish Community uh me and Dr kachowski went to the JSU meeting last night and met with the students as well as their as their JSU sponsor and I was able to meet with the um the HAC last week and really talk about you know what the rise of entice looks like um the better support you know our Jewish Community within the district and really show forms of solidarity so had a lot of good conversations with that in terms of different things that we
073get you from a professional development standpoint but then also once we say when to uh you know Jewish Heritage Month as well what are some events that we can do um you know as a district that really affirms that stance you know you know solidarity with that as well um so kind of moving on with that um into like our student support group so have any opportunity to meet with a lot of different support student support groups in the district since I've been in um like I said I've met with the JSU last night and had some great conversation it was just great for me to listen and really learn that perspective in the past we've met with the um of the BSU as well as other student organizations as well just to look at
074what the student experience is like and what we can do and then looking at student support groups on social emotional standpoint so it's looking at our Panorama data and looking at our sense of belonging our self-efficacy and what are some specific groups of students that we can Target even more specifically so this semester we're um we're piloting a group about meets every Thursday during Greyhound time of our African so we have about 13 African-American males actually each Thursday and we bring an outside facilitator named Tony Thompson who has his own company and he does a phenomenal job and really just working on self-efficacy self-empowerment and really um you know creating a safe space an affinity space for students you know to really kind of come into their own and it feel kind of that you
075know closeness that they may not feel on a regular basis I know we have a lot of organic groups as well um with our African-American girls that are ran by different staff members too um and it's looking at you know after piloting the program and seeing how it is how can we now expand into different groups of students and expand it down to the elementary so again that's where we're at um again it all ties back to you know our strategic plan and profile of The Graduate and really giving the students the skills that they need in order to be successful and understanding that in order to do that it's uh you know looking at each individual identity and making sure that we're doing what we need for that identity to make sure that they
076can reach and ultimately that was that was terrific thank you both of you um questions comments go ahead um thank you for being here thank you for all the work you're doing great job presenting it I'm really happy to be the board rep for your committee it's I'm learning quite a bit and I really um respect the way you guys are approaching this and the input that you get from the entire staff and faculty it's just I do feel really good about the direction we're headed and the way that you are being data driven and um so Kudos my question is actually for when we want to do this work and we know how important it is we know that um each staff member that is engaged in this kind of work as you both
077are has only a certain amount of hours in the day to do the do the all this work so my thought for you Jenny is you have two roles you are both the counselor at Glenridge as well as this amazing coordinator how does that work for you on a daily basis are where are you I don't need details I'm just wanting to know for sure that our efforts are um are not being too divided you know among our specifics you know staff I I want to know that you feel you have enough time to do both jobs to the extent that is required just being the Glenridge counselor is a big job um so now you have this other role so what does that look like for you I think that's a great question so
078what it looks like is of course during the day the majority of the time I am at Glen Ridge serving the students at Glen Ridge but what I love about this role is that I could take advantage of opportunities remember we feel that this work begins in the classroom so at Glenridge and I'll expand to the other campuses in just a second I'm able to collaborate with teachers and look at counseling also well I'll talk about that in just a second but collaborate with teachers about Equity initiatives or practices even those conversations about interventions for students who may be having struggles academically or who may need extra support for certain behaviors or even those students that we need to reach who may need um to be stretched a little bit more because they're doing so
079well we want to make sure that they feel that they're part of the class environment too that's Equity um being the coordinator I meet with so many groups in the district whether it be the other curriculum coordinators our new teachers years one through three are career teachers and so being able to provide professional development and that Equity lends when I attend those meetings through PD through shared experiences and interactions so taking advantage of those opportunities is that yeah so you you feel like there are enough hours in in the day for you to be a full-time counselor and to have this role on top of that yes beautiful thank you you're welcome I know you guys have something to say who's next all right I'll go I thought maybe we'd go around the horn here
080so um on the side where you said the next wave of work to do if I heard you correctly is students feeling that they feel comfortable being able to speak out and I was at 47 percent that was the overall so um like maybe you could talk like their goal for like how far you want to get one year from now or three years from now and then like working backwards from that what's what's the plan did what to fill the gap that's a good question I think you know with with adding the uh the questions in last semester weekend and we're just trying to get a baseline on where we are um and this kind of gave us a good you know a good breakdown on kind of where we are and I think
081it reflected exactly you know what Carter was saying um which I think it boils down to making sure that you know our teachers feel confident and being the profile of The Graduate and teaching our students to embody that as well in terms of where our numbers are the oldest that they continue to go up I think with continuing to really work with our humanities teachers especially with the work happening in social studies we're hoping that that has an effect on what those numbers look like as well as continuing to curate and get resources to teachers when there are hot button topics I uh this week and every teacher having that opportunity to really talk about those things and really dig into the nuances um a lot of our professional development focuses on being able to
082have those hard conversations within the class room um so I think we've got a lot of things kind of going you know in place right now so it'll be uh very interesting to see what these numbers look like in this line again um I would like to we don't specifically have a goal like hey we want to be at 55 percent by the screen I think we do want to see a steady increase I think looking at you know what the numbers look like next year will give us two years kind of side by side to really kind of give us you know Direction in terms of where we need to go to really attack ing it so the racial specific number but we do have some things in place we want to see if
083those have a positive effect and Jason just to piggyback on what Cameron said when looking at a panorama type survey and this type of a sample size they have stated to us a three to four percent increase is significant okay all right we'll kind of give you up yeah next question it's all right there's only three you guys have 90 minutes right so in the actual you reference the actual data that the the equity committee is like working through and disaggregating you know maybe you can talk a little bit about both when looking at the academic data and the social emotional data like what's the biggest success that we've can celebrate and then what's the biggest challenge that you guys see I had working through that data or do you even have the Baseline data
084yet yeah yeah so we we have the Baseline data that we're working off of right now um so right now we're looking at uh like I said math and literacy data um so we'll uh October was the first time we dug into the data um um so to break it down October and November are dedicated to academic data okay so for example we're looking at you know like I said math and literacy so we've got Baseline data that's aggregated by race um and really just looking at it from a three-year standpoint uh three to four year standpoint and seeing what do we see in terms of year to year um is there growth and we've got it broken down in quartiles in terms of um you know 50 being a baseline of being on grade
085level on up and then below grade level on the other side of that 50 so really looking at just how those numbers change from year to year so um one thing that we've really looked at is a lot of movement um and high numbers in those limitable quartiles so 50 is on grade level those kids are going to matriculating between 35 to 40 percent and like 60 65 percent and kind of how are we moving the needle with them yeah and I think that ties into our tier two interventions as well because you know kids who are on great level and doing fine the tier one things that we are doing within the classroom are working um we have a lot of teachers um and Specialists and and certified folks who work hard with our
086tier three kiddos who are really struggling but how are we moving the needle with those middle kids and are we seeing which way are we seeing movement and in some in some cases we see moving backwards with some it's um frontwards and I think as we looked at it from an umbrella standpoint one thing that I asked the committee to do was to kind of say okay where do we need to go deeper into this data so if we've got it from an umbrella standpoint do we need to break it down in terms of looking at individual profiles of all the kids who are within 35 to 55 and seeing what they've looked like from year to year what um okay you know um you know do we want to break it down in terms
087of socioeconomic statements do we need to dive into how our students with IEPs are scoring and what their movement looks like so it's like starting from an umbrella and then figuring out from a committee where do we need to go deeper we'll unpack that data at our November meeting and then come up with some academic conclusions that we can draw from that before we move on to uh social media cool and then just you referenced tier two interventions like can you give me just like one or two quick examples of what that looks like Okay cool so tier one would be everything that's class in practice yes so pretty much your universals right tier two would be those kids to where those tier one universals may not be meeting the the cut for those students
088so maybe there's some extra things that they need so one thing that leaf started developing last year is really using our plc's uh within our teacher learning communities to really kind of be that tier true support So as they meet during our professional development days and nearly a POC time they have to necessary data and information they need to say okay I've got these few kids that I'm struggling with in math another teacher may have them what are some things that we're doing because maybe this teacher over here is doing well with them so it's kind of the sharing of ideas for teachers with on their team and then going back to implement those I mean maybe that maybe that looks like maybe a little bit of an adventure from a specialist in that PLC
089um or a counselor if it's social emotional related or so on tier three would be when we go back and Implement those tier two strategies that were discussed those aren't even working so once we get to tier three we need to get more intensive does that mean testing for for an IEP does that mean um some deeper social emotional intervention I need to take place does that mean a specific schedule that needs to take place so those tier twos are okay my first you know for lack of better words back and tricks isn't working what's kind of my backup that I can go to it's kind of economy so uh I have one comment and one question I seem to like to do um but as a as a comment I just want to acknowledge
090and um Express appreciation for the fact that we are in this conversation and talking about the fact that we have a lot of different groups but we're not just talking about the fact that we're diverse we're you know nothing plowed we have Asian kids and we have Jewish kids and we have black kids and we have white kids and sort of just stopping there like you're talking about having these conversations about the specific things that as a society have happened and are happening to those groups and we were talking about displacing communities we're talking about anti-Semitism I I think I don't know if this is a similar experience but I feel like in you know maybe as a as a student myself there was this sort of like we're cool we have people that are
091different here there's black people there's other people and there's you know different colors and so everything's fine just because they are in the same place you know and I I just really appreciate that we're talking about that but we're talking about things that happen to these different groups and and that are that we need to address and giving the place for that and I think that's just construction is really important and it's different somehow so I'm really I really like that you talked about some different things there and that we're that we're doing that so thank you Matt and for modeling that and so the question that I have it kind of goes along with what Chris was saying um you know our job as a board is I think to set these goals but
092also facilitate the things that are needed to implement them and for to make them a reality so are there things are there resources are there are the things that you need or that you are are starting to identify that you need more of to help us really accomplish this goal and what we state that will you know ensure this place for everyone and talk to us about that for sure um you know it's very interesting um yeah I talked to a lot of people who have my same role the role that's completely different per District depending on who you're talking to um and like we said I luckily you know blessed by you all and being committed to the work really being able to really do the work and really expand on it and look
093at it over multiple Avenues I think as we continue to uncover more then we get deeper and deeper into the work those questions will be answered like you know a year ago it was just me up here talking and now you know we have Miss Todd here as well contributing to the work too so I think as the work continues to expand and we continue to dive deeper and deeper and really like you know solve a lot of you know the inequities that we have like how definitely uh we'll definitely be able to pinpoint you know where those needs are I think like I said right now within this year kind of being the first non-covet year so to speak it's really given us an opportunity to dive deep um and I think once we're
094able to assess um you know what those specific need areas are you know like for example with the um what the student group we're doing with the African-American boys at the high school that was something that you know we didn't have the capacity to facility rate Outsource for that um to provide that experience so I think it will probably pop up in the uh you know it'll pop its head up you know through the uh you know through like individual programming and things like that um so that certain people aren't stretched too far um and you know we're able to be super specific you know so I think time will tell us we continue to move forward I just I think I want to also just clarify that in asking that question I um just
095speaking for myself I expect to hear some like we need this from you all because I I don't think we are doing everything that we need to want to do from the starter we wouldn't be we wouldn't have this all of this as a as a focus so um I think you know I I want to hear what that doesn't mean we're going to do everything or be able to do everything um support every everything about my expectation is that we've been after some time here so you know we really need to do better at this it's this thing or that that funding or whatever whatever it is so I'm not asking that hoping you'll tell me oh no we're fine you don't have to worry about it but that's that's what I but yeah
096for sure um and that's something that we appreciate as well knowing that you know it's not a you know we don't have to have a level of fear in asking yeah you know knowing that I definitely gives us the confidence um thank you both um the presentation was great and the work you're talking about doing I'm so impressed with and I think you two are such a good team like I can tell you have complimentary skills you know like to help each other out with the work I just had a couple comments one was about like what you just mentioned the the group of African-American males at the high school that gets together with the outside facilitator I think that is such a great first of all I think you you said it was maybe
097you had you hired an outside facilitator just to not stretch anyone too thin but I actually think that's such a great idea going back to kind of what we were talking about with Carter earlier that those students can probably be less inhibited just in their conversation that it's not a staff member from the school so I actually think that's a really great idea whether that was the intent or not I mean I could see that working all kinds of all of these groups of students without it being a teacher or someone they have to go see later in school where they might be embarrassed and not really be as open and honest with I think I think that's a great example of that and also I love that you're doing these parent and power I
098love first of all that you're calling it parent empowerment groups or whatever but I think that is such a key piece to this the parents feeling a sense of belonging in our district as well as the students and it when you said it came out of the um Community engagement Forum it actually made me remember from that last Community engagement form that I happened at one point talking with a parent of a transgender student who met another parent of a transgender student whose students were actually in different I don't want to offend anyone because I don't know if I'm using the right term but different stages or phases of their journey through that and so I just like it was so great to see that they were leaning on each other anyway so I'm so
099happy that those ideas came out of those events and I I think that doing us with our parents will only trickle down to their children and make the whole family feel like they belong with just self work so great idea thank you go ahead so thank you guys thank you for the presentation thank you for all the work that you've done on this so far um I think what would be great for for me and maybe for others on the board is it sounds like you do have some baseline data for that disaggregated data if you could share what it is so that the next time that we talk to you we we know where progress is being made and where progress is stalling out um and then the other thing that I would say
100is you know as you look at the academic data as you look at some of the SEL data there's stuff that those numbers are just never going to reflect which I know you guys are painfully aware of but um I've heard you say that there may be another way to cut the data in terms of socioeconomic status but really asking students the kind of questions and getting feedback from Carter here is the stuff that will help inform why maybe some of those numbers are the way they are especially when you're looking at the math and literacy scores for example how many students are getting support outside of the classroom doesn't matter how much professional learning we're doing with our teachers if 50 70 20 I don't know what the number is of students are getting
101additional tutoring in subjects that parents say of the some parents some families have the abilities to pay for outside of the classroom so that's one of the things that I would you know say is something that probably deserves a little attention the other thing is when we talk about um you know a place for everyone especially when it comes to the high school or as a secondary school to maybe include the middle school and some of that now a lot of students spend time doing things outside of the classroom where some of this professional learning isn't taking place with coaches with drama um you know professionals with uh with Orchestra with band with whatever it is that their interests are inside of the classroom and you know we have the privilege of being a district
102that allows any student to make any club that they want provided they can get you know an executive sponsor in the form of a teacher and I can't under emphasize how much of an impact for example a coach can have on a student when you have an athlete in the high school that's spending 10 hours a week or more with an individual coach what happens on and off that playing field in terms of that coach's communication to the athlete in terms of that team's interaction with other teams at other schools in terms of some of the less than Stellar interactions that occur between teams and how those coaches deal with that and how the teams deal with that whether they deal with it at all I mean those are all things that impact a kid's
103sense of belonging in our district and I think that it's an area that you know we haven't really spent really any time since I've been on the board talking about but now that I do have kids in the high school um I can see that has a big impact um and a lot of these things that happen in terms of a kid's sense of belonging happen outside of school but at school affiliated events so I don't know how we figure out how to incorporate that stuff in but I think given the amount of time again that some of our students spend with coaches with other teammates um it's something that you know we should think about and in the you know during the Middle School ages when my kids were younger too A lot of
104the incidents that happened in terms of negative incidents based on race also occurred outside of the classroom whether it was on the playground whether it was after school you know a lot of these things happen outside the washable eye of our teachers in a formal classroom setting and so I don't know I don't have a solution for how we try to capture that other than talking to students and giving them a safe place where they feel like they can talk to other adults about that but um but it's a big part of the work that you guys are doing that will never get captured in professional development if we only focus on the teachers that are in our district so let me respond to that so um the first portion of that as we dive
105into the data and we continue to like get deeper into specific groups one of the next phases of that so if we're looking at a group of students um within a certain identity group being within a certain you know percentile of scores bringing them to the table in terms of what their experience is um and referencing back to the equity policy in terms of once we have a good feel for you know our data humanizing that data and reaching out to those individual groups or individual students or families to really give us a full picture so that is a part of the process we're just not there yet in terms of identifying what are the key groups in stakeholders we need to bring to the table to have those deeper conversations um and I'm glad
106you brought up the the part about Athletics and stuff you know being an ex-coach um and actually you know um meeting with Steve Hudson a lot over at the high school and I know he's Incorporated different surveys that have to do in terms of belonging and disaggregated with a lot of his coaches as well to make sure that you know not only that they're feeling a sense of belonging not only on the team but on the field and that they feel supported I've met PD just with coaching groups um because again like a lot of what we talk about in terms of equity coaches do they put players in the right position um to be the most successful based on the strengths they coach different players differently maybe harder on one player but you know
107more softer with another to make sure that they can reach their goals so coaches embody a lot of the work that we're doing um I totally agree with you and like I said me um myself Steve Hudson and uh we've had these conversations actually my um and I can share this data with you as well my uh dissertation that I wrote before my doctor was based off uh participation in athletics um and uh extracurricular activities so what I did was I pulled data for Clayton for that I took three graduating classes and I broke it down into GPA and ACT scores and I divided the kids up by race socioeconomic status and IEP status and we also looked at them kids and zero activities one activities or two plus activities and then looking at those
108numbers across any demographic across any identity the more activities kids were in the higher their GPA GP um I could have looked at that and you know next to Panorama data and different things as well but for sheer time and just trying to get that dissertation done acted out but there is a correlation with that and Student Success that's why so we talk about that sense of belonging and having those conversations um and I've sat down you know with the drama and Fine Arts programs at the middle school and the high school in terms of potential barriers that you know don't give equal representation of who we are as a district and different recruitment tactics to um you know to use to have a more diverse population with that and kind of looking at what
109those access points are so a lot of those conversations are happening um and and my bad for not sharing that um I was struck with all the stuff that happens on a daily basis but a lot of our teachers and our facilitators and our coaches are you know dedicated to that we've had those conversations and a lot of levels at the middle school at night that's good and I can incorporate some of that data information in the next report okay that'd be great um and then last year I remember you had reported I think together with Malena on it might have been a different pan around the survey but there was definitely a question in there about sense of belonging and it dropped precipitously from elementary to middle school and then it dropped again from
110middle school till to high school so we did have a baseline last year did you guys ask that same question I appreciate that you guys gave us kind of the bookends of the the highest percentage response and the lowest percentage response that correlates to you know there seems to be a gap year but last year there definitely were questions in the student surveys about sense of belonging and I think we all Express concern about how it seems to be very high and Peak at the elementary school and then drop as they go into middle school and secondary school and so did we ask that same question has it gotten any better has it stayed the same so what we did with that is actually look at why that is so um and again stemming from
111the you know the community engagement to the empowerment night and asking those specific questions a lot of folks were talking about how type knit things at the elementary school thrown into the middle school and they're disconnected from friends and they don't have a familiar teacher and everything is new and it takes time in order to kind of get the hang of things they want to get the hang of things they go into high school they have to do it all over again so one of the number one things that we got was how can we create opportunities for people to build those networks so when they when they matriculate on to the next level those relationships are already kind of built which is starting with these empowerment nights and kind of expanding from that creating
112more opportunities for parents to get together district-wide so that you know when kids do get together they already have kind of that that relationship so a lot of that had to do with you know elementary schools being tight-knit if you were kids being with the same teachers things like that and then you know like once they get to middle school things just kind of expand you know I so create an opportunity so hopefully especially as we target the data and look at specific identity so we can kind of see some correlations that this work is working um to see if we need to work harder okay so we have anecdotal evidence from the um the community nights we have but we didn't ask that question again is what I'm hearing in this latest survey so
113that we have the difference we are not the exact same question and I'm actually looking at the data we just we closed the window for the Panorama data recently so Robin is still desegregating it okay from the time they presented it we had given the spring version yeah um and it was steady last year so it didn't get better or worse yeah okay because it was 73 at the elementary school that had a sense of belonging at the secondary it ended up being we ended the year at 58 at the middle school and 49. that's yeah and that's what I remember is that it just it got you know yeah it it just it dropped it just drops and so I knew it was something that we talked about well we need to figure out
114why I think we figured out maybe some of the why is what I'm hearing um but it doesn't sound like we've hoping that this fall the most recent fall data gives us a different picture have that by Next by the next board we board meeting we would be I would imagine and I could be wrong that from the spring to the fall we wouldn't see much jump right just because spring and then we hit the summer and then they come back and do it for the fall and they really haven't gotten sure you know into the group so I would think our best our best bet engaging would be fall to spring or to Spring to Spring you know year to year coming around and being able to see whether you know we're great that's
115it okay Jason Carter thank you I was waiting on you [Music] um that was great thank you thank you thank you okay so we are why don't we take a short five minute break in the bathroom and talk about our policy policy all right go see this chair these chairs are low yeah swing my legs pull it right up all right this is how many hours Jason if you want you can actually sit on that chair and put your feet on that chair I know I know right it didn't give me a cover yeah yeah we have like the high top tables too like for flexible seating for professions [Music] all right let's do an exercise ball next time yeah there you go we do that for questions [Laughter] all right include support let's talk
116about our Capital Improvement projects um and that's actually an action item yes so should I read the motion yeah I move that the Board of Education authorized District staff to proceed with engaging Design Services for the projects as presented with a goal of constructing these projects during the 2023 construction season it's been moved and seconded questions so has everybody had a chance to look at this so because if you haven't it might be or if you've only spent a little time looking at it and John spent a lot of time together with Nisha kind of putting this all together and it's um it kind of captures stuff that uh I believe at least is valuable and necessary Investments to complete some projects that we actually had already communicated to the public that are done but
117they're not really done done is the way that I would put it so um and they're the types of projects too that are pretty visible so um you know there's a they go a long way towards the the you know the continued kind of brand the Clayton brand The Branding of Clayton the the whole perception that the community has of the school district even if they no longer have kids in our district or have our you know have kids that could be coming into the district so I mean I don't know John Misha do you guys want to add anything else no I mean just so everybody knows what these improvements are we're doing some I'm going to be doing some amazing things to um as as a field and uh and to gayfield which
118is we're going to the Press Box I know I know the coaches are really excited about the Press Box um they're gonna uh make our locker rooms super super cool and have proper ventilation um and uh which is gross that they don't today already no no um so I could speak to Isaac Guild a little bit yeah um because before I was on the board I was very involved in that the fundraising and that that project um all of this was supposed to be completed right um everything that's mentioned here the Press Box and the dugouts and I think I think are they field too no um the Press Box was going to be two stories the pas top and underneath would be I think maybe bathrooms and a concession stand and the dugouts and
119then just for financial reasons shows the things that were most important which was first of all the true feel the new lighting the new scoreboard um but Asic field as you all probably remember was not solely funded by the district we solicited private donations from community members and corporations so to Kim's Point people that donated who were donating for the project at the time and then kind of halfway through the fundraising I think it was then quietly maybe just decided or announced that there phase two to kind of finish it so people donated money thinking that this is what it was going to all look like and that there would be a phase two completed at some point in the near future so yeah there were rendering there were renderings for all of it I
120was saying that we because of the economic Arena specifically because of the prices of these these materials have gone up tremendously right yeah is that what we're talking about yeah at the time I think that it just didn't raise enough money yeah but this was this was 19 20 to 19. it was right it was like could have been 17. but we raised the money during that time then we started then we started the project before Sean Lowe yeah yeah that was because the cost of the project was higher than expected of course it is the amount of money that was raised and not have enough contingency to cover everything that was envisioned right and sold to the donors um and so this is the uh this is what was envisioned that is still left
121to be done right how much was it again how much is it we have to get this freakedown it's what's left I mean it's we we don't know the answer to that but I think it's somewhere what's in here what was not built was estimated around it probably was a good buy compared to today's pricing yeah so for these two projects now the estimate without actually having them that John has put up is between two and three million so but that's a total you know Swag until we actually get costs so it's not a request to go do these projects it's a request to go get estimates so that we can decide to decide to fit these projects so but I do think that these two projects again are pretty high profile they were promises
122made but not yet delivered in some cases especially with respect to adsec um and then I don't know how much time I think all of us have spent some amount of time at gayfield whether it's you know through the Merrimack like Elementary end of your parties and or you know I know you don't have kids yet in the middle or high school that necessarily use the fields but um uh you know gay field compared to other high schools of our size and whether we have our stature is pretty yeah so you know I mean it's one of those things where you know as we're investing in how much do we have like sitting around of that money that was raised that didn't go towards these projects is there any money left over or is it
123all just pretty much a zero yeah we do have money for Capital Improvements that we raise during like property and prophecy that are earmarked for Capital Improvement so there is there is money available for Capital Improvement projects and these are two that have been identified where we might want to spend that money once we figure out what it costs to do this so that's really what this is and I think this goes back to um something what you were saying actually earlier Kim with Cameron's presentation our kids spent so much time not only in the classroom when we take pride in that right like our facilities in the classroom and the resources but they spent so much time on the fields in activities and why would we not have the best facilities yeah and it's
124the reason that we often aren't chosen to host like you know District events or Regional Regional events I mean a lot of stuff is going to Ledoux a lot of stuff is going to other schools and and we're not getting opportunities to do that and part of it is because of the state of our facilities right so and I would say to your point about being high profile like adsic isn't part of Shaw Park and Clayton Rec Sports also used it they do there's maybe an opportunity to have this maybe I'm maybe I'm crossing a line yeah or some property developer I mean I do know we rent it out we do I think make money like does fat bonds still use it for baseball you know we do makes a very popular rental site
125right and now because of the turkey yeah we do rent make money that way yeah it's a part of our public city park so it's like it is like to your point high profile the district but just to the whole Community yeah question though for Nisha is I assume you have like either a mental or an actual list of capital Improvement projects across the board through all of our buildings and facilities and I'd love to know like one how did you choose these two right now to focus on and two maybe like what are some of the others and how did you prioritize which ones we should look at first so I John and I actually we really have been having these conversations for a while now in terms of capital Improvement plans and really
126just creating like a five-year timeline of that and for me since I would say last year these two have been high priority especially um just finishing up adject field and then gay because that truly is a community like events are held there when you think about homecoming alone right we have alumni that come back and again it's that emphasis on Athletics and activity that I've had from last year last year and talking to Steve Hudson and our coaches it's it's an area that we need to improve we really do and so that's why I tended to go more over here and then the other projects I know John's been talking to Jim Burnell as well John I don't know if you want to expand on the list or the plan moving well additionally the construction
127environment today is so different than it was pre-coveted and timelines are just way longer labor shortages supply chain issues we're still finishing up projects from this past summer so I don't want to miss the next construction season in 23. these are projects that are Anzac field is far enough along and we can I know we can build it the other one I think we can get ready and get it built as far as projects that can be achieved for next year these are two of the Clippers they're high profile but they're not that big right and a lot of work's already been done on one of them so I think we can do that everything else we're looking at would be longer so we really need to start planning that really for this next spring
128and stuff to look at what's going to be and before buildings season and not to jump the gun on like you know committee updates but it's one of the things that we talked about with the uh with the finance committee when we met and our goal is to bring them a comprehensive list of those projects that could occur 24 and Beyond when we meet with them again in January so um we'll just it's great please say yes to this yeah so let's do it all right all in favor all right any opposed motion passes and now we are on to um our employee benefits renewal I move that the Board of Education approved the insurance providers the plan designs benefit summaries premium rates and District contributions for 2023 as presented and authorize District administration to
129execute contracts to facilitate these employee event second to imagine seconded questions or comments all on paper new post um thank you all right so we are on uh our second reading for policy BHA which is board training and development Board of Education approved policy AAA for training and development for a second reading and approval second we should imagine seconded questions all in favor all right a new opposed and we are now on our first reading of policy gcbda all right good evening so I have uh we're going to put policy gcbda and g d b d a together essentially there's same policy one is for professional staff and the other herbs for support staff but other than that it's the same perfect um so the policy being reviewed is gcbda professional staff short-term lead and
130gdba support staff leave msba is added leave for victims of domestic violence or sexual violence is required by House Bill 432 this leave is being informally referred to as victims economic Safety and Security Act also known as vessel employees who are victims of domestic or sexual violence may use this unpaid leave for court appearances counseling medical attention and other services related to being a victim of domestic or sexual violence employees may also use the sleep if they have a family member or someone in their household that's been a victim of domestic or sexual violence so just so your for your context we did implement this at the beginning of the school year it's part of the requirements of our staff receive so everyone has this has already been in place so it's just now in
131the policy to match what our practice has been if you have any questions regarding these two policies I just have a question maybe it's more one for our board counselors here was this never part of like Federal FMLA or any type of other this wasn't covered there I guess I was just surprised at reading this that it wasn't already covered by other family medical leave act or other you know areas it it may have been but this is state law new state law that was passed and so our policies whenever the state whenever a state has a new law that impacts education then we have to make sure to update the policies so that's kind of I think where we are with us but it's a good law yeah I mean I just I unlike
132some of them that are passed most right I mean it seems controversial and also if you want to see how someone could be I could see them yeah not really with the program here on this yeah some of this stuff I just yeah oh I'm all for it I just was surprised that it's you know yeah and what about uh attorney policy I ICC sure next policies policy iic iicc with school volunteers um msbas revised this policy to mandate that screen volunteers undergo a criminal background check by the school district before they are left alone with the student the screened volunteers defined as any person who assists the school by providing uncompensated service and who may be who may be periodically left alone with students screened volunteers can access student education records only when it's
133necessary to assist the district and while supervised by staff members a volunteer who is not screened cannot be left alone with the student or have access to Student Records msba assumes that a volunteer that a volunteer who is not screened means the volunteer has not undergone a backbone check and essentially we talk about the background check to this level to be a screen volunteer it's the same exact one that you have to go to to be an employee which requires fingerprinting so pretty much most things that we traditionally think of as a volunteer would fall into this category so if you're going on a field trip you have the potential to be left alone with the student or a group of students right so that would be the full-on background check if you're volunteering regularly
134and you get your child's classroom that would fall into this if you're going in for your students start of the week or you're doing something to present on career day that would be different so there's different parameters but for most part it is a screen launcher we already have this in place we did this a couple years ago with some other policy updates we're just getting everything caught up we've had this in place in practice we've had this in placement for practice for I believe at least three years it's also been a little unusual with covet because we kind of stopped all the volunteer any questions about this policy and one sure um is there also like sort of training that goes in a background check and does that come into the policy as well
135sure so they we have we have our own procedures for that and then what they do is they sign off on some of the mandated training that we are required to have all right um nobody has any further questions and we will move to move on to our consent items I knew that the Board of Education approved the consent agenda 9.02 through 9.07 but all in favor aye any opposed and now we are on to our financial report I move that the Board of Education approves September 2022 disbursements in the sum of four million ninety thousand four hundred fifty five dollars and twenty seven cents it's been moved any questions all in favor can you opposed so that's approved and now we are on to board Communications I think there was a Kim already mentioned
136the finance advisory committee yeah Jason you want to update the other stuff we talked about or John go for it I will say John put together a really nice meeting we had it was very well attended and we had a we had a really good discussion the meeting was slated to go for an hour I think we actually went for an hour and a half and the time flew by um the community members were very appreciative of the topics that we discussed and John you can maybe get an update on the things we discussed and I think we're actually going to be bringing something to the board soon upon the advice of that committee so we talked about enrollment Trends Revenue trends fund balance Trends we ended up talking about fund balance policy made a
137recommendation that we will bring to the board once they must be a good topics I will add that uh I think three of the community members that are on the board have been on this committee for like five or six years it sounds like yeah even longer than that yeah so it was really nice to have that institutional memory because nonetheless had yeah none of us combined right right it was very productive meeting and we're looking forward to seeing them again and they said it was nice to be asked to be met with without them us needing something um which is maybe a good um uh life lesson or takeaway is that regular engagement with community members before we need them for something and listen this community I believe is always going to show up
138when we need them for something but they did appreciate that we were there not asking for hey we think we have another bond issue around or hey we think we might need this or hey we think we might need your influence here it was really hey you know we'd like to have some discussions about some Africans that we're seeing get your input get your expertise figure out if you've talked about this in the past um you know it was it was it was a really it was a great discussion so that truly were thinking Partners we used to get a lot of updates about the fund balance I haven't heard much about in a while I guess what I used to always struggle with and I used to go back and forth um was just
139like what was the rhyme and reason how we did right how we actually come up with the fundamentals I've never understood it yeah it wasn't like definitive it should be yeah yeah yeah so we had a we we had exactly that discussion we talked about um you know what's a what would be a reasonable type of fund balance is that if we were going to try to set one as a board and implement it as policy which is actually government Accounting Standards recommendation for Best Practices we don't currently have one so that's what as soon as we have the language in place we'd like to bring to everybody here for consideration and the committee supported that too but as part of that we um I can commit to you Jason and to everybody else here
140who's interested in that topic because it's you know so exhilarating um that uh John is an excellent teacher and will do the best this is teaching Aids on the side Jason and I had helped to try to bring the board to an understanding of what the fund balance is how it's calculated why it's important um and why we should you know all understand it so we can be able to communicate it because when we did a prop e the fun balances often utilized it was it was I was I was getting beat up a little bit yeah I was just like I don't understand yep how many utilize it and there's no way you know what I'm saying it's not you know so yeah it'd be great to understand that yeah I didn't rehash property
141I'm joking it's a joke the more we can make it more accessible the easier it is when you're actually asking them for something but also just right well and the goal is and again I don't want to um you know give you any I don't want to steal the plot from when we come back to you and and have a more robust discussion about this the goal is for us all to be educated but also to have the plan in place so that it's not an emergency the next time and and it's part of educating the community because it's very unlikely I would say it's impossible if we have you know inflation the way it is for the next five years in a row but it's very unlikely that um we will need to go
142out to community to the community anytime soon with another um request for funds right but we want to have the procedures in place so that whoever is sitting in these seats five years from now 10 years from now 15 years ago whenever it is that next time occurs that there's something that triggers that so that it's not the same like type of I mean I'll just speak for myself it's not the same type of fire drill that we experienced the last time we went out for property where it was like you know we gotta have this and we gotta have it now and then just like you said we took a lot of flack for it because we didn't have time to get the community on board if we start having a regular discussion about
143it it starts being you know part of you know we review policy here I think we're required to once every yeah a couple years two years um that uh you know it'll just it'll just become hopefully part of um maybe not every day nomenclature because you know we have such you know uh enthralling turnout in terms of people who watch these meetings or come to these meetings before or after but we'll have more people that know about it we'll have at least the seven of us plus the seven additional people that are in this room all the time to know about it plus the next seven of us that are on the board you know five years from now that know about it and you just start to build a critical mass so that the
144next time it's not such a knife fight in phone booth what is this question I could have better understood strategy wise yeah I know we want to do as a field and the other project but I know that costs are high you know in interest rates are high and but there's it's going to come down so strategically when it comes to I'm just thinking about in my own business I have to think strategy wise is it a good time to do construction is it a good time to buy right and I but I know it first quarter of 23 second quarter for sure good ease monetary the the ease rates uh prices will come down on things so if we will will that reflect in our strategy to build in 23 or will we be
145paying these high prices if we commit to something let's just saying by December at right now for this project I just want to make sure we're not we're not spending money we're going to be wise to hold off for a year I know we want it done but as far as it wise to do it now this is just me thinking if I'm a critical business standpoint my crystal ball is as cloudy as yours I mean I I don't know how to predict the future so um my anticipation is that generally over time as time goes by prices rise so while there may be some chance that they decline in 23 or 24 I can't guarantee that and so I don't really even try to factor that into my thinking about scheduling something like that
146you know it's hard for me to time the market but we would have I mean we're just deciding to to get information at this point we would have another decision point where we would right conclude things like that I'm not trying to derail as much it's a really good thought and Jason what I would say is after we get an idea of what the cost is then we can figure out who we want to do it and as you know once you there's different approaches to that you can fix you can have some variable costs and then some fixed costs so when it comes time to trying to decide what we're comfortable fixing and what we're comfortable leaving variable you know we can we can we can have that decision uh at that inflection point
147um but yeah I mean I'm I'm same as you and John that's cool it's cloudy but for whatever we can do to try to be intentional about what we should fix and what we should leave variable I think we could do once we know what the size of the nut is not we I appreciate it so that's good the only way that dialogue at the table yeah yeah you know look I don't want to get the weeds I'm not I'm not uh not the treasurer excellent move on so great um what else anything else anybody wants to talk about tonight um I would just quickly I did so privately but I just wanted to publicly um thank Dr Poole and Dr kachwski for going to the JSU the Jewish student union meeting last night this
148club meets at 7 pm at a Starbucks it's not like you know necessarily easy it was an effort for Dr Poole and Dr kachowski to go out of their way to meet with these kids and um I know that they all felt really good to be heard just to discuss like anti-Semitism Rising anti-Semitism and to what Carter's brought up before how we handle the Jewish holidays and what they liked that some teachers did or didn't do so um I just want to publicly thank them for going out of the way at night on an evening to meet with this club of kids and just listen to this or maybe it's easier also to meet at a Starbucks at night but I mean back to what Carter talked about you know sometimes easier to talk to
149work colleagues about stuff outside for the students but like yeah for the students for sure I mean for Dr pulling Dr kachowski to come out at night and go meet I should have said this stuff earlier but sometimes it's good to listen and not always talk yeah but I just want to say this I think it would be kind of cool if you know if students in the JSU right if they invited other students like their friends who are done they actually they're actually were students who were not Jewish that's cool that's cool and then like same thing with the clubs that are for African-American students like if they invite a friend to come and just like sit and just listen so that that's a great conversation yeah it's a great way to have it
150for them to have a perspective on what's happening in these kids world because I know I agree my son happened to be African-American yeah surprising and I'm not sure if they if they discussed these type of things all the time yeah so it'd be kind of cool if like you know it wasn't the the same kids all the time other kids yeah so well like I know um for example my son had gone with his friend to the FCA Fellowship of Christian athletes meeting earlier in the day yesterday so that friend went with him to the JSU meeting last night so just to your point exactly like hearing you know from different kids and I know there's a lot of non-jewish kids actually that regularly attend the JSU meetings but but I think it's great
151that's a good point that is all right shall we adjourn yes I move that the Board of Education concerned we're adjourned sorry guys