Board of Education Regular Meeting No. 1532

001the Limber Schools Board of Education meeting number 1532 is now called to order. Uh and just to make a comment in order to follow the St. County Department of Public Health 2019 novel Corona virus order for business and individual guidelines for social distancing and reopening. The number of patrons in attendance currently here is limited. Uh but the meeting is livereamed and may be viewed by the public on the district's YouTube channel. Uh we'll move to 2.0. Dr. Lake, do we have any changes to the agenda? We do not. Okay. Given that, do I have a motion to approve the agenda as presented? So moved. Second. Motion by Kathy, second by Matt. All in favor say I. I. All right. Motion passes. 70. At this time, uh we will stand if able for the pledge of

002allegiance. I aliance to the flag of the United States of America to the stands one nation indivisible with liberty and justice for all. All right. Thank you. All right. We'll move to one of the fun and exciting portions of the evening, which is our special recognition. So, I'd like to introduce Dr. Michael Strapman, the principal of Truman Middle School, who will present those recognitions for us. Mike, good evening. First of all, I want to thank the board of education for allowing me to speak tonight on behalf of Truman Middle School. Tonight I get to talk about four amazing members of our school over at Truman. First of all, I'd like to talk about our 2020 Truman Middle School teacher of the year, Mr. Greg Greg C. Grag Grages. Greg teaches seventh grade social studies at

003Truman and has been an influential part of the success of our seventh grade team and countless of countless students. His ability to build relationships with his students is second to none. He also provides many fun and engaging ways uh to teach in the classroom. Greg is a supportive colleague who is always willing to help others. Greg, thank you for your service to Truman and our entire community. Our second person tonight is Mrs. Carrie A. She's our 2020 Truman Support Staff Person of the Year. Carrie is our library building assistant. She has been an integral part of the positive climate in the library and launchpad. She greets students and staff by name and is so welcoming to all. Besides her typical library assistant duties, Carrie is someone the staff and students trust. You'll often see her

004taking time to connect with students, she's a wellrespected and we're lucky to have her in the library. Her infectious personality sets the tone for the building for all relationships with students and staff. Carrie, thank you for prioritizing relationships and supporting our school. We also get to recognize tonight two amazing students. They're both with us tonight. First off, I'd like to recognize Jessica Wheatley. She's an eighth grade student at Truman Middle School who is a stellar student, excels both both academically and through her leadership. She has maintained exceptional grades her entire time at Truman Middle School. She is also a wonderful ambassador for Truman as a member of our flight crew, which is a student leadership group that supports the character growth of our students. This year, she took on the task of designing, pricing, planning,

005and creating t-shirts for every member of flight crew. She also came up with the idea of creating a weekly activism book talk that is shared every Monday in flyer times. Jessica is a true leader among her peers as well as our entire school. They respect her and look up to her in many ways. Jessica has a very bright future ahead of her at Lindberg High School. Thank you, Jessica, for all you do for Truman. Our last student tonight is Ma Mac Saunders. Mac is a member of our flight crew as well, which is our student leadership group and has been for multiple years. His leadership and positive, fun-loving energy also brings happiness to our school. His personality is contagious. He always has a smile on his face, even under his mask, and is a true

006leader at Truman. This year in flight crew, Mac has volunteered to help the pep rally challenges and give tours to new students. He has also promoted the community project to his peers and can be seen in the district-wide promotional video. Every morning before school, you will see Mac greeting students in the hallway. He is a true leader among his peers. Mac, thank you for all you do for Truman. I just want to say one last thank you for allowing me to speak tonight and share a couple of wonderful people that uh we interact with on a daily basis at Truman and make Truman such a special place. Thank you all for being here tonight and congratulations. It's great stuff. Congratulations to all the uh recipients. There's great stuff going on at Truman. Um, that's I

007love seeing that part of the meeting for sure. Uh, we'll move to 4.0, which is special recognitions. Oh, I'm sorry, 5.0 consent resolutions and commendations. Uh, we do have two consent resolutions this evening. We have 5.0101, which is the teachers of the year that were recognized, and 5.0102, support staff persons of the year. So, do I have a motion to approve the resolutions honoring the teachers of the year and support persons of the year as presented? So moved. Moved by Jen, second by Mike. All in favor say I. I. Opposed. Motion passes. 70. Uh, now we move to 6.0 and this is the citizen comments regarding agenda items. Uh and I believe we do have one regarding an agenda item which is the EAB contract. Um let's see. Will we include that as an agenda

008item or not? EAB is um it's on the consent agenda. Consent. Okay. All right. So that we'll have you come up whoever signed up for that. We'll have you come up with the non-aggenda items uh towards the end of the meeting. Uh so we'll move to If I can get my papers to go here. Sorry. What? It's not. It's on the consent. Yeah, that's fine. Okay, we we're going to pivot here and we're going to have you come up barely sour. You can come up if you want to speak on the Please give your name and address as you come up and you can speak on that item at this point. But no, it is we thought it individual item. It's on the consent. It's on the consent, but we'll we'll do it at this

009time. So I would like more information on this contract. Okay, thank you. And just to uh refresh everyone, we usually keep the comments to 3 minutes or less. And we don't respond publicly to any comments made here, but somebody from uh administration or the board will reach out to you directly after uh this meeting. Um so given that we'll move to 7.0, which is communications. We'll start with the calendar of events. Mr. Secretary. Yep. Thank you, President Chamia. Appreciate that. Um, not a lot going on. We're finishing up the school year. So, there's a strings concert, elementary strings concert on the 13th. There's a middle school spring concert on the 18th, all via YouTube. So, it's kind of nice to sit in our jammies and watch the concerts. High school graduation is the 26th. And

010as I've been reading through principal emails or enotes, it looks like each of the fifth grade um elementary students will have a parade. The middle school eighth graders will have parades and then the high school will also have a parade towards the end of the year. So I think that's really about it. Kind of summarizes it. Okay. Uh 7.02. This is where we have a report of meetings. So, any board members who have attended state or other meetings, parent group meetings, any district meetings, anything uh related to the business of the school. Uh now's the time to discuss those. Anybody has anything? Didn't have a lot. Just a couple celebrations which was nice to kind of be present and celebrate um through National Honor Society and looking forward to graduation in person stuff. Anybody else?

011Okay. Um 7.03. We don't have any announcements, so we'll go to 7.04, 104 which is to review the upcoming meeting agendas for the board. That's back to you. Um it's coming up the meeting the agendas for the Do I read through it? You just pick out highlights if you want. Okay. There's anything. So sorry. Sorry. Matt asked to help train me and I didn't understand what he was saying. So on June 8th is our next regular meeting and it looks like let's see if there's any highlights. Um the GR I don't we'll go over CIP plan um facility use rates um go through meal prices budget adjustments um we will honor the graduating class um um support person of the year teacher of the year not anything terribly exciting is that good anything I missed

012no okay good up. I think that'll work. Thanks. 7.05 is in reference to the board of education member appointments. So each member of the board does serve on various committees. So each year the Lindberg board reviews the committees that board members serve on. Um and our list of committees obligations and that what they're responsible for are available in board docs if you'd like to review the list. and board members will submit their committee choices uh to the vice president, Jennifer Miller, and then we'll get our assignments for the upcoming year. Uh so that's 7.05. 7.06 is the MSBA board report. So we will now watch the May uh MSBA report. [Music] Hello everyone and welcome to the Missouri School Boards Association's board report for the month of May. We thank you for the opportunity to

013share some news and information during a few minutes of your board meeting. We begin with a look at this spring's Missouri assessment program testing. Because of the impact of the CO 19 pandemic on schools this year, the state board of education decided to continue with the annual MAP testing, but suspend the use of assessment results for accreditation and accountability purposes. Commissioner of Education Dr. Margie Van Divven told those attending MSBA's recent legislative forum, "It's important to use the assessment results to determine where students are academically as we emerge from COVID 19. But what we're hearing is that kids are actually doing okay so far on some of the reading that they're at least maintaining. We want to do better. We're focusing on literacy, but they're maintaining. Where they're falling behind is elementary math because of

014those discrete math skills that are very challenging to do at home. A lot of so in particular, uh, families are more comfortable picking up a book and reading to kids and engaging in those just like we just said, our teachers are. Uh, and so some of the discrete math skills, look at that in your districts. Look at that in your data right now and let us know how they're doing because I'm concerned about that. Van Divven says it's important to know what was effective for Missouri students during the pandemic, where inequities exist, and where to apply resources. The MAP testing window is open through May 28th. Meanwhile, school districts in Missouri and throughout the nation are making decisions about how to use significant new funding available through the American Rescue Plan. Part of that new

015law includes 7.1 billion dollar to help close the digital divide in education and give school districts flexibility to meet local needs. In Missouri, it's estimated that as many as 23% of students do not have adequate internet access at home to allow them to do school work online. The National School Boards Association is asking the Federal Communications Commission to distribute the new federal funding through the current -ate program. NSBA's chief advocacy officer, Chip Slavven, told those attending MSBA's legislative forum, the money will help provide devices and internet connectivity to students, teachers, and others. It's a complex, complicated problem. Um, but it is not one if you hear, you know, if you hear of a legislator or a member of Congress saying, "But we just gave you 7 billion, so we fixed the problem." I can assure

016you we have not fixed the problem. We It's a help. It's a it's a blessing to get it. It's going to it's going to make a difference for some students temporarily, but long term, this has got to be a key part. We're talking about school infrastructure and we're talking about equity that we focus on closing this homework gap. NSBA is emphasizing to the FCC the very different challenges public schools are facing with the digital divide based on their location, economic situation, and other factors. and that no one solution works for every school district or community. If you were just elected to your school board last month, congratulations and welcome to schoolboard service. You're probably aware state law requires new board members to complete 18 and a half hours of training in your first 12 months

017of service. MSBA's free certified board member essential training is approved by the state board of education to fulfill that requirement. A member of the Holden R3 Board of Education and a member of the MSBA board of directors, Georgia Gar believes it's important for newly elected board members to participate in the training as soon as possible. I think one thing that uh is important to know is that we've all been to school and so we believe that we know everything there is to know about school. But the reality is is being a schoolboard member is really a an involved job. And to do it right, you need to understand the law. You under need to understand your role. And you need to understand that everything you do needs to be guided by what's best for kids.

018You can complete 10 and a half hours of training online and attend virtual or in-person interactive sessions for the remaining eight hours. See the MSBA website for additional details. MSBA's Igniting Great Ideas Summit is set for June 18th and 19th in Springfield. This event features a wide range of topics and speakers related to schoolboard leadership and current issues facing boards of education. We'll also be holding our June delegate assembly at the summit when delegates will be electing statewide officers for the coming year. Every MSBA member board is entitled to have at least one voting delegate at the delegate assembly and we urge your school board to be represented at this important meeting. You can watch video interviews with the candidates for state office posted on the MSBA website. Registration information on the great ideas summit

019is posted on the MSBA website. Also, mark your calendar for the 2021 MSBA annual conference in cooperation with the Missouri Association of School Administrators to be held November 5th through 7th in Kansas City. The event will once again feature more than 100 sessions and workshops, many presented by school leaders from districts throughout the state, all in a new location in downtown Kansas City. In addition, MSBA's Center for Education Safety will be presenting its annual Safe Schools and Colleges Forum on November 4th, also in Kansas City. Get the latest information and guidance on school safety issues for those who govern and work in K12 schools, colleges, and universities, as well as law enforcement officials. That's it for this month's edition of the MSBA report. Thanks for allowing us to have some time at your board meeting

020and so long from Colombia. [Music] All right, we'll move now to 8.0 under special reports and this is cabinet updates where the cabinet members give us updates on the committees that they had. Uh we'll start with Joelle with facilities and finance committees. Um we had our finance committee meeting last week. That meeting always precedes the board meeting where a group of um members of the community um meet to go over board items and the bids and um ask questions about finances. So that happens the Thursday prior to each board meeting. Our facility meeting, um we had our last one, I think I reported that at the last meeting. So that won't meet again until September. Sure. The HR advisory meets also um on the Thursday before each board meeting, excuse me. And uh each month

021we go over the personnel services report uh for the month. We also reviewed um CO 19 data uh as it relates to our local area. Um good news trends all going in the right direction, going down as was um mentioned in that meeting. So uh we'll have our monthly meeting again in June. Thanks. that I was in that meeting and that was encouraging data that we were looking at for sure. Uh we'll move to Tara who has three committees student life, teaching and learning and technology. So, in the last month, we've had each of those board advisories have met teaching and learning reviewed our process for elementary ELA um materials and how we are going to go through the process of narrowing down those selection of materials, look at developing an impact study, how we're

022going to um have those resources available within each of our buildings for universal feedback. We're able to collect some input from the advisory members in order to help us build the rubric in the selection of those materials. For our technology board advisory, we really focused on the transition of K5 iPads. So, as you know, this year our elementary students have had a mixture of Chromebooks and iPads depending on the grade level. And as part of our technology impact study, we are rolling out K5 iPads going into next year. So, had a lot of conversations around take-home policies, getting feedback from the advisory as to what is appropriate for students to have accessible at home and what um needs to stay at school. And so those conversations are ongoing. As a result of the feedback from

023the group, we've surveyed teachers as well to get some further information before making a final decision. And then our student life board advisory really um delved into what we needed in terms of a mental health, mental wellness hub, um what we need to put on our website to ensure that our families have access to resources um at their fingertips and and who to contact for for support. I also want to point out that in our July board workshop, we are going to focus our conversations there around our work with equity. We have reached out to Floyd Cobb and John CrownAppapple with Core Collaborative who do the work belonging through a culture of dignity and they're going to join us for part of that meeting and then that'll set us up for further conversation about how

024we continue our journey. Thank you. That's great stuff. Thank you. And those board workshops are open to the public just so everybody knows. Um, and we'll stay 8.02 I think with Dr. Sparks with the uh curriculum update on technology. Yes. And just as a reminder to everyone in the audience when we are doing a curriculum update tonight and for the board, not only are we doing are we presenting this live to everyone here, but we are also recording it so that it can be shared out in parents. So keep that in mind as the presenters are are sharing tonight. I'm excited to share with you our technology integration work. Um, as you know, in 2018, we partnered with Barry Dunn to do an assessment of our technology services and really evaluate what um what what

025struggles we were having and how we could improve our technology integration in support of student learning. So, tonight we have three members of the teaching and learning team who are going to share that journey and what has happened since then. We have Colin David, our blended learning coordinator. We have Dominic Jaggy, our executive director of technology. And we have Jill Lawson, our executive director of assessment and student services. So I welcome Colin up to start. So there were three major themes that emerged during our technology audit that we conducted in 2018 2019 school year. These findings helped us formulate a clear vision and a plan to bring the ideas you see before you on this slide to life. The audit helped us form and execute a plan to increase student device access, hone in on

026best practices to support student learning, strengthen our network and infrastructure, and the final piece digital wellness emerged during our work on the above three ideas. So in the 1920 school year, we conducted an impact study in grades 3 through 12 across the district. Teams of teachers volunteered to use one of two devices for roughly a quarter. Once the quarter was over, the team switch devices to continue the learning. For example, if I had Chromebooks in the first quarter, Dominic would have iPads. During the conclusion of the first quarter, our classes would switch devices. That way each class had enough time to truly dig into what the device was capable of through the whole entire uh time we were teaching our units and our chapters in our classrooms. At the end, we surveyed our staff to

027and students to see what device would fit best at which level. Our precoid plan was to provide one device per student in grades 3 through 12. But uh one of the valuable lessons that we learned during the pandemic was to rethink our distribution plan. We pivoted and now our plan was to expend to extend the one device per student all the way down to kindergarten. During the 2021 school year, the students in K5 used an assortment of iPads and Chromebooks in their classrooms. Our timeline for the 2122 school year is for all K5 students to be on the same platform for all K5 students going forward will be using the iPad for learning. So the keys to making this plan a success can be found in these four professional learning areas. To make a deep

028impact in learning, we need a comprehensive professional learning plan. We begin with our campus growth by implementing ambassadors or canvas ambassadors of the high school. The big idea was to grow our expertise across the departments to make sure we address the learning needs of not only our staff but also of our students. We have participated in face-to-face and online conferences to learn new techniques on how to personalize the learning experiences using this platform. Throughout the PM pandemic, we hosted countless one-to-one and small groupoup sessions which allowed us to go deep to individualize the needs of our staff. Next, we are deploying new designs and using blended learning techniques to address the needs from our latest student survey. If we transition to Apple in 1920, we began our partnership with Apple Professional Learning to bring their

029coaches to our campus. From that day, they have been helping us leverage our iPads in new ways. For example, using numbers for students to collaborate with interactive notebooks that serve as a portfolio of student learning. Another would be clips. This fast tool enables the students to communicate what they have learned by showing and telling exactly what they have mastered. And then Chromebooks. This year we partnered with Microsoft to help us strengthen our use of OneNote. Think of OneNote as a notebook with superpowers. This notebook allows teachers to push and pull things from a student. Think of it. A teacher has the ability to add a video right in line with their math notes, empowering the student to look back for assistance long after class. The same students then can add a short demonstration video to

030their notes, allowing the teacher to see their thinking. We added one, we added Wii video which allowed our students the ability to create their own video of documentaries. This year by pairing Wii video and online video editing suite and the documentary process, the students had two ways to show mastery of their learning targets. So technology staff, soon you will hear about the new hardware and software we've added this year alone. Every every deployment is paired with technology staff training so we can make sure that we're use utilizing new tool the new tools to their fullest capacities. We want to have a safe learning environment for our students. So in the next few slides we're going to go over some of the things that we've implemented uh to help protect our students. The district uses Google

031Workspace for education, so protecting access to those accounts is critical. This past year, we implemented two-factor authentication on all staff Google accounts. This adds another layer of protection that drastically reduces the chances for someone to gain access to their account. In addition, any staff member that chooses to have their Lindberg account on their phone is forced to have a passcode on that device. And with all the students having devices and all those devices logged in with their limb accounts, we want to make sure any software that we push to the devices is FEA compliant and any information the software may collect is used for school purposes only. We purchased Ed Privacy to help vet the software for compliance. Ed Privacy reads through the privacy policies for compliance and gives us a software score. As you

032can see with this picture, we put in Zoom. If you type in Zoom, it'll give you a compliance report for that piece of software. So if you see it says a furpa thumbs up, if we get that thumbs up, then we can push that out to the student devices. And in addition to that, it will if with a click of a button, we can post that to our district technology website. So that way it's viewable for all parents to see what kind of software we use. Next slide. Uh we previously only had filters in while at school and when we transitioned to every student having a device, we installed securely filtering software on all student devices to help protect them from accessing inappropriate sites. Now the same filters that are applied at school are also

033applied while the devices are at home. These are the categories that we're current currently blocking with some exceptions for specific educational websites. As you can see on the these are the categories that are currently blocking and uh as you can see on the bottom right we have games under review that came from our technology committee. They were wondering if we should still consider games to be blocked and so we'll still discuss that with our technology committee and maybe we may um unblock that while the students are at home. Uh this slide shows some other features of securely that we use to help protect our students. Securely auditor scans communications for instance of instances of nudity, cyber bullying, suicide, and violence. When securely detects one of these instances, it sends an email notification to a building

034counselor, the building principal, and select district administrators uh so they can have a conversation with that student if needed. Security 24 is a Securityly 24 is a team of specialists that monitors flagged activity 24 hours a day, seven days a week. So when Securely gets a flagged alert, they will evaluate the context of the words along with recent searches of the student and websites visited to determine a risk factor for that student. Depending on the risk factor, Securly will email, text, or call Lumber School's administrator until they get a response. For extreme risk, security will call the police for a wellness check if they are unable to get a response from the district administration. So far, we haven't had that happen yet. Lastly, securely home was rolled out to in January to parents. Parents have

035the ability to download the Securely Home app to view their students online activity, get notifications for flagged activity, and get weekly reports on their students online activity. The next few slides will go over some of the improvements we made since the technology audit. The audit exposed some frustration students and staff had with inconsistent Wi-Fi and difficulties connecting to our network. This was considered a critical priority for us given that we were making plans on rolling out devices to all the students. We evaluated and quickly realized the current wireless was not giving us the results that we wanted and we started evaluating the Aruba Aruba wireless. We were attracted to Aruba wireless because some of the features on this slide that makes the wireless more reliable, the increased speeds and the self-healing features make it more

036reliable. Um, we tested Aruba at the high school and received positive feedback. So, we made plans to roll it out to the rest of the schools. We will complete that roll out uh this summer, finishing with the elementary schools. In order to avoid downtime and frustrations that go with that, we implemented a new monitoring system for our critical equipment. This is a dashboard that is on a TV in our office. It gives us real-time status of our critical equipment. typically um typically and what you see on the screen is everything's in green. However, if we have problems or if there's uh increased activity, those uh that equipment will highlight in orange, letting us know that there could be a problem. We can go out hopefully fix that problem before people realize that there's a problem

037that's even existing. And if it's it can turn red and we know that there's a piece of equipment down, hopefully we can get there before school starts. The audit also recommended that we get a cyber security assessment every year. Since we are a member of MONET, they offer this service as part of their membership. This year we scored very good on the audit and they gave us some suggestions on things that we can improve. We have already made improvements to those suggestions and we will continue to make improvements to our security and performed these assessments every year. In addition to those improvements, we imple implemented a new secure wireless system this past year as we rolled out devices to all the students and staff. We also removed some older firewalls and transition to newer firewalls.

038This reduced our entry points into our network, making it more secure. Since fishing attacks may be the biggest threat to our network security, we purchased Copence. This software simulates fishing attacks for training purposes. It gives us statistics on how many users are clicking on the links and entering information. Users that click links are redirected to a training page that shows them how to recognize fishing emails. We have sent three fishing emails scenarios over the past four months and each one gradually getting harder and harder to recognize and we are still able to reduce the click rate from 35% to 10%. This slide shows some infrastructure upgrades we made to make sure that we stay ahead of the demand on our network. We upgraded our internet connection this year from 1 gig to 2.5 gig and

039we will upgrade it again this summer to 4.75 gig. Also, we have equipment in that has the capacity to go to 10 gigabits per second. So, we can easily just up it to 10 gigabits per second if we need that. We also are installing new caching servers this summer that will also be 10 gigabits per second. That will help the performance of our network. We also move some of our servers to be hosted by the vendor. This makes our network more secure while making the services more accessible from outside the district. We will continue to weigh the cost benefit of these hosted services and make the change when it makes sense. We have improved our own hosted servers to be replicated every 15 minutes to reduce data loss and downtime. And we are making more

040changes this summer to hopefully eliminate the downtime or reduce it even further. Hello and thank you for the opportunity to share the work that our digital wellness group has been organizing this year. So our students, excuse me, our work with digital wellness is an important part of our whole child journey to ensure that students are leaving Lmberg not only equipped with the necessary content level skills but equipped with those success skills that are paramount for our students lives. So our digital wellness framework is unique in that it captures what is really important, students doing the right thing. So the framework is being developed and presented to the board tonight. It focuses on five different digital behaviors. Being inclusive, informed, engaged, balanced, and alert. And each of these components illustrate what citizens do on a daily

041basis, both online and off. So each of these um components captures what we really hope Lindberg students will know and be able to do before they graduate, such as be inclusive. here. Students are open to multiple uh excuse me, multiple viewpoints and respectful and empathetic with others online. Being informed, students are evaluating the accuracy and validity of digital media. Being engaged, students are using technology for civic engagement to solve problems and do good in the world. Being balanced, students are prioritizing um time and activities online and off. Being alert, students are being safe and creating safe spaces for others online. Next slide. So the framework focuses on the dues for digital citizenship which we are calling digital wellness and our work is anchored to provide students with the support that they need so we can

042teach them what to do and then give them an opportunity to practice and reflect on those expectations. Next slide. The committee is in the process of creating grade level appropriate expectations that align to the digital citizenship framework. So this is an example of a kindergarten draft that we want to post and share with you tonight. So as you can see this is just a draft and definitely a work in progress but there are many areas um where the work is already happening and we just need to put it in one place. So our committee is seeking input from librarians, counselors, health teachers, grade level teachers, parents and students. And we are laying out this work um that is happening in these five areas so we can um determine opportunities where there's coverage and opportunities um

043for or excuse me where there's areas of coverage and also opportunities to grow. So we will continue to work on this digital wellness um framework over the summer and share updates with the board along the way. Any questions on the work regarding technology integration? Just want to point out digital wellness wasn't originally in our um assessment of technology services, but obviously it's something that as we use technology more and more with our students, it's a it's a priority and it's one that we want to make sure um that we do in conjunction with families. There's a lot of transfer that happens outside of the school environment when we're talking about digital use. And so finding a way to have digital wellness be um a school home connection is really important in our work. And I

044I would just make a quick comment that audit that we did, you know, in that first year that I was here is really serving as that blueprint for us. And I think it's really important for you as a board and the community to see that we're using that to guide our work and making sure that we stay focused on that. And you think about Wi-Fi uh dependability and security and all of those things three years ago to where they are today. Dominic and his team and Collins training with staff and Jill's work around this is just I mean it's it's really good. I mean that's all I can say is it's really really good and we are um as good as anybody out there and as safe for our kids and making sure that they're

045protected and giving them and teaching them the skills they need. So good job team. That's really really impressive. Good job. I was just going to say thank you also. And then in the principal's newsletters, can they do a little blurb about that? Is it coins? Is that what that thing was called? The coence with the fishing training. Yeah, that came up actually in one of our board advisory meetings that parents probably need that same like opportunity. So, um, one of the things that Beth and I are working on as we go into next year is, um, some rotation of things that are very purposely put into those principal enotes that address digital wellness, fishing, because fishing would be part of that alert component of that framework, especially just at the senior level when you've got

046the colleges and things like that, knowing what to look for and not. Thank you. Any other questions? All right, I'll echo that and say thank you to the technology team. I mean, there's a lot of work that goes into providing, maintaining, and making sure the proper usage of of these technology devices. So, uh, it's appreciated. You guys do a heck of a job at it. So, thank you. Uh, we'll move to 9.0. We have action items by consent. We have items 9.01 through 9.16. Uh would anyone like to remove any of these items for individual consideration? Okay. Hearing none. Do I have a motion to approve the action items by consent 9.01 to 916 as presented? I have a question for clarification. Before we go on, do we have a motion and a second first

047and then we'll go to a question? We'll go. Yeah. Okay. So moved. Motion by Kathy. Second. Second by Megan. Okay. Now Mike the discussion and I know Tara you and I have had conversations over this and you know as we've discussed even in the technology committee uh at times but I have a lot of concern over you know how we survey students what we do with the data where the data ends up going that such data is secure um and I just wanted to for clarification for anybody else here too uh does This contract involve any type of surveying of students. EAB is strictly a research partner. So we are not you they do not offer surveying um services at all. We use them for um when we have specific projects that we need deeper

048research on in order to evaluate. Um and then they also do national um projects over the course of long periods of time. So for instance, two years ago, they had a large long-term project on mental wellness with a lot of professional learning that they sent to us to support our journey. Um they also um that same year did a full segment on principal professional learning and how to support prof uh principal development. And then we also contract with them when it's time for us to do. For instance, digital wellness is something I just as asked them recently to pull national research on and they were able to give us best practices regarding that to help us in our work. So their input was used for the digital wellness which we just went over. Correct. Yeah.

049Okay. Good. All right. Thanks. Thanks for clarification. Thank you. Any other questions or discussion? Yeah, let's be clear. It's not a survey, it's a research. And so basically, when we have topics and we want to know what best practices are out there, we use them to help us because, you know, our team is limited. So this is like instead of paying a researcher six figures to do it, we pay this company to do that research for us to make sure that we are providing the best service for professional learning and best opportunities and programs for our kids. That's what this is about. And didn't we use them too when we were looking into full day kindergarten? I believe we used handover on that one. Correct. Yeah. Yeah. Same type of We had two for a

050while and we're narrowing it to to one partner for the future. Yeah. So, we had handover and EAB and we to see which one met our needs the best and we're going with EAB and dropping off handover is what we're doing. Yeah. Okay. Anything else? Okay. Uh so we'll vote now on a motion to approve the items by consent. All in favor say I. I opposed. Okay. Motion carries 70. Uh 10.0 O individual action items. We do have three of those on the agenda tonight. We'll start with 10.01 uh which is school start times. Dr. Sparks. So, as we shared in our April board meeting, the school start times task force has completed their work and made the recommendation to adjust times. Um we did have a handover survey that was completed by over 3,000

051of our our community members to give input on that. And so the final recommendation from the task force as a result of that input was to move to an elementary start time of 8:55 um with an end time of 3:45, retain middle school at the 7:40 to 2:40 time period, and then move high school to 8 to 3:00 p.m. daily. So that is the recommendation that we have before you tonight. All right. Thank you. Uh, do I have a motion to approve the shift in school start time scheduled to begin in 2021 2022 school year as was presented? So moved. Second. All right. Motion by Matt, second by Christie. Uh, any discussions or additional questions before we move to vote? Um, Tara, how long did the task force meet? Like when was their first meeting

052and how often did they meet? We met every couple of weeks starting March 5th, 2020. So, we started meeting right before and then continued those meetings through um through the original lockdown and then um finalized the survey in the fall. Um waited for that process to to go through and then surveyed uh families, students and and staff in January. And then who what type of people comprised of the committee? It was uh we had teachers, we had students, we had athletic the athletic director, we had our director of community programs who would support Flyers Club. Um the gamut of of all of all um members. So um trying to think who else I'm going through my mental models of who else was on the on the committee. Teachers, parents, administrators, transportation was also involved. Transportation

053was also Yes. Thanks. Um Terra um just again just briefly thumbnail sketch of the results of that survey um you know overwhelmingly supportive definitely um when you look at the proposed survey compared to the current stat I'm sorry let me rephrase when you look at the proposed start times um 58% were either found that very appealing or appealing compared to 30% who did not the remainder would have been in neutral Um when we look at the current schedule, it was 39% of families finding and staff um finding that appealing or very appealing and 39% who equally found it unappealing. Um where we start to see some differences in that data is at the elementary level. Elementary was much more neutral in the data, meaning that um for the most part, the level of appealing versus

054versus unappealing was almost identical with a slight um increase in the appealing side. And the concerns that we've heard from that have been really more around um you know, students getting home a little bit later because it does extend the end the end of the school day and some concerns around um before school care as well. Right. Right. Okay. So overall it was uh supportive. It was more or less a split out at the elementary level. Correct. Okay. Thanks. And even with middle school not not changing times, middle school was highly in favor. And I think that's because I mean again I'm I'm making an assumption here. They're seeing that high school on the horizon is something that they would be in favor of making that change. I think it also had to do with

055the busing because by starting high school after middle school, the bus will be running a little later instead of 6:40 in the morning. I'm glad you brought that up because that is a that is a big point to this because some of the feedback has been middle school is not even changing. How is this benefiting early adolescence? And the reality is that the bus the entire bus system will move back in the morning. So there will be more time for those students as well if they ride the bus. That's good. Okay. Anything else before we move to vote? Okay. Uh so, uh voting on the motion. All in favor say I. I. Opposed. All right. Motion carries. 70. Uh 10.02 is the Southwest Food Service Excellence Contract Renewal. That's Joelle. This is a annual renewal

056for our food service vendor. Um, our management team that provides resources and administers our program. Um, note that the district still owns the program that we just hire them as um, a resource to manage that. all of the revenue for the program comes to the district and then we pay them back for the expenditures. We went out to bid for that. Um and it's a 5-year bid. We can change that um prior to five years. That's why we bring this to the board annually to based on service um the renewal for the next year. Um, so this food service program is a $2.5 million program within the district and the increase for their administrative fee. We pay a cost per meal. Like I said, we pay all the expenditures for the program and we receive

057the revenue and then we pay as af um a cost per meal. So participation drives their um revenue. Of course, this year everybody's had free meals. So, and there hasn't been much revenue because of the COVID, but um their escalating clause for this year's is right under a 4% increase in their management fee. And we are pleased with their services. I am very pleased with their services. Okay. Thank you, Jo. Um, so do I have a motion to approve the renewal of Southwest Food Service Excellence, also known as SF, uh, contract for 20 2021 2022 as presented? Second. All right. Moved by Mike, second by Jen. Uh, any discussions or questions for Joel? Okay, we'll move to a vote on the motion. All in favor say I. I. Opposed? Okay, motion carries 70. Uh, back

058to Joelle for 10.03, which is the first student transportation, the annual contract escalation. Yes, this is also a service for the district. Um, it's about 2.3 to $3 million a year um for transportation to the students in our district. This um service is bid every 3 to five years. We have a current contract with annual service renewals. So, we have five-year rates with um coming to the board annually to renew their service services based on performance. Their escalation clause for this year is a 3% um rate increase. And um we've been doing a lot with transportation, working on a lot of efficiencies and um first student has been right alongside us along the way. they've participated in in many studies that we've been doing for the last few years. So, I would recommend approval. Okay.

059Thank you. Uh do I have a motion to approve the 3% annual escalation rate increase for services provided by first student for 2021 and 2022? So moved. Moved by Kathy. Second. Second by Megan. Uh any discussion or questions on that particular item? All right, we'll move to a vote on the motion. All in favor say I. Oppose. All right, that also carries. 70. Uh 11.0 uh reports. For the record, we have four items for the record. Uh 11.0101 is the rights and responsibilities handbook uh which falls under Terara. 11.0102 the special education program evaluation also yours. Uh 11.0103 0103 the CIP the comprehensive student improvement plan uh that's the first reading under Dr. McKenna and 11.0104 is uh the compass that the the cabinet tracks. So uh those are all for the record. If you

060have any questions you can reach out to individuals responsible. Uh we don't have any other reports or review of any policies. So given that we'll move to 12.01. This is why a lot of you came this evening. Citizen comments regarding non-aggenda items. So uh this is the time we'll hear those comments uh regarding Thomas that were not on the agenda tonight. Uh when I call your name and forgive me if I don't get it exactly correct. I'll try my best. But please come forward and restate your name, give your address, uh the topic you wish to speak about. And remember that um if somebody's already spoken specifically on the topic you're addressing uh we ask that you uh bring something different uh and uh not uh sort of repeat that what has already been commented

061on. Just be cognizant of that. Commonets are limited to three minutes. So um Jen here will have a card that she puts up when you have one minute time remaining. So, we're just being aware of everyone's time and we try and limit it as best as possible. Uh, definitely just uh try and be as civil as possible in in here and we will not comment publicly uh to your statements, but somebody will return uh uh response to you from the administration or the board. Uh so, we'll start with Mary Core. My name is Mary Core. I live at Do you want the actual street address and everything? 1311. What's wrong? Yes. 1311 Samoa Drive, St. Louis 63126. So, thank you for the opportunity to speak this evening. I wear several hats in this district, but

062I'm here tonight as a parent. I have had a child in this district every year since 2005. I have seen great progress from Lindberg in regards to equity and diversity, most notably in the past three years. As a mother to three biracial children, I couldn't be more grateful for your commitment to all children. Recently, there has been a lot of media coverage on race and if anti-racism should be taught in schools. We are all aware of the battle happening in our neighboring districts, and I'm starting to hear the same fear from parents in this district. I am here to speak for the many parents in this district, myself included, who support this work in our schools, and who feel we will be doing a huge disservice to not only our children of color, but all

063of our students. I grew up at a time when we were taught to not see color. Slaves were referred to as workers in textbooks, and Martin Luther King Jr. along with the Civil Rights Act, put an end to unequal treatment. This seemed to serve me well. I saw the world through rosecolored glasses and because of that I was unable to appreciate or understand the struggles and life experiences of someone different than me. Fast forward to when I had my first child. Those rosecolored glasses no longer served me well. Yet, I didn't even know what I didn't know. I made some terrible mistakes. My limited understanding of how every fiber of America's fabric is interwoven with white dominant ideals prevented me from understanding how my own child might have different life experiences than me. Thankfully, my

064child had some amazing teachers in this very district, who knew the importance of talking about race, who understood the importance of representation in books, who did see my child skin color and all, who validate validated my child's identity. My firstborn still recalls how her first grade teacher at Crestwood Elementary introduced her to a book where the main character was black. She is 21 now, but still remembers her excitement. My oldest child has been my greatest teacher. And I owe that in part to some of the incredible teachers in this district who knew the importance of doing their own anti-racism work and then brought that knowledge into the classroom so that each child felt seen and understood. Just as reading and math curriculums involve evolve and improve over time, so should the way we teach our

065children about their history. I could argue that the racial divide we see in our country is because we have had the mindset of not seeing color. And by by doing that, we have failed to look through a critical lens and address barriers that were purposely put in place to hold people of color back. The misguided idea that we are teaching our white children that they are bad or should feel shame is simply false. Are German children not taught the horror that was the Holocaust because it would make them feel bad? That rationale seems ridiculous to most. When my youngest came home after talking about Rosa Parks and said she would have been the only one in her class at the back of the bus, I wasn't angry and she wasn't scarred by that knowledge. Instead,

066we acknowledged what that must have felt like and how grateful we were that those laws have changed. Why then is it unamerican or harmful to teach how our history of white supremacy still seeps into every system in this country? Why do we learn history so that we don't repeat it? Our children can handle the truth and they deserve to look through a critical lens instead of the rosecolored ones of the past. I stand with our teachers who are bravely incorporating social justice and anti-racism in their lessons. I commend Lindberg administration for Mary. We're against time so we'll have to wrap it up here for seeing the importance of this work and I urge you to continue moving forward in your work on equity and diversity. As Maya Angelou said, we do the best we can

067with what we know. When we know better, we do better. We all know better. It's time to do better. Thank you. Sorry, I went over top. That's all right. Thank you. Um, next we have Sarah Visco or Visco. Hi everybody. My name is Sarah Vasco. I live at 814 South Sappington Road, St. Louis 63126. Hello board members and Lindberg community. My name is Sarah Vesco and I'm here tonight to share my deep appreciation for this district's work toward equity and diversity and to urge everyone to think carefully about who we want to be as a community. My husband and I have three children in the district, but tonight I'm going to speak specifically about our youngest child's experience. This district's diversity work has already impacted her in a powerfully positive way. At school, she learns

068about different cultures and celebrations. She sees diverse characters in books and learns how to be more caring, compassionate, and empathetic. As a result, she has been exposed to some amazing things during her short time in this district. She has learned about the Chinese New Year, Ramadan. Her classes completed units on hair and skin tones. She has learned black history along with current in influential African-Americans. She has gained awareness about different disabilities. These are just a few examples from her amazing education thus far. An even more specific example of my child's growing empathy because of this work around diversity happened a few weeks ago on a Saturday afternoon. She said, "Oh no, I ate." I responded with, "Well, of course you did, honey. It's almost noon." She said, "Well, I was going to fast." I said,

069"You are not Muslim. You don't have to fast." She said, "I know. I just wanted to know how it felt for other people when they fast for Ramadan." She has a student who was celebrating this holiday in her class. And my child wanted to understand her better, be connected to her and feel what she may feel. She wanted to see her classmate as a whole person. Every single part of her. That was an amazing moment for me as a parent. Her heart has grown exponentially this year because of this very important work. Though our district is primarily white, there are many other students who deserve to be seen and represented, who need to be seen and represented in order to thrive. This equity and diversity work is crucial for every student. As my white ch

070child learns about the world around her, it is important for her to become more aware and able to adjust and interact when she is in different, more diverse settings. always centering the white perspective does a disservice to every single child in this district and prevents this type of growth and understanding. Throughout the year, I have never heard her express shame about her whiteness, only a celebration of her identity as well as others. Instead, she comes home daily excited to share what new wonderful things she has learned. During a unit on skin color, she spoke openly after school about how beautiful every person's skin was. You see, she sees others differences as beautiful and embraces those differences because they make us each unique. She also sees similarities that bind us together. At age five, she sees

071our interconnectedness. I am here to say thank you for the work you are doing to make our district more equitable for every single student. Thank you for hiring teachers like my child's teacher who understand and value the importance of teaching our students about diversity, for encouraging teachers to feature a variety of diverse books that represent every child, and for exposing our children to different cultures. Thank you for setting the standard for our district to be curious and kind. This is the kind of community we want to be, the kind of citizens we want to raise. I am also very thankful to Lindberg for hiring Dr. map as our director of inclusion, equity, and diversity. Sarah, I'll let you know where we are past over. Okay. Okay. Thank you. You can wrap up. Thank you. Uh

072next. Yeah, it's tough to see the sign. We know. Uh next we have Tara Tenan. Hello. Good evening. Um my name is Tara Tennan. I live at 12776 Nano Lane, 63127. I'm here tonight on behalf of the parent group uh Lmber Lindberg Equity and Diversity Coalition and um this is the statement that we wanted to have read tonight. So um members of Lindberg Equity and Diversity Coalition are happy to see the addition of a director of inclusion, diversity, and equity for the 2021 2022 school year. We are excited to welcome Dr. Jeremy Mack to our community and are looking forward to the wealth of knowledge and perspective he will bring with them. Lead as an organization is particularly grateful to Reed of his appreciation and celebration of individual differences and his commitment to building relationships

073with district families and colleagues. Making this position a priority both by allocating prot allocating protected time and salary to support it is a big step, but it's only one of many needed to move this work forward. We are looking forward to learning the specifics of his goals for the district. We want to acknowledge Lindberg's stated goal to uphold high academic standards for all students through culturally responsive classroom instruction, professional learning, and sustainable relationships with community stakeholders. As these are things that we value as well during this time of public concern over diversity and equity and inclusion work in schools, we are asking the district to publicly remind our families of this dedication through an email or a statement. We see the empathy, compassion, and solidarity our children feel when they're taught to acknowledge and celebrate

074each other's differences. We see them leaning in with curiosity, asking thoughtful questions, growing in awareness and sharing the love that they feel for their classmates, not despite their different ethnic and racial d uh diverse backgrounds, but because of these differences. They're also easily able to recognize how they are truly alike at the end of the day by sharing their values, interests, and f friendships with one another. The rich culture within our district is no doubt something to be proud of, to shed light on, and to celebrate as the more we know, the more we grow. Thank you. Thank you. Um, next we have Bess Fitz Morris. Hello, Bess Fitz Morris, 9236 Kattishak Circle. Good evening. Recently, I saw a press release on the Lindberg website in which US News and World Report ranked Lindberg High

075School 10th in Missouri and 920th nationwide. This is a significant increase from the school's 2020 rankings. Wow. This is really something to be proud of. Truly a feather in our cap. But I also noticed in that same press release that an alarming number of students are not proficient in math or reading. While we should celebrate the great people, programs, and progress shown by this press release, we should also note that nearly 30% of students are underperforming in math and 25% in reading. There has been a tremendous emphasis in our district lately on equity. In fact, I see that our district will be adding a team of diversity and inclusion administrators and equity officers to the payroll, which I imagine will come with a host of resources and support staff. How much will this cost? And

076what exactly are their job descriptions? What policies will they shape, promote, and implement? And how can parents review them? Is there a parent faculty committee to help with this process? In addition, we have a contract with EEC, but I can no longer find them on the website. Are we still in contract with them? And will they still be training teachers and administrators this summer? If so, what is the total bill for their services and training? As with any budget, we have to choose wisely how we spend our money. I have to ask, is this the best use of our district's resources? If we want equity, wouldn't it make sense to focus on doing what is necessary to help the students lift their understanding of and competence in reading and mathematics? How can we even think

077of celebrating what should be great news when nearly a third of students are underperforming? After all, the opportunities of a person who cannot read or do math will be extremely limited. Education is the ultimate equalizer. I propose we look at where we at where how our dollars, teacher training hours, personnel, and other resources are good. Excuse me. Let's look at them critically, not only to achieve equity for each child, but to ensure each and every student in Lindberg is flourishing in reading, math, and in all areas. Thank you. Uh, next, uh, Matthew Randleman, Matthew Randleman, 9859 Sappington Road again. I'm sorry, English is still thirdish as last time. I'll try three minutes. Um I was here last month with a request not to teach identity lessons in our schools. Every person's identity is private and

078connected connected to personal beliefs and ideologies. For me, my most core identity is established on the historical fact that Jesus of Nazareth died for me and I am a child of God through the cross. That's who I am. not Japanese, not Hebrew speaker. That's who I am. I know that every nation of men are created from one blood as St. Paul tells us in book of Acts. But I also know that other people would hold different views of their identities and we should all agree on this identity principle. It is deeply connected to personal ideology and we are to respect each other. Therefore, schools should not interrupt personal ideology and shape children's identity with set of other ideologies against any beliefs or ideologies. It is a violation of freedom of belief and religion. I am

079here tonight to report again about the identity activity that happened at high school on March 30th. The students were given survey of identity profile and were encouraged to fill their beliefs, gender, sexual orientation, race, ethnicity and so on. The activity was provided by a southern poverty which the legislation at the state capital called out as CRT organization. Same day I raised my concerns to the administration of the school. I also pointed out that it was violation of privacy and two weeks later I was here to report about this activity. I ref referred to the instruction of a department of education which tells to avoid isolation of race. I have not received any response from the board. 10 days later the district held professional development day on April 23rd. The students stayed home so the teachers

080can have this opportunity of PD day. The survey that over 2,000 students filled on March 30th were used by the teacher for this PD. Unlike youth truth survey for this ident identity activity, the parents were not informed or asked permission to allow students to attend. Students did not know that there would be use of their papers as lab samples of identity training for the teachers. This is clear violation of the law and trust. Schools are forbidden to forbidden collecting personal information without agreement of guardians. Not to talk of the use of the of it to train teachers. It is far beyond hiding the learning material from the parents on canvas. I am calling board of education with following actions. Call to action one. Include this citizen statement into public record and provide me with a

081record. Call to action. Two, open immediate investigation of this identity survey and the use of the data for professional development training and report back to the community with a transparent information. CRT or not, please stop this obsession of shaping students identities. It is our job to do. not of the school and Mackie we we are up against time so if you can wrap it up. I am handing out to seven board members the all materials that I have here so that you can uh look through it. I have here the presentation that I received from the administration on March 30th. It starts with April 23rd. It has been already planned on March 30th to take this survey. So the teachers can look at identity how it affects. You can provide us with that and then

082we'll have to wrap it up though. Okay. And I also attached all the low languages so you can look at it. Okay. Okay. Uh we will move on to Diane Dragon next. Good evening. Diane Dragon, 9036 Middlewood Court. I'm here to talk on literacy as I often am. Listening to all these passionate parents concerned about the content of our curriculum is wonderful. Districts thrive on active involved parents. The irony in all of it to me is that regardless of what you all decide to teach our children, an unacceptably large percentage of our kids will be unable to read it without assistance or support. Lindberg High School is congratulating itself on being in the top 2% of the state. The fact that we can accomplish that while we leave behind 25% of all of our high

083school students and 50% of our children of minorities as not proficient readers is the real tragedy in my opinion. We are beginning our new ELA curriculum cycle, review cycle, and the exact same people that got us into this predicament are the ones deciding how to move forward. No parents are being allowed to participate or observe. No outside experts are being brought in. Why the ELA, the English language arts curriculum decisions need to be decided in private meetings without any outside input is exactly how we end up in a room full of upset parents. The lack of transparency in the process and the absolute refusal to allow any parent participation is inappropriate. According to the pre presentation done by Dr. Hamby and Dr. Lawson to this board just two months ago, 50% of our first grade

084children are failing to meet basic reading benchmarks. We are barely clinging to the 50th percentile in the nation. And yet we are congratulating ourselves. While we celebrate being the cleanest dirty shirt in the state, what is going to happen to our marginally literate graduates as they walk across the stage in a few weeks? Thank you. All right, we'll move on now to Brian Irwin. Hi, my name is Brian Irwin, uh, 9129 General Grant Lane, 63123. I am the parent of two kids at Sappington Elementary, and I'm here to voice my support for Lindberg's equity and inclusion curriculum. As much as we may wish it was not the case, the facts are that today race does matter. Studies bear this out in almost all aspects of society. Economics, education, health care, criminal justice, racial disparities exist

085in all of these areas and more. These are broad societal problems. And it's important to note that that's what this curriculum is tackling. Systemic racism is different from individual racism. No one is calling any kids racist. Changing these systems needs to happen to move toward racial equity. But our children cannot do this if we hide this information from them rather than educating them. Let me tell you what I learned in school about Hispanic cultures. Nothing. About Asian cultures, also nothing. For black history, I learned that the Civil War ended slavery. Things were murky for about 90 years while George Washington Carver made inventions out of peanuts. Then a new wave of racism sprung from nowhere and ran rampant until Martin Luther King ended it once and for all with no lingering after effects. And where's

086an example of where that education got me? One day in high school at an after school activity, I told my friend Germaine, who was black, that I was walking back to my house to get something I'd forgotten and asked if he wanted to come with me. I remember the way he looked at me and said, "No, there's no way I'm walking through your neighborhood." And I was stunned. After all, my education had told me that race didn't matter, that racism was over. But Germaine knew what I didn't, that race does matter, and that a black teenager walking through a white neighborhood may not be a welcome sight. Since my education gave me no framework for even beginning to understand where Germaine was coming from, I didn't know how to respond. I think I might have

087told him he was crazy for having those thoughts, completely invalidating his viewpoint. That did him no good. I felt confused and defensive, so I just shunted the moment aside and didn't think about it again until I was an adult. That did me no good. It was an uncomfortable moment, maybe even a little scary. And I gather that's what a lot of people who are hearing some of the information in this curriculum for the first time are feeling, especially if their first exposure to the issue, is through opponents of the curriculum, many of whom deliberately frame their opposition in inflammatory language to stoke fear. Could the Lindberg school district and community react the same way I did by putting these facts aside and ignoring them? Probably. We are a school district that, depending on which website

088you consult, is 85 to 93% white. I'm talking to an all-white school board. I can go into every single classroom K through five of my kids school and not see a single teacher who's a person of color. But wouldn't failing to confront these facts about our society be perpetuating the very cycles we're trying to work against? Do we want our kids to know no better than we do and therefore be unable to do better than we do? I don't think we do. So, I'm glad that you're willing to tackle issues that make people uncomfortable and prompt questions from our kids because we can't achieve racial equity by pretending that we already have. I thank you for acknowledging this and support you as you continue to do so. Thank you. Thank you. Uh, next we have

089David Yates. Hi, I'm David Yates, 9331 Queenston Drive, 63126. I have a 9-year-old daughter. She is third grader at Lawn Elementary. And uh my wife and I sent her to a public school uh because we want her to be around kids, interact with kids who don't go to the same kind of church as she does, who don't look like she does, who have different family structures that she does. Um, I talked to a number of parents uh, some of whom took their kids out of uh, the school uh, during COVID because they wanted to go to a school that was doing something a little bit different, but they're looking forward to coming back from a private school to Lindberg because of that, because they want their kids to be around people who are different than

090they are. Uh, so again, I echo a lot of the sentiment that I've seen here. Uh I appreciate what's going on with the equity and diversity programs that uh Lindberg is starting to tackle. Um I was talking to my daughter about what her experience has been and she really appreciated uh like February, Black History Month. It's very obvious where you're talking about other uh communities. She did a project on Artha Franklin. She thought that was great. Her mother thought it was great. She's a big fan. Uh and there are a number of books that she gets to see. But uh that is wonderful. And I want you to help me do more. Um, it's not enough to read the books, to see the videos, to talk about it just in the classroom. Uh, my daughter's

091nine and I'm so excited that in this very white community, a lot of her kids don't look like her. It excites me a great deal. Someday my daughter will be 16. It'll be much harder for her to have those friendships because at nine, the world has treated kids who look like my daughter and kids who look differently pretty much the same. By 16, it's going to be wildly different. And I got to echo uh Brian's sentiment that when I was growing up, I didn't have a framework for dealing with that. Help me give my daughter a framework for dealing with that. uh looking at the social and emotional development and how diversity impacts that. Help me make her a better friend at 16 to be the friend she is now at nine. That she understands

092those experiences I and that you're working with me to make that happen. I appreciate the hard work that you do dealing with a lot of flack trying to make the best decisions for a community and I really support what's going on with the equity and diversity initiatives. Thank you. Um, next we have Brian Pence. Brian Pence, 10827 Liber Drive. Wanted to let you know as I come here today, we and my concern is basically transparency and where we are as a structure of learning, where we are as a as a process. What are the tools we're utilizing as we transform into an intentful diverse approach to learning and equity as the term is used now versus the racial theory heart of where this is coming from. I myself name for example it invokes a certain

093thought of who I am whether regarding diversity and racial equity. I will tell you that if my brother were here, my sister were here, and my father were here, and my nieces and nephews were here, you would see a very diverse group of people that you might judge as one race or one ethnicity or one background versus another. And I assure you, you would not be correct. The reality is we all come from our different backgrounds. The main concern and the reason I'm here is transparency. I was in LA in the housing projects in 1968 right after the watch riots. I was there with the Black Panther movement because their movements I did get to go to Head Start. I did get free health care that my mother could not afford. I did move out

094of the housing projects. Those types of things later on in life. I chose a school district today as a process of learning for the needs of my children. And that had to do with advanced learning. My eldest son, who is autistic, graduated from Lindberg High School with a 4.7 GPA, international balor degree and bilingual in Spanish. He got a scholarship because of that. He still struggled with that scholarship at St. Louis University because they have no programs for autism. Going back to the heart of the matter, during his time here at Lindberg School District, he got a great education. Nobody figured out that my son is significantly visually impaired learner. Thank goodness he could read. Thank goodness he was reading at the high school level in the sixth grade at the college level by the

095time he started middle school. If it weren't for that, he would not have had that. So when I hear about literacy as it relates to a need and a commonality, I guarantee you that is the heart of the matter. including myself and my ability to be here today and provide a living and a resource for my children so we could grow out of poverty which is the oppression. Poverty is the oppression. I resent the fact that we're using tools that regard oppressed and oppressor instead of equity as it relates to a universal approach to elevating everyone up to a basic understanding of the principles of education so they can thrive and learn and grow and develop and be the person they wish to be. Lastly, I have to make sure that we no longer ask

096my children to be surveyed and understood on what they think is their own racial or ethnic background because that's up to me. I don't need to pull out pictures of my family members to help them understand who we are. My job is taking care for that. Your job is to get our children up to that level so they can grow and develop and learn. Thank you. [Applause] Uh, next speaker we have Michelle Yepz. Good evening. Michelle Yep, 612 point 63128. Over the past two months, an amazing and very informative book study has been occurring in this district. Book chosen is Overcoming Dyslexia. Dyslexia impacts 20% of our children. At each meeting, we've had experts, local experts, district uh local district experts, local state experts, and last night we had a national expert from Canada, Nancy

097Young. She brought some very great information about how to incorporate what we're learning about dyslexia through the whole entire ladder of reading so it's impactful to all students from those who are in the top 5% who can read naturally without any issues all the way to the bottom 10 to 15% which are dyslexic. All of this has um been been going on. But unfortunately what has shown is that um it has been uh very poorly attended by administration, the board and staff. The shame surrounding dyslexia is evident because no one in the district is promoting the book study or actively discussing it. The shame of the student remains because they still can't read or write or spell as well as their peers. How are we going to collaborate to break the cycle of shame? Thank

098you. Thank you. Um and last Merly Sour on non-aggenda item. No, unfortunately based on our process, we have to have a sign up prior to the meeting. My name is Mayor Lee Sauer. I live at 93 9306 Queenston Drive. Um, since the last meeting, I spoke at the last meeting. I I uh called Dr. Cochran to follow up on that um identity activity and um he explained to me that they did that because there are some students that have issues with race and that's why they have these types of that's why the school has these types of programs. Well, um I just wanted to point out and I did Tim as well. Desi has a three- tiered approach and it says if some students have issues, there should be strategic efforts. Um only if uh

099if um if there's um there are certain reasons for doing universal programming and based on what Dr. Cochran told me, that would not meet the Desi three- tiered approach. Um also, um I asked for information from Dr. Cochran and instead he sent me justification in the form of a bunch of surveys. So um our students are taking a bunch of surveys and and this one doesn't even make sense. It says students from my school value people of diverse races or ethnicities. If you hit one, you strongly agree. If you hit five, you strongly agree. So this is almost nonsense. um other surveys on uh different types of these group identity concepts were taken and uh you know I don't want my I don't want my child surveyed like this I think this is absolutely wrong

100I think we need opt outs for surveys [Applause] not only for our students not only for students but for teachers and for admin too if they don't want to do it they shouldn't have to um we also don't want group identity and that is in the guidance and counseling curriculums. And so we'd like the board to take a look at that and either get it out or give us an opt out. And once again, not just for us. Uh the women in history, uh it's a course at the high school. Not only does it talk about identity by class, race, ethnicity, and more, it also talks about the oppression matrix matrix which describes the uh voices of white elite women and how they predominate versus less privileged women. So um empathy is a new thing

101in school. There are many studies showing that learning to be too empa empathic can lead to feelings of emptiness and alien alienation and cause anxiety and depression. We are bombarding our children with empathy in social emotional learning curriculum and elsewhere in the school. The amount of empathy training in pack and similar classes and that is woven into the curriculum needs to be identified and analyzed. I I actually believe that Lindberg might be abusing our children both socially and emotionally with an overabundance of empathy. People don't connect and develop close relationships over painful disagreeable events. They connect through positive emotions which are most important to relationships. Finally, I'd like the board to tell us what is lead for life, the Lindberg life. Dr. Sparks talked about it at a board workshop. She said there's 15 goals

102to it. There's a class for it at the school. Um and uh she said she was going to start grading considering grading our students on this. So we would like the information well in advance so we can understand this. Thank you. [Applause] And just to reiterate again uh we don't respond publicly but if you put your contact information on the sheet here uh you will be responded to by the district. And uh when we speak about transparency again to go back the board workshops are uh publicly available to be attended and they'll be live streamed as well. So the July workshop which pertains to a lot of what was spoken about this evening uh is is uh accessible by the public. Uh so keep that in mind please. All right we'll move to 13.0 0

103which is recess to conduct our executive session. We don't have a need to recess because we already conducted that. So that takes us to 15.0 which is adjournment. Do I have a motion to adjourn barn meeting number 1532? So moved. Uh moved by Christie. Second. Second by Matt. All in favor say I. I. I. Oppose. Motion carries 70. Thank you.