001i pledge allegiance to the flag of the united states with liberty and justice welcome to the rockwood board of education meeting we would like to congratulate and welcome two new members of our board izzy imek and jessica clarke [Applause] we would also like to take a moment to acknowledge both our salvage and marquette communities following the loss of one of their students our thoughts and prayers are certainly with them we would like to thank the administrative team and all the staff and students at summit high school for being gracious hosts for our meeting this evening thank you also to the ambassadors who are here from our schools to assist with greeting and signing in our guests the purpose of this meeting is to conduct the business of the district hear reports about our progress and
002listen to the community on important issues we want to remind all of our visitors that we expect the audience to remain civil and respectful at all times as the board conducts its business calling out verbal aggressiveness inappropriate language or name calling is not acceptable if the meeting becomes unruly the board may take a recess until such time the audience is appropriate if inappropriate behavior continues by individuals they may be asked to leave the meeting if the audience becomes so inappropriate in their behavior that we can't conduct our business the board reserves the right to adjourn the meeting the sport of education meeting is live stream for the community's convenience opinions expressed at the meeting are not necessarily the opinions of the rockwood school district youtube reserves the right to monitor and block inaccurate and misleading
003content that process is beyond the control of the rockwood school district we want everyone to have the ability to hear the business of the district reports presented and the comments of everyone who is here to speak we appreciate your cooperation and that you took the time to attend tonight's meeting could i please have a motion to approve the agenda second motion and a second any discussion all right all those in favor please say aye anyone opposed that passes next could i have a motion to approve board of education meeting minutes for the march 17th 2022 meeting second motion and a sec and a second any discussion okay all those in favor please say aye hi anyone opposed any abstentions i'm saying is are you abstaining thank you and next we have patron comments during patron
004comments rockwood patrons may address the board of education concerning issues related to the school district under our updated policy there are now two patron comment sections during regular board meetings the first public comment period shall be solely for patron comments related to items on tonight's agenda which will be limited to 30 minutes the second public comment period shall occur at the end of the meeting order of business and shall be for patrons to make a statement or address the board concerning any issues pertaining to the rockwood school district please know that patrons also have the opportunity to submit comments and writing to the board at any time each speaker will be limited to three minutes combining time or giving your time to someone else to speak is not allowed only one speaker is allowed at
005the podium at a time the board uses the public comment periods as an opportunity to listen and receive information but board members will not engage in debates or discussions with those speaking other than to seek clarification of their comments a board member may ask that the superintendent ensure that the appropriate staff member follows up in a timely fashion with the individual regarding the information question or concern presented during patron comments we have a stand with microphones ready so both the board and the audience may hear the patron comments clearly i would like to remind everyone that comments about individual employees and or students will not be permitted in public session we also expect that you will remain civil and respectful in your remarks and if anyone becomes disruptive we reserve the right to cut your
006three minutes short verbally aggressive language and vulgarity in any form is not acceptable whether you are reading someone else's remarks or they are your own it will not be tolerated the board appreciates that you have taken the time to come this evening and we value both your input and your perspective for your convenience our three-minute time clock is ready we have two speakers this evening for agenda items and patron comments the first speaker is david schweity i'm ready i think anytime you may start so again um i am grateful that as everyone is here on the i was here march i'm sorry i don't have to hurry because i was here at the board meeting december the 16th uh 2020 at crestview high school and i was one of the parents that were standing outside
007with the other 50. i was at the board meeting last board meeting on march the 17th at eureka high school and then today so i appreciate the board doing a great job handling the students and the reason i'm up here is actually to try to bring more parents into the the board meeting presently there are parents and and students that are at home watching this board meeting because they can't be here for whatever reason i actually have a laptop in front of me and a missouri constitution uh the laptop had five emails on it i was wanting to put a voting system in so that the people that are at school at home can vote by via email so that they can participate and help with you know what the board's decisions are so fortunately
008i get hopefully if you allow me i get to speak speak three minutes at the end of this meeting so the first um i had again this is a little difficult for me because i'm not used to speaking in front of people and this is only the second time so our third time because the last time i was here there were just myself um challenge materials i was hoping that the minute would go up but um i'll just let it go and speak again because i'm kind of nervous so again i appreciate everybody being here i appreciate the people that are watching this on youtube and i'll explain a little bit more how the voting system works using the email which is similar to the tv program that was on america's idol i think it
009was called where they used texting to vote for the people they liked well this idea was to use emails because it's a simple thing and of course the board already has emails where parents can send in their comments and there are some materials in the library that i think should be removed but of course i'm just one person and the voting system was set up to try to unite the parents that are sitting at home and i thank you very much all right excuse me our next speaker is johanna bodien good evening thank you for being here and congratulations welcome to our newest board members i'd like to speak tonight about agenda topics related to the bill list and the challenge books on page 19 of the bill list there are nearly eleven thousand dollars
010in charges to uh fullet content solutions llc it appears by the description that the expenses are library materials and fiction books for several months as the board members are aware parents have been challenging books one by one that's the process that we have been given that if we don't agree with something that's in the library and we don't want our child to read it we must go through this process of challenging the book and then everybody is impacted it's not really the process that we would choose um so it doesn't seem effective as well to a lot of parents and um i'm wondering is it possible to refine the book intake process so that there's more transparency to what's actually being approved to come into the library i'm wondering if any of you know what
011that eleven thousand dollars is being spent on if you know the titles of any of those fiction books so that's something that would be made available to parents as the books come into the library rather than us having to wait to figure out that our child's been reading it in class or that they checked it out two weeks ago and they have assignment due next week i just think there's um [Music] a way for you guys to maybe look at the policy and understand what's in the school and what's in the libraries before it's actually being exposed to the children um so i'd like to ask the board to consider looking at the intake policy thank you that concludes this portion of patreon comments on agenda items thank you dr ricker takes us to superintendent
012and board comments dr ricker thank you first off we want to as we have over the past several months shared information related to our covid19 update so if you go to the next slide this kind of gives you an idea historically where we've been as it relates to district-wide percentages in the next slide please this is where we are through to your left which would include today next slide please these are new um recording week of monday through sunday on positive cases you can see where we're the trend that we're headed into and i once again i want to mention that we are keeping an eye on any of the new streams that are in uh europe or other parts of the world with the working group that we meet with now will be every
013probably every week to every month if additional information comes forward so dr kindred asked for that update quickly each time um so we'll move on to uh earlier tonight the board of education approved the hiring of two new additional uh positions and two administrative people jessica well we're moving some people and hiring new people so i want to congratulate them this evening uh dr jessica berthold as the new assistant principal at crestview middle school aaron cook as the new assistant principal at wild horse creek elementary and aaron is over there and um we also have dr milch schwab as the new director a district coordinator for literacy and speech for grades 6 through and luke fuston who's here as well is the new assistant principal at wildwood middle school and they all begin their positions
014uh july 1. jessica is currently an assistant principal at rockwood middle uh south middle where she's worked prior since 2020 prior to that she taught spanish for 10 years at crestview where she was also leader in me lighthouse coordinator helping crestview earn the distinction of a missouri school of character jessica earned a bachelor of arts in spanish and education as well as a master of arts in education from truman state my alma mater she earned her doctorate in educational leadership from maryville dr kinder knows that school currently aaron is an administrative intern at bowles a position she has held since 2017 she has also served as an assistant principal and assistant intern for summer academy and she taught seven years at west ridge elementary as well erin earned a bachelor of science in education from
015the university of missouri colombia and masters of arts and school administration administer educational specialist degree in administration from lindenwood melissa is coming to rockwood from the school district of washington where she has worked as a literacy coordinator and instructional coach since 2016. melissa has also served as a summer school administrator in washington and president of the district's professional development committee in new haven she earned a bachelor of science in secondary education and masters in rhetoric and composition in a master of arts in k-12 administration from southeast missouri state she also earned her educational specialist degree in curriculum and instruction and her doctorate in leadership in teaching and learning from missouri baptist university lyricus cur luke is currently a physical education and teacher and the head of the physical education department at lasalle springs middle school
016where he has worked since 2017 he's also building team leader and safety team committee member at lasalle as well as a varsity assistant football coach freshman boys volleyball coach at eureka luke earned his bachelor's degree in physical education from southern illinois university a masters in educational administration from southwest baptist university and engineering completion of an educational specialist degree from southwest baptist as well aaron and luke are there others are probably listening uh on on the stream and let's help congratulate them and give them a round of applause for becoming part of our administrative team we're glad they're here for the sixth straight year rockwood earned a near perfect score from the missouri state high patrol during the annual bus inspection process rockwood's fleet of 140 buses earned a 99.3 percent approval rate with no buses
017being taken out of service the rockwood transportation department maintenance staff prides themselves on keeping the district's fleet of school buses in tip-top shape for safe and efficient daily transfer of more than 10 000 students we are fortunate to have such a dedicated maintenance team members drivers leaders and other transportation staff to help us care for our students each and every day so let's give them a round of applause that's a nice [Applause] the rockwood school district has earned the certificate of excellence in financial reporting distinction for the fiscal year from the association of school business officials international this is the 17th straight year that rockwood has received this distinction reflecting the district's commitment to transparent hot transparency and high quality financial reporting in its annual comprehensive financial report the asbo international award recognizes districts that
018have met the program's highest standards for financial reporting and transparency last fall the organization also recognized rockwood with its meritorious budget award for the 22nd straight year congratulations to our finance department and thank you for continuing to be such exceptional stewards of the taxpayer dollars and we look forward to maybe next year's award as well congratulations to doc to mr northington and his crew dan steinberg finally tonight i'd like to congratulate yourself spring 7th grader natalie royal who was awarded first place nationally in the vesta right essay competition invest right stemming from stock the stock market game is a national contest that evaluates students overall understanding of the stock market participants describe an investment portfolio of stocks bonds and mutual funds in sectors destined to transform the future and natalie focused her essay on green
019bonds to help the environment great work natalie on an oppressive achievement we know you'll continue to strive to make a difference in our world and into the future so let's give natalie a hand as well and that concludes my comments for this evening thank you thank you dr ricker any bored comments this evening tammy and i had the opportunity last week i didn't know if you were going to talk about it tammy so if you'd like to go for it go ahead um yes we had the opportunity to attend the attend the region seven missouri state school board meeting and it was very informative was well there was over attendees there and um highlighted and spotted uh key things that are happening in districts around us so it was good to mix with other board
020members network find out what their schools are doing finding they have some of the same issues that we have but also celebrate some of the same successes so it was a great evening and of the ignite the regional meeting will be in st charles this summer and we're encouraging all of our board members to attend at that meeting and i also wanted to talk a little bit about the administrative training or the leadership training that happened on monday in reference to multi-tier systems of support or rti this is my third or fourth session i have attended with teacher leaders and administrators and it is fabulous to to see systems being put in place to ensure that all kids are able to receive the instruction and interventions that will help them grow and achieve and it
021is also part of our way forward and so that it that was amazing and i look forward to the next session thank you awesome any other board comments all right can i have a motion to approve the consent agenda items as submitted second motion and a second any discussion all right uh all those in favor please say aye hi anyone opposed and that passes uh next up on our regular agenda items first is a presentation that the cope committee put on the agenda the college and career readiness overview looks like glenn hancock and ivy hartman are coming up to join us just make sure this works real quick all right all right thank you and good evening for those of you that haven't had a chance to meet yet my name is glenn hancock i
022work as our director of research evaluation and assessment for the rockwood school district in my role i get a great opportunity to observe all the different departments that work together to do wonderful and great things especially for the aspect of college and career readiness this evening i'm joined by ivy hartman she's one of our post-secondary college and career counselors and together tonight we'll be sharing information about where our graduates go after high school as well as the opportunities and experiences we offer throughout school and our journey ahead as we continue to improve upon the college and career readiness that we're supporting our students with to be ready for high school i'm sorry post high school this evening i will begin with where our graduates go after after high school the chart before you shares information
023collected from a survey we do each year about six months after graduation we send out a survey to our students asking them where they are now six months after school we start with an email follow-up survey for students that we don't hear back from we also then follow with personal phone calls we usually get around 96 to uh return rate on the email and then the follow-up calls we do as well from the chart you can see here the majority of our students they follow up with four-year college and two-year college as the primary areas they choose to attend following high school we also have a number of students and you can see that number has increased as the year 2021 is in dark blue and the number of students that are entering employment right
024after high school has increased as well as the number of students that are attending a two-year colleges increase from prior years as well we also have a number of students that enter the military and the number of students that also enter advanced training programs attend non-college credit post-secondary schools and other students again we haven't been able to follow up with but we continue to follow up and reach out to find out where they're attending and where they're going after high school this year we also included a follow-up question asking things that we can do as rockwood to improve upon the graduate experience or the prep work for graduating and one of the top things they they shared back with us was more around financial literacy and preparing for life after high school a lot of
025them are entering the finance world they didn't experience before and experiencing new things as they enter college and so those are some of the things we'll take back and share as we continue to improve our curriculum program offerings as well throughout the preparation we have a number of experiences that are gained through our natural curriculum in rockwood we have over 300 plus courses uh 32 of them being in the advanced placement and honors well 32 of them being an advanced placement alone and a number of other honors courses we offer as well the gic is a geometry and construction where students pair geometry with hands-on construction going at the same time many of you might have seen tiny houses that have been built by our students amped is a program that focuses on algebra and
026the business side this group will make t-shirts and screen printing and sell those as well so they combine the algebra and the practical experience of the business world well as well pltw our project lead the way courses those courses range from engineering to health and sciences we also have a number of art and design application courses we provide an opportunity for students to all juniors to take the act south tech i'll talk a little bit more about self tech on the next slide video radio news production classes and authentic science research so a lot of hands-on opportunities where students get hands-on experiences that they can even create and use in a portfolio for scholarships and even graduate admittance to two and four year and even employ employer scholar i'm sorry employer applications we also have
027a number of high school graduation pathways in addition to achieving the normal set of credits designed to graduate from a rockwood high school the diploma there's a number of other ways we offer pathways towards getting a diploma south tech which is a school that allows career and technical classes taught by professionals in the workforce that have held those jobs before for students to spend a half day there getting hands-on classes and credit as well as a half day at one of their home high schools missouri options students that are struggling to acquire the number of credits needed for graduation also might be close to dropping out this is a program that brings them back in gives them some necessary courses and assessments to provide them a high school diploma and they also get to graduate
028with their high school class cce is a cooperative career education opportunity where students get to join the workforce and they attend school at the same time and then also our early college partnership students leave that program they begin their junior year they have the opportunity to leave with an associate degree and their high school diploma upon graduation so again a number of opportunities and pathways we have available for our students to graduate i'm going to turn over to ivy so she can share a little bit more about the other opportunities that we share along the way to prepare them for post-secondary i think it's important about language i know um msip talks about college and career readiness right we always hear this college career readiness i have tried to make a little shift in the
029language that i'm using so that i'm more approachable and our office is more approachable to students i think they hear college and then the courier is kind of left off and we want them to understand that we're here for all of those things that we saw on that first slide and very competent to offer that so um i'm now known and fondly in the building as the post high school counselor and well i hope fondly anyway and so we are talking about all those post high school plans offering an asveb which is the military aptitude exam on every campus for every student and if they don't have access to that we'll connect them with a recruiter so they can take that our a plus program has 12 and a half hours of career shadowing built
030into that of the 50 hours they need of tutoring total for tutoring and mentoring for to complete the a-plus program oh thank you glenn sorry about that um spark is a new partnership program at new it's been around for a little while with professional studies um and with the parkway school district um my colleagues and i host evening and weekend programming virtually and in person when it comes to financial aid planning how to look for schools what kind of jobs can i get in stem how hard is it and how do i get into those highly selective schools what's it like to be a college athlete i hosted something recently about hbcus so we've got a lot of different things going on so students and parents can access the information they need on those post
031high school plans as well as presentations during the school day including reps from a variety of aspects not just college reps but also technical reps and of course we have military representatives in our lunchroom during the school day um as well as technical schools um that will come and visit us just like the college as well and then i know that many of you know that rockwood offers a visit to south county technical high school in students eighth grade it's been really fun and exciting to work with emanuel young and partners in education we already know what a great job that they do but just to highlight a few of the great things that are going on so that our students are getting exposure is that eighth grade career fair and then of course in
032this wonderful new program where we've got it's not new the career exploration but where a student could feasibly do job shadowing every semester they're a student in a rockwood high school and that's just through a sign up process and then it's not an all-day thing it's just a few hours and that's across a lot of different disciplines and i know if you follow matt schindler on twitter you'll see all that stuff posted as well and what's going on with that so it's really exciting and the kids at summit their faces just light up when they go what do you mean i can do that that's great you know and then in terms of project interface we really have done a great or pi has done a great job of recruiting students across all of the
033high schools a diverse group of students to participate in the summer experience and i know i had one student attend and he was thinking about aerospace engineering aeroscience whatever and they took him up to see the boeing exploration program up at st louis community college flo valley and saw how he could not only do that but then he could also go to slu and be working part-time it just really was an experience a hands-on real-life experience that rather than me talking to him about it or showing him on a computer and i was so grateful that he was able to have that experience and so they of course do a presentation at the end and they get half credit for that and it's really fun for me to write about and then to write about
034too and college essays and things like that and in my letters of recommendation when they talk to me about those experiences and then of course we had this brand new apprenticeship and career pathways showcase that was fabulous and we did it at eureka high school 250 people attended i learned a lot about the different employers that were there and avenues that i've been able to share with students since i went to that and our students have come back from that and we have some great testimonials of students getting jobs as a result of that alumni and current students as well in addition to our fabulous curriculum those when i keep in touch with alumni they'll say oh those ap classes they really prepared me for college and all and but the other thing that i'm
035hearing is hands-on exploration through a lot of these clubs and i feel so fortunate to be in the rockwood school district where our students have access to so many different opportunities if they only just get involved really fast fantastic and run by really great um you know teachers and professionals i'm gonna turn it back over to glenn and with all that going on we're still wanting to continue to improve we're wanting to do even more a couple of things on our journey ahead that we're looking at doing having an interest inventory available at middle school and high school that way students can share their interests we can make sure we're partnering our classes and offerings up with the student interests that we have you saw the great offerings that our partners education department has as
036they try to match student interests with the careers college and i'm sorry the careers that are out there we can get more volunteers to support and do the career shadowing and also the project interface we're also looking to continue to connect our alumni here our alumni has a lot of great stories and experiences we're sharing a lot of these stories and experiences that our graduates our recent graduates have had we're sharing those online their communications department is doing a great follow-up story to where our students are going by sharing a lot of graduate profiles so profile of a graduate there's several online that really share how students participate in the after school activities they also have an opportunity to go to south tech in different schools and how that pairs together with where they're at
037now whether that's a student that's at west point a student that is in the career following all the carpentry work they did while they were on the fall fall plays so a lot of great experiences that we want to connect with our alumni again and even incorporate that into a mentorship program as well we want to continue to support all individuals students that's their first time maybe a generation a first generation student going to college in their family making sure we're supporting and having things in place for them so they understand the financial aid process application process also increasing trade and vocational interest ensuring that we're matching those interests up with the passions of students as well reframing college and career readiness collaboration making sure that we're kind of pairing everything together again you saw
038all the offerings we have ensuring we're pairing them all together offering opportunities for students to create portfolios so they can share that work and all the great things they're doing with prospective scholarships and even employers going forward and as well as continuing to increase partnerships for alternative post-secondary pathways we just started one it was called access point where a student has an opportunity to receive coding classes and the group that's providing the coding classes is going to offer a job following graduation so that way it's a great opportunity to pair their passion with a career opportunity once they graduate here so we really appreciate listening and being able to share all the great things we're doing and helping our students with the college of career readiness thank you very much [Applause] thank you both that
039was awesome any board questions and comments i just want to comment i did attend the one at south tech and it was amazing and i was i told the board there were a lot of middle school students there and they were excited to to plan for the future for them so thank you for doing that i have a question so you mentioned some evening and weekend programming how would parents of high schoolers get a schedule for that number one that's my first question and secondly i know you're here at summit is this district-wide i mean are there other people exactly like you doing the exact same thing in other high schools you mentioned some of it being zoom could we offer that zoom stuff like you do something to zoom could we offer that as
040a district-wide schedule that you could provide that for the entire district when you're doing a zoom one we did partner through covid as a group right we did we said okay if we're gonna do the selective college admissions thing we're going to do it for all rockwood students and so a lot of those were you know and we and there's six of us post-high school counselors in the district and so two of us may have done highly selective i did how to fund the gap in financial aid this spring and so we kind of spread out the the responsibilities that way and it was advertised through twitter and through all the normal means um one thing that we started at summit and i think that some other high schools have incorporated we have a calendar
041that that parents can access and you can see not just my stuff but everything that's going on that we know about as far as it goes to post high school planning it could be a webinar with somebody totally at missouri s t or something so going forward though next year what we're planning to do is actually pull our resources so that we have a calendar and it's set and we're actually looking at the month of october late september all through october being this post high school it might really focus on college planning at that point but then as we go through the year really focus on post high school things and so we're going to collaborate and it will all be virtual we're finding that that is really the most accessible thing for students and
042families and especially if it's recorded and they can access it again later so that's our plan for the next school year and we're in in talks of doing that awesome great thank you any other bored comments or questions that was awesome thank you both good good topic cope all right next i'd like to invite dr willett up for a review of challenge materials this is an information only item good evening i'm here with a an informational item on three the results of three challenge committees that recently met these are all three library books and they are books of choice for our students in the library the first is it feels good to be yourself by theresa thorne this is an elementary book the decision of the committee after meeting twice and you can see that
043in the minutes they really wanted to give this some thought um decided to retain it in the library but there will be a checkout that a note upon checkout that notifies the librarian to follow up with a parent teacher and counselor to check in with that student if they to see if they would have any questions afterwards they really wanted to make sure that a trusted adult was notified that the student had the book and that they could follow up with them so that was the decision on that one the second one is living dead girl by elizabeth scott that is also a high school library book and the decision was to retain in the library without restriction and then the third one was lawn boy by jonathan everson and the decision on that one
044was also retained in the library without restriction that too was a high school library book just a reminder that if parents do not want their students to pick out to check out specific books or specific genre of books they can always let their librarian know that and they'll make a note in their account and then we recently put together a system that will allow us to have parents put their name on a list to receive daily emails about what their student has checked out so that is a new feature that we've got working if parents are interested in that they can contact their school's librarian and they can get them on that list thank you dr willett any questions uh for dr willett um i was just wondering what were the criteria for deciding if
045it was restricted or not so the committee always discusses the concerns with the material and the value and they compare both of those things and then in the end we ask i ask as the moderator would someone like to make a recommendation for this book and then whoever's on the committee makes that recommendation and they discuss that and discuss whether they feel like they can reach consensus on that okay so it depends on the book what they're actually talking about it's the content of the book anything else all right thank you dr william next item on tonight's agenda is the proposed agenda for the april 21st board of education meeting so members can take a look at that and if there are any comments it's just information and this meeting is at pulling that up
046oh we're back here yeah okay right back here everyone will know exactly where to go maybe it's always an adventure back there all right next on the agenda then future agenda presentations and events to attend there's going to be moving through april and into may becomes a busy season around here so there's going to be lots and lots of events you'll both have access to board calendars probably starting tomorrow as part of janet's process with you so things will just pop up once that's um all set up for you guys the big event on there to note is sunday may 1st at four o'clock we will be back in person um at the doubletree uh so moving back over to the doubletree for the rose award ceremony and dinner that evening so janet will keep
047everybody informed and get everything signed up for those and then just as a reminder to check june 11th on everybody's calendars and let janet know she'll email us when the registration comes up for ignite and we'll see where we land on that all right next we have the next patron uh comment section of the evening so i have a quick uh intro for that we have i think three comments this evening we will now hear from those rockwood patrons who have signed up to speak about non-agenda items as a reminder each speaker will be limited to three minutes please remember that comments about individual employees and or students will not be permitted in public session we expect that you will remain civil and respectful in your remarks and if anyone becomes disruptive we reserve the
048right to cut your three minutes short for your convenience our three-minute time clock is ready our first speaker in this section is tara miller hello my name is tara miller and i'm a rockwood resident i'm also employed by the district so in a very small way i'm paying my own salary i would like to welcome the new board members and thank the current board members for their continued service to the community your support our students family staff and the whole community is greatly appreciated one way the board stewardship has personally affect me is through policy 1305 that is the non-discrimination statement i'd like to read a portion of it the rockwood school district prohibits and will not tolerate discrimination against or harassment of any student employee or applicant for employment or in its programs activities
049because of race color national origin religion sex sexual orientation perceived sexual orientation gender identity age genetic information marital status disability handicapping conditions or any other factor that is not a proper legal basis for an employment decision this policy will prevail in all matters concerning the staff students the public the educational programs and services of the district and individuals with whom the board does business i began my position here in 2013 and i can honestly say this is my dream job in 2016 i came out as transgender knowing policy 1305 was there made me comfortable to do so i was welcomed and accepted by my co-workers and peers i have remained here at rockwood for another six years and i hope to retire from rockwood i've been privileged many are not especially students according to a
050survey last year 75 percent of lgbt youth face discrimination against their sexual orientation or gender identity at least once in their lifetime 42 percent of lgbt youth attempt suicide more than four times that of their cisgender heterosexual peers the good news is that this drops significantly if they are supported and affirmed in my own personal experience discrimination happens more often because of a lack of knowledge rather than outright hatred our job is educating young minds we are shaping the next generation of thinkers and deciders let's continue this culture of knowledge and understanding because we do whatever it takes to ensure all students realize their potential thank you [Applause] our next speaker is danielle murray hi my name is danielle meart i use she her are they them pronouns i'm the parent of a student in
051rockwood and my husband and i are the st louis chapter leaders of transparent usa a nationwide support group for parents of transgender kiddos we were once new transparents ourselves with zero knowledge on how to support our transgender child and are thankful to the countless kind gracious parents in our support group who have shared their experiences with us as we supported our kiddo we've also had the privilege of supporting many parents here in rockwood over the years as more kiddos feel confident enough to share their truth with their parents friends and teachers i'll bet you can imagine it's concerning to be the parent of an lgbtq student in rockwood right now as you know there's been harmful information shared on social media by parents in the district which is then overheard by children listening to the
052grown-ups at home as a result we've seen an increase in bullying in our schools in recent months and that needs to stop thankfully my kiddo knows that no matter what happens at school that our home is safe but i'm certain there are students in this district who don't feel safe at home and being at home during the pandemic was especially harmful which is one of the many reasons i'm here tonight admittedly i don't have all the answers but there is a group of parents in rockwood who would like to meet discuss and share non-confrontationally what we've learned during our journeys as parents of lgbtq students even as grown-ups we're always learning and are ready to meet you where you are in your journey there are lots of students parents teachers and rockwood community members who
053identify as lgbtq therefore i hope everyone is willing to work together and bridge the divide both new board members have mentioned their willingness to build bridges after comments made during the campaign i pray those words are sincere if so i look forward to working with you both to make rockwood the most inclusive accepting and affirming district in missouri thank you for your time and for listening our next speaker is g schmeidakie so you've heard both the staff and the parents perspective of queer students so now it's time for the student first i'd like to welcome miss imeg and mrs clark to the rockwood board i would like to invite you both to enjoy the in to join the existing conversation of how to make every student feel accepted safe and like they are able to
054learn in a rockwood classroom we believe that if one doesn't feel safe then they are unable to effectively learn and currently queer students in rockwood simply do not feel safe let me introduce myself my name is jesh medeki and i am a junior at rockwood summit i am in four ap classes four music school programs and nhs along with other extracurriculars i hope that in listening some of my academic credentials that you take what i have to say a little more seriously because i'm not only a good student but i'm a queer student i'm a demi-romantic bisexual genderqueer good student and i'm not the only one in rockwood there's a very large community of lgbtqiap plus good students i'm here to talk about the life of a queer student in rockwood during passing periods i
055get looks from kids in the hall when i walk with my partner when i try to use the bathroom other students in there make faces at me and some have even asked me to leave or have called me slurs there isn't a bathroom that i currently feel comfortable using when homophobic comments have been made by my peers the teachers do too little too late slurs can often be heard in the hallways one of my friend's belongings were stolen and thrown away by a homophobic classmate our school did nothing to try to get those belongings back which included their phone and other personal items another friend was chased at lunch by several homophobic students and were called slurs and name even though there were staff members on lunch duty none of them stepped in many people
056think that being queer is a choice that we wake up one day and decide to be different but i ask if given the choice why would we choose to be constantly bullied harassed and embarrassed i'll give you the answer that question absolutely nobody would make that choice none of us make the choice to be queer but every day we make the choice to wake up and be proud of who we are we make the choice to come to a school with students that don't accept us so that we can get an education that we deserve parents have accused us of turning kids gay before but let me tell you this we can't turn your straight kids queer we just want your queer kids to survive as mentioned queer students are six times more likely to
057have symptoms of major depression four times more likely to attempt suicide and sixty percent of queer youth feel so hopeless that they've stopped their regular activities and every 45 seconds at least one queer youth between his age 12 13 and 24 attempt suicide in the us so unless you want more rockwood students to be a part of that number changes need to be made and they need to be made quickly i know that some people in rock would want to ban books or end discussion about rockwood about gender and sexuality in rockwood classrooms doing so will not change someone's sexuality or gender identity because once again we don't choose to be in a minority stray kids will be straight no matter what but queer kids will only feel safer if represented we look forward to
058meeting with you soon to look at the crucial conversation of inclusivity for everyone in rockaway and we invite you all to do that with us thank you [Applause] our last speaker is sloan cowell well those were all really amazing speakers i think they deserve another round of applause [Applause] so i was here a year ago almost the day congratulating the new board members from last year and wow this year has really changed and things are completely different but i just want to make sure that everyone on the board listened to the last three speakers and will accept all students in rockwood all students not just your favorite students but all students in rockwood and i really hope that the board will welcome dr kane i mean he's superintendent of the year for the whole country
059the man is very accomplished thank you [Applause] that's it correct that's it okay all right with that we will adjourn the meeting thank you all pretty good 30 years [Music] of course you