Akron Board of Education Meeting Livestream - November 30, 2020

001good evening and welcome we're going to call to order the regular meeting for the acam Public Schools board of education for Monday November 30th 2020 roll call please Dr abar here Mr Alexander present Mr Bravo here Dr Hall hi Mrs Mansfield here Mrs mckitrick here thank you thank you and we are fortunate tonight to have with us one of our student representatives to the Board of Education Salam s from The akan Early College High School who will lead us in the Pledge of Allegiance I could ask everyone to please mute your microphones except for Salam whenever you're ready okay I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands one nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for all thank you so much our

002first order of business of course is community and school Reflections I'd like to open it up to the board if anyone has any and because we have so many people in the meeting uh if you drop me a line in the chat too so I know you're waiting I don't want to miss anyone would anyone like to get us started all right hearing and seeing none we will move to the second item on the agenda which is our request to address the board item 1.4 we have had an addition Mr Reynolds uh has requested to address the board and uh Mr Reynolds whenever you're ready Mr Pendleton will help you keep time thanks for being here tonight thank you um thank you board members um I just want to kind of echo some of what

003I've said before you know um there are a lot of people who are losing hope um for this school year um and as someone who at the end of October both me and my wife had the Corona virus um as someone who lived through it um I I request that you guys seriously consider um what the rest of the year will look at look like and consider some sort of back to school model um I have two kindergarteners and I'm concerned like many others are concerned that this school shutdown well not quite School shutdown but online will um last the entire year and that will put them behind significantly um because you know your your younger kids kindergarten is where they learn classroom decorum uh how to act how to do and you just don't

004get that in Zoom or in Zoom or in in uh Google classrooms so I would ask that you consider that as you make any decisions um and consider really uh coming up with a plan to get our kids back in school uh everyone who deals with the health have has said that uh schools are not a mass spreader now right now I understand that the uh issues we are in with with a lot of spread but honestly the school will require masks will clean clean well and and will uh disinfect well and I really don't think our schools would be spreader locations um because if you do what you're supposed to do and you follow the protocol it does not not spread in schools um occasionally there are issues um as I know working with

005Head Start there's occasionally issues where a kid or someone was asymptomatic and something happens but you have that in your plan and you you work through that uh process if something happens like that but I I would encourage you to give the parents and the teachers of some of these Stu of these students a little hope as far as getting our kids back in school thank you for your time thank you Mr Reynolds We Appreciate You addressing the board tonight um and before we we have no uh recognitions this evening we do have a couple of items under Communications before we do I know that we have done community and school Reflections we've offered that already but uh I know our student representatives to the board usually wait uh until after the board has gone

006I want to make sure Salam did you have anything that you wanted to report out or share this evening I don't want to put you on the spot oh no sry um I do have one um the main reason I'm here that's all right I'd like to present it now okay I Can Begin I'm sorry I can't hear you very well oh I said I do have like one like thing I guess you could say I would do want to report yes please go ahead all right thank you okay hello everyone my name is Salam said and I am a junior at AR college high school and I want to become a nurse practitioner this is my third year serving a the student board my first serving fresh would you like me to like um

007start from the beginning sure go ahead okay hello everyone my name is Salam said and I am a junior at agley College High School I want to become a nurse practitioner this is my third year serving on the student board my first year serving were exciting and fresh the student board was able to go to the State House of Columbus Ohio for a human trafficking Workshop the workshop left an impact on me because we were having real life stories from actual people not a YouTube video the student board was constantly meeting new people I saw Alisa Mansfield at the science fa last year and we talked about the student board members being on the a stage at this year's science fair I was anticipating to happen it would have been a cool experience experience considering

008this is my third year many things are different we are all looking at a computer screen and I and other students can vouch that this year is challenging I get an assignment every single day and it feels suffocating when I know an assignment to do if it's like a competition with myself in time I feel like I'm running a race and I can't look back I I ran track in the seventh grade on track when you're running in the race you don't look back until you get to the goal line and Jack normally I would look back and say I ran that race look what I have accomplished but okay but School in the virtual world is like running track but when I cross the line I don't get to look back at what I

009have accomplished when I submit my assments at 11:59 on Sundays I don't get to look back at the pages I wrote or be proud of the work I have done I just say next move on I write my assignments for the following week I feel like I'm in a rut sometimes I do my assignments at 2 a.m. in the morning the bonds that students and teachers share creating the school environment is different in face to face you are forced to speak and answer questions but you are in a classroom in virtual school you can EAS you can easily hide by cutting off the camera and not speak it's comforting but it's in conflict with myself I do want to engage and I know the answers but I don't want to get out of my comfort

010zone it is easier to have my cup of coffee with my hair messy than to turn on the camera honestly each kid is different there are no permanent Solutions but there are temporary suggestions number one is there a way that only teachers can see the students answers in the chat box sometimes students are afraid that they have the wrong answer and they don't want to embarrass themselves in class said what answer to say and the students can avoid being embarrassed I feel more students would participate in this way number two students and teachers need breaks even if it's an hour your mind feels physically and mentally heavy and this can get to you a lot on a syron days no new assignments should be given students should give an act students should have an actual

011weekend to rest and have to have and not have to complete assignments that are due on Monday number three students need more understanding sometimes the Wi-Fi cuts out sometimes are issues and students may have to log in late we need real advice to help us calm down and handle the M mental stress thank you for taking my thank you for taking my suggestions into consideration on a positive note my sister aham is a ninth grader at a Early College her favorite teacher Mr O'Neal has a really fun virtual lesson his perseverance as a teacher does not let covid-19 get in the way of his PL he had a mock child in his class my sister said it was a unique and fun experience my sister said everyone participated including the shy STS my sister W

012the mock child she was a prosecutor on the behalf of the student board we look forward to our virtual meeting with the board members on Wednesday and the SC board wishes good health all students staff and their families thank you thank you Salam we always appreciate uh hearing from you and really appreciate your perspective today and the questions you ask uh I was uh taking a couple of notes and I'm sure others were as well appreciate the suggestions all right for Communications uh under section three of your agenda we do have a couple of things this evening so at this time I'd like to turn it over to uh assistant superintendent Dr Ellen McWilliams Woods along with our instructional policy uh committee uh for our College and Career Academy of aaran Middle School master plan

013uh discussion thank you very much it is what wonderful hold on one second I think we lost Miss mckitrick okay I'm back sorry having bad luck tonight all right thank you glad you're back sorry Dr MC Williams Woods go ahead that's absolutely uh fine that this is the world of um this remote education and remote meeting so we're all learning to be flexible um so we're very pleased to be here tonight and our instructional policy committee members will wrap up at the end with um some comments but we're here to give you just a short recap from our presentation our special board meeting um just a few weeks ago that we focus deeply on our Middle School transformation and we have quite a few Partners here that are our major funders and uh strategy partners

014and implementation partners that I'll in roduced towards the end of our segment to thank them for all of their efforts as we move our high school College and Career Academy concept to the Middle School to make sure that our students are prepared so I'm going to turn it over to Mr Black good evening uh Rachel if you could present the screen thank you tonight you guys are going to hear from the glue glue of the Middle School transformation and the glue of the Middle School transformation also made sure that in this transformation we not only followed what it was going to take for us to be a number one Urban which is making sure that we focused on high quality teaching and learning focused on learning conditions also focused on uh business and Community engagement

015but also making sure that with our uh partner of the next gener for Next Generation um that we also followed the model that was in place at our high schools and the model that was in place in our high school all high schools also focused on transforming teaching and learning focusing on the learning conditions and ensuring that our students had more Civic engagement and we're going to um first turn it over to who we call our convening um partner and that is the akan uh Foundation and with the akan foundation John garfo not only helped us menend this together but he also went over over and Beyond to help us partner with other nonprofits and local businesses to ensure that our students at the middle school had a authentic Next Generation view of what they

016can do to be Learners in the Next Generation so I'll turn it over to John garfo thank you Mr Black and I must say it's been a indeed a pleasure to work with you and the rest of the aps staff on this on this endeavor um good evening school board on behalf of our board and staff at akran Community Foundation let me first say how much we value um our partnership with the akan public schools um when we were first approached with this opportunity we knew immediately that it was a space that we wanted to be in um one of the reasons being that we have a great relationship with over 500 nonprofit organizations in the community and with our involvement we were able to uh bring together uh many of those nonprofits to be

017part of this Middle School transformation process we realized and next slide Rachel we realized it was important for us to be involved in the co-design of the business engagement model as well as to remain active as a uh member of the executive committee which I've had a great pleasure of of doing so over the past 12 to 14 months and finally ACF feels very strongly about our commitment to the schools that we are proposing to fund a full-time partner broker position to be the link between the nonprofit community and the middle schools and the school system as a whole our board is actually meeting this coming Friday to approve a second installment payment towards this commitment and it will be fully funded um come next spring so we are thrilled to be at the table

018we are thrilled to be a part of this initiative and uh we look forward to uh the future of what the Middle School transformation holds and we we appreciate the opportunity to do that with that I will turn it over to T thank you John uh good evening board as you've seen in our master plan proposal through the collaborative work with Community businesses nonprofit organizations students staff and building leadership we've identified three overarching themes that drive our work those three themes are instruction habits of mind that I've been fortunate to chair climate and culture led by Ivon Culver and social emotional learning led by Megan Manion so to begin our instruction and habits of mind work our team collaborated uh the expertise of our key stakeholders and coupled it with the amazing work found in

019our elementary schools ID programs stem programs and new tech to construct our proposal that will support our version of the portrait of The Graduate Rachel you can go to the next I'm sorry to transform instruction this group believes that it is best accomplished by what we ask our students to wrestle or inquire during their learning process and to challenge them to do something with their knowledge in IB we ask students to use their Newfound knowledge to think Global but act local to improve their local communities in stem we ask students to use their knowledge to push the boundaries of science technology engineering and math matics that will lead to new discoveries and Innovations in new tech we instill in our students to use their knowledge to not only transform their lives but to enhance the

020lives of others around them all of these examples are being planned and taught with an emphasis on inquiry or problem solving but more importantly creating a sense of action taking action is not only limited towards gaining acceptance into higher educational institutions joining the military or earning the most competitive wages but to serve on boards volunteer in your local community and to start or support a nonprofit organization to help our students better understand the community in which they live we have identified several we have identified service learning as an essential element of our model this component will bring local nonprofits into our school into our students lives through guest speakers and experential learning experiences while committing to providing middle school students with Service Learning opportunities that are deep rooted in their standards and planned and organized

021to be deeply rooted in their local communities our dedicated teachers nonprofit organizations students and family members understand the need to change the way we prepare our students we believe that by teaching through inquiry based and problem solving lens that our students will be best positioned to use what they have learned to solve their real world problems and to use this knowledge to change the world that they live in by helping students take ownership of their learning We Believe believe that this connection will lead to improvements in our eth grade math scores across the district as the Matrix and our grant outlines our team of teachers know that this shift in lesson plan design will require intense professional development that will bring that will begin pending the board's approval as you can see we are eager

022and excited to transform learning for our middle schools and now you will have an opportunity to hear from Ivon cver who leads the climate and culture transformation team thank you Ivon you're muted hello as Tamiko said I have the privilege of working with the climate and culture team I promise I did not plant Salam but as Salam so eloquently said students achieve more when they have a sense of belonging and they feel that they are a part of something bigger than what they are and the climate and culture team focused on some of those goals and we had five overarching themes within our team one was creating a welcoming and inclusive environment two was providing and promoting Equitable opportunities three maintaining open communication and that's two-way communication and collaboration among students Personnel parents community and

023the Board of Education number four was establishing building wide clear and consistent expectations for behavior and number five was creating and sustaining positive relationships and we wanted to make sure that that crossed all channels adult to adult interactions adult to student interactions and student to student interactions we realized that in order to do that there are several things that we are going to have to do and part of our plan includes uh cultural development so that we are able to honestly and openly see where we are and more importantly learn how to grow we also wanted to make sure that we are truly treating our families as our educational partners and hearing from our voices and and incorporating those messages and we wanted to make sure that our teachers and our staff understand that they

024are a significant part of our climate and culture and that they too have a voice they too are are heard and that they too are filled as they consistently pour themselves into students on a daily basis and as we talk about the individual needs of everyone involved at the school you can't do that without looking at some social emotional learning and so for that we are going to turn it over to our third Community or our third committee Megan Manion thank you Ivonne uh thank you board and thank you Salam for your words of wisdom uh you know social emotional learning uh we know that uh strong social emotional skills help us on our journey both in the classroom as well as preparing us outside of our classrooms so uh I had the privilege of

025working with five tactical teams uh that worked very hard that were comprised of uh lead teachers administrators and Community leaders each of those teams as t and Yvonne talked about uh were comprised of teachers students our our families our parents our community members as well as Community leaders each team worked each Tactical Team worked diligently to make sure that we helped identify and map out ways for more Equitable Middle School practices with regards to Transitions and support in relationship to Social and emotional learning we looked at professional development uh to support our staff with increasing our understanding and our knowledge of what social emotional learning is and how we can uh use that to support our students as well as how we can Implement trauma informed practices and strategies uh throughout the day with our

026students we looked at ways to explicitly teach our students strong social and emotional skills uh this will assist our students in developing and creating uh self-regulation maintaining strong positive relationships and U making um strong responsible decisions as we work with our nonprofits students on our committee were very uh vocal uh in making sure that student agency was uh talked about and so we do appreciate our board member or student board member making sure that uh she demonstrated that this evening we also looked at structures uh as another Tactical Team uh and for both our middle we have both middle school and high school students sit on this team and we talked about uh how we can support systems and align our structures to support our students coming into our middle schools as well as uh

027leaving our middle schools and the various transitions that happen throughout the course of a school day lastly our parent in uh family engagement committee work diligently to create uh closer Partnerships with our Mo most important stakeholders our families some of the outcomes that you can expect from this purposeful work from this dedicated team of teachers students staff Community leaders uh is an increase in teachers Knowledge and Skills of what social emotional learning is and how to relate with our students an increase in how students self-report on the youth view survey that is given as well as an overall increase in the average Middle School attendance rate during the school year we will work with uh what um John daralo just mentioned Our acan Community Foundation uh where we will identify a a broker partner and

028we will look at having family lisons as well as uh academy uh coaches at our middle school as we look into the 212 school year we will look at begin partner development as well as experiential learning and so I'm going to turn it over to Dr MC Williams Woods who is going to talk to us a little bit more about the budget so you've heard from our U three leads and our three themes on the Middle School College and Career Academy and you can tell that the major Focus is this connection to the community and working on our own uh social emotional learning building those relationships and making sure that the climate in our middle schools is supporting students and empowering them in their voice uh just so many compliments for our student board members

029every single time they're here that's just a snapshot of what we envision for uh the student agency or student voice as well as family voice that we've built into this Middle School transformation um all of this couldn't happen obviously without a budget to support this and in similar way we did the high school we mapped out fiveyear budget that we uh talked about um and introduced just the overarching theme at our special board meeting and then work through the finance committee and instructional policy um if we can flip to the next slide Rachel there's a few assumptions that we went into uh during this five-year mapping out the budget of what this Middle School transformation would take obviously we're we're in a situation that we'll hear later on tonight about our fiveyear forecast and we're

030hitting a very critical point in this district and so we knew we had to not put a strain on our local general fund money to support this transform particularly when we were looking at this uh critical point in our budget and looking at potential Levy down the road that we knew we had to look at uh partnering with foundations to help support this work we also looked at repurposing current money that we have to figure out how can we maximize what we currently have and shift money around and then actively identify reductions as we were shifting those funds you know what could we stop doing what could we um now reclassify some funding to help support this Middle School transformation ultimately though we knew we needed to make sure that after all of our what

031our students have gone through uh particularly this last year we can't Short change our students and we did not want to get off track with this significant nationally recognized College and Career Academy transformation and so that was our commitment next Rachel so the big idea of why this is so important and we couldn't get off track is is this is the process and the methods that we're using to raise student achievement we are wanting to make sure that we're keeping our Innovative College and Career cies on track with the high quality teachers raising the bar with with higher level courses built into this transformation and you heard quite a bit about providing that mental health mentoring and that wraparound support for our students and families so that every single graduate is ready to move right

032into college into career or into the military and ultimately we're doing this as a central part of the Workforce Development in this community and that's why we have the key partners uh that we have who are so um critical to this transformation so the the highlevel review of the fiveyear forecast budget and this these are the figures of new money each year this isn't the total program budget this is the actual every year over that five years how much new money are we going to need to infuse and this is what actually goes into the fiveyear forecast then the general fund portions of this so the total five-year forecast budget of new funds to support this is a little over $3 million uh 1779 of that is private grants and foundations that I'll talk about

033in a minute here 696,000 is that retooled funding that I talked about where we took current money and and and we're able to reconfigure it to help support this transformation and then the remainder it's a little over $560,000 is new general fund money that we'll be allocating for this uh transformation when you look at the the list of uh names here on this slide we have the G Foundation that has been our longest standing partner that has supported us from the the birth of College and Career acmy all the way through and continues to support us um in both the high school transformation and some funds to support this middle school and as you know a huge support for our elementary um essential experiences and continued support of our elementary College and Career Academy strategies

034the Martha Holden Jennings Foundation is our Central funer for our Middle School transformation from the beginning supporting our Master planning and then throughout now implementation for Middle School the you've already heard about the Aron Community foundation's involvement in the master planning process and the funding for our partner broker and then I was pleased to be able to announce that instructional policy that we received new funding from the hulet foundation for $1.5 million for this next year from December to December to support the Middle School uh transformation and then the Chan Zuckerberg initiative also another $1.5 million to support our elementary work and some middle school and some of our diversity equity and inclusion work in the district so the combination of this um these incredible partners are supporting our Middle School transformation I'd like to

035recognize uh Dan Keenan from the Martha Holden Jennings Foundation who was on uh in this meeting and kirston to from the G Foundation who is also in the meeting I'd like them just to say just you know quick um uh welcome and explain why they're supporting this initiative Dan you want to start sure thank you uh thank you Ellen and thank you to the Board of Education to to dat it as well um so Jennings Foundation is is thrilled to be a partner with akan and to invest and uh to us it's it's important that we have great models in Ohio because we know that terrific work is taking place here in particularly for um students who uh represent what Ohio public schools are about it's about leveling that pling field and creating Equitable circumstances

036and so what we've always loved is um the body of work of akan schools um you know there's really three things that come to mind to me is the first is very transparent about your priorities and the priorities are clear that you you want students to know that they matter and you want their learning to matter to them and that to us is is just invaluable having that priority but then you take it and you align your work to that is the second thing so it's not just having that priority and being transparent about it but everything that you do the deliberate nature the detail that takes place the research um is just phenomenal and uh we know that just wanting something to to happen is different than wanting to happen than taking that next

037effort to align your work and then the third thing that I think is really special um that makes this a great investment for us is you're a great model for exactly what you're asking the kids to do you you take every facet of your community every resource and instead of using a deficit model for challenges you you take a value added approach and we appreciate that greatly you look at how each uh Community member Community partner uh employee in your schools students themselves can contribute towards the goal and uh then you put it to work and align that as well and to us that's that's kind of some of the Special Sauce that we see and um you know being part of the Middle School to us is is a small you know we feel

038great about being a small part of a bigger picture of synergy that takes place and and I love what said earlier about you know knowing that um you have a sense of belonging you matter and contributing to something bigger than yourself and that's how we feel U investing in acan schools so thank you for the work that you're doing we're excited that your priorities are straight and to be a part of that and and to to be a small uh part of the the bigger picture here thank you so much Dan and uh Mr Keenan was instrumental in bringing the hulet foundation to the district he's the one who shephered that whole relationship in so thank you for that as well uh Kiren to from the G Foundation thanks alen and thanks to my uh

039funer colleagues that are here Dan and John Galo and I know I see barisford and others here um I think that exemplifies precisely why G Foundation has uh been in this commitment to APS and to our Ean families for so long because we're all in this commitment to ATS together and Dan mentioned three key foundations as to why uh he's funding and I could pair the same things you know the reason that we support college and ceries and now the Middle School transformation essential experiences goes back uh four College and Career caterings it goes to the stem middle and high schools it goes to the Early College akan Early College it goes to bookle high school transformation these were all just stepping stones and building blocks onto this next phase of innovation and moving our

040families to the 21st and Beyond Century so you know the leadership Ellen and David and Mark black and R cver and Mary Kelly and everybody else that we get uh the my deep privilege to work with three top things transparency Relentless focused on uh high quality instruction and learning and the leadership and everybody at Arkham Public Schools is more than willing to learn as well and to bring us all with them so um there's no better investment for our funds for our funding and for our attention in our time so thanks for letting us be part of of this process thank you very much and lastly uh I just want to showcase again Rachel if you can flip two slides to our partner um visual that you've seen many many times um we invited two

041of our key partner groups here because the Middle School um as you heard from uh John garafalo today that it's going to be focused on connecting with the non profits and we have this unbelievable partnership with United Way and Angie barford is here from United Way and they will actually be the recipient of the huet Grant and the czi Grant and then will'll distribute the funds quarterly to us but um because they uh because of their commitment to recruit all the businesses for the high school every Monday the United Way and Connexus Neo will sit down and now the akan Community Foundation representative will sit down and manage all of these Partnerships and relationships so I do want to recognize Sue Lacy from Conexus who is here who is a key driver of our business

042Partnerships and our business advisories and our uh industry um sector Partnerships at the high school and Angie Beford from United Way who manages all of our partner broker for the high school that now akan Community Foundation will be add adding that piece for the middle school so thank you as well for being here and lastly Michael householder representing the akan Education Association has been instrumental on our executive committee and helping with the whole bringing in all of the teachers who participated in the master planning process so U I will now turn it over to Lisa Mansfield and Valerie mckitrick if they want to add anything and otherwise that concludes our presentation the actual approval of the resolution will come towards the end of the meeting and all of our partners don't have to stay that

043long until the end uh we just wanted to recognize you here at the beginning uh of the meeting very quickly if I may thank you everyone I and that's really what I want to say is thank you to the countless people who have put in countless hours to bring this to be and so the teaching staff the administration all our Community Partners my heartfelt thanks for everything you've done to bring us to this point and I look forward to having the Middle School College and Career Academy transformation thank you thanks so much for being here to all of you I miss seeing so many of you out in uh in the in the community um I know you're still doing all of your incredible work even um from our living rooms and um and dining

044rooms across the city just a few things that really stood out tonight the idea of service learning the sense of belonging and family and student voices such exciting things to hear and building a strong positive relationships all of those things are things that when we listen to Salam those are the things that she missed you notice she didn't talk about you know missing talking to her friends in the cafeteria or missing um although that's relationship based too um she talked about those relationships with her teachers and with her her fellow students so we're listening to those things and we're we're trying to build the base for when we can go back the excitement of having this team working with us um John and kirst and Sue and Dan and then our own Staff Mark Rachel

045T yavon um and having Angie there to help us as well I know I've probably missed tons of people and none of that is anything without Ellen she'll take no credit um and she continually forces us to the front I can remember how when we first started talking about Middle School I kind of felt like when I'd had my first child and people came up to me and started talking about when are you going to have another and you're like wait can we just wait to see how this one works out for a second but it this this team is not waiting we're like right in it um continuing to to build and to grow and to innovate and there's no resting on laurels um the last steering committee meeting that I got to sit

046in on I got to sit in on the elemente team so um kudos to all of you for not letting us rest but pushing us forward to innovate so that our students and our community can continue to grow thank you so much to pick up there too and Echo I don't know that I could say it better than Mrs mckitrick and Mrs Mansfield but I also want to say thank you the board the G Foundation the Martha Holden Jennings Foundation akan Community Foundation hulet Foundation initiative and our partners Conexus and Michael householder Pet Ship at aea and to all of our staff it can go without saying that we couldn't do this without you but I think it needs to be said that we couldn't do what we're doing without you ership to Dr Ellen

047McWilliams woods and Dr James for the vision and the leadership and I think you know the funders that are here tonight the those that aren't the partners that are here this evening and those that aren't I think is really what sets akan um and its peers who are embarking on this initiative apart and we're taking it even one step further and what we've been able to to put together here or what our staff has been able to put together here and so I just want to take the opportunity to say thank you uh we really appreciate your support and your investment um in this district and in our students so thank you very much we appreciate it thank you very much yeah Mr President before we move on this is Dr H I just had

048a quick question comment if I may absolutely so again you know I I can't say any more eloquently than than than Mr Bravo Miss Mans Miss MC have but but uh but my question is actually for Mr gal so you know as I sit through board meetings I try to listen with you know kind of the public ear and think about the as I'm listening things what questions would I have and so um your organization is is funding a position uh that partner broker position and so while I understand what that position is I think it'd be great for the folks who are listening um you know in the public to kind of hear you sort of unpack it a bit more and kind of talk about about that role and how it how you

049envision sort of why you chose to fund that position position sort of doing um from a value ad standpoint uh again because I think that's an extra step that we definitely appreciate so want to give you that platform as well sure thank you Dr Hall um I I think it's really the the connectivity that we offer to the community and to really open up these students eyes to thinking about a career in a nonprofit organization I mean i' I've been in nonprofits ever since I graduated from college 34 years ago and and nobody really taught me what it meant to work for a nonprofit organization or that there was even a career path in that field so that's why we we thought this was a great connection because we have connections with the nonprofit organizations

050and that connectivity is so important to getting these kids turned on to um a true passion that they may have that they may not know exist um until they learn about this experience so um that's why we decided to throw our head into the ring and and join forces with APS to do this thank you thank you Dr Akbar yes um I I don't have a question but I just just wanted to Echo um everyone else's sentiments and thank uh John Christ and Dan Sue and I think Angie I think I got everybody right I can't say some people's last name without messing it up so I'm like I can say the first names um but thank you very much for you and your organization's commitment to acan Public Schools um and to uh our

051students in this community you know akan is uh a great place uh to live work um and play and if you think about our young people uh specifically those who are from marginalized communities and those who live in poverty one of the biggest things that the research tells us is that um they want to give back to their community and to their families um as a career and as a focus for their future and so their choices um typically are LED through that and so beginning that process of thinking about it um how do you professionalize that type of work uh through Partnerships with nonprofits through Partnerships with the zoo through Partnerships uh with different organizations that you're going to bring to the table or have brought to the table I think it's going to

052literally transform our young people's lives uh to not only do things that they um can do in the future but something that they probably will end up doing um and beginning to commit their lives to service at a very early age so thank you very much for your partnership thank you very much for your commitment uh John and your organization for funding the the position um and thank you for everyone else's uh just sheer dedication to this process uh hats off to everyone involved uh Dr MC Williams Woods who won't ever take any credit um and Mr Black and Mr Hatcher um and everyone else I'm I'm probably missing some people uh but I'm just in awe thank you thank you Dr abbar Dr MC Williams Woods or committee anything else on this topic that's

053all for tonight Mr President thank you so much and thank you again to our partners um uh you're more than welcome to stick around for our five-year forecast uh but please don't feel obliged if you have other things to do this evening thank you again for joining us thank you at this time we are going to move to the next item on our agenda the moment we've all been waiting for uh we're going to turn it over to Mr Pendleton and his spreadsheets and we're gonna talk about our fiveyear forecast Mr Pendleton all right are you able to see the fivey forecast slide okay is it the presentation view I hope yes okay wonderful uh thanks uh to our partners and that setup in terms of understanding the the everchanging nature of school finances and

054I think what Prides me no more than to work with this board and community and and partners is the framing that the finances really never get in the way of what's right for kids uh and that's that's really the The Guiding Light um that is really humbling to work with so hopefully that reflects in uh my spreadsheets or lack thereof in this presentation just really quick uh in what are required to present to the board is a five-year forecast which serves as a tool to assess the school district's Financial Health uh you're well aware that the district has two components to this it's the historical projected financial data which we won't get into a lot of numbers more about Trend analysis highlevel results and then the notes or significant changes Andor assumptions so we're talk

055about the assumptions a lot today because um as you well know we're in pretty unprecedented times so for the agenda for the five fiveyear forecast overarching goal of showing this cial Clarity um Kiren talked about one of the initial goals they had or has been through the whole process was transparency and I think through the board finance committee committee of the whole in uh the return rap committee this financial CL Clarity and transparency has been steadfast throughout second we're going to talk about the impact of covid-19 and then there's the assumptions um and a heavy caution on assumptions that's where we're going to spend the most of our time today and then finally we'll talk about future Levy needs and hopefully framing that for um future discussion before we get into the spreadsheet we're gonna

056the next slide spreadsheet uh covid-19 has been I'm I'm sure all of you reflecting the same has been the most significant change to a set of C circumstances that uh is very disruptive disruptive to families disruptive to being a parent uh disruptive to producing financial data and guiding principles around money so that sound decisions can be made throughout the board this is by far the most significant and I'm often reminded from my father who's a retired superintendent and I've talked to superintendent James about this superintendent and board decisions they resonate for a really long time like like seven years when you're talking about an academic program or Middle School College uh and careeres and so this going to resonate for a really long time Finance tends to be a lot shorter than this we're going

057to talk about what covid-19 has done to disrupt uh that stability and talk to you about some of the long-term implement impl applications of the finance all right this is the worst spreadsheet I have Mr Bravo uh so I'm I'm G to jump right to the end where everybody does in the fiveyear forecast if you already got the package today you've gone to the bottom line you say how much cash do we have can we make it another year that'll make it really simple I know it's busy up top but if you look at the top under fiscal 2021 in May this was the May five-year forecast we talked very openly about a million deficit remember set the stage what was happening in may we just started this Global pandemic we had just received word

058that there was going to be in upwards of five to 10 maybe even 20% budget cuts with the potential shutdown we weren't really understanding how much Federal stimulus dollars we were going to get a lot of uncertainty right um and then fast forward to today in bottom half of the screen is the November 2020 um forecast that we're submitting tonight and the Delta of uh lessening that deficit by the tune of 13.2 some odd million dollars and we're going to walk through some of those impacts and um you're all in luck this isn't going to be hours long presentation probably should be but it's going to be relatively brief because what we talked about at finance committee and I think we're all understanding is these assumptions these questions that we need to constantly ask and

059you're constantly debating in the board are driving our finances just the same so we're going to be reviewing this fiveyear forecast every month and if something significant happens a significant decision on behalf of the board or significant that happens in terms of budget reductions or additional close uh shutdowns with businesses in additional um PPE these are the kind of questions that you should be asking of your fellow board members me finance committee and throughout the next few months so let's walk through a little bit of what the impact of covid-19 has on our current finances these are the the two columns are the two various pots of money that we've received receiv that have been Federal stimulus call them federal state and local grants not including those which we talked about tonight which are really

060dedicated towards programming about assisting us through this time and this is significant right this is 13 14 15 million doar that has to be spent According to some very strict guidelines the first and the largest amount is the Esser funds which you've seen and those are the dollars we've received about 10.7 million about $1.8 million spent in fy20 or last school year and another $1.2 million spent this year well why haven't we spent more of that 10.7 million remember that's the most flexible pot of money that we have can last us till September 2022 so 2022 These funds are good for but cares act the CRF the Broadband Ohio connectivity Grant and then the cares act Summit covid-19 Public School reopening Grant all had to be allocated and spent before the end of this calendar

061year uh unfortunately like many other school districts and government agencies we were already down the tracks in terms of spending those dollars and coding those into the accounting SST system so thanks to uh the finance office staff specifically Todd Atkins for being flexible and going in now two and three different times into the accounting system properly moving these so that that top set of funds that 10 10.7 million Esra funds we have the most flexibility and lasts the longest now for the first time uh I'm going to try and show my forecast five portal does everybody see forecast 5 yes okay wonderful right this is the first time so I'm pretty excited about this the tools that are available as we dive deeper into the forecast 5 toolbox here as you'll notice this is a

062simplified financial statement that you saw in an earlier slide I want to talk about an area of the forecast that doesn't get a lot of attention it's the non-personnel expenses I want to bring up this dashboard and hopefully you're seeing has everyone see the blue bar chart okay perfect this is going to work perfectly so that simplified financial statement these are all expenses outside of personnel right so why is that important Brian well let's we talk so much about our Revenue stream we talk so much about our Levy stream our property taxes versus our state aid and then we talk a lot about personnel and retirements and benefits because it's such a large percentage but what has the biggest impact on our forecast right now is our non-personnel expenditures let me bring this down to

063another level and this is interactive and what we do in finance committee is we start to isolate things we start to say why are why is capital or why is H purchase service why is it why does it have the trend that it does and so we can interact with these tools at a really high level and what I want to come back up to this top bar chart so this is again this is all non Personnel expenses why is this chart important in the subtleties of this chart look back to fiscal 2018 so that's the 201718 school year and fiscal year and through 2019 as we're approaching discussions and deficit spending as we're still tightening our belt preparing the community for potential Levy talks and then what happens in fiscal 20 or the 1920

064school year come march with the global pandemic we have shutdown you can see it reflects in the 78.5 million to the 76.7 million now here's where the financial transparency and why we're going to continue on this discussion and why this is going to resonate for a little while longer so the assumptions present in the 2020 and 2021 where you see this uh 76.7 to 76.3 is it's rather flat but we're not in school Ryan so why isn't it rather why why isn't it a significant drop the assumptions and to remain conservative with school district finances so that you don't kneejerk or pendulum swing a decision with finances that has other ramifications that impact classroom which is one of our our guiding values is to produce a trend that allows us to make decision but again

065isn't needer so in 2021 with the likelihood that we could be coming back after the first of the year in a blended environment could be extending a school year it could be opportunities for intensives over a summer after a vaccine becomes available after a vaccine becomes available hopefully in the first or early second quarters of the year we could Infuse a lot of resources into wrapping around kids to provide instructional um instructional days in person uh albeit it could be significantly social distanced and it's going to increase our transportation cost tfold and then why Ryan are we looking at a fiscal 21 to fiscal 22 in a significant jump assumption in fiscal 22 is we are back in full-time instruction with all 21,000 of our students why is it a jump that seems a little

066bit larger than inflation if you go back to those questions and we'll finish up with those same assumptions we really need to go back to fiscal 18 and fiscal 19 to get a real Baseline and if we just apply some simple inflation to this from 2018 to 2022 that's just a little over 3% that's not uncommon that's uh that's not out of line for the kind of expenses that we're talking about just bringing back Transportation over the life of the forecast albeit even though we're operating a lot many more buses and drivers than what people think because of our requirements with Community non-public and Charter and the way schools are funded this will add tens of millions of dollars to the forecast so we do want to prepare our finances for full in-person instruction uh

067blending that from the end of this school year into the start of next school year and just to show you the the depth uh we can look at these um charts in live time now I did receive a question from a board member about total District benefits in and it was framed in light of um negotiations and virtual instruction and a lot of our staff who are receiving health care benefits which is as we've talked about one of the second the second largest expenditure we have in the budget and so I just want to show you a little bit more detail regarding this and how these benefits are are playing out you can see from fiscal 19 to fiscal 20 really this is when the global pandemic started to take a hold of us and

068uh a lot of people stayed home and still are in fact fiscal 21 where we are we're still operating at a 3 to 5% Trend assumption and right now it's coming in less than that if you compare our fiscal 21 to fiscal 19 you see it's not coming up with that kind of inflation healthc care specifically you can see a little bit this is $40 million spend for the district again we're a service orientabil business so personnel and benefits are our largest expenditures you can see that same subtle drop from fiscal 19 20 to 21 with just getting back to some inflationary Trend in 22 uh and then just for uh those who are listening we're trending at about a five to a s% rate on uh 2023 through 2025 on out that's beating some

069national statistics and that's a credit to our bargaining group for partnering with us on plans like paladina I'm going to go back to the presentation was excited to be able to share does everybody see the um slide deck again yes okay thank you as we round out the fiveyear forecast presentation and open it up for um questions this chart this uh this simple back of the envelope napkin graphic I think is where we should spend some time talking uh definitely in committee level and maybe even our monthly report out from finance committee but assumptions what assumptions are we driving or driving the forecast and then what actions and I love this when I found this I love this because it shows you um how serious we are about the discussion and how the board in

070governance structure of a public school is not going to take action when the known is in the highlighted section in the mid in the middle so if we have a global pandemic pulling on one side and a presence are forced to make us take action on another we're going to make some sound decisions based on know items and that's why I say we're going to save you from the hours of presentation tonight and just kind of set the stage for future discussions this is the snapshot of the fiveyear forecast that uh we're submitting tonight to the Department of Education you can see that we've gone from a 15 a little over $15 million deficit uh for this fiscal year to minus two depending on what we do the rest of the year that will have

071a major determination about what cash balances and what deficit spending we'll have throughout the rest of the year I want to stop here and highlight the section in the red and because I do want to set the stage for future Levy needs and even know that we're not in person instruction and even know that we've received Federal stimulus dollars there is going to be long-term ramifications to our finances there are going to be uh PPE technology cost additional cleaning cost uh to the likes we've never seen before and they're going to be become permanent parts of our budget remember that uh Esser funds that large pot the $10.7 million there's been no reauthorization of additional monies so those kind of increased costs now just to put it in perspective want to belabor the point but

072put it in perspective that's $10.7 million that needs to last us till 2022 on a $370 million budget we have been able with good active management on behalf of the board and Leadership a belt tightening that we showed you in 2019 to stay off the ballot now for eight plus years maybe a year longer so let's leave the board um with those timelines and I've added a new timeline in here just for you to reflect reflect on again no decisions have to be made but those timelines are as follows the May 4th 2020 election what we were previously talking about that's obviously before the likelihood of a virtual um school year or a blended school year this has been some time ago and I'm going to add on to the right so that you can

073see and I'll email this presentation out if it's not in your board packet the November 2nd election for Levy time frame of which it'll be nine years then there's still a need for additional revenues it is our time we're still deficit spending but we are actively managing uh transparen managing those those finances last slide I have is what's next what's next for virtual learning what's next for additional Federal stimulus and those additional related expenses to operate will we likely have summer interventions where finally have a vaccine and that we're able to reach our children in more significant ways than what we are so with that I will turn it over to questions thank you and we we do have a couple of folks lining up with questions um Mr Pendleton uh as I handed over

074to some other folks with questions too I have um I suppose a statement and a question but it's not not necessarily just the deficit spending itself right because if we were to save money for a large purchase that we wanted to make in a future year there's a potential that we would obviously deficit spend so it's not the deficit spending itself but it's also that ending cash balance and where that puts us and we notice in your forecast of course that there is a future year coming up um where there really is sort of a cliff um with or with or without levies in place um and I wonder if you might talk about that just a little bit and and also our cash Reserve policy and where our current fiveyear forecast puts us and

075finally um a followup to that um we have uh well I'll let you start there but I also kind of um well I'll let you start there okay and follow up so the cliff and the cash Reserve policy thanks for mentioning both of those as you know the most important line item in the five-year forecast for those who are watching in the board is that Revenue Surplus or deficit and in your materials you see that even though we trim that deficit we are still deficit spending pretty significantly next year um you know to the tune of about 12.8 million but you start to look out in odd years and we're def deficit spending 23 million in 30 million reaching into our cash reserves and so that sets the stage for your next comment question is

076our cash Reserve policy currently stands at a recommended practice of having uh greater than 10% to our overall budget and spend and so we do violate that cash Reserve policy it's not a sh and steadfast in the policy but it is a recommendation that not only that we engage the board but the community in those discussions long before that happens so that we're not doing that that's only two two school years away and you all know a levy cycle um you know any Levy that's passed in 2021 doesn't collect until January of 2022 so it is very relevant to be talking about an operating Levy now when we technically violate that cash Reserve policy in the 2223 school year not just two years away with only $30 million in cash on our books and that's

077a segue into my followup and then I'll hand it off to Mr Alexander and Dr Akbar um given the pretty substantial disruption that covid-19 is having on operations and finances how often you know we typically bring this update this fiveyear forecast at least publicly twice a year in May and October uh we know that you keep more of a realtime view uh would you envision that we would be sort of revisiting the fiveyear forecast a little more frequently over the next year or so uh given the disruption that's going on we definitely will I would say we do review this every month we've included some new slides in the monthly financial report that has uh the simplified financial statement right there in the early part of that document and then we did talk about a

078larger state of the schools in terms of finances about having that this month and in partnering with the super intended I think we're going to add that in January or February uh so that we know a little bit more of the assumptions that are having an impact to our forecast so definitely we will be sharing this more often uh than not thank you Mr Alexander and then Dr akar thanks Ryan that was a very good report as usual um and we know that in the past we have uh had to cut and we've cut according to what we what we needed to cut and we've also cut to a point where we were almost down to bones and uh you know we can't cut bones and be able to survive with the forecast you're given

079today and this is just so the public can have a clear understanding um without what what can we do uh with our our our finances at this point uh or is there anything else we can do to help move forward without having to do anything drastically or uh without having to put a levy on unfortunately with the way the state of Ohio schools are funded and you all know the the efforts that we're taking with the general assembly is every school district has its time whether it's three years or five years or sometimes 10 depending on if it's a high growth District or low or whether it's dependent on the state or local more ours on average is about every six years when we look back over I think the last 30 years that we've

080talked about we've extended this one eight likely nine um so as far as that that value Mr Alexander of transparency um efficient government spending efficient uh metrics we we hit we hit the marks we really do hit the marks it is unfortunate um that when we go back to the public sometimes it is viewed as we're not hitting marks but I stack up our efficiency ratings from transportation to operations to spending per pupil to anyone um I think our staff does an amazing job of that but I think the most important thing to this Mr Alexander is doing just what we're doing tonight and through finance committee is continually sharing our story sharing where we're spending this PPE money on whether it be getting technology in the hands of students and hot spots uh to

081making sure that our equipment and technology is leveling the playing field and and supporting instruction so I think that's what we we knock out of the park directly right and with Co that really put a hamper on everything and so we basically need the public to know that uh we're going to probably we're going to be putting a a levy on the ballot we're going to need to help and we and we know it it gets difficult is tough at times but we we have no choice you know this is all we have I mean I wish we had a a better funding source uh formula so we can fund schools a little better and not have to rely on the public but uh we need it in order to keep AC Public Schools afloat

082and uh I just want everybody out there to know that we when we put a levy on we're going to need it it's important and not just for us as the the board or superintendent the treasur and all but for our students that's the most important and not just the students as well but the the teachers you know because we need the teachers to be here to teach the kids what they need and we also need those students to be able to get the best educational experiences they have and I I want the public know that we actually doing the best we can with what we have and we have to go to the ballot we just have to because we're going to need their help so anybody who's out there listening we want you

083to know that we're gonna probably we're g we not probably we're going to need your help so we can continue to the type of education we're give on our kids if not then our kids suffer School District suffers and then part of our city suffers as well thank you thank you Mr Alexander Dr abar drar yes um very similar thought process and uh train of thought as um Mr Alexander one of my my biggest concerns honestly isn't the things that we know currently so what type of things you're factoring in currently one of the biggest concerns for what I see when I look at that fiveyear forecast are all the unknown costs and all the things that we don't know what might happen so for example you know we have had you we have done

084a great job of utilizing you know the partnership and the funds uh to build the majority of our schools but there are some schools that aren't not rebuilt and to think about this this time frame um where the buildings haven't been fully operational in the way that they normally are you know I'm wondering if like the F maintenance on some of those major items that are needed in certain buildings if that's calculated into this for forecast um and if so um how does that factor in considering all the schools that um with the things we know they need um and those things that may just come up those big ticket items that we talked about what a few months ago they one of the schools needed that's right and we we did Dr abbar to

085your question spend more time talking about those kind of items prior to the global pandemic so the answer is yes and no yes we do include unfortunately in our general fund because we don't have additional permanent Improvement Levy funds available to us we include the regular and routine maintenance of our buildings new and old out of general fund no we do not have budget available for multiple roofs or building envelope issues or HVAC issues um those we will need to address long term our staff does an amazing job keeping our buildings up and running safe warm and dry however we've talked long term we're going to have some buildings to address and that is not included in the forecast so to replace uh one of our buildings that hasn't or wasn't addressed through the school

086facilities commission uh that is not budgeted thank you um yeah I I appreciate that um and you brought up in your report um about the need for a levy in the January 11th um date uh for the first resolution um that is around the corner cor um and I'm I'm just I'm not concerned about it um well I am actually I don't even want to lie about that that's probably not the best word for me to use because I am concerned I think that's actually our organizational meeting date um and I'm just wondering if um just as we move forward maybe in the next week or so if you just give the board that timeline you just gave and then maybe we need to have a retreat um not just to talk about the levy

087but to talk about the levy and maybe even just um all these other things about the unknowns that may come up um and things we need to prepare for in the new year plus a recap um from this year I think Patrick and I briefly talked about that this morning so yeah kind of nerve through our finance committee meetings and then you know there's two places in my presentation that you mention and what you're most concerned about what's not listed on the forecast right so from uh March and may forecast to now there's been so much more information that we've gleaned about this and how we're operating and I do believe that over the next few weeks and into early January that will be telling as well but um I that's what I included the

088November election time frame in here because I do want the board not to feel as if it's being forced to put a May initiative on and uh be able to in a sense if we can balance the budget for this school year in a sense we bought ourselves a year right remember so we were just a real highlight from that busy slide up front we were in minus $15 million uh and now we're sitting at a minus two deficit spent some of these unknowns regarding our decision of inperson or Blended uh learning are going to have major implications on our finances uh that being said our financial position is a little improved but still deficit spending so wait and see continued discussion obviously uh but that's why I wanted to include the November 2nd election

089on there good thank you I didn't see anyone else but is there uh wait a minute MRI Miss mckitrick thank you Mr President just a quick comment I know we talked about how our deficit spending went from 15 million to two million but I want to reassure people because it's been suggested that one of the reasons we're keeping kids out of school is as a cost-saving measure and I feel very strongly and I'm pretty sure I speak for the entire board when I say by no means has that ever even been a consideration in fact it's really a rather repugnant idea to all of us I'm sure we all want our children back in school no matter what it costs right but the one thing we're not willing to risk I suppose I want to

090say is anyone's health so to anyone listening out there who's thought that perhaps we're keeping kids out of school to save money please understand and please know that by no means is that the reason your kids are learning remotely thank you thank you thank you Miss mckitrick anyone else hearing and seeing none um we do have a resolution to approve uh under Section 3.3 of your agenda it's the resolution for approval of the five-year forecast beginning fiscal year 21 and it's resolution 20-62 will entertain a motion to approve that resolution have a motion from Dr abbar and a second from Miss mckitrick Mrs mckitrick any comments questions or discussion all right uh hearing none roll call please Mr Alexander yes Mr Bravo yes Dr Hall I Mrs Mansfield yes Mrs mckitrick yes Dr abar abar

091yes thank you thank you our next item is approval of the regular meeting minutes for Monday November 16 2020 we'll entertain a motion pH moved second thank you a motion from Mrs mckitrick a second from Mrs Mansfield any comments questions or discussion on the minutes hearing and seeing none roll call please Mr Bravo I muted too quickly yes Dr Hall I Mrs Manfield yes Mrs mckitrick yes Dr abar yes Mr Alexander yes yes thank you thank you superintendence recommendations personel uh Mr President I wish to recommend approval of the Personnel recommendations presented in categories 5 through 16 thank you we have a motion on the Personnel recommendations so Mo thank you a motion from Mr Alexander a second from Mrs MRI any comments questions or discussion on the Personnel recommendations and seeing none roll call

092please Mr bravoo yes Dr Hall I Mrs Mansfield yes Mrs mckitrick yes Dr akar yes Mr Alexander yes yeah thank you thank you next Mr President I wish to recommend approval of the resolutions and motions presented in category 21 thank you do we have a motion for the consent agenda items so Mo second thank you a motion by Mr Alexander a second by Mrs mckitrick any comments questions or discussion on consent agenda hearing and seeing none roll call please Dr Hall oh I gotta go first this time okay yeah hi first time ever hi this is me yes yes mrri yes Dr abbar yes Mr Alexander yes Mr BR yes now you know a little fun fact um Once Upon a Time it used to be an alphabetical order starting with a and going to

093the end every single time and Mr Pendleton when he started uh discovered that in the event of a split board it always it would always make the person whose last name was last in the alphabet um the ability to have the tiebreaking vote every single time so if you'll notice now uh just a fun fact he rotates it um it's always an alphabetical order but it always starts with the next person in alphabetical order so just a little fun fact for you you since I'm last alphabetically I [Laughter] appreciate I'll mix it up Dr Hall thank you sir all right and finally Mr President I wish to recommend approval of the business Affairs recommendations presented in category 23 thank you do we have a motion moved second thank you a motion by Mrs mckitrick a

094second by Mr Alexander any comments questions or discussion on the business Affairs items hearing none roll call please Mrs Mansfield yes Mrs mckitrick yes Dr abbar yes Mr Alexander yes yes Mr Bravo yes Dr Hall I thank you all right uh superintendence report yeah uh several items uh this evening Mr President one is uh the governor governor dwine signed House Bill 404 and part of that included um extending the authorization for uh the boards including public school boards to continue uh to have virtual meetings uh that was supposed to expire tomorrow it now goes through July 1st of 2021 um I know many of you saw the uh news uh piece about Chromebooks we had a public records request from a News Channel about that so for 2019 and 20 we issued about 20,43 Chromebooks

095and out of that uh that year about 715 were deemed as lost and this has been when we started this maybe four or five years ago that was a big concern um so yes we do have you know for some I think in terms of Elementry they're pretty good of keeping track of their Chromebooks I think the problems at Middle School where you know either the thing got dropped and someone says it's lost because it can't be repaired or it's been left some place but we do have the ability um when those are ping to shut them off we've um I know Deborah folk can address like any insurance issues uh Howard Lawson can address you know more uh technical details of how those things are shut off so they can't be used um any

096further so far in the 2021 fiscal year um about 20,5 Chromebooks out there with our students and about 438 of those have been deemed uh lost um either stolen broken and not turned in and we have been uh most of the time with most people if they're coming forward with a broken Chromebook it's replaced but these are actually ones where they don't have the Chromebook to return I just wanted to provide that short update of the next one um regarding Co I did send out a correspondence and some information um to the board regarding Athletics um postponing the actual start of more of our regular season games there were three that had been previously scheduled so I let those go we also got our rapid covid tests in and um that testing actually starts uh

097this week and so we're trying to keep our kids in their respective Bubbles and reinforcing the things that they need to be careful of when they're not uh with us you know after hours uh to make sure their Seasons you know don't get interrupted um I can say that we have had you know some issues with uh I know one of the latest ones was a coach uh I think who had a sibling who who uh got Co um and that caused uh one of our teams to have to isolate you know because of their proximity to the adult and not necessarily a student so um when Summit County came out with their stay-at-home advisory we thought it would be prudent to you know postpone those games that weren't scheduled until after that advisory expires

098I believe that's December 16th and so so um after that we want to be able to resume but we'll look at what the data you know is showing us I know over the there's been a lot of concern about the Thanksgiving weekend uh that we just had and whether people were going to gather so those are uh some of the things that went into uh that decision the other one is our remote plus um looking at starting you know postponing the start of that we were going to start uh actually today um with fact but again um conferring with Summit County Public Health and some of the things that we were seeing you know these high rates of infection and now you know Summit County Stark County I believe Medina County are all on the

099um watch so we could go into the purple um category as early as this week but we'll have to see how that goes so um at a minimum you know looking at doing the remote plus uh in January I know I'd like to thank Dr Hall for sending some additional information I shared with him and I'll send that to the board uh later this evening uh kind of a draft um piece where we could make some decisions about how we're going to go so for instance in the purple Zone it would be 100% remote instruction in the red zone as long as we're not like on the watch like we are now it could be more of the remote Plus in orange and yellow there really to me is not much of a difference between

100the two and I think we should look at a blended model um our decisions will need to be whether you know if we're going to do that Blended model what's the level of infection in the community and from all the research that you know we've seen um you know kids under 10 aren't necessarily it's not that they can't get infected with covid they can but they don't have the serious symptoms that people over 10 particularly adults have and so those are some things that you know we have to really look at in terms of you know if we at one point we propose bringing back or trying to bring back our you know kindergarten through second or third grade students and so those are some things that we'll have to approach but we can't I

101think our speaker tonight was correct we can't have a whole year of kidss you know being on remote we're going to have to you know my concern are those younger kids and of course our seniors and make sure they can graduate so we may have to look at as Ryan pointed out in his fiveyear forecast you know a summer period where we may have to offer some Services uh to our students so I hope to be able to send something uh to you all in advance of our next board meeting and then after we get back looking at um you know with our remote plus looking at where we then transition from there I just want to say something Dr James thanks for uh giving us that report because I saw on the news this

102morning on Fox8 that they were saying that we were starting and so I I kind of wait a minute I I know you sent out to us that we weren't starting right so I want to make sure that I did ask Mr Bravo to uh you to give update on that because we need to know and people need to know because the the news is saying one thing and we know we're actually doing so I wanted that exactly thank you sure thank you Mr Alexander and Dr James uh for my report tonight just a couple of quick things um many of you will notice and and certainly the public that's watching May notice that uh Miss Atri is not here with us this evening she did touch face with me yesterday evening and un un

103fortunately her father has passed away and so she is uh working through that with her family at this time and so we just want to send out um our thoughts and our prayers to miss Atri and her family let her know that we're thinking about her um and and that uh we'll make sure that she stays up to speed on everything we're doing here but did want to let everyone know that um for the benefit of of the public uh even more so in the board we have finished our evaluations for the year as of our last meeting we completed Mr Pendleton's evaluation uh just a reminder to our board those were our uh summative evaluations our formative evaluations will take place after the beginning of the uh New Year and so we'll keep you

104posted on that as we move forward uh on our superintendent search just want to draw your attention to uh Mr Horton's uh emails to the board he has sent out some additional information including the revised timeline as well as the doodle poll uh that we discussed during our uh last special meeting um so if you could please take time and complete that so that we can start to put dates on the calendar um at least holds on the calendar Mr Pendleton also sent me uh the contract and salary information uh that we spoke about during that special meeting and so I'll be forwarding that on to uh all of our board members so that you have a good perspective of where we are currently as we start to talk about where we're going um and

105then uh spoke with Dr Akbar today and we'll be sending I'll be sending it uh the advance APS document back to him uh for review uh after uh we finish consolidating our notes which hopefully will be tomorrow and then that will go back out to the board and to senior staff to plug in some holes and for some edits so that we can finish that portion um as we prepare for our upcoming meetings on the super superintendent search that's it for me uh treasurer's report just a quick update that uh House Bill 305 Senate Bill 376 is entering its final two weeks of testimony we'll be uh issuing testimony between the house and the Senate and House in the morning Senate in the afternoon with a wrap up and closing in the Senate Tomorrow there's

106uh talks potentially of a vote in the house for a committee and possibly the whole on Thursday so stay tuned to that I'll keep you posted any contingency plan for uh current weather um driving down tonight so I don't have to mess with the snow in the morning no the testimony will take place regardless okay you wer dirting me we're directing that anyone coming down good safe travels thanks all right under uh committee reports legal contracts and board policy no report thank you finance and Capital Management yeah it's just me tonight um again condolences out to miss autrey um again she couldn't be here she's my my partner um on finance so I'll be giving the report out solo tonight um so to jump in uh the finance committee uh met November 23rd uh and

107the following folks were present uh miss arry Mr Bravo myself Miss mckitrick uh Dr James Dr MC Williams Woods uh Mr penlon and Miss Tekk and uh what follows is some highlights from that uh committee meeting uh Mr penin updated the committee regarding um Draft House Bill 305 um you've heard us you've probably heard us talking about this multiple times um it's now being referred to um as the fair school funding plan um and you know uh and so that you know there are there there's a list of districts that are available to reach out to and encourage the treasure superintendent legislators to pass that bill so you know that's kind of the activist part of this that that you know those of you who may be watching um you know in the public you

108know um again you you please have a look at that list um also as well um Senate Bill 89 uh was passed as well um you know this is a you know this is also tied to to Ed Choice which you've heard us talk quite a bit about in these meetings as well um you know this bill basically sort of makes some changes to sort of uh you know to what schools um will and won't qualify as Ed Choice um you know you know this this is also I I know that it's going to it would impact the the federal poverty number I think it goes to 250% so obviously that would that would increase the number uh students that are eligible to apply for the voucher um and you know this this this is

109is important because it it can impact accurance per pupil funding so um and then we also talked about uh again I think as you heard earlier uh Dr mams Woods um you know provided an update to finance committee where we talk through the um the budget as well as the fiveyear forecast as it related to the middle schools College and Career Academy uh program um and so uh and you also heard that we got a number of Grants to help sort of uh cement that uh that plan so um and then also Mr penan shared um a fiveyear forecast which he you know essentially previewed for you all here tonight again you know we we first discussed that in in finance committee um and I know moving forward uh some of the themes of the

110forast um you know of our forecasting will again you know providing additional Financial Clarity on on on on not just the known but as the unknowns become a bit more or a bit less Opa um you know we'll be uh you know know sort of endeavoring to share more information around that uh the impact of covid-19 um you know and you know one thing I I'll say to that is one of the things that we didn't talk about tonight that uh that I'm sure we'll have to talk about moving forward is that um you know as vaccines become available um you know we'll have to sort of start to Think Through you know those vaccine costs you know anywhere from $3 to $37 per dose um with varying degrees of side effects and and whatnot

111and so I know that this board is going to have to figure out along with Dr James and his team sort of um you know what role of any does APS have in in in helping to address some of the cost um as as as relates to That vaccine and you know what do we do from a a policy standpoint around um you know around students and teachers uh getting that vaccine I know that and we all know that there are a number of folks who for whatever reason you know are opposed to getting any sort of vaccine and so as we sort of start to Think Through you know um you know our plans in January uh as this vaccine begin begins to come online it it's going to create um even more uh

112items for for this sport along with Dr James's team to really be thinking about um you know and so and how that and how how that impacts us both in the short meaning in long term uh financially as well so um so that would conclude the uh the finance committee update I'll see the four back to you Mr President thank you uh instructional policy and student achievement no further report thank you under item 29 on our agenda for unfinished business we do have um The College and Career Academy's master plan the board uh is requ is has been requested to adopt that so at this time we'll entertain a motion for approval of the college encer Academy's master plan for middle school so moved second thank you we have a motion from Mrs Mansfield a

113second from either Mrs mckitrick or Mr Alexander not sure who came in first it was a photo finish any comments questions or discussion uh before we vote on the Middle School plan yeah I I've got a comment Mr President if I may um so yeah I mean you I want to thank Dr Williams Woods for spending the time that she took to ensure that um the board memb sever of us who knew uh were up to speed and kind of in the loop as to sort of how this had sort of the history uh and then also sort of both current state and sort of where we're going so um you know there's a Cadence of meetings that she sort of made us aware of and has invited us to to make to help ensure

114moving forward that we stay in the loop because because that's important as well so um so so so want to thank her for that uh for for investing the time um you know it's in several of us who uh who needed a remedial course in some of this so thank you you anyone else all right hearing none roll call please Mrs mckitrick yes Dr abbar yes Mr Alexander yes Mr Bravo yes Dr Hall I Mrs Mansfield yes thank you thank you and there is a need for executive session tonight pursuant to Ohio Revis code section 121.2 2g2 to consider the sale of property and also Revise Code section 121.2 two G3 to meet with board legal counsel to discuss disputes involving the board Andor the school district that are the subject of pending or imminent

115Court action so at this time I'll entertain a motion for executive session so thank you we have a motion from Dr Hall I believe we had a second from Mrs mckitrick yes thank you uh roll call please Dr abbar yes Mr Alexander yes Mr Bravo yes Dr Hall I Mrs Mansfield yes Mrs mckitrick yes thank you thank you we're going to head over to Executive session now if everyone could remember to exit out of this meeting and we'll be back momentarily Marilyn be sure you click out e e e right e e e uh Mr writtenhouse if you want to flip the switch thank you thank you and welcome back to the Aron Public Schools Board of Education regular meeting for Monday November 30th 2020 we've just returned from executive session there's no further items

116or action to come before this board so at this time we will entertain a motion for adjournment so move moved second we duly noted um we'll pick them out there uh we have motions in second for adjournment We Are are adjourned thank you all have a good evening good night everybody have a good night good night good night good night be careful