7-6-20 Board of Education Meeting

001That has that's from the old meeting. I think >> Okay. So, I'm going to call the meeting to order. Uh, can we have a roll call? >> I guess it is. >> What's up? >> Is it filming? I guess. Okay. >> Mrs. Eolds >> here. >> Dr. Hooker >> here. >> Mrs. Johnston >> here. >> Mrs. Lewis >> here. >> Mrs. Singh >> here. >> Okay. Can I have a a motion to adopt the agenda, please? >> A second. Second. >> Uh, all in favor? >> I >> um the record needs to show that Mrs. Johnson is attending virtually. Uh, and can I have a motion to go into executive session in accordance with the Ohio Revised Code to consider appointment, employment, dismissal, discipline, promotion, demotion, or compensation of a public employee or official and

002matters required to be kept confidential by federal law, rules, or state statutes? >> So move. >> Do I have a second? >> Second. >> And is this a roll call? It >> is. >> Mrs. Lewis, I >> Mrs. Sing. >> Hi, >> Dr. Hooker. >> Hi, >> Mrs. Johnson. >> Hi, >> Mrs. Eichols. >> Hi. >> Okay, so we need to turn off the >> Do you want me to swing a chair around? I think that Mark was here. Are you expecting Mark? >> I saw him. >> I think Amy said that Mark and Nick were going to come and you had Whitney also. Yes. >> We should be good then. >> Yeah, we should be fine. Thanks for being here everybody. >> Yep. We're on here. >> Guys, why don't you grab a chair

003and you can just keep your social distancing. >> Hey Nick, there's a spot up here that's socially distanced if you want to. >> This one right here. >> Someone wants to be up front. He says, "No, >> that's fine." >> Okay, so we're fine. >> Okay, so we're moving on. Whoops. We're moving on with our meeting and we do have um some personnel actions to take care of first. So, um, would you like to run us through that or? >> Uh, these are approval of some of our, uh, personal service contracts and supplements for summer work that's going on in the district. Uh, we'd like to, uh, ask the board to consider approving 5A uh, 1 through 17. Uh, at this time, >> okay. Can I have a motion for approval of personnel actions letter

004A 1 through 17? >> So moved. >> Second. >> Roll call. >> Mrs. Lewis. >> I >> Dr. Hooker. >> I >> Mrs. Johnson. >> Hi >> Mrs. Sing. >> Hi. >> Mrs. Eicols. >> Hi. >> Okay. So now we are moving on to uh what all the 260 plus people watching on YouTube and all the people in the room are here for uh the 2020 2021 school reopen plan dialogue. And as we have just um had some discussions uh about you know the process u just in our executive session the things that we need to talk to our attorney about. It's clear that this is about as clear as mud and we don't have great direct um direction from the governor or from the county or from anyone else. Uh but neither does anyone

005else. So, we're all kind of in the same boat. So, we really are going to need to be patient and really work with each other and hear everyone's concerns. There are a lot of constituent groups in this um but obviously the most important thing at the end of the day is the safety and um well-being and education of our students and the safety and well-being of our staff um and our families. So with that um we do have some guests with us. Um Melissa, do you think it's best if we start with our guests and for their perspective or are they here to answer questions or >> um Well, Whitney is here. Whitney Bu is here. She's the principal of elementary school and she's here to be able to answer any questions on behalf of

006the principles. Amy Pampa is here. She serves many roles for us, but I think at the moment is serving as the EPO president. And I think she was hoping to be here for a question and answer session unless you guys have something to say. Mark Atwood is a Latin teacher at the high school and the interpreter is the counselor at the middle school and I think they were hoping to be here for question and answer unless I'm wrong and you have something you want to say to start. >> Question and answer. >> Awesome. Okay, great. Thank you. And also just uh for people watching um board member Elizabeth Johnston is on Zoom. So she's here. You just probably can't can't really see her necessarily all that well, but she is participating. So we do have

007all five board members actively participating. Um so Mr. Kcki, would you like to start us off? >> Sure. Thank you. Um we're really excited to have our colleagues here with us tonight and I thank you all for taking the time to come. We know we have a lot of people listening in who would who would like to hear uh probably more answers than less. We're going to try to work through a presentation that we put together tonight to talk about some of the contingency plans we've put in place. I just want to start by first of all thanking uh our staff members, IGO members, our classified staff members. Uh want to thank also the Hamilton County ESC Superintendent Chad Hillicker and the Hamilton Health Commissioner Greg Kermanerman for all the help that they've given our

008team. Uh along with some guidance, we've also heard from legal representatives and Britain along the way. Uh we're really appreciative of all the help they they've given us to provide some detail into the guidance that we got from the Ohio Department of Health and the Ohio Department of Education in two separate documents last Friday that many of us have been waiting on for for some time. So what we're going to do is we're going to go through um a little bit of a presentation that we call our brave return to school. And I'm going to ask Dr. Stewart to kind of start off. You all have a slide presentation hard copy uh in front of you and um we're going to talk a little bit about some of those foundational assumptions that we put into

009our planning and we're going to work through what we call the return to school plan which uh under our planning committee's work has been kind of plan A. what if we were able to bring uh a large majority of our students back on campus and then also talk about other contingency plans which you've heard people talk about a blended or hybrid model and an online option and um Melissa will get us started off with the foundational assumptions and then I'm going to talk about some of the current safety guidance that we were given from the state and then we'll work through this uh this packet and then we'll have some time to talk about next steps and also take questions uh that we can help to answer along the public statements as well. >> Yeah,

010we have some public statements at the end that we'll we'll go over when you guys are ready. >> So, Dr. Stewart, you want to kick us off and kind of work through the brave return to school, please? >> Yes, absolutely. So, um I have never been accused in my life of being too quiet, but I don't have a mic. So, if it's difficult to hear me, let me know and I can move to another location. >> Do you want to come up and use the mic just so that we're sure that everybody can hear you? >> Sure. >> Be great. You have to be front and center. Hang on. >> Be careful. >> Yeah. >> Wouldn't that be something if I fell down? >> Yeah, that would not be good. That would not be good.

011>> Okay. Thank you. >> You're welcome. Thank you. So, we decided to call this the brave return because this is going to be returned to school like we have never had before. And as Mr. Michael said, there's so many variables that we are really feel like we're building a plane while we fly it. But we have some foundational assumptions that we think are really important. And one is we know that we want to consider and be as flexible as we can as a staff member so we can have the best student teacher ratio that we can possibly get. And that way, we've talked about potentially reassigning some staff members so that we can have a smaller ratio, including using alternative spaces. The space we're in now, the multi-purpose room, is a great example of that.

012It allows us to spread students out more. So, we're considering all factors like that. We also know that we really have to be prepared to be a very flexible organization next year. If we start the school year off by everybody returning to school, there's a chance throughout the school year we might have to go back to online learning if that is what is said that we have to do by some type of health agency. And we want to be prepared for that so that we don't have to take time off as an organization and say to our families, okay, give us a week and we'll figure it out. We want to be able to go the next day if that's what happens. We also think that we will have some students who will not be

013able to return to school this next school year. They will either have themselves or a family member who has a health condition that prevents them from being in school. And we know that we need to provide an online learning opportunity for them. And we believe that our parents should have an expectation of us that the online program serves with as much quality as the face-to-face program does. and we've been working really hard to make sure that that will be the case. We also think that when students are not in school full-time that it can be really disruptive to families and so we're trying to keep that in mind as well. We're aware that we have not received all the information that we need to about transportation. We're waiting for that information still. That could influence

014the plan that we're going to talk about today. We're aware of that as well. We also want to make sure that we're considering safety measures that provide the best environment for our students and all of our staff members and we want to be compliant with any of the health agencies. So those are our guiding foundations. Can I answer any questions about that? Okay, moving on to district safety guidelines. I think Mr. Kcki has a couple words about this. >> Thank you. So, there are several things here that we just want to talk about. And what we've done as a team is we've had administrators and teachers who've been working on several committees. And as we've gotten updated guidance from the Ohio Department of Health, we have taken that guidance and tried to work that language

015into our plans. As many of you know, with the guidance we received last Friday uh last Thursday afternoon, sorry, from the Ohio Department of Health, there were five main uh topics that were covered that we need to make sure are part of our planning. No matter what plan we end up subscribing to. First, we need to make sure that daily health checks are taking place for children and adults. And when that happens, we will be working in partnership with one another uh and our families to make sure that those things are happening. and also making sure we're working in a partnership with our staff. Second, we obviously have to make sure there are ample opportunities for people to do uh sanitizing, handwashing, hygienic practices that make sense in hightra areas. So, entry points, exit points,

016restrooms, all of those things that deep cleaning you've heard about and hygiene practices are very important. Uh third, deep cleaning with a routine and and routinely cleaning between shifts or changes or classes or transitions in hallways or cafeterias or playgrounds. All of those things are going to become a regular routine and part of our our work in the organization. Fourth, practicing social distancing, of course, is going to continue to be very important whenever and wherever possible. And those things factor into some of the planning we're going to talk about. And then of course fifth and and probably most important and it's the the universal thing that we're all living with right now is a face mask covering or face covering protocols. So those are all of the strong suggestions and guidance we got from both

017the Ohio Department of Education and the Ohio Department of Health last week on Thursday that factor into some of the ideas that you see here. uh board members and our conversations with our teams have routinely um tried to take these things into account as we're making some recommendations which we'll come back to as we go through uh this presentation. >> All right. So before we jump into the three plans that we have for educating students, we want to first talk about the fact that we're going to have some students who will be engaged in the online learning opportunity for the entire year. That's really new to us. That's for most of us. We weren't trained to think about teaching our students online every day all day long. So we have spent a great deal of

018time both in May as well as in the summer. people are dedicating extra additional time and professional learning so that we can be prepared to do that and do that really well. So knowing that there have been times that people have asked me if I think that the online program will look exactly how it did in the spring and my answer to that is no. I'm really happy with the job that we did in the spring. I think that everybody should give themselves a pat on the back. The teachers worked so incredibly hard, but we also learned a lot during that time. We partnered with the University of Cincinnati as well as the University of Colorado in trying to understand what it means to have the most rigorous online content and pedigogy that we can

019have. So things will look different for our students who are online in comparison to the spring. And that includes more rigor, more accountability, and more engagement opportunities for our students. At the same time, there are some districts around us who are using a paid platform to educate all of their students, K through 12, and we have some concerns about that. We believe that there are programs that could supplement the pro the the curriculum that we're going to offer students, but what makes Indian Hill special is Indian Hill teachers. And we want teachers in Indian Hill to be engaged with our students online. And that will be a mixture of both asynchronous and synchronous activity, but with a great emphasis on live teaching engagement moments for our students. So, it will look different. In grades K

020through 8, the teachers are actually going to create that curriculum. But in high school, we're going to need some supplemental help because I don't know about you, but there's no way I could kind of plan for AP physics. like there are some really specialized curriculum that we have. So in those cases, we'll be able to look at some programs that can assist our teachers because it is very important to us that we not reduce the course catalog for our high school students. I want to especially acknowledge the work of our high school counselors, including Esther Hall, who have spent hours and hours engaging with college admission officers, so that we know exactly what we need to do to make sure our students have a competitive edge when they apply for post-secary options. And what we're

021hearing from those those those candidates is don't rely on GPA, don't rely on ACT or SAT. It's all about the the mixture of classes that they choose to take when they're in a high school. And then additionally, like how they can show their unique learning and leadership styles during this time. So knowing that it's very important to us at the high school level that we not drop core or some of the honors or more rigorous classes or classes that offer things like leadership. >> So that's a quick overview of online. >> Just uh real quick to add to Dr. Stewart's points here. When she says curate courses K through 8, I just want to emphasize the time and effort that that takes our teachers who we want doing that work. That's an ongoing planning piece

022that we have to factor in and and our teachers, to their credit, started that early on this spring and have continued that with extra professional learning. And that's how we know we'll be ready to stand that up as we move forward. But this is not an easy task when you think about creating um nine grade levels worth of courses with our teachers as the curators. Just one thing. Um, you know, again, I think that we can be very pessimistic about we're very likely to end up online at some point that, you know, how could I believe it won't happen? I know what we're doing at Xavier and I I think it's probably the right answer. It as a professor, it's driving me crazy because I'm literally spending all of July working on this. But basically

023what Xavier has told us that we need to deliver person in-person content synchronous learning but we need to set the entire thing up and we use canvas here you use canvas now right >> correct >> and so every module for the whole year or the whole semester should be preloaded and if you're going to have an in-person class that's great that's what we want but that it needs to be set up so that when the grenade drops if it does and We are blown out of here all home. We're ready to rock and roll as a as as teachers. And I'll bet you a bunch of teachers are already doing that. I mean, I would think so. I'm seeing shaking heads and that's great. But I think that we really need to mandate that that

024it absolutely has to be set up ready to convert to online in seconds. And then because as we were talking about before this meeting, we're going to have some kid turn positive and then that's going to cause 14 kids to not be here. Well, we can't drop their ball. They're going to be out for 14 days and we've got to make it literally seamless that they're just still rocking and rolling and maybe they can come in synchronously for the live lecture or whatever it is. So, I know that it's a lot of work and I I boy, I thank you all as teachers. Thank you for all you do. Uh but I think we really need to do that. And do we know whether our technology is good enough? Are we capable with bandwidth and

025everything to deliver synchronous learning out of every room in this building at the same time? >> So yes and no. There would be some additional equipment that we would need to purchase if we're going to have students participate by by remotely being involved in the classroom while the rest of the class is face to face. Um if you don't mind, Dr. Hooker if we can just put an asterct on that and if I can bring up something else I would love to get the input of the board members about this and certainly there are parents who are sharing with me their input. >> One of the things that has been talked about is why can't we just make online feel like it's face to face even if we get to the point where we have

026100% of students and we all have to go back to being in remote learning next year all of us. Why can't it look online? There's even been some suggestions of saying if there's no one here, the teachers could even report to the classroom and they could just be on camera and they could be teaching from their classroom. And I understand the desire to make it seem like what we know of as school as much as possible. But there are some cautionary tales with that that I think is really important for us to consider. First of all, when students are participating and they're only participating by watching through a camera, they are a consumer and not a producer. Our students at Indian Hill need to be producers. They need to have an opportunity to think creatively

027and critically about the content that's at play and to demonstrate their knowledge in some way. And we always say that that not only includes listening, but speaking and writing and engaging with their peers. That's the first thing. Second of all is it also means that when you're in the classroom there's actually multiple ways of communicating with students. So as a teacher if Mr. Atwood is having the students work he's not just sitting back. He's looking over their shoulder to see what they're writing. He's listening to their conversations and he's giving immediate feedback. If students are only participating by watching a video then he's not going to have the chance to give them that feedback which is a really important part of learning. We also want to make sure that we're very careful about the amount

028of screen time that we're asking our students to participate in. I don't know about anybody else, but during distance learning, I realized I had a threshold for how many Zoom meetings I could participate in one day. And I probably have a more formed brain than some of our smallest students. So, we want to be appropriate about how much we're asking students to be on the screen. Our families have also said to us, it's really important that we have a mixture of synchronous and asynchronous, though families do want more live sessions and more accountability. And I think that we need to do that as well. Lastly, I think that we want to make sure that we're continuing to give students as much content as we can so that they can continue to thrive in all the

029settings that they'll be in after after they're leaving us. And for some of our students, they're going to be in settings where they're going to have blended learning opportunities at the collegiic level. So, we want to try to model that as much as we can as well. So, I I think that it's something that we want to consider. And, you know, there's only there's we only have one person in our district right now who I'm just making this one up, teaches AP physics. And so, is it possible that we look at having some type of system that really allows us to capture that specific teacher? I think that is true but I think we also have to be careful about all those other factors as well. >> So um as we get into the plans

030here just I think to your point Dr. Cooker. Um, a lot of people were asking, you know, why do you have three committees and why are you working on three plans and why do you have these contingencies for the blended or the online? And the fact is they all kind of um rely on each other for some of these details we have to work out. And so, while we're going to focus now on this plan a return to school mostly, we do have those other plans that that we'll touch on. >> Any questions before I continue? Thank you. So plan A is if students return to school to us for 5 days a week, all students coming on board, unless it's a family who says we choose to have our student be online. Looking at

031that, we will not be able to meet the guideline or the suggestion of 6 ft of space between students in three out of the four of our buildings. And it is an issue related to the number of staff that we have as well as the number of big spaces that allow for that. So if we did that at the primary school, students would have 4 feet between them. At the elementary, 3 to 4 feet, at the middle school, 3 to 4 feet, and at the high school, in most cases, we can actually accommodate 6 ft. So people might say, well, why would that be at the high school? Because of our course catalog that we have, we have more teachers and we're able to then reduce that student teacher ratio. Now to do that we

032might have to collapse a few sections or we might have to say can we use this space and have more students than we typically would in one particular session but we think we can get close to 6 ft at the high school level. Additionally the building is just bigger at the high school level. We have more classrooms that we can use here. So what are the pros to this one is that we have all of our students back 5 days a week and that is a that's a pro. We miss our students. We miss seeing them. Um, graduation and just a a quick thank you to the principal Jeff Damado as well as all the faculty who helped with that. Seeing those students was was just really a highlight of the entire season. Um, so

033it also allows us to use current staffing and we don't have to make so many changes and our staff and what they're teaching. And so that it to Dr. Hooker's point, if we're asking people to build curriculum, if they could build curriculum they're really familiar with, that's advantageous for us. And it allows for us to have daily instruction. The cons is that it limits the feet of social distancing that we can have in three of the buildings. And lastly, at the middle school and high school level, there will be mobility, meaning that students are going to be moving in the hallways. Now, I know that Mr. Damado is going to work with the teacher leadership team and come up with some really good solutions that try to take in mind that it can't look how

034it usually looks when the bell rings and everybody's out there. Um, we keep laughing and saying it's going to look like a highway and there's going to be cars on the highway and they're going to have to merge in when there's enough space and merge back out. But it's going to take some thinking of the entire teacher leadership team to come up with the answers for how we can make that be as safe as possible for students. >> Is there any way to do one ways? Yes. Um, we are I think that he would like to really work with the teacher leadership team and all of the principles really are kind of thinking about that right now like which hallways would be one way, which would be two ways, which staircase do you go up,

035which staircase do you go down, all of that type of thing. And so that will be some new learning for our students when they report to school the first time. That will feel very unfamiliar to them. So some safety measures that we'd want to have in place, they're kind of all the things we've talked about before. We'd like to ask for your opinion about masks and what that could possibly look like in school. I think that if if Amy Campa would like to jump in at this point, I think that she might have an opinion about what teachers are willing to do, what staff members are willing to do. Mrs. Campa, do you feel like you're comfortable jumping in at this point? >> Sure. So, um, as an organization, the health and safety of our

036students and our staff is our is our number one priority. And based on the guidelines that we're hearing, not only from the state, but from local officials, we feel very strongly that masks should be worn to protect all involved, staff, students, students, families, and teachers families. >> Yeah. Let me uh jump in there and emphasize strongly. You are absolutely right and I think our plan has to include a system that says school is mandated. Masks are mandated. They're nonoptional. If you have a medical condition or a some sort of reason why you cannot wear a mask, we will have this online version that we will deliver to you online and you will not suffer from an educational standpoint. But we cannot put teachers, staff, and other students at risk by allowing somebody based on personal

037freedoms uh uh or even legitimate medical reasons to put those people at risk not wearing a mask. So I I and others may disagree with me, but I I feel that policy has to be absolutely 100% period. So there are several things that that Amy and and Melissa mentioned here that I think we should just reiterate. Number one, under plan A, what we are saying is we're trying to layer and balance those safety guidelines that speak to the face covering mandate that you just talked about, Dr. Hooker, and then also layering that with social distancing to the best of our ability throughout a school day that may start with a child entering a bus until they leave school and getting back on the bus. And knowing that in all of our buildings to do this

038100% of the time and maintain 6 ft is not possible for those students who choose to return and and even those students who choose to return with a face covering. But we feel like the pros outweigh the cons and that our staff is willing to go along with some of those things and those measures do exceed both what the ODH guidelines and the AAP guidelines that they they've used as a lot of their language uh suggested and we think that we can do those things. um and provide that under this plan. >> Uh there's some additional there are some additional measures that we're considering like lockers for example. They're very closely packed in there. So maybe students wouldn't be able to use lockers. We'd have to consider some other method. To be honest with you,

039most of our students at the high school level don't use their lockers very often. So that won't feel too different for them. And additionally, we know that we're waiting to receive some more information about the use of the cafeteria. We don't know exactly what that's going to look like. There's a chance we might not be able to use it in the way that we have where we had an entire group of students report all at one time and we're prepared for that. We might have to eat in alternative spaces. >> Have we heard anything yet about will we have to be doing like boxed lunches in the cafeteria? Do we know anything about that yet? So we have asked our um vendor uh Aramark our partners to work with us on some of the scenarios

040that are suggested to them and uh some of the guidance that they've been given to work up different scenarios for whether we would use a cafeteria with limited capacity or shifts and stagger students who need to get meals. Um and then also uh we have asked for guidance from Hamilton County about using classrooms or alternative spaces for food operations as well. And that's also something that we want to gauge with our parents specifically to each family as we move forward which will help us with the planning in every building. Um just a couple of other safety items that that we want to mention as well under this particular plan. The guidance we've got from the state basically is suggesting again 6 ft of social distancing among students and staff and volunteers in all school environments.

041And they go on to list all the environments except for two. And I just want to point this out because we will get questions about it. They do not list auditoriums or stadiums. Those original base orders from the state that close large gathering spaces have not been amended for schools yet. So while cafeterias are a part of it, restrooms are a part of it, classrooms are a part of it, and buses are a part of this, um stadiums, auditoriums are not yet. So, we are still restricted on how we can operate those spaces based on the original health orders that were put out and we also have not heard some of that guidance that um in terms of extracurriculars which we know we're going to get questions about as we're talking about details for the

042fall. I just want to make sure everybody understands that the governor said here's how you can do this in schools but left those two big pieces out. Those are two huge parts of our facility and campus plan that we still need to get more guidance for in the future. Um, also just in terms of specials, and we'll come back to this, when we talk about electives, things like band, the performing arts, um, choir, planning for how we're going to use space in in school, as Melissa said, might look a little different and may also include outdoor classroom environments or venues. And that's something that we're looking at and studying also. And Jeff Clark isn't here tonight, but he did a wonderful job of doing a lot of research on music education for us and provided

043us a lot of great details that'll allow us to put some best practices in place that OMA is actually using statewide and we're really pleased with that. So, we'll come back to those things to add more detail as we can. Um, one question uh I have is one of the things I saw at CPS that I think came out today was that when they announced their hybrid plan that um the community really um heard them and I know that they have a much larger community than we do and I don't know what's available in our community but it may we might want to think about you know what if there are spaces that are less than 3 ft in certain buildings are there community partners ers, whether it be churches, whether it be the village

044c village buildings or green acres or otherwise that we could look into to potentially, you know, have some additional space if we need to have additional space. >> That's a great suggestion. Thank you. Um, with all the plans that we're going to go over today, we're hoping that we can spend the most time on plan A. None of them are perfect and all of them have pros and cons, but we thought it was really important to be as transparent as possible with everybody. So, some of the things that I think are beloved in some cases might not look the same. So, we know for example, easy one to think about is PE class. When the students come in and they all the students in the entire school share the same piece of equipment, that's the

045kind of thing that we'll have to consider a change. But that also includes some academic areas. An example of that would be Discovery. Discovery is the name of our gifted pullout program for students who show eligibility and they work with one of the gifted intervention specialist in a resource room and primary, elementary, and middle school. In those classrooms, they all share equipment and they're very specialized equipment. They're not the kind of equipment that we can afford to get for every individual student who's in a discovery classroom. So plan A definitely thrives on the fact that our students are back with us in instruction for 5 days a week, but it doesn't look exactly the same. Discovery would have to change drastically and we might not be able to give the service in the way that

046we have before in the past. Um students, we definitely don't want to have the extra mobility of students translating between um their home room classes and recombining if we're going to have to do some trace contacting. So, those are the things we want to be really transparent about is when students come back, it won't look exactly the same as it was before. >> Something as simple as um the use of water fountains in a different way is going to look different. um equipment in restrooms that have um automatic flushing systems are going to be things that students by strategy have to be taught about and educated about because some of those things will be changes for them in how they might interact with things that they might not have thought of in the same way

047um when they would return under a plan like this. >> The last thing I'll add about this was when we talk about students being pulled into a resource room and I know Mrs. Johnson, this is probably something that you're thinking about and you're probably about to ask a question about this. Erica Leopard is the director of pupil services and she has been working nonstop to think about all these ways that we can make sure that we're going to meet the needs of those students who have a disability whether those students come with us face to face or they choose to be at home and to make sure that we're giving those services. So that would be something different in the fact that those students might actually due to their IUP um uh goals that they

048have need some time in a resource room. The next is operations and I think that Mr. Kcki has a few words about that. In terms of our operations under this plan, I think we've covered some of this, but again, we will we will work with uh the food service uh vendors in order to talk through the best way to use a staggered schedule in specific buildings or to assign students. We know we have some students also who may bring food from homes. And one of our follow-up steps to tonight is to work with families specifically to see what they plan to do in terms of food for their children. Um, we've talked about the fact that transportation can look different under certain models. Under this particular model, we believe that our transportation can look very

049close to normal operations. Again, there would not be 6 ft of social distancing on a bus, but there could be two riders on a bench or three if they were siblings and we would be able to maintain uh a typical bus routing system under this plan A. Um, which would not look different. it would look different under any of the other plans. Uh we would still want to see which of our families were were planning to use transportation and those who were not to try to maximize that that social distancing and to um try to gauge how much our ridership might change based on how people feel about the environment. Um and we've also talked about the fact that um we would need to look at um other services like Melissa mentioned and I think

050this goes back to even in the classroom environment. Um we'll talk more about this later but the PPE the supplies that would be necessary everything from the visual cues and signage that you would see in buildings for the traffic patterns to the safety supplies that we would want to make sure we had on hand. I just have one question about um under this operations page and the transportation where you have the students in K through five will be bus per state guidelines with uh two asterric riders per bench but then grades 6 to 12 students will be encouraged and asked to provide alternate methods and I know we talked about that being a big solution if we don't have as many writers but why why the difference between 6 to 12 and K through five

051when they go to school at different times. >> Um, this is more of a a general recommendation in terms of what we would like to follow up on with our parents in terms of asking who would uh need to ride and who might look to to transport their children in a different way. Um, we would like to know those numbers and we know that some of our parents might have a concern based on what's been going on. They may change their plan. We have a large number of students now at the secondary level who either get dropped off or who drive themselves their siblings to school every day. And I think in terms of our next survey with parents, we really like to just get a handle on those numbers because that will make our

052ridership overall a little more flexible and maybe we can plan our routing to really be be effective for everybody. So it it's not that 6 through 12 would not get a ride. It's that we would like to identify who would want a ride and who might do it differently this year. Yeah. Right. >> But wouldn't that be true of K through five? Also, I'm I'm a little I'm just a little concerned about how this is written uh that somebody may misinterpret that we are trying not to provide the >> Yeah, I think to clarify again K through five, if the parent wanted to provide them transportation, that would be open to them as well. >> Okay. >> But we want to try to provide those K through five riders wherever necessary with a ride if

053they need it, knowing that they make up the large bulk of our transportation. >> Okay. We just may want to rework that wording. >> The other question I have is so two riders per bench. How much how how much space is there between them? Two writers in >> Yeah. I I think that uh you know because I read this and it it doesn't make sense to me. That's not what we talked about. But you know under state law we're obligated to bus K through 8. We're not obligated to bus 9 through 12. But that doesn't really solve the problem because it doesn't fix all the the first two grade or the first two buildings as far as busting them. Yeah, I think we have to look at all this and see what parents and we

054have that previous survey that you the school did where we had almost a thousand respondents and I think it was 40% of them indicated that they would be probably bringing their kids to school. Well, that lights up that bus a lot. Um, I don't know if we can get to one per bench, which would get you your 3 to 6 ft. Uh, but it certainly would help a lot. Uh, and, uh, so I mean, you can't tell someone we're not going to bust them because under state law, we've got to bust them uh, at K through8. Diane Spurlock, our transportation director, has worked with the staff to come up with multiple scenarios. And again, under plan A, with a full return to school, if we were to use our current routing system, um, and bring

055people, again, just like in our classrooms, there would be less than 6 ft of social distancing and we would try to maximize the space between riders. Um, which is another reason why we'd want to know what our families are doing. Uh, and again, that does meet the guidance that was put out by ODH and OD, and it does meet the law. Um, however, it is not maintaining six feet of social distance on the bus. That would be impossible under that plan. >> But does but it doesn't even maintain three, right? >> It would not maintain 3 ft um on a bench, I don't believe. No. >> And is is that exempt from the 3T recommendation? Um, under what we got from ODH and OD last week, they gave us the flexibility in all learning environments

056including buses to make this work this plan if we chose to do this. >> But so >> when they specifically talked about social distancing and encouraging social distancing, did they exempt buses from that? >> They did not exempt buses from social distancing. What the Ohio Department of Education says is that you should maintain a distance of 6 ft from others and take every effort to distance yourself when possible when possible. And what ODH said is that school staff should try when possible to maintain 6 ft of social distancing in all learning environments. They did not say children. So, this is one of the the flexibility issues for local control that in both of those documents was kind of shifted back that we need to consider in terms of plan A because there is no way

057to affect a full return to school under plan A unless we are willing to think about a similar busing model. Every other busing model is either person or cost prohibitive and would require substantial changes. Yeah, I I do think your question and I I think we're getting stuck on this six feet and again I'm not a lawyer. The the recommendation if I heard the recommendation from the governor it was he would like 6 ft but he did not lock it to 6 ft. He was like that would be the best scenario 6 ft great but here's flexibility do what you got to do at the local level. That's the way I read what he said and I think that that's correct and that and it also just 3 to 4 feet and putting them on

058buses follows the AAP guidelines. What the governor specifically said was practice of social distancing of at least 6 ft can reduce spread and further can be can be further reduced when other measures like face coverings are layered on as often as possible in all school environments including buses. I think it is important to remember that everything that we have is a guideline. None of this is a law. It's not even a mandate. It is a guideline and we want to do the best we can with the priority of bringing our children back to school. >> So just to kind of keep that umbrella flat. >> So I think we've hit most of the highlights of what a plan A return to school would look like. Um, I just would say about extracurriculars before we move

059on to talk about the other models. Whether we're talking about athletics or activities, again, we do not have any further guidance from the state about the commencement of fall sports um or the commencement of large performances or extracurricular activities for clubs. Uh, we do not have that guidance currently from the state of Ohio. We do not have guidance on large gatherings in public for those events and we do expect them to look different once we get that guidance um based on the original orders we saw earlier in the spring which said you couldn't have people in groups of over 150 gather in large public places. Until we hear different and get that permission, we don't have any new news on sports clubs activities u marching band for example. We don't have that news today. And

060if we were to do plan A and bring everybody back, my understanding is we are also in the process of developing plans for contact tracing plans or developing plans for if a student comes to school ill, testing uh requirements, those types of things are being being considered and being put forth in a plan for the board's consideration. You know, that would be part of the overall plan. um as I understand it and um you know one of the things that we don't know yet is certainly how many staff members might have medical issues etc and what the what the numbers of those staff may be that would also be a potential component in whether we could actually do plan A. >> Exactly. We of the five things that we talked about at the beginning of

061the meeting, those topic areas that we had to hit, we were specifically asked to work out a testing strategy for the district, a social distancing strategy, a face covering strategy, a transportation strategy, and all of those things are a part of the plans and the frequently asked questions document that we're working on for families. Um, so that once we have those final details, we can share them out. All right. Does it feel okay if we go into plan B now? >> So, plan B is the model that we would have in place that would ensure 6 ft of distance between our students and all four of the buildings. And in order to do this, our students would not be able to come to school 5 days a week, all day long. We'd be looking at

062about 50% of the students coming into the building at one time at the primary, the elementary, and the middle school. So to do that, there would be two sessions. Students would be assigned either an AM session or a PM session. We would make sure that that was coordinated by family. So if you had students in different buildings, everybody would be on the same schedule. And it would also decrease the mobility that we had at one time as well. So it would it would continue to provide more distance and less mobility for the students. So the pros to that is with six feet we're still getting students into school. We're reducing the mobility. We're increasing the social distance. But the cons are that we're also reducing the instructional time that we have in a face-to-face model

063for students. So students would have about 2 and a half hours of instruction a day with a lot of focus on English language arts and math. At the middle school level, we would add social studies in, but science would mainly be through an online learning module that would be facilitated by the teachers. Additionally, unified arts or what some people call specials would be relegated to an online model because of the limited amount of time that students would be in school. for this model. If we did an AM and a PM model, working with Diane Spurlock, who's the director of transportation, it means that we would only be able to transport our students in grades K through 8 because we'd be running so many routes first thing in the morning, then again at the end of

064the AM session, the beginning of the PM session, at the end of the day. That's more routes than we typically do with more students. So we would not be able to provide transportation to our high school students which is probably the confusing note that we saw in the other one. Thank you for your feedback about that. So that is definitely one of the cons of this model. Knowing that then if we can't provide transportation we have two options at the high school level. One is that the high school level could be used as a space for office hours. So we have it organized and ready to go if this is what we end up having to do, which is that students can sign up to come in and they can visit with the teacher. And

065so if Mark Atwood teaches Latin, he would have a day that we would be assigned to him that he would be here all day long and students could come in and meet with him based on a schedule that they would that they would choose to be with him. The other days, Mr. Atton would be responsible for teaching students virtually. So, and that would that would be high quality with accountability, rigor, and engagement, but it would allow some face-to-face time. The problem with that is that we're not providing transportation. So, we're really leaving up to the students to and the families to work out how to get here. And we think that that's really disruptive to our families. We also think our students would prefer to be on campus more than just that limited amount of

066time. The other option is that we could have students come 5 days a week, all day long at the high school level and get them six feet apart as we mentioned in plan A. The problem with that is we probably have some families who are relying on the high school students to help provide child care for their younger siblings while their parents are at work. So, if the students are here all day and they have younger siblings, it might put the parents in some precarious situations where now they're having to figure out daycare situations for their younger siblings. And so, that might become problematic, too. So, we wanted to see the reason we made plan B is we wanted to say to ourselves, okay, if we had to do it, if we had to guarantee

067six feet of space between everybody, what is the model? What would it look like? And what would be the pros and cons? So, as you can see, there are some real issues with it. There's some there are some it would be it would be a challenge for everybody. I don't think everybody would love this model, but we can say as a group that we looked through it and we have it ready to go if that's the case of what we need to do. >> And I just want to point out something um with the guidance that came out last week. The county put out what's called the state put out what's called a public health advisory alert system that was created and many of you have seen it now and it's in operation already. That

068public health advisory alert system system is to provide county data and information to layer additional safety measures to combat flare-ups of CO 19 across the state. That is not a school closure alert system. So, when it comes to um a hybrid model, we heard some people already say, "Okay, well, if because of the county health alert system, you go into uh red or maybe purple, you'll just switch to blended or or hybrid learning." That's not the case. That system will not necessarily trigger that we would move to that type of model at all. And really what we will hear is we'll hear from either the local um county health department, the state government um or in conjunction both um about a shutdown possibility. And we would also have local control over those decisions. So much

069like some school districts have made a decision to close down in the past because of flu. We saw that last year in the in the fall and winter around here uh with some school districts. We will have some local control over those decisions. And again, I just want to clarify, it may never be to transition to a hybrid model, but part of the great planning that the committee has done here is so that if we had to, we could. And if somebody said you can have 50% capacity in your buildings, we could put a model in place that worked without necessarily going to full online. Although I believe that in future if we have shutdowns having that full online model and option that we've been preparing for is going to be probably more valuable. I

070just want you to know that there was a lot of work that went into this model by the committees and um we could stand it up if we had to. I would just say I'm not a fan. I think you have just about the same level of risk for and you've got a lot of negatives uh that are doing. So you're still going to have all these kids coming to school potentially being exposed exposing staff and yet you've got this halfway thing. You've got to get these kids back and forth. The parents, you've thrown them under the bus trying to deal with a kid at school half a day and not half a day. I I'm not a fan at all. I would rather us go totally online or be totally in shop. That's my

071two cents. >> Yeah, I I have to say I feel the same way about plan B and I really appreciate all the work that you went into it because I do think it's important that our community understand what the downside of plan B is and also how challenging that is that just because we provide six feet of distance doesn't mean it's going to be used by our students necessarily every minute of the day. So, I think to trade off that opportunity to have our children back face to face with each other and with their teachers for the um the hope that they might have that six feet does to me that that doesn't weigh out. >> In our last parent survey, the large majority of parents I think agreed that they preferred a return to

072school model over a hybrid model or blended model. and we heard that clearly and we got plenty of feedback about it which we really appreciated. Um, and we've tried to inform that in in our planning. Let me just say I do understand a lot of work went into that. I'm not belittling it. I just don't think it's going to get us where we want to be. I I'm not belittling the hard work that went into each and every one of these types of of monitors. >> All right. So then looking at plan C, plan C would be if we had 100% of our students online, similar to what happened this spring. Um the pros of that is obviously it has um this the option of having students have the most social distancing because they're in

073their own houses. Um, but I also want to just to reiterate how hard the the teaching staff has worked to develop a greater sense of online pedigogy and just the countless hours that they've dedicated to that so that when this happens, we're ready to go. For example, in the spring, we didn't have grades because we felt like do no harm was the right place to to be. We we knew that we were in a very steep learning curve at that time. And I feel like we're ready to start talking about the fact that grades would be an appropriate option back in the fall because we feel like we're more prepared for an online model. So it though we've done this before, I will say it will look differently. There will be more accountability, more live

074sessions, more engagement from students. And I think we've developed a better understanding of what it means to have a high level of relationship and engagement with the students even if it is from a living room versus in a classroom. So, I do I want to just say that I I really as a teacher who taught online at the college level, we did our best, but it ain't as good as in person. Let's not fool ourselves. We can do it as well as any school district in the world, and it's not going to be as good as being in person with these amazing teachers. Okay? I'm sorry. It can't be. I think uh in our conversations, our students, our staff, our um leaders I think agree that ideally we want students with their teachers and we

075want to maximize that amount of time on campus. We have heard that um from our parents as well. Um, I just want to cover a couple of other points in terms of of the overall strategy here of putting a plan A in front of you or a return to school plan along with these other contingency models. We try to follow those foundations that Dr. Stewart kind of referred to at the beginning of the presentation. And again, the basic principles that we heard last week were um we recognize that, you know, our parents are partners with us in the educational process. So, when it comes to some of the safety things that we're going to have to do in terms of daily health checks, um in terms of temperature taking, in terms of a face covering

076policy, uh in terms of identifying and supporting vulnerable populations, both students, uh staff and guests, um all of those things, we have to really try to take a partnership approach and the strategies that we've talked about as a team. Again, uh I think you heard from Dr. Stewart today and I would welcome any of our teachers uh and Mrs. Bule to weigh in here is we talked about flexibility of the use of space and time. We talked about flexible transitions um especially when we're talking about having that traffic back on campus with the layering of these safety precautions in place, being flexible with transitions. Uh we talked about providing some personalized learning opportunities for students which I think our staff has done a tremendous job of being very innovative and creative during this time and

077coming up with some great ideas that we would probably employ. Um we've also talked about the social emotional learning supports that are going to need be necessary for our students um especially some of our younger students and those students who again um aren't used to doing these things and we really have to work to teach them but also support them. Um, and there's a lot of family engagement that we can do to make sure that this education um, piece of the plan works for everybody. There are a couple downsides. Again, I just want to reiterate or cons that I think just everybody has to be able to um, digest and none of them are fun. Uh, limiting things like field trips and travel off campus away from campus overnight just cannot look the same. even

078with plan A and return to school, those things cannot look the same this year. And I know that that's frustrating for families. Um, whatever we do get from OMA and OSAA about athletics and activities, I can assure you that some of those performances and activities will look different. A football game may be played, but the venue and how we all populate it may look a lot different. and how we deal with those situations uh may be different all the way down to how we charge for tickets. Um, so I think we all need to get used to some of those things. When we talk about performances for clubs or a choir performance, for example, those performances may be amended or look different, modified from what we're used to. And we all have very high standards

079at Indian Hill about the quality of our performances. And I think what our committees have tried to do in working with our teachers is make sure that that quality is protected even if there have to be modifications that are put in place. So I feel really comfortable with where our committee is in terms of some of the team recommendations on a brave return to school and I think that again we'll look for your guidance as a board to to fleshing out some of these other details that we need to finish. Um, but in terms of can we get students on campus, can we transport them, can we put the safety guidance in place we need, I think the answer is yes based on the planning that our committees have come up with. And I think

080in our conversations with leaders and teachers, we've reached some consensus that we can do some of those things. But again, I if there are questions that you have or if we can hear from anybody else who'd like to weigh in, I I don't want to speak for the whole group. >> Can I just make one clarification really quick? So though we've spent so much time talking about plan A, I just also want to reiterate that we will have students who cannot participate in plan A. They will not ever be set foot in in the buildings until potentially there's even a vaccine. We have a strong plan developed that we can serve those students in an online model. So I don't know what the percentage of those students will be. I think we're very close to

081asking parents to give us that information. But while we will have some students report here to campus, we will have students who will be online. And those parents should have an expectation of quality education for their online students as much as the students who are coming face to face. And there might even be some families who change their mind during the year who say, I started off face to face now I'm no longer comfortable and I want to go online. and we need to be receptive and flexible to that. Along those lines, as a school district, we've been studying the characteristics that are most important for our students success when they leave here. And it has to do with 21st century learning. It has to do with things like collaboration and showing initiative and research.

082And one of the main components is something called cognitive flexibility. And I have to say as an educational team, we have never practiced cognitive flexibility as much in our lives. And I just want to say that plan A, B, and C, to Dr. Hooker's point, is because we started to work on plan B a long time ago, like way back when the students were still engaged in online learning, and we're learning something new every day about COVID and the ways that school should respond. So, we know that we might be tasked with a plan MN or O at some point during the year, but we're up to the task because we want to do whatever is necessary to help our students be here and be successful. And it would just be remiss for me not

083to say thank you to all of the people who've worked so hard and and are raising their hand to say I continue to work hard for this. I'll do whatever we have to do for all of our students. And I'm committed to every single student. Um and there there are so many people in this room sitting here who've not had really a day of summer because they're so committed to that. And what a wonderful team it is. >> There there's no question. We have the just the the most outstanding team and and the commitment at all levels. I mean, from bus drivers all the way up to you all and and all the teachers and principles is has been really touching the entire time that we we've watched that and we see it and we

084want you to know that we we definitely do see it. One thing I do want to say to the kind of the parents that are listening when you think about um you know it would be my personal preference would be to get plan a everybody back here as soon as possible and keep them here. But we all have to be realistic that we could start out that way. It could all be going great and then all of a sudden we have a lot of positive tests in the school district and we can't be here or if it's a community issue and we're told by the Department of Health or um Department of Education or anybody else that we can't be in school like what happened last spring. So, I think we just all have to

085have that in our heads that we I if if that's the way we go and we haven't voted and I don't think we'll vote tonight because we're waiting on more information. Uh we really have to understand the staffing plan. We have to understand how much our staff is not comfortable coming back or not able to come back. Uh and we have to understand how many students that we'll have before we can make any kind of a definite decision. But I think we all as a community need to really give each other a lot of grace and know that it's very possible that we could start out and a week later it could change or 6 months later it could change. There's just still so many unknowns and I think that could be definitely this school

086year and possibly into >> the next. We just don't know. So, and I think everybody sort of knows that but I think it's important to say it out loud. >> Um Nancy, that was very well said. Um, I just want to throw one more thing that we need to flush out that I had spoken with u earlier, but I want to just really talk about it for a second. Temperature taking. So, when kids are walking in school, we're not going to have a choice. Just like the airport doesn't have a choice. They're going to use these completely inaccurate, horrible thermometers that you pointed towards the forehead. They are they will miss a fever all the time. Okay. So, but that's as good as you got that you can screen rapidly people. So, we need to

087make sure that 100% of our parents understand that if a kid says they have a fever, I don't care what the stupid thermometer shows, keep them home. Okay? If you think your kid, mom, I I published research 25 years ago that showed mom was as good as any, actually better than any non-cont thermometer. Unless you stick it in their mouth, under their tongue, or up their butt, you're not going to get an more accurate thermometer at all. >> Yeah. Well, we don't want to do that. So, it we really need to understand that they need to own this. Don't if you think your kid has a fever, your kid is sick, don't listen to that silly thing you bought at Walmart or Walgreens. Believe your kid. Believe in yourself. Keep that kid at home. You

088have, we have to have, and it's mentioned in here, shared decisioning, shared responsibility from the parents. You can't just say, "God, I got to go to work. I'm going to send my feed kid to school. Please don't do that because then we're going to shut the whole school down. We can't do that. So, I just sorry. I just the science behind these non-cont things is horrid and uh we really need to be careful. >> Well, I I think just to to your point, Dr. Hooker, the thing that we've gotten a lot of questions about and I'm sure people are wondering about is that notion of no matter what plan you put in place, if you have people on campus, what happens if? So, we know that there will be children who don't feel well in

089school and need to go home for various reasons. But when there's a suspected case or something that is symptomatic of CO 19, we really have to be serious about the contact tracing that begins and happens. And the guidance that we got again last week, I just think it's really important to go over so everybody understands it. The contact tracing includes anybody who comes within a suspected individual during a 10 to 15 minute uh cumulative period of time within 6 ft of them in school. They would have to be involved in the contact tracing. The contact tracing could be expected to take anywhere from 2 to 5 days, but all of those individuals would have to be quarantined for 14 days, no matter who they are based on the current guidance we have from ODH. So,

090it is a really serious issue and when we do have someone who's symptomatic or showing COVID like symptoms and they're on campus, we are immediately going to have disruptions to deal with. >> Absolutely. ask if they have anything to say. Oh yeah, absolutely. And we also have some public Yeah. >> Um I just uh would like Nikki, do you have anything to say? I'm always running my mouth and I just would like your thoughts and opinions as another board member. What's your input to this situation? >> Sure. I appreciate that because you all were asking the same questions that I had. So, you know, I didn't have to ask. >> All right. So I agree for this to happen it is very important that parents play an important role and not just send their kids

091because they are working and I think teachers and administrative everyone has done a tremendous job putting this plan a together and I think if we all work together this will work but again as Nancy said we can start with this but we never know it might change. So as parents we all have to be very patient in dealing with these situations like you know there will be situations where your kid is not having any symptoms but you still have to quarantine. So it would be really nice if parents could just work with the administrative team and not get frustrated because I see a lot of time parents are getting uh frustrated that they're not getting enough information from the school district. But there's lot of work that goes in and there's lot of guidance that

092school has to follow from ODH and from other department and these plans were not shared because they didn't have enough clarification from ODH or other from the government. You know the parents who are watching I would just say is have patience and have trust in your administration and have trust on your teachers. They are here and they want your kids in the district back. I don't think there's any teacher who would not want your kids back. They're all missing your kids and they want them back. We all want your kids back and the top priority for us is the safety. We want everyone to be safe and feel comfortable coming here to this building. So I think it's just we all have to be patient and work together. Um, Elizabeth, did you have anything that

093you'd like to say? >> Yes. Can you hear me? >> Yes. >> I first of all, I want to commend on the work that has been put into this because it's not difficult with all the unknowns. And I like planning for all the reasons that Melissa pointed out. Important for students to be back at school and it's important for them to be participants, not consumers. That is a very big aspect of in-person education. Um, however, if we have to go to plan to another plan and we don't have to do it online, I prefer plan B simply because at least it gives the kids a little bit of facetime even if it's only 2 and 1/2 hours a day, which is better than nothing. A lot of pediatricians have been concerned about the emotional and

094social well-being of children being isolated at home. So I think I prefer plan B over plan C. I think the progression A, B, and C is perfect and I want to commend everyone for all the work that you've done. Great. >> Thank you. Um and uh we have any I would just like to add um on behalf of the teachers and the staff um thank you to the board and the administration for considering the health and safety of the students and staff as a major priority and also considering all of those things that that make our district as unique and special as it is. I think that these plans do a good job in considering all of those things and I feel very lucky and fortunate to work in a district that listens and considers

095the opinions of teachers because that does not happen everywhere. So, thank you very much. >> Well, I'll just say thank you to the teachers because I know that Melissa has um committees put together and like you were talking about Dr. Hooker with setting up online so that it's better than what we had in the past and they did a great job, a tremendous job like for one day us being in school and the next day we were out. It was amazing. Um, but you know, I mean they like we set up a K to 5 now and Google Classroom so that if you have a kid in K to 5, you're going to be on the same programs. You're going to it's going to look the same for parents so that it helps them out

096because even me with my own children, I had a hard time and this is what I do for a living. So I can only imagine a parent who doesn't have that, you know, knowledge of it and also with 6 to 12 and canvas and setting those platforms up so that they are ready to go if you're online or if you're in person. Um, and the teachers have been working so hard. I mean, they have missed out on quite a bit of their summer because they have been doing Google certification or taking extra classes so that they are better than what they were. Um, so I want to thank you all too because without you all we couldn't have done any of this. >> Gentlemen, did you have any questions or anything to add? >> You

097have any specific questions for us? >> I do. >> Yes. >> So if we go with online, how do you like if we go with plan B, how do you feel? the uh teaching kids foreign language online is do you think it is easy enough for kids to learn online or how do you feel about that? >> I'll I'll respond with this. Um, whatever we choose to do, we are going to make it work and it's going to be great because we're awesome and our kids are awesome and the families and the community that supports both the school and the kids and the families is incredibly resilient. As an organization, we're not promoting one plan >> over the other. And so I hesitate to to to get into too much specifics in answering just that

098question. Uh I've said this before, I can teach Latin very well in any format. Um it's hard to teach kids online. Um, but I won't say any more because we represent 180 members and um, and so I want to make sure that my comments um, represent all of them, not just my own, right? I'm here to represent that. >> I appreciate that. And one thing I would like to make a comment for is you said that board is and the administration is listening to the teachers. I just want to say is we're all in this together and we are a big family. So, you know, teachers are important for us, parents are important because it takes a village to raise a kid. And I think at home, we are parents. But when when we send

099our kids to the school, you guys are the parents of our teacher of our students. So your feedback is very important and we really appreciate all that you guys do. I understand it's July. It's an official time for you all to take a summer break, but you all are still working and really I I can't appreciate or can't thank you enough for all the work that you guys are doing for our students. >> I think we did have some public commentary. >> Correct. So, I'm going to read this in the order I receive them. Um, there are a couple that have students name in there in there. I'm going to paraphrase through the students name. Um, I'm not sure if the parents would appreciate either either leaving them out or leaving them in, but I'm

100going to error on this on the safety of leaving them out. First message is from Claudia Pashera and Charles Man. Hello, my name is Ch is Claudia Pashera and I would like to submit my comments for the upcoming school year. We hope the members of the board of education follow the recommendations of the American Academy of Pediatrics. The AAP strongly advocates that all policy considerations for the coming school year should start with a goal of having students physically present in school. Similar similarly reducing classmate interaction play in elementary school age children may not provide enough co 19 risk reduction to justify potential harms and that's in quotes I believe that's from the she's quoting the AAP there we support masks social distancing and such guidelines for the fundamental purpose of bringing students back full-time to

101ensure as much normaly as possible this one's from Maggie Kettler. Thank you for your work for our students. Here are my questions slashthoughts. Will the district have plans to do contact tracing when a student, staff member, family member tests positive for CO 19? If and when this happens, will a class be moved to virtual? Will students be tested before returning? Will absences be handled differently this year? How will the district encourage sick children to stay home? If a child has a fever, will they require a negative test before returning to school? I have children with significant health issues. While I would love to send my kids back to school full-time, I would need to be assured that they will be practicing social distancing, good hand hygiene, and contact tracing. I also worry about the health

102and well-being of teachers and staff. They are obviously much more at risk. I'm hoping to uh I'm hoping to have a hybrid model where classes can be smaller and kids more spread out. The CPS model is ideal for me. I'm fairly certain that if school is 5 days a week full-time, we will do a virtual learning year. I'm hopeful this will be provided by the district in some capacity. Thank you. I look forward to listening to the meeting tomorrow evening. Maggie Kelly, >> can I ask a question just quickly? We did get rid of the perfect attendance awards, correct? >> Yeah. >> Good. Just want to make sure. Thank you. >> From Jen Snow, I'd like to know if face mask will be required. If so, are face shields also approved? Thanks, Jen Snow. From

103Mara and John Rishard. Hello, we are parents in the district with two sons. I'll leave out their grades. At this point, we are leaning towards having the boys attend in-person school, at least part-time, if that's an option. A few things we'd like to know, express our opinion on. Ideally, the schedule for students would be the same each week and not change every week. I've heard of one district that is having one group of kids come Monday and Tuesday and the other group come Thursday and Friday every week with Wednesday set aside for thorough cleaning. Having a predictable, consistent schedule would be easier for us than one that changes each week. If in-person school is on a part-time basis, we would like the option of having our two boys on the same schedule so they would

104be attending school on the same days. If we select the in-person school option at the beginning of the school year, would we have the option of switching our children to 100% online later in the year if needed? Regardless if in-person school is part-time or full-time, what are the plans and procedures for when there are COVID cases among students and or staff? Is the plan based on severity levels? Uh i.e. 1 to three students, their group stays home for 14 days, 5 to 10, their entire grade stays home, 11 plus, the entire school is shut down, etc. Thanks so much for giving us the opportunity to give feedback and ask questions. We know this is diff a difficult time with no easy answers and we appreciate the challenging task at hand for the school board as

105they figure out the best path forward for students, teachers and families. Sincerely, Martha. Mara and John Rashard. I do think that's a point that I had not thought about is that we probably should have developed over the next month some turf wires. You know, if this happens, we'll do this and if this happens, we'll do that. again realizing we may have to change those but I think if we have something then we can modify them. If we have nothing then it's going to be Kirk and his office trying to decide is this too much or not enough and I don't think that's a good way to do it. >> Yeah. Although I think with contact tracing that is with one case >> right. >> So if there is one case >> and it's a confirmed

106case we are required to report it and do contact tracing. >> Yeah. I was just talking about the closure of a classroom and closure of a school. Those should have predefined. >> Yeah, >> thanks. That's a really good point that she's made. So, >> okay, Jen Creed, my question for tonight's school board meeting is, if there is a hybrid or staggered schedule and a family has multiple children in the district, will an effort be made to schedule their classes on the same day? We have two working parents and need to consider our work schedules and planning our child care. And that was from Jen Creed. The answer to that question I think Nick is yes. If we did a hybrid model we as principles have already looked at that and made sure that we have

107you know have kids on the same schedule. So for every parent that is wondering that that is a yes. >> Okay. The next item is from Jody Stre. The one thing I feel the state and CPS guidelines did not address was this. My child was in a classroom with someone who got CO. Do they have to now stay home? Does the school building shut down? My child is on a sports team with somebody who got CO are they to stay at home? Does the school shut down? When cases are found within the school, how does the specific building move forward? Thanks, Jody Strut. So again, I think just to reiterate, we have had three out of the six comments so far have gone back to this notion of contact tracing and we are mandated to

108report in any suspected case to the Hamilton County Health Commissioner. They then begin contact tracing that can take anywhere from 2 to 5 days. During that time, anybody who comes into contact with the student or staff member within a six-foot distance for a cumulative time period of 10 to 15 minutes at any time in the last 48 hours of their lives has to go home for 14 days. That's how the contact tracing would work. And so to Kim's point, we would trigger not just maybe one person with a suspected case, but it would create a disruption we would have to deal with and then talk about what those trip wires might be based on the volume. And that that goes for in class or anywhere on campus. >> And that then speaks to the point

109of how critical it is that we have this really high quality online system ready to go and ready to go tomorrow. Yeah. >> versus a waiting period or or any kind of catch up. And I think you've done a really nice job of making sure that we have that. >> And one I'm sorry, one other point that um I would think would be part of the uh procedures and I know we haven't developed them fully yet. We need to look at all this before we approve any plans. But part of the procedures I would assume that if a student um is diagnosed with COVID and you know they didn't get in the classroom, we didn't know about it. We didn't there's going to be a requirement that for students that are coming back to school

110that they they must mandatorily report to the school that their child um has CO. Yes, there's a a reporting requirement and the county is also developing a letter of clearance so that when a student would be ready to return to school after quarantine, they would have to be fever-free for 72 hours without the use of any fever reducing medications before they could return to school after a negative uh case or test case. Um, and for everybody, whether that's a student or adult, that would include 3 days temperature and symptom free and a clearance letter from Hamilton County's health department stating that they're cleared, which we would then want to gather from our parent um, upon return. Just to clarify, I want to make sure I understand this. So that that's in a case where somebody

111had a symptom, got tested, was negative, then all these people that do this because if the patient if the index patient was positive, that's a different thing. That's right. That's for Okay, so this is for the one that the kid had a fever went home. You know, the thing we've got to keep in mind, and I think everybody in this room knows it, but I'd rather say it. These tests are not perfect. I have patients in the intensive care unit at University of Cincinnati who we absolutely know have COVID and their test is negative. So, we have to that's why I was emphasizing earlier the subjective fever and subjective. If you've got a sick kid, keep them the heck away from this school. No test is perfect and we need to understand that. So, that's

112why that that additional thing is that's a really important point, Kurt. Thank you. And I just want to make a point here to the parents who are watching. These are not the guidelines that school district is putting for you. This is coming from the county. So these are just the requirement that the district has to follow. So it's not the district is putting this and district is making this to your kids. It's the county. So you know we just have to as a district we just have to follow some guidelines from the county and from ODH and all the the Ohio departments and that's exactly what your district is doing. >> I apologize in the reporting it's the reporting is not a guideline but it's is expected and we we will follow. >> Yeah. >>

113That is just to keep everyone safe and keep the plan moving. >> Sorry. Thank you. anymore. >> This is a dialogue. So, >> very good. >> The next submission is Renee Graham. Uh the first item is tests. If there is a choice between online and in-person school, will students who choose online and students who choose to attend in-person school? All have open note tests to remain fair to all students. Will tests be timed for those online? Item two, sports. If a student tests positive during the season, how will the school respond to that? From Jennifer Castensson, thank you for all your hard work always for the board, for the school system, and for our children. It is appreciated more than you know. I'm sorry. Actually, I think that was for me. So, I got a

114little plug in for myself there. I think Jennifer, >> I will go on with her her letter to the board here. >> Surprised you didn't move that letter to first. I know you have a meeting this evening and I'm just adding my voice to the number of families who want to be able to have our children attend school in person this fall for their critical emotional, educational, and social development. I love the idea of the students being responsible for their health and the health of others. Something that other countries have been able to suess to do successfully and something I'm sure our children are very capable of. We live in such a crazy time, but we also have the blessing of so many resources in our district to make nearly anything possible. I'm very confident

115that our district is strong enough to overcome this in a very successful way, hopefully maintaining the amazing reputation that it has deserved to date. Thanks so much for your efforts and please let me know if there's a role that I can take in the reopening. Jennifer Cass. >> This one is from Karen her. I am sure you have received many emails from parents about the board meeting tonight. I do not envy you in the decision that needs to be made. I have four children in the district and this year they will all be in high in the high school. My children have different learning styles. My main concern with returning to school, however, is my son who is medically fragile. He loves to be at school. My biggest fear, however, is what would happen to

116him if he is exposed to CO 19. Even if he were to stay home and his siblings go to school for even part-time, they could bring home the virus and infect him. When you are discussing the return to school, please keep my child and the other children like him in mind when making the decision. That was from Karen her. When the board uh this is from Sarah Heg Hegapian, apologize if I'm not saying that name correctly. When the board discusses reopening school this fall, I have the following questions I'd like to submit for dialogue. One, how do we plan to maintain academic rigor emphasized regardless of learning modality in person versus online? I have signi significant concerns here in the case where online learning continues for an extended period. Two, what is decision timing? When

117do parents need to declare if they elect to do online only for the upcoming semester or year? Three, what opportunities will there be for district parental input? Thanks for all you all you do. I understand these decisions are fraught with complexity. That was Sarah Hegopian. Susie Kushman. Uh she asked, "Are mass going to be mandator mandatory for middle school and high school students?" That was Susie Kushman. Becca Shear, how do you plan to enforce maskearing at all times by all students when parents don't agree with this? That's critical. Without enforcement, the schools become dangerous. Have you thought about rescending the survey about bus riding? I think lots will be driving their children, which would help the district financially. I think lots has changed since the survey initially went out. That was Becca Shear. And finally,

118it was Claudia M. Iousen. Uh, we have the following question. How do you plan to enforce maskearing at all times by all students when some parents do not agree with mandatory masks? What is the plan? Without enforcement, the schools become dangerous. Kind regards, Claudia M. Ihazen. And that was all the the emails I received. >> Okay. Well, there's, you know, obviously lots and lots of questions, so um I think it's impossible to answer all those tonight, but as we proceed and we get the more information that we need so that we can make some determinations, um I believe we will have the frequently asked questions um that will be submitted and available to all parents, all students, all teachers. Um, I believe there will be more surveying, but now we are getting to the point

119where we can ask parents what they're thinking that they'd like their children to do. Um, and we can start getting that information in knowing that they could change their minds and they need to have that, you know, prerogative to do so. So, um, if your question didn't get answered tonight during the course of this meeting, it will definitely be answered in the next couple of weeks. And I know one of the questions is when are you going to make a decision? Um, and I guess that I need to ask you all when when do you think that we can have the staff type information that we need and the idea on numbers of students so that we can reconvene and make a decision. So, to your point, Nancy, we've talked about a couple of those

120exact action steps that you just outlined, including sending another parent survey, asking our parents to declare um some specific um guidance for us by family. Um and I know Dr. Stewart has helped to work on developing that survey. We plan to release that survey this week. um we have to wait for the form to be populated, but we we will be ready to share an update to parents and get that next round of surveying out. That information and data is really important for us to get back. And I want to thank everybody because I think our last survey we received over a thousand responses of the 1400 families that we serve. Extremely important information for us to get back. Um, and then also we're going to circle back with our staff and our our um,

121partners that we mentioned earlier and that we thanked earlier in the meeting to make sure that we are reviewing all of these plans again based on what we heard tonight um, and also some of the questions that we need to circle back to and we will provide an update. I think the frequently asked question document is going to become very important. So when we share that document out and then it's placed on our website, parents will have a resource center to go to to be able to answer these questions over time. And again, we're working on on finalizing some of those details and we are going to use the guidance we've received from the Ohio Department of Health and the guidance we received from the Ohio Department of Education and that specific language that you

122all approve as we we share that out with parents. And so we would just ask for everybody to continue to be flexible and patient with us for a few more days. Collecting that data back from our students and families is really important. And then internally we have a couple steps we have to take with our own staff as well to gauge some of the protocols that we have to put in place. Um so that we can feel very comfortable in this brave return to school model. And again, I think the people in this room, I think I can speak for them when I say we feel like we can make plan A work with some of these details ironed out and supported by all. And so the the the survey information and data is going

123to be really important. >> And I I would maybe rephrase that and not call it a survey because that that to me implies opinion. I Yeah. almost like an application for what you're going to be doing um from a teacher standpoint and from a parent student standpoint. So that I think it's important for the parents to know that this is something we really just have to have back. >> Um we're going to need that data on every student. We need to know what every student is doing. Um, and then the other thing that I would just ask, and I'm I'm sure you're thinking this, but I just want to say it out loud, is u before we um offer the the FAQs to the community that please have bill duters review >> in detail uh

124because this is such a moving target and we don't want to put information out there that's not accurate. And the other thing I want to reiterate is that when we send this out and if if we put FAQs on there, we as a board have not yet made a decision. We have a lot we have more information that we need in order to make a decision on whether we're going A, B, or C. So, um I think the the facts is really to kind of answer some questions, but that doesn't mean we've made the decision yet on which plan we're wanting. >> Absolutely. And I think the the uh frequently asked question document will have to be a living breathing document and it will change as determinations are made and it will change again as

125situations change throughout the year. Um again we just we appreciate all of the parents, the children, the teachers, everyone. Um just knowing that this is just an absolute moving target. We're doing the best we can possibly do. None of us are perfect and none of us have a crystal ball even though we all I know wish that we did. So, you know, I just really appreciate your patience. >> Um I I can just feel some frustration. I've had a number of phone calls from parents. Uh this is not going to bode well with them. Uh they want a decision and they want it now. Uh I'm not saying we need to have a vote. I'm not asking for that. But I'm just telling you a lot of parents are not going to be happy with

126oh you know when so when are we going to make this decision? Parents need to plan. If we're going online that's going to be one set of plans for them for work and for daycare. If we're going B that's going to be a different set of plans. We're going A that's a different we've got to come up with a decision. And I agree with Kim and and you know that we need some some things answered namely staffing and all those things. But we've got to get this decision out to the parents. They've got a plan and we we have an obligation. So what is our plan? What is our timeline? We've got to have more than just it'll be a few days. That's not a timeline. I need a timeline to be able to get

127back to my constituents that says this is what we're going to do and this is by when we're going to do it. >> Well, I think what we need to do is schedule another board meeting. >> I think it's an exceptional idea. Um, I think we need to schedule the next board meeting and we need all of the information before that board meeting so that we can have a full discussion about whatever that information is. So, um, I think really the next steps are to set that board meeting and I would expect that's going to be maybe within the next two weeks, but I >> Well, I I'm I'm wondering is a week from tonight too soon? We have um we have to make sure that our uh parent application or questionnaire link is live

128with the system that we're using. We have to verify that. Again, if if that's verified, it's a matter of getting that out with our parent update in a timely manner. I would say that we can do that no later than Thursday morning this week. Um and I'm assuming that's if we're meeting the 48 hour guidance. some kind of um we have to verify that. But then we also need to leave that open for a specific amount of time to get that parent feedback and and I I would suggest that we leave it open and I'll ask parents to answer that um and and submit that form within a week and then I think we would have some of that data. I think in terms of our staff and internal questionnaires and some of those things

129we need to do, we can take care of that pretty quickly. >> Okay. So I guess my question is um is there any way that we can have this meeting before or by the 17th of um July? And Elizabeth Yeah, Elizabeth. >> Elizabeth had a question. Go ahead. >> Yeah. Um, I want to know what your recommendation is and everyone who's put all the time and effort into it, but you all must have a pretty good strong recommendation based on the guidance given from the governor and the health officials. And I understand you want to get feedback from the parents, but ultimately you're not going to satisfy everyone. And I'm interested to know what your recommendation is. >> I think to answer your question, Elizabeth, I would like to segment it into two parts. I

130think first, we have specific guidance we've now received from the Ohio Department of Health and the Ohio Department of Education. And those two documents are documents that give us the basic principles and language that we then need to make sure all of our board members are comfortable with. And when we feel like that has been vetted by all of our educational partners to the degree that you're all confident, then I think we can uh take care of the safety recommendations we're going to make. Whether they're mandates or suggestions, we'll we'll have all that language ready. And we have made team recommendations to the board members to review and I think we just need to finalize those. The second part of the answer is we need specific data points back from both students and families and

131we need them back from our staff members themselves. And when we get that data, that's going to help us to round out our planning and to really feel more confident about the suggestion that I think we're leaning towards. And again, we we have to make sure that we have those things before I believe we finalize the plans. I I hope that answers your question. Well, I was asking you to finalize the plan. I was asking you as an educator and your executive staff and and everyone who's been involved in putting these plans together what your recommendation is or you know want to go down that road. Uh no I I I will tell you professionally that I reflect every day on the social, psychological and emotional health of children along with their academic needs and

132I believe to the extent that we can maximize getting them back on campus to learn from their teachers that is the best environment for education to occur. So, that's my professional feeling um and philosophy. And I'm also a proponent of making sure that the safety guidance that we have is in place and understood and can be um that we can train staff and educate families appropriately so that they can have confidence in our plan and and I think those things have to be in place for everybody to move forward. >> So, when can we do this? Back to the original question. I think to NY's point, we could hold another special meeting and and and review these recommendations prior to the 17th. Um, and again, I'm available at your disposal, board members. Um, so if

133we're looking at the week of the 13th, uh, the 14th makes sense to me on a Tuesday. >> That is a no for me. >> Okay. Then that doesn't make sense. So, um, >> I have a question. Will we have all the uh, questionaires back then? Well, I think if we release them, if we release them by Wednesday or at the latest Thursday morning this week, we would have them open for a week. If we tried to get together by the 14th. If we can't do the 14th, I would suggest the 15th. And I think we'll have some data back. >> Okay. But for um for me to do the 15th, I would have to do it earlier in the day. I can't do the evening, >> but I could I could do the 16th

134in the 16th. >> I can do the 16th. Okay, let's do it the 16th. >> 16th? >> Yeah, >> 16th works for me. >> Okay. >> At 6:30 for executive and 7 for the meeting. >> Same setup. >> I would think 6:00 for executive. >> 6:00 for executive and 7 for Great. I just want to add since we are going to do it on 16th and all the parents who are watching any plan that we make is very important that we have your voice and I think this plan that was made had your voices in it. So I would strongly encourage you all to take the survey ASAP as it comes out. Ask your friends to take it so that the administrative team has more data to work with what you want, what your kids

135want so that you know as I have always said we are all in this together and we have to find a perfect plan that I don't think we have a perfect plan but at least we can have something that works for most of us and we can have the kids back in classes. So please take the survey, ask your friends to take the survey. Your voices matters a lot. So next meeting is on 16th and we hope that you all will take time to fill out these surveys. >> And it's not enough time for what we need for the staff. >> Yes. >> Yeah. Great. >> Okay. Uh any other Sorry. Any other comments from anyone? I I would just say that I'm strongly wanting and I think a lot of people are to get

136these kids on campus every day, but we've got to make sure as a board that it's safe. >> Yes. >> And legal and can be done practically. >> And that's the decisions that that's the data we're gaining. So don't be mad at us because we didn't make a decision tonight. We're not making that decision because there's three or four things that have not been answered >> before we can make that decision. So, >> we're working on it, but >> and not and not the least of which is do we have enough staff that can actually physically be in the buildings to take care of your children. >> Well, and a point on on that to speak for the members the our primary concern is the health of our members and health of all the students

137that serve. And I want to circle back to something Dr. You said especially about parents sending their kids to school and making sure you don't send your kids to school if you suspect right here. Let's flip it and let's try to model that. I think it's important that we that we model that as a workplace. A lot of our members, a lot of our teachers and staff also be the young kids and also can be exposed to other people. >> Absolutely. >> So, it's important I think that we make sure that they all of our staff know that when they make the decision to either stay home with their sick child or because they're running fever that they're fully supported in that. We've done a great job at that as a district always. >> These

138are new and strange times. So, it's important that we we look at it as from a workplace perspective. >> Absolutely. >> I just I'd just like I know we're going along. I just like to finish up again and thank everybody who came tonight. Um our teacher leaders, I so appreciate your commentary. And I I just want to say to everybody who is listening and paying attention, um we understand how hard this is. We understand that people want to plan their futures. We understand parents want information and we really appreciate all the flexibility and patience and all the public participation we've gotten the input from our community. It has been extremely helpful for our team and and I'm also very proud of this group and I I think you all have said it, but I just

139want to reiterate I've been doing this for 26 years now and I don't think I've ever seen a more healthy dialogue about something so important at a board meeting as I've witnessed tonight amongst a team of staff and leaders. And I've been witnessing that internally for months as these people have worked on plans that I think are going to help us feel safe and feel like we're meeting the law and feel like we can build confidence to get people back. So, I'm really proud of of all of you and thank you to IGO and our our principal team, our leaders for putting time into this preview tonight and dialoguing about it. A lot of great questions and a lot of good answers also, I think. Um, okay. So, if there's no other comments or questions,

140uh, do I have a motion to adjurnn? So, >> move a second. All in favor? >> I >> Thank you to everyone. >> Thank you to all the people that are watching also. See you next week. See you soon. will die.