Mentor Board of Education, August 8th, 2023

001good evening the August 8th 2023 regular meeting of the mentor Exempted Village Board of Education is called to order this meeting is being held in accordance with section 3313.15 of the higher Revised Code please place your mobile phones on silent mode for the meeting Mr Wade please call the roll miss breiner here miss cook here miss dressling present Miss Payne here Mr Tuttle here thank you please join me in the Pledge of Allegiance I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States thank you I would like to welcome everyone to the August 8th regular meeting of the mentor acceptance Village Board of Education prior to this evening each board member has received for their review and consideration the agenda and materials associated with each agenda item for the board's approval via the district's paperless

002Board of Education agenda system board Docs the public can access the agenda through the school district's website the agenda is available through the district's website for public viewing this Sunday prior to the board meeting board members have the opportunity to call the superintendent and Chief Financial Officer for information concerning agenda items and to request if needed additional information there are two places on the agenda when the board entertains comments from the community the first hearing of the public is dedicated to those who wish to address the board on agenda items only the second hearing of the public is dedicated to those who wish to address the board on any subject whether it is an item on the agenda or another issue to participate in the hearing of the public section interested speakers must sign prior

003to the start of the meeting sign ups are were made available online through the school district website or on-site prior to 5 PM when it is your turn to speak you will be called to the microphone when addressing the board please state your name and address questions to the board president each person may speak only once per segment and comments are limited to three minutes the purpose of the hearing of the public is for the community members to address the board the board continues to welcome feedback from the community as an important component to conducting business this is an information gathering opportunity for the board and administration so we can work to best serve our community if at the end of the public participation we do not make a statement please know that no way

004does that demonstrate a lack of care for comments shared by our community rather we want to be thoughtful in our approach and we will provide a response in a timely manner when appropriate this meeting is being televised live in on delayed basis and will be shown on Spectrum cable channel 1026 in Mentor and channel 1025 in ventron Lake this meeting is also being recorded and can be found on our YouTube channel Cardinal TV Mentor Ohio thank you at this time we have District highlights and recognition Mr Heath good evening Mr President members of the board and Mr Wade this evening we are pleased to recognize several staff members who are being honored for their commitment to their schools and their students we will begin with our excellence in teaching Award winners this is Burnett will

005you please join me at the podium this award recognizes certified staff members who demonstrate exemplary qualities in their profession and are involved in activities which reflect professional commitment this evening's recipient represents the best at Mentor Schools it is our pleasure to honor the winners of the 2023 excellence in teaching award Jennifer Berger first grade teacher at Fairfax Elementary [Applause] Melanie Stanek first grade teacher at Ridge Elementary great teacher at Memorial [Applause] and Jordan Wilcox conditioning and PE teacher at Mentor High School Mr President members of the board and Mr Wade at this time we'll be recognizing certified and classified groups for their excellence in team collaboration to be selected for this award the team members must demonstrate enthusiasm for their responsibilities and a strong commitment to the school system the teams must also be respected

006by colleagues parents and students and demonstrate strong collaborative skills our certified excellence in team collaboration award this year goes to the music department at Mentor High School with the following teachers please report to the podium Kim Driscoll Adam Landry Ben McMurtry Steve paremba and Matt yoke [Applause] thank you congratulations thank you our second group is the third grade team from Orchard Hollow with Jen Sanford Melissa Gibson and Chelsea sedlick please report to the podium thank you vibration our classified excellence in team collaboration award goes to our I.T Department would Tim Baker Todd Bauer Doug Estes Tracy Gibson Joe Hernan Jan Orlando and Joanne savatos please report to the podium congratulations Mr President members of the board and Mr Wade nominations are also collected every year for the outstanding service award to be selected for this

007award and nominee must demonstrate enthusiasm for his or her responsibilities a commitment to Mentor Schools and have the respect of their colleagues parents and students the winners selected this year fit that criteria perfectly it is our pleasure to honor the winners of the 2023 outstanding service award our first recipients are the Mentor High School main office secretaries Paula Coughlin and Anne McGrath [Applause] our second group is the Ridge Elementary Office Team Danielle de Dante Michelle Del Center and Tracy zwagerman would you please report to the podium our next recipients are the service building business operations secretaries Fern mance and Denise Patterson [Applause] our vehicle technicians Randy Horvath John Cava Tom Schmitz and Carmen zanella please report to the podium thank you yeah [Music] congratulations and finally our classified outstanding service award winners Chuck Henry custodian

008at Lake Elementary [Applause] Sue Kidd secretary at Lake Elementary [Applause] Kimberly cutsy custodian at Mentor High School [Applause] Bridget McLaughlin secretary at Memorial Middle School you know Mike sporky district-wide maintenance [Applause] and Vicki selecki classroom assistant at Bellflower Elementary [Applause] all right everybody smile for a picture now oh that's it you're done here congratulations to all of our award winners this year foreign just want to give everybody a couple of quick updates here on some items before we jump into the rest of the meeting here this evening first the board policy manual that we have posted for public view Remains the one that was presented at the board works session that we had on July 17th for the first reading of the policies there were updates that our board members made at the table that

009evening that have been made in our draft policy manual that our board members can see in their board docs access if we would have posted a new document with the updates and made that active for public view the way it would have appeared was that it as if that were the final approved policy manual so we apologize if that caused some confusion but that was the way we had to approach it through our board doc system uh Mr Wade and I actually talked about how we might approach this from our board policy updates here in the future and we've got a couple things worked out that we will try and make sure that all of those policies that we update periodically throughout the year now once we have a final manual in place will be

010viewable to the public prior to that meeting a second due to the nature of tonight's agenda on board policy we want to let everyone know that the topic of sexually explicit language will be part of that discussion and finally I want to thank our board members again for all of the hard work that they have put into going through the major project of transitioning our board policies to the Neola manual we identified early on in my first year that our policies had gaps were outdated and sometimes contained contradictory language so this was a necessary task to make sure that we had a manual that covered us with all of the legal updates on a regular basis our board members are obviously very active in their roles in this district and take their responsibilities seriously every

011single day with this task it was no different we've spent countless hours on the phone in meetings and individually reviewing all of these policies we have utilized our Neola representatives and our legal counsel on numerous occasions to review some of the options available to us to make sure we had a manual that everybody can be comfortable with as we enter this school year I'm so grateful to all five of you for your painstaking efforts and pulling this manual together thank you at this time we'll take a short break to allow our award recipients to leave before we jump into the rest of our business meeting thank you for coming this evening thank you thank you [Music] okay next on the agenda approval of the minutes we have a motion to approve the minutes is presented

012so moved second comments and Corrections hearing none Mr Wade please call a roll Miss Payne yes Miss jesling yes Miss Pryor yes Miss Cook yes Mr Tuttle yes motion carries 5-0 next on the agenda hearing of the public I'm going to call two speakers up at a time our first speaker is Laura Dillon from Hayes Boulevard she's a resident in the district and we also have Sage McMillan from Danbury Court who's a parent Guardian in the district foreign can you hear me yes yes my name is Laura Dillon I live at 7177 Hayes Boulevard there should be there should never be a reason for sexually explicit material to be available to minors in our schools I have lived in Mentor for 40 years and raised my children through the Mentor Public Schools I have always

013voted yes for the levees not now I will vote no on all future lovies until sexually explicit material and education is stopped in the schools to minor children also as a taxpayer who is funding this sexually explicit material there are quite a few Mentor residents who have already raised our children through the school system and we believe in basic education if you won't listen to us now then we will speak with our voices in November and vote no on the levees and vote no on which school board members are allowing this thank you foreign [Applause] thank you next two speakers Lauren Breslin from Galloway Court a parent resident of the district in Jacqueline McCormick from Ridgeview Trail resident of the district good afternoon my name is Lauren Breslin and I live on Galloway Court in

014Mentor our family typically makes brownies every weekend I think it's safe to say that the vast majority of Americans love brownies they are a very popular dessert a dessert that would be highly valued however what if a teacher at a dog feces into the ingredients should we eat this brownie should we serve it to our friends of course not because even a spoonful of dog poop would ruin the entire batch of brownies this analogy is similar to a good book one that everyone with common sense and moral decency would agree had literary value if you add even just a little bit of porn just a little bit of sex just a little bit of pedophilia the whole book and its literary value is nullified I assert that any type of sexually explicit material nullifies the

015literary value of any book so let's begin first with the effects of eating dog poop dog poop compared to pornography is relatively harmless do you know what happens when someone ingests dog poop really nothing it's gross according to Medical news today you could contract viruses bacteria or parasites you may need to take medication all unpleasant but you will recover however sexually explicit images and pornography stay in our imaginations for the rest of our lives according to a 2016 article in the American College of Pediatrics a summary of studies found the following effects of pornography on young people are as follows one males demonstrated increased callousness toward women two students considered the crime of rape less serious three students were more accepting of non-marital sexual activity oral sex and anal sex four students became more interested

016in more extreme and deviant forms of pornography five students were more accepting of sexual infidelity in a relationship six students valued marriage less and were twice as likely to believe marriage may become obsolete seven males experienced a decreased desire for children and females experienced a decreased desire to have a daughter eight all students showed a greater acceptance of female promiscuity is this really what the school board is discussing and debating tonight can we not search out other worthwhile meaningful uplifting literature for our students again as a parent to a young child and three teenagers I argue that books need to be vetted and removed from circulation there is absolutely zero justification for including sexually explicit materials in their readings or assignments thank you thank you foreign McCormick the fact that I am even having to

017stand here and speak today and fight in support of a policy that would help protect our children's innocence and protect them from having trusted adults provide them with sexually explicit graphic materials is just asinine I was appalled at the last special meeting Maggie cook a current Chardon school teacher and Mary breiner wanted to keep the right to Pander obscenities to minor children as long as the literacy artistic or scientific value outweighs the sexually explicit content this is absolutely innate insane the definition of the policy proposal is very specific I'd like to know which one of the terms are you okay with showing graphically and detailed minors is it fellatio bestiality molestation or maybe it's pedophilia Jenny surprisingly agreed with Tom and Annie at the last special meeting and stated she supported the sexually explicit portion

018of the policy as long as the sexually content portion was added this was completed so I sure hope that Ginny you haven't switched your opinion on the issue that would not be very transparent I know several teachers were disappointed in your original support of the book The Bluest Eye to remind you all of the explicit materials we were talking about an excerpt from the book talking about a father molesting his daughter is as follows and I quote a bolt of Desire ran down as genitals giving it length and softening the lips of his anus he wanted to her end quote this is sick and many pages of this book are filled with this smut this is the graphic detail we're talking about as adults we should never Pander obscenities to minors you may have heard

019about a previous long-term Mentor English teacher Andrew Saba who was just arrested for nine counts of pandering sexual oriented materials to minors in fact I know that the mentor school board has a current complaint filed against them with the mentor Police Department for doing just that due to several books being explicit and given access to minors I will tell you that we have parents and community members ready to file additional complaints at the mentor Police Department if this policy is as written doesn't pass we are awaiting your action or inaction on this policy to see what you decide your decisions have a direct impact on the future success or failure of the November levies it is not enough to give parents notification that their children may be exposed to sexually graphic materials that's why there

020is an Ohio code against pandering obscenities to minors we do not want our children's Minds infiltrated with filth and we will not support your pandering obscenities to minors anymore on our tax dollars we've already made the news both locally and nationally recently for many things from allowing boys and girls bathrooms and locker rooms allowing children to transition and use different names and pronouns without their parents being notified and using tax dollars to purchase teacher trainings that lean heavily left I don't think you want to add another one to this list especially when you are asking for the public to support your levies do the right thing for once helper gain some trust from the community and support the policy as written thank you thank you our next two speakers are Rachel Perry from Maple Street

021who's a resident in the district and Michael Williams from Walden Court who's also a resident District Rachel Perry and Michael Williams thank you Mr Wade I didn't hear my name again I apologize for that that's so embarrassing good evening president tunnel it is very nice to see you again it's always nice to see you I've been coming to these meetings since March and I've been coming here seeing people that live in my neighborhood speak with to you with such disdain with just this little bit of a sting in their voice when they say your name feels like they are making fun of you it feels like they are talking down to you and I want to apologize on the behalf of my community for that okay I'm not trying to point any I'm not trying

022to say anything about anyone else I would like to point out that right now I'm having a hard time concentrating because I hear Whispering coming from behind me okay that is what I'm hearing I'm hearing people talking when I am supposed to be speaking while I am when I am exercising My First Amendment rights they can do that anyone here in this room can do that it's not gonna bother me because I know that my government will never do anything to silence me because that is my constitutional right I would like to just briefly talk about two policies one it's just about school bus policy I'll try to be as brief as possible we all know that Memorial closed last year I think in the spring because they didn't have enough buses I think people

023were mad about it but I think the board listened to people that were mad about that because right now and get I am saying this off the top of my head and I had a traumatic brain injury six years ago so my memory is just not what it used to be okay I think you were attempting to hire 50 full-time school buses is that right maybe and I so far maybe you're high already hired 48. so that tells me that you're working and then also six out of the Ten school bus um you know positions that are just for Subs six out of those have been um filled but one thing I did notice is that or heard or listened I'm learning I don't know anything about it is that on the same day that

024Memorial closed down the school bus system still got all the kids going to private school to school that day and as a public school kid who took the bus until my senior year I didn't even own a car I've just tried to like put some perspective here and say please don't forget about the public school kids and don't forget about the public school kids while they're here thank you thank you um before we take the next speaker Mr Tuttle could you please ask the audience to be respectful so that we can hear Mr Wade and so that we can keep the meeting going well I think you brought the point forward and I appreciate that thank you thanks Mrs Brown next Michael uh Dear Mr Tuttle Mr Wade Mr Heath and school board members I

025stand here tonight to fully support policy proposal number 2520.03 as written to limit sexually explicit in any sexual content in Mentor Schools to our minor children through sexually graphic books pictures videos drawings or depictions this policy is very well thought out and the language is well written and very clear it will protect our minor children from harmful sexualized materials you may argue and you have argued that the literary value could outweigh the sexual content in some of these materials I repudiate this argument and ask you if any literary value can be so valuable as to risk polluting the minds of our minor children with sexually explicit content that could negatively impact them for the rest of their lives the only question is what will you do about it I ask you to send a clear

026message to the authors of sexually explicit books and materials to their Publishers and to any purveyors of sexualized materials that we will not allow it here for our minor students will you stand up and set a precedent in the mentor School District that you will protect our children from immorality smut and pornography will you stand up and set a precedent in our surrounding school districts will you stand up and set a precedent for the rest of Ohio school districts and will you stand up and set a precedent for the rest of this nation I hope and pray that you do the right and moral thing here and vote to accept this policy as written thank you thank you [Applause] our next speaker is Susan zednick from Little Mountain she's a resident in the district and

027then we have Gil martello from Camelot who's a resident in the district and also parent foreign and like you said I live on Little Mountain Road I'm a parent here and a citizen in the district um I'm here to uh I just want to give my thoughts about um the option one that Annie Payne put forth um regarding sexually explicit material and I I just wanted to point out that the board's mission statement says that they aim to provide a safe learning environment and provide a high quality education and I think if we adopt if you adopt option one then you'll actually be following the mission statement that you that you have our our students deserve to have a safe place to learn while having the best books and materials it is absolutely absurd to

028think that literary or artistic components of a book would somehow outweigh the disturbing and harmful effects of reading sexually explicit and pornographic materials not only is that illegal it's morally abhorrent pediatricians social workers therapists and plenty of other people with plain Common Sense know that sexually explicit and pornographic material harms children in many ways physically mentally and emotionally I'm very disturbed and disappointed that we actually have people on our board women who are mothers or grandmothers aunts sisters that actually think that porn for kids is not a big deal that's really troubling and it's not that you just think that it's not a big deal you actively work hard to get it to our kids and you actively work hard to defend that it's there if it's if it's a book that you feel is

029so worthwhile there's no reason that you can't send an email to the parents and say Mrs Smith I believe that here's a list of smutty horrible books I think your kids should read I think that's important do it on your own time that that certainly do that but you have no right to have that material in the school for minor children to access and I don't think that's an unreasonable request or just asking you to do the right thing there's no harm in keeping those books from children and letting the parents say hey you want to read it go for it but it shouldn't be at school I just also want to say a quick recommendation to parents out there it's a it's a terrible shame that we actually have to have a conversation should

030be real obvious what we should do but because we're having this conversation I would suggest all parents bring your kids home it's safer you can see from what's going on here that our public schools are not a safe place and so I would say bring them home and I also say thank you to Annie Payne who works so hard on this option one and always fights for our kids thank you thank you thank you [Applause] thank you [Applause] Gil martello 6880 South Camelot good evening Mr toddle Mr Heath Mr Wade members of the board the past few months I have watched with considerable disappointment and what I consider to be an egregious abuse of taxpayer resources the ongoing debate of what I've seen material is who can view it in under what circumstances is embarrassing

031obscene divisive hateful materials have no place in our schools after months in debate the value of these materials as it relates to the benefit of our children's educational experience goes unexplained in my opinion that's because there is no value speaking to the subject of value this board has voted to place two levees on the ballot this fall if these level levees were to fail it might be because the taxpayers of this community see this exercise and others like it as a complete waste of resources our focus should return to raising the faltering standardized test scores and more adequately preparing today's youth for globally for the globally competitive Marketplace I'm going to pause for just a second I am had the privilege of hiring about 50 people where I work I can tell you the students

032of Mentor are not prepared they can't fill out a job application properly I resume I ask you Mr toddler members of the board stop trying to twist the semantics of the argument to find the middle ground there is no middle ground here I've seen materials do not belong in our schools the policy in my opinion of the Metro City Schools should be as follows under no circumstances shall a mentor City School distribute or make available to the students thereof I've seen materials as defined by the Ohio Revised Code section 2907.321 it is really that simple I am now respectfully asking you all to start showing the taxpayers this board is capable of making Swift timely and proper decisions based on common sense I'm not and not capitulating to the whims in tyranny of a few

033thank you very much here's our Kim bezon from Marjorie Drive who's a resident in the district also parent guardian and then Roger Jewell from Hart Street who's a resident emperor in the district good evening everyone when news broke that former English teacher from Mentor High School was recently arrested for pandering sexual oriented material masturbation bestiality five counts pandering sexual orientation material create four counts pandering sexual oriented material create produce publish pandering sexual oriented material minor cell makes you wonder why it's so hard for some parents in the audience and some on the board some of the board members to understand what parents like myself are fighting so hard for the policies such as 2520.03 to pass with no amendments or adjustments made to it why is it so hard for the community members with children

034in the schools to have such a problem with tax paying parents who homeschool their children to avoid situations such as the recent arrests of that former High School teacher an explicit sexual materials being at the hands of minors we need to do better in the Mentor Schools and stick to the basics by providing wholesome traditional academically favored curriculum based on course subjects that don't push politics woke agendas or sexually explicit materials keep the children of our community safe provide them with academically challenged materials that will keep test scores up that out sexually explicit books that take minors innocence away and spend tax dollars wisely then maybe just maybe you will see a levy pass in November especially from even homeschool parents such as myself my question to all of you in favor of this nonsense

035why are you pushing so hard to have this kind of material in your schools you need to start trusting the parents who show up at these board meetings who are fighting and wanting to fight to protect these children their innocence and understand that we are truly the ones who want what's best for them safety for their minds and not be filled with the filth and garbage My Hope and prayer is to be listened and that my message is loud and clear and received and I'm my hopes are that it touches your hearts and not have Hate in Your Hearts thank you thank you good evening Mr Wade Mr Tuttle Mr Heath school board members here we are again it's August I'd like to know if The Bluest Eye is still in the library that's a

036question you can answer it's August we were told that the that you were going to meet with the board or whomever is making these decisions to put these books in the library and we were going to get them removed is that going to happen I guess we're not answering uh folks you just you just get Mr Heath you just gave a warning about graphic detail of books being discussed at a meeting with all adults some meetings are shut down when people try to read that stuff but it's okay to put it in a classroom I'm standing here today telling you looking you in the eye for 25 yards it is not acceptable for that book to be in any library that has students going into it right excuse me speak to me now I'll be

037speaking to all of you all right it's Mr Tuttle to Mr Heath Mr Tuttle is that book still in the library we'll get you the answer Mr Heath said that he's going to be removed by August it's August and that book is still there isn't it are we still doing pronoun surveys that's got to stop are we still allowing Boys in girls bathrooms and vice versa the stuff has got to stop men are too good for this too good for this and it's not acceptable it's not acceptable how many times do we have to come here and make these pleas for somebody's going to listen I'm not going to threaten you with a levy I'm not going to threaten you with anything these are kids that you guys are intentionally damaging you're a teacher you're

038damaging these kids for the rest of their lives I'm asking you to stay in your lane and teach these kids so they can fill out an application on a job interview [Music] so they can add so they can subtract so they knew a little bit about history my wife and I will take care of our child we've raised six of them we've done a pretty good job we'll decide when our daughter gets taught sex education you will not you will not and in love and in all the mercy and Grace that I can muster I offer you this Luke 17 1 Jesus said to his disciples things that cause people to stumble are bound to come but woe unto anyone through whom they come whoa unto anyone through whom they come I don't know if

039we understand the size of the problem that we're creating here those books need to go and we need some answers we also need a superintendent that will talk to us thank you [Applause] thank you our next two speakers are rose iapolo from judges Court resident parent and employee and Linda O'Brien from a tanager Court resident hello wait I'm gonna have to do the granny style so I can see you and my paper I'm speaking regarding the sexually explicit policy that was originally presented by Mrs Payne and Mr Tuttle urging you to vote it as is I feel that you are hijacking this policy because you feel that there can be educational benefits to explicit material what are those benefits I haven't heard one single example from any of you in the last three months you've

040had more than enough time to find one example one book one school in this country that has come across where where That explicit material actually benefited the students I can only assume that anyone up there opposing this would have at least one example I haven't found any legitimate studies or articles that list the benefits of exposure to this stuff there are however many studies conducted that prove exposure to this material is harmful especially to girls damage to self-esteem anxiety Eating Disorders depression self-harm and Suicidal Thoughts the district uses tax dollars to pay this book review committee to review sexually explicit challenges every time a bookish challenge across the district money what a complete utter waste of time and resources when the definition of explicit is so black and white this policy is written by Annie

041and Tom would greatly reduce the need for books to be challenged it's hard enough to keep our kids away from explicit explicit content kids have it at their fingertips everywhere why not let school be a safe and stress-free place for students why not let parents know that when their kids are in the building they are being protected it's a sad realization but all districts have a percentage of students who are victims of abuse are you comfortable providing explicit explicit content about rape and molestation to a student who may be a victim of rape or molestation this could set a victims recovery back years for what for those who need to call this policy book Banning I ask you this the school's place the schools place internet blocks on students devices to prevent them from accessing

042certain apps and websites while on the building's Wi-Fi does this mean the school's Banning websites no they're simply creating a way to protect them from accessing mature material and to avoid distractions the district limits the black to school property kids are free to go on whatever sites they want once they leave this is because the child is no longer the responsibility of the district but to the parents if parents want their kids to access YouTube videos and believe that is educational then they are free to do so outside of school the argument that kids need this exposure in school is debunked by your own internet policy thank you thank you [Applause] good evening Linda O'Brien here from Tanager Court you know when I moved here three years ago I never and why my wildest imagination

043could have anticipated that I would be standing here tonight having to help Define what pornography is to a group that is supposed to be educated professionals it takes me back to a time that on TV I saw an elected individual saying what is sex exactly and then it eroded into further into saying well what is the word is that's the degree of absurdity that this requirement consists of but I thought that after listening to miss jesling's support for The Bluest Eye that maybe we did need to get so Elementary as to Define this basic concept so I looked it up and for all of you here's what it says it is printed or visual material containing the explicit description or display of sexual organs or sexual activity intended to stimulate erotic feelings that's what it

044says I don't think that's complex Common Core math is more complex than this so we all know that pornography is creating a moral crisis in this country and it's having a corrosion and a terrible negative influence on people of all ages why are we allowing it to start at the beginning this is not about literary value there is no literary value regardless of what some of you believe pornography is bad you don't take black and try to make it gray by adding a little bit of white no it's either white or it's black and in this case it is pure black as pornography and we have to get it out of our schools and in case you need some extra help the U.S code 1470 says that it is illegal to knowingly distribute pornography to

045minders and then code 1466a says illegal distribute and possess pornography that depicts minors in a sexual act The Bluest eyed does both of those in spades it was said best by the Justice of the Supreme Court when he said I know it when I see it I see it in print I see it written I see it in pictures I know it I hope you know it because it's time that we can stop this absurd discussion thank you thank you thank you our last speaker is Andrea Bliss from Liberty Street resident in The District parent in the district sorry you didn't hear what she said she's asking if she can speak she passed the first time she passed this evening before yes she she can do that yes that's fine please Tom I would just

046like to point out if we allow this then we need to allow it going forward for everybody okay so she passed is what she was called and she said pass um I'm just saying if whatever we decide we need to be consistent so we allow that going forward we need to allow it for everyone we're in the same section put this on me well I'm going to have to say you pardoned yourself and I can't accept you to do that again so what's that oh she's not there I'm sorry so I'm confused who is it the mic thank you you're on the list she must be Andrew Bliss you're Andrea Bliss thank you I'm sorry to interrupt you good evening president S I live on Liberty Street and I have two kids currently enrolled in

047Mentor Schools at the elementary and middle school levels I'm here this evening to voice my support of proposed option two and to ask that you do the same like many of us here I attended and graduated from Mentor High School and I value the education that I received here just as I value the education that my children have and will continue to receive in Mentor Schools it is my firm belief that the path to a strong and healthy education must feature involvement and communication between parents and staff this is something that I feel option two aims to accomplish option two backs parental rights in terms of transparent transparency and parental authority over the content that our own children can check out from school libraries option one aims to remove classic works of literature from school

048libraries based on a seemingly intentionally vague definition of the term sexually explicit content a term that I have heard supporters of option one irresponsibly use interchangeably with the word pornography while option 2 offers flexibility compromise and opportunity for parents and Educators to work together in determining Solutions tailored to the comfort and needs of students and families on a case-by-case basis option one seeks to take educational materials away from all students based on the Winds of a select few on a personal note when I was a senior at Manor High my honors English class read The Fountainhead by Iron Rand a book that includes rape the class discussion of this book led to a very important conversation about consent that the young men and women in my class may not have had otherwise to this day

049I think about and am grateful for the insight and knowledge that my classmates and I gained from that talk and I dread the idea of my own children being robbed of the advantage of experiencing similar learning opportunities because someone else without ever having met them decided it was not appropriate for my children to read something that they have deemed sexually explicit content I know that we all want what is best for our students and I urge you to choose option two as it is the option that allows us to parent our own children without limiting the education of anyone else's thank you thank you that concludes the first section superintense report I want to provide a few updates for everyone on a couple of topics that have been brought up prior to we get it

050getting into the consent agenda first is on the board policy pieces to the puzzle with the communication process that will be under undertaking here soon we've spent several months reviewing writing and editing a new set of board policies with our administrative team and our board members there are several policies that have changed the way we'll approach our work moving forward it is now my job to make sure that these policy changes are implemented consistently and effectively across the district the first step in communicating these changes with our administrator is with our administrators and staff members prior to the beginning of school year I actually started this process with our building administrators and Department supervisors at our first administrative meeting last Wednesday I spent a significant amount of time identifying the key policies that will impact

051our work in the classroom this year I am sharing a document with our administrative team that includes the policy number the policy language and the key talking points for each of the policies that directly impact some of the things that I've been hearing from our community throughout the last year some of those topics are around parental rights selection and use of instructional and Library materials controversial issues staff ethics and the use of social media among others the next step for me will be to discuss these policies during my opening day speech to all staff in the district on Monday August 21st I want that information to come from my voice to their ears so I can assure our community that I've explained the policy changes to our entire staff there will be a learning curve

052to this there are nearly 500 policies in our new manual but we will continue to reiterate the implementation of these policies throughout the school year in regards to the pronoun surveys based on the Yola board policy 2416. no student will be required to complete a preferred pronoun survey without prior consent from the student's parents we will continue our practice of not giving any preferred pronoun surveys at the elementary level and within the administrative guidelines for 2416 we will establish the protocols to ensure a parent's rights to opt their middle school or high school student out of any survey where preferred pronouns would be asked are met I heard loud and clear and my first week as superintendent that there were concerns with the professional development modules used in previous years through the better lessons platform

053we put those modules on hold in my first administrative team meeting because we have a contract in place with better lessons I spent several meetings working with our curriculum Department to identify review and select academic training modules that are aligned with state requirements that we have for professional learning for our staff around gifted instruction and support our curriculum department has reviewed the slide decks for each module to ensure they are free from any controversial issues and we have shared that information with our Board of Education members for their review this step will allow us to meet a state requirement without losing any of the public funds that have already been allocated for this contract I want to remind everyone about the guidelines we are currently required to follow regarding transgender restroom use all public school

054districts have been required to follow the same guidelines with this issue since September of 2016 when a federal judge and a U.S District Court in Ohio ruled in favor of transgender rights allowing a transgender girl to use the female restroom in a school in the Highland local school district in Morrow County that ruling was upheld in December of 2016 by the sixth Circuit Court of Appeals in Ohio within the last week another U.S Court District Court in Southern Ohio ruled in favor of transgender rights relating to restroom usage in a case filed against the Bethel local school district in Miami County this is not a superintendent's decision this is not a board of education's decision it is current School law in our state and until there is a change made by our state legislature the

055president of the United States or the U.S Supreme Court which actually upheld transgender rights as recently as June 2021 there's nothing we can do to change that we are however watching the progress of House Bill 183 which has been proposed in the Ohio house which directly addresses this is this issue it is currently in the house higher education committee so we will continue to monitor that bill this fall I want to give everyone an update on the information we have been gathering on the book challenge with The Bluest Eye while we have not been able to pull the committee together yet because everyone was on spring or summer break we have been able to gather some historical information on the book so we know how it has been used in the past it appears the

056book was first included on the supplemental materials list in the district sometime in the mid 90s I believe I was in Middle School then the book is on the supplemental materials list for two courses honors English 10 and regular English 11. we have asked our English teachers at the high school if they have used The Bluest Eye in their course in the past and none of the current teachers have used it in their time here in Manor at the very least that means it has not been used in over 15 years we were will be having a follow-up conversation with our English Department to discuss this book when the teachers come back in the next two weeks when a book is part of our supplemental materials lists for a course a copy is also placed

057on the library shelves in the nearly 40 years that the book has been in our media center we are are aware of it being checked out nine times it was checked out within the last two years so it does not qualify to be weeded out based on our guidelines that recently removed over 2 000 books from our libraries pending our board policy discussions this evening and the progress of House Bill 722 which addresses sexually explicit content that is currently in the house primary and secondary education committee I am looking at ways to expedite this challenge so we have a resolution no later than the September 12th board meeting I know last month Mrs cook shared some of our state test scores during the student achievement update the scores she shared showed that showed the comparisons

058to the state of Ohio test scores we received a lot of negative comments about making that comparison so I want to explain the reason we utilized that comparison in our district our district leadership team meets twice a year to review all of our national state district and Benchmark assessment data at every grade level and every building in the district the first levels of comparison data that we look at are how did we do compared to last school year and the previous years and how did the state do compared to previous years this gives us an indication immediately of the level of difficulty of the state test at each grade level with each content area that year if we see an area that we did not perform as high on compared to our previous year's data

059and then see that the state increased in that area we can start digging into that data first to identify our challenge areas and develop strategies to improve Mrs cook showed you those first few slides last month to Simply provide an overview of the state test scores in our DLT meeting we reviewed over 200 slides worth of data to get a true understanding of where we are as a district we will continue to disaggregate our data and make comparisons to our similar cohort districts around the state we will tap into our resources and connections we have with other Educators in those districts to see where they are improving and what they are doing to help them improve are we happy with our scores yes and no we're excited that we maintained or improved in 15 of

060the 20 state test indicators this year we are happy that our math scores which was one of our Focus areas this year improved in all but one grade level are we happy with our scores across the board no I'm a pretty competitive guy I don't think I'll ever be satisfied I know there's a lot of work ahead of us and I am hopeful that I can divorce devote more of my time to the instructional leadership in these areas now that I'm in year two here in Mentor I believe I've had to answer this question every week that I've worked in this District thus far so I'm asking for all of your help with this one can we please stop the rumor that we have litter boxes in our restrooms I can assure you that we

061have never nor will we ever as long as I'm the superintendent have litter boxes in our restrooms I'm pretty sure our classified Union would not allow it I was at the doctor's office a couple of weeks ago and as I was sitting in the chair going through the normal first office visit questions with the doctor her first question when she found out that I was superintendent here was so what's up with having litter boxes in the restrooms at the high school [Music] I'm begging please help dispel this rumor I have no idea where it started but it is completely false as I start my second year here as superintendent I want to let you know that I've spent a lot of time listening that was my goal this year to listen I've listened and take

062and taken copious notes at our board meetings I've listened during countless individual and small group meetings I have had with parents and community members I have listened to members of our business advisory Council throughout our work this year and I've listened to our students teachers and administrators in all of the school visits I conducted last school year this year I want to start moving on some of what I have heard specific to our Academic Program I want to solidify our core content areas in math English science and social studies I want to provide related arts and elective programs that meet the interests all of our students have I want to build on the amazing CTE programs we have in our district I want to expand access to college credit plus courses for our students and

063I want to build connections with our business and industry Partners in Mentor to ensure our graduates have the skills they need to step into the wealth of career opportunities we have right here in this community we will accomplish this through our strategic planning process that will guide the majority of our work this year we will involve stakeholders from across our district and our community to create the goals and action steps to drive this District forward and most importantly we will do this in a positive respectful way that we'll be engaging to all people involved thank you [Applause] and Mr Jewell I'll get you the sexual education uh updates next uh next month for you as well Mr President members of the board and Mr Wade I have the following recommendations listed under the consent agenda

064and recommend approval of items six a one through six a three so moved second please call the roll Mr waves for that discussion I do have a question David I do have a question for this question too did you as well I just had a comment mine's just like like a Kudos I'm excited about the fly fishing club that has really taken off and I think the money that anybody gives for that club is amazing because it is very expensive to purchase items for fly fishing so it came from the middle schools Foundation that's the second one this year right I think there was another one earlier too it was for this well for the orchard Hollow I'm the university yeah they had received a grant from it's like 5 000 it was a lot

065one of the uh company you know yeah yeah it's great that's all I just had it no no no okay so my question is if you could talk a little bit as we're as we're recommending the designated bus stops um and and I know we had a speaker address this in shorts on everyone's mind as school is starting up what time does my child get picked up what time were they brought home they're creating a schedule they're planning their work life balance and I know that last year we had we had difficulty because we had lack of drivers we had lack of drivers we had lack of substitutes and it created an issue for parents where sometimes they were sitting 30 40 minutes before the bus would pick them up so could you give us

066an update I know we've made a big push to employ drivers we know that there's a bus driver shortage throughout many districts how are we currently are we still hiring drivers are we still hiring substitutes and the number of drivers did we currently hire at capacity do we have enough full-time Subs how many did we have last year versus this year so Rachel your your numbers were almost spot on so kudos to you um we we I believe unless Mr Burnett can correct me we've hired our final full-time bus driver today so that brings us to 48 total full-time drivers we currently have four five or six sub-drivers based on where we may have just hired that last person from last year at this time I believe we had one maybe two sub drivers that

067were available to us so we're actually a little bit ahead um the the one thing that I will mention is uh our transportation supervisor uh inherited all the routing because it was done prior to her taking the the full-time position last year here um she rerouted the entire District this year to to try and be more efficient a couple of things were happening we actually had a a handful of drivers um that had gaps that were you know small gaps but they were sitting idle for a period of time she's closed those gaps so that those drivers are driving continuously now during their shifts that opened up uh four additional routes for us that are allowing allowing us to be a little bit more efficient in the way we approach things I right now we

068feel like we're in pretty good shape her only concern that she has at this point is the transportation of some of our Middle School sports teams since often times they have to leave at like two or three o'clock which is during prime time for the afternoon routes at the especially at the elementary level so we're working through those those issues right now and again hoping to to get more subs and to be able to cover some of that for us uh we did a job fair this Saturday we actually had a couple of drivers coming through one of them already had a CDL which is phenomenal uh the other is going through the process right now of getting his his temp license uh it was great because the transportation supervisor brought a bus over and

069had that individual actually sit in the driver's seat and had one of our trainers over his shoulder kind of pointing things out to make sure that he passes that test so that we can get uh get him certified to to start driving we're always going to be looking for more drivers again I I think our comfort level from a minimum would be 10 we're currently in that first time four five six range as far as substitutes go we do have other administrators in the district that also drive so we can add them in when necessary but often times then that takes them out of the office to from their supervisory roles to to actually drive routes so we're again publicly we're still looking for drivers we're in much better shape than we are when than

070we were last year and we're very hopeful with the with the rerouting and the efficiencies we have in place that our timing is going to be much better than it was last year thank you one one additional thing I'll throw out there and and uh this is something that we just made some final decisions on yesterday uh we're working through a different communication system as well um we've had a group and a steering committee kind of working through this not only for transportation but for the entire District as a whole so we do have a new system that will be put in place we've got a transition plan for that to get it fully implemented here this year but we're very hopeful that those communication pieces will be a little bit more timely number one

071but then we'll also um instead of just receiving an email we can also include a text message so those families that are not constantly checking email can get that notification right away on some of the busing pieces to the puzzle uh final thing I'll mention with busing too we're still digging through some of the numbers um looking closely at our non-public routes looking closely at our payments in lieu of transportation we are trying to save some money across the district obviously um and we we put that to all of our departments including Transportation so we're going to look closely at some of that here in the next week or two as we're getting ready for school to start to identify the cost savings that we've been able to have out of this this work in

072the transportation office this year I just want to add that I I had asked there was a question earlier about the private school busing I believe it's a high Revised Code that requires us to bus students to private schools unless we do the payment in lieu of and if it's within so much radius or so much time so that's something out of our control but I did ask how many of those routes are for private schools just to see how big of an issue it it truly is and there are three out of the 49 total routes that are going directly to private schools there's 15 routes that have both private schools as part of the route and our schools so something to maybe look into in the future it doesn't seem like it's as

073big of an issue that I thought when I heard that I was like this sounds kind of weird that we would have to you know transport students to private schools so I wanted to see how big of an issue it was and so we do have three routes that are just private school routes but 15 that have both out of 49. actually any we got that reduced to two now so it's two yeah two full-time drivers are strictly driving non-public routes so even if we did something with that that's still not going to fully solve our huge no Miss Payne yes Miss dresslink yes Miss Pryor yes Miss Cook yes Mr Tuttle yes motions carry five zero Mr President members of the board and Mr Wade I am recommending approval of the resolution adopting a

0742023-24 Calamity day alternative makeup plan so move second comments input please call the roll Mr Wade it's Justin yes Miss Cook yes Miss breiner yes Miss Payne yes Mr Tuttle yes motion carries 5-0 Mr President members of the board and Mr Wade I'm recommending approval of the 2023-24 parent student handbooks for the preschool the elementary schools the middle schools the high school and cares so moved I'm going to give it to miss jessalyn she's sitting next time please call the roll I need a second it was good a second can we have discussion time discussion okay um I was looking through the handbooks and I was just I didn't see any dress code in there um so I was wondering if you could touch base on that and do we get to see the dress

075code because there were a lot of complaints last year of dress code violations or parents saying we don't have a dress code and it would be helpful if we had that we might have it somewhere but it's just not in the handbook right right yeah and I I think we talked about that last year around this time as well there's uh there's language in the handbooks but there's a a more detailed piece that the middle schools and high schools send out as well in relation to to dress code so and if I'm wrong I'll correct myself in September but we can make sure that that language is available to you guys so that you can see that too how what is the is the reason that we don't include it in the handbook and the

076only reason I'm asking is because as a parent you would think that you know going through the handbook it's like everything's in there so it would be helpful if we did include that even if it is specific to each school to have it in the handbook I think would be more helpful than having two different pieces of information okay so Mr Heath do we get access to see those um just the dress code policy do we ever vote on that or I'm not sure can you look into it and just let me know okay yeah and obviously you know we've got very vaguely language in the handbooks but uh yeah we'll make sure we have that okay included here for next meeting thank you and then we'll uh I'll talk to our principals about including

077that in that full language in the handbooks moving forward perfect thanks Colorado Miss Jackson yes Miss Cook yes Miss brighter yes Miss Payne yes Mr Tuttle yes motions carry 5-0 [Applause] Mr President members of the board and Mr Wade I'm recommending approval of the contractual agreement with the city of mentor so moved second oh discussion question and just as a point of clarification this is uh that agreement with uh regards to the EMT Academy which is an outstanding program by the way yes very fortunate to have that [Music] um yes Miss Payne yes Miss Pryor yes Miss jessling yes Mr Tuttle yes motion carries 5-0 Mr President members of the board and Mr Wade I'm recommending approval of the contractual agreement with Classic Automotive Group so move input comments another great addition to our CTE

078program I think we offer amazing things in our CT program this is one of them I know a lot of us got to tour both the EMT program and this program and it's just phenomenal big thank you to Classic for that too yeah we're all up there yep help you know Mrs brainer and I could remember when we took out the auto shop here we were heartbroken but it's come back even stronger it's fantastic certainly outside of the basics but it's preparing our kids that aren't going to college for up in that Community Partnership with one of our biggest local businesses um gives us resources and Equipment right here in my talent absolutely please call the roll Mr Lloyd I just finished my notes here sorry Miss Payne yes Miss jesling yes Miss Brian yes

079Miss Cook yes Mr Tuttle yes motion carries five zero Mr President members of the board and Mr Wade I'm recommending approval of agenda item c one related to certified personnel and C2 through C4 all related to human resource matters comments hearing no Mr Wade please call the roll Miss Payne yes Miss dressling yes Miss Briner yes Miss Cook yes Mr Tuttle yes motion carries 5-0 Mr President members of the board and Mr Wade at this time we would like to introduce our new administrators like to start with Mr John fullerman John joins the administrative team at Mentor High School as a unit principal this year he received his bachelor's degree from Cleveland State University and his principal licensure from John Carroll University recently John was with Cleveland Heights University Heights where he was an assistant

080principal for the past eight years and previously at Summit Academy in Canton for two years as an administrator prior to being a school administrator John was a Cleveland Heights police officer he resides in Chardon and is a busy dad to three girls we would like to welcome John to the mentor community [Applause] president members of the board Mr Heath Mr Wade I would like to express my gratitude for selecting me for this position I am eager to contribute my skills and experience to the success of the mentor School District I look forward to serving the community in school all making a positive impact and being on this amazing team thank you thank you John Mr Chad Russo [Applause] Chad joins our Mentor High School administrative team this year as a unit principal as well he

081received this bachelor's degree from Kent State University and master's degree from Ashland University Chad has been with the district for the past 22 years as a social studies teacher at Ridge Junior High and Mentor High School he was an assistant athletic director at Mentor High School while also being a key staff member to have Mentor High School recognized with the purple Star Award which designates schools who support military families Chad resides in Mentor and has two kids in Mentor Schools welcome Chad Mr President members of the board Mr Heath and Mr Wade thank you for allowing me to share this moment with everyone here I can't put into words how excited I am for this new opportunity in my career as I get ready to start my 23rd year here at Mentor Schools it will

082look a little bit different this year that's probably why I already have butterflies in my stomach when I think about the first day of school a few people I'd like to recognize for help me and assist me on this journey Miss Bobby borak who really took me out of her Wing last few weeks of school and helped answer several questions that I had about becoming a unit principal Jason Crowe and Kathy Burnett both for having the confidence and trust in me to make that transition from being a classroom teacher to becoming a unit principal last but not least thank you to my amazing wife Melanie My Two children for always being by my side and give me the support that I need to accept new challenges when they present themselves I couldn't be happier to

083be a member of this administrative team this school and most importantly this community thank you [Music] thank you Mrs Ali foray [Applause] Ally joins the student services department as a special education supervisor and will oversee our integrated preschool program at Garfield she will also work with Fairfax Hopkins Orchard Hollow Broadmoor and Lake Catholic she received her bachelor's degree from Xavier University and master's degree from American College of Education Ali was hired as a preschool teacher in The District in 2019 but was previously a kindergarten and preschool teacher with Cleveland metropolitan schools also congratulations to Ali who was recently married and bought her first home so I think you have officially hit the trifecta of stress so congratulations on your new position good evening Mr President members of the board Mr Heath and Mr Wade I

084wanted to take a moment to express my gratitude for the opportunity to work at Mentor Schools as a special education supervisor as I embark on this new chapter I carry with me the lessons experiences gained during my time as an intervention specialist and teacher I'm committed to upholding the standards of excellence that Middle School embodies as well as contributing My Utmost dedication to the growth and the progress of our students the encouragement and support I've received so far has inspired me and I'm excited to see the positive and effect we all will make this upcoming school year thank you [Applause] Mr Adam Dugas [Applause] Adam joints our administrative team as the Bellflower principal he received his bachelor's degree from Toledo University and Masters in educational Administration from Ursuline College Adam has been in the district

085since 2009 as a teacher at Lake Elementary and also spent a few years as an instructional coach at Hopkins Elementary he lives in Mentor and has two kids that keep him very active one of which will be at Bellflower this year which will be fun congratulations Adam thank you good evening Mr President members of the board Mr Heath and Mr Wade I would like to sincerely thank you for this opportunity to served as a principal of Bellflower Elementary School over the last 14 years I've worked as a teacher in the school district as an and as an instructional coach in both of those roles I had the opportunity to build relationships with staff students parents and the community I believe those experiences along with my own core values align with Bellflower and our District's mission

086of inspiring students today to reach their full potential I am grateful for the opportunity to continue my career in Mentor Schools and I'm excited to begin this new opportunity as an administrator thank you foreign I apologize for the length of my report this evening I just wanted to be like Bill Wade [Laughter] my portion of tonight's agenda thank you I will make it up to you next month do you have to yes I'm required to buy unfortunately Mr President members of the board Mr Heath I will do the section for board business thank you it is recommended that resolution authorizing addendum to the employment contractor the superintendent be approved second discussion discussion comments please call the roll Miss jessalyn yes Miss Cook yes Miss breiner yes Miss Payne yes Mr Tuttle yes motion carries 5-0

087members our Mr President members of the board Mr Heath the second reading and approval of the mentor Board of Education Yola policy 2520.03 so moved comments we need a second oh we need a second I'm sorry I second that I'll take the floor and just kind of go over some of this so before we kind of dig into the the detail of the policy proposal I'd like to just kind of clarify why um Tom and I felt like it was necessary for us to go ahead and propose something specifically in regards to sexually explicit content um and then Mrs jeschling had a a good suggestion for sexual content to be added to the policy at our last special board meeting so the way that I see our role as board members is also to serve

088the community the community has been very loud over the last two couple years but more recently there have been several book challenges and a lot of them have kind of Fallen fallen into the category of sexually explicit I don't think it's a good thing for us to continue to have book challenges with sexually explicit material in them so instead of every single month having these challenges because we have been told that there will be additional challenges based on the same issues of content being very sexually graphically explicit so I sat down with Tom and we sat with our board attorney and then Mr Mr Heath as well and we felt like it was important to address this for our community because we serve the community and they have spoken very loudly I think it would

089be um not responsible for us not to respond in some way to address their concerns we may not all agree but I think it's the responsible thing to do to try to address the concerns that have been brought To Us by the community so when Tom and I sat down we kind of after we talked with our attorney we had to come up with some type of definition for sexually explicit content we wanted to be very specific so that there isn't any kind of gray area of oh gosh you know this old classic has the word rape in it are we going to get rid of it so I just want to read the sexually explicit definition um just so everybody's kind of on the same page this is what we came up with so

090it says for the purposes of this policy and those that policies cross-reference herein sexually explicit shall be defined as any written language graphically describing or images pictures photographs drawings movies or other visual depictions portraying sexual intercourse masturbation sadism masochism bestiality fellatio cunnilingus pedophilia molestation rape or incest so it is very very specific and we said we added due to Mrs Cook's suggestion she said you know I think it would be better if we had at the last board meeting where we discussed this if we inserted the language that says graphically describing we also added sexual content to address some of the concerns that were brought by Miss joshling and some of the other board members about those classic books that might not raise to the level of sexually explicit but might have kind content in

091them that could be objectionable to some parents so we kind of took both options that were originally there was an option one in option two we kind of put them together to address both concerns so the sexual content would would really kind of address those things that we talked about at the last meeting that were Classics that may include some sexual content but don't rise to the level of let's say rated R where we wouldn't have it in the schools so I'm confident in this policy I think it is our job to address the concerns of the community I think they expect us to have a standard parents don't want majority of parents I don't think want sexually explicit materials that are graphically described about you know miners being raped by their fathers we've had

092two books already being challenged that include that information I think the responsible thing to do would be to pass this policy as is IT addresses the AP concerns because I did learn from talking with Mr Heath that I wasn't aware of that the AP courses are college board approved so there are certain things that we can't change in them so we added that language in there as well and I'm comfortable with that with notifying parents though that that language that um they could be exposed to sexually explicit information so that is in the bottom portion of the policy we also addressed the college credit plus courses along the same lines we don't have control over that so we excluded that and then also any kind of state mandated curriculum such as you know State mandated

093sex ed courses so I feel like it's really all in here I I'm not really willing to compromise any further on this I think that we are expected to have a standard that we will uphold and I don't think we want to give parents one more thing that they will have to do to opt their children out of it I think that would be their responsibility if they want these books to go ahead and get them from the public library or like somebody suggested tonight I think was a good suggestion if a teacher has a book that we can't provide they could always email the parents say Hey you know this is another book we're not providing it but feel free to go to the you know Public Library so that is kind of the

094the why and um where I stand on the policy so I read that very thoroughly and of course we were all together for our work session so I jotted down a few notes that I thought capitalize my my thoughts back in the late 90s Mr Fred Rogers wrote the Let's Talk About it series it's four separate titles adoption divorce extraordinary friends and step families offered particularly helpful resources for parents by tackling confusing topics in a reassuring and truthful way they were examples of the power of books to provide information that may be very important for some but not necessarily wanted At All by others individual families could use those books depending on their unique circumstances the chance for young readers to see themselves and to understand the world through stories and in non-fiction books has

095great value and that's a key consideration in any library's collection development plan a person familiar with school librarianship knows the selection process that is the professional standard the media specialist and Mentor has a demanding job that was once shared by more than a dozen certified professionals her work encompasses the management of all digital print and ephemeral resources in the K-12 collections it is impossible to read every item instead she follows the district's best practices guidelines as has been done since the 1960s in school libraries everywhere to purchase books using professional references reviews book looks Etc it's a system that works well for most but not all viewpoints the Harry Potter books are an example of a beloved series that raised objections for some parents however the number of actual books borrowed from our media centers

096at the secondary levels is low to give a comparison point in elementary building of about 400 students might borrow between five to ten thousand books during the school year at Manor High more than 2 000 students borrowed a total of 745 items in 2223 and some fraction of that number would be fiction titles secondary students are generally utilizing databases and other curated online resources for their school assignments the fiction being read are usually books required by their English or social studies classes and maybe from classroom sets other fiction titles in the secondary media centers are getting so little use that this extensive discussion seems out of proportion to the actual demand and we're providing easy Public Library access at the high school when approved by their parents for students to request whatever they would like

097to borrow one could even ask whether a fiction collection makes sense for the high school at all when compared to all the content surrounding younger adults from television YouTube movies music lyrics video games cell phones streaming services and social media it's hard to equate concerns about a passage from a rarely read novel to The Graphic extremes to which they may be regularly exposed in the world around them that's where parents are working hard to guide limit and discuss those complex issues to protect their children based upon their family's beliefs parents might decide what is right for their household I fully support respecting and empowering all parents to have that control further we don't know the individual circumstances or needs of one child versus another I agree with Mrs Payne that students maturity levels are best

098assessed by their parents therefore allowing each parent to precisely choose what is right for their child makes complete sense this materials policy that we have before us this evening is one that we've spent hours discussing and researching we had a two and a half hour work session to collaborate on the policy language that would best serve our school Community particularly after import input from the board attorney there were concerns about interpretation of what qualifies as explicit content he was concerned that even one word could be problematic we discussed Plastics from Shakespeare to Hawthorne to Orwell and how those literary Works might be embraced by some while being rejected by others given the fact that we've received multiple emails with sincerely held while directly opposing viewpoints urging this board to both restrict access to books and

099to never restrict such access we are left with a conundrum what complicates the matter further is that very few of us who have expressed a very few of those I'm sorry who have expressed their opinions regarding this topic have children currently attending our schools we don't have data to guide us as to what all those parents want and it doesn't matter if what the majority favors is wrong for even one household either way a decision May trivialize the needs of some of the students we serve so I think the right course of action is to individualize and Empower each family to set its own guidelines they don't have to abide by a majority because their Sovereign role is honored and determines exactly what their children may access that Safeguard would include materials that are studied

100as part of class any required or supplemental reading that is assigned and even more broadly what a student can check out from the media center respecting the parental role and offering full transparency is what has been a central part of our discussions for many months particularly when Mrs Payne and I have attended the district curriculum meetings a parental notification mandate can be formalized in board policy 25 2003 it aligns with the State of Ohio's proposed legislation referencing all instructional materials it means that no administrator or teacher has to discern if something is or isn't explicit as our attorney warned that there is subjectivity in making that choice this alerts parents where there might be some sexual content of any kind and leaves it to them to review and decide if they wish to have alternative

101material assigned they can opt for notification via Infinite Campus of any item selected from the media center Collections and that's already in place what's the reason that no other District in Ohio perhaps in the country has a policy with language like this in the draft paragraph under sexually explicit content there's an implied equivalency in the list of topics blending normal and deviant Behavior what happens if something is left out that itself could create confusion and failure to support and respect parental expectations even within a household different children might have different needs and sensitivities by handing parents the full power to choose decisions are perfectly table tailored to each student as a nation we value our individual freedom to read what we wish it's been stated many times by those who are challenging books that they

102are not censoring or Banning them this approach bypasses any slippery slope that imposes the views of some over the rights of others the process of challenging materials and the time and cost invested may be unnecessary because every parent will be notified of all selections they can guide what their own children read in light of their ethical or religious views I support local control and this is the very concept of that in its purest form I have some questions um to be quite honest I was pretty surprised when we had the the draft of the policy that Tom and I had originally proposed to see several options added in which Tom and I had taken out for today's meeting so what you're seeing here is just what Tom and I stand by but I was very

103surprised on Friday when I saw the additional options put in there because where we left off at the last board meeting that was in front of everybody taped was on a good note where we all agreed not all of us but where we had three with Mrs jesling agreeing with both parts option one and option two so I have a couple questions and a couple comments the first question I would have is did the attorney tell you something different than what he told me and Tom with Mr Heath and if so why were we not included in that conversation because if the if we're being told something we were told you know this is defendable and then you are not being told that same thing that's a problem number so that's my first question is

104who met with the attorney and how did all three of you come to the same I didn't meet with the attorney I was based to get on our conversation during our work session that there were concerns about some some words or definitions that's why we began that discussion furthering well what about classic books you know what what I might think is fine someone else might be offended by that's what I meant about over the Harry Potter series that would seem innocuous to many but not to everyone and so concerns about a list what if something's not on the list that's something that I was concerned about as I reviewed this and read it and reread it and reread it at the fourth time so as I was looking at it I I just in my

105mind taking any judgment out of it and simply giving every parent the full power to control for their family what is right or what isn't and that we've already put in place the the idea of this but this would codify it so I get what you're saying and I can appreciate that which is why I was for adding the sexual content piece to the policy um I think that people expect us to have a certain level of standard even though the culture changes are standards necessarily don't have to people still expect us to have a certain standard that we uphel hold as a school and I think that allowing parents to have a choice sounds sounds great but at the same time if we think about the possible harm that could be done to a

106child who may have gone through something that was sexual abuse and let's say the child other child in the classroom starts talking about this book that they have and now the harm that could be done to that other child who doesn't even read the book but because it's provided by the the curriculum and they choose that book we could have harm to children who may have gone through traumatic events I know Mr Heath actually was in a discussion with me and and somebody from the community about their child who's in Mentor Schools that went through a very traumatic event and this kind of material these types of books even if they're not in her hands if somebody next to her brings it up and has the book of there and says hey check this out

107that's that could set them back years in their in their counseling efforts so I think that there there is a standard we don't have you know no dress code policy and just leave it up to parents a whatever you want you know your child to wear we still have a standard we have to have standards that parents would support and those materials those sexually explicit materials that are board attorney did support he wouldn't have written the policy if it wasn't something that they could defend is very specific and I don't find any one of these definitions okay for minors to graphically view or read um I don't know which one of these terms are you okay you know where you would say that the benefit for the sexually explicit information would outweigh um or the

108the literacy value would outweigh the sexually explicit content when we're talking about pedophilia molestation rape incest fellatio bestiality masochism masturbation sexual intercourse those are things that I just feel like we don't need in schools those are standards that I feel like can be upheld that parents would expect us to abide by and not have to make them opt out of these options Mr Tuttle um we we do have I'd like to just to call a point of order here because with Robert's Rules one person speaks and then everyone else has a chance to speak and then when everyone is done you can have a second term but we're kind of going with a back and forth here and we all have opinions so if we can move forward that's perfect timing because you've never called

109that before just saying we've done I just learned this sure appreciate it sure you did very interesting so what you're suggesting we need to end the discussion no I'm just suggesting that we're going back and forth between two numbers I know other people comments I believe Mrs brainer does have comments I'm assuming you do as well so that's a good point okay you could speak Mrs cook you'd like to speak yes you have the floor um I appreciate the opportunity to discuss my thoughts on the proposed policy 25 20.03 tonight before I begin I'd like to share a couple passages that contain content that some might view as questionable and as a listener you can decide if this content is appropriate for your child to hear or read and this is the first Passage um

110it is written by a young girl unconsciously I had these feelings even before I came here once when I was spending the night at Jackie's I could no longer restrain my curiosity about her body which she'd always hidden from me in which I'd never seen I asked her whether as proof of our friendship we could touch each other's breasts and Jackie refused I also had a terrible desire to kiss her which I did and every time I see a female nude such as the Venus in my art history book I go into ecstasy sometimes I find them so Exquisite I have to struggle to hold back my tears if only I had a girlfriend and this is the second Passage I turned around and for I knew it he was on me just run up

111behind me he did he got me round the neck cussing me and saying dirt I fought and hollered but he had me round the neck he hit me again and again he chucked me on the floor and he choked me and took advantage of me now as I read these passages you could sense that some people are less comfortable than others and if I were to take a vote the consensus in the room about the appropriateness of these passages would not be unanimous not even close the first passage you heard tonight was from Anne Frank's diary and the second was from To Kill a Mockingbird it is somewhat unfair of me to ask you to make an informed judgment without the context of the full novel there are some people in this room that feel

112that this content is not appropriate for their child and this is okay it is okay if everyone in this room doesn't agree different people have different opinions about what is appropriate for their children what may be considered explicit to one person may not be to another and as such decisions to remove materials should be made with careful consideration and should be based on clear policies and procedures that are transparent creating policy is something that I take very seriously I want you to understand that I must consider the implications of all policy and ensure that it is understandable and enforceable and as I work to understand this policy I sought legal counsel and completed research about similar policies as a result I formed opinions about various parts of this policy first I would like to address

113the first section that addresses a process related to sexually explicit content I am not convinced that this policy clearly delineates sexually explicit from sexual content this vagueness makes the policy difficult to enforce the passages I read today may be deemed explicit to some and not to others because it is a matter of opinion the second section of this policy addresses a policy for materials with sexual content this process acknowledges parental rights I support this plan I support notifying parents that material contains sexual content I support the right of parents to review material I support a parent's rights to request alternate material the sexual content process described in this policy is enforceable and clear I see a clear difference from opting some students out based on a partnership with parents and eliminating all content from all

114students based on the opinions of others there are over 55 000 people living within the boundaries of Mentor Public Schools and we have heard from approximately 50 people some are in opposition of this policy and some are in support this is hardly a representative sample furthermore I have serious concerns that a policy that eliminates content for everyone also limits access to educational content and intellectual freedom limits may include access to AB AP class content in literature or psychology it may limit topics addressed in nursing Health criminal justice or our EMT Academy and it may limit a discussion about rate being used against enslaved people and it may censor current event topics that are discussed in class this policy is not limited to fiction materials and the implications can be far-reaching it is contradictory to our

115policy that states that materials are read in their entirety during a challenge and they are not judged on the single Passage I am in support of adopting the process to notify parents when sexual content is present to allow parents to review materials and to provide them with alternative materials that are right for their child I believe that these discussions are important and that we can come to a compromise as a team together that is clear and enforceable thank you I attempted to follow everything you had to say what's interesting I I did take a note of one thing you did say where in the book you quoted took advantage of me is that that would be sexual contact or is that sexually explicit or is that implied well that's I think that's the problem is

116that it is up to interpretation because it's implied and when we spoke with the attorney he said you have to be careful about using implied words because implied is to each person interpretation well I want to follow people and hear from everyone but I'm happy to answer the point of order it was Tom had the floor it speaks directly to sexually explicit there is no ifs ands or buts or missed interpretation of those visual depictions portrayed that we have listed there our attorney said that is defensible and that's an easy interpretation as far as those actions those verbs it's not implied it's there can you argue about that and do you want that in the books that our students can take home and read or read it here in the library or access it on

117their iPads their Chromebooks I mean what I just I don't want to answer and and be out of order so I understand that but I I mean by that because this is very straightforward okay there's no implication whatsoever so if we don't have it then it's okay in the books is that what you're stating I'm confused about what you're asking me if we had books that contained those specifically descriptive words explicit are those books okay in our Public Library our school and our public system in the high school I believe that parents can decide for their own children so I believe that every time that there's any content no matter how vague or explicit if there's a notification put out then the parent can decide for their own child what they feel is appropriate we

118have that in part two of that and sexual content yes and I completely agree with that section that's what I was stating that I agreed with that section well I disagree with you I think this can be supported and defended by upon our policy is applicable and we should not be in the business of okay providing materials in sexually explicit content which is not what we're engaged to in charge by the state to teach or for that it's not part of the curriculum and and I hear that point I I spoke with legal counsel when I was reviewing the policy I asked to speak with legal counsel and when I spoke with legal counsel um our lawyer was very clear with me that when he spoke with both of you that he said it is

119like a litmus test if it's in if the words are in then the poly then the book is out so if it is discussing rape the book is out and if it is discussing any of those other topics the book is out so he was we were trying to come to a way to make it um delineate the two between sexually explicit and sexual content and that's where we added the word graphically in I don't feel that it is still clear that we can be enforceable across the board all the time to the same level that's just my opinion and the board may feel differently but based on the legal counsel that I received I have concerns that we can enforce this clearly and so I feel that it is more appropriate to create a

120policy that is clearly enforceable which means if there's any sexual content parents are immediately notified and then parents decide if their child can read the book or not Mia Tom I believe you're doing the same thing that Annie's doing and that's having a discussion so I think we should all have a turn too great state our feelings on the policy is that okay go right ahead Mary okay I don't think it should be a discussion so I just hit a couple comments here I've heard the statement the majority of parents want this policy and I don't know how you quantify that I you know I I think we had 12 maybe 13 speakers on the first half of our public comments I don't know how many of them have students in the school district several

121of them stated excuse me Mr Tuttle can you please get order thank you you know this is about the students in the school district and this is a decision that we're making um you know I we're talking about our community that's that's the point I'm trying to make we received 12 emails about this subject before our meeting that doesn't include the three that we got from the same individual one which was a Biblical reference so I counted that as one so when we talk about the majority of parents like I said that's hard to quantify we're also getting comments and emails from parents on the other side okay I know people are passionate about this and I appreciate that I understand that I think it's important to note that nobody is pushing any books any

122topics and I'm not going to repeat all those nasty words we've heard them plenty nobody's pushing that on anyone contrary to what some people may think were set um from my conversation with Mr Heath do other school districts have this policy in Ohio no and that came from our attorney so we would be the first district in Ohio does Neola have this policy in any other school districts no so that is worth noting huh regarding what we have in front of us um I've heard sexually explicit I've heard obscene I've heard pornography again I think it's subject to interpretation who came up with this definition I'm hearing Mrs Payne and Mr Tuttle did is this list of these nasty words all inclusive again it sounds like it came up from these two individuals I believe

123there are some missing words that could be included there be that as it may I believe the term sexual content is broader again I feel that sexually explicit is subject to interpretation I don't like it I I think it sets this up for possibilities I mean in a court of law anything is possible I think by going the route of sexual content and we've heard the term parental rights for how many years now it's about parental rights and I'm for letting parents make that decision for their children not this board saying take out the books vet the books ban the books I've said it before and I'll say it again I am not for Banning books whatever you want to call it vetting is the latest term I believe that by talking about sexual content

124and giving parents that individual choice for their child this is a win-win it's individualized and each parent can choose for their child Mrs Brenner Have You released the floor excuse me I'm not finished okay I'm not qualified to make correction correct curriculum decisions and I'm not a psychologist so I can't say how someone is going to react to reading a book that's not up to me I don't make those what do you want to call it assumptions okay we can assume all day long but again if parents are involved I think that's what would make people happy I really do I think that is doing our due diligence but to say no one across the board can read these books I don't think that's up to us um and again deciding on curriculum is not

125the job of a board member that's all I had to say Mr Tuttle thank you Mr since she released the floor can I Mrs Payne can I finish my remarks as well so I disagree vehemently with Mrs Briner that we are not to have discussion that is our job to have discussion there are pieces and parts that we could all provide that could make this policy better or different and I think that that is our job to discuss things if you watch the State Board of Education meetings you'll see them do just that I'm surprised that coincidentally when I propose a policy with Tom support point of order is called in Robert's Rules of Order are called when we have never done that before so it's a little interesting there I just want to make

126that point I have several other points that I would like to make in reference to some of the comments that were just made I heard Banning books this is not Banning books Banning books would be these books are no longer allowed anywhere we have a public library that would still have them um there are some books that would have pictures in them that would depict these words that you called Nasty Mrs Briner and I would agree with you they are they are nasty words but they are even more nasty when they're graphically described or depicted in pictures so I think that that is even more reason to support not having sexually explicit materials for our minor students in school we also know that we currently have one person who has filed a criminal complaint against

127Mentor Schools for pandering obscenities to minors and last I checked we have they're waiting for a decision from us on The Bluest Eye okay so we finished that let's say the book goes away there could be another one if we don't have a policy in place to prevent those types of books from being provided or having access to for for minors so I think we would still run into that issue I don't know what Mrs cook was told that was different than what Mr Tuttle and I was were told with our board attorney it was not told to us the same way certainly the terms were not if it has this word in it it's out um it was or wouldn't have included the words written language or depicting her pictures its pictures don't have

128words so that wouldn't wouldn't fit so I would like to make a point about that um I really in all honesty I I went to Mentor Schools all through kindergarten through 12th grade it was amazing um thankfully I didn't run into some of these books and had I have ran into some of these books let's say my my mom didn't check the email because parents get a lot of emails and we know that they get different emails every day and how many are actually checked if if I was to read that book I certainly don't think that I would want that those images in my head we had an email today from an adult that said that they read this book and while it was written beautifully I'm talking about The Bluest Eye while it

129was written beautifully and it was a a good book those graphic descriptions of not just that passage of the whole book read in its entirety are still left in their mind and that's an adult I think the the community requires that we have standards I understand your opinions you can have a different opinion I don't think changing this policy to a watered-down version of it is is something that the community is going to support I think that people have been speaking out for a long time about what they expect our standard to be we are not Banning books we are vetting them for age-appropriate materials for age for for minors we're talking about minors so I think we need to uphold the standard that has been set although other schools don't have a policy like

130this we've got policies that other schools don't have we also know that maybe those other schools don't have these types of books in their schools they could I can tell you that Riverside did have the book identical I can also tell you that the second a parent wrote in about that book it was pulled immediately so because they don't want sexually explicit materials in their schools I would assume that was the reason why but it was pulled immediately so I do think that we can have a policy that other places don't have and I certainly would be happy to be the first policy in Ohio to prevent miners from having graphic detail depicting these words in graphic descriptions because it's inappropriate for minors I don't think it's our job to give miners access to these

131types of materials if under the same lines of parental rights the parent has the right to go out to the public library and go get the book so I think that there are kids who could be harmed by this more than they could be helped by this by books like that I should say if you're going to look at an opt-out process and if I'm if I'll be outvoted which I'm sure I would I think that an opt-in process might be more appropriate if you ask parents how many of you want to support your children reading this definition of these words in graphic detail go ahead and opt your child in so that you can read books like that that would be an alternate to an opt-out in my opinion so I stand firm I

132don't think that that minor should have access by trusted adults teachers Educators librarians to materials that are sexually explicit and graphically described or depicted and I think that definition is very specific I don't find any one of those terms if they were graphically described as being acceptable for minors and I stand firm on that [Applause] I felt very good any other no I mean I I appreciate that that Viewpoint it's for me it's defining graphically and then how does that fit into curriculum I know that you mentioned health class health class is not State mandated it is mandated that we have health class there is not a state mandated curriculum there is a lot of a lot of courses that we have that they're not mandated that we have them but they are good well-rounded

133education you know classes like psychology and criminal justice and nursing these are topics that they will most likely cover rape and um and maybe in graphic detail and by limiting these things the first sexually explicit content would would limit those discussions and those classes because I would imagine that it would it could be quite graphic um using sexual content gives us the freedom to alert parents and make everyone aware that this is happening and it's not just an awareness and it's not an opt-in or an opt-out it is this is our standard that if there is sexual content our standard is you will be notified and you can look at the material and review it yourself and you can ask for alternate material for your own child those are the steps that are lined out

134in this policy and I completely support that it's a great middle of the road compromise I feel that we do have an obligation to hear the community concerns and I think that this is a wonderful compromise where we are here in community concerns it's also stronger language than anyone in the state of Ohio has it this there is not this policy related to sexual content is also not anywhere else so it's not that we are turning a blind eye and that we are pandering pornography it is simply informing parents and understanding that there is some content that is discussed in some classes we would make parents aware of it beforehand but that there are cases where it is appropriate to have mature discussions anything anything I had when under the exclusions from the policy coverage

135it talks about District approved or it excluded District approved curriculum to Mrs Cook's point I think our health curriculum is locally selected if I'm not mistaken we have to have it but we choose what it is so whatever the the comprehensive curriculum is that's included there should be under that umbrella that it this isn't applying to that however in your correct a college credit plus Mrs Payne that is not under our authority to control we also we don't notify parents sign off on that if they opt their student into any of those classes however the AP classes which are controlled by the College Board we don't alter their content or lists or any of that however we could certainly follow that process related to sexual content to alert parents so I thought that was a

136good addition you know I understand how a provocative list can imply that we've got shelves filled with with outrageous books I in my remarks what I hope to convey was that a selection policy looks at many factors the reason why The Bluest Eye has been in our collection for 40 years is because of those external factors but as you pointed out it certainly is not for everyone but is it for no one and if we have the explicit caveat that means it is for No One and we have 18 year olds in our senior class if you're 17 you can see any movie you know there's so in my mind Tailoring whatever we do to empower individual parents to control what our school is offering for theirs their child their children seems to me the

137best middle ground that's respectful of the needs beliefs cultures um across the board and that it abridges no one's freedoms and in the case that you had mentioned what if a book was brought up in discussion if a parent is opting their son or daughter out they won't be participating in that discussion they'll have an alternate material provided so that they can have an equally challenging opportunity to learn and grow and be Exempted from something that the parent objects to because I don't I don't know how you can make it right for everyone without taking that approach that's that's just my point of view so are we ready to vote on this I think we've got to call the roll Mr Wade we've got different versions of what are we voting on we would have

138to Define what we're voting we're voting on this resolution the policy that's in the agenda this this secondary it includes the sexually explicit content yes as it is written we're not going to rewrite it tonight either passes or it fails right okay well I'd like to make a motion to well we have a motion on right now the first reading our motion vote Yes or No promotion is to discuss is that correct our motion is to discuss right now where motion are right now we're discussing the policy well Mr Tuttle just called the roll he said please call the rolls yeah I said we should call the roll so we're voting on the policy as is right now I'd like to continue discussion I don't want to sit another hour two hours and try to

139weave this out and we won't come to a conclusion fail this we've had the discussion I've called for the roll thank you well I I would like to amend this policy following Robert's Rules of Order he already called the roll bill I don't think you've recommended the role had not been called he just said police call the roll but he did not call the role yet well he gave the order as the residing president that's Mr Wade please call the roll so I don't want to end up with nothing so that's my concern we're going to end up with a watered-down version of what was presented we'll have a work session well you said please call the role the role we should be voting on this and then if if other board members would like

140to propose them I don't believe just because the president said call the rule overrides the majority of the board though I mean just I mean you have options to a man you have options to table if you don't want to vote on it tonight because there's further discussion if you wanted to suspend discussion because of a time constraint someone could make that motion there's there's options for motions for anybody to make and then the majority of the board then agrees if it is seconded obviously everything has to be seconded or it dies on the vine so to speak but you could you could make a motion to you know you could end the discussion if there's an agreement the discussion is over there could be a motion to suspend discussion and table the current motion

141until further notice so there you can motion to amend because a vote wasn't taken I don't believe my understanding Robert's rules that that we're done but if the board is is a majority still feels there's a discussion to be had I don't think we can just automatically call the roll either because it's the majority of the board so so because the finalized the version that we're voting on is now going to possibly be amended I don't feel that we should vote on a policy that the the public didn't get to review and provide input on I mean we ended somewhere very different after the last special board meeting then where we are right now and I think the public deserves to see what is going to be our final say on this policy in writing

142before we vote on it I agree with that yeah definitely we don't have the time to get accomplished this evening and do it right so you could suspend discussion and table table the current motion to further discussion at a different time so to understand that correctly if we made amendments today would this be first reading or would it go to a first reading next time I think it goes again it goes back to what the board feels is best for the current situation right I mean Robert's Rules is just to kind of just make sure that the process goes through so that when the sausage is made at the very end that everyone feels that it's gone through an appropriate process right that it's been fair and consistent my suggestion if you want one I'll

143be happy to give you one please do my suggestion is if you need more time you table the current boat you continue discussion at a later date you create a policy that you feel comfortable with presenting back to the community for a vote and then you have a vote that's what we've done in all other situations we've had discussions in the past there's a group where we haven't made this changes to board policy because of the fact we wanted to make sure it goes through the proper reading of a first reading and then a second reading because we didn't want to have any issues with the policy enforcement so as someone who likes to remain conservative in that approach I think the best decision at this point would be based on what I'm hearing the

144recommendation from my office to make sure that we're compliant with policy is that we hold off boating because it appears that certain members want to have a policy it's just we haven't agreed yet on what the policy is going to be so my suggestion would be to have a motion to table the current policy until further discussion could be had and if that motion is seconded and then voted upon that would do that because it does seem like the five of us want a policy but there's Divergence on the detail you have to have a policy that's enforceable can we still vote on the rest of the policy because we have Schools starting at what two weeks this policy does not preclude the board from voting on the remainder of the policies let's check so

145could you define that so we can vote on a portion of this policy as it's read I believe my understanding of Mrs briner's question was is if we tabled this current discussion that we're having okay can we then vote on the rest of the policies as well the rest of the policies yeah we can do that yes okay is that acceptable Jenny yeah to enable it so does that mean we're going to have another work session yes yeah would we be able to bring in our board attorney since we have discrepancies between what we were told and what Maggie was told that would probably have to happen executive session because of the fact that it's a legal opinion I mean otherwise we're going to keep doing this instead of everybody here at the same time

146talk about it so after he after we meet with the attorney then we could go out of executive session and back into public session and discuss the policy without bringing up violating attorneys correct you feel like we need legal counsel at that meeting yes Jenny I'm fine with legal I never did speak with the attorney or nor hear from him I mean the changes that I want made in the policy I don't feel like I need legal counsel there for that no I would agree with you I would be comfortable with a portion of it but it's very important to you to speak with the attorney I mean I've spoken with Craig I understand what legal counsel said if anyone else feels that they need to speak with them I I've spoke with legal counsel

147I I know what he told me I did it too but we have different interpretations of what was told so I think it would be imperative if we're going to make decisions that we make sound decisions based on everybody hearing the same thing can I make another recommendation Mr President go ahead I would encourage us to have legal counsel as a part of discussion because of the fact that this policy has to be able to be enforced the board has to feel comfortable with the policy as written to enforce it so that when we do enforce it that we're enforcing it consistently in a way that does not put the district in a situation where we're liable to not be consistent I mean I think if I heard anything tonight it's about the consistency and

148enforcement and and the standard of said enforcement so by having a discussion with legal counsel to help ensure that we have a agreed-upon standard that we all are hearing the exact same thing I think it would be important to do that so that Mr Heath or myself or any administrator in the district when they have to enforce any policy knows that they're doing it in the fair and consistent way that doesn't make us have future issues because we're not enforcing any policy consistently especially since with all of this there's there's clearly some gray area and we're the only ones who have this policy it's not a Neola policy therefore we're we're going to be kind of on our own should there be a challenge in my understanding that correctly yeah yeah we would be setting

149we'd be setting the standard and there's there's ourselves out there correct then you know it makes sense to have an executive session when would we like to have that when we should table the motion and then we can discuss that yeah thanks so we need a motion at table at this point or we're just going to sit here oh I'll motion to table it I'd rather it be tabled than be amended on the spot and voted on well I'll second that so you need to call the rule discussion or roll call Mr President discussion anyone I wish we could move forward with it tonight and get it get it hammered out but if if we want more discussion with legal counsel then I'm I'm a couple so are you saying that we would vote on

150aversion tonight have further discussion with legal counsel and then modify what we I mean my preference would be to see what we can all come to a compromise on tonight and vote on it and move forward but it sounds as if Mrs Payne would like to hear legal counsel um so if we want to do that that I I can agree to that um but I think we could make a compromise tonight but that's just me I think we have a duty to be transparent with the community and so because we landed somewhere different at our special board meeting and we have difference of opinion on on the attorney and what they told us I think it would be the responsible thing to do to meet again and meet with the attorney and and talk

151about it I don't think it's right to come up with something we we haven't done that in the past where we amend a policy on the same night and then try to approve of the policy I don't think that's transparent foreign do you need any to clarify that motion you see the role Mr Wade you explained it perfectly to what we need to do when we take roll please call the roll Miss Payne yes let's cook yes Miss Briner yes Miss jesling yes Mr Tuttle yes the motion to table the current motion on the floor is approved 5-0 Mr Heath did you want to try to figure out when to squeeze in a work session or do you want to do that later we can do that in new business if we want to wait

152until then that way we can keep going keep going perfect foreign agenda Mr President members of the board Mr Heath the second reading and approval of the mentor Board of Education yield a policy manual on board Docs so second please call the roll oh we need any discussion please I just I had a couple policies I wanted to double check um 2240 controversial issues I have some questions on that one um Mr Heath or actually the board there's a section in here that talks about how students can initiate the topic of controversial issues um yeah and I wanted to just clarify that we did take out the portion that says in the discussion of any issue a teacher May Express a personal opinion but shall identify it as such and must not express such as

153an opinion for the purpose of persuading students to his or her viewpoint we decided to strike that through and not include it at the special board meeting but because the draft version didn't match up with what the public was seeing I just wanted to make that note and make sure that that's that is what we're voting on is not including the right for the for a teacher to express their personal opinion um is that correct yes that's correct just because it didn't didn't match up and then it says controversial issues related to the program may be initiated by the students themselves provided they are presented in the ordinary course of the classroom instruction and is not substantially disruptive to the educational setting I know that there have been some heated discussions especially in some of

154the government classes and things like that where students will start to bring up something that's highly controversial and I just wanted to know in in the administrative guidelines would that be addressed in there like because I've heard from some parents that it's not necessarily even coming from a teacher it's other students but they're being allowed to discuss those controversial issues so I you know was wondering if there if there's any administrative guideline that address addresses that and we don't have the administrative guidelines fully developed yet so that's obviously something that could be included if need be okay I would assume that this is talking about if it just kind of comes up as part not as something in-depth conversation and then I had a question from a parent asking if this policy would address any

155kind of flags in the classroom pronoun buttons things like that or would we still allow teachers to if they so choose to have any kind of flags or pronoun buttons or anything of that material I don't think the policy specifically addresses that at this point okay and I don't know if that would be something anyways that would be like a First Amendment right issue I don't feel confident adding anything in there without double checking with the attorney on that one so I just want to make that point um and then well does anybody have any other things that they want to bring up so I don't take up the floor any other policies I had a question on I think it's two five two zero point oh two under this is the library the challenge

156process for the library or media materials and it says under C it says profanity or obscenity it says virtually all material that is challenged belongs to one of three basic categories and it says relation it should be religion ideology or profanity obscenity board policy regarding these areas is as follows and then C we removed a morality so it we removed when it says material shall be subject subjected to a test of literary merit and reality by the media specialist and teachers who will take into consideration their reading public and Community standards of morality so I'm just wondering why that was removed and I don't remember that conversation yeah it's under C it's on policy 2520.02 did you say 0.02 yeah I don't see that as being removed see I see it's struck through the portion

157where it says of morality is struck through I was just wondering what the reasoning for that was under letter C where it says profanity obscenity material subject shall be subjected to a test of literary merit and reality by the media Specialists and teachers who will take into consideration their reading public and Community standards is that yeah it says of morality after that that it was struck out our old policy had it in there and somebody decided to remove it I was just wondering what the reasoning was for it being removed I don't remember seeing that in ever that was a section I looked at and I don't remember seeing it was in the pebble and Wagoner ones that we had oh see so the what you're referring to is language that came out of the

158old policy manual transitioning into this one yeah we struck through yeah all right yeah Community standards so is it redundant is that yeah that's what I think Community standards what other things would be included in community standards it's perhaps broader than morality because reality again is a very subjective topic you know there's a wide Continuum of various beliefs standards all the rest some people have salty mouths some people would never utter such a word and you know and everything in between so yeah because that was in the first policy reading too I thought there was just some sort of change that was so maybe that was from the old policy to this one just redundant is what we're thinking okay and then under that same policy if you go down to the committee shall and

159then see wave values and faults and form opinions based on the material as a whole rather than on passages and sections taken out of context I take issue with that only because I do think that there could be a few pages from a book that make it wholly unacceptable for children and and I think that whoever is on the reviewing committee should have the right to to have a vote against that book if they value what's in those few sections as being you know unacceptable regardless of of the rest of the book that would be my my concerns with that and also um you know to have an analogy if you have a glass of water and 99 of it is pure and one percent of it is poison you know based on that one

160percent you're not going to drink the water because it'll poison you I think that teachers should have the same teachers or whoever's in the committee the reviewing committee should have the same right to say no um if there are a couple passages that they vehemently disagree with being appropriate for minors it's my understanding that the Review Committee the process mandates that the item being reviewed everyone on the committee is responsible to read the item in its entirety prior to the meeting so that would not be an option and they may feel just as passionately that that selection or that those pages preclude including that book but they still have a responsibility to read it in its entirety so it's not taken out of context so I would not be comfortable with removing that expectation for

161a Review Committee to do that which I'm fine with them reading it in the entirety I think they would have to if they're you know yes I don't know why we wouldn't but I just don't like the verbiage of it saying you know you can't wait a passage and make your decision on the passage as long as you've read the whole thing you could in my opinion you could weigh that Passage I think that's what it's saying though Miss Payne is that what we're I think it's saying that you have you shall like weigh value and faults and form of things based on the material as a whole rather than just reading this individual passage taken out of context yeah so I mean the Duty so you could still doesn't it doesn't preclude someone from

162saying the one percent poison is worthwhile getting rid of it I just had to have read the other 99 to be able to judge that and this is one that we do have the administrative guidelines on that were those emailed to us those ones or was that no that was 911 administrative guidelines on this yeah I don't I don't think we've got administrative guidelines for O2 for 25 2002 at this point okay I think what we were trying to do is build all that into policy so we had that entire complaint process and review process laid out in policy as opposed to just in the administrative guidelines and the administrative guidelines we don't have access to change or they don't come across us at all right technically they don't have to but I think part

163of our process is going to be to have another work session when we get those administrative guidelines written so that you guys are able to see all of those make any suggestions that you might want out of there before we enact them but again they don't need to be board approved that way we can be a little bit more flexible and Nimble and and changing a practice quickly if need be okay um as long as it doesn't violate the the policy itself which that's my concern with not having access to the administrative guidelines is for instance that one policy that you and I exchanged emails about the policy was correct but the administrative guidelines for homeschooling was vastly incorrect it had a lot of information there that's not required by law that could get us

164into a situation if we didn't update it so I'm glad we updated it but for things like that it's hard to say you know approve of I'm worried without looking at those administrative guidelines that we could run into that issue with other policies so I would like to see the administrative guidelines before they go live so we will have access to see them before they go live is that actually write an administrative guideline to have that I would like that if we could do that I think that would be helpful [Music] um I think that's all I had sorry I I was looking at the the policies in the incorrect place I know Tom just found out today that we were supposed to look at them in a different area were you guys all looking

165at them in what what mode were you guys looking at them that link that we had Craig the Google Doc links okay because yeah so coming out of that that board work session I did send that Google doc to the entire board with all of those changes that were made and those were all those were all in the draft version that you guys had access to and board docs but I know some of you were looking at the first reading manual still and didn't see those changes um but again right after that board work session and that that board update we had the entire Google doc with all of those changes that were made thank you there were a couple other minor things but I'll I'll just email you those okay thoughts they weren't any

166deal breakers so and things that we potentially could address in administration instead of just Miss Briner yes Miss dressling yes Miss Cook yes Miss Payne yes Mr Tuttle yes ocean carries by zero legislative update next on the agenda legislative update no report this is bringer she said there's no report and I didn't get it in time no know thank you student achievement report Mrs cook the power of the clicker today okay as promised we were going to dive into um our scores for Science and the social studies curriculum and then I also have some AP content again this is to inform the board and to inform the community of how we did on our Ohio graduation test for fifth grade science you can see on the left again the left is our scores from 2019

167to 2023 if you remember from last time 2020 was a non-test year and on the side of the right is the state score so you can see as Mr Heath kind of explained at the beginning that sometimes we're looking at the trend of the state to see was the test more difficult this year you know what are we going along with the same trend of the state you can see that we do definitely follow the same trend of the state it looks like 2021 was trickier for students for whatever reason maybe coming back from covid we haven't met pre-pandemic numbers yet but we are rising and significantly higher than this state this is 8th grade science numbers 8th grade science you could see we definitely had a dip in 2021 there that was even below

168the state but we have come back strong we're over our pre-pandemic numbers so for eighth grade science 75.7 percent of our students met proficiency in biology I'm also doing strong with 2023 we had 80.6 percent of our students passing proficient level for our biology test 61 percent of the state was at a proficient level also of note that I thought was interesting that the state level was in Decline where we were not we we are not at pre-pandemic levels yet but we are definitely coming back strong these are our American government scores this one I thought was interesting because we didn't change much we're pretty consistent here 77.6 of our students passed at a proficient level for the American government test 69 of the state for United States history we did very well were almost

169at pre-pandemic numbers 85.7 percent of our students proficient on the United States history test with 68 percent of the state this graphic talks about our AP tests and what you're seeing here in the red is the total number of students in the 10th 11th and 12th grade so we've stayed pretty consistent with our numbers of students that are just attending in those grades the blue are total students taking at least one AP test and what I learned from looking at the numbers was that 23 to 25 percent of our 10th 11th and 12th grade student body takes at least one AP test each year so about a fourth of our 10th 11th and 12th graders are taking at least one test and some of them take many more than that Mrs cook yes do we

170know how many students take college credit plus that would be a similar kind of pursuit I know there are differences between them but those are students who are earning college credit that's a great question I didn't ask for that data but I can report on that next time I've got it oh so thank you get out into your next meeting okay thank you um and and the reason that I didn't ask for that is because I was reporting on test scores and with CCP we do have you know how they did in the class but we don't have a there's not a test that they take so there's not like a Ohio graduation test or a test that they take that goes um with a score for the CCP um advanced placement test performance 79

171of all our test takers scored a three or higher which qualifies them for college credit if you're not familiar with advanced placement test performance when when students take an advanced placement tests after they complete the course it is a cumulative exam or project and they're rated on a one to five so if they earned a one or a two they wouldn't really be able to earn college credit now colleges do our subjective as far as what they accept as a college credit some colleges would only accept a five or four but three is is the average so 79 of all our test takers scored a three or higher and then standouts we had one hundred percent of our AP chem chemistry students passed with a score of three or higher and they averaged a four

172which is outstanding 100 percent of our AP seminar students earned at least a three with an average of 4.0 and 100 of our AP drawing students earned at least a three with an average of 4.4 these are amazing scores EP is very very challenging little shout out to Mrs Kane in the art Department because that's it's not typical that it's offered and it gives kids another opportunity to excel yes yes dinner okay and that concludes for tonight foreign Mr President members of the board Mr Heath quick update we're a month into our fiscal year Mr gatsky you're not going to get paid [Laughter] looking at the first month of the year comparing to our May forecast revenue is down by about 733 thousand dollars on 734 000 and expenses are up per forecast by about

173914 thousand dollars almost 915 000 so we're looking to be about 1.6 worse than we have projected in May I will explain that as we go through so if we look at our current Trend this past July our actual Revenue was down by 0.1.1 million dollars we got a little bit less than our tax reimbursement this year by about five hundred thousand dollars and our investment income was down in July this year and I'll explain why that was um overall again 733 thousand dollars almost 734 000 less Revenue uh the majority of that comes into a couple buckets three main buckets that it's coming into um first and foremost I had projected that we'd have an advance out in June for about two hundred thousand dollars which means that we would have had an advance

174in of two hundred thousand dollars but as we closed out June if you remember we only Advanced out a fraction of that so we I overestimated the advanced out so that corresponding has an advance in an under investment in Revenue so it's not really a loss of Revenue it's just when we're trying to figure out how much we might have to advance out at the end of the fiscal year sometimes we don't know it's based on timing with regards to when we get cash from the state for our state and federal grants um the other portion of that was if you remember in my June 23rd update we had an investment that we bought above Prime um so we paid more so that we had a higher interest rate because when that investment was purchased

175interest rates were extremely low so if you pay a little bit more you get a higher interest rate which allowed us to have more interest earned over that time we made money however when that investment comes due we have to expense the cost of the investment plus Prime which made this month seem to be less revenue generated however when all is said and done our projections will be correct it's just this month was lower so when you divide kind of what I project we make in revenue for Investments over 12 months it'll all pan out it all wash out but when you're looking at it one month at a time it seems like we've understated for the month the other piece of the puzzle was um when we coded in some receipts for restrict State

176funding we had you know coded them as Career Tech as restricted funds some of that should have went to care so we had to pay cares back for some of that overstatement and funds that we got from the state so that accounts for a reduction of about uh three hundred thousand dollars in tuition payments being less than we have rejected because we had to make correction from June so ultimately this will end up being timing it'll all work itself out when we receive funds that way but it's not typical that we're under in our Revenue usually we've been over so I wanted to spend a little bit of time on that when we look at expenditures for the prior year I saved us 13.2 million dollars this last month you're welcome [Laughter] actually again I

177didn't do anything it's just timing if you remember we had the big transfer out last year to fund the capital Improvement projects for the next four years obviously we didn't have to make that transfer this year so it looks like we saved 13.2 million dollars so that will be the common theme throughout the entire year we'll see that we're always going to be down because this year was the you know the next three years we won't be making those transfers out because we made them in one complete transfer if you remember you were all singing my phrases last month because we were a million dollars below and I told you don't don't pat me on the back too much because the fact that our buses didn't come in that we had ordered and were Cash

178basis so this is just a reminder that I saved us 999 000 last month and I've lost us 914 000 this month and again it's not that I lost or saved it's just a timing issue because those buses weren't paid for in last fiscal year I have to assume that they are going to finally come in at some point in this fiscal year so I had to move that expense to this fiscal year so it's showing as the fact that we are going to be seeing a in an increase in expenses um but we saved it last year so it's really a wash so we're basically where we should be we're about expense wise we're actually spending almost to what we projected on 114 million dollars which pretty good but again it's one month so

179it's not really good Trend data so just wanted to share that with the board real quick overall I I think we're in a good spot it'll work itself out as we go through the rest of the year and obviously we will have our Appropriations that have to be submitted for final Appropriations to the citizens Financial advisory in the beginning of September bring it to the board at the September I believe it's the 12th meeting maybe or whatever that Tuesday is and then we will have an updated November forecast based on those Appropriations that we approve and again the Appropriations that we approved in June as Temporaries will be pretty close to the Appropriations that we will approve for final appropriation since September based on the way we've been budgeting happy to answer any questions do

180you have this slide too that you were going to show us is that just for us I just keep it in there just in case I ever want to just bring it out um Mr President members of the board Mr Heath I asked for the approval of B through F and addendums and maybe act upon one motion second please call the roll Mr Wade Miss jessalyn yes Miss Payne yes Miss Briner yes Miss Cook yes Mr Tuttle yes motions carry 5-0 I just unfinished business I'll help you out it's unfinished do we want to set a date for a work session sure and I believe we have a our regularly scheduled meeting with uh with legal counsel tomorrow so we can confirm a date but if we can get maybe a couple on the on

181the calendar to share with them that would probably be the best way to approach it um probably a couple weeks out here so oh it's the week of the 21st I don't think anything's really happening that week so that's going on the first day of school two weeks out um yeah so we want to look at the like the 21st kind of afternoonish again works for me if after like three o'clock yeah when do you start back Maggie I will be back so if we could be um I need to be at least at 4 35 4 30 or 5 o'clock five o'clock would be best so the 21st 21st is one option at 4 45. I could do that the only thing to take into consideration is we did have some emails when we

182had the the last special meeting from people who said hey people are working during the day can you make it later so could we do something like 5 30 because usually people get off work by five is this an executive session or is this or it could be yeah could we do executive session first at 4 45 and then after and then move into our special meeting at that point so if we go 445 exact session 21st or 22nd workers looking okay so 21st um uh 22nd is actually the first day of school you don't want to do that no do we want to look at the 23rd I can't the 23rd or the 24th not that you need me but just letting the board know I'm okay on the 21st if that works I'm

183good with the 21st so let me bounce that off of our legal counsel tomorrow and see if we can get that one to stick if it doesn't I'll reach out to everyone and I'm happy to have a treasure Pro tem take the minutes of that meeting I'm sure you are don't don't feel that you need to not held it on the 23rd or the 24th you're just trying to throw Mr vaccarello under the bus here only because it is before school starts do you want to do that to yourself and we got a lot that maybe we could yeah the first day of school is just fun for me so I yeah but I think you're at the bus garage at like 5 30 in the morning would that be possible the following weeks back

184do you think we could do it next week is that all right to what about the 17th 17th 17th 17. same time same 17th is good for me 17th of August I can't do that one not good for Jenny how about the 16th 16th is good for me 16th is not so good for me same that week is a little a little rough yeah so if it could be maybe the week of the 28th that's good for me yeah I'm okay with that one you know that's not good for you for Mary oh not good for Mary what about right after Labor Day then like the fifth yeah I could do the fifth that's a week before our regular board meeting week before the regular meeting then September 5th another possibility I could do that

185what time fifth sixth or seventh I would probably be looking at 4 45 for the exact session again it is I hate to put it off that long but I would prefer the six but I could make back into town for the fifth does the sixth work the sixth is good okay let's go sixth instead of fifth then so I'll ask about September 6th yeah 445 exact session that sounds good is that a second option or is that a primary option just like a work session right yeah so we'll do exact session first with uh with our legal counsel and then have a work session for the conversation and so is it 21st off yeah we'll try the sixth first if if that doesn't work we'll maybe we'll toss out the the 21st and the

186August 21st as a possibility okay like I said I know it's the night nor the day before the first day of school but and I could do the seventh or that fall seventh work we have citizens Financial advisory that day on the seventh yeah I don't need to be there but Tom and Maggie yeah Tom and Maggie will be there so that's something happening well let's start with those two dates the sixth and then potentially August 21st if uh if the six doesn't work for legal and then we'll uh we'll go from there the 21st of August of August so that'll give us a couple dates at least as a starting point and see what we can do and I'll let you guys know so we're still back at August 21st so our our first

187choice is going to be September 6th if that doesn't work I will check on August 21st and if neither of those work then I'll reach back out to the group okay sounds good all right thank you moving forward on the agenda hearing of the public in business did we just do it that was old business new business nope nope thank you okay now we're ready for hearing the public first two two speakers Ann Anderson Center Street parent Guardian in the district Susan zednick Little Mountain resident in the district Anderson's I see Miss sednick is here uh Mr Jewell Hart Street resident will be after miss sednick hello again um there's a few points that I would I would like to make Mr Tuttle um it's been implied by some of the board members that because

188some people do not send their kids to the Mentor Public Schools that they don't have a right to say um or have any have a say in what goes on here in our community with public schools and I take strong issue with that it doesn't matter if you where you decide to send your kids to or if you even have children if you're paying taxes and you're part of this community you have every right to speak up I don't I don't fault Mrs cook because she's a teacher somewhere else but she serves on this board I don't have a problem with that but I could make that an issue but it would be ridiculous and so I think that it's completely unfair and ignorant to make a comment about well your kids don't even go

189there so I I just I need to say that I think that that's offensive um I also I guess what I don't understand is when we are talking about this sexually explicit material it seems like well if we can't make a perfect law or make it just right then we won't do anything and we need to have a standard that that is showing parents that yeah we have some standards here we have some things that are right and wrong and we're going to try to do our best um by your kids and they're going to be safe I find it interesting that we are so afraid to tell male students no you can't use the women's room because you're a dude we don't want to do that because that might hurt his feelings but we

190don't care if we read garbage out of The Bluest Eye and there's you know a 16 year old girl who's maybe been a victim of abuse it's like oh well you know who cares who cares about her trauma but we don't want to hurt that dude's feelings even though he's got other options for the bathroom I just want to say really quickly well whatever time I've got left we have mission statements that you guys say you want to inspire students to reach their potential you're going to provide a safe learning environment and there you're encouraging strong Community Partnerships none of that we can see means a damn bit of difference to any of you except Annie we have a parental involvement statement that wants parental involvement but we get involved and then people don't listen

191the reason why there's been a book in in that Library since the 90s is because we trusted our teachers and we trusted you we thought that when we sent our kids to school there was safe material thank God for covid because we all woke up and saw the BS that's in school and now we want it out thank you thank you I Echo a lot of her thoughts my question here tonight who or what board or what administration decided to have these books in our libraries in the first place and what gives you the right to decide whether they stay or not you have a group of parents that are telling you that they don't want to elicit sexually explicit illicit material pandered to their children people get arrested for this every day we just

192saw it in the news people get arrested and put in jail for this every day watch to keep you guys from happening to having the same thing happen to you I don't know the answer to that question but I do know there's going to be more police charges or complaints with the police department to file there's gonna be lawyers consulted there will be lawsuits coming if this stuff is not cleaned up it's got to be stopped we don't want sexually explicit lewd and indecent books I don't care who wrote it I don't care how long it's been in the libraries I don't care if we compare it to Mr Rogers or a book on witchcraft or not these are illicit sexual sexually explicit books that we're giving kids the option to read are the teachers

193going to be pushing these on the kids because we're going to have a problem when that happens are you listening judging by tonight I don't think you are but I hope you wake up and realize what you're bringing on yourselves because it's not good and it's not going to end well it really isn't I want to see that avoided get rid of the questionable books and then we can move on stop going after our children are we pedophiles up here are we child are we going after our children who are we listening to who are you listening to that makes this sound like it's okay because it's not okay I don't know any father that you would ask hey would you want your daughter reading The Bluest Eyes I don't know of anybody that would

194say yes I don't even know if you guys would say yes but you're sir making it sound like it that is unacceptable for a board of adults and a group of leaders that have been entrusted with kids safety and child safety and the well-being of our school system that is just inexcusable you're going to be held to higher standards or you're going to be removed some of you need to think about resigning and resigning now because big changes are coming thank you that's me our next two speakers are Laura marchesa and Rose iopolo yeah I did it again I even had your phonetically Rose good evening everyone Lauren marchesa I live at 7816 Oak Ridge Drive I've got two students that The Mentor Schools went Hopkins one at Memorial first I want to thank the

195board specifically Mrs cook Mr Heath for reporting out on the busing situation with kids who take the bus daily uh throughout the school year I was one of those parents shuffling around and getting emails just about every day about delays and and kids sitting on buses for a lot longer than I think we really want them to um so thank you for reporting out on that it's good to hear that some improvements being made I'm still a little concerned uh that we don't have the subs that we need it sounds like we have maybe half of what we need which is not great uh so in times of challenge though and when things are difficult I do believe it's important to come to the microphone or the table with Solutions or ideas and so that's

196what I'm here to do tonight so I did chat with some folks who are familiar with um you know our transportation department and the the field of bus drivers as we know is pretty slim out there it's really hard to attract and retain bus driving Talent these days so um I took a look at it looks like our substitute pay rate starts at about 17.50 which is actually not very competitive I understand that our full-time rate is which is great to hear the substitute rate not so much so 17.50 an hour for Subs but when you look at like Willoughby East Lake it's 20 an hour Riverside looks to be about 1950 per hour Chardon 20-ish Kirtland 20 62 an hour so you can see we're kind of on the lower end so I'm wondering

197if there's a way we can maybe increase that hourly rate for our subs to attract more applicants for those positions because truly this makes better one of the lower paying districts for Subs in the region so that could be why we're short some other ideas might include maybe a signing bonus I know that Willoughby Eastlake is doing this for their full-time drivers but or when drivers have to double up or even triple up on their routes because that did happen quite a bit last year perhaps we can provide extra pay for that that might be an incentive drivers who train others could we maybe give them some sort of award for that or some sort of extra pay for that as well so that's an idea and then finally an idea for training students actually

198to be better bus riders we do have some challenges as every school probably does every every district with behavior on the bus so perhaps somehow providing some training for our kids whether in orientation or maybe even the safety programs that we have in June that could actually bring more drivers to our school when we have better students who will be on their buses just some ideas wanted to share thank you thank you let me say Apollo you got that right two out of three tonight Rose I promise we've been working with him on this I'm gonna spell it out phonetically next time it is actually on my screen and I still said it wrong that's okay okay um so this I didn't necessarily know if I was going to speak I wanted to see kind

199of some of the things that went on so um everything I have are just bullet points and concerns of what I heard tonight um it was mentioned that explicit materials is it that it's not it's kind of something that you can it's up in the air and it's up into it um interpretation and I say explicit material based on the definition that you all agreed on is pretty specifically defined um if you think that uh fellatio cunnilingus bestiality is not considered porn then I don't want to know what you do consider porn um there are no litter boxes yes that was everybody had a good laugh on that but there are students who wear ears and even pin a cat or dog tail to their backside and walk around school so it's not impossible for

200parents to hear that rumor that there's litter boxes and think huh that couldn't be too far away so while I didn't participate in in those rumors I I certainly would not be surprised if I if that when I heard somebody say that um Mr Heath I'm wondering what the school law is specifically that you're speaking of um regarding to uh transgender students using whatever bathroom they please so if you could cite that law that you were talking about the attorney general's recent opinion does suggest otherwise um Mrs brainer made a suggestion on a scenario as to how to handle the explicit material so um here's how I think that scenario would go and if put into real life with kids boy a's mom approves an explosive book and with graphic picks and content boy B's

201parents opt out boy a takes pics of book and shares on social media or in text to boy B parent of boy B sues the school it's not realistic to think that just being able to opt out is going to keep that explicit material from getting spread around to everybody else and that's our big concern I think an opt-in is is more realistic and more manageable and you know you just you can't underestimate I know a lot of you your kids are not you didn't raise kids in the era of social media and phones and it's pretty sneaky what these kids can do and get away with so I ask when you sit down with your attorney that you really look into some of those things because I know that if I opt out and

202my daughter sees a picture in some of these graphic books you will be hearing from a lawyer so I don't think that that's why put why put the district at risk when it's not necessary thank you thank you [Applause] Lindsay wall and rosemary Masterson Lindsay is a Beechwood Drive parent guardian and rosemary lives on Hart Street and is a resident of the district so then I believe you're up Miss Masterson so I've heard a lot on the side of reason and balance and a lot of other opinions as well I Off Script I think to suggest that our children are only exposed material that comes through the school is absurd everybody's got the internet everybody's got phones everybody has access to each other so eliminating material from availability in the schools changes nothing I think

203as parents teachers and leaders of Education it's imperative that we Foster a broad environment of learning that helps our students grow into strong-minded independent thinking adults who can observe and rationally assess the happenings of the world they walk through every day we can't just choose to learn what we want to know but rather what we should know so the good the bad the uncomfortable the truth of who we are of our history of of the world we are in we should be equipping students with the ability to analyze and evaluate various ideas and Concepts presented in books by Banning books in school and limiting curriculum content we are Sheltering them from difficult uncomfortable or controversial topics that are an essential part of The Human Experience shielding them from these realities denies them the opportunity to

204grow intellectually and emotionally and ultimately stifles their ability to engage with the world around them we need to trust the innate intellect of our youth and their ability to develop into Discerning adults not to infantilize them and curate the content of Education every day we see evidence in our world of a backwards slide toward racism sexism and an utterly unequal view of human worth there is truth in the adage if we don't learn from history we are destined to repeat it the students of today will become the leaders of tomorrow and I believe it is our responsibility to expand their experience not hamstring it we have the ability to help our children grow into exemplary productive adults if we can trust the open exchange and dialogue that comes from an expansive and honest education I

205encourage this school board to rise to the highest good of educating our students through inclusion diversity respect and Truth thank you our next two speakers are Sage McMillan from Danbury Court parent guardian and Jacqueline McCormick from Ridgeview Trail resident in the district I think either one are here so then we have Lynn mazicka from Clifford Court who is a resident and we have Paula billfelt from Hart Street who's also a resident Mr President member of the board members of the board Mr he's Mr Wade thank you for the opportunity to speak this evening earlier this summer I mentioned the problem pinegate was having with the drop-off and pick up for Orchard Hollow being and being on Arrowwood Drive in Pine gate the administration promised to move it out of pine gate I want to give

206you a follow-up here's a portion of a post in the pine gate website good news coming to you there will be no Orchard Hollow pickup track that this year through Pine gate I just spoke with the superintendent and he assured me a letter is going out Monday explaining the new process and sure enough the letter was sent out explaining the new procedure I'm sure you can't see this but here's a map of the new procedure and it's all in and out of Hendricks and nothing through Pine gate and as a resident of pine gate and as a person who has been watching this I thank you heartily I thank you this is a good thing you've solved a dangerous situation and you respected the residents of pine gate I attended today's special meeting at 4

20745 regarding the board's federal funds budget plans for fy24. the total amount received was 701 303.98 it is ludicrous to call this a drop in the bucket as was mentioned by a board member what programs would have to be cut or eliminated if we lost this money by violating Title IX guidelines we know that most of our money comes School of money comes from property taxes but this money is also certainly needed it would not be good stewardship it's getting late of the school's income to risk this money by violating federal policy thank you thank you and I just want to reiterate I'm Mr Hammond through the assistant superintendent's office has done a wonderful job working on that Orchard Hollow solution so thank you to Tim Mr President clarify something real quick uh Miss mazziko

208was referring to that was just the title 1A amount the 700 1000. we the total amount that we reviewed tonight was uh 4.6 million dollars which is only a portion of the federal money that we receive because that's what we're obligated to present out annually for the Ida money we actually received 7.4 almost 7.5 million last year um in total federal funding uh so it's about a little bit zero zero more because that is zero we're just missing a zero so just to make sure I just like to make sure that we have the factual information um but you were right in that number that was part of what we presented but we do receive about 7.5 million dollars in federal monies in one shape way or form my name is Paula and I'm a

20956-year resident of Mentor my son is a recent graduate of Mentor High oh get closer um I'm new to all this I should have spoke in the beginning uh the one thing I would like to say is I do see you listening I do see you trying hard you are an intenable uh position of walking striking a balance um so thank you I appreciate everybody out there today I stand before you to address three issues that strike at the core of education and intellectual Freedom book Banning in schools critical race Theory and curriculum lgbtq Plus in high school in the high school community at the last board meeting several individuals stood before the board saying they would not support a school levy based on the inclusion of these items in our schools first Banning books

210as an advocate for knowledge critical thinking and the pursuit of truth I firmly believe Banning books is a detrimental and regressive practice the second issue was CRT and many stood before this board advocating for its exclusion at its core CRT encourages us to acknowledge and confront uncomfortable truths about the pervasive nature of racism throughout history our students so weak-minded and fragile that they need to hear Advanced full whitewash history tell the truth talk about it learn from it finally at the last board meeting many spoke out against lgbtq and fostering an inclusive environment embracing this community is not only good it is necessary it allows us to break down prejudices and creates a nurturing environment where all students can thrive last meeting some invoke the name of Jesus Christ I would like to think of

211Jesus were in high school today you would be among the LGBT community exemplifying the Christian tenets of generosity compassion and love these three issues all have three common or have common themes inclusion acceptance and empathy if we deny students access to these we deprive them of their chance to develop we narrow their review and we reinforce ignorance and Prejudice which I believe are the very items a conservative agenda is advancing in the name of protecting children I say to those who seek to ban books bury history and exclude others you will not succeed while darkness and denialism can hide much they erase nothing I say to the school board do not let the Tail Wag the Dog there is a small but sadly loud group in our city who represent exclusion ignorance and Prejudice please

212continue to encourage open dialogue between students parents and teachers these discussions provide guidance while representing intellectual Freedom or respecting intellectual freedom and autonomy of each student let us Foster civility understanding critical thinking and ultimately the empowerment of our student thank you I'm a little nervous so that's why my voice is shaking thank you you did good if you're good our last speaker is Brady Anderson from Center Street so that concludes the public participation section of the agenda [Applause] motion to endure motion to adjourn Miss Payne yes Miss jesslyn yes Miss Reiner yes Miss Cook yes Mr Tuttle yes motion carries at 5-0 meetings during 8 41 pm