Westerville Board of Education April 11, 2022

001thank you yet [Music] now [Music] somewhere like that [Music] welcome to this evening's meeting of the westerville city schools board of education we're delighted to have all of you this evening uh the evening's agenda will be displayed on the screens in the front of the room there will be two opportunities this evening to address the board relative to agenda item 7.1 through 11.3 please state the agenda the agenda items you're referencing at the beginning of your comments the second opportunity is agenda item 12.1 there's a sign up sheet located in the table in the back of the room and each speaker will have five minutes to address the board there will also be a timer on the screen and with that miss marshall will you please call the roll mr bell here mrs meyer here

002dr nestor baker here mrs altman here mrs davidson here will you please join us in the pledge of allegiance i pledge allegiance to the flag of the united and to the states for which it stands one nation under god indivisible with liberty and justice for all okay we have an exciting night ahead of us so first off we have district highlights and i'm going to go ahead and pass it off to dr nancy nestor baker and von bell thank you president davidson this evening our first um district uh highlight and resignation uh we have with us this evening state auditor uh keith farber who is here to present an award uh for the district's uh financial presentation thank you i'm sorry well it's my honor to be here as your state auditor i get the

003joy of recognizing folks when they do good and frankly arresting sometimes folks when they don't do good and so in that regard this is one of those good days and i think it's important that we do the good days to recognize that most people in government most people who work hard in government whether it's your school who i commend for the public sacrifice and serving it's a very important role or your school treasurer who we're here to honor that most people in government are hard working honest and do the right thing and this is one of those cases we're here to recognize and present our auditors award with distinction just a little bit of background on this award as state auditor we audit the 6 000 government entities around ohio that spend tax dollars i

004always tell people i don't audit individuals i don't have businesses and i don't collect taxes what i do is ask act as the citizens watchdog on those tax dollars so i watch over tax dollars and we do 4 800 audits a year of people who spend tax dollars everybody gets audited if you spend tax dollars either every year or every other year and we have two awards and the two awards we give out of the auditor's award and the auditor's award with distinction the auditor's award goes to about the top 16 percent of those 4 800 entities the auditor's award with distinction which i'm presenting tonight is rare it is so rare in fact that out of those 4 800 entities that we audit less than 3.6 percent of those entities receive this award it

005is even more rare to get this award 10 years in a row that means your books and records have to be perfect you can't even have a public record violation or you won't get the award and as you'll hear me say the auditor's award in good books and records clearly are a team sport we're here to recognize nicole marshall your treasurer and nicole if you come forward and receive this award i would also ask after you received the award if you'd invite your staff this is a team sport you can't have perfect books and records without support from your board your superintendent all of your staff and your entire community so on behalf of the people of the state of ohio on behalf of the state auditor's office nicole it is my honor to recognize

006you as one of ohio's very finest treasurers for school district [Applause] thank you auditor faber for being here and thank you to the board of education because without you setting the expectations and setting the example for our district i don't think this is something that we would be able to accomplish and also the leadership team [Music] i you know everyone's support it is a team effort as auditor faber mentioned um but i would like to introduce my staff they work very hard um some of them actually been here the whole 10 years so we have our assistant treasurer laura hendrix [Applause] so i want to get a group picture with everybody if that's okay dolores page she actually just joined us in payroll but previously accounts payable [Applause] katharina mead is our senior payroll coordinator

007christina carney she's our payroll associate and we have adam ben tomas he is our benefit coordinator [Applause] leah show leslie she's our fiscal coordinator and meg patton she's our executive assistant in the treasurer's office also couldn't be here tonight is gloria stelzner so gloria's been in accounts payable for over 20 years she's absolutely contributed to this award over the last 10 years so um i just want to congratulate you like your picture with your whole staff yes i'd like everybody to come up with the board and the auditor if that's all right and our big i got balloons that say 10 over there so thank you so much okay uh okay all right here we go [Applause] we certainly want to thank auditor faber for being here this evening to present that award much it

008is greatly appreciated and well deserved on behalf of ms marshall and her staff our next recognition this evening is a recognition of a south indoor track and field champion in the 60 meter hurdles and so i want to invite coach jimmy gall to come up and introduce miss marissa saunders thank you good evening everyone i appreciate the opportunity to be here this evening and not to just introduce one outstanding young woman but both of them this evening first i'd like to introduce to you westerville south junior marissa saunders who i had the pleasure of presenting to you back in the spring after her state championship in the 100 meter hurdles in the outdoor state meet after hip surgery 10 days later she has rehabbed and was in full form this indoor season followed that state

009championship outdoors with a state championship in the 60-meter hurdles indoors this past season that was on friday march 4th 2022 at the state indoor championship meet at spire maurice's time of 8.70 seconds was the fourth fastest performance in the history of the state indoor championship meet and during the course of the season she lowered her own school record in the 60 meter hurdles to 8.65 seconds at the louisville indoor games on february 5th 2022. maurice there's our school record holder in the 60 meter hurdles the 60 meter dash the 200 meter dash indoors and the 100 meter hurdles outdoors like to present to you our state champion marissa saunders [Applause] thank you georgie [Applause] congratulations to marissa madam president um have a resolution that was presented to marissa that i would like to move to

010have that resolution adopted by the board and the resolution reads a resolution of accommodation for marissa saunders whereas marissa saunders a junior at westerville south high school and coached by jimmy gall launched a personal best indoor track and field season during the 2021-22 school year and whereas she lowered her own school record in the 60-meter hurdles to 8.65 seconds at the louisville indoor games on february 5th 2022 and whereas she followed followed up her 2021 division 1 state track and field championship win in the 100 meter hurdles by placing first in the 60 meter hurdles at the 2022 oat and ccc indoor high school state championship meet on march 4th at the spire institute in geneva and whereas her time of 8.7 seconds was the fourth fastest performance in the history of the oat and

011ccc state indoor championship meet therefore be it resolved that the westerville city schools board of education and superintendent commend marissa sanders along with coach gaul and his assistants for representing our district and community with pride and distinction april 11 2022 ready mr bell yes dr nestor baker yes mrs meyer yes mrs altman yes mrs davidson resolution passes congratulations to marissa let's recognize her one more time [Applause] and uh at this time again coach gaul and this time we'll have him introduce alexis roberts who is the south indoor state track and field state runner-up in the 60-meter hurdles right it is my pleasure to also introduce to you uh westerville south sophomore alexis roberts who joined our team in our district this year from big walnut she followed her teammate to the top of the podium

012in the 60 meter hurdles finishing second in the state with a new personal best time of 8.97 seconds alexis set a personal best of 9.05 seconds in the semifinal round at the state championship meet and then became the third wildcat hurdler to break the nine second barrier in the finals in addition alexis earned a spot on the podium in the long jump finishing eighth with a jump of 16 feet four and three-quarter inches it's my pleasure to introduce to all of you state runner up in the 60 meter hurdles and state placer in the long jump sophomore alexis roberts [Applause] welcome let's congratulate alexis on her accomplishments and last but certainly not least we also want to recognize at this time coach gaul for your outstanding work and achievements in working with the track team

013so we want to also acknowledge you so we have a certificate of appreciation for you as well this evening [Applause] congratulations coach [Applause] and now dr nancy nestor baker i'd like to call up coach david grant oh mrs mcgeorge please come as well now before you introduce connor i would like to move the following resolution this is a resolution of commendation for connor euton whereas carter uten a senior at westerville north high school and coached by david grant capped off his high school wrestling career during the 2021-22 school year and whereas he entered the season having won the 145 pound state wrestling title in 2021 and whereas he finished the season with a 37-2 record and a 134 and 12 in his career and whereas he helped lead his team to a fourth consecutive occ

014championship and his third consecutive occ title and whereas he qualified to compete in the state wrestling tournament for the fourth consecutive year and whereas on march 13 during the tournament he defeated miamisburg's fletcher rose 19-4 in the first round in the quarterfinal pinned illyria's erik trinsky in three minutes 23 seconds in the semi-final defeated lebanon's luke marsh 24-9 and pinned his opponent from lakewood st edwards in the final match in 98 seconds to win the 157 pound division one ohio high school athletic association's state wrestling tournament at ohio state university and whereas he was named the ohio high school wrestling coaches association's outstanding wrestler of the division one state tournament therefore be it resolved that the westerville city schools board of education and superintendent commend connor rutin along with coach grant and his assistants for

015an impressive season and thank him for representing our district and community with pride and distinction the resolution is dated april 11 2022 dr nestor baker yes mrs meyer yes mr bell yes mrs altman yes mrs davidson yes coach grant i'd like you to introduce connor if you would this is mcgeorge is she gonna you're just turning the whole thing over to you yeah that's how you win mrs mcgeorge would you introduce connor yeah connor come on up so members of the board dr kellogg miss marshall it is my pleasure on behalf of westerville north's administrative team tonight to recognize one of our senior warriors as you already heard connor has won the state championship not once but twice this year in the 157 pound weight class conor has achieved more than any other wrestler previous

016at westerville north and maybe westerville city schools i'm not sure on that but westerville north for sure because he is a four-time state four-time district tournament champion a four-time state qualifier and a two-time would have been three if we didn't have that darn coved state champion in my opinion not only is he an outstanding wrestler but he is also a scholar athlete and one of the most charismatic and influential leaders we have ever had in our program and as you know we've had a great wrestling program for many years so that says a lot next year he will continue his wrestling and academic career at iowa state and i also want to recognize that he is here not just because of his ability and his conditions and commitment to the sport but also because of

017his parents support and because of our amazing wrestling staff as well so please join me in congratulating connor [Applause] thank you connor so very much congratulations to you and i also want to thank and congratulate coach david grant who cannot get out of being applauded no matter how much he tried i think those kind of achievements need another round of applause [Applause] now i would like to call up kathy ryan from the zanta clubs who is going to talk about and introduce this year's outstanding young woman kathy good evening it's a real honor to be here addressing the school board and all of the audience and recognizing one of your outstanding young women students from westerville north her name is maya schaffen maya you want to come on up i'm here on behalf of arjanta

018club of columbus which is a service organization and we work to serve women and children in the greater columbus area advocacy hands-on service education really trying to improve the lives of women and children one of our favorite projects is our outstanding young women's program each year we invite each high school in the greater franklin county area to nominate one woman from the senior class who they believe represents leadership scholarship and contribution to the school and community this year we had over 50 applicants what we do then is have a usually have a leadership forum in person but this year of course we had to do it virtually and we had a great turnout for our forum and then later after that we looked through all the application materials and choose 12 women that we recognize

019as outstanding in the city maya is one of these 12 outstanding young women i'd like to tell you just a little bit about her and again it was very hard to select this year because there were so many well-qualified women maya is a senior at westerville north high school she plans to pursue film and media studies in college and from there establish her own film studio that specializes in christian and black empowerment films to positively impact the world of course maya excels academically she is a member of the national honor society she performs in the concert choir has directed her school's black history month event is an active tutor an occ scholar athlete active in the fellowship of christian athletes and it goes on maya created a social media ministry for christian teens which she

020then developed into a hands-on community service project and she leads the international fellowship of faith ministries youth program at her church from some of her application materials we find this statement passion determination leadership and activism drive maya to want to contribute continue to speak up for those whose voices often go unheard it is a true honor to be here this evening and to honor maya chapin [Applause] let's give another round of applause for maya chapin and thanks to zonta club okay moving on to 4.1 approve the minutes of the regular session of the board of education held on monday march 14th work session held on monday march 21st 2022 and a special session held on friday march 25th 2022 as presented may i have a motion so second any questions or comments with any of

021these minute meetings nope miss marshall mr bell yes mrs meyer yes dr nestor baker yes mrs altman yes mrs davidson yes up next 5.1 we have an equity update and i would like to invite cynthia davis thank you to the board president mrs davidson to the board um to the entire board to the treasurer miss marshall and dr kellogg so thank you for inviting us to give an update on educational equity um myself cynthia davis and miss latresa reeves are here to present today so um yeah i guess i have the controller here so here we go i'm not sure where i'm okay so today we're going to share a little bit about our department educational equity as well as our building equity teams and our district equity team and at the end we'll have

022some time for questions as well educational equity the vision of the department is as you see in front of you educational equity exists for each student when gender race ethnicity language disability family background and or income are not i mean no longer obstacles to accessing educational opportunities the purpose of educational equity as well as the purpose of our building and equity teams is to provide guidance and support for the superintendent and the board in regards to ensuring all students have equitable access to educational opportunities consistent with our policies for non-discrimination and access to equity educational opportunities so as i mentioned we have two different teams we have a building equity team and then we also have district equity teams and a lot of people in our community as well as teachers our staff members are

023very familiar with our building equity teams and our district equity teams because they've been around for a while but i do want to give you just a little bit of information in regards to what we're doing in those particular teams so the goal of the teams are basically to review building policies practices and data related to the 10 key equity targets the equity targets were established in 2020 by a committee that was requested by dr kellogg during 2020 when we had the racial unrest in our world and he asked if we can gather some of our educators together and we met in regards to creating what would be some recommendations and some action steps for our district continue in regards to our racial equity work that we're doing in our in our district um those

024key targets you have access to those i believe we have gone over them before but they're also on our website as well um it's very important for our building equity team so the way the equity teams are designed is there are teachers school counselors there are special ed teachers they're administrators as well as parents and community members who are on building equity teams building equity teams exist in each one of our buildings across the district so everyone has a building equity team in our district here the the team thinks about what are some of the high level priorities in regards to what are some of the equity targets so they get together and they think about what our equity targets in our district and how can we make these things um we realize these equity

025targets and our work in our buildings so last year everyone had the opportunity to create a building equity plan so their two-year building equity plans so this is year one of actualization of those equity plans building equity goals we're in year one of those goals so what that would look like would be each building created building equity an equity plan and there were goals that were included in the plan so we what we did was we divided them up into two years because this is not a usual normal year or last two years have not been quite the norm and so what we did was we said let's divide these goals into a year one and a year two so this year we are in the process of completing we executed the year one globe

026goes and now we are in the completion of the year one go and once our our building equity teams have established their goals executing those goals and then they're implementing them those goals and the way that we're implementing them we have our checks and balances and accountability and those goals and what we're doing the actions are sent to our district equity team for support and accountability okay so the district equity team what we do in our district equity team and in addition to or similar to the building equity team the district team also has teachers administrators community members and parents on the district equity team okay so both of them they're they're different people on each team but i just want to let you know what each team is made up of okay all right

027so in our district equity team our goal is to review our district 10 key equity targets so we're doing that in our buildings as well as in our district on our district team we establish priorities for our district work and then we execute the work to support our building equity teams and what that looks like is because our building equity team created the equity plans those plans are shared with our district equity team and as a district our equity team is looking at ways in how we can support the building work around equity okay so that's our goal and our work and our district team is to support the work in the buildings okay all right we update the board and the community on the areas of the work in the district on our district

028equity team we review the bet improvements their goals their plans and their outcome and then our work is to still support the bet and their two-year building equity plans and goals so let theresa is going to come up and talk a little bit about our building plans thank you to the board of education to ms marshall to dr kellogg i'm theresa reeves and i am the educational equity specialist for the school district as cynthia was speaking she was talking about the building plans as part of our checks and balances process that the schools are in the process of reviewing their two-year goals revising and updating if a shift is needed the final plans are due to the superintendent on april 29th there was a midway check-in point back in november so schools could stay aligned

029and see how they were doing on those goals board members also have access to those goals and they can see what each school building is doing in our district the form that the teachers that the equity facilitators fill out also includes the equity funds and how those were used to achieve those goals so there's great accountability there's also a reason to celebrate as schools reach those goals or realign them and that's it let's see and um the building equity teams are just going to continue to do the work and we start planning for next year's goals really soon i would like to also add that each building has an equity facilitator in each of our building and the equity facilitator their role is to lead the work in regards to their equity teams and they

030are given an opportunity at every staff meeting to keep our staff up to date on how we are achieving our goals or if we are kind of behind in any challenges or stumbling blocks they can work with their staff in regards to that and so each building has an equity facilitator and each equity facilitator is there making sure that they're accountable for their budget and also the work that they're doing in their goals so in our district equity work we have divided up in committees so there's an academic curriculum materials committee a budget process committee a family engagement work group there's our hr and professional development student behavior and discipline and then student well-being so those are our work groups from our district equity team so i want to give you a little bit of

031an update about some of the work that we've been doing this year so for our academic and curriculum materials team their committee group and the committee group can be made up of teachers administrators and parents or community folks so they are individuals so we have our district equity team i just want to make sure it's all clear because there's a lot of moving parts here okay so on our district equity team right there are work groups all right so these are work groups and each work group can have their own committee to begin working on a specific project okay or or equity work so with the academic curriculum materials committee what they decided to do was to [Music] well let me also kind of go back so with our building equity teams what our building

032equity teams did was said these are some things that we needed to work on right these are areas that they wanted to work on in their buildings so the district equity team decided to support them and the way that they were supporting them in the academic curriculum materials is our buildings wanted to request more diverse curriculum and materials and so with doing that we wanted to make sure that what they were selecting right was representative of our students in our community and so they created an equity rubric for curriculum and material adoption process so the buildings did not have to create the equity rubric the district equity team did that for them and then shares will be sharing that with each building okay all right so family engagement what they did was collaborated with the

033westerville public library to establish and distribute a library card for all of our students our hr and professional development team created diversity questions interview questions that will be used during the process to interview new staff and team members team our hr and professional development team some of those individuals attended an ohio department education diversity lab for hiring diverse educators so we had i think about three three principals in addition to scott reeves and myself who attended the ode diversity lab the student behavior and discipline committee their work was really focusing on the revising the student handbook disciplined data taking a look at discipline data and looking at what are some best practices to address some of the discipline disparities that we may see in our district in addition we have been working with mr mcelroy

034on this sro review committee and that's led by our safety and security department student well-being in their efforts they have been creating recharge rooms in our school buildings well-being services and seeing and celebrating students on a regular basis and in our budget work group they have established equity funds in each of our buildings so every building received equity funds which are overseen by our equity facilitator and they also created a survey that they distributed and collected feedback on how those funds were being used whether or not buildings needed additional funds but they really wanted since this was our first year to get a handle on what exactly was happening with the equity funds tree i think i have the very best slide of all to present now i'm very excited about all the programs and

035events that we've had this school year so i'll begin with the first one the joy and genius and multicultural literature we invited in dr samantha stewart from the ohio state university to come and present to equity facilitators in elementary and the elementary world and equity facilitators were invited to invite a teacher a guest teacher to come along with them because we wanted to make sure that everybody knew that equity work is for everyone to participate in dr stewart presented on how we can engage students in literature how we can get them excited to read and to write and to talk about literature zetta elliott um also dr zetta elliott also was one of our virtual author visits and we had over 80 educators and some principals that logged in for that presentation dr elliott helped

036us work on using some of the books that were provided by the westerville education foundation through the many voices grant that provides diverse literature for teachers through a grant program so between dr stewart and dr elliott teachers were able to put those books to great use and feel very excited for the literature in their classroom and pass that on to their students in our middle and high schools there are student equity groups and each middle school and high school has a different name for their group however this program is made so students can also help buy into the work of equity do things to help create a sense of belonging within their schools and develop their leadership skills and our equity facilitators help lead that action and so that's it's pretty amazing to see what

037these young people think of and what they come up with black girl joy and awareness series this was actually the brainchild of students girls black and brown students responding to what was going on what is going on i guess in our country and wanting a place to feel empowered and to better understand their place in the world and the gifts that they have to offer to their schools and to their community so dr ariana howard who also is from the ohio state university comes in to the various high schools and does a program with the students and they leave feeling excited and empowered and resilient and she capitalizes on those character traits that they can bring forth and show up in their school and not show up in their family i had the privilege of

038sitting in on a session this morning at westerville south and students talked about when they feel so good in their classes when they feel successful even when they make mistakes and so dr howard helped them to put that to put that to words and they did a little collective poem at the end it's a very very powerful program i wish i had something like that when i was in school the young men um motivating and inspiring young men program is at westerville north high school and it is facilitated by mr tim brown who is an author and he i think the title says that all what he does there for young men motivating them and helping them be the best that they can be we also assisted buildings with speaker engagement some schools wanted to

039have certain speakers in to help them with what diversity and equity looks like in their building and we helped align them with great speakers to motivate their staffs and then we are also supporting the community read through we rise the book is called how the word is passed and we are having two book chats with educators tomorrow actually tomorrow and wednesday just to talk about the first chapter of this book but we're hoping to create quite a buzz around the community um supporting um reading and literacy and learning about history the one thing that isn't on there is the african-american read-in and the equity department helps support that the african-american region is actually sponsored through the professional organization the national council of teachers of english it is actually our nation's longest-running read-in through communities and

040schools in the united states that features diverse literature and it's been going on a long time and this is actually westerville's third year supporting the african american reading so the african american reading i'll leave you with this visual if you can imagine families logging on sitting on the couch together over cereal over pancakes and just engaging in conversation about books and literacy it was it's a pretty amazing thing i'm very grateful because we have principals on dr kellogg and dr hopkins attend every year as well so it's um a really powerful thing told you don't you think that was quite a slide thank you so moving forward in our equity work some of the things that we were not able to get to this year just because of covid and the um you know just

041the delay and due to staffing shortages we were not able to do our professional equity learning with our operations department and so that is something that we are looking forward to doing um as we enter into the next academic year educational equity will integrate lbgtqia plus into our equity efforts for next year equity facilitators were planning a retreat in june because we know that we need a little additional support and education around new topics that are going to be happening and so we're going to do that work next year well in june with our equity facilitators and that ends our presentation are there any questions well i just want to follow up real quick on thank you for this um fantastic work and presentation um just a quick question something you just said at the

042end you talked about including lgbtqia plus into equity work next year i'm just wondering how you're thinking that might change the composition of teams or are you looking for new students to join the group are we that far in that work yet just thinking about the people involved and who can speak so the plan as of today is we have made arrangements with kaleidoscope which is a community organization that focuses on youth and and gender and lgbtq and so they have agreed to work with us and also the board so they will be working with us starting in june to come to our equity facilitators training and then we will also have them present at our all administrators for all of our principals and then we're also asking them to come to our we day

043our westerville educator day so right now what we're looking to do is to provide educational learning for our staff that's what we're looking to do right now because all of our staff will support our students and so we want them to be knowledgeable about how to support our staff our students okay thanks i'll just say thank you i think basically along the same line so thank you for all your work i don't don't have a question but um dude would like to also thank um thank you mr vice miss reeves thank you both for all of the hard work that i know goes into this area also would like to just commend you on the framework that you have established for our equity work because it is uh two of the highlights i believe of

044it number one it's inclusive so it allows for the inclusion of a number of different um pop populations across our across our district so i really want to applaud you for that and also applaud you for including a budgetary aspect to this because i believe that demonstrates the district's commitment to this work you can always tell what a district is serious about because there's money behind it and there are uh there's personnel behind it and so i'm excited to see that we have both included in this framework so thank you both very very much for all that you do also want to thank all the the volunteers and staff that work along with you in our buildings and at the district level on a day-to-day basis for all of the hard work they do well

045thank you thank you and it has been beneficial to have equity facilitators who are um supplemental on a supplemental contract so that has been definitely helpful because now we're doing k-12 right and so i was one person in the trenches and so it's definitely helpful to have additional people in buildings doing the work right to make sure that it continues in addition to the equity funds that they're able to work within their building so thank you i do have a couple of questions um i'm wondering if for the benefit of the people here and the people who watch the board meeting if you could give a couple examples of building level goals and priorities so one of the building level goals let's say for elementary so with our elementary buildings this was their first year

046really diving into equity work because for me i was mainly in secondary for the duration pretty much for my eight years my seven years since this is my eighth year and so for elementary buildings it was really about professional development and professional learning around equity in addition to making sure that they had diverse books in their in their libraries some of them some of the buildings wanted to do library audits where they wanted to see if there were inclusive materials in our libraries right and so a lot of the work kind of stemmed there on books in the elementary area in middle school most of them wanted to get students involved in the work and so as we had on one of our slides one of the things they wanted to do was to create

047equity student groups to hear student voices that was some of the work in their professional learning as far as our educators if you remember the be the change work there was some scenarios there where student voice was given around the dear westerville or dear olympia whatever the schools were during 2020 and so what we wanted to do is create opportunities for student voice in our buildings so for an example at heritage middle school they created an equity student council and with the council they have a collective group of students that looks and mirrors their student population and during the times that the the equity facilitator one of their school counselors their assistant principal created and facilitated the group presentation so they can build their knowledge base on what equity looks like in their building how

048they serve all of their students so i think it was in february they the team worked together to help with their um february program but not only that they had little wristbands that's it um i think it said like equity is excellence and excelling or something like that and then they also had equity counseling and they distributed to all of their students in their buildings and so they're able to talk about what equity is and what it looks like in their building so that's what we did in our middle schools they had other goals that they wanted but that was one of the highlights and so for an example in our high schools one of the things that they wanted to do especially at north was they have a goal to ensure that our students

049particularly our black student and their academic achievement is addressed and so we're working really closely with them in regards to creating programs so that students can see themselves and when they see themselves and they see that they belong then we believe that they're able to achieve right but we're also working with their staff in regards to how do we work with all of our students in our building to make sure that we're not only just seeing them as individuals in the building but we're also helping support their academics and so that was a really big shift because we wanted to see what their academics was looking like but then also how do we support them and so that was some of the work that we're doing elementary middle and high school thank you you're welcome

050i don't have any questions just a huge thank you to both of you and your teams and anyone involved so thank you so much for your work thank you oh yeah sorry i'm so sorry i had a question that popped into my head i know you and i have talked about how you measure how we're doing i don't know if you could talk just a little bit high level of how you measure how we're moving along sure so a part of the work that we did in year one was we were working to where we worked with ohio state college of education and created the modules for be the change right and so within the modules we worked after keller kind of worked with me and dr lucy with the college of education to make

051sure that we were asking the right questions on a survey and also what they did was a pre and a post survey and so they created it i gave the questions to dr kellogg to make sure that we were asking the right questions and once we did that then our staff was able to before they even started be the change we wanted to see what their knowledge level was around equity diversity and inclusion right where our students are concerned so each person before they begin the professional learning opportunity would be the change they took the survey so that was the pre-survey and then when they're finished with the educational learning opportunity be the change then they take the post survey and so what that allows us to do to see if there's any gaps or

052if there's been any growth in the learning and so once we understand that there has been growth and movement mindset shifts you know changes for understanding around diversity equity and inclusion then we can say okay we see that this particular staff has increased their knowledge and their learning around equity or we understand that there may be some gaps and where there are gaps then we understand we need to provide additional professional learning for them and so that's how we're measuring is because we have a pre and a post survey and then we'll be we're able to see if there are any gaps or if there are any areas that where we are excelling thank you so much i really appreciate all the work you both are doing you're welcome any other questions okay thanks thank

053you so much thank you moving on to 5.2 we have a superintendent's report dr kellogg just a thank you to cynthia and tree for being here this evening and sharing the work it's uh they quietly just go about and get things done and there's a lot of people that are now engaged and really proud of that the the efforts that are going in and the work that they're doing so i thank them for being here this evening for what they're doing so president davidson members of the board tonight i'm going to provide an update from the administrative team regarding our efforts to move forward with the goal of expanding the magnet program so this evening going to present the the our efforts to expand and and the transition to do that so um the the

054goals of of uh the expansion really centered around three major things one was to expand the current math science program we've looked at those numbers we've seen the demand we also know that the current configuration of single strands the isolation of the world cultures from other magnet strands is part of what we're looking as part of that expansion want to maximize facilities capacity we have some classroom spaces that was available and a lot of discussion about updating the program purpose and goals as we move forward just a good time to refresh that just a reminder current state those who are familiar with the programs know what we have right now at um emerson um which is uh actually the smaller of the two buildings but actually has more classrooms classroom space taking up right now

055with the five grade one through five classes for world cultures just a reminder those students admitted via the annual lottery and then it also has the six classes of the self-contained gifted program that's two sections at each grade level three four and five those students are admitted uh based on a standardized test score so those eleven classrooms are what uh fill up the emerson building at this point there we go hamby hammy which is actually a larger building is under capacity it has five classrooms of the math science strand again students admitted by lottery and five classes of the fine arts strand admitted by lottery so 10 total classrooms there 11 total classrooms at emerson some available space at hamby so that's what we're working with from a resource perspective so here's um layout of

056the plan took into consideration we met with teachers principals i had email conversations with parents as as this was unfolding to look at this and we tried to to balance all those needs and look at this from a lot of perspectives to make sure that um we we could as lit as least disruption as possible and move as quickly as possible to keep uh the program as robust as possible so here's where we're at i'm going to point out this way so over here you see current world cultures there's really no change it remains at emerson we'll fill the first great seats with um world culture applicants again via lottery second third fourth and fifth grade if there are seats available we'll lottery those but that really really no change to the world culture stream

057the the goal was to move the fine arts strand over to the world cultures building over at emerson makes sense under humanities umbrella in general so here's how we plan on filling that grade one just like we would any other year the grade one class will be filled by fine arts applicants this will really be the new section will be really it's the news section will now be at emerson as we start building that out and that will be a new teacher i'll touch on that a little bit when i talk about hamby why that's the new teacher so that's kind of traditional model other than the new teacher it's the same old fill this by fine arts applicants through the lottery second and third grade is a little bit different how we envision filling

058this we had a lot of feedback from families that are currently in hanby fine arts strand grades one and two and some of their expressed concerns about um changing buildings and their attachment to the current program there so we've made accommodations for that um what we would uh what we're planning on doing is the grade two and grade three fine arts classes at emerson will be filled combination those students current at hamby in grade one and in grade two will be offered the opportunity to either remain at hamby as part of that school in grade 2 and group 3 or to move to emerson as part of the fine arts program so those those sections will be partially filled by current hanby students who opt to move and then we'll backfill the rest with fine

059arts applicants as we've done in the past i call that a new section at emerson there'll be a new teacher i'll show that why that is when i get to hanby same thing in grade three so now give us eight classrooms full at emerson next year grade four and grade five those will be new in 24 and then 20 and 25. really i think as we'll see at the end of this we're going to have a magnet advisory committee i think the question of do we do both sections in the second year or do we do one and then one will be part of the feedback from that committee moving forward so this will start to round out and give an opportunity for these eight classrooms full of teachers to start working together and define

060what this building will be like in the future in terms of fine arts and we'll see that come out of the committee so that's the hanby plan excuse me the emerson plan fine arts will be shifting over there we'll fill that with those students who want to come from hamby and then we'll backfill the rest with new applicants gives us eight sections um at hanby you're gonna see a similar kind of kind of pattern here's the traditional one strand of math science that we have grade one filled with math science applicants the additional section of grade one math and science will also be filled by applicants you notice in grades one two and three it says current teacher remains several as we talked to hanby teachers and as we look at our wa contract these

061teachers are assigned to hamby they'll remain in hamby they are always like any teacher in the district eligible to apply for another position if they wanted to do that and would give them preferential give them the opportunity to interview but as it stands they would remain there in those classes and become part of the hanby program as it moves forward if that's what they choose second and third grade same concept as i said with emerson those students are currently in grades one and grades two in the fine arts strand will be given the option to remain at hamby and be par part of the evolution of that program or move moved emerson so depending on the number of students who opt to move to emerson the rest of that will be back filled with math

062science applicants as we expand the math science program and current teachers in first second and third grade at this point would remain grade four and grade five um would remain for next year and again part of the transition planning as we go into next year about how do we transition that in the next two years so um teachers have options to stay where they're at students in a program of options to stay where they're at in order to make room for all that we do need to move the self-contained gifted program in order to make room at emerson right now there's 11 11 classes over there we need to make room so this would move this six um we would move all six uh self-contained classes and the teachers and the students from emerson to

063uh hanby grades three four and five that will create the space we need at emerson don't like moving people it's always a disruption it always causes some concern i understand that i appreciate that this one has a little bit positive flavor to it at least in some perspectives and that the whole court is moving it's all the students have been together it's the teachers they're accustomed to the venue changes to um from emerson to hamby and i know that's a disruption similar to the disruption we're seeing changes in building location for lots of our students next year this is what allows us to go at this pace it was important us to make sure that when we ended this change going the next year there was a balance between the enrollment at both buildings because

064we have the shared staff for our elective offerings that are not our active offerings or special offerings that are there so there needs to be balance in order to make that schedule work this helps so that would be the plan for the self contained gifted program important part of this is establishing a magnet review committee this would be a superintendent's committee really we want to re-engage the communities of both schools and talk about program definitions program goals and finishing out the final transition as we move this thing forward i think there's lots of conversations we know that over time at hamby the two strands have kind of morphed into this singular steam concept that maybe would end up let them have that conversation seem similar kinds of of pairings between the gifted at emerson and

065the wolf cultures we see all those opportunities coming and giving those buildings and the communities there the opportunity to find that for us and bring that forward next year want to kind of take a look at pros and cons at least as our team looked at it really really minimizes disruptions in terms of magnet families and their moves doesn't require the magnet teachers to move it does distribute our enrollment more effectively across the two schools gives the staff and the school communities that are attached there enough people enough energy to start building on that what do we want to be does meet our goal of expanding the seats available in mass science fills the capacity of both those buildings we have a net gain of 125 seats in the magnet program that's a good thing

066there are cons certainly they're they're moving the gifted teacher and their students changes venue for those for those adults and those kids as well we we know that that that is something that's on their minds and the current fine arts strand i think has some transition uh pieces going on as some go to world cultures over at emerson and some opt to stay at hamby but i think they also get to participate in the definition of what that will look like for the collective school population in the future timelines um some of this is tightly compressed i understand that we've already worked on communications but we've tried to pace this out to give people enough time to make decisions so we have our presentation of the plan tonight we have prepared communication i'll go out

067tomorrow there's two pieces to this one will be to all elementary families there are mines that summarizes the transition plan i just described it reminds them that the lottery closes april 18th so they still have from now to april 18th if they have not entered the lottery and they're interested or they have entered and they want to make a change they have time to do that between now and april 18th there'll be a targeted communication to grade 1 and 2 hamby fine arts families that explains their option to either stay at hamby or go to emerson and we give them a timeline of april 22nd so we give them plenty of time to consider which direction they'd like to go our two principals uh chris and megan at the magnets have already scheduled additional open

068houses this is close i understand that there's an open house at emerson tomorrow from 5 36 an open house at hamby from 6 to seven i talked to both principals about that this is a tight type line doesn't fit everybody's needs they welcome anyone who wants to email or contact them if that doesn't work and they want to come spend some time and visit the program they can do that we'll accommodate that lottery closes on the 18th um 22nd we'll close out the requests for those that hand me if they want to stay we anticipate doing the lottery on or about april 2019. lottery notification going on or about may 2nd and deadline for those families that are offered a seat at the magnets to respond by may 18th so we can build out those

069schedules we'll post the three positions at uh at emerson this week so we can begin moving forward with the hiring process as well with our staff either i've hit the wrong button or i've killed the battery any questions i do uh a couple of questions couple of comments dr kellogg if we could be very clear when we communicate with the hanby families about their option to stay um i have heard a little confusion about what that actually means from families they need to know if they stay the strand they're in so that i think that's an important communication piece i want to be sure that is made you know this coming school year is going to see a lot of changes across the district and this is one that in a lot of ways exemplifies

070the changes that we're seeing across the district and it is hard for a lot of families to make those changes i think the board probably remembers that i was have been concerned about moving to make this change now i'm still concerned because i still would like to have seen the magnet review committee before the shift however [Music] even though i am very concerned about it i fully understand what you're trying to do in the context of not only these two buildings and the programs within them but also within the context of the district as a whole and that is important to handle manage approach deal with in a way that conducts the changes in as most compassionate way as can be done at the same time we are doing the necessary assignments across buildings that

071are going to happen and moving to expand the magnet at this point in time assists with that in some ways not large ways but in some ways as we look at the numbers in some of our schools in some ways that said i i do still have concerns and you know that i've shared that with you i've bothered you about it over and over and over again and i appreciate the time that you have spent with me i also appreciate the time you spent with me at hanby taking me uh meeting me over there and we took up most of megan's afternoon as we went through the classrooms and talked about the possibilities for those students who are moving over there particularly as you know as we were talking with megan about moving the gifted

072program into hanby with the strand that's already there and as the art strand phases out of hand beat what does that mean what could that be like and i could see you were thinking and megan was thinking as well and i wondered if you have any thoughts about how we might be planning to make the move as successful as possible for staff and students first and foremost what will make this work and why i'm confident in it is the staff and the principals they when we talked with both principals about these changes initially their first reaction was excitement of the opportunity to do something that we had recognized and we talked about this with the board before we all recognized that there was some weaknesses in the magnet program definition purpose etcetera we really want

073to give it um a little bit of um juice so to speak right spruce it up and and make it a little more solid and they that's been on their minds and they've been talking to barb wallace and myself and dr hopkins um in his role about that opportunity so their initial response was really really positive really really excited and immediately their head started spinning with the possibilities of how we could do this what could it look like and had to slow them down and remind them that it's you know the great leaders they are we got to bring other people in that conversation so that's number one number two some of the strongest teachers we have in the district are at those buildings and have done wonderful work with kids that's why many of

074our families are so committed to those buildings and is because of the teachers because of those principles and i think in the end um that's going to be the winning formula as well as giving those school communities the opportunity to bring forward to us what they want to be for a long time the magnets has functioned more of a this is what the district says they are and make it work and i think this is an opportunity for them to own the space and own the definition so i think that's exciting so those staff those students are going to embrace each other there'll be some initial let's get to know each other always a great learning opportunity for people and i think that's where the magic is going to be the sooner i'm out of

075the way of what they're doing and move them forward they're better off i think they're going to be one last thing in the magnet review committee i understand and agree with what you were saying about ownership but i don't want us to lose sight of the fact that these are district schools and as such what is decided as regards what the magnets will be must also take into account where we're going what we do who we are as a district you know we'll as with many things in that joint relationship district the building will provide some parameters to help give them a framework to work from i don't think based on preliminary conversations with people in formal conference it's been going on for years these conversations i think um i think people see a pretty

076clear path to something that's going to satisfy those who are part of the program those who want to be part of the program in the future and what we're looking for as a governance team in particular what the board's looking for creating is part of the school district so i think we get over this speed bump get into role and we're going to be okay thank you okay um it thank you for the the i know how much thought has gone into making this is the least disruptive change as possible that doesn't mean it's not disruptive for some people more than others um and so i'm just thinking through some of those and just some of these are questions some of them are just things for us all to think about um the first one

077i just wanted to mention is the parent-teacher organizations that these buildings are going to be you know they might think they have their leadership in place for next year but people are going to get moved around so i just want to say that out loud and recognize that that will be the case and see how can we support those organizations as they have people you know i mean walking to opposite ends of vine street now um so that's one piece what sort of supports can we give to the parent organizations parent-teacher organizations um i wanted to also uh follow up on dr nestor baker mentioning you know these are district schools and so um there are best practices all over our district right in different realms but these are places where you know whatever the

078programs become whether it's some kind of humanity centered probably in stem or steam center to really think about what's the mechanism for using them as sort of incubators or you know latching onto those best practices that might be replicated across the district or at least shared across the district that people can pick up on if they would like to other educators so just really want to encourage us to think about that how can these be places that help inform these types of focuses across the district for other educators i'm thinking a lot about gifted teachers and families who get picked up and moved wholesale down vine street and so i'm pretty sure i know the answer to this question but just want to ask so we're talking about the gifted teachers will all move but

079there will be open positions at emerson if any of those teachers wanted to apply for those roles right allegiances to that community in that building then that's um something that could happen right it needs to be done in the context of our wea agreement but yes any open position is available to them or another staff yeah okay um and then i'm thinking about um with the magnet review committee too um you know obviously we don't quite know what that is yet right now we're that's the thing that's going to happen thinking about program definitions and goals and transition and also just want to make sure that as part of that and i know the hanby community is going to welcome the gifted program over but thinking about gifted as part of that because it's magnet

080review committee i just want to you know encourage us to include the gifted community in those conversations about developing what happens at the school that they'll be part of and then i guess this is more from a personal and parent side had kids at lots of these schools over the years and i i mentioned this once i try not to bring in my own stuff too much but as a as a young person i went to hanby for fifth and sixth grade gifted self-contained was there at the time and i just want to encourage the families who are maybe feeling a little angst about moving out of emerson just from very long ago a great experience for me was that the library was almost an extension of our building so when you reach the upper

081level of elementary and you're maybe reading above grade level it's really great that the library is two doors down right and it really became almost this extension of our learning space it doesn't hurt that dairy queen's in the middle right so if you have to go past dairy queen to get to the library that's okay but there are some there are some real benefits to that i think for the gifted program at those upper grade levels and the fact that the facility at hanby you know the playground smaller and stuff but our gifted program is that third through fifth grade so a little bit towards the upper you know they're towards the upper elementary so i i'm i'm hopeful i think that those families those students the teachers will find some benefits that maybe aren't

082obvious you know right now where everyone's thinking about these changes being made but i'm really appreciative that we're able to expand the magnet program i'm thrilled to think about the additional number of seats and the last thing i promise is those rising second and third graders they're going to be extra spots open that people aren't expecting right so i know that we'll do this but i just want to encourage us to be as aggressive as we can with getting that news out particularly because families think about magnet lotteries when they have rising first graders and not as much when they have rising second and third graders so thank you for the thoughtfulness that's gone into the transition and um i think everyone's going to be fine in the end but that doesn't mean it won't

083hurt along the way so thanks uh great comments and questions very well done thank you for sharing your personal experience um i want to highlight one thing i think from the last failed levy this is the last restoration piece that we needed to deal with what is it yes and middle school the restoration of middle school yeah and we've started that already um i i am excited about that i know a lot of kiddos are moving and it is high anxiety and anything we can do to help you know we want to be there so thank you and thank you dr kellogg and your team for doing this i mean well i appreciate it i particularly barb wallace shel relford the principals chris and megan have been wonderful uh paul hopkins scott dorn um greg

084v brandt's i mean they've it was a simple six slide deck but behind that was a lot of hours and a lot of wrestling around with things and to the to the folks families that have been emailing us with their thinking and their concerns if if we weren't able to give you something that alleviated that we will be here to help you and hold your hand and take care of your kid throughout the change which is what we do and it's it's an it's an exciting opportunity but it does present some anxiety for some people we understand okay moving on 6.1 public comments on agenda items 7.1 through 11.1 we do not have any this evening which takes us to financials 7.1 a resolution to approve the purchases in accordance to orc 5705.41 and board

085policy 6320 so moved second oh president davidson members of the board thank you um so this is what we call the now purchase orders so this is a case where we have a purchase order that's dated after an invoice date so what we're looking at here is our t-shirts that were printed for well made printed however they do t-shirts for the dc trip for our genoa middle school and this was just a case of timing with the order being placed and how the invoice was dated the money was budgeted out of the student account and all that so i would recommend approval so we can have it paid before they go on the dc trip [Laughter] any questions or comments hearing none mr bell yes dr nesterbaker yes mrs meyer yes this is altman yes

086this is davidson yes moving on to the personnel consent agenda 8.1 through 8.15 may have a motion so moved second and that brings us to scott reeves welcome thank you thank you and good evening president davidson members of the board dr kellogg and mrs marshall i would like to present to you for your consideration tonight's personnel consent agenda the items brought in tonight's agenda mostly represent our regular action items with regards to resignations hirings changes of assignment and contract status changes there are a few items however to be noted in tonight's agenda tonight we are asking the board to consider and approve the following we have 20 classified resignations before the board this evening representing mostly aids and classified substitutes partially offsetting those resignations we are asking the board to approve the employment of 14

087classified positions we have six teaching and one administrative resignation for the board to approve so far one of those teaching positions have long been filled two are posted and one has been filled by a reassigned teacher we have six classified and seven licensed changes of assignments within the district we have eight classified contract status changes and one administrative and with that administrative change i'd like to thank point view assistant principal sherry chafin who has done an outstanding job as the interim principal of robert frost elementary school in the absence of sarah burka we have two teacher hires for the board to consider and with the board approval i'd like to welcome dr michael warren who will be replacing rashonda elder as the assistant principal of huber ridge elementary dr warren comes to us from the

088pittsburgh area and we are excited to have him as a member of our team and lastly we have four classified and one administrative retirements to consider this evening jack bolt will be retiring from his position with the transportation department with 18 years of service to the district jacqueline hopkins will be retiring from her position in the food service department with 13 years of service to the district brenda kopp will be retiring from her position in the food service department with 22 years of service to the district kemalahan will be retiring from her position as secretary with 12 years of service to the district kim finishes as the right-hand person to westerville a d west elifords and is well known for her amazing theater productions that she leads at westernville north high school barb wallace will

089be retiring and it says 29 years on the agenda it's with 30 years of service to the district barb has served as a teacher a principal director of special education and it has been my personal honor to serve alongside her as she served as the executive director of elementary so collectively these wonderful wonderful employees have served the district for 95 years that would take us way back to 1927. and in that year in his plane the spirit of saint louis aviator charles lindbergh made the first solo non-stop transatlantic flight traveling from new york city to london england the academy of mostly motion picture of arts and sciences was founded which culminated in an annual award ceremony to honor the year's best films directors and male and female actors and every year since the academy awards

090have been a big hit the all black harlem globetrotters basketball team played their first ever game duke ellington and his orchestra made their historic run performing at the famed cotton club a little closer to home here in columbus the 555 foot tower then known as the american insurance union citadel now known as the leveck tower opened as the fifth tallest building in the world the tallest between new york and chicago and almost 100 years later it is still the city's most iconic and recognizable building and finally the experts at mgm studios told animator walt disney that because women would be terrified of a giant mouse on the screen his idea of mickey mouse would never work and with that any questions from the board well done hearing none thank you mr bell yes mrs meyer

091yes dr nestor baker yes mrs altman yes mrs davidson yes thank you old business 9.1 final reading policy 6110 grant funds may i have a motion so moved sec any questions or comments here hearing none i did just want to make a comment that we did make the revision that we discussed and so i didn't hear from anyone else so we're good with that mrs meyer yes dr nestor baker yes mr bell yes mrs altman yes mrs davidson yes 9.2 final reading policy 6114 cost principle spending federal funds may have a motion it's all moved second any comments questions here hearing none this is almond yes mr bell yes mrs meyer yes dr nesterbaker yes this is davidson yes 9.3 final reading 6325 procurement federal grant funds may i have a motion so moved second

092any comments questions here hearing none miss marshall dr nurse baker yes mrs meyer yes mr bell yes mrs altman yes this is davidson yes 9.4 final reading 60 policy 6423 use of credit cards may i have a motion so moved second any questions or comments here hearing none mr bell yes dr nester baker yes mrs meyer yes mrs altman yes this is davidson yes new business 10.1 first reading policy 2271 college credit plus program and we'd like to welcome ann baldwin all right good evening president davidson members of the board dr kellogg this is marshall this evening we have a policy update that for a college credit plus that has been revised to include the provision of state law that requires male students who are 18 years or older to register with the selective service

093system in order to participate in the college credit plus program the supervised policy reflects current ohio law and is recommended to be adopted to maintain accurate policies this revision has been shared with families in previous college credit plus presentations and has been a past practice for our students and the college will initially reach out to the student if they don't have that number on file and then we can assist our college partners if they need that information from our students any questions none thank you so much thank you up next 10.2 first reading policy 2370.1 blended learning and welcome dr hopkins thank you good evening president davidson members of the board dr kellogg mrs marshall the revision to policy 2370.01 blended learning adds an additional component to what constitutes blended learning the new definition adds

094and includes non-computer-based learning opportunities to the current definition previously the definition only included online learning this revision aligns our blended learning programs should they ever be offered to state guidelines and it's recommended to approve these revisions and to adopt them to maintain accurate policies i'm happy to answer any questions you may have thank you hearing none thank you recommended action standing business 11.1 resolution approving loose furnishings packages package for westerville south high school phase 4 may i have a motion so moved second and mr dorn good evening president davidson vice president altman members of the board dr kellogg and ms marshall the loose furnishings package is in preparation for the opening of south's fourth phase of renovations that is currently under construction phase four includes the first floor south academic wing and the second floor

095media center in general the scope of work includes all new furniture for five classrooms new teacher desks and bookcases for six classrooms new teacher desks for the 10 science classrooms new furniture for one project-based learning area and one small group room new computer tables with chairs for the media center and furniture for the new satellite cafe located at the entrance of the media center bids were solicited in accordance with the ohio revised code on february 24th and we received two bids that were publicly read on march 24th the lowest responsible bid was submitted by zimmerman school equipment in the amount of 180 786 dollars and 44 cents this is actually slightly over triad's line item estimate for furniture but within the overall budget for phase four the work area will be available for furniture installation

096starting on july 25th and by substantial completion by august 8th of this school year just in time for the start of classes it is being recommended that the board accept zimmerman school equipment's bid for phase four's loose furnishing package at westerville south high school i do have one quick question because i know it's come up in previous projects so as far as any loose furnishings that we're not going to continue to use in the building right that we're retiring what happens to those well when we went through south at the beginning of this project we identified the amount of furniture that we could reuse and came up with a a percentage the um some of the furniture that we determined that we were going to reuse will stay itself but some has been delivered to

097other buildings to be used in those those buildings but i think if you're asking the question about when it gets to its end of its useful life we really keep furniture way too long it is not really something that then becomes something somebody else is going to want we have had those some we've put out some teacher desks things like that we've had some community members stop by and pick those up before our waste hauler was able to get to those but in general they're they're they're going to an infill yeah thanks for walking through that because actually it was both pieces i wanted people to know we don't just take everything that was used before and you know toss it out there is a process of discerning what we're gonna hold on to and

098where it is best served and then there is a point at which it needs to be let go so yeah thanks anything else okay thank you hearing none dr nasterbaker yes mrs meyer yes mr bell yes this is almond yes mrs davidson yes um 11.2 a resolution approving alternate power supply granting rate of entry and consent for collection of american tower company cell tower mr dorn again yes this resolution pertains to the american tower company cell tower located between the stadium at westerville south high school and the transportation building approval of this resolution will allow the american tower company to connect new separately metered electrical supply to the tower it will also provide the approval for dish to become a co-locator on the tower that currently provides service for at t and it will bring

099resolution to the existing electrical service issues between the district and american tower company it is being recommended that the board approve this resolution this evening may i have a motion some any questions or comments here hearing none thank you mrs meyer yes mr bell yes dr nestor breaker yes mrs altman yes mrs davidson yes 11.3 uh 2022 and 2023 student fee schedule dr hopkins welcome may i have a motion so moved second president davidson members of the board dr kellogg miss marshall i'm submitting for your consideration the student fee schedule for the 2022-23 school year there are a few changes to this year's schedule that i wanted to bring to your attention first of all every year we use state government information to adjust the annual income guidelines for annual all-day kindergarten tuition also like

100to note that the test fees for both ap and ib tests have rised just a little bit and we have also noted that the school campus parking permit is fifteen dollars a semester and thirty dollars a school year and i'm happy to answer any questions that you may have hi i know earlier i i asked this question um and i know that you and i have gone back and forth about it a little bit but um i think it would be really good and i think you're intending to do so but to just really be specific about um the cap and what the fee is capping so in my i'm not being very articulate i'm sorry um pay to play and also what is booster correct um just so i know i had that question

101to you where what is considered booster fee and what's considered a pay-to-play right and thank you for bringing that to our attention um the pay to participate programs is primarily for athletic programs i believe it was a few years ago when some of our organizations and activities such as marching band for example that reduce that so the family cap is for any of those activities like i said predominantly if not exclusively athletic programs that's capped at a family amount i believe it's 300 a year and we're going to be very specific about that there are some courses in our academic planning guide especially at our secondary level that do include some additional fees such as marching band and what we're going to do is we're going to go back and make sure it's really clearly

102articulated which of these are required course fees as opposed to which of these are potential fees to the booster group to help support those programs so thank you i really appreciate that thank you any other questions or comments just a quick comment i appreciate the efforts to keep the fees from going up significantly it's long been a concern of mine the level of fees that people need to pay particularly those who don't qualify for assistance it's it's tough for families so i appreciate the efforts to keep those from exploding indeed thank you dr nasterbaker yes mr bell yes mrs meyer yes this is atman yes this is davidson yes up next we have public comments and we have one tonight i'd like to welcome casey welcome did i say that correctly to the podium hi

103i have a little cold my name is casey wacko and i have a third grade student in emerson he's a third grader in the gifted classroom and he was in the world cultures program for first and second grade he has a younger brother that's in kindergarten that's anxiously awaiting to get into emerson for first grade next year i'm here to speak to changes coming to the hamby and emerson magnet and gifted programs um i'm not against change at all but i am for thoughtful methodical change and i feel like that's not happening here um despite what's being been said tonight about parents being involved in lots of thought going into this and lots of different parties being involved in these decisions that's just not been the case i'm concerned about the timing how these decisions

104were made and communicated and they're impacted on the gifted program in particular i don't understand why parents have not been informed let alone consulted along the way and i'm not the only person that feels this way i'm just the only person that's talking tonight a lot of people didn't even realize this was happening because we just found out about it two weeks ago right as people are going on spring break the night before the magnet deadline um teachers were also informed just a few weeks ago from what i understand and i would have also liked to have seen the board vote on a big change like this i feel like this is a big change that shouldn't just be we shouldn't just be told that this is happening we there should be some involvement across

105the school community so i'd like for you to please reconsider it sounds like maybe that won't happen but i'd love for you to reconsider making your final transition plan tonight i'd like for you to not make extreme changes like moving kids this fall so close to the end of the year i think it makes a big difference especially to the gifted kids i love the idea that you're creating a team i'd love to create a team representing the three magnet strands and the gifted program and let the parents the teachers administrators and the staff work together to create thoughtful timely and efficient short and long term con plans i want would like for you to think about details that need not be rushed or overdone i'm not really sure i would like for you to

106ask yourselves what's really driving this hasty decision i don't know if it's a promise from the levy if it's funding that's going away if it's some other other reason but is it really what's best for our children who are in these programs right now the current gifted kids are taking the hit from these changes and they've been essentially given no consideration or options at all um we make big decisions um like this when we make big decisions like this i feel like we should be given a year in advance notice or at least um in the fall or maybe even just right before the magnet lottery opened up for applications it seems like it's not well thought out and that's been demonstrated by the way it's been communicated or not communicated to the people that

107it it will involve if programs must change buildings phase moves in and out by grade for minimal impact to current third and fourth grade students including the gifted students not just the ones at hanby who are proud of their school please add new magnus magnet classes slowly piloting one or two in their current building and then learning from that experience before adding or move or adding or moving more please take into account the many nuances of the gifted children who we aim to serve anxiety is a common struggle for gifted kids as demonstrated by some of the many presentations that the gifted specialists have given throughout the year yet the way that we're rolling this out is giving kids more anxiety and it's giving the parents anxiety too after the last two years we've had

108a lot of anxiety and as we know the apple doesn't fall far from the tree the pta is responsible for many activities and events that make emerson special recent volunteer restrictions mean parent representation is down emerson's pta this year is made up mostly of fifth grade parents and gifted parents um as was mentioned earlier those those leadership positions are being decided now and we're rushing into this at the end of a school year for no apparent reason to me arts and world cultures sound like a great combination but the marriage of world cultures and giftedness is another aspect of what makes emerson magical and i worry that gifted curriculum will be diluted over time and lose its world culture's focus and schools are just finally getting back to normal our kids and the families and

109the teachers that support them have made it through two years straight of non-stop change and ambiguity and stress so let's not add to their mental health burden if we don't really need to especially when the pandemic and further covet impacts are not necessarily over i know you said you have confidence in the teachers and the staff um at emerson and at hamby but those are the the folks who've made all this work these last two years they've been through a lot already why are we rushing to do this at the end of the year and expecting them to fix it for us i would ask you again to involve impacted parents and teachers in these conversations sooner or all and then truly utilize our input moving forward please also think more intentionally about how changes

110are community communicated taking into account all audiences the timing and how such announcements filter down to our kids we want to work together with you and i hope that you'll let us do that thank you for your comments and spending your evening with us we appreciate it um moving on to board comments 13.1 anyone like to go i would just like to mention that coming up on april the 20th um we will um host our uh the name just left my head westerville prepared thank you miss marshall it's a partnership a collaboration between westerville city schools the city of westerville the westerville area chamber of commerce the westerville library otterbein university columbus state community college dawson careers and coda it's going to be held at the point there will be breakout sessions and parents families

111are certainly encouraged to attend additional information uh regarding the event can be found on the district's website um other than that i'd like to congratulate and well and thank um all of our retirees that were announced this evening we want to thank them for their many years of committed service to our district to our families and students they have certainly made a tremendous impact on more lives than they will probably ever realize so want to thank them want to uh congratulate again all of our athletes that were recognized this evening ms chafin that was recognized for her community service this evening and again our our finance team miss marshall and and your team uh for the continued outstanding and excellent work that that you all are doing and that's it um i also want to

112congratulate nicole and her team i think that auditor faber made it pretty clear how remarkable the achievement is it is incredible to consider that an organization of this complexity has managed to hit that mark of perfection year after year after year it is not something that i take for granted it's not something i think any of us take for granted and it is utterly remarkable the only word i can come up with it is fantastic it is an achievement beyond what i think any of our peers have managed to achieve and i thank you for doing what needs to be done to keep the complexity in some way manageable for that level of both transparency and excellence so thank you to you and your team i also want to mention jack pope and jacqueline hopkins

113and brenda kopp and kim mollahan and barbara wallace this tells you quite a bit about me i guess kim molina and i went school together at westerville south and did theater stuff together kim has been such an incredible gift to theater in this this particular district and uh has been an incredible gift too many student lives as has everyone who is retiring tonight i call out kim just because i remember her when i couldn't figure out how she got her hair to be so full and i couldn't make mine do it many many years ago when that's all i was worried about i also want to call out barbara wallace barbara and i got involved in this district at roughly the same time very close together and i have always counted on barbara she is

114authentic as they come she's always been a straight shooter no one matters more barbara than students and i just have such respect for barbara wallace and i will miss her when she goes immensely and i will miss her ability to say you need to think about and to tell me what it is i need to be thinking about i do thank you casey for talking with us this evening i do share some concerns as i as i said i do believe that our gifted program our teachers our families the way our program is approached by those teachers and families will do well at hanby even within the confines of a very quick decision that was made so i will be watching just as you will be watching and participating and we will do all that

115we can do to make the move work for them well sometimes i ask a lot of questions and sometimes i have long comments and tonight my question my comments really are ditto um to what's gone before and just to reiterate that last point thanks casey for your words that on a personal level it's it's because i know the teachers the educators involved in the gifted program from having children be in the program until last year that i understand that's the group that's going to be the most impacted but i also know those educators are amazing and we'll make this work so thank you for coming and sharing your concerns and you know i think putting my trust in them and in our leaders and and the kids who are always more resilient than we think

116they will be but it's a lot to ask we know there's been a lot going on the last couple of years and everybody's resilience wells are like pretty much down to nothing so um thank you and and again i just want to shout out the congratulations to those we honored at the beginning of the meeting i know everyone else has said it but i i can't imagine how many hours all of those young people and their coaches have put in and mischafin into her work hours and hours and hours that have gone into you know we get to do a little a moment of recognition and they're not the only ones there are young people all over this district who really dedicate their hearts and souls to things some of them get to come in

117from the bor in front of the board and be honored and others that doesn't happen for but i just want to honor that lots of young people putting lots of wonderful work in this district towards many different ends and it's always special when we get to invite a few of them here well i also would say ditto to it's been said congratulations to the students that's really inspiring their coaches and the finance team nicole the way you break down numbers is like no other so thank you for all that you're doing into all the retirees um i really appreciate your comments casey and all the parents that have reached out i know there were some amazing gifted teachers here tonight my daughter went through the gifted program too i know that there's a lot of

118concern and worry and sadness but i think there's really a lot of opportunity to and i'm not discrediting the concern so i'll be watching too and i'm excited about the opportunity i think well i'm excited about the opportunity i did want to give a few legislative updates as um we know that i've talked about house bill 126 in the past it was passed by the ohio general assembly unfortunately and it's on its way to the governor for signature aside from the enormous amount of bureaucracy this bill adds to us and it's a lot we expect there to be a significant loss in revenue and i think nicole for calculating that for us estimates based on the cases that we have sent through the board of revision we will lose approximately 275 000 a year in

119revenue the district has reached out to the governor with a viable solution and has asked for him to veto the legislation i would ask if you feel moved to please call the governor yourself too and ask him to veto this bill this past week actually i guess it's monday my bad i'm sorry last week um a really controversial bill was introduced house bill 616. it was introduced by representatives loichick a republican from bezeta i'm not sure i'm saying that right i've actually never even heard of that place and representative gene schmidt a republican from miami township on monday april 4th and this legislation would restrict public schools stem schools charter schools or private schools that accept students on state scholarships from providing any sexual orientation or gender identity information to grades k through third in

120students in grades 4 through 12. they could not receive materials on sexual orientation or gender identity identification in any manner that is not age appropriate or developmentally appropriate for students in accordance with state standards it has not been referred to a committee yet but you can call your senator or a representative and i'm hearing that it's likely going to move pretty quickly and unfortunately has a lot of support done at the state house um then there's house bill 327 which i have spoken about in the past as well and this bill um would prohibit school districts community schools stem schools and state agencies from teaching about racism and systemic racism it's before the house state and local government committee and it had a fifth hearing on february 22nd and an amendment bill was introduced i'm

121not sure how quickly this will move given that house bill 616 has blown up but you can still call your uh state senators and representatives and then just a quick human resources update um mr scott reeves has been visiting various colleges and universities and we've heard about some of that in the past including tennessee state west virginia state and central state ohio university on his spring break i believe university of toledo and bowling green and i'm excited to see what comes of this so thank you for doing so that's all thank you very much um just i'm gonna echo all of these board comments just one quick highlight um to the recognitions you know congratulations to all of you nicole and your team outstanding not surprised you guys are absolutely amazing so thank you for

122all that you do every single day um i truly appreciate it so moving on 14.1 the board of education will meet on tuesday april 19th 2022 for a special session at westerville north high school for the gem awards at 6 p.m and for a regular session on monday april 25th 2022 at 6 p.m here at the early learning center and with that may i have a motion to enter executive session to discuss matters required to be kept confidential by the state or by federal law so second mrs meyer yes dr nasa breaker yes mr bell yes mrs altman yes mrs davidson yes so we're going to move into executive session and then we'll come back to this room to close out our meeting but thank you all for joining us tonight okay so moved second

123i have to say it again you're coming back from exact executive session and may i have a motion to adjourn please so moved second mr bell yes mrs meyer yes actor nestor baker yes mrs altman yes mrs davidson yes we're adjourned you