001riser pledge of allegiance madam secretary get a roll call please mr fredrickson can you help her mark mark here i'm here thank you present present denise brooks here mary mckee yeah joe hidalgo here chris marcel here ed solomon here andy black here we all good i just got a big quick comment the last special meeting we had i made because i go back and watch our meetings um i made the mistake of saying uh we're going to do the national anthem and i got some comments from friends this board of directors will i don't want to hear in the national way of them i do apologize uh it's the pledge of allegiance we need a lot of practice for the news i believe ms marcel was practicing was she the national anthem well maybe we'll
002maybe that's something we'll put in the new year anyway for those folks that it sounds to me like mr k just volunteered himself for the lead role sorry folks that eagerly want this school board to sing not happening anytime soon good evening dr frazier the superintendent's report police sir good evening mr solomon good evening members of the board and to rcr community uh this week uh is teacher appreciation week all across this great land of ours and uh looking here in cr after having seen our teachers work firsthand over this past year i will tell you that i literally do not have the words to sufficiently express the appreciation that i have for our council rock faculty as well as every member of team cr these folks have honestly gone so far and above the
003call of duty all year long it has been growing at times as you might imagine it's been hard uh to keep a smile on your face and be positive day in and day out and yet that is exactly what these folks have done um and because that's what they've done um i am of the very strong opinion that they deserve to know just how appreciated they are these folks in my strong opinion are the truest of true professionals and i am very grateful to be their professional colleague so please if you haven't had a chance yet to say thank you to at least one member of team cr do so this evening or do so tomorrow while uh teacher appreciation week is only celebrated technically this one week in the in early may each year
004the reality is that our teachers deserve our respect and our added our adoration every day of the year so thank you to all of you out there who are part of team cr uh earlier this week i had communicated a study that we are commencing with the delaware valley consortium for excellence and equity the dvce is supported by the university of pennsylvania um just had a chance to spend about 90 minutes with them before our meeting here this evening and i want to be clear here that as a district we absolutely believe in diversity equity and inclusion and with that we have two basic fundamental desires the first of those is for all students in cr to have equitable opportunities to participate and not only participate but to succeed in all aspects of school and
005the second of these fundamental desires is for all students to feel valued and to feel that critical uh important sense of belonging feeling like you belong and are valued in all aspects of school so this upcoming study through dvc ee is actually a pretty narrow look at our work in terms of how students are placed into leveled secondary classes and i i want to be clear about this and this component was asked about at a recent board meeting and i think it deserves a little reiteration the plan here is to lift every concerak student up and to lift every cr student up without that being at the expense of any cr student we don't want to see any of our students held back we believe that the high tide does indeed rise all boats and
006that is the fundamental premise of this work so we want to ensure that every council rock student experiences an appropriate level of rigor in their coursework and has equitable opportunities to succeed in this coursework so that when we say success for every student every day we literally mean every student when we say that so i do want to thank uh everyone out there team cr members parents students alumni etc who have already volunteered through our landing page on the website to be part of this study if you are still looking for an opportunity to do that please do so by midnight tonight that is when uh the feedback window closes so uh again i sent that letter out on monday the link to the landing page is in that letter that i sent out on
007monday we can't do this work correctly without you we need your voice so again thanks to everyone who has already signed up and if you are interested in doing so and haven't had that chance yet please do seek out that opportunity this evening uh switching gears from a pandemic standpoint uh you likely saw the news earlier this week that the state will be lifting all orders with the exception of the masking order effective as of may 31st this isn't going to change much for actual school days when you look at the calendar we only have eight full school days uh in grades k to eight uh between may 31st and the end of the school year and even fewer days at the high school level because of final exams but it certainly will impact some
008of our end of year gatherings uh and in my opinion in a positive way and that includes our graduation ceremonies uh so we will be uh providing some additional communication on this tomorrow but as i report this evening we are anticipating still holding both ceremonies at the walt snyder stadium uh and we are anticipating at this point in being able to revert back to four tickets per graduate instead of two tickets per graduate uh i do ask all parents uh to be on the lookout k-12 for a general letter that we will be sending out in the morning and all of our senior students our 12th grade students and their parents to be on the lookout from a subsequent letter from your school administration tomorrow afternoon that will give you some more detailed information pertaining
009to graduation and other end-of-year activities and lastly from a pandemic standpoint good news is definitely on the way for our middle school and high school students who want to get vaccinated you've likely seen it appears that the pfizer vaccine will soon be approved for children ages 12 to 15. so again this is good news for students our kiddos who want to get vaccinated and it's also good news for our middle school and high school plan in the fall which calls for a much much more back to normal reopening of schools so we're excited about that parents please know i heard from dr damsker today on the county-wide call that they will have they expect to have five different vaccine sites set up as early as next week and the pfizer vaccine will be offered at
010all five of those sites and lastly on the related note as we do look ahead to the fall at the elementary level please remember that we will be offering both a traditional in-person model k-6 and we will also be offering a separate cyber school model uh all parents all parents in grades k-6 next year will be asked to register their child by june 1st 2021 so a little bit less than a month from now to register your child uh all of your children if you have multiples either for in person in the fall or in the cyber model for the fall so that's a june 1st deadline that we'll have and that pertains to both new parents as well as returning parents we anticipate uh we're targeting early next week to be able to provide
011some some more detailed information to our elementary parents on that cyber model and then we are targeting next friday to launch uh the actual registration process so next friday is the 17th so the window uh that we're targeting is from may 17th through june 1st to be able to actually make those registration decisions and then we have a board meeting uh two days later on june 3rd and that evening as an item for discussion we'll be able to present to the board exactly what those registration numbers look like and accordingly what staffing numbers look like uh which is important because that is also when we will uh be approving a final budget for fiscal year 2122. mr selman that is my report thank you also if you would i'd like to hear some of about
012some of our return families that are coming back from their year away in their charter world coming back to council rock yeah it's a work in progress um can let everyone know that we uh last week we made an outreach to all uh all families that left us uh since the pandemic began we already had 10 families who had registered back with us for next year which is which is fantastic as i expressed in a letter to these uh to these families it would be our absolute honor to be able to provide the world-class council rock education to them once again next year and we sincerely hope for that opportunity so uh we've heard back from uh a few of the folks uh beyond those ten since then and uh we will continue to continue
013down this road and hope that we're able to get more and more of our students back because uh it's an honor to be able to educate them absolutely and this and this board and our staff has worked hard to position the district to offer that and and i would hope that after a year away you miss home and you come home absolutely good good right mr cox solicitors report sir mr salmon i circulated a report to the board on tuesday and beyond that don't have anything to add other than to announce the executive session that the board held earlier this evening on personnel great thank you sir public comment mr fredrickson now we'll read in the record the public comment is an opportunity for members of the public to address the board we will ask
014that you limit your comments to no longer than three minutes please consider the fact that there may be young children in the audience are watching this broadcast live on crtv when speaking it is our goal to maintain a respectful environment so that members of our community have an equal opportunity to address the board without interruption while the board welcomes your ideas and will consider them in deliberating an issue we may not respond to your comments or questions in addition to listening to in-person public comment community members you also email their comments and questions to public comment at crsd.org email comments will go directly to the entire board of school directors and the superintendent and will be attached to the board meeting minutes moving forward as such all written public comment submissions will be available for
015review by members of the public emailed comments will not be read aloud as part of the public comment portion of the board meeting good evening sir could you provide your name what township you're from leave the mask on and you have three minutes alex enten northampton township thank you sir good evening dear members of the school board i stand before you today with a heavy heart my concern is that what i'm about to say will fall on deaf ears but i'm also optimistic that what i have to say will get the parents listening to this involved in holding the school board accountable for decisions made that impact our children and the community we live in at the march 25th meeting susan elliot proposed spending twenty thousand dollars for a upend group to come to do
016an evaluation of our school district for equity and then on april 8th all but mr hidalgo voted to approve it before you all took that vote no one had mentioned any of the following what caused you to decide in participating in this 20 000 equity evaluation based on what evidence was the decision made that there is an equity issue how did you decide on awarding u pen to do this evaluation instead of spending twenty thousand dollars in this equity evaluation why is no one asking why our school rating is falling every year we used to be in the top 10 of the school districts in pa now we're not even in the top 20. also during an economic hardship for many during this pandemic the school board keeps voting to increase maximum school tax rate
017on this community the priorities of the school board are concerned to myself as well as other parents when will the school board's priorities align with the people who voted you into your positions to those parents who are unsatisfied with what we're seeing i urge you to come out on may 18th and vote for candidates who will most closely align with your values beliefs and the direction that you want cancer rock school district to go thank you thank you sir good evening good evening how are you today i'm doing well yourself good thanks have your name with the township you're from please your mask on and you have three minutes sir all right thanks george moriarty upper bayfield good evening it's nice to be in person again and as we all continue returning our district to
018a proper sense of normalcy shook at tate's hand outside because we're both vaccinated it's kind of cool after a year like we've just lived through there's been a great deal of discussion about the negatives that we've all experienced however i like to look at things more holistically and in reflecting on that i wanted to highlight what this board has accomplished since 2013 which is when i first participated as a community representative on the 2013-14 capital planning committee the first accomplishment was that capital planning process board and administration led by then superintendent mark klein worked with the community and set up the strategy for future successes that have followed thanks in no small part to that work our district has been able to make steady prudent investment in the facilities which has included renovations and construction
019at goodknow elementary new town middle holland middle wrightstown elementary rolling hills elementary as well as the star center thanks to the incredible talent of doug taylor and his team this has been done generally on time and under budget the strategy is important because school districts cannot deficit spend they must balance their budgets each and every year having a long-term capital debt plan to upgrade facilities is not running a deficit it's prudent budgeting during a time of low interest rates to do what has to be done to keep our facilities meeting the expectations of council rock taxpayers to have a best-in-class offering it also bears noting that this board administration have through these years found savings to make up for initial budget deficits to meet that aforementioned requirement to balance the budget there's a dangerous precedent
020in conflating budget processes because we can quickly find ourselves stalling investment in facilities when following the narrative of saving tax dollars beyond capital planning this group has conducted a good transparent search for a new superintendent done a fine job leading the team forward you've also achieved a successful redistricting and middle school consolidation that effort has established a great educational program for the students of council rock that minimizes social and academic transitions in addition this board's maintained a remarkably constructive relationship with its unions which we can't overstate the value of that pay freeze that they took saving five million dollars furthermore there's been the development of the 2019-2023 strategic plan which laid out three goals student wellness redefining student success and school safety and security these focus areas represent a thoughtful response to the student learning
021environment and importantly the student wellness goal focuses on mental health positive behavior interventions embracing diversity and an evaluation of the school day this plan was adopted unanimously and as i recall speaks to the principal excuse me as i recall was adopted unanimously and speaks to the principled approach you all took i realize i'm out of time so i'll stop there thank you very much for all your service thank you sir good evening hi how are you good how are you welcome hi um my name is heather roberts i am a lifelong new town resident a council rock graduate and a business owner uh for the past four years i've also been a member of the upper makefield business association umba has been an active and dedicated part of the community since 1967. as an organization
022one of the things that we are the most proud of is our long-running scholarship program since its inception in 1987 umba has awarded over 203 thousand dollars to 95 deserving local students the scholarship committee looks for students who are academically strong well-rounded community focused and will be good future ambassadors for their school and the organization each year the committee reads through over 30 applications from local schools including council rock pensberry neshaminy and central bucks we narrow the applications down until we select the top two to four students to receive the scholarship we value our relationships with our recipients and are honored to support them in their journey to higher education and successful careers over the years the organization has also made connections with the social workers and guidance counselors of these local schools with a
023special emphasis on council rock our goal has been and will continue to be to help families who have fallen on hard times and need assistance this past holiday season we reached out to the social workers to acquire the holiday wish list of three local council rock families we acted as santa's helpers and not only provided every item on the list but also collected over a thousand uh dollars in gift cards that we split evenly between the families umba consistently strives to make the biggest impact possible in our area and the surrounding neighborhoods we are looking to make further connections with not only the student body but also social workers guidance counselors teachers and school board members we would love to continue this discussion with anyone who believes strongly in helping the community and our local
024students and are looking for like-minded people to become new members and also help to make the most positive impact please feel free to reach out if you have any further questions and thank you for your time thank you good evening microphones in the center of the room bam there you go hi hi can we have your name the township you're from leave your mask on and you have three i'm from new minutes township and i've had four kids that are fortunate to have four kids attending council who are graduates and two are still in the system and during my 16 years in council rock i've had the pleasure and during that time i've gotten to know andy block has proven to be engaged as a leader he's knowledgeable and passionate about his tradition he's always
025open to new ideas he's always willing andy's here for the right reasons he's here to make council rock the best district possible and this is a very important trait to have in a school board we really don't know what the future holds i think the past year has proven decisions can't be solely based on tasks or current views on a specific topic decisions have to be based on a person's thought process and their ability to make sound decisions andy has proven he makes these types of decisions over the past years i reached out to andy several times and it's always prompts to reply my and i'll be honest we don't always agree yet andy is very clear and being respectful and listening and evaluating what i have to say and i truly appreciate that andy
026keeps the focus on what's important and that's providing the best education possible andy's ability to value others even when their viewpoints don't align with his own makes andy a very strong leader given the uncertainty that our future holds these skills are vital to the success good evening microphone hi could have your name what township you're from please leave your mask on and you have three minutes hi my name is christina cascarino i'm from newtown i'm here today asking for the masks to not be required outdoor at recess any longer the fact that they can be removed to 80 degrees proves we don't need them at all temperature does not affect coveted spread we do know that covert spread outdoor is minuscule and very low per dr fauci and very low per the cdc the cdc
027states outdoor masks or outdoor spread may be possible also masks may prevent droplet exposure it's not definitive less than 10 percent of what we know may have been from outdoor spread dr damsker states we are winning this fight as recently bucks county cases has dropped um dropped 28 in the last week and 42 percent in the last month this is per the newtown patch 54 of adults who have wanted the vaccine in bucks county have been able to receive their first dose also all of counter rock school district personnel that wanted the vaccine has had the opportunity to be fully vaccinated if they still have fear that the children may spread covet amongst everybody there then this burden should not be the children's anymore as they have had the opportunity to be vaccinated children count
028for only thirteen point eight percent of all coveted cases and only sixteen percent of this thirteen point eight percent are asymptomatic making the outer spread even more minuscule at this point it's more dangerous for their mental health and physical health for them to have the mask on outdoors there's not enough time for me to go into all the risks of wearing a mask outdoors but it but the numbers do crush the miniscule amount of the risk of coven spread outdoors another thing with the kids is that the masks get very dirty outdoors as they're constantly touching them after touching equipment playing outside in their outdoor environment and trying to get fresh fresh air as they're trying to you know touch their mask and adjust them for fresh air 80 degrees to 90 degrees according to
029the national weather us service is a temperature that you use caution for outdoor activity i don't know why we have to wait until we reach a cautionable state to have the mass removed outdoors when we know the spread is minuscule for outdoor spread of covid also the 100 humidity stipulation is just cruel neshami school district they are removing their outdoor masks for recess may 10th i don't understand they're our neighbors why can't we do the same provide our children that mass break as well outdoors during recess so i'm just asking you to please face your choice on this on scientific evidence not public comment or political pressure and to let the kids have fresh air at recess i think after all they've been through that's the least that you can do for the remaining of
030the school year thank you thank you man i'm nervous don't do well public speaking good evening your name your township leave your mask on and you have three minutes my name is mehta i'm from upper makefield i just want to thank the board for taking the first steps in reclaiming our future our children's future you made the right decision to invest into soul fine stone hill crest and the turf there's a lot more work that needs to be done more investment needs to be done there are some incidents that have happened on the football i mean the baseball field in the soccer fields that will definitely need more investment and people services there's the way the way that we look at it we've gotta defend against our threats our threats right now of obviously the
031peso threat but then also the mental health issues that are being caused by this transition of going from the third industrial revolution to the fourth industrial revolution these cell phones the the way that people these young kids are absorbing media some of the things that are being said on these fields we need to do something about that and i know dr frazier that's part of your strategic plan it's number one on your strategic plan and we've been talking about this since and i just want to let you know that i'm grateful for you putting that plan in place we need to execute on it now as a sole feinstein parent i have been in discussions with craig miller my hope is that he will put together a program that will address this yeah but one
032of the biggest weaknesses right now we have is is the politics of division the kids are picking it up they're picking it up you know i moved here in 2016. i don't know what's the north the south the east west whatever the issues are but i'm asking everyone here as leaders please just let's control that and i think that if our kids see us they'll respond in the right way but please do that thank you very much everyone thank you thank you sir that's it one more good evening ma'am step to the microphone you just state your name township you're from yeah leave your mask on and you have three minutes it's on my name is patricia del pizzo from churchville and um sorry i'm not used to talking in a mask i'm a grandmother
033of a middle school and a high school student first i'd like to thank you all for getting the kids back to school quicker than a lot of the other schools in the area so thank you for that my comments today are to address children wearing masks in school any level of being sick is not good but a child children do not seriously get sick from covet 19. yet schools are placed under the highest of restrictions the mass requirement for children is inconsequential and detrimental for the following reasons children are unable to wear masks for a long period of times without touching their face spreading many germs children have low hospitalization rates low death rates and a 99 9 rate of not getting coveted a mask will hide a teacher's face a child's face which is
034a disruption to learning asking our children in school is a distraction from learning asking our children in school we're telling them to be afraid we're teaching them to be afraid for our children and my grandchildren's sake it is extremely important that stability and normalcy return to school in the classroom and i'm talking about 2019 uh 2021 school year according to the cdc 266 children died of covet 19. every death is a tragedy every death a tragedy but during the 2018-19 flu season 477 children died of regular flu also in 2019 we lost 2 545 children under 18 traffic accidents 776 to drowning and 2 2156 to suicide we did not stop sending our kids to school or banned cars or swimming pools we understand that we live in a world of risk we send our
035children out daily and hope they make it home safe every day we must accept the fact that absolute safety is not possible next year september 2021 marks 18 months since the covet 19 restrictions i would like to implore you to look for proof that mass work before requiring children to wear them i'm here to ask you to please consider the idea that students can return to school masculists free the students of council rock school district and please allow them to breathe thank you for your time thank you and good evening thank you mr fredrickson that's it thank you sir all right from there we're going to go yes i'm going to ask mr block to read gh and i under number two please sir uh i moved to approve the minutes of the meeting of
036the board of school directors held on april 8 2021 i further to approve the minutes of the special meeting of the board of school directors held on april 22 2021 and finally i moved to approve the minutes of the special meeting of the board of school directors held on april 26 2021 thank you have a second second this is marcel any discussion on this any objections seeing and hearing none i'm going to ask the secretary to record the motions passing unanimous consent please little change of pace folks we're going to actually drop down um i know mr bilac's on the phone to uh under finance committee gnh i'd like to get those motions read please so we can take care of that quickly mrs marcel would you mind uh okay can you hear it mark
037i'm sorry yeah it's fine go ahead okay please i move to approve the personal actions as contained in the attachment to this agenda and i further move to approve the personal actions addendum as contained in the attachment to this agenda have a second second mr block with a second any discussion on these any objections you want to do it yeah okay and the secretary roll call please denise brooks yes mary mckee yes joe hidalgo yes chris marcel yes you want me yes no i'm good thank you andy black yes mark feileck marcus ed tate yes yes yes it's 9-0 dr frazier please fantastic mr sullivan thanks so much for uh moving that up on the agenda congratulations to two of our outstanding council rock administrators who have just been approved for new appointments this evening
038i'm going to go through them one by one and ask each of these gentlemen to uh to come to the microphone and i'm going to begin with mr jim vaca who was just approved as the new principal for marine m welch elementary school succeeding mrs rebecca grimm beginning on july 1st uh we had a total of 39 applicants for this position mr vodka is uh was the unanimous choice of the selection committee he's currently serving as interim principal of hillcrest elementary school and extraordinary extraordinarily so i might add jim has served our district since 2002 and has taught grade six uh gifted support and uh for second through sixth grades and has served as the lead teacher at hillcrest for the past 12 years uh has a bachelor's degree in education also a master's degree
039in education uh and has been a successful basketball coach for many years so jim i know that your wife devin is unable to be with us here this evening due to a work commitment but we are so excited to formally add you to our administrative team and uh we know that you're going to accomplish great things with your team uh at marina and welch congratulations i appreciate it uh thank you to the board for your approval and your leadership uh thank you to the administrative team for all of your support especially since january i'd like to thank the interview team for selecting me uh rebecca grimm has been great and very supportive also and i just can't wait to start and work with the welsh kids and community and staff and get a chance to
040really learn about them and uh you know as a council rock graduate and a kid who's been around here since the 80s i'm truly appreciative and looking forward to the opportunity thank you very much [Applause] congrats jim happy for you and happy family doctor don't walk away yet yes jim i couldn't be there tonight but uh it was just a few years ago that i talked to your entire team at hillcrest and one of the things i told you was to make your mark and i'm sincerely hopeful that as you move forward and take this position you do make your mark of maureen welch thank you thank you dr thorward thank you again well said dr thorough thank you and uh our second here this evening also by unanimous selection from the selection committee is
041mr jason triskewicz who has just been approved to succeed ms mccarthy as principal of council rock high school north also starting on july 1st we had a total of 20 applicants for this position uh mr truskevich or mr t as he is affectionately known around crn has served in council rock since 2003 joined the school district at that time as a science teacher at north holds a bachelor's degree in general science a master's degree in education and an educational leadership certification uh mr t is also a coach uh coach extraordinaire i believe uh for uh for his boys both the travel and interim mural baseball teams for the warwick township little league which is outstanding so we are likewise uh extremely extremely excited for mr t excited for us uh to be elevated to this
042new rule uh he has been truly an instrumental part of a number of initiatives at north a number of initiatives across the high school level here in the district and uh jason we're just thrilled to have you taken over we know that your wife beth is able to be here with us this evening welcome beth and uh congratulations to both of you jason thank you dr fraser thank you all the board for appointing me selection committee and cabinet again through all the support through the process again for the past 18 years council rock north has been like a second home to me the passion in that building is unbelievable and i'm extremely excited to continue the excellence that susan mccarthy has placed in that building she has been a true leader mentor and a friend
043as i'm moving into this new role and i'm extremely excited for it looking forward i can't wait to sit down with you know the administrative team that i've been with for the past eight years with addition of someone new looking up in the forward ground and then this summer really i'm super excited to sit down with the students and teachers and the community to see you know what they love about council rock north what they want to see growth in council rock north because we have an amazing group of students in our buildings and i'm excited to really get hands on with them and their families to make certain that we can improve every single day at north to get them ready for the changing world um so i'm super excited for that and again
044thank all of you and i gotta thank my family my son's with the ball fields right now my daughter is a dance class um but again many people watching right now against my wife again i can't do what i can do ramp because my wife she's been a phenomenal support over the past eight years in the administrative role and i know that's going to continue so again thank you congrats jason and look let me just close real quickly this is a testament to the excellence that we have in this school district from a bench standpoint pipeline standpoint you know we certainly hire from the outside at times we promote from the inside at times this was a competitive interview process where we had some folks from the outside looking for lateral moves and the best
045of the best we're right here in cr so jason congratulations jim congratulations i'm thrilled for you i'm thrilled for us and uh go celebrate any further comment before these gentlemen leave take a picture of them now give them a couple years they won't look dead hey on behalf of the board seriously guys congratulations it's nice to see coaches become principals good luck means there's hope for me no education committee mrs mckay please take us thanks very much mr salman the education committee met on april 26th we have three agenda items the first being secondary snack break and mask protocol we then looked at textbook and core resource approvals for next year which will be on our consent agenda and then finally we looked at digital resource renewals as that concludes my report i'd like to
046move to approve consent agenda items b through e as contained in the attachment to this agenda have a second second mrs brooks thank any you from the board any objection john on the phone okay hearing none i'm going to say oh thank you okay thank you you know i'm going to ask the secretary to record the motions passing unanimous consent from there we're going to go to letter i have item f if i may oh sure i move to approve the health and safety plan changes as attached to this agenda second second is mrs marcel discussion on this dr thorward can you hear me mr sullivan before we go there could we just have dr lambert giving i'm sure i'm sorry wave me down dr lambert please i'll just keep going dr lambert please welcome
047uh thank you the changes are basically the implementation of the modified quarantine protocol following an individual who has been identified as a close contact within the school or if so ordered by the bucks county department of health we have discussed this at previous meetings anyone interested will find those changes on pages 23-25 and 33-32 anything else sir no thank you thank you i apologize again dr thorward you have some comments sir yeah i do can you hear me i can hear you thank you can okay thank you um i'm gonna ramble a bit but uh it's important um i i i can't vote for this because um nothing's changed since the last time and and every time we move with these i'd like to move the needle back towards kids i went to school high
048school college grad school in the 80s and 90s and there was this guy you might have heard of him called nelson mandela and there are mandela rules for the treatment of prisoners and when when this health and safety plan was first forced on us by the state um i remembered that because uh there there's clauses in there about isolation and and and things like that um mr mandela was a figure during the apartheid years he was a leader and quote one thing there could be no keener revelation of a society soul than the way in which it treats its children i think this plan all these plans harm kids i think it's time to get rid of them i think it's time to move on and get back to normal i won't be voting for
049this but i will state now so we don't move past it i will be making a motion to modify this again much like i did last time we were all together um so i wanted that to be known now we this this is not good for kids you heard some speakers today saying the the mass mandate is not good for kids none of this is good for kids and it's time it's time to move and as a big school district it's time for us to stand up and say you know what this is wrong so i'll be making a motion afterwards actually a couple board members can stand with me or vote me down but i would like some more changes to this thank you dr thor any further comment from board members yeah i'm
050going to be voting for this tonight only because i want to move the modified quarantine into the health and safety plan so my understanding and please correct me from wrong is that removing the we're removing the the requirement to renew the authorization for the superintendent to offer modified quarantine because modified quarantine becomes the standard now in the health and safety plan am i understanding that correctly yes that's correct okay great so that's i and i want to say i agree with dr thorton in principle i'd like to vote no but i i desperately want to see that modified quarantine move forward so i'll be voting yes for that this health and safety plan tonight just for that purpose and just from a clarity standpoint and this goes back to our previous board meeting we were
051asked to begin modified quarantine on um april 26th do i have that date right that's correct and we did uh we have implemented modified quarantine since then so this is just codifying uh relative to the health and safety plan what we've been doing as requested by the board since april 26th thank you any comments mr adago please my this is mostly to mike you know i think we did do it on the fly and uh they they implemented it to the wishes that the board asked and this is just codifying what you had already asked to be voted on so you can still vote for it we can still move forward with further motions to change it because i like mark marx or mr bilix comments on it um because i agree we we've got
052to keep moving back towards a normal as as most possible and of course my main thing is if it's okay with the bucks county department of health then i think that's a good guideline for us to follow and i'll just keep pounding beating that drum thank you mr trump i'll interrupt just just to say i agree with you joe i did not realize we did not formally codify it a month ago mr marcel um i just had a question for dr fraser um could you comment on [Music] kind of the requirement for having a health and safety plan um and also we've been hearing about the mask order potentially changing in the future like have you guys been speaking about what that may mean in terms of changing this potentially again you know just if
053you could maybe just comment a little bit on that i it might be helpful for the community to kind of understand how this fits into what they're hearing from the governor's office as well absolutely and it can get a little confusing for sure so we are as of today anyway still required by the state to have a health and safety plan what goes in that health and safety plan of course is up to the uh to the board of school directors uh by virtue of these votes uh what came out on tuesday from harrisburg was a relief of all orders with the exception of the face covering order um and the caveat that was given to that is that once um i believe i'm stating this correctly dr lambert correct me if i'm wrong once
05470 percent of the adult population is vaccinated then the face covering or the mask order would also be lifted is that correct dr lambert yes it is okay so i guess we're not there i don't know exactly what the number is someone mentioned 54 earlier um so i my assumption is that once we reach that point which hopefully we will reach that point then then that means that we would be able to uh to remove that mass requirement uh but but technically at this point it is um it's still a state order and so we don't have that's not really a board decision the board isn't permitted to to waive that requirement since it is a state order so do you envision thank you for that do you envision us voting on this again in
055june after that you know kind of memorial day time frame and then if we reach that threshold and the mass order changes potentially voting again at that point like just to keep this updated yeah i mean i i just trying to think about like just for people to know like at what points it may be that we're voting on this today and then there's another opportunity to be voting again as things keep changing i know that we originally were voting on this once a month you know for other reasons but it seems like now it makes sense to be voting on frequently because things keep changing constantly yeah so i think everything that you just said is spot on accurate and the piece that i would add to it is the state doesn't require formal
056board approval in order for changes to be made in between board votes so let's say hypothetically that we get to the point call it in two weeks uh where where that the mask order is lifted then you know it's something that we could discuss at the committee meeting the next committee meeting it wouldn't require a formal vote as long as that direction uh or authorization is provided to the administration then of course we would we would implement that just like we did a bonafide quarantine on april 26th okay that's really helpful thank you you're welcome anybody could i just say that the language requiring us to have this come back to the board every month is still in the current plan yeah just a question about the the state or lifting of the orders besides
057the masks and impeding on the education the social distancing uh six feet three feet four feet um what was the uh did they lift any kind of distance measurements or change alterate that also i don't know that there was ever an order per se on distance and dr lambert i'm looking at you to see if i'm missing something there i believe those were always a recommendation which is why in the plan we've consistently had six feet to the extent feasible or something along those lines um so that's why we've you know we've had five feet we've had four feet we've you know whatever it's been from classroom to classroom or or venue to venue uh so yeah come may 31st which is you know memorial day uh so come come technically june 1st the first
058day of school thereafter uh the only order from the state that will still be in place is the mask order and that's assuming that it hasn't been lifted by that point so but based upon what was ordered what was uh issued on tuesday all other orders uh crowd size gatherings indoor outdoor uh etc all those orders have been lifted effective as of may 31st okay thank you because i just want to make sure we're keeping an eye on the distance where we can help to basically it's impeding on the education of the social distancing so whenever we can look at that and we're not concrete on six feet but it'll be interesting to move forward uh keeping our eyes on it for eating and getting the kids in next year you know and and so
059it's not you know the statistics and the information is constantly changing and i'd also ask that as we make these uh changes to do the best we can to take step forwards back to normal to keep in place in on the draft table all the info all the things we've learned from the current situation that we've been through because i truly believe for one reason or another we could experience something else where we'll be right back to where we were i hope that doesn't happen but i want to be totally prepared for it and so all that investments that we did uh this year to be as successful as we have been when it comes to remote learning and the options i want to keep that on the forefront as we move forward to understand
060hey we got to have plan a b and c ready to go then to say we're surprised and can't move forward that would be my my my suggestion as trying to give some guidance on how we move forward i just appreciate the opportunity to be able to say that thank you mr doggo anybody else mr tate please thank you mr solomon i agree completely with mr haraldaga we we really have to learn from what we've experienced over the past year plus and i think we've seen that on a consistent basis i mean the way the administration our leadership has refined our approach to managing education and logistics and everything else during the pandemic i think reflects the fact that it's continual learning and i think we'll build on it going forward i'm very confident um
061i'll vote against this change simply because i'm not a fan of modified quarantine at the same time i'm confident our administration is going to implement it very effectively you know the team has done a wonderful job with the health and safety plan and managing what's going on in our schools still i'm not a fan of modified quarantine so i will vote against him thank you sir anybody else just a quick question since we put this in place april 26th um what is the landscape like with this in place dr lambert you want to speak to that piece if you can the impact that we expect to see is that the number of students who would be out of school because of a full quarantine would decrease the so that that is what happened now we
062have many many more kids that are on a modified quarantine so they're not required to miss school although we have some families that elect to do so regardless um in general our current numbers are on the decrease as they are across the state our numbers today we had no positive cases of student or staff and the number of contacts was with the modified quarantine was smaller and let me tell you that was a great email to receive with no positive cases when that came through yes yeah and i think we're again we're learning as we walk through this i think i think the fact that we've been as proactive as any school district in the area has been fascinating um i've been saying for two months i want mass off kids at recess um to
063me i've said it every kid's body reacts differently i was coaching a softball tournament this weekend one of my girls who was not wearing a mask went in to an asthmatic situation thank god i had my wife there who was a nurse to tend to her she had no mask on i don't want the phone call when the kid goes down on the reese sorry uh i texted you but you may not have seen it sorry i did not thank you two things that's okay for i have two questions or or or two things here the first is way back when this started in the dead of the night we were forced to sign an attestation form um mr cox might be the perf i i at some point i'm going to move to destroy
064that in fact i'll drive it to harrisburg and light it on fire in the steps of the capitol um where does that stand and what do we need to do to end our beholdenness to the the state mr cox do you know and if not you can get back to me dr thorward i believe that the governor's announcement stated that that attestation requirement would fall away on the 31st with the other mitigation protocols that will be lifted and i would expect that there will be further guidance forthcoming um this month regarding that and yes that's my understanding as well dr thorwardt and my apologies i was remiss and not mentioning that earlier when i gave a summary of it okay i i i have never forgiven the state for that so i just want to
065make sure that that goes away permanently um i think mr salomon took my thunder on kids at recess and we'll table that until after this vote if we could please are you good doctor from here uh uh un until this vote's done then i've got a motion okay thank you sir all right madam secretary i have a roll call for the health insurance uh solomon i have a question please oh i apologize that's okay i also texted you but you should pay more attention to your phone no i'm telling you right now that oh there it is it just came through now okay no problem i was joking um mr cox i think this question is for you regarding the lifting of the mask mandate and how it applies to our health and safety plan
066or the actions of council rock couldn't the board direct or vote to direct the administration to remove the mass mandate for the for the district once it's removed from the governor's office is that something we can do in preparation so we don't have to reconvene we don't have to wait yes uh well let me say this the mask mandate remains in effect and is a lawful uh binding uh order on on the district um i guess the only hesitation i have mr bilac is to sort of make that decision in a vacuum where you don't where where none of us know the the date on which that order might be lifted or or the the context or details of it you know as a lawyer i tend to try to avoid making decisions in a
067vacuum like that but yes you you could uh but um [Music] there might be reasons to to defer it until you until you hear how the governor is going to modify that that order or the secretary of health okay thank you anybody else and i'll give it a pause check your phone i'm looking it's a blank screen mister dog are you good i'm counting to three how are you all right madam secretary roll call on the health and safety plan please ms edward tate no mike thor only because of modified quarantine yes denise brooks yes marion mickey yes joe hidalgo yes see kristen marcel yes it's solomon yes andy block yes mark pilot yes yes 81. dr forward i'll give you back the floor please thank you um at this point i'd like to make
068a motion i moved to uh change the health and safety plan to remove the mass mandate for children at recess or any outdoor physical activity regardless of the temperature from this point forward open for a second second second thank you mr bialik for a second mr uh salomon like you i agree it's time if it's okay at 80 degrees it's okay it's 60 degrees they're outside they're running around we heard some parents talk today we're not the first school district to do this in the area and i i did do some research and the bucks county department of health is okay with this too so long as kids are up and moving and not just clustered sitting on the floor somewhere you use the term physical act like a formal book yes you've talked to
069them as well thank you any board discussion on this mrs marcel yeah go ahead let's have a clarifying question so dr thor in your motion are you saying that all students during recess would would be able to not wear a mask or are you saying that just the ones that are moving like i'm just trying to make sure if if there's something from listen listen they're either running around playing soccer football basketball or they're six feet apart they should be able to take up take their mask off when they're outside it's time um i don't i don't have a problem with mandating mass when they're sitting in a corner on the on the pavement playing with their phones if they're next to each other but we can spread them out outside and and uh and
070should and should give them the break thank you and nishamni is currently doing this can someone does anyone know this question yeah champion he begins that model on monday oh they're beginning it on monday they haven't done it yet okay that's a question about more details so basically mr oldago please thank you so we're talking about getting um taking the masks off when you're six feet apart right and you're moving i mean we're going to have to kind of get some kind of moving or moving okay you can't be six feet apart playing soccer right so you don't want to get active and if you're still and you're within without six feet apart that's kind of like the original quarantine that's the original mask mandate or the suggestions that we had from yes from from
071the board of health locally so that's kind of going back to the original um just i have a question about enforcement and what happens when somebody's basically sitting still and the who's going to measure are we going to have some kind of leniency here is it the honor system or people going to be written up yeah i said okay you're too close because i'm i'm pretty good about it i mean i i live by that rule pretty much if i don't have a mask on i'm not getting close to somebody else you know outside and i think the kids go ahead joe they're like a first grader is not going to think about six feet we're just going to have to treat them like children again i sorry but we are we're going to have
072to treat them like kids and and do the best we can it's time i i just don't want to see this policy become some kind of harsh discipline i agree with you i agree with you and and right now what what dr frazier put out it was was as good-spirited and and as as as well as he could do it but it's subject to interpretation at every school and it's going to be different at every school and and this just cleans it up you don't have to wear a mask if you want to go ahead i don't particularly have a problem with people wearing a mask if they want to but we're talking about little children here they want to go on a sliding board they want to run around they want to kick balls
073they want to throw balls let's let them without a mask on okay what about adults i don't mean do we care about this no i don't think so because every adult in that school has had an opportunity to be vaccinated they can and they're adults they can do whatever they want yeah we're not mandating they take it off either right i think this motion applies to uh to students just the students okay and um i i don't see um i think i could support this just want all the details that's all hey mike are you are you singing across the board at every level or are we focusing on a certain level here just for clarification purposes i i i i said recess i i have another motion coming for outdoor phys ed because i
074had a bunch of middle schoolers ride by me on bicycles wearing masks again this week which is nuts outside um but that's my second motion for right now it's recess i don't think we offer recess beyond sixth grade so uh i just had a quick question so i'm sorry i was just going to talk um do we know if other schools and school districts are doing that at the secondary like it just would be helpful to to know i think just to have a sense of like what other districts are doing how they're wording their motions like just i i i want to be a leader mrs marcel i'm not not a follower so i'm going to lead here and if if we're fast and loose with them a little bit we can refine them
075i i i trust our administration but let's make a movement to in this direction mr ellman may ask a question to the makers mrs mckay yes please thank you dr thorward is it your intention through this motion that students who are at recess sitting at a table or sitting on a bench with their friends should be required to wear their masks as well when there's less than six feet sure yes yes because they're not moving and they're not six feet apart we'll follow the spirit of the governor's order here for the record yeah the governor's order provides for face coverings indoors and outdoors with others who are not members of a person's household and unable to maintain sustained physical distance so criteria for not wearing a mask outdoors or unless you're eating in a restaurant
076yes that's true too so can rob restate that please i i don't know about dr thorpe but i could not hear what he said the order with respect to face coverings requires them indoors generally and outdoors when uh the wearer is with others who are not members of that person's household and unable and unable to maintain sustained physical distance that's the that's what the order provides so you know i don't think the governor's order really makes a distinction between recess or phys ed it's it's outdoors and so maybe framing the motion around that criteria is is a way forward dr thorward are you are you interested in one encompassing motion or do you want to do separate motions i i want children who are outside to be able to take their masks off mr cox
077tell me how we do that and i also want the board to decide this not dr frazier because i would like to give him cover because the governor could pull his certificates for being a superintendent and that's not what i want to happen here i want the board to take a stand here and say when kids are outside and it's hot like it is now it's summertime and 400 plus days into this thing it's time to take the mass off so um however you want to approach that but i'm i'm insisting now with a second to get a vote if mr cox would like to rephrase this so that it's just anything outdoors it's troubling to me when i see seventh and eighth graders driving by my street in a phys ed class on a
078bicycle wearing masks why are we doing that to children if someone can tell me why i'm i'm happy to entertain it but we we we can go there so mr selma may i yes mrs mckay uh dr thorward i think what we're we're struggling with right now is not so much um the validity of your emotion but perhaps the framework of your emotion in other words i believe you addressed strictly recess and physical activity at recess and i think what we may be trying to craft is an encompassing motion that would also include phys ed classes that's what i think i'm hearing i'll take it further and say if they're outdoors they can take their masks off would that help i don't care what grade it is outdoors with mask off if they're within six
079feet of another mask must be on just just something the order requires masks outdoors when they are unable to maintain physical distance so all right the motion could just develop doctor the motion we can forward we can follow the order and let these kids do their thing and we're already doing it with some of our sports a lot of our sports teams you know sports teams outside of school and i would imagine the schools are you guys are dealing with kids taking mass off during recess anyway as as it is yeah if they're six feet apart they're already prepared so if that's already happening to some extent then this is just uh an acknowledgement of of that and and i think to dr thorwart's point it's a bit symbolic um you know if we're going
080to be outside and they're going to be playing sports and they're you know it's going to be hot and they're going to be socially distanced and that's what the order calls for then it doesn't sound like we're in violation of that and it makes sense to me um i'm hearing something different actually go ahead mike dr thor please sorry but i'm sorry sorry to interrupt i apologize but um you're not six feet apart when you're playing soccer or football so sorry i'm outside of athletics i don't disagree with that dr forward all right i want to make a stand here mr block um you know and and it's time to start taking this back for kids the the order doesn't refer to six feet it's it says it says um the masks can be removed
081outdoors when folks are are able to maintain physical distance yeah but that physical distance also has some time limit on it which is you know which makes activity kind of screw that up pretty good doesn't it can i make a recommendation um sure violet mr cox would would would you how comfortable would you be with just pausing for a moment and drafting a motion that includes all grades uh all students to to allow them uh you know with the idea of what dr thor is trying to accomplish so that we can uh vote affirmative or vote around the board uh whether we want this to go forward or not does that make sense i'm i'm happy to take a shot at that dr thor what do you have um other items that you're trying to
082add in or is it is that common this is it that this is a sum and substance of trying to move the needle on giving kids their lives back i'm happy if if you'd like to take a crack at it so it's not convoluted and complicated perfect i'll wait and i if you can email it to me or text it to me i'll re-read it and uh i'm in my motion why doesn't why don't i take a shot at that and speak for 30 seconds with dr lambert and uh the board can continue with their business is that okay doctor i don't have a problem with that i'd be appreciative yes sorry for now good yeah i can always make it again if if if rob doesn't come up with one that's fine i'm working
083diligently here yeah that's fine all right i guess we'll move to uh letter g mrs brooks are you update please uh thank you um decided for my report that i would switch the focus and talk this time about some lesser known things about the iu since we talk about legal things and some of the common things that we see in schools um april was the month of the young child so the iu board received an overview of the early childhood programs that they administer um i don't know that everyone is aware that the iu provides high quality preschool programs and services to nearly 4 000 eligible children and their families prior to the time that they enter kindergarten the iu currently serves about 3 000 children in special ed services through preschool early intervention 387
084students through head start and 315 students through pre-k counts so with the programs they have the iu is supporting students in this county virtually from birth into adulthood the other thing i wanted to share was that the iu has just off launched a career ready bucks website that's careerreadybucks.org this is a free service to bucks county school districts students and businesses that's intended to enable students and or their teachers and school counselors to make connections with local businesses through which they can share experiences designed to inspire and develop an understanding of future career opportunities experiences that businesses can offer can include being a speaker participating in a career day providing an internship opportunity or job or offering job shadowing opportunities first phase of this process is to register register school districts this summer there will
085be outreach to uh local businesses and this site will fully launch this fall so another example of the great work and leadership of our iu great stuff thank you mr brooks letter h bit i understand mrs mckay you're giving the update thank you thank you mr salmon the mbit exec council met on april 12th and the bulk of our meeting was consumed with discussions about capital improvement projects we expect to be moving forward with repairs and replacements to two sections of the roof over the summer with more roofing repairs to come and also a project involving paving around the building and while we we had those sort of nuts and bolts issues before us i am very happy to bring to you some really exciting news about the performance of mbit students at the skills
086skillsusa state competition mbit students earned a total of 16 medals at the state competition uh 12 of which were gold medals and those recipients wanted to represent pennsylvania at the national competition in june so once again tremendous job done by mbit and our students and in addition to that also very excited to report to you that the national technical honor society inducted four council rock students of a very high honor and i'd like to recognize by name jack hammond from council rock north mason horner from council rock south mason shores from council rock south and john urban from council rock south for this very high achievement congratulations to all of our students that concludes my report thank you ma'am letter i oh sure congratulations to those four students from the nba for the national uh
087technical honor society i know two of them really closely and it's really awesome so good job everybody yeah fantastic stuff letter i mr tate please craft thank you mr solomon i have good news to report about the third annual council rock golf classic on may 19. uh it is essentially sold out and i think that's a wonderful triumph and we'll have a lot of fun and afterward we'll provide a full report to the board as to how the golf outing went particularly i think we'll focus on well you'll dispense with the report then i suppose you don't need a report after the golf outing unless you want to give one all right we'll play it by ear love to hear about golf we'll play it by here that concludes my that concludes my report thank
088you sir mr cox do you want to go back to that or we uh sure uh dr thorward i don't know how this will strike you but i wrote a motion that says motion to revise the health and safety plan to require students to wear a face covering outdoors only when they are unable to maintain sustained physical distance okay i can work with that um um mr bilik what do you think you you second in my motion are you are you okay it feels a little vague to me but i'll trust the administration to make sure that the message gets out of what the intent of the motion is um so that kids running around exerting will not be required to wear a base cover i i happen to think so as well i think
089we made our point fairly clear anybody watching this should see it so um i'd like to amend my motion is that how do you like to do it mr cox sure why don't you just adopt what i read as your motion dr thor work sure i'd like to adopt what mr cox just read as my current motion subject to a second second second uh mr adago got a second in there uh well i think i just point of order i think i actually have to amend my second that's you have to mend it all right we'll give it back to mr barlock sorry mr doggo sorry joe it doesn't really matter anyway i had a question for mr cox if i could mr douglas would you please repeat the motion motion to revise the health
090and safety plan to require students to wear face covering outdoors only when they are unable to maintain sustained physical distance and when it comes to playing soccer how does that look is that going to be breaking the rules when they're kicking and taking the ball it would be unlikely during when students were playing soccer that they would ever be closer to each other for closer than six feet to each other for more than 15 minutes okay yeah absolutely so we're talking about the time limit is fantastic word maintain i think becomes yes in this scenario the the kids who would be wearing masks are the kids who are sitting together at a picnic table chatting okay yeah thank you sorry mrs brooks did you have a comment no i just wanted to hear the motion
091one more time thank you anybody else have a question just real quick thank you mr cox i i i appreciate the um the tweaking of my motion that they're they're coming on the fly and i appreciate mr bye like uh you know raining me in a little bit and making it happen so thank you you work diligently on it too by the way i believe you i believe you madame secretary we're going to go to a roll call on this if there's no other comments mr bailek are you good i am good thank you madam secretary roll call please um marianne mckee yes yes dr thor absolutely yes andy block yes denise brooks yes mark beileck yes joe hidalgo yes this is 9-0 if if i may thank you to my fellow board members it's
092time i i'm glad we uh we had this discussion we we are a big school district in pennsylvania and we are leaders let's lead and i appreciate all your support and help with this thank you yeah right well thank you to the administration to roll the next phase of this out and and for the kids you know do what you're supposed to do on this when you're out doing your thing and parents get on board with it as well if you could i'm going to move the finance committee mr bayek please thank you we had a finance committee uh last on april 15th we talked about a lot of things we approved the middle bucks institute of technology proposed budget resolution and we had an update on the 2122 budget development we also spent a
093lot of time going through uh the assumptions of our five year projections it was a i think a really great exercise that gave mr stone some good direction on those assumptions and before mr stone reports i i just want to acknowledge that uh on our list of personnel actions tonight was um we voted on mr stone's resignation now i know mr stone being the person he is he's not going to want a lot of comment about this around the table um but uh but i think it has to be said that he's done a fantastic job in the short time he's been here and we appreciate it we're going to miss him greatly so with that i'll um turn it over to mr stone for an update if he has any updates uh i don't
094have much to add mr bialik just that we will continue the budget process with a discussion at the finance committee meeting next week on the final budget and then approval on june 3rd very good so with that i move to approve consent agenda items b through d as contained in the attachments to this agenda second for that please second second and forward any discussion any objection madam secretary i want to ask you to record the motion passing with unanimous consent you move it along there mr barlock moving on to bus routes so i moved to approve the 2021 fourth market period bus routes subject to adjustment modification as determined by the administration to be necessary and appropriate to ensure the safety and efficiency of the transportation operation during the school year have a second second
095mrs marcel any discussion objection or hearing none i'm going to ask the secretary to record the moshe's passing with unanimous consent keep it going mr barlock letter f please last item i believe i moved to approve a donation of photography equipment and supplies from a council rock south alumni uh to and a council rock south teacher okay second mrs marcel with a second any discussion any objection who's that thank you thank you absolutely yes thank you right all right hearing none we're going to ask the secretary to record the motions passing with united's consent we did gnh earlier in the evening i please thank you i moved to approve the edrpp assignments payments and the edrpp coordinator assignment slash payments as contained in the attachments to this agenda second second mrs marcel any discussion on
096this yeah if i may please please dr thorward um i'm going to be a voting no on this um we heard from a council rock student this week about some it's not doing much or anything at all um i look through this there are very few of these that aren't being paid even though um everything's been virtual um i recognize people doing the best they can but i i i can't be i i'm just not there with famous so okay anybody else can he explain a little more dr thorward mr oldago is asking you to go into a little bigger detail on your explanation sir if you don't mind if you don't mind no no sure sure i'll i'll i'll um mr o'dogger you received the same email i did it was from a student
097who didn't get to perform in any theater production this year because of covet basically if they didn't happen i recognized that kova didn't happen i recognize that there's reasons for this um but we're paying full stipends to things that you know either kind of happened or didn't really happen or happened virtually i recognize the teachers are doing their their best for this and the people that get these edr pps do this but um you know we keep talking about budgets and we keep talking about spending and you know if if we're not given the full monty here in terms of uh um what's expected or what's typical for these these clubs organizations whatever um i i i'm not sure that that we should be paying them um that's just me uh i i i'll stand
098alone here but uh i'm i i can't go there without some detailed effort in terms of and there's no time so i'll lose this one um with you know what did we do this year versus other years you know and for for some of these i bet it's it it's 10 times as much work for others i don't know that we we did i i don't know and i can't vote for something if i don't know so i'm gonna stay there please mr dogger thank you mr thorward because you know i think i can support your concern about that email and when it's appropriate maybe we should talk about i'd like to know i think the public asked the email the students are entitled to know why uh certain activities were allowed it's probably because
099of indoors and indoors and not being able to keep that social distance but anyway let me finish but as far as um as far as these some of these payments that i always thought that's this is probably a good time to mention that some some of these um [Music] some of these total payments just seem you know somewhere where we could we have people who volunteer to do this stuff for nothing and we are paying a lot of money here for maybe it's contractual or something but i think it's something that uh we should uh we should look into because uh you know this is part of where we pay a lot of money where we could actually if we could change things around here i know people that would volunteer to love to be
100active and be part of the thing but uh so i think i'm going to jump along for the for those two reasons with dr thorward on on this is something we need to look at uh moving forward thank you thank you mr dog anybody else i have a comment yeah mrs brooks please so and these are con contractual things and i have absolutely no hesitation to support the efforts of these professionals in executing the work they did it is not their fault that there were limitations placed on them and that some of their activities had to be done virtually or in a different manner i applaud the efforts of every person that will receive the payment for these efforts uh in trying to bring some normalcy and the extra things that make school better uh
101was it perfect no but it is a situational thing based on circumstance and i'm hopeful that we can return uh to what we you know want these programs to be in the future but i want to thank every single person on this list for the efforts that they've done and i will happily support it thank you mr brooks anybody else mrs marcel um i just had a quick question uh dr frazier in terms of next year and some of the activities if we're looking at school hopefully you know kind of being a return to normal in a sense um some of these activities may have a little bit more of a feel similar to that i'm assuming i didn't know if you had any thoughts on you know just if people are thinking more about
102activities for the year given that you know we only have like a month or so left yep absolutely i think as we look ahead to the 21 22 school year not only can we expect the school day to return to a real sense of normalcy but i would say all extracurriculars whether they're athletic or theater or club based uh whatever they the nature might happen to be we will be returning to a definite sense of normalcy in the fall thank you another question i have a question for uh maybe uh maybe for our solicitor the good mr cox thank you um so it's contractual these these things that we uh these positions are filled contractually by staff um maybe sometimes uh there's a hard somebody might take it that doesn't want it really but there's
103nobody else to fill it so they're gonna do it i mean this does happen from time to time uh in life um my question is i think we should abide by the contracts and that's not my point here i want to be a man of of rule and and follow the laws of contracts but is there something that we can look at in the future if not already able can we open it up to community volunteers who do the background checks and do the same thing for all the volunteers maybe we have some very talented people who can bring some skill sets that are really going to benefit the children in many ways so my suggestion is if not now but to put it out there now to to be able to offer these positions
104to people who who qualify through background checks that bring some great skills and may even do it for as a volunteer position you know that i think we should for the benefit of this of the students we we should probably open this up to more people in the future i'm sure we're locked into a contract now but it's something that i'm just putting out there because i thought about it when i came on board mr cox is that something we can do now or in the future mr hidalgo i i would rather advise you and the board on that question in an executive session because it is a labor negotiation matter and and a collective bargaining matter so at this point we can't i'd rather just not advise you and that's fine okay thank you
105it's something that i can advise the board in executive session on or the the district's labor council could advise the board on an executive session and that's a better place to do it they're good i hope it was okay for me to ask the question sure all right and mr hidalgo if i may just to add an aspect not from a legal sense but from a practical standpoint with the existing uh contract that's in place most of these uh edrpp extracurricular assignments uh do get awarded to consort faculty and staff members but not all of them do so you're questioning about community members being awarded some of these some of the folks who are on the list to be approved this evening do not work for the school district otherwise so just so you know
106that is already the case now as a former teacher and as a former principal and now superintendent i have a certain bias towards wanting staff members to hold many of these positions because there is a mentorship component and just a relationship component that transcends the sport or transcends the the activity whatever it happens to be but uh with that said there are certainly times uh whether it's because we don't have staff members who are interested or uh in certain cases because the best candidate of course is is a community member who otherwise isn't employed with us so so that's the case now that's been the case in the past and i'm sure it'll continue to be in the future as well oh that's great that's great see that's a good point and point take point
107taken mike my question i see that actually because i recollect that some other you know school district professionals would be there but you know work in in our district as a coach or something or does it do we advertise if i may if i may i'm sorry to jump in but because i'm not there it's just hard to interject but if i may we we do have volunteers as well who partner with our edr ppp staff in many capacities and athletics and in other aspects so we we do have a number of volunteers all with clearances all who have been vetted by our office who are already a part of some of our activities thank you thank you uh when would we have a disc when would be appropriate to have that discussion uh about
108the no plays are oh oh i'm sorry this is uh miss taylor no i'm okay thank you i'll just move on good yep okay anybody else yes please mr block please you know while we're having a debate about whether to pay edrpp or not it is contractual i want the public to understand as well during this pandemic uh the edrpp program was uh you know obviously impacted and to mike's point some were working twice as hard others were making it work but but let's not forget that the the staff who are ours uh did did contribute in an 18-month pay freeze with almost five million dollars worth and give back so i think you know it's it's important that we just you know when we're looking at that contract that we look at in a
109balanced way you know i do and i brought this up years ago and i believe it's contractual as well non-employee non collective bargaining union employees do receive piezers on top of their on top of their payments and not for discussion today but that's always kind of been something that you know i felt like was was worth discussing not our staff you know the other thing i like about edrpp for our staff is you know when you start to look at uh the range of salaries uh that we have and uh the the the amount of uh the smaller amount is mckee helping out here of teachers coming out of school we're gonna need to be competitive as we as we move forward you know with our salaries on the bottom end while balancing uh the
110the the top end because we're going to need to recruit and retain top talent coming in when there's a lot less coming out so um you know my point isn't about just pay more more more my my point is utilize these other programs that we have to work in partnership uh with with uh you know with with our folks to uh to come up with the best solutions that are best for them and best for the district thank you sir anybody else yes please i have a question yeah please yeah mr stone can you uh tell me what the total amount is of this um this payment i i'm sorry if i'm if it's obvious i'm not seeing it i i can't unfortunately do it um off the top of my head mr bialik but
111i can i can look it up and advise the board in just a few moments i suggest i suggest moving on however because i um may take more than a few moments okay very good thank you madam secretary roll call with this please kristen marcel yes ed solomon yes andy black yes mark pilot yes yes mike no denise brooks yes mary [Music] and mr bye like finish up with jay please yes i moved to approve the appointment of cheryl rebecch rabbinic uh as i'm so sorry if that's uh not correct as school board treasurer for a one-year term and until a successor is appointed second mrs marcel ii any discussion or objection right hearing none i'm going to ask the secretary to move to record the motions passing unanimous consent from there yes mr stone
112please the fiscal year to date uh spending on edrpp is 1.28 million dollars that is just the salary expense that does not include any of the fringe benefits that uh would be paid on top of that one more time mr stone please if you would 1.28 million dollars for our current fiscal year that we're in right now 2021. mr bilock did you hear that i did thank you um yeah thank you i have just one more announcement about the finance finance committee before we move on uh solomon uh so the next finance committee will be next thursday night the 13th at our normal starting time 7 00 pm and that will be via zoom so the majority of the or more of the public will have an opportunity to participate and view the slides as
113they can be difficult to view on youtube yeah thank you mr bilock it's a good choice on that it's one zoom meeting i have no problem backing so you can read everything um mr tate we're gonna move down the facilities you have a uh committee report i'll just note that we did not need to have an april meeting because our workload was light our next meeting will be may the 20th thank you sir there i'll move to board new business mrs marcel just briefly wanted to echo dr frazier's thoughts in terms of teacher appreciation week i thought it was just wonderful what you said and i also wanted to thank all of the ptos because they've been doing an extreme amount of work that i've seen on social media we've gotten emails from people just
114have heard a lot from just people in the community and so i just wanted to thank the ptos i know that this year has been very difficult from a fundraising perspective for them and and so i just wanted to thank them and to echo dr frazier's you know comments about our wonderful staff thank you thank you any other new business from the board i have a comment mr violet in addition to teacher appreciation next week is law enforcement national police week law enforcement appreciation in the past we've had our officers who served the districts out to show their appreciation but i just want to say that while we're not doing that this year i hope we can we do that next year and uh and though i won't be on the on the board i
115hope it continues but i want to say i appreciate not only the officers who serve directly in our schools but all the ones in our area and all throughout the united states you know we lose officers every day unfortunately and it's a it's a significant problem so i just want to appreciate publicly each and every officer that serves yeah i'll second that mark um uh you know because if we have a problem at the school it's not just the resource officer that's coming it's it's it's everyone it's all hands and uh it's important that we we recognize that thanks and uh yeah just uh just to make sure that we have clarity around this and and mr bolick i'll certainly suck in your thoughts as well our appreciation runs runs very very deep with not
116only our sros but with all four of our chiefs and the entirety of all four of these police departments without a doubt um we actually um and this was the preference of our four chiefs we if you you might recall that we actually halted the practice of having her officers come in for an actual meeting a couple years ago so the last time that that happened was in may of 2018 since we started monthly threat assessment team meetings with our chiefs uh and other first responders which continues to this day in fact we had our most recent meeting this past friday afternoon uh we uh at their at their request and at their preference we've we still issue certificates um i have this on my on my uh to do list or my agenda for
117superintendent's report in the june meeting uh just since we haven't technically gotten to that week yet we will as you said next week but just to make sure that the community is clear on this piece that we last year of course was coveted but even the year before we we stopped the practice of having the officers come in while on duty or off duty in the evening and pulling people off the uh off the streets or off the beat and that was again that was that was their preference thank you sir mr douglas another comment yeah sure i wasn't sure if this was new business or old business but i had a couple questions regarding i guess the superintendent's report and some comments that were made from the public regarding um the diversity and equity
118study program that we're getting into uh as i said was the sole no vote for that because i have a lot of questions about uh you know a lot of the same questions that the public uh member i don't remember what his name was was mentioned i'm kind of interested that he said that because i wasn't planning on asking anything tonight but one about that but i did have a question when it brought up like basically um you had mentioned something about not holding people kids back or something and so um you know i feel like in my situations where i've been involved with my own students that there was this very strong almost a policy of we don't want to hold kids back right and i've had experience in my family with other other
119people that i know and i've never heard one person complain of being held back in as an adult saying i've heard people complain that wishing or making a wish that somebody would have put them in pre-first or would have put them back a year would have set them up for for bigger success so i guess my question is um i i don't look at holding students back as a failure of the school district but as the as as a result or a function of the individual's need that may not be developing at the same rate as everybody else and one of the biggest legs up you could ever give one of these students is giving them another extra year of education i i'm a strong believer of that so i wanted to make my position
120known to you and then ask if that was something that we were that you were focusing on as part of this interest group because it kind of was mentioned and i'm just trying to get more understanding of what the goal is with that or what your feelings are i think we're talking apples to oranges right when i said held back i wasn't referencing grade retention okay so this is a study um as you know relative to uh our course placement of students into level classes so what we don't want to see is if we have a student who is um worthy deserving of being in an ap class we want them in ap class if they're worthy deserving of being in an honors class we want them in an honors class so when i said
121held back i mean we don't want them in in honors if they should be an ap we don't want them in a you know a grade level course if they should be an accelerated et cetera it's not apples and oranges again well it's quite all right but no because i think you ask and i'm and i'm glad to have the point made out about the elementary uh level uh reten grade retention but to your to your point um are we how do we know that this is an issue i would think that we're already taking care of everybody that needs to and where are we seeing the warning signs that this is as a problem that we were doing kind of that gentleman's uh question of where are the statistics what where that we're currently
122having a problem with diversity and equity within our school district you know mr hidalgo i i until you do a study like this and it has to be i want to make two points because both of these have been brought up in the past so one is can't we do this ourselves and the answer is absolutely not because we we would be applying inherent bias because we're studying and analyzing ourselves so it has to be an outside group this is the most reputable outside group that we can have and and the other piece is you know can't we just go pick up a study that's been done for another school district and again the answer is absolutely positively no because every school district is different our practice are first of all our courses are different
123than other school districts our practices for making teacher recommendations or prerequisites for those courses are different from other school districts our demographics are different our teacher demographics are different um there are nuances all like just weaved all throughout the system and the piece around equity is you don't understand especially at a deep level until you do a study so in my opinion and it's i i'm very i'm very strong in this opinion and very impassioned in this opinion this is twenty thousand dollars that um frankly if the board didn't pass it that night i would have paid for it myself that's how strongly i feel about this because when we say every student every day we main every student every day all means all and we need to put our money where our mouth is
124and make sure that no kids are slipping through the cracks i don't care who those kids are i don't care what their race is what their ethnicity is what their gender is what their faith is no kid should be slipping through the cracks and we don't know that we don't understand it much less be able to do something about it until the study is actually conducted so if this if we're not going to spend 20 000 on this i don't know what we're going to spend 20 thousand dollars on well i agree with everything you just said uh my question that i would like to ask then what what other organiz as this gentleman had asked it's a good question what other organizations did that are comparable to the u pen organization did we uh
125did we investigate or or did you investigate and why you pen over the others and uh and i'll let you do it because i have one more question but i know miss mckee is going to want to speak so i'm just going to say i want to look at the diversity of the group that's doing the work to myself because it's equity diversity i want to make sure that all spectrums are are uh are it's not a bias group because sometimes you can get bias and so we just i just want some validation that's all because i told you i was a little worried you know our country's divided right now and i don't want one side being represented more than the other you know we're going to get because we're pretty uh diverse from
126you know right down the middle type of school district and i think when we do this diversity plan it's good to know where the panel's coming from make sure all sides are are giving the input and that's all i ask for but i'll let you ask the other question about what other ones you looked at and why we chose that one yeah as i mentioned earlier i spent 90 minutes before our meeting this evening with this group of people both from dv cee as well as the team the external team that they have assembled there are um superintendents from other districts in the delaware valley who are part of this team there are diversity coordinators from school districts as part of this team there are folks from private industry and they represent the broad swath
127of diversity that exists in in society as well as that exists in the council rock school district i don't have i don't personally have any concerns with that whatsoever in fact um after after meeting all of these folks i i i have a relationship with some i met some for the first time i am just extremely extremely grateful that these folks are giving of themselves to participate in the study over the next two weeks and i think that i think everyone should know that why dvcee why penn because we actually belong to that consortium so the board approves that contract that we have with the consortium uh i attend professional development sessions uh other members of the cabinet members of the faculty attend we uh there are a couple student functions as well dvcee helps
128us with a diversity career fair uh that they hold that we partake in so there are a number of you know i would say aspects to this relationship with dv cee but it's uh they they're the they're certainly the best in this area um and i don't i'm not sure who would who would quibble with that well i'm very glad that you explained that to the public that's having questions about that and we have a partnership with the university so this is not the beginning of it so i appreciate you letting me ask the questions and answering the questions honestly your heart's in the right way right place and thank you thanks mr doggo thank you mr dog mrs mckay please thank you i'll be brief but mr hidalgo i just wanted to add to
129that that dr frazier very graciously allowed me to join in the first meeting with this group uh so their word representation there i was very impressed with their level of professionalism and expertise the quality of the work that was produced within that session to me was very significant i also praised the representation of council rock teachers and administrators who really came very very ready to work with an open mind to say how do we make improvement here and in terms of questions that we've had about the necessity and did we see a need for this you know simply stated sometimes you don't know what you don't know as someone who spent a large part of my career in sixth grade making sixth grade recommendations for students moving on middle school i know firsthand how hard
130our teachers work to make the best recommendation for every single child what's in their best interest where are they really going to flourish and succeed it's something they work so hard at and take so seriously this is in no way designed to find fault with that process but rather in any way possible to assist our teachers in feeling as though we are taking into consideration every element of what will make our students successful so i feel very confident that this is money well spent and the result will be much of the benefit of our students and our staff thank you for adding and i'm glad you volunteered and i appreciate your input as always miss mckee thank you that was great thank you mr mckay mr tate promise to be very brief i i don't
131recall exactly what i've said publicly in meetings here or privately in conversations i did have a good long conversation with a parent actually now a grandparent in the district who was asking questions about this initiative and um i really feel strongly that it's critical because i think ms mckee just you know talked very eloquently about how important these decisions are in terms of recommendations for the tracks that kids go on i mean it is the beginning of determining their career track it couldn't be more important and one of the things that research and and dr fraser could talk much more knowledgeably about this than i but but the little bit i've seen there has been terrific research into unconscious bias in education um that has affected children of of all demographics including girls one of
132the things that that has been found out about a contributing factor for the for the low numbers of females in science and engineering and stem careers is because of unconscious bias in teachers and the way they treat girls in the classroom and that has that has been a factor that has been identified and addressed and you know the education community is doing a terrific job in remedying that unconscious bias and i think you know this is an opportunity for us to look and see you know very simply if there's unconscious bias in the way that we track kids it would be terrible to find out that for years we've been you know um inadvertently um letting bias drive decisions i expect we'll find that there are no serious problems but it's certainly worth investigating because
133it is really a critical matter and i i feel very fortunate that we have the relationship with the folks at u pen in this organization and um you know i'm really glad we're going forward with this initiative just one question thank you sean i'm not trying to monopolize this but does the state do anything along these lines regulating and inspecting i know we had some equality but it's probably more with like sports teams and title whatever nine or whatever it is yeah i i don't know if i would use the words regulating or inspecting for either the pen group or pde so i don't think either group does that but uh there are a number of state level initiatives around diversity equity and inclusion um particularly from a training standpoint for administrators for teachers etc
134um so it's it's certainly a focus statewide but not this particular tracking and placement of students no we're doing over over and beyond what the what the uh what the pde is looking at indeed it is okay thank you you're welcome yeah i'm excited to see what how this all rolls out and i would have been happy to spend your twenty thousand dollars by the way that was news to my wife yeah yeah honey announced it was truly symbolic i think about to call your marriage counselor he left a couple hours ago can i make a motion to make him pay for it no no okay now mr cox is done for the evening uh if there's nothing else from the board i'd like to adjourn the meeting thank you here we go see you
135in june you