001good evening everyone i'd like to order the september 28th meeting of the methecton board of school directors please rise for the pledge of the united states of america and to the republic stands one nation indivisible with liberty and justice for all the public is hereby advised of the audio and video recording of this meeting for the purposes of rebroadcasting in attendance we have everybody in attendance except for miss kim aubry larsonness now for recognition of guests and scheduled speakers dr zurby thank you madam vice president this evening we have three uh scheduled speakers uh our first one and and one of three very important ones we have nikki kralivich executive director of the matthackton education foundation here with a number of board members to present a presentation as well as a check presentation ms kolovich
002thank you all right as dr zerby said i'm nikki krelovich and i think many of the people in the room probably already know that um i'm the executive director for the matthackton education foundation when i started with the foundation three and a half years ago i never imagined the incredible programs we would be able to sport i am proud of the exponential growth and the impact that we have made to support innovative programs for math and students four years ago the foundation awarded just sixteen thousand dollars in grants this past school year we awarded four hundred and forty one thousand one hundred and twenty dollars in grants our check presentation tonight represents the programs that we funded over the past school year these programs will impact students across mythacton for years to come our 2020
0032021 grant awards include the new hydroponic farm lab which was just delivered a couple of hours ago to methachton high school by crane our new forensics lab at the high school mental health support like the reach program throughout the district the philanthropy club at arcola middle school stem kits in elementary schools the math act and backpack program feeding students in need they're the stem kits elementary school stem kits and manipulatives for our youngest learners stem ecosystems in our elementary schools there's the philanthropy club at arcola and pre-k need-based scholarships for the most vulnerable students for those who do not know the mathakton education foundation raises private dollars to provide innovative opportunities for all students in mathacton we are an independent 501 c 3 and are not affiliated with any political organizations we are able to
004do all this great work because we have innovative educators in the facton who come up with these great programs and then we have generous donors who help us to fund them as i look around the room tonight i do see many of our teachers and administrators who have not only come up with great ideas for the programs but who have donated to the foundation our school board here who donate parents who are here who donate to the foundation and i want to thank you all it truly takes a village and on behalf of the foundation and all of the students in the facton who benefit from your donations i would like to say thank you so thank you [Music] [Applause] at this point if the board directors from the fact in education foundation can can
005join us up front for a photo that would be great [Music] so oh [ __ ] so um thank you [Applause] thank you next on the agenda we have an equally important presentation and certainly things don't get done in this district without high quality caliber individuals and tonight dr jason sorgini our director of hr is going to share with you just a few of the individuals that have achieved outstanding recognition for all their efforts in making the methachton school district an important safe and enriching environment that it is so dr sorgini let's see the presentation let's recognize some really good people good evening and thank you dr zurby it's my honor tonight to present the mathan school district award of excellence to the following staff members first we have karen mossip our transportation supervisor karen mossip is
006the transportation supervisor from the thacton school district she has been the person behind the operations that may go unnoticed by many but the staff of both methachton school district and first student rely on her daily she brings a level of knowledge and experience to the school district that we draw upon regularly she is always concerned about the students experience and their safety her dedication to getting everything right helps us operate over 90 routes to over 40 different schools she is well deserving of this recognition and i can tell you that karen was actually one of the last people over the bridge on the night of the storm on germantown pike so she was here to the very end making sure that our students are safe so please join me in congratulating karen [Applause] next we
007have jang yoon jang was hired as a casual on-call custodian in february of 2016 and due to his hard work and commitment he was hired full time in may of 2016. chang is a vietnam war veteran and is the district's most senior employee zhang has worked at various buildings throughout the district during his employment and has proved himself to be an extremely reliable and dedicated employee he has not taken any sick days in five years zhang is a true team player and is always willing to go above and beyond to assist his fellow co-workers he is a valued member of the mathakton family please join me in congratulating jang yoon michelle davis our pupil services secretary michelle davis is a valued and integral part of the pupil services department team and an exemplary employee of
008the district she is responsible for many tasks and her knowledge experience and expertise allow her to perform these tasks with great accuracy michelle is a dedicated employee who takes her position and responsibilities very seriously she takes on new assignments initiates tasks offers support to staff students and families and shifts priorities to meet the needs of the department and the organization we are very fortunate to have michelle as a member of our farina team and i'm very grateful to work with her every day congratulations michelle dave dehaven our tech specialist dave dehaven has been a member of the mathactin technology department for three years on a daily basis dave brings with him professionalism patience and a problem-solving attitude when asking district staff about dave the responses are consistent they say things like dave is a great
009person and is very proactive we are so happy when dave comes to help dave is a great representative of the methacton school district the technology department and the school district are thrilled to have dave as a key piece of the team congratulations dave [Applause] ashley tornetta ashley has been with the district since being hired as a casual on-call in september of 2019. she was recently hired as a full-time custodian in may 2021 in her short time with the district ashley has proved herself to be very reliable and is a very hard worker she was asked to step up and help out at eagleville elementary school this summer and while filling in there during the construction process she became a big part of helping to ensure that the school was ready for the opening of the
010school year we're grateful to have ashley as part of our mathactin family [Applause] and finally chris de liberto chris was hired as a casual on-call in may 2003 and was hired as a full-time arcola custodian in january of 2013. chris is also a very proud math acting graduate who had awesome effect in teachers with over 10 years of experience with the school district he is very reliable and dependable chris will always go above and beyond to help everyone out chris has been filling in for the arcola and sky view head custodian this summer and we've received many emails praising his efforts and getting the buildings ready for the new school year chris needs little direction when given a task and the job is always well done we thank chris for a lifetime of dedicated service
011to mathacton please join me in a round of applause congratulating congratulating all of our september award of excellence recipients thank you very much [Applause] next on the agenda we have dr jamie graveny's high school principal to here to present m awards dr gravinis good evening everyone thank you so much for having me tonight i have the wonderful pleasure of sharing with you that 471 of our high school students earned m awards for academic excellence for the 2020-21 school year to get an m award students have to achieve a 93 percent or greater grade point average as their names scroll on the screen we will be recognizing these students at the board meeting tonight and then also having this presentation posted online so that we can celebrate their accomplishments there we go thank you congratulations students
012and parents and guardians for this great accomplishment m awards will be disseminated through our counseling office thank you thank you that does and that ends our guest and schedule speakers for this evening um i just want to make a few announcements if i could um item six the appointment of new student board representatives that action will take place following public comments and before the board meeting the approval of board meeting minutes however the next item on the agenda the oath of office is something that we're going to issue and our vice president will administer the oath of office to each of our our two new junior student board reps we have joseph shaw and serena fukori so first off serena would you please come forward serena welcome you ready okay i do solemnly swear that
013i will support obey and defend the constitution of the united states and the constitution of this commonwealth and i will discharge the duties of the office of student representative to the board with fidelity thank you joseph welcome are you ready okay i do solemnly swear that i will support obey and defend the constitution of the united states and the constitution of this commonwealth and that i will discharge the duties of the office of student representative to the board with fidelity thank you [Applause] okay welcome to the new student representatives and thank you for being here we're going to move on in the agenda with reports that are attached but we have the um a few that we're going to read out loud the dei report miss purdue do you have that you don't have that
014good evening this month's dei report we have two matters with respect to the di the district's efforts on di during the month of september 2021 sorgini has led the process for the recruitment of candidates to fill the dei supervisor position created by the school board of directors round two of the process is scheduled for friday with several members of the board and other stakeholders involved second last night there was a presentation via zoom by dr gallagher landis on a summary of the di committee recommendations this presentation is posted to the district dei section of the website this information along with feedback inputs scheduled to begin october 1st via surveys on october 21st we have focus group meetings and other important district matters will be included in the final strategic plan targeted for february and that's
015the report that we have and we'll bring more information as we progress thank you miss purdue and then we have the intermediate unit and north monco technical career center i was unable to make the last north monco tech meeting so ms reese do you have a report so first with the iu we met on august 25th and on september 22nd i was unable to make the 22nd due to my own back to school night as a teacher but um i'm just going to share two big pieces of news with for the iu the first is that um they have officially opened as of august 31st a partial hospitalization program centered around mental health for k-6 students and why that is important to us at mathacton is just the stronger riu is and the stronger montgomery
016county is in helping students with mental health issues is the better for all children that is housed in the early learning center which is the old iu on main street so we uh we're very excited about that and i believe the board received the press release about that and if you didn't let me know and i will forward it the other big piece of iu news is and i brought it up at the last meeting because of the success of pre-k counts and head start and the fact that um buildings don't have as much space they did officially go into um uh hoping to purchase that uh building in west point in order to extend their services those are the two biggest pieces for the iu um bear with me i'm like new to wearing
017readers i'm like trying to read trying to speak all at the same time i think i hit everything for the iu as far as the tech center we met on 9 20 and the tech center just like most schools did take on just a little bit of water due to ida but nothing was too serious and they were able to handle that internally and rather quickly there they did go over the audit review as well as discussing a fund balance which i think a lot of districts have been doing um and what they plan to do um there's we're still going to probably vote on it next month but they're looking to add a one-year only senior senior program and nothing is set in stone yet but one of the current programs we have is
018a one year senior only allied health and biotech which is um very popular and they're hoping to possibly add a social media and digital marketing class um and i will i have a lot of details on it but until it's official i won't share them um we had tried to expand mechatronics and due to different mostly it's very difficult to find a mechatronics professor this or teacher this is the next best thing um what else did i want to quickly share oh the other program that they're probably going to add is sports medicine and rehabilitation as of now the western center is the only program of its kind in montgomery county so if north monco added one that would be fantastic but again liz and i will let you know if that occurs um after
019next month's meeting we are still zoom and we at north monco for our meetings and we're gonna looks like we're gonna be zoom at least one more month the spacing the issue is more spacing they're using the room we usually use um four classrooms and um the the joc of the north monco is a little bit larger with two reps from each sending district and three from north penn and i think i covered everything um i think i did so i'm all finished thank you miss reece next i have a report from the student board representatives you press that in when you want to turn never rest just one when one event ends another begins the year started off enthusiastically as the school hosted several opportunities for students to socially interact after a long year
020of online learning these activities consisted of basketball dodgeball painting movie watching a chill zone and so much more during the last month the beckton warriors sports teams have gone head to head with four different schools with only one loss the girls varsity tennis team went head to head with north penn high school and won five to two on august 26th the boys varsity soccer team went up against west chester east high school and lost one to two on september 3rd the boys varsity team came back when they went up against owen j roberts winning 3-1 last but not least the boys varsity soccer went up against upper marion area high school on september 10th and won 2-0 on the basis of club gatherings save a life club oriented around charity work and helping the community
021had its first meeting september 20th after school on the same note the stem-based aerospace club's first meeting was held on september 14th until 3 p.m september 12th was the day that bus routes for student transportation changed and around the same time the traffic pattern for drop-off and pickup was adjusted all right on september 13th and 15th the ladies warriors basketball open gym trials occurred open gyms for basketball are now open every tuesday and wednesday from september 9th to november 17th in addition september 14th was the 9th and 10th grade back to school night and it ran from 7 to 9 p.m back to school night for juniors and seniors was set on september 20th from 7 to 9 pm additionally senior pictures happen on september 21st to the 23rd from 4 to 8 p.m wednesday
022september 22nd was a very special day for the factory high school students since the home dumming homecoming dance was hosted that day at elmwood park zoo from 6 30 to 8 30 pm seniors had the ability to go to this event early as a privilege after a week of spirit wear the final day of homecoming festivities consisted of a pep rally during 7th period at the high school homecoming kings and queens were selected and announced for each class during this event as well as the fall sports teams stephen kent and sarfita thurton were selected for the class of 2023 homecoming court and as for the class of 2022 troy klieger and rhys koch won to end the friday the homecoming varsity football game was first at 7 pm which the team ended up winning regarding
023future events sats are being held on october 2nd at 7 a.m picture day retakes are going to be held on october 13th from 7 30 to 11 30 am lastly almost acting sophomores and juniors will receive the opportunity to take psats on october 13th and that is it you very much and welcome to the board um next we have the foundation report mr beam or miss krelovich thank you good evening as you saw i missed the actual check because i had a dinner meeting over in fort washington that i had to rush to but that's why i came in a little bit late but you can see what the foundation has been doing you know from the prior times that i've spoken with you about what we're doing and we're very blessed we have a
024wonderful board we have a terrific executive director we have a community which is supporting our school district and we're doing great things we've come a long way we have a wonderful school board member who's been a part of our foundation in mary and mary's going to be leaving the board and we are going to miss her very much on our foundation she's been a real benefit and help to us you know also that thursday night we have our apex awards evening it's not a dinner but it's a cocktail reception at the blue bell country club and i hope that many if not all of you will be there it's going to be a fantastic evening and i just want to give you a real sort of what do they call it um i don't even
025know the expression but it's like a sneak preview i encourage you to bring a few extra tissues with you okay and this has nothing to do with your health but i have previewed the videos which have been done about our honorees two years ago we had our first event as as you know most of you were there then the honorees this year are incredibly deserving and the videos which you will see that night are amazing um i'm bringing some extra tissues for myself okay and i'm just letting the rest of you know you here and the rest of you out here if you're there um it's it's going to be something very very special and you know that we have decided that we're going to be outside in a tent and then we're going inside
026with masks i want you to know that a few people inside the room will not have masks on and i want you to understand why mark constable who is our mother wonderful mister mcfacton retired uh teacher extraordinaire at math acton has a son an adult son corey who is um completely deaf and the only way that he can communicate is if he can read lips so at their table at least i don't think they're going to be wearing masks and i just want everybody to know that that's the reason for that there's no other reason but it's just so he can communicate and we're giving him a script of the videos so that at least he can follow along somebody suggested that we do um you know subtitles um that's out of our league for
027something like this you know it's that that's sort of at a different level but this event is going to be just a wonderful celebration of everything good about what all of us here together are trying to do for math acton i look forward to seeing all of you there and we're going to celebrate we're going to have a beautiful evening right now thank goodness it's not last thursday when we had all that rain looks like we're going to have a good weather forecast and there's so much to celebrate i'm looking forward to it and i'm looking forward to seeing all of you thanks very much thank you mr beam and thank you for your support of the district next we have communications miss kelly thank you and good evening everyone mathecton school district is thrilled
028to support the efforts of the methectone education foundation as it prepares for the apex awards on thursday as mr beam just mentioned just as an overview the ceremony will recognize those who have achieved distinction outstanding accomplishment or made significant contributions within their professions in the greater math acting community also parents of methectomy high school students are invited to register for our annual financial aid night event which takes place also on thursday uh september 30th from 7 to 9 pm the event is designed to help families learn more about the process of applying for aid through the free application for federal student aid better known as fafsa as well as the css profile through the college board there is still time to register look for the link on the district or high school website under upcoming
029events and you all may have been keeping an eye to the sky today because of the weather well there's another good reason to look up our planetarium shows are back for a new season the september shows were a big hit next month's shows are set for october 15th and october 29th make it a fun night out with your family and your friends tickets are available for purchase online at methecton.org planet ticks t-i-x or at the door on the night of the show on a first-come first-served basis thank you thank you miss kelly and next we have the superintendent's report dr zerby thank you madam thank you madam vice president this evening you see that there are some advisements for the board's uh information needs but i also want to bring to your attention one adjustment
030that needs to be considered on the agenda so if you would take a notice to 1105 and that is supplemental contracts in the attachment for supplemental contracts on the last page page four of four there are five individuals and i'm going to read their names off uh last name is wright thomas cherry shannon men and cherry a second time for that's for math club student council a half computer club intramurals half and in intramurals half they are being removed from the list which will then create a an adjustment so the agenda item would then read just bear with me to approve the the supplemental contracts it says approve the supplemental contracts in the amount of and it will be modified from 248 etc to 508.65 so that dollar amount will be adjusted and those five
031names will be removed and that ends my report for this evening thank you dr zurby now it's time for public comment on board action items this is an opportunity for residents to comment on matters that are to be decided upon as outlined on the agenda the board asks that you keep your comments to four minutes or less [Music] jamalik war sester payment of the bills do you um do you guys review the bills and the payment of the bills because i don't think you do um i'm particularly interested in the legal bills and the payment of the legal bills does anybody up there review your legal bills and the payment of those bills if if you do raise your hand because that's what i thought you guys don't review the bills um i can't find
032any bills from sweet stevens am i wrong are they in there and i can't see them how does a law firm that's billing 900 grand for right to know have no bills for this month how does that work guys guys question that at all does that bother you because i've been provided some information that shows that we're double paying for legal services guys aware that that means we're paying the same invoice twice maybe you could investigate that and get back to me because i'd like to know why we're doing that maybe that's why we got 900 grand worth of right to no bills um the audit findings um and this is right out of the summary inadequate documentation and a failure to implement internal controls resulted in an inability to audit more than 8.2 million
033dollars in transportation reimbursement you know what's how what's that about the district failed to maintain complete records and properly monitor its contracted bus drivers as required by law now this is a independent auditor who's making these findings so can can somebody explain how we get to that point see may i look towards mr navarrete he's the property committee chair in every property meeting we talk about transportation so maybe mr navarrete can tell us how we get to this point yeah my question would be did mr navarrete was he aware we were going to get audited and if he was what did he do in preparation for the audit and further what did the board do to make sure mr navarrette was prepared for the audit because obviously you weren't prepared for the audit and blaming
034dr zerby and blaming mr bricker is not going to cut it because they don't run the school district you guys do i mean you may think you know i go home at five o'clock and i'm no longer a school board member that's not that's not how the whole thing works you're a school board member 24 7 and you're responsible for everything that happens in in this school district not dr zerby read his contract he can't do anything without your direction mr bricker can't do anything without dr zerby's direction so i think you need to prioritize you know where your position is overall in this whole scheme thank you hi my name is sandy hamilton i'm a resident of lower province and i had a few kids who came to the district and i have another
035child in the district i believe you are here to help the children i just have different views about the diversity equity and inclusion um to me it's under the umbrella of the critical race theory from what i understand so i don't know how deep into this the school is interested in going but um i believe that the critical race theory has been renamed and repackaged as diversity equity and inclusion excuse me miss hamilton is there a specific agenda item that you're referring to when you're speaking of this yeah the diversity equity and inclusion like i just don't know it seems so vague and i just i just wanted to tell you how i thought of that okay this is a time to speak about specific agenda items so i thought this was i mean i
036don't know i mean i can talk another time it's fine but i just i just thought that this was appropriate i'm it's um i can come out of time or whatever it doesn't matter okay i mean you can continue yeah i just wanted to know a little bit more about it or um tell you how as a parent how i feel about it um i'm not sure the direction the falcon's going to as far as education or um turning into what some professors call their schools as social justice factories i just don't want math acting to get into deep into a direction where i don't know who has a say or what parents have to say um so that that pretty much was what i wanted to talk about tonight um and some of the
037books on the on the on the parent resources about whiteness and about um how you know police are shooting certain people you know and to hate the police i don't i don't understand that i was a little confused about that about those books um so those are the two agendas i wanted to just i have questions about them and i just wanted to make you aware of how i felt about it about the anti-police and about uh the de and i how deep into it they were you were going to go thank you all right thank you seeing no other comments on courtesy of the floor we'll move on with the agenda and oh i'm sorry pardon me [Music] good evening jessica bradbury lower providence township item 10e state audit as someone that has worked
038in audit and compliance i'm concerned about the language that states that these are significant deficiencies i'm also disappointed in our response saying that you disagree with one of the findings you should take accountability for your failures and learn from them you failed to meet pennsylvania statutory obligations as well as district policy however during the property committee meeting ms reese laughed at the findings saying that it's just paperwork it's a waste of time frankly we're lucky that the paperwork was on file at our third-party bus contracting agencies however undue reliance on a third-party contractor creates risk for our district and more importantly it creates risk for our children what if there had been drivers without the proper clearances what if we use a third party to collect survey information from our children and there's a data
039privacy breach another concern of mine is during the property committee property chair mr navarette was unaware of how often the audit is even performed this report is published on pa auditor.gov on the website and you can find all of the recent audit reports there's four in total and this are the these are the first findings since 2004 almost 20 years for item 10g arrowhead construction change order in the amount of thirty thousand dollars thirty thousand five hundred seventy four dollars and twenty cents to relocate electrical poles if approved tonight that brings our total unplanned construction costs up to 305 dollars since march why is this a change order and not something that was factored into the original plans and budget surely we would have known the poll needed to be moved item 13b policy second
040read last week miss aubry larsenace did not answer my questions regarding the community submitted policy and how we would incorporate some of that into our existing policies especially around discrimination and non-discrimination up for vote this evening perhaps you can provide some answers mr almond why wasn't a legal review performed during july and august why did policy board chair miss hole say that this verbiage is already in our existing policies what are the policy numbers where we can find things like our district will not say that any identity group is inferior or superior that our district will not force anyone to say that by nature of their identity group they're responsible for the historical actions of those in the same group that an individual by nature of their identity group will not be considered inherently racist
041sexist or oppressive policy 321 does not include verbiage that would prohibit a teacher from making part of coursework or awarding course credit or extra credit student political activism or political lobbying we must establish an environment based on dignity defend intellectual honesty and return our focus to academics athletics and the arts if you approve revisions to policy 103.1 and 104 this evening will it be possible to make further revisions this year please provide us with the next steps and your timeline for the community policy on dignity and non-discrimination that was submitted in june by parents and concerned taxpayers thank you [Applause] okay moving on with the agenda um it's now the next will be the next one is the appointment okay so student board reps um we are at six a the uh appointment of the
042student board representatives so can i have a motion to approve the appointment of matthackton high school juniors joseph shaw and serena fukori as student board representatives to the board of school directors for a term of two years affected the 2021-2022 school year mr navarette can i get a second miss purdue any comments seeing none all in favor any opposed okay eight zero thank you [Music] [Applause] now we are at board meeting minutes okay um we're at number nine board meeting minutes can i get a motion to approve the board meeting minutes dated special meeting july 12 2021 work session july 20th 2021 regular meeting july 27th 2021 special meeting august 10 2021 work session august 17th 2021 regular meeting august 24th 2021 as attached mr mcginnis a second mr navarette uh any comments okay all
043in favor okay thank you any opposed all right 8-0 thank you and next we have fiscal items mr bricker thank you tonight for your approval we have the list of bills treasurer's report there are no budgetary transfers the closure of two student activity accounts the approval of this response to the state audit bond financing resolution 21-04 and arrowhead construction to approve the customer agreement with pico thank you does anyone want to take any separately in fiscal items okay can i get a motion to approve fiscal items 10a through 10g mr winters second miss purdue and comments from the board i have actually a couple questions um i just wanted to see if you had any comments about any points raised by the public on any special handling of the legal bills audit findings or the
044change order the legal bills were not received once they're received reviewed and processed they'll show up on the list of bills um not the same they didn't have any we just didn't get the invoices with audit the paperwork that was missing was in our the files and we just did not have a current copy of three pieces of paper if i think correctly no excuse they should have been in our files the reason we disagree is the fact that the clearances were reviewed previously they're reviewed by the transportation coordinator with regard to our head the reason that we need the polls to be moved and repositioned is because we're changing the entrance they have to have a clearance of i forget what the height is but there's a clearance height that they have to reach
045and that's why they're having to do that initially it was three poles and we worked with them and we're only moving two poles associated with that okay thank you um any other comments my only comment was we discussed at length the audit at property and we discussed the polls last week at the work session so that's why some of us are quiet because we have already discussed it at length but thank you for the public bringing up their concerns thank you okay um we have the motion on the table um all in favor of the fiscal bills physical items any opposed eight zero thank you next we have personnel items dr sorgini thank you madam vice president for your consideration this month we have the following personnel items one resignation administrator this is an edition
046from last week four resignations classified three resignations professional including the addition of curtis brown technology education teacher at methachton high school we thank curtis for his service to the students of matthachton and wish him well the elimination of three positions professional two employments professional eight employments classified one change of status classified three uncompensated leaves professional one uncompensated leave classified a series of supplemental contracts including as dr zurby said an update to the list of sponsors as well as the addition of an iep meeting attendance contract instructional software support specialists and gifted giep writing contracts one addition to the classified substitute list the addition of multiple individuals to the list of approved volunteers in the district and one community education swim instructor thank you thank you dr sorgini does anyone want to take any personnel items
047separately i just would like to take 11d separately please 11d separately okay thank you um can i get a motion to approve 11 a b c and e through r miss cancro and a second miss rhys and just to be clear madam uh vice president the motion that was just made was to uh have item 110 as referenced by dr zerby so that 1105 now reads uh 243 508.65 thank you i was going to say that but thank you all right um could we we have a motion um and do we have any comments about these items and noting the new cost for item 1105. any comments about these just want to thank dr sergini as always and i hope you're a little less busy in the coming months our your agenda's a little shorter
048but i do appreciate all your efforts thank you all in oh sorry mr winters yeah i just have uh sort of two comments one it doesn't necessarily fit here but i think the the fact in education foundation and the support that we've gotten from the science teachers to initiate these programs uh above and beyond their roles as teachers is admirable and fantastic and i hope at some point we can actually recognize those individuals directly uh dr zerby um at the same time the flip side the item number five is again disappointing to me to hear we need to take five thousand dollars that we have budgeted for for the most important time of getting back to school with uh programs and after-school activities and i hope um that that we find solutions to those and
049hopefully uh some of the staff uh reconsiders uh the choices that they made um the most important aspect for these students at this time is normally uh and i believe these activities hopefully none of them go by the wayside but uh as you mentioned before at a couple meetings uh this is the most difficult time for us in recent years to fill the sponsorships and there's clearly sponsor money that was put in the the mea contract this year to support these activities thank you any other comments from the board okay all in favor of those items any opposed okay that's 8-0 thank you and now we have item 11d um eliminations of positions can i get a motion for that please miss cancro second miss hull and comments on that seeing none um all in
050favor any opposed okay thank you [Music] next we have curriculum and programs dr welsh thank you thank you madam vice president for your consideration and approval revisions to the grade seven and eight social studies plan course documents to reflect the modifications to the pacing guides assessments and learning activities also approve the boost program for the 21-22 school year as presented the cost not to exceed 131 713 where such costs will be covered under the essers grant and also approve the 2122 revised instructional calendar as attached thank you does anyone want to separate these we're good okay can i get a motion for 12a and 12b in curriculum drew mcginnis and a second mr winters any comments no i just want to reiterate from the work session that the uh i look forward to the opportunity
051of the boost program and i thank all those uh involved in advance thank you miss reese all in favor any opposed thank you all right next we have policy um mr regina [Music] thank you madam vice president uh number of items for first read and second read under policy as you may recall zero zero six point one and zero zero six point two is a change of policy classification to represent the psba numbering we also have a 313 evaluation employees that's also an addition and a change based on the new act 13 requirements issued by pde and for our second read we have a number of psba recommendations as it relates to the title ix policy which is why you see 0.1 and 104 back on the agenda thank you thank you anyone want to
052separate any all right can i get a motion to approve um all the policies on second read six policies on second read ms hall and a second mr navara any comments on these yes yes i'm sorry so uh miss hull can you just talk about the the normal process around uh policies and how they come up for cycle and when they can come up additionally uh sure we do have a review cycle that we um we have mapped out the entire policy database and um the admin actually tracks the review cycle we try to have a review of just to break through the entire grouping and we separate it by department sometimes so that we're not always putting all the burden on one department for the coverage there's also psba updates that come up quarterly
053um if there are revisions then we would take that into consideration to review the policies also so then they're brought to committee we review them recommend them for first read and then they move on to second rate thank you how'd i do jay very well done i couldn't have done it better oh sorry yes just with that i mean as we have the public comment come in when we have suggestions from family from people from the public how was that analyzed reviewed and brought into with this policies uh it was disseminated through the committee and i requested at the last meeting that we have legal counsel review any overlaps that we have from our title ix coverage of nondiscrimination to what was proposed by the public so that should be covered in the next policy
054meeting thank you and the changes i just want to point out as you already noted that the uh there are title nine recommendations that that propose some of the 103 and 104 changes that is correct you well said there were pspa recommendations that came in our new volume so that's correct all right all in favor of these policies any opposed all right thank you and next we have under other under gifts and donations we have a backpack donation from generous individuals in the amount of one thousand eight hundred seventy dollars and eleven cents for which the backpack program that i help out with is very grateful um to receive those funds and we are voting on accepting okay thank you um so can i get a motion to accept those funds mr navarrete a second
055miss reece any comments just to thank you again and uh all in favor any opposed thank you liz i just i wanted to ask you a question i know we're still um accepting other donations not monet you know it doesn't have to be monetary outside of arcola and outside of the high school is that correct that is correct the backpack program has been out right outside the arcola doors as well as outside the east wing at the high school and um we also have a facebook page you can follow that's at my fact and backpack we have an amazon list there and you can have items shipped directly to the high school and they'll be um distributed to the schools you just answered my next question so the amazon wish list is on the facebook
056at the thactin backpack yes okay thank you thank you all right we trips um okay now we have additional transportation employees for the 2021-2022 school year as attached can i get a motion to accept that mr mcginnis and miss reece any comments on those all in favor any opposed thank you 8-0 um then we have dates for board members calendars um do we have any one for old business any comments on for old business from the board i don't anything for new necessarily old business but i just wanted to address miss hamilton i know it was probably confusing when you came up nobody was ignoring your questions just typically dei was not an agenda item so it's fine that you spoke we we didn't mind um typically that would be at courtesy of the floor
057it your your concern not your your concerns or would be difficult to address in a few minutes because dei is a huge topic but i did want to let you know that we did receive your email i it didn't have a question so i apologize if you were expecting a response i didn't respond i don't know if anyone else did um and in short the district is trying its best to share with everyone what what dei consists of there was a a presentation on monday evening which miss purdue spoke about and we are in the process of hiring somebody and that person would be available to to discuss and and and work with some of the issues that the community has positively and negatively including some of the resources that people are concerned with um
058dei is such a large encompassing arena that i i can't do it justice in a few minutes but um we do hear your concerns and um [Music] uh if many districts in montgomery county do have have a dei initiative and we're just trying to kind of get to where many are and you know keep feel free to share those concerns and know that we will be sharing with you any initiatives that are going forward and uh in short thank you sorry i just just wanted to add so i don't know if you were able to get on the zoom call yesterday but what that zoom call really defines some of the work that was ongoing from when the we decided to establish the dai office with that we had and what you can call or
059put the equity or climate survey done just to get a baseline for where we are as a district and that composed of people within the community students teachers everybody and parents also had a chance to provide input into that what was talked about yesterday at the dii meeting um they went over some of the guidance statements they defined some of the terms of dei just because like we said it's a big topic right so they define diversity equity and inclusion also and they provide a summary from each of the di subcommittee as far as their recommendations from the survey and general recommendations from the district also and all that i said is on the district dei page it will provide you with information but i think what we have we know that within the administration
060we also don't have someone that's specifically trained to handle issues or bring recommendations or handle any recommendations that come from the um the subcommittees when we talked about diversity equity and inclusion and so this is where the next step i mentioned is we do have interviews started where we're looking to bring someone that's professionally trained to handle this and what they will do is really tackle those issues as they come up so we're not i think you asked the question about how deep the district is going into dia i don't have visibility into that but hopefully once we get all that happen we say it's not going to be done in an isolated situation but it will be made visible so everyone will have input as far as what we plan to implement everything else
061so hopefully you'll stay tuned to get more information as everything comes out and if you're on a parent in the district you get the emails about it and you'll be involved thank you if i could just add the information regarding the dei process so all that information is going to be taken in as part of the strategic planning process and implemented as part of that full review into recommendations just are there any other comments from the board alternate business okay now it's time for courtesy of the floor uh the board will now provide an opportunity for residents to make comment on matters that are or may be before the board the board asks that you keep your comments to four minutes or less the board of school directors may choose to respond to matters following
062the conclusion of the comments or you can submit questions via email to information mathactin.org hello my name is julia knuckley i live in lower providence i urge the school board and school district to look into later high school start times later start times have been shown to improve academics improve behavior and most importantly reduce teen car crashes and reduce high risk behaviors such as drug and alcohol use the american academy of pediatrics the cdc and the american medical association all advocate for high school start times of 8 30 a.m or later when puberty hits the melatonin hormone which is also known as the sleep hormone shifts later in our teenagers making around 11 pm a more natural sleep time for them teenagers need around 9 hours of sleep our high school start time of 7
06330 a.m means that most of our high schools need to get up around 6 a.m in order to get to school on time this means they are getting around seven hours of sleep when they need nine you may ask why don't they just go to bed earlier but this can be very difficult as i mentioned before their melatonin doesn't kick in until closer to 11 making it harder to fall asleep earlier i remember as a teen long before cell phones and other distractions just laying in bed with my mind racing unable to fall asleep in order to get all the sleep they need they would need to go to bed at 9 00 pm which would be very hard for most teens i understand that nowadays cell phones and other devices can also affect sleep
064times so we need to make sure that we're teaching kids healthy sleep habits but it is not enough because the school start times are fighting against nature studies were done that showed that one benefit of virtual learning is that it allowed kids to get more sleep in the morning which helped them academically the most productive part of sleep happens in the last couple of hours when most of our memory storage and mood regulation happens this is the part of sleep that we are depriving from our teenagers and the part that helps them academically and behaviorally my own daughter gets up at 6 15 a.m to catch the bus at 6 51 she usually doesn't have time to eat breakfast and she says she doesn't feel like eating that early anyway yet she doesn't have lunch
065until 1 pm she is distracted during school because she is so hungry and tired during the school day i know it will be a logistical challenge to change the start time everything depends on it from busing to after-school activities however other school districts in our area such as radnor unionville chadsford and phoenixville have changed their start times and have seen positive results i encourage our school district to do the same it will benefit our teenagers our families and our community overall thank you anybody else for courtesy of the floor [Music] good evening john andrews lower providence the last speaker spoke excellently about high school start times maybe she's a professor somewhere and she should be heeded for making a convincing story at your last vote meeting in august august 24th i spoke to the issue
066of a bill for thirty four thousand dollars for abandoning two wells at the arcola i'm sorry at the arrowhead uh school construction in the minutes of that meeting i was mentioned as speaking to the action item but the minutes failed to reflect my comments basically you you committed thirty four thousand dollars when i was arguing for three thousand dollars to do the job and uh at that time the property committee chair mr navarette had not issued the meeting minutes for that property committee meeting where the this issue was discussed for 40 minutes 40 minutes so the i'm not sure how many people were at the committee meeting how many of the four but in response to my comments on that action item miss reece indicated that the item was discussed she got into no no
067particulars miss larcenies the board president apparently allowed for no meeting minutes they have yet to be prepared and the board voted along the lines of the committee with no facts no meeting minutes something rather wrong about how the school board administers its its voting to allow for uninformed votes by at least five directors also with regard to that well abandonment item there was no indication of multiple bids my understanding is any school funded project for over 20 thousand dollars requires multiple beds the also uh there's a recent uh vote on on the start time at skyview oracle or recent by recent i mean back in the in the spring uh previous to to this school year there were separate start times for both sky view and arcola this year there's one start time and the
068property transportation committee meeting minutes indicate big problems much more traffic difficulty in buses getting in and out and i think that uh the change to save a couple hundred thousand dollars was not worth it and you should reconsider someone may have egg on their faces ask you to wrap up mr andrews yes someone may have egg on their faces but uh the considerations of the entire skyview arcola community are a lot bigger than some egg on the face thank you [Applause] [Music] jim malik warcester you know i love it uh one month before the election and we get the the kinder gentler board extended time allowing people to uh talk about anything they want during voter section not that i disagree i just i just love how it comes always like the month before the
069election and then after the election it goes back to the way it used to be but i am glad you're sitting up there as the chair miss drummond i need to ask you why you were having private conversations about the arrowhead project on your personal computer because i requested those conversations and you apparently said you didn't have them but i have them so maybe you can tell everybody why you use your personal computer to do school business rather than your regular school account you know well i can get to address you which is nice um in august this board approved the code of conduct policy this code of conduct applies to students building administrators staff and believe it or not it even applies to parents parents have their own code of conduct when they're at
070home according to your policy right the rules for parents are simply insulting i read them i couldn't believe it um but guess whose conduct is not mentioned in your code of conduct all you guys nothing about the board's conduct right it's okay for mr mcguinness to you know use profanity it's okay for people to tell people that they got to take their tinfoil hats off you guys have nothing so my recommendation is you come up with a policy to regulate your behavior you know you're good at regulating everybody else's but your own uh you know i i just don't see it um you're you guys spent five grand on a enrollment study by milo and mcbroone that was a total waste of money uh they predicted 1736 students k to four this year paid five
071grand for it and you got your five grand because the actual enrollments 1592. they're off by 144 students you do the math at seven classrooms so somebody somebody's got an answer for that one i mean what a waste waste of money uh dei here our dei mentioned um you guys don't call us shots for dei it's the private non-profit group that's calling all the shots right mr navarette miss larcenies they go to the private meetings and they're the ones i i heard to came up with the code of conduct so they're the ones calling the shots um now i do know because i got some of the emails that i needed but i filed a right to no request for all everything dei including communications with dr campbell zurby everybody else that was in november
072you guys never answered my request and then you said you needed 150 days to produce it well as of today it's 10 months and i still don't have any information so my question is what are you guys hiding what are you hiding thanks anybody else for courtesy of the floor uh joe written how slow providence so i wanted to speak tonight about a few concerns i had during last night's dei presentation i understand that no questions could be asked at the time and i wanted to see if i could post some of those here tonight i'd also like to provide some insight that i've found what i see is some major problems and some glaring hypocrisys that really undermine the legitimacy of the dei committee and the work that it's going to do first and
073foremost no data was given in regards to the survey that i'm and i'm more than willing to be corrected on this i didn't see any um i would love to see what the results of the surveys were what they were like what information were we drawing from to get this presentation um within the presentation itself uh certain things stuck out to me one being the definition of equity we underlined removing personal and system barriers in the limit of full participation of all individuals and groups this is vague enough to basically cover anything and so i think that it should be narrowed down um application and screening of the selection of committee uh dr zerby provided me with the rubric that was used and i can tell you that the rubric was set up to basically
074filter out anyone of differing opinion uh that's just how the rubric was set up it's available online for people to look at looking at it it seems to have netted a committee where 80 percent of those serving on the committee are registered democrats there is not there is very little to only 20 of republicans in our district we're very 50 50. so clearly this intellectual diversity wasn't taken into consideration again uh the analyze survey results um and then when it came to the inclusion and balanced curriculum uh i wanted to make sure that we're really pushing balance because if we're going to have a committee that is 80 one ideological bent i would love to see some diversity or balance of that curriculum also i also one of the things that i was deeply upset
075about is the on the personal growth about the anti-bias and anti-discrimination training so i actually have a lot of experience of this i've audited two uh for two different companies i've worked for and i to say it's inherently flawed would be an understatement uh anti-bias anti-discrimination studies for everything that says it works there are two studies minimum one one to two that say it is counterproductive at best it is counterproductive at worst then just not doesn't work at best there are thousands upon thousands of studies including one with 17 000 participants that said that completed anti-bias training and discrimination that found after 24 hours all anything that they had learned in these meetings was gone they could not retain anything it didn't balance onto year coming years um so i have so much more but
076i wanted to get to this so one of the other issues i have with the way the dei committee was set up is i don't think it was properly vetted i don't think that there are people on that committee who are committed to diversity equity inclusion and to prove that i just want to bring up some comments from members of the board and members of the committee that i think go are antithetical to uh diversity equity inclusion a member of the dei committee said get aids and die gay boy uh i'm really gonna quit my job because there's just too many white people here uh could methachton make a public service and leave janitor closet doors open so us students can [ __ ] inside of them instead of staircases these it goes on religion has rotted
077the brains of white people and there's not a single effing thing you could say that would change my mind uh director mary hole has a comment here that uh from january that says secret service production ends thank you for your comments oh thank you can i finish my comment i'm gonna finish it uh mary hull says uh secret service protection ends for the children of donald trump after today good luck that's stochastic terrorism so i would love to hear how that's going to be diversity equity and inclusion please be seated any further comments from the board to wrap up oh sorry hello my name is aaron ranieri from lower providence i set up here in july and said a lot i'm sorry [Music] i just there's a little bit more now that we have started
078school that i feel like i need to say um i've never felt the way that i feel this year i'm scared for where our district is heading and how much our ranking has dropped normally i would take that with a grain of salt because normally i think some of the things that they use to rank you know isn't correct um our ranking has dropped a lot since i've been here since i started 20 years ago um [Music] but it's different when you can feel that drop it's different to me now i do trust that our ranking has dropped that much people aren't happy as i said before in the july meeting parents are pulling their kids out and it's a lot of people that i know in the community that are involved with us at
079different things like mara and the myth and warriors youth association they're pulling their kids out because they're not happy with things that we're doing and things that they're hearing there's also a lot of teachers leaving we have two i think i'm correct on this dually certified science teachers leaving right now they are both getting all their years of service i believe at different school districts and getting paid a lot more we just cut a math position tonight i apologize i couldn't get here in time to speak before that position was cut but i was coaching we talk about stem all the time but i wonder if it's just a buzzword or if we really mean it after a year and a half as challenging as this have been has been i don't think having that
080extra math teacher would have been a bad thing i think smaller class sizes are really important i was doing a project the other day in algebra 2 and i really i couldn't get around the room fast enough i didn't predict that the kids would have as big of an issue related to past things that they have not learned and not caught up with um and i wonder if that stem word really you know holds weight around here um these science teachers aren't leaving for nothing um i think they feel the same way that i do um i think our best investment isn't stuff i don't think it's new textbooks i don't think it's whatever got delivered to the high school today i forget what it's called i apologize it's been a long day it's teachers
081you know there's a lot out there right now that is free for us to use if you have really good people in front of these students they can find materials to use we find free stuff every day you know some of it's important but our major investment we need to get good people and hold on to them there are way too many teachers leaving i believe you know we have a couple different positions open at the high school right now i'm afraid this engineering course that we have is going to get cut because of the man that's leaving the high school i had to step down for from two clubs this year and and i want to apologize to my students for that they know that i enjoy doing that so much i think it's
082important that we all see kids outside of the classroom it's awesome to chaperone things it's awesome to be at games and see the tribe and to be at dances and proms and everything i like to see the kids out there i did run a class congress i was supposed to play in the prom this year i had to step down though because now i'm teaching three courses one of which i've never taught before and that's the job i get paid for and i take pride in my work and i need to focus all day every day on planning three different courses now every day i'm gonna have to ask thank you thank you anybody else for courtesy of the floor kelly mann lower providence i watched the dei meeting last night and i just wanted
083to know where is the data it went from being called an audit to a survey to a pulse check as it was referred to last night and i heard survey again tonight during the july board meeting it was suggested that the september dei meeting would be informative the slideshow was very basic it did not allow for questions or answers what services did the district pay dr bruce campbell thirty thousand dollars to perform i think this has been asked before but if there's a breakdown anywhere where you could guide us to look that up that would be great will there be public district dei committee meetings that will allow for questions and answers as i understand from the social media comments by the secretary of the community d.i task force there is an ad hoc school
084board committee comprised of three of you that sit here tonight and i quote her the three of them are active members of this group and participate in every scheduled meeting with the membership to keep us updated on their progress and to make the task force position and we're talking about the community task force input known to the administration who are you working for that's my question her stopped i'm sorry but who are you working for there's three of you sitting up here and you're bringing in input from a community activist task force parents were repeatedly told in previous meetings that these two groups were separate these comments suggest otherwise and also is there a way for the public to view the breakdown of the essr funding thank you [Applause] anybody else if i may i
085wasn't going to say anything but i just can't could you please state your name and shelly acres lower providence but i have to say something i've been following critical race theory since this whole thing blew up about a year ago the dei part of it is really the implementation of this whole critical race theory and i hope the board is very aware of the fact that it is a purely political thing it's purely political and i why do you even need a dei person i don't know this school district too well other than the fact that it's had tremendous ratings i come from lower marion but your school district was pulling in front of us we were very jealous why is your school district in such a state that you have to bring in the
086dei person you mean your kids don't get along your teachers don't work it out they don't do these things i don't understand it isn't a must you're just copying off of everybody else that's around but the important thing it's political and they're trying to indoctrinate our kids and you have to be careful and that scares the hell out of me [Applause] anybody else [Music] hello again jessica bradbury lower providence township yes ms reese i know there was a discussion during property committee i was there with the four other people um however if you look at the meeting minutes there's all of four lines that are captured doesn't explain anything that was discussed i would like the board to consider making more transparency into these meetings by beginning to stream and record them so that we
087can go back and see what was discussed last night we received an update on the equity audit however we've seen the name change dr gallagher landis said it's not an audit it's a pulse check not one single piece of data was provided last night so essentially we saw recommendations being made by a committee mostly comprised of the same political activists that were behind the creation of the dei program in the first place why wasn't there any data presented is it because there was a shockingly low participation rate for the survey is it because the questions you asked our 11 and 12 year olds about their gender and sexual identity were extremely inappropriate is it because you had no technical controls to ensure that one respondent couldn't take the survey multiple times and that we had
088no way to protect their identity and keep it anonymous i asked about a statement of work with dr campbell in november before you signed it i asked and i'll ask again tonight what did we engage with him to deliver we received nothing what did we get for the thirty thousand dollars we paid and why did we pay more than colonial school district they paid seventeen thousand for the exact same person for the exact same services we saw student life draft goal two involving the removal of warrior and apache logo and mascot will the strategic planning process allow us to refine that goal a decision as significant as changing the history of our school's mascot and logo should be made by seeking input from alumni current students staff community members taxpayers i had a wonderful conversation
089with a family relatively new to district who explained that in their home state decisions that would impact the community like this or like building an entirely new elementary school are made by a referendum vote i'd like to ask in advance of the february meeting if we can consider adopting a policy so that when it comes time to decide these new dei recommendations can they be made by a referendum vote let's let the public decide we also heard the personal development committee recommended that our teachers receive training on microaggressions and that they go through an implicit bias training where is the data that shows that that's actually beneficial that that won't already take our already taxed teachers and make them do even more it'll make them more unhappy with the environment we need to have more
090transparency not less for our teachers for our parents for our community members if we're going to trust the motivations of the board and the district to provide for the education and future of our children please release the data that you collected by this equity survey i'm looking forward to next month working with the policy committee to further our discussions around the community submitted policy on dignity we must work together and create an inclusive environment for all people in the methactone family thank you [Applause] brian leggett lower providence township um i'm the parent of 2018 and 2021 graduates of the high school so i shouldn't care anymore but i do uh because i am concerned about some of the transparency of what's going on here with the board and how things are being kind of turned
091around and the the direction and some secrecy also i'm concerned that we should be educating our children and not indoctrinating our kids if you ask any child and especially in the high school who has republican or conservative viewpoints they will be told that you will be told that their viewpoints cannot really be shared in class because they will be looked at and they will they fear great retribution from their teachers my younger son last year at the beginning of the year told me at the beginning of the year he said dad i can't tell what political party my social studies teacher is i said that is great that's awesome you should not know he he or she should promote both sides about a week later he said well dad i know what political party he
092is and through the wonders of zoom i was able to see that he was not teaching thought he was teaching his opinion and there was no room for thought so that's where i have a problem with what's going on here now my other son in 2016 wore a trump shirt to school he got dirty looks from his teachers he uh was had some things said to him that he put a sweatshirt on so that he couldn't express his political view in class the voter registration in this district is 43 percent republican and 41 percent democrat i also am a member of the community dei task force janine darby is my neighbor she invited me to be part of the task force and i participated in the meetings one of the things that disgruntled me about
093these meetings is the political bent that was taken i heard things like disparaging remarks set about the high school principal for having a trump flag in his in his uh yard um i heard a board of supervisors member discuss the need to flip the board of supervisors so that they can enact their agenda i heard a political activist from from a different school district talk about the need to recruit progressive candidates to get their agenda forward these were things in the dei task force i'm just telling this because it's not about dei and you would think that we we had a black female veteran military veteran as a candidate for congress in our voting district you would think that that would be somebody that the dei group would want to promote during a community conversation
094on anti-asian bias a speaker referred to this member or this person as crazy and nuts meanwhile the moderator of that session who was on dei committee your di committee nodded in approval your di committee has 75 percent democrats so there's no diversity of thought on the dei committee speaking of anti-asian bias on the website i looked at the at the at the link for addressing anti-asian bias it takes you to a website called learning for justice you know what the lessons are on learning for justice uh the truth about voting rights intersectionality privilege oppression those are the words of critical race theory and i heard miss uh aubry license talk about that we are not going to promote critical race theory well it's right there on your website and the last thing about the mascot
095there are no native americans on the dei task force i think if you're going to make decisions you should include people who are members of the native american community thank you [Applause] anybody else for courtesy of the floor seeing none any other thoughts from the board to wrap up seeing none motion to adjourn motion to adjourn thank you meeting adjourned