001good evening i'd like to call to order the august 24 2021 regular meeting of the methachton school district board of directors please rise for the united states of america to the republic for which it stands nation under god indivisible with liberty and justice for all the public is hereby advised of the audio and video recording of the meeting for the purposes of rebroadcasting um we have all board members in attendance except for miss cancro who is on her way um so she should be with us momentarily recognition of guests and scheduled speakers dr zurby thank you madam president this evening it's my pleasure to introduce our director of curriculum instruction and assessment dr walsh thank you dr zurby good evening everyone induction is a program that all new teachers participate in as a part of
002their orientation to the methachton school district this year we had a group of 15 new teachers that were in attendance both yesterday and today with various topics such as instruction human resources pupil services technology and safety all covered it is my honor to share with you the induction class of 2021 hi everyone i'm matt walsh i'm the director of curriculum instruction and assessment here at the methachton school district and it's my honor and privilege to introduce to you the induction class of 2021 [Music] all right everybody my name is hillary rhoda craig i'll be teaching fourth grade at arrowhead i have stopped here a few years and i always come back just because i love the schools and the community and the love that you can feel when you walk into each building my name
003is bonnie alexey i am the eld teacher over at eagleville elementary i actually started my student teaching third and fourth grade over at woodland many years ago and my first job was a remedial math teacher in the district so i've come full circle my name is raphael kiefer i'm going to be the eighth grade science teacher at arcola middle school where i will be teaching another long-term supposition that was a long-term sub last year where i'll probably see a lot of the same kids again or some of them anyway and a lot of my teachers i worked with last year in the teens that i worked with last year were phenomenal so i'm looking forward again to another great school year with uh arcola hi i'm alexis miss moroney i will be teaching ninth grade
004environmental science at the high school this year so i chose the factory so i did a long term sub um at arcola and absolutely fell in love with the district fell in love with the students and um just the whole team as a whole and then uh thankful to be able to continue from a long-term sub to a full-time position here at in fact my name is megan rowley i'll be the reading specialist at eagleville elementary school this year i'm looking forward to a new position i've been in the classroom for seven years so i'm getting out of the classroom technically also be working with students but i'm looking forward to a different position hi my name is amy delaney and i'll be teaching general music k through four at worcester elementary school i picked
005with acting because i actually was a day-to-day sub here before i even graduated and i really liked the kids and i thought it was such a welcoming community that i wanted to be here as soon as i could hi my name is alyssa duffield i will be teaching third grade learning support at worcester elementary school i chose math actin because i've heard amazing things about the district and the community and i wanted to come join this smith acton family my name is robert i'll be teaching grade 7 social studies at arcola middle school actually one of the most exciting things i'm looking forward to is going back to arcola i went there uh i went to that school myself so it'll be great to go back there and see how it's changed and be able
006to work with those kids and help them get ready uh for their future career in high school my name is veronica laguna i will be teaching general music and choir at arcola i chose math acton because i am from the area i graduated from north penn high school and i've heard wonderful things about mythacton so i'm so excited to be working here hi my name is anita rao i'll be teaching french at arcola seeing the students being around people again i worked completely from home at my last position so i'm really excited to just be spending time with other people my name is amy januarti i'll be teaching seventh grade reading at arcola i have to say that i'm looking the most forward to going back to school in person with hopefully without any virtual
007i was virtual most of the year last year so i'm really looking forward to going back in person my name is angela hiller and i will be the fifth grade counselor at skyview upper elementary school i just can't wait to meet my students all 300 some of them hi i'm penny farrell i'm going to be teaching spanish at matthackton high school i'm really looking forward to meeting my students and connecting with them it's been a little bit since i've been taught high school so i'm really excited to be back in that environment i picked methachton its reputation precedes itself i know it's a wonderful school district my name is logan moyer i teach third and fourth grade learning support at arrowhead i think i just like oh especially at arrowhead and after being there for
008a whole year how it just kind of feels like a family environment arrow had all the teachers are really close and you can rely on everybody to help you and my mentor and everybody i worked with were so incredibly helpful and last year was crazy so i couldn't have gotten through the year without their help and i just had an amazing group of students who made every day worth it hi i'm brittany booth i'll be teaching learning sport at the high school i picked with acton because last year i was a long-term sub at eagleville and you could really feel the sense of community and and it was really like working with a family i really enjoyed the students and it's a really great environment to work for [Music] as you can see we're really
009excited to have our new induction class of 2021 and a special thanks to amanda kelly for her expertise and production skills at the very last minute so thank you again any questions for dr walsh on the uh new teacher induction once twice no questions i just there's two teachers you might want to warn because they are going to have my 13 year old so if um if they have any concerns you can send them to me duly noted okay all right well thank you very much next on the agenda we have the school start we have dr walsh and mr regina and dr angstad and board members should have a copy of the presentation at their table they're also welcome to follow along if they want to turn around and watch the screen good evening
010everyone uh so tonight the three of us will be going over to some of the methachton school district opening updates uh to get things started it'll be dr angstad dr walsh and myself first on the agenda will be dr walsh he'll speak through some of the education updates second will be dr angstadt she'll speak through some of the covid protocols and mental health services and then finally i'll wrap up with some of the operational updates so without further ado we'll turn it over to dr walsh okay so we're going to talk about those five topics induction our welcome back activities technology some pd days and the fact in virtual academy so first up i'd like to talk a little about the group that you just met the induction class of 2021 there are 15 new
011professional staff that were hired as of today some are right out of college and a few others have experiences from other districts so we're excited to welcome them and onboard them and they officially start tomorrow with professional development activities august 23rd and 24th were the days slotted for induction and we've always had two days and then there are four after school sessions if you are brand new to the teaching profession so i'd probably say about 10 of the 15 are brand new to the profession so they will be attending four after school sessions and those sessions cover a range of topics such as parent teacher conferences the observation process differentiated instruction as well as progress reports and report cards there'll be things that we covered during induction was departments as district overviews there will be
012a time at the building with their mentors which occurred this afternoon so they got to be paired up with that person who will really form a close bond with through the entire year and kind of guide them through the the various things that will happen between now and the end of the school year in june and we also have a year-long celebration plan because it is an important accomplishment to fulfill your induction process i remember mine from many years ago and i'm still in touch with my own mentor but everything that we do aligns to the danielsen framework for teaching on the four domains about planning and preparation classroom environment instructional practices and then professionalism so everything we did over these past two days it ties into one of those domains and one of those
013elements for tomorrow we'll be talking about with our staff how we can welcome back students that is a big focus with our professional development this year some of the things that took place to welcome back our students were the tours were held this summer by the principals and the school counselors there's a big focus on building climate culture and relationships and connections for example the seniors will be having a back to school tailgate in the high school parking lot at arcola they'll be doing a spirit week there's a book study also at arcola and the elementary schools will continue to work on developing relationships and connections with each other and with their teachers we establish a caring community of learners k to 12. that's essential we all know that kids don't care what you know
014till they know that you care so we'll really be focusing on that these first few weeks of school um really with our social emotional activities uh call it especially focusing on period eight the whole month of september on social emotional and wellness so again our focus is less about curriculum and more about those relationships those first few weeks of school it is essential now more than ever some technology updates from mr brannick's department we will continue to have our three tech integrators to support the teaching and learning at all levels the smart boards projectors are continue to be used as an instructional tool in the teacher's toolbox we also have tech support at each building for those teachers who need additional tech support and if there's any problems or tech issues there is a help
015ticket system that's been very successful student device distribution devices are scheduled for distribution for k to 2 and 10th grade kindergarten will be receiving tablets this year and chromebooks will continue to be used grades 1 through 12. our district email migration took place to the cloud which just adds another layer of security anything that is cloud-based is is a lot better than what we have housed in-house and our curriculum integrations continue with our technology we found out through the pandemic a lot of fantastic tools our teachers continue to use them and we're thrilled to just integrate them into our teaching repertoire so that's a great thing that's happening with technology our pd days our professional in-service days will take place tomorrow and thursday for all staff department and grade level meetings will occur there'll be
016school-based faculty meetings we'll review procedures practices and routines the traditional back to school information that teachers have to cover and you can see some of those professional obligations required under the pennsylvania code is act 13 which is a revised teacher evaluation system grades k to 12 act 126 is the mandated reporter training grades k to 12 acts 71 with dessert which is our youth suicide prevention training that's all mandated through our safe schools protocol teachers will continue to update refresh their google classrooms and as always students with special needs have ieps 504s and healthcare plans they will also be reviewed and our methachton virtual academy as of today we have 57 students we support our supporter through the brandywine virtual academy right now we're asking for one semester obligation which will end january 21st of
0172022 and you can see the breakdown of our enrollment numbers and again this is as of this afternoon so again 57 students total okay so those are some of our back-to-school activities um that'll take place between now and welcoming back students on monday very quick question super quick those numbers that don't look like they changed too much the overall okay sorry no see the overall numbers maybe we may have had a few students who've returned but other students may have also been added okay so at the end of the day yes it's 57 okay okay thank you all right i'll pass it over to dr angstad all right i'd like to provide a brief update on the covid protocols and mental health services that we're providing the first thing i wanted to share with you
018is that our principals will be sharing a mass guide in their newsletters and on the school's website as a reference for both staff students and parents and it's really about the proper use of wearing a mask and how to wear it how to handle it if you take it off and there's a sample of that guide on the next slide so let me share that with you so this is the sample this is page one of that reference um it's actually three pages long so we wanted to just give you an update this was provided to us from the cdc on august 13 2021 the next thing i wanted to talk a little bit about is there are special lanyards that were purchased for our students in k-6 the k-4 students will be issued a
019lanyard that the district has purchased so that they have a place to hold their mask when they're doing having lunch out to recess or any time taking a mask break it allows them to clip it onto the bottom and there's a picture of it there it's also a breakaway lanyard so if it would get caught somewhere it pulls apart for safety concerns our students in grades five to six will also be issued that lanyard but it will also hold in addition to their math their student ib badge in terms of contract tracing our nurses will be following the guidance issued by the cdc in the montgomery county department of health our nurses are in touch with them regularly meeting i believe weekly at this point in time the chart on the next page summarizes the
020steps they will use to identify who is a close contact when i met with cheryl piper this morning she reminded me that this is as of today and it could change tomorrow or you know it may have already changed and she just doesn't have the update but there's a series of questions they have to ask and then as you can see it's indoor classroom household contact and then general close contact guidance and there's all the parameters if they're mask or unmask and then the time element comes into play but the bottom part that's color coded in orange on the slide behind you yours may not be in color it says do i need to quarantine and that is based on whether a student is vaccinated or a staff member is vaccinated and they answered yes
021or if they're not vaccinated so all of those things play a role in who is a close contact we expect to have less close contacts this year than we did last year just because of the way the new regulations are being handed out to us and she did say that this was as of the latest information she had as of today on the next slide we talked a little bit about covid19 assurance testing and i know dr serby is going to speak to this a little bit more but the district will be offering volunteer shorts testing for staff again this school year pending board approval and specific details on how to participate will be shared at the start of the school year with our staff testing will also be available for athletes participating in fall
022sports at arcola and bethakton high school pending board approval and again more specific information on how they can participate on a voluntary basis will be provided at the start of the school year and then i also thought it was important to just update the board on where we are with mental health services we are partnering with central behavioral health again they provide mental health services for our students who are eligible for that support whether it be through a an iep or a 504 plan we have made sure that they are aware if we have an increase in need that we may need to reach out to them for more support we've been meeting throughout the summer keeping an eye on all the caseloads and the needs of the students who have participated over in the
023summer getting some support from them additionally springfield psychological is fully staffed ready to go including our newest clinician who is kane williams and he will be serving our four elementary schools they will be providing that services for students in grades k to 12. so we're excited for that expansion and appreciate your support and lastly there are springfield psychological is also developing an infographic for our staff really talking about mental health awareness and the signs and symptoms things they should be looking for in their students as they're returning to school and they're sitting in front of them what are some of the things they should be looking for just to kind of give them a little cheat sheet so to speak if you're not quite sure what to do here are things you should be thinking
024about for your students and leave the next slide goes to jay mr regina are there any questions for doctor and said at this moment no miseries just a quick quick thing um in the past we were lucky enough to visit with the reach staff at arcola sorry not anytime soon but at some point i would i'm sure jen would agree as chair of education at some point this year i'd love to touch base with the elementary in high school since we got an opportunity to talk to the arcola people just because it was it was really nice to see what arcola was doing and we haven't had a chance as yet to see more about the high school absolutely and they loved when you visited at arcola so thank you any other questions miss purdue
025just a quick question as far as um what i mean here here today is um what is our process for requesting um mass exemptions is that something that will go through the nurse or are we telling them to go through the building yes so um currently what we've i've sent out to our buildings it's been sent to the building principals and our school nurses is that if a parent is asking for a mass exemption there is specific information that they need to receive from the parent if the student already has an iep or a 504 plan there's a different process for those students reconvening the team and having that process through that channel if the student does not currently have an iep or a 504 plan they would provide the documentation and then the 504
026team would meet to discuss accommodations and determine if it's a request we would be honoring and that's based on a medical or a disability need thank you and then just a follow-up question and i don't know if you know it now we talked about testing for staff and also um the athletes and um and i guess you mentioned that we won't have the specifics until the start of the school but i'm wondering if we will provide testing for athletes is it also possible to provide testing for students if there's possible possible exposure in the classroom or anything i believe dr zerby is going to speak a little about that in the next presentation okay thank you okay any other questions for dr einstein this is just the one not really a question but somebody talked
027about like with the mental health services and this is this is really nothing with your plan it's fantastic someone was talking about just even having ambassadors at lunch tables at the high school so anybody knew or been out of the district for a year to just have like a location because we have the ambassadors and we also have like even if it's like national honor society or in activity groups um to kind of mark it as like a welcome table for like the first six weeks just to help reduce some of the mental health anxiety and um so that was just i thought that was a great idea thank you for sharing thank you miss campbell for that suggestion i appreciate that um anything else for ms or dr einstein no mr regina good evening
028a number of topics we're going to talk about for operational updates first we're going to talk about staffing and where we are at the start of the school year we'll have a quick review on bussing we'll review some of the safety protocols that we have potentially changed or may look a little differently after the pandemic we're going to talk about alternate events and things that we're planning for going into the future with respect to that and then finally we're going to talk a little bit something that's been a topic of ours recently about tents and outdoor spaces at each of our locations to start with staffing a great job dr sergini and his staff and the other administration on getting all of our contracted teaching positions filled now i say that of course excluding the
029resignations we just received last week this is an ongoing process as many of you know and as one school district hires one group there's interviews that take place and they're hiring others and we're doing the same to other districts at this time so for instance for those individuals that we're hiring from other districts they're placed on a 60-day hold most of them from that district so we are hiring substitutes in the long-term capacity to be able to fill that 60-day window naturally if they're on this agenda the likelihood is they're not going to resign as early as till to maybe tomorrow which gives them two weeks so you're looking at the end of october before they're released so we're planning for that naturally each year to know that that may happen to us building substitutes
030we do have building substitutes in each of our buildings although we we did get the approval to double that um and we're still trying to there just aren't enough building substitutes out there to be able to comply with that request quite yet uh we do have two building substitutes at the high school in arcola as many of you remember if we have to utilize the large group instruction areas which we plan to we'll be able to utilize these building subs the lower grade levels if we need to and move people around so we are prepared to do that in case we have to and of course we're still looking to increase the building substitute numbers from busing as of last monday all busing routes are available in powerschool and as you can imagine masks are
031required on all buses of course the iep 504 approved x exceptions do apply safety protocols first of all the you're going to hear a term potentially in the county it's called alertis so what took place was there was a class button system that took place in the county it was a system where there was a panic button essentially in each school if pressed it would go straight to the 9-1-1 dispatcher and it would alert 9-1-1 that there was something going on at the school that they alert the authorities that system will no longer be in place starting december 30th of this year so the district had invested in the alerted system which is a similar system that also has a beacon located in the district that alerts internally that the button has been pressed to
032give us enough of an option to be able to alert the school in case we would have to go into a lockdown in that situation the hope is we never have to use this but in cases where it might happen we do have that here in the district at each of our building locations threat assessment training this is a mandate a state mandate a federal mandate actually at this moment in time where schools have to train their staff on threat assessment which is which essentially is training staff on if a student makes a threat how do we assess that threat and what do we do for that student to support them and any of the victims that may be associated with the threat so our staff was trained those on the threat assessment teams in
033june and we'll be providing a one-hour video to all of our staff to educate them on what threat assessment is in the upcoming month stop the bleed training that's something you may have heard about as well this is a training and a kit that we have that essentially will provide a way to stop the bleed in case of a trauma those that have seen the research on it in case of any kind of situation that take place the one way that um we could potentially be in a bad situation is if we can't stop the bleed of an individual that's experiencing that trauma so this is a training and toolkit for our staff members so they know how to utilize that and they're trained to do so for drills our drills are pretty much the
034same this year with the understanding that we did do last year for the situations in which students were not in person or if we had some distancing requirements we held some video trainings that took place in place of fire drills or even lockdown drills if we couldn't run them in person we are prepared to do that again although it is not our first option we're prepared to do that again in case we do go into a situation where we find ourselves in a virtual environment again alternate events dr gravities and her staff are already planning for alternate events for homecoming and as you can imagine prom preparation and graduation preparation certainly are being discussed already and what those alternate events could look like in case we have to go to that route again other building
035level activities are also being discussed at various levels and again that's something that the administrators and their staff are working on diligently and just preparing just in case we have to go to those in the future so for the tents and outdoor spaces uh what what we're looking at is a 20 by 40 tent um they'll be each of our buildings there'll be one in each elementary school at least at this moment in time um and these are just the original plans this can is certainly subject to change if the need arises and then a number of those at skyvy arcola campus and at the high school campus the table setup arrangement is there will be 10 tables under this tent at arrowhead you can see the location of that tent it's in the rear
036of the building there again this is the general area the planned area for it to go we do recognize that there could be things as we're preparing these tents and putting them up that may cause us to change the location for instance at arrowhead there is some academ in that area we may be forced to use smaller tents if the need arises but at this moment in time that's the one location for that tent in eagleville the location is in the back of the building on the far end of the field in woodland it's in the front location there at the near the bus loop at warcester right behind the school right now at the skyview arcola campus we have four locations that tents could be placed uh main shows locations are on two on
037the opposite ends of the building uh further towards the sky view on the campus one on arcola end and then one behind arcola and of course at the high school we have two on either four locations two on either side that could be located at the high school and that is all the updates that i have and dr walsh and dr angstad have i'll take any questions any questions uh miseries um i just it's more of a request similar to what i made with dr angstadt as far as safety protocols you're sharing that with us because every in-service safety protocols are gone over but and i don't know if it's a facilities question or a are you listening to that feedback is that what is that me is it the mask let me go like
038that yeah okay i have a really thick mc i was representing mciu but it's super thick um i don't know if this is a facilities question or an education committee question but at some point over the year like i asked with dr ang said i would like to hear about some of the safety training because i think every school district does it a tiny bit differently like i have a three-hour training on thursday and it's a little bit different than what matthachton does so i would be curious about that um and i don't know if it's or it's an exact session i know we're only allowed to talk about you know certain things an exec session and safety is one of them so at some point this year i would like to find out because
039you know i don't know i know if you're familiar with this is alertis but there's something called alice so i would like to know more about what methactin does specifically sure i think uh just to speak to that i think at a committee meeting we can certainly talk to generalities okay um but it would definitely be more appropriate probably in our executive session to discuss the safety protocols that might be more specific to some of our school safety situations thank you any other questions i'm miss hall i just want to say thank you for all the information on the professional development that's being done i know in policy a lot of times it comes up in review of when are these when are these trainings going to be held and things like that so i
040appreciate the clarification on that you're welcome thank you miss hall any other questions okay thank you mr regina dr washington dr hank said very much appreciated next on the agenda i have the matter of covid 19 testing and i just want to share some information i don't have a presentation to share there are two documents that are posted to the to the agenda both at the guest and schedule speakers section of the agenda and also on recommended board action items for the past five months there have been discussions on various testing options with chop recommending the test to stay program and the county recommending the acet program recently the state program was released and their program better known as a pool testing program in the short of all of this the chop test to stay
041appeared to be the most promising for the staff and students but it is not supported by the county while we could implement it it would not reduce or help in any way to lessen the isolation quarantine requirements the impact fundamentally is not aligned with the county's covet 19 exclusion policies and that's what prevents the county from as part of as pro policy prevents them from enabling or allowing tests to stay to be accepted so moving on the their the newly released state program was developed to address schools that reside in counties that do not have a county health department however as good as this resource is is yet to be determined our nursing staff has a number of questions into the group running the program and those have not yet been answered to date leaving
042this program as a potential but not ready for implementation the county department of health recommends that we sign up now because the deadline is the end of august and in doing so it gives us an opportunity to participate if at a later date the information that we ascertain from the questions allows us to properly uh implement such a program and of course we would come back with those recommendations and those specifics to the board before implementing any additional program the asip program which is the same program as dr angstad mentioned earlier in the presentation is the same program we implemented last year and that was available last year for most districts now there were some pilot districts that offered it to students but most districts were only allowed to use it for adult volunteer testing
043our recommendation this year is that likely by the the first full week of school uh following labor day uh we would implement this in a voluntary fashion again at each school location and then at a centralized location for uh aramark slash first student or other central or non-school related employees these the second part to this is this year as you can see in the document that's been attached that the the county through the asic program allows for athlete athletes to be tested um and it's it's it's my recommendation that we make that available on a voluntary basis that um we provide a form uh parents can choose of athletes can choose to participate in in the program as they wish we will set the dates and times when that testing occurs and depending on the
044on the uh the amount of participation it might be multiple dates and times but generally speaking it is something that makes sense for us to at least make available if in fact there are families that want that testing to take place and all we would have to do is make sure that we make the proper arrangements uh so that it doesn't interfere with practice time and and things related to participation in that sport so again the the idea here for the asic program is to basically provide the same level of assurance testing for adults on a voluntary basis and then to add the voluntary testing program for athletes are there are there any questions for for me at this time or for doctor angstadt misabilis so just to clarify um this is being offered only
045to student athletes because that's a limitation of the program or that's a limitation in what we're offering that is what's indicated in the uh in the available use of the resources by the by the exit program okay so it's not a limitation that we're putting on the program it's a limitation of the program that's being given to us okay yeah we would not have enough resources either manpower resources or uh testing resources to provide it to all students okay i mean and it does make sense from an exposure likelihood standpoint because they are going to be unmasked outside um there's more opportunity i guess so i mean it does make sense i just wanted to make sure i understood where the limitation was coming from so thank you and again i i don't have a
046whole lot of information on the what we call the state program or the pool testing because it it um there's a little it's coming out really fast and we don't have it but my my recommendation the county's recommendation our nurse's recommendation is let's sign up for it we will not will not implement the program or until we have board approval to do so that way we're in if we if we want to take advantage of it and we don't lose that opportunity in case we need it that's that's really the why while we're sharing with you here this evening i don't normally bring recommendations that don't have a lot of detail to them but i i don't have another better option for you here this evening other questions it's only i i'm sorry you know
047i didn't catch is there a cost or this is caught what is the cost of this i don't know if i missed there's no cost either the two programs oh with the exception of manpower so so we do uh do we do pull uh you know our nurses might have some additional uh time after or before school that we need to compensate them for there are typically secretaries slash office assistants that would normally assist the nurse as part of the the intake process so there are some cost internal costs that you know are not certainly aren't necessarily planned for but are things that we believe we can handle and properly handle as we did last year and plus those costs could also be used or covered uh under the uh srs 3 funding i get
048that it's they set the rules but the only thing if there's an opportunity to give feedback i would throw in there to get marching band included uh everything that a athletic team does is mirrored by marching band so and i hear you we'll take what we can get right now but if there's any way to submit a can we expand this to them because they're doing everything a football a field hockey team is doing right now that's that's appropriate thank you for that suggestion anything else thoughts on marching band for that as well miss purdue i think i'll go back to my um question before and just see is it possible if in the case where we have students that also need it and i don't know if that's feedback i don't know if this
049is still something that's under discussion and if you can bring that up at the meeting so if you have a chance to provide input if i understand what you're asking i think you're asking that we would use it on on uh make testing available for students who need it yeah and on a on an as-needed basis based on showing symptoms possibly or if there are yeah if showing symptoms in the school if we roll it out and um is based on board approval i'm just wondering if that's possibility to also include students and not just athletes yeah i i think that that at this at this time uh the guidance from the county on the use of the resources for acet to start testing people outside of their program might encourage families to send their
050children to school knowing that we will be we would we would test them and we and we would lose the ability to manage that testing process i know that may sound odd but but there's a lot of discussion that occurs with this and and and uh the nurses are in a different conversation than i'm in with with the superintendents and the county and generally speaking um providing this outside of the the scope uh right now uh you know becomes problematic in a number of ways uh so we so i'm not saying it won't change um it's possible that the the pooled program or the state program might provide a resource for us to do something with students that's a wait and see matter though but as of right now the asic program i don't have
051any other alternative other than suggest to you that we have a voluntary for athletes involuntary for our adults because the the the the concept of using this type of antigen anagen test to uh determine whether someone should go home or not is the problem that we have with the test to stay concept that chop wanted to see happen so it it's almo it's almost the same it's almost the same thing does that help yeah that helps i'm just wondering if if not this program maybe if there's another program so it looked like there's more discussion so there may be opportunities that we can extend this out and that's i just wanted to put that comment out there if we have the opportunity to provide it for all our students is something that i think we
052should look into well i i can we can certainly do that i think if there's a if there's a i'm certain there are um for-profit organizations that provide testing services and supplies and materials for school districts to you know test our entire student body um if the you know our nursing staff our administrative team uh we haven't considered that as a productive way of managing a uh you know the the pandemic however the board you know wants us to look into those things and come back with some recommendations we can certainly do that but at this time i i don't have those resources i'm aware that those are out there i get i get the emails on a regular basis so i i probably see what you see in in terms of of those resources
053uh again those those things those things you know uh look you know from from my initial review they look good on paper in terms of you know providing a particular service to help us address this there's a huge number of time and manpower challenges associated with us administering tests or even doing self-administering administered tests and and and how to do that on a regular basis so that so there's there's a there's a balance and all that and and and it's and our our our guide for for all that we do has been you know with the with the folks on our calls on a weekly basis the uh the county and chop and none of them have suggested that we go into you know testing all student populations so yeah mr winters did you secure
054i were able to secure on additional uh nursing support i know based on what's going on with the ability to uh find in all areas of healthcare and obviously being strained but i wouldn't be able to secure that wasn't in the original presentation yeah actually probably dr angstadt or even dr sergini could speak to it better but i know we have secured a nursing support through ghr so i actually had a conversation with shayna from ghrs where we get our contracted nurses from this afternoon they have two nurses secured that will share the for elementary school so two will come in um do arrowhead and and eagleville and another one will be sharing worcester and woodland i believe are the mix don't quote me on that that may change um but they were coming in
055and we have them in place until the end of the first semester with the understanding if we would need them to be extended that that would be available we also have another nurse that we contracted for that will be at the skyview arcola campus we currently have a nurse that is out for a short period of time our floating nurse is covering for her and the contracted nurse will be providing additional support to that campus the other information that i can share with you is we also reached out to see if ghr could provide some nursing support if we do move forward with testing the athletes have someone available after school to help with our athletic trainers both at arcola and at the thacton high school so yes there are people in place thank you
056dr axe any other questions on matters of testing it's not seeing any other questions that ends uh the scheduled guests and speakers for this evening thank you dr zurby and just as one final comment i really do appreciate the all hands on deck approach that we have going for the start of school year i'm already excited for the start of school and hearing everything tonight has made it even more exciting so uh thank you for all of your hard work these last several weeks in this last year and a half too can i i'm so sorry can i ask one question before the with the presentation the volunteers um whatever the policy will be like what you guys are thinking with communication to the volunteers because i think everybody's eager to get involved so even
057if there's some level of support like library when nobody's there or just if you could send communication i think there they want to help thank you ms cancro all right so moving on to reports we have attached to the agenda the finance committee report and i'm assuming other committee reports will be attached as they are available for those that were held um dei report mr german thank you um the mathakton school district dei leadership team presented the community survey data a summary and subcommittee developed recommendations to the administration at an in-person work session on august 4th the district's administrators developed short and long-term priorities from the recommendations in an in-person work session on august 17th the district's administrators with the dei committee leaders and available committee members which were 38 participants took those prioritized recommendations
058and created smart goals to formulate the action plan that will carry into strategic planning several of the action plan items have been earmarked to be expedited for execution at the onset of the year these include but are not limited to communication of the code of conduct to students families and staff at the onset of the school year communication of the process for reporting incidents and the process that administrators will follow when they receive a report the august 17th meeting marked the final meeting with dr bruce campbell our consultant whose contract concludes at the end of the month completed action plans are due to the dei office by september 12th the month acting school district dei wrap-up meeting is set for september 27th and information to connect to the virtual meeting will be posted on the
059website thank you mr drummond looking forward to having our student board representatives join us again hopefully next month um for the education foundation we have with us this evening mr beam oh i'm sorry we'll do we have an update for north montco i'm so sorry i skipped right over that um and just real quick iu meets tomorrow so and we didn't have a july meeting and i will uh tell you about north monco and liz if i miss anything please let me know um we met on august 16th um and the plan is of course 100 in person um the director did note that we would only go virtual if for some reason there was a functional closure due to staff or student quarantine she doesn't expect it i'm not trying to scare anybody but
060she did want to know that would be the only reason that it's 100 in person we kept with the approved health and safety plan in june that follows monco and everyone will be fully masked at north monco um a couple items of interest there they were able to purchase a new diesel truck um as part of a grant and the import the reason that's so important is because these trucks have new electrical systems so the students can't possibly learn how to fix a diesel truck without a new diesel truck in the electrical system um the other note of interest was as you may have remembered they were trying to extend the mechatronics program because it is so valuable and so popular so they had built not built but they'd extended a room for mechatronics they're
061unable to find a second teacher because it is such a specialized program however the good news is they were able to place all the students who wanted to participate in mechatronics um so there is no waiting list for mechatronics and usually there is a waiting list so there was kind of like a bittersweet double-edged sword there and they are providing the teacher with instructional support because the numbers there are a lot of students and what they were able to do with the extra space is expand the internet technology program so they were able to kind of problem solve and that was really it other than they're just looking they also had new teacher training and induction and they are looking for a wonderful start to the school year and our students will start there they're
062all fully aware with this on the 31st they spend their time on the 30th in atmo factom so good luck to all the students and staff at the tech center there are a couple things in my notes to add um one is an essers grant that was received um for 550 000 or so and that they're planning to put um some of the money into enriching math and literacy instruction in the school another was that we heard an update to improvements that they're working on in cyber security within the building and um also they're maybe looking at some new program possibilities at the school marketing and social media and physical therapy sports medicine and that was i think all i had to add thank you and again apologies for almost skipping over you okay so
063picking up where i was student board representatives next month foundation report mr beam thanks very much i'm jim beam i'm have the honor of being the president of the methachton education foundation and it's been quite some time since i've spoken with each of you and consistent with the theme so far this evening about the new school year i just wanted to come before you tonight and for anyone listening into this meeting from the community just to give you a a brief update of where we've been as a foundation and where we're going as we head into this new school year i hope and think that you are as happy as i am that the foundation thanks to the wonderful community support of individuals and businesses and i also want to specifically thank dr zerby and
064tim bricker for their support in terms of engaging businesses and others to make contributions to the foundation which have enabled us to really make a difference in the lives of students here in mathakton uh this past year the foundation has given more money to the district than it ever has before and the good news is i'm very optimistic about the pace of which we're going to continue this into the future as you may well know some really wonderful things have happened this past year there have been some new courses that are coming into fruition after a lot of planning we have the hydroponic farm lab in the senior high school and also the csi forensics lab these courses are cutting edge opportunities for students to really participate and i so wish they'd had something like
065that when i was in school i mean these are the things that our kids are really going to get excited about and for the parents out there who have younger children by the time they get to the high school these courses will be refined even further i'm just really excited about where this is going to take us you know it's it's just part of what we are doing and uh thanks to you for for your uh embracing all of this and thanks for the teachers who came up with these ideas and i do want to take a second for any any teachers that are out there we are continuing to look for new ideas and new opportunities i've been meeting with dr zerby he has met with his administration they have come up with wish
066lists of ideas you know ideas for new things that we haven't done yet new things new opportunities for us to do and and and a list has been presented to the foundation at least to me the foundation board hasn't seen it yet but there's some wonderful opportunities there and i love the creativity which has been demonstrated by the administration in terms of helping us keep moving forward keep taking this upward we really are climbing higher as a district and i think it's something that you should be proud of and that all of us in the community should be proud of as well in terms of something else that that started a year ago is that someone came to me with a concern and a complaint and wondering what we could do thinking that we needed
067to do more about entrepreneurship that in this age in which we are living it's all the more important for people to think outside the box for people to not just rely on government or anybody else just to take care of them but for people to continue with the american spirit of of uh entrepreneurship taking a risk doing something that hasn't been done i'm looking at the water bottles that are in front of all you and i'm older than just about all of you and i can remember drinking from a hose as a kid and somebody's saying you know someday maybe uh maybe they'll put water in a bottle and sell it and we all said that'll never happen you know and just look so with the opportunities of entrepreneurship um you know we did uncover
068a wonderful organization called unchartered living we're also working with junior achievement and i'm delighted that this fall the entrepreneurship class which will be taught by microban or urban sick did i say that right i hope i didn't mispronounce his name or basic i thank you that's going to be happening the foundation has played a large role in terms of providing the initial funding for that and what's going to be especially terrific about all this is that community volunteers are going to be coming in we have between 40 and 50 students already enrolled for this class in this first year which exceeded my expectations to tell you the truth i think it's only going to grow i had meetings today with a couple of very prominent community leaders a businessman and i told them about this
069and offered them the opportunity to provide people from their companies to come in to speak to these students and they said i'm not going to do that i'm going to come in myself this is really important so we are doing something here which is catching the thread of the business community and showing them how in a very relevant and practical way we are teaching our students to enter into the business world whether they go immediately after high school or after they complete a college or other higher education opportunity i'm by anyone listening to this i would like to say that we're still looking for more volunteers i have no doubt that we're going to find them i think there's a decent chance that there's some volunteers right here among you on the school board and
070i'd be delighted to talk with you about this more we're not looking and i'm going to win well you can't see me we're so far away from each other but i'm not going to wink at you and say we're looking for for for bright active excited people wanting to come in and excite our students we're not looking for people who are going to come in and bore them because we all know it's a sin to bore a kid and we're not going to do that but i am extremely excited about this opportunity and by the way this is going to be a lot like a shark tank situation at the end of the year they're going to i mean they're going to have projects they're going to go through and at the end of the
071year there's going to be a competition and this gives us an opportunity to in other parts of the country that i've seen it becomes as almost as big as a football game with student activity so anybody who is interested in volunteering please let me know this is something that's going to be very very exciting i think you all know that on september 30th we're having our second apex awards event it's not going to be a dinner but it's going to be at the bluebell country club and it's going to be heavy hors d'oeuvres and beverages and there are a wonderful list of honorees this is going to sell out we're not quite there yet but we are well on our way so anyone who is interested in attending please go on and get your tickets
072it's going to be a sellout we are planning this event by the way with all contingencies in mind bluebell country club does have a tent they don't have a permit to use it but we're gonna see what happens we're still we're playing we're we're planning you know we're planning this like you're planning the school year on a daily event you know every day by day we're gonna see what happens but come heck or high water we're going to have that event and it's going to be very successful i'm very excited about it and i look forward to seeing many of you there the last thing i just want to mention is last week you heard a presentation from dr zerby talked about the strategic plan and what's going to be happening and he mentioned something
073specific that was music to my ears i'd heard it before but i was delighted to hear it in public and that is this idea of a stem academy this is something else you know if there's an expression sometimes you either go big or you go home and here at mathacton i think we want to go big and i just want you to know that the foundation is very excited about this we want to support you and we're going to have to figure out how that works it's a large undertaking but when we talk about rankings of this district when we talk about everything else associated with raising the whole level of education at mathactin this stem academy idea is is one that i think is absolutely top-notch i hope that you give it very very
074very serious consideration and just know you're not going to be alone they're going to be a lot of others who are going to support you in that thanks so much for your time thank you mr beam now we have communications miss kelly thank you and good evening everyone uh this week we are welcoming new and returning with actin teachers and support staff in preparation for what is sure to be an outstanding school year earlier tonight you saw a video of our 2021 induction class which we will also post online up next tomorrow and thursday we'll have two days of in-service for our teachers the first day of school is august 30th i'll be there with my handy camera in each building taking a lot of photos so please stay tuned for a slideshow of all
075the opening day action and also please download printable first day of school signs thanks to the education foundation it's on their website methectomyfoundation.org so we want to see your photos your first day photos as well in other news this year's this school year's theme is building our future we have another special video coming out shortly that will show you some of the exciting ways that the mathan school district is building our future and please do not forget to stay connected with us by visiting our website at mathactin.org and by following methecton school district on facebook twitter and youtube thanks so much can't wait for the school year to start thank you miss kelly and now the superintendents report dr serby thank you madam president um ms kelly i i think the the acting in this
076uh superintendent's video is pretty good this year isn't it all right i hope everyone likes it um it's pretty uh but what what i'd really like to share here this evening is i need to say thank you let me say thank you to our secretaries to our custodians to our maintenance staff to our administrators and everyone else that's put in you know umpteen hours of work here this summer to get ready for uh a school year that you know uh hasn't happened yet and hasn't happened for two years where we start off with a welcoming and where we start off with an opportunity to engage teachers and students for the first time with some students not happening for almost two years so with that uh you know my hats go off to our secretaries our
077uh custodians our maintenance people our administrators everybody that's put in time to be ready for this school year you saw some of the the fruits of that labor here this evening from dr walsh dr rank said and mr regina in terms of the things that they've shared but there's there's just thousands of other conversations uh memos communications plans that that take place and i just want to thank everybody uh certainly the board knows uh but the public should know that you know we have a number of construction projects underway and those things you know just you know bear down and put you know some additional challenges in front of us so so with all that said uh a big thank you goes out to everyone involved and i really appreciate their efforts and we will
078be ready for uh on monday uh the next thing that i want to share is just a quick comment on the presentation that was provided last week by mr mcfarland from lower providence township and his presentation was specifically to audubon elementary school and with that i'm just going to you know you know basically say here this evening if there's no objection by members of the board at this time i will meet with the board president and the chair of the property committee and our solicitor to re-engage the solicitor in the process of working with the township solicitor to draft an agreement with lower providence township for the purpose of leasing the audubon elementary school for the use as a community center recognizing that a draft agreement is necessary to ascertain the detail necessary to determine
079the risk and rewards associated with such an endeavor uh and if there are any objections at this time um i i will let the board know that we'll proceed with that and we'll come back with a timeline uh so that you know where we are in that that process any objections at this point seeing no objections uh that ends my report here uh for this evening thank you dr zurby um the board will now take comments on board action items um as you'll notice there's um one thing that is usually on the agenda that is missing this month and that is the board meeting minutes those will be attached to the september meeting agenda so the board will take comments on board action items this is an opportunity for residents to comment on matters that
080are to be decided upon as outlined on the agenda we ask you to keep your comments to four minutes or less we will do our best to respond to matters following the conclusion of those comments um most likely when we get to them in the agenda as always introduce yourself with your name and municipality please come forward [Music] good evening john andrews law of providence [Music] one item that's on the agenda this evening is closing two wells at the arrowhead school the item was also on the agenda for the property committee meeting earlier this month but there was no property committee report so seems to me that the uh just because there's no property report that uh the item should be tabled there are other reasons for the item to be tabled the uh the
081contractor has been found to uh close the two welds for some of approximately thirty thousand dollars i'm not aware that there were multiple bids there's no need to close those wells before the construction is complete uh so there's no need for i think it's a seven and a half percent to add on by steubner the major contractor i think five percent by federia and perhaps five and a half percent by the architect the uh i found an internet uh citation that closing a well costs uh 500 to a thousand dollars uh well gets closed to prevent contamination of the aquifer that the well would draw water from and closing a well involves putting an apparatus down the pipe and cutting the pipe off at some depth maybe 10 feet below ground level pouring some solid
082materials into the pipe to seal it up and maybe the last top 10 feet of the pipe being filled in with concrete and i think a small crew could uh do all of that for these two wells in oh as much as half a day's work thirty thousand dollars for that doesn't make sense to me for anyone whether they're whether they're poor or rich also the well possibly could be used for water for toilets water is expensive each month at the current arrow at school the water bill is something like seven hundred dollars so it's a case of if you have lemons can you make lemonade if you get my drift and at a minimum the responsible action for you to take this evening is to table the change order thank you i have uh
083i have some other comments for courtesy of the floor this evening thank you again anyone else with public comment on board action items [Music] good evening jessica bradbury lower providence township i would like to discuss an item noted in the superintendent report and also listed under 10 m supplemental contracts there is an advisement and a supplemental contract for dana tornetta to move from grades 2 at eagleville to grade 5. last week mr sorgini reported that you would be collapsing the eagleville second grade from four sections to three in the recent years the second grade class size has been between 18 and 19 students for class the august enrollment report indicated that this year there are only 68 students enrolled in second grade at eagleville making the class size jump to 23 students per classroom and
084that exceeds class size as governed by board policy 126. are these classrooms also equipped with the temporary hvac units with an average of five more students in the classroom and temporary hvac units do you have any concern for the students and the teachers relate to that situation regarding agenda item 13c covid testing participation first i would like to thank you dr zerby for responding to my email yesterday to clarify that he would not be recommending any of the three types of testing in the ginkgo polled testing attachment according to dr zurby there is not enough information about the programs listed to recommend them at this time the ginkgo assurance statement also requires the district to select what type of interest they have in the various testing options will you be considering adopting pooled testing which
085is one of the options pooled testing takes a sample from many many people and puts them all into one test if the results come back positive it requires all the individuals to then get individualized testing if we are talking about subjecting our children to pooled testing will that create additional confusion and trauma for them and take them out of the classroom while they have that individual testing if so for how long the only timing that i saw in the pa department of health forum is that it is required to be filed two weeks before we have the capability to begin testing under that program so please take the time to prepare a robust plan that outlines how teachers and students may opt in or opt out of this testing program how consent will be obtained
086and how privacy will be maintained will you assure us that you will not allow children to consent to testing without parent and guardian knowledge parents want the choice with regards to their children's health and medical treatments and interventions it is disappointing to hear the board continue to try to blur these lines the parents and taxpayers deserve to know how testing programs will be deployed governed and managed before the board votes to authorize our superintendent to sign and return this form thank you anyone else for public comment on board action items just marissa rocco lower providence just one quick one on the approval of the inter scholastic athletic schedule i haven't heard any mention other than an email that someone sent me regarding the limit limited locker room usage so i'm reading an email here that
087students in adults while indoors jim hall okay that i'm sorry that's just about wearing a mask that the locker rooms would be limited in the number of kids that would be allowed in them at one time and the distancing in the locker rooms so while you're approving this schedule and some of these events would occur after school i'm wondering how much more time that might come cut into the periods that kids need to leave school so if you're approving a game you know on this schedule that's at let's say three o'clock and there's limited locker room usage are kids now going to be needing to leave class even earlier and if so you might want to think about possibly well it's too late now but rotating those end of day periods because kids can't consistently
088miss the same class so i'm just wondering how that might apply and i really haven't seen um i know we haven't talked about it here at the board meetings but this email was sent out from coaches um to their teams or to their team parents so i would just be curious to know how that might um impact the the schedule of students and what they might miss that's it thanks anyone else with public comment on board action items all right then let's move on with our agenda we'll be approving our meeting minutes next month so then we move on to fiscal items and mr bricker good evening for your approval tonight we have the list of bills treasurer's report there are no budgetary transfers we have two change orders for arrowhead gc002 for 33 600
089and gc 003 for 23 2 307.90 the first one is for the well closure and the second one is for additional decking we have also the approval of action on three student activity accounts two of which is the opening and closing of the class accounts and a new one that we discussed last month which is the opening of an account for unified sports and we also have the approval of the school breakfast and lunch prices which are the same as they were the previous year thank you mr breaker would anyone like to take any of these fiscal items separately okay so then i will take a motion to approve all of the items listed under fiscal mr navarrete is there a second ms drummond comments from the board just to address mr andrews questions i
090believe we discuss the wells at length at the work session i appreciate his comments but they were um they were talked about at the work session and then just i um sent an email about this months ago but just while we're talking about reports um all the board members to write their reports so for several years i wrote the education report you know the the chairs write the reports at other districts the administrators write those reports so it just might be something we want to think about just that if you know um we write them and type them and send them to mrs rutledge and they get posted it might just be something we want to consider i know one time when um i think it was miss cancro or myself couldn't make it an
091administrator did it instead but like this time mr winters did it so it's just something to consider um because the administrators and the chairs are both equally important so something to consider for the board thank you miss hall i'm back to the wells i know that we discussed it in property and at the work session and ralph or i don't know who can help with this but i know that we are required to close those wells are we not yes and they were also bid by the subcontractor and this is the lowest bid okay thank you anyone else okay all those in favor aye motion carries 9-0 thank you thank you mr bricker moving on to personnel items stalling for time as dr sardini comes to the podium thank you very much madam president good
092evening everyone for your consideration this month we have the following personnel items i'll be highlighting those items that are additions to the agenda from the work session last week three resignations professional with the addition of shelby serrano french instructor at mathakton high school and ashley alvaranga chemistry and physics instructor at mathakton high school we thank shelby and ashley for their service to the students of mathacton and we wish them well in their career pursuits four resignations classified with the addition of susan chung instructional assistant at eagleville elementary and carrie lofgren office assistant at worcester elementary we thank susan and carrie for their service to the students of mathakton and we wish them well two employments administrator miss erica thomas for supervisor of secondary special education please note that the agenda has been updated to specifically
093identify that erica will be at the high school level grades nine to twelve and also as we discussed last week mr michael bordreau for principal of arcola intermediate school four employments professional with the addition from last week of bonnie alexey eld instructor at eagleville elementary and melissa lopez eld instructor at mathacton high school eight employments classified with the additions as follows jennifer brown instructional assistant at skyview jenna garcia personal care assistant at methachton high school catherine massive bus aide and transportation molly ashcroft bus aid in transportation marguerite trahe personal care assistant at eagleville lindsey rivas personal care assistant at eagleville and daniel talia reading instructional assistant at eagleville five changes of status classified including the following all of which are additions from last week christine maczynski from personal care assistant at warcester to instructional assistant
094at worcester mavin goher from personal care assistant at eagleville to instructional assistant at eagleville kathleen shireman from recess assistant at woodland to instructional assistant at woodland gabrielle winters from part-time office assistant at eagleville to instructional assistant at mathacton high school and constance mckeon from personal care assistant at worcester to instructional assistant at arcola three uncompensated leaves including one edition from last week lisa driven social studies and gifted instructor at methachton high school a series of supplemental contracts including additions to the list of mentors and program coordinators from last week as well as two contracts for moving classrooms and one addition to the list of approved volunteers thank you you've had a busy month dr sorgini yes madam president thank you would any board members like to take any of these items separately item 10 i4
095please yep any others all right so i'll have a motion to approve all items under personnel with the exception of 10 i4 miss reece is there a second mr mcginnis comments from the board i just i just had a question i know um we've had some movement within some of the supplemental contracts that we might have approved for a different contract at one point and now they're moving into a different position yes um do we need to take any action to avoid the previous contract that we had with them we don't need to avoid them they are year to year and if the person doesn't fulfill that the position itself is approved so we're able to move somebody else into that okay thank you mr neverett i got my permission from andrea to speak so
096i'm good i just want to say i know andrea touched on it last week but i had the pleasure of sitting through the interview process for uh mr bordero and he has big shoes to to fill uh at arcola but boy i'm excited about having this gentleman join our team he came into that interview guns of blazen um talking about how much he loves in middle school and this this man has dedicated his his professional career um to children at this level he gets it um it was clear from everybody else in the room that were professionals in in that environment that they agree that he gets it so i'm excited for him to join our team [Music] mr winners yeah dr sergini the the one thing that does stick out to me and i
097know that this is a byproduct of the late latest uh mespas contract but the the uh rates that the new employees have are i believe 85 of the existing rate um one of the things i want to make sure that that you guys uh come forward if these rates that or we're looking at at 15 45 15 25 15 1577 are um obviously very close to a 15 number that's being presented around around the country and also the competitive nature of the work environment that we are in um if there's any issues specifically to that i would hope um you come forward with those as quickly as possible um i mean it in some days it looks like some of them are three or four dollars difference than somebody that's been around maybe just one
098more year so thank you mr winters if i can speak to that one of the components of the negotiated agreement is actually raises over the life of the agreement so over the course of the next several years there are uh what are tantamount to about eight percent raises annually to move those numbers up through the 23-24 school year so those are conversations that we do have with individuals when we hire them and they have responded favorably to that i just want to say on a personal note um the resignation of shelby serrano breaks my heart just a little bit i had the the unique pleasure of hearing her voice during fourth period over zoom every year every day last year and um she definitely made a big difference for at least one student so uh
099miss serrano if you're listening cole says good morning and uh we will miss you i'll just follow up to that thank you to mr regina for explaining that this you know this happens i lost two colleagues in my hallway this week but they're staying for time and so thank you for explaining how that works and just to add on to what you just said um and miss and i don't want to say her last name correctly so i'm just going to say her first name i know ashley was very involved and coached for us and things too so i wish her luck in her her as you said career future and thank you again for all of this and to reiterate something i said last week i am so thankful that the supervisors of special
100education are set and in place because those are such difficult roles to fill so now that we have um in our five eight miss fallston who's been there and now we have miss uh dr mangano at elementary and then a experienced special ed supervisor um in our high school that that helps me sleep at night because those are very difficult positions to fill so best of luck to everybody on this paper this year thank you we are quite fortunate sorry i forgot one more um i always ask and i imagine i don't really want to ask on item 10a one two and three i imagine based on their on or before date of resignation that they're moving on to different districts is that correct they are moving on to employment elsewhere all three of them
101um i believe all three are correct like mr winters just so you know i did ask as well geography you know that one district that pays which we can't compete to with et cetera and also too i didn't forgot to ask about miss bradberry's question about miss tornetta and um we do a really really we do it we have tried very hard to keep that that policy that's unusual not unusual but we have kept that policy as much as we can to hold that and some years it's easier to do than other years so um it's pretty awesome that we have a policy for cater to and when it's close like that sometimes we have to make those decisions anyone just yes i just want to echo uh miss aubry larceny's comments on shelby serrano
102and thank her for the service to the district and um just share how much my daughter really enjoyed having her as a teacher all right with that then all those in favor of the items under personnel with the exception of 10 i4 all right the motion carries 9-0 and now moving on i'll take a motion to approve item 10 i4 on the agenda mr mcginnis second miss drummond comments from the board yes as in requirement of the pennsylvania ethics act and conflict have been of interest i will be abstaining this vote uh related to item 10 i4 which involves a change of status the nature of my interest is false my wife will become an instructional aide which will be increase her hours at the district so financially impactful thank you mr winners so all
103those in favor of 10 i4 opposed and one abstention from mr winners right so i know you don't want to oppose it so with a vote of eight zero one the motion carries thank you all thank you dr sargini moving on to curriculum and programs dr walsh thank you madam president uh under the board agenda 11a through c approved the following curriculum updates as per documents provided to the board ela 9th grade academic english honors english and world language 9th through 12th grade french 3. also approved the emergency instructional template and emergency instructional time schedule as presented for section 520.1 and in addition approve the pia athletic schedule for the fall 2122 school year for policy 123. thank you dr walsh can i have a motion to approve the items under curriculum and programs ms
104reese i'll take a second from mrs drummond any comments from the board um no just that um uh uh the member of the public who asked about the locker room i would suggest i would assume we would refer her to her building principles um and i can only speak as a parent but you know i as athletics yes they do miss some of the end of the day for away games etc and you know i'm i'm sure the uh mr schnabel at arcola and dr spiwak at the high school will and the coaches will address that i will i know we've had some games already um there was a scrimmage today for girls soccer and there was different things already and we're all crossing our fingers unfortunately we saw some sporting some teams have already
105not at my facton yet don't want to scare anybody but there have been some you know uh what's that called uh postponements of games and things due to covid so let's cross our fingers that our marching band and our athletes stay healthy and safe in the use of the locker room and out there on the field so no problem all right anything else under curriculum and programs all those in favor motion carries 9-0 thank you thank you dr walsh under policy we have nothing under first reading the policy committee did not meet this summer um under second reading we have some minor revisions to the code of conduct i'll take a motion to approve the code of conduct under 12b mr mcginnis and the second miss hall comments from the board seeing none all those
106in favor motion carries nine zero yeah under other dr zerby on the agenda this evening is uh item 13c coveted 19 testing participation as listed thank you dr zurby may i have a motion to approve item 13c is listed ms perdue is there a second mr winners comments from the board ms cancro so just for clarification then dr zerby with right now we're just voluntary and the questions that we have from the public about consent privacy with guardian and you know testing children with the with or without the consent of a guardian can you just address that please yeah the the the privacy matters are all contained for the acet program are all contained in the uh the process that the county uh requires uh so we don't actually handle the records uh everything is
107done through a third-party uh group that's um i believe is hired by chop or or something to that effect and uh they handle all the red so the individuals go in register and they use qr codes to identify themselves and all that is handled by a third party so we don't have records of who does what uh all we know is they come in they show us the qr code we register and they go through they go through the steps that's for the adult testing the student testing would work the same way but of course we would work with our solicitor to ascertain a permission slip or not a permission slip but a permission form for the child to be given permission by the adults uh to uh participate in the voluntary athletic uh process
108and with regards to the other program um i don't have details for you this evening and i'm not recommending an implementation of i'm just recommending that we apply and see whether or not there is some value to it and if so i'll be back in front of you to say what we need to do and how we'll do it yeah thank you for that dr zerby the way that it's written on the agenda um i can see where there could be some confusion but we're with authorizing you to submit the application for the ginkgo covid testing program and the mou for the asic program so all we're doing is applying for it we're not implementing it we're just getting further information and and i am comfortable that you'll be bringing more details to us as
109we have them mr just a point of curiosity on the certified test administrators that will be on the premises are they are tech are they are like school nurses staff or are they test administrators from the um county health department or somewhere else for the asic program all of our nurses were certified last year they have to go through a 30-minute recertification online program that our lead nurse coordinator ms pifer will be leading them through in the during the in-service in the next two days and then we also have third-party nurses that got certified as well through the same process and we received that training certification training from the abds uh last year thank you and also and i just had another just clarification question um again this is voluntary and a courtesy so if
110you prefer to go somewhere else for your testing you may go somewhere else for your testing correct okay thank you miss purdue you have a question i just have a comment on i think it was mentioned about pool testing from my understanding from pool testing is usually limited to four individuals in most cases they're tested to ensure that resources are used wisely and what happens is that if the four individuals if the test comes back positive they will test all individuals individually but it's really it's not like you would take a whole classroom pull them all and then tell them provide them with negative results and hank leave them out to wait is my understanding but i just want to know are we and i know we we don't have specifics on testing yet but
111is that something that you've heard as far as this program as far as pool testing well the the primary testing through this state program is a pooled model and um there are a lot of details that we don't have information on and like i said earlier to have a conversation of any level uh without me knowing or out my nurses informing me of what we can and can't do i think it would be fruitless at this point so i'm i'm just saying that we might have opinions on whether we should do these things we might have you know other outside information that that suggests this will work or won't work i'm telling you right now that all i want from you is the opportunity to take advantage of something if i think it will work
112and our nurses will think it'll work right now we don't know that and if i can't get into the into the uh through the deadline then you know the opportunity is not available to us that's that's what i'm trying to avoid the only thing i wanted to add because we keep bringing up miss pfeiffer and we've we've thanked her numerous times but thank you again to miss pfeiffer and all of our nurses who are still going to have a very challenging year as we mentioned you know updates constantly and they are so invaluable and we're so lucky to have mrs pfeiffer in her position of i mean being president of all the pennsylvania school nurses i mean i i she's just such a valuable resource so thank you to her and her entire nursing staff
113all right with no further comments then we'll take a vote all those in paper of item 13c any opposed okay the motion carries 9-0 uh dates for board members calendars we have our committee meetings being held in the lgi at the high school and our work session and regular board meeting will be here next month um anything for old business anything for new business miss drummond i just want to thank all the community members who have donated to the methachton backpack program last year and this summer as well we are gearing up to send that program down to the seven schools and if you want to follow us on facebook at my fact and backpack there's a list of items that we could still use there's you can order from your favorite retailer or you
114can drop it off in front of this building or at the high school but i just really want to thank the community for all the support for this program and and it's just been wonderful to see so thank you so much thank you mr and thanks to you and miss winters and now miss otero and falston for your work um coordinating this program this year and mrs coop and this is coop i'm sorry the group keeps growing all right anything else under new business miss purdue i'm just happy that we are a few days away to the start of the school year i remember last year we had a rocky start or when we thought about starting and i think we're hopefully in good position i haven't heard any red flags being raised and we
115stay here tonight and i'm just looking forward to the first day and we'll be counting out each day at the end of the day and marking it off as a completed date and i know the students are still not really ready to come back because they still want to enjoy summer but i think we are in great shape and i'll wait to see how far we progress thank you all right anything else then with that then i think we can move on to courtesy of the floor um the board will now hear and from residents you can make comment on matters that are or may be before the board we ask you keep your comments to four minutes or less and we may choose to respond to some matters following the conclusion of the comments
116marissa rocco lower providence ms reese that was me that asked that question and i understand i had an athlete at this school too i understand they get out early and maybe my question should have been saved for the end um which is now because when they're all getting out now for practice so i know i did comment on the schedule and this wouldn't really be the schedule but the email i have here coaches should send athletes into locker rooms in groups that will appropriately allow for spacing of athletes three feet or greater while masked how are they going to appropriately do that um i i'm and i know you're saying ask the building principles but there's a lot of kids leaving for not only games practice um other kids in the gym i just i
117want to make sure that it's that things aren't going to take so much longer and that if so the parents are aware of it um miss larcenis has also referred me to building principles because while i think the tents are a great idea i did ask about that and i said last year unfortunately arcola had a lot of outside time my daughter never got outside once from her teachers not once her teachers did not let them go out i think it was her seventh period where most kids were out but she she was never able to not her her whole class so if we are using tents and doing things of this nature these building principles teachers need to hear from administration that this needs to be everyone we need to be inclusive of everyone
118in the entire school that they all have equal time outside teachers should not be refusing to let their kids outside and they shouldn't be refusing to go outside um her seventh period teacher told her class no we're not going out so and this is the end of year when it's supposed to be fun you're letting the kids live a little and you know that's disappointing and i don't necessarily think that that's a building principle issue i think that it should be coming from here filtering down to the principles another thing i want clarification on is dr angstadt said earlier we should have very few um very few needs to quarantine because of how how we will be masked and distanced ms reese said last week that she talked to multiple community members and said because
119of the three feet and the mask no one will need to quarantine and i had about five community members email me and call me and ask me about that because they were confused because their kids were sent home last year traced in the classroom as three feet so i want to make sure we're all on the same page because it did say on the slide less than or equal to three feet i think that's what it said 15 minutes or more mass could be a possible quarantine so which is it i just want to make sure we're clear because if they are in the classroom and especially at a case like eagleville now where we have a lot of kids in a class we are certain i'm asking this question we are certain that they
120will not have to quarantine at all i'm asking that question for members of the community so if we could just clarify that um and then in lunch obviously that's a different circumstance um so if they are six feet unmasked um they will not have to quarantine so i just want to get clarification on that is the distancing and that they then if that's the case there really shouldn't be any needs to quarantine so if we can just confirm that thank you anyone else for courtesy of the floor [Music] good evening jessica bradbury lower providence township what is the end goal that will enable us to unmask our children is it having a vaccine available for all of those under 12 is it having everyone vaccinated is it having zero cases of covid the goal keeps
121shifting making it seem like our children will be masked not only for this year but for years to come how are you planning to reduce the social emotional and psychological impact that these masks are having on our children many of my questions went unanswered during the special meeting two weeks ago what are we implementing to support our children will there be more social skills groups established could we use the multi-million dollar surplus from last year to bring in additional counselors to support the children and the parents this year how do parents get their children involved with these great programs like soar and reach if they have concerns about their children's health two weeks ago a notice was sent out by the active minds k-12 initiatives team posted to a google classroom what is the active
122minds k-12 initiative team when was this team formed and who was part of it what is the objective and where is the charter this appears to be an outside program that was shared for awareness to help develop mental health advocacy but it was limited to bypoc and lgbtbq students miss aubry larson ace do you feel that one student's mental health is more important than in others mental health is relevant to everyone every student every teacher every parent and every member of this community i emailed all nine of you asking these questions and i received no responses do you accept our district promoting exclusion based on student identity could you please put that question in the meeting minutes i would also like to take a moment to correct a statement that i made two weeks ago
123i said that it was a orchestra supervisor but it is actually a candidate running for sister supervisor that tweeted quote i don't want healing i want retribution end quote she is also a member of the district dei community outreach subcommittee last week a resident of lower providence and a small business owner had his business attacked on social media by a fake account for allegedly associating himself with board candidates do you know anything about that miss aubry larsenace that's not a matter that comes before the board we should be acting with dignity and respect we must stop trying to target stalk slander and cancel people in order to silence those with diverse backgrounds and different points of view members of the board two weeks ago not a single one of you has publicly disavowed this hypocritical
124bullying behavior that is seemingly more prevalent with the adults in this community than the children your silence is deafening thank you anyone else for courtesy of the floor vince joseph's worst sister township montgomery pensa montgomery county pennsylvania methecton school district you know it's funny uh all over the internet there's these national websites that uh they expose schools uh for how radical their elected official board members are uh the resources they put on their websites and what they would like their teachers to teach i don't want to admonish any teachers at all but it's it's you and my facton's all over them i counted at least ten do you think people that want to move to this district are looking at those and saying maybe i shouldn't move there or maybe i should move out something
125to think about anyway you put out an infographic that said methachton school district does not teach critical race theory and there are no plans to teach crt in our schools crt is not part of the effect and improved curriculum do you think us taxpayers are really that dumb do you think that would placate the overwhelming majority of taxpayers who are appalled by your radical agenda do you think we'd read that and go oh good i guess it's okay and move on i realize it's an empty room people are on vacation but you're going to see a lot more of us we're not going away you can go away because we vote with our feet so let's break down your statement a little bit because there's some questions that need to be answered i can't help
126but notice you didn't denounce critical race theory i would like it to denounce critical race theory unless of course you agree with it we have no plans to teach it you know there were no plans to require masks but here we are it's not in the mathactin approved curriculum well i should hope not this is in portland as much as you would like it to be a few more questions and i would like these questions expressly added to the minutes because i want them answered in writing number one define crt i think you should define critical race theory if you're going to put it on an infographic i think that's important because uh you've changed the definitive the definition of equity three times you've changed the definition of equity three times substantially in the last
127six months of course you're going to change it again why would we believe it put it in writing what disciplinary action will you take against any teacher that does incorporate any aspect of crt in their class will it be in writing as a rule to those teachers you only mention teaching how about counseling training guest speakers website resources look obviously crt in the abstract is not what has parents outraged and we'll get board members voted outcome election time it's the many divisive and racist concepts within it that you are okay with evidently more questions we want answers to unless i checked when taxpayers ask questions to elected officials you're supposed to answer them that's how this works not oh i guess everybody left at the end of the meeting so oh well or we talked
128about that in a workshop go look it up put it in writing post it or email it you can email it to me and then i can disseminate it so will any training counseling teaching or communication buy effect and adopt express or promote that one race is inherently superior to another or that one race by virtue is inherently oppressive consciously or unconsciously that a person should be discriminated against or receive adverse treatment or receive favorable treatment because of their race that their moral character is determined by it that they bear responsibility for actions committed by others that look like them in the past or any aspect of the so-called 1619 project i would like answers to all of these questions thank you anyone else for courtesy of the floor all right so moving on i
129do want to respond to just a couple of things quickly um moving backwards um we have a great resource here that was provided to us from the pennsylvania school board association all about critical race theory and critical race theory is a framework for examining the effects of race and racism in society being a theory it has been discussed in graduate level higher education and legal circles since the 1970s not as curriculum but as a point of discussion and analysis at last time i checked we don't offer graduate level higher education in this district so critical race theory is not a concern here um no calling out that your time is done so one of the questions that was asked was how we're addressing social emotional issues in the district i believe dr angstadt has also
130spoken to that this evening some of the increased programs that we're going to have we've expanded the reach program these consultants that we have from springfield psychological have done an excellent job of identifying students in need and our teachers will also be equipped to also to identify students who may be struggling um outside programs are offered to the district all the time that are offered to certain select groups there may be a program that's offered to male students who play golf there may be a program that's offered to female students who play volleyball we we take programs from outside places all the time i it's not something that ever comes before the board it's something that's handled at the building level again the use of the locker rooms the use of outside space all of
131those things are building level issues those are handled by building principles i don't believe it is the function of the board to tell teachers how to conduct their classes um to tell them what is or isn't appropriate in terms of their use of space obviously we encourage strongly all of our teachers to use the outside space that's available to them whenever possible um but you know a science teacher who's trying to run a lab is obviously not going to be able to use outside space they need some of the facilities that are in their classroom so for us to dictate how they use the outside space i think would be inappropriate and an overreach for a school board and as far as the contact tracing i i'm sorry if there's going to be a problem
132with calling out then we just won't respond to questions so okay i'll take a motion to adjourn motion to adjourn okay meeting adjourned thank you you