001all right give me one second and we are live okay you can begin all right good evening everyone I'd like to call to order the February 23rd 2021 board meeting of methacton School District Board of Directors please rise for the pledge Dr zeria we don't have audio I pledge of allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands one nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for all hello my name is Luke s and I'm in fourth grade at aead elementary school a couple things about aead that I love the teachers extra learning opportunities we have throughout the year and the friends that I've made I've had wonderful teachers since kindergarten Mrs fer Miss Fitz Mrs Brown and Miss Young they were all caring and
002make M exciting since Co hit we all had to learn virtually on Zoom my teachers have made learning on Zoom a lot better than I expected it to be another thing about that I have loved is learning how to code using code.org we've been able to do that their library and sometimes with Mr jail last week I made really wonderful friends at AR I'll be sad to leave but I'm happy that all of my friends will be joining me at sky thank you for the opportunity to share my thoughts about very well done thank you both and I can turn the microphone back over to our board president thank you Dr Zerby uh the public is hereby advised of the audio and video recording of this meeting for the purposes of rebroadcasting there was an
003executive session of the board held virtually on February 18th 2021 for legal matters involving right to know given the need to conduct the school board meeting in a virtual environment the board required members of the public wanting to make comments on agenda items to pre-register by 5:00 p.m. today for attendance we'll do a roll call Miss canro here miss Drummond here miss Hull here Mr mcginness here Mr neet here Miss Purdue here miss Reese here Mr wyers here all right recog of guests and scheduled speakers Dr zery thank you madam president this evening we have uh three presentations the first one 're really uh happy to have Dr Roberts principal of Arrowhead Elementary School soon to be the new Arrowhead Elementary School well in a little bit in about a year and a half but
004uh we're happy to have him here and we're happy to have him uh tell us about uh the awardees for Arrowhead Elementary School Dr Roberts all right thanks Dr jerby uh before I start it was nice to see the picture of arrowead without the snow there's so much snow around there right now so uh that was a nice little I guess hopefully a sign of things to come let's keep our fingers crossed but it gives me a lot of uh pleasure and it's a great honor to recognize the uh staff members tonight from Arrowhead so we'll start with uh Pam Kennedy uh Pam is a first grade teacher at Arrowhead she is a leader among her colleagues Pam is an organized kind caring and extremely dedicated person to our students staff and faculty we're always
005uh very impressed with how she engages her students during lessons whether it's singing a rhyming song telling a funny class joke dancing for the kids or just saying her catchphrase oh my uh Pam is a natural teacher and this is evident by the appreciation our students staff and Community show to Mrs Kennedy so that's a recognition of Pam Kennedy Dr Zerby can we go to the next slide please all right next up we have have Sue bassick uh Sue is an instrumental music teacher for students at Arrowhead and Sky View uh as a leader in the music department Sue is incredibly dedicated to her students uh Sue always brings enthusiasm and creativity to her lessons and certainly brings out the best in students uh during their performances if you've ever seen them kids always do
006an amazing job and that's as a result of Mrs bassick and we certainly believe she's a true asset to Arrowhead Sky View and the district all right next up we have uh Miss Katie young uh Katie is a fourth grade teacher at Arrowhead uh Katie possesses a calm and nurturing demeanor with her interactions with students staff parents uh Katie's always wanted to try new ideas and you know Innovative strategies in the classroom to help her evolve her craft as a teacher and certainly to engage her students in lessons uh Katie is a quiet leader uh but more importantly she is respected and admired by her students and her peers all right next up we have Miss Sandy Civello Sandy is a PCA personal care assistant uh Sandy has shown her creativity and Innovation during the
007pandemic as she uh it was always fun to visit her Zoom she transformed her kitchen area space her home into a classroom to help engage her students so that's been a great thing to see Sandy do during the pandemic she's always kind she's caring uh she brings a smile and positive attitude every single day when she's uh dealing with students and staff and it's certain certain been wonderful to watch Sandy help our students grow but it's been even more impressive to watch Sandy grow as an educator next we have uh Miss Irene DBS she is an ELD English language development instructional assistant at Arrowhead Irene is always willing to assist uh students and staff whenever necessary right now she's actually assisting out not now but during uh afternoon dismissal it's been great to see Irene
008helping out with the car line so I could add I could have added that because our car Line's a little bit longer but she certainly displays a team first attitude that's evident everything she does with our students staff she is focused on educating the whole child and uh she's an outstanding educator in person and we certainly feel fortunate to have her at Arrowhead and obviously within the myth Acton school district and last but certainly not least is uh Mrs Adriana Rundle she's new Arrowhead and she is currently an office assistant uh Adriana is extremely hardworking and very detail oriented she is a very quick learner problem solvers you can always be found helping a student staff member family member with anything that that you need and the great thing about Adriana that we've learned and
009we love is that she just brings a fresh perspective and creative ideas that certainly uh benefit Arrowhead and I would say Mya and you know moving forward every single day and those are the recogn recoges uh for Arrowhead and thank you Dr Zerby for allowing uh me to recognize them absolutely Dr Roberts congratulations to all of our awardees thank you to our staff uh and and our principal uh our support staff professional staff uh without you uh certainly uh the the experience that our our students and our families would have would would be uh clearly less uh enjoyable less uh educational and uh certainly um you know the this is a prime example of the recognition that um is is due to all of our staff across the district and and thank you Dr Roberts
010for you know sharing these fine outstanding individuals with us today it's my pleasure thank [Music] you next on the agenda we have a food services update um as many of you know um we have uh done a lot of work with uh within the Food Services uh Department uh since covid has has hit and here this evening is Zach lindman from Aramark who is our site manager and Zach has a few uh things to share not only including the the work that that one would expect him and his people to normally do but all the extra efforts that he and his staff and as and as well as many of you on the board have have also participated in in terms of preparing Foods uh for uh distribution when schools were closed so Zach uh
011I have the I'm going to put the presentation up and we'll get you started thank you all yours Zach all right excellent members of the board thank you for having me on tonight I do appreciate the time um this is a presentation simply about uh the work we've been doing as th mentioned uh with Food Services since co uh took hold of the district uh in September uh next slide if you could um so you can see that we when we decided to go virtual uh in August 2020 it did throw a couple kinks in the plans in terms of a normal year of operation in service we opted to go for the SSO seamless summer option which lets us feed the students uh at no cost uh in this situation here um the the
012the funding is offset by uh a grant from the state um to sub in with that uh we're also choosing to do a little budgetary work uh to get the best options for the students uh the most filling options for the students meeting the minimum criteria uh for what we're feeding everybody and uh doing it as as cost-efficiently as possible um the next side if you could not deserving uh of course in doing so uh this new SSO plan allows us to to feed all the families that are in need this uh this SSO lets us feed anybody in the district guid in the district boundaries that's under 18 so it's not simply for methacton uh methon enrolled students uh it can be for anybody in um a Catholic School nearby or um anybody that's
013under 18 in the area uh we have had a couple people at least um to my understanding come through at our curbs of distribution that have been from other other areas uh a little further out maybe than our district boundaries but have spoken some really high praise about what we've been doing um in the district and to be honest um pretty good in comparison to how other schools are doing it so I'm I don't have a feather to put in my cap but I would if I could um the doing these meals at curbside allows us to prepackage everything in two Lo containers heat safe bags uh different clamshells that let us not touch the B or stuff that goes to the families um as many times as we may have say in the past
014year um which has been really fantastic we work with Cisco in Philadelphia to get paper supplies in get not just our food but cleaning chemicals as well too and they've been really great we're not the only school going through this type of thing in the first place so they're they've been instrumental in helping us get the right packaging that we need for all these curbside meals um the last thing that's been great about this plan is that the only thing that that throws the king get our plans now is the weather which we've been having a lot of the past couple weeks but outside of that if the district decides to transition to uh to hybrid to Virtual or any other method of inperson Education um we at aark are ready to Flip Flip the
015model with it we've got three three proven worked worked out plans um and if anything changes it really is um by the grace up top that lets us have weather issues um next slide Dr derby um you can see here strictly from the numbers that uh in the beginning it we were're not doing so hot in terms of how many meals we were providing to families but a lot of that I think had to do with it being a brand new year and a brand new setup for how we were Distributing meals in the first place uh in a virtual in a virtual setting you can see that in October um it it took a big jump which was wonderful so we got the word out via social media just talking to people being out
016there every single time um and just kind of getting to know the parents and the families that were coming through our our curbs line which was which was great um a little dip in November as expected with the holidays same in December we were still in Virtual Mode for part of that and then in January we ramp back up um the number once provided to Dr Derby initially was 59232 amount of meals to matatan families but as of as of uh before distribution tonight we were at 72 ,000 meals for the year so far that's that's curbside and in school obviously in school's not been as substantial so far we've only been in school for you know month and a half now but um next slide please um this is some stuff I'm really proud
017of here we we have since this since the far left picture was at Sky View in the seating area uh in the beginning when we were first knocking out 500 550 uh bags of food that were going on to families ever single every single distribution event in September October we were at two days per week um and this was this was a regular setup for us this was an every every other day set up for us in the cafeteria and it worked out really really well we had a good group of girls um going through and and packing all these bags get them nice and organized get them wrapped up get nice and tight keeping them under food safe temperature control it's been fantastic um and you can see the next three pictures were some
018items that we've been providing to students since starting the uh re reheatable Entre at home um you can see a corn dog beef bones and chicken parmesan some really really cool things that I was really proud of and um the girls at each of these schools the elementary ARCA Sky View and the high school are doing just amazing amazing work and I couldn't sing their praises enough about that next slide if you could uh these are just some come up things here things we've done with aark in uh in working with the district um the big thing is that we worked with share uh and fill abundance which you may have seen the trucks going around the county uh often enough but share program ran this incentive called Farm families which was really meant just
019to get farmers who were in in receipt of a lot of extra produce that wasn't getting uh wasn't getting sold to these individual 30 lb boxes full of food and and chicken and hot dogss eggs and yogurt and and sour cream and milk and and a whole nine yards these are 30 lb boxes that we got about 130 140 boxes each week and went out to these these families that needed it whe they were in backpack program or they were uh contacted just uh via the the free reduce program however we were able to get these boxes of food out to them um it was it was great we hand out every single box every single week without fail and uh it it was a lot of food that went out to to families which
020was really great it I showed that 500 boxes went out over the course of the month and that ends up being over 12,000 pounds of food that we uh went through the district which was great so um you can see a couple photos there of some of my girls outside there during during distribution which the tent setup that uh Bob Jones and the group have set up for us has been absolutely wonderful uh in doing so next slide please and uh this was this was pretty cool stuff too we did we were in receed of whole turkey Ro that normally would be provided for our senior citizen lunch in um in Thanksgiving time but uh we had them and they weren't going to be having that event this year for sure uh due to co
021things so we modified that made that into sandwiches and as you can see 300 pounds of meat and 900 plus sandwiches it was it was a very turkey type day that's for sure definitely um second of that you can see that in the month of December we started working a little bit on some Social Media stuff I was working with Mandy Kelly to help promote uh just not just the curbside meals but also us getting back into school as well and that you know eating the cafeteria was safe and that we were taking the best precautions possible but Miss Kelly's been fantastic helping us put um any kind of notices on on social media for us as well which has been great so next slide please um in December we did have a national cookie
022holiday so we were able to bake off um I think it ends up being about 1,400 cookies that we ended up baking off and um bagging them up individually unless little LA and put them into every every curbside bag that uh it went out and it was just a nice little treat I mean it's it's always nice to give kids something to look forward to even if they don't know they're looking forward to it as well which has been nice so um and you can see at the bottom there that we did decide to move that SSO program until the end of the year which was which was a great thing um I think we all know that money's pretty pretty dirty um and we don't want to be exchanging that if we can help
023it in times of Co so the no cost meals to the end of the year has been a real a really true truly great thing next slide um we did utilize all of our Department of Defense produce don't ask me why Department of Defense has gotten into the produce game but they're in it um we've used up all the funds that we had there and we're able to secure some extra funds which is great that will let us continue to provide these what I honestly call weird types of produce we got in things uh last year and part of this year that normally I think a lot of students wouldn't try I know I didn't try them in uh in elementary school manded oranges and grapefruits and we're getting in dieon dcon radish pretty soon
024um Water Crest is gonna be coming up the up the alley I mean things that are just really really different that you wouldn't expect to see in a school and that's something that I'm really looking forward to um the uh what I what I did do in the month of January to try and help uh push these meals at curbside was to create what I call the curbside Corner FAQ I was finding a lot of parents were asking the same type of questions I can't get out here can I have someone else pick it up for me is it for anybody under 18 is it for justment act and students how far can we come out blah blah and this curbside Corner FAQ kind of answered all those questions all at one time all in
025one Fell Swoop and again with M Kell's help she was able to put that on the website for us and uh put it social media and it's been it's it's I think it has certainly increased the amount of curb side bags that we've done and that's trendable data that I can see in an Excel format justop up the ladder once we start putting new uh New Market materials out there for it which has been great uh next slide and this is just um this is these are all the employees here at all our schools and uh I just want to put out the the big thank you um I mean obviously this is not just me doing this by any stretch imagination I could not have done any of this without all the employees that
026are there below um and gosh I I you know although I hope this doesn't continue to the next year I know that um this is a wheel that nobody wanted to reinvent um and we were able to pull a lot of best practices from other districts as they were to us and it's been great um so I I give a thank you to all these all these workers that are here and um and I hope to continue doing the same thing we're doing uh for the rest of the year and uh hopefully we'll be back to normal by September Zach we are I can't tell you how proud I am of the work that you and your staff have done so I you know please uh you know when I when I get into the
027buildings and and talk to the staff I I'll I'll remind them again how important their efforts have been uh to not only our students but really to our community so uh if you wouldn't mind Zach let's take some comments or questions from members of the bo board if if there may be any absolutely any questions from members of the board Miss Drummond I I just want to thank you for coming tonight and doing this presentation and also for the help that you provided um when we were back in this summer when we were doing the big drops for the backpack program participants that was a um was all a big undertaking and I know this year is too so um just thanks for keeping that going for all of us thank you thank you and
028thanks for coming by there tonight and it's just yourself it was nice to meet people face to face to voice and face to video call too as well thank you Miss German uh Mr mcginness did you have your hand up I did uh and Mr lindman I'll just Echo what everyone says this is a fantastic program but um just one question I I think I misheard you earlier in your discussion this is for meaan students and families only correct it is for anybody under 18 in the district boundaries in the district yes in the district Founders okay thank you yes sir thank you Mr M any other comments or questions from members of the board uh Zach thank you so much for being with us and thank you U and please extend our our warmest
029regard for all the effort uh with your that your staff has given uh through this whole season and thank you to you for your leadership really appreciate it thank you I appreciate it and I'm glad to be part of the team thank you very much next on the agenda we have uh Mr Regina and Mr bicker uh we we'll be giving a more thorough update uh of the uh mea uh that's the methon Education Association or teachers uh Union FactFinder agreement as you recall uh prior to uh the vote on the FactFinder agreement Mr Regina and Mr bicker gave a a brief uh uh presentation limited to that which uh the law would allow us to uh provide uh prior to an actual action by the board um it is the uh this evening an
030opportunity for us to you know provide a little bit more detail uh as as what the the transpired so I'll turn it over to Mr Regina and Mr bicker thank you Dr Zerby as many of you will remember from last week or the last board meeting we had discussed the fact finding summary which uh is covered in the slide that you have here in front of you and some of the things that we were able to share with you was the term of the contract which is a four-year contract uh at this moment in time since the contract would have started July 1st 2020 it'll be in about three and a half years um from this moment in time um Mr Bricker will be going over the financial impact some of the information that they
031talked about in the last time we presented uh which we'll be discussing some of the uh net increases of the contract some discussion on the salary Matrix and some of the work that was done done with regard to benefits and then ultimately we'll get into some language discussion how some of the FactFinder recommendations uh which were ultimately approved by both groups have impacted the work year work week and work day along with some of the other topics of discussion that were addressed in fact finding so without further Ado I'll turn the financial part of this presentation over to Mr Bricker thank you next ey Dr Zerby so the first thing we want to give everyone is an overview of the MEA population so most of our staff is on step 16 uh with regards to
032the column and step with regard to the Sal salary Matrix and our staff distribution is B basically in the Masters plus 30 next slide one of the things that the uh salary matri changes that we were able to get with the mea's approval and their support was to be able to smooth out the salary Matrix to ensure that over time that the steps are even and more Equitable across the lines um the equal percentages increases between steps two to 15 were the main focus as you can see the Top Line there the blue line is the current Matrix where the Gray Line was the original salary Matrix and how that'll phase in over time it really helps and Smooths out where the middle steps would have a large concent conentration of spikes in the Peaks
033and values that we talk about next slide please the new s Matrix will be phased in over four years it'll address the Peaks and values as I said before and once fully implemented the with the exception of this TOP Step will have an increase um equal to each step over the time each year members will receive a half a step over the four years uh first three years will include an off-step bonus of 750 then 500 and then 250 uh the salary increases are all in I'll go over is 350% 3.5% 3.42% 3.22% and 3.14% next slide please with regards to benefit the uh employees medical coverages there was a change in not the plans but in the employee contributions in years one to in the current year these uh rates were already set as
034defined by the last contract so in the next coming years each one of those will increase by 1% with the exception of the open Choice 3 plan which will increase a half a percent each year next slide Dental Envision will also increase 1% each year with the exception of the last year which will only increase by half a percent again the 2020 2021 benefit were established in the prior contract so those were already set in advance next slide please okay with prescription drugs there are some changes currently we have the buy up to the 1020 Plan and there's a 177% employee contribution or 83% District contribution of the 10235 plan starting next year we'll be introducing the 10 15 2540 plan that'll be at an 18% contribution with a buy up to the 1020 2035
035plan and the elimination of the 1020 plan uh the 10 the 15 2540 plan will increase to 19% in 2223 and increased by another half a percent to 19 and a half% in 2324 next slide please CH thank you Mr B Al with language items that exist within the contract so a little little bit of uh history with this item the items that we take to fact finding are those items that we did not agree upon during our normal negotiation process so I I don't want to limit the discussion of the language items that the board and the and the uh Association had agreed to there were many items that we were able to reach an agreement upon before going into fact finding but of the open items at the table there were four major
036items that were still being discussed one was of course the duration of the agreement which was the four-year agreement that you that we're discussing tonight the second one was discussion on the work week and work day and what what transpires at the high school is we seek 18 volunteers to teach six classes uh every year so what that means is a typical high school schedule will exist with uh where a teacher could be teaching five periods they'll have one duty period one prep period and then a period for lunch and and for those individuals where we seeking 18 volunteers they may teach six periods and they will not have a duty period so what was happening prior is that we were seeking the volunteers rather early in the schedule and often we would be seeking
037the volunteers before even the schedule was completely prepared um so it was difficult to make sure that we were seeking the right volunteers and and that a lot of that is driven by when uh students choose to take and elect courses some of it is how long it takes to do the master schedule so we both both part agree that this is going to be an improvement by extending this from a March April time frame meaning that we have to post the positions in March by April the association or the teachers have can choose which 18 would like to volunteer and those timelines have shifted from May and June respectively it also adds of our department chairs that we're teaching four classes um will now be teaching uh the normal course load of five classes
038one prep uh one dut Duty in one lunch um as as do the normal High School staff members the third item is the duty coverage issues that that take place so there's an open grievance and arbitration that's taking place with result to some of the coverage language that existed in the prior contract and the FactFinder had agreed that we are going to defer the decision to this uh upon action taken after the arbitration and the last item is we've added language where the parties will agree upon uh cooperating to maintain a health and hey health and safety and sanitary workplace um we we do have elements in place that we do that now but this uh putting it in the contract kind of memorializes uh the comments that we spoke about during the negotiations and
039allows us to move forward with some of the concerns that were shared at the bargaining table and with that being said uh that's all that we have for the report on the FactFinder agreement thank you Mr bicker and thank you Mr Regina are there any comments or questions by members of the board Miss Aubrey lares uh yes thank you Mr Regina and Mr bicker for um sharing that summary um I just wanted to to say that um while we did end up in fact finding at the end of this negotiation I wanted to um commend our teams on both sides for the process that we followed um we did have substantial progress that had been made prior to covid um and prior to ending up in fact finding um many of the outstanding language issues
040for example were solved um before we went into fact finding and I just wanted to take a minute to recognize our team um Paul winners Jen canro Liz Drummond and myself um but I we the the collaboration on our side on their side um on both sides I mean we we really um I I have seen negotiations not go well and I've seen them go well and I I definitely feel like this was um this was a win in many ways and I I thank our team for the the work that they put in thank you madam president uh Mr wyers yeah thanks um I wanted to to point out two things that I think are real positives moving forward well three actually I I do believe the uh the salary schedule is um very
041close to what we discussed a few years ago uh when we had the sub the subcommittee related to the arbitration um non-binding arbitration that we had a few years ago that had been mentioned many times by the public and uh sort of the direction we took uh and what is the final solution I think is is real positive for uh retaining and actually hopefully um having a schedule that's appealing to to individuals when they're seeking employment second thing I'll point out is I I think there's been significant uh movement on what we need to do on the medical and prescription front as it is a big driver for the district's call costs and uh the the benefit of uh the open Choice Plan Three is hopefully something uh all the unions will um consider more
042and the idea is it is better off for the financial aspect of the district but also is uh actually advantageous for the actual employee uh on how much they're paying into their medical and it's still a very good medical plan so I encourage all the unions to consider that moving forward and I also want to point out that one of the uh items that uh Mr Regina mentioned about the 18 volunteers at the high school and I think it it is fair to say that this process has been over the last two contracts been very sticky uh issue between both the district and and the union but uh time and again we've had volunteers uh beyond the time frame that has been requested and there's been a lot of team teachers that have uh at
043the staff at the high school level they're really um trying to make sure that the programs that we're trying to facilitate with a very difficult schedule as Dr serini would would would attest we've been able to make sure as many students uh are able to participate in as many learning experiences and and uh things they want to experience in their high school schedule that can be very difficult and we it is truly appreciated that um a lot of the mea uh High School members have have uh continued to step up beyond the contractual requirements that so hopefully these new dates that allow allow that uh will continue to allow for the high school to have the outstanding programming that we have so thank you good comments Mr wyers uh thank you very much uh other
044uh questions or comments uh from members of the board seeing no others uh again Mr bicker and Mr Regina uh you know we you you guys uh partnered with the board as as part of that negotiation process and and certainly uh um you know we want to we want to Echo what our president has said uh you know it it was a great effort on both sides and uh while it took more time than one would would would hope um we we hope that this uh provides uh a good uh working uh environment for us uh to move forward and do some great things for our students and our community so thank you to everyone that was involved yes I'm sorry Tim and Chay I don't I thank you as well for your participation in
045all of this we really could not have done it without you no problem Kim well well done yourself you guys did a wonderful job thanks glad to help and and so uh Madame President that ends my or the presentations uh for this evening okay okay Mr Summers president yes just before uh going into reports i' just like to expand upon the executive session report uh from earlier this evening and just uh uh clarify that that executive session on February 18th was for the purpose of Consulting the board Consulting with his attorney regarding information and strategy in connection with uh the litigation in the Montgomery County Court of Common Pleas uh between the mathon school district and the Pennsylvania office of open records and those cases are docketed at numbers 2020 20878 and 2021 01133 thank
046you thank you Mr Summers okay with that we will move on to our reports um our committee reports and um minutes are attached to the agenda um for the Intermediate Unit Miss Reese I'm going to take oh for the Intermediate Unit sorry I did that last last month too um our meeting is tomorrow um so uh I will report in the future and I guess the tech Center's next yes okay um I'm gonna take this only because Miss Drummond was there but she left a little bit early to go to um the Fon diversity um equity and inclusion meeting so I'm going to start off the IU report excuse me the North monco Report with sharing something North monco has been doing um just like many districts um they are working with uh diversity uh
047equity and inclusion group as well that was a little bit more Grassroots um started by some students in staff and they've really done some wonderful things and one thing that they did was this really amazing Black History Month um presentations where they connected um famous African-Americans with the field that the children are learning so they did this great thing with the Easy Rider motorcycle um the Easy Rider uh the motorcycles and Easy Rider were um made by two African-American men and Henrietta LAX and biomedical engineering and they just did a really nice presentation and at the tech center we don't get to see as much of what the students do as you would think so that was really wonderful um they also shared with me their budget which we will vote which the tech center
048board will vote on next month so if anybody would like to look at that let me know um and I will forward it to you um of course Dr zerby's aware of it but if any board members would like to the biggest things on there is um some of their bigger projects is looking at a generator um they are also working on a changing their entrance like we are at Eagleville they're Project's a little bit smaller but they are working on a more secure entrance for um visitors and um they are also going to be looking for us to hopefully create and approve a capital fund balance um they do not currently have one and um they might have a little bit of a balance this year and they are hoping to put it to
049the capital fund and lastly we don't have many parents that come to Courtesy of the floor at the tech center just probably because they go to their sending districts more often and there was a woman that expressed concern that the tech center was not full-time yet and um we addressed her issues and the tech center did a wonderful job starting earlier early a little bit earlier in the year because they knew the tech center students had to be Hands-On but they are struggling with getting the students fulltime because it is such a Hands-On environment that the six feet distancing is very very difficult um and so they are working on it they do hope to bring um students in more often um but it's easier said than done and all the sending districts no matter
050what the current sending District's um current situation is they all understand that but I did want to address that parents concern it wasn't a methacton parent but I'm sure our parents worry about the same thing so I did want to share that and um that's it thank you Miss ree um and now our student board representative report Mr Nolan MOSI good evening everyone the MAA and swim team had their final meet of the season on Thursday the 18th freshman sophomores and juniors completed their course selection cards and began meeting with their counselors to schedule their classes for next year the television studio is to accept applications for this Spring's 15th annual Film Festival also National Honor Society inductions are taking place this Thursday February 25th spring athletes can complete the impact testing remotely this year
051to the new Option with covid and lastly minithon is planning multiple fundraising events to help raise money with children with cancer this will be taking place soon in the near future thank you Mr McClosky and now for our foundation report Miss Nikki kovich hi can you guys hear me okay yes we can excellent um we have some exciting news to share tonight uh many of you will remember last January when we unveiled the new stem maker spaces in the libraries for $135,000 at Arrowhead Eagleville Woodland war sester and Sky View and tonight we are thrilled to let you know that the foundation has committed to funding $220,000 for two new stem Innovation Labs at the high school these trans oh these transformative Labs will supplement mathan's core science curriculum and allow for advanced applications in
052a way that is not typically provided to high school students the first is hydroponic Farm lab this farming in a shipping crate lab will differentiate meth Acton's environmental science and biology programs with a vertical hydroponic Farm inside of an insulated custombuilt shipping container methacton is going to be the first school in Pennsylvania with the state-of-the-art farming system so a huge thanks to Mr savitz Mr Walton and Mrs Murray who are helping to bring this opportunity to the high school the second lab is a forensics and biochemistry lab so picture it methacton CSI and it'll offer a who doneit case to solve using forensic tools and methods such as DNA electroforesis I had to practice that one by the way fingerprint and handwriting analysis fiber and hair analysis and an ftir spectrometer to an analyze counterfeit
053printing to name a few Miss alvaranga misss Palmer and Mrs Griffith Have Been instrumental in developing this new Lab at the high school and I'd be remiss if I didn't mention the partnership with our administrative leadership like Dr sorini Dr graines Dr Walsh and Dr Zerby who all recognized the value of these Innovative programs and helped to bring it to methacton these Labs will be the largest grants the foundation has ever supported to date and we thank you and all of our faculty and administration involved for creating this opportunity for these our students tomorrow we will kick off our fund development efforts for this program with a check presentation from two local businesses for the first $65,000 towards these Labs so stay tuned as we announce these gracious donors tomorrow and as you all are
054learning the stronger schools build stronger communities and our Community Partnerships are really critical to Our Success even in a pandemic the foundation continues to build Connections in our community this month methacton alumni and Friends highlighted methacton couples who are who met while they were in methacton schools and are still going strong you can read these metha and sweetheart stories on our website and Facebook page we have nearly 19,000 alumni of methacton and many are teaching or raising their students here in the district so if anybody listening or watch watching tonight is one of those 19,000 we urge you to please go to our methacton alumni.org website and join the official Alumni network for free um the last thing I want to tell you about is another new and exciting community outreach initiative our methacton grandparents
055Club launching in March our committee of 30 grandparents are going to help us connect our greatest Generation with our youngest generation here in methacton if anybody has any questions you can always email me or check out our website at methacton foundation.org thank you very much for letting me present tonight do you have any questions any comments from members of the board uh Miss Hall I just want to say thank you as the liaison to the Education Foundation I have um I was able to see this presented and see the curriculum and the costing and there's been so much work done behind the scenes to get this program you know proposed and and up and running and I'm so excited to see this come come to be an actual program within ma Acton so thank you
056to everyone who worked on this and I know there's many administrators on here that have seen this too so thank you indeed thank you uh other comments uh questions from members of the board uh Nikki it goes without saying that the support that the mton Education Foundation has provided the mton uh Community our teachers and our school district is is just completely tremendous and uh you know your your your uh announcement here this evening and the check presentation scheduled for tomorrow uh is just you know indicative of the fact that uh there are so many people that care and want to make a difference and and I just want you to know and and please share with your president uh Mr Beam uh how much we appreciate all the efforts of of everyone involved our
057donors and our Board of uh of uh of foundation for all their efforts so thank you and uh keep up the great work we appreciate it thank you thank you Miss kovich it's always wonderful to hear these positive updates of all these great things that are coming out of the foundation and the work that you do there uh now for communications Miss Kelly good evening everyone I have a few news items to report five methacton high school students representing the class of 2021 have been named finalists in The prestigious National Merit Scholarship program they are Alec Chang Claire Chen Jeffrey gong Angela Lee and Tam my fam finalists compete for $2500 scholarships they are evaluated on their academic record accomplishments and potential for success in rigorous College studies among other criteria more good news out
058of mton high school this month the methacton girls basketball team marked two Milestones Nicole Timco scored her 1,000th career point during the Warriors February 9th basketball game against PJP Nicole is the second Junior in the school's history to earn this achievement as a lady Warrior and their coach Craig Kaminsky net his 300th career win last Wednesday when the Warriors defeated upper perk and earlier this month Giant Food Stores in aabon delivered a very sweet surprise to the cafeteria staff at Sky viw Arcola ahead of the Valentine's Day holiday uh to recognize them for all of the love and the hard work that they put into feeding our students during this pandemic and every day our cafeteria teams at each School building also received balloons cookie tray and a thank you card uh from the local
059giant as well pictures and video of the surprise are posted on the district's website in Facebook and Twitter pages congratulations to everyone on your achievements and for always making our mathan community very very proud that's all I have tonight thank you Miss Kelly and now for the superintendence report Dr Zerby thank you Madame President I have a few matters of importance that I'd like to share with the board and the Community First I want to thank uh our support staff our teachers and our administrators on the Blended learning model implementation at the k6 level we are pleased to announce that we over 64% of our K through6 students in in person four days a week uh we have a high of 77% in one building and lower 50% in another but I am pleased with
060the cooperation and effort that's being made to in given the circumstances involved in in the covid pandemic uh matter that simply uh give us opportunity to to share our appreciation and certainly to share my appreciation for a job well done so I just want to thank all of those individuals for all the work that they did they've done we are scheduled to begin the Assurance testing uh each Friday in in in our schools uh we got we got snowed out uh last Friday so that pushed us back a week but this coming Friday uh both our high school and our Eagleville uh sites will conduct their pilot run and then the following uh Friday uh the rest of the schools will start uh their pilot process and will be probably up and running in full-fledged
061within in about 3 weeks uh we also have a a Central site uh that's that's scheduled uh for doing testing for bus drivers aromar employees and other non-school uh building uh Personnel so for example uh uh staff that might travel from building to building but not be assigned to a school building uh will have opportunities to uh get the Assurance testing uh every Tuesday so we have a number of nurses outside nurses other support staff that are helping uh with the uh uh organization and management of that process Dr soini has been working with the nurses and working with our staff to organize those people and get them all in place so appreciate everybody's involvement in that it's it's a big deal and it's it's an important effort uh for for all of us and
062to keep you know the safety of our our students and staff at the Forefront thirdly I want everyone the know uh that we held our uh diversity Equity inclusion kickoff meeting on February 17th we had about 113 members of the public attend and then we received as a result of that approximately 85 applications for the 30 open uh diversity Equity inclusion District committee spots so all of you that were on that call recognize that uh you know part of that kickoff event was to announce that we need uh greater participation uh in the discussions uh specific specifically those surrounding uh the need to gather more information and input from the larger Community through an equity audit uh so that group of 30 individuals from uh various constituencies ac across our district both inside the district
063and outside the district will be uh participating in that process uh once we have all those names selected uh those individuals will be contacted and uh we will recognize them uh as as Miss Kelly has been doing with uh everything that we are doing in terms of the matters of of of Dei and keeping that uh apprized on our on our district website so in terms of our ongoing planning and while the board has a decision this evening with regards to the S12 seven grade 7 through 12 4-day Blended return we have already begun meeting on next school on next school year our goal is to provide the board with a plan in May uh we will be uh Gathering input from our staff and we will address uh various matters in terms of operational
064models and instructional practices however I need to prepare the board and our community for what is likely to be the most important factor in providing a traditional in-person experience that is those things surrounding distancing so the current recommendation of six feet is likely to be reduced as more people get vaccinated as we continue with Assurance testing as we maintain uh masking and and most of the other health and safety measures and the likelihood that the positivity rate within the community and the incident rates within our community will returned to similar lows as seen in uh as witness in in in last August so there's more to come on this communication I plan to uh continue uh you know regularly not only providing you know com comments about the this matter at our meetings but certainly
065address them in video and uh written format over the next several months so more to come on on uh the plans for next school year and lastly uh in addition to thinking about uh next school year I've been working with my team to plan for the future keeping to our mission and vision to ensure an exceptional methacton School District experience for all I will be presenting in April uh a two-year plan that includes a strategic planning process uh with Community uh CommunityWide stakeholder input uh new programs and services all with a focus on the whole child and a revisit of some of of several matters that have been put on the back burner as a result of the covid uh challenges so I look forward sharing that path forward in our meeting in April and
066that ends my report for this evening thank you Dr Zerby it's good to hear that we're looking to the future hopefully a future without snow um the board will now take comments on board action items this is an opportunity for residents to comment on matters to be decided upon is outlined on the agenda this evening um it's helpful when you're speaking if you can mention what agenda item you're speaking about um that way we can be sure that we address your concerns or comments when we get to that item in the agenda um to that end it this is not a time for questions and answers but the board um will hopefully be able to answer or address your questions um as we get to those action items we ask that you keep your comments
067to four minutes or less and if you could state your name and municipality before you begin speaking so those that pre-registered to speak tonight if you could raise your hand and I will um bring people in okay first I have Jessica Bradbury hey good evening can you hear me yes I can thank you Jessica Bradbury Lower Providence Township I'm sorry I didn't get a chance to go through and write down which specific agenda items but I think it should be obvious um so first regarding the return to school for 7 to 12 um I hope to see the board approve that agenda item this evening um nearly a year after our last in-person board meeting I would respectfully ask the board to revisit the suspension of board policy 0062 specifically regarding the limitation on the
068number of school directors participating in a meeting electronically members of this community would like to see the board lead by example our teachers children have returned for in-person learning while supporting remote participants and yet the board meetings continue to be in an all Virtual Mode what is the reason for this as I mentioned last week facial expressions and body language are a huge part of communication we should have the ability to meet in person while still maintaining the option for virtual participation indefinitely uh with regards to the eagle whe renovation and addition we heard last week from kcba that the canopy was added relatively late in the project and there's no real benefit so I'm just wondering who had requested that to be added into the scope and why um what other options were explored
069to remediate the security issues uh were there any other options submitted by kcba or any other Architects at any other price points or are we essentially looking at one proposal from one architect with likely the most expensive option the more the project costs the more kcba stands to profit um shouldn't we also have the board first approve full day kindergarten the creation of that program before we approve two additional classrooms to be built for it as members of the public we're watching more and more building expenditures being approved by the school board without evaluation for for alternatives to ensure fiscal responsibility we've operated at a surplus for many years now and yet rather than return some of this year's $5 million surplus to the taxpayers instead we're talking on a tax increase uh during this
070past year while many small businesses large corporations and even our very own households have re-evaluated our budgets cutting expenses wherever we can due to the uncertainty caused by the pandemic I'm just wondering has mathon School District administration and our board directors taken that same view of our budget to determine if maybe we can cut costs rather than increasing Revenue through tax raises that's it thank you very much for your time this evening okay next I have Joe writtenhouse hello can you hear me yes I can hi Joe writtenhouse Lower Providence Township uh I just want to keep it short uh I wanted to speak in favor of the motion to go back to school it seemed very positive uh it seemed like most of the board was on board last time so I wanted to
071continue to make sure that V support was heard from the community um I I'm actually really really happy that uh Dr Zerby spoke up about a future plan going forward not uh for the coming year and stuff like that so um I guess my only question is when it comes to this current plan and how it will phase into a potential other plan is what will the benchmarks be for lowering the distances between students what will the uh what will will the benchmarks be for uh how much we go back to school when will we look for uh nonmasking if if possible are we going off of Montgomery County are we going off Pennsylvania I I just want to have a very detailed list of every step and what benchmarks we will hit so that
072uh we everyone knows exactly what we're going into and there's no two we two week two we delays for everything else outside of that I uh you know I think it's a great plan so uh yeah that's it okay thank you Mr writtenhouse uh next I have Greg young hi can you hear me yes I can great Greg young wor sester um just to pile on to what Joe was saying uh I'm I'm feeling pretty good that we're heading in the right direction I'm confident in tonight's vote based on last week's work sessions uh that we're going to be voting to go um back 7 through 12 4 days a week what I'd like to see um not just input from the staff regarding next year's school year and what the plan should be with
073six feet reduced maintaining masking Etc uh that we should be focusing primarily on five days no virtual option or what I'll call a virtual crutch uh we definitely don't want to consider a 4day plus a virtual day as The New Normal um other than that I think you know the metrics are good through K through 6 64% in person and I am excited to hear that there's a two-year plan being developed for the whole child because that's where we should be F focusing our time and energy is on the children thank you thank you uh next I have John Andrews whenever you're ready yes I can John Andrews low up Providence uh I'd like to compliment the three pitches early in today's meeting they were very well done and and informative uh I was uh
074disappointed that the list of bills has an item for niche.com a uh a a boost program for about $66,000 uh you know we've been in the mode of uh good education rather than paying for for good stories and and that's it's unfortunate that we're going in that direction uh relative to uh use of surpluses a huge surpluses uh I read in the newspapers of uh effects of the pandemic in in the United States either 10 million or 20 million people out of work uh locally where is supporting a lot of uh food program through the as aramak described and and I think uh some Surplus should be returned to the taxpayers uh and uh with regard to the Blended instruction option uh it's starting on March 15th I wished it could have started sooner that's
075all I have this evening thank you Mr Andrews next I have Brian [Music] erell good evening Brian hershaw Lower Providence uh first comment relates to item eight suspension of board policy um I also have the question about when in-person meetings will resume and if it's to be determined what parameters are you looking for um to resume those meetings in person that's not only the board but the committee meetings as well um next is right it 10A the list of bills um November legal fees paid to Sweet Stevens Cass and Williams are about approximately 145,000 wonder if you can provide any commentary on what matter is that related to whether that's a recurring monthly expense that we should expect and what steps have any are being taken to reduce those legal fees on the treasures report
076there's still $6 and half million dollar of taxes held in escrow I believe all which relates to the Shannondale tax bill litigation what if the board at some point in the near future could provide an update of that ation item 10d the depository approval based on review of the finance committee meetings I believe this approval should be retroactive um the minute stated that when I could read what I read that this account has already been open and there are taxpayer funds um deposited into this account U regarding item 10i committed fund recommendations um I'm concerned way that you know basically this is just done to solve some bud being done to solve budget issues issues and can be viewed as a budget gimmick as opposed to really addressing the operational issues that may be contained
077in the budget um last year the board hastily committed $2.6 million of surplus to peers funds to a appeasers reserve um which never materialized and now instead of returning that money to taxpayers uh the board is or the Administration has found another use for those funds by paying down debt um and regarding that debt I'll ask for the third time um what is the interest rate on the debt being retired if those rates are extremely low it does not make any sense to retire that debt um regarding the commitment of funds for Charter schol Charter School expenses um I think it's inappropriate to use surpluses to offset operating costs there is an assumption which is again speculative that those Charter School costs will come down that students will in fact return to a facton that's
078kind of speculation similar to the peers set aside that was done last year um so I would encourage the board to vote against items both items in 10i um and vote to return funded to taxpayers those surpluses at least some portion if not all of them and if the board doesn't want to do that I'd like to hear from each of the nine board members why you feel that tax and spend policy is more appropriate uh than returning funds to taxpayers regarding item 10j uh this project the eagle Ville Renovations has morphed into addressing water infiltration and insect infiltration issues um to include an expansion $2 million of the $6.7 million total cost is going to expand the building adding classrooms when the district already has excess capacity in its buildings um the it was
079cited that kcba said to add classrooms later would cost 4 million doll but remember kyb's estimate on Arad was way off to the tune of about 25% they overstated it so I would not rely on their estimates um you should get another estimate to um confirm that cost um so if I was so the board I would enage to vote against this project or at least take the $2 million out for the expansion uh it's been stated that additional classrooms are being built for full day kindergarten which is a program that has not been approved uh by the board 's see regarding item 11 L3 which director actually approving a supplemental contract for bus Duty my question there is that amount prated for the four days that students are in the buildings um and for
080the days that these students are in the buildings for the uh second semester this year I believe that was it thank you thank you and next I have Lucy B you can unmute whenever you're ready Hello Lucy B Lower Providence I wanted to continue to advocate for the um 7th through 12th grade student students and just I guess my question is why isn't there any urgency why are we waiting from one meeting to the next to address this and vote on this our children are in crisis these students need to get back fulltime also curious why are we looking at four days and not five I believe they should have the option of going to school we are here to educate them everyone there without student no one has a job we don't need teachers
081we don't need staff so I'm asking please make it urgent and think about the students first thank you thank you um okay is there anyone else that has registered to speak seeing none we will move on with our agenda may have a motion to approve the suspension of board policy 00 6.2 with specific regard to the limitation on the number of school directors participating electronically winners thank you Mr wyers secondness thank you Mr mcginness any comments from the board seeing none all those in favor I I I any opposed motion carries 90 I have a motion to approve the board meeting minutes for the special meeting and work session January 19th a regular board meeting January 26th and the special meeting of February 3rd is attached winners thank you Mr wyers is there a second
082mcginness thank you drew comments from the board seeing none all those in favor I I I any opposed the motion carries 90 fiscal items Mr bicker thank you madam president tonight for your approval we have the list of bills to treasurers report there are no budgetary transfers a depository approval to approve people's Security Bank and Trust as a depository for the remainder of the year the mciu general operating budget for $ 71,7 47 for meth School District which is a reduction of $1,120 from last year 2021 Capital products to approve a change order which is a credit amount of $1,880 for the fueling station bus Patrol authorized the administration to work with bus Patrol to provide stop arm camers at no cost to the district act 36 approve the district to pay for student the
083variable cost of their PD uh per pte form under option three which is roughly 36% of a route cost there is the committed fund recommendations the paser committed funds totaling 2,615 75577 to decommit these funds use them the pay off the escro lease using the pay off the north MCO technical career center lease any shortfalls will be paid from the general fund and then commit funds for the charter school expenses of $63,750 from the anticipated 2021 Surplus to the charge School expenses there's also four Eagleville School renovation who approve hollenbach construction of Boyertown PA and a p bit amount of$ 2893 million which includes a base bid of $2.97 million and selected alternative to add base cabinets and amount of $5,500 and Alternate three at wall cets in amount of $2,500 and Alternate four Del
084C from the addition in the credit of $85,000 to carry out the general construction Contracting for the addition of Renovations of Eagle School approved five star Westchester at a total bid amount of $22.26 six million to carry out the mechanical construction additions and Renovations for Eagleville Elementary approved Pinnacle electrical construction of War Miner PA at 1,285 500 which includes a base bit of 1, 288,000 Select alternate four delete the canopy addition which is a credit of $2,500 to carry out electrical construction and then finally to approve Mico mechanical of tord PA total bid of $282,500 which includes a base bid of 284,000 with select alternate number four which is delete the canopy canopy from the addition which which is a credit amount of $1,500 to carry out the plumbing construction and contract for the addition
085and Renovations of Eagleville elementary school thank you Mr bicker um does anyone want to take these any of these fiscal items separately Miss ree the last one Eagleville please that is 10 so I just had it up but to unmute I just let go it no that's fine I for some reason do not have a current okay yeah Jay please okay any other items to take separately okay so then I will take a motion to approve items 10 a through I as presented thank you Mr wyers is there a second thank you Mr naet comments from the board um I believe I said something similar asked the question last week but just to reiterate I am comfortable with the um lease payments and the charter school expens say that Finance is um uh suggesting I
086did just want to um reiterate again that we need to do our very very very best to get the tax increase as low as possible if if at all if we're going to do some of these things and I I know that's easier said than done but I did want to reiterate that okay thank you Miss ree any other questions comments from the board Mr neverett Paul if you want to go first go ahead no there's I we do have a couple of outstanding questions here on I here so Tim um the peers uh we discussed this a few times uh where that number came from of why we had the the expectation of where that and obviously that didn't materialize yes you are correct that is correct so but we do have some questions
087related to um the interest rates on two uh i12 i12 and I13 all right the Esco lease interest rate is currently at 2.49% the North monco lease is a blended uh bond with three other schools I'm not exactly sure what our portion of that interest rate and how that works out I'd have I can get that for the school board U but I'd have to go back to pfm who manages the bonds for uh North Mona to give me that information so we also discussed the possibility of other debt uh options on those um can you speak towards uh the debt that we have the traditional debt non- lease related sure with the exception of the north monco lease which is technically a lease Bond um which they other schools are looking to refinance to
088give you an idea with the lower interest rates today uh will save them roughly about $150,000 we have no other currently callable bonds that have not been paid off meaning we had one that's callable this year but we've paid it off so there's no way to really do anything with that one at this point in time I mean we have called uh we have refinanced call A non-callable bonds before so I I guess the question is have we exhausted all the the the refinancing possibilities um and and it brings up the question is you know I I um I know we get advised for but I I'm the thought has gone through my mind is that that maybe we should have a thirdparty independent uh advisor uh on our debt um and how to to
089lower our long-term costs associated with the which is going to be normal part of running a school district I know but uh you know when we go back to our our friends that have a a vested interest um I just want to make sure that we really do have a a view of really the right thing to do because I I honestly I I'm not a high Finance guy in this particular area so I don't know what the all the alternatives are and want to make sure that we're making sure that the refinancing and the use of of uh Surplus money is used effectively I actually have a meeting with pmm this week to discuss any other potentials the last time that we did a non-callable restructuring Bond it did cost the district $800,000 I
090think the final number was lower than that but the original projected was $800,000 but there was a benefit to that that smoothed out the overall expenses of the bonds and made it uh more U advantageous for for a school district uh the other ones currently last time I talk to pfm do not have that Advantage when I meet with them I can talk about the timing to have them come to the finance committee so that that that does raise the question and I and I I apologize Kim and I didn't ask for this separately uh I I separately um but it does raise the question there is I know that we're developing the budget and making decisions on what to do with uh you know the the additional Charter School expenses Etc um do we
091really need to vote on this in February well we have to make a decision with the escro lease to save the interest that'll continue to urw that amount will continue to increase and with regards to the north monco portion we are joined with other groups so we are either going to have to a pay it off or B Be become part of the restructure that they're currently looking at doing um from a budgetary point of view both of these will save the school district to combine $277,000 of annual payments uh which is significant in reducing the budget oh absolutely no I I am in I'm in in favor I just trying to make sure that uh the refinancing of a non-callable bond isn't going to save us $33,000 in the next the budget on a
092yearly basis bis you know what I mean so and I I don't know if I necessarily know that we've exhausted all those Alternatives I apologize for for you know uh hesitating here at the 11th Hour um I'll just make a comment on on the the charter school expenses as well you know we are making an an assumption uh that the number of students has increased from significant threeyear averages um and we understand why and we hope that many of those students and I think it in this case it is based on a assumption that may or may not come happen but I believe that many times we've been uh stressed to do a budget based on most likely scenarios uh so there's been often an argument about Chann andelle and knowing that buildings are coming
093on on on as as property um we do this is an unknown and and to uh actually add additional $600,000 as an expense for next year associated with the knowing that is an unknown is actually going to do the alter all opposite of what I believe uh many are asking us to do in the public um so I think that was most of the questions associated with that but I I don't know uh Ralph I took a long long period here but I don't know if there's a possibility we could table this and the Dr jerby you can weigh in as well yeah just just to follow up on what Paul said I don't I think in terms of the Esco payments and the north monco lease I think that will has to be voted
094on tonight I think if we wanted to table anything it would have to be in the charter school piece of it um I think what you're seeing here is you know we made a decision with theer funds um with with our excuse me with our Surplus last year and committing it in in we thought was the wisest way at the time with the information we had you're seeing us here pivoting based on new information um and and finding a way to do exactly what people asking for and that is bringing this money back to the taxpayers right by taking out um I think Tim you said in the last meeting roughly $300,000 in interest payments uh over the next uh was it eight to 10 years um so that's money that does go back in
095the pockets that's a that's a future tax increase that we don't need to make for this so um I'm in support it I appreciate it um I think these are the things we need to do I will second Paul's uh call for let's maybe we should have a third party uh look at our long-term excuse me look at our long-term debt structure somebody is not pfm um and maybe give us a second look at those things we can take that up in finance next month though any other comments or questions on any of these items Miss can just Dr Zer if you could just clarify I know in the last work session and in this one about the niche.com there was remarks that we were trying to buy where our ranking is and this is
096nothing to do with buying ranking but an analysis of how things are ranked and if you want to just explain that where that cost came from yeah certainly uh the the reference to niche.com under boost package has nothing to do with the the the ranking itself in terms of how they use that information you know nobody nobody can buy the ranking so there there is no such thing and that is not the intent of of our engagement with them it really is designed for us to better understand that process and as you know and everyone on this board and everyone on the call who has been following our conversations about uh rankings and making that as one of our our our goals as a as a district to make this make you know allow everyone
097to have an exceptional experience as part of that um it's all about understanding where we are and where we what the things we need to do uh both from an instructional perspective from a staffing perspective and from all the the different Avenues uh to to to leverage uh our understanding and to put our best foot forward so it's certainly not buying anything other than an understanding of uh and to help us through this process so I hope that clears the matter up thank you in terms of yeah in terms of what Mr witer said and just so everyone understands when you commit funds for the charter Charter School expenses uh certainly you could do that today and then next week uncommit that I mean just as an example you're not you are not locked into
098that particular decision um if if in fact we get closer to June and you realize that or we realize together that maybe that's not the the best choice the the reason you see the items in I right now is is specifically designed to uh provide relief not only for our long-term expenses but the use the money that we have in terms of the surpluses that we received previously and those that might be associated with this particular budget uh to offset potential future tax increases and this is in in all in all fairness uh a good representation of the effort that the board and the administration is trying to make uh to leverage those surpluses to uh reduce uh any potential future attack increases so I think these are good decisions these are good recommendations from
099Mr Bricker um and certainly um uh I I do uh I I do think that if we need more information in terms of the long-term debt uh before we start talking about a you know a third party uh we certainly should entertain bringing pfm in uh to share with us what uh you know we need to know and if we're com comfortable and confident in the information they share then fine if we if we're not as a result of that then we ought to consider uh you know what other what other party could provide us the type of information and Analysis for which you seek so that's just my recommendation uh but we need to certainly do that quick so I will certainly talk to uh the finance chair uh following our meeting this evening
100and uh we'll make a determination based on these conversations and see what we can do uh to get you the information that not only the finance committee needs but the rest of the board needs so thank you on that Mr wners did you have something else yeah so I appreciate those comments and I understand I I I I don't misinterpret the the purpose I support the purpose of what we're trying to do here I get that it's just the I I just want to review the debt schedule a little bit more but um looking at the when we when people talk about the Surplus from last year the um I I'm looking back at some of the numbers so the Transportation uh agreement was close to $1.6 million which is the buses that were not
101Run related to uh March uh mid-march through the rest of the year um we also received $150,000 for a car's funding um we had uh let's see here um we saved $150,000 on consumables because of covid uh we had less utilities we had less uh pupil services so almost I would say 80 I I forgot I know that Tim uh gave us this number at one point but I think 80 or 90% of this Surplus was related to covid I think it's really important to point that out and some of the other items that were not related to covid the finance committee we are looking closely to make sure that those things that Tim has incorporated those into the Budget moving forward uh for example uh there was a basic subsidy change after our budget
102uh from the state which caused us to have additional income from the revenue on the revenue line of close to $400,000 between basic uh subsidy and the special education so we're looking at all these things at a at a lower level and I I think it's merily important when people understand uh they understand where the Surplus is coming from and what the Surplus was and the principle of just uh tax and spend is not the principle here at all not my principle um and I think it's really important that it's it's spoken out as being you know we are trying to be fiduciary responsible and make sure uh that the money being spent is effectively spent and not over over taxing uh residents thank you Mr wyers that was well said any other comments on
103any of these agenda items okay so all those in favor of items 10 a through I I I I any opposed okay the motion carries 90 so now I'll take a motion on item 10 J the Eagleville Elementary School renovation I'll a motion okay I heard Hull first and a second neverett comments from the board Miss Reese um I am in favor of um the uh facade and the mechanical and I may be in favor of the other work that is being done but it was my understanding that we would ask for a price for the addition and I thought we were going to also have a plan B um so since this has all been lumped together I I can't support it as is okay any other comments Mr wers sorry I'm uh very
104talkative today I I think there was a question related to canopies I believe the request for canopy came from the principal related to uh I believe this came up in property yeah Mr wnter said be more specific uh it was a it was related to uh the principal and teacher discussions about uh the building as as you all know uh we included the teachers uh in this uh discussion uh both from a a structural perspective and from a cosmetic perspective and uh their their input was taken seriously and U it is true that the recommendation for the canopy did come uh at later in the process uh but it it certainly was a recommendation from the teachers through the principal yes Mr na yeah um this is a long long time coming I think you
105know we talked a little bit about this last week at the work session um but this is a process now this or this is the culmination of a process that started you know five six eight years ago um I will say just in the three plus years now that I've been on the board um getting this uh this facade issue resolved um has been a priority for our property committee um we've been through numerous uh investigations at different layers each one revealing something new uh that needed to be addressed so I'm glad that we're addressing the facade issues I'm happy that we have pulled forward the um the HVAC work on the master plan uh I think it's worth noting there was a question about looking at Alternatives here um to what we're doing at
106the front entrance um I I know in property um I don't remember if it was last year if it was two years ago three years ago um we did investigate uh in response to security issues that uh were raised by our consultant um we did talk about other potential Alternatives uh as how to handle both Eagleville and War sester which s share a similar entrance but um we talked about uh modifications inside the building physically relocating the office uh where it's there maybe using alternative spaces in the building as office is uh we looked so far as to maybe even enclosing the hallway uh at that entrance space so that when someone comes into the building uh they would only have one place to go which was to the office so we we looked at
107a lot of those those different options um and ultimately settled on on where we are now um you know the reason uh that we came back to this and I think it's important for everybody to know um when we look at what the costs are here um Mr Kelly pointed out last week that you know when we do this addition we're looking at a net cost for it of about one point I think it was 1.97 so call $2 million um which on its own might cost three or four million do um there was a question that was brought up I think uh last last week's meeting about um you know could we just eliminate the second floor and just build the office but I think it's important to realize that the building you know
108when you when you're adding an addition onto a building right the the second floor realistically is just is there's walls there's MP there's not a lot of cost involved in that second floor as there is in all the work that goes on to the substructure obviously in the roof so um I don't know that I can give you an exact number but you know let's just say it was only 25% so I think this is the right project at the right time um one of the other things there's another question raised relative to um looking at alternatives to kcba I think it's important to point out that kcba was actually our second choice in this um for those that were paying attention maybe it was around this time last year even um we had uh
109we had another party um who actually started some of the investigative work um we had them propose some designs to us uh for the ex for the exterior of the building how we could redesign the facade looked at different paneling options um ultimately we were as a board very unhappy with what we saw uh as part of that and given given the desire or given the interconnected nature of the systems the facade and the and the mechanical systems which Mr Kelly talked about last week right these are the louvers on the outside of the building and how the unit ventilators are connected into the facade um that integration creates a layer of complexity um that other folks uh just simply weren't qualified uh to be able to uh to advise us on and design around
110which is why we came back to kcba so um I think from a design perspective I'm I'm thrilled with what they've come up with I think it matches the character of the existing building uh and meets our needs for the future so I will I will happily support this thanks the oh sorry the only other thing I will add is just to reemphasize that that each year we have to do a safety audit throughout all Matha and districts so like Ralph said the entrance way isn't something that we just think is something we need to do it's a safety audit for both w war sester and Eagleville so this is is I don't know if Dr Zerby if you want to even just briefly say what a safety audit is because I think it's important
111to know that this is not something that we're like well we think this is something that needs to be done it's a high recommendation yeah that that that's correct Miss kro um you know the the entrances to uh all of our facilities were reviewed as as part of the uh safety audit that was conducted by the state police and the County Emergency Management team and uh those uh those plans uh included a number of other things from training to entrances to parking you know everything about our campuses so uh this this eille entrance is is is on that list and and we recommend that uh this be approved by the board so that we can not only address this matter but um and and for what if it's worth check another thing off of our
112list that we need to we need to accomplish uh in terms of safety for our students and staff in in the district I I think the struggle with this is not that um the safety component of it is the addition of um the additional the addition onto the work is what it seemed like and I'm I'm just thinking back to when we started talking about Arrowhead and all of a sudden there was a war sester um component of it that was put into it and I'm just wondering when we starting to make these I know they recommend okay once you're doing this maybe you should add this on but we don't always have to add on to where we can focus on the project at hand instead of adding on additional and I think that's
113the part of it I don't think we don't support um changing the front and for safety reasons we just I don't know maybe everybody feels differently but Phil um do not really support the addition at this time yeah I think it's important to note that the addition while yes it it could support full day kinderg Garden um which I mean this board has made no secret that's something that we have been talking about for some time um but it it also will help to alleviate some of the um the numbers the the enrollment numbers that we're seeing at the elementary level I mean yes we do have some you know a handful of of classrooms available at our Cola but obviously we're not sending kindergarteners to a middle school we need classrooms in our elementary
114schools so um we've already seen war sester is is getting up there and in terms of enrollment and there is construction going on in Worcester Township so um this is the right time to be adding on classrooms while students in in war sester um you know we could potentially be looking at redistricting within the next few years and Eagleville would be the next closest school for some of those students so um I think that this alleviates unnown problem and possibly solves for a a future dire of the district Mr neverett yeah if I can just add to that Samir I I I tend to agree with you I mean I think ideally we wouldn't be doing this now ideally we'd be making this decision in two or three years from now um just unfortunately we're
115in a position that where we've got to act on this facade now I mean quite honestly I would have liked to have acted on this last summer um but you know the way things went down and the way the investigations went um you know it developed as it did so I would I would like to I personally I would I would hope that we would be looking at this two three years down the road when we had a much clearer picture of what our elementary enrollment um was going to look like but I think you know Kim's point is a Salient one about war sester um we've got the opportunity now uh we know that there were students that just gosh what was it four or five years ago um you know developments that were
116Eagleville developments are now uh War Sor developments and and as War Sor grows uh we're going to need to shift that and shift that population you know back towards Eagle Bill U so that we can accommodate them at War sester so yeah I I would ideally I think we'd be making this decision in a couple years time but given where we're at right now today um you know this I think it's the right decision because ultimately right we've got to make sure that we're that we're we're addressing our facilities needs not just for today but also with an eye towards the future and I think you know pass boards have felt short uh in that area and that's what we're focused on fixing all right any other comments so let's move to a vote then
117for item 10 J all those in favor I I any opposed okay so let the records show we had a vote of 72 with Miss Reese and Miss Purdue opposed m Mr Summers is there a need for a roll call votee or is that sufficient no the vote is clear okay thank you Personnel items Dr serini good evening everyone for your consideration this evening we have the following items four resignations professional of those four three are retirements last week I thank Mr Bruce vogle and also Mr Ralph merer for their years of service this evening I thank uh Mrs Jill Nickerson for her 32 years of service to the students of methacton and wish her well in her retirement we have one employment administrator One Employment professional Four uncompensated Leaves professional two uncompensated leaves classified
118one sabatical for professional development for the 2021 2022 school year three supplemental contracts and one classified substitute custodial for your review and consideration this evening thank you Dr sorini does anyone want to take any of these Personnel items separately okay then I will take a motion to approve all items listed under Personnel Rees thank you Miss Reese is there a second Rond thank you Miss Drummond any comments from the board Miss Reese um just one um I know you said there would be additional last week Dr serini and I see additional um on the list um we have in the past had issues um filling you know specific roles like chemistry foreign language Etc obviously we are going to fill this role but do we worry in this covid world and the secondary World about
119these you know specialty type um uh positions and I it's it's February so that's in a nice spot that you have you know several months to fill it but have what's the kind of ongoing uh HR Outlook in teaching these days thank you Miss Rees we we do have some time to fill them uh as I I mentioned both last week and this week uh several of these retirements constitute many years of service so it's it's never easy to replace the years of institutional memory and a great deal of dedication that these individuals have brought to the positions uh at the same time we are also well aware that there are issues throughout the Commonwealth with certifications and the number of new teachers being certified so uh we do appreciate having the opportunity this far
120in advance to begin this process Miss KRA only comment I have um for volunteers I know we're looking at for next year's planning i i attended a war sester home and school meeting last week and there were some parents that were very interested in knowing what the future may hold with their involvement back with volunteering in the schools so when we look at the health and safety plan if we could just look at what the standards might be that we could get parents maybe back in and helping and supporting the the school district I just want us to also keep that in our plan and since it's under volunteer I just wanted to bring that up so I think that's an action on the health and safety plan I don't know if we're going to
121I think there's a vote on there and I had a comment so I maybe wait till that point but there's volunteers indicated on there with a start date oh thank you I'm thank you for that any other comments on Personnel items Miss h um I wanted to ask about supplemental contracts for bus duty at Sky View and arola um my son takes the bus so I haven't seen how Carline is going there but if you could expand on um how many how how many staff we are utilizing for that and how it's going certainly there are approximately seven staff at Sky View and eight staff at arola and they assist both during morning and afternoon arrival and dismissal and are out there to assist with the buses and uh we do appreciate being able to
122have these extra Duty contracts to have additional staff out there during these important times of the day thank you and to follow up on that um are we prating these contracts or I mean we have students in the buildings five days a week correct these are second semester contracts only also the majority of these individuals had done a a handful of days during the first semester so it is prated to the second semester acknowledging that there were days some days done during the first semester and then uh some days in the second semester that won't be done so that it does come out um pretty much equal okay thank you any other comments on these Personnel items seeing none all those in favor I I any opposed okay the motion carries 90 thank you thank
123you Dr serini well done for your first time all right moving on to curriculum and programs we have nothing this evening um under policy we have nine policies for a first read that will be up for a second read next week um and then or I'm sorry next month and then nine items under second reading that we are voting on this evening so can I have a motion to approve these nine policy items as listed H thank you Miss Hull is there a second Purdue thank you Miss Purdue comments from the board Miss Hall I had um we have revisions to the code of conduct tonight and um Dr Zerby could you just expand on the acknowledge M process for once this assuming this is approved um moving forward to have parents and students be
124informed of the change yes uh assuming that the uh there's a motion to approve uh these policies and the one listed as code of conduct uh there will be a communication coming from the district that uh will require uh parents to log into their uh into their account in the student information system and to review the matter and then to sign off an acknowledgement that they've reviewed the matter uh the code of conduct is uh signed off on or and and and designated through an electronic means uh each of the last probably four years uh within the district and as a result uh we would we would have to do the same because of the changes that that are that are assumingly being approved here this evening so that that will transpire over the next
125few weeks it won't some it won't be something that will happen just automatically but the technology department is well aware of it Communications will be uh consistent over the next several weeks for my building principles and from the district to make sure that everybody's aware of and then there's also every time that a parent goes to log into the parent portal uh a banner will pop up letting and reminding them that U they need to review that and to check off after the review thank you I also want to thank the members of the Dei task force that um that brought forth some recommended changes for the code of conduct it's not typical for us to be approving the code of conduct midy year but um you know over the last few months with in
126conversation in our policy meetings um we were able to see some areas that could stand to be improved and didn't think that it was worth something that needed to be waited on um so I appreciate that it was um I think one of the first collaborative efforts between um the district and the Dei task force and the the first of many to come I'm sure um are there any other comments on these items then all right all those in favor I I I any opposed okay the motion carries 90 um under other let's take um I guess gifts and donations first um and then we'll we'll move on to the rest um can I have a motion to approve the gifts and donation from the cinet family for the best buddies program Mr mcginness and
127second Mr Navarette comments from the board all those in favor I I I any opposed motion carries 90 obviously we have no trips um school year calendar we have a motion to approve the school year calendar wers thank you Mr wyers is there a second mcginness thank you Mr mcginness any comments from the board Miss Reese um yeah could Dr Zerby um explain what change what I don't know if changes is the right word but what um modifications were made since the work session because I believe there was or yes so uh Dr Walsh would you mind uh referencing the modifications please sure um the reference on you'll find on the second page of the handout indicates um with new language uh revised language inclement weather and emergencies will be determined by the superintendent from
128along among the five flexible instructional days for virtual instruction and the March 18th day okay and so so there is one day I want if you want to say built in so and then and do Derby can make under the he may it's under his discretion let's say there's a snow day that's not really the best snow day maybe he'll use it as flexible instruction day and then if you get a gang Buster maybe he'll use it as a snow day is that what that means that is correct and then can you just explain to me um just um why one and not two and I'm fine with it I would just like to know why one and not two because we now have the ability to use those we got approved from Pennsylvania Department
129of Education to incorporate the five instructional days the flexible instructional days um in lie of having any additional days tacked onto the calendar and no no and I totally understand that I 100% understand that um but there was talk of possibly having two days be at Dr zerby's discretion not one I'm just curious why we and that's I like that we at least have one I'm just curious why too yeah based on looking at the calendar um using those five instructional days um if we tacked on the second day that would push us back into the following week in June that would bring everyone back on June 13th as opposed to finishing out on a Friday June 10th so knowing we have that flexibility under the superintendent's discretion we kept it at the one day
130okay any other comments all those in favor of the calendar as presented I any opposed seeing none the motion carries 90 um I just wanted to clarify I just realized that um I had an Omission in my printed script that is on the agenda um but our vote for gifts and donations was for two items not one um the gift from the cabinets family as well as the gift from Sue hacker so I apologize for that Omission um and thank you to both um may I have a motion to approve item D the appraisal of property Dr thank you Miss Drummond and a second Miss Reese any comments from the board Mr mgis uh yes as I stated in property last week um my mother's uh estate and the house that I grew up on
131abuts this property so I will be uh refraining from any discussion and abstaining from the vote thank you Mr mcginness I appreciate that any other comments all those in favor I I any opposed any extensions all right with the vote of 801 with Mr mcginness abstaining the motion carries uh now may I have a motion to approve the updates to the health and safety plan as presented Drummond thank you Miss Drummond is there a second Rees thank you Miss Reese any comments from the board Miss Purdue so I don't I just have one question for Dr Zerby and taking a look I know um the memo went on it's data minor um changes but in the document we have the volunteers listed as returning volunteers on March 15 I just want to know if there's
132any I guess any plan events happening around that time frame why that time is set to March 15th I guess how we landed on that um date and also if we have any other precautions we plan to implement for bringing volunteers back to the schools well certainly uh the uh the concern that we have is uh you know through this whole pandemic was to limit our exposure and limit adults into buildings and and and uh and any other persons that that really don't belong there um we have had discussions uh among the administrative team whereby there may be instances where uh volunteers can be used and so what this health and safety plan only does is it says it will open up the opportunity for volunteers to be um made available when the principle so
133indicates that a specific uh need is to be addressed and whereby the conversation uh will occur between the principal and my office with regards to the frequency uh of that need and the importance of that need and and in addition to the requirement for that adult to follow all the protocols associated with uh or that we require as per the employees in the district so with with all that said um it it's not it's not an Open Door uh volunteer uh uh expansion it's it's a a I'll call it a uh uh a controlled uh you know use because there will be some activities uh that uh will likely are to be planned um by home and school to be lik to be planned by our building administrators uh there's there's likely going to be
134a need um at our secondary levels uh to and Elementary levels uh for for certain uh needs and until we until we open the door and allow that uh to a greater degree to occur um you know we wouldn't be able to you know leverage that support in the in the from the community uh so that's why the health and safety plan is designed to do that to allow that where needed uh but in a controlled fashion okay um so I you just know that in the past we've used volunteers heavily during like the lunchtime and also in the libraries and so that's why I was asking are we planning to bring in volunteers for the lunchtime to help out and also the library or are we really limiting that also currently um there has
135been discussion about both of those uh types of activities um but there is uh some hesitation uh along those lines as well so um I can't I can tell you right now that um principles are going to try their best to uh manage that that which they need to manage with the existing staff that has to be there uh when we find ourselves in need of volunteers and we may see that as the year progresses uh we want to leave the door open for that to occur and without your approval on that matter it makes it that much more difficult for us to uh you know to get the volunteers when we need them you know I I just want everyone on this call to understand that we recognize the value that our volunteers bring
136to the operation we we we certainly are clear in that we also recognize the challenge not only to our volunteers but also to our staff and our students by uh U not carefully planning for the use of those Volunteers in this situation so um I hope everyone understands that I just want to make sure that the board knows that we're going to be very cautious as we as we proceed with the use of volunteers um it's not something where we're just going to say okay everybody that's a volunteered now can come in thank you thank you for clarifying that uh any other comments from the board seeing none all those in favor I I any opposed okay the motion carries 90 and now uh the 7 to2 Blended instructional plan can I have a motion
137to approve that item all right I heard Rees and Drummond so we'll go with Rees for the first and Drummond for the second comments from the board Mr mcginness guys I apologize I know most of the questions should be banged out in the work session but um post uh the work session pre this meeting I had a couple of parents of hybrid uh students asked me some questions that I I didn't have great answers I I had no answers and was embarrassing to me so if I could ask for some clarifying questions um couple of the parents feel like we move the goalpost on them uh for the hybrid kids they finally went back in two days a week felt good about it when we initially asked them for a decision we said that wouldn't
138be uh changing until uh April and is my question is are we coming back to them and saying I know you finally got comfortable two days a week but you now have to choose either four or 100% online I think I missed something there so if anyone could paint that picture for me I'd appreciate it that's a that's a fair question and I could I I can reasonably understand why someone might make that statement um so uh Mr mcginness and the rest of the board should know that um the the only discussion that we were having uh with an April ail time frame was that with which uh we would provide a second option uh for selection for parents and students in grades K through six at the time the board had in front of
139them uh the plan for Blended learning for grades K through six uh we were we were discussing that in January with the understanding that um the there's uncertainty about the direction of positivity and incident rate and all sorts of other you know concerns related to the pandemic and we understood that at that time parents might need another uh uh uh check uh at at at those parameters before they feel more comfortable with bringing children back into the schools uh so but that but that April time frame was only discussed in terms of its uh ability for uh giving opportunities for for K through six students at the time we were discussing that we also uh said that we would we would put the survey out for the 7 through 12 uh parents and students as
140we said we were going to do back in I believe it was October when we approved the November hybrid uh plan so if we remember back all the way back to October and I know that's hard because we've had so many discussions on this stuff but in in October we approved the fact that we were going to go back in a hybrid environment uh at uh K through 12 and that we would re uh survey parents in uh in the grade levels at the change of the semester which was honor about the the the time we did it I think it was a week later than the time we did it but but generally speaking that's what we were planning to do so we we are not we are not uh trying to uh you
141know change uh what we had said uh we were going to do we were clear about that all along uh but I I do understand that that there may be some folks that have just decided to come back in the in the hybrid environment and that uh it may appear to them now that uh their choices between 4 days and online are the only choices um and that is the case um the the choices are four days or the choice is uh all online now there are some uh students that will be coming five days and and those things are written into IEPs and of specifics but those those will be the options so let's play this out a little bit uh we send out the survey and again an extreme tale event everybody says
142they're coming back what do we do for rooms spacing um and again I get it it's an extreme event that we're probably not going to face but how are we handling that Dr Walsh can you talk about how we're going to handle the the the students and the use of the large groups and the rotation within the classrooms sure so um just as we've applied to the elementary um if there were circumstances that caused us to go over those established class sizes using the 6x5 um metric um we would be going to a uh rotating hybrid which would be three days um in person and two days off on the Friday and then one other additional day um and again we would do that on a caseby Case basis working with each of the building
143administrators um if we did actually exceed those capacities which does vary um in the different buildings so at arola and the high school you know we would certainly consult with the building principles and and Mr Jones and his staff on what could safely fit in so those parents would be notified by those building administrators if indeed we exceeded that capacity based on the survey we're not anticipating that um but you're right in case there's a worst case scenario we do have that backup plan you're on mute I know I'm sorry uh and I apologize for not working this out the work session I really do so I'm a junior in high school uh I've just gone back for two days I'm willing to try four days I get in there and I am freaked out
144that people are not masking people are not socially distanced I want to raise my hand and and go back to 100% virtual is that an option absolutely thank you but to to clarify as we stated before it won't be a back and forth so for example if a student gets into the four days a week and they realize it's not for them they can go back to Virtual but they can't change their mind again correct okay and I can't rig the system bad term but it's late I can't rig the system and uh sign up for four days but Tuesday I raise my hand I want to go virtual Wednesday I show up Thursday I want to go back to Virtual it's uh that's not going to float can you can you rig this I
145mean I I I know what listen I'm just we got we got a we got a scenario play here right that's all I'm doing no no that's it's a it's a fair statement and could someone do that in the beginning I I might I imagine some folks might do that um but you know you know the the administrators and the uh the teachers will uh you know be watching those students who are to be attending in person and watching students who are to be attending online and and the the the issue for us is if someone is planning to come in person and um and we have to uh have an adjustment to seating and do some rotation within the each certain sections based on the availability of of of seats and and the distancing
146you know we don't we don't want to take the the opportunity for for uh students to uh be exposed for people that might be gaming uh the process so you know we're going to be paying attention to that and we want to we want to certainly you know treat everyone with uh you know the respect and and and appropriateness in this process but you know it's hard it's hard for us to put rules in place and and then say oh well the rules are only good for some so so you know it's it's a will we be tested I I'm certain that there was some folks up test us they've done it since the beginning of of uh this this covid process uh and we've tried to work with those families and sometimes we find
147that there are legitimate medical or other types of reasons that that substantiate the need to make some other types of of accommodation U but we can't do that for 1500 students you know and sit down and and and outline all the different accommodations So the plan that we're sharing with you in general is what we believe will be the the most appropriate uh for the majority of our students and if we have to address some some matters along the way I'm I'm confident that Dr Mangano and and Dr graines will work with their team and and and and address the students and the families uh to best meet their needs um there's no there's no great there's no great uh uh system that isn't infallible in in in what we're what we're presenting here but
148but it does keep us aligned with the k6 uh uh environment uh it it it allows for our uh our students and teachers to to make that uh uh contact in in a in a in person um and it really you know takes us to through to the end of the school year as close to uh I'll call it our normal opportunity for inperson instruction as we can get thank you yeah and I think it's worth noting that the the reason that we approved a 4-day model for um in person with one day virtual for K to 6 and the reason that that's what's on the agenda for the 7 to 12 this evening is we we're still living through a pandemic and there will still be students that need to go on quarantine and
149need to be um out of school for extended periods of time and by maintaining the virtual environment it allows the students to move back and forth between the two the two modali um with a little bit more continuity so that um you know we we don't want families to feel discouraged from following quarantine protocols and by maintaining the virtual environment simultaneously with the iners I think it allows for that I'll just add one more thing Mr mcginness I appreciate your questions because it's you know you can't always think of everything the week before and um I will say you know this has been a struggle all year and and I have to say I I am although we've all everybody has differences of opinions I really really do appreciate the thoughtful approach that our Administration
150and our board even if we all didn't agree at all times took the took to this and I the reason I say that is because I am now working different District people whenever I say this people think I mean math Acton in a different District in a secondary seventh grade classroom and I'm thrilled to have my the students who feel who were able to to come back full-time but because where I work didn't take this exact approach there were students that were there hybrid but because we were not we where I work I'm not are not keeping to that 5 by six some students didn't not many but some didn't come back and I appreciate that we are doing everything we can for those that feel able to come back um and what like the
151reason what Dr Walsh explained and why Mr mcginness asked so that if those hybrid students want to try it we are being as safe as possible so I really do appreciate that because I I I miss my students who just decided that their families chose and it wasn't many but I missed those so I although those few extra weeks this may take I do think it's worth it so I really do appreciate the district going the extra extra mile here um and I know it's not easy and I thank the District administration and and I thank the parents um who understand that this is a pandemic and a very unique situation um so thank you and like we all said we we I you know I approve this Miss Purdue I was just wondering if
152we can go over the timelines again based on um the decision of the board what what are the steps that need to happen I know it was last week but I'm sure many may have forgot in it so if Dr Zerby can maybe review those timelines again uh Dr angad do you have uh that that timeline in front of you by any chance and would you would you care sharing with board again I do have it in my head so the survey will be going out tomorrow at 8:00 a.m if this motion is approved the survey will close at noon on Sunday February 28th and then we will start um doing all of the internal work with um looking at courses and periods per student um with the return of there will be a communication
153to families on March 10th about their child's um schedule for coming back and we'll be greeting our students in 7 through 12 on March 15th which is a Monday and there's no snow on March 15th either yeah if there's snow good we're lucky thank you all right any other comments and thank you Dr angat that was impressive I sleep on [Laughter] it that's some dedication there all right uh any other comments from the board then on the 7 to 12 Blended instruction plan as a reading teacher I just have to say Miss Dr Zerby might have jinxed us about the um no snow on March 15th it is the Ides of March which I will not say what that is that will have to be if you're ask your um your English your high school
154English teacher but um and uh thank you again yes no more white stuff all right let's go with a vote now all those in favor I any opposed all right this motion carries 90 and that is it for our voting items this evening um we have our dates for our board members calendars with the meetings coming up in March and does anyone have any old business this evening uh I don't know if it's old but there was I think we addressed every sing maybe not every single I think we addressed most questions that were brought up um there was a question about some legal bills and I believe is finance going to be having some discussion about that next month is that correct or not correct uh we have not set the agenda yet but
155I will be speaking uh with the chairperson on those matters yes okay so if they're not discussed at Finance for some reason we will make sure to discuss it um at the board meeting because it it is a it is an area of concern anything else for our old business how about new business Miss Purdue and this may be fall on the old business but I was wondering I know Dr Zerby mentioned when they talked about niche.com as far as um what we're doing is actually looking into it for lessons and um um or to look at how they gather their information I'm wondering if that's something that he will be once we get the information that's needed to share with the board and the community also yeah actually Miss Purdue I'm glad you shared
156that because as part of my uh presentation uh for April I will be sharing that information absolutely thank you all right anything else under new business okay with that we will move to Courtesy of the floor the board of directors required members of the public wanting to make comments to pre-register by 5:00 pm today um this is an opportunity for residents to provide comments on matters that could come before the board we ask that you keep your comments to four minutes or less the board may choose to respond to matters following conclusion of the courtesy of the floor period um and as always if you could just start by stating your name and municipality okay first I have Lauren nelon hi Lauren nin War sester um I just wanted to mention two things um number
157one obviously we are at War sester and have an interm principal and I just wanted to acknowledge U Mr fely he has been so communicative and the dismissal process both arriving and leaving um it's it's been smoother um we have been in the district three years and the war sester parking lot I remember remember vividly when we first you know attended school it it was it's dangerous and the fact that there is now traffic directing um that's huge and I hope and I I missed the there was a lot of information tonight on the budget but I hope that there will be something in place permanently for the traffic flow um you know 73 very dangerous so I hope that's considered and it's not just a temporary measure um because even on a normal non-co
158year the traffic in that parking lot is uh very high and dangerous so thank you to um him for all he has done in his very short time with us so far and the second thing I just wanted to mention um you know surrounding districts and I know we're not comparing but um they have offered five days a week and I'll be honest as a working parent with five children um the fifth day is disruptive I felt badly my son came home said Mom I forgot my whiteboard I forgot this and you know I forgot I I it's a lot to send them four days which I'm very appreciative of and have that fifth day where they unload everything you know the teachers are doing everything to do the virtual environment and then pack it
159all up and leave on Monday things are going to get missed and you know it is disruptive and um you know I know that four days is great um but I just I don't see why we can't have a plan to go back for that fifth day um again there's so many parents that don't have child care and and are working and it's it's challenging and it's not a a daycare babysitter situation it's just that continuing um there are virtual students that remain consistently that's their choice but for the four days I just don't see why we can't offer that fifth day and it doesn't sound like that's even going to be an option for the remainder of the school year so hopefully that can be reconsidered thank you thank you Miss uh next I
160have John Andrews John Andrews Lower Providence I want to bring up an item relative to today's agenda that I missed earlier and that is that uh on the committing funds for Charter School expenses uh the sentence reads 1.0 commit [Music] $63,000 from the anticipated 2021 Surplus to Charter School expenses and there's no period at the end and I'm wondering is that for Charter School expenses for for this fiscal year or next fiscal year or both that's so that's a question uh to be hopefully to be answered thank thank you thank you Mr Andrews next I have Joe writtenhouse hi Joe writtenhouse Lower Providence uh I'm gonna keep it brief but uh I uh thankful for the uh back to school for the 4 day um but again as the uh earlier speaker spoke about I
161wanted to reiterate I think that there needs to be a plan in place for that fifth day and I worry that we are setting ourselves up for going to the end of the year without any consideration for what that might uh what that fifth day might look like or what not might look like and what the following year will be I I worry that we will go into the next year again with another 4-day solution and not a five-day um secondly I just want to talk about transparency for a little bit I I feel like um maybe it's just the people I speak to uh in relation to the board meetings but there's a lot of a rhetorical trick called Gish Gallop going on where a lot is thrown at people very much and it's
162hard for them to uh keep track of every single situation that's going on and sometimes votes can get past them which they were unsure about uh looking at transparency sometimes the the requests that we I've put in um and others have put in they they aren't fulfilled even though a lot of the uh stuff that we've gotten back was public information but it's still censored so I I just kind of wanted to ask like what what is the criteria for stuff that isn't obviously legally required to be censored um why some stuff that is public information is censored um uh third I want to thank uh Zerby Purdue and canro for speaking about niche.com for the the bit that's come up uh I'm still confused a little bit about it um because as I'm looking
163at the site as it speaks uh as it sits right now we are the only verified account on there that has multiple uh avenues for you know perspective I guess people moving into the district to look at so I just want to understand do we pay for that is that something we paid uh as a district to have um because the ranking on here is not commensurate to what it is for the rest of Pennsylvania and it is uh I I don't want to it's not it's not the exact same number and I think that that just I would just love more information I'm not suggesting anything outside of that and then finally I uh very briefly wanted to talk on the Dei committee um I had the pleasure of taking uh a class with
164the Dei committee that uh I believe was formed prior to the uh committee associated with Thon um I am a little confused as to what that distinction is between those two committees I know one is probably private and the other one is through the school um but they share very similar names and I'm uh a little bit confused as to what uh you know how they work together um I wanted to ask about the volunteers so uh part of the the concept of equity is the idea of equal treatment not as opposed to uh equality equal treatment under the law um I wanted to understand the 30 volunteers that would be asked are are what is the criteria for those 30 volunteers how many bipo uh student students teachers faculty social demographics we I took
165a Wonderful class with the the local group and they brought up ethnicity age indigenous status body size class social class religion Faith race Health sexual orientation gender National Orin and disability SL ability um I I just think that it should absolutely be public information what the Dei task force is who is accommodated um I want to make that we're not leaving people out I also want to make sure that the the group in and of itself is genuinely searching for Equity um so yeah I just wanted to understand if we could get a idea from Zerby or anyone on the board what that what that criteria for the volunteers would be and if they're looking to expand that it to fit uh criteria that they do not reach if say they don't uh fulfill a
166social class or health status what what that would look like um outside of that thank you next I have Greg young hi can hear me yes I can great Greg young wor sester um thank you for the vote tonight to go back to 7 to 12 four days a week with one day virtual um certainly with a focus hopefully the focus is on getting back to a f day not to sound like a broken record but that that fifth day virtual um just just feels like in personal opinion like a like a crutch and I know we're in the middle of a pandemic and miss larssen you said the reason for the two modalities and the virtual option is so we could bounce back and forth we need to be clear that we're focused on
167a plan to go back five days a week next year I have very little confidence that any of that um any of that planning or discussions is in play for this year uh but the just hearing that you know the reason why we have two modalities is because we're in a pandemic while the pandemic's not going to be going away in September but we can put a health and safety plan in place that can give us five days a week without having the four plus one as you heard in another parents say tonight that virtual day is disruptive I'm sure it's disruptive for hundreds if not thousands of of people um and then Mr mcginness when he said that we moved the goalpost I don't think we moved the goalpost I think that survey that
168came out that pulled the parents or pulled the community about a two-day hybrid that was a misfire of a survey that that survey should have never even gone out it should have been f a four plus one uh virtual PLL that parents were confused as to why that survey was even going out that's water under the bridge now we're now at 4 plus1 let's move forward focus on a five day a week um just one comment about the fact finding and maybe I'm confused and it could be clarified later but when I look at the bullet points that led to fact finding I I'm questioning whether or not fact finding was even necessary we're talking about you know health and safety language that found its way into fact finding safe Health sanitary procedures if if
169there was push back on that then then I'm scratching my head I understand the four-year agreement that may have been something that that needed uh needed some fact finding but a 1% increase on medical and dental costs the average is I'd say four five six% per year that 1% increase in the contract is going to result in uh more and more negative um impact to a yearly budget um but I I'll look into you know those those budget discussions as I uh as I can get to them but other than that feeling very positive about the vote tonight thank you very much uh let's just move forward together thank you next I have Jessica Bradbury hi good evening can you hear me yes I can thank you Jessica Bradbury Lower Providence Township I'd like to
170start with the motion to suspend board policy 0062 approved 90 with absolutely no commentary from the board could you please tell the public why you will not even discuss returning to in person board meetings Also earlier was everyone with their hand raised permitted to speak and not the strangers from Pittsburgh that we're afraid of but people in the community that participate often is that why we prefer the virtual Arrangement because it allows better control and censorship second the teacher contract has this been signed I know the FactFinder report was approved we talked about it earlier tonight leading most of us to think the issue was however I've spoken to some teachers and I'm hearing that is not the case so please tell us what's the reason for the delay and when can we expect the
171teachers to have a valid contract in place why does it take so long for the board meeting minutes to be posted why aren't all the presentations that are given on our Zoom calls during committee meetings work sessions and regular meetings posted on the website for the public to review when we want to review these Pres presentations you are forcing us to submit a right to no request as one of the callers earlier mentioned when we do get our request fulfilled we are given a presentation a presentation that we saw live during a committee meeting where every single slide is blacked out these documents are viewed publicly therefore they are public record we're talking about the return to school side there's nothing sensitive in that so providing a document that is comprised in entirely of redacted
172Pages it only furthering our issues with transparency not to mention driving up the exorbitant legal fees just to reinforce what others said earlier we must no questions asked must restore a five-day in-person learning model for next year the fifth virtual day is disruptive to everyone to the children to the teachers to the parents the only way to move forward is through strong leadership and proactive planning why would we wait two more months to begin those discussions in May the children in our communities are our greatest assets and our most precious Treasures our number one priority should be planning for their future and discussing their return to the classroom five days per week as soon as possible thank you for your time this evening thank you uh Brian ernshaw Brian hershaw Lower Providence uh first thank
173you to Mr wyers and M ree for addressing some of the comments and questions I had um during public comment on board action items um not all items I brought up were addressed um so my first question is how is the decision made about who is going to answer what and what questions will or will not be answered um I know the board president said your time is valuable but ours ours is as well so um it just feels like I mean I'm wasting my time but if you could just tell me how you decide on what you're going to respond to or not um the items that weren't responded to was as a previous um commenter mentioned was the resumption of in-person board meetings I still like to hear what the criteria is for
174when that will happen if it will never happen just tell us I mean tell us what you're looking for before you will resume iners meetings um I appreciate looking into the legal fees but the legal fees I always referred to were Ur in November and there should be some sort of understanding what those were for given that it was 145,000 essentially enough to fund two teacher salaries and benefits for an entire year um it should have an understanding of what those are for and nobody's able to answer that question for some reason U would like to hear about Shannondale where at stands I mean that's going on for 10 years or more um and $6 half million dollar of taxpayer funds are are sitting there you've had to take higher tax increases because because of
175that money held in escrow um it sounds like that new depository account I don't know if it was retroactive or not but it was implemented before board approval there was no indication whether it retroactive or not um and then there was some discussion about looking at financing involving pfm um I would encourag board to take a look at a recent Philadelphia inquir article about what PM's recommendations and their impact of interest rate swaps at on certain school districts and a hospital before you engag pfm as far as looking for their recommendations on what to do with that um because they stand also stand to benefit on any refinancings that are done they're gonna get fees for doing that um and lastly I I find it on the debt that you're paying off I find it
176incredible that nobody on the finance committee or the board had looked into what those interest rates were and the fact that on one of the debts being retired Mr Bricker still doesn't know what the interest rate is when you're retiring debt it's a common analysis to do to look at what the interest rate is and what makes sense from an efficient use of capital standpoint it's just incredible that nobody looked into that and the fact that you're taking surpluses that were set aside for peers and then just use it to pay off debt without any sort of analysis being done just says to me that you're just looking for a home for that Surplus cash and do anything with it except return it to taxpayers it just make any sense and and there's got to
177be some sort of financial analysis done to to assure taxpayers that you're using their their money their funds in the most efficient way possible because if you're not doing the analysis you're not I just don't get it thanks thank you next I have Michael Ryan good evening everyone Michael Ryan Lower Providence can you hear me okay yes all right um I just want to make some comments about the uh how happy I am that the district and mea came to an agreement on the fact finders report um I know Mr bicker had uh made some comments about the uh salary schedule revisions and Mr Winters had made some comments as well but this is just such an important thing for the district and I hope that the you know everyone out there realizes that this
178part is good for both sides here you from the district standpoint this is phenomenal for budgeting um it's also great as Mr Winters mentioned for retention especially for the younger teachers you know if they're sitting there step two or step three when they get hired and four years later they're only sitting at step seven if they're lucky and they're not making a whole lot of money so what do you do if you're stuck in that situation and we've seen it teachers will look to make more money in a neighboring District um the revisions that take place over these next four years uh hopefully will stop that for happening which will be great for Teacher retention and the the new starting salaries I think are going to be fantastic as well um you know the teacher
179Marketplace is so tough right now so having these competitive salaries will help bring in better teachers to M Acton so um from the teacher standpoint um they they're they're sitting there now where they can make a reasonable percentage increase every year which is phenomenal they don't have to wait till Step 11 when they can finally get a jump you know or the big jumps that came thereafter um so I remember years ago fighting for this and unfortunately it didn't happen during my time on methon school board but I am very happy to see that it did now and in fact when I first joined this board and had discussions with fellow board members back then the discussion was don't even try it it's too hard it's too expensive it will never happen and I just
180want to commend this board for putting in the time the effort and all the long hours that it took to get to this point this is a great thing for myth Acton so thank you all thank you Mr Brian all right uh seeing no one else then for Courtesy of the floor um I will close that portion of the meeting and let's move on um are there any items anything else that the board wishes to address before we adjourn Mr wyers so I want to make sure I I say this correctly uh I am not cherry picking off I'm trying to answer as many questions as I can um so the uh there was a question related to the Charter School expenses uh they are related to next year's based on an expectation of a
181certain number of students uh continuing on charter schools that would not be um the the traditional amount of students uh going to Charter Schools if somebody else wants to put more uh language around there that's please um uh there was questions related to uh I think we should discuss the in person I think the Miss lenes has discussed this before um I do agree the principle that some of the presentation should be we need to do a better job from an organizational perspective of putting those presentations uh more timely on on on the agendas and so forth uh especially presentations that have been U made um for the for the aspects related to the some of the questions about the contract the 1% increase in the medical is an increase for the employee to pay
182so when they're paying 177% they're paying 177% of the premium share when they go to 18% the following year they're paying 1% more of the total premium share often that doesn't even cover the C the increasing costes that happened to the medical so just for a clarification or maybe I misunderstood I apologize but that the the principle of trying to go avoiding fact finding we all wanted to avoid fact finding you get to a certain point where you're not coming to an agreement so uh there were many issues uh on the element uh related to all the elements that were discussed by ch and uh Tim um but we we did settle a lot of them and some of them we we needed somebody else to help uh settle settle some of that information for
183us ideally we would settle uh without having a third party so hopefully in four years whoever's on the board can do that um legal fees uh there is a lot of legal fees I think we discussed in summary some of those legal fees um I believe I mentioned some of the major aspects which leads into the shann andelle conversation Shan andelle is on schedule for a a court case uh at the end of March um obviously we're not going to talk anymore related to the court case but uh certainly there's many on this board that would love to see resolution to that issue um and I think that's it if somebody wants to jump in please do Mr neverett yeah I gotta let Paul go first all the time because he takes all the answers
184it's good um hey just one question there's a question raised about Dei and I sat through that same um through that same class that they um um the person in the public referenced it was uh it was incredible but I think it's important to note that there are there are two different and distinct groups and organizations here the the Dei task force is a local nonprofit entity that operates privately um certainly many of us are are involved in it and and and care deeply about this issue um the effort that's being undertaken by the school district um has certainly been inspired by um the efforts uh by that Dei task force and is certainly an outcropping um of the concerns that have been raised by that uh by the Dei task force um but they
185are separate um they are uh different entities um and I think that that should be made clear but I I do expect just like there were um um policy considerations that were made to the code conduct based on the concerns that were brought up by that group they're they're another stakeholder within our community uh just like parent groups um sporting groups uh home and school associations um and and and like any group we'll work with them to uh to achieve the goals that we all want for our kids thank you Mr na for clarifying that um I just have a comment just while we're talking about the Dei and I was going to ask maybe if Dr Zerby can speak to the different subgroups that um will participate just because I think that was one
186of the questions asked about um what the volunteers would look like who will be part of that group and I know just from the work that Dr Campbell is doing we'll have different subgroups that will participate we'll have students we'll have parents we'll have community members teachers and staff so I don't know if that deserve you if you want to add on to that a little bit more uh certainly uh Miss Purdue and Miss Kelly I think we've we've included uh the presentation that outlined uh how those groups would be constructed and and uh and we've also have the uh a video uh available for the meeting the Dei kickoff meeting that uh where where um uh Dr Campbell explain that that process so in more detail that stuff is uh available on the district
187website if you go to the main website under departments and and find the department of diversity Equity inclusion all the information is is there for you but just in general uh there there is a group of I believe six uh uh employees within the District Two being administrators the other four teachers within the district that are considered the leadership team and that have been working directly with uh Dr Campbell as part of uh the the district's efforts and uh they will be reviewing the 855 applications uh that I said earlier were were submitted and there are I believe uh five subgroups uh which will have about six individuals for each subgroup which gets us about the 30 uh you know individuals for that group um so they are looking at a number of things in
188terms of of of the application process has questions those questions will be be used to make the best uh cross-section representation uh for our our district and and of course you know there are things that they're considering uh as that as the presentation for that evening outlines there's there's a number of different things it's just not you know race religion those types of things there's a I think there's probably like 40 or 50 different um indicators uh with which um you know we're we're looking at in terms of lenses to look through as we start you know having these conversations so you know I I think it's all laid out there if uh any member of the public you know has any other specific questions uh they can certainly uh email the uh Miss Miss
189Kelly what is the email address it is Dei methacton.org excellent thank you so um yeah so and there's that that's constantly monitored monitored and uh any information or suggestions that anyone from the community has um we certainly that that gets pushed on to the district leadership team and Dr Campbell gets access to that and we use that information as part of our uh process going forward so I hope that Miss Purdue answers some of th those questions and if if I can just um also add to that that the number of 30 participants in this group was something that was suggested by Dr Campbell as a manageable size um that's that's you know where work can get done and things can get accomplished but it's not unwieldy and um that was the size Target he
190suggested yeah that that's right Miss German but he also said as as you may recall that um there's a there's a lot of work uh to be done and there's going to be a need for even more people to be involved at at other stages through the process so for those people who might not make the the initial 30 uh group uh they're certainly going to we're going to retain their names and and and contact information and engage them where where most appropriate um just since we're in the middle of clarifying things and uh Mr Summers uh if you I think this is best handled by you a member of the public mentioned why some items are first of all there's right to no request and then they're simply just asking the district a question
191you know you can certainly ask the principal questions the the superintendent you know there are things that you can just ask right to know is totally different we won't get into all of that but um M Summers if you could explain why some things are redacted from right to know that would be excellent quickly not you know sure um so to your point the the it is not the only way to get information from the school district is through a right to no request in fact the vast majority of questions uh that the district receives are through uh just traditional communication emails phone calls letters other forms of of Correspondence and I think the district would certainly encourage uh anyone with questions or seeking information to to um contact the district through all of its
192available means um but there is a mechanism to submit a formal request for information for records actually um for for specific records that exist of any public agency in the Commonwealth and that is through a public right to know request um there's a you know information about how to submit that um any request that comes in is analyzed and uh the district searches for records that respond to that request and if there is information contained within those records um that is exempt from access under the right to no law uh the district May uh redact that information um the right to no law itself contains um a number of specific exceptions so uh the most important of which include um information that would would jeopardize the security of of a building you know so certainly
193the district has information in its possession that if provided to uh a member of the public who intended to do harm uh we have you know the district has the right to withhold that information and certainly one of the considerations that the district always has to to think about is that the person who may be requesting a particular record may have very good intentions and may not um intend to do anything harmful to the district but the district has no control over a record once it's provided to a member of the public um the member of the public can you know who who obtains a record from the district you know um can distribute that record how they wish and so the district has to exercise caution about what information it is providing and ensuring
194that it would not harm the student the the staff members the community um so that's merely one exception there are obviously others for personnel related items student related items um and and so the district you know if there is a an issue of importance to to not provide that information then the information would be redacted otherwise um the vast amount of major of information that's requested the vast number of records that are requested are certainly um to be made available to the public and would be made available to the public thank you so um the only other points that I needed to clarify then um is that there seem to be some confusion about um where we are with planning for the 2122 school year and I Dr zery said that we will be bringing
195this to the full board in May but that does not mean that we are waiting until May to discuss it um I I thought that it was made clear earlier but apparently not um it it's something that will be discussed in the education committee moving forward um conversations are happening um internally with Administration and staff um to to begin that process um so that we are ready to hit the ground running come the end of August um and then finally I just wanted to thank Mr Mike Ryan um while you may not be on the board anymore your um work in negoti has lived on and so um your your legacy was definitely a part of our negotiations so thank you um Miss Purdue so another and and I think this has come up in
196emails and also public comments in reference to when the board plans to return back to um meeting in person I don't know if that's something that we can discuss here or if that's an item that we can put on to discuss another time I just wanted to know in the past when this has come up um we have well I have stated that um I have seen over the past year since we have done these meetings virtually that um our engagement with the community has grown um Community involvement in board meetings has grown and um and and I've seen a lot of positives that have come out of having our meetings in the virtual environment um if I felt that there were things that were suffering because our board was continuing to meet virtually um
197I would be much more eager to bring us back to in-person meetings however um I I have yet to see anything that that I feel we are not accomplishing as a board and as a district um and and I I don't I don't see that we have had problems in the past year because of the virtual environment um obviously I'm I'm just one person here but um if there are members of the board who feel that there are things that um we are not accomplishing because of the the virtual environment then I I do think that we should address it I will I mean I will step in I do think that's something we should consider we are like they are saying we are having our staff our students coming in so there is there
198is a level of being able to be in person and create a do the live streaming that the teachers do as well so I have no problem further discussing it whether we start in a committee meeting and they go to the school board in the large our Cola Center but I think that's something that as we move forward and we're getting our vaccines and we're doing the antien testings and there's the the incident rates going down I think we should be able to address being in person again I think that's something maybe we could you know just have a discussion on doesn't have to be in a public meeting but just have a discussion with Dr Zerby and and while we were talking sorry go ahead Paul no just I would support going back as
199well I guess we can put it on the agenda at the work session I'll let miss you know them decide but I was just going to say I was looking at my notes real quick before Drew made a motion to adjourn and uh I think there's one thing we did not address and it was whether there was a teacher contract or not and uh correct me if I'm wrong Mr Dr serini or or or Mr Regina but the board approved the fact finding report and the teachers union approved the fact finding report which might seem like that's not a contract but it's a contract so it's done and um if there's a a member of the public mentioned there was teachers confused by that I believe that's a Association issue not issue but you know
200there there is a contract Mr Regina would you mind just speaking to that what likely one might be referring to sure sure there the contract is is a relatively large document um which there's a number of items that need to be whether it's Rewritten or or rephrase so there's an editing process that takes place in that once the contract is approved or the FactFinder report is approved then both parties uh start to they meet typically in person but uh in this case it's been virtual um and we try to address those matters in the contract to get it completed as soon as possible so we can move forward with it this this isn't necessarily a period in time that everyone really enjoys because we're we're really adopting a new contract uh at this point but
201we don't we don't have it in writing in front of us so it's a it's a process that we like to move forward with as quickly as possible but we recognize that uh any missteps or mis edits in that contract are are now in that contract for the next four years so we need to be very careful careful that all the edits are proper and and done right and I think also Chay you can point out that there are things that are in the contract that are already being honored for example there's an encouragement to announce a retirements uh earlier in the process and I think that's been communicated to the mea as well so there are things that are already in place and being moved forward and I believe uh um Tim and the
202payroll are they're all ready to go uh with past past uh seven months worth of pay as well so that that's correct Mr wners I just have one comment I think this was a great um discussion I know we're fortunate today because our meeting is not that long and it's not every single night that we'll have the luxury to have this after meeting discussion to kind of address some of the Public's um comments and but I I think it's definitely a great step in the right direction and just because we're having some discussions about it and it put people's mind at ease instead of waiting till the next day and wondering do they need to put in a right to know request who do they need to send an email to to get some of
203the information and it may not be everything that's captured here like um maybe that's what it come up to say we're cherry pick and stuff but we are taking notes and we are working on make communicating better with the public by making sure that we are um tuning into what the comments that we're receiving and also following up so it's a step in the right direction so just bear with us and be patient we'll we'll get it right all right anything else Mr mcginness motion no Jour is there a second second all right everyone have a good night meeting adjourned thank you