School Board Meeting - 1/18/24

001ex sorry e you would we yeah until actually picks over Z happy [Applause] birthday all right uh hereby called order uh January 18th 20124 regular meeting of the Board of Education uh please rise for a pledge to the flag I pledge 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 uh all right um can we have roll call Elizabeth goldber here Mary Lee Hall here here here here here here here wison here all right I have a oh that's a little loud um I have a couple of uh meeting announcements uh first I'd announced that we were not able to have our buildings and grounds meetings on Tuesday as uh all after school activities were

002closed so uh we were looking to make that up at some point in the near future uh we did have an executive session uh just before uh tonight's board meeting uh to discuss a student discipline matter and uh legal matters um and now I'd like to turn the floor over to uh Mr litz uh thank you Mr President uh wanted to make a statement concerning the posted agenda for tonight's uh school board meeting before public comment or any action by the school board on the listed agenda items for this evening some people in the community have asserted that the school board actions at its December 7th 2023 public meeting to add agenda items to Hal the retirement of the warrior head logo and to retain recordings of Schoolboard meetings in in order to allow more

003time for further Schoolboard consideration of both of these matters violated the sunshine act the assertion being made is that adding these uh agenda items at that meeting violated section 7.1 excuse me 72.1 of the sunshine act conversely the school board announced at that time that the December 7th meeting agenda when when these agenda items are made that they were acting under the the Minimus business exception within 7121 of that law that expressly allows for such amendments so there's a difference of opinion what the sunshine act Provisions does and does not permit the difference of opinion isn't necessarily surprising because that section of the law 7121 was added to the sunshine act in 2021 and there are no judicial determinations about what the term Di minimist business means for purpos of the statute that's not a

004whole lot of guidance on that however that dispute whatever it may be doesn't need to be resolved in order to fully resolve any alleged violation or infraction of the sunshine act from the December 7 2003 meeting the reason I say that is the Pennsylvania Supreme Court and Comm Court have repeatedly held and I quote most any Sunshine act information or violation could be cured by subsequent ratification at a public meeting close quote so consistent with that wellestablished legal principle The school board has elected to list items 80.1 and item 10.01 in its published agenda for this evening for ratification votes these items are the exact same agenda items that were voted on and added at uh the agenda for the December 7th 20 23 meeting because items 801 and 101 were listed on the January

00518th 20 meeting agenda that was posted more than 24 hours in advance of tonight's meeting and there will be an opportunity for public comment on these agenda items before any votes and the school board will be taking a public vote on these items later this evening any alleged Sunshine act infraction that may be alleged from December 7th 2023 will be fully and completely resolved the school board isn't obligated to take these me uh measures to ratify these things however it elected to do so at my suggestion my Law Firm suggestion to hopefully avoid a needless fight and potential litigation cost over an alleged Sunshine act infraction that can be resolved through the above stated actions thank you all right uh moving on to item two 01 approval of the January 18th uh 18th 2024 agenda

006I'll entertain a motion to approve the agenda as stated move so move do I have a second uh we have a motion in a second is there any discussion any n or abstentions that motion carries uh item 3.01 approval of the December 7th 20 23 minutes I'll entertain a motion to approve the December 7th 2023 minutes so moved I have a motion second Motion in a second any discussion any n or abstentions that motion carries moving on to item 4.01 the student representative report and I'll turn it over to Caroline all right so I have uh quite a bit to talk about tonight so due to the much anticipated closure of school tomorrow the Junior Achievement stem Summit that was scheduled for tomorrow was postponed until March 5th um in exciting news senior Karly Coons

007and Junior Khloe Warner performed at the district 7 uh band concert with 148 other students from 46 other schools and after the event Chloe Warner was informed that she qualified for the regional band concert the weekend of February 9th through February 12th the shs tech ed projects will be featured at the York Builder show in the Workforce Now Booth um the SAT music department is super busy as always um they just closed out their Winter concert season and they're getting ready for their spring musical or their Spring Concert season uh speaking of the spring musical uh rehearsals for that are underway the musical this spring is called once upon a mattress it is a spin on princess in the PE so if you get the chance come out and see it that'll be in March

008um Floyd Fletcher Ethan Perry and Tanner Perry successfully completed the ycal construction pre-apprenticeship program in December and then um we hope to have some students in the second semester um apprenti ship soon a special shout out to miss Aon Holloway and her and her eight excalon co-workers who are all shs alumni who came back to the high school to participate in a career career panel for shs students um the employee spoke to students about the large variety of career Pathways a large company can offer as well as the ability to develop new skills and move into other career Pathways uh another shout out to senior Isabelle ropel she just published her first novel titled forget and uh it has been a multi-year Endeavor and she's very excited to have gotone to have published that okay

009on Wednesday February 7th we have two student engineering teams traveling to the pet and C Conference in Hersh PA so these two teams were selected out of um they're two of 11 State finalists uh who were chosen to compete Bren raffl and Hunter Smith are presenting a one-handed controller prototype that they designed uh for students who either are only able to one use hand or only able to use one hand or want to try out something different when they play uh video games and then Michael Kaiser Karly Coons and Madden Loy and Luca Nan um are presenting the Zogo which is um a new way to take apart Lego bricks um invented for people who again have uh difficulty using Lego bricks in their traditional fashion and um they sorry that's and they're going to

010continue to develop their inventions um with the help of Industry mentors as they enter into the governor's stem competition this spring and shs has begun work with York College of PA to forge a partnership that may open up additional dual enrollment opportunities career field experiences and community outreach opportunities and um in construction news uh the shs science teachers got to move into their new rooms in early January and hopefully they'll be staying put this time uh but they're really enjoying the new classrooms and that is all I have thank you m um moving on to uh item 5.01 uh we have uh presentation for board director's month uh by uh Dr Bryon so I'll turn the floor over to you thank you president hle uh actually I'm going to invite uh a couple of my

011colleagues up uh to help with the presentation although we value and appreciate our school board directors each and every month January represents School Board recognition month which highlights the significant role that all of you play uh each and every day in leadership over the district unquestionably there's no more uh genuine hearts or greater gifters than our students themselves and then planning this evening uh the school board recognition it took only a matter of seconds for us uh to know who would be at the heart of this awesome celebration regardless of our roles our students represent the essence of our district additionally to inspire our students toward the love of books and reading it's deeply rooted uh our goal of each member of the Southern York County School District family uh is to pass on that

012gift of reading and also appreciation for reading to that end tonight as we recognize our school board we have invited three of our district library and media Specialists from each of our elementary buildings who have brought with them some very special guests who will be sharing in our celebration presenting amazing gifts in the form of books in honor of each of our board members to be to be placed uh for circulation and enjoyment within each of the elementary libraries each book reflects a name plate referencing the respective gift recipient in recognition of the support provided by our school board our school directors are also going to receive an extra special treat which our library specialist will share at the conclusion of the presentation so without further delay I'll introduce our three Library Specialists and that's

013right here before you which uh before today is Ann bovich from Friendship Elementary School Melissa Lanigan from Southern Elementary School and Wendy Fitzgerald from shrewbury elementary school so ladies the floor is all yours all right well thank you and thank you for inviting us here this evening and we are so excited I am so excited and honored to introduce my three students from Friendship Elementary all of them are excellent Library students excellent readers so can my three students from Friendship come forward I'm going to introduce you to Nate Carrington from Mrs Groves kindergarten class and Aya nein from Miss Martin's first grade class and Paige marale from Mrs cruik second grade class and each one of them is going to be presenting a book perfect excellent so NE let me show you who you're going

014to give your book to so Nate you are going to be presenting your book to Mr Jeremy hat over there in the corner can you give Nate a wave wonderful and Ali you are going to be giving your book to Mr hle he is there in the middle so this is AA can you give him his book Thank you a and you are going to be giving your book over here to Mrs hankle she is over here in the green shirt thank you so much wonderful and the three books that we are presenting are going to be the same they're going to be in each of the three libraries so um I let my colleague share a little bit more about those books but can we give our friends a good a big [Music] Applause

015good evening um I'm here from Southern Elementary mostan and I would like to invite up Wyatt Morris come on up W Isabella kassoon and Tessa [Applause] polish all right Wyatt Morris is from Mrs is from Austin [Applause] then we have Tessa p and she is from Mrs Demian at a second grade class in southern Elementary and and finally we come to Shrewsberry Elementary and I am so pleased to present to you this evening Miss Miss Katherine Grace from kindergarten and she is going to be presenting to Mrs Elizabeth Doberman Mr Jesse Taylor from first grade and he is going to be presenting to Mrs Samantha Hall and Mr James manry who is going to be presenting to Mr Joe Wilson so please welcome them as we to me so Catherine is going to be sharing

016this book is perfect with Miss Elizabeth zberman thank you Jesse is going to be sharing um everyday creatures and that goes to Mrs Samantha Hall and finally we have Jimmy manry and he is going to be sharing read read read and you're going to be sharing that with Mr Jo on behalf of our elementary library program we wish to thank you very much for your time and your appreciation and continuing to help us cultivate a love of reading and a lifelong learning of reading with all of our students not just our youngest students but our oldest ones as well thank you very much we appreciate it thank you all right and before we move on um uh certainly you are welcome to stay if you were part of that presentation but if you uh need

017to get home due to bed times that sort of thing I'll give you a moment to let's go okay nice try Dr oh my goodness do we want to put them over here I can collect everybody's and put it over here if it's is it getting in your way oh okay all right I mean oh that would be nice see Mr in your way while we're waiting uh real quick any board member that would like to come in and read the book to a particular class in Elementary uh all you have to do is reach out to Dr rert or myself and we'll hook you up with the library and and set that up so you can come in for half hour or so and and read to the children so let us know here

018in the next week and we'll make that happen that's wonderful thank you thank you Dr brys all right moving on to item 5.02 uh presentation by the Native American Guardians Association good evening my name is Tony Andrews and I will be uh controlling the presentation and doing our best to keep us organized uh we have six different presenters and I wanted to thank you all for the opportunity for the Native American Guardians Association to speak with you in regards to the cqu hanic Warriors and your logo we see on the screen here educate not eradicate what a better way to do that than to be speaking with the school board with this issue in front of them uh I've listened to some other presentations that have been uh presented to your to your board and

019a couple of uh quotes I heard native voices haven't been able to to voice their opinions and that they would still encourage you to do the research to look out for other native voices speaking about this space well the Native American Guardians Association represents 90% of rank and file Native Americans and many of our board members are here today tonight uh to speak about just that so with that i' like to start us off with uh some information from Chief Walt Redhawk Brown uh Chief Brown is part of the nightway tribe in Virginia and this is a picture of Chief Brown in front of what we what he calls the great tree of Peace uh the great tree of Peace represents the iri Great Law of Peace which was the basis of the United States

020Constitution that's the kind of education that maybe you haven't heard before that isn't part of the curriculum it's considered the oral constit ution of the iray Confederacy and the iray Confederacy has been around since 1451 ad one of the oldest democracies in history uh the Great Law of Peace had an impact on the US Constitution in 1988 was certified in a house resolution one of the things from the irai is that they make sure that debate is heard from both sides and if none is available from one side they assign a Sen representative who would debate on their behalf and I'm happy to hear that the board is listening to both sides and is now hearing the side from the Native American Guardians and one last thing I'd say is that when native names and

021imagery are eradicated we never learn learn more about names so we're hoping you learn something tonight and see the need to educate not eradicate so thank you thank you once again for from the Native American Guardians Association uh our featured speakers are all n Naga board members and Naga Warriors first on our list is Ivan Alex doer a board member followed by Ivan will be Unice Davidson our President we then hear from Jonathan so Jonathan uh is on audio it seems we we are having some connection issues there so we'll see how that goes myself my name is Tony Andrews I handle their social media I have a small piece then we have a special guest in Sarah Wilcox uh she's from Camden Michigan going through a similar process and she'll give us an update

022on some schools there and we consider her a Naga Warrior as well and batting cleanup uh is David Fen binder also a board member and he'll be speaking more about the education piece itself so with that I'm going to turn this over to Alex Doer and Alex you're up hey there can everyone hear me all right yes yes okay great excellent we're going to try to give you the uh the opportunity to hear from um as many of us as possible today um just because as we've said um sometimes it feels like uh we don't get a balanced view on this issue and so we're going to tend of take some turns go through a lot of information here and uh give give you the opportunity to hear a lot of us from a lot

023of different tribes a lot of different backgrounds um sharing uh our thoughts on this issue so uh I'll I'll start things off um I usually say oio U my name is Ivan doer I'm Cherokee um and I've been with nagas since uh 2018 um I graduated the University of Illinois where we faced a very similar issue um it did not go well here and I would say um since 2007 where the Native American issue really came up um at the University of Illinois things have have only gotten worse um on the Urbana champagne campus and it's been quite a shame to see what's happened to the campus overall and even the Native American studies Department um since losing our chief Alek imagery um we've gone down from a native student enrollment 200 uh to below

02420 and so uh a lot of native students have chosen not to come to Champagne uh because the controversy has gotten worse um even though they tried to put it to bed back in 2007 because of that my big dog in this fight I've been working also with my own um organization the honor of the chief Society focused in Illinois trying to preserve native names and images I work um as a resource conservationist with the soil and water district and that's just kind of my whole thing um whether it's agricultural resources like Soil and Water uh or native names and images I believe that when we have something good it's our duty to preserve it and pass it on to the next generation and uh that's why I'm talking with you here today how we

025do in the slides do I just say next slide or all right that'll work so I think the the first question in in science when we come up we talk about the null hypothesis why Native Americans um why is this uh why are these names and images that we see across the country and uh overall what it comes down to is we as the people were here uh all the way across the country country now it doesn't necessarily mean that sometimes when people came up with with the individual names that they had native people in mind especially when it comes to Something Like a Warrior um a warrior could be a lot of different types of Warriors when you look at this country's history we could be talking about Native Warriors we could be talking

026about Colonial Warriors we could be talking about modern Warriors but we do appreciate it when people think of that native history and and when they bring those two concepts together when they think of what does a warrior mean in uh The History of the United States it really does give a little bit of perspective to understand that the history of the United States didn't start in 1776 and so when we talk about a warrior for a good chunk of this uh nation's history of what we call America a warrior does find its imagery um in in that Native American realm and uh we're proud to be thought of and and we're proud to be remembered in that way and thought of separately from some of those other warrior names that you might see like Patriots

027Trojans Spartans Etc one other thing that we want to point out is when we talk about representation um we are proud to be called Warriors and we like to see those names and images in other places uh a lot of times when we see people calling for the removal of the Indians or Warriors those people are not being represented um the very essence of the warrior spirit is someone who fights someone who fights with pride someone who understands that there is U value to being part of something greater than themselves whether that be a school environment whether that be a team whether that be a command unit in battle um those are all things that we are representing when we hear the name Warrior and this campaign of misinformation um of saying Native American imagery

028means this or that um that's really not part of the warrior spirit in fact a lot of that Campaign lies in inherent um misinformation and that's why when we go ahead and look at the next slide here uh a big part of what nagas campaign is is to fight against that misinformation um we're going to try to touch on a few high-minded topics um throughout this presentation but I encourage you all if you want to read through some of these questions that you might have asked yourself or that other people might have oppos to you we've heard a lot of these questions we fielded a lot of these Concepts some of them are a little more reasonable others um are kind of inherently flawed and so I want to direct you all if you want

029to have a greater understanding of this issue please visit our website take a look at some of those FAQs um because we really have um heard this issue come up a lot in in other communities and in our own community and uh we want to give you uh just kind of the what what we've heard as as we've uh gone over this issue in the past one other thing that you'll find on the website um as well it's kind of our ethos and oath um I won't go through the whole thing uh here with you but um just some of the highlights here that you'll you'll see at the bottom is we really care about education over eradication it is is our duty to protect and defend these positive representations that we see and is

030our duty to stand uh with with facts and Truth a lot of these things that you see here in in our kind of oath we put in there for very specific reasons because a lot of times when you've heard this issue discussed in the past the people who are bringing that uh are are kind of the opposite of what you see here and so whenever we're kind of decide that it does our best to stay in facts and truth and keep what we're going to bring to the table rooted in in those values because those are important things that are worth protecting to us so when I talk about misinformation why why do I bring that up um one of the things that you'll see whenever you hear people that are challenging these names and

031images is they'll try to use the word mascot and they will try to come into come into the fight already trying to to skew your opinion one way or another I I do believe that there is is such thing as as a mascot and we'll get to that um a little bit later on but there is something very important about separating the idea of a Native American warrior about taking just the Native American Image and saying is this a mascot because it's not a lot of people will come in trying to tie those two issues together that they will try to claim that anything Native American is inherently bad that you use the name Warrior that you use the image of a Native American in profile or headon or that a certain name means this

032or a certain logo means this but none of those things are mascots and if you try to make this about a mascot already the waters are are are kind of Muddy and so it helps to try to separate out those issues one by one and say what is it that we're talking about here are we talking about the name Warrior are we talking about a logo like the one that you see here pictured or are we talking about a guy in a fuzzy costume that's going around the sideline hooping and hollering interacting with fanss the whole game all three of those are very separate issues and if we conflate those issues then already we're campaigning from a place of misinformation and so it's important in fact critical to to separate those issues before you start

033this discourse and anyone who tried to tie those issues together you got to be a little bit weary of that um because that's a that's a slippery slope towards understanding the the real core of the issue at hand I say that because one of the one of the things that I hear all the time is they bring in a parade of students and they they're all they're they'll be in masks or they'll they'll have gagged themselves or something they'll be holding up signs saying I am not a mascot I am not a costume and they'll be raging against all these things and they'll say they'll look me in the eye and how in the world can you support a racist mascot and I can tell them very simply I don't what a foolish question who

034would support a racist mascot I'm against things that are racist uh frankly I'm not a huge fan of mascots most mascots as they come um I I like to to stay in that Warrior spirit I want my team to win not be goofing off on the sidelines and so when you see something like what's pictured here um you know there there is a spectrum there are definitely things that Naga doesn't support we're not here to go out and say that uh racist mascots are are good in fact we're we're against those two who wouldn't be but there is a positive path to take and we want to make sure that whenever the opportunity presents itself that we evaluate we think critically and we don't miss out on an opport opportunity to celebrate something positive the

035reason is because Native Pride heals communities um whether it's native communities I can tell you in in my home Community you can get down and in fact hey I've got it right here the the mug if you go down to Cherokee North Carolina they're high school they're the Cherokee Brave that's what they call themselves they've got a big Kansas City looking Arrowhead there on the the half court and we're proud to call ourselves Braves and we're we're proud to support that imagery uh but even outside the native Community um that's part of native history is learning for these different tribes that had different names and languages and Customs to work together as a native people sharing a lot of times nothing um but the land and our school communities today are a lot like that

036when we go out on the athletic field the spirit is very similar that we might have different hometowns different neighborhoods different beliefs um of the places that we all come from when you step onto that field you're kind of putting that personal that individual identity to the side you're becoming part of something greater that's a very uh Native American ideology to think in terms of the we and less in terms of the eye but it also really Fosters a community Spirit whether it's something that you're taking to the athletic field or something that you're just taking back out in the community when you think less about yourself as an individual and more about your role in a larger Community um turns out that the communities whether they be school communities or neighborhoods they they really

037benefit from from that style of thinking in their leaders and and especially their young people now not everyone feels this way and so to give a a little bit of time to talk about where where does this come from where does this idea of controversy uh really why why is this happen happening Across the Nation most everyone that we talk to when they bring up this controversy they get to the point where we say you know where is this coming from other than personal opinion A lot of times they point back to this fryberg dissertation um yes it is a a scientific article um but no the materials and methods were not particularly rigorous um also the the version that everyone points back to is is the first draft and later on revised it with

038more critical methods that had a a much more balanced take uh on the issue of native names and images and so it's one of those that they like to toss out there hoping that you're not actually going to read it hoping that you're you're not actually going to go look through it when you look at this issue as a a whole you'll realize a lot of the the sloppy methods like you talked about earlier of assuming everything is a mascot uh a lot of that is what you get in the fryberg dissertation and you don't get a lot of sep separating that issue out uh individually to the value and the Merit of images on their own names on their own or the positive depictions of those things put together what you also won't hear

039is um what happens to these communities after these decisions are made there really are two paths forward there's different ways to to approach this um but really what it comes down to is there's there's two B elements you can keep your names and images or you can get rid of them a lot of the critics who will tell you all of these things about how they don't like mascots they don't like native names and images they really don't go back and revisit these communities and see does the camaraderie increase does the Native American awareness increase do we talk more or less about Native Americans do Native people uh have more agency do we get more representation after these names and images are are taken away the answer is no I can tell you uh as

040I said before here in the champagne Community you almost don't want people to know that you're Native American here uh because if you mention it you're all of a sudden going to ignite this this divisive subject you're going to get angry people on on both sides and uh it's it leads to terrible division within the community within the school you also don't see increased representation a lot of the examples that I point to of people who handle this issue well I look at like the Chicago Blackhawks who give a a large percentage of their merchandising to the Native American Cultural Center of Chicago I look at the Atlanta bravs who are almost supplying half of the funding to the Cherokee okon Lefty Cultural Center which works to preserve the Cherokee language pass that down to

041a younger generation if these organizations got rid of their names they never uh keep working with the Native American Community they always sever the link they try to move on to something else and they don't want to talk about who gets left in the dust but it's the same struggling Native American people so we yes uh we're we're divided sometimes people look at names and images and and they get put into a negative mindset some look at it positive we'll get into that later but what I'm saying is those struggles don't go away when you remove native names and images the discussion stops for you A lot of times in the community in the school board hey you know it seems like the controversy has ended but we lose agency we lose representation we lose

042a platform that we have an opportunity to remind people of our history and celebrate um something that is important to us and something that we want to share uh with all people U not just keep to ourselves and and watch it wither away on the other side we have that opportunity when you double down essentially when you preserve these native names and images um it's a win it gives us an opportunity we can still think critically we don't have to keep everything exactly the same we can take a look at the image and say is this stereotypical or can it be rebranded can it get better we can take a look at the name and say where did this name come from is that really the name that we want to use to represent ourselves

043but if you work together with local tribes or organizations like Naga it gives us the opportunity to explore the Best of Both Worlds to use this as an opportunity to educate and understand and I think uh you know we look at that as a win-win because isn't that really what we're trying to do in a school environment is learn from the lessons of the past learn and understand history and figure out how those lessons can can guide us into into a future where we're thinking about things intelligently and we're looking back to the lessons of the past uh I don't want to sound um catastrophic here but I guess uh you know if you list if you get rid of Native American names and images why do you even teach history what's even the point

044of a social studies class uh if you don't think those things are valuable and so if we accept that the lessons of the past are valuable then let's talk about how we can use native names and images to celebrate those positive things uh a big philosophical draw that we that we come from comes from Dr Phils and Bardo and it really comes into this idea he's got it in his book this the time Paradox which kind of more deeply and in more detail uh explores this idea of a self-fulfilling prophecy um but one of the ways to kind of think about it in layman's terms is it's not just a self-fulfilling prophecy looking forward into the future but it's also looking back in the past and you're going to see opportunities in the future the

045same way that you analyze the past if you look back in the past and you view that as a negative mindset as things that we're in the past we've evolved beyond that we're we're going to do better in the future then when you look in the F then when you look to the Future you're only going to see the negative you're only going to see the things that that need to go away the things that you want to ignore and you're going to look in in the future with a mindset of not what you can build but what you can take away and ultimately as we were talking about these are things that are harmful for local cultures and for communities when you're focused on the negative when you're focused on the bad and what

046you can get rid of you're not looking to think what you can build conversely when you look into the past and you see something good when you see something worth celebrating you say yes there were good things and bad things in the past and I'm going to focus on our accomplishments I'm going to focus on what we can be prideful about the parts of our history that make this a town a community a country worth celebrating then you're going to look to the future with the same mindset and you're going to say what can we continue to work towards what are those things that we want to preserve and celebrate and make part of our Collective fabric that we want to share and pass down with the with the Next Generation and those mindsets are

047very helpful because they're focused on building they're focused on fostering a sense of community and preservation those things are are very helpful because they provide stability and camarad to the local community in which they're being applied so we understand that that this is a divisive issue and I'm sure you have heard and will continue to hear Native American voices um whether it's me and my colleagues on this call or people in your community or people Nationwide you are going to hear very strong very passionate arguments on both sides of this issue but I can tell you in my own family in my community it really does boil out to be uh kind of a a 90% are are for it are for native names and images or understand that it's a nuanced topic they want

048to discuss it on a one by one issue not paint everything with a broad brush uh or some will simply say you know I'm not concerned I don't think it's offensive frankly there's bigger issues affecting me as uh as a contemporary Native American that been worried uh about these schools impacts on n names and images but uh you'll see when you when you look at the numbers when you talk to people if you uh go to a community whether it's an organization or whether you're back home on the reservation uh the the numbers really do come out pretty consistently every time that really it's only about one in 10 who just says yep everything with a broad brush inherently offensive we don't want to talk about it um the remaining 90% are either supportive or

049we understand that there's some gray area worthy of of critical thought a lot of these polls um came about when the issue of the Washington Redskins was being discussed um talking about the football team there again a great example of a lose lose scenario uh they started the Washington Redskins um Cultural Center uh a charity organization a non-for-profit there in Washington DC they were criticized for it when they got rid of the name they got rid of their charitable organization which is not a positive uh I also know just personally they had one Native American board member um that was there and and part of the team decision-making process they let him go uh after the name change so again a net loss for the Native American Community as part of the Redskins Rebrand and

050beyond that even um the logo of the the Redskins itself um Walter Blacky westle design that Redskins logo that I'm sure we all remember um and that we we've seen in a couple of these slides um as a symbol of Pride you know whenever you're not sure how to think about a piece of art it does help to talk with the people who are being represented maybe talk with the artist um not only does the artist view it as a very positive symbol um but there's a lot of people um that are that are black feet who who are being represented by that logo who are also very proud and and loves to see the black feet being represented on the national stage and again something that we're not getting now with the with the

051name commanders and their very uninspired imagery that they're currently using all in all and I think a lot of people don't realize this either um but Native Americans um were were people um ju just like anybody uh a lot of times when you hear a tribe speaks out about this or the tribe speaks out about that uh tribal politics are politics we we have elections the the tide turns it goes back and forth sometimes a tribe will be in support of one thing they elect a new Chief they elect a new Tribal Council and and now the opinion of those in charge has changed and so really what it boils down to and I think uh we touched on this earlier it's a bipartisan issue there are opinions on both sides and the worst thing

052you can possibly do the worst stereotyping that anyone can do against native people is to assume that we all believe the same exact thing and that we all are painting everything with a broad brush we are all offended by X and we're not offended by y or z um we come from a lot of different tribes we have a lot of diverse history we we have a lot of diverse backgrounds and that's why we're bringing this issue to you as a group as a lot of people from all around the country sharing what we've heard sharing what we've seen in our own communities so that you can get a sense of how this issue is addressed on on a larger scale um but what it really comes down to even when you look at the

053numbers and you look Beyond this this isn't a political issue in terms even of conservative or or liberals um you hear those terms tossed around a lot um but really it's uh it even goes beyond that I know a lot of people who are more liberal who believe in the power of is a positive thing that we want to share with a lot of other people and and they're not offended by it I know a lot of people who are very conservative who are saying you know we we don't need to be throwing money at uh at the Arts and and things like this but but actually that image I really like it I I I like what it represents and so it's it's beyond politics it's it's beyond tribal affiliation it's beyond young and

054old really what it comes down to is personal opinion it's really easy to be fast at the gun when you're offended by something because you don't really necessarily need to take time and research and present your information with facts you just come in you start yelling maybe cry if you need to and that's all you need to support your argument a lot of times we as an organization come in as kind of the second wave because we take our time to get all the facts straight make sure that we understand the issue and that we can give our fair share that we can do our Fair Duty do our diligence to see both sides of the issue present them and allow you to make your your own opinion hopefully one that results in positivity and

055and not more divice so with that I'm going to go ahead and I think turn things over to Unice I appreciate the time and uh hopefully I didn't bore you because there's a lot of great uh a lot of great additional speakers and a lot of more great information uh that you've got coming up so thanks everybody for the time thank you Alex and just checking Unice uh make sure you are off mute and we are ready to go right can everybody hear me okay yes okay um so my name is unus Davidson I am the President of Native American Guardians Association I am also one of the founding members of the organization back in 2014 uh first off I'll start with uh I am from the spirit Nation a tribal full blood enrolled member

056of our tribe in North Dakota um I uh I just lost my train of thought but anyway I want to say a little bit about why we started the organization due to what was happening in the country I was seeing all these names I I went through a thing in North Dakota ourselves about losing our Su name at the University of North Dakota and when social media came about and I got involved in Facebook I started seeing other people talking about it I thought why is this going on what's Happening well anyway I started getting contacted by a couple other Indians of the country who said you know do you know what's happening and we introduced ourselves we talked a little bit about it and we just said well we got to do something we

057didn't know what to do but we we said well we'll just start talking to other people and that's kind of how we created Naga as we call it um so anyway that's kind where we're at right now we're working very hard as Alex said we uh talk with many many natives of all around the country uh every day in our Facebook page on um people introduce themselves and want to join our organization and we're very welcome we welcome them from all over I mean every tribe you can imagine so I'm very happy uh to be here tonight I want to thank the the York South York school board for inviting us uh to come here tonight to finally have a give you our side of the story okay so the second one about tribes and

058democracy when I talked about people getting a hold of us uh through Messenger on Facebook or through our email or website many of them asked the know Unice they said we see where your tribe voted to save your Sue name how did that come about I tell them well we had to form a committee to to do on our reservation we had a guy who started to investigate and find out why uh we took a little poll and we found out that we had a lot of tribal support for it and then next we have to do a petition to our Tribal Council to get it put on the ballot I said all this took place within a few months we got the petition I said that but that didn't end there I said our

059Council who wasn't for the name our tribal chairwoman she went after us in tribal court and tried to say our petition was no good good so we ended up going through court with him and we had a judge come on board that wasn't from our area and she she asked election trib election board how you know what were the names were they C good did you say anything wrong with them and they said no there are five names on there that they're tribally enrolled but they just can't vote so they the judge took that into account she said no she said the the petition was good so we had to go through a lot but we did have a vote in 2009 April and it was probably the super majority vote ever on our reservation

060due to the Sue name and uh came out 2 to one it was uh 67% that people voted to save the fighting Sun name and you know the reason I wanted to talk a little bit about that is because we uh when we did this if you want to go to the next uh slide please yeah while we were doing all this we found out through uh well my grandmother was actually a part of this delegation that went to the University of North Dakota and she had told me back in 1999 she said uh she said my girl she said don't ever she said I want there's two things I want you to do she said I want you to always always have good relations with the University of North Dakota she said she said

061because she said we fought hard to have the education that you're going to be getting there our people are going to receive there she said years ago we used to live out the Buffalo the Tonka she said no we don't have that anymore she said we have to find a new way to to uh to fee ourselves and to take care of our people and she said that's through education so she told me about the the the naming ceremony in 1969 with the president Starcher how they gave him the name uh it was from our tribe Spirit Lake and from Standing Rock and they went to the university and they did did this ceremony and she told me to always try and stand up and to have good relations you know relations with them because

062it was done for a good reason it was done for the University to give us education so but knowing that that's why I decided to jump in when the committee asked me if I would join them I said absolutely so we did everything we could in North Dakota to do it and we went to um we went to courts I mean it's a long story we went through many battles and courts but we were told as the Su people that we did not have any standing even though we were asked to vote about it he wanted us to vote and after we did then that's who we fought our tribe fought um it was it was really it was really a a um a terrible thing what happened after we did that election all the

063sto nasty stories that came about of our tribe and talked about it badly and we didn't even all we did was wanted to save the name and uh so when this was all going on when we started finding out our names and images were being taken away that's why I got in a fight because of what happened in six 1969 and what our tribe did I want to tell people that you know no matter what you do you have to stand up and fight you know they're going to they're going to fight you look what they did to our tribe they can do that to a federally recognized tribe it's easy for them to go after these schools which they have been so you know you just have to keep fighting and just keep uh

064um standing your ground you know I I talk many times through the nation I tell people this is your community you guys are the ones that pay the taxes you you know you you keep your community going you know these people have no business going in your community telling you that you have to change your name and image and tell you what to do it's just it it shouldn't be that way so anyway um I talked a little bit about our our vote on Spirit Lake why we did when we voted how we voted and you know it's uh the one screen I'm sorry I'm going kind of fast on of the powerful versus the people that's kind of where that's kind of where we're at right now is we are having the powerful in

065every community that we're seeing is going after not listening to the people they're not listening to the majority of people um so that you know that's why we formed the the mega that where we're at I'm sorry I'm losing my train of thought but anyway what you're doing the board members that asked us to speak here tonight what you're doing in my in my belief is the right thing you're doing this because the majority of your community does not want to lose the the Sanic logo and I totally agree why why do you want to take away and hurt a culture that's such a minority this this country right now and we have you know we don't really even have a say anymore but here they are trying to do away with our like one

066of our board members calls it the Indian Removal Act it's just the same thing again why are you going after why you going after such a m small minority in this country and um I it's not right but I'm really happy that you folks are doing this that you are fighting back and you know taking back your community doing what you can to have to speak for the majority of the people that's why you're reelected so I'm very very happy about that um I just totally lost my train at thought I'm sorry but I got to tell you um yeah another thing is the shimy high school we were asked to we were asked to uh three of us from our doaga board members three of us we testified in in the shimy you can

067see in 2019 and uh they were they were they went after them about the name and their image also so we testified and we gave a lot of testimony about why the Redskins was not was not a derogatory name I mean I grew up on a reservation I went to school on a reservation my whole life I've lived there and I've never ever heard any of our tribal people my grandparents or any of the elders ever say anything bad about any of these names and images never especially the Redskins I mean we've never I've never heard nothing and we' even we even call ourselves skins I mean you can come on on our reservation now and you're going to see people wearing the logo the fighting Sue logo um we have a high school out

068here we call the Indian school out here on our reservation are called the Indians they have an Indian warrior it's a beautiful logo that they use in fact we have two schools the other one is the Warick Warriors and they have a beautiful logo now they changed it to a an Indian G and a girl a male and female to represent both uh the genders that play in the and basketball and sports so you know I I just don't understand what's going on but when we we were in the Pennsylvania lawsuit I know when I was reading on the court order that they gave the Court ruling I read there where this Pennsylvania human relations commission board they brought the lawsuit yet they had to come out and say that they could not find anything

069derogatory about the name they couldn't find anything hostile about it so they they told the Pennsylvania that shim many school that they could go ahead and keep the name and you know that they they couldn't take it away from them cuz they couldn't find wrong with it and uh they went ahead and told him that you know maybe uh uh maybe they could you know they could keep their their logo and they told them they said you probably have to educate more not eradicate these they just they went along with everything that we were saying even though they brought the lawsuit against the school the high school district so it was really um it was really uh surprising after we we won that lawsuit that they would come back and say that but anyway um

070yeah as it says in this next slide you know we have bigger problems to address in Indian Country on my reservation we have many um people who are homeless we have many people who are who are hungry and starving I help with a food bank we bring food to the reservation to to give it we go out we do you know many volunteer hours um right now we're working on a home to try and build for our homeless children um there are way bigger issues to deal with on the reservation rather than to worry about you know these names and images but right now we have to we have to here I am fighting for these names and images just to save our culture to save what little history we have left of ourselves so

071you know what it's it's really terrible what's going on in this whole in this whole process so but anyway I wanted to let you know you know I do a lot of genealogy and a genealogist I went back and I was doing a little bit of history about the sus mahanic tribe and I was I was reading through some of this stuff I just thought you know saying to myself you know what's wrong with the image that you're using I couldn't see anything wrong with it and I asked a few of my my relatives and my friends I said you guys see anything wrong with this Sanic logo and they all said no what's wrong with they said it's really a nice uh it's really a nice well done logo and they asked me who

072it was so I told them who they were and um you know I said for the for the Indian population these names and images represent the pride in our ancestors it reminds us of the sacrifices they endured to guarantee our survival yet today this is the center point of the Seventh Generation concept observed by virtuality every virtually every tribe in North America the North America hemisphere it means we will make no decisions that will not that will ensure a Seventh Generation from now until existence so you know as as a recognized triy the SES Sanic no longer exists but there are descendants from that tribe yet today I found out so I just thought to myself are we to deny them their Heritage are we to sell them tell them that they have no rights

073their Heritage must be forgotten I don't think so you know you remove when you when you get rid of something you remove them from from your sight and your lips before long it's not going to take long and they're people are going to forget about it that's what we're fighting against we don't want that to happen to us as a people so anyway um and what Alex talked about those polls that definitely is true since we've been getting up more and the more in the news and the media we have been contacted by so many Native Americans in the country from Alaska Hawaii all over the nation so those polls are pretty accurate by what we we're finding out and U it makes me happy to see the Indian people speaking out in this country

074now but anyway um I'm just glad that you allowed us to come here and to talk talk today and tell our side of the story and like we always say we want to educate more we don't want to eradicate of our our culture thank you all right Jonathan so is up next Jonathan is on audio with us Jonathan can you hear us yes I can hear you can you guys hear me yes we can we have your introduction slide up first [Music] hello my relatives and my people my name is Jonathan soul I am a the Su people and I am born for the B of water CL my maternal grandfather is for the Su people my maternal grandfather of the tangle CL um this is how this is how we uh in Navajo introduced

075ourselves when we talk people then those were my four Clans um so us navajos out here have four Clans and that's how we can tell who's related my brother sister mom grandpa um to our relatives um well I'm half Navajo and I am half the CN Su so I grew up as a Navajo Navajo reservation with my grandparents um you know I decided to stay with my grandparents and my grandparents raised me so uh been raised up traditionally um and uh so yeah I'm kind of I just got off work to but anyway um I teach my kids also to be traditional and we we try to keep our language intact our you know respecting our elders um our kids are our next Generation as for me being the middle generation right now I'm to

076teach my kids to get ready for the next Generation to keep our heritage our culture running um this is why I became with Naga as a board member uh me and my wife so my wife is also a full-blooded Navajo and we're both enr members of Navajo Nation so um anyway uh a lot of things Advance the slide to your 505 club and and a little bit more about what you believe uh in regards to Naga and what we advocate for okay so we at the 505 Club back in 2014 um a group of us Indians um friends we all got together you know just out of the blue let's just have a picnic we did um and when we had I think there was six of us or seven of us and we just

077came about and said hey let's just start let's start a club and so we put it out on Facebook Facebook we put on an Instagram it's called the 505 Club um basically just to me and greet get to know more people um and our our group and Facebook became more and more and the more we got we said hey let's do a meet and greet so every year in about June or July we meet up in Albuquerque we go to a park and I cook um most of the other Founders will come out and bring prizes from from our own pocket and we get everybody come out and talk um talk about football maybe even talk about family um make sure everybody's doing good because that's how we are we we make sure everybody's doing

078good if they need help we can help them um but um it got really hectic with 505 later on when we heard about the trademark like uh Alex or like who it was saying when the five when the trademark got attacked by the five got attacked we came into the picture again the Native American was working with the Redskins it was the black feet Indian himself you know got introduced to us so we ran into him and from there we started clicking so I I I do believe my 505 Club grew so much that we helped them win the case also with with the trademark to show that us Native Americans really approve the the the logo um most of us all became fans you know just like I did and most of them did

079we became fans of the Washington Redskins because of that logo that was on there to me that was a representation of you know the 1998 Super Bowl when they played against the Broncos and so I was fascinated with the with the native image um from there on I I I started liking negative images from All Sport so I'm I'm I'm basically wearing everything from the Braves to the Chiefs um my dad's a Chiefs fan so you know um to to to to um Cleveland Indians I still have two caps are Cleveland Indians even though they're not there no more but I still aware them um just anything Native American um but our our 505 redin Club is actually still getting bigger and bigger we're still accepting people um they're Die Hard redkin fans I could

080tell you that they really adore it and we're not quitting so you know even the all commanders right now we still we still meet because we're family and that's how we we we we adore native images because it makes us family um Jan let me ask let me ask you a question can you give the the people a little bit of uh a feeling of what it's like to live on the [Music] reservation okay so I live in this I live like in the middle of the reservation right now in Arizona the Navajo reservation um if you guys can see on the map you'll see how big it is um so my living on the reservation and and I like a lot of us we don't have running water um we most of us go

081out to water wells and we fow up our tank and we have underground tanks that are underground we fill them up that's how we take our showers um get water to wash our dishes you know um and and feed our animals um and and I'm one of them and I also my my my mother-in-law has power which they just got like six years ago seven years ago they got power um me and my wife we don't have power to our house just yet um we're on the waiting list for it um it's been about year and a half where we're still waiting for it um but I do have an extension cord that runs all the way to my mother mother-in-law's house just so we can have power in our house and that's it's like

082that all over the nation there's a lot of people that don't have power don't have water um we're not looking we're not looked upon to be important I guess I don't know that's the way I feel but a lot of people on the reservation like Unice was saying mentioning we don't we all we all wear their apparel and if you ever go to reservation you can look at Native Americans and you're going to see a lot of them wearing the hat the brave hat the native images out there and most of them do not feel like it's advented to them they're proud so don't speak to you about it but that the concern that they talk about the issues that need to be talked about against what Unice was saying is there's a lot of

083alcohol there's a lot of drugs there's a lot of suicide from our kids which not your mascot activists will tell you that these kids are committing suicides because they're Native American images out there and that's not true because you know just like the slide's going to come up with a hypocrisy about you know um you know NCI having a native image on their logo to you know compare to what's on the reserv what's off of the reservation like your school having a native image what's the difference there there's really no difference because our reservation on Navajo reservation I went to school at Red Mesa uh Redskins is what the name was that's their name redmesa Redskins they're located in Arizona I went to school there for one year the whole Community is really backing them

084up uh um you got tuac City Warriors you got wind Rock Scouts you have Shiprock Chieftain um and of course your school is called The Warriors my daughter's school is called mini farms Community School Warriors and that's where it comes in why why why why are we uh why is it gain an acceptable you know for for for our to have it to have a native image out there but you guys can't have it that's that's not what it's about we don't feel like that should happen like that we want you guys to represent us we want you guys to know who we are and for us Native Americans we adore it we we know you guys know who we are um and H I'm losing fat what I was supposed to be talking about

085he covered it Jonathan and you we we just flipped through the two different slides um one was the NCI versus CSCO hanic and uh I know that came up as a question how come it's okay for the NCI and not for the CSCO hanic logo and then um you know that then also the other the other piece of that we were looking at the hasal Indian nations University versus the University of Illinois you know both very respectful both wonderful native imagery there's really no reason to be parsing them so with appreciate that if there's any last words no there isn't and in my language I would say a and thank you for uh allowing me to speak you guys thank you John okay so my uh my introduction I am Tony Andrews I I handle

086social media for Native American Guard Guardians and uh community outreach talking to different schools uh personally I'm a thir threeyear veteran of the automotive and banking industry I've been a project manager I've been involved with training uh I do Consulting expertise and uh my reason for coming on to the team was uh because I I I saw an opportunity to help with their social media and I've I've done it in another fashion so I wanted to bring my expertise to the team I'm proud to work side by side with our native board uh to grow the social media presence to work with schools like susqu hanic and to determine what's the next steps and and how do we how do we put together uh the 5,000 different schools that are out there that have either

087lost their native imagery against their community's will the different uh uh businesses that have Native American imagery teams schools School boards so I I we just think there's just so much opportunity to to educate not eradicate and to sell that message and that's what we're here doing today and the opposition has a Playbook usually it starts with the claim of offense and they use a tactic to to get themselves into a school and the organized process typically begins with a current or former student that's claiming offense uh by the school's native imagery or or saying they've been bullied by it uh Alex earlier talked to this as well they have an organized agenda the coordination of these name change campaigns actually in 2014 was exposed when the center of American progress began Distributing packets to

088the schools describing step by step how to eliminate their traditions and they stayed in unambiguously that the goal was to to gain a 14% increase in voter ter turn out to to benefit their agenda uh there's one slide that that we don't have here but it says they tried to bury us but they didn't know we were the seeds natives aren't going anywhere natives continued to be proud and they're proud of their traditions and the they were wrong bullying actually is a two-way street uh the the actual bullying most most comes from the change people the people that want to advocate for change uh we've seen community members being shouted down in school board meetings um as recently as as as this past couple of weeks native opinion on social media censorship exists including deletion

089of posts opinions even in one of the Sanic uh rooms there was a very respectful conversation going back and forth and I want to hand it to the people that were uh advocating against us it was respectful it was a good conversation but somebody decided to take the whole thing down uh we've seen docks and trying to out people a job loss people being fired other financial and physical threats in different communities simply for standing in support of native names and imagery uh some people on the reservation even in in spirit like and what Unice was discussing were afraid to come forward but the name of the fence is really a two-way street there are many who feel who are offended by this modern-day Indian Removal campaign and it's resulting in an effective cultural genocide

090of the American Indian you know with that I'd like to turn it over to Sarah wiox Sarah thank you Anthony and I just want to thank the board for allowing Naga and myself to come and speak uh my name is Sarah wox I'm a registered native with the Lumby tribe of North Carolina I live live in Camden Michigan and this is where I serve as a trustee on our Village Council and I'm a very active Community member and it's very apparent that the sasan community has fought and is fighting to keep their history and traditions with this recent uh lee elected five new school board members to represent their will to keep their traditional Warriors logo and I want Sanic to Know You Are Not Alone communities all over are taking a stand to preserve

091history here in Michigan the sanduski school district their board voted to retire the Redskins name and logo in 2022 however last year a recall was filed against three of the cuski board members and in November of last year those school board members were removed and replaced and new school board members um now are planning on bringing back their name and their logo and here in Camden Michigan um at the cam front School District I filed a recall petition against two of the board members um they voted last April to retire our Redskins name and logo and the petition was uh successful and we will be having a special election May 7th where myself and another um Native American descendant of the communi tribe will be running and our goal is to keep our name and

092her logo so I just I want to thank the community members here um that have fought and to say and uh to save their history and tradition and I just want to thank the new school board members and csah hanik um that have fought and are fighting not just to to preserve the traditions and history out there but to um save Native American H history so thank you very much thank you Sarah bad and clean up David F binder one of our board members David yeah good evening all thank you for your time my name is David finen binder my Sue name is Juan ble OA Brave Eagle I'm an enrolled member of The Crow Creek Sue tribe in South Dakota and my uncle my mom's brother gave me that name years ago so I

093I proudly and honor that uh professionally I'm an electronic data interchange data analyst programmer I've been doing that for oh probably old more than most of you are old I did testify in Colorado to the col Colorado legislature they passed the bill to do away with native names and imagery for all the schools um there are few schools that had signed agreements with some local tribes or I should say federally approved rooved tribes that got to keep theirs but I was a graduate of Yuma Colorado from Yuma High School Yuma Indians that town was named after a railroad worker who is from The Yuma tribe and he died there and to honor him that's why they gave the town the name Yuma and hence the Yuma Indians and they had to change that which is

094very upsetting um nobody was offended by it you know I I grew up in Denver and Junior High I moved to Yuma out on the farm to live with my aunt and uncle and in Denver or in Yuma I was never offended by the use of the native names in imagery and I also feel uniquely qualified to speak on Native and non-natives my great-grandfather 11 Generations back came over on the Mayflower so while he was came over here on the boat my mom's family was already here with open arms and trusting and look where that got us but you know it's it's history you know we we can't do away with history good or bad we have to take both of it um so today's cancel culture is to removed our Native American Heritage and

095traditions by using deceitful and Despicable tactics that we see today once the Native American names and imagery are removed from our schools Our Heritage and traditions will never be taught or heard of again outside the reservations in my opinion this is a modern-day genocide if this cancel culture is successful of eradicating Native American history and Heritage what's to stop them from eradicating the history and Heritage of everyone here so I want to say to you board members do not be discouraged stay strong stand proud and the unity natives are a very unified group uh you go to the I'm sure Unice can speak to that too but I still have some relatives on the CR Creek Sue tribe and everybody's a cousin there you know so it's everybody's United that way um it would it

096would be good for schools sports teams to partner with a local tribe when possible and you know like I mentioned before in Colorado there were a few that had an agreement signed with some local tribes and they got to keep their name and image um as you can see on the slide you know the Spokane Indians minor league baseball team and the Atlanta Braves Chicago Blackhawks you know so it's it's um well I I just I can't stress enough the UN to be unified um powow you can go to the next slide I think that's the next one it says talks about oh well anyway so so partnering with Naga we do a cert certification program sorry about that um we will do an honest assessment of the school's native names and imageries and make

097recommendations where we feel is needed um as you can read recommendations include no costume entertainers of a set of standards for appropriate fan Behavior which includes no wearing of war bonnas war paint Etc offer consultation to promote native education which is really dwindling I moved to New York in 2013 and the native history in New York just blew me away because I'm a Colorado Native and lots of schools around around here where I live now um they're fighting some are fighting to keep their native names and imagery and some just fold and are changing I talked to a couple of local school boards here and they the one school board I talked to said They wish they'd have heard my talk before they voted so I requested for the from the superintendent to speak at

098one of the board meetings and and the superintendent never got back to me never got back to me a neighbor finally um asked me if I ever got to talk to him I said no I never heard from them so then he they gave me a new email address which sent it to the whole board and when I did that then I heard from the superintendent oh they already did the vote but I can come talk to them anyway and after my talk I had two or three board members say they would not have voted the way they did if they heard me talk first you know so it's there's an agenda to get rid of it and our Positive Solutions work with Native artists to create distribute and institutionalize a broader array of social

099representations of American Indians and we did work with for our icon for Naga and I and you correct me if I'm wrong that he he was a native the artist that did that and and that's our icon there our logo um so you know it's it's good to to partner with them you know we support all of our Natives and you know like Jonathan said you know the substance abuse on reservations is is bad you know even on the crow Creek reservation which isn't near as big as what Jonathan lives on is is still bad there um uh this inclusion and diversity this is what I was talking about before also sorry I just kind of bounc it around um powwows are a great opportunity for non-natives to learn about Native culture so if you

100have an opportunity to go to a powow I'd highly recommend going it it's just a a great environment friendly you know you you won't be pushed aside you won't be ignored you won't be made fun of even if you don't know how to dance you know you know we always say white people can't dance so but they're easy so if you have a chance to go to the poww I would recommend doing that and the pows begin with a grand entry where the American flag is prominently displayed you know I'm a Native American I am a US citizen and I'm I'm proud of both you know America is my home and native blood you know runs through me and I'm I'm very proud of that and in closing I would like to sayya be a

101fierce Warrior thank you for your time thank you David uh we are now at the end of our presentation uh for the entire team uh thank you so much for for listening to the Native American Guardians our positions of educate not eradicate we're we're ready for any Schoolboard questions anyone have questions or or comments that you'd like to to deliver to Naga I have if if we need someone to start I'll go ahead and start um so you mentioned that um communities don't go back to see if representation improves after logos are eradicated uh I wrote that down um and what I would say my my observation um now that I'm able to kind of see a little bit more behind the scenes is um that there I did not see any public effort from

102our board after they retired the previous board after they retired the logo to address uh to address this issue of education and representation uh now I was pleased to find uh after speaking with administrators that there have been some steps taken uh mostly through the normal curriculum review process so there there have been some enhancements um but really no no public effort and I think no concerted effort and I really believe um there something like that should come if a board is going to retire the logo because because of issues of they're concerned about uh a one-dimensional view um that the board should then address that because I don't think you correct a one-dimensional view by removing the one dimension that you had um so my question for you though that's related to that is

103have you ever seen a community heal after removing the logo has has the Divide heal have you have you observed that in any case Unis I'm GNA let you anybody yeah yeah I um this is Jas Davidson you know I haven't and uh we lost the Su name back in 2012 and we still have people on the side that want to keep it who are who are just asking well what happened you know why don't they come and at least try and teach about us anymore you know why don't they do something other than just they come in Bey they divide they cause friction they cause Division and then it's they take it away and then they're gone and nothing ever happens they leave a community in a disr of you know why why did

104this happen so I have all the years I haven't seen anybody do anything about it really you know you just had to add this is you know directing social media there are so many Native groups online and all they want to do is to be to to be known to be seen and the amount of of sharing of content and and presenting their history it's it's incredible and I think a lot of these School decisions were going on prior to this type of worldwide web being formed and you cannot get away from the Native sharing of information and sharing of their culture it's it's really breaking down all different borders all different tribal borders whether people are are residing in on reservation or off-reservation tribal members or non-tribal members the one thing everybody seems to

105come together on is our names and imagery and it's a beautiful thing thank you anyone else have questions or comments I I have a question um in our experience the first go round that we did with the logo it it seemed to be that students who were in support of keeping the warrior head logo were much less likely to publicly indicate their support they preferred to do the district survey that they sent out they preferred emails versus the students that and and I respect their opinion but felt that the warrior logo needed to be retired they tended to be much more comfortable to publicly voice um that opinion is that something that with the schools that you've been working with is is that the normal way that it goes that students that want to keep

106the logos don't feel comfortable sharing those opinions publicly I I think that's a uh that's a valid point I think there is bullying going on uh there's calls of racism to the point that the word doesn't even mean anything we said we we've said you know people that stood up have lost their jobs U and and and there's in always starts with the claim of offense so you really have to you know look at the last couple of years uh anywhere where their opinions are being silenced or or people are not feeling comfortable speaking out in public because of how that's going to be um interpreted by others and who wants that that hassle who wants who wants to be bullet I certainly don't but it takes amount of courage to stand up and it

107takes a lot of Courage of these Native Americans in front of you today to stand up and and represent the truth so yes I believe that this most students Native Americans uh people all around have feel similar on many different issues not just native Natives and if I can uh say something to that on our reservation when we had the when we had the vote we didn't hear many of our people say anything about it they were silent but when we voted we were overwhelmed everybody was we didn't exp it to to get the vote that we did so yeah it uh it's kind of the silent majority stay silent they don't say anything but if they have a chance to vote where they can do it unanimously I think you probably would see a

108big turnout in every community and many communities that we work with today people who don't want to speak out they message Us in the background so yeah there is a lot of support I know almost every community that we work with we have a lot of positive comments and a lot of people people who are very uh the majority of the communities and the and the and the school children sometimes we hear from them so yeah I I I know what you're saying if you don't mind I'll step in here and kind of let you know what's been going on here in Camden we have a pretty strong and vocal Community um and prior to the Michigan Coalition Against Racism and sports and media that pushed this issue for change there was no Division and

109people felt very comfortable of you know claiming they are the Redskins but after they came in um I feel like that our community is still pretty strong and vocal and support of the Redskins however because there's been this strong one-sided view that has been pushed on a national level um there's a lot of people that feel apologetic or that they are in the wrong and it's it's really created a lot of division because there's only been one side that's been able to get out and vocalize so it's really important that people are educated they see both sides so if they change their mind and say oh yeah maybe it is a little racist they're not feeling guilted into that that they can really see um both sides of the spectrum thank you uh does anyone

110else have any questions I I I do actually a follow-up question on on um what you just said uh to your recollection and I understand that you know you're not going to catch everything but regarding the one side only ever being able to be heard was your organization ever invited to come and speak to our school no we weren't in fact we were uh we were only told through found out through the media that that was happening sahic at your school otherwise we wouldn't have even known about it in fact it was our attorney at the time who actually he lives in in Delaware or Pennsylvania and he he knew about it he heard seen it on the on the news or on the paper or something and he theone that contacted us so we

111didn't even know until but think was like a day before and he decided he was going to go to the meeting anyone else all right I have one one more small comment which is that um I did observe uh a number of people um one a former board member uh and a small number of community members also maybe a few former community members including that including a former board member who really um really harassed you guys online um and I wanted to apologize for that um it it shouldn't have been that way I didn't see anything like that done when the NCI came came to present you guys didn't even get to come to present uh but I I saw I did see harassment uh of your of your representatives and and I apologize for

112that thank you but that usually that's how it usually goes we we we don't we don't go after people for who they are we don't go after them for their uh where they come from or anything they'll never see us do that we present the facts and that's all we deal with thank you thank you all right um feel free to listen in to the rest of our meeting a lot of it probably pretty boring to you but uh again feel free to hang out hang out and watch um all right uh moving on to item 5.03 uh proposed District comprehensive plan for 2024 to 2027 uh we're going to get a presentation by the plan committee members thank you president hankle uh school board members and community this evening we're going to give a

113brief overview of the district's comprehensive plan more so what the purpose is of the comprehensive plan uh because as of today uh we will be making it public for 28 days for viewing so that at the February school board meeting we'll have an opportunity for questions from the school board uh so that we can uh have the uh comprehensive plan approved at the March meeting so with me this evening uh are several members of the committee uh we have Dr Hughes is our director of curriculum uh Mr Chris nuland who is a teacher at our High School uh Mr Sarah mosus who's not only uh a teacher at Southern Elementary but also a parent uh Mr Joe Wilson not only a school board member but a parent and Mrs Samantha Hall the same as a

114school board member and a parent so thank you all for being with us we did that one Community member unfortunately Mr Dave Bowers had another commitment uh could not be with us this evening to present this overview so as we take a look at the uh purpose the comprehensive plan is something that is done by each of our school district every three years and the purpose of that is that we can continue to focus on our students the achievement and the progress that they're making and this comprehensive plan once is approved in March will be will start in 2024 2025 school year and go through the 2627 school year as I mentioned I have a few members with me that will speak briefly uh more specifically we had 46 total members that were a part

115of this committee not only did it include uh parents staff members administrators but School boards and community members it's very important when you're doing a comprehensive plan that we make sure that we have a full view of all stakeholders and feedback within there so at this point I'm going to turn over [Music] to District Vision yeah M Smith okay so the vision and mission statements are crucial for all nonprofits to thrive including connecting all stakeholders to its purpose and serving as the basis for leadership decisions and this applies for schools as well according to the definition in Marzano's book on high reliability schools a mission is a statement as to why the district system of Education exists the fundamental purpose for its schools and how to accomplish that purpose a vision describes what the district's

116system of Education should become to better fulfill our fundamental purpose as a school board these statements serve as pillars to guide decision-making policy development resource allocation and other aspects of school operations as a school board member we have the responsibility to familiarize ourselves with the work of the school system and bring to the professional direction of the schools the Viewpoint knowledge and wisdom of the community as an elected representative recognizing the importance of these two pillars for our school district Mr Wilson will now share what those vision statements are good evening so back to the vision one thank you all right so our District's Vision it was last updated in 2001 um Southern York County School District vision is that we is that of a dynamic organization that will work in partnership with the family

117and community and will continuously strive to develop productive contributing responsible citizens capable of meeting the global challenges of the future okay and our vision this is our action this is kind of how we do things how we achieve those goals Southern York County School District through a Cooperative effort with the family and Community will provide a quality learning environment that promotes character Fosters responsibility and challenges students to achieve their full potential so next we've looked at the goal of the committee so we wanted to have a group of people that will help us to look at what's going really well in our district and what are areas that we continue the work on the move forward so as a committee we sat down in table groups and we looked at each building and brainstormed the

118positives that are going on and areas that we wanted to continue the work with and then in those groups we started to look and identified goals and action steps good evening everybody I have the planning and preparation phase the info mainly was derived from the previous District comprehensive plan what happened then was the district updated with new members of the steering committee which as Dr rert said there were 46 of us and we you met on several occasions went over components of the comprehensive plan and you'd see all of the things that we did go over the profile and plan Essentials steering Comm which is the 46 people the local Education Agency profile which is the district mission and vision as the two School Board directors talked about and our educational values thank you so

119the comprehensive plan steering committee um we completed A needs assessment to identify strengths as well as challenges that we would address in the proposed comprehensive plan that involved um collaborating to analyze a variety of District assessment data that would include our state assessment data like the pssas the Keystone exams um as well as other District data that you could find on the PA Future Ready index um like attendance information student demographics for the district we also looked at our local assessment data that would be like our in-house District assessments that we use to measure skills aren't necessarily assessed by the state exams um we use that information to identify the best instructional strategies that we can use to meet the needs of all our students and help them grow so these um challenges and strengths

120are summarized in the proposed comprehensive plan so as we developed the plan we looked at really analyzing those strength and challenges like we talked about we went through and we did goal setting where in each one of our groups we went through and we created goals that then had action plans and we had to come up with professional development and our communication steps for each one of them so as you will see in the plan it is divided out into these areas to be able to show what we as a district would like to continue the work on and move forward with in addition to the comprehensive plan itself we are required by the state of Pennsylvania to include other required reports those are academic standards and assessment requirements we have to go through and

121go through a comprehensive list of making sure that our curriculum is all up the date and that we have all of the pieces required by Pennsylvania in addition we have to have an induction plan which we completed and had board approved several months ago we have to have a professional development plan student services assurances and a gifted education plan assurances ensuring that we have all of the components necessary from Pennsylvania Department of Education for our gifted programs so this evening we just wanted to give you a brief overview of the purpose behind the comprehensive plan as I did mention uh that the comprehensive plan will become public this evening uh for the next 28 days I would encourage the public as well as the school board uh to review that and when we uh get

122back together I believe it's May 15th for our next school board meeting uh that we will enter 16th Mar March okay no but at but our sorry at our February meeting that we would get together uh answer any questions so that for the March board meeting we would have this approved and send that off the pde for final approval and then sign signature by uh president ankle any questions from the school board thank you very much all right um all right um so um let's go ahead and have educational updates from Dr epert and then um we may take a short recess uh before we get into public comment just uh for our various needs thank you president hankle um just some overall comments well I guess winter is truly here finally here uh hope

123everyone had a wonderful holiday break uh and everyone had an opportunity uh to spend quality time with the family and friends I know over over the last few years we've had very little accumulation of precipitation uh but I'm hoping that our students have an opportunity to get get out there enjoy the snow but more importantly as you're out there student drivers be safe parents driving be safe uh and more importantly uh if you have an opportunity there's a great uh Hill here to sled right outside the Middle School uh F continuing to focus on my themes of safe supportive and collaborative culture um our district uh will be in the process of applying for safety grants so for the school board you were aware uh that in uh previously we applied for the Pennsylvania Commission

124on crime and delinquency for the mental health and safety uh we did receive a notification regarding those so we will be reapplying for those to assist with uh areas of professional development support mental health as well as safety throughout our district uh regarding the supportive uh component um I'm kind of bummed tomorrow would have been my first visit of the new year at Southern Middle School uh but it's not going to happen we will reschedule it but I know Dr Bryce and I uh have a a flurry not to use that term intentionally of visits to all of our schools over the next few weeks uh it'll be great to get back into the classrooms see the awesome instruction that's going on as well as our students reive the highest quality education souer County School

125District um under collaboration over the last few months I've had an opportunity to share and congratulate schools uh we have the opportunity to celebrate that true berry Elementary now becomes the third School uh within our school district uh to be certified in level one and also the third school in the state of Pennsylvania to be certified uh becoming part of the international registry so a huge thank you to all of the uh stakeholders in supporting uh the submission of artifacts um I also am aware and been aware that southern middle school cqu high school also Al submitted uh their paperwork for certification so we're going to be hearing very soon uh so our goal is that you know within the next month to two that we'll have all five buildings within our District certified in

126level one which is a huge accomplishment and achievement by all individuals involved uh just to kind of go through some reminders some of them uh Carolyn had earlier uh Middle School Dance was scheduled for tomorrow uh that is going to be rescheduled until uh moved to January 26th Carolyn mentioned about the stem ja stem that will be on March 5th uh we do have many students uh musicians that are going to be participating in many different festivals uh one would have been this weekend for the York County Orchestra Festival which will be rescheduled uh just a quick reminder to all our high school seniors that the scholarship night is Wednesday January 24th at 7 p.m. we hope that we have uh all of our seniors attending that to receive the information regarding scholarships uh the

127Pennsylvania music Education Association Coral Festival uh it's the 26th and 27th uh we have the York County Coral honors band Festival on February 2nd and 3rd uh pmea District Orchestra on February 9th and 10th so I want to congratulate all those students that are going to be participating and representing our school district uh the all School uh all sports booster meeting will be on January 20 31st at 700 p.m. and the CES hanck High School winter band and Jazz Band concert with Thursday February 1st at 7:30 p.m. uh two other notes uh the life after shs career exploration trade opportunities uh will be Thursday February 8th starting at 5:30 p.m. in the High School auditorium and then finally it'll be at the time of our next board meeting uh but we will be having parent

128teacher conferences the evening of February 14th and 15th uh just a reminders that schools will not be in session on the 16th uh Friday the 16th and Monday the 19th in observance of president's birthday so president ankle that's all I have this evening so please make sure you have a great month of January or not um all right uh so I will entertain the motion for a short recess uh try to keep it to five no more than 10 minutes um would anyone like to move for a recess I'll make a motion do I have a second second all right any discussion I don't think we we don't have to discuss on a recess all right any Nays or extensions all right uh we are in recess e this sorry e for e for well

129for hopefully we haveone back definitely more than five but a little closer to 10 at this point uh so I I hereby call us out of recess um all right next on the agenda we have public comment uh due to the number of speakers I'm just going to and and the fact that some may be new to it I'm going to just go over really quickly the uh the guidelines for public comment um when you uh when you come up please announce your name and municipality uh each speaker is limited to five minutes and you'll get a one minute warning uh if you've if you've gone to four minutes um you can only speak once on the same topic unless all others have requested speak and heard I probably won't we probably won't be having

130anyone speak twice on the same topic tonight um the period for public comment will be limited to 60 minutes per meeting now I will say my predecessor uh never enforced that I don't plan to enforce it myself but I don't feel that I can unilaterally suspend that maybe he had an informal agreement with the prior board uh so at 60 Minutes I plan to put it to a vote whether to extend public comment um and then uh direct all your comments to the presiding officer uh card and pro proper decorum are required and uh no slanderous remarks about a board member employee or student all right with that uh the first person we have is uh Peggy cop hi my name is Peggy comp and I'm from New Freedom and I'm a parent I'm a

131resident definitely a taxpayer and I'm going to be speaking today to address the potential reinstatement of the Native American warrior logo I believe this issue is not one to be taken lightly as it reflects our values as a community and the respect that I hope we hold for diverse perspectives well I understand that for many of the alumni in the school district the former Native American warrior logo is an important part of their identity as a former Warrior but I believe this decision to retire the logo in 2021 was the right decision and we should not be reinstating the logo at this time and I believe this for a variety of reasons first research shows that the overwhelming majority of Native American organizations in this country oppose the use of Native American themed logos this

132includes the National Congress of American Indians the oldest largest and most representative American Indian organization as well as an ani nation of Pennsylvania both groups strongly supported the retirement of the former logo in 2021 and have expressed their desire not to return to that logo at this time the one organization out of more than 100 that does support the use of such logos by school and sports teams is the Native American Guardians Association but a review of the online literature regarding this organization clearly shows that most Native American organizations do not consider Naga to be representative of the wider native community and in fact naga's famous 90% data point is based on a 2016 survey with respondents from just 504 individuals who self-identified as Native Americans and 44% of whom declared to have no affiliation

133with a recognized tribe this is less than 1% of the Native American population in the United States naga's claim should not be therefore considered in high regard this evening and should certainly not be used as a justification to return to the former logo if the true goal is to honor and to educate then surely we can find a way to do just that without returning to the former logo secondly another justification for the vote to reinstate the logo tonight questions the process followed by the former board prior to the vote to retire the logal in April of 2021 however a review the timeline of the process the board followed shows that the study of the issue was a comprehensive and inclusive process that took place over eight months from August of 2020 to April of

1342021 during these eight months a subcommittee of the diversity committee appointed by Dr lemman conducted a thorough study of the issue that included numerous meetings a community survey two reports presented at public meetings and a virtual presentation by the National Congress of Native American Indians at a special board meeting in March of 2021 while the Native American Guardians associate was unable to speak at a board meeting because they had not obtained the proper permissions they did send a three-page statement to the former board prior to the vote being taken and the statement clearly outlined their position which we heard tonight in support of the logo for the board's consideration in addition to being able to express perspectives via survey the sycsd community also had an opportunity to speak during public comment in each of the

135regular monthly board meetings during the eight month of pro from proposal the issue at the August 2020 board meeting to the vote to retired the logo at the April 2021 meeting in contrast the current board directors raised the isine statement in the December 7th meeting and just one month later are planning a vote there's been no study of the hard cost associated with reinstating the logo and replacing all the items currently displaying the new logo prior to acting on the issue this evening a vote to reinstate the former logo is a vote to throw out every dollar already spent on rebranded in since 2021 and is certainly not in keeping with the definition of fiscal responsibility there was a passing mention of private donors by the board president at the December 7th meeting but no

136further information about such donors has been provided to the community as noted on Facebook however this week the newly elected board members conservative syc political pack has wasted no time accepting $20 donations for t-shirts sporting the warrior head logo in conjunction with a nationally recognized symol the Republican Party which is my opinion raising concerns about a conflict of interest in taking the vote this evening and finally let us not forget the oversight of student voices regarding a logo that ultimately is meant to represent them despite the plea by the student member of the board on the December 7th 20123 meeting to remember that the logo belongs first and foremost to the students there has been no effort that I'm aware of in the past month to seek student input it's also important to remember that

137the current logo were designed by our own staff and students with great thought and great care from a period of time that lasted from May of 2021 to August of 2022 the result of their months of hard effort is a design that includes a respectful honoring of the area's indigenous past while allowing for the concept of a warrior to extend beyond a tired and stereotypical depiction of a male member of the Sanic tribe in fact the new logo allows students to draw their own conclusions as to what a warrior looks like in the context of the world World in which they currently live to conclude it's important to acknowledge that the community survey put out during the comprehensive study of the logo issue in 2021 did show a majority of respondents in favor of keeping

138the former logo however the survey results represented just a portion of the information the former board took under consideration when making the decision ma'am your time's out and therefore I thank you for your time and consideration I urge you to vote not to reinstate this evening try try uh please try to keep it to five minutes um if you have a sentence or two uh that's fine but let's not go well beyond Miss Amy Hall hello Amy Hall Shrewsberry Township um in the past I spoke on two separate occasions about our logo um one was um my comment was based on a six-month period of not having a logo um due to the process of either reinstating the old one or voting for the new one and I emphasized that our school and students did

139not have any representation um my second public comment on our logo um I had two questions referring the new logo and that was to um the main logo versus the secondary one I never publicly shared my opinion on our logo and whether I think it should or should not be retied ired however I am now stating that I do not think that human faces should be logos this has been my opinion even before I had students in our district it wasn't a strong opinion but it is now due to the nature of reinstating it again I am aware of the community members and students who do want to see the old logo come back I am not offended by the graphics as much as I am offended that the PRI that the priority that this

140takes over our students teachers teacher retention and many other things you say it's the process then fix the process you say it wasn't presented to the Comm it was presented to the community at the wrong time do I think our school board should have waited until after we were out of the pandemic before having this passionate um conversation I agree I think that we should have waited too you say that the logo shows Warrior Pride it's important to the alumni but real Warrior do not need an an image to identify their themselves I don't believe that an image tells your story an image doesn't tell a person who you are the following statements are from some of our alumni um a gentleman in the class of 52 what is the what does Warrior pride mean

141to you I witness Warrior pride and the students from New Freedom and Glenrock high school uniting and starting life in the first Consolidated School in PA another gentleman in the Class of 55 what is Warrior Pride to you there were challenges of bringing two committees into one and combining two high schools another issue was school colors it was put up to a student vote and the school colors were proposed maroon and gray we were Rivals and suddenly we were a team a gentleman in the class of 63 what do you remember most about being at Sanic coming home after winning a game of from a away an away game singing and chanting all the way home and once we got to the entrance of the school we stood up and we sang Our Amma matter

142now I know why my boys want to ride the bus home because they still do that to this day this gentleman also donated his varsity jacket to Susan high school and if you see it it is green I also learned that the school colors maroon and gray were custom colors and much more and they were much more expensive when the band needed new uniforms in the' 60s they went to the more inexpensive colors and that was red and white the monor also had to be Rewritten so that red and white so dear would rhyme lastly I looked through some yearbooks I had to stop at the class of 1991 there was no Warrior logo anywhere not on the cover not on the pages not on uniforms not on clothing so why are we focusing on

143the reinstatement of the warrior head in its original form to replace all current logos clearly no one needed a logo to show or experience Warrior Pride until now you say you didn't attend our school and that you don't care that the logo is what the logo is and that you don't have a foot in the race I didn't go to this school either but I care about our logo and I care about what is do to our district you say that this logo is not a hill you're going to die on I'll die on it because this needs to be over because we have bigger battles to to face it's our teachers one minute it's our administrators and it's our students I am willing to work with anyone to move forward we must focus on

144teacher attention and burnout and we must focus on Mental Health our students want to come to school and learn and prepare for the Life After High School this has to stop there's a vote after this so we all know what's going to be if you need your image you keep your logo we have our Warrior pride and then we can move on thank you Stephanie muser good evening my name is Stephanie muser um I am a parent um an alumni and also my son is the third generation of my family to attend this school thank you for the opportunity to speak this evening I'd like to start by saying how disrespectful it was to rebut my comment at the December 7th meeting in future please extend the same courtesy to me that was shown to

145you when you stood where I am now and please stop using your position on the school board as a bully pulpit to silence those that disagree with you now on to my public comment I first found out that Naga would be speaking from an syc conservative supporter the community deserves to know why your surrogates are receiving board agenda items before the rest of the public I think I can say that all of the community regardless of their opinion about the mascot would appreciate better more diverse and inclusive curriculum in our schools that's why I was terribly disappointed when the southern York County conservatives celebrated refusing a freedom writer the opportunity to speak to our students last year about the Civil Rights Movement but onto our conversation about Naga I assert that Naga doesn't speak for

146the majority of Native Americans and their record as a nonprofit organization suggest bias to a political agenda in fact when they claim to represent 90% of the Native American Community this is based on a flawed Washington Post survey with just 500 4 respondents as a nonprofit fundraising professional it's part of my job to advise my clients on good stewardship of public donations so when I heard Naga was to speak I pulled their tax 990 forms reviewed their website and looked for articles related to their work their tax 990 forms have several red flags first this organization has only been around since 2017 second their Revenue swings wildly year-over-year on their website they assert that donations come from small individual gifts but their tax 990 forms suggest one to two large donors account for all of

147their revenue organizations with individual giving programs tend to have more steady revenue streams then I dug further and found a June 2020 Sports Illustrated article linking Naga to a foundation tied to Dan Snider the for former owner of the Washington commanders while a 5013c doesn't have to disclose who their major donors are many do so in their annual report for donor transparency Naga does not reading further other school districts shared stories of the bullying and intimidation by members of naga in an effort to silence those that didn't want to retain racist mascots at their school finally I compared naga's tax records and charitable giving ratings to another Native American organization the Native American rights fund narf has a four-star rating with Charity Navigator and is an accredited Better Business Bureau charity too Naga won't disclose

148anything to charity rating organizations about their fundraising practices I urge the school board to take on information from one of hundreds of Native American rights organizations opposed to retaining racist mascots organizations like the Coalition of Natives and allies or the National Congress of American Indians further more the community should know that the school board refused to allow the Coalition of Natives and allies the opportunity to speak this evening I can read that response from the school board into the record after my public comment if time allows for purposes of transparency I point out Mr hankle shared his disappointment with how the prior board handled the logo reti at the December board meeting I asked the community how is this better again silencing anyone that disagrees with them is not their job as school board directors

149Gathering complete information to make the best decisions for our community is their job I know this comment is mostly falling on deaf ears so let me close by saying keep your mascot you can't shake our Warrior Pride thank you Brian cop good evening friends my name is Brian cup I live in New Freedom um I want to start before I get into uh my comments about the presentation and the warrior logo um by saying how impressed I was by the vision um and the goals that are set forward for our school system for the district for next year that encompasses what you all are here to do we are here you are here to produce intelligent thriving students not distract us with logos and sweatshirts we're here to provide students with their best opportunity I

150should thank the old school board because my oldest son just graduated from SAS sasquan last year and is now um at a prestigious College studying computer science engineering and so the administrators and students or I'm sorry administrators and teachers and staff and prior school board members really served my family very well my oldest son is a uh state champion in powerlifting he's done many many things and I'm so proud of him and what he's become because of what he received here squ Han high school and in in our district now I have another son who's in the 10th grade I wish I could be so enthusiastic because I'm a little worried because conversations like this where we're you're discussing a logo of an Indian head with a with a hatchet and a bowl on the

151sides that's what that's what these people are upset about a an Indian Head logo that's not why you're here holy mackerel that is not the job of a school board produce students keep teachers keep administrators keep intelligence and thoughtful processes amongst yourselves so that you can continue to provide students with what they deserve and it's not this kind of nonsense the Naga presentation was so flawed I couldn't really contain myself but I tried really hard but they made a lot of emotional claims and went after people and and said people were crying about logos and this and that and they really dug into how how upset you should be if they're trying to take away your logo it doesn't matter it doesn't matter here's why it doesn't matter specifically because Naga and the presentation that

152you saw does not represent who they say they do at all and if you support their data and their ideals you're stepping in it you're making a mistake one minute remaining I have a short list of other organizations that I'll delve into real quick that um that are against Native American mascots and logos and stereotypes let's dig in real quick uh I got two minutes left right just kidding Association on American Indian Affairs the buncom county Native American intertribal Association in North Carolina the Cherokee Nation of Oklahoma you American Indian college fund the American Indian high education Consortium the American Indian Mental Health Association the American Indian movement the American Indian opportunities industrialization Center of San Bernardino County let's skip a couple time let me get just a couple more the national caucus of Native

153Americans state legislators you get my point Yep this is a distraction and it should end thank you very much Nicole Hammond Nicole Hammond no she here no all right uh Nicole h Nicole Hammond see anyone getting up uh lyanna Feer the aneer shrewbury township when hundreds of organizations representing nearly every state and federally recognized Native American tribe and many many other unrecognized tribes offer the same strong stance opposing the use of native imagery as mascots and logos you are not listening when you were presented with the results of study after study describing how damaging the use of native imagery is to Native Americans you are not listening when your students tell you they don't want you reinstating the retired logo when you should be focusing on Mental Health supports teacher retention and life preparedness you

154are not listening you don't even listen to yourselves you claim the issue with the retiring of the logo is about the process by which it happened yet here you are hearing evidence from the one group you could find to support you and then voting on it in the same meeting you ask for 120 days to reconsider and in the same meeting ask for a vote to reinstate 30 days later you claim the logo is a sign of respect and ignore the vast multitude of voices you are supposedly respecting who tell you it is not respectful you stand behind the slogan educate not eradicate yet you like Naga are only concerned about supporting an amalgam of stereotypical images including the super school appropriate weapon and tobacco pipe and not offering specific curriculum or presentations to actually

155you know educate when the feelings of the only native family to a recognized tribe in our district a family incidentally that travels at the country actively preserving their culture and educating people and they tell you the logo is offensive and why and that her family faces racial backlash and is treated as less than by members of our community and you continue to cater to that same segment of our community you are not listening Pennsylvania has no state or federally recognized native tribes the closest federally recognized tribe to us is the senica nation in New York in 2023 the New York Board of Regents banned public schools from using native or indigenous nicknames and imagery unless the School receives written approval from one of the eight the state's eight federally Rec recognized tribes the senica nation

156actually gave permission for one District to continue its use Warriors incidentally with the president saying respect for native people and our history should always be the expectation not the exception in the classroom on the athletic field and in society while the regulations provide an Avenue for agreements between districts and native nations it is our belief that any such agreements should be rare limited and used only in unique circumstances rare limited unique circumstances in this case 40% of the district students were members of the senica nation and the district is in the only city in the country that is built on land least from an Indian Reservation what are our rare limited unique circumstances I'm listening I teach my kids that doing the right thing is never a waste of time so here so many of

157us are tonight to stand stand up for what is right even though we know the truth of what is happening that you are not listening but we are we're listening we're watching and will not stand silently by in the face of your attempts to diminish our district and as a side note a a recommendation was made to the board regarding the creation of a museum in the old schoolhouse that could be used for field trips for our students and for students from other districts I don't recall any members of the new school board from promoting that or any other ideas since the banishment of the logo either and that's all I have to say about that thank you Trudy zampier Dr Bryson Dr rert president hankle and school board members thank you for this opportunity

158to speak tonight my name is Trudy zampier I live in shrewbury Township I had three children that went through the school district here I currently have two grandchildren that are here um a little bit off my what I have prepared for you is that they're talking about other people are talking about the students and what they are saying well I've talked to not only my grandchildren but number of their friends and the thing is the children that want to keep the original logo don't say anything because they're afraid they're going to be bullied so with that being said I want to tell you that tonight I'm here to strongly urge you to reinstate the warrior logo and the reason is this school is built on Sanic Indian Land PE those Indians lived here in 1951

159each of the local areas had their own school it was decided at that point that they would consolidate and that is when cesan high school was born the name was decided on because as I said the cesan Indians lived on this ground and all along the creek that runs through our area and was home to the Sanic Indians in fact there were many Indian artifacts that were found around here on various farms and on the Bailey Farm which is currently the playground and Carnival grounds in New Freedom Mr Bailey was so enamored with these artifacts that he built a beautiful showcase when he passed away and his daughters were getting older they decided that those artifacts belonged here at cesan high school because that's the history I would like to know where did those artifacts

160go at a board meeting two or three years ago nobody knew where those artifacts were that's a disgrace in 1951 or 52 there was a contest to come up with the mascot design the original design was a Chief's head it was designed by Jerry Miller of New Freedom and at that time he won $25 that was like a fortune years later a group from the school met with a native American group to have them critique the logo it was suggested that being as we are warriors that we get rid of the chief picture and adopt the warrior picture it was with the guidance of the Native Americans that the basis for our logo was designed what is a warrior to me a warrior is strong they're a leader they're proud they're courageous they're passionate they're

161protectors and Guardians their teachers and helpers to their peers and those younger these are wonderful attributes these are things we should be teaching our children while reading some things about Indians I found a CO a quote from Chief sittingbull who was of the Haka Lakota Sue tribe thank you the quote was the warrior for us is one who sacrific himself for the good of others his task is to take care of the elderly the defenseless those who cannot provide for themselves and above all the children they're the future of humanity end quote this whole thing started with one letter being sent to the administration by one student and I'm going to say supposedly because the wording of that letter did not sound like a student's wording this also happened during covid there was no inperson

162board meetings and nobody could really come out and speak for or against what they were doing the admin did send out a survey and that survey came back that 80% of those survey wanted to keep the logo by the way if you weren't an employee a teacher or a student or a parent you were not surveyed what about all of us taxpayers so but still 80% of those were surveyed did say to keep the warrior one minute remaining was this some closed door politics and why when the majority wanted to keep the logo were the wheels set in motion to change it now we have four or five different logos that can be used any good marketer is going to tell you you need one logo to be your brand I appreciate the efforts of

163the students that helped with the design of the new logos they did a wonderful job with what they were tasked to do if it just shouldn't have gotten that far you cannot rewrite history you can't cancel the past you can't change history by trying to erase what you don't like as Educators you should know that the only way to not repeat bad things from the past is to teach the history including the wrongs and how we have wred them two years ago I challenged this board and the administration that November is Native American History Month we celebrate the History Month in February we celebrate other things I challenged them to set up some kind of curriculum some kind of activity some kind of bringing people in to do something for to teach our children about

164the Native Americans let's continue to honor the the Native Americans that have lived in this area and let's keep our Warrior thank you Danielle Willman hello my name is Danielle Willman from New Freedom and I'd like to speak regarding the decision to bring back the previous logo while I was a student at the high school I had the opportunity to work with my peers and teachers in the project to redesign the school's logo before making the decision to reverse this change I would ask that the board would think about how this decision reflects on the school and to consider the message that you will be sending to the community the staff and to the current and all future students in making the decision to bring back the outdated logo you tell the community that the

165hard work of community members and alumni is not valued by the current board in addition you demonstrate that the district as a whole is unwilling to accept and embrace change and growth you tell the staff that you do not respect their hard work or the hard work of their students you show that your priority is not to improve the district and help the students and staff but to align the school with your personal beliefs and expectations perhaps the most important is the message that you are sending to the students you show the students that their ideas and voice have little impact or importance in their community commun you teach them that their hard work and Innovation is unimportant you tell them that their eagerness to improve and Spark meaningful change in the world is unwelcome

166in this community and lastly by being unwilling as a district to Foster an environment of healthy change and acceptance you teach the students to stop working hard to stop growing and stop learning thank you Bob bets Bob bet trth Berry Township uh before I address you guys I'll address you guys and I'm going to say sorry Mr bets um you have to address your comments to I'm going to address you guys all right this is a shameful display where were all of you when we found out teachers were having sex with students into school you weren't here but you're here over a logo dispute where were you with every other major issue in this building we've stood up here tonight and we've said things like we try to be uh respectful and reasonable and fair

167I've heard nothing but laughing I've heard nothing but trash talking in the audience let's focus on the task at hand here people we all want to say this logo shouldn't even be reviewed by this board uh I just heard that a little bit ago uh that the priority for the board shouldn't be to review the logo to bring it back I would counter with the priority of the previous board should not have been to remove the logo this was not ever an issue for the board to take up let's move past this issue and get into the real issues at hand with that thank you board sitting in this meeting for the last several years now uh I've always brought my grievances my concerns my questions to the board uh assuming that I was speaking

168to people who made policy who utilized uh their positions and uh uh sorry I lost my place and put the decisions in place that actually pushed our district along uh the people that we voted into these position positions and those should be the people that most certainly would listen to us and listen to our wants and needs uh and represent us as a community but it has become very clear that that is not the case uh and what I mean is not that the board members aren't doing that but that the administration is actually who is running the district uh the board does not appear to do anything other than take direction from the administration uh the admin writes Poli policy in the buildings the admin writes the handbook the admin enforces it the admin

169pretty much does everything yet I did not vote for any member of admin I did not put them in their roles or their positions yet they are making every Rule and every regulation in these buildings they hold all the keys they hold all the power and they do all the work in the buildings every day we need to turn this around I need to see this newest sitting board make those positive changes that we need to see made I need a board and an admin unified together doing things together and not an Administration pushing things through to a board simply for the sake of saying that they worked together and I've seen it happen multiple times Administration wants something that a board doesn't want the administration gets it anyway because let's be honest they're here

170every day the rest of us aren't so in that thought uh I'm really hoping you guys are going to start reviewing certain policies and the student handbook in particular uh case in point a couple months ago we had the accusation uh which was founded and uh proven that a teacher was having an inappropriate sexual relationship with a student I brought up in that meeting that the consequences listed in our policy go anywhere from a really good strong talking to up to termination if you look in our student handbook and in our policy uh if a student calls another student a Bad Name the exact same punishments are available to that student a good start talking to up to expulsion from the school I wouldn't say that these two offenses are anywhere near similar to each

171other yet our policy dictates that the consequence should be the same for both actions so a student can call you a bad name or a teacher can touch you an appropriately both could have the same end result that doesn't quite seem right to me uh I look in our handbook at how we categorize violations uh a class one violation there's really one thing that falls under class class one minute remaining thank you tardiness tardiness is the only class one violation uh and it doesn't really seem like there's much done to anybody in a class one violation until they've offended it multiple times yet a class two violation uh you could uh get detention you could be suspended you could be uh uh in school or out of school suspension you could have an intervention with

172the teacher you could do all these things uh a class two violation uh you know dress code violation public dispay of affection unauthorized consumption of food or beverage outside of the cafeteria so we're going to suspend somebody for taking a drink outside the cafeteria possibly but not for being repeatedly late to class meanwhile late to class also falls falls under C class two violation so it's a class one and a class two and in certain cases a class three if it's repeated over and over again and in a class three you can be expelled for being late we need to fix these policies now these are the problems that actually exist in the building that we aren't addressing because we're distracted we're distracted constantly please guys move past the distractions let's get things happening thank

173you um Sue [Applause] Meyers hello my name is Sue Myers I'm from New Freedom burough and um yeah I do think this is a distraction I think the last board went through the proper channels had a committee did did things the proper way and to bring this up one of the first board board meetings for the new board um it seems out of touch there's so like other people have said there's so many other things that we need to be focusing on teacher shortages AI school safety big big issues but I'm here because um I think logo and branding is important and just to go over the the process that's been going through and I don't agree with it it um logo and branding can have strong impacts positive and negative I'm an artist and

174a designer and have worked on rebranding campaigns for businesses and nonprofits updating logos is the norm logos and symbols can reinforce stereotypes and can instill a sense of pride in students and the community one or the other they can be good and they can be bad depending on how it's done I applaud as I said the former School Board members who dove into it they did their research they reached out to Native American organizations involved students and more I've heard it said that the former board did not heed the community survey the survey was but one of many considerations and I wonder how many in our community that took that survey are Native Americans I heard it today that there's one Native American family in the community in the school and they were not listened

175to um and with due respect to the naga group the solution to that their in invisibility or feeling marginalized um is not shortsighted or negative represent representation through stereotypical logos and symbols the National Congress of American Indians feel that these logos do more harm than good and many other Native American organizations as we've heard and from the data that I've read from leading psychologists in the field negative representation creates poor self-esteem in children leading to mental health issues and high rates of suicide we cannot just be around for grief counseling when tragedy occurs we have to be prepared and listening beforehand instead of this logo I believe that we can honor Native Americans by making sure that our curriculum incorporates a complete and true history as others have mentioned I think we can all agree

176on that we can honor Native Americans by exposing children to to positive Native American Role Models doctors scientists teachers and their great contributions to our society there are endless ways to honor indigenous people we still have our Susan name and we can we can celebrate that we can put a mural in our school as Naga suggested with uh getting a Native American Artist to work with students some want to keep the logo due to Nostalgia as a parent of two Susan I I have talked to them and their friends about this they are not attached to this logo they did not fill out the survey because they no longer live in town but they as well as many in the younger generation in general are very attuned to social issues and thank goodness they understand

177the stereotyping is harmful and that it's time for a change they are not being overly woke they are being respectful of all types of people I'm the co-founder of New Freedom Heritage our organization was founded on the principles of Community unity and preserving and celebrating our history I was involved with many of the mural projects in downtown New Freedom and at one time the mural at the freedom green was of a bear riding a cart when we decided to change that mural there were folks that were nostalgic about the mural and wanted to keep it a committee came together and was in and we involved high school students and changed the mural to a train scene and other people then last year committee came together to change the mural yet again and there are folks

178that had fond feelings for the change for the train mural and didn't want to change that but it was changed and I'm sure the mural was change will change again Nostalgia can be wonderful it has the power and ability to bring people together however Nostalgia cannot come at the expense of how others might feel and it should not prevent our children from creating memories and traditions of their own those that are not impeded by our own desires to feel a certain way people and organizations that change with the times are more resilient as one of my favorite authors Christina fer says recognize and understands the inherent impermanence of our world and build a practice of non-attachment we can all be susceptible to a desire to recreate the past however history teaches us that at moments

179of profound change our Nostalgia can be used against us one lasts sorry about 10 seconds ago so or so 15 15 seconds ago okay thank you very much uh Andrew stab wait did we Skip One Megan gilber Gilbert oh whoops sorry Megan Gilbert sorry trying to get up here fast so that we can keep moving I know it's um late here um I wanted as I was listening to the presentation um earlier today I was like oh I want to fact check and I want to go over this and I think some people did a beautiful job of doing their homework um and pointing out um some of the issues with the organization that uh presented here um in front of the board this evening u i I do want to point out that I

180well I I think the Native American uh logo should remain uh retired this is not about a eradicating Native American imagery or their history I am all for finding ways to celebrate um their their Heritage their history I think we can do a lot better than a logo you know I I started this sorry I'm Megan Gilbert and I have three children in the um Southern York County uh School District um you know I've spoken about this issue I think um three times and and I didn't want to bring up all of the things that have been said before I figured if you if that hadn't convinced you before it wasn't going to convince you um now but I do think it's important since we had that presentation earlier tonight to not discount what the

181NCA aai um presented to us because I think their evidence was really really compelling um what's really important for me to say here tonight once again publicly is that I believe if you vote to bring back that logo you are saying that your tradition or Nostalgia whatever the reasons that you have for bringing it back is more important than the humanity of others many Native Americans didn't just wake up one day and say you know what I think that's offensive and I think we should just stop it they have done research they have been educating us for decades about the real harm that this has caused and I believe them when they say that I believe that hard evidence that they have presented um with us upholding the human dignity of others is one of

182my core Val values I work for an international humanitarian organization and I see all of the time what happens when people are not treated with dignity when their humanity is denied and it's it's not good it's in fact I think one of the worst things that you can do to a person removing that logo didn't erase our Traditions it didn't diminish the traditions of the history it's all still here and I see it all around us here instead removing that logo enhanced the reputation and Trad tradition by saying we never intended to cause harm but now we know that it is harmful so we are going to change it we had students create a new logo one that could be embraced by all it gave us the opportunity to show everyone that we are a

183community that cares about people who have been marginalized but that's not happening now and I will admit I will never understand why I'm I'm saddened I'm in some ways embarrassed and I'm ashamed that this is happening right now and I really wish we weren't talking about it as many others have said I do have concerns as well that this is the first order of business that you thought this was the most important thing to do for those of you who are new members of this school board it is sending a very strong message to me loud and clear I think it's sending a very strong message to our students that this is what is important to you not the education not their well-being not preparing them for a changing world not addressing what I think

184is going to become a very urgent crisis of a teacher shortage I also want to point out that there were students who didn't give their name to the newspaper who spoke in favor of keeping this logo retired they didn't give their names to the newspapers because they were also um afraid of being bullied that concerns me and if students who wanted to speak in favor of this logo felt like they were being bullied or were afraid of that that concerns me too and that should not happen we should all be able to express our feelings freely I also think it's important to think about the cost and what this will um cost to bring that back and the money that has already been spent to paint that new um logo that we have so uh

185for all of us who want to keep this logo retired and believe that that is not going to happen I always like to talk about hope I work for a faith-based organization and so one thing that gives me hope is that when I first spoke out about this issue I thought I was going to be in a very small minority and it warms my heart and gives me strength to hear from the people who spoke about this tonight and I want us all to continue to speak out about Injustice continue to speak up for those who are marginalized to the students to my children that I've heard about to the conversations I hear about to the students that I know here who are empathetic who are kind you have such an important role to play

186in this District I'm sorry that you're dealing with this but my urge you to vote to run for office to speak up and to use your dollars because Money Talks as we know and one more thing I would like to say to all of you here um tonight who are making this vote and if you vote to continue this I don't think history is going to look kindly on any of you thank you all right Andrew [Applause] F [Music] good evening I'm a parent and a taxpayer and what a sad reason to have to come to a school board meeting in my community like many others speaking tonight I don't believe the old logo should be reinstated for many of the same reasons and when I was thinking about what I would say tonight to

187persuade some of you on the other side from your intended course of re introducing the previous stereotypical logo I thought maybe I'd build an argument based on the more recent opinion surveys that you're in that your guests so conveniently ignored tonight um but then I decided let's just be honest your mind is made up you'll do what you want because you can no matter what anyone here says tonight so let's just really acknowledge what this is I think it's cowardice and I think it's cruelty and sadly I predict that cowardice and cruelty will be the lasting Legacy of this board and you begin building that Legacy tonight ultimately this is a fear of change and a willingness to stereotype others at the expense of humanity at large you're even afraid to stand behind your decision

188I noticed that most of you wouldn't even speak to news reporters about your viewpoints leading up to this meeting and you're already playing games with the sunshine act to avoid accountability and scrutiny and personally I think you're obscuring why you're really doing this I think we all know that I've given a pop quiz about the susano people's history most of you would fail and enhanced curriculum isn't the end goal either so we and I don't have to pretend that you care about Native American Heritage even if you want to play make believe and that leads to this this is cruelty which always seems to be at the core of this type of conservative pack funed Movement we are seeing among school boards across the country at the behest of out of town out of town

189political contributors you're steamrolling over the thoughtful student work that went into creating a new logo with little regard for their efforts all because you're afraid of change you are standing on the opposite side of what has been identified as a civil rights issue you'll rightly point out that Native American viewpoints on this differ but you'll choose the side of harm I think that's telling it tells us who you are and what you stand for and it's an ugly look for the southern Community but you've earned it you're bringing cowardice and cruelty to our school district tonight that's a toxic combination for people in charge of our children's education and I think it's a harbinger of what we all know is to come more cultural order distractions less focus on educating our children for the first

190time ever I'm sad that my daughter goes to school at Southern so do what you want this won't be the last embarrassing and shameful thing you do I just hope you don't do too much damage before the people of this District decide we're better than this and vote you out now Dennis Val Dennis my name is Val Dennis I'm a parent and spouse of alumni I live in Shrewsberry Township and I have a statement to read from the National Group the Coalition of Native Americans and allies this school board has invited Naga Native American Guardian Association to quote un quote teach without knowing the underlying facts of this group this organization is making money by trying to uphold using native people as mascots na AG's argument that if you end the use of native mascots

191no one will ever know about native peoples is completely unfounded all that will end are the insulting caricatures and stereotypes that are merely distortions of true indigenous cultures they are demeaning cultural Appropriations and in no way honor Indian Country the Coalition of Native Americans and allies goes on to say there are now 11 states who have successfully passed legislation to end the use of native imagery names and fake cultural appropriation like dances chants and Tomahawk chops for sports mascots whenever a mascot name or logo elicits a stereotype of a minority it reduces those people to a possession of that majority it is not okay to use black people Jewish people or Asian peoples as a mascot but it's okay to use Indians it is not and that is their statement there has been at least

192one National Group who has filed a lawsuit against Naga it's important that we balance our time we're cut off for those few extra minutes when we had a super lengthy presentation here most of which had nothing to do specifically with the issue that we are discussing we are a minority of minorities those folks here are a minority of minorities and we must understand that they did however share some things that are important for us to learn when I visited reservations um in the area in South Dakota some indigenous folks shared the level of poverty the environmental degradation and the issues that are going on on those reservations we heard some of that and that's crucial for us to understand I was ashamed that I did not understand the depth of what is happening in our

193own country on reservations it's horrifying and for us to be able to argue about this particular drawing is ridiculous when we could be supporting the reservations suicide they talked about and that is absolutely correct and there are many many reasons for suicide attempts um based on how European immigrants coralled Native Americans into reservations these indigenous folks that we talked with in the South Dakota area to help educate us talked about the fact that during the Roundup of Buffalo when a buffalo hide was offered to a European immigrant the response and the payment for that was a cup of whiskey and that started to generate the alcoholism that has gone down through the centuries further taking away the culture um has created more and more alkaline ISM there are towns in that area um that are

194across the state line because the reservations technically cannot have alcohol but across the state line there are towns that have been created by white folks that are simply liquor stores no schools no churches just liquor stores to perpetuate keeping a group of people down recently I was asked what is the line between honoring a culture and disrespecting a culture I respond to the answer to this question is empathy when we listen and understand the majority viewpoints point of a cultural group we know what is respectful and what is a stereotype over the years we have listened to multiple individuals and groups from Native American communities we have heard from groups who represent a minority of native people and from groups who represent a majority of native people it is clear that the majority of Native

195Americans do not want to be represented by stereotypes the stories and thoughts of the majority of Native American people are their truths not ours most of us have not lived on a reservation most of us do not have grandparents who sent who were sent to the boarding schools where the philos was Kill The Indian in him and save the man in 1763 the few remaining ssoh hanic Indians who had survived violence and diseases were massacred in Lancaster by Scottish and Irish immigrants over 100 years European immigrants killed over 56 indigenous peoples in the Americas how many of us knew this before we started discussing the logo we are here in a predominantly white school district how is it that our opinion about an image would be more more important than the majority viewpoints of members

196of the US Native American communities the very least we can do after several centuries of attempted annihilation of native culture is to have empathy and understand that the previous logo was a stereotype it is time to have empathy it is time to understand and respond to the beliefs of the majority of Native Americans the students created the new logo we can save time by moving forward we can focus on education that prepares our students to be ready for adult life we can focus our time taxes and energy on the best educ ucation we can offer we can keep the new logo created by our students thank you thank you all right we are at one hour of public comment so I will entertain um well I guess we don't need a motion to do this

197I will just call for a vote uh to extend uh public comment um am I wrong that I thought if it was something we were voting on we listen to every public comment that's been the pr but the policy is it's limited to 60 minutes and I feel like I should unilaterally uh not enforce policy so I would just put it to a vote um I just thought that if it was something voted on I thought everybody got to speak about that it's it's it's a practice but there's no policy to that effect okay uh it's been the practice um Mr litz could you weigh it on that I believe policy 913 I remember the number correctly public participation you do have have as announced in your agenda the opportunity for public comment with a

198aggregate limit of of one hour at the beginning the meeting which is permissible under uh the sunshine act to do that um as the president pointed out his predecessor you was fairly liberal with that and didn't vigorously enforce that but that's your policy so and and and if if so that's the policy I don't feel comfortable unilaterally uh overriding policy so I will be the first to vote to extend public comment um so I vote in favor of extending public comment uh Mr Hall need to do I vote in favor Mr Ash yes Wilson yes yes I'd like to hear everyone that came to speak extend it yes all right we have unan unanimity so um uh moving on to Abby Sher Abby all right uh moving on to Rachel zelony hi my name is

199Dr Rachel enan and I'm in a Shrewsberry Township um this new board campaigned on fiscal responsibility and I'd like to address how this pledge intersects with our discussion of the Native American history today fiscal responsibility is not only about how much money is spent but also where this money comes from and what it means for all of those who use it so as an educator and as a writer of curriculum I'm struggling to reconcile a mission to educate not eradicate while our new board members are also proudly boasting a financial endorsement from the 1776 project for those who don't know the 1776 project aims to reform how history is taught in public schools most off cited as the new way to teach so-called patriotic history is the Hillsdale curriculum my husband who is a history

200teacher and who focused in Native American studies in school sat down with me to do what we do best we read the 600 less plants the curriculum as a whole is reductive whitewashed and lacks academic rigor the lesson plans are sloppy bullet points but we're focusing today on how it represents the Native American history that we are supposedly preserving as an example of what you can find in this curriculum includes teach students about the various ways about the various Wars that occur Ur in the new war between settlers and Native Americans a lot of detail is not necessary bullet point one another teachers should emphasize that many of the relationships between the settlers and the Native Americans were mutually respectful and cooperative and conflict rarely occurred this is a strange way to say they did

201what they did in order to survive in the 600 pages of curriculum we do find an uplifting count account of Thanksgiving but zero mention of the carile boarding schools which started in Pennsylvania and allowed the government to kidnap hundreds of thousands of Native American children separated them from their families abused them and tortured them from speaking their native language this curriculum randomly and abruptly ends at 2008 suggesting that teachers have no need or ability to teach Beyond this point throughout the materials colonists are referred refer to as settlers instead of acknowledging that Native Americans were settled here long before they arrived many of you have spoken about the need to have better education for this population and I agree I know many in this community have struggled with a highly educated woman from Baltimore making

202suggestions for your classrooms but I couldn't find a man to read the suggestions for me so here I am use some of the money you say you can easily get from private donors to form a diverse task force representatives from different tribes include our excellent teachers and create lesson plans that encourage conversation instead of deepening the divide the LPE tribe told us that our logo made them feel like an artifact that was rooted in the past instead of a living breathing people do a lesson plan that traces the obstacles these people face today and showcase their contributions our students know this is a debate don't emit details don't minime eyes we should not prevent them from tackling a difficult subject material design a lesson plan that uses primary sources explore both sides explore how bias

203and credibility affect reporting and absorption of knowledge design a lesson with the goal of appreciating someone else's point of view and being better for having heard it let's emphasize that we should never assume that one person or one organization represents all possible opinions and when we finish these lessons maybe we should all sit down and learn them ourselves and see if we can figure out how we can apply these principles for how we talk to each other thank you uh Kelly Jarvis Kelly Jarvis Kelly driis she's Ray bro I'm glad the board president asked the Naga presenters tonight if the organization was contacted by our district we all heard their answer they said no they were not contacted by our district well I happened to sit on that District committee that researched for over half

204a year the district diversity committee reached out via email to both organizations requesting the opportunity to discuss each organization's perspective on the topic National Congress of American Indians responded to the email request and Naga did not respond to the email so you either believe the administrators the teachers the board members the parents and the students who were a part of that committee or the group who presented tonight but if you consider the group who spoke just now to be honest I urge you to Google the speaker we listen to tonight Ivan dosier and find out about his confession under oath about accusations made of a professor at the University of Illinois and his his admission under oath that it never happened not exactly trustworthy if the board and the community want to honor Native Americans

205please start by honoring the wishes of the only Native American family we have in our district the eiso sisters Katie and Erica eisenach are alumni and they were award-winning athletes during their years at ssoh hanak their children now attend our schools the isocks are known throughout our district they're highly respected the family travels extensively through the US and Canada sharing their culture with others they dance to honor their family and strive to keep their traditions and cultures alive our elementary schools have enjoyed performances by their dance companies during Multicultural nights their mission as stated on their website is quote educate and Inspire through song and dance as well as Bridge cultural gaps Katie and I met when our sons were about six and they now attend the high school her son is rose rose budzo

206aala aala Su and senica I've learned through k that the susah hanak joined the Sena at one time so her son might actually be a descendant of the susqu hanak natives I recently saw her son in an athletic uniform part of the uniform had the retired Native American logo and is redf faced I was prepared to read a statement for Katie as today she had to be out of state but she drove back specifically for this meeting and I see she's managed to make it here so I'll take the rest of my time to read it information I received from the Coalition of Native Americans and allies who wanted to present this evening much like Naga but was refused by the board president I have that email by the way why warriors with an Indian

207Head image are particularly problematic a warrior as a name can mean several things someone aggressive or experienced at War however it becomes particularly problematic when it is paired with the head of an IND American Indian who looks especially ferocious it is that stereotype of the Savage Indian warrior and the fear that image elicited among settlers that prompted Scout bounties and other forms of US Government sanctioned extermination of natives in their own homelands including here in York County profits from Scout scalp bounties encouraged settlers to murder and then scalp any indigenous person men women and children scalps also known as Redskins they were turned in for generous sums of money the Spencer bips Bounty awarded 50 lb Sterling for one adult male scalp what a clergyman would make in a year and lesser amounts for scalps

208of women and children in the 1800s the California native population was reduced by 2/3 in one decade through the practice of bounties when scalp bounties became too expensive other forms of extermination were enacted to rid the US of what the government deemed its Indian problem and it is essential that if susak High School insists on keeping the name Warriors that it not be associated with Native Americans This native and racist stereotype is harmful and should not be continued and that's the words you would have heard tonight good luck uh Christ [Applause] McGovern my name is Christen McGovern I live in Shrewsberry burrow and I have two kids who go to um shrewbury Elementary um tonight I'm reading a statement on behalf of Nicole Hammond who couldn't be here this evening good evening as I am

209at West York High School cheering for our Warrior swim team I thank Kristen for reading my public comment I am Nicole Hammond alumni and parent of an alumni and a current student I spoke once before on the issue of revisiting the retired logo in March 2022 at that time I spoke about the need for the school board to uphold our district Mission and the psba code of conduct I would urge you all to go back and listen not just to my comment that evening but to all of us who spoke in favor of the new logo as it is just as applicable today this time around I want to emphasize some of your own words and how disingenuous they sound now in 2022 a couple of board members shared their thoughts about the new logo

210through comments made onlinee I really don't care about the logo besides the process taken to get rid of it end quot Jennifer hangle and quote none of the logo have any real significance to me for for me this is all about the process end quot Nathan hle this sentiment was reiterated at last month's meeting meeting if the process taken to get to the AL is really the issue then deal with that develop and approve a process for the board to use in future decision- making if you really only care about the process then leave the incredible student-driven and student created work alone let it stand and reinvestigate the process to be so emphatic in your disagreement with a process and then to avoid any appearance of implementing a fair and ethical process in reopening this

211wound for our district is completely disingenuous at last month's meeting Bill Hall expressed expressed a desire for the students to have a say in the food served in our cafeterias and was happy to hear from Sue green that students were a surveyed about their choices and B part of the committee which determined the menu however Mr Hall dismissed our student rep Caroline when she suggested the same for reversing the logo decision once the initial concern over the offensive and racist Warhead logo was presented to the board committees researched and investigated they reported to the board they fact gathered pulled the students and listened to Native Americans by moving to immediately vote on reversing course this board has done nothing to listen to any of the interested parties there was a survey sent to the community

212to gauge their opinions the survey has been much maligned but it was never meant to act as a vote it was one of many tools to be used in DEC in making a decision while the survey might have been better in theory than execution has this board made an attempt to survey the community no the previous vote happened after hearing from well-respected and established groups which represent American Indian tribal governments tribal citizens and individuals these groups operate in an in an above board manner with financials that are transparent this board is only allowing one group to speak tonight as we heard and their financials history and relationships with tribal governments citizens and individuals are questionable at best this time a hasty motion was made at the January meeting in violation of the sunshine act that

213would be enough to call your quote process into question but even worse you are continuing continuing with the vote in defiance of suit filed against you use the previous process to develop a new one and move forward from there leave the offensive mascot in the past and celebrate the incredible Talent of our students and teachers by embracing what they created for our district that is the end of Nicole's comments um I have a few I just wanted to add for myself um I just wanted as some other people said tonight I am not in favor of eradicating Native American history I can't say that any of us are um no one wants to get rid of the warrior name either we just want to get rid of the warrior head that is being used we're

214proud of the name this is about showing empathy to a large group of Native Native Americans as we heard tonight who find the warrior Warrior head logo offensive we can show support to them by not using the racist logo and instead provide more educational opportunities to learn about Native Americans I loved hearing the Lang the native language that some of the presenters were using tonight let's do that in our schools let's bring that in let's bring in more education about actual history that happened and not use a racist logo thank you it not hello my name is Katie EO and I'm from New Freedom bur first and foremost this issue of the logo needs to be focused on our children and our youth to put the mask out away is respect retiring is respect for

215the past for the present and for the future it is respect for my native kids in the district and Native kids that may pass through here in the future may my kids and future native kids never have to experience this controversy that you have put my kids and family through we as a native Nation do not need to be remembered or honored through a logo there are better ways to honor and remember us most importantly this has stressed my children my nieces that are going through the district that should be enough for you to move on leave it be and move on with what matters most our kids and their education my kids are not proud to be native in this community you have made it an embarrassment for them we go everywhere else in

216the United States and they feel welcome and proud but here when we when we have to perform here my kids get incredibly nervous to get in front of all of you because they know what goes on here and how they're treated my son I noticed that that he's starting to tuck his braid in why he's gone through racism in elementary school and it was a big deal he went through sexual harassment when he was in elementary school and people tell me that we haven't experienced racism maybe I haven't but now my children are and that's why it's it's different now when when my children are going through it as opposed to when I was going here now my children are experiencing it and you only have the courage to do what you're doing because you

217are in the land of your own I encourage you to present your side to a group of all Native Americans and a group of a room of all Native Americans and see how that goes for you you may feel discouraged as I feel and as my kids and family in the district feel I hope you can someday experience what we are feeling you care so much to bring the logo back for your Public Image you have made the logo represents a political stance and it's un n in and it's proof because some of some of you are wearing t-shirts that have conservative with the logo on it you may think you know all about Native Americans but our government mandated history has failed all of you and all of us you are not educated enough

218to know what is going on in native country and Native history to represent a warrior head the truth is just now emerging about our people as the collective we are creating movements to collectively do this as a native people we now have the power to fight our image being used inappropriately and we have the power to share the truth moreover those that those of you that want to keep the mascot blindly support inaccuracies about Native people your Warrior logo support face group was in favor of aim they were sharing pictures of aim and saying good things about aim aim stands for American Indian movement aim was founded in 1968 initially centered in urban areas in order to address systematic issues of poverty discrimination and police brutality against American Indians they also be began the removal

219of the logo movement my family my son's family were deeply rooted into the aim movement his grandmother came here specifically for the aim movement and she never left and they also um marched through here years ago and the support group was sharing pictures of that um and they would be rolling in their graves now to know that a a warrior logo support group is sharing pictures of them and showing support for them because these are the type of people that they fought this is offensive to my relatives and aim who have fought so hard for our rights as native people it is my due diligence to call this support group out because the blood that runs through my veins and my kids veins is the same blood that was part of aim this is just

220one example of many I saw we are all so contradictory in your ways of fighting in for the logo you have no idea what you are sharing and you have no idea what you are doing when it comes to our culture it is offensive and ignorant you're are not native you do not know the culture the culture takes a lifetime to learn and understand you have to be immersed within us to know us to me the logo indefinitely represents our native spirituality which is essentially a religion to us the peace pipe represents prayer and praying with tobacco the logo is identity theft of the cesco hanak and you do not have their permission to use the symbol of their culture and religion you you cannot consult with them because they are gone because of your

221ancestors that brought disease and colonization that caused death and misery why would they want you representing them respect to the cesco hanak is to leave them alone and let them rest in peace most tribes have a belief that when someone passes on you don't mourn for them or have a shrine for them which is essentially the logo we want them to move on and be happy in the spirit world there are certain protocol that is done in our Ceremonies for Honor for you to say you are honoring the cesan up is unsettling because those are not our ways to be boastful everyone has five minutes and have our image be adorned you already got to keep the sacret tribal name for the name of the school and that should be enough for you to honor

222them thank [Applause] you all right um Captain John Smith Captain John Smith Captain John S Smith I'm the commander of New Freedom BFW and I'm not here to talk about your controversial Indians versus Americans versus anyone else I'm here to thank the athletic department of susc hanuk high school and especially the girls varsity and junior varsity uh basketball teams for their participation in re Across America on December 16th uh I was very proud of um I'm also uh an employee of the Southern School District as a timekeeper for most the athletic events and I presented the uh girls with a certificate of achievement I mean certificate of appreciation excuse me from from the VFW um personally I sat here for two hours listening to people going back and forth by the way board members I

223didn't vote for any of you so don't hold that against me uh the point being is um I am a firm believer in in something that was brought up um not here in in North America and not part of the North American uh traditions in north um Native America excuse me but there was a gentleman France during the French Revolution that made a statement it was copied by Thomas Jefferson and that is voler and I may not believe in what you say but I will defend with my life you're right to say it and I'd like to thank everybody and the athletic department for the opportunity to be able to work with fine young people and be able to uh support them in their athletic Endeavors thank you thank you uh Katherine [Applause] Poe I

224am heartened to know that this is my first Schoolboard meeting my kids just entered kindergarten to see such passionate representation from my fellow parents um and students um I really really appreciate uh the words that Katie shared and specifically The Bravery to talk about the experience that her kids have gone through um I work as a I'm a therapist and I specialize in adolescent mental health and I had a whole another plan on what I was going to say when I came up here but as I watched Katie disc talk about her kids experience and then I watched Mr hle not even look at her not even look at her and I will tell you what that got me to my core of the disrespect that this board has going for the people here and

225it that disheartens me and and now my child is in kindergarten and I feel like there is a battle ahead because there is some sort of weird political game being played and it's going to be at the expense of our children's mental health I am aware of the mental health struggles that your students face because I work with them I hear their fears and their pain and I know how close some of them come to Calling it Quits and I know that they're and kids that called a quits this school year and this mascot situation may seem like tradition and it might feel like warm and fuzzy feelings of the past and that Nostalgia and I can respect that I've had those experiences I had to decolonize my own history when I had attachments to

226these things in my life and I had to do it the hard way when I was working with Native Americans out in New Mexico where I got my education on the peblo which are like reservations but that's how they do it out there and it was very humbling and I made an idiot of myself a number of times and when we don't arm our children with compassionate awareness with with with the education that lets us know the actual history of the people of this land the people of this land they are eliminated they were a gen genocide was committed against them and we want to keep the trappings because it makes us feel good and that just seems gross and it scares me that I know you all have already made up your mind and

227I know that not much that I say here is going to change that but I know I am going to fight that we are going to ensure that our kids are educated in these matters because it makes better citizens and it gives them a better opportunity when they get out into the world and they don't have to look like an idiot like I did when I went out for my education and when I went out to to do my first job um trying to serve in a good way in the community to help people find Health and Wellness we got to do better by these kids and I don't have confidence that you're even willing to listen Nathan like you're not listening right now I'm writing down what you're saying it'd be better if you

228made eye contact that makes me feel heard that's part of connecting and communicating I'm done Chris [Applause] reri reri is that reri sorry CES can they go before me or do I have to go on uh we'll go in order okay oh oh oh okay we got some students sorry I didn't know who is asking yeah we can go to the students uh first student I believe we have is Amanda [Applause] Diggs good evening school board members students teachers admin NAACP HRC CNA and community members over the past four years here at susco hanock high school I have never felt a sense of acceptance or a safe and secure environment or that my thoughts are valid I am Amanda Diggs and I'm a senior here at santic high school over the past four years I

229have spoken at multiple Schoolboard meetings created a club and assisted the school in hiring practices to promote inclusivity and assist in creating the safe envir environment for other marginalized students like myself this is once again another time where the students are not feeling heard by the district for 4 years ago we opened the discussion about the old logo Not only was there an outcry of community with a petition of almost a thousand signatures in support of removing the old logo it has also fostered an unsafe environment to the students the conversation of the old logo left students divided to the extent of bullying physical violence harassment which also went beyond school grounds circulating on social media this conversation about the old logo has opened into a broader topic on human rights in the community I

230have myself been pushed into lockers called a monkey on multiple occasions and even called the ensler by bringing back the old logo it feels like the district is fostering this environment in order to continue on to a clean slate in a better time I encourage this board to proceed with the new logo this new logo has the same potential of a lasting Legacy at Susan High School it is not about how we appear to the public eye but making sure we protect the human rights of the students and not supporting an unsafe environment I also encourage the community to not only speak up but to vote during election period to assist in creating a more safe and inclusive environment thank you Rachel digs Rachel digs my name is Rachel Diggs and I'm speaking on behalf

231of Aiden Hall who's a junior at shs it is disappointing to hear that the new school board has on their agenda to stop any construction of the new high school building if it includes images of the old logo it is also disappointing that you want to bring back the old logo that has been retired and get rid of the new logo that so many students worked on at this point it doesn't seem like it's about the retired logo or new logo it's about someone getting their way please consider the students that you represent when voting tonight also what I would like to say is leave you guys with a CLI those who do not learn history are doomed to repeat it thank you Ryan Pratt um hello y'all I'm Ryan Pratt I'm speaking on behalf

232of you know keeping I mean getting rid of the wor head logo but got to tell a little bit about myself first so it was January 19 2021 16-year-old me was in a group FaceTime call and joying myself with 12 other students that attend Susy as we were in a call it was brought to our attention that our names were put in the group chat where we were called monkeys slaves referred to as the n-word while also using KKK means to degrade us and using jokes about lynching all while laughing at their racist ANS we then went to school about the situation which we were told there's nothing possible to do as it wasn't on school property whereas we would begin to hear too often the feelings of dehumanization Force silence and disappointment were all

233feelings we begin in to know as our pain wasn't being heard by coincidence racist situations were brought to our attention like clockwork which we were supposed to deal with just that sophomores in high school daily we were hearing about students of color being disrespected with slurs and other ways that degrade their importance and around that time it was also brought up that our previous Warhead logo would be getting removed when this information hit the school we were faced with an uproar of even more racism at the removal of the logo was blamed on the minorities all the problems and threats that were previously sat behind our backs were now something we were faced with as we step foot on school grounds the divide created by the removal of the warrior head Lego became a political

234one students worrying about the politics surrounding the conflict because of the community at the next board meeting we stated our opinions about the racist depiction of Native Americans to which it got removed however that was sophomore year it's now my senior and the conversation about the logo has come back into the schools however this time it's not me facing the racism it's the under classman getting harassed by their peers students scared to speak about how drastic The Divide is between students has impacted them the same feelings of dehumanization and force silence not only only on me and my friends but the Freshman sophomores and juniors who are directly under us by bringing back this logo you're declaring that southern York County School District is a racist District a district that does not care about the

235concerns of all people residing here you all will be declaring that this district is a promoting a divide amongst the students which will continue the cycle of minority students feeling unheard that started way before my time here as a newly elected board bringing this logo would be a waste of money a waste of time and a waste of power you all fought so hard to obtain it's apparent to the student body that we need help closing the Divide made by the choices you all have made to Pro promote your selfish agendas to which it is your job as the board to figure out a solution to this problem as I write this statement I remember that two years ago a sophomore version of myself wanted nothing to be a part of this Warrior family he

236wanted all things relating to the Warriors of sus hanak high school because he thought being a warrior meant persevering through life challenges and showing resilience when everyone else given up I can say now as the scene that the warrior logo never displayed these characteristics for me as our sports team warm up for game it's not the warrior logo that runs through their mind inste it's the characteristics that I just listed bringing back the war logo as a school board will only be contradicting the quote unquote family status we have here that every student is reminded of in the beginning of the school year although the word head is something that's a part of our school history we can see that times have changed and now more than ever it's time for southern York County to

237change as well so do what you must to make the change thank you and here oh here as well I also have a position a petition of other students who didn't feel comfortable speaking but their names are on here um is Victoria Jones a student she not here okay sorry good evening my name is Victoria Jones I'm a sophomore cesco hanic High School I feel that the Indian H logo is offensive and it's not a moral example of a Native American I also feel like student voices and concerns are being ignored and bringing back the Native America the native image mascot brings Division and a waste of resources there are present issues within this District that require attention and action we as a community need to address Natalie shanberg is that are you a student

238yeah okay sorry good evening my name is Natalie shamberger I'm in eth grade and I go to Southern Middle School I'm here to address the reinstatement of the susqu hanuk warrior head logo you claim that we should change our logo back to the warrior head image but I believe that that is something that is extremely unnecessary I take the stance and I believe that many of my fellow students would agree with me that changing the logo is very unnecessary we have discussed this issue in the past and we came to the conclusion that we would change our logo to our current logo the students in the past made the decision to petition against our previous logo and we resolved the issue we should not need to revisit the issue instead we should focus on bettering

239our curriculum instead of spending our time arguing like children about something that is currently fine as is and has been discussed and resolved in the past and we should start focusing on what you claim you stand for our education as an eighth grader I am ashamed to say that for the first time I had ever learned about anything about our previous logo and the history behind it it was in my geometry class this year and the only reason it was brought up was to make our math class easier and it was an acronym in the past the school board had claimed that our logo was a learning opportunity yet it was only once it was gone that I had learned anything about it none of my teachers and none of the Schoolboard had ever added

240anything into the curriculum in the schools I've attended to educate the children about our previous logo this needs to change the warrior head has been mocked and used in a condescending way I'm a part of the student body and I hear and see things that the adults that do not work inside of the building do the student body is the eyes and ears of the school and I can assure you all that the people in our schools are not kind to these sorts of issues and controversies people have made fun of and imitate the warrior head and I can assure you if I know my peers that will not change and I don't see it fair to allow that to happen you claim to be a part of the warrior community and you say you

241want to educate us but you haven't done anything so far to do so you are focusing on an issue better left alone that has been resolved you are not focusing on our education and you are not fighting for what you say you believe in you are not listening to the students in this community and we are not and we are learning not to trust you my question that I will leave you with tonight and my final statement is that I am a warrior who fights for what they believe in are you thank you Landon Harrison good evening my name is Landon Harrison and I'm a student at a senior at CS hanak high school I'm a member of the Multicultural club I'm the public relations coordinator of the alliance club and I'm also the founder

242of a genzi empowerment organization called your system our future since the beginning of the debate over the school district's logo I've stayed somewhat quiet regarding this topic as this is my first time ever speaking at a Schoolboard meeting being quiet is something I no longer want to do this debate has not only divided our school but it has also divided our community I'm up here to ask you to stop bringing up this debate knowing what it does to our school and our community I'm asking you the community to stop letting this divide us because we are better than this I'm asking my peers to stop using this topic to promote hate and discrimination because that's what's happening and I'm tired of waking up every day and coming to a divided school and I'm tired of

243leaving school every day and coming home to a divided Community I I hope everyone else feels the same way many if not all of the current school board members praise themselves on transparency where is this transparency at I'm not seeing it and the rest of the community isn't either I should be out with friends I'm 17 I should be doing homework and preparing for tomorrow school day instead I'm here asking you as elected officials to do the job that the majority of our community put trust in and elected you to do with that being said please take the time to research the organizations that you bring in front of our community to make sure that they are trust to make sure that they are trustworthy because there were so many other organizations that could have

244been that could have spoken here tonight such as the National Congress of American Indians also known as the NCI instead instead sorry I'm ashamed to say that the decisions regarding my education are made by you please do better thank you Chris rer rer yes oh wait is there one are you signed up I'm I'm I think we need to go with just who signed up for this for now because no we're going to just go with who signed up um because but we we came with we had the list before the meeting and it's a long list if if we were not well over time uh but so my name is CHR area I live in New Freedom I have two children one uh they're both in uh Southern Elementary so I was going to

245go I was actually going to cover two topics tonight but uh based on the uh feedback uh or the the research done before and I guess during the Naga presentation I'm just going to focus on the warrior head logo I'm going to read my prepared statement then I got something to say after that so regarding the warrior logo oh just so you know I wrote this as like a nonpartisan try to like work together but my opinion has changed since hearing stuff tonight uh regarding the warrior logo my wife is a commander fan and I'm familiar with the arguments on both sides while their fight involved a national if not Global recognized team subjecting our community to same ordeal has had Pro problematic results in an attempt to simplify it seems both sides of this

246debate intend to honor the Sanic tribe with opposing philosophies one is to honor by imagery and daily remembrance of their existence contributions and struggles while the other is to acknowledge the pain and suffering of Native Americans from past to present by preventing what is interpreted as exploitation tonight's agenda item 8.01 calls for the pause for retirement of the warrior head logo for 120 days for the board to assess agenda item 8.02 calls for the reinstatement of the warrior head logo to replace all current logos for all logo applications including but not limited to sports teams athl athletic activities Spirit Weare and academic needs not only do these appear to directly contradict one another but it also undermines the guidance provided by the board at the December meeting the board should heed the words of president

247hle at that meeting such as quote considering the soft costs and quote doing the right thing the right way unquote and board member Bill Hall stating that everyone's concerns quote do not fall on deaf ears both sides of this debate have good intentions I implore all stakeholders to not let this devolve into an ideological culture War where our children are the ponds please all of you take your time focus on data and sensible feedback acknowledge and compromise with each other put aside emotions get input from multiple local Native American groups properly vetted and researched and above all talk to the students and listen to the students for they are the only ones that ultimately matter in everything any of us whether it be a board member a janitor principal teacher parent superintendent bus driver in

248this school district do that's my statement the the other the other thing I wanted to touch on was I learned I I became uh more on the side of not reinstating the logo after I heard Katie speak for five minutes versus the two hours of I don't know what that was from the Naga group so and I think the only thing that she had that I mean the best thing she had everything she said was very valid and potent and I but I think the thing that should really ring home with everyone is that you using the logo is a mockery of her spirituality and their religious Customs I'm Christian I believe the majority of people in this community are Christian if I was attending a Schoolboard meeting where they were making a mockery of

249my Christian sacred rituals and I brought that up I would expect them to listen to my advice I mean listen to my concerns the fact that I've been offended and and consider take that into grave consideration everybody in this group thinks all of you have made up your minds I think you're all intelligent people people and I implore you to listen to everything you've heard tonight especially to the one that matters the most uh our Native American that that spoke here tonight Katie thank you very much Bill Walker The Walker no uh Mary nce hello my name is Mary n and I'm from Shrewsberry uh burrow um I'm this has been going on for a long time um and I did do some research and I had reached out to I know we um it

250was a wonderful speech um by our Native American Family who I do not know personally so I reached out to someone that I know personally um and he has done um if you're in the scouting World which we are um he is has done so much for this uh scouting World from um doing uh being in troops um running camps and such and I reached out to Dr Frank littlebear who is not in this District but he is in yourk County so although he's you know a he's still a little bit closer than I know what we saw tonight um I reached out to him because I wanted his feedback because I did want to do some research on my own reach out to somebody that knows a lot more about this than I do

251um I was very honored that he wrote back to me um and then he asked me to share this with you it's it's an honor to to me that he asked me uh to do that so I I do thank him um so I did ask him what does he think about Native American imagery um and this is his response to me in an email I've spoken to lots of schools that face this crisis you would think the community would want to deal with bigger issues budget education Transportation bullying at at risk kids drugs teachers and classroom support and I have to agree with that honestly we've been doing this for a long time but nevertheless here we are my thoughts as an indigenous person who grew up in the culture and earned a degree

252in the field of study I don't find the logo offensive quite the opposite in fact and he is not with nagga so just so you all know what's offensive is watching them continuously remove things that serve as cultural reminders from society and claim it's the best interest because it's offensive it's just another form of extermination you just hide it behind political correctness what did they the school do other than than keep an element of who was here before them and in some ways show pride in that remove it and generations forget about it they stop asking questions stop teaching or even wanting to learn why indigenous people fought so hard to survive to be remembered and why if nothing else as we live in the shadows of these great people Society should be forced to

253face whose land you're really on let that be a logo a statue A Relic Etc that we are not going on cannot be forgotten and if you're going to use us as a symbol then it better be founded upon the best damn principles in its representation I hope this helps please share them with please share this with them I'd like to attend but fortunately I have other obligations but I'm happy to be of servants and guidance thank you for reaching out Dr Frank littlebear Native American lecturer musician and artist um he also sent me pamphlets he does a lot of um uh Community work as well and I forgot the um to um print them up and send it to you um but I do want to say that I know we've heard a lot

254from the opposing side um and and I get that I really do but a lot of people aren't here tonight um and they came out and voted obviously because you're all sitting here the people in the community wanted you in these seats but when you're you're here and you have an opposing view and you say something and you're called a racist like I just was or when you're said or when you're said you should be ashamed of yourself then no wonder nobody wants to come out and it's sad that people don't feel that they can sit here and be and speak their minds so I just say that you all were voted by a majority of Southern York County to be in these seats no you didn't fool anybody you had a big logo on

255the billboard do what you need to do tonight vote it don't vote it that's fine but it's your time to speak and you are here put and put here by the people of Southern YK County and you will make a difference and nobody's going to be mad at that thank you all right thank you to all of our commenters um I'll just uh move on um I know we may sometimes have time for comment afterwards but that was very very long public comments I so we'll just move on to the uh next item um uh item seven the consent agenda um uh 7.01 sorry the consent agenda I'll entertain a motion to approve the consent agenda as uh as presented so move do I have a second second second wow um any discussion does anyone

256need to pull any items out for consideration any Nays or extensions that motion carries uh 7.02 extracurricular coaching and supplemental agreements um Board of Education to consider approval of the following the I thought I just made a motion to approve the whole consent agenda yeah the whole consent agenda you don't go through oh that's we need to oh sorry sorry sorry yep yep that's just uh my eyes are tired so thank you uh all right here are all right 8.01 uh item for ratification Warrior head logo um the uh oh this is youen sorry it is do we need another recess I I would really appreciate one just real quick minutes yeah so let's yeah let's take a short recess apparently I need it it's okay for a for e for l yeah e all

257right item 8.01 uh item for ratification but this is uh education report so take it away this H all right 8.01 is item for ratification Warrior head logo our solicitor already explained what that was it's an action item and so I'm going to go ahead and move to Halt the retirement of the warrior head logo including any disruption or removal of said Warrior head logo for the next 120 days giving the board appropriate time to take up the future Direction sycsd logo unless such action results in any expenditure of funds at which time the administration will notify the board immediately incorporating amendments made to the original motion and just as information this is not bringing back the logo it is just halting destruction of the warrior head logo so for clarification purposes may I have

258a second second all right do we have any discussion questions uh just yeah just really quickly discussion uh it was stated during public comment that this was contradictory with the next item and in no way is because um there with if we're listening to to public comments then item 8.02 could be it could be voted down in which case this would this would be we would have made a decision but it ALS it could also be tabled um and so this still gives us time to consider the uh the issue even table the issue if someone felt like that was necessary uh based on public comment and uh and Revisited a later board meeting without without incurring the potential cost of further destruction followed by potentially a later vote uh that might restore it um

259so there there's nothing contradictory about that that motion at all com so since it was my motion um I would like to try to make some clarification so first all uh I chose 120 days because it is not I I'm not trying to unilaterally move forward on this decision that the board needed and maybe 120 days wouldn't be adequate but the board needed the time that it would need to decide whether or not it did or did not want to take action on the retired logo and that's why I gave it 120 days but I said at the very end of that comment that I did not desire to see it drug out especially into an 8-month process because I would agree with many in public comment that we have a lot of work that

260needs to be done and it is my belief that everything that could be said has been said that's why I gave it 120 days um not with the intention of it from my perspective of it ever reaching 120 days but I can only speak for myself I cannot speak for the board and that was my purpose in asking for 120 days thanks Mr H uh I would comment on one thing you said which is um there there was a comment that uh we you know I was going to address this during the the next item but um comment that we need to make sure we're we're focused on education and we're spending too much time on this um I I I really did think that the the prior board should not have waited into this

261issue should not have spent the time that they spent on it and I think that the time they did spend as we'll get into later was was not well spent um but I would point out and Dr Bryson can confirm this we did not remove a single item from this me this month's agenda we were willing to stay here as late as it took to do everything that needed to be done in our view to to address every issue that needed to be addressed we will stay as late as it takes tonight to do that because we do take all of these things seriously we take the divide in our community seriously um I I just I as a board I I know we we take these things seriously and and you can see it

262in the fact that we didn't remove anything from this agenda nobody asked to remove anything from the agenda that was already on it placed there by the administration in fact we uh I believe people added other stuff so we we are very I'm very serious about it I know this board is very serious about it um about getting done what needs to be done on all fronts and we're willing to spend the time to do it um and I would like to agree with you in that I would have preferred to have never seen the issue brought up in the first place I I have a comment speaking specifically to 8.01 the ratification that we're doing I know that in the December 7th meeting the reason that I did vote in the positive to uphold

263um Mr Hall's uh proposal for the people that are on the side of not wanting to see the destruction of the logo and for the people on the side of wanting to see the district's decision um for the future of the of the warrior head logo the disparity the the time period between December 7th and today that would have been under the previous Ford's policy what they voted on more than 30 days to continue to go along with the destruction of the logo so I think maybe part of what isn't being understood right now is if it could be argued that we already knew what we were going to do or we already like whatever whatever that is that's still 30 days that would be subject to the previous policy's destruction so in my Minds

264based on what you were bringing to the table it's regardless of what we choose to do with the logo could we put a pause between you said 120 days to just stop for a second and of course we already talked about the fact that the um the high school sign that sted into it that not a part of it we all said okay yeah fine we understand that but just any current destruction we have under policy now as things wear out that's subjective I'm not really a fan of that but I also didn't V for it um we also have things that have disappeared that in our our minds it wasn't a part of the new building project but they're gone now let's pause that let's not do that and that's what this line item

265is about so that's just for my personal clarification it had nothing to do with bringing back the logo not well it did in the sense that it's saying halt the destruction until we can decide as a district what to do with other things so that's just my two SIDS about that does anybody else have anything else to say do we want uh Mr litz would it be prudent for us to do a roll call vote to go on record for this that's your choice I mean you second if you I'll call for a roll call vote since it's ratification and we want to be Crystal Clear who's on board who's not Nathan pinkle yes James Hol no Joe Wilson yes Elizabeth Doberman no Bill Hall yes Mary Lee Hall yes Samantha Hall yes Jeremy hash

266yes yes all right moving on to 8.02 reinstatement of the warrior head logo I move to reinstate the warrior head logo in its original form to replace all current logos for all logo applications including but not limited to sports teams athletic activities spirit wear and academic needs may I have a second second all right moving on into comments and questions um if you guys don't mind if it's okay with everybody I would like to go ahead and Kickstart those comments um it's not an easy thing and we are listening I am listening I do want to try to normalize the thoughts and opinions of perhaps a side that wasn't represented today the thoughts and opinions of all the emails that we got and by my count we were at 150ish um and what it what

267it's like to you know we it's okay it's the job I don't take offense and I've certainly been on the other side before and I've said some harsh words and I I don't I don't mind the harsh words um but I can see why people would not want to stand at that Podium and give their support to a logo when they've been called colonizers people who are participating openly in discrimination and racist and then at the same time be called a coward if you have a difference of opinion this isn't easy to do I'm going to do it I'm not Howard so for the 2020 2021 process history I've received feedback from some who are not in support of reinstating the warrior head logo citing among other things the 2-year process and all its history

268of petitions subcommittees diversity report presentations as evidence that this was a carefully wellth thought out process that the community should take pride in and a method to criticize whatever potential decision May accom about tonight because it might not follow a similar approach and that's feedback that I actually think we need to address so here's a quick overview of highlights of the past process June 2020 The Prompt we constantly hear that this was a student Le effort to retire the logo let me dispel this theory for you as is now confirmed by our district two letters two where two were the start of all of this one letter received in June of 2020 from a past graduate and one email received a month later in July of 2020 by a then current student how many letters

269were there complaining about the offensiveness of the logo prior to 2020 any guesses Zero from the 1950s to May of 2020 zero letters stating this it's important to note our district did experience a period of History where we changed the logo from a chief to a warrior per the recommendations of local local Native American input but those changes and exchanges were never made because of Any claimed offense simply their aim was to help the district achieve a more accurate Warrior so it's 2020 and we have two letters one from a former graduate and one from a current student since the previous board essentially disregarded the input of the alumni on the matter entirely one could argue they decided to take up the issue of retiring the logo because of one then current student email and

270i' like to pause here for a second just so everybody can understand I believe it is fitting and good for any student to voice any concern they have with the school board my point in bringing up the history and the number of emails is by no means a reflection of any disrespect I hold in my heart towards anyone who engages in their civic right to voice their opinion instead it is to be crystal clear and factual about the foundation of the warrior head logo inquiry that brings us to July 24th 2020 two change.org petitions are created the change.org petition started by a recent graduate at that time to get rid of the warrior head logo received 640 signatures as reported by the ydr in August of 2020 it's important to note there's a couple hundred

271more uh since that time another petition created on the same day in favor of keeping the logo was reported in that same yd article with more than 3,640 signatures also important to note that numberers up the previous board president went on record during board discussion that the board was not considering online petitions because no one can vet who is signing them and where they're coming from fair enough the logic discounts the retirement P petition which had 3,000 fewer signatures anyway August 20 2020 during the most extensive covid protocols our district would experience the board decided to take up the logo issue during a regular board meeting no in-person learning no inperson board meetings the board takes up this issue due to two emails in fact one Whatever concerns our district is currently going through in

2722024 and we've got a great deal we're going through I think we can all agree nothing was as upsetting to our district in its day-to-day operations for staff teachers students and parents as Co disruptions families had health struggles fear of a virus civil unrest jobs were suspended many lost forever it was a dark time for our district April 6th 2021 the district survey presented to our community it was emailed to stakeholders on April 6th and the responses were collected throughout April 9th 3,324 total responses 1,667 former students in alumni 1,244 current parents of St of students 229 current employees 553 current students current direct stakeholders at that time were the largest respondents not alumni current parents current students current staff it asked three questions one the importance of the warrior head logo to the community

27372.6 respondents said it was important 62% 62.4% of current students said it was important current students two the importance of the perspectives of Native americansamerican Indians to which 58.7% felt it should factor into their decision and here's where the survey bias comes in of course the questionnaire did not inform the participants that if they indicated to any degree that perspectives of Native American should be factored in that the board would then go to only one Native American representative organization the ncii who is well documented in their recommendations against logos like ours get their opinion that the logo must be retired and then come back to the community with a false premise that well the community said they wanted to hear Native American voices here's what they said we asked them we've heard here today that

274this is not true that Native American voices are a Collective and agree with everything and frankly that's incredibly insulting three should the logo be retired the survey presentation then interacts with information about that very question should the current logo be retired it reported as follows more than one in five responders believes the logo should be retired due to its insensitive nature the bias is of course in the framing more than in five believe the logo should be retired I asked this board what's another way of saying the same statistic almost four and five people say keep the logo an overwhelming majority say keep the logo a very small minority say get rid of the logo it's all in the way you present something isn't it don't get me wrong I absolutely love the results of

275this survey I'm just pointing out that even when the district tried to steer an influence the outcome still couldn't be done the district's own survey supported the retention of the logo and the previous board ignored this brings us to March 18 2021 the diversity report it's presented during a regular board meeting the single most important part of this report in my mind is the section that indicates that there is no Native American consensus on the topic of logos this is our own diversity report done case closed of course it also tries to use the faulty fryberg study I believe Naga had already talked about and the Preposterous claimed that the Sanic tribe didn't live here incidentally I was the one that asked Naga if they had received an invite to present they did not get

276an invitation to present as a private citizen I'm not I I'm not going to belver my point now because as a private citizen I think I've added Ely been on record with my contempt for the diversity pport March 25th 2021 a week later the National Congress of American Indians gave their presentation to our district during a special meeting it's important to note that this was held entirely virtually and no public comments or in-person interactions with the board were made also of note this video can still be accessed and it can still stand as a record of what the NCI recommendations to our district said incidentally the NCI during that presentation cautioned our district to take our time three weeks later the board voted to get rid of the Loco also of note it was a

2777 to2 vote so that's the timeline a few extra details I think are important as documentation through this experience letters to the board the outpouring of support to keep the warrior head logo is well substantiated during this entire Pro throughout process both then and now and even this pre this uh even the previous board who retired it admitted the numbers in support versus against weren't even close former board director Bruce Balman is on record stating the disparity the new board has now experienced the same with this new round of emails we had a huge response rate I showed you before and almost entirely for bringing back the logo very few in comparison and in raw numbers indicated a objections to the warrior head logo and I would also like to say that part of the

278reason our emails can be used against us is because we do in fact send them over 120 130 emails and I personally responded to each and every one of them media recent interviews testimonies a few days ago a news Outlet interviewed various people offended by the logo and who reported that the logo allegedly was left off a single yearbook cover at some point in the past and then tried to substantiate based on that allegation that Native American logos were never really a part of the district's history I'm not sure that the board I'm not sure that board members that even voted to retire the logo would try to make such a bold claim that the logo wasn't an established part of the district's history it was a pleasure to watch in real time the alumni

279respond to this claim and document pictures of their yearbooks jackets rings and other spirit wear dating all the way back to the early 1950s Faithfully tracing Native American representations all through the last class that was allowed to use the logo after 2020 it was one thing to take the historic logo away it was quite another thing entirely to attempt to Gaslight the entire alumni and suggest that the logo that they love was not a part of their Collective history and that it never existed to begin with in my mind I wonder why we had to retire it at all if it didn't exist but that's just me I guess it's all fair game when you add the diversity reports even more egregious claim that the Sanic tribe never lived in southern York County despite all

280evidence to the contrary including the works cited in the diversity report I'm still scratching my head about that one but I'm still expected to to trust the process of the previous board and extol its process as the standard by which everything else should be approached let me be frank I expect that stakeholders who agreed with the previous board's final decision will Al like the previous board's method I expect stakeholders who who will agree with whatever this new board decides would like our process I sympathize I've been there I get it the plea from a few that we need to input that we need to receive input from current students not a single current student emailed the board this go round complaining about the warrior head logo coming back few have done so in the past

281not a single current student emailed the board asking to keep the W the arrow or the S conversely we did receive letters from current students in our district supporting the return of the warrior head logo Additionally the vast majority of current students were included in the district's previous survey already and a solid majority indicated the warrior head logo was important to them they have been surveyed we've only added three graduating classes to the alumni since the logo change the past Community survey is only nullified in my mind if you can convince me that this is now a kindergarten first grade and second grade initiative driving the charge that the warrior head logo is offensive sorry I don't believe it elections surveys emails Community feedback every time this issue comes up the results are the same

282every time overwhelmingly the community wants it back we've experienced two election cycle since its retirement and it's still not going away people on the other side seem surprised that it's still an issue it's possible they may have completely underestimated this community's unbelievable passion and Devotion to the warrior head logo it's not going away every single board member who voted to retire the logo but one has either lost their election or chose not to run for reelection every single candidate not previously on the board who ran opposing the warrior head return has lost the majority Community has spoken on this issue loud and clear you might not like the results but here we are in closing the warrior head logo actually is not the most important thing facing our district and I did not personally care

283about the warrior head logo it was the process it was the way that it was handled it was the way that it was ignored the other side and it was the divisive racism and colon izers and it's just not right to be calling that to judge other people's hearts and Minds this is why I don't want to drag out the process it's not the most important thing we're facing but it is an important item that needs correcting in my opinion I'd like to fix it now and move on and that's my bit um yeah can I speak really quickly because it is curfew and I do need to get home um I just would like to point put it excuse me I would like to put it out there that um although this has become

284a big Community issue um it is and a lot of students say you know they don't care about the logo and it doesn't impact them um whether or not the Boyer head is our logo or not the fact that this is still an ongoing debate is continuing to impact the students today I was sitting at my lunch table and I stood up and there were students who instead of sitting and eating their lunch and taking their break that they get from their their one break a day they get from their classes they were walking around getting students to sign their petitions to bring them into the Schoolboard meeting today and I sit in class and I hear students discussing this issue instead of you know trying to learn AP Calculus and I just I think

285for the good of the students it's good to just put this to rest I was sitting in a freshman chemistry class today helping being a teachers assistant and these freshman students struggle to do basic algebra some of them so I think distracting them with these other issues which you may not be doing purposefully it's still distracting them from what's important which is school and getting ready for after school not whether they can be represented by a w or Warrior head so thank you Mr um uh on on that note um that is for me one of the reasons that I am happy that this item is on tonight's agenda rather than some some later agenda because we have two uh two problems here one is the the effect that continuing to fight and struggle over

286this has but the other is the the gaping wound in our community from the Lost trust I mean I visited thousands of people at their homes and there is certainly lost trust over this and other issues um and we can't ignore that wound but we also do not want to drag things out unnecessarily uh and I am I am senstive with the idea of not dragging things out um so I I don't think we should drag this out I think that unless there's a compelling reason uh we should should act swiftly on this um at at moment that's what I intend to do um so um I want to address a couple other things um one uh people complained that I was writing things down as people were speaking I'm not going to apologize for

287that uh I am not your therapist I a policy maker and so I'm going to take I mean if you want me to not act on anything you say then I'll stop taking notes and if you'd like me if if you want to tell me up front look I don't actually want you to act on anything I'm saying I don't want you to actually consider it Beyond an hour from now when you'll have forgotten my words I just want you to to empathize with me right now and then it will be gone into The Ether uh because you'll forget it if that's what you want just tell me that up front at the beginning of your public comment I want you to stop silencing the community uh I've we listen to a couple hours of

288public comment and we did not silence anyone we I let many people go past their time and also you are out of order point of order thank you um I'd also like to make some comment um I can relate to what Jen said uh and and many people in the room at standing at that podium in a different room and giving endless comment many times about this very issue um and not feeling like I Was Heard um but I would like to say that although I may not agree with what you say or maybe I do agree with what you say I'm listening to everyone um and quantifying listening to you is not agreen that's that that listening is taking every everyone's opinion and I think that the opinion represented in in the schools um

289survey uh although not scientific because it couldn't really reach out to the the masses um coming back at you know 80% desire I think there would be 80% of the people who would say you didn't listen and 20% of the people would say you did listen so then the question becomes who do you listen to who this is America we live in a representative Republic and as Representatives it is our job to represent our district it was this is a passionate issue for me and if you've been coming to board meetings for a long time you already know that I've spoken about it probably more than any other issue and it was important to me in the political process I understand not functioning at the moment as a political entity however arriving at one of

290these chairs is a political process the one cannot be separated from the other and in that process it was very important to me to be as open and clear with the community about what my intentions were I know many on the on this current board felt the same way that's why there were enormous representations of the susco hanok warrior logo currently retired in every piece of campaign literature we did every everywhere that we went we put it out there because we wanted the community to truly have the ability to have their opinion heard at that point 50 5500 people in the community chose to say this issue is important enough to me that I want my voice heard and out of those 5,500 people the majority spoke that they wanted us sitting in these chairs

291and I feel and I am compelled by those who voted for me to listen to what they said and what the majority spoke I would also say that the logo transcends the school it really does and that's not specific to Southern nework County in my years of coaching for 19 20 years many many many teams out there choose to use the representation of their District to represent their team um my my son uh played for um the Trojans which is York Suburban so he he goes and he plays for that team and every team there is the trojes they're all in the same color as the school and they identify with the school because that is their Community I would say that that is the same in Southern New York County you don't need to

292look far when you're traveling around our streets to see syc uh this sport that sport the other sport still to this day using the warrior head logo in their advertisements it represents our community and it represents the students in our school currently yes but it also represents over 60 years of students who graduated from this school and as was spoken earlier there was never a a thing spoken of prior to this for all of those years and years and years of alumni and I would say that as I also went out and knocked on more doors than I could ever remember individual after individual after individual wanted to see the warrior logo returned I agree with Caroline I would love to see it brought to a conclusion this evening I would love to actually have

293the community's opinion represented in a logo that represents the community all right and U I had I had some more to say but I was interrupted um so I wanted to address a few different points um Mr Sangle so uh one of the things that was raised was we didn't like the process so it it was noted that uh I didn't care about the I didn't I didn't graduate from Susan this wasn't the logo that I had and so so at that level I don't care but I do care about what the community wants I live here now and I do care about what the community wants so if the community overwhelmingly wanted a change I would be okay with that I wouldn't I wouldn't be nostalgic I don't have Nostalgia about it although that's

294growing over time um but you know the the the process was flawed fixing the process doesn't fix the flawed decision made by the process so uh if I'm not sure we have a defined process for evaluating logos at this point um if that becomes a common issue maybe we'll look at a formalized process but no it was the the process was flawed and it came to a flawed decision um so I wanted to deal with a couple additional issues of diversity report as Mrs H pointed out uh it came to the astonishing claim that the suquan Indians never lived here I just wanted to really pin it down sus uh one of the one of the uh sources of the diversity Reports say Sanic Villages found in Pennsylvania have been all located have all been

295located along the sasana River from the New York border to the Lower sasana Valley um it goes on but I would note that the Lower sasana Valley includes all of York County so their own sources contradicted them um then it concludes despite local folklore and so is this a is this a good process that that tries to trick people based on false claims despite local folk laar in Legend current research findings demonstrate that there's no evidence that the Sanic Indians lived in or around municipalities that comprise the southern York County School District I mean why did they have to lie if this was a a an upfront process or or I mean I guess I hate to accuse them ly but how do you come up with that how do you read those sources how

296do you state some of the things cuz some of these things were directly stated in the report and come to that conclusion um so I you know that was the shoty scholarship made me embarrassed to have the report on the school website and so to my relief all the links to the report had already been removed by the time I asked the administration uh if it was still present anywhere and now it's been entirely removed so that's uh that's a good thing because it was it was not scholarship that made me proud of our school um the fryberg study was referenced multiple times um and then also the uh 90% uh survey uh that Naga uh referenced I would like to just clarify the survey that Naga was referencing was not their own survey it

297was a survey conducted by The Washington Post which is a an experienced organization at at at at uh performing surveys and polls 54 is also uh a common number for election polls that have a margin of error of 3 or 4% um so 90% okay maybe you could say well maybe it was 85 you know margin of error um still overwhelming majority uh whereas the fryberg study um that instead of using a random sample which The Washington Post study used it dramatically undersampled certain groups men were only represented at 31% how do you do that how do you do that by accident men are half of the population why were they only represented 31% and that was not the only group that was uh that was under represented uh by its uh membership in the

298population um it that's just the most egregious one um so anyway I I did read a lot of these material so I wanted to pull out the case against the warrior logo I drew it uh I saw it in many forms but I drew some specific language from a letter we received from the Native American rights fund let me back up really quickly I was uh it was brought up that I turned down the uh Coalition of Natives and allies they only emailed us a few days it I think it was less than a week before the meeting about presenting so it was not nearly as long before Additionally the uh it was it was suggested that we decided that Naga should be invited in fact the old board indicated that Naga should be invited

299that was in the diversity report um Naga was not invited in fact there was an email sent to a low-level part-time employee of Naga uh in response to something that did not give any kind of invitation and the low-level parttime employee didn't respond but there was never an email sent I've asked for the emails from our district there was never email sent to naga's primary email address the reason I didn't have any trouble getting in touch with them is because I Googled Naga Native American Guardians Association I looked at contact and then I contacted them and they got right back to me so the effort could not have been robust uh and in fact from my research was not um anyway and and and the reasons I so they said they have the email the

300reasons I gave the Coalition of Naas and allies in addition to the fact that it was very short notice um is that I felt like we can't actually have every organization who'd like to speak on this topic speak so the fairest thing to me seemed to be well one organization was supposed to be invited per the old board and was not so I thought well we should invite them and then we'll have heard two perspectives on the subject we can't hear from every group that would like to give a perspective on the subject in the interest of time so I thought well that seems like the fairest thing is to give each side their say their their hearing um Mr president I call the question well what what sorry you don't know what that is

301he wants to call for a vote he's asking that they vote and we End discussion oh oh sorry um yeah um um can we vote on on that because I feel like board members should have a understood the only thing I'd suggest ma'am ma'am yeah you're out of order you got you got a lot of stuff on your agenda here folks in 11:15 so yeah so we'll we'll we'll try to wrap it up I would encourage you to all right um uh but we we we have a call question so let's let's vote uh are we ending discussion Mr Hall I feel that if if someone else wants to speak they should have the right to speak if no one else does then we can End discussion should have the right to speak I just

302have one thing to say and it's definitely not very long um but I I was in the middle so we vote whether we're ending discussion uh are we ending discussion no we well we need to resolve the the call the question discussion we have to resolve so we need to resolve this motion to discussion all right call the question motion I'll take Mr H is there a second Mr H's motion call question sorry okay second all right vote there's no discussion vote vote to discussion I uh no M Hall no M Au yes M Hall no no no no no all right motion we will try to wrap it up uh fairly quickly um so the the argument from the Native American rights fund uh the argument was the logos portraying Native Americans and they

303didn't they didn't say uniformly but they just said logos portraying Native Americans present quote an ahistorical and characterized image of native people supporting narratives of native violence ferociousness and savagery um and they they go on to say that well one they complate MC cuts and logos um their analysis primarily based on evaluations of historical rather than current attitudes and it makes no accommodations for Logos being potentially different from one another makes no accommodations for differences from one Community to another it's just a blanket statement that takes none of the particulars into account so I did want to cover really quickly they they claim that that this logo reinforces certain perspectives certain views of Native Americans I I got like like Mrs hle said there were hundreds of emails um or at least well over 100

304emails so these were the words that that I saw over and over that represented how people felt about the logo in this Community Pride 35 times honor 20 times strength 13 times bravery courage eight times Heritage five tradition five respect reverence four loyalty three I have not seen anything about viciousness savagery haven't seen it yet um loyalty three distinguished signifi two Mighty two virtue one love one commitment one resourceful one Integrity one hard work one attitude all the rest are one attitude camaraderie fight Fierce okay so we did have a little bit of of you know pushing that Marshal direction from like one person uh courteous power determination sacred spiritual family cherish character leadership heart protector toughness moral certitude growthmed peace so so I would say yeah you're out of board um is is the

305audience supposed to be calling if you keep calling out we'll have we'll have to have you removed um we're trying to get the business done um so uh this they're making an astonishing set of generalizations um and they take no account of the fact that what may be actually going on here is not that the logo promotes a stereotype but rather that there's a narrative that it does and guess what the narrative that it promotes a stereotype can be just just as harmful to the people who believe that narrative as if it were actually true so if you say this logo produces a stereotype in the minds of community members that you are Savage and vicious and fierce I'm not seeing it I mean I saw one fierce but Savage you know these kinds of

306adjectives that I never saw that narrative is going to be harmful so let's be real let's be real about how people actually see this their motives and what they're actually trying to do here so you can think they're wrong and I would say if you think they're wrong here here here here is my comment point of order point of order so I would say that what what's going on here is is the entire argument is based on hearts and Minds okay so um you know I would say that hearts and Minds can't easily be changed by da Dawning your Jack Boots and demanding it so what you have to do if you want people to feel differently you need to convince them you don't force it on them when the overwhelming majority of the community

307feel is is believes this logo is is honoring you need to convince them not try to force it upon them so so point of order point of order order um so one more thing and I'm sorry there's just so much here but it was was stated that we were throwing away the work of the students who worked on the the arob based and Schoolhouse logos and I'll have some comments I I don't want to throw away any work from any student so any representations of that logo I'm not saying we're voting on this now but my view would be we keep them I'm not for tearing down history I'm not for throwing away history I say if someone made a beautiful art of the the W logo the warrior with the arrow or uh or

308the schoolhouse logo we can keep those physical I think we can keep those physical artifacts but let's not pretend we weren't throwing things away when we retired this this was sent home to a student from 2012 I met him while I was campusing and he said the school sent this to me because they didn't want it anymore so student contributions are potentially at risk either way and I believe we should hold on to them as many of them as we can while still having a unified logo within the district all right I'm done so so I just had one um short um thought in reference to the logo I'm certainly a heartfelt woman I hear everyone I am touched by everyone's time and what they've bought to this evening this has been an ongoing issue

309and I I see things differently and in the years of race pit against race and hurt and language being used incorrectly I'm I'm being reminded of critical race Theory and that is not something that our school condones or teaches by any means but in all of the communication critical race theory has an aggressive force in academic circles it dismantles social structures feeds disunity intensifies ethnic hostility ident identity politics institutes resentment creates guilt or victimhood for people according to their skin color words have been used like systematic racism implicit bias privilege cultural appropriation microaggression and social justice the truth about race is that we're all one people group we're all one human race with beautiful variations and diversity in all kinds of characteristics and these are what make us each unique and equipped to use our

310gifts and talents for the benefits of all all strengthening our resolve and determination to succeed not driving us apart are there some that will say things they shouldn't yes are there those that will try to capitalize on these learning opportunities to create unrest unfortunately yes but I choose to see the wonderful blessing from the Native Americans that gave us our beloved Warrior many years ago and restore the respected piece excuse me the respected place of position deserving of the historical significance and strength of the name Warrior for sycsd and those are my thoughts um I do sorry I have just one more thing I have to add um uh I I wanted to let everyone know because it was raised by both sides uh in both emails and public comment that um I am and

311was before this meeting pursuing what we do on the front of Education in this school district and what I found was the previous board did not take any specific action on that so they they eliminated the logo and then they took no specific action uh to advance Native American Education I've already connected with uh Bob and Len about what we have there have been some improvements to our curriculum but they I I don't think there's a concentrated effort at this time uh and I did bring up to the idea you know the bbard there was talk about putting a you know a museum in the schoolhouse I talked about putting a center in the library because I think in the schoolhouse they're not students aren't going to see it but I think we want to

312have something in the library where students can learn about historical and current uh Native American issues uh and I've already asked to to start looking into that Len is already looking into that for me what we can do on that front so I do take that issue seriously I think we do need to have uh robust education about local native tribes uh including sasoh hanic and others um and uh and I'm taking that seriously um and that's now my comments are complete so I did have a comment and I was going to actually just let it go because it's really really not going to matter um but I said the last time I voted for the logo change I was on the fence with my decision I listen to every public comment leaning one way

313and then leaning the other because I really really didn't know where I stood I never thought I would vote against that old logo near the end a Native American parents spoke she and her sister have children in our school district she told us how the face of the logo was offensive to the Native Americans not the warrior name she offered to help the district research the cesano tribe and create a new logo honoring the ssan tribe without the face this was the deciding moment for me me she honestly was one of the few of us that can have an opinion on this matter the logo never bothered me before this point but looking through her eyes I understood and needed to be updated it is most upsetting to me that you will let others from

314other states and other school districts persuade you that oh it's not offensive but the one parent that goes to her school district spoke and told you it is offensive to her family but it doesn't matter you're still going to vote for that logo so I agree with what Caroline said we are still Warriors no matter what the logo is and we do not need that Warrior head to say that we are a warrior I think we need to vote because we've spent an hour on this one agenda item and I think it's just get I would like to just interject a snippet and I agree I think that we we've heard it from so many speakers tonight that education needs to be a priority American Indian education I saw the curriculum K through 12 and

315it was sad we should be doing so much better in that area even if we have the susano name on the building we need to do much better um that's my commitment to this um and I I hear you I know there is some racis racism problems in our schools I've worked with other families to try to work with them to make sure their children are taken care of I take it very seriously so um and honestly look this logo is not the most important thing on this agenda I know we heard that when we started out here it is not the most important thing on this agenda tonight that's two items down two items or is it three three items down so I just have that's I want to say one only thing um

316just to respond to what you were saying Mrs Doberman I hear you I mean the thing that I struggle with the most is hearing people that are in pain what was told to me when we let the logo go the last time is if anyone person is offended shouldn't we let it go we cannot make decisions that way I've already had three emails from people that say that the warrior logo that we have now looks like a violent weapon we can't make decisions based on offense because somebody's always going to be offended the internal belonging that we have comes from within I I can be as welcoming as I want to be I'm welcoming to everybody out here I've heard some very harsh words today that sense of belonging comes from within in each of

317us and we can't do anything to make that for somebody else so I I hear that I struggle with it this is probably by far one of the hardest things but I just know that the precedent that we sent that if even one person is offended we can't do it then that will never Foster discussion for us as a community ever to be able to get to a point where we're not calling each other names so I the last thing that I wanted to say is that as Schoolboard members we took an oath to obey the Constitution and the United States of America and in Pennsylvania in our Commonwealth and we are to discharge our duties with Fidelity and I can tell you sitting up here it's not an easy thing to be able to

318do that it's not cowardice to come up here and look at everybody and be able to respond to every every comment we are doing what it is that we feel that the people that elected us and put us in these seats ask us to do and you can disagree with it but you just have to appreciate that this is what we feel our call is I was voted in because of this we have other people that were voted in because of this it's a very strong message so that's all I want to say and I just I do thank you all for being here I do hope when we see each other out in the streets that we can be kind to each other even if we disagree I don't have any unkind words for

319anybody in here I'm happy that you showed up but I just ask for the diversity that we say that we celebrate for diversity of thought to be respected thank you is there any more discussion is that it all righty so we had a mo we I moved and we had a second um I would like to request obviously a roll call vote James Hing no Joe Wilson yes Elizabeth Doberman NOP Bill Hall yes Mar Lee Hall yes Samantha Hall yes Jeremy H yes yes yes all right moving on to 8.03 can I ask one question um Mr litz can I just ask like obviously this one needed to be a roll call vote but do we need to do a roll call vote for every single one because if if I would say Nay it's

320going to show no and if you wanted to make a motion to approve 8.3 through 8.09 that too but I but I mean like if I just say nay we don't need to do a roll call no you don't have to do a roll call that's all ask request one because it's just yeah all right 8.03 um posting the proposed District comprehensive plan 2024 to 2027 for your information just to let you know this is not approving the plan this is just approving to post it to make it live and so I'm going to go ahead and hand it over to Dr rer uh thank you Mr hankle as we mentioned during the presentation uh this this item here was just said it'll be posted for 28 days uh we will come back in February

321for any questions uh that the board may have or the public uh that would have shared with the board and then that way we can answer any of those questions regarding the comprehensive plan make any of those revisions so that when we go to the March uh board meeting we'll be approving the district comprehension plan set you done that's it you got it all righty so I go ahead and move to approve posting the proposed District comprehensive plan 2024 2027 through 2027 on the district website for public review for 28 days approval of the plan will be requested at the March 2024 meeting um may I have a second second all right do we have any discussion do we have any Nays or extensions hearing none the motion carries 8.04 is the revised District health

322and safety plan for 2023 2024 I move to approve the revised dist District health and safety plan for the 2023 2024 Year may I have a second second are there any disc discussion items from anybody any questions yeah um so looking through this plan um there there are so many things in this plan uh relating to quarantining social distancing uh many other things that we are not currently actually doing um that I'm not comfortable approving this plan at all um I think we need some pretty massive changes um to at least reflect current practice of the board or current practice in the school um and and and so once we have something that maybe reflects current practice then we can then we can have an idea of what policy changes might be needed I don't

323even know what changes to make because I don't know what we're doing now um and and the changes would be extensive so I'm going to move to table uh this item until the February meeting uh because I don't I'm I'm not I don't feel like we need to vote it down I do want to address it um but just I can't I can't get on board with what we have right now because it's not at all reflective of current practice did you move I'm sorry I moved to table it okay do I have a second second Mr President yeah I I do have a a followup question as I worked with Mrs Hall regarding the wording of the current revision um I'd be willing to work with uh Mrs hankle if there are any specific

324uh spefic specific components in the current plan so that when we come to the February board meeting we can already have that uh the revision yeah I'm fine with that motion in second so we have motion and second to table um any discussion any discussion of the motion to table any oh sorry I I mean I yeah go ahead did you motion yeah any or exensions all right that motion carries that that table go ahead so that brings us to 8.05 the 2022 2023 academic achievement data update um this is for public information and I'm going to go ahead and hand it over to Dr refer thank you Mrs hankle uh school board at this time of the year is when we share the academic data uh some may ask why it's being shared in

325January as opposed to earlier in the year uh as a district we we receive uh the proficiencies for the pssas as well as the keystones that come over the summer uh but the other component that we don't receive until November is the projection report the growth report which comes in November uh so as we take a look and compile all the data uh it gives us an opportunity then in January in order to review that because December with reorganization and many of you being elected coming into to the board uh it would be moved us to you know do this in January uh one question that was brought up in looking at the uh data and speaking with Mrs hankle uh we did want to provide uh in what was posted was the 20 let

326make sure I get this right the 2020 2021 through the 2022 2023 data three years of data uh but at the request of the board we did include the 2018 2019 data which is PR pre pandemic so cat would you mind please pulling that document up that has the four years of data please no not Keystone it's the one that not P there it is right there there's one right there okay we Chang I changed it up um so just some talking points by looking at the data for the school board members I did provide you with uh the updated uh version of this um as we take a look at the data um that includes the 2018 prepandemic as well as the 2020 2021 hybrid uh data and then the 2021 22 22 23

327post pandemic data uh one thing we wanted I wanted to share with you as we take a look at proficiency specifically there's a lot of factors that are uh that influence the overall performance when we're looking at that uh but one of the in one of the implications when we look specifically at data that has a negative impact is what we call opt outs uh parents do have an opportunity to opt their child out uh due to chapter 4 religious reasons uh when it comes to looking at their state assessments and uh some some of the data I wanted to share um from 1819 um between the elementary and the middle school we had 23 students opt out you might say well Dr reford that's 23 students out of about 1,400 but even that 1

3281.3% to 2.2% doeses have an impact when we came back during that hybrid school year of the 2020 2021 at the elementary level we had 110 out of 9910 students that took the assessment 12% 12 .1% of the students opted out of the assessment the reason why I bring that up and I as we look at that those have an impact on your overall proficiency because they do not count those scores have a negative impact on your overall proficiency account is not proficient if they don't take the test correct oh wow um so some of the other things I I did want to point out um students that are enrolled that were enrolled in algebra during the 2019 2020 school year so if you recall we started that school year and then the pandemic hit

329in March okay students enrolled in algebra algebra is also one of the three Keystone assessed areas that students need to uh need to take if students any students that were in that algebra during the 2019 2020 school year what occurred is they did not receive a score the state gave them a proficient tag as I called it but they did not get a score so when you look at the results I want to take if you look specifically at the 2023 math for the high school for the high school that is based on the senior that took that assessment so when you look at that 47.4% that's when those students at the high school took algebra go you you go back four years they were in nth grade when you had 89 of those students

330of the 2011 of that class took that assessment I mean did not take that assessment if you're following me they did not get a score that had a a negative impact on the results so if you're looking across at the at the high school just specifically with math you'll see an 82.3 a 69.4 an 86.4 and a 47.4 you're like okay what what happened there because they did not take that test they got a proficient that helps them for their graduation but because they didn't receive a score it had a negative impact on the overall results and as we looked at results throughout the county regarding the math at the high school level you can specifically see that each of those schools has a major drop for a one year based on when those students

331took the uh the Keystone algebra so I didn't want to share that because I know when Dr Bryson and I were initially looking at it that was that first thing that really jumped out at us can can you give us the um and not not right this moment but can you give us those percentages that opted out yeah yeah I will if if uh if you want me to read those I'll go through them right now for you have to read them um follow for for future reference I want to take those and calculate what it would be if if we just ignore those because this is an inaccurate picture that will also be an inaccurate picture because it'll contain selection bias but some two inaccurate estimates that blank an accurate estimate are are more

332useful than just one inaccurate estimate that's that's biased in One Direction uh the other thing I wanted to share is State averages um in that gray column on the in the very bottom you can see starting from the 201819 up through 2022 to 2023 that the state averages in the four assessed in the three assessed areas you see a decrease because it's consistent across the entire state that there has been a decrease in there and just a couple things to point out to the board uh our elementary remained above the state area I mean above the state average for all four years in all three of the assessments the ELA math and the fourth grade pssa so I do want to point that out they they remain even though you might see a little fluctuation

333with the scores they still remained above there uh the Middle School remained above the state average in ela for 3 years remained above the state average in math for one of the years and then for the e8th grade science for three of the years uh above the state average and in the high school um just as I indicated with the elementary had remained above the state average for the four years regarding the n9th grade Keystone algebra the 10th grade English Lit key as well as the 10th grade biology ol uh couple other items to note um that in ela specifically the elementary and the middle school had to adopt a new curriculum as a result of the common core standards that were implemented several years ago and we are starting to see now a consistent

334uh level of instruction across grade level and across schools so whereas Shrewsberry I'm going to go elementary Shrewsberry friendship Southern they had the same curriculum map but they might have been us utilizing different resources now when you're looking at the uh the program that has been approved there's consistency so when there's discussion between the staff members uh during their team meetings during their grade level meetings now they're talking apples to apples as opposed to uh uh apples and oranges uh the same thing thing occurs with the uh as I'm looking at math at the year of the pandemic the 2020 2021 we adopted a new math program ready math so we had summer training we had professional development spread out through that first three quarters of the year and the pandemic hit so that's another

335component because even though we've adopted you I mean the state adopted to new Ma standards several years ago this program has provided us more with a standards based instruction so that we are teaching the students or providing instruction of what they need to be successful uh another note is that regarding the math is with algebra we have students you would think algebra's high school but we have students that take it seventh and eth grade at at the middle school level uh so that is something that is spread throughout and for students that may not have tested proficient in our Keystone algebra of course in Geometry was which is that next level in the sequence of math uh that first quarter the first part of that is heavily ladened in algebra so that gives the students

336the ability that if they're continuing to see that content that when they retake those keystones in the winter they have that freshness with them as opposed to diving directly into a geomet full on the geometry course um the pssa is currently in uh fourth grade and e8th grade just to note to the board that uh the pssa at the elementary level will be moving to the fifth grade in uh two years uh will be be the assessment and our high school assesses in the biology uh for the 10th grade uh but prior to the the adoption of the new science program our teachers have been utilizing the curriculum as the guide but then also having to pull resources from the Pennsylvania standards aligned system you know the item Samplers as we call them it's types

337of questions that would be asked you know maybe on the assessment but we want those teachers to be asking those questions on a daily basis to really have our students be more critical thinkers as we're moving forward uh one of the uh charges so to speak for the for for our administrators uh continue to focus on those grade level teams focusing on the local data having this discussion on a regular basis because what we have seen is growth occurs through collaboration and the more teachers are collaborating uh about how their students performing taking a look at what students are doing well but this group of students may not be performing well well in a concept with math or with Ela or with science having small group instruction uh you'll hear you may hear the term

338station rotation where the teacher will have two or three stations that are occurring uh but the teacher has an opportunity to provide direct instruction uh to those students to help remediate some of their skills so we have a lot of positive things that are going on uh throughout throughout the district I know you know when we take a look at where our students are performing you know you know many of those years when you look at the middle school that was under my leadership uh but there's a lot of changes that you know we had to look at not only at the middle school but throughout the district is how we provide that support and instruction for our students to help them uh you know continue to grasp the con uh you know the concepts

339for growth uh are there any specific questions uh that I can answer this time related to the this chart regarding to proficient and advanced because there are two additional uh charts I want to go through yeah just really really quickly um so I mean I find the numbers even with the opting out some of these numbers are definitely seem concerning to me uh anything anything down around 50% I mean because we're talking proficient students being proficient and to have only half of them or less proficient is half or fewer proficient uh is is um is is concerning the the 19.5% I know that included a lot of opt outs but that's that's just a really low number and I'm wondering the question I have is with that being the 21 school year uh 20 to

340uh 21 school year and then uh so that includes seventh and eighth graders from 2020 and 2021 right the Middle School number so those are by the time you get to 2223 those are the nth and 10th graders so it seems to me like they that could be one of the things that is substantially contributing to the 47.4% in 2223 no no because that large that large percentage remember I mentioned there's 202 students in that in that graduating class 89 of them were in took algebra in that ninth grade those scores automatically okay okay I see I'm going to throw some 12% one thing I would do is caution you on these scores to compare them right now okay I know it's what we want to do but the other piece of adds to it

341is if I'm taking algebra in seventh grade I also have to take seventh grade Matha think about that they're required to take both even though they're not in seventh grade math right now one would think that they're going to score high in seventh grade math because they're in an algebra class not so much because they're not in that they didn't have all the reviews you know so that's the convoluted thing about middle school and why when you look at those scores across the state they're in the 30s all the time and it's it conceptually too becomes this thing that they can make an exam that you can have zero proficiency if you want to make it hard enough for some um and that's why I think the relativity of looking at where's the average but

342work to be done at the middle school and some of the scoring and I think that's our bigger focuses I'm not going to get hung up on one particular score but what's happening in our benchmarks throughout the year where we where are we that yeah because I mean even if you take away more uh half of the students if you double that 19.5 uh well okay so so you've lost yeah so you've lost 15% or sorry you've lost about 40% of the students um so that's still only a third of the ones that actually took it because 60% took it only a third of them so that's that's I guess that's in line with the other years um but with those being so much lower than the high school I I still wonder if the

343lack of proficiency is depressing the number in 22 23 the the the Middle School relatively lower numbers for that year for that year so so the the concern I have is if that's a cohort that's moving through uh and and was in Middle School and is in high school uh we need to identify that that cohort is struggling and and particularly act on that yeah and I think that goes back to where I mentioned about the the the teachers you know that that's where the rubber meets the road and the discussion that I have heard Bob has heard where teachers are talking about that they're talking about how their students performing they're talking about what are some areas we need to focus on on and it's not just we're looking at pssa and Keystone here

344but we have students that are taking the um uh classroom diagnostic uh tool I think I got that right the cdts uh they have other local assessments I ready uh which is one that they take for the for the math we have a star math assessment so there's other assessments that are being taken that throughout the year teachers are benchmarking that we don't have to wait until until April when they to take the pssa or may when they take the Keystone mean go ahead I was just going to say I mean just in the interest of time and we have education M committee meeting when March could this be something we could unpack during that meeting a little bit yes absolutely I mean just because I before and during before through email and and yeah

345yeah I yeah I think we need to go a little deeper into the the data behind this and you know okay we have all these other assessments like like the I ready or the you know all our other interim assessments what do they tell us in comparison with this because the same kids whether they're taking the pssa or those other assessments maybe we need to start yeah what what we' have seen is some of some of the assessments that we've had or that have been provided have not been 100% correlated because of the change of Standards what we're seeing now is more of a correlation of of how the students are performing on their benchmarks which is more of a more of a predictor not inaccurate just like the weather but as a predictor as

346to how our students would perform when they take these assessments thank you um if I could just say one thing that in that process if we can not not being able to understand the number of opt out students per year and and and all of that and how that will impact the numbers it's still very dis concerning to see that you know in the covid year the high school math numbers were close to 70% but right now we're at 47 and that that's a that is an enormous drop off in light of the fact that obviously the covid years were very difficult for for the students so having a better understanding of how that opt out yeah affected every one of those years would would maybe shed some more light because these tests are what

347help us understand where our school is yeah I think I think correcting for the opt outs is critical so let's let's have that as a as an item follow up okay because even if we're looking at this and we're saying okay 47's above the state average State average is only 38 yeah but so yeah they covered some of the reasons for that is opt outs and some of it is is it's been a while since they had that class um I'd like to correct for the opt outs and then revisit I I don't I can't I can't properly evaluate this as certainly I would also like to mention that part of the reason why I was not uh I I it was a hard thing for me to evaluate the health and safety plan we

348see what that covid year did to education it's undeniable and for me to put my seal of approval on a health and safety plan that you know recommends I I can't believe that we would ever say out loud or in paper that we would shut down our school for Co ever again look at what it did to education so yeah for my and and the one thing on that and M an thank you for sharing that the one piece as you take a look at some of the the ELA you know that's something that you know students are you know working on the reading there's writing there's a lot that that fault goes within there with math it's it's a lot of it's built on you have to have a found Foundation yep you know

349and it starts in you know year you know from primary intermediate grade up to middle school but even when you get in the advanced classes of the algebra you know algebra is the foundation for all the other uh courses geometry Algebra 2 and so on um so we have we have recognized that you know some students may not be algebra ready um but other students are and it's it's a matter of you know when we place the students in the when I would say those academic classes at the at the younger level so that you can make sure they have those skills moving forward I'm glad I'm glad you mentioned that because just for personally when I was looking at these scores and I was like okay well we've got some areas in science that

350you know we can improve on but when you when you compare science to math and Ela in that covid year especially and you're like well how and then the subsequent year after why are they oh that's right because it builds in math it builds like you interrup not you personally we've interrup students and building processes whereas a lot of those science subjects they can be Standalone so I'm glad you clarify that that's what I was seeing too um CAD can you move on to the next slide you want to go to the high school sat uh just some accomplish uh sharing uh regarding the high school postsecondary uh you know when you take uh specifically a look at how the students have performed in the area our high school are producing students that are doing

351very very well on uh AP exams Etc but it's not just a high school please understand this goes from kindergarten all the way up and those students may not have that ability or may not have reached those skills at certain levels during their early career our high school's been able to produce you know real solid students coming out of here that they are career and college ready uh so a lot of you know Kudos uh to our students and then also to the board you know this board now but even previous boards by providing those opportunities for students to be taking those AP exams um and they're scoring very very well uh when you're looking specifically at those assessments so uh that's just something I wanted to note uh regarding the SATs uh you you

352may see with the SATs and acts the numbers may be down uh that was the first thing that I took a look at why there weren't as many well in in talking uh with some of my colleagues the colleges are they're not requiring they're not requiring yeah so they're looking at GPA um and then students are looking at well can I save $110 you know and not take take an assessment now there may come a time where that would factor in into students enrolling at the at the Collegiate level um but at this point those numbers are down so I did want to point that out to the board yeah and and whenever the numbers whenever the numbers of who are taking the test drop the scores do rise naturally because of uh because a

353student who's likely to do better is more likely to take the test or a student who is not as strong is more likely to opt out um so I would say going 555 to 570 is probably with with a small decline in the number of students taking it's probably a flat um uh probably flat when when you correct for the the selection bias but we are we are above State and National averages so and then for for any other items I'll work with Mrs hankle um specifically for the March Education meeting that will'll come back for and do a further presentation with the data sounds fantastic all righty that brings us to 8.06 revisions to the Sanic High School curriculum guide for the 20124 2025 school year um and I'm going to go ahead and

354give it to Dr rer again thank you Mr tle uh the uh the main focus here is the high school there's there's a memo that that is attached those are the specific changes to the high school curriculum guide which is basically the course there are some wording changes of uh some specific courses and then there are some new courses that the high school uh is going to offer you know per year approval when we take a look at the Curriculum maps uh for next school year two in the areas of food one in the area of uh computer AED design for a CAD program uh so you know that's where the change is uh uh specifically were for the curriculum guide what you see for the final copy those were with those revisions already added

355if the board approves them um the guide memo was super helpful thank you very much going through that and we're going to need to use that big kitchen now professional all right I move to approve the revisions to the Susan High School curriculum guide for the 2024 2025 school year may I have a second please second second do we have any discussion any comments I do actually um is it I was looking through here because the Electronic Arts is something that I'm real familiar with we did there still is another in incidence of flash being in here we'll need to get rid of that um Electronic Arts 3 still mentions flash which is Def defunct technology that you can't use anymore and Joe which specific course was that uh electronic Arts 3 Electronic Arts 3

356I see it y thanks for picking that up Joe we read stuff well and you know stuff any other comments discussion well do we need to do we need to amend it to not include or yes would the maker would like to incorporate Mr Wilson's uh comment and the final approval that am friendly Amendment and and and you are in favor of that yes I am all right you're all set okay thank you all right any Nays or abstentions well Jeffy trying to go home okay hearing none the motion passes that brings us to 8.07 revisions to the Southern Middle School curriculum guide for the 2024 2025 school year I will give that to Dr reer thank you Mrs hankle uh same thing uh regarding the high school the only difference is uh there were

357just uh two changes on the memo page uh regarding the changes for their curriculum guide okay um I move to approve the revisions to the Southern Middle School curriculum guide for the 2024 2025 school year may I have a second second do we have any discussion not this time any Nays or abstentions hearing none the motion passes that brings us to 8.08 health examiner for the 2023 2024 school year uh I have to give that to Dr rert as well all right thank you again Mrs ankle uh just so you're aware at school board uh every year you know we we look for a volunteer or or dental company that would provide volun uh volunteer time uh there's a small uh nominal stiping that goes along with that per student uh but to provide Dental

358services for those who do not have uh someone that they can see on a on a yearly basis uh and I got to I got to send some love out to Glenn Rock denel and uh because they stepped up to the plate after several contacts with other uh uh other places and they jumped right on board as soon as you know they they found out that we needed someone and we needed to get someone in real quick so uh uh we're we're expecting that it goes very well between now and the end of the school year and then when we come to you in August we're presenting them back again uh for the way they stepped up uh to support our community for those students that need that service thank you Dr effer I move

359to approve the following Health examiner for the 2023 2024 school year Glenn Rock Dental any discussion sorry can I have a second second now is there any discussion uh I do want to add there's legislation coming and is being considered by the house education committee that could make it so a dental hygienist can satisfy that school code requirement to offer dental care for students rather than um an a dentist doctor thank you for that head up yeah thank you could be coming uh any other discussion any Nays or abstentions hearing none the motion passes 8.09 clinical athletic training agreement between Commonwealth University of Pennsylvania and the southern York County School District I move to approve a clinical athletic training agreement between the Commonwealth University of Pennsylvania and Southern York County School District for a term

360of 5 years through January 19th 2029 may I have a second please second any discussion and comments any Nays or abstentions hearing none the motion carries 8.10 revision to the elementary field trip list for the 2023 2024 school year um I believe with 8 point yep you'll never believe it I have to give it over to Dr Robert again thank you Mrs hankle uh just uh School Board just as a a quick note the one modification that we did make for the Elementary uh field trip is in the one that was approved last uh last June uh the elementary would take students to the Strand which is now the Appel Center and it was indicated that they would go for um an El English language arts Focused Field Trip well the one that they have

361now that is current for this year is a science focused uh field trip so the change we're going to make is for the Appel Center but then instead of having it specific for an English language arts or science we're just going to put a core content area so that that way if next year they come up with a math Focus we don't have to come back and and make a modification or a revision to the field trip list fantastic I move to approve a revision of the elementary field trip list for the 2023 2024 school year may I have a second second do we have any discussion any questions any Nays or abstentions hearing none the motion carries that brings us to 8.11 costs associated with speakers approved through the vetting process I move to

362approve the costs associated with the following speakers that have been approved through the vetting process Burns health education to present their grow and no program to all southern New York County School District fifth grade students at a cost of $819 per student or per School School rather and Cara voy to conduct a schoolwide mental health presentation for ssoh hanic high school students on February 13th 2024 at a cost of $1,000 may I have a second please second do we have any discussion I would like to add for um board information that um we are invited to attend any of the guest speakers we just have to let Dr Bryson know and he will accommodate us and specifically with the burns Health Center uh health education the uh students will be segregated by sex and they

363will have their separate presentations given and it is also an opt out for any parents that want to opt their student out and that opt out will be made available to them both by the fact that I'm announcing it now you can hear it this way um it'll be through the newsletters the electronic newsletters that are sent out and then also the uh file folders that are going back folders level folders that go back and forth between the teachers and the parents so that's for your information yeah um I I did have a constituent reach out with concerns about the burns Health Center um uh I didn't see any issues uh with this specific program um but I think it's having board members able to attend uh presentations that are raised as as cause for

364concern by constituents is a is an important uh important practice so thank you any other discussion any Nays or abstentions hearing none that motion passes as well 812 speakers approve through the vetting process I move well actually it's information only so it's the all that those guest speakers right there and um I probably should hand that back over to Dr rer if you would like to talk about those uh thank you Mrs ankle yeah these uh uh these two uh that we did along with uh mental health presentation as well as the uh uh the board briefing for suit Burns you know it's we have a real unique opportunity to have the kids heart challenge which we do on an annual basis and a Keller brown with your AG litery uh uh program that comes

365in really gives our students an opportunity to you know learn from some of the experts in the field especially with the kids heart challenge they're going to have a lot of fun getting their getting their heartbeat up getting their steps in taking a look at right now oh it reset so I'm at 72 so those kids will definitely beat me in Step so it it just gives those opportunities for those uh kids to do some really cool things are you stepping under the table because I feel like we've been here since mid you figured me out see Bryson I told you i' get my steps in for board information I just wanted to let you know that as part of the vetting process as the um education chair I did look at every single item

366of available to me all the packets all I went online and and researched all the organizations and listened to all the speeches and I had no problem signing off so all righty that brings us to 8.13 stage one Curriculum maps as districtwide Master maps and I will hand that to Dr Robert uh so for for the board we do have uh four Maps one is the updated curriculum for the health education K through three and then for number two three and four these are the new programs for the high school uh the advanced foods and introduction to baking And Pastry as well as a computer aided uh computer aided design uh so these are courses that we're really excited to add and offer our students in the new version of the high school all righty

367I move to approve the following stage one Curriculum maps as districtwide Master Maps health and physical education grade K through three Advanced Foods introduction to baking and pastry and computer aided design otherwise known as CAD may I have a second please second all right do we have any discussion I need that volunteer for the tasting it's on record everyone's heard it I'll make a note of that right any other items comments questions all righty any Nays or abstentions hearing none that motion carries 8.14 other items of business does anybody have anything I don't either and education is done uh before we move on finance and budget how's the drive going uh he bought us another hour and a half BR bought us another hour and a half U so through some some kind of tech

368wire um all right sufficient Mr treasure all right uh 901 Treasures report for November and December so we're going to do two months at a shot here um I'll try and do this efficiently we're going to start with the uh concentration accounts we started the month of November with a balance of m310 7080 we ended the month with $29 million $777,500 38 I'm going to I'm going to do all the concentration then go through the TX just to keep them together a little bit uh going so December the month end was at 23,5 72,8 and4 so for the month of November the tax collector account is $72,000 $726 73 for the month of December it was $4,460 the I didn't hit her uh Sue yes so should I go back to hit the dispers the

369uh revenue and dispersements okay it's you gave the balances yeah um I do want to hit the investment balances real quick before we wrap this portion up uh the investment balance for the month of November ended the month at 29,43 3,816 46 and for the month of December the investment accounts totaled out the balance at the end of the month was $32 million $421,500 41 that was for your information uh next up is review the bills for payment they are listed in board docks um I would recommend paying the bills do I have a motion to approve the bills for payment so moved a second second second any Nays or exensions or any discussion any as or abstentions hearing none motion passes exonerations refunds this is an easy one there are none so item 9.04

370Tax Collector's report that is the for your review do we still have to act on 9.03 it is there's nothing to act on there's nothing to act on there's no yeah yeah no 9.05 this is also um budget status this is attached for review nothing to do with that uh 9.06 budget transfers this is an action item this is for a vision screener and a homeless set aside this does not affect our budget so I would motion to approve these budget transfers second any discussion hearing none um any as or extensions oh okay hearing none passes the 9.07 cafeteria report for November and December a lot to read that's attached for your perusal 9.08 the annual financial report and audit for 2022 2023 um the My overview and then I'm going to hand over to

371sue is the audit found no issues we're in good Financial Health and our liabilities have stabilized over the last few years uh gasb 96 I'm not saying it yet I will eventually changes in the reporting is related to uh software and contracts um Sue do you have anything to add to that one the only thing I'd add is a huge thank you to the business office and Mr Carrington um as business manager for the audit um did a wonderful job again we had a clean audit for for both for our financial statement audit and our federal single audit um and then the only other piece that we like to point out um SAS 114 letter that's required by Auditors um there were no difficulties during the audit um no disagreements with management um we did

372not have any audit findings or issues um during the audit so again thank you to our staff um doing a great job great thank you very much uh n 09 results of the Food Service survey this will be Mr Trevor Carrington hello hello um I will try to be as quick as possible because I understand what time it is um so if there's any followup questions I'll be happy to answer them um but we will just get started um so we conducted a survey and I just wanted to talk about the purpose of the survey so this survey was put together to solicit the feedback of our stakeholders um relating to our food service program those stakeholders include students parents and our District staff um we did this survey to really understand what things are

373going well with our food service program and what things we can do to improve the Food Service program um lastly the district this year is in the final year of its five-year agreement with witson which is our food service management company so just to explain the process we took and then the timing of it um the food service advisory committee which is a subcommittee of our Wellness committee um we generated the questions so um we we work together to understand really what what we are looking for from our um stakeholders um the survey was sent to parents high school students and staff at the end of October we left it open for about a week for responses um those results were then received compiled reviewed by the wellness Comm Committee in December um and this

374was really just done to understand what areas could be improved and what the district should know before its request for approval process so last month the board authorized the RFP for Food Service management companies we really wanted to do this in tandem so we could kind of go into that process really knowing what our um stakeholders were looking for so survey results um for my view I think we had really good participation you you kind of never know how well it'll go um we had 452 parent responses and there's an aster there and that Aster means that um the way we made the survey was if you were a parent and you had an elementary school student and a high school student and a high school student um that would be two separate responses but

375it would only look like one person submitted it so we had to break them out to add two responses because we did look at everything at building level um so 452 parents and you can kind of guesstimate if we have about 3,000 kids what that really might dictate um students we had 338 responses uh we sent that to high school students only um we did get feedback from elementary students and middle school students but that's really just more anecdotal kind of conversational feedback not actually the same survey and then we received 153 responses from our staff members so um when we did the survey we asked a handful of questions these uh were four primary questions that were asked um and we really looked for the satisfaction from the person completing the survey so the

376first was um how satisfied are you with the variety of options available overall our rating was 3.18 and then you can see it's broken down parent student staff so the parent is um them responding kind of on behalf of their student or their view of the program um students would be our high school students responding and then staff the same so varet iy of options available was 3.18 which does put us in the middle um one being the lowest five being the highest so it's good we're a little bit over average not quite quite great as we could be but still a little bit over average um nutritional value of meals was 3.13 overall um friendliness of food service staff so this is great we are above a three we're higher than average so we're

377at 4.06 and then cleanliness of serving line area is 4.08 um so we do have this data really broken down on this level but when we received the responses we do have it by building so we didn't show that because we don't want to kind of say oh this school needs to improve more than this school but really what this does is show us that overall we're average or above average in the categories that we were surveying so um two other pieces that we asked in our survey were breakfast participation so the food service advisory subcommittee really wanted to understand the number of students that were eating breakfast in our cafeterias each day and then I'm going to do the slide again for lunch um so as you can see on that slide we have

378about 15% of our students eating breakfast in the cafeterias every day um I think probably if you look back five years I don't think that number would be anywhere close I know Dr rert as a building principal was very low at the middle school back in the day um 18% eat one to four times a week in our cafeteria for breakfast and then 9% % eat a few times per month um that leaves about 58% of students and parents responding for their student um that said they never eat in the cafeteria so on the survey we added a few responses to understand why they never ate so of the 58% that said they never ate in the cafeteria about half of them so 53% said they don't eat breakfast or they eat breakfast at home

379and that can make sense depending on what time you wake up what time you get to school that that student might be hungry um the other ones are listed so quality of food was 16% horse selection was 15% nutritional value of 6% and then just the marod of other things made up the final 10% so to kind of explain part of the quality of food and poor selection and this is my potential interpretation of way of how that response could be we are Guided by the national school launch and nation and breakfast program so what is required for that program is not exactly what I may want to eat every day for breakfast so the program requires um milk fruit and um two grains and you have to select two of the three so for

380me I may like eggs that's not one of the items shown there so you could say oh I'd love eggs every day for breakfast but it's not one of the things that the program is guided to follow so that could be one of the many reasons why you aren't eating breakfast or why you feel there's a poor selection so it's one of those tricky things when we do want to follow the program um and we have to follow the program but it may not meet everybody's desires so next up is lunch participation um this one was pretty cool to see how many people do eaten our cafeterias on average each month so every day we had a response of about 45% so that to me is pretty awesome um 27% were one to four times

381per week few times a month for 8% and then 19% said never kind of the same responses that we had for breakfast so why aren't more students eating lunch in our uh building so 27% prefer a home packed lunch um 27% also set the quality of food available 23% were um poor selection 7% nutritional value 6% dietary restrictions and then all others were about 10% so similar to breakfast lunch has to follow those same guidelines a little bit different you have to um pick either a milk fruit vegetable meat or meat alternate and a grain so what I may like for lunch may not really follow the lines of the uh national school lunch program but it is what our food service management companies would serve so later we'll talk about potentially what we can

382do to kind of help more people eat that lunch or breakfast so we did have a final item um for additional feedback this I think to me um understanding surveys and that most people would like to get through them as quickly as possible it was pretty cool to see the amount of people that responded with an additional comment so about a third of those people that took the survey all together responded with some additional feedback so that's pretty cool um we received about 350 additional response feedback items um there is a lot of detail in them so it was not just a word or two it was some sentences some paragraphs in some scenarios um but what we did is we looked at them and we summarized them as much as we could and these

383four is items um so meal choice and variety so over half of those 350 responses um they related to some version of meal choice or variety um so some of the comments were we seem to cycle through the same options um many wanted to see a higher nutritional content in their meals um different options for proteins so potentially chicken beef fish beans things like that um one of the difficult items with food service and food service on the scale is the ability for us to make everybody happy so in order to kind of paint that picture I'm going to read two comments um so for example at the elementary school level um we received comments that we have too many Hot Dog Days also received a comment saying we don't have enough hot dog dates

384so we are happy that some think we have too many and some may think we don't have enough it's very difficult to make everybody happy with all of the options and the food we serve um another thing that came up during the survey was variety so we saw variety and that it kind of hit at the secondary level a little bit we can understand at the elementary level there is limited variety I have a six-year-old he was here um this evening and if he were to walk through the lunch line and you gave him two choices those may be a lot of choices for him so at the elementary level they do a very good job trying to make the choices um easy for our students and they kind of pick in the morning and

385they they make it easy for them but then when you get to the secondary levels we have our food courts so on the other side of that wall and then the high school we have that food court area so there's a lot of options for those students so we thought we were doing very well with variety part of the variety issue issue um plays into time so students feel they may not have the opportunity to take advantage of the variety because the lines are long so at the high school we have the panini press and the deli bar that's a very long line and students don't always have enough time or they decide not to wait in it they'll just go to the quickest get a slice of pizza so they can go and eat

386their lunch um so with that and to kind of jump around a little bit um we understand that and what we're trying to do is take the additional feedback that we received and see what we can act on right away because there's no point in doing this if we can't kind of work and Implement those things so one of the um those items when we shared it with our current Food Service management company um they pursued and figured out how we could do a pre-order system so at the high school level coming soon we will have pre-ordering for students um hopefully that will give them the opportunity to take advantage of our variety and pre-order their meal and then we can kind of hopefully fix that variety issue for some um other items were the

387variety of the sides we had so people might say the the entree is great but you don't have enough hot vegetable sides so as soon as they heard that feedback we saw more hot vegetable sides on the menu so to any point that we can share this information with our food service management company and then when we do our RFP making sure we share that information with them it can only help us um time kind of touched on that students may not feel they have enough time to take advantage of the variety lines might be long um or the launch period isn't long enough for them portion size kind of goes along with the hot dog issue um so um we have to follow the national school lunch program and Portion sizes to an extent

388are dictated by that so an elementary school student has to fit in that Elementary School Meal pattern same for high school so students come in all shapes and sizes so a student's appetite at grade six may be different than a fourth grader and same for the high school senior two seniors may have much different appes what's enough for one may not be enough for another so we will kind of try to be always mindful of how we can adjust that what options we can provide to other students that still might be hungry or those that may not want all of the food uh the last it item are pricing snack purchases and alart items so there were many comments where we serve too many snacks and we don't have enough snacks available or we have

389too many ice cream days or not enough ice cream days um we also reive comments that the parent has no ability to restrict purchasing on their child's account so just to share that is something parents are able to do there's a section on our website that explains the process to go through for Al part um but really what we want to do is make sure parents understand they have that ability so on the last slide here uh are just some next steps and things that we will do with these results so we'll continue to look at the survey results to see what changes can be made um we don't want to just receive the survey sit on it and think okay great we're doing okay um so some of the feedback we received has already

390um been implemented and changed things and we'll continue to investigate what we can review um regarding the feedback to understand what else we can do with this food service management company through our RFP and any changes in the future um so we'll also continue to advance enhance our program communication so the alart purchasing could be one of those items um just explaining to parents where you go to find that information what options are available to you in order to restrict your child's account or how you can go in and look at all of the purchases your CH your child or children have made um in the cafeteria and then lastly I would just like to thank everybody who did take the time to complete the survey we tried we spent a lot of time planning

391it trying to make it as simple as possible and something easy for everybody to look through taking a few minutes I'm just thrilled that we had about 900 plus responses and a third of those actually gave us additional feedback that we can act on so that was just um awesome and thank you very much so any questions I did fly through it on purpose but do have yes um in your opinion did were you surprised by how many high schoolers responded I I have teenagers they really like food that surprised me that it wasn't as many as I would have inated I was surprised from the standpoint that about a third of high schoolers responded um from I can appreciate that they probably blew it off and didn't care not saying in a in a

392bad way but if I was back in high school if I got a survey about food service like okay maybe I could get to it I don't know seeing a third respondent was pretty cool okay and then the comments uh the feedback about time not asking for actual percentages but how often did the time part come up with not having enough time that's something I've heard too and I was curious about how often yeah I can look back um it was so I I do know meal choice variety was half if not more of the additional responses so a lot of people had questions or things on that one um I don't remember time off the top of my head were the time responses pretty much just I don't have enough time to eat is

393that yeah it was there's a great variety I may not have enough time I don't go to this line because it's too long don't is I don't have enough time to eat it wasn't like it's the wrong time of day my lunch is too early or too late have too much time not sure okay we do have students that may not have a launch at the high school level so they work or come in late stuff like that okay any other questions for Trevor not a question but a comment um I'm not sure if anyone noticed on the petition that was given to us by the students but one of the students jotted in the side yeah I did see that spend on good food yes I thought that was kind of to the conversation

394still made it into like I know um just to highlight food um very briefly that um Mrs Green and I heard is that we will be having a PA beef day at some point um so our food service program does a very good job really reaching out to make those local connections so that's pretty exciting um to support our state and have some good food hopefully for our students MH I heard there was a smash burer week as well there was yes was past tense I was not here that day but yes I heard they were very all right okay thank you all right thank you right 910 York School of Technology budget resolution for first reading um this green do you want to I can just briefly um so everyone has the the full

395budgets there for York School of Technology um it there are no additional staff for buses um basically they they have about a 3.53% um increase in their overall budget I did review the budget in detail um if there's any questions I can okay thank you uh 9.11 for the Liu operating budget resolution solution I think the big piece to because I had quite a few questions on this um the big piece to point out for the Liu budget is this is just the operating budget not the program budget for Liu um so it is in scope of the IU it is pretty small it's about $8 million um versus their their program um budgets or their non-operating budgets are about $125 million U they run through um the Liu uh Board of Directors for approval

396this is just the operating piece um and our direct District contribution is about $5,400 um and that's unchanged from the prior year but again I'll take any questions and both of these are to be voted on next month okay uh 9.12 investment program guidelines for 2024 this is uh there's no change on on our uh investment program guidelines this year beyond the interest rate that's noted in the attachment uh I do need to make a motion to approve the investment program guidelines for so second right uh any questions no uh okay any Nays or abstentions hearing none motion passes 2024 2025 budget update is item 9.13 um is there any information we wanted to get into tonight or um I I think I can hold most of it I can just very briefly um summarize

397U now that the school code bills are finally passed um we are looking at all of the new Grant programs um there are webinars uh coming up in the next uh about three weeks from now early February so um we will attend all of those and and probably at February be able to bring you more information but basically we're on all these new things um and we're still and we're working through the budget process okay all right and next up we have I would like to so if I want Jeff yeah so if I wanted to hit 14 15 and 16 in one shot you could say could I had I'd like to make a motion to approve 14 whatever so I'd like to make a motion to approve 9.14 9.15 and 9.16 second do

398you have a second let oh sorry hard okay yeah um I think I need to add a little flavor here there's obviously the first one is for updated uh replacing outdated wireless access points in elementary middle middle school then we have two um two requests for proposals that need to be approved to send out so any questions on any of those any Nays or extensions all right those three pass uh other items of business for finance and budget I have none okay turn it over to two poliy uh item 10.01 item for ratification retention of board videos this references the um uh introduction that um Mr litz had earlier I make a motion to instruct the superintendent to ensure the retention of all existing and all future videos of public board meetings until the board

399has a chance to vote on a policy concerning the retention of these videos or for 90 days from today whichever comes first incorporating amendments made to the original motion do I have a second second sorry I just totally forgot what I'm supposed to do I was second comments oh any any discussion thank you I do have a question will this cost us money to hold it all on no YouTube to retain the videos will it cost any money my understanding is we have unlimited on you a very large or unlimited space with you yeah we won't necessarily hold them on YouTube Forever we'll pull them down on the district any form of retention any Nays or abstentions that motion passes um uh item 10.02 is just public information it's the board policies I'm not going

400to read all the ones that we have but we do have 26 um on there so it's quite a bit um so again just information 10.03 is the psba principles for governance and Leadership again just information for the board um to review those principles uh 10.04 we have a memorandum of understanding with the southern York Education Association and Joselyn rert I make a motion to approve a memorandum of understanding with the southern New York Education Association and joshlyn reper teacher concerning tuition reimbursement for certification second thank you um any discussion okay um any Nas or abstentions okay that motion passes and item 10.05 student adjudication a the Board of Education to consider approval of adjudication for student a the board hereby permanently expels the student from the southern New York County School District effective immediately

401provided however that the student may apply for readmission to the school district after one calendar year January 15 2025 if the student agrees to complies with and has met and meets the following conditions number one while expelled the student must participate in the alternative education for disruptive youth program chosen for the student by the school district while attending this program the student must maintain regular School attendance and have no disciplinary referrals while enrolled in the program specific consideration for read admittance to the school district will require no violations of District policy 103 while enrolled at the district provided aedy program number two the student may seek an alternative education other than what the School District offers but it shall be at the parents expense number three while enrolled in the aedy program the student must

402participate in any and all counseling programs requested by the school district Andor the aedy program including but not limited to Mental Health counseling such as Student Assistance Program the student must follow all recommendations as part of that process point four while expelled the student is prohibited from entering upon any school district property and attending any school activities unless authorized by a school administrator I make a motion to approve adjudication for student a do we have a second second I have a motion a second any discussion or questions any Nays or extensions hearing none that motion carries and item 10.06 other items of business I do not have any and that concludes my rep okay on to buildings and grounds um 11.01 uh water test report for December 2023 U that is there for our information

40311 and2 two buildings and grounds report for November and December Mr that's okay it's late we understand question I'm sorry I Mr Question think you was turning the buildings and grounds report over okay 11.02 buildings and grounds report just for your information uh 11.03 cesco hanic high school project progress report financial report and timeline um given for your information certainly if there's any questions as we go along did you want us to put the slide up that we had on the financial can also find time sure okay we can cat if you can put the slide up from financial report please is that it yep thank you so basically what this slide shows um we were asked to put together so this is just an excerpt from the financial report um it shows the original

404budget um compared to the revised budget and the remaining um budget per subcategory after all incumbrances so anything that um is a known expenditure for the project so far um so original budget 70 million um and then we have remaining budget by subcategory of 94,000 again that is um uh incorporating anything known but not yet paid even and then down below we show project to date summary of change orders um we have Prime contractors so we have four primes we have prime contractor um change orders of about U $527,000 um change orders for FES of 1, 31,000 um and then um other site cost orders um that total about 80,000 mostly um due to Builder risk from that last item um so that puts us at $1.6 million um we did in June do a

405reclass from financing cost um to contingency um and then we have got we have architectural credits um for some of the change orders of about $882,000 which leaves us um contingency at this point of 86,000 so we'll take any questions on that yeah I well I not a question I I I have a comment um I just and and I'm going to do this and it's I might bring this up a few times on some of the expenditures during the meeting um this is not a value judgment but it's just uh I want to put things in terms of a unit that is more accessible than 1, 31,000 uh3 um some something that connects the taxpayer because I think it will also help to uh respect the taxpayers and and demonstrate a certain amount of

406gratitude uh to to them for you know and and and respect for their money so 1,3 the average school tax for a household in the district is 30 uh 3651 $3,651 so uh 1,031 million um and $3 actually I over whether I calculate this for calculated this for that or 1,81 million3 uh $3 but it's 282 households uh full tax for a year um so I just want to point that out that that that is that is significant and and that's you know 282 households um so and we need to we need to be respectful and grateful for for our taxpayers um the entire high school project cost of $ 7,383 and10 would represent that 19,27 households taxes for an entire year of course we don't have that many households in the district we have

407between 8 and 9,000 so you could also state that as the entire uh local tax burden for about a period of about 2 and a half years um is what we're talking about there uh so I just wanted to put that in in terms because once you get into millions of dollars it kind of disconnects it from the taxpayers so I'm not saying we didn't need to do so obviously as bestos it needs to be handled uh but I just want to put this in a in a form that that that respects that connection with the taxpayers properly um and that's my comment on this I might might bring up that conversion one or two more times but and I I would like to draw a little bit of attention to the um architectural credits

408the 82 uh th000 um just so that people understand that that is when the myth when the myth of whatever the particular change order is uh involves some of their culpability and that's their portion given back to the district um because of of missing uh whatever the change order may be any other questions with with that we can go on to um 11.04 change order gc4 three uh we actually I'm so I'm so sorry um I I did want to highlight and just make fact check me to make sure that I'm processing this correctly because I'm seeing a million dollars for ASB bestus mitigation we have was it a $50,000 allotment M and we approved roughly $40,000 last month I think that from a taxpayer standpoint this shows I think and if I could continue

409to ask the aggregated costs because when the general public and and I know you guys are being fully transparent these these numbers are here defined and so they are but in a meeting to be able to $40,000 uh additional of two date aggregated cost you know that to to borrow from the children that hits differently um and I I believe last meeting we asked what those aggregated costs were and no disrespect to you Mr Buffington um I I can't imagine why anybody wouldn't remember numbers but um it was mentioned that to date it was somewhere in the ballpark of hundreds of thousands that's a million and I just wanted to point that out not for not for anything for you but just to the general public that we are a million out we're we're 20x

410the original budget yeah it's it's something really 50,000 the original right million 20 it I think it's a lesson learned that we' got to look closely at at things like that um and and and watch just be more wary of the potential for for misses like that you're never going to catch all of them but certainly certainly we want to catch that sort of thing in the future if at all possible and thank you so much to for putting this together and for for giving us exactly what we asked for so I really appreciate that Mr buckington thank you yeah I I will say 50,000 when I when I heard that number I'm not an expert in construction at all but to me that sounded like a number that might make sense for a house

411wouldn't you think think about when these buildings were built to me that number made sense for maybe a house or a restaurant that was built during that time um because I know as best is expense to contain just you know with my limited knowledge of the field uh and I do know that and then so for a facility of this size uh it's hard to imagine that any substantial amount of as bestus could come in at 50,000 um so the building was given a clean asbest report before the design so there wasn't an assumption made that there was any as best as but that should tell us that maybe the experts aren't always experts I mean to have a million dollar miss you would you would admit to have a million dollar Miss by experts

412is a is a pretty big Miss not when nobody knew it was here but there are the experts who are supposed to be able to know it's here and if if you given the time the building was built um forget it was a large possibility that there would be asbestos that's the timing uh so it it at least I I feel like you know they were clearly very very wrong about their expectation of the investors well and regardless of whether or not they knew they were given a clear bill again from the transparency standpoint the aggregated cost to continue to be reminded because I know that the general public they hear one then one total oh $40,000 that's not that big of a deal yeah well no to the tune of a million dollars so

413far and so that's where regardless of whether anybody did anything wrong or there was it was under bid or any of that kind of conversation to be continually reminded of what we are to date that hits different and we're still not done correct no like where's the end inight on this well as we discussed in earlier you know there's still a large area of the school that needs to be demoed and you know any asbest would have to be removed before that demolition can take place um so if there is more hidden aestus you know there's no encapsulating something you're tearing down so if it's there we're going to have to Abate it um which is I think why there is a a large question of if we've already encountered a million dollars worth um

414are we going to encounter more and I I think at this point the jury is still out however some of those things we discuss like some of the caulking around the windows it's it's in the encumbrance some of the some of the for the bulk demo area is actually in in that encumbered uh as well some of the other things we we've done um is some uh destructive testing above the plaster ceiling that's above the you have acoustical tile ceiling here at the high school there's a plaster ceiling above that um you know that conceals many things above there we have gone through and made many holes in in those areas inspecting um you know the best that we can you know um but certainly and when you when you open up a building built

415in the 1950s um I don't want to say we're not going to encounter anymore because I think the likelihood is that we probably will encoun them more um but I I at this point we're going to have to deal with what we have to deal with uh we don't have to necessarily be happy about it and I I don't think anybody in the room is but we we have to de with it and I just want to add one thing Brandy thank you for the additional um the additional on top of your role as facility manager all the other buildings are still in operation still doing everything always time and it's 1:30 in the morning and I want to make it clear this is not your fault nope and regardless of the fault bill you

416make very good point point that I want to add to and it could get bigger it could get larger there's a large part of the building that needs to be demo and it's virtually impossible to say so we'll cap that at whatever whatever we don't you're setting yourself up for another wrong number potentially um but I think we can continue to move forward with a overall lump s yep have awareness of this was a hard report to give to a board and thank you that that took got some thank you and I I just want to add to we do have additional slides and information that we were going to give at Tuesday night's buildings and grounds that we didn't have so when we have the buildings and grounds meeting we'll have good to go

417to 11.04 change order GC 43 was brought to the board uh involves the um Wayne coating existing wng coating call it the green tile I think most folks uh relate to that um obviously we're changing that as part of the construction process or part of the construction um that change order involved the backup um with that Wayne's coding so um keep the project moving an estimated cost of 36,100 was brought the board approved that um obviously we're looking to U keep costs as low as we can uh that chain order was F finalized at 28,6 40 so that's for information which is about a $7,500 reduction don't wor it's going to and brought it down from 10 household to 8 household 11.0 um change orders approved on site I can go one by one if

418we'd like um just to remind the board uh up to $20,000 I can approve on site the importance of that is to keep the project moving we can lose much more you know don't not sure how many households uh but we can lose a lot of money if we don't keep the project moving um so in conjunction with the construction manager and Architects um and with the bestus ones with the environmental consultant you know obviously I'm looking at those closely um and so the the list that there is for your information but I've approved those on site uh to keep the keep the project moving yeah I would like to having them peace meal like this I think it's important even though you're allowed to approve Chang orders under a certain amount it's nice to

419have the full amount I think it came to about 75,000 or 21 households and just for clarification that um the change order summary to date includes those numbers those are included in the monthly report yes okay sorry I was making sure I had enough this space no problem okay um 11 06 advertising for bids for HVAC uh filters ask the board for their consideration on approval to advertise for bids for hbac filters um we'll be uh purchasing enough for the 20 24 2025 school year um few years ago uh we started putting bids out and so excellent results um so we're going to continue that Trend so just uh for board information um this is the purchasing of the actual physical filters um this is an in-house program where we we replace them ourselves so

420and funding what's that what's that that's funding so it's us or loses at this point yeah so uh I'd like to make a motion to approve advertising for bids for HVAC air filters for the district for the 24 20 20 24 2025 school year funded through Esser funding have a second second second any questions or comments okay 11.07 or exensions oh sorry sorry I'm of you hearing none motion passes there I go sorry 11.07 custodial equipment bids uh and 11.0 08 kind of go together we put out a bid for custodial equipment um we got irregularities in in the results um so we were thinking do we go back out to bid and or do we use Cooperative purchasing tonight um I'm asking for your consideration to reject all the bids from from the custodial

421equipment bid but then also consider on Cooperative purchasing uh 11.08 to uh purchase equipment from Hillyard for 42676 and8 uh for mini scrubbers um from americam for 6,476 111 for floor machines um as well as from veritiv for vacuums wet vs and manyi agitation equipment um for 8,972 35 and I believe I mentioned last time that our custodial staff um was involved with um looking at our current Fleet of equipment and um figuring out how um and what pieces of equipment can help them to do their jobs um more efficiently and more effective so I'd ask for your consideration want to combine those two um yes I can 11.07 11.08 uh motion to reject all bids for custodial equipment bids motion to approve quotes utilizing Cooperative purchasing from hilard for $ 42,67894 76111 for floor

422machines utilizing P dgs Contracting pricing for the erative $1,972 35 for vacuums wet facts and many agitation equipment utilizing tips Cooperative contract pricing funding through APR Sr Grant and reject quote five microfiber cleaning system do you'll have a second second second any questions or comments U the uh total amount looks to be about $8,000 or 19 households is that accurate um I didn't add them together but I will take your word on that Mr an yeah I want to make sure that adding them up is correct these aren't either or or anything okay and one thing thank you one thing to note there um we did not uh award the um microfiber cleaning system so we plan to come back to the board with a recommendation for for that in the future 11. any n

423or exensions I'm ahead of you again I'm sorry that's okay hearing none motion passes all right 11.09 contract with gr spanogle um ask for your consideration to um relocate uh some water lines in our uh main campus pump house which is sits over by seller Elementary this involves um water meter that is read by uh Glenrock Sewer and Water Authority um actually calculates our um helps to calculate our our sewer bill for the main campus so this is uh for clarification this is for um treating the acidic water correct the the the modification for this um is to get the water meter away from the treatment so that you know the water meter doesn't um wear out as quickly as a um recommendation from uh the Glenrock Sewer and Water Authority thank you uh so

42411.09 I make a motion to approve a contract with gr Spug nugle I'm sorry spag for the relocation of the waterline injection locations in the main campus pump house at a cost of $457 do I have a second second any questions yeah I got a quick question on that so if we're looking at the total is 4,575 if you go down to the next page it says add pricing for two spare injector points is that g be something we want to do later or no yeah I don't think I think the 4575 would would do that um second page down so for 4575 5,000 I mean that's not a lot of parts I I I understand what you're saying but if you've ever cut into that size ductal steel nope water line that's not I'm

425necessarily a simple process um you know I have a extensive uh experience with this and it does not seem out of line in any way to okay otherwise it would have said so so thank you for any other questions or comments exensions I just like the name sple it's a tough name didn't get it right uh hearing none motion passes 11.10 contract with John with Johnson Controls uh I think everybody can picture the um Hood suppression system that are in that's over top uh kitchen equipment in in all our kitchens um seller Elementary and friendship um are due for 12E inspection and part of that inspection is the recharge cylinder that feeds that Hood um will be recharged so this uh proposal is to to um update those those hoods those two hoods um I

426suspect we're going to have uh additional ones in the future from from our other schools obviously High School being last down the road way down the road and you know obviously as it as it says this is for fire uh suppression so it's you know very important so uh 11.10 motion to approve a contract with Johnson Controls for the regular 12-year inspection of the fireh hood suppression system at Southern Elementary and friendship Elementary at a cost of $2,880 do I have a second second any questions or comments any Nays or extensions hearing none motion passes thank you 11.11 uh quote with Builder Specialty Services um we get all our outdoor and indoor bleachers um professionally inspected annually um one of the things that we're looking to do is there's a section of the home bleachers

427that the header stool between the seat and the um area where you stand and needs U reinforcing um it's our student section by the way and they certainly get uh excited um we've gotten a proposal and we've we've um also included um in the discussions the U professional inspector as well um so I'd ask for your consideration so uh obviously this is something that is probably very near and dear to the hearts of our students so it is uh surely money well spent not not only to keep them safe but uh you know to allow them to really enjoy that that Warrior Spirit U I know my children have benefited and probably caused some of the damage so uh 11.11 motion to approve a quote from Builder Specialty Service Service Incorporated to install additional supports

428to the outdoor stadium bleachers homeside at a cost of $5,997 do I have a second second any questions um are we making these bleachers um sufficient to withstand future jumping or uh or is this just to bring them to normal standards normal standards normal standards all right um so there you have it any students stud who are watching this video maybe on recording that's a long shot um stop jumping on the bleachers 1.6 families uh paid for [Laughter] it all year any other comments or questions any Nays or abstentions motion passes quote 11.12 quote from Sage Technologies uh ask for your consideration uh over at sell Elementary we have um three autistic support uh classrooms two of those classrooms already have um delayed eress um on the classroom door um so if you have a

429student that um wants to flee the classroom uh code does not allow you to lock that door but it does allow you to delay the egress so um this third classroom actually has two doors um so we need to do both of those doors um so we're asking for your consideration um to to install these devices um on these two classroom doors at seller Elementary yes so and and then in our discussion about this um you know in the event that we needed less space um this is a system that's able to basically be turned off so the room could go back to uh other uses if necessary but then it also always gives us the ability to then return to um the delayed access yeah um uh I would I do we did we

430do a motion in a second yet no okay let's go and do that so 11.12 motion to to approve the quote for the update to the autistic support room door at Southern Elementary of sage Technology Solutions for the amount of 9,954 any questions or comments second second I'll second second questions are coming so uh I looked into this just because uh I wanted to understand it a little bit better um because the crash bars themselves are actually a small part of the cost there's there's the wiring of alarms the wiring of a remote alarm in the office as well there's wiring wiring of all the card access systems so that helped me to understand um why this is a lot more than just those delayed eress bars that maybe go for $1,000 $1,500 some somewhere

431in that ballpark uh on on on two doors um uh also um I believe the the district is looking into ways to possibly uh mitigate some of these costs in the future maybe possibly even uh recover some some money um um but I don't know I I don't think any of those plans come to parition but I was pleased to hear about those those possible plans to deay some of these costs uh going forward any other comments questions any NS or extensions motion passes 11.13 and 11.14 uh have to do with our baseball B field uh because our buildings and grounds meeting was postponed uh I would ask that we table those those two um items and you'll receive more information at the buildings and grounds meeting and we'll bring those back in uh February

432after the buildings and grounds meeting sorry after the buildings and grounds meeting yes so we'll discuss it in Greater detail in the buildings and grounds meeting they have a a presentation that they're going to give and so forth help us have a better understanding which is the reason for and the reality is that period of time not going to be able to get out and work on these fields in the snow so you know it it it may present a small delay but not significant okay thank you all those two items together I'm sorry roll those two items together make a motion um well we're we're going to just table them right yeah you have the motion I make a motion to table don't's no motion notion okay okay information IGN we're just so we

433will table them until the next meeting all right make motion table a motion thank you everybody okay thanks Randy so it's part of discussion yeah okay 11 point5 use of facilities uh that information is there for for us um and do I hear uh 11.16 any other items of business hearing none uh thank you Mr President uh Transportation health and safety 12.02 Transportation report is there um brief overview they um decorated a bus and passed out holiday treats in a parade and they took the opportunity um or first student took the opportunity to hand out literature to hire new drivers and we from that we got successfully trained and licensed three new CDL Drivers um during the month of November and December there were combined total of 11 red light violations of those violations three

434were called on camera eight were driver observation um the two common ones were vehicle passing the bus straight on head on and vehicle went around the bus from behind and that concludes that report that strikes means a substantial reduction red light violations from where we were a year or two ago right yeah excellent 12.02 uh motion to approve a contract for car of voice check at a cost of $500 to present to District staff at the safety act 55 in service on Friday Friday March 1st 2024 the contract is there if you would like to view it do I have a second second second uh any comments or discussion any Nays or abstentions motion passes any new items of business all right 13 turn over to athletic report all right item number 1301 the athletic

435report hopefully everybody's sleeping and they don't hear this until later but the Warriors are off to another strong winter season all the winter teams are approximately halfway through their season here are some of the current excuse me highlights boys basketball Warrior boys basketball is coming on strong as they move through the season they are currently sitting third at the Y aoua division 2 and are in Striking Distance for making the District 3 playoffs girls BAS basketball the warrior girls basketball is also picking up some notable wins over top ranked teams they are currently sitting in fourth place in a very tough ya AI daa division 2 The Warriors are currently in currently sitting in position to qualify for the District 3 Championship Warrior wrestling is currently sitting in second place in the ya AI Divi

436doublea division 2 several of the warrior wrestlers have picked up notable wins over ranked opponents putting them in good position as they move towards the sectional championships swimming both the boys and the girls swim teams are off to a strong start the warrior boys team is currently undefeated at 5 and0 while the girls are 3 and two with several student athletes posting post season qualifying times unified Bach ball has served as a powerful addition to the athletic program here at s at SAS hanuk High School the Warriors pick up a win in their first ever botch match and even took on a team of high school teachers in a scrimmage the program has a positive impact on the both the students and the staff and continues to boost the culture in the building congratulations to

437Lily wjuk for being selected to participate as part of the you under 18 um United States field hockey team the team will travel to Belgium and will play Ireland Spain and Belgium that's pretty cool amazing awes and last but not least girls volleyball I hope I don't butcher this name but congratulations to Anna Marie pic that petravic um for being named all state by the Pennsylvania volleyball coaches association and that concludes my report all right um on to 1401 other items of business I don't have any anyone else have other items of business for this meeting all right on the 1501 legislative Council all right thank you president hle I will in the interest of time uh abbreviate my report tremendously uh so the First Things First Act 33 of 2023 that's House Bill 301

438it was signed into law with budget policy changes and a few highlights the school mental health Grant funds each district will receive a base Grant of 100,000 there have been concern of parents and Guardians relating to parental consent regarding the treatment of their child's Mental Health so Senator Kristen Phillips Hill has recently co-sponsored legislation authored by Senator Wayne Langer Hulk uh that will require parental consent for students to use school-based counseling services so it's a comfort to know that that's coming for parents um also uh the bill does provide environmental repair programs that grants districts that Abate or remediate environmental hazards schools will be required to match 50% of the cost right now it's not clear if it can be applied retroactively for existing projects such as ours at sycsd but paying close attention to

439that and more to come later also um um heading to the governor's desk um House Bill 1478 student Dental screenings a school code requirement can soon be fulfilled by a dental hygienist currently a district may only use a licensed School dentist so that would be helpful financially for us also so um something really good uh passed by the Senate uh also approved by the house education committee House Bill 1875 establishes access to Advanced courses for all student grant programs to provide training for educators who teach AP courses and to also provide AP exam assistance to students which is really good those AP exams are expensive we've paid for a couple of them ourselves um pte would reimburse school districts for the full cost of the AP exam for each student who takes it so that's

440nice to see coming down the pike and the house and the Senate are now in recess until February 5th before taking a break for Budget hearings the house will then not schedule to return until March 8th to allow time for prepairs in the house repairs to the house chamber and that concludes my report uh 15.2 York School of Technology I have nothing to report because the meeting's next week okay uh Lincoln Intermediate Unit 12 um nothing to report the meeting got postponed sorry um York Adams tax Bureau uh s do you have anything no all right uh Southern York County School District Foundation okay so I've got some information from our last meeting um on January 4th Dollars for Scholars information went out to all parents and students and scholarships opened on Friday Jan AR

4415th for the class of 2024 very exciting the application for the sycsd foundation scholarships located at Sy csdf dooll for scholars.org to apply there's a very good chance that an application will result in a scholarship the deadline to apply is Monday February 5th so don't be left out in the cold apply for those scholarships today and get great news in May and also uh come out to support the battle of the buildings on February 28th at 6:30 at the High High School cheer on your favorite teachers and staff as they earn scholarship money for students relaying their way through the evening tickets and t-shirt sales will go will open Thursday January 25th $4 in advance and $5 at the door be sure to bring a few extra bucks for concessions and come say hello to

442a few Foundation directors while you get your goodies looking forward to seeing some of those familiar faces and Sharing Smiles if a student sees me on the at the event and says to me show me the money I'll have a little extra something for you while supplies last the next Foundation meeting will be at the middle school library on Tuesday March 12th I look forward to Bringing another update at our March board meeting that concludes my report thank um any other item of business all right uh 16.01 Student Activities report from November to December uh tasks for your information are the fund balances by various student clubs uh 16.02 uh resignations and retirements uh we have uh looks like uh four res or three resignations one retirement um uh there for your information um and

443then uh 17.01 I'm going to turn this over to uh Dr ref thank you president hankle um as we're taking a look at at our numbers uh for the home education we did notice that there was a spreadsheet error uh as we looked at the number that was reported last month it was I believe 992 uh we took a look back and traced it back um we indic found out the error started in September because our number that we had in um August I believe it was 193 was correct so there's a spreadsheet error we corrected it uh so the uh the most the accurate number for the home education is a 206 so uh we do apologize for uh misreporting uh the uh the numbers over the last few months but we're able to

444identify what that error was and we put some measures into place so it uh won't occur again likely to occur less likely thank you president thanks for tring that down uh 17.02 athletic trading political experience um uh just for your information Conor kuster Commonwealth University of Pennsylvania athletic training intern has been placed with Callie fenter of OSS during spring 204 semester uh moving on to 17.3 announcements by the board president and superintendent uh a couple of meetings uh personel and policy committee meeting will be held on Thursday February 15th 2024 in the Southern Middle School cafeteria beginning at 6:15 p.m. the next regularly scheduled meeting of the Board of Education will be held on Thursday February 15th 2024 in the Southern Middle School cafeteria beginning at 7 p.m um Dr BR anything add real quick

445uh it's that time of year big thank you to Mr buffington's entire staff operations maintenance custodial staff either uh cleaning up parking lots sideway sidewalks and and then we tend to try all all over the floors and we come into the building so just a big thank you to all of them if you see them give them other than that uh keep living your dream thank you you thanks uh all right uh item 18 new business does anyone have any new business maybe not uh and finally I make a motion to adjourn uh this meeting uh do I have a second second second any made or exensions I doubt we are so how can we help for