Vermillion School Board

001of the discussion points equity in restroom and locker room policy or restroom and locker room access policy the purpose of the first reading just as by way of information is to ensure that any public entity doesn't craft implement a policy in a single period of one meeting and so it is common to have a first reading and then a second reading to ensure that the public has the opportunity to provide public input or comment on that proposed policy in a near finished form it is unclear in both our policy and other documents to provide guidance whether a first reading even requires a vote and so as chair's discretion i am going to call for a vote the vote however is a vote simply to forward the policy to the second reading it does not produce

002a binding guarantee you can vote yes which would forward it to the final or a second reading at the next meeting which would be monday evening and then you're not obligated to vote the same way at that time so yes vote tonight does not bind you to a yes vote in the future or final form of the policy likewise a no vote does not do so but we would need a majority vote to forward this to the second reading and so at this time and i do know that the board i have identified four issues that i think we need to discuss but i am going to open the floor to public comment as in the past i would ask people to keep your comments brief and to the point i have asked rachel as

003i do every meeting because we have had three prior meetings for public comment and we have again public comment this evening and will again uh next week and so we have done everything we can i wouldn't say everything we have done a great deal to ensure the public is aware of the policy and has an opportunity to provide that input to us in recognition of that i wish to acknowledge that i received a letter from some concerned citizens who did not feel comfortable addressing this body publicly and i want to recognize that that has been received and noted and i believe i've spoken that all of the board members have also received that letter and so we are aware of that input and i think that's important and i do recognize that this particular issue

004uh is one in which there is uh some potential for um creating dissension between you and other members of the community and i respect that but i also as we have for the past 18 months discussed difficult topics with a great deal of respect for people and for their opinions and so i expect that to continue this evening so without that i will ask the first person to come forward and that is matt fairhome even though i call your name if you would please because i may mispronounce it please introduce yourself when you reach the mic good evening my name is matt fairhome absolutely i have two items i'd like to bring up to the school board tonight the first is that i am a little bit surprised that the need for a special meeting

005on this proposed policy it is more appropriately handled during a regular school board meeting no sense of urgency or emergency brings up the need for a special meeting this topic is simply another board policy being discussed in regular order perhaps this topic would certainly prolong a regular meeting and but you're allowed to have long meetings and you of course control the agenda anyway so i cannot help but wonder if it is a possible tactic by proponents of this policy to limit exposure of it at a regular regularly scheduled board meeting where more people would be inclined to attend and oppose it my second purpose i grew up during a time when the ideas of acceptance and tolerance were much discussed it was somewhat settled by acknowledging that requiring someone else to accept a different point

006of view is less desirable than promoting the tolerance of different points of views especially in a pluralistic society such as our own the argument for acceptance is that everyone must agree with everyone else's opinions and viewpoints the principle of tolerance suggests we can live with and should respect inevitable differences the idea of tolerance and its meaning of putting up with something seems harsh to some so the words acknowledging difference and respect for others expressed the same idea having said this i am concerned that this policy requires parents and i suspect of a great majority of them accept a socially constructed distinction rather than respectfully acknowledge differences that can be accommodated i am concerned with that approach one cannot be surprised that such a course of action stirs up great concern and even alarm among parents

007and students alike such concern and alarm the board should consider rather than dismiss as unfounded no argument is given about this policy for lack of tolerance and understanding acknowledgement but i have heard some proponents suggesting acceptance is the only option left to the board i do not believe that is true you're asking parents and students to ignore observable fact and accept a socially constructed narrative about sexuality to replace observable fact with opinion and narrative is obviously concerning to many it is not appropriate for a biological male to be in the girls locker room nor a biological female to be in the boys locker room nor their respective restrooms nor hotel rooms this may be especially true considering that the during the ages at issue the capacity for self-controlled prudence and judgment are still being developed

008as to the inclusion of athletic competition of this policy the school board sensing victory over a more narrow concern is i fear overreaching and getting ahead of state level procedures and concerns it appears the board is through this policy requiring that people accept a socially constructed reality a personal narrative about sexuality rather than tolerate and respect difference the policy is not asking for acknowledgement or respectful tolerance of difference it is requiring acceptance of a viewpoint regardless of others it is reasonable to make administrative accommodation for differences the district has experience with such accommodations such a practice upholds the idea of toleration and acknowledgement and respective differences it is not a benign nor innocent thing to mandate acceptance of a socially constructed distinction over observable reality such socially constructed narratives are by nature changeable and hence

009problematic in public policy the preference would be rather than force subjective distinctions upon the district residents the board should promote respectful toleration and accommodation of differences amid observable obvious reality this policy does not do that please reconsider this unnecessary overreaching policy that frankly promotes mandated opinion over observable reality and respectful toleration thank you [Applause] mike phelan thank you all my name is mike phelan i'm a parent of two kids in the district and i want to thank you all for the hard work that's gone into this policy that will do and already the existence of this discussion already is doing positive good for students in our district and for teachers and parents and everybody else in our history students that i know are already having an easier time in school having an easier time with

010friends and classmates because they know that these changes are being discussed because they have hope that these changes will be passed in the near term um as we've talked about many times come up here this actually is a life or death matter for transgender students in vermilion the having just having a school system uh that is accepting and supportive of transgender students identities leads to a dramatic decrease in suicide attempts and if we're not here to keep our students all of our students safe i think you know we would agree that all of us no matter our position on this policy know that that's important um we need to go a little bit beyond a very surface level idea of biology that biology begins and ends with what genitalia you have observable the day that

011you're born there are many biological differences between people and that doesn't stop at what genitalia you were born with there are many many studies showing that for example brain patterns of transgender women look much more like brain patterns of cisgendered women that is non-transgender women than they do cisgender men right that our brain chemistry is not directly tied for all of us to what body parts we do or do not have right um and to say okay well we have one simple observable thing we can look at and say what it says on your birth certificate what the doctors saw or did not see the day that you were born determines everything about how you need to live your life is simply not representative of how complex biology and human beings and nature are so

012this policy is already doing good i will do a lot more good once we implement it i thank you all for your hard work i urge you to approve this policy as soon as you can thank you good evening my name is charles phillips um some of you may know me by seth i'm an alumni from vermillion high school alumni from usd i've lived in this town more than anywhere else in my entire life bleed red and white i'm all about it i brought my family back from sioux falls to vermilion because i believe it's a great town great community great place to live my mother has taught in your school district for over 20 years she recently just left my aunt still does i'm sure some of you might know my mother and i

013still describe her as an ex-hippie she loves everybody and i love that about her i believe every single person transgender or not has a right to grow flourish has a right to be loved and love others 110 percent with all my heart i have an issue when i have an eight-year-old daughter in your school district eight years old i'm sorry her brain is not developed enough to know the difference and to know what's happening and i we had a very blatant conversation with her do you want someone in the bathroom whether they feel or think whether they're trans or not if someone thinks that they're a a young boy wants to be a girl or a young girl wants to be a boy either way we had this conversation and she's eight years old she

014said no absolutely not she does not want that i have absolutely no problems with this council if they want to work for and when i say this to me in my mind i admit it does sound like segregation have male female transgender but that's not the way i want to put everybody's have a place to go that they're comfortable and that's the way i feel about it i have a very hard time when i spoke with multiple principals i've spoke with teachers throughout the district when there is a very small number of transgender people in the school district now again i'm not saying that they shouldn't be left out in the dark i'm not saying they should not be cared for they should not be protected their children they should be protected but as much

015as we're protecting these children what about the 90 plus percent that are over here what about the families that don't want this there there are there are people who do and i understand there should be accommodations made for those people um one of my biggest fears in this community is because a lot of my family leans a lot more towards towards this policy i'm pr i'm the black sheep of the family and this be on youtube i'm sure it's gonna pull me out on that but i will do whatever it takes to protect my children for those of you who don't know and things i can't thank this board and the school district enough my son is jonathan devries so that name doesn't stand out to you 2018 brain trauma went through jollies now in

016middle school was on an atv accident this school district has done more for my family than i could have ever asked and that's why it is a stab in my heart to watch this being forced upon a vast majority i don't want a little girl in my son's locker room he's 12 years old he's just starting to come to the age where sexual exploration and interest and i'm not saying he's going to do anything i'm not saying the transgender person is going to do anything but we're creating an issue for the majority that doesn't need to be there we can make other arrangements there are other arrangements other than forcing this upon the people who don't want it again i mean i worked as a dj for 14 years djing for four of it at

017a gay bar i really don't it doesn't affect me i don't as long as people are happy that's all that matters but this is about protecting our children and again i'm not saying protect them from sexual violence or rape or anything like that i hate to bring heavy words into a meeting but i'm a little worked up but it's protecting their innocence and it's protecting their rights to be comfortable with their own bodies my little girl is even afraid to go into a locker room with other other little girls she she's not comfortable with her own body yet much less going into a shower room when there is when there is a transgender person in there i mean that's nothing my daughter should see there's nothing my son should see and again i understand that

018we need to project the transgender children and transgender adults they have the rights to do it's not my place to control anybody but i will protect my children and that just really concerns me thank you [Applause] elizabeth thank you again for taking time out of your days i know last meeting i don't know what time you guys actually got out of here so really appreciate your guys's time and taking time to hear from the community so our last meeting i stressed a concern about safety of my two daughters and son just to kind of recap of who i am in reviewing the revised policy i still have concerns same as before and i fear that the vermilion community is being set up for failure with this proposed policy one large issue that wasn't addressed at

019all as far as on the sheet is how it relates to adults so for example uh as far as in in my count in the month of october we had 21 activity events that were open to the public things like soccer football volleyball with such a policy how would that play out in a public setting that way if you're creating the definition that we must allow a biological male into a biological female restroom if it's consistently held excuse me if a biological male into a female restroom as long as it's by consistently held would that apply to visiting adults if this is also for adults how in the world are you going to screen that as far as new person coming in for example if they at a sporting event if someone who looks like

020me walks into a girl's locker room or a restroom would that be allowed and how would there be a potential enforcement mechanism to that if that type of a policy is out there if there's no pre-existing paperwork on that individual are we going by their word on how they're identifying at that time or how do you plan to avoid people um trying to manipulate or abuse the system um we all want to try and protect all of our kids regardless of where they fall as far as in the restroom situation that way so that's that's my major concern in the same way our students from other schools then also allowed to use their restroom of choice as well and by that definition you're creating that i can't use essentially if if how in the world

021do you screen that as well with somebody that's from a different school are they able to use the different locker rooms restrooms that type of thing i just see a lot of issues in that regard um i also did some research and i know a few schools that have this type of policy i heard firsthand that there were some most girls in a locker room chose to shower at home after practice rather than at school because they did feel unsafe i've also spoken to another person as well that similar nobody wants to come out in front of the board as far as publicly but they broke down in tears thinking about having somebody that doesn't look like them biologically speaking in the restroom very very intimate settings obviously and i know a school where this

022type of policy is in place that kids try and hold their bladder if they're scared to go to the restroom they try and hold their their bladder so that they don't have to go to the bathroom and that obviously is going to lead to issues so these fears are justified as far as the type of policy that you're creating and i'm sure you've seen the news about loudoun county and i don't know if you've looked into that policy but that's almost identical to the type of policy that we're talking about creating as far as with these types of meetings the other concern that i have would be about enacting a policy like this without the proper facilities in place we talked about some issues regarding the locker rooms that as it sits today are not

023set up for a way to set this off in a successful way there's a lot of work to do and so pushing it is unreasonable in my my mind there's also a solution which is clear and safe for everyone so definitions are important so we need to return to what the original purpose of even having a restroom is restroom usage should be defined and classified only as a biological activity that's its sole purpose the restroom is not a social event or activity the purpose is solely a biological activity of getting rid of waste so returning to that definition is going to make things much clearer the student or adult that uses the restroom that matches their biological plumbing and this is the this is only biological plumbing not an identity question it gets confusing when

024you involve who they believe or think that they are in that regard so if you define it as a biological activity then i see that fixing a lot of the different issues and in creating a policy like this i think that's part of the frustration is how how you clearly define those roles and who is or isn't and so our original way seems like it was the best and it was working excellently as far as having the male female and then the single stall individual so also each friday i receive a update from the school i very much appreciate those updates so i had the idea i know a lot it's been brought up as far as somebody not wanting to come out publicly i'm wondering if there's a way for people to submit anonymously

025concerns or that via either a survey or some sort of link would be helpful you already have that going out to the public it'd be one thing to add it would be one idea i mentioned as far as with the students you could also do the same kind of thing that way so unfortunately with this type of policy that is making one group feel better at the expense of more students that are now going to feel unsafe and uncomfortable so after three months of discussing this i see us moving forward with the policy that's going to make the larger group more unsafe and put us at risk for future sexual abuse again these are hard topics so again i really appreciate your guys time i know it's a thankless job and whatever decision you make

026you're going to have people on both sides that wish they had it a different way and so i definitely get that but i hope that you hear from all students and parents not just the ones that are speaking up the loudest but do what's best for our kids that we love thank you [Applause] good evening my name is paul formasano and i too appreciate your time in deliberating this important and sensitive matter my heart certainly goes out to the families and children on any side of this particular issue and the difficulties that exist here much of really what i wanted to say is has already been been said but perhaps just to emphasize first and foremost yes i believe in the safety of of all the children and that's certainly necessary what i am concerned

027is the father of four of having my children in situations where they where they feel uncomfortable and frankly i think it's uh it's not right that we're asking perhaps the most vulnerable element of our community to be able to bear this particular challenge when we ourselves as adults aren't necessarily faced with these kinds of things we don't go to the usd wellness center and have these particular protocols in place and so i'm concerned that children who are don't have the emotional cognitive capacities to be able to understand really what's happening to be put in these particular situations and i don't know how long it's been since any of you have spent time in in locker rooms but that's not always the the best place to be that being said i think it's just necessary that

028that you know we build respect we build kindness but at the same time we allow for that those differences to exist and that we can disagree but uh not be disagreeable in that so i would encourage you're not supporting that proposal and i thank you for your time [Applause] uh come forward my name is sarah taggart um so i did a little bit of research on transgender and apparently there are transgenders sort of an umbrella term to refer to [Music] different sexual identities like non-binary gender fluid gender queer no gender multiple genders other gender identity so my question first of all is i understand that there's some concern about you know litigation and i guess discrimination and so forth against the trans community with the gender fluid which is under that umbrella how do we

029control that one minute i'm you know female the next minute i'm male i'm uh you know how how can that be under control how can that you know i know this one portion of the policy says um referring to the restroom and locker room part of it uh that they will use the locker room for the gender which they consistently persistently and insistently identify so if that actually is the policy we go with are we not then uh discriminating against the general gendered fluid which is under that umbrella i mean i don't think so but uh that's that could be a an issue that would come up and so then are we just going to let people every day come in and decide what they want to be that day and you know it just

030could be massive chaos okay and if it's a concern about discrimination that's something to consider but i am pretty outraged about the overnight accommodations that particular portion is pretty unbelievable to me um that i mean do we all understand how it works when when somebody when there's an overnight outing and you get a hotel room and there's two beds there's two queen beds and so according to this policy you know the transgender student is going to be in with the non-transgender students so are you proposing that let's say i have a high school girl and there's three girls in that room and you would all be okay with a biological male crawling into bed with my daughter i wouldn't be okay with that conversely if i had a boy i would not be okay with

031a biological girl crawling into bed with him and sharing that queen bed this is a big problem and i can't imagine anybody thinking this is okay i mean there's plenty that can go wrong here okay um i you know i would also disagree with the restroom locker room sharing those as well that's going to make kids very uncomfortable and i understand that we need to accommodate the trans community too but not at the expense of the non-trans community that's completely wrong this policy is so one-sided i can't imagine anything that the trans community isn't getting out of this that they want this says this does nothing to protect the non-trans and i don't even know if that's the right terminology community it's a completely one-sided policy and i believe that it put it you know

032i know there's a lot of talk about concern about having some legal problems i would i would argue that this policy is going to bring on a whole lot more legal problems than not draft not adopting this policy would this is a mess sports another thing it's not okay and fair for a male to compete against a female there's a reason they've been separated out it's an unfair playing field for a biological male to go up against a female and also very unsafe for them to get thrown around on the court or whatever by a male so those are my thoughts thank you for your time and effort on this appreciate [Applause] it others who wish to address the board good evening my name is lindsey jorgensen and i come in full support of this

033i've spoken to you before on the importance of making things fair and reality is when you look at these children you won't know these children are children and they're girls and transgender girls are girls and transgender boys are boys and these children are being who they are and we need to support that so i'm in full support of this thank you thank you please come forward hello this is my first time being here i am not a parent of two children or i don't have kids that go to vermont i have kids that go to tea two males i want to bring up that i have a lot to do with vermilion i grew up here i went to school in vermillion in the school district i'm 27 years old i was a wrestler for

034many years and coached wrestling for five years one thing that happened in vermilion when i had my oldest son as we were driving down main street we had seen a homosexual transgender parade and as a parent and a father having to explain why these people were so prideful of that is absolutely angering to me and just sick and to think that adults can sit here and think that we even need to have discussions on this is mind-blowing and never in my 27 years of living in this town did i think it would get this ugly i mean you drive down main street you see homosexual flags and business windows and we think this is something that is neat and cool i'm gonna just be real clear and honest and pretty bold and a lot of

035people get offended by that and that's okay i don't have to carry that burden but i also do want to share that i am a newborn christian who has gone through a lot of change a lot of heart change who can definitely share more on that but we're not here to talk about me and my changes in life but i stand firm in god's word and i do truly believe that god made male and made female he did not make transgenders he didn't make us to be homosexuals in romans 8 he actually explains very straightforward that you will not inherit the kingdom of god if you continue to sin and such felt but a huge huge message i wanted to definitely say to the parents who are okay with this matthew 18 6 reads if

036anyone causes one of these little ones those who believe in me to stumble it would be better for them to have a large millstone hung around their neck and to be drowned in the depths of the sea woe to the world because of these things that cause people to stumble such things must come but woe to the person to who they come that's a pretty hard one to handle and to even say but it's got to be said you want to continue to take these poor kids manipulate their minds and their brains and continue to teach them wrong even with masks and how you want to throw masks on their face you're psychologically damaging these kids and i would just ask that you definitely definitely go to bed tonight and just allow the holy spirit

037to guide you and really listen to what god has to say because this this is not okay and so i just thank you for your time and i really would encourage more people to stand up against this because this this is just sick you guys so thanks thank you is there anyone else who wishes to address the board thank you all again for being here tonight um as a parent of children in the district i appreciate all of your time and all of your service um i just want to say that i do support this policy i think we have to we learn better and we do better and what we are learning is we are learning that our children there are children in this district who need to be supported just like we will

038support and we will make accommodations for a child who has learning differences just like we will make accommodations for a child who might have medical differences we need to work with these families and we need to work with these families one-on-one to meet their children's needs and that's what i see in this policy and that's what i really appreciate in this policy because you're not outlining exactly what you're what's going to happen right it's not that a child comes in and they say i want to go to this restroom today so i'm going to get to go to the source from today i want to use this horseman tomorrow i'm going to use this restroom what you're saying is we're going to meet you where you are and we're going to help you and we're

039going to support you and in those numbers of self-harm and in those numbers of children who are not supported by their school districts and how detrimental that can be on them being able to meet them where they are have open conversations with these families have open conversations with these students what that's going to do is that's going to make this a place where all of the students in our district feel safe and feel welcome and i have no doubt that this school district will meet with families who have concerns and put in place accommodations for those families that have concerns and that's what this policy does this policy allows the district to be to be able to do that for children who have not had that opportunity in the past so thank you i appreciate

040the time i've read over the draft several times and um it is it it allows for that there is nothing in there that is um it's not there's nothing in there that's going to be mandatory you walk into school on the next day it's going to be working with families and and i appreciate that and i appreciate you um allowing all families in the district to have that opportunity so thank you thank you anyone else erin oh come on up um my name is aaron kirkov a lot of people know a lot of people understand that i'm a pretty outspoken individual especially with the school district and all that i watched the school board meetings uh quite a bit especially last week i pride myself on being a history person i got that from my

041dad god rest his soul um very passionate individual and my main point is just to express like as parents as adults do we not remember our history at all i mean we can go back to where the schools are segregated we can go back to where i went through the generation of whether or not somebody that was homosexuality or gay or however you want to you know put the term if they were allowed in schools now i would like to say that i coached a girl that played football and i can tell you that they actually played harder than most of the boys there and actually stepped up and none of the kids had a problem with it now i understand the cautionary thing for like elementary kids when it comes to this policy and

042all that but i'm tired of this damn hate my i have a religion i'm catholic that doesn't mean that my my religion or i'm any better than anybody else now do you really want to really want to you know look out for all the kids or are you just looking out the kids because you feel because most of the time as an example in life us adults are the ones that put the uh what do you call it the influence our children to think a certain way my god i seen a lot of kids that had no problem with me because i was a mixed race and i am i'm irish jessica mexican i was a lot darker when i was a kid god forbid that i came to this school i got punched i

043got kicked i got spit on i got pushed around because i look different let's uh fast forward to my son being in middle school son was told that he was a poop staying kid because he wasn't dark enough or light enough my son was called uh the n-word with nugget at the end of it when i brought this to the attention to the public no outrage because apparently that was acceptable why do we demonize individuals right away automatically we always demonize people because they look different they dress different than act differently now i grew up with my irish grandmother in montreal south dakota originally and then came here with the catholic school or not catholic school but the catholic church and apparently i learned a whole different religion than a lot of people in this

044generation i dress different i look different my son dresses different look different i have individuals that i worked with that were transgender no one had an issue with them they never demonized anybody they never went after there i mean we went to the fact of with people that were homosexuality the first thing everybody thought was oh they're gonna get our kids we're they're gonna freaking take it i think come on people we're adults here enough is enough now if these kids want all they want is to be accepted all they want to be to have the human experience i learned that from one person that i talked to about this so yes i understand concerns on the elementary level and all that but i'm not going to live in fear i respect all you you

045guys have made a huge compliment for the school district and the better of positive so i i thank you for taking the time to make an actual adult a decision on this and i respect what you guys are going to decide and you know maybe just a little bit tweak a little bit here and there but like at the end of the day no kid is going to be held to a lesser standard than any other kid than they already normally are so i thank you i just wanted to express that because i'm just tired of the hate in this community you would think we would learn from that and we'd move forward on this thank you anyone else who wishes to address the war um so i don't know if anything was answered before

046but i was just the first reading so then next week would be the second i'm a little concerned about this policy being pushed through a little quickly i think there's a lot of things that need to be covered first because i have young children and i just you need to help me understand more like what are these facilities going to look like i think concrete details need to be made before you actually pass this policy i just need help understanding you know the bathroom's gonna look different you know to accommodate i don't know obviously i don't know either side but i have a daughter like i do it what do i teach her so when she comes home and this is going to get passed through what's going to happen in the bathroom is she

047going to see other equipment or you know i need to know what to teach them so i'm not trying to go bad on either side but i think concrete details are big in passing this because you could pass it and then we all don't know what you're actually going to decide on it locker rooms are even bigger i have boys i think of when they're in middle school even like you're going to have stalls or you can have other things because i'm just saying they're going to see anatomy of the opposite sex and like they're both going to feel weird both sides and that worries me big time so i think that's what's lacking unless if you guys already decided that before on if you're going to have urinals in both or i don't know

048what it has to happen but enough for my three-year-old to have to understand what it is because if she goes in the wrong bathroom she comes out you know i'm like yeah you can go potty she sees the wrong stuff she thinks she's in the wrong place but if it's going to be in elementary schools this is going to be hard and it's a lot of us a lot on as parents to have to teach this you know the tv is crazy i don't let my kids watch much anymore commercials are showing so much and my kids are shocked and now i have to teach them that so we need a lot of time for us parents to decide when it's right to teach our parents our kids this stuff too so give us the

049exact details of it so that we can work with them on this because i think we're lacking in that [Applause] my name is jason schmitz and i've attended three of the four i think meetings on this since august i don't have any kids i'm a member of the community a lifelong resident of south dakota my comments still don't attempt to address the topic of the gender circumstances individuals or families deal with when is strictly directed at the school board and the the policy and the practice and um in the and and it just as an obs and a few observations and maybe to go on the record and i'll i'll explain that but it seems like as time goes on and there's an increased awareness and i know some feedback i've gotten and it appears

050you're getting some um you know email feedback and that sort of thing the concerns of the majority for the representing the majority of this students seem to surface and that really puts in question this need for urgency to push this fast because the more awareness has seemed to correlate in a greater uh a greater concern the practice as it was stated originally seems very considerate if there are additional accommodations i think it's been repeated make those accommodations whatever necessary without compromising or making vulnerable the majority of the students as for again the proceedings it appears that the issue hasn't been clearly uh stated or explained i guess what's the problem i know there have been assertions about why this policy is making or is going to make things better better in what respect to address

051specifically what problem that isn't being addressed in the practice or additional accommodations okay the first meeting um also there was a little uh it wasn't really clear that a policy was going to be pursued and then and then you clarified that and so the policy seemed to be identified with restroom practice and then as and again not to be repetitive but once i asked about the policy in the la the policy that was drafted in the last meeting it surfaced the notion of locker room overnight accommodations in sports which is a is a significant expansion beyond what the original topic was framed to address and is definitely an overreach which has been which has been articulated as far as the another initial uh concern was the legal exposure and that this policy is now going

052to insulate the school district from any legal repercussions well that's a fairly uh that's quite an assumption also given the potential exposure of the school district if the policy were to be passed and incidents were to occur in the case of virginia in fact the school board members are individually liable for the circumstances that surface based on a policy that exposed a circumstance and actually a potential criminal incident let's see i guess after all the input happens what it appears and again speaking to the proceedings is that what ensues is discussion on how to further proceed with the policy or address language or facility structure there has been no regard for not pursuing this policy so it seems that from the outset that the plan has been to draft move ahead with and pass a

053policy i'm under no illusion that this first reading isn't going to pass and result in a past policy because there's been no indication that that course isn't anything but a predetermined uh predetermined outcome so um it it it would be great to see otherwise and so we'll see so anyhow the the notions of allowing for further input not proceeding with this policy doing whatever is necessary to make accommodations for the individuals that deal with these circumstances but not compromising the majority of the students and families is my recommendation so thanks for your time [Applause] good evening a lot of my points have already been brought up tonight especially jason brought up it kind of seems like going through the motion this is just a formality you guys have made your mind up you guys have

054had an agenda it's primarily to promote the transgender community i don't have anything against transgenders i don't have anything against cisgenders but it seems like you you aren't here to protect the absolute majority you're here to push an agenda you're here to push the woke agenda you're trying to make it where black isn't black anymore white isn't white anymore i sympathize with transgenders i'm sure they run into a lot of prejudice we need to have a very safe environment for all children no matter what their bents are we need to have safety your policy has zero percent safety for the majority of children zero percent it's obvious it's blatantly obvious it's not even a a hint our children are like are like plato you can mold them in a lot of different ways you can

055go and teach them right from wrong the object of school is to treat to teach the three r's reading writing and arithmetic but you're also supposed to teach them how to be young men young ladies what boundaries are you know the old saying about the first things i learned in kindergarten were the most important things throughout life you're just putting those all to the wayside with this policy again this policy is just totally one-sided you're supposed to be the adults you're supposed to be the board of education we used to admire the board of education now the board of education in a lot of places i guess don't doesn't have the admiration it used to be teachers we're supposed to guide our children bring them up in what's right what's wrong you're taking decisions that

056are based upon feelings as fact when i go and see someone at my office we do a subjective objective assessment plan subjective is what they say what they feel what they think objective is what are what are facts but a lot of this stuff is based upon feelings feelings change feelings lie we need to go and encourage our young people in making right choices not wrong choices we're not supposed to have our libraries filled with books that are not age appropriate last meeting i watched just for a little bit well we go and make it all available to everybody we don't promote by having a lot of these books and items in the school do promote they promote either right or wrong right or left up or down you need to go and encourage wholesomeness

057kids will always go for the sugar bowl before they go for the broccoli but if you go and teach a child what is quality what's nutritional what's good they eventually grasp it and learn it so i recommend instead of basing plan your policies on feelings and emotions you base it on what's valuable what's nutritious what's right because the kid will always pick the sugar you need them to develop an appetite for what's good and wholesome and happy what makes their life safe and we need to have safe bathroom policy safe locker room policies it started out with a bathroom policy next thing you know we got overnight trips we have lockers that didn't just creep in that was an agenda that was designed in my opinion on what who's ever on the board pushing the

058agenda it was from the get-go it wasn't just oh let's accommodate the bathroom the policies we had in the past got a boy's bathroom got a girl's bathroom got an individual bathroom for somebody who wants more privacy that protects everybody you're just opening yourself up for massive litigation with this policy again it's just totally one-sided protect the other side be the adults in the room be the board of education be the parents kids will always push the boundaries to extremes and do goofy things i raise several kids i have 11 grandchildren they will push the boundaries you have to show them what the boundaries are they want to know what the boundaries are they'll do all kinds of crazy things until they finally see what are the boundaries bring in a substitute teacher the kids

059will push her to the limit or him to the limit put some guidelines up this policy is one-sided it's a free-for-all i've heard a lot of people talk about well i hope and there is all kinds of um flexibility here yeah it's all flexibility one-sided not flexibility for protection of the majority and we need to protect the minority too but you don't go and throw out the other 99 percent of the kids because you want to cater to one group thanks [Applause] any other comments okay then we will turn who want to clarify a couple of things because i think there are some i'm not going to address all of the points raised but there are a couple pertaining to the the practice and what we've done that i think are justified to respond to

060the first is that how we reached a special meeting for this the first reading was that to minimize and eliminate any concern because it wasn't listed as a full agenda item at the last regular meeting i as chair decided not to treat that as the first reading that the policy wasn't in a first reading form and i also asked and have continued to ask that we act in a manner such that the vote which would either put this into policy or not put it into policy occur at a regularly scheduled meeting rather than a special meeting and so the first reading for a special meeting was because i wanted to make sure we were in compliance so we didn't treat the last regularly scheduled meeting as a public as the first reading and did in

061do indeed do this regarding the the inclusion of sports the wording of that in this particular policy simply affirms that we follow what the south dakota high school activities association has already decided and is already in place anything other than that would actually put us counter to the south dakota high school activities association so while this may be new and wording it is not new in practice for this district or number of other districts in the state and so that that inclusion is does not create a new circumstance for the vermillion school district at this point in time um and last but not least in terms of uh and i am one of if not maybe the only member i could only speak for myself um the the process of not considering a policy i

062i approached this thinking that that was actually the appropriate way to go uh that we could address the rights needs and concerns of a wide number the widest number of people through no policy however in listening and understanding from input from the public and from our teachers and our administrators the policy is actually the most appropriate and this is my opinion of what would shape my my decision making is the most appropriate way and so in that respect my mind has changed in how we should approach this and we have over the last several months worked to craft language because our discussion has gone from the abstract to the concrete and while there are still particular practice elements the point of school policy is not to dictate exactly what angle you should hold the chalk

063it is to set the circumstances by which well-informed educated and trained administrators teachers and staff can do their job and so we wouldn't have every detail of implementation worked out but the policy is to create the environment in which that detail can be worked out so with that i have in advance of this because i know that there are four items um and i i have simply numbered them and then i'm going to turn the floor over so that people can comment on that we do need to going into the second reading should it receive a majority vote here decide on what the title will be that is item one item two there is a particular word under confidentiality which is has been raised by legal consult correct damon then we need to discuss particularly

064the don could you bring up the policy okay there it is uh thank you so under confidentiality you see the highlight for the word essential so that is point number two that i know we need to address um and then if you wouldn't mind i'm sorry i'm sorry to give directions in the direction of the one-way glass but if you could scroll down just a moment to where it says restroom and locker room there are three items there the first there is some wording regarding the specific and documented concern that i think we should discuss um and then a fourth item actually gets out a couple of the comments about whether our facilities are ready for this i mean certainly you know i we we do need to make sure because it doesn't matter what

065our policy is i don't think anyone should be as to put it a quote no one should be able to see someone else's equipment when using the restroom or the shower facilities and that's been our goal to create that independent of what this is that that that is something there is an expect expectation for any individual to be an environment where that is protected regardless and we need to make sure our facilities are that way independent of this policy but that is something to be considered so those are the four items i have are there other things that particular policy items and i think this is a good time to remind both the public and the board that after first reading changes can be made that modify the wording but not substantially modify the intent

066of the policy so we can't come in and add a paragraph where all board members get free vehicles that that would be unacceptable are there other discussion points in the draft policy i would just add to the potential discussion and it it really depends on what we decide with number one in terms of of how we label this that the communications and public publication sections feels out of place in in this policy if we're going to call it a restroom and locker room access policy then it just it doesn't really fit there and so i think that you know we could just consider this to be gender equity policy or come up with sort of a broader name that is not just limited to the restroom access or we could consider this the restroom and

067locker room policy and then you know this paragraph would need to be moved to some other section of policy i think this is important for meeting the identified needs of those students it just feels really awkward to have it in the middle of a bathroom policy that makes perfect sense other points i agree completely on that that was one of my points um also with the sports part um as you stated we already followed the south gold high school association perhaps with some education we could just strike that whole paragraph just because it a it's not part of the bathrooms because it already is being part of the south carolina high school association about who can participate in sports and then kind of nextly the wreck restroom and locker room and overnight accommodations is that

068something we should strike completely right now and add later or are we good with which is your think question number three the absence of specific documentation well it's actually there's some language that we could consider in that second sentence of that paragraph that really doesn't pertain to the restroom locker room aspect um so what i had is item four is um via you know discussion of whether locker rooms should be included um and item five i think we could add or six because i've got five now listed as sports item six be the overnight accommodations so that this is really to guide our discussion it's just to kind of keep us organized as we go through these things uh damon do we have a estimated timeline i know that we have a bid for the

069modifications to the locker rooms that we were seeking do we have an estimated timeline as to when those would be completed uh we thought we'd be able to accomplish that by christmas break so within about eight weeks so if we pass the policy sort of fully as written that's a component of it that in your negotiation with families could wait to be implemented until the spring semester are you talking about the locker room section yes yes because that that would be my my request of course as it has been from the beginning that locker rooms wait until we have them completely updated to the appropriate standards okay by by waiting you mean take it out of it right now or just hold in there and say once we're ready to go we're approving that section

070or we're gonna amend that policy when we're ready that part i don't know if brent has absolutely some tricky motions but basically we're not ready yet structurally noted won't be done until after let's say spring semester so do we cut out that part right now or are we able to put it in draft form and approve the rest of the policy i'll let brent give his opinion but you know ideally we would not want to have something that we're contradicting the policy so if we have it listed as locker room policy and we're not enforcing or not able to enforce it we're in fact in conflict with the policy however the other flip side of that is is you would have to revisit this in december or whenever to add the language back so brent

071i don't know if you have a thought on that yeah damon summed it up quite well usually i would not advise going through the motions twice correct kind of went through all this work to get to this point now all right let's back pedal and just go through it all over again however with the facilities not being adequate at the current moment what i would advise is if it's something you want to continue pursuing just remove it from the policy as it sits today we have the language and then amend the policy in the future no provisional approval nothing like that we'll just address it at a future date is there enough room within the current policy as written for the administrators to decide that because we have you know we have determinations that are

072we have language that are appropriate under the circumstances we have language that sort of says absent a specific concern for safety like there are languages that there is language built into the policy that allows the administrators some discretion and what's appropriate for their building and for the specific student that's requesting this this access so is is there enough of the language that's written in there that would allow us to be able to wait until those revisions are completed or are you suggesting that like there's really not enough negotiation and what's there that we ought to strip it now and then add it back in i would say that there the language is broad enough that you could keep it as it currently sits however from an administrative perspective and that's ultimately the boards this is

073decision is how much pressure would you like to put on the administration you can handle it a couple different ways um but i would advise not to include it if it's not ready to be implemented but that is ultimately your decision that would be the recommendation of the ad and principles as well just until we have because we've kind of committed to our folks in the community that we would put all things in place uh going forward with a policy that would help alleviate any of the safety concerns and while those stalls and those additions may not alleviate all of them it's a good faith effort on the board's part to make sure that those are in place prior to passing that portion that would be the commitment that i would like to see us

074put forward if we strip out this section now can we add it as an agenda item to our first meeting in january to sort of that we that we have a specific timeline in place for when we're going to revisit and when we're going to amend that specific section because of the anticipated completion of those revisions yeah absolutely i mean we would just have that as an ongoing discussion item absolutely ken and there would be nothing preventing you from doing it at an earlier meeting if things are finished beforehand so when we're talking about stripping out we're specifically talking about locker rooms only correct that's what i'm calling item for i think it would be locker rooms and probably shower facilities or is that separate yeah sorry yeah basically yeah any of the language it

075talks about the locker room locker facilities would would have to go out because we don't have those quite updated the way we like but but restroom would be moving forward effectively this would be the restroom policy that moving forward so if i can guide our discussion let's address item one because i think that does actually affect a lot of the further discussion and that is the title so we have two listed on the the draft and then we have a third idea of making it gender equity which would allow a lot of the rest of this to make sense are there so i'm going to actually defer a little bit to the policy committee um because you've brought this forward is there any what what is the committee's reaction to simply modifying the language the

076gender equity policy well i believe that part of the reason that is named as such is so that it would be easy to find amidst all of the other policies that we have but i guess if we were to go with a name such as gender equity policy i feel that that would also be searchable so that it could be found easily yeah i would agree i think the topic would still be like you said searchable and it would be something that would ring a bell to an administrator looking for particular policy guidance so considering that i would be okay with gender equity policy do you think it should re i i if that's a friendly man should it read something like gender equity and access the policy the difference yes okay thank you i

077like that thank you for the suggestion any concerns with that i'm going to then pencil in the first reading as gender equity and access policy do we have to have policy in the policy title no thank you okay didn't know if we have that for all of our other policies but i don't believe probably a third of them okay okay uh item two the the conclusion of the word essential uh damon or brent would you wish to comment on why this is highlighted and what the discussion needs to be or should be really was just that uh we had intentionally put that in as part of our policy committee uh in our discussion uh but in talking with legal it's it's assumed and honestly it's already appropriated with ferpa all of all of our staff

078are falling under the the guys that not share uh accessible information so it was really just an extra word we put in for i think to help make the feel good policy but it's really the word that's that's not needed in the policy so so it would read shall keep this information confidential and staff shall not disclose so all staff even though a large number of them would not have any knowledge or awareness if they should they still shall not disclose that makes sense any objection to striking the word essential okay hey we're moving right along two is done um the the highlighted section under restroom and locker room about the specific and documented concern what is the recommendation or suggestion yeah similarly there we had had some discussion both at the board level and

079community committee level about making sure that we weren't going to have administrators just getting frivolous or just concerns out of inundated with concerns so to add specific language uh adding a standard uh the word compelling was uh thrown out as a as an option there so absent a compelling slash specific and documented concern it just raises the level of what concerns should be it's not a an essential piece of of the language but if we were concerned about the standard of of concerns we could add that if you wanted all concerns to be addressed equally and not have any kind of uh disparity between those we certainly could just leave it the way it was intended but that was the only only reason the word was brought up and we're not just looking to add

080words because right yeah so the idea is that this would uh as as worded currently someone could bring forward a specific and documented concern that trying to think of something absurd um yeah i don't know what it would be but you know that um kangaroos could enter uh at any moment right and we can't prove that they can't and therefore correct that's specific and compelling would be raise the bar of that just for an administrator to say that you know it has to be something specific documented and compelling related to the concern of the of the individual that's writing the complaint or concern but once again the administrators use their discretion daily on these types of activities so if it's not worth the discussion or it's going to complicate the matters it's not a it's

081not an urgency i think that makes sense i think it adds a bit of clarity without adding a whole lot of additional words or changing the original purpose of the language that's in the policy okay any objection to adding the word compelling so are are we emitting specific and documented no additional additional additional so how will it read absent a compelling specific and documented complete with commas including the oxford one but then the next thing will be should we strike this from the policy well the rest german macaroos section he'll be coming to that we're including restrooms right so we would not strike that whole section it would just be the words locker room and showers yeah okay got it so restroom will be the new bullet point so so so point number four as

082i have it outlined is whether or not this paragraph would include the word locker room and shower facilities we can certainly discuss striking this entire section but that wasn't what i had sometimes so i'll say restroom all students have access to a strike locker room bathroom keep bathroom strike shower yep that's it okay and then in the last paragraph there is a locker room again and it ended in the first pair under procedure as well got it okay so so i have a question if i may on of course bathrooms so last night those that attended the new elementary school it was raised by the architect those that were there that in his recent comment from dallas looked at you know current locker rooms boys separated girls more of the transgender where both can go

083in and he said based on new learning what they're recommending what i heard others were there is that it really should be within your stall would be a solid concrete wall up and then those new doors that say if somebody is in or out what i heard so having heard that and their research recommendation are our bathrooms the way they are today comfortable enough board members that were there or damon your administrators how they exist today do we feel they're safe enough based on that new learning last night my memory or i guess what i took away from that is he was sharing three examples of what's being discussed in uh among construction of schools and that was one of three that had been discussed i didn't hear it as a recommendation and i don't

084know that you know the concerns of um you know school personnel or safety concerns would have been considered at a and i was there and i i talked to sean one of the two architects briefly afterwards and you know i think his comments were if the recommendation building knew would be that you would use concrete block to separate the stalls and then the doors would be of you know there are a number of different ways to handle the doors that that is now there are and i know that our resource officer and others in law enforcement have commented about concerns about having no ability to determine whether or not one or more individuals are inside those stalls and so there's you know safety is important and that there are safety issues on having a completely

085closable facility and there are safety issues with having some ability to determine by looking at the very bottom of the door whether or not but in terms of looking over from the sides the ideal is to to eliminate that either top or bottom but i don't you know i don't know that it's an essential well we all know how to avoid our feet being seen of course right yeah okay yeah and in our terms of our our you're actually absolutely right uh doug our resource officers have have viewed our our restrooms and given their opinions on full-length stalls and jim is correct when sean talked about these new facilities that are being constructed not only for safety but for privacy complete privacy they want to make them vented and soundproof so that you're really in

086your own little your own little world in these new bathroom settings our current facilities are of course not designed for that they are normal stalls 12 inches off the floor and 50 or 60 inches tall and so most elementary kids can't see over them unless they climb on a urinal and then they look over or crawl under them which does happen from time to time in absence of taking all of those stalls out which would be the only way to correct that we don't have that ability unless we were to commit those resources in my proposal we did not have that we had shower stalls shower doors uh urinal dividers but no new additional stalls installed into the buildings we i'm just questioned in the middle school that are we comfortable with how high they

087are the current dividers for stalls or should they be higher or should they be lower where you still can feed the make sure we looked at everything yeah yeah there are some that are are less than they're particularly in one of the settings they have you know they're only as high as the most middle schoolers heads some of those kids are quite large and so you know they don't have that six foot or seven foot barrier there at this point our administrators haven't reported a concern and haven't had to deal with any issues with kids peaking or doing things over the top or under there but that doesn't mean it hasn't happened because they just may have not reported it but uh at this point that's we would have to make a commitment to some

088of those stalls at the middle school if you're comfortable leading us that we're okay or you prefer we do it differently well at this point um are you comfortable that the restrooms are safe from a height and location the way they are designed today or we should change those stalls i i in talking with our administrators they're comfortable moving forward with with what we have yep i do think it's maybe important to clarify based on the some of the public questions and comments even though some of the people who had them aren't here but are maybe able to watch from home that there there won't be the additional of urinals into the girls restroom that you know transgender male students will be using stalls and not the urinals because that's what's going to make sense

089for them transgender female students are going to be using the stalls because that's what's going to make sense for them that there's not going to be there won't be a visible difference in the facilities that students will notice based upon the change of this policy with the exception of some greater privacy stalls being added into the locker room and shower facilities i also think it's important that we address this question because it's come up many times about adults and how this applies to adults and currently we don't have a policy that applies to adults because we don't have access to their birth certificates so if a trans woman is on our campus and appears as a woman she uses the woman's restroom there's nobody stopping her to check her genitalia before she goes into that

090facility the same thing is true at the wellness center there are transgender students and adults that are using the locker room facilities at the wellness center and that's in accordance with the policies that are there or other places on campus it might not be observable and visible to us because those are not observable visible differences unless you are specifically invasively checking for them so i think that the school situation is unique and it's not that we're putting an additional burden to kids it's that it's a unique situation because we have access to their birth certificates in a way that we don't in very other environments and so even though that they present as young girls or young boys we have information to to check that in a way that sort of is contrary to their

091identities um so we don't currently have a place in policy that says transgender adult women can't use our bathroom facilities or transgender adult men can't use our bathroom facilities because we don't have anybody at the door checking this would in no way make any change or difference to those policies correct and i think it's also worth noting that during the school day the general public cannot enter the building simply to use a restroom that they have to be there for a specific educational purpose they have to sign in at the office and so this doesn't subject the students to anyone other than their classmates and the staff of the vermillion school district from being in the building during the work day and those visitors who are registered and maybe as well an additional comment on

092that the same with the locker rooms locker rooms are facilities for changing for people in athletic contests or pe so just general students going down needing to use the restroom cannot use the locker room facilities as their bathroom if you're going to pe or it's an activity of course you could but if i needed to use the restroom i go to a restroom in the facilities so that there's no um observance of anybody in a in a position like that so that's a policy we've always had and would continue to enforce that okay so the the discussion then i i guess for item four is the specified i need to get back to the specifics of that locker room shower facility wording included now removed now and added at such time as the facilities are

093completed is there i don't want to judge a consensus based on head nods i feel i feel i feel that we have enough cover in the language to leave it in but you know if the administrators feel more comfortable i think as long as we can commit to having on our agenda at as a sort of as soon a date as possible after the completion of those revisions to make those revisions and are committed to doing that then i'm comfortable with taking it out and that's similar to how i feel i one of my questions was you know the state legislature routinely passes laws and are signed in march that take effect january 1 a year and a half later or july 1 that same year but we don't have a history of setting a

094start date in any of our policies so i think what you just suggested shane makes the most sense um and i have no qualms with simply adding that to our for january meeting for uh amendment for this policy so then i i'm judging the consensus is for the time being to be sure an amendment to a policy does require two readings is that correct yep because it's a policy change we're going to stack up those dates at the bottom of this page pretty quickly so and again as was mentioned if you know if things are progressing we this could be one month it could be our december meeting which would be december i can't i don't have a calendar in my hand so and to some extra to some extent and damian correct me if

095i'm wrong this is somewhat semantical and sort of which way we decide to go because we don't currently have any students that are requesting access at the middle school you're all correct yes okay so we're looking at a december 13th and a january 10th are the next two regularly scheduled meetings oh i guess our agenda but if we are waiting for the completion of these projects and then the project's completed and then we need a regular meeting right for a first reading to make an amendment and then a a month later a second reading um that does drag things out i mean i think if we knew they were going to be completed at the end of december like you know absent any sort of delay like if we knew that that was the timeline

096we could probably do the first reading in december sort of an anticipation of because we could always vote no at the january meeting if they didn't get them completed we could table the second reading yeah it could table the second reading right so we just the thought crossed my mind can we table a portion of a reading and you can't really do that but we could we could have that if it looks pro like everything's gonna happen we could do that in december and then simply hold the final reading until it is complete okay so i am for the time being and the first reading we're striking the word locker room in three places and shower facility in one place and whatever subsequent wording changes to make that not so messy so there's an and

097a comma that come out and just to be consistent can we decide on restroom or bathroom or can we just make that bathroom restroom so it's consistent with all the other preferences i don't have a property i think consistency is good yup does anyone feel strongly let's go with rest since we have no bathtubs okay item five rachel's suggestion about removing the paragraph on sports comments even though it's somewhat redundant i think it's nice to have it included in this same space so that if you're looking for all of the policies and wanting to know how they apply to your family you're not having to seek out the the policies elsewhere um but i mean i agree that it is a bit redundant in terms of our current practice but sometimes that's nice to have

098it in a section where it's easily identifiable i agree i have one suggestion if we could change the heading to activities rather than sports yeah i'd but is there a need to have it there or just they refer to that's all the same just just say put a referral subject to the policies of the south dakota high school so we referred to several other either laws or where we just got rid of the meat to it and just referred directly to that law or see the association so something like energy and i just hate scholastic activities see south dakota high school association because if they make a change they were automatically and versus always knowing they make a word change and we're not aware of it there are a few activities which do not fall

099under south dakota high school activities association um baseball is one of them right but it is one for which we have a school team we list the coach in our salary policy even though we don't pay them so that that's the only reason reason to keep it [Music] would you feel the same about the communications and publication section even though it's not restroom related but it is related to gender equity and access maybe just keeping it just as it's a good now it may end up showing up again someplace else on an anti-discrimination page but if i'm looking for something it might be good to have it all in one spot are you guys okay with that yep once we changed the name i had no issue with that i just felt it was weird

100to be in a restroom policy there i did hear i did have an email from someone um just this last week that indicated that in infinite campus there there is a way to keep a student's legal name but also have their preferred name being the name that's shown in infinite campus to help sort of prevent misnaming by substitute teachers or others who come in and so there are a couple of other districts who face this in the state who are also using infinite campus and so there does appear to be a way to have a preferred name option as the as the default that shows without changing the school's official name and the official records we'll talk and catch up on that item six is the short section on overnight accommodations is there perhaps a

101way because we're saying transitors are we on that page yeah trenchers shall be assigned to room space and consistently sort of gender identity accommodate additional privacy needs as requested could we add maybe something more non-trans or do we have another policy for any other overnight accommodations where other students can request single rooms etc where we're kind of both ways looking at it that way it in really all of our uh practices when we go into places like this it's similar to the the the restroom in the sense that um anybody who's uncomfortable with that can always ask for an accommodation right just like the unisex bathrooms who are always available or the coaches office is available for a kid to take and shower do some things like that that's absent of everybody else's view so

102i could see this being something similar to that that if there was just just really anybody that asked for an accommodation it would be considered obviously there's going to be some ramifications if everybody's asking for accommodation suddenly the hotel room the hotel rooms are going to that there's going to be some issues with this moving forward in terms of who do you say yes to who do you say no to uh typically now i'll be honest when we assign kids to ba to hotel facilities typically me and three of my buddies all say hey we want to be together and we get to do that and in many cases whether they're transgender students or not that's going to be very similar me as a transgender student has three of my buddies and then we say

103well we'll all stay in the same room that's no problem so it may not turn out to be an issue but it does have an opport a potential to turn into some costly stuff if we have to have accommodations so i think at this point it's sort of assumed that any accommodation would be discussed and validated it's just whether or not they're all acted upon i guess is kind of how we handle it now i mean i just think if in the perfect world margaret becomes a senior in high school she doesn't know what friends or hers are transgender or not you know so she may ask for accommodation to whomever and you might decline her but she doesn't need to know who's trans gender right so you shouldn't decline her because she doesn't have

104a reason to know that her friend is transgender she's just their parents perhaps are probably the ones that are going to be asking for that accommodation correct so i just want to make sure it's not because ideally they're not going to know right but yeah this is the one that i i am really trying to figure out how we ensure we we can't disclose who is we shouldn't not can't um it it doesn't matter i yeah i i don't have a good answer here this is the protection because i think about as it's more of the parents maybe well i think i mean i think the the deal is that if you're if you're requesting additional privacy and you're requesting a single room because you feel uncomfortable where you potentially might be created doesn't matter

105who the other students are so we're not accommodating a request to not be housed with a transgender student which would be would put us in that difficult position anyone has the option to if they feel uncomfortable with not knowing the status of the friends that they're choosing to have a room with requesting additional privacy i think i think that's the route that we go right that anybody who feels uncomfortable has that option uh we're going to police and make sure that they're they're never sort of in that situation or trying to figure that out and i do think that i mean we make a lot of assumptions about the sexual identity of these kids and deciding that it's okay for them to be in same gender rooms and sort of same gender situations and so

106we're we're making a lot of assumptions about what is and isn't going to happen in those rooms anyways and so you know anybody who just feels generally uncomfortable with sort of sleepover arrangements right could have the ability to have that additional protection absolutely yeah i'm under no illusion that that's going on i mean it does create if there if the demand gets to be such for so many private rooms that it becomes an expense which the school district can't bear or it places a burden on individual activities where it's not feasible for them to have those overnight accommodations and you know i don't think we can pass that cost along to the individual who requests that accommodation so you know we're either looking at lots and lots of long bus rides or sorry the state

107tournaments in rapid city we don't compete this year this is a challenge uh i don't think it's going to be one that's insurmountable um i this is the one that i really don't i i'm having a hard time envisioning what the future holds the rest of it i feel very comfortable that the policy and that that we can handle and manage everything i'm not this one i just don't know what it does for us and i don't not having it in here doesn't make it any better i'll be honest about that so any thoughts retain strike i'm not hearing any push to remove this section i think we retain it i don't think there's any facility changes there's no other structural changes it was the language that was recommended by you know legal when we

108were adopting this policy i think it makes more sense to have something in place but just to make it clear as we have here that you know additional privacy accommodations can be met by anybody that's requesting them i'm hoping it's just as you mentioned that people are you know choosing the same friends they have sleepovers with to be like these are the people i want to see you know like that that's that will reduce a lot of any of the concerns because they're already kind of indicating preferences and that's where maybe like when we say transgender students should be assigned rooms basic assistance or identity accommodating needs can we just say students i mean because that's what i think that's what makes me feel better is it's all students should be able to make an

109accommodation and maybe that's why i was asking is that somewhere else in the policy when we go to disney world you know is it already a rule that there's four or room or maybe now we're just two to a rumor but i think that would be better all students basically can request accommodations strike the word transgender from the opening from the only sentence in this section yeah that's the one way sounds good to me accommodation consistent because no other section begins with transgender students shall it's simply student student student does that make more sense mr elvis yes yes it does yes okay so i will try my very best to recap these modifications to the first reading and then second reading is very much very small minor changes that do not change the intent uh

110so policy j-o-k is gender equity and access first section remains the same procedure section is unchanged the word essential is stricken from the section on confidentiality communication and publications remains unchanged restroom will be the heading there and it will say all students shall have access to a restroom that is safe comfortable and convenient absent a compelling specific and documented concern for safety the district shall permit a student to use the restroom for the gender with which they consistently persistently and insistently identify section the next section overnight accommodations will begin with students and read otherwise as is the next section will read activities um and that's everything the only correction would be that in the procedure paragraph there is one change of just striking out locker facilities yes i miss that thank you okay so now

111any other discussion so remember the vote is simply a vote to approve the first reading a majority approval will create a second reading at the meeting on november 8th one question absolutely so the procedure is thanks if somebody is under 18 and wants to come to school as a he or she talks to an essential worker i know there's all these rules or laws that is still okay they'll be go forward within the school district to the restroom they consistently identify with without a parent knowing correct that parent won't know but a student would then go to the restroom really that they want to identify with correct okay so i mean do you want to cite anything specific brent in terms of ferpa or i just wanted to know even if there's laws or whatever

112i just wanted to know that a parent won't have to know yes however if a parent were to ask and that student is under 18 we would have to indicate that they have elected to do this is that correct no that is not correct you would not have to identify okay the student you could we could but we would not be required to under ferpa correct okay much like i guess we don't we can't be we can't we don't have to answer which hallway they use to get from the auto shop to art so would we do something that from the administrators or those that know it's consistent if they were asked say again so if somebody came you know if a parent asked you you could say i don't know right but but somebody

113obviously in the school would know so what would our procedure be if they asked that principle you mean if a general patron asked about a student you know if a parent parent or a parent okay i get the counselor i get you know no parents involved no anything they heard the school's doing this they come to you you would go to a teacher principal what would they what would the answer be yes and would it be consistent amongst the principals or schools it would probably be it would be consistent i mean the the administrators will will do the same things we would be following basically the advice of council which is in ferpa we couldn't disclose that if it's an educational document in terms of a request that a student wants to change something on

114their school records things like that parents have an access and a right to those as as of a minor child but in terms of the conversations behind doors with counselors or administrators parents i'm not saying behind those doors i'm just saying a student came to school today chose to change or be the gender they identify with as a parent found out went to school to ask you or a principal will they say don't know or will they say yes that's true i would say they'd probably say you need to you need to ask a kid because we're not going to we won't get into the middle of that with a between a uh potential ferpa violation even somebody under 18. even with somebody another personal opinion on that but that's doesn't matter that's fine so

115maybe a way just as far as pronouns if my son andrew who's six goes miss johnson and says i want to be called aj or if it's a bad example what's andy okay as my preferred name would that principal um call them by that preferred name that that the student wants as a choice as a six-year-old versus i am saying his name is andrew and he will only be called andrew even though my six-year-old is saying no yeah i want to be called andy no we wouldn't i know all my kids have nicknames but i've truly tell them that you don't get a nickname no matter what even if your best friend wants to call you that no but you know that's that's kind of like where is that involvement i guess of the parent

116yeah as far as these little kids or any age you know want to be that that pronoun necessarily you know nicknames come up quite a bit and um they're not a legally binding change to their records so that doesn't give us so much heartburn um as somebody who wants to change their records so if my name is you know damon jr and i want to be called dj my friends call me dj at school the teacher probably picks up on and starts calling me dj yeah but my name is damon and that's what that's going to be shown on my papers and that's what i should be be referred to as but you know quite honestly nicknames do sort of stick with teachers from time to time but the kids don't make that request to

117a teacher we don't make those changes unless the parents know about it or have said that they they support that as students get older though there's a little bit more of assertion right from students as they get older with that and and teachers handle that a little bit differently but once again it's not a legal change on any of their documents that recourse requires additional paperwork and but as the policy's written we're making it completely the choice of the student of their pronoun yeah yeah um if you know i would just in this case in this case you know and it's it's a valid point jim's absolutely right we could have a student that does this behind their parents backs and we'll have to deal with that if it happens uh our our experience thus

118far has always been the parents and the family members have come together with this request so it makes it a very easy choice and we can support that if we get that request from a middle school or a high schooler we're going to sit down and deal with it but right now as this stands we would honor that request lots of complicated issues sometimes with with language for sure so a preferred name because it shows up an infinite campus we probably would want to notify that your parents are going to be able to see this if this change happens that's that's an educational record absolutely right okay any other comments questions okay so again a yes vote simply approves the first reading making way for a second reading next monday night um an a vote

119would obviously nay and abstain has the same effect as in a vote we need three yes votes to approve the first reading but i will call for both abstentions and no votes so do you need a motion doug that would be appreciated yes so the motion is to approve the first reading i'll make a motion to approve the first reading of policy j okay as revised as revised yes thank you second by carol and shane all in favor of approving the first reading signify by saying aye aye opposed nay nay nay that makes five abstentions okay the first reading is approved by a vote of three to two we have no need for an executive session this evening so sorry thank you okay we have no need for an executive session so our last order

120of business is a motion to adjourn motion to adjourn by rachel second by carol i think that was carol getting good at voices uh all in favor of a journey signified by saying aye hi i'm not even call for a post we are adjourned