001the evening. We have several policies that we're going to look at with just some small changes. To have that conversation, I'm going to turn it over to Dr. Seir to talk about 1.901, 903, 904, 905, and 906. >> Thank you, chair. Uh Richard, if you would switch over to the agenda page that we bookmarked, that'd be helpful. Thank you. sort of taking these as a block and uh these will look very familiar to you because we did so much work on them previously but you know as one as we made one last pass through this I'm fighting this mouse for just a minute so if you'll let me the mouse is winning present um as we went through these we realized uh we could make a good great and realize that there are actually some
002confusing terms in there the term chart Chartering authority is a sort of term of art for uh an entity that in this case would would grant uh the ability for a charter school oper to operate. And in our state we have two. We have the local school district and the chartering commission or the charter school commission, the state charter school commission. So, as you see, we just kind of did a strike through and everywhere it fell upon the school district, we put LEA for local education agency, uh, which is the term we use in policy. And when it was not, it was commissioned. You can see there's another example right there. Um, where things have changed relative to reporting of, uh, things, you know, to the board. Those now go to the state board of
003education. Um, I'm just just scrolling through those so you can uh you can see visually what I'm telling you uh and and verify that we did also strike out a report that is arcane that no longer exists relative to uh a September one report that uh is is not uh applicable anymore. But other than that uh I'll answer any questions about any of those you have 901 903 four five or six. But otherwise, I think it's pretty pretty straightforward. >> Any questions or discussion? [Music] >> All right, seeing none, then may I have a motion to approve 9 1.901, 903, 904, 905, and 906? >> So moved. Second. Right. >> It's been first and seconded. All those in favor of approving those five with these changes, please raise your hand. All right, that's unanimous. Thank
004you so much. >> Thank you. And uh in the similar vein, uh just to make it better, the the TWWSAA uses sort of a peculiar term related to residency, they refer what we refer to as a school zone. They refer to as a school territory. And just so uh I think that so they can use that as sort of a a capture of private schools and public schools under one sort of terminology. Just to make it clear, uh we did change this relative to the homeschool participation component that says homeschool students shall be uh uh permitted to participate at the school to which they are zoned. just added that phrase in there so there's no ambiguity about if they were to go look at the TWA sta regulations and rules that they would say well
005I live in the county you know that's the territory like it's your zone and it just clears that up >> do we have any questions about one 4301 excuse me all right seeing no questions about 4.301. May I have a motion for approval? >> So move. >> May I have a second? >> Second. >> Then first and seconded. All those in favor of these changes to 4.301, please raise your hand. All right, that's unanimous. Thank you so much, Dr. Seir. >> Thank you. And I'm going to pass it back to you. And I believe Dr. Bow, are you going to handle the next discussion? >> Thank you. >> All right. That gets us to the school calendar and the special election that's coming up and our decisions about it. For that, I'm going to turn
006it over to Dr. Adrien Battle. >> Thanks so much, um, board member Rod. Um, I'm actually going to invite up um, Chief of Operations Mora Sullivan, um, to walk us through this next agenda item, um, which is which encompasses the special election um, and a recommendation for um, some tweaks to our school calendar to accommodate it. Thank you so much. Thank you, Dr. Battle. Um, as as you know, uh, at the last governance meeting, we brought to you the fact that October 7th and December 2nd have been, uh, called by Governor Lee to be a special election um, to fill a US representative seat. And, um, this, of course, as we mentioned before, is um, was called just recently after you had already approved and set our calendar for the year. So now we um
007we do have about 20 sites that will be involved in this um in this election and using our our um our our values keeping ourselves grounded and our values of protection of instructional time and um and protection of our students and our the keeping our schools as safe as possible. We um have the following recommend recommendation to offer to accommodate the October 7th election day. We will swap the instructional day of that was scheduled for the 7th with October 10th that Friday, which was to be an um a scheduled professional development day. Students will therefore not be in school and teachers and staff will be able to accomplish their needed professional development activities that week. But on the 7th, October 10th will be listed as a regular day of instruction on the calendar. And this
008is where it'll get a little a little confusing, but this is what we have to have to do um uh to accomplish the number of days that our students need to be in school. And then Dr. battle through um her powers will be able to declare October 10th as an emergency event day as we approach that day. School will not end up being held that day and we will be able to begin the fall break. Now, this has to be approved um by the the state as we do with any time that we have a um an inclement weather day um or any other kind of emergency event. The state law gives the director of schools the ability to declare such a day for illness, for unsafe conditions in the building, um for inclement weather,
009etc. You're most used to seeing those as snow days. So, um and then the December 2nd election day recommendation is a little more straightforward. We had two professional development days scheduled in January, January 5th and 6th. Our recommendation is to swap January 6th for the December 2nd election day. So, it's a more of a straightforward swap. And but the um they both actually are straightforward for your action because you're just swapping October 7th and October 10th on the calendar and then December 2nd and January 6th on the calendar. So, that's our recommendation. made this recommendation after talking to lots and lots of stakeholders including um our bus drivers union, our um SEIU partners, our MEA partners, um other teachers, other other members of the community as well as families and and um and even some
010students and principles. So um that's our recommendation and happy to answer any questions. All right, looks like we have some questions. I'll start with chair player and then we'll talk with Abigail and Zach. >> So, I was listening but I'm still processing. So, can you repeat again? >> So, we're swapping the 10th and the 7th. >> Explain that. >> Yes. October 7th and 10th will swap and then December 2nd and January 6th will swap. >> Okay. Make sure I got it. Thank you. >> Can I just highlight the October 10th day was already um a non-instructional student day so there's no impact to families for their day. >> Correct. Thank you for that. Member Tyler. >> Yes. Um how certain are we that we will get the ability to wave the 10th if it will
011be on the calendar as an official school day and that we're going to use an inclement weather day for that and since it's not technically the election day itself. >> Yep. Um so um two things. one, you heard um Chief Sullivan um nicely um describe what inclement weather days can be used for. Um this is about safety um of our students and staff and so given that um we would like to apply for um the inclement weather day under those conditions. Um the second thing is I had the opportunity of convening with um other superintendents who are being impacted um by this um recently and I will tell you this is consistent with um the ways in which they're approaching um their calendars as well. So this is this will not be just an MNS
012um um approach to how to deal with election days but pretty consistent of of course of what's happening in the mid Cumberland um area of the districts that are impacted. >> Okay. Has anybody spoken to anybody at the state to get >> We we have attempted to reach out. Um we've not heard back yet, but it's not been a long runway. So, we do anticipate to hear something back soon. >> I mean, I think it's great. I just want to make sure that >> absolutely >> we don't get stuck. >> Absolutely. >> We would not um you know, pending approval um we would um actually try to confirm um approval if any is needed. We still are unsure if it's even needed at this point, but we want to just dot our eyes and cross
013our tees. Um, we would not communicate anything out fully until we have that. So, we've already tried to start u making contact to see if we can get some pre-approvals or at least some past ones. >> Member Young. [Music] >> Thank you, Chair. So on our agenda and our packet for this evening, um it has for us, let me read it. It's it just says school calendar special education >> and or and fine. But I guess but as far as hack, what are is there a is there an actual and I don't know the mechanics of this. What are we necessarily voting on tonight? I guess is my question. Like is there just the calendar change? Is that what it Okay. Okay. >> Yeah. An amendment to the calendar. >> Okay. Oh, sorry. >> Thank
014you for saying that forcefully. >> Herob block. Um just for um purposes of discussing publicly. Gosh, what's going on with the mics? Are they jumping at us? um the I'm assuming that part of what um Chief Sullivan when you referenced it u in terms of talking with um uh bus drivers and CIU members and other folks is that part of that is about making sure that our staff have the ability to have the day um to vote themselves as well. Is that part of the consideration with with staff? And I I know that's an intention that we often have. Yeah. Um so yes, that was um part of the discussion um itself. We we needed to check for a few things. Um one, clarity around like why this is even needed. >> Um we wanted
015to account for um some of the pillars that Chief Sullivan mentioned, safety being um a top priority for us. We um needed to check against the school calendar. We just wanted to make sure that we were considering voting, all the things that um are necessary for us to balance this out. Now on October 7th and December 2nd, teachers will be in PD both days. Um but that does in itself allow for some >> more flexibility. Yeah. Right. >> Um and then this the other question is um in part because we're just voting on generally a calendar change. How will it be communicated to um staff and families and students etc? Yeah, this has been a um pretty intensive cross cross collaborative um effort. Um so our communications team has already um started to draft uh
016what the communication will look like in the simplest most visually um um understandable um ways. So we would send one, we would use our socials, we would use our website. Um we plan on also using um um our email system. Um I think we might be also planning for a call out. So, we're going to try to overly communicate um this change um for the community and of course our school teams will be critical in just also continuing to share the information. I just want to make sure for clarity from looking at Friday's director's report and of course the conversation we're having today. So, students will not report on the 7th, excuse me, October 7th. They will not report on October 10th and they will not report on December 2nd, but they will report on
017January 6th. >> That is correct. >> Got it. >> My only concern is with students not having to report on the 7th and the 10th. There are these two days. Are we concerned about families potentially being like, "Let's really extend this fall break." Is there a way that we can communicate or are we already planning to communicate with them the importance of still not missing those instructional days? >> Yeah, of course. And I think the team that dug into this, I mean, we tried to weigh the pros and cons um of each, they will still still be attendance um days. They are also the first few days of the second quarter of the school year. So, we will continue to emphasize that, but also keep in mind the 10th was already a non-instructional day um
018for um for students. >> Sure. No, I think it's it is the best option out of not the best options because they're not something we were in control of. Um so, I appreciate that there's going to be some additional attention drawn to it to families and making sure they understand the importance of starting off your quarter correct and the importance of attendance. Um, some families are going to do it because that's just what families might do. But as much as we can mitigate that, of course, for our attendants, >> and we'll of course encourage our families to do the right thing. Um, part of this is also being responsive um just to the safety um concerns that have been heightened over the years given the elections and school happening at the same time. So, um
019through our attendance planning and attendance um incentives and campaign, uh we'll continue to um push that all the way through um fall break. >> Thanks. It's my understanding from talking with you and um some others of the staff, I know that this process took a lot within internal staff groups and then also talking with some principal groups and some other stuff. So, I appreciate how crosssectional you were, but trying to make sure that it didn't affect students or teachers or pay schedules as much as possible. Um, so I appreciate this attempt particularly because we have been trying so hard to not have schools open um, during election cycles for security concerns have been brought up not only by board members but by our families and our staff. Um, and I see Dr. Donna McKenna, you
020have a question. >> Yeah, thank you. Um, I apologize for my tardiness but I was listening online and so just have a quick question about the inclement weather days. I know we will be borrowing one of those inclement weather days. um what happens if we go over the four that are left? Um can you kind of talk us through that? >> I think it's five >> that will be left. Um and so part of the communication and this recommendation um is just putting everyone on notice that if we were to go over those um five days that we do have two virtual days um at our disposal. So, if we were if it was looking like we were going to get um to that point, we will begin our communications and preparation um that in
021the event we needed to, we could leverage those two um virtual days. Again, I mean, I'll highlight we're not the only district that's impacted um by this. Um and there is just no ideal situation. Um we spent quite a bit of time as one example with our principles um talking through this and they quickly realized that um there's pros and cons to um every way you can kind of slice this and um accomplish what we're trying to accomplish um here. And so we're trying to um just bring forth the least disruptive and the one that um really supports again the priority around safety but also protecting instructional time as well as the professional development and learning time for our educators. Thank you for your thoughtfulness and the work that you all put into this. I
022I just wanted to clarify that so that we had it on record. Thank you. Thank you. >> All right. Well, it looks like there's no further questions. In order for us to bring it forward at our board meeting, can I have a motion for us to have a vote on an amendment to the calendar? >> Motion made. will just fill it out. >> No. The motion would be to have an amendment to our school calendar. >> Motion to have an amendment to our school calendar. >> And it's been first and seconded. All right. All those in favor of that, please raise your hand. All right. That's unanimous. Thank you so much. All right. Be there. No further business. This meeting is adjourned in record time. Thank you.