001foreign [Music] um organizations perspective thank you absolutely amazing yeah [Music] straight hello all rise today he's great yeah her service husband got a job here and then you're thinking maybe and they were like actually we need you now yeah right now they're at our house [Music] all right that's right that's my mind [Music] oh okay yeah again closer yeah okay so all right good evening everyone if I could have your attention please it's six o'clock on the dot April 20th 2023 and this is a duly filed and posted regular meeting of the Alamo Heights Board of Trustees thank you all for being here this evening I'd like to welcome anyone listening on our live streaming broadcast if anyone would like a recording of this meeting we'll also be posting it on a link on the
002district website within 24 hours after the end of this meeting in addition we'll also post the materials being presented within 24 hours thank you sorry clay I didn't wait for you nope I'm good um so you can review a copy of those materials as well these can be found under the school board icon at our ahisd.net website if anyone in the audience would like to address the board this evening we always welcome your input during our citizens to be heard item on the agenda we ask that you please fill out the yellow form by the door read the instructions and indicate the agenda item if there is one so that we can introduce you at the appropriate time uh Brian just want to confirm everyone got the yellow sheets everybody okay thank you uh with
003that I'm going to move on to section two of our agenda delegations and recognitions and hand it over to Dr Frank Alfaro thank you Mr Hamilton I'm excited to see such a big crowd for our first recognition tonight we have an award that we give out every month to an employee called the spotlight on excellence and it's designed to shine the spotlight on someone who often Works behind the scenes often unnoticed to fuel our tradition of excellence and so today I'd like to call up our assistant custodial supervisor come on up everyone in this hypnosium as Xavier in espanol in Panama uh since uh 2015. I just yeah yeah 2015 and he is the assistant because those supervisors I had custodian back there supervisor over there is Jerry and of course our director is David
004Ramirez here to celebrate him and all of the people in the back wave of us if you're here yeah they're all his colleagues as well as his wife Stephanie who going yeah Stephanie's in Alamo Heights uh graduate taught by Dr bashara yeah at any rate so enough about him um he truly is a spotlight behind the scenes working with all of the staff we put on so many events and you often take for granted the setup for events like tonight we don't just randomly have chairs hanging out there all the time there's lots of background work that goes into every big event we have we have the celebration of learning we had a a few weeks ago they set all that up everything you can think of we had um the strings event uh last
005week everything you can think of all of our team is working hard behind the scenes and Xavier is a uh integral to that he's very calm he's collected he's always you will do it and I know it's a lot of work and you guys are all great to do it and I appreciate you uh spearheading it all in addition to that it's just a great daughter and although every campus throughout the district is was excited to talk about uh nominating him for a spotlight on excellence and so if you like this you can say anything if you want I just want to uh to say this recognition represents all Plant Services my team thank you so much congratulations now I'd like to let's get the whole team up here and let's take a picture okay
006all right so they've been Gary let's get a picture of us first obviously [Music] I appreciate all of you all coming out to support Mr FedEx here don't be shy don't be shy all right ready one two three one two I'm gonna take another like this yeah all right thank you thank you thank you I know yes [Music] thank you [Music] yes Franklin the background [Music] okay okay all right thank you all again congratulations foreign our final recognition tonight is our uh monthly update from the high school student council Dylan let us know what's going on well you know before I get started I just wanted to say how cool it was to have our custodial staff here I know you know whenever I'm having a bad day and not just me anyone and just
007how incredibly positive and the overwhelming just love that our entire custodial staff like shows us as students just they show up for us when we meet us and sometimes it's just a smile of holding the door for us but um we all appreciate them so much and they they work so hard um so I thought it was really cool that they were able to be here today um on a student council note I will say we have some of the exciting stuff going on tomorrow bright and early 5 a.m We Leave the high school for a student for Dallas we're gonna have a student council state conference um so there's going to be some exciting stuff going on there um I'll be giving a presentation on uh it's a great day to be kind and
008about ways to promote kindness and character education in schools um and I think it's going to be good we're taking about six people um plus Dylan and Rangel so I think we're all gonna get a chance to really learn um I mean me I'm just you know going to go but we're taking some freshmen and sophomores who are really going to learn and soak that up and I'm hoping they'll bring some really cool ideas um back to campus other exciting things we have going on is our talent show this year's theme mule's Got Talent MGT like AGT MGT oh thank you so we're gonna have judges and we're gonna have like the big red buzzer and the exit lights up it's it's we're gonna go all out let me tell you so I'm excited um
009I know that we're going to be working really hard on that one um but other than that I mean we're just making sure um you know things are going good we have the first Friday come up it's gonna be a Cinco de Mayo first Friday so we're gonna get Mariachis and we're gonna have raspas and we're going to have a whole bunch of different fun activities um that will be um there to promote kindness for that first Friday it'll be our last first Friday too um so a lot of exciting stuff going on over at the high school that's it so Dylan before you sit down we appreciate you last two years of services congratulations thank you that's it [Music] all right thank you Dr alforo with that we'll move into section three citizens to
010be heard we have received 16 requests to speak on public comment about an item that is not on the agenda in order to facilitate an orderly meeting and respect all participants time and in the interest of conducting an efficient meeting any group of three or more persons signing up to speak on the same topic that is not on the agenda shall appoint one person to present the group's views to the board and will be limited to three minutes each of you will have three minutes to speak Alicia will hold up a card when there is one minute left as she's showing right now at another card when your time is up in making your presentation we ask that you do not refer to individual students or Personnel by name or position especially in a public
011setting it's best to be careful with comments about specific people in addition by state law the board is not allowed to respond to your comments but we're always welcome and appreciate your input as important members of our community that and I'm going to say up front I forgot my readers in my car so I have to ask Dr Bashir to ask help me with some names um if you could okay we're going to start with Keegan frenza yeah okay thank you okay thank you sit at the table Yeah sit at the front of the table or stand said yeah [Music] hello my name is Keegan ferenza and I'm a sophomore at Trinity University I'm thankful to have the opportunity to speak to you all today and I'd like to thank the members of the board
012for their time and their continued commitment to Alamo Heights today I would like to remind you about the importance of two different points the first being the importance of practicing anti-racism policy the students and faculty of Alamo Heights need to be made aware that simply not being racist isn't enough everyone needs to be actively working Against Racism and finding new and innovative ways to create awareness around these issues if racism is simply avoided and people continue to claim that they simply do not see color then the work of the people who came before us will be for nothing in the future of Tomorrow Will Be uncertain practicing anti-racism will improve the overall quality of learning and allow students to have the space they need to learn minority students will feel safer when attending school and
013it will be because of the conscious effort made by their peers teachers and principals this kind of change is not performative and will require continued dedication from all members of the district the second issue I'd like to discuss is how racism can often lead to forms of aggression and bullying I believe it is important to note the violent effect racism has on people there needs to be more awareness around issues of racial harassment and Alma height schools and a larger effort to confront difficult topics surrounding issues of race the victims of these terrible aggressions might suffer academically mentally and even physically providing students with the safe environment will help to remedy these aggressions the Futures and the lives of these students are in your hands if the if these goals are accomplished the achievement Capital
014lesson graduation rates will rise and students will have more opportunities thank you foreign we'll hear from Gabriella McAdams Alamo Heights is a good school district and has a lot of resources but they seriously need to work on their school culture of discrimination racism and ignorant Administration 2020 Niche reviewed three stars even with a student body of under 1500 more than 70 is white and is very apparent who it leads to in this District there's a huge disparity between lgbtq plus Hispanics African-American in essence between minority groups and the white Christian Community 2023 in these review four stars hello my name is Gabriella and I'm here as a college student in Resident living in the Alamo Heights community and I felt it important to come and be an additional voice of accountability the school board and
015District as a whole I want to continue echoing years of complaints of discrimination and harassment from students and parents which somehow continues to go unprioritized as a white majority area nestled in a minority majority City this places the board administrators and Educators in the position to go the extra mile to protect marginalized students Alamo Heights is praised for many levels for academic achievement in both some of the highest education ranks in Texas for categories like graduation rates college readiness and choice of educational programs unfortunately this District also carries an Infamous reputation for large amounts of hate discrimination and bullying this carries on into 2023 where my peers and friends who have attended Alamo Heights especially at the high school level tell me that they sacrificed their mental health and self-esteem by staying in this district
016for the sake of their academic Futures I've also heard from those who have left the district as they recount blatant ignorance from Administration almost as often as students the voices of current and former students over the span of years who explicitly stake their fears of safety under this District's policies and actions should be repeated over and over and should weigh on the minds of every Community member who all have the power to do better like many districts in the country there is a trend of implementing half-baked Solutions in the wake of discriminatory allegations I implore the board to revisit some of these programs like Vision 2020 and the diversity Equity Council and strategize beyond the desires of some donors who may prefer a neutral stance on perceived controversial issues such as basic student inclusivity in
017the words of a Community member we created a culture of entitlement where there is no empathy these kids have never had empathy fostered the first step to changing the reputation of hatred and elitism in Alamo Heights is accepting that there was and is an issue of ignorance in regards to dire social issues that are affecting the most disadvantaged students inclusion and Equity are not just media buzzwords as they have been deployed in political debate they work to address real feelings and struggles of excluded populations that the majority is rarely forced to consider improving Equity means little if those at the top of the hierarchy do not truly believe in or understand the fight for Equity themselves so in addition to all the shiny new facility Renovations that are in the works I encourage the board
018to put just as much effort into pushing everyone including themselves admin and parents to take real action towards educating one another and fostering an environment of empathy because it is owed to these pain students and families both past and present encouraging a thoughtful and open mind to other life perspectives amongst the community is an effort that is needed to produce visible School Improvement for every child who is confronted with an academics of these Choice respect for peers work quality education thank you thank you Mr John 's next Caleb Jenkins Hi how are y'all uh thank you for allowing me to speak today um so I'm Caleb Jenkins a high school graduate and uh soon to be college graduate of Trinity University um I currently am here on behalf of Trinity University and uh all year
019in my schooling in America class we've been learning about the school board system and after doing some research on Alamo Heights I see I found that your website lays out the demographics of the student population I'm sure you are all well aware um but to bring to your attention 51.3 white 41.1 percent Hispanic 2.3 African-American point one percent Asian and point four percent Native American 2.3 percent of the student population being African-American is worrisome in your 20 in Your Vision 2020 strategic goals under the headline belonging and Equity goal it states a strong sense of belonging generates feelings of trust connection pride and motivation Alamo Heights is a community that seeks to bridge our differences I'm here to argue that having a 2 2.3 African-American population amongst the majority of white and Hispanic uh campus
020does not create a strong sense of belonging it goes on furthermore Equity means that each student experiences a deep sense of belonging without schools and that not a single student walks our hallways feeling marginalized because of their identities and so how could the one black kid in the room with his 15 other non-black classmates not feel marginalized and I went to a private school in New Orleans Louisiana and I graduated amongst a small class of 64 students three of the 64 students were black I left the school with a with a quality education but reflecting on my time spent there I had to deal with marginalization almost every day it was so normalized to the point that I wouldn't even recognize what was going on unconsciously I was in constant competition with my counterparts counterparts
021to succeed keep up while battling mistreatment I'm here to testify that San Antonio is a segregated city that has allowed systemic racism to exist and to guide the education of its community um we cannot all be passive observers of this segregation by doing nothing we are further legitimizing racial isolation Jim Crow laws are far gone but they are still alive and prominent in Alamo Heights ISD the wealth gap between people of color and non-people of color is an economic problem but finding a solution to that problem starts with education it is not so much a concern to diversify Alamo Heights but rather to rather call for Alamo Heights to be proactive in that change integrated education can benefit all students incorporating diversity programs does not benefit these racially isolated Black Folk nor does it benefit
022the white folk and grand scheme of things but the future of the nation rests in the hands of San Antonio's board members who have the ability to bridge the gap between socioeconomic status and education through your active pursuit of rectifying the Injustice injustices and inequality caused by systemic racism thank you next we'll have Catherine zar [Music] good afternoon my name is Catherine and I attended ahisd Cambridge Elementary and ahjs from 2014 to 2016. well in sixth grade I took Health at ahjs where the only thing about sex that the instructor taught us that would be forever unhappy if we did it too early to do her own family tree on the board wrote the age at which certain numbers first had sex and X Out December who had had sex before marriage so that they
023were now unhappy in life then once the girls and boys are separated still the girls at our virginities were something that we were supposed to gift to our husbands and that the gift would be ruined if you had sex before and you wouldn't be able to bond with him he would probably divorce US never once did she think that we might not marry that we might not marry a husband largely because of this sex education it took me till my sophomore year of high school to realize that I was gay years of wondering why I didn't like voice yours was thinking I was a psychological defect and a monster because no one had ever bothered to mention that's possible and normal to like someone who isn't a guy you were doing worse than failing lgbtq
024plus students you're actually hurting them causing wounds that for me still haven't healed by limiting lgbtq plus people from the sex education from the health curriculum and from the curriculum at large you are telling your lgbtq plus students that they aren't normal that they shouldn't exist and you're also giving their straight peers permission to look down on them lgbtq plus youth are four times more likely to attempt suicide than their straight fears four times they experience bullying they experience harassment they experience hate Erasure and dismissal in and out of the classroom and you have a responsibility to protect them the next time you look at the sex education curriculum and that's something that you look at it Through The Eyes of your lgbtq plus students and families better yet ask them invite them to share
025their experiences and their recommendations for a more inclusive sex education online you can find free and accessible lesson plans that you can customize to age level and specific topics at advocates for youth called rights respect responsibility that includes lessons on defining sexual orientation and gender identity printing the intersect for all people safe sex practices for lgbtq plus people and more money would be surprised at how popular such an initiative is One Nationwide survey found that 78 of parents support such an education at the middle school level even more in the high school level I would also like to take a moment to Advocate on behalf of the 9th grade students finding queer Erasure and censorship and recognize their strength and courage you deserve to see yourself in the curriculum you're beautiful and loved and you
026matter thank you for being here I exist lgbtq plus people we exist we go to your schools watch down your hallways and attend your classes it's time to stop pretending that we don't thank you Bullock good evening um so tonight I'm representing 45 people from the 100 block of East Stone View and the Neighbors on Vander oven who have houses that share Street and access with Alamo Heights High School and have actually signed a petition in agreement with the things that I'm going to read so since fall of 2020 we have experienced excessive and frequent noise and lighting disturbances from the new stadium and heavy and unlawfully fast traffic trash in our yards and buses idling and parking in basically people's backyards we are here this evening to bring these problems to your attention and
027propose reasonable Solutions which will require the board the city council and the police department to collaborate first the new Sound and Lighting system it was completely all suited for this small community streets adjacent to the school have endured many evenings of Amplified music and yelling and announcing in which we could hear word for word every play every name multiple evenings a week the placement of the speakers causes a problematic Echo heard outside the stadium as well the Jumbotron lights are often left on all night and the other lights are turned on as early as 6 a.m causing light to shine into the people's homes when no one is even on the field an amplified siren sound is often used to Signal goals and it's loud and repetitive especially during weekend tournaments when East Fair Oaks
028became one way to allow for school parking on the street residents on the south side of Eastbound view began experiencing an increase of trash flowing into their yards sometimes from events but often just from kids dumping their trash after lunch these neighbors also experience buses from other schools basically parking in their backyards during events well it's basically their backyard often times with our engines are running so the diesel smells waft into their backyards finally the amount and speed of the traffic despite the fact that our street is a school zone has increased as the result of the East Fair Oaks becoming one-way and a lack of monitoring we're asking for a regular communication between our neighborhood and high school and the high school so that we can become good neighbors to each other complete and
029we want to ensure that the stadium lighting is turned off when there are no events or practices we ask that the loudness of the stadium noise returned to a reasonable level for a neighborhood we've been there for 22 years so this is really just the first time we're bringing it here please disallow the PA system used to be used during non-ui events we ask that the siren sound be reduced and if not just taken out we ask that they're litter at the high school be monitored we're even suggesting providing community service opportunities to pick up that trash and please discontinue the bus parking along the north side of East Fair Oaks so I hope we can work together on some solutions thanks thank you to the next is Billy Bullock [Music] she taught for me
030great welcome all thank you Billy as always short and concise next we'll have Charlotte Orozco against Ela the class that had the literature Circle Unit is with the topics of transformation in the World's End I was excited to find that various books available for us had to choose had representation for the lgbtq plus community be that I myself and part of that community being gays is something I try to hide I wear knee-high rainbow socks every day of the week if I had an Affairs yes I have long hair and yes I wear them all then I found out that the unit had been put on pause unofficial sources are saying that this censorship happens because parents complained about there being lgbtq plus representation so what about me needs to be censored for rare Classics
031I exist and I'm proud of who I am if a parent is afraid of me and what I represent I ask why this is who I am and I should be able to see myself represented in our curriculum and not have to worry about being erased because of the parents bigoted views the sad truth is when queer youth don't feel accepted at home and at school this can lead to worsening depression even suicide I'd also like to point out that everybody here wearing a yellow Dot shows that they're supporting our kids thank you next will be Lisa Livingstone I think she spoke for me okay next will be Anthony Guerrero good evening my name is Anthony I gotta help my wife Melinda be there at 164 East Stone View Place we've been there for a
032little over 30 years our house is located just across from the street from the North End of the football stadium over the years we have seen some the completion of some wonderful improvements to the high school however we are here this evening to address several recent issues involving the high school of the house the issues of the loudness of the state of speakers the parking of buses along the north side of these Fair Oaks just outside our backyards the lack of trash cans on the north side of the high school and the students feeding around the school and on Eastern we propose a following act to the following to address and correct these issues first is Speaker loudness can the volume control be permanently set to a lower decibel level can a pool of operators
033be established to always ensure monitored operation of the volume is forward for all events can the position of the speakers be redirected of course football games will be exempt we need loud to support our mules okay so second is a bus issue not allow any buses to park along the north curb of East Fair Oaks we would prefer an established designated parking location for all buses for all events at all times perhaps on the east side of the state of vanderhold we have had three water leaks in our backyard over the years and each time a bus would start with this Wheels directly over the water supply line feeding our property it has resulted in the line coming apart also it is difficult to enjoy our backyard with people looking directly over our fence we
034have also experienced derogatory language from visiting schools therapy there needs to be more trash cans located on the north side of East Fair Oaks and the high school I have recently counted approximately six to seven trash cans on the south side I frequently pick up trash left by students outside along my fence perhaps making a daily school announcement informing the students it is against the law to there and students taught littering will be held accountable maybe starting a later pick up by school clubs to enhance the appearance of the high school and its surrounding neighborhood last the speeding speeding has always been a problem over the years again maybe a daily friendly announcement to students to please adhere to posted speed limits it would also help the Alma Heights Police monitor the streets around in
035the school lunch after school and at all events we are confident these issues can be addressed and solutions put in place to correct them we say this based on the fact that over the years issues have come up before been addressed and solutions put in place agreed to by all thank you for allowing me to speak with God in our concerns have a good evening thank you next Melinda Guerrero yes I'm famously sent an email to all of the board members here in Idaho hopefully concur with what my husband just said so I thank you for your time it's pretty detailed so I apologize for the length of the email but it it really does point the concerns from the East lview neighbors thank you so much next Ginny Hixson good evening my name is
036Jenny Hickson I said um is having the book kerfuffle um I'm pleasing my kids with my wife and with their dad so we are an lgbtq family I think um there's been a lot of back and forth about what happened happened with this with this class I think what I would like to say is that you have fantastic English teachers in this District who picks amazing books that represented the spectrum of all kids and what I would encourage you to do is think about the ways that as a district we can continue to support our teachers in having the access to the broadest spectrum of literature that our kids need to be able to read about themselves to read about their peers to read about their City reflected in the literature that we have good
037literature should challenge us it should make us really uncomfortable I know that all the things that I've really learned in life I've learned because I felt kind of icky while I was learning that they made me feel like I didn't know anything and that's what if we're really challenging our kids they're going to read books that are going to challenge how they see the world and so I would encourage you to think about the policies as we move forward in this increasingly political environment around we all have all pay attention to the news and what's happening at the legislature these decisions are being taken out of the hands of local control and so as people who are raising our kids we need to think very carefully about how we support our teachers who know our
038kids best in presenting the widest array of literature available to them and making sure that all of our programming represents all of our kids that's why we live in this District because we believe in the good quality of Education that you can provide and that's what we know that you're going to be committed to providing for our kids so thanks very much next Joey crimmer okay [Music] next Lisa Fox been here for two years reporting you guys were two years I hope that I have shown y'all respect learned something from me these last few years I want to see to all the students that are here right now reach out for help if you look at my Facebook Lisa Fox all the school board work with me been trying to do this for a long
039time so last week we had found out the TA had finalized the um the law that Maureen molak had worked with the Texas legislation to get past to help with the bully prevention so what are we going to do now are we going to just do the minimum and shove it into committee and just say hey you did the minimum we're doing all we can or are we going to do better like we always say we're on the heights we do better right I looked at the Committees I all the Committees around I looked at who's in the Committees in the high school the Middle School Howard Cambridge and I noticed that it's basically the same people in the same committees so how is that diversity it's not all the things that these these students
040have said today are exactly what I've been saying for two years but they say a lot better than I did have been saying the one that stood out for me is a student has said sacrificing mentality for the education Alma Heights uh brings and that is exactly what I have heard throughout the years that my six-year-old neighbor that says the same thing that he experienced with bullying because of minority these students are saying the same thing that is ridiculous I was brought up a Catholic I go to Saint Anthony apology since I was born I was brought up to love all and respect all no matter what it was not my job it's not my job to judge it is only God's I always look for a compromise but when it comes to the bullying
041prevention and the and Reporting there's no compromise at all the numbers I gave y'all last month showed you guys that three percent of the students are are actually getting reports to the state so when 66 students report a bullying incident only three of those are getting reports to the state and the other ones are being treated however they want to be treated by the Admin don't leave this up to the teachers they already have to worry about shooters I encourage y'all to to pass policy that at least when a student reaches out however they reach out internet admin teacher counselor when they're making the report the bully prevention checklist is given to them so that they are educated about what bullying is maybe what their experience is not bullying maybe it is but at least
042educate the students in what they're reporting to you guys that way everybody is educated and not just you the adults furthermore I encourage everyone in this room to continue coming every month and speaking on these topics it takes a long long time and I'm sorry but if that's what has to be done thank you thank you next and David yeah oh my apologies there you go see that's one of them terrible images thank you all hello I'm sad to say I haven't been here yet this semester because normally I teach on Thursday night so it's good to be back and seeing you all um in a political era when the Texas legislature is targeting vulnerable Texans um and censorship is rampant across the state and the nation books that become the latest weapon in the
043culture wars um Texas leads the nation in bans and challenges is tracked by the national um Coalition against censorship in America and teachers are professionals who are credentialed to select books that engage students meet curriculum standards and are good fits for their classroom and their community families of course can discern that some books are better or some are not good for their kids these are this is the reality and books can be very powerful tools for Learning and growth as the three new speaker said so given that the unfolding events centered on the literature circles in ninth grade there's a political reality there's a reality of censorship so it's imperative that the district be attentive to the perception of censorship when making curricular decisions 350 signatories of a letter requesting more information about the current
044situation in ninth grade at the same time they're voicing a broad support for diverse books in the curriculum from kindergarten through 12th grade while some voices may want to remove books from the curriculum for all children those 350 plus people want them in the curriculum chosen by professional teachers supported by those same teachers as children engage with the sometimes very challenging content they present the district has Brave systems in place for this your policy on book challenges is very robust it includes that families are allowed to opt their children out of books for themselves only not for everyone and it leaves the books in circulation while that challenge is unfolding that is a brave system and so I encourage the district to lean into that system because that's a lot better than a lot of
045other places the key is that those we don't need a few voices to silent the silence those diverse stories those stories need to be in our schools in our Fisher official curriculum taught by the teachers you have hired and trained to be excellent to support students in meeting those profile of the learner goals that are aspirational and amazing it's part of the reason you started with three brilliant Alum saying very powerful words from their experience here and so I want to thank you all for the continued work of creating these policies encourage your use of them when they become appropriate and looking forward to continually working to make this district one where everyone belongs and that it offers exceptional educational opportunities for the diversity it represents thank you foreign dear members of the school board
046my name is Noah and I'm a sociology student at Trinity University I'm here to express my concern about the recent increase in the security budget for Alamo Heights Independent School District as you may know the district spent 250 000 on security in the 2022-23 school year more than four times it was spent on the security of the previous year at the same time District cut social worker spending from five thousand five fifty seven thousand uh 546 dollars to zero while I understand the anxiety and unease overdone violence in schools in America I went to high school in America I'm still troubled by the implications of the increase in security spending in ahisd firstly the increase in security spending put a strain on the school's budget and I'm concerned that it may lead to cutbacks in
047other areas such as extracurricular activities or classroom resources additionally research shows the increase in policing and security can create a sense of fear and anxiety the scare and anxiety can have a negative impact on academic performance according to research published in the Journal of Criminal Justice furthermore according to the Intercultural development research Association or idra as I'll refer to it through the rest of my address and increase in surveillance and security on campus can lead to a breakdown in trust between students and staff crime while school grounds has been decreasing nationally that is why it's concerning that ahisd has increased its security managers including the addition of more school resource officers despite little evidence of their effectiveness there is little research showing a connection between officer presence and crime rates this is especially concerning considering
048there's a whopping 346 students for each counselor in this District that is more than the 250 students to one Council ratio recommended by the American school counselor Association and the Texas Education Agency the district also currently has zero social workers schools are seeing less crime increasing security increases student psychological well-being and academic achievement why then are we spending so much on more sros cameras and bulletproof class while neglecting tried and true methods of student support counselors and social workers while it is important to take steps to ensure that schools are safe and secure environments for students and staff it is equally important to be mindful of the potential downsides of over emphasis emphasizing security measures therefore I urge the district to consider alternative approaches such as investing in effective research-based programs that promote safe School
049climates and redirecting funds spent on policing schools towards productive culturally sustaining supports schools should try to strike a balance between creating a secure environment and fostering a positive and supportive School culture thank you for your attention on this matter okay last speaker this evening will be will be Chris Provost I must say I agree with uh what Leah and Tony and Melinda said hello I've come to speak to you today because I'm deeply concerned about the safety and well-being of the residents who live on eastbound View Place my name is Chris Provost I live on East Southview with my wife Jessica and my two children we have lived in Alma Heights for five years our house backs up to the Alamo Heights High School parking lot on East Fair Oaks next to the Alamo Heights
050stadium and the mule Dome fortunately the problems I'm going to mention all have easy solutions the first problem which is probably the most important to me is the heavy and speeding traffic which has been funneled onto East lview place by the medians on vanderhoven and East Fair Oaks becoming a one-way Street this is called caused heavy and speeding traffic on East elmview that is unmonitored and extremely unsafe I have fears every day of my children or someone else's child being struck by a vehicle on eastbound view because of unsafe drivers this is a school zone and drivers regularly go 40 plus miles per hour down east downfield the easy solution in my opinion is to update the school zone markers at each end of the street with digital speed signs that will notify drivers of
051their speed violations even easier solution is Park a police vehicle on East elmview to catching ticket Speeders every day for a month or two to shut it down second problem excessive noise from the speakers of the stadium must be decreased permanently this is a quality of life issue and it brings down the property values of the houses on every street surrounding the stadium I understand the speakers are already in place but there is a volume knob there are ways to shut down or quiet each speaker separately the easy solution is to put a student or staff member in charge of never letting the volume get inappropriately loud third problem is idling buses on East Fair Oaks constantly sending fumes into my backyard and my neighbors where our children spend a significant portion of their waking
052hours there's no reason for any bus to idle on East Fair Oaks when there are three parking lots available around the school the easy solution is buses should Park in the three parking lots around the school and if any bus must Park on East Fair Oaks and they should be required to turn off the vehicle finally trash blowing into the backyard from the students who Park on East Fair Oaks needs to be addressed I'm continuously picking up trash left by students who Park on East bearings the easy solution is to start a student program to beautify Alma Heights High School which would involve picking up trash around the school or if that is impossible use it as a deterrent for students who break the rules thank you for taking the time to listen I truly
053believe there are solvable solutions to all these problems my family and I and many of the citizens who live on eastbound view we look forward to working with the school and the city council to solve these problems thank you everybody yeah I'm thinking maybe it's about time okay all right with that we're going to move into section four of our agenda items for presentation for possible action the first being this evening presentation on an Alamo Heights High School student trip science department to Costa Rica next July our presenter this evening will be Mrs Lucy Duncan awesome um thank you so much so I'm back again um we are planning ahead this time for our trip to Costa Rica so we are going this summer with um we have 22 students and two parents um going
054to Costa Rica uh in July so that's it but I had a lot of good feedback from the students so we're really excited about the trip and so I wanted to start planning early because I wanted to give students an opportunity to kind of spread out their payments and just open it up to more students that wanted to go um so we're going back to Costa Rica next summer and the kids are really excited we're going to have our first meeting our first parent meeting next Thursday um and this time it's pretty much the same itinerary that we're gonna do this summer except we're adding on tortugero and that is really cool because and we're actually um we're also doing the gudada Apple Reserve so those two places are really cool because the students are
055going to stay inside the jungle so we actually had to take a boat there it's not someplace you can access otherwise and we're going to stay inside the jungle so what I've heard is that the wildlife is just coming to you when you're in this uh jungle house you're going to see monkeys like you open up your window there's gonna be a little monkey there um and they're going to be able to see a lot of the wildlife and biology first hand so the kids are going to get a really great experience and it's longer so that's kind of nice so we're going to be able to spend like two days in each place so that kind of just extends their experience um and I think it's gonna be a great trip so they're also
056going to see La Fortuna waterfall but also do all the other kind of suspension bridges ziplining all the Adventure stuff and add some more of that biological study so it's going to be a wonderful trip um it's time for July again summer time just to give it that amount of time for the students to be able to enjoy it and learn right any questions I have a silly question so I I did notice that some of the locations are kind of remote um and it said breakfast and dinner like what what are you gonna do about lunch I just know like so lunch typically where we're going they'll have like little like um like you know kind of like uh boots or Eatery so there is yeah okay I didn't know if they were just
057like gonna skip lunch because I know like oh no so they'll they'll be places to get food okay and that's just kind of um because you know different people want to eat something different yeah I just it just didn't seem like that it wasn't like the kind of place that you go to the food court no I was going like there's no McDonald's or anything like that so they're going to be eating traditional Costa Rican food um so I told them to get excited about that it's really good um but they're gonna definitely have to expand their palette there but yeah great well thank you appreciate your comments at the beginning also about payment inclusion and being proactive yeah I appreciate that as always thank you thank you next this evening we'll have a presentation
058of Alamo Heights High School student trip acquire Department to Orlando Florida again next year awesome I know we're trying to rush away from the storm so I won't take this out I did bring the invitation store pop show which is on Saturday the 6th of May um last year was British Invasion so this year we're born in the USA please take one um when we're headed out oh yeah very excited for next year's um Orlando trip to the theme parks in Orlando and also just a chance to do a workshop with a Disney professional on movies and the soundtrack soundtrack with movies I've taken a choir to do that trip before and that experience is even more so rewarding than singing for a sidewalk full of people who aren't paying attention to this so as
059far as buyers go we don't get a chance to march in the main down Main Street like band does so doing a workshop where they could get to have their hands on on singing in a Disney soundtrack is a really fun experience I provided the itinerary in the packet which you can see we'd be flying um so we would fly out at the odarc 30 on the last Friday before spring break and hit theme park on each day a workshop on one of those days Universal Studios and then the animal kingdom and then fly out that evening arrive home exhausted and ready for a couple of days of spring break before heading back you know I I went to Disney World as a high school singer with my choir and still remember all of it
060I've taken choirs to Disney World two times and and loved every every memory we make there um it's a great trip for kids and there's so much to do and they're all right there in the theme parks this is something we're looking forward to um we taught in in talking payment schedule the one in your packet is uh talks about how they pay in 2021 so that did not occur that's a just a copy and paste error from a previous trip that I edited everything for about the year and talking with our tour company um they've they've opened up our online payments already so if our parents can start paying as they sign up before the summer but those payments will be broken down in August September October November December and Jane um broken broken
061down there fundraising we would do two different styles of fundraiser coffee and tumbler sales just to support the choir that would help the students who are traveling pay for their own trip so if they work really hard towards that they'd be able to fundraise a huge portion of their of their trip and then also a general fundraiser will require plans to sell virtual Christmas carols in November December chance for family out of town to receive to help support the choir with just a little chip in and then they get a personalized video Christmas Carol it's been really successful for some colleagues so yeah I'm happy to entertain questions the coffee tumbler coffee and Tumblr So like um it's it's a fundraising company that then sells coffee beans and then also personalizing great tumblers that's your
062first sale all right any other questions I appreciate the support you'll always give us a thank you well thank you okay all right our third presentation this evening is presentation of special education program review by Mrs Benavides oh no hey welcome good evening our newest eating kind of Stormy outside so I'm going to start off by giving a state of the union so to speak for special education I'm going to apologize in advance for using all the acronyms if you don't know what it is just please stop me and we'll go through it but um this is kind of our overview for the evening we're going to talk about the individuals with Disabilities Act what that means Alamo Heights where we're at as far as special education the programming that we provide our DEA audit
063that we have this year our special education Trends and enrollment and then we'll open it up for a q a so what is idea idea or the individuals with disability acts covers for um distinct areas it is the federal law that was developed in 1975 to ensure that all students with disabilities and their families are protected that their rights are protected that students are insured what we call Faith or free and appropriate public education that educators are and Educators and families have the resources that they need so that we can provide services for students and that students have access to another acronym lre or the least restrictive environment which is accessed with their general education peers so what does that look like and how a wall hides this is our Continuum of special education services
064as you notice in the Triangle all of the layers have access to the general education setting and we'll we're really proud of all the inclusion that we do have within Alamo Heights but as the triangle Narrows the services become more specialized for the students as so does the least restrictive environment their environment becomes more restrictive in terms of access to students with who are served in general education alone so supports and services that we do provide I'm just going to touch base on one of them on the slides and the reason I'm doing that I'll explain it in kind of importance and as we go through the slideshow how it impacts that co-teach and in-class support is a service that we provide that is a special education staff member within the general education setting so
065the students are getting specially designed instruction by either a paraprofessional or a special education teacher in that setting um this is a lifted more restrictive placements and the one I want you to pay attention to is our Ace classroom or our alternate classroom for education and this is a classroom or a service for students with emotional issues or behavioral challenges within the general education setting and this support again is done by special education staff and it can be in a special education classroom or the general education setting but this is an area of growth in our district when we look at this slide I want to again point to ecsc or early childhood special education and in this program we've also seen lots of growth this is a program for three four and five-year-olds for
066three-year-olds come half days four and five-year-olds come full time and this is usually a pull out service but there is also some uh that's the word I'm looking for in class support as well talk about related service this is a list of most of the special education related services that we offer it's everything from speech therapy to transportation otpt and so on how the importance is speech therapy this is again a disability that many of our students qualify for and we provide lots of services in this area now all of these services and supports are monitored by TDA tea now has a cyclical review audit they do with all schools within Texas and it's a five-year cycle and there's nine separate sections to include dyslexia and student audit of art files it's important to note
067that dyslexia now falls under special education and I'm going to talk about that a little bit more but this audit also included policy procedures and stakeholder feedback the highlights from the cyclical review or teas findings I think I gave you the wrong presentation something's different I know um that's okay and I may have pulled up your previous one I apologize that's okay um so here are some of our our glows and then the next light will be our our grows but dyslexia was absolutely one of our gold stars um they did an audit of Guardian intervention identification and parent notification we did outstanding um the others were child find evaluation and faith and child fine is just seeking out children who qualify for special education services within our district whether they're coming to Alamo Heights
068or homeschool or at private space areas of growth we're in the area of IEP development and it's basically an impact statement on how a student's disability impacts their involvement in progress and General Ed curriculum and we weren't as clear as we should have been and so I'll touch base back on that and how we're going to work through that the other grow was properly constituted in arts there were Arts that we had that did not have career and Tech representation and we need to do a better job of that part of it was not know that speech was is considered a career in Tech course and so we need that staff member at those Arts so we're working on a corrective action plan as far as Trends and enrollment goes we took five years worth
069of October snapshot data and put it into where and how we compared with the state on the far right and as you can see historically Alamo Heights has been below the state average for representation in special education we have a 20 22 23 snapshot date but we also have current numbers and currently with our numbers growing and I want to say we're at about 6 20 and that changes on a daily hourly basis sometimes we're at 13 which is uh a percentage and a half over the 11 .7 percent that the state was at the year before yeah there is a tornado alert right now but I think that just means the conditions are good for a tornado foreign we're going down to the crawl space okay please I'm sorry thank you let's continue all
070good better can while you're on that page can I just interject so what do we attribute that increase in enrollment too are people seeking out our district because we have a good reputation yes that is one of the factors and as I go through my slide presentation I'm going to show you where the bulk of the increase is and as I mentioned last time I truly believe it's younger families coming in through Power because that's where our biggest growth is so this next slide kind of tells you um again it's the snapshot days dates in October but these are the actual numbers so five years ago at Howard we were at 74 kids as of early August early April we're at 133 kids if you look at the top row where the campus is labeled
071underneath you'll see the increase between the five years so there has been an 80 increase in the number of students who qualify for special education at Howard 114 increase and then 50 at Cambridge and overall for the district we've increased at 51 percent so in those numbers can you explain they changed the dyslexia rule yes so previously dyslexia was not a special education so now it is and so what percentage of those numbers is that the next slide yeah it's it's not the next one but close so I wanted you to be able to see the percentage of students in each grade level and to your question Lisa as you can see r-e-e or early Elementary those are usually are three and four years of four-year-olds are at nine percent as our first graders and
072our third graders so the the increase has been in our early Elementary numbers and second grade is not far behind to your question clay about dyslexia I was curious as well how does the dyslexia play into this not by much let me explain the numbers so LD means learning disability now that a student qualifies for dyslexia through special education they go under that um eligibility criteria so the numbers for dyslexia as you can see under Cambridge therefore that goes into the LD calculation of 10. so the other students that there's four that qualify for dyslexia and there are others that may qualify for math calculation written expression listening comprehension that all fall under the category of learning disabled so the side before you said Howard had 133. so this is just this year that qualified
073this year these are new kids so Howard has a total number of 133 kiddos that have qualified include this year including in previous years they've been at a one-year school there's Pre-K yeah you're counting the free free Tinder yes yes do you have any questions on on this slide so today these are the numbers of kids qualifying for dyslexia or special ed they're in purple up at the top as you can see it's concentrated at Howard with the 77 kids qualifying and how it is so um newly qualified and dyslexia so let's take Cambridge there for example for dyslexia does that mean four newly qualified dyslexia or does that mean four dyslexia total in the whole day school or newly qualified so far this year these are just this year's numbers and they're still climbing
074as we even go into summer testing testing so sorry so if they if they were Howard are these like people that what I'm trying to figure out is Cambridge and Woodbridge we've got 26 and 30 okay were they how were the year before or or at some point I mean yeah my question is is did someone go from kinder to first to second and they weren't qualified and then four if they were very possible okay okay the next slide is the number of students again currently 22-23 for our most restrictive settings as you can see the first group of numbers is for SST or student support team kiddos Howard we have a Cambridge 11 and so forth this year these numbers again will change next year as students transition from Kendra to first or fifth
075through six and so forth where we've grown and I mentioned Ace or our our alternative classroom for Education setting where we service students with behavioral and emotional difficulties this is again where our numbers have increased so our next step is based on all the information that I've given you that include our audit findings professional learning and Staffing levels so for our tea audit we're addressing the CTE representation at arts and we're working on writing our impact statements our professional learning is going to include additional training for General Ed admin counselors to ensure that we're providing the supports as well as ongoing supports for Behavior our staffing levels we're working on an independent workload Staffing analysis which we need to do a data dig dive into and we want to ensure that we have adequate Staffing
076across all levels in all programs on the behavior do you attribute this growing problem like we had some stuff coming out of closing down schools and pandemic all of that proceeding across Society is this something that I think might be a blip or do you think it's Brian's name I think it's rising all over the place I talked to my fellow directors and they say the same things increase in behaviors and even though I talked about Alamo Heights historically being below the state average I think we're going to be at the state average and the state average is going to continue to increase for students qualifying for special education services can we have some theories as to what's going on we have theories especially for our growing number of speech students at the early ages
077people were wearing masks two and three years ago they didn't get to see how people formed right to be able to speak of appropriately I think there's just a height level of anxiety for many different reasons across the board and so we're seeing these behavior problems but students are also we can attribute it there's not real studies out there to solidify any of my educated guesses but it's a combination of things [Music] today's society it's hard to be a kid I think yeah yeah oh Melissa I was just going to ask for next year because you present on this every year is that right or not or only after the audience you're like no I'm not doing that no however I'm not asking for whatever you're out what is there a certain period of time
078okay all right well next time you come to us and it might be a few years then I was just going to ask that you could cover and maybe you know off the cuff but um you know during the art process is it 100 of our parents who conclude the art process with our district and agree with the conclusion of the of the IEP or are we ever concluding ards where the parents disagree because I know it's so formalized I'm not going to pretend to know all the ins and outs but I know at the conclusion parents can either say yes I agree with my IEP or I don't are we getting 100 agreement or are there so there's something about a five percent disagreement but we have the opportunity to come back and so
079we try to gather more information to either solidify what we'd like to do and the parent will do the same and we normally this year in the past three years since I've been here we've been able to come to compromises so it's great it's really great we're at a hundred percent we are at 100 yeah start off that way right I love on future presentations just to add one slide on that result you know we're getting 95 agreement at this stage and after that there's like a facilitated process or whatnot then we're getting 100 or if we by the next time you have some that weren't it was just nice to that'd be a nice stat to also see on our audition it sounds like you guys are doing a great job getting everyone on
080board so that's great thank you another question awesome thank you so much really appreciate the time hey Sean before you leave thank you as always just want to recognize you appreciate you being here [Music] at least okay next we're going to move into a report on board member continuing education requirement I'm having to report that all trustees have received their funnel we've received our final trustee report for the 2022-2023 season all trustees completed their training and exceeded the requirements for current board members no trustees are deficient at least not when it comes to board training all right next we're going to move into the presentation on the district Target area update teacher incentive allotment Dr Jimmy Walker and am I yelling It's Over the Rainbow so we've talked through teacher and Cinema lotment uh last
081week and um and it needs to be turned on thank you so I just want you to know this is step one in a multi-series uh about teacher incentive allotment today is going to be a quick work overview in June I'll come back and we'll talk about our plan to evaluate student growth in the fall I'll come back and talk through the exact application process and then in the spring once we do have a more complete process I'll come and share all that and our implementation Milestone so this is not the only time we'll be talking about this um beginning you guys we've looked at all of this data before about 12 of teachers retired in a 12 left the profession and we had 8 600 teachers who've retired this is a problem not just
082in Texas but Across the Nation there's been research on who is retiring females more likely than males specialty areas special education like Melissa just spoke about what one thing that has uh turned out to be successful is Merit a programs when they're well implemented we've looked at this this is a slide directly from January's taper although this is a national problem it has hit home in Alamo Pike as we look at our turnover rate for the past several years as I talk about teacher incentive allotment it is one strategy to recruit and retain excellent Talent here in Humble Heights we're also looking at strategies to ensure our teachers have adequate planning time that we're reducing the administrative tasks so that time and energy can go into the classroom and looking at multiple things to support
083teacher compensation and benefits so a teacher incentive allotment was originated in 2019 out of house bill 3. it's an option districts don't have to do this but when you create these designations it does augment teachers salaries it's a two-step problem to two-step process to get plans implemented First Step being approval through tea second step is just a data analysis that you're collecting information and growth in a responsible valid and reliable way teacher at cinemaotment is required to have two components one is the in it has to include teacher evaluations and I'm going to talk through exactly what that looks like and it has to include student performance how much students are growing over the course of a year this is the amount of funding allocated through the legislation note that if you are on a
084campus with more need there is more funding because across the state of Texas are trying to attract teachers into districts that are harder to staff higher communities and poverty and in rural areas in Alamo Heights this is what it would look like for us so if a teacher receives the designation of a recognized teacher it's about a thirty five hundred dollar stipend for five years if they receive the designation of exemplary it's about a seven thousand dollar stipend for five years and if they receive that Master Level it's about fourteen thousand dollars a year it's a little different on each campus depending on the percentage of students identified as free and reduced lunch can you go back to the slide before so so a teacher Howard with a masters is paid more than a high
085school teacher and they Allah I mean I know it's state driven I'm just curious It's the percentage of students identified and pre-reduced at that campus so that's why we have slightly different percentages across the campuses so the first thing that was required is it's based on your annual evaluation this is an administrator going into the classroom watching a lesson start to finish and then scoring that teacher based on a very prescriptive rubric on t-tests it looks at domain two instruction domain three learning environment and the ratings if you're scored at three it's a proficient four is accomplished five is the highest distinguished if your average of those two domains is a 3.7 that would put a teacher at the recognize level if your average of those two domains is a 4.5 that's exemplary the percentage
086of students who meet or exceed the growth Target you can see that at 55 to 59 of your students meet a Year's worth of growth in a year's time that's recognized you have 70 percent or more that puts you at Masters I like this because it's rigorous but yet reasonable every year you're going to have some kiddos in your room that are just trying to keep their notebook water like things are going on and this says if you can get 70 a Year's worth of growth that qualifies a teacher from Master's level now you have to have both criteria so if your evaluation was recognized and your student achievement was at growth was at 70 percent the highest designation would be unrecognized in Alamo Heights I have a committee that's working on this and they
087feel very strongly and I concur that we need to create a plan for every teacher who would be eligible so this includes JROTC PE music choir teachers everything what it does not include are our professional staff members who do not have a teaching responsibility direct teaching responsibility with students such as administrators and evaluators could we gain the system by the let's say you taught one class and then could you qualify for this type if a t if if anyone that was coded in 087 would be eligible for Teacher incentive alignment the question would be is that is that yeah is that a good idea but um but the technical answer is yes um additional details the designations for five years there is hold harmless so if you're a master teacher the next year your evaluation
088declines you maintain that designation for five years but if you were a exemplary teacher and the next year it goes up you can improve but you can't decline over that five years the question came up can an individual teacher just opt out the answer is no if we build a plan for fourth grade we have to submit our data for every fourth grade student you can't submit and get a plan approved just with a sampling of students or a few but the entire fourth grade could say we don't want to do this of note to date after 35 meetings no one's opting out of course not so timeline we are right here pre-application we're giving ourselves a long Runway to work through all of these details the first payout would actually her in September 2026
089other districts that have rushed this it's been because they stood up what was easiest and that would be star and we're looking at something that's more reflective of what we value in terms of student growth and that it's been the agreement of all of our staff all of our Educators correct 100 we're about the whole student we're about the whole staff uh we talked about this with District educational advisory committee the feedback from them was positive ways about just looking into how can we get creative with staff compensation positive feedback about the approach for all staff wonderings about communication with parents and wondering about long-term sustainability of funding which likewise we're wondering about and then wondering about to your point Ryan how can we support non-teaching faculty roles all of those are are very good
090questions that we have not fully worked through so y'all it's a lot of work is it worth it so definitely a benefit to teacher incentivizing them homework here stay here there's a benefit to Alamo Heights because as other districts do take on teacher incentive allotment it benefits us if we have this as well it benefits instruction because through this process we're creating these common pre-assessments and common post assessments that'll help teachers plan together and collaborate and it's going to benefit all students because across the district from pre-k music fourth grade AP World History we're all focused on student growth that's good for kids because that's talking about growth or high achieving students students who are on track and students who are struggling I like this program because it really does say everyone should be making
091a Year's worth of growth in a year for the time and it supports students teachers and figuring out if their kids are doing that and if they're not working together to figure out how that's it yes Mr Sharp um so the the way the state funding works they don't put any Caps or any type of curve on this right I mean if theoretically every single online teacher is Masters we get that much chunk of change to pay every single teacher a master's bonus is that correct that is correct okay you know the teachers because each of everybody get into University right direct automatic conditions we're not doing that okay thank you got that thank you yeah if we take a teacher from it another District to receive the certification and their certification is safe based
092on Star different standards I suppose that doesn't matter and they can still come over the designation goes with them for five years there's current funding for how much isn't that important they've guaranteed once we stand it up and a teacher receives a designation for five years after that it would depend on legislative allocations so it's interesting from a budgeting standpoint because they have no idea how many people are gonna how many teachers Statewide are going to qualify these different levels somehow do they know how much money to put nothing on so I want to Echo Lisa's comment like I feel like it's incredibly important for us to go after this but it's like Eyes Wide Open absolutely the funding May dry up in two years they may ding chapter 49 schools like us and say
093you're getting the master stuff over here so we're taking something away from you over here so like it yeah there could be a hole we've been very transparent with staff I'm being very transparent with you yes about this is not funded in perpetuity like this is let's go forward 700 extra that they didn't have before and even if it's one year that's a game exactly right I mean it's a great thing it makes I mean I remember Mark talking about this years ago about we need to you know incentivize teachers by their performance and so I think it's a great idea I'm anxious to see that it works I mean I might actually see that they have the fun yeah yeah yeah uh so I I read about this maybe a year and a half
094ago and I don't maybe I said something to somebody but I thought it was really important because it was there but at the time we're coming out of covid and blah blah blah and I feel like we have three horses that kind of run a lot of stuff out of here and my question is is like okay you mentioned I wrote down some things that you mentioned 35 meetings evaluations Okay so who's doing all this is it just you and and is it 10 of your time is it thirty percent of your time my question is more like are you stressed out about it is this do we like need a staff member to just do this I don't know how long it takes and I'm just gonna remind us real quick and set it
095up you know last June we set the the goals for the district and remember that they set those goals with an understanding that was going to be 100 capacity so this was absolutely one of those goals still your thunder but yes and I'll also say I'm incredibly grateful to work here I have a hundred teachers helping me this summer get this off the ground so okay so it's 101. I have teachers who are going to training for different things how do we set local Norms I have a group doing that I have groups writing pre-assessments like it's I am not doing this I'm coordinating yeah [Music] any other questions for Dr Walker I'll be back in June with more information that's worse we're going to move into section c subsection c section four consideration of
096resolution in support of Texas Public Schools is the most effective means of empowering students and instilling civic pride for the better betterment of the great state of Texas okay so everyone we have a resolution in our folder uh one to save my voice but too because I believe it's important to show everyone that all seven of us are behind this I would ask that we each take turns to reading a portion of the resolutions that I um and then we will move and vote on it afterwards um and before we get there I do want to thank one David and Kerry first for starting this off as our legislative committee kicking it off Stacy also for quitting her eyes and words on it but then also everyone else taking time to look at it and
097wholeheartedly absolutely support this so whereas Alamo Heights ISD believes in agreement with the constitution of the State of Texas that the general diffusion of knowledge is essential to the preservation of the Liberties and the rights of the people whereas Alamo Heights ISD recognizes the state of Texas constitutional duty to establish and make suitable provision for the support and maintenance of an efficient system of public-free schools whereas Alamo Heights ISD believes that the public school system fully funded and appropriately overseen and accounted for by the state of Texas Remains the most influential Avenue of delivering strong student outcomes and instilling civic pride in our communities and our children and for Democratic and Republican forms of government whereas Alma Heights ISD resolutely whereas Texas Public Schools like Alamo Heights ISD and unlike other forms of schooling value
098and accept every student and our subject to academic and financial accountability by the state of Texas whereas an omahaudson independent school district understands that the state of Texas wishes to improve educational outcomes in Texas by considering the use of vouchers education savings accounts and other and or other mechanisms whereas Alamo Heights ISD understands that any such mechanism necessarily would use taxpayer funds to fund school systems including private school systems that are not subject to State accountability whereas the state of Texas already underfunds Texas public schools and to make up for the shortfall recaptures at least four billion dollars per year for certain school districts like Alamo Heights ISD whereas given the recapture system any adoption of vouchers or educational savings accounts undoubtedly will be funded directly or indirectly through recapture imposing yet another undisclosed financial
099burden on Alma Heights ISD taxpayers that does not directly benefit Alamo Heights ISD schools whereas if any Texas public school is not creating positive educational outcomes for students it Remains the responsibility of the State of Texas to fully fund and to fully account for the performance of that specific School whereas taking dollars meant to fund Texas public schools and redirecting them to fund other forms of schooling misleads taxpayers as to the use of taxpayer money reduces transparency and reduces accountability of the use of the public funds whereas private schools choose their own students are not required to meet the same academic standards as public schools and are not required to report test results graduation rates or other performance measures to the public whereas depriving any Texas public school funding is not the solution to improving
100that school's performance on behalf of its students indeed it makes the situation worse for the students left behind and creates a self-destructive spiral whereas as an alma Heights ISD the solution to improving public school performance is community-based accountability direct interaction between taxpayers and their elected school officials the transparent operation of school systems and campuses less State and post bureaucracy and regulation adequate funding from the state of Texas and better attraction and retention of Staff through local control and self-determination I'll therefore be it resolved that the Alamo Heights ISD Board of Trustees calls in the Texas legislature to fully fund and account for Texas public schools to adopt physically responsible policies that encourage local control and self-determination to minimize Regulatory and bureaucratic burden on Texas public schools to encourage transparency in the operation of schools and
101to reject any diversion of public dollars away from Texas public schools to private entities in any form do I have a motion to approve the consideration of a resolution in support of Texas Public Schools as the most effective means of empowering students and instilling civic pride for the betterment of the great state of Texas thank you Ryan do you have a second thank you Carrie all those in favor please say aye aye I thought you were gonna say I do I have an amen I like the way you got the whole circle to go around there first folks all right we're going to move into section five consent agenda these are items that are considered routine by the board or have been previously reviewed and discussed in Prior meetings and that we therefore enact as
102one motion please take a second and look at the agenda and let me know if there's anything that any member would like to remove from the consent agenda in place on the regular agenda as always as y'all look over it always want to recognize the generosity of our community and know that we receive 112 249 dollars and 68 cents in donations this last month thank you all in our minds all right I see no eyes do I have a motion to approve the consent agenda Thank you Lisa do I have a second second thank you Stacy all those in favor please say aye aye aye all right any opposed there are not motion carries section 6 border board member committee reports we're going to start tonight with Ryan tell us about the Alamo high school
103foundation's meeting this week meeting was yesterday right here in this room a good meeting we had a little bit of a bond discussion um Brooke mevin kind of discuss the you know bailouts that we're doing one thing that she pointed out I think is interesting you kind of have on your radar is there a lot of these you know no proper or anti-crop a signs um and they're blue and yellow and they can be mistaken for our prop bag and under the law you have to have a problem as part of your bond package but that has to do with the city of San Antonio and the policing and other issues that have nothing to do with us so you may need to clarify and Burke said that they were getting out and mailer and
104they're also putting out some video trying to you know educate them so we had a lot of talk about that tonight yeah a lot of it's really um and yeah so I mean that was that was really good we also um it is and I'm not under the tree I'm sorry no no problem endowment is going well there's still a great momentum going um they haven't even really officially opened it up they're still having quiet meetings and they're going to make the budget even for the kind of aspirational amount pretty easily there family Teachers Fund is picking up momentum but it's a little bit slow going um they think that that's perhaps somewhat attributable to the endowment of doing so well and Greater Heights tonight also you know they blew the roof but they're picking
105up and they've got keep their eyes out for Heights uttles if don't want to host or attend them they've been really good the new president for next year is going to be Anne Valentine so she hopes to take over next meeting and the last thing is they're already starting Greater Heights time and I've already got sponsorships are out I think they said they've already got 130 000 maybe 150 000 in sponsorships already their goal is to actually crack the 1 million marks and I think they're gonna do Foundation as usual is great all right thank you grateful for it next we're moving the building committee David medal in April 12th oh right we had a I'm gonna make my car under a tree I buy the mailbox yeah we're gonna suspend for five minutes it's
106like that scene in the movie world according to Garth where he's looking at the house and this plane kind of comes in and just smashes into the house and turns his life and goes we'll take it she's like are you crazy because what are the odds of that ever happened again [Music] that's my favorite Emerald open it hey can I give you my feet yeah oh yeah it was it was a good turnout was it yeah but I mean I will tell you at first thank you all right yeah just kind of pressing well I did because I really didn't figure anybody could go anywhere so that's like what we're here what type of meeting we didn't expect they are it's a valuable lesson the San Antonio Zoo what happened the trees yeah my cousin
107actually was a master and arbitrous and he's actually was the only one in San Antonio that was able to go to the San Antonio Zoo and evaluate the trees thank you Missouri already yeah I told Melissa because he uh yeah she's driving yeah oh yeah pass the Tails yeah Ryan you rub a lot of drama I know this is kind of I think it's a sign yeah that was pretty good you got it that was pretty good wasn't close enough okay I paid a lot for that one yeah you can go home to Hillary yeah so I get gap insurance yeah right they're gone you're not mentally he's just lying out there on the ground it's bedtime or you know why not for the next time that's good I mean I'm sorry but I'm hungry
108anyway my kids are freaking out at home trying to get out of here I said they got food I mean look sorry I'm on camera obvious [Music] we had a very brief meeting after the GMP meeting just to discuss the efficient use of the real estate that we have this was pretty good we go all right District design team Stacy from March 24th uh yes uh the the different groups are working through or we're continuing to work through system capacity analyzing different standards for what our District's capacity is for example in our group here that I have with Dr bashira we were talking about stability and Leadership and whether our district provides for that I mean something that came up is the idea of leadership succession plans which our district doesn't currently have but is
109there some kind of formalized way we can um it can either you know have a succession plan another example is you know having good job descriptions which we do currently have thanks to our one full HR Director Frank sinus but just looking at different aspects of our system and our Administration and how do we provide for stability and Leadership or another one we had was training and development what kind of structures do we have in place that increase or provide better capacity so it's it's some good stuff that I feel like um I like that Frank has us slowing down and looking at the the big picture of our system and not just dealing with the moment to moment questions or issues that arise it's it's a good there's the district they were together talking
110about it so that's all I have awesome thank you okay the last District education advisory committee Kerry from Wednesday April 12th sure and my brain is kind of I don't know but I have um yeah we met here and um the first we start off with the presentation of the bond which is always great and then we talked about um our Aunt it was the annual Wellness goals and mainly around the shack review and nutrition promotion and education and physical activity for both staff and children students um and then we talked about um our technology subcommittee that I sat on with Brian and a group of teachers and parents and and Brian presented to us at our guidelines draft that we'll we'll kind of massage everybody it was really great feedback everybody had you know
111good lots of things to say um everybody's listening and taking good notes and so what we'll do now is massage it Brian's gonna correct me if I'm wrong then prison it to some groups of the schools okay and then some other groups and then kind of massage it some more and imprison it so I can see if we're okay and on board with that is that right yeah okay and then I'm sorry I'm afraid so whatever and then the last um was Jimmy um prison presented us with February feedback and we just kind of talked through some of the responses that we got great so it's great it's crazy okay section seven business recommendations there are no business recommendations for the month of April if you notice we're missing our assistant superintendent yeah oh that's
112right um Section 8 calendar review uh on the board behind us so uh District design team again tomorrow Stacy will represent the team um y'all are invited to Celebration of Excellence we recognize um through an incredible sponsorship by Paloma Blanca by the peacocks um any employee that was recognized here in front of the board throughout the entire year we bring them we recognize all employees here are retiring as well and so it's a nice celebration um one day after school May 10th we'll have our morning GMP committee meeting um y'all I found out I spoke to the um head coaches this morning and found out that that's our last Signing Day and we've missed every Signing Day because of GMP meetings so I'm going to send out some options and maybe just starting about 30
113minutes late so that we can start over there and maybe post our meeting over there so that we've heard of that it's a big deal for our student athletes and I would love us to keep there to represent so I love that stay tuned I'm kind of make the nails sometime there learning walk at Howard on May 10th as well senior Awards on May 15th we're excited to host it the mule dough this year for the first time May 17th the school board the I'm sorry Foundation board meeting Ryan nice May 18th he's not going to the 18th of the regular morning that's right okay yeah and you didn't mentioned off to him I'm going to give you about 15 minutes all right Thursday May 18th is our regular important change so I expected tomorrow
114whatever you want section 9 superintendent's communication okay so if Alicia has uh just a little picture collage to highlight the celebrations in April looking back from when we last met her celebration is a very successful job fair one that we've had face to face in the meal down we use the Sky Gym Frank stanage did an incredible job pulling in applicants visiting with applicants each of our campuses visit and start that recruitment process um this is the season of concerts y'all we have the piano concert this week we had percussion concert this week um a handful of you were able to be with us at the strings Festival where we celebrated 50 years of our streams and the meal Dome it was an incredible night of Celebration there first time that we hosted it in
115the meal Dome here um in the district and not traveling out to Northeast of Blossom and so great celebration um Family art night is taking place tonight at Cambridge wonder how they're doing with all this lovely weather they're experiencing our fashion design uh class one two and three has to their annual fashion show so you can see one of our students walk in the runway they hosted that in the mule Dome over lunch on Monday lots of students attended great Community celebration we sent our Science Olympiad students from both the junior school and the high school off today with it with a full-on send-off with the band and the percussion line and our student scientists walked through and loaded the bus Mr milaski was very excited excited about that and then we did the same
116thing at the junior school and so they're traveling to Texas A M and I'm sure I'm going to bring back four great Awards oh my God and then just some quick athletic highlights y'all track ended early District Championship last week and just yesterday the boys place first is area finalists and the girls team play second and that's a big deal for us and the number of students that our coaches have encouraged to participate in track this year is a record number we're seeing seniors participate you know typically in the spring of senior year we have our athletes kind of you know take your time off and rest a little bit and that's not what we're seeing again when I spoke to the head coaches this morning I just think that's a real Testament to some
117of the um the big Vision work that that coach Rittiman has done about the multi-sports athletes but there's just incredible buy-in across the entire coaching staff so very excited about that girls golf is headed to State it's almost like we take it for granted you know that's a huge accomplishment and so yeah so it's two teams yeah two teams again going and then our softball program celebrating the most wins in a season since 2008. and there this is also the first time to earn the title of District Champions since 2017. so they're headed to playoffs for the second time since 2011. that's really exciting if you haven't gotten to see one of their games um it's just fun to see those girls in action baseball is undefeated at District play and is currently sitting in
118first place as well so lots of athletic highlights to celebrate too and so just some quick updates um at least if you click to the next slide we are just I think I have Bond Staffing Safety and Security and so tomorrow actually is my final scheduled Community presentation I think at this point it's over 22 presentations that we've engaged in as far as just different Community groups all of our ptos um I met with the governor's Club I mean canopus tomorrow I've met with rotary and so many of you have been along for the ride Brian especially has been part of most of those and um we've done a lot of communication and so that feels good um Carrie had a presentation right before coming to them so appreciate you presenting to a group as
119well this is a team effort and I feel like we've worked hard to get the word out around this early voting begins on Monday and election day is May 6th um Staffing this is a very busy season for us in HR working with our principals to recommend positions to be hired to to hire and then just a quick Safety and Security update we're excited to announce that we have made recommendation for hiring for our third SRO position and so um tell us that person's name because I don't have it in minutes her name is well help me out here the new one yeah right well we haven't we don't have a confirmation yet yeah okay remember there's several steps that the I know but I thought she was starting training all right no so I
120have not gotten confirmation back tomorrow our offer excited to have a good candidate for this and so good match for the junior school so to be continued for official announcement um anything else Safety and Security Frank is it not broken all right that concludes our agenda so before we move into our next item one thing yeah no objections I was just gonna ask if we when um Mr Keenan's like the next level has already happened or do we know is he still in the running for the state level it takes a while yeah until next fall oh it is Oh I thought it was in the May story yeah applications are Jews yeah okay never mind stay tuned okay I was just excited I think you should win what I will say is that um
121Lisa Berry is that for finalist for the HEB Awards and those are next Sunday nights maybe that's what I was thinking of okay any other questions anything else before we move into the next items if there are no objections we'll take a short break before we entering into executive session as per