001I'm going to call this meeting to order at 70. >> This call is being publicly streamed. >> All right. Um, please stand for the pledge of allegiance. Claire is going to lead us. >> I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for it stands one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Um, and this says we're on to EHSled board appreciation. >> Our leadership who you are. >> Um, hi, my name is Evelyn Hoverston. I'm a freshman here at EHS and I'm part of Miss Hancock's leadership second period. I ran the project of having people write notes for appreciation to the school board. Um, I did a lot of running around the school to make sure people like got to write if they wanted
002to and we ended up with a good amount of cards. >> Well, thank you very much. Thoughtful of you to be Press out of these. >> Okay. That's okay. >> Give that one to him. >> I'll take one. Thank you. >> Thank you. Oh, mine has >> No, it says pretty possome. All right. >> Give me some Hey, this is really good. I'm going to share this with the board. We're going to add it to our calendar now. Where's Cassie? Cassie's over there. This student wrote a lot of nice things. And then also, it would mean a lot to me if you would find time in your busy schedules to welcome the freshmen of next year at our end of year welcome assembly. And I say that would be awesome. I think we would love
003Can you add that to our calendar and make sure that and leadership would you make sure that we get a special invite to that? What? That's super fun. We would love that. Thank you. love to do. >> And and likewise, I think um usually the juniors meet because they're going to be the next year seniors and we have another meeting and I think that'd be a great thing to go to too because >> yeah, we >> I would say this board is always super excited anytime we get to be with students. So never hesitate to invite us. If we can be here, we will. So thank you so much for even thinking of us. you are really thoughtful. Thank you so much for the hard work you put in to um inviting people to share
004their messages and thank you to all the students and staff that wrote them. So, thank you. That was really special. And as a freshman, that's a big step for you to take to come to present at a board meeting. So, really appreciate your courage. It's great. THANK YOU. ALL RIGHT. UM, I'm gonna turn some time over to our student board representatives. >> Okay, I don't have that much to update on. Um, well, we're going to start in the skill center. Uh, we reported this started last Monday on January 5th, so getting back into the swing of things. Um, some student activities. There's peer interview day at the Piers County Skills Center on January 20th certain classes. and I wasn't given much information, but they said it was a chance to interview peers and to practice
005interviewing skills. Um, another activity is open house on um for Pierce County Skill Center on January 29th from 5:00 p.m. to 7:00 p.m. And this is a chance for students or future students to meet with instructors and students and give a tour of the programs as well as some information sess sessions at 510, 5:40, and then 610 as well. Um, and then there's also the food bank going on at Pierce College. It's open every Wednesday from 4:30 to 6:30 in parking lot D. It's a really good resources for any students including Running Start students um who are struggling or in need of some assistance. Um and then some celebrations and recognitions. Um I just wanted to recognize the hardworking Running Start students and the Pierce County Skill Center students who are starting off the runner
006quarter with a good start. And then some additional notes is I don't have any much information since school just started for the Eagle Middle School. Um the um ASB just purchased two more Mary Bridge recycling um program bins which is really really exciting. I'm hoping to purchase some more and then hopefully get the Eatenville elementary schools leadership class involved as well. Um some student concerns is um students at EMS primarily sixth and seventh graders um did not know what the school board was and they didn't know who they were. Um so they were hoping for in the future to learn more about you guys and hopefully meet some of you guys. um some student counsel and leadership updates. Um the EMS kindness gang is getting back into routine after break and they're hoping to have
007some more events in the following months. Um and some celebrations and recognitions. I want to celebrate the students in the seventh grade leadership at Eatenville Middle School for their hard work and dedication to service and kindness. >> That's all. >> Awesome. And super cool. That's something you started in what? Seventh grade, the purple trash cans. Was it seventh grade? >> Seventh grade. >> Yeah. So student leadership that keeps moving forward. That must feel really good to you. Yeah, I'm very happy it's awesome. >> I love it. Do you want to share a little bit more about about the purple trash cans? Why that? >> Um yeah, so it's a flat donation rate of $200. It's through Mary Bridge. So all funds go to um the cancer institute um to support research. Um and I met
008with Mary Bridge um some representatives my eighth grade year and trying to my whole plan was to try to replace all the recycling bins. That was just a little bit unrealistic because it's kind of hard to come up with that much money. Um, but my freshman year and my sophomore year, I was able to get five donated for the high school. Um, and then working for a couple more years, I was able to get the middle school to buy a couple and then hopefully now it'll spread to the elementary schools. Um, and it's nice because now I have the um, seventh and eighth grade leadership uh, teams at Middle School working on it. So, takes the load a little bit off of me. >> That's awesome. >> How does it work? Like, um, so you
009go to the Mary Bridge website and you just purchase a trash can and it's through Lame. So, they'll bring you the their new trash can or their new recycling bin, sorry. Um, and it's all purple and it's just to raise awareness. Um, and then also all the donations go straight to their >> Awesome. Children's Cancer, which is really great. >> Yeah, it's really fun. All right. Thanks. >> Um, I don't have much of well much of anything at all to report for my two schools. Um, I'm waiting for the next meeting, but we us three we went to middle school and elementary school. Was it just what day was it? Wait, what day of the week? >> Friday. >> Okay, it was Friday. Um, and I'd say that went really well. Um, the I swear
010I'm a senior. We met with the leadership, right? >> Yeah. Fifth grade leadership and then the seventh and eighth grade leadership classes after school. >> It's good info. Um, and then if I could recognize anyone again, Evelyn is killing it in our leadership class. I mean, she seriously is running around nonstop. So, >> awesome. Thank you. Um, I just Well, I really only have stuff from the high school because of our meeting with the elementary school and middle school. I was going to wait to combine all the information and put it into our next meeting once we finally go to Columbia Crest and because which we're trying to do this Friday go to Columbia Crest and then next week go to warehouser. Um but from the high school for student activities and events we are
011working on our friendship and kindness week finally. Um we have a lot of new ideas. I was able to talk with both to classes today and really push you know trying to get new ideas out there and getting involvement. Um, basically the friendship and kindness week is just pushing friendship and kindness and trying to really urge, you know, like not like recognizing that bullying is not okay and being nice to everyone and inclusive is what we want our school atmosphere to be. And with that, um, there's this program called Only Seven Seconds. And it's basically a program that was produced by another high school, which colleges and high schools and middle schools, they use this program because it's program that you can put into your curriculum and put into your everyday school life to really
012push that friendship and kindness like 247. Pushing the opening up to people, checking on others, being sure that you're aware of what other people are going through because I mean, one rude thing could ruin someone's whole day. one nice thing can make someone's whole day great. So, we're I'm really trying to push with leadership students. The leadership students are really trying to push for us to work with that more often. Starting it with Frenchman kind week where which brings in this tradition I'd like to start called share a day which is a part of the only seven seconds program. It's spread hope and remind everyone. And it's I mean it's where you just you really push like to set a goal for yourself like hold the door open for someone, compliment someone, tell someone you
013know how much you appreciate them. And I'd like to start it on like the second Monday of every month starting on that week and then maybe next year we can continue all year. Um we're working on doing a second kind as well. We we had our first one which was going really good. we kept having to fill out the sticky notes and stuff. So, we're going to try doing another one in this building. Um, and then for school events, we have TO coming up soon next week on Saturday bas since we didn't really have homecoming. Tahoe is just, you know, kind of a backup for homecoming. It's basically the same thing. Um, we're doing it at Bellow Acres in Auburn and the theme was Golden G. So, wear gold, silver, wear fancy, you know, stuff
014like that. And then for celebrations and recognitions, because it is board appreciation month, I just wanted to shout all of you guys out how great you guys are doing. I think that it's amazing that we have such we have such a strong school board. I know that at my old school you like at my old school the board and stuff. I mean, no one was quite like a family, you know, like everyone was just very butttheads, you know, no one agreed. It was just not the best. But what I can say is like being with you guys is everyone's like a family and I think it's great. And so I'd like to thank you guys for me for everyone else and the school. We're all thank you during amazing. Also I know that this is
015historic. I went to Eatenville here. If you're an Eatenville grad, raise your hand. Okay. To has always been the formal dance and we just didn't do homecoming. It was different. Yeah. So I we're backwards. I don't know why it was just that way be when I went to school here. So somebody started it, but I know that you haven't like this is kind of new to you, so it's different than my school. >> I just thought it was normal. I didn't know for a lot of years. Okay. Um, thank you. You guys are awesome. And thank you for making the effort to go out to the other schools and to visit them. That means a lot to us, but really means a lot to those other students and to the administrators. I had visited some
016administrators and they were like, "Yeah, we're looking forward to your board reps coming out." So, they were talking about it and planning it. So, thanks for doing that. Appreciate it. I would consider any changes or additions to the agenda. Hearing none, um we're going to move on to our work study and this is all the good stuff where we get to hear about um the goals and hopes and accomplishments of Eatonville High School. So, I'm turning the time over to Mrs. Drew. Amy is on virtually. >> There she is. I see her. >> Good morning. I mean, no, it's not even morning, guys. I I don't even know what is going on. >> I am gonna I'm gonna do I'm doing you all a huge favor by not coming there tonight because I am not
017well. So, um I was planning to rally and come in today and present tonight and then um the district nurse talked me out of that. She thought that was a bad plan. So, uh she said. Anyway, so thank you guys for letting me pre present remotely. It's uh actually a little bit boring to have a remote presentation. So I'm really sorry. I will be I will be as um quick and get to the good stuff because what I want um what I want to do tonight is you know we went over the school improvement plans in the fall. You guys have had that information in in great detail. So I just kind of want to do just a highlevel overview of school improvement plan. make the connection between the work we're doing there and the
018strategic plan goal of preparation for life. And then what I really want to do is give you guys a chance to hear from students. That's why there's so many wonderful little faces that I miss um sitting in your uh in the audience tonight. So, um, so again, just talking about our systems that we're strengthening, that's the kind of the school improvement side of things and the students that we're serving and how those priorities that we have with our uh, school improvement plan, our strategic plan, how they play out into real students lives. So, that's um, kind of what I want to talk with you guys about tonight. Um so our school improvement plan um is you know we talk about all the priorities that we have that's kind of the what of what we're doing.
019Um we have every year we have uh you know ourment group they're sat on um the Washington school improvement framework that's what WSIF stands for on that data that they provide. Um and also we have our own data we evaluate and we make decisions about um we we don't um I you know we look all the time in education for the magic bullet and we have yet to find it and so what we have really uh worked towards over the last several years is finding those uh activities those action steps that allow us to make progress and then just sticking with those things and continuing to move forward and so really looking for that sustainable growth. Um so uh a couple of things about our data that are important. Um our graduation rate remains strong.
020Uh our attendance attendance is always a is a challenge. It continues to be a leverage point for us. Um we know that it's very important that we provide equitable access to support for students and we really want to um build systems that are going to keep students on track uh and then so that's just going to continue to be a focus for us. So like you know on track for graduation and then beyond graduation as well. So, um, our school improvement plan is really kind of that engine that's driving things back behind because we want students to be engaged in the work that they're doing, be engaged in activities at school, feel part of a community, earn credits, um, and develop some passions in life that are going to, uh, keep them going into life
021beyond high school. Um, so just a quick our data snapshot for last school year, uh, our overall four-year graduation rate, uh, is at 97.4%. You guys got the report in June, um, with the specifics of a, you know, the couple of students that did not graduate last year. Um, and students with disabilities is a little bit lower, 72.7%. One thing that I want to note about that with our students with disabilities is that um even for students with an IEP, the state really has looked at that that data is a four-year graduation rate. And we do have a number of students that do remain in our system until they're 21 based on their IEP. They head into our transitions program and those um so those do factor in there. Um our ninth grade uh our
022ninth grade on track data is uh last year we were at 85.3%. So that's the percentage of nth grade students that passed all of their classes and that was if you guys remember from my presentation last year that was a huge focus of our work um and it continues to be a huge focus of our work. That's one of the key metrics in terms of um preventing dropout when students get behind in their freshman year. That just puts them um at a very significantly increased risk of dropping out. So trying to trying to promote that and then uh and you can see that's up from the 23 24 school year which was at 79.3%. So we're pushing for 90% or higher. We really are working on that. Um our attendance um our attendance data is
023a little bit backlogged. We don't have the attendance data for last year yet. Um but uh 2324 No, I'm not I'm not saying that right. 2324 was 63.1%. 2425 was uh 66.8% of students that were present more than 90% of the days. And that's just that continues to be a challenge for us. We have um tollo tickets for sale right now and we have um we have a policy uh in our student handbook that asks that students are in good standing before buying dance tickets and that includes you know being on track for good attendance and passing all their classes. And um you know we want to work with students and we don't want to penalize them if they've been ill or if there's been other circumstances in their life. But we're having a lot
024of conversations with continuing to have a lot of conversations with students and families about the state doesn't care if your absences are excused or unexcused if you're gone more than 10% of the school year. It, you know, it does have an impact on your education. So, and and again, we're trying to promote employability skills and employers like employees to come to work. That's a priority. So, anyway, >> can I ask can I ask you a quick question around the attendance? Um I did have that question is do excused um absences matter and you're saying they do not matter. Um >> they do matter. >> They do. So if it's excused it still counts against the score that we're looking at. Correct. >> Yes. Yes. >> Okay. So does that include sickness doctor's notes type excuse?
025>> Everything. >> Yes. >> Okay. And so how many just so I don't have to do the math. Uh how many days can a child a student miss and meet that 90% target? >> So they can miss 18 days in a school year. >> Okay. >> So you know roughly two days a month. >> Okay. >> So we have students I mean we have students right now that have missed none. We have students right now that are you know already hitting that 18 and we're not even halfway through the year yet. So that's a it's a challenge. It's just going to be a challenge. So, um, any other questions on the data on attendance or anything else? >> Is there anything the board can do to support you and your efforts with attendance? >> Um,
026I think that you guys do a great job. I think it's just that consistent messaging and I and you know we do we are seeing improvement even though it's not the improvement that not to the rate that we'd like to see but we went up 3.7% from one year to the next and if we went up 3.7% again you know we'd be pushing that 70% mark. So, I mean, I think we'll just continue to It's kind of a culture shift. And I think part of the problem is during COVID, we we convinced everybody that we didn't need to be in school for good learning to happen and now we're like, "Hey, you need to come to school." So, um you know, I think we I think we just need to continue working on it. So,
027>> great. Thank you. >> Thank you. >> Um okay, so our I'm just going to go quickly through our four areas of our school improvement plan. You guys have seen this before. Um, one area is around academic success and graduation. That includes our ninth grade on track monitoring, looking at F reports, um, connecting with nth grade teachers. Um, in terms of the support that our nth grade students are getting, making sure our classroom instruction is aligned to the five dimensions of teaching and learning. That's work that Sheila and I do day in and day out as we're in classrooms and talking with teachers and, you know, that observation, evaluation cycle. Um, and then looking at credit recovery, that is an important piece of um, of this work. If a student does um, for whatever reason
028fail a class, we kind of have some, we have a variety of different ways that we go about trying to help them make that up. So if they fail uh first semester, if we can capture um them during lunchtime in the month after, so like typically it'd be the month of February, we will pull them in and give them an opportunity to do the major assessments um from their coursework trying to bring that grade up to a pass. And we typically target students that have that they're over the 50% mark, you know, not the ones that were failed miserably, but um just trying to get them to cover the learning. Um and then if that is not something that's an option, then we go into our credit retrieval, which we use egenuity for that. And
029we do that. we are seeing um we are seeing some growth in that where we're able to intervene with students early and we're not we're not seeing these huge deficits that they can't get out of you know trying to get catch them quick and get them caught up quick. Um and it's very helpful because usually by the time they're juniors and seniors that maturity kicks in and they they understand that education they're getting is important. So um we do a lot of work in advisory um our high school and beyond planning is taking place in advisory this year. We're using school links. The state um went ahead and made a a statewide decision on that. So, we're learning we're learning about that this year and moving forward on that. Um tutoring, I mentioned a little
030bit earlier, we um are using some funds from the um foundation. Um the grant money for tutoring, we do that during lunchtime. Uh just because our students are a little busy after school, it seems like it's hard to capture them then. Uh and sometimes it's hard to capture them at lunch, too. um uh trying to get them an opportunity to come in and get their work um completed and if they need any assistance. Um this year Dale Bamford's actually running that lunchtime tutoring program and he's been a good advocate for our students um as he's working with them there. And then looking at MTSS support. So recognizing the and I'll talk a little bit more about that in a later slide. just the just the many many many struggles the barriers that students can face
031and trying to make sure that we are addressing those in every possible way. Um number two is the career and pathway exploration. So ensuring that um giving kids of courses so that they can um kind of dig into something deep enough that they can decide if it's something that they're passionate about. Um running start uh you guys know about running start. You're very familiar with that. We continue to offer that to our students. Um college in the high school is something that we have had for a number of years and we've expanded it pretty significantly this year and we're looking to expand it further next year. Um so that our we have a college in the high school option for 10th, 11th and 12th grade English. Um this year our senior all of our senior
032history classes are college in the high school. Next year our junior and senior history classes will be college in the high school. Um oh sorry I'm going to mute and cough. I'm sorry, guys. Um, we've had we have a couple different math classes that are college in the high school and um, we had college in the high school classes with Dr. Vaughn, but we've uh, he's left. We've replaced him with a new teacher. She's going to be doing college in the high school next year. We just couldn't quite get her up and running this year. Um but we're pretty excited about the opportunities for students um that way. Uh and then and also sorry Spanish and psychology are also college in the high school classes and then dual credit our CTE classes um offer just
033a whole range of dual credits through Bates um Clover Park and Pierce College. Um so that's another great opportunity for students to kind of get a jump start. um work-based learning. That's something that we are actually stepping in. We're dipping our toes in, I guess, second semester this year, we decided uh Kelly Pal, our CT director, and Jay and Christa and I met and talked about earlier in the fall, we talked about, you know, what could this look like long term? Long term, we'd love to see some internships um for our students and our community at, you know, any number of businesses um things like that. And we decided to kind of start very small. and we're going to have a few stu students doing um one or two period internships this spring, but the
034um just within the district. So, we have one that's going to be working up at district office. Christa's got a whole lot of um really great ideas for how to make that a really valuable learning experience for her. And then we have three that are interested in working um at Eatenville Elementary that want to be elementary teachers. So, we're excited about getting started on that. um and industry certifications that those are built into um the majority of our CTE classes where students are getting a certification um like Microsoft for example that certification um and then really trying to um >> before you go on too far I have a quick question on your work-based learning. >> Yeah. >> Is are those opportunities that are being offered are those paid internships or are they just credit
035based internships? Right now they're just credit based internships and I mean that we're gonna start with credit based internships and then it would be so ideal if in the future they could be something a little bit more but we're going to start >> and if partner I'm thinking business association etc grand business association we wanted to partner with associations and we were looking for additional opportunities. Are we looking for credit based opportunities or paid internship opportunities? >> Well, they need the credit. Um, so I mean that's going to always be our priority just because that's what our job is is helping them, you know, earn credits for their diploma >> or what what does Okay, I'm seeing nods over there from the Okay. All right. Perfect. That's >> okay. >> Thank you. >> Uh, okay.
036And then just trying to align with students interests and post-secary plans. So trying to be responsive to students um in terms of what they are interested in and in trying to ensure that our course offerings match that as much as we are able to do. So um an example of that this year um we decided uh to offer based on kind of some feedback from students instead of just offering regular biology we also offered wildlife biology. And our plan was we were going to have one period of biology of wildlife biology and the rest biology with our teacher that's teaching that. And then it turned out that we have a lot of students interested in wildlife biology. And so it went um those classes kind of blew up. So trying to and and same thing
037that happens with sometimes with Tira's biomedical and anatomy classes like you know trying to be responsive to what what students are interested in and ensuring that we have course offerings available for that. Um our uh third focus area thinking about life schools and that whole stu life skills and the whole student development um social emotional learning kind of integrating that in um Maryanne's going to speak a little bit later um in the counselor report um but you know one of the things if you read the social emotional learning standards for Washington state um what you don't see at high school is that we're supposed to be teaching them a lot of these skills. they they really are expected to have these skills by high school. And so it's really application and giving students opportunities to
038kind of experience different perspectives and learn how to kind of coexist. And so that is happening in lots of different ways. I mean we just had uh actually a couple of you guys got to see that actually last week we had our model UN and so giving student you know students are roleplaying these different countries and even though the focus of that lesson is not social emotional learning there is a lot of that that's happening and Mr. Mhler when I was in his class actually the day after we were there last Thursday um he was joking with him okay this isn't personal nobody can cry there can be no tears because you know as you're trying to be say North Korea or something you know you got to have some thick skin and not take
039it personal so those are all good opportunities for our students to kind of practice that social emotional learning uh mental health through fitness is something that is also funded by the foundation and we've done that this is our um third year doing it this is the first time that it's been able to be paid and so we were able to expand it quite a bit. But um Tony Reid um our security person and he is working with Ryan Antinson, EHS alumni and Columbia Crest teacher, but they are having the weight room open after school, really working with students who maybe aren't playing a sport, don't really have anything um that they're doing outside of school and rather than having them hanging out at the skate park or just wandering the streets of town, trying to
040get them into the weight room and set some, you know, set some weightlifting goals and really try to uh take some control over their life. So, that's been a really powerful um experience and just those good relationships and conversations. It's been very helpful. Um attendance and engagement supports, those are very individual um you know, as we're looking for with students that are having challenges um for whatever reason. Uh and then we also with our advisory we just continue to talk about you know all of those employability skills. Actually the CTE classes all have a component of their grade that's 21st century skills and a lot of that is about those kind of those employability skills. So and we actually asked our students to self-reflect at the end of first quarter. We're going to ask them
041to do it again at the end of second quarter and set some goals around time management, self- advocacy and goal setting. just trying to give them the uh belief, help them to grow the belief that this is their life, that they need to make it great for themselves. So, um and then the fourth area is really just that equity and access. And so, you know, I talked about barriers. I mean, we've got students that, um that really have very few barriers and we have students that have so many that it's just hard to even imagine how they get through. Um, so trying to identify what those barriers are, try to help students, um, and connect them with the resources that they need, whether, you know, there's an attendance issue, um, a housing issue, homelessness, um,
042we've got, you know, mental health issues and, uh, substance use, credit recovery, we've got all those things. So, we continue to have a partnership with Cano. Um, they have a substance use group that comes in and we've actually done a lot. I've been meeting quite about probably about once every month or two with the Cano substance use group. It's because I wasn't really comfortable with some of the direction it was going and honestly when we talked they weren't either. And so we really have been a lot more purposeful about who's in that group and how um how the decisions are made in terms of what their meeting times are and all of that. So we've done a lot of work on that and I think it's moving in the right direction. We have students that
043are seeing therapists through conjo at school. Um and then also of course we do what we can to provide resources for students that don't have that are not on state medical. That continues to be a barrier for for some families because it's a long wait. Um and then credit recovery options too. We um continue to work look for supports for students with needs and disabilities. Um, we have had I, uh, you know, Maryanne is been so great at that. And then Kirsten Dill, our other counselor's been out on maternity leave, but Krista Cwley's been filling in for her for the last couple months. And she's been a really great asset in terms of um, just helping students uh, with with needs. I mean, it's just honestly unbelievable sometimes the things I think about back when
044I was in high school and the kind of student that I was and just so completely naive that there were kids that were walking around with all the challenges these kids walk around with. And so, um, I appreciate having a team that is so committed to doing everything that they can to level the playing field for those kids. So, um, and looking at multiple ways to demonstrate success. actually just um one of the things that comes to mind thinking about this is the the um we do the stamp uh assessment. So we've got the board policy about language proficiency testing and so you know we are just every year having more and more and more students who will take that Spanish competency test. Um we have one girl that's a um senior that took it
045this year and was able to earn the seal of bi literacy and four credits. And so sometimes for those kids that maybe are behind some that's just a great way to earn credit. We're also doing a few other um kind of out of the box things with and I it's just really that all the board policy around the competency crediting but we've got a a student who is getting her pilots license and so she's actually earning CTE credits for us that her you know her instructor gave a whole plan. and we followed the board policy, but you know, just trying to find a lot of different opportunities for students to to get high school credit and demonstrate success even outside of our four walls. So, >> can I ask question on that too? Um, I
046should know the answer and I don't. Um, I know legislatively for a long time the only thing we could give those mastery based credits were foreign language. Sounds like C is an option or now is it any subject that we feel like we can find as a board that meets the board policy? >> So it's a little bit different for every So every subject's a little bit different. So they all have um CTE is probably the easiest because because they can submit a proposal and if it if it aligns with a CTE framework, you know, we could like aviation's a great example. That's an easy one to do. Um the other if you if you look in the policies the other content areas talk about some type of demonstration of mastery either by completing the
047next um highest course or through assessment. So, we do a lot of competency based credits. Like, for example, if a student we we this blows my mind, it happens every year. Like, we have a student maybe they failed a semester of English 9 for example, but they got a level four on this 10th grade Smarter Balanced. So, we can go back and grant a credit for that because they've demonstrated on the Smarter Balanced that they have um that competency. um or we might maybe have a student that um failed a semester of algebra 1, but they get a you know, if we'd say, okay, if you get a B or better in algebra 2, then you can earn that credit back. So, um so those are uh some of the ways that we do that.
048And then of course the Spanish, the testing, and it's not just Spanish. We can test in other languages, too. >> Great. Thank you. All right. So, kind of transitioning to, you know, if you think about our school improvement plan is the what we're doing. Um, with school improvement, it's the preparation for life that is the why. We really want to ensure that the priorities we have at our school improvement play in create um a situation where students can attend regularly, where they can learn and earn the credits that they need, where they feel supported academically, emotionally, behaviorally, that they're um enabled and empowered to access their own pathways, and that they have the skills that they need for life beyond high school. And so what our school improvement plan is hoping to focus us on
049is that how are we really working with the students that we have to help them turn their interest into skills pathways and post-secary readiness. You know, we talk about this all the time and you guys I so appreciate you as a board in terms of your um understanding that you know we we joke that there's 53 ways to get a diploma, but that's because there's so many different pathways that kids are on. There's so many different directions that they want to go with their lives and we just really want to create as many opportunities for them as possible. We want to make sure that when they leave our our facility that they have every door open to them that they want open that there's not you know thing like oh well shoot I really wanted
050to go to college but they are not prepared or you know trying to make sure that they have all of those experiences and so that is really what that preparation for life um where that comes into play. And so I um I have all these wonderful students here tonight and I'm so sorry that I'm not there. Oh my goodness. I'm sorry I'm not there. But um I asked the students that are here tonight to um to come specifically because they all have just and I could have brought every single one of them, but I started asking others and so I've narrowed it down to seniors here and they all have just their own pathway and their own story. Um I there's a couple of them that I'm pretty sure I'm going to end up working
051for someday. So, um, but they just have, they've all experienced different classes, just kind of find different pathways. They've made their own choices. And I just really feel like, um, it's a lot to ask a high school kid to stand up and present and tell their life story in front of this big audience. But I thought if we could create a structure where they can be there and you guys can have one-on-one conversations with them and hear their stories um and talk about you know the questions I put in your uh in the presentation some questions if you need some conversation starters just to hear from them you know what are the things that they have um grown from through high school what are the challenges that they've faced a couple of them have faced
052some pretty significant challenges and uh have over overcame them in impressive ways and just the um just their goals and their ambitions. They're pretty impressive. So, um thinking about um just kind of letting them tell their own stories and and really they are the preparation for life. These kids are six short months away from launching into life. So, um I think we have given them everything that we can. We're not quite done yet, but so I want to just give you guys some time. um to just talk with these kids. And so I, you know, in my mind I was going to be there and then just everybody could just kind of get up and move and in reality I'm just going to sit awkwardly on the screen. But um uh I really do want
053to give you guys a chance to hear from them. So I guess you can go and do that now. I'm gonna let me introduce the kids. I'll let them um let me uh let me introduce them to you and then >> Well, I'll just have them wave their hand at you. So, um Alana Gibson, is Alana Gibson in the house? I know she is. I saw her earlier. So, um so Anya is in the fire science program at Pierce County Skill Center. She's pretty cool. Um I don't a lot of stories about her, but I'm gonna let her tell you her stories. Um Blair Mims is there. Blair, you want to wave your hand? >> Blair is also at Pierce County Skill Center. Um and he is quite a little entrepreneur. You'll have to ask
054him about ask him about that. And then uh Ruby, you guys know Ruby. So she's here tonight. She's representing our Running Start student because she's um excelling in that role. And Santiago Ruvala. Are you I know Santiago's there. I saw him. Um, so Santiago is at EHS full-time, but he's got some great plans um for next year that I'll let him tell you about. And Alyssa Jacobs, um Alyssa is um actually a couple of these students, not just Alyssa, but Alyssa is an student athlete and she's uh she's got some good plans. Alyssa's actually one of our pilot internship students for this next semester. So, we're excited about that. And then Caitlyn Kenny is there also. Um, and she has some great plans for her life. Caitlyn is a band ex band extraordinaire person and
055an athlete and she's doing great things. Um, and then I don't know if Hayden Kowitz came in. I didn't see her earlier. >> We don't see her here. >> Okay, very good. Sorry, it's really hard for me to hear. Um, okay. Okay. Well, then the ones that I introduced are the ones that are there. And so you guys are welcome to just talk with them. They are prepared to answer your questions and tell you all about um the great work that they've done, what they're planning to do. And so if we wanted to take maybe um why don't we take about 20 minutes and then rejoin together. Will that work? >> So Amy, can I ask you a question? Are you envisioning that they come up and we sit across from them individually oneon-one or
056that we invite them each up to come and present? No, I'm seeing head nod. So, >> we going to grab their chairs and come sit across from any of us. We'll start having some conversations. >> That sounds great. >> Awesome. Okay. Thank you. So, students, if you don't mind, um, and I think it would be great if we have the opportunity to talk to a couple of you. So maybe if we could have a timekeeper and we could have maybe >> Yeah, we're going to do some speed dating. Maybe four minutes. Three or four minutes. That way we get to see um we have one, two, one, two, three, four, five, six. Yeah. So if we go four minutes each, we can get to visit with everybody. Does that work? Can you guys bring your
057chairs and sit across from from us? That would be great. >> You're right. Could you move? >> I can move wherever you'd like. >> Just so you're not so close to each other. >> So I I don't get to talk. I'm just joking. I'm joking. >> How many minutes? >> Totally joking. >> And let's see. We have six kids. Mr. Ber. >> Okay. Mr. Bower also. So there's five board members and superintendent. >> So maybe I'll come over here. >> Yeah. Yep. And then we'll just do a rotate. >> Yoop. Hello. >> Are you >> I think Ruby's coming right here. Okay. >> Remind me. >> Okay. >> Are we missing? >> Okay. Okay. That works. So, we're >> together pretty exciting. I feel so bad. What's your favorite part? >> Yeah, I think myself
058in the wall. >> How did you learn about the pathway? Well, and it's so military, right? So, it's not military, but it's got that structure. Yes. Thank you. You get to be one time you get to meet the interviewer and the other Um I question did you have anything you wanted to do? But one of the things you have to do is It's a pretty good. >> All right. Thank you. It's so nice to get to know. Just let's just rotate that way. I don't know which way that is for you. For me, it's clockwise. I don't know what to tell us a little bit about why you're And have you had any What? So, um, as you're going through higher senior Washington. So what do you find? I've always wanted there. I know that
059they say that sometimes the best thing and their education is to them with seniors. Besten specific scholarship. All right. It's kind of hard to Yeah. >> Thanks for sharing with me so much. Everyone blurry. I don't know. You just go here. So we started off the year by playing a sexy game by 24 and everything. Such a bad guy. Most of the second years Maybe Yeah. What class do you teach? Rotate. >> Thank you. Everybody's taking a leaf. >> Okay. And awesome. Tell me about your >> Tell me about your experience. And then Did you start? Are you learn how to learn music? Okay. I do love it. It's a lot of money. Okay. So tell me something. all four years. So your experience here What's one thing that can do better? One more. >>
060Think we'll be started in four. >> Okay. by a lot of time and attention. Okay. So, tell us how running. I know that you're advocate. No, I didn't. Are you ready? My Thank you. Okay. And he's like, "I should have done really Yes. Yes. Yes. I don't need I just got ridiculous. because you think And that is time. That is time. I mean, >> you're a really good time keeper. >> It's more the board on that one. >> And it was good. I I like you showing the versatility of the board. Thank you students. We are very grateful for the um one the courage you had to come for two for sharing uh with us and three for just being awesome like being great representative school district. >> All right. It looks like we are
061now on to >> I'm not actually done. >> You're not done. Okay. >> I'm not done. Sorry. >> No, I'm sorry. I am almost done, but I'm not quite done. Um, no, I I just want to also say thank you to the students. They have been they were just all super willing and excited and hopefully you got to hear a little bit about what their plans are and kind of how um they have landed on those plans after their time at high school. So, um they're pretty great, I admit. And if you want to talk with them, they're pretty much hanging around during lunch every day. That's what I like to do with them. So, um I want to just just I want to just talk about our ongoing work and then I want Maryanne
062Baker to come up and give our little her council report and then we'll be done. Um just a couple of uh kind of next steps things that we're working on. Um just so that you're on they're on your radar. So, like I talked a little bit earlier about college and the high school. I'm expanding that through Eastern and through Central. And then also with Clover Park Technical College, specifically, Kelly Powell is working on um a college in the high school program for her business classes where students can actually earn a retail business management certificate just by taking classes that we offer here at the high school um through Clover Park. So, that's pretty exciting. Um Dale Bamford's kind of looking at some construction related um college and the high school classes through Clover Park also.
063And then as part of that um this year's sophomores are um we've talked with them. So we've got two classes of English 101 um two full classes of English 101 which is 10th grade college English. So, um, those students are going to have the opportunity to be part of, um, a kind of a hybrid running start program that we're working on and it would allow students to to to still do running start and, uh, through Pierce College earn their associates degree, but because of the college and the high school credits, they would be able to stay at EHS pretty much full-time in their junior year and then do part-time running start in their senior year. So, one of the things that we know about Running Start is that um it becomes a real issue for
064students that don't have transportation down to Pierce College. Um that is a big barrier for for some families for financial reasons or just other responsibilities. It's a long drive from Edenville to, you know, way the heck down there. Um, and then the other option then is then if kids wanted to do an online class, but that's not that's not necessarily the best learning environment and it doesn't set them up for success. Well, so anyway, we're exploring that. And um the nice thing I guess the the big difference is when students earn college credit through Running Start, they're only able to do that in their junior and senior year. And with college in the high school, they can actually earn college credit in grades 9 through 12. And so it gives us an opportunity to kind
065of expand that um into some of the younger grades. So um we'll just more to come on that. We'll just see how it how it plays out. Um you know, we just want to again make sure kids have every option available. Um we're still looking at expanding CTE pathway options. I I spoke to Dale Bamford and the construction program at Clover Park. So trying to kind of move forward in that direction a little bit. get that, you know, the wood shop and the woodworking class, but trying to kind of go a little bit further with that. And then we are always looking for how we can support the whole student. So, um, what I love about, you know, the stories that I get to know and, um, we all that work at the high school,
066we get to know and hopefully you guys got a little flavor of is that every single student has a story and they all, you know, they all have their own um, life experiences, their own challenges, their own dreams. and we just want to make sure that whatever it is that they need that we are able to provide um as much as we can within our you know school system just to make sure that they can get where they want to be in their next in their next stage. So I think that um I think that when we have kids that stay in our system we can definitely do that. I mean, gosh, there's just so many stories of kids we we sit around sometimes talking about, oh my goodness, remember when that kid was a
067freshman and how they were and how they were acting and now looking them looking at them at seniors and I'm not talking about any of the ones in the room there, so but there's others, but um I mean there may be a couple there, but I mean the um that these kids just I mean they just grow up so much and they figure things out and they just do super amazing things and um it's just really a joy to be a part of it and um I really appreciate you guys as a school board and your support just always so supportive and allows um allows us to just do great work for kids. So, thank you very much and I hope that you also noticed the beautiful thank you banner that's behind you. I've been
068looking at it all night, so hopefully you've seen it, but um that's just some more cool signage from our leadership class. Um, so, um, with that, I'm gonna let Maryanne give her counselor's report and then I I asked Cassie to print for you because I'm a big six slacker, the um volunteer report for you um for you for the high school, too. So, hopefully you have that in front of you, too. Most of our volunteers um are through extracurricular and outside activities and things like that, but I wanted you guys to see that. Um, so any questions on the volunteer report or should I just have Maryanne come on up? >> Notice that there's 15, which is awesome. Is that because they are chaperones? Is that because they're part of band booster? 15 volunteers for
069band. >> So band the band parents are amazing. So they come out because the band's been going crazy doing fundraising. Um, and so there's just a variety of them that come out and help with different fundraising activities and um, yeah, chaperon and things. Um, that's that's a big one, too. But a lot of it really is just around fundraising and planning like the when they do their jazz um, events, the pancake breakfast, Santa breakfast, things like that. So, awesome. That's great. Thank you. >> Lot of pancake flippers. >> Flipped through pancakes myself. >> I bet you have. Yeah. Okay. Well, so Maryanne, do you want to come on up? And here's your slide. >> Okay. So, um, we'll start with this slide because I think it's the only one I have. >> Um, originally when
070I gave a presentation, I don't know, is this the best way to understand? Um, about 10 years ago, it was before COVID, I made a diagram and it was totally different. And I'll just show a quick copy of it. And these bubbles all floating here were all the things we were doing in the guidance office. And down here on this little triangle was the balance of mental health and taking care of kids with mental health. And granted, things have shifted. We don't do a lot of these things for lots of different reasons. For example, we don't offer um the PSAT and the SAT doesn't come out of our office anymore because things have shifted. Most colleges don't even want to know that you took the SAT. They're test line or they're not. It's optional. So,
071that is a whole energy that doesn't go on in our office. Um, some other things that have shifted, we used to have a independent study center on our campus that now has been outsourced through grad alliance and we do a lot of credit retrieval within our own system. So all these bubbles that are bouncing around have kind of shifted to this wheel that turns and this wheel has students uh teachers and parents kind of all working together to get all these pieces together. And we have mental health right in the center because we know that for kids to be successful that mental health piece has to be stable. They have to have not any barriers that stop them from um achieving what they can. And I listed three things we've always done. individual counseling, short
072term, meet with a kid, just say, "Hey, let me give you some tips and skills about how to manage your classroom homework or maybe you have some crisis at home or maybe you have friend problems." That individual stuff still takes place. If it gets to be a long-term thing, that's when we use uh concourses because quite frankly, we're an educational institute. We need to still get kids through the academics. The second one, we always have kids in crisis and it could be from home. It could be from school. It could just uh Mckin Vento kids or kids that are without food. Just different things that we kind of help kids out with. And then the last one we put there, um we've always done social and emotional lessons. But in the last few years, we've
073been very specific about doing ninth grade lessons to help with social and emotional needs. Um, I always related to when we all went off to kindergarten and preschool, they evaluated four areas. Are you physically ready for kindergarten? Are you intellectually ready for kindergarten? Are you emotionally ready? Like, can you be away from your mom um in kindergarten? And then also, can you socially get along with the other kids? Those four things are still in development when you're in high school. And I think high schoolers, we kind of go, "Oh, they're little humans that are almost adults. They don't need any development." But we recognize those four areas are still happening. Uh we know physically, like guys, you don't finish developing physically until you're in your 20s. So, we know there's some growth in that. And
074intellectually, we know that's got room. and social emotional. I think if we don't address that and give some support because maybe for whatever reason they don't have that then they get stopped and they can't move on to become young adults. So um if I could highlight the main lessons we did with our ninth graders, we did a lesson on dealing with stress. How do you deal with the stress? There's unhealthy ways and there's healthy ways. And just teaching kids different ways. And I think the way we taught it, kids could actually hear other kids deal with stress in in some ways and could make some comparisons about what would work for them in a healthy way. We also do a lesson on uh refusal skills. Somebody's telling you to do this and you just go
075along with it. How do you stand up for yourself and defend and say why you're not going to do something that might be dangerous? We also do a lesson on confidence. There's three parts of confidence. being responsible, being appreciated, and having um skill at something. So, when you're like not in a good spot, it's probably one of those three legs of your three-legged stool that broke and you got to fix that. So, they're very minor minor lessons, but I actually took a lot of them from when I taught middle school. We taught a lot of those lessons in the Quest program. Lions Quest program brought a lot of these lessons. But I think we want to eventually grow a little bit and teach at different grade levels because right now it's kind of just one-on-one
076and hoping to do some small groups and different things because there's still some social and emotional things that can help kids out. uh the wheels that are going around. Um probably the biggest one to kind of I think is interesting. It says college applications and I'm looking from junior senior counselor obviously freshman sophomore counselor is not doing college applications but I put a 21 there because this year I did 21 applications. Previous years it says like 40 but it's because thanks to technology there's something called the common app. a kid will apply to the Common App and have eight schools they applied to. 10 years ago, I was writing and printing off eight letters to go to each school and putting it in the mail and it was real tedious. But now, it's very efficient.
077Um, when I do letters of recommendation, some schools don't want a letter of recommendation. Schools have moved away from too much information. They want to be more holistic. They want to know kids are involved. They want to know kids are participating in leadership. They want to know that kids are in part of clubs and different things here. I have a challenge writing letters of recommendation for kids that I have no idea what they do. So I ask them for a spreadsheet. What do you do? What have you been doing for four years? And sometimes running start kids. I didn't know they were involved with something at college. You got to tell me that because I haven't seen you on campus for two years. So writing letters of recommendation is a two-way conversation. I'm asking kids,
078tell me what what what I you know, I do remember you, but I don't really know everything you did. So, that to me is a a steady piece that will always be part of the high school. I'm not going to go through each one of them, but you can kind of look at those numbers and kind of see where we're at with things. Um, I think the one that's interesting about credit evaluations because we do get kids earning credits not just at the semester. We have lots of ways kids get credits. For example, skill center kids, we get grades from you every 12 weeks, three times a year instead of so right in the middle of December, I'm suddenly doing credit evaluations for kids because their credits came in. Running start has credits that are
079coming in three different times, maybe four because they went in the summer. So that's like stop what you're doing and mark these credits off. And then we have obviously lots of kids doing credit retrieval, lots of different things. That's always a moving wheel. So for me, I didn't know I was going to be a guidance counselor that was a bookkeeper. That that's part of the job. That, you know, when a kid walks in, I can show them where they're at exactly. Here's where you're at. We don't have to like figure it all out and calculate what you have. So I I think um and I say 120 letters because we write a letter to the parents, hey, your student's not on track. Usually each grade has 25 30 kids. That's pretty typical. Um and those
080are the kids we're trying to get them to recover and get things back on track. So, I don't know if there's questions about that, but that kind of is a little bit of everything. So, and I know when Mrs. Dill comes back, she'll have more to say. So, I know like I do one path and she does the nth and tth graders, but we do a lot of blending, doing things together. So, that's about all I have. >> Okay. >> Amy, did you have anything else you wanted to add? No, just if you had any questions for me or for Maryanne or question that was really great, great presentation. Thank you. Um, so we are going to close out our work study portion and thank you all for your part for being here. We really
081appreciate especially on a school night. We're going to head to our superintendent and board comments. >> Great. Tonight, I just want to take a minute to recognize and thank you as a school board for the incredible work that you do as we celebrate January, our schoolboard appreciation month, as we said earlier. Uh, but you just need to know how appreciated you are. Um, you know, we know that you work really really hard to to uh be very involved in the community. I'm particularly proud of our school board. Not only are you a board of distinction, uh recognized uh you know by the state, one of 10 small schools in the state, but also I just want to say I'm so proud of you because you really care what's about it's about students. It's all about
082students and that's that's really the main focus whenever we have a a meeting is about what's best for students. What's best for students? They care a lot about you and about your success. And there's a lot of work that goes on behind the scenes to make sure you're successful. All the sorts of things that we've talked about tonight could not happen without a, you know, a strong school board to lead that way. And so I I just wanted to say I guess on behalf of 2,000 students and 70 uh you know employees and 10,000 community members. Uh thank you for what you do. Um and how engaged you are and how much you want to participate. I'll just close in saying that when we get new employees um after the first time that we meet
083with them, they regularly say, "Wow, this school board is not like this anything I've seen before." like they're they're showing up, they're serving dinner, they're they're they're coming to the classrooms, they're doing everything that, you know, I haven't seen before. And so, uh, just kudos to you and thank you for the time and effort that you give to make sure that you you lead our school district. Thank you. Um, just a couple other things. We just had a Washington state commercial vehicle uh uh uh inspection. Uh, and they what they do is in the winter they take 10% of our fleet and they they go A to Z for safety. Believe me, I've I've actually ridden on on this kind of ridden along on those and and uh it is thorough. It is very very
084thorough down to the, you know, air pressure of each tire and just things that are a lot. And uh this year we passed with flying colors >> and so congratulations. I would say our mechanics and assistant mechanic, you know, um that's that's quite a feat. Um we just we have 12 kits from the American Heart Association which have been deployed now to all the schools including high school and these kits are full of mannequins and our students will be receiving um different instruction. Uh we just met with our nurses and with with Jeff um Olen and Tira Hancock to go through kind of the high school level health will be rolled out. But we know that throughout our lifetime there's a very good chance that we'll come upon someone who needs assistance. They have they're
085having a heart attack. There's something and we just had one of our employees and I won't divulge that because that that would be up to her but you know who saved her husband. you know, it's just like it happens a lot more than you think. So, so important that we as students, as staff members, uh school board members, um that we all know that we we practice enough that we can always give the aid that's needed to to assist someone until there can be others that come there. And so, we have a 100 mannequins um and times five. I believe I've got that right. Actually, don't quote me on the numbers, but um we have we have many many mannequins. So, those will be uh we want to say that all of our our staff
086members will um receive training on welcome back day on August 25th. And we will between now and then students whether it's the kids heart challenge or whe it's the heart challenge of the high school we'll middle school uh you'll be receiving more and more training just on how to perform and it's only CPR and the signs and and who do you you know what you do first and second and third. So really appreciate the American Heart Association who's already given us money for um for many supplies for that. I will say as I go around and visit classrooms um they are ground that they are grounded in instruction that is improving student achievement and I'm really proud of our employees for that. Um students are engaged and and they're happy. They're happily engaged and that
087doesn't always happen again in certain but they're excited. They're they're learning and that's what we heard tonight. That's what I heard over and over again. you know, what classes that really jazzed you and and things and so there's really good things that are happening with in our classrooms and I just want to thank our our our staff members for that. Um and uh yeah, and then last but not least, I have uh we have um we wanted you always ask me for an update on the stadium, so here we go. So, this was an aerial taken by our own Eric Sword out high school here and uh with a drone. And this is where we're at at this point. Um we now have um our lettering in the end zones as well as in the
088center of the field. And uh our soccer lines are just finishing up. You'll see people on the Yeah. In that upper right hand corner that are still doing some things there. It's all being stitched in. This is not paint. This is work that they're doing uh to make sure that we get a lot of years of use out of our field. And then our Dzone, the place behind the goal post is where you'll you'll still be some you'll see some activity. Go down to the lower left. And then we want to thank our voters for the the money for a brand new artificial track and field that will be used for 247 365. And there on the lower left you see six semi-tractor trailers full of of materials for our stadium which will seat 1224
089to 1224 people uh and will be it should stand for a century. I will just predict that. I'm going to come back and check on it. >> Yeah. Yeah. I hope so too and I'll be in the guest books if I do. >> Perfect. >> But um but anyway, so that that is nearing. You you'll start to see that go up and we'll actually see that go up pretty quickly. So the last thing I just want to say is that on May 1st at 10:00 a.m. at community day, we hope that you're all there. uh we'll be rolling out some formal stuff, but I just don't want to get the word out uh that on May 1st uh community day 10:00 a.m. that we expect to see that stadium completed and be sitting in that
090stadium and looking out on the field having our lights, our restroom, our our score um you know, our scoreboard and and uh just to really see a beautiful thing for our community. And so, um, with that, tomorrow night I'll be at the Lions Club meeting doing a presentation. Uh, if any of anyone of you are wants to join me, then I'll be happy to have you, you know, join in on kind of a little bit about what we're doing as a school district. So, uh, with that, I I really do appreciate, uh, being able to work with you and thank you for your dedication to students. Thank you. That picture made it to my family group chat, which is kind of a big deal, I have to say. Everybody's like, "Did you see this the
091field and how great it looks?" So, it's, you know, across the country news now. So, um, thank you for that great work and thank you for keeping us updated and posted around the great work. >> I could tell you hours worth if you want to hear it. >> All right. I'm not gonna put Katie on the spot first. I'll we'll start here with Karen. Give you you're going to be next. Just giving you a heads up. Go down this way. >> Oh, well, first of all, if I wanted thank Amy for joining us virtually. I don't know if she's still on there. Uh, but um being sick and all and and that was a great presentation and lots of talking when you're under the weather and so I mean you're you're amazing. So, thank you.
092Um and then I want to appreciate our student board members. You guys are so amazing. Um just always doing um above and beyond and um thinking about you know your fellow students but then also the younger students and being such an example for other board members to come. You know you're setting a high bar. So, I I I appreciate that because, you know, we have something to really gauge what greatness looks like. >> So, um and then thank you to all you guys. I love getting to know each and every one of you guys. Uh and um I mean, keep with it. You guys are on a great path and you're you're just doing such a good job. So, I'm I'm excited to to watch and see. I love watching especially if you stick around
093the area and just being able to see what you're doing when when you're out amongst town or whatever, you know. So, you can accomplish great things at a very young age. So, thank you Katie. >> Okay. Um, well, first of all, thank you to everybody. I mean, honestly, I can say thank you to everybody in this room. I did my orientation last week and I got to meet with a lot of you and really spend some time getting to know everybody. I look forward to getting to know you guys a little bit more and and genuinely everyone in this room. Um I'm I'm still new so I'm kind of figuring out what the right thing is to say and when and I'm not great at that to begin with but um I really enjoyed this
094experience. I so happy to get some facetime with some of the students here and I just really look forward to everything to come and I'm very grateful honestly to everyone here again for the warm welcome and for just teaching me and sharing everything with me. >> Awesome. Thank you. Appreciate that. um my echo what they have said of course that um I love it when students come and talk to us and I love the way you were so natural and so much yourselves and appreciated each one of you and seeing your faces and seeing your excitement and your enthusiasm for what you're doing and I mean I just you know I've been on the school board for a very long time and and I I've you know seen a lot of students and I spent
095a lot of you're volunteering at at the high school level at all levels. But I just to see that kind of excitement and enthusiasm and see what you're doing helps me to know for a fact that we're on the right track. We're doing the right things because you students are what it's all about. We're here for you. You know, we aren't here for any other reason. I mean, I don't stay up late at night for anything else anymore. So, I just want to say thank you from the bottom of my heart for each and you and all of your fellow students. >> Uh, yeah. I just wanted to thank this high school leadership kids. I mentioned when they came in, my daughter's in leadership at Unionville L and she said it was really great see
096you guys on Facebook. She said she learned a lot and thought it was fantastic. Um, and then they had the FAA moved down there today and that was awesome. She said it's really cool. I think it's the second third time I've been there. Thank you to the high school for sending students around and doing that. I'm sure they're making it to all the other buildings as well. I've seen the Instagram posts and stuff, so appreciate it. Um, just a big thank you to the high school. Um, so voters know and community members know, um, all the multiple pathways that we offer students to go where they need to go, some of those don't come with dollars back to us. Um, in fact, a large section of some things. And we still commit to doing that.
097One, it's what's best for kids >> and two, it's what's best for our community when they graduate and come back if they do work and and it has to happen. And so despite those financial impacts on us, I just want it to be known that it's for the benefit of all of our kids and it's represented here. Um, and it's really it was a great conversation with the students and those multiple opportunities. I've always been a person that believes school can happen anywhere. It does not happen in four walls, hence my job. And to see that represented here tonight was was great. Um, and thank you to the kids for being here. The only other thing I'd like to say, thank you to Amy and her staff and and counseling department for balancing that and
098figuring all that out as we've gone on because it is and Sheila, I can see you over there, too. It it is it's a belief in them and it's very very hard. Um, one of the questions I had for the students and I get a chance to ask you all and I'll be quick is one of the things I hope that we've done or we get better at and if you have any suggestions I'd love to hear it is my generation is the last year our degree is supposed to last like 25 years we got a job stayed in that job retired from that job whatever it is they say that your guys's graduation and your degrees or whatever you choose to go into micro degrees work whatever it might be is two to five
099years and changing constantly. >> So, how we how are we preparing you for that mental fortitude to change to use your skills you have not in what you've been trained in, but what you've grown in with your hands, your brain, your attitude, your people skills. How how can we better at that to prepare you? Um because I think the next schools that do that are the ones that are going to be leaps and bounds ahead of the others. So >> that that's something I'd love to hear back and and I appreciate Amy doing this because it was really great to hear from you guys. So >> that's it. >> That's great. Thank you. >> Yeah. Kudos to students first. Thank you so much for being here and being great examples of um people who love
100to learn. I could tell sense that in each of you that you love what you're learning. So and I think that's the point. We need to continue to produce graduates that are lifelong learners, love to learn and will continue to do. So, um, EHS staff is awesome and a great team and we're so grateful for the hard work and staying here as well as all of our, uh, district office staff that come and have meetings. Also, we appreciate you. I want to invite um, our student reps, if you could write this on your calendar, and I'm going to ask Cassie to send out the invite. Washington State School Directors Association is having a day on the hill on January 29th. Um, I will be attending and we'll be working on getting appointments one way or
101the other. I will intro you will be I will get you to the house floor if we can or up at least up in the viewing area. Um, but we'll I need to know what your schedules kind of are if you're have any flexibility on that day because priority for me is introducing you to our legislators and if I reach out to them first and you aren't available then it's kind of tricky. So, if you have the whole day open that would be best. if you're, you know, if there's something going on. >> What time? Like >> seven o'clock or whatever. >> Probably about Oh, yeah. You need to leave here at seven. Our first meetings will probably be around 8 or 9 depending on the legislator legislature. Um or we can schedule later in
102the afternoon. Ruby, I'm going to give you an exception because I know it's really hard to miss any school when you have really heavy lift, but you've been such a great advocate and we'll invite legislators here to also be with you. there. >> I'll let you know. >> Okay. >> All right. If you can, that would be and as well as the board. >> So, thank you for if you're interested and we can coordinate rides and spend that day together. >> All right. I think that's it. It's been a long evening for all of us. Thank you so much, Amy. Thanks for being a trooper. I wish you well and hope you feel better soon. With that, we're going to close this meeting at 8:40.