001All those in favor say aye. Aye. Okay, the agenda is approved 4-0. Before we get started on the rest of the agenda, I'd like to state that the board appreciates and supports stakeholder input in our meetings. Part of our role, one we very much value, is to listen to what members of the public have to say. Everyone should have a chance to express their opinions within the guidelines the board has established so that we are able to conduct the meeting effectively and efficiently. During tonight's meeting, there will be time for the public to comment on matters both on the agenda, during each agenda item, as well as not on the agenda, towards the end of the meeting. Please wait to speak at the appropriate time. If you'd like to address the board here in person,
002we ask that you fill out a blue card, which found at that table over there. And if you're online, please use the rates hand feature. According to board bylaw 32-90, sorry, 93-23, each speaker will have three minutes to address the board unless changed by the board. Okay, so moving on to our third item is Spotlight on Excellence, and it will be on our front of the elementary school, and I will turn it over to Jennifer. Thank you. It is my honor to introduce Principal Kim Norgaard and her students to tell us about the wonderful things going on at Arendal. So exciting. Hi, I'm Kim Norgaard, and I'm the principal at Arendal Elementary School. I'm honored to be here to put a little spotlight on all the wonderful things that are happening at Arendal in the
003past couple months now. So we can change slides. You'll see here, this is BU. It's the very first book that I read aloud to all the classes, and it highlights how important it is to be yourself and self-aware as well as learning about others. And all the stars on there are the 425 of them that are writing about things that they love or if they wonder about. And so there are a lot of stars with Mommy and Daddy on there, and there were some about Arendal and maybe even one or two that I found about the printable. We have a big focus at our school in the past six or seven weeks at Arendal on kind citizens, and this aligns with this district strategic plan. And the students are learning how to be compassionate, responsible,
004respectful students, helpful to others, learning about others, and inclusive and empathetic little humans. You'll see here is our upper elementary yard. That's our upper yard where we meet every Wednesday morning for assemblies where we honor students being safe, responsible, and respectful. At the assembly we have students that are picked for different things. Some are they get night hard winners for being safe, respectful, and responsible. And we also have one weekly winner for those that have shown amazing citizenship qualities. So we're learning about others and differences and empathy as well. And that's me, it was happy. The kindergartener who was awarded a night. We also learning how to celebrate kindness of helping others and this is our new Zen garden over there. And they were collaborating on their raking the gravel together and feeling that calmness
005and I'm working on problem solving and building and you can see Miss Granada's MTK building together with her students. We have our little green team we partner with each green corners we have a gorgeous garden. The students learn about food scarcity and taking care of the environment. We also have the same food for our community partners, and they collect the food and give it to those less fortunate in the San Mateo County. You'll see that's also our Wednesday morning assembly where we are collecting for we care for their food pantry. So the kids are asking others to bring and we have quite a few barrels right now. We also have a room for our PTA got a calm corner. So we each teacher kind of created their own place and less school for children to
006help problem solve and get regulated if they're feeling dysregulated or are just kind of have time to have a peaceful moment and happy thoughts. I have our award winners for winning the kind citizen award of the week and we're going to have you step in front so that you can see the board and tell them about yourself. Hello, my name is Greg. I'm in second grade. I learned to be a kind sister, but learning how to solve problems in a kind way. Arendelle has taught me that being a kind citizen means helping others like when I help friends in math, out giving me an answer. Hi, my name is Mia. I'm in third grade. At Arendelle, I learned to be a kind citizen by meeting a good friend and going with people that I should
007be able to buddy better be on track. The buddy bunch is somewhere where you can go if you don't matter, had a problem with a book. Hi, my name is Hannah. At Arendelle has taught me to be a kind citizen by being helpful and respectful. One way to show kindness at school is open the door open for my classmates and let others go first. I'm helpful in many different ways. I'm in kindergarten. My name is Margaret. I'm in kindergarten. One way I'm helpful is to bring someone to the office. When they get hurt. Hi, my name is Koda. I'm in third grade. I'm a considerate person at Arendelle when I am responsible and respectful. One way to show kindness at school is when I pick up trash with Mr. Ray. We are a powerful sport
008and work hard to keep it clean. It's the best thing about Arendelle. I see one of the best things here, Miss Kelly. What's your favorite part of the day? Thank you so much for coming today and speaking in front of the board. I know it can be intimidating. You guys did such a good job. And I also want to thank the parents for bringing them to the school board meeting this evening so that we could, yeah, they're kind to the ship. And thank you, Kim, Margaret, for all their presenting about Arendelle. Thank you. Thank you. Okay. Agenda agenda that contains the items that are routine in nature and which no more discussion. I just needed so we act on them with a single vote. Only first check for public comment. All those in favor say
009aye. Agenda is approved for zero. I move on to five, which is information discussion. The purpose of these items is for information and discussion only. No board action will take place. Staff will present and then there'll be time to ask their questions. So first item is five a teaching and learning update, eliminate outcomes of state testing. And that is me. I need sharing rent. Click yes. Okay, good. There we go. Some for some reason came up on Jennifer's computer. Okay, well, on an annual basis, I get the pleasure of reporting on some of our student outcomes, whether that's now or throughout the school year. Today, not being any exception. You give a little bit of background to start with you likely recall that. All the individual assessments, ELA, math, science, alternative assessments fall under the
010California assessment of student performance and progress that AKA CASP. And we use that acronym. They're all underneath that umbrella. Once again, very pleased with our preliminary 2024, 25 CASP scores are preliminary because they've not yet been. Certified released by the state, which is coming up actually next week at some point. And this goes in tandem with another reporting system called the California school dashboard. And the California school dashboard is scheduled to be released this year on November 15th and next year on October 15th. So they're really trying to ramp up and make these results more actionable for districts. As I said, you kind of get the purpose. We're going to go through some outcomes. We're going to talk about why and a little bit about why we think the outcomes are where they are and
011a little bit about attendance and what sort of role that's playing in the outcomes as well. You know, these goals really well, but these are the three goals that really focus in on these results. These two LCAP goals and this board goal that are directly aligned to monitoring student achievement and student well-being. It's really important to note, too, that these align directly to our strategic plan and our profile. So when you look at this, it's really quite amazing. If we just look at the bottom line is the state results, which we don't talk a lot about. We rarely do the gray line. The orange line is Simtail County and then the blue line is San Carlos School District. And for lack of a better term, it's amazing. You know, the trajectory of the other two
012lines is clearly either flat or down. And our trajectory is up. And that's where I get the pleasure of reporting these results. We've done the public and the board service by displaying these in three different ways. So here we have a line graph upcoming. We'll have a bar graph. And then on the handout that each of you has at your spot, there's actually a chart. And the chart gives more granular information about the number of students in each student group. In a dip into obvious gains for all students. So this is just talking about all students. We really had we closely monitor progress for students experiencing poverty, students with disabilities, students learning English, and students that have been reclassified as fluent English proficient. We saw their maintenance or gains for each of these groups across
013all three subjects. The upward trajectory is clearly a result of our continued focus on skills embedded in the learner profile, on continued development of each student's sense of belonging and curricular emphasis on building of foundational skills and aligning instruction to standards and standards based tasks. So here, as I mentioned, bar chart, which gives a little bit different look at things. But again, it's a clear trajectory for all of our student groups. We'll talk a little bit about students learning English and why that trajectory appears to be down. This slide, again, just gives a little bit of a different look. And it really highlights the tremendous work of all of our students and our staff. And it highlights growth for all students, students with disabilities, students experiencing poverty and students reclassified as fluent English proficient. We've
014talked about in the past a little bit about students learning English, otherwise known as EL or English learners. That's the state moniker that they provide to that group of students. And you notice that that trajectory is down. And at the same time, the trajectory of the light blue bars for reclassified students is up. And that's not by mistake. The group of students learning English continues to hover in or around 50 to 60 students. And the reclassified fluent English proficient continues to grow commensurate with the size of that group. And remember that students learning English, this is only students learning English in grades three through eight. The large majority of our students learning English are reclassified as fluent English proficient in grades K one or two. So they never take the state test as a student
015learning English, per se. They do take the state test as a reclassified fluent English proficient student among also being a part of the all students group. The growth, the 12 point growth for students being reclassified speaks to our strategy of continuing to aggressively, we use that word, aggressively reclassify students as soon as they are ready to move on to being fluent in English proficient. You'll also notice a tremendous gain in students with disabilities. This year was a 14 point gain in and of itself. And we attribute some of this to our efforts to improve teaching and learning of foundational literacy skills. We talked about that a couple of times last year, including at the study session and then at the end of the year when you adopted a formal program. And we've offered that professional
016development to both general education students and teachers and education specialists who specialize in special education. Here we have the graphs for math and science and again the trajectories are truly obvious when we look at it in this matter. Amazing in a lot of ways. It displays our growth commensurate with our efforts in teaching and learning and increasing the sense of belonging again. We can't discount that part. Scores are outpacing county and state level as we said by a large margin. And they're commensurate with nearby districts that have far more resources than we do as well. This is not an accident and we really want to make sure that you all understand that and that members of the public do too. It's attributable to our teachers, the work of the teachers, the work of our staff,
017our principals, and of course primarily the work of our students and the growth in our students that we've seen. That is truly amazing. And put simply as Dr. Frentress often says, teaching causes learning. And our strategies in teaching as they take root throughout the school district are really having an effect on how students are achieving as well as our sense of belonging and the other pieces that we're really emphasizing at all of our sites. So we're going to shift gears a little bit and look at attendance because we know that there's a direct correlation between attendance and achievement and potential achievement, if you will, because obviously if you're not in school, you cannot take advantage of the instruction that's being given. So the graph on the left is a comparison of attendance between September of
0182025 and September of 2024. So the orange graph is for September of 2025 and it looks like there's this gigantic loss, but when you look at the scale to the left, the scales is only 95 to 100. So it's not gigantic loss in certain areas, it's percentage points. And you see in a couple of areas where we're actually on an upward trajectory. Overall, we're commensurate with where we were last year, although a little bit lower, and remember this, that these things are taken in a moment in a moment in time. And as we have more school days, the trajectory can go up or down, especially if we're earlier in the school district or in the school year. If we're later in the school year, we have a bigger end size, the effect of individual days
019or individual weeks lessons. But at this time of the year, it's not unusual for us to see growth in October even for these numbers. And at your spot, at your next to your computer, you have a graph of all of the results from last year, from 2024-25 that we monitor. And then we've also provided current data through this day, which was 926, which is a couple of Fridays ago. And that gives you a comparison sake. It also tells you how seriously we take this as a group of leaders. We talk about it regularly. We bring it up just about every meeting when we're together with our principals as such an important factor that can really influence student learning. And, you know, really think about this since the pandemic, these attendance numbers are absolutely amazing because
020many, many school districts are wallowing around the high 80s, low 90s still overall. So they're experiencing about a 10% rate of absenteeism on a daily basis. And we're not. We're up around 97 right now. And we landed last year as a slide on the left shows right around 96.3. And that there's clearly an effect on student learning when we look at the trajectory and the correlation is so obvious. The last thing I want to add is, you know, our principals really have had a concerted effort. And, you know, a couple of you with young kids, you know how many times the principal has reached out either in the newsletter or as part of an orientation or some other piece that they're giving. You know, don't forget that, yes, your child's four, but attendance is really
021important. Your child is five or your child is seven. Just really talking about how important it is that kids are there because when they're not there, they can't experience the learning. So, you know, know that those efforts are not only important, they're heartfelt. And they really are something that our leaders talk about and strategize on a regular basis. Overall, you know, it can't be tooting the horn loud enough, I don't think. And it just all of this data just affirms our efforts at each school and district-wide to emphasize activities to increase each student's sense of belonging. And it shows how our students enjoy and want to come to school due to the positive social and academic environment. So upcoming for you in future months, we have things sort of mapped out. So we'll have a
022deep dive into students with disabilities at a study session on the 23rd of October. So we'll look deeply at some data. We'll go through some simulations and other pieces that we have planned. In November, we'll do a social-emotional learning check-in. Sheila's going to be going around to sites and getting some information for our early learners. Early learners and our fourth and fourth grade students are going to be doing their sort of earlier check-ins that we have. And then in December, we'll start talking about the California School Dashboard, which I already mentioned. And in January, February, we'll go back and start talking about our new year and I'll be happy to. So thank you and happy to take any questions or clarifying questions. Any questions? Just a comment for me, but I guess congratulations to the
023entire team. This to me is really impressive results and continue to see that trendline continue to go up in most of the last five years. I think speaks to the leadership of the team here in the district, also see everything happening at the actual school sites. It went over quickly, but I do think that the comparison with similar district, similar performing districts in our county, but with the resources that we have compared to those, I don't think that's a story that I fully understood before joining the school board. And so I would just re-emphasize the really impressive work that's happening with the resources that are available to us. I think it just speaks, you know, it's an important message for our community here, I guess I'll say it that way. So I'm taking a moment
024just to re-emphasize that. But again, it's pretty rare to see just all good news, but this is what it feels like over here. So thank you for the presentation and congratulations to everyone. Yeah, congratulations to everybody who's involved. And I would say that even at the middle school level, attendance is also, parts of it is communicated. And I have noticed, and throughout all the school newsletters, there's a real emphasis on making sure your kid, your student, your child goes to school, doing a great job in getting our kids into the classrooms and being excited about learning. So one interesting observation I just had looking at the data and sort of that we're also, we're increasing a lot in the exceeds section, right? That's the thing that's really climbing. So that's also great that we are
025continuing to grow that number faster. Overall, we're doing great on top of that. We're making sure that our kids, even the ones who've met the standards, are still doing great. Great. I will check for public comment on that item. Any item which is for being observed by the St. Carlos Charter on Auditorial Schools. That would be me. Thank you so much. So as the authorizing agency for the St. Carlos Learning Center Charter School, it is the district's responsibility to review the unauthorized actual reports for the charter. After review of their unauthorized actuals, the district submits the report to the San Mateo County Office of Education for final verification and transmission to the California Department of Education. The review letter summarizing the unauthorized actuals is provided to the charter and the County Office of Education and
026that letter is in the agenda in front of you as well. This is not an action item for the board. This is only an informational item indicating we met our obligation as the authorizing agency in reviewing their unauthorized actuals report. Thank you. Are there any questions or comments to item 5C, updates to board policies? That would be me tonight. So this month we're bringing two HR related policies to you for a first read. Board policy is 41-18 and 42-18. You might recall that 41-18, second number one applies to certificated staff, second number two applies to classified staff virtually in the same policy with some idiosyncrasies in this particular one. And it's related, it's a new policy for us, although it's really consistent with EDCODE and with our bargaining agreement with CSEA and SCTA. Much of
027this was enumerated in there. And then the second policy is board policy 41-21, which contains some minor updates and clarifies substitutes, substitute individuals are employees that have rights to a PUSCIC leader. And that was cleared up even more so by a Senate Bill 616 in January of 2024 and actually verified that those employees accrued SIGLEAD and we have a choice on how they accrue. Happy to open it up to board policy committee members. There's a relatively straightforward sort of codifying either something that already exists or changing the law. So this will be then put on the next regular board meeting as an agenda. Great. Now we will move on to section six, reduction in action. The item in this part of the agenda will end with a board vote. So prior to the vote, staff
028will present and briefly describe the decision the board is being asked to make. And then the board members can ask questions, comments, have discussions, take public comment, and possibly tell us more. First item is 6A, approval of comprehensive school safety plans for sites and district. Thank you. I'm here with Sheila Thrower as well and we are co-presenting this item tonight. We would like to bring forward the comprehensive school safety plan for its annual review. And so this allows us to fulfill our requirement with the state of California and end code to have a plan that we reevaluate every single year across multiple school sites. This is a group effort to bring this together for an annual review. So that is the purpose and to have it be approved. This year we're also bringing the school
029site plans for part one to your attention so that we can approve them as well. It is very much mirroring our district version of this plan and so we thought it would be appropriate to bring all the school sites for board approval as well. Just to give you an overview of how we go about this every year, in June of 2025 you may remember that you approved the instructional continuity plan, which is now going to be a part of the comprehensive school safety plan. So we will not have to separate the two documents anymore. They will become part of every school site plans and every district plan that we review. So it's all one document, all in one place. In the summer of 2025, we have an annual opportunity to walk our campuses. On August
0308th, we performed this with our local law enforcement agents. We had a comprehensive school safety walk where we use a template from the Big Five. And we go through the campus together and walk all the spaces. And every year it's gotten the list that we attend to and the list that we get back from the principals is getting shorter and shorter, which is great because that means that we're kind of allowing ourselves to be aware of the items that we should be addressing. And then we have the year to look at them. And then when we reevaluate next year, we're happy that we have less to attend to. So we're grateful for the participation of our school site leaders. They're always very willing to do this with us. And so Jason Reeder, our facilities manager,
031is also with us. Then in the fall, Sheila and I spend quite a bit of time in September working with all the school sites to make sure their plans are ready to go. We also enjoy some training from San Mateo County Office of Education, which has been a wonderful partner in this for us. We have a really great relationship with the county office and any questions we have, they get back to us right away. So it's been a wonderful feedback loop for both of us. And then we also review our plan and meet with our local law enforcement agents and share with the fire department too. And so they give us feedback as well. So it's been really a wonderful fall so far. And we'll bring it to you for some approval tonight. And we
032have this approval process by October 15th is what the county is asking us to do. And so we will do that. And then we spend the rest of the year implementing the plan and conducting the safety drills, applying any elements of the big five protocols. And so we also monitor the safety too as well around campuses. And so we're celebrating that our big five practices are 11 years old. And we're really excited about that. In 2014, it was released its first edition and it was expanded to include some lessons that are developmentally appropriate for all grades that we interact with through K through eighth grade. That would include a book that we can pass around for you to take a look at called Think on Your Feet, Pete, which is a really wonderful age appropriate
033way to introduce some of these, you know, responses that are not common informed practices, but also presented the real life situations that we may need to think on our feet. We have a wonderful and strong partnership, as I mentioned before, with our Sheriff's Department. And we're grateful for their willingness to participate with us. And so we're grateful for that partnership. And Shiva is going to tell you some more. So in addition to the template of a plan being done in partnership with our community partners, our school site plans and our district plan really focus on our multi-tiered system of support and everything that's under the umbrella of that, including our positive behavior interventions and support social emotional learning and prevention education to really ensure that every student feels supported and has their needs met. And
034we do this in a way to create a proactive and positive school environment. So that's our tier one. Then access to school counseling for those students who need more support, as well as our mental health team. And then for our tier students that need the most support, we have a mental health team that does risk and threat assessments, and that's in partnership with the county. And we also have specialized referrals just to create and ensure a safe environment for all of our students, meeting them where they are. So today you saw the part one, the public facing part of the plan. So each the district and each school site has a part one. So that is a comprehensive overview of the plan includes emergency protocols and annual data related to some of our MTSS metrics
035that we track. There is a second part of the plan. That's the tactical internal part. And that's only shown at the school sites or within the district that really accounts for personnel roles, command, incident command and emergency procedures that are directly related to the school site and people involved on campus. And so as Gabri said, our big five we've been using for over a decade using trauma informed practices like on your feet, Pete, which introduces tough concepts because the school in the book is actually being invaded by monsters. And so that's sort of the paradigm to think about bigger, harder to understand themes at young ages. So we use the big five protocols to make sure that we have shared language across county levels with multiple agencies and schools and make sure that law enforcement
036and our community partners are all using the same language and have the same protocols and same action steps in place. So as your agendas. We have a copy of the big five protocols. I'm going to do a little exercise. A little definition though I noticed. Well, yes, I don't want to test without a definition. Well, I'm going to do a test of a protocol and what they think we go. I purposely amended the poster so I didn't have some. Okay, so let's play a scenario in which you are dropping students off on campus, and this happened. Principal Shelton can talk about it later. Where there was a deer who is now on the playground as you're doing school drop off. What are these, and we'll talk about what happens in each of them, but looking
037at the names of the protocols, what do you think would likely be the protocol called for a scenario like that. Okay, so in a sheltered place, what is done is students are taken to their classrooms. We make sure campus is clear instruction continues as normal until that threat is cleared, and then students can go back to entering and exiting class. What about a gas station. Yes, that's correct. And evacuation is like it sounds, you need to leave campus we have systems in place for student release. They are very detailed and thank you to the administrative assistance we learned yesterday, looking at their emergency binders, all the information that they have per student, and what they do to actually get students quickly off campus to their correct context and it's really a huge effort on their
038part so that's a good one. What about air quality over 201, which is considered very unhealthy shelter. Correct. And then the last is police activity off campus. Secure campus, which is not a lockdown barricade and those are two very different threat levels and that's why we wanted to bring this up, just to ensure that we all have the same language. If there is any threat off campus in the neighboring area police will say, secure your campus, students will go to their classrooms, that is very different than a lockdown barricade where there is an element of threat and students still go to their classrooms but instruction doesn't They actually do lockdown barricade and to note that our students don't actually practice that drill. That's only done with staff and law enforcement. And so, the protocols are
039not static. We have climate change and many new factors happening in the world so this year there are two new additions to the big five. The first is for tsunami. Many people may have noticed we are receiving more tsunami alerts than we have in previous times, and our coastside school partners last year did have to do a student release due to the tsunami warning. And so that wasn't one of the big five protocols, it wasn't included in one of the big five protocols. So for us just based on where we are inland we are in the green zone so anytime we get a tsunami warning we'll always be putting shelter in place. The second is also a shelter in place protocol but that's for a medical emergency so if somebody has a cardiac event on
040campus, an AED machine has to be used. I just want to ensure that students go directly to their classrooms so the responders on campus can get to the person who's affected by that cardiac emergency as quickly as possible. Every campus. Some campuses have multiple given their size. All right, and this all is coming together to bring policy and practice together in the school systems to ensure that all students can continue learning, and to put the focus on safety but learning also as well. And so this plan is produced from a template, and it's provided by the county that complies with all of the state regulations related to CSP. We're required to use this template in the document tracking systems and submit it to the county for review. And so it doesn't give us a lot
041of flexibility with the formatting and whatnot and so I just wanted to mention that if you feel like it would with a table or this one. Yes, we agree. School update and adopted CSSP by March 1 annually and then. So that's why it kind of feels a little off. But now all of our county is aligned to have it be ready by October 15 so you can implement it throughout the year and it's always present in the fall. I'm thrilled about that. You might be wondering what is in this plan that you speak of and so we have some listed this is the kind of highlights of the table of contents but it's very comprehensive document. And the way I like to explain it to our schools like councils is, you know, if it's sort
042of a easy go to for if you something is going on in the schools, and you want to know what is our policy or what is our plan. This is a great document to go to because it likely is listed with a link to the board policy and so there's something that would help you get assistance immediately. And so that was the whole point of it is to have everything in one place. So whether it's a school safety assessment or a child abuse reporting procedures, a student threat assessment harassment and hate crime reporting and resource links, and the appendices are provided by the county and they're updated every year and review. And of course we mentioned also the disaster and hazard response procedures. And so this is just a graphic of the overview of where
043we actually seek input and get guidance from to create the plan. So we've talked about the coalition for safe schools, but we also use the board policy seven committee will update policies based on safety and make sure are always updated and included in the plan. And then the Wellness Council also participates with feedback, in addition to the school day councils that we go to present. So now, we present this to you for approval. If you have any questions, but with approval for the district and school day. Just do you have any question. I don't. Maybe I have a question I guess. Thank you for the presentation I think it's useful just to get a sense of how these things work and that there are protocols in place for any situation that might happen. My only
044question is just, I popped up in the central one here as we were talking in on the signature block. And this is a minor thing but I noticed that the dates on there for a couple of the signatures are October 22. I assume those are probably going to be the September 22 signatures so that they're before the middle deadline. I just want to check that that's okay. Sure. I don't know. I don't think you signed it in the future. Should we amend it in the. Yes, onto shaking his head. Yes. In whatever motion that is made. I just don't want to do that for the deadline. Yeah. If it looks at each other. Oh, right. That's the signature last year's date. We can amend the dates. Make sure it reflects. Thank you. Okay. Thank you
045for the presentation. It's helpful to, of course, I'd kind of hear how it all comes together. You're looking at the templates, especially a little dry. Thank you for bringing that all together. So, can I reach out? Thank you. Oh, move approval with a direction to staff to check and confirm the accurate signature dates on all of the plans before submitting. Okay. Thank you. I didn't want to. I think that the school district and schools, students. I think it's a really great understanding of all the big five safety protocols. Parents, community understanding the language and like what is. I just think that there's a need there for them to use the right words are understand when someone says security. Totally understand it and they get it. Thank you. I'll move on to item 60, which is
046public employee performance evaluation. Specifically related to the superintendent's objectives for this year, which we're already in at this point, but, you know, we still need to approve them at our September eight or treat. We did see all of the objectives and have a discussion over them. And I think this version has slight variations. Alternative. Thank you. Yes, we did look at these at the retreat, and I've had conversations with each of the board members since there were a couple of places where there was jargon. And we want to make sure that we're always clear. So one of the places is we had talked about research projects. That's something that we're doing right now with teachers in AI. So instead of using action research, I changed the language there. I think also there were some places
047where I used acronyms so I've spelled out professional learning, for instance, and I think also assistant superintendent barber had some suggestions about the ways in which the superintendent facilitates the continued growth. That's an objective one. And now I cannot recall what I have there, but the important thing to note there is how it's for leaders and educators who are doing the heavy lifting and what I try to do is make sure I clear the way for that good work. Otherwise, these are as aligned as they've been in the past, and I feel very confident that we will continue together as a governance team to do really good work. Any questions, comments? Questions, just, I agree with what you just said and I feel good that we have a process for when we tie in what
048we looked at last year at the end of the year to thinking about what we want to accomplish this year and aligning that with our core goals and strategic plan and the other things that we have in place. All those things are working together in the way they should and I'm not sure that was always the case with the mayor district. Thank you. So part of our board policy is that we need to approve these objectives. Do I have a motion? I move approval. All those in favor say aye. Now we will move on to item seven which is agenda setting. Yes, at the last meeting I mentioned that we have study sessions that are coming up. The next meeting we have is a study session that will focus on special education and in November
049there will be a study session on budget in advance of first interim. We also in November can look forward to hearing from the bond oversight committee they met and they will present their report. We'll also have some updates related to measure H projects in particular TK expansion and building envelope. Thank you very much. Then we also will hear from the partial tax committee they'll be meeting soon and they will give us an update and then come November or come December you'll get your first interim report. Great. Okay now we will move on to section eight which is communications. A is public comment. So we've reached the portion of our meeting set aside for comments from the public about matters not on the agenda but within the subject matter jurisdiction of the board. Under board bylaw
0509323 comments are limited to three minutes unless changed by the board. Since we're addressing the board on a non agenda item, be aware that the provisions of the Brown Act prohibit the board from having a discussion with you, or each other on your comment. We will also not be responding, but please know that we are listening. Taking note and appreciate what we have to say. So with that, trustee Casanova will be keeping time and we have several blue cards if you are on I'm going to do the in person people first. And then, if there is anybody on zoom that also wants to make a public comment please raise your hand. And now just so that I know all on you after we are done with the cards. So, first, and then ask that if
051you have a public comment please go up to the podium so that we can all get here and see. First person is Melissa winter. I have two kids. One is in kindergarten one second grade. And I'm not sure if everyone's aware of it was recently an incident, and then kindergarten at recess. There was a child who was harmed, and another child is now with an aid full time for safety reasons. I wanted to express my concerns about the approach that was taken to address this incident. It is my belief that the current approach is not enabling the children to learn and get the support that they need and I do need all of the children involved. I'm concerned that we are not protecting physical and emotional safety of the children or that of the teachers.
052I'm concerned about what the children are seeing and hearing on a daily basis in class, and then we're asking the children and teachers to navigate a very confusing disruptive environment and trying to learn at the same time. I'm concerned that the children are being influenced and emotionally affected by what they are seeing and hearing in class and at recess, which impacts their ability to learn and grow both academically and socially. I want to share a few words about what my child has described to me. My child has been kicked during the circle time. My child's name tag was ripped off the wall worst backpack those. My child has seen another child jump on top of another child's shoulders during circle time in a way he described is very, very unsafe. There's a child who yells
053and screams during class, there's a child who goes in and out of the class, which is very confusing. My child has some choking behavior at recess on multiple occasions is very, very scared to talk about it and confused by what it is. Next is Priya. Hi everyone, my name is Priya. I also have two boys coincidentally in kinder and second grade. I was first informed about any incident at Britain acres on September 19 that it contained content that said, let your child know they're safe at school. Let your child know that all the adults at school are there to look after their safety and that the school psychologist is available to help them. This is my five year old's class. He's almost six as he won't remind you. This was the first time I was
054informed about anything atypical going on. This isn't school yard fighting. This is not even bullying. Since the second day of school, the kindergarten kids in room two, primarily little girls, have been choked, pinned, punched and endured continuing threats of assault. While staff has been available to engage and gracious in time, I come to the board to request greater visibility to the extent of the incidents. And more importantly, the path going forward. What is the timeline? What is the outcome? How do we know that Britain acres will continue to serve the kids educational and social needs? I mean, all kids in an environment that's physically and mentally safe for all. Here's my brief observation. Various staff have referred to this as yes, there have been a couple of incidents or disciplinary issues in room two. This
055is far more severe than a disciplinary issue. Kids have been scared to return to class saying going to class is scary. Part of it might have been coincidental. Their teacher was absent during some of this. But my observation was that it was unrelated to the teacher. My child talking about his teacher being hurt by two children. That their teacher had been picked up from the ground and had to then continue with our kids saying, you know, I'm OK. Kids uninvolved have now started choking each other on the playground. We have an older and two we hadn't heard. We've been called about different incidents. This choking thing is going two-hand, pretty aggressive from what I can see. All people involved are affected. The children doing the assaulting, the remaining children, the other children on the playground
056who see a child who doesn't have to follow routine or pattern, has adults running after him and is in just a continuous high stress situation. And finally, of course, the teacher who is phenomenal. We've had her with our older child and she helped him navigate through extreme trauma. So we know what she is capable of. And this feels much worse than what we have gone through. We are uncertain how to engage in productive fashion in a productive fashion. We cannot tell if things are getting better objectively or not. I'm coming to recess because I love hanging out with the kids. I don't want to be this weird observer who's taking notes about what's happening in recess. I just want to play with the kids. But because we do not have information to trace, it is
057hard for us to know if it's getting better or worse. Would an independent assessment of the entire day or the entire week at room two be an option? Is that objective enough? Because right now we're not getting any information in a discreet fashion. We're greeted with, yes, it's being handled. Time will tell. Kids are resilient. Five-year-olds need time. I get all of that, but this doesn't feel like time will just tell is enough. We need predictable, traceable communication to help us understand the measurement and progress towards an outcome. That's our ask. Thank you for the open forum. Thank you. Before we take the next public comment, I did want to just remind our commenters that this is a public meeting. It's being recorded. And if we can make sure we don't say too much to
058reveal, we want to protect students' privacy. So I just wanted to remind you that we can hear your comments. We don't want to facilitate too many specifics. Next up is Julia Forrester. Good evening, board members. My name is Julia Forrester, and I'm here as a parent to raise concerns about how the district has handled a violent incident involving my child. I appreciate the hard work that everyone puts in keeping our children safe and providing the safe environment for our children. But I'm deeply concerned about how this particular situation is being handled at this moment. So my daughter was a victim of a strangling incident by another student on school grounds, which was, to be clear, not a beautiful defiance or disciplinary incident. It was a clear cause of physical injury to my child. Despite my
059multiple written requests, my husband and I have not received a written response from the district until today. I mean, also today haven't received it, but we received finally an offer to speak over the phone. We have asked for three things. First, a clear, sustainable plan to ensure our daughter's safety and so the safety of the classmates during school day, during recess and lunch. Direct communication about the steps that have been undertaken to address the repeated violent behavior. And lastly, written confirmation how the district will prevent those incidents from happening again. Today, we have received no clear answers. Instead, it feels like the district is hoping that the situation is going to fade away rather than addressing it openly and transparently with all of us. I want to be very clear. I am not asking for
060any confidential information about other students. All I'm asking for is accountability and concrete safety assurances for all children in the district. The absence of this transparent communication undermines this trust between families and the school system. And it leaves parents like us questioning whether our children are safe in school. And what has really been truly prioritized? Is it children's safety? Or maybe there was something else that we don't know about, which has been prioritized over that safety. As a parent, my first duty is to protect my child. I need to know that the district shares the same commitment, not just in policy on the paper, but actually in practice. As an example, yesterday, my husband was approached by another parent whose child told her that my daughter was choked by another student in school. The parent
061was very concerned. She wanted to understand what has happened because such comments from children who are not even in my class or in our class are alarming among young children. And it's already plenty that I have to take my child to therapy. I respectfully urge the board to review how this case has been handled and to ensure the district has a full compliance, handle this case with a full compliance with education code and require that parents receive timely written communications. Our children deserve to feel and be safe at school. Thank you for your time. Next on the comment is Danya. Good evening. My name is Danya and I work as the executive director of district business services at San Mateo County Office of Education or SMCOE. I'm here to express SMCOE's sincere appreciation to the
062administrative and support staff at St. Carlos School District for their tremendous work in implementing a new financial system known as Frontline California ERP. So we started this project in March 2024, and it's been a huge countywide endeavor. And we know that your staff already have full time jobs. So the work needed to implement the system was on top of their already full workloads. However, we think it's successful because we haven't received any calls about your payroll being wrong. So we take it as a good sign and ensuring that your employees are paid accurately was one of our top priorities. So SMCOE paid the implementation costs of about $5.6 million, which included like keeping both systems running last year, as well as the competitive fees and additional overtime work for our staff to support St. Carlos
063and also other districts in the county. So again, just wanted to say appreciation for all the work. And we know several staff members were involved, but I wanted to mention specifically and thank the following St. Carlos team members, Molly Zeman, Human Resources Assistant, Jennifer Long, Human Resources Director, Lisa Seragiovi, Accounts Payable and Receivable Clerk, Ralph Erlemine, Payroll Benefits Specialist, Chris Escoto, Financial Analyst, and Ralph Payne, Chief Financial Officer. So St. Carlos team was wonderful work with and we know there were overwhelming days, but they just kept marching on. And we're happy to report we completed the implementation and now moving on to continuous improvement enhancements. So we hope that the district will find this new financial system a useful tool to pay your employees accurately, report retirement, as well as keep track of your budgets
064and generally account for all the resources the community provides. Thank you. Next up is Mihael Russ. My name is Mihael Russ and I'm accompanied here today by Daniel, my son was a sixth grader at Central Middle School. I was very sorry to hear about this recent incident. I also have a son in VA who's in second grade and I'm in full hope that Principal Noyes and Timo address this issue, but I'm not here to discuss this incident. I'm here actually to express gratitude. Two years ago on October 7th, 2023, the terror organization Hamas launched a brutal attack on Israel, killing over 1200 people and kidnapping 250 others. What followed was a devastating war in which tens of thousands of Palestinians were killed, many of them innocent civilians. The pain on both sides has been immense
065and the emotions remain blocked. In moments like these where social media amplifies the loudest voices and turns everything into short black and white soundbites, it becomes harder than ever to think critically, to seek nuance and to teach our children to do the same. And yet here in this community, this school district has done something remarkable. In a time when emotions are high and the world really feels divisive, you've kept our schools grounded and inclusive, giving our children space to learn and think freely. As a Jewish mom, this has been a very hard time. I've seen how easily fear, bias and anti-Semitism can enter classrooms, and I know Jewish children in nearby districts who felt isolated and even verbally and physically attacked. So I am deeply grateful for what you and the staff have done here,
066creating an environment where children do feel welcome and where true inclusion and critical thinking can thrive. Thank you. Thank you. There are no more food cards, but there is a voice in Zoom, especially in my phone. If you want to unmute and lower your hand, you will have a voice to speak. Hi. Can everyone hear me okay? Yes. Okay. Sorry, I'm on my phone and I'm having difficulty turning my camera on. But I did want to also just have a few more asks in regards to how the district has handled what has happened at Britton Acres. My daughter was one of the students who was assaulted, and we reached out to the district with some asks. We received one email back, very vague, and then replied with a very specific ask in regards to what
067actions as a district, what is the policies and what can we do as a district to ensure the safety of all children and never received any communication back. It was pretty disheartening. I've been on PTA for seven years. I'm very involved with all three of my children's going through Britton Acres, and I felt very dismissed. It was not the response that I was expecting at all. So I just want to express that it's pretty disappointing. I was a teacher in Palo Alto for 17 years, and I'm very familiar with student behaviors and privacy and what's best for children. And I can assure you what I am seeing and what I've heard is not good for all children involved. There's not a lot of learning for some students who are out of the classroom, and I
068would hope that things are being taken under extreme consideration on what is best for all students. My acts, what are our policies? I know we have some for the upper grades for violent acts, but what is our policy? Let's be very clear because this is happening more and more, and it's a trickle effect of behavior. And so what is our policies on that? And then I also think that there needs to be proper aid classification and training because there's been a new aid on a weekly basis, which is not great for the child or for anyone in the classroom. And I also think that there needs to be training across for all of the yard duty staff and anyone like La Garza. Yeah, so those are some things that come to mind on how we
069can do better. No more blue card, no more raising hands. The public comment portion of our meeting is concluded, and we will now move on to our board member comments. Oh, sorry, employee group comments. I apologize. Good day for that. Okay, sorry. Dan. Good evening. Yes, thankfully, I am not a school board member. No offense, but thank you for being school board members. And I would just like to say that this is kind of a fun and tiring time for teachers. We've been preparing for October goal setting conferences, and it's great to meet with the families and come up with goals together. And many of us have our students make goals as well. And it is a time when we teachers learn about our students and their families and we appreciate that parents show up.
070And so it's a good process. That's it. Thanks. She's out there. She said her Wi Fi is not doing well. Contact me separately. I don't know if Kamala, can you hear us? Do you want to speak? She's not going to speak. She's not. We will move on to item 98 board member comments. I have this week I got to visit the the one San Carlos school I had not yet visited, which was central. It was this week. Right. Last week. In the last one week. It was really cool to continue to see the cross pollination between both the schools like I think it's unique to our district potentially are not very common where you had a real and central both kind of cross pollinating we got to hear the band. And that's that was like
071fifth graders to eighth graders, it was kind of cool to see that. I mean it was also nice to spend some time with Tom and just understand how even though physically or the spaces are different. There is a commonality in the themes and consistency so I can now say I've got a chance to step into all the schools and it's really, it was really good. So thank you. I got to know what it was, but we were at TL for a meeting and I got to see a little bit of a assembly about TRL in this middle school entrepreneur fair, which is, I believe, PTA organized events, where kids have the opportunity to bring sort of their business ideas to life, they get support and what it means to start a business they get some
072seed funding for materials and then there's going to be a fair in December where they can have a booth and sell their product or share their idea. And there were parents who were presenting to the students were incredibly excited about it so it's a great we've talked for many years about how we can take advantage of this amazing community that we're in and many things that our parents do and this is just such a cool way to that's really fun to see that. And like many parents have participated in parent teacher and student conferences this week, and just to respond back to Dan thank you to all of the teachers for all the work and thought that you all put into that. You know it's really rewarding as a parent to see how well the
073teachers know our kids already six weeks into school year and how much they care about their growth as people and as students. So thank you to all of you for the work that you do. I guess I'll go next. I've been thinking about what I want to say. I was going to talk about cleanup day and the skeptic or which are both great events. I think I just want to take a moment to say something to the parents who chose to take time out of the evening to come and be here. Let the board know about their experiences and the children's experiences recently. I guess as a fellow be a parent I appreciate this has been a very difficult time and situation for the entire kindergarten community. I want folks to know that the district
074is taking this very seriously. And I guess I would just ask for staff to engage further with the parent community and the teacher to make sure that folks can have confidence in sending their kids to school. I'll continue to protect individual children's privacy. I don't want to say more than that. I think there are things that have been done and needs to continue to be done. I don't know all the details of it. But I would just ask them to continue to engage with the parents here. I think it's my time to talk about the SCAP event at TOWN, an online option. It's just great to see the members of the community come out in support of our schools and our kids. And I learned an interesting fact that the owner of TOWN, Greg St.
075Clair, he's been doing this, helping, partnering with SCAP for about 20 years now. Just this evening at TOWN, that loan has now raised $1 million for our San Carlos schools. So that was a piece of trivia. We crossed the $1 million mark. And then, yeah, conference week, I have a middle schooler, so I'm not meeting any of the teachers. But I'm very happy about getting out at one. The thing that I thought was really cool, which I noticed in all the school newsletters, at least at the lower elementary school level, was the soccer camp that's being offered or was being offered at White Oaks for all the kids. And I thought that was a creative way to have some sort of programming for the kids who are getting out every day, lunchtime. So I thought
076that was really cool. So whoever organized that or thought about that, that's it for me. I will now turn it over to Dr. Fentress. Thank you. Tonight I want to recognize parent-teacher conferences and acknowledge our educators who met with families, some in student-led, role-setting conferences, to talk about our districts, to talk about our district learners with our parents. While they've known the students for just over six weeks, teachers, education specialists, school leaders make time to discuss each learner after teaching students every day of the week. This is a really important part of the learning process that can be super exhausting, I know from personal experience, for 11 years. So we're very grateful for this important parent engagement. Parents as partners can learn what we're doing with their children. So a big heartfelt thank you to
077all of our educators who were a part of that. And then I'd also like to take some time to say that we continue to elevate the district's message about our sunsetting parcel tax. At Your Place is a mailer that's going to go out to all of our constituents to make sure that they know that we're delivering on our promise of a world-class education with less funding than other districts. And really need the parcel tax to make it all work. We want to close session. The board will now go into closed session to discuss the items 13A and 13B as we move on the agenda. I will check on the comments on any other questions or items. Seeing none, I'll turn it over to the next board member. We are finished with closed session and are
078reconvening an open session pursuant to California Government Code Section 54957.1. There's no reportable action. No reportable action was taken in closed session on either items 13A or 13B. Thank you. Am I supposed to announce the time of adjournment?