Regular Meeting - July 13, 2022

001foreign good afternoon if you notice that the book is not here on today he had to have an unexpected surgery he says his warmest regards and we are all wishing him a very successful surgery and a speedy recovery welcome to the regular board meeting of the Savannah Chatham County Board of Education on Wednesday July 13 2022. this meeting is being live streaming on the district's website at www.sccpss.com I would like to ask Miss Mary Brown our secretary of the meeting has been posted in accordance with all the laws required in public meetings she has assured that it has notice has also been given in the proper places and in proper ways I would like to ask you to join me as we stand for the pledge allegiance to the flag why the United States one

002nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for all I would also like to acknowledge that Dr bringman is not here on today as well as Mr Johnson Brown for a motion to approve the agenda thank you Dr Howard Hall I move to approve the agenda with the following adjustments a deletion to item 8.27 city of Savannah easement right away for Truman linear bike trail revision style item 5.02 District operational update School Readiness school year 22-23 and for the special call board meeting held on Wednesday June 22 2022 item 8.29 m23042 professional Consulting Services gratification magnet schools assistance program msap and item 8.31 workers compensation settlement sbwc claim number 2020-091436 you heard the motion to approve the agenda the power moves in five seconds then take this home times all in favor please raise your

003hand one two three four five six motion passes six zero zero I was like the column Dr Hoskins Brown for a motion to amend approved agenda thank you Dr Howard Hall uh just a question to the record the motion um was Hoskins Brown and the second would have been by your first recognizing Bill okay thank you my pleasure um I move that the approved agenda be admitted to add item 7.11 school safety resolution to approve the gym that's amended Miss hands move okay all in favor please show about raising hand one two three four five six motion passes six zero zero in terms of announcements there will be a board accountability meeting on Tuesday July 26 2022 at 3 30 pm there are no deaths to report for this month and operational update document thank

004you thank you madam chair officers and uh members of the board it's my pleasure to offer the following comments as we gear up for the start of the 2022 2023 school year this is amazing um All Points all signs point to yet another incredible and productive school year our skilled staff and uh devoted staff members are already planning and preparing for the arrival of our students on August 3rd less than a month our enthusiastic central office teams are registering new families they are processing orders of needed materials and updating student files our hard-working and conscientious maintenance staff have spent the entire summer and they're continuing to do that thoroughly cleaning our buildings for our building programs are also still underway and many of our staff members have continued their professional learning over the past several

005weeks we are indeed gearing up to meet our students and our families and the next time that we meet they will have been in session for at least a week or so and so we won't let everyone to know as you'll hear in the operational update today uh what we are doing and our final touches over the next few uh few weeks I'm happy to share the following good news as well the Savannah Economic Development Authority holds the reception with the Georgia first robotics board of directors on Thursday June 23rd to introduce the Chatham County teams competing that included our very own Jenkins High School engineering program students we want to offer a special congratulations to our warriors on their performance during this time Henry trainer Savannah Arts Academy class of 2022 has been awarded

006the stamps scholarship at the University of Georgia where he plans to study ecology and electrical engineering Henry is one of 247 students from across 413 000 applicants across the country who make up the 17th class of stamp Scholars students at the Isle of Hope K-8 school were among the first to receive brand new books courtesy of WTOC and the both Sue kids initiative sponsored by the Ken Nugent law firms from April through May WTOC collected books from Community donations and various locations across the county books were received for distribution to our K through third grade students and the final tally was nearly 7 000 books at Alpha K-8 each student received a backpack with three or four books included and we appreciate the support of WTOC and our Community Partners in the supported initiative we

007also distributed books as several other of our Ka summer learning locations we're very very excited about this initiative and certainly plan to continue it special congratulations to the work of our schools to exemplify strong parent-teacher associations and they continue to support our Savannah Shadow Council of ptas we are proud to celebrate five National PTA of Excellence Award winners they are Jacob G Smith PTA STEM Academy at Broadway PTA PTSA SK appca New Hampstead High School PTSA and Pooler Elementary PTA Coastal Middle School is one of only 12 schools Across the Nation to be recognized in the inaugural class as an as an association for middle level education School of Distinction the schools of the distinction program is designed to both recognize exemplary schools and guide them through a process of strategic Vision setting for ongoing

008growth and success each recipient completed a rigorous review process that measured their implementation of the characteristics of successful middle schools successful middleware schools and continuous Improvement plans Coastal Middle School will be recognized and will present on their exemplary practices live at the amle conference in Orlando later this year also congratulations to the STEM Academy apartment and Coastal Middle School who represented Savannah Chatham County public schools on the national stage in Washington DC at the national Schools to Watch conference where each School officially received their redesignation status congratulations to our schools as we celebrate the magic of middle school and applaud our school leaders our students and our parents we're very excited to announce the launch of the acorn Academy as An Early Learning Center at Gould Elementary [Applause] um this effort is made possible through

009a grant um through grant funding to enhance our early learning offerings the curriculum is based on girls a Georgia Early Learning and Development a curriculum with a class size of 22 students currently 53 parents have applied for admission to this program the applications remain open through July 15th and our difficult task will be to determine that a 22 who get into that program this is a grant funded Early Learning Center on a part in a part of the town that you have heard me talk about before we need Early Learning on the west side of town and we are so excited to do it with credit funding [Applause] um I'd love to uh offer special thanks to our team who put this together um Mr Feliciano Miss drott Miss Akins Angie Lewis they got together

010and just know our need for our early learning opportunities and so we will through our funding by Georgia Power be able to fund this early learning experience for our young people at Google Elementary is one more demonstration of the power of Partnerships especially meeting a a really defined need for our young people so we're very happy about it and we'll give you an update um now we want to highlight our excellent work from our district Communications team as we officially announce again that they are a national award winning team the Savannah County Public Schools division of communications recently received 10. 10. 10 awards from the National School of Public Relations Association achieving recognition in each category entered and boasting five Awards of Merit the publication and digital media prizes were awarded according to the publication

011type and size of the organization Savannah Chatham County Public Schools competes in each category against the largest school districts in the country entry is judged on the overall Excellence as well as is quality compared to others in the category awards were received for our campaigns such as forward to school our newspaper insert our infographic on covet protocols and our 2021 East blast social media promotion the full list of course this is available at our website secpss.com and if you will allow me to have that team come forward for their recognition by this board [Applause] congratulations [Laughter] [Music] sometimes [Applause] so this is the team that uh keeps their phones on because whatever happens in the district where regardless of the time of day or night they are working to ensure that we are responsive and

012I will just say to you that they have certainly enhanced our Communications and wow we can never communicate enough they are responsible for the board briefs that are issued at the close of every one of these meetings they are also responsible for providing a video of the highlights of the board of meetings they also communicate by producing a document that we called in case you missed it which captures not only that key information but also information that is covered in other platforms and they also respond to inquiries from both the public and also from media outlets and other persons who just want general information someone to take this time and say a special thank you to them for their s um special efforts but also because they see their role as integral to making sure

013that the right information is shared about what's happening in the district whether Pleasant or unpleasant they are available to assist us so again thank you very much [Applause] congratulations also to the excellent work from our Human Resources Division which was again recently recognized by the Georgia Association of school Personnel administrators for their strategic planning and recruitment efforts taking the Georgia Platinum Award of Excellence Best in Class in recruitment certified and earning three gold awards for strategic planning website development and recruitment of classified Personnel we're also proud to announce that our very own chief of Human Resources Mr Ramon Ray was elected president of Georgia Association of school Personnel administrators at the spring 22 conference and assumed the role on July 1st 2022 for a one-year term he is also a board member of the Georgia

014Association of educational leaders I want to invite this team to come up as well for their recognition of the five awards that we won from the state and also to acknowledge that Mr Ray is the first is the first officer in more than 20 years 40 years more than 40 years 1979 1979 we've not had an officer serve in this position in this organization until now [Applause] joining us today is Dr Patton and also Mr Jenkins [Applause] thank you so much foreign [Music] last year was really nice to see them being acknowledged our our achievements being acknowledged by school districts all over the state we won five Awards and I don't think there were very many other school districts that won as many as we did so congratulations we're very excited Brown uh board member

015district two and she was among the 13 clean water heroes from across the state [Applause] it's just a nice little video that goes with it too um she was recognized for her extraordinary work to protect George's water doing the Georgia water coalition's 20th anniversary and clean 13 celebration which was held May 22nd so this was during the time just before graduation uh ceremonies that ceremony was held in Macon and there were about 125 people in attendance um and it was really exciting to see not only Dr Hoskins Brown recognized for her efforts but also the city of Savannah so it just speaks to the kind of talent that we have in our area that has been recognized across the state this award highlights individuals businesses Industries non-profit organizations and governmental agencies whose extraordinary efforts have

016led to cleaner Waters including Rivers stronger Communications stronger communities and a more sustainable future for Georgia's again congratulations [Applause] we have been working uh diligently to ensure that we are ready for our young people who will be returning to us on August 3rd and so today my report will be supplemented by sharing um a School Readiness update because we'll be meeting it again but it will be of course after this afternoon we like afternoon also our open house dates have been finalized and shared with Communications for publication Athletics continues to gear up for our fall season we have conditioning occurring right now for football volleyball softball cross country we are playing regular in-person schedules this year also we've completed our first successful year of our young staff Grant regarding our Savannah Chatham eLearning Academy we

017want to remind parents that it is the only virtual option available for students in Savannah Chatham County Public Schools they can actually complete the online application just want to remind them that there is a separate application process for Sila due to the unique nature of the school they can go to our main website or they can actually go to the Seal of Savannah Chatham e-learning Academy website click on the link and complete the application prior to submission it will give the really pertinent facts about Sela and the learning environment so that they're able to make a really informed decision based on the uniqueness of the school currently we have a little over 800 students and as at the time of this report we now have 237 applicants and they are pulling students in and they

018have established dates as you can see for their device distribution well we have also been registering students online and providing in-person assistance with registration for the upcoming school year all summer long and we will continue until school starts a team will even be at the back to school Expo to help any families that need assistance a collaboration with the courtesy Cooper mobile Health lab continued throughout our summer Embrace program and will resume in the fall in our designated schools and we are looking at possible expansion of the program our Handle With Care Community initiative has expanded we have now mou signed with Savannah metro Chatham County Police Department Port Wentworth Police Department Chatham emergency services and Garden City Police Department we will begin the program across all of our schools because safety is first and

019we want to make sure that any students that need support will get it through this collaboration with the police departments and we actually began professional learning last year but our teachers had on-demand professional learning throughout the summer and they will start right back up with more with access to the on-demand professional learning and in-person professional learning for the for the phonics program to make sure that every child has a highly effective instructional program in their classroom our Sophie new teacher teachers training schedule is for July 20th through the 26th and our teachers have really come to appreciate our online curriculum Warehouse they can access it from the school or from home it's been updated with our European documents updated curriculum units on-demand professional learning and has expanded this previous year to include support for our

020ell teachers our sped teachers and our PE teachers academically okay good afternoon we have reached a major milestone in Savannah County public school system on July 1st the new units HR payroll system went online the first payroll run July 15 has been processed and today the file has officially been sent to the bank we are now processing the check stubs for mailing out the employees to receive them this Friday and the following Monday or over the weekend we successfully closed out the previous school year and have opened up the school the student information system and instructional systems for school year 2023 new to school year 2023 is a dedicated online application and registration process for our e-academy that Selah parents that are interested in applying goals to the public website a dedicated process has been

021established because Sela has unique requirements that need to be met in order for families to participate in that program or school the testing and assessment calendar has been developed and posted for the new school year on the public website and Technology orders submitted during the march time period has arrived just in time for school distribution we do have some vacancies in place but are augmenting our Workforce with student interns and third-party contracts is to include my update thank you orientation um certified will be held July 20th through the 26th um newly hired teachers were we were at 268 when we submitted this and about classified as far as um 18 hires but we're certainly working to get that um up as well HB 385 which is the new law that allows retired teachers retired retire

022educated to return full-time in mathematics English language arts and special ed we have hired at least four teachers under that right now we're working on more that will be coming back from our retirees working um in in a capacity there's more than 0.49 which is the limit that they have without the law uh classified as far as our hiring needs and and certified uh 20 elementary teachers 10 sped around 13 um NCCA full school um School fully staffed um we have about 16 schools that have all certified staff that they need so we're still working on getting that to a number where we have all of our schools obviously fully staff so that's what we're focusing on and then just a lot of this information that's in there I'm going to read it but just

023about um our focus on teacher prevention of any positive uh building positive relationships you can see what's going on in our professional learning division and hiring needs of focus on me classified we have bus drivers you know school resource officers safety officers custodial workers um students assistants certainly the change to 15 an hour and everything that we have is the impact of that thing that was effective July 1 we'll have a a positive impact on that and so we're starting to see that as we just came back on the 11th um this past Monday so we'll start seeing a lot more of that impact of that change that the board voted on June 22nd and we still have our employee um incentive uh referral uh 250 that we still are we had a lot of

024employees used it last year so we hope that employees will still refer other applicants to our district that are become our boys and I conclude the human resources maintenance and operation team continues to ensure that our schools are disinfected and sanitized and we're ready to receive students for continuing who have made an effort to work across their schools across the district to ensure that our buildings are clean and we are meeting our goal to make sure that cleanliness is number one for us and we're providing a sanitary environment to our students as you all are aware we had an opportunity over the last two years to be able to provide free lunch and breakfast to all students that waiver was not approved for the upcoming school year so we are in the process of completing

025our free and reduced lunch applications we still have our operations center that will allow for families not to have to come to the central office but instead utilize the auxiliary operations center for those who want to come in person and applications are posted online as well and we have processed over 7 000 applications continue to reach out to our families and encourage them to complete those applications timely manner we will continue to serve breakfast and provide breakfast but those students who do not meet other eligibility requirements will be required to then pay for lunch and breakfast and you see those meal prices for the upcoming school year we continue our efforts in regards to recruitment for transportation services we still have a critical shortage but our drivers who are put all credential drivers monitors and

026staff will be providing assistance where necessary we'll be working with across the district to have staff that who currently are credentialed to assist with some of those routes as well you see some of the new options that we have in place relative to geofencing we do have a firefighter that we want to uh Spotlight who's been serving as a big driver with us for years so there's opportunity for other individuals across this District to come out and support that effort as well you see the numbers that we have and training will continue our robust recruitment process as replace Transportation you also see where we have completed our Georgia Department of Transportation Fleet inspection I'm encouraging all parents to make sure that you register advise us if you will need a required transportation that will help

027us tremendously it gives us an opportunity to consider expanding those options for people transportation services it is our goal to have all route information available the week of July 25th as we prepare for practice so foreign thank you as recently been such as the incident in Uvalde Texas we see the need to continue to prepare to protect all of our children staff that are in our schools so the things that we're doing to prepare for the upcoming the school year is that we're doing uh Career Training we recognize that Safety and Security is a shared responsibility not only are we preparing our sros but we're preparing our school communities our teachers our staff we're doing pricing drills for our students to prepare all officers are receiving updated certification training on the on the craze program

028that comes through Texas State University it includes the best practices and the most current uh study data uh information that we we glean from incidents that are happening across the country and how we can better prepare our schools our staff to be better prepared to prevent and respond to any incident that it may show itself we're also going to have multiple crazy instructors we're recertifying our instructors and we're deploying more so that we can meet um meet the demand and needs when we're training throughout the district we're also doing alert training for our Law Enforcement Officers alert uh is the advanced law enforcement rapid response training we're building on that at Craig's platform and it's also information that we receive from the Texas State University uh it's being provided through the Georgia Public Safety Training

029Center also through the gym where we're partnering where sros are across the great state of Georgia are being trained we plan to send all of our officers to receive the spiritual training as the opportunities available isros as we speak today are going through um act shooter response training we're preparing and we're working across the county with all of our Municipal uh police uh to the partner so that if there's a need for a rapid response we will be prepared and we'll know how to work together to again to prevent and to respond to any uh incident and know how to neutralize that threat especially focus training that we're doing is that we recognize that you saw your body that it's a single officer response and so we're preparing our officers not to wait on back

030up but to be ready to go in immediately and neutralize that threat our officers do not wait for backup and we're training for that as I said right now rssos are critical to our safety security program as well we're investing quite a bit of training because they will be the first to encounter a visitor that may come to the building and so they're being trained on the escalation training base accept defense better equipment to help them deal with emergencies uh with people that may act out of character our crossing guards who's another big piece of our security force will be providing best practices in crosswalk safety and traffic management they will be providing training on responding also to a critical incident that may happen on a campus or a roadway oftentimes there are vehicle accidents

031may occur these intersections and our crossing guards are there and they will receive a training on how to render Aid and what to do in terms that they need to provide critical uh support uh doing an emergency I'm very proud that we recently received the grant to purchase a simulator is a useful Force simulator I think it allows officers to experience stressful simulations in a controlled environment this controlled environment allows them to Horn their skills and then there they get to make the mistakes they're doing simulations so that when a real life situation occurs they're better prepared they'll be looking at things like after shooting response de-escalation work with people in mental or emotional crisis how to emerge emergencies emergency involving people with special needs and there's thousands of scenarios that this technology will allow

032us to better prepare our officers and staff to provide security another piece that we're very excited about is that we're working to uh for building that facility Maps those building in the facility Maps Net Technology will help us create maps that will show evacuation routes uh Emergency Equipment locations entry points it also will help First Responders to better understand the layout of the campus and the schools that we have so that's something that we're we're very excited about we're in the process of looking at that technology and purchasing it and bringing that on board Animal Care is something that we're very excited about is a great partnership right now with the Savannah Police Department but it is a way that we get Advanced notifications when our students have experienced some tragic or crisis event and

033the need to do some early intervention to prevent something from happening to them and to help them get into that crisis handled care has been a very successful program it's been a great partnership it's expanding throughout the county with other First Responders so that we can better serve our students and keep our schools safe all of us are familiar with San Diego promise uh it's a program that allows Anonymous reporting uh we built this program uh into our schools we're going to continue to promote it uh and we'll be doing that at the beginning of the year San Diego promise also has a 24-hour crisis hotline with students can call at any time to get help so we're very excited about that one of the biggest challenges we have with social media we have a

034think campaign that we're working very close with our communication department to get information our schools to get information out to help our students think before they go out and they post something because we want you hit the send button it's always out there and you can't get it back so social media has been a big challenge for us we want the big Campaign which is is it true that helpful is inspiring the necessary to kind it's something that we're putting a lot of emphasis on this year uh to help cut back on some of the threats uh and the dangers in social media we're also going to be kicking off our student pledge against gun violence we know that there's gun violence in our community there's a lot of work right now that's being done

035uh that program is something we did about four years ago and we're going to be bringing that pledge that students will make to encourage students to stand up against gun battles we also have our sad chapters which is students and Gifts uh destructive decisions and our junior Police Academy these are preventative programs that help kids get engaged get involved and help be a part of the solution to keep our school Community safe we know the vestibules are a big part we've done quite a bit of work capital projects has been working diligently uh it has been some challenging getting material but they've done a great job in moving forward with the list of schools that are giving you best reviews 15 happy being completed and an additional additional schools are now in the destruction this

036summer and we expect more and I'll keep you updated on that another piece that we're doing is that we're reducing the carbon emissions uh in our campus police Fleet you know we work 24 7. we have asset protection uh we're riding around making sure that our assets are protected we're responding uh to service calls we're adding in fully electric and Hyper electric vehicles to reduce the carbon footprint to help saving on fuel and money which will help our to put that money back into other areas to help our district Prosper many vehicles have already arrived some others are appending approval in the next coming weeks of the months our mobile camera system we actually have 14 Mobile Trailer mounted solar cameras that means that they're working off solar this is another green product that we're

037using to help keep our construction sites our schools events and things that we have that are safe to better monitor these sites 24 7. so these are some of the things it's a couple of things uh that we're doing initiatives that we have that we're working on there's many more but we wanted to highlight these things we're really excited about it again it's the shared responsibility there's so many people involved in working with us throughout academic Affairs uh data accountability Communications everyone's working together so that we can keep auditions safe leaders for sharing that information you can see an agency of our sides has many many moving Parts very proud to say is our award-winning nationally acclaimed Communications Department is involved with all of these divisions in their initiatives and the information they need to

038put out to the public someone asked Mrs Jennings to comment very Briefly summarize some of our communication strategies and the ways we'll get that information out to our parents in the coming weeks Miss Jennings thank you Mr Hager thanks for the opportunity to share our plans for promoting getting ready to go back to school uh we're already underway you will have noticed the website is already including back to school information and we have a variety of topics that will be covering on that page we also are preparing a newspaper insert we'll continue to promote through social media all of the back to school information you'll begin to see and increase emphasis on the back to school Expo with uh social media campaigns um radio advertising and a little bit of additional promotion on the website

039it's an exciting time for us we get real popped up about it we started learning about this right before the break and we expect to uh we expect to get some great results so please join us at back to school Expo if you think of something that we haven't covered and you think parents need to know let us know we have a lot of opportunities in addition to the back to school Expo we will have a booth out of Chatham uh County Employee Appreciation day at the market Arena on July the 20th where they will have 850 employees sent through a great opportunity for us to share our information we're participating in the hunter Airfield uh Marta palooza on the 22nd I believe um so we have a lot of opportunities to share our back

040to school information thanks thank you Ms Jenny's and of course as we get ready to open up for school and welcome our smiling faces of the uh 36 000 plus students that we serve almost 37 000 annually uh we recognize that kova is still out there it is still something that is providing an impact as we move about the community that we must remain Vigilant and we must remain safe and healthy so we are we did want to touch base on some of our continued safe practices for health as it relates to coveted safety one thing really wanted to stress was that simply as we are recognizing this as a safety matter we will continue to track it weekly Mr Ray will speak very briefly to that the other part is our staff maintains a

041open and very strong line of communication and partnership with local health professionals it was very proud last year as we moved through covid with the superintendent's medical advisory committee we have that group still uh dialed into our numbers and at the ready anytime we could call and ask for any guidance uh whatsoever but our school nursing teams are very much dialed into the Department of Health and the Georgia Department of Health and they're monitoring any changes that may come down as it relates to covid and we've gone pretty good at being able to Pivot so we know how to make a pandemic pivot hopefully that will be very minimally disruptive this school year and as the indicators are right now that appears what it's going to look like as we get ready to open in

042a very close to normal uh realm of operation so that's Mr Ray just to cover a couple of key points that we're using as our primary safety guidance component going into the school year actually in March um helped us to be able to determine what our cluster was and I think that we have a cluster Focus so all of our we're ready for any impacts that we need to have to lessen the disruption as we did later on in the spring we will continue with those those methods um contact with CBC and dph and following guidance we just communicated with them a few days ago there's not any any change of respect in that moment but as we know from time to time that can change at any moment so we're prepared to Pivot at

043any point if we need to but we feel like we're in a good a good place right now currently um anyone with a call which is a reminder for anybody listening to all of our parents and uh you know staff same way um anyone with code must not report to school or work um that's something that will help all of us be safer have all of us be healthier and so we want to make sure that we're sending that message out clearly certainly our Fields had our mitigation strategy but that's what we need to do to be able to stay open and that's our that's our main focus that's our clean list and practice you know we need to continue doing that as we always have as we've done um some of the some of

044that as well Faith government optional want to make sure the public is clear that we haven't changed that we actually started I think Mesa March 7th uh we continue with math optional for the staff other than when the requirement is there as it relates to the Department of Health which is when someone is code positive returning and that's the only um only the only delineation that would be there is the Department of Health requirement um mitigation as we continue having hand washing monitoring self um staying home when ill we still want everybody to follow that process and that's what we need to be able to do to keep you safe be safe and healthy we need everybody's input everybody to support us everybody to do what they need to do to keep the community of

045our schools healthy and that takes all of us to do thank you and that concludes our School Readiness report any questions start a school every year was very good superintendent on that his hands thank you so very much for this detailed report and I would just like to also in um join my colleagues insane this is a very informative uh piece of work that our parents could use and each child that I meet in the grocery store all while walking I ask them are they ready to return to school they say they are so we're ready for them thank you very much is we have folks in leadership positions that have been there for a little bit and we've seen the growth and the proactivity and the good ideas being implemented earlier and earlier we've

046seen that year after year and as a board member but as a parent who consumes this stuff as well and and my kids consume this stuff I just want to say thank you we've we've we were already uh at a pretty high level and we continue to up our game and the details and the proactivity and planning ahead is just really good to see so I just wanted to say thank you for doing that foreign people to our website which has all of the information there as well in this presentation will also be a part of that information because it's a nice little capsule of everything that's in included I want to though make sure I go back to a part of the human resources report that I don't want you to miss we um

047this year are celebrating the movement of 15 persons from classified to certified positions and I think that is an awesome thing and one of the things that we focused on is making sure that persons who are in those positions who are seeking their uh their certification and their degrees have an opportunity to move up within our school district and we're happy to celebrate them we're also happy to announce that we have 30 and growing uh persons who joined us some time ago have now achieved their green cards so they are actually now naturalized citizens and we are celebrating their world as well certainly with the support of our human resources and school-based uh Personnel we have been able to help them and their families attain a status as Americans and that is quite the accomplishment

048it is also the reason that many people have gravitated to our district because of the supportive system that we have in place for persons who are seeking the opportunity to become naturalized citizens so just thank you very much for your support in that way and we're looking forward to see about 30 000 of our closest friends uh join us available on July 30th for the back school Expo thank you for your report thank you for the good news and thank you for everybody that is participating with everything and also just like to acknowledge the thank you to our Taiwan department when I saw that all those title one plans are complete that was good news because as we know the state calendar is on June 30th but with the federal calendar ends on September 30th

049so this is quite early for those plans to be completed and I'm excited about that so thanks thanks to everyone and before I safely I'd like to acknowledge our district five School Board representative elect Reverend Paul Smith he's in the building today to please stand and just give away to everybody and congratulations to his mind we have several of well we only had one appearance before the board today so our officer would give us a safety briefing as we are preparing for that appearance um so we can hear you please officer Williams Officer William thank you please remember the most useful comments are those that are related to matters of policy over which the board has jurisdiction all comments shall be made in a professional manner that does not disrupted to the meeting should avoid

050name-calling towards staff board members and should avoid using profanity please follow the instructions of the board chair who provides over the meeting the board chair reserves the right to call anyone out of order who violates the rules of public appearance we appreciate your interest in the work of our school system thank you thank you we only have one person that signed up to date to speak and that is Miss Beth majority so if you would please come forward man and welcome a retired educator in Chatham County taxpayer returning after speaking at the last budget and Military hearings on June 22nd I along with many taxpayers and one School Board member expressed concern at this meeting over the rushed budget process that caused a 75 million dollar era and was caught by a private citizen we

051requested an external audit and a new set of three meetings as the ones conducted were null and void due to an inaccurate budget being proposed at the first two hearings Michael Johnson district 7 board rep and a past member of the budget committee before superintendent worked to dissolve it stated that the school board doesn't need to emulate Washington D.C legislature where and I quote him we vote for it so we can know what's in it unquote he proposes earlier access to the preliminary budget for board members so they have the time to do their due diligence and catch any potential errors like the most recent 75 million dollar line item in addition he proposes the reactivation of the budget committee that dissolved finally He suggests that this inflationary post-coded world where everyone is just getting

052their feet back on the ground this is eight percent increase in property taxes is damaging to all residents of Chatham County including renters who have this tax increase passed on to them with rent increases the public was told that the June 22nd meeting not to worry that the 75 million dollar era uh about that because it was only a line item error if that were the case the budget total should have remained net neutral at 700 million how is it that at the June 22nd meeting it jumped by 75 million to 775 million it has come to my attention since the meeting on June 22nd that Savannah Chatham county is one of only a few districts across the state that has an internal audit committee this internal audit committee reports not to the superintendent but

053to the board president I have it on good information that this internal audit committee was not involved in the budget process before the budget was passed by the board on June 22nd this fuels the concern that the district and or superintendent is fast tracking the budget without properly time for thorough review by the board without use of a budget committee and without using a valuable resource in place the internal audit team this lack of due intelligence accounts for the extreme 75 million dollar era found to date and causes the taxpayers of Chatham to lose faith in the stewards of the school system's finances and in the budget as it was approved in addition per the video online of the June 22nd special call board meeting at the one minute 47 second to 209 second approved

054with the following deletions to include final adoption of the fiscal year 2023 budget for All funds the room clapped as we interpreted that deletion to me that we had been heard and the budget vote had been deleted and moved to a later meeting date we were most surprised when during the course of the meeting the budget was voted on anyway this is a violation of Robert's rules to delete an item and then vote on it as is budget military process inspires confidence in addition the budget military FY 2023 process recently undertaken allegedly violated the property taxpayers Bill of Rights Senate Bill 177 act 431 which was signed April 30th 1999 and became effective January 1st 2000 one of its two main purposes is to prevent in direct tax increases resulting from increases to existing property

055values in a County due to inflation if the county elects to set their millage rate higher than the rollback rate they will be required to hold three public hearings Place notices of the increase in the paper and issue press releases even though an attempt was made was made to meet this obligation by the Savannah Chatham School Board it was allegedly maladministered as the budget had an error for two of the three meetings and Robert's Rules were correctly followed for the final special meeting where the vote was taken based on this I'm evaluating my option to submit a complaint to the Attorney General's office alleging violation of the taxpayers Bill of Rights thank you for your time thank you I'm Madam chair officers and members of the board I do think it's important to um make

056this statement and you may respond as you need the board names sets and convenience committees I think everyone should know that the superintendent does not name the budget committee superintendent is not convene the budget committee or any other committee so I'll thank you for allowing me to put that in the record thank you moving on to board matters I'm going to ask that Mr edger come forward and lead us through the Board of Education matters more presidents uh taking the board through the Board of Education matters the number of policy first reads for your review item 7.01 is policy Edda this is a four-year review it is a first reader this one there were minor changes in the policy primarily uh cleanup language was provided in the regulation for an easier read but also we

057added an additional component in there on managing operational special use of buses for outside agencies first read are there any questions or concerns the board members Mr Bassey and Miss awesome um I had a question about the process as far as the request that has to be submitted and certainly understand um that there needs to be a lead time to process those requests of minimum of uh 10 working days does that allow for Provisions where say for example an athletic event is rained out and it's rescheduled you know maybe a week later so if you don't have that 10-day window available so yes they were closely with Athletics differently Transportation they work very well together and so they're very flexible when it comes to rescheduling for our events I appreciate clarification thank you I am

058I'm also interested in the entry and um receipt of the requests 10 days prior to the date of the trip um [Music] I know of one case in which I was involved that it was submitted um far in advance but it had not been approved and failure up and this is a couple years ago failure to receive disapproval mean all of the participants think that it was approved until we got far less than 10 days towards the trip and found out that it was not approved so I'm wondering if that 10th day is it's received what is the time that it's going to be processed prior to the departure and I don't know if that needs to go under regulation but I was just wondering if there was some way to be clarified for the

059requester when they will know in that 10 days um so that items wouldn't be canceled like the day before uh um and my comment is about item three under section e we mentioned 4-H activities and Civic organizations um I suggested that that be changed to other Cooperative organizations and that may not be good if it's not the district's intention to make Transportation um available to other groups for which we have Cooperative agreements we have Cooperative agreements with lots of the groups so I don't know if there's an intentional historic relationship with 4-H I know that's being researched or whether there is an intention to not have that relationship with other groups that we cooperate with yeah so so part of the spirit of the review and I appreciate you bringing that out uh we did

060do some historical review to see that uh 4-H component and we were not able to find any specific references to it I do think that as you will see the spirit of what the primary focus is on the registration side is outside agencies that a 4-H reference could as you had indicated fall into what would be called an outside agency so we'll look at it without that eyeglass as it comes back for the second read okay and I'm just I'm a director of a Cooperative program there's a document that creates that program and I will let you know I take advantage of every single thing available to me and my students that I can hang Cooperative program on um so if you want to make sure that you kind of have a funnel on that

061access then you may want to you know may want to address it but I I use the Cooperative status and the document that defines it to allow me to do a lot of things that were not in the imagination of Administrators so I'm attempting to protect you from people like me um who may be very creative actually we'll take a look at it closely from that and we'll also get back to look at the clarity that could be provided in that 10-day component and that's one of the benefits of these types of reviews is to look at it from multiple angles so if we see something in there that could be clarified better we can bring that back in a second read so we'll look at that as well is you know where the trip

062is more than 10 days out um but I've also received comments or complaints concerns about uh Transportation field trips and what's the process for doing the request and people at the school level were confused I thought I submitted it appropriately it didn't make it to the right place so we need Clarity and simplicity and here's how it happens the other comment I have is um you know we Consolidated the numbered sentences into a paragraph basically there's some changes I'm also required I'm also concerned about the sentence all requests must be approved by all required levels of approval but it doesn't say what all required levels of approval are what we're deleting said requests have to be approved by the principal or director of the school or Department concerned um we already I'm concerned it's going

063to exacerbate and lead to more complaints of well I got approval from my department chair my assistant principal the athletic director the principal and my Deputy superintendent I didn't know the assistant secretary to the deputy assistant of the transportation department had to approve it as well see where that goes I just think we need Clarity so that everybody knows here is how a requests have to be submitted and here are the brightline level of approvals Mr capacity comment remind me on on the policy does this mean that if other agencies are requesting use of our buses I certainly understand completely important to have to be driven by our um operations team does this mean it can only be students or would I'm thinking in particular of like if the city of Savannah had an event

064where they needed to transport people and made an application would that be allowed under this policy okay I just wanted to clarify that okay moving on to the policy I'm sorry okay everybody has anybody had a chance to speak okay our homework thank you this is uh one that we brought back as you'll recall we did do an initial review on this back in May received some feedback from the board this particular one is the changes are only to the regulation only so there's no policy matter changes subject to the board's final review here but we'll only change the changes to the regulations so we'll bring those to you for your review and awareness you will note that when we did talk about this back in a few months ago we went back and talked

065to principals we talked to some our students our professional Senate with teachers also got additional feedback and research that was provided to the board on homework and there there were some changes that were made in accordance with that particular exercise and you see that listed now on the regulation side so some of the times have changed and also a line was added about the recommendation for homework uh for Elementary grades as opposed to a strong requirement and then come get some board members Dr Hassan Brown yes thank you for uh this and also the review that accompanied from the staff was really really helpful to see um a review of how homework has been viewed by the um profession and how we and how we created this policy I just have a comment about the

066homework plan I asked about this in the spring and did receive the homework plan um for the school that I was asking about I had gotten some complaints about homework at a school um and I missed this in 2017 when we reviewed this policy and I'm wondering about how we reinforce our expectation that homework plans are created at the school level and are available and I know that may not I don't need an answer now but I'm just kind of commenting that it doesn't appear that we are really enforcing that that homework plan policy in a way that maybe we could or was intended at at one point so we have just not Hospital to update you we've noted that as well and that's part of the uh working group uh that we'll be doing

067with the principals on uh June July 22nd and we'll be bringing that before them periodically throughout the year to make sure we're checking it thank you Mr capacity um certainly I want to agree that I appreciate all of the additional information and have the opportunity to attend the professional Senate meeting with the teachers and here firsthand from them so that was a great opportunity to have some conversation one quick question is in the policy states or two will not be accounted for grading purposes does that need to be repeated in the regulation I don't see it in regulation also a little bit I just want to make sure that that's that's clear we're happy to be redundant with that if uh if there's a concern that it didn't come through on the regulation side um

068I think part of what you'll see there is on the policy side is it's very clear that that isn't an area of not required and then the regulation uh stimulates and enumerates the actions that are taken for where it is uh or strongly or encouraged um but if we if you feel more comfortable from uh an understanding side is our staff and and public at large is looking at that I don't think there'd be too much of an issue just to repeat it be helpful um I do and again I appreciate and understand all of the information and documentations provided I still have concerns about a kindergarten or a first grader getting assigned up to four times a week 15 minutes a night of the market as a kindergarten I still just think that's too

069much I can't support policy any of the comments board members but I appreciate the research that's been attached I appreciate collaboration with the teachers and everyone that has been involved and also as a former primary teacher kindergarten um the kindergarten 15 minutes it's not too much time to collaborate together to ensure that they're not given too much homework to a particular student as well as the high school so they have the team because I will assume um to ensure that it's not Overkill but I do know personally that my opinion of 15 minutes is not too much for our primary degrees because sometimes this is Mom reading to her her child for 15 minutes and that's the whole understanding so it's not always a rigorous assignment it's just to reinforce what's taking place in school

070um yes yes um Dr Hall you uh hit on exactly what uh we've been discussing a lot of times when we think about homework we think of you know years ago when you were doing um 30 Edition problems and things of that nature but homework um looks a lot differently as you mentioned it could be something as simple as having a conversation or going outside and looking at flowers and you know just you know talking about um the colors and things of that nature so homework um does look different so um we just need to do the pendulum shift so we can understand that it's not just you know typically what we think of as far as homework missile and just to add to that um I can remember that homework being just learning how

071to write your name just practicing and it was exciting to practice you know especially the longer your name is that that was a very good exercise so um Denise I think uh that you're thinking about content uh intense situations but it really tends to be just practice as I recall um practice on things that you really want to get skilled at quickly like learning how to write your name well any where but I I'm reading to my child every night I don't think that that's homework for the child um I I just I know I've been there are cases where I feel like this has been um exacerbated and I just think that um encouraging our students absolutely absolutely encourage them to do these things and and where I'm coming from is really we've talked

072about how students are all so different and if you have a kindergartner who's already struggling in school and just trying to make it through a day and then there's an extra homework assignment that places the weight on that child where they can't develop that natural of learning that's the child I'm really worried about I'm not learning I'm not worried about the kids that are going that are you know naturally loving learning and they're excelling and doing really well I'm worried about those that may not have the resources at home or they may not have the support or they may not have other things in place and is really engaging them that the parent is engaging with the reason and the child is being engaged by listening and thought a little bit so it's a good

073thing to have to vote on that because it's a regulation but I just want to um just thank you for your feedback I think if you look historically as school boards you spend a lot of time talking about what homework is and what it means and I would also say that if you have an opportunity to talk to teachers what teachers want is to young people go home and practice what they learn especially at this age um the agents you're concerned about what we want our young people to do is to is to have a positive experience at school so that they can go home and practice their numbers and Skip and run especially for this age um that there's a concern about remember it's not required for uh for this so we'll be talking

074with teachers about it you know I I I just had to say I trust our teachers I think we have a few operations but most most of them are very tuned into children in their developmental levels we do have some that come outside of that and I think our principals do a good job of responding to it but your concerns are noted I have concerns about homework as well so we share that but I also think that um anytime we can encourage practice whether it's the say your letters or to recite Invictus it gives students an opportunity to practice what they learn in school but you're concerned denoted any other concerns are noted as well in this regulation will definitely make some note of those in you'll get a final copy reflecting because it's a

075group so thank you moving on to item point 7.03 and I let Mr editor just read those as he goes along thank you uh Madam border president the policy and regulation change here on IHF uh appears somewhat confusing and part of our effort was to really clean this up so that you can focus primarily on relevant years as you'll know there have been a number of changes over the years and graduation requirements uh dating all the way back to the old lever rates and then get into the cohort years uh there's even been additional changes that are we thought that were relevant based on some of the requests that we get from folks for historical relevant data uh so we went back to what was the the cleanest stepping off point and then deleted the

076others the other onus on this was there were some changes to credit validation requirements and also requirements Under ctae World languages the Fine Arts that was cleaned up as well we did have a question from Mr kashmar about the inclusion of financial literacy and graduation requirements uh you're correct that it was adopted into law but it doesn't officially start until 24-25 school year so it has no bearing on this particular policy review and my question there though was we are geared up or going to be geared up to offer that starting in 2024-25 right that is correct thank you yes any other questions moving on to the policy I Eda instructional unstructured break IPA this is unstructured break these uh revisions have come along uh specifically because of changes uh to the from the legislative

077session in the 2022 years so you'll see that the language that is included in here in red in the middle paragraph that is exact language pulled out of the state code that was signed into law by the governor we did strike a line that was we felt somewhat confusing and rewrote it to indicate that a child who is acting up on the playground having disciplinary action issues on the playground creating safety concern could be removed from Recess the previous line said unrelated disciplinary action it was confusing this is a first read any questions uh I appreciate the explanation as to where the changes came from I went and read the statute the the statute that was passed is a floor um here's the minimum we have to do it doesn't it doesn't dictate that you

078must do this and nothing else so we can certainly deviate from our policy as long as we meet minimum requirements um I'm concerned about the language in the in the first pair the First new paragraph which is paragraph four uh recess is not required in any school day in which students had physical education or a structured activity time I don't know what structured activity time is that could be we're going to sit in the we're going to watch a special movie today um you know the point the discussions we've had before about recess is is really an a brain break and effort to extend physical energy expense stress uh however students want to utilize that time in their own way so um I don't know what structured activity time is that's not related to physical

079activity or free time to roam around outside or sit under a tree or play kickball or whatever it is I'm concerned about that and then um we've also deleted one two three four the first sentence and the sixth paragraph students may not be excluded from participating in unstructured recess breaks for unrelated disciplinary action that's been struck so now my understanding is the district wants to be able to do that or give that tool to the schools I'm not sure um so on that point specifically uh that line was Rewritten with the one that is above it that indicates that a child could be removed from uh the unstructured break activity if there are disciplinary or behavioral safety concerns taking place during that activity okay but the copy I have has that line struck which means

080if you threw milk during lunch we can take away recess no this says if you're at recess and you attack another student or you engaged inappropriately with another student then you are taking out the recess situation if during the morning hours you engage in something that is inappropriate you are not denied recess that is my understanding the first line of section six says we can't the way the policy reads now is students may not be excluded from participating in recess for unrelated disciplinary actions and the proposed policy strikes that language the distance it it doesn't it doesn't address it it says it has no bearing on throwing Oak and lunch or something first period that's my concern let's go back and make it clearer okay so we'll we'll look at it with that eyeglass the

081um effort was to take the unrelated disciplinary uh Action Line and make that more clear by rewriting it with the one above so if we didn't meet that Mark we'll we'll look at it further to do that I don't have a strong feeling about it but the sentence after it says that recess maybe without for safety or academic reasons the sense above that talks about not being withheld for unrelated disciplinary action so keeping that sentence in there just creates I guess the safety net for people who still fear that recess may be withheld for unrelated reasons to safety and academic reasons so problematic or Jesus but I do remember because it's something I think is really important that the whole reason my recollection that this was in here was because recess was being used as

082a punitive like if you don't behave you're not going to get a good playground and it's my understanding that's the whole reason the sentence was in there and the sentence above it has a very different meaning than the ones being proposed for striking so I would agree with Mr cashmere I don't think so we'll go back members who would have went to item 7.05 policy jbcda and administrative regulation jbcda regulation tuition mid-year review correct uh jcda was is coming through in part to a need to primarily update language in the regulation although there was a few cleanup pieces in the policy as well the regulation side primarily was the set forth how are who and how our team responds to in providing uh bills for families who are in the system and they are having

083to pay tuition so we didn't have an experience of in recent time uh where there was some confusion over that with a family member that we serve we realized that well you could possibly have interpreted the regulation wrong so we cleaned up that language and it was very clearly written now that you're going to get a bill for the entire amount which you could pay up front into or you could play pay incrementally and those are the primary changes any questions okay moving on to policy g-a-r-h administrative regulation g-a-r-h employee leaves and absences mid-year review 7.06 this is a regulation change only uh again we had some experiences with staff members who uh were reading uh the language in a certain way what it pertains to when certain leave was allowed for school-based personnel so

084the primary change that we looked at were cleaning up that language and making it very clear when school-based Personnel would not be able to utilize leaves so you'll see those specifically referenced in there on pre-planning days and the five days of the academic remaining last five days of the academic school calendar for example foreign is a result of HB 1084 from the 2022 legislative session that requires Boards of Education to have policies in place by August 1st 2022 for a complaint resolution process as it relates to divisive Concepts the information that we have received for this particular policy action which is a new policy for the board is taken directly from the Georgia school boards Association as model policy language we have compared it against what the state provided as the sboe was also required

085to provide model policy Language by July 1st and per our legal review from our legal team do feel that the gsba a model language that's presented in front of you is a better quality language there are some pieces that we can potentially take from the School Board Association or I'm sorry from the State Board of Education which also could potentially end up and will likely end up in an sboe rule which will provide very clear steps as far as complaint resolution process but that is also listed in the gsba model policy so we feel that this puts us on good track to be compliant with law we had a very robust discussion this morning regarding this new policy are there any more questions of concerns from board members Ms Cashmore I I just get my

086procedural question is if we have to have this in place by August 1st and this is the first read you know what's the plan we'll follow the law thank you good answer objection unresponsive thank you Mr basket I just had one uh clarifying question under four a one it states that a parent of the student enrolled at school where the alleged violation occurred does that need to see parent or guardian or is Guardian implied in parent I would I would say the pair of Guardian would certainly be the the appropriate we do utilize that uh interchangeably because we recognize our situations work audience uh those do a guardianship are the ones that you would go to but uh effectively as the parent um in terms of complying with the law uh [Music] earlier today our

087position would be that the superintendent could declare that we will simply follow this uh first read of the policy uh going forward until the uh formal adoption uh the second read but for now we will follow the the policy as as read today unless the board specifies what it was importance moving on to resolution board norms and protocols thank you the following three items are connected 7.08 7.09 and 7.10 the first two are action items for the Board of Education to provide approvals so that they can be submitted as part of our packet of evidence to the Georgia school boards Association as the board has the foundation and all the components available in its operational practice and governance standards uh we believe uh to be approved uh very uh strongly by the Georgia School Board

088Association as an exemplary board but we do need these uh three actions so that we can move forward to provide that submission to gsba and Mr Feliciano is going to read each of them into record for your subsequent action in support of continuous Improvement to meet the highest level of government standards thus be a resolved that each board member commits to the norms and protocols enumerated within the enclosed document as well as all supporting policies and performance standards that have been adopted by the board and approved the school board resolution board norms and protocols as presented you heard the motion to approve the resolution that has the ground moves I do a second nobody wants to have an alarm okay discussion any comments well I will comment as maker um of the motion I appreciate

089the work that the staff has put into um putting together this information the public should know that it was um compiled from all the work that we did when we were um reinforcing good practices that we felt Advanced and cognia would find supportive of a positive and strong culture um I appreciate it also that the staff has gotten us back on the track of being in line to be a what used to be distinguished born exemplary board um so that people can see our best practices from across the state so thank you for your leadership and doing that my question about this is that if we approve it today um and it is going forward as a packet I see that there's a signature page is there a page that's going to be circulated for

090the signature of the folks that are present or are we going to handle that logistically at another time okay thank you we'll capture as many board members as we came this round okay so all in favor to approve everybody okay one two three four okay so one two three four five a post extension okay motion passes with five zero one moving on to item number 7.10 yes the Georgia Vision recommendations the 50 Georgia Vision project recommendations have been reviewed by staff or alignment with the five-year strategic plan and are now recommended for Board review and approval and in support of continuous Improvement meet the highest level of government standards the door division recommendations are provided in your board packet and posted on board box of public View thus be it resolved upon the recommendation of

091the superintendent that the board endorsed the recommendations listed above for the updated Georgia Vision project and include them in the way forward 2026 strategic plan sorry okay you've heard an emotion to approve the recommendation I move to approve the Georgia Vision recommendation of the way forward 2026. missile second anything thankfulness dot Hassan no thank you very much okay all in favor to approve the recommendation discussion please yes in a discussion zero [Laughter] moving on to item 7.11 I'm gonna ask Miss president uh we just did 7.09 we do now need to it's 7.10 I'm in a hurry huh 7.010 moving on to 7.010 thank you thank you man uh this is the exemplary Board of Distinction application the administration seeks approval to submit the application for gsba exemplary board recognition gsba offers three recognition levels

092quality distinguish and exemplary exemplary is the highest level in board governance thus be resolved that the board does hereby authorized staff to submit evidence supportive of the criteria required for recognition as a gsba exemplary Board of Distinction you heard the motion when you heard the recommendation to it to approve D Hospital second in the comments I would just like to say I'm so thrilled that we're back at this point that I don't think we should have left so I'm very happy about this comments from the house is extremely competitive and she's been waiting to get back in the fight on this for some time so I wanted to thank uh your team also want to thank um uh internal audit all the staff members that contributed to the application it is not an insignificant bit

093of documentation and we appreciate your work any other comments importance all in favor one two three four five six motion passes six zero zero now moving on to item 7.11. Mississippi this is a resolution to support school safety and prevent gun violence um and as much as it breaks my heart all right like five times um it's important Savannah County Board of Education resolution to support school safety and prevent gun violence whereas our Public Schools provide a safe place for teaching and learning we're consistently high levels of academic and Social Development are achieved and whereas senseless and tragic mass shootings at places such as schools colleges universities movie theaters music festivals hospitals medical clinics shopping areas parades and religious institutions have highlighted the dangers of and clearly demonstrate that gun violence can occur at any

094place and at any time and whereas the crisis of gun violence necessitates a sustained coordinated and collaborative effort involving entire communities elected officials at every level of government law enforcement and the entire criminal justice system and whereas since the Columbine High School shooting in 1999 and the Sandy Hook massacre in 2012. there have been more than 300 school shootings Nationwide including the recent shooting at Uvalde Texas Taking Lives shattering communities and leaving emotional scars and whereas State schools provide an environment where disruptions are minimized violence bullying and fear are absent students are not discriminated against expectations for Behavior are clearly communicated and consequences for infractions are consistently and applied fairly and whereas the crisis of gun violence is a public health issue and all students regardless of background deserve a place to learn and Thrive

095and have access to support services that support and enhance their physical mental and emotional health and whereas the most effective approach to creating safe School environments is a comprehensive coordinated effort including school and Community strategies supplemented with legislation resources and support and a state and a federal level and whereas elected officials must commit to closing gaps in the current Patchwork of regulations including gaps that enable persons dangerous to themselves or others to gain access to firearms and those gaps that fail to prohibit the trafficking of illegal guns now therefore be it resolved that the Savannah Chatham County Public School System staff and leaders will continue to work with a broad spectrum of local community stakeholders local law enforcement mental health professionals parents students teachers and staff to take any threats of violence seriously and to

096develop and Implement and monitor policies and programs that Foster and support positive School climate that is free from harassment and violence and support educational programs messages prevent gun violence be it further resolved that Savannah County public Board of Education urges the state of Georgia and the United States Congress to invest and wraparound services to prevent bullying harassment discrimination and violence in schools and provide funding for programs and staff such as counselors social workers and psychologists that support the mental physical and emotional health of all students and staff now therefore be it resolved the Savannah Chatham County public Board of Education urges the United States Congress to pass specific legislation that reduces the risk and severity of gun violence into the state of Georgia and Implement Common Sense measures that prioritize school and student safety and

097environments where all students have the opportunity to learn grow and breath you heard the motion to approve the resolution that has brown in your comments more members will first comments I thought in reading the resolution that she was making the motion but I can make an emotion Al yes okay thank you second it is um one two three four five six resolution passes six zero zero consent agenda could I have a motion to approve the movement of the consent agenda this Hall moves that last five seconds off in board members I started over to the left I apologize um all in favor to approve the consistency one two three four five six motion passes six zero zero and this time I like to ask Mr Feliciano and Mr Jackson to come forward and lead us

098through Student Success academic achievement and life readiness the following board resolution is to support the first city Magnet School assistant program Grant application for Hodge Elementary Duran middle school and Alfred E Beach High School the resolution is provided in your board packets and posted on board box for public View therefore be it resolved that the board is committed to take all necessary actions to ensure continued compliance with the requirements of the 14th Amendment of the U.S Constitution title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and all other applicable federal and state laws as well as all pre-existing agreements for federal and state agencies and be it further resolved that the board of public education for the city of Savannah and County of Chatham as part of its effort to promote racial and socio-economic diversity

099and inclusion fully supports and provides Authority for the superintendent to establish new stem steam magnet school programs at the following schools within the Savannah Chatham County public school system Beach High School you'd heard the motion to approve the resolution Miss hands Mr capacity seconds well I am very pleased to hear about this resolution today and um I'm sure these schools are very happy for the grant and we thank God that alerted his team worked on this for us and this can only help to enhance our children at these schools so that when they leave our school system they'll be better prepared for their life thank you very much um just to clarify this we're still in the application Phase and we're waiting to hear back from the federal uh Team to let us know where

100we stand this was this application specifically was done internally led by Dr Angie Lewis's team well I am sorry Dr Lewis thank you for all that you do and I am very sorry to make that mistake thank you very much Mr Bassey um I'm excited for the substance of what this might provide for the district my question is how does this fit in with our Choice programs um we've had a nomenclature and kind of PR shift over the years we've gone from magnet to choice um this is the name the the magnet Grant I guess but are we calling it employees programs are they limited how does this fit into our overall plan in that aspect so and that's a very good question we one of the strategies we're using is we're using these funds

101to augment and support the existing programs we have in place within these schools now we do receive federal funds from middle and high school CPE ctae programs but we do not receive funds from the elementary schools so for a lot of this funds is to help at the elementary school level to expose our students to these types of programs and then have that um matriculation in place between elementary middle and high to support the CTA programs that are currently exists okay but are they going to be on our website as part of our overall Choice offerings and anybody from the district can apply or is it limited to these schools or are we going to have a separate subsection for magnet programs these are considered to be magnet schools if we received the award they

102would be classified as many schools with no entrance criteria no academic entrance criteria so the already at these schools yes so this would be a non-competitive magnet program that overlays the choice programs already at these three schools so it's an opportunity for young people who may not apply for the choice but to still be able to participate in that academic programming is that correct correct and it does provide right now we have as we've discussed over time a um limited number of funds going into specifically this Elementary School phrase program now we would have a full complement of funds to beat that program up but it will essentially function as a choice program that's how it will function uh because that program is already there so Our intention is to um to be for the

103program efforts in all three of the schools so practically it's going to function like a choice school students may come from all over the district to attend those schools any of the Communist board members all in favor to approve the resolution one two three four five six motion passes six zero zero moving on to item 9.02 budget Commandments Georgia power grid in partnership with Georgia Power three-year Grant was awarded to support equity in education the administration now seeks approval to allocate the funds for expenditures the three schools participating in the grant are Google Elementary Mercer Middle School and gross High School does be resolved upon the recommendation of the superintendent that the board approves that a fiscal year 2022 budget revenues and expenditures by 750 000 as shown in the above table to align the

104local budget with the equity through Education Georgia Power Grant allocation as approved by Georgia Power you heard the motion to approve the recommendation Miss how it's a second yes now the grant we're talking about three-year-olds at Google okay at some point because we need to really thank them in person this is great so besides Mr basket so the ghoul that's the three-year-olds um any of the comments all in favor to to approve the recommendation to represent one two three four five six motion passes six zero zero moving on to item 9.03 president project Lighthouse is a five-year Magnet School assistant program Grant we're in the second year of the grant the administration seeks approval to distribute the newly allocated funds to support the msat programs thus be resolved upon the recommendation of the superintendent that

105the board approves the project Lighthouse funding for year two of five degree amount total is 4 338 dollars for year two and just for clarification we will be updating this document and placing an asterisk next to the grand total amount the great amount provided to us 4 338 this amount consists of two separate allocations the year two allocation is 3 million thirty four thousand three hundred and thirty dollars and a year three partial front load allocation of one million one hundred and twenty three thousand and eight dollars the year three amount is restricted until January of 2023. so the grant amount provided to us by the federal government is four million one hundred fifty seven thousand three hundred and thirty eight dollars for this year you heard the motion to approve the recommendation Brown moves

106I still move D anything without hearts and brown anything from the science comments all in favor to approve the recommendations please raise your hand one two three four five six motion passing Six Zero Zero foreign [Music] actual revenues are at 90.5 of the current modified budget which is just a little bit lower than 95 of last year but keep in mind we will have collections for the month of June July and August that will appear in FY 22. the total budget for actual dispensers or 85 percent of the current modified budget as compared to eight percent of last year uh again we always keep track of student nutrition program fund 600 currently showing a profit of 6.5 million dollars we have a budget um food nutrition uh we proceeded doing the same thing for the

107next year to fill and um add to their fund balance we also they also need fund money they're fund balance when they buy major equipment refrigerators and items um that are very very expensive they use their fund balance to buy those items and they haven't been able to do that in a number of years so we're trying to get them in a position where they can purchase some additional items to do some Renovations in some of the cafeterias um other than that we have no other concerns of the funds that are within our within our budget uh again we're just doing good on collections tax revenue Collections and we may be in a position where we may add money in a general fund to fund balance again this year are there any questions my concern

108was looking at Collections and our the 2022 collections are below the last two to three years um that's indicative of inflation recession inflation um headwinds on economic development that are that we might that we might see we don't even see collections for this fiscal year yet we're I'm seeing trailing for the last you know the beginning of this year so I just want to make sure that we're looking at this year's budget at the current collection trends for 2022 not what we anticipated they might be at the end of last year beginning of this year um and so you know I see the cash flow report that looks good but we're 92 of collections year over year and the trend is not good so I just want to make sure we're keeping an eye on

109that and playing for a lower collection rate and and seeing what that does to our existing budget plans yes the collections have just been been awkward the last three years um that was some years we were ahead and this year we were a little behind um but we have some months that will just jump so we're just waiting to see what's going to happen over the next three months but we've got a monster that for the close of uh 2022 then see how things look to start 2023 when we have full collections in one year normally that means that they're delinquent taxes that will appear the following year so we will get the collections it's just a matter of where we get them any other questions okay moving on to budget transfer Largo Elementary School

110the first transfer Largo Tibet Elementary School budget transfer uh again it's a general item has been posted to the review of the board and the public it's really to transfer information within the project for Largo Tibet Elementary School the roofing project the spirit resolved upon recommendation of the superintendent that the board approved to transfer of funds from A3 Lago Tibet Elementary construction account to Largo Tibet es Roofing an account also the transfer funds from E3 contingency thousand dollars you heard the motion to accrue the recommendation science moves around second yeah board members all in favor please show them one two three four five six motion passes six zero zero moving on to the sure E4 oops I'm sorry all right but uh Madam chair I move that items 10.34567 and eight to request transfers from

111E4 for data and accountability to the items that I'm about to name all be handled as one motion and that is that E4 academic technology take 12 million eight hundred and fifty thousand dollars and move to E4 portable student learning devices by school that one million be moved from academic technology to academic technology School infrastructure that three million seven hundred and twenty thousand be moved from academic technology E4 to E4 security Hardware software and support that two million four hundred and eighty thousand be moved from academic technology to E4 teacher computer devices by school that 75 000 people from academic technology E4 to E4 telephony um telephony annual licensing and support and that finally 825 000 be moved from academic technology to E4 data center infrastructure okay you've heard a recommendations anything from start hopping

112around no California annual licensing I think it's a 75 000 or 750 000. 750 000 item 10.07 okay questions comments a little emerging okay all in favor I'm in favor to approve that these um items are combined one two oh one two three four five six motion passes six zero zero in a Consolidated way and just sort of working for the public the the adopted budget for E4 for technology all we're doing is just moving it now to places where we can spend okay thank you moving on to item 10.09 bid 22-54 food products and distribution service and your contract yes this is approval for the inner contract for full product um the resolution I mean the Portage of items also on board docks that's being resolved upon recommendation of the superintendent that the board

113approved the awarded a bid 22-54 full products and distribution services annual contract for a one-year period to the Williams institutional Foods Incorporated at an annual estimated cost of nine million four hundred and thirty four hundred twenty seven thousand one hundred and twenty three dollars and thirty cents you heard the motion to approve the recommendation his hands moves and that Heisenberg second Brown any other cop comments board members to the Nebraska one question this may not be the right contract because this is for staple and commodity process food items but when we're looking at our food food distribution do we look for opportunities to break these up into smaller packages that would allow for local vendors and produce providers in particular to be able to competitively bid to get more local produce in our schools yes

114if I'm not mistaken we do have some contractors some local vendors where we do uh obtain some products from them but this is just for the majority of food items that we receive items locally as much as we can of course director but it's all about the supplied man understand thank you very much any other comments okay all in favor one two three four five six motion passes six zero zero Madam chair yes can we view the last motion to see how the motion was captured in the record to make sure that we carried it properly okay we just had some concern for whether the emotion was for the combination or for the approval of the items my intention was for the approval yes okay so upon the recommendation transfer of funds of okay that's

115not it yeah she's working on it so so the question on the floor then would be did you vote to combine them all together and redo that then vote to approve that my motion was for the transfer to occur as I read the question that I received from a colleague was whether my motion was for a combination but I my my motion was for the actual transfers to curve which is why I read them all outlined loud but we wanted to make sure that we are being fully transparent stewards appreciate that we just make sure that the minutes reflect what happened which is a vote on the combined distribution of funds as Dr Austin's brown red we should be okay okay thank you for your diligence on that Mrs Davis Brown and thank you for

116your patience Madam chair okay well this is what I've been waiting for at the moment okay all in favor six zero zero thank you foreign [Applause] [Music]