001get mad or may not like you there is also heroic courage those who have the courage to speak up in the face of danger those who have told their parents or teachers when hearing chatter about a fight a possible school shooting or someone who wants to do harm to themselves those who have save lives by act by Having the courage to act unselfishly Maya Angelo said courage is the most important of all the virtues because without courage you can't practice any other virtue consistently courage is the first step to overcoming obstacles and achieving new experiences making the choice to persevere through fear ultimately helps us grow into the individuals we are destined to become courage lives lives inside all of us how and when we use it can Define us courage has a way for
002us to see who we really are it can also show us who the people around us are too courage must be nurtured the love and support we receive from family friends teachers coaches School leaders and those who simply want to see us try feeds our bravery I'm thankful to attend a school that not only teaches me that courage cannot be developed without failure but that success cannot be driven without courage we are all running races on courses that we have not seen it is courage that puts us on the path towards accomplishing our dreams thank you for the opportunity to speak tonight and for celebrating the courageous SE success of all students great [Applause] wonderful message thank you all right um board members so we are now going to dive into our work on our
003goals and guard rails with Mr AJ crille who is in person with us tonight wish we could be in room 267 for this Workshop kind of work but because of the nature of the rest of our agenda tonight um we needed to be in here so we have room for all of the public to join us um I um can probably safely um predict that we will not finish up finalizing our go goals and guard rails tonight but we do need to be finished by we've got another Workshop scheduled for the 30th um we really need to get this done then um so let's let's get our brains focused and let's dive into it floor is yours Mr crille good evening and thank you for having me once again as we continue this journey uh
004first to contextualize it uh just so that we're all on the same page the board recognized some time ago that there's a a extreme importance for a governing body to be clear about what is the community's vision that we are here to ensure happens and also protect the community's values in the implementation of that vision but to do those two things well to really represent the community's vision and the community's values requires that you first make these things plain that you write them down and that you apply to them a set of measurements so that you can actually have a way of knowing in reality are we honoring the vision of this community are we honoring the values of this community absent Clarity in these things we're simply pretending that we have an understanding of
005whether or not we're doing the job for which we were selected this is the nature of all governing bodies what is distinct however is that you all chose to pursue this path of actually doing the work of writing these down making a plane adding metrics to it and then putting in place systems as a governing body where you can hold your superintendent responsible for the execution of the community's vision the adherence to the community's values and that you can use that to drive performance improvements for the students that you serve what's happened so far in this process is that you've come up with a draft set of goals this is your way of writing down the community's vision and a draft set of guard rails your way of writing down the community's values uh and
006you've workshopped that a little bit among yourselves and with your superintendent as we near the end of this process we get down to the details and that is what we engage in this evening of looking at the work that you've done some of the back and forth that's happen with your Administration and trying to see if we can come to a place of finality as it relates to the goals that you are going to hold on to for the next several years the guard rails that you're going to hold on to for the next several years the document that is up on the screen that's available uh on your website that each of you have in front of you uh list both where you began the journey along with some proposed revisions from your Administration
007this is an natural part of the journey you absolutely want to have a collaborative interaction with your chief executive as you are establishing the goals and guard rails that will guide the administration's work however I cannot overstate the superintendent is not the community's representative the board is and so while it is unacceptable that you would ever adopt a set of goals and guard rails without collaborating with your Administration it is equally unacceptable that you would defer the resp responsibility of representing the community's Vision Values to your employee this is your task and your task alone so what we do this evening is we take the advising that you've received from your Administration and we begin to compare does this match up with your understanding of the communities vision and values where that's the case I'd
008love to go ahead and set that aside and consider that complete where that's not the case we'll have to Workshop it a little bit to see if we can reach a place of consensus this evening there is no intent ention to vote on anything this evening that intention is at a meeting later this month tonight our aspiration is to simply try to get to a place where you are actually ready to vote at the end of the month so with that as a summation of what is the overall intention where have we been in the process and what is our work for the night are there any questions before we dive in and I'll just say board members at your desk you should have a print out if you need that for reference I know
009most of you are online but it's under and remind the public it's on board we should have it okay sorry I'll use you use mine all right any questions before we remind the public it's on board now um yeah and to the members of the public you're probably familiar with our website board docs where we have um all of our meeting materials you'll find those there so any questions no all right then we'll dive in we'll start first with the goals we'll move iterally through those then we'll move on to the guardrails so first with Goal number one what's presented uh is the text of what the board uh developed and then immediately after that there is an offer of revisions from your Administration what you need to decide this evening is does the original
010more accurately capture the vision of the community uh does the revision or does the revision more accurately capture the vision of the community or is there do just looking at those to help point you in the direction of something else entirely that more accurately captures the vision of the community so starting with Goal number one what say you I'll just um point out that I see um some clear clarifying language I see targets filled in and um I see a revised um end date I just want to point out what changed here it is fairly common as I'm working with other school systems across the country that administrations are making uh one particular recommendation that's made here which is to step forward in time and rely on 2021 data rather than 2019 data what a
011lot of school systems are finding U which seems to be true of some of your data as well is that the gaps between 2019 and 2021 are so severe as to make their predictive quality almost meaningless um and so this idea of trying to shift forward instead of looking having a baseline be 2019 uh actually setting that with uh 2021 data and then pushing the target date out to 2025 has been a very common practice uh it is not something that you are obligated to do if that is not uh your preference uh but it is certainly an appropriate thing to do if we um if we do push out the end date to 2025 is that then saying that our next strategic plan will start in 2025 as opposed to 2024 which is what
012we had been on track for yeah so I certainly going to recommend that you try to align the end dates for all of your goals to being in the same year uh that will make it easier to be clear about the time for transitioning to your next strategic plan so right now the way things are currently settled the intention is that your existing strategic plan would expire in 24 which means you need to start developing the new one sometime in 23 if you move to this adjustment that adds an extra year under the calendar because it would expire in 25 that means that you'd start really developing the new strategic plan in 24 so that's a decision the Board needs to make too um and certainly board members uh some things you can ask me
013if there are technical questions of this nature but a lot of the questions you may have uh specifically for your superintendent um that being said the summary associated with each of these goals that describes the administration's reasoning um is I find to be very very helpful in terms of helping me understand how they got to where they got now just because that's how they got there doesn't mean you have to agree with them but I think it is incredibly helpful for your Administration to be transparent with you in their thinking of how they arrived at their recommendation other questions or comments about goal one does anyone have feedback to share sure thank you I I'm I'm just glad obviously that we finally have our 2021 data um so that we can include it um to
014me forward it was you know keeping us from being able to have that accurate picture of where we are um and I I just want to comment it's not really a question but just a comment that I think it's very this goal is very reflective of what I'm hearing in the community of where one not our singular Focus but one uh area where we absolutely need to focus and I'm glad that it's stated very specifically um that the percent of Black and Hispanic third grade students where we are and where we need to be I think it's important that we name um the part of the house that's on fire um and and specifically direct resources to um to address it so I'm I'm pleased with this goal in general so since you surfac this
015I I would ask a followup so the original puts forth a singular metric that is looking at Black and Hispanic third grade students M the revision describes two separate metrics um black third grade students and Hispanic third grade students I'll only ever counsel you to adopt goals that have a singular metric so what this leaves you with only three separate options a singular metric that is about Black and Hispanic third grade students a singular metric that is about black third grade students or a singular metric that's about uh Hispanic third grade students I'd encourage you to select from one of those or certainly you can go a different direction entirely but were you to sit with one of those three does one in particular resonate for you the first I think they both need to
016be named and I guess that would mean we would have to come up with a number and go back to staff for a recommendation on on how to what that actual number would be I'm sorry of what that actual number would be yes that would be where I would be leaning based off of what you just described state that again when you said the third um the first one cuz he said we're either going to have restate okay that there would need to be a number that captur both Black and Hispanic like an average of the two yes some sort of way maybe based off of our demographics like percentage you know to better understand which is where we would need staff to help us understand how best because I don't know that you could
017just add them together and divide it by two if that would give us the right number we actually probably need to look at the number well so so essentially the difference described here in the original version you have uh your denominator is uh the sum of all third grade Black and Hispanic students your other options as I'm looking at this document is instead the denominator could be the sum of all black third grade students or the sum of all Hispanic third grade students or we could add one more goal oh or you could have a entirely separate goal one specifically for black third grade students one specifically foric third grade students I would be really up uh disheartened if we tried to do that because we all already understand that the more goals we set
018the less likely we're going to achieve anything there is a relationship uh between the number of goals and the likelihood that you will actually achieve them U said differently the board that focuses on everything is actually a board that focuses on nothing we don't have interim goals here yet but if we had the average I would think the interim goal an interim goal on black would be predictive of the average and an interim goal on Hispanic would be predictive of the average so when I see other school systems that have gone the way that your original draft is written uh where they're looking at U show us um where all of our black and Hispanics their great students are at then it is very common for the superintendent to come back with a interim goal
019one of their interim goals is specifically looking at black student performance one interim goal is specifically looking at spending student performance and so on and so forth and so if you choose not to have them disaggregated in the goal don't be surprised if the administration winds up disaggregating them in the interim goals okay it's a reasonable Direction I don't know that they'll go that direction but it's it's a common direction that I've seen other administrations go okay yes ma'am I'm comfortable with the um using the aggregate average in the of the Black and Hispanic students in the G and just the only technical thing I would say is that we shouldn't use CCR it should be spelled out in the in the goal career in college ready uh uh I certainly agree with that the
020latter part is that you want this to be in as much as plain language as possible and so spelling things out instead of relying on educator speak that being said I want to check you all's math on this I've heard multiple people refer to an average and that is certainly one way at arriving um at the data that is not the way that immediately occurs to me uh the way that immediately occurs to me is I would add up all the students who fit the board's descriptor and then of that pull of students I'd figure out how many students met the criteria that is not going to reveal an average uh it's I guess mathematically possible depending on how many students there are that uh It could wind up being the same as an average
021but it's not actually um the mathematical function is not actually averaging them together if you that is what you want you can to be blunt I don't know why you would that makes sense is this based on when we look at this where students are today as we begin to look at where we want them to be is this where they are today and I guess this looks at October 21 right this October 21 but what is the inim goal here that we've looked at um and as your board chair pointed out earlier um you are current ly not presented with that and so what would happen is first we'll get clarity on where you all stand on what's the goal that you want and then based on that your Administration to get this far
022your Administration probably already has them in their back pocket they're just waiting for the board's Clarity uh before stepping forward with them Mr string so the goal that's set here for October 20124 is third graders in October 2024 who are currently gardeners the goal that's proposed is for October 2025 who are currently in pre or not enrolled at all and so the numbers with regards to this past year or two are immaterial for that population that population is fully in school this year we certainly hope they will continue to be fully in school and fully in school the next year and the next year and the next year year so we've been tracking around a third and we wanted to significantly improve that in 2018 we said and it was an ambitious goal we wanted
023to close that by 50% and so that's what's reflected in the goal here the proposed revision uses numbers that are immaterial to that population in order to reset those figures and reset those expectations to get back to the same place we are today which we would expect those students to get to over the next couple of years so I would propose we stay with the ones that we set because those are the expectations we have of today's kindergarteners and those that are in prek are not yet enrolled I would I I I I certainly won't subscribe to changing the expectations for our work for our students and with their families and Community to lift these um this third grade literacy number very substantially between now and October of 2024 or 2025 so if I'm understanding
024correctly uh it sounds like your observation is that the board's original intent was to go from somewhere in the range of 30s to somewhere in the range of 60s um and you were uncomfortable with by 2025 winding up somewhere in the range of the 30s or 40s you were expecting to make much more for a population of students who were not impact Ed in terms of their in school experience because they're kindergarteners today so but the impact is still being felt today I would say I mean yes they are in in in school which is a big difference the the the question being asked is is the harm that your current cohort of third graders experiencing has that been equally visit upon your current cohort of pre 3K students but that I is that the
025point you're making absolutely thank you uh I I think it's I think it is a reasonable question what we don't have here is data that helps uh illuminate that um some type of insight into uh the performance of our uh four-year-olds this year relative to where they were uh last year's three-year-olds in U our prek programming uh and if we look at that and we looked at the variance of that compared to historically maybe that would give us some insight as whether or not that's the case but um but you're right with what's presented we don't actually know that that's the case but the data uh certainly seems to assume that there is a similar level of harm well what we do know is that our prek enrollment is way down for whatever reason potentially
026because of fears of not being able to be vaccinated ated Margaret I see Mr Strange's point a couple things I want to say um I I would like to stick with 2024 um in general because that's where our strategic plan has has been and I think that's just uh we're going to modify some numbers and goals within that strategic plan but I would like to stay there and I noticed that some of the other I mean I think we've staff has has initiated that I think we can modify the goals to realistically reflect what's going to happen in 2024 so I would I would like to put that forward um the other thing I do see what Mr strain is saying and I think our goal two certainly can and we're not there but I'm
027just those are those are those are students that we know we've had uh in elementary school and we can can expect that the the learning issues that we've all endured from the pandemic will will be present so I would like to have that looked at the only thing is in in in the first goal in terms of our our numbers um you know we're not going to our our current third graders and second graders are definitely going to be impacted so we're going to see that variance so even though we're looking we're basing this on the kindergarteners we're still majority of the time looking at students that have been in our school so I think I'm not I'm not completely comfortable with what I see here um and I think that's a good thought to
028go back and look at that there may be some modification there where we can say that our kindergarteners and first graders may have gains greater gains and then our younger students our older students wouldn't and that may factor into to where we want to go eventually it's a lot it's very confusing are you going to talk and come to you bana I was just saying I agree and I do think we need to continue to look at 2024 that has been our our reach that has been our goal and as we look at the needs right now I think we want to look at can we reach the needs of our students as soon as possible so I do think we still need to look at 2025 and I agree that we need to take
029a look at where our kindergarteners are as they will be the third graders we're talking about before I come to you Miss Feller um superintendent WI can you speak to um the 2025 and is that is that a Runway sort of issue or yes thank you madam chair um so as um I think is generally understood that we have a a 4-year uh strategic plan and what we're proposing here is that uh we reset our Baseline um to 2020 2021 um school year um so that is that's what we're recommending which would then push the Strategic plan or extended out um beyond the current strategic plan that we have now miss fower thank you what I wanted to state was the goals that we have in place I don't want them to be too too
030forward meaning that our students are going to be more worried about the goals rather than producing Learners our teachers are going to be more worried about meeting the goals that we have projected for them instead of worrying about teaching and our students learning um I agree with Mr strain as he stated that it could be too steep of a goal especially due to the pandemic and exua circumstances that our students have been facing however I don't want us to limit ourselves I love superintendent's recommendation to reset the Baseline to 2021 due to the validity of 2020 and half of 2021 our students are still going through a lot in 2021 and the school year of 2021 and 2022 so we need to bear that in mind whenever we are creating the goals and guard rails
031I like the proposed revisions thus far I understand um Mrs deara issue with seeing the importance of people of color African-American and Hispanic students however we have seen a decline in all of our race and ethnicities but I do agree African-American and Hispanic students have been hit the hardest when it's come to the pandemic due to different systematic issues thank you so so far what I'm hearing with Goal one um I'm so I'm trying to listen for consensus and so if I miss it then so be it just correct me and tell me what you think the consensus is so so far what I feel like I'm hearing is a consensus sounds something more like uh maintaining the percentage of Black and Hispanic third grade students rather than separating them out uh making sure that
032College and Career Readiness is spelled all the way out not merely abbreviated um uh bumping the Baseline to October 2021 however keeping the target at October 2024 which if that is the consensus uh the only thing that then we still don't have data to clarify is what the starting point would be right now it's 32.5 um Mr superintendent do is that accurate or is that an accurate depiction of where Black and Hispanic third grade students are for 20 October 2019 that is correct for 19 but what we do you happen to have or do somebody on your team happen to have what that number is for 2021 I can make sure that we that information okay U so then what we would need is the combined number for the combined percentage for October 2021 rather
033than 2029 and then based on that the board would need to make the final decision on how essentially how aggressive do you want to be with this right now it's indicated at 65% by October 2024 uh my guess from looking at your data is that when the superintendent gives us the October 2021 data it's going to be something uh less than 32.5% um and so at that point the board will need to have some dialogue around exactly how aggressive do you want to be U Mr superintendent my recommendation your team comes prepared with a recommendation on on that but ultimately the final decision uh certainly is the board's yeah Sean so so I want to go back first of all I uh miscalculated so our third graders in 2024 are currently first graders um so
034I wanted to correct that but the other piece that I think is really important here is actually keeping our start date and reflecting the fact that in October 2019 for the previous year the number was 32.5 the next year October of 2020 we didn't actually have data the next year October of 2021 um we had data and it was troubling at best right and it and it spoke volumes of the the difficulties that are students faced and we faced in terms of meeting their needs but I think it's important to keep that to reflect that the additional years as they go back right we're going to see that rebound because then it will be multiple years in school and we will be advancing it I'm I'm uncomfortable kind of resetting everything rather than telling the
035full story we set these goals we've got the data from October of 19 and it just reflects the fact that we've got a a gap year where we don't have data and then it falls far but we'll see it recover and that recovery reflects the work that that we must do to meet our students needs and getting them back on track and so it's important that we actually you know instead of just resetting everything and saying okay well we're starting here no no no the the every one of these represents a class of students right a a a a cohort of students that's matriculating through our system and so I think it's important that we maintain the October 2019 and October 2024 that are reflective of the May testing the that year and that we
036keep keep the goal and shoot as high as we possibly can to try and meet it and and what I want to hear Mr superintendent is what's the plan what do you need what do we need to do in our in our classrooms in our schools in our communities in order to do this because it's critical for our students so I want to check in with other board members essentially the challenge I'm hearing is do we want to Benchmark ourselves against pre-pandemic data October of 19 or do we want to Benchmark ourselves against post pandemic or quasi post uh October 2021 um and I'm not even going to restate it casan I think uh accurately describes some of the pros and cons of those two positions that being said it falls to you all what
037say you I'm going to weigh in um I think if we start with if we if we keep the 2019 data as the start date that's like um or the sorry the earlier the earlier year as the start date that's like pretending that covid didn't happen and it did happen and it had a profound impact and we have to acknowledge that and I want our end goal our end Target to be yes aggressive and attainable um but we have to acknowledge that we've we co happened and it is still happening and it's still impacting us and and and it's going to be a rolling impact for quite some time for our kids all right so if I can ask a followup question one of the things that Brian uh very accurately pointed out is that
038the goals the board sets has a culture creation component to it and when you say this is the vision of the community and we're going to apply our resources aggressively toward it that has an impact on the culture of the organization Brian describes some fears about one side of that impact what happens if it leads people to be you know so obsessed with the goal that they behave in suboptimal ways but I would ask you as a followup question to your statement what concerns do you have about the opposite uh cultural impact where we Norm down to a new lower expectation we don't want that either if I could share um I don't want to use the 2019 I think I agree with my co my chair that that's pretending like Co never existed um
039the 2021 numbers are real they are factual uh I'm not sure we have talked about we if we try to set separate the blacks and Hispanics and make it two goals I think we we dilute our ability to move forward with goals that we're going to work on did we decide to put the two together and just we did and that's the consensus I've heard so far but if I'm wrong you all know how to correct me yeah okay I wasn't clear from the discussion whether that was a consensus that we're going to that we could put the two together and just say we're going to have one goal starting with 2021 and then set the end point um not hearing whether we've made a decision whether to go with the 2024 or 2025 I
040don't know did we yeah not everyone is weighed in and I forgot to mention with that one I um I I see the value of sticking with 2024 because that is when our current strategic plan ends I also understand that we may need a little bit more of a Runway to recover from covid so um I could go either way I mean I could be convinced either way yeah I'm I'm a bit more interested in staying with the 2024 I don't want to string this out so long I want to know what we've done and when we when we did it so another oh we haven't heard from Ronda yet yes I'd love to speak so I do agree with Mr strain I think not to include the original where we originally were before covid
041is not giving us a very accurate picture and I ALS so I I I support that I don't I think it's one of those things where no matter what we're going to do over the the the rest of our lifetimes most likely there's going to be an asteris for those couple of years and I think not to to acknowledge that and just to act like I mean I think we to acknowledge that it's there and just with an aster I think we have to say that that's where we were and and that's where we ended up and now we need to this is where we need to get to miss chip right I think when you think about and like what Miss fow and when you think about goals you don't separate that from the
042fact that we want to teach children and we want to make sure the students are going to move as far as they can go each year so you don't forgive a year you don't say what this happened and so it's okay you want to teach to the potential of every child and the goal for every teacher in a classroom is to move those children as far as they can move them each year even though that may be a high goal you want to reach as far as you can go so you don't fall low so it's just like saying I'm going Reach for the Stars I'm going reach as far as I can go with every child every year and it's not just about a goal it's about student learning and we got students that
043are seniors where do we want them to be this year even though they experien the pandemic so each when we look at goals we're looking at students moving students as far as we can move them every year and these goals should be indicative of that how far can we move these children cuz these children don't have maybe the next year and the next year to get there they have this year and how far can we move them this year so it's about achievement not just about well it's a goal and yes teachers are going to be concerned but it's about teaching students and moving students which where do you land on the conversation then uh I wasn't quite clear you thinking more of 20 2019 or 2021 well I'm looking at the 2019 and the
0442024 because I'm saying those we know this happened but we don't want to say well let's not look at a higher goal or reach high because in the proposed revisions we are not reaching as high we want to reach because we're saying this is because of the pandemic this is where they are but do we expect them to reach for example when we start talking about a student at his College and Career ready or four or five so we have a student that's a level one so do we say we're not going to push that student as far as we can to get them College and Career ready in one year because you may only have that you only have that one year to get them there when you're looking at the goals and how
045they're going to achieve thank you Ruby did you want to be did you want to be heard on this issue M Jones did you want to be heard on this issue no okay um so what I am hearing is a near perfect split um on this idea of 2019 versus 20 21 that's why I was trying to you know sneak another board member into the conversation and see if it lean us one way or the other uh Margaret what are you thinking I think that the the end is the more important number here I mean we can we can talk about I think we all know what's happened and um you know I also want to be realistic I mean I don't want to throw a number out there that there's no way in the
046world I we have miracle workers in our schools they do not walk around with magic wands and I think we have to be very realistic about this and so I think too we've seen that the first part of our year and and I know for us and for every district and every person I've talked to all over the country and the state it's just been a tough a tough thing and so we're not making the progress that we wanted to make I'm just going to be real about that so I think that um I'm more concerned about where we end than how we you know mess around talking about how we started but to that point I want to have good stretch goals but they become meaningless if there this thing that no one in
047the world can accomplish um so I so it's it's a balance there I think we can we can send a message but to send to send something that's Out Of Reach is I think harmful to our district and to our students and staff Rihanna I agree with Mrs Marshall um the data was never amazing it was never great for our Black and Hispanic students starting from 2021 or 2019 it was terrible from the beginning and we need to acknowledge that and we know that that's is what that's why we're having this conversation now I'm saying that to say like Miss Marshall stated it does it doesn't really matter if we say 21 2021 or 2019 because they're both bad we're just picking which one is worse at this point I stated 2021 in order to
048give ourself more time in order to grow from 2021 that's why I stated that I like the um reset Baseline however like Mrs Marshall said I'm more looking towards where we going to end where what what goal are we going to set and how are we going to obtain that goal for our Black and Hispanic students because right now frankly we're failing them we're failing our kindergardeners and our first graders and like Mr Sean said in 2024 our first graders are going to be third graders what goals are we going to have in order to see profound um differences and an increase and if that means we have to start from 2019 that's fine with me however I don't want to create these unrealistic expectations and nothing gets done and we're still in the same
049spot so what I'm saying is 2021 2019 it's okay let's just make great goals for our students and see profound um differences thank you man' Jennifer um another way to look at this as far as the asterisk is concerned is if we we could leave the recommendation to start it at 2021 but with the asterisk being always on data that we're publishing that we could you know you know have a link back if we wanted to look back to 2018 but as far as the actual plan and the goal that's here started at 2021 I just wanted to offer that I'm fine with uh doing 2024 I recognize um the comments that have been made and given the fact that we're still in the pandemic um and we don't know exactly how we're coming out
050of this how much longer this is going to extend even in the current situation that we're in it might be a good idea to set it at 2024 leave that piece there um so that we're forced as a board um to re-evaluate you know sooner based on you know a year from now I mean we we'll be looking at that a year from now and hopefully then we'll have some let's hope clear idea of how we're coming out of this pandemic so could I mean I'm just sort of offering that as like a compromise because I think that's what we're looking for some sort of consensus I know we're not voting on anything but then as a a start starting point to move forward to the next one yeah before we know it it's going
051to be time to dig in and start the community engagement for the next six-year strategic plan so a as a invitation to move to goal number two uh I feel like we've actually run around the barn a couple times and are back at the front um my recommendation uh to the board which you certainly are under no obligation to adhere to is to Simply leave goal number one um as currently written um as your superintendent then at your next meeting to bring a set of annual targets for that goal U as written so you'd see the 2019 data a blank for you'd see 2020 but there' be no data and you'd see 2021 data and then the superintendent would offer projections for where he believes the district uh could get to 22 23 and and
052then ultimately by 2024 and so you'd have the goal is written you'd have annual targets for every year from 2019 to 2024 where obviously 19 20 and 21 are already known numbers and then underneath of that you'd have a set of three interm goals that would give you some more insight into how your superintendent would intend to uh monitor progress relative to that goal uh on a month-by-month quarter by quarter basis um once you see those interim goals that might offer some clarity that I suspect we're not going to Garner from pursuing this conversation any further um is there a significant uh push back on that approach to essentially ask the administration to take the next step bring you the data back and then make any decisions about adjustments from there is there any significant
053dis Qui with that approach uh then with that my recommendation is that we pass one as drafted by the board back to the administration with the expectation at the 30th when we come back together again uh that we'll be able to see a set of interim goals uh first a set of annual targets for the goal itself 19 20 21 already established within 22 23 and 24 and then see a set of uh entm goals uh that is how the administration would intend to monitor prog uh that takes us then to number two uh and by the way now that we've surfaced some of the main issues my request is that we copy and paste generously uh so as to avoid rehashing discussion so for example um the board has expressed uh a near consensus
054not a complete consensus around sticking with 2024 so I would recommend that we just follow that through all the way with everything uh um and the board has expressed an interest to maintain a singular uh metric but that doesn't seem to be an issue anywhere else so that takes us to number two the percentage of ninth graders scoring of four or five on math one and of course will increase from X in 2019 to Y 2024 what the superintendent has done for you uh has filled uh filled in that Gap um by describing the 4.5% for October 2021 uh with a belief of being able to move that to 22.5 to October 2025 uh using the doctrine I just described we'd need the superintendent to bring back a 2024 uh number uh rather than 2025
055number but that being said uh now the floor is open on goal two uh what what Reflections do you have what things would you keep what things would you modify M Marshall one thing I think we need to recognize and and this could color our discussion back on goal one is that um the test was rored uh in 201920 so you had two things happening you had renorming and then you've had pandemic and so I think those numbers are really misleading for us to look at and I but but we probably do need to be consistent on whether or not you know we're going forward but I think the conversation we've had with some Community Partners and and and our county has that that's that's certainly distressing but the the business rules and the and
056the renorming happened and so um it's it's just the goalpost really got moved so I think that's that's fair for us to consider so I'd like to keep that 2021 number there I'd like again to stay 2024 uh and that and that number the 22.5 is probably going to go down so that's that's that's tough um math scores across the state I think are so alarming and and we just our standards aren't aren't in line so um anyway that's a thing so let me just I'll stop talking to see what everybody else says other thoughts on goal number two Sean so Morgan I think that the renorming took place and was effective in 1819 and so the 1819 scores reflect the new Norms I if I'm reading this correctly um Mr superintendent do you or
057someone on your team know yes the in in 1819 the new achievement levels um and scale scores were introduced for math one so that is accurate but but that would be but that's our start typically that's been our starting point for the um so 1819 had the new okay okay sorry thank you yeah so so if if that's the case and I agree right if if they were rorm and then they yeah changed significantly then we we would have to address that in this case I'm not sure it's material and so my question is what what was the CCR rate in October 2019 for the 1819 school year uh do we have that data I don't have that at my f tips but uh we can provide that information other question in the in the
058in the board's um proposal here um that was the figure starting from 1819 and through to consistent with our goals in in the 2018 strategic plan or the 2024 strategic plan then that would have uh closed by 50% so if that number were 60 then it would close to 80 right by 50% and so we need that number to understand what our starting point was again given the conversation earlier our current nth grader or our current seventh graders will be taking that these this number is going to reflect what our current seventh graders end up doing and so it was sort of late fifth and sixth grade that was significantly impacted by the pandemic and our decisions during it and so they've got three years to to recover and and the question is during that
059period you know how how far do do those kids are we able to to help them recover and so it's difficult to even look at numbers here because these numbers from last year again are immaterial because this is a completely different set of kids that will have the next 3 years to to recover to a position that the kids pre pandemic were performing and Beyond right so our goals should should should be reflective of the fact that um with with these same Norms our students were performing at a certain uh proficiency rate on these standardized tests and in the future you know although impacted there are several several years to recover and so I don't know what those numbers are and so in order to have the conversation I would propose again that we keep
060these same dates and we work toward those objectives but the the exam question that was was given was what what are those numbers and so that the X here was the um College and Career Readiness rate for math one of our nth graders in uh the 181 19 year and we'll need that data in the 1819 or in the 1920 year no it's the 1819 year that then gets published in October September October of 2019 got it got it got it other questions or comments about goal two well I I think we're going to have the same like you said copy and paste the same dilemma of are we starting with 2019 or are we starting with 2021 yeah um and and and you pointed out that with the first goal that getting suggested annual
061targets um will help inform that decision is that what I heard in which case that would be the case for this goal too that that's correct that's what I'd recommend when you have the full set of data in front of you at the at your next meeting and I think it'll be a little bit easier uh right now uh it feels a little bit hypothetical around the days um I think when you you have the hard data in front of you it'll be easier to make a rational decision about what is what is the message that you're trying to send um and which number you Benchmark off will send different messages um but I think when you I think it'll be easier to be clear about that in your mind when you're actually looking at
062the data in front of you and saying okay we want to this is the message that we want to send with our goals or this is the message uh but without the data in front of you right now uh I I it it just feels a little bit foggy um until we can cure that by setting that question aside and addressing it once we have the data other questions or thoughts Jennifer what's on your mind just a quick comment for the Public's knowledge if you've not been following along as we've been having these workshops since the first of the year um I just think it's important to understand that we do have many students who take math one in eighth grade and I understand some even in seventh um they typically are the students who
063are you know more advanced and they're taking that math one on earlier so these are not all of math one scores but simply math one in ninth grade uh and we've seen that dip across um the state um I just wanted to sort of point that out for cont greater context for the community that's looking and like what's going on in math that there is a whole other subset of math one students who are taking it in eth grade that just aren't reflected in these numbers so I've had another board we had some similar issues with assessment um in Texas and I saw several boards in response adopted goals that essentially said instead of the percent of nth graders scoring four or five on the math one EOC course um they essentially said the percentage
064of ninth graders you know who have by ninth grade scored a four or five and so what that does that expands once again expands the denominator Beyond just a scope of 9th graders who took EOC in 9th grade and expands it to all ninth graders who have taken who have taken the course to that point whether they took it in eighth grade or nth grade um um and then that certainly will a more accurate uh number that describes your student body's success with this particular exam what you all have to decide is that the thing that you're trying to lean into or are you trying to specifically lean into nth grade the the performance experience specifically in the nth grade but I think either of those I think you all have to decide which of
065those makes sense for what you're trying to accomplish but I think either of those are viable uh I want to you know come across field I think Carol did I see a hand go up and then we'll swing back this way yeah I just I I do think it's important I realize there's public confusion about the who's who's counted in the ninth grade score but I think that is the population that we need to attend to and and just stick with that and provide the education we need to community members to ensure them that that is not the entire population um and I've just been sitting here just thinking about the time span and the work that we are doing this year in terms of building our capacity in this work and it's making me
066think that a 2025 um end date makes some sense in terms of allowing us to run through the process long enough with these goals to be better prepared to turn around and do the community engagement and the and the crafting of new goals for a next pathway I'm just sort of thinking C wise that it's it's I think it will be problematic turn it so there are two different ways of looking at that um and you all have to decide which of the two is more valid it's not something uh it's something that we'll actually wind up debating at the next meeting but one way of looking at this is the way that Carol describes which is do we need more time on the clock to actually Implement uh what is in the existing strategic
067plan uh another way of looking at it is we are going to rapidly learn with this system over the next two years and then we're going to quickly want to then write the next plan that comes after learning what we learned from two years of implementation of this one that's another way of looking at it and the only way reason I mentioned that is because I see boards go both directions I see a number of boards that say we need more time and they benefit from that I see a number of boards who to get about 2 years into this exact process and then realize all the things that they didn't realize at the beginning of the process and are now having appetite uh to revise which if you keep it to 24 gets you
068there sooner if you push out to 25 then you get to that revision step later so that's for you all to discern um and that is a debate that we'll pick up uh later this month um but there are two different sides of that I think the uh the side that Carol brings up is an important one to consider have you given your Administration up Runway the other side to consider is um you given that this is such a new process and you're dealing with postco effects do you want a shorter Runway before you go through the process of iteration again uh I was certain I saw a hand on this side of the room yeah Margaret I think another thing we've got to remember is the state is is is there's confusion often times
069with what the state reports if if we if we I think try even though I like what you're saying and I think we can put that in a footnote um in terms of what the whole population by nth grade has done but I do think we kind of will probably need to stick pretty close to what the state metrics are because I think that's what that's what we're going to be measured on on a Statewide basis I don't think Jennifer was proposing a change to the go not at all not at all no no and and to be fair marget that is consistent with the consensus I heard from this board the first time you drafted these to begin with is that you all did want to look at school system performance through a lens
070that is similar um if not identical to the to the way that your community is going to be presenting that data by the state um and that certainly makes sense what I'm hearing so far goal number two sounds a whole lot like goal number one um is that what we'll do is it sounds like the intention is to sit on it and then with the benefit of additional data uh come back again on the 30th and try to decide which way do we want to land on that critical question of 19 versus 21 but then at least you'll have the data in front of you which will make that a slightly easier decision other question to comments on goal two before you transition to goal three goal three the percentage of graduates earning a State
071High School endorsement will increase from X and June 2018 to by June 2025 the proposed revision uh looked um once again translates to June 2021 instead of June 2018 or 19 uh but then actually plugs in actual percentages looking at 61.2% of high schoolers earning an endorsement in 2021 and hoping to move that to 3/4 of students by June 2025 um again using the principles that we've already honed so far in this conversation um the 2018 will likely stand though I'm certainly open to hearing an argument why that should be 2019 instead of 2018 um but then the um the June 2025 you decide should that reflect the previous on to be 2024 as well or leave it at the original that the board put which is 2025 what questions comments do you have about
072goal number three so I think we need to be consistent what whatever we decide if the start date's 2019 it should be that for all if the start date's 2021 it should be that for all if the end date's 2024 should be that for all or 2025 for all I agree any other comments or questions about goal number three that's the answer I like to hear all right that takes us to goal number four the percent of schools whose growth index exceeds zero will increase from x% in October 2018 to 100% by October 25 I really really really enjoyed this conversation the first time you all had it um however now having read uh the administration's response uh they have some concerns about the way that the data uh is being used um and clearly
073want you all to have a conversation about that so what the what the administration's note is suggesting is that the way that you've originally described this uh growth index exceeding zero um doesn't they don't feel as an accurate um use of uh the data set and instead would recommend uh the percent of schools who met or exceeded expected Evas growth will grow from 71% in October 19 to 85% in October 25 obviously we correct that 25 through 24 but the larger question of are you look do you want to keep the growth index to exceed zero or do you want to look at the percent of schools who met or exceeded their expected Evas growth the floor is open uh I think the person who spoke most aggressively for this was Sean so uh I
074know whether you wanted me to start or finish let's get the party started what say you all right so um saying meets means exceeds -2 rather than exceeds zero that's meets is exceeds -2 because Meats is between -2 and two and so this is lowered the bar to -2 rather than zero the statement that um an evos index of less than zero does not reflect negative growth it does reflect growth less than the statistical average for the cohort that's what it that's what it absolutely means and so I'm saying we should focus on a number that is more than the statistical average of the cohort which is greater than zero what meets does is lowers that standard to -2 in that particular calculation so I'm not a fan of lowering the standard I'm a fan
075of saying we really want all of our schools with the effort that we're putting in with the resources we're putting in to be above the statistical average for the cohort across the state and you're saying uh by having meets um that corresponds to a growth index of -2 which is actually below the average for that cohort that's correct whereas zero would be at the average for the cohort that is correct um I don't know if there are any number nerds in the room who want to speak to this I'm actually very much not a numbers nerd but I am I think what you're speaking to speaks to the problem of evos and so I have a fundamental problem with using evos for that very reason that you just described I am a big fan of
076having a growth score I think we can use growth I'm not opposed to that but the very nature that Evas Compares us to this just statistical average of a cohort comparing us with other districts I just I don't know I know we've had this conversation before I think at some point we need to revisit it I'm just I just would like to see a different proposal for how we can measure growth and use it as a goal but not use evos because part of our goal as I'm understanding of why in the spirit in which we develop this and deliver this to the community and engage with the community is they need to be able to understand it and there is nothing about Evas that is easy or understandable in my opinion um maybe because
077I'm not a numbers nerd but um it's just food for thought I I think we need to look at a different measurement altoe are there other uh I'll come to you second Carol are there other recommendations either from the administration or other board members uh I what I hear J for saying is that growth is the right thing to track and based on the previous conversation I feel like we overwhelmingly heard that from the board that you want to have something that looks at growth um are there other indicators of growth that um you were putting forward or that somebody else would put forward uh separate apart from evos which as I understand evos is uh Statewide um you know cohort you know growth data is is there a district specific uh growth metric that
078you use Mr crbo I can um take this back to our team and uh be prepared to follow up U with the board you know this particular Target um of of all was very difficult um because it you know because no matter how well our schools do it really is dependent upon how well everyone else does exactly exactly exactly and that that was the challenge particular challenge with this particular Target and the formula by which evos calculates that is something that not many people understand in fact it's proprietary I understand it's a black box oh so so so here's the thing um I would encourage you all to heavily lean into the previous consensus around um a measurement of growth and um I I personally am a fan of student growth percentiles and other Statewide
079um attempts to uh describe growth uh relative uh to cohorts uh I I think it's a great model but if the collective assertion of the board is that folks don't understand it then really that gives you two options you need to make take it upon yourselves to help it be understood or you need pick something else uh I would I would join you in the assertion that it's not entirely useful to have goals that people don't understand and don't have a sense of if I change my adult Behavior it might actually have an impact on this and so if it's if your assertion is that it's not understood and you keep it then you take onto yourselves responsibility of helping make it understood and that could be a really beautiful thing that you do in
080the community or if you're not prepared to do that or you just don't have confidence in the metric then you need to find something else I will warn you um where this is going your admin your superintendent is kind enough not to say it outright but almost certainly if you're going to have a growth metric if you don't already have one ready at your fingertips the district then is a board what you're obligating your Administration to do is to implement one um and that's going to trigger larger conversations around uh quantity and quality of assessment that is District derived rather than State derived now I personally would not encourage you to shy away from that if what you need to do is to deploy additional assessment processes in order to get meaningful data about your
081students then that is the wise thing you must do um but that's something you all have to decide is that necessary is the state data useful is it not useful if we're not going to use the state data are we going to develop our own system and deploy that but just understand that saying no to one data set largely obligates you to developing your own and if that doesn't already exist that means going through some process of adding that into play so uh let me check in with the super tied before we come over here because I know Carol and Lenor about to jump all over me in a second um and then we'll come over to barar Fel as well um Mr superintendent you are your sense you need to check back with a
082team and figure out and bring a proposal about this or is there something that's already in the works around a growth a district derived growth metric rather than a state one we could come back to the board with a recommendation uh so it sounds like so I'm I'm trying to read between the lines here help me out so does something already exist at the district level or is that something that would have to be developed U so we do have uh growth you talked about student growth metrics um so we do have growth metrics at the district level uh Just landing on what which one we think is the best one to put forth is where I don't want to prematurely recommend something that before having a larger conversation with my team yeah um one
083of the things that your superintendent may find out as he goes back to investigate this and I don't know this to be certain I'm just guessing from experience it may be the case that the growth related instruments that are deployed are not deployed at the same uh percentage as the state assessments so your state assessments are probably experienced by somewhere north of 97 98% of your students uh in-house growth metrics often fall far short of that you know frequently more in the it's not uncommon to find them in the 60s 7s per which means that there are large tracks of students who you don't have data on and so at that point you have to decide to be comfortable with a data set that is smaller or you need to apply that assessment to the
084additional students who are currently not experiencing it like I said I only put all of this out here is because I don't want you to be blindsided by the ramifications of this exact conversation there are a lot of there's a lot of complexity here and you all are ultimately going to be responsible for deciding which way you go on it so we're going to start over here uh Carol Lenor make our way around Thelma uh what say you on goal number four um I'll say kind of what I said when this initially was brought up that I would prefer not to have this metric at all I think especially if I'm hearing folks wanting to have a 2024 end date um I think we have three solid goals that will demonstrate student growth which I
085think is frankly more important than the Met exceeded School aggregate numbers that um is in the proposed uh plan um so I um and the the growth score that the evi system we I don't think there are ways to um coach to improve your Eva score you don't think it's instruct sufficiently instruction is sensitive yeah I mean I think it shows up in all the other it'll show up in our you can coach to improve proficiency but I think it's hard to coach to a statistical blackbox um so I would would be happy with three goals that we have so far identified Lenora where you at um I'm familiar with Evas data and um was in the schools using when Evas data as a growth measure it is difficult it can be complicated it is
086it was very hard for teachers based on looking at their particular class and all the students that were involved in their class that would be looked at for growth I did think it had some value um in looking at growth and how that teacher had worked with those particular students that year and the growth that they made um it this index it is it is a difficult uh process and one to understand but I did think it had value in terms of looking at even for the administration what the administrator how much the administrator had performed and it it was a totally valuative piece um so I think it had value I just think it is a difficult measure and it was difficult on teachers and schools to bring all this data together but it
087is it was used with the state when you talk about goals the percentage of goals and then the percentage of grth this is a state was a St is a state measure well so let me ask the question that was brought up do you believe this that the evos uh as a system is something that uh you all as a governing team uh could effectively go explain uh to your community I think it would take yes it would take some real coaching and work to look at this to to be able to explain it well you do have a coach M okay I'm just saying if that's the direction you want to go I'll gladly support you in that I've had to explain these type of things um in other public you know forums and
088so it is doable but I don't know Evas as well as you know it um and so I don't know if how easily explained you feel like it would be but it sounds like you think it's doable if that was the way the board had to go and I think if we have other really good growth measures that we're using that we're looking at and I see wanting to say something up there uh then I think that's we would need to talk about that what other really good growth measures do we have cuz evos does do that it does bring that growth piece into play I just what are you trying to say Carol before we come down to FMA um I wasn't sure if there was any I mean one of the things that
089would come after establishing these goals is what interim measures would be used and I don't know of any evos predictors it's a it's an end of the year thing an end of the year grow I don't think that there's anything that we create that predicts that that you know would be a checkin on the Evas score at the end of the year yeah uh conveniently that is a headache for Frank and his team um because and what I suspected they'd have to do is they'd have to pull up that data set and then atively look at other data sets to figure out you know what's the degree of correlation between these other data sets and that and see if there's anything that I if your point is uh is accurate to see if there's anything
090like normally I'd say north of 0.5 but maybe even north of you know. 35 I mean even U but that that' be on them to try to figure out is there something that has a sufficiently you know moderate or strong correlation that the board could actually rely on but but uh your larger point is accurate if the administration comes back and says we actually have no data sets uh that correlate with this meaningfully then the options are we start implementing assessments that are correlated or board you might want to pick something else but that again that is a conversation uh for the 30th because when we leave out of here whatever is on paper here the administration is going to have to put together some interims and then so that we can have that conversation
091but it but your point is well made it could be that they come back and say we don't currently have any so if you all want to keep this that means we're going to have to add assessment in place that does have a sufficiently strong uh correlate that that we I mean if we don't have that in place I don't see how you could create that assessment that would do that in the course of the two years that we're trying to do this I mean that you can't it's going to it would be a multi-year effort to get something that and that would be their job to bring back and highlight their first call is probably going to be to the state felma what's on your mind can I just do a time check I
092just want to point out to everybody that I'm hoping we can get through our guard rails tonight and theoretically we're stopping at 8 because we got to get through the rest of the meeting um I'm sitting here shaking my head um I am not willing to put our staff to the task of trying to create Pro metric for us because evos doesn't work and I'm willing to scrap it and then go back to our first goal where we we combine blacks and Hispanics and separate them out and make the blacks number one and Hispanics number two and uh the third one make three number four so Thelma basically wants to take Carol's idea of scrapping number four and then with the space it's saved up she has a wish list that she'd like to fill
093in uh that spot instead by dividing one into two separate ones um so this is definitely a conversation that is entirely appropriate for y'all to have so if there are folks who feel very strongly about that this is certainly a time to make yourself heard um but before we dive into that um I think there's some more folks wanted to be heard on the growth metric before we transition to that anybody else um wanted to jump in on the conversation about evos yes Ronda what's on your mind yes so I would just remind my colleagues that for the last six years we've had a legislative goal to talk to the legislature about increasing growth over Proficiency in our performance grading calculations like we talk about growth all the time so then to say that we're
094not going to include it I guess we need to redo our legislative agenda we need to stop asking for that whole situation we need just give up I'm going to finish yeah of course I wasn't interrupting so I I do get I'm not a numbers wonk I'm more of a I'm a kind of a data wonk but not numeric but so that the 0% and all that I I do not have any issues actually with the way that the staff proposed revision was written with the percent who meet or exceeded goals our parents all look at that data the report cards you know and all that look at that data we we send out reports to people about that data and where our kids are with met and exceeded so for us to just drop
095growth as a goal for this board then I guess we need to rewrite the legislative agenda we need to stop talking about whether it's growth over performance at the state level good grief really people I mean I thought we got I thought we resolved this in that room up in 267 like three months ago so I'm just can't understand how we're now going backwards so we need to make we need to I would love to ask staff if there's other ways to do this um Mr Winston has said that there that he's going to go back to them I don't want them to have to do a monumentous amount of work to come up with some new assessment and measurement tool but perhaps there are things that exist within the system already that would help
096with this but for us to say that growth is not something that needs to be measured I I'm this board member will never agree to that that's all Jennifer um I think it's misleading for us to um to bring up the way that we talk about in our legislative agenda it is true that we have had it on there that is because the state requires us to use um 80% um of our proficiency and 20% of our growth do I have that right I say that right yes and so we have asked the legislature because they're they're forcing us to use it evos to make that 50/50 or 4951 so if we're going to be forced to use it then yes of course it would be great to have a better even score however that
097doesn't mean that we wouldn't probably many of us like a completely different system to use as far as growth is concerned so and as I stated from the beginning I do think growth is important um I'm not necessarily with u my colleague Vice Chair by Bar's Bailey at least at this point I think we maybe should consider a growth goal but I don't know that it should be Evas and so I think we need to separate that from the conversation around our legislative agenda because we are forced to use it we'd like we do have a a request to the legislature every year gets denied but we keep putting it out there because we'd like it to be more representative of what we're doing but um so it I I just think it's important that
098we state that yesan so um so it is the growth calculation that's used across the state and that is used to grade us so there there isn't another growth data point this is it and so if we're going to lower the bar from zero which was the initial proposal to -2 which is meets I'm not sure why we would lower the bar from 100% to 85% if anything that would go the other direction so my counter proposal would be to call it meets because of the statistical probability to say meets but 100% And it should be by October 2024 to be consistent with the others so evos growth score from whatever in October of 2019 for the others to 100% by October 2025 that uh that are Meats meats or exceeds other Reflections on go
099for before we transition uh so the probably the two most significant things I've heard then is what we just heard you know from Shan about switching to um from 85% to 100% from 2025 to 2024 um but then the other idea is stma's idea around well Carol's idea to scrap it and them's idea to replace it um so before we transition away from this because what I'm getting is this is another one that's going to probably stand as it is and then we'll see where we are when we have more data for it um but so before we transition away from Fort any other thoughts on the site on thema's idea Carol's idea of scrapping it entirely of scrapping a growth goal entirely or thema's idea of scrapping it and then replacing it anybody else
100want to jump on either of those bandwagons seeing none uh then uh Mr superintendent uh and again I'll forward all my notes to you but I suspect your team's taking more thorough notes than I am uh but it sounds like the most consistent um it sounds like there is the like the best approach is probably to bring uh the proposed revision but targeted at 2024 instead of 2025 um and then just be prepared to address Carol's question which is what are the interm goals you know for this thing you know what what actually is meaning meaningfully correlated uh to Evas such that the board could rely on that data as an indicator of growth um which sounds like a significant task for you and your team over the next few weeks um so happy holidays
101uh that takes us to guard rails um so in each of the three uh guard rails uh the Administration has provided a uh proposed revision um and uh the with the exception of the third one the only significant change I'm seeing in each of these is the polarity uh from negation language uh to permissive language I strongly encourage you to ignore that proposal from your Administration um I think that will lead you in a direction that would be ill advised um the recommendation inside of this work around guardrails is to be clear about what are the non-negotiables that may not be violated uh not to Simply provide another set of goals that must be pursued uh that may sound like a semantic difference but operationally I assure you is not one of those approaches uh
102implies that you're going to dedicate a lot more resources es to something um the other one does not um you do I do not counsel you uh to add three additional goals um that are just called guard rails I strongly encourage you to have a set of goals on one side says here's where we're going and a set of guard rails on the other side that says this is what we are not accepting on the journey to getting there the problem of changing the polarity is that it then begins to sound like we need to go here and we need to go here and that is not something that I recommend that being said what um is what I recommend that you consider right now are the proposed interim guard rails under each of these
103and as you look at them the critical question that I'd encourage you to ask yourselves is would these do these indicators reflect the interpretation of the guard ril that we intended if the answer is yes then we're clear to move forward if the answer is eh then we might want to have some conversation with the superintendent if the answer is no if the answer is of these interim guard rails these is they described proposed guard rail indicators if they do not match the board's interpret the understanding of the guard rail then it suggests that the superintendent's interpretation of your guard rail is very different than what you intended and the proper response as a board is most likely to modify the guard rail to be more explicit about what you intend so that's what's really
104on the table as you look at the interim guard rails your options are keep the guard rails like yep that matches what we were thinking um or modify the guard rail no that doesn't match what we were thinking we need to change this pretty significantly to offer more clarity to the administration and then let them try to come up with a new set of interims so that being the name of the game guard rail number one the superintendent will not allow inequitable treatment of students and families so the first question is uh do the proposed set of guard rail indicators kind of match your expectations as you were drafting uh this guard rail uh Carol is quick quick on the draw yeah they they partially capture um at least the intent I had but um
105the uh the Guard the guard rail specifically calls out families and there is no mention of families in the um guard rail indicators there is no so so one thing is you'd like to see something about families is there anything else about the indicators uh that doesn't match your expectation yeah um it doesn't talk about um I mean I think our current Equity policy calls out a lot of the values that are expressed and I would use that as a source for the values of equity expressed by the board so um the dispropor disproportionate suspensions is certainly in there but there are other things there as well that are called out in terms of access to um uh resources access to teachers access to to um um the uh co-curriculars that kind of thing yeah
106so to speed up this conversation are other people feeling the same way is Carol capturing other people's sentiments yeah so that that was what I presumed when I read this as well based on what I've heard from you all in conversation it sounds like the admin the superintendent's interpretation of inequitable treatment um differs markedly from what you were expecting ing where you were thinking it was something about distrib equitable distribution of resources this is really looking at did students feel treated uh equally um in fact it's actually entirely different term here you all described you know Equitable treatment this describes equal treatment um so when that happens I think there are two options one you can have that conversation with your superintendent right now and be like hey we we were thinking this a little
107bit differently were you thinking and calibrate and the superintendent will be like yep got it I I see what you're talk about Let Me Go a different direction or if the superintendent's interpretation is pretty firm based on what you've written then your task is to be clear is to accept that you were insufficiently clear in what you wrote and to write something that is more clearly descriptive of what you intended so with that being said does anyone have a is anyone who is um dissatisfied with the proposed guard rail indicators has have a recommended modification of the language that is more explicit and clear of what you did intend yeah so just building off of what Miss sawer said I I recall our previous conversation also including things around Equitable um language access for families
108for second language families for example um so not just during instruction time but even when we invite families parents into our schools for events Etc and so I think that sort of goes along with the same line I just wanted to mention that okay so I hear you describing instead of uh it sounds like you might modify it from saying inequitable treatment of students and families to inequitable access to resources for students and families maybe that's the rewarding inable access to resources and I would include human resources in that uh I I would resources the most important resource you have is the humans who work here uh your finances are important but secondary to that you can have all the money in the world but if you don't have good folks that won't help you
109and so yeah um if your superintendent needs you to spill that out um I would consider that slightly problematic um equitable distribution of resources hopefully is understood to mean Human Resources as well as Financial Resources the question is is that what you intend so uh that's one idea put forth by Jennifer any would else have ideas of if you were going to modify this to be more explicit about your intention uh what it might say I think that gets it uh uh so let me write something down Elise what do you think gets it the the changing if if if treatment was unclear in our guard rails I think access to resources perhaps is more clear distribution of resources human Human Resources inequitable access inequitable distribution oh and are we talking about and key word
110would be human resources if that's we're we're just assuming that's part of it we don't if you unless you just make that assumption yeah so so you you you want to be explicit uh inequitable uh access or distribution I didn't hear you distribution inequitable distribution of human and financial resources yes to students and families yes does the family still make sense in that context we don't really well can you repeat what you said never mind I didn't ask uh I'm having a challenge with um I think what the the interpretation that the St the uh proposed indicators addresses part of what the goal was about in that we think our students are experienced inequitable disciplinary treatment and I think these um his the goal the indicators are trying to reach that and by changing it
111to resources you run away from or ignore that is correct the treatment inequitable treatment would you prop receive what would you propose uh are you saying that so are you saying that you have an alternate edit or are you saying that for you the indicators actually work and that they do accomplish uh treatment that you're concerned about I think the the I'm not sure the way that they were trying to reach decisions around Equitable treatment but I think Equitable treatment was a a guard rail was a guard rail that we were describing when we said inequitable treatment we were talking about inequitable treatment of our students inequitable treatment of our families when they walk in the door um and that's different from resources Ruby what's on your mind and to that point the proposed guard
112rail indicators say nothing about families and and so you would want to see fames still be part of the conversation yeah I think we all do in the uh Sean what's on your mind yeah I think um I'm going to agree with my good friend Carol on this this this needs to be scrapped and go back to the equity policy that this board passed and go and write the indicators based on our Equity policy oh so you're suggesting actually leave the language and simply challenge the administration to use the equity policy as a source material rather than what whatever they used that they use our Equity policy to write the guardrail indicators because those are all in reports there's six areas of equity all of them have reports all of them have data so perhaps
113a modification that you would offer for clarity sake the superintendent will not allow inequitable treatment of students and families you know as described in our Equity policy y yeah yeah that's good that make sense because the equity policy captures the value that we're trying to convey and I know we're not supposed to dictate the um interims or the indicators but really if we were to try to explain the value we're trying to get across here it's in the equity policy um so a potential uh rewrite superintendent will not allow inequitable treatment as described in the equity policy of students and families yeah uh any significant unreadiness with that uh guard rail number two the superintendent will not deprive students of access to a curriculum that is Rich diverse and rigorous um as you look at
114the proposed indicators uh do they match your expect what you were intending with this guardrail yes k um to me it didn't um really reflect the the diversity of the curriculum um there wasn't any evidence of um students having full access to arts or CTE programs and that kind of thing so you're saying uh so I take it you're saying rigorous represented here but rich and diverse not so much yeah got it uh any modification you'd make to add more clarity I don't suppose you have a rich diverse and rigorous policy do you some the equity policy does speak to that yeah yes the equity policy does speak to that somewhat this this good old catch all Equity policy we could look at that yeah uh mind yeah um I think what you said about
115turning our guard rail into a goal is kind of what happened with this one too instead of doing do not do it turned into you will do right and that that misses the point of a guard rail yes so the problem is if your guard RS just become more goals it actually dilutes the focus on your goals yeah um and so I hear you surfacing a worry that that may be what's happening here so the question is is there any particular change in language of the guardrail that you think would better describe your intention well it sounds like we've got a eacy policy that addresses it anyone else have ideas on this and it may be that we been trying to not clearly understand what a how a guardwell functions that we turned a PO
116a goal into a a guard rail just by talking about it in talking about it in the negative it may be that we it is a value yeah it's a value a value this is stating a value I think I think this is a good one to stay with I think we can address it and I think it's a I think one of the Guard indicators we can still use I just think we can add um use our Equity policy around that as well I'd like to keep it yeah I'm wondering if an indicator could be written along the lines of um ensuring Fidelity of our um the curriculum Choice process I mean I know we just went through okay so nth grade ELA for example and there were multiple Community engagement and student engagement
117to help you know come to those so something like that task of the indicators F superintendent which means if you feel like that would have been a more representative uh interim measure what is something that you might change in the language of the guardrail that would have inspired that it's not the job of your staff to read your mind it's your job to be Crystal Clear well I mean we put Rich diverse and rigorous curriculum so I would have expected did an indicator that addressed how we go about ensuring that we have a rich diverse and rigorous and I do see that with the college level courses um but I think even just choosing the curriculum from the get-go so I mean I don't know that we have to change the actual guard rail it's
118just the interpretation of it because there's yeah go ahead I'm always um mystified by what we mean by Rich all right so there's some evidence that this is not as clear as we might have intended so the question is what would you write instead that would be more clear the the rigor it seems like the rigor part was there's some shared understanding around what rigor means and I think with diverse I actually think the district has done a made a lot of progress with that since the since the Strategic plan was adopted in 2018 um let's sit with this for a second uh because we're at time I want to check right quick on number three the superintendent will not neglect student social emotional health and development as you look at the potential guard rail
119indicators do those match what you intended with the guardrail I think those indicators match up MH I mean they they need they need to start you know percent will go from this to that yeah yeah all right so what I'm hearing is we've got a potential modification on guard Row one again I'll work with your staff on that it sounds like there's comfort you know with guard R 3 and then some questions around number two for the sake of time since we are at limit uh what I've heard is some U tangible ideas what I will recommend is that I work with your team uh to try to incorporate some of your ideas and bring back an alternate administrative proposal for guardrail 2 that tries to capture some of what you described um and then
120just as with the goals uh at the end of the month to bring back a set of interim guard rail revised set of interim guard rails for each of these as well as a five set of interim goals for all of the goals um that is the work that that we intended to do I apologize that we are one minute over um so our next steps is at the end of the month we'll come back uh I'll work with the superintendent and team uh to make sure that we have a document that describes uh the revised uh proposed goals along with annual targets and interim goals uh with all the metrics filled in and then a revised set of guard rails uh along with interm guard rails uh for your consideration uh at the end
121of the month uh Madame chair board superintendent as always thank you for having me thank you thank you all right now we shall switch gears I'm going to turn to the superintendent for his report and then we're going to move to board member reports well good evening and thank you madam chair board members I want to begin this evening by addressing a topic of highest importance and that is student uh school safety for students and staff uh we just invested a significant uh amount of time uh at the beginning of our school board meeting um in working toward Improvement and student outcomes and if we are to focus on that for Mission we must have safe schools our students staff and families must be confident that we can carry out that expectation uh to date
122we have found 15 guns on our campuses or Transportation vehicles that is unacceptable and reflects broader concerns that all of us as members of this community must be willing to address there have been some recent media reports um about shootings into occupied dwellings uh in our area and those are on Pace to exceed last year's totals which itself represents a 75% increase since 2018 that is to say this that guns coming onto our campuses are a sign of broader angst in the community so my message to tonight is this CMS serves more than 140,000 students countless thousand more family members and approximately 19,000 employees each of those represents a precious life and we must not allow guns to injure or kill any of those individuals next I want to share um a brief statement regarding
123Hawthorne Academy there are ongoing investigations underway and at this time the principal and un assistant principal have been suspended with pay now I want to move on uh to another topic several weeks ago we issued a request for proposals here and Nationwide asking for for groups with evidencebased approaches to join us in helping our students overcome the impacts of disrupted learning um that uh resulted from the pandemic that we are still in and we will invest up to $50 million of our covid related funding to support this effort over the next several years it is important for our students to have access to evidencebased education support before school after school during the summer months and on weekends and these efforts must be adjusted to meet individual student needs because one thing that we have seen
124in our return to school year School this year is that each of our students return to us in a different place the deadline for receiving responses is close of business this Friday November 12th we have received a number of responses but we are amplifying our request for more we will evaluate the proposals over the next several weeks and seek to develop Partnerships with a number of groups we feel can best support uh for improving student outcomes thank you madam chair all right and now I'm going to turn to board members for reports don't feel that you have to do one um but this is your opportunity I'm going to work down the road so I see you miss cheek yes um thank you Mr Winston for making that statement about Hawthorne I think the community
125needed to hear that I would like to invite everybody to um Lake Forest Church on on November 17th at 700 p.m. Lake Forest is on Gilead Road in Huntersville they have are an awesome Community partner and they've graciously agreed to host a town hall that myself mayor elect Melinda bales of Huntersville and the uh the north Mech and hopeall Community are organizing so that we can give parents a place to um hear about new ideas and new interventions that have been suggested for school safety and also to give parents a place to share their concerns and thoughts hope well has amazing things going on but uh the amazing things have not been what has made the news in the last seven days so we um we're going to have this town hall and try to
126work work on that as a community together and I'm very very excited um for the opportunity to be in front of all the families I will say that the school had a meeting tonight for winter sports and they have a new group that has been in the works for some time called dads on duty and moms on a mission and those adult volunteers have been vetted and are going to be joining our teachers and staff really just to kind of move kids along in the hallways um make sure the bathrooms get emptied out um on transition times and just be some extra extra eyes um it's going to start small and this is a pilot at Hopewell that we're just starting and and if it's successful I'm going to make sure that we talk about
127it at other schools um it's something that's been done elsewhere in the country so I just want to um ask everybody to be in support of their schools right now if you are taking time to complain about what's going on in your schools I would urge you instead to get on their web page and find their PTA you do not have to be a parent to volunteer as a p and join their PTA you do not have to be a parent to volunteer through the CMS portal and register as a volunteer our schools could use your help so put your time and efforts where other things are and that's allara thank you madam chair um this ties right into to um Miss cheek's um statement and around the theme around um guns and Guns in
128our community you know last week I I set through three hours of of um student hearings where I get to see actual pictures um of guns that have been confiscated and that's a really heavy thing and um even more so I think about our staff and our students who are seeing them you know in the schools um it's heartbreaking and I know that CMS will do what it needs to do what it can do to protect I appreciate these new efforts that Miss CH just spoke about but I guess I just wanted wanted to sort of call on the community also in several in several ways if first of all if you see something say something this is really important um we actually had one of the guns that was found uh from my understanding
129was reported by a neighbor who saw someone toss it behind a bush and because the neighbor decided to call and inquire that's how one of the guns was found outside of an elementary school and so never underestimate the power of good you know Community engagement and being aware and speaking out and I know we we teach that to our students as well if you see something say something and that that works that's a first step but you know I also want to call on our city and our cities our municipalities um you know to invest I know here in Charlotte we have alternative to violence programs um it's been in the news as of late and I would you know encourage us all to understand more about that and what our multiple Municipal partners can
130do to help us in those efforts and then of course we all know um that the county plays a role in this also and what has happened over the past few years with Cardinal uh mental health supports and our failures on that end to really get our students and our families the support that they need and I have hope for Alliance coming in that things will be different our families are dealing and suffering with trauma and we can't do this alone so I am calling on our County um to get it right with our um mental health supports um that we take a systems approach to how we address this in conjunction with our cities and our schools will be there to help support um but I mean I've already said it we can't do
131it along I do know one thing we are not going to arrest our way out of this nor are we going to expel our way out of this and it is deeply saddening when you see um I mean they're babies I know they're tall and they may seem big but at the end of the day they're babies that are having access to guns and I know we've called multiple times from the Das for folks to lock up your guns if you if you own guns that's fine make sure you're locking them up in your in your home um if you can um we need a comprehensive approach to dealing with this and I know Miss ship and I have already been engaged with some city and county officials to talk about how we can just
132go about doing that um more to come on on on that here in the future and finally just one other quick thing I do want to acknowledge that the um Charlotte necklin BG Board of Education um through our attorneys not as directly but through our attorneys did file submissions in support of Judge Lee's proposed order for the state legislature to allocate 1.7 billion in Educational Funding as laid out in the remedial plan connected to the Leandro case and if you're watching this right now and you don't know what that is I encourage you to Google it it's super super important there'll be a hearing on it tomorrow um 27 years of chronic underfunding um in our state and it needs to come an end to an end so that all North Carolinians have the right
133to a sound basic education thank you thank you Dr Jones yes thank you um I appreciate the fact that we have taken a deep dive into student outcomes but before you get student student outcomes we have to look at the um inputs Service delivery models um for to our children and for our children instructional delivery overall in many of the schools that um I visited prior to um Co with the chief academic office officer is geared toward what I call prescription teaching or more often I refer to it as clicking and clacking on Chromebooks and as I had um the district specialist show me workbooks um that uh meet uh different levels particularly in a school that has a low percentage of quote uh identified AIG um that they would have some work books to
134um enhance um but for these um Scholars it leaves them bored but teachers look at it with the stressors that they have and say and have said to me um when working with them that these students will make the fours and fives on the end of grade test so they're um they get left behind um school elementary schools with a very large pupil enrollment have a program design of inclusiveness uh in the AIG um uh identified students and many times that rigor that I said we need to Define it just does not happen um as I have indicated in Prior um discussions from this Di is that was my specialty for many years um in terms of instructional um delivery AIG or academically gifted as it was called at the time at the time um
135so we need to uh take a deep dive at the elementary level an examination of the identification and the practices looking at exemplary models across this state State and Nation for improvement set up a timeline for accomplishing this internal review and and corrective measures one of my larger elementary schools one of the largest in the district has so few identified AIG students that they typically don't get the that potential uh rigor that we uh elusively Define moving on to Middle School um one of my most embarrassing moment since I've been on the this board was the national assessment review of one of the middle schools uh of the international backal art program uh that's done u a national assessment and the assessment the person who um gave the report gave some very very negative um
136feedback in terms of the quality of that program uh so um outcomes will only happen when we look at the quality of our educational delivery um we sit here we discuss the outcomes quite frankly when I uh have uh visited the more schools in the more fluent um areas of town I see instructional pedagogical practices which are active student engaged learning not just clicking and clacking on the Chromebook involve students teach High please get off the Chromebook have some competitive debate clubs book clubs Deep dive interest Club clubs building and preparing students for things like Odyssey of the mind um uh one of my colleagues shared to me what goes on it shimrock Gardens um it's a history of how we can have better outcomes yes I'm very familiar with that school and it's history
137of engaging students actively teach our students build on their interest and strengths um let's let's get rid of the sit and get um and putting um uh a a premium on actively engaging our students this by the way was what initially um motivated me to become a board member because I was teaching classroom of teachers for re certification or and we were trying we were talking and discussing a number of times about active engagement and I had teachers CMS teachers telling me they were not allowed to teach creatively because they had to teach to the test what does that mean if it means doldrum teaching and learning versus engaged great teacher uh I mean great student uh involvement uh we are not going to get the outcomes that we so desire we have to assess
138but the first thought of business is to teach well to get better outcomes now I have one other thing I want to because it was November the 11th in 2020 I was asked that uh to um by employees and support services department of the need to address processes and current flaws regarding professional advancement in that department Mr superintendent to develop guidelines and regulations on how to support Personnel uh so they may appeal unfair practices to create and implement Equity monitoring tool to access the work climate and fairness in that department and to Institute the requirement SL accountability of high level departments heads showing interest and awareness of the Departments that they lead and I looked and I said my goodness it's been a year so here's a reminder I'd like a follow up on that
139Miss Marshall thank you madam chair thank yep it's been two and a halfs I had an email saying that the parents were going to get to get started at 7 it's 8:30 now all right thank you very much thank you very much Miss Marshall thank you thank you madam chair listen we need to do our business please do not interrupt our business the public needs to hear us say our business all right thank you madam chair um if if you if you cannot if you do not let us continue to do our business in front of the public without interruption then we're going to have to ask you to leave the building thank you madam chair um uh superintendent I appreciate the things that you have um taken action on it at Hawthorne um Academy
140so thank you very much um I just want to um again talk about we've asked we have asked the superintendent for some short-term and long-term um uh proposals for the gun issue that we're dealing with which I think is top of mind for everybody and and he's going to be giving that to us very quickly we're expecting that very quickly and I want to ask the community to also be thinking about short-term longterm because again we can't solve all this by ourselves this is this is a wider issue and we know that we had a lot of guns purchased during the pandemic and I saw today a stat that said we've had 23% more gun thefts from the beginning of the year from from January to September this year than than last year and and
141that's and and and some of these guns that have come into our schools I'm sure got pulled out of somebody's car so so there's some short-term things our community members can do get a gun lock put your guns up safely put them in saves whatever you need to do we've just got to protect our kids and I want to make sure that people understand that when a student brings a firearm there's a very specific code of conduct and they are they are typically I mean I've not seen it not happen they are expelled that means no sports teams that means no prom that means no more education in CMS no more education in any public school in this state so for parents that think there is just a suspension no it's over and I just
142want people to be very very clear about that and the worst thing in the world is to sit here for the nine of us to look at a freshman a 14-year-old who's brought a gun and expel them because it's over and that's that becomes really a major Community problem and so we're all working to try to figure out how we can solve this but I just want everybody to be very clear we are not taking this lightly we are we are exacting the punishment that is prescribed but we but we know in the end this is not good for any of us so keep all that in mind thank you Miss spes Bailey oh no no comment okay um Miss fer do you have an update for us yes thank you violence is being desensitized
143in our community Weaponry is a keen reflection of our lack of investment in our students and the data that we have just gone over for the last 90 minutes with Mr AJ however the district is working tirelessly but most importantly the 12 professionals currently sitting next to me hint the sacred and duty to abide by the federal and state law for most most importantly Title 9 this is why Implement implementation of the title n task force is imperative a group of students people in general to recommend policy and changes to current recommendations and regulations that we currently have CMS is not perfect and I'm not saying that however bear in mind what information is being portrayed in the media due to the validity of Title Nine is not portrayed from the board CMS does care
144students are heard and CH changes are being made in regards to different things such as covid-19 please wear your mask students are confidential in regards to a person's health I encourage all people to wear a mask to keep all persons safe lastly if you feel strongly about a policy or issue issue please feel free to contact me or your District representative and if you have interest in becoming the next student advisor the applications are coming soon and if you have any questions about that you may ask me as well um be on the lookout for applications and more information to come but most importantly about Title 9 the district is working tily like superintendent stated beforehand the 12 people that are around me are just a small part of the district that represents 140,000 students
145over 140,000 students I say this to say that things are way more complex than it may seem although it may seem as though this board is not doing anything or we're not saying anything you have to bear in mind the confidentiality of the situations that are currently happening this students are always number one hence why I'm here today hence why I have the platform that I do and to say that the changes that are being made are not happening it's happening right before your eyes and you just don't even know it yet I trust wholeheartedly in these 12 professionals that are sitting right next to me and the one that are sitting right over here there's so many people that are working so hard for our students like I said before CMS is not perfect
146and we're making strives to be better however Perfection is almost impossible the changes that are being made for the public in regards of how the board is set up we changed the scheduling for how the board meetings are ran due to Mr AJ and keeping our goals of our students in mind hence while you are able to hear why we are making these changes how the superintendent is going about his recommendations and the board is going about the recommendations like I stated before everything that the board is doing there's a reason to why we are doing this and you just have to put trust into the adults and professionals that are going about their jobs and about their roles that is happening Keen so as I stated before please bear in mind what you see
147on the media and put trust into your District thank you Mr string I recommend that we reinstitute the limits on the boorder board member reports that we used to have yeah I agree and that we move the superintendent and board member reports to the back of the agenda where they used to be all we pulled up board goals forward wear mask than you miss ship did no I want to first thank um the parents and constituents who have called and shared concerns and ways to support our schools in this critical time of crisis with safety initiatives and academics our children must come first the safety the supervision and students feeling protected is key to learning I'm glad to hear that their parents wanting to be involved I heard from a group of the men Dad's
148on duty I actually know some that's involved and I think these are the things it will take the whole Community the city the county and the schools to ensure our students stay safe in school and as Miss dear mentioned I'm working with the group of uh Community people the community Board of County Commissioners City and board City Board of Education members that are looking at what can we do to ensure safety in our community and in our schools so this is important to all of us how can we improve academics until kids feel safe and so we must do that we must have accountability we must be consistent in our work and we must sustain our work we're coming together that's good but staying together will create the change that we need for our students
149and they are our greatest asset thank you Miss Sawyer thank you um before my announcement can I just remind people that masks are required in this building at all times as you'll see it posted there meinberg county is under a mandatory indoor mask mandate are EXs Umi excuse me um it's not your turn to speak um I just want to acknowledge that it's National School psychology week um CMS employs 107 School psychologists and if there were ever a time that we needed every single one of them and the other staff members who support our students and families um now is the time so I just want to give a shout out to uh School psychologists and the work they do to keep our families and students and families healthy thank you all right um I'll
150be quick um You probably all first of all as far as the process of the meeting um some of you may remember that we passed a a bylaw Bea recently thanks to the hard work of the policy committee um Miss ship Miss Sawyer Mr strange Dr Jones and we had a number of hearings and um that bylaw changed the order in which things happen at our meeting and much of that is Guided by the fact that we we need to do the um the most um focus part of the board's work first followed by public comments followed by action items um however I do have the authority to set time limits and I think I agree that I think two minutes it should be the same as what the board as what the public has
151so we'll do two minute time limits from here on out um other than that I just want to salute the good work that is happening in the hope well Community with Miss Chek with the with the parents um the principal and the Zone superintendent to really put some actionable solutions together that I think can be a model for many of our other schools so I'm very excited about that I'm excited to take part in that town hall um I know that on a parallel track there's some similar talks going on with Harding that not ready to announce yet but Miss buers Bailey will announce it when when the time comes um and with that we shall move on with the rest of the meeting so thank you very much so now we're going to move
152on to the public engagement um first we have a public hearing um one public hearing on the proposed board electoral District map and the rules for this are as follows each speaker will be called to speak one at a time each speaker will have a maximum of 3 minutes to address the board each speaker may only talk about the topic that is the subject of the public hearing individual student matters or specific Personnel matters will not be may not be discussed personal attacks will not be allowed profanity or other inappropriate language will not be allowed the board reserves the right to cut off any speaker who violates these rules and we have just one speaker that signed up for this public hearing Mr D Ranken if you could please come down front front to either
153one of the microphones he gets three minutes Madam chair I know the thing says two but he actually gets three under public hearings yeah the hearings get three the public comments get two so if we could get a reset all right go right ahead Mr Ranken right good evening everyone thank you for your time I appreciate it uh my name is D Rankin I'm currently served on the CMS Equity committee as well as of the bpc of Charlotte meinberg education committee there are some board members that uh Pride themselves on being data driven uh so to steal his line based on the data map CS2 is configured in such a manner that is more Compact and the number numbers of constituents are more evenly distributed ss1 is drawn in such a manner that the number
154of constituents in district 6 is much higher than others for example District six six contains 19276 constituents compared to 17983 constituents in District 5 if you go by map ss1 also in ss1 District 1 only contains 18,652 constituents compared to district 6 which is 12,00 more constituents the purpose of redistri redistricting is to address population growth and ensure that one district is more is not more unevenly populated compared to other districts if you look at the deviation percentages in ss1 the deviation percentage actually gets worse compared to the current Boe District map the popul population map SS2 is more evenly distributed and and the deviation percentages are much better compared to the B current B Boe Maps lastly to excuse to to use the excuse that the town should have the same representative has a
155sense of privilege and entitlement this is not backed by any data seems like it's just personal preference what if other areas in the city invoke the same privilege type type thinking and said they deserve a more entitled person to have one more person represent them because they want to have this feeling of no one else in the city can represent them but they wouldn't do that because they don't have this sense entitlement or privilege so to only focus on what best for the towns is not a good strategy based on the data and not being self-serving board members I'm asking that you support map CS2 based on the criteria that you set originally because he meets all the criteria thank you for your time thank you all right now we're going to move on to
156requests from the public and the rules are as follows oh I I need to declare the public hearing on the proposed board electoral District map closed okay request from the public the rules each speaker will be called in to speak one at a time unless you are part of a group so we don't do groups anymore each speaker will be called to speak in one at a time each speaker will have a maximum of two minutes to address the board each speaker may speak on any topic of their choice except for individual student matters or specific Personnel matters personal attacks will not be allowed profanity or other inappropriate language will not be allowed and the board reserves the right to cut off any speaker whoot violates these rules as I call your name please come
157down front to either microphone or to both um and speak in the order in which I call you so I will call a few names at once first we have Kimberly tomkeys then Tracy on and then Sophia Smith hello um go ahead to start go right ahead um I came up prepared to have some suggestions for Title 9 UM prevention program initiatives but it sounds like there may be a better way to address those so I'll kind of stift Gears from that um and talk about how I think it's super important um as a law student personally to educate these students on what their legal rights are in terms of free speech and particularly I was going to discuss Title 9 rights but I know that as a student when I was in high school
158I had no idea I would have no idea the kinds of things that I you know had a right to have so I think it's important to train students to recognize things um that may violate their rights outside of what is obvious um for instance I would never have known what retaliation was as a high school student besides what the word meant but legally that is a very different thing um I would also like to note um while that you guys I'm sure don't monitor the website um the new rules for Title 9 require the training materials for coordinators to be made publicly available and those are not on the website it looks like there was an option for that um but they are not currently linked there are the trainings for these students but
159not for the coordinators which is required so that's all I have to say thank you thank you all right Tracy ANS then Sophia Smith and then Bill Fountain good evening my name is Tracy Owens and I'm a member of race Charlotte a multi-racial anti-racist group of citizens who Advocate on issues involving Education Health housing and Justice with the racial Equity lens I'm a CMS parent and a career educator in my 29 years years of teaching I've participated in many trainings trainings in Reading Writing math classroom management technology CPR bloodborn pathogens just to name a few some mandated others self- selected and all valuable to helping me best educate students but I've never once taken a course on critical race Theory nor have I ever taught such a thing in the classroom that's because CRT is
160not a concept that is used in K12 education which has been explained by education expert ever since it was attacked in the media and as an educator I find it highly insulting that non-educators continue to disregard and dispute this fact what I have been fortunate enough to receive training in is culturally responsive teaching and Multicultural education pedagogies that recognize the importance of including histories texts values beliefs and perspectives of people from different cultural backgrounds into all aspects of teaching I think this board for bringing this necessary training to the teachers of CMS you clearly recognize that in order for students to be critical thinkers teachers need to provide full historical perspectives to help their students make informed decisions on important issues even if it makes them feel uncomfortable students are capable of wrestling with discomfort
161which is necessary for their intellectual growth in the words of Frederick Douglas if there is no struggle there is no progress our children are the future of our nation's progress let's continue to give them the tools and information needed for that struggle so they can make the necessary progress our country needs thank you sopia Smith then Bill Fountain then molini Kumar good evening I'm an eighth grader attending Trinity Episcopal School in uptown when I was given the opportunity to speak at this event I was shocked that we were having this discussion I cannot even fathom what my school and learning experience would be like without diversity education as it has given me knowledge and exposure to many other perspectives I would not have known about otherwise I 13 years old I have a lot to
162look forward to in the coming years one of those Milestones being given the right to vote without diversity education lessons I could never have come to develop my own opinions as well as learn to respect those of the opposing opinion I've been educated as well as challenged in my beliefs and diversity education has given me not only the chance to embrace my opinions but as well as viewing the issues from all perspectives I'm not only being educated on current issues happening in our society but as well as issues in history that have shaped who we are today without learning about this we will never be able to use our past mistakes as a growth tool to help shape our future and Community children are the future right adults are always telling us to be the
163change we want to see in the world but without education on all topics how can we change the world our futures are in your hands it's up to you to educate young people everywhere on issues of all types whether they are current or from a century ago we can be the change we want to see in the world but it is up to you to give us a chance thank you than you Mr Fountain then Ms Kumar and then Rebecca Ivanov oh yes Bill Fountain yes thank you I'm Bill Fountain and I'm empathetic to your dilemma in the plementing test scores and more guns in assaults and school but what can you do to stop these runaway problems hold yourself and the superintendent accountable by extending the superintendent's contract with a golden parachute you chose
164not to hold him accountable for student performance I suggest that you at least hold the six CMS learning communities superintendent accountable years ago I successfully managed two different $100 million programs it wasn't because I was some great leader or manager no it was because my VI vice president held me responsible for producing a quality product on time and on cost keeping the program on track required a detailed plan and regular reviews of course hiccups would pop up that must be addressed yet the objective remain quality product on time within budget these six superintendant have a product prepare their student stud to be College ready or career ready their schedule and budget are defined I suggest you start with an easy objecti achievable objective such as the student test scores be 10% better than last year's
165if they exceed the objective Say by 20% give them a bonus if they fail move them out to pasture and replace them with someone with fire in their belly accountability is a proven concept we even learned it in in uh Sunday school be ready to meet your maker what I'm seeing is that you're kicking the accountability can down the street don't talk about it act and by the way at a boy on the hope well Town Hall thank you thank you enie Kumar and then Rebecca Ivanov and then Sarah Holland did I miss you what was your nameer oh it's later oh you you're coming late uh yeah you're number 19 sorry lot of bills too many bills me to pass the message so do we have molini Kumar no well is that her I'm
166sorry do we no we don't okay so Rebecca ivanof and then Sarah Holland at least 15 guns in 45 days student punished for reporting sexual assault can you smell the white privilege sign $225,000 paid for a speaker to tell us the only remedy to pass discrimination is present discrimination student with assault charges plays football game with ankle monitor pornographic images used in Middle School artart assignment divisive political issues and sensitive sexuality issues being allowed in the classrooms $50 million in Co tutoring funs with no plan or growth metrics yet established and were 50 days into the school year school occupancy metrics changed from 20 to 25 per classroom magically makes CMS appear less overcrowded yet the cafeterias and hallways haven't gotten any smaller excuse me bigger nor have the class sizes gotten any smaller District
167voting map is attempting to draw re redraw the lines for political gain there's currently a lawsuit from The Hidden Valley neighborhood and to Steel Creek and the splitting up of the Matthews and mhill areas CMS has an image problem CMS has a leadership problem Mr Winston was interviewed by Glenn Burkin this past week and they reminisced about their journalism days together when are we going to have a leader who is at least been a principal this is not the experience CMS should be looking for in a superintendent 50 million in coov education funds designated for outside the school days does nothing to improve the school performance during the school day where's the guided study halls with learning support specialist targeting our high-risk kids in schools how will CMS reach every student if the funds are
168only going to be utilized outside the school day we need a measurable action plan with dates and metrics for any Act academic achievement issues thank you for addressing the violence thank you for the to Hall that's up and coming we look forward to hearing more and in 11 and a half months it's time for us to do better and vote for a student Centric board who will lead CMS in a much needed and different direction now we've got Sarah Holland then Melanie Holland then Mike Holland you hello I'm a freshman at hopo high school and I wanted to share my experience and so many others of how school's been so far every choice you make needs to be taken this taken into this consideration before I begin I want to thank Miss Pickard for all
169that she's done she's worked so hard with all that she's been given what I'm about to say is no reflection on her or our teachers anyway just the other day we had a fight at school every day we have a fight at school sometimes many fights and as you know multiple guns have been found from gangs and not from people who don't lock up their guns everyone I've talked to knows that how are we supposed to get out of this if we aren't disciplining the kids who are having the fights and bringing the guns to school we've been on lockdowns more than I can count I as well as others have dealt with racism when I never even in the past where other students may come right out and say they're racist against us calling
170us racist names telling us we're the racist and the privileged simply because we are white and they believe it's totally okay we told many times that this would happen if we've told you many times that this would happen if you focused on the wrong things and only caring about one group of students at the expense of others I've been bullied and harass both in school and on the bus for being white and having a mask waiver the smell of pot fills the classrooms and Halls sometimes coming off the bags of students carrying which we all know pot is being sold in our schools it's unsafe it's distracting it's nearly impossible to learn why are we even at school if we can't learn in a recent interview that I was given I read that the leader
171of this board was asked are our schools safe his reply was our schools are safe our schools are safe respectfully it's clear that you haven't been paying attention and not watching the news how would you even know if you weren't there there when was the last time you stepped inside our schools when was the last time you spoke with parents or students until you do you can't stay there safe it's time for you to do something thank [Applause] you Mike and James Bron um I want to Echo what my daughter just said about Hopewell and how wonderful Mrs picker is um she actually would make a fantastic superintendent um what Hopewell has had to deal with was not a direct reflection of Hopewell it's a direct reflection of this leadership um as you heard from
172our daughter our children are unsafe in the environment nothing has been done to keep them safe I feel like what we've heard tonight tonight kudos to you all for trying to finally do something that we warned you was going to happen but it does seem a lot like damage control although we have clearly have other things contributing to the increased violence and Rapid declining education lack of Parental involvement being one of them there are practical things that can be done that we have suggested numerous times clear backpacks metal detectors dads being present at school I I actually suggested this over the summer um parents support groups with help with home life student programs for most at risk youth all of which I have personally offered multiple times to do at no cost because this is
173what I'm trained to do I work with the youth Attention Center I work with gang members many of whom have come directly from Hopewell so I have incredible insight into what they're thinking why haven't you implemented any of these things if this was such an issue my suggestion or my thought is because it's finally become a media attention and that's was making you have to pay attention we know that it's certainly not for lack of money because according to the commissioner CMS has been giving millions of dollars for security and let nothing to show for it yet have shot down the idea of medical metal detectors for being too expensive but I wonder what the cost of a life is after reading the gaslighting interview that Queen City metro had with the CMS or the
174CEO of CMS it's clearer than ever that it's time it's past time for the change of guard being a journalist by trade does not qualify someone to run the 17th largest District in the country one that is rapidly declining if this were any other job we would be fired and we are asking now for Winston to resign for the board to hold him accountable Mike colland then James Brunson then Ronda Walker thank you so I want to read portions of that Queen Metro interview that my wife just mentioned um so the parents in here listen as to where CMS stands really uh which is a little contradictory to what we heard for the last couple hours sitting here um so the leader of this board says we spent a lot of time talking about test
175scores but I also believe that test scores shouldn't be the proxy for whether kids are being successful or not the reporter says you say test scores should not be the proxy for measuring the district's success what should be the proxy his response well ultimately our goal is produce students who can be successful outside of an educational environment and experience success in life and so in order to do that learning obviously has to take place and that's ultimately why we're here to educate kids but I also know that as part of the educational process students and adults have to experience hardships and how you bounce back how you are resilient and how you overcome and that's not to say that education is not important it's just to say that there are some more pressing needs right
176now because I'm talking about survival blows my mind test scores shouldn't met measure success based on the data we receed received neither is attendance failing core classes and being passed on to the next grade all in the name of equity instead overcoming obstacles is this is like telling a child who's been neglected at least you're learning about hardships this is ridiculous so parents in the room it's clear that education is not the top of the Mind there needs to be a mass Exodus from CMS until a leadership is replaced and this house gets in order this place is a mess there are so many issues and there has to be something done with the leadership of this board thank you thank you James Brunson then Ronda Walker and then Anthony [Applause] Baldwin greetings to the
177CMS school board fellow parents and allies of CMS I am taking this opportunity to be heard to be seen and to be felt as a parent of two students of Hopewell High School please know that I am not making a statement I am making a plea and a request which means I expect and deserve a response from this body first I believe in the ability for hwood high school to be safe to be a safe institution of learning and growth for our children history and current success show that to be true I also believe in staff and Leadership to know what is best for the students in their halls and under their instruction first my first ask is that school leadership have more autonomy to make decisions on school improvements as they see fit in
178a particular School Improvement plan should not be hindered or halted by the fact that the Improvement is funded by CMS so that every school school should have equal environments if that to be the standard then CMS failed a long time ago because every school does not have the same access resource or recourses you hired content competent capable and invested in leadership for these schools so let them lead since the 2012 2122 school year there have been 28 episodes of fighting to Firearms recovered and four dangerous weapons recovered it is my understanding that these incidents stem from stem less from kids being kids and more a result of outside factors and situations bring being brought into the schools I'm aware the need of CMS or hope well charg with raising our children my prayer that my
179fellow parents take the charge its heart to our children not just to survive they deserve to thrive and strive even this the pandemic for the circumstances and situations that currently exist at Hotwell more needs to be done and be done with urgency there are known improvements that while deemed uncool or less Popular by some have shown to Foster more productive and focused learning environments this includes as I Echo clear backpacks school uniforms permanent your time is up thank you so much I just if you need to email in your comments we can read the rest of them later um Ronda Walker then Anthony Baldwin then Samantha Foster good evening superintendent and Madam chair and board I'm Ronda Walker here from uh Mill versage Community uh thank you for allowing me to speak tonight thankfully after
180several school board meetings emails and hard work from Mr Sean strain Akisha Craven Halal all of the board members as of October 11th we were thrilled to see that an addendum has been added to both map scenarios allowing vers and Cool Springs to attend Bane Elementary School just like our neighbors giving Bane only 83% utilization with our attendance so now all our kids can continue to play together parents look out for each other's kids at the bus stop and we can be a complete community remember Bane Elementary school is closer to us than the new South Southeast Elementary School so with side walks my grandson who lives with me and other kids in the neighborhood can walk or even bite to school moving versage Community to Bane Elementary School also keeps with your jca policy
181leanon is very overcrowded with 122% utilization and and moving us will help release stress on teachers reduce classroom size help cafeteria workers and also help custodial staff keep the school covid free we hope to have superintendent Winston's recommendation and also the school board make the most sensible Equitable and logical vote and vote to have all our children attend the same school vote for the addendum to be added to both maps map scenarios thank you for your time thank you now we have Anthony Baldwin and Samantha Foster and then Lisa O'Brien thank you my name's Anthony Baldwin I'm 75 years old I want to challenge every one of you to go back and watch the first two hours of this in my lifetime I've been to thousands of business meetings I have never heard so many
182words spoken and nothing said and nothing said and you wear us out with this you wear us out I challenge you I tried to call you three times thank you ma'am for answering my call and getting me down here because I came here for two constituencies the first one is this man you know who he is keep the dream alive no child should be judged by the color of their skin I came here on behalf of my grandchildren they are white I want no one CRT 1619 pedagogy telling them that they're racist because of the color of their skin I want no one telling any black child that there's a limit to their possibilities here is here is a man here is a man running our school system who didn't know anything if he ever
183loses this job they've got something for him in Washington I'll get back to you were any of you prepared for this were any of you did you review what was coming up it's disgusting watch it I Challen and by the way Dr Jones God bless you my mother said a healthy debate as long as she wasn't on the other side of it is the key to academic intellectual and Human Excellence and I challenge you to watch this because you won't be happy thank you all righta Foster and Lisa O'Brien and then Stacy Stags yes staff will not be here tonight she sent an email that we will share with the board okay CMS is a $1.6 billion School District in the business of educating children yet the score is an F in student outcomes and
184that was both pre and post pandemic there was a 65% decline in math Readiness scores for minority students in grades 3 through 8 last year only 10% passed grade level math that's a 90% failure rate and yet after being asked repeatedly for for a concrete measurable action plan Mr Winston's continued response is an empty word salad of political rhetoric month after month we come here and still no plan and no metrics Mr Winston says that our schools are safe you know what poses a far more dangerous threat to students than Co ever will guns and suicide 16 guns found in CMS schools and two suicides just in the first quarter it is tragic but it's not surprising for a third consecutive school year students are being denied the normaly and socialization they desperately need and
185deserve CMS routinely makes local and National headlines because we are steadily going from bad to worse if this were any other business the CEO and board of directors would be fired based on these results we need a concrete measurable action plan to address the leadership deficiencies in this District because CMS students cannot afford another year of failure thank you all right we've got Lisa O'Brien then Kenya Baker then Brook Weiss we have Lisa O'Brien all right do we have Kenya Baker here okay do we have Brook wi yeah and then after Miss Weiss we have Glenn Stevens and then finally Bill Geer I mean not finally but then Bill gerer last last year's test scores were abysmal we're a quarter of the way through this year and as far as I can tell no remediation
186practices have been put in place why is that where has the 50 million from the tutoring initiative gone why has the tutoring not started we've known that students were failing since before covid so what measurable practices are being put in place to make sure that students make up the Gap in learning that was greatly exacerbated by forced virtual learning that's what these meetings need to be about why are we just now hearing that a program is being vetted to potentially intervene which apparently has no measurable outcomes either in addition to focusing on student outcomes we need to figure out a solution to the elephant in the room that's the gun problem that CMS is facing what's being done about that we hear reports of guns found in schools on a weekly basis I'm tired of
187coming to these meetings and voicing my concerns and getting absolutely no response it's pretty insulting when some of you don't even look up from your phones when we're speaking we're only allowed to speak 2 minutes but many of us make special arrangements for our children take time out of our busy days and commit to attending these meetings to voice our concerns soon as our brief time is up you move on to the next speaker and nothing is ever addressed people's questions are never even answered so what exactly is the point of having public comments it's not any better when addressing most of you via email you're elected and paid to serve this community and the very least you can is answer the questions that are repeatedly posed so I will ask again what measurable practices
188are being put in place to ensure better outcomes thank you all right Glen Stevens then bill gger then Joy Cook Mary Jackson Dorothy vaugh Katherine Johnson Sally Ry Neil Armstrong John Glenn and Alan Shepard what do these names all have in common they all participated in and made history during America's exploration in space Katherine Johnson is also the 2015 recipient of the presidential Med medal of freedom they are all excellent role models for our students what do they what what they did not do was allow the opinions of others to limit their accomplishments they were NAA the precursor to NASA computer and engineer NACA computer and for Trans programmer NACA computer and respon responsible for the trajectory which was used during John Glenn's flight first woman in space Etc what do these talented historical often
189hidden figures have to do with CMS or today's students I'm going to tell you according to data from 2020-21 59.9% of all students are not proficient in third grade math 76.9% of black third grade students are not proficient in math 80.6% % of economically disadvantaged students are not proficient in third grade math 83.3% of students from Foster Care are not proficient in math and 80.5% of students with disabilities are not proficient in math yet the only solution to these stats this board seems to have is to raise the failures and re and reset the norm and it is embarrassing for the Boe to refuse to wrap its Collective Minds around one of two metrics the state uses to measure your perspec effective in your your progress and as if the academic data is not enough
190to Warrant concern CMS has logged over 100 weapons violations in power school since the start of school 15 of these violations were forgun back to my first question the United States is the nation whose citizens walked and drove on the moon with Statistics like the above why is it that the vast majority of parents whose's building level Educators and some elected Community leaders thank you thank you all right we've got bill guer then Joy Cook and then Lily Russell Pinson good evening my name is Bill gger I'm a Charlotte resident living on Kataba Nation lands thank you very much for your public service and for your leadership and the leadership of all who are employed at CMS I'm also a member of Ray Charlotte a collective of anti-racist Advocates that works to create a more
191Equitable Community I and we support CMS continuing to develop policies practices and solutions to reduce the predictable horrific racialized outcomes of students reading and math levels tests achievement scores graduation rates College and Career Readiness CMS does not teach critical race theory in any school to any of our children the impact of the hijacking of CRT an obscure academic concept is to attack any approach to education or policy that acknowledges the existence of historic and structural racism in our country it is an attack on teaching a far more accurate and complete History Dr Peter Mano curator of American religious history at the M Smithsonian said recently maybe we should all just agree that we're not really talking about critical race Theory we're talking about two starkly different visions of the past each vision of the past
192is ultimately about who we are now so who are we now and who are we tomorrow November 10th is the 123rd anniversary of the only Cuda ever to take place on American soil for decades it was a history totally and deliberately hidden from white children do we describe it wrongly as the Wilmington race riot as it was done in textbooks and popular white narratives for nearly a century or do we accurately call it what it was a massacre of black citizens and overthrow of a duly elected city government in the name of white supremacy which vision of this past event and countless others will Define who we are now thank you Mr gager thank you okay we have Joy Cook then Lily Russell Pinson and then Ray L grome before you start the clock let
193me say thank you to to the board my daughter graduated last year she is a student at UNCC Chapel Hill she was an IB student I don't have any other students in the school system I just care about our our children um I'm Reverend Dr madin mcclin Joy Cook was my assistant and I drove rushed back to get her so she wouldn't have to read the statement for me um three reasons that the vaccine is likely to negatively impact our children dear Board of Education I have I I am pleading with you and uh verifiable evidencebased information to Halt all recommendations to parents concerning the vaccination of children under 12 second I'm asking you to ensure that no child is immunized by any agency hos school nurse without the written consent of his or her
194legal guardian and here are the three verifiable reasons the shot is likely to negatively impact our children's lives a Japanese study of fiser data showed that the vaccine content does not remain localized in the shoulder as was thought but travels extensively throughout the body to sensitive tissue in the brain bone marrow spleen liver adrenal glands and ovaries two whether or not the spike protein can be made in these other tissues is unknown because fizer didn't test this in studies of madna however the spike protein entered the circulatory system and causes autoimmune disease 700,000 adults have been injured already according to government be's data three not only is the current shot obsolete for the current strain but in an article published on August 23rd of 21 the the editor of the highly regarded British medical journal
195the editor stated Peter Dashi states that the trials are so shoddy they don't justify approval of the covid vacine the source for these uh studies is the Canadian covid care lines parental guide the British medical journal is highly highly regarded giving this to our children is a gross der elction of our duties and if the German lawyers are assume soon the World Health Organization the FDA and NIH are successful it will be treated as criminal thank you all right Lily Russell Pinson then Ray lron then Ayanna Perry hello my name is Lily Russell penson and I'm a senior at Myers Park High School first I'd like to say how utterly disappointed I am to be standing at this Podium again for a while I was under the impression that CMS was starting to walk in
196the right direction when it came to student safety entitlement after the principal of mys Park got reassigned and the creation of the tile n task force was announced however I can see that is not the case already there have been a minimum of two cases that were mishandled by CMS just in this past academic quarter at Olympic and Hawthorne High Schools from these events it's clear to see that the Charlotte mackenberg school system has not learned from their past mistakes and transgressions we have been continuously failed by the adults who are supposed to protect us and are unwillingly are unwilling to blindly bestow our trust in them again while you've all claimed over and over again that CMS educates their teachers and administrators about how to properly respond to sexual assault and ptal mind complaints
197we are once again in multiple situations where survivors are being humiliated dismissed and even in the case of Haw and high school suspended for speaking up for themselves I'm asking you to raise the caliber of your Title Nine training for school staff have better policies regarding retaliation after reporting and to include survivors in this conversation survivors have valuable insight into what specifically went wrong and can collaborate with you to help you fix the holes and blind spots in your schools the students parents and taxpayers will continue to hold you accountable for your lack of action to protect the students under your jurisdiction and I am not a parent who can get involved with PTA I am a student I deserve to feel safe in my school and it should not be my Advocate to it
198should not be my job to advocate for school safety while being young myself while there may be positive things happening at my school it is irresponsible to let those mask the things that are going wrong regarding safety that CMS has continue to neglect and while I hope this is my last time having to address the board in order to beg protection for myself and my peers I doubt it will be we will continue to come and speak on these egregious issues until CMS can show how they are done trivializing and dismissing victims and have made plans for the future to prevent gender-based violence in schools the eyes of Charlotte are upon you do better CS gr and aanna Perry and then Nikki onewell good evening I'm here tonight as a parent and teacher I saw
199the news article calling for metal detectors in schools and questioning the leadership of Ernest Winston according to research conducted by West Ed Justice and prevention Research Center there isn't any evidence metal detectors work to decrease school shootings or School violence but they are shown to increase PTSD and negative associations with schools if it's Optics you want get metal detectors and change leadership if you want to help your students really help dig into the root issues behind the violence in our schools hunger mental health generational poverty abuse guns and gun violence are symptoms of a sick Community we need Community Solutions stop putting the burden of community issues all at the feet of the school system Ernest Winston is a reflective and collaborative leader he is leading our district in a time of sickness physical sickness
200and our sickness of our community shering all of its responsibilities changing leadership will not change our safety or the outcomes for our students will not heal our schools and will create even more issues my students don't want metal detectors they want to come to fully staffed and funded schools with leadership and staff that look like them and care for them they want to feel the joy of happy staff and students they want administrators and staff trained to not blame the victims and to follow Title 9 protocols to the letter they want to know that any staff that doesn't do this will be let go they want to be safe when they go home as well as when they are at school they want to live in a city that does what is right and not
201what is easy lastly I am shocked that we are in the government center and no adult here has the fortitude to enforce our countywide mask mandate when adults can't follow the rules and adults choose not to enforce the rules we are teaching our children that rules don't matter [Applause] you Ayana Perry and then Nikki juwell good evening my name is aana Perry or Miss Perry which is what my students call me I want to start by saying that I am a proud social studies teacher that gets to work in this District every day I love my students my colleagues and the community that I serve but I am here to talk about the burnout that myself and many others in the district have been feeling and experiencing over the last couple of months we have
202all seen the massive teacher shortage that our country is facing many people aren't majoring education in the same capacity that they did 10 to 20 years ago and we're all feeling the impact of it this school year has been met with many challenges from staff shortages for teachers bus drivers and essential support staff to new curriculum rollouts to heighten violence in our schools and to the impact of the supply chain shortages on our cafeteria staff just to name a few what I have seen is that we have been applauding our school staff and Personnel for their hard work and dedication to our schools our students and our communities yet we're not actually doing anything to support these amazing human beings who do this hard work we've seen over the last couple of months some parents
203and politicians of this profession being villainized over how we keep our stud students safe in the middle of a pandemic and arguing over curriculum that doesn't even exist in K12 education critical race Theory isn't in our schools but we have always pushed for marginalized groups to be seen and heard in history and it deserves to happen because history is the truth and not to make us feel good so what is the school board in our school district Community going to do to help us maintain and retain our amazing staff members people are deciding to walk out and quit every day it's more than just better salaries which is still super important it's about and making sure that all schools and their staffs are equipped and supported we cannot wait on the state of North Carolina
204to change how we value education as one of the largest districts in the state we have an obligation to set the tone so that others may follow thank you finally my name is Nikki wiell in 2014 when I was 15 years old I was raped on my high school campus when I reported to the school I was told by the principal that if they conducted a formal investigation and found the perpetrator not guilty I could be disciplined or even suspended for having had sex on campus Because of these threats I never asked for an investigation my perpetrator was not expelled suspended or disciplin in any way I Este see him on campus for the next 3 years I've always wondered what would have happened if I went through with an investigation I text of him
205admitting to it surely the school's warning was an empty threat now I don't have to wonder a 15-year-old Hawthorne student has recently been suspended after reporting her assault the school investigation decided it was a false report despite a police investigation leading to charges being pressed she was even forced to take a a course called sexual harassment is preventable this case hits me the hardest of all the dozens of cases at CMS I have personally heard I can't help but see myself in this girl I was 15 scared hurt and I needed help I was met with victim blaming and threats the same has happened to this girl how can this still be happening 7 years later can you not hear our cries for change can you not see that your actions have lasting ramifications for
206the rest rest of your students lives is your reputation really worth more than that I don't expect to hear a response to this speech I never have to any of my others or to my emails I just want you to know that I am hurting that all the survivors of your school district are hurting please listen to [Applause] us all right that concludes our request from the public and the next item we're going to move on to is our consent agenda is there a motion that the board Madam chair Mr Jeter mentioned that an email had been sent from somebody who was unable to speak Would we not add that oh yeah there I think it's one that's going to be emailed to the board not one that's send us an email to the board
207Clerk or Miss gags email we have Miss Stag's email was no it was not Mr B's already spoken this Stags sent an email that email will be sent to you under bylaw Bea we do not read emails members must be present to speak what I thought sir please stop okay next we is there a motion that the board approve the consent agenda items so moved before we move to a vote does any board member wish to pull any part of this item for individual consideration yes Madam chair I'd like to pull item e item e all righty let me get that in front of me okay anything else just item e okay all in favor of the motion for except for item e please raise your hand any opposed okay now Mr strain would you
208like to speak to item e sorry yes thank you madam chair so this item deals with our policy on uh face coverings as many are aware the County Commission met on this the as in their role as the County Board of Health and modified their recommendations with regards to their mandate um within the county and so the expectation is that in the coming days few weeks probably less all the guidance is that it's likely that the um the county mandate will be lifted and so it will then be incumbent upon us to revisit this I'm surprised that this isn't an action item tonight because I think it's a conversation that has been occurring in our community it's been occurring within the Board of Health and someone suggested that it be passed through on the consent
209agenda um I think a conversation needs to be had on this uh in terms of modifications um a month and a half ago we talked about the need to establish some sort of data metc some sort of guidance the superintendent brought forward a set of data to be considered um there were no thresholds set Etc and so in the last conversation that we had about this a number of board members said look when we get to the point where our Public Health Department says that a mask mandate is no longer necessary then we won't be able to support I I recall at least a number of members saying we won't be able to support a continued mask mandate that's going to happen over the next couple weeks all right quite possibly over the next couple
210of days that we will get to a point where our County Mass mandate is lifted and so I'm surprised we're not having this conversation tonight that's all I have okay thank you is there a motion to approve present item e so moved we have a second second all right um all those in favor please raise your hands any opposed okay Madame clerk our consent agenda is approved 7-2 now let's get to work on our action items we have four action items tonight the first is uh to consider the naming of the Harding High School gymnasium uh yeah um super U Personnel deployment no personel no um so before the board asks I'm going to turn to the superintendent to introduce this item and to make a recommendation thank you good evening Madam chair and board
211members uh the first item uh that I bring as a recommendation for your consideration tonight is bit of sweet a few weeks ago this District lost a talented leader and educator and Family Man and Harding University High School and all of the students families and staff members uh Dr Eric Ward encountered during his career with Charlotte mecklinburg Schools lost a great mentor this district will fill this loss for some time as I know I will personally this can be an opportunity for celebration as we honor Dr Ward's memory and permanent named the gymnasium at Harding University High School for him Eric was a talented athlete earning a college scholarship to participate in track and field he became a teacher and a track coach in CMS and mentored many in the classroom and on the field
212of competition to honor his legacy by naming the Harding Jim the Dr Eric T Ward senior athletic center seems fitting and that is my recommendation and I would be remissed if I did not take a moment to acknowledge uh the hardworking dedicated uh staff members from Harden University High uh who have uh persevered uh through our meeting uh and uh is here tonight so thank you [Applause] all okay so now I am going to turn to our vice chair Delma bars Bailey make this motion thank you madam chair I move to approve the recommendation from the school Improvement team of Harding University High School to name the gymnasium the Dr Eric T Ward senior athletic center all right do we have a second it's my honor to second okay I see you're crying already all
213right Miss bars Bailey I think you may want to speak to your motion I definitely do all of us were deeply saddened by the unexpected passing of Dr Eric Ward Dr Ward was known to many many people in this District students teachers and administrators his energy and passion for Education were incandescent they Shone through everything he did and he did a lot he was a principal at four schools in CMS and was serving as principal at Harding when he died in September he came to CMS as a teacher and a coach after he graduated from UNCC Charlotte with a degree in mathematics starting at Independence High School one of the most remarkable things at dark about Dr W was that he continued to educate himself while he worked so hard to educate others he earned
214a master's degree a specialist degree and a doctorate in educational leadership while working in CMS fulltime what an amazing energy level he had and what dedication to learning and to teaching Dr Ward bettered himself through education and he modeled it for others to see the value of Education he was a track and field athlete who went on to coach hundreds of students on the field some of whom became Champions Dr Ward was an inspiration and a me mentor to hundreds if not thousands of students in CMS his energy his enthusiasm his desire to better himself and help his Comm Community plus his legendary cheerleading and RAM Pride at Harding pep rallies all these things make naming the school gym for him very appropriate Dr Ward was a unique and Unforgettable educator and this naming will
215help keep his legacy alive in CMS thank you thank you any further discussion I will just say I wish we still had him here rather than be naming a Jim for him yes indeed all those in favor of Miss Byers Bailey's motion please let it be known by a show of hands any opposed and of course that passes unanimously thank you thank you guys for hanging in there okay our next action item is consideration of proposed board electoral District Maps before the board acts I'm going to turn to Charles Jeter executive director of government Affairs policy and board services to present the two proposed maps for consideration and after he makes this presentation we'll go to board Q&A mam chair members of the board thank you for having me here tonight um this is uh
216hopefully the final night of redistricting and 2021 um we have a there we go I did want to show y'all a calendar the items in red are all the times we have presented information to the public that is 12 times tonight that we have presented information to the public going back to February of this year regarding redistricting uh here at CMS and so that's the process as I said I hope we're at the end of this the last item on the agenda there which is the the vote so mming criteria we've all seen this we all know what it is um I won't belabor the point um but it's the five items that were approved in April 13th at our November 2nd I believe special meeting the board made a decision to narrow it down
217to two maps for consideration tonight the first of those Maps is map ss1 um which was uh drawn by Mr strain and does meet the board's adopted criteria you have that information there in front of you and once again all this information is available on the website as well as board docs for those following along at home the second map the board narrow it down to was map CS2 which was drawn by Miss Sawyer that map is in front of you as well that map meets all criteria as adopted by the board on April 13th so as yall may remember the board at the special meeting asked the registering work group not to make a recommendation therefore we are going to take you up on that and not make a recommendation you have two maps
218before you I have done um I did want to let y'all look at these Maps side by side these are the two maps um Madam chair we're happy to answer any questions I would like to thank the incredible work of the registering work group that really worked on this Miss Andre May Mr SC McCully uh Mr ma Shong and Miss Marilyn Brown um from Miss Craven house shop we could not have done this without their en TI tireless work so with that Madam chair I stand the ready to answer any questions the board may have any questions this has been thoroughly discussed um so I am not hearing any questions so we're going to do one map at a time is there a motion to approve proposed map ss1 so moved second okay Mr strain
219would you like to speak to your motion thank you madam chair so I I want to go um back to how this was introduced it was introduced as having been drawn by Shan strain it wasn't actually drawn by Shan strain it was drawn by the board of County Commissioners and so just a small correction there there's one Precinct difference between this and the County Commission m one of the things staff mentioned to this was that it meets the criteria so we've had some discussion as to whether this and the other meets the criteria clearly this does meet our criteria so I think about the feedback that we've received in support of this map the alternative M map one of the suggestions is that it's better for the towns and their representation so we asked the
220towns towns and the towns responded the Min Hill mayor and Commissioners said they preferred this map the Matthews mayor and Commissioners with one exception said they preferred this map the Pineville mayor and council members said that they preferred this map the board of County Commissioners not only voted on this map for their themselves but they spoke about how important it was to align with the Board of Education if the Board of Education sought to do so we also got feedback from a representative of the legal Women Voters who preferred this map and most recently our former Schoolboard chair reached out to each of us individually and said she prefers this map and is a resident of the Mint Hill area so would be impacted by this map earlier tonight this map was described as entitled
221and privileged which was pretty shocking to me um it happens to be proposed and approved by the board of County Commissioners and I'm wondering how in their conversation I didn't hear that maligned criticism leveled at them this aligns with the county commission's districts promoting an even stronger partnership with our County Partners and our funders and it meets our criteria thank you very much thank you any further debate discussion debate Miss cheek I would just say that um I am not impacted I don't know if you can see there's ve I think there may be one Precinct swing in this for me so this is not about me um I was very interested in aligning with the county in as much as possible we spent a lot of time in the spring as I recall trying
222to rebuild some relationships with the County Commission I think it even went to court if I'm not mistaken so I think that at this point just these few months later to have the option of having districts that were relatively aligned so that we could have good or improved Partnerships and one on more one-on-one kind of relationships I've enjoyed the one one relationship I have with my County Commission colleague because we have very closely miror districts I think that that is something that's key and I'm just going to tell you what my my former board chair Miss Mary McCrae said when she called me she said what are you thinking she said I live in Mill to think that the comment was made well if you split the three towns into three districts they'll have more
223representation I don't think you spoke to the people in the three towns to see if they felt that way cuz Mary McCrae surely did not feel that way when she called me this afternoon I I we heard you know the M the Matthews actually voted a resolution on this last night so I just at what point do we why would we not that I just I don't I why would we not so I'm just going to make that comment and um I'm sure there'll be people that don't agree and that's okay Miss dear and then Dr Jones the reason why we would not vote based on some of the comments that have been made by my colleagues is quite simply because that was not part of the criteria that we set forth and as Mr
224Jeter showed up on the map on beginning back in February but certainly on March 23rd we began discussing in a very public format exactly what our proposed criteria would be those things included compactness which in my opinion um ss1 does not not achieve um to the degree that CS2 does we discussed ideal population the the idea that we want to get those numbers those ratios down to zero as much as possible and uh ss1 has some districts at 6,000 over and other districts at 6,000 under it is not a clean map but most importantly redistricting Maps is a huge responsibility and we put forth a very specific and transparent much public discussion I think three online discussions public hearings to hear feedback and to be very clear about what we were setting as our criteria
225compactness ideal population etc etc I think it would be mouth eents on our part to come in at the end and be like nope forget all that what we're really going to focus on is other our other factors it I mean it doesn't even make sense to me and and I understand that some um public elect officials have come out now and said they prefer there have been uh other public officials who've certainly written us we're all well aware and express an opposing view um I was you know in Min Hill last Friday night and was speaking with public officials personally and no one they' certainly had an opportunity to express it to me at that point it didn't seem like that pressing of an issue that maybe it's being um expressed in in this
226particular moment and so I I just think that it's you know even the idea of and if we get to CS2 we I'm certainly happy to speak or maybe Miss saw Will about her efforts to present this map to the County Commission I mean I don't think that's a bad idea but that's certainly what CS2 intended to accomplish as well and they chose not to move forward with it but we can talk about that later I just don't think that should be the guiding Factor when we never from the beginning said this is what's important to us and for us to come in at the end and try to change it does not make sense in my opinion when we have a cleaner better map that follows exactly what we set out to do in
227CS2 thank you Dr Jones I think when we know more and dig deeper um uh to take that deep dive and seek to get information from constituents we can make changes we don't have to dig in uh on what was initially discussed I've talked to quite a PE few people in the menhill Matthews area um I've talked to uh persons who have no legitimate uh uh connection physically with with any of the local ities but collaboration with the county is in important uh and I think as much as we can look at having that kind of collaborative effort between the school board and County Commissioners we will go a lot further down the road of having um a partnership um compactness and all of those things are important but we are in a people business
228hear me a people business and so when we want to get stuck on something that we said before we had a fuller understanding and yes you put up some uh times that um we had meetings and all of that it is very interesting that some very key people our former Schoolboard person and others did not understand the magnitude or the the messaging of uh what was being recommended and and it's it's it's not uh just a former um uh School Board member I meant um but quite a few others so I uh cannot um I cannot support um making a change just because we say that um we talked about it uh as a a body but didn't get the full um extent of conversation from our constituents thank you Miss Marshall thank you madam
229chair I think that it you know we we know from what's going on in every public body that you're going to draw a map there's no way to draw a map that's going to make everybody happy and that's just a fact um but what we set out to do was to when when when census numbers are given the point is to draw districts that are as close to equal as possible we are in a growing community and we know that 10 years ago the the the districts that were drawn are are not uh we can't continue that way they're out of whack I mean they're they're all uh the numbers are all so different and so and the and the one vote one person rule is not happening so I really felt like when we
230started this process we needed to get those districts as close to even as we could because we know we're going to grow some more we know we had districts that needed to grow in terms of population we know we had districts that needed to shrink in population and so we're going to have changes and I'm that's just the way it goes so I I appreciate the fact that there are many considerations and again everybody's going to have some valid points to go on and I'm not saying that um that these uh points that people are making are are invalid or wrong um but we started with the criteria and we had multiple I went to several um uh a virtual meetings I see one individual here that was there and a few of them but
231I sat and several there were none and so were advertised they were we had numerous news stories and and I know that a lot of us in our world don't pay attention to until this the until it's right on us and that's a thing I mean I got some texts about that last night there are people in my district that I have worked closely with that will be in other districts because of this so it's not just you know one group that gets changes we're all going to have some changes um I also believe that if we are doing our job as a board not just one person represents towns we all really should be working together and I think it it it will it will broaden the base of support I you know and
232I can understand that people don't agree with that but if I'm in that position to work with a a town uh that I haven't worked in the past I'll work hard and do it so I don't think that that precludes good working relationships because that's what we're here to do so I'm I'm going to stay with um what we started out with and compactness and and and getting our numbers close together or where I'm going thank you this bars Bailey you know I I've looked at both of the maps and as far as District 2 is concerned there's not a lot of change so I'm kind of like Rhonda it doesn't need e both either map is fine for District Two what's going to happen to District 2 in the next 10 years is the
233River District is going to come on and so I'm District 2 is going to get swamped with a boatload of new residents and we're going to have to draw redraw the maps and I'm going to lose some more territory I'm losing some territory in this one I'll lose some more territory then just to keep if if the goal is to keep all the districts relatively the same size in terms of population um I was hoping that the cities would think it was is a good idea to have each one have their own representative I I'm hearing that they don't um I don't know why that is why that's not more appealing to them in theory I thought it was a good idea okay anybody uh Miss Sawyer yes thank you um I want to just
234make a correction I I went back and looked at my emails and I do not have there is not an email from the League of Women Voters weighing in on this there's an email from a member who clearly says he cannot speak for others and there is no no um thumb on the scale from the League of Women Voters so just um but I have talked to other members of the league and the compactness the notion of having compact districts that are um close in numbers is important um those were the the rules we set forth and objectively um CS2 has is more Compact and has closer close comes closer to to Ideal population so that's where my support lies M ship uh I've also looked at both and and I see value in both
235and so this is kind of difficult I'm in the district 2 area it is as you said M bbell it is going to be a change here um with in CS2 many of of the districts that have been in District Two would be now district 6 and I have heard from the community there that have had some questions and concerns because there's unincorporated areas there's concern about you know their ability to be represented and have support in that area um but it has been a large area as you said and compactness is important and and that area has had a a lot and it will continue to grow and change but yes as I look at both of them I can see Val in both but I do see S2 given some real support to
236the area in terms of compactness I think we've all had an opportunity to speak going to go ahead and call for the vote all those in favor of Mr strange motion let it be known by a show of hands that is one 2 three all those opposed show of hands which one are you ship okay one two is that a hand no I'm on no which way do we count in exstension yeah it just doesn't count okay so one 2 3 four five all right so that motion fails um elction so the next we will uh go to CS2 is there a motion to approve proposed map CS2 move mam shair second there a second a second yes all right with a motion from Carol Sawyer second from Miss deara Miss Sawyer could you please
237speak to your motion I think we've covered the primary issue is that CS2 provides uh closer to Ideal population and more compact maps and abides by the rules we set forth at the beginning of the process anybody else Miss yes I would just like to tell the town of Matthews Mill and Pineville that I apologize to them for this I think they've been slided by this board and I would like for each one of those res residents to remember which members of this board voted this way to split them up when the County Commission has their at large Primary in a few months and this school board has its atlarge election coming up I would like to remind all of them to count your votes I agree all right Mr strain so this is quite
238the slide of hand um so first of all let the record show that I said a representative of legal woman voters which he is and everyone went around saying that well the criteria we set Mr Jeter did ss1 meet the criteria as I said Mr shra both Maps met the criteria ss1 and CS2 shocking okay so the case against the alignment to the board of County Commissioners fails on that basis so what's interesting is that um what this map clearly does uh as described by said representative he called this map Jerry mandard that's what he referred to this map not me that's not my word he said this map was Jerry mandard CS2 and then this board is going to vote against everyone of the towns that they claim they're doing this for that's amazing
239and then given the need for this board to work with its funding partner that provides over a half a billion dollars a year to educate our kids and this board says no thanks amazing so just for the record Mr Jeter one more time the case was made to vote against ss1 because of some notion that it didn't meet the criteria I'm just going to ask staff one more time did ss1 me excuse me did ss1 meet the criteria Mr strain of the five criteria adopted by the board both Maps CS2 and ss1 meet the five adopted criteria by the board okay and and then the other case was that CS2 was developed to take to the board of County Commissioners so that they could adopt it so we'd be in alignment which meant alignment was
240good whatever efforts were made exactly I'm sure they were well meaning the board of County Commissioners did didn't adopt CS2 they adopted their map with one Precinct change from which I took their map and made one Precinct change in order to be compliant with our criteria and so it achieves the alignment that members of this board actually attacked me on social media saying that no no no no we agree that we're working toward alignment with the board of County Commissioners and here we have a map that aligns with our secondary funer that provides a third of our funding at over a half a billion dollars a year and this board is going to turn our backs on all of that and the three towns that came out in force and said this is best for
241us let's let him vote and as long as there are Chuckles in the gallery our former Schoolboard chair who is a resident of the Min Hill area and knows a little bit about the importance of working with the County Commission so okay just something to think about perhaps before you raise your hand for this so-call not my word Jerry Mander Mount all right before I go to miss delar I'm just going to make a quick point of clarification I haven't weighed in on and I'm not weighing in right now but point of clarification I don't think I did not hear anybody say that either map did not meet the uh guiding principles it was implied all all of all of the both of the maps as Mr Jeter has said four or five times now
242meet The Guiding principles I think what what I heard board members say was that one of the AR Arguments for one map over the other actually there are Arguments for both maps that are above and beyond the guiding principles so I I just a little point of clarification there m essentially what I was going to say certainly no one said that neither map uh you know didn't meet the criteria it's just the idea of using other factors to weigh them more favorably beyond the original criteria of which CS2 meets um um with uh the uh ideal population and compactness I think that's so ironic that one person mentions that CS2 looks Jerry mender when I've had several people write me and say that's the very essence look at look at district 6 it actually looks
243like a salamander the way it's spread out across the whole bottom of the county so we're not going to make anyone and everyone happy there have been people from the communities in the towns who have also reached out let's not over and misrepresent uh what's happened I do think it is incumbent upon all of us I know certainly and just so everyone knows this doesn't impact me in the sense of I'm at large so I don't have you know a dog in this fight I just know that as an atlarge member you know we reach out and I'm sure all of many of our members Reach Out across the county and will continue to do that to Foster the relationships um that we need um that's all thank you thank you anyone else like you
244did in Davidson and then moved I I'll just say this is a really really hard um decision and I guess there was a high chance that it would cause strain on this board and that is happening and I hate that um I know that we will you know move beyond the decision and and we've all pledge to not attack one another after a decision is made um so um regarding collaborating with the county there's a lot of hard and practical work that goes into that um I've not seen um a whole lot of collaboration in the last few years when our Maps were aligned so I'm not sure how much of a factor that plays into it however I really appreciate the effort that you put into this Mr strain to to create a map
245where none of their people and none none of our people would be double bunked a map that would that would work for both sets of guiding principles and I really appreciate the work that you put into this Miss Sawyer to do the same thing and um I understand that they voted before we did um they were made aware of these options they did not choose to to go with either one of these I know they spent a whole lot of money on the consultant who drafted their proposed map so perhaps perap they felt the need to stick with what had been proposed to them but I really do appreciate the effort that you both made for that Outreach um so bottom line collaboration with the county is important but it's not about a map um
246and I am here hello County Commissioners I am here to work with you when the time comes um and regarding the towns um it it it did is striking that not unanimously but there were certainly a lot of elected officials that wanted district 6 to kind of stay more the same and I recognize that this is a big change um and I've worked really hard to build those relationships too um over the last few years and so it really does give me angst to um to vote the other way um and I truly truly believe that the towns will have more interaction more communication more relationship building so I know there are Skeptics out there we will prove you wrong um and with that I am going to call the vote all those in favor
247of Miss Sawyer's motion please let it be known by a show of hands that's one two three wait one two three four five opposed one two three so that passes 5 to three with one exstension thank you all right our next action item is to consider the approval of proposed School boundary for Olympic relief High School for the board acts I am going to turn to the superintendent to introduce this item at long last and to make a recommendation thank you madam chair before I ask uh Miss aesa Craven how to come forward and provide staff's recommendation on the uh assignment boundaries uh for our new Southeast Elementary School and for the new Olympic High School uh relief School uh both uh which are scheduled to open next year I want to just share that
248uh among the most difficult and scrutinized decisions that we make uh recommendations that we make as staff um are those dealing with recommendations for updating Student Assignment boundaries for our schools and we understand that uh you know that has had such a personal connection for our families and our students and that is why staff carefully considers uh the implications of boundary changes uh for our students and their families and we seek Community imp put at the end of the day we must recommend and seek approval of boundaries that meet the needs of our communities and enable us to better provide for a sound uh public education that is Equitable for all students and so with that I'm going to turn the floor over to miss Craven how thank you superintendent Winston and good evening board
249members I'm just waiting for the uh presentation here we go for the Olympic relief High School the superintendent recommendation Builds on uh the previously presented Violet scenario as well as a scenario blue um which was recommended by uh members of the community you can see um in the map that's being displayed the new Olympic boundary is in tan and includes uh the high school students in the bewick Elementary attendance area Steel Creek nation's Ford and and the portions of Lake Wy and South Pine which continue to Kennedy Middle School all other um portions of the existing Olympic attendance area will be assigned to the new relief high school and that is indicated on the map in blue we will also assign to South mecklinburg High School those students in the um in the Starmount attendance
250area um that currently continue to Carmel Middle School and Harding High School um and we are doing that in order to keep um that attendance area contiguous um because we have assigned students from nation's Ford and South Pine that currently continue to Harding um to Olympic and Olympic relief as it relates to the board's um four priorities for Student Assignment uh the superintendent's recommendation primarily assigns students um to the high school which is closest to them um with the exception of some portions of South Pine Elementary which today are assigned to Harding High School and will now be assigned to the Olympic relief High School it improves significantly the home to school distance for students in the nation's Ford Elementary attendance area as those students today continue to Harding High School and will now continue
251to Olympic High School in terms of intact feeder patterns we do remove a split feed from Southwest Middle by eliminating the continuation to Harding and both Kennedy middle and Southwest Middle will both feed um Olympic and Olympic relief as it relates to SCS diversity socioeconomic diversity um we project the relief school and Olympic High School to have uh fairly equal um distribution of medium um sces communities in the attendance area um and they differ um on the distribution of low and high um sces communities in their attendance areas um as seen in the first chart in terms of utilization um Olympic does receive relief um and there is room for growth at both schools um the first projected enrollment you see there excludes students who today live in the attendance area but are choosing uh
252CMS magnet programs the final column of projected enrollment includes uh those magnet students um and the reason to show both is um we've certainly heard from the community that while there may be some families who are not currently choosing uh their home school uh with the opening of the relief High School uh we may see some of those students um opt into their home school um and so the projected enrollment is probably somewhere in between those two figures um but we feel confident that um both schools can accommodate it and that it does provide relief um for Olympic and that concludes the um update on the superintendent's recommendation for Olympic Rel all right before we move to the motion do we have any questions is Marshall could you go back was there was there a
253slide prior to this one that's on the board okay um okay all right thank you any other questions Madam chair I did not mention on this slide and I should have um that the superintendent's recommendation also includes grandfathering those students who would be in their senior year uh when the school opens um and it does not change any Elementary or middle school assignments as part of the recommendation how many do you can you tell us how many um students are getting moved assigned to South Mick um I do not have that number with me I if I recall it was 81 students but I can follow up with you to be sure any further questions yes ma'am well the relief have any magnet programs or is it strictly a homeschool it will not have a
254magnet program and so um when we think about magnet programs um that that involves students who are outside of the attendance area being able to opt into the school via the school choice Lottery um that is not something we will offer at the relief school um it will however offer a range of Career and Technical education programs um similar to the range of programs that are offered at at Olympic High School okay I'm going to turn to miss ship then to make this motion thank you madam chair chair I move to approve the superintendent's recommendation to designate The Homeschool attendance area for the new Olympic relief high school as presented in the CMS Olympic relief plan these changes go into effect at the start of the 2022 2023 school year students who who will be
255in the 12th grade in the 2022 2023 school year will be assigned to Olympic High I also move that the CMS Olympic relief plan be included in the minutes of tonight's meeting okay do we have a second second Miss deara has seconded Miss ship's motion would you like to speak to your motion um I'll just say after a lot of work and talking with the community and working also with you Mrs um crav and how I think that this is a definitely a was a good compromise for this community and and the best for them in terms of this the boundaries thank you okay Miss deara yeah just quickly I think this was a great U Move I appreciate all the community engagement I know Miss ship Miss Byers Bailey and and others and me
256to a lesser degree you know had gotten a lot of feedback and and you and the superintendent took a lot of that feedback back to try to make the best uh situation possible so just thank you this is hard work and so thanks for all to all all right Mr strain I want to thank staff for working with the community to come up with a better solution right we came came out with two met with the community um once again engag the community and and actually the community brought much of this forward and we appreciate that uh feedback from the community it makes uh it makes the solutions we bring forward better absolutely so thanks to the staff and certainly thanks to the community anybody else yeah you are the I was going to say
257you're the hardest working woman in town but you're not because there's a lot of hardworking women and men in this room right now but you are up there I don't know if people understand how long your hours are with the you know from the start of this process to the Intensive Community engagement to the end so thank you all right all those in favor of Miss ship's motion please let it be known by a show of hands any opposed and that passes 8 to zero um all right and this is our final action item of the night um is to recommend approval of the proposed School boundary for the Bane Lebanon Road and Piney Grove relief Elementary School and so as usual before the board acts I'm going to turn to the superintendent to introduce
258this item and to make a recommendation thank you madam chair and I'm going to turn it over to miss Craven how thank you um displayed is the superintendent recommendation for the Bane Lebanon Road Piney Grove relief Elementary School um you can also see on the slide um the the descriptions of which portions the surrounding elementary schools um will be assigned to the new school um importantly it does also include uh relief for Bane Elementary um which was a a topic of discussion over several months of um our deliberations here it also assigns to Matthews Elementary the portion of the Sardis Forest neighborhood that is currently assigned to Greenway Park Elementary um in addition to the board's priorities for Student Assignment uh there are also some additional considerations that the board asks the superintendent and staff
259to consider and one of those is keeping HOAs whole and in assigned to the same group of schools that was not the case for Sardis Forest neighborhood um and we had an opportunity to address it while we were looking at the Matthews Elementary uh attendance area um as this proposal relates or recommendation rather excuse me relates to um the board's priorities for home to school distance um it does increase the distance for some students who will be assigned to the new school um for Matthews and Lebanon Road Elementary Schools um there is often a trade-off between the board's priorities um in improving one um we see a decline in others and that is the case here we um have an improvement in utilization um but that is offset uh by increased Hess School distance ites
260does decrease the home to school distance for some of the students who will be assigned to the new school from Bane Elementary in terms of intact feeder patterns it removes a split at Piney Grove by assigning all of the students who continue to Mint Hill to um to uh Crown Point Elementary there are multiple split feeds in the new elementary school um we have an opportunity however in the 2022 Student Assignment review to address those have a group of students leave this Elementary School to Middle School um and so I would suggest that we make sure to prioritize that as we begin those Student Assignment review conversations in terms of sces diversity the new school will be primarily low and medium SCS uh there is a um there's a community of higher sces communities um
261that's included in the boundary right now there are no CMS students um in that particular area um but we do hope that that is interest that we can generate in this new school school and then finally in terms of utilization um you can see from the chart here um that we do achieve relief for all schools um and there is room for growth at the new school as we certainly expect um in the Matthews Mill area to um see continued growth is that it yes thank you okay any questions Mr strain thank you and thanks for your work on this um folks probably don't know that this is a um it is a difficult process when we open new schools as we just discussed with the Southwest Middle School or excuse me high school we
262open schools and they sit empty unless folks move to them we're opening new schools because our schools are overcrowded because our schools are aging um and they present an opportunity they present an opportunity to create a great new school and a great new culture uh as no doubt this school will be and so uh for all the passion for every one of the communities that this will serve um I ask you to embrace the school and and make it the Roaring success that it absolutely can that being said as difficult as this process is I want to let people know that as as recently as when we walked into this chamber there were still conversations going on about this map and these assignments because late in the in the process there were some changes made
263in some of the assumptions and so so we went to validate some of those assumptions and we had staff go out and reassess and re-evaluate the capacity at Bane Elementary and find that the Early Learning Academy building which is the original building that many of said Commissioners that we discussed in the last segment actually attended School 60 years ago um it it it does it doesn't have much life left in it and that that's why we in successfully uh achieved a bond um replacement school which was opened in 2013 with that being said then we had to relook at some things and this has all been sort of Fast and Furious one of the things that was drawn in was um relief for you know mo moving more moving some of the lines around because
264there wasn't as much capacity at Bane and one of the things that came out of that was moving and providing relief to the Matthews community and the Matthews specifically Elementary School Matthews Elementary School is also overcrowded uh its capacity if we put the chart back up is 800 yes this year we've got on this chart I believe 8 27 plus there are seven students identified from Matthews Elementary School who are attending our virtual elementary school so that would bring that the number of Matthews Elementary School students enrolled in CMS to 834 again that's more than 800 but not massively more than 800 and so it's not a crisis situation the superintendent's proposal moves 174 students out of that school which provides tremendous relief the enrollment in in Matthews Elementary School has been relatively flat and
265so from that perspective whilst the relief is welcome I think that the relief is excessive and we can accommodate those students at Matthews without um uh relieving quite as far and the current boundary moves a very important Community to Matthews and that's our crestdale community we're taking our crestdale community which was the heart of Matthews the the the mecklinburg county uh Crest was designed by a crestdale resident and so they mean a great deal to Matthews they're right in the heart of Matthews they belong belg in Matthews Elementary School and the current proposal over relieves Matthews Elementary School given the numbers that were provided here so like I said this is a conversation that has continued to move over the last couple days there's been discussions I know that um Miss Craven how Mr superintendent
266you've made some changes to the maps based on some of these conversations this was one of the requests that came up that that change be considered I again suggest to you that moving the crestdale community and the crestdale road communities out of Matthews Elementary School should be one of the last things that we do and it shouldn't be done here because we are not in an acute situation whereby we need that much relief to Matthews Elementary School right now so speaking on behalf of my friends and Neighbors in the crestdale community and along the communities on crestdale road I would request that you consider the boundary go down Sam new and Trade Street East on Matthews menhill Road and South to East Charles Street to the east of the crestdale road communities as we've discussed
267over the last couple of days that's really important to the Matthews community and it critical crestdale Road communities as the representative or the current representative not the future representative but certainly the current representative of those communities thank you all right any further questions if if something like that can you can you talk to me about what any type of so Matthews is it 82% if if students were moved correct opening enrollment next year yes do you have any idea if these changes that we're talking about and I and I again I don't have the whole map in front of me because I can't see all the streets um is that all the area east of Independence I sorry west of Independence it's not it's not all of the um portion um so as you look
268west of Independence um that kind of teal color is currently in the Matthews Elementary attendance area and what Mr strain is referencing um is the southern portion of that um the street um the street name doesn't show up um on there um uh Mr strain I appreciate your characterization of the of the process it's very much an iterative process as we take into account the data and uh Community uh input and feedback um for the particular portion uh of the Matthew's attendance area that you are describing there are about 71 K5 students in that area today so that would add 71 students um back to Matthews which is about three three and a half classrooms worth um and your characterization of the 2122 20th day enrollment is also correct is 82 seven students and then
269the seven students that would be in Virtual School is 834 um we might also consider the 1920 enrollment um which was 967 students um prior to the pandemic and the 10-year projected growth in 1920 um was a,2 students total not a growth of a,2 but a,2 um enrollment for the 2020 2930 school year um we are having those 10-e projections redone because of course um we cannot discount the last 2 years and um the effect that that has had on our Trends bless you okay so do we have do you have any I know this has come up last minute do you have any calculation on what that would do to um utilization if those folks in that southern portion to remain um it would take us up to um about 72 25 out of
270that 800 725 students enrolled for capacity of 800 um so it absolutely increases right but does not get us to 100% utilization thank you misser in this new plan will Matthews Elementary uh still require mobile units or still have mobile units on site they currently have 12 mobile units um and if we think about about um mobile units having about 20 students per classroom that's a capacity of 240 um the projected enrollment at opening is 653 and so that should get them out of mobiles um in a school that has capacity for 800 students so I think that's that's a a valuable um thing to do for school safety for ease of operation for cost of operation so I think that's an important factor thank you certainly M Craven how that the uh capacity of
271the building is 800 you said with these 71 students the open it would still be below 800 sorry it would still be below 800 yes right [Music] so technically there wouldn't wouldn't be mobiles required because you're still under the building capacity yes and the maximum uh uh enroll rment in Matthews over the last 6 years has been over 1,00 so we're still providing significant relief um it was difficult to understand so I know the area well obviously but uh to to miss Marshall's question the area we're talking about if you if you pull that up again is the teal area that is closest to Matthew's Elementary School so map itself sweeps down toward Matthews Elementary School when it when it's pulled back up here yep the map is up but it's not on our screen
272for some reason so perhaps whoever controls our screens there we go so you'll see the teal area sweeps down into Matthews here and you see just above the word Matthews is where Matthews Elementary School is and that teal area that sweeps down there is the area that's that's closest to the elementary school that I'm suggesting we don't actually cut that close to the elementary school and the crestdale community then is to the south of um Matthews Mill Road which is labeled there and runs down to what's called tank Town Road on this and so the um proposed boundary there would come uh down from Independence Boulevard to the South and then head east on Matthews Hill Road and then South to tank toown Road rather than continuing South along trade Street almost reaching the school
273itself and I think we've established that the the numbers can facilitate this given certainly given what this school has operated at previously and the fact that we're projecting opening numbers at less than actual building capacity even with this change to the map certainly given um this current Year's 20th day enrollment um and it is challenging to pres to predict or project the ways in which enrollment will or will not uh rebound to 1920 levels and the 10-year projections that we had at that time um I think typically when you bring us recommendations we hear it in advance we deliberate you know and then two weeks later we vote and I know this time you guys have really worked with the community and I think with Mr strain to continue some iterative changes um I'm nervous
274to make one more change at the dis I'm worried at how a we're not thinking through unintended consequences be not sure that we're going to capture it in the motion and in the map so I think at a certain point you just need to say enough like we've had time had've been working on these maps for seven months now um so not opposed to the content of what is being suggested but I haven't had time yet to consider it and I'm nervous making any kind of student assignment changes at the Das it's just not a best practice but I do appreciate your earnestness to just keep chipping away at what your various constituents are pushing for well we know we know we're going to have to um drive further relief at Bane um so we're
275going to have to come back to this but the advantage here is that rather than suggesting we move people that we haven't spoken to we're suggesting that we not move people and keep them in place and so that's certainly a conversation I had with Miss Craven how as well that you know the the flip side of this if it was the other suggestion well we need to move more more people reassign more people that's something that that we're not considering although we know in our conversations we're going to have to do that but we'll do that in a second iteration what this does is suggests that a number of folks who in this current plan would actually be reassigned would not be reassigned um I don't know very many people that are overly concerned about
276that this community is in the heart of Matthews this community is the heart of Matthews all right any further discussion questions all right then I am going to Margaret um you have a funny you have a look on your face like you have a question I well I don't have a question um I would like to modify um but I don't know that that's so Margaret I was wait for the motion to be made and then I was going to make a substitute motion okay all right okay sh are you still planning to should I turn to you to make the motion yeah you are okay Madame chair I move to approve the superintendent's recommendation to designate The Homeschool attendance area for the new Olympic relief High School oh I'm sorry sorry sorry a typo
277in the motion yeah that is a typo cuz this is exactly okay Southeast Rel Elementary that's what it needs to say for the new Southeast um Elementary relief school as presented in the CMS Bane Lebanon Road Pony grow relief plan these changes go into effect at the start of the 2023 school year student students who will be in the fifth 8th and 12th grades that doesn't work this right the these that I don't want to interrupt that is correct because going to move okay because the students from Greenway Park who will be assigned to Matthew's Elementary they will also be assigned to the continuation schools for Matthews Elementary which differ from those of Greenway Park okay students who will be in the 5ifth 8th and 12th grades in the 20 22 23 school year will
278be assigned to their current schools I also move that the CMS Bane Lebanon Road Piney Grove relief plan be included in the minutes of tonight's meeting do we have a second a second okay so I wish to make a substitute motion and that motion is that the um the boundary for the Matthews Elementary School uh continue down Sam Newell and Trade Street East on Matthews men Hill Road and then South to East Charles Street to the east of the cres Hill Road communities Miss Craven how as we've discussed we have a second for the amended motion I'm second that pardon I'm seconding that okay so we have amended Mo substitute motion from Mr strain seconded by Miss Marshall Mr strain do you want to speak any further no I think we've covered that ground okay
279any debate on the substitute motion all right all those in favor of the substitute motion let it be known by a show of hands pardon that's three all right all those opposed going to abstain all right two so the substitute motion passes and now that becomes the main motion all right all those in favor of the motion now amended by Mr strain let it be known by a show of hands make a comment pardon is there time for a comment um okay yes well I I am not comfortable supporting this motion I don't think it's good governance to amend a complicated plan um from the dis I think it sets a very bad precedent and I cannot support it all right any further debate we we've lost some people yeah I I will say that
280I this this has been this has been a difficult process there is no doubt about this um Mr Strange's comment on trying to keep some folks together was appealing to me and I have been concerned for some time that that that that portion of the um Matthew's attendance area that that's so close to Matthews um I would have liked wanted to keep that school as intact as possible POS and we still have some room so I am um I'm again I appreciative of everything that goes into this um I think we can we can accomplish um a lot of things and and still keep some keep some folks that are so that are almost in the backyard there and I understand what what we're all trying to do here but I think we can do
281that thank you um so Mr strain and then miss soyer so just a couple of notes here um one thing that that we know is that we're not providing enough relief to Bane and we know that we're going to have to go back to that well so just a signal to the community in Mint Hill that there's further conversations on this and we haven't Incorporated all the changes that are necessary in terms of providing uh relief to Bane but in honor of the process itself and the late notification of a number of communities you know it it wasn't appropriate to to move that um boundary further north from the um the new Elementary School in and Bane so that'll need to be done the other is that we don't uh bring the communities together on
282True Light Church Road with this particular one we've heard a lot about that and I think that that's important because those are communities along that road and it makes sense for every entrance on that road um we weren't able to achieve that partially because we haven't delivered enough relief to Bane um so uh I I certainly expect that we'll revisit that as well in our next U discussion with regards to the boundary between the new elementary school and Bane Elementary School so thank you Miss soyer now I would like to see complete data on the impact not only on Matthews but on the new school since we have not discussed that um I'm very concern again the notion that we're going to do this on the Fly I find very troubling um we've been at
283this a long time I think it's unwise all right all those in favor of the motion please let it be known by a show of hands that is one two three and opposed that is two so that passes by three to two with one exstension all right guys um I don't believe we have any further business so our meeting is [Music] adjourned