CMS Board of Education Meeting, October 12, 2021 (6pm)

001[Music] for [Music] e [Music] e for [Music] for [Music] e everybody I Now call the October 12th 2021 meeting of the Charlotte meinberg Board of Education to order and we'll begin with adopting uh entertaining a motion to adopt the agenda all right all those in favor of the motion raise your hands any opposed okay Madame clerk the agenda is adopted by a unanimous vote of 9 to zero um I'm now going to call on board member Lenora ship to introduce tonight's pledge leader thank you it is my honor to introduce tonight's pledge leader Trinity burs who is an eighth grader at Ranson IB Middle School and is joining us via Zoom she's very proud to be a Ranson Raider so am I because I attended Ranson when I was in Middle School 17 years later

002after I finished college and became a teacher I returned to Branson to teach all the teachers who had been there when I was a student were still there it was such an honor to join them so Ranson has a special place in my heart I think it has a special place in our pledge leader heart too Trinity has been active in Ranson she served on the Raider student council for the past two years she has come up with many innovative ideas for schoolwide incentives she also always has time to listen to others and help if needed Trinity often creates inspirational voice videos or notes for her teachers she wants to become an influencer in the Arts through singing portrait and dancing Trinity isn't the only member of her family involved with CMS her mother Amy

003Jones works in the district's transportation department Trinity will now lead us in the Pledge of Allegiance and then speak briefly on this month's character tra of perseverance thank you Trinity good evening everyone um it's an honor to be with you today it's honor to be with you this evening my name is triny bur and I'm in 8th grade student at Ranson I middle school I will now recite the Pledge of Allegiance I pledge of allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands one nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for all I was invited to speak with you about perseverance perseverance is something we rans and Ivy Middle School exhibit each day it is the continued effort to do or achieve something despite difficulties

004failure or opposition the pandemic has impacted our communities in a mighty way yet we show up to school each day prepared and ready to learn putting our best fo forward regardless of what's going on in the world we are saved loved and respected at R and IB which makes perseverance way much like way better we will continue this great journey because nothing could be greater than to be a ransom Raider thank you and have a great evening thank you all right thank you for that message um colleagues we are going to move on to our public hearings we have four public hearings this evening and the rules for each hearing are as follows each speaker will be called to speak one at a time each speaker will have a maximum of three minutes to address

005the board each speaker May only talk about the topic that is the subject of the public hearing individual student matters or specific Personnel matters may not be discussed personal attacks will not be allowed profanity or other inappropriate language will not be allowed and the board reserves the right to mute any speaker who violates these rules Madame clerk do we have any speakers for policy BSA student advisor Madam chair there are none and any emails relating to this public hearing Madam tier there are none all right thank you I now declare the public hearing for policy BSA student adviser closed um Madame clerk for bylaw Bea on Board of Education meetings are there any speakers or did we receive any emails relating to this Madam chair there are none okay then I declare the public hearing

006for bylaw Bea Board of Education meetings closed policy BG the school board policy process Madame clerk are there any speakers or did we receive any emails related to this public hearing Madam cheer there are none okay then I now declare the public hearing for policy BG School Board policy process closed and finally are there any speakers for the exhibit BGE for the Board of Education policy process any speakers or did we receive any emails related to this public hearing Madam chair there are none all right thank you I now declare the public hearing for policy BGE Board of Education policy process Clos exib pardon exhibit exhibit exhibit BGE Board of Education policy process and that is now closed all right so now we're going to move on to requests from the public the rules are

007similar but I will read them here each speaker will be called in to speak one at a time unless you are part of a group each speaker will have a maximum of two minutes to address the the board and groups will have seven minutes each speaker may speak on any topic of their choice except for individual student matters or specific Personnel matters and personal attacks will not be allowed profanity or other inappropriate language will not be allowed and the board reserves the right to mute any speaker who violates these rules and so our first three speakers are Nicole Ria Rya patchin and Alexis shapira and please forgive me if I've mispronounced your name and correct me and I'll try to get it right next time so first up is Miss r can you hear me

008yes we do go right ahead are you there miss ra okay on average approximately 4,000 children die each year in North Carolina from drowning h hello y we hear you keep going can you hear me yep we hear you m hello we hear you do you not hear us can you hear me yes okay I'm sorry um I lost the video on average approximately 4,000 children die each year in North Carolina from drowning according to the CD um in the last two years of covid 10 children have died in North Carolina Ina that does not specify what their underlying conditions were and what other comorbidities they might have had for God's sakes they might have drowned but if they were tested and came back positive that counts as a covid death of course no one

009wants a child to die it's tragic but what you are doing to the children that are still alive is equally as tragic according to the CDC your four-year-old is more likely to commit suicide then die of covid and yet here we are with your ridiculous mandates so my question to the board and the parents are where's your outrage for pools why are we not shutting down all of the pools filling in pools going to people's backyards against their will and demanding their pools be removed where is the outrage or maybe there is none maybe the only reason there is outrage about covid is because you've been told to be you've all stopped thinking critically for yourselves and have bought in to the propaganda machine while this country circles the drain drowning vehicle accidents homicide cancer

010cardiovascular disease and Suffocation all individually are more likely to kill children than Co why are we not mandating cancer screenings perhaps we all need to stop driving the gos are amongst the Leaning killer I think you get my point all of you who support Mass mandates are a bunch of Hypocrites and for the record parents speaking on behalf of their children domestic terrorists those who are willing to go along with these nonsense mandates that are harming our kids are the domestic terrorists and yes I'm referring to you okay thank you that was your time all right next up we have Ria patchin and then Alexis shapira and then Matthew Ria M Madam chair I do not see either of the next two speakers in our attendee room uh I do see a Matthew but the

011last name is not identified we will uh promote to panelist and check to see if it is Mr Rea okay while we're confirming Mr Ria just to get ready the next two speakers will be Mercy Buckets and Haley brownley hello can you hear me yes we hear you go right ahead Mr Ria hello hello go right ahead thank you I like to talk about masks yes I'm going um there have been 47 studies confirm ineffective an ineffectiveness of masks for covid and 32 more confirm the negative health checks The Masks have to stop in the school how long are we going to do this it's on the second year and there still hasn't been any human evidence that masks are effective in preventing Co or looks like he lost his connection um let's move on

012to Mercy Buckets and then we will try to bring back Mr Ria oh now he's back Mr Ria can you can you try again you're you're on mute okay you hear me now yep we do we looks like you lost your connection can you just um pick up where you left off yes yeah I'm back um just talking about the masks have been there's hasn't been any evidence that they have been effective or ineffective I mean where's the data on that um when my daughter turned five she was in daycare at the time at the start of covid during the lockdowns and um she was made to wear a mask uh for eight hours a day um she was sick out of those six months she was wearing a mask five times on average kids

013they get sick at daycare in school you know it's normal to bring home something um she was sick at least five times with stomach viruses coughs colds you name it uh since she has been wearing a mask maybe she was sick once and this is when she stopped wearing a mask at camp at CMS or my kids do not go to they're not enrolled at CMS at this moment anymore um so it's it's hurting the kids all they know is masks and how they're diseased or they're going to catch a disease you still see kids and it breaks my heart to see them outside Alone by themselves waiting for a bus thank you R okay I understand we don't have just want to confirm do we have mercy buckets or Haley brownley no Madam chair

014okay how about Emma small no I have Laura Corell and someone with the initials LR okay so we don't so we don't have Emma small we don't have John Conrad or Suter Conrad that is correct okay so then and we don't have the group of Madison Cox Melanie Holland and Mike Holland we do not all right well then let's bring up um Lauren Ross or we don't have Lauren Ross either huh there we go so we have Lauren Ross followed by Laura Carell all right hello everyone um I just want to thank you for your time and thank you for Le giving me the opportunity to speak uh I guess my only concern that I have or want to bring is not regarding any type of mask but um me and my family moved here

015last year and I know it was due to the whole covid and this whole quarantine situation I know the school enrolling was a little bit kind of dicey but I will say last year and I also see it this year on how every school every situation seems to operate a little differently with rules and procedures and so I would like to see or hope that someone would like maybe address that especially being a new parent on how our new family here how every school operates differently when it comes to certain same procedures but then the results are supposed to be the same but it doesn't seem like they're the same so I guess that's just my two minutes I just wanted to bring up to someone that I feel like as a new parent or

016new fed family here it just seems like some things are just not always the same going across the board when it comes to schools they all kind of operate and follow rules but it's not always the same manner or the same fit so thank you all right okay appreciate that so next up we have Laura Carell followed by Katherine magota and then Sandra spe and Miss Carell please go right ahead okay thank you thank you for your time um I'm here because I really want to make sure that history does not repeat itself in the past two and a half years CMS students have lost valuable key social events since the onset of covid uh CMS has opted not to host most School related social events uh while sporting events are continuing um in some

017capacity full capacity or not other social events continue to be cancelled specifically like school trips homecoming dances Proms and um other dances for third or fifth and eighth grade I appreciate fully appreciate the severity of the disease and we need to wear masks to protect not only ourselves but others as well that having said that it doesn't mean that we can't continue to host these type of events social events like the homecoming dance prom are critical to teenage development proper socialization not only strengthens the immune system but it's needed for mental and emotional health it's events like these that allow teenagers to develop Independence explore their identities and begin to form relationships my ask is very simple we've already lost the homecoming this year before we react too quickly and cancel prom for 2022 can

018we think outside the back box on how to allow allow these events to occur based on Research I found schools across the country held homecoming dances as fall with no impact from a covid standpoint they were held outside some with mask some without mask some states are requiring proof of vaccination some are saying are a negative test before entering my recommendation is instead of trying to fit a square peg and Rand hole or one siiz fits-all uh can we provide some general guidelines to the principles for each of the schools to say how can we host dance safely and then let the principles work within those guidelines let's leverage the best practices across the country there is a way to enable these events uh we just need to figure out how and I just ask

019please don't let the CMS Stu uh students suffer any any further thank you thank you okay so do I understand Katherine magn and Sandra Spate are not with us tonight that is correct okay so next we have Glenn Stevens Mr Stevens go right ahead okay Houston we've had a problem here from the moment astronaut Jag swager relayed this comment and it was echoed similarly by astronaut Jim LEL all of Mission Control Center was focused on one thing getting our astronauts home alive long before the state published a news outlets all over the state reported we to achieve every individual inside CMS and the CMS Board of Education should have focused on one thing with laser guided Precision student outcomes according to reports 34862 students across the state are either repeating third grade were placed in

020a fourth grade accelerated class or a transitional third grade fourth grade class how many CMS students are included in that number where is the sense of urgency why isn't the superintendent of schools and his staff reporting to the public what measures have been implemented since the last meeting to help our students rise out of the hole this School System created for them why are the flood the funding floodgates not opened and full why isn't the association demanding these answers and instead of Defending a system which is by any objective measure failing our students AJ krael of the Council of great City schools has admonished this board of education to take meaningful steps to move toward a goal of spending at least 50% of its meeting time on student outcomes yet if one looks at tonight's

021agenda it would seem as if it was business as usual within CMS every CMS Department should have already reviewed its procedures for any procedure which is not directly supporting student outcomes classroom Educators should be asking their principles for data and evidence-driven student outcomes Based training every lesson design should be reviewed by classroom Educators and adjusted to provide laser focused datadriven attention to student outcomes and building level administrators should be facilitating this effort nearly 25% of the school year is finished CMS is behaving as if this mission is performing without a hitch thank you Mr Stevens okay do we have Beth Quinn Tim Emery or molini Kumar with us um I'm here back all right so let's bring up I gather they're not with us so if you could bring up Bill Fountain I'm sorry um

022I'm here as Beth I just um yeah I don't have we have I called your name I don't think I've gotten to you yet are you Beth Quinn I am oh I am sorry okay go right ahead Miss Quinn I'm sorry you all had my name from my email different so I'll go ahead I've spoken previously as a concerned parent regarding Mass mandates and I am now aware you've received a legal letter from the North Carolina citizens for constitutional rights informing you you do not have legal authority to implement covid control measures without official orders from the health department which tool guidelines toolkit guidelines would not be considered um in quoting page four of the letter such decisions will likely be found to be a manifest abuse of discretion particularly where the control measures are

023harming children and I wanted to share um some excerpts from an interview with Dr Eric Henson and ENT an Immunology specialist providing Frontline care in Palestine Texas more firers affect your respiratory physiology function we're this is public comment for us to hear from you so we're here to hear from you okay um I'll just summarize then it's um reporting how masks adversely affect our respiratory physiology increasing carbon dioxide and lowering oxygen this affects our CD4 and T lymphocytes which are essential for low um lowering our body I mean I'm sorry which lower our body's ability to fight infection doing the opposite of what we should be doing and when you are wearing a mask and you're breathing bacteria and viruses back in you're increasing your viral load which is also the very thing we're trying

024to prevent and he um reports on his 40 Years of science supporting this and I just wanted to share that with you so thank you okay thank you now we have Tim Emy and then molini Kumar Mr Emy thank you good evening my name is name is Tim Emory I am a member of race CLT a multi-racial anti-racist group of citizens who Advocate on issues involving Education Health housing and Justice with a racial Equity lens one common refrain we hear from othermind speakers to this body is a critical attitude towards anti-racism what is wrong with being anti-racist what is wrong with working and advocating for Equitable outcomes for all children where race is not a predictor the suggestion that words like diversity and Equity are bad words are deeply disturbing in a manifestation of white

025supremacist backlash to telling the truth for too long we have had an allergy to telling the truth about our history in this country thankfully that tide is turning the allergy to the truth has harmed us it has harmed black and brown students in school who don't see accurate representations it has harmed white students who grow up Recycling and believing the incorrect information about our shared history like the ideas that the Civil War was not about slavery or the lack of awareness about the white supremacist terrorism in North Carolina that cultimate cul culminated with the largest and most deadly coup in the United States history in Wilmington in 1898 I suspect that many logged into this very meeting have the same misconceptions I would suggest that all that haven't read the award-winning book Lies my teacher

026told me by James loen anti-racism isn't only important because it's the right thing to do but also because white people will also be better off if we live in a society rooted in equity the systemic racism in our systems harms all while harming black and brown people most severely they still do harm to the majority of white people life expectancy for white Americans is lower than expectancy for white people and other peer nations in the end my Liberation is inextricably linked to the liberation of my black and brown Brothers I want to encourage CMS to continue to implement Equity policies and content into the curriculum and instruction so that truth telling becomes routine and expected thank you thank you okay molini Kumar and then Bill Fountain and then Justin Parmenter Miss Kumar you are up

027hi um I spoke last time about the masks um and uh that's something I wish to speak about again and I had mentioned that you've got statistics you can pull from the data on uh you know covid cases around the schools um and I noticed that at the end of the last meeting you yourselves were talking about needing metrics to make decisions and so I guess we're on the same page here you need to pull some metrics to justify your decision because just coming out with a mask mandate with no justification for it and no metrics to support it it makes no sense and it's it's just wrong um the children have a god-given right to breathe you are saying that they should be covering their faces and limiting their breathing it's on you the

028onus is on you now to justify why that is right decision and I'm waiting to hear what you've come up with in your review of the metrics I get the emails from the various schools my kids are at and my my friends kids are at Co is spreading um is going to it's in in some some Nordic countries they have now equated it to the seasonal flu or seasonal illness rather it's going to be there we're all going to be exposed to it just like we're exposed to colds and coughs and in the winter and I think we just need to treat this as part of life going forward and the kids need to breathe in fact if someone's coming down with something you want them to breathe because otherwise they're going to breathe the

029germs back in their bodies and they're actually going to uh um you know proliferate the illness so it just makes no scientific sense I mean I'm sure your mom's and dad said when you were ill as a child be in an arated room and Bre minutes thank you okay now we have Bill Fountain and then Justin Parmenter and then Monroe Richardson Mr fountain go right ahead uh you're on mute there you go oh you're unmuted and yet we do not hear you if we're not hearing you Mr fountain all right maybe we can come back to Mr Fountain while he works on his technical difficulties so I'm going to go to Justin Parmenter good evening thank you for the opportunity to speak to you tonight over the past few years there have been rumors about

030a troubling pattern of people who worked at cms's Smith facility getting sick earlier this year it was reported that the district was closing the building due to widespread health concerns what hadn't been disclosed until recently were the identities of any of those affected that has now changed since retired CMS principal inz Olen revealed she is battling cancer I had the absolute privilege of working under inz ousen leadership for about a decade first at Smith Academy of international languages and then at wadell until her retirement our library at wadell and now at sale is named in her honor Miss olausen built a magnet program that became a national model for language immersion and was named districtwide principal of the year in 2004 one of the things I appreciated about her leadership the most was that she

031saw each of her employees and students first as people who deserve to be valued for their gifts and support reported when they needed it not as cogs in a machine but as humans first CMS is a huge machine and in large organizations like ours there's a tendency for the focus to be on numbers and spreadsheets rather than on actual people it can be far too easy to forget that our district is made up of individuals who have stories and families and lives Miss Olen and the other Smith staff who have been diagnosed with a variety of illnesses deserve a thorough and transparent investigation into any possible connection between the years they spent working in the Smith facility and their medical conditions let's accept the offer of the National Institute of occupational safety and health to

032investigate a potential link between Cancer diagnoses at the Smith facility an offer which CMS has reportedly declined we need to handle this situation not by sweeping the problem under the rug but by seeing our current and former Smith employees as people who need our support and by working hard to get to the bottom of what happened to them thank you all right thank you um I'll go to you Andro Richardson and then we'll try Mr Fountain again so go ahead Mr Richardson good evening my name is Monroe Richardson I'm the executive director of Reed Charlotte on September 1st the state released the spring 2021 student test scores the pandemic had a devastating impact on reading and math no racial group socioeconomic group or part of our community was spared for reading between 65% and 79%

033of Black and Hispanic students in grades 3 to 8 scored not proficient on their eogs for math between 69 and 81% of Black and Hispanic students in grades 3 to8 scored not proficient on their eogs there are tens of thousands of children in CMS Elementary and Middle School classrooms struggling with reading and math right now unfortunately this is the third school board meeting in a row since the release of the state test scores on September 1st at which discuss about the 2021 scores is not on the agenda I do not think we can count the exercise with AJ CR bill in which third fifth and eighth grade reading scores were used to practice student outcomes focused conversations given what we know today about the state test scores do we have the right plans in place

034are we allocating resources in the right ways are we providing the right supports for teachers what do the teachers themselves say what are our concrete plans for continuous Improvement what are the specific metrics and milestones for improvement how frequently will we run Improvement Cycles we need a public discussion of these important questions and others we know CMS can't do it alone but it's hard for Community groups churches businesses and others to know the right thing to do without clear thoughtful discussion and direction from the district the board and staff of Reed Charlotte along with our community partner stands ready to help for the sake of the children in our community please put discussion about the test scores and District plans on the next board meeting agenda thank you thank you let's try you again Mr

035Fountain have you got your audio working can you hear me I cannot hear you no it looks like it's not working perhaps you could email in your statement and we'll read that into the record okay um let's move on to we've got Stacy Stags and then Stephanie Sneed and then Amanda Thompson rice do we have Stacy Stags nope okay let's go to Stephanie sne uh good evening my name is Stephanie Sneed and this is my fourth address to you on behalf of the black political caucus since September I'm here to continue to shine a light on the longstanding unacceptable performance outcomes of CMS students particularly those that look like me as I've previously stated one of the biggest emergencies in Charlotte are the disturbing districtwide performance gaps now more than ever we are fully aware

036of the trajectory of students that have long-term unfavorable performance while a part of the school system today I just want to highlight that less than 5% of black high school students in math one are performing on a level exhibiting college or career Readiness and only 3% of the students that are entitled to it have a multi-tier multi-tier support system in place a robust and specific plan must be put into a place to address these long-standing gaps and learning loss due to covid simply stating $50 million will be dedicated to the 42 laws performing schools is not enough you have identified where you would like students to be but not how they will get there and September the bpc asked that a robust tutoring program be put into place although you have plans for uh tutoring

037program there is much more to be done we specifically ask that reading Specialists be put in every classroom for lower grades and specialized literacy literacy support for upper for upper grades hiring of experienced staff to ensure that every student that is entitled to a mtss plan has won Recruitment and Retention of blackmail Educators study skill courses Act SAT prep courses Investments and Community partner programs providing educational support technology laptops and internet access for all students technology and learning tools and equipment for classrooms specialized teacher development and training gear towards changing outcomes and hiring of experienced Personnel for development of school Improvement plans that will set a pathway for College and Career read pressure produces Diamonds the bpc will continue to apply pressure until outcome change we can no longer remain silent in our children's livelihoods

038are dependent upon this thank you we look forward to further conversations great thank you okay Miss Thompson rice and then Ray L grone and then Melanie Holland can you hear me yep we hear you okay Co and its effects are still present and we can no longer continue as business as usual with the state of Crisis we are in a state of of Crisis and I am now sounding the alarm over one month time period 17 emails a resignation an early retirements enough is enough 23 phone calls of Educators crying and stressed looking for support enough is enough custodians doing double shifts because they have vacancies within their building feeling underpaid undervalued literally breaking their back putting off Medical Treatments enough is enough students being taught by different Educators daily leading um leading to a

039lack of consistency stress and poor academic performance we are putting a Band-Aid on gaping wounds of trauma and stress enough is enough educators are giv their best but we are burnt out eating with kids be um covering classes and no longer have time to do data dims instructional planning periods grading PD and giving feedback to students expectations should match the realistic time given to Educators where's the time where's the compensation enough is enough staff members of families are trying to figure out why their school has been left off the co dashboard when they know they had nine cases that we before enough is enough let me pause and give a shout out to every educator in school buildings work sites bus hubs and central office that are trying to do their best best but where

040are our life jackets from a board of education member how many deaths resignation early retirements will be enough for you Board of Education members to see the crisis and begin to be strategic and intentional to fix these problems we cannot wait until tomorrow we have to fix these problems today because I love CMS these are my colleagues these are my students my bus drivers my friends my schools I know attending to mass loads before we Bloom has to be happened with a sense of urgency we are in a state of emergency you have heard the alarm how will you respond thank you thank you okay we have r grone and then Melanie Holland and then Lori Carter hi uh my name is Raa grone I teach at Olympic I have children at cotswald billingsville and

041mcclint talk I'm the vice president of cmae and in that position extremely lucky to support CMS staff throughout the district I'm here to voice concerns I've heard from several schools just this week I've spoken to a custodian upset because she can't keep up with the demands of her job cleaning entire buildings after Tik Tock challenges and students not re acclimated to being out in the world with half the staff of previous years I've spoken to a nurse responsible for two large high school campuses with over 4,000 people and what's really scary is hearing that she is feeling sorry for the isolation room nurse who oversees 10 campuses I've listen to bus drivers doing double and triple routes making less money than cats drivers and with no benefits I've talked to an administrator who doesn't know

042how he will fill the gaps of the Skeleton Crew at his building from day to day he spoke of the lack of applications for any any position open in his building he knows this is a shortage Avalanche that is only growing and as for me I've covered classes for absent teachers and vacancies every single day of October this means all of my preparation for class must be done after school hours feedback parent contacts answering emails from distressed students really connecting and educating our children is done on my own family's time my own children miss me my situation is not unique teachers are quitting and there's no teachers to take our place there's no substitutes willing to come into schools for Less pay and safety than working in the fast food industry I sent each of

043you a letter about contact tracing contact tracing isn't happening and people in our schools with verified clusters are dying each of you signed up for this job you fought for it be bold in your actions collaborate with our district leaders for Solutions like so many other counties around us are doing consider coverage pay retention bonuses virtual scho days for cleaning and planning please don't pass the buck fight as hard as every teacher bus driver custodian is fighting right now thank you thank you next we have Melanie Holland and then Lori Carter and then Lisa yo do we have Melanie Holland all right do we have Lori Carter no okay well let's go to Lisa I see you there Lisa you're on mute y sure I am thank you so much sorry about that um my

044name is Lisa Yaro I am the parent of a ninth grader at Olympic High School and um I my plan to speak with you tonight was about the situation with the sexual assault at Olympic High um but before I go into that I do want to I beg your pardon um would like to just voice my um support for the mask mandate in CMS which actually makes it possible for my son who is imuno compromised to actually attend in person learning um the science is clear about the benefits of masks and in fact the American Disabilities Association has actually um published a statement about the benefits of wearing masks I just want to um Advocate and voice my support for masks um would also like to uh share with the board that arpa funds are

045available to provide support for staff and Educators in CMS um under the um American relief protection um plan um going on to the situation at Olympic High in June um news broke about the shocking ways in which the sexual assault um situations were treated at Myers Park and not three months later we have a situation at Olympic High where the allegations and the process were mismanaged students were made to feel unsafe um student protesters have been gaslighted there has been a focus on protecting allegedly protecting the students um and and really the result has been that the voice of the students has been silenced um this has left my son who is as I said a ninth grader wondering where are the adults in the room where are the people who are willing to own

046up to the decisions that were made that were not responsible and were not mature um president or principal Jones has said that um it is important that the students are given an opportunity for learning well the reality is that the students are learning whether we're speaking or whether we're acting and when CMS does not have a unified policy for the management of sexual assault and the management of student Le protests that actually protects the voice of the students then the students are listening and learning from us thank you thank you okay now we have Caitlyn Reed and then Diana Benson good evening CMS is a mess this district has no structure and priorities are completely skewed what does CMS actually care about is it making sure students are able to have a safe way home

047so they're home on time no is it making sure behavior supports are in place at schools no maybe it's making sure that all students feel safe and comfortable in school no CMS has shown these things are not a priority in school students are harassed by classmates teachers are discriminated against and harassed by their so-called colleagues students are left stranded at school until upwards of 5:00 p.m. with no way home because there's no Transportation unless of course schools expect their own teachers to take kids home which they have but these do not concern you the only thing that concerns you is forcing students to wear masks that do not prevent the spread of covid-19 and force staff to prove they're vaccinated or comply with weekly covid testing if they don't prove that they are vaccinated this

048is the priority of the school board and CMS the education of students your children is not a priority what happens when you lose teachers who refuse to comply we all know shoving them into already crowded classrooms is the solution since no substitutes are accepting jobs leaving teachers overstressed and even more overworked than they already are if you think CMS and the school board is are here for your children to make sure they provide the best education possible in a safe environment then I would recommend taking your children elsewhere since this is not the case get your priorities right CMS do better stop pushing politics and do better thank you do we have Diana Benson and if not let's give Bill Fountain one more try to see if his audio is working Mr Fountain all right

049there you are G to try your audio Mr Fountain you try speaking Yeah it's not working all right um Madame clerk did we receive any public comments by email Madam chair we did not okay well then let us move I'm sorry madam chair you had asked Fountain to send his in right but did we receive that have we received that no I have not yeah we have not received anything from okay all right well thank you very much um next we are going to move on to our consent agenda is there a motion that the board approve the consent agenda items um is there a second second okay before we move to a vote does any board member wish to pull any part of this item for individual consideration I'm sure I do I got

050to find the right one uh item d Madam chair okay got that okay so all those in favor of the motion except for item D please raise your hand and say yes yes yes okay any opposed okay so that passed 9 to zero um and Mr strain could you please speak to to item D yes thank you madam chair so obviously we're still under a mandatory uh mask mandate um or or a mask mandate here in the county by our Board of Health a month ago we had conversations about the sort of data that we would look at when it is our opportunity to make this kind of decision um how are we progressing in terms of that I certainly haven't received any information in terms of data or a report on on where that

051stands or um how that recommendation will be formed yes thank you for the question Mr strain I wanted to um just acknowledge uh what you shared about uh the countywide uh mask mandate uh of which Charlotte meinberg Schools uh and other schools in the county are a part of and uh the county has indicated as part of that mask mandate um that uh we would need to be below as a county 5% positivity rate uh for uh 30 consecutive days before that uh mask mandate is lifted and so certainly that would be one of the metrics uh that we would be looking at uh but uh we will uh staff is looking at a a number of different data points and we'll come back at an upcoming uh board meeting uh Madam chair and share

052that information uh with the board okay thank you I'm sorry Mr superintendent that's the same answer we had a month ago so I'm trying to understand when we should expect to see that cuz I actually thought it was going to come forward along with this given our conversation a month ago we will bring that forward uh if if Madam chair agrees uh we could do that at the next school board meeting in two weeks yes ma'am okay thank you Mr superintendent okay so Mr strain um well I guess just to the board in general is there a motion to approve consent item D so so moved SEC motion from Mr stange second from Miss Sawyer um all those in favor of the motion let it be known by a show of hands any opposed okay

053and that passes 9 to zero uh Mr superintendent I think you may have a personal a Personnel appointment to tell us about yes Madam chair thank you I am excited to a share uh one person appointment this evening and uh that is to fill the current vacancy at winding Springs Elementary School um the choice and I thank the board for approving this is to have Dr Matthew slod who is the current principal assistant principal I should say at Druid Hills academy uh serve as the new principal uh of winding Springs Elementary School uh Dr slod has also served as an assistant principal at mariji Davis uh K8 Idol wild elementary school as well as uh winged Park Elementary School uh he's also served as a teacher and a dean of students and I will share

054that um I'm excited uh for a number of reasons uh about this appointment uh but uh most uh impressive about uh uh Dr sler is what I believe is his ability to and his experience uh that he's demonstrated uh with various subgroups of students and his demonstrated success in those areas and look forward to him leading the family of winding Springs Elementary School all right thank you okay colleagues we have three action items tonight the first is to recommend approval of policy BSA for the student advisor um and I'm going to turn to Lenora ship as chair of the policy committee to make a motion for its adoption and as a reminder since this is an item reported out of committee it does not require a second okay thank you madam chair um Madame chair

055I move to approve the creation of policy BSA student advisor as presented if approved this new policy will outline the selection process and the roles and responsibilities of the board's student advisor the policy committee discussed the student advisor policy at the August 31st 2021 committee meeting the version before you tonight was approved by the committee on a three to zero vote at that meeting thank you thank you um any discussion before we vote anybody Miss Fowler thank you Miss Elise I just wanted to um propose an idea for the following student advisors we are using social media a lot to communicate to our students and to our families as the student advisor and previous student advisors before me we use our personal Instagram accounts Twitter or Facebook in order to keep personal away from business

056I propose that we have a student advisor account for all social media platforms for instance having a CMS student advisor account on behalf of the board and just sharing the password with the following student advisor um the Miami Dade County has a similar function where the student advisor Corina white the current student adviser doesn't even have an Instagram her personal Instagram however she uses the Board of Education student advisor Instagram that will allow for more privacy nonh harassing for the student advisor and just a separation so they don't have to feel um uncomfortable on their personal accounts so that was something that I wanted to add on to the policy but everything else is amazing um okay well thank you I'm not sure that this is the time in place to to change the policy

057um but that is something to consider and let me just see Miss Marshall and then miss Sawyer oh and Miss Chek do I see your hand okay uh thank you and I think I think we can incorporate some of these things in in terms of practice I don't know that we have to amend policy for great suggestions to come which Miss Briana Taylor has given us many over this uh over this time um but I also want to uh thank the policy committee for for allowing this uh policy to go through I think it's very well thought out I think it involves many stakeholders to help us get to a place um where we're going to have great representation and to the listing public um we are getting ready to to put out an application

058very shortly around this policy we're waiting we were waiting tonight to have it voted so we can can move forward and we kind of have a a condensed period of time but 10th and 11th graders if you are interested in being a part of this and and being a student advis being the student advisor to the board you're going to have that opportunity to apply soon so be on the lookout we'll there'll be more information about it but I just wanted to do a little public service announcement at this moment thank you so miss Sawyer and then miss cheek no I I just wanted to U let Miss fer know that I don't I I understand your your um desire around social media and I think we can meet those needs without a policy change

059so I don't think that has to be covered in the policy yeah I and i' hope I didn't I didn't mean to sound like I was shooting that down I think there's a lot of Merit to what you're suggesting and but it it doesn't I don't think we need to change polic change the policy in order to Institute that practice so that's I just I just meant that it should be put into practice if you look at the policy we did discuss briefly when I did attend some of the policy committee meetings for the current policy that we're overviewing we did admit I mean we did discuss having the social media in practice I just wanted to highlight the practice that should be made when we put it into policy all right thank you for

060that recommendation um Miss Chek and then miss um Dr Jones Miss Miss CH and then Dr Jones I think that Miss Sawyer just you know that recommendation needs to be put in practice which is part you know that's the outflow of the policy the policy is solid but I highly recommend that we do that I know that um we have a good communication team that can put that in place but it makes more continuity for years to come and I think that that's a fabulous one of your many many fabulous contributions to this position Miss Valor and you know go north Mach Vikings you're always such a great representative of the school and of the student across the district but I'm kind of partial to the Vikings so thank you Dr Jones my question was

061could it be something under regulations um Mr superintendent I think it's just it's it's I don't know it need if it needs a regulation either I think it's a practice that is I believe that that is the case Dr Jones I say one more thing okay I I got a come back to you in a minute Miss Marshall I got to let everyone else have a chance I just I want to say that I think this is a really good policy we've been able to put in place and I think that it is a practice uh and that's wonderful that you bringing bring on to our attention but I think this is going to stand real well for our students and their opportunities to be student advisors and do the work that you've shown us

062that is so great with this position so I think this is well done and I think we can bring in the practice okay anyone else before I go back to miss Marshall I want to give everyone a chance okay Miss Marshall and just real quick I misspoke a minute ago and I never like for um a name to be um mispronounced or or misconstrued and Miss Fowler Miss Banna Fowler you have done an excellent job and so I apologize for mixing up names it happens sometimes when you when you get a little older so thank you okay any further discussion before I call the vote okay all those in favor of the motion let it be known by a show of hands any opposed all right thank you good work you guys and thank you

063for all that you've done to contribute to this Miss Valor to make this a stronger policy um okay our next action item is a recommendation for approval of bylaw Bea and I turn again to board member Lenor as chair of the policy committee for the motion for the adoption and again this will not require a second because it is reported out of committee thank you Madame chair I move to approve the modification of bylaw Bea Board of Education meetings as presented if approved these changes will modify remote meeting participation by board members and restructure our meeting agenda agendas in keeping with our ongoing student outcomes Focus governance work the policy committee discussed bylaw Bea at the August 31st 2021 committee meeting the version before you tonight was approved by the committee on a 30 vote

064at that meeting thank you okay any discussion before I call the vote well I just want to thank everybody for all your hard work on um tuning this up tuning up this policy um all those in favor let it be known by a show of hands any opposed oh I'm sorry you had an oppos you were opposed okay and that passes by a vote of 8 to one with Dr Jones in opposition okay and next we have recommendation we're going to um our last action item is to consider a modification to our bus driers compensation rates before the board acts I turn to the superintendent to introduce this item and to make a recommendation thank you madam chair and board members uh before staff comes forward to make the presentation I want to share that

065uh transporting our students to and from school safely is a critical District operation and so far this year we have faced Transportation challenges like never before uh we are not alone in this situation as colleagues and uh peers and districts in surrounding counties as well as across the country uh share similar stories and uh of difficulties in hiring and retaining school bus drivers uh we currently are operating at a deficit of approximately 100 drivers when we consider both vacancies and drivers currently on one of several forms of approved leave so after reviewing options we believe the best way to address our driver vacancies is to get more competitive with pay we must attract and retain drivers to keep our students and um our district moving forward we compete with not just with other school districts

066but round shipping operations that often pay significantly more than we have offered and so tonight we ask uh that you approve our recommendation to raise starting pay and to raise pay for all of our dedic ated drivers at this point I would ask our chief operating officer uh Mr Brian Schulz uh to come forward and present uh our recommendation thank you superintendent Winston Madam chair Madam Vice chair members of the board uh good evening uh it's my honor to be able to present to you and and bring this uh modification to bus driver Compensation Plan uh to you for your approval uh for tonight what I want to make sure that we communicate the information regarding our our bus driver uh Staffing challenges many of which uh superintendent Winston just covered uh also the actions

067that have been taken to address the current challenges so this just didn't happen overnight and we've had a team working on this uh for a long period of time now and I'd also like to communicate the proposed compensation modifications to improve uh retention and recruitment uh and our purpose as superintendent Winston said is to request approval for those proposed modifications to the bus driver compensation r rates and I'd be remissed if I didn't acknowledge and I'll introduce Adam Johnson and acknowledge Him uh and his leadership efforts is what I would call a transportation crisis uh to get our students uh to and from school across it's a national uh issue as you heard uh uh Mr Johnson and his team uh have taken upon themselves duties that they would not normally have taken upon uh

068in terms of uh driving buses and doing whatever it takes uh to get students to and from school so they can be served uh uh with our core mission in mind of teaching and learning so uh with that I'd like to turn it over to uh Adam Johnson and Mr Johnson if you prefer you may remove your mask during the presentation but that's completely your call if you don't mind that' be great uh because uh fellow board members Madam chair Vice chair uh superintendent Winston I I have been using my bus driver voice a lot lately I've been on a bus driving since the first day of school and here we are in October so that lets you kind of know the Del lay of the land uh but I do want to while I

069appreciate the kind words uh we certainly own that we have not provided the levels of service that we need to for our families for our students um for our schools so we do own that uh we are doing the very best that we can uh when we hear concerns um certainly from board members from parents from school staff we respond to those just as quickly as we possibly can and dedicate additional resources when available to try to fix things as as they come up so with that in mind uh just going to go over some some information to kind of set the stage for our uh presentation this evening as a superintendent alluded to not only certainly this is a national crisis um just recently uh the state put out the survey to all the

070all of the leas and we found that there were about 1300 bus driver vacancies just in North Carolina alone now super superintendent the uh vacancy number has actually gone up from 50 to 56 so just in the past few days we've lost additional drivers to other employment um but we certainly hope to try to get those folks back soon so in addition to those vacancies as Mr Schulz pointed out we do have drivers on some type of approved medical leave that's about 51 um and we do have daily absences so to kind of put this in perspective on a daily basis we may be trying to cover about 140 buses in the morning and in the afternoon what we did note after July 1 of this year was an accelerated rate of those that were

071separating from CMS uh we do see that each summer and typically what drivers do is they sort of wait to see if they can find better employment over the summer something that is certainly 12mth of employment and maybe pays a higher wage we saw this certainly um exacerbated this year likely due to co and likely due to the very lucrative employment opportunities that are out there for drivers and for everyone actually I mean you can't go just a few feet and not see another sign out on the street help wanted and an additional signing bonus and increased pay so we're competing against everyone um at this point so we'll take us on down to the next slide what we did over the past and I get here's my bus driver voice coming back to hot

072me uh but what we've done over the past year we formed a recruitment task force March of this year um that was all of our transportation staff kind of split up into teams and targeted just about everyone we could think of uh Partnerships with the community um we worked with mobile advertising on our activity buses we had the ridership survey if you all remember and while we didn't get a great response rate um this year we're certainly hopeful that parents see the the value in letting us know and we will roll that survey back out this coming year after the lottery closes we did a lot of Route optimization over the summer as we contined to see drivers that left us in July and August we really did our very best to shrink reduce that

073number of buses that we put out on the road and again besides the advertising we had additional job fairs of our bus classes were obvious obviously in effect we had a lot of FastTrack applicants that would try to come back to us and when we mean a FastTrack person that's someone that's already holding a commercial driver's license with the proper endorsements and that shaves that time the turnaround time that we can put them behind the wheel transporting students in most cases one to two weeks so we're really excited to get those folks hopefully back to us with this pay incentive um and this kind of structured plan if it is approved we also put in place thanks to our part partnering with our HR department uh $11,000 recruitment bonus and retention bonus for our uh

074veteran drivers that was in place in August of this year and of course what we're here tonight to discuss is our compensation rate plan so these modifications that we're talking about would result in the following um a reduction in the number of allotted driver positions from the last school year that reduction in the vacant number of of the bus driver position plus we have operational cost that we'll realize from not running that many buses certainly the biggest one would be fuel of course tires oil all of the other maintenance items that go along with running the buses this will allow us to increase this wage to be certainly more competitive in this job market not with just other districts but with other driving jobs here in the in the city so we're really excited about

075that the total estimated cost of this is about $4.9 million now this proposed compensation rate would make the district a leading competitor we would be the highest paid bus driver school bus drivers in the state of North Carolina and in South Carolina and would also put us very competitive um in a place with these other local um CDL driving jobs in and around the Charlotte area so we're excited that this would put us in a place to uh attract back we hope some of those people that have left us over the past couple of months so the wages would look sort of like this 1575 is our current starting pay for drivers when we just had a we just had a class start today 1575 is what they would potentially be making with this new

076rate increase we would hope to uh offer 1775 per hour that is quite substantial we see and we do realize but we know that this is what we need to do to be competitive in the market we also and this is where I really need to recognize if my drivers are watching I I think quite a few would be and the rest of my team this is not just about me the the people that really are making this happen are out there pushing these buses every day and they're running an additional two additional three routes in the morning in the afternoon and and we're doing the very best we can to make this happen so I do want to recognize my veteran drivers and we have been able to put in some sort of a

077tiered increase for those um with several years of experience and we're doing those in blocks of like five to 10 years experience 10 to 15 and then 20 plus years of experience and those would all certainly be based on those years of experience those drivers have we're hopeful that that would really provide the incentive for those folks to stay with us and not leave in mass as they've done over the past several years so with that in mind I will turn it back over to Mr Schulz to tie us up and uh make the recommendation thank you thank you Mr Johnson and and once again we appreciate the work of your team and your staff and the drivers uh that are uh picking up the students and and bringing them to a safe Learning Place

078to school every day so we appreciate those efforts uh so in short we're seeking adoption of the proposed modifications to the bus driver Compensation Plan as presented uh approval of the rates would uh the rate increases will support Recruitment and Retention of bus drivers uh for the students of Charlotte meinberg Schools uh and at this point we'll add any you know closing comments or answer any questions that you may have uh regarding this proposal okay um I see Miss deara Miss ship Miss Marshall Miss Chek Miss Sawyer oh my goodness let me write that down I don't lose track I think misser was okay well I've got de laara ship then Sawyer so thank you first of all for uh bringing this forward and all the hard work that I know your team and um

079your team has been putting or yes your The Mask I didn't recognize you at first your team has been U putting together on this it's very important and I appreciate you mentioning not only is this a local problem nor a state problem but indeed a national problem I do believe we even floated the idea over to Governor Cooper's office that maybe they should call in the National Guard just like the state of the governor of Massachusetts had done um because uh everyone's looking for Solutions and so these are certainly some of the solutions um I app appreciate that this has been brought forward I I do want to ask about the $1,000 uh uh retention or recruitment bonus uh just to clarify was that do we know was that paid for out of the covid

080funding if we have a short answer on that it was just to clarify okay and then secondly do we know how many people to date we've been able not just to retain but I guess to recruit do we have a number on that I'm just curious if if that has worked yes ma'am uh since the recruitment bonus went into effect in August we've hired about 35 folks but in that same period of time we've lost about 50 so it's unfortunate that we'll get one in and then they go another one goes back out we've actually had some that have gone through the class worked one day and then said this isn't for me so it's unfortunate now of course they wouldn't have qualified for the bonus because there are qualifications that they have to work

081through and that's not going to be paid out until several months of of employment so we have seen an uptick because of the recruitment bonus and some folks have stayed with us but we've also lost some in that same period of time and how long for those that are new to the CDL process does it take for them to go through the class remind me we're averaging about 52 days 52 days so there even with this there will be a delay yes but the good news is what we're hopeful for is those that have left us in August September to other driving jobs locally once they hear that this is in place we will be competitive with the places they've left us to go to so we're hopeful that those people could come back to

082us because typically what they do is change status they may drop down from a full-time or a part-time driver to a sub in that case we're they're already in the system they're drug tested so they're ready to go it would just be a matter of changing their status back and then they could get behind the wheel and take over fulltime again so we're fingers crossed hopeful that those folks can come back to us much more quickly yes well we need them so thank you for that and I don't expect you all to answer this and this might not be appropriate for this time but if not now maybe even in your board report later I do hope and I and I understand that we have some other pay incentives that are on the way they're

083not prepared to share necessarily tonight but I just do think we need to speak to it at some point because certainly our bus drivers this is important it's critical but we also recognize there are other positions um in in uh CMS where we're also actively coming up with new ideas and can you speak to that even later tonight is that part of the plan or can you say something now I don't want to speak out of ter that's not that's not part of this um Q&A right now for this report so maybe later at some point yes um Miss de la har we will certainly uh be more than happy to come back um and share information about some of the other things we're doing around compensation for other employee groups okay I just think

084that's critical that we get that information out as soon as we can thanks thank you okay um any more questions I'll turn to you Miss Sawyer for questions about the bus driver oh I'm sorry Miss ship yes Miss ship and I even made myself a list I was just trying to make sure I thought it was me but turning to you Miss chip for questions about the bus driver um compensation yes first I want to thank you all for your hard work cuz I know how just tremendous it is to get bus drivers and keep our bus drivers in the district and work through this I have a a question though about the number of children riding a bus and in seats I've heard a lot about uh are we having three or more students

085riding together now in seats I hope none out of seats and still trying to ride the bus how is that working right now yes ma'am good question um when the state reduced the um restrictions or actually removed the restrictions on capacity one of the ways that we were able to survive is just loading the buses to be more full certainly than they were last year during the 2021 school year what our hope is when we will be able to attract and retain more drivers we could put more buses back on the road to ease some of that capacity um we're not allowing the buses if we ever get any reports that we are getting close to capacity or over we instruct the drivers not to move the bus until we can get another bus there

086or move students to another bus so we are trying to balance those loads out so they're not too heavy but yes there are cases where students are riding 3 to a SE I know that's been a concern yes ma'am for many of the parents um I also wanted to talk about the fact that I know this is good but as we look at drivers you know for the fact that bus driving is not 12 months and it's also in many cases not 40 hours that also makes it you know hard to continue to incentivize and get our drivers what are we doing there how many drivers are 40h Hour Week drivers which is important and with benefits so 95% of our driver Fleet are full-time with Benefits we're one of the few districts in the

087state most of the large districts a Guilford a wake um that that run a large Fleet of buses typically can offer their drivers full-time so while most of them not may not be 40 hours they're definitely full-time so they're really close to 40 hours and that is available so those that are watching that are interested in driving a school bus they are full-time positions with benefits available um we certainly have part-time positions that those that just come in par time in the A and part time in the p.m and so we do have a variety of things that we can offer folks that may fit their schedule that do want to come work with us but good question but most about 95% of our folks are full-time and that's good to know because I know

088a lot of drivers feel that way if is it part-time and using other occup OPP you know opportunities for and we do this since I've been here um since 2018 we provided additional opportunities for them to stay employed over the summer camp CMS certainly helped a lot with with that this past year but we've offered more jobs for drivers to work at the bus garage or doing different duties in the district uh to try to keep them engaged and keep them with us throughout the summer that's great yes ma'am thank you thank you thank you ma'am okay now miss Sawyer thank you and then miss Marshall then miss cheek thank you and I just I'm so grateful to your team I know you're you're just on the firing line and and you all must be

089exhausted on I feel for you and I know it's it's it's hard on the schools it's hard on the staff it's hard on the family so I'm really excited to support this um I wondering if there's a way to um get a little extra HR Support so that uh we can shorten that two week window for folks who might be coming back to the district if we can um try and Y we'll Accel accelerate that um as as much as possible absolutely part of it is unfortunately um the drug testing process just to getting them the drug testing actually another part of this that the drug testing folks um that we use they are short staffed so it's increased the turnaround time by a few days to get results back um and then it's also

090a function of getting them scheduled with the D&B trainers they're short staffed so they're supposed to be hiring additional folks to come in we've gotten them to do agree to do an additional bus class for us at the end of this month and another class in November anticipating hopefully the the spike or increase in applications so we will work on those things to see if we can kind of Streamlight that streamline it a little bit better to on shorten that time are there any um stop Gap plans to um recruit folks in the district who have CDL whether they're coaches or um athletic directors who have CDLs to to pitch in yes we actually have been working with HR over the past several weeks on that plan um I think we're real close to being

091able to roll that out to offer that to any school staff that would be willing even if they're willing to drive just one run for us it certainly helps then you know not having to do a double back or triple back to a school to do you know kind of shortens that weight time for students so we're very close to to getting that ready to roll out wonderful thank you thank you um okay Miss Marshall then miss CH so my my qu my question really was was Miss sawers about our staff yes ma'am that have CDLs because I know we have a variety of bmts we have athletic folks so if you're listening and you've got a CDL and you're in a school and you've got right after school that would be great I'm I'm

092excited to see that plan because I think that could could give us some extra juice here yes ma thank you yes ma'am thank you Miss cheek thank you and gosh I do appreciate your responsiveness to my numerous emails I send you yes maam um absolutely I love the one the other day that you said sorry I didn't get back with you sooner I was driving bus yes ma'am and and I appreciate that you're doing that because right now we're in a critical time now I've I've got colleagues and friends that are in Winston sale and foresight I think their bus driver shortage is the same number as ours and they're fourth of the size so the the heroic efforts that are being done to you know retain people is just crucial I would like to

093make sure that we are really transparent with a Parent Hotline I'm getting a lot of concerns from parents that are not getting their kids off the bus on time the kidss aren't coming when they're they're due and they don't have a phone number that's answering yes they're trying to call the school the school's you know not answering because the kids are in route already so um is there a parent is there a number we can make sure that we get very public for parents to call if they're having transportation concerns yes ma'am our main transportation number is probably the best because we have additional staff there that can answer the lines it's 980 6715 and they can route the calls out to the area offices now the area offices are operating on a skeleton crew

094because most anybody that has a license is actually driving but we can get um more results I guess quickly for parents if they call the main transportation number and then we can get them that's good to know because sometimes it's just really a matter of letting people know and then the the anxiety and all that goes away I do share one of Miss things that Miss delara mentioned and I know that that's going to be something that we talk about more further but in a time when we're leveling teachers right now pulling teachers out of schools when I'm having principes tell me that the subpool is an imaginary group of people because there's really no subs I want to know you know what we're doing to enhance those types of positions um so that we

095can have more people supporting our schools because the schools are hemorrhaging Subs right now there's none there's just none and now that we're leveling those schools people that have been helping cover classrooms they're getting pulled to go do something else so I think there's I I'm really happy to support this measure but this is just one of about 50 positions that we're in critical condition on and I'm not going to be happy if I sit in this dis in two weeks and don't have some pretty good ideas of what we're going to do to enhance some of these other positions so I I'm being as direct as I can be as nice as I can be about it but I want to see some action and and I also want to get the some updates

096on the leveling because I'm getting bombarded with questions about leveling as well so but I am going to support this and I just really support I I'm it's it's huge for staff to see the leadership in the transportation department out in on the buses that is showing everybody that you mean business and that you you care and and I think that that is incredible leadership and I appreciate that so much thank you I I do want my drivers to know that I'm out there with them that I you know when they're going back to run a double or a triple or or staying late to to to take some kids that got missed I want them to to know that I'm out there supporting them and it's actually like this morning I was driving a

097university park run and the little tiny kids little Kinders just standing at the stop and I thought if I didn't get up and do this they would just be standing there so it makes it worthwhile when you see the little ones run to the bus and then when they got off the bus they will you be our bus driver from now on so that makes it worthwhile yeah I appreciate that thank you and Mr Winston I'll be looking forward to some more updates on we're going to save some of these other staff situations thank you we will definitely uh be back and provide that information um to board members all right anybody else Mr strain yeah thank you for the report and the and the recommendations here um I see it every morning at our

098bus stop right so um and taking calls from my daughter on the way here Pap are you going to come get us right because it stretch then yes um so appreciate you taking us through the comp plan and all the various changes uh the the efforts that have been made um and then proposing this additional step we've already done a round obviously of of Recruitment and Retention bonuses obviously there is uh a risk associated with significant increases in pay when we're paying for that with the current understanding that we can reduce routes yes sir because that's based on ridership and if we ever achieve some sort of normaly here I'm expecting some of that ridership to come back uh and and frankly the carpool lines to reduce and so um in terms of looking at

099that can you talk me through the the sort of risk reward analysis that was done of increasing ing the Recruitment and Retention bonuses and the anticipated or or or projected results from that versus increasing the the base pay um particularly if we're paying for that out of the assumption that the ridership is going to remain somewhat close to where it is as opposed to rebound yes sir good question actually couple of good questions there um right now we have about 107,000 students assigned and if you remember um pre-co we were about 134,000 students and we had about 92,000 writers um so we're at about 107,000 assigned and we're getting ready to do our state count starting next week so we'll get the good data on actually how many we're riding historically it's somewhere between 68

100and 69% of the what we have totally assigned we're anticipating that we'll show probably somewhere in about 72 to 73,000 range that are actually riding the buses but what we feel comfortable with is that we do have a good space we'll probably still have about 75 76 positions available to us when we need to add buses back to the road for increased ridership I don't know that we're ever going to get back to maybe we will but I still think because of the other ways that we've been able to gain efficiencies we were really forced into kind of looking at things a whole different way this year to to try to be able to survive the the shortage that we did have so I think that we'll be able to do that effectively with the

101additional spaces that the vacancies or positions that we have that if we need to add buses back to the road for that additional ridership we'll be able to do so successfully so I appreciate the the work in terms of driving efficiency obviously all the work of yourself your staff the entire team in terms of um turning this around for kids right and pulling out all the stops I did had one additional question in terms of the entire department looking at the transportation department and if we've got any additional resource constraints in the transportation department we talked a lot about the bus drivers yes sir um and rightly so but any additional resource constraints we need to look be looking at within the transportation department yes uh our maintenance staff has actually we've lost quite a

102few technicians over this this kind of same period August September and they've left us to go to higher paying technician jobs like diesel mechanics and for other companies that are paying more you know per hour so we're looking at ways with human resources to possibly um to address that and we're also doing some recruiting efforts um with HR to kind of bolster that effort and attract more people in we were fully staffed um with technicians several months ago and certainly pre-o we weren't running that many buses the other good thing there is um the state has allowed me to take a lot of these buses that were not running and deactivate them so we can suspend the maintenance plan on them that means the technicians don't have to service those buses and that kind of

103reduces the number of technicians that we may need so that's one of the ways we're kind of combatting it right now until we can look at some other ways to bolster the effort to recruit more well certainly hopefully we'll put those on the list of other positions we need to talk about as well as make sure that as you um we anticipate putting these buses back on the road yes sir that's bubble Staffing that's going to be required because there's additional Tech work exactly that needs to be done obviously to to put those buses back on the road yes thank you thank you sir okay um before I turn to Dr Jon do you want to have any questions before you make your motion Dr Jones okay I just have one quick question the effective

104date for this change once we November 1st November 1 okay thank you thank you all right I now turn to Dr bour board member Dr Ruby Jones Dr board member Ruby Jones to make this motion thank you modifications to bus driver compensation rates Madam chair I move to approve the modifications to bus driver compensation rates as recommended by the superintendent this action will provide tiered increases for new and existing employees based on experience and increase the starting pay for our bus drivers from $15.75 per hour hour to $17.75 per hour these changes will go into effect on November 1 2021 do we have a second I second this motion okay uh Dr Jones would you like to speak for your speak to your motion I I think we've had uh conversation quite a bit of

105it and this morning I I was out riding um around 8:00 to get to one of the schools in my district and I I guess on my route I encountered about six um of our buses and I've had from this morning to right now to think about how much um and valuable their services are to our educational process thank you thank you m any further debate or discussion before I call the vote um I will just sort of reiterate what Dr Jones said to our bus drivers who are out there God bless you we cannot have school if we can't get our kids to school and now more than ever we need our kids at school on time they need a full day of learning every day and that's not going to happen unless we've

106got enough bus drivers d driving our buses so thank you to everyone who's sticking with it and working these extra long hours thank you to your crew to you and your crew Mr Johnson for doing double duty triple Duty and to anybody else who has it in their heart to come drive our kids to and from school we need you and hopefully this extra compensation will um make it worthwhile to to come into CMS or come back to CMS um and with that all those favor of the motion please let it be known by a show of hands any opposed all right that motion passes unanimously 9 to zero thank you thank you okay now we're going to move on to the reports for the evening first we have an update on our minority women

107small business Enterprise program and I'm going to turn to the superintendent to introduce this report thank you madam chair and I want to thank Mr Johnson and Mr Schultz again uh for their efforts to bring forth the recommendation to boost the uh pay for our hardworking bus drivers and I look forward to joining Mr Schultz in a few short weeks uh in meeting with some members of our operations Team U so I want to thank them again again Madam chair and board members this evening we have an opportunity to share with you as well as members of of our public um our District's efforts to engage our minority owned uh small business Enterprise as well as women owned businesses Miss Chita Lloyd uh will join us to share a report uh uh which we can

108all be very proud of um in terms of doing business with uh mwsb companies the past year has seen CMS set records and this is important uh it's important for our community because it shows that the tax dollars uh used to fund our schools build new facilities and maintain our existing buildings and Equipment has a tremendous impact on building business here in our area Miss Lor will also share updates about how our students get involved with business and uh many begin preparing for successful careers I will make sure not to reveal all of what Miss Lloyd has to share I won't steal your thunder uh but I do want to emphasize that apprenticeship programs managed by her office uh have in some cases seen CMS students work on projects um for CMS such as contributing

109to building of new schools with that Miss Lloyd I'm going to toss it over to you good evening everyone um thank you super jend Winston members of the board um I am very excited to come before you this evening to share uh all the hard work that went on last year relates to our mwsb program um as a quick reminder our program has been in existence since 1993 and this board approved Bast changes uh with the new policy back in ' 05 and 0506 and what you will see today is the fruits from those labors we've been doing over the past few years um our success is measured by all the marketing and our that we do as well as how we monitor uh and our reporting our utilization and provide that type of assistance

110that's needed for our diverse suppliers to be successful not only with us with those others in the community there are a variety of different General statutes as well as board policy that governs the work that we are responsible for um and out of our policy and our past practices we have adopted aspirational goals um that was set as based on a disparity study and as you can see here in the construction area overall goer is 21 Aron engineering surveying is 16 contracted Services is 14 and our Goods is 11% so how are we performing overall um for this past school year we analyzed a little over 4477 million an eligible spend of that 137.5 million was spent with our diverse suppliers and that 4477 million is broken down between those the other four categories that

111we monitored that I previously mentioned as relates to construction um A&E and the conduct Services as you can see our largest expand areas in construction followed by our goods and then our contracted Services overall for our minority business owners uh we had an increase in construction up from 7% up to 18.9% based on actual dollar spent um we also had an increase in O engineering we had had a slight decrease but still achieved that contracted Services goal and we had a slight decrease in Goods a lot of the areas that we purchased during last year had a shift due to shift and how um we were educating our kids and the type items we were buying for our students and this did have an impact on some of our utilization spend some positive some negative

112but our overall spend with our MBE went from $22 million previous fiscal year to $46 million this is a for us a $4 million increase in spend just with our diverse suppliers last year you asked me how did this money break down between the various group that represent our minority business owners and of that $46 million the almost 20 million went to our African-American own firms um which is about 44% of that spend another 38% of that went to our Native American own firms I am pleased to say that we have three of our schools that's been um built by a native American-owned construct Str management firm who also has high utilization underneath his company that's building our schools um then the next is our Hispanic owned business owners at 5.6 million at 12% of

113that spend they followed by Asian owned firms at 2.8 at 6% of that spend so that's how the money was distributed overall between our various minority groups for women owned firms also saw an increase in construction we're right at 23.67% engine in slight inrease is a a challenging uh group for us CU a lot of our firms back um after the recession folded back into larger firms um so they only go after our smaller contracts contracted service you can see we did exceed our goal and we had an increase over the previous year but our largest increase incurred in the goods category and this is the direct correlation to our spend or our Chromebook purchas that we made was made from one of our our women own firms that provide our Chromebooks for our students

114so as you can see our spend with our wbes went from 35 million up to 83 million and I'm also pleased to say one of our high schools is being built uh by a woman own and a joint bench with a minority owned firm which is with West Charlotte as well as two other projects underneath so we get to capture all of that spend as well and they also have high participation underneath them as well for our small business owners this is the only one group that we saw a decrease in our overall spin we also had a decrease in construction we did have an increase in architecture engineering uh a slight decrease also in Contract Services as well as a decrease in our Goods purchases from our small business owners as I said our

115overall spend for our small business was down by $3 million over the pre previous physical year so overall and that construction goal is at 21 we're at 43.0 4% that is actual spend often times with Bond oversight we report out was committed our charge is to track what they committed to spent what they're actually spending as it's actually occurring so those are the dollars and the percents I actually report out to you uh each year and the design architect engineering side we're at 10.19 that is a 4% increase over last year contractor Services had a slight decrease but also still well above our actual goal and as you can see our overall Goods purchases um jump at almost 10% and that's in large part due to um what we had to buy in support of

116our students last year with their technology so as you can see our spend went from 69 million up to 137 million actually 137.5 million over the previous physical year so for us as a district um that 137.5 per is our highest spin in CMS history prior to that our highest spin was $98 million that's back when we built Mal Creek High School that represents 3.71% % of our eligible spend being spent with our diverse suppliers as I said we did exceed our aspirational goals in three of those four categories we achieved on exceed our MBE goals in three out of four categories and our MBE span is also the highest we've ever had in the history of the program whether be utilization or the actual dollars same thing with iwbs we did exceed in three

117out of those four categories and we had our highest spin in the history of the program for our WBS as well so we wanted to understand what how do we get there often times when we have firms we go out and do outreaches and we encourage them to register in our database our goal is not to have you just in the database but actually being utilized so we actually track to know how many of our firms who are register actually being utilized and we look by the different categories this number of moves um probably monthly based on what we're buying but this need we know who's been used who's not why would not successful and opens the door for us to help those who have not been successful to know what needs to be done

118the next time we also want to look back at our departments and we look we analyze exactly the dollars they have available and where the opportunities are we look at who are our top departments as waste of our spend of course information support systems and support had our largest spend in the goods category Inventory management at high spend as well as plant maintenance and our CTE programs in the Food Warehouse all these are direct buys to be different supplies health support our students and our teachers in our buildings our largest area of spend that we had is in technology as well as in Inventor and the management and on the maintenance construction side and CTE I'm pleased to say over 84% of our departments and a little over 80 80% of our schools utilize our

119diverse suppliers when they come to purchasing Goods on the contract and services side our largest spin area for this from the maintenance side of the house as well as look Information Technology again our driver's education program our transportation and information system support so our largest Spinners were always looking for opportunities for us to do in Building Services of course they have the largest amount of money as well as technology transportation and drivers ed so as we're looking at all of our spend annually we're looking to see where the opportunities where the gaps and then how we can then um steer our business to where our needs are so we know how to utilize them going forward last year I shared with you our economic impact of the program and what we're doing and you asked

120the question of what what is the utilization as far as impact for all employment not just for our diverse suppliers so our partners um at the Charlotte Regional business Alliance I went back and looked at the data over those 18 schools that we reported out before and our total employment is a little over 1,836 uh 36 jobs whether be indirect or direct or through the community effect of jobs created in relation to those Bond funded projects and that's strictly just the bond funded project it's not the rest of our spent we looked at the GDP and overall income and it's slow of 132.5 million in revenue or income that these folks are making as a result of our projects and then we looked at the actual total tax estimated tax impact would it be local

121state or federal and as you can see local that's a little over $4 million in tax impact six made for the state and 22.7 million for the federal so we're very appreciative of the bond that our community passed back in 2017 and we're leveraging that vote and that that support of CMS to not only build the schools that's needed for our students but it's also employing folks in the community and we're also helping our students learn on our various projects I'll share with you next so that detail impact Channel those of those 1800 jobs minority on firms responsible 355 of those our women on firms at 478 20 from are Smalls and the remains from all the other others that are non- diverse suppliers and contrib to that those overall jobs have been supplied as

122relates to our bond program for the community impact I think you all know we do a lot of Outreach um Co did not slow us down we did we we learned to Pivot s our students in to do everything virtually as well but also when it came to constructing the jobs We R out on the site when we need to be there we hosted various outreaches through the ladin Chamber of Commerce as as well as working with the Charlotte corporate Community round table and the corly meetings working with our expanded contracts Association the Carolina's Council as well as our regular Community engagement meetings uh participating in small business month and during Charlotte Med week for best practice sharing um last year we did a lot of work working with CPCC as they're um standing up

123their supply Diversity Program and sharing our best practice that on how we do what we do I have met with their new um director that just recently hired and we've um committed to assisting as where needed as they continue to grow their program um same thing with the City of Greenville and working with their um um city government of um answering key changes they were looking to make in their program um Gaston counties in the middle of they just recently approved a different program for their area and many of our contractors who actually do work in the area as well came to us and said can you share with us your best practice and what statutes are actually applying so we can make sure whatever we pass here in our County mirrors what the state

124has mandated for us to do so we've shared all that information as well as well as um meinberg County hosts at a panel of various um experts around the state to share best practice and we did serve on that panel with them as well um to just talk about how we do how we analyze our spend and how we leverage um every dollar that we have to utilize with be diverse suppliers all suppliers how you provideed access to those opportunities and of course through the coordinators Network um this summer um we've actually done two workships working with our other counterparts across the state just to understand what statute says what your local policy says and then what you can do and how you can um really push and Leverage The utilization of your diverse suppliers

125it's not about giving anyone anything it's about how you open up the floor you level the playing field and you look at what your specs say and what you're asking then you actually enforce what you have put in right as far as policy and in your practice we've leveraged various Tech assistance um opportunities as well about how to do business with us various Career Fairs working with women on certification program workplace safety these are all the types of virtual workshops we provided to our uh diverse suppliers all suppliers who was welcome to attend to share with them as well over this past year and I can tell you now this week actually for us is Charlotte Med again and we have a whole round that we had seven other workshops we provided over these past

126two days tomorrow we will have a career fair where our corporate Partners as well as our construction partners are working with Charlotte works on Pro let know about jobs that are available so I can ask to do virtual interviews to find out more about that followed by our Expo and then we do our celebration on Thursday last year's midweek um since we were virtual these are our honoraries that were selected based on um the services they have provided please announc that we had United painting was our um Hispanic own firm who was outstanding in construction Cochran Steels a woman own firm for supply and Manufacturing James Hills and Stripes was also a winner in general service they're a small business owner accer Services is a staffing company that many of our construction firms use um

127and it's the minority own and then we recognize environmental Holdings as our corporate Advocate and Stephie K A diversity advocate for massive Construction CMS Al also recognized in the winter in regards to our efforts and what we've done as far as the utilization of suppliers by the Carolina Virginia Min suppli Development Council we were recognized as the 2020 Regional Corporation of the year um back in December and what's unique for this for us because we are a government agency normally we're only considered in the public category but based on what we do and how we are establish and our utilization that we use they mooved us into the public sector category to compete against the other larger firms and we were selected for them they said what you guys are doing was head and Sh

128with everybody providing for us as far as documentation and what we're doing Workforce Development this sub is also unique for us as a school district we leverage our bond funded projects for opportunities for our students um through the marage youth employment marage Youth Employment Program this past summer um Giovani Martinez Garcia was one of our our Department's interns that we had um and we were able to provide for he actually graduated from CMS this past June um and he was with us this summer and he's um working and plans on going to CPCC in January but he had um High desires and looking for civil engineering so we were able to match his interest with our projects taking him out actually on this site you can see a finished project as well as one under

129construction went through a whole lot of LinkedIn learnings and we did like a um scavenger hunt through the plans just to help him understand to help him decide where he wants to actually Focus his interest going forward very proud uh Giovani appreciated his feedback to us because each year we have an intern we learn from them as well so we can make improvements on what we're doing through our other construction managers they report out to us what they're doing as far as using our projects for other internships we had internships and our new hires so we did have two temporary employees that are currently being um used on our jobs we had 20 permanent hires three of those permanent hires are actually CMS Rock graduates that are working on our program on our projects we

130had um 13 High School interns this past summer and we had 21 college or Community College interns this past summer through one of our hbac firms they have four apprentices that we can count towards working on our projects one of those apprentices is um working at um West Charlotte High School and he's also a West Charlotte graduate in addition to that we're providing um they provided 80 training hours job shouting hours site tours for our partners at Goodwill as well as some additional um work for our students in the Design Academy we recognized hodus Edison for leap for the Workforce Development champion last year lsvp for advocate of for year as relates to help us set up our Workforce Development program and good Industries for being our Workforce Community partner they also help with the

131rock program they have been a tremendous help for us in helping our students as well as educating us on the needs in their Community Mass construction is also another one of our Sims they on those new hires these new hires also were hired by m as in our overall number um these young ladies very proud of our women in construction who are taking advantage of the fiing what's available for us these are part of new hires samit Corporation had a spark for the future at South Mech where they had students come in to understand over the summer to learn about the industry um to move forward and how to leverage the projects going forward none of this could happen with all the right industry Partners you see here um each one of them have made

132a commitment to work with us and work with our students on introducing them to the field and are hiring them or working with them through the um summer internship opport unities same thing with our community Resource Partners we could not do what we do without all of these folks working together um for the better good of all of our students as when they prepare for their careers after their C he experience and for me none of this work I could do without this amazing team that we have U with missani Bea Jason Deans and stac mor I call this the magic behind the scenes they are the ones who are dedicated daily to ensure that we are maximizing our opportunities educating the community on what we have available and then actually monitoring what we're doing

133on a daily basis so for our next steps we continue with our community outreach pre-qualification of our bids like I said sh me is going on right now we have our Career Fairs and hosting our Corel advisor have we continue to look forward for this next school year that we're currently in right now and with that I'll pause for questions all right Miss Sawyer and Miss Byers Bailey Miss Marshall I'm trying not to make sure I look over here too thank you Miss L I am so um impressed at the way that your department merges our our construction and our mwbe efforts with your education core and our education core in bringing students into the field and coordinating apprenticeships and uh work placements um it's a a really shining example of of our mission in

134action in in our work um do and congratulations on the uh the award that is that is remarkable and do do you know of any other districts that have this kind of deep partnership in construction and and our education mission not the way we have it set up okay thank you I just want to congratulate you on that thank you Miss bars Bailey thank you Carol stole half of what I wanted to say but if I could take this mask off you would see this big grin on my face as a result of everything that you have presented today I am over the moon excited about what you know every year you come and you tell us all the great stuff that you're doing and you said and you're going to do more every year

135the next year and you do you it's I'm just thrilled with with what you've accomplished I'm thrilled for the the numbers of minority and women and small business people that actually get a chance to do their stuff to to contribute and to be be mean meaningful opport you know have that meaningful opportunity to to provide a service provide a product and be profitable because you know our economy has struggled so much during this covid rebound we well the co first round not now second round who all knows and yet you have provided a way for our community to continue to grow for CM for CMS to continue to contribute in a way that nobody else around us is is doing which is why you got the award um I'm just thrilled with the work that

136you and your small staff I mean just they're just they're not that many of you and yet you all are doing a fantastic job congratulations thank you for that I got to be very mindful all these numbers that's the CMS effort we're just the ones who are behind making sure we're tracking and monitoring and providing the access but our school schools in our departments have all heard the call of what's uh asked of us and they're all utilized our diversifi it's no longer a push anymore which I appreciate more than anything it's more of reaching out and say hey do you have anybody that's available and that's that's the keys to making all this magic happen is folks that are open to the inclusion of uh and seek the assistance of our area to help

137them achieve their goals for their departments thank you Miss Marshall thank you thank you so much again everybody is is congratulating you as as it could be and I can't wait to see what you do next year it's really going to be hard to top um but I just think the fact that um 1,800 jobs are connected with this and these These are pretty much staying in our community and 137 million spend is a pretty amazing amount of money I heard recently on a Radio Pro local radio program lamenting the fact of minority business owners not getting construction business and so we are here I would I would think you are the tip of the spear and we and CMS are doing this and and our bond uh folks that supported the bond can say

138that that we're raising all boats here and keeping the money here and I think that's really really important to make sure our funding partners and our community knows this and um again really appreciate the use of our our students in this effort and our partners in the construction industry because this is not easy they have to go through lots of regulations and their their age limits and all sorts of things Hoops that they have to jump through but they understand that this is their future and they're excited to invest in these students and I'm so thankful and I just want more of that to happen um I want to challenge us to look at this I I feel I I think when we see the 20th day numbers we're going to see some things that

139we we're not happy about with some of our high school students that have had a harder time sort of staying connected this is this is a path so I would like for us to really think outside the box on how to expand this sort of thing keep these folks interested because in in the end that's we're going to produce some folks that are well qualified and are happy with their work and I think it's a win-win for everyone so um thanks for what you've done so far again you got a lot of work to do to to best this so thanks anybody else Miss ship I just wanted to say too thank you so much for this because this is what it's all about for our children too is to see their education move into

140careers and the quality of their life in the future for jobs and many of them their dreams become reality so I think this is wonderful and also young girls I thought that was just amazing because a lot of of times they we don't believe or they don't believe they can do this kind of work whether it's construction or building houses working in the school on the school building I think this is wonderful of course I was a former science teacher and I we talked a lot about girls in these fields so I think it's just amazing and thank you for this and congratulations to the ward and I I know you'll continue to work to Top This and um thank you anybody else well yeah I'll um I will echo of course I feel like

141I don't need to congratulate you and say thank you because everybody has and you know how much we value your work um but I do want to reiterate the thanks to the partners who are working with you to make these um apprenticeships and internships and jobs available for our students I know that Workforce Development is a super high priority need um and emphasis amongst the our corporate community and it's really good to see this in action um it's also wonderful to get this occasional reminder that we are a fountain not a drain when it comes to the economy obviously we're a fountain as far as um educating you know the future Workforce but in addition just simply in how we um use our bond dollars that we are contributing to the economy and contributing to

142mwsb firms in our economy in a way that a lot of times people forget so thank you for lifting that up and doing such a phenomenal job of it and you're making us proud all right thank you thank you um now I'm going to turn turn to Charles Jeter executive director of government Affairs policy and board services for our next report which is a presentation of proposed Board of Education electoral District Maps thank you madam chair members of the board um first of all um before I start I'd like to um acknowledge the uh great work of the redistricting work group uh the ACC comparable Andre May Scott McCully and Ma Shong um the four of us have worked hard to put this together I would also remind everyone predominantly the public the board has

143not seen this either we made a promise in January no we wouldn't see this information as we sit here today there's only been six people that have seen the information we're about to present to you once we get to the maps so with that being said um on April 13th y'all adopt adopted five criteria these criteria are important I'm not going to reiterate what they are we've talked about them previously but you'll notice throughout this presentation and what guided the work group's efforts was the criteria adopted by this board so everything we do and we get to the maps you'll see how we enumerate how they comply with the criteria that y'all approved I want to tell you how we did this and Max Shong who is um a CMS U member of the CMS

144team member and was a valuable member of this four-person work group we use the S3 software which is the same software program that we use to do our School boundaries um it is a web- based tool you can read all everything it is it is all-encompassing it's an incredibly useful tool the way it does the map drawing and the efforts is as one of the best tools I've ever seen I've and I've been involved in map making at the state level at the local level previously and this tool was incredibly useful for us to make sure we captured what we needed to capture and get it done in the in the proper fashion I want to show you all our current and and I and and this is important important because the ideal population when

145you come out of the census data that we just received would be 85,3 people per District um this is at the if the districts remain the same what the populations would be and as you can see District Two is the most overpopulated the most populated District district District three slightly tops district one uh followed by district 6 District 5 and then District Four it also shows you the deviation from the ideal population and the percentage the percentage is important because we're required to stay within 5% is the threshold set by case law and statutory law as far as the deviation from ideal population we don't have to be perfect 185 9914 in all districts it's not feasible it's not possible we have a 5% buffer we have to stay within as you can see here

146there's only three districts uh well actually none are within the 5% because they're all outside the 2 and a half% threshold so as a result we had to redraw districts in order to meet that criteria as promised we have three Maps we are going to show you so this is map one I did this intent int purposefully for dramatic effect so I want yall to see the population this is what we talked about the criteria what you're going to see first is did this meet the four binary criteria these are the four criteria that are yes or no it was met ideal population contiguous District boundaries incumbent protection and no split precincts those four of the five criteria are easily defined and are subject in objective in nature the next and the fifth criteria is

147compactness and that's more of a visual process if you will so without further Ado that is the first map that we are presenting to y'all [Music] um we'll we'll let y'all look at that for a moment as I've said to the public no one has seen these Maps other than the work group U Miss blatney and U Miss Willis they're not on they're not on board dos they will be on board dos momentarily um we can put it on board dos right now miss Blakey will put it on board dos right now so I want y'all to see this as you can see um we did we admittedly we have some challenges when we draw these Maps um the incumbent protection piece was challenging um but this is scenario one these when we say scenario

148one we're not suggesting that scenario one is the best of the three these are just the three as they came out of the system this is the first one not necessarily what this what we're recommending we'll come back to it scenario two once again for dramatic effect this is ideal population and as you can see once again well within the ideal population threshold and meets the other three criteria so we've met four criteria this is the map in District 2 I'm sorry and scenario 2 admittedly of the three Maps this is the one that most resembles what the districts look like now we'll come back to them I want to make sure youall get a chance to look at them a little bit as we go into scenario 3 once again did we meet the

149four criteria we did and then it gets into the final map option once again this one's a little bit different so I want to show y'all something and and this gives you an idea and this I think is a useful tool so this is current that's one current one and you can see the changes pretty visually there together we will but we're right now we just kind of want to go through the process you have current there two you'll notice here this is the fewest changes like being at the optometrist yeah is it better with a or b and then of course this is a different map so those are the those are the three maps that um we came up with um and we I'll be happy to answer any questions about these in

150just a second I do want to tell you the future calendar we have three virtual Town Halls these are for the public to interact with us the the first one is tomorrow night at 6:00 then we have one next Tuesday and next Thursday everyone is eligible to be there uh they're publicized on our um social media accounts and the if anyone wants to sign up and participate they can either put questions on Facebook live or they can email board Services cms. k12.nc.us which also will be on our Facebook page so that email address will be there and we'll invite them to interact with group tomorrow night as well as next Tuesday and Thursday as we get there um on the 26th we will have a public hearing on the three maps that you just saw

151on November 2nd which will be a special meeting which will be formally noticed tomorrow um we will have this will be a work session where y'all can engage in the maps and make recommended changes and those type of things I will tell you that we are going to ask you that by close a business on Friday the October 29th which is the Friday before then that you provide us with any suggested changes you may want to see making changes in these Maps is not something that can be done I mean it's fairly quick process but it's it's not like flipping a switch it does take a little bit of time to make changes so as y'all look at this data between tonight and Friday October the 29th the more information you can provide us about

152what you'd like to see different the more effective we were going to be at that work session on November 2nd from those public hearings from the November 2nd Workshop we will publish those maps on November 5th and then on November 9th at your board meeting on November 9th the work group will present a final map that we will recommend for your approval on an up or down vote so Madam chair I know this is a lot um you will get a packet um tomorrow this information you'll get get tonight tomorrow you'll get a packet each one of these Maps has significant data scores behind it um not political data we didn't look at political data that was one of our charges um but it has population compactness scores a bunch of data points that go

153with it we will provide all that to you we will provide you all everything you see here we will work with you um as we get closer to November 2nd to make any suggestions you want once once again the only caveat is any suggestions you all make must comply with the five criteria um and so with that Madam chair I am happy to answer any questions all right thank you um thank you to your work team um For Your Efficient work here and um I would just remind board members to kind of keep your questions right now to process not not to debating which map we like best or which specific changes we want to ask for that's that is to come um but with that any questions about the process Miss buers Bailey and

154Miss Sawyer some of the maps look more spread out and some of them look more the districts look more compact was that uh any I don't know that that was a criteria but that seemed to have been the kind of the result so compactness is one of the criteria that one of the five criteria that y'all adopted oh it did um and you know frankly there are many different ways and and measurements um Arizona uses the psby popper method for example is how they measure it's a scale like a RoR scale is for earthquake um to measure that there's the riok there's the um there's other measurements and when you get the data pack at Miss buyers Bailey tomorrow you'll see CE five different compactness scores for all three different Maps scenarios so we did

155use compactness I I will going to that point the reason you'll see seeing some variances here is because of the um we had four individuals four incumbents who live surprisingly close to each other on the edges of their current districts and admittedly that that hindered some of our flexibility as to what we could accomplish and so just so yall know while you see three Maps here the team produced more than three maps and um and and these were the three that we felt were most representative of what y'all tasked us to do okay thank you Miss Sawyer thank you um I appreciate the work of the team and it's going to take me a while to kind of digest the maps but um I've already gotten questions about why doesn't the the school board just

156have the same Maps as the county is preparing for their new um for their new redistricting can you speak to that yeah well two things a um that was not one of the criteria that was it was presented as as a menu that y'all did not include that in your criteria list I will also tell you that of the three maps that the county looked at ear ear I think it was last night no it was it was last Tuesday night excuse me of the three maps that were presented to the County Commission last Tuesday none of those Maps meet your criteria and so none of the three maps that the County Commission is considering as presented to them by their external map drawers would meet the criteria that this board adopted you cannot use

157those without changing your criteria now if they want to marry up to one of our Maps I'm sure we'll be happy I promise you we'll be happy to share them with the information with them and and the criteria that they don't meet is the the incumbent protection and M and scenar in in all three of their scenarios Miss buers Bailey would be double bunked and scenario three for them I think they call it C actually miss Byers Bailey and Miss Sawyer are double bumped so none of those criteria would be met any other questions Mr strain thank you Mr Jeter um in in looking at these I I I don't think we set it as a crit IA but it looks like all the municipal first of all we have seven municipalities for those listening

158um one of those is always going to be split and that's the city of Charlotte and then we have six towns and so it looks to me as if each of these scenarios that are proposed splits Municipal boundaries in the South do you happen to know if that's the case just by glancing at it I think it does uh um I will you know I think that certainly two scenario two looks like it splits Matthews um three probably maybe splits Pineo I think Matthews and Min Hill are are whole in in scenario three um I will tell you that in all three Maps the northern towns remain within District One um admittedly it's a little bit easier in the north because the lines are cleaner are clearer from where they are so I think it's

159because our incumbent lives right at the top so you don't have to worry about that a of a mile from our count yeah and and going to that point districts in scenario one and two you'll see district one is identical there is no change from map one to map two scenario one scenario two for district one and and that's for Geographic obviously reasons the way it worked out um Mr strain this is something that as y'all know y'all did not adopt Municipal boundaries um but that you know certainly um you'll notice we did go out of our way to include those on the map to identify where those cities were so you could see those communities of interest if you will um they're at least pointed in the pointed in the direction that may be

160something y'all want to look at as y'all take out your PIN and your markers over the next few weeks but that certainly um I think it's a fair assessment appreciate it yes sir anybody else all right it'll be fun to dig into this in the next few weeks I appreciate it okay and I am now going to turn to the superintendent for our final um report of the evening which is a quick update on um our fall 2022 student Student Assignment uh developments what's on Deck thank you madam chair earlier this year our board asked us to review some of our planned assignments and engage more fully with uh community members those efforts have taken place over the past several months and in some cases continue with virtual sessions this week Miss aesa Craven how

161uh will join us now to provide a report on student assign for next school year this report will focus on the new Southeast Charlotte Elementary School and for the high school set to open next year to provide relief for crowding at Olympic High School Miss Craven how I will turn the floor over to you thank you superintendent Winston and good evening um board members I'm happy to come before you this evening and share an update on Fall 22 openings and Associated Student Assignment decisions I think think it's helpful anytime that we're talking about Student Assignment to remind our viewing public of the student assignment policy jca that policy includes a single requirement and that is that all School attendance boundaries be contiguous that means a single unbroken line drawn around any given school um to

162Define its boundary and a school attendance area in addition to that single requirement the board has defined a decision Matrix of four factors Each of which is equally weighted they are listed here in alphabetical order so it's not to imply that any one of them has more weight than the other and that is home to school distance intact feeder pattern so the extent to which students travel together from elementary to Middle to high school socioeconomic diversity and then School utilization in addition to that one requirement and those factors there are additional factors that the policy ask the superintendent and staff to take in into consideration things like future Capital Improvements that are expected and to the extent possible keeping entire neighborhoods and HOAs um assigned to the same school as superintendent Winston mentioned um the

163scope for fall 22 Student Assignment decisions is two schools um the building of a Elementary relief School in the Southeastern part of our County um is actually adjacent to Min Hill Middle School it is listed on the 2017 Bond as the Bane Lebanon Road and Piney Grove Elementary relief um throughout this process we have eliminated Bane and I'll talk a little bit more about that um in a little bit as well as added two additional schools uh Crownpoint Elementary and Matthews Elementary and I'll also talk about the rationale for that in a bit and then the Olympic relief High School um which is a new 100 classroom High School our path so far has included quite a bit of community engagement um you may recall that this work uh began last spring um and as

164we approached the June July time frame and consider a vote um the conversation led us to delay that uh to October of this year so that we could continue um Community engagement so what you can see here is just the list of some of those Community engagement opportunities that took place during the 2021 school year and at that time all sessions were remote we've also had a number of sessions uh this school year um and some of those have been remote and some have been person um and you can see there that we have um a few still to go um we have uh the Olympic session uh tomorrow evening which will be via Zoom um we have sessions at nation's Ford wingit Park and also not listed here at southpine um which has an

165event on October 22nd all of the materials and recorded webinars from these sessions can be found on the planning Services um website and I really want to thank our principes um we know that schools have have an incredible amount going on right now um and our principles have really worked with me to um identify school-based events that were taking place that were already drawing significant numbers of parents and allowing my team and I to be a part of those events that we can make sure that we could share this information uh with families in their schools and so I'd really just like to share my appreciation with our principles for doing that looking at the Southeast Elementary School in a little additional detail um you can see two Ms here um the first one on

166the left is our existing School boundaries you can see Piney Grove in green Lebanon Road in purple Bane Elementary in yellow Matthews Elementary in blue and then Crown Point in pink and you can see as indicated by the asterisk the location of the new school inside of the Crown Point attendance area is for this reason that we are considering Crown Point um because the boundaries must be contiguous um we are left without a choice um other than to uh affect the Crown Point uh attendance area that creates for us an opportunity to provide relief to Matthew's Elementary um as Crown Point is not a school that needs relief and so by moving students out of that school um we have some opportunities to include Matthew's Elementary in our conversations for the Southeast Elementary relief school

167to the right you can see the SCS distribution this is not an updated SCS distribution um that data will be available in December um in addition to the 2020 census data we also require data from the American Community survey to update our SCS block groups and we anticipate that data being available in December of this year as we look at uh planning capacity and enrollment as well as projected enrollment for the schools involved um you can see um our schools here that are listed as being over 100% capacity you can also see in the top row there that Bane in uh 201920 was at 83% capacity um and that's because there are a number of classrooms in an older part of the facility that were not included in their uh utilization calculation um when it

168was included on the bond in 2017 since that time we have made some investment in improving the condition of those classrooms in that facility and it is being included in Bane's uh utilization calculation uh so for that reason we're no longer looking at relieving uh Bane you can also see Lebanon Road Piney Grove and Matthews uh well over 100% utilization and Crown Point um at 82% so again it does not need uh relief but because of the location of the new school we do need to reassign students we have two scenarios um that we are considering the first is is the fuchsia scenario it moves students from Lebanon Road Crownpoint Elementary and Matthews Elementary to the new school it also assigns a portion of the Piney Grove attendance area to Crown Point to backfill some

169of the excess capacity there the second scenario is the blue scenario um it differs uh primarily in the portion of the Matthews Elementary attendance area um that would move to the new school it also takes slightly fewer students out of Crown Point um and about the same uh number of students from Piney Grove to Crownpoint and then slightly more students um out of Lebanon Road it looks like a a much larger area um from Lebanon Road um but it's an area that is just not very densely populated um we do not have a lot of students who um attend Lebanon Road in that area I'd also like to present in addition to the two Ser uh scenarios a potential addendum that could be added to either of those scenarios and that involves um communities along

170True Light Church Road um that road represents the boundary between Lebanon Road Elementary and Bane Elementary there are two communities there in particular versage and Cool Springs um that as an addendum we could assign to Bane Elementary that would also include um homes that are not necessarily Associated um with an HOA along True Light Church Road between will grve Mint Hill and lawyers roads when we compare um the two scenarios um you can see the differences in enrollment there we are able to achieve the desired relief um for all schools um in terms of home to school distance comparison between the two scenarios um there would be an increase in students who are coming from the northernmost portion of the Lebanon Road attendance area they would um have an increased home to school distance as

171would some students who would be assigned from Matthews element Elementary to the new elementary school and that is the case in both scenarios I will point out in the vi in the fuchsia scenario that it includes um moving some students who have already um experien to move um in Matthew's Elementary um and so we want to avoid that um certainly as much as possible in terms of an intact feeder pattern um the new elementary school will have several Middle School splits we are not proposing at this time any changes to middle or High School boundaries recognizing that um in short order we do have um a comprehensive Student Assignment review um coming up in the 22 School in the 22 calendar year and we would have an opportunity to address those split feeds then in

172terms of SCS diversity um there is a difference between the two scenarios for Matthews um in that um we would significantly reduce the diversity um at Matthews in the fuchsia scenario and have a slightly less impact on diversity um at Matthews in the blue again in terms of utilization both scenarios provide relief um to the schools as needed the blue scenario um keeps Crown Point Elementary much closer to their current utilization than does the fuchsia scenario for the addendum um that um piece of True Light Church Road with those two communities um would move about 41 additional students from leanon Road and those students would be assigned to Bane as we look at Olympic High School relief um the map you see here are um is the High School boundary Olympic is in blue and

173then the lines that you see indicate Elementary School attendance areas so often when we're talking about assignment for elementary schools we're looking at neighborhoods as kind of the building blocks when we talk about high schools we look at Elementary School attendance areas and so while I'll be talking about Elementary School attendance areas I'm talking about the high school students that live in those areas this is the socioeconomic status distribution in the Olympic attendance area and I want to point out um just kind of um Northeast of the Olympic attendance area you see Nations Ford and portions of southpine Elementary um those are highlighted in yellow as low sces communities um though they are not within the current Olympic High School attendance area we are considering them as part of this change and so just want

174to point that out when we look at um Olympic High School uh the feeder pattern and student distribution what you see here is a list of the elementary schools in the Olympic attendance area the middle schools that they continue to and then the high schools that they continue to the number that you see in the far right are the number of high school students that reside in these areas and that is different than attend um because we know we don't um yield 100% of students in any given area in the county again we have two scenarios the first is the green scenario and it essentially assigns all the students closest to Olympic to Olympic and all of the students closest to the relief school to the relief school that includes students who currently attend Nations

175Ford Elementary and southpine Elementary who continue to Southwest Middle but then continue from there to Harding High School those are the only students at Southwest Middle School that continue on to Harding High School and so we've taken this opportunity to assign those students to Olympic the second scenario is the Violet scenario and the primary difference is that we've taken that group of students at Nations Ford and southpine who continue to Harding High School and we've assigned them to the Olympic relief School the reason to do do that is a tradeoff between home to school distance and socioeconomic diversity at both Olympic and the relief school when I compare the two scenarios you can see the projected um enrollment at opening based on the two scenarios in terms of home to school distance again that green

176scenario assigns the students closest to each of those high schools to that school and it does decrease the home to school distance for that group of students that currently continues to Harding High School it eliminates a split feed out of Southwest Middle School which goes to Harding it also would create an intact feeder pattern from Starmount to caramel to South Mech um because we would assign those students to South mecklinburg in terms of socioeconomic diversity Olympic would be primarily medium and low SC and the relief school will be primarily medium and High SC and of course we achiev the desired relief at Olympic the um the Violet scenario differs in that while we do decrease that home to school distance for students um who currently continue to Harding there may not be a comparable reduction

177in travel time um just based on um the transportation estimate of students getting down there to that relief school we still eliminate that split feed coming out of Southwest and in terms of diversity Olympic will be primarily medium and high SCS and the relief school will have students from all three of the SCS um communities and we are still achieving um the relief at Olympic in terms of next steps um We are continuing to engage the the community uh we have an Olympic uh relief session tomorrow at 5:30 via Zoom we also have some Community specific engagement sessions uh the 20th at nation's Ford the 21st uh wingit Park and the 22nd uh South Pine Elementary we are also collaborating um with the Steel Creek y as well as some faith-based Partners in that area

178just to further get the word out um to that Community um you may recall some of the feedback in the spring um when we looked at the survey results was that we had heard a lot from families who identified as living in the southern portion of the Olympic attendance area and we had not heard nearly as much from families in the northern portion of that attendance area and so um the continued Focus for Community engagement has been to engage and hear from um those families with Community input uh the board's input and with the board's decision Matrix and policy always in mind um the intent is to narrow these scenarios um perhaps with some slight modifications to a single recommendation for each of these new schools on October 26 during the board meeting we would

179hold a public hearing and the superintendent would make a recommendation to the board um for a vote all right thank you um going to turn to board members for questions Miss Sawyer in the elementary um plan on the addendum is there a a compelling reason that those neighborhoods should be moved or is it they just want to move is there a a rationale for that um you know I think we always have uh communities that are right there on the border between two schools and these are two communities that are right there on the border that True Light Church Road uh represents that border um when this um boundary was created uh there was less development um along True Light Church Road than there is today um and some of the communities just on the

180other side of True Light Church Road do attend Bane and so um I I think there's a p the perception of some discrepancy um there okay are the are any of the schools with the new school there close enough geographically to do a pairing kind of solution in at some point um because they are sort of right there um they are relatively close um that's not something that we've looked at so far um but certainly when schools are in that close proximity it's um something that we might consider thank you that's Miss Fowler yes thank you I saw on your presentation you spoke briefly about the diversity aspect when you're speaking in regards to diversity is that more of race and ethnicity socioeconomics um because that can be a d detrimental part of the education

181process for our students so which were you referring to during that time I'm referring to socioeconomic um diversity uh during the last Student Assignment review in 2016 um the board developed and approved um a very particular definition for socioeconomic status and how we um measure it in the district and how we compare different parts of the county um to one another um and so that is one of the board's four factors and so um solely referring to socioeconomic diversity if possible could I look at the different metrics to see the difference between what you were debating with after the meeting of course I'm happy to have a follow-up conversation with you absolutely thank you sure anybody else Miss ship I just want to say thank you for this um bringing this to us now and

182getting an opportunity to share with the Families how we're working to get more Community engagement in this process and especially as we look at um I will just say the Olympic relief high school and um and your work in making sure that students who are not in the home schools and I don't know if you're sharing that will also get information about these Community engagement programs because I know a lot of this work has gone through the principles and I thank them for that but we also want to make sure those students that are not in the home schools they may be in magnets and other schools are going to be involved because that's something we're working hard for the families to see these scenarios and have an opportunity to weigh in on this yes

183ma'am we heard that um feedback particularly from the um Olympic community and so we did send a connect ed yesterday to any student um who was in the Olympic feeder pattern or who attends Nations Ford or South Pim and continues to Harding to make them aware of the information on the website but also to point them to tomorrow's Community engagement session that will be held via Zoom thank you yes absolutely anybody else please M uh Mr strain thank you so just to um carry on with the the uh Miss Sawyer's question here there are actually communities on both sides of TW Light Church Road that attend Bane not just one side currently in fact one of the communities that you've highlighted there you actually have to drive through Bane zoned houses to get to those

184houses in order to go back through Bane to get to living on road so um it it's it is the community that's grown up around True Light Church Road and current boundaries have both sides but those two communities and a few of the other homes are not currently zoned for Bane so thank you for including that sure um the only other question I had was around the uh um Elementary School boundaries and in terms of putting those together the both I'm sorry both of the scenarios go down Idle Wild I think yes right yes and and really that's challenges associated with the proximity there I think to uh to Crown point right so and then in terms of the as it as it reaches as the new School boundary reaches down you've got one that's

185using 74 and 51 and where is the other boundary that you've set it's here comes across 74 and across yeah okay yeah part of the part of the challenge is um where students are located um and so within these areas there are um you know if I look for example at this part of the Lebanon Road attendance area that we're proposing to move to the new school is very densely populated but when I come down here um which is a part that we uh propose moving on the other scenario it's a much bigger area geographically but not nearly as many students um and so you know certainly looking at kind of major thorough fars but also trying to balance that with where we see the students located yeah and I think that that point uh

186applies to both of these both the elementary school and the Southwest um relief High School looking at where the development is going to take place because where where there may not be um much by the way of population there as we saw in the previous uh discussion with regards to population movement yeah you know most of that as a result of Steel Creek really growing up over the last 15 years yeah that's this is where our greatest population growth is going to take place over the next 15 years yes in in in this general area because of availability of land land Y and so I think that's something that we're going to I'll take offline with you to to see where the city planners or the town planners in this case Town planners think that

187that is going to take place because I think we're going to need to take that into account as we look at these scenarios yeah I really appreciate that and um you rais a good point we've done some extensive work on 10-year projections that's you know looking at both permitted um development as well as unplanned development and trying to project it based on um previous Trends and patterns um and that looks at entire attendance areas it doesn't necessarily pinpoint where Within um those areas it takes place which I think could just be a finer point on some of that analysis I appreciate your feedback y okay thank you thank you for all your hard work and we'll see you again in a couple of weeks yes ma'am thank you um and I am now uh going

188to turn to the superintendent for his own report thank you madam chair and thank you Miss Craven Hal for that report we've heard a lot of talk uh at various points in our meeting about uh student outcomes and meeting students academic needs and rightfully so that's why we exist I would also say that uh since the return to school in August we have experienced an unusually high volume of crises that could impact the psychological safety or sense of well-being for our students and staff in addition we are seeing and hearing that students behavioral and emotional needs are more intense than normal uh what we are seeing in CMS is happening all across the country we know that much of what we are seeing is directly or indirectly related to the pandemic while for some the

189pandemic lockdown meant spending more time in a safe comfortable environment where they were academically or professionally successful but for others the lockdown placed them in physical or psychologically challenging or unsafe conditions in addition we know that many people have lost loved ones uh during this time due to the virus an event like the covid pandemic is is traumatic and Trauma impacts people in a number of different ways in children we may see acting out behaviors or social withdrawal some children are struggling with anxiety when that was not an issue for them in the past staff may also be experiencing anxiety fatigue and burnout at higher rates Behavior we are seeing are abnormal compared to the Past because the present is abnormal compared to the Past some indicators of an unusually high level of need this

190school year and we are still in the first quarter some indicators of an unusually high level of need this school year include the number of situations we've experienced that require the use of psychological crisis response protocols since July there have been a combined 21 staff and student deaths due to a variety of causes including uh the pandemic and pandemic related impacts but regardless of the cause these losses are felt TR tremendously by our school communities and the district and exacerbate existing emotional distress in our CMS family and we share our condolences to families and friends and our appreciation for all the prayers and kind words and deeds shared by many in our community since the beginning of this school year I want to share that we have sever veral prevention and intervention efforts underway to

191support our students some that I want to highlight include question persuade response which is a suicide prevention instruction for all nth graders at 11 of our Comprehensive High Schools this work is led by school psychologist and health teachers and teacher students what to do if they or a friend are thinking about suicide additionally we are expanding sign of suicide instruction for middle school students from two schools to eight schools in the second semester lastly I want to emphasize to parents and communities that if you believe your student is struggling with anxiety depression or just general emotional and behavioral well-being we have a robust school-based mental health program available at most of our schools your child school counselor social worker or psychologist can help you get your student connected to Services there is help available if

192you have concerns for your students please reach out to your school and I would humbly ask our student advisor Miss Fowler if you would help us share information with your fellow students about the opportunities and the services that are available for them thank you madam chair thank you all right at this time I will recognize any board member who wishes to make a report Miss Chek Dr Jones Miss bars Bailey well I'd like to thank my colleagues Miss um buers Bailey and Dr Jones for wearing pink tonight because most of the time time in the month of October I wear pink every day and today I left the house and did not and the reason I wear pink every day is because I am a seven-year breast cancer survivor and this is the month that

193we try to raise awareness of breast cancer so I just want to say a quick reminder to everybody that it's time to make that appointment many people and many mamography centers got very behind and people did not have their annual squish done during covid so it's time to remind all ladies and and all the men that are here remind your ladies to make those appointments and take care of that and any other cancer screenings that you can do that are going to help you have early detection will be best and I would just like to um I'd just like to tell all the teachers out there right now and all the principles I know that are really working hard um I'm going to be really working hard to advocate for you and um I'm hearing

194a lot of struggles not just in our students but in our staff and um they're not feeling the love right now and we've got to figure out a way to Rally behind all of our staff so that they'll feel the love they'll know that we are here and that we care about them I think they're missing that right now a little bit so we got to figure out a way to turn that turn it around and um I'm counting on staff to lead the way and um and hopefully we'll get better it's been a rough week out there Dr Jones thank you uh I have two comments and I think they are dovetail um I had the wonderful opportunity this morning to um visit North Ridge Middle School for the dedication of a fitness center

195um I the principal Miss robt Mr Robinson and Miss Graham the AP are always Relentless in um in a loving and kind way to make sure I'm out there to uh enjoy uh all of the uh marvelous opportunities that um that that school provides its students um while the principal M Mr Robinson and Miss Graham are Relentless uh I was uh uh present for the extra wonderful opportunities going on in North Ridge as Mrs bethine Dempsey uh who I want to give a loud shout out to spearheaded and made the wonderful facility of um exercise SL fitness equipment is donated through the national foundation for Governor's Fitness councils those young bodies that early in the morning showed exuberance and ser ious exercise at this um at this wonderful gift that had been presented to them

196it reminded me too something I learned many years ago that if we want to fire up the dendrites of the brain of our children we really don't need to sit them down crisscross applesauce first thing we need we need to fire up those dendrites get them moving and that excitement was there um it was it was truly a Marvel marvelous experience so high expectations um involves active engagement and I want to encourage these students all of our students have spent a lot of time on uh Chromebook so let's see some Chromebook reduction we talk about outcomes yes we want outcomes but how do we get outcomes significant evidence-based inputs implemented with Fidelity and consistency across the district are a must students have not had structures of a normal school day to get them back into

197the pace we have to have activities that will engage engage students let's not just bring them in into the schoolhouse and continue clicking and clacking of the of the Chromebooks is the main uh Avenue for them getting their um learning the other thing um that I'd like to mention is that um well I I'll just hold on that cuz the night's is growing um um and I want to have some serious discussion but I'll hold that for later but um the main emphasis that I I want to share um I think have put across to you high expectations active engagement produces outcomes and so I'm I'm I'm really put out when it's outcomes outcomes and and we don't give enough attention to those two necessary ingredients that go into outcomes thank you thank you Miss

198barus Bailey thank you um last week Margaret uh no Jennifer delara and I had the opportunity to spend the lunch hour down at Olympic uh we had an opportunity to see firsthand how manufacturing companies have embraced that school and embedded themselves into their CTE program uh we after a presentation a little you know this is who we are and this is you know the various companies that are are doing it the most interesting part of that and and by the way the superintendent was there with us as well we had a we had an opportunity to visit three different class classrooms it's a totally different aspect of what the three different classes were doing with CT but the students were absolutely en completely engaged totally enthralled excited about what they were learning excited about what

199they had accomplished what they had produced it it was really a a a thrilled to just watch him I mean some guys had made a a weight belt and they were explaining uh out of real leather they I mean they had gone out and had to purchase the leather and and cut it to and and they were going to use it in the weight room at their school uh because the weight belts that they had at the school were worn out but I mean they one guy put it on and he was pressing with the other student up and down I mean I don't I forgotten how many I think he must have done it what 10 or 12 times I don't know but I just that kind of energy into we did this we

200designed it we cut it we bought the materials and this is what we're going to this is what we're going to make and this is where we're going to use it uh the last class was young lady had never thought about engineering didn't know what Engineers did but she had some time she needed to take a class this teacher said come come just come try my class out she was so excited about I can do this I can do this and and she never ever considered engineering as a part of her life and but they were just you know they demonstrated how their little robot was going to we had to get out the way cuz that thing was really throwing those balls but it it was just so exciting to watch how what a

201difference handson group you know work invol how it engage it engages the students it was really a thrill thank you Miss Fowler and then miss ship Miss ship actually had her hand up first sorry you sure okay so what I want to discuss tonight is three topics first the grading policy the grading policy that was put in place this year our prepare rehearse perform created a lot of confusion not only for our students but for our staff as well there is a confusion on the expectation for the students and I'm curious to see how the outcomes will be for this first quarter there's a confusion about how many prepare rehearse performs are allowed for our 4x4 classes our ad bday classes because it starts to get a little dicey when you get to the high

202school level um and like I said a lot of the students are curious how our outcomes will be for the first quarter because the prepare grade weighs so much the prep grade for the public is 50% of the students grade for instance a if a student completes a test there is well was a maximum of two per quarter if a student fails the test both times then it will be extremely difficult for the student to bring up their test overall grade to a A or B I know that all the answers are not going to be said tonight so if allotted if superintendent Winston could give me a copy of of the prepare rehearse perform guidelines so then I can communicate that with students and staff that will be amazing next staff and teachers and

203administrators are being overworked it is evident in the schools and it's being felt by our students we've all said this tonight however we need to make sure that we put in place ways to fix this I know we are all in a peculiar predicament however that does not dismiss the realities of the situation I believe that we have different resources that we could allocate in order to eliminate these issues next school safety Behavior has been an extremely pressing matter especially at North meinberg High School however I do not believe overp policing is the answer it often leads to the opposite of our goal it can lead to microaggressions plus several conflicts due that our high tension areas it was evident today at North lenberg High School that there were so many police officers it did

204not stop fights but due to the high tensions it created more fights I would be remiss if I did not acknowledge the astronomical suspension rates that are currently in our district I will also be interested to see the mental health check-ins grades and suspension rates that are going to happen this quarter because we've also said that the behavior has been such a pressing matter so if we see that the behavior is such a terrible issue what alternatives are we going to be giving besides overp policing so those are my main three things which was our staff being overworked school safety and behavior and our grading policy thank you Miss ship wow what do I say behind that that's that's good to hear because that's exactly what we need to hear what's going on at the

205schoolhouse door and I just just want to say that I know that principles and this is the month of recognizing principles are working hard staffs are working hard and we must continue to support them and we must move with the cheese that is a hard one who move my cheese how do I move with the cheese and continue to do that and teaching to the whole child which is what you were alluding to how do we continue to do that but these are the things that we must do right now we must be intentional consistent and sustainable at the school level with the focus on our children and it is difficult challenging work but I know we can do it My Philosophy has always been I believe every child can learn I'm a proud CMS

206former student a teacher and administrator and I still believe all children can learn it is what we do each each day that makes a difference for every child giving them the tools to make their dreams a reality and we must do it even when the work is hard and I've seen the hard work even with the leveling that will happen and I want to shout out to two students because we talk a lot about everything that's happening but there are great things that have happened with our students I want to shout out to two students that are graduates of Charlotte meinburg schools one is a student from Hope well she graduated she's a senior there at Johnson C Smith University Alexus Gabriel she is a top honor student and she just was recognized as Miss

207Johnson C Smith University that is wonderful it takes a lot to get there and I wanted to recognize her another student brought to my attentions in the DMV one day Ruth mendz she was a student of mine at sfil she is now about 26 years old she was a graduate of Olympic High School re and she attended ECPI she has an RMA and I think Rhonda this is what registered medical assistant working at Atrium she is a cardiac pediatric registered medical assistant she has now gotten support from an internship she will continue her schooling at CPCC and transfer to a 4-year college to become a registered nurse she will continue her journey I know we can do great things we have and we can continue to do it so that every student has these opportunities

208because this is their future thank you thank you Miss deara and then miss Marshall okay um first I just want to um thank the superintendent for mentioning sort of our Mental Health support needs and the behavioral needs that are needed during this time and the significant loss that many of our schools have felt um and the suicide prevention measures I just think that's really important um that we reiterate that in the community that we have great needs you know in our schools across the board and what we're doing to address it also just want to mention another call for uh more information about some of the other incentive programs if we can get that information out because I do know we're all recognizing tonight how hard our employees are working uh covering classes doing multiple

209things uh that they're being asked to do as everyone is stretched so thin so um the sooner we can get that out and help communicate um to staff and to the public I think the better um and lastly it just hit me tonight as Miss Lloyd was speaking about the mwsb report and the comments that were made about how important um our school bond um is and what it means to the community and the impact the economic development impact it got me thinking more because um school buildings keep coming up in various ways and various themes as I've been out and about over the past um month or so they keep popping up in different ways and I'd like to take an opportunity to invite folks who are listening um Miss Chek and I next

210Wednesday at 11:30 along with CMS staff will help lead a municipal education uh advisory committee meeting where we'll talk a bit about um our Capital needs assessment um process and get that process started started um for the community and then we'll be laying it out I'm sure at the first of the year and what that timeline will be as we we build around support um for our next school bond which will be so um important um as we all know you know I was in a call last week uh where the superintendent was being asked questions and they were asking him questions like don't you think smaller class sizes is a good idea Mr superintendent and you know of course he's going to answer well yes that's a great idea what I find is lacking

211often times in our community is an understanding of what that would mean because of course I think we all understand pedagogically that you know in general there's some great teachers that I'm sure could have 50 kids and do great but in general smaller class sizes is the way to go but how do we get that you know how who allots the uh teacher allotments you know coming from the state are they willing to do that what does that mean extra classrooms we need more buildings right so it's one thing to just say yes we need smaller class sizes but we also have to work with other governing bodies to help us accomplish that so I just want to raise that up in our community in general um as we tie that to the importance of

212our um next school bond that will you know I know some will probably say well your numbers have dropped maybe you're not growing you don't need schools but as we all know many of our schools are at 150% capacity or maybe even more so we need to take a strong look at that and U hope we can rally together the community for that next um Capital needs assessment so thank you very much all right and Miss Marshall if you could hold your report I had skipped over Mr strain so I AP I'm skipping all kinds of people tonight I'm so sorry I'm not bothered so I want to start just um I I met with students just this last week again um regarding mental health programs in our schools and and indeed with the county

213um I want to reiterate Dr Jones's remarks we've we've got to work to reduce our stress levels um in our schools in our classrooms with our kids better support our youth but but continue to maintain high expectations we also need to look at both our staff and our students and and I would just ask both our staff and students be be there for one another I mean it's the it's the best thing that you can do anytime and particularly now I'm moving to a second Point um since we last met I've lost two friends uh and almost lost another to this terrible disease and I wish they had made better decisions I I wish they had made different decisions I've called for mandatory staff vaccinations to protect our staff and their ability to continue to

214serve and more broadly our community so please that the vaccination is the best tool to protect yourselves and and and frankly to get to returning to some semblance and normaly so consider protecting yourselves by speaking to your physician about the facts the risk benefit of the co vaccination we had three speakers tonight and we spent no board time talking about our core mission very similar to the remarks I made a month ago when we sat here and had board remarks we didn't spend any time there either we really need to get back there we need to get there and lastly I want to reiterate the call for the leveling information we've had some significant um uh changes in terms of a differential between what was forecasted by staff and where we are um we forecast

215said over 143,000 students uh we came about 3,000 short of that in terms of our enrollment and that's hit some schools more significantly than others we need to understand what that leveling information looks like how those decisions were made and frankly as we always must we have to make these decisions with students in mind because we're we're moving staff we're moving students again again there's a lot of movement there and and some of it obviously is very important and necessary um but but let's think very carefully before we pull the trigger on you know that the spreadsheet says so we must um you know move a teacher because there's four students differential thank you thank you Miss Marshall I think that most of us um read a number of articles that talk about the high

216stress level right now and I think especially for our staff nobody really has had much of a break it's been from one um large pivot and I know we don't like to use that word anymore because that's just you know it's hard for everybody to think about pivoting all the time but that's what's happened to another to to to all the changes that were last year to standing up a huge school system in the middle of the summer to preparing for a new year that frankly didn't roll out the way we' all wanted it to because we wanted to be out of Co and we're not and so our community I hear from Business Leaders I hear from community members everybody wants to put you know put their petal down on the gas and let's

217just go fast because we have a lot of things to do with our students and our students want to do that too but then there's only there's a balance between the mental health issues that we have the academic needs that we have and the ability of our systems to deliver all that so I want to speak to that just real quickly in terms of some of the things that I know are coming and and I heard that from from staff today I certainly have been getting emails about that and um and and it is it is and frankly as a long time person in this community I've watched this leveling process play out before in the schools where my children have been and it's it's no fun nobody wants to be in this situation and

218I want to minimize that where we can so I know we're we're looking at that and thinking about that but I want to say that in terms of Staff support because I think that's that's so directly tied to student outcomes and unfortunately that's kind of where we are right now we we can't deliver all the things we want want to when when we're swimming in a lot of Crisis and so we're trying to move through that and that's just going to take a little bit more time I think than all of us really had anticipated that it would so when we think about that I think I think for me I've got three areas that I really uh want to speak to tonight I know we're working on some things substitutes is a huge issue

219and that is that is something that uh we can have lots of folks on the system but if they don't pick up the jobs then it this doesn't happen so I just really would encourage our community if you want to help our schools and our students please pick up if you are in that system if you if you have some time this is an opportunity there are incentives that are there there are incentives that are going to come out that I think would be financially rewarding for folks uh we even have some permanent substitute positions that we're advertised now I saw them on the website so we've got some really great opportunities for folks who want if you want to temporarily get in and do something we need you and we and we I think

220it will be just a wonderful thing for all our staff um and there's more going to be more more information on all the things that we're doing to get substitutes um happy to say that volunteers can come back in our buildings I think that's gone out communication last week so we know we have a lot of folks that help with lunchroom Duty uh and things that you may do on a very temporary basis I know many parents do that at their own schools please think about doing it at other schools that may need your help because that's so important for our students the other thing is covid support so I know we've had a number of speakers talking about the time that their staff spends in contact tracing or the concern that they're not doing

221enough so a partnership with the county that I think we can't say yay enough for is that the aim is to put one person in every school that helps with testing and covid support but just like School nurses if people don't apply for those jobs they don't get placed so that that effort is going through meinberg County 22 of those people started this week so that's a great thing so I think those three e those three efforts are going to help I wish I could switch on the light right now and make it all happen fast but I can't part of that is the ARP funding that we have and I know we've had other speakers that talk about where where is this money where where are you where are you spending it and so

222we've come up with some plans those plans are now in process more to come and I would encourage us to figure out again how we're going to communicate that a little bit better because there are things there that the community can already engage with I believe some things will be announced this week that will be really helpful for the community to engage with us in so I'm excited about this again we want to plan well make it sustainable make it accomplish our goals but it takes a little more time that I think we all wanted to give it but we're here and we're here for the work thank thank you Miss Sawyer thank you I appreciate the comments U Miss Marshall made um and want to speak to I think a a challenge that we

223would would be facing without the pandemic but pre pandemic we were all we were already facing Staffing shortages teacher shortages declines in numbers of people entering the education profession we were struggling to hire sufficient bus drivers and all other staff that pandemic has Amplified and accelerated those challenges and those challenges exist throughout our system I mean we heard about bus drivers tonight but it's it's in every single position in every Department um and they're all interrelated so um vacancies in HR impact every other department and we need to acknowledge that that's where we are and I know staff are working as hard as they possibly can and it's going to it's going to be a hard Road here for a while um I wish I could say you know we have some ARP money I

224would absolutely abely love to hire a reading specialist and put them in every elementary school classroom they are simply not there to be hired and that is I think a profound challenge that we're we are facing and it reflects somewhat on the pandemic but mostly on a a a long history of underinvestment in public education um teachers have been North Carolina teachers have been rallying for pay increases for all staff for years and we are now in our third year without a budget from the general assembly so while I am I I recognize we're in a really hard time now and I think Co has like I said has accelerated and exacerbated the problems but we were headed this way and it's a bigger problem than CMS and we need to work as as a

225state and as a country to reinvest in in public education in a way that elevates the systems to the position in in our culture that they deserve thank you all right thank you very much with that I will entertain a motion to adjourn motion to motion from Miss cheek second from Miss ship all those in favor let it me know by show of hands any [Music] opposed we are adjourned for