January 18, 2022 KASD School Board Meeting

001that's [Music] good evening everybody i'd like to call this meeting to order would everyone please rise for a moment of silence pledge allegiance to the flag i pledge allegiance to the flag of the united states of america and to the republic for which it stands liberty and justice for all i'd like to thank everyone for coming tonight there is a log in the back if you haven't done so would you please sign in if you have anything in particular that you would like to bring to the board's attention please also write that down if at any time during the meeting you would like to mention something on an agenda item please raise your hand to be recognized after the normal business there is also time for public comment where you can bring up additional issues

002this meeting is uh being uh tape recorded and just uh before uh we started tonight there was an executive session where we discussed uh legal and personnel matters uh roll call please michelle bats here randy birch here aldarian here erin angle here michael hess here cecilia holt here jason cook here jeremiah light here dennis ritter here okay um at this point i will be making a motion to add that the board will be taking action on the review committee uh decision uh with respect to the uh appeal that was raised uh with the book uh genderqueer so i motioned that an action item be added to the business stating be it resolved that the kutztown area school district board of supervisors uh has reviewed the book gender queer and uh has determined that it will

003uh be taking uh action as to that uh appeal that has been raised to the book committee review to the book i'm looking for a second a second motion in a second any uh discussion uh regarding the fact that we will be uh taking a board action as to that uh review of the book [Music] uh hearing none roll call please michelle batts yes eric sorry aldarian yes aaron engel yes michael hass yes cecilia holt yeah jason crock yes jeremiah light yes dennis treader yes randy birch yes so that carries and uh there will be a new business item regarding board action regarding the book um that will allow for public comment to take place uh beforehand and uh with that the next item on the agenda would be [Music] approval of the minutes for

004the december 20th 2020 school board uh meeting looking for a motion to approve those minutes ritter move motion do we have a second [Music] second motion in a second does anybody have any uh questions or corrections regarding the minutes for the 12 2020 school board meeting hearing none uh roll call please uh ricky aldarion yes aaron angle yes michael hess yes cecilia holt yes jason cook yes jeremiah light yes dennis ritter yes michelle batts yes randy birch yes motion carries the minutes are approved next item is the treasurer's uh report uh mr miller thank you mr burch this is the treasurer's report for december 2021. the month began with a cash balance of 16 million 106 386.26 we had receipts of two million two hundred sixty two thousand six hundred ninety five dollars and sixty

005one cents paid bills and payroll of three million six hundred thirteen thousand nine hundred thirty nine dollars and forty nine cents leaving us with a cash balance on december 31st of 14 million seven hundred fifty five thousand one hundred forty two dollars and thirty eight cents uh thank you uh mr miller uh do we have a motion to approve the uh treasurer's report so moved uh motion uh do we have a second second motion in a second any uh questions or comments regarding the treasurer's report uh hearing none roll call please aaron angle yes michael hess yes cecilia holt yes jason cook yes jeremiah light yes dennis roder yes michelle batts yes al darian yes randy birch yes motion carries next item are approval of bills for payment the first is ratification for general account

006including manual checks in the amount of million seven hundred thirty seven thousand nine hundred forty dollars in six cents do we have a motion second a motion in a second any questions regarding the ratification of bills for payment for the general account uh hearing none roll paul please michael house yes cecilia holt yes jason cook yes jeremiah white yes dennis ritter yes michelle batts yes al darian yes aaron angle yes randy burch yes motion carries next item is 5b approval of bills for payment for general account in the amount of 1 million eighty-five thousand three hundred five dollars and 34 cents do we have a motion greater move second second motion in a second any questions or comments regarding the approval of the bills for payment for the general account hearing none roll call please

007cecilia holt yes jason cook yes jeremiah light yes dennis tritter yes michelle batts yes aldarian yes aaron angle yes randy birch yes motion carries next item is 5c approval of bills for payment for the construction account in the amount of three hundred thirty four thousand ninety four dollars and ninety one cents do we have a motion second motion in a second any questions or comments regarding the approval of bills for the construction account have all the bills been received do we know are we at an end in that project the the main capital campaign problem capital no we have not received all the bills any other questions hearing none roll call please jason jeremiah light yes dennis redder yes michelle bats yes now darian yes aaron angle yes michael house yes cecilia holt yes randy

008burch yes motion carries next item is the superintendent's report mr tim tachen thank you mr birch sorry so for our superintendent's good news report um a few items uh here today good news and then uh some updates in addition to some of the discussion items the first is the national recognition program the college boards national recognition program national rural and small town recognition awards we have three award winners one sitting up here with us today uh cooper dunn joanna hurlin and sylvia niss these students earned this recognition because of their academic achievements in school and outstanding performance on the psat and psat 10 and or ap exams like to congratulate all three students on that fantastic recognition for your performance and obviously personally congratulate cooper because you're sitting at the end of the row here

009great job representing yourself your family your school your community to you and to you and your classmates congratulations second bit of good news is january is school board member recognition month and would like to recognize the school board members who are here with us today and person and on zoom for their significant time commitment as you know we meet typically three sometimes four mondays a month you know and the amount of time in preparation in thought and care and working with community members in addition to the meetings themselves you know they're it's often said that uh positions of an elective nature are thankless jobs and you know that that couldn't be more true but we have the opportunity to run a first-class school district and it is a direct result of the time that is

010dedicated um by our school board members so some of those years of recognition dr darian for 16 years 16 plus years uh dr ritter for 13 plus years over two to uh terms on two stints on the board encompassing many multiple terms mr burch for 10 plus years uh miss holt for nine plus years mr hess had eight plus years and this is bats at more than over a year now and um we have our newly elected members who are only in you know the first few months but with uh full terms um aaron engel um jason cocky and jeremiah light like to thank all of you for the time dedicated to the students and community of kutztown area it is um an unbelievable responsibility but a great one and i couldn't be happier to

011share with you as we serve students communities thank you thank you small tokens of of thank you and recognition um in front of you on the table not so much good news but um one of a discussion item that was linked on the agenda put right into superintendent's report because i think it is the appropriate time to discuss it um putting up the full student calendar it is linked in the agenda but putting it up on the screen would be a little bit difficult it's very small so i just wanted to put some highlights for the proposed 2022 2023 calendar and request any feedback from the board in terms of other items to think about we we would look for an approval in february but just wanted some discussion again it was shared in the

012agenda it's just pretty small type to put up on the board some of those calendar highlights include a first date for students on tuesday august 23rd 2022 that aligns with the bctc calendars also similar to the way this year ran where you have that monday off we start tuesday wednesday thursday friday and then you have the two four day weeks with the friday and monday off around labor day the last day for students without any snow days with a start on august 23rd includes um is thursday may 25th 2023 um if we were to have for again on the calendar list for snow days and then to use flexible instructional days beyond those four days um as the current recommendation the if the four snow days were used and any additional virtual that did not

013require us to cancel squall together it would be a june 1st 2023 last day for students the winter break is a little bit different um in the proposed for 22-23 with an early dismissal on thursday december 22nd and also having monday january 2nd off which with the second falling on monday and then that easter spring great the early dismissal on thursday april 5th and then being off through monday april 10th so those are just some highlights again the full calendar was made public on the agenda for any other questions there are some always some minor details that we work on throughout including end of marking period trimester etc that's on there those are always likely to change um just looking at some different way things fall or even based on an inclement weather day but

014as a basic structure um this does still have us with that early on the earlier end of starting which most of the county is moving towards um aligns us again with the start of bctc which is not an absolute must but it's certainly helpful um you know in addition to a pretty early end of the school year which has been typical the last few years you know what i've found is you can ask for a hundred opinions on the calendar and you know you might get 100 different opinions on exactly what that calendar is but you know largely i feel the the start of the school year um being a little bit earlier has been a positive for us and um in addition the snow day conversation is one that's always developing because the snow

015days are are difficult in a perfect world i think i always hear well this type of day should be a snow day and that type of day shouldn't be versus a virtual day you know but most of the time those decisions are made in a very short window of time and asking families and teachers to prepare in that short amount of time is really a challenge when if we can be able to predict it say okay after we've had four after we've had say three snow days we would say don't forget the fifth one would be a virtual day i think it allows families and teachers a little bit better time to prepare but that's always a develop that's a developing conversation just over the last few years currently this year again there is no

016limit to virtual days you know in theory fortunately we haven't used any yet and hopefully we don't with the number of snow days that we have um if pde goes back to their what is currently under their legislation we would have to apply for five fit days which are the virtual days so we're looking at that as a likely model not knowing what would happen at the state level kind of between now and then so looking at a very similar proposing a very similar calendar this year and then just looking for thoughts and feedback on that because it's you know we would look to get an approval in february and make it make it official i'm going to attempt to put it up on the board there we go don't think it's going to show

017i guess it's not too bad but just showing some of those highlights we just looked for in that middle of august you see some dates with their new teacher induction and teacher in service days with the same number of half-day plc days as we've had this year and the past few years with the exception of when we've had to make adjustments due to covet-related closures etc so that's the highlights around the proposed 2223 calendar and just open to any questions or things to consider before we put it on an agenda formally in february yeah i just had uh one question i like the idea of starting in conjunction with bctc so that those students are in school and they can get transportation there my question is what happens when our holidays don't align with bctc

018or we have weather days and bctc does not i understand that the students if bctc is open but we close because of whether they can still go there if they can get transportation there yeah they would not be denied going there they just would have to find transportation you know on an inclement weather day um the most prominent situation happens unfortunately is because we're in am bctc is when we have a two hour delay there is no ambctc you know and that's um that's the most unfortunate piece about just being am part but um when they don't align those students are pretty much always welcome there are occasions um when we run transportation even if our students aren't in school it's it's few and far between and kind of looking at mr flicker because i

019know that those occasions have have happened at times where we've run the transportation to bctc on a day we were closed students wanted to go but i don't think that's happened in the last couple years but i do recall a situation or two and that's an option we always have if for some reason they are open we are not we can still run transportation for we you know for example we have transportation that runs for some non-publics on certain holidays as well we were supposed to have transportation for one non-public on monday it got canceled that transportation were cancelled because of the weather but in theory we still had have some buses running so we could always send students and they're always welcome on those days it's just about getting there any other questions comments

020feedbacks things to consider before again this is not up for approval this is just a conversation item before we would look to bring it to approval i without any major comments we could bring it for approval next month just if nobody has any questions tonight if someone does think of something later feel free to reach out to the administration so that we can take a look at that before the calendar comes up for a vote all right and if there are no other questions we'll move on from from the calendar just something we had discussed you know i had discussed in the faqs related to our health and safety plan coming out of the um new year just wanted to update with some covet data that we're looking at i'll be you know to to

021be completely honest about the cover data sometimes we collect certain data and then we look at it and find that it doesn't tell us a whole lot so then we have to look at different data or it was really important to us internally that first week coming back if you if you notice i do update the dashboard every friday um and it changed some of the data that we collected in the week one we had put the number of quarantine students you know in week two i didn't include that because what it was doing was all those students were adding up multiple times in a sense without going back because of the way we are collecting it you know so we have to look at different collection methods there so where we landed on that

022is it might be better to look at overall attendance rate because attendance rate would catch quarantines or illness of any kind so it starts looking again maybe holistically at the way that absences are impacting school um because today was the first day of the school week we decided to just pick the first day of the school weeks as this rate to look at as sort of a one measure and as you'll see we did definitely have a little bit of a bump in increased absences there on that week of january 10th and that was pretty consistent in the days around there as far as you know a higher rate and now this week we've seen that rate drop down a little bit again what does that tell us that is a combination of any absence

023so that would be a quarantine absence that would be a sick absence it would be any absence that we have but the any other absence rate we find flaws in some of that data as well i think one thing we learned is that the data is never perfect because we don't if somebody doesn't report a quarantine or a case to us we don't know you know so um looking we do know who's here and who's not that's a pretty simple thing there's one thing we do know uh some additional um just data that wanted to share was the student case totals by week um you'll see a you know a significant spike there in the first two weeks after the holiday which was expected coming out of that holiday and now um you know right

024now that number's lower where again it's only two days this week so far out of five we're looking at these as five day weeks so the pending number you know is really a big difference is coming out of the holiday we had that really huge pending number pending meaning that they're testing we're waiting for tess to get back and it was communicated and then we've seen that kind of subside over the last week and then into this week as well so i don't i can't draw a ton of conclusions from the data that we have just but we do track it so in case anything alarming shows up we would communicate it immediately um and uh that's not the most conclusive report on it that you can have but it's just the honest one where

025we look at it every day and try to make some conclusions and it's not always easy to do so as always though i would like to thank our nurses specifically because in addition to nursing services and managing all this they are the ones who really help us collect this data in addition to the offices so um i'd like to thank them and dr lever principles all and for help for everyone for helping us get that together is there any any questions related to the data that is shared [Music] specific copic data okay well if there are no questions um traverse that is the end of my report uh thank you uh mr tim jackson um the next item would be our board uh committee reports um first would be extracurricular and facilities uh ms batts

026thank you mr birch so at last week's committee meeting there were no items for the ecc so we focused on the facilities the first item that we talked about was the halo system so these are the detectors for detecting smoke and vape and it's it was to address the ongoing concerns about vaping in the middle school and the high school when it came down to the information that was collected um there are some really um positive uh performance indicators for for the halo system however there was also a lot of information collected about how schools respond to those alarms and what the implications are and based on the information that was provided to the committee it was pretty evident that when you put these alarms in schools it takes a significant amount of resource to

027respond to these alarms because they're very sensitive and they're going off and it's a matter of trying to pinpoint who was in the bathrooms now that being said the quote that we received um did include cameras but we already have cameras installed in all of our buildings so we didn't feel that was necessary the total cost was actually 77 to put the detectors in each of the bathrooms only at the high school and so it was the committee's recommendation that we do not move forward with that significant cost and instead look at other alternatives for prevention such as helping the students understand that there are consequences to getting caught and implementing a fine that is part of the current policy that is not always um implemented and so that's where we we landed on that

028particular system anything you wanted to add mr tim chattan no i mean it's just we need to along with families communicate the dangers of vaping and you know continue to work with students um you know even since last week's meeting there's been a few incidences where um students have been referred to some support programs um based on that that it's just uh you know these the unhealthy behaviors and making sure that they are not a part of the school day has to be a priority for us um but that's a holistic approach it's about education support discipline you know and supervision and those are all those are all pieces that are really important to it yeah and i think the one other piece that the committee had wanted to share with the public is the

029fact that that parents are aware that there are resources through the school district if your students are if you suspect or you know that they are addicted to the vaping you know that there's there's opportunity for support through the school district with the resources that have already been identified um the second item on our agenda was related to a field house backflow preventer so last year the borough of kutztown mandated inspection of these devices on all commercial buildings and they basically found that three are failing one at kes was already replaced because of a lower cost and then there's also one at the field house and there's one at the middle school as well as yeah so sorry field house in middle school so the the replacement cost is approximately ten thousand dollars each um

030but the quotes are still pending for those replacements so they are not on the agenda for board approval this evening and the last item was a fence that was needed at kutztown elementary school pro max was awarded the the contract and a fence was installed along the saucony trail to complete the project where they had removed the dead trees and created that pathway that's all that i have for the report thank you michelle next committee would be policy and curriculum uh ms hull thank you mr burch uh so for the curriculum portion of the meeting uh mr flicker presented the kutztown high school course catalog for the upcoming academic year with a couple of courses that had previously been adopted by the board now added and mr cockbrook forward the public comment regarding the physics

031requirement and it was noted that we do have three love levels of physics uh one of them being designed for students who are not pursuing a four-year college and so that the official adoption of the course catalog is on the agenda for this evening and then we had two phases of policies we had one which is just up for an annual review as that's the requirement and that would be the policy 918 title one parent and family engagement which addresses the procedures for engaging those particular families and bringing them into the school and communicating with them and so that was reviewed um for another year and then um for uh revision and adoption we had policy 916 regarding volunteers and um we're adding the senior tax repay rebate program into the volunteer policy that's something

032that we've done at the program that we've offered but we're including it since they are volunteers in our building that the same expectations for all volunteers would apply to them and to 36.1 threat assessment which addresses training various of the faculty and staff regarding recognizing threats and addressing them and so those two policies 916 and 236.1 are on the agenda for first reading this evening and that concludes my report for that committee thank you cecilia uh uh student achievement any uh report dr darian uh no we didn't have not yet met it's met meets with the uh meets at the call of the chair and uh at this point we don't have any information that needed to be reported to us so there's been no meeting uh burke's tcc uh mr miller we did not

033meet last month and then uh the burke's career and technology uh center uh mr clark there has not been a recent meeting the next meeting is january 26th and then uh berks county intermediate unit uh pastor ritter we did not meet in december and we're meeting on thursday evening this week and uh finally the pennsylvania school board association ms holt any report i have a couple of items this evening one is that the all school directors monthly exchange has started up again for this year and that is something that's open to any board member it happens on the third tuesday of the month at 12 30 and it lasts for an hour and um it's the assume you do have to register but it's free and generally they have someone who addresses a current issue

034pertaining to school districts and then breaks up into regions so we're section 8 so then anybody in attendance from this region would then either talk about that or other issues that are facing their districts so it's i attend generally every month and it usually has some interesting interesting information and and some you know opportunity to bounce things off other school directors and so you can register for that through my psba and the other thing i have is an opportunity for students in grades 7 through 12 who are invited to submit entries to the 9th annual what does financial literacy mean to me and that's a contest sponsored by the harrisburg university of science and technology in partnership with the pennsylvania department of the auditor general and students submissions can include a 30-second tic tac video

035short essay or poem on what financial literacy means to them and there are cash prizes first prize is fifteen hundred dollars um and uh the submissions are due shortly february 15th and then winners are announced in april and that that registration is through the harrisburg university of science and technology that concludes my report thank you cecilia and then it looks like we accidentally skipped over a budget presentation uh initial 2022 uh budget presentation uh mr miller turn all right so i don't know if everybody's going to turn around to look at this or what's going to happen here kind of awkward so anyway if you look at the column headings you'll see uh i can use my mouse pointer here here we have the actuals from 2021 that our auditors just presented to you a

036few weeks ago this is the budget for the current year we're in 2122 and this is the budget that we're going to be discussing for the next few months this is broken down here by local revenue state revenue and federal revenue we'll just go over a few of the items here real estate taxes you can see how they're moving up we had a good collection year here didn't budget quite as much here i suspect this is going to come in stronger and this is what i'm budgeting for 2223 earned income tax uh that is the one percent that's taken out of everybody's paycheck so that's it's been going up steadily every year which is always a good sign real estate transfer tax that's the transfer tax you pay when you buy a piece of property

037it's 419 back in 2021 i'm thinking the real estate market hoping it will remain strong and we'll get something similar in 2223. delinquent real estate tax we had a great year back in 2021 um i don't think we're going to have quite as good a year in 2223 because the more delinquents you collect in this year the less there are to collect here but we'll see how that goes interest income as you probably all know with your own personal interests that's not doing very well these days uh rentals of uh property here in the buildings they have not much been going on there so i'm not budgeting very much there all the other local revenue that we have sources of that's what i'm budgeting there for now um state appeaser subsidy uh for all the

038retirement uh that we pay for the employees we get half of that back from the state that's what i'm predicting there that's based on the salary budget fica subsidy that's uh uh your social security uh you know you have that amount deducted from your paycheck in addition to that your employer also has to pay the same amount so we get half of that back from the state so that's what i'm budgeting here basic ed funding is the big big amount of money we get from pennsylvania um you can see the amount there for 21 20 or 20 21. this amount has not been announced yet uh the state is just going to start announcing uh budget numbers in february so we'll see where that goes i'm hoping we can get something similar to what i

039have up there on the screen transportation subsidy um we've been doing really well on that recently they audited us a few years ago they wanted to ding us for a couple hundred thousand dollars we appealed it we won and in the process we figured out ways that we can uh get more subsidy so that's been working out pretty well so i'm predicting 800 000 there other state revenue that's on that bottom line there federal the title one two and four grants um that's what i have there for many years that was going down every year uh fortunately that's been going up every year in the last few years so i'm hoping that's going to continue the esser grants which are all the coveted money that the government's been handing out um that's what i'm budgeting

040there that could change as we move along what happens there is uh when you spend money using yes or grants you uh you uh can report the same amount of income so you know that's not going to have an effect on our bottom line because every time we report an expense we're going to report revenue just cancel that out so that won't affect our bottom line medical assistance reimbursement uh we have a lot of that uh banked up in the state we can withdraw that whenever we want to i'm going to suggest that we withdraw this much this much in 2223 there's a few dollars of other federal revenue we move down here to other other revenue from the food service fund we uh we charge the cafeteria fund for the electricity they use every

041year so i'm thinking that's about what we're going to get from them and then there's just a few dollars down here for a sale of fixed assets because i know we're going to be looking to discard some of the things we have that we don't use any questions on the revenue budget if not we'll move on to expenses so we'll look at salaries first there's the history of the the administrator's salary the teacher's salary support staff i'll give you just a second to digest that there's insurance opt out which is uh if if someone has insurance through their wife's coverage uh they can choose to opt out of hours and they get some to get some money you know so we don't have to pay for them few dollars there in overtime that's not too

042bad there's some other salary money in there for benefits there's group insurance uh currently there's a four percent increase budgeted um typically over the years as we move closer to june the final budget that number the percentage comes down uh four percent is the worst case scenario that the consortium is predicting uh it's kind of weird the last two years because of coded there has been zero percent increase each year so you tell me the truth i don't know i don't really know where that's going to go this is kind of uncharted territory we talked before about we have to pay employer fica for each employee there's the amounts there there's the retirement amounts that we're going to pay and then there's some other benefits listed there we'll talk about just a few of the

043other expenses uh there's the cost for special ed costs for charter schools um i don't know that could very well end up being more than that that's all i'm going to budget for the time being and then there's some some of the other things there's maintenance there's the utilities in there there's uh you know just other miscellaneous things so there's the total expense numbers i have so we'll move to the summary the moment we've all been waiting for here there's the revenue numbers we saw from the first page there's the expense numbers we saw from the second page and then that gives us our bottom line there the bottom line so far for 2223 is negative 437 968 dollars which to tell you the truth is a lot better than i thought it would be

044when i started to put this together uh it's not a bad place to be at this point um this is this is january we're going to be working on this until june so we'll have to see where that goes there's a lot of time in there obviously and i'll entertain any questions anybody might have so what is the uh timing of things for us uh mr miller the timing yes well i'm hoping tonight the board will approve the opt-out resolution uh that's the first thing the next the next drop dead date is going to be in may when we have to i believe 20 days or 30 days before we intend to pass the final budget we have to pass a proposed final budget so that's the next date of importance for us so we

045have some months to work through you know some of the things we have to do i know you've explained the opt out for us before but for the benefit of the new board members and just as a reminder for the rest of us could you just explain that process and what the other option would be if we did not do that yes i can i guess the first thing we'll start with is something called act one which was passed in 2006 i believe it said up until then school boards could raise people's real estate taxes as high as they wanted to every year [Music] starting with act one the state puts out something called the index every year which is based on pretty much on the weekly wage average of the state and uh it

046sets a percentage above which the board cannot raise taxes so this year it's 3.4 percent um [Music] there's other ways that a board could raise taxes there are things called exceptions there's one for if your special ed expenses are rising dramatically there's a formula you can go through to figure that out we don't qualify for that there's another one for retirement expenses if your retirement expenses are raising dramatically which back during the point where peasers was the percentage was going way up every year we we qualified for those i don't think we ever use that uh this year we don't qualify for any exceptions so really the only amount that we could raise taxes if we chose to do so and i'm hoping we don't but um is the index amount now the budget opt-out

047resolution says that we that we agree if we pass the budget opt-out resolution we agree to not raise taxes above the index so really whether we pass that or not we're not we're not going to raise taxes above the 3.4 percent so i hope that clarifies it if anybody has any questions i'd be happy to answer them any other questions from mr miller from the board yes under uh mobile revenue um and you there was a other item i guess and it was but it was fairly sizable like a million some dollars other local record well 653 what kinds of things fall in that category okay so there's current real estate taxes there's interim real estate taxes there's public utility realty tax there's per capitas local service tax uh we talked about transfer tax there's

048amusement tax there's the delinquent per caps student fees there's 236 000 we get through the iu which is idea grant there is contributions and donations uh there's miscellaneous of 40. so those are the amounts there that go into that other revenue line okay i had a quick question about the federal revenue it's not a huge amount it's only a difference of like sixteen thousand dollars but it was like four times as much as is being budgeted in 21 22. why was it why do we anticipate so much less than 20 20 21 on that other federal revenue line the other federal revenue yeah so we had the title one title two title four the sr3 grant oh the 6150 is that what it was on that page yeah but that is it has to do

049with medical assistance um i believe they pay us extra for all the bookkeeping that our medical assistance person has to do [Music] so four times a year we get a check for like a thousand or fifteen hundred dollars i think the question is more why was it twenty three thousand in twenty twenty one versus with a five and six which are obviously within a range within a similar range it's more that the outliers the 20 let me see well back then on the actuals we had the title title one two and four we had the health and safety grant back then which uh we don't qualify for that anymore and uh so there's the breakdown you can see in that column there it was just under that specifically under that other federal it went from

050like 20. what was the 17 373 if you put that with the 6 000 there you go the 17 i'm 49 um i'll tell you i don't know right now but i can look that up and let you know but that seems to be what that would be the difference in that yeah i think it is okay this is taken right off of our uh accounting software and i'm not sure why there's not a name in there but i'll let you know thank you all right any other questions for mr miller hearing none just thank you mr miller you're welcome thank you mr miller so you know this is that high level view of the budget just it you know largely the purpose it serves is to feel comfortable passing the resolution um based on

051those projections looking at the projections um for a solid uh financial year this year in 21 22. um in addition with the surplus from last year you know we're looking at a current right now the projected deficit within a range that we've been comfortable working with over the past few years beginning in march in our finance committee meeting in that fourth monday we'll start presenting like specifics of staffing situations as all those start to become clear as we get to the spring you know and that's where you would start to see some any larger variations as once we get into the details of staffing so and that could go go either way you know based on what our enrollment uh projections course selection at the high school or just growing needs but we'll start seeing

052more details related to that uh in march thank you um this would move us now to the public comment on agenda items uh section and uh looking at the people that have signed in the first person that had signed up is uh steve wilson good evening everyone uh voting members of christian uh concerning uh genderqueer i remember listening to someone in this room saying a couple months ago that if it was his representative it was an inappropriate book and i believe that to be true and i i believe that the the subject matter is really not a concern to the school district and i ask you to consider its exclusion for that reason i i believe that it it's an inappropriate subject for the school board to be presenting before school children equally important is

053that i believe that the book as i've seen it uh represents uh significant obscenities and i think that rises to a criminal level and i think it's very important for you folks to understand the implications of that it's not unreasonable to consider a criminal investigation coming from the inclusion of a book like that in the school district library so for a couple different reasons i'm asking you folks to consider its exclusion the other thing on a personal note cecilia i for several reasons regret that i'm catching less than 20 of what you're saying and i was hoping we could come to some sort of accommodation when you're speaking because i really would like to hear your comments but it could be the byproduct of having lived a colorful life i can't hear anything anymore but

054i don't think i'm alone in that i for some reason your particular voice i'm having a lot of trouble hearing you and i'm just asking if you'd give me an extra effort because i really do want to hear what you have to say i will endeavor to enunciate and speak i thought i didn't invite you to move closer i'm sorry i couldn't understand that i will endeavor to enunciate and speak up can anyone else hear me raise your hand thank you okay i just i'm just saying that's a perfect example i didn't understand single word so with that in mind i hope it's 20 22. i'm hoping we can come some sort of accommodation because i really would like to hear what you have to say thank you for your time everybody and your consideration

055next person that signed up to speak is jerry seaver i also want to let you know that jackie receiver jackie burr just came in and she wanted to be on the list she got here late so just want to let you know that okay tricia a laby asked me to read this document for her uh she tried emailing all of the school board members but it bounced back to her for some re bounced back to her for some reason so um in short this book has no place in our school library i hear the critique of arguments against my position so i'm going to break each of them down argument number one you can't keep your kids in a bubble yes i agree with that however it is practically impossible to live in a bubble

056children these days are bombarded by sexual innuendos whether it be online tv advertisements it's literally everywhere our society is hyper-sexualized ask any advertiser sex sells which is why many companies use racy images and sexual innuendos to sell products shouldn't our public school library be the place where students and parents can go to to realize that there is life beyond sex and one's sexual identity and preferences argument number two this is for kids who may struggle with their sexual identity i find it hard to believe that there are no other books available that do not contain images and sexually explicit if someone really thinks this book is helpful couldn't a counselor suggest the book to the child to be gotten from the community library or the bookstore these students are struggling because of the hyper sexualization

057in our culture yet the school's response is to expose them to more sexual material there are countless books available and a limited shelf at the kutztown i challenge the school to find better use of taxpayer dollars and bookshelf space to truly help these children i have never heard how these books actually help a struggling student we could still provide these students with books containing characters who are transgender transgender etc but without this explicit sexual information argument number three this is a memoir it needs to be taken in it's entirely it's not really porn if we allow this book into school where does it end are we going to allow sex manuals into the school library to help children prepare for the future what about hustler magazine and other graphic material explaining someone's first minor sexual

058experiences even if this wasn't intended to stimulate an erotic response definition of porn we should all be able to agree that these youths are developing brains so it doesn't matter the intent behind it that point will be completely lost on them pictures of sexual acts are not appropriate on our public school library shelf there's a reason miners aren't allowed in book adult bookstores argument number four you want to ban books no i want to ban porn there is a difference argument number five you are just anti-lgbtq no i don't want pictures of any sexual acts in the school this is the first time to my knowledge that a book like this was found in our libraries if there was one depicting heterosexual acts i would be providing the same comments let's focus on the content

059quality of the material which leads to the next point argument number six these books are award winners with the american library association and other notable organizations i and many others have lost respect for these organizations because of their push for sexual material on our children under the guise of education if other parents want to use this as a guide for selecting materials then fine but it's time for a school to be more transparent on the selection of materials and not allow free reign by school librarians librarians who are brought into the alls a-l-a sexual agenda with our children i struggle to understand how this book meets the stated criteria in policy 189 109 administrative regulations educational significance need and value for curriculum age-appropriate materials of the student served reputation and authority of author or producer

060clarity validity accuracy scope objectivity and currency organizations and presentation of contents high degree of readability high degree of potential user appeal artistic quality and or literary style quality format value commensurate with cost ethical standard standards that are commensurated with the community please someone tell me which one of these criteria this book meets are there really no other books available to students struggling with gender id identity that could meet some of these criteria continue transparency issues repeatedly the superintendent has said the book was not in circulation yet information obtained through the right to know document clarifies there is no such category in any policy or criteria there is no list of books that are not in circulation i was told to review the book catalog to see the books in circulation genderqueer was absolutely in the

061school online library catalog and i i have pictures therefore in the correct in the circulation by the school's own definition i was also advised i could ask the superintendent for the process and the criteria for putting them in circulation and inventory it seems like a uh semantic dance is being played here done as an attempt to minimize concerns raised by parents this is not helping already damaged relationships in the community in conclusion okay in conclusion conclude i question the judgment and the qualifications for any person on the book review committee who voted for allowing this on our school libraries we can do better the students parents and taxpayers of this district deserve better i suggest the school get back to placing more appropriate educational material on the school bookshelves let's use our dollars and bookshelf

062space for presenting quality literature to our students to develop critical lifelong skills i encourage you to remove this book from our library shelves to protect these impressionable and developing minors from these harmful images i also challenge you to reevaluate your policies and procedures on selection of materials it needs to be more transparent sincerely trisha libee maxitani thank you next person that is signed up is lisa diffenbaugh hi good evening my name is lisa different ball and i'm parent to three students in the school district when i heard book banning was on the agenda tonight i knew i needed to speak the reason that attention was brought to this particular book isn't because a student brought it home and a parent became upset this is part of a bigger movement to be on books and schools

063genderqueer and all boys aren't blue are just springboards to gain attention and open doors to further ban books about gender race diversity and factual history i could go into detail but it's unnecessary this information is well known and readily available i'd rather speak on a personal level my daughter is 14 years old and in 8th grade she's an avid reader and extreme book lover she has seen what is happening across the nation and seeing this book banning conversation brought into our district the rebellious teenager and her decided that she wanted to start a banned book club where teens could access read and freely discuss books that have been historically banned or part of the new book banning movement she brought this id up to firefly bookstore her favorite store and they're excited to partner with

064her last week the club had their first meeting as many of you know the ready eagle has done two stories on it the first story gained attention and the community came out in a big way to financially support them the second story was shared on twitter by several people with big followings this since gone viral being retweeted more than ten thousand times and liked more than forty thousand times it's gained attention from editors in major newspapers such as the washington post and new york times along with several celebrities athletes authors and politicians she also has an upcoming radio interview about the club it's been very exciting to see the support nationally and across the world unfortunately when it was shared on a local page the club was laughed at ridiculed attacked as if somehow students

065reading books and forming their own opinions is a bad thing i told my daughter that i was coming to the meeting tonight because a book was on the agenda to be banned she asked which book i told her the book that being proposed was called gender queer she isn't familiar with the book i asked her if you hear about a book your the school wants to ban what would you do she said first i'd google it find out why it's banned i told her i did and it says because there are sexual graphics in the book asked her what she would do next with an information she said nothing i don't want to see that so i asked her well what would some other teens do she said well i know a lot of them

066would go to google images and look for the book told her i did that too and all the pictures came up immediately now teens today are still the teens that we were we all remember when we retweet teens sneaking tapes or cds with bad language and listening to them with our friends watching our radio movies with friends and parents run around sneaking and playing violent video games that older siblings or relatives had when they weren't around and yes i know that there are people in this room that found their dads or older brothers or uncles stashes of playboy and penthouse magazine the images in genderqueer as soon as they are googled by students will be shared among teens because that's what teens do for most of us we heard the language saw the movies played

067the games and it didn't change who we foundationally were it takes a lot more than that so fortunately the kids who see these images will be fine so back to this club going viral on twitter the most common comment of the thousands of tweets that have been made regarding the club is nothing will get a team to read a book faster than telling them they can't other things that rang true was when someone said when i was a tween and older the annual list of banned books became my to be read list for the year i figured if i got banned it must be speaking the truth about something another comment the internet has far more harmful stuff for kids to read than any school or public library contain banning a book just provides an

068inquisitive kid with a search term to google on the subject and a final tweet is these books would have gone largely ignored without the fighting the ridiculous fear and the bands my point is to keep in mind when you ban a book you draw appeal to it if this book was on a library shelf with none of this attention around it i'm confident that it would barely be seen the mere fact that the school would take this book out of the library is the ultimate plan for teenage curiosity thank you next person that is signed up is dan wismer hi everybody thanks for the opportunity um i did hear about that book club and i just like to applaud that that was the first book you read was actually a really good book that i

069read in high school um i just wanted to read something i prepared because i do terrible when i actually just try and share my thoughts here so um i want a couple points that i want to make clear that kind of like dig into this a little bit deeper um today we sit at a time when society how society measures good or bad is not agreed on as it was in our nation's past this is a change and perhaps the most significant change as it fuels the political divide seen today in our country and in the school district it is this change that lies at the heart of today's and tomorrow's controversy the change is showing itself today with a book this book is sexually explicit in both description and imagery with intent to arouse

070which if we're heterosexual it seems safe to say would not be allowed one part depicts pedophilia here's my message things have changed now many public schools including kutztown are moving away from the traditional values that we all used to agree on in order to teach the students this new progressive path parents are being excluded i would like and i don't know this but somebody may in the room may know this i would like to ask if anybody knows how many right to know legal requests had to be filed so far just to find out what's going on in kutztown does anybody have the number on that i don't i mean i can get your number i don't have a number in front of me if how many breaks and no requests are there's there's several

071um and it's a pattern that's to me specifically disturbing the worst part is children are now the target so when adults resist an ideology the target becomes the impressionable books like genderqueer about teaching children the views they are taught at home are wrong genderqueer represents a movement beyond promoting acceptance and diversity things we all still agree on and is something that has not changed it represents the corruption of youth and removal of traditional values it represents the labeling of those who hold traditional values as promoters of hate it represents the normalization and promotion of medical treatments including hormones blocking hormone blocking therapies to alter a child's biology that's in the book it represents uh freeing children to express and take part in all forms of sex and to follow what feels good teaching children what

072feels good is right so children get to decide what is good and that and what is bad children are now the deciders to quote the author of genderqueer we need to reduce the shame about sex among teenagers i ask this book to be removed from the school's library a library for children not the public library but this will not end with this book so there's going to be more that are going to come up so i'm thinking perhaps placing adult books which this is an adult book it's labeled an adult book like this should be in an area that requires parental permission which seems to just make sense unless again parents are being explicitly are being excluded from the process uh this is actually in existence in the school in which i teach and it

073just seems like it's a common ground that that just totally makes sense next person that has signed up is jennifer uh coffinger before i go into my reservations about this book um quick question when can um parents of seniors um expect to hear the date of graduation because i haven't seen it on a calendar unless yeah it's i mean we typically approve it sometime here in the next month month and a half because it is somewhat dependent upon snow days we're trying to be to finalize it i think um just as someone who has two graduating we hope we hope to have it soon but the snow days do impact it this summer okay thank you um [Music] for genderqueer i just want to read you a couple of definitions actually more than a couple

074child pornography is a form of sexual exploitation federal law defines child pornography as a visual depiction of sexually explicit conduct involving a minor persons less than 18 years old images of child pornography are also referred to as child sex abuse images pornography refers to books magazines and films that are designed to cause sexual excitement by showing or describing sexual acts pedophilia sexual feelings directed toward children an obsession with children as sex objects overt acts including taking sexual ex sexually explicit photographs molesting children and exposing one's genitalia to children duncan i apologize that you're in this room i don't think it's appropriate same back there i'm 18. um a pedophile is a person who is sexually attracted to children a child is a human being below the age of 18. child sexual abuse there are two

075types one is touching that means touching a child's genitalia making a child touch someone's genitalia etc the second is non-touching showing pornography to a child exposing a person's genitalia to a child encouraging a child to watch hear or read of sexual acts how many of you have actually opened that book hands okay if you have opened that book you know that every definition that i've read is in that book all of those when it pertains to a child are criminal offenses this book it does not belong on our shelves it is a pornographic book it is explicit the pictures in that book make me want to vomit it crawls under my skin and the fact that my child could get her hands on that book luckily for me i have a child who wouldn't touch

076it with a 10 foot pole but not every parent has a child like mine and those parents they might not want their kids to get their hands on that material and yet this school is thinking to provide that i agree with the gentleman that said there needs to be a criminal investigation this is not right i don't care what your belief system is it's you can't buy stuff like this in a store unless you're 18. that's where it belongs it doesn't belong on our shelves the person or persons who bought that book and who approved that book and anybody here who says yes we need that book on our shelves you need to seriously look at them because i would be concerned that they have these tendencies because if you don't it's not okay and

077it's not about banning a book if a parent wants to buy those their kid that book or wants their kid to read that that's between them and their parent and quite frankly i don't agree with it it should be an adult decision not somebody under 18 not somebody in our school thank you uh jackie bridges good evening jackie burgess from kutztown i'm talking tonight about the book genderqueer which was approved by your book committee after seeing who was on the committee i'm not surprised by the outcome i truly believe a few years ago all parents would have been in agreement that the illustrations in this book are inappropriate for children under the age of 18. i think we need to make it clear that people shouldn't be put into a box right and the assumption

078is that with a few community members that we are book banners and that our mission is to bring books it's just not true i we did push back on the all boys aren't blue but once it was approved that was it we didn't keep pushing that but this book is different and i know that people think that if you don't approve this book and then you're not setting the example and that this book will be on a witch hunt from us and that will be burning books somewhere yet our challenging of the book resulted in a spark of reading and a teen banned book club in town which is amazing we all love great great banned books and there's books like the great gatsby 1983 to kill a mockingbird and even harry potter but we're

079not talking about books like that this is books with pornographic illustrations i don't care if this book won a thousand awards it's not even well written if you read it i've read more educational and impressive things in playboy magazines is this something that you're willing to place in all the libraries if you approve this book why not did you know there's a wonderful non-binary book called felix ever after that book isn't even in our school library if you want to be inclusive and you want to ensure students who are transgender or in the lgbqt community then at least provide them with quality literature before you vote on this book please read it consider other alternatives to be inclusive to all students maybe adapt a protocol as other districts do and provide a book rating system

080similar to a movie rating and ask for parental permission thank you so that uh concludes our public uh comment on agenda items uh so that would move us to new business and with uh moving the genderqueer discussion two new business for board action uh randy did you check with me oh i'm sorry uh is there any one online uh okay no okay uh thank you dr ritter okay yep sure so i know that tonight we're here to discuss the genderqueer book please tell us your name robin underwood kutztown not everyone rose their hand that they read this book so i don't think that you should be qualified to even say whether it's appropriate or not this evening also just to clarify a few things um the age of consent is actually 16 not 18. there's

081plenty of students in the high school who are allowed to be doing the things that are in this book by law and some parents are not allowed to tell my child what to read they can only tell their only child their own child so if they would like to tell their child not to read this book they're very welcome to do that it does not have to be out of the library as far as some of those definitions child porn is taking a photo of an actual child and distributing it not making a drawing and no one is forcing any kid to read this book so it would not be abuse to leave it in the library so let's just get these things straight as we decide whether this book should stay and i certainly

082hope that you will take the advice of the committee that all read the book all spent lots of time reviewing and thinking and if you just go against everything they said it's kind of a sham so i certainly hope that's not what happens thank you order please so with that we will now move to the new business section and the first item will be the uh committee review and the the book genderqueer uh just to open this up for discussion so maybe i'll start i so i certainly did read the entire book um and i think that based on the recommendations that that we've received from the solicitor from the information we've gathered um i agree there's a place in a time for for this book if a family so chooses with their children but

083at the same time there's also um ways that we might be able to make sure we're providing appropriate access to to these materials so i would i would like to make a motion that we would approve the option of providing parental consent to checking this book out of the library and not having it available for general access so that the content is available for those who choose and it can be restricted for those who do not okay so we do have a motion that would essentially approve the recommendations of the committee with the provision of making a parental consent a requirement is that correct so we have a motion uh we would need a second before we could go any further with that michelle i'm curious in adding a parental consent to it would the

084book still be readily available on the library shelf or would it have to be accessed through parental signature so i will say that what my expectation would be is that there would be a parental signature required in terms of general access how would that actually be set up in the library i mean that's something that um we could have a request form and it could be under with a signature it could be accessed i do anything with a parental approval for it to just be on the shelf i would have reservations i mean for obvious reasons because you know would just be on a shelf so it would have to be somewhere off the general shelves and with an approval form that would be available online then a student would have access to the book

085so again we have the motion uh is there a sec i'll second mr thank you okay so we have a motion in a second uh at this point we can have further uh discussion regarding the uh the motion i don't know how we can single out one book from the library for parental permission separate from all of the other books there are plenty of things that parents don't want their children to access for one reason or another there are plenty of parents who want their children to have free access it is a parenting issue to address with your children what people like them what people who are in your family access read watch so it goes back to what we heard already that someone else can't decide for someone else's children you may decide for

086your own children in your own family what works we can't be deciding that for other people so i could not support singling out any particular book if anything i could see you leave the library open for parents to come in and peruse the collection choose all the books that their kids aren't allowed to have submitted a list of books that their kid needs to check before they select a book from the library and i thought shoot not supposed to read that one i'll choose something else that's the only really fair way to not single out and censor anything in particular any other questions or comments regarding the pending motion yeah first of all i agree with everything cecilia has said but i'd like to also add the fact that we need to balance harm against

087benefit and i see the harm of this book giving the fact that it's uh accessible in lots of places including the public library where it is not an adult book it is in fact listed under young adult that's where you will find the book if you go to a public library the the benefit the major benefit is for the kids struggling with sexual identity not all of them are avid readers i personally have an aversion to graphic novels i kind of call them comic books but i realize that's uh because i'm really old and uh that is not the current attitude that graphic novels are in fact just that and they're accessible to kids who perhaps can't quite get the same sort of information through the written word and and the child who is most

088likely to be struggling and perhaps do harm with them to themselves because of that struggle might be precisely the one who is not going to go mom can i read this book for that reason i i think it needs to be accessible and if a parent forbids their child to read it that opens up a really good discussion at home and and so again i would agree with cecilia and we'd be reluctant to put restrictions on this book given the fact that the committee the american library association have all suggested that it is in fact suitable for young adults any other questions or comments yeah i'd like to make a few comments um the problem with putting this on a parental sign out what's going to stop that say 16 17 18 year old kid

089who rides the bus with 11 and 12 year old middle schoolers from showing those young kids this book absolutely nothing you know it's not the book i read the book and it's not the book it's the certain graphic images in there and some people say well you can read about it sure you can read about it and some of those romance novels and whatever else that you can go buy at the grocery store but this is actually depicting sex and so if you're going to allow this book then since there's an image of the author completely nude in the book then why not let playboy in the library hustler because honestly those are more tasteful than this book is because they don't show pornographic images of sex acts going on so even if you have

090a sign out you know or like miss hope said you know the parents come in and says to the library well the kids can't see this book this book or this book what's going to stop the kid from going in the library pulling the book off the shelf sitting down and reading it in the library again nothing so [Music] honestly this does i agree with a lot of the comments that were here tonight and that this is borderline pornographic i mean you look up the definition of porn it meets half that definition and are we in the porn business here or in the education business i agree that there do need to be books for that community and like was brought up there are many other books out there that are much more tasteful than

091this book um any other questions or comments regarding the pending motion yeah i'd like to make a couple comments one uh yes i believe that uh there are certain depictions in that book that are both vulgar and obscene uh that seemed quite obvious i would not let i would choose not to let my own children look at it that said we're not talking about moving books leaving books that people object to in re saying that the ala has more authority on what children read instead of their parents which is i disagree with that wholeheartedly um it comes down now and this is you you're gonna let me probably most of you laugh at me but we're down to two or three pages in this book that we consider vulgar so so half of us think

092two or three pages of this book for vulgar were obscene uh the other half think that there is too much value in the book to take off the shelf rip out a couple pages we don't need to teach somebody how to give someone a blow job doesn't doesn't need to happen because it doesn't necessarily need to be a graphic image in a book in a high school library if the rest of the book provides some value you don't want to censor a book let's do what tv does all the time sensor the vulgar images any other uh questions or comments i have one other comment regarding the appeal and the process there's been a lot of talk over the last number of months about community involvement and a committee was called in response to a

093complaint about this book and it's prescribed in the policy that it will consist of certain personnel superintendent principal of the building calls for the librarians in the case of a library resource calls for [Music] teachers to whom the resource is relevant for their material and it calls for a couple of community members and so they met they read the book they read the policy they discussed what the policy says these decisions are based upon are the selection criteria followed properly so these are trained professional librarians who are on the committee there are members who represent the community the rest of the personnel spent time and effort and in some cases money volunteered to review the book and the feeling is that they can do all of that come up with a consensus and a general

094opinion and a recommendation for the material but then the administration's going to do whatever they want why would community want to be involved in trying to help with these processes [Music] quite honestly there were miss halter where there were two parents on the committee i believe the rest were staff members of the school district staff including the staff members that chose to put the book in the library to begin with so to say that two parents which that's really that's all the parents that were involved um have the right to say for the rest of the parents in the community is kind of stretching things i think this is this is a debate between the board please we can't have this coming from the from the audience you know that it's it's inappropriate and we

095can't have it so please stop um any other questions or comments from the board my decision tonight rests on the ultimate purpose of the graphic novel and as i read it and understand it it was the author writing about their experiences and their struggle with understanding who they were and and sensing that they did not fit into the typical binary world that i'm sorry okay my understanding is that this is a memoir in which a young person is writing about their experience through their childhood and into a young adult life in which they wrestle with their that they do not fit into their non-binary into an into that they are non-binary they don't fit into what we typically understand to be a binary world and uh it is that context out of which that i

096make my decision tonight [Music] you know their comments are made about images in the book there are about four in the book that reach the level of perhaps some reach a level of problematic um out of thousands that are in that book so i think you know most of the struggle that i read in all of the pages and i've marked things really are around how this person sees themselves and and finding their way forward in their life and so i think the book has value for folks who may be in that level of discernment um and uh so i am very hesitant to be banning books um i know i've looked out on the list of books that people want to ban i see the bible there as a pastor that troubles me so

097do we suddenly allow those who want the bible ban for one reason or another to have their way and ban the bible um so i'm i i know where i feel i need to vote on this issue tonight okay um do we have any other uh questions uh uh or comments uh are we ready to call the question on the uh motions i do have a question in terms of um restrictions for the book if it's placed in the library we're strictly talking about one copy of a book that would be in the high school library so by definition it would be restricted to just high school students that is correct other questions or comments before we uh do roll call i have just one additional thing that i wanted to bring up so i'm

098not going to posit on whether or not i think the book is right but just something that i you know have found each student typically when we get our laptops at the high school we're we're supposed to read the acceptable use policy or at least uh peruse it review it with our homeroom teachers if i remember correctly we do that more than once in our high school career we look through what we're allowed to do with our laptops and the the district as is stated in the [Music] policy acceptable use policy already operates and enforces technology protection measures that block or filter online activities of minors on computers which would be students used and accessible to adults and students so as to filter or lock inappropriate matter on the internet and the policy of the

099school district defines inappropriate matter as visual graphic or even text and any other form of obscene sexually explicit or child pornographic or other material that is harmful to minors etc goes on to talk about being against discrimination against certain groups as well and so those are the things that the school district already restricts and prohibits using on our laptops here and it also says that no person may have access to material that is illegal under federal or state law um and then the last thing i have is the definition according to section 2256 of title 18 united states code is the definition of child pornography as any visual depiction illustrated or photographic of sexually explicit conduct involving a minor which is someone under the under 18 years of age so [Music] whether or not the

100board would think that you know the the risk benefit benefit that we've been talking about i definitely acknowledge the benefit that this book would have for lots of people and people that i've had close relationships with for a long time but i just wanted to bring up what the district already does in terms of restricting some of these things especially on technology and i think if it applies to the technology that we use it if you view a library as as a technology as a tool that should also apply there as well that's all i have i might agree with cooper uh and a lot of what he said i i appreciate all of his comments i think it's absolutely wonderful we finally have a student rep who actually represents students and expresses a point

101of view however because this book is rated young adult i don't think that a student that accessed the book through our the internet would be in violation of our policy and uh that's part of the reason why i don't see any problem with having it on the shelf of the library and so to be clear that the motion that i made is not to ban the book it's just to restrict access in a similar way where there's content out there and in this case a parent would provide that access to the information if they so choose with that any other questions before we do roll call uh hearing none uh roll call ricky jeremiah light no dennis ritter no michelle bats yes aldarian no aaron angle no michael hess no cecilia holt no jason cook

102no randy birch yes motion does not carry yeah so at this point we can have uh ongoing discussion uh regarding the uh book and uh looking for another motion with respect to any board action remove the book from the library i second that motion so we have a motion in a second to remove the book any further questions or comments as to the uh motion that has been made hearing none roll call ricky dennis ritter no michelle batts i hear you i'm making my own choice here based on the information that that is presented so i made a motion prior and there was a reason i made that promotion because i feel like there are students that can benefit from the content of the book no aldarian no aaron angle yes michael hess no cecilia

103holt no jason cook yes jeremiah light yes randy birch no please again stop it motion did not carry make a motion to censor the obscene for vulgar images in the book i'll second that motion so we have a motion in a second just and again uh are we just talking about the the uh yeah the ball group scene images that have people upset okay it's more than just one well i don't think that's specific enough we need to know like specifically what's going to be censored how are we going to censor i would say that we're going to sensual sexual acts that are being displayed in the book i would say that we're going to section we're going to sense our uh strap-on penises that are uh depicted in the book um i would so

104those are the two that jump out at me the vibrator yeah the discussion regarding purchasing a vibrator i also question and this is this goes beyond i'm not going to make motion for this i just want to point this out that it also the book does encourage uh girls to try to reduce their reduce their rest by by strapping them down not a girl i've never tried it i don't know if that's healthy but it struck me as odd but i would say that the sexual what is what it would be should be censored is a is is a sexual image that would be considered obscene or vulgar the problem i would have with this is the book exists in its entirety pulling specific images out does not sound illogical except in terms of what

105it would do in ter of the entire entirety of the book i would think that simply excising particular images is uh essentially the same thing as taking the entire book off the shelf and i kind of understand the motion i i understand the logic behind it i just have a concern over the effect it would have on the again the entirety of the message of the book and therefore i think i will be opposing that and at this point as the motion stands uh i'm concerned that it's uh overly vague as to what we would be removing from the book does anybody have a copy of the book i'll give you a couple pages right now well i i i'm sure i have i have a good idea of what pages you're talking about but

106just generally speaking as the motion stands i think it is vague and would need clarification i i don't have a copy of what it was i think mr white smells my coffee no i think uh eric could you look up the yeah eric can you please provide the pages the page pages one two four page 135 page 166 page 167 and page 138 those were the some of the pornographic images i just wrote down [Music] am i looking those up right now i met my motion to censor the images the the sexual images on page 124 135 166 and and 138 well the question [Music] okay well we he changed it to it so we would need a second to mr cock's amendment and i will second that any further uh discussion as to the

107pending motion i guess my only point would be i don't know that we want to get into the habit of analyzing every book that we have and then as a board voting what we do and don't want to censor from those books and defeats the purpose of having books at all if we're going to start censoring individual pieces out of books or maybe there'll be magazines that we don't want so we'll be cutting pages out of magazines and then you know would this also cross over into instructional material so i don't agree with this motion and i think it just leads down an avenue where we're going to be analyzing everything that we have and trying to um script out anything that we don't 100 agree with any other questions or comments so i guess

108the question i have is how do we approach this with the online content right how do we have books that have heterosexual acts like depicted in the libraries as well like in in graphic novels like would we allow that on the computer that's that's what i'm trying to rationalize is there's validity to that approach because not that there's a lot a lot of sensitivity around the books and book banding and that's not what i'm intending i'm just asking from a practical perspective like if we limit on the computer how do we make those decisions in comparison to a book i mean specifically the filtering on the computers comes down to working with a filtering company that filters based on a series of terms words known sites etc i mean just from a pure practical standpoint

109the policy you know can govern things that slip through um they can slip through a filter sometimes i mean there's the filters are never perfect because things are constantly changing on the internet so if something were a violation of that policy 15 that slipped through the filter it would come down to evaluating the details of that scenario you know where image is a part of a um you know uh health and or wellness assignment that depicted sex were they part of a literature collection that was um linked to a part of the live we have we have online library you know subscriptions etc you know and or was it part of a site that was in term was uh determined to be for the distribution of explicit images et cetera i mean it really would

110come down to the details of that particular investigation if something slips through the filters accidentally or unintentionally you know at that point usually a student reports it and then it gets blocked because we can do that either on our own through the filter or we can recommend to the filter company that they block something else so it really comes down to the nuance of each individual situation and isn't our acceptable use policy for computers subject like part of that is because of the sipa law is that accurate because of it because of this yeah yeah i mean it also comes as a part of e-rate on some of the regulations that are that are related to the governance of internet and for public entities etc but it also is you know what annually reviewed by

111students where they have to agree to it to you know ensure that they are not accessing things that they should not be accessing through their regular education uh using those devices that's largely what its purpose serves in addition to some of the technical and legal requirements that come with e-rate and other regulations because we're a public entity any other questions or comments from the board i have a question uh how do we move forward from here as far as the content of books that are entering our library so we as parents and as board members who are answering to parents are not in this position again so a few recommendations that came from the committee on you know specific to process were one we have to review the ar because there is some specific updating

112that needs to be done related to the selection process so that's one portion another recommendation was you know of course parents students public really have access to what is in the collection if they were to go to search odyssey but um the belief was that annually which really books are typically ordered one or two times a year that we would post a list of new book titles that were being purchased for the library at each level i mean typically it's going to be a high school one that would have um some questions to it but the we would we would post those annually those were two things that were recommendations from the committee because again the ar for selection is a bit dated and the um you know with books being publicly it's publicly available

113for you to find out if a book is in the collection therefore there's no intent to hide it but again parents wouldn't know what new selections are each year so that will be a process that we implement going forward that when new books are ordered that a list would be um posted on the the height the appropriate schools website related to the library and also potentially shared in the newsletter i have one more question another criteria that was cited was it says genderqueer has recognized literary value based on its inclusion on lists including great graphic novels for teens 2020 and the subtext for that is recognizing graphic novels and illustrated nonfiction for those ages 12 to 18. so 12 to 18 like how how do we know that this isn't now going to end up

114in the middle school yeah i mean books from those uh selection criteria were not you know it wasn't part of that but um it's a good question it's just um that being that it encompasses ages that exceed what would be in the middle school we would would not put it in the middle school but again i think it's a fair question to ensure that i think when we talk about the ar and the lists that are there they have changed significantly in the time since that ar was adopted and we do need to um get some better range around the current lists and the scope of all of them but being that has 18 at the top of the range that's what would prevent it from going into the middle school plus there are 10

115and 11 year olds in the middle school and in addition dr darien's correct there are 10 or 11 year olds in the middle school that will be outside of that range any other questions or comments hearing none uh roll call ricky michelle bats yeah can you repeat the motion please censor images of the book genderqueer on pages 124 135 166 and 167 and 138 yes aldarian no aaron angle yes michael hess no cecilia holt no jason yes jeremiah light yes dennis ritter no randy birch no yeah mr president i will make the following motion that the board um affirm the report and recommendation of the review committee regarding genderqueer second so we have a motion in a second to affirm the findings of the committee um any uh questions or comments from the board yeah

116i think i just want to clarify that any image or any word in isolation um can mean almost anything but those images or or those words in context have a greater value so for example an image of somebody being murdered by itself might not hold any intrinsic value and can be considered offensive and horrid and is but in the context of a history book maybe during world war ii those images hold specific values because context matters so in this discussion i think context of the entire book matters here so not censoring out images in that book is important and it's important to have the book in its entirety available as per the committee's recommendation any other questions or comments regarding the motion uh hearing none roll call please aldarim yes aaron angle no michael yes

117cecilia hall yes jason cook no jeremiah light no dennis ritter yes michelle batts sorry i just go back over some of the content of the report quickly okay you based on one line in this report i'm going to say no randy birch yes the vote was five four motion carries next item is item a personnel it is the recommendation of the administration that the board of school directors approved the following personnel items in their listed items a1 through a9 do we have a motion moved motion second motion in a second any questions or comments regarding the personnel items hearing none roll call please aaron angle yes michael house present cecilia holt yes jason cook yes jeremiah light yes dennis ritter yes michelle batts yes valdarian yes randy birch yes motion carries next item is item

118b policy maintenance and uh we'll do these separately uh item b1 it is the recommendation of the policy and curriculum committee that the board of school directors approved the second reading in adoption of the following policies policy 103.1 non-discrimination qualified students with disabilities and policy 113.4 confidentiality of special education students do we have a motion critter moves motion a second second motion in a second any uh questions or comments regarding the policies and again this is for second reading 103.1 and 113.4 uh hearing none roll call please michael house yes cecilia holt yes jason cook yes jeremiah light yes dennis ritter yes michelle batts yes aldarian yes aaron angle yes randy burch yes motion carries b2 policy maintenance it is the recommendation of the policy and curriculum committee that the boer school directors approved the

119first reading of the following policies policy 916 volunteers and policy 236.1 threat assessment do we have a motion so moved second motion in a second any questions or comments uh regarding the policies for first reading 916 and 236.1 hearing none a roll call please cecilia hope yes jason yes jeremiah light yes dennis ritter yes michelle bats yes aldarian yes aaron angle yes michael house yes randy burch yes motion carries next item item c accelerated budget opt out resolution it is the recommendation of the administration that the board of school directors approved the accelerated budget opt out resolution for 2022 2023 per the attached do we have a motion i'll make the motion uh motion uh do we have a second second motion in a second any uh questions or comments regarding the uh opt out

120resolution hearing none roll paul please jason cox yes jeremiah light yes dennis ritter yes michelle batts yes al darian yes aaron angle yes michael house yes cecilia holt yes randy burch yes motion carries next item is the kutztown borough police mou it is the recommendation of the administration that the board of school directors approved the intergovernmental agreement with the kutztown borough police to enforce civil violations under title 75 pacs section 3345 0.1 regarding bus stop arm violations per the attached do we have a motion a motion in a second does anyone have any questions about uh entering into the agreement with the kutztown borough police to enforce civil violations for the uh the bus stop violations mr is it maya it's my understanding that this is similar in vain to the one that we have

121with the pennsylvania state police correct yes this is pretty much identical to the agreement we have with the pennsylvania state police to implement the stop arm camera program that would find violators for passing bus stop arms currently the target date for implementation is february 9th the cameras are being installed on stop arms currently and waiting for a few bureaucracy items that take place at the state level this will be in place early february with with the state police territory and this would make it in kutztown as well for our entire 99 square miles [Music] any other questions regarding the uh mou i'm curious reading through it just just to clarify is uh kutson area school district are we the ones um issuing the fines and collecting like it's not up to the kutztown police department

122it's the school district um well it's the the legislation is specifically drafted that i mean obviously the police have to um issue the fines and they use the imagery from the cameras it's uploaded through a system in penndot to then generate a violation that the kutztown police would issue but then the money for the fine is directed through the school district and there's a portion that goes to the company bus patrol for running the system and if there's a certain number of violations depending upon a variety of factors we could we could share the we have previously shared the worksheet then there is the potential that a small amount of money could go to the district but that's only after it pays for the full monthly fee of all the cameras that go through but

123at no time is there a cost to the school district so it is the police issuing the fine but the legislation was drafted specifically that they had to be in partnership with the school district and again the part of the legislation is that it took this um it removed the criminal offense to it so by finding violators instead of taking away their license for six months the belief you know is that that would actually make it more effective because um there was some hesitancy within the court system to steep such a huge um hardship on drivers you know in comparison to some other things that they see that go before court so with some the legislation was crafted specifically for this purpose thank you any other questions or comments uh hearing none roll paul ricky

124jeremiah light yes dennis ritter yes michelle bats yes al darian yes aaron angle yes michael hass yes cecilia holt yes jason cut yes randy birch yes motion carries next item item e support staff compensation it is the recommendation of the administration that the board of school directors approved targeted support staff salary increases effective january 19 per the attached do we have a motion ritter moves second motion in a second any uh questions or comments regarding the support staff compensation a hearing on roll call please dennis ritter yes michelle bats yes al darian yes aaron angle yes michael hess yes cecilia holt yes jason cuck yes jeremiah light yes randy birch yes motion carries next item item f pennsylvania k-12 covid test to state program it is the recommendation of the administration that the board of

125school directors approved participation in the pennsylvania department of health concentric test to stay program to provide free optional covid 19 antigen tests for kutztown area school district families when a student or staff member is determined to be a close contact or a positive covit 19 case or so demonstrating cloven 19 symptoms families will have the option to access testing um do we have a motion [Music] motion do we have a second second and again this would be with uh parental consent family consent yes any other questions or comments uh regarding the state stay the state program is this just for uh students and staff and faculty that are in close contact or it would be either a close con somebody identified as a close contact or a student who had symptoms had seen a nurse

126had symptoms and you know right now they would send them home to their family and say you know we recommend you take tests if we have the option for a test they would say they would send them home to their family and say if you would like to get a test free of cost from the district they'll be this time and this time you can take them there to do it um you know it is a uh our intention is to set up a little testing location out at the max autonomy administration building so families would still bring their child up there to to do it so if the program works the way it's supposed to the state is supposed to provide us with um staffing to administer the tests a little skeptical just based

127on staffing requirements you know so we have with the state we requested two time frames um a monday monday wednesday time frame and a tuesday friday time frame that they would provide that staffing if they did not then we'd have to set up a mechanism for our one of our nursing staff or our substitute nurses to do it and our nurses are in favor of this you know with the challenges now things may change again because i don't know the link became active today where people can request their free home tests from the federal government um i was notified that this afternoon it's there's a link where you can request your free home test from the federal government and with some changes to the way testing is paid for you know maybe access to testing

128will become better in the coming weeks but over the past few weeks um access to testing was challenging either you were going for a pcr test which your insurance would cover and you might wait two or three days for a response for a return on that and with a five-day quarantine that five days may have expired by the time you get the pcr back so many families were opting for a um antigen test or a rapid test so with the lack of availability in stores the other option was to go to some type of medical facility but the insurance was not covering those and it could cost the family 80 dollars per test so in dealing with all those scenarios with our families the nurses were recommending that we participate in the free state program

129um and provide that option to families when the situation rises is there a cost to the district for this the only cost of the district would be if the state does not provide staffing then the time of our staff would be but that's the only cost to us we're kind of duplicating what's now currently available through the state and through the area hospitals as well too because my wife works at the hospital they just announced through you know the government that go here jerry knowles just put out a thing in his correspondence that contact his office and they will tell you exactly where to go for the exact same free test i'm just kind of thinking you know if there's a like possibility of not enough staffing and then we got to cover that we

130are is our medical staff going to be able to do these tests we believe yes i mean that was that was the hesitancy early on um and exactly we describe as part of the problem you know we talked about should we be seeking this you know back i don't know if it was october or november and there was hesitancy on our staff's part because what time would be invested in it and at that time testing was available you know then as we saw testing a lack of testing availability that's when our nursing staff said hey we need we really should be offering this because there was some other neighboring districts that were and providing that service to their families and getting results back faster well we had to fill out some paperwork then there's a

131timeline i got to get it approved by the board one that amount of time now some you know some other place some other mechanisms have stepped up to provide testing so there is a chance that it's not all that necessary by the time you know that we're really up and running in implementation but there's also a chance that that bounces back and now there's no testing and we need have families need that access so we've in some of these instances with kovan you're stuck two weeks ahead and sometimes you're stuck two weeks behind but by approving it we'll have the availability to do it in case that situation rises again so what would the staff that the state gives us would they be like just at certain times in the building then yeah so what

132we requested and i i should pull up the form but there was a three hour window on mondays and wednesdays and then a three hour window on tuesdays and fridays and the tuesday friday was two to five um the monday wednesday i believe was say ten to one somewhere in that time frame so they were just two different times that we'd be able to provide that so there's no thursday time there wasn't i don't know why that wasn't one there was no option for thursday i have no idea why again they have provided some staffing to other local districts some districts opted out of the staffing piece it's just been you know it's for us it's really just about as we transition to this next phase of managing kova just having the options and flexibility

133will be a benefit to us and our families i have one one question in the test to stay program through the doh's website uh i noticed that currently we are students that are close contacts not but they would available in the way we would implement it yes yes and then also we sent somebody home for cold centers and they choose to take the district testing and it comes back they're going to be they test negative we're going to it gives us the ability to be more responsive to those symptoms then yes it gives us something so in the end if this program works correctly we're going to lower the amount of missed days due to quarantine and asymptomatic kids that's absolutely the goal yes is there a time commitment say you know we enter into

134this and then they can't provide staffing we're repeatedly having our nurses cover and that cost is is there i mean is that something that we can we're willing to absorb or is there like we would be i mean we can end it at any time this is it's completely up to us whether we administered or not um and we could end at any time but it's also a really you know wise use for covid money as well for the you know i serve money is that that's what it's there for so you can make sure that you can provide what you need to keep school running as normal as possible under these conditions okay yeah i didn't know what the contract specified and it was my understanding in the information we received that this was

135brought to us by our nursing staff that they felt we should enter into this or what did you mean by that no yeah dr lee was saying sort of it's been an ongoing conversation and in the recent weeks they have they are in favor of it for sure um okay and it's been i mean probably i brought it initially back right late fall but but they have signed on to it and thought it would be a good thing absolutely yes i just for those who were concerned about overloading them they have already apparently factored that in they think it's worthwhile there's a load of time and effort and mental capacity to communicate with a family about when they're getting a test when they're getting the result like there's a there's a load capacity to managing

136any of it that just getting faster results moves that load off of the nurses faster quicker okay is there any way to put a mechanism in here that if the state fails to give us the proper level of staffing that we can say enough and we're done we're out of it rather than just voting on this blindly um i mean i we can we can stop it at any time as a district so a mechanism from the board level would be you know just a you know uh report at each board meeting or in advance of each board meeting of what staffings looked like and what that capacity has been i mean that's that's a that's really an internal measure we can stop administering the tests as a district at any time there's no commitment

137that way i just don't want to see the costs fire on control you know and then we're like what's going on here we'll watch those i mean we it's um what we have learned is that time time and money spent in our nursing offices is time well time and money well spent and keeping kids healthy in school are these uh rapid tests that are administered like in-house and then the results are displayed like within the 15-minute time window and then the tests are then disposed of properly that's correct any other questions a hearing none roll call regarding the test to stay program michelle batts yes aldarian yes aaron angle aaron yes michael hess yes cecilia hope yes jason cut yes jeremiah light yes dennis ritter yes randy burch yes motion carries next item item g

138kutztown area high school course study is the recommendation of the policy and curriculum committee that the board of school directors approved the kutztown area high school course study for the 2022-2023 school year per the attacks do we have a motion before any emotion is made just a question is it we're talking about that's the study catalog right correct that was shown to us okay ought that to be clarified a bit in this with with the use of the word catalog or i i think i i understood what it meant uh dr ritter i'm not sure but okay yeah they typically and you know they're somewhat used interchangeable inappropriately i guess there is a catalog of courses that are approved and then there's the course of study that gets handed to students that they will be

139selecting from for the following year they're largely the same um but when we use it to build that scheduling device document for the students we call the course okay thank you so again we're looking for a motion i will i will make that motion then right away second motion in a second any uh questions or comments regarding the approval of the quits down area high school course of study for 2022-2023 school year a hearing none roll call please aldarian yes aaron angle yes michael hess yes cecilia holt yes jason cut yes jeremiah light yes dennis ritter yes michelle batts yes randy burch yes motion carries next item item h job descriptions it is the recommendation of the administration that the board of school directors approve updated uh job descriptions per the attached do we have

140a motion a second second motion in a second any uh questions or comments regarding the job descriptions uh hearing none roll call please aaron angle yes michael hess yes cecilia holt yes jason cuck yes jeremiah white yes dennis ritter yes michelle batts yes aldarian yes randy birch yes motion carries next item item i uh is it's donations uh we actually have two items listed here unless anyone has a strong objection i would suggest that we just do the two together so we have uh two donations it is the recommendation of the administration that the board of school directors accept with gratitude the donations from life touch national school studios in the amount of 150 dollars and 506.67 to the greenwich leonardsville elementary school to be used for school activities programs and field trips and number

141two it is the recommendation of the administration that the board of school directors accept with gratitude the donation of two thousand dollars from gary smith ka hs alumni class of 1974 to the kutztown area high school for use towards travel for educational purposes for junior and senior students mr smith will continue to donate one thousand dollars on a yearly basis uh do we have a motion a motion in a second any uh questions or comments regarding the donations i i would just thank mr smith for his generous donation and his ongoing donations we will be we're are we good at sending those letters out in a timely fashion to thank individuals such as this i believe so okay and uh also thank you to uh life touch and to both our uh donors here uh

142for their uh generous gifts any other questions or comments regarding donations uh hearing none roll paul please michael hass yes cecilia holt yes jason cook yes jeremiah light yes dennis ritter yes michelle batts yes al darian yes aaron angle yes randy birch yes motion carries uh next item item j introduction of new business by board members uh does anybody uh with the board have uh any new business to bring yes um i'm not sure i mean i i know i voted in favor of um the committee's recommendation regarding uh the graphic novel um but i do hear what our community is saying and that i do believe there is some sense in which the supreme court has upheld um community standards and my hope would be that we maybe take this opportunity to look for

143future selection book selections and and i i don't i have no particular solution but that we put together perhaps a larger review committee or some such that might look at what books are brought in and that we look at you know what will our community tolerate to some extent certainly can become part of that but that we have some community participation in the overall selection of books so that we don't get to the point where we have a book and we get into this book banning kind of issue so i i don't know what the solution is but i'm just thinking it's a it's a matter that deserves some attention for us to look at as a board and and whether that's looking at the policies the uh well i mean as a regulations that

144are around those policies the administrative regulations the ars or whatever so that we we maybe can't factor in in a better way so we don't get to this kind of controversial time all of the time or more often a sense of community participation and uh involvement in in what is an important process [Music] as i shared the you know one of the recommendations in the committee was to review that selection process ar because one it's out of date but also um you know it did leave you know some wanting for more details of what once you're directed to look back in an ar to say if something meets the criteria obviously you're looking for greater details to do so um you know so we have every intention of again not every ar comes before the

145board but certain ones certainly need to and you know this is one that we would be bringing before the board um in the coming months so noted that that would be a part of you know your recommendation for that process we'll bring it to the policy committee first any other new business by board members hearing none next item is public comment on non-agenda items only one person was signed up and it looks like robin underwood is left so no one else had signed up uh yes yes please come up and state your name oh um so i have a question about the calendar um that you proposed and you know it's been like several years like you do the same thing why don't you give us a spring break [Music] it's like i mean a

146couple years you did like there was and then you know maybe there was a snow day taken out or whatever but i don't i'm just you know principals and everybody encourages the kids to not miss school but you know a lot of people want to take a week-long vacation so then you have to you know miss school that spring break is you know it's a challenging topic because again everybody's family needs are are different some years ago we used to have yeah that whole week in theory was off and then we would have snow days on the monday tuesday wednesday and i think even thursday typically and then on average we used we did you know we reviewed our data we actually there was a survey at that time and we had on average over

147the previous 10 years used six snow days to the point where those days over the easter holiday would cut into that to the point where almost every one of those years depending on where easter fell and the snow fell etc the only day off was friday days off for friday and monday so it was less of a break and the thought at that time was to because there was a desire for somewhat more of a break was to build in a guaranteed thursday off and not put the snow days there that was sort of the compromise between we heard from families and what we put in practice um you know and it's like anything else it's that there are families who desire to have that time off but there's probably just as many families that

148it's an inconvenience because of work schedules that they don't get that time off you know so it's always that tough one of like you can ask again i think i could ask 100 people about the calendar and maybe 50 of them would say i don't care just give us a calendar but the other 50 would be split 25 25 on different topics that they care about i mean like even if people don't take a vacation like the kids you know can use that break too but um honestly my bigger concern looking at the calendar was should there be a day somewhere in march because you just look at those the march is that long month next year you know that's where i look at because i do think those break days but we typically have

149some snow in march as well to give us an unexpected break and then i mean like i just think it's a little when when is going to be enough like our projected for last day of school is like in may like i'm just like if we you know had a couple more days off for spring break then who cares if we you know go a little longer into june but i know some people disagree with me but it's not even warm yet so anyway um and then i had another question about the snow days um are you always is it always gonna be the first four snow days are snow days and then virtual that's what i'm recommending because again it gives us some opportunity to give families and teachers time to prepare if they

150need to you know by setting what the date is um i wish that i could wake up every day that it snows and say this is going to be a good day for kids out in the snow and then pick that one as a snow day but it just doesn't work out that way so by setting it because sometimes we actually have to have off like two days in a row because like the way the snow falls and then the second day could be virtual or something we could but then does everybody have what they need it it's really just there's all those it's always going to be an issue it's always going to be an issue but if we it's where with a planned four days when we have the third snowed after the

151third snow day i could say hey remember we you know on that fifth day it's going to be a virtual day and then when we have the fourth day we as a part of it say in reminder that next day is going to be a virtual day and now we've given all those opportunities for everyone to plan there's no perfect answer all your questions are the same ones we ask ourselves it's just that's where i've kind of landed as much and then sometimes it's like icy and the kids don't even get to play in it you know so it's like they could be in school but okay anyway and uh with that uh moving on to our informational uh items uh just uh anyone online uh doc meyers now moving on to our informational items

152uh there was the student enrollment summary december 2021 the uh condensed board summary report the cafeteria fund report and student activity reports for the high school in middle school upcoming meetings we have february 7th is the workshop school board meeting at 7 30 p.m at the middle school and by zoom we have the february 14th policy curriculum committee meeting that is at 6 00 pm at the middle school and by zoom also on february 14th we have the facilities extracurricular committee meeting beginning at 7 00 pm at the middle school and by zoom and uh with that i would be looking for a motion to adjourn mr burch we didn't hear from the student representative at all thank you uh jeremiah you're right my apologies cooper with all the items under the uh reports yours

153got bumped somehow there so i'm all good i think uh just the one one thing that i heard some feedback about was people are happy that some of the things i talked about in december the soap dispensers and stuff have been addressed and so people have been happy about that thank you for sharing and we should as uh i mean you addressed it perfectly i think in one of our previous meetings that you know we anybody could disagree on things but following the rules in school is a good thing and holding high expectations for each other in the restrooms is a part of that so thank you for being a leader in that regard thank you for that reminder mr light thank you cooper um and with that i would be looking for a motion

154to adjourn come on second sec all in favor say aye aye take care everyone stay safe