[8:03] okay hold sarah i have to do an introduction [8:09] okay [8:14] uh good evening tonight is september 14th and we do have a quorum so i will call this meeting to order [8:20] due to the current federal and state emergency declarations and guidance about limiting person to person to [8:25] contact due to covet 19 due to the covet 19 pandemic [8:30] this meeting of the edina public school district school board has been conducted online in accordance with minnesota statutes 13 [8:38] d to meetings by telephone or other electronic means [8:44] members of the public may monitor this meeting remotely through the district's youtube channel [8:49] school board members are reminded to mute their microphone or phone when they are not speaking school board members wishing to speak [8:55] should unmute their microphone so i can see who is waiting to speak and then wait to be recognized i will [9:01] determine the order in which board members wishing to speak will be recognized i also want to let our community and [9:07] public know that we are continuing to work on making our meetings more accessible [9:12] and we are considering ways to safely resume in-person board meetings we face two major challenges with [9:18] resuming in-person board meetings we must manage the number of individuals who can safely attend board meetings [9:25] based on social distancing requirements and second we are limited in the physical spaces [9:31] that can be used for in-person meetings due to construction projects and the fact that the edina school board room [9:38] is being remodeled because of the social distancing requirements in the governor's orders [9:44] the board would have to significantly limit the number of people who could attend board meetings and the most [9:49] in most of the available spaces which would somewhat defeat the purpose of trying to get back to in-person meetings with [9:55] public attendance we want the public to know that we explored several spaces in the district [10:00] that would be available for in-person board meetings including auditoriums and classrooms [10:06] in each case either cleaning protocols could not be completed there is not enough room for socially [10:11] distance attendance by more than a few members of the public or a significant amount of financial [10:17] investment in technology would have would have been required to hold an in-person meeting in that space [10:23] [Music] also more rooms have been occupied this year to safely social distance [10:29] students and buildings during the school day some community spaces have now become classrooms [10:35] despite these challenges we would like to start opening up meetings testimony or presentations with limited [10:42] availability for members of the public to attend meetings the board meeting will be conducted in [10:48] the district office conference room on the third floor of the community center [10:54] this meeting will also be conducted using the google meets platform and will be streamed on the edina public [11:00] schools youtube channel some board members will be present in the district office conference room [11:06] and others will be remote we will follow all health and safety protocols for all school board meetings this means [11:14] any individuals who attend board meetings in person must remain at least six feet apart and [11:20] wear faith covering as required in the governor's executive order those not following these protocols will [11:26] be asked to leave to safely social distance the district office conference room has the capacity [11:33] to allow only one individual at a time into the room to report or to address the school board there [11:39] will also be public seating for only 10 members in the collaborative workspace outside the district office [11:45] conference room where they can wait their turn to address the school board the youtube stream will also be [11:51] available in this space public comment will be taken at the beginning of the meeting [11:57] one person will enter the district office speak the speaker will be invited to sit at [12:03] the table in front of the board and be given three minutes to speak cleaning protocol [12:08] after each speaker at the table and computer will be completed by the superintendent [12:13] individuals who do not wish to address the board remotely will still have the will still have the [12:19] option to submit their statements ahead of time i'm sorry individuals who do not wish to [12:24] address the board in person will still have the option to submit their statements ahead of time and have them read at the board meeting [12:31] we are encouraging individuals to still listen to the meeting on the youtube at home [12:36] this helps us manage limitations we have on room capacity the board will continue to read all [12:41] emails sent to the board for the meeting the public is asked to go to the website to send an email [12:47] by noon on the day of the board meeting to school board editaschools.org add to the subject line [12:55] board meeting comment please provide what you want to read in the body of the email [13:00] if you have any questions about our board meetings please contact the superintendent's office [13:06] and that is it for our new protocol um so the first order of business tonight [13:12] is our agenda approval do i have a motion to approve the agenda for tonight's [13:18] um meeting so moved second [13:25] uh we will now vote to approve tonight's agenda allenberg [13:32] hi fox hi green hi jones [13:39] hi michelson hi shaw hi well in treatment hi the board agenda [13:48] has been approved um john will you please review tonight's agenda for us quickly [13:57] turn my mic on so tonight we have uh excellence in action robotics [14:02] we do have some hearings hearing from members of our public a presentation on [14:08] just the first day of schools the consent agenda under discussion [14:14] we're going to talk about the renewal of the technology levy we have uh policies 407 408 we're going to have action [14:22] on a proposed property tax levy for pay 2021 [14:28] approval of end-of-year fund transfers for fiscal 1920. uh we have the purchase of [14:34] chromebooks and purchase of interactive classroom panels the approval of the superintendent goals and board goals [14:41] some rapid policy review of 401 for 405 and then policy review 601 [14:48] and then in information there's some information uh the advanced placement test summary [14:54] report is available to the public and to the board great thank you superintendent schultz so the first [14:59] or the next thing on our agenda is our excellence in action portion of the agenda and tonight we're highlighting [15:05] our green machine um robotics team and we have sarah swann [15:10] here who is um at our high school to talk about um what the robotics team [15:17] has been up to and how they have um some of the things that they've been working on um through on this strange time that [15:24] we've been in right now so thank you for coming tonight sarah and i will turn it over to you um to [15:30] um update us on what the robotics team has been up to and sarah this is superintendent schultz i'll drive your uh your [15:36] your powerpoint or your slides just tell me when to advance okay thank you so this is team 1816's [15:44] day of stem annual update for the dinah school board i am sarah swan i am currently a senior [15:49] in high school and i'm also one of the build leads next slide please [16:00] we'll start off what is first well versus an international organization that runs k-12 robotics programs [16:06] there's about 660 plus thousand students involved worldwide there it helps [16:11] many young people discover and develop a passion for stem and there's about 80 million dollars in college scholarships [16:17] available for first program participants [16:23] so a little bit about our team we were founded in 2006 and we are now the longest sustaining first team in [16:29] minnesota we are also the only team in minnesota that have been inducted into their first hall of fame this year we attended duluth regional [16:36] and we were we won the tournament we were the number one seed and we had an undefeated playoff [16:42] so we've been fast backed by our team a hundred percent of our team members graduate high school eighty-nine percent pursued that major [16:49] college 85 pursue some careers and we've graduated 49 women 76 have pursued some careers i'm [16:56] actually going to be one hopefully will be one of the women who graduate next year robotics has heavily influenced me and [17:02] especially where i've been going my career uh before i joined roblox i played hockey i mean i still do [17:08] but all i could all i really thought about then was talking i wasn't really thinking about anything stem and then i joined i joined [17:14] robotics and i found i really loved stem i had stem and i had passion for engineering and so now i'm actually applying to be a [17:22] mechanical engineering major in college so that's how robotics has influenced me next slide please [17:27] [Music] so this picture on the slide actually um [17:34] actually shows our team retreat in which we uh bring our rookies and different team members to [17:40] which we and where we instill both our mission and our core values and so our mission is to build bold confident leaders who transform culture [17:47] to promote value and celebrate them and our core values our respect trust trust inclusivity commitment and joy of [17:53] life next slide please [18:01] so in 2019 we won the world champions award uh this award is the most prestigious [18:08] award that is given out by first every year is awarded two teams for demonstrating outstanding work and stem [18:14] outreach you know it allows us to gain international recognition and respect and we also get [18:20] our qualifications for the world championship which is renewed and meaning we get to go back to the championship each year [18:27] next slide please [Music] [18:34] so of course our team doesn't the robotics team doesn't only just build robots uh students each year students spend [18:40] about 2 000 plus hours mentoring and working with other first teams in our district so we have events all across the state [18:46] this includes priests uh preseason training summer leadership camps uh events of people serving people [18:53] 70 plus other unique average events annually before coven and we do a lot of advocacy advocacy as [18:59] well one instance is we helped organize murrah in minneapolis and mura is a practice field and so it's one of the sites that has a [19:06] competition field which is purchased for estate money and so like in hockey you need to rent your practice [19:12] so robotics you know many of these teams would not normally don't have the access or resources to have a to get a practice [19:19] field and allowing having access to a practice field allows them to significantly improve their performance [19:25] so it's super helpful to each and every one of the teams that can access it next slide please [19:35] so a bit of a recent activity during combine 19 we've uh worked with different robotics teams to [19:41] produce many faith fields both for uh medical workers for eps teachers and inside 1816 we've [19:48] done different knowledge chairs and also we did a summer uh design challenge where we had different members working cad we've done plenty of [19:55] outreach uh in australia india and also texas and then we also did a ptc on shape [20:01] trial and so ppc is a bronzer and they also publish onshane [20:06] and what ontop is it's an online cad program and so we did time a trial of it on [20:12] where we did user testing and gave us suggestions for improvements and so this onship trials or this onship [20:18] program is actually going to be using either public schools in the future for the pltw classes [20:23] next slide please [Music] [20:29] so thank you so much for the continued support and giving us the ability to to use the facility so we can [20:36] continue to run this successful program for the students are there any questions [20:43] i have a quick question and well first of all thank you for coming and i love the first program and robotics [20:50] it's such an outstanding program for what you do not only in the robotics but [20:56] i know you do a ton of outreach so i really appreciate that um have you guys [21:01] been told if you're going to be able to compete at all this year or how that will work i was just [21:06] wondering um well actually we're um i think they're organizing it [21:12] a bit now but so it's we have a maybe a possibility of doing maybe some live events or also [21:18] where they might be uh just a lot shorter than other events but at the time we're not totally sure about [21:24] how that's gonna work i think it's still uh being figured out a lot so okay all [21:30] right thank you so i have a couple of questions i don't know if you have been with the [21:36] organization i think from prior to the construction in other words we did some remodel at the high [21:41] school expanded the state did you get to see the old space versus the new and what's the comparison like [21:47] um i actually so my first year was the year we had the remodel so i was a ninth [21:53] grader the first time they had they brought hand graders in but so we actually uh use both of the [21:58] stops we use both the upper shock and the lower shock the lower stop is where the uh the new construction was [22:05] and so it's that's super useful to us because uh that we were able to put our router there and that and with the router and with [22:12] the space we have um we're able to produce so making different things for a robot that we previously were not able to [22:19] so it's it's definitely helped us the remodel great exciting program [22:27] sarah can you talk a little bit about um how you got started in robotics did you [22:34] start with first lego league were you an ftc can you talk a little bit about the other programs within edina yeah so we [22:41] actually have there um are i think there used to be four different programs uh but now they're condensing down to [22:47] three so we have first lego league uh first tech challenge and first robotics [22:53] competition which is why i'm in currently so i started with uh ftc my [22:59] [Music] so that was my brother did before me and [23:05] so i kind of did ftc for two years and i wasn't super duper into it um the robots were a bit smaller [23:11] but it's still it's super cool to see all the new different things but when i got to frc i that was [23:19] where it just like clicked for me and that's where i really kind of found my passion the robots are bigger there's just all this [23:25] so much more stuff you know our team has so many different aspects about it and we kind of run it like a small [23:30] business uh we have we have the three different sub teams build uh business [23:36] and csp and so um i'm on build and business as well and [23:43] it's just the divisions of the team and being able to do so much more and so much being into it so uh so much is just [23:50] really great and also i just i love that first has um the different uh pipelines towards the [23:58] frc because when you're younger you know there's not much that you can do to get into get into robotics but [24:05] first lego league kind of combines a really really popular toy and then [24:11] also kind of a start to the robotics that you know you know and so it definitely in an ftc it [24:17] provides a bigger robot or a bigger robot from then it's more complicated and it kind of ramps up all the frc and [24:24] it's just a great way to get uh kids into stem i know so many people who've done robots who are super it was very much [24:31] impacted and like me i'm i never would have thought that i'd be interested in engineering [24:37] you know and something that never really occurred to me and then robins just really showed me that that how much i loved it [24:44] and how entertaining and just amazing it can be so that's like i found that that's something i really [24:50] love and now i'm gonna be going to college for it so thank you good luck thank you [25:00] [Music] any other questions or comments from board members [25:09] well thank you very much for coming and presenting sarah and good luck with your senior year and with [25:16] any robotic competitions that you are able to do this year i certainly hope that you're able to compete [25:24] this year in some way so i know how exciting those competitions are so i wish you luck and i'm sure the rest of [25:30] the board does as well so thank you very much for coming tonight thank you thank you [25:40] okay next on our agenda are hearings from members of the public and we do have some emails that are [25:45] going to be read tonight and we have business director john tope who will read um the emails that we [25:51] have um that members of the public have submitted to us thank you chair ellenberg the first [25:58] letter is from heather teats she writes thank you for your service during this [26:03] extraordinary time it is appreciated i am writing today to ask that the board put in place [26:09] weekly communications to parents and the community of both the number of students and staff [26:15] diagnosed with covid at each school and the number of students and staff under quarantine at each school as a [26:23] parent of a student in the high school i received the email notification this week that a high school student had [26:28] been diagnosed and close contacts asked to quarantine the email also [26:33] stated that the school board would not be sending out notification every time a student or staff was [26:39] diagnosed i completely understand the administration not wanting to send out constant notifications [26:45] however i do believe it is in the community's best interest to be kept informed of the number of students [26:51] and staff testing positive and the number of students under quarantine for each school [26:57] then if the administration determines changes need to be made to instructional models based upon case [27:03] slash quarantine counts it will not be a surprise to the community this communication would only be numbers [27:10] of positive diagnoses and quarantine per school it would not include personal information [27:17] in this as in most things transparency will help keep the community in alignment with the schools during this [27:22] time of constant change and adjustment thank you for your consideration of a timely implementation of this type of [27:29] communication yours heather keith's parent of edina 7th and 10th graders the next one [27:37] [Music] is from tony succio he writes dear [27:42] school board members and superintendent schultz i am the parent of two students at edina high school [27:48] both of my children are currently participating in the hybrid model last week we received the notification [27:55] that there had been a coveted 19 case involving a student on the ehs campus [28:00] the notification indicated that people who had been in close and prolonged contact [28:05] had been contacted individually and the rest of the ehs community had not been exposed to any greater risk than they [28:12] would have been out in the general community although unhappy to hear a covet 19 case had popped up so soon i [28:20] was grateful to be notified and to hear how ehs had responded to the case [28:25] while i appreciated the notice i was dismayed to read that going forward ehs protocol quote does not include [28:32] notifying all families and students each time a case of covet is identified close quote [28:38] considering the unique nature of covet 19 highly contagious asymptomatic carriers potentially severe [28:44] health consequences i think any and all confirmed cases at ehs weren't notifying the entire ehs [28:51] community parents and students should have this information so they can make informed [28:56] responsible decisions regarding continued participation in the hybrid model i ask the board to [29:03] make it part of the district policy that families be notified each time there is a confirmed covet 19 case [29:09] among staff or students at their student school thank you tony succhio [29:15] the last one is from rick avilist [29:24] he writes jeff and school um jeff in school board i'm writing to you as a concerned parent [29:29] of a child in special education in eps i should say jeff jorgensen is our special ed director [29:35] i am alarmed at the lack of planning for the students that are the most vulnerable these are students that already have [29:42] learning disabilities and the lack of in-person engagement with qualified instruct instructors is detrimental to their [29:49] long-term advancement these students have been out of school six months and many did not qualify for [29:55] summer services starting the twenty twenty one school year with only two days a week instruction is not enough to begin to [30:02] make up for lost time frankly i am surprised that the school district only started at two days [30:08] a week if the kindergarteners can go four days a week then why not special education students [30:14] in speaking with other parents many are seeing negative impacts including regression and behaviors and skills [30:21] special education parents across the country are experiencing similar issues and share the same concerns [30:27] this has been well documented in the news there's an article about families of children with [30:32] special needs pursuing in several states here's why article he references [30:38] i would like to understand the eps plan to increase the frequency of in-person instruction for special education [30:44] students we are reaching a point that compensatory services will be required if eps cannot fulfill their role looking [30:52] forward to understanding next steps thank you rick avilas [30:58] thank you director tope i appreciate you reading those for us and just to reiterate for the rest of [31:03] the community um you're welcome to provide um emails to us um for any agenda items [31:09] um via email and then as i referenced before we do have limited space if you want to [31:15] come on to our next regular board meeting um and speak in [31:20] person to us um we're now going to move on to a presentation [31:26] a school year um the 2020 2021 school year um before [31:33] administrators get started with the agenda item i just wanted to set board expectations that this [31:39] is not intended as an evaluative update for learning models but since today is [31:45] the first day of school we just thought it would be nice to get our site level administrators here and to let us know how the first day of [31:51] school went um from a process and evaluation standpoint um at our work session next tuesday as a [31:57] board we'll be discussing a framework for how we should evaluate the 2020 2021 learning models [32:05] and what our communications expectations should be on the go forward basis [32:13] with that being said i will turn it over to um superintendent schultz um to lead us in this presentation [32:20] thanks erica so it is the first day of school so uh we assembled uh leaders to together [32:26] today to just share some anecdotes uh walking through the schools the last couple weeks [32:33] it's uh it's it's much more calm in the hallways for a person who taught with a lot of [32:40] play it was a little i'd like a little bit more noise so but uh [32:45] nonetheless it was a great start the staff i commend everybody who has [32:51] put in the hours of planning the thoughts the expertise the time to [32:57] launch uh this school year and of course the school year does look very different than other school years so [33:03] i'm going to have uh dr smiles will facilitate this this portion just to call people [33:10] out to share where they're at so turn over to you randy thank you good evening chair allenberg [33:19] superintendent schultz board members community members and staff i do have a [33:25] lawnmower right outside my window so if it gets a little noisy i will [33:32] try to adjust here we have a number of [33:38] district staff members here this evening to share a bit of updates from their [33:44] site or from the program that they manage and i'll start off by saying that there [33:49] was a lot of hard work for many months to prepare for the launch of these two models that we [33:56] have and as of today we were able to launch fully our hybrid and our edina virtual academy [34:05] pathways that the virtual academy looks a little different at the elementary level than at the secondary level [34:12] we have all of our students in the hybrid that have now come in for are coming in this week two days per [34:18] week we started that a little bit more slowly last week and then next week we'll be adding [34:23] kindergarten for four days for the week choices from the families [34:29] have been solidified now at least for this first semester or or when at some point the model changes or [34:36] if it changes right now in eva we had about 2050 [34:41] uh students that selected the eva pathway with about 900 of those being in elementary [34:46] at the um in terms of the hybrid about 6300 students had selected the hybrid [34:52] k-12 about 23 percent of the students in elementary selected eva and about 26 [35:00] and a half percent for middle school selected eva and about 25 for the high school we're pretty [35:07] balanced across genders in both eva and hybrid we're slightly higher in [35:12] eva for students receiving special ed services or gifting talented services [35:17] we're significantly higher at eva for students receiving ml services or multilingual services [35:24] we have about 51 percent students of color in eva and we're slightly lower in free and reduced price meals [35:31] in eva but we're going to dig into that data a little bit more at our september i think it's the 22nd [35:39] board work session we'll kind of dig into some of our data regarding the models and how we're going to monitor learning [35:46] moving forward as erica mentioned one of the quotes i've heard probably five or six times from teachers and [35:52] visiting the sites is i feel like a brand new teacher and there's good and bad with that we [35:59] know that this is a very very heavy lift for our teachers we're asking a lot of our teachers [36:05] we're asking a lot of our administrators and our building and site level leaders and we sincerely [36:11] want to say thank you and thank you for all of your hard work and preparing for this launch and preparing for our kids [36:18] our kids need our teachers and our kids need our site leaders and they need our [36:23] principals and we have the best here in edina and so we're so appreciative of all the hard [36:29] work that has gone into launching these two models this year [36:35] um what we're going to do is we're going to take a look at the tiles from the family dashboard and i'll just ask that [36:43] for each of those tiles maybe we can do a brief update or a couple of words to share [36:48] from teaching learning from operations and then we'll do a site report out from each of the [36:53] levels starting with the early learning center so in a moment uh maybe mary whitey can talk a little [37:00] bit about the dashboard jody d st hubert will talk a little bit about [37:05] what's happening with learning if eric hamilton is here tonight maybe a little bit on safe learning spaces [37:12] and any highlights that you want to share mary hyman a couple words about our covid monitoring [37:18] david white about transportation any highlights thus far last week or this week dan hutchinson a [37:25] couple elements about nutrition steve buettner about tech jeff jorgensen if you have a few words [37:30] to say only a few jeff about mental health and wellness and troy stein a little update on [37:37] athletics and activities so with that i'll turn it over to uh mary woidy [37:42] to talk a little bit about the dashboard that we have built as the hub of information that we're um [37:49] sharing with our families about these two models so mary thank you randy good evening everybody [37:55] um yes i'll just give you kind of a quick overview of some of the information about the dashboard and then [38:00] just a couple of other communications things that we've done over the past month just leading up to [38:06] the back to school time so we started building the dashboard in early august i think the [38:12] first tiles that we opened were the learning models and the safe learning spaces and now we're up to [38:19] 13 tiles four of which are specific to the academic programs and include [38:25] schedules and calendars and and links to other information so a lot of these [38:30] tiles kind of tie together and back and forth so um as of today the kind of the peak [38:39] view of the family dashboard has had 22 664 views [38:46] so to put that in perspective i looked back at last year at the same time frame when we [38:52] were promoting the back to school web page of course we didn't have a dashboard last year but [38:57] we had the back to school handbook page and that had um the high point was 8292. [39:06] so folks i feel are really finding the dashboard useful and they're going there multiple times and of course every time [39:12] we've opened a new tile we've promoted it in various ways on website banners [39:18] and newsletters and the principles have really helped us to promoting it in their newsletters and [39:24] their letters to staff so um and we'll continue to build it we'll continue to update [39:31] so just another um uh other couple of quick things on september 1st we um sent out the [39:38] e newsletter safety edition so it was the buzz and in the know that families are used to getting [39:43] but it was during an in-between week and the focus of it was really those four pillars of mitigation social [39:49] distancing masking washing hands and screening and um we really very quickly had a 60 [39:57] open rate it went out to 10 800 families or emails and uh 60 [40:04] open rate um just tells me that they really were interested in the topic and [40:10] so that was well received as well and then last week we had the virtual um q a on september [40:17] 10th we received questions from about 16 families but all total there were about [40:24] 40 questions and during the live stream of it we had at the high point there were about 65 [40:31] people watching the elementary live stream and about 45 were watching the the [40:37] second live stream that was geared towards sec secondary um school and secondary [40:42] academics but since then on youtube we've we recorded it and posted on youtube [40:48] elementary has now had 373 views and secondary has had 257. so [40:55] i think folks are still finding that to be a useful thing and we'll promote that in this week's newsletter too so if anybody missed it [41:01] or didn't know where to find it we can link to that so then this week um and last week [41:07] actually we were out to the sites and taking pictures of the schools of what orientation looked like [41:13] um this week we're getting pictures of what those kind of first days look like i know tomorrow we're going to get over to the high school and see the choir [41:21] practicing outside and we will be putting together one of our eps in focus [41:27] photo blogs that will include with the e-newsletter that goes out on thursday [41:33] so everybody will be able to see at least a few pictures of the fun stuff that the principals are going to talk [41:39] about next thank you so much mary you're welcome um [41:47] jody anything you want to add around the learning models [Music] [41:52] thank you randy and thank you chair ellenberg and community members um the only the pieces that i'll just [41:57] highlight um when you go to the website and go to the family dashboard about learning models you'll see descriptions [42:04] of all of the different models at all of the different levels in addition to the descriptions you'll [42:09] see some learning descriptors some general schedules and some calendars [42:15] and some technology etiquette and resources for families and students to engage in learning [42:20] and i do want to reiterate as we work through our instructional commitments and helping with teaching and learning [42:27] what dr smazel said about our teachers and our admins and all of our staff how incredibly hard everyone is working [42:34] and we are working as a district team to be as responsive and supportive to our students [42:39] and our staff as they enter each different model and make sure that we're maintaining a [42:45] commitment to excellence as we do that so that that is all there's a lot on the [42:50] family dashboard page with the learning models and continued information i encourage everyone to continue to look there for [42:57] additional updates thank you jody i don't know if we have eric hamilton here tonight [43:04] but if you are eric do you want to say a few words about our learning spaces hi randy yep i am here if you can hear [43:10] me um we had a incredibly long summer this year and uh [43:17] um it's amazing because the even the grounds crew was excited to have kids [43:22] back in the building they were they just said we're ready for kids to be in our building so it's kind of fun to hear that side of it we had a good start [43:30] of the school year ecc was able to get a fire drill in within five minutes of school starting [43:36] which wasn't planned but it worked well we placed hand sanitizer [43:43] at every single teacher's desk we put up barriers we put up a [43:51] [Music] hand sanitizing stations at the entrances um good solid start to the school year we [43:58] still are working through a few issues um but very positive start and i'm looking [44:05] forward to the rest of the school year thank you eric mary hyman if you are [44:11] here this evening any updates around our covet monitoring [44:17] hi everyone um yes related to covid monitoring we um [44:23] we've certainly started out with the bang especially with um sending students home [44:30] who have symptoms of covid minor or lesser common symptoms based on [44:36] the minnesota department of health exclusion guidelines um so we're going to continue to work [44:42] with the buildings on that and so what that means is the health staff working with the administrative [44:47] staff and then branching out to the teaching staff and everyone that might have been [44:53] a possible close contact or anyone that needs to be [44:58] monitored for symptoms and that also includes out on the school buses so our you know when things like this come [45:04] up it definitely involves all aspects of everyone in the buildings um so regarding the uh [45:11] communications uh we'll work together to make sure you know we get the community the information they're looking for [45:18] um yet you know still while being confidential of student and staff [45:23] and not making any information identifiable so we'll continue to work on that with the monitoring [45:30] and um you know the most important thing is monitoring is just keeping up with what [45:35] we're expected to report related to the minnesota department of health so that's um that certainly impacts a lot [45:42] of people so we'll continue to work on that thank you so much mary uh david if [45:48] you're here a brief update around transportation yes uh good evening [45:54] cherylenberg school board staff members and community members so i'll give you a quick update on transportation [46:00] i'll tell you it's great to see the buses running again let's say it's been a long summer [46:06] it was great i was out at highlands uh normandale oil g and valley view this afternoon watching [46:11] the buses a very smooth startup on our end [46:16] kids are getting to and from school we are monitoring our load counts and we've had some calls of [46:23] parents asking if they could join back in transportation they may be opted out over the summer [46:29] so we're watching our numbers and we're going to contact those parents next week and see if we have room [46:35] if we can get a few more students back on the buses otherwise like i say everything's going [46:40] great thank you david uh dan hutchinson a couple words about nutrition services [46:49] uh yes thank you doctor um good evening chairman allenberg superintendent schultz uh [46:55] principals and fellow staff first day of uh food service at the district um [47:02] certainly a smaller percentage only fed uh about 22 percent of what we normally do [47:08] with the cold lunches uh we did 219 breakfasts and 522 lunches [47:13] uh those lunches are normally what we do at the high school alone um so we need to say as soon as we [47:20] can get back to doing hot food uh students do like you know the hot food um we will start up a la carte items at [47:27] secondary level starting this coming monday roll it out slowly have a small little menu for [47:32] additional items for for the students generally the feedback from the managers [47:38] today uh with the uh program that we're running at the elementary levels things went [47:45] uh pretty smooth with the deliveries a few kinks here and there uh nothing that we can't iron out [47:51] throughout the coming days but all in all things went well a little [47:57] word just on the deliveries for the distant learning last [48:02] week on wednesday we just had curbside pickup we did uh uh to our surprise uh feed about 30 [48:11] students we had 30 uh uh families come uh well not quite 30 families but enough [48:18] to feed 30 students went out this wednesday with david's team we plan on rolling out [48:25] the deliveries which was pretty much going to be the same thing that we did this summer on mondays but we'll do it on wednesday [48:32] with the dinner meals from um the ed fun and uh give-and-go uh so dinners will go out [48:38] and uh meals will go out we started a new google doc uh for families to sign up and [48:45] currently we are at 54 families and 107 students uh [48:52] so it's very positive we ended the summer at about 125 students that we were feeding so [48:58] certainly uh i think that number will grow uh throughout the uh throughout the fall uh that's about it [49:08] thank you dan um how about a technology update for mr buettner [49:13] good evening dr smazel dr schultz chair hullenberg and fellow board [49:18] members um we had a we too in dmts we're happy to see the kids back [49:24] uh it's always a great time of the year to actually see the technology that we put so much effort in [49:30] to being used by students this year we worked diligently to get the technology in the [49:36] hands of the students and we've been doing a number of projects of distribution at the building levels [49:42] and also working as well to do that and uh now what we're finding is is that [49:48] we're helping to repair that the challenge for dmts is that instead of having nine buildings [49:54] now we have uh countless uh homes that we're also supporting so we are taking telephone calls and [50:00] email support from parents uh that call volume went up significantly the last couple of [50:05] weeks and today we had over 151 phone calls and 210 tickets [50:12] open so we're working through those uh but everybody it's great to talk to people it's great to problem solve with [50:18] families on the technology some of the efforts that we've been doing to try to mitigate [50:24] uh challenges with technology uses by the parents is last week we did offer [50:29] a number of sessions of assisting your child in a hybrid or distance learning model and we had [50:35] over 500 uh families sign up for those virtual sessions and the feedback was [50:42] all positive looking at the numbers we had over um 66 were a 9 or 10 and we had no [50:50] comment that was under a 6 out of ten so it was pretty well received like the q a [50:57] sessions those sessions are on our youtube channel and so i'm sure we have a number of people watching [51:02] those and we will be working with our cultural liaisons and our middle schools and high schools to offer [51:09] more of them in the upcoming weeks that's all from technology [51:14] thank you steve uh mr jorgensen you are up next for mental health and wellness [51:19] uh thank you dr schmazel superintendent schultz chair ellenberg and esteem board members [51:24] it's a great pleasure to be with you all tonight uh it's in terms of mental health we've done a great deal of [51:30] ramp up over the course of the summer and our preschool in-service with training for our staff for some [51:36] caregiver training especially for our teachers around the development of self-care plans and also maintaining our great service [51:43] of continuum in terms of mental health services being available to students that may be struggling coming in [51:49] what we have found already though is that they're in the return of students that we've seen in in person is is that students are taking [51:57] care of some of those mental health issues by coming back with a sense of joy being able to connect with one another [52:03] again it's also been a great panacea for many of our staff as we get past that anticipation and [52:08] planning and we get into direct service to students which definitely lends itself to increasing those positive endorphins [52:15] that are taking place between our ears and so i think we're off to a good start our continuum and services in place for [52:21] those that continue to struggle and uh and we're gonna we're gonna do good work this year [52:27] so thank you jeff uh and mr stein with the update around some [52:33] athletics and activities going on in the district thank you dr schmazel and good evening [52:39] everybody we've had a successful start to our fall sports season specifically and it's hard [52:45] to believe we are entering our fifth week of um practices and competitions related [52:51] to tennis and cross country swim and dive and soccer and we've had a nice start due to [52:57] some really nice protocols put forth by mdh and mde along with the minnesota state high school league but also more [53:03] importantly the support of our community to continue to [53:08] work together to keep our our kids safe and our program safe and running so it's it's been it's [53:15] been nice we continue to expand our streaming opportunities for our programs uh any any program that is [53:23] um uh not allowing spectators in so for example example girl swim and dive we [53:28] are doing some live streaming and looking to expand that and that's been a nice addition we uh we [53:35] should know more about winter sports and the opportunities in front of us at a minnesota state high school league [53:41] board meeting on october 1 and we continue to look at our activities and club offerings and [53:48] those specifically we're working hard for any any activity or club that is teacher-led [53:54] to provide some opportunities both either in person or virtually and we have gone with our student-led [54:01] clubs to be fully virtual uh this year so you had a great uh student and athletes [54:08] and also involved in activities and sarah to open up the meeting and that was outstanding to hear her passion as she [54:15] has uh both success in sports but also in in first robotics so that's my quick [54:23] update thanks so much for your time thank you troy um i just want to say there's been so much creativity and [54:30] problem solving and collaboration with all of these operational leaders [54:35] and that's really something to be celebrated as we've launched into the fall obviously the complexity of all the [54:42] things that are happening behind the scenes are getting surfaced here in just a few minutes and [54:48] it's really amazing amazing work and so thank you for sharing and thank you for all of your hard work [54:53] uh this summer in preparing for our launch in terms of safety protocols and [55:00] reminders of course we you know mary continues to talk about with all of us the importance of masking [55:07] them portions of social distancing the importance of hand washing and we'll continue to remind students [55:13] about those and you'll see photos modeling that you'll see posters modeling that you'll see signage in the [55:19] buildings of how to move or where to move or where to place yourself etc as we continue to [55:25] reinforce that throughout the district so at this time we're going to move through each of our [55:31] sites and we'll just get a little update from early learning and we have leah bird [55:36] here this evening and then um lisa masika and paul domer will speak a little bit about elementary and some [55:43] things happen in their buildings uh last week and and today and then we have tim anderson [55:48] uh speaking from southview middle school to cover the middle schools and then andy beaton we'll wrap it up with the [55:55] high school update so just a few of the highlights so far this year so leah you want to start us off [56:00] thanks dr smazel good evening chair woman alan berg superintendent schultz [56:05] school board members colleagues and uh the community out there thanks so much for the opportunity to share with you today [56:11] was our first day of school at the early learning center and as many of you know [56:17] some kids come to school five days um a week some come four days three days two days so we're going to have a first day [56:23] of school for a whole week straight which should be pretty fun today was exciting lots of very happy [56:30] kids to be back at school and happy parents as well to be bringing their little ones to us [56:36] um working hard on all of our safety protocols social distancing making sure that we're [56:43] washing hands um wearing our masks all that kind of stuff so it was a really good um first [56:49] day like everybody else said there's a few things that we kind of have to tweak or work out but for the most part a pretty [56:55] successful day today thanks thank you leah [57:00] we'll move on to a little bit of update from lisa and paul around elementary [57:07] good evening everyone i'm chair ellenberg in the school board along with community members [57:13] i wanted to just kind of go through some highlights of what was being what has been going on in the elementary buildings we had last week of course our [57:20] orientation week and i've heard numerous times from both staff and families about how [57:26] helpful the time was to sit with teachers to talk about concerns and hopes they have for this [57:32] year the teachers felt very prepared to receive students today [57:37] some of our staff did assessments with students to see kind of where were the students that they were receiving into their classrooms where [57:43] were they at and what has happened since march until now and so that was a really helpful [57:48] piece for teachers and students to get them started a rival and dismissal today went [57:54] smoother than i think it's ever gone on the first day of school um very orderly um obviously we had [58:01] about half as many students um i think this is my 11th year being an administrator and i had [58:07] no um big emotions from any single student coming into school today so [58:13] um which says a lot about you know uh our current times and how kids are [58:18] feeling people were really excited to be back families were excited to be back to walk their kids to school or to drop them off [58:24] in a car um and things went very smoothly um on that end um from grade level perspectives i'm [58:31] just going to share a few little tidbits from different grade levels like i said typically it's our [58:36] kindergarteners who have a hard time transitioning to their first day of school and i had no big emotions from anyone so that was [58:42] they were all very excited to come into the class today i heard from a first grade eva teacher [58:47] that every single one of our students was able to log on and they were able to mute their mics [58:53] remember these are kindergartners from last year coming in for their first time to be able to do a google meet together [58:59] they were submitting work on seesaw and she was so impressed with their ability to connect today through their eva teacher [59:06] um i had second grade teams talking about how excited kids were to be back [59:12] at school and making comments even when they were in the building and submitting work through seesaw saying [59:17] things like yahoo the first day of school and that they just love to be back third [59:24] grade i heard from teachers just that they were able to sit outside and do some learning out there and [59:31] really be able to connect because of the size of the classrooms as they come back really felt like they were able to give [59:37] students some personal attention um we're so appreciative of the extra time to prepare [59:43] for students coming back into the building um fourth graders talked a lot about they [59:48] um participated in music and pe today at cornelia and we're just excited to be back um uh [59:54] face-to-face with their their uh specialists um and then we had fifth grade patrol [1:00:00] who was out um doing patrol today and also um it's a big tradition at cornelia to [1:00:05] have our um student leadership team help um have kindergarteners find their ways to their [1:00:11] classrooms and so they were able to do all those typical first day of school type activities so [1:00:17] overall a really great day um teachers felt very good about having students back in the building and felt like [1:00:23] everything really felt like a big success today thanks good evening everyone i will just [1:00:30] add a little bit lisa did a wonderful job um i i would say the theme again [1:00:36] agreeing that today the theme was happy um i also saw teachers like literally [1:00:42] cheering they had their hands up and said yes i just love this um you could just see that it was just [1:00:48] healthy for everybody the kids were happy to be there the teachers were good it's exactly what we needed we needed to dive in [1:00:54] and and get started so um it was great to have 50 of kindergartners i think this first [1:01:00] week that i know our kindergarten teachers said that was much easier to help them learn [1:01:06] new routines as they went through everything surprisingly kids did really well with their masks i think that was people's [1:01:12] biggest worry um but the kids were very quiet i think equine dr schultz's [1:01:17] uh comment about his visit that it was i think kids are trained really well at home so [1:01:23] everybody out there he did a great job the kids followed everything perfectly they stayed on the dots [1:01:29] wherever they had to go hand washing went well so people are being really flexible and going with it [1:01:34] so i know a couple other colleagues had some kind of neat unique things they wanted to share [1:01:41] uh countryside the kids were greeted with bubble machines and fun music so that would be kind of a neat way to [1:01:46] start their day uh highlands i know did a lot of work uh having kids outside and it was a perfect day for that uh [1:01:53] chris of normandale had mentioned that the kids are already picking up french words and uh being a former immersion [1:01:59] principal myself it's amazing how quickly kids pick up language so i'm sure that was really fun to see [1:02:06] ptos in general i can't tell you how supportive they've been with all of us just providing just the welcoming signs [1:02:12] some provided meals or masks or shirts but we're just exceptionally [1:02:18] appreciative of the support of this community with our schools lunch and breakfast went really well [1:02:25] transportation was great everybody was really timely the drivers were super friendly with our [1:02:30] kids and making sure that they stayed safe and technology did cooperate [1:02:35] for the most part for us so that was great um but just in general it was just a warm feeling you could just see [1:02:41] and hear this just out loud laughter today by staff at lunch and we haven't heard that for a while so [1:02:47] that really sticks with me the most and and we know we have things to you know work toward we want to make sure that [1:02:54] that hybrid at home experience um improves over time and [1:03:00] so i think the theme for that will be iteration we're going to keep trying things and keep improving but [1:03:05] i don't think we could have asked for a better start thank you lisa and paul for that [1:03:12] fantastic update let's shift to middle schools with uh dr anderson [1:03:19] thank you dr sposel good evening everybody chair ellenberg superintendent uh board board members [1:03:25] and community folks tuning in i'll echo what lots of my colleagues said wonderful things [1:03:33] happening throughout our middle level buildings the last couple of weeks particularly [1:03:38] today with a full regular schedule uh you know in full swing today at the middle level [1:03:46] um you know i heard uh miss masika talk about how teachers were thankful [1:03:52] for the time to get ready uh you know an unprecedented set of challenges [1:03:58] so thankful to have a little bit of time to prepare and they've used that time [1:04:03] you know many many teachers um are trying new ways of doing all things new ways of [1:04:08] instruction while students and and are patient in class they're patient online [1:04:16] um you know staff are sharing that it feels like quite the juggling act uh to manage in-person and remote [1:04:23] learners it's a unique challenge at secondary that that we're taking on and that said [1:04:29] you know we've seen lots of evidence of students being resilient and flexible and patient as we've worked to navigate this thing [1:04:37] together an anecdote that i keep hearing over and over again is students already love reminding staff [1:04:44] when their device is muted and they love giving helpful tech tips to their instructors [1:04:51] and uh that's a repeated anecdote throughout all grades i'm sure not just at the [1:04:57] middle level um you know again some snapshot anecdotes today for example math was chiming in on [1:05:05] google meet and presenting slides and then having students go into different breakout rooms [1:05:11] and sharing different strategies to make that more successful you know i was in every remote teacher [1:05:18] space today they were doing well working to figure out any glitches and you know managing in some cases [1:05:27] you know this complex model sometimes has a teacher working with eva kids hybrid home kids [1:05:34] and kids in person on hybrid model and finding already some early success as [1:05:41] principal domer said you know we definitely have things that we want to iterate and improve [1:05:46] and uh i'm thankful for the feedback that we've gotten so far around that to help us do so [1:05:52] we're super thankful for the wonderful pto support as well uh ptos just stepping up in this [1:05:59] community and supplementing our supplies to give us that extra layer [1:06:04] of support has been uh phenomenal um just today in band i know that live streaming [1:06:11] uh was a new thing for them uh and google meet in some cases using both of those things [1:06:16] together google meet as you might appreciate is is designed to be a collaborative uh [1:06:22] experience and live streaming is not a collaborative experience and we're you know learning by doing when is it [1:06:28] appropriate for which type of um approach another snapshot of success i would say [1:06:35] at the middle level certainly is advisory advisory kids are sharing that already [1:06:41] that kids and teachers are able to demonstrate that care for each other in that space to help reduce anxiety [1:06:49] provide that um social emotional support both at the start and in some cases at the end of the day [1:06:55] in advisory to give kids a voice to help them be seen and these are some of those key [1:07:04] things we heard in the springs that would be important to build into our model creating spaces where kids have voice [1:07:10] where they feel valued where they are visible [1:07:15] and where they have a chance to be known and get to know their peers to feel welcomed and to be connected [1:07:23] and i would say that's definitely a middle school success from both today and orientation week last week [1:07:30] here's just maybe two more things i'd offer that a math teacher sent me this today and i [1:07:36] think it's illustrative of many of our spaces at the middle level in math today we [1:07:42] tried using google breakout rooms to encourage learners to talk about math with each other [1:07:48] we believe that talking about the math helps students make meaning of the math and we don't [1:07:54] want to lose that this year there were a few glitches but generally students reported that it went really [1:07:59] well and we're going to keep building on that as we continue to do 20 minutes of breakout groups in each [1:08:05] class period students and families who are online today or in class all were extremely [1:08:11] gracious with each other and with me their teacher as we work to get this up [1:08:17] and running and i love that anecdote because it talks about what's been required [1:08:22] certainly from staff and to staff in inside the system and across the [1:08:28] system providing grace for each other and you know understanding [1:08:34] that this is a work in progress one last thing that i'd offer um and again i think it represents [1:08:41] uh uh all of our schools but it's an anecdote from southie today we've uh we've had an unprecedented [1:08:49] um uh effort in hiring staff to make sure we're well staffed and that [1:08:54] includes a late season of hiring paraprofessionals even maybe later than typical today i heard from a [1:09:02] retired college professor who agreed to join us just last week [1:09:08] and she writes on a complimentary note i find the school our schools [1:09:14] exceptionally warm laid back with eager staff willing to help with [1:09:19] friendliness the students are extremely well behaved respectful and they're ready to learn [1:09:25] the teachers have a natural open approach and are genuine classrooms [1:09:31] are beautifully organized decorated safe and clean immediately i felt welcomed [1:09:37] and recognized that any question i might have even finding rooms would be answered courteously [1:09:43] and in hindsight there's no doubt that accepting this position was correct and the right opportunity for me [1:09:48] i'm very happy coming to work and i think that that's pretty uh [1:09:53] indicative of our schools in general not just the one this person's highlighting that that's been my [1:10:00] experience and is consistently uh true across our system so those are [1:10:05] some snapchats from the middle level today again we want to iterate you know we're going to be getting better you can count [1:10:11] on that with the amazing staff that we've got and the amazingly supportive community [1:10:16] and that's what we endeavor to do but largely a really successful start [1:10:23] thank you tim for a excellent middle school update and coming around the home stretch we have [1:10:29] mr beaton giving us a few words about what's going on at the high school [1:10:34] evening everyone chair allenberg superintendent schultz members of the board thanks for the opportunity to visit with you tonight [1:10:41] uh just a few updates you know we think about those buckets that we have in order to be able to uh support kids with [1:10:48] instruction provide learning supports for them in need the operations of how we do school [1:10:55] it has been a very busy summer to get organized for all of this [1:11:01] but i can just say how pleased i am with the startup of school so thanks for the school board for your support to giving us time to be [1:11:08] able to ramp this up appropriately i think our teachers are feeling a little bit of deja vu [1:11:13] last week after the eighth time they introduced themselves in their course to a very small group of students [1:11:19] but i think it was time well spent time well spent for kids to be able to find their classrooms to feel comfortable [1:11:24] in the space to develop those relationships that they need with staff that was really the hardest [1:11:30] thing to do coming into a school year in a virtual format in the last year in distance learning we knew kids for almost a entire [1:11:36] school year before going into distance learning so that time was really well spent i can tell you that [1:11:42] this week and today felt a lot like school it was pretty exciting [1:11:48] to have half the students in the building at one time i can say um high school students [1:11:55] at edina are incredible they they followed the leads we asked them to [1:12:00] they were super respectful responsive we have not had any issues whatsoever [1:12:05] with getting kids to comply with our safety requests they are part of this and they really want to keep us open and [1:12:12] be there so super proud of them and um and also really thankful to our [1:12:17] our parents have also have been really supportive to us and hopefully just also sending the [1:12:23] message that um you know we're in a partnership to be able to keep this up and running [1:12:29] between home and school so i've i felt nothing but support from our parent community [1:12:34] as well to be able to make the right choices and not have any kid feel like staying home because you're sick is a [1:12:41] penalty in any way we can keep you up and running academically because it all keeps us up and running so [1:12:46] much appreciated to the community and it's been a really solid start thank you andy i would also like to add [1:12:55] we have extremely thoughtful and talented principals and site leaders [1:13:01] in edina and i thank you for being here tonight and providing that update and as andy mentioned a sincere thank [1:13:08] you to our families for your partnership both on the resource side but also on [1:13:13] the ways in which you're helping us take care of our staff and the ways in which you've obviously taken care of your children and prepared [1:13:20] them for a quality launch for the beginning of the year and we look forward to continuing to grow that partnership through the year [1:13:26] to continue our problem solving there's still lots of problems that we'll continue to solve but we feel like we've had a quality [1:13:33] launch and at this time i'll turn it back over to chair ellenberg to see if the board has [1:13:40] any questions either operationally or for our site leaders that we can answer [1:13:46] great thank you thank you um thank you randy i turn it back over to [1:13:52] the board and see what questions board members have or any comments that board members have [1:14:12] i know that there's been such an incredible amount of planning and that showed and tonight when you [1:14:18] guys are given your updates and so i just wanted to recognize that for a moment because in all planning um i know [1:14:26] people get anxious for information as all of us did in this in this moment and so i just wanted to say thank you [1:14:31] because um i know that we have we're all pushing each other to figure out what to do and [1:14:37] how to do this and um it was very clear tonight um i mean look at steve button are you [1:14:43] having a 500 family signed up for that course i mean that that what didn't happen overnight that was [1:14:49] thoughtful when planning so things like that is just really um reassuring as a parent and of course as a board member so i [1:14:55] just wanted to say thank you thank you julie [1:15:01] um yes jd well i'm gonna just jump in um so i [1:15:08] uh at the shaw household i had two hybrid learners and we had um a lot of um things that happened that [1:15:16] weren't according to plan and i just want to say that while it was a little stressful in the moment and felt like a [1:15:22] you know volcano was erupting i just want to give a huge thank you to steve's team at the help desk who can [1:15:28] help with technology and very responsive but also that the teachers had tons of patience with the kids and [1:15:34] had some alternate plans for us and some workarounds and stuff so i just want to [1:15:39] say that like julie said it's very apparent the planning that's gone into it um and that we know i'm sure there are [1:15:46] other families out there that had hiccups today and and i i want you to know that you weren't alone and that um [1:15:52] i feel my kids are still really anxious to start again tomorrow so that's a that's a good thing so thank you guys for all your hard work [1:16:02] thank you janie else is out there i can't see everyone [1:16:08] on my screen right now so i apologize so you might just have to butt in with your questions [1:16:15] yeah i'd like to ben you know we are having our first in-person meeting in half a year and it is just a [1:16:22] wonderful thing to have the warmth of human companionship to see people in three dimensions matt's [1:16:27] waving at me i mean it's just wonderful and i'm [1:16:33] really happy i mean here we all are all masked up but it's wonderful to hear the stories [1:16:39] of the site administrators uh coming back and telling us about the optimistic upbeat attitude that people [1:16:47] are enjoying seeing each other and um it's that's very encouraging very [1:16:53] heartening my two boys have come back and um have felt optimistic seeing their teachers in the [1:16:59] flesh seeing their friends um and i think that this is an absolutely uh fantastic way to start [1:17:08] very good news and uh we're everyone's pulling together and we're looking forward to hearing more [1:17:13] more about this so thank you for your presentations [1:17:18] thank you owen lenny or matt or ellen sorry i really [1:17:25] can't see anyone so yeah it's matt i am i mean i have the same feeling as everybody else i did [1:17:31] pick up and drop off today at concord and uh i wish we started giving kids mass three years ago [1:17:37] because i've never seen such good behavior my kids included like everybody found rules and walking [1:17:42] in line it's amazing so i i thought it was going to be a mess it was just incredibly well managed it [1:17:49] was easy to know where to pick up there is space for everybody so again it's just really clear that the [1:17:55] uh the planning had so thank you [Music] [1:18:04] if ellen or lenny want to talk feel free if not i'll ask my questions so [1:18:11] i actually had a couple of questions i'm not gonna be a downer but i do have two quick questions um well actually three [1:18:18] one i was wondering um steve this is for uh uh director buettner do you have [1:18:24] feel like you have enough staff to answer all the questions that you're getting from a [1:18:30] help desk perspective [Music] and i know that i think i asked this [1:18:36] last time when we shifted to distance learning in the spring and i just wanted to make sure [1:18:42] that you feel like you're adequately staffed [1:18:50] steve you're muted or he's super tired so it could be one of them thank you um [1:18:58] that'll be part of uh video conferencing bingo [1:19:03] um no i i think um the the champ every first day of school is when [1:19:08] technology shakes out that's when all of a sudden the best planning that we had would be put in place [1:19:14] all of a sudden a teacher goes to turn something on or a chromebook starts up and all of a sudden it doesn't work and so we do [1:19:21] we go from maybe 25 to 10 of our staff or our community using the [1:19:28] technology to 100 percent and we we find things break and we have break fix and so we have a big year [1:19:35] this year we've had additional challenges uh one is it is now we don't have 10 buildings we have [1:19:41] thousands of buildings and now we support all those different scenarios and the different permutations [1:19:47] and then the other issue is is that we are down technical support in the buildings this year we have had a number [1:19:53] of of staff that are working remotely and we've had some that have transitioned off and we're looking to bring more staff [1:20:00] members back on so we're back up to 100 percent i'd say this is that it's been a tough [1:20:05] year my staff has been incredible but it has been one of those years where it just feels like the first few days is [1:20:12] like there's no way you can get off the phone because it's just always ringing they do an incredible job of staying [1:20:19] positive being customer friendly understanding listening with empathy [1:20:25] and so we'll work at it i think so to answer your question is it's been [1:20:31] a few it's going to be tough the first few days here to say we have enough staff [1:20:36] but i believe that in the next week or so we are going to plateau out and i think we will be able to address the concerns and the [1:20:42] needs of them okay thank you thank you very much and thank you for everything that [1:20:48] your team is doing because i can only imagine how stressful it is to field all of [1:20:54] those calls constantly so hopefully everyone has been kind to our help desk [1:21:00] um and if you're calling in be very nice to them yeah and i'll just put a plug into our media [1:21:05] specialists as well our media specialists have been fantastic they always are fan and they are a great [1:21:11] resource in the buildings it's just when you have a hybrid or an eva now we have just [1:21:16] such a large population that's decentralized that makes the challenges of supporting technology that much more [1:21:21] difficult yes thank you thank you very much um i just wanted to make one other comment um which i know we're not [1:21:29] talking about it tonight but maybe um at some point i think it would behoove us to [1:21:35] um as a administrative team to think about um [1:21:42] what are those leading indicators that are going to tell us when do we feel we're prepared to [1:21:50] either bring more students in or when do we feel like we need to [1:21:55] pull back and i know that we have data from the state that's [1:22:02] going to tell us things but i also think that this is a i don't think that state data is the [1:22:10] only thing that is going to be driving that decision and so i just wanted to comment that i would like um [1:22:16] you guys to start thinking about as you're experiencing what you're experiencing in your schools [1:22:22] what is that telling you from your professional expertise like what are you seeing and what do you [1:22:28] think some of those indicators are that are going to tell you yeah our school is ready for this [1:22:34] or um we need to go in this direction and i i say that only listening to some [1:22:41] of our concerns about special education um i think we just need to be thinking [1:22:48] about and great i totally understand it's the first day of school so i i'm sure you're just like i just got [1:22:54] through the first day of school why are you telling me this right now but it is our board meeting so it's the only chance i get so [1:22:59] um i just wanted to make that comment so we can be looking for um towards the future and that being [1:23:05] said i did want to express my sincere thanks to every single one of you on the call and [1:23:12] all of our administrators and teachers and [1:23:17] staff members that aren't on that are not on the call um it's just [1:23:24] the work that has gone into delivering this for our students for our parents [1:23:32] it's just it's amazing and um i know there's going to be bumps [1:23:39] in the road i know that um like janie's family [1:23:45] experienced them my family has that doesn't mean that um you're not [1:23:52] producing an outstanding product for a community and so i wish i could personally thank every [1:23:58] single person that is working on this but i cannot um so i just wanted to [1:24:06] offer you my sincerest gratitude to um all of you guys um and um [1:24:14] that's all i have and i know that we have not heard from lenny or ellen so i just wanted to [1:24:19] extend to them to see if they had any questions or comments before we move on to our consent agenda [1:24:24] so i'll jump in here i do want to thank everybody for all the work that they've done in starting school so i want to note for [1:24:31] the people in the community the hardest model to start is the hybrid model [1:24:37] so it would have been a lot easier for us to go okay we're just going to do different learning it's it's much [1:24:43] simpler it's less expensive it would have been easier for us but it wouldn't be [1:24:49] consistent with what we're trying to accomplish so i think people need to understand that the hybrid delivering the hybrid [1:24:55] model is ridiculously complex and the secondary has even more issues i [1:25:00] think than the primary at times so i think the community needs to understand that and i want to [1:25:06] thank everybody for all the work that they've done on that at the same time i would echo what erica said which is [1:25:12] okay so once we get our feet under us what are the criteria that we can look at [1:25:18] for expanding for example the special ed or the elementary level no offense to [1:25:23] secondary but i am sort of a little more focused on the youngest kids [1:25:29] and what we can do to bring them bring more of them into school and also make sure that we have systems [1:25:36] in place to gauge not just whether we have implemented but whether the [1:25:42] implementation is successful in the sense that we're seeing the growth that we're hoping to see from our [1:25:48] kids and you know that's a lot to ask for given how much i've noticed how compact [1:25:53] but that's kind of where my mind is so thank you very much and i really appreciate it [1:26:00] thank you lenny i so don't see oh there you are sorry [1:26:07] ellen okay thank you um i want to thank all staff uh this is a very [1:26:13] good and informative presentation and i can appreciate all your work um i actually can keep this very short [1:26:21] because i completely agree with what lenny and erica just said about um the types of questions that i would [1:26:29] like answered at our next board meeting or for us to be discussing at our next board meeting [1:26:36] i think that that meeting is the is the meeting that at least i've [1:26:41] been told the board members are going to be asking more of those types of questions [1:26:47] and so i'm going to keep this short and acknowledge that this is [1:26:54] the first day of school and there's a whole lot of energy that goes toward making the first day of school [1:27:00] happen it sounded great from what i heard and so i'm going to keep that energy up and look forward to [1:27:08] our next meeting where we'll get more into the details thank you thank you ellen [1:27:16] and thank you um i just wanted to acknowledge really fast randy and john [1:27:21] that have been i'm leading the district in this i've had meetings with both of them on saturdays and sundays and and i know [1:27:29] i'm only meeting with percent of the time and also our i mean our principles have just been going above [1:27:37] and beyond um working crazy hours so um thank you so much to all of you guys [1:27:45] and all of our lead team um i can't say thank you anymore [1:27:50] so i will stop and i will move on to our consent agenda so thank you thank you thank you chair ellenberg and thank you [1:27:57] for your guidance in this is uh complicated but we're off to a great start and i [1:28:03] think as a result of that start whatever we pivot to will be will be done well [1:28:11] thank you very much thank you um so i'm going to move on to our consent agenda [1:28:16] um is there anything that anyone would like to remove from the consent agenda [1:28:23] um so do i have a motion to approve the consent agenda [1:28:28] second is there okay um we will now vote by roll call to approve the consent [1:28:34] agenda allenberg i fox [1:28:40] i greene hi johns hi michelson hi [1:28:47] hi well in treatment the consent agenda has been approved [1:28:54] um we're going to move on to our items up um and for our first two items up for [1:29:00] discussion um the first is the renewal of the technology levy and we discussed this briefly back i [1:29:07] believe in late june um but uh the director of media and technology um steve buettner is back here [1:29:14] to further discuss this issue with us and i just want to add that this is uh placed here outside the work [1:29:22] session because the work session was full so this is really uh board's discussion [1:29:27] about this this will probably this will come back once we get closer to [1:29:33] the decision that is needed to renew the technology levy or go out [1:29:38] for the referendum we would bring it back again for subsequent work session and then possible action [1:29:48] so steve do you want to kick this off sure again good evening uh chair [1:29:54] hollenberg board members dr schultz um it's a privilege to come and speak [1:30:00] before you again this evening to talk a little bit about the technology levy i'd like to provide [1:30:05] a little bit of background and then also talk a little bit about uh where we are with it and and some [1:30:11] potential thinking going forward and again as dr schultz mentioned this is just the start of a [1:30:16] discussion this is not the end of a discussion and additional discussions not only with [1:30:22] this board but uh leadership in the school system and also our community going forward [1:30:27] um it's been a number of years and so i thought we'd go back in time a little bit [1:30:32] to understand uh what we have kind of done with the technology in this technology [1:30:38] level with a little bit of comparison of then and now and so uh when we started [1:30:44] before the technology levy uh the maximum speed on our network was 100 megabits and now it's [1:30:50] two gigs in and out for the internet and we consistently use that in a day uh we had only 3 400 devices [1:30:58] and that was quite a few now we have 11 000 devices that the district owns [1:31:03] and we have close to another 6 000 devices that come on our network on any given day so we [1:31:09] have quite a few devices that are on our network our wireless infrastructure went from 110 devices [1:31:16] to 520 devices in order to accommodate that wireless and it has been a huge [1:31:21] monumental shift from everything being plugged into the wall to anywhere anytime [1:31:26] learning via wireless technology i remember coming here and we had five physical servers now we have 117 virtual [1:31:33] servers we had five terabytes of storage 20 terabytes of of server storage [1:31:41] and our our file storage for documents was one terabyte we have 21 terabytes a lot [1:31:48] of that is in the google cloud system and so we've leveraged our cloud-based systems like google [1:31:53] and microsoft offices onedrive that fits 23 million files that we have in our [1:32:00] google file storage i don't know how many we had that back in 2011 but i'm sure it wasn't that many [1:32:05] our learning platform was at the time edline and moodle and now we have schoology and seesaw and that's [1:32:12] e through 12 and we indeed we use it actually for adult education as well and just the amount of information that [1:32:19] we have to move between systems we want we had five third-party systems now we have over 35 so we're constantly [1:32:26] needing to move user information be concerned about the data privacy and be concerned about the security of [1:32:32] that data information so it's it's gotten much more complex [1:32:38] some of those highlights is from 2010 or 2011 the ipad really didn't exist [1:32:44] back then um the district adopted google apps for education and we talked about the 23 [1:32:50] million documents that we have in that chromebooks weren't just introduced at the time windows 8 was the [1:32:56] operating system for the district now we're at windows 10. um there was instagram was just smart [1:33:04] started and snapchat didn't even exist when our last levy referendum came out we've gone [1:33:09] through three learning management systems we started at headline we went to moodle and now we're at schoology and seesaw [1:33:16] we have a brand new student information system where we did convert student information systems and [1:33:21] that's one of those things that you d you hardly ever do we did it we rolled out a new hr [1:33:27] a business and finance system uh to support our hr and our finance department [1:33:33] uh our hvac or the way we control the temperature in all of our buildings and our climate has been completely [1:33:40] automated now and runs on our network and we've uh thanks for part of the levy facilities rev levy [1:33:47] we upgraded our security system so as you see we've done quite a bit uh in those 10 years [1:33:56] however the current reality is that the current technology levy does expire at the end of the 2021-2022 [1:34:04] school year uh it is at uh 6.5 million dollars a year [1:34:09] and as i mentioned it really is pervasive in what we do um technology touches every portion of [1:34:18] our work and not only does it touch our finance system [1:34:23] and touch our hr system but most importantly it touches our instruction make sure [1:34:29] that our teachers can be incredibly efficient and productive through the use of technology tools but [1:34:36] also that our students can demonstrate mastery and understand and be able to leverage all kinds of content that they [1:34:42] normally may not would been able to access from technology [1:34:49] if you look at our current spending on technology you'll see that our staffing and professional development is a large [1:34:54] portion of our technology levy which is fine that means that those staff and that training is used to help [1:35:02] support maintain and leverage the technology tools that are happening in the school [1:35:07] system uh so that is ensuring that we have enough folks to be able to support the [1:35:14] technology but most importantly that the folk there's a number of staff that actually use the technology [1:35:21] our hardware is the next biggest portion in our software and it goes through that [1:35:32] and like i said it's not done and so as we think about um the technology at the end of this [1:35:38] technology we must think about the future and the future is truly to continue that [1:35:43] excellence that uh duels has put in through the investment in technology and leveraging [1:35:50] technology where it's appropriate in mitigating the negative aspects of the technology [1:35:55] we like to say using that to a technology when it's the best tool and supporting our investment by maintaining [1:36:01] and replacing our current technology if we don't replace our technology [1:36:06] in a few years it will become obsolete and we will have increased problems with it [1:36:12] and again that technology encompasses staff software hardware network and [1:36:18] increasingly curricular materials and so when we talk about a technology levy we're not just talking about the things [1:36:24] that it purchases but how do we support how do our end users use that technology the software the maintenance agreements [1:36:31] that we need to do in order to make sure that the technology supported the network that all of our technology [1:36:37] runs on is all facets of the technology levy that we can't lose sight of [1:36:47] if you look at our technology level compared to our neighbors you'll see that we are right in the middle of the [1:36:53] road between our our neighbors uh hopkins being the most in st louis is being underneath us i do know [1:36:59] that minnetonka most likely is also undertaking uh investigating a technology renewal as [1:37:05] well that uh we'll we'll continue to maintain right in the middle of uh these school [1:37:13] districts in technology living and asking our community to support technology through a levy [1:37:21] here's where uh we're seeing uh increasingly big demand for our uh our funds in the [1:37:29] technology levy funds 10 years ago we would purchase textbooks [1:37:34] and those textbooks would last for a number of years and we'd put those in classrooms and every year the new students would [1:37:41] come in and we'd check out those textbooks to the students and that's what they'd use they bring it to school every day and [1:37:48] if it got damaged we'd buy a few every year and then we we would track them at the end of the year and get them [1:37:53] brought back and then recycle those and we still are doing that but technology our textbooks isn't [1:38:00] only our textbooks our text it's increasingly digital content [1:38:06] it's access to those textbooks in a digital format so that we can load them into our learning management systems [1:38:12] such as schoology and seesaw so that like this year when we're in a coveted pandemic and half of our po [1:38:18] student population are at home at any given time they have access to a digital version of that content [1:38:24] or if they're at school they have version of that content as well it's things like having rich multimedia [1:38:31] resources that are connected to those textbooks so uh seek understanding of the [1:38:38] information that's being taught in different ways they can watch rich videos they can do assess the [1:38:43] assessments leverage 3d manipulatives where they can actually spin things down [1:38:49] in a browser and look at hearts and look at physics and atoms in different ways [1:38:55] and so we're seeing a big need for the transformation of the textbooks as [1:39:01] well and starting to think of those not as just analog books but analog and [1:39:06] digital content that would mean increasing the tech levy [1:39:12] closer to a seven million dollars in order to address that gap that we have in order to purchase [1:39:18] textbooks and digital textbooks so that we can continue to support that transformation [1:39:24] again that does not mean that we would stop purchasing textbooks or analog versions of the [1:39:29] textbooks it would be a this and that and so we would have the analog textbooks but [1:39:34] also we would have the rich multimedia resources and the digital content unfortunately [1:39:41] the digital content isn't a one-time purchase but rather a subscription service hence the additional ask for money in [1:39:48] the capital levy if you looked at that spending here would be a [1:39:54] spending and so that you would see under curricular resources that would go up and so we'd have that [1:40:00] money in that technology and information system support would still um which is staffing would still remain [1:40:07] roughly the same our hardware would go up a little bit and we would move the money around [1:40:16] here's the numbers broken down again so that you can see those numbers in a grid [1:40:25] and if it was to go to seven million dollars a year and again i'm not suggesting that that's what we're we're agreeing to tonight but that's a [1:40:32] spot to start our conversation that would be roughly a half a million dollar increase on the [1:40:38] uh levy which would mean um this is the uh estimated tax increase for [1:40:45] homes so at a three hundred thousand dollar home it would be 12 additional dollars a year for a 600 [1:40:52] 000 home it would be 26 a year and for a 900 000 home it would be 42 [1:40:59] dollars a year so again it's not a large increase we're really trying to be good stewards of [1:41:05] that investment the community has but there would be an additional cost [1:41:11] uh if we were to um approve eventually a levy at the 7 million [1:41:20] some key dates that we want to take into affect is is that if we were to go out for renewal we have [1:41:26] a number of times that we could do that the first option would be february 9th [1:41:31] of 2021 or next year if we did that we'd want to need we'd need to get started [1:41:37] right away on getting ready for that we'd have to have discussions about that like we're [1:41:42] having this evening in the board discussion we would need to adopt a resolution if we were going to do that and we would [1:41:48] then need to make sure that between that time and february 9th that we would be [1:41:53] communicating to our community the why behind additional technology levy and what that is purchasing it in the [1:42:00] impact another option would be to do it in may [1:42:06] again if you looked if you backwards mapped it would be uh we would do the referendum planning [1:42:12] in the fall would be a january board discussion february 8th would be the last day to be [1:42:17] able to adopt a resolution to go out with a technology levy an election day would be may 11th i just [1:42:23] want to point out that both on on the february and the may date [1:42:28] if we would be the only ballot question then associated cost for the [1:42:36] election is falls on the school district 100 percent [1:42:43] the third next year from november and so again we put these those dates in [1:42:50] those as well and that would be more in line with when other elections happen [1:42:55] and other referendum happen [1:43:01] and i'll i'll stop here and answer any questions that you may have [1:43:13] steve what is he um do you know what the actual cost is to run um you said for an election that isn't [1:43:21] that this would be the only thing on the ballot uh i'm working with our director of [1:43:26] finance john tope to try to find that out and so we've made inquiries but we don't know exact amount [1:43:31] yet okay thank you and that's not to say there wouldn't be something else on that [1:43:37] on those ballots but if it is we would incur the cost okay yeah yeah no i had this one [1:43:45] question and then on top of that i was just curious if we have data available on this turnout like [1:43:52] what is the turnout force i was kind of calling it a singleton election what is the turnout for a [1:43:58] single term election in the past compared to um in when it comes through kind of in [1:44:04] the general election um and here right so um it's just interesting to look at that to [1:44:11] see what the what our what edina turns out i mean we obviously always have high voter turnout in our city but that would [1:44:18] be something i think that we should look at when we're talking about the options i think that would be important data [1:44:23] to consider um and then i have a question steve you had said that um [1:44:30] when you're talking about the includes of digital content in textbooks um [1:44:37] you feel like that's more of an industry thing that's happening right that's not [1:44:43] it's not it's not just edina saying okay we're gonna add all this extra stuff in i mean it's kind of the [1:44:49] way the industry is moving in terms of getting up-to-date um um [1:44:56] content for students is that correct is that fair yeah yeah absolutely and so um [1:45:03] you know the the textbooks are are are fantastic but um they fall out of date in very [1:45:10] quickly and so textbook manufacturers what they've done is they've gone to digital content because one they can ch [1:45:16] when content's changed or when they've made a mistake because they do find mistakes and textbooks and things [1:45:22] like that that content can be updated and it also provides just a number of additional ancillary products [1:45:30] we can use so again one of the most incredible things is my volunteer well i used to volunteer [1:45:38] uh this year i don't know with covid but i used to volunteer at southview and i used to work with the students [1:45:44] on math and it was incredible to be able to have the textbook there but when we were [1:45:51] stuck on a concept to be to be able to bring up the electronic version of that [1:45:56] and it would help us decode the step by step in solving mathematical equations [1:46:02] but also allow us to give us a different look or different approach and so maybe the textbook talked about one [1:46:08] approach to doing a mathematical equation but they might have a different one or use different examples and so it's [1:46:14] just that way to be able to approach concepts that are learning our [1:46:20] knowledge or those important standards from different points of view from different modalities from different [1:46:27] multimedia that just adds a value add unfortunately those are generally in a subscription [1:46:34] format meaning that you pay every year for how many students are accessing those [1:46:39] those tools and so they have costs associated with them on an annual basis as opposed to a [1:46:45] perpetual one that you find in the textbook no that makes sense i mean it sounded [1:46:50] like when you were explaining it it it's it's moving from a want to a need [1:46:55] for as um [1:47:00] absolutely progressing in just the way the way things work in education so i just wanted to call that out and then i have [1:47:07] one other question i wanted to ask so um in terms of how covid [1:47:13] and what we've had to do with technology um in the last six months [1:47:19] um i i think a lot about um privacy and security and i know that's always been [1:47:24] at the forefront of our work right so does this levy account for that like with the [1:47:31] additional like you had said like you know we've got people we're not generalized anymore you know we've got people in homes [1:47:37] i just didn't know is is there any impact to the levy um the technology levy that is coveted [1:47:43] related and more specifically security related because of that i don't know if that [1:47:49] makes that question's clear yeah that's a that's a great question and um at this point what i've [1:47:55] we've we've taken uh security on in our department for everyone's role [1:48:00] and so all the way from the director's position i work very closely with donna roper who's the director of [1:48:06] research to ensure data privacy and data security you'll see that we have [1:48:12] what 37 additional systems that we have to be careful on but we kind of just take that on as our work [1:48:21] to make that work and so it is more difficult as we bring on more systems [1:48:26] what we try to do is work uh smarter and so we leverage data standards [1:48:34] like the ims global standard and like we use a data standard data privacy [1:48:40] framework that came out of minnesota and the state of california [1:48:45] to try to make sure that we are holding the vendors accountable [1:48:51] for data privacy so what i would say is is that bundled into that support [1:48:59] for systems is that additional privacy and data security practices [1:49:06] that we need to continue to work on okay that's super helpful um okay i would say [1:49:13] out of the gate if you look at the options i think option a is out that's just my own opinion i think the timing is way way [1:49:20] too tight to try and launch anything before the presidential election would be just not a smart use of resources we're [1:49:27] fighting through a lot of noise to to do that so thank you [1:49:32] yeah julie just that's a great segue which i was just going to ask steve is just to frame this conversation [1:49:38] is are you looking for feedback tonight from the board as to which of these options that um [1:49:46] the board is interested in is that something you would like from us tonight or at a later date i just wanted to [1:49:53] get a better understanding of um that that's great so i think my message [1:49:58] my elevator pitch or my message is is that the technology levy is ending i think it's essential that we [1:50:05] renew the technology levy in order to sustain edina public schools in addition i think [1:50:12] there's going to be a little we're going to need a little bit more funds not a lot in order to address the increasing costs [1:50:18] of electronic curricular and then um i'm just providing a backwards map [1:50:24] of those three options and so those are those are the times that would that would work and that would be [1:50:30] discussions that we probably want to have if option a isn't going to work we have a little more time but i want to just [1:50:36] put that in front of the board to let you know that uh whatever i if if we pick [1:50:43] an option it might have a timeline that we need this need to be cognizant of okay so basically if we if the board [1:50:51] wants to go with the option a you need to know as soon as possible that's correct it's my understanding okay thank you um i want to turn it over [1:50:58] to owen because i believe you have a question yeah then i'll turn it over to you lenny i've got a couple questions here [1:51:04] steve uh do we when does the current levy expire [1:51:09] uh next year is the final year so the 2021-2022 school year [1:51:14] so does it have a hard and fast date like the 30th 2022. [1:51:22] okay so that informs the um when the election would be and so pushing it to next fall [1:51:31] um coinciding with the school board election would be past the date of its expiration so we would want to [1:51:36] have it before then um no you could you could do you could do the um [1:51:42] the election next fall that would be the latest oh maybe the latest you could do it yeah [1:51:48] that would be the latest dates that's correct yeah that's correct the [1:51:55] latest date is november of next year okay so then that's a possible cost savings [1:52:02] toss i think it's uh [1:52:08] so yes now another way of looking at the uh [1:52:14] did you have another question owen [Music] is mike cut out oh i'm okay he's talking [1:52:21] why don't you go ahead lenny and then john schultz can you please let owen know his mic cut out [1:52:26] yeah it might it might be the mute button on the side okay okay why don't you go ahead the [1:52:33] only questions was answered but steve this is it would be a 10-year renewal correct [1:52:38] that's correct it'd be a 10-year renewal and so one of the things that i would want to know [1:52:44] is you kind of take the number seven million if we went for seven and a half million [1:52:49] what and i'm not the answer tonight what i want you to do is think about which is if you had seven and a half million [1:52:54] rather than seven what difference would that make in terms of the provision of the services that we provide [1:53:00] so again i'm not looking for the answer tonight but when i look at the numbers and i look at the it's 42 for a 600 [1:53:08] 000 house for a yearly increase i just want to make sure that that we're [1:53:13] not cutting it too tight because it does seem to me that expenses go up and this has proven to be a good source [1:53:21] of expansion the other thing is i know you're not asking for feedback but i [1:53:26] would be inclined towards the may state that it enables us to with some [1:53:32] flexibility in the event that for some reason the referendum doesn't go well we could still come back in [1:53:37] november but we have had may referendums before we've had data we do have data about the turnout it [1:53:45] actually was relatively close in may to a november turnout [1:53:50] where it's just a school board election so may does allow us to touch the people who have left for [1:53:57] example for the winter they're typically backed by early may so from my perspective i would look towards [1:54:03] a may one i would try to do an analysis of what the additional benefits we could [1:54:08] get at 7.5 million versus 7 million and that's where i'm at thank you thank [1:54:15] you buddy turn it back over to owen something else i was going to say is [1:54:20] that we were at six and a half million nine years ago and we're talking seven million now [1:54:25] um and if you adjust for inflation it's probably pretty close and so in [1:54:33] terms of real dollars it's actually not an increase uh anybody challenged me on that one so [1:54:40] um it it's that that's how i'm looking at that the other thing is um i'm trying to [1:54:47] remember what it was like nine years ago did we have the expectation that the technology levy was a one-time [1:54:54] levy and then we would not renew it or how it had been pitched to the community [1:54:59] is there going to be some apprehension hey you we you hit us up and uh it was a one-time deal and now [1:55:05] you're coming back again do we have are we facing any kind of headwinds with that [1:55:10] can you address that steve certainly so i was here at that time and kind of proud to still [1:55:16] be an edina public school employee and it was a renewal it was a renewal at that time so [1:55:22] it actually went from 1 million to 4.5 million and then and john tope i [1:55:30] know you're on the line you can help me with this it is uh it is uh indexed [1:55:35] it's a percentage the value of of home so as property values ebb and [1:55:41] flow also the amount of revenue that is generated from the technology levy goes [1:55:47] up or down from that and so at the time you're right uh oh and it was not it [1:55:53] wasn't 6.5 million dollars 10 years ago it was 4.5 and now it's gone up over time john [1:56:00] tolke are you there yes i am uh yeah you're exactly right steve and that's that's the correct [1:56:06] answer owen it was 4.5 million dollars we asked the voters for that for 10 years so we had to put a 45 million [1:56:13] dollar price tag on that but again knowing that the capital projects are tech levy [1:56:19] is one of the only ones that's based on a tax rate of 5.562451 [1:56:26] and that can go up and up or down like director buettner said you know we in 2009 and 10 we actually [1:56:34] had a couple of years there where the tech levy would have went down uh [1:56:40] because our actual net tax capacity went slightly down but overall it's grown from 4.5 million [1:56:48] to that 6 million 477 that we'll be looking at later on in the 20 21 property tax levy right [1:56:56] okay so our half a million dollar increase is in real dollars it's not nominal [1:57:04] okay okay good clarification um what was our passing percentage nine [1:57:09] years ago 72 percent 72 percent [1:57:15] and since there's a renewal do you know what it was the time before that uh that i don't know i don't have that [1:57:21] data okay so it passed pretty handily yep okay thank you [1:57:28] so oh and i can tell you i think i was running for school board at the time that the tech levy was up [1:57:34] but uh there was definitely an understanding that that this was 10 years and would then be [1:57:39] renewed this was not we were going to fund and somehow after that it wouldn't happen again [1:57:48] so um i just have a question and then a comment that i see julian matt also wanted to weigh in um steve if you [1:57:57] don't know the answer to this it's totally fine you can get back to me but i was wondering if you knew [1:58:03] um we use human re we have some human resources [1:58:08] and capital in the district that we use for things like um helping parents biology for [1:58:17] special education services and 504 planning it's my understanding that [1:58:24] a lot of times those come out of special education budget sometimes general education budget are [1:58:31] those things that can actually be allocated through the technology levy [1:58:37] or can they not and if you don't know the answer that is [1:58:42] totally fine but i was just wondering if that is that a notion of [1:58:49] having additional resources in our district for the usage of assistive technology for our students [1:58:55] if that is something that we can allocate budget specific budget towards [1:59:00] within our technology levy is my basic question that i'll i'll work with jeff to find [1:59:07] out the exact answer what i'd say is is that we work very close with jeff jorgensen and [1:59:13] in a number of situations we have partnered learning ally is a great example that is [1:59:19] our ability to provide books in different formats audio and [1:59:25] transcribe books and so part of that funded is funded through the tech levy and part of it is funded [1:59:32] through special education so we currently do that um i'm sure there is uh i'm sure there's [1:59:38] a lot of needs that we probably could investigate to see their alignment that we could uh partner [1:59:46] on okay because i'd be really interested in that because i think it seems like that this could be a great avenue [1:59:54] to increase our ability to provide services for parents and support for parents um from a [2:00:02] human resources perspective for that and then the only other comment i wanted to [2:00:08] basically echo lenny's comment and julie's comment i think november is way too early [2:00:13] um at this point and with everything going on in the district to do a levy i think the winter [2:00:20] um we have a lot of people that leave in the winter so i and lean i lean towards doing um [2:00:27] this in may pending what we find out about the cost of it um or november so those really in my [2:00:34] mind are the only two viable options um for my perspective for this levy and i'll leave it with that and then turn it [2:00:40] over to matt who i believe had a comment and then julie [Music] [2:00:45] great thanks i'll be quick um just from a financial perspective looking at all budgeting and use of resources i think [2:00:51] the tech levy is one of the clearest ways that we pass through benefit to learning security infrastructure [2:01:00] and continued growth for all the students you can see on the bar chart steve presented to remain and stay [2:01:06] competitive with our peers in the surrounding lake district it's an important source of revenue and application for [2:01:11] [Music] i agree with the may timeline uh and if not november [2:01:17] and i think because it's a time to prepare the community for why we're doing it and what it means [2:01:22] again it passed very overwhelmingly last time when there was clear understanding of what it is and i always [2:01:28] want to be sensitive to any kind of tax increase to people especially during times when there's more uncertainty around the [2:01:34] economy but when you think about the benefit of having the schools where they are and [2:01:39] the application of those resources and our kids i'm very supportive of trying to make sure this is properly understood [2:01:46] and then approved in that early spring time frame so those are my comments but thank you steve for the thoughtful and thorough [2:01:52] presentation and all the work you guys are doing now especially given the challenging hybrid model thank you [2:02:02] um ellen do you want to go and then i'll turn it over to julie yeah i just have a quick question i i [2:02:08] wanted to hear from uh john schultz about his recommendation with respect to the [2:02:15] tech levy [2:02:20] so i think everything that's been reported tonight has been um is i i really resonate with [2:02:28] the tech levy as john and steve indicated as you can see even this year that it does [2:02:35] become a source of a more flexible source of [2:02:40] dollars to to engage students in different technology as well as different [2:02:46] curriculums so i think it's a i would i would definitely recommend doing the exploration that lenny [2:02:52] suggested and i would also [Music] resonate with the may date i think we [2:03:00] have some work to do with regards to surveying our community and asking the community what they [2:03:07] their thoughts are thank you thank you john julie [2:03:16] yeah i just um steve it does did our tech levy right now does it cover um staff [2:03:24] dmts staff also yes the tech levy covers hardware [2:03:31] it covers the infrastructure like the internet costs the uh support repair costs for [2:03:37] infrastructure some security hardware the security hardware and then it also supports the [2:03:45] maintenance support and administrative of a number of our technology systems [2:03:51] and tools in the assessment so things like our department the help desk being able [2:03:57] to support people using technology the person who manages the servers [2:04:02] our network administrator but also our technology para the buildings and the support those [2:04:09] teachers using the technology our help desk when people call and and then also [2:04:15] it helps support a portion of some staff as well for example our media specialists that [2:04:21] are always helping the teachers understand and adapt and leverage technology and so [2:04:27] it it is it covers in some situations 100 percent of of [2:04:32] people's salaries and in other situations a portion of their salary that is justifiable because of what they [2:04:39] do got it okay thank you um and i just i i [2:04:44] lenny when you mention that about um may that's exactly where my original comment i was thinking too i [2:04:50] think that's the right timing you know the last referendum um [2:04:57] i think that it's a it's an it's a good time frame um [2:05:03] outside of another election i think is is important too but i'd be curious what the community thought so i think for more data would be [2:05:10] helpful thank you thank you julie [2:05:15] [Music] when are we slated to talk about it next um we don't have that slated [2:05:23] next but i'll get back to you guys on that but sometime in february is that if we did [2:05:30] in may no i thought it was we would talk about it in october october okay to at least get the [2:05:38] groundwork set and [2:05:43] yeah so if we're gonna do may if we're gonna do a may it would be fall referendum planning january board [2:05:49] discussion last day to approve is february 8th to adopt a resolution [2:05:55] yeah we need to be ready [2:06:01] steve i just wanted to so kind of piggybacking off of what julie said i think it and i think matt made mention [2:06:07] of this too is that it's gonna it's very valuable to hear what this [2:06:12] covers and that it's not that jump go to oh this just means more kids on more [2:06:17] computers and i know that i also want to remind people that we have [2:06:23] in our strategic plan an opportunity to really look at kids technology use and that we we want [2:06:30] to make sure that people understand that we are both interested in making sure it's a healthy plan [2:06:36] and also that the need for technology goes above and beyond just buying devices and getting kids in front of a computer [2:06:42] so [Music] i also am in total agreement with um an [2:06:47] attempt for may knowing that we've got november of the following year as a backup so [2:06:54] thank you janie so um steve and john it sounds like you have a majority of board members saying [2:07:02] that we should shoot for may pending getting some additional data um [2:07:07] from the community as well as some cost information so um i think that you can move forward with [2:07:15] that and then we can regroup um as to when we should talk about this again as a board [2:07:22] excellent okay thank you very much um and uh we'll uh work john tope dr [2:07:29] schultz and i will will meet regroup and start putting together a more uh formalized um a plan for discussion [2:07:37] great thank you so much steve sorry director peter thank you um we're now going to move on [2:07:43] to review policies 407 and 408 and i will turn it over to board member michaelson who's our policy [2:07:50] chair thank you madam chair uh erica we have two policies for [2:07:58] discussion today they are both in the 400 series which we are going through this [2:08:03] year as part of our annual review of a policy group this is the [2:08:10] personnel set of policies the first policy is 407 the employee's [2:08:17] right to know exposure to hazardous substance substances and this is essentially [2:08:25] a distillation of a series of state statutes the proposal is to make some grammatical [2:08:32] changes and to add a substantive addition to include in blood-borne [2:08:37] pathogens hepatitis c virus hcv [2:08:43] the second policy that we have for review today is for litigation involving or subpoenas [2:08:51] of a school district employee again we have subs we have grammatical [2:08:56] changes and we do have a couple of substantive amendments [2:09:02] uh one is involving employees cannot serve court papers [2:09:09] on school property and the other is that employees if they are [2:09:14] finding themselves uh under criminal charges have got to report that to [2:09:20] the hr department uh a word on that is there was some concern in the policy [2:09:25] committee that that would be a transgression of uh [2:09:33] uh personal liberties to have to confess that but mandatory background checks on our [2:09:39] employees anyway so that's that's uh not that's washed out [2:09:45] so i turn it over to my fellow board members for questions or discussion [2:09:53] [Music] if there is any at nine o'clock at night here they were fairly straightforward [2:10:01] because they are like i would say they are um statutory in nature um and nikki um provided us with [2:10:09] the information on these but so i have no comments [2:10:15] other than the one so with no comments then we will just move that forward to [2:10:20] action for our october meeting then and then i turn it back to you uh chair allenberg thank you [2:10:29] we're now going to move to our action items and um first up um we have director of business services [2:10:36] uh john tope who's going to be on our first two items drive a motion to approve the property [2:10:43] tax levy pay 21. so moved drive a second second [2:10:52] uh director tope uh is there anything that you wanted to review with us regarding this action item [2:11:00] uh yes treyarlenberg uh just a couple of quick items uh this is a 45-page document most of us [2:11:07] the actual property tax levy that's very detailed the reports [2:11:12] that we are getting from mde right now and i shared this with the finance committee are not reflective of where the property tax [2:11:20] levy is going to be at right now reports from the state are showing a decrease of 12 or 13 [2:11:26] that's not going to happen um and on page two of the 45 page document i have [2:11:32] highlighted in each some areas of the 20 pay 21 [2:11:38] levy that are going to be changing in subsequent levy runs one of them is the market value [2:11:44] referendum we're going to have some adjustments uh upward on that integration [2:11:51] levy is not being reflected properly i'm trying to reflect the proper number uh for that in the peach and then also [2:11:59] our long-term facilities maintenance if you recall the board approved a 10-year plan at the june meeting [2:12:05] we have two components to the long term facilities maintenance one is a bond issue that's coming up this [2:12:10] uh spring and then the other one is a pay-as-you-go levy amount i'm trying to reflect what [2:12:16] approximately what that would be as well the other two items are listed [2:12:23] on the next page page 3 of 45 they have to do with our debt service [2:12:30] we are going to be refinancing bonds here with an october 7th uh sale date that's actually going [2:12:37] to bring our initial general obligation bond debt service levy down slightly by about 120 [2:12:43] 000 and in previous levy issues yes [2:12:50] oh can i go ahead yes yep okay and then in previous levy [2:12:57] issues we have reserved some of the funds in our debt service fund balance to pay [2:13:03] for the initial uh interest payments for those issuances and so that reduction for debt excess [2:13:11] i actually pulled that down by about 500 000 so that would actually increase the levy by [2:13:17] the same amount so we'll have some debt excess um but it just won't be as high as the [2:13:23] actual levy document is showing right now and those are the five substantial [2:13:28] changes um and if you look down at the bottom of page three with those changes that are going [2:13:36] to be they should be very close on the edina district taxpayers [2:13:41] would be looking at about a 2.61 increase so fairly reasonable [2:13:48] especially in these times i think [2:13:54] lenny so i just want to say i support this i mean we do typically approve this at this [2:14:01] stage and it's a in my understanding it's attentive of approval we'll come down for the final one later on but yes [2:14:08] whenever we see a number less than three as a starting point that's always nice so from my [2:14:15] perspective go ahead and you know accept this and then we'll see what the final one looks [2:14:20] at like later on right and i think that's a good point director wallin friedman uh we typically [2:14:28] want to certify at the maximum just to take into account all these adjustments that are not properly being reflected right now [2:14:37] are there any other questions about this um issue before we move to vote [2:14:44] okay we will now vote a roll call to approve the 20 pay 21 property tax levy [2:14:52] erlenberg [2:14:59] [Applause] [2:15:08] the 20 21 property tax levy is approved um we'll now move on to the fund [2:15:15] transfers do i have a motion to approve the end transfers for fiscal 1920. [2:15:26] um director tope yes uh chair allenberg superintendent schultz members of the [2:15:31] board uh we did talk about this briefly in the board workshop [2:15:37] the the district administration is recommending three fund transfers uh one of them is a transfer from our [2:15:45] staff development restricted fund balance to our unassigned fund balance in the general fund of a hundred and [2:15:51] sixteen thousand seven hundred and forty dollars also recommending an additional [2:15:56] uh transfer from our restricted for operating capital account of two million dollars and the third [2:16:03] transfer that we're recommending is that we transfer a hundred thousand dollars from the restricted for school readiness fund in [2:16:09] the community education fund to the restricted for community education fund balance [2:16:15] these uh transfers are all allowed by special law that was passed in the spring of [2:16:21] 2020 to give districts flexibility for financing for [2:16:26] covid related expenses thank you director tope um [2:16:32] director michaelson i see that you have some questions no actually i'm sorry [2:16:40] um director tope i was wondering if you could spend a moment to explain some of the investments our district is making to [2:16:47] run both the hybrid and the eva model that are listed in the information section [2:16:54] yeah there's a number of things that we're doing whether it's personal protective [2:17:00] equipment uh providing tier one child care monday through friday uh we're also doing some uh [2:17:08] investing in technology to beef that up and we're also doing some additional [2:17:14] expenditures in teaching and learning in the research evaluation and assessment area [2:17:19] and we're also doing some investing in the mental health services area as well uh i think that one was 185 [2:17:27] 000 so four or five different uh investments of different amounts um but [2:17:33] in investing fairly heavily in in those and then also investing fairly heavily [2:17:39] in our para educators and in that report i think that listed uh you know what the investments were [2:17:46] for kindergarten a pair in each kindergarten class one per grade level per school [2:17:51] at the rest of the elementaries grades one through five and then also some [2:17:57] uh para educators at the secondary and then a couple of ft's for eva dyna virtual academy [2:18:03] teachers thank you and then um it's um [2:18:10] the state has mandated school districts to provide um tier one child care [2:18:16] um is that correct that's correct yes okay and at this point in time they um we are [2:18:22] not being reimbursed for those expenses or are we no we're not okay [2:18:27] thank you thank you for clarifying that i appreciate that are there any other questions for um [2:18:34] regarding this topic okay we will now vote by roll call to [2:18:40] approve the um end of year transfers for fiscal 1920. [2:18:46] ellenberg i fox hi greene i jones [2:18:54] hi michelson hi sean hi warren friedman [2:19:01] hi the end of your transfers have been approved [2:19:06] um we now have director buettner up again for the next two items [2:19:11] um do i have a motion to approve the purchase of chromebooks [2:19:16] drive a second second so you're our frequent customer tonight [2:19:22] director buettner um do you have any information you wanted to provide to us regarding the purchase of these chromebooks [2:19:29] well again good evening board uh superintendent dr schultz and community as uh finance director [2:19:36] john told mentioned previously in the previous action item there is additional costs associated [2:19:42] with doing hybrid and covid learning we worked on identifying the needs [2:19:48] and chromebooks and devices were one of those items that were eligible for [2:19:55] expending what we're doing is uh accelerating the purchase of 1900 chromebooks that will go [2:20:02] at each of our grade levels high school middle school and elementary to ensure that our students have [2:20:09] functioning working devices the unfortunate reality is is that [2:20:14] chromebooks and other devices are on international shortages and so we're coming to this evening [2:20:21] to purchase those to ensure that we get them in a timely manner [2:20:27] and the funding would be through the karzak dollars thank you director buettner are there [2:20:33] questions for director buettner about this purchase [2:20:39] great we'll now vote by roll call to approve the purchase of chromebooks [2:20:44] ellenberg hi hi green hi [2:20:51] jones aye michelson hi shaw hi [2:20:57] roland friedman hi the purchase of chromebooks is approved [2:21:03] do i have a motion to approve the purchase of interactive classroom panels [2:21:11] thank you uh director buettner yes again good evening uh this [2:21:18] interactive panels is is actually a misnomer i should have called it the [2:21:23] wonderful device in the front of the classrooms and so in our elementary schools this would retrofit three of our [2:21:30] elementary schools to have the large interactive panel upgrade the wiring in [2:21:35] the classrooms so that there'd be parity between all six elementary schools as you are doing as you are walking [2:21:42] around your elementary schools at the start of the school you may have seen these new interactive panels in the [2:21:47] classrooms and some of our buildings and so this would be to finish off the other three elementary [2:21:53] schools this not only does it provide interactivity so that the teacher can [2:21:59] project their screens to hybrid or distance learning students but it also allows them to have a [2:22:06] wireless technology so they can move around the classrooms and keep socially distance while they're [2:22:11] doing that work as well so this would be the ability for us to in those last three schools for interactive [2:22:18] projection systems upgrading the wiring and putting in additional chromebooks in their classrooms [2:22:26] thank you director buettner are there questions about this for director buettner i just have one [2:22:33] quick question steve are there other schools that will need to be upgraded shortly thereafter [2:22:39] so this speaks to the elementaries but what about our middle and high school are they all up to date on [2:22:46] this kind of classroom management technology that we would need for the new way of learning and teaching so that's a [2:22:53] great question and so we are on a cycle for reviewing and refreshing the av [2:22:59] technology in the classrooms as part of the facilities referendum we did look at the high school and middle [2:23:06] schools and upgraded that technology so as you look at the four or five year refresh cycle the high [2:23:12] schools have been addressed this would bring the elementary schools up to parity on the [2:23:18] av wiring but in another few years and again this is the need for the technology levy referendum in another [2:23:25] few years we will need to go through our secondary schools and upgrade them i don't know what that technology looks [2:23:31] like but i suspect it won't look like what we have today in our classrooms and it will be something new [2:23:37] okay any other questions julie [2:23:44] yeah just a quick clarification question steve so you um i know that um this perfect the [2:23:50] interactivity for in the classroom is obviously um with the new learning [2:23:55] models with covid it's kind of precipitating right this but i just wanted to um ask you you [2:24:01] see that um do you feel that we have a need for this beyond covid so this purchase it has a [2:24:08] life after coven is my question indeed uh that's a great question and so dr [2:24:14] sean beverson who is the digital learning specialist at the elementary spent a two-year process of working with [2:24:20] our teachers to understand what is a future ready elementary classroom one of the things that we were able to do is we had [2:24:27] in some buildings we had smart boards some buildings we had promethean and some we didn't have any and so in [2:24:32] conjunction with this physical hardware has been a methodical process [2:24:38] of converting our content in a universal design using google slides and so this content [2:24:44] now will be able to be leveraged not only in one elementary school but across six elementary schools and so [2:24:50] when you hear like mark carlson saying that he's working with teachers to develop [2:24:56] interactive and manipulative curriculum that'll be able to be let through these screens and used in [2:25:02] all of our classes amazing okay great thank you for clarifying [2:25:07] ellen yeah and can you uh speak a little bit to the professional development needed to train teachers and [2:25:14] how to use these whiteboards it's a great point ellen thank you for bringing that up [2:25:21] nothing we do is without professional development and so we make sure that we're bringing our teachers along again i'll just [2:25:28] uh reference that that we worked for over uh almost two years to make sure that [2:25:34] this idea was going to work with our teachers and so we took input from our teachers our elementary [2:25:39] principals and one of the biggest facets of that was ensuring that there was professional development [2:25:45] that's not one and done that's ongoing and so this year it's been a little bit of a challenge i would say that because [2:25:51] we've been in distance learning but what we have done is work with some core teachers at each of our buildings that [2:25:57] have been our early adopters and our mentors we've developed content that can be delivered in video screen [2:26:05] screencasts and we videotaped our early mentors and what we asked our teachers to do is [2:26:11] let's get started this year and so our whole goal at the start of this year was [2:26:16] making sure that our teachers uh started the year with a feeling of a comfort level [2:26:22] they could do with exactly what they could do with the biology and now interspersed throughout the year [2:26:28] will be additional learning opportunities for those teachers to take at where they're at the current [2:26:33] level and keep bringing them further along on the integration and leveraging of these tools [2:26:38] so we started with uh training over the summer we provided we have early adopters in [2:26:44] all of our elementary buildings we've developed content that all of our elementary teachers have accessed and [2:26:49] we'll continue to circle back and move our teachers from where they're at to where they want to be [2:27:00] any other questions okay we'll now vote by roll call to [2:27:06] approve the purchase of the interactive classroom panels ellenberg i [2:27:14] box green hi jones hi michelson [2:27:21] hi joel hi well and friedman hi the purchase of the interactive [2:27:30] classroom panels is approved do i have a motion to approve the superintendent goals [2:27:36] do i have a second second okay um so [2:27:43] the back um i believe in august um we met and [2:27:49] um reviewed the attached goals for the 2021 school year um [2:27:56] so i apologize we didn't have time to get to this in the work session um prior to this meeting um so [2:28:03] if there's anything that we wanted to discuss or comment on the superintendent goals before we vote on it then feel free to discuss right [2:28:10] now um but i know we've seen this a couple of times um at our various work sessions [2:28:18] so i'll just turn it over to the board ellen yeah i um [2:28:25] i'm looking at uh [Music] the plan and and in general it is [2:28:30] exactly what we've talked about in the work session so i um only have two comments um about how [2:28:37] it things settled out as it they were written out and they have to do with item number six um the strategic [2:28:45] plan and um i see his goal is to launch a [2:28:51] literacy study and i i will say that i [2:28:57] am getting if if that's all we're going to get [2:29:02] um i i do i'm getting a little bit impatient so [2:29:09] um i would like to see this goal be a little bit different than [2:29:16] that we're going to see a study um in february and i'm wondering what other [2:29:23] people think about that i i this is um so i read that as not a [2:29:28] study but maybe i'm um maybe you can get clarification from um [2:29:34] what john believes that should be but i look at because the study for the purpose of developing a literacy plan [2:29:41] which includes building upon current work and practices and literacy february 2021 [2:29:46] so i think that that seems like that timing is reasonable to have a plan laid out [2:29:52] that's um i don't know if john can clear if you could clarify what your thought is on that i [2:29:59] don't see it i see it more than just buddy great and if that is the way it is [2:30:04] that we will have the plan and not the study but we will have [2:30:11] the plan in february of 2021 that's [2:30:16] different i was thinking the same thing i thought the word study was kind of weak and uh [2:30:24] since we are coming very close to voting on it um and committing ourselves [2:30:31] to actual words we put something in in the language [2:30:36] specifying what we're looking for on the order of and i just wrote down a few things evidence-based measurable [2:30:42] structure structured literacy plan so we launch a evidence-based [2:30:49] measurable structural structured literacy plan by february [2:30:58] 2021 [2:31:04] john how did you read that um so i i i read it as um [2:31:11] really is to have a meeting with the board prior to even beginning any of the work i mean what i [2:31:18] think i'd like to do is get the teaching and learning [2:31:23] and uh and special services together to talk about how do we go about developing this plan [2:31:31] and what are the elements that it's going to take to develop that once that's in place i would bring that to the board for [2:31:37] some input and i would do that yet this fall so it wouldn't be something that it [2:31:43] would be delivered on the february 2021 but i put that date out there [2:31:49] in the event that that study creates the need for resources that [2:31:56] would then fit into our budget work so that's the significance of february [2:32:04] i think the logic behind my reasoning is that i'd like to create a little more urgency with it because i sense that it's such a [2:32:10] significant issue that has so many ties to equity also um and it's one of our top [2:32:16] three priorities so i i think that that's [2:32:22] why so so if we change this instead of [2:32:29] launch a literacy study change the wording to develop a literacy plan [2:32:37] um would people be comfortable with that would john be comfortable with i would be concerned [2:32:42] about um the timeline of that i can develop a literacy plan i [2:32:49] don't know if i can get that done by february knowing that we have uh covid [2:32:55] and um whatever is going to happen with our models so i'm just balancing what we're all [2:33:01] working on right now and this so just that flexibility but i have not had a chance to really talk [2:33:08] this over with teaching and learning yet so to get the idea of what this would what this would entail [2:33:14] so i'm flying blind a little bit from this question because i didn't realize this question was going to come [2:33:20] up tonight so i um [2:33:26] not because i don't think it's important that we have a literacy plan but in all the realistic scenarios that i [2:33:34] can play out in my head what a plan looks like now what a plan [2:33:40] would look like in december what a plan could look like in february what a plan could look like in june [2:33:45] there's so many different iterations that i hesitate for us to say right now [2:33:54] that an actual plan by february 2021 is the plan that we want going forward [2:34:00] long term i agree with julie where this doesn't necessarily supersede literacy work in the district [2:34:07] but i am a little bit hesitant to put a date on a final plan as we get ready [2:34:14] to enter such uncertainty such movement and such instability within um [2:34:23] the district with just what's going on and i would want us to be really cautious that whatever plan we put [2:34:29] together has solid attainable goals and [2:34:36] without having all of the metrics that we've had in place for years and years [2:34:41] without having any of that and really knowing between now and february what those ongoing [2:34:48] metrics whether they be standardized testing whether they be face to face i i'm i agree with the need [2:34:55] for it wholeheartedly i am concerned with putting a date on it [2:35:01] um with that february 2021 date so i don't know if this is something we [2:35:08] can rework um i don't know if anybody else has an [2:35:14] opposing view well maybe no and maybe what i am just looking for is um that we could as we [2:35:22] teach our kids to do whenever there's a big project we can at least compartmentalize [2:35:29] certain aspects of it and say well we will take take off take on a certain aspect [2:35:36] of our literacy plan whether chunk and chunk it out so that by february [2:35:43] we might be able to say and i'm going to just throw out some ideas it could be that [2:35:49] we'll work on our k through second grade plan for literacy or [2:35:57] it could be um what we're going to do in middle school [2:36:03] for literacy i don't i actually i think as a as a board we've often talked about the priority to [2:36:10] start early for early intervention of of students to make sure that they're on [2:36:17] the right path so i would suggest that we take that on and whether we need to [2:36:26] say we have to chunk it even smaller but to make a step is [2:36:33] really important i we i can't just i'm very uncomfortable with this launch a literacy study because i'm [2:36:40] afraid we won't get we won't have any actionable steps [2:36:46] this year in either um defining what our district feels it [2:36:53] needs to do in terms of delivery or materials or um additional supports [2:37:01] so it's very so rewarding well i'm a little concerned about this [2:37:07] late phase in the process to sit here and try to define [2:37:12] feel should be a priority from a literacy perspective [2:37:18] for our district without having any sort of metrics any sort of that alone [2:37:26] is a very important conversation for us to have as a board and to try to just on the fly [2:37:34] say oh i think we should prioritize this in order to put an artificial marker in [2:37:40] a goals document feels very uncomfortable to me [2:37:46] i think one of the challenges that we have is that we did an intervention study last year that [2:37:53] has a lot of components of literacy in it that are already predetermined and [2:37:59] that the district is already sorry that lights went off in here that the district is already actually working [2:38:05] on and so we have an intervention study going on with a lot of literacy components such [2:38:11] as training our teachers and the science of phonics and things like that those things are going on which is why [2:38:17] it's listed in the goals continue the current work at the same time [2:38:22] now in our strategic plan we're talking about doing literacy so those those things are really doing a parallel [2:38:29] path um and so to not really clearly figure out all of these [2:38:36] different things going on and how they coincide and work off of each other [2:38:42] and just to me pull something out of the air and say our expectation as a board [2:38:48] is that you're going to come up with x y and z tonight um i [2:38:55] don't personally think is a good idea i think that we should have the expectation that um we need to have another [2:39:03] discussion about this to figure this out [2:39:08] as as far as a superintendent gold then that we'll we'll figure this out as a superintendent go is that [2:39:15] what what you're recommending i have no problem with the superintendent goal as [2:39:20] written because it says that our expectation is that at [2:39:27] minimum we're going to have a study completed for what we need to do [2:39:34] um and then if need be we can have an update from john at a [2:39:40] further meeting to say these are our expectations [2:39:46] how is the literacy study going on but i think that uh [2:39:52] i don't think anyone on the board or in the administration doesn't um understand a sense of urgency [2:40:00] nor are they going to stop doing some of the work i also think it's very complex to even [2:40:06] try to figure out how do you launch um literacy in this environment [2:40:11] so i think as a board i think we need to understand that which is some of what janie was [2:40:18] talking about which is there's such another layer of complexity [2:40:23] right now that we need to give our administration time [2:40:30] to figure out how do you even launch a literacy study in the environment we're in [2:40:35] how do you even figure out metrics in this environment [2:40:40] and so without having some of these conversations [2:40:47] i just i think it would be bad practice to just try to figure out an [2:40:52] artificial goal tonight that is not achievable well one of my thoughts is i sorry erica [2:40:59] um i um i hate that i feel like i sort of jumped out with this phrase and here we are we [2:41:05] want to move on and uh it's after nine o'clock and we want to wrap this up [2:41:10] um but for me it it's it's just been uncomfortable [2:41:17] the weakness of the word study and i brought it up in the spirit of deliberation to get a [2:41:22] you all think and what's realistic because erica you're you're dead right uh we have this [2:41:29] huge adjustment to make to covet and that is shifting all the priorities um [2:41:36] and so i wanted to at least entertain a discussion about because i wanted to keep ourselves honest [2:41:41] with this literacy goal that is an incredibly important goal [2:41:46] and we don't want to lose it in these abstract words of study that we [2:41:52] could be vague about um and keep ourselves honest to it [2:41:57] um just like i do this with myself you probably do too that you come up with hard and fast goals that [2:42:03] reflect your your priorities and um so i mean if we can honestly look at each other and say [2:42:10] that we still believe that this is very urgent but we have to also accommodate to the [2:42:16] realities of kovid then i could i could go with it as is but if for nothing else i wanted to [2:42:22] bring it up in the spirit of let's be realistic and let's be honest with ourselves about [2:42:27] let's strive for this anyway that's what i want to say lenny okay so [2:42:34] john you had said that you wanted to talk to the teaching learning people to kind of get [2:42:39] a little more um in terms of realistic heartbeats my process on this is to approve it as [2:42:47] it's written with the understanding that we would like as a board to revisit this goal [2:42:52] and so that we may in november put in harder dates in terms of [2:42:59] what the milestones are for what we're accomplishing this year one of the things on a superintendent [2:43:04] goal is you want to know what you're supposed to be doing so i'd like to approve this with telling [2:43:10] you we're going to modify it based upon the feedback from us and the information from you [2:43:16] and put in harder dates so that you can then have a more concrete deadline and i think that that addresses [2:43:24] what owen and ellen are talking about but addresses what eric and janie are talking about in terms of trying to pick [2:43:31] something tonight [Music] does that yeah that makes sense and that [2:43:36] was that was been my plan um to bring that sometime october november to talk to you about [2:43:42] what you kind of shaped this i just haven't had a chance to meet with uh leadership on this [2:43:51] can i just make one comment on top of what lenny what you just said too i think too we you know as we know we [2:43:58] don't know what things are going to look like in november right so i just want to add the caveat [2:44:03] that if i mean there is there is there is no message here from this board [2:44:08] that remotely isn't one of the top priorities it rose to the top of all the different things that we the district [2:44:15] and that has been very clear and there's a commitment there and there's work going on and so i just want to make sure that i [2:44:22] really appreciate john's honesty that he that proved covet and getting our kids [2:44:28] back to school in a launch that we were able to do is is takes a lot of time [2:44:33] and so i appreciate the honesty that he's giving us and telling us like yes and [2:44:40] i need time to do this properly and plan it out and and look at this as a study and so [2:44:46] i want to make sure that when we revisit this that we have that we are using a lens of the top priority [2:44:53] is in this new learning model and all the complexities there and then of course all our other [2:45:00] priorities are important but i just want to say that out loud because i want to make sure that in november [2:45:05] we're not saying well you didn't do this because we don't know what it's going to look like in november things could go [2:45:10] smoothly hopefully they will we've set up the best that we possibly can to get there but i just wanted to [2:45:16] um just make that clarification what the conversation i would expect to [2:45:21] have in november so i really fast want to do a process check and let everyone in the board [2:45:28] on this meeting and in the community know that it's not so in 10 minutes we're going to [2:45:34] have to take a 10 minute break because the streaming the live streaming [2:45:40] we actually can only do for three hours and then we have to do another link um [2:45:46] so i just wanted to let everyone know that at 9 50 we will actually be taking a [2:45:51] break in order to have another um link set up to continue our meeting um so i'm sorry for interrupting people [2:45:58] in this conversation but i just wanted to do that process check right there so we can now continue i see green dots [2:46:05] for lenny owen and alan but i'm not sure if you guys are frozen or if you actually have things to say [2:46:10] so i was only going to say that i think we've all kind of given our peace here and i would appreciate moving on to a [2:46:18] vote on it i am a-okay with that [2:46:24] uh okay we will now vote by roll call to approve the superintendent goals um knowing that the literacy goal is [2:46:31] going to be revisited um at a later date [2:46:37] okay ellenberg i fox hi green i [2:46:44] jones hi michaelson hi sean hi marlon treatment [2:46:53] now the superintendent goals are approved um we're now going to move on to the [2:46:58] board goals um do i have a motion to approve the board goals removed second second [2:47:07] okay um so the board goals we last discussed in august um and from that discussion we discussed [2:47:13] as a board prioritizing the following governing and monitoring the district in [2:47:19] twenty 2020 twenty i can't i'm sorry i can't say those two together 2020 2021 um [2:47:27] governing and monitoring the strategic plan i'm supporting equity work and becoming [2:47:32] more effective as a board with those priorities in mind these goals [2:47:37] um were created which i wrote from that feedback um so again i [2:47:44] apologize we didn't get a chance to talk about this at the work session but um they are listed out um and then [2:47:51] under you see their bullet points because i know that some board members brought up um certain specific things they wanted [2:47:57] us to work on as a board and so i tried to include all of those different things that [2:48:03] different board members listed i mean bullet points so we could have [2:48:09] those things written down as well [2:48:16] ellen so um i think this is actually your or lenny's [2:48:24] um concept for uh that you had brought up earlier in this meeting on the district pandemic [2:48:30] oversight goal number one um and it and you had mentioned [Music] [2:48:37] having the the ability to know when we might make changes to our models [2:48:43] what would be what would what would be the process i i don't know i don't want to put words in your mouth but it was something [2:48:50] that's not listed here for district pandemic oversight and i think it's a good one that we [2:48:56] would know um both when uh [2:49:02] when we would be considering another model or tweaking the model that we have [2:49:08] what is it what would be that process and so i would um i would [2:49:16] add that as a bullet point because i think it's an important one ellen could you do you think if we just [2:49:23] change some of the wording okay so under goal number one receive update on implementation of hybrid and [2:49:30] eva models so maybe if it was receiving a tation and the [2:49:38] oh i'm trying to think of what the word would be um [2:49:44] anybody would be like end or shift and or shift something like that yeah [2:49:50] i'm trying to think of what the right word would be but yeah so basically taking what you were saying alan about [2:49:56] erica's coming about what are the key indicators of knowing when what about if we're doing which is [2:50:01] wordsmithing right if we're doing at the end of the first bullet point for the purpose of evaluating [2:50:08] and reacting to changes in the model [2:50:14] received updates and implementation of hybrid and eva models for the purpose of reacting to and making changes to the [2:50:20] model yep thanks matt is that satisfied that would [2:50:25] capture it that would that would that would do it thank you okay did anybody more useful to me write [2:50:31] that down i wrote it down [2:50:42] i'm just wondering if it's our role to ensure the correct safety protocols for students and staff i'm not [2:50:49] really sure that that's our our role and we might want to change the [2:50:54] wording on that one too oversea rather than insure yeah oversea [2:51:02] probably overseas eric did you get that yep [2:51:12] thanks sarah owen oh no sounds good okay [2:51:20] any other comments okay so we will vote to a [2:51:27] vote by roll call to approve the board goals with the two changes i'm adding to [2:51:35] the bullet i can't think of right now but i know which one it is on my paper for the purpose of evaluating and [2:51:42] reacting to and making changes to the model and then change the word [2:51:48] ensure safety to oversee safety [2:51:56] [Music] we're now voting by roll call [2:52:01] okay hi fox hi [2:52:09] green hi jones hi michelson hi [2:52:15] shaw hi warren friedman hi so the board goals have been approved [2:52:23] with the two suggested changes um we i'm going to [2:52:28] um stop this board meeting now because we only have three minutes one process question in the event that [2:52:36] owen as our faithful leader on policy is able to get us through the next agenda in seven or eight minutes would [2:52:42] that be tolerable that's right [2:52:49] there's no way that we can get your policies until one of four minutes okay because i know we've reviewed this i just won yeah sorry sorry that was man [2:52:57] i'm sorry i don't know i'm sorry [2:53:04] i wanted to do it okay jerry ellenberg yes [2:53:11] um we're going to need to have a motion to extend the meeting past 10 o'clock we need that's right [2:53:16] for the majority to do so thank you so um can i have a motion to extend the [2:53:22] meeting beyond 10 o'clock well so just to sing we need to [2:53:29] set a time and so i would suggest 10 20. that we finished by 10 20 correct [2:53:38] because we're ready to extend the meeting beyond 10 o'clock to 10 20. second [2:53:46] we're so moved um my roll call sorry lenny [2:53:53] i'm cutting you off okay so lenny moved you know and seconded right [2:53:58] yeah yes to extend the meeting from yep and get 10 o'clock with 10 20. [2:54:03] yep [2:54:11] [Music] [2:54:19] so the motion is approved we will finish our meeting by 10 20. we'll be back at 10 o'clock and we will [2:54:26] be off um for a 10-minute break [2:54:34] you