night uh held on September 25th. Previously known as technology night, this event was expanded and renamed the EDINA resource night for multilingual families. In addition to technology, the event featured eina give andgo, members of our transportation team, high school counselors and others. So tonight, I'd like to welcome up to the dis uh cultural liaison Blanca Diaz Dion, Monzerat Seploveda and Hussein Osman, who are here to share details about the event. Welcome I'm not ready. Uh good evening uh chairman Gabler uh school board member uh Dr. Bitman and attendees. My name is Hussein Assman. I'm the cultural liaison for a dinina at the high school. I'm joined tonight by Dr. uh Blanca DeLeon, Latino culture and my partner at the high school. And we have our new uh member who joined Man. So tonight uh we're here tonight to discuss uh our event that created the Somali night and the Latino night. and also so and uh our work is based on the strategic plan B says uh strate uh strategy B reads uh.3 this event helped address uh as a cultural barrier uh to success for our Somali and Latino Latino families. Blanca will also describe uh former uh Adventist and how it reimagine better working with our family needs. >> Good night. Thank you for having us. Yeah, this is a project that was born many many years ago as a technology night. We were in the district. We were using another platform for students and parents to use and to control. When we switched the platform, we thought that it was a good idea to pro provide training for parents and and students on how to use it, especially for parents who don't speak the language and don't have the computer skills to to handle the new system. So we created this technology night with the with time we this stopfinder appear in the horizon and we tried to include it and it start growing and growing. When the pandemic hit we stopped for a while but now these last few years we are renewing retaking the project and doing it again. We are including more resources and we are including more communities and I think that's it. >> The design is there and I'm on >> Hi, good night. Um, so in the future we would like to include other communities not only Somali and Latin speaking families. Uh, we also want to partnership with other resources. For example, Metro South said they will be here next year. And we're just look moving forward want this event to be bigger and to have more helpful resources for families. And do you have any questions about the event? >> Board members, any questions for our guests this evening? >> Yes, madam chair. Um I just had a curiosity as to how do we identify and how well do we reach the parents of the children to invite them to make sure that their participation engagement with this event um can reach as many of them as possible. You're talking about the measure the results or how to reach out to >> No, how do we like how do we actually ensure so if we have so many families of the different cultural groups that we're that we have in our in our school district, how do we make sure that we can get them to come to these events? Um what is the communication mechanism or how do we outreach to them? >> We use a few means of communication. The first one and the most important to us is the personal relationship that we build with families over time. >> Okay. every time they call to request a service or a question or something we invite them and make sure that they are aware of the event. we have any other means like you can talk about the way you >> so uh for example with uh my community I reach out to them uh in multiple avenues like for example email not email will not work most of the time it's either I have to phone call each one by one or uh do a voice recording and sometimes I get a lot of calls back or a text message or friends and families be like hey we have a meeting just to know that and just uh continue with that way and it has been a success so far as far as to that one specific community but although all al also other communities might be different strategies that we might implement just to go ahead and forward and see what works and what not. >> Great. Thank you. >> I just wanted to thank each of you as well as Franny for the work that happens behind the scene. We've seen tremendous progress over the last few years and we're committed to continuing that progress as there's much more to do. I see the impact that each of you have on our families and our students on a day-to-day basis and their eyes just light up and they're so grateful for the work that you do each and every day. So, on behalf of the board, myself and our entire team, just want to sincerely thank you for being part of our district. >> Agree. when I hear about what you're doing and I look at our strategic plan, you highlighted one area, but the reality is is what you're talking about is all over our strategic plan. So, thank you for the work that you do to bridge that home life with our students and it does make a difference. So, thank you for being here tonight and talking to us. >> All right. Next on the agenda is hearing for members of the public. And we do not have anyone here to address the board this evening. So, we will move on to a presentation that we have from one of our district mission aligned partners, Edina Education Fund. And we have uh Kathy Rendleman, executive director uh of the Adina Ed Fund to talk to us about their work, their impact, and how we as a community can support their efforts. So, welcome Kathy. Good evening, Chairperson Allen or Chairperson Gabler, excuse me, schoolboard members, interim superintendent Bitman, cabinet members, and fellow community members. My name is Kathy Rendleman and I'm the executive director of the United Education Fund. Thank you for having me here this evening. Tonight I'm going to walk you through um what work we did last year for the community and take a look ahead of what is going on for this year and what we've got in store for the year 2526 for all of our students and staff. So before we begin, um I'd like to just take a moment and look at um what we have for our vision, our mission, and who we serve um as the Adina Education Fund. You'll notice as I walk through the next couple slides, there are many similarities as what we do in the Adina Education Fund. As with the Adina public schools for the vision and the mission, um we are here only to serve the Adina public schools. So that is on purpose that we have many similarities. Our vision as Zedine education fund is to ensure educational excellence in the Edina public schools for all students and staff. And as you can see in our first slide here, here are some of our students that are helping to ensure this excellence. We have student board members. There are seven of them. and a couple of them it is their job to take our mission and our work um our program in literacy and to help spread that throughout our district. And last year after a really hard year and a half work um to start a tutor center over at our middle schools actually launched that program over at Valley View. And this is a group of our tutors over at Valley View getting all trained in to start that program which happened at the end of the school day at Valley View. um do offering tutoring in um a couple help labs over there at the end of the period and they were over there once a week all year long over at Valley View. And this year we're hoping to continue that program. It'll start up right after MEA and spread it over to Southview um on Friday mornings. So more to come on that. our mission. As an independent missional aligned partner of the Edina public schools, the Adina Education Fund secures incremental funding for district-wide programs and services that strengthen academic learning and support the whole person on their educational journey. So, not only do we work in our programs, which we will speak further about as I go along here, but we offer many different services under our umbrella. We do lots of things as the ad fund that you'll see throughout my presentation this evening. And we don't do that for just our work within the classroom, but we really try to support the whole student. It's more than just what we teach them in the classroom, but we're teaching them as an entire human being. So, our work within mental health and wellness and social emotional learning and everything we do to help develop our people to send them out into the world when they're done within the safety of our walls. um and to prepare them for the world and what's ahead is really important to us. What you see here in these pictures are a really good sign of that. Um some of our students helped out this summer. We had the privilege of helping out at our excite ed program. Um you learning happens year round as you know in public schools and our summer program is outstanding here with community ed. and we were honored to help out and create a literacy fair where two afternoons we had students go in and instead of having your traditional carnival, they were able to design games that were centered around literacy. So instead of students spinning the wheel and just getting a sucker, they got to um spin and have a word and be able to find a couple words that rhymed with that word and show off their skills. Um we had about 20 games going on centered around literacy, all around Dr. Seuss themed games that were all designed by our high schoolers. Who we serve? Ali Dina Public School students and staff. We believe in serving every Hornet every day, 365 days a year in all 10 buildings from the early learning and family center all the way through grade 12. Um, as you see on this slide here, we have our little learners over at Highlands and we believe serving all of our students all the way up to making sure that we have professional development for our teachers. Both of these slides show our science of reading. So, not only are we teaching our little learners the science of reading, but also making sure that we have professional development for our teachers in science of reading. We've got our special ed um departments learning science of reading in that slide. So, why the Adina Education Fund? Well, this is a group that's very well-versed in um in the funding for public schools. I don't think I need to go into this too in depth, but this is how schools are funded. This is how public education is funded. We get our funding from the government. Um here in public schools, we get approximately 60 or so% of our funding from the state government. We get a decent amount of funding from local property taxes and levies and bonds. That's how we do things in the state of Minnesota. And then we get about just over 1% from the federal government here in Edina. That gap that you see there, I don't have it labeled because every year it varies. What is that gap there? Some years it's small or negligible and some years it's bigger than that. We're on a year where the gap was not very big. we were able to close that with the great work that all of you do. It is your job to make sure that that gap is non-existent at the end of a balanced budget season. Well, the federal government try gives us funding. We um try to lobby that work. That's why we have a legislative action committee and those of you that work on that committee know that amazing work that our students do. I'm proud to go up to the capital with them every year and see our outstanding students standing up in front of our legislators. That's amazing. And that is the first role that we have to make sure that we have funding for our schools. Then we go in and all of you do your great job and you balance our budget. After that, fundraising efforts are what can be done. That's not work that is worked into our budget, but it's really work that can do two things. It can either add extras to the classrooms after the budget is balanced or it can provide what we like to call at the ED fund early entry. And what does that mean? might mean that there's something that was put off in the budget because it can't be done this year and it's going to be done in a subsequent year, but maybe if the ad fund were to step in, it could either be done earlier or it could be done a little bit more than was planned originally. A great um a great example of that is the science of reading. That's something that the Edund was able to put in money for that we were able to move forward on faster than our neighboring districts because we were able to fund some of that work. Since 1995, which is the year that we were established, the ED fund has um put forward $8.9 million in grants to be in public schools. Now, I will say that that number is fairly conservative. That's the amount of money that I'm actually able to track down to the penny. It's actually a little bit more than that. Um, but that is the amount of money that we have got record of in our QuickBooks account. Um, but I will tell you that we are able to track that down to each and every student that we are able to bring over to Edina Public Schools. Been pretty proud of that. So, let's take a look at where our finances went last year. This past year, we brought over $384,511. The vast majority of it went to literacy, and that was to the science of reading. That was our third year in major funding for the science of reading and actually a pretty proud year for the ad fund for the science of reading. It was actually our smallest year for science of reading. However, it was our only year that we did not have federal funding grant money. Um so considering we had no large grant going into it, $195,000 is a lot of money when you're looking at individual donors. Would also like to give a shout out to all of our individual parent teacher organizations. all 10 of them, including the Early Learning and Family Center, put into that money. So, a huge thank you to all of them for helping us reach our goal. For our mental health and wellness money, I would like to say that of that $43,000, approximately $30,000 of that went to students and a little over $13,000 went to staff. So, that was a great accomplishment for us last year. And then you can read down there some of the other highlights. Once again, we had about $65,000 go to scholarships. We've got a fantastic Rotary Global Scholar Program, many other areas that we help support in our schools. So, what are we going to do this year? Well, obviously we've got our three main areas of programming, literacy, steam, and mental health and wellness. So, let's walk through them and see where our goals are at. First up, we've got literacy. This year's goal looks low to me, which is odd. It's still $108,000, but $108,000 is our lowest literacy goal we've seen in four years. Um, science and reading goal at $108,000 will cover us, we believe, for our fourth and fifth grade teachers along with our 6th through 12th um, uh, language arts teachers. So, that's where we've set it at. um those teachers are a little bit less professional development hours and a little bit cheaper rate. So that that's what we're looking for. Um this literacy goal is going to allow us to spend money in a couple other of our programming areas. Our steam area, we're looking at $67,500. That's going to allow us to spend some money in steam. That's our science, technology, engineering, the arts, and math. This is an area that for the last few years we actually have not reached our goal. So we're hoping to reach that this year and be able to invest some money to bank some money and be able to pay out where needed to help our project lead the way areas, our arts programs and some other things that have been lacking over the last few years at least from an edone funding perspective. And then our mental health goal. This is a high goal that we've had for the last couple years. We had a very high mental health goal in 2020 and 2021. And now we're approaching that level that we're looking for. Again, $171,000. Of that $30,000 is set aside for staff mental health. We've got $80,000 that we set aside for benevolence funding. That's our funding for our individual students so that they can sit with a therapist in the building. We actually allow for $1,848 per student. That allows them 12 sessions with a therapist. Works out to be about three months of therapy. Um during that time, our therapists work with our social workers and other people in the district to make sure a continuity of care for when that time is up. They have somewhere to go to. Sometimes the therapy is done and sometimes it's not. We got to make sure that our students have a plan afterwards. We also put aside $21,000 in discretionary funding. Mental health is not something that we can afford to be done with at the end of the year and we can pay out and have a zero account balance. I always need to have money on hand when we start the year up because there's always those couple students that need to have therapy support when the beginning of the year starts. And then we've also put aside $40,000 this year for social emotional learning. Um that is new for us. We are trying to start a funding for social emotional learning. This year um that money is going to go towards supplementing programs in our district that already exist. Um, many of our elementary school buildings have social emotional learning already and we're hoping to fund part of those programs that are already there. As you all know, this is programming that should be happening in every single one of our classrooms, whether they are at the early learning and family center all the way through grade 12. Social emotional learning is one of those things that whether you're talking about group work or working on yourself skills or um presentation skills, anything you can name is part of that. And as employers tell us, that is one of the biggest things that they're looking for. It's our students as a well-rounded person when they graduate. Our services are one of the other main components of what the ED fund does, and there's a couple main areas in there. First of all, our fiscal sponsorships and PTO partnerships. The ED fund houses all of the EHS activities and studentled clubs under our umbrella. What does that mean? Well, that means if you are a student at EHS and you are part of one of the 30 activities or 71 studentled clubs at EHS and you want to have a Devon's night or a car wash, then you have to work with Kathy at the Ed Fund and I'm happy to work with you. Um, and we set up time to work with all of our student led clubs and activities to make sure that they understand the rules that they need to follow and we work with them through that and we will be their bank for them and teach them how to work through their fiscal responsibilities there. Okay. We also are proud to work with many other groups like Edini Unified, um ELA, um everything from the elementary school robotics teams like the Cornelia First Lego League robotics club, um Edina Friends of Forensic, which is the parents club for speech and debate, and many, many more. The other two main big areas of our services are senior scholarships, of which we typically do around 58 scholarships a year. Last year, that amounted to about $65,000. This year, we're introducing a couple more. We'll see what that shakes out to be. That's where the ad fund works with individual donors in our community to set up scholarships and work with them on the restrictions they would like to have. And then we work with the high school to make sure that those restrictions are kept in place when the high school decides who those recipients are in the springtime. And we also house the Dina Alumni Association under our umbrella. Every year we work with individual classes that come in for their reunions. And that can be a re um a reunion class calling me and telling me, can you help promote that we have a reunion coming up? Or can you help give us a tour of the high school? This year we offered tours to many graduating classes that you can see on there. Um we do that all summer long on Fridays and Saturdays and into the fall. And some classes ask if we can be their web hosting site and that can mean that we have them on our website. We actually take registrations for their reunion. We handle their ticketing and we're their bank for them. So it's kind of a plethora of what we do for these classes. It just depends. That is great for the district actually too because it brings this these alumni into our community. It helps us to understand who they are and then when we want um to reach out to alumni and to say, "Hey, we're looking for someone that's in this area and we'd really love to connect with our alumni to be able to have our high school students or our middle school students connect with them." We have a resource and a way to be able to do that. So, what all this comes down to is the United Education Fund is really everywhere. And whether your student has been touched with the science of reading through literacy, or maybe they're in a drawing class at the high school, maybe they were part of that Excite Ed camp this past summer and they came home and they told you about that high school student that really helped them out and played this game and they had so much fun with it. Maybe they're in the girls united club that just printed a t-shirt in the Project Lead the Way and that that te short teacher with the curly hair helped them. Or maybe they love their Project Lead the Way class. Maybe they're a rising senior and they're going to be applying for a scholarship and they're almost part of the Edina Alumni Association. Or maybe you're an EDO alum. It's all part of the Adina Education Fund. We are here 365 days a year because learning is here 365 days a year. And it really is important that we're here to support our students and our staff every single day of the year and making sure that all of this wonderful work can happen. We appreciate all of you that are part of our sustaining circle and to help make the UDINA education fund happen. And we really hope that you can help us spread the word. The more people that can give just $5 a month and to help sustain the ad fund and the great work we can do, the more we can do. And I really appreciate you letting us be here tonight. Questions for me? All right, >> no question. But I just wanted to point out that again when you think about everything that the ed fund has done since 1995, but especially over the last five years since COVID with the science of learning, with our read act, um, and all things we've done with mental health and wellness, um, Edina public schools could not do what it needs to do for all of its students without the assistance of the ED fund. So, as the liaison from the board to the ed fund, um I can only echo getting people to recognize that constant support for the ed fund is one of the best ways possible for us to give us the flexibility at the school district level to address the different needs that we might have. So, thank you Kathy, all the parents who are on the board, all the people who support the ED fund. Um really, it's a critical cornerstone of what we're able to do in the in the district and so thank you for all of your effort. Absolutely. >> Yes. Thank you for your work and I know that there's other board members here this evening and staff and thank you for all that you do to support each and every one of our kiddos. So appreciate you. All right. Uh we will be moving on to our consent agenda. And is there anything anyone would like to remove from the consent agenda? All right. Before we vote to approve the consent agenda, uh uh Director Ellenburgg is going to abstain from voting just because of her work um with MSBA. So um the rest of us will be voting on the consent agenda. Uh do I have a motion to approve the consent agenda? >> So moved. >> Arum, do I have a second? >> Second, >> man. All those in favor of approving the consent agenda say I. >> I. Anyone opposed? The consent agenda has been approved. We are now moving on to our discussion items. And our only dis item for discussion tonight is the first reading of several policies. Um even though we only have one item for discussion tonight, I will note that we had a full and robust work session prior to this board meeting where we had several key items that uh the board discussed. So, I will turn it over to uh Director Alenberg, chair of the policy committee to walk us through these policies. >> Uh thank you. Yes, we have a few policies um for discussion tonight. Um the first one had no changes, but it's policy 602, organization of the school calendar and school day. So before I asked Sonia and Nate to actually walk 20 feet, I want to see if anyone has questions about that policy because there weren't actually any changes to it. >> Was it just reviewed because of the site? >> Yes, the cycle. >> It was reviewed because of the cycle. >> Okay, >> I spared you. Unless you need the steps for your phone. Um the second is policy 606.5 and is it um Jod? Are you taking this? And we have director of teaching and learning um Jod D. St. Hubert who's going to talk to us about this one. This one also um we're doing the 600 series right now. And so this um didn't change that much. It was updated with um MSBA model policy. And so there are a couple of updates, but there weren't really any substantive substantive changes. I don't think I still pronounce that correctly. So if you would like to review those, that would be great. >> I will. Thank you, Chair Alenberg. Um, Director, that's happened twice tonight. My apologies, Chair. >> Thank you, Vice Chair Ellenburgg. Um, yes, you have highlighted the main things that we've done in looking at this. Um the purpose of this policy is the selection of and reconsideration of library materials. And so the area where the most changes occurred in alignment with MSBA wording is in the reconsideration section. And that also there was some tweaks made there so that the um policy and the appendix the actual process of putting the work into place aligned and were clear and were tight. Um, so the biggest section that I want to point out is section eight and that was enacted um in 2024 by legislation. So that's an ad and what's new about that is that once a um the process is if if a person has a challenge of materials that they go to the principal and the media specialist at a building. If things are not resolved there then they take that to a more formal process um that you use the appendix forms to fill out. If that happens, that has to also be reported to MDE, no matter the result of that reconsideration and that process. So that's section 8 and that was again new in 2024. Um otherwise I that that really highlights the majority of the things within the policy and the updates. Are there any questions, thoughts, feedback? >> Yeah, Director Burman actually. >> Oh, I'm sorry. Director Barry. >> Um, a lot of our teachers have classroom libraries. And let me preface this question by saying that I truly believe our teachers are professionals who curate their classroom libraries with care and expertise. So this question is merely for clarification purposes. Um, but would this policy apply to those libraries as well or just the media centers? >> It would not. This applies to the media centers. There is a policy I don't remember what policy where it's uh teach like curriculum resources. >> Okay. >> Um where there's a process and that classroom libraries would fall under that. >> Okay. Thank you. >> 606. >> I think you're right. I think it is 606. >> Oh wow. I should have known. 606.5. Oh, >> and it has a it's a >> it's a similar robust policy, but there's um because of the legislation from um the state um I think this is good because it uh specifically clarifies the different areas to your point and then what are the specific policies or protocols I should say for those areas. Uh, director Bergman, >> I just had a clarifying question just from the execution of the way the law is written and how the policy has been updated. >> So, when we get if we get to the point to where uh library materials review committee is is launched by the superintendent and then don't it's specific to that building's uh library or is it districtwide that this decision would then impact what happens? >> That that is a really good question. Um, I think it would be and I would need to follow up on this districtwide. >> Okay. because it what it what I found interesting as I read through it was when you look at how the review >> um committee is structured um you know it seemed like it's specific to a library specialist a building principal so on so forth I'm assuming if wherever the request came from of that particular level of the building so if it's in the elementary school versus the high school um but we're just a point of clarification the policy doesn't need to be updated to say this but I just want to make sure we understand that this would be districtwide the superintendent would do this and this would be on a district-wide basis So >> that's the cons that's how we would approach this. >> Yes, >> director Birdman, Director D. Stain Hubert is 100% correct. It is districtwide. >> Thank you. >> Are there any other questions on this policy? >> Okay, thank you very much for the work and thank Bethany as well. >> I will. I will. Thank you. >> Thank you. Um, next we have policy 624 and um, as assistant superintendent um, well, you'll go over this is a completely new policy, correct? Okay. So, thank you. I will turn it over to you uh, super assistant superintendent Spencson. >> Okay. Just a little bit. First of all, thank you, Vice Chair Ellenburgg. Um, just I I just want to provide a little context about 624. So, we began reviewing our current policy 624 when this first came up. And what we realized over time was that we were trying to revise something that really wasn't revisable. And we figured out why is that in 2023 um the online learning statute law was rewritten. And so our current policy 624, um, this is a general statement. It doesn't cover everything, but it'll give you an idea about what the issue was. Our current policy 624 addressed online supplemental providers only. And what is being recommended is that we pivot to the MSBA policy 624. that is far more comprehensive in nature. And uh just to give you um some of the additional pieces that are added into this policy that are not in our current policy 624. So, uh, the MSBA model policy, it expands the scope, um, to cover digital instruction, blended learning, online instructional sites, and supplemental online courses. The supplemental online courses was really the one thing that was addressed in in our present policy. Uh, and then it just ensures full compliance with the Minnesota online uh, instruction act. In addition to that uh in the current 624 there are only three defined terms and in what the recommended policy there are a set of 10 def definitions including things like digital instruction blended instruction online teacher online instructional site and supplemental online course provider. So, it provides more clarity when you think about online instruction. Um, there are also clearer procedures for enrollment and and credit. Um, and the MSBA version lays out step-by-step procedures for enrollment, approval, and monitoring of supplemental online courses. And it also requires that we appoint an online learning liaison, which in our case it would be Steven Cullison. Um and then uh another example of something that this does is it ensures that PSO students uh um receive the same supports as those who are in a traditional classroom. Um, let me just think that those are the main things uh that the new policy covers. Um, again, most of which are not presently covered in policy 624 that we have. So the recommendation is being made to um utilize what MSBA has provided. What questions might you have >> Dr. Ber? Um the one question that I I don't know where if this is appropriate in this conversation or not, but given the fact that we don't offer online um education opportunities below high school, we got out of that business of doing so. The policy doesn't explicitly say like where we're obligated or where these rules apply. So the question that came up was given that we don't currently offer that, but the policy doesn't say it's only for secondary uh level Are we obligated under the law to if if a student needed some sort of online or supplementary online education component? Would we be obligated under the policy to still provide that even though we don't actually have a program involved to do so? So, we we connect them to another vendor or provider to do so. I would need to circle back to you on an answer um for that one only because we don't presently to your point >> offer >> um online classes to sixth, seventh, and eighth grade or K through um >> I think it's important because the way the policy is is worded with the recommendation that's here. It doesn't it leaves it open to interpretation as to whether we're obligated to do that as it doesn't explicitly call out who it's for and who it's not for. I just curious as to what happens with that. >> I can speak to that and the laws change quite a bit as well as our practices since co and so there's been an active fluidity to those types of things. We would not be obligated to do that but the policy would allow should we go through the MDE process to provide additional programming and accreditation we certainly could and the same guidance would apply. >> Got it. Thank you. >> Any other questions? >> Okay. Thank you very much. And then um uh assistant superintendent Swinson I Oh, or is it Are you staying up for the next one? Yeah. Okay. Um the next one is policy 903 visitors to the to school district buildings and property. And there weren't um many substant substantive changes to the policy. The changes were more in um the appendix. Um and I'll also turn it over to you, super assistant super I can't say those words together. Assistant Superintendent Swinson um to um walk through the changes in the appendix. Um just I I'll just go through the changes and to vice chair Alenberg's point there aren't substantive changes but there is one piece in here that um is worth noting for sure. Um just the first thing I want to talk to talk about is that there is a slightly revised um PSO portion um that was just rewritten for clarity so it's easier to understand um what that portion of the policy was referring to and it's just about access to technology that PSO students have during the school day um I in our district um as it relates ates to there's a visitor conduct portion and we change the wording slightly um that it allows us the same discretion but um is more accurate of how we uh address visitors who may not be being their best selves. Um, so we made a slight revision to that language and then um and then we made also a slight edit to be more clear around photographing and filming. Um, and then the the part that I'd like to draw your attention to is just in appendix one for traffic and parking, we expanded the prohibition of recreational vehicles to include electric assisted bicycles. That is that is would be a new part of this policy. What questions might you have questions? Excellent. Um, that concludes the discussion of this month's policies. Um, thank you very much, Assistant Superintendent Swinson and the rest of the team that contributed. >> All right. Thank you. And these policies will come up for action at our November meeting. All right. All right, we are moving on to the action portion of our meeting. Uh, do I have a motion to approve the language access plan? >> So moved. >> Birdman, is there a second? >> Second. >> Man, I welcome Dr. Franny Peak, uh, director of achievement equity and multilingual learning learner programming to discuss the plan with us. And welcome Good evening, Chair Gabler, Dr. Bitman, members of the board. I am going to review quickly the Edina public schools language access plan. Where the language access plan comes from is the state of Minnesota in statute said that in the 2526 school year all school districts needed to have a language access plan. The state of Minnesota MDE um the Minnesota Department of Education provided ongoing work sessions last year for what should be in your language access plan. So in the Diana language access plan are the questions that the Minnesota Department of Education shared that we should answer in our language access plan. I attended all those meetings, got the template. Um we had an opportunity to receive uh share ideas with each other and receive feedback about things that we were asking to put on our template. found those um incredibly uh valuable in drafting the plan because at first all of us who were attending the meetings went what is this about? What are we supposed to create? But um MDE did help walk us through it. So on the first pages it just you do all your language access plans are supposed to talk about the federal require there's federal requirement and there are state requirements for the language access plan. We cover that in our language access plan. I think the most important part about the whole language access plan is on page four. And I don't I will read this part because I think this is the part that's the most important thing of it is family rights. The family has a right to receive information about their child's education and in their home language. If a family asks for that, they have a right to that. Families have a right to have an interpreter for important meetings about their child. So we if they ask we need to provide an interp doesn't have we'll talk more about doesn't have to be an interpreter inerson interpreter but they they have a right to ask to have an interpreter there and they have a right to participate fully in their child's educational experience and we eliminate the barrier of language. I feel that's the most important part of all language access plans is we um come from the best intentions that we know all of our families want to be active participants in their child's educational career and our job in the education system is to help remove barriers for them. Language access plan is one way that we remove barriers for our families. What is nice about the language access plan is on the next page uh and we have used this lately at some sites when people have called and asked us questions. We have provided the official Edina definitions of all of these terms. These were words that my department knew and used and maybe everybody didn't have the exact same understanding that we had but now we can say these are Edina's interpretation of all of these words. So that is so you that is a part of the language access plan that needs to be in place. Language identification procedures that is on page five when we talk about this this there's federal state law that talks about how you identify language. Um so we just took a process that was already in place. When you enroll in a school, you have to answer the Minnesota language survey, which there are four questions that families need to answer on that survey indicating whether um what language is the primary language at home, what language their child learned, and based off and we at lots of districts, any Dina does too adds in a fifth question, which is not part of the four questions, but that question does ask what language uage do you as the family prefer to be contacted in? So that is when when you asked the question earlier about how our liaison contact families that is the first way that they filter through names is they work with um the enrollment department and we get the list of names from families who have indicated uh the preference of language they want to be communicated in. There's lots of other ways we bring families on board, but that's the I like to say that's the very first step. I think as Blanca said, it's a lot of them being present in buildings and building relationships where we continue to add names to that. So that just is explains the process of our student information system that families ask. The important part about that if anybody asks is we don't look at a family and say, "Oh, I heard you speaking with an accent." and make assumptions about a family's language and start contacting them in that language. We make no assumptions. We strictly go by what the family has shared with us on how they want to be communicated. I think that is what that is guaranteeing there. The next part is we have several tools that we use to communicate with families. One clarification when we talk about communicating with families and interpretation, our cultural liaison are not interpreters. They do not interpret. Our cultural liaison are there to be cultural support or affinity support for a family when they're in a meeting in a difficult time. We ask that if it is a challenging meeting that needs an interpreter that an interpreter is called and the cultural liaison is there and so that um it is very hard for a liaison to interpret and provide support to a family at the same time. So we stay very we we're very strict about that in my department. We are constantly reminding people. Now we do interpret in emergencies. Emergencies happen where you can't get an interpreter. But if it is a planned or scheduled meeting, we have provided multiple ways that we can have interpreters present. So the three ways that we can do interpretation is we have OPI over the phone interpretation and you just dial a number and uh you can do it over the phone or you can put your phone on speaker phone and you can do interpretation that way. Just this school year, we've added virtual remote interpretation so that you log into your computer and a face shows up in a Google Meet and you can put your computer here and you can be here and the com there there is a face that goes with a person. So, it's virtual remote interpretation. You can schedule those meetings or they're on demand. And then the final way is um in-person interpretation. Those are the three ways that we provide interpretation. Virtual or remote virtual remote interp interpretation VR has taken off in the district. I look at the numbers every other day. U just to make sure I'm like was this worth our investment? And yes, it has been worth our investment. Another way that we found out this summer when we were reviewing this with principles that staff communicate with families is through text. And I'm forgetting the name because I don't use it. There was a texting app that Yes. Talking points. So, a lot of our um teachers communicate with families via talking points with our multilingual families because they have a way that they can um switch how they read it. So, that we have a lot of ways that we provide that. As you know, if you look at our website in the corner, you can click and you can change the language of the website. So there's many ways that we provide access to language for families in the district. We had some gaps and the language access plan was helpful for us because it helped us identify those gaps and we closed those gaps and just added some more opportunities within our system to support families. In here we do have guidance on using AI for interpretation um for translation and AI for translation. Um it is okay to use AI for translation if it is not a vital document and federally they define what a vital document is. So if a family asks to have an IEP trans the family has a right and if they ask to have an IEP translated we can't use AI for that. We don't automatically have to translate it but it's what if the family asks then we need to go through appropriate translation. If a student um if they wanted a report card translated we would have to go through um a certified translation service for that. Um we have two of our lead uh Farhe and Hussein are certified interpreters. They're not certified translationists. Um so we do have to go through a translation service for those. I think those are important things for people to understand with the language access plan and the state of Minnesota wants people to clearly understand when you're using professional interpreters. It is a certification to be a professional interpreter when you're translating. It's a certification to be a professional translator because you want to make sure you get the nuance of the message across to the parent. And there was AI guidance on translation. Talked about why we would not want to use AI on those VTO documents and that could get us in trouble. And it just and then the people that support this are our cultural leaison. And then the other group that supports us are our English language development teachers. Um so they are for our multilingual learners who are learning English and they're in English language development classes. They I work closely with them and they support a lot of our families helping to make sure that their needs are being met. And that is we did review this with um as part of the language access plan. You are supposed to review it with principles. So we've reviewed it with principles. we get questions coming our way and we share it with teach just this week as I said we were sharing it with some teachers about um interpretation because some families were trying to have sometimes families want a relative to interpret and it's nice to have in a language access plan that we can say well that's lovely except for we need to have you know we need to either use video remote or have an in-person interpreter so I know one site was working with some families that about needing a certified interpreter and let's see oh last page there was a there was a lot of technical stuff is why it was like so many pages long um we reviewed it with principles staff are know about it and we had to put it on the district website and we have it at the bottom where it says language access plan and once the board gives your official approval, we will work on going ahead and having it trans. We always translate in um Edina Somalian Spanish. We will then have a translated Somali in Spanish copy on the website. It's just not there yet because we have not approved it. Any questions? Director Barry. >> Um, thank you for this. This is >> really fantastic and important. >> Um, I'm wondering if as we get used to using these new tools, um, you know, this is required for all the essential parent notifications. Our PTOs, especially at the elementary level, do a lot of the community building organizing. Um just you know thinking ahead if it would maybe be possible to partner with them and using some of these tools to reach families not just to let them know an event is happening but to maybe get to families earlier and saying this is what this is would you like to come on board and help us plan this just as a community building just something to think about you know but thank you for this >> director Alenberg >> um two questions um one is um given uh the current state of certain things in our country right now, um I could see families being leerary about putting their um language on forms when they register their students. >> And I was just wondering if we communicate the purpose of why we're asking that. and what we actually do with the information to ensure that families are comfortable giving us information in order to help educate their children. Um because I would hate for that to be a barrier to parents engaging in our education system and students as well. So I was just wondering about that. So that has all not just this year or that has always been um an issue with families wanting to put uh some families just will always put English English only and you know that it's not because you hear them speaking another language right in front of you. Um but I always work with staff we have to respect the family's choice. Now, our ML teachers are absolutely amazing and our front office staff are amazing and they will build relationships with families and as they build those relationships with families, we will get we will find out what a family's needs are. So, we've always navigated that and we really do lean into, as Blanca said, liaison being in the buildings is so important and them being around and building relationships. Um, and then our front office staff, they are just really wonderful and our ML teachers build those relationships with families too. But I I do with that I'm always it's a conversation I've had a lot this year and I said we have to respect what the family put down even if we are looking at them and they are speaking a different language and in front of us we have to. So it's just a lot of communication that that information is not shared. I believe our our um enrollment office, they're absolutely amazing down there in the conversations that they have with families that this is just to support you. We're not sharing it, we're not sharing the information anywhere. >> Thank you for um speaking to that. Um, a second piece which is along the same lines of what director Barry said >> is it I think it would be great to partner with our communications department not to put any more work on our communications area. Um but so many of our communications not just come from PTO's but come from individual schools and explaining um what formats can be automatically translated and what can't because as parents we get a lot of PDFs >> and those are not translatable and I think just trying to explain um it because a lot of people don't understand that um explaining when you send out a school newsletter when you do this when you do that can you please try to use these formats because then our families that aren't um English language learn speakers can automatically translate it and so just maybe some learnings in different areas wherever we touch that is really really good advice because I learned that this summer when I was traveling and I was when I went to translate if somebody's website had a lot of PDFs on it I was like I couldn't do the automatic translation Okay, that is an important part of this. >> A lot of what we communicate at the school level like posters for activities, a lot of it is PDF based. So just a >> or if there's a secondary document that Yeah. So just a question comments. So thank you >> director Birdman. >> Um my question is really about the training and understanding of the staff if they then need to use this plan. So, not just the people who might be doing IEPs or doing something spec, but even a teacher who's trying to even though they're using some of the mechanisms you talked about, but where they there's a really clear process they've been trained on how they need to be able to access interpreter for something that's critically important in in that messaging. I want to make sure that not only is this plan clearly that we approve it and it's in place and so on so but it's only as valuable to where we then have it accessible, authorized and encouraged to be used where it'll be most effective for what the goal is for doing so. So do you have any comments or clarifications on how staff are going to know how this works and have easy accessibility for authorization to get it done so they can do that? So we've worked with the principles and then I am working with the ad admin deans at the buildings and so the admin deans are the ones who took on they're like we will make sure staff know how to use video remote interpretation. So just continuing to work with admin deans and work with principles to make sure that staff have what they need. Staff again as I said staff reach out to me. We make sure that the ML teachers are absolutely versed on this because a lot of times people will go to the ML teacher in the building. So just getting it out there slowly. >> You mentioned earlier um as far as how we might measure like its utilization and so on so forth. Have you already come up with metrics or what your frequency of what you want to look at or goals you have around using that? >> I just wanted to know if video remote interpretation was going to be used. So we use language line and language line is a system. It's the one that's most used by schools and hospitals of all of the video remote interpretation systems. So, um, they have a dashboard that you can go on and see. I could pull it up right now and see yesterday this many people use. So we were actually last year we were on a downward trend of our use of language line and now that we have brought video remote interpretation in and I've been walking around telling a lot of people talking point is important but we also need to build in-person um relationships with it. You don't you can't really build a relationship via text. So sometime we do have to call families. Um, that has been my rallying cry for a year. Uh, I got to see that our use over last year was up. Our year-over-year use was up this year. So, people are getting the message that there are resources in Edina. We just got very used to always calling a in-person interpreter. uh and also getting people used to the idea that there are other resources out there that can interpret. >> Thank you. >> I would just say thank you for the for the work. I would just say to our community members that much of this was in place already in Edina public schools. We pride ourselves on the work that we do. This document was helpful and that we just articulate that better uh for us to share with our students, our families, and our staff. So, thank you for your work and we'll continue to uh do everything we can to support our families. >> Thank you. We will now vote to approve the language access plan. All those in favor of approving the language access plan say I. >> I. >> Any opposed? The language access plan is approved. Thank you, Dr. Beare. All right. And our last item for action this evening is um to approve some policies. So do I have a motion to approve policies 208, 516, 516.5, 524, and 713? >> So moved. >> Man, is there a second? >> Second. >> Alenberg. Uh policy chair Alenberg, I will turn it over you to you to mention anything about these policies since we reviewed them at our last meeting. Um there are no changes since um we discussed them at the last meeting and so unless there questions um I'm ready to move forward with approving them. Uh we will now vote to approve policies 208, 516, 516.5, 524, and 713. All those in favor say I. >> I. >> Anyone opposed? Policy 208, 516, 516.5, 524, and 713 are approved. Board members, uh, do you have any leadership or committee updates for the board and the public? I have one. Um, just a reminder that on September 23rd, the board voted to approve the Minnesota School Board Association or MSBA as our preferred search firm in helping us with the permanent superintendent search. Uh, in tonight's consent agenda, the board approved the contract with MSBA and tomorrow evening at 6:30, we will be holding a special meeting with MSBA to begin our work together. So tomorrow's meeting will include a workshop for the board called hiring the right superintendent and we will also be discussing the timeline stakeholder surveys and other pertinent beginning of search topics. Superintendent Bitman, do you have any updates for us? >> Madame Chair, just one uh for the board. This month's boardroom display features art of some some of Madame Frances Amar's students at Normandale. So, you'll see some great new artwork throughout our district boardroom. Her first grade students have been working on art supply robots, and after learning all about the proper use of their art supplies, they trace their supplies and turn them into their own robot creations. The second graders created still life painting using them in front of them. And then the fourth graders have been working on bird creation. So after studying the style of Australian artist Pete Chromemer, students painted their own unique papers of their colorful bird creations. And then finally, the fifth grade students designed some city landscapes focused on the art principle of contrast and the use of color versus no color on the oil pastels and pen. So we are grateful for Madame Aamara French and her students for sharing these examples of artwork that they have done at the beginning of this school year and they certainly brighten up the room. Thank you. Uh, do I have a motion to adjourn our meeting? >> So moved. >> Arum, is there a second? >> Second. >> Alenberg. We will vote to adjourn the meeting. All those in favor say I. >> I. >> Any opposed? >> The motion is passed and the October 13, 2025 board meeting has adjourned.