[4:33] [Music] thank you [4:39] leah and lisa thank you for your update did you have any more um that you wanted to speak to before um it's opened up to [4:46] board members to ask any questions they have i don't think so we're [4:51] ready for questions am i correct lisa we're ready for questions great thank you um julie i see that you um are off [4:59] mute so yeah i just have two um i have two questions um and one comment one is [5:07] you know the timing for when you will open up um registration [5:13] in for the preschool classes or that already open or just what's that [5:19] update on that part yep so our preschool classes actually opened in february and [5:24] they always remain open yeah and so really what we're hoping to be able to do is actually go off of our current [5:32] registrants and really just make the process a little bit easier we might have a few classes that we'll need to [5:37] tweak here and there but we're really hoping that the majority of our families that are already registered will be able [5:42] to stay where they are great okay that's that's right great okay and then the other um [5:49] comment that i wanted to make is i was happy to see that the pyramid [5:55] work that you guys are going to be able to still incorporate that into the classroom and i know that such important [6:00] work um so i just wanted to make a comment that i i noticed that that um i just [6:06] think it's really excellent so thanks julie we appreciate that acknowledgement it's a lot of work and [6:12] our team has done an amazing job yeah and i know it's really making a difference in your kiddos so um or our [6:18] kiddos i should say so i appreciate that so thanks thanks [6:24] um any other board members have questions [Music] [6:30] well you guys get the prize of the night for the fewest questions all right high five lisa [6:37] good job well thank you guys thank you thank you yeah thank you i know you guys are working [6:43] super hard so i really appreciate it okay i think we'll combine uh the middle [6:50] school and high school uh and kind of call it a secondary presentation there's similarities some differences but [6:55] similarities i think we'll start with uh just to have sean and andy tag team they'll take questions right [7:01] after they're done presenting which shouldn't be long all right well thanks everyone thanks uh [7:06] superintendent thank you uh chairman um [7:12] busy in the middle school and just like minnesota weather um [7:17] we waited 15 minutes and it changed and so we've been moving things [7:22] right along hey andy can you mute your mic andy can you there you go [7:29] okay it sounds like he's in a bowling alley you know you never know maybe that's where i'm at yeah you never know so it's [7:36] a very fancy bowling alley with uh white cabinets in it so um [7:44] no no worries so i just want to just go through a few of some operational things [7:49] that um that i want to touch on that are perhaps changes um from previous years [7:55] and i think really good changes for safety's sake and um bringing our kids in um as you well know we're bringing in [8:02] with a hybrid 50 of our kids and our alpha split is a through k and l through z [8:08] and our friend in the enrollment office greg gusweiler has [8:14] done a a pretty deep dive into the alpha split and how it works um across the middles and secondary and [8:22] and feels like that is a good split so i i thank him for that so with that 50 hybrid split um a couple [8:30] little things we're talking about um so lockers we're not going to do lockers [8:35] this year um one of the things we think about with social distancing and middle school kids [8:41] is that they congregate and you can't socially distance when you're next to somebody in a locker so kids will carry [8:48] backpacks and we'll give some size recommendations but we're hoping that that will go much [8:54] better and it'll be a much safer thing for kids we've also talked about no phi ed lockers because we will not be having [9:01] the kids change in fayette if you think about locker rooms and and the proximity [9:06] that that might bring us that doesn't seem like it's a safe right now [9:12] with things get better with the virus or we have that much needed vaccine we could [9:17] dial that back in we've also talked to our music teachers about what that would look like in terms [9:23] of orchestra band and choir and how might we do that um you know [9:29] oxygenating the room with singing with that great tone and sound and so we [9:34] are working our plans in that area to make sure that kids can can get a music [9:40] experience but yet it's a safe one we are working on how do we stagger our [9:46] passing times so that kids are leaving and not in the hall all at once uh talking about um ids so one of the [9:54] things i think is interesting when kids are wearing masks um it's gonna be harder to to build [10:00] those connections because you're only gonna see their eyes and so you're really going to have to get to know students and smile with your eyes [10:07] and being irish you know irish eyes do smile i'm i'm told so [10:12] we thought that it'd be helpful at the middle level not only for kids for lunch purposes and [10:18] check out checking out materials purposes but this is the year they're going to wear lanyards with their ids on [10:24] the lanyard and we'll be able to get to know the kids more because their id will have their full picture and their full [10:31] face and so i think it's a great change um we'll all be wearing that mask [10:36] but we'll get to know kids and be able to connect with them and because in middle school that it's really all about [10:41] relationships um one of the things that uh i think is incredibly important um [10:48] as we look at the instructional side of things is that in an a day b day model um we [10:55] are just we're sort of complicating the hybrid just a little bit more um because we [11:01] always do run an 8 a b day and now we have to have a 50 so if you think about that that is [11:08] the students are in school twice a week can teachers see their kids once a week [11:14] that time is extraordinarily precious that that teachers will have with their their students [11:20] and and so to that end as we think about what instructional practices would might be best practices we [11:27] we know that the flipped model of instruction does offer some benefits and in fact at valley v we had a number of [11:33] teachers um when quite a while ago and one of them mark carlson our k-12 math [11:39] um instructional leader um actually do flip flipped instruction and so we know at [11:45] valley view that that does work and we know that that is something that we should look into um and think about but i i do think that [11:52] it's important for us to think about instructionally as as students do come [11:57] into the classroom and we do have them in front of us we need to be doing things that we can't do in distance [12:03] learning and the main thing that teachers found hard and parents and kids found hard was really building the [12:08] connections with each other and doing those collaborative activities and things like that [12:14] um so i i don't think we come into the class to do a lecture we can do a lecture in another way we come into [12:21] class to really do an activity to really take the information that given that we [12:26] have in front of us and do something with it and with that in mind i think that is as [12:32] tough as this situation is and it's a big ask and it's a heavy lift for teachers no doubt about it it's it's [12:38] really a big ask i do think it's going to actually um have an optimistic that we will be [12:47] rethinking some of what we do when we have kids in front of us um in the future so it's it's been such a um [12:54] it's been such a precious thing to have them in our building and so we should not take that for granted even if we [13:00] come back full-time face-to-face in the future and i'm hopeful of that [13:07] we have been pivoting quite frequently with our decisions and how we think about um the slow role that we might bring [13:14] students in and on the schedule that you have for the middle school schedule and orientation on your board packet you can [13:21] see that um this is our latest iteration and in this iteration we have our sixth graders [13:27] coming in every day recognizing that it is a transition point like kindergarten different than kindergarten like [13:33] kindergarten it's also a transition point for parents as much as it is for students it is a transition point for [13:39] parents as well and so bringing our sixth graders in every day in person um [13:44] would would actually be a really positive thing so no when i say that i'm saying that sixth graders will be in the [13:51] building but they'll be in twice that week splitting the alpha alphabet into that a through k [13:56] l through c iteration while their um sixth graders are in we have part of our seventh and eighth graders also coming [14:02] in and when students are not in uh face-to-face during that orientation [14:09] week so to speak we have them working on some independent learning profiles and some synchronous [14:14] activities there are ways to do that sort of live um that sort of synchronous like [14:21] activities that that doesn't require a teacher to be streaming into the [14:26] classroom we have found at valley view a number of teachers last spring did do [14:32] synchronous leg activities and synchronous activities i think everyone's looking forward to [14:37] that that time when they can see their kids and i think that um [14:44] the the way that we do it in terms of our furniture and our hallways and and all that that entails [14:51] is going to be you know the middle school kids and so i i'm hopeful that first of all kids will come with a [14:58] sense of already realizing that this is a this is a historic time they're old enough to realize that and um the math [15:05] policy and the masking um i'm i'm super hopeful that that kids will come with that mask [15:13] on and um like ellen mentioned what do you do if a kid doesn't wear a mask i mean we have a conversation and if it [15:19] doesn't work we're not going to allow kids to put other kids at risk i mean that is true so we we want to take that [15:25] seriously but um i know i want to keep this short but there's so much to say i could probably [15:30] talk all night but then andy beaten wouldn't get on and i would have to like you know answer to him so i'm not going to do [15:37] that i would just say that we have thought about students first in in student safety and staff safety [15:44] first in all of this it's really about safety and for parents who are um on this route on this recording on this [15:50] live feed listening the decision you make um is going to be key for us in developing [15:56] our next set of plans and that decision should be made based on the health and the safety of your child [16:02] and um i i think there is nothing more important than that we can figure the rest of it out your [16:09] child will get a quality outstanding education whether it's in the virtual [16:14] academy it's hybrid whatever it might be we will respond and we have outstanding staff at [16:22] the middle level so i i know i don't worry about that because i know that um safety is important and [16:28] it's staff safety as well so we want to make sure that everyone stays safe in this and [16:34] we will continue to iterate we will continue to iterate and modify [16:40] and it's really um it's really responding to the data and responding to the needs of kids and to what parents [16:46] tell us they want so with that i have a lot more i could say um [16:51] but i'll just pause there and um post questions [16:56] and or maybe actually andy do you want to go sure i'll go ahead and maybe we'll just take questions as a secondary does that [17:03] sound okay perfect thank you all right chair ellenberg superintendent schultz member of the members of the [17:08] board thanks for inviting us here tonight and thanks sean for your information you know i'm going to repeat a number of the things that you've heard [17:14] tonight you know our are kind of three big buckets um have been in this whole model first around safety and operations [17:21] second is about uh a strong instructional model on student learning you know and that third [17:27] is really about wellness you know for our staff and it's also about the learning supports that we can provide [17:32] for our kids so um some of the things that sean talked about i think will be things that [17:38] we do at the high school in terms of how we teach culture in the hallways certainly teaching our students at the [17:43] high school about wearing their mask i think they will do a great job because i think our students are motivated to be [17:49] at school and if they want to be at school and continue to be at school they will wear their masks they will wash [17:54] their hands they will practice social distancing and that's an absolute expectation at the high school and i think our high school kids have such a [18:01] desire uh to be uh there in person that they will honor that um some things that [18:06] are the things we're talking about is is sort of those issues that um our kids have i shouldn't say issues some of the [18:11] things they value is how do those large group congregations in the hall before they come to school we're going to have to change some things about how students [18:18] enter the building go directly to class we're thinking about shortening up some passing times to be able to have kids go [18:24] more direct sometimes we use that passing time for moving from class to class but a lot of it also is about a decompressing and [18:31] talking to students and their friends so we're going to have to change some of those things so there's a trade-off with [18:37] the things that we have to do when we come back in terms of operations but i think our students will really [18:42] rise to the occasion the next piece you know learning supports is that we are really putting a lot of things in [18:48] place that i think we do when we're face to face kids will have access to peer tutors during the school day [18:55] we will still have student support teams we still have a robust uh counseling and social work and school sykes in our [19:02] building to be able to provide seo support to our kids as you know and supported we have a new [19:07] 9th grade teaming model so we're going to be able to get even closer to our ninth grade students and get to know [19:13] them and have sort of case load representation within those models in that teaming model that we have so we're [19:18] really excited about that we're going to be using our staff the very best way we can we might be [19:25] shifting some of those teacher duties that uh the teachers have and certain moving those from supervision to really [19:31] being office hours because we want to be able to support kids that are home doing online work so how do kids get academic [19:37] support whether they're home doing online work because their teachers are going to be busy teaching face to face [19:43] all day long so we're really thinking about how do we get support to kids in both settings [19:49] i should tell parents and some of the rumors and discussions out there with all of our required courses we will [19:56] be offering and be able to offer those courses both both in the hybrid model and in the online or eva model we will [20:02] be able to do that that includes advanced placement courses so anything that's required that's part of that required curriculum [20:09] we'll be able to offer both the only time we might lose a class is if we have [20:14] a specific elective that we have only two let's say we only have two students [20:19] that are in the eva that have that are in that class it's going to be difficult for us to shift resources to a [20:26] very small class so it's almost like a re-registration for some of those classes we might have to move some of those to a different elective that would [20:32] be the only class that type of class that we might lose but everything else i [20:37] think we're trying to maintain those courses that we offer for all of our kids that [20:42] they registered for it and remember last spring our kids registered for um 38 000 course [20:49] requests that we put into a master schedule within our schedule of all the courses [20:55] both elective and core that they want and so it's it's complicated as it is to create that master schedule and get kids [21:02] those course choices that they want and now in this environment it's it adds another layer of the kids that are fully online and [21:09] the kids are in hybrid the teachers that will be in the hybrid and some teachers [21:15] that also may be fully online as teachers so again depending on the data what we [21:20] have from our kids and their requests and also the data that we have and the accommodations we may have to provide [21:26] for some of our our staff that's going to impact how we run our school so um the data is going [21:33] to be really important so i'll echo what karen said what everybody's saying parents please go on there and make your [21:39] choice so we can have the best possible information to make good choices about our resources starting next week [21:46] and the one one thing i guess that i want to acknowledge about edina high school teachers [21:51] they are extremely dedicated they work very hard and they want to be amazing i mean they ultimately want to be amazing some of [21:58] the anxiety of our teachers out there some of it is related to safety for [22:03] themselves their families and so on but part of it also is just related to the load and and what they can handle [22:10] and they want to be great for those kids that are home doing online learning and they want to be great for those kids [22:15] that are there doing face to face um so i think again we said this about this last spring [22:21] giving our teachers grace as they move through this model is going to be really important for this this community [22:27] and i had a teacher the other day a veteran teacher says well last spring i felt like a brand new teacher [22:32] and now i get to feel like a brand new teacher again you know this fall so i think that we are we are asking a lot [22:39] of them um so we need to take care of them and and consider that um so we're looking forward to the [22:45] challenge um we know there's going to be more challenges as they come so your your support is really appreciated so [22:51] we'll just take questions thank you andy and sean [22:58] um i'll just open up to board member questions before i ask mine my questions i have [23:10] unless sorry i was trying to unmute [23:16] this is actually my screen might be frozen no i was like i kept trying it wouldn't let me unmute um [23:22] i'm not sure this this may be something actually that goes across all grades but [23:28] what's the expectation that we have so if we have students who um need to self quarantine and we have an [23:34] expectation that that may happen for our hybrid students what would their learning [23:40] model look like at home for those who say potentially two weeks well they just say i'm a hybrid student and i go monday [23:46] tuesdays does that mean i'm actually just going to be doing what the the second half of my [23:52] class is doing what's the expectation they're not going to automatically go to virtual academy right [23:58] right so i think we'd view it the same way if a student had um and we sometimes you have a student that has an illness [24:04] and a prolonged illness they still stay connected with their current teacher and their current section um and they're [24:10] doing work more independently with the support of teachers so that we would have the same viewpoint um they would [24:16] stay connected we wouldn't disenroll them from the current section that they're in for a temporary uh situation [24:22] obviously um our our kids that are fully online in the eva are going to be more permanent in [24:28] that regard okay and then my other question is is it the same expectation that um katie talked [24:34] about in elementary that if you look at the percentage of time that we have an expectation of our hybrid students being [24:41] synchronous and asynchronous is that similar to what that percentage of time [24:47] expectation would look like for our eva students too so say the expectation is i'm just throwing [24:53] out 50 synchronous 50 asynchronous is there a different ratio that we're looking at for eva [25:01] you know i think eva is probably going to those kids are going to have again a combination of synchronous and asynchronous learning i think in terms [25:08] of the ratio i think you're talking talking about similar in terms of two days a week that [25:13] the kids are getting the hybrid i think you would look at something like that that would be in a similar realm for the eva of live classes and last year when [25:20] our kids were fully in distance learning um some kids as our teachers were kind of toe dipping into this some teachers [25:26] were doing a lot of synchronous learning and some were doing very little we didn't have as kind of firm as sort [25:32] of universal sort of standards that we have i think that we are would have those [25:37] expectations for the teachers that are working with our kids in eva of having [25:43] synchronous activities whether it's small group full group during the week in combination with [25:48] asynchronous learning i think a lot yes so i agree with that yes and i think [25:55] again i'm going to go back to the parents getting um their their choices and um in [26:01] and letting us know that um i think that depending on how many kids would choose [26:06] that i think that that has to be a factor in in how we manage it as well um if there's only like 10 kids um they'll [26:13] just follow along and be part of a class likely but if there's like you know half of our kids it might look different so [26:20] again i don't i keep saying to people and this is not going to inspire confidence but with me i don't know what i don't know [26:26] right now about what the models are going to be and so being open to that um [26:32] you know we want to get kids connected in and feeling like they're part and they belong that is so essential for [26:37] kids and that's what we missed a lot of last spring and so we don't want to take that lightly [26:43] okay and andy is the high school still planning a seven period day um when we went through the [26:49] variations you know we talked about the block schedule in terms of transitions when we went to this two one two models [26:55] the teachers felt that there's a real benefit to seeing all their kids for two days in a row so we are going to be in [27:01] the seven period uh day model and will that include an advisory [27:08] it will not include an advisory in that seven period day model um if we had been in in full distance learning we were [27:14] going to be in our regular sort of modified block schedule with advisory but just to be able to do this and see [27:21] all their teachers during that period of time we're just going to be in the seven periods okay what about for you sean will there [27:26] be an advisory absolutely we will have an advisory we're thinking every day maybe even on [27:32] the asynchronous day that one would be to be decided but um we would be thinking about doing advisory of your [27:38] day the other piece to that i just want to um offer up is that we would likely [27:44] um not be doing as much flex because when we think about what flex does it moves [27:49] kids and regurgitates them in smaller groups and i'm not sure that that is going to be the best practice right now [27:56] um in a hybrid model i think when we would go full face to face we could robustly bring back our flex [28:03] at the middle levels but i think it is a concern of ours with trying to keep cohorts together and remixing kids at [28:09] different levels that could be problematic okay thank you both [28:15] thank you anything else janie so on um owen it looks like you have [28:21] some questions yeah i've got a question um [Music] sean this is [28:27] primarily for you i love your uh oxygenating room comment it's a fetching [28:33] illusion i don't know if i quite understand it um [28:38] but you said it regarding quite does that mean that [28:44] what do you mean by that if i could ask what do i mean by that so when you sing you you expound more oxygen and the more [28:52] oxygen that you are putting out if you think about the singing you're sitting up straight and you've got more sound [28:58] production coming out so when you have more sound production coming out you have more of the microparticles which [29:03] are the way that covet is spread and so thinking about um [29:08] first of all singing with a mask on if teachers have a um a face shield on they've got mask and face shield so even [29:15] when you sing with a mask on for kids you're likely having some of the same results and so we're just trying to [29:22] think about where do we sing now um the minnesota department of health suggests that you could sing [29:27] outside and that's a great suggestion for a couple months of the year [29:33] not for much of much time you could space students out perhaps in a large space but large [29:40] spaces are also at a premium especially at valley view this fall but they're at a premium so one of the [29:46] things we're thinking about is could kids sing at home and then in when they're in school maybe [29:52] they can have a partner conversation a partner work with um the kids who are hybriding in school and the kids who are [29:58] remote and so what would that look like um so we are we are really taking it very seriously about the oxygenation and [30:05] mary hyman might want to i mean mary's still here mary and i have talked about this andy and that was in a meeting with [30:12] me on it but um it's just that production of more oxygen and in terms of like fired it's that you know it's [30:19] like getting into that you know the cardio mode and um expanding more oxygen [30:24] and the sweat and all that that comes with it i think one of the things that we did on [30:30] oh go ahead right on andy i was just going to add to what john was settle down on what you're going to be [30:38] doing with choir for instance you might have it outside but you're still um in [30:43] process with that am i picking that up now what i can tell you what we what we talked about with choir is i think we [30:50] just want to take it slow and and look at a ramp up of what we're doing we want to make sure we can feel comfortable [30:56] because you have to remember that we had we had specific meetings with secondary music so that's choir band orchestra we also had a [31:04] meeting with physical education there's different variables that have impact potentially on covet in both of [31:11] those spaces about how you work out and breathe how you sing and breathe how you blow [31:16] into an instrument with your you know your spit into that instrument um so we're talking about and also [31:23] in those areas they happen to sometimes be our largest ensembles so you could have a a band that has 90 students in it [31:30] right so and because of that then they have sectional periods during the day so we're thinking about how we split those [31:36] courses how we use the sectional periods so that we can actually reduce the numbers um in those bands when they're [31:42] rehearsing even if we are in a 50 model i think choir specifically [31:48] is thinking that they are going to start um more in that mode of having like sean [31:53] said when the kids are doing distance learning maybe they're doing some of that singing like they did this spring with recordings and things [32:00] like that and do more music theory and partnership at least at the start but then we think there's some [32:06] possibilities especially with our staffing to be able to slowly maybe build in kind of a small [32:13] group instruction that is singing in a larger space using our auditoriums which we're not going to have as large [32:19] auditorium you know concerts and so on but they just i think want to build that up slowly which i respect and i think [32:26] that's the smart way to do it so i don't know if mary you want to add anything else to that but that's what we've been talking about with those groups [32:32] i'm guessing that there's going to be more guidance on things like choir and band [32:39] you know the department of health is trying to be also very very cautious and [32:44] um so things like for students have asthma and if we're we're giving a nebulization treatment we always have to [32:51] think that um remember that covet is a respiratory virus so anything that's coming out of [32:57] our mouth or knows when we're talking breathing heavy or you know deep breaths with um band or choir that's when we [33:05] need to be so so careful so that's why social distancing is so important [33:12] [Music] does that answer your question owen thank you i think it's i think yeah [33:20] yeah it's a work in progress okay thank you welcome [33:26] ellen uh yeah i i just have a couple questions [33:32] i know the the risks really seem to be different for middle and high [33:39] school than it is for elementary school and um [33:45] and i'm just wondering when you went through the survey did you [33:53] do any crosstabs separating secondary the voice of the parents and the [33:59] teachers and secondary from the voice of elementary parents and teachers [34:08] randy can you answer that i think you looked at that data yeah what we did it and i can't and i [34:15] won't necessarily be able to speak to this conclusively but what we did is we separated the data out by site [34:22] and then we pushed that data to our site leaders okay [34:27] did you notice if there was any any differences between primary and [34:33] secondary none specifically i think we had some [34:40] pretty consistent concerns about number one safety [34:46] social distancing questions about health protocols etc and then um another big one was around [34:53] continuity of the asynchronous and synchronous expectation from classroom to classroom [35:00] teacher to teacher um [35:06] yeah and okay thank you um i i just am wondering because i [35:11] i it just seems as if both in the format of the way that the [35:18] middle schools and high schools run and that you you have many more contacts and many more passing [35:25] periods and it just seems inherently um [35:31] just a different animal as well as the contagion so but thank you i just [35:37] wanted to see if the teachers had had been asked about that and if you had um had seen any differences [35:46] the other the other question is um for uh when we're talking about the virtual academy in [35:52] secondary um i'm just wondering if you have when you say you're offering all [35:58] classes um or could you just speak to um a little bit more specifically all classes [36:07] is it all english and science or i i i think what i said is that certainly our [36:13] required classes from a general um chemistry class to an ap chemistry [36:19] class to a a ninth grade government class to an ap government class we will be able to run [36:27] all of those classes because i think of the volume of sections that we have in those areas the issue becomes that let's say i have [36:34] i have some classes in my building that have a single section right now by registration [36:40] and if i have um five students that um are in the virtual [36:46] academy that requested a particular class the question is how do you have those kids [36:52] participate in a club that singleton class so the so the options are [36:58] they drop the class and take something else right the other option is i can't shift a [37:04] teacher resource to a classroom of five kids because that balloons up the class sizes in other areas um or you can kind [37:12] of have the sidecar piece that shawn was talking about is that you could have a couple kids that were home but that are [37:18] staying connected with what that hybrid teacher is now remember with each of these scenarios you create a new layer [37:25] of complex complexity for teachers so you have a teacher that has a class of 30 [37:30] that's 15 of them are in front of them all day and they're doing instruction 15 of them and that's if it's perfectly [37:37] even 15 of them are doing online they're doing online instruction the kids that are at home [37:43] and then the question is do you have a separate student that is [37:49] still that is full-time online learning because then you're thinking about how you do [37:55] your planning from whether it is a consecutive type of planning right you [38:01] know in a classroom like mathematics where one idea builds upon itself so you may have kids getting a particular [38:07] content area online an instruction online and the other getting it face to face and then [38:12] the next content area or lesson it's reversed as opposed to saying we repeat lessons because if it's [38:18] consecutive it's hard to repeat those lessons so there's there's just a tremendous amount of complexity for our [38:25] teachers to be thinking about how they deliver high quality instruction i know they can do it but again it's um it's [38:31] going to be a challenge for them and then you add another layer of students that are full-time online now if we have [38:37] a a good number of students to register for full online then that makes it simpler for classes [38:43] that i can make a full online section you know so i could be a teacher that has four sections that are in the hybrid [38:49] and one of my sections is fully online i may have to make choices to say a particular course is a fully online [38:56] course because of the teacher that offers that um that could be the only teacher that [39:02] teaches this course and that teacher happens to be a teacher that can't come in because of their own health conditions so these are the the problems [39:08] and things then situations that we're thinking about going forward but again i [39:14] think we will be able to deliver in hybrid and for those kids that are in fully online and eva [39:21] and ellen i would say the same thing i would say so much of all of this is just [39:26] dependent on the the numbers we get for the um edina virtual academy and how that plays with [39:34] and where it plays with our um classes that we have in middle school i [39:39] i i don't know if i could paint you a picture one way or the other my goal would always be to make sure every [39:45] student gets what they registered for we have every student registered for their classes and we [39:51] i know my assistant principal eric lois spent the summer developing schedules for them so it would never be our intent [39:57] that we would we would want to take them out of a class or tell them to choose another class our intent would always be [40:02] that they stay in the class that they registered for and that best suits them but again i don't know what i don't know [40:08] in terms of what they're going to select and how that might play with our staffing and again the expectation that [40:14] we would be asking teachers to not only be in a hybrid but to partially staff a distance a virtual academy that is three [40:21] separate and distinct preparations that are very different and and again it's hybrid's a big ask um to put that [40:28] together so i don't know um but i'll know more when i know how many kids [40:34] are going to be in the virtual academy and what that looks like staffing wise at a [40:40] middle level um thank you i i really want to thank you all for those answers um i have one [40:47] quick other question i asked lenny had something related to that you want to do so [40:53] since the state has said that at least i believe the state has said that we have to have an online option [40:59] i think that for classes where there's a single class offered we should [41:05] potentially er on the side of making the class virtual as opposed to hybrid and telling [41:11] the virtual students to register for another but i think we can save that until [41:16] another day because we'll see what the enrollment looks like and i don't really want to create an issue until we get one [41:22] just an observation you know another thing lenny that's a possibility and again i'm just speaking for the high [41:27] school but depending on a teacher i could have a teacher that um has a health condition and wants to be [41:34] and as a great teacher and can can deliver something really well um you could end up having potentially a [41:41] student that's on the hybrid that within their schedule has a full online course so i might be a [41:47] student that has six courses and one of them might be an online course even though i'm a hybrid student [41:54] because of the teacher availability so and we would have those students supervised and they would do that online course or we'd have a partner para so [42:01] they could be live so this is a possibility within that structure to keep kids um in the courses that they [42:07] want right and i would say i wouldn't i'm not so it would be online i'm thinking of like that [42:13] that could come up the teacher due to a health condition was unable to to to teach in the building they could [42:20] remote in and the students could be in a classroom and the teacher would be on the screen teaching them and and i have [42:25] often said you know there's a there's a many teachers in our district and our in our building that [42:32] are outstanding and kids would benefit from them however they deliver the instruction [42:38] so that gives me a great chance for a quick segue which is so what supports do we [42:44] have in place for teachers for three areas one for choice in other words choosing [42:49] whether they teach in the school or home second area is professional development [42:56] and the third is assistance with stress because no matter which model that teacher gets to [43:03] i think we're likely to see elevated stress levels and so we've talked a lot about schedules and students i just want [43:09] to flip for a minute and have you talk about teachers so nikki can you talk a bit about just the [43:15] surveys we're doing with teachers right now and then maybe jeff can talk about some of the stress work [43:21] of course um and so we did do a survey for teacher preference and basically the question that we asked is would you [43:28] prefer to teach in the virtual um the eva form or would [43:33] you prefer to teach in the hybrid form and so as we're doing placements we will definitely take those things into [43:38] consideration um the second component of things is we also asked if you have some [43:45] any type of a disability that would preclude you from coming to serve in the hybrid model and [43:52] so we do have a variety of people who has responded to that survey also from [43:57] teachers to custodians to anybody who'll be coming back with us um in the fall [44:02] and so both of those resources are out there for teachers and i know um that jeff can speak to some of the work he's [44:08] been doing with the emotional wellness of our teachers and employees [44:16] so on the site of support for teachers we're actively in the process of putting together some professional development [44:21] for teachers at the beginning of the year for for one aspect of that but then also having uh trying to develop our [44:28] continuum of services that teachers are able to access during the course of the year whether that's making them aware of [44:34] available services that they've had in the past or making them aware of new [44:39] new types of supports that we're trying to get in place as well with the further in our relationship with fraser services and so [44:46] forth the professional development is really about the development of a self-care plan and this is a [44:51] comprehensive cell care plan that we're wanting to do not just with teachers but with all of our staff at the beginning of the school year [44:57] during our in-service time and it's really focusing in on life balance in six different areas that are essential [45:03] to really having good life balance but then also putting together a plan for what do i do when i'm in crisis what do [45:09] i do when i'm under stress and then connecting them with a pathway to say what are my next steps when i'm starting [45:15] to experience a high level of stress rather than just getting it out or suffering in isolation that's one of the [45:22] things that we find with the distance learning model and even with the model of the hybrid it's going to be awfully [45:27] isolatory because we're trying to limit those social interactions to the great extent possible but we want to have [45:33] pathways for teachers because when you're under stress you don't think about what it is you need you think [45:38] about how we feel and so having that plan that they can refer back to will assist them in being able to access the [45:45] resources that are available to them and so that's what we want to try to put together again for teachers and for our [45:51] paraprofessionals for administrators we want to make everybody aware of the resources that are available and get [45:57] them connected to those resources as quickly as possible but it begins with a good self-care regimen and if we can get [46:03] people to start practicing that self-care regimen in a balanced format and encourage it from the top down all [46:09] the way through we will be successful in keeping our cups full so we can fully cut fill the [46:14] cups the students that we serve and landing what was your third what was your third question [46:22] it had to do with professional development but just yes and just to piggyback we did put [46:27] together frequently asked questions for employees where they can find all of these resources um so that way it's a [46:33] one-stop shop and we do plan to link it to our communication page if it's not [46:39] already up there but we did send that out on tuesday afternoon along with those two surveys just so it like i said [46:45] it was a one-stop shop for all of our employees and you know if i could add one other [46:51] thing um certainly the wednesday as an opportunity for us to split cohorts and [46:57] do that cleaning of the building but it also is a critical time for our teachers to be able to meet with their teams to [47:04] be able to do planning because remember they are working to prepare lessons for kids both in the online and the [47:10] face-to-face format at the same time so your support in that area is really critical it's something that all the [47:16] principals in the district advocated for for our teachers and have that ongoing [47:21] time to be able to prepare the kind of lessons that we want and i would say to that and we are [47:27] trying to um really work smart with the time that teachers have um when they're [47:32] teaching during the week in the hybrid making sure that they have access to their full preparation time and that [47:39] they have that available um in its entirety and and we don't have a lot of superfluous things going on that [47:46] we try to you know meet about this meet about that sort of putting all the meetings to a wednesday that we might [47:52] have to have and allow for community time and for um individual and collaborative preparation [47:58] time so i'm i i feel like that is the right thing and the smart thing to do and as principals we all feel that way [48:06] so i'm going to save my other questions for when we have data on [48:11] alignment of teacher choices with the virtual academy or hybrid [48:17] just because again same thing i don't really want to discuss an issue that may not exist but i just will note that [48:24] we may come back to that question and i'll just note i cut ellen off so [48:30] sorry about that you can go no that's okay you were following up on that question and um and that's great i [48:38] that my next question is something completely different um and it has to do with the reality of [48:45] um both the hybrid and eva models and that is the con [48:50] the issue that we're realizing widening of the achievement gap [48:57] and i'm just wondering if some of the school leaders can talk [49:02] about how they're going to be addressing this um with both of these models [49:10] we are identifying and i think again with the idea of working smarter identifying [49:15] um support support for kids we have some some [49:21] classes which are um i wouldn't call them intervention classes but i would call them classes [49:27] which help kids get the skills they need to be successful and so we're going to run those classes [49:33] wherever a child is and and go into a coaching model but um i'm working with [49:39] staff who might be working in a coaching capacity some of our [49:44] student services folks how do we make sure we have a um a well-designed safety [49:50] net for all students to make sure we're checking in with them the social emotional but yet the academic and how [49:55] do we how do we support that you know last spring we had our super subs in our [50:00] building were um critical and they were so helpful in checking in with students and helping them but we [50:07] um my fear as well is that the students who um [50:12] who are struggling academically um the gap widens when we can't support them as well and so it is mission critical that [50:20] we don't let that happen and that we remediate and accelerate them through what they need to be doing um so that we [50:26] can close that gap and um and you know make sure they're highly engaged in doing that yeah thank you [50:34] steve do you want to talk a little bit about just access relative to ellen's question and [50:40] just ensuring that the technology is available for all our students [50:46] certainly again good evening um so what we've done is we continue to ensure that there's specific [50:52] devices in the secondary schools and so we are distributing currently distributing sixth grade chromebooks [50:58] right now and we've distributed over half of those girl books uh prior to the start of the school so [51:03] that's been a good metric that we have in third through fifth grade there will be a chromebook either that's been [51:10] checked out already that the student checked out last spring that they continued to use over the summer they [51:15] can continue to use it this upcoming school year or they can check out a chromebook we've pre-checked those [51:21] devices out and we'll have them ready for the start of the school year either if they do eva or if they do hybrid [51:27] learning uh we'll work through that first week to do materials distribution or their [51:32] selector and we are pushing down towards kindergarten first and second grade as [51:37] well until second grade students we pre-checked out a ipad to those students if they don't already have a device [51:44] uh and we'll distribute those much like we're doing with the third through fifth grade and then for k1 and 2 we have [51:50] sufficient devices for those families that need those again all the chromebooks that our [51:56] district owned are filtered so that we ensure that students are going to appropriate [52:01] websites and we've worked with the deans at the elementary middle and high schools to [52:06] work with them on when students may encounter inappropriate [52:12] content or maybe making bad choices around technology we feel confident that that's going to [52:17] be in place we're also working with wi-fi hotspots and so as of last year we [52:23] were able to address all the requests for internet access through a partnership between dyna [52:29] public schools and a dyna given goal over the summer we've made contact with [52:34] comcast and we think that comcast essentials which provides low-cost [52:40] home internet access through comcast or xfinity is another option that we have for our [52:46] families and we think that that's going to be a good option because it provides a significantly [52:51] higher uh speed internet speed and will allow it to accompany uh uh to [52:57] penetrate a whole household so we won't be sitting through a mifi hot spot but rather the internet will work through [53:03] the whole household so we're working with families we're working with our cultural liaisons to identify those [53:09] families who can take advantage of that offer and getting them hooked up prior to the [53:14] start of the school i'll stop and answer any questions that there might be [53:21] i have that julie and owen have questions so i'll send it to julie and then we'll get you owen okay [53:30] thanks um okay so i have a couple um questions one is both to both middle [53:37] school and high school so if a student were to opt into the virtual academy [53:43] does that preclude them from any activities that would be going on at the schools that they would have to purchas [53:49] they would need to participate in face to face for example if you have a student who descent oh my [53:56] god [Music] that was that was matt playing a joke i'm just going to call him out because [54:02] he knew that was going to happen okay anyway that's very funny matt um [54:07] okay so would it preclude a student like if they made the soccer team right so they would need to come to school and [54:12] participate in that is there any um have you guys talked about that are we [54:18] that's okay for a student to do i assume it is i just want to say it out loud because i know i've been asked that [54:24] question and so i want to give you so i think troy has left the building but um the [54:31] high school league i think has has ruled that have said you know if we were in full distance learning you would not be [54:38] having those activities but in the hybrid model yeah students that are participating on the soccer [54:43] team since soccer is running this fall or girls tennis yes if they were in the hybrid at home that day then they [54:50] could they would come to school for that practice or wherever that is at the end of the school day so yes they can [54:55] participate okay even if they're in the eva model yes so i think we just have to clear [55:01] that up so if students are in eba it is edina high school edina high school teachers you die in a high school [55:08] classes you done a high school transcript um it's just a delivery mechanism it's just different [55:14] great okay that's great um the second question is um for our rising seniors [55:21] that you know there's been um obviously a lot of prep that goes into your senior [55:28] year including your a.c.t test right college visits all of those things that have now kind [55:34] of gotten um smashed up and banked up now against juniors that are coming in [55:39] um is there um plans this is kind of very specific but is there plans to [55:46] do the act test the statewide act test for our students i know i can't get my [55:52] senior registered until december or my upcoming senior so like i know that's [55:57] another concern is there any plans for that can we even do that um logistically [56:02] um there is a there is a plan to do a statewide act this fall [56:08] at the high school we're working on that right now part of the issue is too is being able to do that in a safe way and then [56:14] proctors so we're likely to do that on a day where other students don't come to school so it would you know we're likely [56:20] if we do that we would probably only have juniors and seniors in the building at that time [56:26] so because we need the staff to be able to be proctors in the building and have those classes uh for proctoring be small enough um to [56:33] be able to do that so i know there's the demand you know where we would predict potentially 400 to 500 students that [56:39] might want to take the a.c.t this fall because they haven't been able to do that they've been prepping for their act [56:45] and maybe hopefully this whole act thing will just maybe not be an issue going forward let's just hope that we [56:51] just keep moving on with colleges and find a different way but we know it's a reality right now and some students that want to qualify for scholarships they've [56:57] been preparing they want to do well so yes we are in the works right now planning for [57:02] a edina high school statewide act excellent just to be clear andy that [57:08] would be limited to edina high school students yes edina high school students [57:13] statewid a.c.t we still would we're going to offer our the act on national test dates if it's safe and those would [57:20] be typically on the saturdays and so on but we are this would be dinah high school only okay you just when you say [57:27] statewide it seems to be different yeah they call it a statewide act versus a national test date there's certain [57:33] kind of rules around that you know my testing coordinators jan carter and jeff [57:38] marshall are awesome and would be able to speak to that but we are in the process of planning a school [57:44] edina only a ct on campus that's great thank you um and then um [57:52] i love that i loved listening to the conversation and the questions about the classes and the um [57:58] you know the extracurricular or an extra class that um if you have only one [58:03] student or two a couple students that sign up and it's a singleton all the different ideas around that so we can [58:09] make you know i know some of them are you know one could be creative foods but another one is french five so [58:15] for some people that is a requirement for in there right it's it's not necessarily required but it would be so [58:21] i just i liked hearing all the different thoughts around that and how we can make that work so i just want to make a [58:26] comment on that um and then my last question is i asked this too of um with the elementary can you just [58:34] address and clarify that if a student is in a class um you know comes is is in the ab cohort [58:42] day um or monday tuesday cohort day that the lessons are going to be continuous [58:47] that the curriculum would be continuous and not um just [58:53] because i i guess i'm i'm not totally clear that that would happen i know we talked about a flip model but um can you [59:00] just talk to that so that i i want to make sure that we are [59:06] looking at and i know there's a thousand challenges with this but is it continuous learning so that [59:13] they're getting new content the whole week or is it repetitive and i know it'll look a little bit different i [59:18] think for each secondary level but if you guys could speak to that that would be great [59:24] well my lens is a teacher a former teacher is is ib [59:30] and my teachers have been spinning and thinking about what this would look like for them some of it is [59:36] course dependent in many ways so let's say i'm an english teacher [59:41] and i have my two days face to face and as sean alluded to we don't want that face-to-face time to be wasted by kids [59:48] sitting there just listening to a lecture the whole time the whole reason to bring kids back is the opportunity for peer-to-peer interaction and [59:54] peer-to-teacher interaction so if i'm an english teacher and i have a unit on a particular piece that we're reading or a [1:00:00] writing prompt or whatever that might be i might do something different [1:00:06] with the students that are at home doing distance learning versus those that are face to face and then repeat that [1:00:12] later in the week and flip it so they have that lesson so one it's the same content but taught in two different ways [1:00:18] and each gets that same treatment now if i'm a math teacher i might have a different idea um i might [1:00:24] say we're introducing um you know standard deviation in a [1:00:30] statistics class and i may have the kids at home watching my lecture [1:00:35] that i recorded on standard deviation and i'm delivering a similar content in my face-to-face class and and then on [1:00:42] the opposite two days it might be something we're moving on but it's just flipped so some kids are [1:00:48] going to get both the face-to-face treatment and the online treatment but that in that regard it could be on [1:00:55] different topics so the content is the same but it's just the delivery mechanism could be different throughout [1:01:01] the week does that make sense absolutely yep okay answers my question [1:01:06] i would just offer um julie as well i think it's really important that we don't create new gaps with learning and that [1:01:14] we progress kids through i also think and understand that this is heavy lift [1:01:19] but i think there's ways that we can think about um how we do how we do it and i think [1:01:25] that's that's a magical conversation i'm not saying flipped is the only game in town i think it's a good game and it's [1:01:31] one to explore um but i i do think it's important that kids have [1:01:36] an expectation they will have new content and they may get it in a variety of ways [1:01:41] um but that they'll have they'll keep progressing through their learning and that for me is um of the utmost [1:01:49] importance yeah and i make sure i want to make that i ask that question too not just for [1:01:56] the continuity with students but also teachers right like what i mean it's it's a huge ask and i want to make sure [1:02:03] it's not too big i mean it feels giant for our teachers to be able to do that which is i i [1:02:10] appreciate you saying andy use the word wednesday as a critical day for that planning for them um and i echo that i think that is um an [1:02:17] untouchable day for for our teachers to prepare so you guys um thank you that's it that's really my questions thank you [1:02:25] real quick are we looking at uh live streaming any on the virtual academy so [1:02:32] for example if you've got a history class that happens to be lecture [1:02:37] we looked into whether we can live stream that to the people who are doing the virtual academy [1:02:44] you know we would have that capability to do something like that potentially it's just whether that is helpful you [1:02:50] know i think if you're going to um you know if you're sitting in the back of the classroom and you're trying [1:02:55] to keep kids engaged in a lecture and now you're not even in the back of the classroom anymore you're you're at home [1:03:00] right or somewhere else listening to that i think that's um some of those things in terms of listening to a [1:03:06] lecture i think sometimes can be accomplished in that if you're going to do something that is more asynchronous where you're just sort of listening and [1:03:12] and so on i think some of that maybe is served better by a screencast where they can stop and start and do that and then [1:03:18] do that kind of flipped piece just from the strict strictly engagement [1:03:24] um now if we had a student in french five that julie talked about that is the single student that is in eba [1:03:32] that wants to continue to take french five now that might be something that we want them to join in some way in that class [1:03:38] in a virtual fashion because they're that student out there that needs to stay connected with that [1:03:45] with that hybrid class does that make sense so it would really it would depend um but i think that just the idea of a [1:03:52] student um sort of being the camera in the corner listening to a lecture and again we're hoping to not do [1:03:59] as much sort of direct instruction because we want to have that collaboration of our kids when we use that limited uh face-to-face time [1:04:06] i would say you can do a seminar um a seminar lecture in a way other than when [1:04:12] you do it in your classroom and what that also does is if you do the seminar um let's say in a screencast you're [1:04:18] really um leveling in the playing field of how kids get that seminar and then kids at home respond in one they respond [1:04:26] to the learning the lecture in one way and kids at school maybe may respond to the learning in a way [1:04:33] that's more collaborative but there's also opportunities then um to think about like a remote and that doesn't [1:04:39] necessarily have to be a teacher coming in streaming it could be kids in school [1:04:45] having a conversation with kids who are not in school in a collaborative group so sometimes kids are our best like [1:04:51] little creative thinkers they will work together and and create a synchronous sort of um [1:04:57] experience where maybe one wasn't there but they they can take care of that and do it and so and our teachers are [1:05:03] extraordinarily creative and so are kids they'll think of some of those ways that we might be spinning but they'll get [1:05:09] there yeah i'll just add in a technology basis both stone and andy has talked um our [1:05:15] teachers have had a long tradition of doing flipped instruction and they do it [1:05:20] they're well regarded around the state i think of the way they've done flipped instruction and that allows for any time [1:05:26] anywhere learning and so those are those objects we can deliver those live but then they get recorded and put in our [1:05:31] learning management system and then the other through that will be brought in this fall is the ability for our [1:05:38] teachers to have what are called breakout rooms in their live in their video google meets and so that they'll have [1:05:45] those abilities to have those small group of students and student interactions within a kind of observed [1:05:52] uh virtual setting and so those are just additional features that are going to allow for that student to student [1:05:57] learning as well as having a teacher guide the learning as well [1:06:04] [Music] [1:06:12] you're muted erica [Music] sorry oh and sorry thank you for your [1:06:19] patience i was i was trying to turn it over to you but i was muted the whole time [1:06:25] all right all right thank you um this is um [Music] [1:06:30] a follow-up to ellen's question about equity and um there's growing evidence that the [1:06:37] um our academic response to this is a national [1:06:42] thing but our academic response to [Music] a [1:06:48] state home order with digital learning and so forth has had negative impacts on [1:06:55] equity and these are unusual times and may [1:07:00] require unusual actions and so to that end i wonder [1:07:05] about something on the order of home visits to our academically vulnerable families [1:07:12] i've heard of success with this in some some other school districts [1:07:19] and um it's often the teachers who will actually do the home visits [1:07:25] just wondering if we've thought of anything like that if this is beyond the pale [1:07:31] um any comments about that sean andy jeff i i think that we can do an at-home [1:07:38] visit virtually i mean so that would be where i would take it right now and we did a number of those [1:07:44] um visits um you know checking in on kids um last spring and we'll continue to do it [1:07:50] and probably have a more structured system and uh an array of people who might be able to do that from paris to [1:07:57] um security to office to principals to teachers to super subs and so like [1:08:04] trying to build a connection and i think that virtual check-in um would be what i would feel comfortable with right now um [1:08:10] i i love home visits i'm just not sure um for me and thinking about um the [1:08:16] situation where that would be um something that i would do but certainly we want to check in in some way [1:08:23] sure and i'm actually glad you brought that up because it is it is unrealistic in some ways to do it um [1:08:29] how what kind of response how successful have the virtual home visits been good um my favorite was i called a [1:08:36] student um and a sixth grade student and he um his mom answered and said the phone is [1:08:43] for you [Music] and so i had this great conversation with a sixth grader asking why he hadn't [1:08:50] done his work and would he start doing his work and what did he have to do today and his mom told me that was [1:08:55] awesome because he kept telling her that he didn't have any work and so it was i [1:09:01] mean in some ways there were some opportunities for students for leadership and self-management in um [1:09:07] last spring that i had not seen in all my years of being a principal that was kind of fun i had a number of kids email [1:09:13] me over the year i had more kids email me and so for all the things that we can say maybe it wasn't it was an [1:09:19] opportunity for kids to rise up and be leaders for themselves and so i i appreciated that and i think that um the [1:09:26] virtual visits were helpful in doing that you know and if i'm just gonna just add [1:09:32] to that you know last spring and kind of our emergency distant learning what we did is we redeployed a lot of support [1:09:38] staff clerical super subs security um to help us as in many ways [1:09:45] kind of case managers for kids and sometimes parents um and we had tremendous success last [1:09:51] spring with our attendance we had about 97 attendance was actually a little bit [1:09:56] better than when we were face to face of our kids being engaged every day and any kid that missed a class um over time was [1:10:03] called uh and developed a relationship with the same resource person that they met and we actually did do a few home [1:10:09] visits last spring but we really were not being getting had sort of um [1:10:14] breakthrough with a family you know we that happened last spring with a few and so um [1:10:20] i think coming up this year in this model i think we again uh last year collected tremendous data with our [1:10:26] student support teams uh we'll be able to do that again based on attendance data and academic [1:10:31] data and find resources to be able to support families when they're at home but we're also hopeful that some of [1:10:37] those kids that struggled in distance learning last spring will have that opportunity for that face time with their teachers that will make a [1:10:42] difference for them did you have more questions or follow-up [1:10:48] questions owen um no that so actually maybe to follow up a little [1:10:54] bit here so andy did i hear you say that perez and other non-teaching staff [1:11:00] were deployed at working with vulnerable families what we did is in terms of contact what [1:11:07] we did is so we had a group of people that we use as resource people so um if we had a student in a certain alpha [1:11:14] group that missed a class in attendance they might give a call to connect with that family and say hey we missed you in and [1:11:21] your third hour algebra class um and they would say oh no i forgot to do my aba and so on but then we also had [1:11:27] some kids that were struggling and we worked with their families sometimes because the parents were saying we needed some support and so on how do i [1:11:34] give my student this information there could have been a language barrier so we just said you know some of those people [1:11:39] that may be doing face-to-face work on a regular basis this spring we just redeployed them to help us in different [1:11:46] ways so um that's why we're able to get through to so many families uh this [1:11:51] spring so i think we'll still try to be smart this year about how we use our resources wisely all of our staff want [1:11:58] to serve whether it's clerical paras security they all have tremendous skills uh to work with people and so we just [1:12:04] try to use them the best way possible exciting i've not heard that that's very [1:12:10] creative very inspiring so might i add a little bit from the elementary on that [1:12:15] same topic yeah we actually we actually deployed our staff in [1:12:22] similar ways and one of the things that we're using as we are planning for this fall is that [1:12:30] ability for us to connect with families and make sure that they have somebody that they connect with at [1:12:38] school whether it be the classroom teacher or a para or the principal or [1:12:44] you know whoever it might be social worker school psych so putting that group of resource folks [1:12:51] together and helping families problem solve part of what we're doing at the [1:12:56] elementary is we have identified what we're kind of uh informally right now [1:13:02] calling our priority students we've identified students that we know need something more than what the typical [1:13:09] experience is going to be we've identified those kids with an academic need [1:13:15] we've identified those students whose uh you know home situation might not [1:13:20] support uh us connecting with them well from a distance [1:13:25] uh we we just know that there are a variety of reasons why kids are not going to engage with us at the level [1:13:31] that we want them to and are those kids that we need to consider bringing in more often [1:13:37] you know when we talk about phasing in uh kids who are [1:13:42] more dependent right now on us for for a little bit more [1:13:48] those are the kids that we're identifying and uh how do we deploy staff to do that how do [1:13:54] we how do we identify those families so just bring [1:13:59] all of those resources together and knowing your families and i think that that how we start this year [1:14:06] with that kind of onboarding or that orientation or those back to school [1:14:11] activities is really going to be key for setting everybody up for what do you [1:14:17] need how can we help you um and on the paranote [1:14:22] we had in the spring periodically had families contact us saying we're really struggling my kid is [1:14:29] struggling and uh we had a pair of professionals who were able to [1:14:35] do regular check-ins with kids they'd do a google meet we'd set it up with a parent and say okay every day at ten [1:14:40] o'clock uh jody is going to be calling calling and getting on a google meet [1:14:46] with your child and their job is just to do a check-in how you doing what do you need [1:14:51] that was highly successful and i think the more ways we find to support individual families into uh [1:15:00] you know uh when they're not with us um i just think that that's a win-win [1:15:07] that's great thank you more than you want [1:15:12] yeah that's great so i think that i these are all wonderful questions and [1:15:18] you guys have obviously put so much effort into this um so i thank you i [1:15:23] think i want i'm going to try to move us to our next section since we're already over schedule [1:15:28] um not that you guys aren't doing an outstanding job answering but um [1:15:34] um so i think we'll just wrap it up for a secondary um and thank you for piping in there karen [1:15:42] as well i appreciate that note about what you're doing in the elementary as well um [1:15:47] so i think john is our next our anchor our anchor is jeff jordan [1:15:52] so jeff will uh talk about special ed and um a little bit more about social [1:15:58] emotional learning sure jeff jorgensen bringing it home uh thank you chair ellenberg uh [1:16:04] dr schultz and esteemed board members i'm happy to to anchor this team today [1:16:11] and and it is good that i anchored just simply because it is about you know we've we put together a hybrid model and [1:16:18] the edina virtual learning academy coming together and and really it's an [1:16:23] ordinal process of development and so first is the establishment of our regular education model for all students [1:16:31] and uh in our in our special education team has been involved with those discussions all the way from the very [1:16:37] get-go and now we go into the hard work of trying to make the hybrid model and the virtual learn [1:16:44] or the virtual academy model work for all of our special education students our 504 students i will even speak to [1:16:50] the ml students or any students that would be considered to be more of the dependent learners or [1:16:56] learners that need additional support in order to be successful and not all of those students are identified as special [1:17:01] needs but i do want to remark on all of those students because it isn't necessary if you have a disability for [1:17:06] distance learning not to be a real effective model for you and you might need additional supports that could be [1:17:12] developmental that could be a lot of different things but special education model was is going to focus very strongly as i said in my [1:17:19] report on on those on those elements of relationship development with our students and our families maximizing our [1:17:25] direct service time with students a lot of parents are asking about what's this model going to look like and what i [1:17:30] can say to that is is that in the hybrid service model we will have access to a continuum of services much like we would [1:17:37] in traditional face-to-face services we will be pushing in we will be pulling out in the same manner and or in a [1:17:45] slightly modified manner as we try to take into consideration the number of contacts that a student is having on a [1:17:50] daily basis so we may end up having conversations with families that will move us towards [1:17:56] compiling uh those service times so that students are still getting the the complete amount of service time that [1:18:02] they have identified on their ieps but it might be in in longer intervals or longer duration or it might be in [1:18:09] shorter intervals where we actually serve students more in a one-on-one basis rather than in the small group [1:18:15] settings that we typically do and so a student that may have been receiving say 30 minutes a day worth of [1:18:21] time might get a 15-minute one-on-one session with this with the with the teacher instead of having the 30 minutes [1:18:27] in a small group session this is intense time and in our dialogues with teachers we've been [1:18:33] having a lot of really great conversations with them just about how much they can get done in a shorter [1:18:38] period of time when i'm able to focus in on a single student at a time as opposed to trying to work with a small group of [1:18:45] three to five students that doesn't sound very large but again individualization is key and it's a and [1:18:51] it is key during this period of time too so we're continuing to monitor our cross-contamination that could [1:18:56] potentially take place and so we're working with our teachers right now i just had a full meeting with all of our [1:19:02] special education teachers and service providers yesterday they give us great feedback in terms of how they're seeing [1:19:08] their fit into the service models that are out there and available whether that be the hybrid or the virtual academy [1:19:15] model we're generating great ideas and we've had people at work on how to enhance both the virtual learning model [1:19:22] and what we can do to improve our services and enrich our services during the [1:19:28] course of some of that collective face-to-face time that many of our students will be able to access [1:19:33] and will be wanting to access the second thing that i'll say about our special education service model is that our [1:19:39] students will be staffed every single one of them will be staffed prior to the beginning of services [1:19:45] so that we will be determining the type and the model of service that the student will receive that will be unique [1:19:50] to each student that is served and that will be writing a model an iep which is their individualized education plan that [1:19:57] will fit three different models of service and so it's really a [1:20:02] it's really a three three models in one plan so that we can switch as the dial turns [1:20:09] uh so that means that overnight we can switch to a distance learning model if we need to or we can dial it back to a [1:20:15] hybrid or we can go back to a traditional model the reason that i bring this up is that [1:20:21] special education 504 plans are very due process heavy types of models of service [1:20:28] and parents need to be included in the decisions that are made about their students and this is why i'm asking that you can [1:20:37] strongly consider slowing down our timeline for engaging [1:20:42] or starting the school year up because our teachers need that time just to do the planning necessary to serve our [1:20:49] special education students our special education teachers do not come in any earlier [1:20:55] and they would need additional time to have those 1100 meetings that we will [1:21:00] need to schedule with families not only those 1100 meetings but then parents may also disagree with the service model [1:21:06] that we propose and then we go through a conciliation process to get to yes [1:21:12] that in you know all by itself is a consideration we need to make when we're saying how do we do [1:21:18] planning at the beginning of the year how do we prepare for our students return but it isn't just that these [1:21:24] meetings are one thing but then allowing our staff to prepare so that they can actually feel right [1:21:30] about the service that they're being able to deliver in that safe and controlled environment is going to be [1:21:36] key for our special education staff but i would also say for all the 504 families for these other families that [1:21:42] are coming in that have concerns about their students and about how they're going to be served whether it be in the [1:21:47] hybrid model or the eva model we need additional time and i really will advocate for that for our special [1:21:54] education staff if we intend to start on august 31st i will say that i don't see a way for us [1:22:00] to begin special education services directly within that first week because we will have to be meeting with [1:22:06] parents in order to get those plans in place as the governor has told us we need to before services would begin [1:22:13] so i'm making a strong plea to you as a board to consider starting us a little bit later so that [1:22:19] we can provide those services to our students and in the fashion that we want to [1:22:24] provide and with our teachers feeling equipped to provide those services because it is again individualized [1:22:30] planning for every single student that we serve i know a lot of parents out there are [1:22:36] very concerned right now that there isn't more detail about the plan of how special education will look but again [1:22:42] it's a very person-centered process in the planning and we want to assure [1:22:48] families that they will be connected with their case managers to go over the specific plan for their students we also [1:22:56] want to say to those parents that are agonizing over the idea of do i pick distance learning or do i pick the [1:23:01] hybrid model and can i switch back if i'm seeing that one or the other is not working or i [1:23:07] have concerns about my students health as we talked about earlier in the presentation today we are going to make [1:23:14] accommodations especially from going from the hybrid to a distance learning model that's an easier switch [1:23:20] for us the switch going from the virtual model to the hybrid is something that will be driven by the iep team and what [1:23:26] i mean by that or by the 504 team either one of those two and have a com can have a conversation to say this is not [1:23:33] working and that we need to have more face-to-face time in order for the student to be successful academically [1:23:40] so we're going to work with families on that and so if they're agonizing over that the teams will be monitoring [1:23:45] student progress if we're not being effective in what it is we're doing with our students we will change the dynamics [1:23:52] so the student will have better access to the services being provided the other portion of that is that [1:23:58] students that begin in a hybrid model will also be staffed to determine how many days of service they will receive [1:24:04] if they need those if they're if they're generally uh lesser impaired students say receiving [1:24:10] just speech and language services they may only they may only attend in the hybrid model the two days a week that [1:24:15] we're talking about for a good percentage of our students but students that need more will be [1:24:21] eligible to receive more up to another two days a week i've already talked about this model and how we can do that [1:24:26] within the elementary school quite easily at the high school as well we'd be able to try to find a way to have [1:24:32] those students attend whether that be in additional days in a supported learning environment or whether that be in a [1:24:38] model where they're actually attending class with both groups a a aabb [1:24:44] so that students may be attending full four days if they need that as part of their overall accommodations for their [1:24:50] disability in order for them to make progress with that i'm going to stop because i just said a lot of words i'll take any [1:24:58] questions that you might have but understand very person-centered process [1:25:04] thanks my first question is there is a calendar recommendation here [1:25:12] that we move this first day of school to tuesday september 8th [1:25:18] and i was wondering is that date something that you consider an [1:25:24] enough time for special education or are you concerned about that date and would need [1:25:31] even more time um for the special education team so i i think pushing it out to the [1:25:38] eighth is definitely giving us a good amount of time to get those ieps done it isn't the formal iep process that [1:25:45] everyone is used to going through it's more or less an amendment to the iep and that can be something that our case [1:25:50] managers will talk through with families we believe that we need a full week's worth of time to get that done for all [1:25:57] of our students and to give parents time to then respond to that and then work through any disagreements that might [1:26:03] take place um so that first week when we're back during the teacher in service week would [1:26:08] be the time period that i would have them doing a lot of that work and then any spillover would follow into the [1:26:14] second week during the week the 31st that's what we would suggest taking place [1:26:20] in conversations with my staff yesterday uh the teachers uh felt you know that [1:26:26] this would be the amount of time that they would see as necessary in order to not just get through those ieps but then [1:26:32] be able to work through the dynamics of getting the schedules put together and having our staffing in place within that [1:26:38] next week more time would definitely be obviously a great asset and i think that's come [1:26:43] from all areas when we talked with elementary principals high school principal middle school [1:26:49] everyone believes that the additional time would be a great asset to plan for these circumstances that we know are [1:26:55] going to be tough because our teachers come back not even a week before services start and a hybrid model is [1:27:01] tremendously complex as i learned yesterday as i'm talking through with my with my teachers they're [1:27:07] responding in a way that's you know is is pretty high stress and and i and i put that into context [1:27:13] uh thoughtfully just in terms of the mental health of this and saying you know what i've been working on this [1:27:19] situation all summer long i've had time to absorb the the mdh guidelines the mde [1:27:25] guidelines all the restrictions all the considerations i that's been my daily bread for the last you know two and a [1:27:32] half months now but our teachers oftentimes are just trying to shut off just to recover during the course of the [1:27:38] summer and so when they're coming back and hearing all of this the first reaction is panic and you know what i [1:27:45] had that same feeling when we were told that we needed to develop those three models and so our teachers just need some time [1:27:51] to digest they're going to be doing that but i also want them to stay fresh in the remaining time that they have [1:27:57] left before they come back so bringing them in earlier isn't necessarily a really great idea at this point either [1:28:03] because they need this time to digest what it is we're talking about to hear what we're to hear what we're planning [1:28:09] to have that restful thought period and then come back that first week during in-service week and really hit it hard [1:28:16] with the development of plans now that they've had a chance to respond to what's going to be taking place [1:28:22] erica maybe i can get randy out of the clubhouse to talk about the mechanics of the [1:28:29] of that uh start day after um after labor day so [1:28:36] um as jeff indicated um and as all of you can see the complexity [1:28:41] of the hybrid as we've talked about this over time it became apparent to me that [1:28:48] we do need to ask for that time those additional that additional week [1:28:55] still will be filled with obviously professional development jeff's got used for [1:29:01] contacting parents on their ieps some orientation [1:29:06] with students as well as just teachers planning their [1:29:12] own lessons and thinking about how to deliver instruction in this hybrid [1:29:18] environment or if they are an eva so i just have randy talk a bit about the mechanics of thinking about this [1:29:25] and how we would try to mitigate the loss of instructional time [1:29:33] thank you john so obviously after listening tonight [1:29:39] we hope that you have a really good grasp of how complicated [1:29:44] this really is and what we're entering into we know it's really important that we [1:29:51] have a quality launch moving into this fall we know that we have a lot of missing [1:29:56] pieces right now that we're still working on and we won't have our family registration and our staff [1:30:03] data to start putting those final pieces together until next week um [1:30:09] and then after that about a week from tuesday our new teachers come back [1:30:15] so one of the things that we know is that we have a high professional development [1:30:22] need that sits in front of doing a quality launch here and as jeff mentioned we [1:30:28] have ieps in preparation for delivering quality student support [1:30:33] services so one of our proposals to the board would be that we would actually extract [1:30:39] the professional development days out of the school year and front load them [1:30:44] if we were to bring teachers in early that is a significant cost to the [1:30:51] district just teachers alone is you know a six-figure cost i think it's [1:30:56] about 275 000 per day just for the teachers so really bringing teachers in for days [1:31:04] early is not within our financial means but if we could navigate our calendar [1:31:09] such that we could front load days of professional development to help launch these two models going into the fall [1:31:16] i think we have pretty strong consensus across our admin team with our union leadership and the feedback from our [1:31:23] calendar committee group back so far has been pretty supportive that [1:31:29] front loading the professional development time would be really important to a quality launch that would get three of the days at a [1:31:36] wash and then the other two days we would ask for would be a reduction in student contact out of the academic [1:31:42] calendar year so some things to think about in terms of that proposal [1:31:48] last spring we had this emergency response and part of what teachers were doing is [1:31:54] they were trying to get through the rest of the spring not knowing if we were really coming back or how long that was going to last [1:32:00] etc but now what teachers are planning for is going to be at least a semester [1:32:07] they're planning out the first semester of the school year and they're planning for content [1:32:13] and protocols and things that they're doing that had already been established last year and [1:32:20] last spring it's one thing to finish a year under covid it's a completely different thing [1:32:26] to begin a year under covid when routines and relationships etc have not been [1:32:33] established and maintained and so part of what we're going to do now is we're going to bring students into an [1:32:39] environment where there's a huge number of safety protocols that have to be [1:32:44] taught they have to be taught to our staff we have to work through all of the [1:32:50] what-ifs and all of the scenarios and what we're going to do and so there's this huge professional [1:32:56] development need and we also have you know the opportunity to leverage technology differently than we did in [1:33:02] the past with some of the synchronous learning opportunities and we need staff to have some time to work through what [1:33:09] that can look like inside of their courses so what we are proposing is that we [1:33:14] front load move the professional day three professional days out of the body [1:33:20] of the school year and put them in the front turn those professional days into student contact days [1:33:26] that creates a little more continuity for those weeks during the school year for students and for families [1:33:32] we would ask that we removed two student contact days that first week and then the orientation [1:33:40] would launch right after labor day that would be the orientation week that's when we would train students [1:33:46] that's when at the elementary we would be assessing students we would be connecting with families in some cases doing conferences [1:33:54] getting kids their materials getting them ready to launch into the hybrid [1:34:00] and the eve the following week then by that next [1:34:05] monday kids have been trained on the protocols kids have their materials they [1:34:10] understand how the hybrid's going to work they understand how we're going to do attendance and assignments and all of [1:34:16] those things they have the resources that they need and we can launch into our hybrid and launch into our virtual [1:34:22] academy in a quality way we really firmly believe to do this well [1:34:28] we need to shift that professional development time up front and again be able to produce the best [1:34:35] educational product for our community right from the beginning so that is our proposal to the board [1:34:42] thank you jeff did you have more um that you wanted to go into [1:34:47] so i just had a little bit on the social emotional update if you want to go into that uh from the social emotional side [1:34:53] as i talked about earlier there is there's a heavy staff component and i i'll just make one additional ad to what [1:34:59] randy just made in terms of the plea for additional time uh my background as a marriage and family therapist taught me [1:35:04] one thing is that when you're dealing with high high levels of stress the worst thing you can do is say [1:35:10] okay we've got a plan to go let's hurry up and get it done all right that's that's one of the worst things you can do for people that are [1:35:15] under stress because it makes them it makes them frantic to get and work hard but not work very efficiently and [1:35:21] they're not very creative under those circumstances just the idea of one additional week can ease the stress [1:35:28] level of teachers as they consider the year coming up and will make them just all by itself [1:35:34] more creative in how it is they're approaching the task that has been set before them the more we ratchet them [1:35:39] down in terms of time constraints the less creative they will be and the poorer the outcomes will be for our students [1:35:45] so with that in mind the professional development side is randy is saying that we need to ramp up there's a large [1:35:50] social emotional component to this as you've heard nationally as you've heard locally in terms of the survey results [1:35:55] and some of the survey results that we've obtained locally as well has emphasized the need for a strong social [1:36:01] emotional continuum thankfully we've got some great partners in the nation in the term in terms of [1:36:07] the castle program as i've talked to you about within the seo program a presentation that i made to the board [1:36:13] earlier last year and they have identified some reunification types of models as we [1:36:18] reunite students coming back in we've identified some some some critical practices or some priority practices [1:36:25] that we're going to work on those were all related to tonight as as our principals were talking about their [1:36:32] service models and that highly relational approach that we're trying to take with our re-establishment of relationships with students or that [1:36:38] initial establishment of relationships with students and families so that first one taking time to [1:36:44] cultivate and deepen relationships build partnerships and plan for sel that's a [1:36:49] really that hard focus again on on really elevating getting information from our students and families listening [1:36:55] to what it is they have to say you as a board have been excellent about that and we as this as a school have been trying [1:37:01] to get parent voice to inform our actions so that parents feel heard so that students feel heard as we change [1:37:08] our model to meet the needs that families are presenting the second element is about really [1:37:14] helping our adults connect heal and build their capacity to support students [1:37:19] as you have a group of students coming in that are under stress if we don't have a practitioner in front of them and [1:37:26] what i mean by practitioners our teachers and our support staff if those those individuals aren't settled in and [1:37:32] of themselves they will they will start to experience vicarious trauma which is just a matter of it's that it's that [1:37:38] counters that it's that effect that comes when i'm dealing with stressful people i start to get stressed myself [1:37:43] and over time dealing in that type of situation can result in in mental health concerns that will pop [1:37:50] up but our teachers are very talented and can hold on for a very long period of time without exhibiting a lot of [1:37:55] symptoms until they do and then all of a sudden we have people that are just not being able to function [1:38:01] any longer and may become sick or maybe come ill and have to take take those leaves and so we want to make sure that [1:38:07] they have a sufficient they have sufficient skills themselves and so that's that self self-care plan [1:38:12] that we want to put together with them and also the connection with the resources that we have available [1:38:18] uh the next is in that area of create safe and supportive and equitable learning environments and so this this [1:38:23] curtails so nicely so nicely with our work in equity because everything we do for sel is nearly synonymous with our [1:38:30] culturally responsive trainings that we do within our district already and so we're getting a two for one type of a [1:38:36] model here when we focus on sel or we focus on culturally responsive trainings or teaching practices we're really [1:38:43] addressing both of those two factors at once because they're both so highly relationship based and so we're not [1:38:48] asking teachers to do two things we're asking them to do one that has double the effect and so if we get really good [1:38:55] at either one or both of these they are they are tremendously effective in helping us close that equity gap and [1:39:01] making teachers making students feel welcome safe in their environment and recognized and celebrated uh finally is [1:39:09] that use of data and so we're working with a couple of different data collection agencies out there right now [1:39:14] to determine our best model to collect data so that we get not only our baseline to see where we're at at the [1:39:19] beginning here of the school year but then also be able to measure on a regular basis how effective our [1:39:25] interventions and our practices that we've tried to change will be in actually changing the student experience [1:39:31] within edina public schools so that being said this is a lot of work to do in within a very short period of time [1:39:37] but this will be something that will do some professional development on right at the beginning of the year and then we will be continuing this work [1:39:44] throughout the year thank you jeff um a quick question i had is other than [1:39:50] you had mentioned the importance of the time for the teachers not only to process but to do their planning for the [1:39:57] year as well um are there other resources that the board [1:40:03] and district can provide to help teachers from a social [1:40:08] and emotional mental health and safety perspective [1:40:13] uh so once again i would say that you know working with with nikki our our new hr director [1:40:20] and trying to put together our continuum of supports and services for our teachers [1:40:25] is essential because a lot of our teachers are not aware of the services that are already available to them like [1:40:31] the employee assistance program there's been an ask that can we can we expand our employee assistance program benefits [1:40:37] to be go beyond that three free visits to maybe six free visits or ten free visits that's something that we would [1:40:44] have to talk about through the contractual language that we have with our eap provider but we've also [1:40:49] approached frasier services about the potential for them to provide some additional services in in the school [1:40:55] system not to serve our teachers directly but to provide consultation to provide some additional training about [1:41:01] self-care throughout the year and to assist them that would be an additional ad to the program that we don't have the [1:41:08] funds and resources for but i know that we are working with the edina ad fund as well to try to secure some additional [1:41:14] dollars for our mental health supports and services which there is a teacher component in that as well [1:41:20] so if the ask the ass would really be about could we find some additional supports in terms of funding in order to [1:41:27] support those that additional time with frasier if we can outline a model of service that would assist beyond [1:41:32] teachers feeling supported out on site by offering these consultative groups because sometimes teachers just need the [1:41:39] assistance to move forward into that next to seek assistance right thank you [1:41:44] matt i'm going to turn it over to you and then get you janie yeah i was going to quickly say jeff thanks for looking into all that i know [1:41:50] that on the finance side working with john tope and others we're seeing what government funding assistance we can apply to these resources [1:41:57] and that still also is fluid right now through what's coming through both the federal and state support levels but [1:42:03] um it's great to check into that so i was going to say thanks guys it's important to see what other resources [1:42:09] some of these areas around mental health could utilize if funds were available we've rebalanced this budget like six [1:42:14] times in the past eight months um i think we're actually in a pretty good place especially relative to our needs [1:42:20] and our peers but it's it's been tricky so um presenting that and going through the ed fund i know there's a series of [1:42:26] conversations set up over the next month of the ed fund that you're leading so thanks for that effort too i mean that's what's great so and anybody on the uh [1:42:35] webcast is still looking at this the ed fund is open to donations for these purposes and does a lot of good in the [1:42:40] community working with their schools and teachers and kids so if there's an opportunity there if you want to do [1:42:45] something and you don't know what to do or you don't want to be around people um giving to that fund can really have a direct impact on our schools and kids so [1:42:52] thanks jeff and i'll go back on mute matt jamie yeah jeff i had two questions the first [1:42:58] one is um is there an opportunity to have any virtual interventions on those [1:43:04] wednesdays is that something that you would look at for like speech um [1:43:09] any of those services that can be done virtually uh so actually we we've been working on that uh jamie because we've been taking [1:43:16] a look at online models for speech delivery services and so that is one of [1:43:22] our intents this year is to really ratchet up the amount of direct service time and so our speech and language [1:43:27] providers have actually done some research and study over the course of the summer to say what do we need to in [1:43:33] or in order to deliver those those services virtually and effectively just like a telepractice model and so i've [1:43:40] already signed the purchase orders on the materials and the equipment that they will need in order to get that done [1:43:46] and include including some desktop resources they can utilize virtually so that's a great assistance but does [1:43:52] wednesday is wednesday a possibility for service absolutely it's more of that supplemental service that we can also [1:43:58] provide to our students we want to schedule in to the greatest extent four days possible and then utilize that [1:44:03] wednesday as that additional supplemental day that we can use to to really focus in on those students that [1:44:09] need just that a little bit more okay and then i have another question too about resource rooms within schools i [1:44:16] know we have quite a few kids that need that space to go to um especially our kids who suffer from maybe some more [1:44:22] anxiety issues and just need a place to reset and what is the thought about having resource rooms this year where we [1:44:30] would have kind of that you know kids from each different group coming [1:44:36] so we so we talked about trying to serve to the greatest extent possible in very limited size groups so if we had the [1:44:42] opportunity to do a group where we were pulling students out of a single classroom to get a service provided that would be [1:44:49] optimal for a small group size because then those students are all in the same cohort and they are in that same pod [1:44:55] which would make the most sense for elementary however we're also investigating as i said earlier in my presentation the opportunity to reduce [1:45:03] the amount of service time students receive but then increase the individual attention that they receive [1:45:08] so if you think about it once again three students coming in for a 45-minute session can be broken down to one student coming in for 15 minutes and [1:45:15] really focusing in on that student's need during that time period would still give some additional time obviously with [1:45:22] paraprofessional support and the like and and also try to supplement more with the virtual side but it would it would [1:45:29] allow a change in practice that probably has been a long time in coming because i think part of our part of our holdup in [1:45:36] special education has always been that you know what we've tried to serve both economically and effectively [1:45:43] and as a result we've fallen into a practice where it's been the scheduled daily service but not highly [1:45:49] individualized enough to make the kind of gains that we would really love to see and so this is really giving us an [1:45:54] opportunity in the hybrid model in the virtual model to change our modis operandi of standard practice to make [1:46:02] those changes with students in an individualized sense and so we're going to try to utilize that type of a model [1:46:08] more moving forward so we're giving the students the time and the and the intervention that they need in a very [1:46:15] concise manner and then get them back to class as quickly as possible so that they're not missing out on the curriculum that they need to participate [1:46:21] in as well thanks ellen [1:46:28] oh um no i don't really have any questions thank you sorry [1:46:34] um are there any other questions from board members for jeff oh sorry julie no that's okay [1:46:41] um i have two things one is um so you mentioned 1100 ieps right in the amount [1:46:49] of clerical and paperwork and brain power that goes behind that is there anything um [1:46:56] similar what erica asked about support to help um bring in [1:47:02] volunteers bring in any kind of extra hands to help with that work i know it's [1:47:09] going to be intense when it rolls out and i know there's a lot of privacy and data issues but [1:47:14] if if there is something that you identify that we could um do a call for [1:47:20] volunteers i know a lot of people have been you know want to help support to make um this school year and all our [1:47:26] students successful as possible so i just would encourage you to raise your hand if you i do identify something that [1:47:32] we could do a call um a call out so well i really appreciate that offer i think one of the [1:47:39] difficulties we run into there is that again iep meetings are highly private uh [1:47:44] and so having additional people assist maybe with the scheduling practice could potentially assist us in just getting [1:47:50] some of those things done but it is giving us that extra weight giving us that opportunity to do that [1:47:55] outreach is is a is the first big ask and if i think of anything else that we could potentially offer or ask some [1:48:02] volunteer support for we will definitely be giving that ass out okay excellent um and then the second [1:48:08] thing is actually um to just address the week the extra week and pushing the [1:48:13] start of the year and i just think it's super smart planning i really like hearing how much it supports not only [1:48:20] our students and just to help set them up for more success but to support our teachers into preparing for the year so [1:48:27] um and i think it was just really smart to pull the other professional development days front load them so actually more [1:48:35] instructional time for students and interaction um and not so much disruption once we get this model going [1:48:40] because it's it's writing a unicorn to get to this model right and so i just wanted to um say i thought that was very [1:48:48] well laid out and a really smart idea so well the the other thing that i wanted to emphasize is that i bring up by 1100 [1:48:54] uh iep students our special education students but we have a close to another 500 students that are in five floor [1:49:01] plans that also need to be considered individually and again we have students that we know are on our watch list those [1:49:07] students that are considered at risk that may be an intervention that are in the 504 plan that are not special ed [1:49:13] that we really do need to consider individually as we try to determine their schedule we have a large number of [1:49:19] students that access our interventions in the areas of reading and mathematics and also students that are accessing for [1:49:26] behavioral or mental health supports that are on no plans whatsoever and are not identified through a 504 plan but [1:49:32] receive those additional services so giving this extra time really helps us plan thoughtfully for them uh that it's [1:49:39] that 80 percent that we're largely prepared for through just general consideration of hybrid and eva but that [1:49:44] other 20 is really in need of individualized consideration not that we don't try to do that for all students [1:49:50] but these students are students that we know need additional supports yeah got it great that's it thanks [1:49:57] thank you jeff i know you're doing a yeoman's work there so [1:50:02] your work do you think you do thank you thank you um john [1:50:08] where were we going to go next in the um so here's uh here's what i propose erica um i [1:50:15] think on monday we can have uh mary present a little bit more communication we'll know a little bit [1:50:21] more um and we could do that on monday uh at the work session at the work at the board meeting [1:50:27] um i think our next steps if it's okay just go walk through that erica [1:50:32] yes so on the monday board meeting i would place [1:50:39] on the um on on action would be to approval of the [1:50:46] september 8th school start because we would need to know that so we can plan [1:50:53] going into the school year so i can get the leadership to plan those weeks out [1:50:59] so it would be good to have that on i'll add that to action and then [1:51:05] i think on august uh 10th during the work sessionary [1:51:10] leadership update we give some more updates on where we're at with the model and the data we're getting from [1:51:16] both students and from staff i can give the board a quick update if there's anything new and i trust me [1:51:23] there will be something new and then i think i would ask ask your permission for [1:51:31] approval of this on august 17th at a special meeting of the board [1:51:37] um if that makes sense i think that's what we talked about erica wasn't it yes so that way on august 17th we [1:51:44] kind of leading to what lenny was talking about if there's things we learn after we [1:51:50] begin to staff this what are some tweaks to the model what are some changes to the model we [1:51:56] can bring that on the 17th okay so for for the board's perspective um [1:52:04] our work session and for the community as well so you understand our work session on the 10th [1:52:09] is focused on um prioritizing um initiatives in the district and coming [1:52:17] up with goals for the district and superintendent um and the board itself so i want the [1:52:23] community to understand if they come to listen to the work session this is not going to be the [1:52:28] con focus of the work session but i also want the board to understand that um [1:52:34] if we want to engage in discussions about um the [1:52:39] moving of the date for the start of school that we should do it now [1:52:45] because this is the upper opportunity we're going to have to talk about it um before voting on it [1:52:51] and then in addition to that um any discussions that we want to have [1:52:58] um [Music] about before voting on the final approval of the model because [1:53:06] there isn't a work session unless we have a special work session which we can but i just want from a process [1:53:13] perspective i want um you guys to understand um this is really the [1:53:20] the time we have to talk about those two issues um and i'm happy to entertain [1:53:25] having um another work session um or a work session before our special [1:53:32] session to vote on it but i just wanted to walk through that process for you guys [1:53:45] thanks erica no problem um and then um [1:53:51] i know john you said that from a communications perspective that mary would be doing an update [1:53:58] right monday monday right um and so but i did want to the community to know that we [1:54:05] have um started a q a page that you can go to right now um that has answers a lot of answers to [1:54:13] questions that were given to the board and that were [1:54:18] that things that people went over tonight um and we will keep updating that page [1:54:26] with when we have answers to new questions we will keep updating the page um but i also want the community to [1:54:31] understand that we are sort of walking a fine tight rope between trying to get information out as [1:54:37] quickly as possible with also um not rushing administrative decisions [1:54:44] because it's this is such important work it's about the health and safety [1:54:51] of the students and the teachers in the district and understanding the curriculum and i hopefully you got an [1:54:56] overview of how complicated it is that there are a lot of questions we simply don't know the answers to yet [1:55:03] and so but as soon as we know answers and we know we've done a thorough job vetting it out we're adding it to the q [1:55:09] a page and we will continue to as you as a community have sent [1:55:15] questions into us hopefully you've seen that we have we're collecting every single question that anyone sends to us [1:55:22] we have about a six page document right now um and through presentations and through [1:55:27] the q a um we're trying to answer as many questions as we possibly can to the community and i just wanted [1:55:33] to note that for community members julie i see [1:55:38] that you are no i just wanted to add i know that the communication update will come monday but i know that that you [1:55:45] know the deadline for sign up is on sunday for um we're asking families to make a [1:55:52] decision and i guess my i just wanted to see if we have like an outreach plan [1:55:58] for any families that we haven't heard from and connecting to make sure that we like are we going to be calling i i [1:56:04] think i got a robo call from one of my calls that came in was actually from the dyna schools [1:56:09] so i know that shares i want to make sure that like especially with um i know our cultural liaisons to [1:56:16] reach out to any families that i just want to make sure that that's happening and what that looks like mary [1:56:23] briefly want to just step in and talk about our claims yeah so [1:56:30] go ahead so you you did julie you did get a a a robo call um as we were [1:56:35] working tonight steve sent out a blast to remind everybody to look for that email in case they missed it [1:56:42] and reminding them of the deadline on sunday night and then there is a team of um [1:56:49] folks in the multilingual um area working with the cultural liaisons [1:56:54] to have a virtual meeting with them to make sure that they understand the process and are getting [1:57:01] the information they need so that they can also make their model [1:57:06] learning model choices by sunday night so both of those things are happening and then i also wanted to mention too [1:57:12] that the faq page that erica mentioned is on the um family dashboard [1:57:20] so we just added that today and um the dashboard is looking very robust right [1:57:26] now it's got six buttons on it so there's lots of information out there and a lot of questions that we added [1:57:31] today and a few more that will come hopefully tomorrow great thank you thank you so much that [1:57:38] phone call what we do is we find out who hasn't submitted and so we're not we're not sending it to people that have [1:57:45] already completed the my info update it's only for those that have not submitted i i did a message with a phone [1:57:51] call and then did an abbreviated message that mary sent out yesterday and i plan on doing that for the next two days and [1:57:58] those are translated in spanish and somali for our families for spanish and somali as well [1:58:03] so the the phone message is just my lovely voice but the email is uh translated [1:58:10] and are we are we offering tech support for families to make option if they need [1:58:15] it too is that part of the virtual meeting that is set up to help make sure [1:58:20] okay yeah absolutely so i've um i've reached out to the cultural liaisons if they [1:58:26] need help with that and then on our instructions we've got a link to email [1:58:31] uh where they help with that that just gets us in a queue and then our team in the enrollment office is addressing it [1:58:38] who's through phone calls and through help and being able to remote in and things like that so yeah we are [1:58:44] making sure that this is not a barrier for a student to make or a parent to make a choice it's really important not [1:58:50] only for the instructional place but just getting the data up to date in the systems for the this year and so it's [1:58:57] really important for us to make sure we we touch all families inside this process great thank you guys [1:59:03] so much sorry that i derailed and asked the question but no no [1:59:09] both have comments so ellen why don't you go ahead i was just gonna say quickly that's been great i got three reminders [1:59:15] in the last six hours and did it during our five minute break so i hadn't done it yet so it was really [1:59:20] helpful thanks steve yeah thank you and thank you mary for [1:59:26] bringing up the uh q a page um i think it's really [1:59:32] important for people to have as much information as possible in order to make [1:59:37] a informed decision and so um i just was i'm hoping that um [1:59:44] the district is also putting up answers to some of the questions that we've received as board members um [1:59:52] we've been getting emails from a lot of people and i'm i'm wondering if those [1:59:57] questions are being incorporated into that question and answer page they are ellen they were all added [2:00:04] super thank you and a lot of those had to do we didn't talk about transportation tonight [2:00:11] a lot of those questions also had you know some of them actually had to do with transportation and um [2:00:19] and and what type of social distancing is going to be [2:00:25] handled on how that is going to be handled and whether or not there's going to be any um [2:00:30] attempt to have um you know um windows open or [2:00:37] what what this district how the district thinks about that so i think we'll handle that on the 17th because we don't [2:00:44] know how many buses um how many kids how many kids how many buses how many routes [2:00:51] until we know how students fall into the virtual [2:00:57] the eva or into the hybrid model [2:01:03] so we don't so we don't know we'll have we'll maintain [2:01:08] six feet on a bus well yeah the social distancing but [2:01:13] we we have to do that by by by executive order so we will do that on the bus [2:01:20] okay thank you [2:01:26] matt did you have a comment no [2:01:31] okay um so john did you have anything else that you had wanted to um present or review [2:01:39] to the board and community no we're in a good place thank you for a long night but you got a [2:01:46] chance to see how all systems in the united public schools are being changed because of kovid [2:01:54] it's it's an amazing does the board have any um yeah it really is it's an amazing system dude [2:02:01] the board anybody follow-up questions or comments owen [2:02:07] um i think i have one short follow-up question it just feels incredibly academic here at 10 o'clock after a [2:02:12] five-hour meeting but um i know some members of the community are interested in i am too [2:02:18] what happens if our numbers shift significantly in hennepin county and or [2:02:24] minneapolis what hennepin counties hovering around right around 20 per 10 000 and i think john you said we [2:02:31] actually the past week went up 0.3 um i think any dyna did i hear you say the [2:02:38] word 15 what happens if our numbers went down um [2:02:43] theoretically uh in january could we go to a four five day a week training our school [2:02:52] are we locking in here for the for the rest of the school year with this uh just uh some thoughts on that yeah so in [2:02:58] the uh safe learning plan for the 2020-21 school year that the governor [2:03:04] put out um they give ranges of of the number of [2:03:10] cases per 10 000. so when we started this planning we were at 20.93 [2:03:16] which the department of health said both elementary and secondary have to be hybrid if we were to drop into the range [2:03:22] between 10 to less than 20 then we could move to elementary in person [2:03:30] and our middle and high school would stay hybrid and we would need to come up with plans on making that shift [2:03:37] and then i think those plans have to be approved by the mde and then 0 to less than 10 [2:03:44] we can do in person learning for all students so so that they're tying it to the number [2:03:50] of cases per 10 000. so when we started this planning this is a [2:03:55] starting plate and we could go either way if if the [2:04:02] number of cases drop we can go to more in-person learning if ours go up then of [2:04:08] course we would move towards more distance learning so this is a starting place uh we [2:04:16] started at 20.93 was the numbers we started at uh that was reported last thursday at [2:04:22] the governor's conference today it comes out every thursday [2:04:29] today we're at 23.24 so we increased by three points three cases per 10 000 in [2:04:36] hennepin county and john just to set an expectation no no one's trigger happy if it drops [2:04:41] the 19.8 for three days we're not switching models and goes back to 20.2 we're not flipping back again [2:04:47] no no no no no an immediate trigger it's a barometer with a reasonable number that's being monitored on a weekly basis [2:04:54] in connection with minnesota department of health so nothing's in stone there's four companies entering phase three [2:04:59] right now in the u.s alone on the vaccine that could be out by january so everything's being tracked on a weekly [2:05:05] basis and nobody should consider september 8th being the plan for june 8. [2:05:11] right if the if we do shift the district shifts the in the [2:05:17] safe learning plan i think we have we have two weeks to make that shift but i think we'll get got i know we'll get [2:05:22] that guidance from the mdh and the mde on this [2:05:28] does that answer your question so there's no there's no we're not set in this plan until [2:05:34] january it's not like a semester long yes and i i don't think anybody [2:05:41] seriously talking about shifting this on a dime but if just general patterns emerge that [2:05:47] after four months it's very clear that we've gone up to 30 or we've gone down to 10 [2:05:53] that um then we can we can shift the um follow-up question i have is are we [2:06:00] we're gathering our figures of course from him and county as a whole is there any way we can interpret and [2:06:06] would we want to interpret the figures for uganda alone for our district um any thoughts about that john [2:06:14] so the mde gave us guidance that were to follow the um [2:06:20] follow the date in the county that were where we reside [2:06:25] okay and just from my personal um opinion on [2:06:30] i think that we have um students that come from lots of other areas not just edina [2:06:38] as well as teachers um and so to me it makes a lot more sense from a [2:06:45] health and safety perspective to take the hennepin county um data into perspective not just the [2:06:50] city of edina because the reality is our schools are not limited to just residents of edina [2:06:59] that's a good point okay that's all i wanted to talk about thank you [2:07:05] [Music] so i just want to make a quick note that while we're telling [2:07:10] families that whatever they select is what they have for the semester and we talked tonight about how you could go [2:07:16] from hybrid to virtual more easily than another i think that we might want to look as a [2:07:21] policy that says you can go from virtual to hybrid if there is space and it would have to be on a first come first serve [2:07:28] basis but to just have a strict thing even if we could accommodate doesn't i'm not sure that would be the right [2:07:34] approach just a thought yeah thanks lenny that's a good point we've talked about that too [2:07:41] [Music] yeah i just wanted to you know this is new for all of us right like [2:07:48] there there is no manual there is no guidebook to say that we're doing everything right [2:07:54] um but i have to say that not only as a board member but also as a parent [2:07:59] listening to this tonight um i feel as if i know no one can make [2:08:05] guarantees about the safety of my kids but i feel very confident as a board member as a [2:08:11] parent and a community member that their safety has been at the top priority [2:08:16] along with the desire for them to continue their learning and so i appreciate that and i just wanted to let [2:08:23] that be known to john to you and to your entire staff and all of our teachers because i'm [2:08:29] um i'm pretty overwhelmed by the amount of work that you guys have put into it and i feel really proud of our district [2:08:34] right now it's an amazing team of people [2:08:41] thank you jamie [2:08:47] erica you're on mute okay you're muted [2:08:53] now i'm not um john did you have any leadership updates before we [2:08:59] finish up the meeting no okay um so i just was just gonna wrap up the [2:09:05] meeting and um wrap it up with how i started the meeting with um i just i [2:09:11] really want to acknowledge our what your son's birthday that's how you [2:09:18] started the meeting no not acknowledging myself you know [2:09:23] um i want to acknowledge our district leadership team our teachers our educators everyone that's going into [2:09:31] making this work for our families as well as acknowledge and recognize [2:09:37] that it is a very stressful time for the same individuals our families our [2:09:43] students but like janie said i'm sitting here tonight and listening [2:09:49] to the expertise that we have um there will obviously be um issues that [2:09:55] arise that we don't even know about but i am confident that we do have the team in place to [2:10:02] put together a safe