December 3, 2018 Regular Board Meeting-Seg1
[00:00:00] That.  As we were looking at the death of a past president and we're also have members of our community of the Jewish and Christian faith. Looking forward to Hanukkah and Christmas that I've always viewed this as a time of transition where we have grief and anticipated hope. And when we go through those times.
just as we might be raising children through periods of transition from teens to adult we have difficult conversations and hard conversations and we're recognizing both the losses as well as those things that were looking forward to.  and when we have those conversations when we show up. Maybe not perfect maybe not practiced.
But when we show up with the [00:01:00] best of intentions and with love and with kindness that those conversations and those moments are ones that we can move through with some dignity and some shared values and move forward in positive ways. And that's what I would be expecting today from our board and our community.
Can you call the roll please, Miss Douglas?  Chelsea King Martin your petty Reynolds here Chad fetch your Vice chair hides here Reagan mullet or here.  And Arts and Technology high school. Please come forward.
Hi, I'm Tyler Corbin. I'm a senior at Arts and Technology High School.  Last Thursday, we went on an all-day expedition to different local [00:02:00] nonprofit organizations in Portland. I went to the Northwest children's Outreach with half the school. Where we focus on organizing the distribution of close to needy kids.
We all had different jobs to do anything from matching baby socks to picking out fashionable clothes for teens. NCO is a volunteer run organization. So we felt really good about helping out.  The other half of the school went to a place called family recovery Support Center. FRS see is a drop-in center for families that have been affected by drug or alcohol abuse the center offers family counseling parenting classes and so helps help self help support like a AA and na the team that went to FRS see help to clean and set up for Holiday activities after the volunteering.
We all went to get lunch at the food trucks [00:03:00] and then reflected on our service. Experiences at the Oaks Park dance Pavilion.  We have a phoenix program graduation coming up the graduation for the fall Phoenix Program is on Monday, December 10th at 6 p.m. In the Kiva. You are all welcome to join us for the celebration of goal-setting personal growth and leadership development for The Phoenix Program participants.
Our goal this year is to have a hundred percent of families meaningfully connected to our school. Our parent group is growing with many new parents getting involved. The parents are planning school activities such as the student holiday gift and our holiday luncheon on Wednesday, December 19th. We have another rock band concert coming up.
The art Tech High School Rock Band is has its third concert of the year. On Friday, January 25th at 7 p.m. [00:04:00] At the youth music project in West Linn. We hope that you will be there to see the band The set list is coming together with an amazing combination of the instrumental and vocals. We will be playing songs such as Black Magic Woman by Santana Major Tom by Peter Schilling, and we will also be bringing back miserlou' by Dick Dale and Comfortably Numb by Pink Floyd from our previous concert.
Thank.
West Linn High School.
Good evening. It's wonderful to see all of you again. Again. My name is Ashley hater and I'm the ASB president at West Linn High School the students and staff of West Linn High School collected 61 banana boxes full of non-perishable food for our 2018 canned food drive a bit short of our goal, but still a [00:05:00] very respectful outcome.
We are really pleased to have given our community an opportunity to demonstrate their generosity and the Oregon City. Elks club was really grateful for our ongoing support. We also raised five hundred ninety five dollars for the West Linn food pantry. Are fall Sports season ended with our football teams lost to Sheldon in the quarterfinals.
All of our winter sports have been practicing for a few weeks and are just starting their schedule of games and tournaments are fall musical the 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee was very successful. I hope that some of you had the chance to come and see it. Our fall production of the gender identity plays to one-acts directed by our language arts teachers Ryan Mooney and Anna Crandall open this Friday and plays through December 15th.
Weston's mock trial team returned from their annual trip to New York for the Empire competition with a sixth-place finish an amazing result last week was our annual mister miss West Linn competition and pageant our competitors [00:06:00] raise two thousand nine hundred and forty dollars and twelve cents for Clackamas County Coalition for suicide prevention an important local organization whose work connects with our mental health focus at West Linn this year our leadership ASB.
Currently planning and preparing for our annual 10 days of Joy 10 days where we give our students a chance to experience Joy by expressing gratitude practicing generosity and receiving some unexpected gifts from us. We are so excited to start the surprises next Monday with our countdown to winter break challenge in our 10 days of Joy advent calendar.
We hosted the TRL Jazz competition at West Linn on November 13th and are fantastic. Jazz band band one again. Our winter choir band and Orchestra concerts will be all week the week of December 17th. Thank you for having me and happy holidays.
Wilsonville High School.
[00:07:00] Good evening, and I see you. All again. I'm Marc Herrera my senior Wilson High School. And so football was our last fall sport that ended. And we reached the State final we lost sadly. We have all of our winter sports starting up. So for example, we have a boys and girls basketball boys and girls swimming and boys and girls wrestling.
We're also having a holiday bizarre this Saturday at Wilsonville High School. You are all invited to attend the following Saturday on the 15th Wilsonville. We will be having the wisdom of Festival of the Arts where we will be showcasing fine and Performing Arts. We also have a toy Doernbecher Drive where we all students from all classes donate toys and well the class with the most donated toys gets like a prize.
We also have a Doernbecher raffle for two blankets, which are for [00:08:00] OSU and UFO pretty much the leadership the students from leadership go to the first period classes and they asked some students if they want to donate money. Not the money donated would be going to turn Becker. We have five more weeks into the semester ends to most of the students are getting ready to getting ready for finals and to get their grades up and seniors are starting to get the feeling that I'm halfway done the school year, and it's pretty exciting.
Um, that's pretty much it. Have a happy. Happy holidays and see you all next month. Thank you Mark.
Dr. Reynolds.
Thank you in the past few months. I've finished my visits to schools including 80 Creek Middle School. And welcome to high school and I sent the report to you. So I just wanted to touch on a few highlights at AP Creek Middle School. [00:09:00] They used they use a variety of types of data coupled with individual individualized approach to student growth and a great deal of thought and care that go into.
Professional development for educators and evaluation and overall they demonstrated outstanding commitment to students Educators and to the community and likewise at Wilsonville high school. They demonstrated a strong commitment to Educators to their ownership of instruction and to Educators professional development.
They have an individualized approach to keeping students engaged and to working with community and I want to I see. Principal Schumacher is here and I just deeply appreciate the courtesy that was shown bit a navy and was no high school and previously at Trillium Creek and with all three of those visits complete and in view of the board's responsibility and goal of closing the achievement back Gap.
I'm very much looking forward [00:10:00] to our further work on performance monitoring and I have a deeper understanding of how schools are used data is used and. It's used at the school level within the district. I attended Bob Carlson's retirement celebration and I look forward to him carrying on his legacy and other ways I served as a member as a mentor to the West Linn High School interact club and also helped with another one of their kettle corn events, and I'm always impressed by the service ethic.
Of those students and I'm sure it's replicated amount across all all clubs of the of the the students showing leadership of the students. I also enjoyed High School athletic events, including cross-country and volleyball I participated in Wilsonville High School grad night fundraiser. I attended the Rotary.
Joint Rotary meeting at Sunset high at Sunset Middle [00:11:00] primary and also had the pleasure of delivering donating dictionaries to fourth graders at Sunset last month with NOS VA. I'm continuing to reach out to board members Statewide for example at the fall Regional meetings in The Dalles. I'm at Clackamas Community College and previously to other school districts.
And each time. I've talked about resolutions including the resolution to add a school board member of color caucus to the OSB board and it's just kind of a testament to the importance of equity and having that voice represented at the highest decision-making level and policy level. At the OSB a convention in November.
I also participated as a presider or panelist on many workshops. One of them was teacher Effectiveness. And that's in one of the [00:12:00] slides with Bill crop who is president of school board members of color caucus and Hilda was Elliot the chief education office and I've sent you some links to the workshop.
I'm at the convention their outstanding. I think they're probably close to a hundred and the those workshops are available to registrants only and so I know that the links that I said or a little funky but if you can navigate through them there really are the content is really good and I did encourage you to take a look.
The governor released her budget last Wednesday, and I participated in small group briefings on Wednesday afternoon, representing Oregon Community College's Association always be a and Oregon community colleges and then Thursday morning representing ospa and I sent a summary to the district to the entire Clackamas region, but.
It's a pretty [00:13:00] amazing budget. It's the K-12 budget includes balance the balance base budget. I'm using available revenues and an investment budget and it's based on the on passage of a revenue package. But the base budget includes almost 9 million of the state school fund which is is good and another 100 million to help pay down purrs the investment budget.
Almost 800 million for improvement of class sizes and increasing instructional days based on the QE and quality education model fully funding measure 98. Major increases for higher education and early learning opportunities. So it's I mean, it's very positive. It is going to require Revenue reform but and it's going to be a challenging year for us to budget and it looks like other districts may choose to do alternative budget alternative budgets or contingency budgets just because of the [00:14:00] unknowns to and then today I spent the day at the Oregon Leadership Summit which is in the annual convention.
It includes business and federal and state and local leaders. There were outstanding presentations by the governor, you know again talking about education funding and Julia brim Edwards of Nike. By Senators already rode one and other members of the Student Success committee talking about what they might they're looking at in terms of Revenue reform and education funding and by Senators Wyden and Merkley and then end of the day with panels on Revenue reform and purrs and the good news is there is a really strong message of commitment by the business Community.
It was a business. Leadership Summit including Nike and other Business Leaders to address the need to address now the issue of Education funding and I believe that [00:15:00] 2019 is the best opportunity ever. For Revenue reform dedicated to education. I have a lot of materials from the conference. I can make scan the handouts and I think they'll be available on a website that I can make available to the happy to answer any questions.
I'll just speak. Speak briefly about activities. I've been involved in in this District in the last month. One of the things I have tried to do is share the information about the new health and wellness standards. I know this is something that we as a board have been trying to do for. Since last spring I think since March maybe even as early as February and we hadn't had much public response.
And so I know that each of us kind of upped our ability to share with our community and draw attention to these new state standards of which our schools are now [00:16:00] being required to teach to so as I look out at this crowd, I'm actually like I am relieved that there are people sitting here because even I you know as a parent.
I'm wonder about these standards and I wonder about the curriculum that will go with it. And so I knew at some point. I mean, these are sometimes personal matters in household. So I'm happy that our parents are now participating in the process and we will all be here this evening to hear you out.
But it is a process it is not concluded. And if you've heard it is concluded you've been misinformed so you do have input and and say in in what will be taught along. The school board also I'm making a decision. So with regards to that I did attend the OSB a conference. There were two kind of take aways from there.
I attended a session on the trauma-informed classroom, which again is an issue here in this District that we've been hurting hearing a lot about and so it was just an opportunity to learn a little bit deeper [00:17:00] learn what some other districts are doing and how how they're informing their instruction around.
Trauma in the classroom and it was I had many takeaways that I've actually shared with dr. Downs and dr. Ludwig from that as well as there was an excellent keynote speaker with regards to diversity and equity in leadership and and the importance that that that plays in opening and adding new voices and perspectives to.
All leadership positions. I had the opportunity to attend the city of Wilsonville tree lighting and I wasn't there so much to see the tree as I was our students from Lowry Beckman would and Wilsonville High School sing during that tree lighting. I had an opportunity to meet with Dylan and dr.
Ludwig Ludwig. And again, we sat down and also kind of had a deeper conversation about classroom support practices and how our district goes about resolving. Conflicts within a classroom and it was an opportunity to [00:18:00] learn a little bit more about our district practices. I attended the joint Rotary meeting as did each of my fellow board members.
It was nice that we were all able to be there. It was a joint meeting with both West Linn and Wilson bills rotaries all together just to share with our Business Leaders about our schools and what our schools are doing. I. Had the opportunity locally at my school to help promote the fall party at a primary school to assist in an art literature activity as well as attend business town with a fifth grade class.
And finally I am gearing up to resume my coaching of the eighth grade team from wood that will compete in the National Mock Congressional Hearing in DC this spring. And I mentioned that because I often leverage my fellow board members to come in and help me out. So I'm giving you a heads up that call is coming.
[00:19:00] Hello everyone. Welcome. I'll speak briefly about some of the things I've been involved with as well. I had the honor of attending the OSB a which is Oregon school boards Association conference and I would say the Highlight for me was a workshop. I attended where the presenters discussed how they've been using what they call empathy interviews to collect qualitative data.
And from the. And the takeaway from that workshop for me was just the power of for our students to be known and to be listened to and the influence of peers on their experience of school. And so that was a really interesting to hear about the work that they're doing and to think about how we can apply some of those practices in the work that we're doing here.
I submitted the feedback to dr. [00:20:00] Ludwig as part of our ongoing superintendent evaluation structure. We instead of waiting till the end of the year. We give feedback during periodic stages throughout the year and thank you to Vice chair to own hides for collecting all of our feedback and having that conversation and to dr.
Ludwig for your willingness to engage in those types of conversations. And the rotary The Joint rotary lunch was sort of one of. Three I think events this month where we're really talking about the future for high school and the district and so that was great to be a part of that with the rotary and they have a lot of good input and they're definitely Community Partners.
And so it was nice to sit down and collaborate with them in that fashion and to have the opportunity to board member to listen to them and they're what they think when we start to talk about the future of high school and the very next night. I was at the long. [00:21:00] Inch planning committee meeting where we had the same discussion and an even deeper level and again engaging with our public and part Community Partners on what the future of high school will look like I find that discussion to be very inspiring and as you know, we'll have a couple of those Community meetings coming up this week.
Tomorrow I will be at the one at Meridian Creek on Wednesday. I did not send out an email to my fellow board members just to sort of say hey, I'm going to be this one. I don't know if any of you will be other ones, but I assume we'll hit the ones that we can as we always do and yeah, that's enough for me.
Thank you.
It's been a very busy month. This was the superintendent evaluation. Month, we did that in November some of you may recall that historically what we've done this district. And what most districts do is that we have the evaluation once a year in the spring. We change the couple years ago to offer a less formal fall [00:22:00] evaluation to make sure the lines of communication open between the board and the superintendent recognize what we think is going fantastic and maybe recognize some areas that we like to see adjusted so early in the month.
I asked all the board members to provide feedback with respect to the superintendent's nine goals nine areas. I collected that feedback synthesize that had a chance to sit down with dr. Ludwig and had a very productive conversations talking about where we thought things were had a chance to meet with Tyler Vic of flow analytics.
He's our demographer met with chair Fitch and dr. Ludwig and Tim would lie and what we know from the recent forecast numbers that our district is getting larger and it's continue to get larger and so the rather than playing catch-up we're trying to stay up in front of it as much as we can and part of that is recognizing.
Winner Schools project to become too crowded and so where do we put schools and how what kind of schools we put there to make sure our school stay at optimal capacity. And so what mr. Big talk to us about is that you know, it's a very complicated process you can imagine things you look [00:23:00] for is, you know locations is zoning size of property.
We need environmental factors and then you know, when we pick the sites we want traffic in a support where we want to put the schools. Can they walk to school? Can you ride bikes to school is an exit places? You don't want schools like dispensaries and bars and next to railroad tracks. And so we just started in this process.
Now, we're looking into planning for the future and taking as much as we can and you know part of that process is obviously hearing from you guys this board and this district is committed to incorporating as the community. But whenever we can per our board goal number three. And to that end we met with the rotary clubs for Wilson West Linn to discuss the high schools because part of that is we want to make sure everybody has a chance to speak as many forms as we can had a chance to go and last and lot not least.
I had a chance to go to donuts and dad at my children's school at limit and those chance to get doughnuts me talk to the teachers and the students and there was the [00:24:00] course the book fair we get to check out all of our oh Bob books. So that's it. Thanks.
Always proud to be a part of such an active and engaged board.
I want to focus my comments on my participation on the November 28 health and wellness curriculum update where the room wasn't quite so full, but it was pretty full and a great number of our district stuff is present as well.
Some of the takeaways that I want to share with my board members is a reminder that we're mandated by the legislature to teach certain topics and by the Oregon Department of Education to teach to new standards and.  the
district has already made some [00:25:00] commitments that they're not going to have teachers. Locating their own resources that we're going to have cohesive plan lessons across the district. So that parents could rely on the also that.  we have looked at what curriculum comprehensive curriculum we needed to be used.
The Oregon Department of Education has determined that. The comprehensive curriculum only covers 80% of the topic. So we need to seek out supplemental and it's important to our district that we do so from groups that aren't advocacy groups and that limits has limited some of our resources. The district has also determined that they're not going to use.
One of those supplemental curriculum [00:26:00] identified as flash by the Oregon Department of Education for our middle school lessons this year because.  sorry,
I am trying to read my notes because of our effort to make sure that it's age-appropriate and we're providing safe and. Classroom discussions around those topics and we want to continue to provide information rather than discuss it from the value based or belief based system. And so just taking a lot of care around those areas.
Another commitment was that in Middle School level there will be no role play or demonstrations regarding those lessons because again, it's not age appropriate. It's not create that safe classroom experience that we're looking [00:27:00] for in our district.
Another commitment made by the district was that they were not going to be they would be sending out updated messages about the material that will be used in the K through 12 before winter break so that our community has that information. My observation was that some attending parents had concerns about specific aspects of some lessons.
And other parents were quite supportive of receiving information on the new topics.
again to remind the board that this is in process that the district continues to gather information from our community for student to board goal 3 and. They have not yet brought that to forward to the board. And so it continues to be a time where as board members [00:28:00] and as a community were continuing to engage in discussion and conversation The District staff is listening.
And so that when the time comes for them to bring that material to us we will have. I'm to consider it the intent on setting the agenda is that we would receive it and then have considerable time before meeting where we'd be making a decision on that curriculum. So just that is was a helpful meeting to attend.
I thought in terms of hearing the district's commitments as they're working forward to what they're going to bring to us as a board. And Aunt engaging the community and hearing their voice in that process.  That's it. So, dr. Ludwig.  So
[00:29:00] we need my boy.
I have no more of a brief report tonight because I have in the last few weeks. Also just been sending you some updates as things have occurred particularly that week in November when our teachers were engaged in professional learning rather than wait till now and share that with you as it was exciting news and and very inspiring and I just sent you an email about that.
You also receive an update about updates on our website for the complaint process. So you've got that and then the Essa toolkit when that rolled out and came from OD e and Deputy superintendent cold Gil. I went ahead and forwarded that to you and and then this morning sent you some information about the work session on Monday.
So trying to also give you some emailed update. So not everything is waiting until this meeting in terms of my report saving this time [00:30:00] for just those brief highlight. So I think three of you have mentioned attending the OSB a convention I was able to attend as well. Certainly there's a clear advocacy on the part of OSB a to.
Work towards Revenue reform and also supporting what they're calling organ promise and honoring our promise which was based on surveys across the state of families in rural districts and urban districts and Suburban districts around their hopes and dreams for their children's education and following up on that to honor their promise as.
Director Molitor mentioned the keynote speaker will Hina Adnan from Sodexo was inspiring spoke about equity and inclusion as a female leader of color and her own personal journey into leadership as well as really putting before school districts that opportunity to think about [00:31:00] diversity in our classrooms and among our staff and also leadership positions among the district and school boards and.
It's mentioned at the school board level as well. You have a resolution tonight that speaks to just supporting that so it's very inspiring message and very well attended and I would agree. Dr. Reynolds that the sessions were fantastic. I was able to go to one on measure 98 update and hero colleagues are doing with their grant funding to hear them learn more about forecast five as we know the software that helps school districts with Finance planning.
Which is I've been a great gift from ospa in terms of supporting school districts who couldn't ordinarily afford that software. So there were some really great sessions and would encourage us to keep finding in our spare time time to look at those online. It's been mentioned that we are in the middle of a health and [00:32:00] wellness renewal.
We did have last week our fourth parent focus group meeting. There was one in January 1 in March one in May and at each of those sessions again inviting groups of parents to come and look at the standards with us as well as consider curriculum and instruction and we got great feedback from each of those sessions some of which you see in the bullet.
That it was really important to our community that when an instructional unit was about to take place in a sensitive topic, especially with our health curriculum that they would get a letter or information about that and would have an opportunity to learn more about the topic. So we've committed to that.
Again, as you mentioned share Fitch that materials that we would use would contribute to what we were we prioritize as a district as a safe and comfortable classroom environment.  And again, as you mentioned that we want our teachers to be more [00:33:00] aligned around this content area more so than maybe others because of the nature of some of the topics and to make sure that folks are using.
Carefully vetted and aligned materials and ones that really promote the information and not personal views. So that's really important that information is given and not personal viewpoints of the teacher or shared so that was important and OD often talks about the organ Farm education often talks about this content area being age of making sure lessons and curriculum are age appropriate.
You'll see that throughout their materials and their information the other three bullet points really came from our conversations with parents. So on top of age-appropriate, what are some other priorities that we heard from our community?  And next slide. Thank you Joe. So what are some next steps is several of you mentioned?
We're in process. We are taking all the [00:34:00] feedback that we do receive parents who have been at each meeting have been able to fill out note cards or feedback sheets. Those do come back to us. That's what informed those bullet points. It does inform direction for us and changes that we're making along the way.
For continuing to work with Wellness teachers and fact the next day after that meeting happened to be another work session with Middle School Wellness teachers and we were able to update them on what we had heard from parents the night before working with our counselors classroom teachers and administrators on both the curriculum the materials that we use but there's also the instruction how we choose to teach it.
And we have that professional discretion. There's off there's often a saying in education. There's no perfect curriculum out there just like there's no perfect recipe book. And so you look and you consider what's right for our context our family our district and parents voices are an instrumental [00:35:00] in that so that we have curriculum, but then we also need to make really judicious decisions in our instruction.
This is knew that that boards are then expected to adopt what's called a human sexuality plan. And so this information will go into that at this time. The timeline is to bring that forward to you at our January board meeting. We'd like to give you. Information about that the draft of that plan to you in December to review so that you can formulate then questions back to us and don't have to process that all in one meeting read it review it and then we'll take your questions by January 7th that will help us to know.
How to better structure that board meeting so you have what you need it helps us also take a very long presentation down to just the slides in the information that you feel you need to make a decision. So that's [00:36:00] the plan at this point is for us to present and for you to adoption on January 14.
You've mentioned that joint rotary luncheon. We've heard a lot about it. Again. This is our second annual one at great opportunity to connect with folks in our community to kind of do a state of the school's address and tore a new school. Third graders who got to sing and the welcome and the tours were all done by students.
So it's a great way to showcase our incredible School supported by our community but also for folks who sometimes don't get into our schools that often to reconnect with students and was greatly appreciated the topic for this for this time was letting them know that we're thinking about high schools last year was able to share within the high school study that we were engaged in.
And so this was kind of a. Part 2 and all of you were there. So thank you for coming and I appreciated that you sat around at different tables and interacted with [00:37:00] the community. That was great.
Several of you have mentioned future Highschool possibilities and for those in the audience or watching on television. We have two Community forums tomorrow and Wednesday where we want to engage our community in this topic. No decision has been made. We're really at the beginning of the decision-making process.
And so this is when we want the community to get involved and to listen to some of the possibilities out there. On the fourth and the fifth and then. Give us feedback that will be important for long range planning committee to have that feedback and you'll receive that as a school board as well.
Will synthesize the feedback cards the posters and no cheese. We're going to have three different ways for folks that night to give information to us. Everybody feels heard and has an opportunity to interact with the information. It won't be a kind of a sit and get presentation. We're not going to do that.
We're really going to structure like a focus group. We're going to give information. Let people [00:38:00] engage in that right and give a lot of feedback and then give some more information engage with that much more like a focus group format on the six or bringing back that group of high school teachers that group of about 50 or 60.
They're going to come after school who are part of a summit last year thinking about high school programming. So going to do kind of a part two with them and engage them also in. Programming and the feet what we learned from the high school study as well as what we've been hearing from our community around how to keep moving forward and making sure High School curriculum feels relevant and as our students have been telling us that what they're learning in high school today is going to help poop with their future.
and lastly, I'm just going to end with. Just that the theme of some of the work we've been doing this year. As you know, our theme is leading for all and you've got this you've got this beautiful board gold number three where we talk about hearing from our community and our [00:39:00] students are a large part of that and we've been really intentional this year to create more student panels.
We've learned that when we give them opportunity to voice not just in the classroom, but actually in a form like a panel. We get incredibly deep insightful and Powerful information from them about what they're experiencing in school what they need from us what their hopes and dreams are how much they support their family their their belief that their family has in them and how much they appreciate their family and appreciate support from teachers.
We started in August with the student panel that came of course to our Leadership Retreat and heard from them that kind of launched the year. You all in your visits had at least one or several student panel speak to you as a board about what they needed from you as board members and what they needed from The District in terms of hearing their voices and their experience.
We've had student panels on our school Equity [00:40:00] teams and voices their as well as presenting to their staff and school communities. We have a district leadership team called inclusive schools leadership team that meets once a month. And we have students on that team and we have had since its Inception and their voices are incredibly important to our decisions and our process and then just last week we had I think the third in our Series II in our teaching with purpose Workshop, which we offer every year for new teachers to the district to help them feel connected to the district.
We. Have various topics and this last one was on equity and relationships and we had about 18 students on that panel. Dr. Preijers nodding. He facilitates that workshop with Kathy Monroe and it was incredibly powerful as students shared what it is they need from teachers. What the relationships they value how they want us to believe in [00:41:00] them and their potential and teachers left.
It was emotional at times teachers left quite impacted by hearing student voices. So this idea of what if we're going to lead for all and every student how do we hear the voices of all and student panels are incredibly powerful way to do that, and we've had at least a number of them by now, and it's only December and we're hoping to continue this trend this year.
And that's my report. Thank you.
Thank you.  In order to foster a climate that encourages and values public input. We want to thank you if you came to speak tonight for taking the time out of your day to share with us your voice and to take a part in the district's action. Your involvement is valued and appreciated. The public comment time is a time when the board uses to collect information rather than [00:42:00] engage in dialogue.
So the board encourages speakers not to mistake our silence for lack of Interest or care. We are listening carefully often taking notes. And if you are asking the district or the board to take action of provide information. You need to provide your contact information for us or to Miss Douglas who is the board secretary so that the appropriate person can follow up with you.
It's my commitment as board chair if someone comes in and asks for something very specific that you within a reasonable time get a response either from District staff or myself.
There are some limitations during public comment and the most important is that is not a forum for singling out individual District employees or students for complaints and that's either by name or implication. I'll be listening for that. So it's just something we protect very carefully that this isn't the place where we have [00:43:00] those conversations.
If you have a complaint about an individual student or a district employee, please do not mention but I've been by name or provide information that would allow them to be identified. There's other ways to pursue those kinds of complaints and I'm glad to address up with you if that's why you come.
Please keep your comments to three minutes. Miss Douglas has a warning card and a final card and she'll be helping us move aware. You're welcome to reach out to the district office through Miss Douglas or myself at a labor time to set submit further materials to the board. So we want to hear what you have to say, but we are limited in our time at.
So when you come forward to the podium, please state your name and your address for the record and and then began Susan Gallagher