2013-05-20 PPS School Board Regular Meeting

District	Portland Public Schools
Date	2013-05-20
Time	missing
Venue	missing
Meeting Type	regular
Directors Present	missing

Documents / Media

Transcripts

Event 1: Board of Education - Regular Meeting - May 20, 2013

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me right good evening this meeting in the board of education for May 20th 2013 is now called order I'd like to extend a warm welcome to everyone present and to our television viewers all items that will be voted on this evening have been posted as required by state law and this meeting is being televised live and will be replayed throughout the next two weeks if you're interested in seeing it again or to taping it please check the Board website for replay times we're also streaming live on pps.net and it will be archived if you want to find it in the future this evening we have interpreters with us tonight I'd like to invite them up this time to introduce themselves and indicate where they'll be located or not hello everybody can you can you use the microphone please for the folks that are in the back just that's okay hi good evening my name is Naim Isaac I'm Somali interpreter great we are going to move on just to note that director Sergeant is absent I know that she would love to be here to honor our valedictorians but she is away out of town um celebrating the graduation of her son from college so congratulations to her and her family she has another one graduating to college so this time of year we are honored to welcome our students who have achieved excellence in academics tonight we're going to meet our 2013 valedictorians from every High School in the district and there are lots of them which just shows that students are working their tails off to do well and Excel in academics and we couldn't be more proud of them superintendent Smith do you have any words and again thank you for joining us earlier for a reception but I'd like to say congratulate congratulations again to all of our valedictorians and welcome um and similarly congratulations to all of our valedictorian families and teachers and principals and the whole support team that has been part of supporting you and being here tonight and we're really excited to have you here uh to let us join in honoring you and get to hear some individual stories from each of your schools so with that um we will I will be over there to to shake hands and trip Goodall our director of high schools will be the one who who starts the proceedings and reads your names so just welcomes you to the mic just a couple of directions real quick so each valedictorian is going to come forward and state their name and the last student from each high school has been selected by the group from their High School to answer the question what in your years at Portland Public Schools has prepared you for your next steps so that's a little bit of the format that we'll be using this evening so I want to again Echo again the accomplishments are enormous if we get a big round of applause for not just the students but the families here today that really I know I can speak for the valedictorians that they they appreciate all the support throughout the years so we're going to start off tonight with Alliance and because Alliance has one student who's first I want to announce her it's Laura cell home Laura thank you I'm Laura salhome Portland Public School is provided with an alternative education when I didn't fit the mold of the typical high school student I am a strong student academically but I have unique struggles Alliance High School at Benson is a small school full of amazing teachers who allowed me to work at my own pace and successfully earned my high school diploma by attending Alliance I gained empathy for other students who struggle in school I learned not to assume alternative schools are for students who cannot cut it academically or do not want to learn and I benefited from making friends with classmates from many life circumstances I am grateful an alternative school was an option it helped me face my challenges and succeed in high school in doing so I gained confidence and it prepared academically and emotionally now to pursue a college education thank you
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now the valedictorians from Benson High School uh I'm ciaobo from Benson High School thank you Juan Rios review from also from Benson High School hello my name is Keely overvey and I'm also a valedictorian from Benson High School class of 2013. in Myers at Portland Public Schools I've learned a few things I've learned how to write a five paragraph essay in under 30 minutes the best strategies for taking multiple choice exams and definitely had to sacrifice sleep games and social times to study last minute for that final but more importantly than that I find that success isn't defined by the number of A's on your report card or the number of digits in that scholarship you received defined by the Fulfillment and happiness you find from pursuing the passions that you have in life as I move on at high school and the college I hope that I'll be able to take the lessons I've learned from Benson my teachers and my friends to find the passions that will help me find a life that's truly worth living thank you valedictorians from Cleveland High School I'm Madison Cole I'm Laney Corrigan I'm Natalie Croft I'm Devin Essick I'm Jessica font I'm Cameron fish I'm Megan Hadley I'm Adrian Hinkle I'm Christopher Hinkle hi my name is Matty aikida I'm Mitchell lineker I'm Sophia laprinzi Hardin Antonio Maldonado Liu I'm Ruby O'Connor I'm Bryden Qualls Thomas I'm Bria Robertson song I'm Lucy Wyman hello my name is Hannah steinkoff Frank and I will be speaking on behalf of the Cleveland High School valedictorians well I have only been a student in Portland Public Schools for the past four years it has provided a wide variety of opportunities to explore new interests and hobbies Cleveland High School specifically has an offline and online newspaper an award-winning choir program a wide range of athletic activities popular theater and art departments and the international Baccalaureate program which allows students to take college-level courses with a focus on global standards of excellence every one of the valedictorians standing in front of you stands out not just for their academic Excellence but for their varied interests their dancers scientists actors mathematicians painters and writers and most of us do not just fit into one of those categories we have Paul Cook our principal the CHS faculty and staff as well as Portland Public Schools to thank for this so right here is a Cleveland we have been encouraged not just to try for success in the fields we flourish in but also to leave our comfort zone and try the new and exciting programs offered to us I know that this diversity has shaped us all into well-rounded individuals who are ready to take what we have learned from Portland Public Schools to be successful in the world outside of high school thank you
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valedictorians from Franklin High School foreign ER Raymond tat I'm Hannah Welsh I'm Wayne Ken Wu I'm Edmund Zan I'm Mona law and I'm speaking for Franklin as a kindergartner at creative science School my identity was defined by my symbol a simple stick figure flower with five petals and two leaves that flower marked my coat hook and my cubby it made me different from the other boys and girls in their symbols my teachers held the expectation that I would be a free thinking individual that I would observe and make decisions on my own I learned to ask why what for and how come I discovered physics and my own curiosity with ping pong balls and playground ramps I saw how the steepness of a ramp determines how fast or slow a ball would roll fast forward to Sunnyside environmental school age 11 I was overwhelmed I forgot about individuality I was shy and all I wanted was to fit in but my teachers required that I try new things and be an active member of my community on a field trip to examine human impacts on the environment we hiked through a forest that had been clear-cut for lumber the smaller shrubs on the forest floor had been trampled and there were stumps and piles of discarded tree branches everywhere I felt in my notebook I sketched a small black yellow bird that I had seen hopping around I felt sad for the Hopeless Spirit Homeless Bird and I wish I could have done something to help this was the beginning of my love for the natural world entering Franklin High School I was faced with new options freshman year filling out that orange forecasting sheet my choices were Swift I would take the standard classes and go the easy route and I got A's so none of my teachers asked me what was wrong the easy route was boring I wanted something to feed my curiosity to inspire and motivate me sophomore year I carefully read the forecasting booklet cover to cover but there was no class titled get your hands dirty and save the world with friends and I wish there was so I found a club Charter form and a co-president and I created something called Earth Club and the next year I chose to take AP biology and I discovered photosynthesis and evolution and ocean acidification now I'm graduating and I know my identity I'm not a stick figure flower with five petals and two leaves I am a leader and a future biology major an environmental activist the magic of my Portland Public Schools experience is that my teachers made me feel like I made it here on my own but they were guiding me the whole time they were the ones giving me the choices providing feedback on my essays answering my questions challenging me to work harder and holding me up to the highest standards thank you thank you and now valedictorians from Grant High School my name is Emily Turner my name is Parks Kendrick my name is Emma Frank hello I'm Lauren meininger Mike Larson my name is Miles Anderson hi I'm Casey Hess hi my name is Logan Miley up Miriam Cohn at valedictorians today throughout my years at Portland Public Schools many things have conspired to prepare me for the next step however the most important factor by far was exposure to diverse groups of people the sort of diversity is unique to Public Schools there are many good types of diversity diversity of relate of race religion socioeconomic status and the like there's also academic diversity
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in my years here I've interacted with kids who intuitively understand calculus kids who struggle with basic multiplication and kids everywhere in between and it's that sort of diversity that has taught me the most as somebody who has watched others struggle and somebody who has been the one struggling the lesson that we all need to help each other out is permanently ingrained in me in an environment where deep-reaching budget cuts are the norm and class sizes seem to grow exponentially learning to both give and accept help has been invaluable even more than functioning as a lesson how to give and receive help however my time in Portland Public Schools has been a crash course in self-advocacy be on my school's Constitution team this year has been the culmination of this development teaching me to be even more assertive and opinionated but but my experience as a student in Portland Public Schools up to that point laid a vital Foundation going to schools or classes under 30 students were the exception rather than the norm and the size of the larger student body limited the ability of staff to provide individual attention to students I learned very quickly that somebody had to speak out for my interests when I was younger my parents could speak up for me but as I got older I realized that I had to speak up for myself and ask for what I needed as I got into the real world I'm confident that knowing my needs and being enough of a self-advocate to ask for what I need will serve me well thank you Jefferson High School hi everyone I'm angelicia Frierson and I'm a Gates Millennium Scholarship scholar this year I'm Alexandra Darley and I'll be speaking for Jefferson High School so by being a part of Portland Public Schools at Jefferson I've been able to take classes at Portland Community College and I've been a part of a class called senior inquiry this is in collaboration with Portland State University and because of this class I've been able to form a community with students because I just started at Jefferson High School I was at the Young Women's Academy for the last three years and because of this I've learned how to do things I never thought I could in reading and writing and I've just formed myself to be a better person and I've also been a part of the superintendent student advisory committee and because of this I've been able to do leadership with Carol Smith and with other students that have been representing schools in the area and it's because of Portland Public Schools that I'll be able to go out and be a leader learn more things and be a person that I never imagined I could be thank you thank you these are the valedictorians for Lincoln High School my name is Anna Kramer hi I'm Hayden Henderson hi I'm Maggie osmondson hi I'm Christina Schmidt hi I'm Santana silver I'm Lucy wicks hey I'm John Williams hi I'm Rachel Katz and I'll be speaking for Lincoln unlike many of the students who are being honored here tonight my public school career didn't start in PPS when I first entered the system it wasn't quite the right fit but PPS was already looking out for me adjusting class placement to Foster the best learning environment of which I could be a part throughout Elementary School my teachers gave me the attention tools and motivation I needed to finish fifth grade in Mr Brand's class with proudly with all E's and pluses on my report card Middle School was different I had to learn to navigate a system where I was one of many teachers no longer could see everything that went on in the classroom and torments were often hurled that when unheard by authorities the bowling was difficult but it built me a backbone and it taught me how to Prevail in the face of adversity it taught me how to focus on my academics Above All Else I entered high school then determined to learn everything I could no matter what and that's exactly what Lincoln allowed me to do it was at Lincoln that I really learned how to balance extracurricular and social involvement with my academic Pursuits The Faculty like Kathy Humes allowed me to take all three IB sciences and the love I felt for those classes pushed me to try an engineering program which ultimately helped me decide to attend MIT the agency of Independence and balance that has been given me at my time at PBS
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will help me in my undergraduate studies and serve me well in my future Adventures Beyond thank you valedictorians from Madison High School hi my name is Laureen Butler hi my name is Joel Interline hi my name is Carden Lee hi my name is Isaiah Truong my name is Sylvia Morales and I am the speaker for Madison High School I have attended Portland Public Schools since I was in kindergartner and I know there's no better District I could have been in but this one the years of the education that I have obtained are very much owed to Portland Public Schools that have provided me the opportunity to build a strong educational background that would eventually help me with the next step in my educational career which is college in my years at Madison High School I have learned not to take the easy route meaning the easy class is to get in the easy grade but rather to challenge myself by taking the numerous advanced placement courses offer at Madison an important aspect that has prepared me and my fellow Madison valedictorians to experience the amount of effort required and time next year college classes will expect from us these level talk college classes have taught us many things such as learning to see things from different perspectives and have given us the skills needed to prepare us well for the next steps in our life in addition not only has Madison provided us with challenging classes but the wonderful staff and teachers of Madison have constantly pushed us to a whole new limit their encouragement to achieve greater academically have been the reason why we have tried to obtain the grades we were able to hold throughout our years as high school students at Madison the teachers are always willing to help their students after school not because they have to but because they they have seen how much we care to learn not just to improve our grade but to give one-on-one student-to-teacher conversation conversation when we have found ourselves struggling the most therefore I thank the Portland Public Schools for the amazing teachers that have taught us at Madison in the last four years because of them I feel prepared to take on the next challenge After High School thank you is about victorians from the Metropolitan Learning Center uh hi my name is Renee barish and I will be speaking for Metropolitan Learning Center so Portland Public Schools has provided me with the resources for becoming a successfully motivated independent and accomplished individual with the support of my teachers and the school Community I have not only thrived academically but strived to make a passionate and lasting impact on the world both locally and internationally throughout my four-year High School career I have been encouraged to not only perform to the best of my ability but to also challenge myself inside and outside the classroom while always remembering to reflect on what my struggles and successes have been the Metropolitan Learning Center Community specifically has had huge impacts on my growth and development as a participating member of society serving as the student representative on the mlc site Council committee I have not only been able to give back to the school environment for which I am so grateful for but I've also been able to work with mlc staff and parents and further appreciate not only what a unique learning space mlc is but how that space has shaped who I have become I am thrilled to say that I will be attending the Hebrew University of Jerusalem Israel this coming Academic Year and I'm certain that my International involvement and interest would not have grown into such a passion if it hadn't been for the support from my family in school I look forward with great enthusiasm to the beginning of my next chapter in life and I'm thankful for PBS and the Metropolitan Learning Center who were my guiding forces the valedictorians from Roosevelt High School I came here four years ago and it was a different place to come here for me and I didn't know anyone and I didn't have any friends but PPS helped me and to become to get off my I was shy because I couldn't talk more and it helped me to become more open and to make more friends and being a Roosevelt it provided me with senior inquiry classes Pap classes like calculus and literature and language and I became more a leader and I work after school with a student with freshmen to help them um students who come from different countries and who have a different experience and who doesn't know um how to help themselves so I work with them and to make them more involved and to inspire them so PPS helped me to become
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a leader and I want to thank you about thank my teachers and my family to become develop tour and I worked hard to become a valedictorian even though I came from different countries I have to work hard as much as more than other students have to work because I have to become friends and in my my accenting my language so yeah I would say thank you valedictorians from Wilson High School hi my name is Paige kraki hi my name is keep Nathanson hi I'm Sydney Rubin hi I'm majena fira hi I'm Emily O'Loughlin hi I'm Jordan Metz hi I'm Emma fredgient and last but hopefully not least I am Nathan palmrose from Wilson High School I actually had the opportunity to talk to many of the other valedictorians from our school about what PPS has done to help us reach our next steps in our lives and I think our findings can be concisely summed up in one word access access to a large variety of advanced level courses where we can push ourselves among other like-minded hard-working individuals access to a lot of unique courses such as computer science which allow us to explore different career possibilities access to a lot of different extracurriculars and the communities that are around these extracurriculars that allow us to express ourselves and really become a part of the Wilson Community as a whole and access to a lot of really passionate and great staff that have been able to help guide us through a very turbulent couple years of high school throughout all this that we've walked many different paths PPS has helped get us to the next level where we can access our true potential thank you superintendent Smith uh co-chairs Belial and Gonzalez these are your valedictorians for 2013. again we'd like to congratulate you we look forward to seeing you um as we speak at your graduations it's great to get to know so many of you as you crossed in front of us and we are just going to take a couple minute break to let parents and families clear out congratulations valedictorians and Families all right folks we're going to go ahead and get started so if you are in the back lobby area if you could um try to keep it down your noise level because I'm not sure folks can hear mm-hmm thank you all um we're gonna get started and we are going to turn it over um our next order of business is the superintendent's report um superintendent Smith I'll turn it over to you so um a couple things we're like we're in the uh year-end event season and we've got awesome stuff that's really our students showcasing um and so I will just report to you on a couple of those things so verslandia if you do not know what verslandia is it is something that you want to look for and put yourself on the calendar for next year and here we have verslandia which was April 30th at the Wonder Ballroom this was our second PPS High School poetry slam and it's presented by literary Arts it's the Grand Slam for individual schools uh Poetry Slams that are hosted by our high school library media specialists so students who are honored with top awards that night first place Micah Fletcher from Madison High School second place kashayla Brown from mlc third Jess flout from Cleveland High School
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fourth Sydney Oliver Grant High School and fifth Lauren Steele from Jefferson High School and I'm just going to say it is such an inspirational night to be part of and so personal and inspirational and anyway keep your eye open for this next year and I would just encourage everybody to attend it's totally wonderful and I want to thank our teachers and Librarians and classroom teachers and parent volunteers who brought students from their school slams to the Wonder ballroom and special thanks to Nancy Sullivan from Madison who brought versland into being and to our sponsors and finally Mary Regner hunt Holman and the rest of literary Arts who make this night possible it is an awesome experience so um on May 11th we had our Departments of dual language and ESL meet with the Vietnamese Community leaders and citizens there were several hundred people in attendance and it's the first in a number of meetings with language communities to share the process for expanding our dual language immersion to include another language or to expand the number of sites of service so a lot of passion around the need to honor the Heritage language and culture of our Vietnamese students as we strive for biliteracy and biculturalism and we will be doing more of these meetings as we explore what what our expansion of dual language immersion programs will be in the coming years so very inspirational meeting at Chief Joseph elementary school Chief Joseph used its Equity Grant from All Hands raised to commission tomavia a member of the Yakima Indian Nation to paint a mural of Chief Joseph on an outer wall of the school the mural completes the schools Nez Perce Garden Beth Britton who is the great granddaughter of Chief Chief Joseph stopped by in the early stages of the mural to meet the Chief Joseph students and see via's work on her great-grandfather's likeness so people are really excited about this as it's as it was taking shape our Wilson High School will singers took first place in the State Choir championship and we're going to get to hear them at our next board meeting but but they took first place and Cleveland High School landed second place in the 2013 5A OSAA State Choir championships on May 11th at George Fox in Newburgh which is a first for Wilson and first for two PBS high schools earning top finishes in one year so we're really excited on that one at Jackson Middle School they just celebrated the 15th year anniversary of The Bernstein art for learning program on May 14th and the school adopted this program 15 years ago using a three-year grant that began began infusing art into the teaching of every subject at Jackson when the grant ran out the school joined with its Community to continue funding the program and have than they have been ever since so just congratulations to Jackson principal John Ferraro his staff students and Community for continuing this fantastic program um women of wind energies Portland chapter has been partnering this month with Abernathy Elementary School to teach students about wind turbines and wind energy generation and here we have first grade students in their third or fourth grade buddies learning by using interactive wind turbines and other activities students from the Columbia Gorge Community College renewable energy Technology Program parents and other Civic and Business Leaders have worked with Abernathy teachers on this pilot project that's become a strong example of a public-private partnership I just want to say thanks to women of wind energy and Portland General Electric Parsons Brinkerhoff and HDR Inc who are the partners that are making this fabulous program happen and then finally grab Grammy winner Sarah memory and his American music project jazz band which is composed primarily of students from Cleveland Grant and Lincoln High School as well as the Sellwood Middle School performed on May 11th at Lincoln Center in New York City so the bandwidth I mean this is awesome the band was among only 5 15 jazz bands chosen nationally to compete at the essentially Ellington event which was hosted by Wynton Marsalis their memory this spring moved the American music project rehearsals to King K-8 school and has plans to engage King students in his work starting in the fall just a thank you to Mr memory for bringing your singular talent and inspiration to our students so cool stuff going on all over the district and our kids are awesome so okay thank you superintendent Smith we're not going to move on to the next order of business which is student testimony Miss Houston do we have anybody signed up we do not okay so that means we are going to move on to
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the next item which is our student representative recognition before we do our recognition of our student representative Garcia we're going to have her provide us with her final student representative report and after that report we will have you introduce your replacement our next year is sounds good perfect so first off I want to thank the board in Portland Public Schools for an amazing year and I have had a really amazing time serving on the board and I've learned so much about politics relationships and government and feel so much more prepared for whatever I decide to take and take on next I've been on the PPS student union and superintendent student advisory Council for three years now and I've seen so much growth Within These groups with that I need to thank the student Representatives before me who've really set up a base for what the union and supersac has become I want to recognize Dina yazdani the 2010-2011 representative and Henry Lee the 2011-2012 representative who I continue to contact whenever I have questions I also want to recognize the adults that have worked with the PPS Student Union in supersex since I've been here I want to send a huge thank you to both Terry Proctor who I worked with my sophomore year and Andrea Wade who I worked with for the last two years and last but not least I want to take the time to recognize the students on the PPS student union and Portland Student Union I know as the representative I often get credit for things that I really do not deserve credit for and these students this year have really stepped up and it's impressive looking at all we've done and learned and all that we've achieved so I'd like to recognize a few things that students from the PPS and Portland student unions have been a part of we've made great progress with our student feedback form many of us worked on the our Portland our schools school bond campaign we've lobbied at we've lobbied in support of a few house bills and for a higher education budget in Salem we've testified to the city council to prevent further cuts to youth we've met with the Portland business Alliance to discuss our concerns surrounding race at the top we've had students serve on various committees throughout the district include including the citizens budget Review Committee the achievement compacts and the Ed specks committee we've led a nationally recognized opt-out campaign against standardized testing we've United with student unions across the country and we've still managed to attend school this year we have really educated ourselves on the issues surrounding our schools taking a stand and shown true leadership in the district what I love most about the student unions is that everything we do is real some students join mock trial or Model United Nations and not to discredit those students or programs at all but what I find most impressive about the students on the PBS and Portland student unions is that we are legitimately playing politics if I've learned anything about public education it's that it's complicated Great Schools cannot cannot exist if they're not properly funded relationships cannot exist without trust the achievement Gap will never close if we can't if we don't tackle social issues outside of schools too many decisions about education are made by people who have not been in the classroom in years and being on the school board is one of the most thankless jobs I know of with that I want to again thank the school board members for dedicating their time to serve our students I don't always agree with you and your decisions however it's impressive how much time you dedicate to our community so after serving on the board for a year I have a few final thoughts that I'd like to share so one we as a board I think need to build a better relationship moving forward so with a student representative next year and as a board we need to continue to be unified so that we can work together even better and two we can't leave the community behind I know we've set up our board agendas in the summer each year however if the community brings up an issue we should address it I understand we can't always have the conversations with peoples while they testify it with people while they testify at board meetings but that doesn't mean we can't personally follow up with them later you may not you may already do this but something I found incredibly helpful this year was attending various meetings with groups that invited me or going out to coffee with people to hear their opinions on issues and share mine it can't hurt to have conversations with people three we need to meet with the Portland Association of teachers regularly I've said it before and I'll say it again we need to work collaboratively in order to best serve the students four we all know that teachers are literally the most important part of the education process as they are the people directly in contact with the students we need to support them and get their feedback on what we're trying to do as a district because they are huge stakeholders in the system a student will benefit so much more from a teacher who is not overwhelmed and is who is happy with their job we'll also be able to attract more teachers to this district and have a bigger pool to hire from if we treat our teachers well I do not understand how we expect to reach our 2025 graduation Milestones if we do not support our teachers not to mention that teachers are going to be the community members that stay engaged in education after they retire and five we need to be creative I understand we're incredibly underfunded that doesn't mean we can leave our
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students behind we always talk about working with the business community and getting our students internships yet I've never been offered any sort of guidance for my school about how we can make this happen I know there are plenty of community members that would love to work with students we just need to invest some time to go find those groups and six we can't let the Common Core State Standards and standardized testing control our district correct me if I'm wrong but I believe I've heard from most of you that you support standardized testing with that said I'd encourage you all to approach standardized testing with an open mind and go out to coffee with the community members and groups that have taken a stand against it to better hear out our side I believe many of you said that you challenge programs you believe are wrong even if that means challenging the law these are National and state requirements that we definitely should challenge to best support our students and finally I would like to introduce next year student representative to you all Andrew Davidson and he's a student at Grant High School and he's actually sitting in the crowd if you want to believe but Andrew attends the majority of the school board meetings he's on the Ed specks committee and he's been an incredibly active member of the PPS Student Union this year I have no doubt that the PPS Student Union in super Zac will Thrive under his leadership and with that I'd like to conclude with a huge thank you to everyone that's a part of this District everyone who actively fights for a better education system and everyone who has helped myself in the student unions this year it's clear that the community truly cares about the well-being of the Next Generation and wants to support public education and knowing that I hope we I hope that we can continue to support true public education in Portland challenge corporate education reformers and work for what students want in their education and if one thing's for sure I know I'll be a lifelong advocate for public education thank you representative Garcia thank you so much for that and congratulations as you bring your term to a close I'm superintendent Smith do you have a couple of words just congratulations and thank you for your leadership this year and it has like over the three years you've been a part of um super sac and student union it has developed and grown tremendously and really I think had a significant impact on the district so thank you for your leadership and thank you to other super SEC members for serving this year great um so we have a little momento um it's a little oddly timed because she'll be with us for one more meeting but since this is our formal meeting we wanted to take the time to do it today and then we'll get to have her at our work session on Monday the 3rd so with that superintendent Smith I think I'd turn it over to you okay okay four for presenting um it is thank you we're going to take a quick picture in front of a picture thank you so sometimes as we're taking our photo I think about what that looks like on live TV it's not the most engaging television although some might say the board meetings aren't the most engaging television um are there other board members that want to say a couple words yeah thank you I would love to thank you for serving on the board I absolutely love and appreciate the student voice on the board and you've been really outspoken this year in so many different areas and it's been really healthy to have that voice and it's also been fun to watch you over four years as you've kind of progressed through leadership starting at your high school level and moving on up through super SEC and then the Student Union and I also love the fact that you were an international
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Ambassador this year in Qatar and I think that shows just how far you've come in your four years as a high school student and working on behalf of all students and representing us not only here but across the world so thank you I've been I've been just thrilled to serve with you so congratulations I understand that Alexi is going to the Sasquatch music Festival this weekend um careful we just spent about 20 minutes before the meeting well mostly Greg lecturing on being careful and I just want her to be safe it was all Greg it was all great uh no seriously though thank you so much for the voice that you've brought to uh our board our meetings uh really appreciate that and thank you for for the work that you've done in organizing students I think that is incredibly important and I think going forward we're going to be able to uh we're going to be able to see that see the fruits of your labor more and more so thank you that's a legacy that you've left yeah when I think of um Alexia I think of um how much of the ethos that I think Portland brings about activism and Civic engagement and so I just really appreciated what you brought so thank you with that we are going to move on to our next item which is public comments Miss Houston do we have anybody signed up for public comment we have okay and Tran and on band as they come up I'm going to read instructions for public comment yes please join us so our responsibility as a board lies in actively listening and reflecting on thoughts and ideas and opinions of others the board will not respond to any comments or questions at this time but we'll follow up on various issues that are raised guidelines for public input emphasize respect consideration when referring to board members staff members and other presenters you have a total of three minutes to share your comments please start by stating your name and spelling your last name for the record during the first two minutes a green light will come on when you have a minute left a yellow light will come on and at the end of that three minutes the red light will come on with a little buzzer and we just ask that you wrap up your comments at that time thank you both for coming thank you three or each of you has three thank you my name is the Adrian last name is trend t-r-a-n I am the President of the Vietnamese community of Oregon and I was thinking of singing a song to to get attention but I'm so nervous you so uh I am an engineer a software engineer for Bowen and the reason I come here today is to advocate for the Vietnamese language immersion program the desire to have that program for uh for the public school and the the things that I come I will introduce myself as an engineer because I want to put myself in Joshua to analyze things as an engineer and with that because I am represented the community and I know the community very well I know the the reasons that you should or you should not um adopt the the program and I come here to what I already sent you the a long letter about the the reasons why but I also come here to ask you to put things on a fairness with numbers statistics so that after you make decision I can come to each other one of you and ask you what is the criteria you you choose the language if you you all can answer me the same answer I'm all for it I'm all for it so so with that Fair and and concise and clear criteria that that's what I want so I'm I'm trying to put myself in your shoes and with that you have to consider the criteria so what criteria you have at hand and what criteria you don't have at hand so for example are you fighting for the kids for the children are you fighting for the economy or for some other countries somewhere else are you fighting for
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now or 10 years later you fighting for to improve the education and the quality of the children now or later so take all of those criterias put on your and and prioritize the criteria with numbers and you put on the scale to see how much what do you want to do with it and you you will come out with the correct answers that each one of you will be able to answer and to address so I um let's say the Vietnamese Community is the second largest after Spanish spoken in Portland thank you yeah light my name is Francis and farm last name p h a m m is Mary I'm a chairman of the Apostle Council of Our Lady of Lavan Catholic Church and I like to Echo what the superintendent just show you briefly about the meeting on May 11 happened in our Parish this is the first time we have the Gen to meet up the ball at the PBS staff and we share our in 10 hours we we dream to have the Dual language program happen in the near future I would like to bring another side not the engineering side but on the other side the benefit of this dual language if it's happened soon not only benefit for Our Generation who was born and raised in U.S but also benefit for the other people the other students from different communities I mean minority and even is a Caucasian because when you learn the Dual language program now in the kindergarten up to high school this will help you generate I mean develop your brand and also you will be more mature when you get into high school and get the job easily in after you graduate from University and then it will benefit the society because right now because we misunderstood our culture so our leader we have not understand clearly how do we consider some different culture in our society in the Melting Pot so if we get this program happen soon it will help us not only for Our Generation but for the country and also for the leader of this country because in the future all of us we will understand each other really well I mean our children if they learn the language from the kindergarten up yellow line but that is the thing I would like to bring it here and I would like to say is we have more than 30-year experience in teaching Vietnamese our parents we have more than 1200 kids go to Sunday school learn Vietnamese we have more than 100 teachers to teach Vietnamese in Portland not only that we have the other school in Beaverton in Portland all of us we have experienced this Vietnamese Sunday school more than 30 years so we would like to bring the awareness to all of you and we would like to see is is happen and then the last thing I can say is what we can do to help you to make it happen thank you very much for your time I don't I beat the light you beat the lights they're not so scary after all thank you but and before we move on um can I ask Mr Tran 30 seconds of a song oh I I was about to sing the uh the few sentence of the national anthem wait what would you be willing to say sure foreign foreign hi my name is winter Harvey h-a-r-v-e-y I would like to speak tonight on behalf of my son Luke and Mrs Esther's kindergarten class at Glencoe Elementary School in September of 2012 shortly after school started my son's teacher was diagnosed with liver cancer this was so heartbreaking to the entire school and Community she made the decision to keep teaching having a
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substitute fill in a few times a week while she went to chemotherapy and doctor's appointments during this time there were various substitute teachers filling in there was also a student teacher Jessica helping out in the class she was there until December when Mrs Esther informed us that she would be out often for treatments and then again for surgery a lot of thought was put into a replacement for her from the very beginning we were informed about the interview process and who they were considering hiring then when Amanda Ferguson was chosen we were given plenty of time to meet with her and to get to know her a bit before she spent six hours a day with our kids at the end of January Amanda Ferguson came in to fill in for Mrs Esther at the beginning of March Mrs Esther decided that she needed more time to heal and decided to take the rest of the year off all of a sudden there was a hasty decision to hire yet another teacher it was kept a secret and we did not get a notice until the night before she showed up in the classroom we did not even get a chance to have a formal meeting with her until several days after she had been there why was there such secrecy about her placement when we asked why such a decision was being made at this point in the year when there was only a few months left we were told that she was owed a position they said that she was a contracted teacher and that if they didn't find her a position by the end of the year they could get sued this decision was not based on what was in the best interest of our kids we later found out that Mrs Evans had been teaching at another school at the beginning of the year and that there was a long-term substitute who had taken over her class all of the changes in the classroom became too much for my son to handle when I had my conference with Miss Esther November she had expressed that he was a very sweet boy and was right where he should be academically there were no concerns at all then a few months ago I started getting calls about once a week or more that he was in the principal's office mostly for goofing around and not following instructions I was asked if there were anything different going on at home no there was something different going on in the classroom the transition was a little rough but he eventually got used to the new routine in his second quarter report card his teacher wrote Luke is positive and has a good sense of humor he is social and enjoys School after the third teacher came into the classroom he quickly became more and more insecure he was not enjoying school anymore he was crying all the time when I tried to drop him off and refusing to go into the classroom it got so bad that I eventually had to pull him out for the remainder of the school year to homeschool him as it turned out Mrs Esther ended up returning to the classroom for the last four weeks of the year she was informed one night at 7 30 that if she didn't return the next day she would lose her pay and benefits for the Year this should have been foreseen back in September our children have spent try to wrap up can you try to wrap up um yeah um her our children have spent the entire school year with a medley of substitutes assistants and teachers coming in and out of the classroom this lack of inconsistency has left the kids confused the rules and routines changed from teacher to teacher day to day they don't know who is in charge and it has caused them to become mistrustful and insecure and I had a list of questions that I would like answered I don't know if I have time to not to ask him but if you want to leave them with with our secretary okay that'd be great okay thank you thank you okay I'm John Gresham and I'm representing the war resistors League I'm here tonight to report briefly on the implementation of the new equal access policy during the current school year I want to start by saying that overall we're pleased with the results our volunteers staffed information tables 24 times this year two or three times at each of the PPS high schools military recruiters from the different Armed Forces branches were present during each of those visits and to my knowledge not recruiting students at other times we are comfortable with the latest revisions in District policy which recommend three visits per year in the co-location of recruiting and counter recruiting groups so that students can compare information and options we think however that an even better option would be to have the high schools hold a career fair once or twice a year and invite everyone military recruiters kind of recruiters Community groups and available college and business recruiters not all visits went smoothly this year as High School staff sometimes struggle to make the arrangements fair and Equitable for all but we've seen improvements in communication and the structure of the visits as the year has progressed for us the one consistent problem is that military recruiters insist on pushing up against the rules and and reasonable decorum during school visits they show up in large numbers and try to dominate the proceedings they pass out gifts and prizes to students that cost well above the five dollar limit and they approach students on the
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periphery who have not signed up to speak with them this spring the Marine Recruiters in particular have brought their chinning bar to equal access visits at Jefferson and Franklin high schools and at Franklin has students write down their personal contact information before trying the chinning bar we've seen the Marines use their tuning bar at events like the Rose Festival and the state fair but we feel strongly that it's inappropriate for equal access visits where the purpose is to inform students about post-high school opportunities and the realities of military Enlistment we also have concerns about safety as well as the collecting of student contact information outside the just of District procedures and federal requirements for doing so we're attempting to communicate with Greg Wallach to work through the chinning bar issue and we suggest the concerned board members weigh in as well I want to emphasize that overall equal access visits have gone pretty well this year and seem to be improving in terms of fairness and efficiency and most importantly in terms of providing students with a balance of information and perspective they deserve thanks thank you thank you for the update and thank you for sharing your concerns our last two speakers are Hong new Lee and Margie Brown Dear Miss Carl Smith as the school board my name is Hong Yul Lee I am fifth grade at Woodstock veterinary school I was born in the United States but my parents came into the United States of political refugees from Vietnam her parents sacrificed a lot for the children they worked very hard and all they want is for me and my siblings to obtain a good education to get a good life in America you always documentary to school there is a mentoring immersion program there are American students and Chinese students in this program I wish there was a Vietnamese vitamin C immersion program for a student like me my parents are trying to get all of us to speak Vietnamese at home but this is not enough because we can speak some weak but we cannot write in Vietnamese I can see that the Syrian and dementia immersion program we are very happy and proud being able to speak two languages the Chinese students are proud that they can learn their native language and English at the same time the American students are happy that they are learning another language besides English I can see too that the parents of the Mandarin language program are very proud they are proud that the children can learn and understand another language for their future I wish that there were a Freemason language immersion program at Woodstock I only believe this would make me proud of my parents proud I want to be able to maintain my Vietnamese language I want to make my parents proud and believe in me I know that knowing two languages will help me in my future I wish that you and the school board would love for my school to have very sandwich to be a part of our school I hope that other Vietnamese children and other Portland Public Portland school will be also to benefit from Vietnamese language programs we want to be proud of who we are we want American for students to learn Vietnamese to learn about our culture and culture and how we live so that they will be more tolerant about our differences my parents sacrificed everything for me I will try my best to make my parents proud I hope you will consider my requests and make this happy as soon as possible thank you thank you thank you my name is Margie Brown last name b-r-o-w-n and I'm a member of the 80 percenters and have two grandchildren in the system and I want all children in this community to have a highly credentialed and prepared teacher I'm concerned that our delayed timeline and process for hiring and transfer in the district hinders our ability to put great teachers in every classroom right now we should be ending hiring and transfers not just beginning we have one we if we want the top candidates we need to adopt the hiring practices of competing districts surrounding districts benefit from our slow process which allows them the ability to hire the most capable new graduates we need one round of hiring that both enter that's both internal and external beginning in March or April all
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assignments should be based on the candidate having the training and experience necessary for the assignment or at the very least time to get that necessary training we need to be making hiring and transfer decisions no later than May and June because dedicated teachers need time to prepare and make lesson plans for their fall assignments I understand that budget constraints impact that impact the schedule but neighboring districts have shown there is more that can be done to speed up the timeline for instance develop a planning but planning budget figure out the likely number of new hires interview new hires and make contingency offers or offers offer letters of intent subject on confirmation I know there were about 130 temporary teachers about to be let go surely it can be predicted which of these May well may still need we may still need or want this especially in certain fields I we commend HR for hiring special ed teachers earlier in the hiring process this year and have heard that advanced math will start soon but I have also heard we may have already lost a qualified temporary science teacher to private schools it is now mid-may and soon too late to find enough highly qualified Advanced science math fore language immersion and special education teachers the students in our schools have waited long enough for adults in this room to fix the process principals teachers and school communities need us to be well planned and decisive we have a very we have a very diverse school district and we need to be able to better meet meet the needs of our diverse communities that means enabling principles to be strong in structural Leaders with the tools to build strong staff and meet the needs of the community please Monitor and accelerate the HR process and make sure we are doing all we can to ensure we have the best teacher to fit every classroom thank you thank you so we are going to move on to the next item on our agenda but before I do that we need to recess as a board and reconvene as the budget committee we are now reconvening as the budget committee and the board acting as budget committee will now consider superintendent's proposed 2013-14 budget superintendent Smith would you like to make any comments about the 13th 14th proposed budget I would and they'll be very brief and part of what I just wanted to call out is what I saw a significant themes in preparation of this year's budget and in our dialogue with the community about the budget and I felt that throughout the course of the process we actually had significant both partnership and its development significant advocacy for what our community felt was important and I feel like there are a lot of our different constituent constituents who are really represented in what the final product is so the First theme overarching theme was our about our Equity Investments which I think we made a very strong statement that was the result of our work with Partners over the last three years on developing and improving an equity policy developing a five-year Equity plan and that this budget visibly operationalized how that shows up in terms of how we allocate resources our Equity formula increased how we differentiate resources and direct them specifically to reach historically underserved students and that commitment received widespread support from all parts of our community other Investments including the Portland International Scholars Academy also focused on intensifying services to historically underserved students and in a moment of testimony when somebody used Martin Luther King's words of it's not where you stand in times of convenience but in times of challenge this was not this was still a scarce resources budget and we had people advocating for all sorts of things that they believe were are important for us to fund and everybody everybody really made strong statements of support for the equity Investments and the priorities that were reflected in this budget people did not say wait until there's a more convenient moment or a more convenient time everybody said as a community this is important for us to do now and that was a really strong and important thing for us as a community I think that's reflected in this budget secondly high schools
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we had a parents Coalition that advocated strongly to accelerate rebuilding the capacity in our high schools which have been significantly impacted by budget reductions during the last two budget cycles and there was an incredible amount of advocacy and energy and collaboration that resulted in this budget reflecting a significant investment in rebuilding capacity in our high schools again before we're at a reinvestment budget and there was a commitment to not impact negatively the current Staffing levels in our K-8 schools so again I felt like that both standing up for what people believe is the most important thing to do in this budget and there are many things that were strategic Investments that had been identified that we put on hold in order to really say this is the thing that's important for us to do in this budget and the third one was the Arts tax and again this one is about partnership and it's about Community where we had last November our community passed on Arts tax and really say it's important for us as a community to have arts in our elementary schools and this is the mechanism by which we do it when the structure of the tax was challenged our city and our school districts came together to say okay this is a way that we can at least partially Implement that while we're waiting for the challenge to be worked out but we believe what the voters said in terms of their intent to say Arts are important an important feature of what we want to have available in our schools so all three of these were places that I felt deep Community participation investment ownership and pride in the in the result that makes me just feel like pleased and proud of the budgeting process and what our final document is even though we are not in a reinvestment budget and I keep saying I am so hopeful for the next biennium when I believe and and want that to be the case I believe that the budget really reflects the priorities of the community and I felt people really show up to say what was important to them so thank you very much for that thank you so with that we'll now consider resolution 4759 do I have a motion in a second director Gonzalez moves and director Morton seconds to adopt the resolution 4759 Miss Houston do we have any citizen comment on this resolution we have six okay our first two speakers Tom Kane and Jerry Eaton I won't go over the the instructions for public testimony but welcome sure should we begin yes please all right my name is Jerry Eaton I'm an English teacher and meek Pro Tech campus of Alliance high schools and a member of the high school action team I'm here to speak to you today in support of public alternative education and it is from this broader broader perspective that I want you to accept this message I begin with this preface for the simple fact that as a member of the alliance staff it would be easy to see my concerns as unilateral or self-serving however that mistake is only possible because of one simple fact Alliance High represents the sum total of PPS alternative high schools it wasn't always this way when I started in PPS back in 2000 then at vocational Village I had 25 colleagues in that one building we had nine full-time vocational strands and while the district district no longer offered alt Ed in every high school as it once had there were still a healthy cohort of at least three public Alternatives in the neighboring neighborhood high schools I know every corner of the PBS budget has felt the pain of reduced revenues but the cuts to all Ted have far out paced those in other areas and that pain has been passed on to the already marginalized students that we serve now if these Cuts were in response to a reduced need I might not be here today if PPS were no longer flush with large numbers of push-outs and dropouts we're not simply enrolled in school who would need us if the district grad rate was nearer the 100 we all agree it should be if every student found their own kind of learning available to them in their neighborhood high schools then fine slash away but that isn't where we stand one has to seriously question the notion that public alternative education the institution that is designed to meet the needs of non-traditional Learners and struggling students should be cut while this District seeks to increase its graduation rate and serve diverse students in a more Equitable way if anything this is the leverage point the place that investment will count the most at last week's meeting several of you asked Carol some pretty tough questions about where the funding was with Alliance and how the process had unfolded the simple fact remains Alliance is still being funded at serious staffing reduction over last year with a lower teacher to student ratio than several Comprehensive High Schools that's fewer students or fewer teachers more students per classroom also most of the ad backs were to
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correct mistakes in the original numbers and were unfortunately gobbled up by Administration administrative costs of maintaining two programs I want to thank Carol for her hard work on this but respectfully submit that most of her answers as to why alliance staffing is being cut were procedural and accounting based they were not pedagogical strategic or Equity based this is a question of vision public alternative education is the vision for PPS doing better than 67 percent it is the vision of high standards achieved through creative means and yes it costs money but not that much more a couple of weeks ago I attended the first High School action team and while it's way too early to predict the direction that that team will Point towards a better and more inclusive High School System I can tell you that the majority of voices in that diverse and skilled collection of Educators and stakeholders called for things like early interventions individualized instruction Career Technical education and Real World Learning these are the things we do in Alliance this is the kind I'm almost done this is the kind of system if if we want to build this kind of system why would we cut our ability to deliver those things now we are only asking for a few more staff and it is clear at this point it will take board action to make that happen please make it happen thank you thank you my name is Tom Kane um I see you all again um I have to admit last week I felt a little felt a little bit like Debbie Downer following the grant people which was a really amazing achievement them and their constitutional team one of the things that came up during that was how it was 11 people that had supported them and worked with them teachers and parents that 11 represents one more than our entire staff um and we don't have access to the kind of Parental support that they have in fact we are often the parental support of the students that we serve I just want to talk a little bit about what it feels like from our perspective a little bit it it feels like we are once again trying to smash Square pegs into round holes our CTE budget has been decimated over the years and if we're talking about serving a broad variety of students the cuts over the years have made a huge difference in our ability to do that these Cuts will only further that process um again I said last week that I didn't want to pit us against anybody else but when you look at 12 million dollars being what I would have to say is outsourcing we are Outsourcing our education and recently A friend of mine a very good friend of mine was sitting around in a coffee shop listening to several students several teachers who work at these programs talking about how they were desperately trying to put together their part-time salaries to make a living and it just seems like Portland Public Schools shouldn't really stand for outsourcing its education and Outsourcing its Educators and that's what it feels like on our end thanks very much thank you speakers are Amy constam and Mary Cogswell good evening my name is Mara Cogswell c-o-g-s-w-e-l-l I am I wanted to first start by saying offering my congratulations to the valedictorians who were here tonight that was really something to see it's exciting to see so many successful high school students coming out of Portland Public Schools I myself am a lifelong resident of Portland I attended Bridger Elliott elementary schools binsmead middle school and graduated from Lincoln High School I'm very proud of my Portland Public Schools education I'm a Portland Public Schools parent now with students in elementary middle and high schools I'm here today as a proud Franklin High School parent and a member of the southeast parents coalition my daughter is a freshman at Franklin this year and we anticipate our other daughters will attend as well as you are aware high school students and parents have been concerned about the lack of a full school day and the negative impact this has on students we are very appreciative that the board asked the superintendent to take back the initial budget proposal to see if there was a different approach that could be taken to restore the teachers and stop the disinvestment in our high schools thank you board members for that action superintendent Smith you Rose to the challenge and found a way to begin to address the shortened school day adding or releasing 58 teachers to the high schools will allow schools to offer a full day of classes for almost all students
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we support your recommendation to add and release High School Staffing and urge the board to support this important change it will help PPS meet its most basic obligation to students and to assist PPS in hopefully complying with the minimum standards of instructional hours this year the work is not yet done until schools are staffed to support all high school students to take a full school day that is why your commitment superintendent Smith to building a strategic framework and adequate Staffing for high schools by January 15th is so important we stand ready to work with you from the Franklin Community thank you superintendent Smith and board members we urge your support for the proposed budget and the high school Staffing changes thank you my name is Amy constam I'm also a product of Portland Public Schools and a parent of an elementary middle and high school student I'm here to testify in support of the budget that's before you and particularly address two real milestones in the budget I think as a district we've been bringing our hands over the achievement gap for many years and this is finally a real statement of priorities by making these Strategic Equity Investments that are I would say overdue and deeply appreciated for all the students in our district in our district and secondly I've been engaged in the conversation about the high school Staffing allocations and I'm incredibly gratified that we've arrived at a proposal that puts 58 FTE back into our schools offers our kids a full school day which never should have been which they never should have had anything less I believe and also a path toward assuring study halls that will really offer our students meaningful academic support and I think this component is really exciting because it is a way to offer support for struggling students as well as high achieving students that need that additional um support and collaboration working on IB preparation and things like that so I think we are going to be able to come up with some really exciting options there but mostly I want to speak to the process here I think a budget is nothing but a public Declaration of our priorities and this initial budget was really an invitation for our whole Community to engage in a conversation about the priorities of this public institution and in this instance after the initial budget was put forward it was almost an organic response from parent Community across our entire city who came to recognize the insufficient Staffing for the high schools were a violation of the fundamental obligation that the district has to our students that being access to a full school day and a range of opportunities for academic growth this this is our social contract this is our moral obligation to our students this is our fiduciary commitment to taxpayers and it's our community it's our commitment to our broader community that yes we are preparing our kids for the future and they're they're all our kids so recognizing this um it was really an incredibly healthy and productive process I think that took place where the superintendent took the budget back and said I hear you this is the commitment that we have to our community these are tough choices these are scarce resources as we just heard from really worthy programs that are deserving of more support there are all kinds of of examples like that but this is a fundamental commitment that the district has my oldest son is a sophomore so he's had two years of less than a full access to his high school education two more years that makes a big difference because that's all they've got every day and every year so thank you very much it's really happy to be part of this with you thank you before you call off the next two I'm going to save myself a quick email Amy I just want to thank you I noticed that on Facebook you posted on some state legislators page about still improving funding for education and I saw another state legislator who actually said you know we're just getting into the 41 days when we talked to wrap up and it's not a done deal keep the pressure on us so I want to say thank you for absolutely our last two speakers are Lisa Zuniga and Lauren chapton my name is Lisa Zuniga z-u-n-i-g-a I'm honored to speak here tonight on behalf of the three parents coalitions known on Facebook as the
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southeast parents Coalition Northeast parents Coalition and the Wilson Lincoln parents Coalition four weeks ago parents across the city mobilized on behalf of high school students in calling for the restoration of access to a full academic schedule for all of our students after two years of mandated part-time high school with more than 80 percent of students carrying schedules with early dismissal late arrival and study halls we couldn't bear to watch this disinvestment play out for even one more year we want to thank superintendent Smith and members of the school board for listening and working with parents students principals and School staff from across the city thank you especially superintendent Smith for open discussions that have led to this agreement with the parent coalitions guaranteeing a full school day for every high school student who needs or wants that option next year we support your commitment to build and recommend a strategic High School scheduling framework by next January this framework to be implemented in the following school year will provide access to a full day of academic classes for all high school students and above all it will be adequately staffed this framework will also meet at a minimum the state standards of instructional hours and credit hours per course we hope it becomes more than that I know you've received copies but I'd like to submit printouts of the agreement and our response to be part of the public record after years of settling uncomfortably for a less than approach to high schools we also ask that you are education leaders Elevate the conversation to one that encourages participation decisions made in these critical last four years can have lifelong consequences from compromising a student's ability to secure a family wage job to determining whether they're even admitted to college their eligibility for scholarship dollars and whether they'll end up footing the bill for remedial courses before they take their first Community College Class whether their full day means getting extra support exploring a new interest or building a more rigorous schedule young adults should have choices not mandates from above and those choices should represent opportunities we also need to raise the bar in regards to compliance with state law students look to adults for direction parents board members principals teachers we all have a huge responsibility striving for technical compliance or simply meeting the minimum shortchanges them and by extension the entire community we ask that you not only support the superintendent's recommendation but that you lead Portland in reinvesting in our high schools and in raising the value of a diploma from Portland Public Schools thank you as always for your service thank you it's Lauren chapton s-h-a-p-t-o-n I'm a parent of a Madison High School senior and a representative of the Northeast parents coalition as with the other parents who have been before you during this budget process I'm here tonight to ask you to improve support to our high school students and thank you for considering it every high school has its story of how Portland's slow disinvestment in high schools has played out at Madison the hard hits are compounded by other challenges Madison's Community faces we simply do not have the financial resources nor fundraising efforts within our community that other schools have we have a three-year-old PTA and no Foundation Madison has had the school Improvement Grant supporting efforts to raise student achievement along with resources brought by the Sig Madison has offered a classes to freshman students with academic priority this year test scores aren't in yet but we're really hopeful and believe the efforts will show then there's a flip side my senior son has had six classes this year and it's been really difficult on B days he begins at 9 45 a.m and ends before 2 pm the short days have made it hard for him to develop routines and be successful this has been his hardest year tonight you have a chance to reverse that the Madison School Community has a two-part ask it's this one you've heard before please support the superintendent's edition of 58 teachers to our high schools and the equity funding included in the superintendent's budget both actions will make a real difference for our students we also ask you to support the superintendent's action lifting the limit on the number of classes students can take of those outstanding valedictorians you saw this evening engaging students more is a really good thing thank you again for considering new investments in our high schools the Madison Community stands ready to support improved funding thank you I believe that's our sixth right okay at this time do we have any board discussion on the resolution giving any additional FTE to Matt or to Alliance as we've heard testimony from them and
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it sounds like it'd be a good investment for us if we pull out of our Reserves so am I adding more ftef so you've got a budget proposal in front of you and and you heard last week what was being added to Alliance so I have not done anything since what we heard last week could that still be a consideration at all or is it it's not part of this proposal it's it's not part of being what considered somebody could make an amendment proposal um to the adoption or resolution I'm not interested in pulling more out of reserves for that so I don't know if anybody else's I knew I had a long conversation today um with some staff about Alliance because I continue to have some concerns and mostly As I look at the tables I just find it so incredibly difficult to understand exactly how the program is being staffed so I I don't know at this point that I would offer an amendment but I would ask that we figure out a way to be more transparent in how we're funding that program and also be open to you know come September if we're not where we need to be that we're open to changing and I think that we've shown that flexibility in the past so that's good because any changes we make in September I will be coming back to you for that discussion um yeah I guess I just would add I mean I think we just need more more of a spotlight and alternative education in general I spent a lot of time and energy in the comprehensives and that's great but we need to be especially encouraged to see that the street and I think it was on the high school action team I think that group is just starting up and we haven't really seen or heard from them yet so that's going to be really important because I want to understand more you know in the overall system what's working what's most effective what are the what's the Staffing level that's really needed to be affected with support kids the way we want to and how are we going to accomplish that with the resources we have and then there's the cbos there's our you know there's just a whole range of questions that we really um we haven't put enough focus and attention on I don't think and as a board and it's not been clear enough to the community or at least certainly not to me so I'm looking forward to hearing more about that as we go forward I think just when you take continue to because there are a lot of students do not have active vocal parents who are able to Advocate on their behalf that we need to accept us to make sure that we're keeping it visible and making it a focus of our attention would also love to see us we've had we've invited the different High School clusters in to talk with us and right at some point I think it would be I mean we used to do some of this work in the student achievement right um but I think that we need to I I would completely agree and support the idea of having more of a focus on our alternative education program and maybe even hearing from and they're actually they will be scheduled as an education options will be scheduled in the same way we've scheduled the Clusters so the other part I mean I think you know Direct raises this question is I mean we hear a lot you know from parents in regards to preparation having students preparation for college but I also hear from folks in the community and and parents in particular that says look I mean not every not every one of our students are are going to go to college not that they don't need to be prepared for that but you know that's not necessarily where they go and we started missing opportunities right now and particularly when we look at you know the the career learning opportunities or or Vocational Technical tracks in taking advantage of I think you know some discussions that the community in terms of you know that are being framed more in terms of community labor agreements that you know our our you know we have some training programs you know that both in terms of the alternative school whether it's Portland youth Builders or at Benson um and even Alliance that um are preparing you know students for you know family wage jobs and we can play a you know a bigger role I think in regards to that part of that part of it unfortunately I don't think that we have heard those voices uh as loudly as as and as present as some of the others here and I you know I just wanted to again you know um kind of remind us of that that component and in particular I think that you know
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how we are looking at the that investment in terms of alternative school as it relates to also you know Vocational Technical uh training and that'll be important in regards to our discussion in the near future and then looking at you know what's what's the real um need in regards to be able to support it I think you know the the teachers that spoke earlier um you know challenged Us in regards to if we are looking towards being more effective with this student population and with this why we disinvest it's a legitimate question but I don't think necessarily we're going to be able to try to address that response you know fully today but will be something that definitely I would Envision that through a gender setting who will be putting on you know before us for a full discussion um so I'm actually pretty excited as we are looking to pass this budget because it really was a it's a flat budget but I think that we have done a good job through this budget in highlighting what our values and priorities are the fact that we are differentiating resources to support historically underserved students is just a huge statement I think from our community too not just from us um so I'm excited to be on the board that's doing that when I first came on the board I don't think we differentiated resources at all to speak of um we had a five percent um socioeconomic factor that was put on a couple of years ago and this is just another step because we know that we need strong relationships with kids and we need stronger supports for some kids and it's Our obligation to get there so I'm really excited about that and I think it's a it's a huge value statement from the city of Portland and this community that they are supporting us and that we really didn't get any pushback at all from our community I'm very proud of that and in fact we I think have stronger Partnerships than we've ever had before with communities of color and with our parents and the rest and I think that the high school schedule was something that um was a huge disappointment for many over the last two years it was a mess and we're fixing it for the most part in this budget I'm again really pleased with the Partnerships and the support we've had from parents in particular who have come forward and supported us through this whole budget cycle and I appreciate the fact that you engaged so much with our parents and were able to you know when we punted the budget back to you and said let's take a second look that you did that in such a gracious and welcoming and open way with our parents a real problem solving mode so I'm excited about that part I have to tell you I was at Grant High School last week job shadowing campus monitor two different days and what I heard from Grant staff all in both of those two days was just a sense of relief that we're that we're dealing with the high school schedule I mean that that's it wasn't a celebration it was a relief wow you know this this is going to make huge difference going forward for our kids and for the whole school climate the whole High School climate so it's it's a thrill and the third piece is the Arts tax it's been controversial it's been challenging it's been messy um but you know the fact is that we are going to be able to have more support to provide to start providing arts in a a more concerted way K-5 and hopefully K-12 as we go so I I think it's a it's a it's a night at some level for us to celebrate that even in a pretty flat budget cycle um I think we've prioritized in a way that the community for the most part can support and and back us and and I think they've shown that they have I just briefly want to say this is the fourth budget I think that I have been involved with and I think and I want to thank staff for this the job that they did on this budget I think it's the best has been the budget that has been the best put together
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from the get-go that I've seen and I appreciate that and also I think the fact that it integrated a lot of what the board talked about in our various meetings and also the Outreach that went uh the Outreach to the community as we were developing the budget I know that I was at a couple of meetings with Carol where she was you know we were putting up what would you like if we could if we had the money what would you want and the outpouring from the community of their hopes and dreams for our schools was incredible very moving and I hope that in my tenure on the board we'll be able to fulfill some of those hopes and dreams but I really did want to thank the staff for the work on the budget because I think it was very well done and then the conversations that happened you know once we had that draft budget have been so thoughtful amongst my colleagues I really appreciate the work that everybody has and the you know really gone Above and Beyond on all of that and um then like Bobby I or director Regan excuse me I want to um say how much I appreciate the work that has been done on the equity the differentiation of resources and the other part about that that has just been so wonderful is the feedback from the community about how excited they are that we're doing this even when times are tough and we're having trouble finding money to cover everything the emails that I received many of them started out with were so thrilled that you're doing this that you have you're differentiating these resources for those students who need it the most and then the ask for what they would like but always first the equity piece and I I was very moved by our community and the support for that within the community and then finally I also want to say something about the high schools and thank you very much to Carol and to staff for helping us get through that and thank you very much to the parent Community I just think that it was wonderful the way that you organized and that you were very clear about what you thought was important and the um the information that you provided about your your children and what their days looked like was very helpful in me reaching decisions about what I thought we should do and so thank you thank you very much to staff and thank you very much to the community and thank you to superintendent Smith appreciate that okay um I think most of my colleagues have uh said my talking points for me but I think the one thing I do want to mention and I've mentioned this in other meetings both private and public in our board meetings about the process that we've gone through over the last several weeks and it's we talk a lot about transparency and we talk a lot about Community engagement and I think it's really important for us to to point out when that's happening the process that we've gone through is we inform the the superintendent on our priorities over a period of months the superintendent and her staff over a period of months review and and look at the forecast review again Crunch and review again and come to us with what they think is the best scenario given the information that they have and in our process is to open that up to the public we do it in the form of public forums we do it in the form of of testimony here and we do it in the form of taking about every meeting that is requested of us outside of any of these one or two parents or community members who would like to to connect with us on a one-on-one basis and then at the end of that we share where we think with that new information we share where we think the budget needs to go and it's up to the superintendent and up to the staff to be as responsive as possible to that and I think what we've demonstrated again and I think that Jefferson cluster enrollment balancing discussion was very much like this a willingness for the district and for this board to examine the facts that are coming to us from the community and incorporate that in our decision-making process and I really appreciate that it's a very authentic form of community engagement and I think it's one that now that we have a couple of these under our belt I'm looking forward to more and more opportunities to engage like this so and that's the Testament of my colleagues on the board is to The Testament of the the staff the superintendent and the community who's willing to engage in a way that is authentic and is in many ways Fearless so thank you all for that that kind of participation
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anything else yeah I guess I'd like to respond so I still have concerns with the budget because I don't think we've completely addressed the issues surrounding Alliance and I guess whether or not we're going to actually fund them now or later I'm not going to be here later so I'm planning on not supporting it tonight but I think if we do say we want to fund them later or we're looking at that I think we do need to set up some sort of comprehensive plan or next steps to say like this is how we're going to follow up with you this is how we're going to make it a transparent process because without that it's so easy it could so easily be lost and not addressed later so with that I'm unsupportive of the budget but I do support the what we've done with the schedules and other things we've worked into this budget however I think that's just one thing that we've left unaddressed great thank you so now take a vote on resolution 4759 all in favor please indicate by saying yes yes all opposed please indicate by saying no resolution 4759 is approved by a vote of six to zero with director Sergeant absent and director representative and student representative Garcia voting no no may I mention one thing um we had a parent Lisa Zuniga who asked that we have the letter that you sent to the parent community and their response incorporated into the record so I just want to make sure that we did that so it's awesome so at this point we will adjourn the board as budget committees and I'll call the board back into a regular session we're now going to move on to the first reading of proposed affirmative action policy the board discussed this item at our meeting on May 13th superintendent Smith do you like to introduce this item um yes I'll actually ask Lorenzo power Chief Equity officer who is our staff lead and also Jolly Patterson of general counsel and Sean Murray Chief Human Resources officer to join the Lorenzo at the podium or nearby coach here Gonzalez board members superintendent Smith lolenzo Poe Chief Equity officer and partnership director for Portland Public Schools before you tonight is the first reading of the non-discrimination policy revision and the affirmative action policy the policies are before you denied with revisions that we talked about and we're here tonight to answer any questions you may have if it relates to either of the two proposed policies or the revision of the non-discrimination policy is there any questions comments that's great no they need them after all he took care of it uh thank you so the proposed policy is posted on the board website with the public comment period being 21 days but the last day to comment being June 10th 2013. please contact info or the contact information for public comment will be posted along with the policy the board will hold a second reading of the policy on June 17 2013. thank you moving on to the monthly Capital Improvement Bond update tonight we're going to receive our monthly update on the capital Improvement bond this is I believe our second at some point I will I'm sure I will lose track because we're going to get a regular monthly update as we go through this bonding program superintendent Smith would you like to introduce this item I would CJ Sylvester our chief operating officer and Jim Owens our executive director of office of school of modernization will provide this report thank you and good evening as uh co-chair belisle indicated this is our second monthly report and we will lose track in short order of exactly which month it is um and the thing we want to talk about first before Jim walks you through the balance scorecard again is the fact that we've been for the last three months going through a facility's visioning process and we've met with several dozen Community groups and organizations student student and parent activists and we have a summit coming forward that is on May 28th that will be from 1 to 5 p.m in the Rose Room at the Rose Garden but what we wanted to be able to share with you tonight is just a short clip video of one of these visioning sessions that was held with the fobby in first grade class just last week so if audio video can roll that for us that'd be appreciated math how we do at school a month now then we do the math and I like the girl
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books and the iPads um um and dads have been here since they were a little kid a lot of family history I like learning one of the most important things is kids are not Shackled with a long history of what was their eyes are bright the future's ahead of them and they are wonderful at thinking about things that adults don't think about and so I'm hopeful and I can see from the drawings that are going on here that they're showing us a whole series of things that we might consider for our schools here in Portland in the coming decades so you can put it in the school my favorite thing about Bobby in school is that there's a prince on the wall over here because you could like they could teach you how to do soccer yeah because we went there at kindergarten oh okay because the last time me and my grandma my mom um we all went there and they were setting up for um so people can have dinner why do you want to field at your school exercise and play soccer soccer and football what has been remarkable about the experience for the last two or three months is a real clear message that we're receiving that school in Portland should be the best schools in the world and people are very much interested in using the Bond as a catalyst to make schools here uh remarkable and and even as we watch these kids draw and these kids are remarkable or talking to the migrant Community or talking to the black and African-American Community all of them hold high ideals that are very similar in nature and they are looking to the Future and wanting Portland to be the very very best to camp is 25 kids are cool and they're cool I love Bobby double thumbs up yes it is good evening what a great way to kick off the the May Bond update it's exciting to be able to continue these Community conversations and starting with our with our kids at Fabian I think there might be a few Architects engineers and contractors in that group judging from their their involvement in that work uh CJ mentioned that this is our second opportunity to update you on bond progress and what I'd like to do is quickly walk us through the balanced scorecard that we introduced last time in your board packets you have a you have a more complete summary this one's somewhat abbreviated so that it fits on the screen easier and is easier to to see as it's as it's presented and not a lot has changed since April 29th when we did the last presentation but I can assure you that there's a tremendous amount of activity that staff's engaged in in terms of our preparations for this summer and certainly we're very confident that we'll be able to complete the work at our schools this summer and be ready when when kids return in September so in terms of our overall perspective I'm glad CJ mentioned that we do have the visioning summit that is going to be occurring on the 28th of May and I think I've been an opportunity to bring our Ed spec work to Mid phase really completion of the first one that will result in a educational vision statement and it'll be something that our team will carry on into the next phase which is actually the development of the edspec document which being a very important Source document that will inform our design teams the gentleman that was featured in the in the in the clip John weeks of course is with the Dow IBI group and John will continue working with the team as we as we move into completion of phase two our work on our Improvement project 2013 is progressing on plan in addition to the five schools that we identified we
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we added the sixth because we were able to pick up some improvements that can be made at Oxley green at one of the science labs when we prioritize the schools our educational facility improvements principally the science classroom improvements were packaged and okli was one that we could get to fairly quickly so we've actually Incorporated that into the into the project and that's that's being managed as well by the by the same team our work at Fabian is progressing this is really precursor work to the replacement of the school and we are on track to have our portable facilities delivered on time actually we're expecting uh them mid-july and very confident that we'll have those in place and ready to go for September our high schools are starting to pick up steam both Franklin and Roosevelt are in scope of work development phase right now our design our teams our project teams are actually writing the statements of work and we hope to get our RFP solicitation out at the end of this month to compete the work and we are expecting a tremendous amount of interest from the design professional Community for these two signature projects I think taking two of these projects on at the same time will really excite the design professional Community cite the entire community and being able to start this work start the master planning phase and then move into design and construction of course as a centerpiece to this to the spawn program on our budget perspective again not much has changed I have not included the financial data that we did last time we'll pick that up again in June we're making some adjustments to more fully reflect all of the costs in the project we had broken out a component for Staffing and oversight and we're putting it back into the to the projects itself so you'll when we do our June update we'll put that back in meanwhile in terms of budget status we haven't seen any change our active projects where we're currently encumbering funds are still the same ones so our high Improvement project 2013 and and Fabian are are moving ahead and of course we had mentioned last time that we sold the first increment of of the bond funds so the 158 a little over 158 million so we're in a good place relative to having cash to to support the contract Awards under our schedule very much on track we have four large construction contracts in place just this week they were fully conformed meaning that the contractors signed their documents District accepted we're starting pre-construction meetings next week or rather this week and then we'll be moving rapidly into mobilization phase as soon as the kids leave the schools we'll be ready to go and we'll be fencing the sites and really starting the work again we have nine weeks nine weeks to complete the construction at these and so we'll be working very very quickly and very accurately wanting to ensure that we're hitting the quality the schedule and the budget requirements that that we have we also are looking at our Improvement Project 2014 right now and we'll be providing a report to you that details how staff approached selecting the schools and provide some some context there is quite a bit of interest in the next Summer's work we need to get started with our solicitations our RFP for the architect design professionals that are going to be doing doing that work and so we'll be doing that at the at the same time we're starting construction nothing's changed on our stakeholder perspective we of course are working our process to select members of the design advisory groups for the for the two high schools and we are expecting applications actually today I think was the deadline for Franklin and Roosevelt and so we'll be going through a process to select those members and then we'll attempt to set them up before the end of school so before the end of June we expect to have the initial meeting and our Equity perspective again no changes from last time we're initially off to uh to a good start but this reflects the consultant activity it doesn't reflect the construction contractor component yet so we're right at 33 percent as of as of this month so that completes our report for May went through it pretty quickly I'd like to open up any questions or comments that you may have for us
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doesn't sound like we have doesn't look like we have any questions at this time it sounds like make it still good progress but not a lot of change from last month it's all right thank you Bob okay and actually I'll just re-emphasize the May 28th event as one that we're really wanting good board participation in and invite people who are interested and have been tracking this to come so May 28th one to five talk a little bit more about what kind of say a little more about it as Jim previously indicated dawa IBI or is the group uh with some subconsultants who have been facilitating our visioning process to date and will also be taking us through the education specification process which is phase two of this work effort and so the envisioning Summits intended to be everyone who has participated in the process today and everyone who has been invited to participate in the process to date and additional people uh who have not yet participated or been invited to participate in the process and the intention is to bring together all of the material that has been developed through these dozens of meetings and start talking about the common threads so that by the end of the visioning summit we have in fact developed a facilities vision for Portland Public Schools there will be several speakers who are intended to be kind of provocative and thought-provoking as we go through the afternoon and it's uh it's vitally important for people who are interested in this Bond work and who are interested in facilities at Portland Public Schools and in the future of uh you know Educational Learning environments that they participate if at all possible and again as the superintendent said it is May 28th from 1 pm to 5 PM at the Rose Room at the Rose Garden and if somebody didn't catch that where will we have that posted so somebody could we can have that posted on the website that would be great speaking of websites do we have a bond update website yet we have a fairly static website right at the moment we have another one that's getting ready to go live about the first part of June right now there's a press conference that they're trying to schedule around this summer 2013 work and I think once the date for that has been established that that's actually going to be the same date then that the website goes live so and we're still in the process of hiring it we had a job posting for a Communications manager for the bond program and that posting just closed uh last night at midnight so we'll be looking to fill that position as well thank you thank you both so at this point we're going to move on to the business agenda we'll consider the remaining items on the business agenda having already voted on resolution 4759 Miss Houston are there any changes to a business agenda no there is not do I have a motion and a second to adopt the business agenda second director Atkins moves and director Morton seconds the adoption of the business agenda Ms Houston is there any citizen comment on the business agenda no is there any more discussion on the business agenda no now we'll vote on the business agenda all in favor please and keep by saying yes yes all opposed please indicate by saying no business agenda is approved by a vote of six to zero a student representative Garcia voting yes yes um our next board meeting uh will be a study session held on Monday June 3rd here in the board Auditorium at this point if there aren't any other announcements we are adjourned

Sources

PPS Board of Education, Archive 2012-2013, https://www.pps.net/Page/2225 (accessed: 2022-03-24T00:57:54.937864Z)
PPS Communications, "Board of Education" (YouTube playlist), https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL8CC942A46270A16E (accessed: 2023-10-10T04:10:04.879786Z)

2013-05-20 PPS School Board Regular Meeting

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Event 1: Board of Education - Regular Meeting - May 20, 2013

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