2013-12-02 PPS School Board Study Session

District	Portland Public Schools
Date	2013-12-02
Time	missing
Venue	missing
Meeting Type	study
Directors Present	missing

Documents / Media

Transcripts

Event 1: Board of Education - Study Session - December 02, 2013

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too high good evening this study session in the board of education for December 2nd 2013 is called to 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 this meeting is being televised live and will be replayed throughout the next two weeks please check the Board website for replay times this meeting is also being streamed live and will be available on the board website for later viewing this evening we're going to start with our public comment as we usually do miss Houston do we have anyone signed up for public comment do we have six six and our first two are Eliza Earhart Eisen and Jane greenall that you are approaching I usually read through the instructions although I know you two have been here before we'd like to thank you very much for taking the time to come to our board meeting we deeply value public input and we look forward to hearing your thoughts Reflections and concerns our responsibilities aboard lies in actively listening and reflecting in the thoughts and opinions of others guidelines for public input emphasize respect and consideration when referring to board members staff and other presenters the board will not respond to any comments or questions at this time but the board or staff will follow up on various issues that are raised please make sure that you've left your contact information with Miss hewson either phone number or email on the sign up sheet pursuant to board policy 1.70.012 speakers may offer objective criticism of District Operations and programs but the board will not hear complaints concerning individual District Personnel any complaints with specific employees should be directed to the superintendent's office and will not be heard in this forum you have a total of three minutes to share your comments please Begin by stating your name and spelling your last name for the record at the beginning of the first two minutes a green light will appear when you have one minute left a yellow light will appear and when your time is up the red light will come on and this little buzzer will buzz and we ask that you respectfully wrap up your comments at that time again thank you for coming and appreciate you giving us your input thanks for your cooperation Eliza Earhart e r h a r d t when my son graduated I thought I was done with advocacy on a systemic level in PPS I volunteered mentoring our high school students on a postgraduate planning and continued to serve on some scholarship boards but when I witnessed how ill-prepared these motivated graduates were for Life Beyond High School my fire was re-lit of the students I helped with College Planning at one PPS High School 88 had ACT scores 15 or below well below College ready for a merit-based scholarship I interviewed two PPS valedictorians whose combined reading and math SAT scores were 700 and whose essays lack the grammatical and organizational skills needed for college or work just looking at my own kids experience with math instruction illustrates the importance of teacher comp illuminates the importance of teacher competency one of my children had an administrator who had not been in the classroom in over 15 years assigned to teach 7th grade algebra it was a lost year of instruction except for the six weeks when a highly qualified sub took over and my kids combined eight years of high school math they had two years with a truly truly exceptional teachers but six years of really poor math instruction which we could afford to supplement with tutors but most families can't through my volunteer work in a PPS High School counseling center I followed students who had A's and B's in four years of high school math through calculus or statistics but needed remediation at OSU or could not pass the math needed to enter the U of O Business School clearly even of the 63 percent who are graduating on time the current level of instruction is not preparing all of them for college or career Betsy Hammond's November 21st Oregonian article has our Oregon public universities and community colleges reporting that many students who earn good grades in high school arrive at College unready for college-level writing or math even the district data reports that only 37 percent of our high school students were considered College ready in 2011-12 based on three of the five act subject areas so I've jumped back into advocacy and I'm calling for a contract agreement that ensures teacher competency in subject matter and grade level as defined by State statue as The crucial Criterion teaching assignments layoffs and teacher assignments layoff and transfer layoffs and hiring over the last eight months I kept hearing that the contract cannot be resolved on the backs of teachers and I totally agree teachers need to be supported well to do their best work with our kids but what about the backs of our kids don't they deserve the most qualified teacher in all their classes don't they deserve to graduate with the skills needed for College and Career I want long service teachers protected against job loss but there are ways to
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retrain and support teachers rather than placing them in classes they are not qualified to teach from day one so I'm pleading with the Union the district and the board to put children first and ensure that competency and teacher assignments is your top priority in the contract thank you thank you okay I'm Jane greenholsh green h-a-l-g-h I'm also here to address the contract and hoping that a strike can be avoided my four main issues are hiring we need to move the budget process forward release the money earlier in the year and have one hiring round no one has explained to me how multiple hiring is a good thing for students it puts portlander to severe disadvantage in hiring the best teachers I'm a union member but my contract does not give me the first dips on jobs instruction hours you all know how I feel about instruction hours Oregon sets one of the lowest standards in the country so freezing these low standards into the contract doesn't serve the best interest of students and I would urge you to add any additional days to the beginning of the year not the end to give some relief to the students who are taking AP and IB exams in April and May they're competing against students with significantly more schooling workload I completely understand why the teachers want reassurance that their workloads won't increase I was at the meeting in 2011 when you moved to the six of eight schedule and cut teachers if teachers hadn't had a workload cap it would have been even worse for high school students this year's original budget proposal also laid off teachers at a time when the district claimed it had a stable budget so there's understandable distrust from teachers and parents as we move hopefully to a more stable economy or if we find more extra money the number one priority should be hiring more teachers and providing more instruction and be wary of impact pay that gives the teachers some economic relief but leaves the students still in an overcrowded classroom with an overloaded teacher teachers one of my favorite teachers is on the bargaining committee he works tirelessly holds his students to a high standard is an inspiration in the classroom an invaluable resource on what works in education you could double his salary and it wouldn't be enough as far as I'm concerned during parent-teacher conferences last week I met equally dedicated professionals who are inspiring my kids to learn we need a good evaluation tool to reward these great teachers and to address the some few bad teachers who do more harm than good I'd suggest 360 evaluations for both teachers and administration and I'd urge the union to help make sure the best qualified most effective teacher can get the job and I'd urge administrators to hold themselves to the same high evaluation standards and I wish we could do 360 evaluations of the parents as well thank you our next two speakers Kirsten Hayes and Laura Peraza Stephanie Weber and Teresa Seeley sure hi my name is Stephanie Weaver uh last name is w-i-e b as in boy ER I was just saying to this teacher don't hate me um so I one of the challenges about coming and speaking is that if you side with PPS on some things all of a sudden it feels like you're against teachers and I just want to start by saying I am not against teachers I absolutely want the best for them I want them to pay be paid wonderfully I want them to have unbelievable health benefits I want them to feel like we are supporting them the um I am a parent of a second grader at Reiki Elementary in Hillsdale and uh I appreciate our teachers my daughter has had fantastic teachers and I see what they do every day with large class sizes and it's a challenge and oftentimes if there is not a parent in there they cannot get done what they need to get done so I have also been an active member at our school for the last being there the last three years the last two years I have funded or I have been the fundraising chairperson and we have been able to raise over a hundred thousand dollars which is a lot of money most of that money goes to funding a teacher
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with that money we still have four three full grades that are 30 plus kids most of them are 30 and 32 kids in a classroom so my challenge when I hear about what's going on is in order for PBS to meet the desires of the teachers union then what does that mean for our kids because is that going to mean that now I'm going to actually end up with less teachers because I'm having to take funds that would be helpful to get more teachers in the classrooms but now because of these demands I'm going to end up with even less and I can tell you as someone who works tirelessly um to raise money it is so defeating to then oh we got all this money we can get a teacher and we just lost two so you're always in the negative and you're it is takes the wind out of you and so this is not about not wanting the best but I don't get it like when I see it on paper and I do the math you can't have both and so that's why I'm just pleading with you to consider how do we do this and maybe it's to say look we we just can't afford this and and then how do we get to where we can work together and and get what everybody wants but that is as apparent my fear is we're just on this sliding scope or sliding uh Hill of always having to dip into that barrel and cut teachers foreign good evening my name is Teresa Seeley s-e-e-l-e-y I've been a school psychologist for 23 years and employed with PBS since 1998. I'm going on my 15th year with the district my assignments for the majority of my employment has been a combination of Education options programs sometimes as much as 20 at a time as well as a comprehensive K-8 school I mean meaning I am considered to be a strong talented and versatile school psychologist who can handle our toughest population of students last March the school board decided that for the first time to non-renew my contract so I am here today to give my citizen comment because I wasn't aware that I had that opportunity I'd like to share some of the reasons being used by The District administration for this recommendation to the board during this present school year as of October I've been on an indefinite paid administrative leave for two reasons in June of Last Summer the 21st I attended a DHS status hearing for two students I know through my work with PBS because their grandmother slash foster parent asked me to go for with her for moral support I was there of my own volition but was asked to address the court by the judge which was coincidental as speaking up was not my intention for being there I was accused of over-representing myself and being there on behalf of PPS without authorization which is not true the second reason is because I wouldn't agree to finish an evaluation early last spring because I didn't think I could give an other existing demands I had nine days remaining in that building and I had other open evaluations that I needed to finish when I later updated staff and told others that I could be ready by to me on results by the Year's End I was accused of being uncollaborative for not agreeing up front to rush the referral two years ago in 2011 I was harassed for providing counseling to a general education student the administrator usurped my role with the family and the student for no good reason the job description of a school of psychologist includes work with both General Ed and special education students I had written permission it was not disrupting the school day for the student there was good reason for it and I had a caseload of general education students that I regularly worked with in the same building in 2011 in 2011 and 2012 I was reprimanded for Distributing to the Special Education team relevant research-based articles to read and consider related to complex and difficult decisions we were in charge of but having conflict over and this professional consultation is cited by the same administrator as an act of me bullying my colleagues in 2012 I was harassed for driving two students to school which I'd been doing for about a year when I was reprimanded the single parent of five asked me for help with transportation for different reasons the bus wasn't an option and there was no means for a car for this family last year I was harassed for talking with a parent on the sidewalk outside of the school at the parents request this same administrator accused me of gossiping and not having a professional reason for talking with the parent despite knowing we had a professional and personal reason to be engaged in conversation
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thank you moving on to the next item on our agenda the draft resolution for full High School master plan will now have a discussion of the draft resolution for the full High School master plan superintendent Smith would you like to introduce this item um I would and I'd like to introduce Jim Owens who and we're going to hear first about the Roosevelt master plan and then and we hear from that team and then second we'll hear from the Franklin folks about the Franklin plan so Jim is that well thank you superintendent Smith and good evening board tonight we have the opportunity to present two Master plans in a consecutive matter in your board packets you'll find the superintendent's recommendations for both High School Master plans and we'd like to walk you through it very quickly the material and provide some context joining me tonight in the first presentation for Roosevelt is office of school modernization Project Director Michelle platter and Michelle is joined by Lauren McConaughey who's a principal with visetti Architects a local Architecture Firm here in Portland Oregon they'll walk us through the slides and after they're complete we'll invite any questions or comments that you may have and then we'll bring the Franklin team up next and we'll go through a similar presentation concluding with any questions or comments in two weeks we expect to return on the 26th of December to get your uh your 16th rather I'm sorry to get your uh final vote if you will on the on the resolution for adoption so with that Michelle we thought we would start out with a discussion of the master plan and how it works into all the phases of a project we are right now just finishing up the master plan this is what you have before you but the master plan is just a component of a larger design process the master plan is actually considered pre-design it's the basic layout of the spaces the next phase is schematic design which we will be moving into with the approval of our master plan and then the last of the design phases are design development and construction documents those will be the last phases after which we'll be able to go out to bid and begin construction of the project just for clarification we wanted to identify the master plan components what a master plan does is first identify the working parameters for the project it gives us the opportunity to look at the building and understand all of the issues that are needed to be addressed in this existing facility we develop functional adjacencies of the program area which means basically just putting things in the right places and we confirm that the overall development was within the parameters of the district's budget we do not detail individual rooms or programs this comes later so when we talk about specific spaces how large they are or what spaces in particular are going to be within the project that's a part of the schematic design phase we do require additional Community input as we go through this process and the master plan generally provides us with the big picture so that the design process can begin we want to start by talking about the Roosevelt High School and I do want to say that we could not have gotten to where we are without the dag members who have helped us through this process some of whom are here in the audience tonight and what we started out with since May when we took this project on to November 2013. in may we created the design Advisory Group September we started working with our design team we had community and stakeholder engagement all the way from July through November this November we just put in for our request for proposal for the construction services and we expect the cmgc that's the construction manager general contractor to join our design team in January of 2014 so we'll have a full project team to take us through the next steps of the project this December we anticipate board approval of the master plan and commence schematic design phase next our next steps as we said is to start schematic design in March we'll be developing the phasing plan for the Roosevelt High School we want to complete that prior to June so that we can engage the teachers and the staff at Roosevelt High School to get through that process we'll move on to design development construction documents over the next year and then we plan to commence construction March of 2015 with final occupancy still on schedule for September 2017. and with that I'm going to leave it to
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Lauren McConaughey and he'll talk you through the rest of the process thanks Michelle and good evening the first image before you is some of the themes that are basically a consolidation of some of the visioning master planning and gold discussions that have taken place within the community within our dag group as well as district-wide these become the lens by which we ask are is the design meeting the needs of the specific school and the district as a whole we have had a host of meetings and here's sort of a grouping of these various meetings that we've had working with the community working with the dag group having open houses discussing with teachers administrators all of these were occurring at the same time as an existing conditions analysis basically a due diligence of what is this historic building what aspects can be kept and and remodeled as we move forward these next group of slides that Michelle is powering through here are some of the options that were looked at in the process of moving toward a preferred scheme we looked at varying elements of the program we looked at the ReUse of aspects of the campus as I'm sure you recall this this campus needs to be continuously occupied while we're restoring the some of the historic structures so it was important to really explore a wide variety of opportunities as as we looked at how to take on this campus the preferred master plan as you see in front of you I'll do a quick orientation for this first of all North is up you'll notice that the uh this the site slopes actually from south to North and as you look at the more Vivid coloring you can tell which ground plane you're adjacent to the the preferred plan keeps the 1920s building here is the front door and the main lawn of the existing School 1920s building the 1930s Auditorium space as well as the 1950s gym as basic historic elements of this campus that will be revitalizing and adding to one of the really exciting aspects of of where we got to in terms of some of the preferred schemes was this notion of connecting Roosevelt together what one of the things we heard over and over again as the school is fairly disparate in fact they literally have to close and lock doors between classes so you can't get in some buildings as part of the safety of this school so the new scheme looks at what we've called a distributed Commons this purple space that connects the varying elements of Roosevelt and becomes that critical Center that connector that ties the varying academic and social programs together to become a whole school place we'll be using the 1920s buildings for a series of academic administrative as well as social wraparound Services the existing Auditorium we're looking at converting into a library It's a Wonderful space but not really terribly good for performance right now and will make a great Library the gym will remain and we'll be adding some gymnasium space adjacent to it as well as a new addition that is performing in Visual Arts to the north of the existing campus all connected by this exciting Commons that becomes a place that's both social it's for differentiated learning a small Amphitheater is some of the spaces that we anticipate in that so much more to come and this is a quick overview of the campus from a bird's eye view here you can see the historic buildings and this purple is the distributed Commons that again links and connects these spaces the yellow is some of the additions to the physical education program and the brown is the Arts both Visual and Performing Arts on the North End of the campus and with that we'll field any comments comments questions about Roosevelt um director Buell where's the 6000 Makerspace the six yes can we enhanced elective spaces haven't been specifically defined yet we're still working on that that'll be a part of the schematic design to actually get in and really recline where those spaces are and how they interconnect with the other spaces within the school give the open house one concept that was there was that they would be in the far upper left-hand corner of the Performing
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Arts Complex they could be and then that provided access for large projects and and material delivery so that was I think one possibility for that yes and that still is one of the kind yeah I had a question about the commons do you know yet or is that part of the the more detailed design work to come whether the commons will be partly or fully covered or how that was a sort of an Atrium effect the common space that you see is an interior space everything is in the within the purple is interior sometimes it's single story and sometimes it's two-story volume okay but it is all interior there's a courtyard in the back um I think Lauren if you could point to that and that that would be an open outdoor Courtyard that opens onto the commons okay because it's hard I don't have a good visual sense because it would look like it was going to be sort of an open almost an Atrium feel in some ways that you could see from the historic building down into it and having a variety of it just sounded really cool but it's just so exciting to see it unfold and then I think you'll is it still um the possibility that there would be this alternative entrance with wraparound services on the lower right hand corner yes that is the plan so Community Services using Community Access through there which is an I just parking back to the open house which was really fun um that just sounded like a really exciting feature as well some of the wrap around services in the school will be maintaining that exterior entrance but we also have a greater connectivity from the interior of the school as well right other comments or questions for Roosevelt I just wanted to add thanks to the design Advisory Group and the citizens and community members who have stepped up to help it's really it's just so exciting it's just I can't wait thank you thank you okay next up to bat is our Franklin team and I'd like to introduce to my immediate right Debbie Pearson who's the osm Project Director on the Franklin project and she's joined by Karina Rez who is an associate principal with tawa IBI group and they'll walk us through a similar presentation for Franklin and point out timelines and point out the the site plan for for the Franklin side Debbie good evening um as you know both Franklin and Roosevelt are on a similar time schedule so the first June to November Milestone dates that you see here are very similar to Roosevelt High School we established the design Advisory Group we commenced with a design in July and then held a series of community stakeholder engagement meetings from July to November and as you know the RFP for the construction management general contractor Services is out on the streets and we look to get board approval on that the master plan here in December in for the next three months after we have the schematic or pardon me the master plan approved we'll move into schematic design from January to March and from April to June will continue for the next year to develop the design development and construction documents one difference between the rules and developed high school project and Franklin High School is that we will in fact be moving our staff and students to Marshall during the duration of the construction so we planned from June of 2014 to January of 2015 to do Renovations at the Marshall High School campus in preparation for the students and staff moving over there in June of 2015. we will be holding tours at the Marshall the renovated Marshall High School campus from January of 2015 to June of 2015 and then in June of 2015 we will relocate everybody from Franklin over to Marshall and then start the construction at marshall in July so thank you very much um similarly you'll kind of hear a repeat of what happened at Roosevelt because we followed a fairly similar trajectory um our sort of guiding principle moving forward was that we wanted to provide 21st Century Learning space in an historic setting that's kind of what has driven us we talk about old wine and new bottles but um essentially the desire that we had was to merge the school district's Vision with what was specifically highlighted for Franklin so the points that you see here are the pieces of that Vision that the Franklin Community felt best best allocated what their resources were
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so for example they wanted independent and self-directed Learners and then that they there there was a real strong push for Equity they wanted a rigorous course offering and state-of-the-art facility and to ensure that all of that was made available to all of the students and staff um so Lauren talked a little bit about this but essentially the due diligence phase ourselves and our 13 different firms that that comprised our design team I like to say that we've been over under and around Franklin we've been in the tunnels we've been up on lifts to ensure that we have a really deep understanding of the building and and pieces of it that we anticipate we were going to reuse that way we are better informed to figure out what pieces belong in there and how we can support those from a cost perspective um so the the plan that you see in front of you came from the entrix study that the district had done I think in 2009 and really kind of guided a lot of what our community felt had value the buildings highlighted in red and in dashed with yellow have been deemed as contributing to the historic Fabric and so those buildings we propose Remain the green buildings and the boiler building we met with the state historic preservation office and they agreed that those buildings perhaps didn't have that same level of significance and so in the schemes that we envisioned we talked about potentially keeping those or demolishing them and you'll see kind of different versions of those in the plans that you see before you um we had really just a fantastic time meeting with our design Advisory Group our students our staff we had well over a thousand voices represented um from students we met we had the pleasure of meeting with about 350 students in one setting and then following up with them and that was a really fantastic experience and so we wanted to thank not only the dag but the administrators and the board members that have joined us and the community and administration and staff at Franklin because without this without them this would not be possible um similarly we ran through a series of multiple options you'll see kind of some some different versions that we explored at the time but I I would say that the community has spoken with a fairly clear and a fairly loud voice that this is their preferred scheme so I'll walk you through it fairly quickly the the biggest aspect of this plan is that the existing square field and track that that currently exists in this area is turned 90 degrees primarily because the way that it's currently set up it really bifurcates the site um to a real athletic complex and then an academic complex and the the circulation from students that currently are in a gym here to get to facilities here for the field and also to facilities that are currently here for weights is really quite cumbersome so this plan what you see are the areas in Gray are the existing buildings that are going to remain and the new buildings this is an athletic complex we have a fine performing and applied Arts and Technology Center and we have a student common Student Center both here and in an Atrium in the um the existing South Courtyard to look at that in a little bit greater detail from a planned perspective again you start to see at the lower level so one of the aspects of the site is that it dips almost 20 feet from the basement level here to the to the level of the field and so we're able to provide really at the basement level the main gym and locker rooms that can come out directly onto the field and then in the basement we you can see some general education classrooms and some service space in the new student center then on the main level of the gym you see the gym was below this is an auxiliary gym some support functions this Gap that you see here is because there's an easement that we have to respect with the city for existing utilities that run under the field the existing building will be primarily the lower level will be primarily admin and counseling and wraparound Services we also will be repurposing our Auditorium for a media center building a new student center I'm connected to try to take some of those exterior historic facades and turn those into interior features and then we build a new Performing Arts Center that really is sort of the the community beacon on the corner of 52nd and Woodward currently we're showing our maker space in the junction between the science and
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math wing and the fine and Performing Arts however as Michelle described earlier we're still in the process of identifying exactly where those enhanced electives will be held and finally on the on the second floor plan you see it's the majority of the plan is um is general education classrooms we're able to create sort of a really Dynamic two-story Library space within the confines of that Auditorium and then also creates in two storage spaces to create some of that vertical continuity that the kids talked about wanting to be able to feel connected throughout their school so you'll see here that again we start to create this Athletic Complex that's directly adjacent to the gym a new Performing Arts Complex on the corner of 52nd and Woodward and then a fairly light and transparent um student Commons that really acts like a student street it's not the main dining area but really A Place to gather and study for the students that greets you as you walk in the front door remember any questions any questions Dr Bill the six thousand square feet on that Makerspace is that the amount that you have projected I have one of the where is the parking for the uh opening Arts where does that show up so if you got the Performing Arts coming out this way right so the so that's the parking and you interrupt from where what we're proposing is a one-way Loop to come in off of taggard and then continue into the parking lot and then one way out of Clinton if you're familiar with a site right now people come in and out of Clinton and it's a one-way very tight Corner that you come as almost a blind Corner coming into Clinton this plan or reorganizes that and does a one-way loop from Taggart in through the parking lot and out of Clinton how many cars in that parking I mean how many how many people in the Performing Arts Center for say a play oh the program area is set up for 600 600 600 and so how many cars does that come out to that parking lot itself has about 130 spaces 130 correct we got 600 and 130 so yeah but I mean is that I mean is that a typical projection thing that you've looked at and said uh there's enough cars uh the as far as the parking requirements for the city are concerned that I don't know I don't know I don't know the answer to my own question this is one of the questions that I'm asking without knowing the answer in terms of the parking requirements on site the city has different regulations associated with Transportation requirements if you're within a certain distance of transportation from TriMet Etc you can reduce the number of parking spaces on site so the parking spaces that are on site are really more to do with trying to support staff that are on site during the school day and then it's flexible it's parking in the evening for those whether it's Cub you know Civic use building people that are there to use the spaces and so during the day those 600 are really students that are going to attend events correct it's the same thing as what they do now there's parking on the street so to be a hundred and spot for 130 cars in the lot and then everybody else parks in the street correct thank you thank you very much um Performing Arts basis how much space is in that it looks it looks big and it looks I love Performing Arts I'm just curious it kind of dwarfs the other the other buildings at least in that diagram we have about 40 000 square feet in the Performing Art space and that was one of the top priorities for the community is that and you'll see that when it comes to you that there's a program area at spec phase two that's coming to you in January and that summary of all those spaces will be coming to you for a comprehensive high school okay okay great and then the gymnasium I think no the athletic part disconnected from the school like that was there considerations about students going back and forth in the weather actually no we did have some quite a bit of discussion about it at different dag and Community meetings from a student's perspective they were thrilled to have um that it in a separate facility all together where they could have all those athletic facilities and they enjoy the fact that there's a 10-minute passing period during the course of the day they didn't feel that there was any issue Associated being able to get from one
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part of the campus to the other and it really for them felt more like a community college campus and was treating them as adults and you know kind of increasing their perception of themselves on campus rather than this tight-knit community security I was more concerned about the weather and going back and forth oh stuff well there is we are thinking about a covered walkway to connect that thank you that's what I was looking for that's all thank you thank you very much so in the Roosevelt design when you look at the baseball and softball field in the Roosevelt design they actually overlapped a soccer field on top of that to allow since soccer is a fall Sport and baseball and softball or spring sports are you looking at doing something similar here or how would Howard Soccer fit into this correct on the football field you do have the varsity soccer field on the football field and then up on the baseball softball field you do have the ability to put a soccer field as a practice field up there as well okay and then I had a quick question in terms of Marshall since the kids will be moving into Marshall I know that we are expecting to do some enhancements to the Marshall campus so would those happen next summer and Jim can you give us some sense of what we're talking about in terms of Marshall enhancements or I can't I don't remember what we're certainly we're currently still evaluating exactly what we'll do there the improvements we make at Marshall need to certainly support the student body and staff however we want to be mindful that we have limited funds at all of our swing site locations so we've identified the the critical items that we need to do such as roof repairs to ensure we have a water tight Integrity across our Roof Systems we've got other improvements relating the other big one is the fire alarm system our current fire alarm system is a non-addressable non-code compliance system so it's a key Life Safety Improvement that's needed which we'll be getting started with this this winter actually January February the work at Marshall is actually under under Debbie's direction to ensure that the work at Marshall is coordinated such that the work can be completed so that we can get families and Community out to look look at the site to see what the students will be attending when they when they start there and then of course Debbie will also be coordinating the transition from Marshall back to Franklin when Franklin's completed over the summer of 2017. tonight any other work Scopes that you wanted to point out okay those are the those are the big ones and we're looking at several other uh smaller items but we we do want to look at the swing space for all uh for Franklin for Grant and for Fabian which are the three schools that we need swing sites for the question is kind of a stupid question I think uh in Franklin when we talked about it quote was our community college type atmosphere and in Roosevelt we talked about locking everything up I mean can you I know that the people from Franklin camp but can you tell me what how that came about what they were saying is that currently they have to it's the way the buildings are now um Roosevelt but I was hearing at the Roosevelt intention was to have it more seamless so that you didn't have to have that right that as I understand the question director Buell is why the difference in terms of themes how did we come about making those I mean approaching it that way I mean it just I mean it makes sense to me I mean I worked in a schools my whole life where you made sure people couldn't get in and weren't supposed to be there I mean absolutely should but it just struck me as kind of we approached them positively both ways right I certainly would defer to my colleague here if she wants to come up to respond but but I think as a result of the process that we used with the design advisory groups and the community forums the Roosevelt Community weighed in in a different manner than the Franklin community and so what they ended up with as they went through the different options was one that fit the the Roosevelt Community more effectively and that the final decisions were made on these plans are they made there are how did they decide in the end who made those final decisions for this is the one we're going to choose did they ever come up with an actual straight up
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process that said beforehand this is how we're going to decide as opposed to we kind of have this right it was uh it was a process that involved multiple options different scenarios that were that were presented and then ultimately as the design team looked at how these could be executed in terms of schedule in terms of budget in terms of scope quality we landed on a preferred alternative that you're seeing tonight ultimately the decision to adopt these preferred plans for both schools will be a board decision well but I mean to bring them these particular plans forward to the board what how was that decided upon was that the design team finally after all the actual design team sat down and said we agree this is the one or was it consensus or did they vote or said people have asked me about this question that's why I'm asking it staff and Community the forums that we have the work right all came together in the design team said this is where we're going to go correct and think of it as as staff ultimately made the okay and then the last question I had is one that Mr curler asked whose absent he's in Sacramento today asked me to ask and he wasn't the 10 million dollars that we lost and then found supposed and you know the it was for sixty thousand square feet is how it came out right which is 166 approximately 166 dollars per square foot and when we had asked about having an additional four thousand square feet of Makerspace it came out at in the high 300 square foot like three I don't know was it 365 or something 389 I don't know 325. was it that low 325 I don't remember I'm just asking a question for curler he's in Sacramento the uh and so the question so would you explain the difference in those two how that came about that was the question he asked me to ask right it's something of a of a nuanced message um as we look at the cost components for these projects we have to look at the building hard costs the site hard costs we have soft costs which are where we pay our Consultants our permits we have furniture fixture and equipment and we have contingency and all of these are proportionally adjusted so we haven't actually landed on precisely what our dollars per square foot building hard cost is at this point we're going to develop that through our schematic design process so recognize that in addition to what we presented in terms of the building sizes and the 60 000 square foot difference we're also going to be adding construction escalation dollars to the projects so the square footage information really won't be something that we can accurately represent to you until we come back again with the schematic design packages so I know that's it's it's a difficult message it's very nuanced but the way we go about estimating it we we're looking at our 220 dollar per square foot uh building hard cost factor pre-escalated that went into all of these all of these improvements and so what I had shared in the way of an email to the board several weeks ago was a summary of how the square footage changed from our from our Ed spec adjusted bond to now our our new sizes remember we're accommodating more students under these options and so the square footage increases and then how that reflects on cost per square foot has changed thank you so I noticed that you put Administration in the Council on Spaces in the more Central entrance and I think that's really good for you know day-to-day operationals reasons and also security reasons and I was wondering for your other entrances and exits do you have any systems in place to monitor those things or you know other counseling administration offices or there will be there at all of the Comprehensive High Schools there'll be a series of access controls and video surveillance in addition to that yes there will be teaching stations and or other program areas that will help to deal with security issues as you're talking about great thanks I'll just I'll just make one final comment because I got to join these fine folks through this process and it's been just so fantastic when I hear director buell's questions I can't obviously speak for the Roosevelt about how decisions were made but I'm assuming it takes a similar but it was just so clear
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from the groups that I got to work with that this was the preferred option that it really brought it brought a factor of wow and practicality and functionality that was really really exciting to the community including everything from the students saying when they get off the bus on 52nd Avenue they have to walk like it's this kind of mass kids kind of scatter and how do they get into the building now they're going to have this clear access this entrance right into the building out of the weather they were really excited about the athletic facilities and this idea of connecting having the commons and the media center it was just really exciting so I just want to think and really truly the Administration has been tireless in their support and their presence and availability and access to students and community so thank you to them and it's just been really exciting so thank you any other questions comments to talk about the resolution now would be the great time to talk about the resolutions themselves so first of all just so chair belisle said I think also in the Roosevelt group we probably looked at six to eight different scenarios and we did the you know stickers on which ones we liked and the whole thing and I think there was a pretty strong consensus also with the Roosevelt group on where we landed so it was it felt pretty good um one quick question again I had a conversation with director curler about this who is probably not going to make it to this meeting tonight there's a question about the enhanced elective space and we keep being told that that's a discussion for a later time and I know for some of us that doesn't feel like it's enough and so I think that he is looking at the possibility of coming up with a another recital or something in terms of the resolution that indicates an interest in making sure that the enhanced elective space the CTE space is substantial enough to allow for a robust program relatively robust program in each of our high school so I just wanted to let you know he I'll work on it with him but we're going to try to get that out as quickly as possible as a potential amendment to this and again it's just stating an intention of the board that this is a priority for us finding because I think I think information like that Tom shared out sent out was based on a premise of requiring a certain level of a variety a whole range of programs and that would be a question that is you know it's up for a question so I think you know I guess I'll just be interested to see what you guys proposed in terms of how specific it is because I'm not necessarily ready to say we must to say that there has to be that specific range of multiple programs offered at each Comprehensive High School because I think going into this that was our understanding that we weren't going to be able to do that with all our Comprehensive High School so but I think when we started our conversations we didn't have the 6000 figure in the 6000 figure too many of us feel small so rather than vote no on these we'd like to have some intentionality from the board if the board if we can get four of us to vote on that we would like to have some intentionality from the board that says we believe that each high school should have substantive CTE space and that that would be part of what our expectations are going forward as they go through the schematics so great thank you thank you all for being here this evening now I'm going to move on to a discussion of the priorities for budget for the 2014-15 budget I'll throw a couple disclaimers in front of this this is not a budget proposal this is an exercise it is simply um a way to force us to talk and think about the budget choices we're going to be making so that staff and the superintendent can begin to hear how we process this information um with that superintendent Smith can you introduce the item um yep I will introduce David Wine who's our Deputy Chief Financial Officer to introduce us to this activity and I'll also throw in a few um just introductory remarks so as coach Arbor Lyle just outlined this is not specific budget proposals this is really an in a beginning stage to our budget process and it's trying to give you enough specificity about the kinds of things we'll be considering as part of the budget process to let you dig in and see where your values lie in terms of what drives you in budget decisions but not these do not represent the actual proposal so this is really an
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opportunity for us to get to listen to you make sense of and prioritize and tell you what drives your your thoughts as we're entering a budget process so with that so we're gonna we're gonna pop you back up if you start heading down into the weeds so we're not looking at we're not looking at this the specific granular nature of each one of the proposals but more the values underlying them okay so be prepared for the pop-ups and with that I will turn you over to David blind thank you superintendent Smith coach Apple Isle board members I'm David Wine the budget director and with me is Sarah bottomley who's the assistant budget director who in addition to helping answer questions is also going to take notes so we can keep track of the discussion tonight I also wanted to recognize that we have a number of members of the citizens budget Review Committee with us who specifically came to listen to this tonight so I'm going to ask them to um stand up and introduce themselves those who are here good evening my name is Roger kirschner Tom Fuller so we thank them for coming so we are essentially at the beginning of the budget development process for 2014-15 and it will be helpful for the superintendent and staff to know budget priorities from our board from our community and our stakeholders we've held a number of meetings with some groups and asked them about items we should be considering as you know from the information in your board packet and in Prior years we've asked the board to affirm its priorities by with reference to this strategic framework and we've also heard lists of ideas from you that are of interest and value our priority-based budgeting process continues to evolve and we modify it based on context and our experience and we are in a different Financial climate than prior years with the possibility of being in a net investment position and not a net deficit driving us to look for cuts and reductions and it's the second year of the biennium so we do have a clearer sense of our Revenue so we added something new this year which and we developed this prioritization exercise we've asked you to allocate points among a number of opportunities and as the superintendent said this is an exercise the opportunity we've described are not formal budget proposals this isn't even an exhaustive list of all of the ideas under consideration and most of these are things that are still the subject of continuing staff work we intended these options to be representative of the kind of things that might come up and not of specific activities the values we attach to them are artificial and to the extent that any of these survive the budget development process and make their way forward they are likely to look different than we described them they'll certainly be more detail and the value is attached to them will be more specific and will be dollars so having said all that it would certainly be helpful We Believe for the superintendent and staff to hear you talk through the choices you have made and perhaps identify the underlying values or interests that inform those choices so I'm going to invite board members to take turns in doing that and that's essentially the first two questions we asked you in that board memo then certainly there'll be an opportunity for more General discussion then there was a couple more questions we asked you like what's missing and are there things that are currently finally do you think we should be reevaluating so we'd get to that maybe after we've sort of run through the whole thing and then towards the end I can confirm some of the next steps in terms of key dates and what else we think we might do with this exercise so with that it's going to offer that invitation to you to to share your thinking with us so we'll probably do this one at a time if we we don't have to move quickly because again staff want to hear kind of our thought process and how we got to the decisions we made but is there somebody who would like to start us walk us through their their point totals and how they got to that and what they came up with as their values or pulled them but I'll tell you where my values are okay if you want me to do Point tolls I'll have to wait I have two two basic values one I think we should shift as much money as we possibly can into the classroom and the second value is that we should support beyond anything else other than the classroom wrap around programs that directly affect children there's a direct connection
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with the child and the wraparound program and that's that's where I go after you lay a foundation you lay the foundation first and then you go to those two spots in in the foundation means all kids are in school all day and so forth that typical stuff and then you go from there and all the money that you possibly can you move there thank you somebody starts off the point totals so if you have your finals if you just want to go down I picked this one I picked this one because this really spoke to me or I didn't pick this one because while I like it well yeah I mean I I had a couple sort of higher level questions I was sort of attended a course first off it was lovely to have the difficult choices of what to add rather than difficult choices of what to take out so and thank you for the lovely spreadsheet that was um great um so I generally was sort of a sprinkling of ones and twos in most places but not all and I will get to some detail so I'm just saying that in general but I also have just sort of you know the wariness of adding on new initiatives um for sure so there's a few of those that sounded new so it was a question knowing that we're early stages that's one of my concerns wanting to know more how sure are we what's you know that kind of that kind of concern and then even in terms of expanding things that we I feel I think you'll come to us and say are pretty proven programs like AVID for example just in making sure that our capacity as a district is there to roll them out successfully and to expand the Fidelity the implementation so obvious points but I just wanted to make those up front because um all of this is with that caveat right so totally understood and accepted on our part and the fact that you prioritize something here we are not taking as a blanket endorsement that means it's automatically in the budget so we totally get that right and there's yeah so um on the Athletics I was at the option one that's maintaining the current expansion that the superintendent did this fall so I think that's one that's on all of these obviously I would love to do the full meal deal and Beyond but so that's so I think that's a reasonable given all the other needs we have to keep that new investment is important or renewed investment Avid expansion I hover between option two and option three again that expansion Fidelity question because to me that's totally proven in an essential program really excited to expand that career related learning and college readiness I was just not I want to hear more from all the high school ones about except for Avid which I feel very strongly about what the recommendation of the high school action team is and how where are really the highest leverage strategies going to be I'm not convinced that personalized learning plans is it so I want to hear more about that before so I have man at this this point doesn't mean that couldn't change Central support capacity infrastructure I was either at a one option one or two on that depending on which positions it would be I definitely regret for example that we cut the Ombudsman I think restoring that's really important there are other pieces in the examples list that I thought would be really but just the general concept of yes we do need more capacity at central office to support schools we've been cutting and cutting classified staff in schools I had a question there you added back this fall are you assuming at this point is this to enable that to continue or is that going to continue and this would be an addition to this would be an addition to okay thanks so I'm not so sure about that one again knowing how important that is but given the other options that was one that didn't pop up as much for me assuming that this Falls additional expansion would continue which it would culturally specific support similar question where and how much and I'm I'm on the fence about that one so at this point I don't have I feel like with the supports we have in place are excellent ones in the Partnerships but it also seems like some of these other pieces would get to that so um the way I did the points at this point it didn't come in custodians and deferred maintenance I ended up um God these are just such Sophie's choices but I went with the option two of deferred maintenance thinking that that might lighten the load of the custodians if the buildings aren't falling around them falling apart around them so I went with that discipline reduction strategies I went with either option two or three um again how quickly can we roll it out and how well can we roll it out but I
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feel this is a high priority for sure early learner Regional centers absolutely support um creating an Early Learning Center at Clarendon and we're using that building and the Foster site but I didn't go for the even though Early Learning is so crucial and I'm really excited about the potential of that model I didn't go for option three again because of the Fidelity of expansion and concern about are we going to be able to should we do one pilot make sure we're doing it well and then roll it out but I would be on all of these I could be talked out of them because these are all important early kindergarten similar thing one I went between option one and option two because I was a little wary of a really quick roll out that we might not do as well versus the more gradual one High School graduation and acceleration strategies I'm on the fence till I hear what those are and what the team recommends something around this but I don't know yet what yet so I'm not I'm in a one or a two there I'm sorry to say I skipped over the literacy literacy materials if I heard more detail I might be talked back into that but given that things are so up in the air in terms of the digital curriculum it seemed to me that maybe we could given the other possibilities for investment wait that one out middle level support at K-8 so this is one where for years I've been harping on how we're not providing full supports for six to eight students but I would need to know the context here of what are we what size schools and what exactly are we proposing because I think um part it's a feature not a bug of k8s that you don't necessarily have a full range of electives my biggest concern is that we have the core program and um I think what the big fault in the district enrolling at the caves was not fully explaining those differences and not planning well to provide a cade program with Fidelity and the facilities are required and so on and so forth as we've heard over and over for years but this is one where I'd I'd need to know more because I'm concerned if we have with that we are we can't a we cannot provide a full middle school program at the caves and because it's just not that's not what it is it's okay it is a different type of program and B I'd want to hear what are the what are we doing to make sure we have a strong nfk program regardless of just um choosing more money into so that's more discussion needed there so just to clarify you did you didn't pick any of those um at this point I haven't okay I'm gonna need more information about what that means online or Blended learning that's something we've been harping about for years I I went on option one or two there outdoor school yes please knowing that you know I'm worried that it's going to continue to be year to year whether we can afford to support the full five days but given if we have any extra resources that's a priority for me to restore that to the full five days student technology questions about that I have just larger questions about what what's our kind of our inventory both inference of computers and also things like smart boards I have just an anecdotal sense which maybe is not true at all but just the sense that there's quite a bit of Technology maybe in Title One schools and wealthier schools I'm not sure about the schools in between and what do we have so that's just kind of need more information but definitely see that we need to make sure that there's Equity there and some level of so I'm I guess somebody between an option one and option two on that one of the big question mark teacher managers is awesome and I'm I couldn't come down to depend on how my other ones and twos added up whether that was a one two or three definitely want to expand again the question of how quickly and well can we expand that yeah yeah and then the wraparound Services now if you added a I'm in there somewhere yeah oh you're doing it right there I don't even have my glasses on what made it difficult is you in a number of cases you said I'm between one and two so yeah now whether to give you one and a half or you know yeah two and a half coming to the exercise wrap around I mean each of these was around 300 000 each per unit right there isn't a dollar value we just we tried to come up with a proximate weights because some things are going to be more expensive but there wasn't a pure dollar value attached to these which is okay well anyway um and then the wrap around services that one is one or again where I'd like to have a larger conversation because this is something where it feels like to me with the Healthcare System reforms there should be Downstream savings that other systems are seeing and I guess what I'm saying is we should not necessarily be paying for the what we absolutely need which is more support services for our kids and I'm wondering
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if there isn't a conversation to be had at the county and Beyond with the health care system that the governor you know should be helping with in other words if you have if you have preventive care at an early at an early stage for children you're going to have you're going to save costs down the line so that's just a larger philosophical assistant question I have um to whether how to what degree the school district should be funding that versus other parts of the system but in a way um so that I left that one off at this point just because I wanted to understand more about that but absolutely see the need for more services so sorry I'm not giving you a precise number here but knowing that this is not an actual proposal oh sorry let me just look at my notes Here see if there's anything else really quick let everyone else talk now did you did you put something on teacher mentors I was either one two or three let's say two let's say three but again given that we're gonna expect that we're going to expand that well I don't want to do things unless we're going to do it right um and then the big missing question for you and maybe this is assumed but we need to we'll be hearing more about this I assume is this um professional development and materials and support to implement Common Core State Standards and where that's going to come into the budget because that's a big chunk thank you very much that's thank you okay really helpful sure sounds good okay first of all thank you for the exercise David this is this was um interesting to do and I like I liked it I hope it works for us time um so just some general things that I was thinking of as I was going through these one is um putting more money toward more teachers smaller class sizes that kind of thing and support for teachers and then I also looked for early intervention especially if it was beginning around kindergarten I'm not as interested in the early early I think our mandate is K-12 and that's where I like to see us work spend spend our funds and do our work um also I was interested in caring for our physical assets and investing in successful programs and I think like um Ruth not not looking for new things for us to do but to invest in the things that have been successful for us with students in the past and then um also is interested in Partnership opportunities that are bringing money into our schools so there's one in here that has to do with Partnerships and and while it cost us money to do it it may end up bringing more to us in the end so I'm interested in that kind of stuff so my numbers um On Athletics I think this is very important that we have trainers in our schools where our students are involved in athletics um one of the are you writing questions down too so one of the questions I had around that was are these trainers uh full-time in the school all the time or are they there for example for PE classes or are they just there for sports after school um and then the development program for feeder schools I that's one of those new things and I'm questioning whether it would make sense for us to do that given whether we would be able to continue it and and some of the programs that have taken over to provide those kinds of opportunities for students that are not driven by us so I think I had I had a one there Avid expansion I love Avid um it's one of our successful programs although I was trying to figure out what the success rate was so one of the things that we should probably discuss at a meeting is AVID and how it's working in our school so I gave that a three career related learning and college readiness you know CTE have always been a strong supporter but what is being suggested in this doesn't really sound much like CTE to me and so I did not fund that I'm just I didn't understand where it was going um Central support capacity and infrastructure absolutely we need um more support at central office so we can provide more support for our schools and also uh I think this is where the support for Partnerships development would be
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and I also agreed with Ruth on the Ombudsman I think that's something that we shouldn't have cut last year and we definitely need to bring back and also our capacity to secure grant funding is one of the things that you listed in there which I also think is very important so what level did you pick on that one hang on I'm looking here a three classified staff in schools I went with a three on that one as well again it's that's adding 51 FTE and I think that we can use a lot more classified staff both in helping our teachers in the classroom and in our support administrative support in our schools so we can do more to provide teachers with more time with students on culturally specific supports I put my notes Here says see Partnerships I'm thinking that's more where that um where we would would do that kind of work I did not put any points there on custodians um I whoops just went away custodians was a two again and uh deferred maintenance I did not put the staff I did not put um any points there I kind of lumped the two together and made it a two my question on that was um how is the the Deferred maintenance different from custodians and then where's the money to do the work for the Deferred maintenance if we have the custodians or we so it's not just bodies discipline reduction strategies kind of crossed was it two but again that's one of those things that I'd love to hear the latest success of those programs so I know we had had a report out from them I think earlier in the fall but I'd love to hear more information on that one early learner Regional centers I gave that I did not put any points there and that's again I just think that that's outside of the K-12 mission but on the other hand early kindergarten transition programs again how successful are those what's the difference between the schools where we currently are having those kinds of programs and where we don't what's the difference at third grade so do the students retain what they're getting before they come into kindergarten um and I gave that a one I did not put any anything in high school support interventions and that's just because I couldn't figure out what we were actually asking for there so it's one of those ones where I would need more information before I would put dollars behind it literacy materials I chose a one the mid-level support k-8s um I also gave that a one I couldn't quite tell what the difference was between option one and two they both seemed like they were giving support for World languages and online Blended learning I think I was looking for some success rates there too what's happened thus far but I did go ahead and um one outdoor school I think needs to be funded through the community so I did not put any extra money there student technology I funded it at one to increase the minimal technology and refresh but I also need more information about that and what's the useful life for the equipment that we currently have teacher mentors I think is a fabulous program and I gave that a three and wrap around Services I did it too to provide the full-time secretary to school counseling office undertake clerical Aid administrative work so counselors can focus their time and energy on students kind of the same thing around that was two same thing similar to what uh adding classified staff that's it
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a couple of things before I get started I just want to mention that that this exercise came with a specific caveat that we're not looking at school Staffing ratios so if you don't hear people talking about teachers or increased that wasn't part of this exercise that's going to be part of a different exercise so I just want to throw that out as I think about people at home not necessarily looking at the materials that we're looking at um with that I just want to also note that we were given 25 points to allocate and after my first run through um I had come to 74. um so I had a lot of trimming to do which again is a is a better place to be than literally cutting programs but looking looking at how do you expand I I mentioned that just because um there are great things in each of these and I Echo I Echo other directors comments about you know some of this is contingent on program evaluation how do we know it's effective what does the high school action team saying um what are our own evaluations say so with with those caveats some some a couple of things that I noticed were missing right away were things like summer Scholars but again maybe that's the high school action team um and then there wasn't any mention in here about expiring or sunsetting grants and there's some learnings that we have from Sig grants or other grants that I just want to make sure we we capture or or think about as we move on so with that I'll try to be brief in my comments again knowing that a lot of these have value um I found the major themes from my as I went as I had to go from 75 points back down to 25 I found a real relaxed and reluctance on my part to cut High School supports so um Avid expansion for example got one even though I again was curious about program evaluation the high school Career and Technical education well I didn't quite know what it meant I supported that idea as trying to figure out if it's an important connection or missing or struggling to make at the high school um and so I'll get to that number in a minute and then the other I did the other end of the spectrum and I um I appreciate director Knowles comment about the K-12 Continuum but I really do think our charge can start at pre-k because those become our kindergartners and so I when it was early childhood I also found myself really reluctant to um to cut that or reduce that along with middle school I got really excited to see Middle School supports I thought we were going to head back shop and a whole bunch of electives and then I read read a little bit further and realized that it was supports for k-8s which is still important but I thought we were going to do something along with director Atkins what she was saying is how do we offer that robust program at the middle school because I really do think that that students at that level really need that um that unique engagement at that level so with that I put and I never did get down to Zero by the way I'm five in the hole but you can listen to my thinking about how I got there Athletics important we should continue the investment but I didn't put any numbers there because I had to get to zero um Avid I gave one um career related learning College I I chose two option number two Central supports I chose option number two and that was really based off I just continually hear people talk about really wanting to push resources to the classroom and I I agree with that and I often hear the most common complaints that I hear are supports lacking from the central office like that it's a one-two thing people want more teachers and more stuff in the classroom but when they actually complain about the district it's some lack of support from the central office including in the schools classified staff in schools I chose one partly because of our previous investment in that um and I had to get to close to zero specifically cultural supports I don't really understand what's here it's a little confusing but I chose three just as a value statement of saying we still have to reinvest in being culturally responsive whether that's internally externally or all of those options so I just wanted to highlight that um custodians custodians if I appreciated the little Preamble you put here about how out of sync we are with other school districts um about how much we expect our custodians to actually do as far as square footage but I didn't give it any any ranking but again that's not that I don't value it or don't think it's important how to get to zero deferred maintenance same thing I didn't choose anything in that discipline reduction strategies I chose one particularly because of the scaling concerns people had I'd like to see it roll out in a systemic and thoughtful way not because I think that our disparities in discipline are okay
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but I think we have some really good successes that we can begin to build on Early Learning Regional centers I'm not sure Regional centers we that's a conversation but I do think it actually opens us up to lots of other partnership ideas which gets me really excited and so I chose two for that um option two sorry early kindergarten transition program I also chose option two part of that's just that I remember director Sergeant being really excited by that because of the the outcomes we were getting in if if we're not excited about pre-k this is this is really they're three weeks away from kindergarten so that's that's pretty close to our our kids um High School support interventions I chose two literacy materials I chose one but I appreciate director Atkins question about it's so up in the air but the fact of the matter is today's kids deserve materials and supports and teachers deserve them today and we can't wait until somebody figures out what the next best thing is mid-level supports I chose too option two that is online Blended learning again this still seems like a really priority and it feels as I as I hear different teachers experiences with flipping the classroom I think it's something we just need to forge ahead with so I chose option two outdoor school I didn't choose not because I don't want kids to go to outdoor school but I had to get down to zero student technology I chose one again this feels like just a basic support that our students need and deserve in today's world it doesn't feel like an option it feels like something we should do and again consistently I hear of different schools talk about how hard it is to do what they need to do with that refresh money if they've even gotten the refresh money so and then teacher mentors again I support it I supported the last budget but I didn't give it any numbers this time same with wraparound Services somebody that is in a partner agency that does provide some wraparound Services obviously a priority but I didn't give it any priority any numbers so I should be about oh negative three sweet Dr Martin all right thank you I'm the reason why I think teachers sometimes grade on a curve or try to recognize um the uh great inflation in uh their term grades but uh I had a hard time um either not prioritizing or pulling marking down I should say items that are that are at least important to me values wise but I want to give you an idea of the major themes that that we're running through my head when going through this one is uh how do we invest where we can leverage other resources we do this a lot of times with with other funding sources the sun program is an example other funding through uh you know relationships with Parks is an example relationship with with foundations with other organizations that can bring resources and so how do we how do we use that as a leverage point to to bring in additional resources to our schools and I think the number is roughly 75 percent of our budget is through State funding so the other 25 is is our ability to leverage in some of those resources title all the title program would be included in this too the federal title entitlement programs the other one is as you know on the heels of watching uh Architects and and our modernization folks come in and talk about uh repairing and rebuilding schools I really wanted to put maintenance as a as an important piece of of how we prioritize our resources this year I think it's also a commitment that we've Made In terms uh to the to the voters and saying this is something that if you pass this this bond this is something that we will do we're not going to defer maintenance in the future we're going to take care of our buildings and we're going to budget to do so and I think we came up with a budget plan during that process too another another theme or value that came in was how do we find ways to advance our most underserved students I'm including our historically underserved our ell students our students in special education how do we manage to bring them along as we as we grow opportunity and achievement we're also Bound by our achievement Compact and these are the same groups that we have to we have to find ways to to Inc really find double-digit growth over the next several years to meet our achievement compact stated goals um and then you know to piggyback something that I I wasn't necessarily thinking of but director Buell said uh kids in school all day so uh what does that mean to me I think things I think
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of things like um uh enrollment uh working in enrollment finding ways to capture our increase our capture rate I think of um you know I know in the old days PPS had truancy uh programming so helping helping bring kids back into the schools who were out knowing that that their play their place in the classroom is the most important so so those were some of the major themes that I was I was considering as I was going through some of these numbers and these won't uh be only 25 points at the end so but I'll share with me anyway um Athletics I put as a two or option two Avid option one career related learning and college readiness I put it just in option three and again uh you know you speak about how public testimony affects decision making this is something that I moved up after today's comments from a Community member and former parent or a PPS parent who said the kids that she valedictorians were not prepared for for college uh and that's something that that strikes me it seems like it's something worth investing is an option one for Central supports classified staff it was sort of an option to going into an option one I recuse myself from the culturally specific supports question uh custodians I put is an option one deferred maintenance again as I mentioned one of the values is uh I would hold this high in our budget process and and put it as an option three in discipline reduction strategies uh I would have as an option three perhaps migrating to option two because I think there are higher Investments at the front end of that we're talking about cultural shifts and as those shifts occur then we have less of a less of a budgetary impact but more of a sustained cultural impact um earn Early Learning Centers I I again I think uh coach Eric belisle said this the regional Center's concept is something that is probably still up for Up For Debate and question across the board but um but this is where I see our opportunity to leverage additional resources that are not coming through the typical K-12 system but how do we how do we do that use that resource in a way that supports what we need to and uh and create kindergarten Readiness across our district uh early kindergarten program which that would that was uh oh I'm sorry did I not tell you which early Learners option three early kindergarten program option three High School graduation and acceleration strategies again as we're looking at State I know it's probably already 25 or more it's again again this is this is the best part about being on this side of the Deus because you've got the budget problem um so I know yeah so uh High School graduation and acceleration strategies uh I rated this as an option three as well um you know what no no we don't need the peanut gallery here but uh but primarily uh again we're looking at we're looking at uh needing to needing to really invest in these solutions that are um that are going to graduate our kids I mean we have a 63 graduate four-year cohort graduation right I can't think that that would be anything less than a high priority um literacy materials I would put as an option to uh leaning towards option one um Middle School level supports weed absolutely need Middle School level supporters option three online Blended learning I would I I'm gonna make the call on and I'm gonna just put that as an option one I had it as an option too but um you're welcome if you did this another 17 times you might get down to 20. no no I wouldn't uh outdoor school option one student technology option one uh student uh okay and uh
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teacher mentors I would put as an option one and then uh wrap around Services I would put as an option three because this is um again uh for us to be successful with with kids in the classroom we have to have opportunities for us to engage with those same kids outside of the classroom if we don't they're not going to be successful we could just divide each of your points by two and you'd be almost perfect why don't you do that bring that back next week director again so I um I think it's probably really good for the board collectively that there is not the first one to go yeah I tried to look at uh two things as I was doing this the first was what has the highest student impact and the second was what will positively impact graduation rates so those were kind of the two filters I was trying to use the big question I had and one of the reasons that some of these are rated lower than you might expect given what I just said is last year we devoted eight percent of the budget to four percent to uh low socioeconomics kids and four percent to historically underserved and I during this budget process I want to get an understanding of how those monies were spent because my expectation is they were spent on things like Avid and things like more classified staff for different things and um so there's a variety of these where I do a lower ranking because I think we just put a whole lot of money that I would expect went into some of these programs so I think one of the things I'm looking for is what was the impact of the those dollars that we put last year so that's a big question mark for me so as I go through there's going to be some like Avid that I don't read as highly even though I really value it because I'm assuming that we put those monies there already it's one to come yeah I went to fde but we'll we'll put that as one to do more detail about yeah yeah so um and the other things are things that weren't on this list would be additional days which I know is a contractual issue and we're already adding three but I think we need to be looking to add more as we go over time and to add those at the beginning of the school year or not the end of the school year so they actually have some impact lowering class sizes was a big one and I think that is a very expensive option so I that would be on my list school resource officers and the issue now of how we're going to deal with that given that the city pulled back some funding for school resource officers I think we need to have that discussion with them and figure out whether we meet them somewhere additional CTE electives in high schools whether or not we're trying to beef up the Benson program in some capacity whether or not we hit our high school instructional hours and have our kids at a full schedule and professional development around courageous conversations in common core those are things that I didn't necessarily see on this list that I'm thinking about so in terms of my list Athletics I did a two especially excited about the idea of getting Athletics into our feeder schools and our middle schools option two option two oh this is interesting I may end up like you then because I'm not sure well no I didn't write so we'll see if this works Avid expansion I did a one again I have an expectation that we did some of that last year career related learning college readiness if we do more CTE electives I I only gave that a one because I'm hoping that we're doing more CTE electives as we go Central support capacity and infrastructure I did a one in particular I want the Ombudsman back I like the idea of the more capacity for doing grant funding it's just a smart investment and the development of annual School climate surveys I think would be particularly smart on that one um classified staff in schools I didn't understand why this was only k-8s that it seemed like we were talking about um but I I did not add any more of that we just added a big chunk and it wasn't clear to me exactly what that would be used for culturally specific supports again my expectation is a lot of that hopefully was done with our eight percent funding so I did not add more there custodians I did option one especially with the hope that this might decrease over time I don't know whether or not we're we still have a big amount of custodial over time on the books but that's something that I would hope this might help to address too and give them
01h 40m 00s
a little break deferred maintenance I did not put anything into between the bond and the construction excise fee it seems like we've got some funds going there the only exception to that might be trying to add one or two more ground screws to try to clean up the outside of our building there you go director Beale um discipline reduction strategies I did option three I think that's a really important one the early learner Regional centers I did not put anything in here and I don't I don't understand how that funding works and whether that pulls from K-12 funding or how how that works so I need more I need a better understanding of that before I would do that one the early kindergarten transition program I did option one I really like it I would not necessarily expand it to the early first grade transition I would try to expand much more broadly in the early kindergarten transition I didn't understand why all of a sudden we're switching it over to be a two-year program rather than I would rather do a blanket kindergarten program um the high school support interventions I think we're going to be hearing a lot from the high school action teams and hopefully would be looking at eventually doing kind of a care team kind of model so I gave that a three literacy materials I put zero at this point middle level supports a k-8s I did a one online blending learning one outdoor school I I gave it a two I think this is a really first of all it's a direct support to middle school students it and it supports Hands-On learning and it's all about STEM Science technology engineering math I I would love to see us bring that back full-time huge Equity issue too yes yes family can provide that kind of thing student technology I did it too teacher mentors I would love to expand so I gave that a one and wrap around Services again having a full-time social worker at high schools I gave that a three um option three or three points option three option three option three or three um per episode three option three oh did I go over now yes by two points I didn't go over I didn't go over when I did this last night and I still have one more so um option three in particular if the 10 all right the only reason I would do option three is if the 10 FTE for additional counselors in K5 K-8 and middle schools ensures that we have a counselor in every single counseling support in every single one of our schools this just bothers the hell out of me that we still don't have that um so and then my last one I think another point would go toward sros if we need to meet the city part way we we got to figure out how we have SRO support in every High School cluster so thanks all right I'm sorry sros for the audience or school school resource officers so they're provided by the city of Portland and it's just amazing community policing at its finest but those were cut back and so sorry I was using that acronym SRO student representative um so first of all thank you David for coming to Super sac and uh sort of leading a similar discussion with us I think it was really valuable and I noticed that a lot of these came out of that discussion I think so I was pretty pleased with that um so again a lot of my decisions had strengths attached to them I wanted to see how these you know were actually coming out in a more detailed explanation and again I would like to see the last year's Investments as well I think that's really important because I would like to counter that into mine um and I'm really looking forward to the high school action team coming forward I think a lot of these will be addressed and I think a lot of the solutions factor into these at some really you know affordable rates as well um and mine are all in points to make it a little bit easier for you um so first of all I gave two points to Athletics I think that's something that we just need to be expanding I gave three points to Avid it's a program that I've heard nothing but good things about um I gave Five Points to Career related learning and College and Career Readiness but with the understanding that we would add some CTE in there as well I was really glad that we were talking about you know Outreach and getting students involved with the community in possible careers but I really wanted to see that engagement in school as well um
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I didn't give anything to Central support capacity and infrastructure classified staff in schools culturally specific supports or custodians not because any of those things aren't important but again I got it to 25. um deferred maintenance I gave a one I think that'll again help relieve some of the strain on custodians and again back to director beale's point the outside grounds and inside as well there's things that we just need to be keeping up on um and that's you know going to lead into day-to-day lives of students as well so they can take pride in their school um discipline reduction strategies I gave a one I just think that's something we should always be working on regardless um early learner Regional centers I didn't give anything to early kindergarten program I didn't give anything to I gave two points to high school graduation acceleration strategies um that's something I'm just really excited about but again I want to see some more specific explanations for it I didn't give anything the literacy and materials I would really like to see more specifics on that and then maybe I could allocate some uh Middle School level support in k-8s I gave three points I'm really excited about that that's when I hear from students all the time about online and Blended learning I didn't give anything to again I think it's important but I had to cut back at door school I gave two um that's pretty much a no-brainer for me I don't mean it's not just an explanation um student technology I give a one I'm excited by what I already see in schools but I'm looking for more teacher mentors I gave two I that's a great program I I really when we're talking about best practices in this district and expanding those I think that's a huge part of it and wraparound Services I gave a three just because in the work with the high school action team and you know looking at what's going to affect students directly that's something that I really feel passionately about so thank you director Buell you ready for your numbers oh I'm okay good it's getting late my questions you had one more question two more questions for us um just no I think you already um let me go through them because we did the questions um wonderfully and I think that was that was exactly what we were hoping to hear from you so things where you wanted more clarification um I think that I think that was enormously helpful um it's point of the process so thank you for that um I will just confirm some next perhaps I've moved the microphone out yes I made scrunchy noises while you were talking um so just to give you um a few dates in terms of the process I'm feeling very schizophrenic I realize they say process and process both um so this attempts at the budget process for this year this is the process we're going to go through um we will have a fork a budget forecast for you in the middle of January so what we think the year the next year will look like which is about the same time we'll be bringing you the formal budget amendment the superintendent we've penciled in proposing the budget on March 17th this year that's about a month earlier than last year which was April 15th two reasons one obviously the earlier we can do that the sooner we can get started on school Staffing which is a compelling motive and it is the second year of the biennium so we have a greater level of certainty about the financial picture than we would do otherwise that would mean that the board would be the board acting as the budget committee would be approving the budget in late April and then the board as the board would be adopting the budget in late June so that's some sense of framework for you um yeah um when are they typically approving their budget because late April sounds really late I mean part of the reason that we're going through the discussion with the teachers union is that we want to get out early or um so that we can be sure that we can you know get the best new teachers out there so I'm I'm trying to understand I know that this is a month earlier than last year but last year was really really late so do you have any sense of when other districts are out there improving their budgets or what other school boards are I don't
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know when other districts are proving the budgets in terms of school Staffing though we have always released School Staffing immediately after the superintendent proposes the budget so that would be March 17th that's March 17th March 18th so I mean we can set we will certainly check and see if this is the way we could but yeah we can we can we can we can see what other people are doing okay okay certainly um and then the only other thing I would add is um we will probably do the same exercise with some other groups since it worked so well with you um and that will I think be helpful for the superintendent and staff too in terms of you know hearing from other other folks what their priorities might be they I proposed a system whereby we go ahead of for a huge portion of our hiring of every other school district in the Tri-County area so we're not only recruiting better but we're hiring better I've given it to Mr Murray I'm hoping that our people in the HR department will look at it I haven't heard anything back it was about a month ago but I think we can hire up front with a huge number of of employees before anybody else hires where we get to take the crop right up front and I'd just like to point that out that I've talked to him about that and hopefully we can at least talk about it or something thank you we just requested co-chairs that there be some kind of preview or discussion around what the topics are going to be for as we are doing our budget discussions over the next few months I mean I think I think each year we're trying to refine that and work on it so it's a using the equity lens and making sure that the just the balance of Staff presentation time what the topics are and the amount of time we have for discussion and what purpose you know just that whole discussion I think we talked earlier this summer about trying to just continue to improve that so I just before it all of a sudden is you know February and it's happening that to have that I don't know what that would look like but just for you guys to just a request for you to consult with us and have that discussion early on while that's being set up would be great actually I think you gave us a bunch of information in this conversation of where people were interested in hearing more and actually I'll just say back at the beginning we gave you criteria numbers of which you actually mentioned when you were talking about what what you were considering which included um connecting to the Milestones the racial Equity lens the Strategic framework but the other ones were successful program expansion and replication so how are we building on our own successes which numbers have you mentioned how are we leveraging additional resources and utilizing our Partnerships and one of the ones we heard in our conversations with both leadership of our employee groups and super sac and Coalition communities of color and achievement compact committee was how are we building schools for the future not simply recreating the schools of the past so it's not just going back and trying to fill in holes of what we used to have but really holding ourselves to what are we trying to create for the future all of which I thought were good reminders of good guiding principles but you gave us good triggers of what are the things you want to hear more about when we're doing budget topics I think more information it's not like yeah this is now like we can we must do this or we won't do that based on just this one discussion the numbers of things like we want to hear more about what happened with the historically underserved like how did that play out here are things that you know really interested in it but want to see what's the data what's our data on Avid what's our anyway I think you gave us a bunch of information you did great in this conversation so thank you for just doing the work ahead of time and coming prepared to do the prioritizing ago as we did a shift a year or two ago where we we had been doing family engagement internally and we are now doing some internal family engagement staff and some partners and I'd love to get a sense of how that's going and who's doing it better or whether we're coordinating among those groups or I don't know what the accountability mechanism is but I'd like to hear more about that and really I think I'm not only ended up saying it was a both hand it wasn't an either or we'd framed it as any other or in a numbers of years ago and then we said okay we actually need both because
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we're we're uh when we're doing Outreach we needed to connect yeah we can do you we'll give you some more detail on that one yeah director nulls um David I'm not sure if it was just me or if anybody else received this but on the attachments it has notes of meetings with super Sac District employees but and I didn't have none of those were attached to my stuff so could I get notes from all of those I didn't have any of that I'd love to see it okay that wasn't in your pocket no uh that will be to you by email um but before nine o'clock I'm not going to read it tonight thank you thank you but if I don't do it tonight I will forget it so I will I will send that to you baby what's the timeline where we could ask for information like what are all our contracts you know who do they go to and where are they want to see that before we get to the budget stuff when should we start asking for information like that I think that's a question you should send to the superintendent yeah I think if you're if those questions are occurring to you right now let's start building the list of what information collectively you are wanting to see yeah that sounds great yeah I think in years in years past we had we kind of funneled through the finance audit and operations committee I'm going to say what people's list of different questions were and just knowing that there's unlimited staff can only do so much it's always that balance of finding the information that because we can continue to ask questions about every single program and here's what I'm going to give you a little added will you direct it to me and and uh to David both so that we're both getting them but David will be the one that's keeping the master list um yeah and actually let's keep the co-chairs too so and we'll build what's the list because whatever one board member is requesting will provide to everybody so that you're all getting the same info okay so well I think that uh we already talked about talking with every board member as Ruth asked so yeah so if we're wanting to go deep on some different issues kind of trying to come to some sort of consensus about what's the short list even that we're not going to have an endless number of meetings do we need to add more people to the board no do we need to add more people to the staff in order to get questions answered each of us has a fiduciary responsibility and we're dealing with every taxpayer's money so there's I'm going to have a bunch of questions and I would expect that they would get answered I would assume that that's the case is that we all expect that and I think maybe we need to add more people in order to make sure that takes place I don't know that it's not my job to decide that I just don't want to get cut off uh asking questions like I have another yeah uh with that thank you for being here Miss bottom League were very quiet but thank you for taking notes and thank you for being here the board will now consider our business agenda Miss Houston are there any changes through a business agenda no do I have a motion and a second to adopt the business agenda so I moved second director Knowles moves to adopt and director Regan seconds to adopt the business agenda Miss Houston is there any public comment on our business agenda no there is not is there any more discussion on the business agenda all those in favor please indicate by saying yes yes yes all those opposed please indicate by saying no extensions the business agenda is approved by a vote of six to zero with director curler being absent and student Representatives Davidson voting yes yes the next meeting in the board will be held on Monday December 9th this meeting of the board is now adjourned

Sources

PPS Board of Education, Archive 2013-2014, https://www.pps.net/Page/2224 (accessed: 2022-03-24T00:57:54.073648Z)
PPS Communications, "Board of Education" (YouTube playlist), https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL8CC942A46270A16E (accessed: 2023-10-10T04:10:04.879786Z)

2013-12-02 PPS School Board Study Session

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Event 1: Board of Education - Study Session - December 02, 2013

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