2015-06-11 PPS School Board Study Session

District	Portland Public Schools
Date	2015-06-11
Time	missing
Venue	missing
Meeting Type	study
Directors Present	missing

Documents / Media

Transcripts

Event 1: Board of Education - Study Session - June 11, 2015

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good evening this study session of the Board of Education board of education for June 11th 2015 is called to order I'd like to extend a warm welcome to everyone present and to our television viewers while our study sessions are generally limited to receipt of information prior to vote at times we do conduct votes during study sessions any item that will be voted on this evening has 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 on our ppsv services website so director nolles and student representative Jaz wall are absent this evening so first up tonight we get to celebrate our amazing Grant Constitution team YooHoo yeah after participating in simulated Congressional hearings on the US Constitution and the Bill of Rights we are extremely proud to announce again to celebrate tonight that our own Grant High School won first place in the National we are the people competition held in Washington DC this achievement marks the fourth consecutive year that a Portland Public Schools team has taken the national title with Portland Public now having won a total of seven national titles the hashtag is PPS proud and now over to you Carol and I'm going to ask Carol Campbell Grant High School principal and Briana Hayes to come on up and talk introduce the team but I also want to tell the team that um you guys were flying back from um from Nationals when we were in a board meeting and we celebrated you and then a couple of us left and went to the airport to greet you I think Bobby got there in time I got there just after um but we were so excited to have you win another National Title it was really cool so thank you for being here tonight and introducing yourselves to us and letting us honor you hello my name is Briana Hayes it's kind of like being at competition right now except there's more judges oh no no no it's kind of exciting smile that's all we um The Experience on con team is something that's Unforgettable and you don't get it anywhere else throughout your four years of high school or in your education period so it's really an honor to participate in in it and to continue on and win a National Title and um coming from being a student of color and actually succeeding on here and feeling like I'm a part of a family I've never received so much support before and actually been motivated and driven and actually so connected with the things that I was learning about that it made me so passionate about so many things that I now take interest in and it's also helped me connect with a lot of other people and because I can give my perspective on a lot of real issues instead of generic one-sided opinion so I feel like we've all contributed so much and it's just a great experience that I hope everyone has the chance to take one day thanks um and I just have to say a little bit about bana too she spoke at graduation and she's also the president of the black student union it's kind of a theme with the students that are on the con stitution team that they give they give service and and are involved in a lot of other things that that really demonstrate really strong leadership skills and uh briana's done that this year uh as the black student union president she also gave a very eloquent speech around Equity at graduation that it would really be nice if every school could hear what she had to say it was amazing and it was in front of all those people um this is nothing right and then right after she was finished she won the uh William Fletcher award which is like the most coveted award from Grant U named after the first principal in 1924 who stated during his tenure there that we were all there to try to live together so I mean planting those seeds of equity and and community and all of that so it was perfectly fitting so along that that theme there's the students that are here tonight and those that weren't able to come are very visible in the Grant Community community in the school in the school community in the larger community in the city and the nation because of their work with the Constitution team um Gunner Olson the student body president is is on the Constitution team Ali yidi who is featured in the grant magazine graduation addition for running a Street Sandwich Club where they a group of students Feed the Homeless um Cassie Hill's a grant magazine photographer anap posy SCH with sportswoman of the year um it and it goes on and on I mean
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I wish you could meet them all personally and and hear their stories they're just an amazing group of people and their leadership and I spoke about this at graduation their leadership the grant magazine leadership the the way that they have quietly changed the culture in climate at Grant uh this year and last year um is really evident in the behavior of the students and the way that they they give back to the community so I just want to thank Jeremy reinholt um all the coaches the students for their hard work it's hours and hours of prep preparation and they give up a lot of things to be able to be on the Constitution team and when it pays off it's great um but they still work hard not knowing if they're going to win or not so um I brought you a copy of the grant magazine this the graduation addition in case you didn't get a prescri a subscription yet um because there's some Fe some articles in there that really speak to the articles that are in the magazine may not be about all of these students but the work of the students in this magazine is a reflection of the climate and culture that this group of students has set for us so I'm really proud of them for that and um I'm just going to finish with there's an article in here about one of our students who's going into the military who had kind of a rough time in school and um because of a disability um he finishes this article with you don't have to be the best you just have to be the best to each other and I think that exemplifies what this group of students is is all about so thank you for everything so like to invite you all over I think uh it said the South Wall which I believe is over there uh do a photo with the students and principal Campbell and the board and the superintendent you do a quick photo South I was told South wall while we're all getting ready can I just mention that um if you want to see your speech um we usually make DVDs available for the grant um for each graduation so if people are interested in your Equity speech that DVD should be made available and you can contact PPS Television services is it really it everybody ready M thank you thank you so much and thank you also for bringing the copies of the magazine for us so next we have um public comment Miss H do we have anyone signed up we do we have three and our first two speakers are Gary Myers and Shelby Perry welcome so come on down I'll just read our instructions as you're getting settled thank you so much for coming tonight and taking the time to provide your comments to the board we look forward to hearing your thoughts Reflections and concerns we will be actively listening and reflecting your comments but not responding to comments or questions during public comment period but we have asked our board manager who's ranne who's sitting over there at the end of the row she's available if you'd like additional information about how we might uh follow up so guidelines for public input respect and emphasize respect and consideration of others complaints about individual employees should be directed to the superintendent's office as a Personnel matter so 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 um during the first two minutes of your testimony the green light is on then when there's one minute uh remaining the yellow light will go on and when your time up a red light comes on and we respectfully ask you wrap your comments then and uh we really appreciate you coming out tonight and look forward to hearing from you thanks so much all right thank you my name is Gary Myers m y RS um I'm the director of education for Southeast works one of the community based organizations that um the board supports um just wanted I'm here with a couple of uh students at in the cbos that'll um do more of the talking I'm not going to take three minutes but um I wanted to thank the board for um your continued support of all the community- based organizations that serve students um in a different way it was uh it was great to see the um Constitution students up there and um see the the great work that
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they do and and to also see that you you know you support students that um come from different backgrounds that might have uh some other challenges in their lives that um are looking at school in a different way so um we serve the students um in a variety of the cbos in our um you know Mount Scott program in um Southeast works at uh New Horizons there's lots of different you know um not lots of programs that are doing good work with homeless Youth and uh Youth and transition youth that are uh dealing with um some struggles in their lives and um it's it's a it's just always an honor to think that the Portland Public Schools has supports students at all different levels and we reach out to some students that for whatever reason the the traditional systems aren't working for them so um we can provide some other unique options um Southeast works is uh more specifically focused on the uh GED preparation um we are an accredited school we do um we can do credit recovery we have licensed teachers um I'm a licensed administrator um we've expanded our program from one teacher a year half ago to now three teachers uh we have uh we serve students from all over the city but you know we're located on 79th and Foster so we work a lot with students in the area that's affectionately called felony Flats um a lot of homelessness a lot of drug abuse a lot of um folks that are dealing with some real challenges out in that part of part of the city so um you know we're we're located in a Work Source Center which is a unique um alternative school sort of setting we think in the country um it's actually you know on the main floor of our building is an adult uh Work Source Center where you can go in to fill out your forms to get unemployment to get job training and and placement and then upstairs is the youth center and we um do a lot of those same services for the Youth in our uh in our alternative school around education and and job development also so I have with my with me uh Shelby one of our students I'd like to share a little bit of her story and then um there's a student from Mount Scott we'll be talking after that welcome hello my name is Shelby Perry p e r r y I attend in southeast works I'm originally from Pasadena California my mom became an addict and went into recovery in Compton California um for shields for family it's a program that allows single parents to have their child I dropped out of sixth grade due to bullying um a lot of obstacles in that I moved to Portland two years ago to try to better my life I wanted to take a different route I am up there in age I'm 22 now so it's kind of either they going to make it or not I found Southeast works very supportive it's a home outside of my home it gives me a break from the struggles um the teachers really support me I'm one test away from graduating I get text messages from everyone at Southeast Works to show up on time where am I at the concerns they help me with whatever I need regardless if it doesn't even have to do with school they're there for the support um Southeast Works has given me the opportunity to have a future and I didn't have that so after I graduate I'm hoping to attend Mount Hood Community College which back in Compton I would have never even looked at walking into a school or any type of program and they gave me a way to better my life and to get out of the situation that I am now like hope for tomorrow so I owe Southeast Works in my life so yeah thank you for your time thank you thank you so much and so our next speaker is Amanda Wilkins welcome Amanda than thanks so much for being here thank you um hi my name is Amanda Wilkins uh w l k i ns um Schoolboard directors and superintendent Smith thank you for the opportunity to speak tonight my my name is Amanda Wilkins I'm 17 years old and I graduated last week from man Scott Learning Center I'd like to share a little bit thank you um I'd like to share a little bit about my story and why programs like Mount Scott are so important I was really struggling my freshman and sophomore year at my previous school which is a large Traditional High School um I failed some of my classes and then my sophomore year things got really hard I was suffering a lot from depression and I was actually bullied a lot at school and that led me to basically drop out I was dealing with a lot of issues with my family and I was self-injuring for a while and I was in a really bad place and then I found Mount Scott Learning Center and it turned out to be a really good fit for me Mount Scott really changed my life in a good way the teachers and staff are so supportive every day I would come to school and feel supported encouraged and challenged and you just don't find that in many other schools a lot of people have a perception that kids in Mount Scott and other alternative schools are bad kids but really we evolved to spin through something that's really hard and these schools provide us with a second chance
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and we're trying to make good decisions that's what brings us closer um is the fact that we all have this common ground it's hard to describe the close community that Mount Scott has but I'm really fortunate to have experienced it I really love this type of learning environment compared to my previous school and I um and I know that there are a lot of other kids that need this type of option the teachers and Mount Scott definitely Challenge and push you and it's not easy sometimes it seems overwhelming but you can always go to your teachers and actually get that help that one-on-one support that you need before going Mount Scott I really didn't know what I wanted to do after high school but the transitions program there really helped me navigate through the process of preparing for and applying for college just getting through the financial aid part can be overwhelming especially for students like me that may not have any real support outside of school to assist them but the staff at Mount Scott um guided me through all that and as a result I received a future connect scholarship I have my first year of college at PCC paid for thanks um and I'll have a college coach to me Mentor me this kind of support for preparing for Life After High School I'm not sure I would get it anywhere else I graduated last week and I'm so excited and it's crazy because I didn't think I it was going to be able it was going to be possible for me to graduate this year but at Mount Scott they made me realize that I could I'm so lucky I found Mount Scott and this in staff there because they have provided me with an amazing opportunity that I wouldn't have had otherwise I definitely don't see myself being where I am today without them thank you for listening to me and for supporting the contract Ed Community Based programs like Mount Scott these schools are changing lives they definitely changed mine thank you Amanda thank you thank you so much for the great public comment we really appreciate it so next on our agenda is the school climate survey results um superintendent Smith would you like to introduce this item um yes this was something that was identified by the board uh in its work plan last summer as something we wanted to accomplished this year um and John Isaac who are is our chief of communications and public affairs Kim Fox Middleton who's our Outreach manager and John Harvick from dhm research are going to provide us a report on the outcomes of the survey thank you superintendent Smith thank you members of the board um we're really excited to be here to report on back about the successful School surveys to you uh here tonight um I also want to recognize in addition to John horvick from dhm and Kim Fox Middleton who's here and you're going to hear from all of us I also want to point out a few other members of the staff who were instrumental in um both developing and um administering the successful School survey who are here so I want to point out uh oh there's no April Elise Christensen and Sean Helm who are both from uh uh data policy and Analysis which is part of system planning and performance and then April alalo who is not here tonight was also a member of the team so they spent a hours working to develop the survey and then administering the survey in our schools and they're available and when we get into question and answer of any questions we have for them so in our presentation tonight uh first uh we're going to run through the history just a review of the background that led to the successful schools climate survey uh then Kim is going to talk about the Outreach effort uh particularly around the parent survey because that was the one survey where we we had to be have encouraging participation the student and the staff surveys we could conduct internally um then we're going to turn it over to John who's going to talk about the dhm analysis of the results from all three surveys um and take questions from you at that part and then I will finish up with um lessons learned and next steps because this is just the first step in many that we need to take to fully uh finish the survey so in September 2014 the PPS Board of Education adopted a work plan which directed the superintendent and staff to develop and administer a district-wide survey measuring School climate superintendent Smith recognizing that a successful climate survey would require collaboration between system planning and performance depart the system planning and performance department and Community involvement in public affairs directed our two teams to lead the effort in developing the new survey and designing and implementing a strategy and plan for encouraging High levels of participation for parents and Guardians um in response to this directive we developed a cross- departmental work Group which was convene to review options for the school climate survey and develop a draft mission statement for surveys and recommendations to the board um as you know we recommended adaptation of the uh California climate surveys including the California healthy kids survey uh and we worked on adapting those surveys in December and January of
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this year so in December and January sipa and SP staff met and solicited input from internal and external stakeholders for recommendations and edits to the survey those stakeholders included community and parents for public schools stand for children the Coalition of communities of color Portland Council PTA Portland Association of teachers service employees International Union and uh pfsp who I always have struggle with that acronym our um school secretaries and professional staff in our schools um we solicited input and feedback and edit edit from those stakeholders and 100% of the requested additions deletions and edits received from these stakeholders were incorporated into the first draft of the climate survey and this time is when we named it the PPS successful School survey this first draft was then reviewed and edited in detail question by question literally by the PPS board School climate Committee in January and February prior to us putting it into the field um the final survey was approved by the climate committee and the parent and guardian survey launched the first week of February the parent survey was administered with our survey partner Oregon's kitchen table the staff and student surveys were administered internally using our qualtric Survey System the parent Guardian staff surveys were open and then closed by April 15 2015 and before I go on I just want to recognize the members of the climate committee who were fabulous to work with director Steve bule director Atkins and director Matt Morton and I also want to uh take a moment to just thank director kler who as you all know really was the strong advocate for us doing the survey which I think really turned out to be a great success um so that's what led to the development of the surveys and then I want to turn turn it over to Kim who's going to talk about participation and community outreach access to yeah okay thank you good evening um let's see so we had um we did a lot of planning as uh John had stated earlier and um our goal was to raise awareness about the successful School survey since we have not done a survey in quite some time and uh prior to the actual launch of the survey we had posters lawn signs um mailings that went out in all supported languages and they basically went out um a good month beforehand so people were very aware about the survey and and um then we also did an e blast uh in regards to the survey um and also um we did a a lot of internal Communications with our leadership um Sun coordinators secretaries school and family Partnerships we worked in commun uh with our community agents and dll and ESL and then career coordinators and school counselors um once we got to the point of launching the survey they're like we know about the survey which was great they actually heard about it were ready to go and then we uh delved into our Outreach and engagement part and we did a lot with our principles um something to simple as just having a presence and reminding people about the survey having in it in the uh School offices the principals would also send messages out um either by email or just in person and then we coordinated with the school's PTA and Sun programs um actually having um activities going on either um PTA meetings or if there were events that the sun schools had we would be have a presence there We additionally had a traveling computer lab which would uh be available for schools not only during the Monday through Friday school week but also during the weekends uh we made that available and we did a couple of uh opportunities for parents to take the survey on the weekend and then the other thing we T did to engage our parents and families uh for the survey was the raffle incentives uh Timbers and Thorns uh donated uh some prized uh prizes for folks and then also schools took the initiative to do um Raffles as well Fabian is the one that comes to mind they actually offered a bicycle uh both in the morning they had a breakfast and they had an assembly and then they also did another uh raffle in the afternoon and they had probably one of the highest um participation in the uh the survey uh knowing that the successful School survey had not we hadn't done one in a while we really uh made an effort to be culturally uh do culturally specific ific Outreach and I had mentioned earlier we partnered with the community agents uh not only uh the DL uh dual language emersion but and ESL but also School Community agents since uh and fobian is an example that comes to mind we survey we had surveys at culturally specific events uh L Ellen had an elll night uh we also went to community events uh the T Festival um at the Oregon Convention Center the MLK event at the Highland Christian church
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and which we reached thousands of people probably five to six thousand people right there and it's again raising awareness reminding them to take the survey that it was available in the multiple languages both in paper and online in um in their language also it was um in verbal form too so they can press that we um delved into a little deeper in the Spanish speaking area for our families and we um had a contract with uh uh organization that helped us reach out to our families uh Spanish speaking families and they helped us with um Facebook they had it in Spanish uh they also were able to give us um a partnership with the radio station so we actually did PSAs for the month of February and they went on in the weekends and we had a community agent from a particular School Rigler who not only um was advocating for the survey at regler but also did uh the PSA announcement because my Spanish is pretty poor to be honest with you um and then from there we have our results so let me just finish this part by saying that in total we spent just over $225,000 on Outreach and communication around the survey and as you know ultimately we heard from we got a participation from 6,31 of our households or approximately 27% of PPS households while we did not reach our goal of 40% we are pleased with the results of this first effort uh the partic participation rate was strong enough for Davis hibbits to provide PPS with weighted results which reflect the actual demographic makeup of the school district and we now also have fresh data informing us how our families prefer schools in the district to communicate with them which we'll talk about in Lessons Learned we also have the ability to disaggregate data by race and other key factors and for the first time we have disaggregated data based on sexual orientation and gender identity which is very exciting um so with that I want to turn it over to John to talk about the dhm analysis of the results and um let him take it away well thank you uh very much thank you Bo a pleasure uh to be here to be able to to share some of these results with you I am John hori with dhm research uh just real quickly about us we are an independent nonpartisan public opinion and policy firm based here in Portland although I do work across the Northwest and across the country as well and we do a lot of Education work including a lot of work with school districts and we've worked closely with PPS a number of times in the past and so we were thankful for the opportunity to get a chance to to look at this data and our role was really to take a fresh look at it so to be an independent outside party to look at the data as uh was said uh you all did the hard work on collecting it and that's uh 27% uh I know maybe a little short of your goal but I do survey work uh you know seven days a week and that response rate is exceptional really uh you I think that 40% is a goal to try to get in the future and and I'll cheer you on for that but you should be very happy with 27% it's really hard to get that sort of participation um as John said we we got the data from PPS uh we did an independent analysis uh he mentioned that we statistically waited it and we did so we did the variables that we well take a step back because of the way that the survey Outreach was done with the parents also with the staff and with the students but especially with the parents right it's a community engagement effort and with a random sample of course what you're trying to do is get a representative group of people in the population to participate in your project because then you can make inferences about the population as a whole this effort good Outreach exceptional Outreach to get 27% of the households but you never know unless you do the analysis does that 27% really look like the population as a whole or it's just a subset so what we did is we looked at the demographic characteristics compared it to the to the population as we knew it and then we weighted it statistically so if a group was underrepresented they got increased a bit if a group was under over represented they got decreased a little bit way to down in the results and because of size was so large we were able to have uh large enough subpopulations uh to be able to do that the takeaway is is once we did all that there's really not any differences a 0 23 in some questions but essentially your total numbers even without waiting them did a great job of reflecting the attitudes uh in the community all right so the Outreach was not only great in getting lots of people to participate you got a broad enough U uh segment of the population to participate to really make good and accurate inferences about the population as a whole so I'm going to walk through just a few of the Topline numbers there we've provided uh uh the administration with three separate reports for parents one for parents one for um administr staff and one for students there's so much good data there for you and there way too much for me to talk about so I'm going to try to pick out a few in each survey some positive some green lights and and some yellow lights as well uh some cautions I don't think there's any red light that really stood out to me in
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this data but there are some things I think deserve your attention and um some followup and maybe some further research um I'm going to start with the students um so the students we looked at the fifth graders that seventh graders and the high school students so I understand that there was a broader range but we really focused on those and I'm going to just call them elementary middle and high school so on the positive side uh and this is really theme throughout the the the various surveys is that you just asked in a number of different ways uh students are positive about the schools um large majori say that they're inviting places to learn that schools care about them that they're treated fairly by the students and other adults in the classroom these are places the schools are places welcoming environments where students want to be right so that's uh takeaway number one and the other sort of thing I looked at is just just students do students want to be there are do they uh how do they think the uh how do they judge their other classmates and one of the questions we asked or was asked in the survey are your fellow classmates motivated to learn and yeah strong majority large majorities of students said yes my classmates are motivated to learn so this is they're telling us uh that these are the schools are places where they welcome they want to be and that the students are motivated to learn so those are some real good positives some things to uh s stood out to me as yellow lights have to do with student interactions uh in particular with bullying um so 50% of middle school students and 40% of high school students reported uh being insulted called name or called names in the last year okay so we heard a little bit of that even with some of the students that talked before us about some of their experiences and and we heard a fair number of students in the survey say that's something that they've experienced um also one in four students from historically underserved communities so communities of color so they've been harassed or bullied at least once in the last year due to their race ethnicity or nationality so uh some things to to be aware of now that course or compares to 15% of white students in the sample so it wasn't um just minority students who said that um but one out of four did say sometime in the last year so those student interactions of student um relationships between each other is certainly something that I wanted to call out for you with regards to the staff survey again we heard overwhelming and even more so than than the students uh but at the margins here but the vast majority of staff reported that their schools promote a welcoming supportive and respectful learning environment let me just give you a few numbers at least 90% of Staff agreed to these statements my school is supportive and inviting place for students to learn teachers go out of their way to help students students care about each other and students get along well with each other so again real strong n positive numbers about how people our staff and administrators feel about their school they also said it's a safe environment um it uh so nearly all teachers also agree to these statements the teachers make it clear that students to students that bowling is not tolerated nearly all agreed that their schools emphasize that showing students respect for all students in cultural beliefs and practices and that students Foster an appreciation for student diversity so the yellow lights for the the staff uh really had to do with training and having access to necessary materials um 60% of Staff indicated that the need more professional training mentorship and other support especially for uh serving um special education students that's this is really the area that stood out for teachers where the numbers were different was really around training 57% indicated that need more professional training uh to meet the emotional and developmental needs of Youth in half indicated that they need more professional training and closing the achievement Gap okay so even though you know I look at these sort of percentages does a lot in survey research and sometimes I look at numbers and say 60% that's a pretty good number and sometimes I see 60% that's a yellow light some of it has to do with the context of the questions and some of it has to do with compared to everything else in the survey and so when I see numbers like this 60% 50% even though they're on the positive side of the scale in context of a survey where so many of the questions that we were concerned about we're seeing 80 90% um it is worth um acknowledging this
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is where teachers said that um uh that they probably need the most support for parents again heard very positive things about the environment of their child's School 86% agreed uh that their child's teacher effectively is effective uh in supporting their uh Children's Learning needs and more than 80% agreed that principals teachers and staff treat all students with respect parents agreed that uh student learning or that the schools support are and are an inviting place for student learning and academic success and I know this is really important because as I've talked to John and others about the work that you've done we saw really positive numbers with regards to communication so 90% of parents in the survey said that they have someone they can contact when they have concerns 88% said that the school keeps them well informed of activities and 80% said said that someone promptly returns their phone calls messages and emails um someone who makes a lot of phone calls messages and emails if 80% of people I dealt with returned mine quickly uh that's that's quite a good number I think um we asked how they want to be or you asked how they want to be communicated with and 82% said that they prefer email um and that's probably the case just in the way that people interact with the world now I do think we have to be some uh cognizant of just the method that people took the survey as well so most of the folks took the survey online and so there could be a bias just in uh who has access and their preferences for how they want to provide and get information but large majorities there were differences so by demographic characteristics in particular with race and so white households about 90% so their their preference is email um but minority households were much less likely to say that they even though most of the time preferred email they were more likely to say that they wanted personal phone calls or have information sent home from the student that could be an access issue it could be a language issue could be any number of issues but something to be aware of that there is a difference in communication preferences by demographic categories and uh one negative that stood out and I think this is actually what they got headlined in the paper is that um parents did talk about food uh in the survey or mention food in terms of something that perhaps rated a little bit less about their child's experience and so we saw somewhat less positive numbers for having healthy food options in the schools and for having enough time for their students for their children to eat in the schools as well those are uh two of the the lowest rated items in in the parent survey uh so with with that I'm happy to answer any questions uh but I just wanted to flag a few of the the real positives uh and a few of the the the cautions for you to to follow up with and think about and John I didn't know if you wanted to go ahead and do the lessons learns in next step and then we'll just go into questions for the whole topic sounds good I'd also mention uh every all of you have the detailed reports from dhm which go in as you know much more detailed question by question um section by section um a lot of demographic information right yeah so um one thing I wanted to go back and mention that you know Kim did her report on the Outreach and I just want to really commend um Kim who's our manager community relations this effort was two months and it was early mornings being at schools in the morning with our the mobile labs and it was every single day looking at the we were getting reports from Oregon's kitchen table every single day tracking the percentage at every school so we'd shift strategies to focus on the schools where we saw lower participation um it was being in schools around lunchtime and then it was out in the evening doing ptas elll nights community events um it was literally two months of Kim leading a team just going gang busters so I just want to point out that um you know right at the end of that Kim came to me and said hey I'm going to take a few days off if that's okay because it was two month like a campaign for two months and Kim just did an outstanding job and we were really lucky to have her um okay so I want to go over Lessons Learned and these are initial Lessons Learned and as we continue to do the analysis and look at the disaggregated data there will be more but these are our first takeaways from this first effort so the first is that um if you look at the preferences among our families and John mentioned some of this the preference for electronic communication and I don't mean just email is increasing while preference for sort of traditional things we think about is decreasing so the lowest ratings some of the lowest ratings in terms of all parents were to make a phone call at my home phone um but if you look at the phone call gave me a phone call on my mobile phone that's much higher now than um my home phone there was a high percent the highest
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percentage was email but there was also a a high percentage for text messaging um we also have data now independent from this that says that um over 60% of adults now access the internet primarily through their mobile phone and that that percentage is even higher for families of color so we believe as a Communications team working with our schools and also for the district that we want to start um shifting our Communications to mobile devices um we actually think that there's that is a more Equitable way to be communicating with fam Ames um because over 90% of adults of all Races have mobile devices so we're going to be looking at strategies for increasing our ability to text message information to parents making sure we're primarily calling mobile phones rather than landline old school landline phones and then looking it ways that we can be doing our email in a way that's more easily accessed on a mobile device um our email right now tends to be very traditional something You' read on your computer screen at work or at home on your laptop how can we be shifting our website and our email so that it's EAS more easily accessed on mobile phones um second is that there's there's clear difference among who took the electronic survey and who took the paper survey the vast majority of the electron online survey was our W families and the vast majority of our paper surveys were um families of color um primarily we believe that's because of major cultural differences um you know the way primary way we collected uh surveys from family of color was in group settings so events we'd go to a cultural event where you'd have a large Gathering um whereas the we received you know lots of responses high levels of responses from White parents through our repeated eblast and whenever we did a boosted Facebook post we saw jumps in both our white families and then also our African-American parents really responded to our boosted Facebook posts um so again online white English-speaking families high level of comfort higher level of comfort with our paper surveys from families of color um we saw a big jump at the school level so when we saw schools that were had really low participations that were in like the single digits one of the the most effective way to get a boost in participation was to get the principal to send out a single subject email so we know our parents of all Races really pay attention to emails from their principal so whenever we could get a principal to fit into their time to do that to send an email that was only about taking the survey we always saw a jump at that School sometimes 10% overnight um so if we want to communicate urgency whether it's about this or something else we know that single subject emails from our principles to their Community is a highly probably our most effective way in terms of urgently informing a school Community about something um also and this is going to be no surprise to anyone having strong engagement from the school PTA um resulted in higher rates of participation um you know a few I just want to call out because these ptas were awesome uh Fabian Kim talked about the Ser they did their own um raffle um and they were one of the top five in participation Roseway Heights was incredible in this survey they were one of the top five access um was the top participant they actually beat the 40% goal um Clarendon you know our new P PK they had 100% participation at that school so they got every family and that was driven by the parents parents and then Boise Elliot Humbolt did just an absolutely amazing job of encouraging their African-American families to participate so those are ptas that we just wanted to give credit to for really going above and beyond we had help from ptas all over the district but those were really the sort of rockstars um so uh that made a difference um we didn't actually you know we asked Oregon's kitchen table who does surveys all over the you know State what's a proven you know give us your three most proven things that work and they said number one thing is a raffle you offer incentives people will take the survey so we worked with the Timbers and um the Thorns to give us you know tickets we actually got playoff tickets donated um and we didn't actually see much of a noticeable difference for the district-wide survey or at least we couldn't see it but then when Fabian did their um raffle at their school it just boom I mean it just it's clearly was the thing that drove participation there so again for future you know next time doing this survey we'll focus on trying to get schools to do their own Raffles rather than us doing a districtwide one that that will be a better strategy for us um John could I ask real quick what was faban what was faban raffling off a bike bike yeah two bikes two bicycles yeah brand new bicycles um so again if we have you know principal Andor PTA communication that deliv delivered high levels of participation obviously we would ideally if we have both then we know we get high levels of participation and then the last thing is you know we wanted to conduct particularly the parent survey with the third with a outside partner um we tried to do everything with the survey you know we drove participation
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through our Outreach and Community organizing work but we wanted to give a comfort level to our families that the survey was being done independently that the data was being collected independently um but we did have a number of problems with the with the password system I actually think some of you actually um experienced that so it got better as we went along um Oregon's kitchen table actually worked directly with some parents who were experts in online security a parent at Roseway Heights LED that and we had them come in and we did a consult with them and he added some security and tried to improve the way we could do the password but I think if we do this again we will want to do it through a not we won't want to have people have to create an account and log in and do all the steps because that was clearly a barrier to a lot of people whether it didn't work or it just was too much and so we had folks say you know what I I sat down to do this but I don't have that much time I'm just not going to do it so our preference will be to not have that those steps to take a survey in the future um so those are our LES our main Lessons Learned as I said there will be more as we continue to look at the at the results um so the last thing I want to do is say next steps because we're not done this is the this is the districtwide analysis we have more to do so the next steps with the survey data are to communicate key findings to internal and external stakeholders and the community and we've been doing that we've released the parent results already we'll be releasing to the community the staff and student results next week um and we're doing that both through to the news media to um our internal email list our external email list and also directly with stakeholders who helped us develop the surveys um our team internally is completing a detailed analysis of the disaggregated results and we're focusing on three things like there's tons we could focus on here but we're starting with three priorities which is to focus on key differences by race and the analysis that Davis hiitz provided us is really going to help with that differences between Title One schools and n non-title one schools so looking at poverty and then the last is school title are there key differences between high schools and elementary schools or k8s and middle schools um we are breaking the results down into bucket so if you remember the survey had sort of subject areas um we're taking the subject areas that are relevant to a key piece of work that a team of staff is leading in the district so for example the we've got tons of good data in this in terms of the culture that could lead to higher rates of exclusionary discipline in a school we're taking that stuff and we're providing it to lenzo and his team so that they can look at it and figure out and and decide how they'll incorporate it into their work around reducing exclusionary discipline we're doing that with all of the results and then the last thing is we're going to get the we're going to start the hard work and this is a lot of work of getting the school level results Broken Out by school um analyzed and then provided to our school administrators and to the parent leaders at that school so they can look at what their individual School Community said and decide how that will be used in terms of developing their school Improvement plans going forward um we believe we'll have all of this work done by the end of the summer so it's going to take us a few months it's tons of data um but by the end of the summer going into the next school year every school should know what their Community how they responded to the survey and um with that we'll be happy to take questions or comments thank you all so much um so board members questions comments director Morton just a a quick comment just to piggyback John on uh some of the uh uh some of the commentary around um technology the use of Technology some of our most rapidly uh uh growing communities in terms of people accessing technology are communities of color who are accessing it via mobile devices so I think H I think you're right on the target having um having a focus in those mobile devices the other thing you mentioned this too and I just want to just want to support that as well some of the challenges that I heard particularly from my community who I think we filled out mostly uh paper um surveys uh was the complexity or the you know I think to me it always comes down to relationship and Trust so if I'm entering personal information in and a password and then I'm that password is being confirmed and then I have to log in those are probably one or two too many steps for an institution that I'm not really sure what they're going to do with the information once they get it uh so that's just something to be aware of and I know you are but that was the you know that was a feedback that I got um but I also know that there was a lot of effort put out to sit down with parents sit down with youth within age range and uh and fill out help them fill out or ask answer questions or give it to them and give them the space to fill it out so uh more more Outreach to partners partners to
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boost that boost that um that participation so I I'm really excited I think it would have been fantastic to reach the goal but looking at the results and what we can defer from those or what they're telling us makes a big difference now and I think this is what we hope to accomplish when we move forward this as a as a um initiative so thank you thank you other folks director killer sure um so I'd like to also say thank you Kim special thank you to you sounds like you did great work so thank you um and I'm looking forward to seeing and getting out the the per School results because that's for me that's was the main the the the aggregated data is helpful and um really as well but uh but really what um what I think we all want to do is have a continual feedback loop with our schools um um so that's great that that's going to happen and um so I I think it's it's a good start I appreciate your lessons learn because I think this is something that is we should be doing on a yearly basis um I had a question for the the pollster uh the you started I wanted to make sure they understood you correctly um said that the results that we got would be similar to um a random survey is that did I understand you right let me say a little bit differently okay the survey was a community engagement survey so lots of steps were taken to get a wide number of people to participate um anytime you do Outreach or or collect information from a subset of the population it could be representative the population or it might not be represen the population so just having a lot of people participate in something doesn't necessarily mean that you can make inferences about the whole population when we do survey work in my world we usually start from a position we can't talk to everybody so we're going to take a random sample in a project like this you don't necessarily want to do random sample because you want the goal of it not just to hear from um a representative sample but to engage the community and the process it well so a different an appropriate strategy was taken so when we did the analysis we wanted to make to look is did the people who participated are they it's not the entire population but are they like the entire population and so we compared as best as we could on the demographic characteristics we tend to no Drive attitudes things like area and race and gender things like that and um say what does this survey population compare to the population that we know and and so we looked at that and then we said well if we waited the data that is if we took the put the groups who were underrepresented in the survey and we sort of added emphasis of them and the analysis by making their their results count a little bit more to the proportion that they are in the population if we took the groups who were participated above what they are the population and made them contribute a little bit less to the total results if he did that so that it the total results looked like the population as a whole what would happen and this is a common standard way of doing survey work um and the the end point is is once you do that in this case that the results didn't change change much at all and the reason they don't change much at all is because the the the influence of the weights didn't matter because the you started from a the sample that was pretty reflective of the population as a whole long way of answering your question but as a you know I wanted to make sure that I'm I'm answering accurately I appreciate that and then do you do survey work kind climate survey work for other school districts is that something that you guys you've done we do lots of climate related work absolutely for school districts for communities uh for cities counties things like that uh and do you use the random sample method or you use what we do we do both so depends on the type of project we will frequently do a random sample and a community engagement piece as well because both are important Tools in your your Outreach and in your your data toolbox we helped create uh the op in for Metro which is a a community engagement um really platform but to gather and be able to do administer surveys and gather information so we do both we do a lot of random surveys but we also partner with organizations like a PPS or the school districts to do our reach as well in other ways okay thank you can I just I just want to say one play probably the most the biggest place where you saw over and under representation in this survey and that you know this is I don't think will be any surprise to anyone is the vast you know the largest group that participated was our elementary school parents right so if you look at particip ation levels
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and I it's in the report it Peaks at second grade and then literally by grade it goes it's a straight line down in terms of the percentage to 12th grade where the lowest participation level we got were parents of seniors in high school so that you know that's a probably the biggest example where it was you know the the participation was out of whack right with the district so there were others that weren't as big and we were pretty proud of where we got in terms of our racial demographics you know we it's white families were over represented by but not by that much and so it was really exciting to see that when the weight was applied we were able to be very close one just thing to know and you have really smart people working on this is that I'm talking about the district level information when you start looking at the individual schools you may not have in some particular schools enough people of a certain demographic to to wait in a way that you can feel confident so uh thoughtful smart folks will have to be looking at the data independently for each school and may come up with some um good advice for you on how to interpreted m m direct you had your hand up um hi thank you uh I had two questions um one was at one point John you were talking about um I I thought you started out by saying that the staff wanted more professional development and training around uh special ed emotional development needs closing the achievement Gap and the rest but then I heard you instead talking about teachers so were you talking about staff generally or were you talking about teachers or do you have a breakdown I didn't come with we hav't report the breakdown between staff and administrators and most of the people who took the survey were staff so the total excuse me are are teachers and so the results going to be broadly reflective of them okay but we have that information in the full report okay because I that could be really interesting School staff that took the survey correct it was only School staff School staff y right but just to understand where the teachers are at versus some of our support staff might be interesting to see if there's a differential there um and then the other question I had is about um you called out bullying as um seeming to be a pretty significant issue that we need to be paying attention to and I know that we have restorative justice and poses you know behavior supports and recess works all kinds of different programs in the school but um are we looking at any specific professional development around bullying and identifying bullying interrupting bullying or I mean do do we do that I'm going to say we have some that's in individual schools but not not that's systemic and actually I'm going to let John do a brief thing about Beyond differences because there's something we're looking at next year good that that we piloted actually this year but that we're looking at trying to expand to next year you wanted to do a so um I would also say you know bullying if you look at the parent results it was a sort of the top concern of school climate issues among parents so you got something parents are concerned about the top issue with students um so it's clear that this is an area we need to look at so um you know last year thanks to the board you adopted a resolution to declare February 13th um no one eats a loan day so that was a pilot to work with the National Organization Beyond differences was act which actually offers a whole curriculum for schools around social isolation and bullying um so we uh they just did a site visit here um last week and we plan on the exciting thing about um Beyond differences is all of their programs are are student l so it's about empowering students to change the culture in their school and we plan on greatly expanding our work with them next year in particular around a year-long campaign that focuses on online bowling in Middle Schools called a beind online um we actually while they were here um with Grant students last week held a press conference where they organized their own beind online week and we in particular calling out apps that allow um uh Anonymous comments that lead to really bullying and shaming comments among peers and we've learned that a third of our high school students at any one time are on certain apps like an app called after school that allows Anonymous comments so we had a third of our high school students are participating at any one time in this app so um we plan on greatly expanding our work with them next year to offer student-led programs around social isolation and buling that's one example um there's many others there's the mindfulness some of our schools are doing that we could expand there's this the um restorative justice work that some are doing so there's lots of things going on here and there it's I think taking it and looking at how we do a whole um districtwide approach in particular our middle school students if you look at that data it's really um a concern among middle schools thank you Dr B thank you for this report The Bullying fits right in with what I was trying to talk about couple weeks ago that each
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School needs to have their own discipline plan that brings everything together and bullying should be part of that I know that we have those but we're not always using them they're not really there and being used the discipline plans in to the degree that I'm trying to talk about us that we should be doing so that's great uh I just a couple General comments and then a couple specific ones a couple lessons that I learned from looking through this one if 80% of the people are returning their phone calls that means 20% of the people aren't 20% of the people not returning phone calls is a huge amount if we had 20% of our schools who are not returning phone calls that'd be 13 of our 77 schools so that's a pretty big and and we kind of want to look at the 80% and the 90% And The 75% when we're analyzing of what they actually do mean because something like returning phone calls would be we should be up there 98% or something at least and so I think that's important when we're analyzing is hey 80% we're good well no we're not I mean on that stuff so I guess that just find negativity that comes out there's a difference between need and would like uh if we are asking our staff do they need and if that was the language I'm not sure it was but because I didn't go back and look it up after you said it but if we're saying that they need there's a there's a lot of difference between needing uh what is the professional development of something and would and would like to have it uh and and so I think we want to be careful when we use the language that we make sure that the language that we were forced into using in the survey we don't take it and suggest that it means something else that it doesn't so that's kind of tricky stuff I think that's a good example the three things that I took away one we're still having the old trust and respect problem that we had in the tell survey and mean there's a lot of people in a lot of people here are saying they don't trust and there's not trust and respect within their school and I know we're working hard at that and I'm just this just says we need to keep working hard at it and the second thing is there's a a lot of people talking about classroom disruptions it's a major thing in here but it's not 80% think it is but it's huge it's a large percentage that think it is and that's a serious problem that we have right now going on and we need to get it in tow I think for next year when we start the year we should have these plans laid out where we're going so we can deal with that and then the last one is one that I'm just guessing maybe nobody might pick up and it's the stuff around Health where we talked about we're not doing this in health the smoking the and that stuff and we would have a tendency to maybe say okay yeah we're not but really I think what that could very well be a product of is that we're not teaching Health classes like we should be in the elementary schools maybe just I guess I'll bet if we went out and looked at our health curriculum it might be really pretty weak it gets it's one of the things that gets pushed out it gets pushed when the testing starts pushing all these this these curriculum the curriculum out and it's pushed out social studies clear out of some schools that I've talked to people you don't have social studies inow grades anymore pushed out science well health is kind of the next one down so it could really be being pushed out well we've got a lot of kids who come to school who can use that that type of a curriculum in their daily lives today and so we I think we need to take a look at that and say okay are we teaching Health regularly and what are we teaching at our various levels and are we actually doing it so that's what I would that was one thing that really stuck out to me so thank you very much I really appreciate it director B could I just make one comment I just want to say director B I really appreciate your comment about the 80% 20% because I think that's exactly right that's how we talked about it as a staff I just want you to know that that there there's lots of questions in here that are related to customer service and communication that you look at it first and you you have the green yellow red anal Anis that we did where the Red's really small which is really good to see we you know the never return a call and most of them are whatever the question was are three or 4% but we want to get that red to zero we want to get the yellow to almost nothing and you know there are ones where we need to strive for when we do this survey next year and the subsequent years we're going from 80 to 85 and get it up to like 100% that should be the goal in some of these maybe we never get to that but that's what it should be but um so you know you see a lot of green on some of them you say hey that's really good we actually
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need to get that last 20% so I just want to do appreciate that thank you direct B um my first comment actually has to do with um the participation of elementary middle and high school and it said no surprise to anybody but I just um it's not a surprise and I just want to continue to challenge us about parent engagement because I don't believe High School families are less engaged or less interested there's something about the way we view it or what we expect from families in our engagement that doesn't developmentally follow the family or the the support system of those kids so I just want to just highlight that because it came up um that I think that we could probably do better whether that's our you know maybe it's because the elementary kids parents in the school every day so it's about communication how do how do we reach those High School parents um that being said coming back to the survey um I too director bu want to appreciate what you were saying about um 80% 90% is good on on some of these and missing 20% or 12% um like if if I hear um for example that our our staff that there's still 12% of the the teachers that don't say that they're an inviting classroom or an inviting school or that all the staff in that school will will support kids that that's concerning that that's a lot 12% of 6,000 or 3,000 teachers is is a lot um and then I just also want to highlight the fact that I um I was surprised that I felt like there were two disconnects that I heard one was in that bullying so it seemed that our teacher excuse me our parents and our students said bullying was a problem but the way and it could be just the way the questions asked but then when we look at the staff most people said oh teachers will do something about or staff will do something about it and teachers make it clear that bullying is not tolerated those are really high percentages from our staff survey saying yes but that doesn't translate into lack of bullying from the parents perspective or or student perspective so that was one disconnect um the other one was um also about whether it's a welcoming um a high achieving academic environment there it wasn't a huge disconnect but it seemed that staff thought wow the school is doing really great it's really engaging it's we hold kids to high standards and it wasn't as high from a student or a a parent perspective so I was just not surprised but I thought those were interesting I just wanted to highlight them but thank you for the work and thank you for um for the report I appreciate it the specificity so just can I can I make a couple followup comments or I can't help it I just want to say that that is exactly why having this dat is so exciting those are examples where you can look at it and say okay why is this different exist there's a we have a perception thing going on here and I just think it's why it's exciting to have data like this um and um I just wanted to say Point well taken on the high school that's definitely a lesson we need to learn for our engagement going forward in all things okay so the way we did engagement in this really seemed to work for our elementary school parents right and you know for Middle School didn't work for our high school parents so we need to take responsibility for how we get that up increase that level next time absolutely yeah I think Greg that's a good point that Greg Mak but I think that a lot of the problem is around I don't know about this survey but is around engagement in middle school because is where that's where I see I see the parents hanging in there with the little kids and then they and they love going to the sports and activities and stuff in the high school and they're all over that in the middle school we have I was out of the Middle School big one and they had they didn't have a PTA because they couldn't get anybody to come as Middle School you don't see that in the high school really I don't think and I don't think you see it in the grade schools either but you see it in the middle school so getting and one of the it's one of the reasons I kind of the thing that brings parents in the most into the school the most parents that ever come in in middle school or once's going to those athletic events so having those Athletics pull people in and then you can talk to them and meet them and off you go and so and those types of things so those which we don't have a lot of so so thank you so much I'll just wrap up with a couple comments um really appreciate this I'm really excited about the work and like everyone else just appreciate all the hard work that went into this exciting um first survey um just a couple things one uh we received separately just a written um annual report um on student wellness through nutrition and physical activity from that on that policy and if I were continuing on the board I would uh for one thing I just I'm hoping that our new board members got a copy of this because it's important ongoing um but since a couple of the key findings are sort of um yellow flags if not red flags were around this issue uh we just encourage
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the board going forward to take a look at those maybe using the um expertise of um The Wellness advisory committee which it looks like from the report is kind of looking for bit of a reboot and having it maybe bringing in a new coordinator to assist for that work so that would be an exciting way to address that and just in the larger the larger P picture though in terms of the key findings both districtwide and then whatever you're going to find school by school which will be very very interesting to see um we didn't the board will need to articulate what their followup and resp responses so again just encouraging the board going forward whether it's through a committee or asking for followup or articulating goals as a result of what the results are just would encourage the board to do that um because that would be our role in responding and and using this um this really good information so um thanks again for all your great work thank you very much all right so next we have a discussion around the leadership and Entrepreneurship public charter high school or leap um superintendent Smith would you like to introduce this item I would and Kristen miles who's our um Charter program uh director will present the report and this is really an update on our leadership and Entre entrepreneurship program which as you know is closing this year due to financial instability so thank you superintendent Smith board members um so as superintendent Smith just stated we all know that leap is closing at the end of the school year due to severe Financial instability so I'm here to update you on that the closure process and then also talk about an action that the board will need to take at the time of closure for a little background leap opened in the 20067 school year at its high point in 201112 it had 351 students uh this year leap started at 225 students and has seen a gradual decrease to today's enrollment of 187 students in March of 2014 uh PPS staff in accounting and I began meeting with leap regularly because there was concern about their financial stability uh unfortunately leap's financial situation continued to deteriorate and in January of this year leap requested an off-cycle payment to avoid a midyear closure they were granted that payment and we continued to meet with leap staff and board very regularly and continue to monitor their financial situation uh when we met with them in mid-march of this year Lee presented a plan for the 20151 18 school years but unfortunately that plan did not include how it would clear its existing deficit which was estimated to be about $181,000 a few days after that meeting the board of core Educators which is the nonprofit that operates leap voted to close leap at the end of this school year since leap will beo will be closing before the end of its contract it is necessary for the PPS board to vote to terminate the contract cont which is the resolution that you have then and you'll be voting on on June 23rd I want to note that we are offering leap a number of supports in two main categories uh to ensure that leap can remain open for the remainder of this year we are covering the gap between leap's State School fund allocation and its required payroll expenditures at this point that is expected by the end of the year to be somewhere between $2 $250,000 we've also hired a full-time counselor to work individually with students and families to explore options for next year this counselor is working in very close partnership with leaps counselors and with reconnection services and reconnection services in turn is assigning each student to an Outreach coordinator over the summer to finish that transition for every student um to transition to new schools next year I'll also note that leap continues to be a strong partner in this process we are working with OD uh folks in our accounting department reconnection Services which has just done a huge heavy lift to support students and data and policy and other departments to ensure that all the required tasks are completed and most importantly that students are connected to options for next year we anticipate a positive end to the school year and a smooth closure and with that I'll take any questions thank you very much board members director bu the school year is over right the uh their last school is the 16th 16th mhm did they start later then no they have a few extra days they have extra days they have a few extra which they can't afford what's that I'm sorry which they can't afford to have extra days I mean are we paying for all the extra days for them just we can't pay for our own kids for extra days but we can pay for them that's well they're pay so St so Charter School payments are a little bit different they're paid um per student per year so each student is wor the full ADM and it's just divided up over the
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course of the year so regardless of how many days are in the school year each charter school has a minimum but each student is uh and and each each student is worth the same amount of dollars that they're paid so we would pay them the same amount of money regardless whether they had fewer days or not so I'm just kind of confused about how this is all coming down at the end the state gives the charter school a certain amount of money MH and then they use that to pay for their students their staff and their facilities right their staff and so on for whatever they're doing educating their students now they're coming back and saying we spent too much money and we don't have any money now is that I mean I I don't understand where the 200,000 is coming from exactly plus the counselor which is about 4 ,000 so it's closer about 270,000 that we're giving them to bail them out because we care about the kids which is fine I don't have any problem with that but I do wonder what happened are how did they get in such a situation where did they must have I mean if you're getting money quarterly you're spending your money quarterly you should have enough money to pay your staff if you're paying your staff too much I mean did they have the building fall down or I mean how did they get in a hole that's that large a number of factors um the primary one being that their student enrollment has decreased and has seen a steady decline over the course of the year and since the previous year so as they have fewer students um they receive fewer State School fund dollars so um but they still have a staff and a facility they still have staff and so it was a primary importance that the school not close in the middle of the year so our support to them is to keep teachers in the building so that students can finish out the year so we um we are are ensuring that their teachers can be paid for the rest of the year so that the school can remain open all of their other Financial uh reli liabilities were are on the nonprofit to take care of so if why didn't they lay off a teacher or two if they have less staff they have adjusted their staff but they didn't adjust it enough so that we didn't have to give them extra money that they could do it I mean was it just poor money management versus their numbers or I think there are a number of factors they're they're in a building which has a long-term lease and um and as a lose students not every student would equate to to laying off an entire teacher so um as they lose a few students here and there they would they would still have to provide a comprehensive education and still keep a full teacher load um they have made adjustments as they have gone but they have found themselves eles in in a very big deficit now are they a are they a nonprofit they are I mean and they're their own nobody else there's no other money supporting them where they can pay back the money we're giving them they can't all Charter Schools can fund raise and can write grants and can look outside for for donors which they do and which all Charter Schools do but there's no overall I mean it was a private it was a charter that was put together by a certain number of people then they came through and it wasn't there's no body Beyond them so cuz some Charters have a right they it's not a p organization that has a significant other Enterprise that it's operating correct like seii or yes so they don't they just okay okay ha to get them that money director BL um so I'll just say I'm never excited um to to lose money or to see an educational option go away um especially when they were serving students um as far as I can tell pretty effectively but I just want to call out that um when I first joined the board there was a lot of work with our finance staff to to redraw contracts and rework contracts so that we were actually getting a better Glimpse sooner of um of our Charter School's financial position so I just want to send a kudos to you your team our alternative Ed and our our finance staff for catching this as Rel relatively quickly as we did again not happy about a deficit or um to have to to go in the hole with that um but I I think it's a huge testimony and a huge compliment to to you all in the work that we did um to make sure that our contracts um allowed us to catch us as early as we did thank you and I'll just wrap up by also adding my thanks to staff for all your hard work both on the financial side and on the support side most importantly for our students and I just really appreciate the really thoughtful and um careful full um attention that you're clearly giving to give one-on-one
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support in transition for each and every student so it's very sad to see this and unfortunate but thank you for making sure that the students are supported and find success in their next school so oh director Regan so I know of a couple of students who went to LEAP back in the day and um and really had a a good and powerful experience one went on to an apprenticeship program one went on to college and um so it is sad to me to see this outcome um I had a couple of questions one is has there been any debrief or analysis as to why the enrollment at leap dropped so significantly over the years was it was it leadership was it the curriculum was it something else do you do you have any sense of what happened there's been a lot of discussion and wondering about that um and uh while we don't have a firm answer for that I can tell you what has come up in our conversations with them um they they believe that part of it is that that PPS is doing a better job of keeping of retaining students in the comprehensive high schools which is a good thing and and they acknowledge that and um and that may be part of why students weren't seeking out leap particularly um they also felt like their board felt like they had veered a little um a little astray from the original entrepreneurship vision and that perhaps their program didn't quite reflect that as it used to so um they were interested in in uh returning to to that as much as they could and they felt that they might have lost some students that way um that was that would have been in their plan uh for future years if they had been able to to clear their deficit okay good and then I had one um clarification the existing deficit of $1,918 that basically belongs to the Charter School Board yes we don't pick that up okay thanks director bule didn't Greg's comment made me wonder about something uh did we know in January they were going to be $200,000 short we knew that they had a deficit yes and and every charter school I mean we knew that they they were calculating their deficit and by March we knew that that deficit was going to be about 180,000 and the and when we made that decision when was when was that decision made to give them the 200,000 and to keep them open who made that decision was that when was that decision made I don't remember it coming before the board and I don't remember it being part of the budget I'm trying to just remember when that whole thing was made I mean I I don't I'm not sure I dis I mean I'm not sure I even disagree with the decision I think it's wonderful we're helping those children out but when was that who made that decision when was it made to spend $200,000 I don't remember coming to the board and asking for $200,000 I would love to be able to spend myself here's Karina to answer the question hi good evening Karina wolf senior director of multiple Pathways to graduation I just want to clarify that we didn't give the school $200,000 so I think there might be a misunderstanding or a Mison communication so part of what we've done is we have when the um Andes here with our in our financial department if there are specific Financial questions um we're happy to have call Shere up and have her answer questions as well director B but when it became um clear that the um that leap as an organization was not able to sustain um because we were hearing things like we're writing grants and there there were different time pieces that they were calculating getting themselves out of a deficit and then time passed and some of those things didn't happen when it became clear that um that they were not able to be self-sufficient by like Kristen had said them coming to us asking for an off cycle check um we we were in the position to assist them with um what what that refers to is assisting them with um instead of waiting for the entire month to pass cutting it to to help them make their payroll um based on the days of enrollment based on the numbers that they had had at that time so trying to help them in their in their shortcoming what they had asked actually was that the deficit that they came to us with is that um I think it was 160 at the time that we that would that would Portland Public Schools help them get to a zero balance and the answer was we don't do that so um that was the that was the conversation that we had with their board um or their in their school
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leadership when they came and asked that we we don't have the ability to do that for schools so we didn't give them any money what we've done is we've been able to we the decision was made we they have more than 200 students not to close um during the school year and so part of what we wanted is we have kids for instance in March who are in the middle of their third quarter or beginning their fourth quarter um who are on on track to graduate who are in the middle of their courses um not it would not be to the advantage to have a school closed midy year and so that's that was the conversation around helping them so they could sustain through the end of this school year how did they sustain through didn't we give them money to help them sustain through added supports yeah with added supports and with so we did give them money some some with their shortfall for uh for payroll for teachers thank you so actually Sheree is offering to come up and give a little more of financial specificity too absolutely that be helpful if that would be helpful good evening this is Shri Lewis the senior director for accounting and thank you for letting me be here today um during the end of the year as you've all see with us we prepare a caffer the charter schools are responsible to do Financial reports just as we are so every year we analyze their financial statements so over the last 3 to 5 years uh the charter school has been in fi financial distress several times so as they become in financial distress one of the things that we do as in the charter school department all Ed and finance we ask them to meet with us periodically and that is maybe once a month once a quarter depending on their needs they have to come back to us bring back a revised budget come back and say how did they reduce their spending so this year some of the Strategic things that they did was let's look at their budget that they started with based on the ADM okay and they started with strategically what it was then we said what's in your budget that we can shift so they looked at some of their fixed cost looks that which is their rent their rent was up for renegotiations could they re-evaluate their rent and maybe get a reduced rate or extend their rent basically to another 5 years so they can get a lower rate or basically look at that because they had a balloon payment at the end of this year so what they did was renegotiate their rent they've re-evaluated some of their expenses and got rid of their non a lot of their non-personnel expenses over the last two to three years so basically their non-personnel expenses are about 2% to 2 and a half% really small for an agency their average salary per teacher they've cut a few teachers over the last couple years so as the district has tried to work with them we don't tell them what to do we give them recommendations so we started doing this probably probably October as we start to get the enrollment and giving them advice get their numbers in as quick as possible we've even basically every month on the 25th we process payments if they need something ahead of time because we know they're financially strapped we don't give them of Advance we've tried to get them get your data in and we'll be able to process the payment as soon as possible so the district has done everything and they've actually complied we they've made no negotiated Cuts they um had a new board member or a new staff member that came in was supposed to help them get grants that didn't work out they decided to leave at midy to save them some money on their budget so there were strategic things that they we work with them to design but as a district the key is that we have to get the kids through school and the leadership of this District did a great thing have we give them $200,000 no as we evaluate their checking account every month so every month they have to send us back their checking account bank balance receivables payables we analyze it in the accounting department or as Cheryl does back that's sitting back there and we determine whether or not they need a payment and we're not including staff that's associated with the Morrison we only include staff that's associated with the charter school not the Morrison project so Kristen has done a wonderful job aligning them trying to figure out where the cuts is the key is we need to keep the kids in the classroom because mid year it wouldn't have made any success for the kids right now we've only given one payment of about $67,000 to get them to where they needed to be to make payroll and the key I I need them to pay purs I need them pay the employees so we made that payment
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right now they didn't need a payment in may they they had sufficient cash we analyzed it they had enough cash on hand so they didn't ask for an advance in May in June they we will have to pay out whatever in June one of the criterias is that they still have to give us all the financial information one of the agreements is that we're going to take on one of their staff to sit in my office for the month of July even though they're going to close their building at the end of June the fiscal responsibility is still going to continue for a month because we've agreed to give them a space a place to lock up their financials so they can close their organization and be whole and help the District close what we need to for the students and help them close themsel as organization so if they would have finished the school year he wasn't there on their own yes under the situation that they have but have we given them any more money than we normally would have given them right now we would know right I mean we would know we wouldn't have given them any more money did we give them more money I'm not trying to suggest no one someone's doing a bad thing here I'm just trying to get it straight we give have we given them more money than we would have cuz we just got them saying that we didn't give them more money and the question I asked is when did we decide to give them that money where did that money come from and and how did who made that decision to do that outside of the because it didn't come to the board as far as I know Steve it it did come to um I mean the answer from my perspective is is it's a superintendent and um the the charter folks our staff made the decision that's what I'm asking no they let me finish and then they they did come to the Charter committee um and at that meeting you couldn't make it but Matt was there and I was there wasn't very long ago I'm not on the CH commit this year oh well there there you go so Ruth so did the charter committee decide to give him the money we were informed about it we were informed about about okay so going back to my question yes who made that decision when was it made so here's what I'll say that's all I'm asking yeah I was apprised of this all the way through so I'm just going to say this was a really um uh like close in with Le trying to figure out how to manage as an organization was trying to figure out whether they were going to be able to survive or go under and the way in which we were figuring out how do we we don't want them to go under we want to figure out how we get our kids to the end of the year we we decided that our main um priority was on paying the staff so we did not want to be in the position of covering debt for the organization we did want to be in the position of saying we'll sustain staff to the end of the year and then our decision to add counseling support so that what we believed our responsibility is in having a partnership with a charter to serve our kids is to figure out if it's closing where will they all that they get really specific individual support to figure out where they transition to so we're not leaving them hanging and actually we also looked at okay do we actually hire the staff and have them become we looked at a bunch of different options as this was happening um and they were still trying to figure out can we make pull this out and can we figure out how we can fund raise there wasn't a track record of being able to do that anyway there was a bun we went through a lot of um internal decisions and but our priority was keep the staff in play so they're supporting the kids through the end of the year and and contribute our own counselor to the s to the situation so that individual kids get the advice and the you know we helping them establish where they're going to be next fall and thank you for doing that and then we brought it to the Charter committee to let them know here where we are with this when when did we make that when did you so you made that decision with the charter people Carol made the decision okay fine but when did we when did you make that you have any idea when that decision came about well it we we became aware of it in March as it says here and we're still working with them like their decision to close is I don't know when their decision to close was I mean I don't know this okay in mid March so you very all right it actually is a it's a legitimate question that's being it is a legitimate question typically contracts or expenditures over $25,000 are supposed to come to the board for approval and within 30 days or so and it didn't seem like that happened I mean I'm again in agreement that it it was the right thing to do but you know it's it's way after the fact at this point I don't think it was a contract but why don't we move on at this point I think it's an expenditure $2,000 I mean question and typically the
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board should have some so by appropriation laws by contract laws we technically have not exceeded the contract value for the current current School the value that we existed in put in as for the elite charge School we've not exceeded that what we've done because right now we put them in based on what we thought they would be at the time based on their enrollment based on the enrollment so by contract law and by appropriation La we've not violated any budget policy any appropriation law by contract we're still within the law of doing that and the superintendent gave the authority at that point because the ADM was not where it was because just because I lose one staff member or lose three kids that doesn't mean the classroom closed so therefore by appropriation law we're still within the guidelines and within the contract value that we currently have so thank you superintendent Smith for exercising your Authority appropriately on behalf of kids so we're going to move on to our next agenda item thank you guys thank you so the next agenda item is the fabbi and Construction contract exemption request so at this point the board is going to continue as the local contract review board a new identity um so organ revised statutes and our own public Contracting rules provide specific procedures to allow for exemption from the traditional design bid build process and to instead use an alternative Contracting method of two-step low bid solicitation process superintendent Smith would you introduce this item I would so Emily cordage who's our purchasing and Contracting program director and Jim Owens who's a director of school modernization will walk us through this thank you good evening board members chair Adkins and superintendent Smith um I am Emily courtage program director of purchasing Contracting and as superintendent Smith mentioned this is Jim Owens with me senior director of office school modernization you have any your board packet tonight draft findings and a recommendation to approve use of an alternative Contracting method for the Fabian PK through 8 Concordia University College of Education public Improvement project this project is unusually complex the scope of the work includes hazardous material abatement demolition of the existing school facility and construction of a new facility that will h house the k38 school an ear Early Learning Academy the Concordia College of Education a Health and Wellness Center and other wrap round Services fund sources include both PPS as voter approved bond funds and Concordia University's contrib contributions including land and funding on time delivery is critical deconstruction of the existing building is expected to begin in November 2015 and construction must be completed in time for students to return to the new Fabian school in September 2017 for these reasons it is crucial that the contractor selected for the project be highly qualified and experienced in completing a project of this scope and complexity with multiple funding sources multiple anticipated users and a critical schedule path under our public Contracting rules and state law public Improvement projects typically must be procured by means of an invitation to bid which is a low bid process for the reasons I just noted and set forth in detail in the draft findings and recommendation staff recommends that the board Grant an exemption from the rules and approve use of a twep alternative Contracting method for the Fabian project the two-step process begins with an open and publicly noticed request for qualifications or RFQ in which proposers submit their qualifications to handle a project of this complexity all those deemed qualified by the evaluation committee will be invited to participate in a second step the invitation to bid the two-step process will ensure that the contractor that has awarded the project is highly qualified to do the work has a proven track record and also submits competitive pricing under our public Contracting the rules the board acting as the contract review board May Grant exemptions and approve alternative Contracting methods only after a properly noticed public hearing staff published notice of tonight's hearing on May 26th in the Daily Journal of Commerce and made the draft findings available to the public thank you for your time great so I will now open a public hearing on the alternative Contracting methodology use of two-step method for fa and pre8 project misson do you have anyone signed up all right I will now close the public hearing on the Fabi and prade alternative Contracting methodology use and ask the board to consider resolution number three excuse me 5099 Faby and 3 K8 Concordia University College of Education public Improvement project
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exemption from competitive bidding and authorization for use of alternative contract method do I have a motion and a second so moved director B moves and director Morton seconds the motion to adoption resolution 599 for discussion director bu we've already issued the public notice of our intent to do that we issued the public notice of our uh recommended findings and this hearing yes and then why are we here why are you bringing this to the board because we told hear telling us that you did it telling us that we notifi the public of this hearing and then the Board needs to Grant okay and the reason that we want to do this is can somebody do it in a paragraph what what I heard is that we want to hire the most qualified contractors we can for a highly complex project right instead of using what we would normally be required to do Under the rules and under law which is just a pure low bid process we want to ensure that we get somebody who is qualified and experienced enough to do a work of this scope and complexity with like I said multiple users multiple funding sources that need to be tracked separately um a critical schedule path so so therefore we issue that open RFQ process and then allow those who are deemed qualified to participate in the invitation to bid and and that's is part of this process that that's supposed to save us money or not cost us extra money is that part of the law this is actually an example of a hybrid approach that takes uh advantage of looking at qualification based uh factors for for contractors and gives us a better sense of who the firms are that we would then invite to submit uh competitive bids on uh so it really allows for us to take advantage of understanding The Firm we don't know that there would be cost Savings in part because when the construction doc documents are completed and we issue the invitation to bids we're going to have a standard priced uh bid that that we'll have so we'll be looking uh at factors relative to the qualifications but we designed this as a pilot project because we don't know what our savings would have been at the end of the project we do come back to the board with a with a summary of what we found as a result of the pilot and we'll be comenting on whether we saw any price savings at that time and it's a pilot project because because it's it's a hybrid model and we don't have uh the clear findings like we have under the cmgc uh that give us a sense of what our cost savings are and that's what allows us to do it even though we don't know we're going to save money which is what the law requires right it's since we're deviating from the normal ITB process or the traditional design bid build process this allows us to look at qualification factors on a project of this complexity uh and then be able to uh to then bid the work in a normal fashion but I would think part of the issue here too is that you can end up having issues around cost if you don't have a qualified contractor who can deliver it in a quality manner to our expectations so director blow I just wanted to say say I appreciate um this approach it seemed to me the most prudent I'm not knowing whether or not we'll get savings or not it's a it's a very competitive construction um environment right now um but this seemed to really both kind of hedge our bets about making sure that the people that are going to apply are qualified because this is a very complex project multiple funding sources multiple users as you pointed out um as well as still um bringing somebody on a little bit early so that we can try to project early about knowing what the actual cost is so it seemed to me a really smart way to go um so I just appreciated anybody else director K just I I just have a question so the um so current current law that we're deviating from is we're required to take the low bid so yes under the normal invitation to bid process which is the default in the public Contracting law for um public Improvement projects yes we do we take the lowest bid that is responsive and responsible corre so responsive and responsible well it has to respond to um the bid documents um and and the and they have to be qualified they have to have the licenses um that are required Etc so there's some basic it sounds like there's sort of a basic threshold but what I'm hearing is you'll be able to do additional interaction with them or investigation evaluation the request for qualifications is much like a request for proposals where you you ask for you
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set out some criteria and ask them to respond and give their um qualifications and experience and provide references and so forth and and to director Ker's uh question I think when you look at the two considerations responsive and responsible the process that we're using here allows us to better Define responsible which is the firm's experience the track record doing this type of work respons relates to have they responded to the terms of the solicitation both the RFQ as well as the imitation to bid so it's it it gives us more visibility around the qualifications of the firms and allows us to have a better sense of who we're going to be working with uh also at an earlier stage so even though they don't participate in the design process we do uh learn earlier who the firms are and then we know among those firms those the ones will invite the the bids from and then we'll we'll execute the contract on the basis of the responsible firm submitting the low responsive bid thank you any other questions okay the board will now vote on resolution 5099 all in favor please indicate by saying yes yes any opposed any extensions all right resolution director bule abstained oh director bule abstained I think is that what your hand raised was director bu abstained okay so resolution 5099 is is approved by a vote of five to Z all right the board will now thank you very much the board will now reconvene back into our study session so next uh it's our business agenda the board will now consider the remaining items on our business agenda having already voted on resolution 5099 Miss Houston are there any changes no any other from the whole thing okay um do I have a motion in a second to adopt the business agenda so move director B moves have a second second and thank you director kler seconds the adoption of the business agenda Miss Houston any public comment any board discussion uh director bule on we're buying a cargo van for the IT department about 34 Del 78 the way down Northwest Truck and Equipment Northwest trucks and Equipment 32,000 I'm sorry what page is this on where are you Northwest one right I'm sorry I'm still not what page is it on I'm sorry page oh that's weird it's do we have a do we have an amended version of this it's not in mind expenditure contract exceeding 25,000 not it's the report on new contracts between 25,000 yeah that's not the business agenda that's not the business agenda that was just a report going to come up on the business agenda no it's just an informational report about smaller contracts that we don't vote this is the expenditure contracts exceeding 25,000 but those we don't vote on okay read head and we talk about yeah I know I know okay so any discussion about the business agenda I director blow I just wanted to call out as I do each time on the exciting contracts that we have going on for our um modernization and our bond so we are approving tonight contracts uh for the work for Design Services for Chavez Cleveland Scott and grout um as well as abery Jefferson mlc cwood Beverly clear Fernwood Sunnyside Vestal and Winter Haven um is part of the um summer 16 projects which will be next summer I just want to say again it's exciting as as we heard earlier tonight there were 27 schools already that have been touched in the previous Summers there's 28 schools that are going to be touched that's 55 schools we are well on our way to to meet the 63 threshold and this is really exciting because not only does it keep kids um dry um by improving their roofs um but it keeps them safe um by seismic seismically retrofitting these these buildings it improves education because we're doing science labs and we are increasing accessibility as we talk about um Ada accessibility as we've continued to put in elevators and so I just wanted to call that out as an exciting um investment and I'll just add I'm really excited about the piece on on the business agenda tonight that is approving the contracts for our alternative education programs and Community Based programs and our partners who are um supporting our students we heard um very wonderful stories from two students earlier
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tonight really appreciated them coming out and um just appreciate all the great work that's happening to support all our students and excited to see that continue all right so the board will now vote on the business agenda oh I'm sorry director bule well you we've got some new intergovernmental agreements and they're all under 150,000 but they've got numbers below the like Henry International Incorporated is 90,000 but it's got a number below which is a contract total of 5,370 $1,916 so I'm sorry are you referring still to the report versus the business I'm back on the report so let's continue we're working on the business agenda right now and let's complete that could this be in the business agend it's $5 million I think we'll take that offline for staff to explain that piece to you but let's go ahead let's please now vote on the business agenda all in favor please indicate by saying yes yes any opposed any abstentions one abstention so um director Morton abstains and we have the business agenda approved by a vote of 5 to zero and it sounds like director be you'd like staff to get back to you with um clarification clarification on the report about the because I think other people out there might have the same question so clarification about why if it's a it's a small amount of a total archaeological it's it's provide on call archaeological consulting services and according to this paper that I have we have spent over $5 million to Henry international corporation for these things but that's for something else it's got to be I just like to have it clarified I I'll I'll take a well I was going to say I have a guess we we've approved a contract for heri international to do work with us um for our archeological for our bond work archeological and so when you're going to dig in the ground part of that might be archae archaeological um and so the superintendent's reporting us a payment a $90,000 payment because that's what the report's St telling us about because we want to know about it but we don't need to approve it any more than the $5 million contract that we've already approved that would be my guess but perhaps somebody can right so our policy is that so that one was already approved that contract but it has been our policy to report to you just as a matter of information amendments over $25,000 between 20 and 150 well for amendments for already approved contracts just anything over 25,000 this says it's for we have according to the paper that I had which is what I'm asking about M it says we spent $5 million for archaeological Consulting Services that's what it says see so we spent $5 million olical Services the amendment is $90,000 right but are we spending have we spent $ 5,5 million for archaeological Consulting Services which is what it says on this paper that I have again Jim Owens senior director off school modernization uh this is a component that is an additional service to the construction management and program management support services contract that the district has with here International and the total amount that it was initially awarded at was over $4 million I don't have the exact number in front of me but we have the ability to order additional services from them we asked them to uh identify uh archaeological Services which would be on call services that we may require this does not involve the district actually spending any money at this stage this is an authorization to modify the herei contract so that we have the ability to tap here if we need archaeological services as part of the bond work that we're doing great thank you very much great all right thank you both so with that clarification on that report um earlier tonight we had a very nice uh ceremony um thanking the four of us who are outgoing board members so I just want to appreciate superintendent Smith and the staff for the lovely gifts we got some wonderful Student Art and um just very kind words and it was lovely to have folks here um director Regan uh actually will not be joining us for the next two last two meetings of the school year so she requested time on the agenda to share some remarks thank you very much and I did share most of these remarks earlier tonight um small group that was gathered um these are slightly expanded but not too much so thank you for indulging me a few years ago President Obama gave a graduation speech where he told students that the choices you make large and small add up over a lifetime to a lasting Legacy he said it's not about being satisfied with the latest achievement the latest gold star what matters that you give back and what matters is that you give your best those are words I've spoken at the last dozen
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or so graduation talks during the past five or six years including two graduations this week as a school board member there is nothing that tops the pride I feel as I witness students graduating from high school and moving on to their next Life Adventure and I love soaking up the pride excitement and positive energy that families teachers staff and community members feel as they watch our kids complete this Milestone they truly is is no better high as a school board member I realize now as I leave my position on the Porton School Board why President Obama's quote resonates so strongly with me it's because this job this choice to serve as an unpaid elected School Board member isn't about being satisfied with the latest achievement or the latest gold star it's about feeling the urgency to do more and better by our kids and stepping up to try to make a difference I have served on the Portland School Board because I want to give back and I have tried to give my best it wasn't always easy just prior to my first election the board before me faced an unprecedented hole in their budget that threatened to end the 2003 school year five weeks early in fact Gary Trudeau with the Dunbury comic strip Lampoon Portland Public Schools nationally the city stepped in with $15 million and our teachers agreed to work 10 days for free saving that school year in the meantime I had stepped up at as parent leader with some of you here today to help start a Grassroots movement called hope help out public education and we rallied the community to vote for a temporary funding mechanism to ensure we could offer a full year of school to our kids for at least the next three years I started on the school board in what could only be described as one of the lowest points in the district's history back then David wied a new board member with me often quoted Charles Dickens referring to these years as the best of times and the worst of times times and they were as our economy faltered as the state budget shrink as school funding decreased and as enrollment and Portland Public Schools dropped we were forced for the next 10 years to make impossible and terrible choices while always working to protect the classroom and ensure a full school year yet during this same period our community stepped up over and over again to Rally with us it is such a promising time now to be on the school board when our budget is finally stable when the state is beginning to reinvest when student enrollment is increasing by 500 students each year when we passed a racial education Equity policy that's transforming our efforts to better support historically underserved students when we're adding back Librarians counselors language immersion programs art and Career Technical education when we've provided a successful middle college program at Jefferson High School when we're bringing back a full week of outdoor school when we're purchasing musical instruments at last when we're beginning a 30-year rebuild of our school facilities when we have a local teacher Levy that's paying for 650 more teachers in Portland Public Schools next year than the state provides and when we put the foundational pieces in place to support our teachers as they have worked to raise our graduation rate 177% over the past 5 Years yet there's still so much more to do I am especially proud of five things that have been accomplish during my years on the school board as we raised graduation rates first is the passage of the racial education Equity policy that has set in motion significant and systemic change across this District to better support our historically underserved students second is the difficult work we've done during our last two teacher contracts to better ensure a great teacher in front of our students every day and to add days to our school calendar that included streamlining our internal hiring process so we are out and the market earlier each year and able to hire the best and the brightest new teacher talent for our classrooms including minority and bilingual candidates and our own student teachers it also included updating an Antiquated teacher evaluation tool to ensure that we can provide support earlier to teachers who need help or to be canceled out third is adding more language immersion programs across the district to better support our emerging bilingual students and families and to empower our students to be World citizens as well as adding back Hands-On experiential learning opportunities for our kids like art and music and Career Technical education fourth is the passage of our 2012 Capital facilities Bond where I served as a primary board leison to the community I'm proud that we're rebuilding fre high schools as well as Bobby and K8 with an amazing partnership with Concordia University in that we're making seismic safety accessibility and other improvements at up to 63 schools and Fifth and most importantly I'm proud to have been the board lead on every local school funding Levy for the past
02h 00m 00s
12 years and I'm so grateful for our community support in giving us the ability to hire an additional 600 plus teachers to ensure smaller class sizes for our kids more support for struggling students and more electives and enrichments for our students all of these changes helped us increase our graduation rate and helped us begin to close our racial achievement Gap my strongest advice to the new school board coming in is to stay focused always on what's best for kids and to visit schools on a regular basis and the new school board should immediately bring back the board's committee structure which allowed each board member to take a leadership role in our work and enabled us to truly move our work forward as we focused on the board's strategic agenda as four new board members join this board I am proud to be leaving them and our students in a much much better place than when I joined the board back in 2003 and I hope that our new school board will act with great urgency to make the intentional and targeted Investments needed to continue to accelerate student achievement and graduation rates for our kids because as President Obama said the choices you make large and small add up to a lasting Legacy it's not about being satisfied with the latest achievement or the latest gold star what matters is that you give back and what matters is that you give your best so as I complete my board service I'm grateful to my husband Barrett and to my sons Jamie and Dylan and to so many great friends and fellow school advocates across Portland and across Oregon for your support during the past 12 years and I'm grate and I'm grateful to Portland voters for allowing me to serve in this role it has been an honor to work with many of you here in the district and in this community to support our students in public education and I wish our new school board every success thank you thank you Dr thank you so much can I just say we we had a really nice um reception ahead of time where we actually did um acknowledgements of everybody individually but because it is Bobby's last meeting I just want to take this moment to say thank you to you and I've really enjoyed working with you um and you you have you've been an incredibly tireless Advocate on behalf of the school district on behalf of our kids um both with our local options and with the legislature in terms of increasing the kind of funding that's available and making um education a top Topic in the legislative session this year um but I also want to just acknowledge your service on Oregon Schoolboard Association uh and really changing how that organization serves our school boards and serves our districts um and I think making it more effective so we will benefit from that as well but thank you it's been a pleasure working with you thank you so much and I I also would just like to say thank you um you are leaving a lot lifelong Legacy uh so I think the our whole Community is owes a dead of gratitude thank you dear here director F yes I just like to say I I don't know who's going to go to all the meetings now that Bobby's I went out to the golf tournament last year and I thought I I'm doing pretty good I paid money to play I showed up real early in the morning I got out there and I'm thinking okay you're doing a good job here Steve and Bobby's sitting there taking the money and had beat me by about an hour or something wonderful what a what a she's been such an ambassador for the school district and it's really been wonderful I'm going to miss her deeply and by the way the next pil golf tournament is next Wednesday and the more forums who can come out and play the better support for our students and our athletes across um Oregon uh across Portland Public Schools and I will be out there registering folks um yet again next Wednesday so well I know you'll be doing a lot more than just that I just can't wait to see what your next you've been an amazing um contributor to this community and I can't wait to see what your next what you take on next so with that uh the next meeting of the board will be held on Monday June 15th this

Sources

PPS Board of Education, Archive 2014-2015, https://www.pps.net/Page/1893 (accessed: 2022-03-24T00:57:53.371200Z)
PPS Communications, "Board of Education" (YouTube playlist), https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL8CC942A46270A16E (accessed: 2023-10-10T04:10:04.879786Z)

2015-06-11 PPS School Board Study Session

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Event 1: Board of Education - Study Session - June 11, 2015

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