2017-12-05 PPS School Board Regular Meeting, Work Session

District	Portland Public Schools
Date	2017-12-05
Time	missing
Venue	missing
Meeting Type	regular, work
Directors Present	missing

Documents / Media

Transcripts

Event 1: Regular Meeting of the Board of Education - December 5, 2017

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the regular meeting of the Board of Education for December 5th 2017 is called to order welcome to everyone present so any item that's going to be voted on this evening has been posted as required by law the meeting is being televised live and what will be replayed throughout the next two weeks please check the board website for replay times this meeting is also being streamed live on PBS TV services as a reminder we now have a our PBS Ombudsman Judy Martin attending all the meetings she's up on the back she's got her hand raised specifically Judy will be here to listen to public comments and if appropriate provide additional support for families who need or want it Judy can be reached at 503 906 three zero four five or buds Minh at PBS net also we have our interim general counsel is large who's joining us on the board Dyess tonight we also have interpreters with us this evening and I'd like to ask them to come forward at this time introduce themselves in the language they'll be interpreting and inform the audience where they will be located in the auditorium so someone need their assistance please come forward interpret in espanol see Marisa Seaton West at fondo control operate gracias HIV net weakened tongue Viet Nam's equivocal babysoul kikuchiyo night sakura Tony pimp Langevin a movie [Music] what pasta but I teach atomic theory veggies perceivable show the proper house so I want to welcome all of the pioneer community that's here with us this evening and we look forward to hearing from you tonight as well as from superintendent Guerrero regarding proposals impacting the pioneer program I also want to thank all the community members who over the last week have taken the time to write to the board and to staff and to share your perspectives and concerns it was really appreciated we have a full agenda tonight our agenda for this evening will be as follows we'll start with the superintendent report followed by public and student comment and then the rest of our agenda marysville and the mindfulness program that was on tonight's agenda has been moved to December 19th which is our next school board meeting included tonight in our meeting will be updates on the ongoing work related to the opening of two middle schools and the superintendent's report relating to that an executive session later this evening will receive an update on the independent Whitehurst investigation we'll also have a work session on the superintendent's goals and evaluation as well as a discussion of the board's benchmark evaluation and plans for ongoing systemic improvements as background for the issues that are before us tonight for the past 10 years students in the middle grades in North and Northeast Portland received an inequitable middle school experience per year the district delayed this new board and superintendent committed to moving ahead and opening two new middle schools so that in the fall of next year more than a thousand students will be able to attend a neighborhood middle school and receive a more equitable middle school learning experience as we move to open these two new two middle schools it meant that there were changes and impacts on other programs and communities that are going to mean need to be worked through and in advance of the superintendent's report I'm going to be asking Vice Chair Julia Esparza Brown and the chair of the teaching and learning committee to serve as the board's unofficial liaison with the superintendent about the Pioneers program service delivery so there's a primary point of contact from the board between the board and the staff it's the superintendent's role to lead in terms of daily operations and management of the schools and programs the board does have an overarching role to ensure the alignment of PBS's works to board policies federal and state law and approval responsibilities for financial commitments both capital and operational above a certain threshold so with that I'm going to ask superintendent Guerrero to share your report and an update for us good evening board of directors good evening everyone there continue to be many wonderful activities and and positive work happening by our students and our educators across the school district to highlight that are happening but tonight however I'm gonna focus my comments on recently shared plans that primarily impact a pioneering pioneer school community first I'm going to provide a summary of the plan that has been shared for everyone's benefit just to provide some context second I'll
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provide some some underlying beliefs and values about how we go about educating and supporting our special needs students third I'll outline some decisions that have actually been made and still remain and to ensure we're best prepared to meet the needs of Pioneer students in the 1819 school year the plan for pioneer over the last week there's there's been a lot of attention and questions about our proposal to reconfigure the Pioneer special school I recognize that this news comes on the heels of other actions that will reconfigure and change how we are delivering education to students with disabilities to students throughout the Eastside and that kind of change is never easy to recap on October 24th the board approved a resolution to move forward on to new comprehensive middle schools at Harriet Tubman and Rose Way Heights and define the feeder patterns for those schools in establishing these two middle schools at these particular campuses meant that other programs would be affected and need to be situated elsewhere in the same resolution the board directed the superintendent to find a suitable and singular site for the access Academy because the program was forced to relocate to allow the opening of Rose City Park as a neighborhood elementary school as such staff has been conducting an assessment of all PPS and buildings in the portfolio to identify one facility large enough to house access Academy given that options are limited within the current school portfolio the conclusion was that the best location for 350 students is at the holiday young son complex this complex however is currently being used by approximately one hundred and twenty three students in the Pioneer program from a facility's point of view it is a to building campus a good portion of the school has a non-traditional design and it's built in an open pod manner the decision was made internally to relocate the access Academy to the Holliday young son complex and to explore where pioneer students might receive their services because we understand that preparing a school to open or a program to launch successfully require sufficient time for planning it was necessary to move forward with the initial facilities plan especially given the number of sites that will be undergoing reconfigurations or relocations during our facilities analysis a smaller yet suitable site the Applegate campus was identified that could enroll the approximately 50 elementary age pioneer students in the fall of 2018 it has the sufficient classrooms and space to support both the learning and support needs of students that leaves the older secondary age pioneer students needing to be situated currently there are 44 middle school aged students and 24 high school aged students that's approximately 68 students for whom we need a thoughtful solution staff has continued exploring site possibilities that's been consistent in our messaging we have identified a tentative site to propose to the school community I'm not going to name it this evening I'd like the opportunity to do that directly with the school community in the scheduled meetings that are scheduled for next week we believe it will make for a campus that can meet the needs of students who require a more substantially separate environment and we look forward to sharing that this would essentially permit for a lower and an upper campus per se pioneer continuum across those grade levels and that is simply a facilities proposal the real work of the program design is something that we would look or to engaging the school community with I want to talk about some core values about serving students with disabilities haven't been here a long time and I think it's important to also to also shed some light on some of the values that go into the work that I attempt to lead around here PPS like every public school district in America must ensure that it strives to meet the needs of every one of its students in Portland like in most other places we serve a broad range of diverse learners or at least that's our charge to ensure an equitable opportunity for all of our students to receive a quality education unfortunately we continue to come up short and guaranteeing that every single student is successful that is a dilemma that is facing almost every urban school district in America for instance that requires us to think about how we support the language development needs of a second language learner we have to understand how to be more closely responsive for our students of color and we have to have a broad repertoire of strategies for effectively addressing the specific learning needs and differences of our students with IEP s they are entitled they have the right to a free and appropriate education in the least restrictive environment
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historically PPS has been found to be disproportionately identifying students into particular special education categories and programming the outcomes for our special education students is unacceptably low in many cases and we must do better from a programmatic point of view pioneers currently a special school option it segregates students in a more restrictive setting it doesn't provide necessarily general education peers access and I believe we need to work towards ensuring a full continuum of supports and services for students with special needs our intent is not to narrow this continuum but to ensure that we continue to build our capacity all along the continuum at all of our schools our students with disabilities everywhere need our best thinking and we have wonderful examples of that around the district and we should continue to learn from some of those promising practices there is an overall need to move in the direction of evidence-based practices in many of our programs we must do what is most challenging to listen respectfully to the public comment tonight and I would ask that you allow the superintendent to share his thoughts and perspectives so that we can have a dialogue thank you we'll ask the will ask the AV team just if we could wait a minute let's ask the AV team to turn up the volume we must do what is most challenging to ensure that we offer a full continuum of services and interventions at every school in the Portland Public Schools we won't do this in the course of one school year it was only 1976 when PPS if history lesson I've been getting lately when PPS even welcomed students with disabilities into its schools they have waited a long time and we must proceed with all deliberate speed there but when we are unable to provide the right supports we have unfortunately learned that this can be extremely detrimental to our students in fact it's been a matter of life and death there is a very real need for PPS to define its guiding principles in this area and to evolve it special education service delivery model and this will require us to work in partnership families educators and administrators some next steps as we work towards reconfiguring pioneer student programming our goal will be to provide pioneer supports co-located not just on comprehensive school settings and we do have pioneer classrooms in a number of settings to explore the feasibility of facilities where more intensive supports can be provided I've named a lower in a number campus as the intent for students who require that and decisions about what level of support any student receives is best made by the student's parents or guardians and their IEP team this proposal is more about the little more than just about the location of students because facilities is just one part of the equation it is important to be clear about how we will staff classrooms and work to ensure that all pioneer students continue to receive and to enhance where appropriate the level of staffing and supports in order to give students the supported opportunities to help them achieve academically and and and experience social success I understand that this plan raises many valid concerns and questions among both parents and staff and whether it's more most appropriate for a pioneer student to attend a traditional school or to attend a more appropriate setting the intent is that students will have all of those supports guaranteed and outlined in their IEP s pioneer k5 students will be together at Applegate campus which has the space and classroom configuration that meets the needs of the students it'll be afforded all of the current high levels of staffing for the secondary students we look forward to sharing a second facility that can similarly provide and house those supports and interventions as well moving forward our commitment is to actively listen to the community's concerns and questions thank you everyone who is written messages we fully expect to hear more thoughts concerns reactions and questions about this plan including tonight we are listening this past week several board members
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myself and other senior staff attended a meeting at mlc with a number of special education parents where we had an opportunity to share a little bit more of our thinking but more importantly to hear directly from some pioneer staff and found members this next Tuesday I look forward to to meeting with the staff and on Wednesday with the Wednesday the 13th with the community I and senior staff will be present to meet with the pioneer school community and are hoping to confirm additional time along the way we hope to have many more details to share at that time especially those that offer a possible response to many of the specific questions that are being raised I am committed also to establishing a pioneer advisory board to coordinate land input and ensure a positive implementation in closing next week is inclusive Schools Week in schools and districts across the country I challenge us to try and suspend disbelief that that we can do better that we can tackle areas that need improvement so that we can better ensure safe and supportive schools everywhere while we move towards strengthening and enhancing our special education services whether those services are delivered in a general education classroom a Learning Center a self-contained class or in a substantially separate setting before engaging in these programmatic questions that focus on how we improve our capacity to more effectively serve diverse learners we needed to make some critical facilities decisions in order to plan forward there are real constraints involved when forced to make these decisions there are no perfect solutions but I acknowledge the misstep and transparently including the broader community and understanding the difficult choices in this situation we're committed to serving all of our students especially our most vulnerable as we are now proactively doing with other school communities we're committed to working hand-in-hand to look at get input and maintain a regular two-way communication loop as we look at the programmatic design questions staffing models and other components to provide the best possible range of supports and interventions to make available for our students and educators I want to recognize that System transformation is difficult and complex work it is a tough process and often the initial phases are more dramatic and disruptive I understand that there are fears and valid concerns about our need to ensure safety and provide sufficient interventions on all of our campuses before we invite the possibility inviting students who perhaps we might not be prepared for on our gen ed campuses in the way we wish to and I'm committed to more robustly supporting those efforts and our students need us to work on those proactively those issues we need to accelerate the work to expand our understandings our instructional and behavior strategies and collectively communicate that of course all our students are valued with the best of intentions I'm committed to moving PPS forward being new to the context here it may seem like two steps forward one step back right now but I'm committed to involving educators and community stakeholders in Co constructing a district-wide vision for serving our students in the middle of this there are core beliefs I hold for serving our most vulnerable students that I won't compromise but I will demonstrate greater sensitivity and collaboration as I and a slowly growing new team proceed and initiating change in our school system so that we can take on these challenges hand in hand from the beginning yesterday during our mediation session with P ATI I took many notes regarding the history history and chronology and PPS that were shared by teacher leaders which certainly helps to explain why the level of distrust and doubtful confidence in our ability to follow through I took to heart both the stories that were shared and the stern reminder that we will only be successful for our students by working together and I appreciate that reminder thank you for listening it's my turn to do the same Thank You superintendent Guerrero for sharing both new and additional information and as you noted they'll be in a meeting next week where there'll be an opportunity for you to share the next evolution of your thinking and also to hear from all of the impacted families and staff members so thank you so now we're gonna shift to student and public comment before we begin the public comment period I'd like to review our guidelines the board thanks the community for taking the time to attend this meeting and providing comments we value public input as it informs our work and we look forward to hearing your thoughts reflections and
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concerns our responsibility as a board is to actively listen with our electronic devices turned off as a quick reminder in the audience it looks like everybody's complying the sign should not be held in a way that obstruct others from viewing the meeting board members in the superintendent will not respond to questions or comments during public comment when our board office will follow up on board related issues raised during public testimony guidelines for public input emphasize respect and consideration of others complaints about individual employees should be directed to the superintendent's office as a personnel matter presenters will have a total of three minutes to share your comments please begin by stating your name and spelling your last name for the record during the first two minutes of your testimony a green light will appear when you have one minute remaining a yellow light will go on and when red light goes on if you could just finish your last sentence and thought and wrap up without it be appreciated and before we start the public comment I want to thank we had I want to that want to thank some individuals that after the last meeting the six public comment slots filled up on a variety of issues and when we received follow up over the last week of people asking from the Pioneer program asking to have an opportunity to address the board meeting that the several individuals who had asked for an opportunity to address the board deferred their public comments until the next board meeting so that the Pioneer community would have an opportunity to participate in tonight's public comment in addition to I know an opportunity for a probably a full and robust conversation next week so thank you to those community members and we look forward to hearing you on the 19th so with that I'd like ask miss Hewson to call the first two members of the community to speak why song crane and Chris Marquardt [Applause] good evening superintendent guerrero board members citizens of Portland thanks for the opportunity to speak tonight my name is Christopher Marco and I'm a teacher at pioneer on November 27th the superintendent informed our staff that our program would be relocated dissolved and/or displace our staff opposed this action we believe there will be harmful effects to our students for several reasons for the students of Pioneer our special school was determined to be the least restrictive environment or LRE the words restrictive and least run into a dilemma when what is typically considered less restrictive the general education setting proves to be actually more restrictive for a student with severe behaviors LRE is predominantly impacted by our students inability to maintain safety for themselves which in turn impacts the safety of staff and students around them most of our students come to our setting with emotional trauma which can present a severe external or internal behaviors and these moments our students are extremely vulnerable when they are treated viewed witnessed in sensitively by other staff or peers this leads to re-traumatization this can have a vicarious effect on the observer as well Pioneer special school provides a necessary level of supports for our present student population many of our students are disenfranchised by living in poverty sexual physical or psychological abuse self-harm emotional disturbances mental health challenges suicide attempts ideation in the act itself lacked of lack of safe community being in foster care being homeless or lack of stable home environment and increased access to substance or substance abuse the dangers of running away dysfunctional family systems the stigma of failed educational and social successes an inability to maintain healthy relationships and engage in peer friendships staff at Pioneer have created an environment that acts as a balm to soothe the emotional wounds created by the above our school acts as a surrogate family for many of our students offering safety stability reliability predictability consistency and respect some of the ways we support our students our monthly school-wide award assemblies yearly activities like Thanksgiving feast back-to-school carnival and barbecue art night talent night field day and our school graduation ceremony these traditions provide a focused celebration of our students and their
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skills our setting provides spaces for our kids to de-escalate in private when needed to be restrained until they demonstrate a safe body without judgment to have access to sensory spaces and access to confidential spaces to discuss mental health concerns solving a vexing inequity dilemma by creating another vexing inequity dilemma is short-sighted to say the least [Applause] our staff fear increased injuries more vicarious traumatization more stigma Mostafa pioneer aim to honor the decisions made by IEP teams regarding placement and support we the staff of Pioneer proposed a respectful and collaborative discussion with access and PPS the board superintendent to Co construct a new and/or different model that's beneficial to our entire community thank you [Applause] my name is Atticus Wysong crane ATT icus WI asan GCRA any dear Superintendent Guadalupe Guerrero I'm writing to inform you of my strong opposition to your recent decisions regarding the Pioneer program it's my understanding that you've recently decided to break up the pioneer school program separating us into separate schools I must inform you sir your decision is a terrible mistake and is regarded as such by almost every student teacher and sport staff member at our school the Pioneer program is an absolute necessity for many young students what we learn here is essential and cannot be provided anywhere else furthermore the middle schoolers will be most affected by this change our need of this program more than any else they develop skills they can't get anywhere else and they create a routine here which will serve them the rest of their life this decision also comes off not as an endeavor to improve student education as you claim but as an intent to oust children with special needs out of school they need to succeed academically in favor of the most privileged and those who are already academically successful whereas I [Music] out of us out of a school and as a person who is mentally handicapped this choice seems discriminatory and downright ablest this decision is a mistake plain and simple please sir as someone who has attended pioneer for many years I have benefited from the wonderful staff and culture of stay feed provided here I have however suffered outside its walls and from that experience can confirm this a course of action will end badly without any question or doubt moving the middle school students to mainstream will result in utter catastrophe there is a reason the kids are placed in the program we cannot handle the large classrooms we will be unable to perform tasks that may seem simple to other students and we will not have access to the resources that I've already explained to you in your apology to the families you said there was a vexing inequity problem but did you ever consider that your plan would exacerbate an already severe problem of discrimination towards the disabled and mentally handicapped you've also said that your you've also said that you're doing this at the request of concerned parents however the blatant disregard of the mentally disabled has led me to believe that you were have not convened with the parents of the students you are displacing I urge you to correct this mistake at once if you speak with the pioneer parents you make him to realize that this plan is not for best it's not the best for everyone as you believe I beg you to abandon this this plan if you have care for all the students of PBS you will not go through with this I hope I have been clear and concise with my point I fear have not been able to convey everything I'd hoped to with this letter I would be more than willing to respond if you would like to respond I would be more than willing to discuss this further now to get advice on crane 12th grade email listed below [Applause]
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next we have Rebecca dick and Patrick stoop fell Oh Joey good evening folks I will have her start off with the comments but I also have a guest that will be joining me for my testimony of Co testimony if that's all right with you guys it's actually not allowed I mean really our protocols of whoever signs up its you're signing up I didn't sign up but I've been invited so how did that happen pardon I didn't sign up but I've been invited so how did that happen that's a lie anyways I'm just I would just like somebody to come up it's no big deal it won't cost you much all right it'll be quick the longer we talk we would ask that you respect the rules of public comic because other people don't have an opportunity if you're you I know I know I understand that okay why don't you go ahead with your your comments last name spelled da ke good evening Board of Directors I am here in short to propose a middle school independent study program I know this might seem like a small problem given the big problems of a lot of the people behind me but I feel it's important that I address it this idea for an independent study program is to help address the lack of challenging academic rigor across the Portland public school middle schools I am here on behalf of the average student while I could spend my entire three minutes talking about what I mean by a lack of academic rigor instead I would like to refer you to last month's meeting with the 8th grade student talking about her experience at her middle school her experience is not unique it's not so what to do with teachers facing such a range of students students who struggle to read and students who are who are reading at an advanced level how can even your best teacher address this range I know that there's a tag program but to be honest there is no tag program at least not at Alameda not at Beaumont it doesn't exist it just doesn't so imagine an independent study program you've got it in high school could it possibly exist in middle school can we try I'm here to provide a possible solution we've implemented an independent study program for my daughter out of desperation because her test her education is completely stagnated that's not acceptable so we let's find a solution I'm hoping to work with the district on this but imagine an independent study program where we use online resources if it's good enough MIT and Harvard it's good enough for the Portland Public School District there are resources out there you have a lot of problems to solve and you need to do it efficiently and cost-effectively you need to do more with less so how can you do that perhaps an independent study program using online resources is a possible solution imagine a independent study teacher at each middle school right they don't spend time lecturing instead they spend time assessing writing programs right students submit their writing they get assessed online perhaps a teacher can do hundreds of students with this assessment because they're not teaching they're not they're not in the classroom lecturing instead that's being done online it happens at some of the best schools around in the world we've got to start to innovate we've got to look at some solutions here because you have too many students leaving I have two more students to get through Beaumont middle school and they will not attend that school if it doesn't change so at a minimum I hope for your support but ideally I'd like for your help I'd like to have some contact with your curriculum development team sit down and try to brainstorm I've got a team of parents at Beaumont and Alameda who are interested in trying to provide this is a program across middle schools if you don't innovate those two new middle schools which I commend you for opening they're kind of fail they're gonna fail if you do something if you don't do something different you've got to do something different and so I hope that you'll contact me like I said I'm moving ahead because it's the only way I can figure out how to keep my kids at middle school thank you thank you director costume our board staff frozen towel to connect mistake with Brenda Fox and staff who are already working on a bit of a blended learning component of the middle school curriculum but to provide whatever information they can at this point to mistake there'd be great names go ahead please go ahead oh I just was whoa you guys have millions of dollars i sat in a budget committee we can't fix the mics Wow awkward anyways my name is Patrick stoop will some of you might may know me hey Rita how's it going who else doing out here hey Scott you might not remember me but uh anyways I'm kind of a district insider actually um my name is Patrick still on the former student body president in Portland Community College
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former legislative intern for a rep Kinney guy for mom won't let me youth for me i rattle on all day but like the long story short is Pioneer was actually a program I was at for a small bit of time when I was in middle school because I was a bit of a truth teller and a Hellion and I I didn't really appreciate teachers um you know saying things that weren't necessarily factually true I was kind of a history buff and political buff at a young age so anyhow I'm a bit of a district insider for the folks who don't know me and so I know there's a lot of historical oppression of alternative education funding in Portland Oregon anyhow I've worked in politics ever since graduating high school my story is a weird story usually students who are from Pioneer um I know a lot of you guys would think that they're on what was still phrase a dumping ground but kids do actually succeed if you if you believe in them so anyhow like ever since graduation I got politically involved and well you guys put my face on the side of buses for ad campaigns in my life story is actually it's backwards but my life story has been in the newspaper you know you guys have actually used me as a token student represent about many committees but then you want to cut the program that actually gave me an opportunity to meet you guys in the legislature and in these halls and whatnot so I really don't appreciate the diss ingenuity of it and I don't appreciate that you didn't allow me to bring my invited guests to the front one I myself was an invited guest so anyhow long story short I want to tell you exactly why I'm here tonight I am now representing an organization called Millennials for solidarity and we build bridges through civic engagement and we bring people together the far left and the far right to tackle issues that nobody wants to talk about because politicians don't want to talk about the issues that really really hurt communities so I brought on all these wonderful folks here let's hear it from you guys let's hear it let's hear it [Music] but I've also brought Joey Gibson here tonight because I know that this is not a left or right issue this is an issue that the far left and the far right Joey Gibson Andy and Tifa everyone deserves to care about this issue and have their voice heard now if you don't want to hear Joey's voice or or these good folks voice that's fine but we're not going to allow Portland public to stomp on alternative education any longer its historical oppression we know about it and yeah it's gotta stop and last but not least I want to make a point let me ask a question to the new superintendent cuz I was fairly close with Carol I understand also I have a question can you respect that I'm respecting you can state your question but he's not going to that's okay that's fine go ahead and state your absolutely respect your time so respect mine please I understand you're probably a progressive and I assume we're all pretty progressive here in Portland and I just don't understand how everyone's attacking Betsy like I'm not approach front person or anything necessarily but like I don't understand how people are attacking Betsy DeVos for possibly your question I get I'm getting there ma'am but I don't understand how people are attacking DeVos for targeting people who are the most vulnerable when actually the most progressive suit were intended in the nation is the one who's actually attacking the most vulnerable so maybe we got to have the Department of Ed come in and have a bipartisan conversation of what the solution looks like because I know there's not okay funding your time is up that's all tonight thank you that's all [Applause] next we have Kim Wilson and Gabrielle Mercedes Bulevar it was the second individual Miss Kim Wilson here do you want to call the next person up it is [Applause] my name is Gabrielle Mercedes believer good evening superintendent PPS Board of Education and student rep we are Jefferson cluster family with kids attending our neighborhood schools at Chief Joseph Buckley Green and Jefferson after years of inequities we are finally getting glimmers of hope middle schools are being restored efforts to provide culturally responsive inclusive students practices are being pushed and Student Success at Jefferson is to be celebrated tonight I want to share the collaborative efforts of key staff working to support our aqua green middle school community and specifically our
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students receiving special education services we know we still have a lot of work to do and this work will be ongoing it is my hope that we can capture meaningful data that a student-centered and continue to invest in our middle school students this school year miss Terri Singh was brought in to ugly green as the instructional support principal she has been transforming our special education services for our students and working to increase inclusive practices that provide greater access to direct instruction than the general education setting last year exclusive practices became accepted norm with students often pushed out of gen ed sitting in isolation and/or segregated from their gen ed peers we know from PBS data that our students on IEP s have the lowest graduation rate Terri sing together with her eighth grade special education teacher miss Brenda Sheridan have been working to identify high risk eighth-grade students that are failing at least two core subjects Ms singham is shared and created a Saturday school and called to invite each student personally including my own for each didn't identify they worked with each core teacher to create an academic folder for each student and a list of work to be completed to reach grade level missing is scheduling one Saturday school Ament through the rest of the school year for identified eighth graders to provide opportunities for individualized direct instruction to assist students in reaching grade-level and core subjects and to help prepare students for transition into high school it truly takes a village this year aqua green has a new addition to our custodial staff Marvin Francisco marvin has a critical addition to our community after sitting with our students when they're escalated and he trusted adult support Marvin is fluently bilingual and came to Saturday school to support our students he seamlessly worked to support our Spanish speakers in science math and language arts this is how you start to create an inclusive and welcoming community where every student belongs and is supported to reach their full academic potential as a community we asked for culturally relevant multi-tiered systems of support for all students in our middle school as an evidence-based best practice model we know we have work to do but these glimmers of hope that our student centered and the staff supporting them should be recognized I appreciate missing Monsieur de and mr. Francisco for their effort to send our students their social emotional and academic needs lastly I would like to thank miss Brenda Fox and Miss Kathleen Elwood from the PBS Middle School planning committee our community have been asking for this past year for a listening session to address the challenges we experienced with our middle school implementation as part of their assessment miss Foxx and Michelle would head listening sessions during parent-teacher conferences to capture voices from our staff parent caregiver and student communities our site counselors shared I work with them and we are looking forward to a copy of their assessment in hopes that this is the beginning of an open and transparent engagement to collaborate in the success of aqua green and all middle schools we also look forward to the hiring of our permanent principal soon thank you thank you [Applause] well good evening members of the school board superintendent Guerrero welcome to Portland my name is Dan hovering hav has in Victor ra n I am the primary instructor of non-violent physical crisis intervention for PPS I see some familiar faces out there how's work [Music] usually it's not so enthusiastic when I ask that question in addition to being being the instructor I am also a lead therapeutic intervention coach for the Pioneer program I have worked within that program since before it began when it was just a lone classroom and a mostly empty building an administrative support was a flip phone located in the Secretary's pocket I could tell you many many stories about the incredible compassion empathy and understanding I have seen through the Pioneer staff students and parents throughout its 18 year three location history but alas I'm here to talk to you about one thing and that is safety when a person is confronted with risk behaviors as we often are in the Pioneer program whether they be high medium or low our response can either be productive or unproductive the most effective way to ensure a productive response is through a team approach this team is not limited to just a handful of classroom staff it is the entire staff and the entire building it is this team approach that ensures the safety of our students and our staff in regards to relocating the Pioneer k5 from its current location in the holiday Center to the Applegate site I am not in agreement with this being a suitable move for our k5 students [Applause] there there are characteristics to the holiday center building that to some people might seem like their quirks but to us their de-escalation necessities things like wall-to-wall carpeting in all the rooms extra wide hallways near unbreakable windows though all the transition areas in the common areas are soft non-slip linoleum floors okay these things cannot be duplicated in another building I've seen us try to do this three times now in different PPS buildings I'm also a taxpayer you know what I do for this money don't waste it on another retrofit regrade upgrade whatever you want to
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call it of another site what what we have now works okay access students they don't need these therapeutic components to their environment that we see is so essential to do the job you're charged us to do okay this is a take away this is a compromise on student and staff safety okay it's not just a relocation um I'm dubious about the pledge to provide more staff training in and around the safety supports of our students in the general ed buildings I have been ranting about this for years and have been met with the same bite the lip look at the floor there's no money for that expression all the time I did one more thing I tell my staff and the people that I trained that when it comes to human behavior there is no good or bad okay looking at it that way makes a long day longer there's right or wrong this decision is wrong to dismantle the Pioneer program [Applause] so Jamie Keil are you here okay so now I'd like to ask our contract with the Portland Federation of school professionals allows them to make brief comments that during our agenda and I'd like to ask Belinda Regan to the table for her comments good evening superintendent Guerrero and school board members as you just heard my name is Belinda Regan I am the president of the port on the Federation of school professionals we represent the 1,400 classified workers in the school district who are hands-on with the students and particularly those at the Pioneer site so I wrote a little speech and as I sit here tonight I decided I wasn't going to read it to you because I have so many other thoughts that have rushed through my mind as I listened to the superintendent speak as I admired Atticus and Dan have run one of our members and have spoken with the parents out in the turnaround who were very loudly protesting when we met with the pioneer staff last Thursday evening we were so disheartened to hear their stories because we are aware of what happens to pioneer and to understand how very disturbing much of this has been for them we we realize that this has been a process as we looked at different places placements for access moving schools sending them to different locations and dividing them up and because their protests were loud and strong the board seems seemed and the superintendent seemed to retract those choices to separate the students that access and move them into a single site which i agree with i think they should remain together but i I think that the words that we heard from the pioneer staff were very clear in how they feel as being made a second class or their students and themselves being made to feel as if their second class that access had parents who were advocating for them that their voices were louder and strong and perhaps more more well heard than those of the kids who are coming from foster care who are homeless who do many of whom cannot speak for themselves and I I want to mention the young man who was sitting right here I'm assuming he's your son he had a great t-shirt on that said I cannot speak so I so please stand up for me [Applause] so [Applause] I I want to simply am saying this because I think that there is definitely a feeling amongst this population behind me particularly those in red that pioneer should not be treated differently than access they may be at different ends of what you would consider the learning spectrum but in reality they are all individuals who need to flourish and if you divide up this group I don't believe that they
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will I have to say that Atticus was a perfect example of a twelfth grader that I would want my child if my children were not adults to look up to as a K through fifth grader so to move those K through fifth graders into a separate location and have the expectation that they will know what behavior to model when there is no behavior to model for them and that works in that sight I think we need to be aware that there are wonderful results coming out of pioneer we need to honor those results we need to give everybody the same opportunity that we give the access children I don't believe that we are doing so by dividing this this group of students small as it is into three separate locations I also want to state that I have felt unheard by Portland Public Schools for many years in respect to visiting the programs that how special ed students we have requested at our level year after year that instead of having somebody from the school board go out and visit and sit with the principal during the day or bringing community members in to be principal for a day go out and stand in the shoes of these people not for not for an hour to meet with parents or community folks or those who may be there on a temporary basis sit in these classrooms and see what actually happens with these kids and I don't mean just at Pioneer I mean in every special ed classroom [Applause] you have one of the best groups of educators working with these kids both at the p80 and the PF SB level and we need to snow and honor what they do and accept that their programs are as valuable as the tagged programs absolutely so I was going to I was going to read a letter from one of our folks out there and we've put a copy it up Shannon Schwartz wrote this I've put a copy up in front of each of you I believe she emailed it as well I know that you've got a lot of other letters of concern from folks out there but you know I would like to suggest very seriously and to you too mr. superintendent that you go into these special ed classrooms and spend a day not just a pioneer but at Atkinson school where they have nine kids on seizure protocol every single day that para educators have to serve physically and emotionally we have people who love doing this helped them loved it more by letting them stay with their cohort letting the students stay together and enjoy the learning possibilities that are there for all of them [Applause] so in addition our contract with the Portland Association teachers allows time on the agenda for brief comments so I'd like to ask suzanne cohen the president of the p80 to come forward [Applause] though i do have the great pleasure of representing over 4,500 educators in Portland Public Schools I could not begin to give you the quality testimony that you've heard tonight and that I'm sure that you've received in letters and emails and messages as I have and the reason I can't speak like they spoke because I am NOT a student at pioneer I am NOT a family a community member from Pioneer nor I'm I am an educator at pioneer but I can tell you what I did do I went out there and I met with the staff as soon as this was announced and I heard directly from them about their concerns and their needs and their program and that is the first misstep that has been made when decisions get made behind closed doors without input from those who know best then that
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decision is not going to be successful [Applause] I have spoken at so many school board meetings I feel like it was just the last one that I asked you to put away your rose-colored glasses and any data or stuff that people were telling you and really listen to the people who know because they are there every day experiencing the experiences that are necessary for you to understand and that is made apparent by some of the statements that are getting made right now about the pioneer program they do not resonate with what the students and family and staff there feels these are not their words they are words that somebody else has told you to say about the program without first-hand knowledge of what they're really experiencing and this disconnect this disconnect is the first ask that we've asked with any decision that you actually get there and talk to the educators I've also come here and testified many times about our negotiations and issues around us we welcomed you about the vision of the schools Portland students deserve and key elements there being a continuum of special education services of safety for our students it has been years that we have been talking about the the immediate needs and safety controls that we need at every level that our needs are not being met and we talked just the last school board meeting about the ripple effect that one student with unmet unmet needs can have on an entire school community we're top level administrators are spending the days trying to keep one student safe or from running out in the halls with no one trained to properly do restraints now you're talking about Pioneer middle it's 44 kids well if I'm telling you about the ripple effect of one student in one building in one classroom this ripple effect of 44 students is huge and that ripple [Applause] there is a reason that it's not just pioneer staff that has come here tonight to speak to you there's a reason that you're hearing from special education educators across the district and their families and general education students and that is because they are feeling the ripple effect they are right now struggling to meet students needs and and make sure that everyone is safe and everyone is learning and that the IEP really is that team that you speak about but I already spoke about inconsistencies who gets a one-on-one parent who doesn't what are the rules you know IEP teams where people are told we can't offer that because we don't have it don't write your goals that way and when systems like this exist how could you push more into it I do not want to pretend to have the level of expertise or knowledge that our superintendent has around best practices but there is something that we in this room do have knowledge around and that's our students and that's our schools because we have been here over and over again living through this through all the changes and all the different staff we've been the consistency prior to a Guadalupe arrival I talked about a three-legged stool where every leg has been broken except your educators who are there supporting and keeping our schools running and yet you would move forward without consulting with those who know best some some key issues around our bargaining proposal that mentioned has definitely been safety and sped redesign and and this flies in the face of everything we've been trying to communicate for so long this weekend educators from all over the nation gathered in Portland for a conference called the National Council of urban educators these issues of how can we welcome all our students how can we make sure that we have learning environments where people can make mistakes and then be welcomed back into their communities our issues that we must all tackle together but this solution is really just seeking more problems we need to be at the table with you working to solve them with when I talk to this group of educators it was prior to this announcement but I was able to relay to them a lot about why have we been going so long without a contract that this is our fifth superintendent that we've been negotiating this contract with they filled out postcards we have many here that we've brought as a gift to show that the support they are feeling PBS has been in national news over and over again for missteps we are coming from a place with some hope some ideas that we could actually come together and start to actually tackle some of these very real issues but we cannot do this when these decisions are made an isolation separated from those who know best and we cannot do this when when you continue to disregard messages that are being told and I really hope that you are reading the emails that you are getting
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because they are addressing and are speaking so highly of everything that Pioneer has to offer and you're also hearing from all our schools and the supports that need to be in place so that they can currently meet our students needs there is a reason that programs like access and pioneer have been created and those reasons have not gone away and until that we can actually start to build and support our schools and fill our Paris shortage and our other inequities how can you push down more when you haven't even stabilized the foundation that we need to support us all [Applause] we brought you these postcards as a gift to let you know that there are educators not just in this room not just throughout this district but throughout the nation that want to help and support Portland Public Schools and help us all move forward and rebuild but if we kept if things like this keep happening without us you're gonna keep being met with resistance and opposition because we will not have decisions made about our work and about our professionalism and about the things that we experience every day that we care most about without us there so you can do this without us and you'll be met with resistance or you can invite us we can do this together and we can start to come up with real solutions that meet everyone's needs [Applause] thank you Miss Cohen so in our continued work to prioritize the opening of two new Middle School's next fall we're going to ask for the superintendent staff to share presentation on the community engagement element of the plan so just as a recap to date the board has voted to open Rose Way Heights and Harriet Tubman middle schools next fall providing more than a thousand students with an opportunity to have an enhanced neck rule middle grades experience we've already designated feeder patterns and some boundary adjustments and the real work with inside the building what's going to be happening in classrooms and schools is now being developed by the planning principles and the superintendent so with that superintendent Guerrero I don't know is it on now it is but a hairy-ass staff director for strategic operations and outreach joined by Natasha Butler planning principal for Harriet Tubman middle school happy to report out today on some of our activity and community engagement yeah thanks [Music] board and superintendent Moses so as you mentioned until recently almost all of our community engagement for the past couple months has been focused on the feeder boundaries and boundaries feeder patterns and boundaries you know what mister step we're gonna just take a moment to allow because I know we want to hear what the plans are we're gonna allow just the if people want to leave at this point so we'll just stand down for for a minute or so so that we can hear the presentation
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okay I I'm gonna ask the okay mr. Rostov we're gonna ask you to speak loudly all right thank you thank you as as you might have mentioned until recently almost all the communication that we've been doing for the past couple months on these two middle schools has been centered on the feeder patterns and the boundary changes and so forth and now that's been decided we're entering a new stage with Harriet Tubman and rose way heights where were zeroing in on the individual schools and the students and the families who will become part of their communities so we're we're able to now really discern you know who to engage how to engage and and just be more targeted in that and the purpose of course is to get buy-in to get families excited about the new schools and to help ensure a smooth transition out of the Kait model and into a k5 and middle school model planning principles Natasha Butler and Kathleen Elwood have been busy scheduling meetings to engage the school community on how to come together as a united community determine the vision for the school's discuss staffing and other issues so initial engagement sessions have already occurred that where these introductory sessions that allowed community members to talk about how they want to go forward in the remainder of these sessions that we have rather than us just doing a top-down this is what we're going to do and Natasha and Kathleen have been working on that Kathleen in fact couldn't be here because she's attending engagement and then tonight at Vestal so that's ongoing but Natasha is here and she can and she can talk to you in more detail about her and her colleagues plans to engage families as we move forward with opening these schools next year Antonio Lopez is here as well and can answer any questions that you might have as can i and and a side note before I turn this over to Natasha's the schedules of these community engagements are now posted online on the Middle School's page and so you can see each one that we have scheduled for the for the time being and to go well into the spring so Natasha do you want to get some more details about what you've been working on yes good evening Natasha butler planning principal here yet Tubman community engagement meetings are being held monthly at one of our feeder programs which includes out in one of the King junior school Saban voice Elliot Humboldt and Irvington the community engagement meetings are focused on areas voiced from feeders comment page PTA meetings and cite council discussions for example the November meeting at Boyce Elliot Humboldt addressed the Harriet Tubman facility Geri Vinson chief operations officer attended the community meeting and gave the participants an update on what has been done to date upcoming plans and the ways a community will be informed and engaged throughout the construction phase during the month of December the community engagement meetings will focus on staff in hiring practices representatives from human resources will explain the process the desired profile of the candidates the timeline and the constructional language during the month of January the community engagement meeting will be held at Sabin and the focus will be visioning that would include an overview of curriculum and instruction opportunities to engage students in the planning process an overall program design other events that are in the planning stage include a meet-and-greet for teachers and support staff interested in coming to Harriet Tubman and alumni gathering a pass Harriet Tubman students that want to play a role
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in the rebirth of the middle school program and at least two events that will allow incoming 6th 7th and 8th grade students to connect before the official grand opening that would take place in August enclosing active attempts are in place to consistently communicate with parents community partners about next steps and how they will be active participants in the planning stages I can give you a bit of a synopsis of what's going on with roadway Heights in in Kathleen's absence but on December 12th I think it's going to be a good one there she's having a community meeting that will start with dinner basically it's just a coming together of the school community she'll give some updates and begin discussing opportunities for family and community members to shape the future of the school and that's the first in a series of six meetings that she's going to have again you can take a look at these online if you'd like but the titles of some of them are meeting on January 10th be part of the vision meeting on February 17th creating our school identity that's gonna be an important part of these schools as they merge these various k-8 models into a a solidified middle school on March 14th building a culture of learning and respect and in a date on date to be determined in March she's going to do a student orientation that's the state of community engagement right now on the two middle schools any questions from board members go ahead director constantan can you elaborate it all on the student piece of the visioning around curriculum to what house students will be involved if you're planning to do anything you know classroom based activities for for fifth graders now just the extent of student input on the framework itself yes currently I haven't I've had the opportunity to go to each of the feeder programs the middle school programs and most schools have a leadership team of students and so the idea is to meet with those students to determine how they want to come together as a group as a whole and so as a result of that some of them are doing actual community projects and we're trying to find ways in which they can engage their partner schools in the process from that discussion will lead us to determine what other events we will have between now and August but currently we're going to use their current structures at their individual schools and to invite them in the process as to how they want to engage the feeder partners welcome so for families interested in the cultural aspect of the curriculum what's the engagement plan because they know that there's kind of a short timeline of ordering materials for next year so getting the feedback from the community and students correct so each of the planning sessions are going to be scripted and so that will take place in January during that time between now and January I will be meeting with and I have been meeting with the current team around curriculum instruction in house but the January meeting will specifically talk about the committee's and how parents community members teachers can be engaged in the community um excuse me in the curriculum and instruction side of things so it's very much in the emphasis stage because at this point we were really trying to decide if we were going to move forward and so each month the focus will be on a particular area and that area will be in January so more information will come to you between now and then yes thanks can you say a little bit more about the mechanics of how the how the community engagement is is being conducted and maybe let me give a little preface I've been at a lot of community engagement episodes done by PBS and [Music] they left a fair amount to be desired most of the time so can you can you talk about who's organizing the meetings who's facilitating the meetings who's being who's being invited how are they being invited and what
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kinds of I mean I know it's early yet but could you say a little bit about the kind of turnout that you've been getting and in particular my concern is that the way we normally conduct these things you get sort of you get a certain demographic that tends to show up for meetings because there at certain times in certain places and and it's not necessarily diverse or representative so what steps are we taking to ensure that we've that we're really getting a representative turnout of the the people who are going to be effect the families that are gonna be affected by these changes I would like to say that's not my reality I have spent time since I started in September going to each of the feeder schools building relationships number one the PTA site councils principals parents and so I would like to say that I have a familiar bunch of individuals that know who I am and know the focus in the mission of what it is that we're trying to do now with regards to outreach that attempt has been made through parent coffees PTA meeting site counselors to specifically talk to them about how to best engage and once they've informed me then I've been very intentional to make sure that information is sent to them in advance that the agendas speak directly to the issues that concern to them and so as a result of that again the future meetings are scripted based on their comments what it is that they want to see in the end the projected outcome so last one last month in the month of November facilities was a huge discussion so as a result of that Gerry Vincent you know spoke to the to the community and was various transparent about where we are and where we're going after that we had about a 30 to 45 minute session that allowed them to share out to talk about what would you like to see next and as a result of that they decided that they wanted to hear more about staff in hiring practices so the focus for the month of December will be just that as a result of that I've tried to cut the middleman not have me translate the information but have actual individuals that can speak specifically about the various needs about hiring and practices as a result of that Human Resources will be the ink the individuals present they will talk about the contractual language they will ask them questions they will receive feedback they would provide questionnaire and surveys so that we can be very intentional about the work going for it that is the plan for every meeting that number one we hear the voices we take a note of the comments from the comment page we keep them up-to-date on by means of the website that I am physically on site that I'm at every single one of their site council PTA meetings ongoing so that I can specifically hear the individual needs of every school which may vary but making sure that we acknowledge their concerns and that we don't minimize them at any cost the planning principles Natasha and Kathleen are driving these they're facilitating they're the ones that are driving this suppose providing whatever logistical support we can in terms of making sure that the rooms are set the invitations go out correctly and and there's food there there is child care there's interpreters and so forth but it's the planning principles that are setting the agenda and and facilitating these things how does it turn out been thus far so on average then last night I think we were at about 70 so 60 to 70 precession and I anticipate more than next that's great I have a bit of a random question are you seeing parents show up whose children are not enrolled in the feeder schools now but who are excited about this opportunity to be a part of the new middle schools I don't have a direct answer for that but what I will tell you is that some of my participants a great percentage of my participants do not have students that are in the middle school but that are insane great 3rd and 4th 2nd and 3rd because they want to see the vision because they want to get their children prepped for the next step so they have also served as great advocates in the work to help encourage those middle school parents who may be a little reluctant so I would like to say that I have just a range of parents from kindergarten all the way through 8th grade that are active participants in the work about the students and sort of creating a sort of a team or student a culture
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across the student bodies so for the 5th graders you know they they've never experienced sixth grade anywhere so it will be I think a natural thing for like oh this is just what it is but for the current 6th and 7th graders at the schools they will be sort of joining a new new community and as somebody who my senior year in high school I was part of a consolidated school I think mr. bule was maybe part of that where we had a to high school communities consolidated and it was really important so it wasn't like this is the one group of students and then here the students from the other schools but really combining and creating a sort of a common culture and a common sense of values and sort of part of the new identity maybe you could talk a little bit about what you're thinking in terms of bringing students together this year and anticipation for next fall my hope in a perfect situation was would be that that would have already happened so as a result I am really trying to find an accelerated way to do that and to do it more often I would like to have at least two events before March that will allow students they have an opportunity together logistically how would that happen because you have the weekend they still have school during the course of the day and really figuring out how to move those students from their actual from their current schools to a setting that will allow them to to connect do some activities talk about the vision as to what they would like to see in this school just to give us overall feedback and so again the avenue that I'm using currently right now will be the leadership classes in each of the current feeder programs because a lot of them are currently working on a project so I've been invited for example to come to their student union groups to hear some of their requests they've asked for things such as a turf field they've asked for you know extensive sports programs they've asked for an opportunity for you know school dances certain times of the year things of that nature that an average middle school would ask so currently what I'm trying to decide on or the exact dates but in fact they will have at least two to three opportunities before the end of the school year to come together the the piece about identity I think is very important that they have an opportunity to have a voice about the identity for ss4 as the mission statement the motto the mascot things of that nature and so I am currently in the process of developing a committee of parents community partners support staff by means of the alumni group by means of sight counts by means of PTA and those that just really want to participate to help me again accelerate this and to add some level of engagement and creativity for our students we have to change the narrative because we have to get our students excited and so it's really a big push that the first event is really about serving them and welcoming them and letting them know that we really want you to set the stage to make Harriet something great I hope to give you more specifics as to what that will look like at the next meeting but I just want you to know that it's currently in place and moving thank you let us know what the board can do to be helpful with anything so next the board will consider whether or not to accept an appeal on a step 3 complaint I'd like to ask Vice Chair Moore to manage this item before the board the board is and I just want to remind the board members that we are not allowed to discuss the contents of the appeal at this time tonight we are only voting on whether or not to accept the appeal so we'll not be discussing the content of the complaint if the appeal is accepted tonight the board will then vote on the substance of the appeal within 30 days board members receive the background written information on this appeal in their packets so before you is resolution number
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5545 a majority vote of yes means that the board will accept the complaint and vote on the substance of the appeal within third days a majority no vote means that the board will not consider the appeal so the superintendent's decision will stand and if the complainant chooses to pursue any further action the complainant can appeal directly to the Oregon Department of Education so before you go on there is a numbering issue the information we have in our packet says resolution five two five six and the script said something else yes it's five four five but okay so just board numbers we are referring to the packet that you have that references the resolution a different resolution number five to five six no okay so the resolution I'm looking at this really quickly resolution number five to six six is is yet another one okay that's that's the original resolution around the boundary changes that are at issue with this complaint but miss usin can you tell us what resolution number is the level three complaint okay I was right the first time just so to the pet the packet is there's some information yeah this this it so for board members this is the okay it's the level three complaint it's the only one in our packet and it's five five four or five okay sorry dude okay so um do we have any I guess we have to do we have a motion it's it's there I see that there's public testimony on this matter does that come following our vote or prior to I think we were super zolina motion yep I move we vote to approve resolution 5 5 4 5 is there a second second director anthony has moved and director constan was seconded the motion to adopt resolution 5 5 4 5 miss yu-san is there any public comment Jill coos Trina and me a kiss Trina I thank you for hearing us tonight this kind of came up at the last minute so bear with us I went back to review some of the footage from your past board meetings where the Lincoln Wilson boundary change was discussed and it was obvious to me at the time that you all took really great care when deciding on bright amell and Elementary's fate although only 23 students out of more than 300 were affected in each grade less than 10% you were very concerned that those 23 students were not disenfranchised from their classmates heading into Lincoln you emphasized the need for a humane solution the spirit of the resolution 5 to 56 was at the current 6th 7th and 8th grade students at West Sylvan who were affected should be allowed to attend Lincoln there doesn't seem to be any disagreement that Nia could attend Lincoln tomorrow if things don't work out for her at her current school the confusion as we have understood it is that there doesn't seem to be specific language regarding the sports and extracurricular activities it feels like common sense that kids that are grandfathered into the school academically should also be grandfathered with regards to sports in his written response superintendent Guadalupe Aguero stated this matter illuminates the need for board policy and clarification around students who are grandfathered into previous boundaries and wish to participate in sports or other extracurricular activities to which boundary area is a criteria Mia was caught in this grey area and she has suffered the consequences by not being allowed to compete in the sport that she loves this year the frustration for us is that everyone who has heard our story has been wonderful and they seemed to understand our dilemma
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Ombudsman G Martin although being a neutral party gave a firm recommendation on our behalf Criswell should OSA a has stated on numerous occasion occasions that he has no objective objection to mia competing he just needs something in writing from PBS stating that Mia's school of record is Lincoln and yet we can't seem to achieve what everyone seems to want not to mention that there is no opportunity for her to dance at Wilson because there just isn't a dance program I understand that our case could set a precedence in the future for other boundary changes but what we don't want to see happen here is that you overlook that this is really just about a 15 year old girl just trying to participate in her chosen sport with the same teammates and classmates that she has competed with and attended school with in the bridal mile community and despite the language that may be missing the spirit and intention of that resolution was to protect someone like Mia so this is her last chance and she's just looking for all of you don't maybe intervene on her behalf thank you I only heard a few hours ago that I'd be able to speak in front of you so I'm not quite as prepared as I would be but I've been dancing since seventh grade ever since I moved back here after living overseas for two years being on my middle school's dance team allowed me to reconnect with my old friends from elementary school and I started to feel at home again from it the choice to attend st. Mary's instead of Lincoln was extremely difficult for me and also heartbreaking because all my friends were going to attend Lincoln the thought of not going to school with people I knew was holding me back from making the decision to go to a school I really wanted to go to and and to get the education I needed it was only when I thought and heard I could be on Lincoln's dance team that was able to make the decision that I could get the education I wanted but to keep my friendships that I had and to stay connected to my community Lincoln is a part of my community the people I know at Lincoln I've known since preschool in kindergarten these are boys and girls I've grown up with the girls on Lincoln's dance team I've been dancing with since seventh grade dancing is one sport that I have really enjoyed and wanted to work hard I spent these last few months not knowing if I can stay on the team but that hasn't stopped me from practicing on the sidelines and working as hard as I possibly can even though I can't perform at upcoming competitions I've still shown up to competitions and performances to watch and cheer on my team because that is what we are we are a team a family and a community I'm asking you for the opportunity to let me continue dancing with my team members because this is something that's so important to me and I'm just asking for your help thank you thank you thank you any discussion we're not supposed to have substantive conversation on the matter but there does seem that the matter at hand is whether we are gonna excessive the appeals or if we if we will accept the appeal in which case right thirty days we're going to hear the about the substance war we deny the appeal and thereby the superintendent's decision will stand any discussion if not the board will now vote on resolution five five four five all in favor please indicate by saying yes yes I'll oppose please indicate by saying no no miss Houston I'm gonna ask for a roll call vote yes director as far as a brand director more yes director Anthony yes director constan yes and Sharon Edwards no so are there any abstentions superintendent I mean I'm sorry you're gonna get a promotion Student Representative tram Upstate abstention so the vote is four to three in favor with student representative Tran abstaining party it was it's four to the motion classes four to
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three yes with one of with with an abstention by the student representatives right the appeal is accepted yes so next before us is so remembered I just liked that I think we should also address the superintendent's recognition that there is a void in our board policy so we do not the reason they're in this situation is because there's nothing in our board policy that specifically addresses this so that's a housekeeping item on us in our review of our board policies so if we can put that on our agenda for reconsideration as we're in this complaint process that would be great yes I would sir in committee you want to well I I want to consider this as part of our overall work plan just given everything else we have this year focusing our Moraira ties in what policies have the impact on the greatest number of students so yes we can put it on the list but we'll prioritize it I don't think we can say that we're gonna do anything about it in the next 30 days and I want the rest of the board to weigh in on how its prioritized so next before us is a revised resolution regarding a policy waiver and approval of third party fundraising sales through february 1st 2018 directing staff to create a process for obtaining school board approval as per policy 3.3 0.020 p 7 limitation on use of facilities and grounds and I'm just going to looks like we have a team to speak about it but I want to note that the resolution before us is slightly Riza Reeve is revised from the one that was originally sent out and posted and the primary difference between the one that was originally posted and the resolution we're going to consider tonight is that originally there was a mention of the Hillsdale market in here because they currently have a sort of commercial use of school facilities and have a five-year lease that's coming up but primarily what we're just what we're doing here is providing a waiver since apparently we don't have the processes in place we're providing a waiver for two for two projects and then the staff is going to come back to us with the we have a policy but there's no process or anything an administrative directives in order for people to be complying with the policy so Hillsdale has the market has been removed from this resolution and we'll consider it once in the new year once the staff has the processes in place for us to actually consider it so with that superintendant Guerrero take it from there you have mr. king our Director of Facilities who's going to highlight the report that was prepared for your your information in a supporting role our CEO Oh Jerry even sent us here this evening as well chair did a very good job of summarizing what's before you just briefly the facilities and asset management department has been recently become aware that there is a policy that limits use of facilities and grounds that actually states that the sale of merchandise MPPs property by third-party vendors is not allowed without the consent of the board we have a couple of items as the chair mentioned we have two requests before you that prompted us to come before you and think about how to bring this process bring these requests to you for approval in a sort of a streamlined way we don't have administrative director directives so we will develop or operationalize a process by which these come before you we're going to be doing that rather quickly probably in the next within the next few months should be something we're able to do and then in the meantime though we do have one third-party request and that is for a mattress sale benefiting the grant banned program that's for this weekend it's been scheduled for quite some time so we're asking for a waiver for that that sale we don't well we have some other groups that are interested no other groups have actually tried to schedule something so this is the only one that we know of and then as the as chair Bram Edwards stated we also know we have a farmers market and it's not the lease terms that come before you but just the use of that site by a third-party vendor the Hillsdale farmers market that's been
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there for quite some time so I think without further ado I will just stop there and field any questions so I'm not sure the Hillsdale farmers market really about I mean just how I'm reading the policy it appears this more would be more of a city or cific use of buildings versus because I don't see that I don't think the vegetables being sold or the products being sold there are going to the benefit of PBS students which I think that point mattress sale yeah that's a good point and and I think we were being overly conservative but that's a good reading and we could if that makes sense and it seems to to me that that would take the farmers market probably off consideration and what we'll do is our normal channels for negotiating that then and then we would develop a process for these third-party vendors that benefit schools and and it is primarily honestly mattress sales seem to be the only ones that come to our my mind so in just a further follow up so say that did the Hillsdale market did fall under this Cu B is our policy for something like that a full cost frequent it doesn't have a benefit to PBS students or mission do we have a full cost recovery the $6,000 didn't look like it was full cost recovery right it's a good question we don't have a full recovery policy for leases I think it's a honestly I think that's a very good thing for us to consider we do lease out several of our buildings as you know um the rate is somewhat of a continuation of what was negotiated five years ago so we've been continuing on that trajectory but I think consideration of so to answer your question I'm not sure if it's cause recovery or not so I guess I would the difference between this and I think the mattress sale is ultimately there's a benefit to our students I would hope that commercial activity that's happening on PBS grounds that we apply a full cost recovery so we're not subsidizing a commercial endeavor which seems different than this policy that's a good point talk tomorrow so I'm in a parent for a while but it seems to me around this time I would get deluge with requests for you know reef sales and you know beef jerkey and you know I poinsettias and all the rest of it are those covered under this I have to be honest with you you know our my focus pretty much our focus has been on civic use of buildings and use of facilities for third party sales I I don't know the depth of sales that occur in schools and so I'm afraid I can't answer that question there are a lot of them yeah and usually when you're buying your wreath or your pepperoni or whatever that is it's student based and it's not like using I mean I guess is the mattress sales you're using the gyms for some period of time yeah and the students themselves are not selling I think with wreaths sales or candy sales it's the students that are doing the selling themselves whereas as the mattress sells it's a third party vendor that's coming in the it's doing the selling the school's buy the candy and then sell the candy as opposed to you don't know the mattresses and sell them okay holding a fundraiser I think it might be good to get a little legislative history on this policy like like what what was the problem we were trying to correct here or deal with yeah I am and what would be covered by this policy and what wouldn't because frankly I don't want us having to I mean I don't want to approve every reason yeah and perhaps one of the things that we can do in this sort of when we operationalize this is try to be a little more clear and when it applies that may be the most straightforward way to deal with it there may be a like minimum threshold that for things that come before the board [Music] so I just want to clarify current policy is that every kind of watch my adjectives here every mattress sale or a third party sale would have to come before us on an individual basis that's currently that's the way the policy reads right now let's see let's see if we can so just to offer
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some nights agenda we have 26 to offer this it may not be the specific legislative history for this policy but in the past when PPS has not had had been has been short on money and our mission was threatened there often appear commercial opportunities for the district and I think the Coke and Pepsi can't the Coke contract of whatever 2002 is a great example of that where you know the trade-off was a couple you know it's a couple million dollars for the Coke contract and there was a lot of concern by our community about the commercialization of our school buildings and there was I believe that there's a there's a commercialization policy that we have that was developed around that time and so I think I don't know if it's specific to this but really a guarding of our public facilities to keep focused on our mission and avoid overly over commercialization of our facilities welcome to the football game at the Sealy mattress field so just a recap for everybody essentially we're giving it we're waiving the policy and we'll have the district staff come back in early January with a set of recommendations so the board will now consider resolution five five four six do I have a motion so moved a second second director Bailey moves and director more seconds the motion to adopt resolution five five four six miss Houston is there any public comment there's not is there any board discussion on this resolution there's no discussion the board will now vote on resolution five five four six all in favor please indicate by saying yes yes yes all opposed please indicate by saying no are there any abstentions a student representative Tran yes the motion resolution five five four six is approved by a vote of seven to zero with student representative Tran voting YES I believe our only committee report this evening is from director Bailey on the enrollment forecasting committee at a meeting yesterday yes by the way yeah thanks we have two main agenda items last night I'll talk about the second one first and that was looking at our transfer different transfer policies so where we're moving to is getting one a schedule of some regular data updates we did get some preliminary data but not for this past year on hardship petition transfers on the lottery so we're trying to get more data there and specifically so that we act can act sooner or later as a board to decide to change our lottery for and let's see what's what's the term of art our thematic focus option programs thank you those are the non dual language immersion programs we're still working on that one so we had a good discussion with Judi Brennan so we're going to work on some data the I would have preferred to be able to act on that this year that would be a very short timeline because February 1st is when letters go out to parents saying lotteries coming up and here's how it works to do to put together a proposal and to have public hearings and then to allow staff the time to change what we have in place would be pretty tight by February 1st and my bias is always to do a good policy and to do it better rather than trying to rush something through I think the concept that we started talking about was and actually Sacketts forwarded that to superintendent Smith several years ago she did not forward it to the board for consideration that we we I can't remember exactly what we proposed it may have been something like a how we do
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with Benson so that the first you know there'd be one from every school that had an applicant would be accepted first so right right now with with a lottery it's no matter what neighborhood school catchment area you live in you have an equal chance I looked at data for particularly for vestal and creative science and because the way the odds turned out this was 2 or 3 years ago instead of 1/3 which is the average of applicants being accepted they had just over half and it seems like if have half of the vestal applicants were accepted which is you know not what the odds are but it happened and it was basically a whole class so this does have an impact so we're moving along to get that taken care of I wish we could do it this year I don't know that that's possible and that if if you guys want to give me some direction to say bring us something on January 5th to start that process but [Music] there you go well with your reference to a second are you suggesting that there may be time and an appetite for an administrative redress of this if it doesn't specifically call for board approval I should know this but yeah let me get back to you on that I think I'm pretty sure the two questions because it may not require board a true approval but there may not be administrative capacity and appetite to address it in such a short order I think the other the other factor worth considering is we will I think in the next year not in the next month but in the next year where you talk about January you know you know the the enrollment and transfer the enrollment forecasting committee and and D brac before it and second before it have been asking for a review and evaluation of the role of the thematic focus option schools within the complete portfolio of PPS and I think not not anytime soon but sometime by this time next year I'm hoping that we will have developed a much better sense of kind of a strategic plan for the district and and how how the focus option schools fit into our understanding of the kind of educational opportunities that that we want to deliver to kids right so we we are on record in our middle school resolution asking the superintendent to come back to us with a plan yep but not in the next two weeks really thank you for the report oh one other item we looked at was some follow-up of the boundaries situation and we kicked around a couple of ideas mostly we focused on rose white Heights and Scott and we have a data request in that director Anthony made about looking at a larger area to shift to Scott we got an email from a citizen after the meeting that I may want to well we need to have another committee meeting soon suggesting it a different solution so we have in the initial proposal there were two small areas of Alameda on the east border one that was suggested to go to Rose City Park one to shift it to Scott one of the objections to those was that it was a small group of kids and it's our
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we have a policy values at least try not to do that the citizens suggested we combine those two areas and shift them to Scott and that would be a larger area and I think crossed that threshold from small to large enough and secondly we have seen as part of the regular Scott discussion that's going on we've seen some projected numbers great by great for Scott that shows that it's still a little bit short and there's particularly worried about the younger grades going forward certainly the the older grades with if regular students come over from the neighborhood side that would be robust but the younger grades is a worry going forward this if we did that that could pretty well address it we want to follow up with staff to make sure this is the numbers work but that's that's there Thank You chair Bailey so one of the things on that if there is going to be a further boundary consideration just want to make sure that we follow the even though it seems like we've been through everything once I think people somewhat feel like well they're done for the year so if we are going to do something make sure that we follow there's some pretty specific requirements in our policy about boundary changes and notifications so let's just make sure that if you are if your committee is going to make a recommendation that we coordinate with the communications and community involvement staff to make sure that we provide the proper notifications okay yes thank you I'd like to ask director anthony for a report on the Health and Welfare Trust and I guess I'm going to preference you can either preface it or I can that some of the information that about the health and welfare trust can only be communicated in an executive session but director Anthony is going to provide a pre-brief highlights that are appropriate in a public setting about health and wealth for addressed meeting good evening a tiny tiny number of people in Portland know that 40 years ago Portland Public Schools and its partner unions set up an independent trust that governs our representative represented employees healthcare I represent the board on the trust it has been an absolute joy it is so wonderful to work with something that works so very very well and this October I had the opportunity to go to the annual convention of the body to which the trust belongs the International Foundation of employee benefit plans and if you say that name slowly enough you can put anyone to sleep I invite you to try it with your own children before I talk a little bit about what I saw at the convention Michelle could you please stand up for just a minute Michelle Patton who has represented represented IFSP on our trust for altogether 13 years Michelle was awarded the trustee master pin which means that she has taken an awful awful lot of classes has been very diligent and it's a recognition from a very large organization that she has really put in the time and done the work and is representing her people very very well [Applause] [Music] these conventions are a wonderful opportunity to learn an awful lot about a great many subjects alternative investments which is very important for our trust I am on the trust Finance Committee the financial status of your health fund global economics active versus passive investing curbing medical trends behavioral finance
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eliminating retiree health liability which is a very important topic for us managing opioids and dealing with their addictions which is becoming increasingly important not just across Oregon but in Portland and particularly for Portland Public Schools students I'm going to be talking about that at great length later not tonight audits bargaining mergers wellness programs with which we are doing very well and to which we are going to be adding and it's going to I am quite convinced save us a great deal of money equity investing and finally and to my mind best of all and this is going to tell you something about me HIPAA audits and I think this is very very important and very encouraging for Portland Public Schools because right now as we've mentioned DOE perhaps six weeks back the legislature has opened a possibility for school districts to begin to assertively bill Medicaid for appropriate services we provide students sped services services for medically fragile students behavioral health services services teaching students how to deal with their dyslexia school nurses school-based health clinics I am convinced that there is potentially a very significant amount of money that we could have as an ongoing revenue stream to help offset the costs of some of these services to our most needy children and the point of the very long session on HIPAA audits is that this is something I've known we are going to have to deal with as we deal with billing Medicaid but it's going to actually be fairly easy for our represented employees to deal with it and to deal with it legally I'm not going to go through all of the technical aspects of that tonight which I'm sure makes you all very grateful but it's very possible and through the trust and the foundation I have been put in touch with some outside people who have the capacity to help us do this and to do it extremely well and I'm putting together information right now I'm hoping that we'll be able to put out an RFI very soon and we can make some real headway on this so thank you thank you director Anthony any other committee report anybody have a upcoming committee meeting they want to announce I just I think director Anthony again for you you're working on this it's really important and it's really complex and I really appreciate what you do director espresso Brown did you have something yes teaching and learning committee will be next Tuesday but Wednesday wait 12 Tuesday Tuesday the 12th the calendar sat out 4:30 to 6:30 so agenda will be posted do we decide by Rosanne by Friday by Friday director more yeah the finance audit and operations committee also has a meeting on the 12th and the at 3 p.m. 3 to 5 and the agenda will be out Friday and as soon as I confer with my fellow committee members and staff we will schedule a teaching fourth no one in forecasting so the only I have to report and I think it's just worth noting is that on December 4th directors more constand myself and superintendent Guerrero and the rest of the district bargaining team spent
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pretty much from 9:30 in the morning well into the evening at the table with p80 discussing the contract there's going to be small group works between now and our next meeting on the 11th and it's been very productive and a respectful dialogue an exchange of views so I just want to thank the board members and the superintendent and all the staff for that continued work we also have two principals who serve on the PPS team and we appreciate their insights that they bring to the team that the team in the discussion as well so on the 11th we'll have another day one of the principals Kathleen Elwood defended her dissertation yesterday morning and then came back to participate in the mediation for the rest of the for the next six hours and actually participate in robust discussion about the very topic of her dissertation she did doctor now with flying colors actually yeah that's so apparently she's running a community meeting tonight so that's why she's not here so the board will now consider the remainder of its business agenda having voted on resolutions fifty five forty five and fifty five forty six board members or than any items you'd like to pull for a separate discussion and vote miss Houston are there any changes to the business agenda do I have a motion in a second to adopt a business agenda the business agenda has been moved by director Esparza Brown and seconded by director Anthony miss Houston is there any public comment no any board discussion on the business agenda the board will now vote on the business agenda all in favor please indicate by saying yes yes all opposed please indicate by saying no student representative Tran yes any abstentions the business agenda is approved by seven zero vote with student representative Tran voting YES so we're now going to adjourn and go into to another room for an executive session and then followed by that we have a board work session on two pieces of the leadership goals and evaluation it's a continuation of work from a lengthy work session we had on November 17th so with that

Sources

PPS Board of Education, Archive 2017-2018, https://www.pps.net/Page/12568 (accessed: 2022-03-24T00:57:51.006202Z)
PPS Communications, "Board of Education" (YouTube playlist), https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL8CC942A46270A16E (accessed: 2023-10-10T04:10:04.879786Z)

2017-12-05 PPS School Board Regular Meeting, Work Session

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Event 1: Regular Meeting of the Board of Education - December 5, 2017

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