2022-01-25 PPS School Board Regular Meeting

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District Portland Public Schools
Date 2022-01-25
Time 18:00:00
Venue BESC/Hybrid
Meeting Type regular
Directors Present missing
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Event 1: 1/25/22 PPS Board of Education Regular Meeting

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this board meeting of the board of education for january 25th to 2022 is called to order for tonight's meeting any item that will be voted on has been posted on the pps website under the board and meetings tabs the meeting is being streamed live streamed streamed live on pps tv services website and on channel 28 and will will be replayed throughout the next two weeks please check the district website for replay times good evening everybody and welcome to everyone here on january 3rd the oregon health authority and oregon department of education released a school health advisory to be in effect from january 3rd through january 31st in order to help with the recent surge of covid cases do the omacron variant these extra mitigation efforts are in place to help reduce the spread of kovid so that districts can prioritize in-person learning for students the guidance includes the recommendation that schools hold events such as conferences meetings and fundraisers online rather than in person in order to comply with that recommendation for the month of january all board meetings will be closed to the public we know it's preferable to meet um fully in person but we want to do our part in helping support the effort effort to prioritize in-person learning for students next the board will vote on the consent agenda and bear with me for just a moment while i pull that up members if there are any items you'd like to pull for discussion we'll set those aside for discussion and a vote at the end of the meeting ms bradshaw are there any changes to the consent agenda no board members are there any items you'd like to pull from the consent agenda do i have a motion and a second to adopt the consent agenda so moved directors green and julie and brim edwards moved and i believe directors director holland seconded the adoption of the consent agenda is there any board discussion on the consent agenda and ms bradshaw is there any public comment no i want to also mention thank you director scott and director khan stem for attending virtually and student representative weinberg will be joining us about an hour late uh tonight so so everybody knows they're in attendance and um joining virtually directors scott and con stem go ahead i just said hello good evening good evening the board will now vote on resolutions 6433 through 6436 all in favor please indicate by saying yes yes yes yes all opposed please indicate by saying no are there any abstentions the consent agenda is approved by a vote of seven to zero and student representative weinberg is um absent madam chair i just want to recognize and thank director greene for some of those contract allocations tonight that came out of his committee for [Music] managing and bringing those forward with staff [Music] alignment you so much i wish i could actually take some of the credit but it was really the hard work of the of the staff and and the work that they were doing back in october and november really bringing attention to certain things that really helped to get this across the line so i really just want to take a moment to appreciate our our budget staff for really the the hard work and effort that they put into this so but on their behalf since my guy's not here right now but we've got miss clear and we got the soup here on the behalf of their amazing team i'll say thank you all and appreciate it yes and and thank you for your leadership on that committee as well because it takes all of us pulling in the same direction to move work like that so now we turn to student and public comment before we begin i'd like to review our guidelines for public comment first the board thanks anyone here for taking the time to attend the meeting and providing comments public input informs and improves our work and we look forward to hearing your thoughts reflections and concerns i might have to separate you two at some point [Laughter] um so we look forward to hearing your thoughts and your reflections and your concerns our responsibility as a board is to actively listen and to that end i'd ask each of us to give our full attention to the people in front of us
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virtually our board office may follow up on board related issues raised during public testimony we request that complaints about individual employees be directed to the superintendent's office as a personnel matter and if you have additional items you'd like to provide to the board or superintendent we ask you to mail them to public comment all one word at pps.net that's public comment at pps.net and please make sure when you begin your comment you clearly state your first name and spell your last name you'll have three minutes to speak and you'll hear a sound after three minutes which means it's time to conclude your comments ms bradshaw do we have anyone signed up for student or public comment yes we have both we have ada crandall good evening board members my name is ada crandall c-r-a-n-d-a-l-l and i am a sophomore at grant high school i am here tonight because i'm extremely concerned about your proposed relocation of harriet tubman middle school it's finals week right now and i should be studying for my algebra test tomorrow morning but instead here i am at a school board meeting begging you to do what is right and not displace students to accommodate the expansion of fossil fuel infrastructure in the middle of a climate crisis in preparation for this i spent some time looking into pps's bullying policy because here's the thing i think the oregon department of transportation is a bully and that you all are bystanders doing nothing about it i don't know what you all were taught but what i learned in your school system is that when you see someone being picked on you're supposed to stand up for them so why is it that when odot's proposed freeway expansion is literally cutting into tubman's backyard and threatening to displace hundreds of students your response is to give in and let it happen the pps website says that bullying is strictly prohibited and shall not be tolerated and to me it seems like you're breaking your own rule why aren't you modeling to students what it means to be an active ally and stand up against injustice as a former tubman student i know the pollution at tubman is dangerous no student should have to worry about if the air they're breathing at recess will one day cause asthma or lung cancer but the decision to move the school rather than fight the freeway expansion follows the same short-sighted line of thinking that started the climate crisis in the first place yes you can move students away from the direct threat of pollution but you cannot move them away from the life of climate disasters they're inheriting as a result of your decision to support fueling this crisis without even making odot study the alternatives odot has bullied you into thinking this freeway expansion is inevitable but it's not pbs could avoid all the community disruption associated with displacing tubman and potentially king elementary by simply forcing odot to consider not building the freeway the project just lost a key federal approval last week remains tied up in multiple lawsuits and is currently 500 million dollars short these these recent updates are a massive step forward in efforts to stop the expansion efforts that for some reason pps seems to be completely ignoring i urge you to join in with community groups demanding that odot fully study the environmental impact of the rose quarter freeway expansion which would include studying congestion pricing an alternative that would reduce congestion and pollution rather than increasing it at the last board meeting i attended i asked each of you to raise your hand if climate justice was important to you and as i remember with striking clarity everyone had their hand up this is your chance to follow through on that promise don't just raise your hands raise your voices and raise your standards if you truly value climate justice you will not settle for the displacement of students to accommodate the expansion of fossil fuel infrastructure into the backyard of a middle school if you truly care about climate justice you will not let odot get away with this and destroy my generation's future tonight i urge you to stand true to the values that you teach students and dare to imagine a better world stand up for us thank you for your time thank you thank you next we have tupac del rocio hi hello uh another lucio and tupac here is it okay if i go before duplex at his request absolutely thank you thank you chair to pass vice chair scott and members of the board my name is ana del rocio i am a mother of two students at bridger elementary in southeast portland i am here tonight with respect to southeast enrollment balancing to urge pps leadership to refocus its efforts on ensuring that every school in southeast has the resources and support it needs to close the achievement gap for black indigenous latinx aapi and low-income children in our communities
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families at bridger are calling for focused and accountable conversations about investing in harrison park neighborhood students and targeted financial and staffing commitments for black and indigenous students in all schools we need everything from support staff to counselors and family support critical wraparound services this need is getting lost in segc's efforts to divide dual language immersion students against black and native students in neighborhood programs invisibilizing and ignoring native spanish-speaking students in dli programs who are black indigenous and aapi no one seems to be asking the tough questions about what guarantees the district will give to those families regardless of where their pps middle school will end up being these broad strokes perpetuate a harmful tactic of white supremacy and utilitarianism which would sacrifice bypass students in majority white schools in favor of an oversimplified fabricated binary of black versus white esteemed professor john a powell refers to targeted universalism as operationalizing belonging each group's differences must be taken into account targeted universalism is designed through careful consideration of positionality and situatedness it is inclusive of all regardless of differences it expands the we current efforts at pps have veered far from professor powell's take on targeted universalism and have instead fallen into a scarcity mindset where outcomes are zero-sum and communities are othered and divided against each other recent comments by segc members targeting families in dli programs as outsiders taking away from legitimate neighborhood programs is xenophobic and contradicts pps's race and social justice framework dismantling the spanish dli focus at kellogg will be an utter capitulation by pps to this rhetoric and sentiments this cannot be tolerated we must center the lived experience of students and families and incorporate more teachers and principles into the decision making for scgc thank you thank you my name is dubaka matatenka and this is what i wrote chair to pass leicester scott and members of the board my name i'm a student is at bridger elementary in fourth grade i'm here to testify about what bridger means to me to ask you not to ignore around the next families like mine feel safer when i know about things that are going on going to happen we had zero clue that bridgette might change we didn't know if it was a joke that was scary the events in cobit and distance learning were really tough for me i was really confused and unhappy it just wasn't right freddie elementary is not just my school it means everything to me i've had so many fun times i'm so happy to finally be here i have so many friends i play with them my recess i play tag with my mind julia i don't want to go to any other school we are learning a lot we're learning about native peoples and how they were forced by white christianity that they were only nine federally recognized tribes who should when all should be recognized that they were forced out of their houses torn from their family to go to boarding schools had to cut their hair where appropriate clothes and were not allowed to speak their language i think this relates to what's happening at pbs today because i think the government needs to stop telling brown people where to live or to go to school or what languages we get to speak at school i don't feel good when people in the government use their power against us i wish people in the government would listen to families and use their power to make things better not worse i'm only nine years old respectfully i would rather be playing video games with my friends i want right right now i but but i want to sacrifice my free time to stand up for myself and others i want every school in portland to get more support for black native latinox asian american pacific islander and low-income kids no matter what building they're in my wish my wish for schools is to be united not divided thank you thank you very much thank you aaron cruz hi can everyone hear me we can hear you hello hello good evening um my name is aaron cruz uh i am a student within pps and i attend harriet tubman middle school my goal is to attend morehouse college
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in atlanta georgia i feel grant will help me prepare for college in that case i was wondering if you guys would be willing or able to expand the high school or school boundaries for grant high school if you are not aware grant has over 2 000 students and my neighborhood school jeff only has 600 i know it is a big big ask to change the school boundaries but it will be a lot there are a lot of kids like me trying to set themselves in a place where they feel they can be stable could you guys please take into consideration that there are a lot of black and african american students that don't have the resources to be where they want to be this is a big ass again but still i would like to take this in consideration are there any questions that you guys would like to ask this is your time to for us to hear from you and your thoughts thank you that's just all i wanted to ask thank you so much thank you we have nemo cruz nima's on her way over from the attendees section hello can everyone hear me good yes we can thank you hi my name is nema cruz c-r-e-w-s my pronouns are she her and i'm a student within pbs my goal is to attend spelman college in atlanta georgia i feel grant will help prepare for college because they have great ap classes and they also give harder work unlike other high schools but there's only one thing about that grant doesn't allow people outside of that neighborhood to attend their school anymore i also notice that grant is a majority white school there are 71.1 percent white people at grant high school and 5.8 african-american my best friend brother tried to get into grant high school but they didn't accept him because he doesn't live in that neighborhood and because he's black i also want to go to grant high school because i want to be a lawyer and they have a great debate team i just don't think it's fair all i ask is that you guys let people out of that neighborhood to attend grant high school so everyone can get the equal opportunities they need i also want to be a professional dancer when i grow up i like to be a jefferson dancer what i asked from you guys and from jefferson high school is that not only me but lots of other people as well are able to attend jefferson high school are able to be a jefferson dancer even though they don't attend that school i really hope that you guys take what i'm saying into consideration and make some things happen thank you for your time thank you very much thank you we have craig wilhelm okay craig can you hear us i got you now i got you now can you hear me yes we can okay my apologies uh i was so excited to uh uh hear from all of the students so uh that was great um good evening my name is craig wilhelm w-i-l-h-e-l-m my pronouns are he and him and i am oregon's civilian aide to the secretary of the army i am here today to kindly urge the school board to rescind resolution number 4503 adopted on 24 october 2011 regarding the equal access to military counter recruiters in public heights are portland public high schools it sets a biased rule that destroys diversity equity and inclusion the resolution states quote the district encourages students to serve their country in a variety of ways including military service the peace corps americorps and service with other organizations but should ensure that students who are interested in a career in the military are fully aware of all aspects involved in military service and in furtherance of this should allow counter recruiters first the flaw here is the resolution in the paragraph singles out the military why wouldn't students who are interested in attending the peace corps or the university of portland or sorry the university of oregon or portland state also be made fully aware of all aspects involved in attending these institutions and in furtherance of this should allow counter recruiters for these organizations just the same believe me i am all for a student and parents to have this tools and
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information at their disposal to decide what career path is best for them and their child but singling out one service organization in this case the military over the others and not apply the same rationale and counter criteria to all organizations academic institutions trade schools etc is frankly reckless and discriminatory second the resolution lists the counter recruiter organizations that the school district might use and with an established practice of providing information to students about military service and career alternatives are all of you familiar with these listed counter recruiting agents have you reviewed their mission and their memberships what is the quote-unquote established practice of vetting them and how often and who determines what information is being disseminated and its accuracy one of these organizations listed the americans friends service committee is a religious society that claims it works for peace since when does a public high school dis or public school district take counsel from a religious organization another veterans for peace claims on their website that military policy pressures some recruiters to adopt unethical practices in order to make mission is there specific systemic evidence of this and look at the unethical recruiting behavior made headlines in academic institutions where bad recruiters accepted parents bribes to get their children to the freshman roles there can certainly be bad apples in all organizations today i assure you the majority of army talent managers are not like that and are looking for top management and future young leaders who want to serve their country learn a trade receive educational benefits and be a part of something greater than themselves our leaders and soldiers do not wish for war it is ingrained in training that war always should be the last resort every day i assure you soldiers are working in our communities supporting hospitals affected by staffing shortages mr wilhelm i'm going to ask you to conclude your comments since your three minutes is up yes i will in closing i ask you to repeal the resolution it singles out the military as requiring counter recruiters where other organizations do not please level the playing field thank you for allowing me the opportunity to present my case to you with sincerest and humble gratitude thank you thank you with ashley brooks hi thank you board for listening to me my name is ashley brooks b-r-o hmm are we able to get ms brooks back into the meeting i'm working on it this brooks if you see there you go yes hi can you guys hear me we can hear you thank you huh okay sorry about that we have a little technique that's okay i taught online for a year i know how it goes so hello my name is ashley brooks b-r-o-o-k-s my pronouns are she her i'm a seventh and eighth grade social studies teacher at fabian school in northeast portland i teach to the school that is 72 students of color where the majority of students students are historically underserved and has one of the highest homeless populations superintendent i wrote to you and others at the besc on the eve of our return from winter break i wrote about how overwhelmed i was and how my workload was too high to complete everything i needed to do during my contract hours i did not receive a single response to my email weeks later i am more stressed and overwhelmed than ever many days i am planning lessons grading assignments and emailing assistance to my student outside of my contract hours to be clear i and many other faculty and staff members in this district are working hours and hours every week for free the impact of this stressful situation is felt by my students as i am unable to be the best teacher i can be when i am exhausted during the six days we were in the building before going online for two weeks we had huge numbers of staff and students out i don't know if you're aware but it is very difficult for a school to run smoothly with so many people out as so many students were out sick or
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quarantined it was necessary to make two versions of every assignment one for those in class and another that students could figure out on their own at home now that we are back in person i anticipate this will happen again as we are still in the recent coveted surge in addition to all of this i have a mountain of assignments and assessments to work through before grades are due on monday i cannot give meaningful feedback or adequately assess each of my 127 students within my contract hours and thus will be doing much of this outside of my contract hours working for free as many teachers do every day all over our district our entire educational system is built on the unpaid labor of countless teachers and other school staff every year in pps is taxing but this year is so much more so all i want to do is be the best teacher i can be for my students but without the time i cannot i am far from the only teacher who does not have the time to do all that is needed to hosa special teachers sped and esl teachers school admin and many others are subbing in classrooms and doing the work of eas and pairs in some instances during their contract hours when this happens all of these people must work outside of their contract hours in order to complete their job duties to make each day meaningful for our students when we are stretched so thin our students suffer the lack of empathy and understanding for those of us who are who work with students every day is utterly appalling and leads to the lack of time and resources that we need to do our jobs and give our students the education they deserve the district can begin to rectify this situation by listening to those of us who are in the buildings with students every day we have been telling you what we need for years a big part of what we need is reduced workloads more planning time and more time to collaborate with our colleagues we need more teachers guest teachers and more school-based staff in order to achieve this if we continue on this trajectory i can guarantee you that more and more teachers will leave this district and things will get worse for our students no one wants to work in an environment where they are not only unappreciated but unpaid for much of their labor thank you thank you for your comments thank you we have benjamin rodriguez there we go good evening uh members of the board my name is benjamin mendoza rodriguez m-e-n-d-o-c-a-r-o-d-r-g-z sorry about the camera this is my son joshua i just want to show him that way you guys put a face of uh what we kind of uh fill in and boarding on this i'm the proud parent of uh kids enroll at the pps dual immersion program both at bridger i want to tell you that pps can do better than what is happening now at southeast it seems that every week there's a new challenge in the school plan we met with the bournemouth members in december and we tried to make we tried to make our voice heard but it seems like no one hear us we know that change needs to happen we stand with the black and native communities we need more support and attention by pps we believe all of our communities who have been neglected by pps need to stand together and support each other what we need need is to be reunited with our community the siblings and the teachers of kellogg we compromised so all of us could benefit in some way this process you have you have doesn't take into account or debate our difference in voices and experience and leaves higher income neighborhood and wider schools without having any of this of people listen to the community listen to the families listen to the teachers and use this info for your decisions not just the numbers by flaw and idyllic analytics our lives uh are here in your hands we understand that you guys gotta take make uh some moves the proposal for e2 doesn't take into consideration consideration uh bridger into going into kellogg they're just sending them somewhere else we asked again and again that uh to be at kellogg and you guys are not hearing this um we feel distrust now by pps because uh promises have been broken again and again and again and we feel that we
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were not being hurt you guys have a southeast coalition telling you is telling you what to do but we never said none of these things we are asking not to do this as parents as uh teachers and yet you guys are moving forward with these things there are no body yet but this seems like it's a going that way you guys speaking to of uh of uh unification and uh but your actions are saying otherwise i agree at bridger that most of the overcrowder and our data school in the district but we need to figure out how to do this without creating more havoc than what it is already the kids are going through enough already as it is with code especially now with the new variant people and teachers are getting sick and kids are getting sick please consider this on on to the boring and decision of you guys doing today thank you for your consideration thank you for your comments tyler brown uh you're on mute mr brown sorry about that hello my name is tyler brown b-r-o-w-n i use he him pronouns i'm the vice president of the pta at dr martin luther king jr elementary school we've been meeting with members of the board over the past six weeks or so about relocation to harry tubman middle school and we've been sharing ideas back and forth which has been great i think we can all agree that the community engagement is crucial to finding equitable solutions that serves first and foremost to underserved communities that are typically left out of these conversations that said we haven't heard anything from pps about the community engagement since since december when they dropped a meeting on us with four days notice right before the holidays and no child care or other accommodations provided since that time any and all engagement with our school community has been facilitated by our we absolutely understand the impact the covet has had on the district every day functioning and i want to offer some grace there but the district hasn't made even the most basic effort to hear from families who aren't privileged the ptas are the pta are willing are are filling in the gaps for the district putting the labor on the burden of the community over and over i wanted to emphasize how crucial it is to speak directly with families potentially affected by moving harry time in middle school and to the end i wanted to i wanted to draw attention to an idea director lowry and director hollins shared during the intergovernmental affairs meeting last week that we feel would be very helpful their idea was to create a community working group for the board to get to solicit feedback from that would help center the voices and needs of african-american and latino families to ensure their opinions are heard loudly and clearly as this process moves forward on an accelerated timeline we believe that having a community input group that the board could consult through out the process that's up to speed on where things are and that's able to provide useful feedback quickly will be helpful to would help the board come up with solutions that's equitable and supported by the affected communities thank you thank you that concludes public comment thank you so um thank you all for your comments feel free to connect with the senior board manager roseanne powell if you have something specifically you'd like to follow up with with the board or the board office student representative is joining us a little bit later a little bit after seven superintendent would you like to go ahead to share your report this evening yes thank you good evening directors one last thought of this director scott and constance i think we're pulling up a few slides for you okay well while the impact of the pandemic the last two years has been taxing on all of us
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the last few weeks in particular have really stretched and challenged our community we see in the surge of covet cases and this omicron variant many people in our community have gotten sick or needed to [Music] quarantine themselves and this hasn't made it possible in all cases for folks to come to work folks students to come to school since our last regular meeting we've had to make some necessary decisions about transitioning a limited number of our schools into remote learning some of which started back in person yesterday our goal remains keeping a careful eye on the health and safety of our employees and students prioritizing in-person learning as much as possible i want to make sure and continue taking every opportunity at the same time to appreciate because i was a long-time para classroom teacher and principal making sure to continue to take every opportunity to appreciate our school leaders educators and the many support staff at pps for their continued adaptability and dedication to our students and their families and i have a remote that's not advancing there we go and our ability to maintain our eye on in-person learning is a direct result of our continued efforts to minimize the risk of covid19 in our schools for students and staff and so even though a number of our schools have had to transition to temporary temporary distance learning over 85 percent of our pps schools have remained in person this calendar year and we know that the transmission of covid19 depends in large part on local rates the number of people vaccinated and mitigation measures in place to prevent transmission here at pps our measures continue to include there seems to be some ambiguity about everything that we've had in place but it includes regular contact and guidance from public health experts for our health and safety decisions continuing to make accessible covid19 vaccine and boosters for students staff and families we're grateful that 98 of our staff have been fully vaccinated and that we have a high vaccination rate in multnomah county across every age group we continue implementing the state's requirement that adults and students must wear masks at all times regardless of vaccination status we continue to stockpile and have close to 100 000 k n95 masks today that we continue to replenish and make available to pps staff and students and lastly we continue to partner with oregon health authority to offer regular covid19 testing opportunities for both students and staff that include symptomatic testing weekly screening testing and free tri-weekly covid19 testing site for staff right here at the central office in addition to these mitigation measures you've heard this before but just to remind everybody we've installed more than 5500 hepa filters including in every learning space in the district and cafeteria that was a 3.9 million dollar investment we also upgraded our existing air filters in each school's mechanical systems to a merv 13 hospital standard which is a higher level of filtration and provides another layer of protection against covet 19 transmission and i know you've heard this before directors so pps has remained assertive in implementing our health and safety measures that will minimize the risk of covet 19 it will create the most controlled learning environment possible and we'll continue making necessary adjustments along the way as the ever-changing guidance also changes so that in-person learning can take place on to other topics by keeping our schools open our students have the opportunity for the fullest possible school experience and in addition to the in-person teaching and learning this has also meant that our students can engage in other activities clubs and extracurriculars it is in these spaces that we know our students are reconnecting finding joy and all the traditional school activities routines and traditions that have often been disrupted over the last couple of years as an example this weekend our pps high schools dominated the we the people high school constitutional regional competition so we're so proud that mcdaniel high school won three of the six unit awards while four pps high schools have now advanced to the state finals on february 5th
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cleveland franklin grant and lincoln high schools will be going to the state finals with the top teams heading to nationals in washington d.c and as directors know pps high school teams have won more national titles than any high school in the country since the competition started more than 30 years ago and i have a feeling that this streak will continue so congratulations to this year's constitution teams here's another example of the ways that our students are thriving last week in an annual tradition 14 of the state's best basketball teams including nine pps pil boys and girls teams put on quite the shows at franklin high school i really enjoyed watching many of these matchups and i know that for marshall haskins our athletic director staff and students playing on this day means a lot more than just basketball it's a way to honor the person in the legacy of dr king as well and i'm excited to catch a few more games this upcoming month as pil prepares to represent pps at the state championships in march and similar to our constitution teams i'm optimistic and i have a feeling that our basketball teams both the girls and the boys will do really well and bring home a state championship and other good news later on tonight's board's agenda dr renard adams our chief of research assessment and accountability and margaret calvert our regional superintendent of secondary schools in multiple pathways will join us to share more about oregon's just released graduation outcomes and here's the spoiler for pps students 84.4 percent of the class of 2021 earned a cl a high school diploma within four years an impressive result this represents a steady increase for the 12th year in a row pps students continue to graduate at a higher and increased rate than their peers in multnomah county and across the state of oregon in fact more than half of pps comprehensive high schools posted graduation rates above 90 percent including jefferson at 91 percent benson at 93 percent did you hear that director hollands okay benson in particular graduated 91 of black students and 90 of latino students from the class of 2021 so congratulations to the benson texters and principal curtis wilson there as i posted this remark last week i'm so proud of our students for their resilience and tenacity during a time when the pandemic has brought about significant disruptions to public education and their learning experience and as i shared with the broader community we attribute the positive growth in our students early earning a high school diploma at pps to the dedicated efforts of our educators staff and community partners working together towards our student success with this incremental improvement to our overall graduation rates even during a pandemic i can say as a superintendent that i'm pleased but i'm not satisfied until every one of our students is equitably supported to stay on track walks across the stage on time and has a strong post-secondary plan so we have much more work ahead of us directors and here at pps our focus has been been to build a curriculum and a learning experience that lifts up the histories the stories and the voices of our black community we know that as educators we have a responsibility to center honor and uplift the black experience in school curricula and extracurricular activities every day and we also acknowledge the importance the relevance and the origins of black history month as has been a regular occurrence our teaching and learning team has prepared and will be sharing a set of resources for our schools and educators to use in the coming month i'm going to ask dr cheryl proctor our new deputy superintendent of instruction in school communities to just say a few words and a few remarks about the support that will be provided to schools dr proctor good evening chair depass directors and superintendent guerrero as i share with you this evening in preparation of black history month schools received a list of instructional resources to instruct to enrich student learning experiences black history month is an annual celebration of achievements of african americans and serve as a time to for recognizing their central role in u.s history also known as african american
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history month the event grew out of out of negro history week the brainchild of historian noted harvard historian dr carter g woodson and other prominent african american americans the resources provided to schools were intended to help leaders to support educators in planning to think about in planning to think about centering student voice and to focus on celebrating black history culture achievements experiences and the ongoing struggle for liberation and justice and while the resources were not intended to be fully exhaustive and definitive they are designed to be a starting point for conversation and as we continue to move towards a culturally responsive instructional practice throughout our system all day every day 365 days of of the year i know that we are also working very closely with our staff specifically you know using resources like a culturally responsive teaching in the brain by dr azaretta hammond and other resources to support educators in rethinking pedagogy and practices so that we can continue to lend the black voice to the learning experiences in the classrooms every day thank you thank you thank you dr proctor uh directors in addition to the curricular resources that we're providing our educators for black history month i also we also want to thank you for unanimously approving january 31st as a professional development and educator planning day at your last board meeting and while our educators are investing this much-needed day to plan collaborate and learn together especially focus on how best to support our students at this particular time i want to share with you that some of our racial equity social justice partners sun providers and child care providers will also be making available services for students and families in fact 10 of our racial equity partners 16 sun schools and 9 special programs will provide an array of services across 23 schools and through eight off-site events so we expect our partners to have uh this menu of activities including visits to see the omsi mandela exhibit uh the lloyd center skating rink and participating in other activities at the sei center student group gatherings at roseway heights tutoring and homework clubs and many other enriching activities will be available to students we recognize that any changes to our school calendar impacts each of our families in unique ways we hope that these limited supports will help address some possible needs across our school communities on this particular day so i want to say thank you to all of our community partners once again for stepping up and for continued your continued collaboration more new talent directors as is the regular tradition here at pps i'm so pleased to announce the appointment of freddie mac as our next senior director of communications freddie who will be starting next week recently served just to give you a little bit of a sense of his unique background as deputy special assistant for public affairs to the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff in washington d.c in this previous role he served as second in charge for planning and executing all public affairs activities within the joint chiefs of staff office a long-time public servant freddie has served also in the us department of agriculture and enjoyed a successful 20-year military career including serving as an official army spokesperson so we're elated about freddie joining team pps to help design develop and implement our next district's communication strategy we believe his empathetic leadership strong public relations background and people-focused communications experience will make a great addition to the team and we can't wait for him to begin so i don't want you to just see his picture because we have him here live i believe so freddie i think is available to join us by zoom to share a few words personally and thoughts about taking on this new role here at pps lieutenant colonel i thank you for that kind introduction mr superintendent i am deeply honored and very excited to work with you the faculty the staff and the board of trustees of pps to educate and equip and encourage uh our next generation of leaders and more specifically i look forward to communicating uh and building relationships with all stakeholders through every medium available
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to support the district and the visions the mission and vision of the district so again it's my honor to join your team and i look forward to arriving and uh and getting after it thank you thank you and welcome uh mr mack i i don't know what you'd like us to call you is it lieutenant colonel or is it mr freddie works fine [Laughter] thank you and welcome freddie we look forward to meeting you in person welcome thank you all right thank you freddie we have a long to do list for you well directors you know the pps community is beautiful for all its diversity next tuesday here at pps and across the world uh we'll be celebrating and welcoming the vietnamese lunar new year on february 1st our vietnamese community marks the beginning of the year of the tiger and will host celebrations across a number of schools i want to take this opportunity to express my good wishes to everyone who celebrates and hope this new year is full of peace health and happiness i'm looking forward to being present at rose city park tomorrow morning to get a sneak preview of the performances that our students are working hard to prepare so to our community out there happy new year impressive i was actually just sounding that out myself and then on a more serious note on a more serious note as many of you know on saturday january 15th i think many of us witness the 11 hour standoff at a synagogue in texas in which the rabbi and three congregants were taken hostage unfortunately this act of terror is part of the growing climate of anti-semitism across the globe and one that is also directly impacting our students their families and our staff especially those who identify as culturally or religiously jewish i've heard directly from members of our community how vulnerable and emotionally difficult this rise of anti-semitism is having on parts of our community so i want to take this opportunity to affirm that here at portland public schools and as your superintendent i stand strong with our community and denounce this growing anti-semitic violence i continue to be disheartened by the need to make these kinds of statements on occasion as it indicates a failure of our society to see one another for our humanity so we hold our jewish community and families impacted by this growing threat and stand strong with one another to eradicate all forms of hate in our community our district and our lives are enriched and strengthened by the presence and contributions of the jewish community and as educators we will continue to be there for our students and remind them of the active role we have in creating a future their respects and brings value to each other and finally directors in closing i want to take a moment to give a special thanks to brian robertson who's retiring at the end of this month brian has helped to capture the joy the learning and excitement of our school communities for over 10 years we've often enjoyed his short video clips here in these meetings bringing to life the work and highlights of our students and school communities and we appreciate his role in making our board meetings virtually accessible to our communities and i know he's not here with us this evening but i want to wish him all the happiness and joy as he now commences his retirement so thank you brian and that ends my report thank you thank you superintendent and thank you brian uh for your many years of service um we'll now move i see student representative weinberg not to put you on the spot but are you ready to jump right into the work of the district and share your student report of course um so i actually don't have much to report just with preparing for finals and everything um but um i think recognition of the closing of the semester coming up on friday just putting it out a thanks to all the teachers district office staff principals support staff para educators that have all made the first half of this school year able to be in person for all students and also just congratulations to students who have made it through this first half of the year yay yeah yeah sorry back to business um we're now going to go through the board committee reports and i think if we just go down the line with director hollins do you have a report yes thank you trader pass so we had the facilities operations uh
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meeting last thursday wednesday one of those days um we got a report from the bond accountability committee we also got a report from the office of school modernization we got a update on the ada transition plan and that should be coming to the board at some at some point and we made the decision as far as on the committee level as far as the whitaker adams site in the um city's proposal for the safe west village and that was it excellent thank you um director broome edwards thank you chair i know we'll hear from you later in the meeting but i don't know if you have a brief update thank you jared pass so there's a number of items later on the agenda about some of the work we've been doing but i think i just want to highlight that we had a committee meeting the on friday and then we have another one tomorrow at four and i just want to like recognize that the topic of last friday's committee meeting and the topic of tomorrow's meeting is the climate response climate justice and sustainable practices policy which has been in committee i think almost a year and about four weeks ago the two the parties involved were quite far apart and i really want to acknowledge um the they're quite far apart on on paper but in spirit um i think there was a common purpose and a common agenda and just in the last four weeks i want to thank staff a lot of staff who worked hard to to find the language that brought us together on paper of what i think in our hearts in our minds we had common ground and i also think that the climate advocates who um brought that um that that set same spirit to the work um because we're very close and hopefully uh tomorrow we will be bringing out a committee and bringing it to the full board for a first reading um so i know all the committee members who have been working on it um you know we're excited to bring it forward because it's it's big and it's bold um and it was messy yeah thank you and before we move down the line i just wanted to thank director hollands for considering that um proposal that the city because we did the right thing by considering it and being really clear and um you know working through the process of um of just considering it you know it's a moral it's a moral um and community problem and um i wish the city well in their search for for spaces um director lowry do you want to um go next yes so we had a really great uh intergovernmental committee gary and i had lots of fun and uh we got to hear from our staff about the timeline for tubman and if we want to open it in fall of 27 we need to have a slight site selected by may so um the staff had some really great slides with like big red lettering to help us see like where the drop dead deadline was but they have a wonderful and robust plan to really do their due diligence on options and to incorporate community voice as you heard from mr brown uh from the king pta and so i it was very thoughtful i thought conversation that explored you know their their the best option isn't there um but to continue to talk about what can happen with this site that will be the best for our students i did the young lady who spoke tonight caused me to to think about how we can continue to be in conversation with odot about this project as it you know relates i think you know we know that there's pollution at tubman and so moving tubman i think in the long run is the better option but to think about as we look at our environmental policy and some other conversations um as we continue i know some of us we the prior board did sign a letter to odot about this expansion and has done some work so we will be raising that at the next meeting which is on the 16th of um february and continuing to do our work around how we relate to other bodies of government in our community thank you director glad to say something in response to that in the governmental committee so we actually did get um some collaboration from the um king pta they actually sent a slide deck for potential options right so the collaborations um that we was talking about is it looks like it's paying off thus far
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excellent thank you for the addition um director greene uh yes the alternative school and charter school committee we we've been doing some some some good work working behind the scenes just trying to shore up all of our all of our schools and i really want to take my hat off just use this moment really just to appreciate our staff i mean we don't say it enough we don't tell them thank you enough they're we ask a lot and they've already got a lot going on and then a new guy comes in and asks a lot again sometimes he asks it the wrong way but he's still just steady asking and they're they're the nicest people and and i just i need to i just want to take this moment my time to really um the committee is is going to go on and it's going to keep working there's more work to do but i really just wanted to take this moment to publicly um really thank the staff because without the staff doing all the hard work on the back end the stuff that nobody sees you don't you don't realize just how much is being done nobody nobody thinks about the people that are setting up the the stage for the concert they just see the concert but it took the it took the people in the back setting everything up setting up the lights setting up the smoke making sure that the mics were working making sure that all those pieces were there in order for that concert to be what it was and without those people doing what they did then the concert would have just what would it have been and so i just really want to say to the staff say to the soup say to our teams we know that you guys are are working hard we know that you've got a lot on your plate you've got a lot on your shoulders and there's a lot more heavy lifting to do and we appreciate you for doing what you do and so i just want to say thank you who carries the amps [Laughter] that was an example but you're a great roadie we appreciate it director thank you that and thank you for modeling um one of the characteristics we want to see in our graduates and that's collaborative collaboration um director khan stem did you have an um did you have a report we are on the agenda with our audit um later in the agenda yeah okay we'll wait thank you okay um i think we've got everybody um we're going to now get a report on our graduation rates and superintendent garetto uh would you like to introduce that next this next item thank you director pass i think you heard me give a little bit of a teaser on a topic we wanted to spend a little time on this evening and we know that the state of oregon just released official graduation outcomes so thankfully we have dr renard adams our chief of research assessment and accountability who's prepared a nice presentation for you to try to understand what the highlights are what some of the trends are where our work remains we're very clear about that uh we also have some featured guests this evening we'll have them introduce themselves as they come up as well so it's for you as well yes the more the merrier so glad to have our esteemed principal of jefferson high school here with us this evening congratulations on your outcomes as well dr adams take it away thank you superintendent um good evening board director student representative weinberg we are pleased to have time with you tonight to talk about our recently released graduation data i am um joining me tonight our dr cheryl proctor our deputy superintendent for instruction of school communities margaret calvert our regional superintendent for secondary schools and multiple pathways to graduation and principal allen from jefferson high school which just reached a 90 percent graduation rate so we're really excited about having him here to talk about that in addition i also believe dr heimel is virtual with us tonight in case there are some particular questions if i could have the next slide please thank you our guiding questions for tonight are on the screen before you these will serve as our guard rails for our conversation uh the team here will be happy to take questions at the end of the presentation but one of the but the questions we wanted to answer tonight are what is our graduation rate for the class of 2021 and how does it compare to the statewide
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graduation rate what are our trends in graduation rate by race over time what are our high school graduation rates and then we wanted to share with you what central supports have been put in place to support graduation success at high schools and then we wanted to have principal allen talk about what schools are doing to reach that 90 threshold because you know that's sort of a critical marker of success in terms of graduation rate so let's dive right in for the class of 2021 pps students achieved a graduation rate of 84.4 percent which is an increase compared to the prior year in class portland public schools has seen a steady increase in on-time graduation rate of its students from 2009 2010 which was the first year of the cohort graduation model all the way to the present the graduation rate has increased by nearly five percentage points in the past three years by over 10 percentage points since 2014-15 and by nearly 26 percentage points since the implementation of the cohort model this is significant and steady progress in the aggregate we will disaggregate these data and look at where our work still remains in just a few minutes there we go during the same time as the overall graduation rate has improved and specifically over the last five years pps students shown by the blue line have outpaced their peers across the state of oregon and graduation rate with oregon students all oregon students being shown by the gray line for the class of 2017 pps's graduation rate was 1.2 percentage points higher than that of the state today for the class of 2021 that difference has increased to 3.8 percentage points while we celebrate our overall success in the aggregate disaggregated graduation data reveals where we still have work to do all student groups achieved graduation rates greater than 75 percent with the exception of native students and pacific islander students who earn graduation rates of 50 and 73 respectively it should be noted that these two cohorts of students are much smaller than the other student groups so we sometimes see wild fluctuations in the changes of graduation rate year over year because when you have a smaller cohort it takes fewer students to cross or not cross to really change what that rate looks like while the overall graduation rate in pps has increased persistent gaps between student groups remain and require focused attention while three and four african american and latin next students graduated on time within four years currently there's a 13 percentage point gap between african american students and white students and a 13.5 percentage point gap in graduation between latinx students and white students moreover the largest gap is currently between our native students and white students and that gap stands at 38.5 percentage points this slide shows one year comparisons of between graduation rates between the class of 2021 and 2020. one-year comparisons reveal increases in our graduation rates for asian multiracial other ancestries and white students and decreases in graduation rates for african american and latinx students and again the large changes in graduation rates for native students and pacific islanders should be carefully and cautiously considered due to the small size of the cohort there are 26 students in the native cohort and 30 students in the pacific islander cohort compared to the much larger cohorts for the other groups of students now let's look at the 10-year change in graduation rates by race and ethnicity all student racial groups demonstrated increases in the graduation rate from 2009-2000 to present for some groups the rise in graduation rate outpaced the increases in the rate for pps as a whole multi-racial other ancestry showed the largest gains to date followed by latinx students white students and african american students on the next slide we will look at line graphs as a way to understand gap closure but what we know about glap closure is that for our students of color to catch up and close gaps their change in graduation rate needs to be the highest over time it needs to be greater than that of our white students and our asian students in order for those gaps to close this line graph shows graduation rates by race and ethnicity from 2009-2010 until the current year again here we see those large fluctuations for native and pacific islander students so please continue to interpret those rates with
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caution some gap closure is evident in these data and that progress must be continued and accelerated for black latinx native and other brown students for full gap closure to be realized now let's take a look at our student membership groups for the class of 2021 students experiencing poverty achieved a graduation rate of 78 percent while six in 10 students who were either students with disabilities or english learners graduated within four years on time lastly our talented and gifted students continue to show strong graduation achievement with a graduation rate of 96 one other very interesting data point that we're currently digging into a little bit deeper is our cte completer graduation rate our initial data show that students who completed at least two credits in a cte program of study have a graduation rate of 95 percent so we're looking into that a little bit further this slide shows high school graduation rates by each campus of note as the superintendent noted earlier over half of all of our comprehensive high schools achieved graduation rates greater than 90 percent what is also notable is the column to the far right with the text highlighted in green which shows the 10-year change in graduation rates all of our campuses and alternative programs have shown growth over the last 10 years in their graduation rate which is remarkable next dr proctor will talk about the why behind these data in terms of the central office supports that have been implemented to support schools and their graduation efforts thank you so coordinated efforts across the system have been in place to support students in credit completion and have contributed to much of these results this includes supports for credit completion at school sites funded through measure 98 portland evening and summer scholars and virtual scholars in addition 189 students graduated from our cbo's as part of the class of 2021 or as fifth year graduates as well over the last four years the high school system supported by the central office staff focused on six targeted strategies through the high school success plan the first is implementation of culturally sustaining pedagogy and curriculum second is fostering healthy and equitable school climate and culture third is preparing all students for post-secondary success and fourth is enhancing cte quality and integrating cte with core academics the fifth is systematically implementing interdisciplinary grade level teams and finally improving overall systems alignment and responsiveness we used intentional investments from the measure 98 grant to support these strategies some of the specific specific actions and supports that we provided to the high school students included funding coaching and directing and direction in creating 9th grade success teams organizing and and funding multiple credit recovery opportunities for students planning and executing expanded leap into ninth grade summer programs which is the summer bridge and opening new cte programs across the district so some of these efforts really as you see that is listed here really contributed to to the overall numbers that you see here as well and finally you know we want to talk about how we focus on target targeting the chronically absent students and providing individualized post-secondary planning on focal students and expanding the advanced course opportunities like dual credit and ap course work throughout the district and now we will hear from principal allen of jefferson high school whose students achieved the graduation rate of over 90 percent for the first time principal allen is completing his 14th year as an administrator at jefferson thank you dr proctor i think i was there when he first started so i when i was at whitaker uh i was one of the kids in sei and he was one of the counselors there absolutely no no
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nice young man nice thing i'm sure you have some stories goodness chairperson the past directors superintendent guerrero it's my pleasure to speak to you this evening just share a few notes that i jotted down so our growth that jefferson is due to many factors including our focal student work our robust partnerships with sci latino network our in-house credit recovery work like after school tutorial saturday school and high expectations for all students such as our middle college model and biotech health science program as well as our strong and dedicated teachers and support staff additionally we extend all of our high expectations to other areas that engage our students athletically the arts extracurricular activities and this also supported by consistency in our school leadership and faculty ms calvert and i've been to jefferson high school it's my 14th miss calvary was with me for 13 years and so yes that's been the grind that we've been we've been doing so that's part of it next slide at jefferson of course like super like superintendent guerrero was talking we're always pushing for 100 an achievement for all students and we won't give up until we meet that goal 100 has kind of been the language that we've been talking about next slide i want to linger here yeah so we can see that steady progress with those different student groups of students over time yes this is a function of principals and teachers and counselors knowing students by name and need and when you do that and you focus in and you provide those those differential supports you reach and see the types of graduation success that principal allen is here to share with us and you know when i was a teacher a long time ago back at jefferson high school 84 through 88. um so when i talked yes when i talked to the staff today just about just celebrating our rates you know i can't ever remember 90 being uh achieved at jefferson high school ever since i've been and i've been in portland for 42 years so we're very excited about that but if you see 93 of our black students and you know obviously all means all but that's huge for us too we're really excited about that so man that's that's good news and then just lastly you know we believe that all of our students can achieve and in our middle college model and this slide shows that this belief is 100 of our students earning a jefferson middle college diploma with 12 or more pcc credits is close to being realized so that's just 12 but actually last year two of our students earned a middle college diploma high school diploma and an associate's degree on top of you know getting so that's uh your work we've been doing and just uh 2020 uh as far as college credits which you know again we've been in this pandemic for a little less time and uh so we had 3 500 students 3 500 credits that were earned by uh 2020 class and 5 000 credits college credits earned by 2021 class so those kids were just i mean they were going for it so you know it's it's all of that work that we've been doing over the years that's made a difference so i'll be glad to entertain any questions you guys might have but i'll give turn it back over to dr proctor and dr adams this is um this is actually the conclusion of our presentation um so it's timely we'll now take any questions you might have and i just want to thank you principal allen with everything that's going on in the school buildings and how stretched we know staff and students are at the moment for taking time to be with us tonight thank you so much for being here um and that was very encouraging um to see particularly in your building the fruits of that all of this labor over the years um i have one question that's not even that important um would other board directors have questions of what what we've just heard i i just want to make that comment that i think when we see graduation rates go up the sort of backlash to that as well you know they're just passing kids through but one of the things i really appreciate that you know in your conversa comments tonight and continuously and what pps is striving for is that robust academic experience and those high expectations for our students and that this is about really preparing our students for what superintendent said that successful post-secondary path and
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i really see that that this these graduation rates are a celebration of the ability and success of our students to live into that graduate portrait and so thank you all for and margaret i know this has been a fun year for you too of helping to make that happen and um you know holding our students to the all of our students knowing that they can be successful knowing that they can perform at high academic rigor and really helping them push the envelope of what maybe they even thought was possible for themselves i had a couple of comments um one is dr adams you referred to uh the team at jefferson knowing all of their students by name and by need i think that we know that this is the key to uh raising achievement and eliminating our our gaps through every level but i think it's interesting to note that this kind of differentiated attention and personal attention and deep curiosity and and understanding of students individual learning needs was even more important in the pandemic and in the pivot to remote learning because maybe you can get away with one-size-fits-all a little easier when everyone's in the same room together um but it just doesn't didn't work at all in remote learning and yet our students were still able to be successful i think because of those relationships so i just wanted to call that out and then the other thing i wanted to call out is um these were our four-year graduation rates but we also have some pretty stunning statistics for our five-year graduation rates and superintendent in your remarks i got my hackles up a little bit because you said we won't be satisfied until we see every student graduate in four years which yes i believe is a laudable goal but i'm also so proud of our students who graduate in five years and those are impressive statistics this year um because many of those students come back from being completely disconnected for education and um as dr green as uh as director green was talking about before these are many of these are our students in our alternative settings and um we they came back and they got connected and a lot of times they got connected through cte or other things that really spoke to them in a relevant way about what they wanted for their lives so i want to celebrate those those kids too and just um thank you principal allen for joining us and uh i've loved in the past years celebrating success at jefferson high school on these as this trajectory has uh has risen and risen and risen so it's uh i feel very proud to be associated with this work thank you i guess my question is um you know considering the success at jefferson um and knowing all the different inputs the middle college program the knowing every student by name and need having a higher number of african-american teachers what is it that we can replicate in other buildings because of the success it's like it's successive it's working at jefferson could it work in other places i'm wondering about you know our other school communities you know each one is different has its unique characteristics but what is it from jefferson which which i love so much and it's my neighborhood high school and a lot of family history there what can we take from from that that excellence and transfer to other buildings um so we can see that success that's a question for everybody that's a great question because there there's a good practice here yeah something to learn from there's a proof point and i'm sure principal allen and team will will talk about they're not operating in a vacuum our high school team there's a high school success plan there's elements in there that you would find as features across all of our campuses but i'll let you elaborate okay well you know i would just add a chairperson to past that i think the one of the things that's been most important is just have consistency so miss calvert and i we first came together at jefferson high school we kind of made a pact to each other and we just said okay um well whoever goes for the principal job we're going to stick together because we kind of knew where jefferson was and we was like oh we're gonna stick together and get the ship on the right track and make sure so consistency and leadership and then with her and i were able to uh hire staff members who had the same philosophy that we had who wanted to be there who love working with kids and and so i think that's definitely part of it relationships good partnerships with uh with our partners with like sei and and latino network those
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those that's important but that's that's pretty much the core yeah it looks like um the the hiring piece is really interesting because you can hire for emotional intelligence or just hard skill and i think that your success your track record over the years has proven that you've been very intentional about who you've brought into the building and um using this the theory of action that you've just um spelled out to us and um yeah i just i would love to see the things that are working those elements of this success that are working employed in other places differentiated to the school communities that are served in those other places good evening i just have um one one uh small bit to add to this conversation as well and i think there's a lot about uh collective action and efficacy and so um i think one of the pieces that we've been able to see grow and be sustained at jefferson is an understanding that every person that is in the building is responsible for the students that are there so ricky um excuse me principal allen mentioned uh focal student work and this is very essential to how we approach working with students so everyone in the building identifies students that we know have great potential and um and then become feel very responsible for their success so that happens for every every staff member so this is this is part of the work that we do we identify um students that uh that we we know are you know in danger of finding real uh dramatic success and then how do are we going to support them to do that so i think there's some real intentionality over the years um in doing that and it's become embedded in the culture of the of the school and the staff um that is something that we do regularly so right now i'll just add to that ms governor we intentionally pick kids of color we want our secretaries our custodians our cafeteria workers to have focal students that they know that they want to work with who they got relationships with and we track and we we asked them to learn above the line information about those students and below the line information about those students so that's those are some of the strategies that we use and we've been doing that since we initially started that courageous conversation work and with those focal students that's fantastic i i just remember my i went to mlc and graduated from there and when the lunch lady from the 70s got ill our it was a multi-age um we we kept her we we supported her for the last two years financially and every other way you get that relationship and it's really meaningful for kids especially for those that don't get recognized by maybe a professor or a teacher so a school community director passed chair to pass with high expectations critical first piece and you heard some of the more systemic pieces around our high school success plan some of the ways we've made strategic investments dr proctor listed some of those out but we also have dr hamel here with us this evening was wondering if you wanted to add in how some of the specific targeted support uh to our high school campuses have have also been part of part of the ingredients hi thanks so much superintendent and again congratulations principal allen and happy to be here chair to pass and board members i would just add that i think our schools have been really intentional about making engaging programs for students so increasing the different variety of advanced coursework so at jefferson that shows up as the middle college and i think across our system we have added really exciting advanced courses for students to take that that keep them engaged in school as well as a really robust cte programming that shows students the application of the knowledge and so i i would just add some really exciting programming additions would also be that piece do we have a journalism a cte there because at one time that um television station was like the biggest one on the west coast i think maybe there's a television station but is that is that a cte option currently not anymore but we are hoping to bring that back we're hoping to bring that back but we we're currently lost that teacher to retirement and um so we're looking to try to pull that back together
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uh church have a question first of all i want to congratulate mr allen i know it's been a long road over a jeff um you know growing up here and hearing all the the doubts and all the naysayers about jeff and the community that surrounds jeff so i'm gonna definitely congratulate you on on the success um it is well overdue and and i appreciate you for for being there and leading that charge thank you but i do have a question it's not for mr allen um so when i talked to uh dr adams about this a little earlier um i want to know like what's the relationship between proficiency and our graduation rate um because you know i know the last couple months we've heard a lot of information about our proficiency ratings especially with our black and brown kids so i just want to know what is that relationship with that and does that mean that each kid who graduates is proficient in those um standards our graduation standards so uh in terms of um looking at the graduation requirements for the state of oregon and looking at the three-tier approach that is uh typically uh taken which looks at course completion credit completion there is a level of proficiency if you will but a level of requirements that are applied to each course that a student has to successfully attain in order to earn the credit and through the accumulation of a number of credits that is one tier of how they're able to measure towards graduation also in the state we looked at essential skills but for the past two years since the pandemic the essential skills component had been waived the essential skills is one that could be achieved through the smarter balance the the assessment that's back and also through other measures as well there are localized assessments by which some students will be able to demonstrate some essential skills but when it comes to the measure that talks specifically about demonstrated profession proficiency uh for example in ela and math you know with the waivers that happened over the past couple of years that had not been necessarily a part of the graduation requirements now when we talk about relationship thinking about the current cohort of graduates that we're looking at this data for this cohort of students prior to the pandemic had you know over 10 years of schooling and grounded experiences in learning and building skill and it's very different than when we look at for example our recent map data that was presented to you and if we look at the eighth grade students for example that is represented in that map data although students had uh before the pandemic like you know deeply you know we may have seen some learning loss but you know they had a shorter runway if you will uh to strengthen skill development with six years uh because by the time the pandemic uh it went into effect they were probably in sixth grade whereas we're looking at this particular graduation cohort who who more than likely had a runway of 10 you know being in 10th grade by the time we started to see some of those effects there but um you know really looking at how we are really looking at data sets and making comparisons it really is by cohort by cohort and then there are different factors on that kind of way in to how um you know the graduation is calculated especially with some of the waivers and things that occur during the time of the pandemic but in terms of proficiency part of the proficiency that is required for graduation is a course proficiency and credit attainment with a particular rigor of expectation for each course that is required for graduation so when you say credit attainment are you talking about display like the report card grades or are you talking about some other yeah of course yeah there's there are a number of courses and credits that have to be accumulated to um to uh meet satisfactory but a student could graduate with straight d's correct like if they got a d in every single subject they could still graduate um you know i'm gonna pass that question too so i think that that's an important part of director hollands as we talk about that that i think the needle we're trying to move is right to increase so someone can graduate and still not be proficient
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that is that is by the grades um yes but then there's also it depends on what you're describing so there's also again the essential skills part and and uh part of what was in the calculation for the graduation requirement from what i understand in the state of oregon was the essential skills um and that had that in itself had been waived now when it comes to um you know the the rigor and what is required to actually pass a class um you know yes there are students who are able to pass a class with a d but but it's still if they are able to meet the combined requirements prescribed by the state then they are able to earn a high school diploma one of these yeah so i think um one of the other pieces that uh i think is it was part of the board goals too is around measures of college readiness right and so when we look at that that is around um and i have to i'm doing this i'm looking at dr himel who knows this off of the dome um but i think that it's you know a question of uh ct course completion advanced course work completion so these indicators are the pieces that you're getting at is like not only are you meeting the graduation requirements but how are you demonstrating your knowledge in in in these advanced courses so some of the pieces that we are seeing um some of the successes that we're seeing across the system are uh places where it's like uh ib for all so like there's a sophomore human geography class that is offered um either for a it's actually an ap class excuse me that's not an um an ib class but so there are these that then provide some of the external um validators and of um rigor as well and so what you see i think this is the part that um i'm going to go back to what mr allen shared is that one of the things to recognize is that not only did students meet graduation requirements at jefferson in particular but they also earned five thousand two hundred or five over five thousand college credits so this is a way of also demonstrating proficiency right of like not only meeting the standards that we see laid out in our courses but also that they're they're they're showing and demonstrating understanding in advance and excuse me advanced coursework as well and this is why our board goal is not high school graduation right this is why we set our board goal as having you know that that next readiness and we also recognize that for some students like all students are um able to achieve greatness some students their greatness is in cte their greatness is in by literacy their greatness is in art their greatness is in math and so we want to have pathways to recognize those skill sets and the greatness of each individual student which is why the board goal is around that showing demonstrated proficiency in a pathway that gets them ready for post-secondary life but graduation rates are wonderful and you know i think your question about proficiency those numbers we saw of like less than five percent of our black boys um are on track for math in fifth grade which you know that being on track for math in fifth grade is a huge indicator of your success in um more advanced math and so you know we cannot expect if that's the case in you know fifth grade how are we getting them you know to the high school diploma well there's some some pieces to that that we i think you know we are seeing growth we are seeing increased rigor we're seeing um really good news and we have to still keep our eye on the prize which is making sure our students are growing making sure they're attaining the things that we know they can attain and having high expectations for their academic success i'm glad you brought that up because so when i look back at the oregon department of education assessment piece and i'm assuming this is 2017-18 class that's now graduated in 2021 you know when i look at not only looked at the math but i looked at the language and the science scores as well and when i look at uh black boys in you know eighth grade which will be that next year they would have went to high school at 12.3 but then in language and science it would piece those same low per um those same low um proficiency rates um and what dr adams was talking about back in december where he was as he was explaining the different numbers how they would get at say eighth grade but they'd be reading that fifth grade level right i just i'm just trying to see how did that gap or how did that what closes at that point from them in the eighth grade being able to read that fifth grade level and then by the time they get to 12th grade they're proficient enough to graduate i just don't understand that connection so is perfect proficiency
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i think that's one of the questions about like what is proficiency and is it 12th grade level or what is the standard for being proficient i mean 62 of americans read um that's the wrong number but the vast majority of americans read at a fifth grade reading level or below like that's that's kind of the level of american sort of uh ability at this point so what what does proficiency look like in math and reading for the high school student well i think in research we would always say proficiency as measured by right and so then it depends how you want to measure it and so one of the ways we measure proficiency k8 is through either s back or our map assessments when we do those graduation is a culmination of students demonstrating their proficiency via coursework with their teachers who do in my opinion a yeoman's job differentiating instruction and meeting students where they are and of course there are we know there are students that did not graduate on time and we can certainly my team and i can certainly look into those students and see what their actual last proficiency score was to sort of understand that but um it would really depend on how we're measuring it it's like your heart rate versus your pulse versus your blood pressure all those things are important they're all three um slightly different measures of um what's going on with your heart and i would ask that we think about graduation as a different marker of success than we think about uh an achievement test score because someone can be there are some instances where i've had students who were just terrible test takers you know no matter what they showed me in class on the unit test they just bombed all the time and i had students that could um sometimes not be the most attentive engaged students and do well on the exams and so you have to wonder what's going on with that but i think it's all about knowing each student by name and need and providing he she are they what they really need that enables high schools to do that work of closing some of those gaps that enable students to then be successful in their coursework and graduate on time and may i um did you did you get your question answered because i was curious i think okay yeah and as i as we look at the graduation rates and we so and we celebrate um what we're seeing in those rates today uh just like superintendent guerrero says there's still work to be done and it's full at full acknowledgement that a we need to get to a hundred percent and um b we need to also better define uh exactly what our grade level expectation is for high school curriculum and for the instruction that we're providing to students even at the high school level um so so the instructional framework that we are in the process of developing is something that's going to be addressed for grades k through 12 and then you will see a better definition of how we can better define exactly what that grade level expectation is at the high school level in terms of rigor of instruction and how we could best meet it so to give you an example one of the trainings that i've done over the years is um you know especially for my high schools i used to supervise uh like margaret a a cohort of of high schools and i used to say to the principals what is a a what is a b and what is a c and if we looked at the state assessment and a student and i looked at proficient what i would break down in the data is we would look at the proficiency rate of students in english 10th grade english for example and then we would compare it to student grades in that same 10 uh 10th grade um english course and what we would see is yes what what i hear you're getting to the heart of is that there's perhaps a gap in the definition right so what is the a does a equal proficiency or above you know um does is c a c should equal you know what we see in the in the measures of proficiency what that really takes is a standard aligned curriculum standards aligned instruction that really can then bridge the gap um in what we're seeing within the data so for example if you're looking at previous years aspect data and if if there has not been a practice of aligning what we're teaching to the same skills and standards that are actually assessed by the s back then you're going to see this mismatch in results and i think that's what you're seeing um director hollins and that is part of the work of the academic office to ensure that we're bridging some of that so thank you for that um but another
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question is so being i know this predates you um so before the waiver happened how do we measure math and reading proficiencies and how it was aligned with the s back before the waivers came yeah so there's um when we looked at the essential skills there are a number of ways that students are able to demonstrate um proficiency on the essential skills so they um it was students were asked to demonstrate in reading writing and mathematics and that could be done in a number of ways some were through nationally norm tests like the psat the sat the act which we offer to um our uh where in the past we offered to uh our sophomores the psat and our juniors the act in addition there is the smarter balance assessment that's another way to do it and then there's uh local performance assessments that could be done on site that would address the specific skills so students had a variety of ways that they could demonstrate that proficiency that then would support them meeting the graduation requirements i think the other piece too that when we talk about to your point about is it earning credits or is it demonstrating understanding one of the things that you also need to attend to is a grade point average right which is a cumulative measure of student performance over time right so it's another indicator that we can look at and it's one of the pieces that we uh do it's been some of the work that we've done with our ninth grade success teams and uh is looking at that relationship and where our students what are the indicators at a freshman year that if your gpa is at such a level it's it's a combination of credit attainment and grade point average so those are a couple of ways that we assess it but the in the past and then previous years for a demonstration of essential skills it was a variety of measures and and means that students had to demonstrate it the benchmark year in oregon as uh the junior year um so that would be that you do it prior to graduation but the benchmark here is in the junior year so those kids who graduated in 20 would have done their those assessments that benchmark year in 2019 that's correct okay so great so the graduation rates we're seeing those kids had that opportunity to do the uh those they had their first opportunity they didn't have i know we offer students another chance yeah so okay they have they have it multiple in any given um cohort there's multiple opportunities starting as early as the uh sophomore year through the senior year and uh the waiver uh the essential skills were waived during the pandemic so i and um for both the class of 2020 and the class of 2021. director brent edwards said you have a comment or question i have both um at first i want to thank director hollins for raising the question about proficiency and i think the answers demonstrate um that it's more complex than just um grades um but it's also really an important question because i think we all want that pps diploma really to mean something um and i i think um just in the context of the pandemic the early data we saw is that you know those students who went from seventh grade right into that time they knew they were in school they were in high school is and the impact that you know has on their learning and their their gpa and like just that that foundational base um and so i think you know when we look at the great work that's happening to think that we've got some uh whole court cohort of students who need special care and what do we need to do to help them um through that because um we want to continue all that good work um but i also really want to thank that continued pressure like dig deeper and into the numbers um about how we help our students not just graduate but also be ready for their next steps um i do have some questions about some of the alternative schools but before i do that i want to just really acknowledge um all the different pieces that were involved in making that happen so if voters hadn't passed out measure 98 or the student success act wasn't in place we wouldn't have the the funds to provide a lot of those supports and then when i look at just what school staff are doing in the building um and you know i'm glad that um princeville and you brought up consistency of leadership because when i was on the board before it was right after jefferson had been reconstituted
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and there had been a whole series of principles had rotated through there and i think those numbers and the results really show what the great things that happen when you have strong caring consistent leadership in a building that both principal calvert and principal allen have demonstrated over the years so i you know i i hope that's a lesson that as a district we look at the importance of what that means to a school community to have that in place over a sustained period of time and then the last piece is um you know there was a list on the slide of all the things that helped made that happen but i think the thing that's really hard to capture that when i went to meet with um a group of seniors at jefferson and i think it was the spring of 2018 um to talk to them before their graduation about what made what made the yeah just an informal focus group or just reading about like you know as they were as they were getting ready to leave and they could be super candid which they were about like what made the difference for them to graduate and be ready to sort of take their next step and you know all the students spoke about the relationships so we all know that a you know rigorous curriculum is super important and you know rich variety of classes but really what they spoke to is the relationships and the relationships with teachers with sei with their mentors other community-based partners um i mean they talked about the principles and like how often does that happen i mean they really the students really felt cared for by the school community and that was really what the thing that they identified as the thing that made the difference for them so i don't want that to really be missed because those relationships are so fundamental so thank you for the consistent leadership and i know lots of other high school teams and the feeder programs are doing great work as well and we're lucky to have strong administrative teams at the high schools um i since a lot of questions have been asked and i think director holland you hit some questions i had i was wondering i want to ask just about a little bit different lane is this was data about our comprehensive high schools and the question i had about the cohorts is if you were a freshman say at cleveland and you ended up moving to one of our alternative programs are you still in the cleveland cohort if you started there your freshman year or where but and you graduated say you went to um alliance or one of or rosemary anderson high school how are those accounted for and um i'm just in some ways curious like for for uh i mean those are all our students as director constant pointed out that those are a lot of our completers that really show the grit and resilience to get over the finish line where do those students show up in either the cohorts or the comprehensives or in the data so um two there are two pieces to it so what you're describing is uh what do we consider as district alternatives that are accountable schools so that's the language sort of of the technical language of the state right so alliance is an alternative school that is within district and that's an accountable school so if students transfer to alliance then that's alliance has its own graduation rate um similar with mlc so um if however a student i'm sorry just like if that's if they start an alliance or if they said go where they finish it's where they finish so if i'm a student that starts at um jefferson and transfers to alliance i lead the jefferson cohort and go into the alliance cohort okay so so what does it count as jefferson i'm sorry i'm just it doesn't count it just so they're not even part of the cohort though they they leave the cohort and they go to the alliance cope and that would be true like if you were at cleveland and you transferred to iw wells yes you would count at the wells cohort not at the cleveland that's right yeah and what that points out is the very necessary work that school leaders and teams have to do monitoring all four cohorts at once because kids are constantly entering and leaving different cohorts and you have to keep track of where they go and where they're coming from in order to one maintain consistency in their educational offerings but two to make sure you're being held accountable for the kids that you actually graduate so for the schools the other piece that you're asking was like the contract at
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alternative schools so schools like uh pyc or mount scott or those schools what ends up happening is they remain in so they like would so if a student leaves not going to go back to saying you start at jefferson you go to the uh to poic you can and you finish at poic you still count in the jefferson numbers right so that's the difference between what an accountable school um how that that shows up or how if you move to what are called the contracted alternative schools so part of what i think um uh c area senior director karina wolff and her team will be sharing at the next sort of charter and alternative school is what is that impact overall on on portland's graduation rate so she'll she'll surface what that looks like and they'll dig into those specific numbers at that time but as we mentioned i think dr proctor mentioned it um what we saw this year from the contracted alternatives for the contribution to four-year graduation rates and five-year graduation rates there were 189 students that could that finished at those contracted alternative schools that then show up as a benefit in our pps numbers so pps gets the benefit if they graduate but if if they if they don't where do they show up and so if i if i go into my math language right so it's a fraction they'll show up in the denominators as the cohort and that they graduate then they end up in the numerator and the denominator so that will be a help right if they end up um not graduating from that school then they still count as the in the in um in the denominator so they will it as they move they say and it once the excuse me if they go into one of the contracted alternative schools they stay in the schools cohort and they regardless and then whatever the outcome is that still gets reported back to that school's cohort margaret that was some i'd like to commend you on that very elegant geeking out there we can just take a moment to appreciate that you are all in fact educators and even i could follow it and i always appreciate math terminology because it just seems like a language i understand like i was like oh my gosh numerator yes makes it makes all the sense in the world now so um and this is maybe just like how i view things but it would be helpful to get it like all together so we because so all of our our students and some of those are obviously the some of the most marginalized students just to fully understand the full picture while celebrating the great successes that we're having but also like where do we need to provide more supports um i had also one question about because the data when i was looking at it um around native students the numbers i've seen were higher understanding that students in the pps indian education program have much higher at graduation rate than the 50 percent that you had up here so i'm just curious and maybe that's in that other data set that we're going to going to see um i would probably have to defer to ms calvert on that so i do um i do have a little bit of information about that um so and i want to thank um again area senior director karina wolf who is who has worked tirelessly to support our native students along with area student director lorna fastbuffel of course what we see is that students that are enrolled in indian education like our pps indian education program had a 77 percent four four-year graduation rate up from 27 percent um and and higher than the district-wide so the students that are participating in the indian ed uh program um within that within our own districts are we're seeing dramatically different results for their graduation rates than students that are not say it again it's at 27 uh sorry it's up 27 so it's the overall the uh it's 50 for native students across and in the the students who participate in the indian ed program graduated at 77 so it's a 27 increase great question i'm sorry just um and i don't need this right now but the cohort numbers for um the native hawaiian pacific islanders and the um native american students looked like that just the cohort numbers were so small to begin with and that seems like 26 and 30 that's those are the that's the size of the cohort in our in our entire district or is that
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i'm sorry that's the quotient again so the it said the cohort size and maybe i'm reading the data wrong but the cohort size of native american students was 26 26 and the pacific islanders and native hawaiian it's only 30. so that's that's the total size of the cohort yes yes and remember they also explained that the size that n equals will skew the data one student could make a difference in the data either way yeah and i wonder if also there's like people students identifying as multi-racial it just seems way smaller than my understanding of those school communities and mpps it's a great question i think i mean just general trends overall we've seen that students identify more and multiracially than they have in the past so i think that is true and so we're seeing that the multiracial categories are larger than they have been in the past okay thank you as of the 2010 census we started to see there was a category added where you could identify as more than one race i i just have one question one table three is those numbers folded into table two as well i didn't i'm sorry i didn't know director on table three are those numbers folded into table two so we talk about uh economic disadvantage especially are those numbers folding into table two are those separate numbers say that one more time i'm sorry you're looking at the report now so i needed to get to my copy page three you have table three um cohort graduation and completion rates and are those numbers folded into table two are those numbers standard long numbers those are folded into our overall rates because i can be african-american and talented and gifted i could be white and economically disadvantaged so these are just different ways of looking at the students in the different reportable ways we're accountable for reporting the data okay i really appreciate this conversation and i think it's been so helpful to really dive in but i'm looking at our agenda and wondering if some of this can be follow-up conversations that we have through email to clarify some of these data points and if we can thank you very much yes we do need to move on we're past our time and we're conscious of um all of us being here including staff but i want to recognize that one of the things we talked about our retreat was talking more about student achievement and and the work so like i really appreciate the the deep dive versus just a cursory presentation um an opportunity to talk about it in a way deeper way absolutely so we're doing both we're getting grace being respectful of everybody in the room recognizing the conditions we're working under and taking a deep dive on we can do both i'm also i'm just conscious of time and if if you have follow-up is there is there one particular place you can email me and i will if it's not a question i can readily answer i'll lean on the team and we'll get answers and responses to you so thank you and thank you for your presentation and your your patience everyone in the room and um that was really the questions were great i really appreciate director holland and director brem edwards questions and everyone's comments um we're going to move now on to um thank you principal allen on a school night thank you church so we're going to have the first reading of policy revisions director broome edwards would you like to introduce the proposed policy rescissions yes um so tonight we have uh two first uh we have three first readings um i'm i'm sorry uh now we have one first reading no i'm sorry two first readings um that the policy committee uh considered the other day and um are unanimously recommended that the full board um have them introduced and put them out for public comment and the first one is policy 1.80.020 the non-discrimination anti-harassment policy and house bill 2935 requires school districts to have policies against discrimination and specifically related to hair and hairstyles and so if you look at the policy draft we have added a paragraph to our policy that um aligns with this new state law and the paragraph reads race includes physical characteristics that are
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historically associated with race including but not limited to natural hair hair texture hair type and protective hairstyles a hairstyle hair color or manner of wearing hair that includes but is not limited to braids regardless of whether braids are created with extensions or styled with adornments locks and twists so it's inclusive language does that include jewelry um so this is a statutory language from the legislature this is a secretary language from the legislature that um we'll include in our policy excellent um so that's the first one again that was unanimously recommended for first reading by the committee and then second kind of appropriate for the conversation we just had there is a board policy relating to graduation requirements and the um it's policy 4.20.042 and again this is another um two pieces of legislation um made changes to the grad to the diploma requirements uh the first one was house bill 2056 which removes english from english language arts and it allows a student to meet language arts graduation requirements in a language other than english and then second it amends world language the world languages definition in addition senate bill 513 added a half a credit for civics requirements to the graduation requirement as a part of a social science requirement i think some of the students that superintendent guerrero was referring to earlier tonight that participate in the constitution team are well on their way of earning at least that half half a credit so what we've done is went into the board policy on the diploma requirements and made adjustments to align with the statute so both of those policies will now be posted on the board website and the public comment period is a minimum of 21 days contact information for public comment will be posted with the policy and if there's not substantial changes to either of those through the public comment period or in the policy committee the board would expect to have a second reading or adoption of the policy at the february 22nd meeting thank you um we'll next consider the second reading of the are we there yet i'm sorry i blanked out for just a moment um the second reading of the workplace harassment policy director brem edwards will you please introduce that policy before i ask for a motion thank you chair to pass this this was another policy that the policy committee recommended um to have a first reading on it there has not been any public comment during the public comment period essentially that what the summary of what this change to an existing policy does is the legislature made some revisions to statutes related to employment and required workplace policies to address unlawful conduct constituting discrimination in the workplace and to provide protections against workplace harassment and also added definitions related to definitions relating to gender identity so madam chair i would do i have emotions i'd like to make a motion if we're making a motion that we accept this or whatever we gotta do we're getting to be such a team that you're anticipating what i'm gonna say um that's always a good sign do i have a motion and a second to adopt resolution six four two nine it's the resolution to adopt exactly yeah i already made i made that revised workplace harassment policy five point one zero point zero six zero p um director green moose director hall in seconds uh the adoption of resolution six four two nine is there any board discussion and is there any public comment no seeing as there is none the board will now vote on resolution 6429 resolution to adopt revised workplace harassment policy 5.10 p all in favor please indicate by saying yes yes yes all opposed please indicate by saying no are there any abstentions resolution 6429 is approved by a vote of 7-0 with student representative weinberg unofficially voting yes thank you
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shall i keep going yes we'll go for the second reading next we'll consider the second reading two policy rescissions director broome edwards will you please um introduce the two proposed rescissions before i ask for a motion thank you chair to pass um and this first one is really in honor of director scott because i think if you read it the first one policy that we're we the policy committee recommended rescinding or deleting is a policy related to definitions it was adopted in 1971 and amended in 2002. it has such insightful definitions of portland public schools board members and the school board but clearly not something we need to have in a policy manual so that's the first policy that we're recommending rescinding the second is policy 2.40.010 um teacher membership on committee again this was something a policy that was adopted in 71 and amended in 2002 and this is actually a long-standing practice in the district and we don't need a policy to tell us who should be included in committees so those were both recommended by the policy committee there's been a 21 day comment period and no public comment director greene thank you chair to pass i'd like to make a motion a second do i have a motion in a second i do director green moves director hall in seconds the uh um the adoption of resolution 6430 is there any board discussion and ms bradshaw is there any public comment no the board will now vote on resolution 6430 the resolution to rescind board policies 1.0 1.10.02 p definitions and 2.40.010 p teacher membership on committees all in favor please indicate by saying yes yes yes all opposed please indicate by saying no and are there any abstentions resolution 6430 is approved by a vote of 7-0 with student representative weinberg voting yes thank you we're now going to go through the resolution to add an audit on um esl english as second language programs to the board's audit plan director khan stem would you like to introduce this item i would i would be happy to so the um audit committee is bringing forward just this one audit um for our new audit plan basically we're kind of syncing our cycle to get back in compliance the board calls which calls for bringing forward a slate of uh adopted audits uh right at the time to coincide with our fiscal year so we've sort of been out of sync with that we've been more tied to a school year so we still have two audits from our audit plan that was approved by the board last year that have not been completed and really have hardly been undertaken yet so those are still on our plates that is the hardship transfer audit and the associated student body funds audit um so our team is hard at work on those so we're just bringing forward at this time one audit to round out uh the slate for this year and then we'll be back at it uh in the summer in july to discuss what we want to see on um for our uh internal performance auditors uh next year so what you have here as you can see in your materials is to approve an audit plan that just has one audit which is looking at our english as a second wish grams and the language here is to determine whether the district is compliant with obligations under title vi of the civil rights act of 1964 which states public schools must take affirmative steps to ensure that students with limited english english proficiency can meaningfully participate in their educational programs and services so i think most of you probably share my sentiment that um what we're striving for is simply not compliance for our english language learners complexity but success personal success for all of our english language learners so this will um give us an opportunity to take a deep dive and look at our program offerings and our outcomes for our english language learners which personally i think is long overdue um we know that our english language learners in this district are not seeing the success that they should and they're not something of english as a second language programming into the general
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education setting um with the speed that um they should be i think it's safe to say so i'm happy to take any questions um i i feel really strongly that this is a personal this is a uh important audit and i appreciate the support from the rest of the audit committee and bringing this forward and do we have any questions directors do we have any questions no i'm also really personally vested in seeing the outcome of this audit it's a issue that's really important to me having attended school where it wasn't in my first language and also just um really supportive of seeing you know these students that come to our district be um successful as they can be um so thank you for sharing that with us director khan stem do i have a motion and a second to adopt resolution 6428 resolution to approve the proposed internal performance audit plan that would be of the esl programs i make the motion exactly director green moves director constance action [Laughter] you're too slow we'll we'll put you down for constant and holland's um both second it so everybody gets their name on a piece of paper is there any board discussion and ms bradshaw is there any public comment no the board will now vote on resolution 6428 the resolution to approve the proposed internal performance audit plan um all those in favor please indicate by saying yes yes yes yes all those opposed please indicate by saying no and aren't there any abstentions resolution 6428 is approved by a vote of seven to zero with student representative weinberg voting yes yes great and superintendent i just wanted to say um thank you because the staff my understanding is that the staff has been not only accommodating to our internal performance auditor on all the audits but particularly in um beginning to think about and scope out this audit um but i think it's safe to say they've been enthusiastic that this is an area where we um need to take all kinds of different deep dives and have different perspectives on what's working and what's not working so thanks to your staff for um helping help in there well this is an important area for us to focus on so we welcome it excellent we'll now move to the amendment of the fiscal year 20 20 21 22 budget for school district number one j multnomah county oregon superintendent superintendent guerrero would you please introduce this next item i'll gladly introduce our cfo alberto delgadillo who is here live and in person thank you thank you hopefully everyone's doing well this evening exciting talk about a budget amendment right this is this is what it's all about now i'm just kidding that shouldn't be amazing and a budget amendment revenues it's always fun i was going to highlight the amazing work that's been happening at jefferson with all our high schools and dr bernard and dr proctor talked about right that's that's where it happens that that that is exactly what we're all here for um and takes money to buy lando and so that's why i'm here uh really um opportunity to present to you all the resolution to amend the current budget and during the course of the year there's transactions that transpire there's a budget that gets adopted and throughout the year changes happen whether it's additional revenues or additional expenditures or just shifting between accounts and so it's a routine and common process to come forth to the board and submit an amendment to the budget and sometimes there may be a second amendment or a third amendment but this is our first amendment or amendment number one and so with with this proposed amendment our goal is to align our appropriations and expenditures and resources based on what's transpired thus far and in addition to that to uh follow oregon local budget law which allows us to to do this and there are specific guidelines in how we do this uh so i i want to just kind of give a voice over over the memo i won't do a deep dive into any of the tables but obviously more than welcome to uh and and so really i think the biggest one to highlight is our general fund it's it's fun 100 and there is a transaction of 400 million dollars there so i think that's like wow that's 400 million dollars but there's there's a reason and ryman reasoned for that and that's related to our pers bond
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so we had a refunding of our purse bond and one would then say hey how come isn't that why isn't that in our debt funding service or in our debt fund which would be lines 300. so i promise you i'm not going to geek out on this but just from the perspective of what's happening there's some very specific accounting guidance and recommendations from the oregon department of education into how we manage this transaction so we do see 400 million dollars coming into the general fund but that's really um think about like deferred compensation for retirement benefits it's kind of like a way to think about it versus actual expenditures to then go do what you'd normally do in the general fund which is not the case and then there is a correlating expenditure um in in fund 300 which accounts for that 400 million so i think to to really sum it up the general fund increased by about three million dollars not 400 at the end of the day right there's some technical accounting that we need to do when we wrapped up our audit we then also had the opportunity we wrapped up our audit in december we now had updated financials so as you go through our our amendment there's a lot of true ups essentially reconciling okay well you actually had this much left or this little adjustments to account for so a lot of those transactions are recorded in the amendment in addition to additional transactions that have happened in the special revenue fund the special revenue fund you may recall accounts for our esr funding our student investment account so when the year began we started with an adopted budget and a few months later or excuse me a few weeks later there was additional revenue that came in through the student investment account that's updated there's been some transactions and refunding with fema and so a lot of those are also recorded in addition to as the year progressed we were responding to esser making adjustments with okay well we're going to use ester funding to support uh purchasing tents for schools or doing things like that so a lot of that got moved around and so this amendment represents those transactions so i'll stop there and just open it up for questions board directors do we have questions i don't have any questions just a statement that uh my friend roberto when he says he geeks out over these numbers he truly geeks out over these numbers um and he he combs through stuff with the fine-tooth comb and he he goes back again and he gets extremely excited more so than anybody i know about numbers and equations and so i just want y'all to know that he he did us all a favor by giving us the nuts and bolts of this thing because he could really really dial this in at a moment's notice i have this spreadsheet ready i told you my undergrad was in chemistry so i just then just also love oh my god like detail so we can talk about stoichiometry and balancing you know cross-dimensional analysis so this right it's it's an opportunity to do that i appreciate the art and the science behind the the memo was really helpful to understand the the comings and goings if you will and one thing i will also note as part of the oregon local budget law we're required to publish uh the information and i will share that we published it once and we realized that we dropped three zeros out of that 400 million dollar transaction so it's like hey 400 000 is not a bad day that was wrong uh so we did republish it uh in accordance with local law and and really just being able to share that we added the three zeros it was a typo team caught it we made that correction and so from a public publication perspective we made sure to catch that and do that and we'll ensure that doesn't happen again at least right the goal with being the case yes correct yes yes it was a typo not like missing money back somewhere right you appreciate that transparency go ahead um director constance i said we appreciate that radical transparency i do as well i it's it's noted and it's always um you know like algebra it's good to see the thinking and the rationale um is the does the oregon law require that we publish this in like a local
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business journal or yeah we in a wide enough publication so we publish into oregonian okay and so um we had published uh sunday okay great thank you and thank you for um catching that um three zeros uh that's a lot wanted to tell the accurate story as required by law yeah no that's fantastic um do i have a motion and a second to adopt results director green moves director hall in seconds the adoption of resolution 6437 that's the amendment to the fiscal year 2021-22 budget for the school district um multnomah 1j multnomah county oregon is there any board discussion i just have a question this um follows on the conversation we had before the board meeting and i appreciate you sharing the 400 million that it's not just all of a sudden we have 400 million more because i think that could be how it read if you didn't have the expert commentary um from staff to explain what that was um and i'd ask about um the reason that's normally called the reserves but you're either the beginning from balance of the ending fund balance and i'm just it's 88 is that are you are we basing that on the without the pers money correct so our calculation the 88 million is essentially uh and that's in table one or table two in in the attachments it's essentially based off uh the 770 million what our general fund was was budgeted so our that fund balance we're calculating it off that general fund and then i guess and this is more just for um lay people like like me or for taxpayers um is okay so if our budget was whatever 779 and then we had this 400 million dropped on on it um when we go to the historical because i think this is always an important conversation in oregon like what's the historical level investments and what's the baseline that we're operating under like it we're not going to have this blip that all of a sudden goes up and everybody then an hour continues even though right now you put it in the general fund for purposes of like historical trends it would be without the perspective yeah we would have to footnote it and make like a note calling that out and making the distinction regarding it's like your your classic managerial budget versus your accrual budget and like the distinction between what can you really work with versus what what are the accounting standards and and gatsby tell you how to record it and document it so we'd probably use it in the future with without it for our just general grants with that now to have these conversations when we look at trends we would just carve that out and and make a note great did that answer your question yeah okay so um ms bradshaw is there any public comment no so the board will now vote on resolution 6437 amendment to the fiscal year 2021-22 budget for school district number 1j multnomah county oregon all those in favor please indicate by saying yes yes yes yes all opposed please indicate by saying no are there any abstentions resolution 6437 is approved by a vote of 7-0 with student representative weinberg voting yes thank you is there any other business at this time before we adjourn we are adjourned thank you


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