Board Meeting 032719 2B

Number four the same is true of the weighted staffing standards formula or WSS schools that lose librarians counselors and nurses get to stare blankly at a formula.

Number five it is not just money.

The district also needs to pay attention and care.

Number six years ago the district unknowingly overspent its budget by tens of millions of dollars.

There was no obvious percentage improvement and test scores.

Number seven superintendent has said that members of the strategic plan steering committee were quote brave unquote.

Why were their meetings held in secret.

Number eight.

Director Pinkham has proposed reopening Indian Heritage High School.

I ask that someone on the board publicly commit to provide a second to such a motion.

I also ask for a second for reopening the African-American Academy.

Number nine the money spent on the plan would be better spent on reopening these schools.

Please vote no on the plan.

Also please discuss issues at Washington Middle School.

They seem to be coming up.

Thank you very much.

Good evening, my name is Sarah Sense-Wilson.

Members of the Urban Native Education Alliance as well as our Youth Council and Elders Advisory Council want to address the issues surrounding the draft strategic plan and the steering committee process.

We are on record in writing and in testimony opposing the strategic plan due to the glaring omission of American Indian Alaskan Native students from the strategic plan priorities.

Our American Indian Alaskan Native students are some of the most complex challenging and misunderstood populations of underserved and underperforming.

According to data our students with 506 IEP non 506 First Nations non federally recognized non tribally enrolled students continue to be neglected and understirred by Seattle Public Schools including.

excuse me including American Indian Alaska Native students in the strategic plan for Seattle Public Schools would ensure prioritizing resources focus effort and increased collaboration with community to solve these chronic persistent and multi generational challenges.

Again we urge you to amend the draft and specifically include Indian students as a priority.

Additionally we need to address both the current and historical perpetuation of trauma and historical trauma on our community.

Over the past 11 years many of us involved in Indian education have experienced witnessed observed a multitude of broken promises commitments and intentional efforts to diminish our voice and our presence.

Duwamish homeland acknowledgment indigenous people day resolution and other attempts To demonstrate good faith and restorative justice are ultimately token gestures that fail to restore our faith our trust and belief in your system.

Elevating individuals chosen by Seattle Public School to represent Indian community is insulting harmful.

to our students our families and our community.

We would like to again you guys all have a copy of this.

I emailed it to everybody and we have yet to receive any response from anyone from the board or the superintendent or administrators and that in itself is discouraging.

And I really hope that you guys take to heart you know our message and.

Open your minds to this to change.

Open your minds to the possibility of collaborating in an authentic way and stop tokenizing community members.

Thank you.

After Carol Simmons we will have Tom Spear followed by Jeremy Manzer and then two D Chambers.

Good evening.

It is so true that institutional memory is both a blessing and a curse.

I was a member of the first Seattle Public Schools disproportionally portionality task force formed in 1985 to develop a plan and make recommendations to eliminate disproportionality in academic achievement and disciplinary sanctions between certain groups of students of color and white students.

Many of the same recommendations were repeated through the years by subsequent task forces, but were ignored.

Tonight 35 years later you will vote on a strategic plan that will benefit a targeted group of students identified as furthest from educational justice.

It has been reported that the strategic plan steering committee did not consult the district's own racial and equity tool during the drafting process that excluded One of the most historically underserved groups of students in our nation's schools.

Sadly Native American students qualify for also being targeted in the strategic plan.

They have the highest number of students placed in special education classes lost their school where they were successful.

are currently educated in a school with insufficient instructional space discipline suspended at or near the bottom of academic achievement and graduation rates and are now invisible in the strategic plan.

Please do not adopt this plan until you can proudly state your unapologetic intention by including native students who also fit the criteria of being the furthest from educational justice.

Thank you.

First of all I want to correct Director Zachary DeWolf.

Chief Seattle is my mother's fourth generation great grandfather.

He was Suquamish on his father's side Duwamish on his mother's side.

There was no such thing as Muckleshoot is a creation of the U.S.

War Department.

They're not on the treaty.

You won't find their name because they aren't a tribe.

So please remember Duwamish, Suquamish, not Tulalip, not Muckleshoot.

Thank you.

Secondly, I've been coming here since 2003 when I came on behalf of the Duwamish tribe at my tribal chairman's request to ask you folks and your predecessors to not please not forget the native people especially the first people because the Duwamish are still thanks to George W. Bush federally unrecognized.

So we don't get counted.

We don't get served.

There are two things that really bother me tonight and the first is the fact that Licton Springs K through 8 is being shoved out being denied adequate space and adequate resources.

I'll let others speak to that.

The second is that your strategic plan which has been months and months in the making omitted Native Americans in any meaningful way.

And that's the biggest insult that I can imagine as a person of more than one heritage.

Thank you.

I'd like to cede the remainder of my time to Genesis who will speak on behalf of our youth.

Hello my name is Genesis Alcala.

I am in fourth grade at Licton Springs.

My tribe is Chichimeca it's in Mexico.

I would like to talk about being kicked out of the premises of Robert Eagle Staff like if we had broken into a place without permission.

I felt scared and.

And it it conflicted with our learning.

There needs there needs to be better ways to handle these things.

and there should have been a public apology.

That's a reference to the January 24th expulsion of Clear Sky UNEA program by the janitor with instructions.

He was told by someone downtown that we had to evacuate the building immediately and stay out until further notice.

January the 24th elders children adults mentors everybody had to go.

I'm here because Washington Middle is a case study and how — Your name please for the record sir.

My name is Jeremy Masner.

Thank you sir.

I'm here because Washington Middle is a case study and how an arrogant approach to increasing educational justice can instead reduce it.

It is unconscionable that over half of black and Latinx students at Washington do not meet SBA standards.

But while the strategic plan calls for inclusive and authentic engagement to reduce inequity Washington families and staff have seen indifference or outright hostility from the school and district leadership.

Strategic priority number one calls for students of color to feel safe and welcome.

We want to celebrate a reported 60 percent reduction in suspensions but we cannot celebrate when teachers complain their discipline referrals are ignored leading to continued classroom disruption.

We want to celebrate reported improvements in safety but we cannot celebrate when our black students tells us it comes at the cost of school feeling like a prison.

We cannot celebrate while the names of black students with lunch detention are publicly posted for the entire school to gawk at.

Priority number one also calls for students of color to be proficient by seventh grade and we want to celebrate targeted universalism prioritizing staffing for those students but we cannot celebrate two instructional days lost chaotic schedule changes at the start of second semester.

We cannot celebrate teachers being assigned new subjects with no advanced notice.

Strategic priority number three calls for culturally responsive professional practice.

We want to celebrate outreach to marginalized communities but we cannot celebrate when the requests of Muslim families for culturally appropriate bathrooms go unheeded for months only to be suddenly addressed by a change that instead needlessly marginalizes the genderqueer community.

I have two requests.

First do not approve the strategic plan.

until you've understood how Washington's focus on educational justice has led to further marginalization and injustice.

You must clarify the plan's goals and strengthen the plan's accountabilities to defend against a repeat of this pattern.

Second please update the WSS to reflect Washington's multiple levels of service so that the school can actually provide differentiated efforts to meet the needs of specific populations.

Thank you.

After Tuesday Chambers we will have Vicki Pinkham followed by Darcy Brixey and then Joanne Roxayers.

Hello.

My name is Tuesday Chambers.

I'm the Ballard High School librarian.

I'm the ITAC committee member.

I'm also on the library steering committee and I'm also a library content demonstration teacher.

Dear school board and superintendent the new strategic plan will set the course for the district for the next five years and help the district form its focus its resources work and initiatives.

The draft plan includes a short list of high impact priorities and measurable goals focused on improving outcomes for students.

Yet we are closing libraries.

The letter I'm about to read is from a student at Ballard High School who I will call Valerie.

Dear school board members and superintendent I'm writing to you today to convey my personal opinion and utilize the voice I have as a student regarding the budget cuts taking place in the fall.

I know that I wouldn't be the person I am today without the guidance provided by the librarians throughout my life.

From a young age we're taught to read and to explore the whole other world books provide us.

Reading has left a mark on me and has taught me so many things and has made me the person I am today.

There are countless reasons to why these cuts to our library program should not be considered.

For starters from my personal experience I didn't have guidance in my household.

Growing up the school faculty members they substituted for my parents and were role models in my life.

The librarians throughout my 11 years of school had provided support and have taught me many things I would have struggled with otherwise.

When I was younger I loved to read all the way up until my freshman year.

After that I was experiencing things in my personal life that made me lose my will to go to school yet alone read a book.

It wasn't until my librarian convinced me to join the after school reading program that things turned around.

And since then I can actually enjoy something I've missed.

Many students need this kind of guidance and support in order to live up to their potential.

Not only do the librarians encourage you to read and to obtain knowledge but they provide social and emotional support any high school kid would appreciate.

Students deserve to have a place filled with people who support them and encourage them to do better.

Ask yourself why would I want to strip these students of that opportunity to have access to knowledge and resources and opportunities that could change everything.

We as students deserve more than that.

I hope you take the time to hear our voice because we need you to fight for us and the education we all deserve.

I'm here today not for my position and not for me I'm here for Valerie.

I'm here for all kids.

I know every single board member and the superintendent serves all kids.

That's why you're sitting there.

But what also unites you all are the libraries that serve all kids.

So I'm asking you today to please please please look at the restoration plan and move the librarians and library programs across this district to the top for all kids.

Thank you.

Vicki Pinkham is next and then after that we'll have Darcy Brixley.

Sorry I cut in line.

No worries.

We were just asking which one was which.

Hello my name is Vicki Pinkham and I'm here to talk about the strategic plan Indian education in Licton Springs.

I'm concerned about the Seattle Public Schools strategic plan that it does not include American Indians Alaska Native verbiage in the six plain six page plan which is down from 35 pages that I understand was the previous plan.

I just wanted to reiterate that the Seattle Public Schools is committed.

This is their mission statement.

Seattle Public Schools is committed to ensuring equitable access closing the opportunity gap and excellence in education for every student.

What it does not say is that it does that it should include exclude American Indians Alaska Natives special needs students or Washington Middle School students as a parent for Seattle Public School students.

I volunteer for tutoring of Seattle Public School students.

I support I do not support this plan.

And additionally I'm concerned that in the next 40 years My daughter is going to be here with the same concerns.

I'd like to cede the rest of my time to Andrea Fleming.

Hi my name is Andrea Fleming and I do have a 14 year old son who does have an IEP.

I I would not support a strategic plan that would exclude him in his special needs.

I'm not seeing that that any other any other student or any other culture or any other color you know student would be less valuable.

But I don't appreciate the idea that it would be saying that My son's needs would be less met or that they would be you know viewed as less important.

Again he does have an IEP.

He does go to.

Rainier Valley Leadership Academy.

It's a good school.

Not I'm not saying it's a bad school but you know I really really would like you guys to rethink your you know what your priorities are with it with a strategic plan.

You know all students are important.

And I just feel like at this point you know I've seen that Native American kids are pushed aside and not not really viewed as as important.

And again I would I would really like you to rethink the strategic plan.

Thank you.

My name is Darcy Brixey.

I'm a parent also a line cutter.

Apparently I would like to talk to you also about the strategic plan.

I noticed it's filled with words and phrases like equity educational justice and a limiting opportunity and achievement gaps.

I'm perplexed that the plan does not deliberately include access to school libraries and information literacy.

Equity is at the very soul of libraries and it appears that library access and information literacy has been egregiously omitted from the new strategic plan.

Time and again research has shown that student achievement and literacy rates are directly related to access to a full time certificated school librarian and robust library hours.

Information is released at lightning speed these days and our society is now settling for mediocre mediocre or false information by simply clicking and sharing and you know you all do it.

The students outlined in the strategic goal deserve to be given a solid foundation of information literacy in order to attain racial equity.

This is the part where I tell you I'm also a public librarian.

I work for the King County library system.

I've worked at the Bellevue library for a number of years and when the Bellevue school district cut their secondary librarians it was a disaster.

And what that meant was students had no access to a full time librarian except the ones that could actually make it to the public library.

They lost out on enrichment programs.

Don't do it.

I just want to finish by saying please consider building school librarians into this plan.

I hope that you send a clear message to students and families that a library is a place of equity and it is very truly a cornerstone of our society.

Please include it in your strategic plan.

Thank you.

And that is almost two minutes.

After Joanne Rock Sayers we will have C.C.

Chan followed by Manuela Sly and Sabrina Burr.

Joanne Rock Sayers.

My name is Joanne Pinkham.

I'm in eighth grade and I go to Hayes Wolf K-8.

As you heard earlier the Seattle Public Schools strategic plan excludes American Indian and Alaska Native and special education education students.

This is sad to me because this racism adds to my invisibility in school.

I'm Ojibwe and Esperson Tlingit and my father is director Scott Pinkham.

I've testified before to this school board about ongoing racism in our schools and not adding these students is racism.

It says that I am not worthy of being recognized in the school strategic plan.

I'm invisible and yet here I am.

Seattle Public School Board did not add these students to their strategic strategic plan and is hindering my ability ability to fight for what is legally mine to be recognized to add quality to my education as I move towards my path to college.

Superintendent Juneau asked what Indian education means and how was Licton Springs moving towards achieving their goal to call themselves a native focused school.

She gave them one year to figure that out.

That school needs a place to grow.

But that isn't happening.

It is housed.

in the corner of Robert Eagle Staff School who would like to see them pushed out altogether.

Yet the highly capable students have their own school located across the parking lot.

How are we going to accomplish something where there aren't any native teachers on staff.

leaders or elders.

As you know we're on Duwamish land.

It is sad to think that people from all around the world are able to keep their languages and their culture when coming to America.

Even the signs outside this room have many languages but none are in American Indian languages.

The Duwamish Ojibwe and Nimiipuu or Tlingit.

American Indians need to need a native focus school and native focus school would benefit everyone if they're willing to learn true history of their city.

Thank you.

I see my.

I see my the rest of my time to Gabriella.

Go.

My name's Gabriella DeSantis.

I'm a Seattle Public Student School at West Seattle.

I'm sorry and I want all native students.

The two minutes is up.

You can't cede time that has already expired.

I apologize that you didn't make the list but we need to be fair to everyone.

Thank you.

OK.

Hi guys.

I'm Cece Chan I'm from Nathaniel High School and I'm part of the NAACP Youth Coalition.

I want to talk to you guys really quickly about your strategic plan.

OK.

So first in your mission statement you guys talk about opportunity gaps and I feel like in order to talk about opportunity gaps we need to acknowledge that the gap was created by white supremacy and it's still present in our education.

So we can't talk about an opportunity gap without addressing that we're normalizing white norms.

Secondly.

In the second in the visionary statement you talk about students receiving high quality and world class education.

Well what is high quality education look like.

Well let's start with renovations for Rainier Beach High School in 2025. Let's not push that back.

You want high education.

Like that's what it looks like.

Also world class education.

What does that look like.

Ethnic studies.

Our curriculum needs to represent our students.

Our students aren't only the descendants of Europeans and we represent the world you know.

And I'm going to tell you guys really quickly I spoke at Olympic View Elementary School this past Monday and I had the students do a textbook activity where I had them flip through a textbook and count how many times they saw themselves represented in a positive light.

And a lot of them some of them didn't want to touch the textbook the textbook because they said it gave them bad memories.

They said that they felt sad and that they couldn't even find a lot of pictures of themselves especially the students of color.

If we want to have a world class education we have to recognize the lack of world world education in our curriculum today and we need to fix it.

We also have to focus on teachers too.

I mean why is it mandatory.

Like why isn't culturally responsive training mandatory at a district level.

I mean if we're hesitant about that that's saying something about our teachers and the workforce.

And why do we have teachers who are uncomfortable with teaching things like ethnic studies like that says something really big too.

And then lastly in the theory of action you talk about unapologetically addressing the needs for students of color.

And if you guys say that then you can't get hesitant and threatened about.

Amazing people like Tracy Castro Gil when she's really trying to push for things like if you guys aren't going to talk about that.

Oh last is the last quote and this is from a fourth grader.

There's only white people in this textbook.

There is only one page that has two black women.

It's not fair because I'm black and I wanted to see myself in that book.

My whole class were sad mad and empty inside when they saw the pages.

Please take this unfair racist rude textbooks out.

And I have letters for Rick Burke and the school board from all the fourth graders from Olympic View Elementary School.

But thank you.

Hello.

I cede my time to Sabrina Slye.

My name is Sabrina Sly.

I'm a freshman at West Seattle High School.

I am part of the superintendent student advisory board.

I'm here to support the new strategic plan and at our last meeting I and the other advisory members discussed the ideas of the strategic plan and agreed that it is need that it is. needed for change towards racial equity.

I'm a Mexican-American girl and I want to see positive changes in the school district.

For example I would like to see Proyecto Saber classes in every school.

When I was a student at Denny International Middle School I saw that it was a great place for students of color to come together and talk about where we come from our strengths challenges and identity.

Unfortunately opportunities for high quality education are not always available to students like me.

I believe the new strategic plan is very is a very important step first step.

I'm honored to be a part of the student Seattle Public School District because it is a great district.

But like everything there's always room for improvement.

The new strategic plan finally recognizes there is a need to support students of color and especially African-American boys.

I am not an African-American boy but I understand the importance to focus on those students who are at the bottom of our system.

It is long overdue.

I heard some adults before me speaking against passing the strategic plan.

I respect their opinion but I do not understand the resistance to work towards racial equity.

The color of our skin should not determine the quality of education we get.

Thank you for listening to me and the students in Seattle Public Schools.

After Sabrina Burr we will have K.L.

Shannon followed by Brian Terry and then Karen Lamb.

So I want to start in honoring the Duwamish land that we're on.

And I ask the ancestors to forgive me.

Both African-American and Native blood run through my body.

And what is going on here hurts me.

And I know the ancestors are crying.

School board you need to work on policy 2010 to make sure since time immemorial and both ethnic studies can be adopted.

I thank you and I thank this committee for the hard work This doesn't mean that any child in Seattle Public Schools gets neglected.

It is not zero sum.

There's a story about a lamp and about a fish.

There is plenty if we work together and stop fighting like crabs.

My president Chandra Hampson was a part of this and she reached out to her native community.

I have e-mails here and I'm going to give you a few of her words.

Note on how I ended up on this community committee.

I had an opportunity via the nominating process to sit on the strategic planning committee for the superintendent new strategic plan the 2013 plan had expired due to the newly superintendent hired.

The timeline was quick.

Among the many partners the district had we the Seattle Council.

president wanted them to slow down and go deeper into the community.

The listening sessions which were a part of this process.

In many we were successful in broadening the district's view in our communities and how they got to the table.

When the community partners came back together we pushed on why only staff union and board members were included in the strategic plan community.

Shortly after the district opened up the nominations shifting my hat from native parent and native volunteer advisory board member.

I reached out to my community to share this opportunity.

I indicated my willingness to serve in this capacity with their endorsement.

This was shared with representatives from the.

Parent Advisory Committee the United Indians the Chief Seattle Club the UNEA.

I appreciate the support I received from those who responded.

Encourage others to apply.

So I just want to be straight on where this is and the only thing missing on the strategic plan.

We have opportunity gaps and we have achievement gaps.

We need to add belief.

We have belief gaps and that is missing.

You need to be innovative and add belief.

because we need to work on our beliefs all around.

Thank you very much.

She's not able to be here tonight.

Okay thank you.

Brian Terry.

Good evening.

In our schools today a white student is 20 times more likely than a black student to be identified as highly capable.

This leads to segregated classrooms which send a clear message to all students.

White students are more capable and more deserving.

This is called white supremacy culture.

We are infecting all of our students with these hurtful ideas.

Please update the strategic plan or pass a resolution to identify and eradicate white supremacy culture from all of our programs.

The damage caused by our inequitable service model is especially evident at Washington Middle School.

Families and teachers at the school are passionate about working together to address this and to create a school that meets the needs of students from all backgrounds.

Unfortunately our school is now ruled with an iron fist.

Decisions are made behind closed doors.

Information is tightly guarded.

Feedback is not welcome.

Those who speak up are publicly chastised.

Students and staff are silenced by their fear of retribution.

Public shaming is now on the agenda.

Last Friday students who received attention had their names posted in the lunchroom vilifying rather than supporting these students.

This oppressive climate is driving away teachers and families.

Please help us provide more oversight and support to our school before it is too late.

Thank you.

After Karen Lamb we will have Katie Kennedy and then Rebecca Wynkoop and then Craig Seasholes.

Was an office assistant at Dearborn Park International School.

You've seen Ms. Zolk bringing her wonderful dance troupe coming for you guys.

Anyways I'm here on behalf of our librarian.

They call him the book man.

I love giving tours to parents coming into our school.

I open the secure doors.

We open up to a beautiful library.

It's full of books, overhead, iPads.

He integrates everything in technology for the kids.

He brings in wonderful authors.

We've had countless authors come in, talk about their books, get the seed planted about how you can write a book.

Illustrators come in, and they fold origami yogas.

They're a wonderful, wonderful librarian.

He's always introducing new books, sending out newsletters to the staff and to parents of upcoming events.

The book man always makes his face open to a picture day.

The science van comes along.

He makes room for cause and effect for holding the wheel in the sea of gravity.

He's installed a little free library book in front of our office, in front of the school.

And the library is a very vital, important part of our school.

You mentioned how the gentlemen gave you a book.

Where did you get the book?

Maybe from a library or something.

So books play an intricate part in all of our children's lives.

And I was really floored when I heard that the school district doesn't have a full-time librarian at every school, which is kind of silly.

So I'd really love to see full-time librarian with information technology instruction at Dearborn Park full-time.

It's wonderful.

The kids love him.

I get excited to show people around the school.

I brag about the wonderful authors he comes in with, and it's almost time.

Okay, so thank you very much for your time, and I appreciate you listening.

You have a lot on your plate.

I don't know how you do it.

Thank you very much.

Hi my name is Katie Kennedy and I'm a parent of two children at Dearborn Park International School.

One in kindergarten in the Mandarin program and then other in the third grade in the Spanish program.

We love Dearborn Park.

The immersion program offers an amazing opportunity for our two kids to learn a foreign language at the optimal time where their brains are open to this learning.

leading to better educational achievement as well as better preparation for relating to and working with diverse languages and cultures.

We have a standout non-classroom staff including our passionate and skilled librarian and music dance teacher and a committed and enthusiastic principal.

All the staff are kind and caring and invest in the success of our school and our students.

We are a diverse school that reflects our diverse neighborhoods surrounding the school and our school is a place for all those families neighborhood families to come together.

We live three blocks from our house or our school is three blocks from our house.

Our school is surrounded by trees.

It's truly a great place.

It is a great asset to our community and I hope it continues to flourish.

It can't though if we don't change the enrollment structure.

We have been had declining enrollment for the past five years and need your help to change it.

We've lost about 20 percent of our students over five years and the cuts that are resulting from that are really have a huge impact and are we won't be able to continue the way the way things are going.

There are three seemingly simple solutions for our school that could increase.

that could allow us to sustain in the healthy successful place that it is.

Our waitlist needs to be opened up.

This would help us next year.

Every year we have people on that waitlist that can't that aren't allowed to come to our school.

I know there's a Spanish speaking student a block away from our boundary that can't come.

There's people that want to come and we need the kids in order to flourish ourselves as a school.

And so let them come right away.

And then there's changing there's changing enrollment boundaries around our school.

We would like to be involved in those conversations.

I think that's already happening.

And then the last thing is we would like a geo zone so that heritage speakers nearby could come to our school.

Thank you.

Director Harris.

I am Rebecca Wynkoop I'm the librarian at Robert Eagle Staff.

I'm also a parent of two students in Seattle Public Schools.

You each have a copy of this book by Peter Reynolds called Say Anything and if you would please read it with someone you love this evening and then consider donating it to one of our 100 schools that don't currently have a copy.

I'd like to cede my time to Rose from Garfield.

Hello my name is Rose Clark and this is my first time at a school board meeting.

It's not for lack of interest.

Sorry.

It's not for lack of interest that I've never come to one before but rather lack of necessity.

The reason that I'm here today is because it has become increasingly apparent that speaking up about changes in Seattle schools is absolutely necessary.

The loss of 40 million dollars in funding for our schools will have damaging effects on the staff and students of this district.

The limitations that the state has put on the use of local education levies has created an untenable situation forcing our district to lay off displace and cut the hours of staff members.

at the expense of our education as a student at Garfield High School.

I couldn't stand by and watch as we lost 15 teachers each of them with fresh perspectives and the potential to form meaningful connections with the student body.

I couldn't stand by and watch libraries across the district have their funding cut denying underserved students the resources that they previously provided.

I couldn't stand by and watch my teachers be forced out of their jobs because of a levy cap.

That's why I decided to start a save our staff campaign.

My fellow students were eager to volunteer, and together we learned more than we ever thought we'd need to know about education budgeting and state government.

Last Friday, we hosted a call-and-email campaign so that people could get in touch with legislators and ask them to amend Section 203 of Engrossed House Bill 2242. Now, I stand here because I am unwilling to be passive when only activism is fitting.

I protest against the disproportionate number of teachers of color whose jobs are endangered because of our lack of funding.

The teacher who inspired me to write poetry again shouldn't lose her job next year nor the teacher who taught me to always look deeper nor the teacher who sparked my passion for science.

We're losing 15 teachers at Garfield next year and cutting our librarians hours in half.

Garfield along with one hundred and twelve other schools that this school district serves will suffer because of the lack of reasonable funding for education in our state.

On behalf of myself and the fifty four thousand other students of Seattle Public Schools.

Thank you for petitioning the state to raise a levy cap and I urge you to continue your efforts to raise the levy cap and find alternative funding for our education so that all of us can get the schooling that we deserve.

Thank you.

After Craig Seasholes we will have Nancy Fisher Allison followed by Kimberly Byrne and then Hugh Kim.

I appreciate the comment about being careful who you follow.

That was powerful.

I appreciated her advocacy as I appreciate the board's advocacy in Olympia and encouraging us to go to Olympia.

So next April 2nd there will be a dearth of librarians in Seattle Public Schools as we go to Olympia and speak to the same legislators you did and any of your advice about how to get the message through to increase funding to our district.

We're happy to carry that.

to to second your motion but also to try to help get some of those accounting strings on library funding.

I was fortunate to sit in on the policy 0030 conversations and I listened to eight major points of our strategic goal and looking for action items.

Six of those points touch on libraries welcoming communities certainly libraries welcome all.

April is school library month and we appreciate if there's recognition in April that.

that school board members go into libraries and see and be seen.

Tuesday April 16th is my library snapshot day and many school libraries will be looking for photo opportunities with education leaders in all of our schools.

We look for equitable access and as Darcy Brixey said that's a cornerstone of libraries.

We look for partnerships.

School librarians are bringing money into the district in terms of grants.

Tuesday Chamber brought one hundred thousand dollars to to Ballard school and now she's facing a cut.

Libraries partner and bring in grant funding to the district.

It's not zero sum.

Libraries support all students and participate in credit recovery.

I think that we could build a course that built library and information technology skills as a credit bearing class that could be done across the district.

We serve and deliver diverse books for diverse students like nobody's business.

Please come visit a library and see how we address that.

If it's the standalone Native American collection or it's the sort of collection that you'll see reflected in my library when you visit.

Thank you.

My name is Nancy Fisher Allison.

I'm the point five librarian at John Rogers Elementary.

I'm here to talk about the students and staff who depend on our library and not only for books and information.

Our library is a safe haven for new students English language learners SPED students who need a break from the classroom.

Children who have been othered in some way and kids who seek respite from the playground.

During informal hours we offer books digital activities board games and maker space activities.

The library is a calm down space for several children on IEPs and 504 plans.

It is also a place of comfort for children who have experienced trauma and suffer from PTSD.

It's not simply the open space of a school library that supports social emotional needs but also the teacher who inhabits it.

Librarians are committed to creating places that are warm welcoming and non-judgmental.

Our unique instructional role allows us to notice the whole child.

Social-emotional learning is woven tightly into our work.

We incorporate SEL content into our library lessons and activities, from interactive read-alouds focused on characters' feelings to mixed-grade programs such as the Global Reading Challenge.

As one of our global readers observed, I learned it's much more fun to work with people you don't usually work with.

It's kind of a new adventure.

Librarians team with arts organizations to offer programs that have social-emotional dimensions.

Yesterday, our whole school reveled in Book of Theater's performance of New Shoes, a story from the Jim Crow South that drew powerful responses from students during library read-alouds.

In our discussions, we talked about empathy, dignity, fairness, and growth mindset, concepts embedded in our social-emotional curriculum.

Although my position is halftime I'm frequently in my building on my days off.

It's a bit like being the pied piper.

Children invariably spot me and follow me down the hall.

Is the library open.

May I check out a book.

Can I work on the jigsaw puzzle.

If this unmet demand exists in an elementary school I can only imagine the situation in secondary schools where social emotional needs must be an order of magnitude higher.

Thank you.

Hi my name is Kimberly Burton and I'm a parent at Dearborn Park International School of a first grader who's in the Mandarin immersion and I'm also an educator of 18 years working for Highline and I'm here to tell you that Dearborn Park is unlike any other school I've ever been in.

I worked in several districts.

I've been in many many schools and I've never seen a school that is so based in social justice and equity.

Real quick story.

My son had a new babysitter last year when he was in kindergarten.

She came over and the first thing he said to her was do you care about MLK.

And she took too long to answer.

We never had her back.

Just kidding.

What I'm what I'm here to talk to you about is the boundaries.

It's a it's a small neighborhood school and that's part of why it's so special.

But things have changed and.

So a lot of families are moving in with zero kids and we need to start thinking outside the box releasing the waitlist letting in those heritage speakers.

That's really important.

And also I'm really happy that you are including you're letting us be included in the conversation regarding the boundary that little pocket up there on Beacon.

It's a special school and it's a small school and I'm also the PTA chair chair fundraiser and I last year the PTA made seven thousand and this year as far as our fundraiser our auction and this year we were told that we needed to try to raise twenty seven thousand to pay for different things.

And we can't do that alone.

We need your help.

I know superintendents coming to visit Dearborn Park next month and I wish I could be there with you but I'll be teaching.

But I just it's such a special place.

Please help us.

Please help us.

Thank you.

Hi my name is Hugh Kim.

I'm ceding my time to Houston.

Hi my name is Hewson Kim and I'm an eighth grader at Washington Middle School.

Our school has been in upheaval.

Straight off a major issue that our student body has faced has been the recent schedule changes and following disruption in learning.

For the second time this school year, several teachers remarked that the principal had precipitated these most recent changes on her own, with no collaboration.

This made the transition exponentially worse than it had to be, and made us fall behind on weeks of learning.

Changing hundreds of kids' schedules with less than a day's notice is an egregious act, especially if the change is done without the support of the majority group that is also the most affected.

teachers and students.

My history teacher taught language arts for the first half of the year before being assigned to teaching history an entirely different subject.

Another example is an often reiterated problem because of late buses.

Dozens of people miss their first period class which is more often than not a core class central to learning.

When messaged about the solution of putting advisory first in order to avoid the loss of learning time there was no response from the principal to teachers.

This lack of collaboration between the principal, students, and staff leads to chaos and distrust.

We are immediately aware of the top-down approach and lack of access to have our voices heard.

We feel irrelevant.

Leaders, such as a principal, should hold themselves accountable, be transparent, and responsible.

Because if they don't, why should anyone else?

The leader sets the example.

This brings me to the last point the culture of our school.

Last week the principal put the names of students whose behavior had resulted in their detention in the cafeteria for all to see.

What kind of culture are these actions encouraging.

We're collab.

One where a leader in a position of power utilizes it to humiliate instead of inspire.

Where collaboration is unheard of between our principal and our staff to the point where solutions to problems that affect our learning are ignored.

We go to school to learn but we stay at school because of the culture.

How can anyone be proud of what is going on at Washington Middle School.

Next up we have Paul Hubert followed by D.J.

Yu.

I cede my time to Chris Cruz.

Hello I'm Chris Cruz.

I'm a new parent at Dearborn Park and also a new parent in that in June we adopted a two year old girl from China which is super exciting and our five year old son was so excited but he refused to speak to her in Mandarin even though he knew how to speak in Mandarin.

Then in September he started at Dearborn Park and the next week he started asking her questions in Mandarin.

It was really a wonderful great thing.

Dearborn Park is an amazing place.

It changes lives.

We've only been there a couple months and it's been really wonderful.

But we're also worried as you've heard about the future of Dearborn Park.

If we don't fix the enrollment system that we have for Dearborn Park I'm concerned that by the time my daughter can go to Dearborn Park they won't have a Mandarin bilingual program.

Already students are feeling the effect of the decreases in staff.

Next year I have to explain to my son why his librarian can't be in the library all day.

Why he can't teach the technology classes that my son really loves.

It's going to be even more difficult to explain how even when we fix the enrollment we won't be able to bring the the librarian back because of some arcane PCP allocations set by the WSS committee.

I had to learn a lot to figure out what that means and I'm still confused so it's not going to make any sense to him.

There are three seemingly simple solutions.

You've heard them already but I'm going to tell you again please let more kids in off the waitlist that can help us this coming year.

Please make sure that Dearborn Park is and stays part of the conversation about reassigning a neighborhood that's three blocks away and is being reassigned to a new school anyway.

And lastly please look into creating a geo zone like those that are created for North End international schools to fill the 25 to 30 percent of our school that isn't filled by our neighborhood now.

Thank you so much.

I cede my time to my husband.

Hi my name is Hugh Kim.

I'm a parent of an eighth grader at Washington Middle School and I'm here to voice my support for the students at the school as well as the parents that are here with us.

It's been a very difficult year and I think you have all the details of what's been going on at the school and leaders really truly set the tone.

And I, you know, unfortunately we've had to witness that with this current administration and in the White House.

And it's just things just fall off the rails.

So I think it's very important that you listen and really pay attention.

I'm ceding the rest of my time to Emily.

Emily Wheeler parent of a 7th grader at Washington Middle and I did provide the staffing allocation for Washington Middle.

And as that shows and this is available on the website that from 2017 last year to this year we had the same allocation.

We were told in the fall by our current principal that there were budget cuts there weren't enough teachers And she was going to have to cut foreign language for 7th graders even though all the other middle schools have foreign language for 7th graders we do not.

And she had to shift teachers around and she was going to have to move a bunch of things because we didn't have enough staff.

This shows that was lies or extremely misleading as far as I can tell.

The school was also given in this budget an additional special education person that wasn't there.

Our principal is not a leader.

She has caused chaos.

We've tried to give her time to find her footing.

She hasn't.

I'm sorry we can't talk about specific individuals.

You can talk about systems.

I didn't.

Okay.

Thank you.

The leadership at our school is not functioning and needs to be replaced.

We need you to do this now and not to wait any longer.

It's a complete chaos there.

As you heard from many parents you've gotten many e-mails.

You guys need to pay attention to Washington Middle.

You cannot close the achievement gap by ignoring the south end schools.

You just can't.

It's not going to work.

Thank you.

This concludes public testimony this evening.

Thank you.

Okay we are back to board comments.

Who would like to go next.

Director Burke please.

Good evening.

I want to thank everyone for their comments and sharing with us.

It's as you've heard before it's a super powerful part of sitting behind the dais is recognizing the impacts the needs the hopes the dreams the fears of our community and makes us really thoughtful about how we can make better policy make better decisions.

A couple of things looking back at my last couple of weeks I had.

Director Geary had mentioned we had a conversation around policy 2015. This is our instruction materials policy and we're looking at how to bring that into sort of contemporary times where it's not just about buying a textbook and the policy was not reflecting that well so that that work continues and I think Director Geary for her leadership and helping pull some of those common threads together.

Recognizing that work is going on.

We also recognize that we can't wait around the since time immemorial program.

People think oh this is we're adopting it it's a it's a course but it's not a course.

It's it's a framework.

It's includes materials.

It's got professional development components.

It's K-12.

And it's supplements the teaching that happens essentially in many classes many subjects.

And so it it's it's already being used in many of our schools now.

It is.

Essentially required by statute.

And so what we're going to do is we're going to formally recognize that statute in the work that we do here.

I think President Harris and Director Pinkham for offering to co-sponsor that.

So that will be coming forward in the in the upcoming weeks.

Regarding the science process science adoption process I had the pleasure of sitting in last week on the elementary and middle school adoption committees hearing the reports from the field test teachers.

Essentially each elementary and middle school band evaluated three programs.

And so I got to hear that feedback it was it was really informative spent the entire day there listening to them and I'm really grateful that they shared that time with me.

And I look forward to further conversations on that but I'm not going to make any sort of other comments around that until we get closer to our work session on it and a decision.

I had a sort of an opportune meeting which was just a couple of days ago maybe even yesterday.

It's all a blur now.

I had a work meeting which was held at the Seattle Maritime Academy on an unrelated topic.

And it just happened to be the same day that the Seattle Maritime Academy was doing an open house for school for high school students around the area.

So multiple districts were participating and multiple schools were participating.

As I was walking out an entire busload of students from Roosevelt High School came into the Seattle Maritime Academy to learn about the programs they offer the skill center they offer.

And so I think some of the conversations that we might have.

feel like things aren't happening but the career navigators that are in the schools are reaching students helping facilitate field trips.

Our skill center principal Dan Gossman is helping to knit that together as well.

And so I just wanted to since that was a sort of a serendipity meeting I wanted to publicly acknowledge that and thank people that for making that happen.

And then I'm going to editorialize a little bit.

Actually just this morning again a work related story that crosses over into education constantly happens.

I'm visiting a customer through my professional life that's a multinational company that designs and builds really sophisticated equipment that basically people's lives depend on.

And I'm in a meeting with them and education comes up as it often does and we're talking about interns and they're saying wow our interns that we bring in we put them out in the shop and they get so excited because they haven't worked with their hands and it's really sad how the education that they get is all about used to be hands on and now much more computer focused people that used to design electric circuits are now designing them on the computer where they used to build them.

So I think that's just it really kind of reaffirmed for me how important our conversations are.

We can't prescribe a particular type of learning.

We have to recognize balance and we have to be very intentional about it because the investments that we make with our capital equipment with our operating dollars and our adoptions and our words even determine what resources our kids get.

And that's going to carry forward for years and years.

So I just wanted to share that story.

with everyone because obviously it's a passion of mine.

I do not have a community meeting scheduled yet because it's been a little bit crazy but I look forward to setting something up in the month of April.

Who's next.

Director Mack.

Director DeWolf just let me know that there was a shooting in North Seattle that I just heard about which is devastating and unsettling.

This weekend I got to attend the March for Our Lives town hall that the students who marched last year it was very large.

Many of us participated.

We signed a resolution.

Just devastating.

So my heart goes out to those impacted and continued resolution from myself and hopefully the rest of the board and our legislator to actually make some movement on gun responsibility.

I don't have a community meeting scheduled either.

It's been way too crazy.

Haven't been able to manage that.

We have lots of great board meetings happening.

We have our retreat this weekend on racial equity which I'm also excited to be participating in.

I'm also next week we have our budget conversation and one of the things that I.

need to understand better and I think would be helpful to the whole public to understand better is the process for adjusting the school budgets as they get developed and then eventually get finalized.

It's a question that I am going to be raising at the work session kind of specifically about how what is our process on how the budgets get rolled out and then what kind of feedback loops do we have for.

adjusting to enrollment realities or other changes or other needs that come up.

So hopefully that will help daylight some at least process around how we can resolve these challenges.

I appreciate folks coming to talk about enrollment issues and boundary issues and so forth and those are top of mind for me.

Always we have the student assignment transition plan which gets adopted in the fall.

And in the meantime we.

need to be starting to work on the various boundary issues that we need to potentially change or make.

And so that work is ongoing.

One piece of that is that I'm planning to we are planning to set up an advisory committee to help support that work in our facilities master planning because there's so much of that going on that needs additional kind of.

Transparency and conversation to ensure that we're making good decisions around things like Dearborn Park and and and other schools to ensure that we have robust enrollment and support our students there and and all of that.

So thank you for coming and letting us know about the issues there today.

And I appreciate the conversations around the focus of the strategic plan we'll be discussing that.

More in depth later.

But I want to note that we have consistently supported ethnic studies.

We have there's a bill in the legislature that we've signed in pro on as well.

We adopted it as a course.

So it exists as a course and we need to continue to do more.

But I do want to acknowledge that support and also The support for getting Rainier Beach renovated after all this time it's on BEX V super proud of that.

The timeline may not be as ideal as we'd hoped and we'll continue to look at that.

So appreciate those comments coming forward.

And I I shared I share concerns about what I'm hearing about Washington Middle School.

I and I don't know how to respond honestly.

I think we we may have some issues to resolve.

So thank you for sharing your concerns.

And I think that's all I have.

Thank you.

Next up Director Pinkham.

Thank you.

Good evening.

I'm proud to say that I'm Nez Perce Niibipuu and.

I think you know the urban native educational as it comes out here and sometimes I feel like they get have been have this bad reputation that they're anti Seattle schools or anti native education programs here at the for the Seattle schools but they're just trying to push that we see based upon the school district's data the need to raise our native student performance.

And I support that as well.

I support raising all students of performance especially again closing that achievement gap.

When I ran for this office I said that's who we need to focus on because once we raise the close those achievement gaps everyone benefits and came here and they had the African-American male academy to focus on African-American males because they are you know one of the furthest from equitable justice.

But I also need to say that given where we're at on the indigenous lands you know all schools across this nation should acknowledge they are on stolen indigenous lands and help support that community.

So I want to voice that that's what I plan to do for my rest of my term here not to take away from anybody else but that's what I feel I got to do.

So just want to thank the people that came here and talked and spoke and shared their views and perspectives.

There is a lot of things that Seattle schools does right and I'm proud to be a board member.

Yes I'm here helping lead but there's a lot of things we still need to address and I hope that we can do that.

And as a new election year is coming up who's going to run and who's going to come back.

You know do we need that common voice.

You know how.

OK so I'll retract that.

But.

We need to keep moving forward and I feel that we need to do that by one acknowledging and I spoke to Superintendent Juneau you know one thing I see big thing to do get our welcome signs.

Yes to include indigenous language.

And she said she's going to.

Work on that.

Yes.

So thank you for doing that.

The concerns with Licton Springs I'm going to reach out with the PTA community.

Hey I want to attend your next meeting to see how we can help you become that native focus school or go the direction that you feel will be better for the native population all students that you serve you know because we want to I want to see that school succeed.

So letting them know I know Blaine Parse I think she's on the PTA I'll try to connect with them but other PTA members or parents of students at Licton Springs send me an email.

Let me know when the next meetings are going to be and I'll do my best to make sure I can attend my next community meeting.

Got to put on my reading glasses here is going to be the other side.

Make sure you get the times right.

April 7th from 1 to 2 p.m.

That is a Sunday at Broadview library.

That's my next community meeting so please attend.

Other announcements I want to make here.

Unfortunately the University of Washington Spring Powwow has been canceled.

That was originally scheduled April 6th and 7th but due to.

Not being able to find a proper venue they had to cancel it.

Urban Native Education Alliance continues to have its Clear Sky program on Tuesdays and Thursdays at Rob Eagle Staff Licton Springs K-8 doing cultural activities tutoring mentoring for our students.

They also sponsor the Native Warriors athletics program on Thursdays and Sundays Thursdays at Rob Eagle Staff Middle School gym and Sundays either at Bitter Lake Community Center or Broadview Thompson gym come out there and.

enjoy some physical fitness with some students other students and.

UNEA clear sky good medicine conference is coming up.

It'll be held at Robert Eagle Staff Middle School April 12th and 13th.

So it is during spring break from 11 to 5 p.m.

inviting native youth ages 10 to 19 or anyone that wants to come out and learn more about the urban native community.

Please attend with keynote speakers including Nikita Oliver and Dr. Katrina Claw.

For more information I'll make sure I get it posted up for people to access.

But they do have a number here.

206 9 4 1 0 3 3 8. For more information on the clear sky good medicine conference Qeˀciyéẁyéẁ.

Thank you.

Thank you Director Geary or Director Patu.

Director Geary.

Thank you.

Thank you everybody for coming out and as always thank you to especially to our students who come and speak.

I find I find my hope in their voices even though I will admit that it has been very very difficult to go to Olympia to see the budgets to see people coming and not be able to say OK yes fine we're going to do it.

That's very hard for me.

So I generally have my meetings Tuesday mornings at Zoka on Blakely above the University Village.

I would welcome anybody to come and hang out with a group of parents who really care a lot about education.

Always a couple of new people come and share their thoughts and you can check on Facebook.

I will be there next Tuesday but not over spring break.

I want to take a moment.

I read the paper every day ever since I ran for public office.

I started taking the actual paper.

So in spite of the fact that sometimes it is infuriating to read the Seattle Times I feel like it's really really important for me to at least flip through every page.

And I saw this morning that there was an obituary For Waldo King the founding father of Seattle's renowned high school jazz program died at age 92. It says that he started the first student jazz band programs in Seattle first at Garfield in 1960 then briefly at Franklin High School and for more than a decade at Roosevelt High School from which he retired in 1983. And so I think it's really important that we remember the people who contributed so much to our district and who were.

created something that is still a point of great pride for our city.

Something that we come around the music of Seattle is something we all take pride in.

I did as people have heard I did a lot of work and I'm going to talk about the strategic plan now because as soon as our comments are over the room kind of clears out as we get down to business oftentimes.

But I'm going to say a few things about the strategic plan and our focus on African-American males because as I look around this room in the audience that's not really a demographic that I see here.

And that's really hard for me because I see natives.

We have three natives up here and so while I appreciate Their invisibility their lack of voice historically and in the statistics I see this group of people come week after week and speak up.

I see these programs being developed in our schools to meet the needs and create space for their voices.

I know Sandpoint Elementary in my district now has a new program for their native students.

I see the comments saying please bring more of these programs and I'm going to give a huge credit to one woman Gail Morris and all the people that work with her because she's done so much work around that.

But there is an intersectionality with African-American males in all of these discussions.

If you go into a native gathering you will see people who appear to be African-American and they are native.

And if you go into the special education rooms you will see African-American kids.

But when you see the people coming to advocate from those groups you won't necessarily see people who appear to be African-American within their ranks.

And I think when we say that we want people to unapologetically put the needs of our students who are farthest from social justice first we are asking that every single person within our system ask themselves where is the intersectionality around this work and how do we make our community better by focusing.

on the needs of a group that voice just really isn't heard and we don't hear their voices and sometimes advocating for our own needs and we didn't take the time to figure out how their voice could be met in our needs.

So I just point that out that this is really important work.

It's not that it's one over the other but I think that if we can get to a group that is so.

underrepresented and has such tragic outcomes within our system that we will find that we are creating space for lots of different voices.

So it's not an either or but it is really a request that everybody look at themselves in this process in this system of institutional systemic racism and just figure out what each of our roles has been and it's not based on the color of our skin.

We are all caught in this system.

So I say that it means a lot to me.

It's going to take a lot of hard work and I wish it was appreciated when I go down to Olympia how hard that work is going to be.

So and with that I will stop.

Thank you.

Director Patu please.

I think one of the most enjoyable thing about this job is I have the opportunity to actually visit schools and be able to watch students at work.

Just last this last week actually had opportunity to go to a couple of the elementary schools and I think it's it's just very motivating to just sit back and watch students enjoy their learning and the people that actually that are teaching them enjoy teaching.

When I was going through schools I didn't always have great teachers.

But you know when you watch teachers that are really passionate and really into their work it's really exciting because not only they're exciting but the kids are exciting about learning and I believe that all our students deserve teachers that are excited about learning and excited about teaching.

And so far the schools that I've been I was really quite amazed by what the teachers are doing right now in our schools and hopefully to continue on.

to visit schools and just be amazed by the work that's going on.

Sometimes we don't give teachers credit enough for the work that they do because we have to remember they have to deal with a lot of kids and sometimes.

Those kids are not the greatest kids but at the same time we have to give them credit for being patient and also are able to teach our students or our children what is it that they need in order for them to carry on to the next level of their life.

So for teachers I say thank you for all the hard work that you do and continue to inspire our students.

There's so much to learn.

It's been really this week has been a very hectic week for me mainly for the fact because I'm getting ready to leave for Europe which is a place that I've never been before.

And every time I think about it I just think oh am I.

Is this where I need to go.

So I'm blindly going to her because my daughter told me to come with her.

But I'm hoping that it will be a new experience for me and hopefully that when I come back I'll learn something completely new about that culture because I think that culture is very important and it's always amazing to see different cultures.

And that's what Seattle Public Schools is all about.

It's about all the different cultures that we have in our schools and how we encourage every school to celebrate cultures within their schools because we have quite amazing students and their culture that they bring to us.

I remember when I first came to America nobody knew where my island was from.

They thought I was from a foreign country that they never heard of and I didn't speak any English.

But at the same time the people that actually that were with me were caring enough to help me to try to understand even though I didn't understand what they were saying.

But yet at the same time they made an effort.

And I think that that's been a.

Something that we do quite excellently in a lot of our schools here in Seattle Public Schools.

The teachers really make an effort to make sure that their students not only learn but are understands what is it the reason why they're there.

And for teachers I command them for all the hard work that they do because a lot of times we have students that we can't deal with but because their patience and the reason why the kids are there and so they can learn.

So I say to teachers.

Thank you for all the good work that you do and continue to make great progress because without you our students wouldn't be where they are today.

And and I and I really appreciate being on this board because it gives me an opportunity to actually to see how education is actually going in what direction.

And as a board director.

It's amazing to really to be able to have part of what is it that we need our kids to be able to learn and looking at the people that actually that are teaching our kids are they actually giving excellent education to our students.

I think for the most part yes they are and hoping that we can continue that work and be able to just to see our kids excel in more ways than one.

I'm proud to be on this board and the people that I serve with because we're all here because our hearts in the right place.

We all want to do the right thing.

We might not always make the right choice but I think that this is a place where if you really want to make changes in education this is where we need to be.

So hopefully that.

We don't I don't make too many mistakes.

I've been the longest board director sitting up here and hopefully I got I think I got two more years left and then you don't have to see me anymore.

But it's been a great opportunity to actually to be part of this board and be able to see this Seattle Public School grow in various direction giving opportunities to every student that come through those doors and and hopefully.

I have two more years left and hopefully those two years will be one of my last best two years that actually that that I will actually be able to give to Seattle Public Schools.

Thank you.

Thank you.

OK.

Daughter Monica if you're listening take me to Europe.

I'm jealous.

Last hopefully not least.

A number of thank you's.

Thank you to the folks that have been going down to Olympia that have been writing to Olympia especially the student voices our PTSA our Washington Paramount duty our staff.

Thank you for all the folks that turned out for the legislative town halls over the last two weeks.

Thank you to my state senator Joe Nguyen.

I was fortunate enough to attend his with a number of.

teachers from both Highline districts and Seattle school district.

I was disappointed that my other two legislators didn't show up but they probably thought that I was coming with my McCleary is in fact fake news and and it hurts my heart and it certainly hurts my brain.

that our legislature who we have been told to wait four years until we had a quote unquote healthy majority is not delivering urban school districts have very different needs than other school districts and that does not appear to be recognized.

Our homeless population our kids in need we have a disproportionate percentage of folks when when I tell my fancy.

litigation lawyer type folks about a 40 million dollar deficit and the numbers of kids needing special attention and the number of homeless children we serve.

They go gape jawed and I'm like wait a minute.

This is not new news.

We've been reporting it.

Dahlia Bazaar is over here with the Seattle Times has been reporting it.

Neil Morton's been reporting it.

Folks wake up and smell the coffee.

This is our future.

When I tell them that we're talking about halftime librarians again gape jawed.

So truly talk to everybody in your professional communities and in your neighborhoods and make them wake up and smell the coffee because this meme out there that it's all been solved and you pass the levies Not just one levy but two levies in February that you pass the Seattle families education preschool promise levy.

Of course we're rolling in money.

Well you know a couple of years from now we're still going to have a 90 million dollar deficit.

We have not fixed the structural inequity and one of the worst tax systems in this state.

And if I'm being too political take me to PDC jail.

Double dog dare ya.

Thank you to the Concord community who had their auction last weekend.

Great food great music great company.

That is a Title 1 school a language immersion school and they work awfully darn hard out there and in South Park and I encourage you to go if you ever have the opportunity.

Outstanding folks.

Director Burke and also Director Geary brought up since time immemorial.

I'm an absolute fan of this program.

The legislature Senator John McCoy put this in place years and years ago.

I know that there is concern by staff that we will be putting in.

Board policy by resolution and if we let the genie out of the bottle then goodness knows all hell will break loose.

But we have waited long enough for this and I hope that when we bargain with our teachers We will require professional development for since time immemorial.

We have not done a good job on this and frankly I'm ashamed of that fact.

So game on.

Let's see what happens.

Let's rise it to the top and hopefully we will work through our issues with 2015. Hopefully we will work through our issues with respect to amplify science.

If nothing else we will have honest straightforward conversation about all these issues and we'll still love each other at the end of the day.

That's that's who we are and I'm really proud of that fact.

It's a little like family with respect to the strat plan.

I intend to vote for it.

Is it perfect.

No it is not.

But I do not want the perfect to get in the way of the good.

I am far more interested with what we do about it.

I am old.

I have sat on more boards than I can count.

I have helped craft by committee more mission and vision statements than I can count.

But I'm a pragmatic person.

I'm not an ideologue.

That's not who I am.

It's not how I'm made.

I want to know what we're going to do about this.

Are we going to walk our talk.

Are we going to have accountability measures at the end of the day.

We had a strategic plan 60 pages some 65 folks that came together to write the last one and did we make progress.

We did make some progress.

Did we make enough progress.

Absolutely not.

So I'd like to go with the kiss rule and go straight down the middle and walk our talk and call each other out when we're not doing that.

And I applaud the folks that come down and testify and send us e-mails they call us out.

I would say however that folks that want to throw rocks at our head you need to back off.

It's not OK.

And if you want to throw rocks at the heads of administration that's not OK either because folks are working hard and everybody that says the Seattle Public School District is mismanaged.

I invite you to wear my high heels.

I got a pair of red shiny ones for you.

It's not that easy.

So give us some space and work with us if you would when Folks are saying how horribly mismanaged this district is.

A I emphatically disagree with you.

Do we have room for improvement.

We absolutely do.

But but pouring gasoline on the fire so that legislatures legislators can push back that's really not helpful if you're on the same team and you want the same things for our students.

And let's remember it's about students.

It's not about adult issues.

I am a little fired up because I know folks are working real darn hard.

Am I frustrated.

Holy smokes am I frustrated.

The dog is so sick of listening to me vent.

I want to know about enrollment numbers.

I want to know what's going on behind the curtain about the weighted staffing standards.

CFO Berge will tell you that I ask a lot of questions and I do so As they say unapologetically that's my job.

But do I appreciate staff's willingness to come to the table and give us the information that we asked for.

Absolutely I do.

Couple of other issues and then I'll shut up and we'll get to the main action here.

The student assignment plan we need to be working on yesterday.

We have many many boundaries that need to be addressed and whatever systemic issues we have to make that happen we need to deal with those yesterday.

We have a new COO in Fred Podesta.

I've got a great deal of confidence in him and I might add he came to my last community meeting and I think we opened his eyes up about how things are done in Seattle Public Schools.

It was it was.

Terrific and I hope that more staff will come towards that note.

I do not have a meeting planned yet but they usually occur on the third Saturday from 3 to 5 at a library in West Seattle and you are at the 50 50 chance of getting lasagna and it's worth coming for again.

I I have concerns about the transparency and the robustness with which we communicate with our families.

We're working on it.

It's recognized a lot of things.

We as board directors don't get to put out on the street and it's and it's a real trust exercise and it's really frustrating because if you know me I like to talk.

And I like to communicate and I like to collaborate but I also have to put my fiduciary duty ahead.

And frankly it's very uncomfortable oftentimes.

Stay tuned.

It's a pleasure and it's an honor to work with the folks up here.

So action item C1 adopting a five year strategic plan.

This came before executive committee February 15th for consideration.

Motion please.

With pleasure I move that the school board adopt the 2019 through 24 strategic plan as attached to the board action report.

Second.

Madam Superintendent the floor is yours.

Because you get to lead the implementation of SANE.

I do and I am honored to do so Madam President.

I just think it was really great that we had so many students here this evening.

So many who were speaking in their heritage language.

And so I just like to start that way as well.

Oki Nixiwixwax Nii-tah-nih-ku.

I'm Skapi Pekani.

Ootskwee Sikiyaki that means hello my friends and relatives.

My Blackfeet name is Blue Cloud woman and I just wanted to start that way because I am not fluent in my native language and that is because of a long long long history in this country of oppression and racism in our public education system.

Native people were forcibly taken to boarding schools ripped away from their families put into schools where they had their culture taken away their language stamped out of them where the motto was kill the Indian save the man.

And so as I think about all the oppression and racism that's been in our public education system for the history of this country and the reasons why I don't know my heritage language.

It's why tonight I'm so excited to bring you my recommendation for a targeted five year strategic plan to focus our resources work and initiatives of this district.

This plan reflects what I heard from our community during my listening learning tour our January 2019 engagements what I heard from students loud and clear what I heard from the board during our work sessions and retreats and what I heard from staff and cabinet.

Unlike prior plans this year's plan embodies strategic while our ongoing operational work to provide excellence to all of our students persists.

This plan has clarity about what we are trying to accomplish for our historically underserved students and families.

And I just want to read from the theory of action.

To achieve educational justice Seattle Public Schools strives to provide safe learning environments curriculum that incorporates a student's life experiences and culture and instruction delivered by high quality culturally responsive educators.

Unfortunately many students from certain ethnicities have not historically experienced equitable opportunities for all or part of their educational journey including African and African-American Asian Pacific Islander Asian Pacific Islander and Pacific Islander Latinx and Native American students.

These students are our priority with an intentional focus on African-American males.

This draft the draft strategic plan is guided by the principle of targeted universalism.

In addition we believe that an intentional focus on African-American males will ultimately benefit all students.

We would not have a strong written written version vision for our district without our dedicated strategic plan committee which was made up of community members representatives from our principal core SEA our union a board representative.

and staff and I want to personally thank Director Geary for being the board representation on the committee.

You were the right pick and thank you for being so strong throughout that process.

If there are any other committee members in the room I just thank you as well and make sure that thank you so much for your work.

I also want to thank our community for offering feedback throughout this process.

including my listening and learning tour and again during the January 2019 engagement on our draft.

Thank you to the board for the conversation at the last board meeting and the robust conversations we have had throughout this process in particular at two board work sessions and two board retreats.

In response to the discussion at the last board meeting one change has been made since introduction.

The footnote within the high quality instruction and learning experience priority defining high quality instruction was updated to add the language with consistent and appropriate feedback.

We know that there is a lot more work to be done to implement this plan.

There are work plans data dives information gathering community engagement smart goals et cetera et cetera.

And we have to do that implementation within our current budget situation.

So that's going to be a big lift.

But I know that this community and our district is full of smart resourceful creative people that can make sure we are working to move the needle on student achievement and student centered decision making.

Seattle Public Schools has focused on racial equity over the past few years.

It's one of the things that drew me to this job but never has it been so explicit in our primary guiding document.

I'm proud the board will approve this aspirational plan tonight and I look forward to the hard work it will take to make it a reality.

I see this plan as a courageous statement to our community to our families and most of all to our students.

This plan is the reason you hired me.

It's the reason I chose to come to Seattle working together with our community our families and students.

We Seattle Public School staff and the board are setting our charge for the next five years.

We are telling our community that we are committed to strive for excellence for all of our students and making sure that excellence reaches each of our students particularly those who are furthest from educational justice.

I tell this story a lot and we do it at the beginning of every board meeting we stand up and give the Pledge of Allegiance and at the end of the pledge are the words and justice for all.

And when I sit down I whisper the word to myself someday someday we will have it.

The direction this plan sets will help inch us closer to that ideal.

And if we do our work correctly and we do it together as a team we will be able to stand and say the phrase at the end of that pledge with the word today.

And so I look forward to working with all of you in this room.

I look forward to the staff.

I look forward to the work with the board the heavy lift that we're going to have to make.

I ask this board to stay strong.

I ask you to be considerate of the hard work of the committee our community partners and the voices of our students and pass this plan as is and know that we will continue our focus on those students who are furthest from educational justice and we will start that work with African-American males.

Thank you.

OK questions comments concerns from my colleague who would like to speak.

Director DeWolf please.

Thank you.

I also just wanted to thank both Director Geary and the incredible volunteers that sat on this committee for the strategic plan.

I have only done one other in my non school board life and recognize the immense amount of work and commitment to reckoning with certain things that strategic plans invite us to do.

Our country was founded on indigenous invisibility and anti-black racism.

And while we can always do more for our most underserved students I believe that the strategic plan gets us closer to educational justice for all of our students.

Now what we're going to do with the strategic plan is we're going to reckon with the inherent racism that is built into the DNA of our public education system.

But now I have a charge for our city for our neighbors for our parents for voters for families and for educators.

We're showing up in this way to reckon with our racism.

We are inviting you to join us in our efforts and reckon with our collective racism as well.

It's going to take all of us to undo institutional racism.

Please show up and we're inviting you to join us.

I'm really excited to vote for this.

I know it's taken a ton of work but I couldn't be more proud of really focusing on racial equity and the students that are most underserved by our system.

So thank you for the incredible work.

And I know we're going to be back here the next day putting in the time to make sure we're implementing that well.

So thank you for your work.

Director Mack.

Strategic plan mission visioning is a lot and a lot of process and a lot of work and a lot of folks put their input into this strategic plan.

And I too want to thank everyone for that process and for the intentional focus of the strategic plan.

It is it is more narrow than some folks may like.

And I and we are making an intentional decision to be more narrowly focused to do that hard work.

I do think that having that narrow focus will improve things for everyone across the district because every time we don't every time there's an issue or a shortfall every time in every system the people that are most disadvantaged are always the ones that are most harmed.

And so if we take that lens in our decision making in the future and look at what are we doing and who is it impacting and ensuring that we are focusing our efforts on improving and closing the opportunity gap then we can we can only do better with the regards to the comments around the concerns around the operational We've got a number of comments and concerns that the operational priority was not as focused now that is focused primarily on district and it doesn't really reflect a focus on the schools.

And I'll say the same thing I just said about that intentional focus.

I actually I put a lot of thought into this and part of the reason why I came to being a school board director was because of.

Our challenges around our district systems and wanting to help impact that because again in those systems who gets most impacted it's most disadvantaged students.

And so I think that our intentional focus around our district operational systems it will and needs to translate into what's happening directly at schools.

And we need to we need to focus on our our central office and our our overarching systems.

and get better there.

So I I I understand the credit the criticism and concern around it but I'm also supportive of the way that we have landed in the language around this and I want to point out that.

The second goal under this talks about operational functions will improve communication to school leaders family and students.

And that's one of the measures is our student awareness family surveys.

So there is a feedback loop for us to be seeing how it is that how how are we actually impacting at the school level which leads me into the other kind of question that's been mentioned is the implementation plan and.

There's some information in the BAR about the timeline for that.

I was curious to get a little bit more clarity around the process that we're going to go through around the specific implementation process.

What's the board's role in that.

Are we going to be helping to approve KPIs or do we have any clarity around that because I feel like.

That's where the rubber meets the road and how do we ensure that the initiatives that we are starting are actually reflecting the strategic plan.

So that was that's kind of the question that I'd like to raise I'm wondering is it possible for.

Aaron to speak to that or Denise what are your thoughts.

There's a lot.

Director Mack there's a lot of work to be done.

Like I mentioned there will be a process put into place and of course that work will be done collaboratively with the board.

I think there's definitely a thing and then out of that will you have great talking points around it will flow different department kind of plans and the work that actually has to be done.

But I just had a visit with Director Burke and you had some great words around that.

I'm happy to go there if that's a tag.

But I want to make sure.

Hang on.

Does that feel as though your question has been acknowledged and or.

Yes actually it does because I mean I would.

The commitment has been made and I appreciate that and I understand that we're going to kind of work through it as to how it how it plays out.

So hearing the ideas that the collaboration is going on with Director Burke about his ideas for how that can happen will be really helpful and so I appreciate that.

Everyone's ideas.

Yes excellent excellent.

And so yeah I do I do that.

Just try shutting one of these board directors up.

Good luck.

And I and that was all that I.

Yeah I'd be happy to.

I'd be happy to hear from Director Burke because that's and that's that concludes the comments and statements I wanted to make.

The floor is yours Director Burke.

Thank you.

I'll I'll I'll weave that in.

I had a couple of points that I wanted to make.

that I've been at some level a passenger on this journey.

And I'm grateful to those that have driven the train had been on the train the entire time have shaped the whole thing.

But there've been some really great check ins at the beginning where we as a board and through work sessions helped set some some key principles multiple check ins even down to helping work through some of the language concerns at the end.

So while I haven't been involved as involved in the process as my colleague Director Geary and many of the folks on the committee that I'm super super grateful for I feel like I where I started about wow I don't see myself in this plan.

I don't see some of the things that I'm passionate about in this plan.

Along that journey I've been learning and I've been learning and internalizing what.

focusing on the students farthest from educational justice really means and I realize wait I am in that everybody's in that we're just doing it through the vehicle of those students farthest from educational justice and we've said that as words.

But it took me some time and I just want to be transparent about that it took me some time to really take that and and let it let it sink into my heart.

So not being named explicitly named in the strategic plan my belief and what I hope that we will continue to articulate is it does not mean lesser than it does not mean forgotten.

It does not mean marginalized.

So that that's something that's that's really important to me.

One of the other concerns that I've heard is around high quality and since I'm from an engineering and manufacturing background the concept of quality is very sort of sacred to me and the challenge around high quality is that the pure definition of quality is essentially how it compares to an expectation and our families have different expectations.

We have different expectations.

And so when we talk about high quality my expectation for my family for my student for what the system can deliver could be completely different from another person's family.

I've spoken to two parents who say my kid used to go to a school and they would run away and now they're in a school that loves them and they're happy to be there and they'll stay.

And I say that's amazing.

But you know what.

We want we want to go above that expectation.

We don't want that to be our minimum expectation.

So I think that the concept of high expectations really comes down to continuous improvement growth.

and communication around what are your expectations.

Are we meeting them.

Are we exceeding them.

Because every time we meet expectations people will say well I expect a little more.

I expect a little more because that's human nature.

That's what all of us do.

Whenever something becomes the norm we'd like to see what's next.

So I'm really conscious about high quality and we'll continue to encourage the district to use systemic measures around quality as we go through implementation.

So around implementation I was having a conversation with some some some folks on cabinet about this and we were likening it to an educational project as oh this is like a capstone project like wait no it's it's not a capstone it's more of more of a midterm because really the capstone is student graduation post-secondary success.

This is just this is just a this is just a midterm.

There's a lot of work left to do in the second semester here.

And so that's where we start thinking about what comes next.

And the in the bar section 12 has a set of categories with nominal date ranges.

that staff has looked at it so this is what we think we can do in within our capacity and for the board's perspective and the public as well.

There are some really specific touch points that I want to highlight policy A02 which is performance management.

And so this is a document that we started in people are laughing.

I know I told you I'd go there.

That's what we started in C&I committee and exec and we essentially said oh this is this is something that we need the strategic plan for.

We can use the strategic plan as an implementation vehicle through policy A02.

That's where the board can collaborate using a policy vehicle.

We have a superintendent evaluation.

We heard our superintendent passionate about this issue and she has said I want to be evaluated on the strategic plan.

She said that.

She's nodding.

So that's that's kind of a big deal.

And then we have district smart goals or kind of district level goals that are board approved that are collaborative that are kind of the big initiatives.

There'll be tons of department level and staff level initiatives below that that are going to help make this happen.

But that's another place where we as a board and community with outreach and really thoughtful processes can put that in place.

So I just I'm really excited about where our midterm is and I plan to support it because I think we did a really nice job on it and I'm grateful to those who did.

So thank you again.

Other board comments concerns Director Pinkham.

Thank you.

I asked you on the report Superintendent Juneau as we look at this and focus on African-American male that we be sure that is going to include we're not going to leave anybody behind and especially Native American students.

So I'd like to know a little bit more about that.

How are we going to make sure we are as we focus on the African-American males which is good.

How is that going to serve the other.

students that are farthest from educational justice.

I think that may help me out to say OK I see I do see the vision but I got some people in the community that I don't think they're quite clear on it.

And but if we can definitely just say it these are what we're going to do and this is how it's going to help these other communities it may help clarify some things.

There may be some I don't know if it's Scribner error it just says native students did we need to put Native American students in it.

Was that the intention.

And.

Part of the goal where we say students furthest from educational justice including and then it just says Native students but Superintendent Juneau read it Native American students.

Do we need to make that adjustment.

Do people do people know what Native if they just said Native students versus Native American students.

We say African-American African and African-American students.

I would like to see that it does say yes native American students because there could be a lot of people say I'm native I'm native to Seattle I'm native to the United States.

I'm seeing consensus up here on the board.

Mr. General Counsel that's a Scrivener's edition is that correct sir.

Thank you.

And other things that we talk about you know students of focus and then we use another language students of color.

Can I get clarity on that that our students of color the students of focus.

Yeah and I'm sorry I was sick when this was introduced.

I wasn't here at the meeting.

Part of what you read to achieve educational justice as it goes through it says unfortunately many students from certain ethnicities have not historically experienced equitable opportunities for all are part of the educational journey and then it includes.

And then as we go down it just says you know students of color.

Is it intentional that the students of color are those ethnicities that we listed above.

Yes.

It's the same.

Yes.

OK so I just want to make sure that we that gets clarified.

Students of color furthest from educational justice is that is that OK.

So and.

I think you know I talked to Chief — I'm going to mix it up — Aaron Bennett-Galvey and I asked you that's one thing I want to make sure that was clear you know how can we show that for the Native community that's contacted me that Native communities are not being left behind are not forgotten in this document.

So if there's anything that someone can share that can help.

sure and I think everyone up here I believe if I take your word that yes Native Americans are not going to be forgotten in the strategic plan.

No student of color no students even not of color are going to be forgotten.

But we're going to intentionally work with African-American males and bring up everyone along with it.

If I can get everyone to say yes Scott that's our intention.

Native students Hispanic students Latinx students Asian Asian Pacific Islander students The list goes on students you know Muslim students students from different backgrounds.

We're going to do that.

That's the intent.

Thank you.

Erin is there anyone that can help support maybe from the.

Board.

That is the intent.

You read it I think throughout.

I think this is it's clear what I read in the theory of action is clear.

We talked a lot at the board retreats around what targeted universalism is and it really is making sure that we.

We are looking at ourselves as a district and we are changing our structures and the way that we do business to best meet the needs of a targeted group.

African-American males in doing so we are helping to change the structures that will best help all students of color who are furthest from justice.

And by doing that we will be helping all students in our system.

That's the theory.

That's the principle.

That's what's weaved I think throughout this entire plan.

You know I know that sometimes it's difficult not to see yourself explicitly named but I believe that if we do right by African-American males in this district we are going to be doing right by all students of color and by all students.

Yeah so thank you for that.

And so again I'll I'm going to really support and there is a community that I'm going to be responsible to so I'm going to make sure that remind everyone how.

Let's not forget our Native American students.

Let's not forget our Muslim students and any students that may sometimes fall through the cracks and do my best to make sure that their voices are heard.

And I would just say I mean you heard earlier that there are programs for native students which we are really really really proud of in Seattle Public Schools and the work of Gail Morris the native program the federal funds that come into our district that are then dispersed out for assistance.

The Parent Advisory Council of the Indian for the PAC money to help guide and advise us in a way.

And just a reminder that African-American males don't come with any money right that there aren't there aren't set aside funds for African-American males like there are native.

native money and so we're happy that we're able to have that those funds to at least build a nominal system to support native students and we have a really good base as a result of that to build upon and to learn from for other students.

Director Geary.

Oh I think I've said enough other than to say I want to give a huge thanks to Erin Bennett for being my partner in this work keeping me focused.

Encouraging me to circle around with different communities and different members.

So thank you.

Thank you to everybody who participated on the steering committee.

We've said it before but there were so many really good conversations about what these words mean what it's going to take.

And at the end of the day we're not going to see a change unless we see a culture change.

And this is what.

is meant by the strategic plan.

It is a culture change that if we can change the culture within our building for our African-American males it will be changed for our other students of color farthest from educational justice.

It would have to be.

That is the hope it is certainly not anybody's goal that we're looking at a different group five years from now and a different group five years from now.

The group is that we change the eyes and hearts and minds of the people within this institution and the people of this city so that every student is met with belief and expectation.

No matter how they identify their culture whether they want to spend time in their culture giving them the strength and courage to go out and other cultures because they know that.

That is just the new institutional norm.

So you know we have to start somewhere and it's going to be inches because it is so deeply ingrained but it is a start and it's when I hope that is emulated by other school districts and other agencies in our city.

Thank you everybody.

Did you wish to speak on this issue.

Yes I do.

I just want to say that it's a long time waiting for this to happen as a longtime board director.

This is really has been an issue that that's been ongoing and hoping that someday that we can be able to really come down to and realize how important this is for our particular African-American male.

And so just hearing that and being able to say we're finally moving forward.

I think it's a plus for this board and actually realizing that we're making changes that has needed to be changed for many many years.

So thank you for that change that we're making and moving forward.

And thank you to Superintendent for actually making that a priority.

We're going to continue on to do bigger and greater things for all our kids.

Thank you.

OK last but not least I've already indicated that I will be voting for this.

I had my comments this evening about rock throwing to folks that are working really hard and I implore communities that are not happy with this to get over it and to help us.

I am angry about people that seek to divide us because we're on the same boat and this strategic plan and targeted universalism does not mean that we will continue to polarize highly capable or other labeled groups of children.

Again the word.

Children needs to be uppermost the labeling that goes on the divisiveness that goes on is is born a privilege.

And I have to tell you prior to joining this board I never thought of myself as privileged and I have learned a great deal sometimes very painfully.

These are children we're talking about.

If you're not happy.

Join the team.

Help us.

Give every student in our district a good education.

Volunteer.

Triple dog.

Dare your legislators to spend three consecutive days in your classroom.

Make it real.

It is not us's and them's it's and it's the driver here folks.

And with that note roll call please.

Director Burke aye Director DeWolf aye Director Geary aye Director Mack aye Director Patu aye Director Pinkham aye Director Harris aye.

This motion is passed unanimously.

all the really hard work begins.

C 2 BTA 3 award construction contract K 5 1 0 6 bid number B 1 2 8 3 9 to Western Ventures Construction for the John Muir geothermal wells project.

This came before Ops February 7th for.

Consideration motion please.

I move that the school board authorize the superintendent to execute construction contract K 5 1 0 6 with Western Ventures Construction in the amount of one million seven hundred and three thousand five hundred dollars including base bid plus alternate number one and alternate number three plus Washington state sales tax with any minor additions deletions and modifications deemed necessary by the superintendent and to take any necessary actions to implement the contract.

Second.

COO Podesta you want to tee this one up quickly and we have a time check of 746 and a whole lot of intro items that are yours.

Sure.

Chief Operations Officer Fred Podesta.

We talked about this in a certain amount of detail at intro.

This is to dig 80 geothermal wells for a new efficient HVAC system at John Muir Elementary.

This is the BTA 3 project.

We this is the sixth project like this we've done and I think we're ready to go.

And this is the one that was amended given a eagle eyed constituent.

Thank you.

There is a minor change on the second page in the section labeled alternatives.

There was an error.

It made reference to seismic work and should have again talked about digging geothermal wells.

And it was my version of magic seeing you respond in five minutes.

There you go.

Director Mack did you have something to add Madam.

No I was just going to note that and appreciation to folks who kind of catch these things.

We have so many construction bars that come through and details do matter.

So thank you.

And for responding so quickly to get it updated and.

I don't think there's any remaining issues.

If anyone has any other questions.

I think we — comments questions concerns from my colleagues.

Seeing none roll call please.

Director Patu aye Director DeWolf aye Director Geary aye Director Patu aye Director Mack aye Director Burke aye Director Pinkham aye Director Harris aye.

This motion is passed unanimously.

C3 BEX IV award construction contract P 5 1 2 3 bid number beer beer.

B 0 9 8 1 3 to CDX construction services Inc. for the Catherine Blaine seismic improvements project came before Ops February 7th for motion please.

I move that the school board authorize the superintendent to execute construction contract P 5 1 2 3 with CDK construction services Inc. in the amount of six hundred and twenty nine thousand dollars including base bid plus Washington State sales tax with any minor additions deletions and modifications deemed necessary by the superintendent and to take any necessary actions to implement the contract.

Second.

Questions comments concerns from my colleagues.

We spoke about this in intro.

Seeing none roll call please.

Director Burke aye Director DeWolf aye Director Geary aye Director Mack aye Director Patu aye Director Pinkham aye Director Harris aye this motion is passed unanimously.

OK D we're on introduction items.

We have 8 this evening.

This is a time check.

We are at 7 50. Well the superintendent is out of the room I think we can give her an assignment or two or three.

That was a joke.

Hello.

Number one I'm looking at asking for a break.

We will take a 10 minute break.

Please be back here at 8 0 1. Thank you.