SPEAKER_13

Good afternoon.

We will be calling the board meeting to order in a moment and SPS-TV will begin broadcasting for those joining by phone.

Please remain muted until we reach the testimony period and your name is called.

This is President Hersey.

I am now calling the May 17th, 2023 regular board meeting to order at 419 PM.

This meeting is being recorded.

We would like to acknowledge that we are on the ancestral lands and traditional territories of the Puget Sound Coast Salish people.

Ms. Wilson-Jones, the roll call, please.

SPEAKER_27

Director Harris.

Vice President Rankin.

Here.

Director Rivera-Smith.

SPEAKER_19

Present.

SPEAKER_27

Director Sarju.

SPEAKER_33

Here.

Here.

SPEAKER_27

Director Song-Moritz.

Present.

And Director Hampson is not yet in the room but I'm glad you'll be joining shortly.

She's in the building.

President Hersey.

SPEAKER_13

Here.

SPEAKER_27

And we do not have a student member available to join today.

SPEAKER_13

Thank you very much.

I will now turn it over to Superintendent Jones for his comments.

SPEAKER_04

Thank you, President Hersey.

Thank you for all who are here tonight.

Last Thursday, I had the pleasure of kicking off some of the year-end festivities with our SPS Scholarship Ceremony.

Together with their families and loved ones, we celebrated the tenacity and excellence of 51 graduating seniors who received scholarships from the SPS Scholarship Fund.

The students' stories, perseverance, and dedication to their education was truly inspiring.

We look forward to seeing all the places that they will go and the things that they will achieve.

Thank you to the counselors and school staff who supported these students along the way for exemplifying our vision of providing a world-class education to each student.

And thank you to the scholarship committee, Director Harris, including our, for recognizing our students for their efforts.

We really appreciate it, and hopefully you all had a chance to see that.

If not, take a look at it.

It's truly inspiring.

We have a city mental health initiative kickoff.

I'm excited to announce the new initiative channels more than four million dollars to expanding youth mental health supports in response to students' calls to action.

In partnership with the City of Seattle's Department of Education and Early Learning, Public Health of Seattle and King County, community organizations and SPS student leaders, a pilot program launched last year in five of our schools.

This effort will be continued and expanded in the coming year to provide support to our students who need that and are demanding that it happen.

Note board members that BAR will come to you in June to expand this work with DEEL.

Regarding Washington Middle School Jazz, I want to provide an update in response to the ongoing concern about Washington Middle School Jazz program changes.

Frankly, it's been a pleasure to hear how special this program has been and continues to be for the students.

We are listening, we're working on solutions, and we've had so many people come forward willing to help that I think a solution is on the horizon shortly.

I think some of you are here for Lincoln High School football.

We've heard many in the community talk about Lincoln High School football.

Each day Seattle Public Schools athletic department coordinates with all SPS middle and high schools to provide valuable experiences for our student athletes.

And for our athletes we know that competitive sports are part of the high school experience and allows them to learn grow and thrive.

Their safety on and off the field, courts and arenas of play is our top priority.

The Metro League, a collaboration of athletic directors, school principals, building leaders, has assured SPS that athletic safety is prioritized and considered in every shared decision as a practice, and that game scheduling determinations, and when they're scheduling games as well.

Decisions regarding the current two-tier football structure were made jointly with the Metro Advisory Executive Council.

So student-athletes from 16 SPS schools, including Lincoln High School, compete in Metro League, and SPS acknowledges the many expressions of concern for the public regarding Lincoln High School athletes.

The district's leadership team is reviewing each of these messages that are coming forward.

So looking ahead to next season, the school principal, SPS, and the student-athletic director, we will work through any concerns regarding the two-tier Football structure and and I guarantee you that we'll make sure that we have the safest safest environment for our students Switching to a gun violence proclamation tonight.

We'll be offering a proclamation of gun violence awareness declaring June 2nd as gun violence awareness day communities across the country are reeling from the impacts of gun violence and and the SPS community is not immune.

Our students, families, and schools are directly impacted by these tragedies, and we must take action to prevent more lives from being senselessly lost.

Let's together take a moment of silence to remember those who have lost their lives.

Thank you.

I'm going to ask Vice President Rankin to read our proclamation.

Do that now, please.

SPEAKER_32

Thank you, Superintendent Jones.

Before I read this, I just want to thank Moms Demand Action, Grandmothers Against Gun Violence, the Alliance for Gun Responsibility, and our own Seattle Student Union for their partnership and support and bringing this proclamation forward with us the first year that Director Rivera-Smith and I brought it to Superintendent Juneau and for their continued partnership in bringing this annually and to you, Dr. Jones, as well.

A proclamation of Seattle School District No. 1, King County, Seattle, Washington declaring June 2, 2023 to be National Gun Violence Awareness Day in the Seattle School District to honor and remember all victims and survivors of gun violence and to declare that we as a country must do more to end this public health crisis.

Whereas every day, more than 120 Americans are killed by gun violence and more than 200 are shot and wounded, with an average of more than 17,000 gun homicides each year.

Whereas Americans are 26 times more likely to die by gun homicide than people in other high-income countries.

And whereas, protecting public safety in the communities they serve is the district's highest responsibility.

And whereas, support for the Second Amendment rights of law abiding citizens goes hand in hand with keeping guns away from people that should not have them.

And whereas gun violence prevention is more important than ever, as we see an increase in firearm homicides and non-fatal shootings across the country, increased calls to domestic violence hotlines, and an increase in city gun violence.

Whereas in January 2013, Hadiyah Pendleton was tragically shot and killed at age 15, and on June 2nd, uh...

twenty twenty three we recognize the twenty sixth birthday of hadia pendleton people across the united states will recognize national gun violence awareness day and where orange in tribute to hadia pendleton and other victims of gun violence and the last one the loved ones of those victims Whereas the idea was inspired by a group of Adia's friends who asked their classmates to commemorate her life by wearing orange.

They chose this color because hunters wear orange to announce themselves to other hunters when out in the woods.

And orange is a color that symbolizes the value of human life.

And whereas Washington State has an average of 853 gun deaths every year, with a rate of 10.8 deaths per 100,000 people.

A crisis that costs the state $11.9 billion each year, of which 171.7 million is paid by taxpayers.

Washington State has the 40th highest rate of gun deaths in the U.S., and whereas guns are the leading cause of death among children and teens in Washington State.

An average of 60 children and teens die by guns every year, of which 54% of these deaths are suicides.

And 43 are homicides.

And whereas the Seattle Public Schools community is directly impacted by gun violence and whereas anyone can join this campaign by pledging to wear orange on June 2nd the first Friday in June 2023 to help raise awareness about gun violence.

And whereas by wearing orange on June 2nd, 2023, Americans will raise awareness about gun violence and honor the lives of gun violence victims and survivors.

And whereas we renew our commitment to reduce gun violence and pledge to do all we can to keep firearms out of the hands of people who should not have access to them and encourage responsible gun ownership to help keep our families and communities safe.

Therefore, Seattle Public Schools declares the first Friday in June, June 2nd, 2023, to be National Gun Violence Awareness Day.

We encourage all schools to support their local communities' efforts to prevent the tragic effects of gun violence and to honor and value human lives.

Thank you.

SPEAKER_04

Thank you, Vice President Rankin.

With that said, I'll turn it back to you, President Hersey.

SPEAKER_13

Thank you very much.

As mentioned earlier, unfortunately, our school board student member is unable to join us this evening, so there will be no student board member comments.

We have now come to board comment section of the agenda.

And I'll provide some additional comments when we get to introduction item number one, which would formalize the governing structure that we've been piloting since fall.

I'm excited about the progress that we've made together by shifting many of the items to the full board conversations, beginning to use our time together for collaborative work, and standing up focused ad hoc committees to move our priorities forward.

Looking ahead to our next few weeks, we have a full calendar.

On May 31st, we will have a progress monitoring session on guardrails.

During our June 7 regular board meeting, we will have our exit conference with the Washington State Auditor's Office.

Because of that, we will adjust the timing of public testimony to begin at 5 p.m.

as opposed to 4 30. Also on June 7, we will appoint student members for the 2023-24 school year.

If directors would like to participate in the interviews for student members, please reply to Julia by Tuesday, May 23. During our June 21 board meeting, we will have an opportunity to thank this year's school board student members who have served with enthusiasm and brilliance over this inaugural year of the program.

On June 21 we will also receive the proposed budget for the 2023-24 for introduction and a public hearing with final action on the budget scheduled for July 6. As we close out the final months of the school year we are planning for our coming year's meetings.

Our ad hoc community engagement committee is developing recommendations for an engagement calendar and this work will go hand in hand with our work to develop a comprehensive board work plan for the coming year.

I've asked that staff chart out the required board actions for the coming year so that we can forecast our decisions further in advance and plan accordingly for the work sessions, community engagement, and other work we need to do in preparation.

SPEAKER_99

All right.

SPEAKER_13

So we will now have a brief report on the Ad Hoc Community Engagement Committee.

As the chair, I will offer that.

We actually just got out of the meeting, and we are focusing our next few sessions on developing a proactive calendar that outlines some of the major board decisions that are going to take place so that we can then backward plan board-focused community engagement around those issues, as well as working on a series of one-pagers that educate the community a little bit about the work that we do and help or at least are designed to help our community do some wayfinding in terms of how to get problems resolved but as well as that figuring out what is the balance between community engagement that is under the purview of the board and family engagement that is under the purview of the superintendent and how can we Respect our separate tracks of work while still finding opportunities to collaborate where possible So it's been a really productive space and I'm excited to continue working We'll now move into our other reports for tonight.

Do we have an ad hoc policy manual review committee report?

SPEAKER_32

I'll give a legislative liaison update first this will Unless there's any happenings to report this will probably be my my last regular update for this school year anyway from legislative.

But I wanted to share that I was invited to participate in a meeting last night co-hosted by Seattle Council PTSA and the Seattle Student Union around reflecting on the successes of this past legislative session and the work yet ahead of us.

And it was really great to see.

SEF President Jennifer Modder there with us as well.

So we were joined by representatives Sharon Tomiko Santos and Jerry Paulette and Senator Jamie Peterson to talk specifically about issues that they championed on legislation for our students.

So I believe that was recorded and is probably available via the Seattle Council PTSA channels.

I've got something you're interested in the legislators and I shared sort of highlights from the session, proudest moments, and what we are each focusing on between now and the next legislative session.

So there's some good information in there.

And thank you to everyone who joined us.

For the Policy Manual Review Committee, we had our second meeting.

Yesterday was that just yesterday yesterday and we are getting started digging into Our first meeting was was some some background for ourselves and reminders for anyone who may want to participate in our meetings about the laws at the state level that govern how school board directors do policy and why, and have now moved into some reviewing recommendations made from the Governance Ad Hoc Committee from a 2018 audit that was done in SPS by Moss Adams that had some governance recommendations, including recommending a policy governance model.

And some some staffing recommendations and kind of rebrought to the surface things in that that were really relevant for our committee specifically and also looked at some material on guidance for policy review and analysis in terms of what kind of category they fall into.

That's provided by Council of Great City Schools that we'll be using.

So just getting started, we're developing our work plan now.

We have a charter and some suggested deliverables for that committee.

So if you really like to talk about policy, or rather hear other people talk about policy, please join us for our next meeting, which will be, I think, June 14.

SPEAKER_13

Thank you very much.

Do we have any additional liaison reports.

Yeah.

That's fine.

SPEAKER_20

Okay.

At the last meeting I announced that I would be having a community meeting this Saturday May 20. It is canceled.

I have some family obligations.

They will change the locks if I'm not there.

Secondly Alki elementary school.

And Richard Best and his team will be at Alki May 22, Monday at 7 PM to talk about that community's concerns.

Thank you.

SPEAKER_28

I have two committee updates.

The first one is for the BEXPTA Capital Levy Oversight Committee.

This committee last met in this room on Friday, May 12th.

As part of our regular meeting, we did a regular review of the budget.

There was nothing of note there.

We also did a review on the various project statuses.

I'm really pleased to share that Northgate Elementary is substantially complete, which is great because it's just May.

And the goal was for the students to be going to school in their brand new building this fall.

Phase two, which involves the demolition of the previous building, will happen once the school year starts.

West Seattle Elementary is also close to completion.

Director Rivera-Smith and I had the opportunity to tour it a few weeks ago, and we were already seeing furniture in the classrooms, and it seems like a very warm and inviting environment for our kids.

The oversight committee also got a presentation similar to our board's presentation on the BEX VI capital levy planning.

There was a casual discussion and a desire to continue to provide feedback.

Finally, the committee chair Janet Donaldson and Richard Best and I had a brief conversation about the role that that committee could play in better supporting our work around capital projects, board action reports.

the members of that committee are subject matter experts.

They include architects, contractors, people who have extensive experience in working in public works projects.

I think that's something we can discuss as a full group later when that committee bar comes up, but I just wanted to offer that there is interest in the committee and supporting the board in approval of those bars.

The next meeting for that committee is June 9th at 8.30 and in this room.

The next update I have is for the Families, Education, Preschool, and Promise Levy Oversight Committee.

The committee had its annual retreat on April 27th.

We did a deep dive on the many investments that the city makes on behalf of our youth.

And the levy is in its year three of a six-year cycle.

In total, all the programs serve 27,700 kids.

ranging from the youngest learners that we have, the Seattle Preschool Program, to school-based investments in our school district, school-based health centers, and of course, Seattle Promise, which is a fantastic program for new graduates of our district to go to Seattle Community Colleges.

I would characterize the data as showing the continued significant impact the pandemic has had on the academic, health, and social-emotional outcomes of our youth.

We had a really robust conversation about what changes we may make or recommend to the committee.

There will be some underspend money that we'll have to make a decision about how to best use that money.

That will be coming this summer.

And finally, we got a brief presentation about the $4 million that, as Dr. Jones had mentioned in his comments, that the city has generously offered to us.

In 2002, the Department of Education already did some pilot programs around mental health programs.

And beginning in June, they will be reviewing these programs, doing a needs-based assessment, and begin a process for identifying expansion schools.

And hopefully that will start at the end of the summer.

That's it.

SPEAKER_24

Go ahead.

Let's see.

Is this on?

Thanks.

The next quarterly audit meeting is on June 6th.

And I believe, I haven't gotten confirmation, I believe we'll have the agenda for that posted on Friday.

Many new favorites will be coming back around from the last meeting.

Including transportation and communications It'll be our first I think our first Audit response on communications, so that's exciting at least for us.

I don't know how our communications director Feels about it.

But yeah, we're excited to get caught up in that on the good work that's happening there and Important new addition to the special attention item which many of you may have heard us speak about Superintendent Jones has spoken about it.

We as board members spoken about it in various Meetings budget meetings.

We talked about it at the policy governance meeting.

I mean the policy manual meeting and that is the Teaching the 2018 Moss Adams Teaching and Learning Study, which is a very, very deep dive into our efficiency or lack thereof in many areas.

Again, back in 2018, but we're bringing it back around because it remains very relevant and we're excited to have this good work.

And Moss Adams is gonna come on the 6th and the auditors who did this work are gonna come and talk to us and we can inquire about what next steps might be in terms of, there are deliverables for both the board and for staff coming out of this study.

So I'm excited to pick up that work again and hope that fellow directors will join me on June 6th.

I forget what time, are we at 4 o'clock now with our audit, quarterly audit meetings?

It's not in the calendar yet so I'm blanking on the time.

I think it's at 4 o'clock, 4.30?

Four o'clock, okay.

And then on Tribal Liaison Update, Superintendent Jones and our Manager of Native Education, Gail Morris, and I met with the Muckleshoot Tribe on the 4th.

We got to hear all of their, I actually don't know the number, I should know the number of districts that are on the lands that are Accountable to education deliverables for the the Muckleshoot Nation that was really inspiring to hear all the different work that districts are doing and then Gail and Superintendent Jones and I all spoke Gail about the educational components and then Along with Superintendent Jones, and then I spoke briefly about our increasing tribal consultation requirements and obligations with State law 5252 but also in good practice with appropriate tribal consultation in honor of our First Nations here and we have a meeting on Friday with the Suquamish nation to do the same thing and to also further our conversations about our memorandum of understanding with them and tribal consultation policy, which I expect will be part of the policy manual and as it is the Tribal Consultation is the ultimate honoring of the traditional Indigenous knowledge of this place, which is incredibly critical, but also because we are on the lands of sovereign nations who have status in this country that requires that we pay special attention to the education of Native students in ways that acknowledge their citizenship with those with those nations throughout here in Washington State and throughout the country.

And Director Rankin will be traveling with me to Toppenish in just a matter of hopefully less than hours, plural, where we will go to the last and third convening between tribal leaders and school board directors related to the law that now requires school board directors Tribal leaders to do consultation and directly as government to government and we'll be learning also again about some how data plays into that which is a importantly growing component of our conversations here together in terms of the data that represents how our students are doing and our commitments therein.

I'm hoping Superintendent Jones will also be listening in for that data portion of it.

We did, Director Rankin and Superintendent Jones and I met with staff from enrollment and our research and evaluation department to talk about best practices and identification of students with respect to both their citizenship and their identity.

And we have had a lot of work to do in that area for a very long time, and I feel like we're on the cusp of one One thing to note, the way that we tag students in terms of identity when you check a box that says this is who I am or how I identify is dictated by a long, complicated history that for reasons that if you're interested in exploring, I would encourage you to, but are controlled by the Office of Budget and Management at the federal level, which doesn't have a lot specifically to do with how we identify our citizenry in terms of their identity, but it gets very complicated and can really reduce the amount of services and funds for those services that we are able to garner from both the state and the federal level if we don't take a real I can't think of another word besides scrubbing approach, but it's really what we refer to as a max identification approach to data.

And so while it is focused on native students, what we are learning in this process, I believe, is extremely helpful to students.

throughout the district because one of the best practices, for example, is that if a student has multiple identities or citizenships, that they are able to be all three or all four or all five of those things and not just one thing, which is how our current system defaults when our data goes up to the state and to the federal level.

So if you see differences in data about our demographics, between what we report in Seattle Public Schools and what you see in federal data.

It's because the federal data is incomplete and we have likely gathered more information about the identity of our students and we'll need to continue to do to do better.

I think that's it.

Wish us safe travels on the way to Toppenish.

Sorry.

One more thing.

If anybody wants to join to the Zoom call with Director Rivera-Smith has had the opportunity to go with Superintendent Jones and myself to Suquamish.

If any other directors would like to join us on Friday, you are more than welcome to meet with our chairman of the Suquamish Nation and his staff and learn a bit more about what this process is.

I encourage you to as It's something that you're all going to get trained on and have to do going forward.

SPEAKER_13

Thank you very much.

We've now reached the public testimony portion of the agenda.

We will be taking public testimony by phone and in person as stated on the agenda.

Board procedure 1430BP provides the rules for testimony, and I ask that speakers are respectful of these rules, and I will summarize some of the important parts of this procedure.

First, testimony will be taken today from those individuals called from our public testimony list and, if applicable, the waiting list, which is included on today's agenda posting on the school board website.

Only those who are called by name should unmute their phones or step forward to the podium and only one person should speak at a time.

Speakers from the list may cede their time to another person when the listed speaker's name is called.

The total amount of time allowed will not exceed two minutes for the combined number of speakers.

Time will not be restarted after the new speaker begins and the new speaker will not be called again later if they are on the testimony list or waiting list.

Those who do not wish to have time ceded to them may decline and retain their place on the testimony or wait list.

The majority of the speaker's time should be spent on the topic they have indicated they wish to speak about.

The board expects the same standard of civility for those participating in public comment as the board expects of itself.

As board president, I have the right to and will interrupt any speaker who fails to observe the standard of civility required by board procedure 1430BP.

A speaker who refuses or fails to comply with these guidelines or who otherwise substantially disrupts the orally operation of the meeting may be asked to leave the meeting.

Ms. Kuh will read off the testimony speakers.

SPEAKER_16

Thank you, President Hersey.

A note for your speakers joining us via phone.

Please remain muted until your name is called to provide testimony.

When your name is called, please be sure you have unmuted on the device you are calling from, and also press star six to unmute yourself on the conference call line.

Each speaker will have a two minute speaking time.

You'll hear a beep when your time is exhausted, and the next speaker will be called.

The first speaker on the list is Aran Goyoaga.

SPEAKER_40

Thank you, Superintendent Jones.

My name is Erin Goyuaga, and Mike Lutonich is going to speak on my behalf.

SPEAKER_05

Hello.

Could you please pull out this handsheet, this handout that you made?

This handout, can you please pull that out and sort of follow along?

This is what the Lincoln football testimony is going to be regarding.

Okay.

So, hello, my name is Mike.

I'm now going to try and speed read through this.

This is about Metro's tiers, aka divisions, specific to football.

There was three tiers, which in Metro's words, promoted fair play, increased attendance, and lowered injuries due to grossly mismatched teams.

But last year, they abandoned it, removing the middle tier and enlarging the upper and lower tiers.

So the gap between top and bottom teams throughout the whole league got bigger.

Why?

All we're told is scheduling difficulty for the couple dominant teams.

My son plays for Lincoln, which has moved into the enlarged top division.

I know what you're thinking.

We don't want to be the doormat.

This isn't an everyone gets a blue ribbon thing.

We aren't naive.

Our fight is for fair play for all teams and to rid the league of gross mismatches.

Let's talk about how it's supposed to be in Metro.

It's supposed to be about a level playing field, but some programs recruit.

So a great athlete might have gone to our school, now happens to get a full-ride scholarship to another school.

Recruiting at our school is a coach seeing a big guy in the hallways and saying, want to play football?

It's supposed to be about, every once in a while, David choosing to fight a Goliath.

Nope.

Metro mandates it, plus three more right after that.

This should be about the community gathering together at games, cheerleaders, band, alumni.

Nope.

Students don't want to come out and watch some team get blanked 56 to 0. Hell, the parents would rather watch TikTok.

This should be about making an inherently dangerous sport less risky.

No.

Again, two tiers widens the gap and creates more gross mismatches.

That sure don't make it safer.

So what is this about?

Scheduling.

SPEAKER_06

Okay, thank you.

SPEAKER_05

Okay, well, the last thing is our ask, which is, we ask you to give us a meeting with Dr. Conci Pedrosa in the next couple days, where we have time and platform to explain our point of view and request a revote.

This revote must happen this month, so another season isn't lost to a broken system.

Please help us accomplish that.

SPEAKER_16

The next speaker is Oliver Compton.

SPEAKER_12

My name is Oliver Compton and Luke Brubaker will be taking my time slot.

Hello everyone.

My name is Luke Brubaker and I was a captain as a senior for Lincoln football last season.

I had the opportunity to be a varsity starter for Lincoln for three years, and the first two of which were played with a three-tiered scheduling system.

However, last year the decision was made to move to a two-tier system, simply to make scheduling games easier, especially for top teams, as Mike mentioned.

This decision paved the way to a series of games with grossly mismatched opponents.

For example, last year under the two-tier system, Lincoln was scheduled to play games against a variety of teams that we never would have played under a three-tier system, including Cleveland and Chief Sealth.

We won those two games by a combined score of 105 to 7. I also distinctly remember those games as one of the most boring games of the season because they kept dragging on because the other team kept having players get injured.

During halftime of the Cleveland game, Lincoln players were unsure if a second half would even be played because Cleveland barely had enough players to field a starting lineup.

Games like these have shown increases in player injuries over the years and lower fan attendance.

After the three-tier system was adopted in 2017, player injuries decreased in ensuing seasons and fan attendance improved.

And I'd like to point out that our SPS Athletic Director, Pat McCarthy, is well aware of these trends when he pushed the decision through to move to two tiers last year, and that was evidenced in his own words in an email in May 2022 to Roosevelt parent, Bruce Bailey.

Despite this, Pat McCarthy went on to say that the two-tier system was better suited to the league's scheduling needs.

It's one thing to test out a system for one year, but to continue with the two-tier system would be a gross negligence of player safety simply for the sake of scheduling convenience.

Choosing schedule simplicity over player safety was a terrible mistake that must not be repeated again this year.

In the event that catastrophic injuries and lawsuits occur, SPS will have no excuses as to why they let this happen.

We needed the school board to head out this dangerous system Can I finish?

I have one more sentence.

Dangerous situation to the superintendent and assistant superintendent for immediate review so that Metro League can go back to being a safe environment for kids to play football in.

Thank you.

SPEAKER_16

The next speaker is Heidi Groffel.

The next speaker is Kerry Sear.

SPEAKER_02

Hi, my name is Kerry Sear and I pass it over to Bruce Bailey.

SPEAKER_09

Hi there, good afternoon.

My name is Bruce Bailey and I'm here today as a member and representative of the Roosevelt High School community.

We are in full support of the Lincoln School community and their efforts to unwind the poor decisions made by Metro over a year ago regarding their realignment of divisions.

Personally, I am a Roosevelt graduate, as is my wife, Erin Bailey, who is also a member of the faculty at Roosevelt.

In high school, I was fortunate to be an all-conference player for Roosevelt, later played for the University of Washington, won a national championship.

Football has been a big part of my life and helped me as an adult.

Over a year ago, Roosevelt fought the battle Lincoln is now fighting when Metro made the decision to reduce divisions from three to two.

Despite our efforts, Roosevelt was moved up to the upper division, and the season went along as directed.

Sadly, Roosevelt lost every game it played by an average of over 30 points.

We had to forfeit a game because we were short players due to injury.

Kids left the program.

Many of those kids are those furthest from educational justice.

participation overall has been impacted.

There's a long list of things I could share from what has transpired over the past year for Roosevelt, but since my time is short, I believe it is most important for you to hear.

The decisions made last year to create a new system into the divisions was inequitable and dangerous.

Kids want to play football for Metro, and it's just not what it should be.

What further is evident that these decisions were not well thought out by the powers of Metro, nor was there a proper evaluation process completed by the league.

As members of the board, I encourage you to ask direct questions of those you oversee and get to the bottom of what is happening in Metro football.

I personally think you'll be disappointed by the decision making process and the lack of thoughtfulness.

Our kids deserve an equitable and safe environment to play football.

Thank you.

SPEAKER_16

The next speaker is Oliver Grothwalser.

The next speaker is Quinn Fleet.

The next speaker is Chris Jackins.

SPEAKER_34

My name is Chris Jackins Box 8 4 0 6 3 Seattle 9 8 1 2 4. On the personnel report under separations the report lists Ruth Metzger longtime principal including at Lincoln.

I wish to thank Ms. Metzger for her service to the district.

On the fiscal stabilization plan and on the economic stabilization account, three points.

Number one, the plan would use all of the current economic stabilization account, $42.2 million.

The proposed replacement plan is a schedule, not a plan, and the proposed source of funds is hoped for underspend.

It is reminiscent of the plan adopted to pay for the district headquarters.

We're still paying for it.

Number two, please consider the following alternate plan.

There are three steps, A, B, and C.

Step A, enrollment is dropping.

Free up $40 million in capital funds by downsizing the oversized projects at Alki, Montlake, and Rogers by About 18%.

Step B, prepay $40 million of contracts for currently identified maintenance work using the general fund in the current fiscal year with the funds coming from the economic stabilization account.

Step C, reimburse the general fund from the capital fund for the $40 million.

has currently still allowed this fiscal year as extended capital, restoring the economic stabilization account and providing an extra $10 million per year for the next four years to balance the general fund.

Number three, a quick review of the three steps, free up capital funds, prepay for maintenance work, reimburse the general fund from the capital fund.

My compliments to all the speakers tonight.

You're doing a nice job.

Thanks a lot.

SPEAKER_16

The next speaker is Natalie Weinstein.

SPEAKER_21

Natalie Weinstein, I'm ceding my time to Corey Goldstein.

SPEAKER_23

Good afternoon board.

My name is Corey Goldstein.

I'm the head counselor at Franklin High School.

In front of you is a petition that was written by faculty at Franklin High School addressing safety issues and a request that more security is assigned to Franklin.

I'd like for the record to read this to you.

This is to the safety and security manager Mike Wells, safety and security assistant manager Benjamin Coulter, Seattle Public Schools superintendent Dr. Jones, and the rest of the board.

We, the undersigned, are requesting Seattle Public Schools provide Franklin High School with additional security personnel, at least five in total, trained in culturally responsive, restorative, and de-escalation practices, and paid for by SPS, not out of the already strained building budget.

This year, Franklin High School has not been safe.

Over the last month, there have been at least three unregistered adults in the building, one who caused a fight and one who came to follow a specific student.

Next year, if no changes are made, the budget cuts will make the safety issues even worse with fewer adults in the building to look out for safety.

We used to have more security in our building.

Those staffing cuts, as well as COVID and gentrification, destroying many community ties, have left our building especially vulnerable.

Our security personnel work very hard to build relationships with our students and keep our school safe.

But with five floors and a detached gym, it is impossible for them to keep our community safe.

We are at one of the busiest intersections of Seattle.

We need at least five personnel to meet the minimum threshold of safety.

We need someone at the main entrance to welcome visitors, bring them to the main office, and monitor their entry.

May I finish?

Thank you.

That work is currently put on our administrative secretaries who are not equipped to do that on top of their other duties.

We also need one person to be devoted to safety in our detached standalone gym, which has seven entrances and is a block away from the main building.

We also need one person on each of our four main floors of our big building aimed at building relationships with students, expanding our capacity and restorative justice, and student at school reflection instead of suspension, and supporting students to be in class focusing on their learning as much as possible.

More security personnel won't solve the many problems that the continuing cuts to education pose for the well-being of our students, but these positions will go a long way to ensure the basic safety we all need.

Thanks for your time.

SPEAKER_16

The next speaker is Tia Rasmussen.

SPEAKER_15

Hello, my name is Tia.

Thank you all for being here.

I'm an educator at Franklin High School and I want to elaborate a bit more on our petition.

I first brought my emergency backpack up with me.

I did an inventory of this backpack in September of this year and over half of the required safety supplies in it were missing.

We do not have the money at our school to replenish our backpacks and we haven't all year.

I also want to acknowledge the dichotomy of the issues being presented at the school board meeting.

Your advocacy is great.

I'm really impressed by all of the students out here, but We are fighting for the core safety of our building.

Our extracurriculars are in jeopardy in different ways.

Within two weeks, three different adults in our community were in our building pretending to be students, following students, or coming to assault students.

And they all entered without hesitation and with no one there to recognize them as people who were not members of our community and were not meant to be there.

Our community is over 90% students of color.

Over 70% of them qualify for free and reduced lunch.

They are furthest from educational justice.

and now they are furthest from safety.

It is not just additional personnel that we need in our building.

It is also core safety supplies.

A fire happened in our building a month ago and went undetected for over 12 minutes because our fire alarm detectors on the second floor were not working.

Some of these issues are being remedied but the majority of them are not.

We desperately desperately need additional funds and we need your support.

I feel like this has to be an oversight because I know the values and mission statement of the board and of Seattle Public Schools and I know that if following that mission statement and those values that this issue this conflict and these barriers that our students are facing would not be occurring.

Thank you.

SPEAKER_16

The next speaker is Mike Lutunic.

SPEAKER_05

You don't want to hear from me again.

I'm ceding to Todd.

SPEAKER_27

If a speaker already had time ceded to them earlier in the meeting, then we will not be calling their name later on.

President Hersey, I would defer to you, but the speaking spot was not intended to be available.

SPEAKER_06

Superintendent Jones and the members of the board, thank you for your time today and for listening to the community of concerned student-athletes.

I'm a proud parent of two student-athletes who, with their teammates, have built a successful football program from scratch over the last four years.

The coaching leadership was and is a positive influence on my sons and their teammates.

teaching them valuable leadership skills, prioritizing their safety, and building a strong and equitable community at Lincoln.

That community, along with many other fledging football programs at SPS, such as Franklin, Roosevelt, Cleveland, Nathan Hill, are at risk due to failing these recent changes.

This decision to go to two tiers has resulted in a football system that's less safe, less equitable, and less competitive, resulting in more blowouts, more injuries, and failing engagement.

We have three requests.

One, that the assistant superintendent and the board investigate safety and inequity of a two-tiered system and immediately repeal and revert to a three-tiered system for the 2023 football season.

Secondly, we want the board to make a policy that requires the Metro League to establish a transparent decision-making process so these inequities and safety concerns don't happen in the future.

Third, please act now for the safety and equity of our SPS football community.

Thank you for your support of the student-athletes in Seattle Public Schools.

SPEAKER_16

Next speaker is Susan Hood.

SPEAKER_30

Hello.

My son, Rory Leonard, is a rising senior at Seattle Academy and a student-athlete at Lincoln High School.

I appreciate the time to share my experience about Lincoln football.

My son Rory has grown immensely in the program.

This is the only two years he's played football.

He's learned invaluable life lessons.

However, I worry about his safety.

In the final game of last season against Garfield High School, Rory sustained several injuries, including a lost tooth and a torn MCL.

He underwent months of physical therapy but remains committed to his teammates.

Rory is one of the largest players on the team.

And I say this because if we were to go to a two-tier system, Garfield would be the least of our problems.

The decision to move our team to a higher division seems influenced by an old boys' network among athletic directors prioritizing connections over student safety.

Moving to a two-tier rather than three-tier system puts our students, like Rory, at greater risk of injury when competing against schools like Eastside Catholic.

Safety and fairness should be paramount in such decisions.

Please reevaluate this decision and its consequences on our student-athletes.

We need transparent and ethical decision making that prioritizes student well-being.

Thank you for addressing this issue promptly and ensuring a safe and fair environment for our student athletes.

I appreciate your time very much.

SPEAKER_33

Thank you.

SPEAKER_16

The next speaker on the list is Emily Compton.

SPEAKER_32

Hi I'm Emily Compton and I'm giving my spell to student John Mathis.

SPEAKER_01

Hello my name is John Mathis and I'm a junior on the Lincoln football team.

Despite last year being my first year ever playing football it changed my life for the better.

I've grown as a person as a leader and been a part of a great brotherhood and program.

The beauty of high school football is greater than football.

It's the character building brotherhood leadership and culture that makes it such a great thing.

For many people it provides something great in their lives in a way out of hard times.

Recently it seems that high school football in Seattle has lost priority of what it really is about, which is developing the youth into mature young adults, being a part of something bigger than yourself, and providing a fair and competitive space to bring the community together.

I'm here today to advocate for Metro football, where the entire football community makes decisions together, rather than just a few.

It's important that we develop a system that's sustainable and beneficial to our community.

The first step to achieve this is to highlight the inequity and safety concerns of a two-two system to Dr. Brent Jones and Dr. Conte-Pedroza.

Patrick McCarthy said the three-tier system led to, and I quote, more competitive games at all levels, increased attendance, and lower injuries.

It's clear that with the three-tier system, it's most equitable and beneficial for the metro area.

We request your help by highlighting the inequity of this system and creating a better metro football.

The opportunity for change is still present.

We need your support now so we can benefit metro football and adopt the three-tier system for the 2023 season.

As I conclude my time here, I want to leave you all with a question.

Will you help us make a difference and prove to make a positive impact on our lives?

Thank you for your time.

SPEAKER_16

The next speaker is Audrey Komomoto.

SPEAKER_40

I'm Audrey Komomoto, and I'm giving my time to Eddie McKay, or George McKay, I'm sorry.

SPEAKER_18

Hi, I'm George.

I'm a freshman at Lincoln High School.

And I've only been playing football for like a year.

But the one thing I learned about football is family.

All of my brothers here, I care about very deeply.

And in this decision to move to the two-tier division, my family has not been considered at all.

I think that the two-tier division The two-tier system doesn't benefit anyone except for the private schools and the mountain division.

Every single team is put at risk, including Cleveland when playing against teams like us and us against higher teams above us.

In this decision, the top priority was not safety.

It was, honestly, I don't know what it was.

Really, I just want my brothers to be safe.

And I just want the sport of football to be played correctly.

Thank you for your time.

SPEAKER_16

The next speaker is a duplicate on the list, so we'll move on through the list and add a spot on the wait list.

The next speaker is Stephanie Skilljohn.

SPEAKER_25

Hi, good afternoon.

My name is Stephanie Skiljan, and I'm a teacher at Franklin High School, and I'm here to also speak about the need for security staff trained in restorative justice practices for Franklin High School.

As Mr. Goldstein mentioned before, at Franklin, we have five different floors of our school, eight potential entrances, and two gyms that are detached from our main building, which we have to cross the street to get to.

We only have two security staff to help keep all of that space safe.

Our school is located in an area impacted by gun violence as well as many other issues stemming from economic instability that's been brought on by rapid gentrification in our area and the echoing repercussions of the pandemic.

This year we have had more than one instance of adults coming into our building without permission with the intent to do harm to our students.

We have had a threat made against our school that put us into a shelter in place.

We have had many fights, firecrackers being set off in the building, bathrooms destroyed, and an actual fire.

Our admin team, who are all brand new to our school this year, are constantly putting out metaphorical and literal fires.

Our hard-working security staff is also spread way too thin.

Our physical education staff are left alone to monitor the track, field, and gyms, which are located at a busy intersection and transit hub on Rainier Avenue, while also teaching their classes.

Many students tell us that they have anxiety about coming to school on a daily basis due to their uncertainty about school safety.

By adding security staff, our existing staff won't be stretched so thin and we'll be able to form relationships with students and staff.

They will know who is part of our community.

We aren't asking for more people to police our halls, we're asking for more staff who can truly know our kids and our school.

We also would like the opportunity for our admin to be able to work on proactive approaches to build community at our school that was really impacted by the pandemic.

We're still recovering a lot of community at our school and we aren't able to create a safe space until all of our students are invested in that community.

We need our admin to Sorry, can I finish this one thought?

We need our admin to be able to focus on proactively building community at our school rather than spending their days intervening on security threats.

Thank you and I hope you consider our petition.

SPEAKER_16

The next speaker is Whitney Kohn.

SPEAKER_17

Hi, my name is Whitney.

I'm a parent educator at Franklin High School.

It means I'm one of the lowest paid employees of Seattle Public School.

And yet I am donating extra time in order to, we've rebuilt some of the practice rooms, I know some of you are Quakers.

We've rebuilt some of the practice rooms to be a recording studio downstairs.

The students have a positive place to go and be creative, to make good choices, to be safe.

We have, that's all been volunteer.

We're trying to bring back a Parents in the Halls program.

So volunteer parents, we're doing all this.

It's me, it's other paraeducators and certificated teachers.

We're doing all that we can to make it a safe school, to make it a community-based school, one that invites back in that positive way that community keeps us safe.

there's only so much we can do and right now we are like squeezing water from a stone and so we really need this petition is so important to get that those extra security have them be trained in restorative justice to help that and now I'm going to hand it off to Bailey who's going to talk about something else.

SPEAKER_08

Thank you so much, members of Seattle Public Schools Board and leadership.

My name is Bailey Medillo and I'm a political and nonprofit worker and a Filipino-American here in Seattle.

And I am a member of Anak Bayan South Seattle.

I come here today because we demand that the school district continue funding Filipinx, American U.S. history classes, and all other ethnic classes.

Filipinx students deserve and have a right to know their history.

And once again, because of budget cuts, education on marginalized history the histories of communities in our nation furthest from justice are on the chopping block.

This is unacceptable.

I stand in solidarity with our high school leaders and our teachers and our educators in their fight for more safety for our students because safety is intersectional.

Safety is physical and safety is social.

Safety is community and thank you for your time.

SPEAKER_16

The next speaker is Lexi Ojecek.

SPEAKER_26

Good afternoon.

My name is Lexi Ojecek and I'm a school counselor for multilingual students and families at Franklin High School.

Today we are here to ask for basic personnel necessary to keep our community safe while at school.

Our ask is simple.

So there's one person on each floor in our detached gym at all times.

We want peacekeepers from the Franklin and Mount Baker, Beacon Hill, and Columbia City community who are trained in restorative practices, de-escalation, and can prioritize building positive and trusting relationships with our students and staff.

This is not an ask for the police or security resource officers to enter our school, as this assuredly would not make Franklin more safe.

The scope of our reality is that our community needs and deserves so much more than what we are asking for.

Real true safety and belonging within our school and the larger Seattle community means better utilizing the resources and exorbitant wealth that we knows exists in the city to create conditions that allow all people to live and thrive here.

At our school that means my students wouldn't have to work to support their families financially to provide health care and child care That they wouldn't have to send money home to their origin countries.

That they would never have to worry where their next meal is coming from if rent will be paid on time or in full.

Or if they'll be able to do homework at home with functioning Wi-Fi.

Students their families and educators alike in our community are still fighting to ensure each other's survival in the wake of the pandemic.

Every day when students show up with so many unmet needs all of the adults in the Seattle area are to be held accountable for that.

Myself, my colleagues, my students, we all do what we can with what we have and it will not ever be enough.

How can we preach and expect educational excellence knowing that students have so much more on their minds?

Our students deserve more.

Our community deserves more.

No cuts to current staffing and enough security personnel for each floor in the detached gymnasium at our school is already setting the minimum threshold of safety incredibly low.

I sincerely hope that at least that can be met.

Thank you.

SPEAKER_16

The next speaker is Kyle Wendell.

The next speaker is Erin Hawkinson.

SPEAKER_29

Thank you.

Clearly the safety of our students in the classroom and out in the football field are of utmost importance, and I'm here to discuss the concerns I have about students playing a high contact sport, such as football, where there are only two tiers.

This creates competition between grossly mismatched teams and a huge safety risk for our students.

And this affects all 16 Metro football teams.

My son is a sophomore at Lincoln High School, and when COVID hit, he suffered significant losses.

As the remote learning continued, he became even less interested in school, became more socially isolated, and didn't even want to get out of bed.

The summer before his freshman year, a friend convinced him to attend Lincoln High football practice.

And although I never wanted my son to play football, it's been a blessing.

From Coach Hart and the other coaches, he learned about climb.

Commitment, little things, intensity, mental toughness, and brotherhood.

This football team has changed his life.

He's made new friends, he studies the playbook, and he's part of a brotherhood.

But now, with a two-tier system, some may not play due to understandable concerns over safety.

The commitment and brotherhood are at risk, and not because of our boys, but due to questionable decision-making of adults.

According to Pat McCarthy's quote, Metro's three-tiered football model was developed to continue promoting fair play and lessen the risk of injury caused by grossly mismatched teams.

It makes no sense to change to a two-tier system, which clearly puts our children at an increased risk of serious injury.

My son, who's finally invested in school again after the tragedy of the lost years of COVID, cites football as his saving grace.

His intensity, commitment, and mental toughness are there.

But when asked to come here tonight, he said no.

He said, Mom, they just don't care about us.

These athletes and families around the district need your help.

There's so much to be gained in a relatively safe football system.

And my son has gained so much.

But there's also much to be lost, especially in an unsafe system.

So please act.

And we request that you, the board, highlight the safety and inequity of the two-tiered system and change it back to a three-tiered.

Thank you.

SPEAKER_16

The next speaker is Kelsey Camp.

SPEAKER_22

Hello.

Thank you.

Good evening.

My name is Kelsey Camp.

I am a mother of a 10th grader at Lincoln High School and a 7th grader at Hamilton Middle School.

You've heard many community members share their concern over the two-tier football program.

Some focus on safety, others on the morale of the students, the student-athletes, and the potential drop in participation.

My concern is that the decisions made which deeply impact this community were made in a relative vacuum.

Before we can influence safety, balance competition, and increase participation, we need a well-defined process to debate changes in the Metro League that will allow and encourage all impacted individuals to weigh in.

I request that the board highlight the safety and inequity of a two-tiered system to the superintendent, Brent Jones, and to the assistant superintendent, Concie Pedroza, for immediate repeal to a three-tiered system for the 2023 football season.

I'd also like the board to make a policy that requires the Metro League to establish transparent decision-making process so these inequities and safety concerns don't happen in the future.

We must act now.

The appeal must happen this month, and we will accept the results.

Thank you.

SPEAKER_16

The next speaker is Alicia Prather.

The next speaker is Parnell Letunick.

SPEAKER_20

I'm Parnell Letunick and I'd like to cede my time to Rob Compton.

SPEAKER_07

Good afternoon.

Thank you so much for making this forum available to all of us.

We all really appreciate it.

I am the father of three children.

My son is in the Lincoln football program.

Coach Hart had spent every waking hour building a program of enormous self-sacrifice.

To walk away when success was developing initially seemed strange.

However, he's right.

If he didn't take that stance, nothing would have changed.

Today is the first time that we have had a response from the Seattle school system.

Thank you.

I, like many in this room, was at the Lincoln-Roosevelt playoff game 18 months ago.

Roosevelt were worthy winners.

Lincoln lost without troubling the scorers.

Roosevelt went up to the new top division and lost all 10 games.

They sustained many serious injuries, and others quit.

It is only a matter of time before a catastrophic injury occurs.

The fundamental differences in recruiting options available to the public and private schools create a disparity in size and skill of player that not only fails to teach any of our athletes life skills, it's also very dangerous.

As such, the school district leaves itself open to claims of negligence.

What is not apparent is that the Lincoln football program is in danger of collapse.

Parents and players alike have a decision to make in the coming weeks.

Coach Hart indicated he would not let his son play the proposed schedule.

Parents may heed that advice and pull their child.

Players may also choose not to continue.

The good news is Brent Brackey has created an alternative schedule.

On occasion, I'm sure we all ponder our legacy.

My children will undoubtedly head my personal list.

My wife and I want to ensure that we have provided all we can for them.

Their personal safety, however, is paramount.

What is going to be your legacy?

Are you going to heed the coach's warning and protect our children from the train wreck?

Or are you going to offer thoughts and prayers after the carnage?

Thank you.

SPEAKER_16

The next speaker is Laura Silver.

SPEAKER_31

Can you hear me?

SPEAKER_33

Yes.

SPEAKER_32

Hello.

OK.

This is Laura Silver and I'm ceding my time spot to Christina Black.

SPEAKER_31

Thank you.

Hey y'all.

My name's Christina Black and I am a mother of a child at Franklin High School.

Also a longtime SPS employee.

I'm currently the levy coordinator and academic interventionist at Franklin High School.

I work there, my daughter also goes to school there.

And I guess what I would like to emphasize and kind of talk about right now is the fact that what we are asking for is security staff who are trained in restorative practices.

We are not asking for people to come and solely respond to the dangers that are happening almost daily at our school.

We are asking for personnel that can come and prevent the harm that is being caused.

And that prevention happens by knowing each other.

That prevention happens by having shared ideas about keeping each other safe.

And as my colleagues and students have shared, right now we have three brand new administrators who are doing their best, but they only have capacity to respond.

And I want to talk a little bit about the need for Seattle Public Schools to really be funding restorative practices in schools.

I know that you all have recently created a restorative justice department but unfortunately there's no funding attached to that.

They come and ask us all the time what do you need.

We tell them what we need but they have no money.

So it's nice, I like Leon and Jay, shout out, they're really cool people, but they don't have capacity to be at our school preventing violence.

What we need is to have people join our community or even better, community members being trained in restorative practices so that we can really know each other, know who we are when we're in the building, and know ahead of time before harm is gonna be caused.

And that's what we're asking for.

Thank you so much.

SPEAKER_16

The next speaker is Audrey Ishibashi.

The next speaker is Frank Schmitz.

SPEAKER_39

Good afternoon.

My name is Frank Schmitz.

I'm an MD.

I'm a scientist and a proud father of a Lincoln football player.

First of all, I would like to Oh, I'm too tall for that?

Okay, let's try this.

First of all, I'd like to thank the board for the commitment to put the safety at the most paramount in decision-making about the two-versus-three-tiered system in football.

And I would like to give you a couple of lines of evidence as to why I think that safety is truly in parallel in the tier-tiered system, two-tiered system.

First one is precedence.

You had many accounts of people, there are many people who attended games where discrepantly mismatched or closely mismatched teams played against each others with astronomical amounts of injuries that shouldn't happen.

It happened before, it should not.

Second, data.

We reached out to various experts in the field, in medicine, trainers of the teams, and so on and so forth, and surprisingly, there's no data.

Reason for that could be either data is not collected, data is possibly not shared with us, or it's that it is simply not analyzed.

But there is data and there's very simple explanation as why these injuries happen.

One brain expert, for example, said, I know the physics, it's very simple.

What does it mean with that?

Let me give you an example.

When we look at a top level team in the upper tier versus a top level team in the lower tier, compare their rosters, And just look by the weight distribution of these individuals.

The top 10 players by weight in the upper tier, upper division tier, are on average 50 pounds heavier than in the lower tier.

If we translate that, two people, 150 pounds heavier, running at 10 miles per hour against each other, The impact is around 10 kilonewton, which is roughly twice the amount you need to break a femur.

You can imagine concussions are easy, and depending on how the force goes, even cardiac arrest might happen.

And third, if I may continue, it's simply common sense.

Anyone you talk to understands that a mismatch leads to increased injuries.

Even Chad GPT, and as you heard before, Pat McCarthy agrees as well.

As such, I would like you to support the move back to the three-tier system for the safety of our students.

Thank you very much.

SPEAKER_16

We were informed that the speakers earlier in the list that weren't present or were not present So I'll be moving on to the waiting list The first is David SD

SPEAKER_02

Good afternoon, and thank you for listening to this amazing football community.

I have a son, Reece Esty.

He's a freshman in the program, and I'm here to say a couple of things about that program and the impact it has had on him.

We're here to see if you can't help us get this tier system changed, or at the very least, change the upcoming schedule to what was proposed verbally and agreed on between SPSAD, McCarthy, and Principal Corey Eichner.

My son entered the Lincoln football program at the end of his eighth grade year at Hamilton at a minimal level, and he's been fully immersed since August, and he has been dedicated ever since.

This program, which we had heard amazing things about, made him a better football player, athlete, student, and a better community member overall.

This program teaches more than football, and that has never been more obvious when you look at how these boys have grown.

It teaches individual responsibility, accountability, and pushes them to excel at a high level.

If you mispractice, don't communicate, slack off, or have a bad attitude, or treat people poorly, there are consequences.

Success in this program comes from hard work, commitment, and pushing hard to get to the next level.

When COVID hit, all sports went away for my son.

His basketball program shut down and never restarted.

Baseball was canceled for the season after the first week of practice, and he lost the ability to play in both these sports, and I don't want him to lose out again.

We have a big decision to make as a family.

Do we want Reece to follow in the footsteps of the Roosevelt community?

No.

Do you want him to play if these small changes are implemented?

Absolutely, we do.

We're here because nothing has changed after the final vote or after the story broke two weeks ago.

We are hoping you can help jumpstart that change.

We are hoping you can help bring this amazing program back to life.

More importantly, we are hoping you can keep these kids safe while playing competitive games.

And that's all I have to say.

Thank you for your time.

SPEAKER_16

The next speaker is Angela Fleet.

SPEAKER_19

Hi, I'm Angela Fleet, and I am ceding my time to Oliver Salomino.

SPEAKER_00

OK.

Hi, my name is Oliver Salomino, and I'm a junior on the Lincoln football team.

And first, I just want to start by clearing up what I've heard a lot of people say, which is that we're only here today because we don't want to face harder competition.

And that's just not true at all, because our coach has always told us to face adversity, work harder than the competition, and be good people, which is what we're doing today.

And as a team member, I can tell you that we're not backing down.

We're working harder than ever before, and we're getting our team ready to play next year.

But that's not why we're here today.

We're here because we want fairness in high school football.

And the vote to go back to a three tiers wasn't fair because the principals were not given any information or enough time to make an educated vote.

If we had a truly democratic process, all schools involved would be able to have the time to voice their positions ahead of a vote.

We would be able to re-vote on this and come to a fair agreement that benefits all schools.

And the reason we want this vote is because, as Pat McCarthy said, the three-tier system lessened injuries caused by grossly mismatched teams, promoted fair play, increased competitiveness at all levels, and increased attendance, especially at schools with less success.

Thank you for your consideration.

SPEAKER_16

The next speaker is Chad Camp.

The next speaker is Henry Camp.

SPEAKER_03

Hello.

I'm Henry Camp.

And I'm here to talk about, say, Lincoln football, which I assume some of you or many of you have played high school sports.

And a big part of the high school sports is the morale and the brotherhood of those teams, clubs, or anything that you have been a part of.

And an important part to consider is the impact that this change may have on teams' morale or people's mental health in general.

Losing or getting wiped out, I've heard from many of my Roosevelt friends, made them not want to play anymore, made them not like the sport anymore, which declines the athletes that want to play sports in general.

And losing the love for a sport that you once loved so much is a very hard thing for any athlete to go through.

And I think it's especially worse that these things could have been avoided because, or these things can be avoided if we change to the three-tier system or just go to the schedule that our amazing athletic coordinator Brent Brackey has proposed.

In doing this, this may bring more athletes back or in the future just have more athletes in general, which brings, which I've said it like how I've said, just brings many people together and it learns and it helps you learn a lot of lessons.

Coach Hart has helped me and a bunch of my brothers and friends over here.

how to be better, better people, better men in general, how to work well with people, how to treat people with respect.

So many things I've learned in the past two years I've been playing this for and I was excited to play two more with him until he unfortunately quit because of these sudden changes.

And I would like to reiterate that we can play and change this system with the proposed schedule that Brent Brackey has proposed or do another vote in the upcoming month.

for the three-tier system, which I think could help a lot of people.

Thank you.

SPEAKER_16

The next speaker is Carolyn Kleban.

The next speaker is Jeremy Herbin.

The next speaker is Sheila Charles.

The next speaker is Jindana Nolkar.

SPEAKER_19

My name is Jindana Nolkar.

I'm releasing my time to JIN.

SPEAKER_37

Hi everybody.

Are you sick of hearing about football yet?

I am here to talk about the three-tier system.

I wanted to thank you all for being here and for listening to us.

I wanted to explain that it not only supports physical health, but mental health and emotional resiliency.

My name is Jen Longton.

My son is a senior this year, so he's been through the football program at Lincoln high school his freshman year he was actually at O'Day and We did not allow him to play football because of the size and the ability to recruit I just didn't think that it was safe for him when we went back to Lincoln So we pulled him out and we have always been in public schools.

And so we wanted to go back to public schools we thought that that was talking to Aaron Hart and talking about the program and talking about just his leadership and what he was doing for these young men that we chose to put him back in football.

It was the best decision that we ever made.

I will say that my son ever made.

had a great experience.

Even with a lower tier, the three tier, there's already a limited number of players.

So my son had to play all three positions, so offense, defense, and special teams.

So he was basically at risk of injury every moment of the game.

There's not enough kids even at a lower tier because of safety.

So I just wanted to say that it's already a risky sport, and he was injured quite a bit.

We know the stats already, but I just wanted to, again, just stress how important the mental health, the community, the brotherhood that he had, being able to be competitive with people his size, knowing that was okay to be that size and not 50 to 100 pounds bigger.

And then I just wanted to say that you're in a remarkable position.

to make a remarkable difference, not just for us, but for everyone who spoke today.

To go back to a tiered system that's already been established would be a win for all of us.

So thank you so much for your time.

SPEAKER_16

The next speaker is Ashley Harper.

SPEAKER_35

Hi my name is Ashley Harper and I'm ceding my time to Rachel Solomino.

Thanks.

SPEAKER_36

Hi and members of the Seattle Public Schools Board.

Thank you for your time.

I just want to say I'm a parent of Lincoln High School.

Also just going to summarize what you've heard today about the football program.

But before that I just want to acknowledge the concerns for safety at Franklin School are really important, and we hear you.

So in summary for the football, I think we have four requests from the board.

Firstly, we request the board calls a meeting with Assistant Superintendent Conci Pedrosa, where the Lincoln Principal and the Athletic Director can highlight their case for a safer and more equitable three-tier system.

just to be heard.

And two, that we request Consul Pedroza calls a re-vote on the three-tiered system for the 2023 football season amongst all 16 principals after they've been given the information.

And we urge you to act now, please.

The appeal must happen this month.

And we will accept the results.

We also request, number three, that the board creates a new policy that requires the Metro League to establish transparent decision-making process.

So the rules are transparent and these inequities and safety concerns don't happen again.

And lastly, I think you heard a little bit about the fact that it's incredibly hard to find any data on safety.

And this whole issue is really about safety concerns for grossly mismatched teams.

We request that the board creates a policy to track injury data across the sport in the Metro League and make data-driven decisions going forward.

Thank you so much for your time.

We really appreciate listening to us and for all the parents and students who spoke up.

Thank you.

SPEAKER_16

The next speaker is Rafi Wehle.

SPEAKER_11

I'd like to give my time to Marla Aginyan.

SPEAKER_21

Hello, I'm Marla Eginian and I am a mother of two teenage multi-sport athletes.

Both of my boys play tackle football.

They play because they love the game, their teammates, and the fair competition.

Please keep this sport safe for them and all our student athletes.

The current two tiers in our Metro League does not benefit anyone and creates grossly mismatched games.

We have seen increased injuries, kids demoralized, and decrease in participation.

Please revert back to a three-tier football model that will create much more equitable matchups for our athletes.

I do not want to see kids drop the sport because we did not act.

Athletics and sports teams are keeping our students busy, healthy, motivated, and social.

They're learning sportsmanship, teamwork, leadership, and commitment.

Team sports are extremely important to our children's growth, and it is in your hands today to keep our sports teams growing with motivated athletes, not to create inequities.

As Pat McCarthy previously stated, our three-tiered football model was implemented in 2017. It was developed to continue promoting fair play, create improved scheduled matchups, and lessen the risk of injuries caused by grossly mismatched teams.

Since the adoption of this tiered scheduling, we have seen more competitive games at all levels, increased attendance, especially at schools with less success and lower injuries.

Additionally, if we can get the schedule we are requesting, then we will have a full season with strong attendance.

I run our concession stands on Friday nights at our games and strong attendance will equate in strong sales and money that we put back into our program.

However, after sitting through this public testimony, I would like to donate our concession stand sales to Franklin High School.

I heard what they had to say and I would like to meet with them and help them as I'm asking you to help us.

I'm taking action tonight and I hope that you will too.

SPEAKER_16

The last speaker is Darren Hoop.

SPEAKER_38

Hey, I'm Darren Hoop, teacher at Franklin this year.

I'm going to hand it off to him in a second.

I just want to say on behalf of Franklin educators, we also stand in solidarity with the Lincoln families, educators, staff, parents.

I'm not going to repeat everything that was said except just to reiterate in terms of Franklin, we do not want more cops.

We do not want metal detectors.

We do not want any more militarization of the school.

Really what we want are more adults, almost like instead of security, counselors that are mobile in the hallways to work with students, to encourage them to get back to class and to help build relationships.

And then the last thing I'll say before I hand it off is the bigger picture here, we're all dealing with cuts.

And at some point, we need to live in a society that prioritizes education.

We have a military budget that's like $800 billion.

We have two men that live in this area that are worth over $100 billion.

And yet we're fighting over football schedules and a few more security.

And it's absolutely outrageous.

North end, South end, we all have to stick together in the future.

And lastly, I want to say and stand in solidarity with any member of our union that is facing a possible job loss or moving to another building.

I want to hand it off to Viet, a student at Franklin.

SPEAKER_14

Yeah, hi.

Yeah, I'm Viet.

I'm a freshman at Franklin High School.

And I won't lie, I don't have a script tonight.

I wasn't planning to speak tonight.

I do want 28 seconds left.

But I guess what I'm here to speak about is funding, really, because that's the main problem.

Even as a student, you still hear about it as a student.

I work for Team Read.

I work at the elementary school, John Muir, and the site coordinator, Sydney Arellano.

Even at the elementary school, you'll still hear, Yeah, even at the elementary school, you'll still hear a lot of things about budget.

So it's not just the high school.

It's not just Franklin.

It's everywhere, really.

It's kind of scary.

I remember speaking to my counselor about this, and it felt like nothing ever got done, really.

It felt like everything was slow.

That's just how I saw it as a student, at least.

But here I am.

Here I am.

speaking to speaking to well this entire board of everyone here really and I guess I guess you guys hear me then but are you gonna listen?

SPEAKER_16

This concludes today's testimony.

SPEAKER_13

Thank you very much.

We appreciate it.

Yeah.

Give yourselves a round of applause.

OK.

With that being said we are going to take a brief recess for about 10 minutes.

Please board directors try to be back at 6 0 1 and we're going to get started as soon as we have a quorum.

Thank you.

has been moved by Vice President Rankin and seconded by Director Sargi.

Do directors have any items they would like to remove from the consent agenda this evening?

All right, seeing none.

All those in favor of the consent agenda, please signify by saying aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

SPEAKER_99

Aye.

Aye.

SPEAKER_28

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

SPEAKER_13

Aye.

SPEAKER_99

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

SPEAKER_13

Aye.

Aye.

SPEAKER_99

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

SPEAKER_13

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

SPEAKER_99

Aye.

SPEAKER_33

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

SPEAKER_99

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

SPEAKER_33

Aye.

Aye.

SPEAKER_99

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye

SPEAKER_13

Because that agenda passes unanimously.

We will now move to the introduction items on today's agenda.

Are we ready?

Because I got some good stuff for you.

All right.

The first item is amendment to board policy numbers 1220 board officers and duties of the board 1240 committees 1250 school board student members 1310 policy adoption and suspension manuals and superintendent procedures 1400 meeting conduct order of business and quorum 1420 proposed agendas and consent agenda 1620 board superintendent relationship 2015. Great year.

Selection and adoption of instructional materials.

6550 internal audit policy and board procedures 1620 BP.

Board superintendent relationship procedure 1630 BP.

Evaluation of the superintendent and 6550 BP internal audit procedure.

As a sponsor I will introduce this item.

The background section for this item describes our earlier actions to implement recommendations from our ad hoc governance committee.

I'll summarize to say that in October we accepted recommendations from that committee and voted to approve temporary changes to many of our policies to pilot a new approach to our work.

The item we approved in October said that we would work to identify a permanent policy change in April of 2023. Consistent with that plan we held a board work session last month to assess how things have been going and discuss policy changes and other ways of refining our work.

During that work session I shared my recommendation that the board move forward with one standing committee the audit committee and organize our other work through full board sessions and time limited ad hoc committees and paneled to make recommendations back to the full board.

The board action report before us makes those policy edits and builds on other feedback received during the April work session.

Before I open it up to the board for questions and discussion I also want to contextualize this journey that we have been on.

During recent years we have made substantial strides to build a more cohesive governance team as a board with our superintendent.

We have been focused on doing this work because we know the effectiveness of our district leadership impacts our students.

We have been working to transition to a policy governance model focused on student outcomes.

And I want to be very clear, this is not something new or experimental or unique.

Our unique governance model that we are employing.

It is rooted in fundamentals of what works.

Nearly five years ago in 2018 it was reported to the board that the most significant organizational issue for our district is governance.

This finding came to us through an efficiency study from Moss Adams.

The study spoke of how the board's governing environment impacts our district's work for students.

The report went on to say that the role of an effective board is to lead district strategy and policy through our strategic plan and board policies.

This was said in twenty eighteen.

We were advised by Moss Adams to adopt a policy governance model focusing the board policy on excuse me focusing on board policy and strategy.

It took us a while, but this action moves us in that direction while providing openness for us to continue to refine through continued policy work.

With that said, I would like to say thank you for all of us who have leaned into this, which is everyone in their own way.

This has not been a comfortable transition, but I think the best part about growing sometimes are the pains that come along with that because different and doing things different and then aim to do them better in many respects takes time and is often incredibly uncomfortable, and there are not always super clear answers.

So just as a personal aside, I want to thank everyone who has leaned into this work in their own way and for all of your contributions to get us to this point.

So with that being said, I would like to open it up for questions and discussion at this time.

Does anyone have questions or discussions at this time?

I am thoroughly surprised.

Take your time.

Oh, yeah.

Wait time.

My bad.

Sorry.

I'm rusty.

Take as long as you need.

SPEAKER_28

Maybe I'll start.

Please.

I had submitted this question to the form.

I reviewed the agendas for the standing committees for the Audit and Finance and Operations Committee and compiled a short list of reports that those committees used to receive.

I would be interested in our collective thoughts on are any of these reports of value to the full board and therefore we should be creating a mechanism for receiving these reports as a full board.

I have the list here.

Should I read them or

SPEAKER_13

So I think if you would like to read them that's perfectly fine for purposes of the record Having read your question just to respond.

I think that that's perfectly fine.

I think that we should be doing a regular review of the reports that You know committees used to receive and like even think about like are there you know is there a way?

And what is the best venue to receive that information?

Because it could be in a written report to the board it could be through a work session and So to answer your question, yes, I think that we should find the best way to do a review and ensure that we're not missing things based on our transition and things just aren't falling off to the wayside.

I don't have a clear enough answer and I don't know how productive a discussion it would be to just receive those reports because I would need to get some additional information before I would determine if You know I full-throated Lee supported like finding a way to get that information versus like something that I didn't necessarily think would be useful to the board But please we're you know purposes proceed how ever feels right to you They can just give an example of one one would be the facilities master plan update I

SPEAKER_32

Well, yeah, I wanted to add but I didn't I wasn't sure if you were okay, so I'm director Samaritz and I had I think in the last board meeting said hey, let's look at the let's look at the Items that used to come through committee.

So I did the same for SSC and I and when it was previously called CNI that's student services curriculum and instruction and it used to be curriculum and instruction and And I don't know, and I was going to send it to you, and it's on my district laptop, which I don't have, so sorry.

But it's actually really a long list.

But a lot of the things are, like I would be really interested in us just figuring out where those things should go, because a lot of them were like informational updates that are interesting.

but not necessarily directly related to board action.

Or some of them were also, like the Facilities Master Plan should probably be on a publicly accessible website, just as a, you know, instead of distributing it somehow, it should just be part of our capital website that it's there updated annually, just like we have the the district's budget webpage, you can look and see the calendar and the purple book, which is the projected budget.

That's not information anybody has to go digging around or watch a meeting for.

It's on the website for the public and for us.

So I think in the SSC&I there were some things like that.

that I think probably should live on the website and in a lot of ways actually will then become more accessible than coming through committee because those committee agendas and minutes were previously only available by requesting from the board office.

They weren't posted online.

So some of these having them just, you know, always be updated and live on the website is more broadly accessible than coming through.

committee.

The thing I did notice actually that I thought was really interesting was I kind of in my memory and experience as being in board meetings and being or being in committee meetings and being a community member at committee meetings, I really expected there to be a lot more heavy things related to developing the policy, and there actually wasn't.

So it really would, there wasn't a lot of being able to track the progress of a policy in development.

It would literally be, and I cross-talked agendas, it would be like the policy that was scheduled to come to the full board for introduction on X date came to committee two weeks before.

And then there's nothing for it prior to that.

So that was really interesting to me that, you know, as we've been talking about wanting to shift to be a proactive governance board instead of responding and reacting to things as they come up, creating an opportunity for policy work to be more transparent earlier in the process to the board and also to the public, just like what are they working on right now, I think will actually make that more of a proactive work in progress kind of process than...

Seeing it real quick.

And then two weeks later, having an introduction, and then two weeks later, approving it.

So, but yeah, there were a lot of kind of annual updates, too, that I think would be valuable for them to either come to the board through the in-progress board bulletin, or like I said before, just be updated all the time on the website for anybody to see.

SPEAKER_13

Yeah so great question coming from Director Somerville.

It's in fantastic context coming from Director Rankin.

I think that the most logical next step is I will work with staff to figure out like what is the best venue to have that conversation and I will report back as soon as we're able to figure something out.

And it might also just be that like we as a board need to figure that out through an ad hoc committee or maybe it could be deemed to the board policy committee once it's completed its you know most pressing work.

But please take this as a commitment from me that I am I am very interested in figuring that out as well.

Thank you.

SPEAKER_10

Yeah.

Master Fred Podesta interim deputy superintendent.

I believe that report does still come to the board and I think that was part of the analysis as you all were starting this work about just because the committee went away doesn't mean the report has gone away.

So I think that conversation about how to facilitate that and what's the right venue and how to make sure the public gets to see it, which probably will be a better airing than we used to get in committees, at least for the types of things I'm acquainted with.

So anyway, just a plug.

SPEAKER_13

An incredibly important plug.

Thank you very much.

Yes.

SPEAKER_28

I just want to respond to what Director Rankin was talking about.

I think the bulk of the items I would characterize in the same way.

And then there were a couple of things that, in my observation, it was helpful to get kind of regular check-ins with the committee.

So I would say like the sexual harassment policies would be an example.

I would put curriculum adoptions in that category as well.

I'm not suggesting that it has to be those exact standing committees, but I do think just having an opportunity to get updates in advance of a pretty significant meaty bar is really helpful in terms of our decision making.

The other thing I would say is that there are Things that are of great value to the community or interest to the community that may not be tied directly to a board action, I would give the example of advanced learning, the changes to advanced learning.

And I think there's frustration in the community that there's no updates or progress tracks.

And in some sense, the committees did kind of serve that opportunity because it could be added to the work plan to have a discussion, to have somebody, a staff member come and give an update on what is happening with advanced learning.

So I just kind of put that out there as something that we may want to consider as how we would like to address it.

SPEAKER_13

Yeah, no doubt.

And I just want to remind folks that we do have like a big board work plan too.

So there's always the opportunity if we you know do this review take a look it's like oh actually this would be you know great to get updates on you know and then it's I would say probably even more effective that it comes to the full board because more people are paying attention to I think like these full board meetings as opposed to the committee meetings that were often like not during super accessible times.

But you know I I agree.

Go ahead Director Hampson.

SPEAKER_24

I think it's a, that particular example is a good one because it references, it's an, I think it's probably an output.

And so I do believe that to the extent that we can, we're all still very much learning how to do progress monitoring and so that would be a really, because we do have an advanced learning Component of one of our goals That that's an excellent place to be able to talk about that to contextualize it with that, right?

I think and then as We get into the new strategic plan and look at Refining the goals and the guardrails that Those types of metrics and that I was just talking about this extensive and amazing data dashboard that Charlotte Mecklenburg School District has, and that I would love to see us get to that point.

And that is some of the data that they have on their dashboard.

I think the thing I would want us to stay away from is There were frequently reports that were because people were wanted to know but they're not necessarily connected to an output or an outcome with respect to our students and we do also though have guardrails like for operations and so I think to the extent that we always go back to those goals and guardrails and remind ourselves like, okay, so if we're looking for this information that must be connected to what we've either set as our core policy manual as a function or governance policy manual of something that we need in order to do our job well in governance, or it's tied to one of those goals and guardrails.

But there were definitely some that I think the point that I was really trying to make is, is this something like that advanced learning report I could see being useful?

I would want to know from staff, is it useful as an output metric for us getting to our goals?

And so then how does that play into that?

SPEAKER_32

I think I would add to that, that for me, We have to think about, too, where the overlap is between stuff that comes to the board that actually should go to everyone.

That rather than having it cut maybe this is sort of reiterating what I said, but in terms of like advanced learning I know I've gotten some questions recently about math course progression and so I don't think people don't want to know like What is you know?

What is XYZ district staff doing do they have an internal work plan for blah blah blah?

They want to understand what changes are coming or have been put in place that are going to impact their students experience so the extent to which we can, in policy, direct the district very specifically to be transparent about issues of parent and student needs.

You shouldn't have to contact a board member to ask them what math class your kid is going to be able to take next year.

Right?

And we shouldn't be the ones getting that information from staff.

That is either a school-based or a district program-based thing that should be available to everybody and consistent and not hard to find.

So that's kind of where I think some things that came through the board didn't necessarily need to.

or should have come to the full board and only went to the committee, which yes, is accessible to the full board, but there were a lot of things to track.

And then some things the board has asked for because they haven't been made available in a way that's publicly accessible, and it actually should have been, rather than coming to the board separately at all, if that makes sense.

So that advanced learning example, I think, is really a good one about when people ask us, what are they actually getting at?

And I think they're just like, one person said this, and then this person said this, and I'm not sure what classes my kid is going to be able to take next year.

And I'm frustrated and confused.

SPEAKER_24

It's also one of the best practices and we're providing data to making it public to native families for native students.

I know that would apply to every other student group as well.

SPEAKER_13

Thank you.

Great discussion.

Director Harris.

SPEAKER_20

I'm disappointed that a great many of the things that we used to discuss in committees have not been set up in work sessions, which was part of the reasoning for suspending committee meetings.

And I'm disappointed that we have yet to have a bulletin that's operational, that's available to the public for transparency and accountability.

Going to all the meetings is it a pain.

No doubt.

No question whatsoever.

Learning.

About.

Our.

Programs.

And oftentimes our policies.

I think is part and parcel of a board member's duty.

And it's part and parcel of that accountability and transparency.

And I do believe that this will end up being a major part of the school board elections this year.

And whether it's because we haven't explained these transitions well enough, which is a possibility, or whether the community doesn't feel that we're representing their vision and values.

But we have a problem.

with information being corked in this building.

And our taxpayers and the folks that vote our levies at over 70 percent have a right to know a whole lot of this information.

And I well appreciate that I'm a minority on this board with respect to student outcomes focused governance and I mean no disrespect whatsoever.

But I think that we're corking information to the public, and I think the public has a right to know, and we have a $1.3 billion budget, and we are seven citizens.

Thank you.

SPEAKER_13

Thank you.

Go ahead, Director Sommers.

SPEAKER_28

One final topic that I will throw out there is I have a concern, and I'm not suggesting that the previous structure of the three standing committees somehow alleviated this pressure point, but I have a concern that this puts a lot of power in the hands of a board president.

And it lends itself to a lot of power for a board majority.

And I would be interested in our collective thoughts on how do we balance the various perspectives that the seven of us who are all elected by the same electorate are going to have.

SPEAKER_13

Yeah, for sure.

I'm happy to lean into that.

I think that that's the nature of the board and existed before.

I think a lot of folks, especially in recent months, have talked about, oh, a board majority, da, da, da, da, when that's a thing in every faction of government.

It's just something you're not going to escape.

And I think that it's more challenging when their ideologies, they just don't align.

But that's government, right?

When folks come in, none of us are going to occupy these seats forever.

And I would say that, especially in relation to putting the power into the hand of the board president, the board president doesn't have any power in terms of, I would say that Given our unique structure and the fact that we're a board, none of us have individual power, right?

Like, board members can bring forth policies that the president and the superintendent will decide on, sure.

But that, I think, is better than just staff bringing forth policies as kind of what it was before, right?

And to a certain extent, still is.

I think that the collaboration that's more clearly aligned between the board president and the superintendent is largely a good thing.

But if we get deep into it and a board feels as though they want to change it, that future board has the ability to do so.

I think that where we sit in the seats that we occupy, we have a good working relationship.

And to assume that all boards that come after us will, probably not going to happen, right?

Nor do I think that that's necessarily a bad thing.

I think that I understand your concern wholeheartedly, and I think that it's more of, in that regard, a lateral move to a different procedure that still has the same issues as you attested to at the beginning.

with our old structure, but what we gain on the opposite end of that in terms of structure, I think our ability to hold the superintendent and the system and ourselves accountable is worth that risk.

And if another board come in a few months, feels differently, then they are more than welcome to take a different path because that is what they have been elected to do.

So that's kind of what I would say to that.

That's how I think about it.

Yeah.

Director Hampson.

SPEAKER_24

Oh OK.

Sure.

I. So I was disappointed that we didn't spend more time digging into our wishes for the.

Policies that govern our work working relationships and our working relationship with the superintendent when we had our retreat, you know we got like this much done and I Yeah, I mean, I would just do nothing but work and none of the fun stuff, which people also don't like.

So we did other things.

But I think that there is important work related to what you're talking about in there.

And that one of the elements of the structure being set up in the framework in the policy manual core set of policies is that then That particular policy that relates to how we work together is reviewed at least every two years, is what I'm thinking we would consider, if not every year that we take a look at it.

And that, I think in terms of, because being the president isn't just that you end up having to decide all these things with staff, because somebody has to do the stuff.

But you also then are burdened with having to do all of the stuff.

And so are there other examples that we want to take from where there's a little bit more sharing?

I think looking at internal audit and that committee chair role, the maintenance of that is an important check and balance on that.

It's something in the future boards could look at how that person is decided versus it being somebody that's appointed by the so maybe you appoint maybe you elect both as President and a chair of audit because there's good configuration in there to force a And not just because of this report, but we can self audit, right?

And audit that so that it's not just the president making all the decisions, but like, are we actually following the policies?

Are we doing the things that we said that we would do in addition to our own evaluation?

So I think there's opportunity to fix some of those things.

I think we just don't know what the answers are.

And that's possibly why we didn't get more work done on that, because it's all pretty amorphous.

We haven't had a set of policies that we all know really well, that we check in with each other on, because they're small enough, and that we're in some, not necessarily consensus, but at least democratic agreement to follow in our relationships with each other.

There's lots of work to do there.

So I hope that happens, and that there is some, yeah, better balance.

SPEAKER_19

I want to just go back to, and piggyback a little bit off of the comments that Director Harris made regarding the conversations that we're not having anymore without the committees.

And this isn't to insist that we have the committees.

I'm just, I am, I do, because I went to all of them, and that took a lot of time.

And I did it when he was in person too, and that took a lot of time.

Even now, I think about the things that we got from there that we're not looking at now.

We're all here looking at this from the viewpoint of people who've been there, who've been in those committees and did all that reading and all those presentations.

And we know it.

So not going forward with it doesn't kill us.

Future directors never had that.

And with all that knowledge base that we've gained, and for the years we've done that, we come into this job Only seeing the surface and if we're really representing the community in the work of this district We need to understand the district a little better And I'm thinking like in executive committee.

We would have updates from our labor partners every you know, I think of one different won't come every month in SSC and I previously see and I we got updates on a Amplify rollout and I mean, in these operations, we had the capital budget, you know, so all that stuff that we got to really dive into and learn this district and learn up on it so that in our work we did, we could actually know what we're talking about, even if it wasn't on a granular level, because none of us could get us.

as you know, informed on everything as our staff is.

But that rounded out our experience in this district, it rounded out our knowledge base, it rounded out our understanding of how we bring in community to the work of that.

So we, you know, we're good, we're good because we had that already.

We know what we're missing and how we can still try to ask for it.

Future directors aren't going to know what they're missing.

So we really do need to set them up and set us up with, like you said, how do we still have that work be shared?

How do we still have that presentations come to the full board?

Because there's a lot of little pieces that we don't get right now and I kind of miss them.

I know it was a lot of work for staff and I appreciate that.

But that's what made our ability to do this job whole by just knowing our district because if no one else We should know this district and we should get that information on some level Um, so that's just what I wanted to share.

SPEAKER_13

Thank you I'll hop into you in just a second.

I think that there's so much right about what you just said I think I just have slightly different context in kind of the education of a school board director in order to be effective in your role, right?

I think that depending on who you ask from person to person, board director to board director, that you would be hard-pressed to find a board director that would know or that would claim to know enough about the district to be able to feel like good going to sleep at night, that they could answer any question or operate effectively.

And I think that because of exactly what you said, that we have a difference in under, we know what the old structure was like, and we know what now is like.

And it's sort of like the transition between people who didn't have the internet and the people who only have the internet, right?

Like you just, there's no way that you're going to know what the world could have been before you, you know, could have the information that you wanted at your fingertips.

What I would say is that, from my perspective, as a young person coming in to do this work, and as a person who also has to maintain a full-time job, the ability to go to every single committee meeting is impossible for most of us.

And I think that's awesome that you were able to do that.

And I wish that this was a structure that paid me so that I could do that as well.

Because I love this work.

At the same time, I'm thinking about all the new board directors that are coming in.

that will also have to work full-time jobs, and how are we making this role more accessible, right?

Like, it is a slog.

I cannot tell you what it's like to go, like, into work at 8 o'clock in the morning and then come to, like, before, especially during the pandemic, three or four or five board directors in the, three or four or five board meetings in the evening, right?

And I don't care what anybody's opinion is.

That's not complaining about the workload.

That's complaining about the fact that for a person who is supporting a household, this is unsustainable.

And so it's going to yield people who don't, who have enough resources to participate in this job because the rest of their bills are covered to lean in.

And that is traditionally how school boards across the country, not exclusive to Seattle, have always operated.

I would say that for me, By shrinking, not necessarily shrinking, but narrowing our focus to what we as a board sitting here have determined to be the most important things, which are the outcomes for our students, it actually allows me to participate more fully because I have focus as well in terms of what we as a collective have determined to be super important.

I don't think either way is right.

I think that for the change that we need to realize in our district to make sure that more folks can see themselves represented in this seat, I think it speaks volumes that we don't have people beaten down the door to run for this job because traditionally it has been a really hard sell.

to most common folks out in the community in terms of the amount that it takes.

There should, again, and I've used this example before, there should not be an instance to where it is a completely common thing for somebody to say, two out of your four years are going to be spent learning and drinking from a fire hose.

our kids don't have time to wait for a person to reach their break-even point two years into their four-year commitment, and that is what seriously causes burnout.

We're seeing across the state School board races go un-challenged.

We see directors of color only staying in the role for one term more often than not, if they even get the opportunity to finish.

And I think that that speaks volumes to the unsustainable structure that we as a community have let go on for a very long amount of time.

And that's not to say that there aren't superhumans like Director Harris who can balance both, like, a full-time job and the school board for eight years at a time, you know what I'm saying?

But I would argue that that's not most people's story.

And As I'm thinking about the legacy that I want us as a board to leave, I want it to be one that not only did we help provide some structure to a place where there was very little before, but also we made it possible for folks who don't traditionally serve in these seats to see themselves as a person who could make that commitment.

And just to be quite honest, there's not a lot of folks out there, given the way that we have run, and still somewhat now, that are seeing themselves reflected in the ability to step up and put their name in the ring to represent their district in this way.

So that's not a retort or a rebuttal in any sense.

I think, for me, I just see it just from a different facet.

Yeah, please.

SPEAKER_19

I don't know if you understood what I said, because that sounded like you heard me saying, I think we should have committees.

And that's not I don't want to go to those committees again.

So that whole thing was beautiful, what you said.

But I don't know that you heard me because I was saying that I was saying I was reflecting on what we got out of the committees and how can we still get some of that without the committees?

Trust me, I yeah, that was that kicked butt.

That kicked my butt to go to all those committees.

And I'm not thinking that, and I know that's unsustainable.

So I just want to clarify, because I don't know if maybe you thought I was trying to say, hey, we need those communities back.

That's not what I was saying.

I agree with what you just said, that it's asking way too much of people, and we're not going to get, you know, we are going to get burnout.

So anyways, I wanted to clarify that in case you thought I was trying to say that.

SPEAKER_13

So I, okay, I hear you.

SPEAKER_19

So, okay, again, what I was saying was, just let me, sorry, I'll finish real fast.

Yeah.

Again, those pieces I just, I use as examples.

I'm just wondering how we can still get some of that information so that board members have that base of information without having to go to four standing committees a month.

Yes.

SPEAKER_13

Yeah, so fair.

And I could have done a better job of articulating my point.

I think that what I was trying to say, again, as I tried to clarify, was not a retort in directly what you said.

But from my vantage point, the ability to have that information is, to me, a sacrifice that I am willing to have to make this role more accessible.

I think what I would have appreciated as your colleague in that moment is asking for clarity instead of assuming that I didn't understand you.

Because, yeah.

I don't know.

I don't, yeah.

I think I'll leave it at that.

But that is the trade-off that I was trying to articulate for me that makes this worth it to me.

So I appreciate you clarifying your point.

I'm going to pass it on to another director.

Anybody have.

SPEAKER_32

Yeah I go for it.

Kind of wanted to tie together a little bit of what Director Harris.

and Director Rivers, and you said, which is, like this is actually, like Lisa's saying, I want that information, I want that information, and going to all those committees was a lot.

What's cool is we're the board.

So we actually get to make those decisions about how that information comes through.

Like the Amplify, for example, came through the SSC&I committee at regular updates by that board's request that that happen.

This board could request, A full update of X on the agenda.

I have a work session that's being scheduled as far as I know, and it's in our work plan that I requested.

So I think it's really, like Lisa said, getting to dig in and know what's what we're up here governing is critically important.

And in terms of barriers to access, I know how much personal experience and knowledge I have in certain areas.

And it shouldn't be expected that somebody has to have those.

to be in this position.

So we do need to figure out the ways to get the appropriate access.

I know some of their districts, instead of work sessions, they call them study sessions, where it's literally like, OK, here's a study session.

We're going to help support the board in understanding this thing.

And I would have to dig into it more to know if people have that.

I would be really interested in us having buckets of areas that we just get an annual study session on, or quarterly, whatever it may be.

That in a lot of ways I think, for the whole board, because where I found is the value of information in committees and the density of it.

was sometimes too, like, I will always recall the 25-minute conversation on the vendor for interior door locks.

Like, I don't think we need to do that to make our decision as a board, right?

But understanding that safety and security makes decisions and works with the capital team to make that purchase, yes, we need to understand that.

And so I think some of it has to do with how much level of detail is in there, and then how do we set ourselves and future boards up for success?

And again, because they'll be the board, they can change it by a vote of majority if they want, but how do we make sure through study sessions or whatever it may be that that information is still available?

They're really valuable conversations, especially when SSC and I kind of absorb a lot of things.

We had some really great conversations that I would find myself wanting to stop to say, we've got to have this with the full board and not everybody's here.

And I really want everybody to have this information and understanding.

So I think another thing that some other boards do is do their, and this goes to Director Sonwitz's point about responsibility and power of the superintendent and president, is some boards have in their regular meeting time agenda setting for the next however long.

So they do that as a board instead of via request to the president and then the president setting it.

That's something that if we wanted to do, I think we could decide to do.

So yeah, I think that's really, I'll just say one more thing about that is in a committee, it always felt a little bit predetermined that here are the items you get to know about.

So yes, it was really good information, but it was also sort of don't look over here, do not bring your own things from community or priorities.

These are the things you're being presented with.

And I do not mean that in any shade to any individual staff people.

I think it's just easy to create those structures and then just follow them, because that's what exists.

And so in some ways, I think this frees us up as a board to make decisions about What is and what do we think is really important for us to know and then?

What Avenue should it come through so that the entire board has access to it and that you know ties in with the policy?

Stuff too because we talked yesterday in policy committee about even knowing how to bring a policy forward that's not equally accessible to all seven of us just because of time or Relationships or whatever it may be and that's to Vivian's point not doesn't give everybody access into representing up here Yeah, I do want to emphasize and I know we're talking about this in our the ad hoc committees which I

SPEAKER_24

Really is not and I'm sure staff would reiterate this we're not moving.

We're not we've sort of replaced committees with Environments where we can do actual work, which is what we didn't have before and so it's a different type of learning in that regard that regard Some of that work right now is to try to rectify the situation that we don't have opportunities it's it's a state issue and it's a district issue that the orientation for board members is not what it needs to be in order to feel comfortable making the decisions that are brought before you.

I think that you, you know, this is why some people stay on for 20 years and every board member couldn't be expected to have the same level of knowledge or even that, you know, there are certain things that I know Liza knows because she's been paying attention to them for the better part of 15 years.

I'm not trying to get that level of knowledge about that.

Informed enough to make an informed decision And so I think it's a really delicate balance.

There's a this sort of I don't want to oversimplify This transition because yes, this is where we need to I mean it's it's in this audit report for a reason right we didn't even know that this said that here, but it's Like if we're going to really be successful as a district, here's the kind of leadership practices you need to adopt.

And so I'm really grateful to this board for pushing in that direction.

And it's still really complicated.

And so I think one of the things, though, that the that I am grateful for in terms of the shift to, OK, if we're going to be in committees, we're doing actual work.

is that when our committees before, we were always working directly with Superintendent Jones or a prior superintendent's staff people.

So our relationship was more with their staff than it was with the superintendent.

And often the superintendent wasn't even at those meetings.

And I mean, this is still a Sabrina Jones because I'm going to ask something that bugs me about internal audit.

I want him there for me to pose my questions to him, not to his staff people.

Even if they're the subject matter experts and he needs for them to be there to present, my relationship and our relationship is with him, not with staff people.

And so I didn't realize until We started looking at other models, like how much we had wrapped into individual board members' relationships with other staff people.

And there's kind of some, you know, not for bad intent, but some ways to move things forward outside of our relationship with the superintendent, which I think is really inappropriate.

So I think that this is much cleaner when we have committee work.

It's about work.

and not about, and then yeah, if we need to learn things, there needs to be training that fits into another bucket.

So let's just be really clear about what we need and how we're gonna get it and not try to mush it into something that isn't designed for that purpose.

But it's still a very rough, it's hard to transition, very hard.

SPEAKER_13

Thank you.

Any other thoughts, points for discussion?

OK.

Thank you very much.

Moving on to introduction item number two.

The second item is a BEX V property acquisition for the purchase of the Seattle Public Utilities property located at 8817 Seward Park Avenue South Seattle Washington 98118 for improvement of the Rainier Beach High School.

I will recognize Mr. Best.

SPEAKER_11

Thank you Director Hersey and good evening members of the board.

Tonight I'm coming before you with the recommendation that the board approve the purchase of a 100 foot by 100 foot parcel at the southeast corner of our Rainier Beach High School property which we do not own is currently owned by Seattle Public Utilities.

Back in 1958 when we acquired the Rainier Beach High School property.

This parcel of property was specifically excluded from that acquisition.

And Seattle Public Utilities has now located a sewer pump lift station that was at that corner, now to the south corner or the south side of Henderson Street.

And so this property is available.

And the advantages to Seattle Public Schools in that this is really the front lawn or the front door to Ranger Beach High School But there are a couple of utility advantages that make this a really significant acquisition for Seattle Public Schools.

The stormwater and the sanitary sewer conveyance systems we are able to connect to on this property which then connects to Seward Avenue.

If we did not own this property We'd have to cross Henderson Street and make those connections on the south side of Henderson Street to the stormwater system and the sanitary sewer system.

That is a significant risk.

Director Rivera-Smith hears me speak about unforeseen conditions all the time when we review change order proposals.

But knowing what's in the ground on Henderson Street poses a significant risk.

City of Seattle began a sewer system on Henderson Street back in 1919. I can tell you from our records on our older school properties there's probably a lot of information that is lacking and so in capital projects and planning when you're looking at mitigating risks This is one of the ways that we thought we could mitigate the risk for Rainier Beach High School's project and reduce that risk for the public.

We've collaborated with SPU.

We've worked together to have a community engagement process.

We hosted information on our website.

about the process that we're embarking with with SPU on the purchase of this property from SPU and then property acquisition.

The funding source for this property will be the BEX V Capital Levy Property Acquisition Account.

I want to make sure that there is a clear understanding this is coming from the capital fund.

It's not coming from the general fund.

And we did have an appraisal prepared utilizing the key appraisal.

Seattle Public Utilities has agreed to the appraisal price.

And so, open it up to questions from the board.

SPEAKER_13

Director Rivera-Smith.

SPEAKER_19

Thank you Richard.

I have a question about the revenue source.

I know that we have a line item for property acquisition.

What is the amount of that line item?

I'm just trying to compare how much of this we'll take from that.

SPEAKER_11

BEX V capital levy, we had a line item of $30 million included for property acquisition.

We utilized approximately $5 million for the purchase of the Sapucan Street warehouse.

at 640 South Spokane Street, and then this would be another $1,250,000.

So approximately $23,750,000 would still remain, or $23,750,000 would remain in that line item, Director Rivera-Smith.

Thank you.

I'll go ahead and ask the question that my mean friends will ask me tomorrow.

SPEAKER_20

How come this is coming to us when Rainier Beach has been on the agenda for, gosh, I don't know, 10 years?

SPEAKER_11

I will tell you, Director Harris, until a couple years ago, I did not know we did not own this parcel of property.

And we've had numerous conversations with our civil engineers, when our civil engineers highlighted the problems to capital projects and planning about the connections on the south side of South Henderson Street.

this property became much more valuable to Seattle Public Schools, that we then engaged the City of Seattle and Seattle Public Utilities in conversations, and it's coming to you.

I will say, I know this will be going before the Seattle City Council in June of 2023, but it's coming to you as we've worked through the process.

And it's been a rather extensive process.

SPEAKER_20

I'm not debating that fact.

I'm just trying to figure out how we missed it for lessons learned in the future.

SPEAKER_11

It was learned about through the title search.

I will note that the title searches are required by the OSBID form process.

When we did the title search for this property, we learned that we did not own this parcel.

And we don't do title searches as we're doing conceptual planning of our projects and levy preparation.

It's only when those projects have been identified and are being implemented that we go out and do a title search.

Correct.

Because we started on Rainier Beach High School in 2019, I'm gonna guess the title search was done 2020, time frame 2020, maybe early 2021. This would definitely highlight a need to do that, yep.

SPEAKER_13

Any other questions on this item?

Okay, thank you very much.

All right, our time use evaluation is in progress.

That work needed to shift due to some director unavailability, but I am volunteering to complete this evaluation and will report back to the board.

So give me a minute.

We have two written updates attached to tonight's agenda.

The first is the monthly budget status report and the second is the compilation of questions submitted in advance of today's meeting by board directors and the staff responses received and posted earlier this week.

There being no further business to come before the board, the regular board meeting is now adjourned at 6.59 p.m.

Enjoy your evenings.

Stay safe and stay cool.

Drink water.

See you later.